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silentscrying · 1 month ago

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🐾 snowprints

vet student!megumi x dog owner!reader

summary: when you find yourself in need of an emergency trip to the local vet clinic, it's late and the sign on the door is flipped to closed. luckily for you, animal science student megumi fushiguro is still around, and he's willing to help you and your dog out—and maybe get a little more than he bargained for in the process. but he's not used to letting people in, and you've never been particularly patient. when winter rolls around, will you be spending the holidays alone?

content/warnings: 20.7k words. complete. sfw. f!reader, you have a dog, megumi has his dogs, they are unbearably cute, megumi doesn't know how to communicate for shit, language, no use of y/n, christmas yay!!, aged up characters, including riko, she's in college, and she's a menace, (light) angst with a happy ending, mentions of deceased parents (typical fushiguro canon), soft, fluff, you know when your sister psychoanalyzes you at the kitchen table, car crash, alcohol, reader studies environmental science but can't keep plants alive for SHIT, so much unnecessary pining, gratuitous overuse of italics and em-dashes

note: this takes place in the same universe as out of my mind, but you don't have to read that to know what's going on here! though it may help with some context. happy hella late birthday megumi fushiguro you will always be famous

PART I // BATMAN & ROBIN

IT’S TEN O’CLOCK and dark when Batman decides to cause problems.

Batman, of course, being your three-year-old German shepherd mix, the one currently whining and staring up at you with big, dark puppy eyes while he holds one paw up limply.

“Oh, little buddy,” you sigh as you squat down in front of him, despite the fact that he hasn’t been little in a very long time. He’s been restless all night, so you caved and took him on a late night walk, and it’s so dark you can’t tell what’s wrong with his paw even in the glow of the phone flashlight.

God, fuck. Where’s the closest vet? The one in the city is definitely closed. You’re fairly certain there’s a smaller one somewhere on the outskirts of the JU campus, though, one that the pre-vet students use for clinicals.

“C’mon, champ,” you murmur, tugging gently on Batman’s leash. “Let’s go get you checked out, huh?”

The early September air is chilly, a little bit of a bite to it. You’re glad the temperatures haven’t yet dropped below freezing, so you don’t need to let your car defrost before going. “Up,” you say, patting the passenger seat with the door held open for Batman.

You punch the clinic into maps and pull out of your suburban street into the busier roads. It’s not far, thankfully, and you make a beeline for the door with Batman on your heels, not noticing until you’re right in front of it that the massive sign hanging on the door is flipped to CLOSED.

“No,” you groan, leaning forward and pressing your forehead to the cool glass of the closed door. You close your eyes, wondering what the fuck you’re gonna do, and then—thump.

You nearly jump out of your skin, eyes flying open and gaze raising to meet the amused eyes of a guy on the other side of the door, who’s trying and failing to suppress a smile that feels a little teasing. Oops.

You step back and wave sheepishly, and the boy unlocks the door and swings it open, taking in the sight of you and your limping dog.

“I’m sorry,” you blurt. “I know you’re closed and it’s some ungodly hour on a Tuesday, I just didn’t know what else to do—”

“It's fine,” he says, waving it off. “I’m just cleaning up, it’s not a hassle. Come on.” Batman has no qualms about following the guy through the open door, so you follow, glancing around the small clinic. It’s pretty sparse, save for the bulletin board overflowing with pet photos on one wall.

“Fushiguro,” the guy says in introduction, glancing back over his shoulder at you. He’s got deep blue eyes that match his dark scrubs, and his hair sticks out every which way in a manner that feels intentional. He must be around your age. It takes you a beat to remember yourself and give him your own name, stuttered out as you pass into the back exam room.

There’s a white coat tossed haphazardly over a spinning chair, and the guy—Fushiguro—picks Batman up like he weighs nothing and situates him on the metal table.

“Hey, bud. What’s your name?” he asks, scratching behind Batman’s ears. Your dog is usually weary of vets, but today his tail pounds on the metal of the table as he raises his head to sniff at Fushiguro’s face.

“Batman.”

Fushiguro’s gaze snaps to you and he blinks, evidently thinking you’re joking. “No.”

“Yes.” You hold your index fingers up above your head to imitate your dog’s pointy ears. “Batman.”

“Oh. My god,” he says. “And what, you’re Robin?”

“I am not the sidekick in this situation.”

“Batman dragged you out here at eleven on a school night. You absolutely are the sidekick.”

You scoff, moving up to the table and stroking Batman’s fur. “Am I just a sidekick to you, little guy?” you coo. “You wanna be a hero so bad?” He noses happily at your palm.

Fushiguro side-eyes you, half-grimacing as he grabs Batman’s paw to look at it. He doesn’t seem to mind, which is honestly a shock. He hates people touching his paws, even you. “You baby talk your dog?”

“You judge your patients?”

“Course not,” Fushiguro says, smirking as he looks back at you. “Just their owners.”

You roll your eyes but can’t help the huff of laughter, and his dark eyes reflect the fluorescent overhead light as he turns away. He’s undeniably attractive—you don’t remember seeing him around campus.

“You go to JU?” you ask, and he nods.

“Sophomore. Pre-vet. D’you?”

“Nah, Kaisen.” Your school is a lot smaller than the neighboring Jujutsu University. They’ve got something of an athletic rivalry with Kaisen College, but you really don’t care. “Environmental science.”

“You know everything there is to know about trees, or what?” His tone is teasing, and you know he doesn’t mean anything by it. The fact is you do know more about trees than normal college students probably should. Doesn’t mean you can keep plants alive for shit, though.

You’d guess there’s actually a fair bit of crossover between your course of study and a pre-vet student’s bio track, but you say, “I specialize in rare long grasses, actually.” It comes out so deadpan that he glances at you, brows knit together, trying to gauge if you’re being serious. You only last a second before you crack under his scrutiny, and he shakes his head and huffs as he turns back to Batman, who is now trying to lick Fushiguro’s nose.

“Excuse me,” he says. This only seems to encourage the dog kisses, but Fushiguro decides to just ignore them. He hums, grabbing a pair of tweezers and squinting as he moves to pull something out of Batman’s paw. “Just a splinter. The pad of a dog’s paw is one of the most sensitive parts of their body, so it’s not surprising he was so worked up about it.” You watch as he pulls out a thin sliver of wood, probably from stepping on some splintering twig, and drops it into a tray on the table.

You watch as your dog drops his paw back to the table and stands up, tail wagging at lightning speed, like nothing was ever wrong. He jumps off the table before Fushiguro can grab him and bounds over to you, rubbing himself along the outside of your leg like a giant cat.

“How much do I owe you?” you ask, pulling out your card, but he waves you off.

“It was literally a splinter.”

“But—”

“Honestly, it’d be more work to boot up the payment system again anyway. Don’t worry about it.” He holds your gaze, and you can’t tell if he’s lying about the payment system or not, but you slide your card back into your wallet without complaint.

Something passes between you, some weird spark of recognition—not that you’ve met before. You know you haven’t. But you don’t typically have this kind of easy banter with strangers. Something about this guy intrigues you, and you don’t particularly want to stop talking to him.

But you’ve already kept him past close, and you need to get home.

The moment breaks when Fushiguro clears his throat, leaning over to grab something off the counter. “Right. Well, give me a call if he starts limping again, but he should be alright.” He holds out a hand and you realize he’s offering you a business card, weirdly professional for a student.

M. FUSHIGURO Veterinary Technician Trainee, JU

His number and email are printed beneath it in small sans serif lettering.

“Oh, you’re fancy.” You raise a brow at him, tucking the card into your jacket pocket. “Thank you. Seriously.”

“Well, who am I to refuse Batman?” he says wryly. He walks you to the door, and you try not to think too much of it—he just needs to lock up behind you, probably.

Before you slip out, he leans down and pats Batman on the head, earning a happy little tail-wag in response.

“Drive safe, Robin,” he calls, and you groan at the nickname as you unlock your car.

At home, you key his number into your phone and save the contact as fushiguro (cute vet). You sit there for way too long debating over whether you should text him—Batman’s fine, and it’s late, and he gave you a business card. Not exactly an invitation to flirt, tempting as that might be.

But you really want to.

“Should I text him?” you ask your dog, who’s decided to curl up right beside your bed and look up at you, waiting for an invitation. Your twin bed is not big enough for this and he knows it, but he always seems to think he’s a smaller dog than he really is.

Batman, unhelpfully, tilts his head at you, his perky ears flapping with the motion.

Maybe it’s because it’s past eleven and it’s dark out and you’re exhausted and you don’t have the best sense of judgment right now. Maybe it’s because Fushiguro’s just really cute.

“You’re right,” you say, nudging Batman with a socked foot. “No use waiting. Say cheese.”

you: [1 Image Attachment] you: gotham city’s savior says thank you

It’s kind of embarrassing how you sit and stare at the screen for two minutes, waiting for him to answer. Batman snorts, like he’s making fun of you, and you lock your phone and toss it on the bedside table. “Oh, don’t start.”

Your roommate and best friend, Setsuko Sasaki, is studying abroad in Japan for the semester. It’s been lonely, strange without her occupying the second bedroom of your little rented townhouse. You’d like to say this is why you’ve resorted to talking to your dog, but that would very much be a lie, because you’ve always done this. Sometimes, when she’s home, Suko adopts a gruff, low voice and answers for him.

You jump when your phone buzzes and make yourself count to three before checking the screen.

fushiguro (cute vet): don’t mention it. always had a soft spot for batman, anyway. fushiguro (cute vet): his sidekick’s alright too.

“Oh, he likes you,” you tell Batman. “Wingman. Thanks, little buddy.”

you: well, send a bat signal if you’re ever in mortal peril and i might show up

After that, you try to push Fushiguro to the back of your mind. He doesn’t go to Kaisen, so it’s not like you can stalk him in the university directory. You have no reason to run into him around town. As the semester ramps up and you fall back into your routine of classes and exams and friends, you don’t think too much about the cute vet tech who happened to be around that one night.

Or, you don’t for a grand total of six days.

You’re on a jog with Batman, afternoon sun making up for the fall chill in the air that’s hung around since it stormed last night. You don’t intend to stop, but Batman abruptly sticks his nose in the dirt about halfway through your run and refuses to move.

“Dude.” You backtrack and see that he’s discovered a couple pairs of dog prints, pressed faintly into the damp earth. “Oh, you smell friends, huh?” He tugs you forward, following the scent of these other dogs. “Hey!”

The thing about having a massive German shepherd mix, even one as docile as Batman, is that he is inarguably a lot stronger than you. So you don’t really have much of a choice but to stumble along after him as he bounds across the grass and comes out on the other side of the path—you don’t normally come this way, because there’s a dog park over here and he gets way too excited.

But today he’s on a mission, and you only see two other dogs in the fenced-in park—two huge balls of fluff, one white and one black. “Fine,” you say begrudgingly, undoing the gate and letting Batman off his leash. “Go play. But we aren’t staying long.”

He bounds off toward the other dogs while you latch the gate behind you, and then a familiar voice has you spinning around with your eyes wide. “Bat signal wasn’t me,” Fushiguro says, raising both hands in a gesture of innocence. “They did it.” He points at the other dogs, who are now engaged in a butt-sniffing circle with yours.

“Fushiguro!” You grin, making your way over to him. Once the other two dogs have deemed Batman a worthy playmate, they move on to you, sniffing at your palms and circling around you until the black one jumps up and nearly knocks you over with the force of it. “Oh, hello!”

“Kuro,” Fushiguro chides, rushing forward to tug at his collar. “Hey. Down.”

“It’s okay,” you promise through a fit of giggles as Kuro tries to basically hug you. “Oh, you’re cute, aren’t you? Hi, Kuro.”

Fushiguro huffs out a breath of relief when Kuro finally gets down. “That’s Shiro,” he says, gesturing to the white dog, who is now chasing Batman around the park. “Think she’s found a friend.”

“He dragged me all the way here,” you tell Fushiguro. “Guess he missed you or something.”

“Just him?”

You grin. “What, you think I was out here pining after you?” He only smirks in response. “I don’t even know your name, M. Fushiguro. What good is a business card without your first name on it?”

He hums, shoving his hands into his pockets, considering. “Guess.”

“Guess,” you echo. “Okay. Um. Michael.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Max.”

“Nope.”

“Um, Maverick.”

“What the hell?” He looks at you with furrowed brows. “Who in their right mind would name their kid—”

“Okay, hey,” you interrupt, holding up your hands. “I just watched Top Gun, okay? What do you want from me?”

“M—”

“Nope, out of tries for today. Three strikes, you’re out.” He shrugs, wholly unaffected, like this is just how the world works and he’s got no say it in whatsoever.

You gape at him, planting your hands on your hips in affront. “I hope you know I will be insufferable every single day until I’m right.”

Batman trots back over, prancing between you and Fushiguro until he crouches down to pet him. “You come here a lot?” you ask, glancing around the empty park. “I’ve never seen you here. Or your dogs. I think I’d remember giant balls of fluff like that.”

“Yeah, not often,” Fushiguro says, pushing back to his feet. “But Kuro’s been so restless all day. Had to let him run his energy down somehow.” The dog in question is chasing his own tail in circles while Shiro looks at him, unimpressed. “You live over here?”

“Few blocks out, yeah.” Your place is between the two campuses, an easy walk to both places because Suko takes Japanese classes at JU. Apparently Fushiguro doesn’t live too far away, either, just on the other side of the skate park where you know your friend Hajime hangs out all the time.

By “hangs out,” you mean he probably (definitely) buys weed there, but that’s not your business. Maybe he and Fushiguro know each other—they both go to JU. But Hajime’s a senior, so probably not.

You don’t get the chance to ask because Fushiguro’s phone rings, and he sighs and answers it with a glance at you that might be apologetic or might be mildly irritated. Hard to tell with him.

“Yeah, that’s fine,” he says gruffly. “Okay. See you.” He hangs up and tucks his phone back into his pocket, then whistles for the dogs. “Time to go.”

“Good to see you,” you blurt before he can turn away. He seems a little taken aback, but you don’t break eye contact, and you think he might be on the brink of a smile.

“You too, sidekick.”

—

After that, the two of you start texting more often, gradually moving from photos of your dogs to real conversation. And you keep your promise to be insufferable about finding out his name. You send him new M-names every day, never seeming to get any closer to the truth. For his part, he refuses to call you anything but Robin, cementing your existence as a superhero sidekick and nothing more.

you: new theory you: the M stands for mr you: monsieur you: m’lord

He dislikes the messages in response, and you send him a teary-eyed emoji and hope the guilt is enough to get him to tell you.

It is not.

You and Fushiguro are in some sort of convoluted orbit around one another, sometimes colliding, sometimes drifting away. There’s really no reason you should keep stumbling across him, considering you go to different schools, live in different places, study different things.

But after that first day at the dog park, you might take Batman there a little bit more often.

Every time you talk, Fushiguro starts to take up more and more headspace. You find yourself searching for his flash of ink-dark hair, spiky and disheveled, in every crowd. Every set of fading prints in the grass or mud might be his, might be Shiro’s or Kuro’s. It’s stupid, how much you’re thinking about this boy.

At some point you start dragging your friends out to the coffee shops between your two campuses to do work, rather than the one in the student center. You justify it to yourself with the half-assed excuse that if you run into your friends less, you’ll get more work done, but really you’re just hoping he’ll be there. And your friends are happy to oblige, especially Riko, if it means she’ll get a glimpse of this mystery vet man you don’t shut up about.

Riko’s a year below you at Kaisen, but you know her from back home. She’s a frenetic ball of energy and indignation, and she’s fully prepared to go to every coffee shop in a ten-mile radius for the purposes of what she calls “the mission.”

But the coffee at the second place you try is actually god-tier, and you wind up there regularly after that, hunkering down to grind out your assignments in your spare time. It’s there that he finds you, sliding into the seat right across from yours so abruptly that you nearly fall out of your chair—your noise-canceling headphones really block out the entire world. He smirks as you sheepishly tug them down around your neck, glaring.

“Warn a girl, Jesus!”

“I did,” he drawls, taking a sip of his coffee. “Twice.”

“Boo.” You kind of forgot about your own drink because you were so into your work, and you pick it back up now, mostly for something to do with your hands. “Well, hi. What’re you up to?”

“Same as you, I think.” He nods at your laptop. “Mind if I hang out here?”

“You certainly can, but you’ve just stolen someone’s seat and you might have to fight for your life when she gets back from the bathroom.” His eyes widen almost imperceptibly, and as if on cue, Riko is beelining toward the table from across the room.

“Well hello, Mr. Seat Thief. Pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

Fushiguro seems to be gauging Riko, and you realize this is kind of the first look he’s gotten into your private life outside of your dog, and you’re irrationally nervous about it. But he scoots over and grabs a chair from the next table over, giving Riko a mocking bow in response.

“Better?”

Riko nods, and then grabs his coffee and takes a long drag out of it. He doesn’t object, and that should have been your warning—you can see when the bitterness of it hits her all at once, her face twisting in some combination of shock and despair and mild outrage.

“Oh my god,” you say as Riko grabs her water bottle and chugs to get the taste out of her mouth, aggressively shoving Fushiguro's coffee back toward him. “Of course you drink coffee black, you fucking loser.”

“What, you dump six cups of sugar in yours? That’s not coffee.” You flip him off instead of justifying this with a real response.

“I was gonna use that as payment for your crimes,” Riko gasps dramatically, leaning over the table, “but I was instead punished. You’re in my debt now.” She glares at him fiercely, turning up her nose, before abruptly abandoning the bit and grinning at him. “I’m Riko, by the way.”

He snorts, but a very small hint of a smile appears in a corner of his mouth. “Fushiguro.”

Riko nods and glances from him to you, as if to say really? This guy? You can already hear the analysis she’ll be giving you on the way home. Easy on the eyes, I get it, but does he like, have a personality?

“I did research,” you tell Fushiguro, nudging Riko’s shin under the table in warning. “On you.”

“You stalked me online, is what you’re saying.” You’re learning that he’s not a very expressive person. He treats laughs and smiles like rare currency, and everything you need to know about what he’s thinking is in the tiniest shifts—a downturned brow, a blink, a tilt of the head. You’re still learning, but you like to think you’ve got it down enough to know that this doesn’t actually bother him, despite the resting angry face.

“Yes,” you say, shameless. “Except when I typed in Fushiguro and your school, I got all these results for the editor of your campus paper. You have a sister?”

If he’s surprised, he doesn’t show it. “Tsumiki, yeah.”

He doesn’t offer more, so you push. “Older?” You already know the answer, but best let him believe the depth of your internet stalking is shallower than it really was.

“Two years. She’s a senior.”

“Cool. I don’t know a ton of siblings that go to the same school.”

“You’d be surprised,” he sighs. “My cousin and her twin sister both go there, too. And one my roommates’ half-brothers.”

“Convenient, I guess,” you concede. “Sibling discount or something?”

“Nah, but it was easier this way,” he says, pulling a textbook out of his bag. “Go—uh, our legal guardian works around here anyway.”

Riko raises a brow but doesn’t ask, which is a remarkable show of restraint for her.

Legal guardian. Parents aren’t in the picture, then. You want to ask but you don’t, not yet.

The three of you buckle down and get some work done, casually exchanging conversation over the next few hours, and eventually Fushiguro has to head out. “Rehearsal,” he says.

“Rehearsal?” Riko asks, glancing at you as if you know what he’s talking about. You don’t, but you have some absolutely ridiculous mental image of Fushiguro in choir and you almost laugh out loud.

But he just says, as if it’s nothing at all, “Oh, yeah, I’m in a band.”

“What?” you nearly shout, jumping out of your chair so fast it pushes across the floor with a scrrcck. “You’re in a band? You didn’t think to tell me this before? What’s it called? Can I listen—”

“Nope.”

“But—”

“Nice to meet you, Riko,” he says loudly, cutting you off as he slings his bag over one shoulder. He mock-salutes you, two fingers to his brow as he turns to go. “Robin.”

You sink back into your seat and watch him leave, only turning back to Riko when the door swings closed. She opens her mouth and you hold out a hand. “Don’t start.”

—

At some point you start calling, letting yourself fill the silence of your little townhouse with idle chatter as he listens. He’s not one for small talk, you learn, and he’s a good listener. And he pays attention. He remembers the stupid little details you give him, the names of classmates and professors you can’t stand.

“Katie from Ohio?” he asks when you’re ranting one day about the partner you’ve been assigned in enviro. “We don’t like her, correct?” We.

“We do not.” Katie from Ohio does not pull her weight in group projects, and it’s driving you up the wall.

“You tell your prof about it? Isn’t this your favorite one?”

“Yeah, he is,” you groan. Haibara teaches your conservation bio class, and he also taught ecology your freshman year, and he’s the best teacher you’ve ever had. “But no. I don’t want to bother him about it. It’s whatever.”

He hums, unimpressed. “Is it?”

You groan, feeling like you’re getting lectured by your parents. You hate when other people are right. “You want me to talk to him.”

“I’m just saying, if you get a shit grade and it’s Katie’s fault, don’t come crying to me.”

“I will, though,” you say, putting your phone on speaker and setting it on the counter while you pour dog food into Batman’s bowl. “It’ll be super dramatic. I’ll sob in your arms and everything.”

He snorts. “Talk to your prof, Robin.” You stick your tongue out like he can see you.

But you do talk to your prof, and Haibara is your favorite for a reason. Katie gets a shit grade. You do not. Fushiguro does, in fact, say “I told you so.”

By mid-September, you still have no idea what Fushiguro’s first name is. You’re at the end of your rope.

you: GOOD MORNING MASON fushiguro (cute vet): no. you: MORT fushiguro (cute vet): no. you: why don’t you want me to know. is it crazy you: melvin fushiguro (cute vet): NO. you: marie you: meghan fushiguro (cute vet): … you: well, that’s it you: i’m calling you maleficent until you tell me you: i’m gonna do it in public too you: so loud

INCOMING CALL: FUSHIGURO (CUTE VET)

You don’t greet each other when you pick up—you never have. Instead, Fushiguro just says, “You could’ve picked like, ten other Disney characters and you went with Maleficent?”

“Don’t hate. You’d rather be Mufasa? Boy’s dead.”

“Oh my god.” Everything Fushiguro says sounds long-suffering. You wonder what it sounds like when he laughs, really laughs, if those walls ever break down and he lets himself actually outwardly express his emotions.

“I can call you Mickey Mouse if you really want—” Batman starts barking from his spot at the window, and you groan, waving your hand at him pointlessly as you try to get him to stop. “Hey! No! There is nothing outside, what are you on about?”

“He probably just thinks you’re barking with him,” Fushiguro says unhelpfully.

“Oh, and yours don’t bark out of turn?”

“Not really.”

Now that you think about it, you actually aren’t sure you’ve ever heard Shiro and Kuro bark aside from excited greetings at the dog park. “What the fuck, dude? Do they teach you the secrets of the trade in vet school?”

“Nah, I’m just a natural.” He says it so deadpan you aren’t sure if he’s joking or actually being cocky.

“Come over and help, then,” you say, before you can think it through. It’s a Saturday night, and clearly neither of you have anything better to do.

You aren’t sure what exactly you’re expecting him to say, but for some reason you’re surprised when he just responds, “Okay.”

“Bring the dogs.” You text him your address, and half an hour later he shows up with the dogs in tow. Meeting him at the door, you see his car parked along the curb. It’s small, black, as unreadable and practical as everything else about him.

“That,” he says, pointing to the long-deceased cactus in the pot on your front stoop, “is dead.” Probably because it’s been there since August and you forgot it was there after one week.

“Yes, thank you, very astute.”

“Isn’t keeping plants alive your whole thing? What are they teaching you?”

“Okay.” You start to close the door, but Shiro bounces forward and noses between it excitedly, and you laugh, opening it to let her and Kuro in. “Be nice,” you warn Fushiguro, letting him step inside. He rolls his eyes as he passes, and Batman nearly knocks him over with how excitedly he leaps up to greet him.

He’s also barking, and you raise a brow at Fushiguro expectantly. “Okay, Dog Whisperer. Do your thing.” You close the door behind him, and in the two seconds that you’re turned away, Batman fucking stops barking.

You whirl around, planting your hands on your hips, and find Fushiguro kneeling in front of your very silent, very happy dog.

“What the fuck.”

He looks up at you with the most smug expression on his face, and you throw up your hands in exasperation.

“Hey, don’t pout about it,” he teases, standing and following you into the living room. “That’s what you wanted.”

“I wanted you to teach me how to make him stop, but apparently you just slipped him treats behind my back.”

“Insult to my talents,” he says, hesitating when Kuro leaps onto your couch. “Are they allowed—”

“Ah, yeah, it’s fine.” Batman follows suit. “Got enough dog hair on that couch to make another couch, probably.”

You suddenly find you don’t really know what to say. Because Fushiguro is here, in your house, on a Saturday, your dog is not barking, and you’re alone. Alone with a guy you are very much attracted to. Suddenly you just don’t know any of the words in the English language.

But Fushiguro seems entirely at ease. He always does, really. There’s a quiet sort of confidence about him, and you aren’t sure if it’s fabricated or not. He just looks like he belongs wherever he is, nonchalant about everything.

“Done any more stalking?” he asks, sitting next to Shiro on the floor. You flush a little, feeling weirdly caught out when you aren’t the one bringing it up.

“No, but I might if you don’t tell me more about this band of yours.”

He shakes his head, absently playing with Shiro’s fur. “Just a crazy idea my housemates had. We just practice in the basement. Probably not very good.”

You opt to sit on Shiro’s other side on the ground, and Batman uses the opportunity to lick you directly in the face, since he’s on the couch and you’re now eye-level. “Thank you,” you tell him dryly, shoving his snout away.

“Don’t get humble now,” you tell Fushiguro. “What do you play? Or do you sing?” You really can’t imagine him singing. Everything about this guy screams quiet bass player.

Apparently you’re right. He won’t tell you the name of his band, and allegedly he doesn’t have any gigs this month, so you let it drop—but only for now. “Cagey,” you accuse him, but you’re smiling.

You talk about your courseloads for the semester—his is pretty bio and anatomy-heavy this semester where yours is mostly ecology and conservation-focused, but there’s a bit of overlap in your curriculum, and you find that it’s easy to make conversation about your respective career paths, even though he won’t stop bringing up the fact that you managed to kill a cactus.

“They’re notoriously hard to kill,” he drawls. “Did you try to?”

“No!” You cross your arms over your chest indignantly. “Mean.”

“Honest and mean aren’t the same thing.”

You don’t really notice the sun going down until the living room is swathed in shadow and you have to flip on the floor lamp. It’s been hours by now, but it’s felt like minutes. Every thing you learn about Fushiguro opens up ten new lines of questioning, and you want to know so much more about him. But he shrouds himself in this mystery you can’t seem to get around.

Eventually you stand up to grab snacks from the kitchen, and when you return you find Batman practically on top of Fushiguro, licking his face while Fushiguro just takes it. Cute, you think uselessly.

Batman. But also Fushiguro. And also just the sight of Fushiguro playing with your dog and looking entirely at home on your shaggy living room floor. Fuck, he’s really cute.

“Have you always had dogs?”

He shakes his head as he sits up and nudges Batman off of him, gaze going just a little distant. “Not ‘til I was a teenager.” There’s more there.

“Your idea? Tsumiki’s?”

He shrugs it off, picking at loose threads on his sleeve that don’t exist, some nervous tic he’s developed that seems to only show up when you try to talk about him. Hence, shroud of mystery.

Like you gathered at the coffee shop, his parents aren’t in the picture—dead or absent, though, you’re not sure. He does tell you a little bit about his legal guardian. His name’s Gojo, and according to Fushiguro he is certifiably insane. He says this enough that you know he means it fondly—if he didn’t, he just wouldn’t bring Gojo up at all.

It shouldn’t be possible to talk so much and learn so little, but the hours keep slipping by and finally neither of you can hide the yawns punctuating your conversation. “I should go,” he says, and you reluctantly lead him to the door, crouching to say bye to Shiro and Kuro before you open the door.

“Drive safe, Fushiguro.”

You don’t expect him to respond, but he pauses halfway down your drive, turning to look at you over his shoulder. The moon is out now, and it casts him and his dark clothes in silver. You suddenly find you can’t look away.

Not that you really want to.

“Megumi,” he says.

“What?”

“My name.” He swallows, looking away quickly before looking back. “You can call me Megumi. If you want.”

Chill. Be chill, you tell yourself, trying to school your features into that same neutral expression Fushiguro—Megumi—always has, but you know it’s not working. You can’t help but smile. You feel, weirdly, like you’ve earned something.

“Okay,” you say, leaning on the doorjamb. “Megumi.”

Megumi.

You do one last little bit of internet stalking that night, because you just want to know.

His name means blessing.

—

Everything about Megumi’s house speaks to the collision of three wildly different college-aged boys tempered by the saving grace of one girl.

Remotes for a range of gaming consoles are sprawled across the floor, there are way too many half-empty bags of Doritos, and you’re pretty sure there’s just a single half of a drumstick stuck between two of the couch cushions. But there are also nice, dark tapestries pinned to the walls, string lights bordering the room, a couple plants that are better-kept than any of yours have been.

You know very little about Megumi’s three housemates except that one is a golden retriever in human form, one is a skater boy, and one is a senior named Kirara who somehow keeps them all in check.

“Sorry for the mess,” he says, gesturing at the controllers and chip bags that honestly don’t constitute a mess in your book. Not after all the boys’ dorms you’ve seen, including Hajime’s.

“I like it,” you say honestly. “Also, it smells good in here. I’m proud. Kirara?”

“Kirara.” He nods and leads you to the couch, where you confirm that yes, that’s a broken drumstick.

“I don’t even—Jesus,” Megumi says, pulling it out of the gap between the cushions and tossing it onto the low coffee table. “He breaks more of these than I think is normal.”

“He being skater boy or golden retriever?” you ask as you tug your legs onto the couch to sit cross-legged, facing him. You dragged Batman with you—Megumi said his dogs would appreciate the company—and he’s taken it upon himself to sniff every corner of the house before deeming it suitable for playtime.

“Golden retriever. His name’s Yuji. Skater boy is Ino.” None of his housemates are here—it’s a random Thursday afternoon and the two of you happened to not have classes after two thirty.

“How’d you meet them?”

“Kirara went to my high school, so I knew her before coming here. I knew Ino too, actually. Yuji—I don’t know that anyone really meets him so much as gets forcibly adopted by him?” He somehow manages to make his scoff sound affectionate. “Him and our friend Kugisaki. They’re crazy, but we were all in the same orientation group freshman year.”

“Your friends sound fun.” You like the idea of two outgoing freshmen just deciding Megumi had to be their friend. “How’d you know Ino?”

He tugs at the sleeve of his black henley, picking at a nonexistent string. There’s a bit of a pause before he says, “His—I don’t know, his mentor? Nanami, he knows Gojo. So he was around sometimes.”

You don’t really know what to ask, simply because there’s so much to ask. It doesn’t take a detective to know there’s a lot to unpack in Megumi’s past. “How long have you been…” What’s the proper term for this? “Has Gojo been around, like… since you were a kid, or...?”

Despite your attempt to catch his gaze, Megumi’s eyes are trained on the far wall. “Kind of. Yeah.”

When he doesn’t elaborate, you fight to keep your lips sealed, to not push. You don’t have a right to his past. He can tell you if he wants to. But you’ve always been impatient.

And it’s starting to become a pattern, this strange caginess about his own life. His family, his friends. Every so often he lets something slip, and then it’s like you can see the doors in his mind slam shut—six deadbolts holding you out.

