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theknightmarket · 10 months ago

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"Deal."

In which three disagreeable deities are forced to agree. TW: cursing Pages: 28 - Words: 11,500

[Requests: OPEN]

You were a cultist. You weren’t about to hide that aspect of your life because it was no mere aspect, not anymore; you devoted your entire being to tracking down the pantheon that would mark the end of all humanity. It wasn’t out of spite or service. You had no cosmic motive behind your catastrophic actions. But it wasn’t a test either. Belief rested in your heart and calm in your mind as you traded away the lives of your friends, your family, strangers who would never know what was coming, and your own, for one little thing.

A kiss.

Everyone thought you were joking. Nobody, not even the dredges of society, would risk it all for a little physical contact. They snorted when you told them your plan, and raised an eyebrow when they thought you were carrying on the bit for too long. Oh, there went the ‘town crazy’, traipsing down to the antique shop to pick up the latest prop for their little jape. We laughed at them, for they carried the weight of the jester for our amusement.

Oh, you’d show them. If they lived long enough to recognize what was happening. If they didn’t, you’d still be better off than them.

You proudly owned up to your title of the local lunatic, although it was first given as a joke. One step into your apartment, and they might’ve realized that you weren’t joking. All the ritual memorabilia scattered along the walls, all the unholy ingredients stored in the cupboards, all the little things that contributed to the utter collapse of humanity. Well, as long as the person working the antique store wasn’t a liar.

And, chances were, he was.

But it didn’t hurt to try. And try. And try. And try. One of these days it would work. Eventually, you’d hit the nail on the head and get exactly what you wanted.

The slam of the book on the wooden alter reverberated around the apartment, swallowed by the artifacts you’d collected. You didn’t know when that day would come, if it would ever come, but you were definitely trying. A manic grin split your face in two as you flipped through the yellowed pages. Awful corruption for a god, but you were going to use it anyway. You could always rewrite it if all you needed was the instructions. They were deities, after all, they deserved better than some dusty, half-broken tome.

You hummed to yourself while you worked. Normally, your speakers would be up and running during the hours you studied old texts, blasting the playlist you’d accumulated over the years. Sorting things was never your forté, so they were all in one place. A bit jarring, but you got used to it, and you didn’t have the time to rearrange anything right now. There was work to be done.

The circle you’d engraved in your wooden flooring – which you notably did not tell your landlord about – was surrounded by candles to make the points of a star. Classic. Reliable. Any source of light was diminished, including the overhead lights that you never turned on and the curtains that you never opened. There wasn’t anything to see anyway, and you preferred your side lamp, though you also switched that off when you had everything in place.

Finally, you rushed to the book and read through the specific instructions for the one you were going to summon first. Try to, at least. The preparations before were all commonplace, every ritual used them, but this was where it changed. You might have been drawing a different symbol or equipping a unique relic. In this case, you were to light the candles pink and inscribe all manner of curls and swirls on the floor with a similar shade of ink.

The packet of lithium was in your hand before you knew what you were doing, but you didn’t resist sprinkling it into the wax divots near the wicks. Your high school chemistry lessons finally paid off, as long as you ignored that your first thought was food dye; working with a pantheon of deities outside of your understanding of the world was undoubtably taking a toll on your mental state.

But that didn’t matter right now. The only thing that was important was the paintbrush in your hand that pooled thick lines of neon pink in the exact shape of the symbol in the book. It had to be exact. Perfect. They deserved it.

You connected the last line to the rest of the shape and sat back on your knees to marvel at your work for the brief moment of life you had left. You wouldn’t get the chance once the end of times was ushered in. It didn’t matter to you if it was a sin to be proud of the product of your years of labor. It was probably more of a sin to cause the deaths of eight billion people. What was one more drop in the bucket?

Wiping your paint-splattered face with your sleeve, you rose from the ground and hastily stumbled towards the alter again. The only thing left to do was chant.

Adrenaline rushed you as though you were being judged, chased, stalked. And you likely were. You felt the stares of a hundred gods and monsters on you, from all directions, right into your eyes. They were eager to witness the introduction of apocalypse. They followed where your pupils went. Holding sparks of anticipation, they flitted across the page to work out the pronunciations, wild birds in their cages pleading to be free from the confines of flesh. Your grip on the alter tightened, knuckles paling as all blood rushed away. Any tighter, and you’d rip splinters from it.

You knew you opened your mouth, and you knew you spoke. The chant flowed like thick oil from your throat and poured itself over the paper. You felt it – gods, did you feel the words cling to the life you gave them – but you didn’t hear it. But it was working. It was working, so you didn’t care. You didn’t matter. The ritual did.

So, it didn’t worry you when a flash of pink light, brighter than an atomic bomb, sprung from the centre of the circle at the dip of one of the paint’s arcs and blinded you. Sight and hearing gone, you relied on touch to ground you, and even that was fleeting. The alter was knocked to the floor and you followed it, landing roughly on your palms in accidental prayer. You assumed you were still looking in the vague direction of the flash. The pink had turned to white in the space of your fall. Whatever was with you now, you had no choice but to worship it. The host of the apocalypse, the bringer of the end of times, the catalyst for the collapse of humanity.

The thing that smelled sweet and clasped your hands gently. You still couldn’t see. Did you do it right? Did you summon the right one? Did you knock over a candle and accidentally burn the apartment down and this was heaven? How did you get into heaven?

Your vision was clearing up while you spiraled. Gradually, the spots of light were pulled apart by a softer tone. It wasn’t the shadow you would have expected after removing all sources of light save the candles, but it wasn’t the flashbang from before, and you would take it. You’d hate for your efforts to be for something but unable to experience it to its fullest.

Shakily, you breathed out, exhaling something akin to dust from the lining of your lungs. A few particles remained in your mouth. Sweetness, again. As though you had dipped your tongue in sugar.

“My- my God?” you mumbled. You could hear your voice this time. Words you knew and recognized. Familiar. Safe.

Yet you still felt safe with the hands of a stranger wrapped around yours. They were warm and soft, and, blinking with the sensation of stepping into the sun for the first time, normal looking. Slowly, you turned them over, so the palms were facing up to you. They were human.

But the thing kneeling mere inches away from you was not.

“Please,” they spoke, with a smile you swore you once saw carved into marble, “call me Wilford.”

He looked kind. When the last vestiges of bright light faded, you were greeted by the pleasant sight of a handsome, if not confusing, man. Really, the pink moustache and hair, the same color as the paint and candles, was the only sign of him not being the average person on the street, besides the fact that he appeared in your ritual circle like the second coming.

When your eyes met, his grin widened. You couldn’t guess what was going through his head, you wouldn’t dare, but you had questions as to why he was guiding you to stand so tenderly. “Now, whatever did you summon me here for?”

“I-I... well, I meant to- uh, dammit, I—”

Your poor excuse for a sentence was cut off before you could make more of a fool of yourself by hushing. Of course, you quieted down, thankful for the excuse to focus on breathing instead of talking. A haze of some unknown emotion clouded your mind and heart, but whatever you were experiencing must have been obvious to the deity you stood before. He took you by the crook of your arm and coaxed you towards the couch a few steps away. Doing this ritual thing in the middle of the living room was a blessing and a curse, though the latter would only come into play if it failed. You hated rearranging furniture.

He laid you down onto the plush pillows, cooing at you softly. Was this the relationship between gods and humans? Pets to play with as they saw fit. It made sense, as much sense as infinite immortals could make. There was no argument to be on an equal playing field, but you had imagined it to be more…

Violent, maybe subservient. You didn’t expect to be pampered with a hand patting your hair and assurances muttered until you were able to function again.

“I summoned you,” you shakily spoke. It was a statement, but you couldn’t stop the uncertainty seeping into your words.

“I should hope so—” Wilford’s laugh was the same as his voice, incredibly sweet and lighthearted, despite having enough power to stop your heart with just a glance, “—I am here, after all.”

Hesitantly, you nodded. Alright. He was actually there. You had summoned him. It actually worked this time.

“Do you remember why you summoned me?” came his own question.

You definitely did, and your subconscious seized your mouth again to avoid having to say it aloud. To the people in your town, the ones you entertained with your plots and stories, it was easy to tell what your end goal was. With the actual deity face to face, it was much harder. You should have planned for this. Maybe you could buy some time to get your confidence back.

You latched onto the odd choice of words that confused you in the first place. “Do… do I remember?”

“Sometimes I forget myself, and if an eldritch god does, I’m sure humans do, too.”

Your own breathing filled the silence left behind at the admission. Wilford’s chest didn’t rise or fall, why would it, and he seemed preoccupied with carding a hand over your head anyway. His moustache twitched every time that he brushed against your actual skin, and his smile grew an unnoticeable millimeter wider. It left you frozen and staring at him, which he didn’t appear to mind.

You could do this. There was no going back now.

“Well, Wilford,” you began, barely managing to escape his touch long enough to sit up straight, “I do remember.”

“Good! How can I satiate your heart’s deepest, darkest desire?”

“I want to kiss you.”

The reaction you received was not one you expected from a god, of any shape or form. He hummed pleasantly. Nothing else, he just hummed, the sound reverberating in the small room but never seeming to fade. It died out in a flash, instead, as he placed an elbow onto the couch cushion and balanced his head in the hand of it. In the fifteen seconds that you were both completely immobile afterwards, he didn’t blink, and his smile stayed plastered where it was.

“You want to kiss me,” he repeated, tone as peppy as before you revealed yourself.

No matter how hard your heart beating against your ribcage, you didn’t dare back down. You were in it now, whether you liked it or not. So, slowly, you nodded, becoming more and more sure of yourself in the process.

Wilford stayed perfectly quiet and perfectly still for another moment. You wondered if you’d done something wrong, something so taboo that you’d broken a god – but a kiss was much easier on the mind than the murder of billions of innocents; you should have been the one to freeze, and yet there you were, waiting with bated breath for him to say anything else. But he didn’t.

Not before he lunged forward, springing to lean over you in an inclined plank and barricade his arms around you. Even without the cover of blinking, his eyes seemed to mimic the stars – flashes of planets and sparks of supernovas jumped around in his pupils and radiated light to the whites. You could barely move your head enough to make eye contact with how close his face was, pressed almost directly underneath your chin, enough that you felt his mustache ticked at the skin as his grin grew impossibly wider.

“Oh-ho, now that’s an unusual request!” he commented, “I don’t think I’ve ever heard that one before.”

The position you were trapped in gave you no leeway. When you spoke, your breath shifted the curls of his hair. “You haven’t?”

There was silence in which Wilford tried to remember, but he came up empty; so many years and requests and people, anyone would have trouble keeping track of them all. His own established issues didn’t help him any, but that didn’t matter. After all, that was the past, or the future, or a different present that he needn’t care about. You were the one in front of him, looking awfully scared for such a simple want, and you were the one he was tending to. The strange human who just wanted a simple smooch in return for possibly giving him the entire world. It was almost unfair.

“But it is intriguing.” His head cocked to the side. “The average summoner would ask for something bigger. Riches, power, time—” Then a thought occurred to him that made his smile collapse into a sharp grimace, broken only by him spitting out, “—fame.”

You supposed it had crossed your mind once or twice that you should do something more substantial with your boundless wish, but nothing else seemed worth it, to you at least. Why would you care about being a billionaire when you wouldn’t live long enough to use the money? Power was a moot point because you didn’t care enough about any entity to want to control it, and time?

“Isn’t the world going to end anyway?”

A few stray chuckles floated up from Wilford’s mouth. “Oh, no, of course not!”

Any fear that remained from his bout of silence was traded out for doubt, surprise, and a great deal of confusion. When he brought his head back to eye level with you, there was no sign of a lie, just dim amusement as your misconception. You might have been offended had you not been preoccupied by the questions that ran through your head.

He peeled back far enough that there were a few inches between you. “What point would there be in destroying the very thing that gives you power? The cults of eldritch gods support them, in every place and time at once, and to willingly minimize your area of effect would be plain silly. We can’t just destroy dimensions willy-nilly; we have to be selective. So,” he practically purred, closing up that gap slowly, “you’ll be completely safe. The people around you, however…”

Although he trailed off, you didn’t need any more explanation. A world-ending catastrophe wasn’t your aim, anyway, what was currently happening was. The space between you was getting smaller and smaller at a leisurely pace. You couldn’t complain, physically or figuratively. Puffs of air danced across your lips, like fog rolling in from the sea, and the couch dipped as Wilford’s knee came to stabilize him at the edge. You risked prematurely closing the gap entirely when you whispered, “That’s fine.”

“Good,” his whisper came out as the final bat of a wave against the shore, “you don’t exactly have a choice anymore.”

Not that you would protest as his lips skimmed yours so lightly that you weren’t certain it was happening at all. If you were to lean less than a centimeter forward, you would connect, and the deal would be done. Internally, you were a blank canvas, mind in a haze of expectation and adrenaline. Whether this was just you or the effect an eldritch god had on you, you didn’t know, and you didn’t care. You had devoted years of your life to this pursuit, you couldn’t waste the golden opportunity on minor worries.

But it wasn’t your fault that you were interrupted.

