#also it took me like over a week and The Other Q had to look at ALL the WIPs

[thoughtfulfiction]

Social Media QB

Author���s note: reposting my old work on this side blog! Let me know if you’d like to read a specific one. Thank you for reading!

The reputation of the Chargers social media team was unmatched. They are known for being funny and up to date on all memes and pop culture references while also showcasing players’ personalities. That alone made you apply and this past year on the job had really been a once in a lifetime experience. Working with Megan and the crew was a daily adventure and you were becoming more and more comfortable calling the guys your friends. It even got to a point where you didn’t even call them by their names anymore.

Quentin was usually just “Q.” JK was always “J’Kaylin”, Derwin was “3” and your favorite nickname was definitely calling Justin “Sunshine.” At first it was a Remember the Titans reference but it became a lifestyle. Everything and everyone revolves around the sun and that’s exactly what it felt like when you were at work. All of the players were important and special but you could just feel the energy in the room shift when Justin was there. It was palpable, it almost took your breath away sometimes.

Off camera he was goofy, funny and had this uncanny ability to make the world stand still for a bit, even just for a few fleeting moments where it felt like you two were the only ones in the room. But then reality would hit and you were reminded that you work for the team and he’d never see you in that way, he was just nice to everyone he encountered. But on camera? It was all fun and games. There was a running joke, mostly based on his real feelings, that Justin hated cameras. He couldn’t stand being the center of attention or having people perceive him so he avoided the social media team altogether when phones were pointed in his direction. 

But sometimes, a rarity, you were able to get him on camera, even if it was just for a split second. The two of you reviewed the questions he was going to be asked before their Hot Ones appearance and there was ALWAYS a discussion, more like subtle begging if you all were going to have him participate in any content.

“We need Justin for this new segment we’re doing, so you’re gonna have to talk to him.” Megan sighs, grabbing her Stanley cup that was sitting on the counter. She’d just finished editing a video where she and her assistant put fart spray on the tiny mic and could still smell the rancid scent until she grabbed some Lysol spray to de-funk the place.

You were going through photos taken during practice earlier that morning and deciding which ones to post and without looking up you asked her, “why do I have to do it?”

Lorren and Allie giggle in the corner, shaking their heads. “You cannot be serious right now y/n,” Lorren gives you a pointed look.

“What?”

“We all know you and Justin have a thing for each other. Even if you won’t admit to us…or yourself. It’s pretty obvious.”

You finally raise your head up from your laptop, staring at them while also wracking your brain trying to figure out when your innocent crush had become so painfully obvious. If the girls knew, then Justin had probably somehow caught on and the thought of that made you want to dig a hole right outside on the practice field and never come out. “Is—am I that easy to read?”

“No one blames you,” Megan runs a loving hand on your shoulder. “And I’m sure you’ve been trying so hard to hide your feelings that you haven’t noticed that he’s doing an even worse job of hiding his massive crush on you.”

The look on your face sends the room into a fit of laughter. “We’re being serious. The way he looks at you and acts around you. Anyone can see he’s into you friend.”

You weren’t convinced, “I need an example.”

“Okay fine,” Lorren stands up to prepare a demonstration. “He wasn’t ready to put the mics on when he was mic’d up until you walked over and helped him get the mic in the perfect spot in his pads. And then he wore the friendship bracelet for six weeks because you handed it to him.”

Allie pipes up to put in her two cents. “And let’s not forget when he had you driving him around the golf tournament and kicked Zion to the curb. There’s no way all of those are just a coincidence.”

“Fine. I’ll go ask him if he’ll shoot the video for us but I’m not going to lose my job because of a meaningless crush on the starting quarterback.”

You waited around for the guys to leave treatment after practice and caught up with him on his way out. “Hey Sunshine, quick question for you.”

His cheeks turn a light shade of pink and he gives you a small tight-lipped smile. “What’s up?”

“I need you to do me a huge favor and be in this tik tok. It’s a short game and it’ll only take like 15 minutes.”

His deadpan face and disappointed dad sigh has you practically begging, saying “please” in your finest sing-song tone.

“Fine, I’ll do it.” You knew he’d crack, he always did. “On one condition. You also have to participate.”

You hold your hand out and he engulfs it with his much larger one. “You’ve got yourself a deal Herbert.”

“Okay the rules of the game are simple,” Megan begins from behind her phone screen before hitting record, “we’re going to give you these Canadian snacks and you’ll rate them on a scale from 1 to 10. One being it’s awful I’ll never touch that again and 10 being a solid snack that you’d eat everyday if given the opportunity.”

You and Justin nod, diving in on everything from the ketchup chips to the toffee. The video didn’t take long as promised and the quarterback went about the rest of his day with no further distractions.

In your office a few days later on the team’s off day, you were contemplating your life. Maybe you should take a step back from him so people don't get the wrong idea. Sure, your coworkers were convinced the crush was mutual but what if he was just being nice? He was always so focused on football and making the most out of every opportunity. Why in the world would he waste time flirting with a social media manager? It just made no sense. Instead of continuing to run a million imaginary scenarios in your mind you packed up your stuff and tried heading out to the parking lot. Even after all this time you still struggled to maneuver all the twists and turns of the building and somehow found yourself walking past the quarterback room. You intended to just keep walking but he was in there alone and called out your name when he saw you.

“What are you doing here? I didn’t think anyone would be in the building today.” His bright eyes staring down at you made your heart feel like it was beating out of your chest. You desperately needed to get it together.

“I came in to finish up a few things but I’m heading out now. What are you doing? I think you’ve watched enough film to last you a couple lifetimes.” That gets a light chuckle out of him and he shakes his head, the two of you knowing that his quest for perfection would never allow him to believe he’s watched enough film. “Thank you for shooting that video the other day. The fans are gonna love it, they’re always begging us to get you on camera.”

“No problem, anything for you.” He clears his throat after whispering the last part, desperately hoping that you didn’t hear it. Even though you definitely did. You should go home for the day and leave him alone in the office so he can get back to work. You should stop staring at his lips that look so soft and just begging to be kissed. He should turn around and get back to the playbook and the computer but here he is, standing still, right in front of you.

You’re just there, waiting for someone to rip the carpet out from under you, to fall on your face, for someone to tell you that this isn’t actually happening. The space between your bodies diminishes significantly, so much so that you can smell the Dr. Squatch Birchwood Breeze radiating off of him. It’s intoxicating and you swallow the fear in your gut and ignore all of the common sense thoughts plaguing your mind, allowing you to feel.

The kiss is tentative at first, he pulls back slightly, whispering if it’s okay to keep going as you feel his breath against your lips. You don’t respond but instead pull him in closer, hearing a satisfied husky moan from him as he allows your tongue access to his. His right palm rests against your cheek until he’s tilting your head up ever so slightly to deepen the embrace and he pulls you in even closer, holding on for dear life while closing and locking the door behind you. It was so much more than he imagined, these feelings that he’d been pushing aside were being confronted and magnified by the second. This innocent crush that you had on him were genuine, real feelings that created a deep ache in your bones, actively being soothed with his hands all over you as the two of you made out like helpless teenagers.

You didn’t think you’d have the strength to tear yourself away from him…until his phone rings. He ignores it the first time but it’s all you can think about by the fifth ring.

“Answer it,” you whisper breathlessly and you can feel him hesitating to pry himself away from you. The heat that was radiating off of his body that you felt being so close to him sends shivers down your spine at the sudden distance. A thousand unspoken apologies are painted on his face as he pulls his phone out of his pocket. He keeps the call short and sweet but the look of devastation is clear when he hangs up. “You have to go don’t you?”

He nods. “I’m so sorry. We can—we need to talk about this I know. And I promise we will. I just—I need to take care of this.” He doesn’t want to leave, not like this. Even if he knows you understand. Justin presses a kiss to the side of your head and whispers another “I’m sorry” leaving you in the room to think about what just happened.

You walk around the empty parking lot until you reach your car, letting out a deep sigh at the thought of what the conversation with him is going to look like after this. You need to be mentally prepared for good news, bad news and everything in between.

He is the sun after all. And sometimes when you stand too close, you might get burned. And maybe, just maybe, you’d avoid the burn altogether and bask in the warmth as long as you can.

[ask-mirage-mews]

!!!WARNING!!! This content may be unsuitable for some viewers. Take caution if the following topics disturb you.

Body Horror, Blood, Gore, Eyestrain

[wowconradfisher]

all of the girls you’ve loved before

pairing: min ho x reader

genre: slight angst, best friends to lovers, they are both so dense to each others feelings..

summary: being best friends with KISS’s resident “heart throb” is not for the weak. falling in love with him isn’t either, so what happens when the line between best friend and boyfriend becomes too blurred?

a/n: hi hello i am back from the dead. i’m convinced this acc is just gonna be a jenny han-iverse fic acc bc if not conrad then i’m writing about min ho. i have ended school so i hope i am more consistent with writing! feel free to send in requests + questions btw :D i hope u guys enjoy this silly fic that is also based off a taylor swift song hence the title!

Sitting outside of your best friend’s party that he throws every year was not something you thought you would be doing. You were convinced that this time was going to be different, and maybe just because you were seeing Min Ho in a different light, he would see you too. Here you still were, all dolled up but with no guts to walk into the party. You sighed, thinking about how pathetic you might be looking at the moment to anyone walking by. It was annoying in your opinion, just a month ago you couldn’t stand the thought of being with your best friend but now you’re starting to second guess and think more about the times you’ve spent together.

It was about 2 weeks ago when you and Min Ho, well more so you, started kind of overthinking the things you two would do together. You used to think that it was just regular best friend things you did, like talking about your past lovers and flings, laughing about all of the late nights you both have spent on your own having lame fights on the phone. But then you start thinking about the other nights, sneaking out past curfew and holding onto each other's hands in hopes of not getting caught. Or the way he would treat you the way he would never treat anyone else, allowing you to see his softer side, doing silly things like letting you do his skin care after he knows you’ve been crying in his bathroom about some dude that said “loved you” not knowing how carelessly he’s throwing out the words that mean so much to you. You see yourself doing the regular “best friend duties” like never saying bye to each other because you know you’ll be seeing each other again anyways, but you know it shouldn’t bother you when you see the new transfer student Madison write your best friend’s name in a heart all over her assignment. 

You shook yourself out of your daze and stood up, you knew it was wrong for you to be feeling this way about your best friend and there was no reason for you to start feeling this way now. Looking at your phone’s reflection to fix up your makeup, you took a deep breath and confidently made your way to the venue. Walking in and seeing a bunch of lights and loud music was expected, but tonight your goal was to forget about how you felt and let the universe tell you what to do. 

“Excuse me ma’am who let you out looking so good?” a voice spoke from behind you while tapping you on the shoulder.

You turned around and to your surprise it was one of your other close friends, “Q oh my gosh I haven’t seen you in like a week!” you exclaimed while pulling him into a hug, not failing to notice Florian behind him. Once you pulled away you waved at the other male who signaled to his flask, basically asking you if you wanted a shot. You grinned and suddenly all of your prayers had been answered and your night had begun. 

If you were being honest, you knew you weren’t a light weight. You always thought of yourself as someone who could just drink enough to not be a heavy weight and be at the perfect level of tipsy where you can feel the buzz. This is the point where you had to go out to the dance floor because of how free it made you feel, not a single care or worry in the world. That was until you felt someone tapping on your shoulder. You turned around to see a guy, a random one you have never seen before around KISS. You could admit he was a bit attractive but not as attractive as Min Ho. 

Looking up at the stranger you let out a forced smile, “Hi?” you spoke, but sounded more like a question

“Couldn’t help but notice a pretty girl dancing all by herself, you looking for someone to dance with?” the guy asked as he tried to put his hand on your waist. 

You backed away before you suddenly felt someone behind you put their hand around your waist, “Baby I’ve been looking everywhere for you,” a boy spoke with an accent you could recognize anywhere. Looking up, you let out a soft genuine smile at the sight of your best friend. 

Min Ho cleared his throat and saw the guy was still there, “Hey man I don’t know if you noticed but she’s my girl, so I would appreciate it if you didn’t hit on her,” 

The guy furrowed his brows at Min Ho before quickly realizing who he was, “Oh shit sorry man I didn’t know,” he quickly muttered out

“You’re lucky I didn’t have you kicked out. Now leave us alone, yeah?” Min Ho replied, shooing the other guy away. 

Once the guy was gone, Min Ho held onto your hand and led you to a more secluded area away from the party. He looked at you and caressed your cheek, “You okay Y/N?” he spoke softly

You looked up at your best friend and took in the way he looked at you. The way he looked at you made you feel so delicate, like you were the only person that mattered to him. You broke out of your daze and just nodded at him, “Thank you Min, I think it’s time for me to head out now though,” You spoke

Min Ho frowned, but it looked more like a pout to you, “But I just found you,” he spoke, “and we didn’t even get to dance yet,” 

You took his hand that was on your cheek and held it, “I know, I’m sorry I’m just not in the mood for it anymore,” you replied softly 

After hearing your response, it was like something in Min Ho clicked, causing him to hold your hand again, “Okay, let’s go then,” he spoke like it was no big deal

“Let’s go? What do you mean? Like you’re gonna just ditch your party?” You asked in disbelief

He nodded, “Uh yeah duh? Why would I stay at a party that my best friend doesn’t even want to be at?” 

There was that word again, it just keeps dangling over you and taunting you everytime you think you guys could be something more than just friends. Hearing his response just made you let out a small smile. Him pretending to be your boyfriend just lets you have a glimpse of what you weren’t but what you could be, truly it does break your heart but what can you really do about it.  After that night, he just dropped you off back at your dorms, you didn’t even have the energy to invite him in like how you guys usually do. It did feel awkward just leaving him but you needed this. Your heart needed it. 

You did feel bad for ghosting everyone. It had been a week since the party and you needed to shut down and take time for yourself to really think about what you wanted to do about your feelings for Min Ho. After being by yourself for a week and doing your work online, you felt like you really did learn a lot about yourself, and that in order to get over your feelings for your best friend, you had to accept that you had those feelings in the first place. 

During this week of you ghosting everyone, you weren’t the only one in question about their emotions. Min Ho to say the least has been snappier than ever to everyone. Most times, whenever you were around he would be at his nicest, you were someone who humbled him and brought him back to Earth but without you? He truly was something and someone you did not want to cross. The boy is a mess, he doesn’t know how long ago you guys haven’t talked for this long. Even if it was just a week, it felt like years. One thing Min Ho will do for you but never admit or do for anyone else is giving you space.

If he’s being honest with himself, he tried so incredibly hard not to fall for you or do anything that can potentially jeopardize his relationship with you but the moment he saw you at his party looking the way you did dancing on the dance floor, he knew he was done for. That’s why the whole week he has been so upset with himself for doing what he did that night, for calling you baby, for pretending to be your boyfriend, all of it, because now you weren’t even talking to him. It wasn’t until you texted him asking if he could come over where he finally felt the feeling of anxiousness leave his body.

Min Ho was standing at your door with a bouquet of your favorite flowers, debating on when to knock. That was until you beat him to it and just opened the door after hearing his shuffling from behind the door. Genuinely you were surprised, you didn't expect him to show up so fast, and with your favorite flowers too?

"Hi Min," you spoke with a smile before opening your door to let him in, "Come in please, you've been here countless of times so don't get shy on me now,"

He chuckled, taking off his shoes before stepping into your dorm, placing them among your other shoes and then following you to your room. Before sitting down, he handed you the flowers, "Here Y/N, I got you your favorites,"

"What's the occasion Min?" you asked taking the flowers and admiring them before placing them on your lap

"I just missed you that's all," he replied before sitting down next to you

You cleared your throat and started fiddling with your hands, "Min Ho I've been meaning to talk to you about this for a while," you spoke, "But if I'm honest I want to say I'm sorry for ghosting you for a week, I just needed time to figure out what I was feeling,"

Min Ho grabbed onto your hands and held them, preventing you from fiddling with your hands and causing you to look up at him, "It's okay Y/N, you know I would give you all the time in the world," he replied

Staring into his eyes, you knew you had to say it now or else you would never want to say it, "Min Ho, I'm in love with you," you said feeling so much lighter with that confession alone, "I think I always have been, but I wanted to be sure of it before I told you. I don't know when it exactly happened, but at one point the lines between being my best friend and wanting something more with you started to blur. So please tell me now if I'm just overthinking this whole thing and maybe I'm the only one who feels this way but-" you spoke before Min Ho leaned in to kiss you.

Your eyes widened in shock for a second before you closed your eyes finally kissing him back, melting into his touch and putting your hand onto his chest. If you could describe what the best thing that has happened to you, it would be this moment alone. The way your lips moved together in perfect synchronization, like you were both made for each other. Truly it could not compare to anything you've ever felt before.

Once you both pulled away, your forehead rested against Min Ho's, "You drive me crazy Y/N, I never even thought I had a chance with you but I'm so thankful all of our past romances led me here to you," he spoke

You smiled at his response, "So does that mean you love me too?"

"I love you more than words can describe, I mean I can show you in actions too?" He replied with a smirk

"Min Ho!" you gasped, playfully hitting his shoulder

He laughed at your reaction, "I'm kidding! I mean unless you were serious?"

You rolled your eyes playfully at the boy you were thankful to be in love with. At least this time you were sure this would be real.

[moodriingz]

Waiting Room pt. 2 | Q. Hughes

Summary | part one it’s Quinn’s turn to pine over the reader while she tries to move on, but can she do that when she’s still in love with Quinn?

Pairing | Quinn Hughes x reader, Elias Peterson x platonic!reader, reader x oc

Warnings | Angst?, mutual (but blind) pinning, cursing maybe 

Author's Note | Thank you so much for all of your support for part one! I feel so bad that it took me forever to write part two, but this semester really kicked my ass. I hope this lives up to the hype. I honestly just wanted to get it done to move on if that makes sense? I’m hoping to continue writing so feel free to send requests! I’ve also recently gotten into F1 so you can send requests for that too!! xx

Masterlist

“You were so right, me and Evan got along so well. He’s great. We’re going on another date too.” 

Quinn felt sick to his stomach. Not only had your friendship dwindled out of nowhere, but now you’re with someone else. Worst of all there was no explanation to why you pulled away. Quinn racked his brain for any reason why you would stop hanging out with him. 

Now he had to watch you give your attention to someone else. He was so jealous of this random guy. Quinn wondered what made Evan better than him? All he knew was that the bright smile and light blush you seemed to always have was for some other guy now. 

A couple of weeks passed and Quinn barely spends time with the team outside of practice and chooses to spend his time going through old photos and videos of the two of you or watching anything you’ve ever suggested to him. He’s halfway through one of your favorite movies when there’s a knock on his door. His heart flutters hoping it's you, but is immediately let down when he realizes that it's Elias and Brock at his door.

“What do you want,” He asks begrudgingly, leaving the door open as he returns to his couch.

“We wanted to make sure that you’re alive,” Elias said.

“Well now you know bye,” Quinn quips at them.

“Dude something is up with you and we’re not leaving until we find out,” Brock said.

“Is this about Y/N?” Elias asked.

“Fine yeah it’s about Y/N. I just really miss her,” Quinn admits after taking a deep breath.

“We used to talk almost everyday and that all stopped on the last road trip and now she’s seeing that new guy. I was finally going to ask her out and she just shut down.”

“Wait you were? You told me you didn’t see her that way and she overheard,” Elias says confused.

“She heard me? Why didn’t you say anything?” Quinn asks as his heart shatters all over again. The last thing he wanted to do was hurt you.

“She was so upset and I didn’t think I could change your mind. She had been pinning after you for months and you never did anything, so I just believed you,” Elias said with a shrug.

“I didn’t think she felt the same way so I was just putting my feelings aside because I cared more about our friendship,” Quinn says, putting his head in his hands. “I think I royally fucked up.”

“Maybe not, Y/N and Evan don’t seem super serious yet. You might be able to wiggle your way back in with her,” Elias says sitting down with Quinn.

“I don’t even know where to start.”

“Maybe bring her coffee? Start there and see what happens,” Brock suggests and Quinn just nods making a game plan to get his girl back.

The next morning he gets up early for practice to go pick up your coffee from the cafe you always go to. He knew where to go because the cafe printed their logo on their cups and he had plenty of time to take note of it. As he walked in he immediately recognized your silhouette waiting in line.

“Looks like you beat me to it today,” Quinn says walking up to you in line.

“Beat me to what?” You ask confused why after not talking to each other for a month he decided to come to your cafe.

“I was going to bring you coffee today,” He says awkwardly with a small smile on his face.

“Oh well you can still pay if you want,” You suggest as a joke.

“Yeah I guess that’s true,” Quinn says, hoping a conversation would start on its own. After a minute of silence he gives in and asks, “So what’s new with you I feel like we haven’t really talked that much recently.”

“Nothing much, you know filming you guys all day,” You say wondering if you should mention Evan. It’s still so new and you don’t know if it's going to work out, but he makes you so happy.

“I actually just started seeing this guy. His name is Evan, I think you would like him actually, he's really nice,” You say, deciding to rip off the bandaid.

Quinn knew he wouldn’t like Evan because he was getting with the girl of his dreams.

“Yeah maybe you should bring him out with us after a game or something. I'd love to meet him,” Quinn says kicking himself because that’s the last thing he wants, but anything to get back in your good graces. 

You give him a smile at his comment thinking of what to say next. Luckily for you the barista calls for you two to order. And just like you suggested, Quinn paid. He offers you a ride to the arena before you even start walking back to the metro station to get to work.

You both sit in silence trying to think of anything to talk about. You finally start the conversation by mentioning that an author you had recommended to him a while ago put out a new book and how excited you were to pick it up. 

Just like that the two of you fell back into conversation like you hadn’t missed a beat. You arrive at the arena way quicker than you thought you would and almost don’t want to get out of the car and leave Quinn again. You walk inside and as you are about to separate, but Quinn stops you.

“Would you like to go stop at a bookstore after work today to pick up that book? I could take you home after so you don’t have to take the metro home,” He asks hoping you would say yes.

Yeah that would be really nice. I’ve really missed hanging out with you,” You say with a smile and leaving to go get your work started.

“What’s got you smiling like that? Evan?” Megan, your coworker, asks jokingly.

“Actually no I ran into Quinn this morning when I was getting my coffee and we just talked for a while. Now we’re hanging out after work,” you say, taking a sip of coffee. Hoping to hide your smile behind your cup.

“Wait, really I thought you two were going to avoid each other forever.”

“Well I guess not. He said he was going there to pick up my coffee which was really sweet of him.”

“Oh he’s so into you,” Megan says sitting back in her chair. 

“No he’s not, why would you say that?”

“Think about it, he stops talking to you right after you start seeing Evan and out of nowhere he’s doing all of these nice things for you?” 

You stop and think about it, but there’s no way he told Elias that he could never see you that way. You brush it off and get on with your day. You didn’t have to shoot any content today so you didn’t see any of the guys during their practice, but Quinn was waiting for you after work to take you to go find your book.

You try not to think about what Megan said to you today, pushing it to the back of your mind. Once the two of you get to the bookstore you feel like a kid in a candy store showing Quinn all of the books you had on your reading list but haven’t gotten yet. Without you paying attention he grabbed a basket and started throwing them in there to pay for them himself.

He finally leads you up to the counter and insists on paying for all of the books he grabbed for you. You try to convince him that he didn’t need to but you were cut off by the clerk.

“Girl just let your cute boyfriend pay for your books. That’s what I would do.” You try to deny the accusation from this random teenager, but before you could they were announcing the total and Quinn was inserting his card. He grabbed the bag and walked you back out to the car.

“Sorry if what they said was weird, but just think of it as a payback for all of those coffees you got me,” Quinn said, trying to make you feel better.

“No it’s fine I think it’s kinda funny actually.” You say finally realizing you were there for several hours and were too tired to make dinner.

“I think I’m just going to order take-out for dinner if you want to keep hanging out at my place,” You say with a blush creeping up your cheeks.

“Yeah that’d be great,” Quinn says as you start ordering. He stops at the restaurant while you run in to pick it up. He decides to text Elias and Brock an update and that he’ll tell them more later. 

The drive to your apartment was filled with playful banter about what you should watch and Quinn just watches you as the streetlights illuminate your face. The two of you finally arrive and settle on a new movie you just saw. It really didn’t take much convincing for him to give in; he just wanted to push your buttons a little bit.

Later, they are surrounded by take out tins and you’re starting to drift off. At some point during the movie your head ended up on Quinn’s shoulder and you started to doze off. Quinn wasn’t complaining, but felt like it was time for him to go as the credits started to roll.

“Hey Y/n/n wake up,” He says quietly as you groan and cuddle into him further. “Y/n/n you have to get up-the movie’s over.”

When there’s no sign of you moving he decides to just pick you up and bring you to your bed. Thinking you’re asleep he decides to give you a “friendly” kiss on your forehead and says goodnight. You feel the butterflies that you thought were now reserved for Evan coming back all over again. Quinn grabs the trash from the takeout and sees himself out, and can’t seem to wipe the smile off his face. On his way home he decides to call Elias.

“Elias I’m in so deep I don’t know what to do,” Quinn says concerned because he doesn’t want to break you and Evan up and ruin something else for you.

“Wait what happened?” Elias asked confused because all Quinn had told him was that they were heading back to her place.

“I kissed her-” Quinn said before Elias cut him off.

“You what? You move fast, man.”

“Well I kind of kissed her. She fell asleep on my shoulder and wouldn’t move so I carried her back to her room and then I kissed her forehead. Now I’m going home,” Quinn says still with a deep smile on his face. “I just don’t know what to do.”

“I guess act like nothing happened. She was asleep right? Just leave it be for now and still hang out with her. I can talk to her and see what’s going on with Evan and then you can go from there.”

“Yeah good point thanks Elias, I’ll see you later.”

The next day you walk into work reminiscing last night with Quinn hoping you could relive it again soon. Silly crush aside, you missed your best friend and wanted things to go back to normal. 

Elias practically corners you just to ask questions about Quinn.

“Quinn told me you two hung out last night, so you aren’t ignoring him anymore?”

“I was never ignoring him I just was busy,” You say trying to move around him to get to his office.

“Yeah alright. Anyways, how is it going with Ethan?” Elias asks, teasing you.

“Evan is great. I think I might invite him to a game or something soon,” You say, rolling your eyes.

“Oh wait, really?” Elias asks as you start to walk away. “For the record I think that would be a great idea. Maybe next week against Winnipeg?”

“Yeah I’ll have to ask him. Now if you will excuse me I have to go to my desk.” You say finally walking away. 

You set your things down and open your computer and Megan starts questioning you about your evening with Quinn.

“It really wasn’t anything crazy. We just went to the bookstore where he bought all of them for me and then we went back to my place and got dinner,” You tell her leaving out the fact that he brought you to your bed and kissed you goodnight.

“The fact that he bought all of your books is enough to tell me that he’s into you. I know you had a long list you were slowly buying for yourself.” Megan may have set you up with Evan but she wasn’t blind to how much Quinn was into you and vice versa. 

“I’m thinking of inviting Evan to a game. What do you think?” You ask to change the subject.

“I think it would be a good idea if you weren’t afraid of what your work husband would do,” Megan says, teasing you.

“I- what are you talking about,” You ask, hiding your blush.

“Y/N you can pretend to be oblivious, but Quinn really likes you and you should think about his reaction to having your new boyfriend at a game.”

“Who even knows if Evan would want to go,” You say before locking in on your work for the day.

You had already made plans to go out with Evan later that night so you figured it would be the best time to ask him then. You go home and get ready for your date thinking about what Megan said to you earlier in the day. 

Soon enough you leave to go meet Evan at some new restaurant you would never pick out because it was too fancy for your taste. He greets you with a kiss to your cheek asking you how your day was.

“It was good I just had to deal with Megan and Elias berating me all day,” You say, aiming to leave the questions about Quinn out.

“Why would they do that?”

“Oh I was just thinking about inviting you to a game soon and they were just making fun of me,” You say sheepishly.

“That would be so cool! Would you be able to hang out with me or would it be like a wag situation where I just watch you do your magic,” Evan says with a chuckle as you start to look over the menu.

