#and he agreed that i should indeed leave it until tomorrow and hope my brain is screwed on straight by then | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

umbry-fic · 3 years ago

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The Revenge Plot

Summary: On a lazy afternoon, Lloyd hatches a scheme to prank Raine. Genis gets pulled in against his will. Colette is just happily along for the ride.

Will Raine figure it out? Will the three succeed?

Fandom: Tales of Symphonia Characters: Colette Brunel, Lloyd Irving, Genis Sage, Raine Sage Relationships: Colette Brunel & Lloyd Irving & Genis Sage, Genis Sage & Raine Sage Rating: G Word Count: 4712 Mirror Link: AO3 Original Post Date: 01/04/2021

Notes: A fun little gen fic for April Fool's Day featuring the Iselia trio!

~~~

“We would have tricked Professor Raine and gotten our revenge at the same time!” Lloyd finished. His voice, the scratching of a singular pen nib against paper, the occasional flap of pages turning and the creaking of his chair were the only sounds filling the quiet classroom.

The three of them, Lloyd, Genis and Colette, were the only ones still left in the Iselia Schoolhouse. The sun was setting, casting the entire room in different shades of muted reds and oranges. The shadows cast by the trees outside the windows stretched across the desks, resembling gnarly, bent fingers that shifted. Lloyd and Colette were scrambling to finish the homework that was due tomorrow and had agreed to stay back in the classroom after school to finish it. Genis had no reason to stay. He’d finished the next two week’s worth of homework.

Genis had crossed his arms and claimed he wanted to do supplementary exercises. So he would be staying as well!

Much to Genis’ relief, the two of them hadn’t tried to refute this reason. If they had, Genis would have shot back with an excuse of pitying the two of them for not having the tenacity to even finish one page of exercises. That would have been enough to shut them up. Hopefully. That was the plan, at least.

Colette nodded eagerly, gaze fixed on Lloyd and chin nestled on her palm, having long given up on actually doing her math homework. The textbook on her table had been opened to the page of multiplication practices for the last ten minutes. Not a single word had been written on it, her pen instead laying uncapped next to it, having left a trail of ink down its side. The time had instead been spent raptly listening to Lloyd while experiencing a growing sense of awe, eyes widening as he went through his plan. It sounded smart! Who would have thought?

Genis, on the other hand, had his head buried in his textbook and was doing his best to ignore Lloyd’s continuous talking, pen scribbling down equation after equation. But he couldn’t tune it out completely, and it was starting to get very annoying.

Lloyd, who was sitting in his chair backwards so he was facing his friends, arms hugging the backrest and legs swinging in the air, grinned. “So? What do you think, Genis?”

With an annoyed huff, Genis loudly snapped his textbook closed and slammed it upright on the desk, glaring at Lloyd over it. “I’ve only been half-listening to your mindless yammering and even then I can tell your plan is ridiculous. You should be doing your homework, not being a distraction! Do you want to get detention tomorrow?”

Lloyd winced at the thought of spending a beautiful sunny afternoon trapped in here again, writing “I’m sorry” over and over on the blackboard until his fingers were completely smudged white with chalk and so raw he thought they might bleed. It would be great if he never had to go through that again for the rest of his life.

“I couldn’t focus. It’s not my fault all of the math questions are impossible.” Lloyd pouted, starting to rock the chair on its legs. Colette worried, with how far back Lloyd was tipping the chair, that he might just fall over. “So I came up with this instead.”

Genis groaned, resisting the urge to chuck the textbook at Lloyd’s head. He would leave the physical violence to his sister. “If you can come up with such a ridiculous prank, you have the time to finish your homework.”

“I was asking you what you thought of it! You still haven’t answered.”

“I think it’s quite good!” Colette spoke up. “But Lloyd, your -”

“Explain to me exactly how you’re going to clear this classroom of students on a school day?” Genis asked smugly, interrupting Colette’s attempt to warn Lloyd of his dangerous chair rocking behaviour. He could bet Lloyd hadn’t thought of that. This should be enough to stump Lloyd and get him to rethink pulling a prank on Raine. Why was he even trying to do that anyway? Was he asking for death?

“That’s where you come in, Genis,” Lloyd replied, stretching his arm out to point straight at Genis’ face. Genis gaped. What? Himself? How did he even play into this idiotic scheme?

“You get to go around town the night before telling everyone that school’s off the next day. You’re Professor Raine’s brother, so everyone will believe you!”

“I - H - how did you even come up with that?” Genis was at a loss for words. The worst thing was that Lloyd’s idea made sense. What had the world come to for such a miracle to occur?

Did Lloyd have a brain somewhere in that ridiculously thick skull of his?

“Dunno, just thought of it,” Lloyd said nonchalantly, further rendering Genis speechless. Just thought of it??? “So, you in?”

“No!” Genis protested. “Do whatever you want, but I’m not pranking my sister!” He wasn’t insane enough to agree to this. If they pulled this off, what would Raine do in retaliation? Make Lloyd carry four buckets of water instead of two? A week’s worth of detention? Make him sleep in the dark? Just the thought of it was enough to make him want to cower.

The smile on Lloyd’s face wasn’t dropping, however. It was unnerving. Did Lloyd still think he could be convinced? How?

“Then you leave me no choice.” Lloyd tipped the chair towards Genis, leaning closer over the desk. Genis scooted his chair back, attempting to put as much distance between the two of them as possible. “I invoke the sports meet. You remember, don’t you?”

Colette cringed at the increasingly loud creaking sounds coming from the chair, the harsh sound almost deafening to her. Did the other two not notice it? Were they too engrossed in their conversation? Was that a crack running down one of the chair legs?!!

“The sports… meet...” Genis trailed off as realisation hit him like a lightning strike.

Every year, at the insistence of the mayor, the school held a sports meet where the students were divided into two groups and pitted against each other in various activities. It was sweaty, loud, competitive, and Genis hated it with a passion. Every student needed to be assigned at least one activity, and no matter how many times he had pleaded with his sister, she had refused to budge on the matter. School regulations were school regulations, she had said, and what kind of school teacher would she be if she let him off easy just for being her brother?

After three years of embarrassing himself and letting the whole world know of his absolute lack of athletic abilities, he had grown tired of it. At last month’s edition of the annual sports meet, he had brokered a deal with Lloyd - take his spot at the 100-metre sprint, and Lloyd could have one favour, any favour.

Thank the Goddess Raine hadn’t noticed anything amiss. Either that, or she had chosen to stay silent.

“You’re using your favour for this?” Genis spluttered, starting to panic. “I thought you were going to ask me to do your homework for a week or something!”

To be honest, Genis had completely forgotten he’d ever made that promise. He had expected Lloyd to call in his favour within a day, but there had been complete silence from Lloyd’s end over this matter. For it to return now, of all times, to bite him in the back…

“A promise is a promise. Right, Genis?”

Genis remained silent. There was no way to refute that statement. He had, indeed, made that promise. And Raine had always told him, since young, to never renege on them.

Lloyd had, for once, well and truly cornered him. Had he planned this all along?

No, it couldn’t be. Genis refused to believe it. Lloyd wasn’t smart enough to play that long of a game. It was just a lucky coincidence.

Lloyd grinned, leaning back with his arms crossed behind his head, causing the chair’s front two legs to come off the floor. “So I guess that’s settled! It's a great opportunity to get Professor Raine to loosen up a little! We’ll deal with the details some other time. As for the tomatoes, Colette, can you borrow some from your grandmother’s garden?”

Colette nodded, frowning at what she was very certain was a crack on the chair’s leg. “I can ask Grandma; she’d probably give some to me without asking any questions. But Lloyd, you should stop rocking your chair.”

Lloyd blinked at Colette in confusion, cocking his head. “Huh? Why -”

A resounding “crack” echoed throughout the classroom as one of the chair’s legs split in half in an explosion of wood splinters, pitching the chair to the side and throwing Lloyd onto the floor.

“Lloyd!” Colette cried in worry, running over and kneeling next to the groaning boy on the floor. “Are you alright? Does it hurt? Are you bleeding? Do I…"

Genis paid no attention to any of this, sinking down in his seat and putting his head in his hands. He was embroiled in this ridiculous scheme now, definitely for the worst. He could only hope that Lloyd failed in his machinations or came to his senses.

Even if they successfully pulled this off, the only result awaiting them were the graves they would have dug for themselves.

He supposed he had his answer now.

The fact that Lloyd had ever considered trying to prank his sister proved, once and for all, that he was a mindless idiot.

~~~

One Week Later

Genis stuffed his feet into his shoes, staring out the window at the unnaturally dark sky. It was the middle of summer, and on any other day, the sun would have been happily smiling down at the world, even in the early evening.

Just his luck that the day before Lloyd’s… revenge plot (calling it that left a sour taste in his mouth), the sun would be hidden behind a barrage of storm clouds, thunder faintly rumbling as lightning lit up the sky.

He would hate getting caught in the rain while running around Iselia doing Lloyd’s bidding. It’d just be rubbing salt on an already open wound.

Genis sighed. Might as well bite the bullet and get it over and done with. Lloyd had at least promised him that he wouldn’t need to turn up tomorrow for the actual deed. Maybe Raine would never know he was part of this!

...

No. There was absolutely no way Raine wouldn’t figure it out. No matter what, he would be dead by the end of tomorrow.

Speaking of Raine, his sister should be preparing for tomorrow’s lesson right about now. She almost always stuck to her daily routine - eat breakfast (prepared by him), head to the schoolhouse, conduct her lessons, eat her packed lunch (also prepared by him), organise any necessary detention or supplementary sessions, come home, eat dinner (cooked by him, what else did you expect?), prepare tomorrow’s lessons… She carved out some time, especially on weekends, to read up on ruins and, of course, spend some time with him. They could talk about anything: more complicated magic incantations, the most recent book they had read, the insane things Lloyd got up to… Countless topics, skirting around the one thing they wouldn’t bring up unless they had to.

But they were both creatures of routine - perhaps that provided a much-needed sense of security to combat the ever-present fear that their deepest secret would be unearthed, here, in a place where they had finally found peace, much like it had before. History always repeated itself. That was how the saying went.

Maybe Raine did need to loosen up a little.

Well. He would get going. There should be no chance of being caught now and raising Raine’s suspicions -

A hand landed on his shoulder, causing his heart to jump out of his chest as a familiar voice was heard from behind him. “Where do you think you’re going?”

Holding his breath and praying his absolute hardest to the Goddess, Genis turned around slowly, trying to maintain a straight face. Raine stared down at him, unimpressed, one eyebrow raised as she crossed her arms, awaiting his answer. How had she even gotten behind him without making any sound?

Lloyd had laughed at him when he’d said, once, that Raine was a silent predator. But you had to be there to believe it! She had struck terror into his heart ever since he was seven, when she’d caught him stealing from the cookie jar and grounded him for a whole week.

He’d been forced to eat Raine’s cooking for that entire period. He sometimes still had nightmares about the writhing tentacles he’d had to consume.

“I was going over to Lloyd’s to help him with math again. You know how he is with fractions.” He was going to have to congratulate himself later for keeping a stable voice. He had no idea how he was managing it.

“At this time of day?” Raine replied, frowning as she glanced out the window.

Steeling himself to come up with some plausible excuse, Genis opened his mouth -

“I’m worried it’ll rain while you’re out there. At least take a raincoat. I wouldn’t want you catching a cold.”

“Oh, right.” Genis accepted the raincoat his sister had grabbed off the clothes rack and stuffed into his hands, staring down at the grey plastic, a small smile forming on his face. “Thanks. I’ll… get going, then.”

“Take care. And don’t stay out too late, alright?” Raine opened the door, stepping back. “I will punish you if you turn up to school late tomorrow.”

“Can’t you just wake me up and take me with you?” Genis complained, stepping out of the house, still smiling.

“No. My answer is final. I will not accept any dissent over this issue.” Raine leaned against the doorframe, the corner of her mouth curving upwards slightly.

Genis waved goodbye to his sister, setting off down the footpaths of Iselia towards his closest schoolmate’s house. It’s not like he expected Raine to change her tune.

Stubborn, overly strict, prone to violence, but diligent, protective and caring. That was his sister.

He wouldn’t have it any other way.

~~~

The Next Day

Raine figured out something was wrong the moment she stepped foot into the schoolyard.

Shutting the book on the Balacruf Mausoleum that her head had been buried in just moments before, she closed her eyes and tried to identify the source for the sense of wrongness that had arisen.

Come on. Concentrate…

Ah. That was it. The complete silence.

Teaching at a schoolhouse that catered to children ranging from the ages of 8 to 16 meant there was always some noise, from somewhere, reaching her ears. Excited chattering, the scraping of desk legs against the floor, the creaking of old wooden boards that supported the weight of children, chasing each other around. One got used to it until it became nothing more than background noise that she didn't actively register. Nonetheless, it was a collection of sounds that brought comfort.

All that sound, carrying the weight of life with it, was gone now, drained from the schoolhouse and leaving it dark and soulless. The children, playing skip rope, catching or hopscotching in the dirt of the schoolyard until she shooed them in for class were absent as well.

There was not a single hint of life. The air was still. Silence dominated.

Was there no one here at all? Hmm.

She had suspected something was off ever since last night. Genis seldom left the house so late, and for Lloyd to do his homework at that time of day? It was unbelievable. Nothing, no force in this mortal world, could make Lloyd Irving finish his homework. It infuriated her to no end, but… It was also slightly endearing; part of what defined one of her beloved students.

So this was what Genis had been up to last night. She’d contemplated asking for the truth or just forbidding him from leaving, but had seen no point in doing it. He was no longer the tiny, vulnerable bundle she had cradled in both love and fear, wondering if they would survive, wondering how she could ever create a happy life for her brother. Genis would be turning 12 next year, growing into himself. Maybe this was part of a rebellious phase. Who knew?

That thought brought with it both a sense of loss and a dizzy, wondrous, beautiful sense of joy.

Not too long ago, she would have never thought they would get this far.

Raine reached the door to the schoolhouse, trying the door handle and finding it coated in some... thick substance. She brought her hand back, red, viscous liquid dripping lazily onto the dirt. Now that she looked properly, there were random puddles of this same liquid scattered haphazardly around the school grounds, almost like it had overflowed from some container being carried across.

The consistency and the earthy smell… There were even still small chunks swimming in the liquid. Tomato paste. Definitely.

That meant Colette had to be involved as well.

Firstly, High Priestess Phaidra had the best garden in Iselia, which, impressively, she somehow maintained on top of all her duties. All the children got their tomatoes from there for their fake Halloween blood.

Secondly, Lloyd would not have survived mashing the number of tomatoes required to produce this amount of paste. Not when, on Halloween night, he had hidden behind Colette every time one of the children, dressed up as vampires with fake tomato blood dripping from their fake fangs, had passed by. It was a ridiculous sight, since Lloyd was taller than Colette, but Colette didn’t seem to mind, smiling and letting out a little giggle whenever Lloyd gripped her shoulder, hissing in her ear about the evils of tomatoes.

Colette deserved to have fun as well before everything came to an end. She was just as much a child, and yet she had to shoulder a heavier burden than even Raine had at that age. The most Raine could do was give Colette the childhood she herself hadn’t had the chance to experience.

Lloyd and Genis were already doing a good job of that. Raine was thankful, but at the same time…

All she could hope for was that they made the best of memories together, memories that wouldn’t fade like those she had of her parents, that remained forever in the most pristine of conditions. In the end, that would be all that remained. Would it be enough? Would it ever be enough to fill the gap left behind by a beloved person, forever gone and never to return?

Walking into the dim building, Raine spotted the trail of red footprints leading straight into one of the classrooms.

This was far too obvious, wasn’t it? What was all the red supposed to represent? Blood?

Were they trying to make her believe the schoolhouse was haunted? She would never fall for that. The “blood” itself was amateur at best; it didn’t have the right texture to masquerade as the real thing.

That was strange. Genis was most likely the one who had boiled the tomatoes. Lloyd couldn’t operate a stove, and Colette might have been able to do it, but not without potentially causing a fire.

Genis should have known the proper technique, but yet…

Might as well indulge them. Children, living the time of their life. She couldn’t begrudge them that. Honestly, it was cute to see their honest attempt at a prank.

Though she would still have to punish them afterwards. She was looking forward to that.

“Lloyd!” She called, placing her book down on one of the dressers lining the corridor and taking a single step into the classroom. “Come out, would you?”

~~~

Earlier that week

“The plan’s simple, really,” Lloyd said from his position at the sink, scrubbing his arms with soap for the third time, the skin starting to turn pink from all the rubbing. Colette and Genis were sat at the dining table with a vat of chunky tomato paste in front of them; Colette staring at Lloyd in concern while Genis stared in disbelief.

All three of them had taken part in the tomato mashing after Genis had boiled the tomatoes, making use of the hammers that Lloyd had… borrowed. Colette had asked if it was okay to use Dirk’s tools on fruits and if it would stain, but Lloyd had shrugged and said that it would be fine and they’d just wash them afterwards. “Dad will never notice” had been Lloyd’s exact words. Genis was starting to doubt that, considering the hammers were now a wonderful shade of red, with stray pieces of tomato pulp hanging on by their dear life.

Surely the tomato paste had been washed off on his first trip to the sink, as it had been for the two of them. Lloyd was making a huge deal out of this. He’d been wincing throughout the entire mashing session and had taken great care to dodge the occasional squirts of liquid.

Lloyd really hated tomatoes that much, huh?

“I know you asked why we’re making the paste so chunky,” Lloyd continued.

Yes, Genis had indeed asked that question. If they were trying to convince Raine of supernatural activity, they were doing a terrible job. That’s what Lloyd had said in the classroom last week, right?

Raine wasn’t even the type to get scared. He was.

“That’s because it doesn’t matter! It doesn’t need to be convincing. In fact, we want Professor Raine to think she’s got it all figured out!”

~~~

Now

Raine felt her foot catch through a loop of something thin and fragile, experiencing resistance as the loop went taut, a loud scraping sound coming from behind her.

Ah. She’d thought it all figured out, and let her guard down as a result. It had been a trap all along, and she’d fallen head-first into it.

Impressive. She’d have to congratulate whoever came up with this later.

Raine barely had enough time to glance up and see the other end of the string now looped around her foot, climbing up the wall and tied to the handle of a washtub resting on a ceiling beam right by the door, before the chain-reaction of tugging string and gravity caused the washtub to tip over and release a veritable waterfall of red liquid.

It all crashed down on her, pelting down on her clothes and face at high pressures. Now, instead of just one of her hands, every centimetre of her was covered with tomato paste. It was heavier than expected, her sleeves weighed down and drooping towards the floor.

Ugh, the earthy smell was nearly overpowering at this intensity, nor was the mushy feeling pleasant. Was this why Lloyd hated tomatoes? She could understand a little now… Though only when there were this many.

Thank the Goddess she hadn’t brought her book in with her. Otherwise, she’d have to murder the three of them.

~~~

“Towel?” Genis offered, crawling out from his hiding place under one of the tables with a folded towel in his hands. Raine was standing absolutely still with her head angled towards the floor and hadn’t moved for a full minute, clothes dripping liquid onto the floor and forming tiny puddles. The washtub was balancing rather precariously on the edge of the ceiling beam. He hoped it wouldn’t fall over and smack Raine on the head.

Lloyd was sitting cross-legged in the corner of the classroom, snickering. Even Colette, sitting with her knees pulled up to her chest next to him, couldn’t keep a smile off her face.

Raine raised her head, and Genis was relieved to see that his sister was, indeed, smiling. He had decided, in the end, to come along of his own volition. He wanted to see the results for himself.

It's been some time since he's seen a smile so wide on his sister's face.

“Thank you.” Raine took the towel, moving away from the shadow of the washtub as she began to towel her hair. The clothes were most likely hopeless. There’d be no cleaning them without a good wash. “Congratulations. You tricked me. Did you come up with this, Genis?”

“No, I did,” Lloyd interjected, waving from his corner. “Did you like it?”

“So you can be intelligent if you apply yourself. Surprising,” Raine muttered, a glint beginning to appear in her eyes. Colette’s smile was beginning to drop, though Lloyd hadn’t yet noticed.

“Ha! Well, now you know how terrible tomatoes are. And this is revenge for all the buckets of water you’ve made me carry!”

Genis took a step back, sweat beginning to form on his brow as he recognised the murderous expression on his sister’s face. Time for the grave, then?

It was inevitable.

“We’re even now, I assume?” Raine towered over Lloyd, smiling sinisterly. “Well, that’s good to know, because I have the most special idea planned for you! All of you!”

Yep. Yep, they were dead. So dead, and there was nothing they could do about it.

As he'd said to Lloyd at the very beginning, this had been a terrible idea.

But... Genis can't quite say, anymore, that he regretted participating in it.

~~~

In the end, Lloyd and Genis were forced to clean the entire schoolhouse from top to bottom. “It has to be sparkly clean,” Raine had warned, or they would really be in for it.

Colette, it turned out, had church duties to attend to that day. Not even Raine, in her position of authority, could touch the Chosen. Colette had apologised profusely to both of them, telling them that she would be back as soon as she was done. After all, she had played her part as well and should accept her due punishment.

So the two of them had slaved over walls, the ceiling, and furniture, armed with an army of rags and a tiny bucket of water that they had to keep refilling. It was toiling work, further slowed down by Lloyd’s staunch refusal to touch the tomato paste. Lloyd was the only one who could reach the ceiling! He needed to stop being so squeamish and just do it!

Admittedly, there were also moments when Genis had thrown the rag into the bucket a little harder than necessary, causing a splash of droplets that hit Lloyd and elicited vicious water-splashing battles. He was trying to express his earlier frustrations at getting dragged into this in the first place (even though he had long changed his mind over the whole thing). At least water would dry on its own.

Colette turned up later in the day with a tray of chocolate muffins that her grandmother had freshly baked, warm to the touch and which melted in the mouth. Genis savoured one happily. He would never pass up Head Priestess Phaidra's baked goodies; they were absolutely amazing and didn't come along that often. Genis watched in amusement as Colette laughed at the messy way Lloyd ate, chastising him in a soft voice and gently wiping the crumbs off the corner of his mouth.

After the wonderful break, it was right back to work. Colette took up a rag herself and began cheerily cleaning, chatting with the both of them and joining in the water fights with an enthusiastic grin until they were all giggling uncontrollably. At this point, Genis could come up with no excuse for his behaviour. But it didn't matter.

Even Raine turned up again, wearing a new change of clothes, and helped clean the floor with a mop. His sister slipped in the occasional berating, which Lloyd enthusiastically retorted as Genis sighed at the usual childish display (ignoring his own behaviour), as Colette covered her mouth and laughed.

The schoolhouse was awash with warm sunlight, laughter alive in each of their chests. Joy fluttered in the air, and the memory of that day was a warm, golden sphere to be cradled and cherished forever.

All in all, Lloyd declared it a success.

Genis was inclined to agree.

#fanfiction #tales of symphonia #colette brunel #lloyd irving #genis sage #raine sage #one shot

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enchanted-seokjin · 4 years ago

Text

The 1; kim seokjin.

↬ summary: Y/N meets Jin after six months following their break-up.

↬ genre: one shot

↬ word count: 2.6k

↬ warnings: very slightly smut insinuation

↬ note: inspired by the 1 by taylor swift

I hold my breath when I see him walk through the door. He smiles widely at my friend and hands her over the gift which stands out from every other I’ve seen so far. And I’ve seen them all, for I’ve been here even before people arrived.

My friend wanted me to help her with the last details, setting the table, making sure everything looked neat and smell good. It was a façade. I realized once I crossed that same goddamn door and saw that my friend had opened a bottle of wine and served two glasses. That could only mean that it was a setup. I didn’t say anything, though. I was reminded that it was her birthday and I had to put up with any crazy idea she had in mind.

Many thoughts crushed my brain. Was she going to cancel the party? Was she going to ask me to tell one of the people she’d invited that the party wasn’t going to happen after all?

I laugh as I remember how naïve I must’ve looked caressing the cat while my friend told me that she had invited Jin.

I didn’t get mad, but I was indeed shocked. I knew they got along well but I wasn’t aware that they were that close. For a moment, I thought she was going to confess that they were dating and my heart sunk just by the thought of it. When I asked her directly if they were more than friends, she looked at me confused and then disgusted. She assured me that Jin was her friend and nothing would ever change that. She was sorry for not letting me know earlier but it was kind of a last-minute invitation since she wasn’t sure how I would feel. She also said, “I understand if you want to leave.”

I couldn’t leave.

Now I wish I had.

My friend looks at the present, surprised by the presentation. It’s a tiny box, wrap in an elegant white paper with a red ribbon. I try not to smile but I fail and I look down at the cat moving between my legs and I’m thankful I’ve found this empty couch with no one around to bother me as a hang onto the glass of wine as if my life depends on it.

Jin has always had a good eye for details and I know that my friend appreciates it. I know I did. I know anyone would.

When I look back up, I see Jin greeting a few of the people who are standing close to the door. He’s wearing black jeans and a dark shirt tucked inside his jeans which accentuates his waist. He looks stunning, smiling cordially, and having chit-chats with strangers. He’s always been good at that, too. The first time he invited me to an event I was nervous. I hate crowded places so I tried to turn him down but he assured me that everything would be okay and I believed him. He was right. He made me feel comfortable and included. He showed me a side of me I had never seen, one that glowed every time I stood next to him, talking to strangers and making new friends.

None of the people I’ve met during those events are my friends now.

As Jin moves, I want to get up, take the cat and fly upstairs but instead, I stay where I am because, at least, the floor isn’t quicksand here.

He’s late to the party, nevertheless. I noticed that as I was drinking my third glass of wine, thinking about how I should react once I see him after six months following our break-up. He’s never late. He’s always early. If he had a meeting at the dentist, he’d be there twenty minutes earlier. He doesn’t mind waiting but hates the idea of making other waits.

I guess he has changed.

Our eyes meet and I can feel my whole body turned numb as Jin gives me a tiny smile. A shy smile. The kind of smile which has always made my heart flutter, now makes me want to disappear.

I want him to keep chit-chatting with the blonde guy but I know he’s apologizing when he interrupts him to walk towards me.

I forget how to breathe.

“Hey,” he says, smiling. His hands inside his pockets. He looks stunning under the white artificial light which makes his black hair shine. “New friend?” he asks, nodding towards the cat, now sitting next to my legs.

“She’s protecting me,” I reply, gazing at the cat as well. I don’t know if I’m holding the glass properly so I lower it to the armchair. I’m not leaving it at the little table. I’m afraid the waiter may come and take it away--- I wouldn’t know what to do with my hands either. I don’t have pockets as Jin does. I wish I hadn’t worn this stupid black dress.

I wish I was at home.

“From whom?” Jin asks.

I smile without saying anything. I don’t know what to answer. This situation is way too awkward for me.

“You’re late,” I point out instead and I wish I hadn’t. Though, Jin doesn’t seem to mind it. He stares at the window. A black cloudy sky displays through the lime curtains.

“I had to take care of a few things,” he replies, calmly and I wonder if he’s feeling his world crashing as mine is because I can sense everything coming down to pieces with him so close to me and I want it to stop.

I sigh and, this time, I gather the strength to put the glass on the table. I wait for the waiter to come and get it as a mouse waiting for a piece of cheese to drop. He doesn’t.

It’s time for me to go home.

“Well…” I begin as I get up. The house spins around for a second but I manage to keep control. Jin stares at me intently and I ignore his gaze. Instead, I focus on the cat, which meows and leaves. I’m completely alone with Jin. Great. “I hope you have fun,” I smile. I hope it sounds genuine.

“Are you leaving?” he inquires, confused.

“Yeah, I have an appointment tomorrow,” I explain. It’s a lie, so I don’t get into any detail. I know enough not to reveal too much information when you’re lying, especially when you’re drunk. I pass past Jin, hoping he’d let me go but he follows me.

“Let me take you home,” he whispers as I take my black coat.

“No,” I simply say.

I put it on and hear him sigh with impatience. Even though I’m not looking, I know he’s scratching his ear.

“My car’s right outside. I’ll take you home and then I’ll come back,” he begs. I turn to look at him. I’ve my bag between my hands, clutching onto it as hard as I was clutching on the glass of wine.

I smile ironically. Does he think I’m preoccupied he might miss this party?

“No, Jin,” I argue, slowly. “I’m good.”

I’m not getting into that hell of a car with you. I’m drunk, not stupid, I want to add. However, I choose silence and aim to walk towards the door when Jin steps in the way.

“Your house is not far,” he protests. “Let me walk you, then. It’s late.”

It’s true. It is late. The plan wasn’t for me to leave the party, I was supposed to help my friend clean up the mess afterward and stay overnight, and I was excited to have a girl’s night. I hadn’t had one in such a long time; I yearned for a little bit of fun. Yet, seeing Jin changed everything.

“Fine,” I give up. I also know that he won’t let this go. If I leave without saying a word, he’d still follow me so it’s better this way.

“Great,” he smiles. “Are you going to say goodbye?”

I deny, reaching the door. As much as I love my friend, if I see her now and get the chance to say a word to her, it would be something far from “Happy birthday! I love you,” so I’d rather leave quietly.

Outside, the air is cold. I listen to the door close behind me and Jin approaching me as I start walking in the right direction.

“Aren’t you cold?” I ask. The answer is obvious; I can see Jin shrugged with his hands inside his pockets. He’s lucky there’s isn’t any wind. “Didn’t you bring a jacket?”

“No,” he barely looks at me so I stare at the empty street. “It was kind of a last-minute thing, coming here. I forgot to bring a jacket.”

“That present didn’t look like a last-minute thing,” I point out before I can stop myself and I hate how bitter my words sound.

“It wasn’t,” Jin answers, ignoring the bitterness. “I was going to give her the present even if I didn’t come tonight.”

“Of course you were,” I agree. “You’ve always been meticulous over important dates,” These words shouldn’t be charged with resentment but they are.

Jin takes a deep breath and I gaze at him. Our eyes meet for a second and I feel I’m about to break so I turn my head straight, though I can feel his piercing eyes on me.

“I wasn’t sure if I was going to come because I knew you were going to be here,” he explains with a little bit of frustration. My heart sinks but I ignore it.

“For what’s worth, I didn’t know you were coming until today.”

He stays silent for a second.

“I should’ve told you.”

“I blocked your number, remember?”

Jin quiets again. This time, it feels like an eternity. Then, his voice echoes in my brain.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers. “I never meant for any of this to happen,” he goes on and I lower my head, closing my eyes for a second as his sincerity burns inside my chest.

“Don’t say that,” I beg.

Jin takes a deep breath.

“I’ve been wondering about you, you know?” he says. And I want him to stop but I don’t say anything because my heart’s in half and I forget how to speak. “What you’ve been doing… If life’s been treating you good…”

I laugh and look at the other side. Job wise? I’m good. Study wise? Getting there. Love wise? Still can’t get over him. I was at the bus stop last week and my soul left my body for an instant when I thought the man driving a black Mercedes was him.

“I’m good,” I answer. “I’ve been focusing on my studies.”

“Trying to get into Art School?”

I smile as memories come flashing back.

“They say it’s never too late,” I look at him with a smile and he smiles back. We both know it was he who convinced me of that. “Don’t know if I’ll get in, though.”

“You’re really talented, Y/N,” he says with all seriousness. It’s always been like that when it came to my dreams. “Don’t throw yourself under the bus. You have a bright future ahead of you.”

I did have one. Once. With you.

“Thanks,” It takes me a few seconds to gather the strength to keep talking. “What about you?”

“Same old, same old,” he replies without looking at me. “Still working.”

“That’s good,” I babble as our eyes meet again and he flashes a tender smile. My heart sinks again and I feel tears burning behind my eyes. “Love wise?” I ask and look away. I’m not sure how I’ve mustered the strength to ask this. It’s as if someone else has taken control over me… Or something…

Jin doesn’t reply right away and I ignore the urge to start running because if I did, I don’t know if my legs would be strong enough to support me.

“Tried online dating,” he responds. “But it wasn’t for me,” he continues and I know he means it as a funny anecdote but it doesn’t sound like that. The air has shifted and I can feel the weight of these past six months over my shoulders. “You?”

“Nothing,” I say, shaking my head.

It’s funny to hear that he’s been trying to move on while I’m still trying to get used to waking up alone every morning.

Jin sighs again and scratches his nose. I know he’s about to say something serious even before he opens his mouth.

“I did love you. You know that, don’t you?”

Of all the things I was expecting to hear from him, this was at the bottom of the list.

I shake my head as I bite the inside of my cheek. It’s all too real. It’s all too raw. I can’t take this, but Jin doesn’t take into account my feelings.

“After we broke up,” he mumbles as if he’s measuring his words. And I know for sure that he is. Jin’s too afraid to break me. “I’ve made up scenarios in my mind where everything worked out. I think it could’ve if we’d tried.”

I let out a weak laugh because it’s better than crying.

“I didn’t know you wanted to try.”

“I wanted everything that had to do with you.”

I smile, trying to hide my sadness. Suddenly, the shakiness in my hands is gone.

“You should’ve shown it.”

Jin looks down for a moment, and I know he’s regretting his decisions.

“We were something, don’t you think so?”

I nod. Yes, we were. All our friends and family were so sure we were going to end up together for the rest of our lives. I thought so, too. I thought Jin was the one. My family thought Jin was the one. I guess it would’ve been fun, to grow old together. To keep learning from each other until we’ve memorized every aspect of our personality, every inch of our bodies.

I see my house in the corner and we slow down our pace. Maybe it’s our subconscious working for us.

“Yeah,” I agree.

Jin lowers his head again.

“I’m seeing someone,” he lets out carefully.

I don’t react. There’s nothing else he can break in me.

“I’m glad you’re happy.”

“You’ll find someone, too.”

I guess I will. Someday.

I picture Jin with this new person, hanging out with his family. I picture them visiting Jin’s family every Sunday and Jin’s mom teaching them how to cook. That’s what I did every Sunday, at least. It was fun. Jin’s mom would end up amazed at how useless I was in the kitchen while Jin would assure me that I didn’t have to worry about anything because I had him.

We stop when we reach my house. He walks me to the porch and I turn to him. I open my mouth, ready to ask him if he believed that we would be together now if only one thing had been different… But I say nothing.

“Thank you, Jin,” I mutter instead.

“It was nice seeing you, Y/N,” he smiles but he doesn’t move.

I know that, in a different time, he’d come in with me, have a glass of wine. He would be telling bad jokes as alcohol starts to hit us while I fall in love with him as every second passes by. I wouldn’t wear this black dress for too long, he’d get rid of it as soon as he gets the chance and I’d enjoy each torturous moment unbuttoning his shirt.

“It was nice seeing you, too, Jin. Have fun at the party,” I state as I walk in because I should be the strong one; as I always have.

Still, tears fall in silence knowing that Jin is on the other side of the door and I will wake up alone tomorrow, again.

#seokjin #jin #kim seokjin #bts jin #jin imagine #jin x reader #jin scenarios #jin fanfic #seokjin imagine #jin imagines #seokjin x reader #seokjin scenarios #bts scenarios #bts imagine #bts x you #jin x you #bts fanfiction

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wherepoetswentodie · 5 years ago

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BOM 10 Day Challenge - Day 7!

Write an interaction between the Mormon boys and villagers

Okay so this is techincally a day late on UK time but it’s on the right day USA time soooooo I get a pass k.

-------

“Elder Price, is there a reason you are sitting on my step?”

Kevin looks up at Kimbay and then shrugs. The reason he’s there seems really stupid now, and he doesn’t want to say it outloud. She stares down at him, clearly expecting an answer and when she doesn’t get one, she sighs and nudges him with her foot until he moves out of the way.

“Are you going to sit there for the rest of the afternoon?” she asks.

“I don’t have anywhere else to be,” he says.

She frowns, “Don’t you have baptisms?”

Kevin shakes his head, “I don’t like preaching anymore. Or organised religion,”

Kimbay scoffs, “Don’t flatter yourself. There is nothing organised about what we do here,”

Kevin cracks a smile and wraps his arms around his legs, resting his chin on his knees. He feels Kimbay’s gaze on him for a few seconds before she sits next to him, gently bumping their shoulders together.

“What is the matter with you, boy?” she asks, “Where is Elder Cunningham?”

“With Nabulungi,”

“Where is Elder McKinley, then?”

Kevin shrugs, “I don’t know. I left the hut early this morning. I didn’t see anyone,”

Kimbay turns to look at him, “Do you not think Elder McKinley will be worried about you?”

“He said he was going to be in his office all day, anyway,” Kevin says, “Probably doesn’t even know I’m not at home...”

“Okay...” she says, “So...why don’t you go home?”

Kevin mumbles something into his knees, hoping that Kimbay will get fed up with him not talking and leave him alone. He isn’t so lucky and she flicks his ear to get him speaking again.

“Come on. I haven’t got all day,”

“I miss my mom,” he mutters.

This is met with silence and Kevin groans, putting his head in his hands. It is moments like this that remind Kevin why he doesn’t like talking about his feelings, because no one ever seems to know how to react. He himself doesn’t even know how to react to how he feels.

“Never mind, it doesn’t matter,”

“It does matter. I have just never heard you talk about your family before,”

“They disowned me,” he says quietly, nails digging into his palms, “My mom and my dad and I...I don’t - my dad he’s always been strict and always expected me to be the best and I didn’t - I didn’t think that he’d be okay with everything that has happened but I thought that maybe my mom would be but she...she wasn’t,” he feels his throat tighten and tears boil behind his eyes, “And it was her birthday yesterday so I - I called home but when she - when she realised that it was me, she - she told me to not call home again and hung up on me but I just - I want to speak to her...I just - I want my mom...”

Kimbay clears her throat a little, “I am sorry, Elder Price. I did not realise that your parents would be like that,”

“Yeah,” Kevin says, “I didn’t think they’d be like that, either. I mean, I thought - I thought my dad would but I - my mom she - I thought she’d be better...” he trails off and looks back up at her, “‘m sorry. I don’t - I don’t really know why I’m here. I thought you’d - I thought you’d...I don’t know. I think I’m just gonna - I think I’m just gonna go back to the hut,”

“No,” Kimbay says, standing up and pulling him with her, “Come on. I’ll make you coffee,”

Kevin sits at her rickety kitchen table with his head on his arms whilst Kimbay brews his coffee. She places the mug in front of him and gently nudges him until he sits up.

“I’m not crying,” he says, despite the tears streaming down his face.

“No, you’re not,” she agrees, gently wiping his eyes.

“I just want my mom,” he says, despite how childish it makes him sound, “an’ I feel - I feel bad...”

Kimbay frowns at him, “You feel...bad?”

“Cause I - I don’t really have anything to complain about, do I? When I’m - When I’m done here I can just - I can go home and leave here but you - you can’t,” he mumbles. He groans and puts his face in his hands, “Sorry. That was - I don’t know what I’m saying. I just - I don’t have anything to complain about, really but I - I still complain all the time about - about everything but I - I shouldn’t. I know I shouldn’t,”

“You’ve been through a lot for such a young person,” Kimbay says quietly, running her hand up and down his back, “You’re allowed to complain,”

“I - I know but I don’t want to talk to Connor either because he - I don’t want to - his parents have been terrible. They won’t - they didn’t even call him to disown him they’ve just - they’ve not spoken to him. They just sent him a letter telling him to never come home again and I - I still have my siblings but I’m - I’m acting like I’ve got it worse than anyone in this fucking village,”

“You are allowed to be angry at the world, Elder Price,”

Kevin digs the heels of his hands into his eyes, “I just want to - I want to...I want to be able to go to my mom and have her solve all my problems for me like she did when I was a kid but she - she doesn’t l-love me anymore,” he trails off in a sob, “she doesn’t - she doesn’t give a shit. I could - I could drop dead tomorrow and she wouldn’t care,”

Kimbay sighs and puts her arm around his shoulders, pulling him closer to her.

“She might not, but there are plenty of people here who do,” she says quietly, “and that should count for something,”

“But none of them - none of them are my mom,”

“Your problem, Elder Price, is that your glass is always half empty. There are always going to be things we don’t have in life, and there are always people who are going to leave us, but there is also always things we do have and people who don’t leave us,” she says, “You might not have your mother, but you have your own little family here, don’t you? However weird we might be,”

Kevin sniffles and nods, “Y-Yeah. I guess,” he looks up at her and smiles a little, “Sorry for - for dropping this on you. I just - I didn’t know where else to go. Arnold wasn’t around and I - I don’t like Connor worrying more than he has to. He’s got - He’s got so much to worry about and I don’t - I don’t want to drop this on him,”

“He doesn’t know they’ve disowned you?”

Kevin shakes his head, “N-No. I just - I told him that I haven’t heard off them because he just - he worries so much,”

“I know he does. Remember when we took that picture of us all? He started hyperventilating because you and Elder Church had the same tie on and he was worried it would ruin the entire picture,”

Kevin can’t help it and laughs. Just last night, Connor had woken Kevin up at around 3 AM, worrying that they might have gotten everything wrong and that God was indeed real and he was leading them all to Hell. It had taken almost three hours for Kevin to calm Connor down enough so he would fall asleep again, by which point it was almost time for them to wake up and start the day.

“You are allowed to be angry at the world,” she says again, “No matter who you are or where you come from,”

“I still feel like a dick,” Kevin mutters.

“You are a dick,” Kimbay says kindly, “but you’re a dick that has been through a lot and is allowed to complain about it. There is always going to be people who have it harder than you, but that doesn’t mean you’re not having a hard time, as well,”

“I know but I still feel guilty. Like I don’t deserve to be moping around all the time and-”

Kimbay tuts and puts her hand on his cheek, forcing him to look at her.

“You are allowed to be upset. You are allowed to be angry. You are allowed to feel pissed off at God and your parents and whoever else you want to be pissed off at,” she says firmly.

“I - yeah. Sure.” Kevin mumbles.

“Say it, then,” Kimbay says, “Say you’re allowed to be pissed off,”

Kevin laughs, “I’m allowed to be pissed off,”

“That wasn’t so hard, was it?” Kimbay says, brushing her fingers through his hair, “Stop being so hard on yourself, please. You don’t deserve it,”

Kevin nods and wipes his eyes, “Sorry. I don’t - I don’t know why I came and bothered you. You probably - You probably have better things to worry about,”

“It is okay,” she says, “It is better than you wandering around on your own. Come on, I’ll walk you back to the hut. I’m sure Elder McKinley is worrying himself sick,”

“I can walk by myself,” Kevin grumbles, getting to his feet, “I’m an adult,”

“Barely,” she says, pinching his cheeks.

They walk to the hut in a comfortable silence. Kevin isn’t sure if seeing Kimbay as a maternal figure is strange or not, but decides that he isn’t going to think about it too much, or say that to her. Though if the way she ruffles his hair when they get to the hut is anything to go by, she might know exactly what is going on in his brain.

“Thanks for listening to me moan,” he says, not quite meeting her eyes.

Kimbay presses a kiss to his forehead, “I don’t mind-”

“Kevin!” a panicked voice yells, cutting her off, “Where on Earth have you been? I’ve been worried sick!”

“Sorry,” Kevin mumbles, turning to face Connor, “I was - I went for a walk,”

“All day? And without telling me? I thought you were - I thought you were being strangled by a snake or - or being eaten by lions or both and I - have you been crying? What’s wrong?” He cups his face in both hands, “What’s happened? Is everything okay?”

Kevin feels his bottom lip tremble and he pulls Connor in for a hug, squeezing his eyes shut, “Thank-you for caring about me,”

Connor frowns and pulls away, giving him a searching look, “Um..I - obviously I care about you, darling. I - you don’t need to thank me, Kevin,”

“I know. I just - thank-you,” he whispers before turning around to face Kimbay again, “I’m overly dramatic, I know. I’m sorry. I won’t - I won’t bother you again,”

Kimbay rolls her eyes, “What, and miss out on our coffee date tomorrow? What sort of son are you?”

Kevin somehow manages to hold back his tears until she is gone.

#BOM10DayChallenge #Kevin Price #Kimbay bom #Connor McKinley #Elder Price #Elder McKinley #McPriceley #but barely #tbom #bom

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mystery-star · 5 years ago

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Threshold of Space - Chapter 11 Familiarity

Pairing: Spock x OC

Warnnigs: mentions of sex, swearing, mentions of past to dub-con

Words: 6384

All Parts:

If you want to be added to the taglist, let me know!

Please do not repost my work on other sites or platforms!

“So uhm… how did the hearing go?” Carissa asked

“Quite well. Oliver’s expelled for what he did”

“Really? That’s great” she beamed “Now he won’t bother me again”

“Besides, it’s not technically your fault because the accuse was ‘attack on two Starfleet Officers’”

“That’s good. Then his buddies will leave me alone. They’re a bit daft and probably won’t figure out that it’s my fault. At least I hope so. What about Jim?”

“Oh, he got suspended for two weeks. But since we can’t really do anything but repair the ship at the moment he’s okay with it. He thinks of it as a holiday”

“That’s good to hear. What about Spock?”

“He got praise for ‘role-modelling and ending a fight’, what else?”

“But-but he knocked Oliver down”

“No, he didn’t. When Oliver lunged at him, he merely stepped aside so that the idiot fell himself. He didn’t even touch him. Of course Oliver tried to claim that wasn’t the case and that Spock beat him… but there were too many witnesses who have watched the fight so you can imagine where that went…”

“And you? What about you?”

“Well, I only was a witness because I was not involved in the fight at all. I also confirmed that you actually got bruised ribs thanks to Oliver” she nodded “Before I forget it; Spock has said he will come once he is finished to bring you home”

“Okay” to her surprise, her boyfriend came earlier than she thought. McCoy excused himself and said he would go home

“Please, just turn off the lights and lock the door when you leave. I take it you’ll manage that, Spock?”

“Don’t we need to clean up first?”

“No. I put everything I needed away, besides they will need to clean everything anyway before the semester starts”

“Okay” she nodded

“Well then, I’ll be gone. Have fun you two and good holidays to you. See you and get well soon”

“Thank you. And thank you for everything you did for me in the past hours. It means a lot to me”

“Of course. I saved your life, now I’m responsible for you” she rolled her eyes and watched as he left. Shortly after the door was closed, Spock placed his hand on hers

“And thank you too” she said, covering and squeezing his hand.

“You are welcome”

“I’m sorry that I dropped the accuse in the first hearing. I just didn’t feel well at all… and I thought that we’d never get to an end if it continued like this. Besides, you were right. It was indeed Oliver who was behind this. He admitted it before he attacked Jim”

“I was aware of the truth”

“Then aren’t you… angry I well… ruined the chance to have Oliver punished before he did something else?”

“I do not blame you for any of the incidents that have happened and I was aware of your uncomfortableness during the initial hearing. You are right with the assumption that a continuation of it would not have been prosperous”

“Yeah. And in the end we got Oliver punished anyway… not that I’d want to be gleeful but I’m glad that he will be gone”

“This is indeed fortunate since the possibility that he would have concocted a new plan against you amounts to 94.27 percent”

“Make it a hundred. Because he ‘promised’ me to make me pay. Actually, he wanted me to meet him later today. And… he threatened to hurt someone else if I didn’t show up. Fuck. What am I gonna do? What if he makes his threat come true? He would go after Nicole and Leonard”

“I doubt that Cadet Moore will have the time to find either of them until his departure tomorrow”

“So he will be gone by then?” he agreed “But what if he tells his friends to make his threat come true and go after Nicole anyway when the new year begins?”

“There is nothing we can do to prevent this”

“Well there is a way… I could do what he wants”

“This option is beyond all question”

“What else can we do? I can’t let him hurt my friends because of me!”

“Carissa, even if you comply with his request you have no guarantee that he will not harm your friends. In fact, the chance that…”

“I don’t want to hear your number! What would you do in my situation? I know you would go there too! Besides, if I let him have his will, I can make him promise that he will leave my friends alone”

“Unfortunately, that contract would be invalid according to paragraph 18 of contract law”

“And why is that? What does it say?”

“That any contract which content is impossible, unlawful or immoral is invalid. Thus, he would be officially allowed to rescind from it”

“Spock, I don’t think he knows about that law…”

“Which does not mean he would not exercise his right.” he grabbed her shoulders “Carissa, please try to understand that your appearance would not change anything”

“I know this is silly, stupid and illogical. But if there is any chance that he’s satisfied after he… well… it’s worth it”

“Carissa, I have given you my word to not inhibit you from making your own decisions and would only offer you advice but if you insist to go ahead with your plan, you will leave me no choice but to break this promise. Which again would mean you would have to end our relationship as this was one of the conditions that you agreed to a reunion”

“You-you’d rather I break up with you than doing what he wants?”

“Neither of the options is favorable but I would indeed prefer the first one” she took a deep breath (as deep as her injury allowed without pain) and nodded

“Okay” she said “I know you well enough to know that you’d actually stop me if you have to… So I wouldn’t even have a chance against you… you won. I won’t go but I want to warn Nicole and Leonard. Just in case he makes his threat come true. Maybe we should inform someone from the Academy as well…” he gave a nod as well

“Then I will caution Doctor McCoy and see to it that the personnel of the Academy is informed while you can warn your friend”

“Okay. Thanks” he let go of her

“I think it would be better if I found another place to spend the night and I will organize you another accommodation for when you return from your vacation”

“Why that?” she felt her heart bumping painfully fast. Did he want to throw her out?

“Seeing as I broke my promise, you will have no choice but to end our relationship” she was silent for a while as she tried to process his words. Then she almost felt like laughing.

“Oh Spock” she sighed, sitting up and cupping his face “I’m not gonna break up with you. Technically, you didn’t even break your promise, you only said you would do it and in the end it was my decision not to go. Besides, I didn’t mean it literally. I wouldn’t break up with you just because you’re not accepting my decision once… but if you kept doing this and started to limit my freedom I would eventually finish with you… which doesn’t mean I’m not mad at you right now” she bit her lip “Okay, no I don’t think I am mad at you but I should be” she hit his chest “I just can’t really be mad at you. I hate you for this” he only raised an eyebrow

“I am relieved to hear that but your last statement is inconsistent as you cannot not feel anger towards me and hate me at the same time”

“And this is exactly why I can’t hate you for long” she sighed as she buried her face in his chest.

“Is there anything I could do to eradicate your emotional conflict?”

“Oh no” she hummed “If you want to earn my forgiveness you can strain your brain a little”

“Would you consider a kiss an appropriate apology?”

“Depends on what kind of kiss…” he lifted her face and captured her lips in a sweet kiss. When they parted she nodded “Apology accepted”

-oO0Oo-

Somehow Carissa had the feeling that her chest hurt even more in the morning as she got up. Her boyfriend was already up and was preparing breakfast.

“Good morning, Carissa. How are you feeling?”

“Honestly? Like a bloody starship used my chest as landing place”

“Your comparison does not make any sense since starships are not meant to land on the ground”

“Fine like a shuttlecraft landed on me. Happy?” he placed a plate in front of her

“It was not my intention to anger you, please forgive me if I did so”

“No it’s fine… I’m just tired. Why couldn’t there be a train that leaves later?”

“If you had used the last evening for packing, you could have slept longer”

“It was our last evening together… I didn’t want to waste it with packing” she huffed. After breakfast, Spock helped her pack, probably because he didn’t want her to strain herself. As he had promised her the previous day, he then brought her to the train station to see her off. She felt strange to know that he wouldn’t be around for a longer time, after all she had gotten used to seeing him every day. Or almost every day. They reached the platform and Carissa fumbled with the hem of her shirt. “That means goodbye, I guess?” she sighed and hugged him, ignoring the painful pressure on her ribs. He only placed his hands on her back and she didn’t know if it was because he didn’t want to hurt her or because he wasn’t comfortable to show affection in public. But he did something, that was everything that counted for her “I’ll miss you” she mumbled

“I must admit it will be unaccustomed to have my apartment to myself”

“You’ll just miss my help, admit it”

“That is not true” she chuckled

“Nice to know” she pulled away a little and pecked his cheek.

“Will you promise me to take care?”

“Okay. There’s not much I can do anyway… everyone I know and want to see seems to have left for holiday… So the most dangerous thing that can happen is that I get bored to death. As for you… make sure no one tries to… I don’t know, take over earth or something”

“The possibility that his would happen in that time frame is below 6.7 percent” she giggled

“Good” to her surprise, he pecked her cheek before he helped her mount the train and lifted her suitcase and Blacky’s transport cage into the train as well. She dragged her stuff into the inside of the train to get a seat. Biting her lip she stared at the storage space above her head and doubted that she could bring her stuff up there. But she couldn’t leave in in the aisle either or place it on the seat next to her. Luckily, she got help from a middle-aged man before she got completely desperate. “I’m sorry” she said. “I could have lifted it myself but I shouldn’t… I uh… bruised my ribs”

“I hope you get better soon then”

“Thanks” she smiled and sat down, tucking her tomcat under her thin jacket that he couldn’t run away. “Guess what, Blacky? We’re going home” the animal let out a meow “Yes I know you’ll miss Spock, I will miss him too” she looked out of the window but as it seemed, he must have already left. He probably didn’t want to be even later for work than he already was. After all he was in charge now that Jim got suspended. The train started moving and Carissa pulled out her PADD to watch a movie.

-oO0Oo-

Her mother was awaiting her at the train station when she arrived and took her into a bone crushing hug.

“Ugh… Mum, my ribs” she panted, trying her best to avoid any contact

“Oh I’m sorry, honey. How are you doing?”

“I’m fine. The journey was good”

“Did you have lunch?”

“Of course I did”

“Something from the train? I do believe those food synthesizers are older than the Federation itself…”

“No, actually I got something from a little store at the train station before I got onto the train”

“Oh that’s good. Let’s get you home them” she took Carissa’s suitcase and her rucksack so that she only carried Blacky in her arms and his transportation box.

-oO0Oo-

Somehow she felt strange about being back home. Although some things had changed, it still was like she remembered it. Just her room was just as she had left it a year ago, the only change was that her sheets had been changed. She decided to unpack her things before her father came home. Once he did, they had dinner together and Carissa was asked about her plans for the following weeks

“I guess I’ll just stay around here quite a lot”

“You know, Stoltenborg moved away”

“Oh did he?” she asked, internally feeling glad that the old neighbor wouldn’t be around anymore

“Yes, instead a young couple moved there. They’re your age. Maybe you can meet them once?”

“Hm I’ll see” she wasn’t too happy to go out and meet new people. At least not if she had to befriend them. If it were people of other background she would find it interesting to learn more about them.

“I could invite them over for lunch this week?”

“Maybe?” she said with a shrug “Speaking of lunch… I could help in the restaurant a bit sometimes”

“But you don’t have to, honey. This are your holidays”

“I know… but otherwise I’ll get bored”

“We’ll see”

-oO0Oo-

Her mother still invited the couple that now lived nearby over for lunch one day and although Carissa liked them, she knew that they’d never be friends. She spent most of her days in her bed, reading or watching something or tried to teach Blacky some stupid tricks. At times she also called her friends and Jessica, her best friend from high school, said she would be back from Egypt a couple of days before Carissa had to leave. Which meant, she only had to dawdle away another couple of weeks.

One afternoon, Carissa sat on her chair at the kitchen table with her knees tucked up and she tried to make Blacky move who had curled up on the chair beside her by tickling his whiskers with his cat toy. His nose twitched comically making her giggle.

“Oh Carissa, leave that poor animal alone”

“What? If he was annoyed he would be long gone. I’m just trying to stimulate him that he plays with me” as it seemed he must have decided that this was enough and he jumped of the chair, arched his back then dashed away. “Oh man” she huffed and dropped the stick with the toy on the chair he had been on “Now I’m alone again”

“As I said, you could go and see Melissa and Zane”

“You told me that over twenty times. And I told you every time that I don’t really like them enough to become friends with them”

“I didn’t say anything about becoming friends. Just spend time with them. Oh or you know what? I’ll ask if Chester has time”

“Chester?”

“Your best friend from day nursery”

“What? I was three at that time. We’ve last seen each other over eighteen years ago”

“Yes, but his mother and I are still friends. And he moved back to town a couple of months ago”

“Okay, Mum… I appreciate your help but you don’t need to try and make me meet all kinds of people I’ve known as a child or that are twice my age… I really am fine being here”

“Why don’t you go to town and have some fun? Alone? Go get an ice cream”

“I’ve had ice cream four times in the past two weeks”

“It can’t hurt to have one more” she ruffled her hair, making her sigh. The doorbell rang and Carissa got up as well, grabbing her shoes “What are you doing?” her mother asked

“Getting an ice cream as you said”

“Wearing that?” she said, eying her tank top and hot pants critically

“Mum, come on, it’s 96 degrees. Just a wacko would go out with more clothes on” she said as she put on her shoes “Well uh, I’m gonna take the back exit. Your visitor won’t like it if I just push past them” she waved her mother goodbye and tried to leave the corridor before her mother opened the door.

“Oh. Carissa come here, it’s for you” she stopped dead in her tracks.

“For me?” she squeezed her eyes. Of course, her mother must have called some old friend of hers anyway to make her spend time with someone. Suppressing a sigh she turned around, already trying to find an excuse to get away quickly, then she recognized her visitor and her jaw almost dropped. “Spock?! What are you doing here?” she shrieked, sprinting towards him and throwing herself round his neck.

“The Captain has urged me to take a holiday and after 26 hours I did not know how to spend these days, thus I have decided to visit you” she smiled and pressed herself closer to him

“You’ve got no idea how happy this makes me” he didn’t reply and leaned his head onto hers for a while, until she pulled away and let go of him. Instantly, her mother was there too and tried to shake his hand again, then failed at another attempt of the Vulcan greeting.

“It’s nice to see you. Carissa, why don’t you show him the house and the guestroom?”

“That will not be necessary I will reside in a hotel during my stay”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Of course you’re staying with us”

“In other words, you have no choice. Because there’s only a hostel nearby, not a hotel. We really live in the back of beyond” Carissa translated

“I do not wish to cause you inconvenience”

“Of course not! I’ll just go and put clean sheets on the bed. Or wait, Carissa, maybe he wants to choose the sheets I’m sure he’ll like the galaxy ones” she rolled her eyes

“Mum, I have the galaxy ones at the moment....” she looked at her boyfriend “Alright, let’s go, then you can put your things there”

“I’ll be in the kitchen” Rachel said and Carissa knew that she’d be preparing something to eat. She took off her shoes and dropped them next to the shoe rack before she led Spock to the guestroom.

“Okay, you can put your things into the dresser over there. It’s just, the drawer at the bottom is already full with board games and some of my old toys. I’m gonna get you some sheets. We’ve got: dinosaurs, flowers, palm trees, red and yellow stripes, a lion or letters. Oh or a plain purple one. Or I can go and see what my parents have”

“I would like the banded one” Carissa nodded

“I’ll go get them, you can unpack your things in the meantime. You can come to my room next door when you’re done. Then I’ll put the sheets on.” she placed a hand on his arm, then left to get the sheets from the storage room. Then she went to her own room, not wanting to disturb her boyfriend. Besides, she had to tidy up her room a little. She chuckled because she had wanted to do this days ago. At least she now had a reason to do so. But she didn’t really pay attention where she put the stuff, as long as it wasn’t visible. So, she pulled out the drawer from under her bed and tried to stuff her clothes in there when she saw something shiny under her bed. Wanting to know what it was, she tried to crawl under the bed but to no avail. That was when she decided she had to move the bed and braced herself against it and tried to push. It didn’t budge and she kicked the frame, regretting it when a piercing pain shot through her whole body and she cried out. She held her toes, bouncing around in pain. As always, it got worse and she stumbled over the drawer she had pulled out and fell right into it. “What luck that I’m lazy” she mumbled, being thankful that she had stuffed her clothes into it earlier.

“Carissa?” she heard her mother shout “Everything okay up there?”

“Yes Mum” she cried when Spock entered the room. She was sure to have seen a slight flash of amusement on his face when he saw her lying in the drawer

“How did this situation come to be?”

“Well first I was only tidying up my room, then I saw something under my bed that arose my interest and I tried to get it. When it didn’t work I kicked against the bed and in my pain I stumbled over the drawer and fell into it” she said as she got up, rubbing her ass.

“What is it that you have spotted beneath your bed?”

“That’s the thing. I don’t know.” This time she leaned her back against the bed and tried to push with her legs. Spock appeared beside her and placed a hand on her arm, gently nudging her to get up. With two swift movements he had pushed the bed away enough that Carissa could retrieve the object which she recognized as her old pocket telescope. “Oh there it is. I must have kicked it under the bed when I packed for the Academy” she remembered how she wanted to take to the Academy in her first year but suddenly couldn’t find it anymore.

“What are you two doing up there? I hope you’re not trying to move both beds in one room!”

“Of course not Mum” she shrieked and let out a groan. When she looked back at Spock she grinned a little. “You should have heard her when I told her that I stay at your place at the moment… she gave me a very embarrassing talk” she sighed and took another look at her telescope, wiping dust off it. “I thought I had lost it” she mumbled and grinned when memories came up. “When they gave me this telescope for Christmas when I was ten, I spent hours watching the sky and doodling star charts. And sometimes I invented stories about my adventures in space… I guess I saved half the universe and the inhabitants of the planets made me their queen. Or I was abducted and the boy I had a crush on at the time would save me and then tell me that he loved me and all...” she chuckled “I think I’ve got the booklet with the stories I wrote down somewhere” she placed the telescope on her table and went to her shelf. “Oh or are you done? Shall I put on the new sheets?”

“No, I did not finish and I am capable of changing the bedding on my own”

“Oh okay. If you need my help, you’ll know where you find me”

“I appreciate your offer for help but I am certain that it will not come to that” she nodded and tried to pull her bed back in place. Spock showed her to step aside again and pulled the bed back with one hand before he left

“Showoff” Carissa muttered, failing to stifle a grin.

-oO0Oo-

Once her boyfriend had unpacked everything Carissa told him of his plan to go to town to have an ice cream.

“But if you want to do anything else, we can do that too. Unfortunately, there isn’t much to see here… I could show you around a little but it’s too hot to do a lot”

“I believe that getting an overview of the town would be the best option”

“So sightseeing?” he agreed.

“Great, let’s go. I mean, you can get changed and then we leave”

“There will be no need for me to change my clothes” she stared at his dark long-sleeved shirt and long trousers

“Err okay…” she said with a shrug. “Let’s go”

“Where are you going?” her mother asked when they came downstairs

“I’ll show him around in town…”

“Oh that’s nice. Do you need a map?”

“Mum, I grew up here. I certainly don’t need a map!” she sighed and put on her shoes again. Her mother appeared in the corridor and handed each of them some water

“Don’t forget to drink out there. It’s hot” Carissa rolled her eyes

“Thanks Mum” she said

“I’ll get you a bag” with that, Rachel left again and returned with a handbag which she handed to her daughter

“Thanks” she quickly left the house and placed the handbag behind a bush “Let’s leave that stuff here, there are water fountains in town. We won’t die of thirst and I don’t want to carry that around” she explained and Spock handed her his water bottle

“It would be wiser if you took something with you. Due to perspiration you will lose up to 23.255 percent of your…”

“Okay, I get it, Mum” she opened the bottle and drank all of it before tossing it to the bag. “There, can we go now? I filled my water reservoirs” Spock raised an eyebrow but nodded.

-oO0Oo-

After a short tour through her hometown, Carissa needed something to cool down (and use the toilet) so she more or less dragged the Vulcan to the ice cream parlor. He didn’t seem too happy with her choice and only ordered something to drink.

“Are you sure you don’t want any of my ice cream?” she asked, waving it in front of his face

“I have already assured you that I do not want to taste it”

“Okay. More for me then” she replied and suddenly got an idea and pressed the ice cream in his face. When she saw his mien she almost fell off her chair from laughter

“How can your immature behavior be that amusing to you?” he replied

“It’s not just what I did… did you see your face?” when she tried to lick at her food again, one scoop fell down into her lap, making her shriek.

“I am quite certain that this was a demonstration of the Indian concept called Karma”

“Oh just shut up or I’ll drop the rest of my ice cream on you” she huffed as she got up to find napkins.

“Hey uh, can I help you?” she looked up and almost jumped back in shock when she recognized the guy as Finn, her ex.

“No, I’m fine”

“You missed something, right there” he took a napkin himself and tried to wipe away some of the mess on her shorts.

“Get your paws off me” she barked, taking a step back

“I was only trying to help”

“Yeah and hoped you could have a grope”

“That’s not true”

“This is what it’s always been”

“You said it. Has been. I changed”

“God, what’s that supposed to mean?”

“That I realized I was an idiot and that I would like to try it again”

“Sorry, I got someone else”

“Bullshit. You’re only saying that because you don’t want me to prove that I changed”

“No, I am saying this because I have a boyfriend and he’s only sitting a few feet away”

“But-but you can’t do that”

“What? I broke up with you, so I can date whoever I like. Now, if you’d excuse me, I’m going back to my boyfriend.” she tried to leave, not caring about her mess anymore. But Finn grabbed her wrist.

“Wait. I-I admit, this meeting wasn’t as I have imagined it… but I’m sure if we went out together and talked a bit…”

“Whoa” she broke away from him “I’m not going out with you”

“Why not?”

“First of all, I am dating someone else. Secondly, even if I didn’t I wouldn’t want to spend time with you. You don’t seem to understand what you did to me!”

“But you don’t have to tell him”

“No, as I said I don’t want to spend time with you”

“But I changed”

“I hope you did. You can prove that to someone else. Look, the waitress over there. Why don’t you go and flirt with her?”

“She won’t know that I changed. And I don’t love her I love you”

“Hard luck. I don’t”

“The feelings will come back”

“Ah wait, now that you said it… I think I feel something for you…”

“Really?”

“Embarrassment, hatred and annoyance” she hissed. Finn chuckled

“I’ve always liked your sense of humor”

“Bad thing I was serious”

“Carissa” he placed his hands on her shoulders “all I am asking you for is a second chance”

“Finn look, I have already told you that I have a new boyfriend now, and even if I hadn’t, I wouldn’t want you back. You hurt me and you don’t even care”

“What has he that I don’t have?” she had a look at the time

“I think the shop will close before I’m done…”

“Carissa, I know I behaved stupidly and I wanted things you weren’t ready for but that’s over. Besides, this time it won’t be that special anymore because you’re not a virgin anymore”

“And how is that a sign for me being ready or willing to… do you even hear yourself talking? That makes no sense. God, why do I only realize now how stupid you actually are?” she groaned and felt tears burning in her eyes. He grabbed her hand and squeezed it

“Please. I can make you happy” she tried to free her hand

“Finn, I am not interested. Just leave me alone”

“Can I come and visit you?”

“No!”

“How else can I reach you?”

“Not at all. I’ve made myself clear when I told you that I don’t want to hear from you again”

“But that was ages ago” he brought her hand to his lips and she was quick to pull it away

“What do you think you’re doing?” she hissed crossing her arms.

“I told you that I changed”

“Changed? That you’re not pushy anymore? You’re trying to persuade me to get back together with you and you touch me without asking first? No I even told you to stop and yet you continued. I’m having a flashback”

“But it has never bothered you before”

“It did and I told you but you didn’t care. That is why I broke up with you”

“I do believe that she has made her request to be left alone quite plain” she heard Spock’s voice behind her

“What do you care? Who are you even? No, what are you?”

“Finn, this is my boyfriend”

“What? That cannot be… you left me… for that?”

“Excuse me but I left you for being an asshole. I just was lucky enough to meet Spock later on” she glanced back at him, realizing that he had cleaned up his face completely.

“What happened to his ears? Why don’t they look normal?”

“He’s Vulcan”

“Vulcan? But isn’t that a burning mountain?”

“Okay, first of all, that is called a volcano. Secondly, it’s not burning, it is just... well filled with lava, which isn’t quite correct but I doubt you’d comprehend if I tried to explain it anyway”

“But what…? I mean just look at him. That is… you know… Where and how did that happen?”

“I apologize but speaking rate as well as the incomplete and incoherent sentences have made it impossible for me to conceive the content of your inquiry”

“What?” Finn’s jaw dropped open

“He asked ‘what?’” Carissa translated “But we won’t answer your question because this is none of your concern” She turned back to Spock. “Come on, let’s go”

“I really don’t see what he has that I don’t… except for weird ears”

“Finn, we had that”

"Yes and you didn't answer my question"

"This conversation is ridiculous!" she sighed. "Just leave us alone" Finn crossed his arms

"Oh yeah? Is it though?" he turned to her boyfriend "Listen, I don't know who or what you are but stay away from her. She deserves better than you"

"Oh someone like you maybe?" she taunted

"Yes" he glared at the other male

"It is not my intention to leave Carissa unless it is her wish"

"There you go. Piss off" she made a shooing hand movement. Her ex made no move

"So you want to sort this out the hard way?"

"Okay, you're stupid" Carissa hissed "Besides, I doubt my boyfriend as that daft to use violence because of me, which is one point why he's better"

"Since when do you speak for him?" he glanced past her at the Vulcan "What do you say?"

"I agree with my girlfriend. The use of violence is highly illogical and unnecessary in this situation"

"What else are we gonna do to establish the matter?"

"You could just shut up and leave. That would be clever and nice of you. But come to think of it… you're neither so I guess you'll stay" she sighed "How else can I make it plainer to you that I'm absolutely not interested?"

"I know that you will change your mind. What do you even know about your 'boyfriend?' Maybe their culture is different and you two are long married and you don't even know"

"I doubt that. Besides, I would have nothing against marrying him right now just that you piss off" he shook his head

"I don't believe it. But have it your way then. One day you'll wish you had left him before"

"The only thing I wish is that I had left you earlier. Or never dated you manipulative prick at all"

"That doesn't change anything" again he turned to Spock "Just that you know. She's not a virgin anymore"

"Oh wow, congratulations. Of course that will be the thing that makes him break up"

"Maybe that is something special in his culture and he can't have you anymore"

"Your assumption is wrong"

"There you go" this time she had enough and grabbed Spock's wrist "Now let's go"

"This talk isn't over yet!"

"Fine, then continue it as a monologue because we're going. We've got better stuff to do" outside the parlor she sighed in relief "Sorry, I told you about him…. But he wasn't that crazy at the time we’ve been together. At the end maybe, when I realized how stupid he actually is."

"Is he hoping for another try at your relationship?"

"Unfortunately" he said nothing more "Okay, let's forget this. I don’t want to think of him. What else would you like to do?"

-oO0Oo-

Once they were home, the Vulcan announced that he wanted to meditate in the guestroom.

"Okay, I'll tell Mum to be quiet" she pecked his cheek and left "I think you should wait a little before you start because she might come up to offer you her yoga mat or whatever…" she chuckled and closed the door.

"So, how was your date?"

"It wasn't a date, we just went to town together and had an ice cream. Well I did. Uh, Mum, he said he'd like to meditate now. Which means he wants silence. Can you please be quiet a little?"

"Of course. Do you think he'll want some candles? I still got scented ones" she hurried away, probably to get them

"No, Mum, as I said he only wants some peace. Just stay downstairs and relax a little"

"Or I could go and join him. I've learned some relaxing techniques in my yoga class"

"Mum no, this is important to him. And he wants to do it alone because it’s very private. Please, just promise me to stay downstairs. I'll help you clean something if you want" she smiled at her daughter

"If it means this much to the both of you I respect his wish" she took a seat on the couch "I'll just be here and read"

"Thanks, Mum. I think I'll join you and put a note at the door for Dad that he knows when he comes home. Or maybe I'll wait outside because otherwise he'll shout through the whole house why he should be quiet…" she corrected.

"Do you think he'll need that long to meditate?"

"It depends. He usually only does that when he had to deal with emotions or if he's under stress"

"Did something happen?"

"We ran into Finn and the taunted both of us a little. I guess that was it" she replied. "And yes, it can happen that he will be occupied for a couple of hours. It happened when I was at the Academy once. Because usually he tells me that he wants to meditate that day before I leave so I can just stay in the library and do homework that I don’t disturb him. But one day he just didn't write me that he was done… finally I fell asleep in the library and woke up way past midnight and by then the Academy doors were locked and I had to sleep on the floor of a classroom. In the end, Spock told me that he was worried about me when I didn't return and after that day he didn't meditate that long anymore or said that I could just come home when I wanted" her mother nodded

"Alright then" they both sat down on the couch and Carissa took out her private PADD, seeing that Nicole had tried to contact her. She wrote her a message, saying that she couldn't talk to her now because she had stuff to do. In reality, she just couldn't talk to her in peace. Unless she went outside, which she would do anyway before her father returned. If Spock was finished before, she still could go to her room to talk to her friend.

Next Chapter

#spock #spock fanfiction #spock x oc #fanfiction #star trek #Star Trek Fanfiction

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wardencommanderrodimiss · 5 years ago

Text

Witches, Chapter 24: welcome to Themis.

Watch me go this whole arc without mentioning the “dark age of the law” but still trying to impress upon us the corruption inherent in the school and the legal system anyway.

[Seelie of Kurain Chapter Masterlist] [ao3]

[Witches Chapter Masterlist] [ao3]

-----

“Phoenix Wright speaking.”

“Hello, Mr Wright? This is Constance Courte, one of the professors—”

“—at Themis? I remember hearing your name. What’s up? Is something going on with the school festival?”

“No, everything remains as scheduled - including your lecture that you’ll be giving tomorrow. I was calling to ask if, perhaps, you would be able to arrive a bit earlier tomorrow - say, around one o’clock? I’d like to discuss in advance what you’re planning for your lecture and seminar. I imagine that Professor Means likely told you that the stage is yours and you are free to say what you like, but he and I disagree on - well. We have rather different teaching styles, shall we say.”

“Yeah, he pretty much said it was up to me, but I’d be happy to have a chat with you about what you’d like the fledgling defense attorneys to learn to make it easier on your future judges. The mock trial starts at two, right? I can definitely be there early - oh, I invited my two junior partners along, too. Hope that won’t be a problem.”

“Not at all. I look forward to meeting them too. And there is something else I would like to ask of you, though. It’s in regards to Prosecutor Gavin.”

“I’d heard he’s the prosecutor who was invited to speak, same as me.”

“Yes. At my suggestion - he was one of my students. I teach several classes open to students of any course. I believe it’s better to have a fully rounded view of the courtroom and understand all those positions, and I hope you might agree. Klavier was one of my favorite students, though I’m not sure I should admit that I do have favorites.”

“I’m not sure I’m following what you mean to ask. If you’re worried I take some sort of issue with him, on basis of what happened eight years ago, I’ll be the first to assure you that I don’t blame him for what happened.”

“I’m certainly glad to hear it. Now, I said that I suggested that Klavier be invited, and he agreed to come to Themis again, yes, when the academy’s administration sent him a formal email asking him if he would come speak. As for myself, I have reached out to him a number of times over the past year, most recently floating this idea, and every time, I am met with silence. Considering everything that has happened, I’ll admit that I am concerned about him.”

“...Honestly, so am I, but I am, without a doubt, the worst person to ask. I know for a fact that he will be doing his damndest to avoid me.”

“We may be in that boat together, and I fear that tomorrow he will continue to do so. This brings me to you, Mr Wright, and what I would ask of you. I have heard quite a bit about you, I’ll admit, some rumors much less court-related and much odder than others. One of the things they say is that you are quite good at seeing things that other people can’t.”

“...!”

“However that may be, I would be deeply grateful if you would, if necessary, help me corner Klavier tomorrow, because I suspect you may have also noticed that he is very, very good at avoiding people if he does not want to be found.”

“Well, this just feels like my first day of university all over again.” Phoenix shields his eyes against the sun and stares up at the building that looms in front of them. It’s a huge campus for a high school, but it’s also a fancy lawyer high school with alumni that probably donate boatloads of money from their lucrative careers, so it’s not all that surprising. “Lost as hell.”

“There’s probably at least three lecture halls in every one of these buildings,” Apollo gripes, staring out across the quad at the other nearby academic buildings. “Which one is the lecture hall where we’re supposed to meet the professor?”

“She said the main lecture hall,” Phoenix says. “I am making the assumption that this building in the center of campus is the main building, and thus, houses the main lecture hall.” But who the hell can actually know, really? Athena’s probably lost as hell too, since they’d waited as long as they could by the main gates to campus waiting for her, and still she didn’t turn up.

With still an hour until the mock trial, students aren’t swarming all over the campus yet, though maybe it would be better if they were. The mock trial is also taking place in the main lecture hall, but because it’s only students and faculty attending the mock trial, there are no signs pointing the way, because everyone who is regularly at the school would know where the damn main lecture hall is. And there’s no crowd to follow, yet, and so, their current predicament.

Behind them, someone clears their throat. “By chance, you would not happen to be Mr Wright?”

It’s the hair, isn’t it? Or the blue suit. Hilariously, “hair and bright primary color suit” is also how Phoenix would describe both Apollo and Athena to anyone looking for them. The office accidentally has a theme. “That would be me, yes,” Phoenix says, turning around to come not quite face-to-face with a very tall man, with a carefully arranged gray beard and hair, and, over his vest and dress shirt, a white robe that in any other situation would scream frat party bedsheet toga. Trucy went to the Themis website last night to show him pictures of the professors so that he knew who he was looking for. “And you are Aristotle Means?”

“I am indeed.” He offers a hand and Phoenix shakes it. “It’s wonderful to finally get the chance to meet and speak with you in person.” He was the one who sent the invitation email to Phoenix. And a formal invitation letter and a pamphlet about the school and one about the mock trial and Phoenix meant to read those and has no idea what they disappeared to.

“Thanks for the invite,” Phoenix says. “And - oh, this is Apollo Justice.” The introductions are swiftly made - “The other lawyer at our agency should be coming, too, though I’m not sure where she’s gotten off to” - their situation and desperate need of directions explained, and Professor Means offers to escort them up to the main lecture hall, which is on the third floor of this building, meaning that Phoenix and Apollo almost had it. “Thank you. I appreciate it - and for the invitation to come here to speak. I wasn’t expecting that - I’m sure there are other defense attorneys around, and alumni at that, who are…” Phoenix searches for any words at all that won’t drag himself too fiercely through the mud. Apollo is suddenly seemingly very interested on all the posters on the walls advertising school announcements and campus clubs.

“Nonsense!” Means says brightly. “Truly, I could think of no defense attorney I would rather have to our illustrious school, and I am glad that situation has been sorted out that you may return to the courtroom. I have had my students study your cases for years, you know.”

“R-really?” Kind of flattering, kind of alarming that he had his students study up on the tactics of a disbarred lawyer. Unless they were “what not to do” kinds of lessons, in which case that’s not flattering, and also why would he invite Phoenix here, then.

“Indeed. Your defense of Will Powers is one that I find particularly exemplary. That even while you were backed into a corner, you still managed to shift the blame well enough to buy yourself and your client further time, and another day to investigate. I have my students practice how to make effective accusations of a case’s initial witnesses, and to sound convincing even if they themselves do not believe their gambit.” Phoenix’s stomach flips over itself. Apollo really isn’t looking at him now. Means, oblivious to the tension between the two, that Phoenix hoped was going away but now is back in pained full, continues, “It is unfortunate, in truth, but is our client’s acquittal not our utmost priority? Is it not ultimately justified, what we do in pursuit of that?”

“That’s a bit of a slippery slope, don’t you think, Professor?” Apollo asks. He finally looks Phoenix in the eye, but he’s glaring at him instead, and that just makes Phoenix feel even worse. He’s supposed to give a lecture to these students; what’s he supposed to say when all they know him for is his most desperate and shadiest moments? Hell, what’s he supposed to say to Apollo once Means leaves?

“Unfortunately, if it is, then it is the prosecution who have given us our push down it.” Apollo’s frown deepens. “Consider how many of them value only victory and have their own underhanded tricks that, if we did not act, would convict our clients not on strength of evidence but simply on the prosecution’s say-so, that they demand this of the judge. We are letting our clients down if we do anything but fight their fire with our own.”

Phoenix expected him to protest further, but Apollo is strangely quiet. Maybe he’s thinking about Blackquill threatening Mayor Tenma to try and get a guilty plea, or maybe even that time that Klavier didn’t tell even his detective that the defendant could see and the witness was blind. He doesn’t mount a defense of the supposed minority of prosecutors who aren’t underhanded on behalf of his friend, at any rate. Means changes the subject and Phoenix carries on a conversation with him without his brain in it, and when they come up on the lecture hall, Phoenix has no idea what the hell they were talking about. He just wonders what Courte thought about inviting him here, considering it was her favorite student who got him disbarred. She hadn’t given any hint of animosity during their weird conversation last night.

“If I see Professor Courte around, I will let her know that you’re here,” Means says as he leaves. “But I wouldn’t be surprised if she doesn’t show up for a while. She labors under the unfortunate curse of being habitually late.”

The size of the lecture hall reminds him of his own university days, but not the quality of the room itself, which is unfathomably better. Hell, it’s at least as nice as the courthouse, stark white marble-looking walls and shiny white desk surfaces, with a screen at every station. Students wouldn’t even have to remember to bring their laptops for lectures. The cynic in him wonders just how much this all cost, and whether they could have gotten even more nice screens and supplies if they hadn’t tried to make this hall look like a temple or museum. Wealthy alumni, he thinks again.

“So when he said ‘curse’ there,” Apollo ventures slowly, the first thing he’s said since he asked Means that question, and Phoenix is just glad that this all hasn’t put them off speaking terms yet. “Do you think that was just a turn of phrase or - I mean, that just sounds really petty, for a curse.” He sounds more like he’s trying to convince himself of such, rather than actually believing it.

“Petty’s what they are,” Phoenix says. “Besides, I know a guy who has a fae blessing that he can memorize any words that are written down on a page, so long as he eats the paper it was written down on. A curse that’s just chronic lateness? Might not be that far off.”

“Eats the paper?” Apollo repeats.

Phoenix sinks into one of the seats in the back row. Apollo has no idea how lucky he is that the fae in his past saw it fitting just to give him plain, unvarnished Truth. (Magnifi gave the same to Thalassa and Trucy, presumably because in the human world he thought he would need them, but what was the motivation for Apollo’s fae? Just a gift?) “Eats the paper.”

Time crawls by, with Phoenix checking the clock every few minutes, neither Courte nor Athena showing up. “I did tell Athena we’re meeting at one, right?” he asks, and Apollo, staring bored down at his phone (“Your daughter is texting in class” he said a few minutes ago) nods. “Right, because I told both of you at the same time, and you’re here.” The back of the chair is low enough that he tilts his head the whole way back to stare up at the ceiling when he tries to lean back.

1:30 comes and goes. Apollo encourages Trucy’s bad habits of texting in class. Phoenix sinks down into the chair and props his knees up against the edge of the tables. The hall slowly starts to fill up with students and their colorful uniforms, based on what profession they aspire toward; and then with an overhead announcement telling all students and faculty to please make their way to the lecture hall, the room begins to flood. Apollo springs up out of his chair and waves to someone. “Hey, Athena!” he shouts, ignoring all of the eyes that turn toward him for his loud yell and the fact that he’s someone not dressed like a student. Athena’s probably run into a dozen people who mistake her for a classmate and asked why she isn’t wearing her uniform.

“Apollo! Mr Wright! I am—” She doubles over, hands on her knees, to catch her breath. “So so sorry that I’m late!”

“You’re lucky that the person we’re supposed to be meeting is running even later,” Apollo says. “So you’re not the last one here.”

When Means returns, he informs them that he still has not yet seen Professor Courte this morning, and then Athena immediately launches in to badgering him for information about the school. He seems to appreciate her enthusiasm, and she for her part seems enthralled by the whole concept of Themis. And why wouldn’t she be? She doesn’t know enough to know the rot that crept under the foundation and, for all Phoenix knows, still lingers there.

“Excuse me, Professor Means?” A small but firm voice interrupts the conversation, and Phoenix’s wandering mind. What subject had the conversation gotten to, anyway? “Forgive my interruption, but with the mock trial starting soon, and you giving the opening speech, it would be best if you went up to the balcony now to wait for when we start.”

“Ah, of course, Ms Woods,” Means says. “As organized as ever, aren’t we? I shall leave you to keep this trial running smoothly, but do introduce yourself to our guests, wouldn’t you?”

The young woman wears the black dress that marks the students of the judges’ course, and she has pinned a sunflower up in her ashy brown hair. “Of course,” she says to means, and then she turns to Phoenix. “My name is Juniper Woods. I’m a third year in the judge course and the Student Council President. Professor Means must have given you the introduction to our prestigious academy, but if there’s anything you wish to know—”

“J-Junie?” Athena gasps. “Junie, is that you?”

“Huh?” The young woman blinks in confusion, and then her dark eyes go wide and she too gasps, a hand flying up to slap over her open mouth. “Th - Athena? I barely recognized you! I didn’t know you were back from Europe.”

“I know, I know, that’s my fault, I’ve been so bad about staying in touch with people since I got back and started working and everything - I kept meaning to write!” Athena’s grin gets progressively more nervous and her babbling picks up speed. Widget can’t decide whether to settle on green, yellow, or blue. She clasps her hands together tightly. “I didn’t realize you’d for-sure decided to study law! And such a prestigious school, too!” She casts an admiring glance around the hall.

“So,” Phoenix asks when Juniper doesn’t respond and instead continues to stare ahead, not at Athena but somewhere between Apollo and Phoenix, in blank shock, “old friends?”

Athena nods, her hair swinging about wildly with her enthusiasm. “We knew each other when we were kids! We were best friends, right, Junie?”

Juniper has nowhere near Athena’s energy, or apparent glee. Maybe it’s still her surprise, or maybe it’s some sort of embarrassment, or maybe it’s - whatever, but all the same, a pang of sympathy shoots through Phoenix’s heart. A long-lost childhood best friend who’s much more reluctant to pick up the relationship again. Poor Athena. Juniper isn’t even looking at her, and has turned her eyes toward the floor now. “Yes. We lived close by each other, and used to play in the forest together.”

Maybe she just likes plants, and nature, with the sunflower in her hair, running around in the forest as a child. Not everyone grew up right in the city. It’s possible for that to be an innocuous statement. Some people actually just have yards and trees in them, Phoenix, he tells himself, failing to convince himself. Because on the other hand, she’s an old friend of Athena’s, and she’s studying law and there’s that old joke about that, and Phoenix can say it all he wants, my kingdom for one normal kid, for one other person besides Ema in our ever-expanding social circles to be relatively normal, relatively unaffected by fae bullshit—

And Juniper’s not looking at anyone, and Athena and Apollo are looking at Juniper, so Phoenix can cast a quick glance over her.

He closes his eyes to reset himself to regular vision, and to ask himself if there’s such a thing as fate or destiny that drives them all together like this, or whether Edgeworth is wrong every time that he says most people in the greater Los Angeles area are maybe a little more superstitious than most but otherwise unremarkable and unmagicial. Because he claims that, and then Phoenix meets someone else, just by chance, and no, no, they’re at least somewhat fae-adjacant too. To hell with it all.

Also, her name is Juniper Woods, which, come on. That’s a very fae-trying-to-figure-out-how-to-name-someone-like-humans-name-humans name.

“I’m afraid that we only have the one seat reserved for Mr Wright in the mock trial, and otherwise, you should wait in the lobby down on the first floor,” Juniper is saying. She seems much more comfortable and self-assured when they’ve switched back to talking about the organizational details of the day. “It is a part of our curriculum, after all, and we need the space for all of our students.”

“Oh,” Apollo says. “Darn. I wanted to see what the mock trial was all about.”

“I’ll trade you,” Phoenix says. “You can take my seat, and I’ll go wait for Professor Courte still, with Athena.”

“But I want to watch the mock trial too!” Athena protests.

“Sorry kiddo, but Apollo got first dibs, and he’s got seniority on you, too.”

Athena groans. She doesn’t try to engage Juniper in conversation again, either, when she escorts the two of them downstairs. Juniper leaves them in the lobby there, as stark white and like a Greek temple as the rest of this building has been, but there are a few nice couches and some wide windows that let in enough natural light. Phoenix sinks down into a couch, even though it reminds him a bit of the courthouse lobby couches and he has an official long-standing rule against those. Athena would hopefully stop someone who tried to beat his head in with a fire extinguisher.

But he needs to take the time to figure out what he could possibly say in a lecture, that won’t make him sound morally bankrupt or like an idiot who only wins by lucky bluffs. And maybe he is, but he doesn’t need to encourage the legal system to fill up with more people like that, especially not if Means is already doing so. He closes his eyes. What are the most important things that Mia taught him? What has he noticed Apollo and Athena have trouble with - what parts of defending has he watched them learn on the fly, because it can only be learned in a courtroom? He could talk about body language; he’s not Apollo or Trucy or Thalassa, but he’s pretty good at that.

Or, hell, what are the biggest mistakes he’s made over his career? What could someone have said to prevent those? Don’t trust evidence given to you by strange girls in top hats, except if Apollo had heeded that then Phoenix wouldn’t be here. Always check what’s written on the back of your evidence. Someone who seems too weird to be human might still be human but you should always watch the way you phrase your statements anyway. He’s going to sound like a paranoid morally bankrupt bluffing idiot. And again, maybe he is, but that’s not something he wants to encourage. Is it paranoia if it’s justified fear? Is the terror that he’s instilled Apollo with something that will help or hurt him in the long run? Or the short run.

Something loudly shatters. Athena yelps. “What did you break?” Phoenix asks, opening his eyes, expecting to find Athena frantically attempting to hide the pieces of some broken Themis decor that costs more than anything in the Agency because appearances might be important but Phoenix hasn’t ever been secure enough in the amount of clients he has to spend a thousand dollars on an easily-breakable light stand, Mia.

“It wasn’t me!” Athena protests. She stands in the middle of the lobby, staring all around, and there’s nothing broken in Phoenix’s line of sight, so with a yawn he swings his feet down from the couch. “I think it came from outside.”

“Guess we should go take a look,” Phoenix says. “Everyone else on campus is supposed to be in that lecture hall right now.” Maybe it’s Professor Courte, wherever she got off to.

Outside, Athena swivels her head around like an owl, trying to judge where that sound earlier came from. “Maybe over there?” she suggests, pointing across a stretch of green to, further along the side of the main building, a stage set up with a line of spotlights and giant speakers along the scaffolding. As they approach, Phoenix sees that the stage is set up like a courtroom, with two benches on either side, a judge’s podium looming high in the back, and a witness stand in the center. Just like apparently everything else at Themis, they are all designed to look like they’re made from white marble, and trimmed with gold. The whole school balances precariously on the line between classy and pretentious. “Do you think they’re having some sort of concert here?” Athena asks.

With Prosecutor Gavin around, it wouldn’t surprise him. There’s something lying on the stage behind the witness stand, something green. “Athena, what’s that there?”

They hurry closer to the stage and up the stairs on the side, close enough that Phoenix can see the woman lying on the stage, in a green track suit, her hair fanned out across the ground, a dark bloodstain spreading out across her white shirt from the arrow jammed in her side. Athena screams. Phoenix has been here too many times before. “Athena,” he says, turning to her, watching her face pale and go slack, “call the police.”

She nods silently, fumbling the phone from her pocket and dropping it to the stage; her hands are shaking when she picks it back up, and she casts one last glance at Courte before she turns her back on the scene. Phoenix kneels, finding no pulse in Courte’s neck. Her skin is cold. Already dead - already gone. Athena’s voice shakes, but all considered, she does a good job at relaying the necessary information and sticking only to that. “I’ll run and go tell everyone in the lecture hall, too,” she says, tucking her phone back into her pocket.

“Wait.” Athena stops with one foot raised. “Don’t. They’ll find out as soon as the police get here. We might as well do some investigating now, before anyone else gets here.” Who knows what sway someone at this school might have with the police, whether that someone is the murderer or just wants the incident buried for the sake of the academy’s good name. If they know what the crime scene looks like now, they’ll know if it was tampered with later.

“Are we allowed to do that?” Athena asks. Her eyes turn back down to the body and then she looks away, pressing her lips tight together and swallowing hard.

“We’ll make sure to leave everything just like we found it,” Phoenix says, picking up the little notebook lying next to Courte’s body and paging through it. A planner, with a sword emblem on the front cover and every page. Under today’s date, she lists mock trial preparation in the morning, the meeting with Phoenix at 1:00, and the start of the mock trial an hour later. No hint as to who she may have interacted with in any of that span of time. Her limbs have begun to stiffen, so it definitely wasn’t recent. “But considering—”

Considering the rot inside this institution. Does Athena need to know that? Is it going to help her solve the case if she does?

“Considering?”

There’s no reason to dump all the rumors and past troubles of Themis on her now. It might not even be relevant, and Phoenix can keep his eyes out, with that in mind. Athena is still standing at a distance, her hands to her mouth, her eyes big and fearful. “C’mon,” he says. “Deep breaths, and take a look at this and tell me what you see.” She, unfortunately, has to get used to this if this is the career she wants to stick with; there’s nothing like dropping right into the deep end for acclimating to it, and Apollo saw a man die within his first month of working at the Agency, so Athena’s got a lot of catching up to do.

The murder is just like the mock trial. The body’s location, the lack of blood suggesting that it was moved, the murder weapon - just like the mock trial. Apollo’s head is buzzing, or maybe that’s Athena in his ear, seemingly more indignant about the school newspaper she found than the actual murder. “—and Junie would never lead guys on like that! ‘Battle for the she-devil’s black heart’! This is slander!”

“It sounds like tabloid trash,” Apollo says. Campus newspaper standards sound like they’ve really fallen since he was in school.

“Ugh, I know,” Athena says. “That’s what Mr Wright said.” Compared to the explosive reaction when the police arrived and put a halt to the mock trial, campus is eerily quiet now, as the police have begun to send away most of the student they believe could not have been involved. Apollo wonders how they could have alibis for the time the body was moved - there was some sort of check-in or attendance taken of students at the mock trial, given that it is part of their curriculum, after all.

Apollo stuck around while Phoenix and Athena were questioned, and now Phoenix has gone off elsewhere and set them loose. Athena wanted to go find Juniper. Apollo really hopes she’s not going to bother her more about this damn school newspaper. “But it was talking about the two competitors in the mock trial being rivals for her affection. You saw the mock trial, Apollo. What were they like? Were they any good at being lawyers? Were they better than me?”

“Now you’re starting to sound like you think they’re rivals,” Apollo says, pushing open the door of the stairwell to let them out on the third floor, back to the lecture hall; if Juniper is anywhere, it’s probably here. “Your rivals,” he amends, because Athena doesn’t look like she gets it. “For Juniper’s attention.”

“Well, isn’t everyone at least a little in love with their best friend?” Athena asks.

Apollo snorts. “My best friend is insufferable,” he says. Which doesn’t necessarily refute Athena’s point, given that someone else in Apollo’s life who is also insufferable is Prosecutor Gavin, and that - that’s a road Apollo’s not going to go down. Not that they’re actually friends. But the half of that. The insufferable part—

“So?” Athena prompts. “So what’s your point? So whenever I meet him don’t say things like that, because then he’d be more insufferable?”

“Sure,” Apollo says. Might as well go with that answer. He pushes open the lecture hall doors and looks out over the large hall. Almost empty now, he spots Juniper sitting in the bottom row, and two other students, one in the red uniform and one in blue - they might even be the same two guys from the mock trial - standing by one of the benches, talking among themselves.

“Because being insufferable doesn’t rule out—” Juniper glances up at the door opening, and then she stands, smoothing down her skirt, and Athena hurries down the stairs to meet her, abandoning the current thought. “Junie! Are you all right? I was worried that—”

“I’m all right,” Juniper says, a little stiffly, and Apollo can’t decide which of the two girls he feels worse for. Athena, whose eagerness to reunite with an old friend keeps being rebuffed, or Juniper, whose body language screams uncomfortable with her every action. “I have to be. I’m Student Council President, and representative of the school, after all. I need to keep myself together, and act properly, for the sake of the school and my classmates.”

Athena nods, more in a way like she’s acknowledging what Juniper is saying rather than agreeing with it. Her fingers flutter toward Widget. “Um, I hate to ask this of you, especially right now, but could you tell us anything about Professor Courte?”

Juniper sounds like she greatly admired the professor - her professor, considering that she’s one of the judge course students. She coughs a few times as she’s talking; Apollo figures she’s just got a cold from working too hard - this might be a high school, but Apollo remembers college, and this seems more like college - but Athena appears incredibly alarmed, and she keeps restlessly shifting her posture, unsure of what to do. Maybe Juniper wasn’t in great health when they were younger? Whether it’s either of them steering the conversation, or just the way it happens to go, Juniper moves on to telling them about the mock trial. She wrote the script that outlines the initial scenario and the evidence involved, and she and Courte were the only two involved in putting it together.

As she explains, her two fellow students finally finish whatever conversation they were having and approach to join her. Hugh is a smarmy and rude budding defense attorney who has high opinions of only himself and Juniper; Robin is a very excitable prosecutorial student whose voice cracks when he yells too loudly and he carries a lump of clay around in his pocket to fiddle with and smush back up whenever its shape becomes unsatisfactory. Athena cheerily introduces herself, and then as soon as the two boys are looking at Juniper, she turns, aghast, to Apollo, undiluted panic written across her features. Horrified by her best friend’s apparent taste in guys? (Apollo can sympathize. The best taste Clay has ever had is his low-key celebrity crush on Klavier, and Apollo’s not gonna get into that.)

They do seem to genuinely like Juniper, though, or at least they can’t stop talking her up - once they’re done arguing about which of the two of them was closer to winning the mock trial, vowing to beat the holy hell out of each other, and then assuring Athena that they won’t actually be beating the holy hell out of each other, because they’re all best friends and have certifiable proof of that. (Athena gets a strange expression on her face when they say that. Maybe she hears something in their voices, or maybe it’s just hitting her that her long-lost old friend has new friends in her life, people who have their own in-jokes and secrets shared with her. It would be like Nahyuta meeting Clay, and that thought makes Apollo feel very strange, too.)

But besides their appreciation for her mock trial script, and her acting as the defendant in said mock trial, she is - or was supposed to, before this happened - singing in a concert for the school festival. “It was supposed to be later today,” Juniper says, ducking her head. “I’m only singing because most everyone else was too embarrassed to try out…”

“But still!” Athena has joined what’s now a triangle of people gushing over Juniper. “The stage outside, right? My Junie singing in front of a crowd - that’s incredible! You’ll be amazing!”

“Ah - th-thanks.” The poor girl is definitely uncomfortable with all of the attention now. “I made my own costume for the performance,” she adds. “I was still working on it this morning.” She takes her phone from her pocket and Athena eagerly leans in to see. Apollo rests an elbow on her head to push her out of the way enough that he can see without crowding Juniper’s personal space. “I based it on the outfit of a singer I really love—”

“Lamiroir?” Apollo didn’t mean to interrupt so loudly, but he recognizes that ruffled white dress and the beautiful blue cloak; he would remember it even if the brooch on her costume hadn’t come into contention as a piece of evidence.

Juniper almost whacks her head on Athena’s when she raises it. “You know Lamiroir?” she asks, and Apollo almost laughs, because he knows she wouldn’t think to mean it like that, but he does know Lamiroir, as in, met her, multiple conversations with her, cross-examined her.

“She’s an amazing singer, isn’t she?” Apollo says, and Juniper nods in eager agreement. He can’t actually listen to much of her music all at once, though. Something about it makes him homesick for somewhere, and he’s not really sure where - it isn’t Khura’in, exactly - but it always leaves him melancholy at best. And while Lamiroir’s songs are beautiful, none of them are what he would call upbeat, and that doesn’t help either.

“She’s incredible,” Juniper says, her words turning into a sigh of admiration. “I was so excited to hear that she was coming here for a tour last year, even if she wasn’t the main act, and then I couldn’t make it—”

“You didn’t really miss much,” Apollo says. “Since she only sang one song, and then there was the murder.”

“Huh?” Athena asks. Hugh and Robin don’t exactly appear to be in-the-know either.

“Were you at the concert?” Juniper asks. “Wait,” she adds, before he can answer, and she finally seems to have a little more energy than she did before, and to be relaxing her formality, even just a little. “Your name - you’re Apollo Justice. Didn’t you defend Machi Tobaye?”

“Er - yeah.” What’s this weird feeling - being acknowledged? Being recognized? Weird. “That was me.”

“Now you’re really gonna have to catch me up on what that case was about.” Athena interrupts with some force, sounding more than anything like a petulant child. Though she also has to be feeling bitterly left out, finding Apollo suddenly pulled into this group of people who have some connection to her old friend that she doesn’t. “Whenever we have time to talk about old cases. Whenever this case is dealt with.”

Maybe that was a bad thing to say. Maybe that cursed them, cursed the investigation to be suddenly kickstarted in the worst way. Maybe that’s a ridiculous thought, and it’s just unfortunate, unlucky timing, that at that moment, Detective Fulbright enters, trailed by a few officers. “Hello, my lawyer friends! Long time, no see, though I’m afraid we’ve no time now to catch up - Juniper Woods, you’re under arrest for the murder of Constance Courte!”

Athena shrieks louder than Robin, and both of them are louder than Juniper, who blanches and then goes a little sickly green, her hands over her mouth as another bout of frantic coughing escapes her lips. It’s not Juniper who Fulbright has to argue the reason for arrest with - it’s Athena, Athena demanding the evidence, the motive, why why why, and when Fulbright tells her everything he can he adds that Prosecutor Blackquill won’t let him say any more, Apollo’s stomach drops through the floor. “Blackquill?” Athena repeats indignantly. “Prosecutor Blackquill is the one—”

“Indeed!” Does Fulbright have any idea how terrifying the man actually is? Or is his casual attitude only feigned. “Now, if you will excuse me, I have work to do, and we must be going. Come along now, miss.” Two officers flank Juniper, escorting her up the stairs to the doors, one of them holding the mock trial evidence that she still had in her pocket.

“Hold it!” Athena cries. “Hold it, hold it!” Fulbright stops, and so do the other officers, but Juniper doesn’t look back at Athena. “It’s not her! I won’t believe that! Junie! I’m going to defend you! I promise I’ll get you freed!”

At that, Juniper turns her head. She still looks green and pale, and tears flow freely down her cheeks, but a smile crosses her face, the first one that Apollo has seen her give. “Th-thank you, Thena.”

“Have you ever actually defended a case before?” Fulbright pushes his sunglasses back up his nose, from where they had slid down as he gave Athena a disbelieving look. “As more than the assistant, I mean. You’re pretty new to this, aren’t you?”

“I’ll help,” Apollo interrupts. Can’t let Athena start to second-guess herself now, especially not with her friend the defendant, and likely in desperate need of reassurance, at that. “I’ll be right here with you, Athena, for the whole case.”

“You don’t need to worry about a thing, Junie!” Athena calls after her, and between coughs, in her tiny voice, she thanks them again, and then she, and the other officers and Fulbright, are gone, and the door closes on the silent hall.

The first person to make a sound is Hugh, with a derisive snort. “Please. Like rank amateurs are going to be able to handle this case. I’ll get this solved and have it under control for Juniper’s sake.” He turns, hands still in his pockets, and stalks toward the doors behind one of the mock trial benches.

“You don’t even have a badge!” Athena shouts after him. “And I do, you smug little—”

Whatever her particular choice of insult would be, she is drowned out by Robin, also yelling after Hugh, and then running after him. “Totally rude, man! And I’m in this too, don’t you forget it! I’m gonna save Juniper!”

Athena places her hands over her ears and leaves them there a moment, until both of them are also gone, and silence returned to the hall. Just the two of them now, in over their heads with another case and client. “The mock trial,” Athena says finally. “You said that it was all kind of like the real murder?”

“It was almost exactly like what we know of the real murder,” Apollo says. “The body probably having been moved to the crime scene, the arrow as the weapon, the - the stage wasn’t set up yet in their mock crime scene photo, but—” Is he missing a detail? He’s still pretty sure he’s missing something. Rope, was there a rope? No, he’s just assuming because of the bruising on the victim’s wrists in the real crime scene. “I’m going to start scrambling the two in a minute. I wish you’d seen the mock trial, too, or we had a script, so then we’d be sure we’ve got all the details right.” Fulbright mentioned the script, so it’s probably part of police evidence now, and way out of their hands. And by the time they’ll be able to talk to Juniper again, she’ll have gone through questioning by Prosecutor Blackquill and who knows what state that traumatic event will leave her memories in. “It’s not like I took notes on the mock trial or anything.”

Who could have thought it would be this direly important?

Now that everyone else is gone, Athena’s bold, decisive confidence is falling apart, and her shoulders slump, almost like she’s deflating. “We’ll write down what we know for sure and then come back to this later,” Apollo says. This is Athena’s case, and she’s going to need to take charge, but he’ll give her a few moments longer to come to grips with their situation. “Then we’ll need to—”

“Or, Herr Forehead, we could just take a look at the script now, ja?”

Apollo nearly smacks him in the face. It’s not Apollo’s fault, really, because Klavier could have given him warning, and how was Apollo - how were Apollo’s reflexes - supposed to guess that he was right behind him? It’s Klavier’s fault for putting himself right in arm’s range of a startled defense attorney and deliberately startling him. He’s got no reason to look so offended that Apollo nearly hit him.

“Prosecutor Gavin! What are you doing here? And how did you—”

He remembers that Klavier attended Themis when he was younger, yes, and he’d wondered if along with Phoenix, there had been a prosecutor invited to lecture, just for equity - but that doesn’t explain why he’s here in the lecture hall, and in his hand, a professionally-bound booklet that, on the front, reads submission by Juniper Woods. “Is that the script? How did you get that?”

Klavier winks. “I just so happened to borrow it for you, Herr Forehead. And not even a word of thanks?”

“So you aren’t supposed to have it. Just to clarify.” Apollo glances around the hall, knowing he won’t be surprised if he spots a certain faery dog in the vicinity. If Vongole picked up something and ran off with it, would the ordinary person just see a floating object, or does what the invisible-to-most hound picks up turn invisible with her, too?

“Ah, I’m sure we’ll get it back before it’s noticed to be missing,” he says. Definitely stolen, but maybe he took it himself, ghosting in and out of wherever the police have their evidence piled up.

“So is anyone going to introduce me, or are you just gonna leave me hanging?” Poor Athena, left out of the loop again. “I guess you know this guy, Apollo?”

“Why hello there, Fräulein. I don’t believe we’ve met before.” And there goes Klavier turning on all the rock-star charm, a brilliant smile and his accent falling on thick. “I believe I would remember your face.” Apollo rolls his eyes. Typical Gavin. Athena doesn’t seem entirely taken with him, yet, but she’s definitely relaxing from her earlier frantic nervousness. “My name is Klavier Gavin. I’m a prosecutor, though I was rather more famous for my band, the Gavinners. Regrettably the band went, ah, kaput, last year, but I was the lead localist. Perhaps you heard of us.”

“Gavineers,” Athena repeats. “No, sorry, don’t know it.” She pauses for a moment, considering something that Apollo expects to be smarter than what she actually says. “Can I have your autograph anyway?”

Klavier laughs.

“No, Athena, don’t encourage him. His ego’s already the size of Jupiter.”

“Ach, jealously hardly becomes you, Herr Forehead. And you’ve no reason to be - you’re the one always being trailed by the lovely Fräuleins, ja?”

“She’s the new lawyer at the Agency,” Apollo says irritably. It really is so much easier to like Klavier with no one else around, no one he’s putting on a show for, putting up this facade. It feels - almost dishonest, and like Apollo’s talking to someone entirely different than the man he knows, or thinks he knows. And it doesn’t surprise him that he’s currently dealing with this version of Klavier, especially because they’ve already failed this month to deal with the elephant on the calendar. It’s been a year since they watched Kristoph break down into the changeling shadow of himself, and a year since Klaver told Apollo everything there was to know about him and his brother - and Apollo texted him about it, earlier in October, and Klavier refused to engage. Threw up a stone wall and Apollo has no idea why he’s so much less willing to talk than he was in April. Now they’re face to face and Klavier’s just playing the vapid Eurorock flirt, and Apollo can’t even wring his goddamn neck because he has a case to deal with instead.

“I’m Athena Cykes! Nice to meet you!” She extends a hand and Klavier slaps the mock trial script into her palm instead. He does give her a little bow of his head, saving her from looking too off-put, and she turns her attention to the script. “So this is Junie’s script?” she says. “The one the actual crime is like.”

“I figure we could give it a little mockup of our own,” Klavier says, sweeping a few loose strands of hair behind his ear. “With myself as the prosecution, of course, Herr Forehead as the defense, and you, Fräulein, to fill in as both judge and defendant.”

“So like a mock mock trial,” Athena says. “All right! I’m ready to go!” She flips open the script and starts paging through it. “Let’s see, what do we have for evidence…?”

“And you, Herr Forehead? Ready to rock?”

“No,” Apollo says. “Why can’t we just, you know, look at the mock trial script and just read it?”

“Ach, but where is the flair? The drama? To the bench with you!” He plants his hand in Apollo’s back and shoves him off toward one of the mock trial benches. Athena has already taken her place at the witness stand, her nose in the script book.

“You are insufferable,” Apollo mutters, and he regrets saying it - or that specific choice of word, or using that word earlier because that’s more how he tends to describe Klavier, not Clay - because Klavier doesn’t seem to hear him, and Athena’s head snaps up and she shoots him a look, and then tosses another pointed one in Klavier’s direction. Apollo shrugs. Athena’s not the one that reads body language. If he doesn’t say anything she can’t hear anything. She flips to the next page of the script and pulls a few photographs out from where they were wedged.

“Achtung, baby! Let’s rock!”

The murder is really, really just like the mock trial. The body was moved from the location of the murder (the art room in the mock trial, currently unknown in the real case) down to the quad (just the stretch of ground in the mock trial, on the stage set up in the real case), where it was found with an arrow in its side. The athletics storehouse lies around the side of the main building, near the art room window, and contains heavily padded high jump mats and ball carts, which would allow the body to be tossed out the window without showing signs of trauma and easily moved. The real murder weapon wasn’t decided in the mock trial - it wasn’t the arrow, Robin argued, and the mock autopsy report agreed - but Klavier suggests it’s an awl from the art room. The mock trial script has several photos packaged with it, including the awl, the one Juniper had in her pocket.

“I hope that was just paint on it,” Athena says, pressing her lips together. “It’s scary how similar this is.”

“It can’t be a coincidence,” Apollo says. He believes in coincidence, but not to this extent. “I guess we should investigate the art room.”

“I’ve got to sneak that script back, so I might as well check up on whether the police have gotten to that.” Klavier leans onto the bench, propping up his head on one hand. “What’s your next move, Fräulein and Forehead?”

“Wait, wait, hold up!” Athena yelps. “I need to finish scanning the script! I want to have a copy of the whole thing!” She has laid it out flat on the stand, and Widget is lit up, recording everything in front of it and projecting a screen to the side, where she is checking her photos of each page to be sure they are readable. “And then we’ll - we’ll - Apollo, what should we do next?”

“Start by interviewing everyone who might be related to the case,” he says. “Hugh, Robin, definitely - Mr Wright might be able to tell us if Professor Means has anything to say - and we’ll ask around to see if there are any other witnesses.”

Athena nods vigorously, and as she continues her work with the script she bounces on her feet with nervous energy that once again collects within her, the tension in her shoulders and the deeper furrow of her brow, anxious to get moving again. It might be a miracle if she finishes her task with the script without bolting off and chasing the need to feel like they’re making tangible progress. Klavier at the other bench has gone silent, and now that Apollo thinks to look, takes a wide glance around the hall, he spots Vongole stalking about the edges of the room, the way she did in the courtroom a year ago, circling silently and ceaselessly. Could Athena see her? Apollo doesn’t know what the pattern is for who can and can’t, and he isn’t sure he wants to.

Instead of a lot of things he could say, he goes over to the other bench and says, “You’re in an awfully helpful mood today.”

“Am I not supposed to be? Shall I keep all of my information to myself, though I am not the prosecutor, and this not my case?” He straightens up. “We have the same goal, ja? To find the truth of who killed the professor.”

Is that the goal of a defense attorney? The truth, or to save their client? Is that the goal of a prosecutor? The truth, or to get justice for those wronged? Should all of those be the same thing? “Did you know Professor Courte?” Apollo asks. Athena closes the script book but doesn’t move. Her intent stare, and her head tilting this way and that like an owl, tells him she’s not just waiting for the answer, but waiting to analyze it.

There is a moment after the question when Klavier slips, when even his powers of glamour don’t hold up, and actual, real, emotion finds its way across his face. He looks exhausted, he looks distraught, and Apollo has barely a moment to take it in, to process that pain, before it is gone, smoothed over and replaced by Klavier’s neutral expression. And more than neutral - more like he’s ratcheted the glamour up a few more notches, bright and gold and hard to tear his eyes off of Klavier’s face, but impossible to get even a glimpse of the actual person and feelings behind it. “Ja, I knew her. She taught the judges’ course, but she made some of her classes available to all students, and I was fortunate enough to be able to take some with her before I went to study abroad.”

Athena’s eyes narrow into a suspicious squint. So what she’s hearing is definitely more than yeah, took a couple classes from her a decade ago. Apollo guessed as much. He remembers Klavier talking about Themis, about a professor he had there, one who if not knew what he was and what the fae had done to him, had guessed by knowing enough about the fae to notice his horrible high-sodium dietary habits. Apollo opens his mouth to mention that.

Whether Klavier notices that, or notices Athena’s expression, or was just steeling himself for a second and always intended to keep talking, he adds, “She was a brilliant woman. Always concerned with truth and fairness and the proper means to an end, and determined to dig out corruption wherever it could be found. I’ve rarely known a more honest person, or a better one. I had not seen her for quite a while and had expected to speak with her again as I came back here. And now…”

Athena’s face falls. She raises a hand to brush aside her bangs and surreptitiously wipe her eyes. “So,” Klavier continues tersely. “I have as much reason as you to want to be sure that we find her real killer, ja?”

What to say to that? I’m sorry is hollow as it ever is, and the best Apollo can do - the only thing he can ever do - is to investigate, find the truth, expose the murderer. He and Athena should get moving again, but he doesn’t quite want to just leave Klavier alone now either. Not with the grief that keeps flickering across his face, a different kind of grief than before: Kristoph and Dayran were murderers. Professor Courte was murdered.

“Were you going to be giving a lecture like Mr Wright was, too?” Athena asks, offering the script book back to him.

Klavier takes it and idly thumbs through the pages, stopping on a photograph stuck between two middle pages, of Professor Courte lying in the dirt holding an arrow to her side, posing as the mock trial corpse. “Ja, and a concert as well. You saw the stage outside? That was to be for a bit of a reunion performance of the Gavinners, just this once, one last time.”

“Really?” Apollo asks. “I didn’t expect you’d just—”

He and Klavier never spoke about the band, the break-up, and Apollo had just assumed what it was about. No replacing Daryan, and then, after Kristoph, Klavier reevaluating everything, re-prioritizing, figuring out who was Klavier Gavin, and what was he, prosecutor or rock star? Or something like a crisis of faith. Of identity, though honestly, given what he knows, he thinks Klavier can’t really afford to get hung up on identity crises because that’s his whole life.

“Ja, well, the school asked, and suggested having a student representative up to sing one song, and at that point I could hardly refuse someone the grand opportunity to get up on stage there with me, could I?”

He winks, leaving Apollo more the fool to have expected something meaningful from him. “Oh! That was going to be Junie, right?” Athena asks. “Had you met her before? She’s a real sweetheart! She would never kill anyone!”

“We exchanged a few emails discussing song selection and other such things, but I am hardly the man to determine whether she did what she is accused of.” Klavier waves a hand, feigning a casual dismissal of Athena’s statement, when his own response is, knowing his history, anything but casual. Athena’s face darkens, but she perks up a moment later as he continues, “As I am neither prosecution today, nor ever the defense, I will refrain from judgment, and simply do my best to help you find the truth. That is an acceptable agreement to us, ja?”

“Ja! Danke! Whatever help you can give us would be fantastic!” Athena says brightly. “Thank you so much!”

Klavier grins back at her. First meeting of the Themis German Language Social Club, call to order. One day they’re going to need someone who knows Khura’inese and then they’ll all be sorry. (Ha. As if.) “Best we all get back to investigating, but I won’t say goodbye, as I’m sure we’ll be seeing each other again. Bis Später! Herr Forehead, Fraulein.”

Vongole follows him up the stairs out of the lecture hall, close at his heels, confirming for certain that Athena can’t see the fae dog. “Au revoir!” Athena calls after him, and even still down on the floor, Apollo hears Klavier’s laugh.

“Huh, German sounds different than I remember,” Apollo says.

“Always the critic,” Athena says. “Prosecutor Gavin seems like a pretty good guy. Really friendly. It’s kind of nice, to be reminded that’s possible - I mean, I know, like Mr Wright and Prosecutor Edgeworth, and Prosecutor Debeste was very friendly too, but—”

“And then we’re against Prosecutor Blackquill for this case.”

Athena sighs. “And then,” she echoes, wearily, crossing her arms, “there’s Prosecutor Blackquill.”

“I’m afraid, by orders of Prosecutor Blackquill, that no one not affiliated with the police’s official investigation is allowed in here right now!”

Fulbright’s broad shoulders block off almost all of the doorway of the main building’s third-floor art room. Behind him, Phoenix gets a glimpse of some colorful mobiles hanging from the ceiling, several officers bustling about between easels, and, very likely not affiliated with the police’s official investigation, Prosecutor Gavin. Frozen with wide eyes, he stares at Phoenix, and then as an officer passes by barely an inch from him, he hops to the side, landing on one foot and bouncing to the other, deftly maneuvering himself between people who have no idea he is in their midst. “So Blackquill is the prosecutor on this case?” Phoenix asks, and it takes all of his years of practice to keep a straight face with Klavier, over Fulbright’s shoulder, making a slashing motion across his throat. Definitely not supposed to be there.

“I am here, am I not?” Fulbright asks. “Prosecutor Blackquill and I are a team! Which is to say yes, he will be prosecuting!”

Does Blackquill consider them equally a team? Somehow Phoenix doubts it. Though, all considered, the detective seems to like Blackquill well enough, which makes him someone Phoenix should try and talk to. He’s only going to learn so much about Blackquill from facing him in court, or talking to Edgeworth. What of the detective who has to be his eyes, ears, and hands on the crime scene?

(Although, as far as eyes are concerned, Phoenix tries to peer at the window to see if, by chance, there might be a hawk sitting on the outside sill.)

“I thought the crime scene was down at the stage,” Phoenix lies. The lack of blood beneath Courte’s body refutes that suggestion. “What are so many officers doing up here?”

“I’m afraid I’m not allowed to say,” Fulbright says. That’s a pretty good hint that they think this is a place of interest, and that they’re looking at it as, possibly, the real scene of the murder. “If you would, Mr Lawyer, please leave us to our work.”

“All right,” Phoenix says, catching Klavier’s eye. Kid still looks like he thinks the eye contact is a preamble to being hit by a train. “I’ll just be heading out that way.” He tosses his head back down the hall and with that, does as he is asked and leaves, and immediately after turning the corner he parks himself there and leans up against the wall. Just out of sight, but the stairs and elevators both lie beyond him, so anyone leaving or going to the art room passes right by him. And he waits there with his magatama burning a hole in his pocket, metaphorically; if it ever does anything, it gets cold, like ice against his skin that will never melt with his body heat.

The minutes tick past, and then, finally, the hellhound rounds the corner first, tall, tall as Phoenix has ever seen her, but still wispy, barely corporeal, head held low yet almost eye-to-eye with Phoenix, her empty red ones and his blue. Klavier follows a moment later, all gleaming shining gold like the sun shines only on him, like different light illuminates him than the overhead fluorescence of the academy hallway. Funny, how Thalassa looks like dusk, a rich blue and starlit night, while it’s the daylight that glows out from under Klavier’s skin. The same, and not at all; two sides of the sky, and the magic in the very air of the Twilight Realm soaked through them to make them so.

But Klavier’s eyes still gleam that haunted blue that says every way he turns his head, he expects to see fae, or just fears that he will. Balanced on a knife’s edge between paranoid and justifiably so. “What’s the word in there?” Phoenix asks.

When he stops looking with the Sight, everything about Klavier goes dark, dull, desaturated, gray and tired. Lines under his eyes like he hasn’t slept well in weeks, and the color sapped from his face by that same exhaustion, he’s two different people when the magatama cuts through the bright glamour that a changed child effortlessly breathes. A star, and the black hole it left when it burnt out.

“They think it’s the location that the murder actually took place,” Klavier answers. “Luminol reactions detected traces of blood on the floor that was wiped away. The suspect’s script also had the art room as the most likely scene of the crime, so they are only further convinced of her guilt.”

“Planning out a murder in advance so well that it gets chosen as a mock trial case.” Phoenix shakes his head. “Hell of an argument the prosecution is making. But that’s good to have confirmed for sure. Any talk about a motive?”

“None that I heard.”

“Not that they’ll necessarily need a motive, with this other evidence looking like it does,” Phoenix muses, “but Prosecutor Blackquill will probably figure out something anyway. I wonder what Ms Woods’ grades look like. She’s probably a smart kid” - her script was the one chosen, and she’s Student Council president too - “but that’s the first place I’d look if I was trying to figure—”

“How can you do this?” Klavier asks.

“What?”

“Just stand here and - and talk to me like nothing happened! I ruined your life!”

“Is that what you think happened?” A year ago, the only time they’ve seen each other since that unfortunate, life-changing trial, even with Vera, Trucy, and Apollo around as a buffer, Klavier still ran from him. Phoenix knows that this is exactly what Klavier thinks. Guilt wouldn’t have him running and hiding otherwise. “I don’t think the truth of that matter is as clear-cut as that.”

“Don’t—”

“If I held a grudge against everyone who inadvertently, or with good intent, helped a bad actor��s ploy to ruin my life, I wouldn’t have any damn friends left,” Phoenix interrupts. Maybe that’s an exaggeration. He would still have Larry and Maya - but Edgeworth? Pearls? Iris? Vera? Trucy? For Redd White, Morgan, Dahlia, Kristoph, their hands on the strings, knowing how to play a perfect prosecutor or a family member against their latest target.

(And Kristoph and Dahlia may be too alike, poison and betrayal and petty pride and a devil’s horns, but Iris knew exactly what her sister was. Iris consciously chose to help her manipulate and lie because she wanted to stop her from killing anyone else but didn’t want to see her caught for her crimes. She was a well-intentioned accomplice who knew exactly what she was doing to help her sister. Klavier had no idea. Phoenix would be a damn hypocrite to forgive one and not the other.)

“Don’t - don’t patronize me, just because I’m not one of your little band who can see lies.”

Phoenix swallows, forcing down a strange and foreign anger that bubbles up from his stomach. Is it because he’s hearing someone else’s voice when Klavier speaks, someone they’re both conspicuously avoiding mention of. “Dammit, Gavin, I’m not. Look at me” - he motions to his chest, to the cursed necklace mark imprinted around the base of his neck, that he knows Klavier can See with his marked eyes - “and tell me that your brother was the first person to hate me enough to not care who becomes collateral and who gets used!” He drops his hands to his sides and they smack against his legs. “I’ve been here before, and I’m not lying to you, and I don’t hate you or blame you.”

“You don’t hate me,” Klavier repeats, his voice dead and dry and wholly accentless. Does he do that on purpose? Or is it an accident that it slips, that he sounds just like - like him. “You don’t hate me, of course you don’t, I’m to believe that, yes? Then do you always carry that magatama with you?” He tilts his head; his eyes don’t waver from that grayer shade of blue. “Or that’s just something you happened to grab knowing that I would be around.” He leans forward a few inches so that he’s closer to looking Phoenix in the eye. “Couldn’t let me get past you. Couldn’t bear the thought of something slipping out of your control.”

“Are you sure you’re still talking to me with that last bit?” Phoenix asks. Or does he just want to bait Phoenix into reacting to the comparison - does he want to make Phoenix hate him for these things he’s saying? Does he want Phoenix to hate him, to hate him for his part in what happened as much as he hates himself for it. “Yes, I did bring my magatama along because of you, but I was going to lend it to someone.”

He’s got no way of knowing how Klavier is going to react - especially since they don’t know who killed Courte, who to blame, who to hate and hold responsible, but Phoenix, Phoenix is right here, and Klavier already lashing out at him as the specter of his guilt and everything that went wrong - but he knows he needs to say it. “Professor Courte gave me a call last night. We were supposed to meet earlier about the lecture, but she also admitted to me that there’s a particular someone who she was worried was avoiding her, for whatever reasons he might think he has, and she asked if I had any way to help her be sure that he wouldn’t be able to slip away without her getting a chance to chat with him.”

The last of the light bleeds from Klavier’s face; something dies behind his eyes. “She’s worried about you,” Phoenix says, realizing as the words emerge into the air that there is a problem with the statement, and Klavier blanches, hearing it too. “She - she was. I’m sorry.”

Klavier’s nod of acknowledgement is a shallow motion, and his face pinches together like he fears moving too fast will make him sick. And then he bolts for the stairwell, flinging the door open and disappearing inside.

“Klavier—!”

The door slams with a force that shakes the hall. But the hound remains there in front of Phoenix, looking at him, as though she’s waiting for something. Seeking some kind of help or reassurance Phoenix doesn’t know how to offer.

Over behind the main building, beneath one of the art room windows, they find Robin Newman high-strung and lamenting - loudly, furiously - the fact that as a prosecutor there’s nothing he can do to save Juniper. The police investigation at the stage is ongoing - they tell Apollo and Athena to go away because students aren’t allowed to be snooping around, and Athena gets fired up and Apollo has to urge her away before they have a Nine-Tails Vale redux but with more witnesses. Stomping away and telling Apollo that they’ve just got to come at this from another angle, literally, to hide and eavesdrop, Athena stumbles into a conspicuous cardboard box that pops up to reveal itself to contain a student - Myriam Scuttlebutt, one of Juniper’s classmates in the judge course, by what of the uniform they can see not hidden beneath the box. It has arm holes in the front so that Myriam can have a fuller range of motion. It’d be impressive dedication to snooping if she wasn’t the one who wrote the trashy campus tabloid and its slander about Juniper, and if she hadn’t just tried lying to Apollo about being Juniper’s friend to get information on the case. As it is, she’s annoying.

She’s the prosecution’s witness for tomorrow. Blackquill has bagged a girl in a box who hisses like a snake, and when the sunlight hits one of the punched-out handholds in the box, the place that presumably Myriam sees through, her eyes catch the light and glow like a deer in a car’s headlights.

Human eyes don’t reflect light like that.

Surprise isn’t even an emotion that Apollo feels in these situations anymore, just resignation. Maybe Blackquill will say something tomorrow that drops a hint. Maybe Phoenix will sit in the gallery and be able to tell them. Maybe Apollo is too tired to care anymore.

Phoenix they find again in the main campus building, with Professor Means, who, on finding out that Athena took up Juniper’s defense, tells her that he will do everything in his power to help the case and that if they aren’t finding the evidence they need for the correct verdict, to come see him at once. Phoenix’s face darkens as the professor speaks, and Apollo is glad to know that he isn’t alone in thinking that all sounds mildly shady.

By the time they’ve made this full loop of the campus, they find that Hugh has also circled back to the lecture hall, where he tells them that he actually saw Courte’s body when he was wandering around before the mock trial started, but he didn’t want to say anything because the mock trial would be called off and he knew he had to win because he was going to confess to Juniper when he won. Athena looks aghast, and she doesn’t say why but Apollo thinks he has an idea: that, of all people who could be in love with her friend, it has to be this black hole of egocentrism that took it to the point of ignoring a corpse.

If these are the kind of people that go to a law high school, Apollo will gladly take the college debt instead. (Not that Themis isn’t probably expensive as hell, but. The point remains.)

The autumn sun sinks down through the orange sky as they navigate rush-hour traffic to the detention center. Athena’s leg starts bouncing in the waiting room, enough to disturb Apollo’s chair next to her, and she continues to vibrate as they head in to see Juniper. “I think you can afford to take it down a notch,” Apollo tells her, and she nods even while she continues to drum her heel against the ground. So much for being a bastion of calm to support their client. He just hopes that Juniper won’t really notice Athena’s frantic nervous energy.

Juniper is already on the other side of the glass when they enter, but she sits with her body positioned away from them, her arms folded and her hands tucked away, and her long hair hanging down past her face. “Heya, Juniper?” Apollo ventures, Athena gone silent but still twitching her leg, and all of that movement in the corner of his eye doesn’t help him as he tries to understand Juniper’s body language. She’s afraid, upset, understandable, but is some of that - is she nervous because they’re here now? Is some of her fear directed at them? “How are you doing? We’ve talked to everyone that we could but there are a couple things we wanted to ask you.”

Juniper turns her head. Apollo’s stomach drops; Athena gasps, and Widget lets out a staticky, surprised warble. No word to this emotion - “surprise” doesn’t quite cut it, even with Widget’s yellow background. “I wanted to tell you, Thena. I just...” Juniper coughs into her hand. Her skin has taken up the yellow-green color of a plant that hasn’t seen enough sunlight, and when she pushes back some of the hair that frames her face, she tucks it behind a pointed ear.

When Athena said that Vera reminded her of an old friend of hers, she didn’t mean Juniper, did she?

“I didn’t know how,” Juniper concludes at last, when the silence stretches on without interruption from either Athena or Apollo. “Or if you could still think of me as—” Another coughing fit interrupts her.

“Of course you’re still my friend!” Athena says furiously. Widget lights up red, bright enough that it illuminates the bottom half of her face. “And of course we will still defend you!” She clenches her fists and turns her impassioned glare on Apollo. Does she expect that he’s going to be the weak link? That after Tenma Taro, no, this is what’s too weird? They’ve been working together for a whole six months. She should know him better than that.

“Of course we’ll still defend you,” Apollo repeats, before Athena can kick him or something, like she looks like she might. “You don’t need to worry about that. You’re not the first changeling I’ve defended, anyway.”

“Huh?” Athena cocks her head to the side. They didn’t tell her about Vera - Vera didn’t mention it, and so Apollo and Trucy never did. “Wait, really?”

“I’m not” - Juniper coughs - “a changeling.” She raises her head and finally looks them in the eyes. Her own aren’t the plain red of all the fae’s true forms that Apollo has ever seen, though if he actually thinks about it, that number is only three, Kristoph, Vera, and Iris. The whites of her eyes are still white, and still have dark visible pupils in their centers - it is just the irises that have changed to that bright, distinctive faery red. And thinking back, he definitely remembers noticing that Vera’s ears were large, distinct and almost batlike, while Juniper’s aren’t much larger than a human’s ears, and if they had the points but without her sickly green skin, Apollo isn’t sure that too many people would notice. Her hands, nervously clasped together, lack claws. “I’m half human.”

“Really?” Athena has finally stopped bouncing. Was she worried about some discord she heard in Juniper’s voice, that has now cleared now that she’d admitted this. “How is that - how does that happen?”

“Athena,” Apollo says, “nobody here wants to explain to you how babies are made.”

Juniper covers her face with her hands.

“I know how that works, Apollo!” she yells, her face reddening like Widget’s face reddens into anger. “I’m not asking that! I mean, I didn’t know that was - I guess there’s no reason why it wouldn’t be possible - so you’ve always been like this? Looked like this? I definitely don’t remember that when we were kids.”

Juniper doesn’t lower her hands but pulls them apart so that she’s peering through at Apollo and Athena with one eye. Pink has begun to show through the yellow-green of her cheeks. “I didn’t know when I was younger,” she says. “My grandmother - you remember I live with her, right, Thena? - never said anything until she thought I was old enough to understand, and to be strong enough to consciously hide it.” She bites her lip. “It’s easier if you don’t know, and just believe the whole way that you’re human.”

“Grandmother on which side of the family?” Apollo asks. He’d be lying to say he wasn’t personally curious, but who can honestly say before it happens what kind of information becomes relevant in a trial. They might need to know.

“She - she isn’t human.” Apollo wonders if that’s odd that even someone who shares blood with the fae seems reluctant to name them as they are. “And she warned me that this might happen if I get too stressed or emotional and now—” Another longer coughing fit overwhelms her.

“Do your friends know?” Athena asks. “Robin and Hugh?” Something like distaste hangs evident in her voice on their names. Earlier she told Apollo that all three of them sounded anxious when they spoke about the strength of their bonds, like maybe they really are on the verge of a triangular friendship breakdown, be it over the supposed love triangle or something else. Some other secrets, and she’s worried about Juniper in the middle of it.

“N-no.” Juniper seems especially nervous again, tense across her shoulders and she’s moved one hand to clutch her other wrist tightly enough that her knuckles don’t quite turn white, but a very pale shade of yellow. Close enough to white on green skin. Is she worried what they think of her for not telling them? For not telling even her closest two friends? “I wanted to, really. But I just - I never - I—”

“You couldn’t figure out how,” Apollo says, remembering Klavier talking about that same problem, Klavier telling him that he never even told Daryan, never knew the way to. “I understand completely.”

Athena raises her eyebrows at that - now she’s probably wondering what secret Apollo is hiding, and good luck to her if she ever tries to guess, but Apollo isn’t even thinking of his own situation right now - but Juniper visibly relaxes, slumping in her seat. “And I wanted to tell you too, Thena, as soon as I got to see you again, but you’d been away for so long that I couldn’t even start to guess how you would react. Or if you’ve been away for so long that you wouldn’t even believe me and would just think that I was crazy.” She looks down at her hands. “I think I started, um, showing” - she touches a hand to her face - “during the interrogation, and that prosecutor, Prosecutor Blackquill—” Her head snaps up and her red eyes widen. “Prosecutor Blackquill, Thena, he—”

“He’s a real jerk, I know,” Athena interrupts, “but we’ve beaten him three times before and I’m not gonna let him convict you! I promise, Junie, you don’t have to worry about that.”

She nods. By the expression on her face, that wasn’t all she was going to say, but after a few more seconds of silently looking at Athena, she continues, “He must have seen me this way that you’re seeing me but he didn’t even say anything. And I’m afraid that he’s waiting for some perfect time to reveal it, because—” She stops talking and they wait while she coughs. “Because—” Again, she coughs so badly that she can’t continue through it.

“Are you all right?” Apollo asks.

“Sasha has a heart condition,” Athena says abruptly, and the confusion might have successfully paused Juniper’s fit. “And so did Azura, and they were both selkies. And they said that it’s like, a thing, for people who are magic like that, trying to grow up in the human world.”

Juniper nods. “There’s so much metal and iron everywhere. And here especially. I feel like I can’t breathe in here.” Her shoulders shake as she inhales.

“Being partially human doesn’t help you with that?” Apollo glances down at the ring on his hand and is glad that she didn’t offer to shake hands with anyone when they first met.

“My grandmother said that it’s a genetic grab bag,” Juniper replies. “I guess I’m just not very lucky. But I’m worried that the prosecution will” - she coughs - “that I don’t know how he could know but—” She coughs again, but keeps talking through it, her voice growing more and more high-pitched and strained like she’s running out of air and choking. “But Professor Courte was the only person at Themis who knew this about me.”

She doubles over, wheezing.

She’s afraid that Blackquill is going to turn that into a motive. Apollo gives it some thought and decides there’s no point to reassuring Juniper that even if her glamour hadn’t cracked up, Blackquill would still probably know. That’s not reassurance.

“I…” Athena’s voice emerges faintly and her eyes dart toward Apollo, as though he isn’t equally clueless to how to respond to this revelation. Finally, she repeats, firmly, “We’ll get you found innocent, Junie, I promise.”

Get as much other information from Juniper as she knows about the mock trial and the real case, and then go into the trial tomorrow with their heads held high. That’s all they can do. They have to hope that it’s enough. They’ll have to make it be enough.

#fic: the witches of los angeles #roddy fanfics

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mrneighbourlove · 5 years ago

Text

Into the Darkness and Unknown: Ch 7. The Burden of Knowledge

‘My dear Revan. Are you well? I know you are still learning to read, but I do this for your future. Either you read this when I return, or if something unexpected happens to claim my life. Need not worry. Your father is mighty, but more so, he is careful. Omisha has been a vast and colourful country. The air is hot, and the jungles vast. I think someone with your imagination will come to like it if you ever explore its land yourself. However, to be honest, it is difficult to judge in the present if that is a possibility. The people of this land are opposed to humans, as of now. I hope to change that with time, and I know that it will be your generation who will no longer know of prejudice. I’m sorry I’ve been away for so long, but the work I do is important. It is for your future as well as everyone else. This does not mean I don’t miss you. I hope to be home soon. I love you son.

- Your father Malik.’

A month and a half. A whole month and a half Leere and Malik found themselves in Omisha. Due to the attack, and unfortunately only three days into the trip, no communication could be sent to Hyrule due to Mother being paranoid information being intercepted by additional enemies. Bonegrinder needed time to recover, but neither had any idea it would take such a strenuous recovery.

Malik spent his time learning combative history of Omisha, sharing stories of Ganondorf and Link throughout the ages. Leere made herself getting comfortable knowing every villager she could. As a tease, she decided not to have sex with Blue and White’s younger sister, being catty that the doctor could wait. The poor woman couldn’t get Leere alone with her. Currently, she was playing with Solani, climbing up a tree. It seemed that her mother slowly eased up on letting Leere get closer.

“Solani, the secret to climbing tree’s for humans is balance.” The princess was carefully reaching for a piece of fruit near the top. “Steady your feet, reach up, aaaaand... got ya.”

Leere indeed snatched the fruit off the tree, but with a snap under her, the branch she was standing on broke, sending the princess plummeting to the ground. Other branches broke most of her fall, but she still hit the ground hard, having the wind knocked out her, the back of her skull ringing as loud as two brass cymbals smashing loudly in the coffins of her brain.

"SQUAWWWK!!!" Solani rushed over to the princess and looked slightly panicked. "You okay?!" Thanks to a spell that Mother had allowed her children to use, there was easy communication with the two visiting humans. "I told you that I could get it! I have wings! You are bound to fall and fall you did!"

"Why are humans so clumsy?" Sneha, her sister, rolled her eyes. "Trip, fall, repeat."

“Simple my dear girls, I wanted to show you the strength of tiny humans. Ow my fffuuu-reaking head.” Even in a dazed state, the woman was noble enough to not swear around kids. Leere felt the back of her head, frowning at the feel of blood. “Darn it. You kids ever see human blood before? Feels so gooey.”

"Only the ones that tried to kidnap us when we were chicks." Sneha spoke without filter, earning a jab from her sister. "Ow! What?! She asked!"

“I’m sure they got torn up good eh?” Leere cracked a smile, trying to stand. “Oh man. Doc might get her wish to have me alone in her office. Woooo, the earth is spinning.” The princess immediately fell on her ass. Appeared she was losing balance in her legs as much as she was losing balance in her filter. “Don’t suppose one of you wants to get some help while the other stays close?”

"I'll go get Nomusa, I'm faster than you." Sneha took to the sky while Solani waited with Leere. "I'll be sure to tell her that you got hurt being stupid."

"Don't call her stupid!" Solani huffed as her sister flew away. "Just because she hatched two minutes ahead of me, she thinks she knows everything."

Leere felt close enough to pull Solani close enough for an arm around the shoulder. Pretty sure after a month her mother wouldn’t treat her like Prometheus. “Well not stupid, but maybe climbing up the tree without a harness was a little dumb.”

"... well... a little, perhaps so." Solani agreed. "You humans don't have a defense against gravity like we do."

“Oh boy, that’s the truth right there. Lucky I didn’t go splat like a raspberry pie.”

"Next time, please leave the task of picking fruit to me." Solani asked Leere as an afterthought. "Are you going to go check on Bonegrinder today?"

“Yeah. Probably after I get myself checked out.” Leere sighed, giving the girl a half-hearted smile. “If things go well for him, I’ll probably be leaving.”

"Aww, you're not staying? It's been fun learning from you." Solani pouted a little. "Mama said to be careful. But you're not too bad. I think."

“You’re a pretty great kid Solani. But I got a home of my own to go back to. I’m sure my own mama is a bit worried how I’ve been doing all this time.” Leere gave the bird a light ruffle on the head. “How about this? Ask me anything on your mind.”

"It's not good to make your mom worry." Solani had to agree with Leere's reasoning. Her own mother worried enough. So, it was logical that human mother would worry too. "I guess... why aren't you with the other Mortuus? Why aren't you like... a bad guy? Why do you wanna be a good guy? ... I mean girl. Not guy."

“Well, I don’t remember them too much, but my birth parents were bad guys. They escaped to Hyrule with me when I was a young little thing. After being adopted by my new family, I wanted to help people like you Solani. I wanted to use my gifts to save lives, help other people feel safe.” Leere looked to the sun in the sky and smiled. “Maybe there are other good Mortuus, trapped in Malus. Maybe I’m the only one. Regardless, I’m going to do my best living a life where people can look into the shadows and still feel safe.”

"There's been a lot of bad Mortuus..." Solani said quietly, "A lot of bad humans too. Mama wonders if Mother is doing the right thing sometimes. Though, everyone knows that Bonegrinder's visions are never wrong. We have to have a little faith... but it's hard."

Leere silently nodded along to Solani. Maybe it was the dazed head and leaking blood, but the princess asked in an almost worrisome tone, “Do you think I’m a good human?”

"Yeah, I do." Solani nodded. "It's just... hard to think that there are some good ones out there when all we've ever known is bad."

“That’s called hope Solani. And if I can be the start to your list of good humans, that’s honour enough for me.” Leere grinned, giving the girl a light tickle on the stomach to get a laugh before her sister came back. The princess wondered if she really did make a difference to these people. She certainly hoped so. There was so much mistrust, so much secrecy in Omisha she had yet to crack.

Kiume broke the princess’ thoughts when he approached Leere and Solani. "I have news." The father of White and Blue told the princess. "Bonegrinder is awake."

“He is?!” Leere was so excited, that, when she tried to move, she forget her own injuries. She was quick to stumble back onto her but with Solani in hand. “Ow.”

"... Sneha also sent me to tell you to stay out of trees." Kiume then bent his eight legs to lean down to inspect Leere's head.

“I just reopened an old head wound. Not a great big deal.”

"You let me decide what is 'a great big deal' or not." Kiume was not the best healer, but he could mend an open wound. "There... might be a little tender for a few days."

“I’ve been knocked around by worse.”

"Would you like to go see Bonegrinder now? Or fetch Malik first?" Kiume informed the princess. "He's still a little woozy, so he's resting in Mother's nest. Though, she will allow you to see him. As long as he can slither and eat by the end of the day, he should be able to return with the two of you to Hyrule tomorrow."

“I’m sure Malik won’t mind continuing his journal on his own if seeing Bonegrinder doesn’t guarantee our departure. You don’t want to keep me in your care for a while first?”

"I'm quite confident you'll be all right. There's no brain matter leaking from your head." Kiume then arched his eyebrow. "Unless you're referring to the 'other' type of company, which should not be discussed in front of a chick."

"Hey! I'm almost ten! I'm practically grown up." Solani squawked with a huff and puff of her cheeks.

"Sure, sure."

“You’re the one who can’t stop batting those pretty eyes at me.” Leere patted Solani’s head. Her head was still woozy because she didn’t notice the obvious as of yet… “Advice kid. When a boy or girl does that to you, that means they like you. Bonus points if they stutter around you.”

"... boys? Ew." Solani was not exactly at that age where she thought of romance. "Boys are yuck. Why would I want a boy to like me?"

"You keep thinking that until you're about two hundred years old, kid”, the old spider chuckled.

"I'm not a kid!"

“Nomusa? Aren’t you a teenager hopelessly in love yourself?” Leere grinned mischievously towards to who she still believed was the young doctor. “Besides, what is a kid anyway? Who are we to judge? Solani can fly after all. That’s a pretty grown up thing for birds to do.”

"A 'kid' is someone who isn't old enough yet to learn how reproduction takes place."

"How what takes place?"

"See what I mean?"

“Ok. Point proven.” Leere paused when she saw Solani’s mother fly down with her sister. In her current position, she couldn’t exactly hide the fact she had an arm around her daughter getting heart to heart with her. “Oh. Hello there!”

"... it's time for lunch." Solani's mother, Syndia, was not exactly comfortable around humans. It was still taking a bit of getting used to since Mother decreed these two visitors were not to be harmed. She did not like it that her child wanted to hang around a... a Mortuus of all types of humans, but would not dare go against Mother. "Come, you need to eat, and you're still growing feathers."

"Mooooom, five more minutes?"

"No, it's ready now. Come along."

"Aww... okay, I'll see you later, Leere."

“Hey, it was good to hang out. In case we don’t get to say goodbye again before I leave... you’re a good kid. It was awesome to met you.” Leere gave Solani a warm hug. “I’ll be back for more than on visit to Omisha. Now go eat and do as your mother says.”

"Before you walk, I think you require a clear head." Kiume placed his large hand on top of Leere's skull and used his magic to clear her senses. "You have quite a knot there."

Leere waved goodbye before stretching out her limbs. Her head suddenly felt all the clearer. “Thanks, Nomusa. Don’t know what you missed the first time. Maybe I can-!!!” A deep sense of confusion rose up to her chest from her gut. “You’re not Nomusa.”

"... no. I am Kiume. My daughter is Nomusa." The elder healer crossed his arms. "Maybe we should wait until you got a little more clearer head."

“Oh wow. Did I make a move at you in her place?”

"Yes."

“…”

“…..”

Leere took a deep gulp to swallow a sense of embarrassment wanting to crawl out. “Sorry about that. I’ll go see Bonegrinder now. Oh... maybe it’d be best to not tell Nomusa.”

"I figured you were not in your right mind since you prefer females instead of males, but I will take it as a compliment." Kiume gestured toward the Temple of Ruin. "Mother is waiting. You best go."

“Well, your daughters had to get their beauty from somewhere.” Leere took a few deep breaths before entering the temple. Since her emotional epilogue a month ago, Leere saw Mother only a few select times for check ins. In her time, Leere tried to study Echidnan language, explore the territory of the country, as well as grow a stronger relationship with as many monsters that felt safe around her. Seeing Mother at her throne, she bowed respectfully. “Greetings Mother. I was told Bonegrinder is finally feeling well?”

"Modoc is well enough to talk and move." Mother told Leere, looking rather tired. She had researched text after text to find a way to ensure that the deity inside the Anagari remained stable. The Echidnan leader had spent a majority of her magic and resources and was in dire need of rest herself. Yet, she could not slumber until she was sure everything was all right once more. "He is still... out of sorts. Do not be surprised if he says things which make no sense."

“I will be careful around him. Mother, are you well? You look fatigued.”

"I am simply tired, Leere. It is not easy using magic when you have none to spare." Mother admitted to the princess. "Yet, I have seen worse. Go visit with Modoc. Even if he is still confused, it will do him good to see a familiar face."

“Please take care not to strain yourself.” Leere gave her a kind glance before leaving to journey deeper into the temple.

Mother had constructed a new nest for Bonegrinder on the ground level. It was too difficult to carry his body up to the higher levels of the temple. So there he rested, on pillows and silk. His body had mended well, with a few new scars to boot, but his mind was still threading itself together after the strain.

Leere carefully journeyed close, placing a hand upon his chest to feel a heartbeat. “Bonegrinder? Are you awake?”

"Faces, faces, everywhere in places... hrm... another face..." Bonegrinder was murmuring to himself and his eyes were glazed. "When are you?"

“I’m Leere Dragmire. In my 40’s.” Leere looked down into those glazed, dazed eyes. “Who am I talking to?”

"He does not know if he's... Modoc... no, Bonegrinder... what about Prama? He barely knows, barely knows himself, but knows all..." The Anagari's tail flicked back and forth. "Who do you want to talk to, princess who desires answers? Part of him keeps you from knowledge, the other part thinks you should know."

Leere’s fists squeezed tightly, feeling so much older than she appeared. There were indeed answers she needed to have unearthed. “Can you tell me what is so important about the markings about my back? And do you believe Malus is truly dammed to hell?”

"Ah, curious little one..." The Anagari even sounded different than his usual self. "Malus used to be prosperous until their downfall. A downfall due to promises of power. You know power is so seductive, but can be so corruptible." He then elaborated. "I was there, I saw them turn from using their gifts to transport the souls to the afterlife, but then decided to manipulate them for their own purposes. Such was a cause for their damnation." His head then turned to look at her. "And you would be part of their plans, princess. Modoc wanted to ensure you were kept ignorant. Bonegrinder agreed. But I know you wish to have that knowledge. The knowledge that you are a piece of their ritual to bring back the entity of Chaos, incarnated as pure Tyranny. To bring forth corruption." He asked Leere. "Another reason why the Temple of Time scares you, beckons you and torments you... to show you what is a possibility to come."

Leere looked down at him, unsure what to say at first. It was one burden replaced by the next. She always knew that she was a failed sacrifice, yet now she knew what for. More so, there was always a danger of her forced purpose being fulfilled. “Why didn’t you tell me before?”

"Modoc, Bonegrinder, your friend didn't want you to hurt further than you've already been hurt." He mused. "Figured it would be best to keep you in the dark so you would live the remainder of your days in normalcy... humans always want the usual. So boring... but it keeps the balance."

“I wanted the truth. Why couldn’t he- why couldn’t you give me that Modoc? I... what else are you hiding from me?” Leere’s voice fizzled to a whisper, her muscles relaxing from a sense of defeat.

"He would not tell you for he feared you would hate him. He is already facing blame from his creations," The Anagari's hazy eyes blinked slowly and then he said. "He earned your friendship and did not wish to lose it. One of the victims of Chaos' terrors, if he could spare even one, it would be a good deed done..."

“I don’t need secrets. I don’t need to be kept in the dark. I’m afraid of the dark after all.” A sad chuckle escaped her, her head falling down into her arms. “I need friends who can be honest with me. I need a light to rely on. If not you... than someone else.”

"Would you hate him for trying to protect you? He is, simply, a host." The Anagari then had a bit of a maniacal giggle. "Darkness and shadows bring nothing but dread, two can keep a secret if one is dead..."

Leere tilted her head, unimpressed by whatever was talking through Bonegrinder. “I am shadow. Now how about whatever entity you may be, take leave of Modoc’s body?”

"He cannot until Kaska comes to fetch him, princess. Just as does Dhakk and Chaos with their bodies, he has his. Surely you know the tales, Mother should have taught you well." He then asked with a tilted head. "Should he teach you the rhyme?"

“Wait. Dhakk? You speaking in third person like Bonegrinder, or the first? Which god does that make you?”

"Which do you think, princess? Snakes have a very bad reputation for having part in the end of the world..." He chuckled, partly rising from the bed. Bonegrinder's eyes were no longer hazy but now solid white. He was very clear that there were two souls within one body. The Anagari's eyes were usually redder than blood, but now, were the color of fallen snow. "Very clever of Kaska to manipulate the circumstances so my host would be just that. Somewhere no one would look for him. Someone who would be avoided due to fear to keep him safe. Until it is time for the final battle until Chaos, he will be unable to leave his host."

“I see a lot of destruction from your host...”

"He is a formidable creature and deadly shaman... what he does is not me. I am not him and he is not me."

“Cryptic. Like most higher beings I know.” Leere gripped his hand, looking deep into those white eyes. “I want my friend back please.”

"Why? So you can torment him further?" The deity was curious. "I still do not understand what draws you to him. My host is by no means a saint, but serves his purpose well. He has accepted his fate, yet still tries in his own way to benefit others. What has he ever done to benefit you? Didn't you say he brings forth much destruction? Hasn't he brought you misery? Why stay by his side?"

“He was a friend to me when I needed one. The destruction he brings is chosen by those who seek it. He saved my life. The misery I felt was inflicted on myself and by monsters in the dark. Now, tell me, exactly, what do you mean I torment him?” She aggressively grabbed him by the thin beard dangling from his chin. Leere didn’t know if she could truly intimidate a god, but she didn’t care.

"You truly do not know? He wants to save you from your impending fate," The deity then paused. "But knows he may not be able to do so. He lost his family and does not want to lose anyone else."

"That's not torment you sniveling being. That's concern. How dare you make me believe I'm a burden on him." Leere let go of his beard, patting down her pockets for chalk. Soon as she found an old broken piece, she started to get to work on drawing a circle around Bonegrinder.

"If you are trying to exorcise me, it won't work." The deity told the princess. "In time, you will see what I mean. For now, I will allow you your friend back. If you have more questions, I will be waiting... or you could ask Kasdeya. The mother of many will elaborate more so than I." He then told her. "Be grateful this snake cares for you, Leere. He took a hit for you, and we have been repairing ourselves for a long while."

Then he retreated to the recesses of the Anagari's body.

Leere paused her attempted exorcism. Throwing the chalk away, she sat down next to Bonegrinder until she heard his presence stir next to her. "Modoc?"

Once the deity had retreated into the recesses of Bonegrinder's mind, the Anagari squirmed. He was in agony. The pain would not subside. For all Mother's magic, she could not cure all that ailed him. Dark magic had its price and while light tried to battle it, he had to suffer the consequences. He looked so frail. "Tiny princess..." He tried to mask the discomfort from his voice. "He would have thought... you'd be home by now."

"Malik and I wanted to wait for you. We're a team." Although she smiled, and her hands were soft and kind as she held his, there was a sense of unease in her voice.

"Don't jest, tiny princess, you know that Malik hates this snake's guts." The Anagari said dryly, being a bit of a brat. "Still sore since he lost a fight and knows he would lose again and again."

"He has honour Modoc. He respects you enough to not abandon. He hasn't had any contact with his family for over a month now. Stop acting like a child." There was something about his brattish behaviour that seriously got under Leere's skin now.

"He is not Modoc!" Bonegrinder shouted so loud that dust shook from the stones. He jerked on the bedding and held his head so tightly, that his claws made it start to bleed. "He is not him! He is... he is... he doesn't know who he is!" He groaned and closed his eyes. "When is he! The visions, the memories, what is what, who is who, when is when, he can't stand it anymore! Let him forget! He wants to forget the screams, the bodies, the failure, the absolute failure! All this power and he can't save one fucking soul!" Sparks of magic filled the air. "Why did you tell her?! She had to know! She didn't, she doesn't, she won't---"

Mother quickly skittered around the corner and approached the nest. She held tightly to the Anagari, trying to ensure he would not have another outburst of celestial magic. It could harm everyone within the Temple or even outside of it if he was too agitated.

"Don't laugh as death passes you by, for you might be the next to die," Mother repeated the age old rhyme, trying to bring some sense of clarity back to the snake. "The grim reaper walks beside of thee, she comes for all, for you and me. What's next? Tell me what is next."

"Darkness and shadow bring nothing but dread, two can keep a secret if one is dead..."

"She... the grim reaper walks beside of thee..."

"Answer me!" Mother nearly shook him. "Don't let your mind crack again! You're here! You're with me! With your friend, Leere! You don't want to hurt her, right? Keep control!"

"He is... I am... who am I?"

"You are the shaman once known as Modoc, you call yourself Bonegrinder now. Why? Why do you call yourself that?"

"Because... because..." His eyes nearly rolled back into his head. "The bones of his enemies will be ground into dust... nothing left..."

"Good, good... tell me of your family..."

"Ngh... Kaksa... no... Akihara..."

"Your children."

"Osage and Ponca..."

"Your friends."

"Blue, White, Red, Black, Silver... such pretty colors."

"And the kid in the maze?"

"Hrm... tiny princess... so small.... so... so lost..." Bonegrinder emphasized the last word, looking heartbroken. "Mother, how can he help her if he cannot even save her?"

"It's okay, it's okay, she's right here... she's still alive."

"Alive... still alive..."

"That's right... sleep now. She's all right."

"Hrm-hmm..." Bonegrinder started to doze in Mother's arms. "So... tired..."

"Then sleep."

Once Bonegrinder had dozed off into sleep again, Mother's tense body relaxed with a deep sigh. "Oh thank Kaska..."

Leere watched the whole ordeal with dread, watching two massive slithering monsters shake back and forth all so one could keep the others emotions calm and in control. The temple stone shook for a few moments there. Finally feeling like she could take a breath, Leere leaned back against a stone pillar. "I don't even know what to think of that."

"I doubt he will recall any of this when he wakes again." Mother kept as still as a mouse while holding Bonegrinder. "When he's in pain, he barely remembers what happened or what he says. It's all like... a dream to him. That's as close as I can describe it." She looked so tired herself, but held strong. "Destroyer and Chaos are out there... Prama is here." She stroked Bonegrinder's long hair. "Prama is bitter for what has happened to him and has been separated from Kaksa for what feels like an eternity. Yet, he still protects us through Bonegrinder's eyes. While sullen and crass, Prama still looks for Kaksa and to us..." She then said, "Despite what you may believe or anyone else, he does have our interests at heart. At least that is one objective they both agree upon."

"What now? Is he going to sleep for another month?"

"The last time he was attacked by Chaos, he was asleep for nearly an entire year." Mother told Leere. "It would not be fair to keep you or Malik from your families any longer. When he is well, I will send him there. For now, if you wish to return to Hyrule, I will open a portal for you."

"What about his family within the Hive?"

"We will send word that he is in recovery still. They have faith in him." Mother then told Leere. "This is great a burden to know, Leere... if you wish to rid yourself of this knowledge, there are ways."

"... this." Mother held up her hand, magic forming in her palm. Yet, it aged her skin prematurely. "Pure life force. Prama is the Maker. His host can accept nothing else."

"Modoc complained about too much light in him."

"It hurts him sometimes, but I know naught of what else to do. This is the only solution which works." Mother's magic returned to her body. "I have tried many other ways. Perhaps he will wake sooner, perhaps not. For now, tell Malik that Bonegrinder is still unstable. The last thing your kingdom needs is the chance of a deity wiping it off the map."

"His body holds darkness within him... with all due respect Mother, I think you aid the spirit of the god inside him, but not Modoc himself. On that note, perhaps I can be of true assistance."

"I cannot allow you to use your magic upon him, Leere." Mother told the princess with a small shake of her head. "I am ancient and will live until you and yours are long gone. You are mortal with a select number of years left. Any unknown move could result in transference of your life energy... willing or not." She sighed and carefully laid Bonegrinder's head back on the pillows. "I aid the deity to save us all. I aid Modoc because he is my friend. Prama require light. Modoc uses darkness. Hence, he can use either type of magic. Yet, too much of one... and the scales are tipped."

"Two things you should know about me Mother. Most of the life I have has been taken other mortals to fuel my own youth. Stolen from criminals and murders. And I am all but willing." She placed a hand on Bonegrinder's chest, taking a deep breath. "You're right. He does need balance. But I can also see in those beautiful eyes of yours, despite proclaiming your superiority over mortals, there is fear in your mirrors to the soul. I believe you haven't been giving him that balance he needs due to your own fears. My own mother and father taught me that every source of light casts a shadow. Both must be embraced as they can't be separated. Please... trust me." Slowly, Leere channeled her stolen abundance of life energy, laced with shadow magic to fill the darkness Bonegrinder was missing.

Bonegrinder started to stir, grumbling curses, and Mother calmly removed Leere's hand from the Anagari. She was holding her breath. The Anagari then settled and returned to slumber. "We cannot have another outburst, for I have not the energy to contain him." Mother then told the princess. "And I never said I was superior. Just that I live much, much longer."

"Most people don't like being called mortals. Makes them feel like they are being talked down to someone with a god complex." Leere was very tired herself suddenly. She must have given him 5 years of life within the span of ten seconds; the Anagari was like a sponge. "I thought that would wake him... I'll go fetch Malik, and we will leave. Taken up enough of your time and hospitality as is."

"While you do wish to help, you cannot know everything for sure, Leere. Please be more cautious in the future." Mother covered Bonegrinder with a thick fur pelt before rising. "I will escort you to the exit."

"I know..."

________________________________________________________________

Previous Ch. https://mrneighbourlove.tumblr.com/post/190828059731/into-the-darkness-and-unknown-ch-6-poking-the

Next Ch. https://mrneighbourlove.tumblr.com/post/190959464556/into-the-darkness-and-unknown-ch-8-connection-to

#crossover #old gods #Leere #Malik #Bonegrinder #Mother #Echidnans #Omisha #Malus #ridersoftheapocalypse

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stvrgrs-archive · 5 years ago

Text

Part 1/3 of my gift to @ishipallthings as part of the @3490fest

(part 2, part 3)

For the prompt: Steve is asked to do a painting for a charity auction. He’s stuck on what to paint until Tasha offers to be his model in the Iron Woman armour. It’s a great idea, if it weren’t for the fact that he has feelings for his best friend, and spending weeks painting her doesn’t help. Once the painting is finished, Steve realises how obvious his feelings are and panics. Mutual pining and ending in getting together.

Hope it’s what you wanted!

2.2k, on Ao3

Pour Your Heart Out, I’ll Keep It Safe

Steve looks up from his tablet when he hears Natasha shuffle into the kitchen, resurfacing from the workshop for a quick caffeine top up. She’s dressed in her usual workshop-binge attire: stained tank top and sweatpants, hair falling out of its bun. There’s grease staining her hands and arms and – well, everywhere, and Steve’s not sure he should find that as attractive as he does.

“Catchin’ flies there, Cap.”

He snaps out of his reverie and looks up to see Natasha grinning down at him, coffee clutched between both hands. He blushes and busies himself with getting back to his tablet as she collapses onto the sofa next to him and peers over his shoulder.

“What’s that?”

“The Brooklyn Arts Council asked me to do a painting for a charity auction they’re holding in a few months. It’s for a good cause,” he adds at Natasha’s teasing look.

She just shakes her head fondly, “Always the Boy Scout, Rogers.”

She shuffles closer to flip through his various ideas and Steve has to force himself not to squirm. This close he can smell the workshop and coffee and the perfume she’s wearing and it’s all just so Natasha it makes him kind of dizzy.

Once again, she breaks him out of his thoughts.

“So, mon Capitaine, what were you thinking of?”

Steve gives her a blank look, still distracted by her perfume.

“Of painting. For the auction?”

Oh, right.

Steve glances back at some of the rough ideas he’d been sketching but none of it felt right.

He knew he could probably paint a few Stars and Stripes and it’d still sell, as long as it has his signature at the bottom, but he’s never been known for doing things by halves and this will be no different.

He shrugs.

“I don’t know; haven’t got much inspiration yet.”

He gazes down at Natasha as she considers the sketches in front of him and has to resist the urge to reach out and pull her into his lap.

Then something starts to shine in her eyes and she grins, Cheshire Cat like.

“What about me?”

Steve’s not stupid, he knows what she’s suggesting. Truthfully he’d been thinking about it for a while, but his brain stutters at the actual possibility so all he can respond with is a wonderfully articulate “huh?”

“Me, paint me in the Iron Woman armour. Come on, Steve, we both know that’s basically a modern day Mona Lisa! What better muse could you want?”

Steve tries to settle the butterflies in his stomach at the prospect.

What better indeed.

The following afternoon Steve’s getting everything ready when Natasha comes clunking through the door, the armour proud and shining.

“Your muse has arrived,” she announces, mock bowing and grinning up at him, “you going to paint me like one of your French girls?”

He manages to stifle his smile enough to reply, “I understood that reference.”

He quickly finishes setting everything up and turns around to arrange Natasha’s pose.

“So, uh, I was thinking you could stand in front of the windows and- here.”

He grips the waist of the armour and moves Natasha so her body is angled slightly away from the floor to ceiling windows and he stands back to check. Then he moves in again, hesitant and nervous.

“If you could just tilt your head-”

He steals himself as much as he can and raises his hand to gently angle her head up and looking slightly away.

It’s only when their eyes meet that he realises how little space is between them, the sound of her quiet breathing all he can hear and she moves her head so she’s looking up at him, a small smile teasing her lips.

They stand like that, entranced, for a few seconds or hours, Steve’s honestly not sure and the spell is only broken when Natasha remarks

“You’ve a crack in your ceiling.”

The comment takes him by surprise and he stands there a moment more, frozen and reluctant, until he shakes his head and steps back.

“Well, who built this tower, Stark?”

Moment over, he ignores the catch in his breath and the pit in his stomach.

Natasha gives him a shocked look as he sits down.

“Rogers, you know I just designed this tower, I’d never have such sloppy workmanship.”

He smiles to himself as he starts examining the paints in front of him.

“Whatever you say, Natasha.”

Neither of them mention that his art studio was later added onto the apartment as an extremely extravagant birthday gift and that Natasha did, in fact, help out with the construction.

They don’t meet for nearly another two weeks. With Natasha off at a business meeting and Steve running ops for SHIELD, their schedules rarely match up, something Steve knows he probably should have thought of since the auction is in just over a month. He thinks about mentioning it to Natasha but he can’t bring himself to give up the time with her.

He’ll make the deadline, he’s sure of it.

*****

“Steve, maybe-”

“I’m fine, Natasha, please stay still.”

Alright, he concedes to himself, maybe he won’t make the deadline.

It’s currently 1:17am the night before the auction and he still isn’t finished. Natasha’s had JARVIS simulating a sunny summer’s afternoon light since four in the afternoon and Steve hasn’t moved since then either.

Damn him and his crush.

Steve has to admit, as much as he’s stressed right now, he still wouldn’t trade the past six weeks they’ve spent together for anything.

After the first few days, they fell into the routine of Natasha meeting Steve in the studio with coffee in the morning and working until the late afternoon once the sun had started its journey back below the horizon.

Then they’d go out together. Steve tried not to call them dates in his head.

The first time, they’d gone out to the MOMA (“for inspiration,” as Natasha had insisted). After that, their trips became less and less related to the auction and, Steve had noticed with not a little excitement, more and more like pseudo dates.

And throughout the whole thing Steve convinced himself he’d get it finished, until he ended up less than 17 hours before the auction with the damn thing still most decidedly not finished.

“Steve, seriously, go to bed and finish it in the morning.”

Natasha shakes her head at him and moves to walk over to where he’s sitting, hunched over.

“Natasha, you go to bed, I can have JARVIS project your image, really.”

She just sighs and stays where she is.

Almost four hours later, Steve slumps back in his chair and rubs his eyes, groaning.

“Fucking finally,” Natasha yawns and rolls her shoulders, stumbling over to him even despite the armour.

“Wait!”

Steve shoots up and hurries in front of Natasha.

“I want it to be a surprise,” he explains.

She looks up at him, unimpressed.

“But it’s me,” she argues, pouting. “Besides, when else am I gonna get to see it? It’s being auctioned off tomorrow.”

“All the pieces are being displayed beforehand, you’ll see it then.”

She gives him the side eye and just shrugs when he doesn’t budge.

“Alright then, suit yourself. I’ll see you tomorrow, Steve.”

She’s turning to go when Steve blurts

“Wait, do you want to stay here?”

She turns back to face him, seemingly confused and surprised. Steve tries not to blush.

“You just- you seem tired. Instead of going down to your floor.”

The edge of her mouth quirks.

“All I’ve been doing all day is standing around.”

Steve smiles at her, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Well, I owe you.”

She ends up passed out in his bed curled up next to him after pulling him down with her as she collapsed onto the duvet. Steve falls asleep content and imagining having this, having her, like this all the time.

In the morning, Steve agrees to meet Natasha at five to drive to the auction and she leaves to start catching up on work until then.

He goes into the studio to get the painting ready for whoever will be collecting it and when he goes to take it off the canvas, he stops. And examines the painting. And feels the beginings of panic clutch at him.

Fuck, he didn’t think this through.

*****

The limo pulls up outside the showing and they’re greeted by the usual mass of reporters and flashing lights. Once inside, a server offers them champagne and laughably tiny portions of food and they walk around the gallery together.

Steve’s stomach ties itself in knots until they come to his.

He watches Natasha’s face carefully as she looks at the canvas.

It’s not big, about 15” by 30”, but he knows that doesn’t matter.

The painting ended up being from the waist up, the armour shining and the reactor sitting proudly in the centre. Her face is tilted up as she seems to soar towards a clear blue sky that fades to a sparkling galaxy.

He thinks back to this morning, finally looking at the finished painting with a mind that wasn’t so sleep deprived. Natasha Stark, immortalised in oil on canvas. He remembers realising with more than a little horror that it’s so obvious, that people will know. Worse, that Natasha will know.

It was undeniable in each careful stroke of the brush, almost reverent, as he’d accidentally poured his heart out on canvas.

Natasha looks up at him, seemingly shocked.

“It’s great, Steve, it’s really-“ she pauses as she swallows and turns back to the painting. “Amazing.”

Steve gives her a small smile in return, smothering the fluttering in his stomach.

He opens his mouth to tell her, just tell her, you idiot when she continues.

“Why’s it called Confession?”

He swallows and rubs his palms against his suit trousers, probably more nervous than is warranted. He opens his mouth to tell her when a man comes around to tell them that the auction is starting and to start getting seated.

He closes his mouth and holds his arm out for her to take.

“I’ll tell you later.”

The auction seems to go well. Steve makes note of some of the artists to compliment after.

Finally his own painting gets placed carefully on the canvas under bright lights.

“And last, but not least, we have Brooklyn’s own, Steven Rogers, who so generously donated this original piece, titled Confession.”

The offers start increasing so quickly it makes Steve kind of dizzy. At one point he turns to Natasha to comment on it, to tell her she has to take some credit, to just tell her, you idiot but she’s staring up at the painting. She seems almost transfixed, studying it and Steve sees the moment a switch flicks and he knows she’s figured it out. He just about to say something, ask to talk to her outside maybe, when she shouts

“$50 million!”

The room falls almost deadly silent and everyone turns to stare. Steve feels his cheeks heat and shifts uncomfortably. Well, then. Talk about grand gestures.

The drive back to the tower is silence, Steve afraid he’s somehow upset Natasha.

The limo drops them off at the front doors and they cross the lobby, their footsteps echoing. They get on the elevator and just as the doors slide shut, he gathers his courage again and turns to Natasha.

“Natasha-”

“Were you going to tell me?”

He hesitates before rushing on hastily at Natasha’s raised eyebrow.

“I was! Tonight; I tried before when we were looking at the painting, but then we had to go in and then during the auction but you, y’know, bought it and- just now,” he finishes weakly.

She shakes her head and opens her mouth to respond but Steve barrels on, determined to finish now that he’s begun.

“I didn’t know how to tell you and then I talked to Sharon this morning and she called me an idiot-”

Natasha snorts and Steve smiles.

“-and told me to just tell you, that I might be surprised.”

Natasha moves closer to him and as he meets her eyes he thinks back to the beginning of all this, when they stood in the same position, both with the same desires.

“So what are you telling me, Steve?”

“Natasha Stark,” he licks his lips nervously, “W-”

He never gets to finish as Natasha surges forward, pressing them together and tugging him out when the elevator doors open.

They stumble and land sprawled on her sofa, staring at each other and breathless.

“You’re such an idiot,” Natasha laughs.

“You didn’t ask me either!”

She just continues to laugh and presses her forehead against his.

“I took you to all the classic date places, babe. Hell, we even went bowling. It’s not my fault you never realised; now you have to come up with something new for our first date.”

“How about dinner and a movie? We never did that and there’s this Italian-”

She laughs and punches his chest lightly.

“You’re such a sap.”

“Well?”

She lays down half on top of him and rests her head on his chest, silent for a few moments until she responds quietly

“Dinner would be great.”

#ishipallthings #3490fest #marvel #stony #stevetony #natasha stark #mine

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atlas-of-space · 5 years ago

Text

Life with Tom - blurb

SUMMARY: just some sweet moments between you and Tom. How you met, what you’re doing now and some insights in your future together

WORD COUNT: 3,8K

WARNINGS: just some swear words here and there, some mentions of the devil’s tango™

—

“Hi sweetheart, I’m not interrupting something I hope?” Tom said when you accepted his face-time call. You were cleaning your car as he called and turned off the vacuum. “No it’s alright, just cleaning my car. How are you babe?” you blew a strand of hair out of your face.

“I’m fine. Just miss you. You’re still coming to London next week, no?” You didn’t live in the UK, but just over the channel. You tried to see each other at least once a month, but as you both had busy schedules that was difficult. Tom was away for filming a lot, and you were a uni student who was busy most times of the year. But you both made the best of it, as you were both happy for yourself and for the other who was accomplishing their dreams.

“Yes, I’m driving my car so I’ll take the ferry to Dover and drive to London then, if that’s alright for you? We could go for a drive then and just escape for a while?” You loved Tom, but him being like super famous sometimes put a strain on your relationship. You were known as a super private person by your friends and family. That’s why Tom and you decided to keep your relationship on the low. It was sometimes annoying that people kept linking him to other celebs, but at the end of the day, it was you who got the text that he was safe at home, wishing you were by his side.

“Oh god, yes I’d love that. We could go back to that cute cottage in Scotland? Or something else is also good, I just wanna see you to be honest.” You blushed as Tom said those words. You had been together for a while now, a little over two years, but sometimes it felt as it had been a lifetime. And you were ready for more than a lifetime with him.

“I’m totally in. God I’m so happy you’re back in the UK and that exam season is over. I cannot wait to spend the week with you.”

You had met Tom a few years ago. You were both on the same flight from New York to London, when you heard your plane had been overbooked. Both you and Tom were forced to get on another flight.

“Are you serious? I paid so much money for this flight and I still have a connecting one to Brussels!” You exclaimed. This could not be happening now. Your classes were starting again in a few days, and you could not use this extra stress.

“I’m so sorry miss, the next flight leaves tomorrow and the airline will pay for your next flight and the hotel, if it’s any consolidation.” The attendant said, a sorry look on her face. “It’s alright, not your fault obviously. I’m sorry for being annoying. It’s a stressful time.”

The attendant gave you a small smile, “Of course I understand miss. Everyone would get annoyed when this happens. Anyway, my colleague arranged a transfer to a hotel near the airport. You and another passenger will be escorted to the hotel and we’ll pick you up in time tomorrow for the other flight to London.”

You nodded and put your passport back in your backpack whilst getting out your phone. You sent a text to your mom, saying that your arrival would be a day late and hoping that she could still pick you up.

You were put in a van together with all your luggage and had to wait a bit until the other passenger got into it. After a few minutes, a guy stepped in wearing a cap and sunglasses. He looked annoyed, but you were sure that you had the same look on your face. Nevertheless, you gave him a small smile as he took off his sunglasses.

“Hi, also kicked out of the flight to London?” You said as the van got on the way to the hotel.” The guy nodded, “yup, really didn’t need this today but I’m happy they arranged a hotel and the flight for tomorrow.”

You agreed and turned to look out of the window. Your mother hadn’t responded yet, because she was probably already sleeping due to the time difference.

“So, also going home again or just a stop on the way?” The guy asked and you snapped out of your day dream. “Oh, uh, yeah home as well, I have a layover in London and then a flight to Brussels. You’re going home as well I presume? Hearing the accent.” You joked. He was obviously from the UK, you just couldn’t lay your finger on the region.

“Yes, indeed. I’m from London. I’m off of work for a few weeks so I’m going back to the home town you know.” You nodded. “That’s nice. I just went on a solo city trip and in a few days my uni starts again, so yeah.”

A silence fell between the two of you. The traffic was really slow today so the van took a bit longer to reach the hotel you would be staying at.

“I’m Y/N by the way. We should probably stick together as we are both kicked off this flight”, you joked when you offered him a hand. He shook it, “I’m Tom, nice to meet you Y/N, my fellow riot.”

The van arrived at the hotel and you both got out and hailed out all of your luggage. You took charge as you walked over to the reception desk.

“Hi, we’re the passengers of the flight from New York to London from British airways. We got two rooms by the airline I think.” You got out your passport as Tom came to stand next to you.

“I see, Y/N Y/L/N and Tom Holland is that correct?” You both nodded and gave your passports to check in.

“So here are your room keys. Room 391 is for miss Y/L/N and room 393 is for mister Holland. Breakfast is from 7 am until 10.30 am. You are still free to use our bar if you’re interested. If you need any help, you can always call the reception desk at number 9.”

You got your keys and got into the elevator to the third floor. “So we’re neighbors then, hope you don’t snore too loud!” You elbowed him as a joke. He snorted and rolled his eyes. “please, you probably snore as well so quiet.”

You laughed and swiped the room key. You wanted to say goodnight to Tom, when he cleared his throat to say something, “I know it’s late but we could maybe go to the bar together? As we’re stuck here and don’t have anything to do. It’s okay if you don’t want to, just wanted to ask.” He awkwardly scratched his neck (do all cute boys do this? Is this like a universal sign of awkwardness?).

You pondered for a moment. Was it smart to go to the bar for a drink with a cute stranger with whom you definitely had a click with?

“sure, I’m down for it. Let me just put my luggage in my room and freshen up and I’ll meet you in the bar?” You suggested. “yes, great! i’ll wait for you at the bar then. See you in a bit!” Tom walked back to the elevator when you got in your room to freshen up.

“So already hitting the alcohol I see”, you said as you sat down next to Tom at the bar. He turned to you and took a sip of his cocktail, cocking an eyebrow. “nothing is better to forget my sorrows as drinking a mojito.”

You flagged down the barman to order the same drink, “cheers to that I'd say. It is kinda a shitty way to end my vacay but at least I met a cool guy.”

Tom raised his drink to clink with yours, “absolutely true. Not everything that happens has to be bad.”

At the end of the night, you both were a bit tipsy as you both couldn’t handle your liquor. “I told you I don’t drink on the regular!” You laughed as you held onto Tom’s forearm in the elevator. The room was spinning just a bit for you, but you felt absolutely fine in this instant. No, you felt amazing. You just had so much fun with this random dude and you could talk about everything with him and not feel awkward.

You waited before your door to say goodnight to Tom. Even though your day had a shitty turn, this newfound friendship turned it all around. “So, I guess this is goodnight then?” You whispered quietly to not disturb other guests.

Tom’s eyes were twinkling when he nodded, “breakfast tomorrow?” He really hoped you would say yes. This had been such an amazing but unplanned night and he lived for it.

You grinned and stepped closer to give him a quick hug. “Of course Tom! At 9 in the breakfast lounge then?”

His mouth curved up into a smile and he hugged you back. You both said your goodnights and got to sleep.

—

“This is goodbye then?” You bit your lip as you said those words. You were standing in front of the boarding area. You had your economy seat, but Tom had a business seat, so you would be separated and would probably not see each other again.

“I guess it is,” he gloomily said. Tom really wanted to sit next to you during the flight so you could talk some more. “Well, if this is it. It was really nice to get to know you Tom. Thanks for making this shitty day into a really fun one.” You put your arms around his neck, and he enclosed his around your waist.

“This doesn’t have to be goodbye though. We could exchange numbers and meet up once in a while?” Tom asked hopeful. He knew that his own schedule was very busy from time to time and he presumed yours was as well. But he really liked you. You were really chill and had this self confidence and intelligence that he really admired. He wanted to get to know you better and pick that brain of yours some more, more than just over drinks.

“That’s a great idea. Just text me when you’re home then? I probably won’t react immediately with my other flight but I’ll try to get back to you as soon as possible.”

You exchanged numbers and both went your own ways.

From there on, you developed a close friendship. You tried to visit each other or to FaceTime each other as much as possible. After your first year of uni was over, you got to visit him for a month and you got to see him on set. That was also the moment you realized this might be something more than just friendship. You were a little too comfortable with him to be just friends.

After a few dates and stuff, you decided to call it for what is was - a relationship. That was about 2,5 years ago now.

—

You drove your car onto the ferry and parked it. After you got out, you sent a text to Tom, saying you were on the ferry. You enjoyed taking the ferry when you went to the UK. The fresh sea air and overall silence of the sea calmed you down. You usually read your book for a while and looked out onto the sea for the time you spent on the boat.

The ferry arrived and you drove the few hours to Tom’s flat blasting your music. Tom had moved his car, so you could park yours right in front of his door.

“Hi darling”, he said as he opened the door. You immediately hugged him tightly. You hand’t seen each other in person for two and a half months now, and the distance had been difficult.

You buried your face in his neck, taking a deep breath and leaving a small kiss on his neck. “I missed you so much. This week will be amazing.”

You got into the flat and cuddled on the couch where you talked about what had happened in the last few months in your lives. Tessa was at your feet and you stroked your feet across her body. “I swear to you, if we weren’t dating, Jake would be my husband!”, Tom chuckled, “He’s like my soulmate, I swear.”

You rolled your eyes and tapped his nose. “well damn, guess I’ll go back home so you can go back to Jake then. Sad to see that I had to drive all the way here to find out that you already have a crush on someone else”, you continued to play into his joke. You missed this banter with Tom when you were apart.

“No, but for real, he’s a really nice guy and he was so fun to work with and to do the press tour with, but at the end of the day, you’re still my person”, he said as he nuzzled his face into your hair. A blush crept up on your face as you gave him a kiss on his hair. “I really love you, so much”, you replied as his face came back up to look in your eyes.

“I love you so much as well”, he mumbled whilst leaning in. The kiss was sweet, as you opened your mouth to him. You continued making out for a bit on the couch, just enjoying each other and hearing the bustling sounds of the city.

—

“Hi ms Carrick, it’s so nice to be back again!”, you said as the older lady opened the door of the cottage for you and Tessa. Tom was getting your bags out of the car, as you were already going inside to check-in. Ms Carrick was an older lady who rented out a cottage on her land. She didn’t have any idea who you guys were, but she knew you liked your privacy and always made sure you weren’t to be bothered by other visitors. You visited her a few times a year because she just had the quaintest little place and made the best breakfast. Her small house in Scotland was in the middle of the fields and fairly close to some big woods.

“Hello dear, how are you? Where’s that boyfriends of yours?” She gave you a hug and petted Tessa on her head as Tom entered with your bags. “I’m here, hi ms Carrick, so lovely to see you again.”

Ms Carrick checked you in and gave you the key to the cottage. “I’ll make us some tea while you guys get settled in. You know the way right, dear?” Ms Carrick got into her kitchen to prepare a kettle and you and Tom went up to your room. The little house was very light and airy and had a great view over the fields where sometimes cows were grazing.

You opened the doors to the balcony and leaned on the railing. Tom came to stand behind you and wrapped his arms around your waist and rested his chin on your shoulder. “a weekend in the woods with you. Nothing I want more at the moment.” You turned in his embrace and gave him a small kiss, “I love you, thanks for agreeing to doing this every few months. I really need the peace and quiet sometimes.”

“I love you too. Thanks for proposing this. I never knew I needed this until we did it the first time last year. You’ve really inspired me to sometimes take a break, you know that?”

After you drank some tea with ms. Carrick and played a bit with Tessa, you decided to call it a night.

Every day you would wake up with the sun shining through the light curtains, the light filtering through and shining on your bare back. You’d turn on your side and would look at Tom for a while. As you thought back to the night before, your cheeks would turn crimson because of the activities you and Tom participated in.

After waking up slowly and just being lazy bums in bed, you’d go to the kitchen where ms Carrick had an amazing breakfast prepared.

The next few days were filled with walks in the woods and through the fields with Tessa. You’d wear her out by running around and playing fetch with her. After, you’d play some boardgames together or you would read a book, while Tom was tinkering on his phone.

On your last whole day in the cottage, you started the morning of with a morning walk. When you came back and had breakfast, you curled up on the couch with your book and a cup of tea. Tessa was laying next to you, snoring gently.

Tom had been off the whole morning. You decided not to push him to talk to you, but just waiting until was ready to talk. Before the walk, everything had been fine until you mentioned that you loved this domestic lifestyle you had adopted during the vacay in the cottage.

You were just about done with a chapter, when Tom came into the room, twisting his hands in the other. “Can we talk about something Y/N?” This was apparently the moment he was going to say what had been on his mind the whole morning.

You patted the spot next to you and closed your book, putting your bookmark in the right spot. You turned towards him as he sat down, grasping his hand in yours and rubbing your thumb over his hand.

“what’s up, babe?” Tom took a deep sigh and focussed on your thumb rubbing his hand. “Well, you know how you said you loved being here? And just living together for a while?”, you nodded encouraging to keep speaking, “so I was thinking, that maybe after you’re done with uni, we could maybe look for a flat together?”

You nodded, looking at him and just thinking about what exactly Tom was saying. “So, are we talking about moving in together then?” You know that was what he was asking, but you had to be absolutely sure this was it.

“Yeah. I mean, we’ve been together for a little over two years now, when you’re done with uni almost three and a half so I feel like this is the moment, you know?” He said as he observed you with curious eyes.

You brought your hands up to your mouth and placed a small kiss on Tom’s hand. “I’d love to. I’d love to move in with you and live with you.”

The small smile on Tom’s face had turned into a full-on grin, as he took your head between his palms and gave you a big kiss on your lips. “Fuck I can’t wait to move in with you.”

“Me neither”, you beamed. You’d have to think about the logistics though. Moving to another country wasn’t that easy. Especially when you were thinking about getting another degree.

You gave him a hug and just held each other for a while. This was such bliss.

—

“No, no, that box is for the bedroom!” You yelled at Tom as he almost dropped the box when he tripped over the carpet in your living room. Your hair was sticking to your neck, as you were moving all your stuff into the flat you were renting with Tom. The day had been ridiculously hot and you were just now unloading the boxes from the van.

“Woman, you have so much stuff. Where does all this come from?” Tom sighed as he carried another box of yours to the bedroom. You flipped him the finger and turned on your music. You had bought a small cabinet for in the hallway to put all your basics in, but it still had to be put together.

“God, I love but hate Ikea”, you mumbled to yourself as you dropped all the screws and bolts on the ground, next to the still unassembled cabinet.

“What’s that, darling?” Tom came to sit next to you, surveying your bad Ikea-building skills. “I love shopping and walking around in Ikea, but their shit is so hard to set up sometimes,” you sighed as you looked through the construction manual.

After half an hour of banter with Tom, you almost finished assembling the cabinet, but not after almost putting your finger between the cabinet door. “Fuck, that was close. You almost had to finish moving everything in alone, Thomas,” you teased Tom as he just rolled his eyes and smirked.

The flat was a mess the first few weeks. But every day, it started to look more put together - or as put together as you guys could make it. Your small kitchen had an island and a table attached. Lots of plants were on the windowsills, and your herbs were flourishing.

The cabinet in the hallway held your keys and other trinkets you might need before leaving your place. Your living room was the place you two spend the most time. You had bought this amazing rustic rug in a local shop and had combined it with some modern pieces of furniture.

You had always been big on interior design, and Tom had giving you free rein on your flat. The colors of the walls were all very light and open, lots of plants around and not too many decorations. This flat was your dream.

Tom also had fallen in love with the flat, but even more so with you. You really had made this place into a home, without even much effort.

“This place looks amazing, sweetheart.” Tom said as he gave you a kiss on your temple. You were just deciding to put some artworks up, but didn’t know which ones yet.

“I love this place so much already. I never wanna leave,” you said as you wrapped your hands around his waist and leaned your head on his chest.

“Me neither, but I’ll always look forward to coming home to this place, to you,’ he replied as he stroked your back.

“These last few years, have been like, the best few years of my life, you know that?” You said as you gazed at Tom. He nodded and brushed some hairs out of your face, “for me too. I’m just so happy every day and now even more because I get to see you first thing in the morning, and I get to see you last thing at night. I honestly couldn’t ask for anything better.”

You cuddled on your couch for the rest of the evening, enjoying each others company and discussing what the future would bring.

—

So this was itttt. Sorry it’s so sappy sometimes lol I honestly just wish I could have someone like this in my life but alas I’m single af. Yeah I wanted to write some smut bit I literally have no idea how bc this bitch hasn’t even done the devil’s tango™ herself so lol.

Im thinking about maybe adding some blurbs to this story later on, just some short sweet parts about their relationship or something idk.

anyway, thanks for reading, feedback is v v appreciated over here

MASTERLIST

#tom holland x reader #tom holland fluff #tom holland imagine #tom holland ffh #tom holland homecoming #tom holland one shot #tom holland prompt #tom holland blurb #peter parker x reader #peter parker #peter parker imagine #peter parker one shot #peter parker blurb #peter parker story #tom holland story #how does one tag?#i have no clue lol

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mearcatsreturns · 6 years ago

Text

Hope for Dummies, ch. 5

There's not a guidebook to hope, but they could sure use one.

An end to waiting is just the beginning of...well, the rest of their lives.

Thank you for joining me on this fairly fluffy journey for Luka and Abby! I'll do the epilogue as soon as I can, but this main part of the story is done. And it has some smut, so be forewarned and/or excited.

You can also read this on ao3, all 7.5k words of it.

Valentine’s Day passes with little fanfare, and Abby buries herself in frantic, last-minute studying for her licensing exam. Neela already took hers, but graciously agrees to study with her anyway. Luka offers his assistance, but given that their attempts at studying tend to end in giggling and a lack of productivity, Neela’s the better choice. It helps that she doesn’t imagine Neela naked.

She works an early shift the day before, so she only catches Luka on his way in. He doesn’t see her yet, so she takes the opportunity to look him over while he’s not paying attention. He’d said he was buying a new suit, but she hadn’t expected...wow, she needs a glass of cold water.

Speaking of tall drinks of water, he finally sees her and brightens as he makes his way toward her.

“Hey, check you out, Mr. GQ,” she says, smiling broadly at him.

Blushing, he thanks her, then pulls her behind him into lockup. “Your test is tomorrow, yeah?”

“Yep. I’m going home now to study a little more and then go to bed at a reasonable time.” Or try to, anyway.

“You’re going to do great,” he says, reaching for her hand.

Abby lets him intertwine their fingers. “I’ll settle for passing.”

“And I hope you’re not settling for anything,” Luka replies, placing his on her other hand on her waist.

She licks her lips. “Not at all.”

His eyes follow the motion, and he hesitates for just a second before lowering his mouth to hers in a lingering, hard kiss.

When they finally pull away, breathing heavily, he says, “For luck.”

Abby just nods, whispering, “Yeah, for luck,” as she watches him duck out of lockup and start to walk away, though not before one last longing look at her.

&&&

She doesn’t know if she kicks its ass, but she does get her exam done. She just has to wait six weeks to see if she passed. It’s not like she doesn’t have plenty to do to keep her distracted from worrying about it between now and then.

Abby calls Luka a couple hours after she gets home. He answers nearly immediately, sounding breathless. “How did it go?”

She smiles. “Hello to you too.”

“You know what I mean, Abby,” he says, chuckling. “But really, how did it go?”

“I think it went okay, but my brain is mush and I don’t wanna think about it anymore unless I have to.”

“Fair enough.”

“How was your day?”

“Not too bad. There were a couple traumas, but we were able to save both of them,” Luka says.

“You didn’t get anything on your suit, I hope,” she replies, trying to keep back a giggle. God, what this man does to her.

“Hey, that was yesterday. I changed and wore my very boring normal clothes today.”

“Oh, there’s nothing boring about your usual clothes, especially when you wear those blue shirts of yours,” Abby blurts out. Her cheeks heat immediately.

He clears his throat, but his voice is still gruff and low. Jesus, that voice does things to her and should be illegal. “Oh, you like those?”

“Mmhmm.”

“Then maybe I should tell you that you can even manage to make scrubs look good, but my favorite is when you wear those lower-cut blouses,” he tells her, and her stomach clenches. Is she...tingling?

She tries to recover. “How shocking that you’d like the lower necklines I wear.”

“Mmm, it gives me ideas.”

Abby has a few ideas of her own, but first she needs a cold shower. And to remind herself that it would probably not be helpful to mention that she’s wearing his sweater and very little else.

“I...I think we should probably change the subject,” she finally says with genuine regret and frustration. Can it be graduation already?

Luka lets out a sigh. “Probably. Sorry.”

“No, I...I definitely encouraged you. In fact, I brought it up.”

She thinks he mutters something about her indeed bringing it up, and she smothers a laugh. Finally, he says, “Well, if you want to celebrate being done with your licensing, we could go out with Neela, Pratt, Carter, and Kem.”

“That sounds good. Susan and Chuck, too?”

“Yeah, I’ll invite them. Susan needs to stop giving me condoms, though.”

Abby cackles. “She does that to you too? Don’t pay her any attention, I think the pregnancy hormones are getting to her. She knows why we’re waiting.”

“Like I’ve said before, it’s worth it,” he says, and then she’s biting her lip and smiling for entirely different reasons.

She’s pretty sure she loves him.

&&&

Luka dreads the meeting ahead of them, but they have to get it over with and make their selections about matches.

It’s never one of his favorite things to do, but this year it’s just so damn awkward. Situations like these are what he was trying to avoid by pumping the brakes with Abby, but he supposes that even if they were just friends this might still be unpleasant. He just can’t be objective about her.

All the attendings gather in the lounge, Kerry included. After a short, brutal assessment of Lester, they proceed to Abby, and Luka’s stomach twists. So much is riding on this.

Kerry talks briefly about Abby’s qualifications, then opens the floor for discussion by the rest of them. She looks at him pointedly, and he squirms in his chair. Everyone is looking at him, so he finally speaks. “She has, uh, good clinical skills. Excellent ones.”

“She really does know her stuff, and patients love her,” Carter adds, though his lips are twitching.

Susan agrees. “She cares about people, and they can tell. Sometimes the only person who’s not sure about Abby is Abby, but she’s gotten a lot better lately.”

Is...did Weaver just give him a sly look or is he imagining it? He shakes his head and they move on, discussing Neela. Their opinions there are a little more split. Luka likes her, but he’s not sure the ER is the place for her, or if she even wants that.

Weaver hurries out of the lounge as soon as they’re done to head to another meeting, while the other three attendings linger.

Carter comes over and slaps his back. “Good clinical skills, huh?” He smirks before going out the door, leaving Luka with Susan.

“Yeah, do you have personal experience with her clinical skills, Dr. Kovač?” Susan grins at him and raises an eyebrow, and he can feel himself turning bright crimson.

“Well, what am I supposed to say? I...I’m biased when it comes to Abby, and it seems everyone knows it,” he says, ignoring her previous quip.

She gets serious. “Luka, we all love Abby. Not the same way you do, but all of us are biased. Carter still cares about her a lot, she’s one of Kerry’s few friends other than you, and she’s one of my best friends. We’re just teasing you, because we know your involvement makes you both better doctors and people. And you’re our friend too.”

“We...we’re not…”

“You’re not dating?” Susan snorts. “Yeah, Abby told me. For the record, while it’s very noble of you both, you’re involved whether you call it that or not. It’s not like either of you is actually single. You wouldn’t even think of dating someone else, would you?”

“No,” he says simply.

“Besides, according to Frank, you’re actually married. You’re committed to each other and don’t have sex. Ergo, married.”

Luka rolls his eyes, but he struggles to keep from smiling.

&&&

Luka nearly falls backward when Abby all but leaps into his arms, babbling excitedly. “I passed! I passed!”

Ah, her licensing exam. She’s been worried, even if she tries to hide it when they talk. As smart as she is and competent with patients, she knows standardized tests aren’t her forte.

He wraps his arms around her and leans back against the wall. “I knew you could do it.”

“Must have been that good luck kiss.”

“Or because you’re smart and work hard and know what you’re doing. But if you want to test again to see if it’s the kissing, I’m happy to try more.”

She bites her lip and her eyes brighten, and she says, “Well, we could try a celebratory kiss.”

He realizes at once he’s still holding her and that there’s an infrequently used exam room two doors away. It’s not like he has a pressing case right now; they can afford this time.

Later, he might wish he was more subtle, but for now, he doesn’t care. He just carries Abby into the room, not setting her down until he closes and locks the door behind him.

Luka licks his lips, then he doesn’t have a chance to think, to plan. Abby’s lips are on his, or his are on hers. It doesn’t matter, because all that matters is the feel of her in his arms.

It’s not long until the kiss begins to affect him (though truthfully, he’s been affected ever since she said they should kiss again) and he pulls her close enough that they’re pressed up against each other.

She’s kissing him and saying his name, and he tries to hold back a groan as she arches against him, but it’s no use.

He pulls back, and she whines in protest. Then he spins her around so that her back is toward him, and he slides a hand under the neckline of her scrub top. “Is...is this okay?”

“Just...don’t stop,” she says. Words turn into gasping when he reaches under her bra, and he can’t help but thrust into her backside.

He obeys, pressing hot, open-mouthed kisses from her jaw down the slim column of her neck.

When he trails his other hand down her side and slips it under her pants and panties, she cries out, “Luka!” before clapping a hand over her mouth.

God, she’s so wet and responsive and she’s writhing against him. Luka loses the ability to think beyond her and him and the way they feel against each other. If only they could feel more skin, but god, she’s bucking against him as he moves his hands over her and inside her and it’s too much. It’s too much. As soon as she gasps, clutching at his arms and stiffening, he thrusts against her once more before losing himself.

Once he recovers, he becomes aware that (a) he just came in his pants like a teenager and (b) Abby is still slumped against him. The latter fact seems more important, so he brushes his lips against the top of her head.

After a few more moments of heavy breathing, she finally breaks the silence, “So, uh. We did that.”

“Mmmhmm. We did. Any regrets?” He prays she says no, because he can’t regret holding her, loving her, making love to her in any way he can.

“Not a one, but we’re...kinda messy. Literally. You probably more than me.”

He sighs. “Yeah. Ah, we can clean up in here, but if you wouldn’t mind bringing me some scrubs…?”

“Of course,” she says, turning and kissing him once more. As soon as she’s cleaned up a little, she reaches up and pats his cheek. “I’ll be right back.”

“Can’t wait,” he manages.

Abby returns in short order, holding a pair of scrubs in his size. Her cheeks are pink, but she smiles. “I, uh, there might be at least one person who has questions about why I needed such giant scrubs, but here they are.”

“Please tell me it’s not Susan,” Luka pleads.

She kisses him, just a quick peck, but the casual affection of the gesture is almost as potent as what they just did before. “It’s not Susan.”

“I get the feeling you’re not being exactly truthful.”

“Hey, you wanted me to tell you that. Besides, Susan is better than it being Carter.”

He groans and buries his head in her shoulder, wrapping his arms around her again, not caring about the scrubs getting crumpled between them. She reaches up and cards her fingers through his hair, and he enjoys just being with her for a few more seconds.

“I should probably get dressed. But are we okay, Abby? I know we said—”

“Oh, Luka,” she says, cutting him off, “I know what we said. And we should probably try to abide by that, but I’m also not going to let us beat ourselves up for this.”

The smile tugging at his lips overtakes his face. “Good.”

&&&

Abby is napping in the on-call room when she hears the sound of a throat clearing. She opens one eye, and seeing that it’s Luka, she blinks blearily. “Hey.”

“Good morning, beautiful. Or afternoon, but yes.” He’s smiling, and he takes a seat on the edge of the bed.

“Everything okay? Do I need to get up?”

Brushing her hair out of her face, he says, “No, and I’m sorry to wake you, but I was going to get coffee before my shift, and I wanted to see if you want to come along.”

“Oh, sure. Just a sec,” she says, pushing herself up and straightening her clothes.

They walk over to the Jumbo Mart together, and Luka’s hand finds hers as they cross the street. Abby looks up at him, smiling softly at the sweet gesture.

After they get their coffee and pay, they head out walking. Abby’s done with her shift, she just knew she’d fall asleep on the train and miss her stop if she didn’t take a nap first. They don’t go far, just lean up against one of the brick buildings and sip at their coffee.

Luka breaks the silence. “So...has Kerry said anything to you about matching with County?”

“Uh, she hemmed and hawed, but basically said that if I ranked County as my first choice, I’m kind of a shoe-in. And I did.”

“Hmm, good. Given any thought to what you’ll do between graduation and starting your internship?”

Oh, Abby has several ideas, and all of them involve her and Luka being very naked together. One particular fantasy involves him bringing her breakfast in bed—completely in the nude, of course, or maybe just with an apron. It might be unrealistic, but a girl can dream.

Instead, she says, “Um, a little. Sleeping for a week, I hope.”

He laughs, but seems distracted. “Yeah. Ah, I was talking to Kerry today, and she gave me a week off right after graduation for some reason.”

“You...you didn’t request it?”

“No, but, ah, I was looking at the schedule and I wasn’t on it, so I asked her about it.”

“That’s kinda weird, even for her,” Abby says, looking up at him.

His cheeks are red. “She said—she said that she, ah, thinks it’s best I take some time off around when you might have...time.”

Oh. Ohhhhh. Abby feels her own cheeks flame brilliantly, but she can’t help teasing Luka. “So she told you to take a sex vacation, basically.”

“Only if it’s with you,” he says, chest shaking with laughter.

“Oh my god.”

“If you want her exact words, it was, ‘I don’t want to be around you and Abby right after graduation, and I don’t think any patients should be.’”

On one hand, she kind of wants to disappear or melt into the floor. On the other...a week. With Luka. “I’m not sure if I should thank her or just go die from embarrassment.”

Maybe she and Luka haven’t exactly been circumspect since finding out she passed her licensing exam. Maybe they’ve been caught making out in almost every room with a door in the ER, and maybe their “we’re not sleeping together” is wearing a little thin with everyone, themselves included.

It’s just...it’s been nice, in a weird way, not jumping into sex. They’d rushed into things physically the first time around, and that’s pretty much how it’s been since...ever. Luka said it’s the first time he’s waited and taken things slowly like this since Danijela, and Abby likes that there’s something, well—innocent isn’t the right word, but she can’t think of anything better. For once, their emotions are farther along than anything else. It’s getting harder and harder to wait though, and at this point saying they’re waiting is a little laughable.

They haven’t had sex, not really. There’s just been a lot of making out. And...more. In addition to the ER, there was that memorable time when Luka gave her a ride home after a shift they worked together and they’d ended up dry humping in his back seat like horny teenagers. That’s not even touching on what they’ve gotten away with at the hospital.

Okay, so maybe she can see why Kerry might have basically told her and Luka to take a sex vacation. It’s still embarrassing, though.

Shaking her head, she leans against him, and he shifts his coffee to his other hand to wrap his arm around her. “So I was thinking...what if after your graduation ceremony, we go away somewhere, just the two of us?”

“You want to get out of town? Travel somewhere?” she asks skeptically.

“Nowhere too far,” he adds quickly. Yeah, she can’t imagine either of them wants to spend a bunch of time driving or on a plane when...well, it’s been almost three years.

“Huh, maybe. Get away from Chicago and our responsibilities, maybe somewhere on the water?”

“Like a vacation.”

“Not like a vacation, an actual vacation.”

He kisses the top of her head. “Sounds good to me. I can find a place and book it, unless you want to choose…?”

“Nah, I trust you to find somewhere good.”

“Do you want to leave the day of your graduation, or maybe the next day?”

Abby considers their options. On one hand, leaving right after graduation sounds tiring and like...well, they’d have to wait to get to their destination. But if they don’t leave immediately, she’s not sure they’ll end up going anywhere at all. “Um, how about right after graduation?”

Luka smiles, clearly on the same page. “Perfect.”

&&&

One day. One day until graduation, and it’s driving Abby crazy to be here finishing up this psych rotation.

It’s been...freakishly good. Honestly, if she weren’t completely sold on being an ER doc, this would be fantastic. Somehow, everything with her family, with her history of alcoholism, makes this rotation engaging and very much her wheelhouse.

But she misses the ER and she misses Luka. She’s worked at County without Luka, and she can imagine being with Luka without the ER, but the two combined is just a no-go.

At this point, it’s less than twenty-four hours before they leave for their little vacation. Six days and five nights at some little cottage on the Lake Michigan coast a couple hours away, and she can’t wait. Fortunately, she doesn’t have to, not much longer, anyway.

The beach and Luka await, and her bag is packed. She even bought a new little bikini for it, though she’s hoping that clothing will be superfluous for the majority of the trip.

Abby shakes her head and heads back toward the elevator. She can daydream later, just as soon as the shift is over.

She’s almost at the elevator when someone grabs her wrist. Smiling before she even turns, she lets Luka pull her into his arms. She hooks her fingers into his belt loops and turns her face up for a kiss.

It’s just a quick peck, but it feels so good to not have to hide it anymore. Technically they should wait until tomorrow to be open about it, but Abby is very aware they’re not fooling anyone—not even themselves—at this point. She didn’t even bat an eye when Morris called Luka her boyfriend a few days ago when she’d been down on a consult...which she hadn’t realized until she’d realized Morris, Haleh, and Malik were all staring at her with raised brows.

“Ready for graduation tomorrow?” Luka asks, twining their fingers together as he pulls her aside.

Biting her lip, she nods. “Very much so. And I’m even 90% packed for leaving after.”

He smiles at her. “I need to finish that up, but I’m going home in just a couple minutes. I just wanted to say hello. And that I’m looking forward to seeing you at graduation.”

“Thank you,” she says, and then Abby can’t help it—she throws her arms around his waist. His arms slip around her, and they stand there holding each other until one of the residents from oncology clears their throat. Oh, right. They’re in the way. “Um, I’ll see you then?”

“I can’t wait,” he says, and she watches him walk away as she steps inside the elevator and the doors close.

The shift goes by quickly, and when she finally stops by Admit before heading out, and she’s surprised to find Kerry there waiting for her. Kerry’s not smiling, not that Abby can blame her with all that’s happened with losing Sandy and now trying to get back custody of their son, but she’s there with a large envelope that she hands to Abby.

Abby looks at her questioningly, and Kerry tells her to open it when she gets home. “I won’t be able to make it to your graduation tomorrow, so I wanted you to have this now. And have a good time on your trip with Luka.”

“Thanks, Kerry.”

“You’re welcome, Dr. Lockhart.”

&&&

Abby opens the envelope on the train home. In addition to a nice card and gift, it includes all the official paperwork for Abby’s residency. Abby chokes up a little; it’s so real now, even if she’s known for a while unofficially. She’s going to be a doctor of emergency medicine at County.

It hits her just before her stop. She’s done. She’s done with med school, and the only thing she’s waiting for is her diploma and the ceremony.

Luka isn’t her teacher anymore.

She hurries off the train and into her apartment, throwing the last of her things she’ll need for the trip into her suitcase. After a short pause, she grabs a few more items and tosses them into a smaller bag that she hoists over her shoulder before heading back outside her apartment. She only has to walk a block or two before she finds a cab.

As soon as she arrives at her destination, she pays her fare and heads up the elevator. She takes a deep breath, and just like she did almost a full year before, she knocks.

Luka comes to the door quickly, and when he sees her standing there with her purse and overnight bag, he licks his lips and wordlessly holds the door open for her, eyes wide.

Abby sets her bag down in the kitchen and looks around. He was clearly in the middle of doing dishes, but she can’t regret interrupting him.

“I, ah, I have some leftover Thai if you want it,” he offers.

She steps closer to him, close enough she can reach for him and toy with the hem of his tee shirt. “Um, thank you, but I’m good. I ate a sandwich before leaving work.”

He waits for her to continue, though he places a tentative hand on her hip.

“I—I realized that I’m done with med school. I mean, graduation is tomorrow, but I don’t have classes or rotations, my grades are in, I’ve got the internship. So, uh, no more teachers o—”

Luka cuts her off, placing his hands on her cheeks and kissing her breathless. Oh, thank god.

She wraps her arms around his neck and scrambles to get closer to him. He seems very on board, if the way he hoists her legs around his hips is any indication.

She’s so lost in the way his mouth, his tongue, his everything, affects her that she doesn’t register at first that he’s walked her over to the living room. Not until he bumps into the back of the couch and growls in frustration.

Abby doesn’t care, though, not even when she starts falling backwards over the end onto the cushions of the couch. She giggles, pulling Luka on top of her. The couch leans ominously for a second before he tumbles onto her, looking very put out.

She nips at his bottom lip, then soothes it with a gentle kiss. When she pulls back, Luka is sheepish. “Sorry about dropping you.”

“Does it look like I mind?”

Given that she’s underneath him, legs hitched around his hips, that telltale red flush spreading down her chest...well. He’s an idiot, but not about that. “No.”

With that settled, Abby tugs at the bottom of his shirt. He pulls it over his head and tosses it across the room. He palms her breasts through the layers of her clothes, and she whimpers in frustration. She needs to feel him.

Luka obviously understands, because he hurries to unbutton her shirt. When he sees that she’s wearing a front-clasp bra, he lets out a groan of his own before unclasping it with one hand. He pushes her bra and shirt off before lowering his mouth to her nipples, sucking and laving.

Abby moans, “Luka,” arching her hips against him and raking her nails down his back. He shudders in her arms, but helps her out when she runs her hand under the waistband of his sweatpants.

God, he’s not wearing anything under those pants, and soon he pushes them down his legs. She can feel him hard and hot against her, but there are too damn many layers, and she can’t—

Then he reaches between them and unbuttons her pants, and though she gives a whiny, breathy sigh when he pulls back, he tugs them off, managing to pull off her underwear as well.

He doesn’t waste time, just settles back between her thighs. Reaching down and finding her wet—so very wet for him—he kisses her hard, then lines himself up at her entrance and slides home.

God, he feels so good. She’s missed this so much, and now he’s inside her again. It’s been almost three years, but her body remembers his like it was yesterday.

“Fuck,” she gasps against his lips, and Luka seems to take it as a command, burying his head in her neck and thrusting into her hard and fast. When his rhythm starts to falter, he reaches between them and settles his thumb against her clit, and then it’s just a few more moments of frantic movement and pleasure before Abby tenses, cries out, and lets ecstasy take her.

Luka only lasts a few strokes more before he stills, spilling inside her with a groan.

He collapses on top of her, and Abby welcomes the weight of him against her, sweat be damned. When their breathing finally returns to normal, she laughs.

He pushes himself up on an elbow, still looking adorable and delicious and disheveled. Smiling, he asks, “What?”

“So, hello.”

“I guess we did kind of skip that part, didn’t we?”

“Mmhmm,” she says, giggling. He covers her lips with his again, this time slow and tender. He’s still inside her, and he flexes his hips against hers. He might have softened and need some time to recover before the inevitable round two, but she savors the feel of their bodies intertwined, flush up against each other.

Eventually he releases her lips with a sigh, brushing a light kiss against her forehead before finally pulling out of her and pushing himself to his feet.

Abby whimpers, but takes his proffered hand. They get up and clean themselves up a little before he reaches down and pinches her bare ass.

She yelps. “Hey!”

“I had to. You’re too cute.”

His grin is just so dopey and happy that she can’t even feign indignation. She melts against him into his embrace. “Dummy.”

“But you lo—like me anyway.”

“Very, very much. Especially right now.”

He makes a sound of assent, resting his chin on top of her head. Suddenly, he bursts into laughter, and she can’t help smiling against his chest. “What?”

“We didn’t make it to the bed. I had all these plans for us, ah, christening my bed, and instead we can barely make it to the couch.”

“I’m just glad we made it to the couch, honestly. Our knees or backs would probably hurt from the floor.”

“We’re not that old, Abby.” As if to prove his point, she can feel him beginning to stir against her stomach.

“We’re not. Shit, we should probably clean up the couch.”

He looks tempted to tell her to forget about it, but then he nods and kisses her cheek. “Okay, but then do you want to go upstairs?”

“Someone is eager,” she teases, though she starts heading toward the stairs.

“Yes. It’s been three years for us, and I’ve been...well. We’ve been ready for this part for six months.”

Abby softens and smiles gently at him, taking another step. “I’ll be waiting.”

“Be there in a couple minutes, draga,” he says, watching her make her way up, adoration in his eyes.

That feeling is entirely mutual.

&&&

Luka makes his way up a little while later, carrying her overnight bag and two glasses of water. He smiles at the sight of Abby tucked in the side of the bed she’d always favored, the sheets around her waist. He’s not quite ready to go again yet, but her breasts...well, he loves her and he certainly loves her breasts.

Setting a glass on the nightstand next to her, he goes to his own side of the bed, aware of her gaze on him. He’s torn between self-consciousness and preening, though when he crawls into bed and she immediately turns to wrap an arm around his waist, he settles for contentment. (Though it’s hardly settling, the farthest thing from it, in fact.)

“So what’s the plan for tomorrow? Since now I guess ‘see you at graduation’ doesn’t make much sense.”

She laughs and rests her head against his chest, and he pulls her on top of him. “Hmm. I tried to pack everything I needed for it, but if we could still stop by my apartment afterward for my suitcase, that would be nice. If that’s okay with you.”

“It’s perfect.”

“I seem to have forgotten pajamas, though,” she says.

“I promise you won’t need them.”

“Oh, yeah?”

Luka nods. “Yep.” He takes one of her hands that’s toying with his chest hair and guides it down to his cock.

“I see,” Abby says, wrapping her hand around him and squeezing lightly.

“Exactly.” If he’s a little hoarse, ah well.

Instead of trying to talk more, he kisses her deeply. He runs his hands all over her, and it’s not too long before she’s gasping against him and taking him inside her. She rides him slowly, leaning her forehead against his as they make love. Luka comes first, but she follows just a few minutes after.

Once they’ve straightened up and have gotten back to bed—he thinks they might actually sleep a while now—he turns on his side to face her, reaching for her hand.

“Do you need a snack or anything?”

“Well, unless you want to go again right now, I’m more tired than hungry,” Abby says wryly, squeezing his hand.

“Just wanted to make sure.”

“Thanks.”

“So.”

“So?”

“Did it live up to the months of waiting?” he asks. He hopes he keeps the uncertainty from his voice. He couldn’t bear it if she’s disappointed.

He clearly doesn’t succeed, because she takes her hand from his and pokes him in the chest. “You can’t seriously need reassurance. That was...well, that was amazing. Both times.”

“I didn’t even use my mouth, and I know you like that—”

“Luka,” she cuts him off, “we have plenty of time for that. It doesn’t need to be perfect every time, either.” Abby takes a breath, then continues, “that said, this was still pretty perfect.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Luka smiles. “I think you’re pretty perfect.”

“I’m really not and I know you know the ways I’m not, but I’m glad you think so.”

It takes everything in him not to blurt out how much he loves her, but he doesn’t want to do that post-coital. She deserves more than that. She deserves romance and appreciation and just...everything. “Hmm. Well, I like you, perfect or imperfect.”

“I feel that way too,” she says, snuggling up against him. “And, Luka?”

“Uh huh?”

“I like the bed. Very nice and comfortable.”

“Good.”

“I’m pretty fond of the bed’s occupant, too.”

He doesn’t have an answer, so instead he just kisses her.

They drift off shortly after that, and though they make love once more in the night, any of Luka’s plans for sleeping in until they need to get ready for graduation are dashed by the ringing of the phone.

He sits up, blinking blearily. It’s definitely the phone. Abby wrinkles her brow and buries her head under her pillow, and Luka rubs his eyes, glancing over at the caller ID. It’s Carter. Huh.

“Hello?” He might not sound terribly polite, but it’s six in the morning, he’s off, and Abby is finally in his bed.

“I’m sorry to be calling so early, man, but—” Carter’s voice breaks, and Luka’s testiness fades.

“What’s wrong?”

“Is Abby with you?”

He pauses, before deciding on honesty. “Yeah.”

“I—good. I don’t want to say it twice, if she’s there and can listen in.”

By then, Abby is awake. She’s still frowning, but she sits up. Luka covers the receiver and asks if she can hear. When she nods, Luka responds to Carter, “Okay, she’s awake and listening too.”

“Yesterday, Kem and I...we ended up going to the hospital, and they had to induce labor. Our baby died. Stillborn. The cord wrapped around his neck, and…”

Shit. Abby winces and gestures for the phone, so Luka hands it over. “Hey, John. Luka and I will be there in a little bit, okay?” She raises her eyebrows at Luka, wordlessly checking that he’s willing to do go.

He doesn’t hesitate. “We will.”

Carter pauses, then answers wearily, “Okay. See you guys soon.”

By unspoken agreement, they get up as soon as they hang up the phone.

“Shower?” Luka asks. It’s not how he planned to make this request, but he doesn’t want them to roll up smelling like sex when Carter’s mourning. He might be too distracted to notice, but Luka has no desire to compound his and Kem’s pain.

Abby nods and follows him. It’s quick, and though they take turns helping each other wash, it’s more intimate than sexy. Abby kisses his chest before they turn off the water and step out to dry off, and he brushes his lips across her forehead after wrapping her in a towel.

Abby’s shirt from the previous day isn’t fit to wear again, and her blouse for graduation is too formal, so she borrows one of Luka’s. He aches for Carter’s loss, but his heart is a traitor and is just so warm at the sight of Abby in his clothes.

There’s not a lot of traffic, but it’s still 7:15 but the time they get to the hospital and up to the right floor. Jack Carter offers to go get them breakfast, and Carter just nods numbly at his father.

Abby is holding his hand, and she squeezes it quickly before letting go and going to hug Carter. Carter stands still for a moment before he crumples, and Luka’s heart breaks for his friend. He goes over and puts a hand on Carter’s shoulder, patting as gently as he can. He wants to hug him too, but he’s not sure Carter wants that.

Carter makes up his mind for him when he lets go of Abby and embraces Luka. Carter is holding back from sobbing, but just barely. After a few moments of Luka holding Carter while Abby murmurs soothingly and rubs his back, they make their way to the chairs.

It takes him a few minutes, but Carter composes himself. “I really appreciate you both coming, especially when—well, sorry for interrupting. But you should go home.”

Luka exchanges a look with Abby. Sure, much as they might want to be alone, they have the rest of their lives ahead of them, and Carter needs them right now.

“Besides, I don’t want you to miss your graduation. That is today, isn’t it?” Carter asks.

“We have time, John,” Abby says, and Luka places a hand on her knee, nodding in agreement.

Jack Carter returns then, bearing coffee. “They didn’t have any bagels, but the coffee’s fresh.”

Each of them grabs a coffee, Luka carefully passing one to Abby.

“I was just saying, Dad, how much I appreciate you guys all being here, but I think that we—we’re okay.”

Luka’s heart twists with pity and compassion. He and Kem aren’t okay, and they might not be for a long time, but hopefully they can bring each other some comfort.

“And, um...I think you guys can go,” Carter says, inclining his head toward Abby and Luka.

We can hardly stay against his will, Abby seems to say, their eyes meeting in another wordless exchange.

She finally stands, and Luka pushes himself to his feet after her. “Okay. You know if you—”

“I know,” Carter says.

Abby leans down and kisses the top of Carter’s head, and Luka reaches out and clasps his hand. They walk out of the ward, and Abby’s hand finds his.

He brings it to his lips as they step into the elevator.

She takes a deep breath, then asks, “You know that I—Carter is just my friend, my trying to comfort him wasn’t—”

“Abby, I know,” he interrupts, “I wish there was something we could do, but all we can do is be a listening ear for him if he wants it.”

“Yeah, it just...well, it sucks.”

He can’t disagree. They make their way to his car hand-in-hand, and as soon as they’re inside, he has an idea. He’s been keeping her gift in the car anyway. “Since it’s probably too late to go to sleep again before we have to get ready, you want to go grab breakfast somewhere?”

She smiles at him. “Sure.”

Luka takes her to this little breakfast joint he knows, grabbing the box from under the seat and sticking it in his back pocket. He doesn’t remember until they’re there being greeted by the hostess that this was a place he brought a lot of his conquests a couple of years ago. Shit.

Magda remembers him and lights up, especially when she sees the way he’s holding Abby’s hand. “Dr. K! We thought you forgot about us.”

“Not you or the potato pancakes, Magda. How is your husband?”

“Doing good, praise god. I’ll tell him you asked. And who is this young lady?”

Abby blushes, and Luka grins at her. “This is Dr. Lockhart, my girlfriend.”

“Not a doctor yet,” she says with a wave of her hand.

He looks at his watch and snorts. “Okay, you’ll be a doctor in like four hours,” he says, then grows serious. “I hope you know that no matter whatever else is between us, I’m so proud of you and all you’ve done, Abby.”

The color in cheeks deepens, but she looks at him with her heart in her eyes. “I couldn’t have done it without you and all your encouragement.”

He ducks his own head.

Watching this exchange, Magda softens. “This is good, and I’m glad you’re here. I’ll bring the pancakes, and you come back soon, okay?”

“Okay.”

As soon as they’re seated, Abby raises an eyebrow and asks, “You used to come here a lot?”

“Ah, yeah. When...well, a couple years ago.”

Understanding dawns. “Ah. So...with other women.”

Fuck, he hopes he hasn’t made a huge mistake bringing her here. Idiot, idiot. “Um, yes. Sorry?”

Abby giggles, and he frowns at her in confusion. “Sorry, Luka, you just looked so sheepish. You’re my best friend on top of everything else, and I know what you were a couple years ago. It’s fine.”

“It doesn’t bother you?”

“Not unless there’s a reason it should, but I’m pretty sure you introducing me as your girlfriend, us planning a vacation together, and well...everything else—it’s not like what you did with other women.”

“Not at all.”

“Then we’re fine,” she says, still chuckling. “Just...you should have seen your face.”

Finally, he grins back. “Abject terror?”

“Totally.”

Their food arrives quickly and they dig in. After all, they did work up quite an appetite. When they’re done, he clears his throat and reaches behind him for the box in his pocket that’s made sitting uncomfortable.

It’s a wooden box, larger than a jeweler’s box. Her brow wrinkles in confusion when he hands it to her. “Your graduation gift. Open it.”

“Now?”

“No time like the present.”

“Ha ha, very punny.”

“You liked it,” he says, laughing.

She shakes her head in amusement, then opens the box. Cocking her head to one side, she bites her lip. Abby looks at him inquiringly as she takes the shiny golden instrument out of its box. “A...a compass?”

“I know it’s corny,” Luka explains, “but it seems we always find each other.”

Abby swallows, looking down at the compass, then turning to him and reaching to cup his cheek. “It’s beautiful.”

He shrugs. “So are you.”

Taking a deep breath, she says, “Luka, I—”

Whatever she’s about to say is cut off by their server arriving with the check. He pays and they leave after saying goodbye to Magda. On the way to the car, she tucks her hand in the crook of his elbow, and he smiles down at her. God, he can’t remember the last time he was so happy.

Then he remembers the interruption. “What were you going to say earlier? At breakfast?”

“Oh, just...I’ll tell you later,” she says, squeezing his bicep.

He has a feeling he knows what it is, and now he really can’t help smiling.

&&&

They barely get her to graduation on time, having gotten distracted while they were getting ready. Abby had mentioned that her dark green shirt reminded her of Luka’s eyes, and Luka had put on that deep blue shirt she loved on him under the suit she’d admired a few months before. And, well, if they’d had to hurry to remove the clothing and then get it back on a while later, who could blame them?

Sitting next to a heavily pregnant Susan, Luka beams as Abby walks across the stage to receive her diploma. She smiles back at him, and he whoops with joy. Susan elbows him, a soft grin on her face. “So, you two, huh?”

“Yeah,” he says, “we’re going on a little vacation right after this. A little time to ourselves before she starts her internship.”

She pats his arm. “That sounds perfect. I’m happy for both of you.”

“Thanks,” he says with a grin.

After congratulating Neela and Lester, they walk off, hand-in-hand. He helps her remove her cap and gown so she won’t pass out in the heat, tucking her regalia into the back seat of his car. After they pick up her suitcase, they get onto the freeway out of Chicago.

He glances over at her as soon as they take their exit. She looks so...happy. He knows that’s not all due to him, and honestly, he’s thrilled for her sake that she’s accomplished one of her biggest goals. Suddenly—and yet not so, the words have been bubbling inside him for three years—he can’t not tell her. “Abby?”

“Yeah?” She reaches across the console to rest her hand on his thigh.

He places his hand over her smaller one. “I just...I love you. So much.” There’s silence, then he hears a sniffle. “Is...is everything okay?”

Her laugh is watery, and she wipes her eyes. “I love you too, dummy. That’s what I was going to tell you earlier at breakfast.”

“I beat you to it.”

“You sure did,” she says, rolling her eyes. But she’s smiling radiantly, so he lifts her hand to his lips.

Then he keeps driving forward, onward to their future. “Ready, Dr. Lockhart?”

“Ready, Dr. Kovač.”

#luby #luby ff #er #er ff #luka x abby #amber writes #hope for dummies

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