#My medication has helped me wake up earlier but it hasn’t made me any less sad unfortunately

[moookar]

can i get some criticism on my gesture drawings? I struggle with motion in my art.

while i was drawing these, i figured out what people mean when they talk about muscles flowing in the pose. I just just figured that out though so i would definitely like tips on how to apply that etc

Reference photos taken from line-of-action.com

[specialagentsergio]

side effects may vary

summary: An unexpected side effect brings you and Spencer closer—literally—when he’s prescribed a medication to help relieve his chronic nightmares.

pairing: spencer reid x gn!reader

category: fluff

content warnings: prescription drug use, one small sexual reference, discussion of tornadoes (spencer gives a small infodump)

a/n: i wrote this for @imagining-in-the-margins‘ “there was only one bed” event. when i saw the “medication makes someone sleepy” prompt, i had to take it, because this happens to me regularly lol.

word count: 2k

masterlist

It’s become a habit for you and Spencer: every Friday night you can, the two of you get together and watch a movie or show. It’s always at your place because he doesn’t have a TV, but he doesn’t mind—you have the better couch anyways. He thinks he could stay on it forever, especially on the nights where you don’t watch anything at all and talk for hours instead.

He made the mistake of mentioning this Friday night tradition to Morgan once. He’d questioned just why, exactly, Spencer liked going over to your place so much. Spencer hadn’t realized Derek was teasing him until he’d already come up with the lame excuse of your couch being really comfortable.

Morgan had chuckled. “I think it has less to do with the couch and more to do with the person who owns it, kid.”

He was right, of course, but was Spencer going to admit his silly little crush? Absolutely not. Especially not to Derek. He just continued going to your place every Friday, stubbornly ignoring the smirks and eyebrow wiggles sent his way from the man.

It’s one such night a few months later when an alarm on his phone goes off, making you both jump. He nearly spills the popcorn everywhere in his scramble to turn it off. “Sorry. It’s—wow, it’s nine already.” As usually happens when he’s with you, he’s lost track of time. It’s why he set the alarm in the first place.

“You have somewhere to be?” you ask.

“Um, no. I just…” he trails off, leaning forward to dig through his satchel at his feet, searching for the white paper bag he picked up from the pharmacy earlier in the day.

You don’t ask aloud, raising an eyebrow instead. It’s you providing him with an out—you’ll let him pretend he didn’t see it if he doesn’t want to answer the question.

He sighs, pulling the little orange bottle out, a prescription from the psychiatrist you’d coaxed him into seeing. “It’s just, uh�� it’s supposed to help with, y’know… dreams,” he explains quietly.

“Nightmares,” you clarify.

“Yeah. That’s what the alarm was for.” He pops the cap and looks at the little pills inside. “To remind me.”

“We can finish this later,” you say with a gesture towards the TV. “It’s okay if you need to leave.”

He shakes his head. “She said to take it a few hours before bed. There’s plenty of time to finish.” Not that he cares that much about the show. He just doesn’t want to cut his time with you short.

“The bottle says it can make you drowsy, though,” you say, pointing out the little flap on the side of the bottle he hadn’t noticed.

“It won’t,” he dismisses nearly immediately, shaking a dose out into his hand.

“You can’t know that.”

“I’m a chronic insomniac. I’ve tried medication before. It doesn’t work,” he says firmly.

“If you say so,” you say, unconvinced.

“I do.”

“Just don’t say I didn’t warn you.” The words on their own typically imply annoyance or resignation, an insistence that the speaker knows better, but from you, all he can detect is amusement. And if he didn’t know better, he’d say your slight smile conveyed affection.

“Oh, I won’t,” he replies confidently, and takes the dose with a sip of water.

That confidence turns out to be misplaced.

It doesn’t happen quickly. You finish watching the current episode and he insists on another. About halfway through it, he starts to feel… different. A little… foggy and unfocused. Any movement he makes feels slow, and his eyelids are getting heavy. Try as he might, he can’t quite keep them open. He’ll rest them for just a minute….

“… encer. Spencer.” Something pokes his arm and he grumbles, shifting away.

“What?”

“It’s over.”

He blinks a few times, slowly reacquainting himself with his surroundings. Credits are rolling on the TV screen; he's about to ask why they look slanted, then realizes it's because he's slumped to the side. He pushes himself back to sitting, a delayed "oh" leaving his mouth. He rubs the sleep from one of his eyes, and catches your expression in the other.

"Shut up."

"I didn't say anything!" you protest but the little laugh punctuating your words gives away what he knew you were thinking: I told you so.

With a sigh, he begins gathering up his things, pulling his bag into his lap and untying his shoelaces so he can put them back on.

“What are you doing?" you ask.

"Um, going home?"

"You can't ride the Metro like this," you say. "You're half asleep."

He tries and fails to suppress a yawn, but still insists, "I'll be fine."

"Spencer, I don't like you riding the Metro this late even when you're totally lucid. You know that."

He does. You often express such worries on your Friday nights, offering to let him stay with you. He always declines. Your couch may be comfortable when he's sitting, but it's not long enough for his legs horizontally.

He also worries about what he might say in his sleep. He's been playfully teased by team members often enough already. The last thing he wants is to ruin your friendship by expressing his feelings for you in his sleep.

He's got one shoe on and is about to put on the other, but you snatch it away. "Hey."

"No,” you say firmly. "You're staying here tonight."

"(Y/N)--"

"Take your shoe off." You flip the TV off, stand, and stretch. "And come to bed."

His mouth drops open a little. Come to bed. Did he really just hear that? You say it like it's the most natural thing. It sounds so...domestic.

He really likes it.

His eyes follow you as you walk to your bedroom. You stop in the doorway and look back to him. "Come on."

He's in a bit of a daze as he walks towards you, not realizing he's still wearing one shoe for a few steps. He clumsily kicks it off, then follows you through the bedroom door and into the adjoining bathroom, where you provide him with a spare toothbrush.

Normally he wouldn't want to share toothpaste with someone. He's even refused to do so a few times on cases when his little travel-sized tube has run out, instead going down to the front desk of whatever place they're staying at for a replacement, no matter how tired he is. But tonight he doesn't even think twice, just takes the tube when you pass it to him. It simply feels...normal, as if you and him do this every night before bed.

I could get used to this.

Spencer's still a little groggy from the medication, so it isn't until he’s standing in the bedroom that he realizes that there’s a problem. "There's only one bed."

"Um, yeah," you reply. "What, did you think I had bunk beds?"

"No, I just..." He's not sure how to explain it when you're pulling back the covers like it’s any other night. "There's one bed... and two of us."

"That's correct. It's a queen. It's made for two people," you point out. You sit down on one side, then pat your hand on the other.

He slowly approaches the bed, but hesitates, twisting his fingers a little. Your expression shifts, and he blinks. Surely that's not a look of disappointment he's seeing?

Your voice is quiet when you speak. "Spencer, if you don't want to share a bed with me, you can just say it."

"What? No!" he exclaims. "That—that's not it at all."

"Okay, then, what is it?"

"The opposite,” he says with a nervous laugh. “I can't believe you want to share a bed with me."

"Why wouldn't I?" You say it so simply; he can hardly believe it.

"Well, because I'm... me," is the reply he comes up with. "I'm annoying, and I talk too much, and my limbs are all long and weird--"

"I don't think you're annoying, Spencer," you interrupt. "We wouldn't be friends if I did."

"Oh. I guess... I guess that's true. But my arms and legs--”

"Are fine,” you reassure.

“I…” He’s a little too out of it still to think of something else. “Well, okay.”

“Since that settled..." You smile up at him. "Would you get into bed?"

He can't help but smile back. "Okay."

You both settle in. Right before you turn off the light, he speaks again. "I talk in my sleep," he says quickly, heat rising to his cheeks. "Just thought you should know.

"So I'm gonna get your fun facts in the night, too?" you ask, the corner of your mouth turning up.

"Maybe." He fiddles with the collar of his shirt. "Derek says every night is a toss up between that or gibberish…”

You laugh. "Noted."

You turn the lights off and silence falls over the room as you both find comfortable positions. The medication definitely hasn't worn off; sleep is quickly approaching him again. He feels a light touch on his arm. It trails down to his wrist. A slight pause, then you're sliding your hand into his. On instinct he winds his fingers through yours. He hears a content sigh right before he drifts off.

---

Morning light spilling through the curtains wakes him up. He takes in a deep breath and stretches. He feels amazingly well rested; more than he has in a long time. And he had the best dream about you….

Spencer rolls over, then jumps a little—you're right there next to him, awake and looking at him with a soft expression.

"So it wasn't a dream," he says aloud.

You smile. "No, it wasn't.”

"We slept in the same bed," he says, dumbstruck.

"We did."

"You... held my hand?"

A nod and a bashful smile. “I did."

"Huh." He's quiet as he processes this and gathers his memories together. There's a question that comes to mind, but he doesn't know if he’s brave enough to voice it. Instead, he asks, "Did I sleep talk?"

"You did," you reply. "You told me the widest recorded tornado was 2.6 miles wide."

"The 2013 El Reno tornado," he says automatically. "It’s also the second most powerful tornado recorded. It occurred on May 31 of that year. Though it officially ranks as the widest tornado on record, current Doppler estimates of the 1999 Mullhall, Oklahoma tornado indicate that it may have been 4.3 miles wide."

You blink. "That's terrifying."

Spencer winces. "Sorry."

"It's okay." You hesitate a little, biting your lower lip, then slowly reach out and take his hand. Again, his fingers thread through yours perfectly.

He looks down at your joined hands, then back at you. His question from before returns. "What does this mean?" he asks quietly.

"It means..." You take a deep breath. "I like you.”

He frowns. "I know that. That's why we're friends."

"That's not what I meant." You squeeze his hand as if to remind him that you're holding it. "I meant that I like you as more than a friend."

His eyebrows shoot up. “Really?" he squeaks.

"Really," you confirm. "If you don't feel the same, I understa--”

You're cut off by him leaning forward and pressing the lightest little kiss on your lips.

"I like you as more than a friend, too," he says softly.

You give him the most wonderful smile. "Then get back here and kiss me properly."

Spencer obliges. He's never cared less about morning breath.

You scoot closer to him when you break apart and push his limbs around slightly to get into an embrace. "Finally," you murmur into the skin of his neck.

The sensation makes him shiver. “What do you mean?"

"I’ve been trying to get you into my bed for weeks."

He nearly chokes on his own sharp inhale. "I—what?"

"Not like that," you clarify. "I just wanted a good opportunity to confess. I figured you'd be too comfy in bed to run off right after I told you."

“You think I'd run off on you?"

You shrug. “You tend to remove yourself from a situation if your feelings get too intense. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but in this case, it’s the last thing I wanted to happen, you know?”

"Yeah, I get that,” he says. "I promise not to do it with you, though. About anything.”

You lift your head to look him in the eyes. “Kiss me again."

Spencer does.

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

tell me what you thought here!

smut follow up: hands to myself

general taglist: @calm-and-doctor​ , @spencerreid9​

[dinosaurtsukki]

dating the armed detective agency’s medic

a/n: of course i have to write one for the ADA even though i’m a biased port mafia bitch. there’s a bit more characters here so i’ll try to keep each one short but still very fluffy and sweet <3

this man is always getting himself injured and even though agency has yosano, fukuzawa thought it would be a good idea to hire another medic who could deal with less life-threatening injuries

ofc dazai flirts with you the first chance he gets and every time he comes into your clinic

dazai: good morning my dear belladonna! the weather is beautiful today, but not as beautiful as you of course

you: YOUR ARM IS BROKEN PLEASE SIT DOWN

although as much as he likes to slightly mess with you, dazai genuinely enjoys coming to the clinic and being treated by someone like you

he likes observing your hands and how careful they are when they bandage his arm or that cute little scrunch of your brows when you’re bandaging his forehead

while on a mission, atsushi and kunikida go the extra length to protect dazai because they know you’re worried about him 

and then one day dazai comes into your clinic again and instantly you think that something has happened

until he surprises you by bringing out a bouquet of flowers

‘if i get injured less on missions, would you let me take you out on a date?’

jokes on you though after you guys date dazai finds every excuse to visit you in the clinic

he’ll get papercuts on purpose just so he can get you to put a bandage on them 

kunikida is annoyed because dazai they’re just papercuts jfc also please go back to work

seeing that you’re always concerned about his health and well-being, dazai finds himself making much less attempts cause he knows the stress it puts on you when you have to bandage him up after and make sure he’s alright

thanks to you our man is able to take care of himself a bit more

even though he is your boyfriend he’s still going to mess with you in any way he can

he’ll barge into your office claiming that his chest hurts because you didn’t give him a kiss that morning

also will highkey hug you from behind even if you’re treating another patient

the first time he meets you is for a physical exam check-up because it was required at the agency and he feels embarrassed at first seeing that the agency’s medic was gorgeous

atsushi was fresh out of the orphanage so of course he was quite malnourished and still had some injuries from his abuse

you had no idea who’d dare hurt such a sweet boy so you do your best to treat him and instructed atsushi to come in for some follow-up check-ups

although when he comes in for that check-up he talks about how he’s been healthy because he eats a lot of chazuke and you’re like ‘oh no, no, no, please eat other things too’

you end up packing him a bento box because he’s your patient so ofc you have to keep him healthy 

the two of you run into each other a lot in the morning because atsushi tends to come in way earlier than he’s supposed to so you often find him sitting in front of the locked door

thus begins your early morning chats. atsushi’s always polite and never interrupts when you talk and you love how he shows so much interest in whatever you say

atsushi began to realize that he has feelings for you but boy is he bad at concealing them also ranpo kind of busted him in front of everyone in the agency including you

but atsushi was saved by you hinting that you wouldn’t mind going on a date with him at all and he’s ecstatic until he realizes he hasn’t been on a date before

he takes you out to a nice restaurant and insists on paying for everything

nothing much changes with your routine but atsushi likes to bring you breakfast in the morning and the two of you have little dates before going into the office

he knows how worried you get when he goes out on especially dangerous missions but he does everything he can to protect the city and the new home he found with the agency and you

this guy was one of the people, other than yosano and fukuzawa, who interviewed you for the job and you can’t forget how intense he was when it came to asking questions

of course, you answered all of them well but kunikida was very serious that you knew how dangerous it could be to be involved with the agency

there was a self-defense portion in the interview that you knew about and of course kunikida was the one who added that

to his pleasant surprise, you managed to dodge all his incoming attacks (kunikida lowkey found it hot, like that’s requirement number ten on his list checked right there)

kunikida does get injured a fair amount during missions and he doesn’t want to get dissected by yosano all the time so he goes to your clinic that’s right near the office

he likes how efficiently you work and how gentle your hands are that even when you’re stitching up his wound he almost can’t feel a thing

however, kunikida does have a bad habit of not resting for the appropriate number of days. like, even with a bullet wound he’ll still hobble over to his desk to finish his paperwork

once, he came down with a terrible case of the flu so of course you sent him home only for kunikida to sneak back into the office when he thought no one was looking

you ended up taking kunikida home but poor guy could barely do anything by himself so you took care of him too

kunikida is definitely the delirious babbling when he’s sick so he ends up talking about his list of traits for an ideal woman and how you filled out a good portion of it

when he wakes up (much more sane) he sees you reading that list on his notebook and he’s like WAIT WHAT ARE YOU DOING

he handed you the notebook personally before passing out and kunikida can’t live it down

you: well, even if i don’t match all these requirements, would you still be interested in going out?

kunikida: yes... please

everyone can tell that kunikida’s about to go on a date because of how nervous he is the entire day

he knows how tight your schedule can be and how busy he is with with work but he always makes time to have his lunchbreak with you

loves to hear about your day and even has some space in his notebook dedicated to any interesting stories you have

the first time you met him was when he also had his physical check-up which ranpo insisted he didn’t need but fukuzawa made him so he had no choice but to follow

the entire time ranpo’s just like ‘nothing’s wrong with me, see?’ and then you do a simple dental check-up and find that he has like two cavities he didn’t want to tell anyone about it because he’s scared of the dentist *cue ranpo trying to run away and you grabbing him by the poncho*

of course fukuzawa makes him go to the dentist too but ranpo insists that you have to be the one to take him and schedule the appointment and come along

truth be told, you’ve always been pretty attracted to ranpo because you know of his skill as a detective so you were excited to have this day with him

only for you to have to physically restrain ranpo to the dentist’s chair (you even had to call kenji to help) while his teeth was getting checked

ranpo was squeezing your hand the entire time and he was fairly grumpy after the whole ordeal that he wouldn’t even talk to you until he asked if you could get ice cream

you: the dentist just told you to eat less sweets

ranpo: but i neeeeed them

you: fine, how about frozen yogurt?

after the dentist trip, you know how much of a hard time ranpo has with eating less sweets so you decide to leave fruit on his desk as a healthier alternative but he won’t TOUCH IT

after some bribery on fukuzawa’s part (’i’ll acknowledge you if you eat fruit more and also tell atsushi to give you a piggyback ride every day’) he finally concedes

he actually finds himself liking fruit so in the afternoon he’ll swing by the office just in time for you to be slicing fruit

ranpo gets over the fact that you sent him to the dentist and enjoys his time in the clinic eating fruit with you and sleeping on the cots inside

your clinic is where he hides when he doesn’t want to do work and when he pouts and asks you to say that he’s sick you can’t help but go along with it

he’s also super physically affectionate around you. will literally have his body draped over yours sometimes while you work

people start talking about how you two look good there and one time someone asked if the two of you are dating and ranpo’s like ‘of course we are!’

and you’re surprised self is about to protest when ranpo smirks at you and says ‘why? am i wrong?’

lmao ofc he’s not you’ve been struggling to keep yourself from being a flustered mess around him

he’s still clingy around you but this time he comes into the clinic every few minutes to ask for a kiss

▸ 🎕 ┈┈┈┈ 🎕 ┈┈┈┈ 🎕 ┈┈┈┈ 🎕 ┈┈┈┈ 🎕 ◂

taglist (check out my post for details on being part of my taglist): @waitforitillwritemywayout @atsumu-brainrot​ @laure-chan @goodfoodxoxoxo ​ @guardianangelswings @ah-kaashi @amberalisa​

[whump-a-la-mode]

Villainsicle | Part 13

I know it’s been a while, and if I’m being completely honest, I really ran out of steam on this story for a while. But, we’re back! If you’re new to my blog and are interested in this story, all of the parts up to this one can be found linked in my pinned info post.

Thank you guys so much for all your support of this series so far! I hope you enjoy this part, too!

Taglist:

@whatwhumpcomments

@sola-whumping

@professional-idiocy

@trappedgoose-in-a-writblr-room

@literally-just-kirby​

@the-polari-person

@teachunks

@daydreamed-snippets-2nd-blog

@sunflower1000

@lightdrinker-blog

@regalwritten

CW//Mentions of bathing, restraints, drugs, dehumanization, conspiracies, collars, talk of diseases, talk of falling, Stockholm syndrome, affectionate caretaker, conditioned whumpee

After their bath, Villain rested.

It wasn’t exactly how Counselor had imagined the whole affair going. Villain had already spent so many days resting, laid up in that same bed, but once they were clean and settled into fresh clothes, they had requested nothing except to be able to return to sleep.

They supposed it wasn’t entirely unexpected. While the bath hadn’t exactly been physically exerting, there had been several instances during it that Villain had nearly burst out in tears. Whatever was going through their mind, it was undeniably intense-- and that wasn’t even mentioning the heavy dose of sedatives coursing through their system.

And, thus, Villain slept. They were unconscious almost immediately upon hitting the mattress.

This time, however, there was no nervous twitching to accompany their unconsciousness. Instead, for the first time, their face showed a perfectly placid expression.

Taking care not to wake the sleeping patient, Counselor draped a fleece blanket overtop of them, tucking its edges in around their shoulders. They twitched, but did not awake. A moment later, they buried their face in the fabric.

Counselor had never before imagined that Villain was even capable of existing in such a calm state. Yet, here they were, looking for all the world as though not even an earthquake could wake them up.

Their gaze flicked to the bedrails. Upon returning to their bed, Villain had not so much as seemed to note the leather-and-foam restraints hanging there.

Yet, Counselor could not draw their gaze away from them.

Villain had been staying in the base for weeks, phasing through various states of aggression and fear and sickness and, on rare occasions, hesitant happiness. But, even after all that time, no one truly knew anything about them.

At least, Counselor knew nothing about them. Based on the way Leader and Medic’s expressions twisted when the prisoner was mentioned, it was clear that the both of them knew more than they were letting on-- but neither was keen to admit as to such.

Maybe Hero had had more luck on this information gathering mission.

But how much information was there really to gather? Officially, Villain had simply appeared on stage a few months ago, alongside two unknowns. More or less, they had acted just as any other villain did.

The other villains, however, had motives. Backstories. They were following orders.

Villain... If anyone on the outside cared about them, they had yet to risk any sort of jailbreak.

There was more to this than the official story, Counselor knew that full well. How much more... as to that, they had no idea.

But they had no need to rely on second hand accounts and official reports to know what Villain was. That much was obvious. They were a villain. Whatever their backstory, whatever their past, they were dangerous.

Right?

Counselor’s gaze drifted back to those restraints. Those simple straps, dangling from a metal bedframe.

At some point, Villain may have been dangerous. But not right now. Right now, they needed help, and that was exactly what Counselor was going to give them.

And, if they wanted that plan to go anywhere, they would have to start with the doctor who harmed their own patient.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 

This time, when Medic answered the knocking on their door, their glasses were on the right way around. They blinked a few times, rubbing their eyes, hardly noting as the piping hot cup of coffee was pushed into their hands.

The doctor glanced down at the beverage before looking back up to meet their visitor’s gaze.

“I thought you wanted me to sleep.”

“Well, that was before. For now, we need to talk.”

“If this is decaf again, I swear I’m going to strangle you.”