Another flashbang blinded you with white light. Ringing in your ears that stopped you from hearing anything except the high pitch, even when you felt your mouth open. This time, instead of the complete blankness of your senses, you were overwhelmed with pain, as if you had been dunked in the river Styx. Not just the brightness of an atomic bomb, but the agony of one, too. A migraine flexed and stilled in your mind, focusing all the thoughts on the damage it must have been causing you. What this was or why it was happening were secondary to silent prayers for it all to stop.

And then, just like that, your prayers were answered. In the flap of a butterfly’s wings, you were left reeling on the couch, pushed back into the cushions and fighting against your swimming vision. It was hard to distinguish direction for a moment, even the memories of the apartment you’d lived in for years struggled to help you, but it soon cleared up. In front of you, from the couch to the wall, was the same as it always had been, and you had to wonder whether Wilford had just made a dramatic exit before anything could actually happen.

Voices from behind you made you realise not only did Wilford not leave, but someone new was in the room with you, and it wasn’t a friendly neighbor checking in about the noise.

“The least you could have done was wait until I was finished.” That one was the voice you recognised, but the tone was much more acidic than the softness you were already used to.

And then, came the one you weren’t familiar with. “What would be the point of showing up after you’d sealed the deal?”

Against the bell chime of Wilford’s voice, this one was sleeker, as if it had been artificially smoothed down to slide from the throat to the mouth and out into the air. It lacked a sweetness but made up for it in baritone words like the soft pounding of a heart in your ears. It matched your own that had dropped into your stomach as your thoughts clouded with the newcomer.

“From what I remember, you’re not one to act with much sense,” Wilford replied, a spite overtaking any of the enthusiasm he had shown you. Whoever this was, he didn’t like them.

The stranger’s sarcastic laugh punctured the air of your apartment. “Oh, that’s rich coming from you.”

“And anyways, I was here first, and, unlike you, I was actually summoned.”

“Wilford?” You were surprised by the shake of your voice – you weren’t a meek person by nature, but you supposed being in the presence of two gods would do that to anyone. You understood that you should have been groveling at their feet, thanking them and begging for forgiveness, and yet you simply rose from the couch to finally catch a glimpse of the deity he was on the cusp of arguing with.

“Yes, darling?”

His response was thrown to the wayside as your eyes met with the unfamiliar face in your living room. Your first thought was to wonder how the second god you’d ever seen was just as gorgeous as the first. The second was that your eyes blew so wide with fear with that you were sure they were going to fall out. They were draped head to toe in a crimson that burned in the candlelight, which, now that you actually looked, was no longer the pink you had lit it to be. It was much darker, eerily the same color as the blood that flowed through your veins, but it caressed the edges of their body and face like a lover’s hand.

You swallowed before you asked, “What- what’s happening?”

Your question flipped a switch in the two’s minds. On one hand, Wilford broke out into a snarl unbecoming of the man you’d seen him to be as he groaned, “We’ve been party-crashed.”

On the other hand, the one in red started to step – glide – toward you, the robe swaying across the floorboards and creating patterns in the still wet paint that they strode across. A smirk pulled at the corner of their mouth when you were within arm’s reach.

“What Wil here failed to explain is that I am the King in Red, Heir to Carcosa.” Neither of those titles you recognised but you felt your heart drop regardless, especially as he stopped barely a few inches away from you. The sliver of Wilford that you could see did not look pleased, but he stayed where he was anyway.

“Another eldritch god,” you clarified.

His touch on your hand felt like someone had lit a flame in your palm, the veins used as routes for a wildfire to grow. Your impulse to snatch your hand back was overtaken by the need to close around the warmth. The decision was made for you as he brought your hand towards himself. “Guilty as charged.”

The kiss was better, worse, different to the flame of his contact. It was so hot that it fully circled temperature and fell into a blazing coldness against the back of your hand. You were half sure he had melted away your skin, despite the strange lack of pain, and taken your breath along with it. You didn’t speak, couldn’t find it in you to, when Mark came out of his bow and stood straight enough to meet your eyes again.

“Considering Wilford here told you his, my name is Mark.”

You didn’t know how to feel; all the awe and terror and confusion and fatigue was catching up to you, convincing you with a gentle hand to lie down and forget that there were two gods in your living room, who you now knew the names of, that you were going to play host to. Everything was crumbling around you.

Putting up your scraps of confidence, you asked desperately, “Why are you here? I didn’t, I mean, I already—”

But mortals’ crises were nothing but spilled milk to eldritch deities. Flippantly, Mark waved his hand, the sleeve of his robe peeling back, before he spoke, “Yes, yes, I know I’m not technically the one you summoned, but I couldn’t help but overhear what you were trading for the lives of your friends and family.”

“Something that doesn’t involve you, that’s for sure.” Whether you were grateful for Wilford’s intrusion or appalled by the obvious disrespect didn’t matter. Mark’s smirk sharpened, expelling all the smooth charisma.

“If you’re going to make snarky comments,” he snapped, “I suggest you find another of your cultists and make some other exchange. I know you have hundreds.” Wilford gasped indignantly, not that you knew which suggestion he took the most offence to.

“And leave you alone with one of my followers?” His scoff cut into a growl.

In your preparation for summoning a god, you hadn’t done much research into who you’d actually be summoning. The specifics of the character weren’t anything you cared for, considering you would use whatever you could get your hands on – pink paint and lithium were the easiest combination of materials, and some of the other rituals asked for either very difficult or very uncomfortable things to get your hands on. As such, the relationships between those deities were unknown to you. Whatever this was, an ancient rivalry or a mere spat, you hadn’t prepared for it.

Nor were you prepared to be the person they were fighting to convince.

“Darling,” Wilford started moving closer, intentionally giving Mark a wide berth, “I know I said you’re safe, and you still are, but being around him for a long period of time has proven to be deadly.”

Sarcasm bubbled up within you. You hadn’t expected it to be a safe endeavor, after all. Still, you kept your mouth shut, more out of respect than the fear.

Mark had no such qualms about backtalking, however.

“Because becoming a ditzy canvas with no memories at all is so much better than what I can offer?”

Wait, what?

“Quite frankly, yes! A lot of people would take it over becoming a husk for you to puppet on stage.”

What?

One second, you were damning the world to apocalypse. The next, you weren’t, and everybody could live their happy endings. And then the next, you were sacrificing the people in the town but saving your own skin. And then the next, you were either losing your memories and your mind or you were renting out your body as an actor.

You really wanted someone to give you the story straight, without all the fluffy words and fighting. But the fear must have showed on your face, because Mark was gesturing in your direction with a manicured hand.

“Come now, you’re scaring the poor thing. I think we can come to a better agreement, don’t you?”

You didn’t like the tone of his voice in the last half. You didn’t like it one bit. He was suddenly less like a sneaky door-to-door salesman and more like the snake in the garden of Eden.

“I mean—” Your words sounded choked out, even to yourself, “—I don’t really think I want anything else.”

“There’s no need to pretend with me, dearest, that’s my job. You must have a larger goal – and with me, you won’t be sacrificing the people around you. They get to live, and you get what you want. Isn’t that better?”

You saw what the problem was. You supposed that after so many years of humanity milling about, there’d be conflicting impressions of them, especially for gods who didn’t see things on the same level as you. The world wars and the protests and the charities muddied the waters of what humans were really like.

Mark was making the – albeit completely understandable – mistake of assuming that both you and the townsfolk were good people.

“I think you overestimate how much I care about the people in this town.”

You couldn’t help the swell of pride in your chest when you noticed the shock on his face. Hell, his back straightened, and he blinked as if he just weren’t seeing you right.

“But your family. Surely, you don’t want to be the cause of their deaths?”

And he was assuming that your family was still alive.

“No, I- uh, don’t have a family.”

His face dropped as if you’d spoiled the ending of a show. Unimpressed, bored, and vaguely disappointed. Maybe he wasn’t used to this kind of resistance, maybe he wasn’t used to getting it wrong. Presumably, that wasn’t a habit the gods made, but it happened regardless. It was happening, and Mark was having a hard time getting back onto his feet.

After a moment’s hesitation, he stilled and frowned. “You’re making this a lot harder than it has to be,” he complained, and yet he spoke with such confidence, as if the outcome couldn’t be anything but him getting what he wanted, that you almost believed it, too.

Wilford stepped around Mark, very obviously and probably meant to tease him, in order to pull you back down to the couch cushions with him. You flopped against the back of it, only secured by his arms around you, cradled like a toy that a parent threatened to take away from their child. Just as stubbornly, he spat, “It was all going smoothly before you showed up.”

“And if everyone played along, we’d be done by now.” You could hear Wilford rolling his eyes better than you could see it in response to Mark’s groaning. You weren’t doing it on purpose, or, at least, you didn’t think you were. Why would you? The man beside you definitely was, trying to get under his skin and poking and prodding, but you were just answering the questions. Were you supposed to play alongor were you supposed to tell the truth?

Wilford interrupted before you could come to a conclusion, “In this day and age, I don’t understand why you’re here.”

Mark looked you up and down. Judging. He smiled, not unpleasantly but vastly less wholesome than Wilford’s grins. It reminded you of a rose, not just the petals but the thorns as well. He wasn’t lying about the danger he brought, he just wasn’t mentioning it, in the same way that you might not recognize a rose for the pain it would cause but for the beauty it was known for. Nobody talked about the spikes, just the satiny crimson of the prettier parts. Distantly, you wondered whether that smile meant you passed inspection or something different.

“I’m just interested.”

“Go be interested in someone else.” He waved his hand, a shooing motion that lit a flame in Mark’s face, his cheeks becoming just as red as his robe. You didn’t particularly want two gods getting into a petty fight in the middle of your apartment – hell, you hadn’t planned for there to be two gods in the first place – but you still wound up the mediator.

At least, you tried. “Can’t I make a deal with both of you?”

But your proposition was shot down immediately, a combined, “No!” bouncing off the walls and down the hallway. It sounded like the thunder and the rain of a storm, like it was down the street and right next to your ear simultaneously. Their yell, their one agreement so far, could have shaken the earth in the way you had expected their arrival to, instead of the flashbang you had been met with.

You shrunk back into the embrace of the couch, pressed into it in the way that got pennies and wallets and keys lost. You couldn’t tell whether it was out of fear, worry, or the want to get disappear like those common trinkets. The feeling of regret flexed in you, growing and shrinking and growing and shrinking. This whole ordeal was more than you had bargained for. You’d expected a one-and-done kind of thing. Now, you had childish rivals tossing insults.

Speaking of.

Mark bent down to take your hand into his again, but he didn’t lean to kiss it. Instead, he drew his other hand over it, fingers dancing along the skin and prompting sparks around your knuckles. “Dearest,” his teeth were gritted together so that the words struggled out from behind the bars, “I would rather die than share a follower with him. We both know how well it worked out last time.”

A tut from your side before it merged into a laugh. “You’re still hung up on that?”

“What reason do you have?” came the venomous response, disbelieving and mocking.

“I just don’t like you.” Wilford’s smile was bright even as he insulted Mark to his face. If you were to reach out, you were half sure your hand would catch on the tension between them, and you were surprised when you were able to get up from the couch and drag yourself through the air without being stopped.

When you were a few steps away from the pair, out of the blast radius, you sighed, “It’s obvious that this isn’t working. Is there a way to end the whole summoning thing?” You weren’t keen to have to redo all your hard work, but you were even less interested in losing your apartment to a minefield. As the saying went, there were plenty of fish in the sea, and finding another god couldn’t be that difficult. You hoped.

Your eyes latched onto the sudden fear in Wilford’s eyes. It was small, but it was there. Despite that, his grin never faltered, and his voice was steady as he answered, “No—”

“Yes, there is!” Mark announced with more excitement than you had heard in your entire experience with him, and, possibly, it was the most genuine, too. His head whirled to frantically search around the room until his gaze landed on the alter.

Wilford jumped to his feet. “It’s extremely complicated and you probably don’t have the materials and it takes time—”

“They have the book, don’t they?”

What ensued was by far the most insane part about this situation; you stood next to the wall, watching with concern, while Mark dashed for the summoning book. He was barely a few inches away from grabbing it before his face met the floor, snuffing out the candles that he landed on and knocking several others onto the floor. Wilford grunted in the new position as Mark’s elbow connected with his stomach – he recovered surprisingly quickly from the tackle to the ground – and he tossed the other god onto his back. A bundle of flames licked up at them on your wooden boards, but the threat was diminished with their combined rolling away.

Before you met them, you would’ve been scared out of your wits by the thought of two eldritch beings grappling in the middle of your apartment, especially because you would have made certain assumptions – that they had demonic powers, that they could kill you accidentally with the snap of their fingers, and maybe they still could. It was only now that you realized they not much more than schoolboys fighting in the field at lunch break. You couldn’t be intimidated by that.

So, walking forward to stamp out the fire that had been growing into a few smoldering patches of ash, you grabbed the book that they had seemingly forgotten about and proceeded towards your front door. Not schoolboys. Toddlers. Thinking of them like that gave you only one course of action; wait for their tantrums to end and then pick up the pieces.