You know a little bit about Gojo, but that’s where the information stops. You drop hints that you want to meet Tsumiki, and whether he’s protective or just too oblivious to pick up on them, you can’t tell.

Maybe, then, the issue is that you haven’t given him much either. He’s met your dog and Riko, but maybe you need to offer him more of yourself before he’s comfortable reciprocating.

So you do. You tell him about your family, sitting on his couch with Shiro at his feet and Batman between you, Kuro unable to sit still. He listens while you talk, unsettlingly attentive eyes intent on you. You live about a half-hour drive away from your parents' place, you tell him, though you don’t go home often.

“It’s not that I don’t like my family,” you sigh, leaning back into the couch cushions and stroking Batman’s fur. “It’s more just that they’re never there, always on business, wrapped up in their own shit. So there’s just… no reason for me to stick around, except a couple times a year on holidays.” You shrug. “At least here it’s not an empty house. Or it’s not usually. When my roommate’s not in fucking Japan.”

“At least Japan’s cool,” he says, shrugging.

You sit up, leaning toward him. “You’ve been?”

He shrugs. “Yeah, once. Gojo said Tsumiki and I weren’t allowed to hit sixteen without having been on a stupid-long flight somewhere. Which sounds insane, but that’s pretty standard Gojo logic for you, I guess.”

“That’s so cool,” you sigh, part of you wishing you could be on a stupid-long flight right now. On the way to somewhere warm, preferably. Fall is starting to give way to an early winter, and you’re not looking forward to running Batman in the cold.

Travel, at least, seems to be a safe topic, and the two of you trade stories about road trips and flights and different cities. You challenge Megumi to Mario Kart at some point and immediately regret it, because why is he so good?

After he thoroughly kicks your ass, you sink back into conversation, walk the dogs, and eventually part ways so you can get some work done.

megumi (cute vet): you know when somebody says they’ll text you when they get home megumi (cute vet): and they don’t? you: SHIT SORRY megumi (cute vet): you’re not dead. you: NOPE you: sorry i got back and then batman knocked over a lamp megumi (cute vet): you don’t have to cover for his vigilantism, sidekick. i already know.

You do feel bad for forgetting to text him, but part of you is a little warmed by the fact that he was worried. Not that he’d ever admit to being worried about anyone, except maybe a dog.

you: okay fine he was stopping a robbery you: happy? megumi (cute vet): depends on what they were trying to steal

The work on your desk says you should stop texting and buckle down on your assignments, but he starts teasing, and you start feeding into it, and then you’re on the phone again, and by the time you finally hang up it’s too late to reasonably get anything done.

You can’t say you’re particularly upset about it.

—

The semester ramps up quickly, and you’re drowning in work. That’s your excuse when your basil plant by the kitchen sink dies a week after you bring it home—you’re just busy.

Megumi notices, and the next time he’s over a rosemary plant mysteriously appears in its place. He denies any involvement.

When you aren’t with Riko or Hajime, on the phone with Suko, or hanging out with friends from class, you’re with Megumi. His place, your place, the dog park, the coffee shop. It hasn’t reached a point where your friends comment on how much time you spend together (except Riko, who has a loud opinion on everything and does not care if other people don’t want to hear it), but you like the hours you steal during the week just walking around or drinking coffee or trading idle conversation.

You even visit him at work one Sunday when the clinic is slow, watching him handle the few dogs and single cat that come through. He’s easygoing with the clients and has that same calming effect on every animal—like he speaks some secret language, understands them in a way other people don’t. You love watching him like this.

You like this guy. It’s not rocket science—you put him in your contacts as “cute vet” the day you met him. The hard part is that Megumi is too difficult to read. If he has feelings for you, you have no idea. You don’t think he’d go out of his way to spend time with someone he didn’t genuinely like, but whether it’s platonic or not is so fucking over your head.

Until you finally meet one of his friends.

It’s Riko’s doing, really. The two of you are at the coffee shop when she strikes up a conversation with a redhead in line, and it doesn’t take long for her to make the connection, probably because they’re both talking ten miles a minute and not holding anything back.

“Oh my god!” Riko screeches, turning to you after you place your order. “Hey! This is Nobara. She’s friends with Fushiguro.”

She beams at you. “How do you guys know Fushiguro?”

Riko answers for you. “The vet. She has a dog, the clinic was closed, he was there. It was probably super romantic.” You groan.

Nobara’s mouth forms a small O and then she says, “Ah, you must be the sidekick.”

You can’t stifle your laugh. “He even calls me that when he’s talking to other people?”

She laughs, shaking her head. “No, he doesn’t tell anyone anything. Ever. But that’s what you’re in his phone as, and I saw his screen before he could hide it.” She leans in conspiratorially. “He won’t tell us who you are, which means he’s into you, y’know that, right?”

“Um. Is he? I don’t really—”

“Girl,” Nobara says flatly. “He doesn’t talk to people. Yuji and I have to force that guy out of the house half the time. If he’s hanging out with you, it’s because he likes you. Not that he knows that, probably. He’s horrible at feelings. I offered to give him a free therapy session and he said he’d rather become a monk.”

Riko mutters something about how that wouldn’t be too far off from whatever aesthetic he has going on right now, but you’re hung up on something else—Yuji and I.

“Oh my god,” you say, realizing something. “You’re Kugisaki.”

Her entire face lights up and she bounces on the balls of her feet. “He told you about me?” she squeals. “Ooh, he does love me! I’m gonna give him so much shit! What did he say? Was it good?”

The three of you end up talking for half an hour, after you all get your coffee and find an empty table. Nobara talks a mile a minute, but you can’t help hanging on to every word she says—she has a lot to say about Fushiguro, and you feel like you might be learning more about him this way than from the numerous conversations you’ve had with him.

She lives down the street from his place. She knows Gojo, who is apparently exactly the way Megumi described him—loud and eccentric and kind of stupid, but a guy who obviously loves his kids. She and Yuji, true to Megumi’s recollection, basically forced their friendship upon him on the first day of school, and they’ve been a trio ever since.

“He doesn’t tell anyone shit,” Nobara says, echoing her own words from earlier. “I feel like I probably know more about him from Gojo than anything. Or reading his notifications over his shoulder.” She smirks. “But he’s a good guy. I wouldn’t put up with his shit if I didn’t mean that.”

“About—what you said earlier, about him… maybe having feelings for me,” you start.

“Definitely having feelings for you,” she corrects. “Whether he knows or not? Undetermined.”

“Right. Uh.” You don’t get the idea that Nobara is a person you ever want to argue with. “Could you not… mention anything about that? To him?”

She sighs. “Course I won’t. Y’know, the guys always say I can’t keep my nose out of things, but two of my roommates have been in love for years and haven’t done anything and I haven’t said a word. Even though it sucks out part of my soul every time they’re in a room together and they just stare longingly when the other one isn’t looking. They’re so stupid.”

“You and Fushiguro are also stupid,” Riko says helpfully. You glare at her, and she throws her hands up in exasperation. “What? You like him, right? You can’t look me in the eyes and say you don’t like him.”

“He is a good friend,” you say, feeling the burn in your cheeks give you away even before Riko starts cackling.

“I like you,” Nobara tells her, sizing her up. “I might regret saying this, but I think I need you to meet one of my housemates. You could be chaos goblins together. I feel it in my bones.”

Riko rubs her hands together like she’s plotting something, and you think you should probably keep her as far away from said housemate as possible.

Eventually, Nobara pushes to her feet, draining the rest of her coffee and slinging her bag over her shoulder. “I gotta go, but I’m so glad I ran into you. I feel like a spy, knowing Fushiguro’s secret girlfriend.” She wiggles her brows at you, and you don’t bother denying it, just burying your head in your hands instead. “You guys should give me your numbers. I can give you Fushiguro intel.”

Riko immediately accepts Nobara’s phone. You wonder how Fushiguro will feel about all this—fond exasperation seems like the default emotion when it comes to his friends. But you give her your number, waving goodbye as she skips out the door, and lean back, thinking as Riko immediately starts to tease you about your boyfriend-not-boyfriend and how at least he has cool friends, even if he doesn’t have a personality.

You just keep looking out the window, trading snarky comments with Riko as it gets dark—earlier now, at the end of September.

“Are you ever gonna tell him?” Riko presses. “I don’t wanna watch you pine for the next six months.”

“We haven’t even known each other that long,” you insist, tracing patterns aimlessly on the tabletop. “And I don’t… I don’t know. I kind of want him to be the one to say something. Because if Nobara’s wrong and he isn’t actually into me, I could fuck everything up—”

“Isn’t actually into you?” Riko exclaims. “Oh. My god.” She waves a hand in front of your eyes. “Can you see? Do you need to get your vision checked? Do you—”

“Okay!” you laugh, swatting her hands away. “Message received, Jesus. Chaos goblin was right.”

“I wear that as a badge of honor,” Riko says solemnly.

Yeah. She can never meet Nobara’s housemate.

—

It’s a Wednesday, and you and Megumi are walking back to your place from the dog park. His car’s at your house, and the dogs have just had a very high-energy playdate that hopefully knocks them out for the night. The air is chilly and the sky dimming, and everything about it feels immaculately fall.

That’s where your conversation has ended up—the upcoming fall break, which is really just a Friday where neither of your campuses have classes. A three-day weekend really shouldn’t be called a break, you think. It’s misleading.

“You’re not going home?” he asks, and you sigh, shaking your head.

“Parents won’t be home. Not really much of a point.”

“We could—” He clears his throat. “We can hang out that weekend if you want. If you need the company.”

“You’re not going home either?” You glance over at him, a little puzzled. “Like—to Gojo’s?” His lips become a thin, tight line, and you wonder if you’ve somehow crossed some invisible boundary. You’re about to tell him he doesn’t have to talk about it if he doesn’t want to, despite being on the brink of insanity because he doesn’t tell you anything, ever.

But then he says, “He’s a bartender. Not around weekends, usually.”

“Ah.” Nobara mentioned that.

You did tell Megumi about running into Nobara in the coffee shop, and he immediately looked like you told him that you hung out with Gojo and saw all his baby pictures.

“She’s nice!” you insisted, and he sighed, raking a hand through his hair.

“She has no filter.”

“She’s fun.”

“She’s Kugisaki.” He shrugged. “Learn anything interesting?”

You told him about your conversation, minus the whole feelings thing, and he agreed that Riko and Toge Inumaki should never, ever meet. “For the good of the entire world,” he said solemnly. “People would die, Robin.”

Now, as the two of you turn onto your street, he glances at you like he’s trying to find something. And maybe it’s how tired you are, maybe it’s the way his eyes look so bright even though they’re so dark, maybe it’s that weird streetlight-night aura that makes everything feel a little bit not real, but you find yourself studying him right back, meeting his gaze without shame.

You want to know him, to be a part of his life in the way he’s become a fixture in yours. You want to meet his housemates. You want to meet his sister, his family. You want him to open the door and stop acting like you’re going to rob him or something the second you get inside. He knows you better than that, right?

He blinks, and you smirk. “I win.”

“Wh—that was not a staring contest.”

“It’s okay,” you tell him sympathetically. “You can’t be good at everything.”

His laugh—his real laugh—isn’t anything like you thought it’d be, but somehow it’s even better. It transforms his whole face, some blink-of-an-eye shift that lights up his eyes and makes everything about him brighter, louder.

You want to make him laugh like that again. As often as you can, really. Always.

“What?” he asks, staring at you, the light lingering in his eyes, some sort of afterimage of his joy.

“I just—I like your laugh.”

He stops, and you realize you’ve reached the end of your driveway. You drop Batman’s leash and let him run around the yard, and Megumi’s dogs follow suit, knowing better than to go far.

“I like your laugh, too,” he says, a crooked smile spreading across his face. And somehow that feels more like a confession than anything he’s ever said to you.

You’re very close.

He’s leaning in and you’re almost subconsciously reaching up to meet him, heels leaving the ground, and he’s still got the slightest curve of a smile lingering on his lips, and—

“Oh!” Shiro jumps on you from the side, tail wagging excitedly.

When you look back up at Megumi, laughter on your lips, his smile is gone, and he’s looking away, hands shoved in his pockets.

“Megumi—”

“That’s my cue,” he says, a forced-sounding chuckle punctuating the sentence. “I should, um. Get back.”

“Oh. Um, right. Yeah. Totally.” You’re kicking yourself now, feeling stupid, foolish. Did you just mess this whole thing up? Was it too soon? Did you read it wrong?

Megumi opens the back door of the car and lets the dogs hop in before circling around to the driver’s seat. “Robin…”

You look at him, trying to squash the hope adamant in your chest. And he looks like he doesn’t know what to say, for a moment, his lips parting and then closing and his eyes darting around before they finally land on you again. “Night,” he says quietly.

“Night, Megumi.” You lift a hand in a half-wave. “See you.”

Batman stares at the street long after the car has disappeared around the corner, and so do you.

“Fuck,” you murmur, and then again, louder, “fuck.”

—

Megumi’s texts over the next week are less frequent and more distant—at least, you think so. Maybe you’re getting too in your own head about it.

From then on, he’s pretty quiet. You wonder if you fucked up. You haven’t talked about it, the kiss. Almost-kiss. Your texts start getting fewer and far between, and in the chaos leading up to midterms you almost don’t notice. Almost.

Lots of almosts, lately.

you: still on for break?

Part of you expects him to go back on his word, say something came up. Especially when he takes a half hour to respond. He’s just busy, you tell yourself. Stop being dramatic.

megumi (cute vet): your place at 5, right?

“Oh,” you say aloud to nobody but Batman, smiling a little. Well, that’s good. You can ask him what’s been on his mind lately. He just seems… preoccupied.

When break rolls around, you spend Friday out with friends and Saturday catching up on schoolwork until Megumi comes over. You’ve hung out so often—you don’t know why you’re nervous.

And it seems contagious. He still shows up at your door and immediately picks up a conversation you left off on the last time you texted him, but he just seems slightly out of reach, somehow. You let it slide for about twenty minutes before you sit him down on the couch and ask.

“Okay. What’s going on with you?”

“What?” You don’t know if he’s playing dumb or just actually doesn’t realize he’s been acting strange.

“You’ve been… look. You’re acting weird. And I feel like we need to talk about whatever happened last week.”

The ensuing silence makes you want to take it back, or say something else, or do anything to create sound in the little bubble of waiting that's formed around the both of you. But you make yourself wait. Give him the space to find words.

“I guess… there is something I wanted to talk to you about,” he says suddenly, flatly, without looking at you. Your mouth slams shut and you find yourself drawing back a little, the remoteness of his voice almost physically distancing.

“Uh,” you say, like the eloquent person you are. “Okay?”

He swallows once, hard, and he looks at you with so much reluctance you almost wish he’d just look away. Your heart is twisting itself into knots.

“I think we should… take a step back.”

“What?” you whisper. “What do you mean?”

He sighs, raking a hand through his hair. “I mean—this is going… do you want a relationship?”

The question feels so abrupt you’re momentarily shocked into silence. But you know where he’s going.

He doesn’t want this. Doesn’t want—you. And it hurts more than you thought it would. It’s not so much a sharp stabbing sensation as a thousand needles worming their way into the crevices of your heart, slow and numerous and deadly.

Because you do want this. You want him.

“Yes,” you admit, quiet.

And he says, “I don’t.”

In general, you want to ask, or with me? But the words stall in your mouth, all blocked up and sticky, and you don’t say anything at all.

“You shouldn’t,” he murmurs, looking down. “Want that. With me, I mean. It’s…”

“It’s what?” you ask, hesitant. Another long, horrible silence.

“It’s never going to work,” he says, detached. Almost cold. “Us. This.” He’s still not looking at you.

“Let me ask you something, then,” you say, hating the unsteadiness of your voice. “Do you want it to?” Do you have feelings for me? You want to know if this is something he’s denying himself or if he really just doesn’t like you.

You know your own intelligence, though. You haven’t made up whatever this feeling is between you.

He doesn’t answer your question. Just murmurs, “You don’t know me.” And somehow it sounds like an accusation.

“You won’t let me!” you burst out, your voice louder than you intended. But all this caginess, this dancing around everything real, it’s got you at the end of your fuse. Shiro looks up and whines, Kuro leaping off the couch to stand in front of the both of you, curious. “I told you everything! I told you about my family and my friends and my classes and my hometown and my car problems and fucking Katie from Ohio, and you don’t say anything, Megumi, you won’t talk about your family, you won’t introduce me to your roommates. You won’t tell me about your band or your childhood, you took weeks just to give me your first name! What—are you just embarrassed of me? Do you think I’ll judge you? Do you not trust me? Is that it?”

“No,” he practically growls. “God, it’s just—you don’t understand—”

“You’re right, I don’t!” you exclaim, throwing your hands up. Batman paws at your leg, wondering why you’re shouting. “So help me understand. I know I’m not patient, but if you have shit you’re not ready to talk about, that’s fine. But just say that. Tell me to wait and I’ll wait. Just—give me something.”

He looks at you and he’s utterly unreadable, doors slammed shut.

“If you don’t want me in your life, just fucking say so,” you spit, but your voice is wavering now, uncomposed and only loud so it doesn’t shatter. If he really said it, said I don’t want you, you don’t know what you would do. It would be too sharp, too painful, too much.

“You don’t want this,” he says instead, averting his gaze. His tone is measured and even and emotionless.

“Don’t tell me what I want,” you seethe, but your words come out quiet. “If you really think I don’t want this, it’s because you won’t let me.” You’re whispering now, worried that if your voice raises any more, it’ll crack the paper-thin walls holding back your tears. “Megumi…”

“S’better this way.” He rubs the heel of his hand over his eyes, a messy movement that seems so at odds with the evenness of his tone. “I… I have to go, Robin.”

And the strange, unstable feelings of betrayal and confusion and hurt morph abruptly back into something hotter, something angrier. Because how dare he come here, spend fall break at your house, listen to you spill your heart onto the carpeted floor? How dare he run away, say he doesn’t want this, and then still call you that stupid, endearing fucking nickname?

“Yeah,” you say icily, glancing away with your arms crossed over your chest. “You do.”

You count to five, silently, before he moves, and you don’t look when he does. You blink tears out of your eyes when Kuro hesitates, nosing at your hip before following Megumi out the door.

It slams, hard, and Batman stays perched at the entry, tracking him as he walks out of your house, your life.

You don’t move for a very long time.

INTERMISSION // A REAL GOOD START

MEGUMI FUSHIGURO IS in deep, deep shit.

That is to say, he’s lost control of the situation, which is the one thing he does not allow to happen. Ever.

He can’t stop thinking about you.

Sleep is hard to come by in the days after he fucks everything up. He keeps thinking about how it could have gone if he’d just—if he’d done anything else. If he hadn’t run off after he almost kissed you, traitorous heart thumping in his chest even while his brain screamed danger!

You became part of his life so fast and so naturally he didn’t know it was too late until the damage had already been done. If he let himself kiss you, he would drown.

But he didn’t. He shut you down instead, on a Saturday night that could have been different.

He makes excuses when Gojo invites him over Sunday afternoon, going into work early just to avoid him. Even if Megumi’s perfected his poker face, nothing gets past Gojo. It’s like he has some sixth sense for when his pseudo-kids are in emotional turmoil. He’ll force Megumi into a talk therapy session (run by the most unqualified bartender of all time) and he’ll die of embarrassment on the couch.

So instead of talking to someone, anyone, he throws himself into his work, into rehearsals, into school. He goes to the clinic early and leaves late. His fingers are sore from plucking the same lines out on his bass until his housemates go to sleep. His eyes are dry from staring at his laptop until three in the morning. But it doesn’t matter what he does. He can’t. Stop. Thinking. About. You.

The thing about being in a band with all of his housemates is that there’s really no world in which they don’t notice something’s off. They’re spending even more time together lately than usual with the Battle of the Bands going on, and his only relief is that none of them say anything—at least not aloud. There are a number of raised brows and the occasional questioning shoulder nudge, but it seems Yuji, Ino, and Kirara know him well enough by now not to push. That, at least, he’s grateful for.

Nobara Kugisaki is a different story.

It’s a Monday when she storms into his living room—she didn’t even bother knocking on the front door. Shiro and Kuro run happily around her legs, and normally she’d be fawning over them, but today she looks furious. He can almost see smoke coming right out of her ears, eyes narrowed to dark slits as she stares him down.

“Fushiguro.”

“You,” he points out, “do not live here.”

“And you,” she seethes, “have one minute to explain to me what the fuck you did.” Before he can say anything, she waves her phone around in the air and says, “Hi, Nobara, I was just wondering if Fushiguro seems okay to you? Things kind of fell off and I would feel weird reaching out but I’m just a little worried.”

She’s quoting you.

Texts from you.

Shit.

Megumi knows that you and Kugisaki have met, but for some reason it just did not cross his mind that you might have exchanged contact information.

Control the situation.

He clears his throat, refusing to break eye contact. “Well, she said it,” he huffs, his usual toneless expression. “Things fell off.”

You still wanted to check on him. He treated you like that and you still…

“You broke up with her.”

“We weren’t together—”

“You broke up with her. Are you a fucking moron? This girl—” She jabs her finger into her phone screen so hard he’s surprised it doesn’t hurt— “is so fucking cool. And she puts up with you. And you like her. And now you’re acting all weird. So what, you go over there and tell her you can’t be together? What the fuck, dude? Why?”

What a loaded question that is.

“Because,” he grits out. “It wouldn’t have worked.”

“It wouldn’t have worked,” Kugisaki repeats flatly, walking over to the couch and making herself at home way too close to him, staring him down. He turns his head away. God, she is so persistent. She is so annoying.

“Yeah, congrats, your hearing works. Can you leave me alone?”

“Tell me you don’t have feelings for her and I will.”

“I—”

“Look at me and say it,” she snaps.

Megumi looks at her. “I don’t,” he mutters.

Kugisaki rolls her eyes so hard Megumi can’t believe they stay in her skull. “Okay, sure,” she says skeptically. He doesn’t like this tone, where it’s going. “So if I set her up with Toge, you wouldn’t mind?”

“I—” He clamps his mouth shut, hands curled into fists. “Kugisaki, that’s not—”

“That’s what I thought.” Normally she’d look smug, victorious after pulling one over on him, but this is worse. She just looks… concerned. He hates it.

“Look,” she sighs. “You’re not going to talk to me, so I’m not going to waste my time. But when you figure this out—and you will figure it out, or I might kill somebody, and it will be you—I’ll be all ears.” Her gaze might as well be pinning him to the wall with how fierce it is. Sometimes he lets himself forget how much of a force Kugisaki can be, and right now, she’s got that glint in her eyes that he hates, the one that makes him feel like she knows something he doesn’t. “Understood?”

“If I say understood, will you get out of my house?” he grumbles. She says nothing, just looking at him, and he thinks maybe she could win a staring contest with a fish. For a long, tense minute, he doesn’t say anything, and neither does she.

Whatever. She doesn’t know what she’s talking about. She’ll forget about it eventually.

He sighs, tipping his head back against the wall.

“Understood.”

—

Things seem to happen around Megumi, to him, not because of him. The last conscious decision he made was to end things with you, and now he’s just a passive witness to his own life. Ino has something going on with Nobara’s housemate, Yuji’s scrambling to pass his midterms, Kirara bounces between their house and Hakari’s place faster than he can keep track of, and Megumi… he just exists in the periphery, goes through the motions.

He keeps finding his thumb hovering over your contact name. A dog with a silly name comes into the clinic and he wants to text you about it. He hears a song that reminds him of you (every song reminds him of you) and he wants to play it for you.

He wonders if Riko has him on a hit list yet.

A voice in the back of his head that sounds an awful lot like Kugisaki keeps repeating, Why?

Why did he end things? Why did he bite the bullet so fucking hard?

Because you deserve better than him, honestly.

You don’t know me, he told you. What he didn’t say, though—because you wouldn’t want me if you did.

Part of him knows that’s probably unfair to you—your words keep playing back in his mind and not even his music can drown them out. You won’t let me! But there are things he can’t imagine saying out loud. Explaining the way his dad disappeared, not even showing his face again when his mom died—eighteen-year-old Gojo from across the street on their doorstep, promising he and Tsumiki wouldn’t go into foster care. Bloody knuckles from fighting middle school bullies. Gojo and Geto trying to raise a bunch of kids when they were still kids themselves.

Gojo didn’t leave, but he should have. Megumi knows he threw away so much of his life for him, for Tsumiki. He could have done so much more. He could have done anything he wanted. But Megumi held him back.

Maybe he’s holding him back even now. He knows Gojo would deny it.

The point is, Megumi has shit to figure out for himself, and you shouldn’t have to sit by and watch him deal with it. That’s not fair to you. Yeah, he went about it wrong, but—but this is for the best. You can find someone who actually gives you everything you deserve, and he can… whatever.

Megumi’s band, Shibuya Incident, doesn’t perform this Friday at The Fix—Shoko and Geto’s bar. They’ve already made finals. Tonight will just decide who their opponents are. But even if he’s not up there playing, the Battle of the Bands is a welcome distraction. Even if Ino’s just making lovesick puppy eyes at the stage the whole time and Yuji won’t shut up about wanting Taco Bell. Megumi lets himself get a little lost in the music, and Kugisaki’s band is good, really. He votes for them as soon as the digital form opens and then vows to never tell her.

They should win, but Black Flash takes it again. Kasumi Miwa and Maki’s sister and their friends. They won the whole thing last year. Great, Megumi thinks.

The night comes and goes, and he dodges Gojo on his way out of the bar despite knowing he’ll get a text about it later. And then they’re all piled into Yuji’s car on the way to get his beloved Taco Bell, and he’s just about convinced he’s done with feeling anything at all when Kirara screams.

For a second, there’s nothing at all.

And then the world comes back to life around him in a shock of colors and sounds and a lot of cuss words, mostly coming out of his own mouth.

“Holy shit!” Yuji shouts, yanking the wheel hard to the right, and Megumi can barely process the sight of the white car barreling toward them before there’s crunching metal and shattering glass, and it’s like he feels the collision as an aftershock, shaking all his bones back into place. The airbags go off and he’s blind, wind knocked clean from his lungs, and then he’s moving—no, he moves. No more passivity. This is real.

“Everybody out,” he demands, wrenching the passenger door open and taking in the sight of the crash. Smoke is billowing from the hood of Yuji’s car, the vacant passenger side of the other one entirely smashed in. “Everyone okay?”

Yuji circles around the back of the car and Megumi clocks immediately that he’s holding his wrist weird, wrong. “Yuji—”

“Ino, come on—hey. Hey. Ino.”

Kirara’s got one knee on the edge of the backseat and one hand braced on the roof of the car, and Ino is not making any move to get out.

Sirens. Who called the cops?

“Kirara?” Yuji asks, moving to help her, but she holds up a hand and looks back over her shoulder.

“Don’t. I got it. We’re fine. Just—bad memories, I think.”

Megumi knows Ino hates driving. He doesn’t know why, but he can guess. So he doesn’t push it. Kirara’s the psych major, after all. And probably the one with the most emotional intelligence and any semblance of tact. She’s got him.

He’s about to turn to Yuji when somebody stumbles out of the other car. The car that had been driving in the wrong lane,directly toward them. If Yuji hadn’t reacted so quickly, they’d all be dead.

“What the fuck,” he hisses.

It’s his cousin.

“What,” he says, louder, “the fuck? Naoya!” He storms over and grabs Naoya by the front of his shirt—his breath reeks of alcohol, and he’s laughing, like he didn’t just almost commit vehicular manslaughter. “What the hell, man? What’s wrong with you? Are you—”

He hears… screaming?

But not from here. Not in person. It’s…

Megumi looks at the cracked phone on the ground, having been flung straight through Naoya's shattered windshield. He looks at his shitbag cousin, who’s half tipping-over, legs like jelly under him.

“Naoya,” he growls. “Who. Is. That?”

“Hah,” he slurs. “Mm. My ex! My ex. She is… she is.”

He’s not making sense, but Megumi might get back into Yuji’s car and drive it into his cousin on purpose. Naoya was dating this girl—Megumi knows her. She's friends with Yuji. Some brand of art major, he’s pretty sure, and she's nice, way too good for him. And then what, she finally gets away and he still torments her? By drunk calling her from the car, letting her listen as he crashes? The blood in Megumi’s veins might as well be venom.

He shoves Naoya back with a scoff, letting him stumble over himself, and grabs the broken phone off the ground. “Hey,” he says, and she’s still screaming, this poor fucking girl— “Hey! Hey. Calm down. It’s—hello?”

“Naoya? What the fuck, Naoya—”

She’s definitely talking through tears, maybe angry, maybe scared.

“Not Naoya,” Megumi sighs. “Uh, this is Fushiguro.” She’s quieting a little on the other end, and he hears a guy’s voice trying to talk her down. “Listen. Naoya’s fine. Just… drunk. And an asshole. Are you okay?”

After that, the entire night is a blur.

He talks down Naoya’s traumatized ex-girlfriend on the phone, Ino’s girlfriend shows up and calms him down, and then Gojo and Nanami and Shoko are there and Hakari shows up and Gojo’s dragging Megumi to the ER with Yuji to get his wrist checked out and it’s sprained and Tsumiki is running into the waiting room and hugging the life out of him and Maki calls and Naoya’s got a DUI and then finally, finally they’re home. Megumi can barely keep his eyes open. He doesn't know what time it is.

He sleeps harder than he has in months.

—

Megumi is so fucking exhausted that when his phone starts buzzing the next morning at the kitchen table, he doesn’t actually think it’s real for a second.

INCOMING CALL: SIDEKICK

He’s hallucinating. Sleep deprivation, or something. Or maybe he actually got a concussion in that car crash and now he’s seeing things that aren’t real. That’s the only explanation.

That or you butt-dialed.

He doesn’t bother explaining himself to the others as he stands up and retreats to the hallway, almost letting the phone ring out before steeling himself and swiping to accept the call.

“Hey?”

He’s never greeted you like that before. It sounds so fake. He usually picks up the phone and just starts talking about whatever you texted him, or whatever weird thing he saw that he has to tell you about. Not hey. Hey is for people he doesn’t know. Doesn’t care about.

“Um. Hey.” It is stupid, what just the sound of your voice over the phone does to him. “I just saw this article about a car crash? Are you—”

“I’m fine,” he says, too fast, too sharp. Stop it. “Sorry. I’m—yeah. We’re all fine.”

You clear your throat on the other end of the phone. “Okay. That’s—that’s good. I just… wanted to make sure.”

He pushed you out, and you texted Kugisaki to ask if he was alright.

He pushed you out, and you’re calling to make sure he’s okay.

I’m not, he wants to say. I fucked up. I fucked this up.

I miss you.

“Thank you,” he murmurs. “I… appreciate that.”

Maybe he can still salvage this. Still be friends with you, at least. But that’s a slippery slope, isn’t it? He’ll just hurt you again. But…

“It was my cousin,” he offers, not really knowing why he’s saying it. Maybe as a peace offering. He didn’t tell you things before, important things. Maybe he can start now. “Drunk. On the phone with his ex.”

“Oh,” you say. You sound surprised, but Megumi isn’t sure if you’re more shocked about his words or the fact that he gave them to you. “That’s… awful.”

“Yeah,” Megumi breathes. “Um. Yeah, he’s taken care of now.”

“Good. That’s good.” A dog starts barking, and Megumi feels his lips twitch up into an almost-smile.

“There he goes,” he murmurs. You laugh, and he’s actually smiling, now.

“There he goes,” you say fondly. “I should… go calm him down. I’ll…”

“Yeah, yeah, go,” he says, not sure how to end this. “Um, good… luck.” Stupid. That was so fucking stupid.

“Thanks. Bye, Fushiguro.”

