#and couldn’t breathe deep enough to fill diaphragm And chest

[epochryphal]

found out today i’ve been diaphragm breathing by default and have to focus-struggle to chest breathe, and that’s possibly part of why i find guided breathing so disregulating

(that, and “i’m gonna give instructions your body can’t help but semi-follow no matter how much you try not to because you literally have to keep breathing” is just. bodily autonomy feels bad. the ocd and ptsd are just canaries in the coal mine of bodily autonomy)

it’s especially funny cuz i’ve wondered if the reason i’ve felt like my chest goes kinda concave-feel unable to breathe deep enough is dysphoria or an aftereffect of binding (for two years over a decade ago) but no.

no, it’s that i gotta work the chest breathing muscles, intentionally, whereas apparently most folks need to focus to diaphragm breathe and the point is do both

[staycalmandhugaclone]

Identity Pt 4

Part (4) of Identity, the next arc of Doc's Misadventures! If you're new, start at the beginning with Touch Starved!

I owe loads of responses and I'm sorry! I got the writing bug and any spare time I've had in front of a computer, I just wanted to write! Quick answer to the most common question, though: Yeah, the implication is that the contact is her dad - that'll be touched on a bit more later, though, and I'll try to actually be a good tumblr person and respond to everyone's lovely comments this week now that I've purged this chapter out!

Huge preemptive warning before even getting to the real warnings! This is one of those particularly dark chapters that may be too intense for some readers. If that's the case, I'm more than happy to make a summary for continuity's sake; just please take caution to read the tags

Warnings: torture, waterboarding, drowning, interrogation, panic, panic attack, flashbacks, self-blame, giving up, longing for death, temporary insanity, arguably inappropriate use of sedation, guilt, profanity, intense whump

WC: 3,231

Fire tore through my nose and throat, body wrenching forward with violent coughs that sent pain shooting down my side, but the movement stopped short, chest held fast to something behind me – no… beneath me? I couldn’t think beyond the desperate need for air, head shaking as though it might rid my eyes and nose of the liquid still dripping down my face as my jaw gaped around choked gasps. The distorted hum of unfamiliar voices resonated nearby, pausing mere seconds before another torrent of icy water crashed over me, robbing me of what pitiful taste of air I’d fought so hard to gain and sending me back down that spiral of panicked suffocation, diaphragm convulsing uselessly beneath that torturous burn of drowning.

Something locked around my jaw, forcing my gaze toward the blurred colors that surely hid an unknown face and drawing a startled grunt of pain from me. I could almost hear words, confident at least that they were male before my attacker released me harshly enough to slam my already throbbing head against whatever lay beneath it. I’d only just realized my wrists were bound behind me when another frigid wave was thrown at me, again leaving me sputtering for breath.

“… a patient man…” That voice growled, mind finally grasping some meager bit of clarity. “I suggest you answer my questions before things get really unpleasant.” Wheezing, I quickly looked about us for some hint as to what was happening, but the dark cell offered no clues toward who he was or where he’d taken me. I think I was tied to a chair leaning back at a precarious angle, but I couldn’t move enough to check before he grabbed me again, fingers burring into my already bruised jaw.

“Eyes on me, yuh damn rat.” He grumbled. Without conscious thought, I realized some part of me expected to find a grizzled, old man covered in scars, eyes full of enraged contempt, but that’s not who stood beside me. He appeared to barely be in his thirties, white shirt marred with sweat and blood and stains I tried not to look too closely at lest I see something far worse. Years of drinking left is stomach distended and his skin blotchy, and what light may once have filled pale, green eyes had long since abandoned him. There was no anger fueling his actions, no obvious cause for him to seek retribution from long held vendetta. This was his job, and he’d simply lost the will to be bothered by the horrors it forced him to do.

“Ah. Guess yuh weren’t really awake yet, were yuh?” He hummed more to himself than to me, “Concussions can be tricky like that…” With a deep sigh, he stepped back, hand dropping absently away from me. “Let’s start over, then.” The way he rubbed his hand over his face, the weariness dragging against his movements, it felt so painfully displaced against the way my heart raced.

“Who ordered the hit?” Lost, I could only stare at him, thoughts far too muddled beneath fear and confusion to fathom a response. “How about we start with something easier?” He muttered, though he still reached for something behind me. I heard the click of a button followed by the rush of water through pipework overhead, and the terror that gripped me was visceral, body shaking too hard to manage even a broken gasp, limbs wrenching against the shackles about my wrists and ankles.

The vague sensation of pain each movement sent tearing through my left side didn’t matter, nor the growing understanding that there had been an explosion; that everyone near the podium must have been caught in the blast, and I couldn’t begin to guess the extent of my own injuries even as I recalled the horrifying images of those far less fortunate. That knowledge, that pain, none of it mattered in the face of where I now lay: trapped before this stranger who owed me no loyalties and sought only to force answers from me that I could never give.

“Where are yuh from?” I wondered if the hint of a slur in his voice was from mere disinterest, or if he’d already begun numbing himself with some bottle stashed amidst the grime-streaked walls. “Not gonna tell me your name, either, I assume?” My jaw ground shut, gaze turning blindly to the dark ceiling above us. He offered no further warning before clicking another button to unleash the next rush of water. I managed to keep most of it from flooding my mouth, but the pressure forced enough up my nose to send me into another fit of strangled coughs.

“You’re with the Republic, yeah? Some kinda spy or something? What’s that fancy swamp planet…” He seemed to think it over for several seconds before remembering. “Naboo! You from Naboo?” Breath shattering between clattering teeth, I kept my attention turned pointedly away from him, clinging to some distant memory that it was better to remain silent during an interrogation; that even shouted curses yielded more easily to breaking than simply never speaking at all, and then I had to come to terms with that simple fact that that’s exactly what this was: an interrogation.

How long had it been since the gala? Was I still on the same planet? Was I on a planet at all? I didn’t want to acknowledge what the answers to those questions might mean; didn’t want to let myself listen for the rumble of engines or hum or air recyclers. It was easier not to know.

A tsk sounded from the man beside me, and I had to fight not to let my expression crumble beneath that fear.

“A’right.” I wanted to slap him for the disinterest in that breathy sigh, anger drawing my lips into a scowl. Again, there was no warning. A dark sack was pulled roughly over my face. I had just enough time to gasp before that water began to pour down. My chest bucked with violent fits, fighting to force some sliver of air through the endless onslaught, but it wouldn’t stop. Why wouldn’t it stop?

The was a moment when that determination first faltered beneath the weight of a panic no amount of logic could hope to supersede; a fleeting breadth of understanding just how alone I was, how little I meant, and how hopeless even the denial that forbade me from listening for engines truly was, because regardless my dreams and nightmares, regardless the sincerity of my intentions or the purpose I once believed drove me through moments when I wanted nothing more than to shatter, the simple reality was that death didn’t care and all I’d done would amount to nothing. There was no promise of one more chance, no reason swaying whether I lived or died, no thought beyond a bone-deep, primal terror, and not a damn thing I could do to change any of it.

Powerless, I laid beneath the flow of soured water, body thrashing uselessly as the man just stood there, watching; waiting. I couldn’t see, couldn’t breathe, the sensation of that sack about my face constricting with each failed gasp overwhelmed every memory I’d ever made, forsook every imagined possibility of a future, dispelled whatever higher knowledge supposedly separated sentience from feral beasts, and I knew he was utterly impartial to all of it as my lungs burned, spine wrenching against restraints that offered no leeway. The weakness that crept up my limbs was a strange thing. I barely noticed it beneath the new form of darkness overtaking me, yet some whisper of frustration balked at how quickly my muscles began to fail, how deafening my heartbeat became as those frantic coughs faded beneath wet gurgles.

Still, there was some futile sense of denial, a disbelief promising me that he wouldn’t actually let me die; that this was merely some sick form of intimidation meant to break me, and I knew exactly how foolish that thought was as the water flooded my lungs.

-

Agony filled my chest, my head. Fire burned my sinuses and left my throat raw as my torso convulsed in violent coughs even as I strained for breath, begging my own body to grant me some small taste of air. It felt like waking; like I’d been asleep for ages, mind hazed beneath that fog of confusion.

“..ere yuh are… Come on back.” Was that voice familiar? I vaguely thought it shouldn’t be despite how my eyes automatically travelled toward it, unable yet to make out anything beyond a blurred shaped. “Can you tell me your name?” Were his words slurring, or was my hearing merely faltering beneath that disorientating weariness eager to drag me back into unconsciousness? I knew that question, though – it had long since become ingrained into my psyche from years of asking. What’s your name? What’s the date? Where are we, right now? Where…

My lips stumbled around an initial attempt at forming an answer but managed only a choked whimper beneath a hurt that left even strangled gasps crippling. That moment of physical hinderance was enough to grant the very beginnings of a clarity that threatened to break me as some distorted mockery of sensation slowly began to return; glimpses of soiled walls, the scent of putrid water, pain lancing through joints held fast about the hard surface beneath me, through flesh left raw and torn from how violently my body had struggled against restraints still binding my wrists and ankles, looped about my chest and stomach, and the fear that stole through me was like nothing I’d ever known.

In an instant, my heart began to race, the rhythm far too quick to not be a danger in itself, but I could spare no thought toward something so mundane as a heart attack as my every muscle began to convulse, the icy obstruction of adrenaline flooding my veins as logic and rationale faltered in the wake of memories.

“Damn… figured it’d figured take longer ‘en that.” He mumbled, and I froze at the bundle of still dripping cloth hanging from his hand, unable to either tear my gaze away nor stomach the sight of it. “‘ere’s how this works,” he started, utterly unmoved by how my body shied from him as he reached toward me with that cursed fabric. “Ain’t gotta go through any of that again if you don’t want to.” The way my every cell screamed against the feeling of that mask being pulled even halfway down my face left me thrashing anew, numb to any damage sustained from how desperately I found myself flailing against my bounds. “Just gotta answer my questions, an’ it all stops.”

There was no thought; no memory even of how to think as the first drops of water danced atop my forehead. My every muscle tightened, body wrenching away with more force than it could take. Something cracked. I didn’t feel it. My teeth ground together even as my jaw strained to open, to drag as much of that precious, stale air into my lungs as I could.

“Who are yuh working with?” Rage. There was no suffocating torrent of liquid. It was barely a splash, but he knew exactly how little work he needed to do to rend me into that hysterical frenzy that so effortlessly robbed me of all but my most ancient, primal instinct, and I loathed him for how quickly it worked, lips wrenching back into a snarl.

The next gush held none of that earlier restraint. Water filled my mouth and flooded my nose, instantly sending me into ragged, gagging coughs, body jerking in an effort to at least lean onto my side that I might rid my airway of that burning, frigid certainty of drowning.

“Who orchestrated the explosion?” I thought of the mercenary as another surge of water poured over me just long enough to leave me gasping.

How do I free him!

“Who was the target?” I don’t know if there were words in whatever scream I felt tearing through my throat, but he waited mere seconds, unmoved by my choked cries.

Tell me.

“Who placed the bombs?” His emotionless voice reverberated through the darkness, lifting the mask just clear of my lips after each question before dragging it back down in the wake of answers that left him wanting, and I could only flail atop that unyielding surface as he unleashed that frigid water again and again.

I thought of the hatred in my brother’s eyes as my mind flickered at the edges of suffocation.

“Who ordered the hit?”

Did I deserve this?

“Who’s behind the assassination attempt?”

Why didn’t he just kill me?

“Tell me who ordered the hit.”

Kill me.

“Who were you sent to kill?”

Kill me kill me kill me

“Who placed the bombs?”

His earlier boredom was beginning to turn impatient. My body barely managed to struggle anymore. Didn’t matter.

“Who ordered the hit?”

I wanted that darkness. Yearned for it… because anything was better than this endless torture, hours and seconds and years of drowning with no hope of it ever stopping, no sense of time, no sense of self.

“Who-”

The sudden flurry of sounds meant nothing. I’d long since lost any grasp on reality, more certain that I was already dead than I was that those harsh, broken wheezes voiced my own, failing attempts at breath. I don’t know when that sack had been removed nor what muttered pleas tumbled listlessly from numb lips. Flashes of grey and white armor held no meaning, nor did whispered words blaring through speakers, though I remembered some fleeting thought toward the futility of whispering into a mic.

Movement. It didn’t feel like that perceived sense of endlessly falling preceding loss of consciousness… It felt like… running? My eyelids bat against the illusion painted atop the black cloth I was so sure awaited me the instant I managed to truly see. It wasn’t until I tried to move that that madness returned. No restraints held my arms trapped behind me. No unyielding board pressed painfully into my back. I was held only by the arms looped beneath my knees and shoulders, and the instant I understood that, I fought with every hint of strength granted to me by that panic-induced insanity.

I couldn’t hear anything above the chorus of sudden shouts, focus trained solely on freeing myself of that near embrace. I’d barely begun to thrash before feeling the floor rise up to meet me, body instantly kicking out to distance myself from my captor until my heels slid useless atop muck-coated stone, doing nothing more than pressing my back more firmly into the wall behind me.

“…” Muffled words lost beneath the pounding of my heart and the rasp of air catching in too-moist lungs fluttering with hyperventilated breaths stolen between wet coughs. I tried to draw my arms between myself and the figure kneeling before me, but could barely convince my hands to twitch, flared fingers trembling mere inches above the ground.

“…! …ack! Come on, kid; come back!” His voice finally broke through that frenzy, and my eyes locked on his, every muscle freezing beyond that persistent shiver I couldn’t begin to quell. He seemed to hold his breath, waiting to see if I’d break again. My brows drew weakly together, thoughts too frantic to more than stare at him for several seconds.

“…W… Wol…” His shoulders sank at my stammered attempt to call his name.

“Right here, kid.” It was such a strange thing to hear the gentleness in his voice, but that lingering sense of wrong drew me further from the shattered recess of my mind, vaguely noting the four figures posted around us, and I didn’t need to see their helms to know who they were, that they had their weapons trained on the corridors stretching out at either side of me, ready to fire at the faintest hint of a threat. They’d found me… This was real… So, why couldn’t I free myself of that relentless fear, that deafening need to run, to find some dark corner and hide?

“I need to get you out of here.” He explained, words purposefully slowed in a way I should have taken offense to. In that moment, however, that slowness was the only reason I could make sense of them. Get out… They were going to get me out of here… but my body revolted from the very thought of letting him touch me again, of letting anyone touch…

“You can hold on to me, or I can carry you, but we can’t stay here.” I wanted to shout at that familiar, cold logic, the silent apology nestled in his hushed statement, frustration spiking at the weakness preventing my hands from clasping over my ears regardless how useless I knew the gesture to be.

“Hey – hey, look at me.” The guilt tainting his command made me want to scream even as my eyes automatically flicked back to his, some distant thought finally realizing he’d forgone protocol in favor of letting me see his face, helmet abandoned on the ground beside him. My name left his lips in a whisper, head ducking slightly to draw my unsteady gaze back toward him.

“We need to move.” My jaw tensed with curses and pleas and senseless shouts, despite my inability to hold enough breath to manage more than a stammered whimper, chest still seizing with half coughs from the phantom sensation of flooded lungs.

“Do you want me to sedate you?” He barely murmured the quiet offer, head ducking toward me. Did I… I thought of that blissful emptiness… that escape from this fear, from the pain of wounds I couldn’t remember sustaining, from the anger wrought by my own inability to force some semblance of control over myself, and, with a sob, I nodded. His expression darkened, but he said nothing as he returned the gesture.

“Close your eyes.” He whispered, and the tremble seizing through me redoubled, terror spiking at the threat of subjecting myself to that darkness. “You’re going to be alright, kid… Just close your eyes.” He promised… I’d never doubted him before… not like this… but how could I possibly believe him? I knew he could see how frightened I was, how lost I was in that fear; I knew he was counting every second wasted trying to guide me through this, how each of those seconds redoubled the risk of being caught, but he said nothing as I struggled to find myself through that panic, and he wasted no time when I finally managed to force my eyes shut.

The instant I felt the prick of needles, my body balked, managing to jump mere inches away, but his touch was already there, hand delicately catching my cheek as those fleeting reserves of strength abandoned me, muscles quickly going limp against him.

“Alright… I’ve got you… I’ve got you.” A final shiver darted down my spine as the warmth of his breath danced across my scalp, barely noting how carefully he eased me back into his arms, but the distant familiarity of finding myself nestled against him, of tasting his scent in my every stammered gasp even as I felt my mind begin to slip away was a comfort I clung to until even that faded.

Next Chapter

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[beatinginavoid]

Would you please write something about someone enjoying making their heart erratic with pressure or breathplay?

Here you go!

Work was done for the day, the house was empty except for her and her cat, Beans McMuffinpaws, and there was no housework that couldn’t wait until tomorrow. Now, with night having fully closed in, it was time to play.

Kate carefully shut her bedroom door so Beans wouldn’t be able to interrupt, leaving her alone in the soft, warm yellow light of her bedside lamp, where she took off her shirt and bra. In one of the drawers beneath the lamp there was a stethoscope with teal tubing. She picked the medical instrument up with a mixture of reverence and anticipation and got comfortable on her bed, allowing herself to sink back into a nest of several pillows.

She placed the earpieces snugly in her ears and lightly pressed the diaphragm onto her chest.

Ba-thump…ba-thump…ba-thump…ba-thump…ba-thump…

The sound of her heart pumping away immediately enveloped her. The closing of the valves was so clear, accompanied by a soft whoosh of blood, and Kate smiled. Her cardiac muscle sounded great at rest, but it was always better when she played with it.

She took a few deep breaths, her heart speeding up and slowing down at the oxygen levels changing. She took one more deep breath and held it.

Ba-thumpba-thumpba-thump..ba-thump..ba-thump…ba-thump…ba-thump…ba-thump……ba-thump……ba-thump……ba-thump……ba-thump……

Her pump slowed, beating steadily as it worked through the oxygen stored in her body. It was a soothing melody, slow enough to fall asleep to, but she had no plans to doze off yet. Thirty seconds passed and the minute mark crept up. Her lungs began to burn and she shifted in her pillow nest. She let out her breath in an explosive burst and inhaled greedily.

Ba-thump…ba-thump…ba-thump…BA-THUMP..ba-THUMP..ba-THUMP…ba-thump…ba-thumpathump……ba-thump…ba-thump…ba-thump…ba-thumpathump……ba-thumpathump……ba-thump…ba-thump…ba-thumpathump……ba-thump…ba-thump…ba-thump…

Kate grinned as her heart skipped and stumbled, trying to get back to a normal rhythm after the sudden oxygen rush after the deprivation. The muscle thudded against her ribs and pushed the stethoscope’s diaphragm up with every contraction of her ventricles. Without giving it much time to recover, she took another deep breath and held it.

It slowed again, thudding awkwardly against the stethoscope, the beats slightly more pronounced than last time. Her oxygen seemed to deplete faster than before and she had to gasp for breath. Her heart didn’t like it one bit, fumbling several beats in a row and then tripping over a few more here and there.

The blood filled muscle felt amazing as it moved about unsteadily within her chest.

Time to make things more interesting.

Leaving the soft nest of pillows, Kate grabbed a metallic water bottle from next to her lamp and walked over to her door frame. She placed one end against the sturdy wood and the other just left of her sternum. She walked into it, forcing it to stay between her ribs and the wall. The diaphragm of the stethoscope was settled an inch above the bottle. Her heart was already beating a little faster as if eager for the next event.

She stepped forward a bit and let her weight lean into the bottle. The pressure against her chest pushed into her heart, affecting its work. As one ventricle was compressed, the muscle sped up to compensate for the lower blood volume going in and out.

Kate closed her eyes, pressing herself even closer to the door frame.

Ba-thumpba-thumpba-thumpba-thumpbathumpbathumpbathumpbathumpbathumpbathumpbdmpbdmpbdmpbdmpbdmpbdmpbdmpbdmpbdmpbdmp

Her whole body was bouncing against the water bottle, her pump doing its best to fight against the pressure. The racing and pounding was beautiful.

She pressed even harder and took a deep breath, holding it in. The bouncing was very obvious and her heart seemed confused as it tried to slow while still being crushed. It stuttered for a moment until it seemed to adjust, pounding steadily along. When she let her breath out and sucked in another one, still applying pressure, her cardiac muscle threw a fit.

Ba-thumpba-thumpba-thumpba-thumpba-THUMPATHUMP…ba-thumpathump…ba-thumpathump…ba-thumpba-thumpba-thumpathump…ba-thumpba-thumpathump…ba-thumpba-thumpathump…ba-thumpba-thumpba-thumpba-thumpathump…ba-thumpathump…

Its internal pacemaker misfired beat after beat, leaving the pump to struggle along at its increased pace. Kate’s heart was like a hurdle jumper sprinting away and knocking down many of the hurdles along the way.