They didn’t react to the creak of the door, Wilford too preoccupied by bending Mark’s arm back and Mark too preoccupied by not getting his arm bent back, so you slipped out into the night with ease. Immediately, you felt the change in the air. There was no tension out there, covered by the coolness of late hours. They offered a comfort you would never be able to match. Never had you been so glad to be human. Sure, other people were a nightmare and getting out of that town was a dream you aspired to, but you enjoyed this little bit of the world. You wondered if ants felt the same when they looked down off a hill. In the presence of ‘dangerous’ deities, it was nice to sit back and appreciate what you did understand. At that time, you would normally have been able to see the stars twinkling distantly against the black void of the sky, but they must have been hidden by the clouds because you couldn’t see them.

Or the railing.

Or the balcony hallway itself, or, as you whirled around to run back inside, the wall of your apartment. The door stood out like an unfinished painting, bordered by the same darkness that was all around you. You felt caged. It was closing in and spreading apart at the same time, and you could only think to return to the living room. At least you knew what was in there. Out here? Glares burned into your skin from all directions and the shiver of a frigid gust of wind was more physical than your own body. You lunged for the handle to escape it and threw yourself in.

More darkness greeted you.

“Wilford?” you called out, “Mark? Is anyone there?”

You had spoken to the void, but you didn’t expect the void to speak back.

“So, you’re the one causing all of this trouble?”

Those eyes seemed to narrow. The only thing you were certain of was the rapid thud of your heart in your chest, and even then, it was inconsistent. A scream clawed at your throat, but you choked on the sound.

You managed to struggle past the blockage to ask, “Hello?”

The words reverberated around wherever you were, but it wasn’t your voice. Some of the echoes were deeper, some higher, some altogether unintelligible, as if spoken in another language. It hurt when they came back to you.

“Darling, dearest—” Something writhed in the pitch, “I’d ask how they got so attached so fast, but we both know who we’re talking about.”

“And who am I talking to?”

“You’ve been messing around with that book; I should hope you know.”

You almost jumped to your own defense before you remembered what position you were in. On one hand, you had only meant to summon Wilford, not Mark, but, on the other, it probably didn’t matter in the eyes of whoever – whatever – you were talking to.

“I don’t mean to be rude,” you started as you searched for the confidence you had started the day with, “but which one are you?”

“I have man names, many faces… you won’t be around much longer, so you may refer to me as Dark.”

Well, it was certainly fitting. As if to confirm your thoughts, a patch of the void appeared to constrict and tear through itself. Each particle fought for space, sparking with red and blue light, and collected into smaller masses. You were stuck to where you were standing while the voice continued in the background.

“Those two are tenacious.” More flecks of light joined the fray. “Neither will stop until they get what they want.” They warped the area around them in the vague shape of a person. “That just so happens to put you in a tight spot.” The color seeped out of the portrait, but it was still distinguishable from the void. “Wilford will slowly erase your memories, even though he doesn’t mean to nor is he aware of it.” A body began to coalesce where you assumed the floor of the void to be. “And Mark will take your physical form as soon as you pledge yourself to him to use in one of his plays.” It travelled up from dress shoes to black pants to the edges of a white shirt. “And you were about to choose both.” A neck appeared above the collar and those particles caressed the line of a jaw. “That…”

A face emerged.

“That is fascinating.”

Before you stood the fully formed god you now knew as Dark, and you had mixed feelings about that. For one, you had actually watched him appear. He didn’t arrive in a blaze of light, he did quite the opposite. That in and of itself dug a pit in your stomach, and his earlier comment that you wouldn’t be around much longer wasn’t helping your nerves. You felt like you were on the edge of spiraling out of control, but you also felt strangely calm, like there was a voice whispering in your ear that there was no need to get worried. Your breathing stayed steady while you looked at him. A formal black suit and ashen skin were the only notable features he sported. There was no taste in your mouth, no pain in your body, just confusion and a hint of fear.

He opened his mouth to speak, and you braced for impact, but his voice sounded normal. “What’s so important to you that you’d give up your mind and body?”

The answer was coaxed out of your mouth before you could think to say it. “A kiss.”

You had managed to shock not one, not two, but three eldritch deities. You were three for three, and you were damn proud of yourself! When you were back in your room later that night, you were going to celebrate. With what, you didn’t know yet, but you were already stewing in the feeling. It didn’t take long for Dark to recuperate, though, and you were brought back to the present by his gravelly laugh.

“Mortals,” he tutted. “You can never seem to decide whether you’re so significant that you’re the centre of the universe, or you’re so irrelevant that nothing you do matters. You’d give up yourself and the people around you for a show of affection, no doubt ingenuine?”

“Is it so hard to understand that I don’t care about the people here?”

“And your own soul?”

“I went into this thinking the entire world was going to end, so this is a preferrable outcome.”

He thought for a moment, tilting his head and narrowing his eyes. You felt like you were being inspected, and maybe you were, but you must’ve passed his scrutiny because a grin crept across his face. Not sugary like Wilford’s, or sly like Mark’s, but understanding, as if you’d given him the last piece of the puzzle that he had also known from the beginning. You confirmed something in him, and he was going to use it to his full advantage.

“That settles it,” he said, bringing a hand up to snap his fingers. That sound reverberated, not unlike your original words, but without the pain. Instead of granting to a headache, it swept away the darkness like a curtain to reveal your apartment. You were standing exactly where you would have been after coming back inside, a few steps away from the centre of the ritual circle, only Dark was situated opposite you. Just to the side were Wilford and Mark, still tousling as though you had never left.

As Wilford reared back a fist to sock Mark in the jaw, he finally noticed your return, to which he shot a smile at you. A stark bruise had found a place above his eye, but that didn’t stop him from winking at you while he drew his fist further away from his target.

And then he paused, hummed, and jumped up from the floor to greet Dark with a hug and a call of his name.

Mark, meanwhile, stumbled to his feet. He didn’t look worse than Wilford, but he certainly wasn’t better; a cut dripped blood around his mouth, which he wiped away with his thumb. His expression didn’t brighten when he saw Dark, and, instead, he took the grace period to trot over to you and swing an arm around your waist.

“Couldn’t handle me on your own?” he boasted when you were well situated, “You had to call in backup.”

At the insinuation, Wilford whirled on his heel and spat back, “I’ll have you know I am perfectly capable of—”

“Can we be civil?”

Whatever relationship the three of them had, Dark seemed to be the most – if not liked – respected. The two men stopped talking immediately and looked towards the one who had spoken, whose voice somehow sounded like it brought the walls of the room closer even if the volume didn’t change. He was powerful, that much was certain, and he proved it more than Wilford or Mark had, so far.

Another demonstration was when he reached into a slightly shaded corner of your apartment and retrieved something from the inky black. For a moment, it was nothing more than vapor, like dry ice, but then he pulled it further towards him.

Even though it now had a physical form, it helped you none with what it actually was. All you saw was a piece of yellow, tarnished paper that made Dark grimace, before he shook it and the color seeped out of it. You could have assumed it was a trick of the light had that not also healed the rips and tears.

“I’m sure the little cultist didn’t summon anyone here to see a petty squabble,” he said as he reached back into the shadow to get something that made more sense to you, a pen. Not that you knew what to do with it when he stepped closer and held both items out to you.

You looked him up and down in confusion.

Dark didn’t look offended while he explained, “If you agree to these terms, you can proceed with your original plan.”

Wilford popped up over his shoulder to take a peek at the writing. His lips pursed and his eyebrows furrowed but he only stated, “Dark loves a good contract.” Mark, meanwhile, tightened his grip.

Now that you were able to see the front of the paper, you could understand the words and be surprised it was in English.

To sum it up, after your eyes had skimmed over the terms, you would get what you wanted. You were ready to stop then and there, but common sense told you to keep going. Something about survival instincts or whatever boring thing your mind felt the need to involve.

The extra lines told you what would happen for the deities beside you. Wilford would get to take the memories of the entire town over the course of a couple days at a time – a similar situation to what you’d heard happened in Insmouth – but would use your apartment as a home base of sorts instead of an eroded group of rocks. You’d be there for the upkeep and taxes and, strangely, companionship. For two days after that, you would go with Mark to actively participate in his plays. At your side, he seemed to brighten when he read it. You guessed that unconscious husks weren’t the most entertaining when it came to improv. The final line stated that you would return to your apartment, alone, for the weekend, which worked for you.

But you weren’t the one it would be difficult to convince, and, what surprised you, nor was it Mark.

“Unfortunately, we have been over why a custody agreement won’t work,” Wilford piped up, leaning an arm over Dark’s shoulder. “Someone holds a very old and very useless grudge and is also the last person I would ever want to associate myself with.”

The impulse to point out that he had spent the last hour or so associating with Mark reared its head. You subtly patted it down, only noting that your confidence was coming back after the whole eldritch gods acting like petty toddler situation.

Dark spoke as though he were used to this, though, “You won’t have to make contact with the King in Red if you don’t want to. A day’s interim for handover has already been specified.”

Wilford couldn’t help but groan back, “You’re taking the fun out of this whole thing. They’re not a time-share, or a car being traded between dealers.” He went to cross his arms but was interrupted by his own gesture to the man who still had a grip on you. “And besides, Mark would never agree to it.”

“Oh, I’m fine with this arrangement.”

You blinked. Maybe you had preemptively gone insane because that void sounded like it was Mark’s but, even from your limited experience with him, he wouldn’t give up that easy. It unnerved you how casual he sounded, as it did the other two; Wilford’s eyebrows shot up, to be expected, but Dark also slightly reared back, like he had the chance of seeing the truth if he looked from another angle.

“Really?” you asked, turning your head to make eye contact.

“I’m given two days, and it’ll only take one to convert you fully to my side.” His hand left your waist and moved to pull your jaw towards him. “Contracts can be amended, can’t they?”

Damn. He was smooth. You tried to ignore the blush that flourished on your cheeks, and how your thoughts reminded you how little space there was between you and him. An inch, maybe less. It wouldn’t need much energy to move closer – in fact, it made more sense to just remove the gap altogether, right?

Until Wilford slapped his hand from your chin and stood steadfastly between you, the ideas falling out of your mind like a bucket with a hole punctured in the bottom. You hadn’t seen him move in the first place, but nobody looked shocked.

“We haven’t started yet,” he spat, and you were almost distracted by his pout.

They made faces at each other while you reread the contract. It all seemed very cut and dry. There was no point in a fine print if you were selling your soul for some kisses, because there was nothing to hide. No devils in the details for you.

Well, except…

“What’s the weekend for?” you asked. Dark didn’t seem the type to give you ‘time off’ just like that.

And you were right, in both aspects. He didn’t try to cover it up before he started explaining, “If I’m going to notarize this contract, I’m going to get something out of it.”

That got the other’s attention. Their heads snapped to look at Dark, both as confused as you were.

“Your follower here planned to trade reality as they know it for a single kiss, not even the three that we’re offering.” What? “Just imagine what else they could give for trifles like that.” What?

It took you a second to process what he said. He wasn’t looking for a one-up on another god, or entertainment, or companionship. He was looking for a gateway into the human world, and he found that gateway in you. What else you could give him. Access. Apparently, ancient beings who were witnesses to the dawn of time were also subjects to legalities. They couldn’t go invading the world whenever they wanted, they were like vampires, they had to be let in.

As Dark said, you would be the one to let him in, so that he could wreak whatever havoc that you could, or couldn’t, imagine.

That might have put other people off from making the deal. But, then again, you weren’t other people. You were you, and you had no qualms about breaking that dam and letting the flood destroy the town. You’d get what you wanted, that was all you really cared about, and it was the first line of the contract.

“Alright.” All three of the men around you looked towards you. “Deal.”

You took the pen that Dark was holding out to you, ignored the smirk that pulled at his lips, and signed your name on the dotted line.

The paper disappeared in the same puff of smoke it had appeared in. Dark’s hand was left empty, and so was yours as the pen took its own exit, but he quickly crossed his arms behind his back and took a step away from you. More than one, in fact, until he turned and started to walk towards the front door. He didn’t have to see your confused expression to understand.

“Privacy,” was all he offered before snapping his fingers and pointing at Mark.

It must have been insulting to be beckoned like a dog; he frowned and groaned and sighed and stomped all the way to where Dark stood, and then, with an upturned nose, he passed him and stalked into the exposed hallway. It only took a shared nod between Wilford and Dark for him to leave as well, following into the darkness that still stained the world outside your apartment.

You and Wilford were left alone. Right back to the start.

“Well,” he started, taking both of your hands into his, “I’m sorry about that, darling!”

“That normally doesn’t happen, right?” The warnings you’d found scratched into the first pages of books, the cryptic words from sellers, all of them foreshadowed the danger of summoning an eldritch god. None of them told you how ending up with three would turn out, so either it was a rare event, or nobody had lived to give their own advice on it.

Wilford simply nodded and answered, “Quite right.” His eyes drifted to the door that only just clicked closed. “Though, it was the actor and I last time, too, so maybe we’re exceptions to the rule.”

“Rule?”

“In theory, the followers who choose us have such different aims that we never cross paths. I have the mind, he has the body,” a laugh jumped out of his throat, “nobody’s going to Mark to forget their wife’s death. But nothing ever goes how it does on paper. We get muddled up, and then we both make deals, and then our follower’s caught between a rock and a hard place, and then—well, you’ve seen what happens.” He gestured dramatically to the apartment, that now seemed so much smaller than it did before. “You are what happens.”

But you were alive. You survived. No matter what happened from that point on, you had gotten through such an ordeal that would surely make anything else pale in comparison. You could do it.