“I could probably get the night off and sit with you. Do you think you’d be free for the game next Saturday against the Jets?”

“Yeah that would be great! I’m looking forward to it!” He says closing his menu to signal he’s ready to order.

You continue to hang out with both Quinn and Evan, but choose not to tell Quinn about your invite for Evan to come to the upcoming game.

Saturday’s game finally rolls around and Quinn notices your absence during the warmups. You usually can be found on the bench shooting content but tonight it’s Megan in your place. 

“Hey Petey do you know where Y/N is tonight?” Quinn asks hoping Elias might have some insight.

“Yeah she’s in the crowd tonight with Evan,” Elias says pointing towards Y/N and Evan in their seats.

Quinn’s heart drops. You had mentioned that you were thinking about inviting Evan but didn’t think it would be so soon. He tries to forget that you brought your boyfriend to the game, but he can’t forget the fact that you’re wearing his jersey. He can’t help but feel a fire ignite when Evan leans in to say something to you. The sense of jealousy does not go away, but there is a sense of pride knowing his name is the one on your back.

You spot Quinn looking at the two of you and give a shy wave like you had been caught. Evan leaves to go grab some water and you are stuck worrying about what Quinn is thinking about you bringing Evan. 

Honestly since you started hanging out with Quinn again you just felt like your heart wasn’t in it with Evan anymore. You were planning on ending it but he kept talking about how excited he was for the game, so You decided to wait until after to end it with him.

There were no goals by either team after the first period, but something about Quinn seemed off. He was checking the other team left and right and was obviously agitated. The crowd is electric even though the Canucks are down 3-2 half way through the third, but it doesn’t seem to help his mood.

Quinn continues to instigate against the Jets and eventually gets himself into a fight against some player who was aggravating him all night. It doesn’t last long, but enough to get himself a penalty. He looks even more upset than before watching over the play.

Y/N was worried for Quinn. He never was this short tempered and she couldn’t figure what made him that upset. Evan can feel the nerves radiating off of her and rubs her shoulder to try and calm her, but he can’t help but feel like he is the last thing she needs right now.

“Hey Y/N I hate to do this here but I think we should probably end this,” Evan says and you finally take your eyes off Quinn. There is nothing you can do but sigh.

“Evan I’m so sorry I really wish I could’ve been better for you.”

“No it’s ok we had a great time and I’m happy being your friend I just think you have feelings for someone else,” Evan says with little to no hurt in his voice.

“Yeah I would love to still be your friend,” You say with a small smile as he gets up to leave.

Quinn sees Evan get up, but he just assumes that Evan is getting you something from the concessions. He realizes he needs to stop focusing on your date tonight and lock in for the rest of the game.

Unfortunately the Canucks lose 4-2 and Quinn looks like a kicked puppy, but luckily he isn’t assigned to interviews so he can just clean up and get ready to head home. He hopes he can just forget this night, especially seeing you with Evan. 

Little does he know that you’re already waiting for him in the hallway all but pacing the area hoping he’s not too upset to talk to you. Quinn keeps his head down not wanting to see all of the sweet reunions of the couples and families until he hears you call his name. 

He almost doesn’t want to stop worrying Evan would be with you, but you ran up to him to get his attention. Quinn turns around surprised to see you alone with a worried look on your face.

“Where’s your boyfriend?” He asks, his voice laced with annoyance. His comment leaves a sting in your chest.

“Um we actually ended it, but I just came to see how you were doing. I was really worried about you. I've never seen you so upset,” You say with worry lacing your voice.

“Well thanks for checking on me but - wait you ended it with Evan?” Quinn asks, lighting back up.

“Yeah we were better off as friends. I honestly wanted to end it a while ago because I kind of have feelings for someone else, but he was really looking forward to the game,” You say rubbing your arm hoping he might start catching on.

“Oh?” Quinn says with a glimmer of hope in his eyes, but still guarded in case it is someone else.

“Yeah he’s some goofball who was stupid and got himself a penalty tonight,” You say, stepping closer to Quinn.

“Well hopefully he can get that under control for the rest of the season, I’m sure you don’t want to be stuck with someone spending time in a box the whole game,” Quinn says with a smirk and leaning in.

You decided to close the gap and the kiss was all you had ever hoped for. There was a mix of fireworks and something that just felt like home as he grabbed your sides to pull you in closer. Neither of you wanted this feeling to end, but unfortunately you had to come back up for air. 

Quinn has the slightest pink tinge and smile on his face as he pulls back far enough to scan your face for any regrets.

“I’ve been waiting to do that for so long,” He says.

“Finally!” Elias says as he rounds the corner to see the two of you still wrapped up in each other's arms.

“I never thought he would make a move,” Elias adds as Quinn tries to hide in your neck.

“Well maybe we should get out of here and talk a little bit,” You suggest and Quinn excitedly nods, grabbing your hand to lead you out.

The two of you get into his car and you leave the arena stealing kisses from each other at stop lights and looking forward to your future together.

[bad268]

Can you do like a YouTube challenge video with Kimi Antonelli. He doesn’t have enough fics

Stream Starting... (Andrea Kimi Antonelli X Youtuber! Reader)

Fandom: RPF/Formula 2/3

Requested: Clearly (also while I have shit lined up every week through March, I'm back to work so actually writing will be slow lol)

Warnings: none

Pronouns: You/your

W.C. 1331

Summary: Q&A stream with Kimi

As always, my requests are OPEN

MASTERLIST // HITLIST

~~(^Pinterest)

“Hello everybody,” you greeted to the camera only to be interrupted by laughing coming from your right side. Your fans had been begging for a video with Kimi for as long as you could remember, so with a little help of begging (definitely not guilt-tripping), you were able to convince him to join you for a live stream. You turned your attention away from the rapidly moving chat to face the person you called yours as you joked, “Can you not, K?”

‘I’m sorry!” He defended as he leaned onto your shoulder with a smile. You could see a faint blush rise onto his cheeks even though he tried his best to hide in your shoulder. “You’re in your element. It’s one thing to hear you from outside the recording room, but it’s another thing to be in here with you while you do it.”

“Now, you know how I feel every time I go with you to a race,” You responded, moving your hand up to twirl some of his curls between your fingers. You moved some of his hair away from his forehead as you gently placed a kiss to the crown of his head before leaning your head against his. “It’s your natural habitat, and I love seeing you in the zone before a race. It’s cute.”

“Is there a reason this is moving faster now?” He asked, pointing at the live chat. You completely forgot that you were still live, entirely wrapped up in your own little world with just you and Kimi. Your wide eyes gave you away, honestly. Kimi looked up at you and began laughing at your expression before moving to sit up, just settling for holding your hand. “I assume that’s something to do with the stream?”

“Yeah, that’s chat,” you explained after getting over the initial shock of forgetting you were live. “It’s in real-time. Well, like a 20-second delay, but it’s about as close to real-time as I can get it.” You pointed out a few more small features of the steam before directing your attention back to the camera. “Anyway, now that we’ve gotten past the brief delay, I can tell you what we’re doing! If you can read, you can read the title of this stream, and if you can’t read, no problem! We are painting portraits of each other while answering your questions!”

“You did not tell me we were painting,” Kimi groaned. “I’m not creative enough for that.”

“Oh, trust me,” you laughed in response, “we’re finger painting, so they’ll both look bad!”

“Oh, great,” he chuckled as he jokingly rolled his eyes before helping you set up the tarp, paints, and canvases. He laid them out so that everything was facing each other as you adjusted the camera, so you would both be in the frame and you would see the questions easily. “Does this meet your standards?”

“You say that like I am some perfectionist,” you mumbled as you took your seat in front of Kimi. You both started your portraits of each other, so you would have a base before moving into the questions. “Okay, first question, ‘why do you stay with me?’ Ouch.”

“Your fans suck,” he laughed. “You’re everything to me, that’s why.”

“Ah, you’re a sap, ti amo (I love you),” you giggled as you looked for another question. “Oh, this one’s fun, ‘how did you meet?’ Well, I moved to Italy when I was really young and we met at boarding school.”

“No, you are forgetting a key detail, amore (love),” Kimi chastised as he shook his red-colored finger at you with a smile. “You ran into me on your way to class and spilled your coffee all over both of us!”

“Hey! You said you would never mention that!” You gasped as your gaze snapped up to meet his. In mock offense, you took a little bit of the paint that was in your palm and planted it on his cheek, laughing at his shocked expression.

“You’re going to regret that,” he jokingly threatened.

“Oh, will I?” You teased back, almost challenging him. You did not think he would do much. Maybe put paint on your face in a similar manner, but you did not expect him to literally throw a glob of paint straight at your face. Your jaw dropped as you wiped away some of the paint, unsure whether to laugh or be upset, but the smile on his face made you laugh along with him. “Oh, so that’s how this is?”

“You started it, let’s not forget that,” Kimi tried to defend as he put his hands up in mock defense. “I was just making it even.”

“So if I tried to kiss you now, what would you do?” You asked, leaning over your canvas to get closer to him. Kimi seemed confused at first but still moved forward to meet you halfway. When he was close enough, you smeared the leftover paint that you had wiped off your face across his. “There. Now we’re even.”

“I am gonna get you back for this,” Kimi chuckled lowly, “Just wait for it.”

“Anyway, moving on,” you pressed, switching topics as you looked back at the chat before going back to the portrait of Kimi, “Are we always this chaotic?”

“Yes, next question,” Kimi responded immediately, not even looking up from his canvas.

“Thought so,” you said to yourself as you looked through the messages, trying to find a good question. “Ooo, ‘are you both going to be at preseason testing?’ Obviously, he is, but I don’t think I have the attention span to sit around a race track for four hours a day.”

“Hey! You promised you would go with me this year!” Kimi whined. “You said you would drop everything to travel with me.”

“Four hours for three days straight in Bahrain does not sound that appealing to me,” you chucked as you shrugged your shoulders, still not meeting his eyes. “I’ll be there for the first race week, but I doubt I’ll be there for preseason testing.”

“I’ll buy you something,” Kimi offered. This piqued your interest as your head snapped up to meet his eyes as he laughed. “Merch, food, coffee, tea, games. You name it, and I’ll get it.”

“What if I want someone to hang out with?” You countered with a smirk.

“I will try my best. Who do you want?” Kimi asked, genuinely curious.

“Paul,” you laughed. “I need my Mamma Mia buddy!”

“Absolutely not!” Kimi shouted. “I am not subjecting myself to that torture again!”

“You would be in the car, Kimi!” You retorted as you pushed all of the art supplies to the side, so you could sit directly in front of Kimi and hold his hands. “You wouldn’t even have to hear our nonsense. We’d just be vibing.”

“How do I know you won’t talk Rene into putting you both on the radio?” Kimi asked genuinely as he gave you a pointed look, knowing that would be something you would do.

“You have my word,” you said, jokingly putting your hand up in a salute, “Scout’s honor!”

“It’s times like this that I really question why I’m with you,” Kimi admitted with a sigh as he whipped off his hands and pulled out his phone to text Paul.

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” you joked leaning over to leave a small kiss on his paint-covered cheek. “If I don’t keep you on your toes, I am not doing my job right!”

