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recurring-polynya · 4 years ago

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a little in love now and then, part 4/? | ao3 | ff.net |

Summary: Abarai Renji doesn’t have a fortune, but he does appear to be in want of a wife, at least in Lady Kuchiki’s opinion. Fortunately, Lady Kuchiki also has a sister, and a woefully eligible one, at that. (itty bitty Hisana Lived! AU)

Rating: T, for minor cussing

This time: A Turn About the Gardens, p1: Rukia considers her options and also Renji’s shoulders.

Older parts: | part 1 | part 2 | part 3 |

Rukia couldn’t believe her sister thought Abarai Renji was handsome.

The young men in Hisana’s social circle got their hairs cut individually, and carried parasols to maintain their pasty complexions, and would go home if they showed up to a party where someone else’s outfit looked too much like their own.

Abarai Renji’s nose had already been broken at least twice by the time he entered the Academy, and it had taken on an additional swerve to the left in the intervening years. He’d tried his best to tuck his unruly hair into a low ponytail, but the humidity was causing little strands of it to fuzz out and escape his headscarf to stick to his forehead. His skin was the dark tan of someone who spent everyday outside, weather-be-damned. Two of his fingers had that tell-tale look of having been reattached by some Fourth Squadder too close to the end of their shift. He had the build of an ox, if an ox liked to hit the gym in its spare time.

Obviously, Rukia thought he was maddeningly handsome, but she was well aware of how terrible her own taste was. He didn’t seem Sister’s type at all, though.

Right now, he was gazing around the garden as they strolled, hands clasped behind his back.

The most handsome thing about him, she thought to herself, without acknowledging what she was thinking, was the way he carried himself. The first time she had seen him and her brother together, it was clear they hadn’t quite figured out each other yet. But somewhere along the way, possibly on Sokyouku Hill, they had figured things out. Renji was respectful to Byakuya, sure, but he wore his rank comfortably, probably more comfortably than what was obviously his New Year’s haori, which looked like it could stand to be let out a little in the shoulder seams.

Rukia sucked her teeth, desperately trying to think of something to say to him. She should just make fun of him, really, get things back on the old familiar ground. Every joke that spring to mind just seemed too sharp, though, too mean.For possibly the first time in their acquaintance, Rukia worried about sticking him too deeply.

"So, er…" Renji decided to break the silence on his own. "Which ones are the orchids?"

Rukia abruptly forgot her fears. “You dummy. You moron.”

He just grinned at her, his shoulders twitching with silent laughter.

“Orchids are delicate flowers, and valuable, too. They are in the greenhouses, where no stray breeze or raindrop could ever cause them distress.”

“Ah. I see,” he replied, and she wondered if he did. “I’m a little new to this fancy stuff, you see.”

What was he playing at, anyway? “Look, you know why my sister invited you over, right?”

To her surprise, he honestly looked a little perplexed. “Seemed like she wanted me to meet you.” He paused for a long moment, as though he were weighing whether or not he wanted to say what he was thinking. Rukia wasn’t sure she liked that, a thoughtful Renji. She preferred a Renji whose brain was connected directly to his mouth. “It’s just that most people in this situation, I think, might be surprised to find out that you never mentioned to your sister that you knew me.” By “surprised” he meant “hurt”, of course, although she wasn’t quite sure if he was trying to tell her that he was hurt or reassuring her that he wasn’t. In the old days, it had always seemed very easy to tell him things without actually having to tell him anything, but now, she was having a lot of trouble getting a read on him. A guilty little voice in her head kept asking whether this had ever been an effective form of communication. He turned to look at her, a sly twinkle in his eye. “Then again, I think I had known you for about... seven years before you told me that Rukia wasn’t your real name, so I don’t really know what I was expecting.”

“It was awkward,” Rukia finally excused, defensively. “If I’d been around when Brother hired you, of course, I would have told her. I was kinda busy, if you may recall, and now, it’s so far past when I should have said something…”

“Well, it puts me in a bit of an awkward spot, too, you know,” Renji pointed out, mildly. He didn’t sound nearly as angry as he had a right to. “We used to coordinate these things. Are you plannin’ to tell her or you want to keep pretending to be strangers? That could be kinda fun, y’know, every time I see you, pretending we’ve never met before.”

“Oh, stop it,” Rukia scolded. “I’ll… figure out a way to tell her.” The problem was, of course, that she needed to get Hisana to lay off this matchmaking nonsense, and if Hisana found out they had been childhood friends, she would become an unstoppable force of nature, a huge, flaming Sokyouku firebird with hearts for eyes.

“So...why did your sister invite me over?” Renji asked curiously.

Rukia pretended to be interested in a patch of bearded iris. “A big part of being noble is socializing,” she explained. “It’s very exciting to invite a new person over, instead of the same old bores you’ve known for the last two hundred years. She’ll then go tell her friends about how delightful you were, and your inbox will be full of invitations to take tea with a bunch of other bored noble ladies. I don’t suppose you’re any good at mahjong? Good mahjong players are in such demand these days.”

“I am terrible at mahjong, as it happens.”

“Even better, probably.”

Renji regarded a plum tree. "Do you think we should slow down, then?"

“Sl--slow down?” Rukia spluttered.

Renji gave a too-obvious nod over his shoulder, where Hisana, Byakuya, and Touma were dawdling on the garden path behind them. “Your sister and brother-in-law are very good at walking slowly,” he observed dryly.

Rukia clenched her teeth at her sister’s horrifically obvious attempt to afford them privacy.

“But if the point is socializing--”

“No,” Rukia cut him off. “Sister would just find a way to walk even more slowly.”

“Wow,” Renji commented. “That would probably require some obscure branch of reverse-shunpou. Touma doesn’t look like he’s enjoying it very much.”

“I think he wants to be with me. Usually, I walk with him, so Brother and Sister can have a few minutes together,” Rukia explained, eager to divert the subject. “And he spends the entire time fussing because he wants to be with Brother.”

Renji gave her that inscrutable look again, and Rukia realized he was trying to figure her out. “If you like,” he finally said, “he could walk with us. I don’t mind.”

Rukia swallowed, then turned her head, and called back, “Sister, if Touma wants to walk with us, just let him!”

A relieved Hisana stopped trying to restrain her offspring, who barreled forward as fast as his chubby legs would propel him. Surprisingly, Rukia didn’t seem to be the person Touma was so desperate to see.

“Hello, there, Future Vice-Captain,” Renji greeted her diminutive nephew genially. “We meet on your territory today.”

Touma’s face screwed up, his nose wrinkling. “UP!” he demanded, in his most Kuchiki-like tone.

“And here I thought I was only good for top-spinning,” Renji grinned, tossing the boy up onto his shoulders. From his high perch, Touma beamed, the king of all he surveyed.

“He likes you,” Rukia murmured. Touma never warmed up to strangers. If they were lucky, he just tried to bury himself in Brother or Sister’s clothing. Otherwise, it was shouting. Rukia cleared her throat. “‘Up’ is new, I think. I haven’t heard him use ‘up’ before.”

“He’s a nice kid,” Renji replied, purposefully lurching dramatically from side to side while Touma squealed with delight.

“He’s my nephew and I love him, but he’s a terror,” Rukia pointed out. “His nurse is probably lying down in her room with a cold cloth over her eyes right now.”

“Can’t be more trouble than his pop,” Renji singsonged under his breath as he paused to let Touma pull at the leaves of a maple.