She grabbed the water bottle and stepped completely back, letting the overworked muscle recover. Her eyes were still closed as she heard her heart slowly decrease rate from its sustained sprint. The skips and stumbles happened less and less until her heart had fully recovered, thumping steadily inside her.

Best games ever.

— — —

Ta-da?

[badgirlcovenrep]

The Goddess' Blessing (of a daughter)

Chapter One

(NOTES: the raylla adopts Tiffany fic everyone's been asking for

this is going on AO3 once I get home from my sister's but I wanted to post here first. If you'd rather read it there follow me and I'll post once it's officially in there.

Obs: Tiffany is six in this. Mostly because I wanted to write our witch moms carrying their baby and canonically she's like ten so..... and she's also like severely traumatized. We'll get to the healing soon enough though.

+ Edwin is the best papa. And Scylla has p much already adopted this kid, she just doesn't know it yet.

It's half past six p.m when their train screeches to a halt at the Chippewa station. In all the chaos of the last couple of weeks, Scylla hadn't realized Yule was well on it's way. It is still mid November, but the station has been prematurely decked in civilian Christmas decorations, and almost every wall and corner twinkles in golden speckles and fake pine.

Tiffany had been dozing in and out of sleep on the bench next to her, holding tight to her stuffed parrot as well as Scylla's coat sleeve with her restless small hands that spasmed in pure energy even as she slept. Since coming back from Nicte's mission, Scylla had been in a frenzy to get everything ready for their trip, and Tiffany had followed her around the (no longer safe) safe house, clinging on to her attention with wide blue eyes. She'd always liked kids. Before everything happened Scylla even used to babysit for dodger families.

It was never a lot of money, but she appreciated the levity and humor kids carried. They had hope Scylla prayed she could one day get back. Hope that could only come from the fleeting innocence of childhood. But even then, Tiffany was special, she still had all those wonderful, bright things, and she carried them in bulk, spilling out of her tiny little hands for anyone to see.

Yet she was also touched by things so horrible Scylla sometimes shuddered awake in the dead of night, when her mind conjured up terrible nightmares of being in her place. Of being squeezed into a tiny cage, fed dog food, strung up on a stage as masked psychopaths snickered and passed around stones bigger than fists. It showed, sometimes, in how every once in a while her expression became somber and reserved. How she stopped mid-sentence, and Scylla could see the glint of tears in the corners of her eyes.

It reminded her of Raelle - Raelle, who'd sat in her bed just yesterday and snacked on the stupid expensive popcorn her mother had bought - Raelle, who also carried so much darkness behind her strong, steady demeanor - those were the parts of her Scylla couldn't help but want to protect, and as a result, those feelings also extended to Tiffany. Scylla lost a lot of people in her life, and she'd decided the day she found the child's parents that she would do whatever it took to keep her safe. Just like she wished someone might have done for her. Because that sort of hidden, desolate pain could just as well transform itself into something entirely awful if exploited the right way.

People around her start getting up from their seats, reaching to the compartments for their luggage, there aren't many of them making their way up North this time of year but they still fill the cart in humming conversations, deciding on what to do next or where to get dinner. Scylla takes this as her cue to skim her fingers through Tiffany's hair, gently nudging her awake, "Hey, T, wake up, we're here."

The little girl sits up, bleary eyed, and yawns, looking around at the commotion, "it's already Christmas?" She asks, catching a glimpse of the boisterous decorations set up outside.

"Not yet, no." Scylla chuckles, getting up from her seat to retrieve their own bags - they had everything the two could think to bring, and yet were still not much. A duffel bag for Scylla and purple backpack for Tiffany, with unicorn stickers and colorful buttons sewn to the front. Scylla had retrieved it, along with some toys and clothes, from the girl's home, "People just love decorating early."

"Oh." Tiffany quips, as Scylla helps her fit her arms into the straps of her backpack, then takes her hand in a steady grip once they are done, pulling the young girl towards the door to leave the train, "The lights are pretty!" She exclaims happily, blinking in wide eyed wonder.

Outside, November has definitely made itself known, and Scylla is glad they are both warm in their coats as the wind bites her cheeks until they turn a dark blush. She looks around for Edwin, not sure she'll recognize him from the pictures she'd seen Willa scatter around the house, but still willing to try.

For a second, in that moment, she thinks this might not have been a good idea. When Scylla agreed to it, she'd admittedly not been in her full faculties, brain too preoccupied with seeing Raelle again after so long to completely comprehend what she'd been offered.

After everything that happened, she can't help but be a little nervous to meet the father of her ex (?), the same girl she still very much loved. The girl who had run back to her in that dark forest a day before and clung onto her face until all they could breathe was each other.

If she thought too much about it, Scylla could still feel the soft, almost painful impact of her lips as Raelle knocked her off her balance and breathed fire into her chest like molten lava. It'd been so long, she almost forgot the kind of power Raelle had when she kissed. Like she was always on the verge of tasting your very soul. Their whole day back together before was so very delicate and tentative, air fizzling with electricity like the tension of a bow, pulled tight with an arrow ready to shoot.

The time they've been separated her heart was squeezed tight under an elastic band. Whenever she stopped to think, even for a minute, she could feel it taught, so very strained, reaching from the very inside of her ribs. It was there from the very start. The tightness was what propelled her diaphragm into breathing Raelle in that very first night they spent together, even if she knew she shouldn't, and then, it was what kept them orbiting around each other like their very own solar system. Never too far apart. Always wishing to be closer.

When they kissed in the clearing, hairs messy with the wild strumming of the bat just a few feet away, for the first time, she felt like the band released. The invisible string, so very tight, loosening from under her heart to extend around the both of them and wrap them in what Scylla could only describe as exhilarating, shaking relief. The touch of Raelle's cotton gloves, that she never thought she'd feel again - the taste of her lips, like blood and rain droplets and a mouthful of just her.

It left Scylla running on a high since she walked away from Raelle just the day before, in the early hours of the morning.

It's not how she hoped she'd meet Raelle's dad. Deep down, no matter how much she tried not to, Scylla had imagined herself, more than once, coming to the Cession hand in hand with the blonde fixer. In love and together, going home to meet the parents. It's bittersweet to be here with Tiffany instead, and she has to squeeze the young witch's hand slightly to ground herself from the urge to run.

To just take the child's small body in her arms and run- leave the station in lieu of a cheap motel, one with vending machines, where they could hide from the world a little longer.

When the witch looks down, however, Tiffany smiles reassuringly back at her, squeezing her hand slightly in return, and Scylla can't help the wave of affection that washes over her.

"Excuse me? Are you Scylla and Tiffany?" A voice coming from behind wakes them back from the moment, and when they turn, both come face to face with Edwin Collar.

Scylla's sure it's him. If not because he does still look quite a lot like the pictures she's seen, then because the necromancer can definitely see the telltale signs of Raelle written all over his face. It's mostly there in the kind drop of his eyelids, and the way his mouth creates tiny wrinkles of soft skin when he smiles, but it's there, nonetheless.

"Yes, we are, nice to meet you, Mr. Collar." Scylla greets, settling down her bag to shake his hand.

"Of course, it's amazing to finally meet you. Raelle talked you up a storm," he declares, chuckling proudly, "only good things, I assure."

"Oh, I'm sure I don't deserve that." She let's out, hoping it sounded more playful than it feels for her.

"Nonsense. You seem like a kind girl." The man decides, with a solemn nod, before turning to Tiffany, "and you- Tiffany, I'm very happy to have you with me this week as well, I'm sure we'll have lots of fun together."

"Thank you, Mr. Collar." The small blonde replies, half-hiding herself behind Scylla's pant leg.

"Let's go then. It's getting cold." Edwin finally declares, taking Scylla's bag from the floor without a question. The girl goes to complain, but he cuts her off before she can - "and don't fight me on this. Raelle also never let's me carry her bags, for once I'd love to help."

Scylla still wants to protest. Mostly because she feels that they have already asked so much - and she doesn't quite deserve the kindness - but he seems sincere, so she nods instead, and with the affirmative, all three begin their way to the parking lot.

"Is Raelle your friend?" Tiffany asks innocently, skipping happily over her boots.

"Uh- she- yeah, I guess you could say that."

"Well, you said we were going to a friend's dad's house." Tiffany notes. "Where is Raelle then?"

"About that-" Edwin stops in his step, "did you see her? How is she?" He asks, an uneasy tension settling over his demeanor as he studies Scylla for answers, "they told me she was alive but that was it-"

"She's okay. I saw her yesterday, she was well." The brunette assures, and that seems to send a wave of relief over the man, who breathes deeply before continuing their walk along the various cars.

"Oh, thank goodness." He sighs, "when those people took her I thought- I'm so glad she's okay."

"Yeah. We were all worried." Scylla declares. And this, she can relate to. The way he cares so much for Raelle, it spills into the very movement of his expressions. It's familiar, and it warms her heart. She decides right then that she likes Edwin.

"Did the bad people take Raelle too?" Tiffany questions, frowning in scared surprise as they reach Edwin's old truck.

Scylla sighs, not having revealed much of the mission she'd gone on the day before. She knew it'd be scary for her. Tiffany was still very much traumatized, and rightfully so, after everything she'd been through. But Tiffany was also very smart- and observant. She'd catch up eventually and Scylla feels stupid for not dealing with this before coming.

"Yeah. They tried to hurt her, but me and her other friends didn't let them." The necromancer assures, as she helps the girl into the backseat and clicks in her seatbelt, "she's okay now. We're all safe here."

"Oh- Okay." Tiffany nods, but Scylla can see the doubt shining under her eyes.

Scylla wishes she knew what to say, but words fail her, so she squeezes the girl's hand reassuringly once more, winking in what she hopes is humorous solidarity, before closing the door.

***

Raelle's house is just like she imagines- small, rustic - surrounded by a thick canopy of trees and bushes. It reminds her of the places she used to stay with her parents, scattered over random cities all over the U.S. Scylla likes it.

"It isn't much, but we always have warm dinner and pancakes in the morning." Edwin quips, humbly, as he leads the pair of witches to Raelle's room, "you can stay here. Hope it is comfortable."

"This is more than enough, Edwin." Scylla smiles gratefully, "it's too much, really. Thank you for letting us stay."

"Nonsense." He waves his hand with a half embarrassed chuckle, "It's good to have people here again. After Rae and Tally left everything feels a lot quieter." Scylla nods in agreement, as the man turns to leave the room, the two witches inside watching him carefully, "You guys should change and rest a bit- I'll call you for dinner.

Scylla thanks him, and waits until the door clicks behind his back to turn her attention to the luggage that had been settled over a random chair. The room is filled with so much Raelle, she can't help but notice the letters, pictures, memories and song lyrics, glued to every single wall, from a time before Fort Salem, before them.

The blonde used to leave notes on her dorm walls back at Fort Salem. Lots of silly things like "I'll be back after training" or "You fight people in your sleep. It's cute.". Scylla wonders if they are still there or if they've been taken by the army when she was captured. It doesn't matter anymore, the necro realizes, and she shakes her head in an effort to bring her attention back to the room.

"You should put on some pajamas." Scylla says toward Tiffany, who sat, grievously quiet, at Raelle's bed.

She looked thoughtful, in a way regular six year olds don't quite show unless they have to go through way too much. Her small, bright eyes hide barely concealed darkness as she shifts her looks everywhere but at the older witch.

Scylla sighs, finding this place - this relationship - so very painfully familiar. She'd been the scared little girl last time, feeling so very small and alone. And now, as the adult, she was definitely going to try her best not to fuck it. As difficult as it might be. The world didn't need another suffering witch.

After a few minutes of silence, Scylla realizes she was not going to get an answer, so she opens the girl's backpack and fishes out a pair of mermaid themed leggings and t-shirt, along with the small bag that carried her tooth and hair brushes along with some other toiletries. Scylla places the items by Tiffany on the mattress, kneeling in front of the young witch and studying her clear, soft little face.

"Hey. Are you feeling alright?"

"Are the bad men coming here to hurt us?" Tiffany asks, instead of a response, and Scylla frowns in worry.

"No, of course no-"

"They came and took Raelle too." Tiffany notices, tears escaping from her eyelids that Scylla dries up with her thumb, "and they hurt Miss Willa, the other kids' at the office and my mommy and daddy. What if they come here again? What if they really hurt us this time?" As the questions stumble out of her mouth, sobs begin to wreck across her throat until she's shaking, ever so slightly, with the force of her tears and heavy, panicked breathing.

Scylla sighs and rises from the ground to cuddle the girl close to her chest, squeezing tight until she can feel Tiffany's little arms squeeze her back. Scylla's afraid too - most of the time, if she allowed herself to be honest - Ever since watching Raelle leave her in that cell the year before, the girl could feel even more perfectly the path of death and destruction that marked their (the witches') way through the world.

One of the bad things about being a necro - Death didn't like not being known, and it showed itself insistently, to anyone able to notice.

"We don't know whether or not they'll come again." Scylla ends up responding, sincerely, as she squeezes her arms even tighter around the little girl, "but I won't let them hurt you, you hear me? I dealt with them before, I can deal with them again."

"No" Tiffany shakes her head, frowning up at her in teary-eyed fear, "You too. You're safe too. I don't want you to get hurt either."

"Hey." Scylla forces out a chuckle, trying to lighten up the situation for the young witch's sake, "don't be silly, ok? I'm pretty much invincible."

Tiffany doesn't laugh, her breathing having somewhat returned to normal. The girl just stares back at Scylla with a seriousness that's all too unfair, coming from a six year old, and she reaches out, her pinky finger lifted in expectation, "Pinky promise you'll be safe too? Please?"

Scylla knows she shouldn't. The truth is, she doesn't know what will happen. After their plan to capture Nicte was said and done, Scylla barely had any idea what she would be doing now. But Tiffany obviously needs the reassurance, from the way she stares ever so desperately at the necro's face.

"Okay, I pinky promise." Scylla smiles, trying to convey some calm toward the other girl as she let her pinky link with the smaller one. It seems to work, as Tiffany's expression softens and her tense posture falls, "now let's get you under a shower and into some pajamas, ok? You're a very smelly little witch right now."

"Am not!" Tiffany replies, and Scylla can't help but full on laugh this time, pulling the small girl to Raelle's bathroom as she mockingly protests.

Second chapter is almost done, just needs to be read over for mistakes. For C2, Raelle calls home, Scylla meets old dodger friends and she also has an important conversation with Edwin.

Hope you guys enjoyed!

[thefanbasewhore]

"What did they do to you?" With mando saving you

Summary: "What did they do to you?" With Din Djarin from the prompt list I reblogged. Din rescues a stranger.

Warning/Content: abuse, violence, bruises but not from Din himself. This is soft Din with a complete stranger. Not edited and short!

Paring: Din Djarin/Female reader

"What did they do to you?" The Mandalorian's voice is just under a whisper, gloved fingers finding your chin, the only part of your face not covered with large purple bruising. He could tell it's been a while, the yellowish hues peaking through the darkness.

You didn't move, still completely arrogant that the stranger had managed to sneak up on you, let alone touch your face. Lashes lay against the highest point of your cheeks, lips parted as shallow breath fall from parted lips. The skip in your chest told Din that you were hurt, the inside matching the patches of bruises that litter your body, dried blood matting against your hairline along your lips as well.

Someone had done a number on you and judging by the cuffs around your wrist as you slump over the bed they were done yet. It was supposed to be a simple bounty hidden away in a base of some self named ruler but somehow he managed to slip away leading the Mandalorian having to track him down, he left no door unturned but regrets opening this one as the imagine will always be burned in a part of his memory.

Woman were sacred to Mandalorians, a symbol of strength, nurture the foundlings, carry and care for the future. Without woman, Mandalorian's would seize to exists, Din can imagine the rest of the universe as well. You were tucked into the corner of the room when he approached you, his hands touching your face was to wake you but it was no use.

He tries to leave, tries to look for the bounty but can't even make it past the door way when he's shifting his feet to turn back around. He towers over you as you begin to wake, hard and tall from all the basker, arms reach out to grasp the wall in shock, looking for something to protect yourself with but there is nothing.

He's like a wall when you push against the chest plate, basker doesn't make a sound as he kneels in front of you, hands hesitantly reach for your own, you let out a small squeal, eyes leaving the visor as they squeeze shut in anticipation and anxiety. His hands effortlessly rip the shackles from the wall, a smooth line of static. "Come with me."

Shakily legs that haven't bared weight in days won't allow you too, "We don't have much time before they notice I'm here, if you want to get out of here you have come with me."

There's a plea in the way he talks, it's smooth but desperate like he couldn't live with leaving you here. The 'T' shaped darkness never leaves your own face as you open your mouth to speak. "I-I can't."

Din suddenly feels dumb, hands so softly wrapping around your waist, fingers delicately pressing against the thin fabric of your own shirt. "Does this hurt? I'm going to have to..."

He doesn't know what to say.. hurt you? You already look like you are in so much pain, there's no doubt from the bruising that covers bare arms, dark ringlets of finger pads on your throat and face that the underneath the tunic is just as bad.

"It's fine." No matter how gentle he is there's a dull sting, you bit your lip to try and hide it but it's useless as a whimper falls from your lips. His shoulders drop the moment he hears it, you imagine his own eyes scanning yours as his directs his way to you again.

"Can you walk?" You nod as he reaches for the blaster from the holster on his side, "Stay behind me, they didn't notice me before but I picked off a few so it's any minute they will realize I'm here."

You didn't even get the chance as he's gently casting you behind him, a protective stance that makes your heart pound. "If I say run, you run. There's a ship at the edge of the tree line, go to it and hide."

Despite the amount of blasters that filled the air, the amount of rooms you passed through the man with the armour managed to prosper, keeping his promise to keep you safe. The treeline wasn't far, the hints of grey of the ship could be seen through the gaps of trees. Your chest hasn't stopped moving, pants falling from your lips as you lean against the tree for support.

If it's wasn't for it the mandalorian would never even know you stopped. He turns rather quickly, pointing out the obvious. "You're hurt."

The way you squeezed your eyes with stinging tears, throat burning deep into your chest. The air hurt despite how much your lungs begged for more. "I-I.."

It's breathless, a wheeze as you press your hands against your chest bunching the fabric against your chest. Din's fingers touch your neck, sliding down to feel your diaphragm, unsteady under his own trembling palm. "It's your lungs, can you make it to the ship? I can help you."

"They're going to kill me.." you ignore his words as tears slide past eye lids, the way the bruises contour your face makes him feel sick. How dare someone do this to you? "He said he'll never let me go, he means it. He will find me."

"I'll help you." Despite how much his mind screams at him, tells him he has enough to worry about with the kid. It seems the Mandalorian has a thing for taking in strays. "I'll take care of you."

Your hand finds his own, accepting the offer, any shred of hope to be freed from the prince. The moment you enter the ship, he sits you down, climbing the ship's ladder and in seconds in hyperspace.

Din's hands find your shoulders by surprise as you let out a soft huff. "It's okay.. I, Ugh, I'll get the med pack."

As his shaky fingers start to unbutton your shirt in order to hear your lungs better he wants to ask who you are? What happened?

Why were you so badly beaten? Who wouldn't let you go? But by the way your face is angled up to the ceiling, tears stinging eyes, using his shoulders as support for your own hands he decides it's best not too. The device in his hand is pressed against your chest, the gears whirl as the hydraulics begin to huff out hair. When the device beeps he lets out a sigh of relief, nothing too bad, an infection nothing that couldn't be fixed. You didn't even notice the Mandalorian left laying you softly against the blanket he managed to lay on the floor.

Bottles fall to the ground in a hurry as the mandalorian fusses through the shelf. "Come on, come on." It's under his breath as he lets out a small huff as he finally manages to find the bottle.

It's too late, your eyes are flickering close, consciousness leaving as you slip into darkness. "Hey, hey." Din shakes your shoulders but nothing is received.

He's sitting in front of your, pulling you into his lap so your shoulder is against the valley of his chest, hand knotting between the strands of your hair to keep you up. His other hand holds a pill but also tilts your chin to open your mouth. "Take it please."

There's no answer, he lifts his leg for his knee angles to keep you up right, digging into your back but it is not bothersome at the moment. His hand rubs the front of your neck, softly moving against the skin, applying slight pressure trying to get your throat to react to the muscle memory of swollowing. As your throat moves the pill is gone, he sighs in relief as his own forehead presses against the top of your head.

The pill works almost instantly, chest once again moving with no pain, air easily moving through. The mandalorian doesn't dare move, he holds the woman in his arms close despite only meeting you moments ago but it feels nice.. something he's never experienced before.. the warmth of someone this close. Eye lids flicker as fingers reach for his own that trace the nasty bruising on your cheeks.