“This is the first time Dark’s taken part,” Wilford offhandedly commented, before his spine straightened as though he was struck by lightning. You swore you could feel the leftover sparks when his hand returned to yours. “Oh, but no more about them. Party-crashers, really, are the worst of the lot. Just criminal. And not even the fun kind of criminal.” His eyes finally met yours again. “But we got there in the end.”

It was in that moment that his voice dipped from those jovial, sugar-coated words into something deeper. Not that his tone had particularly changed, there was just another layer to it, like a tree stripped back to the core of it. It befitted the god you imagined prior to summoning him. Now that you had met him, it made your heart flutter in your chest and your breathing pick up to match it. Much like how it was what seemed like years ago, except there was going to be no one popping in with a flash of light to interrupt you.

“Now, where were we?”

Standing up straight was an odd choice, but you were in an odd situation and by far more distracted by Wilford pushing forward through the thin air between you and connecting his lips with yours. The second that you were fully touching, you tasted the sugar that seemed a permanent coat for every part of him. It was incredibly soft, gentle, like he thought you’d shatter if he applied any pressure, and he did. Humans were such fragile creatures, bound by the laws you’d created for yourselves, both physically and socially. A pinprick, a papercut, a prod to the wrong part of you, and you could die, just like that. Wilford was determined that you wouldn’t go that way, but it made him far lighter than he would have liked to be.

But if this was him holding back, you couldn’t help but wonder what full force would be, because you couldn’t tell whether it was the sweetness or the man himself that was making you want for more. You forgot to breath as you focused entirely on the movement of his lips against yours. Your mind swam with thoughts, all centered on him, to the point that the last hour wiped out of your mind, and you returned to the beginning. It was addicting, to sum it up, and Wilford had to guide you apart when you started to go far too limp in his hold.

You must have looked some kind of way, maybe a certain dazed fog in your eyes, because he laughed – a sound that was so much lighter than before, if you could remember what it was like before – and tapped your nose with one of his fingers. Your barely caught Wilford’s wink in the hazy mind field you tried to pick your way through.

And then the pressure was gone, just like that, as if he’d never existed in the first place. For a moment, the impulse to agree with that flitted across your mind – it all seemed ludicrous, anyway, that was undeniable – but then the door behind you crashed against your wall, bounced back, and was eventually shut when a pair of shoes were fully inside.

You didn’t turn around, because you neither had the reason nor the time to do so. It was obvious whose hands were on your waist in a matter of milliseconds, each finger pressing into your clothes in time with the corresponding one on the other side.

“Finally,” Mark mumbled as his head came to rest in the crook of your neck. Out of the corner of your eye, you could see his fluffy hair bat against your skin, one stray lock managing to knock against your earlobe. “I thought he’d never leave. He never knows when the party’s over. Never remembers.”

If you hadn’t seen the outcome of their little sparing match or the squabble, you could have been easily convinced he was in love with the other god, going off how much he talked about him. Many of your fellow students in high school pretended to hate who they were secretly attracted to, though they didn’t have the power to smite you if you were to suggest it to them. The man currently wrapped around you proved to be a deadlier risk.

“But that doesn’t matter anymore. He’s gone and we can finally make good on our deal.”

You were shocked out of your joking assumptions by the graze of Mark’s teeth where his head was planted. A nip, and you were wondering if you were starting already, but he stopped long enough to mutter some more muffled words.

“Oh, I have so many ideas.” You barely registered one of his hands coming up to guide your jaw into looking towards him. “If we’re doing it differently,” his whispers danced across your skin before drifting up as he gently pecked up your neck, “I can’t have you doing the same old King in Red script.

From what you’d heard, that was the pseudo-ritual to take your soul, and, as per your contract, you were supposed to be fully conscious when you were performing. You were glad he’d picked up on that, it would be annoying to go through all that hassle just to be exorcised from your own body at the last hurdle. You were sure that you would have completed it had he not brought it up, thankful that at least one of you wasn’t distracted by the current events.

“I would offer Othello,” he continued, and you shivered at the new puff of breath, “but the bard seems too tame for your first experience. Musicals are especially rough on the vocal cords if you’re not used to it.”

Damn, Mark was a tease. Your oh-so-dutiful-cult-follower exterior was cracking the longer he dragged this on. He wasn’t doing this on purpose, he was too excited about the prospect of plays to be disingenuous about the subject, but you had half a mind to jumpstart this thing.

“Your heist movies have always interested me—” Maybe two thirds a mind, “—what’re your thoughts on space?”

In fact, a whole mind.

“Shut up and kiss me.”

That felt sacrilegious, and your immediate thought was that you were indeed going to die for your transgressions.

The next thought was how good Mark’s lips felt against yours. The sugar-coated texture was wiped off and replaced by a satin ribbon. Fear of your blasphemy was thrown out the window as you cherished the push and pull, barely noticing the ache of your neck until it disappeared with a switch of position; you were twirled around by the hand that remained on your waist and the other shifted to the back of your neck. You appreciated the stability but found you couldn’t voice it as Mark dove deeper, gripped tighter, sighed against your mouth. The kiss on the back of your hand was nothing in comparison to this. Anywhere Mark touched was completely numb. No fire, no chill, just a blanketed safety from pain when he settled into a gentle caress of your skin. And then it started to tingle. Pins and needles danced on the surface. Capsaicin.

You shivered.

“It’s unfair,” he separated far enough to whisper, “that we don’t have more time.”

Everything moved at a different pace for deities. Decades could go by in the blink of an eye, entire empires rising and falling with less effort than the waves. Most of the time, they were forced to take a back seat, if only because it all would move too fast for them to have any sort of effect. Eldritch gods found their homes in the stars, where things went more at their speed, where things felt more welcoming than the place that valued every second of the minute more than life itself.

But that begged the question; why were you, a human, so comfortable? Why did it feel right to have you in his arms? You aged and you changed, but you made the weight of time so much lighter. Somehow. In a way that such a powerful being couldn’t understand.

You might have nodded at his words. You weren’t actually aware of your actions, but you vaguely felt your head bob up and down, even if it was slight. Your eyes were still closed – you weren’t sure when you closed them – but you felt Mark bow his head to slot between your neck and shoulder again. That was where it felt like flames licking at your skin, but you didn’t back away. Why would you?

You felt him speak before you heard his words, “But have no fear. It won’t take long for the day to roll around, dearest.”

Your heart stilled in your chest.

“We just have to be patient.”

The flames were doused and feeling returned to your lips in the space of a few milliseconds. Fog lifted from your mind, and you blinked slowly to regain your sense of self.

And then there were two.

Dark didn’t enter with a show of dramaticism like Mark had, nor did he go to find some physical contact like Wilford. Instead, he simply opened and shut the front door and let you adjust to an actual room with him alone. There was an inkling of fear in the back of your mind, the ancient part from the years of hunting buffalo and being scared of the night that yelled at you to run. You pushed down the fight or flight reflex that begged to be triggered. It hushed without challenge, leaving you strangely calm in the face of the most powerful being you had ever met.

You found that you liked his smile. It was surprisingly pleasant, and presumably rare, considering the most you had gotten out of him since Mark and Wilford were involved was a smirk when you signed the contract. This was less sly, and, instead, had the corners of your mouth perking up, too. It only felt right.

What was weirder, though, was the fact that you felt equal to him. You, a mortal with zero self-preservation skills and 206 definitely breakable bones, felt equal to a god who could snap his fingers and kill you. There were no more witnesses, and there was only so much the police could do to track down a being of myth and legend. And yet, your mind assured itself there was no need to fear because you were on an equal playing field. You were both part of that contract, neither offering more or less than they could handle.

Dark, somehow, managed to voice your thoughts before you could. “So, you state your terms, I’ll state mine, and then we’ll have a deal,” he stated.

“What kind of terms are we talking about?”

He stepped forward once, and then twice, until he was close enough to take one of your hands and pull you towards him. Middle ground.

“Let’s start with this one, alright, dove?”

Your stomach flipping, you were the one to cross no-man’s land. Being so confident in the presence of a deity was unnatural, but, then again, everything about this was – except the feeling of lips against yours was beginning to become more and more familiar. The pressure, the texture, the—

The kiss ended as quick as it began. Dark drew back an inch with an exhale of cold breath while you stayed frozen. Your eyes didn’t have the time to close in the first place, so you easily noticed the plain shock on his face. Eyes wide and shoulders down, you could only imagine that you had done something wrong.

You were sorely mistaken.

You registered being dipped when Dark’s hands came to rest at the small of your back and your neck, and then your lips connecting so harshly that you thought they might have bruised. They were definitely already swollen from the combined efforts of the last two experiences, but now? You forgot the ability to breathe and simply submitted to the tug of his teeth against your skin.

Apart from the lapse at the beginning, you had no way of knowing this was Dark’s first encounter with anyone, let alone a human. For all his suaveness and elegance, social skills weren’t something he practiced often. That left them lacking, outside of business deals, to the point that every conversation with someone turned into a trade. Information, ideas, physical assets, it didn’t matter – but this scenario, with such a nice warmth contrasting his coldness, he forgot that this was an official exchange. It almost had him wanting to disregard the terms altogether and figure something out for just the two of you.

But Dark was nothing if not formal. No matter how much he felt the impulse to go further, he had to calm himself down, and that meant he had to take a step back.

He only managed a gap worth a sheet of paper at first.

“Mortals.”

You drew back the rest of the distance, so that both of you could speak comfortably and without temptation.

“You really are fascinating creatures.”

With those closing remarks, Dark trailed the hand from your neck to your jaw to your chin. A finger pushed at your bottom lip.

“I look forward to finding out more.”

He disappeared as quiet as Wilford and Mark, while you struggled to stay upright with your knees as firm as jelly and your heart threatening to give out.

So much had happened in the space of those two hours, at most, in your apartment. For one, this was no longer your apartment, really. You shared it with three eldritch gods, only one of which you had signed up to interact with, and even that was something you originally thought would end in the massacre of your species. Complete extinction. But there you stood, alive and well, in the middle of the living room. Nobody was dead yet, and nobody who you cared about would die.

You didn’t fight the laugh that bubbled up in your chest – it spilled out like an overflowing bathtub, you felt like you were drowning, you were drowning, but you were alive. You were alive! You’d done it! You got that kiss you wanted, and two more on top of that. A hand, probably yours, jumped to your mouth to cover the cackles that escaped you, but it did no good. It was all just so hilarious.

The laughter only died down when you bit into the palm of your hand. With your teeth lodged into flesh, you had physically tied your mouth shut like a bear trap. This way, you could think.

First, you had to find something pink to wear. Second, you had to brush up on your improvisation. And third? Well, you didn’t exactly know what Dark was going to do, but by all the eldritch gods in that book on your alter, you were excited to find out.

[Yep, I definitely went insane. My mind crumbled and this was in the rubble. I normally struggle with the kiss at the end of these kinds of things, so I kinda shot myself in the foot by giving myself three in one, but it's done now, so enjoy while I sit here and collect the pieces of my brain <3]

#fanfiction #writing #markiplier egos #markiplier egos x reader #markiplier #one shots #x reader #actor mark #darkiplier #wildlife #markiplier wilford #darkiplier x reader #actor mark x reader #wilford warfstache #asshole mark #sucker for love #📜 royal decree 📜

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rawliverandgoronspice · 26 days ago

Note

If you were to design a villain for a Legend of Zelda game, with the caveat that should said Villain grab the triforce, they would recieve Courage (instead of the always villainous power), what would they be like?

That is such a fun ask, thank you so much for the prompt!!

I think it would depend on the target audience of that game (basically are we 2D Zelda-ing it or 3D Zelda-ing it), but I see a couple different options right off the bat:

Treasure-hunter who wants to steal various trinkets from different tribes, mostly for the thrill of the achievement, regardless of whether or not there's any justification (or consent) to this hoarding (and perhaps even putting the tribes at risk since their magical protections are gone?). This villain would do every dungeon before you (and perhaps leave an even bigger mess behind that you'd have to navigate) and gather every artifact before you can get your hands on them (maybe leaving only some kind of ghostly trail of their presence behind, so you can still use these objects but in a limited way, or on limited time, or by paying with a certain resource...) until finally setting their fancy on the Biggest Possible Artifact there is... and being granted Courage as a consequence/reward for their reckless yet selfish adventurous spirit. And then you fight this villain, and they have the exact same equipment as you. I think this villain could make for a neat little 2D Zelda guy! Challenging but not lore-breaking or anything too serious.

My mid-crazy level for a 3D Zelda villain would be: perhaps some kind of Zant-like figure, a sorcerer that had to face a terrifying entity and survived, but went insane and is now persuaded the world is too soft and wouldn't stand against the attack of the looming darkness trapped underneath the realm and planning to return, and so is devoted to plunging the kingdom into its personal hell as a preparation to face the Big Bad of the game, whoever that is, over-valuing Courage to the point of becoming cruel to softness and weakness and those who need protection (so basically making them through a living hell as a form of tough love). This villain would seek the Triforce as a means of defense against the perceived threat, not realizing perhaps the threat either: has been living inside of them all along and corrupting them from within, or that said threat was waiting in the shadows to seize the Triforce immediately after grooming that villain to do the work for them (wonder who that threat could be... nobody ever behaved that way in TLoZ canon before 😇). Perhaps that villain could be Sheikah, because that sort-of fits with their OoT characterization and that's cool and we could have dark!Sheikahs again and I'd be down for that a whole lot.