“Bye, Robin,” he says, but the line’s already gone dead.

—

Megumi sees you three times in the month of November, and every time he feels ten times closer to a train wreck.

It snows in November, because it’s stupid and cold and winter comes early here, and there are prints leading toward the dog park. Imprints of dog paws and boots, side by side, and he’s a vet student. He knows what size dog those prints mean. He knows exactly who it is.

He lets Shiro and Kuro tug him all the way to the dog park, and he doesn’t even remember letting himself through the gate. He just knows that you see him right after Kuro starts panting excitedly, and you freeze.

He half-waves in the most pathetic, lame response ever known to mankind.

“Robin,” he says, the nickname falling off his tongue like nothing ever changed.

“Fushiguro.” You smile, hesitant, and he wishes it didn’t feel like a needle that you used his last name. He walks over to you—just following the dogs, he tells himself, that’s natural. Batman almost knocks him over in his excitement.

Megumi can’t not smile at a dog. That would just make him a bad vet, wouldn’t it?

“Hey, bud,” he says, crouching down to pet him. “Yeah, I missed you too.” When he looks back up, your gaze is a little distant, and he closes his eyes for a second, collecting himself. He pushes back to his feet and turns to you.

“Did you know I’d be…” You don’t finish the sentence, but he knows what you mean.

“I… snowprints,” he says, shrugging. It seems to be enough of an answer for you.

“Snowprints,” you echo. “We found you with tracks too, the first time. Didn’t we, Batman?” Like he understands, Batman slaps his tail against the ground and flicks his ears forward and back. Yep. Sure did.

He scrambles for something to say in the silence—small talk is the bane of his existence, but is it ever small talk when it’s you?

Small talk doesn’t matter.

Everything you say matters.

“So. They teach you how to keep plants alive yet?” he asks, and has to fight not to physically cringe after he says it. God, it’s like he never learned how to talk. But you laugh, which he counts as a win.

“No, but someone is significantly less barky, so thank you for that.”

He has you for five minutes before your phone rings, and you chuckle, showing him the screen.

“Ah,” he says. Riko. He doesn’t object when you go, slipping out through the gate with your phone pressed to your ear, because he doesn’t have the right.

But you text first, later.

sidekick: it was good to see you sidekick: and the dogs. obviously

“Look at that,” he mutters to Kuro, whose nose is nearly touching his phone screen. “You’re my good luck charm.”

megumi: you too, sidekick. megumi: and batman. obviously.

The second time, you’re crossing paths in the coffee shop, both of you on your way to other places. It’s brief and stilted and still leaves him feeling like a mess.

“Black?” you ask, nodding at his coffee. You’ve got a hat tugged haphazardly over your head to ward off the persistent snowflakes outside, and it’s—you’re cute. Fuck.

He huffs a laugh, looking down at the sleet-stained floor just to avoid staring at you and your cold-flushed cheeks. “What else?”

“Vanilla latte,” he says, glancing at your cup, because he wants you to know he remembers. Maybe it’s just wishful thinking, but he thinks you look pleasantly surprised.

The third time, you don’t see him.

He knew you had friends at JU, but he’s never seen you around campus before. You’re with the guy with the blue hair, always pulled up into two knots on the top of his head—Hajime, maybe?

You throw your head back and laugh at something he says, and it’s like—fuck. Laughter shouldn’t sound that poetic.

And he knows he can’t lie to himself anymore.

It’s time to talk.

Kirara would probably kick his ass the second he told her anything. Ino’s busy with his new girlfriend, Yuji’s an idiot, Kugisaki is… well, she’s Kugisaki, and he can’t handle that lecture right now. And he sure as hell isn’t gonna talk to Gojo.

Which means he only has one option.

When he knocks on the door of Tsumiki’s apartment, she takes one look at him and sighs, long-suffering.

“You finally ready to talk?”

This was probably a grave miscalculation. If Kirara would kick his ass for the way he treated you, Tsumiki might actually hang him from his ankles out the window and leave him to die. But not before he apologizes to you. So at least he’s got time.

He walks in without responding and ignores her invitation to sit, pacing the kitchen instead in an uncharacteristic show of nerves. “I fucked up.”

“Yeah, I gathered,” Tsumiki says dryly, but she hops up onto the counter and looks at him, patient as ever. Tell me, she doesn’t say, but Megumi hears it anyway.

“I think I might be in love.”

—

To her credit, Tsumiki is dead silent for the entirety of Megumi’s rambling explanation. He’s a little hoarse by the end of it—honestly, he never talks like this. He feels like he just dumped his heart onto his sister’s kitchen floor and is awaiting some sort of judgement.

“Also, I think she hates me,” he finishes, finally sinking into a chair at the kitchen table. He tilts his head back and stares at the popcorn ceiling. “And I deserve it.”

For a beat, Tsumiki is silent. And then she says, “You wrote a song about her.”

He snaps his gaze to her so aggressively it hurts his neck. “What?”

She rolls her eyes and pulls something up on her phone, sliding up the volume and pressing play. She scrolls to some random point in the song, and Ino’s voice sings, “She’s got me up late starin’ at my phone, waitin’ for a text, feelin’ all alone.”

“Tsumiki—”

She turns it up, and Megumi looks anywhere but at his sister. There are plants everywhere, warm light filtering in through the windows onto herbs on the kitchen windowsill and succulents in the living room and god, everything reminds him of you.

“And she don’t even know what she’s doin’ to me, all my hopes are high-strung and she’s just gonna leave, no!”

“Okay! Okay, stop, I get it,” he huffs, dragging the heel of his palm down his face and trying to ignore her smug smile. “How did you even know?” he mumbles. “I’m not on the credits.”

“I know you,” she says dryly. “I also know Ino, and his lyrics are not that… I don’t know, poetically nihilistic.”

“I really can’t tell if you’re trying to insult or compliment me right now,” he says, sighing.

“Also,” Tsumiki says pointedly, “because this is what you do, Gumi.” He gives her a quizzical look in lieu of a response. “When people get close to you, you lash out and then you run away.” She hops off the counter and crosses the room to the table, pulling out a chair across from Megumi.

“No, I don’t,” he grumbles, tilting his chair away on its back legs and inadvertently proving her point.

She just looks at him until he relents, burying his face in his hands.

“I don’t think it’s unprecedented,” Tsumiki says gently, “considering the way we grew up. But you can’t keep shutting down good things, Gumi. You wouldn’t even be friends with Itadori and Kugisaki if they hadn’t forced their way past your bullshit. And you love them, right? They’re great. You know they’re not gonna hurt you.”

“Nobody knows that,” he huffs. “College will end and we’ll all go our separate ways and I’ll never hear from—”

“Nope,” Tsumiki says loudly, cutting him off. “Okay. My turn to talk. Shut up.” She glares at him, planting her elbows on the table. He feels stripped raw. “The whole pushing-people-away-before-I-get-hurt thing? You need to stop. You cannot look me in the eyes right now and tell me you don’t have people who would die for you, Gumi.”

He opens his mouth to object, but she swipes a hand through the air, silencing him. “I’m not done.” Megumi has only seen his sister like this a few times in his life, and he is fairly certain that if he tries to interrupt her again he might not leave this apartment alive.

“You have me. You have Gojo. You have Geto and Shoko and Nanami. You have all of your housemates, and Kugisaki, and probably all of her housemates too,” she says. “And none of us are going anywhere, okay? No walking out on the kids, no betrayal, no kicking you to the curb. So you need to get your head out of your ass, Megumi.”

Well.

“Look. It’s a defense mechanism. I get that,” she says, a little gentler now. “But you are not doing yourself any favors. And this girl? You’re in love with her, Gumi. That means she’s pretty special, okay? Because I don’t think I’ve ever even seen you look twice at a girl in your whole life. And I know she doesn’t deserve this, just as much as you know. So you have two choices.”

Megumi doesn’t think he’s going to like either of the two choices.

Tsumiki leans back in her chair, shrugging. “You can let her move on without you and keep screwing yourself over, or you can go tell her you fucked up and ask her to forgive you.”

He’s never liked asking for things. Tries to avoid it, actually. But he’s finding there are a lot of rules he’s willing to break when it comes to you.

“But if you’re going to ask this girl to step back into your life, you need to make sure you’re ready for it,” his sister says firmly. “You need to have your shit together. You need to know how you feel.” She pauses, catching his gaze, and once she has it she might as well be holding his face in her hands. He can’t look away, not when she’s looking at him this intently, like she’s waiting for an answer she already knows. “So. How do you feel?”

When he doesn’t answer right away, Tsumiki knocks on the table, like a dismissal. “Okay. You think about that, and when you know—you know.” She looks at him for a long moment after he stands up, those eternal curled locks of hair falling into her face, and he’s suddenly hit with a wave of affection, of gratitude, so strong he can barely stand it. Yeah, so he doesn’t have a mom. And fuck his dad. But Tsumiki—thank god he has his sister.

“Miki,” he says, before he can stop himself. “Uh—thank you. I…” He swallows once, hard. “Love you.”

Her smile is slow but wide, the kind that makes her eyes narrow just a little. “I love you too,” she says softly, and then she winks. “Hey, those words? That’s a real good start.”

—

When Megumi sees you next, he’s going to be ready. Just like Tsumiki said. He needs to know how he feels. So he thinks, and he thinks, and he thinks.

There’s a notebook in the bottom drawer of his desk, scrawled song lyrics he’ll never let anyone see. He fills page after page after page trying to figure out what’s going on in his head, in his heart, how he can make it make sense. Fit together like two hands, two sets of prints in the snow. He tries to imagine what he’ll say to you, how you’ll react, but every word he thinks of falls short, everything just sounds stupid in the face of how much you deserve and how little he can give.

He keeps thinking.

It’s December 19, Kugisaki’s Christmas party before everyone parts ways for break.

Megumi won’t admit it, but he’s having a good time. He brought the dogs, and he and Yuji have been bouncing around talking to their friends. Tsumiki’s here too, and when he loses track of Yuji he makes his way over to her, leaning silently against the wall.

“They’re cute,” she says fondly, and he follows her gaze to the hall—Ino is standing there with his girlfriend, Skipper, and there’s mistletoe hanging right above them. No doubt Kugisaki’s doing. Skipper laughs and pecks Ino on the lips before he says something and drags her down the hall, and then Maki and Yuta glance up at the mistletoe, look at each other in mutual horror, and pointedly do not walk beneath it. They’re finally together, but they wouldn’t be caught dead kissing in front of other people.

And he wonders what you’d do, if you were here standing under it with him.

He doesn’t have to say anything. Tsumiki reads him like a book.

It’s like this:

Megumi is very well-acquainted with loss. But he’s not sure he can handle this one.

He let his own insecurities ruin a good thing, a bright thing. He shut it down before it could start. He struck first and he fucking regrets it.

That’s it, then. Pity party over. Delusions down the drain. It’s time to get over himself, to get real.

Because the truth of it is that he doesn’t give a shit about his birthday, about Christmas, about the trees and the lights and the stupid fucking carols, if you’re not there with him.

Oh, he thinks. His sister has the audacity to smirk.

He stays, because this is Kugisaki’s party and despite everything, he does love her. He’s getting better about that, about acknowledging it—he has people who care about him, and he has people he cares about.

But when he heads out just a little bit early, after whispering your name in Kugisaki’s ear, she nearly slaps him for not going sooner.

“Shiro, Kuro,” he calls, heading for the door. “C’mon. We’ve got somewhere to be.”

PART II // TO TRYING

FOR A WEEK after Megumi walks out your front door, you drown in self-pity like the flower you killed in September with too much water.

And then you open your computer and type his name into the search engine with jujutsu university and band. It’s not hard to find—one of the first results is some Instagram advertisement about a Battle of the Bands at JU, from a couple of weeks ago. One of them’s got to be his. You could just ask Nobara, but—it feels weird, somehow. Wrong. Like you’re encroaching on part of his life that he so clearly doesn’t want you to be a part of.

You can’t helping asking her to check on him, though. You just—it’s probably stupid, but you want him to be okay. Not that you think him pseudo-dumping you would tear him up or anything. But there’s a not insignificant part of you that doesn’t believe what he said that day. Part of you that knows a defense mechanism when you see one.

The thing is, you could’ve asked your friends about him. Hajime goes to JU. He might know Megumi, and if not he could’ve found out. But you wanted this for yourself, this mystery of earning his first name and his history and his heart, except you thought you’d gotten two of the three and it turns out he’ll only ever give you one.

You start typing in the bands one by one, figuring eventually one of them has to be his. A search for Black Flash turns up an artist image of a group of people surrounding a grinning girl with bright blue hair. No Megumi, though.

Shibuya Incident, then. You key it into Spotify and rub your eyes when the artist profile comes up, like you’re maybe seeing it wrong. No. It’s him.

There’s a dark-haired girl who must be Kirara leaning on a familiar-looking guy with pink hair, face split open in a smile. Front and center is a brown-eyed boy with a beanie tugged lopsided over his hair. And in the back, standing, looking characteristically bored, is Megumi Fushiguro.

Why are you doing this? You shouldn’t be doing this.

But you’re scrolling before you know it. Most popular songs. They have an EP called Over Duress. And they have a single—released recently, it looks like.

Strike First.

You only allow yourself one second of hesitation before you press play.

“Catch feels real quick,” a voice sings—Ino, must be. “And they go real deep.” You can’t help paying attention the bassline. It’s steady, constant, holding the rest of the band together as Ino sings. The lyrics almost sink into the background until the chorus snags your attention, and you have to go back and replay it.

“I can hear the heartbreak saying, ooh, I’m on my way. So you strike first, strike first ‘cause she’s not gonna stay.”

Oh.

You understand, then, even if his name isn’t listed in the writing credits, even if you have no proof. Megumi wrote this song. You can hear him in the unfamiliar voice of the lead singer. You can feel him in the pattern of the words. It’s his.

He didn’t want you to leave, so he left first. Is that it?

You understand, but it’s not enough. Abruptly, you’re just—you’re angry. What a stupid reason to let something fall apart. You don’t owe him patience. If he’s not ready to commit, that’s not your problem, it’s his. He needs to figure himself out, learn to let people in, and you can’t just sit here and wait for him to do it. It’s not your responsibility.

It’s not.

There’s some sort of grim satisfaction in knowing that there’s nothing else you could have done.

“Forget that,” you mutter, closing out of Spotify and intending to just toss your laptop on the bed. Case closed. Moving on.

But something in your search results catches your eye first.

JU senior issued DUI after crash on 34th and Olson Blvd Friday night

Okay. So. Nothing to do with Megumi, right? Except it’s showing up in your search of his name. You click on the article, heart suddenly pounding.

Jujutsu University Campus Police responded to an emergency call at 11:41 last night after an automobile collision on 34th Street and Olson Boulevard, four blocks from the popular campus live music bar, The Fix.

“No,” you breathe. “What the fuck?” You keep skimming, everything in you loosening up when it says nobody was seriously hurt, but it just—whose car is that, Yuji’s? It’s bright red. Not Megumi’s.

You’re not really thinking when you make the call. It rings for so long, and right as you’re about to give up, he’s there on the other end of the line, and you realize you have no idea what you’re supposed to say.

“Hey?”

“Um. Hey.” You sound more breathless than you should, just sitting here on your bed with your laptop open to a student news publication. You don’t wait for him to ask why the hell you’re calling, barreling on before you lose your nerve. “I just saw this article about a car crash? Are you o—”

“I’m fine,” he says quickly. Defensively. Oh.

Right. This is overstepping, probably. He doesn’t need you checking up on him. You should’ve just texted Nobara. You should’ve just not read the article, actually, shouldn’t have typed his name into your search engine. He probably thinks you’re a creep who put Google alerts on for his name or something. You don’t have any real excuse for how you stumbled across this fucking article.

But then he says, “Sorry. I’m—yeah. We’re all fine.”

Thank god, you think. But you just clear your throat a little and say, “Okay. That’s—that’s good. I just… wanted to make sure.”

The silence is so long you think for a moment that he’s hung up on you. But then, very quietly, he says, “Thank you. I… appreciate that.”

You don’t really know where to go from here. He’s fine. Of course he’s fine. Why the hell did you call him in the first place? It’s not like he’s going to offer you any information. Because he doesn’t tell you anything, which was the whole problem in the first place—

“It was my cousin.”

You blink.

“Drunk. On the phone with his ex.”

“Oh,” you say, more of a surprised noise slipping out before you can bite it down. It’s less shock at the actual words than the fact that he’s giving you something, that he’s offering you this. You scroll down in the article. Naoya Zenin. The senior in the headline who got a DUI. “That’s… awful.”

“Yeah,” Megumi breathes. “Um. Yeah, he’s taken care of now.”

“Good. That’s good.”

Batman chooses this moment to start barking at absolutely nothing out the window. He actually has been a lot better about that recently, but it’s like it’s his mission today to embarrass you on the phone with the guy who dumped-not-dumped you.

“There he goes,” Megumi says lightly, and you laugh a little, because he sounds almost fond when he says it.

“There he goes,” you echo. “I should… go calm him down. I’ll…” What? You’ll what? See you around? No you won’t. Talk to you later? Unlikely.

“Yeah, yeah, go,” he says. “Um, good… luck.” With what? Batman? Life?

“Thanks. Bye, Fushiguro.”

You slam your finger down on the red button before he can reply.

You don’t want to know what he says. Your name, or sidekick, or Robin, or nothing at all.

—

You try to forget about him, but it’s hard.

Every time your phone buzzes with a message from your friends, classmates, family, your heart jumps, foolishly thinking it might be him. You follow Batman to the dog park without making the conscious decision to, and berate yourself when you realize, lead him off in another direction. Your rosemary plant dies and you hear him in your head, teasing you—isn’t the environment your whole career? Better shape up, sidekick.

Riko prepares a half-hour long PowerPoint presentation about all the reasons he didn’t deserve you in the first place. She must’ve told your roommate, too, because Suko calls you in the middle of the night, Japan time, just to check in.

A week into November, it’s dulled a little bit, the hurt. You’re still startled when he shows up at the dog park, but… not unpleasantly so.

“Snowprints,” he says when you ask if he knew you were here. One word, but it means more to you. Snowprints means he knew what he was walking into, and he came anyway. Snowprints means he saw a chance and followed it to you on purpose.

That’s progress, isn’t it?

You see him at the coffee shop and he remembers your order. It shouldn’t mean anything, but it does. Snowprints and a vanilla latte.

He said he didn’t want this, but you just… don’t believe him.

But you’re not waiting for him. If the cute guy from ecology asked you out tomorrow, you’d say yes. This boy isn’t dictating your life while he figures himself out.

You hope he does figure himself out. But you won’t hold on to scraps.

And you do start to forget, a little. The cute guy in your ecology class does not ask you out, but your friends and your studies and your needy dog are enough of a distraction that Megumi isn’t in the front of your mind all the time. The semester is flying by, and you make an effort to keep in touch with Nobara despite everything—she really is fun.

It’s approaching break before you know it, and you’re going home for the holidays soon, though you’ll probably be back before the new year because Setsuko needs a ride. Man, you’re excited to have a roommate again.

Your suitcase is half-packed, poorly folded clothes covering the whole of your bedspread in some futile attempt at organization. Christmas is in six days—well, five, you think idly, glancing at the clock. Half past midnight. You should go to sleep, but your bed is covered in clothes and you need to finish packing for your drive home in two days.

“Hey, no,” you lecture as Batman sniffs at a shirtsleeve dangling over the side of the bed. You can tell he’s considering making the leap and taking a nap on top of all your freshly laundered clothes. “No. Stay down.”

You push to your feet, yawning, and then Batman freezes in place, his ears perking up and forward like he hears something.

“What’s up?” you mutter, and then his head snaps toward the door. “Dude, what? It’s past midnight—”

The doorbell rings.

“The shit,” you mutter, trudging to the front door. Irrationally you wonder if your roommate’s home early, but that’s stupid—she’d have needed a ride from the airport, and she has a key.

You don’t know what you expect when you nudge Batman aside and open the door into the cold night, barely holding him back from the cracked door with your leg.

Oh.

You’re face to face with Megumi Fushiguro, and your heart does a diving, spinning leap into the bottom of your stomach.

His lips are slightly parted like he stopped speaking mid-word, eyes wild with urgency, and you suddenly wonder if he’s in trouble, if something’s really wrong. Snow peppers his dark hair, the porch light bouncing off the white specks and making him look like he’s sparkling.

You can’t find any words. None at all, nothing that can actually articulate the shock and confusion and barely-squashed hope. What is happening?

“Robin,” he says. And then he says your name, your real name, and—it’s like a dam breaks.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m so fucking sorry. I—I’ve had some time to think and I really, really messed up and I don’t know how I’m ever going to make it up to you but I have to try to explain, I—it’s me, it was all me, all my fault, you’re amazing and I’m insecure and I let that get in the way of something really fucking good and that was stupid, so stupid, and I like being with you and I like knowing you and I want you to meet my friends and my weird messed-up family and I want you to know me, I want to let you know me, and I’m sorry I didn’t just because I got too in my own head about it, about you. You take up so much headspace it’s insane and I haven’t stopped thinking about you since—since, I don’t know, since I fucking met you, and I—”

The multi-colored Christmas lights strung between the pillars of your front step cast colors and shadows over him as he rambles, his cheeks red from the cold and maybe something else, and you can’t take it, watching him like this, desperate.

“Fushiguro.”

But he’s on a roll now, the words spilling from him like they’ve been building up in the hollow space of his throat for years, and he’s not stopping now. You’re not sure he even hears you over the rapid, panicked lilting of his own confession.

“You should turn around right now, slam the door in my face, I get it, I deserve that, and I don’t have any excuse that matters, but I realized how important you’d become and that scared me more than anything I’d ever felt because that meant I could lose you, you could leave—”

“Fushiguro.”

“And it’s—I fell in love with you months ago,” he breathes. “I’m sorry, and I love you, I’m so in love with you, and I—”

“Megumi.”

He finally stops, panting, every part of him frenzied and undone. His lips are still parted around a word he hasn’t said, freeze frame, the remote in your hands. “Will you just come inside?”

The silent second feels like ages, years, maybe, and you can see the disbelief in his irises, like he’s afraid to trust this, afraid to hope.

“No,” he breathes suddenly, and something comes dangerously close to cracking in your heart. Did he come here, say all this, only to leave you again?

“I—”

“No, because I brought the dogs and they’re sitting in the back of my car right now,” he explains, sheepish. An unbelieving, slightly hysterical laughter bubbles up out of you, warm and surprising and not at all unpleasant.

You grab Megumi by the dark fabric of his coat and yank him toward you, pressing your lips to his cold ones, hand slipping up to tangle in the hair at the nape of his neck. It’s like your warmth leeches into him limb by limb, slowly unfreezing him both from the cold and the frantic fear that you’d turn him away again, and it’s below freezing but he’s melting beneath your touch, and you missed him so, so much.

You pull back, your breath fogging in the air like an echo. “You idiot,” you tell him. “Go get them, I want to see them.” You cross your arms over your chest, leaning on the doorjamb and finally processing how cold it is out here. It’s like it’s sinking right into your bones. “And then get your ass inside.”

He smiles breathlessly, standing still for a moment, and then it’s like he just snaps into action, like he’s afraid you’ll change your mind if he waits another second. The dogs run up the path before he does, and you let them barrel into you and then have their little reunion with Batman while Megumi catches up.

“Come sit down,” you tell him, shutting the door and closing out the cold air. “And tell me more.”

It’s almost like nothing ever changed.

You talk for hours in the lamp-lit living room, surrounded by three tired dogs and a record spinning in the corner. But this time, Megumi talks more than you’ve ever heard him talk. He tells you everything.

How he pushed you away and justified it to himself by saying you deserved better, when really you deserved the truth. How his dad left and his mom died young and Gojo was barely legal when he took him in. How he had a lot of issues with his self-worth growing up, and even now, and how it took him a very long time to accept that people care about him. How it was Tsumiki's idea to get the dogs, because after their mom died he couldn't stop having nightmares. How he wanted to call you every day and then he finally cracked and he went to Tsumiki and she psychoanalyzed him at the kitchen table and he sorted out all his shit so he could show up here like an absolute nuisance and beg you to give him another chance.

“That’s all I wanted, you know,” you tell him, the both of you on the floor, leaning against Shiro and Kuro as they sleep. Batman’s made himself comfortable on the couch, occasionally using his vantage point to lick you right in the face. “You, being honest. You didn’t have to tell me about your parents, y’know, if you didn’t want to. But just…”

“I know that now,” he murmurs sheepishly. “I’m sorry. Really. But I’m trying to get over the whole self-sabotage thing. Trying to… try. In general. With people.”

And he means it. Because the only time Megumi has ever lied to you was the day he told you he didn’t want this, and you knew even then that it wasn’t true. He might try to be all stoic and poker-faced, but he’s not a very good liar. You smile. “That’s a good start.”

You’re facing each other, knees touching, and you reach out, hand palm-up between you. He glances at you before he makes any move, like he’s asking—are you sure? But then he laces his fingers through yours. His hands are way bigger than yours, fingers folding over your own, warm and encompassing. Something about it feels very right.

“So I was wondering,” he starts, and this new side of him that is so hesitant but also hopeful is maybe the most endearing thing you’ve ever seen. You squeeze his hand a little, and that seems to embolden him enough to ask whatever it is waiting on the tip of his tongue. “Uh, would you… want to meet my housemates?”

—

“They’re crazy,” Megumi says, standing outside his house with you the next day. “I mean it. I don’t know how to prepare you for—”

“Megumi,” you cut him off, laughing. “No disclaimers. I’m friends with Riko, remember?” This actually seems to be an effective argument, because he smiles a little, putting his hand on the door.

“Yeah, okay. That’s fair.”

You are tackled the second you cross the threshold.

“Hi!” someone practically shouts in your ear, full-on bear-hugging you as you stumble back, laughing.

“Oh my god,” Megumi groans. “Itadori—”

“Sorry!” he yelps, pulling back and awkwardly offering a hand like he didn’t just squeeze the living daylights out of you. “I’m Yuji. Kugisaki’s told me all about you and Fushiguro said—”

“Itadori,” he says again. You immediately understand what Megumi meant. This boy is legitimately no different than the two dogs who have come to crowd around your legs. Actually, Shiro and Kuro have greeted you significantly more calmly than Yuji has. It’d be difficult not to like him, you think.

“No, you’re fine,” you laugh him off, using the handshake to pull him back in. “You’re fun. I like you.” Yuji grins victoriously at Megumi and lets you go, and you finally move out of the entryway and into the familiar living space.

“Ino,” you say, pointing at the boy in a beanie, and then shift to the girl crouched in front of the TV, rummaging through a bunch of games. “Kirara.”

The conspiratorial smirk Kirara gives you—along with the way the Wii games are scattered all around her like a personal hurricane—makes you think she might not actually be the long-suffering order in a house full of chaos. More likely, she and Ino and Yuji are only kept in check by Megumi’s neat freak tendencies and blunt nature.

“Hey.” Ino grins. “Okay, I gotta ask, is your dog actually named Batman? Because that’s awesome.”

“She’s been here for two seconds,” Megumi chides, but you nod happily. You are very proud of your dog’s stupid name.

“Well, I approve,” Ino shrugs, patting the space next to him on the couch.

And it feels natural, the way you fall into place with the rest of them. For all Megumi pretends they drive him insane, it’s obvious he loves his friends, and he seems relaxed around them even as you waste away the afternoon chatting and arguing and getting your ass kicked in Mario Kart (specifically by Kirara, whose undefeated record pisses off all the boys but makes you even fonder of her).

By the time night falls, you feel like you’ve been friends with all of them for years. You learn all about the band—Megumi didn’t tell you that they won the Battle of the Bands, which you plan to give him shit for later. They ask you about your school and friends and seem to actually, genuinely want to meet them.

You go home for Christmas, getting your annual few rare days of quality family time, but Megumi sends you photos from Gojo’s with Tsumiki and the dogs. You respond with a picture of Batman in a Santa hat.

megumi: they really want to meet you when you get back. if you want.

A smile splits across your face before you can stop it. Because this is exactly what you wanted—for Megumi to want you to meet his family, to know that part of his life.

“What are you smiling about?” your dad asks from the couch, and your blush must be answer enough, because he turns to your mom with a raised brow and mouths boy. You shove your phone in your pocket. You weren’t prepared for the interrogation, but it’s too late now.

The thing is, if your family had asked you if you were seeing anyone even last week, you’d have nothing to say. And maybe you shouldn’t dump all this information on them when it’s still so fresh, so new.

But something tells you this is going to last. He wants you to meet Tsumiki, to meet Gojo. You won’t keep him from your family if he doesn’t keep you from his. Plus, your parents leave on another trip in two days. You’re not sure when else you’ll get the chance to tell them this in person.

“So,” you say, before they can start grilling you. “His name is Megumi.”

—

There are prints in the snow.

It feels uncannily familiar, walking your usual path with Batman and seeing the two sets of paw prints and accompanying boots. You place your own footsteps in their wake, laughing at how they dwarf your own shoe size.

You aren’t supposed to see Megumi until he picks you up to go to Gojo’s tonight, but it seems fate—or Batman—has other ideas.

You let him drag you all the way to a big, snowy clearing, where you see your boyfriend and Kuro standing in the snow. It takes you a whole five seconds longer to make out Shiro, who basically blends right into the landscape.

The dogs, per usual, see you first, and Megumi turns at their excited noises to see you. He wastes no time setting off across the field toward you, and you grin, meeting him in the middle.

“So is this a coincidence, or is someone following me?” he asks, meeting you at eye-level as you crouch to greet the dogs. Batman basically shoves his nose in Megumi’s face in response.

“Snowprints,” you say, gesturing to the trail behind you. “Seems to be a theme.” Behind the wall of Kuro’s dark fur, you plant your hands in the snow, letting a mischievous smile grow on your lips. “Anyway, I’m glad I ran into you, because—”

You throw a massive snowball right at Megumi’s face.

“Oh,” he says, swiping a gloved hand across his eyes but leaving flakes of white stuck in his brows, on his lashes. “You’ve done it now.”

“Protect me,” you whisper to Kuro, and then you run.

All-out war. The dogs are thrilled at every snowball that misses its mark, all of them leaping to catch the wayward projectiles in the air, and you and Megumi chase each other and trip over the snow and wind up in a big, snow-covered mess on the ground, staring up at a shockingly bright afternoon sky.

You can barely breathe, you’re laughing so hard. “You’re crazy,” you pant, pushing yourself up onto your elbows, then your palms. An absolute mess of snowprints—his, yours, Shiro’s, Kuro’s, Batman’s—cross over each other in the snow, revealing patches of browning grass here and there, showing the signs of your battle. “Aw, hey. It looks like a giant heart.”

“Sap,” Megumi snorts.

“Buzzkill.”

“Instigator.”

“Oh, yeah?” You grab a fistful of snow and put it right on his head, letting it melt into his tousled, snow-streaked hair. “Well, I’ll instigate, then.”

He laughs, shaking his hair out like a dog, and tackles you back into the snow. “Then I’ll instigate something else.”

You’re so cold you can barely feel half your face, but it doesn’t matter. Not when he kisses you like this.

—

The first thing you think when Satoru Gojo opens the door is damn, he’s tall.

The second is holy shit, those are the bluest eyes I’ve ever seen in my entire life.

“Gumi!” he shouts, enveloping him in a very one-sided hug.

The third thing? Yeah, you like him.

“Gojo,” Megumi grumbles, half-heartedly pushing him away, but the fondness of the interaction doesn’t escape you.