Suddenly, for the first time, Rukia let herself indulge in Hisana’s scheming. “The best way to avoid getting married off is to marry yourself off first.” Renji was a hundred times better than those spoiled noble sons that usually came around to tea. Hisana and Touma had obviously fallen to his charms, and even Byakuya seemed to tolerate him. Renji had been her friend once, as close as friends could be, really. Would it kill her to… consider it? He really did have nice arms.

“Rukia?” Renji was regarding her curiously.

“What?” she demanded, testily.

“Your face is bright red. Are you okay?”

Rukia took a deep breath through her nose. “I fibbed before,” she blurted out quickly. “My sister is… matchmaking. That’s why she invited you here.”

Renji froze, until Touma yanked on a piece of his hair with particular vigor. “Ow! Ow, buddy, that’s attached!”

“She’s such a romantic. If I told her we were old childhood friends, there’d be no talking her out of it,” Rukia muttered.

Renji had extracted Touma from his hair and was now carrying him upside down and pretending this was a natural and normal way to carry a child.

“Pardon my ignorance of the details,” he said slowly, “but aren’t you a little out of my league?”

“My stock has gone down lately,” Rukia shrugged. “I was already looked down on for being adopted, and almost getting executed didn’t do me any favors.” She chewed her lip for a moment. “And that’s sort of the point. Sister doesn’t want to see me married off for political gain, so she’s got it in her head to find me someone I like, and get the Elders to sign off on it at a time when they’d just as soon get rid of me.”

“Oh,” Renji replied. Then, very slowly, he said, “And your sister thought you’d like me?”

“Well, she likes you,” Rukia replied, crossing her arms over her chest. “I hardly know you.”

Renji put Touma down on the path, and the boy ran ahead to the bridge over the koi pond. “It took seven weeks the first time.”

Rukia blinked. “What did?”

“For you to like me. When we first met, you saved my life, me and the guys, and we split some water with you. You started hanging out with us almost immediately, but I could tell you didn’t like me. Seven weeks later, I made a humorous remark about a mutual acquaintance, and you laughed so hard you snorted. That’s when I knew. That you liked me, that is.”

“It was Haneda Kousuke, and you said his face looked like a butt that had been sat on too long,” Rukia cackled, unable to keep from cracking up as she said it.

Renji couldn’t help grinning either. “I was trying to be polite, up here in fancy-land.”

His eyes caught Rukia’s, and for a moment, no time had passed. He was her best friend again, her comfort, her confidant, the other half of her soul. “Never,” she exhorted him. “Not when it’s just you and me.”

And then her cheeks were burning and she was looking away, embarrassed. She glanced back at him out of the corner of her eye, and he was just looking down at her fondly. “I was hoping maybe it wouldn’t take seven weeks this time,” he said softly. “But I can wait for as long as you need.”

Rukia swallowed against her dry throat, and took a long time of pulling a stale piece of bread out of her sleeve and breaking it into bits for Touma to toss to the koi.

“I did want to see you again,” she finally admitted. “It’s nice to see you, is what I mean. I’m sorry to get you caught up in Sister’s grand schemes.” Touma scampered off and tossed the entire handful of crumbs into the pond, wholesale. Rukia sighed. “I’ll tell her the truth about… you know. How we are. I promise.” She tossed a crumb into the pond, and watched, glumly, as the koi preferred to jostle for Kouma’s cluster bomb over her lowly offering.

Suddenly, there was a much larger hand cupping her own. Rukia stared at it stupidly as Renji pinched out a few of her bread crumbs. Did he linger just a moment longer than necessary, before crouching down next to her nephew? “One at a time, pal,” he said gently, tossing out a crumb and holding out his hand for Touma to do the same.

Touma tried to grab the rest of Renji’s handful, but Renji closed his fingers around it. “One. Who taught you about patience? Your auntie?” He opened his hand again, and, scowling, Touma extracted a single crumb. Renji tilted his head up toward Rukia. “It would be good to get our stories straight, I think,” he said, “but maybe you should hold off on explainin’ to your sister ‘how we are’ until we get that figured out ourselves, eh?”

Rukia’s cheeks burned. “Did you hear the part where she wants you to marry me, you dummy?”

Renji tossed another crumb into the pond. “I heard it.” He didn’t say anything further.

“Oh,” was all Rukia could think to say.

#my writing #bleach fanfic #renruki #byahisa #oh no they're getting longer

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yellowcanna · 5 years ago

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Two Sides, Same Coin

Summary: Since the beginning of Quirks, Yokohama has announced independence from Japan and closed itself from the rest of the world.

To this day and age, no one knows what lies within the city of Yokohama—or that was what the public was made to believe. In reality, Yokohama has long fallen into the control of the world’s largest criminal organization known as the Port Mafia.

Follow Class 1-A as their principal organized a field trip to Yokohama! In their short trip there, they must change their perspectives and learn exactly what it means to be justice and what it means to be villains.

Rating: T

Genre: Crossover, hint of shounen-ai (boy love)

Pairing: Contains mild Soukoku (Dazai x Chuuya) and Shin Soukoku (Akutagawa x Atsushi) if you squint

Author: Canna / Yellow Canna

Available on AO3!!

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◅ PREV MAIN NEXT ▻

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CHAPTER 9

YOKOHAMA MURDER MYSTERY (DAY 2: MONDAY)

“Good morning, everyone!”

“…mornin’…All Might…” The drained echoes of mornings were anything but good.

The kids gathered at the open field early in the morning as they were instructed. Their eyes were bloodshot with dark bags below their sunken eyeballs…it looked like a perfect imitation of both Toshinori and Aizawa.

Toshinori coughed into his hand. No matter how pitiful they looked, he can’t back down. He must play the strict teacher role to let them know what they’ve done wrong.

It hadn’t taken much for the grownups to learn what happened after Tanizaki lost sight of the kids. The students told them about venturing into the forest of red maples and spider lilies…as long as the lone man they’ve met there.

They asked about that man’s description, but there weren’t much the kids could give other than the fact that this man had dark brown hair, black suits, and presumably bandages all over his body.

When Toshinori heard of this description, the first thing that came to his mind was this wasn’t normal. There was always more to go with than just these three simple descriptions.

Every person’s perspectives were different. Depending on their gender and interests, they would notice different things. For all twenty kids with various personalities and interests to notice the same three things and only those three things weren't normal at all. And to make it even weirder, it wasn't as if the man didn't leave any impressions on them. If anything, the man left a lot of impressions on them…yet for some odd reason none of them could think of any other ways to describe the man they've met.

Toshinori wasn’t the only one that found this unusual, Aizawa thought of the same thing.

Kunikida was the only one who reacted differently. The moment he heard that the man had bandages all over, blood drained from his face. It was a small detail that only Toshinori and Aizawa noticed, as the kids had their heads hung low from being yelled at. He acted like nothing was wrong and shouted at the students for using their Quirks and trespassing into private property.

It was only after he finished yelling at the students that he pulled the U.A teachers aside and revealed to them just who the man their students met was.

The person their students had described was without a doubt the Port Mafia boss.

When the two teachers learned of this, their hearts had nearly stopped beating. Having dealt with criminals all their lives, they have also handled a fair share of organized crime. Even if organized crime was very rare in their world, it still exists. In every single one of those crimes, the boss was always protected. There was never a moment where the boss would be by himself.

On top of that, the boss of the Port Mafia purposely met up with their students…why?

None of them had an answer.

Kunikida just kept silent after informing them of the man’s identity, leaving the rest for the two teachers to short out.