Okay final pitch, this one being the wildest by far: the spectre of an Ancient Hero, who would start the game with the Triforce of Courage already. Maybe this hero either fully vainquished Ganon or got trapped sealing that angry guy, and has been haunting Hyrule without clear purpose for eons. Maybe there's a new gerudo king, or maybe hylians start trying to become friends with a monster race that we used to oppose (maybe both!)... and a deep dark force begins opposing the effort, attacking everything deemed dangerous and impure. While this isn't nice and making things complicated, dangerous, and maybe needlessly traumatic, we would slowly cleanse different dungeons from fragments of that hero, hear of all the brutal things that hero went through and all the ways they shaped him, leaving him entirely lost and disconnected until he stopped being able to see nuance or think outside of the divine. Basically, the Hero's Shade becomes your antagonist, and you, as the new iteration of the hero, have to gently but firmly tell the Ancient Hero that his battles belong in the past, and it's now time to let go and stop clinging to his duty, and that you are more than capable of looking over the kingdom yourself. A kind of brutal passing of the torch between generations, with a brighter and more diverse and complicated future ahead (and perhaps we even squeeze in how the Ancient Hero refused to see Ganondorf's humanity in the last hour when he dealt the killing blow, and him haunting Hyrule is a result of Ganon's curse? just to squeeze in a complicated Ganon because of course <3)

Here are my pitches!! Thank you so much for the ask once again this was really fun and helped my brain filled with goo and tiny screeches <3

#asks #tloz #triforce of courage #link #hero's shade #sheikahs #thanks for the ask!!!#what a fun ask!!!#those are raw pitches they would all probably need to be refined and stuff but #it's a really fun concept!#wondering what Wisdom antagonists would be like now......

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arliedraws · 7 months ago

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There is something about Order of The Phoenix that's bugging me.

Why was Surius not allowed to go out? I know that wizards and witches would gave a heart attack if they saw a grim amd there was the fear of Peter telling the Death Munchers that Sirius is a dog but why not go on a walk woth him as a dog in a muggle park? Put a collar on him, a leash and boom, Sirius is outside. He can spend time in the sun, play in the mud, whack people with sticks and play fetch.

He literally spent the last year outside! Living in a cave! Stealing food as a dog! If he was in danger he would have moved! I don't get it!

Was he... not allowed to go out as a power play? A... way to break him? Keep him in control and also Harry because Sirius is someone he respects and loves?

Or did JKR just forget logic exists

What do you think??

Sirius could do whatever he wanted. He was not in prison. But taking a walk outside was not going to solve the problem of his depression. The trouble is that he could have left at any time, but he stayed because there was a huge risk in going out after he went with the kids to Kings Cross in September because he was recognized pretty quickly—Snape confirms that the Death Eaters are well-aware of his Animagus form.

Why is this important? It’s just not worth the risk. The reason the Death Eaters knows about Sirius is because of his connection to Harry—I have no doubt that Voldemort would have literally used Sirius to lure Harry to the DoM if he could have. And Sirius KNEW that the reason he couldn’t be caught was because of Harry—Harry would either do something heroic or he would be without a parent again if Sirius were caught.

Also, remember, Voldemort had not yet come back yet in GoF so the rest of the Death Eaters wouldn’t be trying to hunt Sirius. The only people who knew he was an Animagus in GoF were Peter (and Voldemort probably), Dumbledore, the trio, and Remus. Not a huge threat!

Dumbledore strongly advised Sirius not to leave—what was he going to do? Imprison Sirius? Sirius could do whatever he wanted, but Sirius stayed because of Harry and because he wanted to fight Voldemort. I think Dumbledore wanted to keep Sirius and Harry emotionally separated, but I also think he wanted to keep Sirius from being a liability in the way that, Sirius could easily be used against Harry. Dumbledore’s solution was to keep Sirius safe and unhappy—put people on shelves who are unpredictable like chess pieces. Sirius was a very valuable piece that he wanted to save but also keep to use later. Callous but somewhat effective. If Harry had been able to master Occlumency, it would have been successful, but the problem is that because Harry failed this one part of the plan, Dumbledore had already created the circumstances in which Harry would not trust Sirius (emotional separation) but feel like he had to save Sirius.

And the thing is, Sirius was always going to have some sort of depression, and without something to focus on (fighting the war) and his loneliness, all he had time to do was think. But the amount of trauma of finding your best friend dead (and you think it’s your fault), witnessing a MASSACRE committed by the friend who murdered your best friend, getting blamed for all of it, going to solitary confinement/eternal misery prison, and then everything from PoA and beyond was never addressed. He was going to break eventually. A few walks outside here and then might have been nice, but it was never going to fix the problem. He was fucking miserable but it wasn’t just because he was in Grimmauld Place—everything was just exponentially worse because he had all this trauma he didn’t know how to process in a place that made him feel horrible. I just don’t think taking a break for an hour was going to fix that.

Anyway, I think sticking Sirius in Grimmauld Place and his backstory was really well-done and a very solid storytelling technique. Do I feel sad for this fictional character? Yes! But also, not a real person and I think Order of the Phoenix sets up Sirius’s death astoundingly well.

#not that i like any of this #also i’m a lil stoned so i’m sorry if this doesn’t make sense

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aliceismypixie · 1 year ago

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The villain of my story ∥ The woods aren't for games

Summary - "The villain will always be the villain if the hero tells the story" or atleast that's what they say. No one knew why you became what you are. But you wanted your revenge on Isabella Marie Swan and you were ready to do anything to have it.

Pairing - Twilight x villain!reader

Pronoun - she/her (but can be read as a male reader or gn reader)

Warning - kidnapping

Words count - 1.17k~

Set - After Breaking-Dawn Part 2

Chapter 1 - Masterlist

Lucky them, vampires didn't need to sleep. Unlucky them, vampires couldn't sleep.

For the past two weeks, everyone just wanted to drown themselves in a peaceful slumber only to wake up and realize that the threat was only a bad dream and they were actually okay. Jacob, Seth and Leah had the luxury to sleep but once they would wake up, the hard reality would catch up on them and they were forced to watch over their friend.

Yes once again, there was a protection details for Bella once again. And everyone was either tired or annoyed about it. Leah and Rosalie were annoyed about the protection detail, sure they were somewhat 'friends' with Bella, but honestly Leah was there because she didn't have any other choice and Rosalie was more attached to Renesmee than Bella. The rest were tired. Everyone did try to hide it but it was pretty obvious. This family couldn't get a break. At Least not until the threat was gone.

"So you can't see anything ?" Leah asked with a scoff and Jasper tightened his hold against his wife.

"I've tried okay ? But all I see is a blank space. I can't see them or whatever their plan is. I've tried !" Alice argued back as the family was once again reunited in the living room.

"But we can't just have a protection detail, right ?" Seth innocently asked from his seat beside Esme, who sent him a motherly smile.

"No, we need to add a protection force. We can ask Sam's pack for help." Edward butted in and if Rosalie wasn't outside playing with Resentment Renesmee and Jacob, she would have rolled her eyes.

Of course Edward was only thinking about Bella's safety. But could you blame him ? She was his wife and he loved her more than anything. And as selfish as it sounds, the mind reader was ready to put anyone's life on line if it was to ensure Bella's well being and safety. He did it when the two nomads vampires hunted them, he did it when he forced everyone to leave Forks only to left them once they were out of the city, he did it when the newborn army was against Bella and he did it when the Volturi threatened to kill his family. And by his family, I was only talking about Renesmee and Bella.

But could you really blame him ? It was admirable ! A man boy, willing to risk's all his loved one's life for his true love ! Please take in consideration that Bella was only his singer and not his mate. See that ? He was so deeply in love with the main character that he was willing to do anything for her.

But anyways, Edward Anthony Masen-Cullen was only the main lead of the love triangle for the main character so let's not go deeper into the subject yeah ?

Bella felt like she was a burden. I mean she was but the main character is never a burden. But it wasn't her fault if people were revengeful ! All she ever wanted was to live a happy immortal after-life with her vampire god-like husband, her hybrid super rare child and her husband's super rich family. She was the victim here.

As I was saying, Bella felt like she was a burden and all she wanted was for everything to stop and go back to the way it used to be. Obviously not what it used to be before she met the Cullens, but like, you see the past year that passed without the Volturi or a rogue vampire wanting to kill her was actually nice.

"I'm so sorry guys. I really don't know who it could be…" Bella muttered.

"They're alone against all of us anyways." Emmett smirked, clearly thrilled by the feeling of being in a dangerous situation.

"Emmett, this is a serious matter." Edward scolded with a glare and his brother rose his hand in surrender.

"And I was serious too, relax dude." The buff vampire replied yet the tension in the room stayed so thick that you could cut it with a knife and Jasper's power was almost useless.

"We need to be ready for any eventuality." Carlisle announced and everyone agreed, feeling a strange and uneasy shiver run down their spines.

Rosalie, Jacob and Renesmee were all hanging out in the forest. The Cullen's territory was safe for now and if they felt any threat, they needed to go back home immediately, not that Renesmee would know anyways. Right now they were simply enjoying the fresh air outside of the suffocating windows of the Cullen's three story house and talking. Well, Rosalie and Jacob weren't really talking to each other you know, mostly talking to their favorite child.

"Aunt Rosalie, do you think that we'll catch them ?" Renesmee asked and the blond vampire sent her a comforting smile.

"Of course we will. They will not hurt any of us, don't worry." The Goddess-like vampire replied and Jacob rubbed his fluffy head against Renesmee's side, agreeing with Rosalie for once.

"Well then, you'll have to catch me !" Renesmee started to run away and the two grown up exchanged a look before running after her.

They were unlucky though, Renesmee inherited her father's speed. I would say the little girl was lucky to have inherited her father's speed, but when an immortal child was after you and equally as fast as you while your family was too far away to protect you, I wouldn't exactly say I was lucky.

Smelling the unfamiliar scent of lavender and wet-grass around them, Jacob and Rosalie immediately tried to go faster while Jacob howled, alerting the members of his pack. The two adults chased after Renesmee, missing the shadow passing them through the trees as they couldn't even see the hybrid in front of them.

"Renesmee slow down !" Rosalie called in panic.

Hearing her aunt's worried tone, Renesmee turned around swiftly, but what she didn't expect was to see a hooded figure only a few inches away from her with their red eyes glowing.

"I would stay quiet if I were you." The voice was childish yet there was some kind of venom and dangerous aura in them that made Renesmee stunned in fear.

Not far away from them, echoed the call of Rosalie, soon followed by the rest of the Cullens while the shifters were all in their wolf form causing the hooded figure to smirk before putting a hand on Renesmee's mouth.

"Let's go dear." They muttered and suddenly the clearing was empty, as if they never were there in the first place.

Reaching the clearing, everyone's expression fell as they found it empty. The only thing they could find was a letter gently laid on the ground and Bella took, her hands trembling at the thought of what probably happened and her heart fell, as well as everyone else's, as she rode the words of the letter out loud.

"'I told you to keep an eye open Bells. The woods aren't for games'."

Chapter 3

#twilight x reader #villain!reader #child!reader #alice cullen #jasper hale #resume cullen #emmett cullen #rosalie hale #carlisle cullen #esme cullen #edward cullen #bella swan #jacob black #leah clearwater #seth clearwater #twilight imagine

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marshmallowprotection · 1 year ago

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hm! I had a painful idea, because I'm currently incapable of not thinking about saeyoung choi for more than five seconds.

so the notorious days in the apartment. I'd definitely have some issues after a while bc I've been ditched by people I thought were close friends more than once in the past.

Imagining just. Finally getting sick of his shit and not wanting to keep throwing myself against a wall if, maybe... he's telling the truth? It's... not fair to either of us to try and force him into something he doesn't want. Finally looking at him and going, "If you want me to go away for good, look me in the eye and tell me. Look me in the eye and tell me you hate me, that you don't want me around, not even as a friend. Not that you think it's not safe, that it's 'better' for me to stay away--but that you, Luciel, don't want me around. Look me in the eye and say it, and I'll stay out of your way. I've spent too long chasing people who don't want me."

But we all know Saeyoung is a shit liar when it comes to his loved ones. We all know he can't do it. Even when he's pretending not to care, he's painfully transparent once you know what to look for

"Look me in my eyes and tell me this was nothing but a game to you. Tell me you were playing pretend from the start and none of this ever meant anything to you. I promise you, Seven, I'll leave and never look back... as long as you look me in the eyes when you tell me you never once thought anything about me... about us."

Saeyoung couldn't.

He couldn't look you in the eyes even if he wanted to.

That's because deep down all he wanted was to be with you without fear of losing you just like he lost his brother.

There was no way for him to explain that to you, nor was there a way for him to understand it outside of the alarm bells burning in his brain the longer you stood him by his side and he saw visions of you being tortured within an inch of your life all because you loved him… and it wasn’t a sin he wanted you to carry. Why was loving him something that brought pain to others?

In that moment, he has no answers, just pain.

He trusted someone with the most important thing in his life, and that person failed not only him but his brother as well. He doesn't know the how or why, all he knows is that because he did everything in his power to try and do the right thing by his brother, people took advantage of the situation and that could happen again.