"Thank you.." the words are so quiet, but sweet. They make his cheeks red, as fingers press against the helm of basker.

"they won't find you. I'll protect you." Is all the he promises, Din Djarin had added another stray to his misfit clan.

[rugbypolycule]

what more could you do

pairing: arisu ryouhei x karube daikichi

characters: karube daikichi, arisu ryouhei

rating: general audiences, no warnings apply

words: 1788

summary: freshly dropped out of university and knee-deep in depression, arisu ryouhei breaks up with karube daikichi with no explanation. months later, unable to deal with the fallout, arisu goes to his apartment. wounds that have yet to fully scab over reopen.

ao3 link

Karube didn’t need Arisu. In spite of his poignant absence, the sun still rose every empty morning and set at frigid night. The cold still crept through the cramped apartment, through the creaking floorboards and in-between cracks in not quite sealed windows. The earth turned, it turned, and it turned without Arisu. In this, there was no argument.

So, Karube didn’t need Arisu. If the suffocating world outside his slowly encroaching walls continued its screaming persistence, then Karube too would refuse to bow out. He would grit his teeth, hunch his shoulders in his too-thin jacket, desperately not recalling an exasperatedly fond voice that would nag him to dress warmer. He would curse as he woke up to flecks of snow on his window pane and wrestle with his useless heater. He would not ache for the childlike wonder of someone who was no longer there.

Eventually, the snow would melt. The man who had left would take the rent money with him, and Karube would have to figure out where else he could take up space. Karube would go to work in a run-down bar in the sticky heat of the coming summer, cicadas filling the silence in his mind where a plan for the rest of his life should sit. Karube Daikichi would be, in all senses of the word, alive.

Even so, his chest was empty – so he filled it with tar. Karube was never particularly interested in smoking before the hole in his life abruptly dug itself. Now, the nicotine numbed the disquiet in his head, and his throat burned, and for a brilliant moment nothing felt real. For mere seconds, he could shed the sense of loss that hung around him like a bad smell. He tried his best to heave his heavy hurt out with every exhale, to no avail. He kept smoking, kept treading the smouldering ashes into the concrete beneath his boots outside his apartment building. Kept telling himself this was the last one, that this would be the last time he allowed himself to feel like this.

Eventually, the pack emptied. His hands trembled with it, fingers clenched around cool air. Pressure blossomed in the centres of his upturned palms, stomach knotted, the spaces between his ribs drawn tight.

He shoved his frostbitten fists in his pockets, steeled himself to face a space that was not his home. But as his eyes followed his cloud of exhale, they caught on a figure on the other side of the empty street.

Karube Daikichi realised he did not need a heart.

What was the point of a muscle which tore so easily? Which couldn’t regulate its sole function when it was confronted with such devastating eyes? His heart, this useless lead pump in his chest, that supplied blood to his forsaken limbs. To the legs that would halt for nothing tangible on this earth as they made their way towards Arisu. Like a pitiful asteroid in its hapless orbit around a star, Karube fell into place in front of the man who had left him.

‘Daikichi,’ was all it took to break him. To snap the thin wire that ran from head to heart, built to forbear embarrassment in times like these.

‘Don’t call me that. You don’t get to call me that anymore.’ His voice was abrasion in the quiet evening air. Arisu, tensed and taught, raised his hands in cautious surrender.

‘Sorry. Karube, then. Karube.’

There was always something wounding in the way Arisu said either of his names. As if it was something precious. As if he hadn’t swirled the taste of it in his mouth and resolutely spat it out at Karube’s feet. It made him feel untethered, strings cut all at once and without warning.

‘You kept paying the rent. You left, without telling why, and you never stopped paying the rent. Do you think I need your pity, Arisu? Do you think I need your father’s money?’

Part of Karube wanted to spit more poison at Arisu. To ask if living as a constant disappointment to his father was really so much better than living with Karube. To ask if he really did hate him that much, that he would run to someone who had never tried to understand him, who never tried to love him. Karube had given him so much love. Why did he throw it away?

‘It’s not pity. I would never pity you.’ Arisu’s speech was often soft and hesitant, but in this statement there was an unmistakable firmness.

‘So then fucking explain! You left, Arisu.’

‘I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.’

‘Why do you keep apologising? If you’re really that sorry then just…’

‘Just what?’ And his eyes. Glassy with unshed tears and rimmed with red from many previous. Arisu was a man exhausted. That his spine was curled forward, that his shoulders almost grazed his ears made him seem smaller and more fragile than Karube had ever known him to be.

The useless muscle in his chest constricted itself again. Karube’s veins throbbed with it. Had he ever really known Arisu? Had he ever meant anything to him? He bit his tongue to stifle the pathetic question he so miserably needed to ask. But brittle eyeteeth could only do so much against a brain on fire.

‘It’s not fair. None of this is… is fucking fair, Arisu,’ and he makes a fist around the urge to reach out, to touch his frost-reddened cheek, to gentle a thumb at the thin skin of his eyelids. He buried such bile once again in the pockets of his worn jeans, glared at the pavement like it would fix any of this. And he had to clench his diaphragm, swallow once, twice, to kill the sob that clawed its way up his throat. He could feel Arisu’s stare itching at his scalp.

‘I’m sorry. I’m- fuck I’m so sorry, Karube. Please,’ and the waver in his words stuck like needles in his skin, ‘you have to know that I’m sorry. It’s all my fault.’

And all too suddenly, a hand cupped his cheek. It was the cruellest thing in the world, the warmth of it. How Karube’s neck arched towards its softness, how Arisu’s palm was moulded to fit his jaw like they were fired in the same kiln, forged in the same fire. Who was Karube to stop it, when the seam of his lips smoothed ever so slowly against the length of Arisu’s thumb? How could he have halted the splintered shudder that parted his lips against the tendon of an unfurled fist?

Small, like the first patter of rain on a cloudy day, Arisu begged.

‘Won’t you look at me?’

Could he have? Was it possible stare bare-faced and guileless into the sun without burning? Karube was willing to go blind with it, if it was Arisu asking.

Some of Arisu’s tears had spilt, shimmering rivulets grazing his cold-stung features. Karube’s treacherous thumb carved its home in the hollow of Arisu’s cheekbone. Ridiculous. Both men, all fragile lungs and wounded eyes, stood holding onto one another as if he couldn’t quite believe he was real. As if the other would stay for as long as he was held.

Like breathing, like the most natural thing in the world, Arisu closed what little distance remained between them.

He kissed him, a whimper leaking from between the searing heat of their mouths. It was torturous, and roiling up the arched column of Karube’s throat came a smouldering ire. Arisu always did this, always dealt the blow while looking like the most injured person in the room. It made Karube want to hurt. Thus the kiss became more teeth than lips, a grab for purchase on whatever chilled skin was exposed to him. Karube kissed to mark, kissed to plea, kissed to hollow out a space for himself that had long since closed.

The inside of Arisu’s mouth was hot, and Karube was a man starved for warmth. His other hand settled, curling against Arisu’s jaw, and all at once Karube was cradling Arisu’s face. He crushed their mouths together again and again, lips stinging and teeth too blunt to cut deep enough to make it right. Karube’s rage rose like steam out of him in the slick kiss, leaving a gentle simmer deep down in his belly.

Arisu cradled Karube’s jaw like one would hold a baby bird. His fingers gentled against his jugular, feeling the searing jackrabbit pulse of his blood under the goose-fleshed skin of his throat. His chapped fingers ran feather-light up and down, ever-so-slightly grazing the beginnings of karube’s hairline. In days gone by, Karube’s favourite thing to do was let Arisu run his fingers over his scalp, working through the tangles in his long hair until he was satisfied. This caress now was more of an echo, ringing hollow in Karube’s chest. His lungs burned with it as he gasped for air into Arisu’s mouth, gasped for what he no longer had.

It was like being crushed.

Pulling away was like pulling glass shards out of Karube’s tongue. His lips stung and his eyes burned and his heart hurt.

‘Why are you punishing me for loving you,’ he choked out, mouth filled with sawdust, ‘why can’t I have you?’

The moment shattered, red string of fate slashed to pieces. Arisu recoiled and almost snapped back, spine ramrod, eyes red-rimmed and wild. The spell broke as Arisu remembered what he came here for.

‘I’m just here to drop off my key,’ he said, voice broken but tone flat as he could muster. Arisu was a different man with the same face, a crude impression of the object of Karube’s tragic affection. Nothing felt right in the cold street, not in Karube’s palm where the cruel metal of Arisu’s key was pressed, fingers moulded over it into a fist by Arisu’s pitiless hand.

‘Just like that.’ It wasn’t a question anymore. The air that had so violently filled Karube’s chest as they kissed had seeped out and then some, leaving him deflated and exhausted. What little hope he had left had been dying a slow death since Arisu turned the corner onto his street.

‘I’m sorry, Karube,’ and Karube didn’t doubt that he was in the slightest, no matter how much it made his ears burn and his pulse ache.

He replied, ‘thanks,’ as devoid of emotion as he could muster. Karube didn’t need Arisu. Not his hands nor his kiss nor his apology. Crossing the street and unlocking the door to the apartment he resolved to move out of as quickly as possible was as easy as breathing glass without choking. Karube didn’t need Arisu.

He didn’t look back.

[asphyxheart]

Lovely heart

The thin muscular young man has been trapped. It was so tempting, a nice rendez-vous on the 14th February, just to spend time with a beautiful woman. They have eaten at a lovely restaurant, drank some fine dessert wine and the young woman, all shy and murmuring, asked if he wanted to come with her at her home. He happily accepted.

 When they arrived home, she used chloroform on him and he immediately went uncouscious. She dragged him on her bed and attached him, rendering his movement nearly impossible. She then prepared her toys : plastic bag, rope, inflatable collar and the most important of all, a long thin knife and a stethoscope. Everything was set for hours of play.

 The young man slowly woke up, his eyes fluttering in the bright light of the bedroom of the lady. He tried to speak but his vocal cords were paralysed and he only emitted a muted gurgling. She heard it and with a cordial smile, she said.

- Oh, you’re awake, wonderful. I have a very nice program for you.

She put the inflatable collar around his neck and begin to slowly fill it with manual pump, each grip tightening around his precious blood vessels. His face began to turn red, his chest heaving, looking for air, and his heart was racing already. She took the stethoscope and listen carefully as she watched his face turning redder and redder, congestionned by the pressure around his neck. His heart was tachycardic, maybe 154 ; she pressed again the cuff and it inflated more, crushing his carotids and stopping the blood. With an agony gasp, his eyes closed and his heart went crazy and irregular, his chest feably heaving. She released the pressure around his neck and his face went back to a more normal white colour. She was so excited about her first experiment on him, it went perfectly.

 A few minutes later, the young man woke up again, his throat sore from the heavy strangulation he just went through. His eyes widened as he saw her putting a plastic bag over his head and having it attached to his neck with the rope. He suffocated, the plastic entering his mouth and nose when he panickely inhaled. He tried to bite the plastic with no results. She listen again to his furious heart, irregularly beating. His hyperventilating lungs couldn’t fill his body with oxygen : CO2 was already filling his blood, making him dizzy. He was slowly being knocked out when finally, with a pause in the hyperventilation, he passed out again. She removed the bag and enjoyed the tiny hyperventilation movements of his chest, knowing it was enough to make him wake up again.

 She prepared the next experiment by sharpening the knife. It was sharp enough already but she liked the movement and the sound of a perfectly cutting blade. She turned to him and saw he was trying to escape, but the bounds were too strong for him. She approached him, showing him the knife. He was madly shaking his head left to right when he saw the knife. She said.

- I stab your heart or I rip it ? Shake your head if you want me to rip it. But I see, you already made your choice. A good choice. I like it.

Delicately, she cut a 15 cm long line under his rib cage. Then cut deeper, enjoying the warm blood spurting from the giant wound. Deeper again and she felt a hard layer of muscle. The diaphragm. She grinned an adorable smile.

- This is going to hurt a bit. Take a deep breath for me sweetie.

The young man was having his eyes closed but still took a deep breath. At least, he tried, as she cut open the diaphragm when he was doing it, effectively cutting his breathing, litteraly. She plunged her hand inside the chest cavity and grabbed the palpitating organ. With a savage pull out, she ripped his heart out of his chest cavity, revealing a perfectly shaped heart, firm and muscly, dropping blood everywhere. She licked it and then looked at his body covered in blood. She enjoyed it for a moment then decided to put the heart back in its place. She left the bedroom and went to the shower. She was very wet due to the excitement and needed to clean herself from all those body fluids.

[karasimpno]

Karasimpno Does FluffVember Day 1 - Akaashi

Karasimpno FluffVember Masterlist Sick Day (gn reader) 2.6k words | Warnings: a liiiitle spicy, sick reader, painkillers, so much fluff I can’t. This is so self-indulgent I’m so sorry

The first thing you became aware of was the sunlight streaming through the curtains in your bedroom. You inhaled deeply, sensation crawling into your fingers and toes as you turned your head on the pillow, breathing in the morning. You exhaled with a smile as your eyes landed on the beautiful man propped up against the headboard, brow furrowed over his sleek reading glasses as he typed sporadically at the computer on his lap. Too focused on his work, he hadn’t registered your movement as more than restless sleep, unaware that your eyes were raking over his relaxed form.

You took advantage of the opportunity just to watch him work. This was what you had always dreamed of - waking up on bright Sunday mornings to roll over and find your childhood-best-friend-turned-boyfriend in bed beside you. You unconsciously bit your lip, wondering how you got so lucky. This was bliss, you thought.

“Hey sexy,” your not-so-sexy morning voice croaked out - deeper than usual. Akaashi’s eyebrows shifted upwards in slight surprise as he inhaled, taking in your eyes on his. The corners of his lips barely tipped upwards and you recognized the beautiful smile for what it was, returning it in full force with one of your own. His hand, slender and angular, slipped off the keyboard and found its way into yours under the blanket. Just watching the ocean of his eyes was all the joy you ever needed. You leaned over and pressed a soft kiss to the back of his hand.

“Good morning,” he breathed, that barely-there smile still on his lips. You fluttered your tired eyes to clear the sleep from them and wormed your head onto his lap so you could see what he was working on. Wordlessly skimming your eyes over the document, the time in the corner of the screen caught your eye - 11:37. You sat bolt upright, which you instantly regretted as a splitting pain shot through your head, causing you to hunch over, fingertips pressing to your forehead.

Light fingers found your back. “Hey...” Akaashi started, the unvoiced question clear. 

“Yeah, no, just...headache,” you explained disjointedly. “I didn’t realize how late it was.”

“Yeah it was later than you usually sleep but you hardly ever get to rest so I didn’t want to wake you,” Akaashi said in an even tone - though the deep care in his words wasn’t lost on you. He pulled a few fingers through your hair. “Maybe too much wine last night?” he teased, the slightest hint of a glimmer in his eye. You groaned. “Maybe,” you admitted. You laid back down on the pillows.

“Can we just watch Netflix today?” you asked, a little pitifully. That familiar twitch of the corner of his lips. “Sure,” he said, leaning over to press a kiss to your forehead. “Do you want me to make breakfast or anything?” Akaashi asked. You frowned, the thought of food, for once, not very appetizing.

“Nah, I’m not really that hungry,” you answered, fumbling in the drawer of your bedside table for some painkillers. “Where did I...” you muttered, then felt a touch on your arm. You looked over. Akaashi had the pills you sought cupped in his fingers as he held them out to you. You shot him a playfully annoyed smirk. You were always looking for things that he happened to produce in the blink of an eye. “Stop being so perfect,” you teased, grabbing the water bottle from your night stand as you took the pills from him.

“I can’t help it, I love you too much,” he said, giving your thigh a gentle squeeze. You couldn’t help your smile either and pecked him quickly on the lips after swallowing the pills. “I love you too, Keiji.” His deep eyes were dark with warmth. You grabbed the remote and flicked on Netflix, sinking further into the pillows as Keiji’s light keystrokes filled the silence before you picked something to watch.

It was a perfect Sunday afternoon, not even leaving the bed yet as show after show began and ended, your quiet lover’s presence all you needed. Before you knew it, it was a little after 2pm and you were stretching your limbs after having been in the same position for so long. Your left toes accidentally brushed against Akaashi’s calf and you didn’t miss the flick of teal that darted to your face. Your eyebrows raised a bit, meeting the glance. His right hand came up and affectionately moved through your hair a few times, making your scalp tingle. You felt yourself melting a little under his touch, your eyelids fighting a flutter as you bit gingerly on your lower lip. 

Without looking, Keiji used his other hand to shift his laptop to his bedside table, moving forward to plant a tender kiss to your expectant lips. You would never get tired of those lips, soft and gentle between yours. You sighed into him, raising your hand to cup his cheek and letting it rest there as he deepened the kiss, his nose lovingly nudging against yours. For lack of a better expression, your eyes felt like they were floating in your skull. There was an enticing rustle of sheets as Akaashi shifted his weight until he was over you, beginning to suck at your lower lip. You inhaled deeply through your nose and your breath caught at the back of your throat, tickling a bit. You cleared your throat but otherwise ignored the feeling and focused your attentions on the deft tongue beginning to lightly taste you, making your brain a little fuzzy.  You reveled in the deliciously soft sounds of your lips dancing with each other, sighing again in contentment. 

Abruptly, you’re forced to flex the hand resting on Akaashi’s cheek to push him off your lips and past your shoulder as an involuntary cough escapes your throat. You barely heard his exhale of surprise at parting with you but he hovers and waits carefully as you cough once, twice, wait a moment, then cough again. You clear you throat and shake your head a little, blinking. “Sorry,” you whisper, the sound getting caught in your chest. It’s okay he assures you with the way his lips find yours. 

He is gentle again, and you wrap your other hand around the back of his neck, encouraging him to keep touching you. Answering your unspoken desires, you find his careful tongue caressing the insides of your mouth. You tilt your head, needing more, more of him. The hand on his cheek makes its way slowly down his toned chest, finding the hem of his pajama shirt and landing on his hip, just beneath the shirt. You are grateful for every brush of skin you share with him, relishing the beautiful, smooth skin of the muscles taut at his waist where he presses against your pelvis. He pulls an inch away from you, looking down into your eyes, his dark teal orbs your entire world.

“Akaashi...” you whisper, and in a fluid motion he pulls his shirt over his head, kissing with more fervor - your lips, under your chin, at your collarbone, then taking his time to plant a loving kiss at the center of your clothed chest. He crawls back, his lips tracing lower down your torso. Your diaphragm contracts as he does so and you successfully stifle another cough. He pushes your shirt up ever so slowly, eyes not leaving your face. The care in his eyes - the way he wants to watch you as he cherishes you - is enough to leave you breathless, and it nearly does as you tangle your fingers in his gorgeous locks. You lick your lips as he uses his nose to trace sweet swirls up your exposed stomach until his tongue grazes past your bare nipple, almost light enough to seem accidental - though you knew better than that. Your head falls to the side and you allow yourself an audible sigh of pleasure as his soft lips close around one of the buds. Your chest rises and falls a little faster at his attentions, feeling your sensitive peak growing wetter at a swipe of his tongue. You know it’s coming and yet a sudden flash of his teeth across the tender flesh elicits a sharp inhale of pleasure from you. 

The quick work of your diaphragm from your gasp sends your esophagus spluttering and seizing and you hack out a few chesty coughs. Akaashi swiftly shifts away from your chest, giving you room to breathe and stroking your hand to let you know he was still there - as if you’d ever forget.

You smile weakly at him and apologize. You find comfort in his lips again, but this time only from their half-smile as he lovingly looks down at you. He pushes forward and pulls your shirt back down over your chest.

“Ah, babe - ” you begin to protest, down but not out for this round. He’s moving in to plant a kiss to your forehead. “It’s okay, love,” he breathes, a whisper above your skin, your pulse still racing. His lips are so gentle against your forehead and you close your eyes at the feeling in spite of yourself. You hear him inhale and feel him pull back. When you open your eyes, he’s sitting back on his heels, looking at you.

“You’re burning up,” he states simply. You half-laugh and begin sitting up, handing his shirt back to him.

“Well I’m sure I have you to thank for that,” you say with a wink.

“No, sweetheart, I mean I think you’re running a fever. I’ll be back,” and before you can even say anything, he’s off the bed and rummaging through a drawer in the bathroom. You exhale dramatically and pull yourself up to rest against the headboard before he comes back. You pout a little like a sick kid when his featherlight fingertips hold your chin to press a thermometer under your tongue.

“No talking for a minute,” he orders, a playful smirk playing at his features. You miss his touch as he throws his shirt back on and reaches across you to grab your water bottle.