You turned your attention to the camera to wrap up the video as Kimi stepped out of the room to call, who you assumed was, Paul. “Anyways, that’s all for this for now. Guaranteed, we’ll do this again. Maybe with less of a paintball match, but yeah. We’ll post the final products on my Instagram later. Follow that if you don’t already, and I will see most of you in the next stream! Bye!”

~~~~~

© BAD268 2024. DO NOT REPOST WITHOUT PERMISSION.

[thebestofoneshots]

Gilded Constellations | wolfstar x reader

Series Masterlist | Previous episode

Pairing: Wolfstar x Reader Word Count: 7.2 K Warnings: none Prompt: Things finally start to make sense, maybe you'll finally discover one of the mysteries that have been surrounding you This IS a wolfstar x reader fic, but it's incredibly slow burn. They won't start all dating each other until we're very deep into the story, but I promise the long wait will be worth it.

ANNOUNCEMENT:

In a couple of weeks I'll make a Q&A to cellebrate Gilded Constellations reaching 100,000 K words. And I'd love for all of you to be a part of it. So send in your questions, they can be anything you want, things like: How did you get the idea? Where does inspo come from? writing tips (I mean I don’t know much but anyway), character design, fancast, fav characters, things about me, about my plot notebook, literally anything you want, ask away (just state: For Q&A event or something) <3

Chapter 14: Maybe I’m Amazed

Monday October 25th, 1976

You and Remus had a presentation today, but he wasn’t anywhere to be found. You waited near the door of the classroom, with your notes in your hands, looking over them while tapping your feet on the ground, toying with your ring, and turning to look at the hall every couple of seconds, hoping to see him miraculously arrive. But he didn’t, in fact, it was the second time that day people you expected to see were nowhere to be found. 

You were also supposed to go flying with James and Sirius in the morning like you did every single day, but neither of the boys made it. You went up to knock on their room’s door, but nobody answered, and after waiting for a few minutes, you decided to go for the morning flight by yourself. 

Professor Flitwick saw you at the door, looking nervous and smiled at you empathetically from his desk. When your class was just about to start you sighed and walked closer to him. 

“Professor, I don’t understand what’s happening, I’m not sure if Remus will make it. He didn’t tell me anything, I haven’t seen him since yesterday and I–“ 

“It’s ok,” he said calmly “Mr. Lupin is sick, I was informed.” 

“Sick?” You asked with a frown. 

Flitwick nodded, “I believe he and some of his friends all ate something that upset their stomachs at Hogsmeade on Saturday, they’re at the nurses’ office.” 

You opened your eyes wide, that was your lie. But if the boys really were at the infirmary, then it meant something had happened to them on their stupid prank last night. 

You frowned, almost wanting to run off to see them, but resisted the urge to do so “What’s gonna happen to our presentation then? He’s worked so hard on it, I wouldn’t want him to lose his grade.” 

“You can present with him next class,” he told you comprehensively “It’s ok Miss (Y/LN), take your seat, don’t stress too much about it. I know you’ll give a brilliant presentation once your partner’s feeling better.” 

You nodded “Thank you, Professor,” you told him with a smile and went to take one of the seats. 

The class started, Lily and Marlene had worked on their project together and they went first, talking about the properties of wordless magic and then making a very small presentation, teaching some volunteers to make sparks with their wands without saying a word. Tom and Marlene were next, and they gave a talk about the dangers of dark magic and so on. A couple other students asked for volunteers, and while in normal situations you’d have been among the first to raise your hand, today was an exception, you were a little too busy, tapping your feet under the desk and looking at the clock every couple of minutes. 

At some point you decided you had to do something, so you took some parchment out and wrote a small note: 

Hey Puppy! You all right? I missed you and Prongs on our morning flight today… Remus missed our presentation too, tell him Flitwick said we could present next class. Are you all really at the infirmary? Because I know for a fact it wasn’t something you ate… Unless you actually ate something last night, I wouldn’t put that past you lot, but I’m sure that’s not it. I’ll keep an eye out for your answer plane. 

You read it over a couple of times and then started to bend it into a very small paper plane that you left over your desk. When class was over you used the same spell Remus had used at the beginning of the course so that your little plane landed close to Sirius. 

It wasn’t until you were in the middle of transfigurations that a different paper plane landed over your desk, you carefully unfolded it and started reading:

Hey beautiful! Thanks for that strong vote of confidence! We didn’t actually eat anything bad. Remus says he’s sorry for missing the class, and that he’ll do your homework for a week to make it up to you, I’m jealous! 

We really are at the infirmary though, last night’s prank went awry and we accidentally got attacked by Grindylows. We’re all right, Remus got the worst of it anyway… But we came to check on him first thing in the morning, that’s why we didn’t make it to the morning flight. Your rumour somehow got all the way to Poppy, and when we went to check on Remus she gave us some medicine and had us stay in the infirmary to check on us… so it’s basically your fault. 

Anyway, you should still come see your poor boyfriend in the infirmary, pamper him with kisses and offer him some tasty treats… at least.

ps. Since I haven’t retrieved the ones from last week, that would mean you owe me six so far…

You smiled when you finished reading, Sirius was a total flirt, and you loved that about him. When you read over it though, you frowned, that was the second time Remus got hurt after a prank, and if they were attacked by Grindylows, there was no way they were just fine, those little creatures could be absolute savages, you’d know, since one time a friend at your older school had fallen on the lake and been attacked by those nasty little water beings, she had to be taken to the hospital wing, and stayed there for a week. Of course, Remus was bigger, stronger, and a more advanced wizard, since that had happened to her in 3rd year, but regardless, Remus must be pretty battered up, again. 

Finally, you sighed and went back to trying to turn the quill you had in front of you into a bird. Not that you were doing too good at that either.  You let out an exasperated groan after your 3rd try of only getting a beak and little legs to appear on the quill. 

Professor McGonagall approached you  “Everything ok Miss (Y/LN)?”

You nodded, the air of exasperation remaining regardless, “I’m really struggling to get this right,” you told her “This is the first time I ever done transfiguration, and no magic had been this challenging for me before, it’s just…” 

McGonagall smiled understandingly “Would you mind if I got you a tutor? I know a couple students from your year that would be more than willing to help.” 

“I… uh… I’m not really that close to everyone in my year…” 

McGonagall raised an eyebrow, you were pretty much already a member of one of the Gryffindor friend groups, and the rumour that you and Sirius were dating was already spreading too “I was thinking Mr. Lupin could help, and from what I gather you’re already friends…”  

“Oh… Remus? Yeah, we’re close!” 

“Excellent, I’ll tell him once he’s back on his feet. Poor boy, he must be feeling pretty tattered up today.” 

You nodded “Yeah, he shouldn’t have eaten that.” 

“Eaten what?” She asked, confused. 

You arched your eyebrows “The thing at Hogsmeade that made them all end up in the infirmary…” 

“They all?” Minerva quipped “Who else is in the infirmary?” 

“Sirius, James and Peter.” 

“They are there?!” She asked, seemingly surprised. You frowned, how did McGonagall know Remus was in the hospital if she didn’t know the boys were there too?

“Isn’t that the reason Remus was in the infirmary?” You asked, rather confused. 

“The reason he–? Oh right, yeah right, must have slipped my mind.” She said and stepped away. 

You frowned, there were many things that did not make sense with Remus Lupin, you’d already accepted that, and moved on from it, since he was one of the best people you’d ever met, but this, this was just off. McGonagall was not the type of teacher to whom things just “slipped her mind”, and that was a fact. Unless she knew Remus had been in the infirmary for another reason, and if that reason was that he’d been attacked by Grindylows, then that would imply she knew about the boys’ prank and was covering for them, which made even less sense. 

And today was not the first time things were weird, it was like some teachers knew something that you didn’t. And it was all somehow related to Remus. And you really did not want to pry, but your mind, being naturally curious, could not stop thinking about it. And it all seemed so familiar; like you only needed to find the one little string that would solve the entire mystery, and it was just there for you to reach out and pull, but somehow, you were trying to find the tail end with your eyes closed. Maybe Remus really did blindfold you the first time you met, but instead of using the physical blindfold, he’d used an intricate web of half-facts and untold tales. Of course, he didn’t owe you any kind of explanation, and it was not like you were going to ask but a part of you really, really wanted to discover the mystery. 

You spend the entire class pondering all the little things that didn’t make sense about Remus Lupin, thinking of trillions of ways in which they could be connected to each other, but nothing seemed to make sense. No matter how much you racked your brain, you could not find the string to tie it all out. You were so focused in uncovering the mystery that you didn’t even realise when the class was over. 

“Hey (Y/N)! You ok?” Tom said as he shook your shoulder, snapping you out of your thoughts. 

You nodded “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine.” You said, but your head was pounding from so much thinking, and to be honest, you did not want to deal with divination class, so you corrected yourself “Actually, would you mind telling Spellman I’m feeling a little dizzy, and that I’m going to the infirmary?” 

Tom gave you a look and nodded, the two of you stood together and started walking towards the door “And where are you actually going to?” He asked, curiosity getting the best of him. 

“Hm? Oh, to the infirmary actually, I’ll just pass by the kitchens first.” 

“The kitchens?” He asked confused as you both continued walking towards the stairs. 

“I’m taking some food for the boys,” you explained, Tom nodded, but still looked confused “They got caught up in the excuse from yesterday and Poppy got them to stay in the infirmary to check on them.” 

“So you’re just feeling bad as an excuse to go see your sweet boyfriend,” he teased. 

You nodded “Yeah, and my friend who got attacked by Grindyllows.” 

Tom frowned “Grindylows? At this time of the year?” 

“Yeah, why?” 

“It’s weird, when the lake starts to cool down they disappear.” 

You frowned at that, yet another puzzle piece to solve, but by then Tom was already walking towards a different set of stairs “See you around, hope you feel better, I’ll tell Spellman where you went,” he said loudly. Tom really was the worst liar you’d ever met. 

“Thanks Tom,” you managed to say before scurrying through one of the hall entrances, so people wouldn’t notice the weird exchange you’d had. 

Once you got to the kitchens you knocked on the frame and asked the elves if you could have some food, they nodded and started preparing you some snacks to go, you asked around, hoping to find Nimbbletwist, but the elves told you that she’d been commission to something by Dumbledore that particular day. When they were done you thanked them profusely and waved goodbye. You grabbed the package of food and after placing the entire thing inside your backpack you started walking towards the infirmary. 

Once you were next to the huge, half-opened doors, you slowly slipped inside, hoping not to cause too much of a stir inside, but the place was pretty much empty, other than the hushed whispers you heard at the end of the room. A curtain was covering the boys from your sight, and muffling their voices. 

“We need to find a better way to deal with your furry little problem,” You heard Peter say “Moony’s been going pretty wild the past few times.” 

“Ehm…” You cleared your throat, whatever the boys were talking about, the fact that they were whispering about in an empty room, meant that the conversation was secret enough for them, and you were not planning to eavesdrop on some of the nicest people you’d met. “Morning boys,” you said with an awkward wave. 

Sirius smiled the second he spotted you, Peter looked like he’d seen a ghost, and Remus looked too tired to care much about you having shown up almost out of nowhere. But James was the first one to speak “Hey (Y/N)! Sorry we missed the morning flight.” 

You nodded “Sirius told me all about your mishaps,” you said as you walked closer to them, you looked around trying to find a sitting spot, and when you didn’t you resolved to stay standing “Brought you guys some snacks.” 

“You actually did?” Sirius asked with a dashing smile, eyes shining in content. His girl had brought him snacks, and she looked as lovely as ever while doing so. By then, you were already turning your backpack in front of you and pulling the little pack the elves had built for you. So he helped you hold it as you pulled the food pack and placed it on the bed besides Remus. They’d packed sausage rolls, pork pies, scotch pancakes, Jaffa cakes and tiny Bakewell tarts, Peter dug right into the sausage rolls, like he was starving. 

“Poppy didn’t give you boys any food?” 

“She gave us soup,” Peter said in between bites “It was so bland and tasteless, she said it’d make our stomachs feel better.” 

“I thought it was good,” Remus said with a shrug. 

“Yeah, you got the one with spices,” Peter complained “You should’ve said we had a headache or something instead.” 

You raised an eyebrow, “Since when are headaches something 4 people can have at the same time?” You retorted. 

Peter shrugged in response “A magical headache or whatever.” 

“At least, thanks to you, we didn’t get in trouble for skipping class,” James said with a shrug. 

“Exactly, that’s my girl!” Sirius said with a wink, then he grabbed your arm and pulled you onto his lap, you arched your eyebrow at him once you were comfortably sitting on him “You looked like you were tired.” 

You laughed, shaking your head “Yeah, sure Puppy, if you say so.” 

“Don’t think I’ve stopped counting,” he said as he wrapped his arms around you a little tighter, setting the two of you in a more comfortable position. 

Finally, you turned to Remus, he wasn’t eating any of the things you’d brought, James was munching on a pork pie and even Sirius was enjoying a Bakewell tart, but Remus looked genuinely beaten up. He had a sharp gush on his face, and another one down his arm, probably many more underneath his clothes and bandages. Just when you started to pay attention to the open wounds, and realising how different they were from the ones your friend had gotten when she was attacked by Grindyllows, Sirius spoke again “You’re wearing your ring today,” he said pointing at it as he grabbed your hand to look at it. 

“Found it in a drawer as I was getting ready in the morning,” you told him “seemed to match the mood of yesterday.” 

“Because of the moon and the stars,” Sirius agreed, paying a closer look at your ring, you nodded, “It’s very beautiful,” he said, slipping it out of your finger and testing if it would fit in his pinky, it stood out among his thicker rings, but he didn’t seem to mind. 

“Won’t you eat anything?” Peter asked Remus as he munched on his fourth sausage roll. 

“I’m not really feeling it,” Remus responded. 

“Mmm… Actually–“ you said as you placed a cookie in your mouth to bring your backpack to your lap again. Sirius took the cookie from your lips and held it for you, you turned to him and whispered a small “thanks,” before you continued to rummage through your bags, “It’s here!” You said as you pulled out a chocolate bar. It was the same brand Remus always carried around, and you’d bought a few at Honeydukes over the weekend. You’d decided to always carry one in your bag, to offer to Remus when he was feeling off, just like he’d done for you several times. You handed it over to him. 

The boy smiled as he grabbed onto it “Thanks love! Don’t deserve it after I failed you for today’s presentation.” 

“Don’t be silly Rem, you had an accident,” you told him motioning to him on the bed. 

“And where’s my chocolate bar?” Asked Sirius as he leaned his head over your shoulder to give Remus a better look. 

“You don’t get one today Puppy, I only packed one in the morning, sorry.” 

“And you gave it to Remus instead of me?” He teased, playing offended. “You do remember I am your boyfriend right?”  

“Well, clearly Remus was the one to save all of your asses last night,” you said pointing at the bandaged boy, and then at the rest, who barely had a scratch on them “However the hell did you get into a fight with Grindylows?” 

“We were trying to get some gillyweed,” Remus responded while he pulled on the paper of the chocolate bar to open it “for a special prank we wanted to do on the Slytherins.” 

“With gillyweed?” You asked with a frown. 

“For a potion,” James added “took the recipe from one of Grandpa’s old journals.” 

You narrowed your eyes at James, but nodded, Who knows? the Potters are pretty much experts on potions, they’d know. “Did you get it?” 

Remus shook his head “We were too busy with the Grindylows.”

“I could maybe help you–˝

“–No!” Remus, James, Sirius and Peter said at the same time. You closed your mouth at that, taken aback by their answer. 

“Love, you did see Moony, right? Do you wanna end up like that?” Sirius reasoned. 

“Well… I’m a good swimmer, I could scare the Grindylows away with bombarda or something–”

“–don’t worry about it,” said James “We decided we would buy it in a magazine and get it delivered, we don’t wanna have to go through that again,” he motioned to Remus. 

“But thanks for offering,” Remus added “It’s very brave of you.” 

You shook your head, “those stupid Slytherin boys have been getting on my nerves lately, whatever prank you do to them, I’d love to help.” 

“They’ve bothered you again since the broom incident?” Sirius asked. A shiver ran down your spine as you remembered the way Evan had pulled you over the railing last night. 

“Nothing I can’t deal with, they’re just a bunch of cowards.” 

James looked at you with apprehension, he thought it was his fault that Barty had started to pick on you, after all the ball you threw at his face had originally been directed at him, not at you. You wondered if the boys had heard of yesterday’s commotion in the astronomy tower, they probably hadn’t, they wouldn’t be relaxed at all. 

Sirius yawned from behind, closing his eyes as he leaned closer to you, resting his head over your neck. “You boys should go get some sleep,” you told them when you noticed that it wasn’t only Sirius who was sleepy, James’ shoulders were slumped, and he normally stood straight, while Peter was sluggishly munching onto his fourth sausage roll. “I’ll stay with Rem, I need to wait for Poppy to come anyway, I want something for my headache.”

“You’ve got a headache?” Remus asked with a frown, “Why didn’t you tell us earlier?”  

You tried to shrug but stopped when you remembered Sirius still had his head over your shoulder “You looked a lot worse,” you said with a teasing smile. 

He shook his head with a breathy laugh, “Don’t put yourself second luv, I’m fine, I’m strong! See?” He said as he raised his arm and as if to show off his muscles. 

You laughed, he wasn’t lying, but it was still funny. “You sure you can stay luv? What about your classes?” Sirius asked. 

“I’ll catch up later, it’s easy. It’s not like we have transfiguration.” 

“Still having trouble with that?” Peter asked politely. 

You nodded “That’s literally the cause of my headache, couldn’t get a feather to turn into a bird. McGonagall said she’d give me a tutor.” 

“How delightful,” Sirius said ironically. 

“My thoughts exactly,” you agreed, “but then she said it’d be Remus, so it’s fine, we’re already working together in so many other classes, he must be getting sick of my face.” 

“Oh shut up, I would never,” he said as he broke off another square of his chocolate.

Sirius extended his hands towards him “Gimme soooome Moooony!”

Remus rolled his eyes, but extended his hand with a piece towards your boyfriend anyway, when their hands brushed against each other Remus hissed “What the hell Pads?” He said with a frown, looking betrayed. 

Sirius looked at his hand, his eyes widened as he saw he was still wearing your ring, your silver ring. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to shock you.” 

“Shock him?” You asked confused, that wasn’t the reaction you’d expect from someone who’d gotten an electricity shock. Let alone Remus’.

Remus nodded, “I’ve got a small cut in my hand,” he lied “It was rather unexpected.” 

You looked at him with a bit of a frown, you hadn’t seen any cuts on his hand. James suddenly stood up and clapped, gathering everyone’s attention “Well, if I don’t move now, I’m falling asleep on this chair. Pete, Pads, you coming along?” 

While you turned your head to look at James, Remus threw a look at Sirius, who frowned apologetically and mouthed “I’m sorry, I forgot.” 

“I’m coming,” Peter said, standing up after James. “Need anything from the dorm?” He asked Remus. 

He shook his head “I’ll catch up with my homework later.” He responded. 

“I’ve got a couple of books here in my bag, we can read something while they go sleep.” You offered your friend with a smile. 

“Sounds great!” Remus responded with a smile. 

“Nerds!” Sirius teased. 

“Pads?” Peter asked, “You coming too?” 

Sirius nodded, burying his head on your back as he hugged you tighter. 

“You don’t have to go,” you told him since he didn’t look like he wanted to let go of you just yet. 

“Why don’t you come nap with me instead?” He mumbled, voice a little muffled since he still had his head pressed to your back. “You smell really nice today.” Truth be told, Sirius thought you smelled nice every day, but with some of the dog qualities still lingering on him after the previous hours of being a dog, he was both extra sensitive to smell,�� and extra clingy of his human too, not that you knew any of it. 

“Let the poor girl breathe mate!” Peter teased. Sirius just groaned in response. 

“I’m gonna stand up luv,” he told you, you were about to stand, but he just stood up while still holding onto you, and once he was up, he slid to the side, and dropped you right back on the chair. Well then, I guess that works too, you thought. 

“Bye Puppy,” you told him as he walked towards his friends. He raised his hands, showing 9 fingers up and raising his eyebrows. You rolled your eyes, but also realised he was still wearing your ring on his pinky finger “Oi my ring!” 

“I’m keeping it as collateral,” he told you, “‘least until you pay up what you owe.” You gave him an amused smile and shook your head as he left. 

“What do you owe him?” Remus asked once the boys were gone. 

“He hasn’t told you about that yet?” You asked casually “says he doesn’t like being called Puppy–“ 

“–that’s a lotta crap.” 

You laughed “Yeah, well he charges a kiss for every time I call him that.” 

Remus raised his eyebrows, now he was amused “he’s just taking advantage of you love…” 

“Is he though?” You said back with a little smirk “The way I see it is a win-win situation. He gets to be all flirty and I get to kiss his pretty lips.” 

“Touché,” the boy agreed, he too thought Sirius had pretty lips “Can I tease him with the nickname too?” 

“All you want,” you replied with a smile “if he tries to kiss you, though, don’t blame me for it.” You both laughed, and a comfortable silence followed, then you remembered you still had books inside your bag and pulled them out, setting them on the bed beside him. He grabbed the one at the top when you noticed which book it was, you pulled it from his hands. “You can’t read that one.” 

“I can’t read… A Wizard's Handy Handbook of Spells?” He asked as he read the cover name from your hands. 

“It’s not that,” you added, holding it tightly between your arms. “It’s… not actually A Wizard's Handy Handbook of Spells, I charmed the cover.” He arched an eyebrow and tried to take it from your grasp, you pulled back but it was too late, he had it in his hands again.  Remus had an awful lot of energy for someone who had been badly hurt just a couple of hours ago. “Remus, give me that!” 

“I wanna know why you charmed the cover first,” he said while dangling the book in the air. 

You looked at him with a frown and jumped forward to try and grasp the book from his hands, but he pulled it back, to the side of the bed. “Remus!” 

“Am I gonna have to read it?” 

You stood up, and extended your hands over him, to try and get the book that was on the other side of the bed, but your feet got trapped with your backpack strap and you ended up falling over Remus. He groaned as your body crashed over a particularly nasty bruise. Your scent filled his nostrils from the closeness, Sirius was right, you smelled awfully nice, a little like him too.

“Shit Rem, I’m sorry,” you said standing up as soon as possible “I didn’t mean to–“ The brusque movements had caused his shirt to rise up slightly and you actually saw the nasty bruise your body had crashed against, you looked at it with a concerned frown and then back at your friend “Remus…” 

He averted your gaze, he did not like being pitted “I’m fine.” He said once he turned back to you, using his free hand to pull down his shirt again “I’m strong, remember?” 

“Yeah, someone falling over a bruise hurts, no matter how strong…” 

He shrugged, he’d definitely had worse than you falling over him “You’re light, didn’t hurt much.” You looked at him, sighing “and you smell nice, no wonder Sirius wants to have you on his lap all the time.” Finally, you laughed, shaking your head as you stared at your friend. Remus realised you had a really nice laugh as you did, he shook his head from the trance of staring, he wasn’t sure he’d ever found a girl as pretty as you. “Will you tell me what kind of book you were trying to hide from me, or will I have to figure it out myself?” He asked, raising an eyebrow. 

“It’s a spicy romance novel,” you said avoiding his gaze, he smiled diverted. The more you know, he thought. “It was recommended!” You added. 

“Yeah, sure.” 

“It was!” You insisted “By your little Ravenclaw girlfriend, actually” 

“Nina Blythe?!” he asked in disbelief.

You nodded “Are you sure you don’t want to date her? She’s clearly into the good stuff.” He gave you a look and you laughed, Nina was beautiful, but she definitely still had a baby face, like Remus had said when you told him she had a crush on him.

“She’s not really my type.” 

“Which is…?”

“None of your business, of course.” He replied sassily, and then changed the subject “How spicy?” He asked, curiosity taking the best of him. 

You shrugged “I’ll tell you when I get to the spicy part,” you told him with a shrug, taking the book from his hands, he let you do it without any fuzz this time “But um…” you pointed at one of the other books on the bed “this one’s good, you’d like it.”

“Is it also spicy?” He teased. 

“Remus!” You complained, “Not every single book I read is spicy!” 

He shrugged “Wouldn’t shame you if you did.” 

You rolled your eyes and let out a breathy laugh. “It’s not spicy, but it is really good.”

“I’ll take your word for it,” he said, taking the book and opening on the first page. Soon enough the two of you were comfortably reading. You were so engrossed in your book that you’d totally forgotten the initial reason you’d gone there. But as you continued flipping pages, it was like the string you had been trying to reach earlier was finally there, shining brightly for you to take it, and tie all the mysterious facts into one sole explanation. As your eyes moved through the words in the book, the description of the male lead started to resonate with you…

Remus was strong. Remus had a lot of scars and bruises all over his body, and they were definitely not caused by Grindyllows, he always carried around a calming draught and had other rather strong painkiller potions in his room as well, he tended to stay away from you when you wore your silver ring, literally jumping from your grasp when you touched him with it on one time, and was also visibly mad at Sirius when he brushed over his fingers with it on, as if they both knew something you didn’t –electric shock, my ass. 

McGonagall knew he was in the infirmary, no, she expected him to be in the infirmary today, yesterday was full moon. 

When you told him that he could get the Fluxweed he said he was good at catching so he switched with you, he would’ve had to harvest it on the full moon. All the boys got really suspicious during the full moon, and the two times you’d seen the full moon happen in the castle, Remus and all the boys had disappeared. Peter was talking about “a furry little problem” just before you cleared your throat earlier. James had joked about his romance novel being called “The Beast Within.”

In the boggart class, when you got a werewolf, all the boys had tensed up, even the way Lily had approached you, constantly looking back and forth between him and you. 

You looked up at him, Remus looked tired, Remus had a great sense of smell, Remus got a lot more irritable around this time of the month, Remus was ripped even if he didn’t look like the type to do much exercise, in fact, you’d never seen him do exercise. Remus Bogart had been the moon. Remus was right in front of you, looking like he’d been up all night and yesterday was full moon. 

Remus’ nickname… Remus’ nickname was fucking Moony! 

YESTERDAY WAS FULL MOON. 

Finally seeing clearly every single thing that didn’t make sense in your head, all the half-told tales and the lies and the inconsistencies, “You’re a werewolf…” you mumbled, almost in a whisper. 

He had been too distraught with the book to notice, so he looked up at you “Sorry, what was that, luv?” 

Your head started swirling with fast thoughts, Remus hadn’t told you himself. Remus probably wanted his lycanthropy to be a secret. Remus had gone to great lengths to hide it. You’d barely met him a couple of months ago and you were sure most people didn’t know about his condition, other than a few teachers, the boys and, maybe Lily. She probably knows, in the bogart class, she seemed alarmed. But Marlene, Mary, Beth? They probably have no clue. What right did you have to know before the people who’d met him years ago? Whoever the hell were you to butt in on this boy’s life? Even if he’d become one of your closest friends. I do not want to make Remus uncomfortable. I do not want Remus to hate me for prying. “I.. uh.. Do you like golf?” You improvised, almost cringing at yourself for how stupid your question had been. 

“Golf?” He asked with a frown.

“Aha…” you continued “the muggle sport, Golf. With uhm.. sticks and small balls,” you then made a little golf swing with your hands. 

“Yeah, I know Golf,” he responded, still confused “Never played it tho.” 

“Me neither,” you responded honestly “This character though,” you pointed to the book “Seems like- very obsessed with it.” 

Remus frowned and leaned forward on the bed, to try and get a glimpse of the book, you remembered that you were literally on the page about the scars on the werewolf’s body and you instantly dropped the book. It closed shut on the floor. You leaned down “Oh no, I lost my page.” Maybe you were a worse liar than Tom in the end. 

Remus arched an eyebrow as he saw you leaning on the floor, you looked rather desperate. 

“You okay?” You nodded and sat back on the chair. “So… how was it? spicy?” 

“Not much so far,” you responded honestly “just very in-depth descriptions of the male lead’s toned abdomen from the time they went to swim on a lake together.” 

Remus nodded, maybe he’d have to borrow the book from you at some point. “And you’re liking it?” 

“Plot’s good, yeah. Very enlightening.” 

“Enlightening?” He asked, not quite understanding how abs would be enlightening, but who knows, maybe they are. 

“Mhm…” you said when you realised the slip-up “What about your book?” you decided to drag the subject away from the spicy werewolf book and onto the one Remus had instead. 

“I’m loving it, actually. I didn’t know you had such great taste in books.” 

You smiled at the compliment “The portrait of Dorian Gray is an absolute classic, it has some of the most killer quotes I’ve read in my life.” 

“Nowadays people know the price of everything–“ he started.

“–and value nothing…” you finished the quote for him, “And there are so many others, you won’t be able to stop.” You told him with a smile, “Like… the only way to get rid of temptation, is–“ 

“–to yield to it.” He said at the same time as you did, a certain glimmer in his eyes when he did. 

Out if nowhere the images of the kiss you’d had at Marlene’s party came back to Remus, he remembered how soft and gentle you’d been, he remembered how your hand over his shoulder had felt, how kind your lips had been to his, how you’d tasted of fresh berries and potions, how after the kiss was over you looked genuinely pleased but cracked a joke to ease the tension, how contagious your laugh had been… how sweet you smelled that day, always with a hint of Sirius’ scent from how close you were to each other. What the hell is wrong with me? She’s dating Sirius! She’s dating Sirius –my crush best friend– Black, he thought. He snapped himself out of it as soon as he could, coughing up a couple of times to clear his throat. 

You looked at him, with a bit of concern and stood up, quickly walking towards the nightstand to pour some water on a glass and hand it over to him, he took it, fingers brushing against your small hands. He cursed himself for feeling something when they did, he’d rather feel nothing at all. Why must you be so kind?, he thought as you waited for him to finish drinking, to put the glass back in his place.  “Thank you,” he mumbled. 

You just smiled kindly “That’s what friends are for.” No, he thought, the boys were rarely as attentive as you were, and Lily, well Lily rarely visited after the full moon, even if she always took a moment to ask if he was feeling alright. Maybe that was why he was feeling so weird all of a sudden, he just wasn’t used to being cared for the way you cared for him. He then started to wonder if you were that nice to everyone, or only to your closest friends, he wanted to know if you also carried around Peter’s or Prong’s favourite treats in your bag, or if you had ever given chocolate to Tom, Alex or Teddy, if you borrowed books to Lily, or if you laughed along Nina the same way you did with him, he felt a tiny pang of jealousy when he imagined those things happening. Remus, stop it! he told himself, by then you’d already sat back in your seat, and found yourself engrossed in your book. Or at least you were pretending to be, in really you were still cursing yourself for asking if he liked golf. 

When you noticed he was staring you turned to him with a diverted smile “Do I have something in my face?” 

He seemed to be snapped out of his own thoughts “What?” 

“You were staring,” you told him, pretending to be uninterested as you still looked at the book, in reality, you were wondering if maybe he’d heard you ask if he was a werewolf and if he was considering how to kick you out of his life for butting in on his private business. 