He's made a lot more enemies than the big bad that's been waiting in the background his entire life. The idea of his brother suffering even more, and you facing any amount of agony makes him want to run away, far, far away, so it could never happen to you to begin with. It might be horrible to run away, and it might be even worse to face everything head-on, but he's the kind of person who would rather risk himself than put his loved ones in danger.

Even if it means he has to go the rest of his life without ever knowing the love he wants.

Do you want to be the only problem with that plan?

The only problem with that plan is that no matter how much he tries to lie to your face, he can never lie good enough to make you believe that he wants to run away. You see right through him and that's the scariest part.

He wants somebody to see him for who he is, but when somebody sees who he is, they see all of the pieces, not just the parts he would rather have on display. If you can love him like that, he knows he won't be able to leave you behind, but if you get hurt, how can he live with himself? He can't... he knows he can't. So, be bounces back and forth, lying through his teeth until he realizes he can't run away no matter how much he wants to.

But until the moment he decides he's ready to admit what he wants, you will see nothing but shame in his eyes... shame and tears. Tears that never spill but bubble up as if they've been there for years with nothing to let them fall.

#mod kait #ask #mystic messenger #mysme #mysticmessenger #mm #saeyoung choi #luciel choi #choi luciel #seven #707 #seven mystic messenger #seven mysme #seven mm #mm seven #mysme seven #mystic messenger seven

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dansevilpianotea · 8 months ago

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i really wanted to make a proper dan birthday post/art today but im super tired rn, so its not happening. instead im writing something personal and philosophical because im an autistic philosophy student and its all im capable of doing.

you will get up that hill

thank you @danielhowell for growing up with me, even tho its only been 5 years (almost), its been the most important 5 years of my life (so far lol).

when i skimmed through ywgttn again recently i realised how much i have changed since i first read it 2 years prior. i used to reject any kind of help despite feeling really bad because for so long my needs were ignored, i was blamed for it or i was given solutions that were toxic and dismissive of my feelings. but i kept going. addicted to the loneliness and the pain, but i knew that this wasnt all there is. i managed to move to a different country on my own at 18, i knew that there was a light at the end of my horizon. i mean, its really not like that tho. there is a sun and it rises every morning, but it also goes down in the evening. it can seem pointless, banal, some might say absurd. pushing up that rock every morning and it rolling down when the sun sets. for me, it felt like the rock was just sitting at the bottom of the hill and i didnt have enough strength to even consider moving it. but this is not all there is. we can change, and the way we change to get better is not rapid but its a slow process of not just trying, but trying again despite failing. this is not a fight that is possible to lose. you only lose it when you dont touch the rock. if it is already at the bottom, you cant get it down further than that. your only way is up. and yes, it can roll down again, but there are checkpoints. connections we make, people we love and who get to love us. risks we take and secrets we reveal that make us stronger to try again. this is your life. you can just pick it up and try. and try again. and try it even tho everyone wants you to hate every second of it and do not believe you can do it. but you can. the only mistake you can make is letting them make you believe that progress has to be fast. even if it takes you 30 years to reach this checkpoint, the more you try to go up, the stronger you will get. its not about sitting there doing nothing and its not about being upset that you cant make it fast enough. you cannot plan for the route up the hill. you learn along the way. its about trying to push the boulder when everything inside of you screams at you that change is scary and everyone outside of you either pushes you to do it in their specific way or they tell you that you cannot do it. the boulder is your life and the hill is happiness. its not yourself who you should push, but the way you need the environment to be so you can be happy. the only true rebellion is happiness. when you are forced to live inauthentically, they do not want you to be happy. even if they think they do all they really care about is you not disturbing their prejudiced view of the world, of you being controlled by them. the gods punished sisyphus. they wanted him to suffer under their authority. the only choice you have to become happier is to make it up that hill and to do it with a smile on your face. even if you are not happy, you just need to want it and to believe that you can get there from your current situation and not through a miracle from an outside force. there is no other choice.

2 years ago my counsellor said to me that i was very good at being scared of things (lol), but i do them anyways inspite of the fear. ever since i can remember i was scared of the most mundane changes, from walking on a different side of the road on my way to school to asking my friend about their dog. but i still wanted to do all those things. i was just incredibly scared of chaos and rejection. so i didnt do them. but i dont regret not doing them. because with every time that i failed i get to try it again but with even more strength. and this is how i got here. my life has changed in such a significant way since i watched your coming out video and thats because of you and this community. i had dreamed of getting out of my hometown for years and i didnt think i could. but when you said the following: "Time changes everything. With the lives that we have, we can try anything we've dreamed of. [...] you are never trapped. There is always hope. You just need to believe in yourself and get to the other side." i needed to hear that. i didnt even know i was gay back then (thanks for that too) but as someone who was bullied for years and had my self esteem wrecked, i didnt think i had enough power. in fact, i really didnt for a long time. but i kept trying and pushing the line further until eventually i could free myself from the traps i was in my whole life. thank you dan. without your community i dont know where i'd be in life but i can only imagine it'd be worse. thank you for being born and continue living defiantly and pushing that bolder up that hill that is happiness. you are an inspiration.

(also shoutout to my phanhub friends, which btw i cant believe how long we've known each other know. i love you guys <3)

happy birthday @danielhowell 🖤🏳️‍🌈

#dan's 33rd birthday #daniel howell #danisnotonfire #dnp #dan and phil #phan #<- for the phandometrics

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havenmoon1369 · 8 months ago

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Not Again (Sequel to Getting Her Back)

- Chapter 7

"Quinn! Quinn, where are you! Drew screamed as loud as he could, "Dad! I'm here!" he could hear Quinn's voice but couldn't see her, "Where darlin'? I can't see you!" he screamed again. "Dad help!" he kept hearing her voice but couldn't find her, Drew could feel his heart racing in his chest, "Quinn tell me where you are!" Drew screamed again, but this time no response, just complete silence, "Quinn! Sweetheart, answer me! QUINN!" Drew screamed over and over but no response. "Sorry Drew, you're too late" he heard a voice say from behind him, all he saw was Quinn on the ground and Heath standing over her, he towards Heath screaming but as he did, he woke up from the nightmare.

Drew was grasping his chest, trying to catch his breath, Stephen came running into the living room where Drew had slept. "You okay bro?" Stephen said concerned, "No, I want my kid back. Did Heath call yet?" Drew asked, Stephen shook his head "No nothing yet, but you were out for awhile, it's almost 8 pm." Drew just sighed "This is ridiculous man, I have his money why the fuck can't he just meet me somewhere and let me give it to him and get Quinn back!" "I know Drew, we all want her back safe, but we can't risk anything, we don't really know Heath's state of mind. He could snap at anything and everything if we're not careful" Stephen said, trying to reassure his friend. "Come on mate, you need to eat something, you need your strength" Stephen said helping Drew off the couch, Drew was still exhausted from all the anxiety and fear he was feeling. Drew sat down at the kitchen table, while Erin heated up some food she had cooked earlier. "You didn't have much to cook in here, so I just made some chili" Erin said as she sat the bowl in front of Drew, "Thank you Erin I appreciate it" he said. Drew didn't have much of an appetite but Stephen was right, he needed his strength so he slowly ate the food in front of him, keeping an eye on his phone the entire time. He got done eating and went back into the living room to wait for the phone call.

Back in Birmingham, Heath was getting his final plans put into place. Quinn was getting cabin fever; she didn't have her phone, there was no computer or IPad, only the TV which Heath said she was only allowed watch cartoons, nothing else which made her a little bit suspicious. "Alright Quinn, I'm gonna step outside and make a phone call, we'll call your dad afterwards okay?" Heath told her, Quinn nodded never taking her eye off the TV. Heath called Drew, he picked up after the first ring, "Yeah Heath?" Drew answered, "Alright Drew, I got it all figured out, I got a place for us to meet, it's very remote, there's only a gas station there and that's where we're gonna meet." Heath said, "And you're not gonna pull any tricks, I'm gonna get my kid back right?" Drew asked, "Yes Drew, I told you that from the beginning, no tricks from you either, no cops, no friends, just you. We'll meet in Sullivan, AL at the country gas station at 3 am. I mean it Drew no tricks, just you and the money" Heath demanded. "Alright, I'll see you then, can I talk to Quinn?" Drew asked, "You'll be seeing her in a few hours Drew, you can talk to her then." Heath hung up the phone right after. "Heath? Heath! Let me talk to Quinn!" Drew yelled, but then he realized the call ended. "That son of a bitch didn't let me talk to her, she better be okay or I'm gonna rip his head off" Drew said angrily. "Did he tell you where to meet him?" Stephen asked, "Yes in the middle of nowhere gas station in Alabama, I know Hunter said I needed to involve the police but I have to go on my own, please cover for me Stephen and I'll make sure it doesn't come back on you, I'll take the fall." Drew pleaded with him, "Alright mate, for Quinn. But as backup you give me that address and you call me and stick your phone in your jacket pocket just in case I need to call for help for you, understood?" Stephen not giving Drew a choice. Drew gave him all the info to Stephen, got the money together, and started heading for Alabama.

Heath came back into the house, he noticed it was really quiet "I bet she's fallen asleep" Heath said to himself. He came around the corner to see the news on the TV showing the Amber Alert for Quinn and a picture of Heath as a suspect, he looked around the room and the front door wide open, Quinn had taken off and Heath knew he was in deep trouble.

#drew mcintyre #drew mcintyre fanfiction #wwe #wwe fanfiction #wwe stories #action stories

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fabre-a · 1 year ago

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LivInn: Accommodation Made Simple

In this world, there are a lot of problems that circulate in our community. And we, people who are business-minded, have different opinions and ideas on how to solve it. Last time, we interviewed different students inside the university campus, and the problem that the students encountered the most was the difficulty of finding a place where they could live comfortably while studying here at CMU. And by doing so, we come up with a solution that will answer this problem. But first, I will tell you about our journey from preparation to customer validation of our business.

Venture Proposal

On February 12, 2024, we finalize our proposal. and I was tasked to do the logo of our service. It’s actually easy since I got an idea immediately on how to design our logo because of what’s our business name is and what's our business is all about. But it’s kinda difficult on deciding what will be the color of our logo is. I tried using maroon as it is the signature color of us engineers. I also tried navy blue since it is the color of our department. And I also tried other colors but it didn’t work. After like an hour, we decided to do it in blue since it is nice and not that painful to the eyes.

On February 13, 2024, we proposed our business, LivInn, with the tagline “accommodation made simple." This is a service that serves as a platform wherein students can book for a boarding house or dorm easily, either inside or outside the campus, without having to unnecessarily spend a huge amount of money or time. Its objective is to help students find a place to stay while studying for their dream course here at Central Mindanao University.

Proposing this business idea is very hard and tiring, especially since it’s very hard to explain your proposal to people who have different ideas or views on how to run it. But we, the LivInn team, believe that this business idea is great, so we didn't stop proving it by answering all the questions without difficulty. After all, it’s we who will run the business.

After our venture proposal, we then proceed to the grandstand to celebrate our success and talk further about on how to improve our service. We also talked on what are the possible questions that will be asked by the future panelist.

Customer Validation

Before we will proceed in making this service, first we need to gather feedback and opinions from the potential customers to make sure that our service will help them accommodate their problems in finding a place to live in. So, we asked students around campus if they are willing to use our service.

There are 9 out of 10 students who are willing to use our service. For the reason that:

It is convenient;

It is accessible to all types of mobile phones or gadgets;

It is not time consuming;

It is faster; and

It is affordable.

They didn't have any suggestion for the reason that our idea is already great. They also said that they will support our service, and will advertise it to their classmates, friends, or siblings once the service will start.

Planning and starting a business is very difficult. But if you are really committed, then you are willing to take risk in order for your business to be a successful one. As what Mario Andretti said, "if you're so afraid of failure, you will never succeed. You have to take chances". That's why we, the LivInn team, are ready to take risks in order for this service to be a successful one.

-- Angela Fabre; BSCE1A

#entrepreneurial_mind #LivInn

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halfawitch-willow · 1 year ago

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November 17th - Choose Your Own SwynAU

Summary:

If you asked the people living in Swynlake, they’d tell you that living in the shadow of one of the most famous theme parks in the world has its ups and downs. Many children spent their childhood running through the park, and over half of the town’s residents work at the Magick Kingdom to some capacity. The whole town is buzzing with anticipation now that the park is getting ready to reopen for the start of the Spring season.

But rumors are going around that there have been mysterious visits to the park offices during the winter, with a severe but beautiful woman walking the snowy, closed park with a critical eye. There was that safety scare with Enchantra at the end of the last season, where the coaster broke and a local man was injured, but that’s all taken care of and resolved… Right?

Those rumors of a lawsuit are just that, rumors. They wouldn’t shut down the park over one accident and risk changing the lives of everyone in Swynlake forever, would they?

Come to the Magick Kingdom, either as a guest or an employee, and experience the spring season for yourself. Will you continue on blissfully unaware of the looming danger, or strike first and try to sabotage the lawsuit? Will you help bring thrills and excitement to the guests in the park, or get swept up in backstage drama?

As the gates at the front of the park say: Make Your Own Magic.