“Km-mhi!” you protest, keeping your mouth clamped around the thermometer, but he’s already gone and filling the bottle with fresh water from the kitchen. When he comes back, he takes the thermometer from your mouth and checks the gauge. You realize begrudgingly that you are in fact a bit cold and pull the covers closer around you. You rest your head on his shoulder, peering over at the thermometer. He instinctually rubs your back. 100.4, the thermometer reads. Akaashi sweeps a hand through your hair and down the side of your face. “I’m gonna take care of you, okay?” Pulling away from him, you smile lightly, knowing there’s no arguing with Nurse Keiji. You love him so damn much but you do feel a little puny. 

“You need to eat,” is all he says. He looks a little reluctant to leave you, but squeezes your hand and presses a kiss to your hairline before pushing off the bed and walking back to the kitchen. 

Sighing, you sink back down into the pillows and hit play on the TV again. Your head doesn’t hurt so much anymore but you can feel your pulse in your skull. You gratefully drink some of the water Akaashi brought you and let your eyes rest a bit. The noise of the TV and the distant sound of chopping begins to get far-away, as though you’re sinking beneath water. At some point, without opening your eyes, you feel a warm cloth pressed to your forehead and behind your ears a few times. You smile lightly, still letting your body rest. Akaashi is being overly helpful but you have to admit it’s nice to know someone’s taking care of you.

Eventually, the smell of your favorite soup wafts into the room. You take a deep inhale, which results in a small cough leaving your chest. Clearing your throat, you groggily gather the covers around you and pull them off the bed as you wander into the kitchen.

“Hey,” you say with a smile, feeling like a walking burrito. Akaashi’s eyes are on your face, and you can practically see him fighting the urge to hold you.

“Go back to bed,” he says softly. “Drink some water and lie down.” You pout a little. “Do you need more water?” he asks. You reach out from the draped covers and squeeze his hand. “No, baby. Thank you for doing this for me.” You’re not sure whether it’s the pressure in your head or how your body just seems to stay tired today, but you suddenly feel a wave of strong emotion wash over you as you think about how grateful you are for this man in your life. You blink at wetness in your eyes and, Akaashi, always keyed in to your heart, has his arms around you in an instant, gently rocking you. 

“You’re okay, I love you,” he whispers. A few moments in his arms and you’re slightly surprised as you feel one of his hands lower and grab you behind the knees, sweeping you off your feet and pulling you into his chest. You always forget how well his strength is hidden in his lithe figure, but you give in and let yourself be completely supported by him as he carries you back to your bedroom where he carefully re-settles you onto the bed, kissing your forehead before he stands back up.

“Drink some water, okay? Soup’s almost ready,” his voice is firm, but you know he’s only worried about you. He returns to the kitchen. Your breath catches in your chest a bit and you cough it out for a minute, reaching for your water bottle again.

Soon enough, Akaashi’s standing in the doorway and your heart nearly melts all over again. He’s holding a tray which he brings to your lap, holding your favorite soup, napkins, and a spoon. You sigh with gratitude and you share a look with him, no words necessary. You can still feel your pulse thrumming through your body, but with the first few sips of the soup, the warm liquid settles your chest a bit. Akaashi has crawled into bed beside you and turned the tv back on. 

“Should I sleep on the couch or something tonight?” you ask weakly, looking at him and playing up the pathetic-ness a bit. His eyebrows draw together in confusion.

“What? Of course not, why?”

“I’ll get you sick if-” He shushes you almost immediately.

“No, no, no, don’t worry about that. Besides if you were going to, you probably did already,” he teased with one of his signature small smiles. When the soup was finished and the tray taken from you, he pulled you in close to him and spent the rest of the day by your side, hands running through your hair, or grabbing you anything you needed.

He did, in fact, come down with the exact same cold days later as you were getting over your own. While you hated seeing him all groggy and miserable, you did enjoy the tables flipping and chance to take care of him for once.

[sunshinelikesavatar]

Here We Are

In which Zuko crashes a ship, ends up very far from home, and meets a Water Tribe woman and her firebending son.

AO3 Link

Lightning blinded Zuko as he scrambled across the small deck of his ship, desperately trying to tie everything down. It would have been hard enough with the storm raging (seemingly out of nowhere), tossing his ship around and threatening to send him to the bottom of the sea, but now—now—

He wished his uncle were here. He wished he was far from this ship, curled up with a scroll as he listened to a storm rage outside, dry and warm. That his mother was alive, that his father wasn’t cruel and callous, that his country wasn’t fighting a pointless war—that he could secure his belongings before he lost them to the waves that crashed over the deck—

The rope that tied him to the ship had saved him at least twice already, and as his feet were swept out from under him again, he clung to it as he was thrown against the mast. He gasped as the breath was knocked out of him and desperately tried to stand. Another wave filled his mouth with saltwater and he coughed and hacked and tried to brace himself against the wood behind him. As the ship tilted, though, he lost his footing and crashed to the ground, clipping his temple on something as he went down.

His last thought before unconsciousness took him was somewhat nonsensical, all things considered:

I hope the tea set doesn’t break.

-

With a sigh, Zuko nuzzled down into the pillow. What a strange dream that had been, so violent. It felt so real, though. His body hurt and ached like he’d really been thrown around in a storm, and his throat even felt raw, like he’d been coughing up water.

Which is when he started coughing, coughing until the muscles of his chest were spasming and involuntary tears from the pain were leaking down his cheeks and sparks flew between his teeth. Trying to stand to get a drink or something didn’t work—he got as far as kneeling before he had to curl forward, forehead pressed into the pillow. He wondered if he’d die like this, alone and hacking out a lung.

A cool hand rested on his shoulder, incredibly soothing. As it moved, rubbing up and down his back, the urge to cough subsided. That hand should have frightened him, but he was so relieved and distracted from his diaphragm no longer attempting to eject itself from his body that he just focused on breathing, gasping in deep gulps of air.

Exhausted and realizing that he had no idea what was going on, he turned his face on the pillow to blearily blink up at the person kneeling next to him with his good eye. There was a fire lit behind them, though, leaving him only with a person-shaped silhouette. They had been kind, though—this was obviously not his room nor his cabin on the ship, and he was laid out on something comfortable. Warm and dry and not clinging to rope hoping the sea wouldn’t swallow him whole.

He tried to say thank you, but all that came out was a hum. The cool hand on his back moved up to his face, brushing back his hair. “Do you want water?” a woman’s voice asked him and he managed a nod. It took a bit of effort, but between the two of them they managed to get him sitting back on his feet as a cup of cold water was held to his lips.

It was not any easier to see the face of the woman helping him, but he supposed it didn’t matter too much. He cleared his throat, wincing at the burn of it, and rasped out, “Thank you.”

“Of course.”

His eyes fluttered shut as he reveled in the ease of his breaths before shifting around to lay down again, bracing himself with his arm as he went. Curling into the warmth of—were they furs? It felt like furs, soft and fluffy—he told himself he would just rest a little while, just for a few minutes.

-

Katara watched the man as he slept, considering his face.

He was much more relaxed than he had been when she rescued him from the crashed remains of his boat. She was glad he’d woken up for a little bit to cough the water out of his lungs, even if it had left him crying (and breathing out sparks, and hadn’t that been a surprise?). Gently, she brushed her thumb against his unscarred cheek, wiping the tears away.

This was not a circumstance she could have foreseen. The only Fire Nation ships that came down to the South Pole were navy ships, armed and threatening if not outright invading. This man’s boat had been much smaller, made of wood and not metal. The broken boxes of supplies showed only the normal things one would expect to see on a personal boat: food, clothes (no armor), some trinkets and weapons, an oddly extensive collection of play scrolls, and a carefully packed tea set.

She had sent Kallik to gather up all the things he could and leave them just outside their hut so he wouldn’t disturb the man’s rest. In this particular case, she thought with a frown, perhaps it was for the best that her hut was on the outskirts of the village.

Because it was indeed a Fire Nation man currently sprawled on her bedding, a firebender, nuzzling cutely into the pillow. Pale skin and black hair could be Earth Kingdom or Fire Nation, but those brilliant gold eyes only came from one archipelago, and it wasn’t like earthbenders went around spitting sparks. So here he was, a Fire Nation man, horribly scarred and burned but born of fire nonetheless. The other villagers would not have dragged his limp form from the wreckage to save him, would not have healed his obvious head wound with waterbending or given him comfort as he cleared his lungs, but she had the beginnings of a very, very stupid plan stirring in her mind, and it required the cooperation of a Fire Nation man such as this.

Satisfied that he would rest easy, she turned her attention to his clothes drying by the fire. They were nicely made and no doubt the thin and light fabric was practical near the equator, but the weather further south required wools and furs. Shaking her head, she pulled out an old parka that had recently been given to her from one of the kinder grandmothers of the village and started to mend the obvious problems. If her plan was to work, this man would need a parka, sturdy boots, thicker pants and tunics—all the necessities, really. Even if all signs pointed to him not trying to end up here in the first place.

It was a while before Kallik poked his head through the door and grinned at her before turning his gaze to the sleeping man. He tiptoed over to her and settled by her side. “I got all the stuff I could and put it in the boxes by the door, like you said,” he whispered. “But Mom, who is he?”

She smiled at his impatience, smoothing a hand over his black hair and kissing his forehead. “It’s a surprise, sweetie.”

Kallik rolled his golden eyes and flopped against her. “Ugh, mom, I’m seven now. I’m too old for surprises!”

“Now that is just completely untrue.” She held the fur of the parka a little closer and pursed her lips. She’d probably need to patch the next tear…she set it aside for now, though. “Come on, help me with the bigger things in the wreckage and let him sleep.” Kallik pouted but followed her out.

-

The next time Zuko woke up, he was feeling much more alert. He could feel the sun’s energy zipping through his blood, high in the sky, calling him to wake and move and get on with the day.

A woman sat by the fire, stirring a pot of something. She turned to him as he pushed himself to a sitting position and smiled. “Hello,” she said, her voice kind and open. “Are you feeling hungry?”

To say he was confused would be to understate the situation. She was...Water Tribe. Very obviously Water Tribe, with dark skin and hair, bright blue eyes, and blue-dyed clothes that looked to be made of thick wool. The hut they were in was lined with hides, with Water Tribe decorations and stylings. And as far as he was aware, people of the Water Tribe didn’t exactly get along with the people of the Fire Nation.

His uncle had told him before to never look a gift ostrich-horse in the mouth, though, so he merely nodded and took the bowl of stew and hunk of bread she passed him. It may have been the effect of surviving the worst storm of his life (he was pretty sure that hadn’t been a dream), but the food was absolutely delicious and he did his best to eat every drop, balancing the bowl on his legs as he used the bread to sop up the soup.

She let him eat in silence, putting a lid on the pot and pulling out some sewing. He watched her work, apparently unconcerned with the strange man sitting no more than four feet away. She was patching the knees of a small pair of pants and making tiny, precise stitches with a smile on her face. When he finished, putting his bowl on the ground by the fire, she put aside her sewing and turned to face him.

“My name is Katara,” she started. “You’re in one of the Southern Water Tribe villages at the South Pole.”

He couldn’t help the incredulous “What?” that burst out of him. What was he doing so far south? Had the storm really blown him so far?

She bit her lip and continued, “Also, your ship is completely wrecked.”

Dismayed, Zuko spluttered. That ship...that ship had taken up all his savings for the past six years to buy, and the first time he took it out for more than a day, he wrecked it?

“No one here knows how to fix a boat like yours,” she was saying, “So even if it wasn’t just firewood at this point, you probably couldn’t leave in it.”

He couldn’t help the slump of his shoulders. This had been his great escape, his plan to start a new life far from his father and sister. A truly inauspicious beginning, he thought with a scowl.

The woman, Katara, got to her feet and brushed off her tunic. “I have a canoe, though, and could take you to a nearby island if you wanted.” And he was baffled by her generosity, to do so much to help a stranger from a nation at war with hers. Before he could thank her, though, she said, “But I do have an alternative proposition for you.”

He leaned back, narrowing his eyes at her. It had been too good to be true after all.

Holding her hands out to the sides, she simply said, “You could stay here.”

And that was...not what he had expected. He cleared his throat, sure he’d misunderstood. “I beg your pardon?”

She sighed and pulled her braid over her shoulder to tug at it. “I’ll be honest, I’m not sure how to sell this to you. To make a long story short—”

Which is when the door to the hut burst open. Years of instinct had him jumping to his feet, arms in ready position. He let them drop as he saw it was a child. “Mom, Mom, Mom, I figured it out, you have to see what I did, I—” The child—a boy—turned to him with—

Golden eyes.

Oh.

He felt a bit sick. He wondered if his conclusions were hasty, though. Maybe...maybe she had happily married a Fire Nation man, who just happened to be out on a trip or something. During a war. In which he knew that there had been several raids on the Southern Water Tribe around the time of this boy’s likely birth date.

Katara’s smile was warm, her eyes crinkling at the edges as she steadied her son from his rush inside. “Kallik, I told you, play outside until I call for you.”

That seemed to startle the boy out of staring at him (at his face, at his arm, and people always seemed to stare) with wide eyes. “Oh! But Mom, I had to show you right away—” He held out his palms, cupped together, and furrowed his brow. A tiny flame popped into existence above his hands. It was, objectively speaking, a sad and flickering little thing, nearly entirely red with lack of heat and threatening to go out with each puff of air as the boy said, “Look, I figured it out! I made it on purpose!”

Which implied that there wasn’t a firebender around to teach him the most basic of firebending skills, such as, say, a loving father figure.

And Katara smiled and hugged her firebending son, kissing his hair. “Sweetie, great job! I knew you could do it! You’ve been practicing so hard. I’m so proud of you.” The boy beamed bright as a sunbeam. Then she laughed and gently pushed the boy out of the hut. “But I was serious about you playing outside! We’ve got some boring grown-up things to talk about.” Kallik groaned and whined but made his way out the door.

It was pretty easy to fit together the few pieces he had. He’d heard about this sort of thing, of soldiers who had so little honor that they would...would…Swallowing (his throat still hurt but he tried to ignore it), he looked at Katara again.

She shrugged and gave him a small smile. “Well, um, that’s my son. He’s...he’s just turned seven and he started...well, firebending.” Biting her lip, she looked towards the door. “There have been a few accidents recently. Nothing deadly or anything, but he gets so excited, and, well…” Here she mimed an expanding fire. “You know.”

He did know. It was something every new little firebender had to learn to deal with, how to temper the flame in your heart so it didn’t burn the world around you. Usually, there were family members, neighbors, teachers, friends, all sorts of people to support them.

Not here, though.

“I’m not...there’s no one here to help him. And I do want to help him, but I don’t know how.”

He almost asked about the boy’s father before he decided that was a terrible ideaand he should not ever bring that up ever, what’s wrong with me? “And you think I could?”

She wiggled her hand in a so-so kind of way. “If you were just here as a teacher, that would be easiest, but the village would hardly accept that. They almost turned me away just because of Kallik.”

Which also implied that this was not her home village, which meant she had either run away, been sent away, or her family was dead and she was alone. All of those options were heartbreaking.

“But...they don’t know the circumstances of Kallik’s, um...of Kallik.” Her face started flushing as she continued, “If I could pass you off as, um, my h-husband, only just able to join us here, that would p-probably work.”

There was already one glaring hole in the plan, though. “Most firebending teachers have both arms,” he managed to get out, turning his gaze to the central fire pit. As it often did whenever it came up, the space where his left arm had once been felt overly conspicuous.

Her hands were wrapped tightly around her braid now as she steadfastly focused on something on the floor. “That might actually, uh, help. You wouldn’t seem as...threatening, that way. And I don’t mean for you to teach him to fight, just to help him control his bending.”

He wondered how he would have reacted to that as a teenager, angry and desperate to prove himself to a father that didn’t care, that he didn’t seem threatening to a village of peasants. And he tried to remember and hold on to his uncle’s words of support, that losing an arm didn’t make him less of a man or a firebender, no matter what people thought. He took a deep breath and tried to clear his mind. “So you want me to live here with you? Pretend to be your husband while I teach your son?” And was he actually considering this as a serious possibility? He hadn’t really had a plan besides “leave the Fire Nation,” after all.

“It sounds so dumb when you put it like that,” she muttered, “but yes, basically.”

And wow, there must be something fundamentally wrong with him as a person, because he didn’t even think before saying, “And it won’t bother you to have a...a Fire Nation man around all the time? With...with how Kallik, um…” He didn’t know how to finish that sentence. Actually, he was fairly sure he should just burn up into ashes on the spot for bringing up the thing that was probably the most traumatic experience of this woman’s life.

Katara was looking at him with eyebrows scrunched together before she gasped and her eyebrows flew up. “Oh! Oh, um, no, that’s...ugh. I’m just so used to talking around it.” She took a deep breath. “Kallik isn’t my biological son. His, uh, real mom, she saw his eyes and decided she didn’t want him. I don’t blame her for that, the situation was terrible. I was supposed to...I don’t know, I don’t really want to think about it. But I...I couldn’t just...leavehim somewhere, and I knew no one in my tribe would want anything to do with raising him after everything, so I...left, I guess. Just sorta packed up and…” She gestured around them at the hut. “Here we are.”

Here she was. A woman who’d left her home and family to raise a son that she hadn’t birthed, a son that had Fire Nation blood singing in his veins.

“That’s what moms do,” he heard his mother say, softly laughing by a pond of baby turtleducklings.

“I think of you as my own,” he heard his uncle say, his hand warm and heavy and comforting on his shoulder.

He cleared his throat. “Can I think about it?” Because yes, he would actually be considering this as a life path. “Maybe take a walk or something?”

Katara bit her lip and moved to one of the chests lining the walls, opening it and rummaging around. “I would like to say yes, absolutely, but people are going to ask who you are as soon as you or I go outside. I’d rather have the story straight right from the start, whether you’re my, um, my husband or just a stranded sailor or something.”

Which made sense. So instead of standing in the sun like he wanted to, he sat next to the fire and stared into the coals. And then he thought and thought and thought.

-

Katara was almost giddy. He was considering it! He was considering her sort-of silly plan to teach Kallik firebending!

As she sorted through clothes, putting together a pile for the man—

Oh, wait. “I’m so sorry, but I didn’t catch your name.”

The man blinked up at her, startled. “Hm? Oh, my name.” He sighed. “Okay, I’m going to be honest with you too. Just so, you know, no misunderstandings.”

Her stomach started to sink. Was he a criminal or something? Her hand went to the lid of her waterskin, ready to pull out water to defend herself. She hardly knew this man, what had she been thinking?

“I’m running from my family. My dad, he, uh, he did...this.” He gestured to his whole left side and Katara had to swallow back bile. “But he’s been pretty clear that as long as I don’t draw attention to myself or try to mess with anything about the war, he’ll let me...you know, live. So I can’t use my real name.”

She almost asked who his father was before thinking better of it. A powerful (terribly, horribly powerful) bender, apparently connected with the war—likely a general. The “who” didn’t matter so much. Instead, she nodded. “That makes sense. Do you have a name in mind?”

The still-nameless man groaned and rubbed his face. “Maybe Li? There’s a million Li’s…”

Katara laughed. “Well, you might as well pick a name you like. Do you like ‘Li’?”

His grumpy glare very clearly said ‘no.’ He sighed and let his eyes wander around the hut, long fingers tapping on his knee. “How about...Kuzon. Yeah, that’ll work.” He met her eyes and bowed with fist held in front of him. “My name is Kuzon.”

Feeling a bit like she was playing a game, she bowed as well, hands braced against her thighs in Water Tribe fashion. “A pleasure to meet you, Kuzon.”

One corner of his mouth lifted in a smile before he returned to staring at the fire.

At length, after she had straightened up most of the hut and started the non-essential mending, he groaned and twisted around, cracking his neck and stretching. He was like a seal-cat stretching in the sun, she thought with a grin.

With a gusty sigh, he turned to her. “Okay. I’ll do it.”

She blinked in surprise. “You will?”

Nodding, Kuzon got to his feet. “Yeah. I didn’t really have much of a plan besides ‘get away from my psycho family’ to start with anyways, and I like kids. I wouldn’t mind helping you and Kallik out here for a while.”

Certain her grin was a bit too gleeful, she bowed in thanks. “Thank you! And once Kallik has been trained, I’ll help you get wherever you’d like to go, okay?”

He bowed as well. “Sounds like a plan.”

Leaping to her feet, she grabbed Kuzon’s hand and ran out the door. “Let’s go tell Kallik the good news!” She heard an incredulous laugh from behind her, but he ran with her.

They found him on the rocky beach by the wreckage of the ship. “Kallik!” she called, waving him over. “Kallik, I want you to meet Kuzon, he’s—”

Three figures came around the side of the wreck, other villagers. Katara felt her words catch in her throat as she saw their eyes watching with interest. Whatever she said would certainly spread like wildfire throughout their little village. And she realized, as she felt the warmth of Kuzon’s hand still in hers, that she hadn’t really thought this all through.”