After some discussion, Toshinori and Aizawa decided to hide this fact from the kids. Until they can figure out just what the Port Mafia was up to, it was for the best not to alert the kids. It wasn’t that the two teachers didn’t trust their students, but this was the only way to keep them safe.

Toshinori felt a chill crawling down his spin just imagining what could have happened if the kids were to know what the Port Mafia boss looked like. If they refrained from using their Quirks, their safety would be guaranteed, but what if they didn’t?

What if seeing the Port Mafia boss made them become alert and showed aggression towards him?

What if their survival instincts kicked in and used their Quirks without thinking?

What if they accidentally made the Port Mafia boss lost a strand of his hair without meaning to?

All those what-ifs could only lead to one result, and it was one they must avoid at all cause.

Being oblivious has less chance of putting themselves in danger than becoming self-conscious. After Kunikida’s long talk, Toshinori doubted the kids will make such a mistake again, but there was still one thing bothering him. He couldn't help but think over the kids' description of the Port Mafia boss.

When he met the Port Mafia boss fourteen years ago, he didn’t see any bandages on the man. From how Kunikida only reacted after hearing the word bandages, that must be the Port Mafia boss’s most iconic description.

Did the Port Mafia boss become gravely wounded?

“Ahem!” Toshinori cleared his throat to gain the attention of the zombies that were his students. “I hope you’ve all used the night to reflect on your actions.”

The moment those words left his mouth, Toshinori knew he had said the wrong thing. After they left the Armed Detective Agency and returned to the dorms, Aizawa had called all the kids to their rooms for additional talk. Due to Toshinori’s health, he had to stop midway and rest up for the night, leaving the kids alone with Aizawa.

Knowing his co-worker, he wouldn’t be surprised if these kids didn’t get a wink of sleep.

Groooowl~

Or eat.

Toshinori stared at the rumbles and growls coming from those flattened stomachs. He couldn’t help but feel a little guilty.

“Anyways!” He shouted over the noise. “Today is your first day observing the Armed Detective Agency in their work! I expect all of you to put your all into it!” He pumped his fist into the air. “Everyone! PLUS ULTRA!!”

“Plus…ultraaaa…!”

Weak fists slowly followed his lead.

“Now let’s go and get some food!” Toshinori spun on his heel as he headed towards the street.

“Food?!”

At the mention of food, the kids finally snapped out of their dreamy state. They rushed after Toshinori as they walked towards the Armed Detective Agency. It was currently 7:30 am and the actual meeting time was at 9:00 am. They got plenty of time to eat before meeting at the Agency for the student’s official first day.

Due to the lack of sleep, Aizawa was skipping today's activity—not that they as teachers got much to do anyway. Since the observation was for the students, they would just get in the way by tagging along. The underground Hero was currently in the teachers’ dorm, zipped up in his yellow sleeping bag and fast asleep inside the closet.

As they strolled down the street, Toshinori couldn’t help but stare at the black towers in the distance. He could still remember when he first saw those buildings. In fact, they don’t look any different than fourteen years ago…

Everything still felt surreal to him…as if he still couldn’t believe he was back in here after all these years.

The Port Mafia…

What exactly are they planning?

“…!” Toshinori gasped as he felt his shoulder colliding against someone else’s. He staggered, his left foot tripping over his right as his balance tipped. Just when he thought he was going to hit the ground, Midoriya quickly ran up and supported him by the arm.

“Thank you, young Midoriya.” Toshinori thanked, coughing a bit into his hand as he heard sounds of something—a lot of something—hitting the ground.

“AAAAAAH!” The loud scream had everyone turning in surprise as they all stared at a man with chestnut brown hair kneeling in the center of a dozen scattered lemons. His white lab-coat was fanned over the ground, palms flat on the rough pavement and head dipped low as he mourned over his fallen fruits.

“My precious specimens!” He cried.

At that, the students quickly got down, each of them picking up a lemon with Toshinori doing the same.

“I’m sorry, I should have watched where I was going.” Toshinori apologized as he held out the lemon in his hand. “Are you alright?”

“Do I look alright?!” The man whirled around to face Toshinori angrily, revealing his face that was half-covered by orange goggles.

“Oya?” The sadness and anger in the man’s voice disappeared, replaced by amusement as he was instantly on his feet and leaning so close to Toshinori that he had to take a step back.

“Can I help you?” Toshinori blinked in confusion.

“Have we met somewhere before?” The man asked.

Toshinori opened his mouth to deny, but his voice was caught in his throat. He stared at the man who was looking all over him with a hand stroking his chin and humming sounds coming from his throat.

Feeling the weight of the object in his hand, Toshinori looked down at the lemon. Suddenly, the memories of that night when he fought the Port Mafia burst into his mind. He remembered that maniacal laughter as the young boy few from the sky—surrounded by lemon-like bombs.

“You’re…!” Toshinori gasped, eyes widening in disbelief as he stared at the fully grown man before him.

“Aha!” The man shouted, pulling back with a snap of his fingers. “You’re from that time!”

"It's…you," Toshinori whispered, unable to help but look over the man. He has really grown. “The boy with lemons.”

“Ah yes~ I was young and naïve at that time. Such an embarrassment to think that I couldn’t mix the gas well enough with the explosives.” The man sighed loudly. “However, I have improved much from then on! If you ever want to become a subject for my ingenious researches, feel free to find me any time!”

With that, the man spun around, lab coat fluttering around him as he walked through the students—hands in his pockets and humming a cheerful tune as he leaves.

“Sir, your lemons!” Yaoyorozu called after him when she remembered the lemons they were all holding.

“Keep it!” The man called, not even looking back as he waved his hand. “Think of it as a reunion gift!”

The kids all stared dumbly at the weird man before looking over to Toshinori.

“All Might, do you know him?” Kirishima asked

“…Something like that.” Toshinori said vaguely. After all, he and Aizawa had just agreed to keep the Port Mafia a secret to the kids. It was best not to let them know too much.

“Give me those lemons.” He instructed the kids, pulling out a plastic bag from his pocket.

“All Might you’re prepared!” Sero gapped.

“You never know when you need to find a garbage can but can’t find one!” Toshinori replied with a dry laugh.

As he collected the lemons from the kids, he made sure to look them over—feeling the weight and texture in his hand—making sure they are actual lemons before putting them into the bag. He gained a lot of weird looks from the students in doing so, but none of the kids questioned his odd behavior.

The rest of the way to the Armed Detective Agency was, fortunately, incident-free. While the kids chattered along the way, Toshinori was deep in his own world.

He wasn’t going to believe that encounter just now was a coincident.

Was that young man with lemon the one watching over them?

No, if he was he wouldn’t come into contact with them. On top of that, his personality didn’t seem suited for that kind of job.

“All Might, are you alright?” Midoriya suddenly asked, jolting Toshinori out of his thought. He blinked and stared at the red building before them.

He didn’t even realize when they’ve arrived.

Toshinori looked around before spotting a red sign that says Uzumaki. That must be the café.

“You kids go eat first.” Toshinori ushered them towards the red door next to the sign. “I have to take care of something so I will head up there first.”

Without waiting for the kids’ response, Toshinori hurried into the building and took the elevator to the floor where the Armed Detective Agency office was located. He needed to speak with them with regards to his encounter with the Port Mafia—as well as inspecting the bag of lemons.

Contrary to Toshinori’s conflicted thoughts, the students’ were much more simplistic.

They were starving.

It was only normal, as the only thing they ate yesterday were the snacks at Lucy’s store.

Iida pushed open the door as the bell above his head rang.

“Welcome!” A petite lady in waitress uniform came up to greet them. “Ah, could you be the students from the Agency?”