“And I’ve heard all about you,” Gojo grins, pulling you into a hug as well—you don’t hesitate to hug him back, because now you know exactly what this man has done for Megumi and Tsumiki. And he’s important to Megumi, so he’s important to you.

Megumi telling you about his childhood and Gojo was one thing, but him actually wanting you to meet his family is another. You feel warm all over as Gojo ushers you into the apartment, where Tsumiki is already busy making dinner. She nearly drops the pan in her hands at the sight of you. “Hi!”

“You all hug so much,” Megumi says flatly when she hugs you too, and she just grins and forces him into an embrace as well.

“Don’t tell me you’re jealous.”

“Shut up.”

“Love you too.”

“So,” Tsumiki says, turning back to the stove and insisting you sit down and make yourself at home when you offer to help. “Tell me about you.” Instead, she enlists Megumi to be her kitchen assistant, and you aren’t sure why it’s so surprising that he knows how to cook, but it is.

The four of you talk about school and the dogs (who are at home with Suko, now that she’s finally back from Japan) and your families and friends, and you can see Megumi growing more comfortable as the night goes on, once he’s sure that Gojo isn’t about to whip out a bunch of embarrassing pictures of him as a kid or tell you all his darkest secrets. Tsumiki is sweet and you take a liking to her immediately, talking all about her job running the campus paper. Gojo tells you about the bar he works at, about his college friends who founded it.

“Do you have to work tomorrow, then?” you ask between bites of the best meatballs you’ve ever had.

Gojo shrugs. “Yeah. But if I wasn’t, I’d be hanging out with all the same people I work with, anyway. Not so bad, huh?”

“We’re actually probably going to swing by the bar tomorrow,” Megumi says, avoiding Gojo’s gaze in favor of looking at you. Gojo lights up. It’s endearing, how excited he is at the prospect of seeing all of Megumi’s friends. “You coming?” Megumi asks Tsumiki.

“To the bar or the house party?”

“Both,” Megumi shrugs.

“Only if you are,” she says not to Megumi but to you, teasingly.

“Yeah, I gotta meet the rest of his friends. All of Nobara’s housemates.”

“Oh, I love them!” Tsumiki says. “Mm, you’ll get along with Yuta. I mean, everyone does. Oh god, and Toge. And S—yeah, okay, all of them, actually. Have you met our cousin Maki?”

“No, but they all sound great,” you say honestly.

“They are!” Gojo says loudly. “They can give you so much dirt on Megumi.” Megumi glares at him with a complete lack of heat.

“You and my friend Riko would get along,” you say, but as soon as you say it you’re not sure it’s true. Either they would immediately gang up on Megumi and make his life a living hell, or Riko would have the same dynamic with Gojo and they would argue until somebody threw a punch.

Megumi stares at you incredulously. “They can never meet. Ever.”

Except they do, because you bring Riko to the bar the following night. You feel like this might have been a dire miscalculation, because not only does this mean she’s meeting Gojo, but it means she’s meeting Nobara’s housemate who, in her words, is a kindred “chaos goblin.” This means that they’re both comm majors with too much time on their hands and they make it everyone else’s problem.

Toge Inumaki is the very possibly the only person you’ve ever met who can match Riko in terms of sheer chaos. It is terrifying. They’ve known each other for a grand total of five minutes before they’re planning a full-on bracketed Just Dance tournament with Rasputin as the final battle.

“You’re insane,” you tell Riko fondly, and she grins at you.

“I think we’re brushing over the fact that you think Rasputin is the hardest one on there,” Gojo says, leaning over the bar incredulously.

“What, you think your old man knees can handle it?” Riko asks shamelessly, and you excuse yourself as they launch into bickering worthy of siblings.

But nothing explodes, and you meet Shoko and Geto and Utahime and Nanami, and all of Nobara’s housemates, including Megumi’s cousin. She’s very no-nonsense in a way that you appreciate, and after you shit-talk Naoya with her, you feel like you’re probably going to be very good friends.

It’s well past eleven by the time you all get back to Megumi’s place, leaving Gojo to ring in the new year with his own friends. Someone puts the ball drop on the TV in the living room and you all scatter across the space, a swell of conversation and laughter as midnight inches closer.

It’s like this:

A living room full of your friends and his, laughing and smiling and teasing and playing Just Dance really aggressively (but that’s just Toge and Riko, really). Megumi’s knee pressed against yours as Tsumiki forces him to smile for a picture with you. Nobara throwing her arms around you, insisting you settle a debate between her and Yuta about the superior shape of pasta noodle. Sneaking off to Megumi’s room while Yuji is distracted, stealing kisses in the dark. Listening to his whispered commentary in your ear as the drinks and sleep deprivation start hitting Toge and Yuta and they get existential on the floor. Suko telling everyone all about Japan and the occult club she started at her university there. Yuji being way too into the idea of starting one between JU and Kaisen, launching animatedly into a discussion of all his favorite conspiracy theories.

Five minutes to midnight, Kirara pops open a bottle of champagne and passes you a glass, and you wave it in front of Megumi teasingly.

“What, you wanna toast to something?” he teases, leaning in toward you. “You gonna say to us? That’s pretty Hallmark movie of you.”

You hum, swirling the glass, lifting your gaze to meet his. “To trying,” you say. “And also vigilantism?”

And there’s his laugh, better than the ball drop, the streamers, the disco ball that came from god knows where in the corner. “I can get behind that,” he says, clinking his glass against yours. “To your superhero dog,” he says, leaning in closer. “And his pretty cool sidekick.” He kisses you as the countdown hits one, and you’re laughing against his lips, savoring the warmth of his hand on the back of your neck.

When he pulls away, it’s only by centimeters, just enough for him to lock eyes with you. “And,” he breathes against your lips, “to trying.”

directory // my masterlist | out of my mind !

jjk taglist open: just send me a message!

@shutuppeter @mikikkoo @reactwithjan @theclassbookworm @lilactaro @bisforbuse @risararelywrites @idkidk32 @gojodickbig @stargazing-with-choso @anonymity-222 @honeyyhuggs

a/n: sorry this took like twenty years and it's SO LONG. heh. i'm incapable of short-form content. it was fun to write though. let me know what you thought, and be sure to pop over to out of my mind (and, if you're curious about naoya's ex, greta's sukuna spinoff, if you are NOT a minor)! thanks loves :)

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understandableparadox · 11 months ago

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a comprehensive list of everything wrong with hazbin hotel.

quick note before i lose myself in madness, my standards for helluvaboss are non existent because its a free show on youtube. also i kinda like helluvaboss and i will indulge in any bias i damn well please.

oh and spoilers. i guess.

the greater narrative of the entire season is "White lady civilize inner city hoodlum". ex: The blind side. rich girl, affluent family yadda yadda.

the story is set up to be like amphibia, owl house, svtfoe, steven universe, that being starting as something episodic then transforming into story driven narrative. why? because we know the benefits and drawbacks, episodic starts allows us to wander the world, it allows us to understand the dynamics, we are not forced to reckon with anything because there is no deadline. characters are allowed to bloom and shine and the audience can actually get attached.

the source material is Vary Clearly formed from remnants of something out of a middle school edgelord narrative. the usage of transformation, the big spooky grins, the "and then i smile as my eyes glow and-"-isms which in most cases i don't mind because in some instances but in a vary Particular case its astoundingly annoying and that annoyance is like a mold, shit spreads quick.

the color Red. as a lover of homestuck cherubs and karkat and aradia, as someone who fucking loves the color red, it is so painful to say but holy shit tone it the fuck down, i know its hell but their are so many other colors that you can use, its everywhere, the streets, the air, the windows, the screens, the characters, i know the pride ring is represented with red but change up the palates every so often for backgrounds

the rush, this ties into the second point made but i think the story itself is rushed. we know everything way to early. i know way to much and it makes it hard to care about anything because im still trying to digest the last chunk of info. "oh ok, so they clear out hell once a year. oh hell has a heaven embassy? ok. oh that adam the angel, i though he wou- oh its every 6 months now. wait the exterminators die a lot? then why is everyone sca- people in hell already have weapons that can kill angels? w- oh we are in heaven now, ok ma- no one in heaven except for the elites know the exterminations occur? how do-" and its that, just this incessant rush to explain everything to you. notably that's just the god damn spark notes, we need to know everything about the characters now, every single bit of their story, their insecurities, what charlie needs to fix, how she can fix them, the major bad guys, everything. you are never allowed to dwell on a character because we need to rush towards something else. it almost feels like this should have been like... season three, it would have been a fantastic season three if you dropped the introductions honestly.

the concept of redemption. for a story of redemption to work you need to look at three things. What is there crime, Do they want to change, What is preventing them from changeing? there is only one single character that has a notable path of redemption, angel dust, but if you look through their story it feels off. What Exactly is he guilty of? he has sex, does drugs and drinks. his apparent nymphomania is tied to his sad backstory as someone forced into the sex industry so how is that their fault? then if you think about it you start to spiral and notice "hey why are most of these people in hell?" like sure some of them may deserve punishment but then you see the fucking dichotomy and its like "I was a inventor in england and died of the fucking plague, i may have made evil little contraption hoohoohoo" vs "I was a cannibal, a full on cannibal, i fucking killed people and ate them and then someone shot me". ONE OF THESE THINGS ARE A LITTLE MORE FUCKING EXTREME. i'm going to go fucking nuts, the thing they went to heaven with when presenting a case to angels on the idea that redemption and becoming a better person is actually real was angel dust not drinking at a party and not having sex with consenting adults and i want to go fucking insane. WHAT IS THE CRIME, WHO IS THROWING THE BOOK, WHAT DOES THE BOOK INTEL, ARE WE ON GOOD PLACE RULES?! half the cast dont Need redemption they need fucking help, and the other half of the cast do need redemption but they do not seek it making the point moot. sir pentious acts like he has the brain of a hyper intelligent toddler tossing about toys, its almost like he did his one bad thing of spying and then got caught, sank his little diddy about forgiveness and second chances and become a null point through out the rest of the series, sure their was Some weight to him sacrificing himself, he was a decently funny character and he had good moments but him popping up in heaven felt like a fore gone conclusion, he didn't deserve to be in hell so why do i care that he is suddenly in heaven? because its working on the concept the good place already made. no one actually deserves eternal punishment they just need help processing what makes them a dick, but instead of looking at all the parts of the afterlife that make it bad, inefficient and then creating and trying ideas to see if it work instead over a few seasons, we crash dick first into all the major plot points in regards to that and say "tada, we fixed it.".

having a sub-plot about sexual assault and its victims then having multiple sexual assault related gag ruins your point.

don't make a bunch of stereotypically jewish characters into cannibals, that was a big thing, really shouldn't have to say it.

if you are going to make a character black, make them black, you can say alastor was black but sweet seren-fucking-dippity that's not a black man.

pot meet kettle but yeah the cursing could be a little less liberal. maybe just blue hair or the pronouns, not both.

there is a very distinctive art deco/jazz aesthetic which normally i love but i feel as though it is not used to its full extent and in some cases really hurts the character design in and of itself.

this is a vary obvious bit but the story is a million times more interested in gay men then it is of lesbians, which culminates in this insane thing where the writers clearly have more talent or perhaps it would be more abt to say practice writing male gay pining then they are with lesbian pining. which i personally think is hilarious because i did not know you could min max fujoshi-ism that hard.

this next section is more to do with each character on a fundamental level, for the sake of brevity whatever there is left, i'm just doing ones with speaking roles.

13. Charlie:

(see what i mean about that red thing?)

as originally stated charlie fits rather comfortably into every white saviour narrative, though that seems to be part of her joke. though i'm not entirely sure how much of a joke it can be when its rewarded and expected to advance the plot.

her character design says nothing, it has the motif of old puppets or dolls, she wears something vaguely similar to service suits, her demonic form is just some extra horns.not to say every character needs to have their life on a clothes rack but some more snake and goat imagery would be nice

its not the chol design of charlie with snake hair, not an actual problem but its a problem to me, damn you @cholvoq for ruining my ability to look at any of the characters without wishing i was seeing your designs instead.

character wise aside from the white savoir bit, i'm having a bit of trouble understanding what the arc of the character is. she is shown to be naive, someone who doesn't understand how the world works but everytime she says something its something astoundingly clear like "people can actually get better". and its treated like someone demanded faygo in every water fountain. is the joke that the world around her to cynical or is so to naive? please pick one or the other.

now if you know me, you know i fucking hate overpowered characters with a blinding passion, one that would set alit the god damn abyss but in this one special instance, i feel like its warranted, she's the direct descendant of fucking God, she can swing her weight around a little, i mean god damn. she in so many instances looks like shes cowering so often, why would the daughter of lucifer get backed down by some rando pimp? why wasn't she the one to fight adam? sure you can say she is young but how young? her parents were there since pre-abrahamic times, most of the characters showed up in hell in the 1900s, some of them showed up in the 1600s, how old is charlie??? how long does it take for her to learn how to be strong? The story does not suffer if charlie is strong and knows she is strong. it can easily be a case of "i don't believe in violence to a weird degree". fit it into her apparent naivety about the world to believe that violence is never the answer even when dealing with a being that is unilaterally horrible and abusive and monstrous.

she ga- no im kidding, i do think her romance was waysided a bit, it would have been fine to have more scenes of them togather and in love you know?

14. Vaggie

why did you name the lesbian vaggie...? Don't do that maybe?

I like how her design is almost moth like but again i feel as though you could have amped that up.

she feels as though someone tried to combine undyne and pearl from steven universe, same story beats and design elements. it makes it hard to really distinguish her as a character.

i honestly dont have much to say about her. she is fine.

christ kill me, lets just get the big one out of the way

15. Alastor.

God Damn

where to start.

"alastor is mixed race" mixed with fucking what? concrete? there is not a single black feature on that creature, now im not saying you have to make him a png of louie armstrong but it wouldn't hurt to add a curl to the hair maybe? make it a tiny bit more wavy? Something? a crumb i beg of thee?

his symbolism is all over the god damn place, native american monsters (you know the one), voodoo, radio, puppets, stitches, circuses??? and Tentacles i guess. two of those are from closed religions so if you dumped those you would actually get a more concise character focused on the concept of vox populi as a means of societal control and influence as we see in his first song. but again that gets drowned out repeatedly by all the other random toy box bits shoved into him.

tumblr sexy man bait

he serves no purpose in the story. he does spooky stuff, pretends to do things and then goes back to sitting around looking spooky. i understand that his motif is supposed to be aloof mastermind but maybe have him do more mastermindy things? if you remove most of alastors scenes, bar the songs, it doesn't change all to much. husk and nifity can still be at the hotel, they could be looking for outs in their contracts the same as angel dust. hell it even helps with the one scene where he dose some spooky shit, asking charlie for a favor in exchange for his help in the fight with the angels instead of asking him about angel weapons which should have remained a strictly vaggie scene.

his presence in a way delegitimize the story, as I noted in in the section regarding redemption, the three parts are "what is the crime, do they want to change, what is stopping them?" and alastor kinda just spits in the face of that. he is a serial killer cannibal that has no qualms about how evil he is and apparently must continue being evil due to being under the control under someone legitimately called the Root Of All Evil. show him take a slight interest in the idea that maybe shit for him could be better, make him Want Change at the bare fucking minimum or dont have him at the hotel.

his stupid little fucking horns, big shot the troll liker wants characters to have big fucking horns, make them noticeable or dont have them.

he looks more like a dog boy, which could have been an interesting thing with the collar motif but fuck me i guess.

personal pet peeve but i fucking hate characters that have a million plus powers, stick to a set number, be creative.

im getting more petty as i go on so last point: he could have been in less episodes, he didn't need to be in dad beat dad, that should have been just a lucifer and charlie episode. inverse the red and black and i think he would be fucking great color wise, his body type is the same as ten different characters, he isnt radio enough, aside from the voice and and staff if you told me he was the fucking Cat Demon i would have been just as convinced.

16. Angel Dust

what the fuck, gay spider? its hard to actully articulate all the thoughts i have on angel dust, not in the sense that he is a deeply thought provoking character but in the fact that there is not much meat on the bones.

all around i think angel dust is kinda middling. he has a decent enough romance with husk, he has a decent enough story line that revolves around battling addiction and removing yourself from an abuser (which the story tries to brand as "Redemption???")

I dont like that most of his jokes would qualify as sexual harassment, i don't mind him being sexual as a character but continuing on when clearly someone doesn't like the jokes hurts the character.

not a critique but he is pink, which honestly ill fucking take at point, as long as its not more fucking red.

i think his design is an improvement over some of the old vivzie designs but it feels like it could have done with going a few more rounds of design changes.

same thing with alastor, charlie and vaggie, there is not enough of the animal that they are supposed to be. You could have told me angel dust was a fucking bee or something and i would have had to believe you. nothing about angel dust initially says spider, hell he dosent even have enough limps to be a fucking spider.

17. Carmilla carmine

are... are you supposed to be a rabbit...?

Big Yoai Hands

ballet fighting style, could have been cool, wish she fought more like sanji or chun li.

A single mom that works to hard, who loves her kids and never stops-

her song was decent, not great, decent. it feels as though the actress has experience singing but not in the way they tried to make her sing during her two songs. they have a obvious mexican influence, honestly just let her sing in spanish in the english dub. go listen to the spanish dub, "out for love" sounds great in spanish.

i wish i had more thoughts on them, fucking rip.

18. cherri bomb

that's not a punk aesthetic that's 2010s alt

decent character, they showed up once or twice i guess, no real thoughts.

19. egg boiz

absolutely perfect, i have not notes on them, these are perfect creatures.

20. Emily

im so fucking happy to see a singular blue character

does the naive dreamer bit better then charlie

We really shouldnt have seen her until the end of season two or middle of three.

good contrast with the other angels on screen.

Wait she is supposed to be black??? Where???

21. Husk

keith david you absolute delight, Why on gods green earth did they only give you one singing part?

one of the few charecters where its clear husk is a cat, i do like the kinda... marquee design, he is a magic cat, thats neat. i still think you can toss the wings and eyebrows and still have just as good of a charecter.

has a deeply intresting story of someone who died as a nobody, became the fat cat of hell and then was forced back to the bottom by their own vices, not used at fucking all.

huge potential, little pay off.

22. lillith

I know nothing about her except she ditched her kid and husband to vacation in heaven and i think thats kinda funny.

alot of werid things floating around her, again she shouldnt have been shown in the show at all until next season.

23. lucifer morningstar

no notes, funniest charecter, did a song based on friend like me.

few notes: i do like the idea that the immortal symbol of pride is a constant emotional wreckage constantly seeking approval through grand showmanship and manic energy that threatens to take over anything they touch.

would have liked more snake stuff on him, maybe some more goat things like horns.

that is such a stupid fucking staff lmao.

24. Adam.

alex brightman you absolute fucking delight, you should have had more songs.

I wish his design was more focused on the idea of him being a glam rock wash up

I fucking hate his mask

We shouldn't have met him until the end of the season.

25. Niffty

again she is supposed to be a bug or cockroach but nothing about her points to that.

token straight

keeps rocketing back and fourth between sexulization and infantilization

you had kimiko glenn but didnt give her a single fucking song?

26. Sir Pentious

the secret season one redeemed.

the pilot version of him felt more like someone that could do a season one redemption arc, a megalomaniac constantly attempting territory grabs, there is something you can work with, actual character flaws to work through.

essentially a child after the first episode.

actually a snake which i appreciate.

no where near steampunky enough.

27. the villians of the show dont make much sense, each one feels like they should be season long deals on their own instead of a bunch of team rocket esque idiots that show up on occasion, do a bad thing and then leave.

28. Valentino

gOD THERE IS SO MUCH RED

only a moth some of the time.

sucks as a villain, maybe they need more screen time to show why they suck in a more substantial way aside from being told that he sucks.

it is interesting that angel dust is only under his magical control when in the studio, it shows that angel dust has to make a conscious choice to return, which in turn can be made to show how abusers can draw back their victims. I do not think it was done well in this circumstance as it shows him to be cartoonishly evil, constantly flying back and fourth between sweet and utter psycho, there is no actual reason for angel dust to ever actually go back to the studio, he just does so every so often.

29. Vox

legit who cares? the only thing about him that is in any way substantial is all the dope ass fan art we get.

propaganda machine angle that is not explored at all, just hinted at. no actual barring on the story whatsoever.

why didn't he try to do the same shit as alastor by the way? he knows its bad if alastor gets in good with charlie so shouldn't it be a ass kissing race?

same body shape as literally every other male character.

tumblr sexy man version of pyrocynicals fursona.

30. Valvette

the actual poster child of the shows huge problem of "Show me, don't tell me".

apparently the glue that holds the villains together. never shown.

apparently the one that makes the love potions that valentino is famous for. had to learn about that in the fuckin wiki trivias

we know so much about her from things outside of the show.

was there to call carmilla a coward, that's her plot contribution. she shows up every now and again but its never anything substantial and serves to more around take up run time for people We Don't Need To Know Yet.

im not trying to be mean, animation is animation, we need smaller studios to have success in the industry so that other indie studios can have that success, felling a tree makes it easier for others to follow. showing that its possible to number brain rot exacs helps all animators.

but this show has so much bullshit attached to it, it has so much fucking potential that it fries my brain with unyielding frustration.

this took a bit to write, im tired, thanks for reading.

#hazbin hotel

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tendermiasma · 3 months ago

Text

Clover Lore Masterpost

I'm very touched by everyone who's shown interest in my Baldur's Gate character. Many of you have asked where they can learn more about him, so here is the promised Clover masterpost!

I'll update it as we go along, but things yet to be revealed I'm keeping secret 🌙 It's pinned to my linktree in my bio.

Clover (he/him)

Half-Elf Wizard

Age: unknown, likely early 20s

Height: ~5'3

Introduction

Clover

The Winter Court

Clover's magic

Origins

Clover's spellbook

INT

Halsin and Clover's relationship

Intro

Intro 2

Did Clover help Halsin with the Shadow Curse?

Intimacy (spicy)

Intimacy cont. (spicy)

Intimacy 2

Injury

Thisobald

Scent

Why did you choose Halsin as Clover's love interest?

Post-Game life

(spoiler-free because I haven't finished it either)

What's an average day for Halsin and Clover once they settle in together?

Miscellaneous lore and FAQ 🍀

Clover's relationship with the other companions

Astarion gets suspicious

Clover's very quiet, especially compared to Halsin. Why?

How does Halsin feel about Clover's hair?

More hair...

Clover's outfit (far left, I've made a few minor changes since then)

Can others do art/fic/cosplay? - It's all so welcome!! I didn't think this would become such a thing and I'm touched and delighted by what you've done. ❤️

#baldur's gate 3 #clover #halsin #cloverhoney #bg3 #I think I got everything hopefully for now #silly lore definitely made it in but also I think everything is important so

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raguiras · 7 months ago

Text

TWST Olympics AU #1

Part 1: Heartshackle trio designs!

Reblogs are hella appreciated!! I'm likely shadowbanned 😭

As the Olympic Games are officially starting in a week, I decided to finally sketch some of the designs for my Twisted Wonderland Olympics AU! Next up are Riddle, Trey and Cater.

Everything about the AU below!

AU rules

Feel free to add your own OCs to this AU!

Fan content is obviously allowed! Just tag me in it, please.

AU summary

This is a magicless AU where all of the TWST characters are Olympic athletes in the real world. Some win medals, some barely qualify — but all of them live in the Olympic village. The students are aged up here (usually early to late twenties) while the faculty members have no set age and work as sports reporters.

♤ Character introductions ♤

ACE TRAPPOLA — A 21-year-old Italian prodigy basketball player. He's considered to be his team's ace (pun intended) and is great at tricking his opponents, making tons of baskets for the Italian team, and efficiently assisting his teammates.

DEUCE SPADE — A 21-year-old Japanese track and field athlete competing in various smaller disciplines falling under the "track and field" term. He's extremely average at most things other than sprints, often ends up in the bottom 3, and is secretly incredibly insecure about not being the best at anything.

ALLEN ALAGONA (YUU) — A 21-year-old Japanese-Italian gold-winning figure skater competing for his current home country, Ireland, along with his best friend and sports partner Alcestris. He gave up on his original dream — becoming a musician — and is now working hard to be the best male figure skater in the world, hoping to kickstart a career as a musician later on.

♤ Relationships ♤

ACE & DEUCE — Their friendship originally started when Ace posted a picture of himself watching a sprint competition while Deuce made a grimace in the background, causing the photo to go viral and become a meme. Deuce originally DMed Ace to take the picture down and got teased for it, but this teasing slowly developed into a friendship. While they get along well, Deuce is secretly a bit jealous of Ace for pretty much being a prodigy.

ACE & ALLEN (YUU) — Ace is a fan of Allen and views him as a fellow gold medalist. Being open-minded and "eager" to make new connections, Ace simply DMed Allen one day and the two became unlikely friends. Nowadays, Ace also functions as a matchmaker, being the only person to know just how much Deuce likes Allen...

DEUCE & ALLEN (YUU) — Deuce knows Allen as the most famous figure skater in the world and is absolutely stunned by both his appearance and humbleness. The two accidentally meet at a coffee shop during the games one day, decide to have a drink together, and strike up a conversation. Deuce is fanboying on the inside and trying to hide his surprise that Allen genuinely recognizes such an average athlete as him. Allen, however, already knows Deuce due to closely following all Japanese competitions, and has also noticed how incredibly ambitious Deuce is. Knowing Deuce's pain of carrying other people's hopes and never being the best at anything all too well from his teen years, Allen wants to get to know him better... and what starts off as mutual admiration and a celebrity crush on Deuce's side develops into full-blown love.

♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤

If this post/AU ends up being well-received, I'll introduce Riddle, Trey and Cater next!

♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤♤��♤♤

More about the Deuce x Allen ship in the canon lore:

part 1 // part 2 // part 3

Friends who participated in the original AU development some months ago 🫶

@althea-and-alcestris @miss-atena @vanrouge13 @spookyavenuestreet @heyhellohihowareyou @nyx-of-night

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wszczebrzyszynie · 1 month ago

Note

can i hear more about the story & world building of your space mining characters it intrigues me so dearly

thats so sweet. im very happy to hear that! well its a bit hard to explain as it has started as an au for hermitcraft s8 + the life series but me and @makowcy (who co-created this au with me) liked it so much we wanted to make it its own thing? so that it wouldnt be tied to the source material, as we both drifted away from the original series a bit in the past year. So story wise i cannot say anything in much detail as were still unsure about what stays and what gets changed (we havent even thought out all the name changes and design changes yet). if you are really curious there is a year old now au explanation post with the plot timeline and other things that is our baseline, though it might get confusing without knowing the characters? it also might not because space mining always was heavily oc-fied. well any way the general timeline is pretty accurate to what we still have in mind, other things not so much. Well Either Way i did went a bit more in depth into the worldbuilding under the read more! hope its readable

First things first i need to say that its space fantasy, not really a sci fi, because there is very little logical science in it? its not meant to be scientifically accurate in any way; while it started as alternative history, we decided it woudlve been better if it were a differently working world entirely - its similar enough to think its alternative history at first, but the more you know the more you realize its something else! familiar and based on our reality but giving me more freedom and room to be vague

In short: people were able to colonize space in 60s or 70s, taking the cold war-like era divide of the world to the outerspace. the entire story is set about 120+ years after that, in a far away galaxy, in the former eastern colonies, about 20 years or so after the fall of the empire, and the setting is generally based on pre- and early post-1989 Poland (the fall of polish peoples republic and the transformation era); its a poor, heavily corrupted part of the galaxy. Its not really lawless, but it could as well be. but its also very cowboy bebop-y, with more fun retrofuturistic elements and the general bounty hunting aspect of it. bounty hunting itself can be "centralized" (done by the police force) or done by individual, unaffiliated bounty hunters and bounty hunting groups; though everything is in a very grey area. The only other life in the universe has been discovered fairly recently; an unassuming rock-like structure, long dead in its most commonly found form, and more fungi alike when alive. Its hidden deep under different planets surface, and is considered to be the most important discovery of recent era, becoming the most sought-after item in the galaxy, despite how little is still known about it and its potential uses

In more... long; because of the crushing debt towards what can be called "the west" (in a political sense; its space, and even though people have left earth behind, that terminology is still in use) and, hm, interesting politics (introduction of capitalism in a socialist state), the poverty was the highest its been since the post-war, which, mixed with poor politics on many sectors and the terror, ultimately causes the fall of what has been up to that point considered simply "eastern colonies" (i imagine the name to be simple; Srebro or Srebro-Kolonia (Silver/Silver-Colony), as mining is an important aspect of space colonization), creating a new space-state (now called -Kraj (country), not colony, though its unofficial names are many); generally considered "lawless" (though it isnt) and corrupted, whose society was left feeling mostly disillusioned, and who has given up. While the circumstances are very much based on real polish history, in the world space mining there was no real... fanfare, no feeling of winning, because i imagine that worlds space to be... generally "slow and cold" - changes happen slowly, and everything is so vast and big, it takes so much time to organise and even send information, that everything is just kind of... made to be slighly disfunctional all the time. Well either way it all paints a picture of the general society both holding a grudge towards and being wary of the govnerment (past and current), and the west, and everyone else; the feeling of being cheated is everpresent, but life goes on, even if it isnt great, and everyone has to adapt to it.

Its no coincidence that mining is even in the name; it became something culturally important, a meaningful pillar not only of the space-world as a whole, but of this silver state especially. Its kind of bound to happen when its such a big and important sector. Thats also why a lot of the characters, both minor and major, were or are miners, or worked in the industry (the main character is, after all, a mining engineer by education). Its a dangerous job, but also something people take natural pride in.

youtube

there are different "levels" to space mining - not all mining colonies and stations are equal (in difficulty, in gear needed, in safety - both because of the planets, but due to inside factors as well; the rise of workplace injury, money cuts, loopholes and pay inequality all predate the fall of the old colony. the politics really were poor), so not all miners experiences are the same, especially since the discovery of whats commonly called in the story a "gwiazdnica" (its normal name being Staryt or more english suited Starite); a rock-like structure in its dead form (and a more plant, maybe fungi-like when alive, though thats a bit of a secret). its very... well hidden, deep inside planets and moons, and very hard to extract, requiring special gear (small mining mechs! the only usage of mechs in the world is for mining). it has been the only living organism found in space. Its... usefulness is still unclear - the giant interest in it lies mostly in its sheer uniqueness as well another living organism, but also in its beautiful appearnance. It looks like the starry sky itself, hence the name.

Since there is no real plant life in space (its either ice, sand, or rock when it comes to "livable" ones) and no natural source of oxygen, people live under domes - some small, more "temporary", usually tied to mining or research work, some giant, almost self sustainable, interconnected on the planets surface. They all can look very different depending on the planet, reason for its construction, age, and all the other factors; some more fleshed-out ones are what me and Aku simply call "sad" ("the orchard"; home planet to some of the characters, known for its giant orchard domes, and therefore the fruits. quite a beautiful place! though that is definitely not its actual name), the "old rosa", (known mostly for its size and its many domes; lots of people live there, and its filled with communal housing - the panelaks, blocks, plattenbau, whatever to call it. Few characters live there! right side of the picture below), the living planet (left side of the picture below; a very important setting in the story. Its an unspecified desert planet, with its only notable construction being an old, long abandoned and very small mining station with a broken dome. It would make it generally unlivable without many costly repairs, if it wasnt for the fact that it naturally has thin but breathable air due to it actually being a starite planet), and, obviously, the earth - similar to ours, but different, the origin of human race, and the planet left behind. Its often talked by spacians in past forms, even though its still alive and there are still people on it (many of them in the character cast as well!); earthians generally tend to recognize each other because of the accent, as space colonies have generally standardized language (think esperanto, or interslavic; a constructed, invented language, typical to the eastern colonies, with little deviations in phonetics; mostly in vocabulary), as well as through one another, as earthians are generally very community-oriented.