Location:

The Magick Kingdom is opening its doors for the spring and summer season! Located just outside the small, picturesque town of Swynlake, Magick Kingdom is one of the most popular theme parks in the United Kingdom, known for its intricate theming and wide variety of attractions. Explore Lyons’ Castle, go paddle-boating on Atlantis Lake, shop on Main Street, and ride some of the most thrilling coasters in the world: Enchantra, Demon’s Run, Kohaku River Rapids, and the Maleficent! There’s also the haunted walk-through attraction, The Hauntly,

If thrill rides aren’t your fancy, there are plenty of other kinds of entertainment to be found in the Magick Kingdom! Come see our world-renowned magical zoo with creatures from all over the world, explore the sprawling Zeniba climbing structure with your family, or come see our world class performers at any of the three venues in the park, including the skating show at the Ahtohallan Ice Arena! Meet with King Arthur’s court at our Round Table character dining experience or at any of the meet and greet locations around the park, or book our exclusive Backlot Tour to see where the real magic happens backstage.

Roles & Suggestions:

GUEST: Become a passholder at the Magick Kingdom! Get perks like free parking and discounted meal plans, and visit friends and family who work in the park. Go on your favorite rides and try to ignore the still, looming coaster at the back of the park that hasn’t operated since the accident the year before. Make invasive TikToks of the face characters, like a dick. Maybe you’re a reporter trying to get the scoop on the accident and the fallout, or maybe you’re a lawyer looking to get a foot in the door for the case.

PERFORMER: Princess and princess and mythical figures from Arthurian legend wander the park to interact and pose for pictures with the guests. Knights perform acts of daring on and off horseback at Lyons Castle, and jesters flip and twirl through the park to dazzle guests with acrobatic feats. They all parade through the park twice a day. The Snow Queen show is the long-running ice skating show in the Ahtohallan Ice Arena, where skaters spin and dance on the enchanted rink. The most coveted role in the park is performing in the fireworks show, a musical spectacular that caps off the guests’ visit at the end of the day. Auditions are in the fall for next year’s cast.

CREW: Working behind the scenes, crew includes the costume department and the stage crew. Stage managers run the shows and are the most coveted role in the park for crew, but competition is fierce. Crew have to apply for what show they want to work at during the season; everyone wants to work the Snow Queen show, and only the bravest dare to work Storytime in Pixie Hollow, which has the highest turnover in the park. Costumers work mainly in the shop in the Warehouse, where all of the decorations for the park are stored and where there are several rehearsal stages.

PYROTECHNICS: Wanna blow shit up? This is where you go to blow shit up. Fireworks happen every night and they have a certain extra magical oomph to make them really showstopping. The odds of losing an eyebrow or two to a firework that went off too soon is never zero.

OPS: The cogs that keep the Magick Kingdom running; OPS includes ride operators, character handlers, photographers, food service workers, and ticket booth attendants. Like the cast and crew, most OPS employees are assigned to a certain ride or part of the park that is their “home”, though it isn’t uncommon for them to be trained at multiple locations across the park to swing in if necessary. They deal with the guests the most, which means they are stronger than any M6 agent alive.

ZOOLOGY TEAM: The animal handlers of the park. They help take care of the magical creatures in the zoo, the fish in the lake, and the horses the knights use for their show. As a whole, they do not care about the rest of the park and tend to stay as far away from other people as possible. That being said, if the park shuts down, they’ll have to rehome the animals to lesser zoos, and that will not stand. For the first time in the storied history of the park, the Zoology team is ready to work with the rest of the employees.

SECURITY: The security team at Magick Kingdom is an elite force of security officers that patrol the park and the grounds day in and day out. Rumor has it that the evaluation to be accepted as a guard is harder than the test to join the Swynlake police force. High School Never Ends, and if the performers are the popular kids, security are the jocks. They get called in when guests get too rowdy or for the occasional fight -- Magick Kingdom is a wet park, after all. They also include Emergency Services, which is the first aid team for the park. Biggest perk? Security gets the Nice Golf Carts. The Crew weeps with envy.

ENGINEERS: The engineers on the Magick Kingdom payroll are responsible for making sure the rides and attractions all run smoothly! They’re the ones climbing up the coasters at 5 AM with a harness older than any of their living relatives to check all the bolts are tight and the gears are greased. They work tirelessly to keep the Magick Kingdom running, and the breakdown of Enchantra was a personal affront to them all. They’ve triple-checked every ride in the park before opening, and some have even been secretly leading their own investigation into what caused the Enchantra derailment. There’s also a few roller coaster designers who are scouting the park for a place to put their latest designs, but they do not get along well with the park engineers. Think architect vs. construction crew; one of them comes up with the crazy ideas, one of them makes sure they’re physically possible.

ADMIN: The team behind the behind the scenes. Admin includes the owner of the park, the board of directors, the accountants, HR, marketing, all the business side of running such a popular park. This entire department has been on fire since the moment Enchantra derailed, and it’s not looking like it’s going to improve any time soon with Eboshi stalking the halls and the park. They’ve tried to keep a lid on just how bad the situation really is to not scare the employees or guests, but rumors are starting to get out. About the Enchantra lawsuit and the lawyers circling overhead, waiting for the lawsuit to deal the deathblow and leave the park up for grabs.

Willow Park Role: OPS - Character Handler and Photographer Favorite Ride: Maleficent

Willow had known she wanted to be a princess from the moment she first stepped into the Magick Kingdom.

She was young and had just moved to Swynlake from the Boiling Isles when she first saw the princesses of King Arthur’s court, floating around the park like flowers caught on a breeze. She’d begged her dads for a princess dress and tiara from the shop, and while her Dad worked as an engineer, Willow would run through the park, gathering any kids she could find to join her ‘court’ for the day. It was during one of those games that she met her best friend, Eilonwy Llyr.

It was also during one of those games that Willow discovered her Talent. According to Willow at eight years old, that meant it was fate. She was meant to be a princess one day.

Willow continued to adore the park as she grew, getting a summer job as soon as she was sixteen along with Eilonwy, and when they were old enough to audition -- Willow for the princess role, Eilonwy for one of the knights -- they went together.

Only one of them walked out a princess, and it wasn’t Willow.

The cruel, mocking words from the audition hall seemed to follow Willow everywhere, to the point where she couldn’t even go into the Warehouse anymore without crying. She became a handler instead so she could stay with her friends who were all performers, and tried to suppress the heartbreak. She did her best to put on a good show for the guests, joking and playing along with Eilonwy as she did her meet and greets through the park, but it was clear to those who knew her that some of her passion had died in that audition.

A few years have passed since the disastrous audition, and Willow was finally ready to face the Warehouse again. Her friends have been helping her prepare for this audition for weeks; Edward helped run the lines and songs for the fireworks show with her, Eilonwy taught her all of the dances and little mannerisms princesses needed to know, and Hunter gladly vented with her while they trained together for his security team evaluation. Willow felt confident that not only could she get the role, she would get the best damn show in the park - the fireworks.

Except there wouldn’t be a fireworks show if the park shut down after the season. Willow’s dad was an engineer on Enchantra, and she knew that the allegations of poor upkeep causing the derailment were false. She’ll do anything to protect the park and her dad’s reputation, even if that means giving up on her dreams to be a princess forever.

Other Potential Characters:

Eilonwy Llyr // Performer - Princess

Eilonwy hated being a princess, but every time there was an opening for a knight, she was passed over. It didn’t help that she was an exceptionally good princess, so casting never wanted to give her the role she really wanted. And she’d be an amazing knight! She could outride and outperform most of the current roster. But this was her year! Eilonwy was going to become a knight, or so help her, she wouldn’t be coming back to the park at all.

Edward Andalasia // Performer - Prince

Everyone agreed, Edward was born to be a prince. He was a hit with the guests and crew alike, and had been the primary prince for the fireworks show for a few years now. It was hard to be on top, though, and Edward knew that several of his fellow castmates were willing to sink to any low to get his covetous role. He couldn’t help that he didn’t like the drama that most of the performers seemed to revel in, and was instead content to just hang out with Eilonwy, Willow, and Hunter outside of work. With the help of his friends, can he remain the gleaming Prince Charming of the Magick Kingdom?

Hunter Belos // Performer - Knight

Hunter’s taken the security evaluation test three times. He passed the written exam with flying colors every time, securing a perfect score last year, but every time he got to the physical exam, he never made it to the finish line. It was embarrassing, especially when he had to see the people who did make it through the test watching from the sidelines as he performed at Lyons Castle as the Golden Guard. This was his year, though; he was going to become a real security guard and leave his gleaming golden armor behind… Just as soon as he figured out how to convince the stablekeeper to let him keep his show mount, Flapjack, when he left.

Amity Blight // OPS - Ride Operator on Maleficent

Amity was not a Swynlake native, and she really didn’t get all the hype about the Magick Kingdom. It felt exploitative at best, with how often they bragged about the number of Magicks they hired. But it was the best paying job in town, and after going no contact with her parents, she needed the money to get into school and get her degree. She may have thought twice if she knew her ex-best friend, Willow, was working in OPS as well. Her parents had basically run the Parks off the Isles, and Amity didn’t know how to approach her now. Was the money really worth staying at this job? Hopefully next year the park would close and she wouldn’t have to make that decision at all.

#swynwrimosilv #swynwrimo2023 #so much of my theme park spite is in here lmao #yall im so serious im pitching this next year #swyntask

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hawaiifiveoh · 3 years ago

Text

recompense | steve mcgarrett

masterlist

Your car insurance doesn’t cover damage due to H50 gunfights. You make sure to tell them. Except the flirting from a certain Lt. Commander is ruining your plan.

steve mcgarrett x reader

Author’s note: Fluff. The energy in this seemed like early seasons SEAL. Featuring an amused Daniel and a cool old lady OC.

3,428 words | ♫ Playlist: romeo - chairlift

____________________________

In one swift angered motion, you clipped the visitor pass onto your shirt’s hem, collecting your nerves as you arrived at Iolani Palace. You took long model-like steps, the glossy black and white ‘special investigations’ emblem passing beneath your feet, the rehearsed speech in your head, fresh, as was the aggravation from being on the phone for 2 hours and the useless end result, on top of the blatant disregard for others personal property and safety. All of it fueled your pace, shoulders back, shoes stomping across the floor. Did this 5-0 team ever think about the damage they caused the other people, outside the case’s focus, what they were left with, to pick up the pieces of, to fix? No, because ‘Oh, it’s 5-0!’ and they weren’t the ones being directly saved anyway. So, it didn’t seem to really matter then. You scowled to yourself, it’s not like you didn't respect their value to O'ahu or appreciate how they put their lives at stake– no you weren’t arguing that. It just so happened that they wrecked your new car– the one you finally saved up for– and almost severely harmed your neighbour and friend– all because they were overeager for a lead and it ended up being a shoot-out with some suspect, who they failed to apprehend, at your apartment complex. Therefore, you were a bit pissed.

You saw two guys and heard the vague ambient sounds of nonsensical squabbling. By their casual stances, and lack of intent, they didn’t seem to be in the middle of anything crucial.

You called out to them, “Excuse me, are either of you the one in charge here?”

“I am, yes,” the taller brunette one replied, turning around fully to the voice, suddenly standing up a little straighter at the sight of you, clearing his throat.

“Lt. Commander Steve McGarrett, what can I do for you?,” he stated officially, offering his hand to shake.

You obliged, introducing yourself, in the most curt form as possible, despite his apparent pleasantries. You were on a mission, no distractions. You handed him a folded piece of stapled papers.

“What’s this?” McGarrett casually asked, opening it to read.

“A detailed description of the damage your team caused at the White Pearl on Tuesday.”

“The apartment complex?”

“Yes, you managed to completely wreck the driver’s side of my week-old vehicle with stray bullets. It’s unsafe to drive. In addition, you endangered the life of an elderly woman on the first floor, Norma, and also managed to ruin her grandson’s ceramic artwork that he made for her 80th birthday present. All the way from the mainland, it made the trip unbroken, until you guys showed up.”

“You have to understand, none of that was intentional. It was merely an effect of the actions we had to take, considering the suspect was in fact, shooting at us.”

“I know it wasn’t intentional. But, you should be aware and accept the consequences of the risk you took. Not place your accountability onto someone else, correct?”

The blonde one raised his eyebrows in expressive understanding, “She does have a point.”

“Listen, existing in the world, on this island, in your daily life– all of it has unforeseen consequences to every choice, conscious or not. One could argue that you picked the wrong parking spot that day,” Steve countered, crossing his arms, his face somewhat intrigued at this whole exchange.

“Oh my god, seriously?,” you blurted out, irritation taking over, “Why don’t you admit you don’t have good aim or any time for self-reflection, Rambo, instead of diverting the valid point,” you spat out, taking a brief pause.

You thought you heard a snicker from the shorter one, before you continued, “You’re perfectly content with other people cleaning up your mess, and accepting that it’s owed to you and your job, even though we had nothing to do with it. It still affects people, it can still harm people.”

The Commander leaned back slightly on his heels, thinking. You were ready and waiting to fire back with another rebuttal, but there was only an exhale from him, and the man with the coiffed-hair’s face eagerly laced with anticipation.

Steve uncrossed his arms, “That’s not true. I don’t think that. But, honestly, there isn’t anything we can do. We can’t go and reimburse everyone for every complaint and tackle that as its own case on top of everything else.”