“Yes, we are," Iida replied.

“Please come in!” The waitress stepped to the side. “Take any seat you want.”

“Thank you so much.” The class president thanked, followed by the rest of the class as they walked into the café.

This café was very different than the one Lucy worked at where everything was pink with laces. This café has a more stoic design with booths and a bar counter where a lone brown-haired man sat with a cup of steaming coffee in his—wait.

“Oh?” The man looked up, revealing a very familiar face the kids had just seen yesterday. The corner of his lips curled up in a smile as he gazed mischievously at the students. "What a coincidence."

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“The person you met is Kajii Motojirou," Tanizaki said, turning his monitor screen around for Toshinori to see the images of the man he just met on the street. “He’s famous even amongst the Port Mafia. Joined the Port Mafia at age fourteen and since then has been active as a notorious bomber.”

“A bomber?” Toshinori can’t say he’s surprised. “Is it alright to tell me this much?”

“That’s not a problem.” Kunikida said from across the room, where he was examining the bag of lemons. “Kajii Motojirou is widely known within the underground, his information isn’t any secret, unlike their other higher-ups.” The man huffed as he said this. It was obvious from the looks of disdain that Kunikida opinion of Kajii was low.

“In any case, these are just ordinary lemons.” Kunikida tied the bag of lemon up before throwing it into a bigger garbage bag and tied another knot over it. After that was done, he peeled off his plastic gloves and threw them into the trashcan. “Though to be safe, it’s best we get rid of them.”

“Thank you.” Toshinori sighed as he ran his fingers through his hair, trying to find an answer to all of this.

Was this some sort of message? A warning? What exactly does this mean?

“Don’t bother thinking," Kunikida said when he saw the look on Toshinori’s face. “Those types of genius’ minds work on another level. Trying to figure how their brain works are equivalent to trying to understand a fish's thought process."

“Is the Port Mafia boss that smart?” Toshinori couldn’t help but ask. Sure it takes a lot for someone to manage an entire criminal organization and control an entire city, but Toshinori got the sinking feeling that his and Kunikida’s definition of smart might be different.

Toshinori couldn't help but remember that green-eyed boy he met so long ago. The intelligence he demonstrated was beyond genius and smart, yet that was purely due to his Ability…

No, there was another one!

Toshinori’s eyes widened as he felt Goosebumps crawling over his skin at the memory of that other child in bandages. The one that had orchestrated the entire battle that night—or at least, that’s what the Port Mafia boss claimed.

Bandages?

Toshinori felt his heart hammering within his chest as he recalled the hair colour of that boy. It was black…or perhaps dark brown? He can’t remember exactly what that boy’s hair colour was, as there were other things he had to focus at the time.

Could it be…?

No, it couldn’t be…

“You’ll understand if you meet him—though for your sake you better hope you never do.” Kunikida spoke through gritted teeth with a vein throbbing on his forehead. He seemed to hate the Port Mafia boss a lot. Then, seeming to remember something, the irritation on his face vanished. “Though if you meet Ranpo-san, you’ll get a grasp of what I’m talking about.”

“Ranpo?” Toshinori furrowed his brows at the familiar name. After some thinking, he finally remembered where he heard it from. That freckled boy—Kenji, he mentioned this name yesterday. Kunikida had also mentioned this name as well…something about snacks.

“Ranpo-san is the detective of our Agency.” Kunikida explained as he pulled out his notebook. “Our agency’s main income relies on him. He is also the one your students will be observing today. We’ve received a call from the police an hour ago about a murder case they need him to assist them in.”

“The children are going to witness a murder scene?” Toshinori gasped.

“Yes, is there a problem?” Kunikida arched a brow.

“Ah…no, it’s nothing.” Toshinori reprimanded himself for that split second of reluctance for allowing the kids to go. If this was back at the outside world, something like that would never be allowed. Not only were they not police officials, but they were also all underage. There are similar training in U.A, but those were all simulations. They would never allow the kids to join in on a real police investigation let alone getting near real bodies.

Even if the higher-ups agreed to allow children at a crime scene, they will still need permission from the parents—and those permissions aren’t something they will easily get. After all, no parents would want their own children to witness blood and dead bodies. Even if their children had chosen the path to a Hero where they would undoubtedly witness deaths—the parents will never see it that way.

“I see…” Toshinori mumbled to himself as the words of Kunikida and the Port Mafia boss resurfaced.

“This is Yokohama. Do not presume our world is the same as yours. Naturally, that goes for those you see as children.”

“In Yokohama’s underground, there are no children—especially Ability users.”

He gazed out the window and towards the black buildings in the distance. Although he has been made aware of this over and over again…their worlds were truly different. For better or for worse, he couldn’t say.

“When will they begin?” Toshinori asked.

“Well…Ranpo-san was supposed to be here already, but it seems he’s running a bit late.” Tanizaki scratched the back of his head as he looked down at his smartphone, then to his co-worker. “Should I go get him, Kunikida-san?”

Kunikida looked down at his wristwatch. “No, it’ll be much quicker to have the kids go to him and then head to the crime scene together.”

“Do you want me to get the students here?” Toshinori offered.

“No, there’s no time.” Kunikida replied as he grabbed the bag of lemons. “I’ll have them depart immediately after they finished their meals—and dispose of this while I’m at it.”

With that, Kunikida headed out the door, leaving Toshinori standing there alone with Tanizaki.

Tanizaki looked around for a bit, seeming to be just as awkward with the silence as Toshinori.

“Um…would you like some tea?”

“…Yes, thank you.”

◤◢◣◥◤◢◣◥◤◢◣◥◤◢◣◥

"That's the intersection," Iida said as Class 1-A arrived at the crossway. The class president glanced down at the hand-drawn map in his hand, then back up, seeming to be trying to find the right direction.

“I can’t believe! A real-life murder mystery!” Kaminari gushed.

“I’m kind of nervous…” Yaoyorozu spoke softly, yet there was still some excitement in her eyes.

“I wonder what sort of crime scene is it.” Asui hummed, a finger tapping her lower lip as she thought over the possibility.

“It would be cool if it's a locked-room mystery!” Sero chimed in.

“A locked-room mystery?” Todoroki perked up, seeming interested.

“Oh! That would be awesome, wouldn’t it, Bakugou?” Kirishima said, nudging Bakugou. For once, Bakugou just snorted instead of making any nasty remarks, showing that he was interested as well.

“I wonder what Ranpo-san is like!” Uraraka said. “We didn’t meet him in the office before.”

“Would have been nice if it’s a busty woman~” Mineta sighed in disappointment.

Midoriya smiled at his hyped classmates.

It would be a lie to say he wasn’t excited as well. After all, they were going to witness a real-life detective solving a case! It was unfortunate that they weren’t told much before being thrown into the street by Kunikida with only a hand-drawn map as their lead.

They didn’t even know what the person looked like, but Kunikida only waved them off, saying that they’ll know the moment they see him.

This made all of them curious…but more than that, Midoriya couldn’t help but remember that strange man…

"Oh? What a coincidence."

“You’re…the one from yesterday!” Ashido gasped, pointing at the lanky man sitting on the bar stool with his legs crossed.

“And you are the kids from yesterday.” The man hummed as he tapped his finger against the edge of his ceramic cup. “Judging from the bags under your eyes, I assume your guardians were quite worried about you.”

At the memory of the hell they went through last night, everyone fell quiet as if their newly acquired energy was drained from their bodies.

“Oh, do you know each other?” The waitress asked, glancing between the two sides.