Due to the lack of natural plant life, and as a "cultural leftover" from the early days of space colonization, when space travel was still new, scary and extremely hard, people living in space have a different diet from those raised on earth; it mostly consists of various (and i do mean various) pickled foods and dishes made from them, sweet sour and spicy, mushrooms, vegetables like potatoes and beets, and as for meat - mostly pork and poultry.

Some people live on spaceships and space stations instead - either beause of work, lifestyle, or circumstance. Living like this can be a lifelong choice or something temporary, though it is something that requires a lot of work and maintance - i mentioned before that space is "slow and cold", and that coldness factor is an especially dangerous one. Its different from coldness as just a temperature feeling or a state - in the world of space mining, "coldness" is more like an energy, a mass, something more tangible and everpersent, that slowly breaks everything down, including the ships and stations. It feels like it "sinks" into the objects and people, and that coldness takes some getting used to. These space stations are usually pretty well maintained and pretty self sufficient, often being tied to mining industry again, as some on-planet stations arent suitable for living and proper colony creation. Id say the most important characters to the story live on the space ships? Including the main character (space ship below). though that thing is more like... living in the car kind of thing.

Another big and important part of the general culture and life is the "bounty hunting" - as before it predates the fall of the colonies, and exists in two forms, the "centralized" (done by police force) and the independent, individual (done by, well, individuals, and independent bounty hunting groups). Its obviously a political tool, especially with the corruption, though it really can pay well sometimes, and some people do make it their main job. That bounty hunting is an all-universe thing, very much not specific to former eastern colonies. Its generally hard to become a bounty hunter, as it requires a lot of knowledge and work and gear maintance, so the centralized form is much more common. On a similar note - a lot of criminal characters are called "terrorists", even though not all of them have commited actual acts of terrorism. its a political tool again

Well thats a bit long. almost 2k words! hope its all understandable. I tried to keep it to the most interesting/important parts, so there are few things i havent mentioned, especially ones that are less important to the world and more to the story itself. Well either way. peace and love

#ask :)#artwork #space mining: o tragediach kosmicznych poza srebrnym globem

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redcrowncafe · 3 months ago

Text

FANFICTION CHAPTERS IN SHORT

Here you will find a summary of the chapters so far, so there will be spoilers. There may not be all of them so I'll add them from time to time.

Be warned.. spoilers!!!

Chapter 1: Introduction

The chapter begins with Lambert arriving to Camelliatown in a taxi. They are freshly graduated from university and they're moving to a new city to spend some time alone and learn how to be independent on their own, working at a "simpler" job while looking for some more close to their study's field.

Once they clean and fix their new home, after stumbling into a certain three eyed mean cat who told em to fuck off, they start giving their CV to several places. They find Ratau's coffee shop and manage to get hired after Midas quits the cafe after he wins the lottery. Lambert is happy about it even if they find out that mean cat works there and will be their colleague.

When they come back home and look outside the terrace they meet their new neighbor: Ratoo. They think he's similar to someone they've seen, but they don't know it's Ratau's older brother.

Chapter 2: Gerberas for the café

After facing some insecurities due their memories of struggling to fit in back in university, Lambert starts their first day of work at the Red Crown Café. They arrive pretty early and Ratau shows approval, then expresses frustration towards Narinder, revealing he always arrives late and sometimes never shows up, without even warning him beforehand. He hints at some issues the coffee shop had to went through after its best era, but refuses to elaborate, leaving Lambert confused. The sheep then gives him the idea of renovating the workplace aesthetically and they all agree on getting some flowers to decorate the entrance.

Lambert goes to the flower shop to buy the flowers Ratau gave them and they meet the owner, who is Forneus, who also sells handmade things in the same place. In fact Lambert lays their eyes on a green sweater and Forneus decides to keep it aside for them so they can buy it whenever they want.

When Lambert comes back they find Narinder, who is receiving a lecture from Ratau for his being late, and when they show the flowers they bought he acts mean. Things get worse when Narinder spits in the drink that was preparing to a customer and Lambert takes it away from him, pouring its contents in the sink. Angrily, Narinder drags them in the storage room and pims them on the wall, insulting them and what they're doing for the shop, but when Lambert takes a stand he fails to sustain his point when Ratau interrupt them awkwardly.

Lambert gets to know one of Ratau's friends: Klunko, who is silly and kind. He helps them placing the flowers the sheep bought in the vases and leaves a good impression on Lambert. When they come back home, they don't realize someone is watching them.

Chapter 3: Fake cigarettes

Ratau is visiting his brother's house before starting the day of work. He knows Ratoo is depressed and when he doesn't find him in any room, he starts to fear the worse, but thankfully when he checks the terrace he finds he simply fell asleep on a chair outside.

Lambert meets the Fox in the café while Ratau is in the bathroom, and the Fox, after introducing his character with politeness, he starts to insult them without apparent reason while they are preparing their order and they don't find the strenght to fight back. After the Fox leaves Narinder arrives and sees Lambert leaving the coffee shop in tears.

Lambert is crying on a bench not too far from the café, and when they see Narinder reaching them and trying to comfort them in his own special way, by telling them they should never let someone step on their feet just because someone is a customer, they are pretty surprised by it and starts seeing him under a different light.

After Lambert comes back to the café with Narinder and Ratau comfort them too, they get to know the rest of Ratau's friends and they end up playing cards together. Narinder seems to adore Shrumy.

At the end of the day Lambert has a nice conversation with Ratoo, who gives them advices on how to befriend the mean colleague. Anyways, the following day Lambert will visit a new city since Ratau suggested them to take a day off because of the stressful day they had to endure.

Chapter 4: Abandoned Necklace

Ratau wakes up in Shrumy's bed and panics because he remembers what happened the previous night. He finds him in the kitchen and, after Shrumy insists on Ratau staying to his place for the morning, failing, they have a lovely conversation while the turtle prepares his horrible coffee. Ratau starts to feel nostalgic, remembering about how it was to be with him, and when Shrumy notices it he starts to get bitter and kicks him out of his apartment.

When Narinder gets to the café to work, before Ratau arrives, he finds the vases flipped over and the plants are a mess. When the owner arrives and sees what happened he seems shocked, but pretends to not to know what and why it happened, belittling the event and looking suspicious in the eyes of Narinder.

After a calm morning, Lambert visits the nearby city, that is bigger. They get to buy a new dress, even if it isn't the one they wanted to get in the beginning, they visit a park and they find a LGBTQIA+ bookstore café, where they meet Heket, Leshy and Shamura. Lambert doesn't get a good impression of the first two, due Heket's coldness and Leshys nervousness, while they're visibly having a crush on Shamura.

The chapter and with Ratau meeting the Fox for mysterious reasons at night and with Lambert finding a moon necklace on the beach.

Chapter 5: Vanilla Extract

Narinder wakes up from an unpleasant and confusing nightmare featuring Shamura and start their day in a depressing way. When he arrives late at work and Ratau lies him Lambert being already here to make him feel guilty, he explodes and tries to stab him with a soft straw. Meanwhile Lambert is visibly in love because of Shamura and both Narinder and Ratau fear they're high. Lambert works in a very distracting way because of their crush, ending up to pour too much vanilla essence in someone's order.

During the day, Ratau understands Shrumy is trying to avoid him and the only way he manages to get the turtle's full attention is when he mentions the Fox. Meanwhile Narinder manages to manipulate Klunko into telling them why Ratau and Shrumy are having a weird time thanks to reverse psychology, so Klunko tell them about the fact they were a couple once but broke up several years ago due Ratau not telling his parents about his gay boyfriend.

After work Narinder drags Lambert away again, but to tell them about the fact he's sure Ratau is hiding something and that he wants their help to investigate. Lambert agrees but at one condition: to hang out so they could at least get to know each other a bit more. Narinder agrees, and then receives an unpleasant call from his landlord.

Chapter 6: Mushroom pizza

After moments of gender dysphoria, self hatred and ADHD syntomps, Narinder arrives late at the restaurant with Lambert, who forgives him for letting them wait so long. The two get to know the owner of the pizza place, Sozo, who Lambert learns he is now happily married with another man. Meanwhile, Narinder and Lambert seem to have a nice conversation: they joke around, tease each other, but for a reason or another Lambert hit the wrong nerve and manage to piss Narinder off, turning that pleasant, casual dinner into an awkward and depressing one.

When they are going to come back home they see Forneus being cornered and attacked by hooded people who want her money. Narinder is paralyzed from the fear, but when Lambert sees one of them pulling out the knife they vocally intervene, trying to stop them. They manage to distract them and Forneus flees, but this makes the criminals pretty angry and start to chase them and Narinder. During the flight Lambert feels sick, and when Narinder takes a sigh of relief because of the danger they escaped, he sees his friend passing out in front of him.

Lambert wakes up in Narilamb's place, a very small apartment, and that's where they admit they have a congenital heart defect. Narinder tries to convince them to talk about it to Ratau, but they insist on waiting for the right time. The chapter ends with Narinder telling his friend to stay for the night and then he plays the bass in front of Lambert's sparkly eyes.

Chapter 7: Missed calls

Narinder wakes up near Lambert and disapproves the fact they're drooling over his pillow, having one of their sweet dreams featuring a certain person. After the two wake up and talk about the events that took place the previous night, the landlord enters the apartment to talk to Narinder, and suddenly shows disapproval when he sees him with another person, which is against the rules of his rent. He doesn't believe in their story while displaying his bigotry and ableism. When he leaves the two realize they're late for work and go together to the café.

When Narinder and Lambert try to explain what happened to Ratau, he forgives their being late but don't seem to take seriously anything they report, which brush them the wrong way, especially Narinder who is deeply disappointed. Shrumy doesn't approve Ratau's behaviour as well and brings him to the storage room to talk about it. The two have an argument but Shumy learns Ratau doesn't want to minimize what happened and that he simply wants to hide his secrets to protect them, then Shrumy explains that even if Ratau is doing so to keep the workers safe, he's getting the opposite result.

At the end of the day of work, Narinder leaves with an upset expression without even saying bye, which makes Lambert sad, but then Ratau explains them he acts like this because he's scared of rain, in fact it was very cloudy.

Ratau and his friends bring Forneus to the police station, where she reports the aggression of the previous day to the cops. They don't do much about it and she's so unhappy about it that she screams in anger mentioning a certain Delilah. Ratau and his friends are forced to drag her outside to avoid troubles with the police and after they bring her back home, Shrumy comforts Ratau who feels guilty and offers him to sleep in his house that night.

Chapter 8: Baggages

The chapter opens with Kallamar and Leshy interacting behind the counter. Kallamar comments the ugly color combinations worn by some customers, while Leshy replies with more creepy comments directed to him and taking advantage of his hearing impairment to not to repeat the mean things he said to him. Leshy also shows disapproval and frustration when Kallamar talks about removing a star that Narinder drew on the wall before leaving.

When Lambert enters the bookstore cafe Kallamar serves him and introduces himself in a very polite, almost dramatic way, also explaining his disability (hearing) and the ones owned to the other two colleagues. He looks a bit weird, but leaves a good impression on Lambert. When the sheep sees Shamura and they don't seem to recognize them they feel horribly embarassed, but then that's how they learn about their friend's memory impairment. The two happily chat again and Shamura lets Lambert give them their phone number, that is also secretly taken by Kallamar.

The following day, on Monday, Narinder manages to get to work on time, but he's particularly tired and silent. During their day of work anyways, Lambert catches Narinder being bullied by the same woman he tried to give her that drink in which he spitted during the first day of Lambert's work. She reveals to be transphobic towards him and it turns out that wasn't the first time she was verbally attacking him. So Lambert defends their friend and kicks the mean customer outside the café, surprising Narinder.

Once the day of work is over, Lambert meets Forneus again, who thanks them for the help they gave her when she was being attacked by those criminals and, as a gift, she gives them the sweater that kept aside specifically for them. Then, when they're about to come back home with the new sweater, they see Narinder being dramatically kicked out by the landlord because of his inability to pay the rent for more than one month. Lambert tries to comfort their colleague and convinces him to sleep in their home until he finds a new sistemation.

Chapter 9: Guns

Lambert welcomes Narinder in their home and he seems to be happy to not have to sleep in the streets. Anyways, he definitely changes attitude when he finds there is only one double bed and decides to sleep on the sofa, even if this one is terribly uncomfortable. Narinder also opens up about his mental health issues linked to depression before they go to sleep.

The following day Narinder punches Lambert in the face while he's sleeping because he doesn't want to be waken up, and after eating breakfast the cat finds Ratau talking at the phone, talking about someone meeting mysterious. The two manage to hear the whole thing and to not get caught by Ratau, then they decide to follow him after work to see what is he really hiding.

When the moment arrives, the two struggle to follow Ratau because of the not functioning street lights and Narinder seems to be concerned with his physical state. Anyways they finally find Ratau and they see him courageously facing the same Fox that insulted Lambert days ago. He lends him a empty envelope telling him he won't give him any more money, and the Fox starts to punch him in front of the two scared colleagues who get caught by Klunko and Flinky, who were here too. After the Fox tells Ratau he's not going to kill him, but attack the people he cares about just to see him suffer, Shrumy appears and immobilizes the criminal. Anyways, he finds himself surrounded by his sidekicks he finds himself forced to leave him go. When the evil guys leave Ratau invites everyone to his house so he can finally give Narinder and Lambert the explanations they deserve.

Chapter 10: Cracks

Once they all get to Ratau's house, Flinky starts medicating his wounds while he explains how he started to pay the Fox many years ago to protect his café because of issues and troubles unknown people caused. He is aware about the fact it was a mistake and he regrets it everyday.

After said explanation, Lambert sees Narinder looking at the raindrops on the windows with a tense expression, this is where Narinder expresses his illogical yet intense repulsion for rain. He gets melancholic and Lambert fails to comfort him.

The same night Shrumy and Ratau sleep in the same bed and they almost kiss, but Ratau steps back because he hates the Shrumy keeps being romantic with him even if he stated pretty clearly he doesn't want to be in a romantic relationship with him anymore.

The following day Forneus and her kits show up at the cafe, and when Baal sees Shrumy, recognizing him for mysterious reasons, he flees, leaving everyone confused but the turtle, who is feeling suspicious about it. When Narinder tries to serve the two customers he suddenly feels unwell and finds himself unable to move because of the tension. Lambert fears he's having a heart attack, but then it turns out Narinder suffers from panic attacks and that one of those was happening right now. Ratau and Kudaai, who is a doctor, manage to support Narinder, who is brought to Lambert's home after the attack.

At the end of that difficult day of work Lambert apparently receives a message by Shamura, but they don't know the person who is texting them pretending to be the spider is, instead, Kallamar.

Chapter 11: Masks

When Lambert arrives home, they find Shrumy entertaining Narinder with the bass and when they leave them alone, Lambert asks him how he feels. After expressing the fact they will do anything to help them in case another panic attack occurs, they gift him the moon necklace they found on the beach, telling him it's magical and brings luck. Narinder of course doesn't believe them but still apprecciates the gift.

This time Lambert lets Narinder sleep on the bed while they will sleep on the sofa instead, surprising their friend. Lambert struggles to sleep that night and they end up chatting with "Shamura", managing to get a date with "them".

The following day, while Narinder stays home, Lambert goes to work and gets to see Sozo and his husband, Helob, enter the café. They express how much they love each other publicly and Lambert feels inspired, wishing to be in such a cute and lasting relationship in the future.

The chapters end with another victim of the criminals who gets beaten after he explains why he can't give them the money. One of the goons runs away from the scene and, removing their mask once he's away, he reveals his tears. He is Baal.

Chapter 12: Comics or books

Baal comes back home pretty late and has a heartbreaking argument with his mother, who begs Aym to let her know whatever is going on with his brother once he finds out.

Lambert finds Narinder's secret: he keeps a gay comic and they decide to read it out loud to tease him. Once they're done Narinder ask them to give him some secret as well and that's how they give him an album filled with photos, the most embarassing ones as well. He starts to feel melancholic and pretty jealous because Lambert still has a family, but when a half burned photograph portraying Lambert and a lion person distract him, they explain that is their ex-boyfriend and that they left them because nonbinary. Narinder of course comforts his friend telling all those muscles and hair compensate for something else. When he suggests them to burn or destroy that photo to get rid of him on a deeper level, Lambert says they will think about it.

The day of the date finally arrives, Lambert waits for their date for almost a hour and when they see Kallamar arrive instead of Shamura they feel confused. Heartbroken even, when Kallamar says Shamura simply forgot about the date. The squid almost convinces Lambert to hang out with him instead when Heket and Shamura arrive on the spot and this is how they all find out Kallamar was pretending to be Shamura just to go on a date with Lambert instead. Heket drags him back to the bookstore café where he left Leshy working all alone while Shamura decides to hang out with Lambert.

Lambert spends a beautiful day with Shamura, buying books and comics for the bookstore, eating dinner together and they end up stargazing. Lambert is completely enamoured with Shamura, even if they don't understand their yapping about astronomy and physics, but then they found they spent too much talking and lost track of time. In fact, it is too late for Lambert to get the bus or the train and go back home, so Shamura suggests them to sleep in their home as a solution. Of course, Lambert accepts their offer, not realizing Narinder had been calling them for a long while due the late hour and them not showing up at home.

Chapter 13 - Pancakes and apologies

When Lambert arrives in Shamura's house they realize Narinder has called them several times because they planned to dine together and he was also worried because of their disappearance. After apologizing and reassuring him they're fine, they find Shamura live with the people they work with, Lambert even meets Kallamar who suggests them to sleep in his beautiful room because of a more comfortable bed, proposal that was kindly denied by the sheep before Heket dragged him away. That night Lambert sleeped in the guest room then than was revealed to be a room that belonged to a friend Shamura really misses and disappeared years before.

After sleeping and having a nightmare about being lost in a maze that looked just like Camellia Town and being eaten by the Fox, Lambert wakes up and hears someone playing the guitar. After they investigate on the sound they find Leshy and a yellow cat on his bed while he's playing the guitar for her. During breakfast the yellow cat reveals to be Felix, a friend Leshy never spoke about to the people he lived with and she leaves overall a good impression on everyone, aside Kallamar who finds her a bit gross.

After exchanging music playlists with Leshy and Felix, Heket invites Lambert for a Halloween party, and when they come back home to invite his friend Narinder he is just too offended by the carelessness Lambert showed the previous day to accept the invitation.

The day comes to an end as Felix brings Leshy back home after a karaoke night. She encourages him to practice his singing to get better and offers herself as a singing teacher since Leshy is already giving her guitar lessons and he gladly accepts the proposal even though he isn't convinced about the singing. She greets him with a kiss on the cheek before going back home, leaving Leshy embarassed and confused, snd that's when Kallamar intervenes saying that it's obvious that Leshy and Felix have a crush on each other, but when he denies Kallamar's insinuation he proceeds to say pretty aphobic things. Heket and Shamura interrupt the discussion before it devolves and Leshy flees locking himself in his room.

Chapter 14 - True Colors

The chapter continues where it was interrupted in the previous one: Leshy is inside his room after having an argument with Kallamar and Heket comes in to check how he's doing, communicating with him with a text to speech option on her phone. Leshy opens up about how Kallamar made him feel, but doesn't mention his doubt for what he feels for Felix.

As Halloween approached Narinder mantained a cold and detatched behavior towards Lambert, who felt a bit too awkward about it to try and actually speak about it with him. Anyways, after they dressed up as a vampire to go to the party, they find Narinder crying inconsolably in the bed. Lambert manages to let him open up for the first time and this is when he finally drops his lore trauma: turns out that he was kicked out from his biological family because he is transgender when he was 18 yo, that he was helped by a older friend who hired him at their bookstore café and that he accidentally caused his death in a car crash he fleed away from out of panic. In the beginning Lambert is disgusted by the latest revelation, but after seeing in much pain and shame he was because of the burden he has on his conscience they feels sympathy and comforts him, deciding to give up the party and stay with him that night so that he won't be alone.

Meanwhile, at the Halloween party, as Kallamar despairs after learning Lambert won't join the party, Leshy and Felix are chatting on the terrace. When Leshy explains her what is aromanticism and asexuality she expresses how much she finds that relatable, even though she doesn't think she's ace. Then she mentions the fact that probably the blame falls on someone who ruined her relationship with intimacy, and when he jokingly says it's because romance sucks, she clarifies that the person who ruined that for her wasn't a romantic partner, leading to an ominous change of mood.

Chapter 15 - Clauneck

When Narinder and Lambert wake up they get prepared to go to an autumnal fair in town, while at the same time Narinder finds the courage to remove a gacha game from his phone. The same morning Clauneck, who is getting prepared to go the same fair but as tarot reader, gets called by Kallamar, his most annoying customer who asks him for the upteenth future love tarot reading.

Narinder and Lambert spend a beautiful morning in the town when at the fair they see Clauneck for the first time, while hes having a fight with another seller who tried to sell a sick woman rocks to heal her cancer. They get a tarot reading from him that reveals the challenges and transformation they will have to face in the future.

Leshy dreams about kissing Felix and wakes up with a flower growing on his face.

Chapter 16 - Blooming flowers

This chapters begins with a flashback of a younger Leshy having his first flower growing on his face and his parents explaining that his body just started to change and telling him where do babies come from. Rest in pieces Leshy.

The current Leshy refuses to give any explanation to his roommates, who ifnore his refusal and check an anatomy book with him, unveiling the reason of Leshy's physical change: basically wormfolks like him bloom pink flowers in spring to signal their most fertile moment in the year, while when they bloom red flowers in any season it means they are in love. Anyways, Leshy seems to have a "Blooming syndrome" that occurs when a wormfolk refuses to admit their feelings for another person. If he won't admit his feelings for Felix it won't be fatal, but he will keep growing flowers non stop. He doesn't take it well.

The day of an important date with Shamura came for Lambert, but they couldn't stop thinking about their ex, so Narinder helps them burning the photo in the storage room, comforting them. After such bittersweet, touching moment Chad (Lambert's ex) enters the cafe and starts flirting with Narinder in a transphobic way. Narinder finds himself powerless and Lambert helps him by pouring boiling coffee on Chad's balls, who is also kicked out from Shrumy. When Lambert has to leave for the date, Narinder feels jealous while not knowing why, but in the end he wholeheartedly wishes them good luck, because he wants them to be happy.

Chapter 17 - Heartache

After spending a beautiful date with Shamura, Lambert finally finds the courage to confess their feelings when they're stargazing with the telescope on the roof, confession that ends up with a polite friendzone under the most romantic sky. Lambert's feelings are hurt but decides to not to take it personally and stay friends with Shamura.

When Lambert comes back in Camelliatown they witness the Fox's goons bringing cans of gas to their cafe to set it on fire, but thankfully Shrumy, who was there, knocks them out and Ratau, Klunko, Flinky and Narinder arrive on spot. The Fox and Helob appear too, and this one is revealed to work for the boss. The two criminals pretend to leave the group alone but, while they're in the car, the Fox tells Helob to shoot at one of the two coworkers, not to kill them, but to seriously damaging them. Helob is reluctant and refuses to do such thing, but the Fox physically forces him to do so and ends up shooting at Lambert's arm.

Everyone is in shock as they see Lambert collapsing on the ground and having a hemorrhage even though the bullet caused just a scrap, which confuses everyone aside Narinder, who knows that the bleeding is caused by the pills Lambert is taking for their heart condition. Ratau yells at Narinder for never telling him about their condition and him, Narinder and Shrumy, bring the wounded sheep at the hospital. When they arrive Ratau and Narinder have a confrontation in which the cat shares his feelings of guilt because of what happened and his fear of losing Lambert forever, Ratau reassures him and expresses he never hated him but felt sad because of how Narinder wasted his potential and hide his best qualities.

After that lovely conversation, the doctor tells them that Lambert is no longer in danger but that they will need to rest for some week at the hospital. Ratau goes in the hospital's garden to refer everything to the Klunko and Shrumy reaches him. When Ratau shares with him the profound guilt he feels and how he wishes to be more like him, Shrumy admitted he isn't strong and brave as he looks amd that he was scared that night, maybe even more than him. Then, they kiss passionately.

The following day Lambert wakes up in their hospital bed, with Narinder at their side. He brought flowers for his friends and they chat about everything that happened, including that disappointing date and the old men yaoi that Narinder silently witnessed last night. During the rest of the day Narinder doesn't feel hungry at all and when he comes back home and realizes he miss having Lambert sleeping next to him, he finally understand that he loves them.

Chapter 18 - Complications

The chapter starts with Sozo kicking Helob out of their house, throwing objects, clothes, and baggages from the balcony. Helob is visibly sorry about what happened, but of course it isn't enough to be forgiven by his husband. Meanwhile, as they pass Lambert finally heals and decides to write a fanfiction about Shrumy and Ratau.

One day at the red crown cafe, Narinder catches Lambert laughing at the fanfiction they wrote and shows disapproval, but he really can't get mad so they start lovingly teasing each other. Narinder then reveals to Lambert that he wants to face his fear of rain and asks them for help and of course, the sheep accept.

When Lambert has to leave the coffee shop to buy some ingredients, they meet Kallamar and find out he specifically came there to meet them without any warning. Lambert tries to avoid him politely but due his stubborness they explode and tell him how they dislike his disrespectful behavior. Kallamar unpromptedly asks them for their star sign and when Lambert reveals to be an aries, the squid rejects them and leaves.

Felix finally visits Leshy at home woth the purpose of explaining what she was talking about during Halloween. She tells him that she once was part of s group friends and that there was a member of her friends that confessed her feelings for her but after some days she rejected him, he forced her to kiss him, probably taking advantage of the fact she could be drunk, and she broke his nose with a punch as reply. Because of that her entire group of friends despised her and left her lonely. Leshy showed his closeness and sympathy to her after the revelation, and in those moments he realizes he's feeling both romantically and physically attracted to her, while she's telling him beautiful things. He tries to kiss her but decides to step back and hug her instead, profoundly disappointing his friend.

Chapter 19 - Gentle Rain

Leshy finds himself having an argument with Kallamar as soon as he wakes up: the squids accuses him of self sabotaging himself and that he can't stand seeing him losing his chance to be in a romantic relationship while he's still single at 29. Leshy refuses to listen to any of his advices and after he finds Kallamar has peeked in his room the previous night and saw his failure, he kicks him out of his room.

After Shrumy and Ratau finally admit in front of their friends that they're putting the past aside and trying to see if their romantic relationship can work out, Felix shows up at the café and asks Lambert and Narinder loves advices since the person she likes keeps driving her crazy. After Lambert encourages her to just be herself and follow her heart. In all of this Leshy's name was never mentioned, but Narinder already has a guess.

After work Narinder and Lambert go for a walk and once they're in the beach, the cat opens up and explains how he think his fear of rain probably started when he ended up being homeless under the car crash and about the fact he tried to rob Ratau's café with a visibly fake gun just to burst into tears in front of him after he asked him if he was okay. Lambert learns that Ratau hired Narinder out of sympathy and because he wanted to help him. After this revelation it starts raining and Lambert sustains and encourages Narinder to help him overcome his fear. When the cat is finally calmed down Lambert decides to kiss him for the first time, and the two end up confessing their feelings and romantically kissing under the rain.

Chapter 20 - Love Potion

After the Fox gives Helob new fake documents and a new home to avoid any more suspect, Narinder and Lambert wake up on the sofa and shows each other a lot of affection.

That afternoon, anyways, Felix finishes her shift at the tattoo store, after tattooing a beautiful moth on Heket's chest. Kallamar was there as well and decides to bring Felix to the shop where Clauneck works, so that he can buy her a love tarot reading, but when they arrive they find Chenmach instead, who gives Felix a love potion. As soon as she leaves the shop she throws it away, explaining to a shocked Kallamar that it is unfair to force someone to love her.

After she finally arrives to the cafe to go to the karaoke with Leshy, Kallamar locks them inside the workplace, where they are condamned to spend the entire night there. They have a pleasant night and after chatting, joking, singing and talking about deep stuff, Felix finds the courage to kiss him. After such action she fears she disturbed her friend ruining their beautiful friendship, but that is when Leshy kisses her with even more passion, and this is how they spend the rest of the night. The following morning, anyways, Leshy feels scared because of how things quickly developed and starts to have regrets.

Meanwhile, the Fox has a talk with Baal, who started to neglect and hate his job especially since he learned his mother was assaulted by the same people he works with. The Fox tells him he will help Forneus' job to flourish, but if he decides to leave his role his entire family will have to pay.

Chapter 21 - Petals in the sink

The following morning Ratau goes to visit his older brother, who is struggling with severe depression, and after he cleans his neglected home he promises him he won't leave him alone during wintermas holidays, that he likes it or not.

Later, in the café, the gambling gang notice how Narinder and Lambert are all cuddly and shit and they're happy about it. Forneus shows up with both of her kits and Baal decides to pay for all his family, while Shrumy still feels suspicious about him.

Meanwhile, the same morning Leshy tries to leave the café in which he woke up without telling anything to Felix, who quickly reaches him and hugs him. Leshy, heartbroken, tells her that while he enjoyed that night with her, he can't stop thinking it was a mistake, and that he wants to stay friends with her. She reacts by getting angry and accusing him of using her, telling him he is a coward and he reacts by saying that while no one can force Felix to love her, the same applies to everyone else him included. Felix feels offended and leaves, even after Leshy tried to hold her back, almost feeling drawn to kiss her again. When he goes to the toilet he notices all the flowers that grew on his head fell off.

Narinder receives a call from Ratau while he's watching a horror movie with Lambert and the old rat invites them for wintermas eve dinner, invitation that they gladly accept. Lambert also invites Narinder to their family's wintermas lunch and, after being a bit reluctant and insecure, he accepts.

Leshy comes back home in a horrible mood and when he's listening to the old recordings about him and Narinder playing their guitar and bass together, he feels incredibly lonely and regretful, crying his heart out all alone in his room.

Chapter 22 - Karaoke

After some days Lambert brings Narinder to dine out for his 28th birthday at the pizza place ran by Sozo. There they also check on him and turns out he's devasted by the revelation of his ex partner being part of the local mafia. He also feels very guilty for not realizing sooner and for what happened to Lambert.

Meanwhile Felix is dining with her parents and she's struggling to eat vegetables, in that case broccoli, because they remind her of Leshy. Since her parents want to force her to eat broccoli before eating anything else, she decides to go in her room with an empty stomach.

Narinder and Lambert go back home and they give him a frame with their photograph as birthday gift. The sheep feel a bit ashamed because they wanted to give him something more, but the cat reassure them that they are all he could've hoped for his birthday.

Felix is hungry and empties her fridge because she hadn't eat anything for dinner. Also, she's still stressed and heartbroken because of what happened with Leshy and she eats unhealthy food to distract herself from the pain. Anyways, since she knows this can bring serious issues on the long run, she decides to stop and to call her friends Narinder and Lambert to vent. They listen to her and when she invites them to go out the next evening, Lambert accepts.

That same night Shrumy brings a drunk Ratau home, and when they're in the car the rat vents about how guilty he feels because of Ratoo's psychological state. Turns out that Ratau feels responsible of his brother's dead wife since the Fox's goons set fire on their home while she was sleeping inside.

The next evening arrives and after their day of work, Narinder and Lambert meet Felix, who introduce them to her friends Amdusias, Valefar and Barbatos. They all go to a pub specialized in karaoke and they get their own room, there turns out Felix's friends know Leshy and that he's part of their friend group, and when the yellow cat vents about what happened they all decode to stand on her side. Anyways this is when Narinder gets the confirmation that both Felix and Lambert know Leshy and he's genuinely scared.

