#and if i need to finish that little abomination of a fic then so be it you'd think people wouldnt mind too much

[coolnonsenseworld]

A little promo with my little obsession on the side...........

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[dontaskmemybias]

Pretty

Pairing: Idol!Lee Know x afab Ninth Member!reader Request: Yes Theme: Friends to Lovers Contains: Anxiety, Hurt/comfort, jealousy, teeny angst if you squint. There is no smut in this part, its all buildup lmao sorry but there will be smut in the next part. Word Count: 10k+ Note: This is a work of fiction and does not portray any of the members irl. I decided to go with a friends to lovers slow burn since you wanted a longer fic anon and I figured I could do a bit more like this, and I was correct, I started writing and just like never stopped? This has become a behemoth of a story and I'll be releasing it in two parts because damn. I know you requested this like a year ago but life happened hard, hopefully you still get to read it.

Author's Personal Note: This week has been awful. I can't describe how tired and scared I have been since Tuesday morning. I haven't written in almost a year because my motivation just was not there and I don't know if it was the existential dread or the overwhelming urge to just be in control of some narrative that drove me to start writing this absolute beast of a story but here we are. Enjoy it, don't, I don't really care either way.

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Snow blankets the surrounding hills as you burrow yourself further into your winter puffer. The boys are all running around the field, throwing snowballs at each other and cackling wildly. You chuckle to yourself seeing their childlike display. You have all gathered to film SKZCode "Winter is Coming" (you and the boys had been binge watching Game of Thrones in your free time and decided to take a little inspiration from it for the title) You let out a laugh when you see Changbin nail Hyunjin in the back of the head with a snowball and in true Jinnie fashion Hyunjin dramatically flails on the ground until Changbin comes over to comfort him.

You had been through so much with these eight boys, late nights in the studio recording your parts until they were perfect, early mornings in the dance studio drilling choreography until it was perfect, you loved it all, but moments like these when you could all let loose and have some fun? Those were your favorites.

Being the only woman in the group was a bit of a challenge in some ways, but it was nice having eight guys to look out for you in every aspect of life. You had formed a bond with these guys over the years, each friendship blossoming and holding something unique.

If you ever needed a shoulder to cry on, you knew you could turn to your leader Bang Chan and he wouldn't just comfort you, he would help you figure out what to do. Only one year your senior and yet his wisdom was that of an 85 year old war vet. Chan was your rock.

Need workout tips or someone to belt girl group songs with? Changbin was your man. He was always willing to help you stay healthy, whether that be helping you with your fitness routine, or working on your mental health. Changbin was there for you when antis said you looked too fat and cheered you up all night. He was the ultimate hype man.

Felix was often in your dorm baking with you when you were stressed (stress baking is both a blessing and a curse). He would massage your shoulders when you got too tense. He really was the sunshine in your life.

Whenever you wanted to try something new—a restaurant, an online game, anything at all—Seungmin would join you. He would say he had been meaning to go there or try that anyway, and this just gave him an excuse, but you knew he did it, so you didn't ever feel lonely. He was like the little brother you never had.

You and Hyunjin bonded over your love for art. The two of you had done all the cheesy trends where you paint for ten minutes then swap paintings until they are both finished (it ended up with an abomination with a cat head and a wolf body, you named it Lee Bang after Felix, Bang Chan, and Lee Know, you both laughed so hard you were in tears) you also would often sketch one another to get better at portraits. Time spent with Hyunjin was always amazing.

Anytime you had a fashion emergency you knew you could count on Innie. He would roast your outfits when they were too "millennial sheik" as he would say, but then immediately assist. He was also great to couch rot and watch movies with on your off days. He was basically your bestie.

Anytime you were feeling down and you just really needed a good laugh you knew that you could turn to Jisung. You and Jisung had bonded very hard very early on because you both suffer from anxiety and panic attacks. The two of you had helped each other through so many at this point it was basically second nature. When you ugly sob in front of someone and they trust you enough to do it in return you know it's a friendship built to last. You and Jisung were basically soulmates.

Finally there was Minho. Your relationship with Minho was… interesting, to say the least. You grew close with him simply because he was your soulmate's soulmate. Anywhere Minho went, Jisung went, and anywhere Jisung went, you went. So the three of you grew very close very fast. Minho's sense of humor perfectly matched yours and the two of you would often bicker back and forth simply because it was fun and it often drove the other members crazy. The bickering started innocently enough, however, a few months ago something changed. The bickering you loved became… borderline flirty? The other members often referred to you both as a married couple and would call Jisung your son. It was all in good fun and it really didn't bother you, but every time someone outside the group made the same jokes, Minho would get this look on his face. You couldn't quite place the emotion behind it, but you recently found yourself thinking about it for much too long.

You are brought back to the present from your ruminating when something wet and cold hits the back of your head followed by maniacal laughter.

"Minnie, that was evil!" You try to sound mad but you can't hide the giggles that escape you at the younger boys' antics. He just sticks his tongue out as you and laughs while running away.

You are fully laughing now, trying to shake the snow out of your hair when you feel warm arms wrap around you from behind.

"You're shivering little moon bear" Minho's breathy chuckle ruffles your hair and you laugh.

Shuffling in his arms to face him you look up and pout. "It's cold out! Of course I'm shivering Min. And why do you insist on referring to me by my SKZOO?"

"Because I find the little pout you do every time I do adorable." He smirks down at you and you think the flush adorning your ears is no longer just from the cold.

"YOH LOVEBIRDS GET OVER HERE IT'S TIME TO FILM!" Changbin's voice rings out over the set and you flinch a little which causes Minho to hold you just a bit tighter.

"Come on moon bear, time to film." He gently whispers to you while tucking you under his arm and leading you toward the group.

~✨~

Filming was going great! Sledding with a pitcher of water was pretty hard but you had loads of fun and managed not to come in last. When it came to the balloon popping portion Minho decided to come behind you like he had before filming and wrap his arms around you.

He leaned in to whisper in your ear "You looked cold again little moon bear." You chuckled when he began swaying you both side to side.

"You're going to start a dating rumor if you keep this up Min." You whispered back.

"Let people talk, how can I just stand by while my favorite girl freezes?" Your breath hitched a little at the comment, whispered so close to your ear you could almost feel his lips on your skin.

"Fair, but you have to deal with the staff if it becomes a problem." You sighed out, settling into his warm arms.

He was glued to you for the rest of the shoot.

~✨~

After getting home from the very fun, very cold, shoot, you decided to take a nice long hot shower and then maybe order some delivery when you got out.

You took your time in the shower until you were basically out of hot water then wrapped yourself in your fluffiest towel and went to the kitchen for some water. Your heart almost fell out of your ass and you let out a shriek when you walked by your living room and saw two people sitting on your couch.

"Y/NNIE My eardrums! Why did you have to scream so loud?" Jisung wailed from his spot on the couch.

"Yeah you baby it's just us damn." Minho scoffed. They both froze when they turned and saw you in just a towel, Minho's ears turning a fiery red and Jisung's eyes going wide. They both quickly looked away and started stammering out apologies, not realizing your state of dress. You let out a giggle at their reactions.

"Chill guys, you act like you've never seen a girl in a towel before, you just scared the shit out of me because I didn't know you were coming." They both let out a little laugh at that and relaxed a bit into the couch, still looking anywhere other than at your towel-clad form.

"Sorry, we wanted to surprise you with Kimchi Jjigae since you were so cold today and maybe watch some movies?" Jisung said quietly.

"You brought food? Ignore my previous complaints, Ji, Min, you are both angels who could do no wrong and I love you with all my heart! Let me put some clothes on then we can watch whatever you want yeah?"

"Yeah" "Sounds good" The boys yelled back as you went to your room to change.

You all spent the rest of the night tangled up on the couch watching shitty rom-coms

~✨~

The next morning after dance practice you get home and shower then realize that you're finally going to have a morning free the next day. Scrolling through your phone looking for things to do you come across a poster for the newest horror flick that's showing tonight. You screenshot it and drop it into the group chat titled "SoulBros" Jisung's idea.

SoulBros:

JiJi😘🥰😂: Oh hell no! That movie looks way too scary! Sorry love ur on ur own.

Min😈😘😜: Sorry I promised Lix I would help him with the new choreo.

🌝Bear: You both suck :/ Guess I'll go alone.

JiJi😘🥰😂: Noona ur so old just use emojis 😑

You laugh at Ji's dig; it is accurate. You guess it's time to pull out the big guns. You dial the number on your phone, and on the third ring, it picks up.

"Yes old lady?" You scoff at his (fake) disrespect.

"Minnie, I want to go see the new horror movie tonight because we have a free morning tomorrow but Ji is too scared to come and Minho is busy. Should I go alone?" You bite back your smile knowing what he is going to say.

Seungmin's voice cracks a bit over the phone call and you hear sheets rustling. "That new one about the witch in the woods? I've actually been wanting to see that too but everyone's too scared to come with me. I could go with you if you want?" You smile to yourself, you knew he wouldn't let you go to the movies alone, let alone to a horror film.

~✨~

"That was INSANE! I had no idea he had a brother the whole time!" You are bouncing up and down, filled with adrenaline from the movie.

"Yeah, that was a twist I actually didn't see coming. Pretty crazy." Seungmin is acting all calm but you know he enjoyed the movie as well.

"Hey Minnie, thanks for coming with me. I had a really fun time!" You say while ruffling his hair.

"Yeah yeah, like I said, I wanted to see it too."

"Hey wanna go grab some food before we go home? There's this hot pot spot nearby I've been dying to try!" You look at him with puppy-dog eyes and he lets out a sigh.

"Yeah I'm pretty hungry, and hot pot does sound amazing right about now."

~✨~

After stuffing your faces at the new hot pot place you finally made your way back home. Walking in you let out a long satisfied sigh and take off your shoes.

"Someone's home late." You nearly jump out of your skin at the grumbly voice coming from your living room.

"Jesus Fuck Min one of these days you're gonna give me a heart attack!" You yell out while grabbing a blanket from your armchair and bringing it to the couch where you unceremoniously plop down next to Minho who acts annoyed at your proximity but is quick to wrap an arm around you.

"Where were you? I've been here for like thirty minutes." He almost sounds… worried? Angry? You can't place it.

"Oh I just went to see that movie I texted you and Ji about then went and got some hot pot."

"Alone?"

"Oh no, Minnie came with me. Said he had been wanting to see the movie too but you know that kid, he just doesn't like me doing things alone." Minho grumbles something that you can't quite make out but then squeezes you to his side and turns on the TV.

"What was that Min?"

"I would've gone with you." He looks you dead in the eyes when he says it. You can't figure it out but it almost seems like he's mad at you?

"Well sorry Min, you said you were busy and I didn't know you wanted to see the movie too, I'd see it again if you wanted to go see it?" You try smiling at him to quell whatever was going on with him and it seems to work because he cracks a tiny smile and just pulls you closer to him while putting on the first shitty rom-com he sees.

~✨~

It was finally time for the next SKZCode! The staff didn't tell anyone what these episodes would be about but said you would all have fun.

You walked into the studio and saw a giant game board and war flashbacks of the last time you all played monopoly flashed through your mind. Images of Hyunjin screaming at Seungmin for putting a hotel on the most expensive rent on the board and Seungmin's shit-eating grin flashed through your mind.

The staff quickly explained the game and everyone got super excited. SoulRACHA was glued together any chance you got as per usual and everything was going great… until they announced the heart fluttering game.

Now, you wouldn't say your heart fluttered easily, if Felix had tried to get your heart racing you're sure you would be fine. Changbin? Piece of cake. Of course, you've never been very lucky.

You get paired with Minho. The expert at getting you worked up. (When you bicker! Get your mind out of the gutter.)

"Will you be able to hear what we say?" Minho tries to look innocent as he asks the question, but you can already feel the heat rising to your cheeks.

"Only if you speak loudly, we decided it would be more fun if STAY can't hear what you whisper to each other." One of the staff quickly explains.

Minho's grin turns sinister and a single thought crosses your mind.

I am so fucked.

Minho stalks toward you once the camera starts rolling and comes around behind you to wrap his arms around you like always. You can handle this, this is normal for you two. Your heart rate stays the same.

You feel him lean in until his lips are almost touching your ear.

"Hey there, little moon bear. This skirt you wore today is very pretty, did you wear it for STAY or for me?" He whispers so only you can hear. He is so close to you that you feel his breath tickling your ear.

The ears wiggle a little bit then settle. You can do this Y/N, Pull it together.

Minho notices and chuckles, pulling you tighter against him.

"I'm sure your pretty skirt would look even better with someone's hands underneath it."

You let out a gasp and the guys go wild. You know STAY's are going to have a field day with this footage. You are now squirming in Minho's tight grip, trying to escape his now searing hands, a burning flush spreading across your face.

Minho almost sounds surprised when he breathes out "Shit."

You think about his words and his arms wrapped around you all night.

~✨~

MinBear has become your official ship name from STAY's, after Minho's stunt during the last SKZCode STAY have been posting online about the possibility of you two dating.

You, Minho, and Jisung just laugh about it whenever it gets brought up and everything seems to go back to normal between you and Minho.

If you dream about him whispering those words in your ear at night, well that's just nobody's business.

~✨~

During the next SKZCode the staff decides to play into STAY's delusions and make you and Minho play husband and wife. The catch? Minho is the wife.

~✨~

"HAHAHA HYUNG, NOONA, WHAT ARE YOU WEARING?!" Innie's voice carries across the room when you and Minho walk into the room. Minho is in the brown wig from SKZ Family, a gaudy pink dress with far too many ruffles, and ballet flats with little pink bows on them while you are wearing a wig with a receding hairline (bye bye idol image), a flannel shirt, and blue jeans. The boys all burst out laughing when you two strike a pose and show off your "wedding rings" (they are blue raspberry ring pops).

"Hello everyone! I am Joe and this is my second wife Mindy!" You smile at the group and they all start howling with laughter one again.

You both decided to play into the roles WAY too much to hopefully show STAY that you two really are just best friends. You don't need the dating rumors to turn into a full blown scandal.

"Oh baby, dear, my loveliest little sunflower, who do you think is the killer?" You turn to Minho and try to hold back your laughter at seeing him wrestle with the ruffles that keep coming up from the collar and tickling his nose.

"Oh my handsome, manly, bravest lionheart, I think it was that barista for sure!" He looks up and bats his eyelashes at you for dramatic effect.

And for some reason, instead of spewing back some heinously cheesy line, you are struck with a totally unwelcome thought.

Minho is so Pretty.

What the fuck?

~✨~

The rest of the shoot goes by fairly quickly. It devolves into chaos, as things normally do with the nine of you. But the rest of the time you are a little more fidgety than usual. The unwelcome thought about your best friend Minho burrowing into your brain until it fully settles and the shoot is over and you are left with the realization that your best friend is pretty.

You'd rather not unpack that.

~✨~

A few weeks pass by and you successfully manage to bury your realization about Minho deep in your subconscious to the point where you haven't thought about it in two whole days! (That's impressive! Really! You initially thought about it at least five times a day… okay like five times an hour)

Finally the group had a whole weekend off! No SKZCode, no crazy schedules, just you, your two best friends, a mountain of takeout and snacks, and a movie marathon.

"Pass the popcorn Ji!" You made grabby hands at Jisung and he just laughed and passed over the bowl.

"Oi! Ya big babies scooch and make some room I wanna be in the middle." Minho yelled out, passing you both a soju bottle.

"Oooohh hyung you know me so well! I love the Strawberry soju!" Jisung grabbed his bottle, smiling up at Minho.

"And you got me yogurt flavored? You must really love us Min!" You smiled up at Minho.

Minho looked down at Jisung then over to you where his eyes lingered a beat too long. You held eye contact until it was a bit too much for you and you looked away. You heard Minho let out a small chuckle as he sat between you and Jisung.

"A toast! To my two best friends, Soulmates, and other cheesy shit!" Minho laughed while raising his own soju.

"To other cheesy shit!" You and Ji said in unison, toasting and gulping down some soju.

You three continued drinking and laughing and having a blast while the movies played in the background. At some point Minho had put his arms around you and Ji and the two of you were snuggling into him watching the movie. You were pulled out of your focus when you started to hear soft snoring coming from Minho's lap where Jisung's head was resting. You smiled and reached over to softly comb your fingers through his hair. You felt Minho softly chuckle under you and you lifted your head to meet his eyes where he was smiling down fondly at you and Ji.

"You two are so adorable, " he said softly, trying not to wake Jisung. You smiled, and your hazy mind decided that was the moment to open the box you had sealed shut weeks ago.

"You're so pretty Min." You all but whispered the words, but Minho heard you loud and clear. His breath lightly hitched and he raised his hand to stroke your cheek.

"You are so beautiful my little moon bear."

~✨~

Weeks passed and the movie night incident was never spoken of. The shared moment between you and Minho had been something so soft and intimate you were afraid of what you would say if he ever brought it up. But thankfully he never did. So you just went on with your life. Your schedule was about to get busy again anyway so there was plenty to keep it out of your mind… right?

~✨~

You can't get it out of your head. No matter what you do it is all you can think about and it is stressing you out. So you do what you do every time you get stressed.

You bake.

After gathering all the ingredients you snap a picture and send it off to Felix.

Y/nnie🤩🧁: [Photo Attached]

Lixxie🍰🍫: I'm on my way.

Felix knew you really only baked when you were stressed out since you never really had the time but the act made you calm down a bit so when he got the picture of all the baking supplies he must have known that you needed a friend because not even twenty minutes later there you were in your kitchen baking enough brownies to feed a small town.

"Soooo, you gonna tell me what brought this stress baking spree on?" He asked softly like he was coaxing a cat out from under the bed. You almost wanted to laugh.

"What gave me away?" You laughed.

"Well when you are baking just to bake you usually only make enough for the nine of us, this is enough to feed the whole company Y/nnie, so tell me what's going on?" You let out a breath you didn't realize you'd been holding and put down your baking tools.

"Lix I don't even know what's going on to be honest. Things with one of my good friends have recently gotten a little…tense? Weird? I don't know. And I don't know if it's just me or if they are feeling it too you know?" Felix is looking at you like he knows exactly what you're talking about and you briefly panic wondering if he can read minds. Then he lets out a sigh and pulls you in for a hug. You melt into his familiar embrace and allow him to hold you while he slowly speaks.

"Things being weird between friends is never fun. In my experience the best way to fix things is through open communication. Just tell this person what you feel and see if they feel the same then go from there." He says while slowly stroking your hair.

"That's the issue Lix, I don't know what I am feeling."

"Ah, well that seems like a good place to start then yeah?"

~✨~

You haven't had time to think about what you and Lix had talked about. Between recording and practicing choreography you barely had time to eat let alone think. So you focused on work. For now.

The next scheduled SKZCode was going to be a haunted house.

Now here's the thing. Haunted houses are objectively not scary. HOWEVER, if someone with you jumps, you tend to jump as well. If someone screams, so do you. So if you are paired with a scaredy cat, you will get scared. And the staff love to make you seem extra cutesy since you are the only girl so of course you get paired with Minho and Jisung.

Jisung is going to get scared. You know in your heart that he is going to scream and he might even cry. Minho on the other hand is going to try and scare you and Ji, and it is going to work. You know this because the three of you have gone to haunted houses together before and that is exactly what happened.

So you resigned yourself to your fate.

~✨~

"Noona, hyung, I am so scared, what if a real monster snuck on set and is hiding with the staff members and it sees us and eats us?" Ji whimpered as he clung onto one of Minho's arms.

"Sungie that's silly, a monster wouldn't eat us here on camera, it would follow us home and eat us there so there was no proof!" Minho snickers as you whack his side.

"Don't scare our poor Ji any more than he already is Min! His poor little heart can't take it!" you hiss at him under your breath. Your slightly shaky voice gives away the fact that you too were getting scared.

"Oh relax y/nnie, Sungie and you are gonna be just fine with me here to protect you." Minho said softly while squeezing you a little more into his side.

Well that was new. He'd usually make fun of you for getting scared and try to rile you up even more. But his tone… it was the same one he had used during the movie night.

That was definitely something you didn't want to think about right now while you were on camera.

You continued through the haunted house, nothing really getting to you, until you opened one room and walked into complete darkness.

Your breath hitched and you clung to Minho a bit tighter. He responded by rubbing soothing circles onto your arm and pulling you a bit closer into his side.

The lights came on and a staff in a costume jumped out and scared you. You and Jisung started screaming and Minho flung himself in front of you. Your eyes widened at the gesture and you looked over to Jisung only to see him looking between you and Minho with a questioning look on his face. This was definitely going to cause a dating scandal if you didn't do something quick, so without skipping a beat you grabbed Jisung and dramatically clung to him. He seemed to get the message and reciprocated. The both of you clinging onto one another while yelling. The whole scene was honestly quite hilarious and adorable.

Minho seemed to come out of it and turned around to see his two best friends clinging onto one another dramatically and cracked a smile before full blown laughing at you two. You and Jisung slowly looked at one another and slowly detangled your limbs, then burst out laughing.

With the tension dissipated you all went through the rest of the haunted house without any further incidents.

Yet Minho's tone rang in your ears, reminding you of what he said last time

"You are so beautiful my little moon bear."