“Just a fateful encounter.” The man chuckled, taking the last sip of his coffee before setting the cup onto the counter. “Thank you, belladonna, this coffee is amazing. Please pass my words onto the owner for me when he gets back.”

“Of course! I’m glad you like it! Do come back anytime!” The waitress smiled brightly as she took the empty cup and headed into the back of the café.

The man got up, taking his black jacket from the seat next to him as he headed for the door. The kids immediately parted way to let him through, but just when he was almost out the doorway, he stopped and looked back at them.

“That’s right, while you’re in Yokohama, you should enjoy some privileges you won’t be able to enjoy outside!”

“What do you mean?” Shouji who was standing right next to him asked.

“Do you kids know that in Yokohama, fifteen is the legal age for drinking and driving?” The man said with a wink before he disappeared through the doorway.

“Hey, what’s wrong Midoriya? You’ve been quiet for a while now!” Kirishima called out to him. “Are you ok?”

“Eh? Oh, I’m fine!” Midoriya quickly waved his hands when he noticed that everyone was staring at him. “I was just thinking back to that man at the café…”

“Oh, that guy?” Kirishima furrowed his brows. “Was there something wrong about him?”

“Are you stupid?!” Bakugou snapped. “No matter how you look at it, there’s something wrong with that bastard.”

“Eh? What do you mean?” Kirishima blinked dumbly, causing the veins on Bakugou’s forehead to throb.

“Did you notice something, Midoriya?” Todoroki asked, coming over to join their little circle.

“No…not really.” Midoriya frowned.

After that man left, Midoriya had asked the waitress about him and learned that the only reason the man showed up at the café was to return the café owner’s wallet. According to her, the café owner lost his wallet two days ago. That man had found the wallet, so he came to return it. As thanks, the Café owner treated him to a free meal.

This made Midoriya felt ridiculous for being paranoid. However, now that Midoriya looked at Bakugou and Todoroki, he realized that he wasn’t the only one feeling that something was off.

“There is indeed something wrong with that guy, but I can’t tell for certain.” A new voice spoke up. Midoriya turned to see that it was Tokoyami.

Suddenly, the squealing sound of girls broke through the tense atmosphere.

“What’s wrong?” Kirishima asked, looking over with Midoriya, Bakugou, Todoroki, and Tokoyami.

“Check that out!” Kaminari beamed. Next to the blond, there was one drooling Mineta.

Midoriya glanced across the street and saw a beautiful woman with scarlet hair rolled up in a bun and held by up a pair of golden hair sticks. She walked in small, graceful steps as her kimono swayed elegantly to her movement. In her right arm, she carried a large bouquet of beautifully bloomed crimson spider lilies. In her left hand, she held a red oil-paper umbrella, shielding her from the beaming sunlight.

“So pretty…” Midoriya couldn’t help but admire the woman with the rest of his classmates. There was just something about her and the way she moved that just attracted everyone’s eyes, making them unable to look away.

“She’s really beautiful…do you think she’s a model?!” Ashido squealed.

“It’s possible, given her height.” Yaoyorozu nodded excitedly with stars in her eyes.

“Hey! Maybe we can get kimono as souvenirs!” Hagakure suggested.

“Eeeh? But it’s probably really expensive.” Uraraka sighed dejectedly as she watched that woman walked around a building corner and out of their sights.

"Hey, four-eyes! Are we going or what?" Bakugou shouted impatiently at Iida who quickly looked back down at the map, not even noticing the rude way Bakugou had addressed him.

“It should be around here somewhere.” Iida looked around the intersection with squinted eyes. Then with a gasp, he pointed towards a certain direction. “Over there!”

Everyone looked to where Iida was pointing at. Across the intersection from them, there was a small store squashed between two gigantic buildings with a sign that said Ariake Harbour.

It was the same Ariake Harbour Kunikida had written on the map. They crossed the intersection. When they walked into the small store, they were greeted by a friendly staff.

“Welcome to Ariake Harbour!”

“Hello!” Iida bowed to the man, feeling extremely awkward as none of them were here to buy things. “Sorry, we're not here to…buy anything."

“Oh, then you must be looking for him?” The staff said brightly. There wasn’t the slightest bit of annoyance, much to all of their relief.

“Him?” Iida looked across the shop and sitting at the far back corner was a raven-haired man, wearing clothing that practically screamed—I’m a detective! “Yes! We’re looking for him!”

“Wow, we really do recognize him the moment we see him.” Jirou gapped in disbelieve.

“Are you…Ranpo-san?” Midoriya asked as the man looked up at them. His eyes were narrow and curved upward that reminded the green-haired teen of a fox.

“Ah, you’re here.” The man smiled, stabbing his fork into the last piece of mini-cake on his plate and shoved it into his mouth. “Well then, time to go! I’m sure Minoura-san is getting impatient. Pay for my bill, will ya? I forgot to bring my wallet!”

“E-eh?!” Iida gapped as the raven-haired man strolled past him, patting him on the shoulder as he did do. “Wait-I—eh?!”

The rest of the kids stared, just as dumbfounded as their class president. The man just walked through the petrified statues of the kids, hands tucked in his pockets as he walked out of the store.

In the end, all of them pulled out their money, quickly paying off whatever bill the man had eaten before they rushed out of the store to see the man standing there, seeming to be waiting for them. When he saw them, he smiled and began to walk off.

“Um, Ranpo-san? Where are we going?” Yaoyorozu asked as they caught up to the man.

“To the crime scene, of course!” Ranpo replied as if it was the most obvious thing. “Didn’t Kunikida tell you guys about the murder case?”

“He did—” The vice-president paused when Ranpo suddenly made a sharp turn. They stared as Ranpo walked right through the automatic doors of the large building right next to Ariake Harbour.

“Eh?”

“Come on now, let’s not keep the police waiting!” Ranpo called, poking his head out from between the automatic doors before ducking back in.

“Wait, so…what?” Kirishima said dumbly as they walked through the doors and came into this glamorous lobby with a fountain right in the middle.

“What is this place?” Uraraka gapped as she looked around. Everything in here was practically sparkling.

“Looks like a hotel," Asui answered as she took in her surroundings.

Midoriya stared at the ladies working behind the counters, then to the man pulling along a cart of luggage dressed in hotel uniforms. It was a hotel.

“My apologies,” A woman in black suits suddenly stopped them, “I will need to see your IDs?”

At that, all the Class 1-A students froze up. They turned to each other, not sure what they were supposed to do as they don’t have any of that. Their reactions only made the woman narrow her eyes at the students that had their faces hidden behind scarfs and masks. Her eyes then darted to the securities standing not far away. As if receiving some sort of signal, they began to move forward when a young man in police uniform came stumbling over.

“Ranpo-san!” He gasped. “You’re finally here! We’ve been waiting for an hour and half now! The chief is waiting for you!”

“Ah~ Kobayashi-kun!” Ranpo greeted the policeman cheerfully, not feeling the slightest bit of urgency, unlike the policeman.

“This gentleman is here to help with our investigation.” The police quickly explained to the woman.

“…Are you here for the investigation as well?" The lady questioned, eyeing the students over again.

"Yes, they are." Ranpo cut in before the policeman could even register what the woman was talking about.

With a curt nod and a bow, the woman walked away, leaving the police with Ranpo and twenty kids.

“Erm…Ranpo-san, who are they?” Kobayashi asked, looking at the kids with just as much wariness as the lady had.

“Does it matter? As long as I, the great detective, is at the scene, the case will be solved in a snap of my finger!” Ranpo boasted. “Now lead the way, Kobayashi-kun!”