“Um, he’s...he’s your f-father.”

[captainrexisboo]

In A Single Night Chp 2

Here it is ❤️❤️❤️ Link to Previous Chapter (in case you missed it)

I’m not gonna say anything about it, except no warnings apply ✨

Tag list in the replies, please let me know if you would like to be tagged, and All Comments Are Welcome!!! Enjoy my lads, ladies, and lovers!!!

Edit: link to chp3 🥰

You banged on the thick, almost black oak door, knowing he was awake despite the hour, “Commander! Commander, please, open up, we need to-”

“Y/N!” he hisses through grit teeth as he swings open the door, still fully clothed as you expected in the same white uniform Rex was donning earlier that night, with deep bags under his eyes and dark curls sticking up, out of their usual well-kept place from running his fingers through it too many times, “The Captain isn’t here, so please, my dearest liege, if you could keep it down-”

“Of course Rex isn’t here, Cody, he’s out galavanting in the woods without a thing to cover his backside except blasted blond fur,” you seethed as you pushed through into the dim candlelit office, your now-tattered cloak trailing behind you, “How long has your brother been a werewolf?”

He stared at you, brows furrowed and lips pulled into a tight grimace as if you had sprouted two heads. His gaze switched from you to glare defeatedly at the full moon that hung outside his window, illuminating the room even more than the candles. He shook his head, stiffening his back as he brought up two fingers to rub at his scarred brow, “My...he...walk me through this. What happened?”

You shuffled on your feet, clenching and unclenching your fists as you cleared your throat, “Rex...wanted to see me tonight. During patrol. And before I could reach him, he…”

Good lords, you sounded mad. You bit your lip as you stopped talking, not finding it in you to continue, tearing your gaze off the floor to look up into Cody’s signature deadpan expression, as if you could project into his mind exactly what you had seen. He stood straight, hands folded behind him, tired eyes still actively surveying your form, precise and calculating. At your extended pause and fidgeting shoulders, he clicked his tongue, “You know, canoodling with any soldier, regardless of rank, isn’t allowed while they’re on duty, your grace.”

“Cody!” you whined, stepping up to him to place your hands on his shoulders, “This isn’t about that! It’s about Rex! He turned into a-”

“I know,” Cody sighed, gently taking hold of your wrists and pulling them off of him, “I had suspected this, I was going to prepare for it, but-”

He groaned gruffly, letting go of a wrist to scrub a hand over his face and covering an obscene yawn, “I guess I lost track of the moon cycle.”

You could only stand there, mouth agape. You pulled your other wrist away, a bewildered scoff exhaling from you, “You knew!?”

He nodded, his exhausted demeanor making his stoic expression all the more bored, as if this was just another debriefing of the low level muggings that took place over the weekend.

“Why didn’t either of you say anything!”

“What makes you think he knew?”

You paused, the question putting you through such a loop you momentarily forgot you were in hysterics. You shook your head, furrowing your brows low as you groaned, “Well why wouldn’t he know?”

“Well, this is a quite a recent development-”

“Commander!” you couldn’t stand the idle chatter that he seemed intent on keeping, “I would love to be casual and catch up some other time, but right now your brother, my love, our Captain is out there somewhere, going crazy with bloodlust-”

“As opposed to what other type of lust?”

“Cody!” you screeched, not bothering if the entire castle heard you two bickering at this point. The infuriating smirk he wore made you want to tear your hair out. You stamped your foot and pointed to the blanket of tall, thick trees that stretched across the starlit landscape outside his office window, “You need to go out there, right now, find your brother, and throw his clothes at him!”

You never thought you’d see the day that Commander Cody Fett, of the Republic Aegis, laughed. Not his normal, brief, smug chuckle that made all the eligible bachelors and bachelorettes go weak in the knees and swoon under his cool facade. No, this laugh was deep, and building, he was taking large breaths in between, clutching at his diaphragm, until he was howling not unlike his brother, barely an hour ago. 

It made you furious.

You ground your molars, tightening your fists, nearly twitching with your anger. You could feel your cheek stitch up as your eyes narrowed, a thrumming growl coming from the back of your throat. You let out a huff, hands flying up to the dark metal clasp of your cloak, a beautiful thick charcoal wool with royal blue velvet on the bottom hem. It was a gift from Rex about a year ago, after coming home from a diplomatic visit, and it immediately became your favorite thing to wear. You kept it clean, and stored it safely in the warmer months- now it was dirt smeared, ripped in odd places from falling onto scraggly rock, and torn from where his claws had pierced next to your head...and you were noticing now, his back claws had pierced the fabric that had bunched around your knees as well when he had you pinned underneath him. 

As you were inspecting your cloak with puffy red eyes, Cody was coming down from his bout of hysterics. You could hear his weakening breath, and you held out the cloak, not wanting to meet the taunt you were sure he held in his stare, “He attacked me. Pinned me to the road before running off…”

Cody grunted low, clearing his throat of the remaining bit of humor as he took the thick, warm material in his hands. He breathed deeply as his fingers traced the irregular tears, blinking heavily as he squeezed the bridge of his nose, coming down from madness as he looked back up at you. You refused to look at him, but his tone was surprisingly somber, “Look, I’m sorry, truly. As you can imagine, I’m very tired...you walk in here telling me my brother is a werewolf, and that the solution is to throw clothes at him? Where did you even hear such a thing?”

You finally looked up at him, expecting more brutish teasing, but instead finding a morbid, genuine curiosity. You clenched your jaw, taking a shuddering breath, “My grandmere...she lost her suitor to the soul of the beast. I didn’t really think about it before, but it makes sense now.”

Your eyes stung with the realization, voice choking with emotion, but no tears were able to fall. You looked at Cody, he was leaning against his desk, cloak folded beside him and listening intently. His eyes were focused on you as he folded his arms across his chest, tilting his head towards you in a silent request to continue. You cleared your throat of emotion, speaking low, “She was already with child at the time, my mother- his daughter, but… only the purest love can change the wolf back to a human. Giving them clothes, leading them back to a warm bed. Well, it turns out he didn’t love my grandmother like she thought. He attacked her, giving her claw marks down her shoulder and over her chest. The only reason she lived was because her father and his hunting party followed her with their rifles, driving away the monster.” 

You paused, a quaking breath wracking through you. Your throat was tight, and you were starting to get dizzy from the irregular breathing, “She lived in heartache for the rest of her days, the scar a reminder she wasn’t enough. Whatever love she thought she had was an illusion- he was only marrying her out of a sense of duty to the child he sired. I’m obviously not pregnant, Cody, I don’t even have that delusion to give me strength-”

“You want me to go out there instead of you,” Cody interrupted, piecing together your last bit of thought for you so you could focus on your breathing, “Because you’re unsure of his love towards you?”

You nodded, choking back dry, sobbing breaths, “I mean. What’s more pure love than the bond between brothers? He hasn’t even asked for my hand yet.”

“If you weren’t in the middle of a panic attack, I’d start laughing again,” Cody sighed heavy. You opened your mouth about to scold him again, when he held up a hand, “I knew he was asking you to meet with him tonight. He’s been hounding me all damn week for my opinions on ‘Will Y/N prefer this coat on me, or my cape? What time of day should it be? Does this sound okay as an opener?’ on and on and on- meanwhile there’s a war about to brew if Skywalker can’t sit still for a moment, Kenobi’s insistent on visiting with daily tea no matter how much I have on my plate, I have troops to train, and I had to research on  how to keep Rex’s wolf in check- and you know how well that faired- don’t even get me started on the pot that Sir Palpatine is intent on stirring-“

“Commander.”

He looked to you, snapped out from his exhausted ramblings at your clipped tone. You waved your wrist loosely, asking him to get to the damned point already. He coughed lightly, “Ah, right.”

He stood straight again, wrapping his hands behind his back and clearing his throat, “Your graciousness Y/N L/N of the Established Republic, Captain Rex Fett of the Republic Aegis was planning, tonight, to ask for your hand in marriage. Under the light of the full moon, ‘because the atmosphere would be just perfect’-”

You tuned out right as the word marriage was spoken. Cody’s voice rang clear in your head, the word turning itself over and over in your mind.

Your love. Your dearest Captain. Him. Rex. He was going to propose tonight. Tonight was supposed to be wonderful, given celebration, filled with purely blissful feelings and warmth- he would’ve proposed tonight. You would’ve stolen him away from his “break on patrol” and taken him back to your quarters for proper celebration, expected protocol be damned. You were supposed to be in the arms of your love right now, letting each other’s heartbeats lull each other to sleep as you shared lazy kisses of simple adoration, but instead you were listening to his sleep deprived twin wail on and on about something or other that didn’t really matter right now because he would’ve proposed.

But instead. He attacked you with gnashing fangs and a snarling maw. He held you beneath him, claws spearing the rock by your head, intent on having his slaughterous way with your flesh-

But instead. You whispered his name. A broken plea. A pathetic whimper… and he heard you. He listened. He threw himself off of you and didn’t look back. It wasn’t the beast- Rex had heard you.

Your love was still in there. 

And you were going to be the one to free him.

[kirah69]

Or Stiles and/or Peter have a really bad bout of dysphoria. If not triggering for you ❤🧡💛💚💙💜🤎🖤🤍

Yes! Thank you!

So here it is. For the Full Moon Ficlet Prompt DISCONNECTED & for the @transbingo​: Vampires.

Dysphoria: It's a term for the anguish and distress a person experiences as a result of a disconnect between their gender identity — who they feel they are — and the gender a doctor assigned them at birth.

Laura Beltrán Villamizar

Title: Fucking Vampires

Pairing: Peter Hale/Stiles Stilinski

Summary: A fucking vampire turns Stiles and sends to hell all the effort he had made with his transition.

Warnings: Trans male Stiles, Vampires, Forced detransition, Angst, Strong body disphoria

Chapters: 1/?

[AO3 link]

Chapter 1

Stiles woke up in a fucking abandoned warehouse, again. Why couldn't he wake up for once in the bed of an attractive stranger? Oh yeah, for that he would have to socialize. He hadn't even been caught drunk on the way home from a party, at least then he'd have an excuse. Someone (or something) had caught him back from the library late at night. He didn't even remember how it happened, just he was on the street and now he was- oh wait, it wasn't a warehouse.

That in the background was the noise of the subway and behind him was an old subway car. Everything looked gray under the few remaining lights on the ceiling (which were brighter than he'd expect), maybe it was just covered in dust. The air seemed stagnant, and he could smell decomposing bodies. It must have been an abandoned station and by the boxes, the makeshift tents with old fabrics, the gasoline drums turned into bonfires and so on, homeless people lived there. He was probably sitting on the bed of one of them. Where were they? There was not a soul around him, not even rats.

Stiles felt his head for any injuries (the bad guys had a habit of hitting him on the head to knock him unconscious) and there was some dried blood, but no wound, it didn't even hurt. He looked down to see if there were any other injuries and-.

His heart stopped. He lost his breath. His mind went blank for an instant, and then he was filled with sheer panic and terror.

It can't be, it can't be, no no no nononononono, not again, how, no, why, it can't be, not again, please, please, why, how, this can't-, nono nonononono...

He couldn't know how long he was like this until his mind settled down, just long enough to form rational thoughts. Everything had returned. Someone... something had kidnapped him and had... had... Oh god, fuck, something, somehow, had made his body return to... its original form. He had tried so hard to get rid of all that and now... now they were back. His breasts. And inside of him... he was pretty sure his ovaries and uterus had returned as well. He brought a shaking hand to his groin and... shit, his clit had returned to its original size as well. He was terrified of looking in a mirror or talking; he didn't want to hear himself, he didn't want to see his face again with feminine features.

Eight fucking years of hormone therapy and operations gone to waste! Who the hell had done that and how? And how come he still hadn't passed out from the panic attack? His chest... didn't ache. It should, and he should be out of breath and blacked out, but it was as if he didn't need to breathe even though his lungs continued to inflate and deflate.

He stopped thinking about it when he felt another presence nearby. “Feel” was the right word because he didn't hear it or see it until it was in front of him. It was a tall man with long blond hair in a ponytail, intense green eyes and extremely pale skin. He was dressed in black from top to bottom with a knee-length leather coat. Was it a requirement for sinister villains?

“How are you feeling?” asked Stranger with a French accent. Oh wait, he had read this.

“Are you a fucking vampire?”

There was a shocked expression on his face followed by a smile that showed too many teeth.

“I knew I had caught a smart one. My nam-.”

“What have you done to my body? Why did you do this to me?”

“Um... Well... I admit I didn't expect it.” He seemed to be trying to smile, but he grimaced instead. “It's the first time I've turned... well, someone like you. I didn't even know you were a woman.”

“I'm not a woman!” he hissed through his teeth.

“I mean, I knew that the transformation regenerates mutilated limbs, missing organs...” he explained with wide gestures of his hands, “but I didn't even know you were an operated girl.”

“Man! I. Am. A. Man!” he screamed and flinched at the sound of his high-pitched voice.

“Um... Look... I'm very sorry about this, but I have to say that you look very pretty like that.”

Stiles saw red. Something reacted within him, like the snap of a whip, and just as quickly he launched himself at the creature. He didn't think about it, he didn't consciously do it. It was as if the beast mode switch had been flipped and his humanity had stepped aside. He felt everything, he acted with all the precision that his new abilities allowed him, but he did not control it.

When his prey stopped moving in his hands, he came back to his senses. He first noticed the blood in his mouth, a taste that should have been disgusting, but he just swallowed. His hands were covered in the same blood and his clothes too. He had practically bled that pig out, appropriate. He had a broken arm, but he could already feel it regenerating. The vampire's body was at his feet. Or part of it. A pair of limbs were scattered around him, and his head had ended up on top of the subway car.

He let out a shaky breath and staggered backward until he tripped over some box and fell to the ground. His mind returned to his situation and he stopped breathing. Not that he needed it anymore. He reached into his pocket for his cell phone, but it slipped between his blood-soaked hands. He tried to catch it a couple more times, but ended up giving up. He left it on the ground and dialed the number. It was a miracle that there was signal there, and he attributed the first tears to the relief it made him feel. He lay down next to him with his knees and arms curled, making himself as small as he could, and waited as the tones sounded.

“Hello, Stiles.”

He heard Peter's cheerful voice, and a sob escaped him.

“Stiles, what's wrong?” His voice quickly turned concerned.

“Peter.” Shit, why did his voice have to sound like this?

“Stiles?” He sounded confused, perhaps because he didn't recognize his voice.

What could he say? How could he explain all that? He didn't want to say it out loud, he didn't want to hear himself in that voice talking about his worst nightmare. He sobbed again, his chest contracting in a strange way because he didn't need to breathe, but he was trying and surely it was necessary to speak.

“Stiles, listen to me, I need you to take a deep breath and tell me where you are.”

That made him give a nervous laugh, and he seemed to be able to control his diaphragm again.

“An abandoned subway station.”

“Can you go to a public place? Can you get help?” he asked calmly, though his voice was full of concern.

“Um... I can... Wait, what time...” He turned his head to see the screen. 3:29 pm. “No, I can't go out. Peter...”

“Don't worry, I'm on my way.” It was true, he could hear the car's engine. “If you can, don't turn off your phone, I have located you. Are you safe? Do you have danger nearby?”

“No, I'm alone.” He felt a great relief knowing that Peter was on his way. He was going to take hours, he had to get there from Beacon Hills, but Stiles knew he would speed up as much as he could to get there as soon as possible.

“Okay. Are you hurt?”

Stiles began to cry louder. No, technically he wasn't hurt, it was even worse.

“Stiles, sweetheart, I need you to talk to me. Are you hurt?”

“N-no, no. Peter...” he said with a whine.

“I'm on my way, hold on. Hide if you can. You'd have to hang up or the battery-.”

“No! Peter, please...” The idea of staying there alone without even Peter's voice terrified him.

“It's okay, I'm here. Can you tell me what happened?”

He knew Peter just wanted to distract him so that time would pass faster, although for him it was enough to hear his heartbeat on the other end of the phone (it was strange and at the same time comforting that he could hear it).

“I was coming back from the library last night. God, I don't know how I could have been unconscious for so long. I woke up here a few minutes ago and this...” he gave a humorless laugh at how ridiculous it was,” this vampire appeared. A fucking vampire, Peter! Why did it have to be a vampire? If it had been... anything else.”

Anything, even if its only intention had been to kill him. That would have been better than what had happened.

“Well, now we can be a cliché.”

Stiles wanted to laugh, but the sound that came out of his mouth sounded more like a groan. Then his cell phone started beeping.

“No, no, no, no, no.”

He leaned over the phone, there was only five percent battery.

“Stiles, you have to hang up. I promise I'll be there soon, but you have to hang up and keep your phone nearby in case you move. I have your GPS signal located, I don't want to lose it.”

Stiles wasn't going to ask how he had located his phone, Peter was up to date with technology. At that moment he was only grateful for it because the truth was that he had no idea where that station was.

“Okay. Don't let the police arrest you.”

“They couldn't reach my car even if they tried. Although maybe you should be listening for police sirens.”

He hung up the phone reluctantly and brought it close to his body, it was his only connection with Peter. Maybe he should feel bad about not calling his father. He could have arrived quickly with the siren without risking a chase, but the truth was that Stiles didn't know if he would come, he didn't know if he would pick up the phone or if he would believe him when he explained the situation or even if he would consider it important enough to travel from Beacon Hills. In short, he couldn't trust his father to help him. He had been aware of it for a long time, but at times like this it was particularly painful.

He could have called Derek, he also lived in Los Angeles, but most likely he wouldn't even pick up the phone and besides, Derek had no idea of his situation and it would be very awkward to explain. Lydia lived in New York, they barely kept in touch in recent years; and it would be futile to try to contact Scott now that he was on the run in Canada with his latest romance, a hunter whose family weren't too happy about her dating a werewolf. (Stiles was not at all surprised that history repeated itself.)

However, he had no doubt that Peter would come, even if he had to cross the country to do so. He was the last werewolf in Beacon Hills and the one in charge of protecting the town since Scott had abandoned his duties as alpha of the territory. After Scott's departure, Peter had sent the few werewolves of his abandoned pack out to other packs to take care of them while he stayed there alone. Peter was an omega, but he was far more capable of keeping the people of Beacon Hills safe than Scott and his entire pack had been. Stiles had kept in touch with him while he was studying in Los Angeles. At first it had been to keep up with the threats against Beacon Hills, but everything had settled down in a few months and they had still kept in touch.

Peter didn't know about his situation either, but Stiles felt that he would understand it much better than Derek. Although if Peter told him like that asshole that he was fine like this, Stiles was not responsible for his actions.

Maybe he fell asleep at some point or got too distracted because suddenly a noise made him react and he jumped up. His body took on a fighting pose not unlike a cat instinctively. It was a distant metallic noise, but more sounds followed like footsteps, gates opening and closing, and a heartbeat. He then smelled a person before he even saw it. He heard a kind of hiss and realized it was coming from him. He was a snake now? Then he saw Peter appear from one of the tunnels and the hiss stopped. His legs shook, and he was about to collapse, but then Peter was there to hold him. He tried to call his name, but he had forgotten to breathe and there was no air in his lungs to make his vocal chords vibrate.

“I've got you, I've got you,” Peter whispered, sitting him down on the closest mattress without leaving him.

Stiles shrugged and buried his face in Peter's neck, clutching his shirt with both hands. He had forgotten about the blood that now also stained the wolf's clothing. He sobbed in great relief now that at last he was not alone. One hand stroked his back comforting while the other held him tightly.

“You did a great job,” Peter commented. Stiles frowned and then realized he was talking about the vampire's corpse. “We'll have to burn it to make sure it doesn't resurrect, but decapitation is definitely the best method.”

“Good to know, you can use it with me.”

“Hey, no, don't say that.” Peter hugged him tighter and kissed his hair. “You're going to be fine, you're going to get over this.”

“Peter, I... this... m-my body...” Fuck, he couldn't say it.

“I know. I know, sweetheart. We'll fix it, I'll find a way,” he told him confidently, and his heart didn't give any lies away.

“How are we doing...? Wait, you know?” Stiles lifted his head and looked at him confused.

Peter looked at him almost tenderly, a slight curve on his lips.

“From the beginning, well, from the formal. At first the smell of Adderall prevented me from recognizing the other medications, but then it was clear.”

“So, all werewolves...” The idea that any werewolf, any creature with enhanced senses could...

“No, don't worry, if you don't know how to recognize them, it's difficult to distinguish between medications. I had a friend in college who was also under hormonal treatment, that's why I was able to recognize them.”

“My smell isn't... is...” He had always worried about so many things so that people would not notice his situation and now he had to worry about another one.