~✨~

The next SKZCode was coming up and the group had been gushing about it the whole time. A camping trip! You would get to play games with the guys, eat delicious food, and even go fishing! The catch? You would all be sleeping on the floor in the same room. Normally this would be no problem. You would cuddle up with Jisung and Minho and all would be good. Now though?

You decided to finally listen to Felix and figure out what you were feeling by laying out some facts.

Fact one: You think Minho is pretty, like unfairly pretty, but then again so does everyone else. So that could mean anything really.

Fact two: Minho acted really weird when you went to the movies with Seungmin, something you do very frequently. You have no clue what that was.

Fact three: When Minho whispered something dirty in your ear it caused something to flutter in you. He was just joking and trying to get your heart racing for the game so surely it meant nothing right?

Fact four: You called Minho pretty and he called you beautiful. You had said things like that before but never whispered and inches from each other's faces… That one… you don't know what to do with.

Fact five: You are clueless as to what all this means.

Cool. Well that was a waste of time.

~✨~

You and the boys piled out of the cars and started to get everything ready for the night. You split off into groups, people needed to go shopping, people needed to cook, people decided to do each other's hair? Not really sure what that has to do with camping but you, Minho, and Jisung gave each other silly little hairdos and everything was great. The day absolutely flew by and you were doing so great not thinking about the way Minho makes you feel.

Finally you were all seated around the campfire. Jisung got saddled with cooking everyone breakfast in the morning and even though he is your best friend you do not want to wake up early so you start to devise a plan to get out of it.

Chan peels Jisung a sweet potato to appeal to him. Damn that's hard to top. You are scrambling to come up with something to top that and miss what is being said until you hear Minho's voice.

"I won't be fake either. I love you."

Everyone burst out laughing at Minho's proclamation to Jisung but you feel… weird. You are looking between Jisung and Minho and there's this pit in your stomach, almost like…

No

No fucking way.

No way are you jealous right now.

Jisung and Minho are best friends just like you and Minho and you and Ji are… and yet…

Shit.

Everything starts to make sense, the bickering, the playful flirting, the butterflies in your stomach.

You have a huge fucking crush on Lee Minho.

As you come to this realization, you lock eyes with him from across the campfire. His smirk softens, and he gently smiles at you.

Oh fuck, what are you going to do?

~✨~

You all lay down for the night and as usual you are sandwiched between your two boys, not so usual, you are clinging to Ji like your life depends on it and are slowly scooting further from Minho's touch.

He giggles probably thinking you are messing with him and grabs your waist to pull you flush to him.

"Where do you think you're going, little moon bear?" He whispers into your ear.

You almost whimper. Almost. You manage to pull your shit together because you are all still on camera and make a show of grabbing for Jisung in front of you.

"I'm cold! I need Ji's heat or else I'll die in the night!" You say dramatically, trying to play it off. Minho must buy it because he remains silent behind you and the three of you get cozy before eventually falling asleep.

~✨~

You wake up in the morning With Minho's entire body wrapped around you. Jisung is trying to get up so he can go to the store with Chan.

"Noona, I've got to go so I can make you breakfast, promise I'll be back soon." Jisung laughs as you pout at him leaving you and you sigh and grumble. You are still a bit cold so you shimmy around so you are now facing Minho.

He is still asleep, so you allow yourself to look at him. You take in his cute little bunny teeth, the little mole on his nose, and his eyelashes fluttering. Oh, his eyes are open, and he caught you staring.

Well that's fucking embarrassing.

He just smiles and pulls you in a little tighter, looking back at you. His eyes pass from your eyes, to your nose, and down to your lips where he lingers for a moment too long. Then he looks back into your eyes.

"Good morning moon bear." He softly whispers. You feel his breath fan against your face and you try not to let your eyelashes flutter at the action.

"Good morning Min." You whisper back. His eyelashes do flutter and you have to hold yourself back from jumping to any conclusions. For a few moments you just gaze into each other's eyes in silence. Finally he reaches a hand up and brushes your cheek.

"Beautiful." It's the smallest whisper but you are barely an inch from his face so you catch it. Minho adjusts his hand so he is now cupping your cheek and your heart starts to hammer in your chest.

Is he about to kiss you?

"Min." It's a breathless whisper, you're so close to him now you're sure he felt it more than heard it.

"WHO WANTS RAMYEON?!" Jisung's voice wakes everyone up and the moment passes. Minho's eyes close and he seems to be frustrated.

You are dying inside.

Was he about to kiss you?

~✨~

The day passes too quickly. You all eat and play games and everything is totally normal on the surface. You have to be normal because you are being filmed. Minho doesn't act any differently, he certainly doesn't bring up the almost-maybe kiss. You decide that if he wants to talk about it then he will talk to you. So you do what you do best.

You perform for the camera and ignore your stupid feelings.

~✨~

You're full on spiraling at this point. Every time you close your eyes you see Minho gazing into your eyes, about to pull you in.

You shake your head. No, this isn't real. Your silly little crush is making you delusional. Minho wasn't going to kiss you, he just called you beautiful and held your face because… because… well you can't think of another explanation, but there must be one because it has been days and Minho hasn't brought it up and if he wanted to kiss you then surely he would have brought it up… right?

Fuck this.

The next SKZCode is coming up and you can just focus on that and not Minho's sparkling eyes, his plush lips, his little nose mole… Fuck. You are officially down bad.

Well you know what that means.

It's time to do something stupid.

~✨~

"Innie! I need your help!" You shout as you walk into the boys dorm. The brunette pops his head out of his door and looks you up and down.

"Yeah I'd say you definitely do." He says distastefully.

"Damn child who raised you?"

"Definitely not you Noona or I'd be dressing like a Target commercial."

You both burst out laughing at that.

"Fair point, but seriously, I need your opinion on what to wear for the next SKZCode."

"Oooh a fashion emergency? Of course you would come to me! Well come right in Noona, we will fix that god awful outfit you've got on in no time!"

He grabbed your hand and dragged you into the room.

"So are we going for Kawaii like usual or did you want to look like one of the guys? I know this is acrobatics so we are looking more toward athleisure type outfits." I.N. says all of this while digging through his closet looking for the stash of your clothes he hid in there.

"Well I was actually thinking I wanted to look… sexy?…" I.N. froze in his closet when you spoke. "I mean obviously not like crazy sexy or anything I just want to look really good you know? Not like a cute little girl and not boyish either. Does that make sense?" I.N. stood up and slowly turned to look at you with a Cheshire grin on his face.

"Noona. I have been waiting my whole life to hear you say those words."

~✨~

You look hot. Holy fuck you have never looked this good in front of the guys. Even at premieres and shows you've always been kawaii or dudebro to match the guys but this? The crop top Innie puts you in fits you in all the best ways, it's low cut enough to be provocative but not enough to be slutty. The back is cut out and it is the perfect shade for your skin tone. But the pants. My god your ass has never looked more smackable. It's like I.N. knew exactly who your target audience was. Your hair is done up in a cute ponytail with the little strands hanging out the front.

You look like sex on legs.

"Jesus Innie you're a god at this."

"I know, I take payment in food and coffee."

"Innie I'd buy you a five course meal for this shit god damn."

You both started laughing and he reached behind him to grab something.

"The final touch."

~✨~

You walked into the studio and it suddenly got very quiet. All the boys were looking at you with varying expressions.

"So? What do you all think? Didn't I do an amazing job?" I.N. grinned at the rest of the guys who were ranging from outright ogling you to shyly avoiding your gaze.

"Yeah Innie you did great." Chan was the first to speak and after that the compliments kept flowing from everyone except the one person you wanted.

Oh well. Onto phase two.

~✨~

You made sure to get a spot right in front of Minho so he could see the full extent of Innie's 'final touch'. A bow in your hair long enough to basically make a runway to the swell of your ass.

The episode went by pretty fast, you were actually having a lot of fun doing all the poses. You noticed when you did the mermaid pose Minho made a noise, a grunt? Maybe a gasp? Whatever it was you were certain your plan was working. Now all you had to do was actually talk to him about what you felt like Felix had recommended.

Once the episode was over you headed over to Minho.

"Hey, Min, you got a sec?" You put your hands behind your back to maximize the silhouette's effect.

"Actually no, sorry, I've got to get home, lots of stuff to get done. I'll text you later okay?" Minho was avoiding your eyes and shuffling from one foot to the other.

"Oh, okay… I guess I'll talk to you later?" You leaned your head down to catch his eye and when he finally locked eyes with you his gaze was searing and sent a chill down your spine.

"Yeah."

~✨~

Well that was fucking weird and definitely not the reaction you had been hoping for. Mr. Self proclaimed butt hunter didn't even attempt to slap your ass in these phenomenal leggings you wore just for him. You groaned into your pillow and allowed yourself to feel frustrated. Any time you had big feelings like this there was always one thing that helped.

You shot Hyunjin a text and after receiving a confirmation you headed to the art studio.

~✨~

Lo-fi music playing on the speaker, a nice hot cup of coffee sitting next to you, and a medium blank canvas sat in front of you, what more could you want? You let the atmosphere wash over you as you tried to use your frustration to create a work of art.

You have no idea how much time has passed, you never do when you're painting with Hyunjin. You could occasionally hear his soft humming and brush-strokes glide across his canvas.

Time with Hyunjin always seemed to calm you down. Maybe it was the chill playlist he favored for the occasion, maybe it was the smell of coffee in the air, or maybe it was the way he simply existed with you in the moment, not requiring you to engage.

You added the final touches on the canvas and nodded to yourself.

"Hyune?" Hyunjin hummed in response.

"What do you think of this one?" You gestured to the finished piece in front of you. Hyunjin stood up and stretched before coming over to admire your work.

"It feels… lonely. Like you are reaching for something in the distance but it's too far away for you to grasp." You simply hummed in response and Hyunjin laid his head on your shoulder.

"I like it Y/N, it's…" He went silent for a moment before sighing and wrapping his arms around you.

"It's beautiful."

~✨~

Weeks had passed since the failed seduction attempt on your part and Minho had been annoyingly 'busy' so you hadn't really seen him outside of your work schedule. The distance was getting to you and you started to wonder if you had done something wrong. Minho had never gone this long without reaching out to hang out or simply showing up at your apartment in years. You couldn't shake the feeling that he was avoiding you and it hurt. A lot. That hurt turned to borderline anger when you saw on Ji's story that he and Minho were having a movie night.

Without you.

You checked the group chat to see if you had missed an invite but there hadn't been a message in over a week since Ji had sent you both a cat meme. Maybe Minho noticed your attempt at flirting and decided that ghosting you was better than outright rejection? Even if that was the case the two of you were both close with Ji and not to mention your co-workers, so how could he just cut you out like that? Jisung hadn't even mentioned the movie night and that hurt you too.

Were you losing both your best friends because you had some stupid feelings?

You felt yourself starting to spiral but before you hit the point of no return you took some calming breaths and closed your eyes. You could not break, not now, you had a busy schedule coming up so you focused on that instead.

Thankfully, it was time to film the next SKZCode so at least you got to do something fun. You prepared yourself to get into the Christmas spirit.

~✨~

The staff welcomed you all in and explained the premise of the episode. You were all going to play games and try and win someone over to end up partnered by the end. You immediately thought of MinBear and how much STAY would love to see the two of you end up together before remembering that you and Minho were currently fighting.

Okay maybe not fighting but it's not like you are exactly on speaking terms. The only communication you'd had in weeks was him correcting you in dance practice.

You couldn't go to Ji either, You were mad at him too. Okay mad is maybe an overstatement but you were definitely not happy.

That left the obvious choice.

You decided to set your sights on Felix. You figured the kawaii image you were presenting mixed with his sunshine would be adorable for STAY. To your credit it works pretty well… for about five minutes. You're not sure what exactly happened but one minute you were fake-flirting with Lix, trying to match up with him, the next he is shyly moving away from you and talking to Hyunjin.

You're confused to say the least, that is until you feel soft breaths on your neck.

"Awh are you eating all alone little moon bear? Don't worry, I'll sit with you." You fight the shudders that threaten to run down your spine hearing Minho's voice so close to you after him being so distant for so long.

"Oh, so you're talking to me now huh Min?" You mean to sound angry but it barely masks the hurt in your softly spoken words. You look down at your lap to hide the tears welling up in your eyes.

Minho goes quiet for a moment then gently pulls your face up, angled away from the camera so STAY couldn't see your tear-laden eyes. A small gasp comes from his mouth.

"Jagi…" He softly whispers before hugging you tight to his chest. "Y/N, sweetheart, why are you crying?" He whispers in your hair to shield his lips from the camera.

"It's nothing Min, I'm okay. Let's just keep eating or STAY will worry about us."

"I don't care if STAY worries, my favorite girl is crying and I'm going to comfort her." You pull away a bit at his words to look into his eyes.

"I'm still your favorite girl?" You whisper the question and you hear Minho's small sound of disbelief at your question.

"Of course jagiya, you've always been my favorite girl. Let's talk more after the skit yeah?"

"Okay."

~✨~

Minho makes sure to stick by your side the rest of the shoot. The two of you end up a pair at the end and as you walk out of the room, prepared to head to the recording studio you are surprised when Minho leads you out the door instead.

"Min, where are we going? Channie oppa told us to go to the recording booth after the shoot."

"I texted him and told him that you needed the afternoon off because you weren't feeling well and that I was going to come take care of you. He said it was okay, so I'm taking you home."

"Oh, okay then."

You both remain silent as you approach the company car and Minho opens the door for you and you both slide in. The ride is unusually quiet for the two of you and you are worried that Minho might be mad at you for something and the longer the silence continues, the higher your anxiety spikes.

By the time you reach your apartment you have over-analyzed every interaction the two of you have had over the past few weeks and you have convinced yourself that Minho actually just hates you and is taking you home to break the news in private so none of the cameras catch you crying again.

You are panicking. You can't lose him because of some stupid attraction you may feel. He is one of your best friends and losing him would be devastating.

Once you reach the door of your apartment you are so close to having a panic attack that your hands start shaking as you try to insert your key into the lock. Minho stands and waits while you shakily unlock and open the door. Once you are inside you are frozen in place waiting for the worst.

Then Minho gathers you in his arms and holds you tight.

"It's okay jagi, you're safe here." He whispers as he starts rubbing soothing circles on your back. You don't even realize you are crying again until he lifts your head by your chin and wipes your tears away. You smile softly and Minho returns it.

You are okay. He is not mad at you. Everything is alright.

"Come on sweetheart, let's go cuddle on the couch and watch a shitty rom-com."

You silently nod and he leads you both to the couch. You sit, his arms still wrapped around you as he guides you to rest your head on his chest. You both stay like that as he starts up one of your favorite movies.

You both watch the movie, Minho rubbing soothing circles on your skin while you nuzzle into his warmth. It is quiet for some time until Minho lets out a deep sigh.

"I'm sorry I made you worry Y/N, I really was busy and some things came up and I just needed a guys night with Ji, I hope you understand I am not mad at you and you are still my favorite girl." Minho's words made you smile and you sunk further into his embrace.

"It's okay Min, I guess I just felt left out and it messed with me for a minute but I get it. We are good." You looked up into his eyes and in a whisper added:

"Promise."

~✨~

There was an electric feeling in the air. You and the boys were beyond excited for your second world tour. This time you were going to go back to Chan and Felix's home country. The two aussies had spent entirely too much time teaching you and the boys all the important aussie slang you would need and helping you all with your English.

The Maniac tour was set to be your biggest endeavor as a group yet. Minho was drilling the choreo into everyone relentlessly and often spent his free time one-on-one helping each member who asked. Ji was always in the studio with his fellow 3Racha members to ensure everything was perfect. And you? You were spending every free moment you could with Felix trying to perfect your English so you could communicate with the international STAYs.

It was overwhelming but you all pushed yourselves to the limit because you wanted to be amazing for STAY.

Finally the day came and it was time for your first concert.

The lights were blinding and the stadium was so loud you could barely hear yourself think.

It was exhilarating.

The concert went by so fast and you had such a great time with your fellow members.

You were still in Seoul but it all felt new, you couldn't believe you and your boys had made it this far.

The next two shows flew by and your time in Japan was short. You and the boys tried your best to keep filming your logs for the STAYs who couldn't make it to the shows. Everything was amazing.

Finally it was time to head overseas to America. U.S. STAYs were much louder than your STAYs back home. The atmosphere was incredible and you all had the time of your lives performing in the U.S. again. You and the boys tried to speak as much English as you could but it is a hard language for you all so you relied heavily on the aussies for translation help.

In between shows you, Ji, and Min would hole up in one of your hotel rooms and gush about how much fun this all was and how excited you all were to finally go to Australia. You would watch bits of movies before ultimately passing out in a cuddle pile on someone's bed, only to wake up and repeat the next day.

The days flew by and before you knew it it was time to hop on a plane headed to Chan and Felix's home. You all made sure you had time planned to meet their families and have a good time while in the land down under.

When you arrived at the hotel to check in, the staff found out that there was a mistake and only seven rooms had been booked. Someone must have thought Chan and Felix were staying with their families but they simply lived too far from the concert venues. After a very long flight and eager to sleep off your jet lag, everyone was too tired to argue about who would be sharing rooms until Minho spoke up.

"Y/N, Ji, and I have kinda been sharing this whole tour anyway, we may as well just share a room from the get-go if that is okay with everyone else?"

The staff looked bewildered at Minho's suggestion. A girl sharing a room with two boys? That's quite unusual. But the other members were used to you three having slumber parties all the time back home and just shrugged it off insisting that if you were fine with it so were they.

So, you three headed up to your shared room.

~✨~

"Ugh, I could sleep for like a week at this point." Jisung groaned out before promptly falling face-first onto the nearest bed to him.

"Yah! Hannie, you know I like sleeping further from the door, give Y/N that bed and you and I can share the other." Minho glared at the younger boy already getting comfortable in the bed.

"Hyuuuunnnggg I'm already in this one though." Jisung whined out and sank further under the covers.

"Min it's okay, Ji can have that bed and you and I can just share the other. I prefer being close to the window anyway." You said sleepily before heading over to the far bed and setting up your stuff on the nightstand.

"Are you sure Y/nnie? I can kick the lazy quokka out if you'd prefer a bed to yourself."

"I'm sure Min, we all have been sleeping on one bed almost every night of the tour anyway, I'm kind of used to having someone next to me anyway." You shrugged and gathered your sleep clothes.

"I'm gonna go shower real quick, airplanes always make me feel greasy, either of you need to use the bathroom before I go?" You asked the two. Jisung had already passed out and you and Minho just laughed at the sleepy boy before Minho looked up at you.

"No, you're all good. I'll shower after you too so our bed doesn't get gross like Sungie's." You both started laughing and you went to the bathroom and hopped in the shower.

While in the shower you let your thoughts roam. You had been so busy with the tour and Jisung had been stuck with you and Minho the whole time as well so you hadn't had time to think about your maybe-feelings for Minho. Now you were confronted with the fact that while you all were here there would be no escaping to your own room if things got too weird for you.

Not just that but you were sharing a bed with him.

You and Minho had slept in the same bed many times but you were almost always accompanied by Jisung as well. Now it would just be the two of you…

It won't be weird if you don't make it weird.

Right?

~✨~

You finally got out of the shower and changed into your pajamas. After doing your skincare you came out of the bathroom and stopped in place when you looked up and saw a shirtless Minho standing in the middle of the room. His back was facing you and you took a second to admire his strong shoulder muscles down to the dip in his back, just above the hem of his shorts. You could've stood there staring forever but when Minho started to pull down his shorts you made a small noise, something between a whimper and a groan. Minho stiffened and dramatically turned toward you with a hand over his pecs.

"Y/N! Sorry! I didn't hear you come out. I was going to change into my robe before going in after you. Sorry about that. I'll just… bring it with me." The tips of his ears were a fiery red and you're sure you were no better. You could feel yourself flushing and you quickly looked down and nodded as he passed by you and quickly went into the bathroom to shower.

Well that didn't help your situation.

You crawled into bed and tried to calm yourself down but every time you closed your eyes you just saw a shirtless Minho again. You lightly groaned and turned your body away from the bathroom and tried to will yourself to fall asleep before Minho came back so you didn't have to face him.

Of course that didn't work. You had been so tired when you got here but now you were like a live wire and you knew that sleep would not come easily.

When Minho returned from his shower he said nothing as he slowly climbed into the bed next to you. It was quiet for a moment before he broke the silence.

"Sooo… do you want to cuddle?" He said it slowly and quietly and you internally screamed. There is no way you would fall asleep if Minho was touching you… and yet.

"Yeah, that sounds nice." You quietly answered.

Minho scooted closer to you and wrapped an arm around your waist, holding you tightly.

"Is this good?" He whispered. You could feel how close he was when he spoke, his breath tickling your ear.

"Yeah, it's perfect."

You were so fucked.

~✨~

Just as you thought, it took you forever to fall asleep. However, when you woke up you felt completely relaxed, you had somehow gotten the best night's sleep you had had in a very long time. You slowly came to consciousness and the first thing you noticed was a hair on your face tickling your nose. You realized there was some sort of breeze on your face, cracking an eye open and you bit back a squeak at the sight before you.

You had shifted in the night and were now, yet again, face-to-face with a sleeping Minho. His arms were wrapped tightly around you and your legs were tangled. He was beautiful like this. Soft breaths coming out from him as he peacefully slept. You stared at him in wonder and decided that a few more moments of this wouldn't hurt.