The young policeman looked like he had a lot of things to say, but it swallowed his words and decided to go with it. He led them into the elevator where he pressed for the top floor. Since there were twenty additional kids, one elevator wouldn’t fit them all so they had to split apart and take the other elevator.

None of them knew what to expect when they arrived at their designated floor. Whatever they’ve expected, it certainly wasn’t a huge rooftop pool—or had they expected to come out to someone shouting.

“How long are you going to keep us here?!” A petite woman in a red dress screamed at a police officer not far from the elevators.

“That’s right.” A man beside the woman joined in. He wore a simple white dress shirt with dark gray pants and glasses. “We’ve been waiting for more than an hour now!”

“I need to get back to my shift!” A man in the hotel staff uniform said nervously.

Kobayashi heaved out a deep sigh at the sight before directing them away from the group bickering in the distance. Ranpo didn’t question anything and neither did the kids. Under the heavy gazes of the police around them, the students followed Ranpo and Kobayashi into the…woman’s change room?!

“Girl’s change room!”

“Stop Mineta-kun!” Iida hissed, immediately popping up by Mineta’s side. The class president was ready to restrain the class pervert at any given notice. With all these police around, they can’t let Mineta run wild!

Any thoughts going through their heads became turned blank when they finally came across the scene.

There, in the shower stall still dripping with water vapor was the body of a dead woman. Her mouth was agape as she laid there on the cold, wet floor. Her wavy ink-black hair fanned around her body with half of her hair inside the drain next to her head—meaning that when she was discovered, the water was still running.

There was a very prominent bloodstain on the faucet with the white tiles around the body covered in light pink hue. The closer to the woman's body, the deeper the pink become, turning into a bloody red right under her head. Her limps were sprawled out, her body so pale that her skin looked grayish under the LED light. The woman was completely naked except for a blue plastic sheet covering her torso and pelvis, giving her one last bit of modesty.

Gasps erupted from the students as they took in this horrifying sight. Blood drained from their faces as all excitements they previously had was thrown out of their heads—replaced by the cruel realization of what they were really here to observe.

This wasn’t about a detective solving mystery cases.

It was about finding the answer behind the death of a person.

This was a murder scene.

“You guys.” Ranpo’s voice snapped the kids out as they turned to the raven-haired man who had taken his hat off and placed it over his chest. His back was to them as he faced the lady, but even without seeing his face, they could all feel pressure rolling off his body. “You’re being rude to the lady.”

None of them knew what face they had, but they quickly found out when they saw the faces of their classmates mirroring their own.

It was fear.

It was their first time seeing a real dead body and they were scared.

SLAP

Hearing the sharp slapping sound of flesh, everyone turned to Uraraka who had smacked her own cheeks so hard it left bright red handprints on her face. When she opened her eyes, the fear was gone, replaced by determination.

She wasn’t the only one.

The students in different methods picked themselves back up as their eyes that were just filled with shock and fright vanished out of existence.

Midoriya’s hands rolled into fists at his side as he stared at the bathroom stall, then to the woman's body, trying to gather as much information as he can.

“What the hell is this?!”

“Ah~! Minoura-san!” Ranpo greeted cheerfully as a grumpy looking man stomped over to them, looking extremely displeased.

“Since when were kids allowed at a crime scene?” The man snapped, turning to Kobayashi who shrank under his superior’s heated glare.

“Now, now, Minoura-san.” Ranpo chided as if he was talking to a child. “It’s these children’s dreams to become law enforcers when they grow up! As a policeman, shouldn’t it be your responsibility to be a good role model for them?”

“You brought unrelated personnel into a crime scene!”

“Alright, everyone gather around!”

“HEY!”

“What’s the situation?” Ranpo fixed his hat back over his head.

“Wouldn’t you know if you use your Ability?” The police chief replied. There was no bite in his words—just stating a simple fact.

That caught all the kids' attention as they stared at Ranpo.

“It would be meaningless if I just solve the mystery without letting them learn anything," Ranpo said, gesturing at the kids.

Midoriya swore the police chief was going to pop a vein, but he pinched the bridge of his nose to stop himself from exploding. It was a very familiar gesture that Midoriya remembered Kunikida doing. From their interactions, Midoriya guessed that this was a usual thing between the two adults.

“Kobayashi! Fill them in!”

“Y-yes!” Kobayashi stuttered as he quickly pulled out his notebook.

“The victim is Suzuki Yui, twenty-six years old—”

“Suzuki Yui?!” Ashido burst out in shock, causing everyone to look at her—everyone but Ranpo.

“…Sorry.” She covered her mouth when she realized she went out of line just now. She looked to the police chief, Minoura, nervously.

“You know her, kid?” Minoura questioned, eyeing the girl who was completely covered in clothing from head to toe.

“She’s the Heroine of The Last Hero," Jirou replied for her classmate, taking the police’s attention off Ashido and to her.

They were too shocked by the sight of the dead body to notice before…but the woman's face was definitely the face of the actress they knew of. She was pretty famous throughout Japan, which brought another question to all of their minds.

A question none of them dared to ask out loud.

Why was an actress of Japan in Yokohama?

Was she also granted special permission by the Port Mafia?

However, they got their answers very soon when Kobayashi continued on as he read off his notes.

“Suzuki Yui works as an actress in the outer world and has gained a lot of fames in the past three years. Her identity created for her in the outside world is a Quirkless immigrant from Germany.”

What?

None of them could believe what they were hearing.

The actress Suzuki Yui was a citizen of Yokohama?!

“She returned to Yokohama and booked into this hotel three days ago for her one week vacation. This morning at 7:34 am, she was found dead in the shower room by the cleaning lady.”

“Bring the suspects over here.” Minoru waved, and three people were soon brought in.

They were the people they had seen shouting at the police when they first stepped out of the elevator.

“Saito Miyako-san, twenty-six years old.” Kobayashi started with the only woman within the three. “She and Suzuki-san were old classmates. She works as an accountant and came with Suzuki-san to for her vacation.”

“I keep telling you, I didn’t kill her! Why would I kill my own friend?!” The lady—Saito shouted at Kobayashi, seeming hysterical and shaken.

“The next is Hayashi Eiichi-san, twenty-nine years old. He is a staff working the night shift last night and has entered the rooftop.”

"I wasn't even supposed to be on this shift!" Hayashi quickly defended himself. "My co-worker called in sick and the boss told me to take over for her! All I did was clean the floors, check to see if anyone was still around before I lock the doors!”

“Omura Daiki-san, thirty-one years old.” Kobayashi looked over to the last person. "He is a plastic surgeon that has performed plastic surgery for Suzuki-san in the past. They've become good friends since then and like Saito-san, he came to join Suzuki-san in her vacation.”

“I’m telling you guys, I don’t know anything! I didn’t even see her last night!” The plastic surgeon snapped angrily.

“Only these three have been seen on the surveillance camera accessing the swimming pool over the night. The first is Saito-san, who came to the rooftop pool with Suzuki-san at 10:34 pm and left alone at 11:43 pm”

“We were going for a midnight swim.” Saito frowned. “Yui didn’t like having people playing around when she swims. She’s a competitive swimmer and the two of us often race together. I got tired so I went back to my room first to sleep.”

“After that, Omura-san entered at 12:00 am, leaving at 12:30 am.”

"I went to look for Suzuki-san," Omura grumbled. “She wanted to get her nose done and we’ve been discussing over what procedure she wants to take. I went to look for her, but there was no one around. I thought she might be in the change room, so I waited a bit but when I didn’t see her I left!”