“Ah…” he acknowledged “I wasn’t…. I was thinking of last night’s accident,” he lied. 

“Of course,” you responded, “Grindylows must’ve  been horrifying.” 

He nodded, absentmindedly and the two returned to your respective books. 

Series Masterlist | Next Chapter

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Raead more Marauders Fiction

[skzhua]

Episode nine.

MASTERLIST

pairing: XO, Kitty's Min Ho x Female Reader

genre: Fluff, angst, enemies-to-lovers, slow burn, coming-of-age.

word count: 5.7k

warnings: Swearing, suggestive, jealous Min Ho, sad for some parts.

summary: Transferring to KISS was the last thing you had asked for and, yet, a certain tall boy made it seem both worse and better than you expected.

note: Bold - Korean, Italic - Over the phone

a/n: So much is happening in this one... and it's so long...

"A reason, a season, or a lifetime."

Q paused his workout for a moment. Frowning at Min Ho in confusion, he asked him to explain furthermore. As he stopped massaging his face with the face roller, he sighed.

"Every relationship fits into one of those categories. I read it in a magazine."

Q, not caring much, resumed to working out. Meanwhile, you came out of your room and sat next to Min Ho.

"The point is," he continued. "Y/N and I are starting a relationship. And looking at how things were before between us, I believe we got together for a reason."

"You needed to get laid with a chick?"

You slapped Q's arm aggressively. "What a way to talk about me when I am right here!"

"Not for that, no." Min Ho chuckled. "She showed me that there was more than just casual dating, that it could be worth it."

You laughed and he looked at you weirdly. "What?"

"I'm talking about real feelings and you are laughing?"

"No, I believe you are being sincere and it's real sweet. But it does not fit you at all." you still laughed.

His jaw clenched. "It might not have been that worth it asking you to be my girlfriend, after all."

That shut you up real quick. After a small apology, he invited you in his arms to cuddle before placing a soft peck on the top of your head. You squirmed in comfort.

"Do I have to third-wheel?" Q whined.

"Don't be like this, you have Florian." you assured but it didn't seem to do the trick.

"Yeah..."

Min Ho immediately noticed the shift in his voice. "How are things with him?"

"He's going through some stuff, but I'm here for him."

"That's good. I'm sure he's glad to have you around." you smiled warmly at him.

Having complained about third-wheeling barely two minutes ago, to Q's luck, Dae and Kitty came to join in the living room, skipping before he took her in his arms. Telling each other sweet 'good morning's, the remaining three of you grunted in annoyance.

"And now I am fifth-wheeling." Q muttered to himself.

Min Ho gave the couple the side eye. "It's too early to be this cheery."

"I am this cheery." Kitty affirmed as she and Dae went to the kitchen counter to prepare coffee for everyone. "Not only because I have the most perfect boyfriend in the world-"

"Lucky you." you said as you sat down with Min Ho behind you, rubbing your arms.

"Thank you?" he gasped, offended.

Kitty chuckled before continuing. "But it has also come to my attention that I am failing most of my classes. That means that if I don't do amazing on the finals, I will flunk out of school."

"How is this making you cheery?" you asked.

"Well, if I dwell the fact that I was considered super smart at home and here I can barely keep up, I will start sobbing."

You, on the other hand, had never been doing any better. Your aunt was proud of you for integrating the school perfectly, your uncle praised your grades in his class, you had friends, a boyfriend... This was all too good to be true. You started to doubt that it was going to last, especially with finals coming up so soon.

"We still have a week." Dae spoke. "We're going to make study plans and everyone will help you."

Min Ho shook his head. "I'm very busy and Y/N-"

"Everyone." Dae said in a stern tone. "Guys, Kitty and I are finally together. I'm not going to let her fail out of this school now."

"Well, I'm in. I'll help with chem." Q said.

You raised your hand. "I could ask my uncle for extra exercises in history." you suggested to which Kitty thanked you.

"She definitely needs to work on her Korean." Min Ho mumbled.

"What did you just call me?" Kitty asked angrily, immediately taking offense.

"Exactly." he deadpanned at her.

Dae assured her he'll be helping her with the rest. Being top student, he was the perfect tutor for her. Clinging your mugs of coffee together, you started to get ready afterwards. However, Min Ho did not let you go back to your room and grabbed you by the arm to kiss you.

"I'd love doing that, but I need to change."

He pouted but let go of you. "We can't have a moment to us in this dorm."

You could only laugh at him. You simply adored how much of a softy he was to you.

Tutoring Kitty was either easy or hard. It depended on how motivated she was and, most of the time, she was only discouraged.

"You've got 53%" you said sadly as you gave her back the sheet of paper.

Your uncle happily gave you exam practices for Kitty to study, but with this one being the fourth she did already, you were starting to feel like she was a lost cause. Plus, the library was fully packed since everyone was studying.

"Great." she grunted before dropping her head into her arms.

"It's four percent better than last time."

"And that's what's going to help me pass, yes."

She made a good point. You sprawled on your chair and sighed heavily with her. It looked as if it was the two of you who were failing. And Min Ho just had to confirm that when he sat with you with his Korean lesson books to take over Kitty's tutoring.

"Aren't you two adorable." he teased you and you stuck out your tongue at him. "I'm serious, you are cute."

"Ew." Kitty said in disgust.

"Not you. Y/N." he specified. "I believe it's time to work on your Korean now."

Kitty shook her head. "I am on the verge of dropping out myself. Give me five minutes."

He frowned before glancing at you. "I'm assuming history didn't go well."

"Nope." you chuckled. "I'm sure she'll get the hang of it... We just need to study more."

She let out a whine. "Study, study, study... this is all I've been doing today."

"Stop complaining, you asked us to help you." Min Ho said, frustrated.

He convinced her to get into studying Korean and you stayed with them, having nothing else to do. She started to get the hang of the the basics but it was still very bad. By the end of it, she was able to tell what were some verbs and such.

"Are you coming back to the dorm with me?" she asked while taking her bag to head out.

Min Ho held you by the waist as you walked. "Not today. I have prepared something very special for my girlfriend."

You looked away from him in an attempt to hide your blush. "Another surprise?"

"You can't have enough of them. Don't worry, I think you will like it a lot."

"I'll love it for sure if I'm with you."

Kitty groaned. "I think I preferred it when you were cussing each other out."

"Says the one who is too cheery when she's with Dae."

That shut her up and she parted ways with you, leaving Min Ho laughing with pride. You shook your head in disapproval.

"What? It wasn't even mean."

"Nothing. So, what's the surprise?"

He smirked. "You'll see."

You took a stroll around campus, hand in hand, and he eventually left the grounds to lead you somewhere. Just there, his chauffeur was waiting for you. You skeptically hopped in and he drove off. Being driven away when you didn't know the destination was usually a sign to run away. But you trusted Min Ho, maybe more than you should.

It wasn't even twenty minutes after that he pulled over in front of Han River. A typical date in Seoul. Getting off the car, Min Ho took your hand to help you out and you followed the trail while admiring the view.

"This is so cheesy." you laughed.

"Stop that, it's cute."

You snorted. "I'm sure you brought other girls here."

He smiled in shame. "Fair. But I didn't like any of them as much as you."

Your face became red. A couple of steps later, something popped in your mind. You grew tense and he felt it. As he halted his movements, he rubbed your shoulders while asking you what was wrong.

"What happened with Lulu?"

He gulped. "Should it matter?"

"Kind of."

He sighed and resumed to walking with you. "I went out with her the night after you literally saved my ass. We made out, sure, but I haven't talked to her since."

You nodded. "Okay, and was there anyone else?"

He shook his head violently. "I couldn't get you off my mind after I..." he paused and coughed. "Well, it doesn't matter."

You began to connect the dots. "You had a sex dream about me."

He coughed again. "No."

"So Q was right." you giggled. "How was it?"

"I did not have a sex dream about you."

"Awe, Min, don't be shy."

He looked away and you kept on laughing at him. He fastened his pace in silence. You called out for him and tried to catch up to his pace. He refused to look back at you. But once you did reach him, you were left speechless. On a picnic table, he had delicately placed candles and lights as well as some pillows for comfort. The best wasn't even that. It was the food. You spotted kimbap, japchae, tteokboki, kimchi... The amount was overwhelming.

"I'm... wow." you breathed out.

He walked up to you and hugged you from behind. "I thought we could use a night to ourselves."

You smiled widely. "This is perfect, no one has done something like this for me before."

"Expect to get more of this. Shall we?"

You sat down face to face and he helped you with serving yourself, asking what you wanted to taste first. Every single dish was delicious, you couldn't get enough of it. Min Ho watched you eat, satisfied with how the surprise turned out.

"When did you even cook this?" you asked, still having a bite of kimbap in your mouth.

"I used my chauffeur's kitchen and I missed my classes today."

Your face fell. "Min Ho..."

"It was my pleasure, darling."

You grabbed his hand and stroke it with your thumb. "I love it but I don't want you to fall behind in school because of me."

He gave you a reassuring smile. "I'm doing great in all of my classes, don't worry."

After eating, you went on with your evening stroll. Talking about everything and nothing, it eventually got to the point where he discussed about his parents with you. He understood the lifestyle of his mother but it was starting to get to him more nowadays. If there was one person he loved more than anything, it was her. So being apart from her for so long, he suffered. The relationship with his father wasn't as pleasant. He had pretty much cut off ties with him, not approving of his new way of living life after the divorce.

"Do you miss him?"

He thought for an instant. "Sometimes. But I miss the old him, not what he has become."

"I'm sorry."

He huffed. "Don't be. I'm better off without him."

A silence took over and he stopped you to observe the river. He wrapped his arms around you while you did the same around his torso.

"How did you do when they passed?"

The question took you by surprise, although it shouldn't have since you were already on topic. "I was empty inside. I lost a lot of friends who were sticking to me only for the wealth. I fought a lot with my aunt who didn't even plan on having children and she suddenly had this kid coming to live with her. It was..."

He saw you choke up on your words and brought his hands to your face to stop you from talking any more. "Hey. You don't have to tell me."

"You asked."

He chuckled. "Yeah, but it doesn't mean I wanted to make you think about it all over again and break in front of me."

You got up on your tiptoes – him being the giant he is – and you kissed him. While it was sweet and delicate at first, Min Ho took the lead quickly. Holding you tighter, he deepened the kiss, almost leaving you breathless.

"Shouldn't we get back to the dorm? Curfew is soon."

He didn't want to but you were right. You went back to the car and the driver drove you back to campus.

You didn't know whether it was you or him who started it, but both of you were needy. Walking in the dorm, you couldn't keep your hands off each other as you kept on stealing kisses every two seconds.

"Guys, we're busy here." Q deadpanned at the two of you as he pointed to Kitty with her school books.

Getting his coat off, Min Ho proceeded to help you with yours. "So are we."

Kitty groaned. "Well, don't do that here."

He gave her a look. "But you are all over Dae all the time here, yes."

You dragged him into his room before he would say another stupid thing. As soon ad the door closed, his lips were back on yours. He lost no time in helping get your vest off, both of you still in your school uniforms.

"You're so impatient." you said in-between the kisses.

"Maybe."

You found him shirtless seconds later and you stepped back to his bed. Laying you down, he topped you and started to work on your neck, sucking on your skin. He brushed your thigh gently before giving it a squeeze. You let out a gasp. You felt him smile against your skin. You brought up to your lips again and started to feel him up and you touched his abdomen. His efforts in looking his best truly paid off, you couldn't find him any hotter.

"You're so pretty." he rasped out.

"You're the pretty one."

"You're right."

You slapped him slightly and he laughed. "I think I love you."

You immediately froze. He pulled back slightly before stuttering incoherent words. You only blinked, which made Min Ho sweat. Why weren't you saying anything?

"Y/N?"

You pushed him off and placed yourself so you were laying facing one another. Putting your hand on his jaw, you stroke his cheek softly.

"I love you, too."

The first thing you saw was Min Ho's bare back. You could hear him breathe calmly as the rays of sunshine hit his skin perfectly. So... You slept in his room... Nothing too odd. You were his girlfriend, after all. You tried to get out of bed carefully to not waking him up. But it didn't work as he turned around and brought into his arms, stopping your from getting out of bed.

"Good morning." he mumbled.

"I didn't want to wake you."

"Too late." he said, stretching his arm out.

"Get ready, I'll go make you a cup of coffee."

He grinned and gave you a small kiss. "You're just too perfect, aren't you?"

You walked out of his room to let him change and freshen up and were startled when you saw Yuri sit with Kitty and Dae. You slowly went to make coffee, confused.

"Hi, Y/N." Yuri smiled at you.

"What is happening?"

"I came out to my mom, moved out of the penthouse, and here I am! Living with you!"

You perked an eyebrow at her. "You came out?"

"Yeah, it was hard, but I feel so much better."

"Oh my God, that's great! I'm so happy for you."

She smiled even more. "Thank you."

"Yuri started to help me with history. Want to join?" Kitty asked.

In the meantime of your hot beverage being ready, you sat with them and asked questions to Kitty. You were happy to see she was able to answer most of them easily.

"Timeline of the later Three Kingdoms." Yuri read out loud the memo card, laying on her back while her legs were slumped on the couch, in-between Dae and Kitty.

"890 to 936." she answered automatically.

"The first political state?" you asked in your turn.

"Gojoseon." she said in a broken Korean.

"Gojoseon." Dae corrected her and she repeated properly.

"What is happening?"

You hadn't even notice Min Ho coming out of the room and was now leaning on your seat, rubbing your shoulder softly. You put your hand on top of his and he gave you a quick smile before focusing on Yuri again.

"I moved in!" she answered happily, proceeding to sit up properly.

"What? Why?" he looked to all three of them. "Are you a throuple now?"

"No." they all answered.

"I'm gay." Yuri said and Min Ho seemed to be even more lost so she continued. "I came out to my mom, moved out of the penthouse. Scared, excited..."

"Wait." he stopped her. "You've been gay this whole time?"

"It's not a choice."

"I know, I mean..." he began to say but stopped mid-way. "So you and Dae... you were in a fake relationship?" They nodded. "So Kitty was right?"

Kitty smiled proudly. "I told you I know matchmaking."

His body tensed. "You're not mad at Dae? He lied, and lied, and lied..."

You tensed in your turn. Because you lied as well.

"I was mad." Kitty affirmed. "But then I forgave him, and Yuri, and Y/N-"

"Wow." he scoffed.

He retracted his hand from you and took a step back. You felt your heart pound as anxiety crept in, and not the kind you would feel when something good was about to happen. The kind you'd feel when something bad was coming.

"You're as trusting as my dad's third wife."

"Hey." Dae got defensive. "Kitty and I are good. Leave it alone."

"I'm not good."

The tone of his voice sent a shiver down your spine. At that point, he was ignoring your presence.

"You lied to me, too." he continued. "A lot. I wouldn't do that to a friend."

He slowly dared to glance at you and you gulped. You stood up next to him. "Min Ho..."

"Or someone I care about." he said more softly, though you could hear the pain. "I just wouldn't."

He left abruptly, shutting the door of his room harshly. Meanwhile, you felt the tears prick in your eyes. Things were just starting to be good for you, and you had to mess it all up.

"Finals." Yuri exhaled. "Makes everyone crazy."

You gave her a look but she shrugged and went back to asking Kitty questions. Feeling the need to get away from all of this, you went to get changed and left the dorm. A walk seemed to be exactly what you needed.

So why wasn't it doing anything? You felt nothing but emptiness as you walked by other students. You plugged in your earbuds to block out the outside world and spaced out, heading to nowhere precisely. You checked your phone after a while but you got nothing from Min Ho. You couldn't blame him for being mad at you, you were supposed to trust him the most. You trusted him the most. You were submerged with guilt and, as your mind came back to reality, you were standing in front of the administration of the school. You didn't even need to knock as your aunt had already opened the door of her office only from the sight of you in her window.

"Hey, I didn't know you'd stop by." she cheerfully greeted you but her smile dropped once she took in what state you were in. "Oh, dear. Come on in."

She offered you tea and even if you didn't feel like eating or drinking, you let her make a cup for you. She cleaned up her desk a little to make space and sat in front of you, waiting for you to speak.

"Can I stay over tonight?"

Her eyes softened. "Of course, anytime. Now, tell me what happened."

You took a deep breath. "I don't know. Things got complicated, I guess."

She nodded her head slowly. "I see. I won't tell you what to do but know that I'm always here for you if anything. Time will fix everything, I promise."

You huffed with a smile. "That's what they all say."

"Because it's true." she chuckled and then glanced at the clock in her office. "Your classes start soon. I'll make you a good meal for tonight."

Min Ho: I'm getting coffee with Dae. Do you want me to get you something?

You scoffed at the text. Although you were surprised he was the one to reach out first, this was not the text you thought he'd send.

Min Ho: You saw my message, I know it.

Y/N: I won't be at the dorm tonight, so no thanks.

Min Ho: Where are you?

Y/N: I'm fine.

Min Ho: I didn't ask how you were doing, idiot. I asked where you are.

Y/N: Are you still mad at me?

Min Ho: Yes..?

Y/N: Okay, then I'm not at the dorm to leave you space.

Min Ho: It's not because I'm mad that I don't worry about you. Where are you? I'm picking you up.

Y/N: Don't.

Min Ho: Please.

Y/N: It's only going to worsen things. You'll stay mad, it'll be awkward, and then we both won't be able to sleep.

Min Ho: We'll talk, I promise.

Y/N: Fine. I'm at my aunt's.

You got up from bed and went to the front door. Your uncle, still awake, watched you leave in silence.

"Be careful out there." he said before going back to reading his book.

"I will. Thank you for tonight, it was nice."

He gave you a smile and you left. You waited by the porch of your front door and saw a fancy car coming only a couple of minutes later. You went inside where Dae and Min Ho were seated, coffees in hands. Min Ho passed you an ice americano and you hummed as to thank him. The ride was, as you predicted, awkward as hell. Dae was fidgeting with the hem of his shirt in uneasiness and Min Ho was sipping on his drink every five seconds, visibly nervous.

And the walk to the dorm wasn't any better. As soon as you walked in, you announced you were going to bed. Min Ho immediately stopped you and asked Dae for some time alone with you. Finally just the two of you, you sat on the couch and he copied you.

"Why didn't you tell me?" he finally broke the silence.

You exhaled loudly. "That morning when Kitty ran away, Dae came to our room to talk with her and said it was fake. But then you opened the door, I was there, he didn't know because he left before he saw me. Then I asked Yuri about it and she begged me to keep it to myself."

He hummed. "Okay. I get it for back then because we both didn't like each other. But what about after?"

You shrugged. "It wasn't for me to tell you. I swear I just wanted to have nothing to do with all of it."

He took your hand in his. That's a good start.

"From now on, don't lie to me like this again."

You nodded and that's all it took for him to bring you into his embrace. You melted at the touch and engulfed your head in his shoulder.

"I'm sorry."

He hushed you. "It's okay. I might have overreacted."

You laughed in agreement. The rest of the evening went on smoothly. He invited you to stay with him for the night and he pulled his laptop to his bed so you could watch something together. Dae complained a few times about the volume and the giggles you would slip out every now and then. Other than that, you felt at peace. You were just content that things were back to normal, and you fell asleep soon after.

You groaned loudly as Yuri kept on blabbering about the talent show. To help Kitty get ten percent bonus on her exam, she gathered as many people as she could to do a traditional dance. That was the condition Lee put in place to boost the notes. And you were not left out of it.

"We have to help her, Y/N."

You played around with the food in your plate as another sigh left your mouth. "I don't know, Yuri."

"You'll get ten percent more, too."

You shook your head. "I already have excellent grades, I don't need bonuses."

"She's your friend."

"So is she yours, and you're already doing it. She doesn't need both of us."

She rolled her eyes at you. "The more, the better."

You then saw a guy from your English class walk to your table. Byungwon, if you remembered well. He used to go to school with you and Yuri during middle school. Apart from brief 'hi's and nods of acknowledgement, you hadn't talked to him in years.

"Can I sit here?" he smiled at you.

Yuri frowned. "Why?"

"My friends are at practice for the swimming team."

"I thought you were in the team as well." you said.

"Injured. I'm left alone."

Forming your mouth in a 'o' shape, you gestured for him to sit with you. "How have you been?"

"Great, apart from the injury. I haven't talked to you two in so long. I figured we could catch up." he beamed at you.

Yuri chuckled. "Yeah, we did draw apart with time. I figured you were living your new life well, you know? Part of the swimming team, girls all over you, good grades..."

He blushed. "You're making it seem bigger than it is. I could say the same for you two. You have quite grown well." He looked at you. "And you look great."

You felt the heat rush to your face, so you focused on your food instead, clearing your throat in the process. "You too." you mumbled.

Yuri's eyes flickered between him and you, a smirk slowly creeping on her face. She knew you used to like him, and so the opposite. Visibly, old feelings easily came back. Though she would have usually teased you about it, she rooted for your relationship with Min Ho. If anything, you were simply taken aback from Byungwon's sudden reappearance.

"You still like her." she teased the guy who instantly gulped.

"No."

You wanted to punch her just there and then. "Yuri."

She shook her head. "Or maybe not. But just so you know, she's taken now."

"I know." he said. "I simply want to catch up, that's all."

A couple of tables further from yours, Q was poorly trying to calm Min Ho down. The latter was fuming. All he could see was the sweet smile Byungwon was shooting at you and the giggles you let out with pink appearing on your cheeks. He knew you wouldn't do anything close to cheating on him, but that didn't mean he wasn't going to be worried about you leaving him for someone else. Adding the fact the two of you began your whole dynamic with hate, he was slightly worried you still had that kind of feeling towards him.

"Min Ho, they're just talking." Dae said, growing discouraged.

"I'm not jealous, I'm just saying that he doesn't need to be so close to her."

"He's only sitting next to her."

He pointed at you. "Did you see that? He offered her his drink!"

"Yeah..." Q sighed. "Not jealous."

Back to you and Yuri, she abruptly got up announcing practice for the talent show was about to start. She gave you an intense look and you knew what she was doing. It most likely was not time for practice but this was your opportunity to get away from this awkward situation.

"Right, we have to go." you coughed out.

"And I'll help you get ready for your date after." she added and your eyes grew bigger at her.

"Ah." Byungwon said, slightly disappointed. "You and Min Ho are real serious."

"They are." Yuri nodded. "Let's go. See you around!"

She crossed her arm with yours before you went out of the cafeteria. You could do nothing more but follow her lead.

"I swear I thought you were going to make him make a move on me."

She laughed. "I might not think Min Ho is the best guy to date, but I know you love him. Plus, it's not the first time I've seen Byungwon look at you like that."

"Really?"

"Yeah. But now, that means you have no choice but to participate in the fan dance with us."

You groaned in defeat. As much as you loved her for saving your ass, you also hated her.

"Hi, baby."

"Hey-"

You were cut short as Min Ho eagerly kissed you, long enough for people around to either giggle at you or make noises of disgust. It wasn't an innocent kiss either, he was going for it.

"I missed you." he said after pulling back but still holding your hand to walk with you to the auditorium.

"You saw me this morning."

"Not in front of swimmer guy."

Your eyes shut closed. "You saw that, the other day."

"Yeah." Min Ho said as a matter-of-factly. "And I did not appreciate him eyeing my girlfriend like she is some meat."

You patted his shoulder. "Awe, is my little pup possessive?"

He glared at you. "I thought we agreed on stopping with this nickname. Makes us sound like we are furries or something."

You shrugged. "I still like it. But thank Yuri, she's the one who saved me from him that day."

He kissed the top of your head. "Glad to know she's on our side. Now, how are you feeling?"

"Ashamed, depressed, and on the verge of crying."

He frowned. "I'm not sure if you are referring to your feelings towards the wait for your grades or the talent show."

"Can't it be both?"

He laughed and rubbed your hand softly with his thumb. "You'll do great, for both of them."

While he was not allowed to, Min Ho insisted profoundly in coming with you backstage. Saying he didn't want to watch the whole thing and only your performance so you could leave together in advance, he was only disappointed when you sent him back to his seat with Dae.

You walked up to Madison who was crouched next to a machine. "Hey, what are you doing?"

She squealed. "Fireworks, for my next performance."

"You perform twice?"

"Yeah, K-pop."

You rolled your eyes and gave her the fans. Of course she had to do a K-pop dance. You finished up to get ready by fixing parts of your hanbok.

"Yuri-ah."

You weren't sure what Principal Lim was doing backstage to run to her daughter, especially since they hadn't talked since Yuri moved in with you.

"I want you to come back home." she continued but Yuri only gave her the eyeroll. "I'll talk to Alex. I'll make sure you can get to know him."

"Alex?" she said in confusion. "Alex, who?"

Principle Lim froze. "Oh, I just assumed that Kitty-"

"Wait, Alex is my brother?"

And here was another drama happening right in front of you. You learned your lesson to not get involved, so you went to the other girls to ignore what was happening. It wasn't even a minute later that you were up to go on stage. You wanted to bury yourself alive from how embarrassed you were. Not because you were ashamed of your culture, but you weren't a dancer. This was, in no way, one of your strengths.

"How could you not tell me?" Yuri spoke as the performance began.

You tried your best to block them out but they weren't so quiet.

"I thought Alex was my brother and that my mom was the one who was pregnant." Kitty explained. "It wasn't until we snuck out of detention that day and went to Lee's house-"

"Wait, you've known since detention?"

You subtly shushed them and went on to your next move. They seemed to get the message and you were happily back to focusing on your dance.

"How could you hide this from me?"

You mentally cursed them out.

"It wasn't my place to-"

"To be honest?

Madison groaned. "Guys, I'm trying to focus."

This might have been one of the few times you were thankful to her. But your friends being themselves, they continued to bicker.

"I wasn't not honest, I just-"

"Lied by omission?" Yuri interrupted her again.

"You lied all semester about being with Dae on purpose, and I got past it, and now we're friends."

"We were friends." Yuri corrected her.

And with Kitty being Kitty, she clumsily stepped on her robes and tripped, knocking off the firework machine. Fire came out and the whole auditorium stood up in panic, Kitty first as the fabric of her hanbok caught on fire. She stepped back, panic across her face as she stared at the flame. You looked from afar, worried about her and unsure if you should put yourself in danger as well to help her.

You got your answer quickly when you saw your boyfriend running to her. He took his jacket off as he help her sit down on the ground, and crouched down while putting the fire out. She squirmed for a bit until there was no more flame. You observed them as he helped her relax and something seemed off to you. You weren't exactly sure what, but you knew it made you feel sick. It wasn't until Dae arrived that Min Ho went to you, hugging you tightly.

"Are you okay? You're not hurt?"

You didn't hug him back and only nodded. "I'm fine."

He placed his hands on your cheeks. "This girl is so clumsy, she could have put all of you in grave danger."

You cleared your throat. "Yeah, luckily, you saved her."

You pushed his hands away and walked further from the stage. He caught up with your pace and took your hand.

"Hey, are you sure you're good?"

You didn't know what to say. You only stared at him in silence, feeling the lump in your throat growing bigger and bigger.

Copyright © 2023 skzhua. All rights reserved.

[lemotmo]

They're so angry 🤣🤣🤣

Q. Ryan and Oliver were trolling us. I'm so embarrassed for them. How can you all think they're enjoyable?

Q. So we get a bts pic that's pro B/T and Oliver's response was to run to Ryan's house and troll us while excluding Lou, again from their get together. Yet we're assholes for pointing out how bratty Oliver is. Please. What they last night was unprofessional, immature and super gross.

Q. Yeah we're allowed to say Oliver and Ryan are sabotaging him because they made a point of making sure everyone was aware they were together last night. I don't care if they want Buddie. I don't care if they don't like Lou. I don't care if Oliver is miserable by the storyline. I don't care if Oliver doesn't like working with Lou. I don't care that Oliver and Ryan are besties who hate us. Our ship won. Their ship lost. Tim better have a talk with them this week about professionalism because their behavior last night was appalling. Especially from Oliver because he was clearly the instigator of the entire thing.

Q. Aww your besties ran to each other last night because Tim confirmed B/T fans won the ship war and they wanted to make sure we all knew they hate him and us. Oliver should especially be ashamed because he's clearly the one whose idea it was. He owes Lou an apology and some decent professional behavior.

Q. Wow. Oliver and Ryan spent their Saturday night trolling Tommy fans what a couple of winners they are. Cry harder boys you lost and we don't care if you hate it or him. Lou's feelings must have been so hurt from being excluded. Oliver's immature little brat. Grow up, man.

A. I've changed my mind, Tim. The show doesn't need him at all for a single scene. The story can be told without his reaction to anything. Let's just get the rage temper tantrum over now and the rest of us can and will happily move on. You all took a couple of fun photos between friends playing around with a mustache filter, clearly trolling Ryan's look, and made it about Lou and yourselves. Because of course you did. He wasn't there. Cry harder about it. Oliver and Ryan are friends. Cry harder about it. Guess what? Pete and Angela also don't appear to have been there and you don't see any of their fans whining in my ask box. They were goofing off with an Instagram filter. You had a meltdown over an Instagram filter, and with a straight face, are yelling at Oliver to grow up. Look I get it. You all have had a tough week. You don't know if he was on set, he most likely wasn't. He's not answering, or can't answer, any of your increasingly unhinged messages. Oliver and Ryan are happily hanging out. The hype and support around and for your ship is crumbling right before your very eyes, the proof of that is everywhere, including in your freakouts over absolutely everything. Some of your own are even turning on him. You hung your hopes on a nothing BTS photo as proof of a thing Tim already told you isn't a thing. Using a made up dm that Tim already said doesn't exist. And Lou got removed from a stupid online SWAT poll. You've been busy this week.

I have an incredibly sad amount of asks about that stupid poll. So I will, once again, try to explain the Ryan and Lou difference to you all. No one, absolutely one is pretending Ryan didn't say it. No one is making excuses for him saying it. No one is defending what he said. It was wrong in every way. Now follow me closely on this next part. When he said it, he immediately owned the mistake. He immediately apologized for it. He immediately went to work on himself. He removed certain people, one in particular, from his life, and he allowed himself to learn things he was once ignorant of. That's the point of growing up. Learning and growing from your mistakes. It's why people, including his cast mates/friends don't continue to punish him for it. He learned from it, which is what you want. In contrast, when Lou's behavior was pointed out you all immediately tried to excuse it away. It was everything from people who were taking what he said out of context, despite the fact we heard him say it. Multiple times. To he was just having a laugh and people needed to grow up. Then it was clearly some deranged evil Buddie fan hacked his Twitter account just to make him look like a trump supporting racist. And when it came time for him to acknowledge and say something his response was to post a bizarre screenshot of something about spitting in girls mouths and telling them it's raining. The difference in how the two men handled their responses to their mistakes is the entire point. And you know that, but like everything else regarding your downright bizarre behavior towards Lou, you need to pretend it's something else. All of it is made up in your head.