#red crown cafe au #cult of the lamb #cotl coffee shop au #coffee shop au #cotl

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thehorrorsoftheblackbunnymask · 11 months ago

Text

Paid Internship (Part 1)(Prison AU)

Author's Note: This is a Prison AU that the viewers of my blog seem to be pretty fond of. The main focuses for the romance parts will differ depending on the part, but for part 1, it's Liu, Jeff, and Toby. The reader is gender neutral and uses She/He stuff, but sometimes depending on what's going on I'll use stuff like Tits. Also, Sully will be in the fic, but I won't use his name. Pay attention to how Liu talks, they will be major differences between his first meeting and his interview.

Author's Note 2: This is definitely one of my longest and most plot heavy fics on my account. I do plan for this to be multi parter, so this part will be heavy on introducing the characters. This part will have some yandere moments, but they will be mostly prominent in part two. If you wanna be tagged for part two, leave a comment, or reblog.

Summary: Welcome to your paid internship at Roosevelt Federal Prison. After being seen for your potential and skills by your instructor at the Academy, he decided to give you opportunity of working in the US' most dangerous prison despite the disapproval and rejection from the higher ups. However, due to miscommunication and faulty paperwork, you're gonna up working with some of America's most danger serial killers for the semester.

Warnings: Descriptions of crimes, Rape Mentioned, Perversion, Manipulation, Gaslighting, Gore, Sadism, Violence, Implied Nudity, Kidnapping, Implied Abuse, Hostages, Death, Murder, Threats, Mood Swings, Sexual Abuse Implied, PTSD, Mental Illness, Dealings, Attempted Murder, Survivor's Guilt,Cursing, Sleep Deprived Workers, Stress, Agression, and More. This AU is not fo the faint of heart.

Word count: 13.5k

Links: {Masterlist} {Prison AU Introduction}

"Hey kid, you ready?"

You were taken out of your train of thought by your instructor and mentor, Officer Joseph Gibbons. Joseph was a man in his 50's, his once hazelnut hair now started to fade into a light grey, he was a man on the heavier side, plump like a mall santa clause, and despite his uniform being quite clean, it was covered in the smell of cigarettes and men's colone.

"...Not really. Are you sure I'm ready for this?" You asked, fiddling with the sleeves of your uniform.

"Ready? Out of the students at the Academy your the most ready for this. Any other Prison just wouldn't do you any good."

"Any go-"

"And we're here!" Joseph exclaimed, cutting you off mid sentence as he walked out.

You took a deep breath before walking out of the car. When you stepped out, you were greeted with heavy rain and loud thunder. As you looked up at the Prison, you felt a sense of fear hit you. It was like something straight out of a horror movie. The Prison was massive, you could probably see it from miles away if not further. Various plants were taking over the brick and metal walls, you could see officers walking around with flashlights, making sure nobody was trying to get in or out, two large guard outpost stood high on each side of the building, each of them blasting a bright light, and a large metal barbwired gate keeping whatever was inside from getting out.

"Joseph!" A voice yelled from the distance, causing the two of you to shoot your heads in the direction of the noise.

Whoever the voice belonged to, they were running towards the two of you pretty fast, waving their arms around like a lunatic.

"Esther, my dear friend. How the kids?" Joseph asked with a smile as he hugged the man.

Now that the man was closer, you got a better look at him. He had short red hair, a face full of a freckles, a small beard slowly starting grow in, and he was definitely younger than your mentor. He was maybe in his late 30's, early to mid 40's. He was in well shape too, his biceps peeking through the gaurd uniform he wore. He had a pistol, taser, and handcuffs strapped to his waist band on the right side of his body, meaning he was most likely right handed.

During your first year at the Academy, you were taught to see every single detail in a suspect or in a scene, no matter how small or big it was, and now you found yourself doing it like it was second nature at this point.

"They're good, they're good. Havent seen them for a while though, I've been stuck here all week! Now, where's this prodigy you've been pushing for?"

"Esther, meet Y/N L/N. Y/N, this is Officer Esther Wibbsy, I met when I first worked here. He's gonna be watching over you during this whole thing."

"Nice to meet ya, L/N," Esther said, sticking his hand out.

You shook his hand with a nervous smile, unconsciously gripping his hand hard in an attempt of letting out your nervousness.

"Dang, nice grip," He said, pulling his hand back.

"Thanks..."

As you pulled your hand back and wipped your sweat on the pants of your uniform, Joseph started to slowly walk back to the car.

"Your shift ends at 10AM tomorrow, you got this, kid! Remember everything I taught you and you'll be fine."

And as Joseph closed the door of the car and drove off, your only hope of backing out left with him.

"Don't worry, you're not going to be working with the actual dangerous ones."

"I'm not?"

"Walk and talk with me, I'll explain everything on the way."

You let out the biggest sigh of relief before following Esther.

"Roosevelt is divided into two sections. The section you're going to be working in is the normal prisoners. They're still extremely dangerous, but they're a lot more manageable then the others."

"The others?"

"The other section is what give Roosevelt it's reputation. You see, Roosevelt doesn't hold only people, we hold monsters, demons, supernatural beings that we didn't even know existed until we caught them. They're in the other section. The goverment put them here because they don't know what to do with them."

"Woah, so, how do you know I won't run into them?"

"That's the thing, I don't really know. To be honest with you, I think the only reason most of them are still here is by their own choice. Most of them are on death row, and if they really wanted to they can leave, especially Ben."

"Ben?"

"Huh? No I was just rambling..."

As the two got closer to the main gate, something caught Esther’s eyes.

"You see that random brick wall," Esther said, pointing to a wall that stood in the middle of the courtyard, starting from the building all the way until it hit the gate. From the angle you were at, you could just barely see a roof.

"Mhm."

"They're behind that wall. That entire half is their section. Most of the officers who work in that part have been trained specifically to work there and nowhere else."

You felt chills go down your spine as you stared at the wall. Something about it gave off a terrible aura.

"Who's staying in that part..."

"Have you heard of Jeffery Woods?"

"Yeah, Jeff the Killer? Slit mouth?"

"Yeah. That guy, is in that part."

"He's real? I thought he was just some urban legend from when I was a kid. His face was everywhere."

"Nope, he's real, and he's in there. Those pictures aren't what he actually looks like though, he's not that ugly. However, people like him are the reason why you're working in my part, it's a lot safer."

And as those words left his mouth, the two of you stood at the gate entrance. You and Esther walked up to the booth where a lady stood there with a tired, blank expression.

"Who's that?" She asked.

"The intern from Gullermary Academy. Joseph's student."

"Oh... Proceed."

Esther nodded as he opened the metal door and allowed you to walk in first. As you walked in, you were greeted with loud screams and banging from all directions.

"You'll get used to that," Esther said as he walked past you. "Wait in my office, I gotta go get your file from the boss." He then pointed to the door that had Officer Wibbsy written on a metal plate. "You can take any of the snacks, get comfortable because this might take a while."

"OK, thank you," You said, smiling.

Esther merely gave you a soft smile before walking off. Once he was out of view, you opened the door to his office and looked around. On his desk, you saw a picture of a woman smiling. She had freckles with long blonde hair. When you picked up the picture, you saw a date at the bottom.

"September 17, 2017," You read.

Was the woman dead? Or was it the date the photo was taken? Either way, it really wasn't your business. As you sat the picture back down, next to it was a picture of Esther with the woman in the photo next to him. The woman was wearing a white gown while Esther wore a suit, and in his arms was a baby girl wearing a little white dress and next to him was a little boy in a suit as well. Looking up, you saw his diploma in Criminal Justice and next to it was his certificate from the academy.

After taking a look, you plopped down on the chair and stared up at the ceiling. You weren't exactly sure what this internship had in store for you. When Joseph brought it up to you last semester, he kept it very vague. He'd often dismiss your questions and cut you off when you pushed it. You weren't suspicious however, since he was always like this when he tought you during your first year.

You wondered on what kind of prisoners you'll meet. Will you meet someone who was falsely accused and now is paying the price? Maybe you'll meet someone who has been in and out of jail and now is here. Due to your young curiosity, your mind just kept on racing with ideas. But suddenly, your phone began to ring.

Looking down, you saw the words "Mom's calling..." on your phone.

"Hello?" You asked.

"Hi sweetie, how are you?'

"I'm alright. I'm just waiting for my observer to come back with my stuff."

"Oh honey, I'm so proud of you! But, be careful, alright? I don't want anything happening to you."

"I will, mom, I will. You know how good I am."

"I know, I just don't want anything happening to my little girl/boy."

"I know. But, how are you doing mom?"

"I'm doing alright. Me and your father plan on taking a trip to Florida in the spring."

"That's great! Enjoying retirement I see," You said in a teasing tone, earning a giggle from your mother.

"WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN?! THIS IS NOT WHAT HE SIGNED!" A voice suddenly yelled, overpowering the screams of the inmates.

"What was that?" Your mother asked, worried.

You stayed silent as you tried to listen to what was going on.

"I'll call you back, mom," You said, before hanging up.

You slowly walked out the room and looked down the narrow hallway, holding onto your gun tightly as you did.

"I'm telling you for the last time, this is what Joseph signed, his signature is right here."

"That is not what he fucking told me. I know damn well he's not stupid enough to put some barley experienced 24 year old in a room with this country's most dangerous criminals. As their observer, I can't allow this!"

You felt your heart stop when you heard those words come out from Esther's mouth. Despite your wonky confidence in your abilities, you were far from naive. You were not ready for this.

"Look, I'm just as unhappy about this as you are, Joseph is fucking stupid for signing this, but legally there's nothing we can do."

"I already told them that they were going to be fine, I won't even be able to observe them! Who's going to even teach them shit?!"

"I don't know, Wibbsy, I don't know. I can call Joseph and ask him what he wants up to do, but for tonight, they're working in the Creeps section, whether you like it or not."

Esther pulled at his hair and he looked at his boss with rage.

"If that kid dies because of this, I'm fucking done with this place, you hear me?"

"I hear."

When Esther walked out of the room, he was greeted by your shocked, frozen figure at the end of the hallway.

"You heard it, didn't you?"

"Y-Yeah..."

"Just... Shit... Take this and just, go straight down that hallway, and they'll take you from there."

"Uh...Ok. I'll see you later," You said nervously as you took your file and walked off.

Esther stared at you as you walked off, feeling a sense of guilt and responsibility consume him like water.

"Please don't die..."

The hallway to the other side was extremely narrow and costraphobic, you could feel the walls press up on you as your walked. One thing about the entire journey that disturbed you wasn't the leaking walls or the filthy floors, but it was the silence. Compared to the other section that was booming with noise, the closer you got to the second half, the quieter it got. You could only hear little whispers from behind the walls, but they were so quiet that you couldn't make out a word. The hallway was dark, dirty, and wet. You assumed that the rain from the storm has leaked through the walls and onto you. You could see roaches and even saw a rat run past you. You wanted to throw up. It was as if this place was abandoned.

When you got to the end of the hall, there was large metal door. There was no card scanner, or even a person standing in a booth.

"Hello? Hello?" You said, knocking on the door.

Suddenly, the door creaked open, and a short lady started at you with wide eyes.

You could only see the woman's head, but she looked as if she was held hostage for years. Her eyes were wide, as if she had been traumatized, her hair was a mess, her officer cap was barely covering her head, and her face seemed to be bruised.

"...Name..." The woman said, staring into your eyes.

"Y/N L/N. I'm the intern."

And before you could blink, you were grabbed and forced into the horrors that awaited you.

The lobby section was bright and white, similar to a hospital. However, there was no cameras, or an officer sitting behind the glass with a computer.

There was a metal door that stood in front of you, keeping from whatever was on the other side from getting out. Ingraved into the door were the words "Inmate Quaters."

"Let me see your file," The woman said shakily, taking the file from your hands.

"Um, are you OK, ma'am?"

"Me? Oh...I'm alright, I didn't get the worse of it."

"WE NEED SECURITY PERSONAL IN SOLITARY CONFINEMENT, BEN'S CELL 001 IMMEDIATELY, I REPEAT, WE NEED SECURITY PERSONAL IN SOLITARY CONFINEMENT, BEN'S CELL 001 IMMEDIATELY!" The woman's walkie blasted as she read your file.

Suddenly, a large group of men ran past the two of you, carrying guns and covered in riot gear.

"Um...Ma'am?"

"Hm?" The woman responded, not taking her eyes off your file.

"Who's Ben?"

"If you're not working on his case I can't tell you anything, sorry."

"Oh...Ok."

"Huh...The Woods... Rogers... Otis... Wright... Thomas... This... no, this can't be right. Are they fucking stupid?" The woman asked, looking up at you.

"I don't know, maybe?"

"OK, It's fine, it's fine! Who's on the roster for today... Rogers... Jeffery... Liu... At least you got Liu... Ok, follow me."

The woman walked towards the door that had "Inmate Quaters" written on it, beckoning you to follow her.

"Have you gone through your file?"

"No, I've only been for forty minutes..."

"Here, read it. Read the first three for now, the others you'll be working on at a later date."

Once the lady handed you your file, you started to read through it as the two of you made your way to the cells.

The file was the one of a picture of a man with pale skin, greasy black hair, a slitted mouth, and a crazed smile. He was a picture of his mugshot, eyes bloodshot with a large shit eating grin.

"Jeffery Woods. A man in his early 30s, arrested for multiple accounts of serial Murder, Mutilation, Kidnapping, Torture, Stalking, Vandalism, Arson, Breaking and entering, Parricide, Drug use and rape. He has the reputation of assaulting, mocking, teasing and harassing guards. Jeff is often in solitary confinement, but that doesn't stop him from his usual actions. Has to be kept away from Jane Elizabeth Arkensaw due to them activity starting fights. He is deemed one of the deadliest prisoners in our institution. During your internship, he will be one of the prisoners you'll be interacting to help sharpen your skills. He will by far be one of if not the hardest to interrogate. His case is still under investigation..."

You read the words on the paper with disgust. His smile, so deranged, so sadistic, as if he was talking a school picture, ignoring the lives of those he's ruined or taken.

"Be careful with Jeff, he likes pretty ones," The woman commented as you read.

"Wait, I have a question."

"Ask it."

"Will be looking into their case? Like, will I be doing interviews and looking at evidence?"

"Well, I'm not sure about evidence, their cases are gruesome, and the transcripts of victims' families interviews and the interviews of victims who survived are not pretty... However, I know you will be interviewing some of them, like The Woods and Rogers. Now keep reading, we're most there."

You nodded as you moved Jeff's paper to end and looked at the next one. The image was the one of a man with stitches. He had a blank tired expression in his mugshot, not sad or sadistic, but one of bordem. He had brown hair with bright green eyes, and just like Jeffery, he was pretty pale.

"Liu Woods, also known as Homicidal Liu. A man in early to mid 20s, arrested for Serial murder, stalking, kidnapping, robbery, breaking and entering, assault, and vandalism. Currently serving a a sentence of 50 years but has a chance of parole once he serves 20. Liu is the little brother of Jeffery Woods, and after Jeffery almost murdered him, he developed an alter ego named Sully. Lui is is relatively quiet, observant, possessive and violent. But his violence gets worse when he's Sully. Lui normally doesn't harm guards or prisoners unless provocted, but he has attacked them with no apparent reason on multiple accounts. Liu is one of the prisoners you will be seeing often due to you working mostly in his section of the prison, where most of the pastas are such of Eyeless Jack and Toby. Warning when dealing with Liu, watch your words and actions, DO NOT touch anything of his unless it's a danger to him or others, and don't ask him too much about his past due to it being his biggest trigger in becoming Sully. If you're dealing Sully, be extremely careful, don't make sudden moves and don't anger him. Sully is extremely violent, sadistic but oddly childish. Sully is supposedly a seven year old according to both himself and Liu, so treat him as an extremely dangerous child."

You stared at Liu's image for a few moments after reading the report. Him and Jeff barely looked the related besides in the eye shape and skin color. With mugshots alone, you felt as if your experience with the two brothers will be drastically different.

"Do you have any advice on Liu?" You asked to woman.

"No. He isn't too bad, just really, really quiet. But when he does talk, he's very charming. He's a man of few words."

You nodded in response as you placed Liu's file in the back and looked down at the last one. It was a picture of a man, messy brown hair, the right side of his cheek was missing, revealing his teeth and gums, his eyes held heavy bags as if he hadn't sleep for days, and his neck and hands were covered in bandages. His expression was a pretty tired one, his eyes were droopy as he stared into the camera, some of his hair covering his face as he looked.

"Tobias Erin Rogers. A man in his late 20s arrested for Serial murder, Torture, Vandalism, Arson, Stalking, Patricide, Breaking and Entering, Kidnapping, and suspected of multiple accounts of sexual assault but is yet to be confirmed. Currently sentenced to life in jail with possibility of parole after serving a minimum of 30 years. He suffers a handful of disorders and quite often causes trouble for both staff and other inmates. He struggled with controlling his emotions and his impulsive behavior which often leads to himself, inmates and staff to be harmed. Despite this, you will be interacting with him during your internship due to him being able to get a long with staff for a short period of time if he finds them "hot." Warnings, don't get too attached, don't believe most of the things he says, don't give or take anything from him, and don't let his suffering fool you. He has a history of using his suffering against others and actually led to him escaping when he was first sent here when he was 19, and they didn't capture him again until last year when he turned 27."

"WE still don't know much about Rogers," The woman said as she stopped walking, causing you to bump into her.

"Oh, sorry," You said, backing away to give her some space. "But, why is that?"

"He hasn't told us jack shit. He hasn't told us about his motives or his past, the only things we know is the murders he's rambled about in past interviews. Since you two are pretty close in age, maybe you got a better shot then we do," The woman responded, opening the door that led to the door of the inmates quarters.

When the woman opened the metal door, there was a massive wall of metal and glass. It was a look in to see the inmates, and luckily it was a one way mirror.

"This is where the inmates sleep and spend most of their time. They don't leave this area unless they're sent to solitary confinement."

As you looked through the glass, you saw two men sitting next to each other against the wall, and above them on the second floor were two women talking.

"The two men on the bottom are Timothy Wright and Brian Thomas. You won't be meeting them for a while, but they're on your roster."

"How bad are they?"

"Depends on who you're asking."

"And above them is Jane Elizabeth Arkensaw and Natalie Outlette. Jane is definitely one of the most well behaved inmates we have here, hell, she shouldn't even be here..."

The woman continued to explain the operations and how things functioned in the Prison.

"Inmates eat breakfast at 4AM, and they don't eat again until 11:30 for lunch. After breakfast, they have freetime to do whatever they please, they don't get jobs or specialties like the other inmates. We tend to leave them to their devices under close observation."

You took a look into the inmate quarters and noticed that the man with short black hair was staring directly at you. He held a blank expression as he stared through your soul. You felt your blood run cold as he stared you down with his cold, emotionless eyes. You saw the man next to him look at him with amusement before telling him something, which cause the man to take his eyes off you and look at the other man with rage. You watched as the man yelled at him, but due to the noise canceling effects the room you were in had, you only saw the movements and gestures, no actual words.

"Ma'am, are you sure they can't see us?" You asked as you slowly turned your head away from the scene.

"Positive. Why must you ask?" The woman asked as she walked towards a door that read Officer Sarah Mandel.

"The man with the sideburns was just staring at me," You said, pointing to the man.

"Oh...Wright. he does that from time to time, ignore it."

"Uhhh, ok," You responded as you slowly turned your head away from the man named Wright.

"What time is it?" The woman asked.

"6:30 PM, why?"

"In 15 minutes you'll be interviewing Jeffery Woods," The woman said as she began to walk into a room.

When you were about to follow her, she walked back out with a piece of paper in her hands. She then rubbed her eyed tiredly before handing you the paper with a yawn.

"You ok, ma'am?"

"Yeah...Just tired, I've been working 18 hours and I don't go home till 10. Now, ask Jeff the questions on this paper, don't go off script. If he tries, redirect him, don’t give him a chance to get off topic. Now, he says some pretty perverted and weird things, ignore it and you'll be fine. An officer will be waiting outside the door, and there's a button under the table to notify him to come in. There will also be another officer with you in the room since this is your first time. Got all that?"

"Yep! So uh, where the place I'll be interviewing him?"

"Follow."

You and the woman then walked deeper into the area you in, going past the inmates quarters and going through a door that read 'Interigation Roon, Level 4 and up.'

As the two of you walked, you decided to read some of the questions on the paper. Most of the questions were ones you've seen at the Academy. Stuff like, 'Why did you do what you did?' And 'Did you know your victims?' And so on and so forth. Some of the questions were more detailed though. One in particular asked 'At the scene of one of your crimes, we found a dog next to a door that was locked. When we tried going through the door, it killed two of our best officers. What was behind that door, and who was that dog?'

You remember when you were younger, this image of a dog with a crazed smile was circling around. Some said it was cursed, others said it was some urban legend. But, you picture the image in your head, and you look down at Jeffrey's wanted photo, you couldn't feel like that was connected to him somehow.

"Alright, you'll be in room 899 for all of your interviews, keep that in mind. Now, they'll be here in 5 minutes with Jeffery, you ready?"

"Yeah, I think so," You said as your hands and legs shook with nervousness.

The woman let out a light chuckle before putting her hand on your shoulder with a smile.

"You're gonna be ok, kid. It's you first day, and you're already working with some dangerous people, but it comes with the job. You'll get it no time."

"Thanks, I appreciate it," You said as you took a deep breath and walked into the room.

The room was small with bright lights, two cameras on each side of the room, clean white walls, and a table with a chair on each side in the middle.

You sat down on the chair facing the door and pulled at your uniform to fix any wrinkles or badges that were out of place. You opened the folder and took out Jeffery's paper before placing the folder under your chair.

"It's ok, Y/N. He isn't going to do anything," You said to yourself as you looked down at the papers.

Suddenly, you began to hear footsteps and the sound of chains walking towards you.

And then, the door opened, and you were greeted with a sight that gave you chills.

A man, so tall that could barely fit through the doorway. His hair was long and greasy, covering his face as he looked down lifeless. He was pretty skinny too, that inmate uniform he wore being quite baggy on him. Covering him were chains, his hands were cuff and his ankles were chains together as well. You couldn't see his face, but you could see his eyes. His eyes were bloodshot and wide, staring at you with insanity and rage.

You did your best to keep your stone cold expression, but you couldn't hide the deed of sweat that rolled down your brow as he got closer to you.

The two officers that brought him forced him down of the seat before tying him to the chair tightly.

"That's a bit much, don't you think?" Jeffery said, turning his head to look at the male officer. He had a massive grin on his face as he asked the question in a joking manner.

"No," The male officer said coldly before walking in the corner.

The female officer looked at you with a nod before walking out and closing the door behind her.

Now, in the first semester of your second year at the Academy, it was mostly focused on interagation and the art of the mind. You were told to remain calm and composed at all times, but don't be too serious as well.

Joseph said people are less likely to comfortable and truthful when you make yourself appear as stone cold serious or far too casual. He said to find a balance, make them feel comfortable, maybe joke once or twice, but make them aware that this is serious.

"So, how are you doing, Jeffery?"

Jeff then shot up and slowly turned his head to look at you. His face was neutral, but the nasty scarred smile on his face did give you goosebumps.

"Jeffery... I haven't been called that in a while."

"What are you called then?"

"Jeff."

"Well, Jeff, how are you doing?"

"Shitty. I've been stuck in solitary all fucking month!"

"I'm sorry to hear that."

When you going the ask why, you remembered that the woman told you not to go off script. You took a glance at the officer in the corner before peeping down at the paper.

"So, Jeff, you've been charged with a books worth of crimes, and you've been on death row since December 25, 2014. We've had you in this place for a few years now, but you still haven't told us why you did it."

Jeff stared at you before scoffing and rolling his eyes.

"Same old question! How many times do I have to tell you fucking people. It was fun! Stalked a few people, kidnapped some, fucked the pretty ones, and at the end of the day all of them would be fucking dead," Jeff said with a grin, his eyes slowly starting to move down to your tits.

"Hey! Eyes up here," You demanded, snapping your fingers to get his attention to your face. "I'm here for answers, Jeff, not to be your eye candy."

"Awwww," Jeff moaned, giving you a pout.

"So..." You said, looking through his file. Jeff looked at you boredly as he yawned and leaned back into his chair. In the corner of your eye, you saw the police officer in the corner give Jeff a glare.

"A girl...oh. A girl went missing right before your arrest, her name was Abbie Grace, 21 year old college student. We haven't found her since and evidence is pointing towards you. Does the name ring any bells?"

"Abbie...? Nope! Not at all," Jeff answered, a strange optimistic tone laying in his voice.

After those words left his mouth, you pulled out a picture of Abbie. She had long pink and blue hair with pale skin and bright blue eyes. Her face was covered in freckles and her eyes had a shine to them. She seemed friendly and kind, her bright smile showing off her dimples and crooked teeth.

"Does she look familiar?"

Jeff leaned forward and looked at the photo. He paused for a few moments before realization hit him.

"Oh! Candy Head."

"So you do recognize her?"

"Yeah."

"What happened to her?"

"Heh, I don't know. I was told to kidnap her, not kill her."

The word told caught your attention immediately, and it seemed to catch the other officer's attention too. Nothing in his file said anything about a boss, it was said that he worked alone, a solo act.

"Told? By who?"

"Eh, I don't feel like telling."

"Jeff."

"What? Suck my dick first and maybe I'd tell you."

"You're not getting anything out of him, rookie," The other officer said, letting out a sigh.

"Well, what'd you do with her while she was with you?"

"Hmmm, well, She was definitely an ugly crier. She would always cry and cry, the bitch even tried to kill me with a butter knife," Jeff answered before laughing at the girl's attempts to escape.

"Hm. Do you remember you remember the last thing you did to her?"

"She did have a pretty face, and a fat ass," Jeff said before his eyes glazed over with lust as he reminisced. An errie smile continued to grow on his face as he contiued his thought. "She was the whole package, and I wasn't going to ler a girl like that go out easy."

You knew what he meant, his file didn't lie one bit, the guy was a fucking sadist.

"After fucking the bitches brains out, I gave the her to Toby."

"...Toby? Is he your partner?"

"Partner? You're funny! As if I'd work with that retard. if you wanna know what happened to her, ask him."

"You are aware that makes you an accomplice?"

"Like I care."

"And you do know that can make your stay here a lot longer, post poning your death sentence to look into your case further."

"If looking at your body means staying here, I'll stay."

"Well, I guess that's where our talk ends for today."

You then stood up and walked out of the room, leaving the officer with Jeff. As you walked off, Jeff stared at your ass, feeling a grin creep onto his face before the officer pulled him out from his seat.

As you walked out, you saw the lady from earlier waiting for you, drinking a red bull as she leaned against the wall.

"How'd it go?"

"Better than I thought... But he's, weird."

"Weird as in perverted? Yeah, we know. What'd he tell?"

"Well, I asked him about Abbie Grace, the 21 year old, and apparently he didn't kill her."

"Really? What did he do?"

"Well... He kidnapped her, raped her, not sure how many times though, and then gave her to a guy named Toby."

"Has to be our Toby," The woman mumbled before taking another sip of her red bull. "Did you ask him anything else?"

"No, just getting those answers were difficult."

"Pity."

RING!

"ALL PERSONNEL, PLEASE REPORT TO THE CAFETERIA FOR DINNER!"

"Welp that's us, let me tell you how this is gonna go," The woman said as she pushed herself off the wall and began to walk.

"The most dangerous and chaotic parts of the day is Lunch, Breakfast, and Dinner. All the pastas normally stick to their groups or by themselves, but during these parts of the day they're all trapped together like sardines. Fights breakout, stealing, and just too much shit goes on. When you're assigned your spot, stay there. If any of them try to get a reaction out of you or try to bother you, don't react. They're not your average criminals, and since they've never seen you before, that's definitely gonna happen today. Stand strong, stay quiet, and observe. Cops like us are merely meang to supervise them, not stop them, that's what Security is for."

"So, is that all I gotta worry about mainly?"

"For right now, yes. And don't leave the cafeteria until lunch is over. Some of them like to sneak out, and let's just say cops who wondered off, weren't found the same way they left. May that be mentally, or physically."

"Oh... So, stay in post, stay quiet, and don't leave."

"Yep, you pick up fast."

"Thank you, Officer...?"

"Mandel. I guess I never told you name, my apologies," Officer Mandel said before taking a another sip of her red bull, "Its been a long day."

‐---------‐-------------------------------------------------------

The moment the two of you walked into the cafeteria, you were met with a loud wave of noise.

"Shit, is it always this loud?" You asked Officer Mandel, who nodded her head in response.

The two of you then walked over to one of the security guards.

"Jesus! You look like awful, Sarah," The guard said with concern.

"I know right. Newbie needs their post."

"Oh, you see that guy over there," The guard said, pointing to a guy with stitches in the corners of his mouth.

"Yeah."

"You're posted in the front of the door behind him."

Looking at the man closer, your eyes widened with realization.

"Is that-"

"Liu Woods? Yeah, good luck," The guard responded before Officer Mandel slapped the back of his head.

"He's not that bad, don't listen to him."

Nodding in response, you took a deep breath as you walked towards the door.

All the inmates were divided into their respective groups. The two men you saw from earlier were sitting at their own table, but a man with part of his cheek removed was sitting with them as well, arguing with the one known as Tim.

"For the hundredth time, it's not my fault the bitch ran away!"

"You sure? Cause last time I checked, she was you last."

"*FUCK YOU* Whatever, Tim. The bitch most likely dead anyway."

You made sure to note that in your head for later. Tobias Erin Rogers, he was listed on your roster, and based on Jeff's info, you'll be meeting him very soon.

When you passed Liu to get to the door, you felt the atmosphere shift. It hit you like a truck, your heart raced as you took at glance at him.

His skin was so pale that he could've been considered sick. Since Jeff was paler than him, you just though it was family trait. But, the stitches on his face and hands made you think otherwise. In his file, it did mention that Jeff tried to kill him. An injury from the incident was mostly likely the cause for his apperance, but you kept your theories to yourself.

Much to you surprise, dinner went by pretty smoothly. But, you couldn't help but grow curious on why so many guards were coming in and out of the cafeteria. You knew better than to let your curiosity take over, but through dinner it became harder to fight.

"Something bothering you?"

Flinching at the voice, you looked down towards Liu, he was looking at you with a tilted head.

"What? Of course not."

"You sure? I ain't telling nobody," Liu persisted as he fully turned his body towards you.

You knew better than to respond, much to Liu's dissapointment.

"You interviewed my brother eariler, right?"

"Who's asking?'' You asked saracastically as you avoided eye contact.

"Me, who else?" Liu answered bluntly, a slight bit of attitude hidden in his tone.

"I don't know."

There was a moment of silence as Liu followed your eyes, realizing that you were looking at the cafeteria doors.

"The doors, huh?" Liu whispered to himself as a grin grew on his face. "You know, past those cafeteria doors is Solitary."

"Ok, why would I care?"

"Why would I care," Liu mocked.

"Jesus, just like his brother..." You thought as you rolled your eyes in annoyance.

"Hey, can you do me a favor?"

"No."

"It might benefit you," Liu said in teasing manner.

You didn't say a word, but you did raise an eyebrow with interest.

"Jeff stole shit from my cell before he got sent to solitary. You convince him to give me my shit back, and I tell you what I know about Candy Head."

"Candy Head?" You asked confused before realization hit you. "You have something to do with Abbie Grace's case?"