“It's slightly different from most boys your age, although mainly because of its lack of smell of semen and most would attribute it to a lack of sexual activity. Anyway, you don't have to worry about it, you will soon be practically scentless.”

Stiles frowned and ducked his head to smell himself. He smelled of blood and other foreign smells, but he could barely smell his personal scent.

“It's a peculiarity of vampires,” Peter explained. “It's the way to recognize them, although the most skilled strive to simulate a human smell.”

“Huh. Well, it's not my main concern right now. What...? Fuck, how am I going to-?”

“We. We're going to fix this, both of us.”

“But how?! I can't even have surgery again! It'd just... again...”

“I know, but I'm sure there's some magic that allows us to recover your body. In ancient times surgeries wasn't an option, but magic is older than science. We'll find the spell we need or create it if necessary,” he said it with such conviction that it made him think it was true, that it was possible.

“Werewolves can't use magic,” he whispered.

“But vampires can. You already had a slight affinity for magic as a human, but now, with a little training, you'll be able to use it without restriction.” That proud smile on his face made him blush (or would have if he could still blush).

“You don't have to-.”

“Shh, none of that. We're going to do this together, don't doubt it.” His expression was determined. Stiles was sure that, even if he refused, Peter would keep trying to help him behind his back.

It was comforting that someone cared so much about him. Stiles sighed in relief and relaxed next to Peter, waiting until it got dark.

Peter took him out of the subway station through its abandoned entrance. It was in the suburbs, a pretty abandoned area in every sense, which was good since he was still covered in blood. Peter's Shelby Cobra was right at the entrance (it was a miracle it hadn't been stolen while they were waiting). It was a shame to stain the extremely expensive upholstery with blood, but he didn't have a choice either, and Peter didn't seem to care.

It took them almost an hour to get to Peter's apartment in one of the highest-class buildings in Los Angeles. It had been his property for years, but he didn't use it often, a few times a year when he went to visit Derek or when Stiles needed help with a research. It was an open, modern space with wooden floors, large windows, and metal, glass, and leather furniture. It was quite impressive, especially the views of the city, but Stiles preferred his house in Beacon Hills, much more homey and full of antiques and books.

“Did you bring your laptop?” Stiles asked.

“I'm afraid not, I was in a bit of a hurry. Why don't you take a shower, and I'll go find yours at your place?”

“I had it with me in my backpack, but I haven't seen it at the station. Maybe he got rid of everything when he kidnapped me.”

“Then I'll go to buy a new one, there'll still be a store open. Make yourself comfortable, there are clothes in the room, take what you want.”

Peter left before Stiles could tell him that he didn't have to buy him a new laptop. It would have been useless anyway, he was that stubborn. Stiles walked into the bathroom and looked at himself in the mirror without thinking, which was a big, big mistake. There was the body that he had worked so hard to change. As if he had done nothing in those years, as if all the suffering had been for nothing. He got into the shower and slammed the glass door. The crystal exploded, falling into small fragments around him. Stiles started crying cowering in the corner of the shower. He was a monster and not just because he was a vampire.

When Peter returned, he didn't say a word. He stepped over the glass and scooped him up, carrying him into the bathroom attached to his bedroom. He sat him on the shower bench and turned on the shower head, not caring about getting wet himself.

“Stiles, tell me if I can take your clothes off or if you want to do it yourself. You have to take a shower, you have to clean this blood.”

At any other time the idea of being naked with that body in front of someone else (in front of himself) would have been terrifying, but he saw the blue eyes that were watching him so worriedly, and he knew that Peter could handle it better than himself. He nodded and raised his arms almost like a zombie. Peter didn't bother to pull the shirt over his head, he just ripped the front with a sharp claw.

“Hey!” he exclaimed in surprise.

“It's beyond saving.”

Peter removed his T-shirt along with the shirt he was wearing on top of it, then lifted him with one arm around his waist and pulled down his pants and boxers. Peter let him sit down again, his body was shaking. He reached for the shower head, and the water washed away the surface blood before Peter scrubbed it all off with the sponge. He was meticulous, cleaning even behind his ears and between his fingers. At some point, Stiles stopped shaking and relaxed under his attentions. Not a single improper touch or look. Stiles wanted to hug him and thank him.

When he finished, Peter turned off the tap and wrapped him in the fluffiest bath robe he had ever seen. They went out into the bedroom, and Peter started looking for clothes in the closets. Even though he didn't live there, there were more clothes than in Stiles' closet.

“Are you tired or hungry?” Peter asked him as he held up a pair of pants in the air to see if they would fit him.

“No, I'm fine, I don't have... Oh, god! I'll have to feed on blood! I'll have to kill!”

Before he could panic, Peter was already there, kneeling in front of him.

“Hey, hey, no killing. First of all, you can feed on the blood of animals. It won't be as satisfying and it won't help you get stronger, but it's possible. Besides, if you wanted to feed on human blood it wouldn't be a problem either. Nowadays it's not hard to have access to a blood bank.”

Stiles snorted a laugh and shook his head.

“Of course.” He couldn't help but smile. After all, Peter was a man of resources like few others. “Sorry about the shower.”

“It's okay, you have to learn to control your new abilities. Put this on,” he said, handing him the clothes. “I know you'll want to star researching right away, but I have to tell you that you should get some rest. Your body has yet to adjust to your new abilities.”

“I can rest with the computer on the bed,” he replied with a shrug.

Peter smiled and brought his new laptop.

“Think about whether you want to stay here or go back to Beacon Hills. Whatever you decide, I'll stay with you, but I think at first it'd be easier in our territory.”

“I'll have to drop out of college,” he realized suddenly. One more thing to add to the long list of misfortunes. “I was so close to finishing the master's degree.”

“You can always follow the classes online.”

Stiles shook his head and took the laptop out of the box. He needed to focus on something, he had to stop thinking about all the things that fell apart in his life.

“The problem is not the classes. In a couple of months, I'd have to start with the internship, and where am I going to do an internship at night? Anyway, what for? What night shift jobs I need my degree for? I'll end up at a gas station or a 24-hour store. I don't need a university degree for that, much less a master's degree.”

He had tried so hard, working to pay for his classes and studying every spare minute to be one of the best in the class. No parties, no friends, no social life, no coming home except in the summer. All that for nothing. Again.

Peter sat next to him and put an arm around his shoulders, letting Stiles lean against him.

“We'll find something. You could be a night class teacher. And if there isn't a school for that, I'll open one.”

Stiles snorted and buried his face in his neck. He knew that Peter wanted to tell him that he didn't have to work, that he had money to spare to support him, and Stiles was grateful that he didn't. Peter knew perfectly well how important it was for him to be self-sufficient.

“Thank you. For everything, Peter, thank you.”

“I'm here for whatever you need, sweetheart.” Peter tightened his arm around him and kissed his head.

He didn't remember Peter being so tactile, or so affectionate, or so close the last time they'd met, but it was probably the only thing keeping him from falling apart right now.

While Stiles was searching the internet and the bestiaries he had uploaded to the cloud for information on vampires, Peter went to collect some things from his apartment. Even if he did not return to Beacon Hills, he would no longer be able to live with his current roommates. Even if they didn't find it strange that he only left his room at night (something that was not entirely unusual among students), they would find the sudden change in his appearance strange.

He texted his father to call him as soon as he could and considered informing the others, but he wasn't ready for that yet. If it had only been the part of turning into a vampire, it would have been easier.

“You should find less naive roommates,” Peter commented when he returned with ALL of his things.

“Then I couldn't have done some of the things I've had to do,” he replied.

He opened the first bag looking for his hard drive. He made regular copies of his computer there just in case.

“When you put it that way.”

Peter took the hard drive out of the inside pocket of his jacket and offered it to him with a smile. Stiles rolled his eyes and returned with the hard drive to the bed. He hadn't moved from there even though there was a perfectly comfortable sofa in the living room.

“Did you tell Derek?” Stiles asked, trying to sound casual.

“No, I won't unless you ask me to. It's your decision to whom and when to tell.”

Stiles nodded tightly and remained focused on the computer. If it had been Scott, half Los Angeles and all of Beacon Hills would already know.

“Did you find anything useful?” Peter asked, sitting down next to him.

“I thought there was a lot of fake shit on the internet about werewolves, but vampires take the cake.” I was researching on the topic of sunlight, you know, to know if I'll turn to ash or glow like a gloworm. But there are so many possibilities, so many variations that not even something so basic is clear.”

Thanks to his studies, he had a better training to know how to distinguish between reliable sources and junk sources, but it didn't help in something like that. One might think that hunters with their vast knowledge could be a reliable source, but experience told him to doubt every word that appeared in their bestiaries and forums.

“I can assure you that you won't glow like a gloworm and, please, don't read that garbage full of toxic relationships again, it leaves us all in a very bad place.”

“I haven't read it! I've only seen memes on the internet,” he replied. Peter looked at him with an arched eyebrow, and Stiles lowered his head. “Okay, maybe I read the first one out of curiosity. Anyway, do you know anything about that? The sunlight thing, I mean.”

“I can't say for sure, but as far as I know, right now your skin would burn and then your muscles down to the bone. Over time, when you get stronger, you'll be more resistant. You may not be able to expose yourself to the midday light, but you may hold out longer during dawn and dusk.”

“Mm... That matches Anne Rice's type of vampires,” he mused, opening the folder named in precisely that way.

“I have good books at home on vampires, and I can get more, don't worry. I can also speak with some contacts. Vampires are quite closed about their nature, which is understandable, but if I explain your situation to them, some of them may decide to help us.”

Stiles squeezed his knee with one hand and smiled at him. It was a miracle that he could still smile.

TBC...

(The Trans Bingo Card btw)

[deuynndoodles]

read on ao3 or click read more!

suspicion increase by deuynndrabbles and @whimsicalweast

Dipper pulls out the paper in his pocket, unfurls it, and shows the paper to the black-haired boy.

“Ever heard of this ghost?”

He immediately blinks at the ghost on the paper.

“I might’ve heard of him,” he finally says.

(There’s a new ghost showing his face in Gravity Falls, and the twins have resolved to find him and find out if he’s malevolent or benevolent. At least that black-haired boy named “Danny” has offered to help them find this strange elusive ghost, unlike any they’ve seen before.)

3.2k | ch. one

Dipper wakes up to an irritating beeping.

He’s immediately awake, and he rises to check where it’s coming from. The brunet easily finds it’s coming from the supernatural equipment Ford brought along, due to the fact they’re camping in the supernatural forest.

Looking to Mabel, he finds she’s still fast asleep. She’s drooling onto her cat pillow, headband resting on the ground beside her rainbow sleeping bag. Her hair is all askew due to this, even messier than it is during the day. Mabel is still wearing a sweater, this one a pale green with a blonde puppy on the front.

Dipper rummages through his bag and pulls out the source of the incessant beeping.

Dipper blinks in surprise when the screen turns on, despite the faint yellow glow. He squints as his eyes adjust, and there are two blaring words at the top of the screen-

‘GHOST NEARBY.’

The device beeps for a second, before displaying a radar. There’s a huge white dot about half a mile away (he doesn’t know for sure, he’s just guessing) and various smaller dots that are more faded.

He sits and pauses, considering his options. On one hand, there’s a big chance for family bonding with Great Uncle Ford and searching for the supposed ghosts. After all, it is the reason they are here. (Aside from camping, Mabel insisted on that part.) He eyes his dead-asleep (ha) great-uncle, sleeping in the tent next to them through the bug screen.

Ford’s been swamped with work the entire week, and this camping trip is a possible getaway from everything. (Seriously, Mabel insisted.) It’s been the first night that Dipper’s actually seen the man get some shut-eye. Between running the Mystery Shack (Soos couldn’t be trusted with the financials), travelling with Stan, and dealing with magical/supernatural entities, Ford has enough on his plate already.

So Dipper decides to let Ford sleep.

Dipper bites his lip in concentration and checks the noisy device once more, the strength meter bouncing between level one and two. Dipper nods to himself in confirmation, as if to solidify his decision.

Surely, he can take care of a level two ghost on his own.

A sudden worry strikes him, the idea that Ford will be upset with him for going out on his own. That he’ll be upset that he misses this opportunity.

But then another thought follows this, and it’s the reminder that Ford needs his sleep. It’s better for one person to research than not exploring the ghost at all.

Besides, they’re bound to find more interesting spirits on this camping trip. It’s several days long. There'll be more interesting ghosts rather than a plain old stray level 2 wandering the area. There'll be more exciting discoveries to have together.

Throwing on his trusty blue-and-white snapback and his navy blue vest, he snatches his bag filled to the brim with ghost hunting equipment and heaves it onto his back.

Dipper turns his head to glance at his twin sister again, who has turned into her sleep and is now facing away from him. Her snores fill the tent, and he gives a slight smile and unzips the tent open.

Stepping out, he zips the tent shut and pulls a flashlight out of the bag, clicking it on and letting the beeping machine in his right hand lead the way into the nearly pitch black darkness.

Fallen leaves and twigs crunch underneath his sneakers, the moonlight barely making it through the canopy of leaves above. It makes it so the only possible light Dipper has is the faint light from the spectral device and his bright flashlight.

Despite this, he paves his way forward nervously, wary of knobby roots sticking out from overgrown shrubbery and and leaves he could possibly trip on.

It feels like Dipper walks forever, but the tracker says he hasn’t gotten any closer to his destination. Despite this, he will not give in.

A gust of wind rattles the brittle branches above his head and Dipper curls in slightly in on himself, regretting not having grabbed a thicker coat.

A shiver runs down his spine, and he’s not sure if it’s fear or just general chill.

A branch snaps somewhere behind him and Dipper spins around reflexively, brandishing his flashlight. (He’s not quite sure if it’s that effective, unless it’s some kind of mythological creature that has a weakness to light. He doesn’t stop, if only to relieve himself.)

His grip tightens around the ghost tracker in his hand, wary eyes jerking around along with the beam of light from the flashlight.

Dipper can hear nothing but the racing of his own heartbeat, the uneven breaths he takes in, and the steady beeping of the device in his hand; he does not let his guard down. The young teen takes in a deep breath, attempting to even his diaphragm. His eyes sweep the landscape, but he sees nothing.

He narrows his eyes at the lack of activity. It’s fairly odd, but he is in the middle of the forest in the middle of the night, so some things can be forgiven.

Instead of relying on sight, Dipper turns to the machine in his right hand for guidance. It continues to beep incessantly, remaining as before with the exact same words plastered at the top and the radar showing an ectoplasmic entity in front of him. The only difference he finds the white dot is closer, and the level counter toward the bottom of the screen is higher.

…

Wait, what?

Dipper does a double-take, but the screen does not change. What used to be a ghost around level two is now a staggering level five, and continues to steadily rise.

Dread pools in Dipper’s gut. He jerks his head back and forth, starting to panic, searching the landscape for the ghost as the white noise of the beeping suddenly is no longer white noise and is it speeding up? Great Uncle Ford talked about this to him, but for the life of him he can’t recall what it means. The sound grows louder and it’s starting to grate on his ears, and he shoves the device in his pocket and sticks the flashlight in his mouth, using his now free hands to cover his ears.

Dipper takes a breath to calm the rising fear inside his chest, but it isn’t effective.

There’s an abrupt cacophony from behind him, making him jump. He turns to the bag hanging off his shoulder frantically and finds that every possible instrument contained in the fabric was going off. Chimes, bird tweets, beeping, you name it.

(As he shoves a hand into the bag and attempts to silence the racket, Dipper fails to notice the device settled in his pocket is beeping even more rapidly and signals a presence higher than a possible limit on the screen.)

As if things can’t get any worse, he finds the bulb in his flashlight sparking and then dying right then and there.

And then there’s silence.

It fills him with dread incomparable to what he felt before.

Dipper’s breath catches for not the first time that night, and he freezes as he realizes there is no sound at all.

The silence presses on his ears, and he attempts to fill it by hitting the side of the flashlight with the heel of his palm, pretending his terror is nonexistent. The sound is a quiet whump and he cries to himself, trying to make it work.

It doesn’t, and instead, the echo of Dipper’s failed attempts sound in the pitch-black clearing (is it a clearing? He can only guess due to the fact he hasn’t stumbled into a tree yet). The newfound hush that’s fallen over the forest like a cozy blanket does nothing to help his nerves.

In fact, it makes him much, much more nervous.

Dipper isn’t sure how long it takes until the flashlight fizzles back into view, and he lets out a sigh of indescribable belief.

He reaches into his pocket and grabs the device, and the screen graces him with an entirely blank black canvas.

Dipper furrows his brow, his terror forgotten for a split second before the implications sink in. It means the ghost is gone, which does mean that he doesn’t get the chance to catch it and his efforts were in vain. And all he gets is a bag of broken machines. But it also means that he can actually head back to the tent, so he’s happy about that.

(Ford will be disappointed in him.)

He sighs and kicks a rock illuminated by the dim light of his flashlight, turning his head and starts to head back.

Wait a minute.

Which direction is the campsite again?

Dipper freezes, his hand going slack and the light pointing straight down at the ground.

There’s a crack from behind and he whirls around, meeting eyes with a pale black-haired boy, his blue eyes reflecting the light directed at him.

“Oh, uh. Hi?”

There’s a split second, and Dipper opens his mouth. (No, Dipper did not scream. And even if he did, it was incredibly manly, thank you very much.)

-

Danny stands awkwardly in the middle of a forest, in his ghost form, nervously rubbing the back of his neck. To be honest, he isn’t quite sure of how he got here. Just a few seconds ago he was flying through the Zone on a visit to the Far Frozen.

He can only assume that a natural portal popped up right as he passed into it. But for now, he’s just currently stuck in a place he doesn’t know.

He takes to the air, getting a good view of the landscape. The night sky is splattered with stars, and he smiles at the pretty sight.

Danny decides to sit on one of the taller trees, taking a spot on a higher branch and he watches the moon. He does this for who knows how long.

At least, he does until the branch cracks from his weight.

Danny knows he’s fairly light, in both human and ghost form. He isn’t sure how the branch broke, but it did and now he’s hurtling to the ground.

As he lands, he turns human in a wave of warmth and light. It’s unbidden, and he flicks some stray dirt off his t-shirt and licks his scratches. Danny steps out of the bush and belatedly realizes the world around him has gone quiet.

There’s a boy in front of him, having whirled around and the flashlight in his hands is directed straight into Danny’s eyes.

He looks fairly young, his huge blue-and-white pine cap dwarfing the rest of his body. Fluffy brown hair sticks out, partially covering his freckled face and wide hazelnut eyes stare at him gawkingly.

“Oh, uh. Hi?”

And the boy screams like a little girl.

-

Dipper isn’t quite sure what he expected, but brandishing a flashlight like a weapon at a teenager rubbing the back of his neck is definitely not it.

He only sees a hint of black hair and pale skin for a split second, before his brain catches up and tells him to put down his flashlight.

“So, what brings ya out here?” The boy says to Dipper, and he tries to calm himself by taking in a deep breath. (It doesn’t work, he should’ve expected that.)

“That’s something I should be asking you,” he says defensively, pretending as though he didn’t scream.

Dipper hears a quiet chuckle. “I came out here to stargaze, pretty much. Then the time flew by. Time flies when you’re majestically falling out of trees.” The last sentence is said confidently, but it only makes Dipper more uncomfortable.

“Yeah, sure,” Dipper says under his breath. He still doesn’t quite trust this stranger.

“Still though,” the teen says, and Dipper can imagine him looking to the side casually. “Why are you out here by yourself, kiddo?”

(Dipper wants to bark back “You’re a kiddo too” but finds that he doesn’t have the words. You can’t exactly say, “Oh yeah, just snuck out in the middle of the night to find a ghost only to get lost in the woods. No biggie.”)

So instead, he replies hastily with, “I came out here for a walk. Couldn’t sleep.”

(It’s the truth, just not the whole truth. But the other teenager doesn’t need to know that.)

The teenager lets out a sudden laugh. “Yeah, I get’cha.” He pauses before he says, “I like to, uh, take walks too. In the middle of the night. Yeah.” It’s said quite uncertainly, and Dipper raises his brow.

(Danny can see the kid raise his brow at his suspicious wording and almost sweats nervously. Thankfully the kid can’t see him so he’ll get away with it.)

“Anyways, it’s getting dark.” The teen says in a by-the-way tone of voice.

No shit, sherlock. It’s been dark for a while.

“You should be getting home. I mean, I should too, but yeah. Your family might get worried if they can’t find you in the morning.” (A little bit of his Phantom persona seems to be seeping in.) “I dunno if it’s just me, but kids back home aren’t too happy to stay out this late without a friend, at least.”

Dipper isn’t sure what the boy says next, as it’s muttered under his breath. (But is it just him going crazy, or was that something about ghosts?)