Finally regarding your demands that Oliver and Ryan apologize to you for being friends, hanging out and having a good time. You all have spent the last 8 plus weeks sending them the most vile, disgusting, inexcusable nonsense. Tagging them in everything from verbal abuse to racist attacks to character assassination attempts. The only thing they owe you is a big fat middle finger.

Thank you for dropping this in the inbox Nonny!

I'm speechless here. I mean... NEVER, in all my years in fandom (and it's been a while now) have I ever come across anything like this. Maybe it has happened before in other fandoms and I'm just lucky to have been in relatively relaxed fandoms? I mean, there were some issues and toxicity in all of those fandoms, but nothing to this degree. I just can't wrap my head around this phenomenon.

And all of it over such a short amount of time as well. Only a couple of months.

We've come to a point where some innocent fun between cast-mates and friends is problematic behaviour now? Really? The cast has been having fun together for years now. And for years we laughed and enjoyed and just had fun with it. But now it's suddenly something bad? Something toxic? Because one man wasn't invited? How? Why? What???

And how is that one vague bts picture proof of BT endgame? HOW??? WHY??? WHAT???

I'm sorry, I'm not going to lose any more brain cells to trying to understand this. After all, erratic behaviour can't be explained by using common sense and logic.

Thank you Ali for dealing with asks like this, so we don't have to. You're a bigger person than I am. I would just ignore and delete. :)

IMPORTANT! Please don't repost this ask and/or a link that leads straight to my Tumblr account on Twitter or any other social media. Thank you!

Heads up! For anyone who is giving me the shifty eyes for reposting Ali's updates instead of reblogging. Read this.

Remember, no hate in comments, reblogs or inboxes. Let's keep it civil and respectful. Thank you.

If you are interested in more of Ali’s posts, you can find all of her posts so far under the tag: anonymous blog I love.

[thefirstknife]

Man. This week.

There's a few things I want to point out again that are really cool and the first is that once you finish the story and get the radio and the lore tab and everything, speak to Failsafe again. She'll give you an "epilogue" quest which requires you to find secret stuff in Encore. There's 8 of them, and all of them are voice recordings of Maya and Chioma from when they had a normal happy life. And they're all absolutely incredible and devastating. They're not uploaded anywhere that I can find yet, I'll try and put them here later with transcripts unless people put uploads online.

These are really important to me because they keep reiterating that there was a time (and Maya) that used to be fine. It's the woman Chioma loved and her transformation into the Conductor is almost an anomaly of only one of the Mayas. The others, even other copies from the Vex Network seem to be different and fine.

Anyway, we tried to find this Maya's Chioma, but it turned out Maya already tested her and rejected her, thus killing the one she was looking for. But I really like how it's done because Chioma wasn't just helplessly clueless in this; she had her own agency and made her own decision upon realising what Maya had become. More under:

So that's okay. Dies.

But the thing is that this is true only for this one Maya, the Conductor one. Other Mayas and other Chiomas are fine. This is really interesting in the dialogue you get for the last chest:

This is the 87th copy of Maya who is looking for 50th Chioma copy. This is fascinating because it means that .87 Maya lost her Chioma and found another. Multiple others even! She mentions how she's become a widow many times over, which means she bonded with multiple other Chiomas just fine. And now she's looking for the .50 one, hoping she's still out there.

And some of them are still out there! There's more Mayas and Chiomas still in the Network and at the end in the lore tab, it's discussed is that Osiris and Saint are going through the Vex Network looking for them.

But before that, our confrontation with the Conductor! She does manage to control us, but Saint breaks free. And he said the line!

He's the only one ever actually. But the thing is, we didn't exactly kill her. She went back into the Network and she took the Echo with her. So that's probably not good overall.

There's a really nice message after from Failsafe who doesn't really want to say goodbye, but also realises that she doesn't have to rely on other people to feel like there's a point in going on. She can go on for herself. Which definitely didn't make me cry (lie).

And Saint also confirms after that Maya is still around:

And Saint being Saint:

Also from Ikora from the radio message, really important stuff:

Lore tab is really cool as well! Some absolutely hilarious bits with Nimbus and Failsafe and I need more interactions between them now:

She shrewdly routed the message alerts to her external display screen. "Nimbus, buddy—" she began. "Hint taken," Nimbus grinned, spreading their huge hands wide. "I'll let you get back to your whole being-a-ship thing. If you see Osiris, tell him Jisu Calerondo is looking for an interview about his sick bird hat. Or, no, say that the CloudArk is losing integrity and only the biorhythms from, like, a truly old and decrepit dude will save it!" "I'm on it," Failsafe said, and pushed an ASCII image of a thumbs-up to her display. Nimbus laughed and gave Failsafe two enormous finger guns as they transmatted out.

Failsafe's reaction to Eido sending her a message as well:

She puzzled next over a message from House Light Scribe Eido, as it did not appear to contain any discernable requests. She marked it for non-urgent reply and sorted it into one of her new subfolders: SOCIALIZATION (PLATONIC).

Then there's Osiris with the information that he and Saint are looking through the Network for Maya and the Echo. It's a really good one for closing the episode.

But as I said, there's still an epilogue quest which requires going into Encore again and finding "anomalies" which contain recordings between Maya and Chioma that killed me in one hit.

There's also a secret triumph this week that can be unlocked and it relates to the Whisper portal, but it's a secret so if you don't want to google around, basically: load into expert Encore and head to the Whisper portal location. The door will be closed, but there should be the Whisper exotic perk icon above it. If you equip Whisper, the door will open and then you can go through the portal which will be active. Once you do that, you'll have 35 minutes to complete Encore on expert to unlock the secret triumph and get an emblem we were wondering about last week. No need to do the extra puzzles or anything, just complete the mission.

I really enjoyed this episode overall as it hit all the right interests for me. Really good cast, loved the return of Failsafe, absolutely died over everything in regards to Saint and Osiris and how close and physical they were allowed to be on screen so much (which is, btw, the first time they've done so. We've had lore tabs and the kiss cutscene and all, but Saint and Osiris have never actually been together on screen in this way before, as all previous appearances was Savathun or them just standing next each other or just them together on comms; the level of physicality and contact and all the stuff they talked about is so important as we've not really had anything like it before).

Absolutely incredible that we got to see Maya and Chioma, what they looked like and all their interactions, especially the epilogue ones where we got a glimpse into how their life was before everything fell apart. And with the knowledge that there's more of them in the Network, I will continue to believe that somewhere out there they're still living a happy life. And Ikora agrees:

Getting to hear these two together on comms and getting so many updates and information about them was an incredible treat. They've been such foundational and important characters to Destiny since the start. We knew about their relationship since the beginning, even back in the day when queer content was really, essentially, not allowed and pushed under the rug. But Maya and Chioma were there and we got to learn so much more about them. A lot of it really heartbreaking, but a lot of it also really nice.

I hope Maya and her Echo will continue being in the story in some way in the future. There's also a question of her Vex Collective as well and what she's done to the Vex in general, but also specifically the Precursors. I wonder if we'll get more into that eventually when the Vex are back as a threat (because in a way, they have to).

[1d1195]

Half & Half

Here is my new soulmate idea. (New meaning different than my other ones I wrote back in the day.) A tattoo appears on the left ring finger of each person when they turn 16 years old. It’s a black outline, nothing crazy—obviously, it’s on the ring finger. It has to do with how you meet your person. (You’ll see in a second.) It’s vague, there’s not much rhyme or reason.

Q&A (because I feel like there are always questions when it come to soulmate ideas):

Q: Sam, won’t multiple people have the same tattoo? A: Great question. Potentially. It’s irrelevant though for the sake of the story.

Q: How do they know it’s their other half? A: Another good question. The pair of tattoos change to the same color.

Q: Well, Sam, hypothetically, if four people are in the same room and meet their respective half can’t they all have the same color change? How will they know which person they belong with? A: It won’t happen. Q: How do you know? A: Because I wrote it that way.

Q: What happens if you don’t find your soulmate in this universe? A: Then you’ll be sad like Harry.

Q: What do you mean Harry is going to be sad?! A: Warnings: Lots of angst, sad, pining Harry, mentions of death, mentions of sex (pg-13 at most)

If you have any questions, please feel free to ask! (But be warned I'm making this all up on the spot!)

That’s it. That’s all you get. (there will also be like one or two liberties I'm taking with this idea that may have forgot to disclose that you'll read in a few minutes). A black tattoo that marks how you’ll meet your other half. When you meet that person, the pair of tattoos change to the same color. I don’t have a preview for you because this turned into a lengthy foreword. Enjoy :)

How can you miss someone you’ve never met? / Cause I need you now, but I don’t know you yet / But can you find me soon because I’m in my head? / Yeah, I need you now, but I don’t know you yet.

Harry looked at the little tattoo on his ring finger. He’d been staring at it since he was a teen. The morning of his sixteenth birthday to be exact. It was small, the length of his first knuckle to the next and he thought it was a cruel fate that it was a little coffee cup. How was that supposed to narrow his search? Why couldn’t it have been something like Niall’s—a snake? How often did one encounter a snake? That would be easy (and it was for Niall). Or something like Gemma’s—a diploma? There was only a certain number of graduations Gemma anticipated attending.

That was more than twelve years ago he woke up with the taunting little marking. For the first week he drank no less than four cups of coffee a day and had his mum drive him all over town to the different shops in hopes of finding her. Anne took it all in stride knowing how she spent eight hours at the library the first day she saw the book tattoo on her finger when she was Harry’s age. It was just something that needed to be done. The heart wanted, what the heart wanted.

He wished he knew what was on his love’s ring finger. It would have been better if the two markings were paired in the tattoo that appeared on his skin. It wasn’t much help to know it had something to do with their first meeting. It could be anywhere. Harry could have coffee anywhere. After that first week, he decided to relax. He was sixteen. There was plenty of time to meet his soulmate.

But sixteen became seventeen and suddenly he was twenty-eight, no soulmate, and the little coffee cup on his finger mocked him more and more every day. There was therapy or services he could try. People could potentially help, but it just felt so tragic. He wanted to just know. Wanted it to be a natural meeting; the way it was intended. Simply discovering one another exactly how the tattoos indicated they would. None of his friends or family needed help. The many Google searches told him it took a mere average of five years to find their other half.

He had more than doubled that time. Twelve years. The person that he was destined to meet was somewhere out there with who knows what etched on their skin. Maybe they had a coffee cup too. Harry had heard of that. But Niall’s soulmate had a balloon because he had taken his nephew to the little balloon cart after the snake exhibit at the zoo. Both the little outlines on their fingers turned green as they met. It happened. He found her.

Gemma’s soulmate had a camera—someone who happened by at the exact moment they needed someone to take a picture of their family after she graduated. Their outlines turned a brilliant shade of red. They had met. She found him. They could start their lives together.

Anyway, it was unlikely Harry and his other half both had coffee cups.

It wasn’t like Harry had a tragic upbringing that he desperately needed his love at the other end of this tattoo to help him cope through life. He adored his mother and sister. He had a great education. He wasn’t bullied and had a set of good friends. He had a stable job and a good home. If anything, it seemed kind of selfish of him to be so upset he was without his soulmate when everything else was good.

But he longed for his soulmate. All day. Every moment. It ached to his core. He swore his heart was beating for his person, tapping out a rhythm that sounded like a name that he wasn’t allowed to hear. His friends and family were all concerned for his well-being. They couldn’t imagine the heartache Harry was suffering and they wouldn’t wish it on their worst enemy. All-encompassing adoration and love? He had plenty of that to give. He wanted to be at the receiving end of it. A match made in heaven. Or whatever cosmic reality was out there. Harry had watched so many movies and read so many stories depicting the meet-cutes between soulmates. He wanted his.

There were therapies and people to help if you lost your soulmate. These, essentially, were dating sites if you didn’t want to be alone after an untimely passing or something else (although Harry couldn’t imagine a scenario that didn’t include death—what was the something else?). Harry thought about the websites and the grief counseling. Because as he approached his twenty-third birthday, he was getting lonely. All of his friends and acquaintances were paired by then and found the loves of their lives by the time he graduated university—they fell well within the average time. He was jealous, simply put. How could he not be?

“Oh, Harry,” Sarah cooed, kissing his cheek, wrapping her arm around his shoulders as he scrolled through options on his phone. She met Mitch when she was a child—the tattoos and color changing appearing instantaneously. It was extremely rare, but it was effortless: a swing and a slide. Light purple. Another match. One moment blending into the next without pause. They found each other before Harry even had a tattoo on his finger. “You’ll find her. You deserve love more than anyone I know.”

He hoped she was right because he was rapidly losing hope.

Tomorrow was his twenty-ninth birthday after all.

How can you miss someone you’ve never seen? / Oh, tell me are your eyes brown, blue, or green? / And do you like it with sugar and cream? / Or do you take it straight, oh, just like me?

Anne said the same thing as Sarah—but he thought she still had hope because she wanted her son to be happy and that’s what a mum did. She had hope even when Harry didn’t.

Harry had a soft heart. He was sensitive. He wanted to be in love more than he wanted anything else in his life. But he went through the motions. Finishing school, getting a job, and doing his best to get through each day without someone to share it with. He could feel pity oozing from every person he met, and they saw the black ink on his finger. His friends spoke in hushed whispers agreeing to any coffee shop Harry wanted to meet at each weekend.

Each night came with a fitful sleep. A different pair of colored eyes appeared in his dream of someone he didn’t know yet. There were so many dreams of meeting his favorite person. So many good ones. So many bad ones. All of which he woke up heartbroken once more, that he hadn’t met the love of his life.

He graduated with top honors because there weren’t many people in school who didn’t have the other half of their soul by their side. Especially by the end of the four years. It was hard for his friends to go out with him and watch him not find the love he was looking for. Harry wasn’t one for partying excessively—he had plenty of fun times in university with his friends at parties without his other half, that wasn’t something he regretted. But by the time graduation rolled around, the parties got further and few between. His friends didn’t need to go out the way he did. They didn’t have to search anymore.

Harry lost the most hope during his third year. He tried dating people he met at coffee shops and cafes. Dating was a loose term. Harry’s dates with those that lost someone or those that, like him, had given up weren’t all that fruitful for either party. Call him old-fashioned, but if she was out there, he wanted to save every intimate part of himself. A sweep of the lips across a cheek, that was all he could muster. Companionship to stave off the loneliness, that was all he could manage at best. Some were blatant in showing their disappointment. But most usually understood—they’d do anything to get their other half back or to find them.

He prayed to whatever was out there that she felt the same way.

The only solace he had was knowing that maybe, just maybe, she was out there, feeling just as crummy as he was. Not that he wanted the love of his life to feel crummy. At the very least, it would be another thing to tie them together and something to discuss when he finally found her. He kept a list of things he wanted to know. Several lists.

The first list was filled with superficial things—favorites mostly: color, food, movie, etc. Outward things that he wanted to know but really, they were things that anyone who knew the most basic information about her may know. The next list was slightly deeper; things that people only closest to her may know. Things that made her tick. What were her political views? Did she have a good home life? Was she a summer or a winter kind of person? How did she take her coffee--with half and half?

Is that why the coffee cup was there? Did she even like coffee? Has it been a teacup all this time?

The final list was deeper, intimate, things that he wouldn’t anyone to know about himself (or her, if he was honest) except maybe a therapist. Did she suffer her first heartbreak despite knowing she had a soulmate out there? Did she believe in an afterlife or reincarnation? Did she have any regrets or suffer ever?

Had she waited like Harry did?

Part of him hated the idea that she may not have felt the same way regarding intimacy. Maybe she gave that part of her to someone else. Someone she had met at a coffee shop and maybe she thought the tattoo changed color. Sometimes Harry thought his tattoo had changed. He believed it so vehemently. The shade of black looked gray-er one day. Another day it looked sort of navy-blue.

It was wishful thinking because even if it did, he never found who was supposed to be his other half at the time.

But he also believed that even if she did have a difference of opinion on intimacy, he would trust her judgment implicitly. She believed she was doing the right thing at the time and that was enough for Harry.

He woke up on his twenty-ninth birthday the same way he had for the last thirteen years—without a soulmate and a heavy heart.

Cause lately it’s been hard / They’re selling me for parts / And I don’t wanna be modern art

Harry started therapy when he turned twenty-seven. He was feeling very low without anyone to come home to. His therapist was helpful and extremely kind. But Harry could tell by the pink coloring on his ring finger that he had already met his other half. While his directions and ideas to help Harry cope with the grief of not knowing, it wasn’t something he could fully empathize with. Harry fully believed that. It wasn’t his therapist’s fault either—how could Harry blame him for finding his soulmate?

His therapist recommended websites with more successful ratings. His office even had a program that Harry would be perfect for. In fact, if he was interested in it enough, he would be a great candidate to speak to others in similar situations. There was a chance for Harry’s picture to be on a pamphlet to help others like him. He could tell his therapist was excited about the prospect of helping others like Harry. But it would only be another reminder to Harry that he was alone.

Harry found himself balling his hands into fists to keep from screaming.

*

His friends asked if he wanted to do anything for his birthday. For the last seven years they had done a coffee crawl in hopes of Harry finding someone that changed his tattoo for good. But this year Harry wanted to be alone.

“Are you sure?” Mitch asked in disbelief. He could hear the alarm in his voice. He could hear the covered whispers from Sarah behind the scenes. He nodded and Mitch was silent waiting for Harry to say something. But he didn’t speak for a full three minutes. When he did, Mitch wasn’t oblivious to the sniffle he heard and the way Harry’s voice broke.

“M’jus...” he shook his head. “S’fine,” he shrugged and swallowed all the emotions. He looked at that horrible, ugly, little mocking coffee cup. “Jus’...tired,” he told his friend.

“Yeah...sure...,” Mitch nodded. “Let me know if you need something, Harry. Happy birthday.”

It just didn’t feel happy.

Harry spent his birthday sulking in his apartment. He called out sick for three days of work so he could lie in bed, mourning the loss of someone he didn’t even know. On that third day he scheduled an impromptu therapy appointment begging the man to just do something to end Harry’s suffering. He wanted to be in love...he wanted to be loved.

But his therapist could only do so much. It was one big waiting game. One big, cruel terrible game.

*

“Uh...hi...m’name’s Harry,” Harry said into the microphone. He placed the guitar on his knee and brought the microphone closer to his lips. “M’therapist...suggested I sing when m’feeling down; s’been a while since I sang in front of a crowd,” he explained to the quiet group. “A way t’cope. Uh...in case it wasn’t obvious, I haven’t...met m’other half,” he awkwardly cleared his throat. “Been waiting thirteen years and four days.”

A few people had their attention focused on Harry. There were a few quiet interjections of ‘aw.’ A couple gasps of shock. There was one quiet happy birthday toward the front. Harry tuned his guitar for a moment. “I didn’t write this,” he smiled wryly. “But I believe every word of it,” he nodded in affirmation and swallowed. “How can you miss someone you’ve never met?” He began.

As he sang, he focused on the playing and singing the right words. He barely looked at the little crowd of the quiet, late-night cafe. He didn’t tell his friends about this. It was for him only. His next method of coping. When he finished the song there was a smattering of applause and he nodded gratefully, shoving his guitar in its case, before rushing outside. He took heaving breaths, the air from his lips accumulating into a cloud in the space in front of him.

That did not feel cathartic the way his therapist said it would. It was overwhelming and Harry actually thought it was one of the worst things he ever did. He felt like puking and began pacing away from the café stopping a few meters further up the sidewalk trying to console himself and his feelings.

“Excuse me?” Harry’s heart almost burst at the sound of her voice. He turned to the person hurrying up the path to him. His heart leapt but he kept his fingers pressed into the palms of his hand. He was going to leave imprints from his nails pressing into the skin.

She had a scarf draped around her neck and a pair of gloves, no coat. “I didn’t want to miss you! Harry, right?” she asked, shivering against the chilly February air pausing beside him as he looked back at the road in front of them. He gave a half nod. “That was beautiful,” she sounded like a song herself. But Harry had thought he met his soulmate before, he knew better than to get attached to just the sound of someone’s voice. There was one person he met ages ago—he couldn’t even remember what year it was that he was so sure was his soulmate. But when he looked, her tattoo was sky blue...and Harry’s remained black.

Harry also taken many science classes and knew the earth was tilted on its axis. But he was certain it had inexplicably turned upside down the moment he heard her voice.

He was still fearful it was too good to be true.

 He didn’t dare look at his finger.

“I saw you rushing out here—boy, it’s really cold! I...I just wanted to make sure you were okay,” she explained as she tilted her chin down to hide below her scarf. If Harry was smart, he would ask to go back inside so she wouldn’t freeze to death. It wasn’t his fault he was a sad, broken man.

Instead, he was speechless, waiting for the inevitable. For her to ask to see his tattoo. He pressed his fingers harder against his own hand. Instead, she bit her lip, her nose turning pink in the frosty temperature. “I brought you some hot chocolate,” she told him. Harry took this moment to realize between her gloved hands she held a coffee cup—or rather, a cup of hot chocolate. Hot chocolate. The same kind of cup that he knew was outlined on his finger. He didn’t take the drink from her. He couldn’t. Even if he wanted to, he was frozen in place.

Instead, he managed to turn his attention to her eyes for the first time. They were so gentle, so kind. There was understanding etched all over her face. Harry just laid it out to a whole group of strangers the hurt he was feeling. He knew she knew. She didn’t seem to mind that he wasn’t talking. So, she continued. “My tattoo is a guitar...and you were the only person in there with a guitar...so...it’s,” she smiled and shook her head. Like it was an inside joke between them already. It was the most beautiful sound he had ever heard. “It’s gold now, this like beautiful, shimmering gold...I didn’t even want to cover it because I want to look at it all the time—and it’s only been about ten minutes like this but—God, it’s so cold out!—but I didn’t want...couldn’t miss you so I didn’t wear a coat—can I see your tattoo?” She rushed, still shivering. The poor girl.

Harry felt lightheaded. She was right here. A guitar. A cup of hot chocolate. It had to be.

Right?

Harry shook his head. “N-no,” he mumbled. The rejection broke her gentle, beautiful features. The poor thing.  Why would he say that?! “M’scared,” he admitted.

She swallowed nervously. Her expression was a little more guarded than when she first stood next to him, but less broken than when Harry outright said no. “I just moved here,” she nodded—complete understanding back on her face. Her teeth were chattering. Harry was horrible to make her suffer like this. “I’ve been looking at this goddamn guitar for eleven years and you should know, I have no musical talents whatsoever. I took so many music classes in high school. I attended every band concert at my college. I haunted my local music store. I—” her voice cracked, and Harry heard the desperation that he had felt for so many years. It ached him to know she felt the same way. Worse than his own pain. He wanted to yank her heart out of her and cradle it, hold it and nurse it back to health. He’d give her the shattered half of what was left of his own heart if that would make her pain go away. She looked at the cup between her hands, tears lining her lashes so beautifully Harry was really starting to believe it was her.

“Baby, I threw a dart at a map,” she whispered. “I couldn’t take it, Harry. I applied for the first job I could find that used my degree in this town. I found an apartment. I packed up and left everyone and everything I ever knew to find my soulmate,” she sniffed. There were no fallen tears, but Harry thought she probably had cried plenty. Harry certainly had. “Everyone I know, thinks I’m crazy,” he knew that feeling very well. “I took the very first flight out possible. So, I’ve been stuck in my old time zone I won’t sleep until tomorrow afternoon. I was tired of unpacking. Tired of being hopeful and I just wanted to get some hot chocolate because it’s so cold, you know? So I went to this café that I Googled—it’s the only place open at eleven at night,” but Harry already knew that. She brought a gloved hand to her lips. Lips that Harry really wanted to kiss. “I know you have two years of waiting on me. I’m sorry about that—I didn’t know we weren’t in the same place, honey. I’m so sorry,” she whispered. Like it was her fault. Harry felt so broken that she was taking the blame for it all, but he couldn’t get his vocal cords to work. It wasn’t her fault. These things happened. It just sucked. It sucked the life out of Harry for thirteen years, but Harry remembered eleven years without her just as well. It’s when he started therapy after all. She had suffered too. “Please,” her voice cracked again. “I need to see your tattoo,” she begged.

It was so quiet on that cold street. His chest hurt; his throat ached. It felt like he was trapped in the smallest of rooms, the walls closing on him and pressing him into a cube of pain. He held out his left hand. She rolled her lips into her mouth. Her shoulders were heaving with the greatest weight she had ever carried. Harry wished he could be braver and help her out, but he was so terrified she was wrong. This was the closest break in his search he had ever had and if she was wrong, he thought it would kill him, surely.

She switched the coffee cup to her right hand. With her free one, she slid her gloved index finger over his bare digit. She released a breathy, watery giggle. Another inside joke between the two of them. “Don’t suppose it’s always been gold?” She asked.

Harry knew when his therapist asked what it felt like when he finally met her, he would never be able to describe the moment accurately. He tried to take it all in. The sounds, the smells, the feelings. His eyes were blurred with relieved tears so he couldn’t take in what he saw but he finally looked down at that beautiful tattoo of his. An iridescent, glittering gold. With her teeth she pulled her glove off her hand—his poor love had to be freezing but she didn’t stop—showing Harry how her little guitar outline matched the color of his cup perfectly, sliding her ring finger against his making the first brush of her skin against his the most magical feeling he had ever felt.

So, this is what it felt like to be whole.

In the same moment, she dropped the mug. It shattered to pieces on the cold sidewalk, stained her pale colored shoes in chocolate liquid and soaked her discarded glove. But Harry didn’t even have a second to react to it because her arms were around his neck. Her face was buried in his shoulder. “I thought it was a coffee cup,” he croaked, wrapping his arms around her middle. She giggled some more. It might be his new favorite sound. He pulled her close, feeling the shards of the mug crunching below their shoes. They stayed like that, Harry’s heart thrumming against his ribs, positively ready to jump into her chest to be a whole heart, finally. He squeezed her, crushed him to her, terrified to let her go. He would need a new therapist to cope with this kind of anxiety.

He pushed her back from him and he brought his hands to her cheeks, trying to take in every inch of the beautiful face he longed to see, touch, and feel every night he slept. He never wanted to stop looking at her. He was scared to let go of her for even a second.

Maybe he didn’t need to explain it to his therapist. This moment would just be theirs. A cold street, a broken mug, and two halves of one soul finally found.

He pressed his lips to her forehead then each eyelid, her nose, her cheeks. He tried to kiss every pore on her skin. “I’ve never kissed anyone,” he admitted. Her heart fluttered. “I know s’pathetic,” his lips never stopped the kisses to her face. His voice muffled by her skin. He pressed his lips again and again to the same spaces. It warmed her, he could tell. Her cheeks turned a deep red, but it wasn’t due to the cold.

“Oh fuck,” she whimpered, and he watched as the tears dripped down her cheeks. Harry had the fleeting thought that meant she hadn’t waited and now that she was finally here, he knew it really didn’t matter. “You really are my soulmate,” she whispered, which proved of course she waited—she was all his.

Harry ran his thumb along her lip and sank his mouth to touch hers. He moaned at the feeling, the warmth, the electricity that ran through her and into him. A completed circuit. Whole. She whimpered again, kissing him back and wrapped her arms around his neck again. He squeezed her close, her toes lifting off the ground.

“Can I take y’home with me, angel?” He begrudgingly pulled away. She quickly nodded, her heart fluttering at the word angel. He didn’t even mean to call her that, it rolled effortlessly off his tongue. “I have...so many questions t’ask you.”

“Please,” she nodded eagerly.

Harry held her left hand because it was without a glove. She was also still without a coat—abandoned in the late-night cafe, but they marched on anyway.

*

But I only got half a heart to give to you. / And I hope it’s enough.

Harry gave her his heaviest sweatshirt and made more tea so he could stay awake and keep her warm. Her jaw still chattered every so often, and they sat in silence for a few moments. Sitting on his bed. Harry had never had a girl in his bed before. He held her hand in both of his. The tea on his bedside table. He was staring at their tattoos. The pair that somehow matched after all his suffering. He thought gold was his new favorite color.

“I have lists,” he whispered. “Of things I want t’know.”

Smiling, that gorgeous smile of hers, she nodded easily. “You can ask me anything,” she promised.

Harry wondered if this was how all soulmates felt. To be heard and seen. This implicit need to be broken open and share every detail they could think of. “I don’t want t’fall sleep,” he murmured. But sleep was winning. He didn’t want it. He found her. He wanted to be awake and ask her all his questions. He wanted to memorize her skin, find every freckle. Wanted to kiss her again and again until he felt like his heart wasn’t half of a lump of muscle anymore. She deserved a whole heart.

She swallowed. “Harry, I’m going to stay,” she promised. It wasn’t distrust he felt. But it was a new ache that he wasn’t sure he could describe. Worry, maybe? That was about as close as he could get to describing it. He was afraid she was a figment, a dream. A really wonderful dream. “I’ll make you breakfast in the morning, it’s my favorite.”

Breakfast. One favorite down, only a thousand more to go. She gently pushed his shoulder down and she rested her ear on his chest. “Dreamed about your heartbeat,” she murmured. Harry wondered if she heard the way it skipped a beat as she spoke. He kissed the top of her head. “If I’m not right here when you wake up, I’ll be in the kitchen, alright?” He nodded. He hoped she would be here though. Waking up without her attached to him after this crazy, beautiful night might make him a little worse for wear in the morning. Would it be crazy to say he loved her? That was crazy. Whether they were soulmates or not. Despite that he did love her. “I love you,” she whispered. “Always have.”