“How many complaints do you actually get from bystanders on cases? And ones with documentation.” You added, pointing at the papers still in his hand, “I’m sure you can do something about this.”

“Alright,” Steve said, trying to hand them back to you, “How about dinner, on us?”

You didn’t get a chance to mock that absurd random suggestion because someone already had, “Dinner on us? What is that? And, by the way, it was your round that hit her car, Steven,” the shorter one immediately snapped back.

McGarrett turned towards him, the papers shifting closer to his chest again, “You can’t know that, Danny. There was a commotion, you had little to no visual.”

“No visual? It was clear enough for me to know where I was shooting, which wasn’t at this woman’s new car or into an apartment.”

“You can’t say that with 100% certainty, days after the fact, and with no witnesses.”

“You want me to call CSU to pull a bullet from the floor mat or somewhere else in her car and run ballistics on it?”

McGarrett sighed loudly as the man now known as Danny continued, hands still making pointed gestures in the surrounding air, “You know what they’re gonna say? The bullet was from your gun.”

“Daniel–”

“I guess dinner would come with a show,” you interrupted, the sarcasm suddenly causing the two men to remember where they were. They both turned back to you.

“Just dinner with me then?,” Steve spoke up, assertively, “Might be preferred that way.”

Was he– was he smirking at you? You narrowed your eyes, on purpose, and made a face to stop whatever they were apparently revealing, cursing some idiotic part of yourself. Your voice remained unimpressed and unaffected, a locked gate,

“If you read the cost estimate for the car, alone, you’d see it’s over $500. That’s not even considering all punitive damages.”

“Well, it might take more than one date, but it can still be arranged,” Steve replied with another lopsided smile.

The Commander’s confidence was killing you right now, like using this sort of method to try and get out of this was going to magically fix the problem. Pfft. No. No, no, no– not gonna work no matter how many times he batted his pretty eyelashes at you.

“Just write me the check,” you said.

Danny let out an uncontrollable giggle. McGarrett immediately shot him a look.

Then you turned on your heel, trying your best to ignore the attention, yet hoping their eyes were on you as you left, feeding off the sudden power in turning the tables. You walked out, as you confidently added over your shoulder, “All my information’s there for payment. You have 2 weeks. Good day, gentlemen.”

You knew getting the money was a long shot. You didn’t want to actually have to get a lawyer and seek damages or whatever. That’d cost more than the repairs itself. It was just the principle of it all. You felt bad for Norma and her loss too, and wanted to stand up for her. When you walked down the palace’s steps, the hot tropical air floating around you again, you were flustered with the anger still running through your veins like a bullet train. And, you hated that your mind kept wandering back to if McGarrett’s date idea was just some ploy to get out of paying, or if it actually… wasn’t.

______________________

You stopped by Norma’s to give her the update, and see if her window had been repaired as it was supposed to be completed by now. It had been fixed, no memory of the randomized chaos ten feet away here any more (well besides your car). At least something worked out. You knocked, and after a few moments, the window’s louvres cracked open a tad.

“Hey Norma,” you greeted kindly, peering between the cracks.

“Hi honey, see they fixed it!”

“They did.”

The window closed and she shifted towards the door, opening it. Apparently, lime green was the shirt colour of the week.

“Come in, dear. I got about an hour before I gotta go kick some ass at the Moanalua course.”

“Who are you playing golf with?”

“Some clown from my art class who said I couldn’t ever get an eagle.”

“Is it a date?”

She howled out a laugh, as she scooted into the kitchenette to get some drinks.

“I just wanted to say I tried to get some justice for you and your lost artwork at the 5-0 headquarters, as well as for my car. But, I doubt anything will happen.”

“Well, you tried, Y/N. You stood up for me, and yourself. So, be proud you did. Maybe, you knocked some sense into them.”

“I don’t know,” you shook your head, “The guy in charge seems stubborn, and thickheaded, not totally, but enough. Also question: who the hell asks you out to dinner as a substitute for reimbursement?”

Norma’s antique bracelets on her wrist jingled as she slapped her hand against the countertop, holding back another amused yelp of a laugh, “He did what?”

“Yeah, I know. He thinks I’m stupid or something.” You commented, sitting down at the teal and white retro dinette set. She slid a glass of iced tea towards you on the table.

“Honey, no, I don’t think so. I think it’s the opposite.”

You gave a look to her that said ‘please explain’ as she sat down across from you. Norma continued, “From what I’ve seen of that team of people and what they solve on the news. I think they’re caring genuine folks. So, if that guy asked you out. He meant it,” she starting softly sing-songing the last part, through a smile, “Because he’s attracted to you.”

Norma had lived way longer, so you couldn’t totally disregard her sagacious yet romantic judgment call, but you weren’t sold on it, even if your heart staggered at the thought. She took another sip of her drink with a knowing expression, before adding, “Was he a dreamboat or what? Your rosy cheeks are saying yes.”

You embarrassingly placed an elbow on the table, putting your forehead into your palm, scoffing out some sound of an attempt at a denial, but mostly failing in the process. You looked back to dear sweet Norma, who still had a faint smile on her lips,

“You couldn’t ever play poker, dear. You got an honest heart, and too much of it shows.”

______________________

About a week later, you came home to find a letter in the mail, with the state of Hawai’i seal on its envelope. You didn’t know what to expect, pessimism the most used option, which worked out well, considering it was merely a typed note saying payment was not authorized as signed by the Governor’s Office, despite 5-0’s request. A business card fell out of the envelope too. It was embossed with a name you recognized, for any further questions. You rolled your eyes, tossing the envelope on your desk. You didn’t call. You didn’t think anything of it, well not much. You had mentioned the apology letter to Norma. She asked if you were going to call Steve, and you just shrugged, forgetting about it. Or trying to, except every time you glanced at your now-fixed car you had a mixed-up mess of emotions, instead of the usual subtle rage.

When there was a knock outside your apartment, you thought it was Norma. But when you quickly glanced to look through the door, you were wrong as soon as you saw the brown hair, broad chest, and rolled up shirtsleeves. You unlocked the door.

“What are you doing here, Commander McGarrett?” You greeted, “Another perp nearby you managed to lose. Or are we seeking some self-reflection?”

“Aha, yeah,” he laughed out sarcastically with a smile, eyeing you, “You think you’re funny, don’t you?”

His eyes squinted at the sun’s golden rays that were lowering in the distance, making his tan skin an even warmer shade. You casually crossed your arms, waiting for him to state the reason he was actually here. His frame was in an ‘at ease’ stance, hands behind his back. (This guy was ex-military, like you couldn’t guess before.) You realized that giving your personal info directly to him and 5-0, was likely now a bad idea in hindsight. They probably ran background on you already.

“You didn’t call me,” Steve noted frankly.

“There wasn’t a reason to.”

“Actually there was. The letter stated the Governor’s Office wouldn’t issue payment in the form of a check,” McGarrett explained as he pulled an envelope out of his cargo pants’ pocket, “Here.”

“What’s this?”

“What I would’ve told you over the phone if you had ever called.”

You peeked inside, seeing four hundred dollar bills lined up, along with something else, a gift certificate for a pottery studio.

“The team did our best to compromise,” Steve said as his hand fidgeted slightly, scratching the stubble on his chin once as he put the rest of the words together, your own eyes softening as he spoke, “It’s most of your repair bill. And that’s a nice place up in Wahiawa, where she and her grandson can go. Make something new. I would hope he’d be visiting her again sometime soon, considering she lives in Hawai’i, of all places,” he noted, another smile tugging at one corner of his mouth, as he watched your reaction.

You didn’t expect this, you really didn’t. So, you didn’t know what to say, besides, your most genuine, “Thank you,” clasping the envelope in one hand, while the other tucked a strand of your hair back behind your ear. Norma’s words echoed in your mind, wondering if your honest heart was showing too much again.

“You’re welcome,” Steve replied, nodding his head for emphasis and maybe a bit of pride too.

He pointed towards wherever his car was parked on the street below, taking a step back, “Well, that’s all. Take care.”

“Wait,” you called out, and he turned back around in a split-second, a piece of hope still in his chest, ready for the pin to be pulled and burst like a grenade.

“I think you should give the gift certificate to Norma, it’d mean more than way. Hold on a second,” you ordered, going back inside to slip on your sandals and grab your keys by the door. So, you could walk down with him.

McGarrett actually waited and didn’t protest against the idea. He matched your stride as you headed downstairs, the breeze through the nearby palms the only noise. You suddenly missed the banter, you only knew briefly, “So,” you breathed out, “How’s your current case going?”

“It went fine, just wrapped up. Why?”

“Just making conversation,” you answered, and you made it to the second set of stairs before you felt the need to speak up again, “What branch did you serve in?”

“Navy,” Steve answered, feet hitting the ground floor, sort of surprised yet delighted at the question, “Navy SEALs, actually,” he corrected, subliminally enjoying the fact he could willingly bring that up into the conversation. McGarrett glanced at you briefly, waiting for a response, but you didn’t say anything else. You continued your pace along the sidewalk, until you found Norma’s apartment.

You knocked on the door, and it opened after a moment. Today’s shirt colour of the week was coral, like a slice of the gradient sunset sky. Norma called out your name sweetly, “How nice to see you, but who’s this?”

“Hello ma'am, Lt. Commander Steve McGarrett, Hawaii Five-0.” He said perfectly and professionally, and never failing to be so with his demeanor, offering the lady his hand, “Pleasure to meet you.”

Norma took it, her bracelets jinling during the handshake, glinting in the sun’s rays, her eyes twinkling too with a sudden sparkle as she glanced at you after the introduction,

“So, this is the fella you were talking about?”

You immediately scoffed, “I wasn’t talking about him, Norma. I mentioned him. Once, or twice. Because of the damages and invoice thing,” you corrected, feeling a blush creeping back onto your face.

“Mmmhmm, well, he seems polite enough to be let inside.”

“Thank you,” Steve replied, a newfound smirk on his features, something else in his eyes now too, bright with some new form of amusement, as he briefly turned to you, raising his eyebrows quickly in self-assurance, before stepping through the doorstep. You followed behind.

“You sit down, and I’ll go get something for you two to drink.”

“That really won’t be necessary, ma’am, I just--”

She snapped her fingers, and pointed, “Sit down. It’ll only be a minute.”

Norma, despite her kind nature and petite frame, had a presence about her when needed. You knew better than to try and argue with her. The SEAL apparently didn’t want to bother either, sighing to himself. You both silently sat down on the tiny loveseat that could barely fit in the room. Steve’s physicality of being was constant, not caring or aware of the fact his limbs and presence were unintentionally and intentionally bigger than most, his broadness enduring with stretched out legs, even with the confined cushions. You felt your knees touch as you shifted your weight. You didn’t think he noticed, his stare fixated on the starburst wall clock like it was bomb going to be detonated. Then you remembered, there was a bullet hole still in that wall, inches below it. He didn’t look at you, holding the small rectangle of paper delicately in his larger hands. You observed him, that subtle feeling you felt when you first met, redeeming itself. You wondered what it would be like to try and get to know this guy, what blessings and burdens he was hiding in those heavy ribs and deep ocean eyes, like the reasons as to why he ever taunted an idea that could tie you two together.

Norma’s reemergence, and the sound of a tray with two full cups of iced tea hitting the coffee table, disrupted your thoughts. Steve thanked her and took control of the conversation, sizing up Norma to be a heavy talker, which was a good read. She was– granted, she did have a lot of fun and interesting stories to tell. Norma was touched by the genuine self-awareness and apology, as well as the kind gesture of the gift certificate for her and her grandson.

“Stand up, Commander McGarrett, so I can give you a proper hug.”

“Norma, you can call me Steve,” he assured, getting up, gently leaning his head down over the elderly woman’s aging and fragile shoulders, the man suddenly recollecting the memories and long gaps of time away since last seeing his Aunt Deb.

“Thanks again, honey,” Norma said again and stepped back, “And thank you, Y/N. You’re always looking out for me. Without you, none of this would’ve happened.”

You just sheepishly nodded your head, making your way to give her a quick hug goodbye, “You’re welcome, Norma.”

“Alrighty then, you two get outta here,” she gestured theatrically, voice like a safeguarding grandmother, her eyes aligning with yours, silently stating her approval and offer to live a little.

“Have fun on your date,” she cooed, strategically, as you and Steve just stepped outside, grinning at both of your confused faces, shutting the door before either of you could say a word to convince her otherwise. You both turned to face each other, knowing what was said, but deciding to drop it mid-air where it still was.

“So, you were talking about me, huh?” McGarrett crossed his arms, proud of himself, as he walked beside you down the sidewalk again, “Good or bad?”

Your heart was still beating slightly faster, the words quick on your tongue, rushing out despite not sounding so, “Neither, but I’d rather talk to you over dinner then I'll know for sure.”

He stopped walking to turn to you, processing the information, “Really?”

“Really.”

“Done. Are you free right now? Norma seemed to think so,” Steve noted, unable to hold back a grin.

You couldn't either, as you answered with a yes.

#steve mcgarrett imagine #steve mcgarrett x reader #steve mcgarrett #h50 #steve mcgarrett x y/n #hawaii five-0 #steve mcgarrett fanfiction

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