Dipper casts his eyes to the ground, his flashlight following. “I don’t really remember where I was,” he finds himself saying. As he says this, he bites his lip lest he say more. He grips the strap across his chest a little tighter.

“Ah, d’ya want some help getting back, then?” His tone is genuinely friendly, and it only adds to Dipper’s initial embarrassment.

The brunet almost declines the offer but then realizes he likely has a better chance getting back with someone who knew the woods rather than roughing it alone with no guide. His ghost hunting device sits heavily in his pocket, as a reminder of how he has no other way to get back.

After all, the idea of being left to fend for himself in the pitch black night, his flashlight possibly breaking again. . . it isn’t very appealing. He could stray further from the campsite, or even die.

“Okay.” Dipper nods in confirmation, knowing he won’t see it, but it makes him feel better so he still does it.

Somehow, they find themselves walking through a forest, with the occasional tweet tweet of a bird calling out. Morning must be approaching soon, as the sky dyes a deep indigo rather than pitch black. Both of them are silent.

(Danny finds the silence awkward, and he glances up at the open expanse above him. He’s briefly reminded of the peace just a few hours before of staring at the stars, and then attempts to strike up a conversation. It makes things easier when they walk out into a clearing.)

“You see that really bright star?” he asks, and Dipper nods out of courtesy. “That’s actually several stars, it just looks like one because of where we are in space right now.” He smiles, and pulls his hand down. “It’s actually my favorite. I just like the message it has in astrology.”

Dipper doesn’t really study the topic of space, but he can still admit it’s fascinating. And seeing the teen beside him speak so highly of the topic makes him want to research it later. He makes a mental note to ask Great Uncle Ford about the concept of space.

“Oh look! You probably know this one already, but that’s the Big Dipper,” the stranger mentions, and Dipper looks away.

“Yeah, I know about it.” Dipper doesn’t elaborate. Silently, discreetly, he brushes a hair out of his face. Danny remains silent before pointing out another star.

This is how the conversation goes until Dipper steps into a clearing, his flashlight illuminating two twin tents. He can hear his sister snoring, and he knows he’s back.

He gives out a relieved sigh. Dipper gives the boy a quick “thank you” out of obligation, and then realizes he’s forgotten something. He turns to ask the boy for his name.

There's nobody there.

Dipper blinks, and then he sees a light above the trees. The glow reminds him of a ghost, and he squints up at it.

It is a ghost, that’s for sure. It seems to wear a black jumpsuit, with snow white hair. But the most startling thing? Its glowing, acidic neon green eyes.

Dipper blinks again, and it’s gone.

-

Dipper is manning the register and Mabel is sitting on the floor, finishing sticking glitter all over Waddles with a huge grin on her face.

He spreads a paper over the counter, eyeing the ghost depicted on it (the one he saw last week). “Ugh, this is one elusive ghost.”

There’s a sound, and Dipper raises his head to stare at a vaguely familiar looking boy. His hands are shoved into the pockets of baggy jeans, and his scruffy black hair falls into his face. It doesn’t hide his expression, but Dipper can’t quite identify it so he leaves it.

“Did you say ghosts?” The teen asks, tilting his head slightly.

“What about it?” He says, rolling up the paper and stashing it away in his pocket.

The brunet looks off to the side and fiddles with the fold on his pocket. “I dunno, my parents are ghost hunters. S’kinda hard not to learn a thing or two 'bout them, so I might be able to help.

(Danny weighs over the words and finally decides on sharing that minor detail. It’s not like he’s sharing their surname after all.

It doesn’t take away from the fact the words feel awkward in his mouth, because he’s spent his whole life denying his parents believed in the impossible. Now, he’s the impossible, and he can’t really say no to them anymore. But he doesn’t stop denying his parents.)

Mabel pops into Dipper’s realm of sight, and before he can make a gesture to stop, she grins and immediately says, “Yeah! That’d be awesome!” Her grin is even wider, which seems almost impossible, but she’s done much odder things. (Like that time she made several clones of herself to naysay his own self. That was odd.)

“Mabel!” He scolds. “You’ve never even seen this guy before!” He can’t exactly say the same for himself, as he’s still struggling to place where he knows the teen from.

Mabel leans over and shields her mouth to whisper to him. “Exactly. Ain’t he cute?”

“You can’t just try and kiss every boy you think is cute,” Dipper groans. He speaks the next sentence louder. “Yeah, sure. We’ll take any help we can get.”

Dipper pulls out the paper in his pocket, unfurls it, and shows the paper to the black-haired boy.

“Ever heard of this ghost?”

The teen immediately blinks at the ghost on the paper.

“I might’ve heard of him,” he finally says.

[aka-ashi-keiji]

Shinsou’s Safe Place ☔️

( this is a headcanon based on an oc designed by @kiyozichan on tiktok, shes awesome and her content makes me super happy! she gave me permission to use her oc for a this headcanon. go follow her for Haikyuu and My Hero Academia content!!! First is an overview of the oc and then we’ll get into the headcanon. enjoy lovies )

Kiyozi kai (aizawa’s adopted daughter) (shinsou’s gf) 

quirk: magnification through whistle and transfer whistle to head (causes victim to pass out)  

drawback: extreme drowsiness that can lead to sleep induced comas

costume: black  pants w dark wine red belt buckle , black shirt, dark wine red  thigh harnesses, aizawa’s binders,dark wine red ballet shoes, forest green fingerless gloves. 

Physical features: aizawa hair w/ platinum highlights, cut above shoulders

personality: introverted mainly, until she gets comfortable. Closed off because of trauma, very good at comebacks, especially with bakugou. Connects to shoto through quietness, good friends with deku. Part of bakusquad, not as loud as them but eventually gets to their level. 

Plot: Shinsou’s reaction after she falls into a really deep sleep because she over used her quirk. 

****************************************************

(Outside Pov)

- Kai has been going at this for hours, literal hours. 

- Her breath was uneven and rigid in a sense, she could feel her chest shake as she breathed in through her mouth

- lips cracked from the use of her quirk, Aizawa could see she was nearing her end. But  he knew she needed to do this. 

- Today class 1-A was given the gym to develop ultimate moves. however, kai’s quirk being slightly physical but mostly mental, she had struggled all throughout the training course. 

- The rest of the students had been sat  outside to wait for Aizawa and Kai. Aizawa thought maybe being by herself would allow her to unleash the power she had felt she needed to hold back. 

- He watched carefully as she brought her left leg back, and planted the right hard into the ground.

- Kai’s hands came up to a fighting stance and curled in her pinky and ring fingers, leaving her hands in gun shapes. 

- she focuses on the air flow around her and how it enters her own oxygen supply. 

- She feels every molecule enter her system and leave with a single breath. 

- Kai breathes deep into the bottom of her diaphragm, one last breath before she pushes her quirk to the very limit just to get this ultimate move. Just once. 

-  She feels that air flow start to increase into her lungs, and her whistle starts at a pitch so low, she can barely hear it. 

- Kiyozi can make objects float towards her with her whistle by going from a high pitch, to a low pitch. And she can make things repel from her doing vice versa. 

- She slowly works up her whistles pitch to an frequency that she can now hear, and so could aizawa. It was close to an uncomfortable ring, but it wasn’t anything unbearable. 

- Kai began to move her hands in circles to help he feel the air flow better, with this the frequency only increased. 

- Aizawa watched carefully, ready to stop her quirk if he saw any true signs she was at her end, and he could sense she was. But, he still waited. 

- The way Kiyozi’s ultimate move works is that she bring her whistle up to half her power then drops to the lowest frequency to draw air towards her. But, after she instantly brings her whistle back up to it’s highest frequency which causes the air to be propelled away from her. This causes a form of hurricane. 

- Kiyozi had reached half her maximum power, and she could see her hands start to shake, and her flow of air started to waver. 

- Drowsiness was starting to fog her brain. 

- she knew that if she pushed any harder, her quirk would get pushed over the edge. Aizawa knew this as well. 

- She had to do this, she had to. She was so close to mastering it, and there was no way she was going to let the rest of the class get ahead. 

- she quietly damned herself for being one of the only hero students with a mental quirk. 

- Kai lowered her whistle quickly, but kept the stream of air steady. It was right there, she could feel it.

- Right as she started to raise the frequency, she heard her dad’s voice scream through the intercom

- “Kai stop! You’re at your end!” Aizawa screamed

- he didn’t activate his quirk fast enough as you unleashed the hurricane from your lips and blew over the towering rock formation within the arena. 

- Once it had stopped, Kiyozi felt the darkness engulf her vision and her body. 

- Last thing she remembers is seeing aizawa running towards in what seems like slow motion as a could of smoke clouds her vision.

{ time skip like 10 minutes lmao }

- aizawa had rushed down to the arena and lifted kiyozi into his arms.

- he carefully examined her as he rushed her out of the arena, towards the rest of the students outside.

- he noticed blood dripping from her head, that wasn’t good at all. especially since she was asleep, that was a sign of a concussion.

- he came outside and all of 1-a stopped their rough housing to try and comprehend the situation.

- shinsou was the first to rush over and take her from aizawa’s arms.

- “what the hell happened! you said you wouldn’t let her get to this point!” he spoke roughly, but still trying to keep his composure in fear of getting expelled for disrespecting a teacher.

- bakugou was the next to move, he was her best friend after all. katsuki would never admit it, but seeing her hurt and lifeless like that crushed his soul.

- he made his way over to the three of them with fire raging through his eyes, down his arms and into his hands.

- he tried to get closer to kai to see her, but shinsou stepped back far enough to keep her out of reach.

- “what the fuck bushy hair?!!! let me see her”

- “you’ll just hurt her more, you’re steaming bakugou”

- “i don’t give a shit, i need to make sure she’s fucking alive”

- at this point bakugou was ready to blast shinsou’s head clean off his shoulders, that was until aizawa stepped between them.

- “bakugou, i can assure you she’s fine. she has a head injury but other than that this is just a minor coma. this is her drawback from overusing her quirk. however, it would be nice for you two to stop yelling so we can get her proper medical help” aizawa said this all with his voice low and unbothered.

- however, if you listened closely, you could hear his voice shake in the slightest bit.

- bakugou grumbled and slowly backed up so aizawa could lead shinsou with kiyozi back to the main building.

- aizawa was walking faster than usual and shinsou was having a hard time carrying kai as she was entirely limp in his arms.

- he watched as her head lolled against his chest, he noticed how lifeless she truly looked.

- this was the first time shinsou had seen kai use her quirk far enough to put her out of commission. it scared the living shit out of him seeing her like this.

- kiyozi and shinsou had been dating for around 3 months now. no one knew except for aizawa.

- everyone just assumed you guys were close because aizawa trained shinsou separately, and aizawa was your dad.

- shinsou, kai, and aizawa hurried into recovery girls office and shinsou gently placed her down on the table.

- recovery girl slowly made her way in and asked for the full story.

- shinsou was usually good at handling his nerves, but as aizawa explained what happened during training. he couldn’t get his hands to stop shaking.

- he heard the sound of what would have been kissing and turned to see recovery girl healing kiyozi’s head

- “she has minor cuts along her head but no internal damage, her quirk drawback will continue as usual. she should be awake in a few hours. watch her closely though, you guys know how those mental quirks can be” recovery girl said as she helped aizawa lift her carefully over his shoulder.

- they walked out and around the building aizawa’s car. he carefully placed kiyozi across the backseat as shinsou took the front.

- aizawa got behind the wheel and started to back out and headed towards his house.

- shinsou’s leg was shaking purfusely, he tried to ease it by watching the trees pass behind them as they drove.

- aizawa reached over a placed a hand on his shoulder, gentle but there. just letting his student know he’s there.

- “she’s gonna be alright. i’ve seen it worse than this. i know this is new to you but i assure you she will come to soon” shinsou just nodded his head, but at that his leg has calmed a bit.

- the rest of the ride was filled with silence and shinsou craning his neck to see kai sprawled across the back seat, face still holding that lifeless expression.

-they arrived at aizawa’s house and he asked shinsou to carry her inside, which shinsou gladly did

- he slid her out the car and back into his arms. he kicked the car door shut and held her under her thighs as her upper half rested against his chest and shoulders.

- he leaned forward and pressed a kiss into kai’s shoulder and whispered

- “you gotta be alright flower, i’ll make sure of it”

{ timeskip 5 hours }

- kai woke with a gasp and grunt escaping her. she’s had sleep apnea since she was a child along with insomnia. (father like daughter)

- but, sleep apnea causes a person to stop breathing in their sleep. so when kiyozi does, her nervous system wakes her and she gasps for air when she does come to.

- she scanned her surroundings, trying to figure where the hell she was and how she got there.

- kiyozi’s vision was still incredibly fuzzy so details about where she was were barely visible

- she kicked off her blanket and noticed she wasn’t in hero costume anymore, but back in the shirt she wore to bed the night before.

- kai heard running down the hall and expected to see her dad, but then she remembered he wouldn’t run inside of the house.

- the door creeks open and shinsou’s head pops in, looking more timid than anyone would’ve expected.

- “shinsou! what are you doing here? it’s like 8pm” kai exclaimed as she tried to cover her lower half back up, the thought dawning on her that she wasn’t wearing pants

- “ oh right, i should’ve knocked. i’m sorry zi, i can go get your dad instead. he’s asleep on the couch” shinsou said as he entered her room, but kept close to the door frame.

- kiyozi put her hands up and waved them in time with shaking her head. “no it’s okay i promise, come in. i need catching up on everything, my memory is a little foggy”

- she laughed as she said it, but shinsou’s expression as he sat beside her gave it away that it wasn’t a laughing matter.

- kiyozi laid her head on shinsou’s strong shoulder, the stray pieces of purple hair tickling her cheek.

- shinsou let out a long shakey sigh that made kai look up at him, except when she did her heart broke.

- a single year rolled down his face and he reached over to hold her hand.

- kiyozi sat up and looked directly at his side profile, waiting for him to follow her actions.

- “shinsou, hun are you okay? did i say something wrong?”

- shinsou shook his head and turned to face you.

- shinsou wasn’t the biggest fan of physical contact, even if kai was his girlfriend. they would occasionally hug and steal a kiss from each other but other than that it was just some hand holding. nothing too clingy.

- so when he turned and grabbed the sides of kai’s face and pressed her to his chest, she was so surprised she had to hold her breath to keep her from gasping.

- she felt his chest shake as he let another broken cry, kissing the top of her head over and over, muttering something kai couldn’t exactly hear.

- she tried to pull away to hug him properly but he shook his head hard and pushed her head farther into his chest.

- it took time, but kai finally understood why shinsou was so upset. he was scared she was going to leave.

- kiyozi took his hand from her head and wrapped his arms around her waist, she then took his head pressed it to her chest. right where her heart was so that he could hear that she was still there.

- when they finally both stilled, shinsou let out the loudest and most broken sob kai had every heard.

- she brushed her fingers through his hair as she shushed him.

- he squeezed her tighter as he spoke into her shirt.

- “i- i thought you were going to be gone, i thought you were gonna leave me for good. i didn’t think i would ever get to hold you like this again. i can’t lose you zi, i really can’t. i can’t lose the one person that actually made me feel worthy of being here.”

- zi took her hands and placed them on his shoulders as he pulled away to look her in the eyes, his eyes pink and puffy.

- “i’m not gonna leave you, id never do anything that would put us in a situation to be separated forever. my dad wouldn’t let that happen. he’s there to make sure i don’t get to this point during real fights. i promised you i’d be here forever, and i meant it.”

- kai took her hand and placed it on shinsou’s cheek.

- “sweetheart, you don’t ever have to worry about me walking out. i’m here for good. i’m here for you, forever”

- and with that being said, kai leaned forward and connected her lips to his gently.

- shinsou leaned into the kiss, trying to burn the feeling of it into his brain. he’d never say this to her out loud, but her kisses melted him down to the core.

- when they pulled away, shinsou hugged around kais shoudlers and she hugged his waist, burying her face into the scent of his shirt.

- ‘he smells like my house’ she thought.

- but then again. shinsou always did to her. because he was zi’s forever home.

************************************************

[ this was rough but i tried my hardest, i hope you liked it zi! you are one of my greatest forms of comedic relief and i love you, thank you so much❤️ ]

@yamshoe

[ecccentrick]

Jaskier Should Really Listen To Geralt pt. 2

Pt.1 || Pt. 3 || Ao3

This is my last writing post here, since I now have a writing blog @eccentrick-ramblings. Prompts and requests are open.  

--

Jaskier had many talents. He could sing, write, dance, play multiple instruments, and was something of a scholar, if did say so himself. But one talent that was known but was hardly spoken of in polite company was the one that was going to get him out of this situation alive. 

He was going to slut it up.

Making himself relax back into the bed, he slid one of his hands through the monster’s thick hair, humming as though content with the current state of things. The creature’s hand of steel relaxed minutely against Jaskier’s stomach and he forced himself not to take a shuddering breath, instead breathing from his diaphragm. 

“So you’re one of those, huh?” Jaskier asked, letting his voice go slightly rough. 

The monster stiffened. 

“Of what?”

Jaskier widened his legs. The beast nestled deeper between them, his whole upper body splaying across Jaskier’s. He tried not to take that as the threat it surely was. 

Turning his head so that his lips brushed against the monster’s ear at every syllable, he said, “Hm, one of those men who enjoys roleplay of the, uh, should I say, unconventional sort? Can’t say I’ve come across too many, but I’m always willing to give things a try.”

The beast pulled back from Jaskier’s neck to stare into his eyes, like he was going to ask if Jaskier was truly that dumb and horny. And Jaskier could hear Geralt’s reply in his mind, yes. 

Wait. Geralt.

Shit.

Okay, so Jaskier had a new idea. He wouldn’t just deescalate the situation like previously planned, stall until Geralt came back empty handed and frustrated. Jaskier would actually have to save himself this time. And, now that he thought about it, the rest of the residents of the inn. 

He was beginning to realize why Geralt was so crotchety all the damn time.

Something in the monster’s eyes changed, a dawning understanding and anticipation. It was feral and raw and Jaskier met it with one of his own, shifting his hips up. He almost had it. 

With one hand still in its hair, he trailed the other up its torso, gently touching its sides, before getting to its shoulder blades, fingertips clenching the muscle and bone there, digging his fingernails in hard enough that if it were a human, there would surely be marks left behind. 

“What is it you have in mind?” The beast slurred his words, despite having only one watered down ale that evening. 

The hand holding Jaskier down raised up, higher and higher, until it came around his neck, a soft shackle. His heart beat double time, and he sucked in a breath that he could still blessedly take, for now. 

His mind blanked for a few seconds, because, to be completely honest, this beast was hitting all of Jaskier’s buttons. If this man were a human, they would surely get up to some great fun. Jaskier couldn’t stop himself from thinking about Geralt. Geralt leaning over him, Geralt holding him down, Geralt’s calloused and scarred hand around his neck, holding him in place, stealing his breath. 

Without having the feign a moan, Jaskier said, “Well, why don’t you chase me?” he dug his nails in deeper. “Capture me. Hunt me down.”

The beast sucked in a harsh breath and Jaskier knew he had him, once and for all. Better or for worse. 

“Perhaps I should give you a head start?” the monster asked. “But you’d have to be quiet, not wake anyone up. Wouldn’t want anyone to be in the crosshairs of a hunt, now would you?”

--

The creaking of the stairs almost did him in. 

The innkeeper had muted the lights in the dining area, leaving them only bright enough to cast shadows and create a sense of unease. Or perhaps that was because he had a beast after him, coming for his blood. Literally. 

He tried to move quietly. The steps creaked. That small sound, so inconsequential, made him realize all that was at stake. The innkeeper, who now most likely slept in the kitchen so her guests could have the rooms, the father and child that were staying in the room next to his, and the orange cat that liked to slink around guests' ankles...their lives were all in jeopardy, and only Jaskier being a good little lamb to slaughter might save them.

What the beast didn’t know was that the lamb intended to lead it to its end. 

He opened the door slowly, silently. Fresh air filled his lungs, crisp and cool. The moon was high in the sky, lighting the way for Jaskier, his socked feet kicking up dust as he went from a slow creep to a desperate sprint in a span of seconds. 

The village was close to a forest, and knowing it was the best place for cover, Jaskier ran for it. Once treetops came overhead, he stopped for a quick breather and to orient himself. 

Geralt always told Jaskier what direction he’d be going in on any hunt. It wasn’t always that way; the bard searching and finding an overdosed witcher next to a dead leshen after he failed to arrive back at the tavern set that to rights. Luckily Jaskier had memorized Geralt’s potions long ago, or he’d be dead and buried. 

Geralt had told him he was heading southwest, which was. . .which way was it? He was fucked, wasn’t he? And not even by a deathless death like all scandalous bards want to go out. 

“Okay, let’s see. Eeny, meene, miny. . .moe! This way then.” 