It wasn’t crazy. Not at all. Not the way she said it. If anything, it made the most sense in the world. “I love you, too,” he felt like crying and if it wasn’t for the clock on his nightstand reading two in the morning, he might have actually cried before he fell asleep.

*

The knocking on the door woke him. So did the near shouts of his name. His love was no longer lying on top of him, but the knocking must have gotten her out of bed. It was nearly nine the next morning, the sun poking through the blinds. It was warm, his bed smelled like her.

He heard his door creak. The gasps. “Who are you?” He heard Sarah ask.

She giggled. “I’m the coffee cup,” even the way she introduced herself was perfect. Maybe he would keep the hot chocolate detail to himself. It seemed that she was willing to do the same by not telling them it wasn’t a coffee cup all these years.

“Oh, fucking finally!” Mitch cheered.

“Princess!” Niall shouted and Harry chose that moment to enter the main room, one of his best friends lifting the sweet girl into a massive hug that made him somehow feel more whole than he ever thought he could. “We’ve been waiting forever for you,” he told her. She simply giggled more, returning his hug.

“Easy, please. I jus' got her,” Harry murmured.

Sarah, seeing Harry finally appeared, threw herself at Harry with a choked half-laugh, half-cry. He kissed the side of her head. “I’m so happy for you,” she whispered.

Niall and Mitch, being the guitar enthusiasts they were, found her little tattoo unbelievably adorable and nearly unfair they had a snake and a swing. “I quite literally had no idea how I was supposed to find a musician when I can only sing—kind of.”

The boys asked her how it happened last night. Was that why Harry didn’t answer their texts or calls? Niall said he would go back and get her things—her purse, her coat, her phone. He knew the owner and was adamant that her things would be safely in the lost and found. She didn’t even care. They asked where she was from and Harry realized how gentle and guarded her answers were—they weren’t revealing, no long explanations.

She kept glancing at Harry with a knowing smile with every question she answered. It took everything in him to not cry from the fact she was keeping her answers short because she knew Harry would want to know the answers first—would want to ask more.

Sarah was looking at her as if she put the stars in the sky—Harry only knew that look because that’s how he felt as well. “Was...was it worth all that pain?” She asked. “I can’t...I can’t imagine,” she glanced at the little slide on her finger that had been there since she was six years old. She shook her head in disbelief. Sad for Harry

But he nodded anyway. As if for thirteen years he didn’t have the most broken heart known to man. “So very much,” he affirmed giving Sarah a squeeze around the shoulders.

“I was just about to make breakfast; would you like to join us?” She asked the three of them. Harry had never been an us. It was like a magic spell. Every word from her lips was like a soothing little cleanser meant to fix all the broken parts of him.

His friends smiled and looked at Harry for confirmation. If he wanted time alone with her, they would high tail it out of there, totally understandable. Niall was already calling the café to see if he could get her things at the very least.

“Please stay, of course,” he shrugged. “We’ve got forever.” Her expression seemed to melt a little at his words. He saw the way her thumb smoothed the skin over her ring finger.

Mitch and Sarah headed to the kitchen island and took their seats, they were a flurry of calls and messages to their other friends. They wanted to spread the good news and this is what friends did for someone like Harry. He didn't need to tell everyone, he had the love of his life in his arms. Niall was headed back out the door to get her things from the café. He’d be back in fifteen minutes.

Feeling more rested than he had in years, since he dreamed about the pair of eyes that finally matched someone that he knew to be his soulmate, he didn’t feel as broken. She smiled at him, gorgeously. He didn’t think he would ever tire of this new feeling of being whole. “Y’sure y’don’t mind having them?” He asked.

She shook her head. “I love them already.”

Harry knew it would be that way but somehow it was still way too good to be true. “We have all waited a very long time for you,” he reminded her. She wrinkled her nose cutely with a little impish grin. Harry placed his hands on her hips, pulling her toward him as if he had done this every morning for his whole life. “I’ve thought about you a thousand different ways and I don’t think any of them compare t’how you actually are,” he whispered.

She pressed the length of herself against him. Arms around his neck. His arms were like a vice around her waist. Harry’s sweatpants were too long on her, and the sweatshirt was scented with her new favorite smell. The love of her life. Her other half.

“Harry, I’m afraid I only have half a heart left to give you. I was really sad there for a very long time,” she admitted quietly; maybe it wasn't the time to tell him, but she needed to say it while it was on her mind. Sarah and Mitch were fielding messages, quiet giggles and words just over their shoulders while they waited for breakfast.

“Jus’ another thing we have in common,” he mumbled into her hair unfazed by her words. “We can share the whole one we make together.”

She sighed with relief and nuzzled her face into the soft shirt he wore. “You’re everything I wanted and more.”

What more could he say? “Me too, angel. Me too.”

--

general taglist: @justlemmeadoreyou @daydreamingofmatilda @sunshinemoonsposts @youdontcaredoyou @tiredinwinter @loving-hazz @likeapplejuicenpeach

Please let me know if you'd like to join the taglist, if it didn't work, if you no longer want to be included, etc. :)

If you like this, check out my masterlist for more of my writing.

[arcadiabaytornado]

Live Playing Double Exposure First Thoughts:

A: Okay, I do love that you can pick Max’s outfit right away. I chose the rainbow sweater.

B: This sounds over dramatic but it was so intense to see Max’s face again. For a very brief moment I was 13 again watching Max wake up in the storm.

C: Am I insane or all the sounds in this game like…muffled?? I have my audio settings all the way up so it’s not that. Speaking of settings I also took the motion blur off and the graphics look so much now.

More Undercut

D: I’m already finding it super interesting that Max finds comfort in the destruction of old buildings after hell week. That could mean a lot of things but I’ll wait to see if the game tells me before I get analytical.

E: I love Safiya already. PLEASE let her be a love interest.

F: I do love the camera mechanism!!!!

G: Max lost her powers after hell week? That’s also super interesting holy shit. I’d love to know more about that, though my guess is that Max maybe completed her purpose with her power and therefore lost it? I wonder what that would mean for Daniel and Alex….

H: I’m trying to not to think of Chloe to much, but man she would have loved an old abandoned bowling alley.

I: Getting used to older Max is an adjustment. She doesn’t feel out of character per se, but it is weird because I keep expecting her to act like her eighteen year old self and then she doesn’t because she’s older now.

J: Older Max is already coming off as a lot more confident/reckless than younger Max. I like that change a lot!

K: I don’t know how I feel about Max making a one liner every time I examine anything.

L: Ah fuck. Is fate after Safiya or Max this time.

M: Did they really put the “We will :)” flashback right before making us confirm that Max and Chloe broke up. I’m going to fight Decknine.

N: Max is never beating the autism allegations.

O: I know people are upset at the “high school sweetheart” line but in context it seems like Max is trying to deflect the conversation to not talk about what Chloe actually was to her.

P: The texts between Max and Chloe were so uncomfortable to read. I know the storm changed them both, but….i don’t know…it just seems weird that Chloe reacted like that to Max wanting to move in with her permanently. I’m getting the vibe that their relationship was mentally and emotionally over on Chloe’s end way before it was on Max’s end.

Q: Max is ghosting her parents now and that devastates me.

R: Can I have a middle ground option on Amanda? I’m not ready for Max to have a huge crush yet, but I wouldn’t say she’s not Max’s type.

S: Okay, the Chloe/Victoria thing seems like fanfiction. It’s the only thing so far that I’ve gone “ugh” at.

T: The Vortex Club parallel is not lost on me.

U: I’m sorry but Max’s eyes look so bad…she also looks like she had a different model from every other character for some reason??

V: I’m just going for it and saying “A date thing” If Safiya is a romance choice later on I’m going to be so mad. But that’s what other saves are for.

W: Hearing Chloe’s name is a jump-scare at this point lmao.

X: I’m loving Moses. He’s so awkward and seems really sweet. Which makes me scared he’ll be the killer because the LIS franchise does not let us have nice things.

Y: I don’t even know how Max is SUPPOSED to talk about what she’s running from regardless if she sacrificed Chloe or the Bay.

Z: I wonder if they’re going to give Max’s power a celestial explanation and that’s what’s with all the solar system imagery.

[the-authors118]

Pov: The young boy Earl Ciel Phantomhive has a rival...namely you...

Part 2

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

"I'm so bored Ciel.. do something with me" Y/n sat in his study "I can't help it that you came so early" Ciel was annoyed "Pff.. don't be an honorless dog" Y/n complained "Excuse me Lady Y/n but would you please leave my young master alone, he still has a lot to do" Sebastian came into the room and Y/n looked at him "Oh, of course Sebastian... but didn't Valentin ask you if you would accompany her into town?" Ciel raised an eyebrow "I only do what my master tells me Lady Y/n" he bowed "I see-" "you should go Sebastian" Ciel interrupted Y/n and Sebastian's eyes widened "Help Valentin with the errands and take this letter to the majesty." Ciel handed over the letter "Yes, my young master" and he left the room.

"So Lady Y/n.. why did you want to get rid of our butlers?" Y/n sat down on the sofa and crossed her legs. “Do you think I’m up to something naughty?” He held his hand in front of his face "Why are you like that?" Y/n laughs "that's my nature, you better get used to it or not"

........

After dinner the two sat in the playroom and played chess. "Don't you think they're both out for a long time?" Ciel sat his figure down "Am I not enough for you?" Y/n giggled as she took a sip of wine.

(Ciel doesn't like alcohol because then people act uncontrollably and he can't stand it)

"When are you actually turning 17?" Y/n looked at him "two weeks after you turn 18, dear Earl" she checkmated him "checkmate darling" she gave him an air kiss "Congratulations" Ciel stood up and went to the window ""Nobody has ever defeated me so dirty.. your mind is truly unique" y/n gave a small lady curtsy "And to hear that from you, dear Earl, honors me too deeply," he turned around “Let's play another game Y/n" she turned her head confused "which one?" Ciel grinned "A question game.. You ask each other questions and whoever gets it wrong or can't answer it has to be punished!" Y/n sat back down on the sofa "well then Phanthomhive.. let the game begin" Ciel also sat down "I'll let you go first lady y/n" Y/n touched her chin and thought "mhh, what's under your eye patch?" She asked without thinking too much "A black hole because there is no eye" he answered simply “What’s under your collar?” "A scar that remains from before"

The two knew that they were lying to each other

___________________________

Later that evening, Y/n was sitting in the room with Valentin and she was combing her mistress's hair. "What did the letter that Sebastian had to hand in say?" Valentin looked at her through the mirror "My mistress... Ciel thinks you're up to something... and now the queen has concerns about her poor awake dog." Y/n's nose wrinkled "Tsk" she stood up "Phantomhive's birthday is tomorrow.. I need to get going.. Elisabeth is out of the way and now I can attack. Make a deal with Sebastian" Valentin looked at her in shock, “But Mistress-” "The two of them have known for a long time.. just like us" y/n stood in front of her "Make a deal with him.. from devil to devil" you smile "we won't touch Ciel's soul but he can't get in my way for that" Valentin bowed "yes, my young mistress"

____________

"Ciel?" You knock on his door "Come in" the voice rang out. "I can't sleep... can I spend some time with you?" When you open the door you first have to look across the room “Tomorrow will be a busy and long day Lady Y/n” You sit down across from him "I know... your birthday will definitely be breathtaking" Ciel smiled "Yes, we are using the whole property.. there will be many guests coming" he exhaled heavily "Are you already excited?" You tilted your head "Not really... birthdays dosen't mean anything to me anymore... but the Queen wanted to celebrate it" You thought "But why the queen? Will she be here tomorrow too?" "Not the Queen herself but she will send a trusted person" Ciel rested his chin on his hand "So behave tomorrow... if you plan something the Queen will find out." You Chuckled "My dear Ciel...I would never do anything naughty.. And especially not on your birthday," "Will you accompany me to town tomorrow? Sebastian and I still have a few errands to run... and we stop at your parents' wine factory" Your breath hitches and you start to shake a little "I know your parents are dead but you could still get some good wine there" Ciel leaned forward "I don't know if the wine here in London is as good as in your headquarters in France, But I don't have to worry about it when you're there, right?" Drops of sweat come down your head "I-I'll think about it Earl" your voice a little shaky "Valentine can accompany me?" Ciel leaned back again “Of course” that made you exhale and you stood up " be careful on your Birthday you'll turn 18 tomorrow and dosen't longer have a fiancée.. all women will probably no longer be able to hold back." He rolled his eyes "I hope you're a good dancer" Ciel looked at you "Of course I can dance Y/n!" You turn to him "Then I hope for a dance tomorrow" you smile at him and his heart gave a little jump "Maybe I'll find the time for it."

*

When you went to your room, Valentin was already waiting for you “Beautiful rose” you point to the rose in her hair "So everything worked out with Sebastian?" Valentin nodded understandably "But he also had a little request" you look at her "you shouldn't do anything that would get his status in trouble" "Valentine help you undress," I wouldn't dare" She noticed that something was wrong while they take off the collar "Young mistress are you okay? Your neck is red"

(Y/n has this habit of her neck turning red when she's scared or nervous since childhood that's why there's the devil mark on her neck)

"We'll accompany the young Earl into town tomorrow... and you should stay by my side, would you?" Valentin bowed to her "Yes, my young mistress".

<3

"Happy birthday my dear Earl" you bow to him jokingly as you entered the room where breakfast was served. “Thanks Y/n.. we’ll be leaving in an hour so get ready.” he pointed to my nightdress, "Oh, of course, but first I'll eat something"you sat down at the table and drank the orange juice that was in front of you "When are your guests coming?" You cut the toast "In the evening... some people will come earlier to stay in their rooms, but it won't be a problem if I come later" He wiped the corners of his mouth. "The king's representative will have a room very close to you." He took a sip of his tea “So please don’t drink so much, I don't want you to bother him with it." Ciel stood up "I'll wait for you in the carriage" Before you could make a cheeky comment, he left the room with Sebastian. "Such an annoying boy" Your grip on the fork tightened "I thought he was already in love" You click your tongue "Ciel Phantomhive is probably a difficult victim after all" You thought quietly.

€

It was quiet in the carriage... the two butlers sat outside to drive the carriage and you sat in the silence with Ciel. "Tell me Ciel... Why exactly do you want my family's wine? You have a whole wine cellar full.." You move a little on the bench "That's easy to explain... the Queen's confidante wants a special wine, and it's only available from your family" Shivers run down your spine as you thought about what your "family" did to you. "Why are you so tense? Aren't you happy to see the house where you grew up?" You choked up a bit "I was in France most of the time... which is why I know the language.. je le parle couramment" (I speak it fluently) Ciel looked at you in surprise.

"C'est bien de savoir que quelqu'un d'autre parle cette langue." "It's nice to know that someone else also speaks this language"

"Merci pour les éloges, mon cher Earl" "Thank you for the praise, my dear Earl" Ciel laughed and leaned back.

When you arrived in town you went straight to the first shoe store. "Ciel, can we meet here again later? I need new dancing shoes for tonight." Ciel nodded as you clapped your hand "Come on Valentine" the two of you went into the store and you picked out some nice high heeled shoes.

"My dress for tonight is ready?" Valentin nodded "yes young mistress just as you requested" You smile "then I'm looking forward to tonight."

As you sat back in the carriage you became a little nervous about the winery Ciel noticed "aren't you feeling well Lady Y/n?" You look at him "I'm fine, don't worry" The carriage approached the entrance to the winery and your hands were sweating, Ciel hummed as he looked out the window. The carriage stopped and you got out and immediately looked around but take a deep breath when you only see Hendrixen. "Hendrixen!!!" You greeted him with a hug "Lady Y/n.. look at you already grown so big" he laughed and adjusted his glasses. "Sir Phantomhive welcome to our winery" Hendrixen turned to Ciel and bowed "The wine you have pre-ordered is already prepared with a small test sample for the taste" He tapped her side with a small smile. "Thank you very much Hendrixen, please lead us there" Ciel commanded and off they went. Hendrixen and Y/n talk a lot to each other "Don't worry Lady Y/n Sir Leskos is not here.. he had to leave on business" You take a deep breath "It's better... after everything he did to me, I don't want to see him anymore" Hendrixen's smile disappeared "I wanted to protect you back then... but everyone thought it was normal, so I didn't do anything" You looked on the floor "I was a gift for him.. my parents wanted to treat him to something good and that's why they had me...". After a while when they arrived in the wine cellar there was already a bottle and two glasses, "Lady Y/n if you want to try it, go ahead" Ciel looked at her excitedly where Hendrixen gave her the glass. She sipped it once and let it pass on her lips. "A very good vintage... Not too sweet but not too strong either.. yes it's good" Y/n put the glass down again "Ciel, this is a perfect wine for tonight" his blue eyes shimmered "Well then... I'll take ten whole cases" Hendrixen smiled "as you wish". As When he was putting the boxes away with Sebastian, Valentin grabbed Y/n's shoulder. "Young mistress, something isn't going right here." Y/n turned around "Valentin.. he's not there so everything's fine" she waved it off and got into the carriage with Ciel after saying goodbye to Hendrixen.

"Who is Hendrixen?" Ciel asked interestedly. "Hendrixen is my parents' old butler.. he took good care of me and my brother "But when he got too old, my parents enrolled him in the London winery under his leadership" Y/n smiled at him "but whatever, what are you wearing tonight?" Ciel raised an eyebrow "It's going to be blue tonight.. why? Do you want to wear something blue now?" You shake your head "nahh blue doesn't suit me so well, I'll be wearing dark red tonight" He nodded.

“You look really beautiful” Valentin praised you as you put your lip gloss on “thanks Valentin.. Tonight I'll make it, Ciel will be mine" you look behind you "what do you think Valentin?" She said nothing "Young mistress I still have this bad feeling.." you roll your eyes "oh, I'm safe you don't have to worry" Y/n looked at the clock "I'm already 10 minutes late.. come on Valentine" you both left the room and went to the other guests. Ciel was nowhere to be seen and the guests were wondering where the birthday child was, Y/n was talking to Prince Soma when she took a sip of the wine, she immediately spit it out and coughed. “Young Mistress” Valentin gave her a handkerchief “Are you okay Y/n?” Soma took the glass and gave it to Agne who smelled it "It's not poisoned"The door opened and everyone cheered as Ciel walked in with a person where Y/n's heart stopped. "My dear guests.. thank you for coming this evening, this is Sir Leskos and he is here on behalf of the Queen." Your world collapsed after Ciel continued speaking "please have fun this evening"Everyone applauded and the music started. “I have to get out of here” you mumble but Valentin was nowhere to be seen and when you looked around, Sir Leskos was already standing in front of you "Good evening my little elf"

[multifandomimagines999]

Hi can you do Brian Quinn x wife reader where your reaction to Q:the musical where your in the audience with his firemen buddies but also your children then transition to where Q puts the boys to the fire men academy and he show's his kids what it means to be a fireman

A/N: Enjoy!

Future of the Department

Pairing: Brian Quinn x wife!reader

You and Brian met working at the same fire department and after chaotic years of friendship, you finally admitted your feelings for each other. Now you're happily married with a 10 week old son, Logan.

Now your little man was almost 2.5 months and y'all were getting the hang of things. Logan was on a better schedule and you were able to get at least a little bit of sleep.

But today Logan and you were helping Q get punished. He knew he was performing a stupid play in front of professional actors. What he didn't know was that instead of actors it was you, Logan, and all our firehouse buddies. Lucky for me Logan was asleep when we arrived.

We took our seats in the front. As soon as the play started, Logan was up and alert. I held him in my lap as Brian came out on stage. When he saw all of us out there he couldn't even speak he was so embarrassed. He continued through the play and towards the end Logan let out a squeal of excitement which grabbed his father's attention. I guess he hadn't noticed Logan was here because he was too caught up in everything else. His eyes went wide and he dropped his head again.

"You brought my son into this!" Brian exclaimed into his ear piece/mic.

"It's okay. You're already an embarrassment. This is nothing" teased Joe.

Brian finished up the play and our coworkers began throwing shoes at him which caused me to laugh. Filming stopped and the guys were done shooting for the day. Brian went out and was talking to our buddies while I walked around rocking Logan.

"Did you enjoy daddy looking like a doofus?" I cooed in a baby voice to which he squealed back, "I'll take that as a yes".

"Look at you. Already teaching him the word doofus" smiled the chief.

"Chief!" I cheered and carefully hugged him, "It's good to see you! You weren't at the station when we stopped by last week".

"My wife was sick, so I had to take care of her. But the guys were telling me all about this little man" he stated, looking at Logan, "You are just adorable!"

"Thanks" I chuckled.

"You know, I'm proud of you kid. You've come so far since your first days at the firehouse. You're one strong woman" he praised, "And now here you are married to Quinn and a mom to a little guy. You've done well for yourself so far".

"Thanks. I bet nobody would have guessed Brian and I would wind up together".

"Oh no. We took bets on if and when you'd get together. Eventually we just kinda dropped out until we heard the news from Quinn, and then we made bets on your engagement".

"Well who won?"

"You're looking at the winner".

"Nice chief".

***

"So this is where Mommy and Daddy trained," Brian smiled as he had Greyson on one hip and our daughter Carly on the other.

Logan stood beside him. I stood behind Logan, hand on my bump as we were expecting our fourth child. Brian showed them our graduation pictures and showed them some of the training areas. All three kids were excited hearing all of our stories.

"I wanna be like mommy when I grow up!" Carly cheered, making me grin.

"You can baby girl."

I looked over at Brian, even more head over heels in love with him. The way he interacts with our kids, how passionate he is, he is perfect.

[drowninginblox]

Thoughts on Fit's Last QSMP stream- spoilers ahead

It is Thursday, May 23rd, 2024. 2:36pm EST when writing. And I am disappointed in myself. Not for anything Fit, the server, the admins, or anyone besides me has done.

I hoped. And once again, I am expectedly crushed. I had a feeling that Fit would take himself out of the equation in the way he did. There would be no Pac Camio (ghost or living), no sight of Ramon either. Just business, as Fit is one to do.

But god did I hope for something out of a fanfiction. The biggest contenders were Pac's ghost or a hallucination speaking to Fit at the bottom of that damn hole to prep and escort him to the afterlife where everyone was waiting for them. OR the idea that Fit, after returning to the island, would kill himself in a similar but unique way to Pac and Mike. Regardless, neither happened. But I am very happy in what I witnessed.

I won't get into too much there will be vod watchers who accidentally stumble into Tumblr- to which I tell you, GO WATCH THE DAMN VOD.

Nonetheless, I enjoyed the Fit abused in-game mechanics to justify his survival down there. However, it calls into question whether or not he took up cannibalism again (writers you know what to do) in which I digress cus that a conversation within itself. I also appreciated that Fit made the effort to check up on more people other than just Pac and Ramon. It sounds like "Yeah, ofc." but let us remember that most of us (and I could be wrong) are shippers, and our yearning for Hideduo kind of blindsided the other relationships q!fit has. (This applies to me to just so yall know)

What fit did to justify or at least give credence to Ramon's character was sweet and I really hope we get some Ramon-centric fics about the possibility of his survival in an otherwise abandoned world, similar to his father. I may do that on my own but definitely not today. Mr. Fit Em See fucking wrecked me and I really could use some fluff right now. Whether it be at my own hand or someone else's, I could not care less.

Hueveitos, we are all going through it. And I bet on all the money I have that Twitter is going insane, Tumblr is dying, and Fit is either taking a well-deserved break or laughing his ass off at us. Probably both knowing that fucker. The brilliant bitch he is. I apologize for not liveblogging, I was enamored with what was going on. But we all were lol

Anyway, I'm probably gonna listen to the music Fit included in the finale and daydream of better days for q!Fit. Ones where, maybe, in another life, something happened on Madagascar's end where the tech didn't work and Fit was suspended in the QSMP for the rest of his natural life. Maybe Ramon is fine enough and just wondering, looking for Fit in an otherwise empty world. Hell, in another life, Pac waited longer for his American boyfriend. Maybe everyone did. Maybe the kids didn't get sick, maybe they all died a week or so after they were found. Who knows!

But with what we were given, and who we had to spend that time with, I know that I'll always look back on the Qsmp in a similar vein to another sorry sap of a sever I know. The memories will persist, the story will continue to be told. The world will keep spinning, and I will keep writing.

Thank you to everyone who was involved in the experience whether it be seen or unseen admin, CC's who somehow found this post on a hellcite, any and all fandom goers that I have stumbled upon in search of solace from the canon, and my girl over discord! I DON'T KNOW YOU AT ALL BUT YOU'VE HELPED ME GET THROUGH THE LAST LEG OF THIS JOURNEY!!

Here's to tomorrow everyone, regardless of what happens! I love this community and I sure as shit hope you guys don't become strangers!

[zelphin124]

LCB-3: Chapter 3

Third session yayyyyyyy- This one took so long but so much happened and it was all too important to cut out! Enjoy!

Masterpost Chapter 2 <--> Chapter 4

~o0o~

The week that surpassed on the bus was nothing short of troublesome, however, most of the information was discarded as unimportant for the story. It was full of memorization of contract terms, cleaning, cooking, gauntlet grinding, and team quarrels. 

The team quarrels didn’t seem to let up. Even now, Jekyll knew Mark and Othello were arguing in the back as the rest sat up front to keep their eyes on the road. Their shouts gave her a headache. She wished to go sleep in a little bit more before she had to work, but she considered the trip not worth the trouble of getting between the two airheads. 

Lenore was adjacent to Jekyll on the other side of the bus; she spread across two chairs with her eyes closed. Jekyll admired how she could take a nap everywhere. Her form was so peaceful, and not anxious about anything around her. 

Mallo sat in the seats in front of Lenore, her legs also spread across both chairs. She was sitting upright with her hair tied back, looking straight ahead at the front of the bus. Between her fingers was a cigarette, as usual. Jekyll had lost count of how many she had. It came to the point where she wondered where Mallo got all the cigarettes from. 

Pen rested behind Jekyll, sleeping on the window and not being disturbed by the bumps on the road, as if he was passed out cold. Jekyll marveled at his ability to sleep anywhere. It was as if he could see the stars wherever he was and rest in their presence. 

Jatayu was adjacent to him. He simply stared at the ceiling with his hands in his lap. He didn’t seem interested in anything. Part of Jekyll wished to go and talk to him, but his mind seemed to be somewhere else, and she didn’t feel comfortable reaching out to start a conversation. 

Jekyll decided to stare at the window. She noticed in the blur of the gray slum buildings outside, immediately telling her she was in a backstreet of sorts. Little to no color besides the purple decorated the richer buildings. Everything was in precise ruin and gloom. It was clear that this corporation was downtrodden and poor. The sky too, was covered in clouds, hiding any form of sunlight. It was a horrible day, and not one person was in sight. 

“Alright, at attention everyone,” a raspy voice sounded from the front of the bus. 

Jekyll lifted her head just in time to see Vergilius turn around to face them. His hands were clasped behind his back and his eyes were more tired than usual. 

“This is your first mission,” he began. “I expect you all to be on your best behavior. You will retrieve the golden bough from the lobotomy corporation facility here in Q Corp. In addition to this, we’ve also made a contract with…” He let out a disappointing and terrifying sigh. “Where is Mark and Othello?” 

“They are in the back of the bus,” Pen answered. “If I remember correctly, they were fighting over something again.” 

The Red Gaze’s eyes turned sharply toward the door, a slight flash of annoyance woven in his mouth. His head gently turned toward his assistant next to him, his voice more gentle than the anger on his face. “Kuvira,” he bent slightly over to meet her eyes. 

Kuvira’s head looked up like an alert rabbit to a twig snapping. Her gaze relaxed as she saw Vergilius. “Yes sir?” She implied a tone of willingness and patience, something he did not return to her. 

“Check on the sinners in the back, Mark and Othello. Fetch them for me, and make sure they aren’t causing a fuss or doing anything stupid.” 

Kuvira stood up immediately, giving a quick bow of respect. “Right away, sir.” She nearly skipped away with a smile down the bus hall before reaching the back door and closing it behind her. 

“Sinners, any notable questions about the place before I continue?” Vergilius turned his gaze back to the crowd as Kuvira left. “Your task is to find the golden bough and return it to Dante.” 

“Hold on, we?” Pen gestured to his coworkers, a look of confusion on his face. “Aren’t you coming too? I thought you were our guide.” 

“I am the bus guide,” Vergilius replied, moving his hands from his back to grab his book resting on the bus dashboard. “I guide the bus, not the sinners on the bus.” He sighed. “I… assist now and then, assuming you guys don’t do your job and get lost… but I cannot guide you to the destination per contract regulations unless in dire situations.” 

Mallo raised her hand, her gaze fixed and stoic as usual. “You informed us that we were picking up a person. Who are they? What do they look like?” 

The only detail Vergilius gave of the person was the brown suit he would be wearing. Mallo didn’t seem to appreciate the vagueness of the answer. 

Lenore also made clear she had a question. “Aren’t we looking for the golden bough?” 

Vergilius stared at her as if she was deaf. 

“I mean, why do we need to sign a contract with someone with a simple task?” Lenore elaborated, rubbing the back of her neck. 

“The person in charge of the signed contract will guide you to the facility as they are well situated with the environment,” Vergilius explained. “They have additional tasks for you to complete on the way.” 

Lenore said her thanks and rested back in her seat. 

Jekyll adjusted the monocle on her eye, her gaze twitching slightly. The voice… well, Hyde, was strangely quiet. 

Not that she was complaining, but it usually didn’t mean anything good. “Where are you?” She muttered under her breath. 

I’m here, idiot. There’s nothing important to say. 

Jekyll rolled her eyes, regretting that she even asked. 

“Any other questions?” The guide sighed, waiting a moment before flipping through his book. He turned toward Charon and gestured for her to stop. 

Jekyll didn’t realize the bus had slowed, but she did notice the sudden jolt when it came to a full stop. Charon’s expression was blank as always, as if she had done nothing wrong, and nothing right. 

When the door opened, there was a man who stepped into the bus. As Vergilius had described, he had a prominent brown suit. He carried a gray suitcase that was the same shade as his combed-back hair. His face was square and he adjusted the large glasses on his face, giving a disgusted look at the state of the vehicle before speaking. “Is this Limbus Company?” He asked, his voice snarky and high-pitched. 

“Yes,” Pen answered faster than anyone else could open their mouths. 

The man alternated his stance to lean more on his left black boot. He seemed unamused. “I am supposed to meet Dante, I assume?” 

Quicker than anyone else once more, Pen pointed to the manager. 

Dante quickly thanks him before standing up. “Right, I will need a translator to talk to our coworker.” 

This would be a good time to show my good work ethic, Jekyll thought. She began to stand up, willing to offer her assistance. 

“Jatayu, can you translate for me?” The manager turned his head toward the veteran. 

“Oh, uh, sure,” Jatayu gently nods and hoists himself out of his seat, adjusting his jacket to look more presentable. 

Jekyll frowned, sitting back down in her seat. A wave of disappointment washed over her. She knew managers tended to choose people they trusted for various tasks, however, she couldn’t help but feel useless in that moment. 

Get over yourself, Hyde scoffed. Pay attention to what they’re saying. 

Jekyll had nothing better to do than oblige. 