"Nah uh, uh, uh, get me my stuff back first," Liu answered bluntly, sending you a glare.

Something wasn't adding up. Jeff told you that he gave Abbie to Toby, but how did Liu fit into any of this? Maybe her disappearance isn't as cut and dry as you thought.

Looking around, you let out a sigh.

"I'll think about it."

Liu nodded his head in understanding before turning back around.

"Wait. How'd you know I'm on her case?"

"Stuff. First."

Letting out a groan, you lightly flinched as a loud ring echoed across the room.

"DINNER'S OVER! BACK TO YOUR CELLS!"

As the inmates got rallied up, Officer Mandel walked up next to you.

"So, how'd it go?"

"I don't know what that file said, but Liu is anything but charming. It was like I was dealing with Jeff all over again, just without the pervsion."

"You sure it was Liu?"

"Hm? What you mean?"

"You'll see. Now, the inmates are getting brought back to their cells, but our job isn't over just yet," Mandel said before beckoning you to follow her. "You'll be interviewing Toby in an hour or two, until then, I need you to look over the testimonals of their previous victims who survived."

"Their?"

"You said Jeff didn't kill her, right?"

"Right."

"So, there's the chance that Toby did. Toby didn't work alone, he worked with those two guys we saw earlier. I want you to get familar with their methods, and I want you to understand this very clearly," Mandel said before stopping in her tracks. "These people are dangerous, they will hurt you if given the chance. After today, you're not gonna have another officer in the room with you. I best not find out that you got hurt because you wanted to be fucking stupid."

Placing a hand on your shoulder, Mandel looked at you with a look you couldn't decscribe. "You're young, and you got so many years ahead of you, so listen to my advice. Listen to the files, and don't ever, I mean ever, go into solitary. I saw you looking at it earlier so I'm shutting the idea down now."

"Yes, Ma'am."

"Wonderful. Now, while you were interviewing Jeff, I decided to hand pick the evidence and testimonials that mostly involved Toby. You're not going to meet Brian and Tim for a while, so don't worry about them."

Nodding your head, you looked at the door labeled "Intern 1."

"Oh, and heads up. The voice recordings are really dark, so, good luck," Mandel whispered to you before patting your back. "I'll get you when Toby's ready."

"Ok."

As Mandel left you alone, you took a deep breath as you opened the door.

The room was bright and clean, a decently sized desk placed in front of you with a computer on it, but it was also covered in various files. In the corner was an old box TV with a VHS and CD player, with a chair placed in front of it.

The room wasn't bad by any means, but it gave you an odd vibe.

Taking a seat at the desk, you decided to look at the different files.

Most of them were detailed descriptions of various crimes scenes related to Toby or the proxies in general, but under all the files was a VHS labeled "Elizabeth Todd's Testimony."

Since you didn't want to spend lord knows how long reading papers, you stood up from your seat and made your way to the TV, placing the VHS into the player before taking a seat infront of the TV. The TV took a while to process the cassete, but once it did, a woman appeared on the screen, the date April 26th, 2008 resting in the top right hand corner.

The girl looked about 19, dark skinned with big curls rounding around her face, fairly skinny but you weren't exactly sure due to her hoodie covering most of her frame, but the thing that you took notice of the most was her eyes. They lacked any sort of life, giving you an uneasy feel as she stared past the camera, implying that someone was in front of her.

"Your testimony will be recorded and kept for evidence, would you like to remain anonymous? If not, please state your name," A light voice said behind the camera.

Pausing for a few moments, the girl looked down to her hands before looking back up to the officer infront of her.

"My name is Elizabeth Todd," The girl started, her voice meek and low as she spoke.

"Would you mind telling us what happened on the day of the incident?"

"...It was my freshman year of college. I didn't know anyone, but I made some friends within the first semester."

Leaning back into your chair, you took notice of Elizabeth's body language. She fidgeted with her hands as she spoke, and always kept her gaze down, rarely looking up at the officers. She appeared nervous. You decided to keep note of that as she continued to speak.

"When spring break came around, me, Lilian, Austin, and Kevin decided to take a camping trip in tye woods near our campus. We took a bunch during the fall so we were pretty familiar with the area. But, when it came to us planning the trip, I always felt like something was going to go wrong..."

Elizabeth's voice cracked as she spoke, causing her to swallow her spit as she shook her hands, trying to keep her composure.

"Nobody listened though, saying I was paranoid even though we went there countless times before. So, we went anyway. Kev and Lilian were setting up a fire while me and Austin were setting up tents. Austin and I were dating at the time, so when Lilian and Kev weren't looking, we wondered off."

Snapping her fingers, Elizabeth continued.

"Austin and I were making out against a tree not too far from our campsite, fucking in the woods was on our spring break bucket list after all. But, before we could do anything I felt my heart drop. You know that feeling when you know something is wrong but you just don't know what?"

"Yes, I've felt it countless times while on patrols," The officer responded, which helped in calming Elizabeth's nerves.

"Well, I got that feeling. We stopped and looked around but nothing was there. But, it was really quiet, no crickets, no owls, just silence..."

Elizabeth paused, pulling at her sleeves as spoke, her eyes starting to water. "It all happened so fast..."

"It's ok, your words will help us in bring your friends justice," The officer said softly, placing a hand on Elizabeth's.

"Next thing I knew I was running. Austi's blood was all over me, but I don't remember what happened. Once I got back to the campsite, Kev and Lilian were roasting marshmallows at the fire..."

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

"Done fucking, yet?" Lilian teased as she placed her marshmallow on her cracker, turning around with a cheeky grin.

But, that grin quickly fell as her eyes fell on Elizabeth, wearing only a T shirt as blood stained her body.

"What happened...?" Kevin asked, eyes wide.

"He's gone...," Elizabeth responded, looking down at her blood stained hands before looking back up at the two. "We gotta leave. Now."

Without asking anymore questions, Kevin grabbed the keys to the car as Lilian helped Elizabeth stand.

"Are you hurt?" Lilian asked as she walked with Elizabeth.

"He's gone, Lily...He's gone."

"I know, I know."

"Lily, call the cops, tell them what's happening!" Kevin said as he led the group, flashing his flashlight at any sudden noise.

"Once we get to the car," Lily said.

But, Lilian and Elizabeth watched as Kevin's flashlight fell to the floor, being followed with the sound of a loud thump.

Lying infront of them was Kevin's body, a hatchet cutting through the middle of his head as he stared at the two.

"No no no no no no no," Lilian mumbled as she gripped on Elizabeth, backing up slowly as she did.

"BULLSEYE!" A cheerful voice yelled.

Stepping out from the bushes, a man with bright orange goggles appeared in the light, taking the hatchet out of Kevin's skull as he admired his work.

"Big guy aren't *KOO KOO* ya? No *SUCKY* wonder you were so easy to hit," The man stuttered out, his head twitching from side to side as he joked, the loud cracking of his neck echoing throughout the forest.

Frozen in shock, Elizabeth looked towards Lilian, who was just as frozen as she was.

"Damn... You two sure *WOW* are pretty," The man spoke, turning his attention towards the two girls. "I've never *SHOO* had a girlfriend before," The man continued before his gaze darkened, his body language becoming more hostile as he took out his other hatchet. "Mind giving me a chance?~"

Without wasting a moment, Lilian grabbed Elizabeth's hand before running off, causing the man to chase after them.

"We gonna split up," Lilian said.

"Huh?"

"It's better if at least one of us survives. You go left, I go right. We're going to have to get Kev's keys and phone."

"No, no please."

"It's fine, if I don't come back, leave without me. Now go!"

Lilian quickly ran to the right, jumping over a few bushes in the process. Hesitating, Elizabeth stumbled over a few branches as she ran the left, separating the two.

"Jeez, are they *KOO KOO* really that stupid?" Toby mumbled, tapping his chin with his hatchet as he looked both ways. "Tits or thighs...tits or thighs... Tits," Toby declared, looking to the right.

Running through the woods, Elizabeth saw the light from Kevin's flashlight in the distance. Picking up speed, Elizabeth felt her heart drop as Lilian's screams echoed throughout the woods, causing bird to fly up from their nest as it echoed.

"Lily," Elizabeth mumbled, staring in the direction of where Lily ran. "No. Get the keys, get the keys."

Standing over Kevin's body, Elizabeth felt nausea fill up her body as she examined his features. His once bright brown eyes now laid dull, staring at Elizabeth as his mouth laid open. Searching his pockets, Elizabeth felt a chill go down her spine as she caught a feel of his skin, painfully cold.

"I'm sorry Kev, I'm sorry," Elizabeth repeated as she pulled Kevin's keys and phone from his pocket. "I'm so sorry."

Standing up, Elizabeth decided not to take the flashlight, not wanting to risk being seen by the man who was chasing them.

Saying one last goodbye to her friend, Elizabeth ran in the direction of where their car was parked. But, as she ran, she could hear the sound of twigs being snapped.

The sounds came in short but consistent burst. He was following her, mocking her.

"I can see you~" Toby teased, letting out a chuckle as he watched Elizabeth stop for a moment.

Brian would always scold Toby for wasting time on victims, saying that too much time on one could lead to another escaping. But, Toby never listened. Having been a proxy for only a few months, the bosses were starting to grow quite fond of him, much to Tim's dismay.

But, this task was different. This was his first solo mission, and a surprisingly easy one too. Stalk the campers, kill them, dispose of their bodies, and go back to the cabin, easy, right? Well, maybe he should've listened to Brian's advice.

The moment Toby spoke, Elizabeth booked it, running much faster than she normally did.

"Fuck, *LOOKIE* she's fast,"Toby mumbled, chasing after her.

Reaching the car Elizabeth shakily pulled the keys out from her pocket, attempting to open the car door as Toby gained on her.

"Please-please-please, God please!" Elizabeth begged.

As the door opened, Elizabeth quickly jumped in, slamming the key into the holder as the car started up.

But, just before she could slam on the gas, a hatchet was flown as her window, causing glass to shatter on her. Luckily, the hatchet didn't touch her, her dodging just in time for it to land on the seat next to her.

Looking up in horror, Elizabeth watched as Toby appeared from the woods, out of breath as he came into frame. But, in his hand was Lilian, blood dripping from her body as Toby held her by her hair.

"Lilian...," Elizabeth mumbled.

Toby then tilted his head as he lifted Lilian's arm, waving it side to side with a sadistic grin.

She wasn't dead, not yet at least. Her chest was rising and falling slowly as Toby forced her to wave. But, blood was covering her face and neck, coming from the top of her head where Toby banged the handle of his hatchet into.

Staring at the two, Elizabeth came back to reality as quickly as she fazed out of it, slamming on the gas.

As she drove, in the corner of her eye she saw a piece of paper tied to the hatchet. Taking a look, she felt her blood run cold.

"If you survive, don't tell anyone what you saw. You'll see what happens if you :)"

She should tell the police? Lilian was still alive when she left, sure there was blood all over her, but maybe if she called the cops she could make it. Or was it too late?

Looking at Kev's phone, Elizabeth made her choice.

"911, what's your emergency?"

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

"Elizabeth? Elizabeth? Fuck, fuck," The officer said as Elizabeth's head slammed into the table, not responding for five minutes before her head fell.

"JOHN, GET A MEDIC!"

The interview stopped there, but the tape continued.

"Elizabeth experienced a seizure during her interview, dying shortly after. But, evidence at the crime scene helped is in determining a series of events," You read as words appeared on the TV. "The bodies of Kevin Howard and Austin Brown were found. Kevin was found with a gash in his head while Austin was found with his head cut clean off. Lilian Smith's body has yet to be found at the time of this recording."

Then, the video finished.

The interview didn't tell you much about Toby's personality, but it did give you a glimce into his cruelty. You decided to use this case as a baseline for the other files you would be looking into, wanting to find common patterns in his crimes and how he picked his victims.

Standing up, you took a deep breath, mentally preparing yourself for the deep dive you were about the take.

After an hour and thirty minutes, you were able to figure out common themes in Toby's crimes, and in two, you were able to get a solid idea on his behavior and personality.

You filled up three pages in your notebook with notes on Toby.

It seems that the proxies in general were very diverse in their victims, some of them being normal civilians while others could be big shot politicians or businesses owners. Toby in particular seemed to mostly target people in their early to late 20s, and most of them were normal civilians or low profiled criminals.

When it came to his behavior, a common theme was that many of Toby's male victims had much more brutal deaths than the women. Women's bodies were often found with a hatchet in the back of the head, or a gash in the side, but their deaths were often simple and quick. The men on the other hand were always found in almost unrecognizable ways. One body was found with his chest completely torn open, his intestines wrapped around his throat and blood smothered all over his face, a truly horrifying site.

The deaths in which his victims would have slowly started to give you ideas. It seems that Toby has some sort of vendetta against men, or more specifically, men with blonde hair. Men with blonde hair were often the ones found in unrecognizable ways. This was something that you would definitely do more digging on and try to get an answer when you're interviewing Toby. Now, you wouldn't say Toby has a soft spot for women, that clearly wasn't the case the more you looked into his behavior, but he did appear to be a lot more merciful and playful when it came to their deaths. Well, maybe not all of them.

You recall that in Toby's file that he would be more complient with people he found hot. Well, in a few cases, there had been women found days or even weeks after incidents. All of which were found dead and in horrible condition, implying that they were kept with him for a while. Maybe that was the case with Lilian.

Now, when it comes to Toby's personality, it's obvious he's mentally unstable. And his mood swings seem to be very self destructive. Often thrown into periods of mental exhaustion where he becomes a blank slate, too mentally out of it to bother with reality.

Despite being in his late 20's, it's been reported that he can be surprisingly teen like when it comes to his interest and some of his behaviors. In past interviews, he's expressed his love for sappy rom coms, and interest often seen in teenagers. It was something that you took interest in, and you decided to figure out if it was just how he is, or if there was a deeper issue at play here.

"Y/N," Mandel said as she opened the door, cutting you out of your train of thought.

"Yes Ma'am?" You responded, looking up from your notes.

"Toby's ready."

Nodding your head, you stood up from your seat and followed Mandel as she led you to the interview room.

"Figure anything out?" Mandel asked.

"A lot, actually. Figured out common patterns in crimes, and some stuff I would like ask hin about."

"Like what?"

"He seems to be much more aggressive men, blonde men to be more specific."

"Hmmm."

"May I ask you something?"

"Ask away," Mandel responded, opening another can of red bull.

"Do you know what happened to Lilian Smith?"

Mandel froze in place, causing you stop with her.

"Ma'am?" You said shakily, looking at Mandel with worry.

"I was on that case... Remember it well..."

"What happen?"

"A week after Elizabeth died, we found her body in a cabin nine miles into the forest... Her head was split in two, going into her neck," Mandel said, her voice shaking as she took another sip of her red bull. "She's the reason why we're trying to charge Toby with sexual assault, the way she was found..."

"Oh... I'm sorry for bringing it up, Ma'am..."

"No, no. It's alright, it's been nearly a decade. If we can officially charge him with it, the judge will be more willing to put him on death row."

Sighing in relief, you watched as Mandel stood up straight and continued to walk.

"I want to remind you, these guys are monsters. Be careful with Toby, he's a lot more unpredictable than Jeff. He might meek today, but tomorrow he could be wild."

"Advice taken."

"Anything else you figure out?"

"He doesn't seem to have a specific preference for victims, only a preference in death styles. I do find his treatment of women kind of interesting though."

"Why you say that?"

"Oftenly, his killings with them tend be more merciful, but, there's multiple times where they've been on the more gruesome side of things. You think I should ask him about it."

"I don't see why not, but don't ask him up front, a lot of the inmates are stubborn and aren't going to give you any favors."

Next thing you knew, you were in the hallway meant for interrogations. You weren't sure why, but the vibe was completely different than last time you were in the area.

"Room 111 is Toby's. Remember what I told you."

"Yes ma'am."

"Oh, also. After Toby, you're gonna be on your own for the rest of your shift. I'll check up on your every now and again, but that's about it."

"What? What am I supposed to do?"

"Look into your other inmates cases. You still Tim, Brian, Ben, Jeff, and Liu to look into. If you stay in your office, you'll be fine."

"...Ok."

Nodding your head, Mandel turned the corner, leaving you alone in the silent hallway.

"111...111...there."

Opening the door, the room was no different than the last one you were in. Table in the middle, a chair on each side, bright lights, nothing new. One thing you did notice was that this part of the prison didn't have any cameras, or computers. You thought it was just the hallways, but it didn't make sense on why they wouldn't be present in an interrogation room.

Taking a seat, you pull out your notebook, looking over the various notes you made. You considered asking questions, but then you remembered what Mandel said.

"Ask them the questions on the paper, nothing else."

You couldn't deny the sketchiness of it all. Yes, you understood why they'd be so strict with who they let in and what they'd ask, they are harboring America's most notorious serial killers after all, but some of the questions didn't even matter. Trying to gain trust is one thing, but asking complete bullshit is something completely different.

"Why did you do it? Stubborn my ass, he would never answer that," You mumbled, reading each question on the paper. "What do you like to do? What does that have to do with anything?"

But, you quickly fell silent as the sound of footsteps echoes in the hallways.

CLICK! CRACK!

The sound of various cracks and clicks could be heard. The cracking of bones made your neck ich, and the sounds of the clicks caused you to grind your teeth together. It didn't help that the sound chains could be heard as well, moving side to side with every click and crack.

Taking a deep breath, your back straightened as the door opened.

Stabding in the door was three figures, two police officers holding onto the man in the middle. The man held a bored expression, his head angled downward as he looked around with his eyes. Much to your suprise, he was much shorter than you thought, maybe around 5'5, 5'6 if you wanted to push it. However, you couldn't help but stare at the injury on his left cheek. Pieces of skin were ripped out, showing his gums and teeth to the world. Not to be rude, but you were kind of glad he wore a muzzle like mask.

When his gaze met up to yours, the two of you made eye contact for a few seconds. Within those seconds, you saw his eyes widen, his eyes softening for just a moment before switching back.

"Cute...," He whispered, tilting his head to the side as a grin slowly formed on his face.

"Quiet," One of the guards said as they sat Toby down, bringing his arms up in order to chain them to the table.

"I wasn't *WOWIE* talking to you," Toby snapped back, rolling his eyes.

"Thank you, I got it from here," You said, earning a nod from the officers as one of them left the room, the other one quickly prompting themselves into the corner. "Hello Toby, I'm sure you know why I'm speaking with you today."

"*CLICK* Yeah."

"So, how have you been feeling recently?"

"Terrible!" Toby exclaimed, an irrated look on his face as he mumbled under his breath.

"Why is that?"

"Hmmm, let me *KOO KOO* think. Oh, maybe because I'm fucking here! Would you be happy and shit if you got caught?"

"I'm not exactly sure."

"Liar."

"I'm no liar, Toby. Now, may I be able to ask you a few questions about your cases?"

"Does it matter?"

"...Uh."

You quickly turned your head to the officer in the corner, who nodded their head in response.

"Uh yes! Yes, it does matter."

"...Fine."

"So. Before you were arrested, did you ever know someone named Abbie Grace?"

"Abbie Grace... Colored hair?"

"Yes."

"Yeah, why?"

"We were informed that you were involved with her disappearance."

"...Snitch. *FUCK* He owes me big time," Toby groaned, leaning back into his chair as he looked up at the ceiling.

"Hey, focus. Can you tell me what happened to her?"

"What if I don't wanna?"

"It's not up for negotiation."

"Aw, look at you toughening up."

"He isn't gonna tell me anything, isn't he?" You thought, doing your best to hide your irration. "Well, Toby. If you don't tell us anything, we can't charge you, but, if, or when, we get evidence on you, you're punishment will be more severe."

As you talked, you noticed a shift in Toby's mood.

"And I'm talking death row, Toby. Death. Row."

"I could get death row right now if I felt like it. Do you honestly think these chains can stop me from bashing your head in? Or from taking his gun and shooting you in that pretty head of yours?"

That was the first time he didn't stutter on a single word. No sudden words, no sudden tics, clear cut.

"You're alive because I'm letting you live," Toby said coldly, his eyes lacking any emotion as he stared into your soul. "Isn't that fun!" Toby suddenly cheered, leaning over as he stared at you wide eyes, a strange amount of joy written on his face.

"...I don't think we have the same definition of fun."

"You're so boring..."

"OK. How about this then."

"Hm?"

"Talk about yourself. What do look for when choosing your victims? How do you treat your weapons? Go crazy."

Both Toby and the officer looked at you in suprise.

"Seriously?"

"Seriously."

"Uh... What about *FLOWER* me exactly?"

"What did you like to do when you were a kid?"

"...I was in and *CRACK* out of hospitals a lot... Whenever I was out, I would *LOOKIE LOOKIE* go play in the woods with my sister," Toby said. "I hated being home..."

There were two things you took note of. The fact that Toby has a sister, and that he didn't like being home.

"You have a sister?"

"Had."

"Oh... What was she like?"

"She was the best. *BIRDIE* She'd always take care of me, stop kids from picking *CLICK* on me...and always made sure I was ok."

"She seemed nice."

"The nicest," Toby said, his eyes softening as he dazed off. "What else?"

"How do see this...hobby of yours?"

"It's a job, not a hobby."

"Hm. What do you hate most about it?"

"My *CLICK* co-workers."

"Why's that?"

"Tim is always yelling at me about something. *COOKIE* You fucked up on this mission! You never shut up! Mehmehmehemehmeh! And *SHOOT* Brian is just there! Sometimes he gets on me too, and other times he's on Tim! *TICK TOK* Like hello, pick a side!"

To be honest, you were surprised by Toby's words. Back at the Academy, Gibbons would always remind you that every criminal was human, so they would and behave as one. Even though you were considered very skilled, sometimes you forget this simple fact, that even the smartest or most dangerous of criminals, can crack.

The way Toby described them sounded like a worker talking shit about their boss in an office. Now you couldn't help but wonder how Brian and Tim would describe each other.

"That seems annoying."

"Finally someone gets it!" Toby exclaimed. But, after he spoke those words, you watched as he slowky looked at you, a faint blush forming on his face as he sent you a smile. "You know what, I like you."

You felt a chill go down your spine as you stared at him. Yes he called you cute, but the way he was looking at you, you couldn't help but feel concern.

"Um. OK, anyways... Did you have any favorites?"

"Favorites?"

"Yeah. Whenever you did your job, did you have a set preference that you could follow or no?"

"Hmmmm... I hate open spaces. *WOWIE* The noise, the people, the attention... *FUCK* I hate it."

"That explains the locations. Maybe I can figure out a pattern in Toby's preferences that can give me more clues to Abbie's case."

"I've always liked the woods, especially the campers. They're always to unaware. *CHICKEN* I once killed a guy who was half way through fucking *FUCK* his girlfriend, oh you *CAN'T *should've seen her face when I bashed his brains in!" Toby exclaimed before moving his up into the air and quickly slamming them down into the table, looking you dead in the eyes with a manic expression, "Just like that! She had your exact face!"

Least to say, you were dumbfounded. This guy was energetic, loud, and manic, the way he talked about his murders held so much life, so much passion, so much pride. The joy in his voice almost made you forget that you were talking to a criminal, and a manipulative one too. Despite his tone, you couldn't tell if he was being genuine, or at least what everything he was saying was true. If he fell for your trick, maybe he wasn't as aware as Mandel said.

"Oh...um. Is that all?"

"Maybe, maybe not. I don't wanna talk anymore."

"Wait, we're not done yet, we still have to talk about Abbie."

Toby sent you glare as his body tense up, his once playful energy gone.

"I know you don't care about death row, but, if Jeff gives us more evidence against you, the judge may consider lightening his sentence, while you, will get a more severe one. Maybe not death row, but still worse than Jeff's."

"So you want me to snitch."

"I wouldn't say that. I don't really care who tells me what happened to Abbie, I just wanna know."

Toby stared off to the side, assumingly in thought.

"Getting Candyhead was an order from the boss...She's *OW* the daughter of a powerful business *CRACK* owner that didn't keep his end of the deal with the boss. So, he had Jeff capture her, and then Jeff *POW* gave her to me to keep her *WOW* hostage."

"Wait... She's?" You mumbled. "Toby, is Abbie dead?"

"I don't know who told you she was."

"Wait. If she's alive, then we have to look over everything!"

You turned around the officer in the corner, who was just as surprised as you were.

"Miss, who's the head of the Abbie Grace case?"

"Detective Adrea Banklin."

"Can I meet with her after this?"

"I'll have to see if she's right now."

"Ok. Toby, our interview ends here."

"Ok~"

Standing up from your seat, you quickly made your way out of the room, keeping the door open as another officer ran in.

"Abbie's alive. But, how? She's been missing for over a year, how can she survive that long," You spoke to yourself as you rushed to your office.

As you opened the door to your office, you rushed to your desk, pulling out the Abbie Grace file from your cabinet.

"OK, ok. Calm down, Y/N, calm down. I understand it's your first real case, but stuff like this happens, so calm down," You said softly as you took some deep breaths. "OK, OK. I don't even have all the files on Abbie yet, so what should I do now..."

Then, it hit you.

"Liu."

Looking into the hallways, you, quickly made you way towards the inmates quarters, making sure to hide from other officers.

"Oh my God, what am I doing, what am I doing? Mandel is going to kill me, Gibbons is going to kill me. But, if it's solve the case, it's fine."

The inmate quarters were dark. You could see figures moving around, but since it lights out, the power in the quarters was out.

"How am I even going to get in?"

"Intern."

"AH!"

Turning around, the officer from earlier was behind you, giving you a suspicious look.

"Oh, you scared me."

"What are you doing over here?"

"...Just wanted to look around."

"...mhm. Well, Banklin is here at the moment, but she's preparing to go home. She's willing to speak now, but she won't wait long."

"That's great! Can you take me to her, please?"

The officer merely nodded her head before walking off.

"Liu can wait," You whispered to yourself before following after her.

"She's at the end of the hallway."

"OK, Thank you, officer..."

"Cherry, Officer Cherry."

"Y/N L/N."

"Pleasure. Also, if you're gonna meet with inmates, be more discrete."

"...How did you-"

"Been there, done that. Got caught up in a deal with Ben, was his bitch for months...You learn a thing or two," Officer Cherry said before walking off, leaving you alone.

You quickly made your way to Banklin's office. Opening the door, you saw Banklin placing various files into a bag.

Banklin was a tall woman with long brown hair, she seemed quite put together despite the stressful work environment.

"Detective Banklin?"

"Hm? Oh, you must be the intern."

"Yes, um. I've gotten some important information about the Abbie Grace case."

"From?"

"Toby, ma'am."

"Rogers? That man is a bipolar punk, I don't trust a word that leaves his mouth."

"I cam see why, but he implied that Abbie is still alive."

Banklin froze as she looked up at you, dropping the file in hand.

"Alive?"

"Yes, when he was talking about her, he talked in a present tense, and when I asked if she was actualky dead, Toby said that he never said she was."

"...It does make sense, we never did find her body, " Banklin said, rubbing her chin as she looked at the floor? "But, we've never had a case where one of their victims survived for more than a month."

"I don't know if you've noticed, but Toby has a pattern of keeping women for long periods of time before killing them."

"I've noticed, but in each of those cases, they didn't live past a month on average when we conducted their autopsy."

"So we're just going go let this info go?"

"I'm not saying that, I'm saying it's unreliable. Toby is far from stupid, and he tends to withhold info. He claims that he'll 'never be a snitch'."

"This claim can change this entire case, Miss. Banklin. Even if Toby is lying, what if he isn't? He sounded genuine when he spoke, and if she's alive out there, why should we just wait and see?"

"Listen here. This is your first time working with these Motherfuckers, you don't know anything about them. We asssigned this case to you because it's still on going. If you fuck this up and put this case in jeopardy, you're internship is done. I don't care what Joesph says."

All you could do is stare at Banklin, frozen in place as she closed her bag. You couldn't deny the fact that you often get way over your head, maybe being labeled the best officer in the academy made you a little over confident, but you didn't want to just throw this possibility out of the way. You didn't have a solid conclusion to Toby's true behavior, you still needed a bit more time on that bit, but until then, you were going to trust a few of his words.

"I'm sorry, ma'am."

"Don't bother. Abbie's case is the last case we have regarding Jeffery. Listen to Jeffery's words before Toby's, Jeffery rarely lies to us."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Good, now if you excuse me, I have a family to go home to," Banklin said, pushing past you so she opened the door. "Oh, also. Stick to what we assign you. We don't only want you to not fuck anything up, but it's also to protect you. Some of these cases are extremely classified and cannot get released to the public. I hope you understand."

"No, no I do."

"Good, see you in the morning."

Then, she was gone. You didn't even realize that you were holding your breath.

After meeting Banklin, you had come to the conclusion that no one was going to take your theories seriously. But, maybe there was someone who would.

Checking the hallways, you quickly dashed back to the inmate quarters. As you ran, you remembered a lesson that you had with Gibbons.

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

"Wrong!" Gibbons said for the hundredth time.

"What?! How is that wrong? The suspect obviously lied!" You yelled, pointing down at the paper, "Look, you see the inconsistencies in her statements."

"Y/N, in this field, not everything is simple."

"Yeah, I know that."

"So... Let's look over this paper one last time," Gibbons said as he sat in front of you. "The detective is pushing the suspect. When under stress, people will either do two things. They'll either confess, or make someone hear what they want to hear. With this in mind, what do you think is going on here?"

Looking down at the paper, you did your best to come up with an answer. Before being put under stress, the suspect's story was adding up, but, the moment the detective put them under pressure, their claims fell apart.

"They're telling the detective what they wanna hear?"

"Nope!"

"What?! What do you mean no?"

"Before the suspect was put under pressure, their story was adding up perfectly with the crime, but, the moment they were put under pressure, everything fell apart. This tells you two things. 1, they're not alone. They're most likely being used to take the fall, explaining the perfect line up. And 2, they indirectly confessed that they were innocent."

"You got that from this alone?"

"When you're in this job for as long as I have been, you pick up on things quickly. But, this, situations like this is what makes solving cases so difficult. When you do your internship, I want you to keep this in mind."

"Keep what in mind?"

"If someone is willing to tell you info about a case, take it, especially if it's from a snitch. A snitch is more willing to throw their friends under the bus for than own gain, making them more reliable than a direct source. "

"What if I can't talk to them?"

"Find a way. Roosevelt is Big, many places to hide. Be smart, not crazy."

"So you want me to break the law?"

"If you can make look legal, than yes."

"...You're the worst cop ever."

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

"Guess I'm the worse cop ever," You muttered, taking a deep breath as you stood infront of the door separating you from the inmates.

Looking to the right, you noticed a key pad with various numbers and letters.

"Shit... uh, how about, 1 2 3 4 5?"

"WRONG, 6 DIGIT CODE" was written in bold letters.

"Six digits?" You questioned, clenching your eyebrows togethers as you thought. "It can't be something simple, but what if it's so simple that people wouldn't even consider using it?"

Then, it came to you.

"Wait...Roosevelt Federal Prison, Creepypasta Ward? R F P C P W."

CLICK!

"Oh thank god."

Openng the door, you felt the atmosphere shift as you took a step into the room. Due to it being curfew, it was pitch black in the ward, leaving you to rely on the sounds of various voices.

"Shit, why did I do this, why did I do this? If I'm caught in here my internship is done. Can I get arrested for this? Probably. Well, too late now..."

You weren't exactly sure where to look for Liu. You weren't sure if he was on the bottom or top bit, or if he even had a roommate. You knew better than to turn on your flashlight, but, you started to feel the consequences of you actions. Maybe you should get you impulse under control.