After some time passed Minho eventually began to stir. He groaned and hugged you a bit tighter before opening his eyes. You were both quiet, allowing the peaceful moment in an otherwise chaotic few months. You softly smiled and he returned it.

"G'morning jagi." He whispered, trying not to break the peaceful atmosphere the two of you were caught in.

"Good morning sleepyhead." You softly chuckled and he giggled in return, nuzzling slightly closer to you.

"I could get used to this, you know?" He whispered, now inches from your face. You breath hitched at his comment and before you could respond there was a loud banging on your door.

"YAH WAKE UP LAZY BUMS IT'S TIME TO GET READY!" Chan's voice rang out and Minho groaned, closing his eyes and tilting his head back. You heard Jisung yelp from the other bed at Chan's command.

"Time to go." Minho groaned.

~✨~

The next few days were a blur. The Aussie STAYs were crazy. The concerts were so much fun but you were all so exhausted that by the time you got back to the hotel it took all of your energy to shower before crawling back into bed.

You and Minho slept in each other's arms every night.

Once the concerts were over you were all invited to the Bang residence for dinner. All nine of you laughed and ate and bonded with Chan's family. It was amazing and you never wanted it to end, but eventually it was time to go. You and Hannah exchanged numbers, her saying you needed a girl friend being surrounded by the eight loud boys all the time. You laughed and agreed, saving her number immediately.

You would cherish the time you got to spend in Australia forever.

~✨~

The rest of the tour flew by, the nine of you really giving it your all and after months it was finally time to come back home. You were so excited to sleep in your own bed again and get back into your normal crazy schedule.

The first few nights back home were odd. You couldn't fall asleep no matter how tired you were. You assumed it was just the jet lag but after days of bad sleep you were ready to snap.

It was a normal day filled with dance practice and small photoshoots but you were so exhausted you felt like you were going to fall over at any minute. You noticed Minho looked dead tired as well. You wondered if he was having trouble adjusting as well.

After your schedule was done for the day you decided to take a nice walk to try and calm your mind. After walking up and down the Han rivers shore a few times you decided it was time to head home.

You entered your apartment to the sound of the TV on and smiled.

"To what do I owe this pleasure?" you jokingly asked the boy on your couch.

"I've been sleeping like shit and decided to see if it's my bed or just me so I came to stay here if that's cool with you?" Minho didn't look away from the TV as he spoke.

"You're always welcome here Min you know that. Wanna order takeout?" You plopped next to him on the couch and leaned on his shoulder.

"Already got your favorite from that one place with the noodles you like." He wrapped an arm around you and turned on yet another shitty rom-com for you two to watch. You let out a hum of approval and sank into his embrace before answering.

"Thanks Min, you're the best."

"Anything for my favorite girl."

You and Minho sat in content silence until the food came. You both ate as much as you could handle before settling back to finish your movie. Once it was over you stretched and yawned, feeling more exhausted than you had in a long time. Minho smiled at you and reached out for your hand.

"You look exhausted, let's head to bed."

You sleepily nodded and took his hand. He led you to your room where you both climbed into bed and he gathered you into his arms just like he had back in Sydney. You both let out a content sigh at the contact and before you knew it you were out.

You slept like the dead. You didn't realize how much you missed Minho's presence until you had it once again. After that there was an unspoken agreement between the two of you to share a bed until further notice. You loved the contact but the longer it continued the more your feelings grew.

You think you might be falling in love with your best friend and for the first time you think you might be okay with that.

[maribatserver]

Maribat Mix & Match Monster Mash 2024

We're back! September hasn't quite begun yet, but we're so excited for this year's spooky season that we decided to give you a little extra time to prepare your frightful fics and dreadful drawings, especially as this year we're mixing things up more than usual.

You may have noticed that this year, the prompts we've given you to start are a bit longer than they have been before. That's because we thought incantations would be more inspiring.

"I am not supposed to be the Final Girl!" "I'll kill you either way." "I'm hunting cryptids." "Has anyone ever told you how creepy you are?" "Not a fan of surprises?" "Oh, bite me." "Turn the lights off."

But as some of you may know, those aren't all we're giving you! From October 25th-31st, each night at the perfect time for necromancy (also known as Midnight EST) a tombstone will reveal a new ingredient for you to mix into your creations. If all goes to plan, your muse will be resurrected in plenty of time for Halloween. Ahahahahaha!

All you have to do is Mix and Match our incantation prompts with the tombstone ingredients to give life to your abominations, then post them so that we can all enjoy the scares! Feel free to use other calendars and prompts while you're at it, as we all know that October has several fangtastic challenges that you don't need us to tell you about.

While we wait for Halloween though, we'll be counting down with gruesome graphics for our incantations, posted each Friday until our event begins. The order of our countdown will be decided by our very own server members, so if you haven't joined the dark side already, send us a message and get an invite. We promise we'll only bite if you ask us too.

When your spooktacular submissions are finished, you can post them on tumblr with the tag #mm&mmm2024 and we’ll reblog them here, or you can submit them to our Ao3 collection, Maribat Mix & Match Monster Mash (Maribat_Mix_Match). Just make sure that you’ve tagged and rated your work accurately, and that any sensitive content is under a cut. Halloween may be the season for scares, but we want to keep our frightful fun safe for everyone!

Special thanks to @newdog14 for designing our calendar and prompts, to @nottesilhouette for helping to brainstorming our prompts and giving Newsie access to Canva Pro, and to @izanae for helping with logistics and for returning to us just in time to enable Newsie during her favorite event!

[mychlapci]

So going back a day or so about needing Merformer Optimus needing to exist and getting successfully knocked up by the most unexpected choice. Ratchet was, of course, fucking awesome, but I’ve always had a soft spot for Optimus/Rung, especially in IDW due to a very good fic.

Rung, the oldest mer not only in their facility, but known to exist. They believe he is the last of his subspecies and as far as they are concerned will be the last of them. He is treated a bit like those old slow tortoises and the staff is all fond of him and he freely moves around largely unbothered by the other mers universally.

Unbeknownst to the staff the reason no one bothers him is that he is ancient and is well known for being the Best Sire hands down. He has had hundreds of offspring and outside of the facility has spent a season at least once with plenty of the inhabitants. Part of his appeal is that the offspring with him generally take after the carrier but with little to no health issues and are longer lived and he is always willing to assist with unrelated clutches, so he’s generally very popular. Everyone is either old fuck buddy on good terms, a descendent, or he helped babysit their offspring from a previous clutch.

Due to his age and species his breeding seasons are centuries apart (like that one old shark that takes centuries to hit puberty) and the fact most of the mers in the facility are already paired up and those that aren’t (or aren’t monogamous) aren’t his type he hasn’t been offering himself when others get horny. The staff think he doesn’t have a breeding season anymore (wrong) and don’t bother keeping an eye on him as he has been known to be helpful for first-time carriers or ones without partners or large clutches. He’ll just show up in a tank and the mers there usually accept his help for the season.

Optimus though, shy, confused, pretty Optimus, just happens to line up both with Rung’s preferences and his first Rut in 800 years. So, smiling sweetly he takes himself over to the tank slips in, completely unbothered by staff and proceeds to gently coax Optimus into a dance and then into his private space to finish the courtship before he gets too far into the Rut and reveals more than he wants the staff to see.

Optimus is absolute putty as Rung spends his millions of years of practice taking mer Optimus’s virginity and insuring he keeps him full and dazed to make sure he succeeds in getting him pregnant.

Another reason Rung doesn’t normal try anything?

He’s a little intimidating when he goes into breeding mode because he’s actually a deep sea mer. Lets add a little eldritch abomination to Rung for this. Picturing a mix of those monster Rung and Spark Eater rung designs to be honest. Like claspers and teeth and tentacles and hypnotic biolights all branching out form the translucent plating over his Spark to keep his partner placid as they generally breed with those not in their species. All normally stored inside him and fangs with just a bit of venom to keep his partner going as long as he is. Optimus though, new to the facility, has his resting place without cameras.

If the staff could see it would look more like Optimus being eaten then having sex, especially with the wailing and wriggling being stopped by Rung digging into him.

I'll be honest, I briefly considered Rung as well. I love me some ancient, deep sea monster Rung who bred his way through the ocean. (We’ve already agreed on this blog that mer Rung would be a dick wielding menace.)

The thought of Rung casually hauling himself into Optimus’ tank, like he had done many times before, unsuspecting, friendly, fluttering his tail around as he subtly initiates a mating dance… I like that. Rung turns the bigger mer into a pretty little doll in his hands, keeping Optimus under him with paralyzing venom and tendrils that he previously didn’t have.

It’s been a while since Rung had a nice, virginal slit to breed. There were times he’d help out young mers come into their own regularly, but it’s been a long time since he’s allowed himself to really indulge. Despite his… very intimidating appearance, I think Rung remains gentle and sweet, coaching Optimus through the mating, giving him everything he needs while taking what he wants.

Optimus has no idea what he’s getting into. By the time Rung is done with him, he’s barely lucid, lost in a haze of overloads tripping into each other, and definitely pregnant <3

[loganwritesprobably]

Teen Wolf WIP

I've just gone back to working on this and the first few paragraphs punched me in the throat, so enjoy them while I workshop and finish the entire fic

It felt distinctly like a full circle moment.

Peter stood atop the stump with Scott at his side, the two of them wrestling the revived Nogitsune to keep it in place. Scott was stronger, but Peter had the sheer determination to keep his family safe on his side. Stiles was on his way, Peter knew that, nobody had wanted to call him in for this, but Peter had known that he deserved to see the fallout, and to know what was coming before he got that dreaded call. It felt like everyone around them was watching with breath held, not daring to so much as whisper in case they disturbed the balance they barely had, lest they lose this fight again.

Parrish joined them, helping to hold the Nogitsune in place, and their final plan was falling into place. The Nogitsune would perish from the hellfire, but Jordan wouldn't be able to hold him alone - not for long enough to actually burn the abomination fully. Scott was an Alpha, a True Alpha, and Peter.. well he's always been a bit of a masochist. He took a deep breath, and briefly met his daughter's eyes. He smiled and gave a small nod to her, and he knew that she understood. He didn't even look at Scott as he kicked out to make the Alpha's knees buckle, and Chris ran out to grab him. Chris and Melissa wrapped their arms around him, keeping him close and preventing him from interfering any further. "Don't let Eli look." Peter managed, despite his teeth being clenched from the force he needed to use to keep the Nogitsune in place. "No more traumatised Hales." Derek laughed, a wet thing, and he pulled Eli into his chest so his son couldn't see, gripping him perhaps a little tighter than was necessary, both of them grounding each other.

"Look after them Scott." His last words, directed to his only Beta, a True Alpha. That felt right. Bookends to his story.

[sholiofic]

Whumptober Day 27: Muzzled

This was actually one of the first snippets I wrote for this project back in September, because it's such an unusual prompt that it caught my eye. (I was going to say "And one I haven't written" and then remembered that I wrote a whole entire fic about this, in this fandom, even. LOOK, I'VE WRITTEN A LOT OF FIC OKAY.)

No. 27: VOICELESS Laboratory | Muzzled | “I have no mouth and I must scream.”

450 wds, Biggles & EvS, gen. Also posted on DW.

Bigglesworth unbuckled the straps from Erich's hands first, white-faced, working without speaking, and then reached for the iron monstrosity clamped around his face. Now that his hands were free, tingling from the blood flowing back into them, Erich had already slapped a hand to it, frantically trying to dig his fingers under its metal edge without regard for the way he was clawing at his own skin. Bigglesworth closed his fingers over Erich's for a minute (warm by contrast, he hadn't realized his hands were so icy), and then started working on the straps behind his head. Erich was also tearing at them as they came off, and the thing was finally ripped away from his face. Erich wrenched it from Bigglesworth's hands and flung it into a corner, where it clattered on the floor and narrowly missed Hebblethwaite, who had just come down the stairs into the cellar.

Without pausing for a beat, Hebblethwaite said, "I see you found him. Do you need a hand?"

"No, we're all right here. Go help Bertie finish securing the area."

Hebblethwaite turned at that, with a sharp nod, barely glancing at Erich, and went back upstairs. For all the seeming chaos of the way they worked together, Erich thought, there was good discipline on this crew. His mind felt sluggish and vague.

Bigglesworth didn't ask anything about the equipment around them, and Erich didn't ask what had happened to the scientists and guards -- he'd heard a lot of gunfire and crashing upstairs. In truth, he wasn't entirely sure he could ask anything. His mouth was horribly dry, his jaw sore from the pressure of the metal frame clamped over his face. He worked his jaw and swallowed.

"Water?" Bigglesworth asked, and offered a flask. Erich sipped at it, and Bigglesworth kept a hand in the middle of his back, a steady and firm pressure he could lean back into, while he slowly got his mouth working again. He cleared his throat.

"I assume there's an aeroplane waiting nearly." The words rasped a little, but it was his own voice, the words perfectly clear, and it was an incredible relief to hear the sound of his own voice after nearly two days of wearing that abomination.

"As always. Can you stand?"

Erich slid off the metal table immediately. The small, firm hand stayed pressed against his back, letting go only when he was steady on his feet -- and even then stayed close; he could feel the light almost-touch as they went up the stairs. He kept wanting to touch his face, he could still physically feel the mask on him, but he knew it was gone, and when Bigglesworth's hand lightly brushed his back, he also knew that he didn't have to speak to be heard.

[neocoffeecafe]

sugar n spice n everything nice! (f) | home | writing masterlist | fic rec library

includes/warnings just fluff , cursing, fem!reader

wc .7k

a/n pt1/fluff ver. of my xmas special! the second part will be published on xmas day

“white.. green.. red.. any other colors?” you hum, as you finish up mixing the red food coloring into the white icing.

“how about pink?” yangyang suggested, retrieving another can of the icing from the fridge.

“why pink?” you ask, the mixing of the food coloring making the icing a scarlet shade of red.

“i dunno, i think a pink santa hat would be cute.” he shrugs, stealing the red dye from you and dropping little amounts so the color isn’t too red.

“oh! we need yellow.” you say, squeezing behind yangyang to the fridge to get another can of icing. previously, you and him had spent nearly $200 just to get the things you needed, including several, several cans of icing. you reach your arm over his pink abomination to get the yellow dye.

“are we gonna give some to the neighbors?” he asks, tilting his head to the boxes of plain christmas themed cookies. “because we’ve got a shit ton of cookies.”

you giggle. “yeah we will. we can give them to your friends, too.” you suggest, squeezing the edible dye to make a bright shade of yellow to your icing.

“what did you want to do for christmas?” he asks, finishing the pink icing and beginning to open one of the boxes of cookies.

“maybe we could just cuddle in the couch, share blankets and drink hot cocoa!” you press a soft kiss to the side of his cheek, which he takes his free arm and wraps it around you and pulls you in for a side hug.

“absolutely. we can watch movies or play video games all day. whatever you want, princess.” he pulls away from you to retrieve some spatulas and the piping bags. you both begin emptying the contents of bowls into the bags, each bag having its own dedicated color.

he hands you a cookie when each bag was filled, coincidentally (or probably planned) a santa hat. “time to use that pink icing.” he winks at you.

“you turd.” you bite back, chuckling and set the cookie on your paper plate. he grabs a christmas tree for himself and gets the yellow. you watch as his tongue pokes out in concentration, watching as he’s delicate and careful in drawing a little star on the top of the tree. “you look so cute.” you comment, pressing another peck to his side.

“do you like my star?”

“i love it.” you begin with the white fluff on the bottom and top of the hat, and then fill in the rest with the pink.

“do you want sprinkles?” he’s still working on his tree, his decorations precise and focused.

“what kind of question is that?” you ask, rolling your eyes playfully. he hands you the little container of christmas sprinkles, sprinkles that you dump on the side and carefully pick out where the red candy cane went and where the little white stars went. you finish your creation and show it off to him, displaying it with a wide smile.

“cute.” he says, handing you a new blank cookie of a candy cane. you set it on your plate and fetch your decorated cookie, setting it in the plastic container where you decided your creations would go.

“well, one down. about seven hundred to go.” you eye the handful of boxes of cookies, the both of you your own boxes of giggles.

“that’s why it’s us doing this. out tag team is quite unmatched, if i say so myself.” he carefully sprinkles yellow and green dusty sprinkles on his creation. “thats two down.” he does the same as you but his next cookie is a heart. “oh i know what im doing with this one.” out of curiosity, you watch as he covers the cookie with red icing, covering every inch. once its covered, he grabs the white and begins writing out three words: i love you. he sprinkles some red sparkly sprinkles on and adds some white stars. “my heart for my lady.” he playfully bows down to you, holding his hand out to display his cookie.

“you’re so cringe.” you take it from him. “i love it.” he smiles and strengthens himself up, pulling you in for a kiss. the cookies and icings were forgotten for a few moments when you’re tied in his embrace of kisses and warmth.

once you pull away to breathe, you glance down at the rest of the cookies and sweet treats. “well. we’ve got tons more cookies to go. perhaps, they could wait a minute.”

@neocoffeecafe

[crab-instruments]

Snippet of a potential fic

Just This One Time

Teen Wolf x Supernatural crossover

a/n: It's been a long time since I've really written anything, even with ideas floating around. I've been rewatching Teen Wolf and it's my current, stupid obsession. Reading other people's fics, I kept thinking about how I would want a crossover to play out, but never finding one I liked. Hell, I don't even care about Supernatural but I found myself researching Polish rock bands for Dean and Sam's identities for a scene where Stiles would point out they can't say the Polish names right, so I started to just write. I don't know if I'll actually finish this but I am posting it more for myself as accountability (though if people like it, that would be encouraging). Not sure of a pairing and if there is one, it'll likely be pre-slash but Sterek since Stiles will be one of the main narrators.

Stiles knew something was up the moment he laid eyes in the two men dressed in suits, parading around the sheriff’s station as FBI agents. He didn’t need werewolf senses to know these two were sketchy. Sheriff Stilinski, his very cruel flesh and blood, had kicked Stiles out of his office when the two had arrived and introduced themselves. It was like the Sheriff didn’t trust his own son with information about high priority cases.

The officers in the room ignored Stiles as he sank quietly to his knees in front of the door, pressing his ear against the door. They were quite used to Stiles snooping and it was always better to ignore the teenager because dealing with him was much more work.

While he was uncomfortable in the position, Stiles didn’t dare move. He didn’t want to create any noise that could bring attention to himself, forcing the Sheriff to kick him out further. It was at moments like this he really envied his furry friends, unable to hear much through the door. The teenager focused a little harder and his efforts were rewarded.

Agent Ciechowski and Agent Ciesielski.

Stiles barely heard the names through the door but it was hard for him to mistake Polish names. Not with an abomination like his first name. Other phrases like ‘animal attacks’ and ‘claw related injuries’ seeped through the door. He couldn’t hear anything else though, as Deputy Parrish yanked him away from the door by the collar of his shirt.

“Hey! Hey! Don’t stretch the shirt out, man! Come on!” The sound of his sneakers squeaked in the bustling room and his arms flailed wildly as he attempted to stand under Parrish’s grip.

“Stiles, I heard the Sheriff tell you to go home, so you should get going. You’re already on thin ice.” Deputy Parrish was young, competent, and well acquainted with the teenager’s shenanigans. He heard enough from the Sheriff and observed the rest with his own eyes.

Stiles faced the deputy, trying to convey his uneasiness with the several expressions flittering across his face in seconds. His brain worked quickly to figure out how he could convince Parrish to help him. “But…! Parrish, don’t they seem weird? They don’t give off an ‘FBI’ vibe. Something is off about them.” To drive the point home, Stiles shifted his weight from foot to foot, uneasy.

Parrish considered the words for a moment, deciphering if this was Stiles’ instincts hitting the mark once again, or it if this was Stiles’ usual brand of bullshit and he was just trying to stick his nose where it didn’t belong. “Why do you think that?” He questioned, lowering his voice and leaning into the teenager’s space to make the conversation more private.

His mouth in a thin line, Stiles eyes scanned the room for answers. “Well, it’s just… I have a feeling.”

“A feeling?”

“Yeah. A feeling. Can’t you see it? About their…” Stiles gestured wildly with his arms, “everything?”

The deputy frowned, almost disappointed in the kid. He expected a better excuse. Parrish straightened his posture and put his hands on his tactical belt. “Go home, Stiles. I’ll keep an eye on them, and I promise, if I see anything suspicious—“

“You’ll tell me?”

“—I’ll talk to your father, the Sheriff of Beacon Hills and my boss, and I’ll share our concerns.”

An exasperated sigh escaped the teenager. Without Parrish on his side, there wasn’t much else he could do at the station. Stiles would have to go do research on his own, possibly give Danny a call and somehow bribe him to break the law again. Had Danny hacked the FBI database before? Maybe if Stiles presented it as a challenge, it could work.

Stiles made his way to his Jeep in the parking lot, but stopped abruptly when he saw a vintage car he didn’t recognize parked a few spots away. Beacon Hills wasn’t that big; he’d have recognized that car if he had seen it before. The only black, noteworthy car in this town was Derek’s Camaro. Therefore, this had to be the car the FBI agents rolled up in. Looking around to make sure there wasn’t eyes on him, Stiles pulled out his phone and took pictures of the car, making sure to get the license plate number to check out later. He noted that the plates were from Kansas and there was nothing signifying that this was a government vehicle.