Before Dante could start the conversation, the back door opened. Mark came out with a strangely calm look on his face. His white shirt and black pants were drenched in blood and reeked of guts. His pipe hung on his shoulders as he observed the situation before him. 

Kuvira was not far behind him, gently swaying to the side slightly behind Mark. She seemed to be completely unscathed, except for the end of her scarf which contained the same color of blood on Mark’s shirt. 

“Where have you been?” Dante turned around, confronting his tardiness.

“Sorry, Dante, I was-” Mark paused, his gaze snapping back to normal. “Wait a minute, why am I apologizing to you? I was at the ordeal gauntlet, pansy. None of your business.” 

Jekyll’s eyes narrowed, observing Mark closely. The blood on his shirt was definitely not ordeal blood. She knew what human blood looked like, to her dismay. 

Oh my gosh, the idiot killed Othello. She heard Hyde rant in her head. No one is going to believe his pathetic lie–

“How did you beat them all by yourself?” Pen stared at Mark with wide eyes in amazement. “Identities,” he replied. “Easy.” 

These idiots. 

Jekyll couldn’t help but agree with Hyde. Was it really not that obvious?

Mallo shot a similar glare that Jekyll had in her eyes at Mark. Mark made eye contact with her. “The hell is that look for?” He snapped, his demeanor becoming harsher by the minute. 

“Mm, none of my business.” Mallo returned the glare before turning around, taking another breath from her cigarette. 

“I’m glad you got the use of IDs down, pal,” Jatayu smiled towards him. 

Mark turned his gaze towards him. “Who are you?” 

The veteran looked confused. “Uh, I’m Jatayu?” He glanced at Dante before looking back at Mark. “Your coworker?” 

“Hmmph,” Mark looked away and took a seat in the back of the bus, irritated.

Kuvira gently passed Jatayu and Dante as she headed to the front of the bus. Jatayu adjusted his coat once more and also turned around, rather embarrassed. His body language told everyone observing that he wished to move on from the subject. 

Dante didn’t seem convinced. “That’s strange, I don’t remember pulling out any ID cards for you…” 

“You got flames for a brain, pansy,” Mark retorted. 

“It’s not that, I just hope another Ithas situation doesn’t happen… Eh, I’m sure it’ll be fine.” 

Pen had a second take as Dante said that. “Is he lying?” He asked Dante, glancing at Mark. 

“He has no reason to lie,” Dante’s flames flickered as he turned towards the man. “There would be no other place that the blood could come from, anyway.” 

The hunter’s eyes lit up. “Well if he used an ID all by himself, that’s even more impressive.” 

Jekyll twitched her head as Hyde ranted. Idiots surround me… these people can’t come to a logical conclusion for sh–

“Do ID injuries usually transfer over?” Lenore asked, confused. “I didn’t expect the injuries to stay when switching back to our normal selves.” 

“Everything is usually fine after combat,” Dante scratches his head. “The IDs usually don’t remember what happened, and I heal whatever ID that fought after combat, anyway.” 

“Don’t mean to barge in this situation,” the snarky voice from the new guy stung the noise like a scorpion. “But can we get this contract settled? I want to get a move on.” 

Jekyll didn’t care for how nastily and pushy the man was being. She knew she would be polite when working with him, but his comments were unnecessary. 

“Yes,” Dante turned around to face the man. “Jatayu, please translate what I say.” 

“O-Oh, yes,” Jatayu shook his head, snapping himself back into focus.

“We as Limbus Company are a proud establishment,” Dante began. “We deal with distortions and collect golden boughs. Your contract has been made to help both of us with our personal goals. Things are going well, and we wish for things to continue going well.” 

Jatayu clears his throat. “Uh, we as Limbus company are a proud establishment that uh… deal with distortions… and things are not… well?” 

Everyone on the bus looked at Jatayu as if he was high. Dante tilted his head as a strange ticking noise sounded. “Jatayu, that’s… not what I said.” 

“Uh, sorry,” Jatayu stammered, scratching the back of his head as his eyes winced. “I’m a little antsy, I will focus better, manager.” 

The new guy had a disturbed look on his face subsequent to everyone else’s reactions. “Right… Anyway, the insurance company of mine wishes to hire you. There has been an astronomical rush of MK-Falons with so many people exploring the old lobotomy corporation facilities. As a life insurance company, we have good business keeping people alive. We have people’s well-being insured and compensate for those who pass into the next life. However, with the large rush of people exploring the facilities, they never come back up alive and are presumed dead. People keep exploring these facilities and we aren’t financially equipped to keep paying their relatives for their poor decisions that cost them their lives.” 

“You’re still paying for the deaths of those who effectively commit suicide?” Lenore questioned. It was a respectful and logical question, and Lenore asked it professionally. 

“Usually, we wouldn’t fund those. However, they are not… classified as suicides, and not many suicides occur in the backstreets of Q Corp. Higher ups did take that in mind, but because of their classification as a casualty and not a suicide…” The man sniffed as if to clear his throat. “The point being, my company has been in a downward spiral because of this rush of enkephalin. To save our hyde from–” 

He said my name. 

Jekyll winced and gently replied. No, he’s talking about a different thing entirely. 

That’s still my name, moron. No one just says ‘Hyde’ out of the blue. 

Shut up–

“We want you all to delve into this and save us money.” The man finished, taking a deep breath. 

Jekyll scowled at herself. She didn’t even get to hear the reasoning and the final part of the explanation. She had no doubt this would lead to further issues down the line. 

Mallo seemed pissed off with how the man pronounced enkephalin. She proceeded to argue with him many times about how the word was said, before giving up as his accent didn’t change how he said the word at all. Lenore tried to convince them both it was the same thing and to move on to more important topics at hand. 

Pen whispered something in the background, and Jatayu stood up to relay it. “So how does all this relate to distortions?” His voice was hoarse, exposing his exhaustion. 

“So, our company tried to take care of the issue on our terms, however, we are not exactly fit for combat, despite having a few combatants left… We tried to go ourselves, but while we were down there we found very… grizzly things.” He shuddered at the mere mention of the description, his hand going to rub his back and neck to calm himself down. “After that first failure of an exploration… we decided to call the experts – you all – knowing you are better trained and more prepared than us.” 

“This implies that you know what’s down there,” Jatayu pressed. 

“There was… a lot of beheadings, and we didn’t make it past the first floor.” 

The silence that captured the bus was loud. The man uncomfortably adjusted his feet as he waited for someone to speak up, getting more nervous by the second. 

Pen was the first to break his anxious bondage. “So, you’re saying we are going to fight distortions?” 

“I believe so,” he stammered. “Are there other monsters that are not in that classification?” 

Jekyll watched the rage immediately take over Mallo’s face. She took another breath of her cigarette to calm down before she spoke. “Abnormalities.” 

The man looked bewildered. “What’s that?” 

Mallo pinched her nose with her free hand, her mood becoming more irritated the more this man spoke. “You idiot–” 

“Did we hire the wrong company?” The new guy backed up nervously, his hands raised as his expression revealed his new fear. 

Jekyll watched as Mallo stood to her feet immediately, towering over the man. She walked up to him, bending down before breathing out one last cloud of smoke. “Abnormalities are feral monsters who exist for one purpose. They are crafted around a singular desire and will never change. They used to be people, but will never return to their former state. Distortions, however, are people who are consumed by a belief and an emotion to a mental breaking point. They can be taken care of and returned to their former state. Knowing the difference is key.” 

When the fear on the man’s face didn’t subside, Jekyll felt compelled to step forward. “Uh, distortions are killable! Unlike abnormalities, they are usually a one-and-done situation.” Jekyll stood up and walked to Mallo’s side. “Either way, we can take care of the monsters down there.” She let out a nervous laugh, clenching her hands together. 

You absolute idiot–

Although the man looked relieved, Mallo immediately became more angry. She turned toward Jekyll, her gaze piercing her soul. “I didn’t ask you for your opinion. You speak when spoken to, understood?” 

Jekyll took a step back, her posture shrinking inward. The fierce threat written within Mallo’s words sent shivers down her spine. Her gaze did not let up, and it only made Jekyll more afraid. 

What the hell are you doing?! Hyde barked. Don’t let her walk over you like that! Fight back!

Hell nah, Jekyll argued. I’ve already upset her enough. 

Jekyll I swear, you never stand up for yourself. Hyde hissed, more irritated than Mallo. This is why I took action with Danves, you need to–

“I suddenly feel that this is an unsafe working environment,” the new man was clutching his suitcase to his chest, glancing between Mallo and Jekyll. 

“Every place in this God-forsaken city is an unsafe place to work,” Mallo turned back towards him. 

“Ah–” The guy raised his finger to protest, but then clamped his mouth shut. “Fair point…” 

“As I was saying,” Mallo shot one more threatening glare at Jekyll before turning her feet toward the man, her gaze turning into a stoic glaze. “Abnormalities have their differences, but if you beat either of them up enough, they will go into submission.” 

The two continued to exchange information about the subject; Jekyll zoned out and went to sit back in her seat, making herself as small as possible. 

Are you done sulking like a dog without its owner? 

Jekyll’s eyes narrowed, not wanting to address Hyde. 

Don’t in all hell dare ignore me. Hyde snapped. You are such a wimp. Where is your strength to stand your ground? Do you even have the brain to notice they’ve been walking all over you?

KNOW YOUR PLACE! Jekyll screamed in her head, wiping away a tear that never fell. Know your place in this, Hyde. You are not the boss of me. Shut the hell up, or I’ll make sure to charge these moonstones real good. 

Hyde didn’t speak another word after that. Jekyll could feel her sulking in the corner just like she was. She figured she would get to hear all about it later. Hyde always complained that she didn’t know what she was doing wrong when everything she suggested was horrible. Jekyll knew she wasn’t bound by the same morals she was, but the lack of remorse her internal companion had was the most scary part about her. 

“Oh, there is one more group I should tell you all about,” the new man stepped away from Mallo to face the group again. “Other groups are searching for the golden boughs, and we’ve encountered a few of them. Have any of you heard of the demon syndicate?” 

There was a noticeable sound of a grip tightening. Jekyll looked up from the floor to see who it was. The only person who changed their demeanor was Jatayu. Jekyll had often taken Jatayu to be a relaxed, patient man. However, the rage on his face completely changed how he came off to everyone else. He gripped his tonfas mercilessly as if he was going to shatter them with his bare hands. His eyes were like fire. 

What’s his deal? Hyde piped up. 

Jekyll didn’t answer as she took a closer look at him. She didn’t know much if anything about his past, but she could immediately recognize the symptoms he was going through. From the clients she worked with to her personal experience, Jekyll could see the anger of uncertain origin fuel Jatayu. When the mere name of the Demon Syndicate was mentioned, the anger stemmed from a place of trauma as many memories flashed before his very eyes. It was a very common form of post-traumatic stress disorder, however, Jekyll knew every person responded to tragic events differently. She couldn’t tell what exactly was traumatic, but she knew it was causing Jatayu to boil in anger. If her knowledge didn’t fail her, it meant he was about to do something very brash and out of character for his normal composure. 

The man continued to speak as Jatayu walked towards him. “They’ve been lingering in this area, and we have lost many customers to whatever practices they’ve been– oh, hello–” 

Jatayu paid no regard to the man as he walked out of the bus and into the haze of the backstreets. 

“Clockhead, or anyone else listening, fill me in, I ain’t listening to this trash,” Mark got up from the backseat and rushed past Dante and the new guy, scurrying after Jatayu. 

“Are we supposed to be heading out?” Pen asked quietly. 

“Someone’s got trauma,” Mallo muttered under her breath. 

“Well clockface, if we die, don’t let it be permanent,” Lenore gently demanded before getting up from her seat and following the two men out the bus door. 

Pathetic speech anyway, let’s rush after them. 

Jekyll disagreed. She knew when meetings were interrupted like this, it meant not all the key information was given. She clutched her hands together before walking up to the contract man. “Well, you can always give me the remaining details and I will pass them along,” she suggested, casting a quick glance at Mallo to make sure she wasn’t going to yell at her again. 

Ew, boring, I don’t want to stick around for information. Jekyll could feel Hyde rolling her eyes. 

“Oh, alright, let’s head on out after the others and discuss–” 

“No, no,” Jekyll interrupted him, her eyes widening slightly as she motioned for him to not move. “The… backstreets are not safe to discuss important contract business such as this.”

“Good point,” the man adjusted his glasses and sniffed again, his voice becoming less constricted. “We want you to take the demon syndicate out, as they are also bad for our business. We can’t protect those whose souls are stolen, anyway.” 

Jekyll took a mental note of the new information. “Anything else we should know about the journey, the layout, the enemies we will be facing?” 

“Why don’t we walk and talk? I see most of your group has started already,” the man suggested.

Is he deaf? You JUST recommended to stay inside. What an NPC… Hyde insulted him for her. 

Jekyll couldn’t help but agree. She glanced out into the fog where Jatayu and Mark had disappeared, and Lenore slowly caught up to them. She heard a brief command from Dante for Mallo and Pen to follow the others, which meant she would have to go too. 

As Pen walked to the door, he pointed at Charon. “Is she not coming?” 

“Mephi needs company. Charon stays,” the bus driver replied in a simple tone, not looking his way as she swung her feet off the edge of the seat. 

“Huh, okay then,” Pen shrugged it off and walked into the haze, patting the bus as he left. “It’s okay you have Charon to be with you.” 

Mallo after observing the situation, followed Pen without a word to anyone. 

“Are you absolutely sure there is no more information you can give us?” Jekyll turned her attention back towards the contract man. “No loopholes, no hidden surprises that you know of, no hidden information about who we might be facing?” 

“All I know was there was a lot of red and beheading in the facility.” 

“That’s all?” 

“There was also a lot of laughter, but that is all I can give you. I am not combat efficient, so my job is to guide you to the entrance of the lobotomy corporation facility. After that, it is up to your company to complete the rest.” 

This bastard had better pay a large sum to the higher-ups if he expects us to charge in with the pathetic information he’s given us. 

Jekyll sighed, realizing she was not going to get any more useful information out of him. She glanced behind her shoulder to see Dante gesturing her towards the door. She took one look at Vergilius, Kuvira, and Charon before she walked past the contract man and stepped into the fog herself. 

“Dante,” Jekyll heard Vergilius’ voice behind her. He paused for a moment. “...Do not let them lose their heads like last time.” 

Jekyll didn’t hear the manager’s reply as she stepped into the fog. She barely caught a whiff of Jatayu and Mark as they took a turn down a street. As soon as she spotted them, they went out of her sight. 

The backstreets were oddly quiet. Jekyll had never been to Q Corp, but after seeing it, it would not be her first choice. The buildings much like the ones she saw on the bus were slightly in ruin and had a grand presence similar to a ghetto. The houses were more like slums, only varying in color by their different shades of gray. The richer parts of the backstreets that she could see, or at least richer objects had purple and violet hues. The only sound was the constant dripping of water off the broken roofs. The smell was horrendous, like the stench of cow dung and ash. It was difficult to make out any specific details due to the haze. The dark clouds above didn’t help at all with the gloomy and nihilistic environment. It was truly a terrible day. 

There were little to no people out. There was one person in front of them, and he seemed to be of no importance. The eerie silence made Jekyll feel the man was about to get jumped. 

“It’s nice to be out again,” Jekyll glanced to her right, spotting Pen in the middle of a stretch. 

“Weather’s hell as always,” Mallo adds a dark cloud to the fog with the smoke from her cigarette. Her hair gently swayed behind her, and her glare didn’t resist piercing into anyone who got in its way. 

Feeling that Hyde was distracted by something else, Jekyll took a step towards Mallo. I might as well try to make things right… She thought to herself. “H-Hey, Mallo?” 

Mallo barely turned her head towards her. “What?” She snapped more than asked. 

“U-Uhm I w-wanted t-to apologize f-for earlier… I d-didn’t mean to s-step out of line I-I-I am sorry…” Jekyll gripped her hands tightly, looking up at the woman who stood over a foot taller than her. 

Mallo’s gaze seemed to relax, even if it was only a little bit. “Hmm. Just remember not to step out of line. It will lead to more problems.” She gestured down the alleyway that Jatayu and Mark went down. “Like those two.” 

When Jekyll turned her head to see where she was pointing, Pen and Lenore were blocking Mallo’s preferred intention. “Are you going to follow them?” She heard Pen ask Lenore, who was too quiet for her to hear the response.

“Uhm, I a-assume you meant t-the two that a-already left, yes?” Jekyll stammered, turning back to face Mallo. 

“Yes, I did. Congrats on noticing,” Mallo took a breath from her cigarette and sighed. “Talking takes too much effort.” 

Jekyll nodded solemnly, relieved to have cleared that up. She didn’t ever wish to upset Mallo; Jekyll was quite fond of her. However, she couldn’t say the same about Hyde. 

That bastard walks all over us, she heard Hyde mumble in her head. Jekyll decided to ignore everything else Hyde ranted about after that. 

“Aren’t you supposed to direct us, Dante?” Pen appeared next to Jekyll and in front of Dante as if he teleported there. “Three of our companions just walked off.” 

Pen’s immediate presence made Jekyll jump. It took her a bit to consider his words. When Jekyll took a glance at the left alleyway, she realized Lenore had disappeared down it as well. She sighed. Really? 

“I wish I could tell you why they’ve gone off…” Dante sighed. “Perhaps they are trying to catch up with Jatayu? I have never seen him act this way before; he’s usually not like this… storming off to hell knows where. Either way, Maut is supposed to lead us to our destination, we should follow him.” 

It was about time Jekyll learned the contract man’s name. She nodded towards Maut before turning to Dante. “S-So are are going to wait for them t-to come back o-or are we following Maut t-to the destination?” 

“I mean, we need our entire party,” Dante answered. “So I guess we are following them to grab their attention.” 

Mallo didn’t think twice. She turned her heel and trod across the left alleyway where the others disappeared. 

This company’s organization is absolute garbage. Hyde sighed in annoyance as Jekyll watched Mallo walk off. You traded M Corp for this? 

We… I didn’t have a choice. Jekyll replied, sighing. 

You had every choice, and you chose the wrong one. 

Choosing the wrong one would’ve been to continue letting you be free, Jekyll hissed. 

I had everything under control! 

We were about to get arrested, Hyde! Jekyll’s breathing quickened as the memories came back. You committed horrible acts!

Horrible? How were they horrible? Are your stupid morals getting in the way again? 

“Shut up!” 

“Is everything okay?” Dante approached Jekyll, his hands gently extended toward her. 

Jekyll looked up immediately, forcing a smile. “Uh- uh- yes! Everything is fine, Dante.” She sighed. 

This pansy ain’t seeing nothing yet. Hyde took a strange control over Jekyll’s smile, tweaking it slightly. 

“If you’re sure,” Dante nodded, the flames on his head dwindling. 

I cannot believe that worked, Jekyll inhaled a deep breath of relief. “I suppose we follow the others, like you mentioned earlier?” 

“Yes, that is the initial plan,” Dante glanced over his shoulder. “Can anyone ask Maut, though?” 

“I can,” Jekyll immediately stepped up on the opportunity, not letting it get away this time. I need to prove myself to Dante. 

Screw proving yourself. Get all the information you can since we are choosing the boring route. 

Jekyll cringed at herself before walking up to Maut and waving her hand to get his attention.

Maut’s voice was as snarky as ever. “What is it, miss?” 

“Hypothetically,” Jekyll began. “To get to the Lobotomy Corporation facility, which direction would be the best to go in?” 

Maut’s finger pointed towards the alley more colored in purple and violet to the right. “Straight that way.” 

How convenient, Hyde snapped. 

“Uhm… how long would it take to get there if we went left where our other companions went, versus right?” 

“Turning right is naturally faster, as it is a direct shot. However, it shouldn’t take more than a few hours more if we went left. Turning left leads to a worse part of town, where my work residence lies.” 

Lovely. Ask him about supplies, and if there’s any information about the town we should know. 

Jekyll hated that she agreed with Hyde. “Would it be beneficial to stop at your work? Perhaps we could grab some necessary supplies and you can give us more information.” 

“I’ve already told you all the information about the facility,” Maut said, clearly annoyed. 

Is this bastard deaf? Information about the city– Hyde proceeded to curse the man out. 

“W-Well, at least we could go left to gather supplies and devise a plan to go through the city and facility, anything you can give us will help.” 

Maut’s demeanor changed immediately. “That’s a good idea!” He smirked. “Why don’t we do that?” 

Jekyll thought it was a sound plan. She turned around to see if Dante would approve. 

The manager seemed to be reassuring Pen that they would be getting a move on soon, as Pen appeared to have grown restless with the rising tension. 

Jekyll faced the left alley before walking down it. “Come along now, the backstreets are never safe for anybody.” 

The rest of the remaining group followed close behind Jekyll, traveling in silence. The haze thickened and the smell worsened, forcing Jekyll to plug her nose as she continued forward through the streets, twisting and turning with the roads. The atmosphere itself got darker and gloomier, but it wouldn’t be long until the gang reached an opening. 

“Is this a safer part of town?” Pen strolled to match Maut’s pace, looking up at the tall man with curious eyes. 

“No, less safe by a lot,” Maut answered curtly. 

Dante shuddered as he eavesdropped. He ticked gently, about to say something, but the narrow backstreet opened up into a small courtyard. There were dim purple lights to light up the main business buildings and their entrances. All the buildings were covered in chains and jail bars to keep anyone from going in or out without being tracked. To the left were more streets that drove further into Q Corp, and to the right were a bunch of buildings. Straight ahead was a more lit-up path with a broken sign. 

The party’s gaze rested on the only person out in the open. He wore a large purple coat and had his hair slicked back like Maut’s. The black suitcase resting at his side matched his boots perfectly in color, and it was easy to tell he was looking back at the party with a stoic face despite the glasses that covered his eyes. 

“Do you know him?” Jekyll lowered her voice, talking to Maut as she gestured towards the purple-suited man. 

“Yes! That is one of my coworkers, Mr. Fylar,” Maut wore a quick smile before it faded. “He’s a good companion of mine.” 

Bro’s got a nice drip. I would love to paint that, Hyde smirked. I wonder if his blood would complement the violet. 

Can you stop? We are trying to focus, Jekyll pinched her nose, adjusting her monocle. She made an effort to distract herself from Hyde’s comments as she observed her surroundings. It would be hard to navigate the backstreets without proper guidance. Having been on a similar mission before, Jekyll wondered if there was a backup plan in case the group got even more separated for navigation. “Do we have a layout of the city, Maut?” The doctor asked randomly, not looking at the contract man. “A layout of the city?” 

“I’m sure he does, quite,” Pen added. 

With the lack of response from the man, Jekyll snapped her fingers to get Maut’s attention. “Hey, sorry for all the questions. Do you have a layout or map of the area?” 

“Oh!” He adjusted his glasses and cleared his throat once more. “I do work here so I have a general layout… but because this place is so filthy and grimey I don’t know it too well, as I usually stay in the nest.” 

“Okay, can you draw a general layout or a map of some sort, on the ground or verbally relay it?” Jekyll pressed, begging for any new information she could get. 

“I can… do you have a piece of paper?” 

Jekyll looked up to the sky momentarily, pulling her jacket forward so her other hand could rummage through her pockets. It took a long time sorting through the various jars and rocks to find paper and pen. However, she immediately handed it to Maut the moment she found some. 

Maut thanked her before placing the paper on a nearby wall and started to sketch out the section of the backstreets they were in, humming to himself as he did so. 

Finally, some useful information. Hyde rolled her eyes. Maut isn’t useless after all. 

Eventually, Maut handed her the map. Jekyll took a moment to observe it, holding it up to the sky to get a better look. A slight ray of moonlight in the sunset peeked through the clouds, giving her light. 

Hey, watch the rings! She heard Hyde snap. You promised you wouldn’t charge those. 

Sorry, Jekyll replied, glancing at the rings as they lit up. I can’t see the map otherwise. 

Do I sound like I care? Put them away. 

Jekyll sighed, putting the map down. She could make out the general details of where to go, but not much more than that. The rings eventually died down, the red light shining from them fading. 

“Dante, you need to get a better grip on your sinners,” Mark’s voice echoed as he stepped out from the shadows of the street straight ahead. “They’re going on about the fact that ‘family matters’ or whatever.” 

Dante tilted his head, confused. “Family… does matter?” 

“You’re delusional too?” Mark rolled his eyes, swinging his pipe around his shoulders. “Everyone knows that family is just some stupid concept, they always sell you out in the end for a price.” 

Jekyll froze at that comment, taking a step closer to the conversation. Family is… a stupid concept? Does someone else actually think that way? 

Hyde laughed manically so loud it rang through Jekyll’s ears. Hah! Markie the clawless cub… It’s about time he finally learned that. 

Dante lifts a finger as if to protest, but he pauses. “I… met someone who thought that way. He was betrayed by his family often. He didn’t make up everything with them, but he ended up forgiving them and he lives a good life now.” 

“Sounds like an idiot,” Mark scoffed. 

“He knew what he was talking about,” Dante defended, his voice getting more serious with each syllable. 

“Anyway, pansy, Jatayu, the gal with the cigarette, and the gal with the glaive are up straight ahead. All of them seemed pretty ticked off by the truth.” Mark shrugged toward the alleyway before setting his pipe on the ground and leaning on it. 

Dante sounded even more concerned. “Did… you tell them that family doesn’t matter?” 

“Is that wrong?” Mark mocked, giving an uneasy smile. 

It’s not wrong, Jekyll added in her head. Just… sensitive people can’t handle that. 

She was surprised to hear Hyde agreeing with her. Dang right. Family never matters, it’s always wise to get rid of them first before they hurt you anymore. 

Jekyll barely noticed Hyde’s voice was getting stronger, and her grip on reality was loosening. Her vision became blurry as she thought about what Mark had said, and how she agreed with him. 

She could hear Dante’s voice in the distance. “I’m… gonna check with them, and ask them what happened…” 

“You suck, you need to keep your opinions to yourself,” Pen stepped forward to confront Mark. Jekyll could barely make out the outline of the hunter’s figure. 

“Are you all delusional?” Mark seemed taken aback by the negative responses to what he said. 

Why don’t you tell him, Jekyll? Hyde’s voice sounded as if it was right in her ear. Why don’t you tell Mark you agree with him? 

I… Jekyll blinked, her heart stopped beating for a moment. 

I thought your whole thing was to relate to people, to validate their feelings. Hyde sneered. Go on, tell them that you agree. 

“I don’t know how you came to that conclusion, but please keep it to yourself,” Pen continued.

“How old are you kid? 16?” Mark changed the subject. After the hunter’s shrug, his smirk faded. “Let the grownups handle this.” 

“Your truths are disrupting the hunt.” 

“The only issue I see lies in the hunters, not the hunt itself.” 

“That hunter with the issue is you.” 

“Put some earwax in your ears if it bothers you, then,” Mark retorted, the grip on his pipe tightening. 

“If you disrupt my journey to the star, I will make you shut up.” 

Mark broke into a burst of laughter. “Try me.” 

That laughter blurred Jekyll’s focus entirely, it was too real, too terrifying… Too much like… me. 

Jekyll’s grip on reality loosened before she realized it. She could hear Hyde clearer than her own thoughts. Finally. 

The last thing Jekyll saw was Mark standing down, being intimidated by Pen and his spear. Her legs became weak, and she fell to the floor, clutching her head. She tried to fight it, but because of how distracted she became, it was already too late. “No, no, no, NO–” she screamed, her consciousness becoming locked in a cage, her body no longer in her control. Her vision became blurry, and the familiar feeling of being trapped in her own mind returned. 

Hyde had finally taken over. 

The cry of pain stopped, turning into a maniac laughter. Jekyll banged on the prison of her mind as Hyde rose to her feet, flipping the monocle over to reveal her diseased red eye. She slammed the paintbrush onto the ground, making a dent in the road before she stared at those in front of her. 

Oh no. No Hyde please don’t do this–

It was the first time Hyde saw a confused look on Mark’s face. “Oi, clockhead, your sinner is going crazy again.” 

Dante turned around from his previous wandering down the straight alleyway. “What?” 

“Are you okay, Jekyll?” Pen approached Hyde slowly, and one of his arms in a concerned position reached out to her. 

Jekyll begged them to run, but no one but Hyde heard her cries. Hyde simply ignored her. She laid eyes on the manager, and without another word to anyone, walked up to him and grabbed him by the scruff.

Dante grunted in surprise. If he had eyes, they would’ve widened at the sudden movement. 

It had been a very long time since Jekyll heard Hyde’s voice audibly. “Let me make this clear, clockhead,” she sneered, rage boiling inside her. “Jekyll is the one who signed the contract, but I am not she. I do not follow your pathetic excuse of a life and commands from your waste of air.” 

Dante cowered under Hyde’s grip, terrified. He couldn’t reply audibly to her in any coherent words. His hands rested around Hyde’s, the one that was gripping the scruff of his uniform. 

“Uh, kid, we might need to knock her out,” Mark started to speak with a new uncertainty, uncommon for his character. 

Pen nodded and raised his spear. “As long as I’m here, Jekyll–” 

“Jekyll?” Hyde turned her head toward the two men, dropping Dante onto the floor. 

Oh boy, here we go… Jekyll thought nervously, having no choice but to watch everything unfold. 

“No, no, I am not Jekyll, that lowlife wimp is not me. Please, call me Hyde.” Hyde extended her hands and bowed mockingly, before non-verbally asking for a handshake. 

Reluctantly, Pen shook her hand. “Are we playing pretend?” He asked genuinely. 

Oh no, oh this is so bad–

“Dante,” Mark shouted at the manager on the floor, actually using his name this time. “Turn her off and on, reset her, or whatever?” 

Hyde lifted her head to stare into Mark’s soul. She recognized him immediately now that she was fronting. “Off and on? Reset? Come on, Mark. You know that doesn’t work, it didn’t work for your hustle, now did it?” 

Mark looks Hyde up and down, laughing. “I have no idea what she’s talking about.” 

Only Jekyll could feel the hint of frustration Hyde chose to hide. Hyde walked up to the man with pride, a sly smirk on her face as her red eye gleamed with delight. Her voice lowered as she whispered like the wind. 

“Split Shards. 11th Day of Year. 04:56.” 

Mark’s eyes widened in fear. He stared at Hyde in unbelief, before uttering a single curse word under his breath. It was noticeable to anyone watching that he suddenly became very, very nervous. “Yeah, let’s reset her.” He barely got his words out as he took a step back. 

… That was the birth moment of your bestseller, wasn’t it? 

Yes, see, now you remember who he is, Hyde replied to Jekyll quickly. “There will be NO resetting, Dante,” she raised her voice like a lion. “Unless you want your head on a stick.”

Dante could only stare and nod in horror. 

Pen also seemed intimidated by the sudden change, and could only back off and watch the chaos Hyde brought happen. 

“Uh, hold on–” Mark stepped forward. “Hyde, would you really want to limit your canvas to a pathetic piece of hell like Dante? He’s only one body, even if that. However, if you go along with our original plan to kill these demon syndicates… you have many bodies to work with for your next…” Mark struggled to find his words as Hyde glared at him. “...Masterpiece.” 

Hyde smirked. “I like the way you think,” she rotated the paintbrush flawlessly. “Very well, where is this… demon syndicate?” 

Much to Jekyll’s relief, Hyde didn’t wait for an answer. Taking a quick look at the map Maut had given her, she followed the straight alleyway until it led to another alleyway. 

Jekyll’s efforts to take back control were useless. Her cries and pleas were ignored. She figured she deserved it; locking someone up for three years never leaves them happy. 

Hyde soon approached another plaza, where she found Jatayu and Lenore. There were a few seats to the left for restaurant dining, which no one was sitting in. There was a torn purple flag flying high in the air; everything else was the same as the previous opening.

“Ah, yes, the other two wimps this stupid company hired.” Hyde’s comment was oddly passive, but it drew enough attention to her anyway. 