Caught up in your thoughts, you failed to notice the figure creeping up behind you. However, you were able to hear the sound of faint breathing.

Whipping your head around, your gun was already in hand, but, the figure grabbed your wrist and covered your mouth, immobilized you.

Adjusting to the dark, you were able to make out a pair of green eyes. You weren't exactly sure if it was Liu, but, the feeling of stitches rubbing against your hand confirmed your suspicions.

"Liu?" You whispered, tightening your grip on your gun.

Liu remained silent as he stared at you.

"What do you want."

It wasn't a question, it was a demand.

"I'm accepting your deal. If I get whatever it is Jeff took from you, you'll tell me what you know about Abbie."

You couldn't see his face, but Liu looked down at you confused. What deal? He did recall slipping in and out of conciouness during lunch, sharing a few words with you before blanking out once more. But, his face quickly turned into annoyance as he imagined Sully interacting with you. The little bastard had to have made a deal with you.

"...Ok," Liu answered blankly, letting go of your wrist.

"What does Jeff have that you want me to get. "

Liu stayed silent for a few moments. What was it that Jeff took this time? One of his guns? Nah, he hates the noise. His bandages? Maybe. So, Liu only shrugged, much to your disappointment.

"If I get you whatever Jeff has, you'll tell me about Abbie, right?"

"...Yeah, yeah, sure."

"Promise?"

"I'm not saying it again," Liu said, sending you a glare.

You quickly shrieked back, nodding your head in understanding before sliding past him.

Feeling around for another key pad, you quickly entered the pass code. Squeezing through the door, you let out the biggest sigh of relief, but you quickly felt that relief be replaced with regret.

"I just made a deal with a fucking inmate," You said, your eyes wide in shock. "What kind of cop am I? Best at the Academy my ass..."

Little did you know, this was only the beginning. The start of your fall from grace.

#creepypasta x reader #creepypasta x y/n #yandere creepypasta #creepypasta x you #ticci toby x reader #ticci toby x y/n #yandere jeff the killer #jeff the killer x you #jeff the killer x reader #yandere ticci toby #ticci toby x you #jeff the killer x y/n #yandere creepypasta x reader #creepypasta x female reader #creepypasta au #.Prison AU #homicidal liu x y/n #homicidal liu x reader #Yandere homicidal liu

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sunderwight · 2 months ago

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Honestly fascinated trying to figure out how both of Ambessa's kids ended up being diametrically opposed to her whole jock spartan might-makes-right mentality.

Tthe obvious answer, of course, is that Ambessa's husband (Kino's dad, and the guy Mel thought was her bio dad until recently) was way more of a diplomat and way less of a fighter, both philosophically as well as in terms of skill. And that he's the one who passed this on to the kids.

This fits well enough as an answer. The guy in the portrait certainly looks more like a talker than a fighter, and we know that Ambessa has a thing for pretty, submissive men thanks to her whole introduction in S1. Also, regardless of Mel's genetics this is presumably the man who raised her and is her father in the "nurture" sense of the equation, so it would be completely reasonable for her to take after him.

However, there are a few issues here.

One is the fact that even when Mel is talking to who she thinks is Kino about the possibility of one of them being a bastard, or of a bastard half-sibling existing, neither of them mention their father at all. While I doubt either of them would hold illusions about Ambessa remaining faithful to a spouse (for all we know the guy's still alive while she's off carousing with twinks), you would think that if both kids were close to their dad or took after him particularly, there'd be at least a passing mention of him in the midst of this discussion.

Maybe Mr. Medarda died a long time ago, though. Perhaps it's a topic so buried that it's an established habit to simply never mention it. Or maybe there is an issue of estrangement between him and his children for other reasons. He doesn't seem to have factored into Ambessa's decision to send Mel away, nor is his potential grief brought up around the subject of Kino. Despite confirmation of his existence, he seems (ironically) to be out of the picture, though it could also just be that the writers wanted to leave their options open for what he might be like in case another Arcane-adjacent series comes into production. I am fairly sure that Mel is the most likely character from Arcane to create continuity into a show about Noxus or Demacia or something, if we get another LoL series, especially since her story feels the most unfinished.

However, there's another possibility, which is that Mr. Medarda up there was such a nonentity in his kids lives that he doesn't come up because there's not much of a relationship to acknowledge. In which case, even if he is more of a diplomat (and he and Ambessa were a political marriage, presumably?) it'd be hard to credit him with influencing the kids so significantly.

One of the interesting things about Mel and Kino is that even though they are at odds with their mother on a lot of topics, topics that even seem to tie into prevailing Noxian cultural ideals (so, things they'd have been overall raised to believe in by the rest of their house and not just their mother too), they are also kind of astonishingly confident in expressing themselves?

So, somebody must have been supporting their alternative viewpoints and validating them as opinions worth expressing, even if they weren't things Ambessa approved of or actually wanted to foster in them as opinions/philosophies.

I think an interesting option is that it was Ambessa herself who did this, actually.

Ambessa's lore mentions that she figured out really early on that Kino did not share her temperament at all. Also, that she started searching about for ways of ensuring not only her house's domination, but the survival of her children specifically. Because the succession in a Noxian noble house doesn't seem to be guaranteed by birthright, which means that Kino and Mel would probably face rivals from their own family if they seemed too weak or vulnerable to lead, and someone else contested it. An easy way to remove a "weak" leader would also be to just kill them off. That's even apart from external rivals (like the ones who actually did kill Kino).

Which means that even if her kids had different values and priorities, Ambessa would probably have wanted them to still present those opinions with ferocity and confidence. If they cower to her, they will cower to others, and that's worse than them just not being aggressive combatants or warlord types. If you're gonna be a peacenik weirdo (by Ambessa's standards) in Noxus then you better damn well still be an assertive one.

I like this idea partly because the image of Ambessa trying to balance her kids having totally alien opinions about things like the value of life and importance of compassion, with trying not to actually beat down their spirits about it. Just spending a lot of their formative years being like, ugh, I have to listen to my nerd ass loser children tell me why they think mercy is a good idea. Such a fucking chore. Anyway great job presenting your arguments kids, lots to think about, let's go get ice cream. Then Mother has to fire one of your military tactics instructors for daring to call you a couple of wieners. Again. Even though she's right.

#arcane #arcane spoilers #mel medarda #ambessa medarda #kino medarda #long post #ambessa just being mystified about why this keeps happening like how come BOTH kids turned out like this???#also the possibility that she looked at her literal infants and was like 'oh no they have no killer instincts AT ALL'#accidentally nurtured her kids to be more compassionate because she didn't realize that being hardcore almost from birth is weird #tfw you were a freaky kid and your society has a lot of pretenses so you mistake normal child behaviors for some kind of inherent weakness #'the children cried when I showed them a dead body this is bad people are gonna make fun of them'

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mrchiipchrome · 10 months ago

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You Always Go To The Parties

W.C. - 5.7 k

okay so this is the project i've been working on for a little, hope y'all like it:) (also listen to American Wedding by Frank Ocean while y'all read this.)

To clarify, this is a lionesses x r series too, but this is literally just the chapter of introduction so that we can get to know the characters.

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

“Do I really have to go? I can’t even drink legally here.” You groan, there was nothing stopping you from collecting your things and getting the hell out of that apartment in Boston, well except the manners instilled in you from an early age. There was nothing you’d like more than to crawl up in bed and sleep for the next few weeks.

No way Emma would let you do that.

The sophomore defender had been one of the only people that had come back to college early, having been asked to show you around the campus and the facilities. She had quickly taken you under her wing, which meant that she wouldn’t let you sulk in bed the rest of August.

Brown cardboard boxes filled to the brim with different things, ranging from clothes to knick knacks, were stacked to the ceiling in the otherwise empty apartment. You didn’t mind, clearly, but it bothered Em.

You tuck your hands behind your head, staring up at the ceiling from your mattress that was placed directly on the floor. Your button up had the first few buttons undone, the top of your chest displayed for Em to see, you had even put your fancy trousers on for the stupid party you didn’t even want to attend.

“Yes, you really have to. How else do you expect to make friends, your cute British accent will only get you that far, you actually need to put in some effort okay?” Rolling your eyes at her words, you were quickly made to get up off the makeshift bed, getting pushed towards the door.

“But-”

“No buts, you are going because I need someone to drive me home when I’m black out drunk tonight, you don’t want me to drink and drive right?” You can’t help but contemplate over her words, feeling the girl’s hand come down on your shoulder harshly.

Clearly she didn’t like that.

“I mean you could just, I don't know…not drink?” She looks at you like she’s disgusted you’d even think about saying something like that, like she has to drink.

“Wow, it really is obvious your parents are rich.” You lock the door up as you look at her through the corner of your eye, a slightly judgemental look in your eyes.

Your parents were rich, but they didn’t spoil you so you weren’t one of those snobby rich kids, you were just like anyone else. Only you had access to more money than most.

“Shut up.” Emma puts her hands up in the air, like she’s surrendering to you, but you see the way she’s smiling slyly at you. Note to self; don’t get defensive when Em brings up your rich parents.

“You know, I could use a new Gucci bag if you want to contact daddy dear.” She looks up at you pleadingly as you make your way to her car, there was no way you’d use your car, it was far too expensive to be left outside a frat house. You really had to get a more beat up one.

Maybe you’d sell it, and donate the money you got for it to charity.

“Aw, we’re taking my car?” Em whines, clearly she wanted to take your cool car.

“Aw, I’m not leaving my really expensive car outside of a frat house for hours.” You roll your eyes at her almost like she’s stupid, throwing her the keys so that she could drive, you didn’t even know where it was you were going.

“You know, you are really sassy for being a rich kid.” Em pulls out of the garage, the apartment complex you were living in was just off campus, so near that you walked there every day for pre-pre-season training (absolutely destroying Em every single time without fail).

“Yeah well, I grew up in the public education system in London, so that’s where I get it from.” You look on as the girl in the driver’s seat taps her fingers against the steering wheel, waiting for the red light to turn green.

“Really, I would’ve thought that they had you in private school from the second you popped out.” The green light stands out against the quickly darkening sky, starless and rather bleak, but that’s what you get for living in a big city.

“Nope, they wanted me to have a normal childhood, so here I am.” You motion to yourself, feeling the bumps and dips of the road beneath you, damn potholes.

“I mean fair enough right.” A certain quietness envelops the space between the two of you, it wasn’t uncomfortable, just present without any real purpose.

Your eyes slip shut, with Em turning the radio on, playing soft instrumental music like you weren’t in the middle of Boston where most people prefer hip hop and bubblegum pop. That was probably the biggest culture shock you'd been given so far, the music.

At home it was different, in a neutral way. It was neither better nor was it worse, but it was simply different.

You sink into your seat, the cool air blasting across your skin in that refreshing way, the summer’s heat canceled out by the air coming from the car. Slowly, sleep starts to take over your body in that calming sort of way that you’d wished for earlier.

It had only felt like moments since you’d fallen asleep as Em shakes your shoulders to get you to wake up, the pulsing music coming from the frat house a walking distance away already making your ears hurt. You look around at the surrounding nature, it wasn’t familiar to you, not the trees you’d found yourself memorizing nor the architecture present in Boston.

Even the people looked different, shirts with the printing of a dog on the front instead of the three books representing Harvard. Stupid of you to assume that Em would be rational for once.

“Where are we Em?” You ask, voice riddled with a sleepy kind of innocence that suggested that not everything had registered yet.

“We are in Connecticut, home of the huskies and what might be the best parties you’ll ever experience.” Your eyes shoot open wide, a more than flabbergasted look on your face at her naïve words.

“You kidnapped me and then drove me all the way to Connecticut for a party we could just as well have found in Boston?!” You ask her incredulously, like you couldn’t really believe her. And you couldn’t.

“Yeah, technically I did but you’ll also get to experience the party of your lifetime, so I think that it’s fine.” She tries to justify her actions by trying to reason with you, and whilst it doesn’t work in the way she wishes, Emma’s just happy you’re not totally freaking out.

“Come on grumpy, let’s go. Who knows, you might even have some fun.” Em pulls you along towards the house spewing flashing lights in a hundred different colors.

You let your eyes adjust to the blinking lights as you enter through the open front door, seeing the entire bottom floor of the mansion-like house covered with hundreds of students, packed together tightly like a sweaty sardine can.

The house reeks of bad body wash, moldy pits and strong cheap alcohol, and in a sense of the word Em really did tell the truth, you’d never seen anything like it before. It was almost like those frat boys couldn’t afford to buy deodorant.

If your arm wasn’t as firmly attached to your body as it was, you were sure that Emma would’ve torn it off by now, the resistance of the sweaty bodies pushing against your own as she leads you to the kitchen proving to be a difficult task for her weak arms.

Reaching the entrance of the large kitchen, the first thing you notice is that it’s not as tightly packed as the living room, only a few stragglers here and there with the stereotypical red solo cups can be found in every single person’s hand. Future alcoholists.

“Okay, base rules since you’ve never been to a college party before, don’t take a drink from anyone you don’t know, don’t accept anyone’s request to go upstairs or somewhere private, you’ll most likely get robbed, don’t be too snarky, people don’t appreciate that and… I think that’s all. Have a nice night!” And with that she’s off to the living room, plucking a cup from a random man’s hand and taking a sip before leading him to the dance floor.

Yeah, base rules or whatever.

Standing alone in the kitchen, you suddenly feel so awkward. The only real parties you’d been to were the one’s your friends threw when your parents were away on their stupidly long business trips, just the chaotic friend group drinking together.

So this, college parties, was something that was totally out of your comfort zone and you’d never hated anyone as much as you hated Em right at that moment.

Spotting a boy out of the corner of your eye, you approach him with confident, yet still relatively hesitant steps, a question at the tip of your tongue. He looks up at you when you’re close enough to smell the odor of old spice deodorant and way too much sweat, his hat turned backwards on his head to hide the greasy hair still somehow poking its way through.

You almost feel bad for the poor thing, well that is until his mouth opens and you’re staring into the hell that is a frat boy’s gob.

“‘Sup dude, what can I do for you?” His eyes run all along your body, from your ankles up to your face where he notices the annoyed expression.

“I was wondering if you had anything non alcoholic.” You smile staley, eyebrows furrowing together when his eyes light up like a kid on christmas. His laugh feels slightly insulting, especially when his hand comes up to point at you, but there’s really not a lot you could do.

“Dude totally, say the thing though.” You look at him confused, like you didn’t know what he meant. Spoiler alert; you did. “Y’know bo'ohw'o'wo'er.”

He laughs again when you roll your eyes, and even if all you desire is to punch his stupid face in, you still say the phrase. Was it worth it for a coke? Eh, debatable.

He opens the fridge and throws you the can and laughs once more at your dirty look.

Sipping the drink slowly as you make your way around the house, the UConn students around you stare unashamedly at you, like they knew your face from somewhere, but you weren’t familiar per se.

Your face scrunches up at the metallic taste of the American coke, much preferring the Mexican one they had in the canteen. You couldn’t complain too much though, you were the one who actually let yourself get dragged to the party.

It’s sudden, the way her eyes catch yours. Deep pools of endearing brown that capture your entire soul in a single second. The girl was mesmerizing as she stood leaning against the wall across from you, her long brown hair falling so effortlessly down her back.

Her gaze is just focussed on you for a second or two, her attention soon being stolen by the man standing in front of her, a sleazy smirk on his face as his eyes ran all along her body. It was clear that she was uncomfortable purely by the way her lips were turned downwards and the way her hands fiddled with the hem of her crop top.

There seems to be a lull in their one sided conversation as she looks to you almost pleadingly, getting the hint almost immediately, you walk over with confident steps, dropping the now empty can on the floor on the way.

The man is almost as tall as you, his burly shoulders disproportionate to the rest of his awkward body, his meaty hands gripping the red cup tightly like he was afraid someone would steal it from him. His hooded eyes do a once over when he spots you nearing them, almost turning a green pale at the sight of you.

You don’t understand why, there was no way you knew him and being recognised as Harvard’s newest addition would be unlikely. Especially in Connecticut.

“Everything alright here?” The girl seems startled by your accent, but she quickly schools her features so as to not show her surprise. Her hands wrap around your waist, and when you look down at her she looks back up at you with pleading eyes, asking you to just go along with it for the time being.

Your arm wraps around her shoulders and she leans into your body almost subconsciously, like you’ve known each other for much longer than you have.

“Yeah, everything’s going good.” He says, not backing down despite having been nervous at your mere presence only seconds before.

“Really? Because from where I stood it looked like you were flirting with my girlfriend.” You don’t even get the satisfaction of watching his gummy smile fade from his thin lips as he takes in your words, because he walks away from you before you can see it.

It makes you chuckle, especially since he walks up to another girl almost immediately, getting turned down in the same second.

“You okay?” You question the girl in your arms, her hand still resting on your waist as you take her in. You can feel her hair against your arm, her nails digging into your skin ever so slightly and the rest of her body pressed so tightly against your own.

“Yeah, he just wouldn’t leave me alone, thank you for the help.” She smiles at you sweetly, her brown eyes shining under the flashing lights. You smile back at her softly, noticing the way her grip loosens, you quickly let up on your grip of her shoulders.

Her unsure steps catch your attention as she takes your hand in her soft one, just like Em had done earlier in the evening.

“Where are you taking me?” You laugh through the sentence as she tries to pull you through the crowd of people, stumbling over her feet clumsily every so often.

“Do you like burgers?” She questions hastily, nearly having pulled you all the way to the front door already, she was a lot stronger than Em that’s for sure.

"Doesn't everyone?” You smile goofily when she looks back at you, her eyes narrowed playfully when you send her a wink. It’s only when you’re already out the door that you realize that Em is still in there, with people you don't know. Strangers.

You stop walking, the girl’s hand still in yours as she too stops, looking back at you confused.

“I’m sorry but my friend, Em, is still in there and I don’t want to leave her alone with strangers.” Her eyes light up again and you look at her weirdly, not understanding why she looked so happy that you had to leave.

“Em Whitmore?” She giggles at the shocked look on your face, clearly you didn’t know much about Em, the girl thinks to herself. You look at her suspiciously, how did she know Em?

“Yeah…how’d you know?” You ask her, still suspicious of her pretty intoxicated form. Her laugh carries all throughout the empty night, no one out and about except you and the mystery girl who’s soft hand is still in yours.

“I know her brother, she comes to a lot of parties here, because she knows she’ll be safe.” The brunette starts pulling you along again and you let yourself follow her, no longer worried about your Harvard counterpart. Her brother wouldn’t let anything bad happen to her.

By the time you reach the 50’s themed diner, you’ve already walked for ten minutes, side by side with the dark haired girl. You’re lucky that it wasn’t too far away, the half stumbling girl beside you probably wouldn’t have been able to walk that far without falling over.

The bell at the top of the door chimes when she pushes it open, the bored looking cashier perking up when he sees your companion. It was empty in the diner and you couldn’t imagine that keeping it open for this long wasn’t only for the drunk college students looking for a quick snack.

She drags you over to a booth in the corner, decorated in red and white stripes, a glass with straws standing in the middle of the table with a napkin holder beside it.

“Welcome to Donna’s Diner, what can I get for you?” The boy from the counter comes up to the booth after you’ve both settled, handing the two of you plastic menus. The dark haired girl smiles up at him, that fantastic glint in her eye once more.

“Come on now Alex, no need to be all professional.” You look up at him from where you’re sitting, his blonde hair curling around his ears, green eyes staring into yours kindly, thin fingers clasping the small notebook in his hands.

“Alex, this is my new friend, she knows Callum’s little sister, mystery friend, this is Alex and he’s in one of my classes.” You smile at him softly, sticking your hand out for him to shake, and he does take it in a confident grip, sending you a smile of his own.

“I’m Y/n.” Now the mystery girl looks up at you, finally a name attached to your face.

“Nika, I already know what you want, but how about you?” He looks to you when he speaks, obviously you wouldn’t know what to order, it being your first time there and all.

“I’ll just have whatever she’s having with a chocolate milkshake.” Alex disappears behind the counter again, your eyes following his retreating form. Looking away from the kitchen door, your eyes quickly meet the ones of the girl you now know as Nika.

One of her hands was tucked under her chin, keeping her head up in order to look at you. Relaxing into the cushions behind you, the small smile slowly taking over your face suddenly becomes full blown.

“What is it?” She giggles under her breath at your inquisitive look, and despite not knowing much more than her name, you already felt like she knew your soul inside and out.

“Nothing…it’s just that this is the last place I would’ve thought that you would bring me to.” The furrow in her brow is frankly quite adorable, her head turning to the side just in time to catch Alex walking out the kitchen with your food.

You see the way her eyes light up again, the platter of pure greasy goodness at the center of her attention right at that moment. All you could think about at that second was how thankful you were that the season hadn’t started yet, because everything there broke every single diet you could think of.

Looking to the brunette, the laugh bubbling up from the pit of your stomach is almost one of wonder, because the beautiful girl had already managed to get through half the burger that was in front of her. It seemed like her intoxicated brain only was focussed on one thing, satiating her hunger.

It isn’t long until you follow her lead, picking up the burger and just trying to get the most you could of it in your mouth. You can’t help the groan that escapes you when the exquisite flavours hit your taste buds all at once, having to lean back into the cushions of the booth to be able to take it all in, closing your eyes fully to enhance the experience even further.

It’s only when she laughs that you finally open your eyes again, only to see her looking right at you like you were made of glass, like she could read you like a book and then play you like a fiddle.

“I understand, I had the exact same reaction when I tried it.” She continues to giggle at you when you start to eat like a poor man starved. It was a funny sight to be fair, the way your fancy act completely disappears when in contact with amazing food.

“How’d you even find this place?” You question her when you’ve swallowed and wiped your mouth off with a napkin, you still had manners after all. She smiles at you, gesturing at your surroundings, at the tables and the booths, the chairs and the ketchup bottles, at everything.

“I was drunk after a party once in freshman year and I just stumbled across it.” You nod in response, completely understanding the randomness of how she’d found the place. When you’re drunk, all you want is some greasy food.

“So it’s a well guarded secret between the students then? I assume there’s usually more people here at this time of night.” You take a sip of the milkshake when the last word has fallen from your lips, heat spreading across your face at the intense look you’re getting from the brunette in front of you.

It’s probably just because she’s drunk, you think quietly to yourself, almost trying to convince your mind that the stupidly attractive smile on her face was just one of momentary value, that it was only because it was late and you were tired that it affected you in the way it did.

“Yeah, something like that.” She responds, a comfortable silence enveloping you two as you continue to eat.

The only thing that could be heard was the murmur of the fan across the room, the patting of the fingers of the boy, Alex, at the counter and the sound of shallow breathing. Well that was until her accented voice breaks it with a question.

“So, how’d you manage to befriend the girl with the scariest brother ever?” Nika asks you, her fingers playing with the napkin she’d taken only moments before. Her teeth capture her bottom lip softly as she looks at you tentatively, she’s positively driving you nuts with her pure unfiltered beauty.

“Well, for starters we both play football for Harvard, but she was the first one there to greet me, to help me pack up the necessities and all that. She never did mention a brother though.” You relish in the way she looks at you, all flustered and sweet despite you not having done anything in particular. It was adorable. Pause.

She nods absentmindedly, opening her mouth to speak before closing it and then opening it again, resembling a fish out of water more than anything.

“Were you going to say something love?” You ask the now blushing girl, and she hides her face in her hands at the embarrassment, clearly having zoned out for a little while there.

Reaching over, you pat her shoulder comfortingly before you ask her your next question.

“How about you? How do you know Em’s brother?” Nika reaches over the table to steal a few of your fries, laughing at the betrayed look on your face.

Maybe it was the drinks or maybe you were just funnier than you’d originally thought, either way the angelic sound of her laughing had graced your ears many times that evening. Not that you minded, you didn’t even mind a little bit.

“He plays basketball, I play basketball, and sometimes we train together.” You can’t help the feeling taking over you, the burning feeling that makes you question everything you’d ever known about yourself. Just the thought of your friend’s brother getting to enjoy her company makes the feeling inside you that much worse.

It seems like she sees the way your expression changes just that little bit before it goes back to normal.

“So, you’re like…close?” You ask the basketball player timidly, rolling your eyes only seconds later when the brunette decides to take a sip of your milkshake.

“No, not especially close. I mean, we talk when we have to at the shared training sessions, but not outside of it. But realistically though, who in the world of college sports doesn’t know Callum Whitmore?” Looking at her cluelessly, you sarcastically shrug as if to say you, because you truly hadn’t known a single thing about the man before she had told you.

By the third time Nika reaches for your fries, you decide to just push them towards her and let her have them, you weren’t even hungry after the monster burger you’d just consumed. It wasn’t at all just because she was too pretty not to get whatever she wanted. Pause.

“You want to switch?” She gestures to your drinks, she’d gotten a strawberry milkshake that she didn’t seem to fancy all that much right at that moment. Sighing goodnaturedly, you give her a nod and allow her to take whatever was left of your shake, smiling softly as you sip absentmindedly at the pink shake she’d given you.

Soon enough, the only thing that could be heard over the natural noise of the diner was the slight slurping every so often.

“I just got to go wash up, then I’ll walk you home, okay?” The brunette nods as she looks at you leaving, pulling out her phone to seemingly start to text someone not long after.

You walk up to Alex, who’s still standing at the counter and he smiles in your direction when you near, only seeing you out of the corner of his eye. Pulling out your wallet, you hold out your card to him.

“Could you do a to go order? God knows she’ll need that in the morning.” You nod your head in Nika’s direction, Alex smiling widely at you.

“You know, I’ve never seen her with you before…” His voice trails off, as if to tell you to fill in the blanks.

“Yeah, we only met tonight.” You smile at him staley, not understanding why the timeline of events was so important.

“You must be special then if she brought you here, it’s not often she brings anyone other than her friends here after a night out. Nico, drop me two burgers on the grill, one choc milkshake and a strawberry one.” As you walked towards the bathroom of the establishment, putting your card back in your wallet, you started to think about his words, wasn’t this place well known? What made it so special to Nika that the server had to point out how she never brought strangers there?

Wiping your hands off on your trousers, you go up to your table to collect Nika before swinging by the counter to pick up your to-go order, the brown paper bag looking out of place next to the two of you. It seems like she’s sobered up at least a little as she looks at you questioningly, her eyes soon falling to the bag in your hands and then back up at your face.

The bell chimes again when the two of you exit the diner, the cooling air of the late night a contrast to the warm atmosphere of the diner.

“What’s that for?” The furrow in her brow is so endearing that you almost feel the skip in your heartbeat, her eyes narrowing at you ever so slightly. Her arm threads through yours, one of your hands in the pocket of your trousers, creating the perfect space for her arm to go through.

You sneak a glance at her, flyaways being highlighted by the streetlights you were passing. Her head meets your shoulder as you start to walk back to the party, her apartment couldn’t be too far from it considering she hadn’t mentioned anything when you offered to walk her home.

“It’s for you, I just know that hungover Nika is going to crave Donna’s diner’s milkshakes to calm her raging headache.” You tease her softly, but there was definite truth there either way.

If there was one thing you knew about being hungover, then it was that good food usually helped at least a little (well, after the spells of throwing up everything from the previous night.) You give her a cheeky smile as you near the party once more, the booming music being heard from miles away.

“Thank you, you didn’t have to do that.” She speaks sincerely, you just smile at her in response, did you have to do it? No, but she’d kept you company all night so you did it anyway.

“Hey, can I just stop by my friend’s car before I walk you home? I just have to get something.” You were so thankful that you’d stolen the keys from Em before you went into the party only hours before. Leading her to the beat up truck, unlocking it and opening the door, you place the bag on the ground before you look through the glove compartment.

Finding the cartridge of painkillers and the pen that you were searching for with a small ‘aha’. The post-it notes Em always kept in her car finally came to use when you stole one, writing a quick message on it before sticking it to the plastic of the painkillers and dropping it down the brown paper bag.

You lock the car up, despite it being a piece of shit that no one would ever steal, Em always insisted on you locking it.

Walking up to her side once more, you open your mouth to speak.

“So, lead the way home love.” You gesture for her to take the lead, it was her apartment after all. Taking your free hand in hers, the girl starts to lead you towards her apartment building, walking calmly side by side with your hands swinging between your bodies.

After passing countless trees, and even more cars, you suddenly find yourselves at the bottom of the slanted hill leading up to where she lives, and when you actually start to walk up the long walkway, it’s slowly almost like you’re both resisting the natural order of events.

But you had to leave her, both Em and Harvard were waiting for you and no matter how much you tried to resist, you knew that’s ultimately where you had to go, it was your life even if the girl you’d just met seemed far more interesting than anything.

When you reach the top, just meters away from the door, you hand her the bag, smiling timidly when she reached out to hug you, her inviting perfume enveloping you in a blanket of warmth. When she pulls away, she thanks you one last time for your kindness.

“Really, it’s no problem.” You reassure her, smiling softly when she turns back towards you one last time before the distance between you becomes larger and larger, her fingers soon punching in the code to open the door.

“Wait!” You call out for her right as she’s about to enter the building, her head turning back to you questioningly. “Don’t forget to put it in the fridge when you get in.” She smiles and nods before disappearing behind the door.

You start your walk back to the party a few minutes after the door has closed, something just keeping you rooted to the ground. It wasn't until you heard your name get called by that familiar voice that you turned around, seeing Nika through her open window, waving at you as you walked away.

It almost felt like you were in some cheesy romance movie as you waved back, turning to walk away after she closed her window.

Truth be told, the evening had felt like something straight out of a romcom and some part deep down loved it. It loved the cheesy moments of pure unbridled love, the ability to express yourself freely, to dance in the rain, be your true authentic self in front of someone else was something you didn’t even know you longed for before you met Nika.

You shove your hands into the pockets of your trousers, every step you take moving you closer and closer to the frat house, closer to Em and closer to getting back to Boston.

Seeing Em sitting out on the steps of the house has you confused, why was she out there?

“Em? What are you doing out here?” You ask the clearly incredibly intoxicated Emma, your loud voice not even startling her, her slow movements showing just how drunk she is. The squeal she lets out when she sees you has you covering your ears, the intrusive sound killing your tired head.

She tries to stand up, but it just looks like Bambi on ice, stumbling and falling at every second. You come up and sling her arm around your shoulder, bringing her over to her car and sitting her down in the passenger seat.

“I’m not cleaning up if you throw up in here, just so you know.” She nods drunkenly, clearly not understanding a word you were saying.

“The reason why I was sitting outside is a long story.” She leans her head against the window, and knowing Em, she was probably imagining herself in a music video right at that moment.

“You can tell me tomorrow.” The car starts with a rumble and you pull out of the parking space on the side of the road, quickly pulling out and starting to drive on the main road.

It’s quiet for a while and you almost believe that Emma’s asleep, well almost since her feet move back and forth against the floor every so often.

“Where were you huh? What were you doing?” Her words are incredibly slurred and you can barely make out what it is she’s trying to say.

“None of your business mate.” She snickers at you, reading way too much into your response than she should have.

“You got some.” The way your face turns red doesn’t help your case even in the slightest, especially when she herself points out your reddening cheeks.

“Shut up and go to sleep, Em.” Your voice cracks in the middle of the sentence, still embarrassed by her insinuation.

“Mhm, you totally got some pussy.” You sigh as she laughs again, she was clearly getting a lot more joy from the situation than you were.

“Go to sleep Em.”

“Mhm.”

Maybe she had been right after all, maybe you had fun and maybe, just maybe the decision to go to the party was a good one. Not that you’d ever let her know that.

#woso x reader #woso #lionesses #nika muhl x reader #nika muhl #uconn wbb #wbb x reader #woso imagines #woso fanfics

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