He dashed in that direction, heading deeper into the woods. He ran until his legs burned, until the wagon roads gave way to deer tracks, until there was nothing but trees, brush and silence. Not even an owl dared to hoot. The monster was here coming for him. 

Jaskier took a deep breath, filling his lungs to their capacity. And then, in that creepy quiet, he screamed. 

“GERALT! GERALT! GERALLLT IT’S AFTER MEEEE!” 

Waiting only a beat, Jaskier continued his flight. There was no sign of the grumpy witcher, and he just gave away his ruse. Perhaps the fear had addled his mind. He should’ve been sneakier, hid in a hollow tree stump, or something. Taken his perfume bottle with him and doused a trail of potent fragrance behind each step. But, then, the monster could follow that too. Hell, even a particularly observant human would’ve been able to trace him; he always bought the strong stuff. 

“DAMMIT!”

He was soon lost, hopelessly and completely. The lights from the village had long since dimmed and he didn’t know which way was the way back. At least if the monster got to him, the others might be spared until Geralt could find it and kill it. His death wouldn’t be in vain. Perhaps he’d even become a local hero. 

A branch to his left cracked. A rustling, then a growl. Footsteps, and then the monster revealed himself, moving from shadows and into the moonlight. It was a great entrance, the bard had to give him that. Points for the dramatics. At the very least, Jaskier wouldn’t die a boring death. 

“It’s as I thought. You were running to your witcher. I’d be angry, but that’ll make this more interesting.”

Jaskier grit his teeth. “You’re awfully arrogant for a monster in the sights of a witcher. The White Wolf. You’ll be dead by morning and Geralt and I will be walking the Path again.”

The beast came closer, his steps measured and sure. Suddenly, he was at Jaskier’s side, a hand at his delicate neck and another on his right shoulder. Back, back, back the monster pushed him, until he hit the nearest tree, bark digging into his exposed neck. He squeezed Jaskier’s neck, bringing a wheeze from the bard’s lips.

“Why. . .” the hand tightened and the longing to cough almost made him gag, “Why me?” 

“Because of your blood, it smells so rare, so fine. None of these backwater hicks taste of anything but the dirt under my boots. But you. . .such fresh nectar.”

“Th-That’s a little insulting,” he took a harsh gulp of air, and it whistled in his throat. “That you- only - wanted me - my blood - not my - da-dashing good-”

“Enough, Jaskier. Save your breath.”

 “G-Ger-”

His back, once against rough bark, was now against a hard chest. And there was that band of steel around his neck. Air fought to get into his lungs, and his voice demanded to be heard but he couldn’t talk, couldn’t make the words form on his lips. Eyes bulged and the skin of his face heated. He was being strangled, and instead of a thoughtless tumor it was at the will of someone who chose to steal his breath until he had none left. 

Soft hands tore against steel. Feet dug into earth, kicked and scrambled, never meeting anything solid besides the ground. Reason fled his mind, and he was just a vessel. A vessel that wanted free. 

“Jaskier, stay calm!” Geralt’s voice reached his ears, echoing. Oh, there was still some hope. He might survive. 

“So I see that you’re a coward,” Geralt said. 

Jaskier was about to be offended until the beast spoke. 

“You’re trying to appeal to my ego. You do care for this bard, then?” 

Geralt was all wobbly and misty, like he was made of liquid bones. His eyes were black, veins a dark gray. Jaskier tried to squint, rapidly blink, but he wouldn’t stay put, wouldn’t go back to normal. 

His throat ached. 

“Let the bard go. He played his part of the bait, now let him go and we can end this. You...you hunt and kill the weak and expect not to be confronted? Take a hostage, a meat shield. Pathetic and cowardly.” 

“I don’t think I’m going to do that. I’m probably all of those things, now that I think about it, and I don’t rightly care. Now, can’t you see I’m celebrating a holiday? The moon is full.”

“Higher vampire. Shit.”

The vampire laughed and that’s when things got fuzzy for Jaskier. He wanted to come out of his skin, wanted to be able to see clearly. His heart felt like it wanted to gallop out of his chest and race Roach. 

“You know what? I’ll just save this for later.”

A prickling sensation started at his side and spread, tendrils of numbness. It quickly became a burning feeling and with it came air, blessed air. The ground met his body. The steel band was gone.

He took a few moments to catch his breath. Each gulp of air felt like swallowing hot coals, his lungs screaming. Once clarity disrupted the fog over Jaskier’s mind he trailed a shaking hand to his side. It came back sticky with blood. He glanced up and saw the vampire lick long, protruding claw-like nails.

In the wise words of Geralt of Rivia, fuck. 

[anotherbeingsworld]

Fight Club

Book: Open Heart

Pairing: Bryce x F!MC (Casey Valentine) 

Characters: Bryce Lahela, Kyra Santana, mentions of MC (Casey Valentine)

Warning: mentions of death.

Word Count: 1270

Disclaimer: All characters belong to Pixelberry. Some of the dialogue was taken from the respective chapter.

Summary: A scene where Bryce tries to convince Kyra for his to help her about her situation. Inspired by the final scene with Bryce, Kyra and MC in Book 2, Chapter 9 of Open Heart 2.

A/N: Hii! So, I am back again with a new fic! I know it seems tooo soon, but I honestly can’t get this idea out of my head and I decided to write it all down and this is the final product. This is how I pictured Bryce convinced Kyra upon taking the surgery from the latest chapter of OH, and somehow I want to make it a reality somehow. Some of the dialogue were taken from the chapter. I hope I did Kyra’s character justice, because she deserves the world. I hope you all enjoy it and I apologize in advance for any grammar mistakes since English is not my first language. Credits to the amazing @dcbbw for the title!! 💖💖 ENJOY!! 

Tags: @soederberg ; @choicessa ; @bitchloveskcbaseball ; @storyofmychoices ; @mrsbhandari ; @dcbbw ; @n-whas ; @princess-geek ; @annekebbphotography 

LINK TO MY MASTERLIST 

Kyra is trying her best to focus on her work, as she sits down in front of the computer. The light from it shines as she tries to balance out all of the hospital funding with the current situation going on.

She found herself staring blankly at the screen, as Casey's words are playing inside her head. She didn't mean to go crazy over her, yet yelled at her. Kyra lets out a sigh as she regrets her words now.

She knows her possibilities towards recovery is small, she has given up all hope. But, seeing Casey with the small light of hope that she brings as she stood by her through everything makes her realize, she wants to try to fight this. Even if she dies, she knew she had done the best she could.

Her thoughts are interrupted by a knock on the door, she is brought back to reality as Bryce appears. He makes his way into the small office and took a seat.

'Kyra, I have heard about your situation and I am so sorry about it. I came here today with a proposition for you. Casey cares about you and after our small moments together, I consider you as a good friend to both Casey and I. I am willing to try this because I would be damned if I lose a friend, hell Casey would be upset if I didn’t do everything I could.' Bryce said causing her head to perk up at that statement.

‘I feel like a horrible jerk, Casey was just doing her job. And, I just- ugh.’ Kyra felt herself stop mid-sentence, as the guilt washes over her. Her eyes were filled with hot tears, she isn’t much of a crier, but somehow, at that moment. It felt right to let it go. 

Bryce watched her with guilt, as he passed the tissue box at her. Kyra took it and slowly wipe her tears away. 

‘Hey, you don't have to beat yourself too hard for it. Casey will understand why you did it, she is that person who is always going to be there for you whether you like it or not, and the fact that she gets mad shows that she cares about you, Kyra.’ Bryce stated as she feels herself calm down by his words. 

‘Why does she still believe in me? I am almost at the finish line, why does she still want me here? I have already accepted my fate, that I am gonna die someday, why can’t she?’ Kyra lets out a sigh. 

Bryce went silenced, as a sign for her to continue. But, nothing came. He took a deep breath and said,

‘That is who she is Kyra, she believes in the greater good. She has the optimism and determination inside of her, and she wants to see you alive and well. Casey cares about her friends, and she shows it. You are one of them, one of those people that made the list. She will never stop at anything at all, hell she would get sacrificed her whole dream if it means she gets to save someone’s life.’  Bryce said as he reminiscing their moments last year, seeing her not giving up on Mr.s Martinez. The way she was brave enough to sacrifice her dream as a doctor just to make someone’s dream come true. 

Kyra lets out a small cough bringing him back to the real world, as he saw a smirk appeared on her face.

‘You are in love with her, I can see it through your eyes.’ Kyra said with a smug expression on her face as Bryce felt his cheeks red from the statement.

‘Who doesn’t? But, cutting back to our subject. Casey is worried about you, she always will. You are one of her early patients, and it is a pretty emotional subject for us doctors..” Bryce reply as he remembers their conversation about Kyra before. 

It was a night at the apartment, as Casey found herself walking in circles in the apartment causing him to get dizzy. 

‘If you keep on walking in circles Cas, you are probably going to make a hole in the carpet.’ Bryce said as she stopped in her tracks.

‘I am having a mid-life crisis here, and the carpet is the last thing to be concerned about!’ Casey said harshly, immediately kicking something on the floor making Bryce worried.

He walks up to her and said,

‘What’s wrong Cas?’

‘It's--’ Before she could reply, she felt her tears fall, as she buried her head into his shirt. Bryce placed his arms around her, as an attempt to calm her down.

‘It’s okay, you are going to be okay Casey.’ He said as he rubs her back in circles.

‘It's not okay Bryce, I knew something is wrong with Kyra. I have this gutted feeling inside of me telling me, something bad might happened...’ Her tears started to fall once more.

‘I can’t lose her Bryce, she was my patient. I had lost both Dolores, Mr.s Martinez, and now, Kyra? I don’t know if I can live with that, facing the inevitable feels so hard right now...’ She said before letting herself lost in between the sobs. 

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

Kyra nods silently, she feels herself wanting to try. The risk might be high, but life somehow can end up with surprises, so she is willing to let it surprise her once more. 

‘Tell me about the procedure...” Kyra states earning a look of surprise from Bryce.

‘An extrapleural pneumonectomy.’ He said earning a questionable look from Kyra causing him to let out a chuckle.

‘It means we are going to take out your lung, part of your diaphragm and the parietal pleura and the pericardium on your left side. We can replace the lining of your chest and heart with Gore-Tex.’ Bryce explains to her, as she still couldn't understand the medical talk.

‘I don’t understand a thing you said, but from the sound of it... It sounds painful.’ Kyra flinches to herself feeling a bit uneasy.

‘It is risky, radical and unfortunately, it hurts. If it works, it’s going to hurt like hell but… if it doesn’t..’ Bryce went silenced unable to continue as she nods understanding the consequences of it.

“I will die anyway…” Kyra continues his sentence as Bryce lowered his head at that, she feels herself trying to weigh it all in. The consequences, the pain, the feeling she felt her whole life, deep down she knows she is terrified to face it, but now. She felt the need to try it, she is not afraid. 

At that moment, with full confidence. 

“Let’s do it.” Her voice sounded confident, causing Bryce to glance at her as asking for confirmation.

She nods.

“Bring it, if that is what it takes to keep on fighting it. I...” She took a deep breath.

“I am ready.” 

She said, feeling the peace in her. She wanted to keep fighting, her whole life has been revolved around this decease and she has gone so far to give up at this moment. 

Bryce feels a small smile appear on his face at the comment, 

“I won’t let you down.” 

“No, you won’t because I want to see you and Casey walk down the aisle one day,” Kyra said as she winks at him.

“Well, I will try my very best to get you there. You will be the guest of honor, and Casey will be darn happy about it.” Bryce reply as he stood up getting the papers ready for the treatment.

THE END

A/N #2 : I really hope all of you enjoy it! I am aiming to show that hope is really a powerful thing and a tiny amount of hope can somehow make a difference and with everything going on, hope somehow an be a huge thing. I hope I can present that in a way. Thank you so much for reading, it really means a lot and I think I am going to leave a quote, it may not help much but, maybe somehow it can give a bit of insight. Once again, thank you.<3 

“But I know, somehow, that only when it is dark enough can you see the stars.”

[lifblogs]

Buy Me a Coffee!

“Cast out the shadows. Cast out the shadows. Cast out the shadows...”

The chant vibrated through the air, sickly green light taking over the cold metal space of Horde Prime’s flagship. Catra tried to move, but when she looked down, her feet were in the horrible amniotic fluid used to create and brainwash the clones. It swished around her with a disgusting warmth, and it tingled against her skin, seeping through the gray and white clothes of Horde Prime. As she continued struggling, unable to move, Catra felt her eyes tearing up. The back of her neck ached.

“No. No,” she begged. “No. Come on.”

“Cast out the shadows...”

Horde Prime rose from the verdant depths, two of his four eyes unblinking. Just cold, malevolent.

“Cast out the shadows...”

“Little sister.”

An all-too familiar hand was on her shoulder, and Catra yowled, skin bristling, tail fluffing up to three times its size. She drew her ears back, tried reaching for the hand on her to scratch. She was grabbed from behind.

“Cast out the shadows...”

Horde Prime’s sharp, metallic pointer finger ran under her chin.

“Cast out the shadows...”

“Adora doesn’t want you,” Shadow Weaver’s voice, deep and ominous, whispered in her ear. “Give in. Become one with the Horde.”

“Cast out the shadows...”

“Little sister, join me in the light.”

Just as the pain in her neck grew unbearable and she was screaming, she was no longer on the flagship. And she was all alone. Too alone. The unforgiving metal and red heat of the Fright Zone surrounded her. Catra, holding her arms close to herself, started walking down one of the deep, dark halls.

Something moved behind her.

She whirled.

No one was there, but more darkness.

“Hello?”

“You really think Adora wants you? You? You pathetic child!” 

Catra spun to face Shadow Weaver. Hands clenched into fists, tail bristling, ears laid back, she said, “You don’t know what Adora wants!”

“Oh, don’t I?” Shadow Weaver taunted, circling Catra. She flickered in and out of being. Everything was too cold. “I raised her.”

“No, you abused her!” Catra argued. “And you abused me!”

No response came from the shadows.

A wonderful, beautiful laugh sounded down the hall, but it echoed, echoed, till it became a terrible thing that scraped down her spine.

Wary, Catra traveled closer to it.

“Adora?”

And there she was, even as the hall grew longer, stretched on and on. Adora was there in her pink jacket, her hair in a high ponytail, that stupid hair poof she loved so much just above her forehead. But she had turned to her, and her smile seemed fake, plastered on. Forced. And the eyes weren’t hers, weren’t the sharp, clear gray of a pale spring morning that Catra had grown up staring into. They were the glowing blue of She-Ra.

Catra faltered, stepping back.

“Adora...?”

Shadow Weaver appeared behind Adora, and Adora’s smile turned into a cruel smirk. Light pulsed from her chest. The failsafe.

“You don’t need her, Adora. Even Hordak knew Catra was a failure. She is weak. You are strong. Cast her out.” An ominous pause filled the silence, and Shadow Weaver went on, “Kill her.”

Adora raised her hand, crying, “For the honor of Grayskull!”

There was blinding light — gold, and white, and all-encompassing. When it faded, Catra’s eyes were watering, and Adora — no, She-Ra — stood before her in the full majesty of her godly height. Power thrummed from her. The failsafe beat in her chest. Shadow Weaver urged Adora forward, dark magic reaching up as viny tendrils to cradle and caress her shoulders.

Catra looked up at Adora, stomach dropping to her feet, ready to cry. There was no true light in Adora’s eyes, no recognition that this powerful being knew who Catra was. She was dirt to be scraped off a boot.

“Kill her.”

“Adora, please, don—“

Before she could finish speaking, the Sword of Protection was driven straight into her chest. Through her ribs, puncturing her lungs, and skewering her heart.

Catra’s breath caught, and she couldn’t breathe her last, not with a ruined chest cavity. Shadow Weaver’s dark magic ran up through Adora’s veins, turning her eyes black. And behind the mask, Catra just knew Shadow Weaver was smiling.

“Join me, little sister,” Horde Prime whispered from behind her.

Catra slid off the sword, fell back into Horde Prime’s embrace, and began to drown in amniotic fluid. Adora-controlled-by-Shadow-Weaver stood high above her.

“Cast out the shadows. Cast out the shadows. Cast out the shadows...”

“Join in the light of Horde Prime.”

~~~

Catra was screaming. It had awoken Adora, and she’d reached for her staff, years of training and pure instinct kicking in. But they were just in Adora’s chambers in the palace of Bright Moon. And they were safe. Catra still screamed.

Adora dropped her staff, and curled her body tight around Catra. Her lover’s strong tail whacked hard against her, body retaliating. Her fingers twitched, claws gleaming in the starlight. It was like she was trying to fight something.

“Catra, please, you have to wake up,” Adora begged. She squeezed her hard around her middle, closing her eyes tightly. She was She-Ra, but not even She-Ra could stop nightmares. “Catra, please!”

Catra let out one loud, final cry, and her elbow jammed back hard into Adora’s diaphragm. Her air left her in a whoomph!, and she instinctively let go to put her arm over her belly.

As she did that, Catra rolled over, her hands clasping over hers. Adora winced, knowing she’d bruise, but was starting to get her air back.

“Are you okay?” Catra asked, voice calm and radiant in the darkness of the room.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine. Are you...?”

Catra pulled away and faced away from Adora again. She rested her head on her bent arm.

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

Adora reached out for her shoulder, and she felt the tension wound up tight within her, the sweat on her skin. Lying back down, she caressed a hand across her forehead and into her still-short hair. It was growing back after what Horde Prime had done to her, almost enough to cover the back of her neck now. But her Catra still wasn’t back to normal. Maybe neither of them ever would be. They’d gone through too much.

“Okay,” Adora eventually relented after having a long-winded argument with herself about whether she should push or not. With Catra, pushing wasn’t the right answer. She needed softness, security, to be held. The time for pushing had gone, been destroyed with Horde Prime, and had even died with Shadow Weaver. They were free. Adora went on, running her fingers through Catra’s hair, “Just... know that I’m here for when you need to talk.”

“I won’t need to,” Catra refuted in a bitter mutter.

“Hey, we’re not in the Fright Zone anymore,” Adora soothed, pressing her legs close against Catra’s. She ran an arm under her and then around, hugging the bare skin of her waist. “You don’t have to hide your feelings. The Horde’s gone. Shadow Weaver’s gone.”

“I know they’re gone,” Catra snapped. Her body was still rigid against Adora’s.

“You’re not weak.”

Catra clawed herself out of Adora’s grasp, almost fell out of the bed, and then clambered to her feet. Her tail was swishing through the air. Adora sat up now, and she waved her hand to signal the lights to turn on, but remain dim.

“How do you know what I am?” Catra asked accusingly. “You don’t. You were always the strongest, always Shadow Weaver’s favorite, always the one to save the day.”

Adora had been reaching out for Catra, but pulled her hand back, as hurt bloomed in her chest. Whatever was going on, Catra wasn’t alright. She needed her.

“Where is this coming from?” Adora asked.

Tears built up in Catra’s eyes, and she squeezed her eyes shut. A heavy sigh left her before she turned and sat down on the bed, hard, holding her knees to her chest. Her tail thumped against the space on the mattress beside Adora’s legs.

“Shadow Weaver won,” she eventually said, voice raw and scratchy with emotion. “Horde Prime won. And you...” Adora saw Catra’s claws begin digging into her skin, drawing blood. Adora rushed around to get in front of her, leaning down. She grabbed Catra’s hands, letting her hold them too tightly. Her lover, her best friend, her family, her life; averted her gaze as she finished, “You killed me.”

“Catra, I would never—“

“I know,” she quickly got out. “But it still hurts. Horde Prime, and Shadow Weaver, they got to you. They got to me.”

“Catra,” Adora insisted, “no, they didn’t. It was just a dream. We won.” She cupped Catra’s cheek in one hand, eyes brimming with her own tears. “Love won.”

Catra relaxed against her, stance softening, muscles going almost limp. Now sitting cross-legged, she pulled Adora into her lap, motions swifter than ever. Adora let out an umph! of surprise as she found herself straddling Catra’s lap. Their foreheads rested together. And Adora could practically feel the smile on Catra’s face as she ceded, “You’re right. We did win.”

“Yeah. Yeah, we did. So...” Adora squirmed in her lap. “Are you going to be okay?”

Catra quickly leaned forward, stealing a kiss. Her soft, warm lips were gone before Adora even knew what was happening. A rumbling purr vibrated through Adora’s body coming from Catra, and Catra came in for another kiss. Adora reciprocated, kissing her with intent, but like they had all the time in the world. They did. They were going to have a life together.

Her lover pulled away, smiling broadly, pupils large with delight.

“I am now.”

Catra fell back, pulling a laughing Adora down on top of her. The two of them squealed and laughed as they rolled around on the bed, kissing.