“It’s not. Though the same threat applies to you if you try to go back to the med bay.”

“I’m a doctor. In fact, I’m our only doctor.”

“I’m a doctor, too.”

“Psychology doesn’t count.”

“Fair enough.”

“If we’re done threatening each other, then, would you care to, I don’t know, tell me why you’re bothering me?”

“As I said, we need to talk.”

“Do I even need to ask what about?”

“I think you already know that. Come on. You have your coffee, so there’s no excuses.”

“You really think I’m going to be that penitent about this?”

“Maybe.”

Medic rolled their eyes, but did not protest any further as Counselor turned and walked off. The two moved to a rather isolated table, tucked away in the corner of a hallway. The cafeteria was far too crowded at the moment to host such a discussion.

On opposite sides of the table, the opposites sat. Two cups of coffee clinked down on the wooden surface.

Counselor took a sip of their drink, placing the cup back down and raising their gaze. Medic frowned, lips turning downwards even further than usual.

“What, are we planning on talking through telepathy or- Come on, Counselor, stop looking at me like that. I hate that.”

“Then are you going to say anything?”

“I can’t read your mind.”

“You said you knew what this was about.”

“Maybe.” Medic shrugged dismissively. The doctor had been horribly standoffish, ever since Villain had been captured. “Doesn’t mean I’m going to start trying to guess your thoughts.”

Counselor took another sip.

“Fine, then. I can start.” Sip. Clink. “Villain told me something very interesting, earlier.”

“You really believe them?”

“I haven’t even said it yet.”

“Then stop wasting time, maybe.”

“Villain says that you’re making them sick.”

Medic’s brows furrowed.

“That’s what they said?”

“Pretty much verbatim, yes.”

“Well.” Medic took a hesitant drink of their coffee. “I don’t know why you’re even wasting your time on a notion like that. What they are is paranoid. I don’t doubt that they think I’m making them sick. Doesn’t mean it’s true.”

“You’re saying that your patient is lying.”

“Maybe not lying. That would imply that they know what they’re saying is not true. They are sick, I will not deny that. And they are not responding to treatment. I can’t say that anything I’ve tried so far has made it any better, but it certainly hasn’t made it worse.”

“Why would they believe such a thing without reason?”

Medic exhaled.

“Because, in Villain’s mind, they do have reason. They have a child’s understanding of medicine. They are sick, and they are under my care and taking my medicines, and thus, in their mind, one of these things has caused the other.”

Counselor cast their gaze downwards, focusing on the way their milk danced its way through the black beverage before them. It was a reasonable explanation. Maybe. They may not have trusted Medic, but they trusted Medic’s abilities as a doctor.

Could Villain really be wrong?

“If they’re wrong...” Counselor began again. “Then what is making them sick? Their incident with hypothermia was weeks ago, now. It can’t still be that?”

“I doubt the two are connected. If this was all a matter of post-hypothermic reactions, then we wouldn’t be seeing these kinds of symptoms.”

“What is it, then?”

Medic bit their bottom lip.

“That’s the problem. I don’t know.”

“You don’t know? They’ve been in your care for... well over a week, now.”

“You think I don’t know that? If you haven’t noticed, I’m the world’s leading expert on Enhanced biology. Not to mention, y’know, an experienced doctor for normal humans. Whatever this is, it’s not a normal sickness. I’ve done every test I can think of.”

“And... it’s getting worse, isn’t it?”

“Not as badly as you might be fearing. Their weakness is worsening, yes, as is their general mental state. But their vitals are fine. They’re not in serious danger of anything, so long as they don’t hurt themself.”

“You think they’d do that?”

“Given just how bad their confusion has been getting? I’m already putting preventative measures in place.”

“Oh.”

Medic raised a brow.

“You thought I restrained them for no reason? I’m not Leader. There are medical regulations about this sort of thing.”

“They’ve been hurting themself?”

“Not what you may be thinking of. But with how bad their weakness has grown, they can’t exactly stand up without aid, at the current moment. Forget walking. Unfortunately, they don’t seem to have realized this.”

“They’ve fallen?”

“A few times, yes. If that is all, I was really just starting to enjoy my day off, so-”

“Wait.” Counselor shook their head. “People don’t get sick for no reason.”

“Congrats, you know a basic medical fact.”

“You know what I mean. You’re the smartest person I know. You must have, I don’t know, a theory? A hypothesis? Anything?”

Medic blinked, placing down their cup.

“I do. Though right now, I have no way of proving it.”

“What is it?”

“Villain has what we call... psionic powers. Powers that affect only a person’s brain, but not their physical body. It’s the rarest type of power, oftentimes because something you can’t see is often something you can’t detect. Thus, this group of powers is poorly understood, to say the least. But I’m sure you know what power fatigue looks like for other Enhanced.”

“Like when Hero broke their leg?” Counselor guessed.

“Yes. The simple act of overexerting ones powers, even without outside injury, can cause physical injuries like that to develop.”

“You think Villain’s having power fatigue?”

“It’s my best guess. It would check all the boxes. An undetectable illness affecting the brain, but nothing else. A never before seen condition.”

“But... is it something you can cure?”

“I can’t cure tiredness.” Medic shook their head. “That’s really not how it works. I can do my best to counteract the symptoms, but so long as the source is still there, I’d be fighting uphill.”

“Then what can you do?”

“I can remove the source.” The tiniest smirk crept onto the doctor’s countenance. “Power fatigue is caused not by using ones powers, but using them in a way that the body cannot handle. At least, as far as we can tell. If Villain can control their powers enough, their symptoms should go away.”

“You really think so?”

“I hesitate to guarantee anything. Not with how poorly understood the condition is.” That smirk fell, replaced by Medic’s resting expression of annoyance. “But training them to use their powers properly is the only way I can see them getting any better.”

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure. I’m also sure that I would really like to go back to my quarters. If you’re done bothering me?”

Counselor bit their tongue.

“Fine.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 

Counselor had momentarily considered returning to their own quarters, but had quickly decided against it, instead turning to the kitchen. They had yet to eat that morning, as had Villain. They figured that a warm meal might help them shake off the sedatives.

And, maybe, some food would make Counselor’s own stomach stop twisting.

They only made it halfway to the kitchen, however, when in the hallway, they nearly slammed into Hero. The two both yelped, and a slosh of Counselor’s coffee slopped to the floor.

“Shit, sorry, are you okay?” Hero asked. There was considerable nerve in their voice.

Counselor nodded. “You just started me, ‘s all.” They glanced down at the spilling coffee now sitting on the tile floor. “I’ll, uh, get that later. I was just heading to the kitchen.”

“Oh. Um, could it wait?”

“I need to bring Villain something to eat.”

“Can it wait?”

“What-”

Counselor’s gaze drifted to Hero’s twitching hand.

“You have something?”

“Mhm. I don’t think it’s going to take very long.”

“Can I see?”

“Not here. Not with everyone else around.”

Counselor raised their brows quizzically, but nodded.

“To your quarters, then?”

“I guess that’s as good of a place as any.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 

As soon as Counselor was out of sight, Medic changed their trajectory.

The musty air that filled their lab acted on them like a drug, sending a calm shiver down their spine. If they had the day off (or if they were being forced to take it off), there was no way they were going to spend that precious little free time moping in their quarters. Not when they could be here.

They sat, the memory foam of their desk chair still molded to their form. The laptop before them booted up with a familiar chirp and bright pink screensaver, written upon in white text:

“Property of Organization. Unauthorized Use Is Unlawful.” 

The grainy selection of videos blinked before them, and they selected the next one in the series. Even if they didn’t have access to their Asset at the current moment, they could at the very least work ahead.

The screen fizzled to life in all its low-definition glory, displaying a familiar room, its walls plastered with protective black rubber, and its tile floor made of the same material.

The presenter wore a bandage on their face, covering the side of their jaw. The gauze warped as they smiled, but they seemed to make no note of it.

Beside them, the presenter’s own Asset stood. The muzzle around their face had been modified, its metal warped as to compress its wearer’s jaw, to the point that even breathing was an impossibility.

Extreme, perhaps, but based on the Asset’s behavior, it was warranted.

Though their movements were weak and unbalanced, they were persistent, not ceasing yanking against their leash for the slightest moment. This time, unlike before, the presenter seemed to be paying attention to them, though they did not seem worried.

“It has been some time since we last spoke.” They began. “I apologize for the delay, but, hopefully, it will not happen again. After all, training our Assets is a full time job.”

A smile. Cheerful, stretching their cheeks.

“Unfortunately, I must report that the recent delay we experienced was as a result of my own Asset lashing out. This was unfortunate, but it made me realize that there is a flaw in my training methods. A flaw I seek to instruct you, today, on how to remedy.

One advantage we trainers have is that we have 24/7 access to our Assets. As we take care of them, we can choose to meet their needs in whatever way we see fit.

Deprivation has always been a part of Asset training, since we pioneered our methods. But it was something I, unfortunately and unwisely, neglected. And I have done you all a disservice by not mentioning it to you.

In order for training to truly take effect, there must be room in an Asset’s mind for it to fit. A reason for them to follow. Fear, certainly, is this reason, but there are other aspects to control.

Following my Asset’s incident, we have been working using these methods of deprivation. Depriving your Asset of things such as nutrients, water, and sleep can significantly speed up and solidify your training. In this lesson, we will go over this, and how it can help you improve your training methods.”

The presenter’s smile was matched by their Asset’s wicked snarl. From the corners of their mouth, licks of flame emerged, just for the slightest moment.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 

Hero handled the flash drive as though it were a bomb.

Perhaps it was, if the writing on the device was at all to be believed. Scrawled on in sharpie, a hastily written yet well received warning.

“Property of Organization. Unauthorized Use Is Unlawful.” 

As if Organization cared about the law.

Hero seated themself in their office chair, leaving Counselor to sit a few feet back, on their bed. They almost flinched, plugging the flashdrive into their laptop.

For a moment, the computer hummed, before it reported chipperly that new files had been added.

“Uh, Hero?”

“Yeah?”

“Where did you get this thing?”

“Leader gave it to me.”

“Did they say what it was.”

Hero shook their head. “That’s what we’re about to find out.”

Still moving terribly nervously, Hero opened the folder that the computer had created for these ‘new files.’

“It’s... videos.”

“Videos?”

“A couple of them, yeah.”

“Should we... play them?”

“I don’t- I don’t know. I mean, if Organization is involved, I’m not sure I want to know what’s on them.”

“It could help Villain.”

Hero sighed, dipping their head.

“I hate when you’re right.”

With deft fingers, they selected the first video.

It had been so long, since any of them had seen Traitor. More than that, it had been so long since any of them had seen Traitor smile.

And yet, that was what they were doing. Grinning, ear to ear, eyes locked upon the camera.

“Hello, everyone, and welcome to the second edition of the Asset Training Video Course. If you are confused, the first edition of this series was, unfortunately, cut short due to... an incident. We will all miss our last presenter, but that does not mean that our duties can be shirked.”

Traitor turned, looking offscreen, calling:

“Veni huc.”

The language the words were in was clearly not English, but the person who moved on-screen did not seem concerned by that fact.

Villain smiled as well, though their warm gaze had an inquisitive quality to it as they regarded the camera. A chain-link collar was arranged about their neck, but it was attached to nothing, and seemed to more or less hang limply.

“For this series, I will be demonstrating all you need to know about Asset training. This, here, is my own Asset, Cadet. As you can tell, they are very well trained, if I do say so myself. They will be helping me show you how to train your own assigned Asset.”

Traitor’s hand reached for Villain, who did not flinch a moment. Their hand ruffled Villain’s hair affectionately.

Villain smiled, and leaned into the touch.

[distinctlywhumpthing]

Chapter 1

WC: 5233

Post-apocalyptic drama: A woman wakes up with no memory after an apocalyptic storm devastates the country. With everyone starting over and finding a new way of life, she is assigned to lead one of the rebuilding programs. The agriculture-based neighborhood is running smoothly until a stranger shows up, the first outsider in over a year.

CW: stranger, unconscious, blood, amnesia, referencing past head injury

I cradle my warm mug closer and survey the room, still feeling far from sleep. I went to bed early, too early, when the sky darkened prematurely because of the rainstorm. The weather pulled my focus away from work to watch the wind wrestle with the trees at the edge of the yard, testing the strength of their branches, threatening to splinter them to pieces. When the rain started, steadily pouring down in constant streams of water without any distinction between drops, the view was obstructed. Now the rain will fall for days and with the wind, we’re all confined to our houses, so I had gone up to bed since I’d have no shortage of time to finish work tomorrow. Everyone says the rain changed after the Storm, but this is all I can remember, anyway. 

The rain is still thundering down onto the roof. I don’t even know what woke me—it’s impossible to hear any of the normal creaks and aches of the house breathing on its own over the weather. I came downstairs to make tea, more for the ritual than the tea itself, something I do almost nightly. The methodical steps are enough of a reset that I fall asleep before my tea is cool enough for a full sip. Tonight, it’s less comforting. Adrenaline still courses through my veins from startling awake. There is no reason to feel shaken. I must have had an unsettling dream that I can’t remember. The thought of lying down in the dark and facing emptiness makes my pulse speed up again. I focus on inhaling and exhaling smoothly, commanding my heart to slow down to a regular rhythm, filling my lungs with the aroma of the chamomile blossoms bobbing to the surface in the strainer. I make my way across the open living space toward the stairs, allowing myself to stall by inspecting the way everything looks different from last night when there were visible stars and a moon. 

The house—my house—looks almost exactly like it did the day I arrived. I run my hand along the back of the creased, brown leather sofa in the middle of the room. It’s worn more on the right side, across from the ring on the coffee table and beside the lamp. It faces a bookcase of hardcovers standing in dignified lines despite the scuffs on the spines and the dogeared pages hidden from view. The warm wood of the built-in shelves meets the slated fireplace, the focal point of the whole floor. There’s no television, so whoever lived here must have read instead. I’ve tried thumbing through the pages of the books to fill my free time but can never seem to get through more than a few lines. There’s the solid oak dining table anchoring the back of the room in front of the picture windows with chairs for eight, another mark of the previous owners. 

I’ve never once had a personal guest but the house hasn’t felt empty, despite its size and living alone. Even now, on a stormy night, despite every line and angle extended, making it seem endless, it doesn’t feel jarringly vacant. Darkness swallows the corners of the room and deepens the shadows under the furniture but instead of making me rush for the light switch, I want to let my eyes dance over the impossible-to-see details. I have them all memorized anyway, so it doesn’t matter if it’s too dark to see. I let my eyes trace the silhouettes of the space once more time before forcing myself to climb back up to bed. 

My foot is on the first step when I see it. Almost obscured by the staircase, a shadow passes in front of the window at the back of the house. I freeze. I can barely see anything through the rain but I know something is out there. My heart is sprinting in my chest as I move back into the room. I don’t want to imagine the emergency that would have a neighbor coming to me through this weather. The figure passes by the last window in the room on the way to the back door of the garage but pauses. I hold my breath, wondering if they can see me through the rain into the dark house. My eyes trace over the shape of their shoulders, inclined head, and clenched fists. They stagger a few steps forward before collapsing onto the grass. Before I have time to think, I react.

I drop the scalding tea, which pours down my leg as it falls, mug saved by the thick, wool area rug. I don’t even register the heat against my skin as I sprint across the house to run out the back door of the garage. The rain and wind rush to beat against me as I step outside. I blink furiously to see through the sheets of water. It’s immediately like I’ve been submerged. Everyone is right that it rains harder now, which is why the Program advises against going outside during any bad weather. This is more like a hurricane hitting away from the coast. We’ll spend the few days after picking up debris, branches and clearing fallen trees. Luckily, it’s not freezing rain like we had all winter. Pools swell around my bare feet with each running step I take through the sodden lawn, splattering mud up from the ground. I reach my destination after a few strides and mentally thank my frequent runs for my speed. 

Whoever it is, lies facedown in the grass so I grab a shoulder to roll the person over. He’s out cold, with mud from the wet ground covering half his face. I fight the urge to pause and identify him because somehow it is raining even harder. I’m almost certain he isn’t one of my neighbors. I crouch down, grab both of his arms and do my best to roll him onto my back so that I can half-drag him across the lawn. It's easier than I expected. Maybe the wet grass is helping his limp legs slide behind me. We make it to the back door and I pause for a moment as reality hits me. I’m about to bring an unconscious stranger into my house. There’s no telling where he came from or why he is here. I try to remember the instructions Inspectors have told me about handling trespassers. 

Something moves on my back and I realize the stranger has turned his head. I’ve been standing here, half-carrying him. It would be irresponsible to try to walk to anyone else’s house in this weather, especially dragging someone. I clench my teeth and pull him up the two steps into the garage and through the hallway. I manage to almost gracefully deposit him on the sofa, leaving streaks of mud across the wood floors. My feet nearly slide out from under me as I run back to lock the doors. For good measure, I close all the curtains before turning on the floor lamp beside the couch. 

I start to look him over for injuries, checking his head first. I don’t see or feel anything under his dark hair. I use my sleeve to wipe away some of the mud on his face. He has symmetrical features, rough, dark stubble, and light-brown skin. I am noticing the long, dark lashes on his closed eyelids when he exhales a sigh. I jump, feeling my face grow hot. I direct my attention away from his face and wind up cursing myself for not noticing his torn pant leg earlier. I pull back the shredded fabric and suck in a breath. He has a long, deep gash, caked with mud that is still bleeding. I fly upstairs to find the medical bag and some towels. 

My mind is spinning but somehow, my hands are steady. I clean the wound and apply pressure to stop the bleeding. The minutes pass quickly. The counting gives me something to focus on aside from wondering what happened to cause this. I match my breaths to the rhythm and feel more centered. My fingers have no problem managing the needle holder and I lose myself in the steady progress of suturing. I’m nearly finished when the stranger sighs again. I pause to look at his face and notice a subtle upturn at the corner of his mouth. He doesn’t wake up but my pulse quickens anyway. I look back down and try to focus. I could lose my job for not following protocol by bringing him into my house, but it only seems responsible to give him first-aid so he doesn’t bleed out. I can turn him in when he wakes up. 

After I finish the stitches, I disinfect it again, apply antibiotic ointment, and tape a sterile gauze bandage over the wound. I clean up all the rain, mud, and blood that we tracked into the house as best as I can, constantly checking to see if the stranger has moved. He sleeps quietly, breathing steadily and looking peaceful. I pick up the mug I dropped earlier and soak up the tea from the carpet. My clothes are still wet so I rush upstairs to change but skip taking a shower, more afraid of the stranger disappearing without an explanation than of any other possibility. Back downstairs, I make myself a replacement cup of tea and settle into the armchair to wait.

I distract myself by thinking about the fields, hoping as usual that the trenches we dug around them for this kind of weather, will be deep enough. We’ve never had a problem before but I can’t help but worry, after all, it is our food source. We are fairly self-sufficient at this point, almost one year in and I don’t want that to change. The Programs started six months after the Storm. They still don’t know how much of the population was lost during the Storm or in the aftermath. Sometimes I hear my neighbors debating it while they work, with guesses ranging from seventy to ninety percent lost, but no one knows for sure. I was in the hospital but others were in shelters, waiting, while plans were made to organize people into homes and communities. Anyone highly skilled was employed as a Programmer. Geologists, engineers, and other specialists identified areas with enough undamaged houses and clear land to use productively. They wrote a Program for each location based on what they would be able to do to survive. Then it was a simple matter of assigning survivors to the empty houses to fill all of the jobs required to make the Program viable. 

Programmers said the fact that I was unattached would help me be a more objective leader. It’s a ridiculous assessment of my situation and there were plenty of others who were also solo, but I didn’t argue. I was pretty objective until tonight’s lapse in judgment. The rest of the residents keep their distance, maybe because I’m here to enforce the rules, or maybe because I’m not fun. I follow all of the checklists and read through the Program details, keeping myself busy. I woke up after the Storm half-wrapped in plaster with no memory of anything. The first few days are a blur of pain from the head injury. Soon enough, it became less dramatic, the amnesia was a fact then and a fact now. I faced it alone and learned quickly not to fight it. I can’t remember anything, no reason to get emotional or philosophical about it. Everyone said I was lucky to have made it to the hospital, most people who were outside in the Storm were never seen again. They guessed I had been injured during the earthquakes, but it was all conjecture.

I tried not to listen to the hospital staff’s speculations about what my life was like, or what I was like. They thought they were being helpful and might spark some memory. I would tune them out and spend hours memorizing the hospital room. It’s so clear in my memories, even more so than the house, which I’ve been living in twice as long. The way the corners of the room met to support the flat, smooth ceiling. The exact number of tiles in the ceiling, thirty, and the number of small lights blinking down, six. The texture of the hospital bedding against my skin, scratchy and worn into a strange kind of soft. Comforting but unyielding, built to last. Everything was cream or beige, blending like coffee with too much milk. I can remember the way the colors progressively deepened as the daylight faded through the single window.

I spent the first few weeks, once I could get out of the hospital bed, getting sick every time I had physical therapy. I pushed myself too hard and too fast they said. The doctors still congratulated me on healing quickly, despite my memory not returning. There were many discussions about patience and time, that I would be surprised to wake up one day with memories flooding back. Despite weeks in the hospital and eventually recovering enough physically to run five kilometers with no headache, I still hadn’t remembered anything. The doctors assured me it was completely normal. I needed more time, they repeated, moving into a Program would help me recover through purpose and routine. 

Our Program area is twenty-five square miles, with the residential street at one corner. The whole area was high enough to escape the floods and surrounded by thick forests that protected it from whatever else the Storm had tried to toss this way. From what we can tell, there were only minor earthquakes here, most of the damage was from wind and water. We made house repairs first, thirty of us total, boarding up the odd broken window or patching a roof leak. Then we started the long process of carving out fields for food and some animals, raised a barn, and built a few sheds. The first small harvests were fairly successful and have continued to improve, despite no one having any farming experience beyond growing kitchen herbs, but it’s all thanks to the Program materials. I handle the delegation and training, but I don’t think I am a necessity here. Anyone can read an instruction manual and everyone works hard for the neighborhood. It could probably run as smoothly without me.