“Are you okay, Jekyll?” Lenore stopped leaning on a lamppost as she gently approached her. 

Hyde rolled her eyes, showing an aggressive face. “Don’t call me that!” 

Lenore was taken aback. “Do… you have a different name you wish to go by? What is going on? I am… very confused.” 

Jatayu tilted his head towards Hyde. “Same…” 

Hyde pointed to the red eye that was now revealed and not hidden under the monocle. “Call me Hyde, and it will always be Hyde. Unless you can actually come up with an acceptable nickname.” 

She didn’t pay attention to anything else the two said as she continued down the alleyway for some time. Jekyll watched the sunset and the moon rise. She tried to plan how to get the moonstones charged whilst she was not in control.

Don’t. Even. Think. About it. She heard Hyde snap at her. 

Hyde, please, we are stuck with these people for a long time, Jekyll pleaded, realizing Hyde was finally listening. Please, do not be rude to them…

That is the least of your concerns, idiot. 

Two lamposts signaled to the doctor that another opening was up ahead. This plaza had the look of a marketplace… after it was raided and murdered. Bloodstained almost every stone on the cobbled road. Every building had boards to block the entrances from this area. This is where the stench of dead ashes came from. The former marketplace had clearly turned into a battlefield not too long ago as if a gang had just claimed it as their territory. 

Unlike Jekyll, Hyde was able to observe the scene efficiently and faster than Jekyll ever had looked at anything in her life. She gathered Mallo was walking towards another road further right, her hair swaying and not bothering to acknowledge who just came in behind her. To her left, she noticed three strange-looking creatures with green gloves and hostile faces. Their robes were also green and carried a dark presence about them. Knowing a bit about the area, Hyde reasoned they were the demon syndicates she was looking for. 

“You three!” She shouted, spinning the brush in her hand. She smiled wickedly at them. “Are you the demon syndicate?” 

The three men looked towards her in a confused manner before the second one stepped forward with a piercing glare. He seemed more outgoing than the other two and had a finer jawline. “What is it to you?” 

Hyde strolled across the cobblestone road towards them, dragging her paintbrush behind her as it left colors on the floor. Her posture was one of pride; anyone remotely knowledgeable of her occupation would recognize her. She admired how the second demon syndicate looked, and her thoughts filled with various poses she could use his remains to paint on her new canvas. “Answer me this. To be the canvas, or to receive the canvas?”

The first and third demon syndicate looked at each other in confusion as if she spoke in riddles. The second one copied their confusion and pasted it on his face. “You’re not making any sense.” 

Jekyll started screaming in Hyde’s head as she gripped the paintbrush tighter. Hyde no! No, do not start this fight, please! We are alone! 

“Relax, I got this under control,” was the last thing Hyde muttered to her before she lunged forward. 

Hyde’s attack was swift, completely catching the second man off-guard. She swung her paintbrush at him, retracting his blood and painting it across his face with multiple strikes. The man retaliated, shooting her with the green glove he had on his hand. 

The third one also shot her, and it ate away at her soul. Hyde finished her attack before resting on her paintbrush, smirking wildly at them. She hid how much pain she was in, as she realized this type of attack was a sin she never came in contact with before. It hurt more than the others, and left a dark, black impression on her mind, unlike the other sins that left colors. 

…You’re staggered, aren’t you? Jekyll sighed anxiously.

And? They don’t need to know that. 

Mallo was already making her way over to Hyde with a pissed-off expression. Hyde turned her head to see Lenore right behind her. Hyde then leaned on her brush and smirked at the enemies as they cowered into the back, realizing reinforcements had arrived. 

Lenore immediately raised her glaive and struck the second man, scratching his face. Her eyes were strangely mello, and the man hissed at her when she struck, waving his free hand through his long black hair. 

Jatayu and Pen were close behind Lenore. Despite Jekyll's rant in a panic, she and Hyde went silent as they watched Jatayu’s entire demeanor change. 

That same rage that enticed the man on the bus multiplied the moment Jatayu laid eyes on the enemies. He raised his tonfas in defiance, lunging towards the first syndicate member and bashing his skull with his weapons. Despite the man attacking him back, he struck four times in a blind rage. There was no room for mercy in his soul. 

Hyde figured it was because of the trauma she and Jekyll had spotted earlier. There was something this chill man held greatly against him. She figured it must’ve been a horrible, horrendous crime to make someone like Jatayu so upset. 

Not that Hyde cared. Much to Jekyll’s dismay, Hyde’s attention turned elsewhere. 

The big sombrero hat resting on Mark’s head as he entered almost made Hyde laugh. She knew what IDs were but didn’t consider them to be that… ridiculous. His entire attire was something straight out of a J Corp gambler. 

Lenore took the opportunity proposed by the distraction. She clashed with the second enemy, trying to break through his attack. She would’ve won from the force she used against the man before the green glove lit up and struck her with the same black, hopeless sin that caused Hyde to stagger. 

Jekyll’s voice only got louder. Is she okay?! 

Hyde rolled her eyes and glanced over at Lenore, who was standing just fine. She smirked. “I like you.” 

Lenore met her gaze and simply nodded in response. “I think we can get along.” 

Jekyll. 

She seemed taken aback that she was called. Y-Yes?

Gather as much information as you can about this… type of sin attack. It’s deadly, more than the other sins. As I’m fighting I will be expecting some information. 

Hyde seemed satisfied that Jekyll agreed to do so. 

Their attention turned toward Pen, who tried to attempt a surprise attack via his light teleportation. To his unfortunate circumstance, the third enemy was ready, and fired the black sin right into his face, eating at his health. 

It does damage based upon our health… Jekyll considered. But it seems they have to spend some type of energy to use it. 

Do they fail to use it if staggered? 

…Yes? 

Good. 

Mallo’s clothes folded and twisted as she stepped into combat, next to Hyde. They quickly turned into white silky chef clothes stained with blood. She turned her now pinned-up hair and glared at Hyde. “You’re an idiot, Jekyll.” 

Hyde rolled her eyes, still leaning on her paintbrush. “Yeah, I’ll catch you up after I turn one of these morons into a beautiful painting.” 

Mallo simply glares with rage but turns that rage towards the threat ahead. 

Jatayu let out a grunt of rage, not letting up on his attacks. He swung heavily at the syndicate member, but the first man was prepared. Despite the blind rage, the enemy evaded each of his attacks, analyzing Jatayu’s rage and using it against him. 

Mark decided to attack at the same time to confuse the enemy. He shook his maracas back and forth as he swiftly approached the second man. Once, twice, before he bashed the maraca across the head of the second man, making him crumble to the ground. 

Pen attacked at the same time Mark did, swinging his spear and piercing it into the third man’s side. The enemy countered, lighting up his green glove and shooting Pen with the deadly attack once more. Pen – to Hyde and Jekyll’s surprise – immediately got up and stabbed the man again, scratching his neck.

Hyde stood up straight, adjusting her shoulders. Her strength returned, and she was ready to kill. “Perfect~” 

Hyde, please, be reasonable with this–

Mallo was faster. Pulling out what appeared to be kitchen knives, she lunged for the second man, cutting his body like a vegetable. The man screamed in pain as he watched his blood soak into his skin. He was motionless on the floor. 

What a beautiful sight, what glorious inspiration! She smirked at the man on the floor, pointing her paintbrush at him. “Time to create art.” 

Hyde didn’t miss a single step in her calculated approach. Wielding her paintbrush she swung it and struck down on the man, then up, then to his left side, then up again, and finally ending her attack piercing his right side. Many colors covered the scene as the man cowered in fear. She pierced the man over and over again until he was nothing but a pile of rubble on the ground. The man’s bloody remains were scattered across the floor and her paintbrush. Hyde’s eyes widened in delight, seeing the blood everywhere; she couldn’t control the maniac laugh that escaped her throat. 

She bent down and pulled out a few jars from her coat, using her brush to collect the blood and scraps of the man’s guts. The combat around her did not matter so long she could gather the scraps while his heart was still beating. She stored them in special jars that wouldn’t smell as horrendous as the corpse did, despite Hyde finding the scent pleasing. 

Jekyll noticed how Hyde’s vision became blurry from delight, and Hyde’s grip on reality started to fade from the pure ecstasy she was experiencing. Now’s my chance. 

What?

Jekyll used all of the energy she had left to force Hyde to blackout, immediately taking the reins of control the moment Hyde was too distracted to stop her. She heard Hyde’s laughter fade, but it was too late for Hyde to stop Jekyll from taking control. Jekyll immediately chained Hyde to the back of her mind, as she stood up, glancing around in horror. It’s over… oh my gosh… 

Mark imploded the first man’s head like a balloon after Jatayu’s staggering attack of rage. To her right, Lenore and Pen worked together to stagger the third enemy before Mallo obliterated his remains as if she blended him into a smoothie. 

The fight was over quicker than Jekyll expected. She dropped her paintbrush in shock, looking at her bloodstained hands in horror before touching her jacket, realizing she had succeeded in taking control. With the force she used, she hoped Hyde wouldn’t recover for at least an hour. 

The party’s gaze turned toward Jekyll as her paintbrush clashed with the ground. Jekyll adjusted her monocle to hide the red eye before she started speaking. “Did… did she hurt any of you…? Are you guys okay?” 

“Who?” Mallo and Pen said in unison. 

Perhaps they didn’t notice, Jekyll sighed. “Oh, never mind.” 

“So… Hyde,” Pen took four steps toward Jekyll, his gaze curious. 

It visibly hurt Jekyll to be called that name, “Oh, oh my gosh she did the… uh…” 

“That’s not her name, idiot,” Mallo interjected. 

Confusion clouded Pen’s face. “That’s what she told me to call her–” 

“I’d know whether or not she wanted to be called by a different name moron,” Mallo snapped, her gaze fixed on the hunter. 

Jekyll couldn’t find her words. She had never explained her situation to anyone, and the first time wasn’t ever going to be easy. “That’s not… okay… she…” She paused. “Let me gather my words…” 

Some of the party members started to whisper to each other as if she was insane. Jekyll’s heart started to beat faster, and she shoved her hands into her pockets to hide how much they were shaking. It became difficult for her to catch her breath, let alone the words to explain. 

Suddenly, Jekyll’s feet were lifted off the ground and she felt her scruff being grabbed. Her eyes widened as she came face to face with Mark; his eyes were boiling in hatred. “You. Me. Talk now.” He demanded, before dragging Jekyll across the room. 

Jekyll tried to stop Mark, desperately trying to find her footing. However, Mallo stopped Mark with her stave, glaring at him. 

“Listen, I don’t have time to deal with you. I have a private problem with her, it doesn’t concern you.” Mark explained, attempting to move past the obstacle. 

Mallo stood in front of Mark, her stave blocking his way. “Well, I have a problem with you.” 

Jekyll looked back and forth between the two. What the heck happened while I was not there? 

The two picked up an argument right where they left off. Jekyll didn’t catch all of their heated banter, but she gathered it had something to do with family, being worthless, and not being able to land an attack. She didn’t have all the context, but apparently, the banter had been so bad, that the environment suddenly transformed. 

Jekyll knew immediately Mallo had summoned her EGO, as it shared many symptoms similar to her own. Mallo’s sword transformed into a shovel with a chained base. The handle cracked under her grip as she swung it towards Mark, pure rage and a hint of regret flashing in her soul. “It’s not over until I say it’s over!” 

Mark acted fast, he pushed Jekyll aside and barely ducked under the attack, completely evading the EGO. He stood up as Mallo caught the shovel, both of them breathing heavily. “You prove me right with every single miss.” 

Mallo’s face sank with despair, and her eyes widened as she stood back in disbelief. It was clear she didn’t know how to respond. 

The tension in the air made Jekyll incredibly uncomfortable. “Guys, please, let’s not fight. Mark, if you want to talk we can talk–” 

“Stop, this doesn’t involve you!” Mallo snapped, a familiar rage overtaking her face. “Remember what I said! Speak when spoken to!” 

“At least make yourself useful,” Mark rolled his eyes in a taunting manner at Mallo. “Follow tonfa guy, he’s wandered off again. You seem to be better at following anyway.” 

Mallo couldn’t formulate words within the rage that fumed inside of her. 

Mark scoffed with a smirk. “I know a guy that could get you moonstones to help with those emotions, your anger is bad for aging.” 

“Your face is bad for my eyes!” 

Pen gently approached the situation, but Mark stopped him. “Kid, don’t pick on me; she started it.” 

“Hopefully, these quarrels will resolve in time,” the hunter sighed. 

Mallo only muttered under her breath. “At least some of you have common sense…” 

“Anyway,” Mark’s gaze snapped to Jekyll, making her wince. “You can explain to them, but don’t take too long or I’ll bash your head in and drag you over to explain.” 

Mark ignored the seething glare he received from Mallo before walking toward the alleyway that the party came from. 

Jekyll gently raised her hand to the sky, charging the moonstones on her fingers, praying it would at least reach one percent soon before she faced the crowd. “Ah, okay… There’s no easy way to explain this… Two people are living inside me.” 

Pen was the most curious out of the three that listened. He ignored Lenore who also approached the group. 

“It’s… too long of a story to explain how it happened,” Jekyll continued. “But I am constantly fighting for control over my body from… Hyde, whom most of you… met…” 

“Sounds like hell,” Mallo commented. 

“Y-Yes, it very much is,” Jekyll’s heart rate picked up again. Mark’s glare only made her hyperventilate more. 

“So who’s the original owner of the body?” Pen asked, clutching his spear.

“I-I-I am…” Jekyll stuttered. Her heart rate was through the roof, and it thumped into her head all the way to her fingers. “Hyde o-only comes out w-when I lose grip o-on reality and m-my sanity drops…” She took a moment to try to catch her breath and stop her shaking hands by gripping them with one another, but it only made things worse. “B-But sometimes s-she c-comes out and i-it’s out of m-my control…” 

Lenore looked the most concerned. “How did this happen?”

Jekyll opened her mouth to explain, but the intimidating scowl from Mark terrified her. “I-I don’t have time to explain I… Another time when we a-are off t-the job–” 

To her surprise, Mallo and Lenore seem to understand, and both of their gazes soften. “Hey, Jekyll, look at me,” Lenore began. “Breathe slowly, count to three.” 

Jekyll averted her attention from the man threatening her to the woman in front of her. She nodded and tried to breathe; Lenore’s calming gaze assisted her more than she could put words for. It took a moment, but Jekyll calmed down, recovering from her initial panic attack. 

By the time she calmed down and turned her head to face Mallo, she was surprised by the face she was greeted with. Mallo’s eyes had softened to an extent that the doctor had never seen before, as if the woman felt pity for her. Her shoulders relaxed and her vibe drastically changed to what Jekyll could only describe as… motherly. 

Mallo dug through her pocket before pulling out a cigarette, and offering it to Jekyll. The moon gently lit her face. “It helps calm the nerves,” she offered, her voice mello.

Jekyll didn’t object; she took the cigarette and observed it. Not another moment passed before Mallo pulled out a unique lighter to light it. 

Jekyll observed the lighter. It was oddly childish. It had small stickers across it, ones that a child would use in a coloring book. The lighter itself was tattered and bruised as if it had been through the rough and tumble. It showed it was reliable. The stickers were also tattered, and Jekyll spotted a number sequence across it. She could only catch the number four before Mallo’s fingers covered the rest as she put it away. 

Having the cigarette lit, Jekyll holds it professionally between her two fingers before gently blowing on it. “If… If I’m ever telling myself to shut up or mumbling under my breath, I’m probably j-just talking to Hyde…” 

“I did hear Hyde muttering shut up, too,” Lenore confirmed. 

“Yeah, we both just wish the other would stop talking…” 

“I would love to hear how it all happened,” Lenore added. “I don’t expect it, as everyone has their secrets, but I’d be willing to listen to that story.” She put her glaive behind her, freeing her hands. “Perhaps it would be best if you let us know how to deal with her when she does come out?” 

Jekyll let out a small laugh as she took in another breath from her cigarette. “I wish I knew how to deal with insane people…” 

“And reckless,” Mallo added. 

Jekyll lifted her cig in acknowledgment. “If you figure out how to deal with someone constantly trying to kill you, let me know.” 

The group disbanded, and the anxiety that was in Jekyll’s chest returned when she made her way over to Mark, gently putting out the cigarette. She knew it wasn’t going to be a fun conversation; all she wanted was to come out alive. 

Before she could reach Mark, however, she felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned around to find Mallo with the same somber expression as she had before. She sighed. “Listen, we are all team players here. If anyone causes any problems,” she gestured her head toward Mark in anger, before pointing to herself. “Tell me. I will have some words to say.” 

Jekyll nodded her head gently before giving a bow of respect. “Thank you, Mallo. I appreciate you.” 

It was the first time Jekyll saw Mallo smile. “No problem.” 

The warm feeling inside Jekyll’s heart eased her anxiety, and she smiled back. To have Mallo smile at you must’ve meant you were somewhat special to her. She did not take advantage of that and treasured that memory. 

Ugh, affection. 

Jekyll’s smile faded the moment Mallo turned her back. “You’re already awake?” She mumbled to herself. 

You know what happens when people get too close, Jekyll. If it happens again, you know I will take action. 

Jekyll shuddered, recalling what happened last time. She treasured Mallo’s smile in defiance against Hyde, before finally closing the distance between her and the man that threatened her with his glare. 

She briefly eavesdropped on Dante and Lenore talking about Jatayu’s disappearance, informing her he had run off in another blind rage again. However, that wasn’t her biggest concern. She couldn’t look Mark in the eyes as she glanced over at Pen, who had finished talking with him. 

“Took ya long enough. I was considering bashing your head in because you decided to take your sweet little time,” Mark snapped, his grip on his pipe tightening. 

“Pen… I need to talk to Mark… alone…” Jekyll ignored his retort and gave the hunter a solemn gaze. 

“Feel free,” his response was short and quick before he joined Dante in conversation. 

Jekyll immediately felt her scruff be grabbed as Mark dragged her into the alleyway. She could barely feel the gentle breeze of the night as she tried to find her footing, not resisting Mark’s strength. 

He didn’t speak as he continued down the alleyway, before finding a brick wall and slamming Jekyll to it, his voice harsh and cruel. 

The collision made pain snap through Jekyll’s neck, and the force of his grip was so hard she wouldn’t be able to cry out for help. 

“Imma need to make this clear,” he sneered straight into her ear. “I don’t know you, and you don’t know me. If you say a single word otherwise, I will rip your body to shreds and make sure no one finds the body.” 

Oooh, blackmail against Mark eh? He has regrets after all. 

Jekyll muttered to Hyde to shut up, but the words were intelligible. 

Mark finally released his grip, taking a step back as Jekyll stumbled to the floor. “What’d you say? Speak up if you want to be heard, pipsqueak! No one is going to be gentle with you here!” 

This motherf–

Jekyll stood on her feet and dusted off her jacket from the duty floor, dried blood falling from her fingers. Despite her fear, she gives him a neutral glare. “Okay.” 

“And secondly,” Mark growled. “Let me speak to your… disorder.” 

“She can hear you,” Jekyll explained. “We share the same mind–” 

“If you want to do this the hard way, I’ll bash your head in until she is forced to come out!” 

Jekyll felt a lump form in her throat as her hands started shaking again. Hyde, come out now…

You have me locked in here, idiot. 

Then I shall force you to come out. 

There was one way Jekyll always got Hyde to come out. She hated the method, and she swore to herself that she’d never do it again. However, Mark wasn’t letting up and growing impatient by the second. She had no other choice. 

Jekyll flipped her jacket to appear on the inside of it. There were many straps across its cloth, each of the straps holding a certain bottle. Some were empty, some contained blood and guts, and some contained various types of moonstones. Jekyll ran her fingers along the top of the jars before resting on the one in the very back; the one that was the most inaccessible. It was encased heavily and had warning labels all over it. Jekyll gently pulled out the jar. 

Anyone looking could’ve read the warning on it. Split Shards - Version 3. Do not use unless supervised. The drug looked like it was crystalized despite being a liquid; it reflected any light that bounced off it. It was a clear liquid and the jar’s lid was attached to an eye dropper.

Jekyll let out a shaky sigh. Why did I ever create this horrid thing?  

Mark’s rage quickly vanished the moment he saw the drug. He took another step back, almost as if he was afraid. 

Jekyll glared at Mark one last time before she unscrewed the lid, removing her monocle from her red eye before placing two drops into her eye. 

The effect took place immediately as expected. Jekyll screw the jar up and placed it back in her collection before clenching her face. Tears streamed out of Jekyll’s left eye as her consciousness was thrown into a sharded place. Her spirit didn’t feel as heavy, and the eternal bliss she felt being free from the shackles of morality was too much of an addictive feeling to quit. 

Hyde was immediately forced to take the reins as Jekyll got lost staring at the various mirror worlds the drug opened her eyes to. The sensation would’ve been almost painful and overwhelming to anyone else, but for Jekyll, it was normal. 

Hyde rotated the paintbrush in her hand, slamming it onto the ground as she smirked at Mark, glad to be fronting once more. 

If Mark could even have an expression that read horrified, it would be the face he made as Hyde fronted. “Alright,” he began in a tame voice. “The incident, that was a single trade. The event will stay between us. The company, the others, no one needs to know about it, do I make myself clear?” 

Hyde simply stared at Mark. 

“Did I make myself clear?” Mark spoke faster. “Or should I threaten you like your painter friend?” 

“Relax kid,” Hyde shrugged, leaning on one hip as she looked up at Mark, smiling in a wicked way. “Bygones be bygones, I just had to remind you who I was.” 

“I did not want to remember who you were,” he hissed. “You paid me to do that, and I will never do it again!” 

“I’d say it’s money well spent,” Hyde smirked, finding his aggressiveness and frantic plea amusing. “That was my best-selling painting, after all.” 

Mark was confronted with confusion once more. “What painting?” 

“Oh right,” Hyde forced a pout face, mocking him. “Your little… arrest happened before I could show you. Don’t worry about it though, lioness.” 

Steam was blowing out of Mark’s nostrils. “You’re just trying to rally me up, this is not worth it.” He stood still like a soldier, tensing as if he was about to get shot. “As long as that whole thing isn’t brought up, neither of us have problems.” Hyde noticed how he tried to use his fear as a weapon. “As much as that painter girl has control over you, at least she knows what kind of situation she is in, because of how docile she is.” 

“She’s weak,” Hyde muttered under her breath. “Bound by the mortality she was taught.” 

“I’ll make sure you’re never heard from again if one peep of it comes out to anyone,” Mark sneered; it was less intimidating and to Hyde more like a plea. 

Hyde simply stared again, feeling part of her head spin from the drug that distracted Jekyll. 

Mark stared back silently as if waiting for something to happen. “I don’t have much else to say, go into your little cage now.” 

Hyde scoffed. “Please, you of all people should know the intensity of this drug lasts for two hours, not mere minutes like whatever crap you–” 

“Then figure something out!” Mark interrupted. 

“Come on Mark, you’re better than that,” Hyde teased. “Or have you already forgotten what happened?” 

Mark spat onto the ground. “Get the painter girl back. Should I threaten her to cage you up?” He forced a laugh. “Sit there spacing out, it’s honestly pathetic how helpless you are against that pipsqueak.”   

Hyde smiled, thrilled by the banter. “Helpless? You seem to be helpless and desperate for the situation to go under the radar.” 

“I will kill you and make sure Dante never brings you back.” 

“Then bring it on,” Hyde bowed mockingly. “Kill me if you dare, you’ll do me a favor and kill Jekyll too.” 

“I don’t give a hell, if she dies, you die too. I’d kill you both right now,” Mark pointed his pipe at Hyde. “You can’t escape that.” 

Hyde cackled, pressing the pipe down with her finger as she stared up at Mark. “What’s got you so convinced that I’m not trying to kill us both?” 

Mark looked disgusted. “You’re sick, it’s a good thing she has control over you and locks you up. You are just a dog on a leash, Hyde.”

“And you’re just a clawless cub who was betrayed by his own pride.” 

Something snapped in Mark. He swung his pipe with full force at Hyde’s head. She was faster; she immediately blocked, raising her paintbrush to stop his assault. 

To both of their surprise, the rings on Hyde’s fingers sparked, lighting up and glowing a soft red color. The moon had barely grazed them with light, charging them just enough to work for a moment. 

Hyde shrunk back and clutched her face, suddenly being hurled into the back of the mind where the drug was still taking effect. Jekyll immediately fronted, her sanity being brought to a stable place. She backed up, looking around as if she just had a nightmare. When she realized she was back in the Q Corp backstreets, she sighed in relief. Her head spun as the drug still took its effect, but her vision was more clear. 

Mark lowered his pipe, noticing Jekyll had returned. He pointed at her with his free hand. Jekyll could’ve sworn she saw it shaking and heard fear in his voice. 

“Keep that thing caged,” it was more of an ask than a demand by his tone of voice. 

Jekyll quickly gathered Hyde’s thoughts to analyze what happened before she held her hands together. “I’m trying…” She sighed, looking at Mark with a hopeless stare. “I wish she would stay caged.” 

There was a moment of silence before Mark cursed under his breath, marching back up the alleyway. 

Jekyll figured it would be best to stay behind Mark as much as possible. She adjusted the rings on her hands before taking slow steps into the night. She followed Mark from a distance, keeping a tight grip on her paintbrush in case she got jumped. 

The two crossed the courtyard without a word to one another. As they continued down the alleyway, they walked over dead demon syndicate bodies. They all had horrific expressions on their face as if they were attacked by a blinding, raging force. Mark followed the bodies before he stumbled upon the group surrounding Jatayu and asking him questions. 

From the looks of the situation and the appearance of Jatayu’s tonfas, Jekyll gathered his rage and soloed all of the combatants that stood in his way. She had no idea if he died or not because he appeared unscathed, but she would admit she was impressed. Seeing Hyde struggle to fight these guys and Jatayu blowing through them was amazing to her. 

Mallo turned around, glaring at Mark before looking at Jekyll. “You good?” She asked quickly. 

Jekyll met her eyes and sighed. “I’ll… explain later…” 

“Maybe we should do some team-building exercises,” Pen suggested, walking up to Dante. 

Dante adjusted his gloves as he sighed. “I would, I just don’t know which ones to do at the moment… tensions are high.” He did a head count of every sinner. “Wait a minute… where is Othello?” 

“You didn’t notice he was not hear this whole time?” Mark scoffed in disbelief. “You lack a spine. Let’s just go already.” 

“No, let me make sure he’s okay,” Dante took a step back and turned back the clock hands on his face. His flames shook in pain. 

At first, nothing happened. It took about ten minutes for Othello’s body to finally start forming. Some of the gunk on Mark’s pipe flowed down to piece together Othello’s body. 

Dante stared in disbelief. “Mark… did you kill Othello?” 

“He shot first.” Was all Mark said as he walked into the facility. 

Jekyll turned her eyes towards the building they approached. It was gray and black, with a simple box structure on the surface. It was clear that the building was mainly if not entirely underground. A large Lobotomy Corporation symbol sat on top of the entrance; it was torn and beaten by the weather and the passage of time. A strange, nostalgic smell flew into the air as Mark opened the door. The way the building loomed and creaked was enough to make Jekyll shudder in fear. 

“Looks like you guys didn’t need my guidance after all,” Jekyll turned around to see Maut before he turned his heel and walked back the way he came. 

Unlike Mark, the rest of the party waited for Dante’s command. Dante relaxed his shoulders and walked up to Jatayu before resting his hand on his shoulder. “You ready, bud?” 

Jatayu turned his head and gave Dante a soft smile. “It’s one step closer to getting them back.” 

No one else said a word as they entered the facility.

[pynkhues]

growing up in a cattle station family in rural Australia has its own very real baggage

curious to know more about this

(x)

Mmm, I mean, rural Australia is its own beast, I guess, anon? My mum's from Mareeba which is way up in rural FNQ and her father / my grandfather worked in agriculture up there, so I've spent a lot of time in those sorts of towns, and while it's different from the region Sam grew up in, rural culture in Australia - particularly rural agricultural life - is generally isolating, politicised, cut off from services from healthcare to schools (I don't know why Sam went to school in Sydney obviously, but at the same time I Know Why because rural schools are underresourced, understaffed, and basically agricultural schools) and sometimes even the internet (I've worked in towns where a portable library in a truck would come to towns once a week and would literally be the only internet that town would get as the broadband infrastructure didn't work), and plagued by natural disasters - the area he grew up in in particular is extremely vulnerable to devastating bush fires almost every year.

For context, Australia's landmass is a similar size to the US, but where America's population is 335 million, Australia's population is 26 million. So think about the US, then subtract 210 million people. That's reflected in the economy, it's reflected in regional services, it's reflected in accessibility, it's reflected in capacity for community and connection, it's reflected in everything, because the myth about parts of the country being unliveable is exactly that - a myth. People live - and have lived for tens of thousands of years - all over this country, and Australia's small population size is reflective really of an attempted genocide of Indigenous peoples, the country's global status as a fairly weak middle power, a small economy, a 'young' country in terms of colonisation (Australia was colonised in 1788, but we have the longest still living culture in Aboriginal Australians, who've been here for at least 65,000 years), and, frankly, our historically racist immigration policies.

But putting that aside - - a personal anecdote; when I was at the writers centre, we helped facilitate a workshop with a food writer in the town of Julia Creek, which is a town of about 500 people (it was a part of a broader tour of rural Q). In that, one woman in attendance had driven 10 hours to come, 4 hours of which were her driving off her own sheep station. That might sound nice, but remember a lot of this landscape out there is this:

(Julia Creek!)

Or the Monaro region, where Sam's from, is a lot of the time like this:

It took that woman four hours to drive from her front door to even a road that would take her off her own land, let alone connect her to other people (and we do see the result of that in domestic violence here, but that's a whole other kettle of fish). That's what I mean when I talk about the isolation of regions like this in rural Australia. We do have some services - the Royal Flying Doctors Service literally flies doctors to people like this as a part of healthcare, right? - but on a day-to-day level, people are - - contained, for better sometimes, but I personally think mostly for worse.

Look, my point is that rural Australia is not easy country to live on, and the harshness of the landscape is intensely tied up in Australian concepts of machismo and a romanticised culture of masculinity, which in itself is tied up in what I like to call racism-but-for-mates culture (i.e. fuck off, we're full [genuine tagline of racists here], oh, but not Muhammad down the road, he's my mate], general homophobia, a culture of anti-intellectualism and also a general desperation to survive a landscape and political situation that resents you for being there (because trust me, the Australian government resents having to deliver regional services to pockets of 500 people ala those in Julia Creek).

The limitations of resource - from education to libraries to literally the internet (especially after the bungled rollout of the NBN - we're 82 in the world for internet speed lol, it's bad even in the cities) - are inherently tied up in that, which makes existing in those environments just overall weighted and complicated and tied up in identity politics that are usually contaminated by conservative ideologies. Which when you're an artist, regardless of whether or not you're a writer, painter or actor is complicated.

Plus the area he's from in particular (the Monaro / Snowy Mountains region) is heavily politicised at the moment due to the conversation around brumbies (the Australian word for feral wild horses and the need to cull them), climate change and colonialism. There's a pretty good documentary about it that came out recently if you're interested at all. Here's the trailer: