#and i have less than a month before i fly halfway across the fucking world

[be-a-cute-scientist]

.

[primrose-path-of-dalliance]

@trueblue-escapist this one got long! :) (edit: now on ao3)

It was by sheer fortune that the message arrived while he was dining at Beau and Yasha's home.

They were trying some of the latter's experimental recipes. Fortunately Yasha had progressed very well in the last several months; this was now the fourth meal Caleb had been over for since Beau declared her love's attempts at Empire foods to be reliably nonpoisonous.

He was comfortable, speculating with Beau over her recent visit to Shattengrod. So when Jester began speaking in his head, he almost dropped his fork.

With strained panting—"Caleb, we need some help."

Caleb’s thoughts immediately went to static. He held up a hand as her voice continued, eyes wide, and both Beau and Yasha fell quiet with concern.

"There’s a lot of fishy people and I have, um. One diamond. We’re on the ship. Hope you aren’t busy—"

Abrupt cut-off. No continuation. He shot a look across the table to the other two, and they seemed to instantly read the tension on his face for what it was. They darted from their seats as he replied, "I am with Beau and Yasha. Hang in there, please. We’re coming."

"Sword?" called Yasha from another room.

"Sword. Beau," Caleb shouted, his adrenaline spiking with every second they were still here, "diamonds?"

"One," came her terse response. "I got it."

He stood up. The chair legs screeched against Beau and Yasha’s nice hardwood. Dug a hand through his hair and pulled half of it out of the tie.

Next he slapped his hands together. A strand of amber formed from his pinched thumbs and middle fingers as he drew them apart. Gods, his trembling hands shook the arcane thread. Ten seconds since Jester’s message.

"Essek," Caleb said to the thread, which vibrated with each word. "If you aren’t busy and have the spells. Retrieve Caduceus if you could and bring him to the Nein Heroez. It’s urgent. And diamonds," he added hastily. The thread dissipated.

Yasha and Beau emerged together from the hall with weapons in hand as the reply came: "I will contact Caduceus, then, and keep you updated. Hopefully I can be of aid. Stay safe, Caleb."

Caleb closed his eyes for a single breath and tried to absorb Essek’s soft, controlled caution.

They were coming. They would be okay.

Without needing to look, he held his hands to Yasha and Beau. "Uk’otoa is being an exceptional nuisance."

Beau scowled and said, "I fucking told Fjord to do something with that ball"—and they were off.

***

Jester woke up to what felt like a giant spike piercing through her head, or maybe a handaxe being sunk into her skull—but if it kept going forever instead of happening in an instant. Her stomach felt like a tiny pool of boiling acid that the ship kept rocking back and forth.

She moaned, curling up harder and pressing the heels of her hands to her temples. It didn’t really help, but the pulsing pain eased a little over some time.

"Arty?" she eventually managed.

"I’m so sorry, my dear," murmured his low voice by her ear. "I came as quickly as I could."

"It’s okay. Water?"

She felt a small weasel tongue lick her cheek, then retreat.

After about a minute of measured, careful breathing through the migraine, Jester heard a door crack open and winced from the brighter light now shining in from the hallway.

"Sorry," whispered a familiar voice, and Jester might have started crying at the sound of his Zemnian accent if she wasn’t already teary-eyed from pain.

The door closed, dimming the room again to its singular lantern.

She did her best to uncurl as Caleb set down a bowl and cup on the small table nearby and brought over a chair to her bedside. He reached for his neck, too, and a crimson weasel slipped into his hands.

"Thanks," she said as he returned Sprinkle to her shoulder.

"Of course. Would you like help sitting up?"

"Please."

She had to rest her head on Caleb’s shoulder for a minute when sitting up gave her a rush of a dizzy spell. His hand had rubbed up and down her arm. He smelled like sweat and fish guts and leather.

Eventually Jester had her back against the wall and the cup of water in her hands as she took a careful sip.

"Everyone’s alright," began Caleb, voice still hushed in consideration of her headache. "We took care of them all shortly after you went down, and Fjord was able to heal you a little bit. Essek arrived with Caduceus not long after."

"That’s good."

She closed her eyes and sipped more water. The warm weight of Sprinkle was draped around her neck.

Gods. Jester loved her friends so much.

"Where is everyone? Where’s Fjord?" she asked.

"Out on the deck cleaning up and figuring out what to do next," came the wry response. "Beau gave Fjord a piece of her mind about that orb. Caduceus suggested to try hiding it in the Happy Fun Ball."

"Aw, man. That’s a really good idea."

"Ja. So we are figuring out who will take it in there and where to put it."

She nodded sluggishly, eyes still closed.

"I’m sorry," said Caleb after a long moment. "Do you want to sleep?"

"No. I'm just tired."

That last word came out with a bit more... a bit more than Jester had intended to say it with. She chewed the inside of her cheek and took a sip of water.

She could feel Caleb's gaze on her. "Is it something you would like to talk about?"

The headache continued to pulse in her temples. She stared down into her cup, at the water sloshing side to side from the rocking of the ship. "If you guys are going to Yussa's later, I want to come with. It’s been a while since I’ve seen Mama."

"Of course."

Jester breathed in and out and continued, "It's been a year and I think I'm sick of sailing."

"Ah."

"I mean, there's been so many cool things. The Lucidian Ocean is huge. One time we saw a sea horse that was big enough to ride on. And the port cities we've visited have all been beautiful. But most of the time it's just this boat. And less Arty. And Uk'otoa attacking us for the cloven crystal. I can't even prank people whenever I get bored because it's all the same people, and it's way less fun to keep pranking the same people over and over again."

Caleb made a considering noise. She sipped water, chewing the inside of her cheek some more.

Slowly he asked, "Are you... thinking of staying with your mother for a while?"

"Maybe."

Peaceful silence. They listened to the sounds of wood creaking and the ocean undulating. Jester felt the shittiness of her body continue to ease, and she set down the water to take a sniff at the bowl instead. Some stew, still warm.

As she had a cautious taste, Caleb said, "Hey."

She brought down the bowl and looked at him.

"Would you like to see something cool?"

"Of course I would like to see something cool, Caleb."

His smile as she sat up with anticipation and set down the bowl was very welcome—and a pretty cool sight already. But she watched him pull out a piece of wool and rub it between two fingers, and all of a sudden there was a cat in his lap and another cat on his shoulders.

Jester gasped, hands flying to her face. "Are those your cats?"

The smile on his face only got bigger and warmer as he looked down at the illusory one in his lap cleaning its brown-and-white face. "Yes. This one is Gretel, she is still somewhat a kitten. The other one is Mac, which is short for mackerel because he was eating one from a rubbish heap when I found him."

"Oh my god, Caleb, that’s so adorable." She beamed and leaned in to wiggle her fingers at illusion-Gretel, cooing without caring that it wasn’t the real cat.

He rubbed the wool in his hand and illusion-Gretel began to purr loudly.

She could feel the dimples in her cheeks from grinning. "I love them."

"They will both be very glad to hear that and will eagerly exploit your love to make you spoil them."

"Well, of course I’ll spoil them, they’re so perfect."

Caleb’s smile eased into something soft. "Would you like to meet them in person, then? Before you return to the Nein Heroez?"

The excitement welling up inside Jester faltered.

Oh, right.

She twisted her fingers together, fixing her gaze on the blood crusted in the space between them and beneath her nails. "Um. Yeah, I would love to, Caleb. But probably I'm not going to come back here."

No response except a careful inhale.

She picked at a bloodied crease in her palm and continued, "Fjord and I talked a couple weeks ago. It wasn't like an argument or anything, don't worry! We're one hundred and ten per cent still best friends who love each other and everything, you know? But he loves being captain of the Nein Heroez and doesn't really plan on stopping anytime soon. Or doing anything else. And I want to do more. The world's so big, and there's like a dozen other planes I could see, Arty promised he'd show me around the Feywild—"

Caleb's long-fingered hand placed itself on top of her fidgeting ones, and Jester's rambling mouth fell silent. The illusory cats were gone.

"It's fine, Jester," he said. She looked up at his furrowed brow and crooked smile. "I understand."

Deep breath in and out. Jester returned a similar smile. "Yeah."

Seeming reassured, he leaned back in his chair and seemed to look off elsewhere, his brow still furrowed in thought.

In the lull, she took up the bowl of stew again with more relish. The weight of the news she'd been ignoring had lifted from her shoulders, and with it some of her worries. She hadn't known how people would react. The more reasonable voice in her mind figured that everyone would take the relationship change with ease, reminding her of Yasha's advice in Eiselcross a year ago. The louder, more anxious voice had stressed over whether any of them might judge her for being a bad girlfriend.

Apropos of nothing, gaze still a little distant, Caleb said, "Essek and I are in a relationship."

Halfway through a sip of the stew, Jester's mouth fell open. "Really?"

His lips twitched at the squeal in her voice. "Ja."

She smiled, said, "Aw, I'm happy for you two," and returned to her stew to try and stamp down the sudden, strange sense of instability overtaking her. Like her heart found itself stuck in the second between missing the next step down the stairs and falling.

"Thank you. I am telling you this, though, because Essek and I have had... somewhat of a similar conversation." His eyes flickered to meet her startled gaze briefly, and she saw a bittersweet wryness in them. "Neither of us expect the other to be, well. Committed. My whole self, more or less, is dedicated to my home. I want to make it a better place. Essek has very different goals in mind for his future. We love each other, but between my life and his constant vagrancy, it would be unfair to expect us to stay the same. And, you know. I don't have as much time as he does, anyway."

Jester had the bowl of stew in her lap now, unable to stop staring at Caleb. He finally seemed to notice her attention and awkwardly fixed his eyes on a spot of the wall somewhere to her right and up.

In her chest, time started again. Jester's heart safely found the next step instead of taking a tumble down the stairs.

"Thank you, Caleb," she said softly.

He returned to looking at her properly, and the renewed warmth in his expression helped resettle Jester's sense of the world even further. "I'm sure your mother could be much more reassuring."

"Maybe, but it's you."

Caleb went a little pink. The flush was still visible to Jester's eyes in the dim room. Thank the gods that the warmth in her own cheeks would be much harder for him to notice.

That was enough conversation for her at the moment. She shoved the bowl of stew back against her mouth.

(send me a brief widojest prompt!)

[wizkiddx]

This bloody door

a lil blurb of complete fluff - readerxharryholland

“THIS. BLOODY. DOOR.” You shouted at no one in particular, really hoping the door would get the message of how much of a bitch it was being, not letting the key that was crafted just for it to work, instead of relying on a shove from your left shoulder. Which of course it wouldn’t get the message - because it was a door. A plank of wood.

That didn’t matter though. After the possibly the worst day you had ever experienced everyone was in for it tonight, the shoe that had given you such bad blisters that now you were absolutely ruining them by wearing them as slippers; the door; and let's not forget the lift that wouldn’t whisk you away quick enough to hide your tears after… after the presentation from hell. The lanky selfish prick, that most people called James but you simply called the fuckwit of a boss, had literally shredded apart your project in 10 minutes - that had been months of work. He was a dick, the lift was a dick and the door to your shared flat also had many similar characteristics.

“You know it won’t like you if you shout at it” Y/f/n, your best friend and flatmate spoke calmly as she rounded the corner into the hallway - looking at you sympathetically. You weren’t one to blow your top often, she knew today must truly have not gone your way. Replying with a cold hard stare at her, it took a moment before Y/f/n offered any solution. “You wanna rant?”

“Well for one we need a new shitting door because I just almost dislocated my shoulder getting in.” You started sarkily, earning an amused scoff from Y/f/n which didn’t really help your mood. “But chronologically? Well some randomer poured half their coffee down my blouse on the tube this morning which you know was annoying because of my presentation. Then got to work,Fuckwit made a comment about me not scrubbing up well because of the coffee stain- even though he looks like a horse chewed up some hay and then just spat it on the top of his greasy head- and THEN he shat all over my fucking presentation simply because he’s an ignorant arsehole who doesn’t care about the environment EVEN THOUGH sustainability is now a big selling point and I know for a fact we’d be getting double the amount of profit if he launched my range!” Hands were flying all over the place as you raged, Y/f/n just standing opposite with a sympathetic nod.

You had this agreement with Y/f/n - sometimes people just needed to let it all out, no filter, no judgement and no crappy advice. So sometimes, if either of you needed it, the other would just stay quiet and instead just really really listen. It was one of the many reasons you completely loved your best mate.

“And you know I was sobbing and almost ran out the conference room because you know, it was absolutely mortifying. And when I felt like that there was only one person I wanted to talk to, no offence to you but, I wanted to call Harry. And I pulled out my phone to, you know to ask for a bit of sympathy from my boyfriend but instead, I was cruelly reminded of the fact he left me on read almost two days ago. And I’m not a possessive girlfriend who wants to know where he is all the time or whatever, even though I think most people probably would because you know his job means girls literally fall at his feet, but no it's not me. Still though…2 DAYS? I mean he was the one who asked me to be his girlfriend, and I get he’s busy directing on the other side of the world but all I need is a single text saying sorry I’m a bit busy at the moment.”

“Y/n” That wasn’t allowed during a rant, you weren’t allowed to interrupt the other. So naturally, you just completely ignored Y/f/n chiming in.

“And like it's even worse because you know he’s been away for ages and I kind of had a realisation a couple of days ago. Before you say anything I know I don’t know what love is right? I know that but-but I think I maybe possibly might actually love him. And that terrifies me but its the truth. I really do think I could quite possibly be in love with him. So-so now” Your voice broke a little at the point, the rage and anger dissipating into sadness - and there was no other word for it. Just this heavy thing that felt like it was weighing you down.

“Y/n I really-“

“So now I have a boyfriend who I love but is ignoring me, have probably lost my job” The voice breaking now was you gulping down an almost sob, again completely ignoring your best mate “and the door is still a dick” Y/f/n laughed a little at that, however, was too busy staring intently at you to take any real appreciation for your comedy in a time of almost-break down.

“…you’ve got nothing to say?” After what felt like minutes of silence, you prompted Y/f/n to speak - it took her opening and closing her mouth but she got there in the end.

“Sorry just a shock um… I think… I think maybe you should go sit on the sofa.”

“God fucking Einstein aren’t you? How could I forget the sofa fixes a broken heart, unemployment and a door?” You didn’t mean to be so sarcastic and cruel, and Y/f/n knew that too - she wasn’t going to take offence after how angry you are at the world.

“Y/n just shut your mouth and go into the living room” You rolled your eyes but followed her orders, marching angrily into your small and simple living room. Sure it wasn’t a luxury, but renting a two bed in London wasn’t exactly the most affordable thing - both of you had still managed to inject a nice cozy vibe into it though, with fairy lights and throw cushions and blankets.

However this evening it had a certain new piece of decor that definitely wasn’t there when you left this morning. Sitting bolt upright with a shit eating grin was a sight that was almost impossible. A curly haired, skinny but oh so safe looking man perched on the couch. Your curly haired, skinny but safe boy. It was almost impossible but at the same time, somehow, very very real.

“Hi” He uttered awkwardly, almost looking scared of your blank, confused expression. You just didn’t get it you didn’t understand and stood their frozen, hands held out slightly as if you were waiting for someone to pass you a plate or something. After a couple of seconds, Y/f/n got bored of the nothing - gently shoving you from behind, meaning you had no choice but to lurch forward, run and then almost jump on Harry, his back pushed into the back of the sofa with your momentum.

Everything just felt so much more right as you listened to his deep chuckle reverberate around his chest. From your position straddling him and arms clinging round his neck as though you were some sort of a koala, Harry finally had all of you in his grasp after months apart. That’s why he’d arranged this whole thing with Y/f/n to surprise you by coming home earlier than what he had told you- it was also why he had been leaving all your messages unanswered, he’d been on flights back and also thought it would be an even better surprise if you hadn’t spoken in a while. Now though, he just felt extremely guilty as your chest started shaking in a way he’d never seen before.

“Hey it’s okay.... just take a minute yeh?”

Because of course he had heard you shouting from the doorway, the flat was only small. He knew you’d had an incredibly shit day, also knowing that sometimes you need a cry just to let it all out. And so he let you, gently rubbing up and down your back while you sniffled into his chest. With a small nod to Harry, Y/f/n made herself scarce - more than reassured Harry had the situation under control.

It must’ve been a couple of minutes, of you just quietly crying into his chest whilst his heartbeat calmed you down. Eventually, though, you leant back but still with your arms round his neck, just enough so you could meet his eyes. “Hey” Harry whispered, as he moved one arm from around your waist to gently wipe away a singular tear drop on your cheek.

“You’re so bloody annoying” You laughed, a sort of wet and congested laugh but still with oh so soft eyes for the boy in front of.

“That's seriously how your gonna greet me? I flew halfway across the world to see you!” He quipped back, gently squeezing you hip as he spoke.

“Yeah well, you didn’t reply to me!” It was a jokey statement with a faked pout - because not to be cocky but having him infant of you like this you knew. Harry wouldn’t have flown home for someone he didn’t care about, his pupils wouldn’t be so incredibly wide and your heartbeats wouldn’t have exactly synced up - which you had noticed as you were lent against his chest.

“I was just trying to surprise you! But yeh was a bit of a dick move.”

“As long as you know it” He laughed at that and you took the opportunity to try and clamber off him somewhat - yet Harry just clamped you down with his hands again, not letting you move from your position straddled over him.

“So have I made the worlds shittest day a little less shit then?” He taunted making you roll your eyes but instead of sassing him back you just leant down and feathered your lips on his momentarily. He whined when you pulled away since your lips had barely ghosted over his; your hands now cupping his sharp jaw and cheeks. Both of you just took a moment to look at each other, for the first time in too long, trying to commit every aspect and little perfect imperfection to memory.

“So” you whispered, biting your lip, with the knowledge Harry had heard everything you’d shouted at Y/f/n when you came in and knowing Harry well enough to know he would definitely bring it up - to no doubt mock you.

“So… you think you could ‘maybe possibly might be in love with me’ is that right?” There it was, Harry was never one for beating round the bush. Moreover, that just proved you knew him like the back of your hand - it made you chuckle almost silently, shaking you had with amusement. “Well I was wondering what could make you a bit more certain of that and… and I’ve already asked Tom and all his year of carpentry experience to fix ‘that bloody door’”

“And why would you want me to be more certain?” You only asked because you knew. You knew him and you could read everything he was feeling like a book. And you liked to tease him

“Perhaps because I maybe possibly most definitely am in love with you?… what do you say huh?”

“Fix my door first., then we can talk.”

[be-the-spark-flyboy]

Crush

A/N: I had way too much fun writing this. Thx @writefightandflightclub​ for making me a Poe hoe ;)

Pairing: Poe x reader (fem!)

Warning: Swearing, suggestive themes, fluff, Poe Dameron

Word count: 2.1k

Summary: The crush you have on Poe is common knowledge, but what is he going to do with that information?

PART 2 - Tension 

You and Poe were smashed up together in a broom closet. Not in the sexy, “their chest pressed against each other, his breath fanning their face” way. More like sweaty, gross and stuck in an awkward position, manner. His shoulder was digging into your hips. Poe had knelt down in that tiny space to retrieve the data chip you had dropped in your haste to shove yourself in the hiding spot and lo and behold, he got stuck. You tried not to pass out from the excessive heat and the leather jacket you wore wasn't helping in the least.

“….I don’t think we thought this through very well,” you mumbled from above him.

“I could have told you that about ten fuck ups ago.” Poe shot back, leaning his head against the door with a thump. You winced at the sound though no one could have heard it from the outside. Music blared in every corner of the club. You moved to peel the layer of leather off yourself.

“What are you doing?“ Poe hissed at you. You were sure you could've spotted an irritated scowl on his face if there was any amount of lighting in the broom closet. But you couldn't bring yourself to care at the moment.

“I’d do you more harm than good if I passed out,“ you huffed. Poe shifted to make more room for you but it was inevitable that your chest was going to brush up against his head at one point. It was not at all awkward when the heavy leather smacked against the back of his head when you finally managed to shrug it off. You whispered an apology.

Your face burned and you still felt warm despite having removed the leather jacket. Maybe things wouldn't have been so awkward if the entire base hadn't known about the colossal crush you had on the man on his knees before you. You were more than sure Poe knew too. Word traveled like wildfire in the resistance. You really would’ve thought twice before joining the game of truth or dare if you just weren't so shit faced that day. Or if you knew you were to join him on a mission less than two months after the unfortunate incident. 

After what felt like an eternity, the music finally stopped and the doors slammed shut after the last pair of foot shuffled out, leaving the whole place in eerie silence. Poe passed you his blaster.

“Alright, I think we’re clear,” he signaled and you blasted the lock, the door swinging open with the force. You practically moaned when the cool air hit your face as you stumbled out. Poe tumbled out in a graceless heap behind you, swearing when he could finally stretch his legs out.  

“At least we got the chip,“ you tried not to sound so exhausted. “Now we can head back.” Poe nodded. You collected the discarded jacket from the floor and the two of you left.

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

Poe hung his head in defeat and sighed heavily. He had been looking out the window at the heavy storm whipping around since you both had decided it would be unwise to try and fly in this weather. You’d taken a nice warm shower and now laid on the motel bed, datapad in hand trying to decode the chip. 

The entire mission had been unbelievably draining as you and Poe spent the past 6 days trailing the target halfway across the galaxy to every kind of sketchy settlement you could think of. You’d barely slept, tracking his ship for days. The past two days were worse. Everything that could go wrong went wrong. From the both of you almost getting caught trying to sneak into the target’s room, to you getting locked in a walk-in freezer and the both of you being trapped in that broom closet for at least 2 whole hours. And for the cherry on top, your feelings towards Poe only seemed to get stronger, while the man showed no signs of reciprocating any of it. That hurt a little. 

You absent-mindedly curled your damp hair around your fingers, trying to focus your blurry eyes on the datapad as Poe finally moved away from the window. He laid on the bed facing you, with his head propped up against his knuckles. 

“You know you don’t have to finish this right away right? Go get some rest, you can finish up at the base tomorrow.“ He said. You just stared at him. You couldn't help yourself. Maker, he was gorgeous. A crown of curly dark hair sitting so perfectly on his head. His shirt unbuttoned at the top giving you the barest hint of his chest. His lips parted slightly as he gave you an inquisitive look. Only then did you register his words. You cleared your throat, abruptly looking anywhere but at him, hoping you hadn't stared too long. Hoping he hadn't noticed.

“Um, you should get some rest too,” you choked out, mildly surprised you could even find your voice. Poe’s lips curled up into a teasing smirk at how quickly colour had risen to your face. Of course he noticed, that damn bastard. 

“Then you wouldn't mind if I shared your bed, would you?“ Now you just stared at him in disbelief. What? Oh no. Oh no no no.

“What’s wrong with yours?“ you asked. You didn’t mean to sound that rude but Poe didn’t seem to mind. Your brain promptly proceeded to short circuit as he pushed himself up on his elbows straight into your personal space.

“Nothing, it's just so cold sleeping alone,“ he answered. “I promise I’ll keep my hands to myself,” he said giving you a dopey smile. Then fell back into the pillow beside yours and made himself comfortable. 

No, you didn't want him to keep his hands to himself. Why did the universe hate you so much? You wanted nothing more than for Poe to kiss the living daylights out of you. And yet he was right there lying not a foot away from you, making no move, giving you no other hint that he might, somewhere deep in his heart, have some sort of feelings towards you too.

The storm continued howling outside the window, and you decided that you’d at least get some sleep before the sun came up. Switching the lights off, you slipped under the covers and faced the ceiling, willing sleep to claim you. 

It didn't. You tossed around a few times trying to get more comfortable but nothing did it. And it started getting colder as the storm only got stronger.

“You still awake?“ Poe asked. You turned around to face him, clutching your blankets closer to yourself. “Are you cold?”

You shook your head at that. Just then, a violent shudder went down your spine. “N-no I'm n-not,” you insisted, shivering. There was enough light streaming in from the streets outside for you to recognize the amused look on his face.

“Well, I'm cold. Can I come closer?“ Poe tried again.

You were sure if you tried to speak your teeth would just start chattering. So you opted to just nod your head. Poe shifted closer to you and wrapped an arm around you pulling you into him. You immediately melted into his warmth.

“Is this okay?” his voice dropped lower now and you nodded once again, already feeling yourself drifting off.

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

The morning light  gently streamed in from the windows as Poe woke up feeling so warm and soft like he was going to sink right down to the bottom of the bed. His head was resting against your chest and your arms were wrapped around his neck. His arm was going numb under your waist but Poe didn't want to move. He just moved his arm from your waist and twisted around to check the time. It still wasn’t too late into the day so he decided he was going to bask in your warmth a little longer. Sure you wouldn’t mind.

A little more than a month ago, Poe had literally dragged Snap along with him to you when he heard about “the cute engineer girl with a crush on Poe”. He promptly lost all of his guts when Snap found you in the cantina with your nose buried in a book, chewing on a pen in your hand. You seemed so focused on your task at hand, the steaming cup of caf forgotten on the table beside you. A few strands of hair that escaped your messy bun, fell framing your face. You sat at one corner of the cantina in your own world, paying absolutely no mind to anything happening around you. He’ll never admit that he sat a few tables away and stared at you the whole time, watching you go about your day, like a total creep. He lost his favourite jacket to Snap that day to keep him silent about it. 

After that, he’d see you around the base quite often, but you always seemed busy with something or surrounded with people and he’d tell himself he’ll talk to you next time. Until that fateful day when Leia had summoned Poe to brief him on his next mission. “Retrieving” a set of blueprints from a first-order sympathizer, paired with the resistance's best electrical engineer. Who so happened to be you. You had shaken his hand with a professional smile. No hint of whatever crush he had heard of. 

He had gone back to Snap and grilled him about the details. How did he know about you? When did it happen? Was he sure it's true? Snap told him to not overthink and just go the fuck to sleep.

After the two of you had left base, you’d behaved professionally albeit a little nervous about your first field mission. Poe had tried to reassure you that you’d be fine and every time you’d smile at him and say “Thanks Poe,” in a soft voice. And every time Poe would nod and walk away before you could see the colour rapidly rise in his face.

Now here he was, wrapped up in your arms and your leg thrown over his, the sleep shorts you were wearing barely covering much of your thighs. He really didn’t mean to sound like a creepy stalker, but he just couldn’t pull those thoughts out of his head when it came to you. Maybe it was the fact that he knew that you were attracted to him too.

Poe was almost fully convinced that the rumour about your crush on him was fake, until you’d stared at him like that the night before. Like you where going to jump him right there. And he wanted you to. He would’ve toyed with you way sooner if he’d known this is how the two of you would end up. Tangled up in sheets in the bed together, though not in the way he wanted but this was quite enough for him.

You slowly started shifting. Poe thought you had finally awaken but you just sleepily tugged him closer to you and buried your face in his hair. Now Poe was sure his heart was beating out of his chest. You suddenly seem to realize your compromising positioning. You had absolutely no memory of how you ended up cuddling Poe, and your entire body felt suddenly felt hot from the embarrassment. Hoping he wasn’t awake yet, you jerked your face away from his hair and quickly went to untangle your limbs from his. But Poe held you in place.

“There’s still time, we don’t have to leave yet.“ Poe told you, his gravelly voice sending shivers down your spine. He shifted his head to look up at you. “I mean, if you’re okay with it?“ His big brown eyes hooded with sleep made you melt on the spot, and of course you agreed.

Satisfied with you answer, Poe went back to nuzzling your neck. You willed yourself to calm down before he heard your heart jack-hammering against your ribs. Poe slid his palm from your waist to your thigh, hoisting you leg higher up his hips and every thought flew right out of you head. 

Poe started grazing the tip of his nose against your neck and the only thing you could focus on was not trembling against him. Heat pooled between your legs as he continued his merry way up your neck and then back down again, this time brushing his lips against your skin. Your breath came in shallow pants as he dragged his teeth along your collarbone, soothing the sting with tiny kitten licks. You could’ve sworn you felt his lips part in a smile when you tangled your fingers in his thick curls. Your eyes fell shut on its own accord when he wrapped his lips around your skin and sucked. You couldn’t stop the broken whimper that slipped past your lips. 

Poe fucking Dameron, commander of the black squadron, resistance’s best pilot and grade A asshole, decided that he was going to pull away from you at that exact fucking moment. You sat up in confusion as he got up from the bed, looked at you with wide-eyed innocence and said, “We gotta leave soon if you wanna get back to base on time.” Then left you there with a look of disbelief etched all over your face.

He did NOT just-

[welllpthisishappening]

One Foot In (7/7)

The facts were these.

Killian Jones was dead. This much Emma knew, standing in the middle of the funeral parlor staring at him. What she didn’t know was why. Or how. Or what she would do when she touched him.

Because Emma Swan had a gift. Touch a dead thing once, bring it back to life. Touch it again, dead forever.

And the last thing Emma could do was bring Killian back to life, talk to him for the first time in years, only to watch him die all over again. Not when she’d spent the better part of those same years being in love with him.

—–

Rating: Teen, but eventually they’re going to kiss Word Count: 10.2K, because, listen, it takes some adjectives to get to happily ever after AN: Hey, this is a finished fic! If you have been hanging around for the last few weeks and clicking on things and reading things and saying nice things, I think you’re swell. I also think you’re swell if you haven’t done any of those things. This was a much longer fic than I remembered, and it’s real nice that you guys waited for me to post it. I will probably continue to hoard fics. (But, seriously, if you’re ever like “I’d like to read that!” Send me a message and I’ll totally send you the Google doc.)

|| Also on Ao3 if that’s your jam, or you can start from the start ||

@shireness-says​ @optomisticgirl​ @nikkiemms, @teamhook, @dayo488​, @greymeetsblue​, @jennjenn615​, @heavenlyjoycastle​, @klynn-stormz​, @superchocovian​, @onepunintendid​, @jonesfandomfanatic​, @lfh1226-linda​ @thejollyroger-writer​

—–

Emma Swan is twenty-nine years, six months, twenty-four days and, approximately...it absolutely does not matter. It feels as if her heart has shattered, a line running directly through everything, shaking and flipping it and her own breathing is ragged in her ears. 

She can’t move. She can’t stop moving. 

Her fingers trace over Killian, everything impossibly still and several other words Emma refuses to give credence to. The stubble on his jaw scrapes at the pads of fingers, the skin above it smoother than she expected it to be. 

The tiny crinkles around his eyes are still there, like he was halfway to smiling before being the world’s biggest goddamn idiot and Emma is a little disappointed in herself that she’s kind of mad. She’s kind of furious. 

“No,” Emma whispers. The word wobbles its way out of her, desperate and weak and neither one of those are particularly good words to be considering with the visual and powerful embodiment of, possibly, all the evil in the world standing a few feet away from her. 

Her fingers are still moving. 

And it’s honestly not fair that this is the moment – the chance to see and feel and commit every single touch to memory. There’s no reaction, and part of Emma’s brain, the part that’s a giant dick apparently, is quick to point out it’s because Killian is dead and died trying to save her and—

“No, no, no, no, no.”

That time the word comes out more determined, as if she’ll be able to change what she can see and feel in front of her simply by willing it so. She’s got magic. She should be able to fix this. 

She can’t understand a world where Killian Jones is dead. 

And yet.

The world does not seem to give a single fuck about what Emma Swan wants. Ever. 

She hadn’t been holding her breath, was desperate for a few extra molecules of oxygen, but the air rushes out of her in a huff, a noise she’s never made and would never like to hear again flying out of the very center of her. 

Ruby jerks her head up at the sound, eyes wide and tears obvious on her cheeks. She shakes her head slightly, an unspoken command or promise that Emma can’t possibly be expected to understand in the moment. 

And it only takes a second, but Emma suddenly realizes she isn’t actually crying. Her cheeks are painfully dry. Everything feels that way, in fact, as if she’s been standing in the middle of the desert for weeks on end and her whole being has been drained. There’s nothing, no push or pull, just an endless sense of desperation and...nothing. 

As if nothing were a feeling. 

It might be. 

“No,” Emma whispers, and she briefly wonders if she’ll ever say anything else. She wonders if she’ll ever find something worth believing in again or if everything will be one endless contradiction – dead and alive, powerful and weak, nothing and everything, all at once. 

It’s the single most depressing thing she’s ever thought. 

She swallows, licking suddenly dry lips and she knows there has to be more. The Darkness has been silent the entire time. That can’t possibly be right. 

There has to be something else. Emma has to do something else. She assumes. She can’t imagine the world will let her go this easily – let her fall off the edge and into the nothing she can see stretching out in front of her, a quiet and acquiesce that would make Killian’s eyes narrow and his lips twist and—

“Killian,” Emma breathes, head falling forward until the tips of her hair drag across his chest. 

He doesn't move. He’s dead. 

He’s dead. 

And Emma’s knees ache, pressed into the floor because of course they’d moved off the carpet and that seems kind of unfair, but that’s the trend they’re going with and the creak of the Darkness moving towards her may be the loudest thing she’s ever heard. 

She ignores it. It’s ridiculous – or at least it must be if Ruby’s exclamation is anything to go by and someone else is crying, or, possibly, two someones and if they ever get out this Emma is going to bake Nemo and Shakespeare sixteen pies every single day for the rest of her goddamn life. That only seems reasonable. 

“It’s time to stand back up, Savior,” the Darkness says. 

Emma doesn’t move. Her knees are never going to forgive her. She cups Killian’s cheek instead, thumb brushing over as much skin as she can reach and the heart she’s certain will never beat again sputters in her chest. 

Like it’s trying to prove a point. 

He’s honestly ridiculously good looking – all long eyelashes and lips that probably would have felt incredible pressed against Emma’s and the strand of hair that drapes across his forehead is going to brand itself on her memory, she’s sure. She keeps ignoring the Darkness, ignores the fluttering at the back of her skull and the hint of something that may actually be her destiny because that also seems a little absurd, bending her head instead and letting her lips ghost over Killian’s. 

It’s not enough, but nothing could ever be enough. Not really. Not when she’d waited and hoped and believed with every single inch of her for so long. So Emma lets herself have the almost, the barely there and could have been and—

“I love you,” she whispers, closing her eyes like that will make the words truer or bring him back. They don’t. She only sort of expected them to. 

The Darkness taps his foot behind her. It grates on her nerves. Emma’s nerves will never recover from the last twenty-four hours, 

She supposes she deserves that too. 

“I’m waiting, Savior,” the Darkness drawls, an impatience that lingers in the air and tastes bitter in the back of Emma’s throat. 

Standing up slowly, she refuses to acknowledge the crack of her knees and the snap of her spine. Heroes can’t possibly have joints as weak as hers. Emma licks her lips again – can’t seem to stop, and it’s a nervous, anxious habit that does not bode well for whatever she’s about to do, but she’s also got no idea what she’s about to do so maybe it doesn’t really matter. 

She turns, palms flat against the side of her jeans, to find the Darkness gazing at her with passing interest. He tilts his head slightly, hair suddenly looking greasier than it had, as if the magic had settled in every strand and Emma can’t help but recoil at the sight. He looks close to his own edge – drifting dangerously close to manic and the yellow in his eyes has gotten sharper. 

Emma digs her nails into her palms and tries to remember. 

“Something good,” she mumbles, half to herself and half to the three people behind her. “There’s got to be something good.”

“There is, Emma,” Nemo promises, and she needs to stop turning away from the Darkness. Eventually that will catch up with her. Probably. God, she hopes not. 

Nemo’s smile is tremulous at best. It doesn’t match with his watery gaze at all or the shake of his shoulders that he can’t seem to stop, fingers reaching for both Shakespeare and Ruby. But he doesn’t blink and the smile gets a hint stronger the longer he stares at Emma. 

She licks her lips again. 

And the first tear that falls on her cheek is warm, another brand and feeling and Emma is pleasantly surprised that her legs don’t buckle under her. She makes that noise again, although this one may be slightly different and no less than ten-thousand times worse. Because she knows it was good and can, maybe, be good again, but not quite the same and the barely there of it all feels as if it rips her in half. 

It tears at the edges of her, shadows creeping up the walls and lingering around the curve of her right sneaker. It ripples through her, settles in between every one of her ribs and wraps its way around her heart, a slight pressure that isn’t altogether unpleasant, but isn’t entirely enjoyable either. It’s not grief. It’s something deeper, something far more fundamental and, God help her, maybe a little magical. 

“It was good, Emma,” Ruby says. Her voice shakes, but her own smile is confident. Nemo tugs her hand up to brush a kiss over knuckles, a familiarity that should be impossible. 

Although, all things considered, Emma is, at least, seventy-six percent positive she’s vibrating with the power of her own magic, so, really she can’t bring herself to find anything impossible at this point. 

And she can feel the Darkness growing more and more impatient with her. 

She turns back around. 

“What was that?” Emma demands, nodding towards the barely there puddle on the ground. “What were you trying to do?” The Darkness narrows his eyes. “Have you not figured that out yet? I thought I’d made my plans rather clear.” “Humor me.” There is absolutely no humor in his answering laugh, a twist of his wrist and flick of his fingers and Emma gasps when another goddamn dead body appears at her feet. She wishes that would stop happening. 

She wishes death would leave her alone. 

“You’re going to bring my boy back,” the Darkness says evenly. “And then I’m going to take control of what should have been mine from the very beginning.” “You said you didn’t have that kind of magic, though.” “And yet I’ve got you, don’t I?” Emma shakes her head. “No, you don’t.” “I’ve won, Savior! The dead man is dead. You’re alone. Again. As you were always meant to be and I’m in complete control of everything. What do you have left to fight for?” He takes a step towards her, and Emma does her best to stand up to her full height. It’d probably be more impressive if she were wearing Ruby’s heels. “There’s no point, Emma Swan. Not anymore. Not for you. So, give me what I want and, maybe, maybe, you’ll be able to find some kind of purpose. There’ll be a reason the Universe gifted you this.”

He’s so close Emma is certain she can feel him – the touch of him on her skin cold enough that goosebumps explode across her arms. 

She doesn’t shiver, though, a victory that Emma is going to horde and covet and the other dead body at her feet looks far more dead than she’s entirely used to. 

“How long?” she asks, and the Darkness hums in something that may actually be confusion. Her smile makes the muscles in her cheeks ache. “How long have you been trying to bring your son back? Is that—did he die before or after you twisted your own magic?” Ruby curses. 

The Darkness doesn’t react immediately. At least not verbally. But Emma can see the tension twist between his shoulders as easily as if she put it there herself, the knuckles of his fingers turning white as he clenches his fists at his side. His eyes get even thinner, barely more than slits on his face and that only serves to make him look even more reptilian. 

Like a crocodile. With particularly powerful jaws. And even more powerful magic. 

“It should have been mine,” he says, barely loud enough to hear over the ringing in Emma’s ears. “From the very beginning. The world should have—” “—What? Given you power? It did. You’ve got magic.” “Not enough!” Emma doesn’t back up – and, really, she’s got to keep better track of these small victories because she’s barely treading water in a whole sea of emotions and the body in front of her twitches slightly. 

“Oh shit,” Ruby hisses. 

Emma moves towards her on instinct, taking the hand that isn’t twisted up in Nemo’s. Her fingers aren’t warm, per se, but they’re also not dead. She’ll take it. 

“What the bloody hell was that?” Shakespeare demands, inching his chair closer to Nemo’s until the wood scrapes loudly 

Baelfire stops moving. His skin looks almost transparent now, a grey pallor to it that makes him seem less human. The clothes he’s wearing aren’t quite as ragged as the Darkness, as if they’ve been cared for – for a very long time. 

She has no idea why the realization makes her stomach clench. 

“Why did you change your magic?” Emma presses, and she’s not sure who’s squeezing whose hand tighter, her or Ruby. “If you wanted to bring your son back—” “I didn’t change my magic to bring my son back,” the Darkness screams. The words sail across the room, sharp and angry and Emma hopes there aren’t spells involved. If there are spells involved, she’s certain they’ve all just been cursed. 

It feels absurd to check that they haven’t been turned into frogs, but her eyes glance down anyway. Still human. 

Still fighting the embodiment of all evil. 

Still not entirely coping with Killian being dead. 

“Oh,” Emma says, understanding slamming into her hard enough that she has to bite back a groan. “It was before then wasn’t it? You wanted...did you want power?”

The Darkness doesn’t respond. 

“I’m going to take that as a yes, then. Alright, alright. So you were what? Born with magic? But light magic, right?” 

Still no answer. 

“Seems like another yes,” Ruby mumbles, thumb tapping absentmindedly against Emma’s wrist. 

Shakespeare hums in agreement. “Keep going, sweetheart. Look at him.” Emma’s head snaps around, and she’s got to stop gasping. It can’t be good for the overall dryness level of her lips. She doesn’t think there’s any ChapStick in her car. But Shakespeare is right – the Darkness isn’t moving, stuck in the same spot by the few pinpricks of light around him. They’re not quite bright, flickering slightly as if they’re only barely holding on to whatever is fueling them – it’s magic, it’s obvious – but they’re still there and fighting and Ruby is definitely the one who squeezes Emma’s hand that time. 

“Ok, ok,” Emma chants. “So, um...you were born with magic, but it wasn’t much, right? Or at least wasn’t enough for you. And then you...you grow up?” “Happens to the best of us,” Nemo cuts in. He winks at Emma when she glances in his direction. 

“So you grow up,” she continues, only staying in one spot because of the grip Ruby’s got on her fingers. “And you met someone and had the kid and something’s got to change. Shit, what could have changed?” Emma glances around - as if the answer will present itself suddenly and, well, it kind of does. In the form of Ruby’s fingers. 

“Oh my God,” Emma growls. “Were you some kind of wrestler in another life? What the hell was—” “Where’s the mother?” Ruby asks. 

Emma is going to have to buy stock in ChapStick to deal with her lips. 

The Darkness blinks, shoulders shifting with the force of his deep breath and the body on the ground twitches again. Emma can feel the rush of magic, but it’s not right. There’s too much and not enough, another strange line to walk, but she knows it won’t work. 

The magic is wrong. 

It’s not going to do anything. 

“Magic always comes with a price,” the Darkness says softly. “Always. No matter what we try and do to prevent it.” “What the hell does that mean?” “It means that there wasn’t enough. I couldn’t control what I wanted to control and I couldn’t control her.” “Do you hear yourself? That seems like a dick move.” “Oh my God, Ruby,” Emma mumbles, but she can’t actually disagree and she’s got a horrible idea of where this is going. “So, let me take a guess. You’ve got magic. It’s not much because, like you said, the world had started to try and balance itself out. So you’ve only got a tiny amount, not nearly enough to inspire much confidence or lord your power over other people and what--did she leave? Is that what happened.” Silence. 

Emma smiles.

She hates that. 

“That’s what happened, isn’t it?” she asks. “You tried to control things, tried to control your wife, so it blew up in your face and you were alone. Except you weren’t because there was—” Emma nods in the direction of the body, the other body, and maybe they should just burn this entire goddamn house. That thought makes her stomach twist uncomfortably too. “You weren’t alone, but you didn’t care did you?” The Darkness shakes his head. It’s not a disagreement. It’s anger and fury and a wave of something that slams against Emma’s legs, knees buckling against the force of it. 

“Shut up,” he growls. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.” “What did you give up? If all magic has a price, what was the price you were willing to pay to twist your magic? Must have been something horrible.” The whole word shakes. 

That’s the only reasonable explanation. Emma isn’t sure reason exists anymore. 

There aren’t any frames left to fall, but the glass on the ground shifts and the couch the Darkness had been perched on tips, a small crash that’s barely noticeable over the echo of something that sounds like everything and feels like a very large void. 

Emma assumes this is what a black hole sounds like – yanking and tugging, trying to swallow up everything in its path and hold onto it until they’re all twisted and flattened. It’s the worst, really. She should have paid more attention in science. 

“Enough,” the Darkness says. He doesn’t shout that time. The words are almost calm, except for the acid practically dripping off them. “Enough.” Emma shakes her head. “No, no, that’s—oh my God.” The shaking stops suddenly, quick enough that it’s almost jarring and the whiplash of everything is absolutely exhausting. Emma’s smile feels more unnatural than ever. 

“What are we missing?” Ruby asks. “I feel like we’re missing something big. And bad. Like decidedly bad.” “The worst, if I’m right.” “Well go ahead and share with the class, that’s PI’ing one-oh-one.”

Emma’s laugh feels more unnatural than her laugh. She waves her hand, a flush of power that doesn’t quite tickle but feels warm and confident and the lights that are hanging around the Darkness flare to life. There are several curses from several different people mumbled behind her, maybe even a few of the goons. 

She’d kind of forgotten about the goons. 

Emma has to wiggle her fingers – the ones not still tied up with Ruby’s – trying to focus the power she can feel simmering in the pit of her stomach She bobs on the balls of her feet, hoping the sound crackling at the ends of her hair isn’t actually electricity. 

That would be almost too normal, though. It’s not electricity, it’s magic and strength and light, a positivity that may be misplaced, but is also necessary and Emma’s neck aches when she twists around and the scene behind her hasn’t changed. There’s still a dead body she wishes weren’t dead behind her, but that same body promised more than she’d ever expected to hear and she meant every single she’d told him in the last few days. 

And then some. 

Because he’d come back too. 

She knows exactly what the Darkness did to his magic. 

“How did you kill him?” Emma asks, letting her fingers press into the back of Ruby’s palm. “That’s what you did, isn’t it? Killed your son thinking it would help your magic grow?”

Ruby sounds as if she’s choking. “Wow, you weren’t kidding about the absolute worst thing, were you?” Emma shrugs. And the Darkness looks like he’s turned into a statue. He doesn’t move any of his limbs, still as marble and rough as something more abrasive than marble and Emma really needs to remember something about rudimentary science. 

He makes plenty of noise though – a low grumble in the back of his throat that is probably meant to be menacing, but Emma’s run the gamut of feelings and she’s tired of being scared. She’s positive she’s right. 

“How did you imagine that would work?” Emma presses. “Did you just—I mean, did you just kill him? Like, I don’t know, what happens in mythical times? Was there a sword involved?” Ruby scoffs. “Maybe a lance? That’s properly ancient, right? Oh shit, Dark One, were you a knight at some point?” “No, no,” Shakespeare argues. “That can’t possibly be right. Knights are always pure of heart.” “Or so the stories would have us believe,” Nemo adds, and the whole thing is equal parts absurd and nice and Emma’s fingers are still almost vibrating with the force of her magic. 

The Darkness doesn’t move. 

“How did you kill him?” Emma asks. “It must have been something bad if it helped you twist your magic like that.”

She does her best to stay patient, waiting for a response or an explanation that won’t make her skin crawl. That feels a bit like wishful thinking though and the Darkness’ laugh starts out quiet. 

That doesn’t last long. 

It grows louder – manic and grating as he steps back into Emma’s space. She blinks, trying to block out the shadows at the edge of her vision and Ruby mumbles something that tries to be encouraging. Or a few more pirate-themed curses. 

“You said true love liked to linger in certain places didn’t you?” Emma presses. “That it takes root and grows and—oh my God, his heart. Your son's heart!” No answer. Again. 

Emma’s pulse thunders in her veins, certainty she doesn’t want and confidence she desperately needs. “I don’t--I don't think I understand how that works. Ok, so…” She glances back at Ruby, a distinct lack of color in her partner’s face. “Do you think he ate it? Like..a vampire? Blood power or—” “—Blood magic is a thing,” Shakespeare says, like it’s fact and Emma’s teetering on the edge of insanity again. 

Ruby shakes her head. “No, no, it’s got to be something other than. And you’ve got to keep thinking positive thoughts, Em. I think your magic’s keeping him contained for now.” Emma hums in confusion and her neck is not going to be able to stand up to much more of this. She snaps back around – the Darkness twisted slightly, arm lifted like he was getting ready to do something particularly nefarious, but the pinpricks of light around him have multiplied and they’re brighter or stronger and Emma squeezes her hand again. 

For reassurance. Or magic. Or whatever. 

“Ok, ok, so let’s rule out blood magic,” Emma continues. “Did you think you had True Love? Is that what it was? You were looking for True Love, trying to grow your magic, get stronger and—oh, so you thought you could take his heart! Your son’s heart? How does that—shit, how does that even work?” “You could do it too, Savior,” the Darkness says. His voice is soft, barely more than a whisper or a whimper. His eyes, however, are strong as ever, dark and menacing despite the light lingering just over the edge of his shoulder. “It’s basic magic. I explained to Bae. Told him I’d be able to right it once I was strong enough, but I needed that emotion. I needed his belief. That I could do something. That I could be more.”

Emma does her best to process that, but she’s a normal human and this still makes less than any sense. Until. “Oh shit,” she chokes out. “You tried to pull his love for you...out of him? Oh my God, oh my God. That’s...that’s barbaric.” “It was a price, Savior. And one I was willing to pay.” “But it didn’t work!” “Yet. It didn’t work yet. That’s where you come in.” “It’s because it wasn’t True Love,” Nemo says suddenly. Emma will have to employ a personal chiropractor by the end of all this. “Was it? You thought, well, you explained it. You’d been looking for True Love for a very long time. Because you gave up your son to be stronger. You thought you’d be able to cheat the system. That’s not how it works. The world fought back against you.”

The scream the Darkness lets out is not human. And, really, that makes sense because Emma is beginning to think the Darkness isn’t very human anymore. 

He’s the lack of all of that – empathy and understanding and love. Above everything else, he’s distinctly lacking in love. And the thought makes Emma shake slightly, the pity she feels rippling through every inch of her decidedly misplaced, all things considered. 

She can’t help it. She pities the thing in front of her, can’t understand the thought process that led him to this moment. And she knows what she’s got to do. 

He can’t be there anymore. 

Because he won’t stop. He’ll wait and he’ll find someone else and—

“You overestimated your own power didn’t you?” Emma asks conversationally, flashing a smile Ruby’s direction when she tugs her hand back to her side. “You take your son’s heart. You grow your magic and twist and it and become something...else, something you’re certain will make you more powerful. But it didn’t, did it? It just made you,” she shrugs, impossibly casual with far too many dead bodies nearby, “lonely. That’s what you are. You’re lonely and you’re desperate. And I’m not anymore.” Someone whoops. 

It’s definitely Ruby. Emma grins. 

“Did you think you’d be able to use your own True Love to bring him back?” Emma mutters, and she’s pacing now, drifting back towards Killian like there are those same magnets involved. God, she hopes so. 

She doesn’t want that to disappear. 

The magic in her veins practically sings, roaring to life and making Emma’s hair shift slightly on her shoulders – life in every inch of her. The irony of it all is almost palpable. 

“It should have,” the Darkness whispers. “I paid the price. I gave up my son for my power and he—he understood.” “You’ll need to practice that again if you want to make it sound believable.” “He did!” “Was he scared?” Emma asks, the tears on her cheeks not for her or what she’s lost. They’re for what everyone else has lost, the reach of the Darkness and the tendency of evil to, well, be evil. They’re regret and mistakes and every single secret any of them have ever kept. “When you tried to tell him it’d be worth it. That his sacrifice would mean something and he’d come back? Do you think he believed you?” The Darkness exhales, head falling forward. “He knew. He knew what it would take.” “Did you?” Her question hangs there – the crux of it all and the turning point and Emma wipes her tears away with the back of her hand. The magic there is warm against her cheek. 

“You couldn’t have, could you? To know what the price really would be. To understand what you’d be giving into. I do, though, and I’m not giving into it. I’m not—I won’t go with you and I won’t help you. This is...you’ve twisted and turned things and ruined lives, but nothing has been as bad as what you’ve done to yourself.”

She takes a deep breath, shaking her arms at her side. The magic has its own pulse now, twisting in between her fingers and lingering at the back of her heels. It’s almost excited, ready to do what it was meant to from the very beginning and Emma doesn’t turn when she hears the grunts behind her. 

She doesn’t take her eyes away from the Darkness. 

Emma steps forward, the man in front of her shaking under the weight of her gaze and the light around him. She smiles. 

“You have to realize that,” she says. “You’ve stumbled into your own hole. Dug your own grave. All of that. Every cliché either one of us could possibly come up with. How long has it been since you’ve believed in something? It must be a lifetime. Sounds depressing.” “You would know, Savior. All those could have beens. You’ve pushed people away with both hands, so certain you’re wrong. That you don’t deserve it.” "That’s true. I...I did. I ran and ran and was positive I shouldn’t have been the way that I am. But that doesn’t change anything. Because I never really forgot and I’ve never—listen, it’s one of those clichés isn’t it? I don’t want the world, but I’ll be damned if you get it.”

The Darkness sneers, teeth bare and the growl in the back of his throat is probably supposed to sound menacing. That kind of misses the mark when it only makes Emma laugh.

She shakes her head, another step forward and the light sitting in the palm of her hand when she snaps her wrist is a pleasant surprise. 

“Huh,” she says, glancing back at Ruby. “That’s a surprise.” “It’s impressive,” Ruby nods. “What are you going to do with it? Oh, oh, can we throw it at the bad guy’s face?” “Seems to make us kind of like the bad guy, doesn’t it?” “Eh, he did threaten to control you and your magic and try to take over the entire universe so he could get his dead kid back, so you know—” “—And he killed our kid,” Shakespeare adds. “More than once. Seems like plenty of reason to destroy him.” Emma shakes her head again – although something very particular happens to a variety of her internal organs at our kid. The light in her hand grows brighter, a groan from the Darkness that is, quite obviously, because of it. 

“That’s kind of interesting, isn’t it?" Emma muses. "You don’t…” She brandishes her hand, the Darkness stumbling backwards to try and avoid it. “Well, that answers that question. I’d rather not destroy you. I don’t—I’ve had this power my whole life. The life and the death and the magic, but I’ve never wanted it. And I’ve never wanted to alter the universe, but it’s got to be more than that, isn’t it? Because you do. 

“You want to change things and ignore the balance of it all and the Universe kind of hates that. I can feel it. How much it rejects you and detests you. And you know it. That’s why it’s twisted you around like this. And that’s why I’m here. To stop you. I can. I can keep it all balanced.”

Emma flips her wrists again, working on instinct and whatever magic operates on. The light around her surges – as if several electric fields have exploded and the noise is almost overwhelming. 

It takes everything in her to stay upright, gulping in breaths of air. Everything feels warm and bright and, at first, Emma can’t figure out what that sound is. She wishes she didn’t as soon as she realizes what it is. 

The Darkness has fallen to his knees, prostrated on the floor with his hands wrapped over his head. He’s shaking like several metaphorical leaves, nails digging into the hair that suddenly looks like it’s producing its own grease. 

Or letting go of its magic. 

That makes a little bit more sense. 

In a moment that makes absolutely no sense. 

“What the—” Emma starts, wavering between moving towards him and sprinting away. The chair behind her scrapes when Ruby moves it, pushing off several goons to tug Emma back to her side. “That’s gross. Did I—” “I don’t think so, Em,” Ruby mutters. She can’t quite mask the fear in her voice though. “You’ve got to keep going. It’s...the light and the, oh shit—” “—Oh God, I’ve got to touch him, don’t I?” “You’re a really good PI now.” Emma lets out a watery laugh and she doesn’t know if the tears on her cheek are new or have, simply, just lingered there. “I can’t believe you’re making jokes.” “Hey, if you got away with flirting at crime scenes, then I can certainly make some jokes. Give and take or whatever.” “Yeah, whatever,” Emma mumbles. The Darkness is still groaning, wincing every time a ray of light graces over him.

“It was stupid how obviously in love with you he was.” Emma’s eyes fly into her hairline. “Is that emotion, I hear?” “And, probably, what you need to save the world. He knew what he was doing, Em. And he did it anyway. So did you. Honestly. I was super pissed about it—” “—Are we seriously doing this now?” “I mean we wouldn’t be if you stopped interrupting me,” Ruby reasons. “I think we’ve got time. Your light or inherent goodness or whatever is taking care of things for a second. What I’m getting at is you both knew what you were doing when you made your choices. Not like our resident villain here.” Emma doesn’t want to argue. She isn’t sure if she’s even got time to argue, but—”That’s not entirely true,” she says. “I...the whole thing was so unbelievably selfish. I knew what would happen if I kept Killian alive and I couldn’t—” She has to swallow, blinking back tears and greed in equal measure. “It didn’t make sense for him to be dead.” “Has it occurred to you that he wasn’t supposed to be at that point?” “What?”

Ruby clicks her tongue, kicking back when a goon tries to lunge towards them. “We had to figure out what was going on with him. Who hired him and why they’d killed him and what they were trying to do. You keeping Jones alive led you right here. To this moment. Defeating ultimate evil and saving the world.” Emma’s jaw drops. It’s kind of lame, honestly. And Ruby’s grin has a distinctly wolfish tinge to it. 

“I’m very good at what I do,” she shrugs. “You weren’t trying to take over the world, Em. You could have. This entire time. You could have played God and—shit, what did the Dark One say?” “Changed the fates of the world,” Nemo supplies, standing as well and shoving a goon back into the corner of the room. “You never did, Emma. You only ever loved. He knew you loved him. Even when he didn’t want to remember it.” “And he never really wanted to forget it,” Shakespeare smiles. “I’d imagine that’s how True Love is supposed to work.”

Emma hums – not sure what’s happening to, possibly, her entire soul, but it kind of feels like flying or what she’d always imagined flying would be. Or, more specifically, it feels like racing down the hill, wind in her hair and a smile on her face and she doesn’t lick her lips before turning back towards the Darkness. 

He looks lesser, somehow, like he’s falling into himself or that black hole she’d been considering before. There’s still a slight tremor to him, sobs shaking their way out of him and one of his hands has started fisting the carpet underneath him. 

The sweat at his temple isn’t that. Emma knows it. It’s power, falling off him in waves and several other water-based metaphors. 

Crouching down, Emma’s hand lingers in the air in front of her. There’s still a light hanging around her, as if she really is phosphorescent, but the magic in her feels as if it’s settled slightly, accepted its job and its purpose and the Darkness audibly winces when she shifts on her heels. 

“You can’t do this anymore,” Emma says, a note of sadness in her voice. “You can’t be this anymore. It’s not...it’s not right. And it never was. It was never going to work.” He groans when he tries to lift his head, like the weight of it is suddenly more than he can bear. Emma can barely make out his eyes, but there’s a hint of something in his gaze that is clinging on – a tinge of yellow and a dash of hatred and she’s not entirely surprised when he snaps his jaws at her. 

Like the goddamn crocodile. 

“No,” Emma says. “It’s not going to work. I was never going to go with you. No matter what you’d done or who you took. Because they’ve never really been gone. They never forgot. And neither had I. Even when I wanted to. Even when I thought I had to. So you can’t stay here. The world won’t accept it.”

She exhales slowly, fighting the urge to close her eyes as she reaches her hand forward. The Darkness’ skin is clammy under her touch, magic pooling under his clothes and at the curve of his chin. Emma holds her breath, doing her best to push her own magic out the tips of her fingers and the light that surges out of her is almost blinding. 

It takes forever and happens far too quickly, another contradiction that makes perfect sense. And the Darkness doesn’t scream. He doesn’t make any noise. But his gaze meets Emma, the yellow fading and the emotion disappearing and he seems to deflate in front of her – as if he’s a balloon that’s been popped or a line of milk bottles that have been knocked over. 

His eyes close. 

Emma counts to ten in her head, only a little worried that something is going to sneak up on her or inform her that she’s got to do something else. She counts to twenty. And thirty-five. There’s nothing. There’s only light and, now, three dead bodies and the magic thrumming in her veins. 

The floor creaks when Ruby moves, the hand that lands on Emma’s shoulder nearly on the wrong side of too tight. 

“So, uh,” she starts. “What happens now?” “I have absolutely no idea,” Emma answers honestly, and the laugh she’s met with sounds decidedly out of place. 

Particularly when the house starts to shake again. 

“Oh for fucks sake,” Shakespeare groans, Emma scrambling back to her feet and thrusting her hands out in front of her. 

There’s no darkness though, no trace of shadows, just more light and something that smells like triple berry pie. Something that smells like home. And love. 

And the faces that appear in front of Emma’s eye line are familiar and not, corporal and not and, eventually, she’d love if something were just simple. She assumes dealing with ghosts can’t ever be simple. She hopes ghosts isn’t an offensive term. 

“Whoa,” Ruby mutters. 

Emma rolls her shoulder, trying to get Ruby’s hand off and it absolutely does not work. If anything she holds on tighter. Maybe ghosts is the right term. “Are you seeing this?” Emma asks brusquely. “I’m not actually going crazy?” “If you’re asking me if I’m seeing the three people who just teleported into this living room, then, uh...yeah, we may both be crazy.”

“Oh ok, good good. It’d be weird if we saved the world and then I was the only one who immediately went crazy.” “Seems like it’d be a jerk move by the world.” The woman with the pixie cut and a cardigan that looks incredibly soft shakes her head. The man is smiling. And the other women – Emma can’t quite bring herself to look at the other woman, not sure what she’ll do if she does. Probably collapse on the floor. And sob. 

For days. On end. 

And she isn’t entirely surprised when the other woman speaks first. 

“You’re not crazy, Emma,” Ingrid says. “The opposite, in fact.” “What’s the opposite of crazy?” “This isn’t all in your head, sweetheart. It’s not a dream. It’s very much real life and you very much just saved the world.” “Although some of it was a dream,” the man adds softly, moving closer to her and the air doesn’t turn cold the way Emma expects it to. If anything, it warms slightly, like she’s been wrapped in a blanket and tucked into bed after eating her weight in pie and a variety of other baked goods. “It was the only way we could figure out to help. Not always easy to cross the planes like that, but you helped.” Emma blinks. “What?” “Helped,” the dark-haired woman says. “Always. That’s—that’s what your magic is, Emma. It existed across the planes of reality, could criss-cross and move with ease. It drew us to you when you needed us.”

“And who...who exactly are you?” “I think you’ve figured that already.” “Yeah, that’s kind of why I think I’m crazy.” Ingrid laughs, the smile on her face making her eyes crinkle slightly and she doesn’t look any different than she did the last time Emma saw her. “I wouldn’t, would I?” she asks, a response to a question Emma hasn’t voiced. Or can’t. Probably the second one. “We’ve been waiting, Emma. Hoping and believing and trying so hard to be there when you needed it. The restaurant is gorgeous, by the way. Although you could probably use some more help on the waitstaff.” “I’ve been a little busy.” “That wasn’t a suggestion to take out a classified ad.” “Are you speaking in code?” Emma quips, entirely out of place sarcasm that Ingrid seems entirely prepared for. 

The dark-haired woman shakes her head again. “You could do it, Emma. Because it wasn’t supposed to be like this. It got all twisted and turned and you’ve unknotted most of it. This is the last part of the puzzle.” Emma considers that for a moment – eyes flashing back to the man behind her and the pang she feels in her chest doesn’t feel entirely magical. It feels like want and need and a slew of other words she’d done her best to avoid most of her adult life. 

It feels like...everything. 

“It’s not greedy, sweetheart,” the man says, ducking into her eye line and ghosting his fingers over her cheek. That’s the wrong word. She can almost feel it. She wants to feel it. “You’re allowed to love. Encouraged even.” “And you always loved that boy,” Ingrid adds. Her eyes flit towards a clearly stunned Shakespeare and Nemo. “Took forever to get her come home every night.” “You get to be happy, Emma,” the dark-haired woman continues, and for half a second Emma lets herself think that other word and quasi titles and then it’s all her brain can latch onto. 

Mom and Dad and Ingrid and a family she’d never forgotten about. Even when she wanted to. 

Her mother smiles at her. 

It may be the nicest thing that’s ever happened to her. Until. Her mother takes another step forward, something shimmering at the edge of her and Emma gasps when she feels the hand that lands on her cheek. 

It’s warm. 

“We’ve always loved you,” she whispered. “That’s not going to change. But you’re not alone anymore either, Emma. You don’t have to be.”

Emma’s exhale shakes its way out of her, head falling forward onto something incredibly and impossibly solid. She has no idea how she stands there, but there’s more movement and a hand on the back of her head, Ingrid’s fingers rubbing and down Emma’s spine the same way they had when she was seven and broke her wrist falling off the monkey bars at school. 

“You can do it, Emma,” her father promises. 

“Ghost-dad is definitely right,” Ruby adds, drawing several stunned expressions from people who are both alive and not. She rolls her eyes. “Oh, what? He says it and it’s supportive and I say it and suddenly it’s not cool? That’s lame.” Emma makes a ridiculous noise – scratchy in her throat, but the emotion lingering in the back corners of her brain is definitely hope and her parents are still smiling at her. 

Her parents are still smiling at her. 

“Emma,” Shakespeare whispers, eyes red with tears and some more that haven’t fallen yet. “Please. If you—please try.” She shakes her head slowly, tugging her lip behind her teeth. “I don’t...how can I do that? The rules were always second touch death. Forever. I mean—” Emma turns to Ingrid. “I wasn’t ever trying to—” “I know,” she interrupts. “I’ve always known that Emma. So answer me one question, do you?” “Do I what?” Ruby sticks her whole tongue out when she gags. “Are you kidding me? This is basic, fundamental love stuff!” “Lording facts over people when you’re trying to control the situation,” Emma mumbles. “That’s still incredibly unhelpful.” “Oh my God, kiss the dead guy!’

“Wow, that’s not exactly subtle, was it?” Emma’s father asks, drawing a laugh out of her mother and this is ridiculous. The Darkness and his son are still on the floor. 

Ruby clicks her tongue. “In case you haven’t noticed, subtlety is not exactly my strong suit. Emma, we are wasting time here. That’s what it is, isn’t it? You’ve got to True Loves kiss him!” Emma is sure there is a reason that won’t work. She’s positive. 

Because this is the real world and she owns a pie restaurant that she will, eventually, have to open and they are normal people with normal wants and normal desires and—

“Oh damn, that makes total sense,” Emma says, not quite grumbling her agreement because she’s not sure she wants anything more than to kiss Killian Jones. She takes another absurdly large breath, nodding once, twice, and again until her hair threatens to find its way into her own mouth. “Yeah, ok.” “You can do it, Emma,” Ingrid says. “That’s what your magic is. Light and hope. And everything good in the world.” “Sounds kind of like a Hallmark card.” “Or happily ever after.” “Is that how it’s going to work?” “Only one way to find out.”

Emma chuckles – a bit of cynicism hanging on, but she moves anyway, dropping to her knees next to Killian. The whole thing is absurdly fairy tale, even with unforgiving wood under her knees. She brushes the hair away from his forehead, a measured movement that belies how hard her heart is hammering against her rib cage. 

Everything seems to still for a moment, the only sound Emma’s breathing. 

She licks her lips. And not for any other reason except some possibly misplaced vanity. It seems wrong to kiss her True Love with chapped lips. 

Emma leans forward slowly, careful not to rest too much of her weight on Killian, but she can’t help the hand that rests on his chest. She wants to feel all of him. She wants all of him. Full stop. 

“I love you,” she whispers, pressing her lips lightly to his. 

She doesn’t push at first, just lets herself linger in his space and around him, lets everything wrap around her and work into her and the magic that’s just worked so hard to save the entire universe roars to life in between Emma’s ears. 

And that’s all it takes. 

It’s like hearing a light switch on. Or walking back into a familiar space. It’s like coming home. 

There’s a flash and a pull in the very center of her and Emma knows. She feels it. 

Emma grunts when Killian shifts, trying to sit up or stand up and none of it works because she's still got her hand digging into him. So he gets creative. And eventually she’ll have to tell him how much she appreciates that. 

His left arm wraps around her middle, twisting her and tugging her flush against his chest. His other hand flies into her hair, fingers carding through strands and wrapping around her neck, making sure Emma can’t pull away from his mouth. 

As if she would. 

Killian’s tongue brushes over her lower lip, Emma’s mouth opening against him. He makes a noise at that, a sound she’s already filed away for moments when it feels as if everything else is impossible and dark and not getting her hands on him suddenly seems like the most ridiculous thing she could ever be doing. 

Emma shifts, slinging her leg over Killian until she’s more or less straddling him and the propriety of True Love's kiss is a lesson she’s never bothered learning. She pushes her fingers into his hair, nails scraping lightly against the back of his head and rocking against him as if there’s an actual tide involved. There’s far too much skin and Emma briefly wishes she had more limbs to touch all of it, but then her only thought is about whatever Killian does against the side of her neck, mouth dropping down to press kisses there as well. 

She may honestly shiver. 

They don’t stop for what feels like several lifetimes – and Emma isn’t sure she’ll ever argue that because it’s everything she thought it would be and even more. He’s so goddamn warm under her, alive and meeting her kiss for kiss, move for move and—

“Is this real?” Killian asks gruffly. 

Emma leans back, the hand against her skin making her wonder just how hard it is to actually teleport two human beings who are absolutely wearing too much clothing. She nods. “Yeah. Really real.” He kisses her again. And it’s not the same as it was before. It’s harder and heady and some other word that’s a synonym of those words and Emma groans against him, more movement and another rock and if they don’t leave soon—

“I heard you,” Killian says, mumbling the words against her mouth. “I was...where was I?” Emma glances around – as if the quasi ghosts behind her will explain something else, but there’s nothing there and no other bodies. Her jaw drops. “Gone as soon as you guys started—” Ruby explains, waving both her hands awkwardly in front of her. “Super psyched you’re not dead forever, Jones.” “Yeah, me too. Swan,” he continues, nosing at her cheek and she hopes he never stops touching her. “I heard you, love. I was—everything was dark, but I wasn’t...it wasn’t bad. It was..” She can see the muscles in his throat shift when he swallows, teeth digging into his lip and Emma doesn’t think much before brushing her thumb over it. “Liam was there.” She’s very glad she’s sitting down. 

Killian smiles, quick enough that Emma wonders if she imagines it, but he kisses the edge of her chin and maybe that’s better. “He wouldn’t let me leave. Kept trying to talk to me and get me to remember things. Stuff we’d done when we were kids and—” He cuts himself off, presumably when Emma’s jaw cracks. “Oh my God,” she breathes. “Oh—I get it. I...it was all of them. Because, oh my God.” “Share with the class,” Ruby mumbles. She’s dropped onto the floor as well, sitting cross-legged with her back pressed against Nemo’s bent legs. 

“True Love is a two-way street. And that’s what, that’s what my parents—” “—Wait, what?” Killian interrupts sharply, Ruby waving a frustrated hand towards him. 

“You can get caught up later. This, oh shit, Em, this makes sense.” 

Emma hums, eyebrows lifted because, well, it does. “They said my magic could cross planes, draw them to me when I needed them. So it did for Killian too. It kept him from—I don’t know, moving on and helped me remember what was good and important and real and, oh do you think my magic knew it could bring him back?” “At this point, I am not surprised by anything, honestly.” “Yeah, me either,” Emma agrees. She’s balanced on Killian’s thighs now, the fingers in his hair moving without realizing as he ducks his head to press a kiss to her shoulder. “I um,” she mumbles. “I am—did Liam, say anything…” Killian shakes his head. “Not in the way that you’d think. He told me he was proud of me. That he knew what I could do and that I had to stop waiting for him to come back.” “I’m so sorry.” “I know you are, love. And so did Liam. It was never your fault.” “But—” “—No, Emma. It’s...I am here because of you, twice over. And, well, if that worked both ways then that’s enough. I heard you.” “I don’t understand what that means.” “I wanted to go. I kept telling Liam I was tired and it was over and he wouldn’t let me. Stubborn git.” Emma’s laugh gets muffled when she buries her face against Killian’s neck, but there are more kisses pressed to the top of her hair and fingers drifting under the edge of her shirt and she smiles against his skin. “Anyway,” Killian continues. “He wouldn’t let me leave. Told me there was more to it and just to stay patient and that’s when I heard you. You told me you loved me and I could—I could feel it, Emma. You’re a much better kisser now than when you were nine.”

She laughs again. And cries. And slings her arms around Killian, all but slamming her lips against his. He doesn’t argue. 

She hadn’t really expected him to. 

“I love you too,” Killian says, more words pressed against her cheek and the bridge of her nose and if they never get off the floor, Emma won’t argue. He kisses her like he’s following a map, doing his best to cover as much of her face as possible while his fingers dance over the curve of her waist. 

“Do you want to go eat some pie or something?” Emma asks. “Maybe, you know...live happily ever after?” Killian beams. “I’d like nothing better.”

They do, eventually, get off the floor, but Emma can’t seem to bring herself to move more than a few inches away from Killian. He keeps squeezing her hand, an arm around her shoulders and kisses pressed wherever he can reach. 

It makes Ruby gag, but Nemo and Shakespeare look torn somewhere between understandably overwhelmed and surprisingly approving and Killian apologizes to them, no less, than forty-six times. They hug him for, at least, forty-six seconds straight. 

Ruby offers to get them a hotel. 

“We’ll use some of Cora’s reward money,” she shrugs, a flash of a smile and more hugs and a copious amount of pie. “And, uh, I don’t want yours, either.”

They hug her in response. 

And do leave eventually – laden down with pies because Emma’s rid the world of inherent darkness, but she also feels kind of guilty about turning their house into some kind of murder hot bed – leaving Emma and Killian sitting in the middle of her restaurant with the chance at everything hanging in between them. 

“I feel like my eyes are kind of rolling back into my head,” Emma says, always a picture of charm. “So, uh—” “—Let’s go to sleep, Swan.” She nods, not trusting herself to say anything else. They move slowly, lingering on steps with kisses that last lifetimes and it’s still not enough, but Emma is more than a little greedy, tugging on shirts and brushing over stubble and Killian’s tongue should win awards. 

Emma doesn’t say that out loud. That would probably ruin the moment. 

And she wants the moment – wants to linger in it and put down roots and several thousand vaguely romantic clichés. So she doesn’t say anything, just kicks her door closed behind her and tries not to actually gasp too loudly when Killian tugs his shirt off. 

“You’re staring, love,” Killian mutters, a note of nerves that make no sense. And Emma saw ghosts a few hours before. 

“What’s the matter?” “Nothing.” “Nuh uh, try again.” “I was dead earlier today, you know.” “Yeah, I was there,” Emma mutters, doing her best to keep her voice even. It doesn’t work, obvious as soon as Killian’s thumb tucks under her chin. “I’ve missed you so much. This whole time...I wondered and I—” “—I know, Swan.” “Then what…” And she’s a little annoyed she didn’t realize before, disappointed in herself and her own wants. “Oh, Killian,” she mumbles, tears stinging the corners of her eyes. “I don’t...come here.” He doesn’t, in fact, come here. If anything, he tenses – eyes wide and a little guarded, but still ridiculously blue and Emma is certain she could willingly lose herself in them. She’s apparently a sentimental sap now. 

Her fingers don’t shake when they wrap around the end of his left arm, although he may just a bit, his quiet contradiction barely audible. That lasts as long as it takes for her to lift him to her mouth, pressing soft kisses to the blunted edge and the distinct lack of scars. 

There’s an apology in every movement and a promise in every shift, guarantees that it’s fine and what she wants and who she wants. Indefinitely. Since the very start. 

“Your skin is so soft,” Killian whispers.

“Were you thinking about the texture of my skin?” “Well...no, ah, maybe. Mostly in the way that I wondered what it would feel like to touch you. Or hold onto you. In another way that sounds less possessive than that.”

Emma scoffs, biting back a smile. “I don’t think that sounds possessive.” “Good since I was definitely aiming for more romantic. It would probably be a pretty bad set up to asking you out if you thought it wasn’t.”

“I am ridiculously in love with you,” she says, drawing a laugh out of Killian. The tears on his cheeks are out of place in a day like this, but Emma’s on some kind of roll and she relishes the salt on her tongue when she kisses them away. 

“Ridiculously, huh?” “At least. And I could be very interested in dating you. Or just...staying in bed forever.”

“At least a few days.” “Something about science experiments with my skin.”

He laughs – loud and easy and it presses against Emma like it’s marking her from the inside out. There are more kisses, ones that stretch out forever and others that are nothing more than quick presses of lips to any bit of skin available and she does her best not to melt in her own foyer when Killian’s teeth graze behind her ear. “I’d do it again,” he says, a quiet admission that makes Emma’s breath catch. “Let’s not, huh?” “We might be kind of busy for that anyway.” “That so?” “Do you not think we are?”

They’re moving, drifting back towards the bedroom at the end of the hall and Emma is dimly aware of the button on her jeans popping. “I’d be willing to be almost confident about it.” “Ah, sounds like a challenge.” “Yeah, well that’s because you’re a competitive weirdo.” Killian hums, more walking and stumbling and kissing. The last one is the most important. “One who loves you a ridiculous amount too,” he says. “And has very lofty goals of kissing every single inch of you.” “I’d like to see you try.” He grins – hers, exactly the way she’d always pictured it. “I can guarantee it.”

They bake pies every day. And fill napkin containers. And balance books. 

It’s domestic and wonderful and Emma kisses Killian in several different kitchens with a regularity that never fails to make her pulse sputter just a bit. It goes that way for weeks that turn to months that turn to years and Emma Swan is thirty-one years, two months, fifty-seven days and, approximately, nine and a half hours old when he kisses her back – while the front door to their restaurant swings open. 

“I’ve got news,” Ruby shouts, heels echoing on the tiled floor under her. “So if you guys are done being adorable, it might be time to make some money.” Killian shifts, tugging Emma against his chest. “What do you think, love? Do we want to make some money?” “Ah, I don’t know,” Emma says, if only to get that very particular groan out of Ruby. “Depends on the facts, I guess.”

Ruby does, in fact, make that very particular groan, grabbing a slice of pie without asking for it. “The usual. Dead body, suspicious circumstances, in need of your particular skills with the chance to let justice be served. Also we got to do this quick because I’ve got a date.” “What?” “This is not a big deal. Do not make this a big deal.” “You brought it up, Lucas,” Killian points out. 

“Her name is Dorothy. She’s a dog trainer. It is not a big deal. I just, you know…” “You wanted to tell us.” “Shut up, Jones.” “Oh, that’s nice,” Emma says, handing Ruby the fork she can’t quite reach with the counter in the way. “Alright, we’re in. Let’s go serve some justice.” Ruby rolls her eyes. “You’re hysterical.” “You say that like you don’t think I am.”

“Yuh huh, yuh huh. Time keeps on slipping or whatever.” Emma laughs, grabbing a handful of berries from the nearest bowl and they don’t use rotten fruit anymore. It’s some kind of step in the right direction thing. They definitely helped set Graham up with that one customer a few months before. 

And no one argues when they get into Emma’s car – Ruby in the backseat and already on her phone with Victor, Killian’s eyes flitting Emma’s direction as soon as she turns the key in the ignition. “You ready, love?” he asks, lacing his fingers through hers. 

Emma nods. “Always.”

[writinginthesecrettrees]

jacket

Currently thinking of Dean and he’s finally got Sammy back with him again, finally got the mix of heaven hell that is Sam next to him in the Impala, all golden skin and long limbs and the kind of sunshine beauty that Dean would gladly incinerate himself on but untouchable because of the one thing that makes him the most precious: brother.

Dean’s so caught up in the push and pull of wanting Sam that he thinks his heart stops, knows his breath stops when Sam steps out of the motel bathroom, rubbing a towel over his hair and drops of water trickling down his shoulders, over his pectorals, rippling over his abs before soaking into the towel that just barely wraps around Sam’s slim hips. Dean stares until his lungs burn, can almost taste Sam’s skin as he imagines catching the drops on his tongue.

His sudden gasping inhalation makes Sam look up, a question in his eyes, and Dean manages to mumble something about going to a bar before he flees, out the door and halfway down the road before he remembers he forgot his jacket in their room and he might not be a coward but he can’t face going back just now. Not with the sound of Sam’s confused “Dean?” echoing in his ears, chasing him the bar.

He sticks to beer, conscious of the drive back to the motel. Needs a different distraction than alcohol, and he looks for it in every too-short skirt and pretty face in the place. Finds a woman with glossy hair in a tomboy cut who grins when he asks her to step outside, share a cigarette in the alley.

It’s an exercise in frustration. On her knees she looks like Sammy with her short brown hair and her pink lips wrapped around him, and Dean leans back against the wall, curls his fingers into her hair and closes his eyes and tries to capture a fantasy in her bobbing head. He’s almost got it and nowhere near finishing when she pulls off with a whine, rubbing at her jaw. Getting her pressed face-first against the wall is better, puts his nose in her hair and her hip under his hand is slim like Sam used to be, sparring in high school on Dad’s orders. The grunts and moans he fucks out of her ruin it, soft and sexy and not Sam and the fantasy slips away as he thrusts harder, faster, chasing the dream of his little brother  that always vanishes before he can grasp it.

She’s trembling and half incoherent when he gives up on getting off and pulls out, drops the empty condom on the ground with a dozen others while he tucks himself back into his jeans and carefully does up the fly.

“You didn’t…” she gestures vaguely, might have pouted if her face could do anything other than a fucked-to-exhaustion grin.

“It’s not you, sweetheart,” Dean says, and it’s true. He hasn’t been able to finish since Sammy got back, his body refusing to accept a substitute when everything it wants is less than an arm’s length away.

He leaves with a kiss and her number in his pocket - “In case you ever get over whoever it is” - that he’s never going to use, heads back to the motel to bury himself in Sammy scent and a guilty wank in the shower.

-

Currently thinking of Sam and he’s got enough distance from his grief for Jess that old feelings, buried and hidden and deniedeniedenied, are starting to come back. And it’s not like he doesn’t have plenty of experience pushing these feelings down, but…

But.

This time there’s something, and it might be wishful thinking, but Sam thinks he sees Dean watching him. Gazing at him, with this half smile like Dean doesn’t believe he’s real, like Dean has felt as empty and lost without him as he has without Dean. Like maybe Dean’s as fucked up as he is. Like maybe there’s hope.

He can’t risk losing Dean, though, not when Dean is the only thing he has left in the world with Jess dead and Stanford so far behind him he’d never find his way back, so Sam tries subtlety. A hand on Dean’s shoulder when they’re searching for history on a ghost, a soft touch to the small of the back when he passes behind Dean at the motel. And hearing the way Dean’s breath catches, feeling the slightest pressure that might be Dean leaning into him and could be imagination, keeps his hopes alive.

Sam’s getting impatient, though. Subtlety is safe but slow, and that’s why he ups his game, starts wearing less and less around the motels, stripping down to single layers or completely shirtless as soon as they’re behind closed doors. He takes extra time in the shower, working up his courage for a blatant seduction, encouraged by the way Dean’s eyes snap to him as soon as he starts pulling his shirt over his head, and steps out into the room naked except for a towel.

It works, Sam knows it does by the tiny whimper coming from Dean where he lies sprawled on his bed. Sam doesn’t look up, focuses on scrubbing his hair dry with a matchbook sized towel and pretending not to notice the towel on his hips loosening, slipping down an inch. A sudden choked gasp startles him and he looks up, sees Dean standing by the door, eyes wide and wild and Dean’s mumbling something as he opens the door, practically runs to the Impala and ignores Sam’s call of “Dean?” in his rush to get away.

Sam throws himself across Dean’s bed, buries his face in the leather jacket that Dean left behind, and sighs.

And cries.

And when he runs out of tears, he makes a new plan.

-

Currently thinking of Dean, gathering his strength before pushing open the motel door because he’s faced down werewolves and wendigos less dangerous than Sammy when he’s warm and sleepy and wearing nothing but boxers, looking up with a smile and a yawn when Dean walks in the door.

Currently thinking of Dean and gathering his strength did absolutely no good because while he might have been able to resist a sleepy sweet Sammy, might have been able to see him as his innocent little brother curled up and needing protection, he finds something else in their motel room.

Currently thinking of Dean and his mouth is watering at the sight of Sam, lying on Dean’s bed, wearing Dean’s jacket and nothing else, on his hands and knees and it’s Dean’s little brother but Sammy looks utterly wanton and debauched with his hole clenching around his fingers and his dick dribbling precome over the bedspread.

Currently thinking of Dean and he’s frozen in place until he hears Sam gasp out his name. That’s all the invitation he needs to take the two steps to the bed, stripping off faster than he ever has before the universe has time to right itself and take away this one shining chance of happiness. Sam’s so caught up in his own pleasure that he doesn’t know Dean’s there until the bed dips under Dean’s weight.

Dean’s imagined his first kiss with Sam countless times, but never like this, never his lips on Sam’s skin and his tongue exploring puckered flesh with Sam’s fingers getting in the way until Sam pulls his hand away and Dean can lick and nip around his loosened hole unimpeded. He makes out with it, holds Sam’s hips still and savors the musky dark taste of Sam’s skin and cherry lube and the honey sweet sounds of Sam’s voice, keening softly and begging for more and nothing has ever sounded better than Sam saying “Dean” in that tone.

One of Dean’s hands slides down, wraps around Sam’s cock and Sam yelps, struggles away from him. Dean pulls back like he’s been burned.

“Not like that,” Sam says, and there’s a hint of a boy spoiled by his older brother in his voice and that should be a turn off but it makes Dean’s dick throb. “Wanna have you in me when I come.”

“Always knew you were the smart one,” Dean hears himself say and it must have been right because Sam’s smiling, leaning back against the pillows and sliding down with his legs spread wide and it’s the prettiest thing Dean has ever seen.

He slides into his little brother and it feels like coming home, right in a way nothing else ever has, a perfect fit, and the look of blissful contentment on Sam’s face - that Dean put there, Dean made Sam happy - brings a sense of peace even as Dean starts thrusting bruising hard. Sam’s silky smooth inside, slick with lube and Dean’s saliva and hotter than Dean could dream and Sam’s arms wrap around Dean’s neck, pull him down for a sloppy kiss, all tongue and teeth. 

Dean falls into the kiss, falls into Sam, gives himself up to everything he’s been wanting. He finds his release in the clenching muscles of Sam’s orgasm, in hot breath panting against his cheek, in Sam’s teeth sinking vampire-like into his throat while Sam muffles his own cries in Dean’s flesh before falling back, limp and sated and smiling sleepily up at Dean as he finishes, spills deep inside his brother.

Sam doesn’t let Dean up, latches onto him with both arms and legs and he’s bigger than he was the last time he played octopus so Dean surrenders to his fate after half-dragging them into Sam’s untouched bed. When they’re tucked into the clean sheets, Sam still clinging to him and smiling in his sleep, Dean dares to whisper everything he’s been biting back for months.

-

Currently thinking of Dean, waking up alone in bed and his heart drops when he reaches out and Sam isn’t there. He sits up and he’s in Sam’s bed, his own a mess of stained blankets.

His heart breaks at the empty room, mends itself seconds later when Sam bursts through the door, all sunshine smiles and a bag of breakfast burritos.

“I got breakfast!” Sam says, casual, as if this morning is no different from any other.

Dean searches for something to say that won’t lay him bare, but he can’t think of anything so he stuffs his mouth with burritos to avoid answering. Grins up at Sam and chews openmouthed just to see the look of horror on Sam’s face.

“Gross,” Sam declares. “I’m gonna eat outside.” He grabs his own burrito and heads back to the door, pauses just before leaving. “Last night… I heard. And… and me too.”

[dystopian-penguin]

Regicide is a two-person job - Chapter one

[Has anyone asked for a mashup between an Royalty AU and a Boarding School AU? No? Well I did one anyway.

While I actually know where I’m going with this (which is rare for writers) I am not so sure if I’m gonna go anywhere with this at all (which is decidedly more common for writers). Either way, here’s an intro/sneak-peak into an idea that has been sitting in my folder for way too long.]

~~

Lena Luthor was not having a good day.

It would have been unnecessarily overdramatic to say it had cracked even her Top 10 Worst Days, but then again, the full repercussions of it hadn’t made themselves fully known yet. Although, she supposed being forced to move halfway across the globe fit the “life-changing repercussions” category, and Lena had no possible method to ever measure all of those.

It didn’t matter. She was going to endure the next two years of her life by making everyone else’s a living hell, as she had always done. Besides, she doubted her antics would make her last very long in one of the most well secured campuses in the world, and when she showed up back home in a couple of months after getting (very politely) expelled it would be her turn to laugh in Lilian’s face. And her stepmother wouldn’t even be able to fully act on her rage without tipping off any investors that the Luthors were many orders of magnitude bellow “less than perfect” as a family.

Lena stretched lazily and put her feet on the table, sparing a passing glance at the picturesque snow-covered mountain ranges passing by thousands of feet bellow her. Deciding that she needed a well-rested mind in order to face the many small battles that were sure to occur throughout the day, she picked up her phone to change to a more sleep-friendly playlist. As she muted her music to scroll through her options, she heard Lilian and Lex’s hushed tones coming from the front of the jet.

“…what my contacts say about her”.

Lilian clicked her tongue at that at that. “I hardly think a girl with that much security actually lives up to these rumors. Maybe they’re trying for a more approachable thought-the-grapevines PR strategy,” she answered.

“She does fit the ditzy dumb blonde type, doesn’t she?” Lex said.

Lilian laughed at that. The type of laughter only Lex was ever really allowed to witness. Lena continued through the motions of picking a sleeping playlist and making herself comfortable enough for a nap, feeling slightly bad for whoever was the focus on their conversation. Her brother and Lilian could be quite vicious about their business partners when they were left alone to gossip, and not exactly fully committed to facts. Not that Lena gave a fuck of course. She had stirred up quite a few nasty rumors about her peers herself when bored.

“That will certainly come in handy for the company in a few years’ time, should it be true,” her bother continued. “Although I do personally believe a rebellious youth would have been even better to our interests than an idiotic leader. Either way, Lena dearest appears to be yet one more problem for the Kryptonian Secret Service now”.

Wait, what?

Lena continued to act as if her earbuds hadn’t been muted and curled on herself as if asleep. It had been bad enough to pull her out of her previous boarding school and haul her ass across the globe overnight and without warning. Had Lilian and Lex really concocted even more unpleasant surprises for her day?

What was she thinking, of course they had.

“Oh, I am sure she will be a problem either way, no matter what the other girl really is like” Lilian dismissed. There was a pause, and Lena heard the clink of a teacup against its plate. “Might I enquire what makes you so keen on believing that particular source this time?”

“For the same reasons you picked this particular academy to exile her to, mother dear”.

Another pause, longer this time, then Lilian answered in a tone of subdued irritation.

“So, he has contacted you as well. I can’t say I’m surprised.”

“Oh, I can. What a stupid individual that was. But no matter, it has been dealt with,” Lex chuckled. “Unless you had any other pending business with him?”

Oh great, thought Lena. She was now once privy to the answers to what is without a doubt yet another “mysterious missing person case” that would make its rounds on Youtube conspiracy videos in a few years. If she didn’t know any better, she would think her brother planned his assassinations with the narrative of those videos already in mind.

And her family wondered why she was half-buzzed all the time.

Lilian must have made a dismissive hand gesture because Lex continued, “Good then, so we can stop these charades and discuss what we actually need to. Mother, I must admit, as much as the rest of this ordeal has been perversely well crafted, I believe sending her directly to that room might be a liability.”

“Oh please. Princess Kara might be a pretty face, but even Lena isn’t that stupid.”

Had Lena’s chair been facing them her ruse would have been over at that moment, as her eyes went wide. Just what on Earth were these two planning now? Lex’s black-market deals and criminal business practices were one thing. Every big corporation out in their happy little capitalistic dystopian society was guilty of that, no matter how much they liked to give flak to the Luthors exclusively. “That’s just good business,” as Lionel used to say.

But toying with Kryptonian royalty was way above even Lex’s repertoire, especially after their last… security breach, so to speak. Had her brother really grown as arrogant as to think he could walk in the same circles as a family thousands of years old and come out unscathed? That level of hubris spoke of Lillian’s intelligence, but her brother…

From a logical standpoint, Lena knew she would have to run into Princess Kara at some point during her (hopefully brief) stay in that blasted Royal Academy. The girl would have to be undoubtedly the hottest shit in that school, being the first in line to an empire and all. Lena also expected to be asked for some sort of report on her for Lex, so it’s not like she had exactly been planning on ignoring her existence entirely, as much as the prissy playboy types exhausted her to no end.

Okay, if Lena was being completely honest with herself, even she was curious about what the princess was really like.

She had met all kinds of celebrities and dignitaries in her short 16 years of life, but she had never met anyone from the only true royalty left in the world. And Lena knew even Lex had met the late King Zor-El only once, and as a child.

It was a silly guilty pleasure, but one that she was certain she wasn’t alone in. There was just something about the Kryptonian royalty in particular that made them seem like truly god-chosen and regal, and the whole world followed them like their own private novela. Rationally, Lena knew that “something” was, simply put, the best motherfucking public relations company in the world. One that not even the Luthors had enough money or sway to buy. She knew because they had tried. But there was still some air of magic and old-world nostalgia surrounding the very small family, and as much as it killed Lena to admit, she was as susceptible to that trap as the general public.

Even the super-rich are raised on Disney princess movies, after all.

Lena was pulled out of her reverie by Lex openly laughing and chastised herself for becoming so easily distracted at the mere mention of Princess Kara.

“Why, mother, that must have been the biggest compliment I’ve ever seen you pay her. I wasn’t referring to Lena’s dalliances, however”.

“Oh? Weren’t you?” Lilian countered with fake interest. There were more noises from the expensive porcelain set before he answered.

“Ok maybe I was a little bit,” he said bashfully, in a tone betraying just a sliver of vulnerability, like a little kid being caught with the cookie jar. A tone that Lena as a child used to think it was just for her. “But regardless,” he continued, “putting Lena in her room is simply too close. Even for whatever torture you have planned for her-“

“And here was I thinking I had made pretty obvious that sharing a room was part of her punishment,” Lilian interrupted.

Oh.

Oh, what the flying fuck?

Lena was being forced into a sharing a bedroom? Oh, that shit was low, so low. Even for Lilian.

“It is simply too close, mother” Lex repeated incisively, before Lena could focus into her seething rage any further. “She is to be there simply to observe and report, nothing else. Engaging directly with Kryptonian royalty is a risk we can’t afford to take, not with Lena of all people at the helm of the matter.”

Well, thanks for the vote of confidence, Lex.

“Well I beg to differ, darling. With the level of security and scrutiny that room is subjected to, there will be absolutely nothing Lena will get past us this time.”

“And therein lies the risk, mother. The KSS simply cannot be allowed this close to Lena. It is bad enough to need a background check to just enter the grounds of the damn school.”

“I admit the KSS might be a bit of an… overkill to our problem-”

“To your problem. I could not care less what Lena gets herself into, and especially not in such an easily bribable school.”

Lena heard Lilian open her mouth as to reply, but what followed were a few seconds of silence.

“Oh, Lex. Don’t tell me this is about you trying to protect her?” she finally said.

There was a muted silence, and Lena tried to keep her heart in a normal rhythm. Lex hadn’t really given much of a fuck about her for a few years now, there was no use getting her hopes up that he had ever been the brother he acted like when they were kids.

“Yes,” he answered more curtly than he usually was with his mother. Lilian must have had a similar expression of utter disbelief as Lena, because Lex felt the need to continue. “There are… details of this that you are not aware of, mother, no matter how much you believe to have bribed that man. But a private jet, of all places, is not the right setting for this discussion, yes?”

There were more clinks that sounded way rougher than their expensive 17th century porcelain should be handled like, and Lena was suddenly reminded of her brother’s secret (and completely pathetic, considering the family’s business) fear of planes. She wished she could say her heart didn’t feel a bit tighter with that knowledge resurfacing in her brain, but Lena was quite pathetic herself. Especially when she came to Lex.

Her brother’s expression must have put an end to the discussion, because Lena waited completely still for a long time but there had been no more words from either of them. But that suited her just the same. Deciding to give her fury towards Lillian proper attention on a later time, she decided to focus on the major bits of information she was able to acquire. Whatever it was this family had been planning to put her through this time, at least now she had an inkling of what it was. And a name. And with that name came a lead, and the very rare possibility of actually preparing herself psychologically to one of Lilian’s sadistic decisions over her life. Lena checked the time on her phone and found out she had roughly three hours for that. Four, if she counted the car ride between the private airstrip and the school.

She would need to google the shit out of Kara Zor-El.

[hyungbean]

Baby, Let’s Get Married | Cedric Diggory x Reader

Summary: Your boyfriend decides to casually sign his death warrant. (Takes place in Goblet Of Fire)

Genre: fluff, angst

A/N: I love Cedric so much, also Cedric and the reader are in their seventh year in this one-shot.

You were beyond angry at your longtime boyfriend for putting his name in the Goblet of Fire without warning. And you were even angrier now that his name had been drawn; while his friends were busy patting his back encouragingly, you sat across the hall gaping like a fish. People can die in these games and your boyfriend had just been bestowed the honor of meddling with death. 

Of course the world loved to mess with you, because you couldn’t even describe the fury and worry that you felt a mere few seconds later when somehow Harry had also been chosen to participate in the games. You had practically, in Fred and George’s words, ‘adopted’ the misfortunate boy. From the second he flashed his giddy smile at you when you came to his defense during his first year at Hogwarts, you had been a huge softy on the boy. Although it hadn’t been easy these past five years as he always got himself into trouble somehow.

“HARRY POTTER.” Dumbledore repeated furiously, which sobered you up from your anger and brought you back to reality. You had never seen the man so angry before, even at Fred and George. Hermione jumps up first, tugging at the confused boy, before you jump up too hugging him tightly, shielding him from curious gazes. You felt the boy melt in your arms, shoulders shaking slightly which was what he did out of habit when he was overwhelmed.

“It’s going to be okay Harry. I promise you.” You whisper, letting him go hesitantly, turning to face the silent crowd.

Soon you were rushing down the stairs to the trophy room with Dumbledore, Snape, Mad Eye, McGonagall, and the two other headmasters who were yelling furiously back and forth. 

“It couldn’t have been Harry! He’s not suicidal sir!” You yell before engaging in an argument with Olympe who kept insisting Harry was a cheater. You had insisted on going with them, although they didn’t protest because they had instantly assumed you were involved somehow when seeing how close to him you were. As we arrive at the bottom, Harry’s expression is enough to make your heart drop as Dumbledore quickly pushes him against a table. 

“Harry! Did you put your name in the Goblet of Fire?” Harry stammers out a ‘no sir’ before Dumbledore asks him if he had an older student do it for him. 

You weave your way through the adults, tugging Harry to your side, “This is outrageous. Harry wouldn’t even want to participate in these games! This is the works of something beyond him! Beyond us!” You insist as you feel the younger boy, cower into my side.

“The Goblet of Fire is an exceptionally powerful magical object only an exceptionally powerful confundus charm could have hoodwinked it. Magic way beyond the talents of a fourth year.” Mad Eye comes to his defense as you nod in agreement.

Karkaroff pushes Mad Eye and accuses him of being involved angering you even more, “Who even are you dude?” You question to no one. No one answers you but you feel Harry tremble a little beside you which causes you to tighten your hold on him.

The adults crowd around Crouch who looks bewildered as you glare at your boyfriend who shrinks a little under your gaze, ‘we’ll talk later.’ You mouth. You see him cringe slightly, rubbing his neck, knowing you won’t let him off easy.

“Mr.Potter has no choice.” You hear Crouch announce. 

“Like Helga he doesn’t!” You yell, fury burning through my body. As you go to approach Fudge, Harry pulls you back to stop you from doing something you’d severely regret.

This would not be a good look for Hogwarts or your boys.

And of course you were right. 

The first challenge was already putting you at large for a heart attack as you watch Cedric nearly get eaten by a dragon; Harry seems to finish a little smoother using his broom to fly although that didn’t ease your worries. This was only the first challenge. How bad were the next two going to get?

“You know.. I’m supposed to bathe with the egg. Why don’t you join me?” Cedric managed to corner you in the library, caging you between his arms. You were trying to help him find any type of information on the egg when he suddenly just popped up with the answer. 

“Scandalous Diggory, didn’t know you had it in you to suggest something like that.” You smile, meeting him halfway for a kiss. You wrap your arms around his neck as he leans down, putting his hands on your hips and pushing you against a table gently. You guys never really got out of the honeymoon stage according to Fred.

You pull away making a noise of satisfaction, “But no. That’s your punishment for entering the tournament without telling me.” He whines, pulling you closer. 

“But you didn’t get mad at Harry.” he pouts like a child.

“That’s different Ced, he didn’t enter the competition through his own doing and consent and he’s my little child.” You smirk, dropping a kiss to Cedric’s jaw before weaving your way out of his arms, flashing a wink before hurriedly heading to your dorms. Not catching a disgusted Seamus who was playfully gagging at Cedric.

A month later it was time to begin the second task. It was only a few hours before the start of the task when a first year informed you Dumbledore needed you in his office. Which didn't sit well with a nervous Cedric who pouted and tried to cling onto you for half of the walk there. God this boy was clingy, but you loved him so it didn’t really bother you all too much. 

“Good luck baby, I’ll see you out there. Make me proud.” You said, kissing him quickly, pulling away before he could wrap his arms around you, your one fatal weakness. 

Rushing up to the office, you were greeted by the sight of Ron, Fleur’s sister and Hermione all seemingly as clueless as you.

“Hey guys. What’s up?” You question confused, going to stand next to Hermione who wrapped her arm around you. Dumbledore and McGonagall were pacing in front of the three gryffindors and young blonde. 

“Ah miss L/N there you are. Well lets get started shall we.” Dumbledore said, approaching us. He seemed hesitant at first, looking back at McGonagall who avoided eye contact with us.

“Terribly sorry for this, really.” was the last thing you heard him say before falling unconscious. 

You didn’t know how long you had been unconscious for, but when you came to you were in the lake, someone’s arms wrapped around your body. Gulping in the fresh air, you gasp, seeing Cedric dragging you to a platform. And you realized just how cold the water was, as you shook profusely in his strong arms.

As you throw yourself onto the platform, Cedric is announced as the person to have saved their ‘sorely missed’ someone first. Although Cedric made no move to celebrate as he kneeled next to you, making sure you were okay. 

“Did I make you proud?” He asked with a cute grin on his face, kissing your nose. 

“Yes, seeing as I’m not dead.” you laugh, throwing yourself into his awaiting arms, kissing him. He hums in surprise before cupping your face and returning it with the same ferocity. Before you guys could continue Cedric is pulled away by his housemates to celebrate. He waves a little before being hoisted up by the rowdy Hufflepuffs.

Krum comes in second, surprisingly dragging a bewildered Hermione out of the water. They had known each other for probably less than a month and she was his ‘sorely missed’? That was somewhat fascinating but remembering how you and Cedric were all those years ago when you first met, you understood. 

Suddenly Ron and the blonde girl broke the surface of the water and you ran forwards, looking for Harry. You frantically look around the surface waiting for him to swim up, when suddenly he comes flying out of the water, landing next to you. Before you know it Dumbledore and Seamus are helping him sit up while you grasp his hand. 

“Harry don’t fucking scare me like that!” you yell hugging him tightly. It only took a few moments for realization to settle in as everyone started cheering. Sighing, you sit next to him as people start to parade over to him. 

Fleur had come over at one point to kiss him in thanks for saving her sister.

Harry always being the hero, making you proud. Though he needed to stop putting himself in danger, there was only so much your health insurance could do.

That night was filled with celebrations to say the least as you were invited to the Hufflepuff dorms to celebrate your boyfriend’s achievement. The party never seemed to end, dancing around with Cedric and ignoring all the hoots and whistles when he dipped you and shamelessly attacked your lips in front of his friends.

“Congrats you big teddy bear.” You mumbled, cuddled up on his chest as the Hufflepuffs around you continued to party.  Linking your hands together he looks down at you lovingly. 

“Marry me.” He suddenly says after a few moments of silence. You jump up, pressing your hands against his chest.

“Are you mad Diggory? We’re not even out of Hogwarts yet?” you whisper-yelled

“I meant after we graduate Y/N. We’ve been together for almost five years now anyway, longer than all the couples here. And we’re the cutest couple here anyway. You’re the only woman I’ll ever be in love with anyway. You are it for me, why delay the inevitable.” He mumbles, grasping your hips, burying his head into your neck. You practically melted into him, running your hands through his soft hair.

“Of course I will Ced. But that better not have been your proposal.”

The third challenge approached faster than you had realized as you were anxiously pacing next to Cedric who laughed a little next to you. 

“Your pacing is making me more nervous sweetheart.” He said, stopping you mid-step and kissing your forehead. He gently runs his fingers up and down your arms, calming you instantly.

“Sorry Ced. It’s just something doesn’t sit right with me about this challenge. It feels off.” You explained, peering up at your boyfriend. He kisses you softly, pushing you to his chest. 

“Don’t worry L/N. I promise to be safe, I’ll always come back to you.” He mumbled, repeatedly kissing your forehead. You giggle and pull away, taking your ring off your middle finger, handing it to him. It was a simple silver band with your family crest carved in the center.

He raises his eyebrows before he slips it onto his pinky. 

“For good luck and protection. It’s a family heirloom, said to be charmed with multiple protection incantations. It has always protected me, now I need it to protect you.” You explained, rubbing his knuckles.

He laughs at your worry, taking your arm gently and spinning you, something he always did when you were anxious. He twirls you into his chest, resting his head on your shoulder, swaying. 

You guys stay like that for a few moments before a voice cuts you both out of your daze. 

“This is adorable really, but the challenge is about to begin.” You turn and see your housemates, Seamus and Dean gagging. Flipping them off, you turn to your man, kissing him quickly.

“Good luck bubs, I’ll be waiting on the other side.” You said quickly, pushing him towards the clearing. He turns and waves at you, the ring glittering slightly.

Don’t fail me now you prayed to your ancestors.

Sighing, you link your arms with the younger boys who were waiting for you, dragging them to find a seat at the stands. As the champions start to walk out you see the Beauxbatons girl chanting something and doing the macarena, honestly couldn't be you. 

You cheer loudly as Ced walks out, smiling when he spots you and blows you a kiss. Dean pretends to catch it, slamming it into his chest, sighing dreamily. This earns him firm smack to the head by you.

When Harry walks out, you cheer shamelessly yelling for your little angel, your maternal side showing through.

Soon they’re being given a pep talk by Dumbledore. When they all have entered the maze you can only sit and wait patiently, leg bouncing up with worry. Seamus and Dean look at you, patting your arm in reassurance. You turn and see your dormmates, Ron and Hermione who smile at you warmly. Although you can visibly see how tense Hermione is. 

It seemed like it had been days, darkness falling upon the stands before there's a flash and Harry is crouching in the middle of the field, hunching over a figure. You feel yourself let out a scream of terror before you heard it. Running down from the stands you find yourself next to Harry, holding Cedric’s cold lifeless hand in yours. Tears pouring down your face as Harry frantically tries to explain what had happened. You couldn’t hear anything as you felt a weight being pushed onto your chest.

You were supposed to have a life together. A big home with three kids, he had said. All those thoughts kept spinning in your head.

God why. Why did this happen to him of all people?

You felt yourself hyperventilating, the stress somehow becoming a blockade in your lungs, causing you to start breaking out into a cold sweat. Feeling hands on your arms, the last thing you saw was the panicked faces of Harry and your dorm mates before you blacked out, faintly hearing Dumbledore call for assistance. 

The black dots shifted into color one at a time and soon you realized you were looking up at the ceiling in the med bay. Recognizing the room easily from visiting Cedric countless of times over the years due to quidditch accidents. 

Cedric.

Oh Godric, it was all coming back to you now. His cold body laying on the grass, his once lively face void of color. You whimpered quietly, sitting up and clutching your blanket. 

“Baby?” you hear a voice croak from beside you. Your head shoots towards the noise, seeing Cedric sitting up on his bed, body turned towards you face etched in concern.

“W-what?” you whispered to yourself, rubbing your eyes to try and wake up from this nightmare. 

“How?” you whispered to him when you realized you weren’t dreaming. He laughs a little trying to get up but groaning a little. You instantly shoot up from your bed, disregarding how dizzy you felt, rushing to his side. Gently, you push him back, trying to pull the blankets up only for him to grip your wrist.

“Hey Y/N, I love you.” He suddenly said. You stuttered a little, feeling his head for a fever.

He’s gone mad.

You looked into his grey eyes, they were full of love and adoration, laughing lightly you kissed his forehead. 

“I love you too.” 

He tugged on your wrist and you hummed going to question him but being cut off when he pulled you into his lap, moving to rest against the headrest of the bed. You leaned against his chest, listening to his heartbeat, one that picked up when you intertwined your fingers together. 

“Your ring worked.” He said, holding up the hand you weren't holding, flashing the ring.

“Thank god. I don’t know what I would do if it hadn't.” You said looking up at him, his eyes glimmered with a playfulness twinge. 

“You’d miss me a lot huh? You must love me then.” He said ruffling your hair. 

With all seriousness, you sat up a little cupping his face, “I would miss you so much Ced. I love you.. like so much it scares me.” You whispered, laughing as tears started to form in your eyes.

He holds your waist firmly, laughing joyfully, “Good. So...you. me. Baby..let’s get married.” He announced, kissing all over your neck and down to your collarbones. You were stuck in pure bliss, gripping his arms firmly, throwing your head back releasing a laugh. 

“Yes. A million times yes.”

Man did you love love.

[semperintrepida]

The Sellout, chapter three

three: the bad news

"So are you going to look at it, or what?"

Ellen was talking, from her favorite seat on the couch with the best view of the register, but Kyra just stared at the jar on the counter, at the card lying face down and innocent on top of all the other cards inside it. She knew damn well what company that card came from — she'd seen the flash of green as it spun in the air from being dunked into the jar with savage glee.

Starbucks green.

"Kyra?" Ellen's voice was closer now. Right at the counter.

Kyra wordlessly pushed the jar in her direction, and Ellen pulled up a sleeve and stuck her hand in, her head tilting into a question. Is this it?

Kyra nodded.

Ellen fished the card out of the jar, her eyes widening as she read it. "Motherfucker," she said. "You were right — she is bad news."

"Show me." Kyra held out her hand.

The card landed in her palm, and as she flipped it over, her fingertips slid across bumps embossed onto its surface. Braille. On a business card. There was nothing a billion dollar company wouldn't do to give itself the tiniest edge over the competition.

The Starbucks logo greeted her on the front of the card. No surprise there. She scanned the text, eyes glancing over the woman's name — Kassandra Agiadis — but her name was less important to Kyra than her title: Vice President of International Real Estate Development.

The words on the card began to smear, and it was like falling while roped in during a climb; that sudden, twisting spin before the world dropped out from under her.

Real estate development. What's the premium for a high visibility retail space in this neighborhood?

She considered the card in her hand — amazing how something so weightless could be so crushing — then tore it in half, flinging the pieces onto the counter hard enough for them to fly off the edge on the other side.

Ellen's head swiveled to follow their flight path, and then she silently walked past the counter and stooped to pick the pieces up from the floor.

Kyra knew this day would come, but like all disasters, it had sat off in the distance until the moment it showed up on her doorstep. For years, Starbucks had been content to keep mostly to the west side of the river, with seventeen stores crammed between I-405 and the waterfront.

Seventeen stores. Down in the Pearl District, there was a Starbucks on every fucking corner, choking out all but a handful of indie shops. But the river had made a good moat, and with Starbucks contained, she'd been able to make a decent living within the rougher, more corrugated edges of the Central Eastside and Distillery Row.

She'd survived Dutch Bros putting in drive-throughs north and south of her on MLK, the coffee shortage of 2011 that tripled the price of beans, and the slow sprouting of competing coffee shops across the neighborhood. She'd managed to stay on the right side of the profitability line, but she'd been clinging to survival by the smallest of handholds for months now. One slip would be enough to send everything plummeting to earth.

She should have taken Thal's money and opened up more shops. She should have sold to Stumptown when she had the chance. She should have—

Her eyes began to sting. She resisted the urge to flee to the storeroom; if she went back there and let the tears leak out, she wouldn't be able to stop them again. And running off wasn't an option even if she wanted to — she was the only one working this shift and someone had to watch the fort.

She breathed in slowly, breathed out, until the prickle in her eyes faded enough for her to push the retail mask back into place.

Ellen was still standing there, watching her. "You'll figure something out, Kyra. You always do," she said, placing the torn halves of the card on the counter. "Hang on to this shit, huh? Just in case."

Ellen made it halfway back to the couch when Kyra spoke up again. "Do you have your laptop with you?"

"How else would I abuse your wifi?"

"Can I borrow it for a few minutes?"

Ellen's grin was feral. "I thought you'd never ask."

.oOo.

It took a while to get the laptop sorted, much of it involving frantic clicking and password after password as Ellen rambled something about needing a VPN and not trusting the government, but eventually Kyra found herself looking at an empty browser window with a cursor blinking lazily in its address bar.

"Where are we stalking first?" Ellen asked, rubbing her palms together in anticipation.

Kyra pulled up LinkedIn and typed "Kassandra Agiadis" into the search field, and when the results appeared, the photo at the top of the list smiled a familiar smile, the woman's confidence captured in pixel form along with that sharp glint in her eyes.

Kyra opened the profile.

Executive leader and consummate strategist with a proven record of results in aligning real estate acquisitions and portfolios with business goals...

She skimmed the suit-speak until she reached the background part of the profile.

MBA, Sloan School of Management, Massachusetts Institute of Technology BS, Economics, Stanford University

A lengthy list of job titles followed. Kassandra had only been at Starbucks a little more than a year. Before that, stints at Apple, Chipotle, CVS. The list went on. She'd rarely stayed longer than three years in a position.

Ellen whistled. "That's a lot of different companies."

"She's a mercenary," Kyra said. "Hired to do something specific and then move on."

Kyra opened another tab and searched Instagram, finding the woman's profile easily enough. The grid of photos featured a lot of concrete and metal, clean lines and minimalism, more Dieter Rams and Mid-Century Modern than any ostentatious displays of money being tossed around. Kyra kept scrolling. Except for the cars. And motorcycles. Apparently Kassandra liked her cars fast and her motorcycles retro.

"It's all very sterile, don't you think?" Kyra said, tapping a finger against her lips.

"I'll say. It's fucking fake. No one lives like that."

"I'm not sure all of it's fake, but it's definitely curated." She wiggled the cursor over a photo of the interior of a cabin, blonde wood and floor-to-ceiling windows framing a view of a lake. "She's paying someone to manage this for her."

"What's the fucking point of that?"

"Maintaining an image. Projecting a sense of old money." But something didn't add up, and Kyra couldn't pin down what it was.

She opened a third tab, this time for a good ol' Google search, and skimmed the list of results. A press release announcing Kassandra's hiring at Starbucks. More press releases. Talks at various conferences. Nothing particularly revelatory in the first few pages, but then a headline caught Kyra's eye and she clicked through.

Agiadis leads Stanford to national championship win

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Led by a scintillating performance from Kassandra Agiadis, Stanford won its second consecutive national championship in a come-from-behind victory over rival Tennessee on Monday night.

Agiadis scored 24 points, muscled her way to 12 rebounds, and was two assists away from a triple-double as she powered Stanford to a 76-72 win, including sinking three crucial free throws in the final 34 seconds, in a game where Stanford found themselves in an early 12-4 deficit at the end of the first quarter.

"She wants to win more than anything, and she showed that tonight," Stanford coach Tara VanDerveer said of Agiadis. "We were in a hole after that first quarter, but Kassandra lifted this team up and said, 'Whatever it takes.' She simply refused to lose."

The article was old, and the photos accompanying the text were small, but unmistakably her: Kassandra, basketball in hand, pushing past two orange-clad players under the hoop. There was plenty of broad-shouldered muscle in that white Stanford jersey, but it was Kassandra's eyes, bright and clear with relentless focus, that caught Kyra's attention.

Ellen snorted from over Kyra's shoulder. "So she's a fucking jock. Why am I not surprised?"

Kyra didn't respond, too distracted by the second photo, which showed Kassandra surrounded by her teammates in a storm of confetti as she held an enormous trophy over her head in triumph, her smile as radiant as the sun.

And now she wore a suit instead of a basketball jersey and cut real estate deals for fun and profit. Seemed she was good at it too, but did it ever make her smile like she had while holding that trophy?

Kyra hoped the answer to that question was no.

.oOo.

She drifted through Wednesday and Thursday, irritable by day and sleepless at night, and when Friday evening arrived with its expanse of free time, she made three attempts to dig into Green's translation of the poetry of Catullus before setting the book aside and walking out to the shed in her back garden where she'd built her bouldering wall.

The faint scent of sweat, chalk, and dusty earth greeted her inside. It was her sanctuary, her shrine to defying gravity. Every handhold was as familiar as a lover.

But tonight she couldn't even climb the simplest problems. Her toes kept slipping and her fingers faltered.

She'd lost her grip.

Eventually she gave up and lay on her back on the crash pad, staring at the curving shadows the holds cast upon the wall, thinking of how problems she'd solved a thousand times could suddenly become so impossible.

.oOo.

Five minutes before closing on Saturday night, Kyra was wiping down the fridge under the counter when the door opened and a presence entered the shop. Maybe it was the way her visitor displaced the air in the otherwise empty room, or the sound of heavy footsteps, but Kyra knew exactly who she'd find when she stood up again.

Kassandra was standing next to the table closest to the register. This time, she wasn't wearing a suit — just an untucked linen shirt over tailored slacks — and she'd pulled her hair up into a loose chignon. The effect was to make her seem casual and relaxed, but no less moneyed.

Kyra wiped her hands on a clean rag to keep her eyes off the intersecting curves of Kassandra's jawline and neck. "Are you going to ask me to make you another fucking cappuccino? Because if so, I'm closed."

That drew a short laugh from Kassandra. "No. As much as I loved the one you made for me, even I'm not evil enough to ask for another this late."

"Then why are you here? So you can gloat before you put me out of business?"

"I don't want to put you out of business." Kassandra pulled a chair out from the table and made herself right at home, stretching her legs out before her. "I want your business."

Kyra's eyebrows lifted.

"I'll buy this," Kassandra said, as easily as if she was ordering a drink. She gestured around the room. "All of it. Right now."

"You can't be serious."

"I'm very serious. How much would it take to get you to say yes?"

Kyra walked out from behind the counter to the narrow wooden bar that ran along the windows, and began flipping stools over on top of it. "Never mind buying me out — why are you here? Don't you have some lackey to work deals like this for you?"

Kassandra shrugged. "I like your coffee."

"Enough to buy my shop." She tugged the pull cord on the OPEN sign to turn it off.

"It beats the alternative."

Kyra skirted around Kassandra's outstretched legs on her way past, and when she reached the counter, she leaned back against it and crossed her arms. "And that would be..."

"We put in a new flagship store down the street from you on MLK — and you take your chances."

Ten years ago, Kyra would have been thrilled at the news that Starbucks was opening a store nearby. In those heady days, Starbucks was a tide that lifted every coffee shop around it. It was Starbucks that taught the average American that there was better coffee out there than freeze-dried instant — and that it was worth paying more than fifty cents a cup for. The spillover in foot traffic from a nearby Starbucks could launch a shop's profits to stratospheric heights.

Those days were long gone. Coffee had become cutthroat and commoditized, and now people bitched that her lattes cost a nickle more than the ones they could get at Starbucks. Sure, there were people out there who cared that her coffee was sourced from a roaster who paid a fair price for beans from small, family-run farms, but there weren't enough customers like them to keep her lights on and her espresso machine humming. So she kept trimming her margins, trying to stay competitive on price while offering better product, knowing it was unsustainable in the long run.

Kassandra's offer was tempting. She could take the money, take a real vacation for the first time in years, make the funds last long enough to find a job, somewhere. Fuck, she could go and work for Thal at his chain of shops over in Bend. She'd probably make more money with a lot less stress, and she'd even have time to climb—

The sound of the door opening again brought her back to reality. A man stumbled into the shop, disheveled and dirty, wearing an oversized puffy coat and a shredded pair of work pants. He shuffled closer, stopping a few steps away from Kassandra. His body swayed with the restless twitching of an addict, too far gone to know where he was, much less care about sweltering in a heavy winter coat during a spring heatwave.

Trouble piling on.

"I'm sorry sir, we're closed," Kyra said as neutrally as she could, threading the line between being welcoming and unwelcoming.

His eyes darted to and fro, unfocused, and he kept shifting his weight from foot to foot while he gestured aimlessly around him.

Kassandra eased herself to her feet. "Hey man, what do you need?" she asked, her voice taking on that even, reasonable tone that most people used when talking to the unhinged.

"Got any spare change?" He was shaking now, deep in his need for another hit.

Kassandra slowly lifted her hands. "Sorry, I'm all out," she said. Then she nodded back towards Kyra. "She's all out too."

Kyra shook her head apologetically.

Her movement caught his attention, and he peered at her with manic eyes. "What you doing here? Huh? Huh?" He reached up and pulled angrily at the hair above his ears. "My house. Mine."

"Nah," Kassandra said. "You're all turned around. Your house is out that way." She motioned towards the door.

He didn't seem to hear her, his eyes hardening to glare at Kyra as his face twisted. "You!" he shouted, and then the moment crystallized into a series of quick-cut images, unfurling into a jerky slideshow: the man lunging towards her, Kassandra sliding in between to intercept him, Kyra dodging out of the way as he slammed into Kassandra, knocking her off her feet...

Kyra could only watch helplessly as it put Kassandra's head on a collision course with the display case on the counter.

Chapter three of The Sellout. Continued in chapter four...

Author's Note: I've taken some liberties with NCAA women's basketball history here. Apologies to UConn fans — I've borrowed a couple of your titles and given them to Stanford. Creative license, eh?

[lyssismagical]

city of stars, are you shining just for me?

Parkner Febufluff Days 15, 16, 17, & 18 – Box of Candy & Teddy Bear & Missing You & Friday Night Ride

Read on AO3

It’s been three months.

Three of the longest months of Harley’s life.

Peter’s been away on a mission for literally twelve weeks with a few Avengers in Russia of all places. Like halfway around the world from Harley’s who’s alone in the penthouse of the tower, alone and miserable.

There’s no reason a mission should take this long, but Harley’s isn’t worried. He gets short texts from Peter every day or two, letting him know that he’s alright and that he’ll be home as soon as he can.

But the bed stays cold at his side, and the gifts wrapped under his bed stay untouched because Peter missed Valentine’s Day. And Harley’s just downright miserable.

He would never admit to anybody that he’s a lovesick sap, but he is.

He’s sappy and he’s a romantic and he just really loves Peter.

Sleeping doesn’t come as easy when Peter’s not in his arms, the world duller when the light of his life is away. It’s probably stupid and he’s just a tad bit overly dependent.

But sue him. Peter’s been on this stupid mission for three fucking months and Harley just misses his boyfriend, is that so crazy?

He curls up in their bed, deliberatey on Peter’s side, trying his best to ignore the way Peter’s pillow smells more like Harley than the hero.

“Harley, c’mon,” Pepper says from his doorway. Morgan’s standing behind her, a book clutched to her chest. She’s nine now, getting older by the very day. “Peter’s fine, you know that.”

No nonesense Pepper today. Sometimes he gets this Pepper, sometimes he gets soothing Pepper sitting at the edge of his bed and pushing his hair back and murmuring how she worries about Tony being out there too.

“Miss him,” Harley says, words muffled by Peter’s pillow. He knows he probably sounds like a child, pouting and cheeks flushed and eyes watery.

Morgan reaches a hand out towards him. “C’mon, we can watch Harry Potter and have juice pops?”

“No juice pops before breakfact,” Pepper says out of instinct, but she still looks expectantly at Harley.

Normally, watching Harry Potter was the easiest way to get Harley to cheer up, but now all it does is remind him more of his boyfriend, halfway across the world, probably hurt from some self-sacrificial play in the battlefield with Tony reprimanding him. Maybe missing Harley just as miss as vice versa.

And like Peter knew, his phone lights up by his head.

Hi, love. Finishing up soon, I swear. Be home before you know it. Love you and miss you.

Harley types out a half-assed response with just a few words, adding a couple hearts so it comes off as less passive aggressive, but he’s just tired of worrying day in and day out about his boyfriend.

Peter’s a superhero, and Harley gets that. He does.

It doesn’t make it easier though. It doesn’t make it easier when he has to wait up until the early hours of morning for Peter to come stumbling through the window into their bedroom, pulling his mask off to reveal cuts and bruises. It doesn’t make it easier when he has to patch Peter up nearly every day, stitches or bandages or carrying him down to medical. It doesn’t make it easy, not when he knows the truth about heroes’ lifespans. About how Tony’s just an exception, most heroes don’t make it more than a few years. Something will knock them down for good.

And Harley doesn’t think he could lose Peter. He doesn’t know what he’d do without him. Peter’s his everything.

“Jus’ want Peter back,” Harley says, voice lifting into a childish whine. He tugs the blankets up to his chin, pouting at Pepper. “Been too long.”

Three months is a long time. Especially for the two boys who have barely spent more than a few days apart over the past seven years of their relationships. They’ve been dating since they were fifteen, and just Tony’s genius interns, always bickering or teasing or subtly flirting through joking insults, and now they’re twenty-two, graduated MIT last summer together, and are now in the process of becomig Co-Owners of Stark Industries.

“C’mon, Harley, you’re being silly,” Pepper says, walking over to rip the blankets from his shoulders. “Up and at ‘em, kid, no more pouting in bed. Come on, May’s on her way with breakfast from that place you like.”

Harley goes to tell her that Peter likes that place. That Harley never really liked breakfast at all before Peter came along. But he doesn’t bother, just drags his feet up under him and lets Pepper lead the way into the dining room.

“Oh, honey,” May says as soon as she arrives, pushing his curls back to press a kiss to his forehead.

“This is the longest we’ve ever been apart,” Harley explains quietly, pouting at the table. “The longest before this was when I went to Tennessee over Spring Break for three days and we still facetimed every day.”

May lets out a laugh and pats Harley’s cheek before pushing the breakfast towards him. “Eat up, you look like you haven’t been eating well.”

Harley pouts more, rolling his eyes, but accepts the offering anyways. “Is it bad that I miss him this much?”

Pepper smiles sitting down next to May. “No, it’s not bad, it’s just love, Harley.”

Letting his head fall into his hands, he huffs in annoyance. “Well, I hate it. Take it back. I don’t want this part.”

Both women laugh at him, rolling their eyes.

“Harley, you’re being silly,” Morgan says, patting him on the shoulder. “Peter will be back soon, it’s not the end of the world.”

His phone buzzes in his pocket and he pulls out, another text from Peter.

I know this is tough and I’m so sorry I’ve been gone for so long. I can barely sleep at night when you’re not there. This is pretty shitty, but I’ll be home soon I promise. I love you so much and I miss you like crazy. See you soon love I promise.

It’s the longest message Harley’s gotten from Peter since he left, normally they just come in a few short words about how Peter loves him, misses him, and is okay.

The day Peter left, Harley wasn’t that much of a mess. Sure, he hugged and kissed Peter goodbye, and he may or may not have cried as the plane was flying off, but he was fine. That was because originally, the mission wasn’t supposed to take longer than a few weeks. Now it’s been twelve weeks and Harley wants to cry everytime he gets a text from Peter without being able to physically be with him.

Love you too darling. Stay safe. Miss you tons. Come home soon.

And Harley can’t help but think of Peter sleeping in the plane or maybe in shitty motels or in weird places while trying to keep watch, missing Harley. He hadn’t really thought of how irritable Peter might be if Harley’s this much of a mess.

“Harry Potter?” Harley finally says, offering Morgan a tired smile.

“When Peter gets back, the two of you have piles of paperwork to get through too, don’t forget,” Pepper says.

May rolls her eyes. “When Peter gets back, you two can have a few days to get back on your feet, alright? We won’t bother you, but after that…”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Responsibilities and all that bullshit, I get it.”

May pats his shoulder as she stands from her chair. Her expression softens when he looks up at her, probably noticing the nasty dark circles under his eyes that he’s realized has gotten a lot worse since Peter left.

“He’s going to be already, honey, I promise. He’ll be home soon. I know it’s hard,” May murmurs. “Trust me, I had to watch him head off to college all on his own a few years back, and my god, did I ever miss him.”

“He wasn’t alone,” Harley says. He remembers that day clearly. Him and Peter, hand in hand, saying goodbye to May and the Starks dropping them off in their shared dormroom.

May smiles and presses a kiss to his forehead. “I know, he had you. And right now, he has Tony with him. And Nat and Steve and Sam. He’ll be just fine.”

“I know, I just really miss him.”

“I know you do, honey.” * Harley wakes up on the couch in the middle of the night, the credits of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire still playing on the flatscreen TV.

Morgan’s curled up opposite him, a blanket pulled over both of them. She’s fast asleep, drooling a little bit against the throw pillow.

Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, Harley sits up slowly, glancing around the dark room, cast in a blue glare from the television.

And then he hears what woke him up, a fairly loud thud followed by some cursing coming from the kitchen.

“Fri?” Harley whispers, one hand grabbing onto Morgan’s ankle, hoping she stays asleep. His first thought is an intruder, but he’s not sure how an intruder would get all the way up to the penthouse without triggering security.

“Yes, Mister Keener?” FRIDAY responds, matching his volume, but it seems much too loud in the otherwise quiet room.

He slowly slides to his feet, keeping his footsteps light as his fingers hover over the emergency button on his watch. Every Stark family member has one of the watches, even May just in case they need help.

He carefully tiptoes to the edge of the kitchen, peering into the dim room.

A figure is pulling open the pantries, left and right, searching for something. They open the fridge with an echoing click, cursing quietly when something slips from their grasp and hits the ground.

But the fridge lights up and illuminates the figure.

Peter Parker stands in the kitchen, Spider-Man suit half off, hanging around his waist. He looks worse for wear, cut and bruised and bloody, but his face just shows mild annoyance. Not pain, no tears.

“Peter?” Harley says, making his presence known. “What in the world are you-”

“Needa find stitches,” Peter says, voice almost slurring and eyes glazed.

Harley freezes, staring at Peter for a long moment. “You’re trying to find stitches… in the fridge?”

Peter pouts into the fridge as though the first aid kit will just fall out.

Pushing down the need to swaddle Peter in a million blankets and never let his boyfriend go, Harley crosses the room and gently takes Peter’s wrist.

“C’mon, darling,” he says, rolling his eyes. “You’re not going to find stitches in the fridge.”

Peter stares at him for a solid minute, unmoving, before he finally presses a quick kiss to Harley’s cheek. “Thank you.”

Shaking his head, Harley tugs on Peter’s wrist until the younger boy follows him into the bathroom. Peter sits down on the edge of the tub, pointing at the wound that needs stitches on his chest.

It’s not a good time to admit how shitty he’s been feeling, how happy and relieved he is that Peter’s home, not when Harley’s stitching Peter’s chest back up. Bad timing.

So it’s quiet as Harley stitches and disinfects and bandages Peter’s wounds, except for the little hisses and mumbled complaints Peter makes.

Eventually, though, Harley’s carefully tugging one of his hoodies onto Peter who looks up at him with a tired smile.

“Thank you,” Peter murmurs, leaning into Harley’s chest. “Know I wanna say a lot and kiss you until the world ends, but ‘m too tired right now.”

Harley huffs out a laugh. “Yeah, course, darling. Let’s get you to bed.”

He leads Peter up to his feet and down the hallway to their bedroom, heart leaping because he’s finally, finally, not sleeping alone. It’s been three very long months.

Peter immediately falls into the bed, kicking his suit the rest of the way off. “C’mere. Wanna cuddle forever.”

“Forever?” Harley says, chucking off his jeans and sliding into bed beside his boyfriend.

“Mm,” Peter says, curling up against Harley. “Forever and ever. Can’t stop me.”

Harley lets out a laugh, peppering Peter’s face in kisses as he pulls the blankets over them. “Don’t want you anywhere else, darling.”

“Missed you,” Peter yawns, tucking his face against Harley’s shoulder, eyes slipping shut. “Couldn’t sleep without you.”

“Me neither, doll.”

“Love you.” Peter leans up to press a kiss to the corner of Harley’s mouth before tucking himself firmly against Harley’s side, a dopey smile on his face as Harley wraps his arms around him.

“I love you too, Peter,” Harley murmurs, kissing the top of his boyfriend’s head. This isn’t exactly the night that he planned when Peter got back from the mission, he was thinking something more along the lines of the Valentine’s gifts finally being opened, a nice meal, and maybe a night of snuggling and watching movies.

But this is just as perfect. This is still the only part that matters, Peter tucked into his arms, head cushioned against his chest, hands curling into his t-shirt, quiet I Love You’s passing between them. Harley doesn’t care what they do, as long as Peter is here at his side.

* Harley jerks awake for the second time only a few hours later. It’s still late and dark, barely able to see through the darkness.

A choked sob escapes Peter and Harley turns quickly, not surprised to find Peter still asleep, in the throes of a nightmare.

“Hey, darling, you gotta wake up for me now, okay?” Harley murmurs, gently pushing Peter’s curls back and rubbing a thumb over his cheekbone. “C’mon, honey, open those eyes for me.”

It doesn’t take much longer than that for Peter to jolt awake, taking a few seconds to get his bearings before crumbling into Harley’s awaiting arms.

“Sorry,” Peter pants, trying his best to get control of his tears. “Didn’t mean to wake you.”

“That’s alright, lovely, that’s what I’m here for, yeah?” Harley soothes, peppering kisses over Peter’s face. “You wanna go for a ride?”

It’s late on a Friday, but if anything helps their nightmares, it’s getting out of the confines of the penthouse and getting some fresh air. A drive through the city sounds like a good plan, Harley knows the warm air and quiet music will do Peter some good.

Peter looks up at him in confusion for a moment before shrugging and accepting the hand offered out to him.

“For you, my love,” Harley says, fishing the presents out from under his bed. “Happy Valentine’s Day.”

“It’s April,” Peter says, but his eyes are shining and he looks up to Harley with a dopey smile through his tears. He hugs the presents to his chest unopened and follows Harley into the elevator.

Harley picks out Peter’s favourite car from the garage. An Audi R8 Spyder and opens passenger for Peter before sliding into Driver’s.

“C’mon, open them up,” Harley nudges, driving out of the garage and towards the open roads. There’s not a whole lot of traffic at three in the morning.

They’re basic Valentine’s Day presents, a box of candies and chocolates, and a teddy bear dressed up like Spider-Man.

But Peter lights up like it’s the best gift he’s ever received. “Thank you so much, Harley. Thank you. Happy Valentine’s Day. I love you.”

“Love you too, baby. But open up the glove compartment. There’s another gift in there.”

Peter hesitates, eyes lingering on Harley as they speed through backroads, top of the car down and soft rock whispering through the speakers.

Carefully, Peter unwraps the box in the glove compartment.

Two golden rings on chains, engraved with H & P like they’re still lovesick teenagers. They did that on their nearly six years ago, carve their initials into a tree behind the tower. To this day, it’s still there. (Whether or not Harley goes out and recarves it every once in a while is unknown to Peter.)

“Figured rings weren’t really our thing,” Harley murmurs, glancing over at Peter. “Chains seemed like the better route to go.”

“Are you proposing?” Peter asks, voice quiet. He’s grinning down at the rings in his hands, tears pooling in his eyes. “I swear to god, Keener-”

“Hopefully that can be Parker soon, hm?” Harley says, trying to push down the smile that threatens to split his face in half. “So what do you say, darling?”

Peter lets out a watery laugh and leans across the middle of the car to slip the chain around Harley’s neck. The gold ring sits in the center of his chest and it makes him feel warm and fuzzy. Peter puts his own chain on, grinning down at it, before he leans over again to press a kiss to Harley’s cheek.

“Oh my god, yes. I can’t believe it. How long have you had this planned?”

Harley flushes. “Uh, I may or may not have had the box in their for a little over eight months. I wanted it be, you know, the right timing, but I figured any time is right as long as we’re together, yeah?”

“Holy shit, Harley. I love you,” Peter breathes, pressing another kiss to the corner of Harley’s mouth. “I missed you so much and I’m not going on anymore missions for a long time, alright? I don’t care how world-ending they say it is, I’m staying here with you.”

Laughing, Harley reaches over to take Peter’s hand. “Sure, darling, whatever you say.”

They both know it’s not true. Peter will jump on whatever mission comes next, that he’ll be gone more often than Harley wishes. But that’s okay because Peter will always come home and Harley will always be there waiting.

[tsarisfanfiction]

Silent IV

Fandom: Thunderbirds Rating: Teen Genre: Hurt/Comfort/Angst Characters: John Tracy, Scott Tracy

Part 4 of my response to @gumnut-logic‘s SensorySunday: Taste challenge. Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3

Answering reader’s questions?  Only halfway through a fic?  More likely than you think.

Sleep didn’t come easily for John.  It never had done, not even before last weekend, but now he couldn’t sleep at all until he knew all his brothers were safe in their rooms.  That indicator was Scott; until Scott came into their room and settled down in bed, John could be sure that at least one brother was still up.  As Scott would never go to bed until Virgil and Gordon were settled in the room next door, and Alan was asleep in his own bed, dragged in to their room almost as soon as they’d got home, his eventual stumble into bed was the sign John needed that the others were all as okay as they could be right now.

Even the stars had abandoned him.  Sat in the window, a favourite seat of his, with a neglected book in his lap, there were no pinpricks of light shining through the darkness.  Clouds had stayed gathered ever since the avalanche, blocking out both the sun and the stars.  Somewhere beyond them was Dad, on a mission to the moon.  John wondered if he knew, yet.  Grandma had said she’d contact the space agency, but communications from Earth to the moon were difficult.  It had always been a sore point between the older boys and their father – off again for months, two year old Alan barely knew who his Daddy was – but now it was a gaping wound.  John had always been fascinated by space, but he swore he wouldn’t go until he knew he could keep in contact with his family.  Always.

Equally as difficult as getting a message to the moon, apparently, was trying to travel when so snowed under even the cars couldn’t move, and planes refused to fly.  There was no snow here, and if John never saw a snowflake again it would be too soon, but Grandma’s state was snowed in.  Grandma was adamant that she’d find her way to them soon, and John knew she was doing everything she could to move in with them, but it felt as though the world itself was conspiring against them.  Every day that passed, Scott lived in greater and greater fear of uninvited visitors arriving on their doorstep.  John refused to admit it to anyone except himself, but he did, too.

Alan snuffled in the corner, clutching his newly inherited but tatty and old teddy bear close in sleep. The two year old didn’t understand what was going on, and John and Scott were both painfully aware that he was the most likely to bring the uninvited guests to their door with an innocent comment. From the conversation he’d heard when they’d got home, something Alan had said on the way home from playgroup had been too close for Scott’s comfort today.

Scott hadn’t been himself, either.  None of them were themselves, Gordon retreating into himself, Virgil pretending everything was fine but flinching at every reminder of Mom with tears in his eyes.  John wasn’t even sure what had happened to him; he could barely remember what life had been like before the avalanche now. Life and responsibility had ganged up on him and Scott all at once and now any free time he might have had was taken up with cooking and cleaning while Scott handled their younger brothers. But John didn’t think all that – Mom’s death, new responsibilities, three brothers in need of assurance and a sense of normality where there was none to be had – was the all that was preying on Scott’s mind.  Not after Alan’s loud complaints about Scott being stinky and Scott’s perfectly reasonable explanation.  Perfectly reasonable, except for one thing.

Scott didn’t have gym on Wednesdays.  John knew his brother’s timetable, even if Scott didn’t know that.  No gym on Wednesdays, just after-school basketball he’d quit at the start of the week.

Whatever had driven him to empty an entire can of deodorant over himself, it wasn’t gym, and John highly doubted it was an accident, either.  But he knew Scott wouldn’t talk to him about it, even though his eyes had been red when he’d come out of his too-long shower and he’d caught the smallest glimpse of something dark on his arm when his sleeve had ridden up during dinner.  Alan had jumped at him from his chair after they’d eaten, as per usual, and normally Scott could catch him with ease.  This time, there’d been the flicker of pain as Alan had collided with him, before he’d covered it up with some light-hearted scolding for being reckless.

John didn’t like the theory forming in his mind, and knew that tonight he wouldn’t sleep until he put it to rest, one way or the other.

It was midnight by the time Scott stumbled into the room, assuring him that Virgil and Gordon were both asleep and put that book away and go to bed now, John.  John hadn’t turned a page all evening, but dutifully obeyed, placing the bookmark back in the same place he’d retrieved it from hours earlier and setting the book on the bedside table before sliding underneath his covers and closing his eyes.

Waiting.

He heard Scott pad over lightly to check on Alan, making sure he really was asleep, before his big brother finally shuffled into bed himself, turning the lights off.  He’d shared a room with Scott for years, knew how his breathing shifted as he fell asleep.  The shift happened, and he counted the minutes in his head.  Five of them, and then he couldn’t wait any more, the burning need to know slipping him out of bed, palming his under-the-covers reading light (a present from Scott, two years ago, after he’d got fed up of John insisting on having a light on to read when he just wanted to sleep; Mom had laughed and told him he still wasn’t allowed to read all night) from under his pillow and slipping across the room to Scott’s bed.

Scott was a light sleeper, and John shouldn’t be doing this, but he needed to know.  The comforter folded back easily, and holding his breath John reached for the hem of his brother’s top, lifting it up just enough to see his fears realised.

Mottled bruising splattered across his torso, deeper and darker in some places than others.  It was painfully familiar – John had had the same, last year, until Scott found him out in a similar way and dragged names out of a tearful eleven year old in the middle of the night.  They’d both been in the same school then; Scott had made it perfectly clear the next day that anyone who so much as touched a hair on any of his brothers’ heads would be dealing with him and his friends, who would be delighted to return it with interest.

John didn’t have bruises any more, but now Scott had moved up into the world of high school and there was no big brother to make fearless challenges on his behalf.

A hand caught his wrist.

“Go back to bed,” Scott said flatly, tugging at his arm lightly until he let go.  The fabric fluttered back down, hiding the incriminating evidence again.

“Why didn’t you tell anyone?” John asked instead, keeping his voice down.  The last thing they needed was for any of their brothers to wake, especially Alan.

Scott scoffed, but John’s reading light caught pain in his eyes.

“Tell who?” he demanded, sitting up and wincing as he did so.  John didn’t think it was a good thing that Scott hadn’t even attempted denial first. Scott always denied it when things were wrong and he wasn’t okay.  Then again, none of them were okay.  None of them would be okay for a long time.  “A teacher? They’d just try to call Mom, and when they don’t get through they’ll be breaking down the goddamn door.  Grandma?  She can’t get here any damn faster.  Dad? He’s not even on the fucking planet!”

“Shhh!” John hissed as his voice get louder.  A sleepy snuffle came from the corner of the room, and they both froze.  It was several long minutes of silence before they relaxed, assured that Alan hadn’t woken up after all.  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

He knew why.  It was the same reason he wouldn’t tell a teacher, wouldn’t risk any adults realising that there was a family of five children living without a single guardian in the state.  Scott had been trying to protect him, projecting an air of invulnerable big brother so John would relax and forget the very real fear social services might catch a whiff of abandoned children.

Scott wouldn’t admit that, of course.

“What could you do about it?” he demanded instead, remembering this time to keep his voice down. “We don’t even go to the same school, and even if we did, we can’t draw attention to ourselves!”

“I can handle Alan so he’s not kicking you in your already busted ribs whenever you pick him up,” John retorted. “I can cover for you while you get pain killers.  Just because I can’t help you outside doesn’t mean I can’t help you at home, Scott.”

“I can’t ask that of you,” Scott protested, and John rolled his eyes.

“I’m offering,” he pointed out.  “You have taken some pain killers, right?”

“How do you think I got all of two seconds sleep before a pesky little brother stripped my bedclothes?” Scott grouched.  “Yes, I took some tylenol when I was in the shower.”

“Cold compress?” John asked, and Scott rolled his eyes.

“Right little rescue scout you are, huh,” he grumbled.  He knew as well as John they’d had a first aid session only two meetings ago.  It felt like two lifetimes ago.  “Shower.”  John reached for his top again, only to get batted away.  “It’s fine, John.  Stop fussing and go back to bed.”

John scowled at him.

“We talk about this now, or we talk about this at breakfast with Virgil, Gordon and Alan listening in,” he promised.  From the flash of anger in blue eyes, it was only the fact that Alan was sleeping in the same room that restrained Scott from exploding at him.

“What’s there to talk about?” he ground out instead.

“Who.”  John stated.  “How long. Why now.”  The glare he got promised retribution later, but less than a week ago John had watched a wall of snow crush a skiing hut with his mother inside. Maybe Scott’s glares would be scary again one day, but their ski trip from hell was still too raw.

“You don’t know them,” Scott muttered after a moment, and John knew he wouldn’t have caved if he wasn’t also raw from the loss of their Mom, and the responsibility crushing his shoulders.  “I thought they were my friends, until yesterday.  Apparently they only liked me because the team kept winning whenever I played.”

“They’re beating you up because you quit the team?”  John wished he was surprised, but while sport had never been his thing, enough of his schoolmates were sport-mad that he could see them doing exactly that. Scott didn’t answer, but his eyes gleamed with tears in the faint light.

It made John angry. Who measured friendship by how successful someone was at a sport?  Who dropped their friend right when they were needed most?  Even if they didn’t know what was wrong, surely a friend would accept a change in hobbies?

He might not know them, but these unknown so-called friends of Scott were going to go down. How dare they make his brother cry?

The tears Scott turned his head away to hide could have just been grief about their Mom, but given the context of their conversation, John knew better.  It was also the sting of betrayal, and he wasn’t going to stand for it.

“Scott,” he said, muscling his way onto his brother’s bed and tugging gently but determinedly on his wrist until he caved and lay down.  “As soon as Grandma’s here, you have to tell her.”

Stony silence greeted him, and he pulled the comforter over the pair of them, nudging insistently at Scott until he had enough room to be comfortable.  “If you don’t, I will.”

“Don’t you dare,” Scott lashed back, rolling on his side to face away from John.  “Get out of my bed.”

“You didn’t let me suffer in silence,” John reminded him, staying where he was.  He wasn’t as clingy as his brothers, but right now he didn’t want his own bed.  “You’re right, even when we do have a guardian here, I can’t stand in front of you and threaten everyone that wants to hurt you.  But that doesn’t mean I’m going to stand by and let it happen.  Grandma will do something.”

“Grandma has the four of you to worry about,” Scott mumbled, and John rolled his eyes.  Whoever said older was wiser had clearly never met his older brother.

“Grandma has five grandsons and she’ll worry about us all,” he reminded him.  “She’ll find out somehow, even if we don’t say anything. You know she will, and then she’ll be sad you didn’t tell her straight away.”

Scott groaned in defeat, then rolled back over with another, pained, groan.  How long did Tylenol last?

“I know,” he muttered, wiping at his eyes with his sleeves.  “I know.”

John shuffled a little closer, pressing their shoulders together.  Once they got bigger – Scott was already hitting a growth spurt – they wouldn’t be able to fit easily on the same bed, but for now, they both fit well enough side-by-side.  After a moment, Scott’s head rested against his on the pillow, and fingers tangled with his own where their arms were pressed together.

“We’ll survive,” Scott muttered, squeezing lightly.  John nodded, and squeezed back.  “Grandma will be here soon.”

It was both a promise and a plea.

Part V

[renaerys]

11. “You’re going to make it. Just stay awake.” (Butch/Buttercup)

{{Original posting unfortunately deleted. Reposted here.}}

February Fic Prompt #11 originally requested by Anon. Greens shenanigans and hella innuendo, just the way I like them.

xxx

Everybody knew that the best person to go on night patrol with was Boomer. The guy talked but not nearly as much as Bubbles, who could probably talk herself through an earthquake and never even notice. He wasn’t a micromanager like Blossom or a straight-up jerk like Brick. And he definitely was not even half as annoying as Butch could be.

“You ever wonder what the fuck is up with Monster Island?”

Butch sat next to Buttercup on the Millennium Tower, the tallest building in Townsville, with their feet dangling over the edge and the city lights at their feet. She narrowed her eyes at him. “No.”

He ignored her. “You know, ‘cause that place is what, three? Four square miles? And the monsters just keep coming.”

“What’s your point?” Buttercup said, not really caring. Her watch read a quarter past midnight. She should’ve been in bed an hour ago.

Butch suddenly leaned in close, and Buttercup leaned back away from him. He looked very serious, and that almost always meant he was about to say something mad dumb—

“Giant beast orgies.”

Buttercup groaned. It was going to be a long night.

“For real! They must be going at it 24/7 poppin’ out tentacle monsters and dino hybrids and flaming squirrels at the rate we fight ‘em. How does that even work? Like, are they all just fucking and it’s Baby Roulette to see what’s gonna come out?”

“Dude, gross. I don’t want to think about that shit.”

“Pssh, don’t lie.”

“I’m really not.”

“You’re not even a little bit curious about what kinda Stranger Things shit is going down right over the bay?” Butch pointed southwest toward Citiesville’s Golden Bay, where the aptly named Monster Island sat a few miles off the coast. “Like the Booger Monster we fought before the Reds fucked off to Snob College. How does that even work?”

He made a crude gesture with this fist and forefinger and then pantomimed picking his nose. Buttercup shoved him off the edge of the building.

“Cut it out, Butch. I said I don’t want to talk about that shit.” She grabbed the backpack he’d brought and pulled out a bag of chips. “Besides, there’s nothing to talk about. It’s just weird monster biology, end of story.”

Butch floated one hundred stories above the ground and grinned at her. “So you have wondered about it.”

“Clearly not as much as you, Horny Darwin.”

He threw back his head and laughed from his gut. Buttercup scowled and stuffed some chips in her mouth. The crunch helped her focus, but her eyes were drooping and her head felt a bit fuzzy.

“Hey, you okay?” Butch was no longer laughing as he hovered close and peered at Buttercup. “You look tired.”

Buttercup cast the chips aside. They weren’t really helping, and she wasn’t hungry, anyway. She ran a hand through her shoulder-length hair. “Yeah, I woke up at 4 a.m. today.”

“Why the hell would you wake up that early on a patrol night?”

“Because I wasn’t supposed to be patrolling tonight, you were.”

“Oh, right. I forgot.”

Not surprising. Butch tended to tune out shit that didn’t directly concern him, especially if it was coming from Blossom. She’d called Buttercup at four in the goddamned morning ranting about some giant hairball monster that had attacked Ivy University campus and how Brick had been so sleep deprived that they’d both nearly suffocated to death and she had to help him to bed and somehow all of this was now Buttercup’s problem because Blossom knew they were patrolling alone for only a few hours to get out of it but no one should be patrolling alone in case of giant hairballs attacking. Buttercup pointed out that the likelihood of another giant hairball attacking Townsville, which was clear across the country from Blossom and Brick’s college, was pretty low. Blossom told her to cut the attitude and make sure Butch didn’t patrol alone tonight. She did not have time to argue when she had to go convince the administration to change Brick’s finals schedule so he could actually get some sleep.

And since Boomer and Bubbles were currently out of town at a music festival until tomorrow, Buttercup had no choice but to be here tonight.

“Ugh, whatever. Did you bring any of those energy shots? I’m about to pass out,” Buttercup said.

Butch sat back down next to her and pulled his bag onto his lap. “You know that shit’s basically radioactive rat piss.”

“This from the guy who scarfed three bacon double cheeseburgers on the flight over here.”

He grinned wolfishly and flexed his bicep at her. “Hey, this hot bod doesn’t get by on yogurt and protein shakes alone. A man needs red meat.”

“A man needs less cholesterol in his diet if he wants to live past 40.”

“See, this is why it’d never work between us. Sorry doll, I gotta lead with my stomach.”

Buttercup snapped at that awful pet name he’d taken to calling her lately and swung around to punch him in the stomach. He caught her fist just as it made contact, absorbing the brunt of her force, and met her eyes. The son of a bitch was still grinning.

“Don’t fucking call me that,” she hissed. Her fist shook and sparked with green energy as she tried to finish her punch, but he held on.  

Halfway under her as she threw her weight behind her stalled punch, Butch’s smile relaxed into something softer but just as dangerous as he looked up at her through his messy bangs. “You kinda like it.”

Buttercup dug her knee into his thigh right over the femoral artery, and he shuddered. “Yeah, this is me liking it.”

She applied more pressure, and he gasped. His other hand grabbed her shoulder and threw her off him, but Buttercup rolled and landed on her hands and feet in a crouch. Butch matched her guerrilla stance and they faced off on top of the world with the stars at their backs and thunder in their veins.

“Still gonna pass out?” he asked.

“What?”

“You said you were about to pass out. Is this any better?”

Buttercup frowned. He’d provoked her on purpose to distract her from her sleepiness? That was almost…

He got up and stretched like a cat, and Buttercup couldn’t help but notice the subtle ridges of his abs when his dark shirt ran up for just a moment. Clearly he was excelling at that gym trainer job he’d been at full-time since they graduated high school.

Not that that mattered at all.

She got up and wiped her hands on her jeans. “A little, I guess. Still tired as shit though.”

Butch cracked his neck like he was getting ready to fight, but he wasn’t. For as long as she had known him, Buttercup had always been able to sense when he felt the urge, just as he could sense it in her. Primal, instinctual, not just a need but a desire to ruin and be ruined all for the manic joy of surviving it. She felt it less the older she got once her body stopped changing and growing, but every couple of months they would inevitably seek each other out for a row. Not even monsters could quite scratch that particular itch. If anything, they exacerbated it.

“Sweet. I got a few other ideas,” he said.

Buttercup crossed her arms. “You get ideas?”

“Ha ha, you bitch. I’m serious.”

She cracked a smile. “We’re on patrol.”

“Yeah, so let’s go patrol.”

“What’re you—”

He took off in a blaze of green, not flying but running down the side of the Millennium Tower, dodging balconies and flipping off the flagpole like some kind of insane Super gymnast. He didn’t lose momentum when he landed and took off running across the busy street toward the next building.

Buttercup was dashing after him before she could think twice about it, to hell with staying here by herself. She slid over the roofs of two cars crossing the street and leaped from balcony to balcony as she climbed the next building higher and higher. Butch had already made it to the top and paused to look back at her. His smiling challenge boiled her blood, and he took off sprinting again along the drain pipes. Buttercup flipped over the guard railing on the roof, sprinted to the other side, and leaped off the edge in a free fall.

The night wind whipped her loose hair, and she somersaulted to cushion her landing on the pedestrian sky bridge connecting this building to the next. Butch slid down the drain pipe and landed similarly a short ways ahead on the glass and metal bridge. They faced off, and she couldn’t help but grin fantastically at the sight of him winded and emanating green power, ready to run.

They didn’t speak, there was no need. He took off and she tore after him, each carving their own path leaping concrete chasms, rolling into their falls, and racing against gravity and mortality up the mirror-bright sides of skyscrapers. Buttercup cartwheeled through a narrow path between two huge AC generators and landed like a cat on the metal railing, where she spotted an enormous tower crane powered down for the night in the midst of a new construction project. It was tens of stories tall, and she wanted nothing more than to run up its mast.

Butch had the same idea and leaped like a monkey from the roof of the building next to hers and grabbed the jib. He hit it with the force of a Super, and the huge machinery whined and began to swing. Buttercup abandoned her original plan for one that would be a thousand times cooler. Moving fast, she raced along the thin railing and pedaled through her jump to get her across to the next building over. The crane groaned in protest as Butch sprinted along the length of the jib. She wouldn’t have much of a window.

With a running start, Buttercup scrambled up the wall of the roof access door and jumped high into the air just as the long, metal winch cord came swinging by. She grabbed it barely in the nick of time and went spinning.

Above, she searched for Butch and found that he wasn’t slowing his momentum even as he neared the end of the jib. Buttercup gave the winch cord a little extra boost of her power and went careening high into the air on an updraft just as Butch free-dived off the jib. The night air parted for her and the stars fell to meet her as she reached out, elated, and Butch reached back.

They joined hands at the wrists, and Buttercup moved with gravity and the momentum he’d brought with him before it could wrench her arm clean out of the socket. Together, they hurtled through the air, bounced off a radio tower pole, and landed in a two-man roll on a private rooftop golf course.

Butch was laughing when they came to a stop in a heap on the green, and Buttercup laughed with him. He had his arms around her as she hovered over him.

“That was,” he stammered, breathless.

“Amazing!” Buttercup said.

“Fucking incredible! Holy shit, when you ran for the winch cord—”

“I didn’t think I’d stick it for a second—”

“But you did and I swear I lost my goddamned mind—”

“You jumped! You fucking idiot, you’re lucky I was there to catch you.” Buttercup shoved him, but he only laughed again and held her waist tighter.

“Woman please, how could you ever resist the chance to catch this hot shit? I saw your face, you totally creamed yourself!”

“Fuck you, it was the moment and I wasn’t even looking at you!”

They could hardly breathe as they laughed, and gravity rolled them over. The grass was cool under Buttercup’s cheek, and above the stars were bright and close. Slowly, the moment subsided as they caught their breaths and watched each other through the gloom.

“I kinda knew you’d catch me,” Butch said.

Buttercup rolled her eyes. “I regret it already.”

“Sure you do.”

He was smiling, but there was no mocking or malice behind it. Strangely enough, Buttercup thought it suited him.

She pulled away before she could finish that dangerous train of thought, and he let her without making a big deal out of it. They sat up side by side and looked out over the city and the ocean beyond. Monster Island was dark, but the detection barrier surrounding it glowed a subtle blue in the starlight and city lights.

“Five and a half hours until sunrise,” Butch said, checking his watch.

Buttercup groaned. “That’s so long from now.”

He nudged her shoulder with his. “You’re gonna make it. Just stay awake.”

“Wow, genius plan.” She nudged him back.

“Hey, I got plenty more ideas where Super Parkour came from. Just say the word.”

Buttercup allowed herself a smile in the darkness. Butch could drive her crazy, but over the years she’d gotten used to his self-indulgent vulgarity. Sometimes she didn’t mind. Sometimes it was just kind of nice. Familiar. A pull she couldn’t explain or describe, except that she knew he felt it too, and he always knew exactly what she needed.

“In a few minutes,” Buttercup said, her eyes drooping a bit as sleep crept up on her little by little.

She could feel his warmth through her sleeve and his, close enough to touch, close enough.

“Yeah,” he said, and turned his gaze skyward. “Just a few more minutes.”

They had all night, after all.

[adamdriverwrites]

Carpe Noctem || Part 1

Plot summary: Mob boss’s daughter & bodyguard au ft. Kylo Ren. Based off this plot bunny (x)

Warnings: extreme violence, swearing, sexual themes, mentions of non consensual sexual violence, drug use and other explicit themes in this story.

Word count: 3734

Pairing: Kylo Ren/Reader

A/N: here is chapter one, im super excited to delve into this, enjoy! tell me what you think!

Taglist: let me know if you want to be added!

Masterlist here

After all these years being away from your home, you didn’t think that the reason for your return would be under such unfortunate circumstances. One of your brothers going to jail, perhaps, but not the funeral of your beloved sister. You weren’t close with your family, you talked to your Father every couple of months when you needed him to send money to help with university fees and such, but it had been a very long time since you had seen any of them in person.

Mallory was the only one that bothered to visit you - lugging herself halfway across the world to spend Christmas or your birthday together.

You thought you felt hopeless and alone before…

You hadn’t talked to your Dad since that night, save for a lone email telling him you would fly in on Thursday and be staying for an unknown amount of time. You didn’t know what to say, and didn’t want to talk to anyone. You reveled in your silence, grabbing an uber home instead of asking him or one of your brothers for a ride. You landed at 1 pm in New York and figured they would be busy. The driver tried to make small talk, but you kept it to a minimum. Directing him where to go, he drove out of the city, entering suburbia and continuing on until the distance between properties grew far greater. Leading him to a particular neighborhood of large mansions separated by sprawling fields and lush forests until you arrived at your driveway. Driving down the long, winding gravel road, large willow trees lining either side, the two of you maneuvered around the circular driveway. pulling up to a stop at the front door. You peered out the window, looking at the dark stone and large glass, the cold Snoke family manor standing tall in front of you. It looked exactly the same as you remembered. Whispering a thanks, you made exit with your one measly suitcase full of belongings.

You had made a silent promise to yourself you wouldn’t come back for as long as you could get away with it. No one could hold a grudge like you, and when your father sent you away to boarding school at the tender age of 13 you never really forgot how much it hurt.

You had come home for one Christmas holidays when you were 16. It had been such a disaster that you hadn’t been back since.

8 years…. The spell broken all because of Mallory. She had been begging you to come home for a long time. And it would seem she finally got her way. You just hated that she wasn’t here to see it.

Walking up to the front door, you grabbed the handle and pushed, only to be met with a force. You almost headbutted the hard, black painted wood, before realizing it was locked. With a sigh and a curse, you knocked on it with your knuckles. Fancy being locked out of your own house…

There was no answer, and you knocked again, this time your fist pounding harder against the door.

A muffled voice came from inside, muttering they were ‘coming and to ’chill the fuck out’. You held your breath, nerves rising to the precipice, you crossed your fingers and toes it wasn’t your brother Lyon. The door swung open, a gust of wind blowing your hair around your face and you were met with someone familiar.

Dark skin, black hair, and a dashingly perfect smile that reminded you of being a kid.

Finn breathed out your name, his smile growing wider as he pulled you in for a hug, lifting you off the ground in the process. You smiled back, dropping your duffel bag to wrap both arms around him in return.

“Welcome home!” He laughed, separating to look at you again. You went to reach for your luggage but he was quick to pick it up. His eyes met yours again and he maintained his smile, looking you over before he shook his head. “Look at you. All grown up.”

You gave him a wry smile. “That’s the funny thing about time…” you looked past him at the wide expanse of the foyer, proceeding to walk through the doorway. Glistening black, white and cream marble, elaborate moldings and every inch sparkling clean. It all looked exactly the same. “Although, I could say the same about you.“

You had a bit of a crush on Finn growing up. He was closest to your age, but still a little older that you revered his actions and jokes like he was the funniest guy on the planet. He was always around because his Dad worked for your Father, and even though he was friends with your older brother’s, he was always so nice to you. Even if you were an annoying little kid. Giving you  a sideways smirk, he used his free arm to curl up and show off his arms, flexing and tensing his muscles. "Well, I uh, have been hitting the gym pretty hard lately.”

“I can tell.” You smiled, if not speaking the truth then only to bolster his confidence he was clearly searching for. You walked deeper into the foyer, eyes casting upward at the tall ceilings. After all these years, you had forgotten how expansive and extravagant it really was. All of it was a nostalgic fueled kick in the face.

“Hey, listen, I’m sorry about Mallory-”

“Me too.” You cut him off. If anything to shut down the conversation so you wouldn’t have to talk about it. “Is Dad home?”

“Yeah. He’s in his office. C'mon,” He shut the large double doors behind him and the two of you walked forward. You glanced at the sprawling hallway in front of you, walking underneath the double curving stairways on either side. As you ventured further, soft voices could be heard. The voices increased in volume, none of them readily recognizable, all sounds merging to create a deep baritone completely unfamiliar to your ears.

“He’s been holed up in his office for the past few days.” Finn explained quietly to you, pushing towards the rumpus room. “You might just be able to pull him out of his funk.”

You sniggered bitterly. “I’m about to make it worse.”

Finn looked back at you. “Don’t say that. He loves you, you know.”

The snigger turned into a small laugh. Agreeing again only to move past the conversation and be done with it. “Yeah.”

You two stopped outside the double doors of the recreation room. Glancing inside the smokey dwelling, you saw no familiar faces. You could rest easy for another minute knowing that you weren’t about to run into any of your brothers. There was about 5 men scattered about, talking, laughing, drinking and smoking. The room was long, filled with a large pool table placed in the center, floor to ceiling bookshelves covered the walls, separated only by windows that peered into the front and the back of the property. Black leather chesterfield sofas pushed to the sides of the room with a few coffee tables littered nearby. It continued on, ending with two more large double doors that led to your Father’s office. You always hated that daunting walk when you were a kid. You gathered it was a deterrent your Dad set in place so he didn’t have to talk to his children that often. They were less likely to walk through a room of gangsters and criminals just to bug their Father when he was working.

“Go on through. I’ll take your stuff up to your room for you.”

“Thanks, Finn.”

You stepped forward, ignoring the looks from people you didn’t recognize, keeping your eyes trained on the doors at the end of the room.

“Holy. Shit.” Your head turned to the voice, and leaning against the bookcase in the dark corner of the room and smoking a cigarette was Phasma. She walked into the light, towering over your short figure, looking almost exactly the same as you remembered. Gorgeous blonde hair in perfectly in place and immaculately tailored suit adorning her as always.

You let a genuine smile curve your lips, and you met her halfway. Phasma was one of the very few people who you could have said you had actually missed. “The prodigal daughter returns…” her smirk copied your own, and her blue eyes cast over your form. “Looking good, Snoke.”

“You too.” You smiled and eyed her cigarette. Maybe it would help your nerves. “Can I please have one of those?”

She pulled an extra from the pack in her pocket and handed it over. “Don’t tell him you got it from me.”

“I’m not a kid anymore, Gwen.”

“I guess not.” She eyed your figure, and you resisted the urge to roll your eyes.

“Alright,” you sighed heavily, coming to the realization this might be harder than you thought it was going to be. “Time to bite the bullet. Wish me luck.”

She stepped aside with a soft smile. Gripping the cigarette in your hand, you walked forward, ignoring the other eyes in the room staring at you. All faceless lackeys, ready to die for your Father’s cause. Coming to a stop in front of the large double, oak doors, lacquered completely in a dark stain, you took a deep breath and prepared yourself. You hadn’t seen your Father in years, and although you had talked, him seeing your face was a different story. The reason he sent you away in the first place was only more prominent now. Raising your fist, you knocked on the door and waited patiently for an answer. Nostalgia kicking in once more, like all the times you were a kid, standing outside this very door and waiting for your Father to beckon you inside.

God, that was shit you would have preferred to forget.

A muffled reply beckoned you to ’come in’. Your hand that was vacant of your unlit cigarette gripped the black iron door knob, lion’s head in a roaring position. Some more gaudy detailing. Twisting it with much more force than necessary, you pushed the heavy door and entered.

The room was smoky, the smell of tobacco assaulting your senses first. The room was slightly darker than the recreation room, and when you shut the door behind you, you realized it was deathly quiet. Noise from the outside barely distinguishable in the fortress that was your Father’s office. A stark contrast to the loud men outside drinking and smoking and playing pool and having fun. This was suddenly the sordid den reserved for strategical talks you weren’t privy to as a kid.

His desk stood center at the far end, two back leather chairs in front, facing it. You noticed an unfamiliar man first, facing away from you. Only the back of his head and broad shoulders visible. Then your eyes fluttered to your Father, leaned back in his chair, head resting softly in his hand, eyes focused on the unknown man before they ventured up towards you. He sat up quickly, his position changing the second he realized who had just entered.

“Hi.” He looked the same as you remembered, if only with a few more wrinkles and more grey hair, though the dark bags under his eyes suggested he was feeling more human than usual.

When your Father stood up and made his way around his desk, the unknown man turned to glance in your direction, and his eyes met your own. Eyebrow perking slightly as he looked at you fully.

“Wow, kiddo.” the proximity of your Father’s voice caught your attention again, and you turned to see he was close. Bright blue eyes glancing all over your face, and a smile covering his lips, before his arms surrounded you and pulled you in for a hug. He was taller than you, and your face pressed against his chest. You frowned at the feeling of contact; not because it was unpleasant, just unfamiliar. You didn’t know which one of those was more sad. Before you could even think about raising your arms from your side to wrap them around him in return, he pulled away. Hands grasping your shoulders as held you in front of him. “Look at you. You’re all grown up, and…” His voice trailed off as his eyes shined with something darker, more solemn.  "You look just like her.“

And there it was. The words you didn’t want to hear out of your Father’s mouth. Like you didn’t live in your Mother’s shadow enough already. You were almost all out of fake smiles at the sound of that comment. You gifted a half-assed one to him out of respect for Mallory’s memory.

"It’s so good to have you back home.” you bit back a snarky comment about why the fuck he would send you away in the first place then, also out of respect for your sister. You guess you still harbored some resentment. You pegged it down to your overwhelmed senses and assaulted nostalgia. Being back home was making you feel a lot of things in a very short amount of time, it was hard to cope. “It’s been a while, sweetheart.”

“Yeah.” Your eyes shifted in the direction of the man behind your father. He was now standing, dark eyes staring at you and your interaction with your Dad. A penetrating gaze that seemed like he was assessing you and your words intently. You didn’t recognize him, and you definitely would have remembered a man looking like that working for your father. Strong roman nose, black eyes that looked like he could kill, a scar running down the right side of his face, broad shoulders and large muscles wound tightly under the fabric of his black suit. An intimidating presence indeed.

“That’s Kylo.” Your Father spoke, walking around his desk. You instinctively followed him, walking towards the man he just introduced, and as you approached the seat, his eyes raked over your form. “Kylo, this is my daughter.”

“Hello.” A quiet voice erupted from your lips, one that you were unfamiliar with. You weren’t even entirely sure it was your own. You blamed this new man, and his piercing gaze. He didn’t speak, or smile a hello in return, only looked you up and down as you moved to sit in a chair, then walked away to the side of the room without a word.

Jesus fucking Christ. Who was this guy?

“He will be…” your Father’s words paused and you looked back at him to see him hesitant, “Looking after you while you’re here.”

“What?”

“Since Mallory’s passing, I have assigned some of my men to your brother’s. Kylo is my best man, and I’ve assigned him to you.”

Your eyebrows furrowed deeply. Was he serious? “You want me to have a bodyguard?”

“What happened to Mallory– I don’t think was an accident, and before she…” your Father hesitated once more. Words catching in his throat. You leaned forward in your seat, eager to hear the words spill from his lips. Before Mallory what? You had so many questions, and after the long flight with no sleep the amount of questions had doubled, tripled. You had fought sleep with the processing of information and trying to deal with it in your own way; paranoia fueled reasoning. You wanted to question him intently, but not in front of company, and not while being home all of 5 minutes. But the fact he didn’t think it was an accident? That perhaps Mallory’s death could have been intentional? Now, that was the sort of shit you wanted to hear desperately.

“Some things happened with work,” he continued, “And I don’t want to bury any more of my children. So Kylo will be looking after you while we get to the bottom of this.”

Your gaze flipped over to the man in the corner of the room, back towards you, pouring a drink from the crystal decanter full of scotch. He turned, and you noticed a lit cigarette now dangling between his large fingers. He eyed you with the same look; devoid of any emotion and impossibly hard to read. Though one thing you could infer by the way he stared at you, he didn’t look like it was his first choice of preferred activity; looking after the boss’s daughter. You let your mind wander to the possibilities of his position working under your Father. He didn’t seem like the usual lackey that hung around the Snoke manor, so what the hell did he do exactly?

“No.”

“No?” He questioned you, surprised at the notion. You gathered it had been a long time since anyone had the balls to tell him ‘no’.

“I don’t need a bodyguard. I haven’t been home since I was 16. No one knows who I am, and if they do, then they don’t know what I look like.” A lie, though you stood by the conviction in your voice. “I’ll be fine. I can look after myself.” Another lie.

“Sorry, kiddo, but that’s not going to happen,” Something behind his eyes changed and his voice softened an infinitesimal amount, staring deep at your face. Another first. Fuck, something must have been wrong. “you’re all I got left.”

You so desperately wanted to tell him that ’you weren’t her’, and that you weren’t destined to fall to the same fate as your Mother. However, the look on his face and the intent behind his eyes, you knew he wouldn’t budge. Stubborn old fool set in his ways. But that didn’t mean you had to do exactly what he said, so you begrudgingly accepted with a nod of your head. Easily ignoring the sentiment behind his comment, especially when you had a whole childhood of neglect at your disposal.

“What time is the funeral tomorrow?"You changed the topic, already eager to talk about something else.

"2 p.m, Greenwood Cemetery…” His eyes cast over his desk. “She’s being buried next to your mother.”

“Okay.” you nodded your head and placed the cigarette you had been holding between your lips. Your father had never seen you smoke, and you figured it wasn’t a secret worth keeping if you were going to be here an undisclosed amount of time. “Well, I’m going to go unpack, sleep off this jet lag.”

You stood up before any more words could be spoken. Already well over this conversation. You glanced in your Father’s direction before turning around and walking towards the exit. Your eyes locked with Kylo’s once more, finding that he was still very intently observing you. You didn’t like that one bit.

Leaving through the doors, you were immediately hit with the loud noise of laughter and pool cues hitting balls - a stark contrast compared to the deathly silence in your Father’s office, and you were grateful that interaction was over.

You were quick to make it out of the room, through the long hallways, up the winding stairs and to the east wing of the Snoke manor. Your bedroom was far away from the madness of the central part of the house. You hoped that most of this trip could be spent in relative solitude, if you kept away then maybe it could even be remembered as bearable.

You ventured to end of the eastern hallway, quiet compared to a lot of the house. Your bedroom doors were left open, you assumed by Finn, who had also placed your suitcase on top of your bed. You walked further in, closing the dark wood doors behind you, and glanced around. It was much like the rest of the house, tall ceilings with elaborate moldings and designs. Floor to ceiling windows contrasted with large red velvet curtains, perfect for keeping out the penetrating sunlight. Your room was almost the whole size of your apartment back home, and you forgot exactly how expansive this place was. Well, there was 16 bedrooms, a green house and a hedge maze, so how could you truly be surprised? Your family loved extravagance and wide open spaces, and if your father was still running the same way he used to, he needed somewhere to keep all his lackeys that resided on the property, and he liked that far away from his own quarters.  

There was hardly any furniture save for a large bed, and a slightly outdated tv and stereo system, and your vanity table. Though all surfaces in your room were lacking a layer of dust suggesting this room wasn’t as absent as it had been for all these years. You gathered your father had his cleaners in here before you arrived and made this room relatively hospitable.

Mallory’s soft voice ran through your head, ’He never lets anyone in there, you know. Just like your car in the dark, dingy part of the garage, no one’s allowed to touch your stuff’. You had sighed and told her to shut up, she always rambled when she was drunk. ’It’s like he’s waiting for you to come back.’

You went over to the vanity, hoping that everything was still in the drawers like you had left it. You remembered specifically one item that you desperately sought. Shoving a disgustingly old chapstick aside, along with a hair scrunchie or two, you found the little book of matches you reserved for when you liked to light candles. Taking it with you and sitting on the edge of the bed, you dejectedly lit your cigarette.

Inhaling the nicotine deeply, you collapsed backwards onto the feather down comforter. Letting the interaction with your Father sink in. Shock now moderately subsided, you focused on his words, on what he had said about Mallory. He didn’t think it was an accident either, and he had vaguely suggested that something bad had happened with work too. Obviously whatever had transpired was clearly bad enough to warrant a bodyguard for your protection. He told you that he was working on it, but that didn’t stifle any pain from the loss of your sister. You were hungry for justice and revenge, and you weren’t about to sit around and not contribute.

So, after Mallory was buried, and you were assured you could have a moment alone with your Dad, you were going to convince him to let you help. He owed you that much.

[rainybookshop]

Of Slytherins and Friendly Drinks

Fandom: Harry Potter

Pairing: Marcus Flint x Oliver Wood

Words: 3,408

Read it on AO3 here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21554488?view_adult=true

He should have known going out for drinks with Terence and Adrian was a mistake.

It’s a mistake because Adrian’s right in the middle of a case that’s been plaguing the Auror department for weeks and of course he gets called away just as their second pint is set down in front of them. It’s a mistake because Terence, who’s dealing with an exceptionally complicated incidence of spell damage and looks like he hasn’t slept in 3 days, turns pale when his wand vibrates and has to rush back to St Mungo’s not fifteen minutes later. And it’s a mistake because, just as Marcus resolves to finish his last drink and find some friends with less ridiculous jobs, the entire Puddlemere Quidditch team bursts into the bar, bringing with them a smiling, exalted, windswept-looking Oliver Wood.  

They’re fresh off a win, of course - they’d have to be, with the amount of jovial hugging going on - but Puddlemere is enjoying their best season in decades, currently at the top of the League by a margin of 683 points. This success is due, in part, to consistently impressive goal-keeping by Keeper Oliver Wood, but is mainly attributed to  Puddlemere’s recent acquisition of famed Bulgarian Seeker Viktor Krum, whose reasons for relocation have never been confirmed. (Popular rumours, however, hint at Krum’s desire to be closer to the object of his affections, reputedly either Ron Weasley or Hermione Granger - or both, if the more salacious gossip columns are to be believed).

Marcus has no desire to fly with a team that takes part in the frankly mortifying levels of affection currently on display from Puddlemere, but he can’t deny the envy he feels at getting to share the field with a player as phenomenally talented as Krum. He’d gone over Bulgaria's plays for weeks after the Quidditch World Cup, memorizing the chaser formations and flight patterns and reading every half-decent review article he could find in the stressful months leading up to tryouts for the League - Marcus is almost disappointed he can’t see Krum among the crowd of exuberant players tonight, but it’s just as well, really - his night’s clearly not salvageable anyway.  

He's just about to finish the rest of his ale and Floo home when he glances up to find Oliver Wood walking towards his table, smiling and carrying 2 fresh pints.

He is, Marcus thinks resentfully, even better-looking than he remembers.

“Fancy a drink with me?” Wood asks when he gets closer, easy as anything, and Marcus freezes.

What the fuck.

He and Wood have hardly spoken in the 6 years since they’ve graduated from Hogwarts - aside from brusquely acknowledging one another on the pitch or at Quidditch functions, they haven’t interacted at all. They’re certainly not at a level of familiarity to warrant having drinks together on a Saturday night, especially when it could be misconstrued by one of the vapid twats at Witch Weekly as a date. Wood probably doesn’t even realize how it might look - two men sitting close together in a crowded pub, leaning close to hear one another over the buzz of conversation - although they’d probably never start those rumours about golden boy Oliver Wood anyway, Marcus figures bitterly.

Because despite being the sole heir to a rather considerable fortune, Marcus has known for a very long time that he can’t have everything he wants.

He’d been lucky to get a reserve spot with the Falcons once he’d graduated Hogwarts after being dropped by the Wasps when he’d failed his seventh year, and he knows the only reason he didn’t lose that spot when news of his father’s arrest broke was that he’d just played the best season of his career. He plays too dirty to be considered for captaincy and he’s too surly with reporters, and while he gets along fine with his team, he’s certainly never developed the kind of nauseating camaraderie that's clearly commonplace with Puddlemere.

So it really doesn’t matter if handsome Quidditch players flash Marcus a smile that lasts just a second too long, or if a good-looking man eyes him speculatively when he’s out for drinks with his mates. Because for all the wizarding world is changing, despite the new laws and the rampant, gleeful speculation in Witch Weekly about which male Quidditch players and star Aurors might secretly be dating each other, there’s too much at stake for him to risk tarnishing his reputation any further.

So Oliver Wood – stupid, idealistic, gorgeous Oliver Wood – can keep his friendly drinks to himself, Marcus thinks.

Marcus reaches forward and downs the rest of his ale, swallowing roughly and avoiding Wood’s eyes.

“Look, Wood, I was just leaving,” he mumbles, turning around to reach for his cloak.

“But it’s not even ten!” Wood exclaims. “You’ve got to at least have one more drink,” he tells Marcus earnestly.  

“No, I, uh... I can’t stay,” Marcus mutters, glancing up at Wood, and he sees the moment he gets it, bright smile faltering slightly before he nods once, briefly.

Except then Wood looks a little crestfallen, and Marcus feels a pang of something that feels horribly like regret.

Before either of them can say anything more, someone calls out, “Vood! There you are,” and fucking Viktor Krum appears at Wood’s elbow, holding an enormous tankard of beer and glancing between them with a furrow between his formidable dark eyebrows.

“Ve are doing shots,” Krum explains to Wood, who groans good-naturedly, before turning to Marcus and adding, “Flint, yes? Your goal against Yarrow last veek vas very impressive.”

And then Viktor Krum is shaking his fucking hand and adding, “Come, sit vith us,” and it’s not like Marcus can say no.

He follows Krum and Wood to a large wooden table near the back of the bar, where Krum introduces him to the rest of the team, who are passing out creamy-looking shots from an enormous tray in the centre, and then Krum gestures for Marcus to take a seat next to him at the end of the table. This leaves the only remaining seat - directly opposite Marcus - for Wood, who sets down one pint and immediately downs a third of the other. After one tense, awkward moment where Marcus feels the horrible urge to start making small, the team starts in on a rousing rendition of the Puddlemere chant and Marcus takes the second pint with a muttered, “thanks”.

He and Wood both return to their drinks, resolutely avoiding one another’s eyes as the other players sing about fair play and fairer lasses, and Marcus blinks in surprise when the first drops hit his tongue. Wood brought him his favourite ale, an old Irish blend that’s almost never stocked in pubs like this. He glances up at Wood, absent-mindedly taking the shot glass Krum hands him, and he’d swear Wood’s cheeks have taken on a faint pink flush, but that’s probably just from the beer.

They all toast - to Puddlemere, of course, Jesus - and then Marcus takes the shot along with the rest of them - it’s sweet, with just enough of a hint of vodka underneath that he knows he’ll be feeling it soon. Krum offers his own tankard up cheers and Marcus taps his glass against his, and then one of the other players calls out, “Can’t start off our evening without doing a Krum shot, eh, Viktor?”and Marcus nearly chokes on his beer.

Krum just rolls his eyes while the raucous laughter dies down - this is clearly not the first time he’s heard that joke - and then the player to Wood’s left asks, “Hey Flint, what d’you think your chances are against the Warriors on Thursday?”

"Pretty good," Marcus tells him honestly, thinking back to the match he'd seen a few weeks ago. "Our biggest concern will be Fitzroy - his aim's even better this year."

The rest of the Puddlemere team murmurs in agreement,  and the one who'd asked him - Adams, Marcus thinks - shakes his head in amazement, adding, "I think his last Bludger landed on target from fucking halfway across the pitch."

"They say Corving's nose vill never be the same," Krum states matter-of-factly, and they all wince in sympathy at that.

"The Warriors' Keeper isn't doing too badly this year though," Adams continues, and Marcus scoffs.

"Their Keeper can't guard his left hoop for shit," he responds dismissively, and the table immediately breaks into collective groans.

"Wood ranted to us about Marchand leaving his left hoop open for forty-five minutes yesterday," a hulking player named Anderson tells him.

"He's mentioned it at least three times this week," adds Ingram, a thin, weedy-looking man who's clearly Puddlemere's Seeker, fixing Wood with a look of fond exasperation.

"It's a beginner's mistake, any Keeper worth his Galleons knows better than to drift in the goal!" Wood protests emphatically, cheeks flushed an embarrassed red that somehow manages to look flattering on him, and his teammates all chime in with good-natured jibes, laughing as Adams ruffles Wood's hair.

Then Anderson unfolds his enormous form from the bench as he stands to get them their next round, and the Puddlemere players leave off teasing Wood as they call out a host of drink suggestions Marcus thinks can't possibly be real.

"You're right, you know," he tells Wood quietly while Krum informs his team that he'll make them all run laps around the pitch if they order the Krum shot again. "I dunno why Marchand hasn't fixed his fucking form already."

Wood's eyes light up, and after a brief hesitation, he adds, "He's fast, I'll give him that."

When Marcus nods, Wood adds, "He never would have made it this far if his reflexes weren't so damn good."

"Do you know how he holds up in close range?" Marcus ventures after a moment.

"You mean if you fly straight at him and try to intimidate him into letting you score?" Wood asks wryly, and just like that the lingering tension between them dissipates.

They're halfway through a heated discussion about whether the Warriors' star chaser is really back in top form following a recent injury (how she managed to sprain every muscle in her hand catching the Quaffle, Marcus will never understand) when Anderson returns holding a tray of elegant-looking yellow cocktails.

"Dirty Snitches, gents!" He booms, and honestly.

“They like Quidditch-themed drinks,” Wood offers, shrugging good-naturedly when he catches sight of Marcus's expression. Their fingers brush for a moment as Wood passes a glass across the table to Marcus, and he absolutely refuses to examine the way the touch sends sparks zinging up his arm. He leans forward slightly in his seat, sipping on a deceptively sweet cocktail as he listens to Wood recount the risks of serious hand and wrist injuries in rookie Chasers, trying not to feel charmed in spite of himself at the emphatic way Wood gestures with his hands.

***

They've mercifully returned to ale when Ingram looks over at them and asks, "You two were Captains at Hogwarts at the same time, yeah?"

"Yeah. We er, had a bit of a rivalry, really," Wood admits ruefully, and Marcus snorts at the understatement. Ingram catches it and grins, looking at them expectantly.

"I uh, may have booked the pitch during Gryffindor's practices a couple times," Marcus admits, and Wood scoffs indignantly.

"A couple of times, he says," Wood mutters, shaking his head and looking equal parts incredulous and amused. "You lot must have taken the pitch at least a dozen times for 'Seeker training' just to reschedule a game two weeks later because that Seeker was injured, even though the git barely had a scratch!"

Ingram bursts out laughing and Marcus shrugs, unrepentant.

“It was just so easy to piss you off,” Marcus grins, and Wood just shakes his head, huffing out an exasperated laugh and fixing him with a look that looks almost fond. A moment later, Wood's knee comes to rest against Marcus's underneath the table, and Marcus has to take a hasty sip of his ale to hide the way the touch makes his heart stutter almost painfully in his chest.

"Besides, you got Potter, we needed to give ourselves an advantage," Marcus shoots back.

"Your entire team had Nimbus two thousand and ones!" Wood protests immediately, and Marcus grins as they get caught up in reviewing old strategies and Hogwarts matches and what he's well-aware was some rather blatant cheating on his part, all while Wood's knee remains pressed up against his own.

***

It's almost an hour later when Anderson sets a deep violet drink in front of him that appears to be smoking, and Marcus realizes how closely he and Wood have drifted to one another, leaning forward in their seats with their hands close together on the table where they’d been holding their half-forgotten drinks.

"Dodgy Bludgers," Anderson tells them, his eyes sparkling with delight, and Marcus eyes the shot glass with suspicion.

"The ingredients change every week," Wood explains, looking at his own drink a little apprehensively. "Usually it's not half bad, as long as they don't try mixing Firewhiskey and raspberry Butterbeer again."

Marcus feels even more dubious, but he's not about to be shown up by the likes of Puddlemere, so he clinks his glass and takes the shot with the rest of them, wincing at the way the sweet taste can't hide the burn of what's clearly a copious amount of alcohol. He's wiping a few stray drops from the corner of his lip when he looks up and catches Wood staring at his mouth. Wood holds his gaze for a moment and Marcus wants to shiver at the intent, dark look in his eyes, before he forces himself to look away, feigning interest in whatever story Adams is currently telling.

Because he’s never heard so much as a whisper of anything about Oliver Wood, Quidditch darling and fan-favourite, especially among young, pretty witches. Marcus would never let himself be so reckless, but the last shot is still lingering on his tongue and he can't help looking over at Wood again. He's staring down at his lap, biting his lip distractedly, but he looks back up through his lashes when he feels Marcus's gaze on him, and suddenly Marcus feels like he can’t breathe.

He’s almost grateful for the interruption when the rest of the team begins to stand and gather their things, wishing them goodnight and looking almost shepherded out the door by Viktor Krum, who bids them farewell with a final nod and a "it vas good to meet you Flint," one corner of his mouth quirked up just slightly.

He and Wood are left alone at the table, where they bundle into their cloaks and make their way out to the dark, empty streets in silence. There's a chilly bite in the spring wind but Marcus hardly feels it, warm from the alcohol and the weight of Wood's gaze as his eyes flick down to Marcus's mouth again.

Fuck, it’s not like he hasn’t thought about it - about what Wood’s Quidditch-calloused hands would feel like on his skin, and if his cheeks would take on the same flush he’s gotten from the alcohol. It’s not like he hasn’t appreciated toned muscles and raw determination and the obvious intelligence that’s clear in the sometimes brilliant way Wood strategizes. He allows his gaze to fall to Wood’s mouth, at the slight indentation in his lip from biting it earlier, and Marcus lets himself want for a second.

Wood's expression shifts to one can’t quite decipher, and the air around them feels stretched taut, thick with anticipation and -

“Well, goodnight then.” Wood tells him with finality, turning to leave.

Marcus blinks.

“Goodnight,” he replies a second too late, cursing himself for his hesitation as Wood turns back towards him and fixes him with a scrutinizing look. Marcus realizes, with a sobering sort of horror, that there’s a very strong possibility he’s read this wrong, in which case he needs to get the fuck out now.

Fuck . This is exactly why he doesn’t get involved with Quidditch players. He feels a nauseating sense of dread creep up his spine, and he's casting around desperately for a way to explain himself when he’s caught off guard again as Wood starts to smile, looking both relieved and just a little bit smug.

“Had to be sure, didn’t I?” Wood asks him with a shrug, taking a step closer. “You were so reluctant to have a pint with me I wasn’t sure if I was imagining things.”

Marcus has to fight not to let his mouth drop open. He can’t believe he’s been outmaneuvered by Oliver Wood, of all people. He feels an sort of anger bubbling up that's reminiscent of trying to score on Gryffindor and being brought up short, of seeing clever Chaser formations that left his Beaters outflown, of a sense of defeat after matches that he would never admit was tinged with admiration. He’s suddenly furious, and he’s itching for a fight, cutting remark on his tongue –

And then Wood is shoving him up against the wall and kissing him so enthusiastically that for perhaps the first time in his life, Marcus forgets to be angry.

The kiss is intoxicating, sure and aggressive and a little bit messy, and before he knows it Marcus is tangling his fingers in Wood’s hair and slipping his tongue in his mouth and tugging him closer. Wood moans a little at that, kissing Marcus thoroughly again before leaning down to suck harshly on his neck. Marcus has to close his eyes at that, letting out a rough, shaky exhale before tugging Wood’s head up so he can kiss him again, and he can’t quite bite down on a groan.

And then Marcus is fumbling for his wand and they’re stumbling into his bedroom after a hasty apparition – honestly, it’s a miracle neither of them got Splinched – and then he’s tugging Wood’s jumper over his head while Wood clumsily unfastens the button on his jeans. Wood’s mumbling something about how he’s always wanted to do this, and Marcus thinks he says something in agreement that’s absolutely mortifying, but it doesn’t matter because they’re falling on his bed in a tangled heap and he doesn’t think he’s been more desperate in his life.

***

It’s - intense. Electric. Maybe more intimate than Marcus would normally allow, but it’s so good he can’t bring himself to care - not when Wood kisses with the same enthusiasm he normally saves for Quidditch, not when the sight of Wood’s blown pupils and kiss-bruised lips makes Marcus feel like he’s burning up, and definitely not when Marcus’s name spills out of Wood’s mouth like he just can’t help himself.

Then Wood leans closer and  bites down hard on Marcus’s lower lip, and Marcus is lost - to everything but the grip of Wood’s fingers on his hip, and Wood’s weight pressing him into the mattress and the feeling like they just can’t get close enough.

***

Later, Wood sprawls out inelegantly next to Marcus when they collapse onto the pillows, chests heaving as they fight to get their breath back. Marcus feels exhilarated and exhausted and lot like he’s just been hit by a particularly nasty Bludger, and judging from the expression on Wood’s face, he’s not the only one. He stares at Wood a moment longer, and he has to close his eyes when Wood leans in and kisses him softly, leaving him feeling exposed and raw in a way he's never felt before.

"Goodnight," Wood says quietly before settling deeper into the pillows and sighing contentedly. Marcus blinks in surprise, watching the way Wood's eyelashes flutter as his breathing deepens and slows, before he hurriedly rolls away  from him so he can't be accused of doing something that seemed horribly like watching Wood sleep.  

Marcus doesn't think he'll be able to sleep with the unfamiliar presence of someone else in his bed, but before long he feels the late hour catching up with him and his eyelids threaten to close. He’ll let Wood stay here a little longer, he decides. He’s just - comfortable, and tired, and feeling a little more generous than usual. And if Marcus doesn’t protest when Wood curls a little closer to him and drapes an arm around his waist - well, that doesn’t mean anything at all.

Besides, he figures, sighing contentedly and (maybe) inching a little farther into Wood’s embrace, Wood will probably be long gone by tomorrow morning.  

***

Author’s Note

The Quidditch Drinks: 

Krum Shot: -equal parts vodka, almond Bailey's, and almond milk (or creamy liqueur and milk of choice) in a shot glass

Dirty Snitch -2 oz pineapple juice,1 oz vodka, and a sprinkle of edible gold flakes

Dodgy Bludger -equal parts moonshine and crème de violette in a shot glass, topped with liquid smoke

Part 1 of “2 Quidditch Captains Walk into a Bar”

[ansgar-martinsson]

Fair Winds and a Following Sky - Part Two

Seat 7A, Business Class, United Airlines Flight 3300 - Somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean

Ten years. Ten years, two months and fifteen days. That was how long it had been since Anna Fair Sky had been aboard a plane. As she sat in seat 7A, she felt like a child of that very age. Scared, out of place, downright fearful.

I want my mama....

Last time she’d flown was with her then newlywed husband, heading out of the Will Rogers Airport on a tiny jet to a small, semi-private island in the Caribbean. That flight was torturous - full of turbulence, hard banks, and ultimately a not so soft landing on the impossibly short landing strip. Anna nearly kissed the ground when they’d lit from the jet - and had taken a double dose of Xanax, bought over the counter on the island - for the way home.

But she had no Xanax now, nothing to chemically calm her except the cold glass of Business Class whisky on the tray in front of her. It was her second, no... third drink of that flight, served in a thick-bottomed tumbler, rounded spheres of ice, and just a splash of Evian water to open out the flavor. She wondered, momentarily, just how many swigs of the Scottish elixir she could down before she could pass into a joyful unconsciousness.

As many as it took, and all on the credit card. Not as if I’m going to be home to get the bill, she thought. American Express can go fuck itself for all I care right now. Let Mamma Travidge handle it. Main account’s still in her name, anyway. She can go fuck herself too.

“Nervous?” 

“Huh?”

“I asked you, dear, are you nervous?” Anna let out a shaky breath and turned to the voice. In the seat beside her was an older woman, white of hair and wizened of feature, yet she seemed to carry herself with a youthful strength, brought through in her voice as well - high-timbred and powerful. The woman set her book down across her lap and turned slightly in the seat to face Anna.

“A little, I... I suppose,” Anna answered honestly. 

The woman shifted her hand, resting her curved fingers on Anna’s forearm. “First time?”

“No,” Anna replied, “I... I’ve been nervous before.”

The woman’s eyes went wide, head cocked and lips pursed in a confused moue, but only for a moment, just for a moment before she burst out in a bark of laughter. “Oh,” she chortled. “Oh, no, dear. No, dear. I meant...,” she covered her mouth, and with her other hand squeezed Anna’s arm gently. “I meant... is it your first time flying?”

“Oh, God, no. No... not my first time flying,” Anna laughed, and the laughter morphed into a moment of half-buzzed realization. “I think I might have made a joke, there.”

“Either that,” the woman grinned and took a sip of her tomato juice, “or you’ve seen the movie Airplane a far few too many times.” She patted Anna on the shoulder, turning back in her seat and lifting her book once again. “Flight’s about half over, I think,” she said, “and it seems you’ve got yourself occupied anyway.” Her eyes flicked between the drink on the table and Anna’s computer screen.

“Oh, that,” Anna replied. “Supposing I do.”

“I don’t mean to pry,” the woman continued, turning a page of her book, “but I couldn’t help but notice that you’ve been looking rather moonily at pictures of the same man nearly the entire flight.” She pointed toward the image, a black and white headshot of Anna’s quarry nearly filling the screen.

“I’m...,” Anna clipped. “I’m trying... trying to find him. I mean,” she corrected, “I will be trying to find him once I get to Stockholm.” She narrowed her eyes and closed her computer with a deliberate click. “But, I’m not sure what business it is of yours.”

“None. None at all my dear,” the woman replied factually, book still open. 

“Correct. None.”

Anna opened her computer again, re-connected to the in-flight wifi, and re-opened the search page. She skimmed through a few articles, using Google to translate those that were written in eye-crossing Swedish. 

“Do you even know who that is?” The woman had set her book back down on her lap and crossed her hands over it. 

“Him? His name is... is Ansgar Martinsson,” Anna replied.

“No,” she said, “I mean, do you know who that is?”

Anna groaned inwardly, and once again closed her computer. “I guess not. I suppose you’ll tell me.”

The woman continued, unfazed by Anna’s display of irritation. “Not a man to trifle with, I tell you,” she bent toward Anna, her words sotto voce, a whisper, barely heard over the thrum of the engines. “He’s a bit of a shark if you ask me.”

“How... how do you know this?”

“That’s why I asked you if you knew who he was. He’s famous, you know, in Sweden, in Europe. Gossip column fodder. Shows up on the pages of those crap rags now and then, and sometimes on the cover of business magazines.”

“So, he’s a businessman. I kind of got that from the....” she pointed vaguely at the computer, “the articles, and stuff.... what I was able to read, at least.”

“My son works for his company,” the woman said. “We’re from Missouri, St. Louis, you see, but my son moved to Ostermalm, that’s in Sweden too, you know,” she interjected. “Anyway, he moved there to take a job with Martinsson Construction as an architect. I’m going there to visit David... David is his name... I’m going to visit David and his family for the summer.”

“So,” Anna intoned, “Ansgar Martinsson is famous because he owns a construction company?” 

“Not just a construction company,” the woman’s chest puffed up a bit, “the construction company - this huge international conglomerate thing. He builds opera houses and civic buildings and universities, just about everything -- he even designed and built almost all of the newer IKEA stores. He’s like... he’s like the Elon Musk of construction, only better looking and less... well, weird.”

“Hm,” Anna said. “I suppose I still don’t understand why he....”

“Come on, my dear,” the woman’s lips curled in a wry, crooked, tight-lipped grin. “Just look at the man,” she said, gesturing toward the screen. “He’s quite charming. Gets out in society, goes to all of the best parties, even throws some himself now and then. He rubs elbows with the rich and famous, knows everyone... and I hear,” she added, “he’s newly single and ready to mingle.”

“S-single?”

“Yes, this is the sad bit, though, this bit here...” the woman gosspied, “his wife... she left him, some sort of traumatic, terrible thing... at least that’s what I heard. And when she did, he went missing. Missing, I tell you! Gone! Poof!” she splayed her fingers, demonstrating. “Gone for about a year and a half, maybe longer, I can’t remember. No one knows where he was or who he was with or what the hell happened to him.”

“Oh?” 

“Of course his family wouldn’t talk, and his company people, well... they were tight lipped as ever, don’t you know. My son was worried for his job nearly that whole time! It was in all the papers, all the online blogs -- so much speculation, so many conspiracy theories.... Where is Ansgar Martinsson?” She made little ersatz quotes in the air. “One paper even reported that he’d been kidnapped and tortured by terrorists. Another said he’d been taken by aliens, but I doubt that very much.”

Anna shook her head. “Oh, I doubt that too. The... the alien bit.” She inhaled sharply, ground her teeth together and looked away - collecting her thoughts, her fears, and the increasing, swirling maelstrom of confusion and... and... 

...and regret.

I know where he was....

And maybe I don’t belong where he currently is.

Wnat the hell am I getting myself into? 

Words like “society” and “famous” and “businessman” and “traumatic” clanged around in Anna’s head. The walls of the plane squeezed inward confining her, the seat a great bear trap, cramping her in place, teeth digging deeply into her flesh, tearing at her spirit. No turning back now. She snatched at her glass of whiskey and downed it, immediately raising the empty in indication to the passing air steward. 

The storm in her spirit and the deluge of spirits in her blood made her head ache, made her dizzy, even a bit sick. Thoughts of the Travidges invaded, clouding those of Alan... Ansgar.  Was he really like them? Would he treat her the same way? Was she on a thousand-dollar one-way debt-shattering flight halfway around the world only to be dragged into the same feelings of disassociation, of abandonment, of lonliness?

Of... rejection?

“You said you’d be looking for him? When you get there, is that right? Like, physically trying to find him?”

“What?” Anna blinked, the woman’s question drawing her out of her reverie. “What did you say?”

“I asked,” the woman said patiently, “you’re going to be looking for him... in Stockholm, yes?”

“Well,” she sighed, shrugging, “that was sort of the plan.”

But now I’m not so sure....

The woman nodded sagely. “I won’t ask you why, dear. I’ve stuck my nose into your beeswax enough for one flight, but I can tell you what I know. Maybe... where to find him.”

Anna shrugged. “His office, right? He’s probably there all the time. I could just go there and talk to him.”

She shook her head emphatically. “Oh, no,” she said, “they have security in that place tighter than Fort Knox. No way in hell you just sidle up into his office.”

“Then... then where?”

“My son told me... David, he told me that Martinsson is kind of an odd duck you know... has his ways about doing things,” she said, “but I suppose a lot of Swedes are like that. Really private and all. Don’t even really like to talk to their neighbors. Can’t even talk to one of them on a flight... but they do like one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“Swedish folks... they love their fika.”

“Fika?” Anna squinted, nonplussed. “What’s that?”

“Coffee break. I suppose that’s the best thing to call it,” the woman said. “It’s... it’s something the Swedish just... do. It’s pretty important to them... and I hear... my son tells me that he... that your Martinsson fellow there... he takes his coffee break, his fika, at the same coffee shop and at the same time every day when he’s in Stockholm.”

“He goes to a... a coffee shop?”

“Sure,” the woman said. “No one bothers him, apparently. Like I said, the Swedish don’t molest each other overmuch. They don’t like all that chit chat... that small talk with strangers don’t you know, and if someone is sitting at a table alone they’ll just.... you know leave them be. I mean, Brad Pitt or that hunky George Clooney could be sitting in a Swedish coffee shop and no one would even think of approaching them, taking their picture or otherwise.”

“Do you...” Anna blinked, smiling blithely at the woman beside her, “happen to know where that is? That coffee shop where Martinsson takes... takes his fika?”

The woman smiled back. “Would I mention it if I didn’t know?”

[5typesoftrash]

My True Love Gabe to Me

My fic for the Sabriel Secret Santa by @sabrielevents. I’m so glad I got to take part in this event, it was really fun. My giftee was @mightywolves23 so I wrote her this... whatever this is. 

Pairings: Sabriel/Destiel Rating: Teen Additional Warnings: Mutual Pining, Sam and Gabriel are idiots, so much Christmas fluff, Destiel are fucking gross, vulgarity, swearing, stuff like that. Word Count: 4,599

December 1st

Dean is- Dean is jumping on his bed. Dean is jumping on Sam’s bed, holding his phone, which is connected to a Bluetooth speaker, blasting All I Want for Christmas at maximum volume. And grinning. Like a maniac. And singing along. Like a dork.

How could Sam possibly be related to this idiot?

He grabs one of his pillows and smacks his brother in the chest with it before burrowing underneath the other one and hiding from the world. Dean resurfaces quickly, pauses his song (blessedly), and grabs Sam’s arm. “Sammy!” he’s shouting, and Sam has never wanted anything more than he wants to be dead right now. “Sammy, come on, I have to make you a Happy December breakfast.”

“Dean, there’s literally no reason for you to make a ‘Happy December breakfast’. You just want an excuse to cook.”

Dean nods excitedly. “Hell yeah I do! Now come on, get your overgrown Goliath ass downstairs so that I can make you food.”

Sam groans but does as he’s told, pushing himself out of bed as soon as Dean leaves the room (he sleeps naked, no way is Dean getting the covers off of him while he’s still in Sam’s bedroom) and forcing himself to forgo comfortable clothing – he does stare longingly at his pajama pants for a minute, though – in favor of his usual combination of tank top under t-shirt under flannel under jacket. And he makes his way downstairs.

“Heya there, Samsquatch,” Gabriel calls cheerfully from where he’s sitting with his feet up on the dining table, eating chocolate pie a la mode with whipped cream. (How he can stomach that for breakfast still mystifies Sam) “Sleep well, princess?”

Sam makes a show of pulling his middle finger out of his ‘bra strap’ and applying liberal amounts of ‘lipstick’ to his lips with it. Gabriel cracks up, and Sam hides his smile. He does like making the Trickster laugh.

He makes his way through the kitchen, grabbing a piece of bacon from where they’re cooling on the counter and receiving a punch in the shoulder in return as he goes. He holds it between his teeth as he opens the fridge with one hand and grabs a glass from the cupboard next to it with the other. He pours himself some orange juice and then tears into the meat with his teeth.

He settles down at his usual place beside the archangel who’s somehow managed to become a permanent fixture in their lives at the bunker and strikes up an idle conversation with him about a book he read about Grace the previous day. Cas, sitting across from Gabriel, has quite a few interesting insights, and it’s only a few minutes before Dean’s carrying plates of waffles and bacon into the kitchen, and Sam smiles gratefully up at his brother before he digs in.

Once the table’s been cleared, Dean announces, “I thought we’d get a tree today.”

“Doin’ it early this year?” Sam teases, grinning at his brother. Every year that they’d been on their own, when they actually had a place to decorate, Dean was so lazy they’d always ended up getting their tree a week or so before Christmas. December first was new, to say the least.

“Shut up, bitch,” Dean shoots back without heat. Cas looks ready to step in if they really go at it, but Sam just laughs.

“Jerk,” he mutters, then adds, “Christmas tree shopping sounds awesome. If we have time, we can even go get gifts for each other, too.”

“We won’t have time,” Dean tells him wisely.

(He’s right, of course. They do not have time.)

#~+~#

They don’t leave for the farm until just after 1, because someone (coughGabrielcough) took about two hours to be composed enough to go. Which is ridiculous, because Gabriel can just snap himself up some clothes whenever he wants, he doesn’t have to take ten years to get ready and make everyone else wait for him.

Ah, well. Dean made a remark about Gabriel acting like a girl and Sam got to go on one of his feminist rants until Dean scoffed and walked away from him, so it was okay.

When they finally arrive, they hook themselves up with the complimentary hot chocolate that they always serve at those places, jump into one of those cart things, and drive off to the far reaches of the many acres of land reserved just for Christmas trees.

“So how tall we wanna go?” Dean asks as they climb out, Sam with the axe slung over his shoulder.

“I’m thinkin’ tall,” Sam suggests with a smirk in Gabriel’s direction. “I’m thinkin’ taller’n me tall.” And Gabriel- Gabriel honest-to-Chuck flushes, ever so slightly, under the heat of Sam’s gaze. Sam stares at him in amazement, because that can be summed up with one phrase. “Holy shit,” he whispers to himself before turning to his brother.

“I mean, we have the space for it, don’t we? Only problem would be getting it back to the bunker, although we do have angels who can do that for us.”

Gabriel, having regained his composure, smiles sweetly at them.

#~+~#

It takes Sam and Dean another half an hour to pick a tree, chop it down, get the angels to fly it back to the bunker, pay, grab another round of hot chocolate, and get in the car, and then the drive back home is forty-five minutes. Because of all of that, they don’t make it back to the bunker until 3:15 or so, by which time Castiel and Gabriel have already erected the tree in the spot they’d previously picked out and are now color-coding the month of December in their Biblical calendar (a joke gift from Dean that went right over Cas’ head, although he and Gabe got quite the shared-laughter bonding moment out of the way Cas so clearly didn’t understand it) with the various activities they’re planning to do on various days. They’re all spread out so as to be flexible in case they get hunts that go a little longer than expected.

Sam and Dean’s angels are nice like that.

(Oh, fuck. Cas has always been Dean’s, that much was clear from day 1, but the scary part is that Sam has started thinking of Gabriel as being his. That’s not good for him or his mental health, and it spells DANGER in big block letters across his life. He tries to heed the warnings, he really does, but… Gabriel’s perpetual sugar high and his… mostly… positive energy and his infectious sugary-sweet smile just get to him, warm up parts of him he’d forgotten existed, and eventually he is forced to realize that he was gone long before he ever had a chance to identify it. There’s no going back now.)

It’s mid-afternoon and none of them feels like doing anything, so they leave the eight-foot-tall tree alone, undecorated as it is, and collapse onto the two couches in the den. Unsurprisingly, Dean gets a faceful of black hair as an extremely cuddly Castiel presses himself against Dean’s side. Slightly more surprisingly, Sam gets a golden archangel’s head in his lap, and even more surprising is the way that Sam starts to card his fingers through Gabriel’s hair. However, what takes the cake is how natural that feels.

Sam hates this feeling.

Dean selects a Christmas movie at random – they end up watching The Holiday – and they all relax and allow themselves to enjoy the peace and serenity and Jack Black singing badly on screen.

Sam hates that feeling, but he loves this one. This is family and warmth and home, this is love and peace and happiness, and this is security like he’s never known. They’re a bit of a fucked-up family, but they’re a family nonetheless, and Sam wouldn’t trade it for the world.

He falls asleep on the couch.

--

December 5th

Sam pays his brother back in kind, and he justifies it by saying that Dean asked for this.

Dean wakes up to a pie in the face, and Sam knows he won’t stop bitching about a waste of perfectly good pie for several days. He could care less.

He lets Dean eat cherry pie for breakfast, and Gabe eats his chocolate pie for breakfast, and Sam has a donut because he kind of doesn’t care at this point, and Castiel doesn’t eat anything. Which disappoints his boyfriend greatly, but he keeps pointing out that I do not need to eat, Dean.

And then at 10, Sam finds Dean’s Bluetooth speaker, connects it to his phone, and queues up a three-hour playlist of Christmas music on Spotify. “Hey, get your lazy asses in here, we got work to do!” he announces joyfully, grinning into the dining room. Dean snorts and pushes his chair back from the table.

“Fine, Sammy, if you’re gonna be like that. I’ll be right back with the lights and ornaments,” he shouts up before disappearing into the storage room.

Gabriel and Castiel join Sam soon after, helping him plug in the power strips and figure out where they want their miscellaneous decorations to go. When Dean returns, Sam smacks the ‘play’ button on his phone, and they start to dance around the common space to ‘Jingle Bell Rock’ as they wind the lights around the tree.

Sam ends up standing on a stepstool at the base of the tree while Gabriel goes up the stairs and stands right next to the top and Cas stands halfway up the stairwell. They pass the end of the string around, singing and grinning, and Dean ‘supervises’. Which, of course, is just a fancy way of saying he stands there, watches them, and drinks a Chuckdamn blueberry smoothie.

Then, when he wants to put the angel on top of the tree, Sam gleefully informs him that since he didn’t help, he doesn’t get to do that part. He bestows that honor upon Gabriel, who practically vaults over the railing to put the little bauble on top, clings to the branches of the tree (while Castiel holds it in place with a very unamused expression) as he plugs it into the strand of lights, and then drops right into Sam’s arms.

Sam grins and winks at him before depositing him on the floor.

Rockin’ around The Christmas tree At the Christmas party hop

Dean grabs Cas’ hand and drags him down the stairs to the place in the doorway where he’d fastened the mistletoe earlier.

Mistletoe hung where you can see Every couple tries to stop

He dips his boyfriend and kisses him loudly, and Sam scoffs and turns away, rolling his eyes. “Those two are gross,” Gabe murmurs to him, and he makes a noise of assent.

“They really are,” he agrees.

--

December 8th

Sam sneaks out for his morning run at four and when he’s done with his three miles he walks over to the Fred Meyer-slash-Starbucks that’s barely a block away. He spends several hours there, trying to figure out what the fuck to get his brother (who never wants anything) and two angels (who basically have everything) and feeling a little guilty that he’s paying for it all with stolen money.

He figures it out eventually, but by the time he gets back it’s almost nine o’ clock and – predictably – nobody’s awake yet. (Actually, he’s not quite sure that’s true. Cas is a bit of an early riser and even if he wasn’t, Dean’s probably gotten into his pants by now. Predictably, he supposes he should say, Gabriel isn’t awake.)

He shoves the double-plastic-bagged gifts into a duffel bag that he then buries in the bottom of his closet to wrap later and decides to get started on making breakfast for everybody because, however much he loves his big brother, he really can’t cook for shit.

He spends a while staring at the pantry and then a while longer staring at the inside of the refrigerator before silently wishing he’d bought some ingredients when he went out. He’s just decided to make breakfast burritos (scrambled eggs, bacon, tons of cheese, secret sauce. They have all of those things. At least) when suddenly an archangel appears behind him.

“Whatcha doin’, Sammich?” Gabriel asks, far too loudly and cheerfully in comparison to his normal early-morning disposition. Sam jumps about ten feet.

When he calms his racing heartbeat, Sam replies, “I was about to make you some food. But now that you’ve scared the shit out of me, I think you can do it yourself.”

Gabriel looks at him evenly for a moment, then shrugs, snaps himself up the biggest, most phallic lollipop Sam has ever seen, and walks past him to sit at the table. “So you didn’t want my help with anything?” he asks.

Sam glances back at the pantry and something clicks.

When did Dean buy frosting? And… woah, there’s a lot of stuff in there.

“Want to make Christmas cookies while our brothers try to buy gifts for each other and end up just screwing in the middle of a grocery store?” he suggests. Gabriel almost chokes on his lollipop, and Sam’s not going near that with a goddamn barge pole.

“I’m on board for Christmas cookies,” Gabe replies, deliberately and obviously avoiding the second half of Sam’s sentence. He jumps out of his chair and the lollipop disappears.

Sam starts to knead out the premade dough they had in the fridge while Gabriel goes to color the icing. They work in comfortable silence, weaving around each other in a well-coordinated dance like they’ve been doing this forever.

Sam is so fucked.

Once the dough is a flat sheet on the counter, he lets Gabriel take over so he can cut them out into festive Santa Claus and Christmas Tree shapes and Sam grabs the bag of flour to put it away and drops it. It kind of explodes, sending up a veritable mushroom cloud and lightly dusting Gabriel’s arm while somehow miraculously missing Sam. Gabriel doesn’t seem to find this acceptable and he reaches into the bag without looking away from his carefully oriented cookie cutter and flicks a little flour onto Sam’s hand. Sam laughs, coats his hand in the stuff, and wipes it down Gabriel’s shirt.

That gets his attention. He grabs a handful and drops it on Sam’s head, coating his hair in white. Sam gives him a flour-ball to the face, which prompts Gabriel to leave white handprints all over Sam’s new shirt and then Sam picks up the bag and dumps it on Gabriel’s head.

Gabriel’s staring at him with this betrayed look that is, frankly, just absolutely adorable, and Sam wants to kiss it off his face, which. Fuck. FUCK.

He wasn’t supposed to do this, he tried so hard not to do this. He’s so completely ass-fucked it wasn’t even funny.

He’s glad Dean cleared his throat when he did because if they’d been left alone for one more second Sam’s 100% sure he was going to kiss him. Archangel mojo be damned, Sam had been about to kiss that self-satisfied smirk right off of his face and accept his death with gladness.

“Havin’ fun, you two?” Dean asks, not concealing his laughter at all. Sam shrugs.

“I mean, yeah, it was pretty fun. Hey Gabe, stick those cookies in the oven and then we can watch another Christmas movie.”

Gabriel grins and taps him on the shoulder. He turns. “Yeah?”

“We should probably shower and change first,” he mutters, and Sam tries so hard not to flush because that sounds like he means together and oh, shit, is he in deep.

“Yeah, put the cookies in the oven, I call dibs on the first shower.”

Gabriel smiles at him as he slides the baking sheet onto the top rack of the oven, and Dean rolls his eyes before disappearing back into the hallway. Sam nods awkwardly several times and then sprints toward the bathroom before he can embarrass himself further.

--

December 17th

Sam needs a hunt. Sam needs to get the hell away from Gabriel before he makes a mistake, like shoving him against a wall, pinning him there, and kissing the living shit out of him.

So he finds a hunt for himself. And for Dean. Cas if he wants to. And not Gabe, because if he gets stuck in a room (or a car, or a motel, or a diner, or a…) with Gabe again he isn’t going to be able to restrain himself.

He ends up running through a big emptyish building at 11pm trying to figure out where the fuck these vamps have tied up his brother. Eventually he kicks down a door and finds Dean leaning against a wall swinging his blade in lazy circles and grinning. Gabriel’s standing in the middle of the room looking slightly spent but otherwise completely fine surrounded by a huge circle of corpses, and Cas is watching Dean worriedly.

“Heya Sammy,” Dean says. “Nice’a ya to drop in. Missed the party.”

Sam fights the urge to stick out his tongue. “You suck,” he tells his brother.

So. Hunting is out.

--

December 20th

They set up an assembly line. All the presents for each person are put into that person’s bedroom, and then each person goes around to everyone else’s bedrooms to wrap their presents for each other.

It’s all very complicated and it takes the whole day, but Sam and Gabriel end up talking and laughing as they wrap their gifts for Dean and Cas and Cas, Dean, and Sam have a wrapping-paper fight while they all wrap their gifts for Gabriel. All in all, it ends pretty well.

That night, they all get drunk on heavily spiked eggnog and sing carols together and pass out in various states of undress in the living room together as While You Were Sleeping plays quietly on the TV behind them.

--

December 24th

It’s Gabriel jumping on his bed this time.

Sam buries his face deeper into the pillow and grabs the archangel by the ribcage, dragging him to one side and pinning him under Sam’s own long limbs.

“You, my good sir,” he announces without moving his face (which means his words are slightly muffled by his pillow), “are an asshole. For waking me up at seven in the am on Christmas Eve when you know I like to sleep in. For your transgression, you are now trapped.”

Gabriel laughs heartily and squirms, but doesn’t fight too hard, just kinda wriggles in the sheets until they’re suddenly lying practically chest-to-chest, basically cuddling, and oh. Shit. Right.

Sam had almost forgotten that that was the reason he was avoiding Gabe in the first place.

He smiles a little awkwardly and pulls away from him, trying not to look like he’s disappointed. He almost misses the way that Gabriel’s expression slams shut and most certainly does not miss the way his eyes follow him sadly as he stands up and walks over to his closet. “Well, congrats,” he says as cheerfully as he can. “You got me. I’m up. What did you want?”

He grabs a tank and a flannel and pulls them on over his bare chest, turning to look at Gabriel expectantly. The archangel just shrugs at him, and Sam scoffs and rolls his eyes.

“You’re tellin’ me that you woke me up for no reason?”

Gabriel nods, smirking widely now.

“I’m gonna get you, you son of a bitch,” Sam mutters, slipping his left arm through the flannel and then jumping onto the bed, on top of Gabriel, trapping him there with his whole body.

Gabriel is basically shrieking with laughter and Sam’s smiling genuinely because he always forgets how much fun they have together, and he swears to himself he’ll never avoid Gabriel again because it never gets him anywhere. All it does is make him miserable.

They roll around on Sam’s bed, wrestling and play fighting, and Sam’s still in his pajama pants and neither of them cares. Somehow it devolves into a tickle fight, because Gabriel’s always brought out the most childlike parts of Sam, and they’re both screaming by the time the person in the doorway clears his throat.

They freeze.

“Hey, Dean,” Sam mutters, trying to hide his face. Gabriel shoves his shoulder, forcing him to look up at his brother, who’s watching him with amusement concealed not at all.

“Havin’ fun, Sammy?” he asks. Sam doesn’t answer. He just stands up, off the bed, and brushes off his clothes.

“What’s up?”

“Cas bought burgers. For breakfast.” Dean seems extremely excited about this prospect. Sam laughs.

“Let me guess. He also bought you pie, your favorite pie, because he knows your simplistic, animal brain like the back of his hand and loves you more than anything in the universe. Right?”

Dean nods enthusiastically. “Yeah! Now c’mon, there’s somethin’ for everyone.”

Sam rolls his eyes fondly before following his brother out of his room, but he does feel guilty for leaving Gabriel there. However, Gabe jumps up and follows him instantly, so he doesn’t feel too bad.

His is a veggie burger with lettuce and tomato slices and cheese etc. etc. It’s exactly his kind of thing, and he smiles at and hugs Cas before he digs into it. Considering their family and the lives they’ve led, he doesn’t even think it’s weird to be eating burgers for breakfast anymore.

After breakfast, they all chill in the living room for a while. People say ‘evil never rests’, but apparently it does, at least for Christmas. Phineas and Ferb lied to Sam!

It starts snowing around 3pm, and Sam suppresses his groan when he sees it, because he knows Gabriel will go into full-on child mode and want to play in it, and he also knows that the stupid archangel will be so adorable that he’ll submit without complaint because he can never deny him anything.

And surely enough, Gabriel glances out the window, sees the white powder beginning to dust the streets, and grins wide enough to light up an entire city block. He turns to Dean, who’s also smiling huge, and Cas, who looks indifferent, and finally Sam, who forces enthusiasm he wouldn’t fake for anyone else because it’s Gabriel, and he just can’t.

Gabriel snaps them all up winter coats and gloves and hats and scarves until they’re wrapped so tightly that they’re barely mobile and they make their way out into the snow, and it’s immediately an Angels VS. Winchesters all-out no-hold-barred snowball fight. And somehow the fake enthusiasm becomes genuine, and Sam laughs with the rest of them and builds Dean a big mound of ice to hide behind and dumps snow down the back of Cas’ coat and hits Gabe in the crotch with a snowball. (He doesn’t feel it, immortal archangelic bastard.)

It takes them two hours to finally wear themselves out, and they go back inside for hot chocolate with (in Gabriel’s case) far too much whipped cream and definitely too many marshmallows. Dean cooks them up a nice, big-ass Christmas Eve dinner, promises even more on Christmas Day, and they eat together in the dining room like a real family, surrounded by candles and a fire crackling in the hearth.

(Cas insisted on both.)

After dinner they curl up on the couches again, and this time Gabe isn’t even trying to hide how clingy he is. He’s in dog mode now, jumping all over Sam and not even caring what Sam thinks of it. Dean and Cas are cuddling in the other armchair like the sickeningly adorable couple they are, but Gabriel can’t seem to stop moving. One minute he’s in Sam’s lap, the next he’s on his shoulders, then he’s laying across the whole couch with his head on Sam’s thighs.

(Sam doesn’t mind, and he hates that he doesn’t mind.)

Sam leaves the room before the end of act one of Die Hard because he knows if he stays he’s going to do something wrong.

--

December 25th

It’s Christmas morning, and Sam wakes up to White Christmas from- wait, is Cas singing?

He pulls on a pair of pajama pants and makes it halfway down the stairs before he nearly falls over, because Dean and Cas are singing a duet in the kitchen as they make the coffee cake, dancing together like fucking dorks and smiling softly at each other. Dean laughs at Cas at regular intervals and readjusts to show him how to do something, be it ‘the note is here’ or ‘no, the steps are like this’ or ‘hold the spoon like that’.

They’re so in love, and Sam is… Sam is jealous. He’s man enough to admit it. He wants that for himself, and he’ll probably never get it, because he’s a coward.

But he’s happy for them, too, because they deserve it after everything that’s happened to them.

They finish the coffee cake. Sam gets Gabriel up and makes alcoholic eggnog because that’s what they all need at 10am on Christmas morning. And then they do gifts.

Dean gets a lot of records and cassette tapes and DVDs of various things. Sam gets books upon books upon books, some books he asked for and a lot he didn’t but wanted anyway. Cas gets a ‘How to Be Human’ starter kit from both Sam and Dean, as well as a promise ring from Dean (goddammit, those two are too cute) and a portable DVD player from Sam, plus something special from Gabe he says he’ll give him later. Gabriel gets a photo album from Sam, because he said he wanted one. He claims to love it. He gets chocolate-covered cherries from Cas, and when he runs into the kitchen to put them into the fridge, Dean stops him on his way back.

“What’s up?” he asks, and Dean is quite obviously fighting back his smirk as he replies.

“Sammy, couldja go stand next to him?”

Sam is supposed to be the smart one. Sam is supposed to be the one who figures it all out and is always one step ahead… it’s Christmas, and he’s with his family, and there hasn’t been a case in a while, and everything feels too peaceful. He’s off his game.

So he walks right into the trap – literally, he supposes. He goes over to stand next to Gabriel, and when he turns back around, Cas has already left the room.

“My gift to Gabe is really a gift to you both,” Dean tells them. “Look up,” is all he adds before he disappears.

Sam and Gabriel look at each other dubiously before craning their necks to figure out what he’s talking about and-

Oh.

In the doorway, hanging from the frame above them, are a few green leaves. Sam cringes internally and wants to punch his brother in the face. And then he looks at Gabe.

Gabe looks… different than he has in a while. He looks more confident, more sure of himself, and Sam hadn’t thought that was possible, but apparently he is. “Samsquatch,” he says firmly, “if you’re gonna kiss me, then just kiss me already.”

So Sam does.

And when he has an archangel’s legs wrapped around his waist and an archangel’s hands in his hair and an archangel’s tongue practically shoving its way down his throat, he thinks maybe he won’t punch his brother in the face the next time he sees him, after all.

He’ll probably just punch him in the arm.