—

I jerk awake, sitting upright. My breath is fast and cold sweat clings to the back of my neck. I try to focus on my surroundings. I must have fallen asleep in the armchair while I was watching—my eyes fall on the empty couch, the wool blanket crumpled at the bottom. I jump to my feet and knock a book off the side table. It lands with a thud on the wood floor and I’m startled all over again. I exhale slowly, trying to settle myself, and massage my temples with my fingertips. 

“Headache?” a soft, almost musical voice says behind me. 

I whip around to see the stranger standing behind the island, a mug of steaming something in his hand. I don’t answer and instead, take in the changes from last night. His face is clean and shaven. The rough stubble I saw last night is now a smooth shadow over his jaw. His dark brown hair is messy but in an effortlessly perfect way. He’s wearing a clean grey shirt and dark jeans that must be from one of the extra bedrooms upstairs. He looks like a completely different person than the one I dragged out of the mud in the middle of the night. 

“Coffee? Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you.” He tilts his cup toward the French press sitting on the stove but must be referring to whatever process facilitated his clean appearance. I swallow my irritation at myself for falling asleep and not being alert to watch him. He’s staring at me with a strange expression on his face. I avert my gaze, looking down.

“How’s your leg?” I ask, walking around the island to see that he is keeping weight off of it.

“Alright, thanks to you. The stitches are perfect—don’t worry, I didn’t get them wet,” he says quickly, smiling like he thinks he’s placating me. 

I furrow my eyebrows. 

He bites his lip and turns away to take out a second mug.

“Who are you?” I blurt at his back. 

He sets the French press down and I watch the remaining coffee slosh around inside of it. His shoulders round forward as he looks into the cup he’s poured. I’m about to repeat myself when he inhales and turns. 

He’s wearing a soft smile on his face. “I’m sorry. I should have introduced myself, I’m Elias,” he says, holding the coffee out. 

I stare at it. 

“You are…?” He tilts his head, studying me. 

I ignore his question, irritated at his calmness. “Where did you come from? Do you realize you’ve trespassed into a Program area?” 

Elias seems to give up trying to goad me with caffeine and sets the mug on the island. “Right, well, when the rainstorm started yesterday, I was in the woods and a tree fell. My leg got hurt but I managed to start walking through the rain to find shelter and wound up here. I had no idea I was so close to a neighborhood…” he says a little too innocently. He runs his hand through his hair, not meeting my eyes anymore. 

I start to do some math in my head. I know for a fact that the closest town ruins are at least twenty miles away and none of the other neighborhoods between were salvageable. Unless he was living in some half-crushed house in one of the still-flooded neighborhoods, that means almost five hours of walking at a good pace. In the rain, through the forest, on an injured leg, it would take probably twice that. He must be lying. No one would make it here that quickly under those conditions. 

I try not to make my skepticism obvious as I ask, “Why were you in the woods?”

“I got lost…” he barely seems convinced himself and it almost sounds like he’s posing it as a question. 

I nod, keeping my face neutral. I’ve heard enough. He seems perfectly fine now, so I can turn him in now. I march over to the front door, tug it open, and step onto the front porch. A wall of rain greets me. I can’t even see the front yard. Elias limps up behind me. I can feel his warmth a few inches away as I stare down the rain. 

“Look, I know what it sounds like, but I promise I’m not a scavenger.” 

After the Storm, not everyone wanted to join a Program. The Program calls the people who roam the deserted towns and destroyed cities, scavengers. Sometimes they work with the Programmers if they find a good haul. More often than not, they operate by their own rules and are dangerous. Luckily, we are so remote that we have never had any find us.

“I’m not here to steal anything. Please—” 

I spin around. 

Elias is closer than I thought and I’m practically in his arms as he leans in the doorway. I meet his gaze and my breath catches in my throat. His eyes are an intense green-gold color, full of light and smoldering. He must be looking straight into my soul. Something flutters there under his consideration. Despite the intrusion, I relax, forgetting my earlier distrust. He smells like pine and soap. It’s so familiar, it must be the scent of the soap in my bathroom. It takes more than a minute for me to catch my original train of thought. 

I mean to be demanding but my voice comes out as a breathy whisper, “You need to tell me why you’re here.”

Elias doesn't answer. He’s searching my eyes one at a time, left to right, and back again, looking for something. Eventually, he breaks away and starts limping back toward the kitchen, leaving me alone in front of the open door. 

I shiver as the cold air surrounds me and shake my head to dispel the strange feelings. My hands numbly close and lock the door before I follow him back into the house. 

At the island, he picks up his cup of coffee and looks back at me. “As I said, I was lost in the woods and my leg got hurt when a tree fell. I could hardly see in the rain so I was just stumbling around looking for shelter. Then, I woke up here,” he repeats with more confidence this time, his voice smooth and even.

“If you’re not a scavenger, why aren’t you assigned to a Program?”

“I managed to stay sheltered for a while in the city,” he offers, shrugging. 

I suppose this could be true. The neighborhood Programs were not compulsory but it seems strange that he would have been on his own for so long. It doesn’t exactly seem safe to be a lone wolf when there are gangs of scavengers roaming around. 

I sigh and run my hand through my hair, brushing it off my face, and realize there is still mud in it from last night. “I can’t turn you in until it stops raining, so I guess you’ll just have to stay here.” If he is surprised or upset by this, he doesn’t show it. I leave him in the kitchen and head upstairs. 

—

Closed in my bedroom, I keep ruminating on Elias’s story. He doesn’t have the look of the scavengers I’ve seen warnings about in the Program. Maybe he left another Program, which isn’t a big deal unless he got into trouble first. Despite these other possibilities, I’m unable to see him as a threat. Something is nagging me about him or this whole situation. Likely, the fact that until now, I’ve never once broken the rules of the Program. I shake my head. It was stupid to bring him to the house. I should have followed protocol. As I stand under the shower, I find myself continuing to rationalize his presence and even excusing his improbable story. This is ridiculous. I don’t know why I am so obsessively curious and willing to ignore my better judgment because of some feelings. 

We are lucky that most of the infrastructure for water and power could be repaired or was undamaged during the Storm. Something about special engineering that preserved the systems. They don’t go into a lot of detail in the Program literature about it, but I’m too grateful to care. Not only is life easier, but it’s also the only reason I am not dead since there wouldn’t have been much of a hospital to save me without running water and electricity. Fuel is the biggest problem now. Most of the underground storage traditionally used was damaged or flooded. In theory, electric cars would still be a possibility, but the roads are in no condition to drive. The Programmers have spent a lot of resources clearing routes. The first few months they had to deliver our supplies in huge off-road military vehicles, which significantly dented their fuel reserves. Even after a year of working to clear roads, journeys take hours with endless detours because of flooding, sinkholes, or other debris.

I walk out of the bathroom and sit on the edge of my bed wrapped in a towel. The blankets are still thrown to the side from when I got up so quickly last night. After I change into leggings and a soft, knit sweater, I make the bed. I take the time to tuck in the corners and smooth the blankets so they lie flat with no wrinkles. I sit back down and work my long, dark hair into two thick French braids. They fall most of the way down my back, definitely too long, but for some reason, I can’t bring myself to cut it. I have to start the second braid over again because I’m so distracted thinking about the man downstairs. I look over at the little chrome alarm clock next to my bed and realize how little sleep I got last night and I still have to refigure the schedules due to the rain. I decide to accept Elias’s offer of coffee in the hopes that I can get some work done before I’m dead on my feet. Maybe I can get also the truth out of him and figure out how he ended up here.

Downstairs, I find Elias bustling in the kitchen. He’s humming to himself softly and beating eggs in a bowl while garlic sizzles in a frying pan on the stove. His movements are graceful and intuitive as he moves through the space. One hand absently pushes around the fragrant garlic while the other scans the spice drawer, fingertip sliding over each jar before finding what he’s looking for. He moves on to chopping after plucking some fresh herbs out of the mason jars next to the sink. The knife almost sounds musical on the wooden cutting board before he slides everything into the bowl and cradles it in the crook of his arm to stir it all together. He transfers the mixture into the frying pan and sprinkles in salt and pepper, every step with so much intention it’s almost choreographed. 

It’s been longer than I want to admit before he turns around, to get a sip of his coffee, and notices me watching. 

He smiles and then furrows his eyebrows. “Are you okay?” 

I blink and rub my eyes which must be watering from staring for so long. 

Elias smiles at me again. “How about that coffee now?”

“I—” I look away and clear my throat, decide on nodding instead. 

Elias turns to pour from a full pot. He limps to the fridge and adds a splash of milk out of the glass carafe, then holds it out to me. My fingers brush against his when I take the mug and my heart skitters. 

“I should get to work,” I say quickly, turning away and taking my coffee to the dining table. I drop into one of the chairs with my back to him and grab my tablet from across the table where I normally sit. I stifle a sigh as I sip the coffee, better than I usually make. I labor to lose myself in reworking schedules and timetables for the entire neighborhood, factoring in the delay due to the rain. 

As I am finishing the log updates I will send to the Programmers, Elias starts setting the other end of the table. 

“Breakfast is ready, whenever you’re finished,” he says, sitting down. 

I nod without looking up. I would like to pretend I have important things to do and won’t drop everything because he cooked for us but I can’t. He’s made omelets with tomatoes, mushrooms, and greens. It smells incredible and looks about a thousand times better than the plain scrambled eggs I’ve been overcooking every day. I swear my stomach audibly growls. 

I snap the tablet closed. “I’ve finished anyway,” I say, trying to sound casual as I slide into the next chair over where he’s set a place for me. 

“Bon appétit,” he says. He rests his chin in his hand and waits for me to start. 

I take a bite, trying to downplay my excitement. I swear under my breath. It tastes even better than it looks with a perfect, soft texture. 

“Thank you,” I murmur into my next bite. I can see him grinning as I peek at him through my eyelashes. His expression could be smug but instead, it’s much softer. 

He watches me for a few more bites before he picks up his fork. “My pleasure. It’s been a while since I’ve had fresh eggs and herbs to cook with. Are they from this neighborhood?”

It seems like he’s just curious, so I answer. “Yes, we have a few acres of farmland and animals. The chickens are everyone’s favorites. The herbs are actually from my garden behind the garage.” 

He nods, taking a sip of coffee. 

“Have you seen any other Programs?” I ask. 

I hope it doesn’t seem like an obvious effort to reveal his true motives but I’ve always wondered about other Programs. I imagine groups can do anything locally available, so there must be a lot of possibilities. The Programs are independent and self-sustaining. We consume everything we produce. I’ve always thought that the Programmers seem to get very little out of the whole arrangement. 

Elias shakes his head and swallows his bite of food. “Nothing up close. This is the first time I’ve been into a neighborhood…” He looks up at me. 

I keep my face neutral. 

“I’ve seen a lot of mobile teams though,” he adds.

“Mobile teams?” 

The Program literature I have is specific only to this neighborhood. There is some general information that must go to all the Programs but there isn’t very much about the overall scheme or how it is managed. 

“They set up a camp for a project and move on once they finish. I’ve seen teams working on clearing the roads, sorting through factories, or siphoning gas in parking garages,” he explains.  

I nod and wonder if these teams ever wind up having to fight off scavengers. I hesitate to ask about scavengers since a few hours ago I accused him of being one. 

Elias changes the subject. “So, what did you do before the Storm?”

I swallow and my palms start to sweat. 

It’s an innocent question, one my neighbors have often discussed but this is exactly why I avoid socializing and keep my relationships strictly professional. It seems impossible to lie. I don’t want to but I’m not sure how to explain that there was no “before the Storm” for me. My life is this job, it’s all I have. After sixteen months, I haven’t even remembered my own name. I chew on my lip, trying to gather the courage to tell him something I have never told anyone.

Before I collect myself, he clears his throat. “I’m sorry, that’s a really personal question. I didn’t mean to pry.” I look up and find him smiling gently at me, his eyes full. “I’m grateful that you brought me in last night and are letting me stay.” 

I blink at him. “Oh, it’s okay…” 

Elias stands and stacks my empty plate on top of his, then takes my mug. “Let me get you a refill.” 

“I can clean up, you should stay off your leg,” I say, standing and trying to take the dishes from him. 

“No, no,” he insists, stepping out of my reach, “it’s the least I can do.” 

I still follow him to the kitchen to get the coffee so he doesn’t have to walk back to the table. He refills my mug and hands it to me, smiling, his eyes still full in a way that makes my pulse feel loud behind my ears. I mumble thanks and retreat to the dining table to pretend to work.

TBC

[mattzerella-sticks]

⭐2020 Fics in Review ⭐

Happy New Year’s Eve! 💫💫💫 2020 sure was a year... between everything that was happening on the macro (the pandemic, elections, etc.) and on the micro-level (shows delayed, some ending - disastrously, so much drama, etc.), the past 12 months felt like a blur. Especially since we’ve been inside and realized time is an illusion!

But, there were moments where I was able to ground myself in the present and not be swept away by the tide. Most of them were because of fanfiction. Whether writing or reading, fanworks became a soothing balm. And I’d be remiss (and breaking tradition) if I didn’t reflect on my past works of 2020! 

I’ve written 43 fics across a wide array of fandoms - the most being Supernatural, with 9-1-1, DC Comics, Marvel, Boku No Hero Academia, Stargirl, Star Wars, Hollywood, and RWBY sprinkled in. I really branched out this year, and am looking forward to what I will write in 2021. Maybe new fandoms? Maybe an original work? Who’s to say!

Thank you to all those who’ve read my works, and am grateful for both your support and continued engagement - can’t wait to see you in 2021 with me 😁

Here are my works!

9-1-1 (TV Show)

Caught (Evan ‘Buck’ Buckely/Eddie Diaz, side Athena Grant/Bobby Nash, side Maddie Buckley/Howie ‘Chimney’ Han)

Photobooths are prime for catching special moments and making them last forever, even if they are less both and more open spaces with a backdrop. When Athena, Bobby, and Michael stumble upon one such moment between Buck and Eddie, what will they do?

And how will it affect Maddie and Chimney?

Lumped Together (Evan ‘Buck’ Buckely/Eddie Diaz, side Henrietta ‘Hen’ Wilson/Karen Wilson, side Maddie Buckley/Howie ‘Chimney’ Han)

As an apology for keeping her thoughts about medical school secret from her wife and partner, Hen takes them (and Maddie) out for lunch. With the promise that it would only be them. And for the most part it was. Until Buck and Eddie strode in with every intention of eating Takoyaki.

Just not with them.

Armed with new information, what's a girl to do? Hen spends the next day fighting back the natural instinct to tease her friends about the wonderful step they've taken together in their relationship. Can she make it home without saying anything? Or will she give in?

DCU

Lonely Together (Barry Allen/Bruce Wayne, past Barry Allen/Iris West, past Bruce Wayne/Selina Kyle)

Barry needs others, yet whether by his enemies or his own actions, he ends up alone. After Iris leaves him, Barry feels as if he drifts through life. Like lightning humming in the air without a rod to ground him.

Until he struck another lonely soul and entered a relationship he never thought possible. Now, months since he and Bruce began sleeping with each other, Barry feels settles. At peace in a way he hasn't felt in a long while. Since he and Iris started petering out.

But it's not love... is it?

Come Home (Jason Todd/Kyle Rayner)

Jason Todd gets a message from Bruce. He's surprised to see it. Then, he's surprised by the message itself. Hearing Bruce's final message stirs something inside of him, urging him towards a place he's avoided ever since his and Bruce's falling out. So he gathers his things, and then... waits.

He can't leave yet. Jason doesn't know why. Bruce gave him a mission, just like old times. Except it's not, because he... Jason can't move. Can't even stand.

That's how Kyle finds him.

Restless (Barry Allen/Bruce Wayne)

Returning home from a mission in outer space, the team picks up a distress signal off-course. They rush off to help, landing on a strange alient planet teeming with life. Especially within the plant kingdom.

While guarding the Javelin, Bruce and Barry encounter one such member while engaging in some familiar fight-flirting. Will its effects spell trouble for the League, or help these two relax their guards long enough to explore new possibilities?

(Hint: It's a little bit of both)

Marvel

Hot Seat (Peter Parker/Johnny Storm)

Spiderman likes Johnny. Like likes him. And he thought Johnny felt the same. He wasn't wrong, but Johnny like liked someone else, too. Someone he actually wanted to pursue, over Spiderman.

Unfortunately that someone is Peter Parker.

However, after a terrible misunderstanding, Johny isn't too keen on seeing either Peter or Spiderman; the longer this confusion left unresolved, the more Johnny's hurt would fester. Can Peter find a way to make Johnny listen?

Hollywood 

Merrily We Roll Along (Archie Coleman/Rock Hudson)

With their careers still on the rise and no peak in sight, sometimes Archie's and Roy's lives get a little too busy. Understandably so. Archie's in the midst of writing his next screenplay while the latest opens across America. Roy spend more time on set than at home working on his latest project. When their schedules allow it, all they want is to be together.

Can they enjoy a simple morning together, or will the clouds of Hollywood cast a heavy shadow over their sunny day?

RWBY

Lucky You, Huh? (Qrow Branwen/Clover Ebi)

After all that happened, it's time for the dust to settle. Choices were made. Now, the consequences for certain actions need to be carried out.

Even though he fought alongside her to save Mantle, Robyn Hill couldn't help save Clover from the whims of the Council. Without a job or home, Clover needs to find a way to carry on.

If anyone understands what that feels like, it's Qrow. Never being one who can communicate his feelings well, would he be the best to comfort the other man. When he's the only one who can, what does that mean for Clover?

Star Wars

Fourth (Poe Dameron/Finn)

What's a man and his co-general to do when they're on a mission together on a planet known for frequent sandstorms?

Flirt? That is a possibility. And definitely the one they take.

Stargirl

I’m Here (Courtney Whitmore/Yolanda Montez, past Yolanda Montez/Henry King, Jr.)

Coda to 1x10 "Brainwave Jr."

Losing Henry was sad, but it's not the first person Courtney knew whose future was snatched by the Injustice Society of America. That doesn't make his death any less tragic. It does remind Courtney how screwed up and dangerous her life was. At least she was able to wake up the next day and keep moving. And so was Beth, and Rick. But Yolanda...

Where was Yolanda? Courtney needs to know.

Crusher (Lawrence Crock/Paula Crock, Pat Dugan/Barbara Whitmore, Lawrence Crock/Pat Dugan)

When Lawrence met Pat, he saw another body that could benefit from some exercise at his gym. The more they interacted, became friends, he saw that body doing other things in other places. And his wife is totally supportive of this. While in the midst of an afterhours training session, Lawrence drags his feet on telling his friend a few important things. Egged on by Paula, will he say what's on his mind? How will Pat react?

And does Pat have a secret or two of his own?

Boku No Hero Academia/My Hero Academia

Little Secrets Everywhere (Bakugou Katsuki/Kirishima Eijiro)

Mina thought letting Bakugo read whatever was in her folder wouldn't be too bad. Maybe he would snipe at her for her less than perfect English translation and sentence structure, slap her on the head with the balled up assignment. What she wasn't expecting was for him to charge with hellish fury towards her in the common room with all their friends to see.

One careless mistake leads to many things coming to light. Everyone walking away with something new to think about.

Boku No Fundanshi (Bakugou Katsuki/Kirishima Eijiro)

Bakugo Katsuki is a top student at the premier hero academy in the world. Bakugo Katsuki is a boy with the ability to use his sweat as a weapon, each droplet containing enough nitroglycerin to obliterate a phone book. Bakugo Katsuki enjoys reading manga where boys fall in love with one another. Two out of the three are commonly accepted facts. The final one is a heavily guarded secret that Bakugo protects with his life. At least until his vigilance lapses, and he loses a doujinshi.

Will he be able to recover what he lost before anyone realizes it's his? Or, by the end of this, will he have found something he didn't know he was missing?

Portmanteau (Bakugou Katsuki/Kirishima Eijiro)

Portmanteau (port·man·teau) n. a word blending the sounds and combining the meanings of two others

Like Bakugo's chosen hero name. But was that his first choice? Kirishima doesn't think so, after finding a damning piece of evidence hidden within his notes. Except it's not what he thinks, at all...

Supernatural

 Real (Dean Winchester/Castiel, background Eileen Leahy/Sam Winchester)

Coda to 15x09 "The Trap"

Morning after, and Sam spies a little something blossoming in the kitchen. Something that stokes the fires of his curiosity. When the scene ends, he walks in with an intent to investigate. Learn about the strange magic that happened before his eyes. How quickly Dean and Cas's relationship repaired. And what brilliant new shape it took on after Purgatory.

Will Sam be satisfied with the answer?

Half-Priced Chocolates (Dean Winchester/Castiel, background Eileen Leahy/Sam Winchester)

The day after Valentine's Day is great for many things. Basking in the glow of a night well spent, sharing the joy of love with your family, and eating chocolate priced considerably lower than it was the day before.

Except Sam can't enjoy any of that, because Dean won't let him. Because Dean woke up in a sour mood and has picked up the banners of war against romantic love.

Albeit, the three aforementioned things might make his conflict the shortest in history.

Spill (Dean Winchester/Castiel)

Dean always thought it would take more to force him into retirement. Yet here he is, locked in the Bunker until the world figures out a cure for a deadly virus. It could be worse - at least they have a home. He cannot imagine how worse it would be if this happened years earlier, where he and Sam were trapped in a tiny motel room together. Here they have options, and miles of outdoor space they can stroll through if their options become stale.

And they were beginning to. Dean could only do so much indoors. Dean knew he needed to shake things up, but couldn't begin thinking how. Luckily Castiel has an idea, and gives him a new way of looking at their kitchen.

Supernatural Crack🩹tober

Following the Supernatural Cracktober prompt list, one day at a time.

Prompts will be listed in the notes and the chapter title.

Enjoy!

Bullets Over the Bayou (Dean Winchester/Castiel)

Everyone wants Castiel Novak to quit the force, including Castiel. But he stays on despite the toxic work environment he’s surrounded by. Still believing he can do some good despite the many lines of red tape impeding him. Luckily, a pair of scissors by the name of Dean Winchester drops into his hands, and he finally feels like he can do some good.

Dean Winchester thought he would be in New Orleans for a day or two. Identify the body of his deadbeat father and then move on. No one knows he’s here. His mother and brother are blissfully unaware of the danger his father roped him into. With a parting gift of a journal, delivered to him the same day he received word about his father, Dean has become the target of a group of people who want him dead. The same people who killed his father.

Racing against the clock, can Dean and Castiel figure out what is so important about John Winchester’s journal that someone would kill for it?

Kick Ball Change (Dean Winchester/Castiel, background Eileen Leahy/Sam Winchester)

Coda to 15x10 "The Heroes' Journey"

Dean has the Bunker to himself at a time after he and Sam regain their supernatural abilities. With nothing needing his attention, he decides taking time for himself wouldn't hurt. But the usual fare leaves him bored and tired.

So he tries something new. Something he wanted to try, but wasn't sure he would be good at. Dean starts off strong, but doing it on your own can only be so fun. Get you so far. Luckily a partner happens by and truly allows Dean to enjoy a part of himself he knew was there, but didn't want to share.

Tempered Desires (Dean Winchester/Castiel, background Charlie Bradbury/OC, background Sam Winchester/Jessica Moore, background Sam Winchester/Ruby, background Sam Winchester/Mick Davies, past Dean Winchester/Arthur Ketch)

Dating, sex, and finding love were the farthest things on the minds of both Dean and Castiel. There were more important things to worry about - namely the pandemic that swept across the globe and changed everything. Navigating this new environment was hard enough without adding romance.

But fate never intervenes when you expect. From first meetings to first dates, we'll see how Dean and Castiel's relationship blossoms despite the circumstances.

Sunrise (Dean Winchester/Castiel, background Eileen Leahy/Sam Winchester)

Dean and Sam were free. Finally, unequivocally, free.

But this wasn't the happy ending Dean had expected. Maybe in the past, having Sam in the passenger seat tearing across an open stretch of highway as the sunsets, it'd be what he wanted. But that was years ago. He's not that man anymore. Dean's tired of sunsets, of saying goodbye. He yearns for a different ending. One that's less of an ending, and more of a beginning. A sunrise instead of a sunset.

Sam has his. Dean lost his. Despite this setback, he won't stop. He'll live in memory of his sunrise.

Except, what can he do when he feels those rays on his face again?

Coda to 15x19

Fixing It (Dean Winchester/Castiel, background Eileen Leahy/Sam Winchester)

Dean Winchester walked a long & difficult road. House burning down when he was 4, constantly being on the move until his father lost a fight with demons at the age of 25. Reunited with his mother only to lose her again. Have a son only to lose him, too. Of all the shadows that have crossed his path, he thought one of the main sources of light was his husband Castiel.

But he had to ruin that, too.

Can he ever have that shine again? Or are there things that are too good for him to hold? Will they mend what was broken?

Heart in My Hand (Dean Winchester/Castiel, background Eileen Leahy/Sam Winchester)

He was right there.

Cas was telling Dean everything he ever wanted to hear since meeting the angel of the Lord... only each and every word of his confession stabbed at Dean's heart. Because once he finished, there's no more time for them. For him. For any chance of happiness - all that taken away by the Empty. And now he has to carry on.

He tries. Stands, gets in his car and drives where Sam tells him. When he meets with the others, though...

Coda to 15x18 "Despair"

A Dumb Idea (Dean Winchester/Castiel)

They celebrated Christmas, Halloween, Thanksgiving, birthdays, even the Fourth of July. What about the other holidays? What about Valentine's Day?

Mrs. Butters actually had a plan for that, but she left before it could come to fruition. Sam, however, stumbles on Dean and a leftover piece from said plan. Something Dean would rather Sam not see. When he does get a peek as to what it is, well... Dean and Sam have a lot to talk about.

Coda to 15x14 "The Last Holiday"

What the Water Gave Him (Dean Winchester/Castiel)

It was over. Chuck lost, Sam and Dean can live their lives how they want them. But their victory wasn't without losses. The biggest upset nearly taking Dean out of the game, happening so close to the final battle. Now he's on the other side, alive against all odds, but Sam knows he isn't happy. Not truly happy since the Empty stole his best friend.

But there's a chance they can save him. A slim chance. A risk that Dean's willing to take despite every logical nerve in Sam's body screaming at him to look for better options. That threading a needle this small is too dangerous. That they don't have to take on another big bad, not anymore. That they don't have to risk their lives anymore. Dean is far past the point of listening. Dead set on this mission, Sam can only watch.

And pray his brother proves him wrong.

(Now with art from gabester-sketch)

Acutely (Dean Winchester/Castiel)

Jack said he's sorry, after getting his soul back.

Jack said he's sorry, and he's looking at Dean. They're all looking at Dean.

Jack said he's sorry, and Dean can't take it. It's too much. Like a frog thrown into a boiling pot he hops out, jumping out from the room towards safety. Doing his best not to succumb to the pain.

He can't hide forever, let the wounds fester. It's too much to deal with on his own, though. Can someone help him through it?

Leeches (Dean Winchester/Castiel)

Sharing a Netflix makes sense, in hindsight. Dean gets it. But that doesn't mean he appreciates seeing a bunch of profiles after his that weren't there last he checked.

He's gonna get to the bottom of this - of when this happened, why, and how they were able to guess his password.

Revival (Dean Winchester/Castiel, Eileen Leahy/Sam Winchester)

Sam and Dean stand there on the bridge, the camera panning out on them as they are finally reunited in Heaven.

But then Sam wakes up.

(Coda/Fix-It Fic to 15x20 "Carry On")

Memento (Dean Winchester/Castiel)

Why did Castiel have a photo of himself in a cowboy hat? Where did he get it? Who took it, and more importantly who gave it to him?

Coda to 15x15 "Gimme Shelter"

The End (We Deserve) (Dean Winchester/Castiel)

Dean Winchester dies in Sam's arms.

And then he doesn't.

(How that scene originally looked...)

Constants

Meeting with alternate versions of themselves makes Sam and Dean think about what the landscape of the former multiverse might have looked like - or, really, "If there can be multiple Deans and multiple Sams, can there be other versions of things they know. Like... Baby?"

Dean says no. There's only one Baby. She's got four wheels, black paint, and has been his from the beginning. Sam thinks otherwise.

Let's explore what the possibilities of Deans, Sams, and Babys in different universes might look like.

Enjoy the Present (Dean Winchester/Castiel)

Sam had a birthday, Jack had a birthday...

It would only be fitting for Dean to have one, too. It's expected, really. Yet the one Sam and Jack throw him still catches him by surprise. Maybe because he actually agreed with Butters, about having outgrowned birthdays. Or because his thoughts were pulled elsewhere because of some disappointing news.

If it's the latter, than a birthday will definitely take his mind off of that. Especially when it comes time for his present.

Coda to 15x14 'The Last Holiday'

Swallow It Whole (Dean Winchester/Castiel)

"The older you get... the less lies make everything better"

But when you've told as many lies as Dean has, it's hard to tell what's true and what's not. How can he remove all the rotten parts of himself without bringing everything down? Which lies have ingrained themselves so firmly, that removing them would change everything about who he was?

And, scariest of them all, who would he be without those lies?

Coda to 15x16 "Drag Me (Away From You)"

Desperation, Baby! (Dean Winchester/Castiel)

Death took her sweet time parsing through Chuck's book, meaning Lucifer spent longer than he'd like surrounded by his former vessel, his brother, his son, and a man whose obvious longing made him want to vomit. Instead of returning with his prize, Chuck welcoming him back, he must waste his valuable time playing 'nice; with those he can't stand.

Not that it matters. They don't trust him, each member of this ragtag group of survivors watching Lucifer in shifts. Never leaving him alone.

It's Dean's turn now, and he's driving Lucifer up a wall by doing nothing at all save for broadcasting a never-ending supply of feeling. Can he cut the signal without showing his hand, or put Dean's heart to good use?

Coda to 15x19 "Inherit the Earth"

A Healing Touch/New Experiences (Dean Winchester/Castiel, Adam/Serafina)

Maybe if Cas hadn't abandoned him, he wouldn't have agreed to Adam's offer. But with free will finally theirs, Cas made his choice, and Dean his. Now he has to live with the consequences - even if they are awkward. He won't die from it, certainly.

It's only a massage.

But what Dean doesn't know, is that it's more than a massage. It's healing.

It Feels Real Good (Claire Novak/Kaia Nieves, background Dean Winchester/Castiel)

Jody sent her to Yosemite, and she brings her back. For what reason, Claire doesn't know. But it had better be important, otherwise Claire gave the Dark Figure that stole her happiness another chance at escape. Will Jody's house hold a reason important enough for Claire to let go of the heavy burdens she's been carrying since hopping through a rift into another universe?

Coda to 15x12 "Galaxy Brain"

Through the Door (Dean Winchester/Castiel)

Cas tells Sam that Chuck and Amara are here. But how does he know? Sure, he could've felt them land through his grace. But all that time Sam was gone? There was enough there that he could've investigated. They'd need to know where they were anyway, when the time came.

But Cas should've known better. Now wasn't the best moment for a little family reunion, especially when there's so much bad blood it can drown them all. Yet he came, and finally got the audience he always seeked with his father.

Coda to 15x17 "Unity"

Four of Swords (Dean Winchester/Castiel, background Eileen Leahy/Sam Winchester)

The Four of Swords, in the present position, means you don't want to interact with the rest of the world. Because of stress, you need to spend some time with yourself - unhealthy always being 'on'. That the healthiest thing to do is to escape.

Dean might crave escape, but it's not something he thinks he can have. Something he deserves, even. After his and Sam's most recent hunt, this cancerous feeling has grown heavy and weighs him down. He cannot escape on his own, as best he tries.

Luckily a guardian 'former angel' angel swoops in at his lowest. Helps pick up the pieces as best he can and lovingly put them back together. But he can only do so much. The rest is up to Dean.

Can Dean take those final steps, say those final words, and finally free himself?

i’d like to teach the world to sing (Dean Winchester/Castiel, Castiel/Others, WIP, 10 out of 15 chapters posted so far)

Mar del Vista, California - 1972

The groovy counterculture that dominated conversation in the past few years still clings to the landscape, floating around like smoke off a burning joint. Changed by the fires of war, Manson, and life into something new. Less trusting, optimistic, and innocent.

Cas is just one of many disillusioned hippies, saddled with a general distrust even before the movement self-imploded. Wary of about everything. Perfect for his line of work, where what's on the surface might not match the truth underneath. It's not an easy life, but he's comfortable with how it goes. Coasting until he hears a case he has no business accepting. For one, it's about a missing teen. And another, it's personal.

Except Jack's disappearance, like every other case he's worked, isn't so cut and dry. Like a rock skipping across a then-placid lake, the ripples stretch far and wide. Those waves slamming at Cas; of cops, federal agents, hippie cultists, and a certain green-eyed detective who's a little too interested in Cas's investigation.

Will Cas find Jack? Or will he drown in the tides.

Checkmate (Dean Winchester/Castiel)

Billie saves Jack from suffering a fatal end from her plan, and knowing Jack was safe gave Cas space to focus on his own troubles. Nearly losing his son again... revelations from Chuck... choices Dean made, were set on, until Sam broke through at the last minute - too close - they all were...

It was too much. Cas needed to digest these roiling experiences away from faces it hurt to look at. Except he stumbles exactly where Chuck wants him. After countless times praying for guidance, Chuck finally decides now is perfect for a long-awaited heart-to-heart.

Coda to 15x17 "Unity"

Slide (Dean Winchester/Castiel, Eileen Leahy/Sam Winchester)

This isn't his day. It's Sam's and Eileen's. But while out on the dance floor, Dean realizes something that forces him to act. Act boldly.

It's not his day, but he cannot push back what's been there all along, dam bursting with no hope or need of rebuilding itself. He has to say something to Cas.

Why? Because it's Electric... boogie woogie woogie

(Inspired by the Suptober Day 9 prompt - Electric)

Unwrap Me (Dean Winchester/Castiel)

Dean never thought he would make it this far. Nor would he have as many wonderful things that he has now. A home, friends, family, and most importantly love. With a former angel.

Given how normal his life is now, Dean decides he wants to go all out celebrating Christmas. Parties, feasts, and the perfect presents. He wants to get Cas something that will translate everything that resides in his heart. Dean believes he has the right gift, but decides against leading with it. Instead surprising Cas with it after showing him his Christmas best.

Although, during his entire time planning Cas's present, he never wondered what Cas got him...

Disappointment is temporary, but creativity is eternal 🥂 to more fanworks in 2021!!!

[kookicat]

A Thief in the Night

The click of the hotel door lock opening wakes him, puts him on instant high alert. He opens his eyes slowly, seeing a flash of blonde hair just before their intruder ducks into the bathroom, a bag in her hands. It's 3:40am by the clock by his bed. 

Just Parker, he thinks and almost lays his head back down, because it's not that unusual for them to duck in and out of each other's rooms. He's pretty sure the entire right side of his body is a giant bruise and his shoulder is throbbing from a glancing blow from one of the mark's cars. Something about the scene bothers him through and he hasn't lived as long as he has in the job he does by ignoring those instincts. 

Fuck. The word flashes through his head in bold red letters as he rolls out of the bed, abused muscles protesting. Hardison is snoring in the other bed, ear plugs and an eye mask insulating him from the real world. Eliot hikes an eyebrow as he passes, wondering how the other man can leave himself so utterly defenseless. 

The lights are off in the hotel room, but enough filters in through the blinds that he can see where he's going. His bare feet are soundless against the plush carpet. He pauses outside the bathroom door to listen, not really sure what he's expecting to hear but it isn't a stifled groan of pain that puts him instantly on edge. 

He taps his fingers against the door, leaning close before he speaks. "Parker? What's going on?" 

"I'm fine," she says but there's a layer of strain in her voice that belies her words. "Go back to bed."

He almost does, stopping the impulse at the last second. Don't add this to the list of things you're going to hell for, boy, he thinks and gives the door a gentle push. If she's hurt, he's the only one of the team with any actual medical training which means he needs to know so he can do something about it. 

She's sitting with her back to the bath, knees drawn up, arms wrapped tightly around them. Hardison's laptop bag is on the floor next to her and Eliot gets another prickle of unease. It doubles as a secondary first aid kit, because it's usually wherever the hacker is, stocked with the basics like bandages and painkillers. He's also pretty sure they used the last supplies from it earlier in the day, and he hasn't had a chance to refill it. 

"Darlin', are you hurt?" Eliot asks, and sits down carefully next to her. There's a lamp above the sink and he stretches up to click it on, feeling the pull in the muscles in his shoulder. 

"No… not hurt," Parker says, but she's even paler than normal, face drawn, and as he watches, another spasm of pain washes over her, tightening her lips into a thin line. 

"Then what's going on?" he asks, softly, and scooches over a tiny bit so their shoulders are touching. "I might be able to help, if you'll tell me." 

She turns, carefully, to face him, eyes darting over the bruising on his face, his arm, the tape and dressing peeking out of the raggy t-shirt he'd worn to bed. "You'll think I'm being a sissy," she says eventually. 

It's cold, in the bathroom and he wants his nice warm bed again, even though he knows he won't get back to sleep. "Dammit, Parker," he growls, softly and bumps her with his shoulder. "Spit it out, already." 

"I have really bad cramps," she blurts out, not really sure what to expect. Disgust, like her first boyfriend? Embarrassment? Anger, for waking him over she's old enough to deal with herself? 

To her surprise, he just quirks an eyebrow at her and sighs. "You couldn't have said that before I sat down?" he grumbles, but there's no heat in it. "Come on, I have some stuff in my duffle that'll probably help." 

He bites the inside of his lip as he stands, holding back a heartfelt groan, and mentally runs through his private stash of medical supplies. He has both heat and ice packs and a range of drugs. 

The bed creaks a little when he sits down, dragging the duffle up onto the mattress next to him. 

Parker stands at the end of the bed and even at that distance, he can see her shivering. She's wearing flannel pjs with bunnies on, but they're not helping much. It's cold in the hotel, even colder outside. It had started to snow just as they made it back which is why they'd decided to stay the night. 

He glances at her, licks his lips before he speaks. "Do you want to lay down?" The thought of sending her back to the girl's room makes him uneasy. 

"Do you mind?" she asks softly, and he knows if he looks up, she'll be making herself small. The urge to find out who hurt her and smash their teeth down their throat is a familiar one, and he swallows it down. 

"Wouldn't have offered if I did," he says and goes back to fishing in the bag, pulling out an adhesive heat patch. He uses them, occasionally, on cold mornings when he wakes up aching, stiff and sore. 

She takes it, peeling the wrapper and sticking it in place on her lower back before curling up in the bed. It's a king, so there's plenty of room. 

He pulls out the tub of drugs he always carries. Most have been legitimately prescribed to him at some point, but there are others that have found their way into his stash by less law abiding means. He finds the pills he wants and pops one out, breaking it in half. It's a painkiller and muscle relaxant combination and he's pretty sure it'll help. A full pill wipes him out which is why he rarely takes them, so yes pretty sure that half will at least let her get some sleep. 

"Have you taken anything since we got back?" he asks, because the last thing he wants to do is overdose her. 

"No, it was okay earlier," she says, curling one arm under the pillow. "How do you feel?" 

He grunts. "Like I got clipped by a car," he says and passes her the pill along with a bottle of water. 

She eyes it, then pops it in her mouth, swallowing it and he marvels in the implied trust in that. If their situations were reversed, he's pretty sure he wouldn't have been able to do the same. 

"Eliot," she says, and something in her voice catches his attention so he turns, meeting her eyes. "Take the other half." She offers the water bottle and he takes it, knowing that she probably has a point if he doesn't want to spend the morning sore and stiff and miserable. Half a pill is a low dose for him but he swallows it anyway, then stands, intending to sack out on the sofa until a more reasonable hour when he can get up and scrounge for breakfast. 

"Stay?" she asks, softly and without looking at him, like it's the hardest question she's ever had to utter. 

He wants to say no, wants to stand and walk away, but he can't deny the look in her eyes, like she's already expecting the worst. He might be a bastard but he's never deliberately hurt any of his team and he's not about to start now. He eases under the comforter, shifting a bit until he finds a spot that's comfortable for both his back and his ribs. 

"Thank you, Eliot," she whispers, reaching over to rest her fingers on the inside of his wrist. 

"Anytime, Parker," he says, but she's already asleep. 

[mymidsummersunshine]

Some game day grzork for ya!

CW for wisdom tooth surgery and mentions of anesthesia, please let me know if I should add anything else!

—

Anders feels bad as he notices Matt’s leg bouncing rapidly. They’re in the waiting room at the hospital waiting for him to be called in for his wisdom tooth surgery. He’s been nervous about it for weeks, and Anders wishes there was anything more he could do to ease some of that anxiety. He reaches over to grab his hand, and Matt looks up at him.

“You okay, love?” he asks quietly.

Matt nods. “Just nervous.”

“Hmm. I’m sorry.” Matt’s stopped bouncing his leg, but he’s still biting his lip, so Anders decides to keep talking to him. “You know, I had mine taken out a few years ago, and it really wasn’t that bad.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah. I mean, I was sore for a day or so, but overall it was fine.”

“Oh.” Matt takes a deep breath. “What about the anesthesia? I’m so afraid I’m gonna, like, accidentally confess some deep dark secret or something.”

“Do you have any deep dark secrets?” Anders has to ask.

“Not that I can think of, but what if I suddenly remember one?”

Anders laughs softly. “I don’t think that’s gonna happen, love. If it helps, I was completely aware of everything I was saying the whole time, I was just super emotional.”

“Hmm. That does help.” He takes another deep breath, so Anders squeezes his hand.

“And if you do, I promise I won’t take video of you.”

Matt punches his shoulder.

A nurse comes out of the door. “Matthew, uh, Grz- Gr-” they struggle with the last name, and Matt just sighs.

“That’s me.”

He stands up, and Anders squeezes his hand again. “Good luck,” he tells him.

“Thanks, honey.” He follows the nurse back through the door, and Anders settles back into his chair.

It’s a pretty short procedure, only about 45 minutes, so Anders spends the time alternating between watching the news on the TV and trying to beat the next level in his puzzle game on his phone. He looks up when another nurse comes out of the back.

“You’re here with Matt G?” they ask, and Anders nods. “He’s all set, do you want to come back?”

“Yeah.” Anders stands up and follows them through the door and down the hall to a recovery room. “How’s he doing?” he asks.

“He’s good, he’s in pain but that’s expected. We’ve given him some pain medication so that should kick in soon. He was asking for you.”

“He was?” Anders asks, and the nurse nods, mumbling something about young love.

They open the door to the room, where Matt is sitting in the chair and another nurse is changing the bandage on his arm from the anesthesia. His cheeks are very swollen and he’s holding an ice pack on one side. He looks up at Anders with tears in his eyes when he hears him, reaching out to him once the nurse is done, so Anders crosses the room to take his hand.

“Hey, love, how are you feeling?” Anders asks.

Matt makes a noise of pain. “Anders,” he says instead of answering the question.

“I’m right here, love.”

“I love you so much.”

Anders smiles at him. “I know you do. I love you, too.”

The nurses give them (well, mostly Anders, Matt’s still waking up) the run-down of what they should be doing at home to take care of him, then once Matt is stable on his feet, send them to check out and head home. Anders guides him to the elevator to the parking garage, then into the passenger seat of his car, where he leans his head against the window as soon as the door is shut. Anders gets into the driver's seat and starts the engine.

“How are you doing, love?” he asks as he backs out of the space.

“Starving,” Matt says, and, oh yeah, he hasn’t been able to eat anything in over 12 hours.

“Do you want to stop and get something? Or do you just want to go home and eat there?”

“I want a cheeseburger.”

Anders has to stop himself from laughing out loud. “I’m not sure that’s the best idea right now. How about a milkshake?”

Matt contemplates for a minute. “Okay,” he says eventually.

Anders turns off the highway and drives to the Five Guys, then pulls into a space and puts the car in park. But before he can even unbuckle his seatbelt, he hears Matt sniffle, and looks over to see he’s crying again.

“What’s wrong?” he asks.

“I don’t want people to look at me. They’re gonna judge me because my mouth is all... weird.”

“Your mouth is not all weird, you just had surgery. Plus I wasn’t gonna make you go inside, love. You can stay in the car if you want.”

He sniffles again. “Okay.”

Anders reaches over and rubs his shoulder. “What flavor do you want?”

“Chocolate, please.”

“Okay. I’ll be right back, I’ll leave the car running for you.”

“Thank you. I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

Anders goes inside and gets in line to order them each a milkshake. He contemplates getting something for lunch for himself, he’s getting pretty hungry too, but he knows Matt is gonna be really mad at him if Anders gets a burger and he can’t have one, so he doesn’t. He orders the chocolate milkshake for Matt and a strawberry one for himself, then once they’re made, heads back to the car.

Matt seems startled when Anders opens the door, he must have been falling back asleep, but he smiles when Anders hands him the milkshake and gives him a quiet “thanks.” Anders drives them the short distance home, then helps Matt out of the car and up the stairs to their apartment. Matt goes straight into the bedroom to take a nap, and after Anders makes sure he’s all set, leaving a glass of water on his bedside table and giving him a kiss on the forehead, he heads back into the kitchen to finally get some lunch.

A couple hours later, Matt makes his way out of the bedroom, looking slightly more awake and a lot less swollen.

“Hey, love,” Anders says as Matt sits down next to him on the couch. “How are you feeling?”

“Sore,” Matt says. “But I think the anesthesia has worn off.”

“That’s good.”

Matt reaches up a hand to massage his cheek.

“Are you still numb at all?” Anders asks, but Matt gives him a knowing look.

“You just want to know when you can kiss me again.”

Anders blushes slightly at the (albeit truthful) accusation. “Maybe. I like kissing you.”

Now Matt’s blushing, too. “And I like it when you kiss me, too. But it hurts still, so not yet.”

“Do you need some more Advil? The doctor said four hours, I think it’s been more than that.”

“Yeah.” Matt stands up to go get the pills, then comes back to the couch once he takes them.

“I am getting kind of hungry,” he says after a few minutes.

Anders grins. “You still want a cheeseburger?” he teases.

Matt shoves his shoulder gently. “Shut up! God, I was really out of it earlier.” He shakes his head. “I mean, I’d love a cheeseburger, but that requires a lot of chewing.”

Anders nods, still smiling amusedly. “Maybe tomorrow.”

“Do we have any mac n cheese?”

“We do, I made sure to stock up.”

“You’re the best.”

They both stand up and make their way into the kitchen, where Anders starts boiling the water before sitting down at the table across from Matt.

“Thank you for the milkshake earlier, by the way,” Matt says. “It was delicious.”

“Oh, you do remember that? You were half asleep the whole ride home so I wasn’t sure if you would.”

“No, I remember.”

“What else do you remember?”

Matt shrugs. “I mean, it wasn’t actually that bad, you were right. They told me it would pinch a bit when they put the anesthesia in and then I’d be out in ten seconds, and that’s exactly what happened. I remember sorta feeling like I was floating through time, if that makes sense? That might have been a dream, I dunno. And then I woke up and it was over.”

“Huh.”

“I remember them bringing me into the other room and giving me an ice pack, I think they were asking me questions but I’m not really sure, I was still waking up. I just remember really wanting you to be there, I didn’t like being alone with all them, as nice as they were.” He looks down at the table.

Anders reaches across the table to take his hand. “I’m here, love,” he promises. “The nurse did say you were asking for me when they brought me back.”

Matt’s face flushes. “I couldn’t help it, I just love you a lot, okay?”

“Good, because I love you a lot, too.”

Matt looks up and smiles at him, and Anders smiles right back, rubbing his thumb on the back of his hand, but it doesn’t take long for Matt to speak up again.

“You want to kiss me so bad right now, don’t you,” he says. It’s not a question, so Anders doesn’t give him an answer.

“Forehead kiss?” he asks instead as a compromise, and Matt just laughs.

“Okay.”

Anders stands up and moves around the table to kiss him right at the top of his forehead, then goes back to the stove to finish making the macaroni. He divides it into two bowls and brings them back to the table, where Matt quietly thanks him before taking a bite. His expression is pained as he slowly chews it.

“You okay?” Anders asks.

Matt nods. “Chewing is hard. I’m glad I didn’t try to eat a cheeseburger.”

“Is this okay, though? I can make something else.”

“No, no, this is fine, it might just take me awhile.”

“Okay. Let me know.”

Anders finishes first and cleans up while Matt finishes his own bowl, then they make their way back into the living room. Matt gets himself an ice pack before joining Anders on the couch, lying down across it with his feet in his lap, while Anders turns on the TV to try and find something to watch, and they end up going to bed shortly after.

The next morning, Matt feels a lot better, and he finally gets his cheeseburger for lunch.

[aenwoedbeannaa]

Forest Fires || Geralt x Reader || Pt. 8

Summary: Now that you’ve made it to the Temple of Melitele, the hunt for the Princess Cirilla begins—with an unlikely team at its head: A Witcher, two and a half sorceresses, one Huntress, and a Priestess of Melitele.

Word Count: 2,645

Warning(s): None for this chapter.

A/N: Alright, so I know this chapter is a lot of setting up for the next few chapters, but I actually really had fun writing it, so I hope you all enjoy it!

If you enjoy my work and want to check out more of it, you can check out my masterlist, and if you’d like to be added to any of my taglists, comment or message me and I would be happy to add you 😊. Also, I do have a ko-fi page now, and I would really appreciate if anyone is able to give a little; it would really help me out with this whole transitioning careers and still pay off medical bills thing. But of course, the best way y’all support me is just by reading and sharing my work. I appreciate it more than I can say. 

Part 1 || Part 2 || Part 3 ||  Part 4 || Part 5 || Part 6 || Part 7

The Hunt Begins

You are surprised when you wake up to early morning light filtering through the windows; it had been afternoon. You don’t even remember the last time you’d slept so long. There was always so much to do back at the cottage—there was never time. Well, that, and the fact that even hunting all day and then taking care of everything else when you got home was less exhausting than opening one single damn portal. All those years of being a sorceress—of it being your entire identity—and you’d still forgotten how damn exhausting using magic truly is.

You sigh, kicking back the covers. Even with the evening damp still lingering in the air, you feel too warm. The Witcher laying beside you is likely contributing to that factor, but you wouldn’t dream of kicking him away. For some reason, you are surprised that he is there, even though you realistically shouldn’t be. Perhaps you just imagined him staying up all night planning things while you were lazily sleeping away, but you are happy to see that he is sleeping. You have no idea what the future will bring, but you are certain that you’ll all need the rest.

“Good morning.” The Witcher’s soft, low morning voice pulls you from your thoughts. You smile slightly, turning to look at him, eyes drinking in the familiar sight of the white haired Geralt of Rivia. His hair is pulled loose, and his eyes are heavy-lidded and sleepy. You’ll never get enough of the sight, you’ve decided.

“Morning,” you mumble back. You are frustrated at the way your voice sounds; all tired and scratchy and haggard. While you certainly feel much better than you did the previous day, your body is still catching up.

“Did you sleep well?” Geralt asks, his amber eyes all warm and full of concern. You are simultaneously touched and annoyed by it. Though, you suppose, there are worse things than someone being concerned for you.

You nod, blinking slowly. “Yes. I hardly remember falling asleep at all.” You’ll have to remember to thank Yennefer later. The tea must have worked wonders. You don’t remember waking up covered in sweat, trapped within a nightmare, either. Finally, you ask, “What time did you go to sleep, Witcher?”

“Late,” he grumbles a response. You raise your eyebrows in a question, which he picks up on right away. “We’re not the only ones trying to track down the girl.” Obviously.

The girl. You sigh at the use of the phrase, even though you couldn’t bring yourself to call her anything else.

“Do we know who else?” You ask, pushing yourself up into a sitting position but making no move to actually get out of bed. But you’re already prattling off possibilities before he can answer you, “Nilfgaard, obviously. And I bet the bounty on her head is pretty high. I’m sure the elves are looking, too. Lara Dorren’s blood and all that.”

Geralt just nods gravely, confirming your suspicions. “There’s also a mage,” he adds, “Vigelfortz.” You don’t bother to ask how he is certain of this specific information. Yennefer would know, you suppose, even if she had turned away from the Brotherhood years ago like you had.

“Nilfgaard wants a marriage with the blood heir to the Cintran throne. The bounty hunters just want money from the highest bidder—which I’m guessing is also Nilfgaard. The elves want Dol Blathanna back the way it was… So who is this mage working for?” Honestly, it was too early to be having this conversation, but you brain won’t let you focus on anything else.

“That’s the thing,” Geralt mutters, lifting a hand to play with the ends of your hair idly as he continues, “Seems like he’s working for himself. Yennefer is with the Brotherhood—Vigelfortz cut ties a few weeks before Nilfgaard sacked Cintra.”

You can already feel a headache coming on. None of it makes any sense—you only remember Vigelfortz from your late days at Aretuza. He hadn’t stood out much then. He was just another mage—not even a court mage, if you remember correctly. You look at Geralt, “He used to study antiquities, old civilizations and buried secrets or whatever.”

“Buried secrets?” Geralt asks, propping himself up on his elbows. Your eyes scan his scarred chest for a moment before finally meeting his eyes.

Definitely not the right time, you tell yourself.

“Yeah—he’d work on archeological digs and things.” The memories start to flow back faster than you expected them to. “And he taught at Ban Ard,” you add. “Probably about the same subjects.” Your mind is spinning at a dizzying speed. What the hell would a scholar want with the girl?

And then it snaps into place.

“The gir—Cirilla is supposed to have the blood of Lara Dorren.” Geralt looks at you, confused, as if he is still trying to catch up. “An ancient bloodline that supposedly possesses great power.” To be honest, you’d thought the whole thing was bullshit; some made up fairy tale. It might be just that; but to someone like Vigelfortz, you are certain that it isn’t.

You watch Geralt’s face harden as realization washes over him, “So he’s just trying to collect another ancient secret.” His words are tinged with the same disgust that you feel. It hurts, thinking about the young girl being pursued by several parties, all wanting someone from her—wanting something she may or may not have and certainly didn’t ask for.

“Fucking mages,” you hiss, voice dripping with venom. Granted, this was just one mage and however many worked with him. Though, you are certain the Brotherhood has its own reasons for hunting down the girl. If you know one thing, it is that the Brotherhood hardly does anything out of good will.

“Treating a human like a fucking old vase,” the Witcher’s warm amber eyes have turned cold as he stares off toward the window.

Silence settles over the two of you for a moment, broken only by the sounds of people speaking outside and the wind blowing through the open windows. When you saved the Witcher’s life in the woods that day, you had not expected this—some crazy suicide mission across the Continent to find a missing princess and, what, save her from the grasps of evil?

“Maybe Yenna’s found something,” you say, mostly just to fill the empty space. If the woman you reunited with yesterday is anything like her past self at Aretuza, it was unlikely she’d slept at all. Once she was focused on something, there was no deterring her for any reason. “She’d know more about Vigelfortz than me. I haven’t had contact with the Brotherhood since before I left Nilfgaard.”

And now, the thought of facing them again filled you with dread. You’d failed your duties as a court mage, failed to protect the girl when you had the chance, and failed to report to the Brotherhood about any of it—letting them think you were dead for the last eleven years.

You stand up and stretch, grimacing at how sore your muscles are for no particular reason, and also at the fact that you are still wearing yesterday’s clothes. “Before we go ask, though, I need to bathe.”

“No time,” Geralt grumbles, glancing out the window at the sky. “We’re to meet down in the hall at seven.”

You huff, running a hand through your tangled hair and looking down at your filthy clothes.

“They brought up clean clothes.” Geralt points to a neat little pile folded atop one of the old dressers. You sigh, as you pad over to the dresser, wishing you���d have woken up an hour earlier. You’d like nothing more than to scrub all of the last few days off of you. But, you suppose, clean clothes will have to do for now. Thankfully, upon further observation you see that they are not much different from the clothes you were already wearing.

You’re the soft material of a shirt rumple in your fingertips, studying it for a moment before offering Geralt a small smile “At least they aren’t making me dress like a nun.”

You are shocked by the soft seriousness in Geralt’s gaze as he looks at you for a moment before finally saying, “You’d look beautiful in anything.”  

Despite the circumstances, the response still makes color rise in your cheeks. You offer him a soft smile, before deciding to finally slip out of your clothes and pull them on. You don’t bother to go behind the dressing screen—it’s not as if Geralt hasn’t seen all of you already.

Just as you are tucking the loose tunic into the high waisted, you feel Geralt creep up behind you, wrapping a strong arm around your middle. You sigh, tilting your head back to rest against his shoulder as he presses his lips to the place where your shoulder meets your neck. The kiss is slow and careful, as if the two of you have all the time in the world to just stay in this room with one another.

Unfortunately, you don’t.

Geralt gives you a small squeeze as he presses his lips to the side of your forehead with gentleness that conveys an unspoken promise—everything will be okay. We’ll figure this out. We’ll do what must be done. We’ll live.

At least, those are the thoughts that flood your mind, even if you don’t quite believe them. It seems a little foolish for the two of you, Yennefer, and whoever else is involved in this particular search party to go up against all of those others; especially the Nilfgaardian Empire. It seems stupid for anyone to go after Nilfgaard—and yet here you are.

***

Despite the fact that hunger had been absolutely clawing at your stomach for some time now, you are finding it difficult to make yourself do something as mundane as chew and swallow. The food looks and smells delicious, but everything seems to turn to ash in your mouth.

The table, though quite large, is empty save for yourself, Geralt, Yennefer, and the woman that you’d been introduced to a half hour before—Mother Nenneke. You can’t help but feel dread creep up on you even stronger as you pick up the mug of hot coffee with fresh cream and swallow it down. There are entire armies looking for Cirilla—not to mention scary mages and at least a few bounty hunters. All of those people, and four of you.

“Triss Merrigold has also promised aid,” Yennefer says, cutting into the silence. You catch yourself wondering at how it was as if she’d read your thoughts for more than a few seconds before you remember that she likely is.

You’d read Geralt’s mind yesterday, for only a moment, and yet you’d forgotten that many sorceresses did that all the time. You didn’t tend to do so much—mostly because you were afraid of what you’d find in those thoughts. It wasn’t as if you were well-respected in any circles; you’d rather not hear about it.

Mechanically, you put up the magical barriers they’d taught you about all those years ago, a wall around your thoughts. And yet, when you do, you do not feel anything pushing against the barrier. Perhaps she hadn’t been reading your mind, after all.

“So that brings the grand total to five.” The worried words slip out of your mouth before you can stop them, drawing three pairs of eyes to you. You chew on your bottom lip nervously.

“Less people means less of a chance of someone turning on us or letting something slip,” Geralt points out, in the middle of devouring some sort of omelet.

“Exactly,” Yennefer remarks.

“Three sorceresses, a Priestess, and a Witcher—seems like a find team to me.” Mother Nenneke is much warmer than you’d imagined. She even says the words with a small grin. It just… was not how you imagined a Priestess to be.

“Two and a half sorceresses,” you mumble, taking another large sip of your coffee.

Yennefer laughs, tilting her head back as she does so. “Oh, Y/N, you act as if you’d really died.”

You find yourself smiling lightly as you look back at the raven-haired sorceress, shrugging. “I may not have died, but I certainly haven’t used magic,” you sigh. Brief flashes of the previous afternoon threaten to bubble to the surface of your mind, but you push the thoughts down.

“Alright, then we’ve got two and a half sorceresses, one archer, a Priestess, and Witcher,” Geralt says, a sly grin also appearing on his face. “Even better.”

You suppose it is true—you learned to hunt silently and efficiently. Though the thought makes your stomach turn, you suppose those skills would be equally useful against people… And perhaps better. As evidenced by the fact that you literally had everyone convinced you were dead, it was a lot less… attention grabbing.

Despite feeling relatively reassured by this, you still find yourself anxiously drumming your fingers on the table.

“But how do we even know where to start?”

At least you are feeling more comfortable, so talking doesn’t make your throat want to close anymore.

Your eyes land on Yenna first, for some reason expecting that she was the one who had the answer—but it is Mother Nenneke that smiles. A slow, almost mischievous smile that has you watching with bated breath, waiting to hear what she is about to say. You can tell by the gleam in her eye that it is important.

“We ask Iola the First.”

Geralt’s eyebrows tick up in recognition, and Yennefer nods gravely. You, on the other hand, have no idea who this, apparently very impressive, woman is. That fact is evident on your face, but the other simply carry on with their conversation, earning an annoyed glance in Geralt’s direction from you.

“Doesn’t she need something that belongs to Princess Cirilla? If she’s going to… you know?” Geralt asks, eyes narrowed in thought as he looks intently at Mother Nenneke.

“Yes,” Yennefer cuts in, “And we’ve got it.”

“What is it?” You are surprised at how quickly the words slip out, and how eager you are to learn exactly what it is. Some of your annoyance has melted away, as you’ve figured out at least something about the mysterious Iola the First. She must have some sort of visions—you’ve heard stories of Priestesses being gifted with things like this. Though, you have to admit, you thought it was mostly bullshit. But if Yennefer and Geralt both trust her, you are suddenly finding yourself putting more stock into the rumors.

Yennefer turns, gingerly pickup up a green cloak that you hadn’t noticed draped over the high back of the chair next to her. You don’t bother to ask how they know its hers—you suppose that isn’t important, but Geralt seems more curious than you yourself are, because he asks precisely that.

“She was seen at two refugee camps following the attack on Cintra, always wearing this cloak.” You can’t seem to take your eyes from it, extremely drawn to the clearly very expensive and well-made cloak.

“The cloak was found in the forest, just outside of Brokolin,” Yen continues, “And Triss confirmed with the dryads that Cirilla had been there and stayed with them for a time.”

Everyone at the table has their eyes thoroughly fixated on the cloak in Yennefer’s hands, likely all thinking the same thing—there is no sign of blood on the cloak, meaning the chance that she is alive is quite likely. Though, the thought that the girl is now out wandering without even a cloak to keep her warm makes your chest tighten uncomfortably.

It is Geralt who finally breaks the silence, turning his attention to Mother Nenneke.

“Right,” he clears his throat, “Let’s go speak with Iola.”

***

To be continued.

 Taglist:  @fairytale07 @geeksareunique @jesseswartzwelder @haru-ririchiyo @unnamedmaincharacter @lazilyscentedwerewolf  @valkyriepuff @dark-night-sky-99 @pantrashtic @lilred254 @cilorawr@blackravena​ @keithseabrook27 @danielarlington @salmonbutter @godsaverosemary  @little-miss-emmalie @hookahpop @ayamenimthiriel @toenailclippingz @ultrahviolent @afterthenightprevails @kathhdd​ @squirrel-saloli @afittingdistraction @holyhumorliteraturelight @curlyhairedandconfused @nikolanna​ @dontforgetthepieh​ @superconfusedandreadytorumble​ @keithseabrook27​ @p3nny4urth0ught5​ @sinnamon-bunn​ @sallyp-53​ @superconfusedandreadytorumble​

[cozywritings]

Stitches ch5: Be Alright

It was finally Friday. The one day of the week that you didn’t have classes, so you slept in, your alarm clock read 10:36 when you looked over. Reaching for your phone you noticed a screen full of notifications, mostly from Emily talking about some cute guy in her anatomy class. Until you caught sight of a text you weren’t too surprised to see.

McDreamy: Good morning honey 😊 I’ve got my 4 hour lecture today and then I’m headed off to stay at Brian’s for the night. Meet me before I leave for enough kisses to last the evening?

To McDreamy: I’ll be waiting.

After pressing send, you got up and took a shower, washing off the week and just taking some time to relax before you started studying for the next week of lessons.

You’ve decided that the best thing about your dorm, besides your boyfriend being across the hall, was the fact that you had your own bathroom in your room. You could shower as long as you wanted, play music as you showered, and you didn’t have to worry about if you forgot a towel or your clothes.

As soon as you stepped into the hot water, you let out a sigh. The hot water feeling absolutely amazing, and you knew it would relax your muscles from the first week stress. Although it was gonna be pretty boring this weekend without Shawn there, you needed to catch up on the notes you missed on Monday during proff com. So you knew it was probably best that he wasn’t here.

The longer you were in the shower, the better you felt. Until you realised it was now noon and you had yet to eat. So you shut off the water, wrapped yourself in a towel and walked out to get dressed. All the while thinking about what you wanted from the buffet in the cafeteria next door.

After your lunch of mac and cheese and a sandwich, you found yourself packing up your backpack to move across the hall. Sure you had your own desk, but Shawn’s was so much nicer and his blackout curtains made you less stressed when you were in a deep study.

Walking into Shawn’s room, you looked around at the clothes on the floor and the unmade bed and sighed. So, you dropped your bag on the desk and took a few minutes to tidy up the room for him. When you were satisfied with your work, you kicked off your sneakers and got to work on your notes, taking Shawn’s notebook from the drawer and copying everything you missed from that first day.

It was a lot of important due dates and when the chapters should be read. Honestly, you weren’t missing much, but you still found it important to have them in your notebook to help you remember them.

Around 2:30, you heard the doorknob jiggle, and your smile widened. Half an hour ago you decided to move to the bed to read your chapters and take notes. When Shawn walked in, he was shocked to find you nestled into his bed with your Sociology textbook in your lap. He was quick to drop his backpack and collapse on top of you, pressing a few kisses to your jaw.

“This is a nice surprise.” He smiled against your neck.

“Your room seemed like the better study option.” You shrugged, running your fingers through his curls and scratching at his scalp. When he let out an involuntary moan you giggled, “feels good Bub?” He nodded, wrapping his arms around your waist and rubbing his thumbs along your lower back.

You closed your eyes at the feeling. The two of you laid there in silence for a few minutes before Shawn said, “Maybe I’ll skip Brian’s and stay here to do this instead.”

You let out a soft laugh, “No you’ve gotta go have guy time. You’ve been with me almost every day this week, you need to see your friends.” He shook his head.

“No.” He leaned back to show you the cutest pout you’d ever seen.

“Shawn. Go out and have fun. I’m probably going to just catch up on project runway and maybe go see the movie in the planetarium with Em later tonight.” He gave you a huge smile, glad you were making good of your Friday night, considering every other night this week you were stressing over classes.

“What movie are they showing?” He mumbled, pressing his face into your neck again. Damn, he was making this really hard to tell him to go to Brian’s.

Threading your fingers into his hair and massaging his head you told him about your plans. “It’s called Abduction. It’s a Taylor Lautner movie. I’ve seen it before, but Emily hasn’t seen it yet so I told her I’d see it with her. After that I’ll probably just come back here and do some more reading.”

You felt him nod, curls tickling your neck. “Back to your dorm or mine?

You lightly smacked his shoulder. “Like I’m gonna come sleep in your empty bed. You’re crazy.” He just shrugged.

“I don’t see why not. The D.A’s never check on the upper classmen and it’s not like you’re sleeping with me. You’re just in my bed.” The idea was really nice. The bed smelled like him, and you were pretty sure that his TV was bigger than yours.

Biting your lip, you gave the idea a pretty good thought. “I’ll think about it.” He looked up at you and smiled, leaving a kiss to your chin.

---

“What do you mean you’re probably gonna sleep in his bed alone!” Emily yelled over a mouth full of pizza as the two of you sat in her dorm.

You just smiled at her. “He’s staying at Brian’s tonight and offered me to stay in his room. I thought it was cute.” A blush rising on your cheeks. The longer you thought about it, the more you wanted to.

Emily let out an exaggerated groan. “You two are disgustingly cute. But anyways. Do you want the details on Eric?” Eric was the guy from her class that she felt compelled to text you about during her lecture. “Well he’s super tall, and has these gorgeous blue eyes. He’s obviously a frequent gym goer. Oh! And he’s 21.” It was so cute to watch her fawn over him, because you’re positive that’s what you look like talking about Shawn. “But also, there’s this girl, Ashley, god she’s so fucking cute. But I don’t know if she’s into girls. So I’ll probably never pursue that one.”

You looked at her a bit shocked. “Em, I didn’t know you were bi.” She looked down quickly, her cheeks pink and eyes wide. “No, no babe it’s okay. I don’t care, I just didn’t know. You didn’t mention it to me before.”

She shrugged, giving you a lazy smile. “I just don’t feel like people believe it’s a thing. And it’s not something I just blurt out. ‘Oh yeah, I love both’” you just smiled at her.

“Well I know a girl in my accounting class that’s flawless and she’s gay, if you wanna know about her.” You swore you’d never seen anyone so happy in your life.

The two of you spent almost 3 hours just gossiping until the conversation got serious. “So, um, I was wondering how you were doing after the whole ex thing? Are you feeling any better since then?” She asked softly.

“It’s okay. He’s actually in my speech class, but so is Shawn so I’m pretty safe. He sits right next to me and holds my hand and stuff. Actually, I have a meeting with an on campus mental health counsellor next week. So I’m going to get back on track soon.” Without any warning, Emily leaned over and gave you the biggest hug.

“I’m so fucking proud of you.” She sighed, rubbing you back and playing with the ends of your hair.

---

Now settled back into your own room, you felt like something was missing. Your room was too quiet, even with Netflix playing some show in the background, and your bed seemed a lot colder than the one across the hallway. And it wasn’t because that one had a heated blanket nestled in the sheets.

Looking over at the clock, you smiled, 11:48. So you gathered your things: your charger, notebooks, and a pair of fuzzy socks, and made your way to Shawn’s room

The room was warm and dark, the lamp having been left on from earlier, was the only source of light. Your head was throbbing due to the laughing you’d done with Emily and the lack of actual sleep you’d been getting throughout the week, but knowing Shawn, he had a stash of medications somewhere. So you set down your things on the bed and searched the desk for a medicine drawer. Instead, what you found was a notebook with all the campus mental health counsellors written down. Next to eat name was a note.

-Dr. Moore: nice but not the right expertise

-Dr. Woodell: extremely kind, specializes in PTSD and rape victims

-Dr. Garcia: too harsh- probably not right for her

-Dr. Casey: way too mean, seems very unforgiving of personal issues- wrong specialisation

-Dr. Hendrix: very nice, another rape victim spec., also does depression and anxiety. (Top choice)

-Dr. Evans: see above note, but add that he’s the only male option (maybe not a good choice)

By the time you’d gotten to the bottom of the page, you were crying profusely. He had gone in and done research on the possible therapists you’d be seeing. He took the time to look into each option and make notes. But you couldn’t let him know you’d found it, so you put it back, opening the drawer labeled “meds”. How you didn’t see it before, you have no idea. So you took two Advil and moved back to the bed, turning on the heating blanket and flipping through the movies on Shawn’s amazon prime account.

It was almost 10am when Shawn opened the door to his room, he’d gotten maybe 4 hours of sleep at Brian’s. They spent all night playing video games, having a few drinks, and just talking about life. However, you were on his mind the whole time. He was hoping you were having a good time and wondering if you’d gone back to your own room.

Somewhere in the night, you had curled completely into the sheets, your body being covered by pillows and the huge blue comforter on the bed. So it was no surprise that Shawn didn’t see you when he walked in. Or when he plopped down on the bed. It wasn’t until he went to pull the blanket back that he noticed your small frame enveloped in the flannel blanket that was still radiating head. Instead of waking you, he just kicked off his sneakers and curled around you, a sleepy smile on his face.

The feeling of something other than the blanket around you startled you, and your eyes flew open in panic. That is, until you noticed that sparrow tattoo you loved resting on the bed. “Shawn?” You asked, not sure if he was awake.

“Shhh I’m sleeping.” He mumbled into the back of your neck, causing you to laugh.

“Can you at least let me roll over so I can see my boyfriend?” you smiled, trying you roll onto your other side.

With a groan and a kiss to the top of your head, he backed away slightly, allowing you to roll over and wrap your arms around his neck. “Wasn’t expecting you to take my offer. I’m glad you did though, I like seeing you comfortable in my room. Please stay?? My head hurts and I wanna love on you.” You responded by scratching at his scalp like you did the day before.

Once again, he let out a sigh, eyes closing as he nosed along the column of your throat. When your hand slid a little lower and rubbed the base of his neck he let out a soft moan. “You okay there Bub?” You giggled, your free hand being cradled in Shawn’s.

“Mhm. I’m fantastic.” He smiled, relaxing against your chest. “Just wanna stay like this all day. Didn’t sleep a lot last night.” You nodded, your lips pressing into his curls.

“We don’t have to do anything today. You can stay exactly where you are” he smiled, kissing along your shoulder as he wrapped himself around you.

And so you did. The day was spent right there in Shawn’s bed, cuddling, exchanging words of adoration, and plenty of kisses being shared. You were pretty sure that this was the best was the best thing to happen to you. That Shawn was the best thing to ever happen to you.

When it finally got dark, Shawn decided you two, more specifically you, needed to eat. So he called in Pizza Hut to be delivered to the dorm and, after learning it would be about an hour until the delivery driver got here, he settled on taking a shower, fearful he reeked of beer and whatever smell radiated from Brian’s apartment. “Shawn?” Your voice soft as you spoke. “Yeah babe?” He asked, closing the drawer full of shirts after he chose what he was gping to pt on after he was clean.

“Do you um, maybe want some company in there?” Your cheeks were a violent crimson when Shawn stuttered.

“A-are you sure?? That totally isn’t the reason I asked you to stay. You don’t have to do something you aren’t completely comfortable with. I mean- I’d love for you to, but you don’t have to if you’re not ready for something that intimate.”  With a soft nod, you started to unbutton your shirt. “Okay baby, okay. If this is what you want to do we can definitely do that. But let’s get into the bathroom and let me do this right. Okay?” You smiled, following him into the bathroom. He really was trying to make you as comfortable as possible.

With the shower water running, and the room filling up with steam, shawn kicked off his sweats, leaving him in his black boxers. Then he turned his attention to you, his fingers slowly unbuttoning your top for you. But his eyes stayed on your face, watching for any sign of panic. “Shawn, it’s okay. Really. I trust you, and I know you’ll be careful. I wouldn’t have asked to join you if I thought I was going to be uncomfortable” With that, he tugged the shirt off your shoulders, eyes following the fabric as it fell to the floor.

You took it upon yourself to shimmy out of your shorts and panties the same time Shawn rid himself of his boxers. So there you stood. Fully naked in front of the only other person who’s had the privilege of seeing you this way. “You look, so beautiful. I didn’t know you had a tattoo.” He smiled, staring at the flower on your hip.

“It was a congratulatory gift from a close friend. She took me to get it after my acceptance letter came it. I have a second one.” You stated, twisting your hips for him to see the black cat sitting on a crescent moon on the other side. “That one I got in an impulse, a Friday the 13th special.”

“I like them.” He mumbled, watching as you grabbed his hand and ran his fingers over the now healed skin. This was the first time he’s touched your naked body, and to be perfectly honest, he wanted to take you right then and there. But he knew his limits, and this right here was a huge deal for you. So he stepped forward and wrapped his arm around you. “I promise I’ll take such good care of you.”

The water felt amazing on your skin, it was the perfect temperature. Shawn stepped in behind you, blocking the water stream as he washed his curls. You had to admit, you’d seen Shawn shirtless before, but seeing him with soap running down his body was something different. You let your eyes travel a little lower, looking down at him. All of him. He looked bigger than Josh, and that worried you a little. But now wasn’t the time.

“Can I wash your hair?” He asked with his arm outstretched, a puddle of shampoo in his palm. “I’d really like that. Yeah.” You smiled, turning around and pressing your back against his chest, sighing at the feeling of his fingers massaging your scalp, occasionally rubbing out the knots in your neck, causing you to lean your head forward as the release of tension.

You let out a sigh at the feeling. “Babe, why are you so tense?” He asked after a few minutes of comfortable silence as the water rinsed out your hair.

You shrugged, “I’m not sure really. Maybe just all the stuff that happened this week. And I have the worlds worst posture when I sit, so I’m sure that doesn’t help.” You laughed, taking your fingers through your conditioner soaked hair.

“Do you mind?” He asked, placing his soap covered hands on your shoulders. You shook your head, curious as to what he was asking to do. You had to clamp down on your lower lip to stop yourself from straight up mewling at the feeling when he dug his fingers into your neck, his thumbs sliding along your upper back easily due to the soap.

“What the actual fuck did you just do?” You asked after you were able to speak again.

His thumbs still running along your shoulder blades, he simply responded, “Pressure points to relive tension. You should probably do that at least once a week if you want to stay out of any back pain in the future.” You noddd, keeping that in the back of your brain as he pressed a kiss to your neck. “Or you can come to me and I can do it for you. Ya know, to make sure it’s done right.”

You laughed, turning around to leave a kiss on his chest. Shawn was quick to wrap his arms around you and lift you up, looking at you for a sign to not do what he was about to do. Instead, you leaned in, wrapping your legs around his waist and stealing the first kiss.

Now dried off and in your “cute” pj’s, you sat on the bed stuffing your face with pizza while The Breakfast Club played softly on the tv. Shawn sat across from you, doing some reading on “nerves and the brain” or whatever the book was about. “Shawn?” He looked up, a grin plastered on his face. “Last night I was looking for some Advil for my headache and I accidentally came across a notebook.” Suddenly very nervous, you looked down at your nails. “And I saw that you did some research on the therapists on campus.”

His face paled. “Fuck. You um- you weren’t supposed to see that.” When he looked over at you, your smile calmed him down.

“I’m not mad Shawn. Actually it’s really sweet.” He reached over, closing the book to pull you into his lap.

“I just know that you wanted to see someone for a while and I wanted to make sure you were getting the best one. So I told them I was doing a paper on how they treated their patients and then I was gonna decide which one they should get you.”

You didn’t say anything. Just pressed a few lingering kisses on his jaw. “Thank you. It really means a lot to me. And thank you for everything you’ve done so far. I’ve never felt so loved and safe in my life.”

“Darling. You are loved and safe.”

[lovemesomesurveys]

A Random Survey Inspired By My Tweets Created by Guia from scyphozoan

1) How are you doing in this time of COVID19? Do you personally know anyone who is not taking COVID19 seriously? Well, now I’m a real hermit crab because I only leave the house literally once a month for my doctor appointments. Pre-Covid I spent most of my time at home, but I got out more compared to this. It’s been a stressful and scary time to say the least. However, a lot of people have been hit hard and seriously affected by this in different ways, so much more than me, and it’s heartbreaking. And yes, I have some cousins who aren’t taking it seriously at all. They’re still going out all the time, partying with large groups of people, and just going about life as normal. 

2) What do you think of TikTok? Have you jumped on it yet? Why or why not? I love TikTok. I don’t make them, but I watch a lot of it. There’s a real wholesome side to it that I really enjoy. 

3) What game have you gone back to playing or missed playing because of this time of self-quarantining? There hasn’t been any.

4) How internet-savvy are your parents? Can you think of time(s) when they surprised you with what they know (i.e. memes, platforms, emoji uses, etc.)? My dad has a Facebook, he browses and shops some online (though he often asks me to do it), and I think he watches YouTube, but that’s about it. He often asks my brother and I for help with something. In fact, I handle all his online billing for him. He’s not hip with memes and whatnot. I was surprised when he mentioned TikTok once haha. As for my mom, she’s a lot better at it. She has Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat. She likes to spend a lot of time watching videos on Facebook. She likes sending Snaps to her friends. She texts a lot and uses emojis and Bitmojis and all that. She’s familiar with memes and whatnot. She does her own online billing and shopping. She only asks for help with something now and then.

5) What is your favorite foreign cuisine? What is your favorite food/dish from that cuisine? Italian. I’m a pasta gal. I used to really love Mongolian BBQ, Chinese, and Mexican, but not as much anymore because a lot of what I liked was spicy and I can’t eat spicy foods anymore. :( Mongolian BBQ was my absolute favorite, but I used to load it up with spicy stuff and sauces. I still eat Mexican and Chinese, but it’s not the same. I miss adding hot sauce and hot chili oil to everything.

6) What is an electronic gadget that you’ve had for more than 5 years? Would you say it was worth your money? Do you plan on replacing it any time soon? My laptop, phone, and TV are all less than 5 years old. I do want to upgrade my phone because it’s the XR and in tech world that is considered old.

7) What TV show would you say you’ve re-watched more than two times? Are you re-watching anything now? I’ve seen all of Roseanne (its original run, not the reboot) and The Golden Girls numerous times. I started to re-watch Sister Sister recently.

8) Do you remember the moment when you started feeling alarmed by the development of the COVID19? How did your life change since? Back in March when the lockdown stuff started happening. That’s when shit got real. Like I mentioned earlier, I don’t go anywhere now except for my once a month doctor appointments.

9) What viral video/meme last made you furious or annoyed? Hm. I can’t think of one at the moment that made me furious or annoyed.

10) When was the last time you woke up feeling pumped and determined to have a great day? How did that day unfold for you? Uhhhh. I don’t think I’ve ever woken up feeling like that to be perfectly honest. Certainly not in the last few years. I’ve just never been like a super optimistic, positive person. Well, not when it comes to myself anyway. I am for other people. I don’t know, man. I don’t wake up feeling refreshed and ready to tackle the day. It’s definitely been the worst the past few years with my severe lack of energy and motivation, but even before. I did used to have more energy and I actually had motivation once upon a time, but.. I don’t know. It’s hard to explain. Like, I didn’t set out to have a bad day, but I wasn’t so... gung-ho either. Now I’m just grumpy and moody.

11) Do you use e-mail a lot at work? If so, what are your biggest e-mail pet peeves? If not, what mundane task do you do on a regular basis at work and what do you dislike about it? I don’t have a job.

12) What hobby or interest of your significant other do you have ZERO interest in? What about something you actually think might be fun or something you actually picked up thanks to them? If you don’t have an SO, you can think of a relative or friend as an example instead. My dad is obsessed with sports, which I have zero interest in.

13) Do you use Uber? If so, how often do you use it or cabs in general? Have you ever had an awkward moment with a cab driver? I’ve only used Uber a few times and it was during my vacation at the start of this year. I’ve only taken a cab a few times as well. 

14) If you are employed, what would you say are the best and worst parts of your company’s culture. If you don’t work, what would you say is the busiest part of your day? I don’t have a busiest part of my day, I do nothing. 

15) What was the last craving you fulfilled? I had Wingstop for dinner and I got my white chocolate peppermint mocha from Starbucks as well, which I’ve had just about everyday since Starbucks released their holiday drinks. I’m obsessed.

16) Do you like stand-up comedy? Who are your favorites? When was the last time you remember discovering someone new that you actually liked? I find Kevin Hart to be funny.

17) Have you ever felt affected by the death of a celebrity or public figure? If so, who? Do you remember when you found out and what was your reaction to it? Yeah, there’s been a few. For example, Ryan Dunn’s death was crazy. I had been really into Jackass and the guys for a long time and it was just really sad.

18) What positive affirmation do you need to give yourself right now? Uhhh.

19) How often do you get headaches? What are usually the cause(s)? What are your go-to remedies for it? What was the worst headache you’ve ever had?  I get tension headaches a few times a month. I used to get them more often in high school. I can’t take aspirin and stuff like Advil and Ibuprofen don’t do shit for my headaches. Tylenol definitely doesn’t, which I don’t take anyway because it has acetaminophen and the pain medication I take regularly does as well and it’s not good to take too much of that. So, the only thing I can do is a cold washcloth over my eyes and sleep.

20) What was the last purchase you regret making? What about it that made it regrettable? How about the last purchase that you found absolutely worth your buck? The face masks I recently ordered because they’re way too thin. As for worthwhile purchases, I’ve done pretty well with my Christmas shopping. I’ve found good deals. And I just love buying gifts for my family, so that makes it worth it in itself.

[redtwomuch]

Jason POV 

There were distress hormones filling the air covering the scent of blood and angry alpha as he was dragged to the edge of the roof. He was about to die by his so called pack alpha of a father no less. The world really new how to screw with him. Making him be the first person, maybe the only person bruce will have ever killed. Maybe if he's lucky he has a puncture wound to an organ he doesn't know about. All he feels is pain but he's not lucky enough for that. Or maybe bruce will just through him off the roof. Unlikely but at least that would be a quick death this will likely take hours maybe even a couple of days. But soon enough he'll be dead with no one to mourn him with his friends most likely already being dead. Just a bit longer and he'll most likely pass out to never wake again. I wonder how bruce will say this went most likely a correction to the universe but at least I'll be at rest maybe for good this time.

That's when red mist started to appear. And an arrow to batman's hand? He tried to scent the air but all he could really smell was the scent of his own blood and distress and a lot of alpha anger but not just of bruce? And past the ringing in his ears there was yelling and growling a female voice saying "how dare you touch him". But he couldn't really focus much on that he was about to pass out but before he could there were hands on his shoulders picking him up and a familiar scent and voice.

"I got you buddy"

Roy?

"Come on kara we have to go now!"

"I'll hold him off you go and I'll catch up"

Sigh "Okay just be careful"

Roy POV 

He would have preferred for kara to have flown jason away from the bat. Would have been less jarring for his wounds. But he didn't know if he could have held off the angry alpha alone long enough for them to get away and then leave himself so maybe it was for the best. As it was it was now his job to get jason to safety and have his wounds looked over and bandaged. He started to make his way to leslie's clinic Jason needed to have his wounds properly looked over he took some bad damage and he wasn't a medical professional he wouldn't be able to treat some of these wounds right. Jason had said some good things about her and she was probably the only doctor he trusted hopefully she wouldn't sell them out to the bat until kara got back.

Once at the clinic he was quickly taken to a room to be looked over while roy had to wait for kara to get back and for leslie to tell them how bad it was. It wasn't long before kara showed up. She didn't look to bad just upset so bruce must not have had his kryptonite on him.

"How is he" she said worryingly

"Don't know leslie hasn't come back yet"

"Well we should hurry before the bat finds out where we are and comes back" she said with a growl

"Yeah but he needs to be looked over before we leave. Make sure nothing's too bad."

"I could just look him over myself" she said sounding offended 

"Yes but you don't have a medical degree. We need to make sure he's not dying before we leave"

At that she looked shocked then apologetic 

"Right sorry just want to take him somewhere safe don't want him to be in this city any longer"

"Me too but this second this might be the safest place for him. We don't even know where we're taking him."

"We can take him to my pl-"

"No. We can't take him any place the bats know about. It would be best to go underground for now."

She made a noise at that

"I don't like it either. My instincts are telling me to take him to a proper den where he'd be "safe" but the places the bats know about aren't safe. We need to ignore those instincts and go somewhere actually safe. So no apartments, safe houses, or warehouses the bats knows about, not the Kent farm, and not kori's island. Those places may feel safe but it's only a matter of time before the bat finds us and we have to make sure Jason's healed by then.

"But Jason was obviously going into a stress heat we need to go somewhere he'd feel safe"

"I know but him being safe is our top priority. Once we're there we can make the place more comfortable and hopefully we'll be enough to comfort him till the heat goes away."

"When can we see him."

"Soon" said a new voice joining their conversation. "But first I suppose you'd want to know how he's doing" said leslie 

At their confirmation she began "He has a severe concussion. His jaw, left shoulder (scapula) fractured, left humerus, and some of his ribs mostly on his left side are all fractured. His humerus has also been dislocated. Part of the stomach, chest, back, and whole left side are bruised and he's in distress heat."

A sudden new wave of anger washed over him and from the scent in the air and Kara's growling he wasn't the only one. Even leslie looked upset until kara started growling then she sent her an unimpressed look to which kara stopped

"Right now he's still unconscious and on some medicine to keep him under until we make sure he won't completely hurt himself moving when he wakes up. And then the medicine to reduce his heat for as long as we can and hopefully it'll go away along with medicine to reduce his fever."

"When can we leave?" I asked knowing full well it probably won't be for a while.

Sigh "Until his internal bleeding goes down and his ribs heal he shouldn't be moved at all." Leslie replied sounding resigned to the argument about to take place

"We can't stay in Gotham. The person who did this to him will be back!" Kara all but yelled but was able to restrain the growl to not upset the doctor too much

"And just who did this to him?" She asked a little annoyed but mostly worried.

Kara looked shocked and upset not sure if it's something she should say. What if she called Batman once she knew. She did mainly work with him after all.

"Batman" Roy answered

To that Leslie got a dark look in her eye but didn't look too surprised. She must have seen Jason shoot the penguin earlier.

"I'll try and work something out so he can leave as soon as possible but it'll probably take a few hours. Until then get what you can to safely move him. With the way his shoulder and ribs are he shouldn't be picked up."

Kara looked a bit upset about not being able to carry him probably feeling useless. He knows the feeling he's feeling that way too. But that doesn't matter what matters is finding what we can to help not focusing on what we can't. 

"Okay we'll get a car while we find out where we'll be going."

Leslie looked a bit upset that we didn't already know where we were going but just nodded and walked away she has a lot of work to do but so did they.

"Me and Jay have multiple warehouses in Los Angeles that we can stay in."

"It's going to take a couple days to get there if I can't fly."

"Yeah, well take a while to get there. Stay at hotels and safehouses while he heals and we make our way there. It might take a couple weeks until we decide on a more permanent base."

"Ok I need to call work tell them I need sometime off."sigh "Hopefully I don't get fired batman could do that couldn't he."

"Yeah but you could return to work you've already helped more than enough. I never would have gotten there in time if it wasn't for you let alone gotten him away from the bat."

"No I need to be there when he wakes up. I wouldn't be able to get anything done until I really know he's ok. And I have to ask why he didn't contact me or anyone else since he came back."

"I don't know everything that he's been feeling but I do know that he doesn't like thinking about his time as robin or really anything before he died. He thinks he's completely different from back then and that nobody would like who he is now. He didn't want to get hurt or to hurt anyone else."

"That's ridiculous. I would never hurt him and there's no way that I would hate him just because he grew up."

"I know but he probably doesn't see it that way. We haven't talked much about the titans besides joking about when I was on the team and bad mouthing them. When we were working together it was to look forward on what we could do and not looking at are mistakes and the people who hurt us. You may not have hurt him personally but you're part of his past and his past hurt him."

"Do you think he'll want to see me?"

"As long as you focus on the him of the now and not the him of the past he'll probably be fine. But remember he is different from when he was a kid not completely but he is."

"Yeah he grew up. So did I. I'll be fine."

"Ok then let's go see him."

When they walked in his jaw and ribs were covered in bandages and his left arm and chest were in a cast. A drip bag to his right and multiple monitors. His scent was fainter but he was still clearly in a stress heat. They both walked over and sat on either side of him content to sit quietly and watch over him for now. Later they'd deal with the mess the bat made but for now they'd rest

[wheremytwinwatches]

[Where My Twin Watches]: Full Metal Alchemist Brotherhood Episode 44

Last time: Doctor Marcoh broke the Hippocratic Oath, Envy chose the worst possible host, and a Central Officer showed Armstrong the Great his collection of action figures. Onwards!

Episode 44 - “Revving at Full Throttle” Oh heck yeah, we’re starting at the family reunion in Liore! Camera shows the radio fixed by the Elric Brothers way back when. [Beard]: “It’s been a long time, huh Al?” [Al]: “Yeah.” *awkwardness intensifies* [Beard]: “So, uh… I saw Pinako recently.” *Rose is standing off to the side, probably wondering about this ‘Pinako’ character her new boyfriend is talking about* [Beard]: “She told me about your body.” *awkwardness intensifies* *awkwardness intensifies* *awkwardness intensifies* [Villagers]: “Hey Mister Ho, could you-” [Beard]: “Oh sweet Leto yes get me out of this family drama. Absentee Anime Father, away!” Wow, really? Al are you just gonna let him walk away from this conversation? You haven’t seen him for a large portion, if not most of your life! Demand some friggin answers! Well at least the cook is trying to cheer Al up, thanking him for fixing up the radio. Al apologizes for the riot being caused by them exposing Cornello, but Cookie insists on looking at the good stuff that happened.

Sure people reacted “badly” at first, but now everyone’s all happily working together to rebuild from the ashes of their home! Can’t fault the man’s optimism. Inspired!Al goes running off to help build, seeing their General getting his hands dirty Toad and Boar (still wearing their winter clothes?) tag along, dragging a protesting Yoki with them. The Villagers are realizing Oh Crap We Interrupted Family Reunion, but Beard’s brushing it off. He left when Al was super young, he probably doesn’t even think of Beard as his father anymore. And have you seen the guy try to smalltalk? He doesn’t know what to say- [Al, clanking towards the group]: “Hey pops! Imma help with the building, cool? Cool. Hey NPCs, gimme that heavy stuff to cart around.” Aw, Beard gets to see that Al being trapped in a cold, unfeeling suit of armor hasn’t kept him from being a decent person. Whoa okay bath time for Winry, apologies for interrupting. Winry’s happy to finally get a good bath after traveling for so long. Rose is chatting with her while laying out clothes, admiring Winry for being a independent Automail Engineer at her age. And she was the one who literally got Ed back on his feet, which would mean later he would help Rose get back on hers. *Goes back to Ep 3 Recap*. That’s right, he told her to Keep Moving Forward, that she needed to use her two good legs to make her own path. Rose tells Winry about her misplaced belief in Cornello, when Winry gripes about Ed’s Tough Love routine Rose says that’s just his way of being nice. [Rose]: “But you already know that, don’t you?” [Winry]: *Stammers, blushes, and tries to hide her face in her tea.* So yeah, Ed exposed the truth behind Cornello’s miracles, and now Liore is learning to stand on its own. “All thanks to Ed and Al.”... yeah, calling it now. We’ll come back to this place in a decade or two, and the old Church of Leto will have been replaced with one to The Armor and the Alchemist. Hey, it’s Lizard dude! Bido, according to Bag of Magic Food. He’s going through a tunnel, griping that it was a bad idea to follow those MPs aw crap he’s wandering into Uncle’s sanctum, isn’t he? Turn around dude! But he’s still looking for Mister Greed, squeezes through some pipes to crap it’s the Golem Room. And are the Officer and Armstrong the Great still there? Quick, pull an Igor!

Ok, so it looks like he got there just before the Officer did his “Look at my cool toys” reveal, he’s hiding behind the pipes again. Officer’s explaining that the Golems are empty dummies that they can bond souls to. Oh, so they’re like Advanced Soul Armors, then? Tell me, have you gotten around the problem that Al’s having of the body rejecting the soul? Anyways, the Golems are immortal and apparently any bonded souls will be completely obedient. Alright Armstrong the Great, here’s the kicker; where do the souls to activate the Golems come from? Officer says that they’ll come from rival nations, “through the course of war”. Hoo boy. This was what I was afraid of way back when the concept of Philosopher Stones was introduced to Armstrong the Great. She is fiercely loyal to her troops and those she chooses to protect, it was the threat against her own forces and the reveal that the Goths were going to harvest the entire country that allied her with our main characters. But an army fueled by the conquest of Others? A chance to not just defeat her hated Drachman enemies, but fully convert them to her cause? Weapons that only grow stronger the more she uses them? I mean, with all the pushing around by Central and bullying of her troops I’m giving her 80% odds to still reject the Golems. But that remaining 20… We don’t get to hear any more as Bido freaks the fuck out and bolts back down the tunnels, screaming his head off. [Bido]: “This place is evil! Pure evil! Why did I ever come here?! Mister Greed would never be in an awful place like this-” Oh hey, it’s Ling! How’s Greed going to react to seeing an old “possession”: happy to see something of old that he gets to claim again, or annoyed that one of his old crew fled rather than try to help him? We’ll get back to that, we’re back in Liore where Al is warning Beard about the giant tunnel running under Liore. Beard tells him to stop talking about the Super Secret Goth Plot To Harvest A Country in the middle of the town square, waits until they’re in the ruins of the Church to discuss the story. He’s letting Al explain everything, does he want to keep his own involvement secret for- well never mind, Al’s brought up his Identical Brother chilling in Central. Beard turns away still acting all Mysterious wait what [Menacing!Beard]: “Did it ever cross your mind that I might be on their side?” But you’re not, unless… NOW HOLD UP. If you’re telling me that we’re looking at a Triplet situation, that Uncle made another copy to Oh ok I get it now. Beard is just emphasizing how trusting Al is, at least with him. But seriously dude, now that I’m thinking about it spilling your entire plan to a guy because you think he’s your father is a terrible idea. Maybe ask him to repeat a childhood memory, or somesuch? So after Al gets his non-corporeal heart to calm down from that scare, Beard says that he wants to tell his Backstory to both brothers in order to save time. Right, about that… Back up in the land of snow, at… “Bank’s Bank”? Really? That’s like a restaurant owned by Mister Burger or a law office run by Johnny Litigator. Whatever. Registers are ringing and checks are being cashed when huh. Sorry, just distracted by the banker’s appearance, she’s a lady with blonde hair but brown eyes and Ishvalan skin. What’s her story, is she an Amestrian/Ishvalan child like Sideburns? Moving on, a giant of a man is making a withdrawal oh hey it’s Monkey, he’s drawing from Ed’s account. Uh, are you that badly strapped for cash? You know that a withdrawal from the Protagonist’s account, by an unknown party no less, is going to raise all kinds of flags in Central. Yup, Monkey got the cash from Ed’s research account, but another banker’s already making a call. Ah, so it was for the medical bill. How much was this doctor charging? Oh jeez, the guy’s chuckling and saying he could charge them even more, Monkey complains that he’s already ripping them off but the doc’s likewise squinty-eyed wife says it’s only “reasonable” considering the risks involved.

Well, as long as they keep their mouths shut well never mind, looks like the cops are already on to them. I don’t suppose they can get a refund? The cops show up and push past the doctor, Lion’s getting bandaged by Mrs. Doctor. Oh great way to sell out the resting patient, our guys had better get a refund if he’s going to cave this quickly. No wait it’s just Monkey scowling from under some covers wait is he trying to hide Ed under the sheets? The cop asks if Monkey was at the bank earlier, and pulls a gun… Outside a guard hears someone walking, another white coat? Doctor #2? Cop #1 is ordering for Monkey to put his hands up oh hey the white coat outside is Ed with some groceries! Outfit change? I suppose his red coat was pretty distinctive. While Monkey’s at gunpoint Lion readies his own pistol and Monkey starts drawing his own gun, things might get loud pretty soon. Wait, is Ed’s hair loose? What happened to the ponytail?

Ok yeah, that was pretty distinctive like his coat. Outside guard is listing off the red coat, blond hair worn in a braid… uh oh. Here it comes. [Guard]: “... and short.” [Ed]: *bites through wooden skewer in annoyance* Nice knowing you, guard. The cops in the apartment hear a thud, and #1 tells another to check out the noise. Outside Guard is out cold, Cop #2 tries waking him up before there’s another thud, #1’s left yelling at the other two for answers when

Wait hold on, is Ed grabbing this guy around the neck? Is he standing on a box or something? Unless… no. No! Is it finally happening? Is my little boy finally getting a growth spurt?! … Wait, but if he’s growing taller, but has an artificial leg whoops better find Winry quick to upgrade, fighting might be a bit difficult if you’re all lopsided. Monkey snarks that Ed just had to take out three MPs on his own, when he hasn’t fully recovered yet. [Ed]: “Don’t treat me like an invalid. My injuries are fully healed, and I’m revving at full throttle!” Title drop! And damn but Ed’s rocking the new look. White coat, loose hair, and a growth spurt? Leg imbalance aside, I am totally down for this. Wait, is this because he “used his own life force” to patch himself up earlier? His body aged up from the energy expenditure? Cool! Mid-ep pictures of Bath!Winry and Older!Ed. So is carrying a wooden skewer in your mouth just a thing now, Ed? The doc’s telling Ed and the Chimeras to shove off, doesn’t look like that refund’s coming after all. Ed snags the Guard’s note in passing, thinking about how they’re just looking for the red coat and braid (pointedly ignoring the “short” comment), guess the outfit change is staying around for a while. Whoops! Took too long, some other MPs have shown up and are demanding they freeze. Wait, “move it kid”? Oh yeah, they’re just telling the guys with visible weapons to stand down, they think that the kid chowing down on bread is a bystander. Who just got grabbed by Monkey and threatened with a weapon! Monkey uses the MPs shock at the hostage-taking to tuck Ed under his arm and run for it, outside some more MPs spot them but Lion shoots some snow down on them. Run for it! One hotwired car later, Ed tells ‘Gorilla’ (“Don’t call me that!”) to step on it, but their stolen car isn’t fast enough to outrun vehicles from Northern Command. Dodge a truck so the MPs crash into it? That they… can’t do, actually. The MPs are catching up when Ed says to turn a corner and park. Plan? Transmutation sounds as they round the corner, the MPs follow but… it’s gone? Wait there’s another car in the road, but… … Ow. Ow ow ow. OW! Sweet Leto, but that hurts the eyes. Really, Ed? I can only assume that the MPs brains have shut off from the sheer garishness of that thing, they drive past the parked car looking for something a little more sensible. The Chimeras immediately ask for the car to be turned back to normal. [Ed]: “And why’s that? I think this car looks cool as hell!” [Monkey]: “Just change it back. Please, we’re begging you!” [Ed]: “You guys got a problem with my sense of style?!” [Monkey/Lion]: “You don’t have any!” Outside of town, Monkey’s answering the call of nature while they all discuss being drifters again. Ed’s wait buddy you’ve got your hair back in a ponytail, it’s not a full-on braid but it’s still close enough that any guards are going to give you a second look. Go back to the loose hair disguise! Ed’s thinking about how he let his guard down around Kimblee, and hoping that Al’s ok. For now, the Chimeras are asking their new boss where to go, Ed says that they need to find Al who’s probably with Marcoh now. [Lion]: “You do know how to find them, right?” [Ed]: “Right, about that…” In Liore, Al’s trying to wrap his head around Beard’s Backstory. Beard understands if Al doesn’t believe him, it’s a pretty crazy story. Then we remember that Beard’s talking to a soul bound to a suit of armor, so the idea that Beard is a Philosopher’s Stone isn’t that far fetched. They chat about being immortal, and thankfully Beard acknowledges the advantages of his form before settling on the fact that seeing everyone he knows and loves wither and perish sucks. Hey yeah, if you have a Philosopher's Stone body, did that affect Ed and Al’s development? Apparently not, Beard says he still has a human body. Unlike Uncle, who’s likened to “a leather bag”. He built a human body around himself and his gathered souls, so if they can destroy the body… Speaking of, the Nationwide TC! Beard looks over the TC and reverse-TC while Al says they can destroy the tunnel below Liore, but Beard shuts down the idea. Pride’s watching over the tunnel. But can they still try before nope we know the tunnel’s finished, and Beard is rather relaxed about the idea it’s complete. “Because it’s not yet time”? How do you know? [Beard]: “Look up, son. You’re too busy looking down when you need to look up.” Oh! I get it, it’s a constellation thing! That explains why the Xerxes King was talking about carving all the Crests before it was too late, the Nationwide TC needs the right positioning of the stars. Can’t do it until then.

Yes please follow along Al, look up to the sky, to… LETO! Bwahaha, Al thinks that Beard’s talking about Sun-God Leto. There we go, turns out Beard has converted to Letoism and plans on praying the Goths away. Or the Man in Central could indeed be waiting for the right star positions, that works too I guess. Oh hey, back to Bido in the pipes. Running? Oh shoot, looks like it was “Annoyed his possession abandoned him” Greed after all. Greed laughs about the chance to kill his boredom, Bido’s shocked to see the Ultimate Shield and hear the voice, yells at Greed for imitating Mister Greed. Wait, does Greed not recognize Bido? Greed boasts about wanting everything, Bido finishes his spiel about demanding the finer things in life. Greed asks who Bido is wait static? Ok, so Greed really doesn’t remember his past iteration? He lost his memories when Uncle reconsumed him? Bido’s struggling to reconcile the Mister Greed he knew with this new guy, while Greed demands Bido answer his questions. [Bido]: “It’s me! I’m your friend, Bido! You haven’t been gone from Dublith long enough to forget!” [Greed]: “Oh, you’re from Dublith! Ooohoho, now it makes sense!” [Bido]: “You remember m SHIT Greed just stabbed Bido! [Greed]: “Afraid not. You must have been buddies with the previous Greed.” Well this sucks, Bido’s trembling in pain and grief while Greed says they’ve never even met wait the static’s back and his arm is trembling and the static is becoming visions of Greed’s old crew. Is his memory returning? Hoo boy Ling’s calling Greed out for killing his old friend. Greed protests that Bido wasn’t his friend, that those memories belonged to the previous Greed. [Ling]: “Then why are you in so much pain?!” Ling’s threatening that if Greed doesn’t pull himself together that he’ll take control of the body again. Greeds gritting out that his old memories were purged by Uncle, that they aren’t part of him anymore- [Ling]: “No, you’re wrong Greed! It’s not that easy! They’ll always be a part of you! You can’t just erase them from your soul! They were the only part of you that you chose! Look at them! Can you not hear their souls crying out? You abandoned them, your real family! You threw them away like trash! Fool, you turned your back on something you wanted. You don’t deserve to call yourself Greed!” Clutching the still form of Bido, Greed screams. End Credits. Post-credit scene in Central at the Bradley Manor, Mama Bradley is suggesting a book to Selim. About an adventurer who travels the world- Bradley’s looked up and Mama Bradley grabbed Selim at the sound of rustling and footsteps. It’s Greed. And he’s not happy.

[megalony]

Baby of mine- Part 5

Yet another part of my newest Ben Hardy series which I am enjoying and which I hope everyone is liking so far.

Taglist: @marshmallowmae  @langdonzvoid  @butlegendsneverdie  @jennyggggrrr  @luvborhap  @caborhapch

Series masterlist

Enjoy.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Cora?" The name passed through (Y/n)'s lips no more than a breathless whisper that was carried away by the slight chill in their air of her home. Needless to say, she was surprised to find Ben's ex in their home without any prior knowledge that she would be dropping by. (Y/n) didn't even know when Ben was meant to be home today, he was only just starting on a new project so the hours were a bit sketchy right now.

Cora's eyes snapped up from staring fondly at the beagle stretched out on the floor to see (Y/n) walking into the living room. She knew it must be a surprise and possibly not even a good one to find her here.

"Hi... Ben called, he sounded a bit frantic so I came round." Standing to her feet the strawberry blonde haired girl glanced her eyes over to the sofa at her side. (Y/n) followed her gaze to see the blond passed out on the sofa, one arm and leg handing off the edge as he looked like he was going to roll onto the floor at any moment.

"Would you like a drink?" (Y/n) offered, trying to clear up the awkwardness as she tipped her head signalling for Cora to follow her into the kitchen to leave Ben sleeping in peace. His sleep pattern was disrupted from both work and the events of the past month so any sleep he could get (Y/n) was not about to wake him up from.

Reaching the kitchen (Y/n) turned on the kettle, moving to lean against the island in the middle as Cora shook her head before indicating to one of the stools, silently asking if she could sit down. Both women took a seat opposite one another, although (Y/n) got up to make her drink when the kettle quickly boiled showing Ben had had a drink earlier. The tension between them seemed to simmer down just a little as they both got seated and waited for a moment or two trying to find something to say.

"Why did he call?" (Y/n) questioned before taking a sip of her drink. Her heart started to ache at the notion Ben had called his ex without even thinking to call her when she was his girlfriend.

"He needed to talk for a bit, everything with Tommy's got to him."

"I wish he would talk to me." The words slipped from (Y/n)'s lips before her mind had time to filter them and actually process them. There was no denying that it hurt for Ben to run to his ex when he felt bad instead of the person he had actually proposed to. It didn't matter that (Y/n) couldn't say she knew what he was going through, she wasn't going anywhere and she loved him. That should be enough for Ben to feel able to talk to her about how he was feeling so she could have some idea of how she was meant to help.

Cora's face fell at the words that sent spikes into her own heart. She wanted Ben to be happy and she could see how much (Y/n) meant to him. She also didn't want to be part of the reason that things were bad for the couple or cause any arguments. She and Ben were not together anymore and she wanted the best for him.

"(Y/n), you can't see the change in Ben because you didn't know him after we lost Tommy. He was a mess, I couldn't help him, he couldn't help himself, the boys could only do so much for him. But you, you make him so happy. Ben cares about himself now, he cares about his life and he can see things differently now." Cora had been the one to see Ben at his worst and not be able to do anything about it, but (Y/n) was the one to see Ben at his best and be someone who helped to get him there.

"Then why doesn't he talk to me?"

"Tommy is part of Ben's life that he isn't willing to share with anyone. He may tell you when Tommy was born, what he looked like and how precious he was but he won't share any true feelings with you. Ben won't tell you what it felt like to lose him or when he first held him. He hasn't told you the date Tommy died either, has he?" That chapter of Ben's life was one that he was keeping for himself and no one else but Cora. He wasn't disclosing anything because it was too close to his heart and when the wound was only just beginning to heal Ben was not going to rip off that bandage and expose himself like that. He would only talk to Cora about it because she was there and had been through the same thing.

Her words made sense to (Y/n). Ben never said how ecstatic he was when Tommy was born or what it felt like to lose him. He only told her Tommy died after three weeks which should have been sometime this week but he didn't say when and he masked it well.

"No." Dipping her head down (Y/n) took another sip of her coffee, her finger beginning to tap against the rim of the glass mug.

"I don't think he will ever tell anyone about Tommy in that detail and that is his choice. Ben never wants to tell anyone about him, like he's a secret to keep but he told you. Ben calls me when he needs to talk about Tommy because no one else feels remotely the same, this is nothing personal against you or preferring me over you."

If Ben had the choice he wouldn't talk to Cora about Tommy, but because she had felt the same things he did it made it so much easier to turn to her and spill his feelings to her. It wasn't personal about (Y/n) and he wasn't preferring his ex to his girlfriend it was simply circumstance.

"Ben's better now he's with you, he's cleared up his act which is something I could never have helped him with."

"Yeah... he said about the drink thing." Ben had never specifically said when he actually got over abusing alcohol for the pain, maybe it was later than (Y/n) first suspected. Maybe he had only gotten help quite a while after Tommy had passed when (Y/n) first thought it was straight after. Either way, it didn't really matter now, that was Ben's past which he had decided to share with (Y/n), he wanted to forget about that and focus on the future. Dwelling in past memories would do no good to anyone.

"Thank God for Mick, I wouldn't have known about the antidepressants if he didn't tell me." Cora's eyes widened at the confusion on (Y/n)'s features, realising she had said something wrong. "Shit- I, I thought you knew. It's fine, ignore me what's important is Ben wants to talk to you when he's feeling up to it. I'm just moral support here and I'm not needed now so I'll go." She rushed through the words, about to stand to her feet when (Y/n) reached out to take her hand, effectively stopping her.

This wasn't some slip of the tongue that was calculated to drop Ben in trouble, Cora wasn't trying to cause an argument or upset either of them. She thought Ben had explained everything with the way (Y/n) was talking about the alcohol problem Ben had. She never meant to drop Ben in the lurch when it wasn't her place to do so.

"Tell me what happened. I thought Ben just started drinking whilst taking his meds."

"(Y/n), it isn't my place. If Ben didn't want to tell you then he wasn't ready-" Cora couldn't spill Ben's private life out even if it was to (Y/n). It wasn't her place to decide what she knew or didn't know about Ben's past and she would feel horrible if Ben really didn't want this part of his history known by (Y/n).

"I know Ben's had his struggles, me knowing won't change anything. Cora please, I need to know everything because right now I'm looking at Ben and I don't think I recognise him anymore. I swear on my life I won't tell him I know if you want, just let me know the truth." (Y/n) knew about Tommy now, she knew it had taken its toll on Ben and she knew he had abused substances to try and help make him feel a little less in pain or just for the sheer sake of it. Knowing a little more wouldn't hurt her and she wouldn't even tell Ben because it surely wouldn't make that much of an impact on her.

Biting her lip Cora glanced over into the living room, making sure Ben was still asleep before sitting back down properly, nodding that she would talk. "Me and Ben were both on antidepressants but we had different kinds. Mine were just to boost my mood but his were the different kind to try and make him feel less broken. If you take them you can't drink hardly anything because it worsens any side effects and makes you dizzy and stuff, Ben knew that but he drank anyway."

There were all kinds of antidepressants, and Cora took the ones that boost serotonin levels because her mood was at a rather low point which was expected after losing a child. Ben wasn't feeling low or high, he felt nothing and the medication was to try and stop that, to help him feel something and stop the darkness that was taking over his mind. Drinking with any meds was not recommended because alcohol itself is a depressant and counteracts what the medication is trying to do in the first place.

"He's right to tell you he isn't an alcoholic, he was and still is a substance abuser. He washed down the pills with alcohol because he wanted to, he didn't care about his health. Ben took painkillers with his depressants and alcohol because everything hurt, and mixing meds like that is harmful. He's never done drugs but he's abused everything else that he could get his hands on."

Ben drank and took pills because he knew it came with risks, he knew it would harm him and part of him felt he deserved it. He felt that he had done something wrong and he should be giving himself punishment for that. Whatever his intentions were, his actions were wrong.

"We weren't living together at the time, but he came round to see me a lot and he had forgotten his meds one morning so he took mine. I don't mean one, he took about five or six of my pills without telling me because he didn't know mixing antidepressants is life-threatening. When I realised he took them I told Mick when he rang and said Ben had been out drinking again, Mick knew it was dangerous and went round to Ben's flat. He was unconscious because he took some of his depressants too and probably painkillers as well."

When Ben took them his intentions weren't to kill himself or pose harm like that, he didn't know mixing the same kind of meds would have such a threatening effect. All he wanted was just to make the pain go away and he didn't care how he did that.

"He- it wasn't a suicide attempt, right?" Knowing Ben had been at such a low state posed the question that he had tried to take his own life and that changed things entirely.

"No. He wanted to get rid of the pain... Mick took him to hospital and he got his stomach pumped. He stopped taking all his meds after that and cut down drinking when Mick said he'd send him to rehab if he caught him overdoing it. Ben isn't in that state of mind now I swear to you and he probably didn't tell you because he is so different from how he was then. He is ashamed of how he acted and you mean everything to him (Y/n). I should go now, but please don't let him know you know."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "Cora gone?" Ben questioned tiredly, holding out his arms to (Y/n) to ask for her to come and lay with him on the sofa. Smiling gently when she accepted, moving over and laying on on his chest letting his arms cocoon around her and trap her against him.

"She left about half an hour ago. Said that you wanted to talk to me about something?" Turning her head (Y/n) rested her cheek against his chest just beneath his collar bone, feeling his hand feathering up and down her back. That half an hour had given her time to think.

(Y/n) didn't know the version of Ben when he had decided that abusing medication and alcohol was what he wanted to do. She didn't know him when he made a mistake when doing that which may well have cost him his life. (Y/n) knew the version of Ben where he drank in moderation because of work and not seeing the appeal in being drunk to the point o being senseless. She knew the version of Ben where he read the labels on medication to know how many to take and when to take them. She knew Ben where he cared if he was ill and where he took care of his health. She knew that Ben was capable of caring for himself and making the right choices in life, she knew that Ben wasn't emotionless like he had felt before. She knew he was no longer depressed or hurt to the point of being reckless.

Ben's past didn't change his future, it only shaped it. His past didn't change who he was now and it didn't mean that (Y/n) didn't know Ben or recognise him anymore. It meant she saw deeper layers to him than she first thought and that was a good thing.

"Yeah, I was having a rough day and I wanted to talk about Tommy for a little while. Please don't be mad that I didn't call you, I had to ask Cora her advise and if she was alright with something before I talked to you about it." Ben didn't want (Y/n) to think that anything that was wrong meant he would run to Cora. It was simply because of Tommy that Ben felt the need to go to his ex and he had to confirm something with her before going ahead because her understanding and blessing meant everything to ben.

"It's fine, she explained why you called I'm not mad. What did you want to talk about?"

"I think I want a baby."

[mechadress]

Saw a literary challenge to write about one of your average days in quarantine. They picked Tuesday May 12th. Since all of my days keep blending together, I thought it would help me set a benchmark for how I handled quarantine. So here it is-

May 12th 2020,

My alarm goes off at 7am. I roll over to turn it off and promptly go back to sleep. This was a normal practice even before the world shut down. I don't have set hours at work, but I prefer to start around 8am. Since my work computer is only across the apartment, the motivation to wake up before I absolutely have to is extremely low.

8am rolls around and I can't bring myself to leave the bed yet. It all seems so pointless as no one seems to care what hours I keep and I don't have any early morning meetings. I scroll through Facebook and Tumblr on my phone, I check my email more times than I really need to, and pet whichever cat is closest, usually Sierra. I find a post from a page that I follow that talks about Victorian parlor games and I share it to the Steampunk group I administer. There hasn't been much content in the group for awhile. I wonder if it's because steampunk isn't as popular as it once was or if no one has anything to say. It gets a few likes and one 'Care' emoji. I think it's because it indicates that people miss hanging out together.

Around 8:15 I need to use the toilet, which is enough to get me out of bed and sign into my work computer. CY yells out from his work station at the living room table to remind me to buy the camper table and a spray bottle he wanted for grilling. I order them from Amazon and feel guilty about getting nonessential items in the middle of a pandemic. I spend the first few hours of work scrolling through FB or Tumblr and knitting. While I knit I watch an hour and half long youtube video from ContraPoints about different types of second-hand embarrassment or 'cringe'. I identify a lot with what she says.

I am knitting a pair of socks simply because I have the yarn and I've never done it before. I tested out the gauge to make sure I had the right sized needles and I do. They are long dpns that were given to me by CY's mother once she realized I enjoyed knitting. Apparently she used to knit as well, but it would hurt her hands so she gave up on it. I had tried to use the dpns as intended, even looking up a video and practicing a few times, but I kept dropping stitches and getting annoyed with them. I eventually decided to order a circular needle from Amazon to use instead. I felt very guilty about this since there's all sorts of post-people and delivery people out there who are at risk moving all these boxes around, and here I'm ordering a stupid pair of needles that are a duplicate size to ones I own, but I just don't want to use. The circular needles are extremely nice and easy to work with and it is a pleasure to knit the socks. I still use the dpns as a stitch holder while I knit the heel. Today I'm connecting the insole and knitting along the foot. It's easy and enjoyable work especially after already completing the first sock.

I eat a prepackaged ube cake while I drink my tea and appreciate the nice pairing of flavors.

I feel bad about not getting more of my actual work done. However, I can't bring myself to concentrate on anything related to work. I keep moving my mouse around every 10 or so minutes so it looks like I'm active.

An old D&D friend of mine named Sam posts on FB about how he is proud of his company for continuing to let people work from home despite Ohio loosening some of the Stay at Home restrictions. I reply "We were told to expect to work from home until at least August. I'm grateful since it's one less thing to think about." Sam and I go back a forth a bit more, expressing gratitude and an interest in meeting up again once its safe. It's the first I've interacted with him in about 5 years and it makes me glad to hear from him.

I start lunch early because I don't have anything better to do. For lunch I make myself and CY a sandwich. We have some really good Italian bread we got from the grocery store that we can make into a decent replica of a Philadelphia style hoagie. I already chopped up the veggies so I can just take them out of the fridge and start layering them on. CY likes his sandwich with mayo and turkey. I don't like handling either of those things, but it's easy enough. I make his first then make a veggie version for myself. We use the new hoagie oil which isn't as bad as I had originally feared, but it isn't as good as the name brand one we had before. Pity they were out of it at the store when we went.

My 2019 tax refund from Ohio lands into my investment account. I plan to use it to invest in assorted stocks I feel will bounce back once the economy recovers.

After lunch I watch a few more youtube videos while I knit. One is a career review of the one-hit wonder band 'Living in a Box' and another is a recording of 'the world's worst singer' Florence Foster Jenkins. I had found an article that talked about people who had a medical condition which made them unable to percieve how poorly they performed a skill. In her case, she was a renowned as a very poor singer who believed she was very good and people would come to watch her ironically. I try to watch a congressional hearing where they discuss the health crisis with Dr. Fauci, but it's too depressing so I stop.

My anxiety related to work continues to grow. I figure that I'm not able to bring myself to do any investigation on my own, but I'm still able to ask people questions. I reach out through Skype to a colleague who I believe had worked with this business group before. I am surprised by how helpful she is and how quickly she is to respond. We get on a call and she shows me some reporting she did that is similar and directs me towards a table she thinks would have the values I'm looking for. She recommends another colleague to talk to and I schedule a meeting with him for the next day since he was busying for the rest of today. I feel instantly better. My anxiety about my work plummets and I find the energy and motivation to start investigating another task I've been given. I quickly find 1) the task was way easier than I initially estimated and 2) the data I want isn't available where I thought it would be. I even find out a new way to pull code out of Tableau and I excitedly share my discovery with another colleague. Around this time it's getting close to 4pm, my usual time to stop working and just become available for questions, should anyone need to reach out to me. I feel better about myself and allow myself to take more pleasure in my activities.

I start to prepare for the online D&D game I host each week, Tuesdays at 7:30pm. One of my favorite things about quarantine is that it's given me the time and ability to play again. I've missed having a regular D&D game badly. We had a very good game the previous week and I'm excited to make new material for this new game. I decide to include a villain who is a Banksia Man, one of the anatognists from the Australian fairy-tale Snugglepot and Cuddlepie. CY had helped me over the weekend come up with a cool backstory for him. I take notes and save some pictures so I can display them to my players through screen share.

A group of our friends are doing a Plank Challenge while we try to stay in shape while in quarantine. Colette set up a FB group with a list of exercises to do for 13 days. Each day, you do your assigned exercise then you post to the group to indicate you completed your day's tasks. CY and I made a point to work out for a bit each day after work and were already doing a fair amount of planks so the challenge as it was written was too easy for us. We tend to double the amount of time for each exercise or we double up the reps. My tasks for today are 30 seconds each of planks, rocking planks, hip dips, and up downs. I do all the exercises straight through twice with a short break in between sets then post to FB in the group.

After doing planks, CY and I go out to a nearby park to walk for a bit. We go for about 2.5 miles. It's a nice day, nearly 60 degrees. I am happy to see wild flowers starting to sprout up and the leaves coming back to the trees. Most people in the park are polite and keep their distance. It's rare to see people wearing masks while they are walking or running, so it almost feels normal.

We make it back with enough time for me to start getting my notes ready for game. CY offers to make me food and asks what I'd like to eat. We had just gone to Trader Joe's the weekend before and gotten a truly ridiculous amount of frozen food. He insists I pick something from the freezer to eat. In the end we decide he'll cut up the jackfruit crab cakes and make them into 'seafood tacos'. He even makes some sriracha ranch to go with it. The crab cake is surprisingly greasy, but it's very tasty and filling. Not sure I'd get it again though.

I go into the gaming group call and we quickly realize that only Gene and Aaron are going to be able to join game. We don't think it will be enough to continue the campaign I prepared for so I offer to do a one-shot just for them. I show them a cute rpg I found awhile ago called 'Fuck! It's Dracula' and we give it a shot. We have fun but I feel a bit unprepared since I have to ab lib most of the plot and come up with secret plans on the fly so they can be betrayed by their NPCs. The game is much shorter than I initially anticipated and we finish up around 9:30pm, much earlier than normal. I don't feel like Aaron and Gene enjoyed this game as much as they would have enjoyed the larger campaign I made, but at least we got to play together for a bit. I appreciate the social contact at the very least.

We dismiss ourselves from game and I join CY on the couch. He is watching some cooking tutorial videos, trying to teach himself how to smoke brisket properly. I go back and forth between different apps on my phone, not really paying attention to the TV. I try to read for a bit, but we eventually settle down to sleep before I get very far. I feel good about how the day went and I'm proud of myself for getting work done on the sock and researching my projects. I feel better about my life than I did when I first woke up this morning.

[aliencowboyqueen]

FIC: The Rules to Accidental Dating (5)

Pairing: Alex/Kyle

Summary: In which Kyle and Alex accidentally pretend-date their way to love.

Rating: Teen+

Find Chapter 1 here. | Find previous chapter here. | Fic Masterlist.

Chapter 5

Kyle knows instantly that the Manes son he sees leaving Jesse's hospital room is not Alex, even from the back. He knows the shape of Alex's shoulders, the way his hair is longer than the standard military cut these days, long enough to almost obscure the freshly pierced ear. He knows the sort of energy Alex emits when he visits his father.

Before the Manes brother, whichever he is, turns to see Kyle, Kyle changes the trajectory of his fast-paced walk down the hospital corridor. He almost collides with a nurse but that still seems less unpleasant than walking into that man.

Yet he feels someone's gaze on the back of his head.

He feels it all day.

When he leaves the hospital, he feels it still. The hair on the back of his neck stands at attention. He feels on edge, being at the end of a double shift doesn't help, the nervous rhythm of his heart reminds him of the night a few weeks ago, when Jesse Manes…

Though he's barely standing on his feet after so many hours at the hospital, he stops by at a store. He chooses Space Supplies for his trip, knowing most Manes men hate it on principle. He makes his way past the tourist trap section with all things alien and then spends too long looking at the milk at the back of the store. He wishes he had his bulletproof vest on. He almost, but not really, wishes he had bought that gun. He wishes he wasn't alone. He wishes his heart stopped bouncing around in his ribcage and his palms sweating. But at least he can stay longer in the public setting, hoping the sensation of being followed fades away.

Then he almost jumps out of his skin when Flint Manes knocks their shoulders together.

"Interesting thing you did with our father…" Flint hisses. He has his arm pressed against the length of Kyle's and Kyle wonders if there's a gun within reach of it. He doesn't dare to look. The knife of fear under his ribs is enough to keep him in place.

Though if Flint approached him in public, he probably won't get murdered tonight.

"If you mean I made sure he had the best possible medical care… You are welcome," he says. Angry men with guns are like wild animals. Like irritated dogs. Don't provoke them, but don't show fear. He is afraid he is dangerously close to provoking.

Flint's intake of breath could be a snort. "Careful, Valenti," he says. "That tone, someone might think you have something to hide."

"Thanks for the warning."

Flint doesn't move away. Kyle feels the heat radiating off him, the scent for his aftershave, senses Flint's intake of air when his arm moves just a little with his breaths. These same things are always a familiar comfort coming from Alex. From Flint, not so much.

But Kyle feels as if his feet have been screwed to the floor. His chest aches where the Jesse Manes' bullet hit him.

"You've been spending a lot of time in my brother's company, I hear," Flint says.

Kyle blinks. It's not a turn he expected the conversation to take. "What is it to you?" he asks.

"People tend to get hurt around Alex," Flint replies, casual.

"Are you threatening me?"

"I'm just warning you. Alex is my little brother, I…"

And somehow that snaps Kyle out of his frozen state. He spins to face Flint. "Is he now?"

He is surprised that Flint startles and actually takes a step back. He doesn't have a gun. At least not a visible one. Kyle wouldn't put it past him to carry a concealed weapon somewhere on his body.

"Because you always did a miserable job of being a brother to him," Kyle hisses. "Where were you when… Ten years ago, during that daily taunting?" He was the one doing much of the taunting then, but he doesn't want to bring that into the conversation. He takes another step towards Flint. "You were conveniently pretending you didn't have a brother at all, weren't you?" Later, Kyle will wonder if his own old shame plays a role in this incident.

Flint doesn't back away. Instead h comes closer and Kyle finds himself staring at his chin.

He doesn't back out either. "So don't dare threaten me with this scary big brother routine now. You should have done that then. You should have been there for him then. When your father was abusing him. When he bullied Alex into joining the army. Maybe you wouldn't have these problems now."  And maybe he is speaking to himself, too.

"You don't know," hisses Flint. "You have no idea what it was like growing up with him."

Kyle doesn't know if Flint is referring to Jesse or Alex. It doesn't matter. His hands coil into fists.

"You don't deserve to call yourself Alex's family."

ooo ooo ooo

By the time his mother calls him in, his lip has stopped bleeding but it's swollen. The throbbing ache is a constant reminder of how stupid he's been earlier. He let himself provoke Flint.

At least he didn't throw the first punch. Or a second one. Flint's knuckles connecting with his jaw knocked sense into him.

"You wanted to see me?" he asks, already feeling like a chastised boy.

Michelle gives him a withering gaze. "What's gotten into you?" she asks. He remembers the times she looked at him years ago just like this. When he was the golden boy of Roswell and only his mother sometimes looked at him with concern and asked whether he was alright. "Why did I hear about you getting in a fight with one of the Manes boys at a store? That doesn't sound like you at all."

"It wasn't a fight," Kyle protests. "Just some exchange of opinions." His lip starts bleeding again when he tries to smile. He takes out a tissue.

"Was this about Master Sergeant Manes?" Michelle prods. "I hear he hasn't recovered yet."

"No, he is still in a coma."

Michelle's piercing gaze makes him wonder if he's being interrogated by his mother or the sheriff. "I would assume that once the barbiturates he so mysteriously overdosed on were out of his system, he would wake up."

"His condition baffles everyone."

"If I didn't know any better, I would think someone was giving him additional medication to keep him under."

Kyle holds her gaze. "That'd be irregular and possibly illegal," he says truthfully. "It would be also very easy to trace."

Michelle sighs. "Is that what you and Flint were fighting about?" She leans forward against her desk, her expression open. Inviting. The good cop. The caring mother. "Did it have anything to do with those letters your father left?"

"No, not at all," Kyle shakes his head. "It was about Alex." Except not really. It was about Jesse, but Flint felt the need to throw Alex in Kyle's face when the original bait didn't take. Kyle is sure of that.

Michelle startles. She leans back in her chair. "Alex Manes?"

"Yeah." Obviously.

She looks at him for a long time, then she shakes her head and expels a heavy sigh. "If you're not pressing charges… Try to stay out of trouble."

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