The Jeep pulled out of the parking lot quickly, much on the teenagers mind.

Opening his laptop, Stiles typed in the first agents name, Ciechowski, into Google. The name sounded familiar, possibly from his mom telling stories of her Polish friends. When the results popped up, Stiles squinted. He wasn’t sure what he expected, but it sure wasn’t the bio of a Polish rock star. The band, Republika, sounded familiar but Stiles couldn’t place why.

Digging a bit more, he found the band’s website. Stiles opened the page and couldn’t stop himself from playing one of the songs, Bikini Death.

The staccato notes from the guitar played through his speakers and Stiles realized why he recognized the singer. The band Grzegorz Ciechowski was a part of was one his mom used to play for him when he was younger, to connect him with his heritage. She had told the story of how she saw them live once and cried when Grzegorz had died.

The memories of his mother ripped a scar open inside his chest, but he couldn’t stop now.

It all came together when Stiles read the names of the band members. One in particular stood out.

Sławomir Ciesielski.

The FBI agents had taken their identities from the Polish rock band. It was what Stiles needed to confirm his suspicions.

These two men were likely hunters checking up on the werewolf population of Beacon Hills.

***

Here's a link to the song, Bikini Death by Republika. There is a Polish version, but I like this remastered version. The title is a line from the song. Mamona and Psy Pawłowa were runner ups.

[jacksfandomrandom]

I got back into writing because someone requested a hurt/confirt Amity centric fic. Thank you, Anon, for helping me get back into the writing game. Anyways, here's the fic.

Summary: Amity feels like she needs to prove herself in the human realm and ends up getting drained because of overusing magic. Luz takes care of her makes it known that she doesn't need to prove herself to anyone.

It had been almost two months in the human realm. Everyone was still settling in and making sure to rest, as they found out that using magic tires them out easily when using it too much. That was everyone except Amity. 

She saw how desperate Luz was to get the portal fixed and on many nights, Luz confessed to Amity when cuddling, how guilty she feels that she can’t find a way to get the witches home. So Amity made sure to do everything in her power to help. When it would be raining, she would be outside or in the cabin, researching. When everyone would be going on human realm adventures, she would stay behind and test things out. Usually, if someone was feeling drained from using too much magic, they would rest for the day. Not Amity though.

One day when they were in the cabin, trying to build a new portal, Luz noticed a few things off with Amity. When she would float an object over, the object and her hands would shake tremendously. Her face was super pale with eye bags and she would wince whenever she would have to use harder spells. Luz decided to ignore it for now.

When the portal was almost finished, Amity was using a bit of abomination goo to keep the portal stable. It was their only stability they had for it. They actually had a good chance of it working but her vision began to blur and she started to feel dizzy. She tried to push through it and keep the abomination goo stable but her body really didn’t like that. The whole world went fuzzy before she felt herself begin to sway.

“Amity? Are you okay? You don’t look to well,” Luz worried, putting a hand on Amity’s shoulder.

“M… fffine-” She slurred out before collapsing into Luz’s side.

“Sweet potato!” Luz yelled with concern as she caught her unconscious girlfriend and sat down with her in her lap.

“What happened?!” Hunter ran over with concern with the rest of the Hexsquad. They had just seen Amity faint and were worried.

“I don’t know! She just passed out!” 

Hunter had medic training so he was the one to ask “what happened” to. He looked over her and put a hand to her forehead. It was searing hot but her face was pale. He checked her pulse, which was thankfully normal. 

“Fever, pale face, eye bags, normal pulse…” He muttered her symptoms under his breath.

“Luz, when was the last time Amity took a day off. And I don't just mean to sleep, I mean a full day,” He asked.

“I-I don’t know! I don't think she ever did!” Luz was still panicking.

Hunter sighed, now knowing exactly what the diagnosis would be.

“She drained herself. Probably used too much magic with little to no break,” He concluded before standing up.

“Will she be okay? I remember she got drained once when we were kids and it was really bad,” Willow asked in a worried tone. It was pretty bad when they were witchlings. Amity couldn't keep anything down, ran a very high fever, could barely move, wouldn't be able to sleep but would pass out when doing anything strenuous, and had major coughing fits that left her lips blue and face paler.

“She’ll be feeling sick for a day or two. Its a lot worse for witchlings though,” Hunter said.

“You guys keep working, I’ll take care of her. She did the same for me when i was sick,” Luz said before picking up the unconscious girl's bridal style and carrying her back to the house.

Luz explained the situation to her mom before carrying her upstairs to the bedroom and laid her down on her cot. The girl whimpered when Luz was about to leave the room, as if she could tell she would be alone.

“I’ll be back soon, Mi amor,” She whispered before leaving. She came back in a minute with a water bottle, a cold and wet washcloth, and pajamas in case Amity would want to change. 

The purple haired girl began to stir as Luz put the washcloth on her forehead, to try and lower the fever.

“Mm… L..uz?” She slurred, not entirely knowing as exactly where she was or what was happening.

“I’m here, Batata, do you need anything? You fainted,” Luz explained, holding the girl’s hand.

“M cold…” was all she said. She couldn't really remember anything a few minutes prior but knew something bad happened. Though, since she was feeling extremely tired, she really didn't feel like getting all worked up over not remembering something.

“I brought you some pajamas, if you want to change into them? I’ll step out,” Luz offered.

“I don’t… think I can move… much. Bones feel… tired,” She mumbled sleepily.

“Yeah, you might be feeling very fatigued. I could… uh.. Help you change into them. But not if you’re uncomfortable with it!” Luz suggested. She didn’t want Amity feeling unsafe or uncomfortable.

“I don’t mind you seeing… thanks,” Amity said. Luz began to change her into nice warm jammies. It surprisingly wasn't that awkward. They were becoming more comfortable with each other’s bodies recently but it could still be awkward at times.

“Sweet potato,”

“Hm?” Amity mumbled.

“You don’t have to prove yourself to me, you know. You can take breaks, I don’t see you as being weak,” Luz explained. She knew Amity often had a mindset that if she wasn't good enough, she'd be treated badly. Luz really wanted to get her into some sort of therapy on the boiling isles as she knew it could later cause eating disorders, self-harm, and even suicide, but before they could even get it all sorted out, the day of unity was coming up close and they didn't have time for it.

“Please promise me that you’ll take care of yourself more? You’ve been taking care of me and worrying about me more than you do yourself. You don’t just have to be “Luz’s protective girlfriend”. Its fine if you need to be vulnerable,” She said, squeezing her hand. (I hate how Amity’s whole personality was mainly Luz’s girlfriend in season 3. She deserved more backstory and angst!)

“I promise, Luz.” The sick girl squeezed her hand back, “now, come ‘ere. I wanna cuddle,” Amity tried her best to reach her hand up to pull Luz down but barely even grazed her. She was yearning for physical affection from Luz.

“Okay, okay, I’m coming,” Luz moved the covers over a bit and laid down with her. Amity dug her face into Luz’s chest (in a non-sexual way) as Luz spooned her. Luz fixed the washcloth on her forehead and kissed her head.

“I love you,” She confessed.

“I love you too, Amity”

[bbyboybucket]

Ahh I love these! For the fanfic writer emoji ask:

😈 🤡 🤭 💥 💔

You literally just made my whole day by asking me and giving so many emojis, I could kiss you rn

😈 - I actually don’t think that I have! At least not in anything that I currently have up. I had a enemies to lovers fic a long time ago (it was horrible, abomination truly) and in one of the chapters, I did a little surprise set back in their relationship when things started to get good, so I guess that sorta counts?

🤡 - Majority of the dialogue in Aching, has a playful, sarcastic tone to it which was fun to do and I really like it all. But if I had to pick a specific line, it’d probably be from Ponytails where reader’s arm is broken and there’s this exchange between her and Bucky.

“Well…I need help puttin my hair up but neither of the girls are here. And I can’t do it myself cause ya know….I’m down an arm.” “Welcome to the club.”

But I do have a new girl inspired SamBucky WIP that’s way funnier anything I’ve so far written (if I ever get around to finishing it😅)

🤭 - I actually don’t think I do! But I do usually tag my tumblr stuff with “Bucky Barnes Fanfic” just because if someone searches those words, it’d pop up

💥 - I’d say average? Like I’m open to it as long as it’s friendly

💔 - a few parts of my lil Christmas fic hurt to write, I more so felt heartbroken while thinking of the ideas rather than actually writing them down because I tried to stick to Bucky feeling more than one emotion at a time rather than just “sad” because it’s more realistic for emotions to be allover the place and not just in one realm, if that makes any sense?

But I did write a Spencer Reid fic a long long long time ago, it’s not even up anymore, but that one really did break my heart to write.

[bicsbec]

I never did post the rest of Natural Melodies 's chapters, but the story is completed so y'all can check it out and read in a single sitting.

I did, however, finish the first one-shot from The Noceda House fic and I'm pretty excited about it. It's a little longer than I thought, but we already know I'm terrible at estimating so!

I happily bring you The Most Mudane Slice-of-life Date Ever, a lumity centric fic about that date Luz promised Amity, taking place in the Human Realm as they make the best out of a crummy situation.

There's a snippet under the cut of this post.

I'd also like to soft launch the next fic I'm working on, which is Gus-centric. Exciting stuff, I'm really looking forward to it. Until next time! (I'll be posting the raeda chaps soon)

Luz had been planning this for months. Well not this particular date under these particular circumstances, but a date with Amity. Any date with Amity.

Planning was a big word, too. It was more like daydreaming. She had a list she went through in her head of different dates.

Bowling, brunch, a movie, a picnic, the beach, roller skating, going for ice cream or milkshakes like in those old teen romance movies, or going to a bookstore, or—

"Luz? Hey, hello, where are you?" Hunter waved a hand in front of her face. She swatted it away.

"I'm right here."

He raised an eyebrow. "Right. Stop thinking about Blight for two seconds and focus. What can we get Camila?"

Luz scrunched her nose at that. "Just call her Mom already, sounds weird when you use her name."

Hunter blushed at the suggestion. "That's—that'd be disrespectful."

"You calling her Mom would be better than getting her something," Vee said from the cutting board. "Or we could make her dinner, like a nice one."

They were already making dinner, but it was just because it was their turn to cook that week. Gus and Amity had cleaned the common areas and Willow had been hanging up the laundry. Mamá would find the house spotless once she got back from work.

"If that's the case, Hunter should stick to peeling and cutting, and only what we hand you," Luz said, pointing a spoon in his direction. Last time he and Gus had been left in the kitchen alone, they'd created an abomination, the affront to nature kind not the magic kind.

Hunter shrugged. "It wasn't that terrible."

"Glad you could digest it," Luz shot back. "Now, el cumple de Mamá."

"I think it should be a small thing," Vee said, bringing Luz the diced potatoes and pumpkin for the beans. "We're already a handful, don't wanna stress her out more than necessary."

"Right, so dinner, maybe game night? Or a movie. And cake."

"No ghouls?"

"No ghouls, Hunter. She doesn't need one to follow her around the whole day, telling her how many years she's got left."

He raised his hands defensively. "It helps you appreciate your remaining days, that's all I'm saying."

"It is effective," Vee agreed. "But it might give Mom a heart attack, so no."

"Thank you, I like my mothers alive," Luz said playfully. But the phrase only made her think of Eda. Her stomach swooped anxiously, an itching desperation crawling down her nerves. She could only hope that Eda was okay. That King was okay.

She ran a hand down her face, trying to ground herself. It was easy to spiral. Her friends were safe. She was with Mamá. They were doing everything they could to get back. These things were enough.

They're not, but they have to be.

[bluebeetle]

Ashes of Yesterday - Chapter 2

AO3 Link

Summary: Male Hawke/Anders, Merrill/Carver Hawke; Red Mage Hawke and very anders positive/pro-mage.

Sebastian has captured Hawke after taking the Starkhaven throne, hoping to lure out Anders to bring them both to trial for their crimes. Being held captive on a ship heading towards Starkhaven isn't exactly a vacation for Hawke, but it gives both Sebastian and him time to reflect on their past friendship before it all came crashing down.

A fic exploring a religious pro-mage Anders romance mage Hawke and his tentative relationship with Sebastian, along with a hearty helping of headcanons and flashbacks.

Ch 1  | Ch 2 (here - 12k words) |  Ch 3 | Ch 4 

Now.

   True to his word, Sebastian returned two days later. Hawke was eating his dinner–nothing more than a simple, brothy stew (with the added spice of magebane) and some days-old bread. Along with the lukewarm water, his meal reminded him of his early days in Kirkwall–just with less questionable meat (it was fish) and significantly more literal poison.

The Prince of Starkhaven sat across from him, on a simple wooden stool. There was nothing Hawke could use as a weapon. He was fully at the prince’s mercy, injured as he was. His body ached, scabs pulling tightly at his skin. Sebastian watched Hawke with eyes clouded with hatred, body tense as though the mage was going to suddenly turn into an abomination.

Hawke twitched, uncomfortable with the dissecting gaze and continued stifling silence.

“...I will admit, I think you were right, about one thing,” Hawke finally said, voice low and soft. His wooden spoon clunked against the bowl. He hated to break first, but he needed out of his own head. How had Anders even survived a year in solitary? Hawke could barely stand being locked up alone for a couple days! 

“It is hypocritical of me to reject blood magic the way I do with the friends I keep, isn’t it?” Hawke laughed, but it was forced. “And the type of spirit magic I use, well, to a lot of people it’s a little too close to blood magic for comfort. You were right, about me not being any better than Merrill or Anders or even Orsino.” He stared hard at his food, swirling it around, the rhythm of his movements falling in line with his voice. “I feel like a fool. But it does make me wonder… if blood magic really is as evil as I thought, and that Merrill isn’t the exception to the rule.”

Sebastian snorted, finally proving to Hawke that he was even really there, and not a figment of Hawke’s lonely mind. “Of course that would be the conclusion you come to,” he said.

“Hmm,” Hawke hummed, closing his eyes. “I mean, I wasn’t going to suddenly turn against the people I love, Sebastian. I just can’t help but wonder, if it's not the magic that’s evil—it can be used for evil, but it’s not inherently so—and neither are spirits and demons, then… is it just the hearts of men that are corrupt? Perhaps the Maker was right to abandon us.” 

Hawke paused, finishing off his bread. He chewed slowly, deep in thought as he mulled over his next words. There was a high chance these were some of the last things he’d ever say, after all. “Merrill always said the denizens of the fade were like us,” he continued, “different and unique, not wholly evil or good. I’ve been realising since Kirkwall that she was right, and Anders and I were just letting the teachings of the Chantry cloud our judgement.”

“You cannot possibly blame all your problems and shortcomings on the Chantry,” Sebastian sneered.

“Ah, trust me, I don’t. You just only seem to hear the ones that I do,” Hawke drawled. “I wonder how much magebane you can feed someone ‘til they die? I could barely keep my meal down yesterday because of it.” He tipped the bowl into his mouth, drinking what remained inside. He felt pathetic, eating it all up obediently despite knowing it was poisoned–but he didn’t wish to learn how exactly they’d force feed him. Especially not when the men aboard the ship all likely hated him. Being the Chantry’s most wanted maleficar tended to not make him many friends.

“We’ll be in the Free Marches in only a week and five days,” Sebastian said. “And once there it’ll only be a day or two to get to Starkhaven. Prepare yourself.” With that, Sebastian whipped out of the room. Hawke couldn’t help but wonder why he had come to visit him in the first place. Couldn’t a messenger have told him? Or had he chickened out of saying something else? 

Then again, other than the herbalist who checked his wounds and the guard who brought his meals, he hadn’t seen hide nor hair of anyone else. Neither were conversationalists, saying the bare minimum whilst regarding him as though he was a very pathetic, very dangerous animal–a wounded Dragon they couldn’t put out of its misery, not yet. 

He wondered if keeping everyone else away was for his own safety, or because Sebastian found isolation a fitting punishment for Hawke, who was known for his extroverted tendencies and constant need for approval. He wasn’t sure which was worse–a ship full of men out for his blood or Sebastian thinking hard about a punishment that would hurt him without spilling said blood. 

Sebastian seemed older, Hawke thought. Tired and weary. It was funny; Sebastian had always seemed decades older than he truly was—now the man seemed ancient. Ancient, like the anger simmering under his skin, so unlike their time in Kirkwall. In Kirkwall Hawke had watched rage dissipate with time, as Sebastian made peace with his family’s death, as he began to accept perhaps he was meant for a life as a humble servant of the Maker and not as a vengeful ruler.

In the end… Well, Hawke knew better than most that sometimes? Sometimes, the Maker had other plans, no matter how much one kicked and screamed. He himself had never asked for the weight of a city, of a revolution, on his shoulders. All Hawke had wanted was to live happily with his family, out of reach of the Templars and the Circle. He was still struggling with that goal, even now.

Though, he couldn’t lie. The look on Meredith's face in the Viscount's throne room—as people cheered for the victory of a half-dead apostate, laying in a pool of his own blood, the worst of his wounds healed with his own magic, spitting in the face of everything the Templar Order stood for—had felt so good to see. 

The Maker had made it clear what Hawke’s path was to be, after that–to free the mages, to prove to Thedas that mages were not swords, or monsters, or anything less than people deserving of the same rights as any other. After all, there he was–an apostate revealed in front of a crowd of nobles, nearly dead after risking his life to save an entire city. Without his magic, he would have died–or not even dared to agree to the duel.  With his gift, he had lived, had continued to be free for years alongside his apostate lover–all because people revered him as a saviour, a champion. Because his magic was instrumental in defeating the Qunari siege; because he had somehow stumbled into the respect of a foreign leader, only because he figured the Arishok wanted directness and honesty. 

Hawke was sure Sebastian did not want to hear about any of that. Not when the Chantry explosion had been a sign from the Maker for both of them–but one that made it clear their paths were diametrically opposed.

  Then.

    The Harimann Estate had been creepy, yes, but Hawke had to admit he hadn’t been expecting the ancient ruins or Desire Demon. Well, that was on him–of course there was a demon involved, it seemed there were constantly demons involved in Kirkwall. The city was cursed, drenched as it was in the blood of slaves and the cruelty of man. 

When he had agreed to accompany Sebastian to talk to the Harimann family, he hadn’t been expecting much of a fight. Or at least none he couldn’t handle with the blade on the end of his staff. Stuffy nobles were usually cowed by a scary looking man with a weapon easily enough–Hawke knew from experience.

But a demon? Still possible to defeat with strength alone, sure–but it wasn’t the type of strength Hawke had. He had muscle, he could use his stave like a melee weapon ‘passably’ (according to Aveline)—but he was still a mage at heart. He was squishy.

Hawke stole a glance towards Sebastian. He had no idea what the current plan was. Fight? Leave? Fall for the sexy demon? (Hawke couldn’t relate to finding her all that alluring, though; the Desire Demons that haunted his dreams wore a masculine façade. If they also had ginger hair, honey brown eyes, and skin sickly pale from lack of sunlight more often than not, well, that wasn’t anyone’s business but his own. He knew all the demons’ tricks; he wouldn’t fall for them like he had fallen for the real deal.) 

The Desire Demon was speaking, taunting them, but Hawke paid her no heed; she was no different than the demons that visited him in his sleep, no different from the one Isabela had fallen victim to, briefly, when they were in the Fade for Feynriel. 

His worry was solely Sebastian. Worry over if he would fall for Allure’s sickeningly sweet promises; if he’d react negatively if Hawke had to show his hand. 

If he revealed he was a mage, what then? Would the archer attack him, run for the Templars? Or… 

He thought back to their long talks in the Chantry, to the kindness Sebastian had shown him. Maybe… maybe the rogue could at least be convinced to not tell anyone, even if they never spoke again–if Hawke was lucky. 

People learning he was a mage was pervasive fear–sinking its teeth even into every thought of his friends. Varric already knew through rumours, but that hadn’t settled his anxieties. He could choose to tell the Templars at any time. Aveline’s sense of duty worried him, as much as he had come to care for her. Fenris had been… tricky, nerve-wracking when he made his distaste known, but Hawke had hoped he had wormed his way into the elf’s heart enough for safety. And so on it went, with Hawke wondering when the other pin would drop–when the Templars would show up at his door to drag him to the Gallows.

Even clarifying that he was an apostate born and raised to Anders had felt like breaking a taboo—and that was after Anders had revealed himself as being possessed. His fear was extremely unfounded, and yet, it lingered all the same. Only Merrill had been comfortable; he knew that the Dalish viewed magic differently from the Chantry. They could be trusted–even if he was human.

But after two decades of biting his tongue, of keeping secrets, of telling little white lies–the idea of revealing himself as a mage to someone who’s trust he did not want to lose made his stomach churn. Strangers—especially those he was about to kill—were a far different beast from a man he knew. Knives in the back hurt all the more if the wielder knew exactly where to stab.

He hated it; the paranoia he had developed, his inability to fully trust that people wouldn’t turn on him because of the ability he had never asked for. He didn’t regret being born a mage—he loved his magic, loved the connections he made with spirits, the training with his father. That didn’t stop Hawke from hating the power his friends had over him; there was no better blackmail than knowing someone was an illegal apostate.

At least Kirkwall was freedom in a way Ferelden had not been, despite the Gallows looming over–but it was still a cage, still a place where he did not dare to speak of his magic to a soul he could not trust, a place where he still had to hide a piece of his own soul. No one could know unless they needed to know. And even then, he often laid awake at night, wondering what it would take for them to decide it was best to tell Knight-Commander Meredith all about him. Money? Fear? Power? Everyone had a limit; everyone had a price. 

He just prayed the one to betray him was out of reach, was steep.

And all that wasn’t accounting for the golden eyes his parents had cursed him with; the eyes that told everyone just what he carried in his family line, in his blood. If it wasn’t a lack of control over their spells or trusting the wrong person–it was his eyes that aroused the suspicion of the Chantry and its Templars; his eyes that made them have to run into the night in search of a new home, with only what they could carry; his eyes that had strangers give him a wide berth out of fear. Even in Kirkwall there had been close calls, but the golden hues only spoke of magical heritage—not the inheritance of said magic. It was a distinction that saved him often. 

Regardless—he’d make his decision on how to tell Sebastian, on what to do if he found out, when he was forced to. For now… outside the fade, demons bled like anything else. He could still win without a single drop of mana spent.

“That’s enough, demon,” Hawke hissed, tired of her sultry tones already. He had faith in Sebastian’s willpower (certainly more than Isabela’s, Maker bless her), but it wouldn’t do any good to let the demon continue to speak. No one’s will was unbreakable; even his own.

Hawke lunged, his blade slashing at the demon. Allure growled at him in response. She summoned shades and lesser demons with the help of Lady Harimann—who was a blood mage, great. Just what he needed. Were Anders and he the only apostates in Kirkwall who weren’t blood mages?  (Merrill was the exception, Maker—Creators bless her? Regardless, he liked her; even if his heart panged, brain playing images of his late little sister, every time he spoke with the elf. She could stay, with her admittedly fascinating blood magic.)

Hawke slashed his stave in an arc, cutting down the shades circling him. It was satisfying—his staff cut through them like a blade on silk.

Fighting always got his heart pumping, the adrenaline singing in his veins. It was exhilarating. Growing up, he had always been taught to control himself, control his magic; to be small, unnoticeable but likeable; to stand down from fights, from arguments no matter how much his rage boiled, lest his opponent realise what he was, lest he lose control of his powers. It was all to avoid the circle, the Templars, the hangman’s noose, the executioner’s blade. To avoid the brand.

Now, he had the freedom to lash out, even if he had to still tread carefully. Despite his childhood of discipline and pacifism, Hawke loved the thrill of the fight. Even when he killed he enjoyed it–and they didn’t all deserve death, not really; so many were just people trying to scrape by in a world that had been harsh to them, just like he was. The stretch of muscles, the warm blood splattered on his face, the regenerating power flowing through him from the corpses he left in his wake because of Death Syphon… It felt amazing. It felt right.  

Hawke couldn’t bring himself to feel guilt for, not when he was good at it, after years of having to be nothing but average to keep attention off him, off his family. Carver always had complained that Hawke stole the spotlight—and it wasn’t untrue, but until Kirkwall he had never felt so free, never felt like he was able to be all he could be and reap the praise for it.

And if there was anything Hawke enjoyed more than violence, it was people liking him; people praising him. He was not a humble man–arrogant enough to chase even his little brother away. 

He was only glad Bethany had never lived to see her eldest brother revel in death as he did now. She had stressed enough over Carver joining the Ferelden army, right before Ostagar. 

Though—Hawke’s hands were not fit for violence alone, and he was sure she would have found solace in that. He could heal, too. Anders had found Hawke had a knack for spirit healing like the Warden himself; Hawke wasn’t some battle hungry brute. It was something he had been secretly grateful for, to know he wasn’t just some violent monster now; that maybe he could be the type of mage Father wished his son could be. And he enjoyed healing too, helping those around him, just as much—maybe more, even if there was still so much pain mixed in.

(Of course, it wasn't just altruism that had led Hawke to spirit healing–initially he had just wanted an excuse to spend more time with Andres, and helping at his clinic, learning magic from him, well… it had been an ironclad excuse. But he was glad for learning all the same.)

Anders had teased him about being a man of many facets, a dichotomy of life and death all intertwined into one. Hawke had been too busy admiring how beautiful his amber eyes were, with their faint crow’s feet every time the Warden smiled, to say anything before the moment passed.

Despite the exhilaration the battle brought Hawke, he felt himself wavering. They were becoming overwhelmed–just Sebastian and him against an army. He had neglected to ask anyone else to join them; Sebastian had asked him and him alone for aid. It was supposed to be an easy gig—bodyguarding some royalty while he confronted the nobles that ordered his family’s death. Easy peasy. But like everything in his life, it immediately went sideways. 

Sweat rolled down his skins. Hawke panted, his breath visible in the cool underground air. He was a mage; he lacked the physical stamina of a warrior like Carver. Fighting like this, without the Fade at his very fingertips, was not sustainable. But he was afraid; afraid that using his powers now would doom his future. He wanted to trust Sebastian, he did—but Hawke had made the mistake of trusting the wrong person before. It nearly cost him his life—and that of his father, his little siblings.

He’d never make that mistake again. 

Sebastian cried out, snapping Hawke’s attention to him. The archer fought and strained against an invisible force. His body rigid, muscles taut—blood magic at work. Hawke swore—Sebastian might not be able to break out of it in time to save his own life. It was Hawke’s fault—he had long since lost track of Lady Harimann during the battle, hyper-focused as he was on the shades. Sebastian needed Hawke’s aid—but the mage was surrounded and they both had the Desire Demon to worry about.

He had no choice. They needed a miracle to get out alive. And Hawke was a mage, after all. He could do miracles. Even if he was squishy. 

He poured his focus onto a single lesser shade, pooling spirit magic in his hands—Walking Bomb would make quick work of the congregation crowding him. All it took was one hit from Winter’s Grasp and the shade was exploding—and taking the others around it as well. 

Hawke didn’t pay the stragglers any mind, rushing towards Sebastian. A quick Dispel Magic cut Lady Harimann's control. Most people associated the ability with Templars, but mages could learn too. It wasn’t as useful in the Circles, unless one was settling a petty spat. Or so Father had said. Hawke had learned the spirit magic equivalent after the first run-in with Idunna and her co-conspirators, all those years ago—just in case demons or blood mages became a common problem. He had really jinxed himself there, hadn’t he?

Sebastian slumped, a puppet with his strings cut. His blue eyes were dazed. For a moment, Hawke was worried he'd be on his own—but luckily Sebastian snapped out of it, shaking his head like a dog.

Aware again, Sebastian drew his bow, aim trained on Allure, face passive and confident despite his anaemic pallor. Good man, Hawke thought.

Magic tingled at Hawke’s senses. He tore his attention away from Sebastian. He fought back another spell, slashing at Lady Harimann, backing her into a corner. Without his magic, he was bigger, stronger than her. With it, he was more disciplined, better trained. She bared her teeth at him, expression crazed as she lashed out with flames. Instinctively, Hawke threw up his own Cone of Cold around him, the fire dissipating as the ice melted. He didn’t give Harimann another chance, rushing forward and burying his blade in her throat, twisting it. She fell to the ground, trying to speak, but only blood came to her lips. 

With the last of her strength, she met Sebstian’s eyes just as he finished off the Desire Demon with an arrow to its heart, and then Harimann was no more, lifeless on the ground. Hawke regarded her with nothing more than pity; a woman led astray by her own desires—desires that she could never reach. He prayed to the Maker that her children would be alright.

Slowly, Hawke turned away from the corpse, forcing himself to look at Sebastian, to dare to see what expression the man had on his face. 

Sebastian didn’t meet his eyes. His face was neutral—but not relaxed. He was tense, flexing his bow hand over and over again. Colour had yet to return to his skin. “I… I need some air, I think. This place is cursed,” he said, “Let us return to the Chantry—I want to pray for Lady Harimann’s soul.” He rushed off towards the estate. Hawke hoped the man wasn’t injured—Hawke wasn’t sure if his offer of healing would be accepted.

They ran into Lady Harimann’s daughter on the way back up—a distraction from the bronto in the room neither wanted to speak about.  But once the cold, brisk air of Hightown was upon them, the continued silence became unbearable. Hawke feared he’d choke on his anxiety. 

Sebastian slowed his walk, face pinched in thought. “...you’re the mage,” he said softly. 

“... ‘the’ mage?” Hawke repeated. Oh Maker, were the Templars looking for him? 

Sebastian seemed unaware of the panic he had let loose on Hawke. “I… from the things you said, what you asked, I always assumed… I always assumed that the sibling of yours that I had not met was in the Circle, either here or in Ferelden. It made sense with your brother being a Templar. He mentioned a Bethany, once."

“You met Carver?” Hawke asked. “Wait, no, I suppose it would make sense you two have met since he…  If it makes you feel better, my sister was actually a mage; but she died during the Blight.” He tried to inject humour into his voice, but fell flat, only bitterness showing through.

Sebastian bristled, and Hawke wondered if had only dug his grave deeper. “...I just… I’m trying to understand it,” Sebastian continued. “You are an apostate, and yet… you clearly believe in the Chant of Light. Your brother is a Templar. Why haven’t you turned yourself in, to the Circle?” 

They were nearly at the Chantry now; blissfully the streets were empty, no prying ears to overhear their conversation. The moons were bright in the sky, illuminating Sebastian’s armour.

“There’s a lot of reasons for that,” Hawke admitted—though many he did not wish to elaborate on. He knew Sebastian would likely not agree with his stance on the Circles; how they had failed; how they were nothing more than prisons. He was used to his thoughts being viewed as radical—it was what made talking to Anders so refreshing. 

And then there was Hawke’s beloved father, who had always wished to keep his children free from the noose that had been tight around his neck for over a decade before he escaped.

“My brother was named after another Templar, actually,” Hawke explained, rolling his staff around in his hands. He didn’t meet Sebastian’s eyes, staring off instead at the Chantry looming over them. He swallowed. Nothing good happened in Chantries at night. “That Templar was… important to my father. And he told my father, once, that some mages were better off outside of the Circle. Said that ‘rule is not served by caging the best of us’.”

“And you think… that applies to you?” Sebastian asked. His tone wasn’t accusatory–just unsure. 

Hawke chuckled, but his heart wasn’t in it still. “I’d like to think so, but… really it’s because… I’m the eldest sibling of three, you know? My brother and sister were—are—both almost 6 years younger than me. So after Father died… Mother could only do so much, so I couldn’t just… I couldn’t just abandon them and go to the Circle.” It wasn’t the full, honest truth—Hawke had known he was a mage for nearly fifteen years before his Father’s untimely death—but it was damn close. He had never actually considered going to the Circle of Magi, not after growing up and hearing Malcolm speak of his experiences at the Gallows. It was rare for his father to talk of it—and when he did, it was in hushed tones, voice heavy as he spoke to them by the waning fire, their camp a temporary home until they found a new one, all to avoid the Templars, the Circle. What he did share made it clear why the man preferred to keep it locked away. 

His father had been abused at the hands of the men and women who claimed they were protecting him. Malcolm Hawke had been stolen from a normal life in Ferelden to, whisked away to the Free Marches far from any family, and told to be obedient or else whatever was done to him was deserved. Locked away with his future decided for him, to only leave with the permission of those with far more freedom than he'd ever have. He had to risk death to be with the woman he loved, the very woman who had no choice but to give up everything—her home, her family, her wealth—just to marry him. He was forced to move his family around Ferelden just to keep them all safe. Father had often told Hawke “the hand that feeds deserves to be bitten when it beats”, but didn’t dare do anything that could risk exposing them. Hawke didn’t even have that luxury, if it could be called that, of being forced to pretend a part of him wasn’t there at all—he needed his magic to keep his family fed and healthy. He had few other options as a refugee in Kirkwall, as the eldest son of disgraced house of nobles.

And Hawke knew so many others had worse experiences. Some better, too, but it did not make up for taking away their freedoms. His father had preserved, had cultivated a life of his own with a family he loved, and had died of illness and not violence. But not every mage was as strong, or as lucky, as Malcolm Hawke.

“So, I stayed. I helped my sister with controlling her magic,” Hawke continued. His tongue felt heavy in his mouth. This was also not a complete lie; even after Father passed, Hawke had tried to continue teaching Bethany what he could. It wasn’t enough, in the end. “And then the Blight happened, and my mother needed my help more than ever, especially with my sister gone and then Carver leaving to join the Templars and I… I can’t just leave her alone. She doesn’t have anyone else but her brother, but he’s… they don’t really get along well.” Hawke shrugged weakly. He was nervous, true—but admittedly he was playing it up. People reacted better to the scared, sheepish mage who just wanted to help than they did to the strong, confident one who blossomed in battle. Nevermind Hawke was really a mix of the two, relying on either persona depending on the situation. It was an old habit.

Sebastian’s face softened as Hawke spoke. Everything he had said was true, just missing details. Hawke also had a feeling family was the way to get Sebastian to understand. Sebastian had valued his own enough to go through all this trouble for vengeance, even if it didn’t mesh with the vows he took in the Chantry, after all.

“Plus, I have tried to help other people, I mean, there was this case Knight-Captain Cullen can tell you about—some blood mages were targeting Templar recruits, getting them possessed by demons, it was a whole thing,” said Hawke as he fiddled with his staff. The skull grafted on top stared at him with empty sockets, judging silently. “I helped stop them and saved one of the recruits, Keran. But it wasn’t something the Templars could have investigated easily being who they are, and most other people would have been killed by the blood mages—one of them tried to force me to cut my own throat open. My magic helped me break the spell and stop her.” 

Of course, even if he hadn’t been a mage, Anders or Merrill would have helped him get free. And it was possible for a non-mage to break a blood mage’s control—it was not guaranteed however. Still, lying by omission was the best way to keep Sebastian from running off and telling the Knight-Captain just how Hawke had helped Keran.

Hawke didn’t like lying to people he liked, but he had done it his entire life—lied through his teeth, to the faces of those who trusted him, left out important details—all to keep his family safe, out of the Circle, out of a hangman’s noose. It was second nature to him.

“And I made sure Ser Keran wasn’t possessed, too, before I sent him off. Templars might have been able to check, but still, I wanted to be sure he was okay,” Hawke said, shrugging. Anders had been the one to check but details, details. “His sister told me that he was missing. She was being ignored by the other Templars so I agreed to help look for him, and well… his position was important to keeping them both fed, too, so I made sure it was safe for him to return.”

The Templar story was factual, of course—but he had cherry picked it for an admittedly manipulative reason. Hawke had helped a lot of people with his magic since coming to Kirkwall—and killed many more. Even Idunna had perished by his own hands. He knew that telling Sebastian about helping escaped Circle mages from Starkhaven wouldn’t convince the man that Hawke wasn’t dangerous, that he was better off outside the Circle—but trying to come off like he was sympathetic towards Templars? That he wouldn’t kill Kirkwall’s entire Templar Order (except maybe poor Keran, and Carver of course) if given the chance? He only hoped it would win him favour in Sebastian's eyes. Lead him to think Hawke would go to the Circle if circumstances were right.

It made him feel slimy, but he had no choice. Going to the Circle wasn’t an option, not now, not ever. He wanted to trust the man, he really did. But Hawke knew he couldn’t, not completely, not without caveats. They had talked often of religion, of Kirkwall and Starkhaven, but that didn’t mean Sebastian would just radically change his values. The chantry brother had made his stance on mages clear, even if it was more sympathetic than many Hawke had met. To Sebastian, mages belonged in the Circle. End of. Hawke disagreed, but he liked Sebastian too much to let his aggression out. He couldn’t bring himself to turn against him. That meant manipulating Sebastian, as much as it made his stomach churn. It was a necessary evil—a concept he wasn’t sure Sebastian understood, if he was being honest.

Sebastian thumbed at his bow, deep in thought for a moment. “...I think… I think I understand, friend,” he murmured. “And it is admirable, what you do, and your care for your family.” He took a deep breath. “Let’s head inside, it’ll be better to talk there.”

Hawke nodded, following Sebastian up the grand staircase, hoping he wasn’t walking towards his own grave.

  “You’re a good soul, Hawke. It was truly the Maker who led you to me.”

They had talked more, in the Chantry; with the topic of Hawke being a mage settled for the time being, the focus had shifted to the Desire Demon and the doubts she had brought forward in Sebastian, indecision swirling with the fire of vengeance he often had shining in his eyes. 

That night seemed to have finally cemented their friendship—helped by the fact that the fancy bow Hawke had nicked at the Harimann Estate apparently had once belonged to Sebastian’s grandfather. (Ha! And Mother said his stealing was going to cause him trouble.) 

Hawke stared out the sun starting to rise over Hightown, still perched on the steps of the Chantry as he was. He had settled into the sort of over-exhaustion that left him unable to sleep.

A friend… A new friend and ally to help him. It was nice, and he knew the warmth he was feeling wasn’t just from the sunlight that graced his skin now.  It would be nice; he and Anders talked religion a little, and certainly Hawke enjoyed hearing about Dalish beliefs from Merrill, but there was something moving about discussing the Chant with Sebastian. Maybe it was because he knew it so well, was so willing to listen to Hawke and his questions, his ideas—so long as they weren’t too radical, anyways. 

Anders was great, and he agreed with the healer on many things. However, it was hard for Anders to not get heated about the crimes of the Chantry—not like Sebastian, who even when he voiced his distaste about anything stayed calm, clear headed. It wasn’t that Hawke didn’t understand, he empathised with Anders' anger—certainly he felt the same way most days—but Hawke had no idea how Anders hadn’t burned himself out yet after three years of righteousness. 

Hawke felt like he was burning the candle at two ends most days—but sometimes Sebastian's assurance, his belief in the Maker, in helping people, in how things would turn out just as they should… well, it helped slow the flames. It was something he really needed in his life, especially with both his father and Bethany gone, and Carver off frolicking with his new Templar buddies. It was selfish—but it helped him feel like his anger, his aggression, wasn’t burning him to ash from the inside out. He needed it. He ought to hate Sebastian, hate himself for throwing his lot in with someone so opposed to the values most important to Hawke, but Hawke’s want for the type of companionship Sebastian had offered, his want to be liked by the people around him—to be liked, even though they knew he was a mage—won out. 

It was just too bad Hawke was probably going to ruin all good impressions of himself he moment Sebastian met his other friends at the Hanged Man later.

    Sebastian had stayed in the Chantry, mind racing too much to even attempt to sleep. He knelt in front of the statue of Andraste, praying silently, his eyes closed in concentration.

Sebastian had no idea if he was doing the right thing, letting an apostate walk free. Part of him was yelling, telling him to get the Knight-Captain right away, to warn him of this noble who could easily turn out to be an abomination just biding his time. It would be the right thing to do. It was his duty, as both a Brother and follower of Andraste.

But… But Hawke had resisted the Desire Demon far easier than Sebastian had—than someone as faithful and vigilant as himself. Everything he had seen from the man spoke of him being intelligent, kind, and faithful to the Maker and His Bride. He was a good man, talking to Sebastian not for want of power or the promises of a prince, but for nothing more than companionship, someone to talk faith with, to aid another of the Maker’s children.

For a moment, Sebastian had been afraid. When he first saw the ice the man had summoned; when he realised Hawke was calling the power of the Fade to his hands; the revelation that what Hawke carried was a staff with a blade crudely attached to it, not a refugee’s spear. Sebastian had been certain at that moment that Hawke would give into the Desire Demon’s temptations, would kill Sebastian then and there—but the man had saved Sebastian, had finished off Lady Harimann and seemed almost… proud of Sebastian for managing to defeat the Desire Demon on his own. For him not wavering further because of Allure’s words.

Even as Sebastian fought the urge to run like a coward, Hawke had only seemed nervous, body language like a skittish cat, eyeing Sebastian as though he expected the archer to turn into an abomination instead.

It was odd, to be the one feared by a mage instead of the other way around. 

‘Rule is not served by caging the best of us.’ Sebastian had almost wanted to call the Templar Hawke spoke of insane, incompetent. But perhaps… Perhaps the man had been wiser than most, perhaps there was truth to his words.

Hawke seemed like a good soul, far from stories of maleficarum Sebastian had been told. He held much anger, Sebastian could tell, but underneath there was so much more. 

Hawke was someone who the Maker must have brought to Sebastian for a reason. Only time would tell just what that reason was. Maybe it was to aid Hawke down the right path while an apostate—keep him in the Makers light instead of consorting with demons—or perhaps Sebastian really was supposed to lead the man to the Circle in time. For now, though, Hawke walked free.

Sebastian prayed that he would not come to regret his choice to stay his tongue—to protect the secret Hawke carried within him. Prayed that if he was wrong, that if Hawke turned to be all the Chantry warned of, that the Maker would understand he had let the mage walk free out of mercy, out of compassion.

Compassion for a friend.

  Now.

    Sebastian stared at the ceiling of his cabin. The ship creaked around him, the sounds of the ocean and beating rain echoing around in his head. His captain said the storm was nothing to worry about, but still, Sebastian found himself unable to chase sleep with the howling winds outside. He had dreamed of Lady Harimann and that night again, memories long since gone resurfacing in the Fade. He wasn't sure what to make of it.

His mind drifted from problem to problem—the issues in Starkhaven, the on-going Circle rebellion, how to capture Anders—and yet, no matter what he tried to focus on, his mind floated away only to return to the same topic.

Hawke.

Hawke, his friend, his enemy. A man he had once respected, a man who he had thought faithful. With him so close after a few years apart, it was hard not to think about him, about a friendship long dead. About how they had met, about how Sebastian truly had not seen the real Hawke until that fateful night at the Harimann estate. 

Hawke’s status as a mage had been a surprise. The company he kept less so.

The other two apostates in Hawke’s inner circle weren’t a surprise; apostates were stronger in groups, and Hawke was friends with many-a criminal. Sebastian had bit his tongue, despite the fact that they actually were maleficarum—unlike Hawke (he had thought, anyways, wrongfully).

Sebastian regretted not saying anything to Meredith, to Elthina, about Merrill the blood mage and Anders the abomination… but never did he regret choosing to not turn in Hawke. 

Not after he saved Kirkwall by dueling the Arishok, one-on-one. 

Anders would have killed innocent souls one way or another even without Hawke’s apparent aid—though perhaps not nearly as effectively—but Sebastian had no idea if anyone else could have defeated the Arishok in battle and lived. At least not anyone who had been there that night. Not even Knight-Commander Meredith and Orsino—they hadn’t gotten the respect of the Arishok like Hawke had. Basalit-an the Qunari had said. No; had it been anyone else, it would have been a bloody Holy war, not a single duel for the fate of Kirkwall.

On top of the respect he had garnered, Hawke was determined and powerful like few Sebastian knew. And, of course, Hawke had the ability to heal himself—without, he surely would have perished from being hefted into the air by the sword to his gut. Sebastian had thought his death certain, at the time, standing there amongst the nobles. Fenris beside him, looking terrified for the first time since Sebastian had met him, almost certainly thinking about how the duel was at his suggestion, his insistence. Despite it all, Hawke had lived, hands glowing blue as he healed himself, having no choice but to reveal to the nobles corralled in the Viscount’s Keep that he was a mage—an apostate underneath all their noses.

Hawke being able to hurt the Qunari from a distance, freeze him in place, burn him, hurt him constantly with spirit magic—on top of physical attacks from his blade—made him a worthy opponent despite Hawke’s lack of proper training, despite Hawke’s limited physical prowess and stamina.

Sebastian had thought he understood that terrible night, why the Maker had led Hawke to him. Why he had been led to the path of choosing to let this apostate stay out of the Circle despite Chantry laws. Why the Maker wished for him to befriend Hawke, protect him. There was a greatness to that man, far beyond just the charisma and kindness he was capable of, the righteous anger and raw power. Sebastian wouldn’t dare go as far as to say Hawke was holy, but it was clear the path the Maker had for him was important. For a mage to have been made Champion of a Free Marcher city was proof enough of that. So many people owed their lives to Hawke. Sebastian had just needed to keep him in the Maker's light. It was his duty.

He had soon learned the same was not to be said of the manipulative bastard Anders, or even poor, foolish Merrill. Neither could be saved, could be brought back to the Maker’s side. Anders didn’t even deserve another chance, not after the horrific things he had done.

That was Sebastian’s mistake, and he was going to rectify it, Maker willing. Starting with bringing justice to the abomination that called himself Anders. 

He just had no idea if he could save Hawke’s soul first. If he could continue the duty he had abandoned, had failed, in Kirkwall.

Did he even want to?  Perhaps it would be kinder for them both to merely show Hawke the mercy of a quick death for his crimes. Perhaps it would be best to let the Maker decide if Hawke was worthy enough to be forgiven. Sebastian would hate to make the same mistake twice, with the same man.

It was hard not to reflect on his memories of days passed, with a mind clearer than ever before. He knew Hawke helped Anders, of course; but... the Warden was the true mastermind behind the explosion, wasn’t he? 

Sebastian rolled over in his bed, his mind a raging storm, a facsimile of pounding rain outside. Perhaps… Perhaps in some ways, Hawke was a victim too. It was wishful thinking, of course, but he was still struggling to figure out how the puzzle that was Garrett Hawke went together. Not when some pieces were of a devout man who cared very deeply about the people around him, whilst others were of a violent maleficar who always seemed to have justification for murder on his lips.

Back in Kirkwall, Hawke hadn’t known many details about Anders' plan, if Sebastian remembered the conversation in Lowtown correctly; the roaring in his ears from his own emotions muddled his memories. Hawke hadn’t known why Anders needed Hawke to distract Elthina; had potentially been manipulated, coerced, abused. Maybe… maybe there was a chance to save Hawke; to keep him in the Maker’s light as Sebastian was intended to. It was worth a try; if it was a hopeless endeavour, well, Hawke already had a noose waiting for him.

Hawke just needed a friend to help him see the light.

  Sebastian returned three days later. 

It was after Hawke had been given his first meal of the day. His wounds were doing better—but they’d scar, he knew, since he hadn’t been allowed to heal himself. His head rested atop his knees, eyes screwed tight, all his focus centred on keeping his food down. The rocking of the ship was a deadly combination with the magebane, making his poisoning harder and harder to ignore with waves of nausea he swore he could feel in his bones.

Hawke groaned as he heard the click of the lock and the tapping of Sebastian’s riding boots on the wooden floors. He wondered, briefly, if they were taking the horses back to Starkhaven too, or if they had been bought and later resold in Ferelden. Did horses even like boats? 

“Hawke,” Sebastian murmured, taking his usual seat. 

“Hrmm, five more minutes,” Hawke muttered, cracking open an eye. His entire body was sore, like he had run a marathon the night before.

“I have plans for Starkhaven,” Sebastian began. Hawke hummed in response. Hawk was reminded of what he did with his Mabari hounds—rattle off his thoughts to them and work through ideas without worrying about them talking back, while keeping him from feeling like he was going insane by talking to himself. Sebastian’s prattling was preferable to being left alone in complete silence for days on end. The herbalist had been coming less and less as he healed, with the meal-giving guard apparently taking up a vow of silence. After calling Hawke some nasty words, of course. Hawke had to resist the urge to bite him.

“A lot of plans,” continued Sebastian. “I want to do what is best for my people, of course. But I don’t want to be a tyrant enforcing my will onto others. There’s… there has been a lot of back and forth with my advisors. There is, however, one thing we have mostly all agreed on…” he trailed off, watching Hawke closely. 

“Me dying?” Hawke asked, voice half muffled by his knees. 

“I want to reinstate the Starkhaven Circle of Magi,” Sebastian announced, chin up. “A new building, of course, since the old one was burned to ash all those years ago.”

Hawke balled his hands into fists, nails digging into the flesh of his palms. The Starkhaven Circle; a thorn in his side that had slowly become infected. Grace had kidnapped his baby brother after he had tried to save her by lying to the Templars, and poor Alain had taken the fall—but made it out of Kirkwall alive, in the very end.

Hawke worked his jaw, grinding his teeth as the anger he felt bubbled up in his stomach, mixing with the roiling nausea already settled there. “And you came to gloat?” he huffed. “Who would you even get to join? I think most of the original Circle members died while on the run—or in Kirkwall during the Right of Annulment.” So many mages dead—but more had lived than if Anders hadn’t forced Meredith’s hand.

“There are still mages who wish to return to the Circles, who enjoyed their time in them and understand their purpose, their importance,” Sebastian retorted. His tone left no room for arguing. “I want the Circle in Starkhaven to be for them. I will not force anyone in there for the time being, at least not until order is returned to the Templars as well as the Chantry and its mages.” 

Hawke snorted. No mage belonged to the Chantry, not anymore, but Sebastian was too blind to see. Too stuck in the old status quo. “How kind. People get to decide if they want to be held prisoner then?” Hawke drawled. “And I bet they can’t change their minds after they say yes.”

Sebastian sighed, rubbing his temples for a moment.

“What? Crown too heavy?” Hawke taunted, unable to stop himself from jeering at Sebastian, not with the haze of poison clouding the part of his brain that knew better. Hawke had a bad tendency of poking sleeping dragons—especially since he had been able to shed the chains from the lies he told to protect himself. Being able to freely be a mage after becoming Champion had been liberating. Unfortunately, it also made him incredibly stupid when it came to confronting those in power now that his fear of being discovered was gone, but hey! Anders was the plan guy, not Hawke. Hawke was just the impossible to ignore, terrifying figurehead, so it all worked out—most of the time.

Sebastian gave him a sharp look. “Hawke,” he cautioned. Hawke felt deja vu— he was reminded of magic lessons with his father.

“That’s my name, I’ve been told. I have a first one too!”

“Hawke, I’ve… lately, since we have been able to speak again, I have been… thinking of you,” Sebastian said.

“I’m flattered, but I am already taken, you know,” Hawke said, his usual wry smile replaced with a sneer. He hoped Anders was doing okay—a pointless hope to have, he knew, as Anders was going to be extremely volatile with his anchor possibly dead.

“Hawke," Sebastian hissed through clenched teeth. He sighed again, wringing his hands. “You are insufferable sometimes.” Only sometimes? He’d have to try harder— "What I mean is… I’ve had more time to think about our past friendship, reflect on it, on everything before Kirkwall fell. And it’s made me reconsider things. Let me think on just how my anger towards Anders and the injustices that happened in that city clouded my mind.”

Hawke frowned, watching Sebastian with rapt attention now. Had… no, there was no way he had changed his mind about anything, had he?

“I lost myself in my turmoil the moment I realised Elthina was dead… Only now do I have clarity. I let those feelings fuel me, until I convinced myself that that version of you my rage had constructed was the person you always had been, but… that is not the case, not at all, now that I’ve had time to think clearly, to speak with you once more, to remember without raw emotion in the way. To consider the path the Maker has created for us both,” Sebastian explained.. “And I think… I think there may be another option for you. Because you were my friend. Because I once saw a good soul in you, a good man.”

“...and what is that option?” Hawke asked, dread choking him. He didn’t want to know, but at the same time—

“Repent, Hawke,” said Sebastian. “If you repent, reject Anders and his heresy against the Chantry—we can tell the Divine that it was all that abomination's plans.” Sebastian paused, looking Hawke deep in his eyes. The prince’s voice was strong, confident, and self-assured. “He used you, friend. I remember… I remember being so angry when I realised you had helped him, but you had sounded like you hadn’t known what he was doing either. It makes so much more sense now. I used to wonder, how you could have fooled me so easily… but you hadn’t. The man I met in the Chantry, who helped me all those years ago, was the real you—not the you that Anders has been abusing.”

“Abusing?!” Hawke shouted, sitting up straight. The room spun around him. Undeterred, his rage pushing him through, he turned to face Sebastian fully. 

“Yes,” Sebastian said calmly, like he hadn’t just accused Hawke’s love—the person he cared the most about in the entire world (sorry, Carver)—of abusing him. “I took confessions, as you may remember, when I was a Brother. I heard many things about troubled relationships, and in particular helped people—not just women—realise that their partner was hurting them, using them, manipulating them, even if they did not use physical violence. In some cases, it’s almost cult-like, the abuser like a revered icon… the victim would tell themselves they were doing it for love, unaware they weren’t loved in return, not really.” 

“Stop, just—stop,” Hawke spat. The need to vomit hit him anew. “Anders didn’t use me or manipulate me or anything—” 

“He was a possessed maleficarum, Hawke,” Sebastian countered. He shook his head, regarding Hawke with pity. Hawke resisted the urge to spit in his face. Tempting, but unhelpful. “One who had plans he wished to carry out to destroy the Chantry. To bring death and anarchy. You were another apostate he could mould, one with the kind of power and privilege he desperately needed to carry those plans out,” Sebastian continued, steepling his long fingers, legs crossed like he was lounging in a throne instead of sitting on a stout stool in the middle of a prison cell. “Years younger—more impressionable—and physically stronger, too. Everything he needed, everything he wanted. He would never have gotten to kill as many as he did if you were not there to shield him from the Templars until the very end.” 

“None of that is true, Sebastian!,” Hawke snapped, body shaking with barely controlled rage. He wanted to lash out, wanted to hurt Sebastian until he stopped saying such awful things about the love of his life. Until Sebastian stopped talking completely. “He pushed me away for years, kept warning me that he didn’t want to drag me down with him because of his plans, he knew the dangers, and he wasn’t looking for anyone to—to use !” 

“He sure moved in awfully fast after you two finally confirmed your relationship, did he not?” Sebastian replied, titling his head.

“That was me, I asked him to stay, because it was safer than Darktown,” Hawke retorted. “You—none of that is true, and I don’t have to prove it to you.”

"Was it you? Or did he only convince you it was your idea?” Sebastian sighed, uncrossing his legs and shaking his head. “He was obsessed with the idea of you, but that does not mean he loved you.” 

Hawke opened his mouth to argue, only to be cut off by Sebastian clicking his tongue—like Hawke was, was a child, a pet. “Regardless—if you repent and disavow Anders,” Sebastian began, “I can vouch to the Divine that you were nothing more than a pawn, staying the hand that carries the blade. No execution, no grave punishment. The only thing that would be required of you after that would be a favour for me—”

“Oh, and so throwing Anders to the wolves isn’t a favour enough—”

“I want you to join the Starkhaven Circle,” Sebastian finished. “And as part of this deal, you would have to join to avoid major punishment.” Hawke's jaw snapped shut. His ears rang. His throat closed up. His eyes unfocused. He was completely unable to comprehend the prince’s words for a tense moment, consumed with fury as he was.

“What?” Hawke breathed. “What did you say?”

“Hawke. You were once a dear friend to me. I did care for you, cherished your company. I know you are a good man—a good man with a lot of anger,” Sebastian said, a hand over his heart. Hawke clenched his jaw, vicious insults begging to spill out. “I know the Maker led you to me for a reason—and I’ve seen a taste of the things He planned for you. You are capable of so much. So, to see you be led astray by a demon like you have, it hurts me.”

Sebastian once again denied him a chance to get a word in edgewise. “And I can’t help but wonder, if maybe the path the Maker wants me to walk is not that of a hunter, an executioner, a bloodied prince, but a saviour of souls like I wished to be in the Chantry,” Sebastian said, blue eyes wide and sincere. That only made Hawke angrier—that Sebastian truly believed the things he was saying, that it wasn’t just lies and manipulation intended to hurt, to confuse. “And you are still able to be saved, to become worthy of walking at the Maker’s side again. I can help you back on that path again, if you just let me.”

Sebastian stood up, eyes still trained on Hawke, towering over him. The candlelight brought out the warm tones of his brown skin, kept the cool edge out of his blue, blue eyes. “Come to the Starkhaven Circle. If you pass your Harrowing—and I think you can, you’re a strong man, the tricks most demons use are not as intricate as Anders’—you’d be perfect as a First Enchanter or even a Court Enchanter,” Sebastian explained, taking Hawke’s clammy hands into his own. Hawke was too taken back by the prince’s words to tear away from him.

“Please, Hawke,” Sebastian pleaded. “I just want to help you. I don’t wish to lose a dear friend if I don’t have to. Because you will be executed, otherwise.”

Hawke stared at Sebastian, eyes as big as plates, unbelieving. Had Sebastian snapped? Had he finally decided to be the craziest of Hawke’s friend group? The man always had an odd edge to him—gleeful that the trouble Hawke always got himself into meant there were ‘so many people to help!’ , both boasting about his strengths as an archer and lamenting even having to kill in the same battle—but nothing that alarming. He had just been a man confused about his lot in life, struggling with the balance of piety and pleasure, of sin and virtues.

This, however, made Hawke wonder if he was hallucinating Sebastian. Anders had once confessed he started seeing and hearing things in solitary; things that weren’t demons or spirits.

“What?" Hawke rasped. His voice grew hysterical with each word he said next:  “Are you insane? I—I’ve spent my entire life trying to stay out of the Circle! And now you want me to—to—destroy my romantic relationship and let the love of my life be murdered while I, what? Skip away to be locked in a gilded cage by some crazed prince?!” Hawke wanted to throw his hands in the air, but he was shaking too much to move. “Sure! Let me pick, do I want to be locked up forever at the mercy of my jailers who have the legal right to murder me whenever they want, or get publicly executed instead? Only difference is I get to pick if the common folk get to see my death or not!” 

Hawke kept shaking his head, unsure of what else to do. “I didn’t just follow Anders because I loved him—and I do, I do so damn much,” Hawke continued, “but also because I believed in him! In his cause! In Justice, in Vengeance! What he said about the Chantry and the Circle and everything! It’s part of why I love him!” Hawke tugged against Sebastian’s grip, trying to free himself.

Sebastian frowned, releasing Hawke’s hand—far too gently, like Hawke was porcelain, which made Hawke want to scream. He wished for Sebastians righteous anger again, for the man to turn out to be a tyrant willing to torture Hawke for what he did, for what Anders did. It would hurt less. Hawke could handle physical pain, but he hated the way this made his thoughts swirl, his heart clench, his stomach twist—all because a former friend said such things. He hated how it made his anger burn out of control, rendering the rest of his emotions to ash.

Sebastian sighed for a third time. Hawke half expected the man to deflate in front of him and disappear into nothing. “I suppose no one can say I did not try,” Sebastian murmured. “I wish it didn’t have to come to this, Hawke. I really do. Anders shouldn’t’ve dragged you down with him, not when you fought so hard for what you had in Kirkwall.”

“I chose to let go of it all,” Hawke whispered, his voice cracking. “It was my choice. Fame, money, a title, all of that unimportant to me. Unlike my love for him or making things right. None of it was as important. Not… Not even the love of people who never truly listened to me when I spoke of what my life was like as a mage, when I spoke of my feelings towards the Chantry and the Templars.”  It was impossible to keep the bitterness out of his voice. He had loved his companions, he honestly had, but there were days where he still found himself wondering if they cared as deeply about him in return. The real him—not the image Varric had built up about the Champion of Kirkwall.

“I would have protected the mages, killed Meredith, even if everyone else had turned on me like you did. Like you still have. But they didn’t, thank the Maker,” Hawke said. If they had turned against him… He wasn’t sure what sort of man he would have become after the Kirkwall rebellion, had he been forced to kill Fenris or Aveline—or Maker, Carver. As much as they drove each other up the wall, he loved his brother, truly.

He and Anders were the only family Hawke had left.

“...I wish I could help you, friend,” said Sebastian, pulling away from Hawke. He moved towards the door, movements slow. He looked sad, failure tugging at his lips. Hawke felt increasingly frustrated. He wanted to get up, to scream and yell in Sebastian’s face—more than he already had—but he bit his tongue. The nausea was still hitting Hawke hard, and he didn’t want to risk vomiting everywhere, especially when he had no idea if anyone would even come to clean it up or not. Nevermind the exhaustion that now settled over his body like a blanket.

Sebastian paused, hand hovering over the door handle. “Your brother may become Knight-Commander of Kirkwall, are you aware? I’d be willing to let him transfer to Starkhaven with that title, if it would make you feel better. I know he wouldn’t hurt you or let any of the other Templars hurt a mage,” Sebastian said, swallowing, face hard like he was making a difficult decision. He didn’t look at Hawke. “He’d have to follow his oaths better than he has been, of course but…” 

“He would only take the job to break me out,” Hawke sneered. His fingers dug into the soft flesh of his biceps, arm wrapped around his legs again, chin propped on his kneecaps. 

Sebastian shook his head again, looking disappointed in the way Father had whenever he caught Hawke lying to him. “I had hoped I could have helped you, Hawke,” said Sebastian. “The Maker will understand I tried, but it seems your fate is up to him now.”

With that, he was gone, leaving Hawke to yell his throat raw into his own hands.

He had thought, once, that Sebastian was his friend. That Sebastian understood him. But more and more Hawke was reminded that the man was far more selfish than Hawke realised, too full of himself to truly see the world and its suffering as it truly was; not a test of character, not something for rich, young princes to witness in order to learn a lesson, to feel good about themselves for helping. Perhaps at first Hawke was nothing but a lost sheep, a vehicle of which to learn about the struggles of Ferelden refugees—just another faceless patron of the Chantry.

Mother Petrice had been a zealot. It had been as clear as day, and she had died for it. Hawke felt no remorse having sat back and watched her bleed out in the middle of the Chantry. He had thought there to be no one else like her in his life, after that. Now, Hawke wondered if he had missed the zealot right under his nose simply because this one had been nicer to him;  hadn’t hated him for wanting to understand and sympathise with the Qunari despite differences in religion and culture. 

Sebastian had still called the Qunari heretics, after all.

Hawke did not agree with everything the Qun spoke of—least of all their treatment of mages—but he knew it would be hypocritical of him to condemn an entire religion for the same sins as his own.  And the Qunari at least treated elves far more like equals than most human Andrastians—despite Andraste’s own teachings, her own support of elves and Shartan. 

After joining his battles, after seeing him defeat the Arishok, Sebastian had—like so many poor fools—put Hawke on a pedestal, and then couldn’t cope when the rug was pulled out from under. The writing had always been on the wall for what path Hawke was going to take in life, and it bothered him only Anders and Merrill had ever really noticed, other than maybe Carver, who had tried to stop him. Tried to keep him out of the Templar’s ire. Still, it felt like only those three had ever really listened to the things he said about mages, the Templars, the problems plaguing Kirkwall. 

Agreeing that what Anders did was necessary shouldn’t have been a Maker-damned surprise. He knew, of course, he tended to censor himself around Sebastian and Fenris, and talked less about mage related things with Isabela and Varric, but it wasn’t like always kept things to himself, never talked about them.

Perhaps Hawke had been deluding himself too; having wanted to be liked so badly, wanted to have someone who could speak the words of the Chant, of Andraste, and tell him he hadn’t been born wrong for being a mage, or the son of one, the brother of one, the cousin of one. Someone who was as close to holy as it got, telling him he was the Maker’s child and had been given gifts, something that could be a blessing rather than a curse. Even if those words were laced with the same rhetoric that cut him deep his entire life; as long as there was something good to latch onto, it had been enough. It had been more than he had been given before.

Instead, Hawke got a man calling him a weapon, a sword, but at the time, Hawke had felt those words to be true. Hawke hadn’t yet learned how to heal, at the time; hadn’t learned how to use his gifts for more than lighting fires and ending the lives of others.

Maybe Hawke, too, had been selfish in his seeking of friendship from Sebastian, and this was merely the punishment he had brought upon himself. This anguish, despair; the anxiety of what was to happen to Anders, to him. The crushing feeling of someone deciding they knew what was best for you, despite them destroying everything you loved in the process. 

He wanted to scream, to break things, to call cleansing fire to his hands, but nothing came. Not even another sound ripped from his throat.

He slumped into bed, deciding sleeping until his trial was his only option; turning against Anders wasn’t even on the table.

[fiberpunk027]

WIP Wednesday

A little peek at the Dragon Age fic I've been working on. Taking place between the Awakening DLC and Dragon Age 2.

“Aren’t you supposed to be preparing?” she asked, picking up the discarded notes and glancing over them. She chewed nervously at her nails as she scanned the lines she’d written herself with his minor input.  “I don’t want to be over prepared. Or else I’ll sound insincere,” he stood and stretched.  “Sincerity isn’t what I’m worried about,” she muttered, her eyes still glued to the parchment in her hand.  He plucked the notes out of her hand and tossed them aside. Before she could protest he lightly gripped her chin bringing her eyes to his. “You need to stop worrying,” he urged her, “Kinloch Hold is already a prison. A dilapidated prison, but even with adequate resources it will still be one. What’s the worst that could happen?” “They could consider it a lost cause,” she said, grasping his hand and yanking it down from her chin. Still she held it tightly and didn’t let go, he noticed. “You weren’t there when the templars threatened the Right of Annulment. They were so eager to count the circle as lost.” “Because templars are taught we’re all just a step away from abominations, better to be rid of us before we can finish the job,” he said bitterly, “Even when you pass your Harrowing they’re practically devastated they can’t kill you for failing.” “Small steps,” she reminded him, turning away and finally dropping his hand.

[zephfair]

Helloooo!!! I love your fics. Idk why but I would love to read a haunted house pynch version of you haha :D I mean, if you ever need some ideas and feel inclined to write that... I would be super happy!! But obviously it is just an idea, I dont mean to say you have to write anything I say :) I just love how you write pynch, your humour, and generally your fics. And I have been craving a haunted house fic :D Anyway, all the best!!

AAAh, thank you so much! You are way too kind to me!😭 I'm sorry it took me a while to write this, and it's pre-pynch, but I hope you like it! Please let me know if this hit your craving for a haunted house fic!💖💖💖

Rated T for language, I think the only other warning is talking about standard haunted house stuff.

This could take place in canon, soon before The Raven King and definitely before Ronan's birthday and the 😘

“I’m just saying,” Ronan said for at least the fourth time in an hour, “why do you want to go to a stupid haunted house when you live with a fucking ghost?”

“That’s a good question,” Noah suddenly appeared right at his shoulder, and Ronan jumped straight into the air and grabbed his chest.

“Holy Christ, you little shit!” he yelled in a very manly voice, certainly not a screech.

“Sorry,” Noah said, sounding not sorry at all. “Did I scare you?”

Ronan swore again. “I think you gave me a heart attack.”

“I don’t know, Lynch, you might not be fit to even go into this haunted house,” Adam said.

“If you’re uncomfortable, Ronan,” Gansey began but Ronan cut off that bullshit real quick.

“I’m not uncomfortable,” he sneered. “And I’m not not fit,” he said with some confusion but then he found his stride. “I’m just saying that haunted houses suck, especially when you’ve seen some of the shit we’ve seen. Why should I have to pay for someone else to try and fail to scare me?”

“In other words, you’ve dreamed up unworldly, eldritch abominations that were out to kill you...and now you’re afraid to go into a haunted house created by Henrietta high kids,” Adam spelled it out.

Ronan bristled immediately, somehow looking just like Chainsaw when she fluffed herself out in defense. “I’m not afraid!”

“Does this have something to do with your religion?” Gansey worried at his lip and eyed Ronan carefully. “I know some religions forbid celebrating anything that reeks of a pagan ceremony. Although, the origins of Halloween are—”

“I don’t have anything against Halloween,” Ronan grit out. “In fact, let’s go trick or treating right the fuck now. I’m just saying that haunted houses … are stupid,” he finished weakly.

“Well, now that we’ve cleared that up, let’s go, Gansey,” Adam said, already turning away from the car.

“I just thought it would be a fun evening together. Parrish has the night off, and Jane told us about this project that her school does to raise funds for local children.”

“Oh, so that’s why you wanted to come. What, is she going to swoon into your arms in fright, the damsel in distress you can save?” Ronan said with as much sarcasm as he could slather on it.

Gansey froze him with a Look. “Jane is actually working tonight. I thought this would be a boys-night only activity.”

Ronan snorted and looked away. The haunted house was in an old faux-Victorian house on the outskirts of town. Ronan had heard about it before, that the high school theater kids manned the event with a lot of adult supervision to raise money for boys and girls clubs. It definitely wasn’t a high tech or expensive endeavor, but Ronan didn’t like the way his stomach clenched when he looked at the covered windows that were flashing from bright lights inside.

Adam sighed loudly. “Come on, if you’re coming, Lynch. I don’t want to spend my one night off just standing in a parking lot.”

Ronan told him what he could do to himself instead. Adam just glared, unimpressed by the vulgarity.

“Maybe this was a bad idea,” Gansey said, clearly uncomfortable by their attitudes.

“No! Go in! It’ll be fun,” Noah said and nudged Ronan in the ribs, making him shiver. “Do you want me to come with to protect you?”

Ronan shivered again. “I’m more likely to have a heart attack if you keep blowing your coldass ghost breath in my ear.”

“Come on, Lynch,” Adam said again but then he smirked. “I’ll even hold your hand, if it makes you feel better.”

“Oh, fuck you,” Ronan grumbled but slowly and very reluctantly got out of the car. Gansey smiled beatifically and led the way toward the entrance while Ronan followed even more slowly. He didn’t want to admit that holding Adam’s hand probably would make him feel better.

The line to get in moved more quickly than Ronan would’ve liked, and the screams and loud noises audible from inside were more disturbing that he would’ve liked too. They finally entered a sort of lean-to that had been built around the exterior entrance to the house’s basement.

There, a bubbly high school girl briefly spelled out the rules (no alcohol, no drugs, no guns, no knives, no violence) and warned them to stay together in the groups she made and not deviate from the marked path. They would start in the basement, working their way up through the horrors of the house until the grand finale on the third floor after which they got to take an inflatable slide to the ground again.

That was the only part Ronan looked forward to.

Then she said, “If you’re with a friend who you think might have a violent or extreme reaction to a jump scare, we ask that you please help restrain them. We value the safety of our performers. Maybe hold hands so your group doesn’t get separated and you all stay together.”

Gansey and Adam shared a Look then each grabbed one of Ronan’s arms—Gansey clutching his right bicep tightly, Adam latching onto Ronan’s left forearm. “Oh fuck you guys,” he hissed.

“We never know how our fight or flight reactions will react until they’re triggered,” Gansey hissed back.

But Ronan did know. He knew the reactions to stress were fight, flight, or freeze. And he’d seen Gansey face enough potential wasp and bee catastrophes to know that he was firmly in the freeze category. And Adam had never once fought back or fled from his father so he was another freezer.

While Ronan, well, he knew that he’d be the first to flee, if that was a choice. Sure, he might throw a punch to gain some time, but if he was alone and not having to protect his loved ones, he’d be away.

So he wasn’t amused that his friends felt the need to restrain him. But his bitterness eased a little when they moved to go down the basement steps, and Adam’s hand slid down his arm to take his hand. Gansey had done the same, casually holding onto his hand like he would a child waiting to cross the street. But Adam, he slid their hands together then entwined their fingers until his bony thumb caressed over the top of Ronan’s.

Ronan gulped and was thankful that the dark hid his burning cheeks and the loud sound effects covered his little whimper.

The first basement room wasn’t that bad as a recreation of a witch’s lair. It was dark with strategic red and purple lights on different scary looking implements. Ronan mumbled, “Satanic magic bullshit,” when a loud witch’s cackle rolled through the room and the witch popped up right in front of them.

Gansey yelled and stepped back right onto Ronan’s foot, which made him yell and swear and jerk back into Adam, which made him yell and squeeze Ronan’s hand so tightly he yelled again.

At least, that’s what they all agreed to afterward.

As the witch’s cackle continued, Gansey hurried them toward the door. “Well, that wasn’t frightening at all,” he shouted over his shoulder. Ronan didn’t answer, too busy brushing fake cobwebs off his head and out of his mouth. That was the problem with letting shorter Gansey go first—it left all the higher decorations smacking Ronan in the face and head.

Adam snickered against his back until Ronan purposely ducked so Adam got a faceful of sticky spiderweb and spit it out with a yuck.

The second room was a graveyard with fake tomb stones and several plastic skeletons that dropped from the ceiling. It was too loud to talk, with recorded screams and other so-called scary noises coming at irregular intervals.

Ronan was starting to feel a little like a stress ball, Gansey first pulling him along then stopping abruptly at a jump scare while squeezing his hand. From behind him, Adam alternately held back, straining Ronan’s arm then crowded tight against his back. Ronan wasn’t about to complain about that. He just tried to balance between the two and shut his eyes at times to keep the flashing lights from giving him a worse headache.

After the last zombie had popped up from a gravestone and menaced them, Gansey spotted the stairs and started pulling them along.

“Holy fuck, this fucking noise,” Ronan ground out, shaking his head.

He didn’t know how Adam even heard him over the growing din from the next room, but he must have. Adam pressed up against his side and breathed hotly in his ear, “How can you complain about this noise when I’ve heard the so-called music you listen to?”

“Oh fuck you,” Ronan said right as a man wearing a leather mask brandished a chainsaw at them. They all obligingly screamed and Ronan felt torn apart again as the other two jostled him in different directions.

Eventually they all got going the same way, headed down a very narrow corridor that apparently wound in a maze through the ground floor. There were scary mirrors, scary zombies, scary clowns, scary fake tarantulas and snakes, whatever was a common fear was represented somewhere.

Ronan was almost getting used to it by the second floor. The horribly loud noises were off-putting, and the flashing lights with alternating pitch-black darkness were jarring, but the jump-scares were actually tame in comparison to the stuff they’d seen.

Even Adam seemed like he was relaxing, and Ronan thought he heard Adam laugh with his forehead pressed against Ronan’s shoulder blade when Gansey got a fake snake around the neck and shrieked doing a little get-it-off-me dance.

Until they got to the stairway to the top floor. There was thick fog floating down, and blue UV lights that made white glow but left everything else in darkness. Gansey squeezed Ronan’s hand and glanced back over his shoulder. “Excelsior!” he cried and started up the stairs.

“Fuck this,” Ronan yelled back and Adam clenched his hand in agreement.

The noises had redoubled, this time combined with a pounding bass beat that was more similar to Ronan’s music than he’d admit but what also sounded like the house had a very arrhythmic, racing heartbeat. It was dark and thick with fog, only the UV light strobing occasionally.

Ronan had to admit it was unnerving. There were definitely people there, just out of reach, but the strobing light made their motion unnatural, unearthly, and only lit parts of their outfits so they flitted from place to place. Ronan couldn’t even push them away as they came closer, circling the group of three.

Then all the lights went out and something collided hard with Ronan’s right arm. He clutched Gansey’s hand even harder and yelled. Gansey had stopped so Ronan took a step closer and whatever hit him didn’t try again.

But the movement had taken him further from Adam and when something rammed into their hands, he felt Adam’s fingers slipping. Ronan was off balance and tried to turn back to move closer to where Adam should be, but something that felt like a human body fell heavily where they were linked, and Adam’s hand disappeared.

“Adam,” Ronan screamed as loudly as he could, wildly reaching, swinging his arm in every direction feeling for Adam.

“Lynch, come on,” Gansey pulled him in the opposite direction in the darkness, but Ronan was turned around in the blackness and kept reaching for where he thought Adam should be.

When he felt his hand brush soft material, he thanked God, almost sobbing, and fisted his hand in Adam’s shirt. Ronan pulled with all his strength, and Adam moved willingly toward him even as Gansey continued to pull him away.

But it was okay, he had a handful of Adam and he was never letting go again. The darkness pressed in on him, he gasped for breath, the fake fog choking him, and his hand sweated in the cotton of Adam’s shirt, his arm wrenched behind him painfully to keep clinging to Adam.

He didn’t understand why Adam let himself be pulled along, it couldn’t be comfortable, why didn’t Adam take his hand again.

Then he looked back right as the black light strobed. And he knew why Adam didn’t respond.

It wasn’t Adam he was clutching.

It was some kind of evil, possessed, Victorian doll but child-sized, in a torn frilly dress, its face a gaping maw of a black mouth and gaping black holes where the eyes should be.

Ronan screamed. He couldn’t even let go of the tight grasp he had on the doll’s sleeve—he just froze and screamed.

When the doll stepped closer right as the light went off, Ronan tore free from Gansey and ran.

Right into a wall that knocked him right onto his ass.

At least it made him stop screaming. He sat on the floor, shaking, rubbing the growing bump on his forehead until the light flashed on again.

And the doll was standing right above him.

He screamed again then saw another shirt glowing behind the doll. A familiar hand landed on the doll’s shoulder and pulled it back.

“I think you’ve scared him enough, Blue,” Adam said.

**********

Ronan sat on the curb down the street from the haunted house and gasped for air. His head hung between his knees which were currently somewhere up around his ears. He hadn’t passed out, exactly, but things had gone black around the edges and he didn’t really remember getting out of the building.

Apparently, Gansey had joined them and between the three of them, they got Ronan onto the slide that took them down to the parking lot. There a volunteer medic had examined Ronan’s forehead, offered him a bandaid, and told him to sit down for a while.

“Here, Lynch,” Adam said, and a sweating bottle of water was pushed into his face.

Ronan took it gratefully, sitting up enough to twist it open and take a long drink. It helped a little, or at least, helped calm his hyperventilating while he chugged and swallowed.

He wiped his mouth with his forearm and shivered. He still couldn’t look Adam in the eyes. “I’m sorry I ruined your one night out or whatever,” he muttered.

Adam sighed and sat down beside him, close enough that his shoulder and arm were solidly pressing against Ronan’s. It made Ronan feel grounded in a way he didn’t realize he was missing.

“You didn’t ruin my night,” Adam said, nudging him a little in the ribs. “It wasn’t my idea to come to this.”

“Yeah, but you were looking forward to it, and then I went and ruined it.”

“First, you didn’t ruin anything. And second, I was just looking forward to being with you. And Gansey,” he added a beat later.

“So you guys weren’t planning this all along?” Ronan had to ask, had to voice his growing fear that somehow they’d all conspired to laugh at him.

“Hell no,” Adam said and pulled away.

Ronan shut his eyes. Of course he had to go and piss off Adam. Way to go, Ronan.

“Lynch. Ronan, look at me.” But Adam had only withdrawn far enough so he could turn to face Ronan. He put his hands on Ronan’s shoulders and tried to turn him a little too.

Ronan finally opened his eyes to see Adam leaning very close but he hung his head again. “Do you really think we would do something to hurt you? You know Gansey loves you like a brother, and Blue loves you like a menace, and I … well, we wouldn’t ever do that to you.”

“I didn’t want to come.”

“We shouldn’t have made you, whatever your reason for not wanting to come. It was a pretty lame haunted house, anyway. And now I’ve got a splitting headache from the noises.”

“Oh shit,” Ronan’s head jerked up. “I didn’t even think about that. God, that must have been torture with your ear. Can I do anything for you?”

Adam looked at him with an expression Ronan couldn’t decipher. Finally he said, “Give me a drink?”

Ronan passed over the water bottle and watched Adam’s throat move as he drank the rest of it. He was trying not to think about swapping spit and backwash with Adam when it hit him.

“Did you actually buy me a bottle of water?” Ronan demanded. “Lemme pay you back.”

“It’s okay, Lynch,” Adam put the cap back on the empty bottle. “My treat.”

“No, that’s not right. I owe you—”

“Ronan. It’s fine. I can afford to get you a water.” Adam stretched out, leaning back on his elbows and looking way more casual than Ronan felt at the moment.

“Well, then I’ll pay you back.”

“Maybe you can buy me a burger. For lunch tomorrow?”

“That’d be awesome. Yeah. Sure.” The words tumbled out of Ronan, and Adam grinned up at him.

Ronan grinned back then hung his head again. “I just can’t believe this was such a clusterfuck. Dick is going to kill me if I ruined his night too.”

“You wanna talk about why you didn’t want to come in the first place?”

“The fuck would I want to talk about?” Ronan muttered and Adam didn’t answer. They sat in silence for a moment until he said, “I just don’t like shit like that.”

“Halloween shit? Haunted shit? Badly performed high school productions?”

Ronan smirked in gratitude at Adam’s casual snark. “Just...shit that only pretends to be scary. Like, one part of your mind is trying to fool the rest into thinking it’s reality just so it can pretend to be scared and get all that adrenaline and shit. It’s like a big con of yourself.”

“Like a lie?”

“Yeah, exactly. I get enough of that in dreams, only in my dreams, what my mind might manifest will actually kill me. If I thought up a creepy haunted doll, that thing is going to murder everyone I love. This,” he gestured back at the house, “This is just weird. I don’t get why people want to pay to put themselves in a fake situation that they know isn’t real just to feel real fear.”

Adam crinkled the water bottle until Ronan looked over at him. “I get it. I think. It’s about vulnerability and control. In your dreams, reality is terrifying and surreal and you might have to run for your life. Or come up with a way to stop the creepy haunted doll. But it’s you doing it. You have the choice to run or fight for your life, so you’re ultimately in control of what happens.”

“Yes,” Ronan said, grateful that somehow he got it. “I’m not chained down and forced to see and do things I don’t want to do. I’m in charge.”

Adam nodded slowly and nudged him. “So no more haunted houses. How do you feel about roller coasters?”

“My driving is the best answer to anyone who wants to ride an artificial scary ride,” Ronan boasted, mostly to make Adam laugh, which he did. Then Adam nudged into his side and they stayed there in companionable silence until Gansey and Blue stood over them.

“Here, Ronan. They say sugar is good for shock, so we got you some hot chocolate,” Gansey held the cup down to him.

Ronan glanced over at Adam who shrugged. “Fine,” he grumbled and accepted the cup.

“I had no idea it would happen like that, Ronan,” Blue said.

Ronan shrugged and swirled the lukewarm hot chocolate.

“I must say, I was mightily surprised to see you there, Jane. After you said you couldn’t make it,” Gansey said cheerily.

“I talked to one of the girls I know in the theater club, and she helped me out with a costume. They sneaked me in to the top floor where I just kind of hung out until they signaled you were coming up.”

Ronan looked up at Blue who looked much less diabolical under the ordinary street light. Her dress and wig were obviously threadbare and worn, and the makeup that had transformed her face into a waking nightmare looked just dark and odd without the UV light.

She shrugged sheepishly under Ronan’s glare. “I didn’t plan it to happen like that. We were going to separate you and Gansey so I’d be holding his hand when he looked back and freaked out. But when I Red Rovered you two, I couldn’t separate you.”

“Red Rovered?” Gansey interrupted.

“You know, that kids’ game? When you hold hands in a line and another kid runs at your arms to try and break you apart?”

Gansey shook his head, never having partaken in the games of ordinary schoolchildren.

“Anyway,” Blue continued, “you and Gansey were, like, glued together so I tried you and Adam instead, and that worked. Two of the other girls had to grab Adam to hold him back while I got in his place.”

They all looked over at Adam. “All I felt was someone run into me and Ronan’s hands until I couldn’t hold on anymore. When I tried to grab him again, people were holding my arms. I thought it was part of the performance until the light came on and I recognized you. And what you were doing to Ronan.”

“I didn’t mean to do anything to Ronan!” Blue insisted. “I’m sorry it freaked you out so bad; I didn’t know that would happen. I just wanted to scare Gansey.”

“It’s okay, Sargent,” Ronan said, proud that his voice was now steady. “It totally freaked me out. Your makeup is badass. You looked like a crazyass doll possessed by the devil.”

Blue smiled proudly and held out her fist. Ronan bumped it with his own. He felt Adam take a deep breath beside him and let it out in relief. Ronan bumped his shoulder into Adam’s.

“Well, I don’t know how I feel about you going to all that trouble just to frighten me,” Gansey said with a little pout.

“Drink your hot chocolate, Gansey,” Adam said and Gansey obeyed.

“So what now? Are you guys ready to grab something to eat?” he said after a long sip. “I feel like burgers.”

“Nah,” Ronan said. “I don’t want a burger tonight. Maybe tomorrow,” he glanced at Adam out of the corner of his eye, “but not now.”

“Who said you get to pick?” Blue asked.

Ronan pointed to his forehead. “I’m the one who got injured. I should get to pick.”

“That sub place out in the strip mall is doing a buy one-get one special,” Adam said.

“Perfect,” Ronan said and Blue nodded. She held out her hand which confused Ronan at first, but then he realized what she was offering. He took her hand for show but got himself to his feet then reached down and ruffled her hair. “Wear that get-up into the sub shop and they might run out screaming so we could get free food.”

She laughed, and Ronan knew they’d be okay. He turned to see Adam smiling up at the two of them so he stuck out his hand. Adam laughed and took it, letting Ronan bear some of his weight. Ronan made a big deal out of pulling him harder and closer than necessary.

“Do I get to hold your hand again too, Ronan?” Gansey’s voice broke Ronan out of his reverie.

Ronan let go of Adam and turned to Gansey. “Any time you want, Dick, any time. Even though you did leave me to the mercies of the evil doll. And you let me run into a wall.”

“Well, next time, I won’t let go,” Gansey promised with a sincerity that made Ronan a little embarrassed.

“Wow, Dick, that’s really romantic,” he sneered, to make all of them roll their eyes and say his name in various tones of frustration.

Then he slung his arm over Gansey’s shoulder and started off toward the Pig, calling behind him, “C’mon you two. Parrish, bring the doll so Gansey can play with her later.”

Then Gansey sputtered and Blue started yelling again, and Ronan felt like they were back to normal. As long as he never, ever had to go into another haunted house again.

[fluffomatic]

You Like Her. Admit it.

Fandom: The Owl House by Dana Terrace

Characters: Hunter|The Golden Guard, Luz Noceda, Willow Park

Relationships: Luz and Hunter (Platonic), Willow x Hunter

Words: 1526

Summary: Hunter tells Luz how he feels about all his friends. She takes notice of the way he talks about a certain Captain. THIS IS A TICKLE FIC!! IF YOU DONT LIKE THAT KEEP SCROLLING!!

A/N: I got a comment on Ao3 on my last fic (I post all my fics on there! My account is AsexualSandbox) And they wanted a fic where Hunter admits he likes Willow! I thought it was really cute so I threw this together! Hope yall like it

Hunter and Luz sat on her new bed in the Owl House. The human had set up a sleepover for all her friends, she knew they all needed a peaceful day after well, everything. Hunter was the first to arrive seeing he still has the mentality of a soldier, always arriving at least an hour early. So the duo decided to chill out until the others arrived.

"Soooooo~" The human said, pulling Hunter gaze away from his scroll. "What?" He muttered. "What do you think of the others? We haven't had much time to just...talk ya know? I wanna know what you think of our friends!" She smiled wide waiting for Hunter to answer. He sighs and sits up. "Well it's not a suprise to say they're all great." Luz gasps excitedly "Awwww Hunter!" "Oh shut it human you already knew that!" She giggled "I know I know I'm messing with you! Please continue" Hunter cleared his throat and continued. "Well at first Amity was uh...hard to be around. I knew she was still skeptical of me. Luckily Willow convinced her to give me a chance." His face flushed slightly at the mention of Willow, Luz quietly took note. "Ah after that it was a lot easier. I mean, I admired her strength after our first battle. And to see her stand up to her mother the way she did? How could I not admire her bravery as well?" Luz nodded happily "I know she's the coolest isn't she~?" Her face heated up and Hunter groaned "I get it she's your girlfriend let me finish. Her and I finally started to get along when I approached her about abomination magic. She was eager to show me all she knew and I was excited to learn. We have sparring matched every once in a while."

Luz chuckled "I'm glad you and her are finally getting along. I was worried at first. I thought she'd always hate you." "She hated me!?" "Anywaaaay! Next! How about Gus?" Hunter pouted but continued anyway. He looks down and fiddles with his gloved hands. "Gus is sweet. When I met him I thought he was just some weak little kid but he quickly proved me wrong. He could fly on his staff like other people could but he found a way that worked for him. When he found me at Hexside he gave me his lunch and kept me hidden even though he didn't know I had left the Emperors Coven yet. And when the scouts captured me he was quick to rescue me, even when I started panicking he took the time to show me a way to calm down. I've never experienced kindness like that before. He's like...a brother to me now. We like to study magic and human stuff together. He shows me all the cool new illusions he learns and he does his best to teach me." He finally looks over to Luz who had the brightest smile and tears in her eyes. "Ugh what?" She sniffles "That was the sweetest thing I've ever heard Hunterrrr!!!" She pulls him into a tight hug and he grunts "Augh! Luz!!" He gently pushes at her and she quickly pulls away "Sorry sorry!! Lost my cool there! Okay last one! What about Willow~" She coos

Hunter's face turns a bright red and he averts his gaze again. "W-Willow is...wow. she's incredible. She's strong and smart! She never backs down, she stands up for people! When I first met her she let me join her Flyer Derby team. When I met the team she put together I was about to walk away. I thought it was a joke! I mean, they all seemed so, ugh how do I put this without being mean? I don't know I just didn't see the potential. But she did. And despite me being an absolute jerk she dragged me back and proved me wrong. She even let me stay. And wooow seeing her in action!" His smile grew and so did Luz's smirk. "She's incredibly strong. One of the strongest witches I've ever seen! She's elegant, she plans 10 steps ahead, she always knows what to do. Even when I had turned them in and they escaped. She was ready to take on Darius, an incredibly powerful Coven head! After I let them go, after I betrayed them, she was still okay with talking to me. Not often, we chatted on Penstagram a bit but, I'm not really good at typing" He chuckled awkwardly. "At Hexside she was one of the first to stand up for me. She fought along side me. After I helped Gus she pulled me into a hug, I've never experienced that before." His blush deepened "She saved me after that too. I was falling and she dove to me, picked me up like I weighed nothing haha. She's so wonderful." He sighs happily, lost in thought.

He eventually snaps back into reality and peers back over to Luz. Her smile is wicked, her hands pressed together in thought. "W-What...? Why are you looking at me like that?" Luz snickers. "You like her, don't you?" Hunter's whole face turns a bright red "Wh....WHAT!? NO I-I MEAN, YES BUT UM-" He stammers over his words, hands covering his face. Luz chuckles "Ooooh you so dooo!! Awwww my little Hunter has a cruuuush!" Luz claps excitedly and he flops over "Luuuuz shut uuup!! I do not!" "Yes you do yes you doooo! Admit it!" He shakes his head "NO!" Luz sighs and pokes his side repeatedly "You like her you like huh?" She pauses, pulling her hand away. She hears a muffled squeak from the witch, followed by soft giggles. It takes her a moment, peering at her finger than back to the spot she was poking, but she eventually puts two and two together. A mischievous smirk spreads across her face.

"Admit it Hunter. You like her don't you?" She coos and adds a poke to his ribs. He jumps and shakes his head frantically. "I know you do! And I know this is the only way to make you admit it! An interrogation!" At that she lunges, hands scribbling all over his exposed side. Hunter squeals, legs softly kicking underneath him. Soft giggles escape his lips as he buries his face further into his arms "Luuhuhuhuz! Luz noohohoho this is cheating! Eeheheheheeee!" Luz just giggles along. "How come I never knew you were ticklish? Well doesn't matter! You're gonna talk! I saw that loon in your eyes~ I know what you were thinking!" She moves her hands down to his tummy and his giggling grows more frantic "Ahahahahaaa L-Luz waahahahahit nooohoho!! Ahhaha not theeehehhere!! I-I'll never taahahahalk!" He reaches down and gently pulls at her wrists, exposing his bright pink face and happy smile. Luz can't help but awe at him. "Well if I can't tickle here thaaaan how aboooooout...here?" She grabs his ankles and holds them in a head lock, hands hovering over his socked feet. "N-No! Luhuhuz please please!! Th-That's a baahahad spot!" He squirms around trying to free his trapped legs but it's useless. Her grip is strong, but her will to make him talk was stronger. "Last chance~" Her hands grew closer. He squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head. Luz just huffed out a laugh. "Your funeral" her hands finally made contact and the poor kid exploded with laughter. "AAHAHAHAHAAAA N-NO NO NOAHHAHAHAA LUUUHUHUHUZ PLEEEHEHEHEASE!!" He squirmed frantically around, desperately trying to pull his feet from her evil fingers. She continued her assault. "You know how to make this stop~!" He slammed his fists down in defeat "OKAY OKAAHAHAHAY YOU WIIIIHIHIHIN!! I LIKE HEEEHEHEHER I LIKE WILLOW! SHEHEHEHE'S SO COOHOHOHOL AND PR-PREEHEHEHETTY *snort* AAHAHAHAHHA I-I FEEHEHEHEL SO LIGHT AROUND H-HEHEHEHER AAHAHAHHAAA!! I LIKE WILLOW PARK!!"

Luz immediately let's him go and he curls up into a ball. "That wahahahas mean Luuhuhuhuz..." he giggled. Luz however was beaming "Awwww Hunter!! That's so cuuuute!!!" She pulls him up into a big hug, he keeps his face covered and mumbles curses her way. Suddenly there's a soft knock at the door. The duo gasps and Luz releases her hostage. "Doors open!" At that, a familiar witch walks in, causing Hunter's face to light back up. "Wi-Willow!?" She smiles and shyly waves at them. "Hey Hooty let me in and Eda said you two were up here. I heard a lot of laughing, what was so funny Hunter?" "U-Uh um n-nothing nothing.....Um did you...hear anything else?" She smiles and shakes her head, pulling out her scroll and typing quickly. "No just you, your laugh is really cute though. I don't hear it a lot~" She giggles and Hunter giggles sheepishly, playing with his hands. "Oh um...thanks Willow." Luz feels her phone buzz in her pocket. She pulls it out to see a new message from Willow. "I HEARD EVERYTHING!! :O <3" She smiles. "Hey wanna see something funny?" She asks Willow. Her head tilts curiously "Of course. What is it?" Luz's hand quickly finds Hunter's waist again and gives it a few quick squeezes

"ACK-! NO! NO HUMAN GET OHOHOHAHAHAHAAAFF!!"

[midnightwinterhawk]

I put together a little collection of Sterek and Steter fics for funsies. “Just a few fics”, I thought, “nothing too crazy.” Thirty fics later I had to cut myself off and finalize the list. You can thank @the-cookie-of-doom​ for the inspiration. 

These primarily fall under the Hurt Stiles Stilinski category because I apparently like to see my comfort characters suffer. Most of these have hopeful/happy endings but mind the tags. For reals.

Placed under a cut since I have no self control and this turned into a long post.

Sterek

adore to see your eyes fly by @1001cranes

(11,309 l E)

stiles is a pyromaniac, derek is a sociopath. a match made in some kind of heaven. teen wolf kink meme fill.

take my heart from me by @areiton

(23,188 l NR)

He didn't really mean to adopt Derek's pack of puppies. He didn't mean to make himself important to them.

To Derek.

He just wanted to keep them all safe.

That's all Stiles ever wanted.

"Why Can't You?" by @asterekmess

(3,602 l T)

Now. This was happening now, and he couldn’t be less prepared.

-

After a long night, things between Stiles and his father come to a head.

And You Say You're Alone by bi_leigh_bi

(30,314 l E)

Between the kanima, the Argents, and Peter's untimely return from the dead, everything has fallen apart. Stiles and Derek try to put their lives back together once the crisis has passed. Stiles deals with the aftermath of being tortured, and the distance growing between he and Scott. Derek attempts to become a stronger alpha and keep his pack safe, and that includes Stiles.

A Victory March by @churkey

(2,688 l T)

When Stiles is eight he learns that nothing will be the same. His dad comes home one day after work and sits Stiles down for a talk. He explains that werewolves and all the monsters are real.

They're real and not hiding under anyone's bed.

Bury the Moon by darthjamtart

(16,592 l M)

First things get bad. Then they get worse. Stiles doesn’t know what he’s sacrificed until it’s too late.

Dying is the easy part.

Love's Violent Delights by @dexterous-sinistrous

(10,685 l E)

Derek caught the way the man’s eyes looked over Stiles before lingering on his ass. He waited for the clerk to place the key on the counter before he reacted.

Stiles startled at the loud noise, turning away from the pamphlets in the display box to see Derek pinning the clerk’s head against the counter. He drew in an even breath, looking between the struggling man and Derek.

Derek briefly looked at Stiles, hesitating before he saw the gleam of excitement in Stiles’ eyes and the hint of lust in his scent. “Ever look at him, or any other Omega, like that again, and I’ll slice your eyes out with my claws.” He shoved the man back, not caring of the commotion that was made as he snatched up the key from the counter.

Empty by @discontentedwinter

(48,034 l M)

Jordan Parrish is the new sheriff of Beacon Hills, a town haunted by its past.

Your Vision Borrows Mine by hazyascent

(188,781 l E)

Stiles has encountered a fair share of monsters before, way out of his league - the kinds that children are afraid are hiding in their closets and under the bed.

He’d even become one himself when he was void. The nogitsune was in his house, his body, and his mind.

But the worst monster he’s ever faced took even more from him and got away with it.

It’s why Stiles has never really been as terrified of werewolves and kanimas and darachs as he should have been. They’re really not that scary, relatively speaking, and he has a whole team on his side. They always found a way to win - until they lost someone they really loved.

Stiles doesn’t know how to be normal, not after everything he’s done and everyone he’s hurt. The nogitsune is gone, but another monster is on its heels.

His uncle is back. And Stiles has never felt more alone.

It Was a Wednesday by @isthatbloodonhisshirt

(80,129 l M)

“What happened? Where are you? What’s that sound?”

Derek jumped, having momentarily forgotten Scott was on the phone with him because Stiles had started moving. He’d stalked over to the other side of the cave, still eying Derek warily and growling, then settled protectively over a mass of clothes, leaves and animal innards. It was probably where he was sleeping.

Lovely. No wonder he smelled like death.

“Stiles,” Derek said, answering Scott’s question. Or, one of them, at least.

“Stiles? What do you—Stiles is making that noise?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“How fast do you think you can make it to the south lot of the Preserve?”

Tiny Houses by @ohmyjetsabel-blog

(77,183 l E)

"So this is what Stiles does. He lies in Scott’s bed and waits for Melissa to say she’s found someone to get it out of him, to cure him of the wrongness and the bad, and he dreams.

God, he dreams.

He dreams of fire and swollen bellies and that scene in Alien, of giving birth to jackals through his urethra, the whole horrific nine yards. His head is a terrible place to be, he can’t imagine his stomach is much better, why anyone would want to put a thing inside of it."

I'm There in the Water by @spaceprincessem

(15,878 l T)

“But it’s—” Derek paused, his words unsure, “it’s not like us,” he swallows hard, chin dipping to his chest in frustration, “it’s like a…”

“An abomination,” Stiles finished, nodding his head as he finally lets his gaze really look at Derek since Scott had pulled them from the water.

He suddenly wished he hadn’t because the way Derek looks at him makes Stiles feel like he is ten years old again. Like Derek is seeing him for the first time since they accidentally fell into each other’s orbit all those years ago. Like Stiles isn’t a burden or invisible.

Like he is enough.

Or five times Stiles felt like he was drowning and the one time he finally caught his breath

Gunplay is Not Really Our Kink by theroguesgambit

(2,577 l M)

“The rules to the game are simple. One bullet, six chances. You pick it up and take turns pulling the trigger on the other man, or we gun you both down right now. You play along, only one of you has to die. Fun game, huh?”

--

Derek and Stiles are captured by a group of hunters and forced to play a twisted game that only one of them might walk away from.

The Price by theroguesgambit

(18,452 l M)

Stiles must surrender the most important thing in his life to protect the town… and no one can figure out what it was.

Nieważny by Zethsaire

(2,037 l E)

The pack is gone, everything they've ever cared for destroyed. Now Stiles and Derek hunt the hunters, taking revenge in the only way they know how; blood.

Steter

Make Me Bleed by @asarcasticwitch

(2,304 l E)

Peter’s expression contorts, impressed or surprised, Stiles can't decipher, but the grin on his face proves he’s not exactly disappointed with the unexpected turn of events.

“Which bite exactly were you hoping for, hm?” The older man curls one hand around the back of Stiles’s neck, trailing his thumb along his pale, fragile throat.

Stiles tilts his head back in unyielding submission, giving the wolf no room to debate his sincerity. “I’m sure you can figure it out, Alpha.

Two Roads Converge in a Graveyard Town by @cywscross

(15,645 l T)

The Deadpool brings one more assassin to Beacon Hills. A man's gotta eat after all.

when you're going through hell (keep going for me) by cywscross

(57,022 l T)

Peter is abandoned in the aftermath of the fire, and Eichen House takes ruthless advantage. Six years later, when he's finally able to move again, he finds himself in a cell with a boy in a straitjacket.

(Kate’s biggest mistake was letting Peter live. Eichen House’s biggest mistake was letting Peter meet Stiles.)

Don't Fail Me Now by @discontentedwinter​

(36,315 l E)

Stiles goes to Derek looking for help.

He finds Peter instead.

Peter takes what he's wanted for a very long time.

Sanctuary by DiscontentedWinter

(56,525 l M)

The Hale Wolf Sanctuary isn’t just for wolves.

It turns out it’s for Stilinskis as well.

Bite Down by EclipseWing (@shadow-of-the-eclipse)

(27,586 l M)

In which Stiles is forced to survive the zombie apocalypse with a sociopathic murdering werewolf for company.

Into Eden by @graciebirdie

(12,232 l M)

Stiles deciding to bring home the stray alpha he'd hit with his jeep probably made him certifiable, if it hadn't turned out Peter was as crazy as he was.

Before you let go (and the light takes you in) by Issay

(4,032 l E)

Stiles makes one last errand - goes to leave flowers on all the other graves. Fuck, so many graves. The grief is as endless and as inescapable as the sky.

He goes home and there is a thing wearing his father's face, waiting for him in the kitchen.

Call My Name by KouriArashi ( @gingersnapwolves )

(81,370 l M)

After moving to Beacon Hills, Stiles starts having recurring dreams of a man in some kind of prison, who needs his help. Things get so bad that he ends up in Eichen House, where he finds out that the man is real.

Hide my tears in the rain. by MrsRidcully

(6,865 l M)

After  years spent successfully dodging werewolves, evil spirits and wendigos,  it was a drunk driver who stole his Dad, a drunk driver with a  suspended license and a record sheet as long as Stiles’s arm. Stiles  would have laughed at the irony if he hadn’t been so busy screaming.

In My Veins Like Disease by romanoffbarton

(1,140 l T)

He tries to leave once.

Foreshock by @twothumbsandnostakeincanon

(22,816 l E)

The day Stiles’ mom died, he almost leveled his house.

Not on purpose. Not even by mistake, really. More by instinct.

Since then he's dug his fingers into everything his has left, holding on with desperation.

Desperation never stopped an earthquake.

Your Touch is My Choice by twothumbsandnostakeincanon

(2,171 l T)

The first time John does it, Stiles is two years old and about to run into the road.

“Mieczysław!” Heart pounding, John grabbed him by the back of his neck and got a hand around his tummy, snatching him back. “No, you have to stay away from the road,” he said firmly.

Shameful Company by Whispering_Sumire (@whispering-sumire755)

(38,779 l E)

"Did I turn into a unicorn?" Peter asks dryly, and Stiles glares at him for a moment before the laughter bubbles up, unbidden, nearly unwilling, and he looks so surprised at the sound, his shock dimming it for a moment before it bursts through with even more trembling ferocity. A long, thin, willowy hand curls into a soft fist over his mouth, and he's shaking, frail, more tears falling, but the copper of his eyes are glowing, crinkling around the edges and scrunched with mirth.

"No," Stiles chokes, chuckling wetly. "No, fuck you, a unicorn? What, like, Rainbowcreep? Zombiesparkle?"

[About a year before the fated Hale fire, Peter starts having nightmares that involve a woman with red hair. The nightmares lead to a spell that brings a man back through time, and, eventually, though the time-traveler is traumatized in the most horrific ways, and Peter's never been good with or for people, in general, they develop a bond that neither of them expects.]

Would You Forgive Me If I Called You Hope, Peter Hale? (Hope, By Any Other Name) by Whispering_Sumire

(10,099 l T)

Stiles has scars. He owns that, he accepts it, he's cataloged and memorized every single one, he's hyper fucking aware of them all.

//

"What do you want, Peter?" Having the more untrustworthy of the Pack getting protective weirds him the fuck out, leaves an odd fluttering in his chest, like moths, waiting perilously and suicidally to be burned.

He doesn't like it.

"You're injured," the man says, "and whatever it is, it's put you in enough pain that I nearly fainted when I-"

"- Used your werewolf mojo on me without my permission?" Stiles smirks, and Peter gives him a black look, crossing a leg over his knee and smoothing out some invisible wrinkle on his pants.

"Tell me the truth Stiles, how bad is it?"

[Or: The one where Stiles has scars, is more than a little fucked up, and Peter notices. He helps.]