“At 1:30 am, Hayashi-san came to the rooftop with a cart of equipment, leaving at 3:25 am.”

“Those were just brooms and mops! I’ve never even stepped into the changing rooms since those were done by the cleaning people in the mornings!” Hayashi frantically explained.

“From the security footage of the cart he was pushing, it possible for him to have hidden weapons within the cart.”

“I’m telling you there’s nothing!” Hayashi looked like he was going to tear up upon hearing how he was the most suspicious.”

“And according to the testimonies all three of them gave today, Saito-san was the last to see Suzuki-san.”

“Wait a minute!” Saito instantly cut in. “Sure I was the last to see her, but I didn’t do it! I’m five foot one and Yui is five foot five! How do you suppose I kill her?!”

“A-and no matter how you look at it, isn’t it an accident?” Hayashi piped in, looking over to the body on the floor before he hastily looked away, looking as if he was going to throw up at any moment.

“That’s right, I don’t get why you’re saying this is murder!” Omura shouted angrily. “What are you police doing?! I can’t believe we’re paying taxes for incompetent people like you!”

“We don’t need you to tell us how we should operate," Minoura said sternly. “Suzuki Yui’s death is no accident. We have more than enough proof to believe that she has been killed by someone.”

"Well, I'm telling you it’s not me!” Saito shouted before glaring to the two other guys. “If you want to suspect, then suspect these two! They’re both dating Yui, after all!”

“Eh?!” Kobayashi gapped. It was obvious the police hadn't gotten that information before.

However, the ones that were most surprised people were Class 1-A. At the very least, those that knew of Suzuki Yui.

“Wasn’t Suzuki dating Harada?” Kirishima gapped as he recalled the magazines he saw.

"There was even talk about marriage, wasn’t there?” Hagakure added.

“Harada? Who’s that?” Minoura felt a headache coming as more new information was given. Information which no one bothered on sharing before.

“Harada Azuma.” A policeman reported, walking up to his chief with a holographic screen floating out of the watch on his wrist. He showed Minoura the picture of a brown-haired man with golden eyes and snake scales covering half of his neck. He was an extremely handsome man—taking away the snake qualities. “He’s an actor of the outside world with mutant Quirk. He acted as the male lead within the movie The Last Hero where Suzuki Yui acted in there as the female lead. They presumably began dating after that. There is rumour in the outside world that they are planning on getting married.”

“Marry?!” Minoura furrowed his brows in disbelieve. “Was she out of her mind?”

Midoriya blinked as he took in the shock on Minoura’s face. Was there something wrong with marriage?

“I’m not dating Suzuki-san!” Hayashi shouted. “We just know each other because she comes to this hotel annually for vacation! We’re just friends!”

“Then why did you withhold such important information from us?” Minoura narrowed his eyes at the worker. “You acted as if you didn’t know her when we questioned you.”

“I-I was just scared!” Hayashi cried. “I didn’t want you guys to think I killed her!”

"Nothing is going on between me and Suzuki-san!" Omura joined in. “My relationship with her is strictly work and friend!”

At that, Saito snorted, gaining everyone’s attention.

“Oh please.” She rolled her eyes. “Anyone with brains can tell you’re smitten with her. I know you went to her hotel room the other night and didn’t come out until morning. Wonder what’s so important that you need to discuss with her all night.”

“You say that but aren’t you the most suspicious?” Omura countered. “I heard your company in the outside world went bankrupted and you racked up quite a lot of debts and has been asking Suzuki-san to help you out but got rejected!”

“You think I would kill her over something so petty?!” Saito shrieked.

“You seem petty enough to believe other people would kill for such petty reason!”

“How dare you! I would never kill Yui over something like that!”

“I wouldn’t either!” Omura roared back.

“Please everyone calm down!” Kobayashi jumped between the two, only to be on the receiving end of their rage.

The kids just stared at the scene, dumbfounded.

“Well?” Minoura turned towards Ranpo. “Can you solve this mystery for us already?”

“Hmm…” Ranpo hummed before a sly smile lifted his lips.

Then, he suddenly turned around, his left hand on his hip and his right hand pointing right at the U.A students. His eyes opened up, revealing a pair of emerald green eyes that seemed to suck out the souls of anyone that dared to stare into them.

“You guys, solve this mystery in thirty minutes!”

“…Eh?”

The police and kids—as well as the suspects—all stared at Ranpo in disbelieve.

For a whole minute, the change room was drowned in utter silence.

┏━━━━━━━━━༻❁༺━━━━━━━━━┓

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momentofmemory · 5 years ago

Text

fictober - day twenty-eight

Prompt #28: “Enough! I’ve heard enough.”

Fandom: BBC’s Doctor Who (NuWho)

Rating: PG

Characters: The Twelfth Doctor & Missy

Words: 1972

Author’s Note: set in the vague vicinity of s10, but before Bill is a main fixture in the Doctor’s life.

>>Right Enough

Missy’s been lying indisposed on her blue suede couch for one hundred and twenty-nine thousand, six hundred and seventeen seconds when the Doctor finally decides to grace her with his presence. Normally, she doesn’t mind his absence—her couch is deliciously extravagant, after all.

Normally, however, the Doctor doesn’t wait an entire month between visits.

“Where’ve you been,” she asks, feet still propped up on the arm of the loveseat and eyes pointedly closed.

He putters about in the background, probably checking to make sure she hasn’t gotten into any mischief (why he bothers, she’ll never know—it’s not like there are any alive things in here. If she really wanted trouble, she’d just walk out of this laughably secure vault of his, kill a city or so of humans, and be back before tea).

“Why?” HIs voice echoes from across the room. “Jealous?”

“No.”

She probably said that too quickly, but he doesn’t call her out on it.

“Oh good; we wouldn’t want that,” he says, instead. “Come make yourself useful and help me move this furniture out of the way.”

Missy pries her eyes open and rises from her reclined position, as languidly as possible to make up for her earlier transgression. “Have we decided dining tables are a symbol of oppression now, too?”

The Doctor doesn’t take the bait, which is a tragedy because Missy had an entire monologue at the ready if he had. She drops her heels to the ground and stretches, spine cracking in response, and then takes out a contact mirror to inspect her hair. It’s a perfect disaster: loose ends flying every which way, fuzz clinging to the hairs along her scalp, and a tangled mess near the top. In all, it’s exactly the way she likes it.

She pokes randomly at a few curls anyway, mostly as a delay tactic to annoy the Doctor. Also, because if it looks like she’s looking at herself, it won’t look like she’s looking at him. She would never be caught doing something as caring as that.

The Doctor’s currently up on the platform in the middle of the room, hoisting chairs off of it with the kind of manic energy Missy’s only ever seen in three-year-olds (and, perhaps, herself). Something about the emotion seems wrong this time, though—a bit frayed around the edges, a weariness and desperation in his eyes.

She snaps the contact shut and strolls over to the dais. “You look tired.”

She’s made sure to infuse her words with as much derision as she can manage, but the Doctor grins anyway.

“You know, I once brought down an entire administration with that line.” He scurries behind the oak table and grabs hold, gesturing for Missy to do the same on the opposite side. “Well, sort of. In essence. Technically the full thing was ‘don’t you think she looks tired,’ but the sentiment was there.”

“Manipulating political structures for your own ends, were you?” Missy grabs hold of the lip of the table despite herself, and they start to carry it off to the side of the room. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were trying to flirt with me.”

“You would be so lucky.” They set the table down, missing the Doctor’s toes by inches, to Missy’s disappointment.

He grins that maddening grin of his again. “Come. I’ve brought you a present.”

He all but leaps back up onto the now empty platform, nearly losing his balance in the process in what Missy’s fairly certain is evidence of a limp. She eyes him suspiciously.

“You’re deflecting.”

“I know, and I’m doing it wonderfully.” He pulls a small blue box out of his coat pocket. “Here. This is for you.”

Missy eyes him with even more suspicion. She can’t imagine liking something that’s making the Doctor this pleased, but despite her better judgment she steps over to him, accepting the proffered box.

“I hope you know if that’s not a key to that door of yours, or at least someone’s severed head, I’m going to be incredibly disappointed.”

“Well. We wouldn’t want that.” The Doctor slides his hands into his tattered coat. “You might want to stand back when you open it. Bigger on the inside, you see.”

Missy starts, wondering what could possibly be so important that the Doctor would risk giving her access to dimension collapsing technology, even if he was planning on taking it right back. She pulls at the silver ribbon holding the box together, and, once freed, lifts the lid.

“Turn it over,” the Doctor says.

“Really, Doctor.” Missy starts tipping the box over. “If you wanted me at your mercy we could’ve arranged something more—dear Gallifrey!”

Three polished, glossy-finished black legs and a pedal rack slide out of the rim of the box, and after it the large wooden frame they’re attached to. Before Missy can fully catalogue what’s happening, an entire grand piano has fallen out and landed with surprising softness on the floor.

Missy stares at the instrument with something between anger and allurement, and runs her hand along the open lid. “Why have you brought me this?”

The Doctor shrugs, wincing a bit at the movement. “I can’t just bring gifts for an old friend?”

Missy catches his pained expression and in a fit of rage, heaves the piano’s lid off its post and then slams it down to cover the strings. “No, no, you most certainly can not. Not when you’ve been who knows where for who knows how long and then saunter back in here with—with this.”

“Is that concern I detect?”

“Don’t change the subject,” she snaps, fingers drumming on the piano’s surface. “My only concern is that you’re jeopardizing the deal that’s keeping me alive.”

The Doctor holds her gaze for an uncomfortably long time, perhaps searching for that thing he keeps calling ‘hope.’ She glares back with just as much fervor, because she’s not about to give him any of that tonight. Not when he’s just spoiled her favourite dining spot for something so paltry as an apology.

Eventually, the Doctor just sighs. “Someone needed help, Missy. That’s all.”

“Must have been an awful lot of someones if it’s left you this desperate,” Missy scoffs, and she’s pleased at how mean that is. “I mean, a piano? Really?”

“A piano,” he agrees, picking the empty box up off the floor and tucking it back into his pocket. “I thought perhaps you would enjoy a more constructive outlet for your… creative tendencies, shall we say.”

Something snaps, and she finds herself climbing over the piano so she can get into his space.

“You can’t lie, Doctor,” she says. “Not to me. This is just your overblown way of trying to convince yourself you didn’t break your stupid oath by leaving me.”

“What was I supposed to do?” To her delight, something of that pain she knows all too well breaks through his eyes. “Just let them to die?”

“For Rassilon’s sake, Doctor! I don’t know how you haven’t noticed this yet, but someone’s always dying!”

The Doctor pales and takes a step back. “That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t at least try to—”

“Would you like us to look up whoever it is you saved?” Missy cocks her head, then glides off the dais towards her couch. “We can do it so easily, you know. Any database in the universe, and we’ll find their cause of death instantaneously. That’s what they are, Doctor. Pre-packaged, instantaneous death.”

“Missy—”

“Are you really that thick?” She doesn’t understand how a being that smart can be that willfully naïve. “No matter what you do, nobody lives in the end. I don’t know what it’s going to take for you to realize you’ve done enough for those silly, ungrateful, walking meat sacks you call friends.”

“Enough?”

Missy freezes mid-tirade and glances up at him, baffled by why out of all the words she’d said to them, he’d chosen that one to fixate on. She swallows, suddenly unsure of herself even though she’s not quite sure why. “I’ve heard enough from you. Yes.”

The Doctor comes down the steps, wearily: one slow assent to gravity at a time.

“Enough,” he repeats, shaking his head. “You don’t think I’ve heard enough, too? After all these years of travelling, these… these faces, these bodies. Scars.”

“I like this game where you make all my points for me. Makes things so much simpler than our usual give and take.”

“You don’t understand,” the Doctor says, and it’s said so sadly and kindly and so unlike anything Missy would ever say. “That’s all right. I wouldn’t expect you to. Not yet.”

“Then make me.”

She’s spoken too quickly again, and this time the Doctor picks up on it. He looks at her with an expression she doesn’t recognize, and eases himself down into the chair across from her.

“I know I’ve done enough, Missy,” he says eventually. “How could I not? I’ve heard enough, I’ve seen enough, I’ve felt enough. Lost enough, even. More than enough enoughs for any one person.”

He clasps his hands in front of him and stares at his gnarled fingers. “You see, what you don’t understand is that it’s not about how much I’ve done, or haven’t done. It’s not even about atonement. It’s about how much there’s still left to do.”

Missy shifts on the couch. “Has anyone ever told you there are other people in the universe that could do these things instead?”

He chuckles under his breath, and it’s without mirth, but not without life. “Do you see that instrument up there?”

“You’ve not left me with many other options,” Missy says, and she’s not sure that he isn’t just changing the subject again, but she follows his gaze.

She doesn’t know much about human design—why would she?—but it doesn’t take an expert to know time was spent in the piano’s craft. The soundboard is a mixture of mahogany and rock maple, the white keys are cast in their original ivory, and the black cut from ebony wood. The strings are steel in the treble and copper in the base, and each hammer is delicately covered in red felt.

It’s beautiful.

“Music,” he says quietly, “is not something that needed to exist. A piano, even more so—what with its complicated strings, and its hammers, and its pedals, and all its nonsense. It couldn’t even have the decency to decide what kind of instrument it wanted to be.”

“But these humans…” He smiles. “They can’t help themselves. There was something in them that told them it was important, even though it wouldn’t feed them, or clothe them, or shelter them. It wouldn’t give them anything they needed. But they knew they had to do it, anyway.”

He stands and straightens his coat, and starts making his way towards the door. “That’s what it’s like, Missy. When you do something to help others, even though you get nothing in return, because deep down, you know it’s right. That’s all—just right.”

Missy regards him for a long moment, then shakes her head. “You are the strangest man I’ve ever known.”

The Doctor laughs. “And yet, you know me.”

She waves her hand dismissively over the edge of the couch, and he disengages the lock with his screwdriver—then he’s back in the world and out of hers. She sighs. He’ll be back eventually, with more of his strange ideas, she supposes. But for now, she is alone.

Missy stares at the ceiling and resumes her counting, and it’s peaceful, and familiar, and safe.

She reaches second two thousand, seven hundred and thirty-six before she trades off running her fingers across suede to cautiously tracing the ivory keys. She’s never played the piano before, or really any instrument. Missy thinks she’ll be able to learn, though.

It feels right.

#fictober19 #doctor who #twelfth doctor #doctor who fanfic #dw fic #missy #fanfiction #memsfic

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with-a-gilded-quill · 5 years ago

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The Fae in the Forest: Chapter One

It was a day like any other. Autumn had come to the central midwest, in the little town of Spring Green, Illinois. It was hardly large enough to place itself on a map, with a population of 500 people, and nothing to see except a library, a park, a gas station, and an abandoned house that even some of the adults were sure was haunted. The town, like most Illinoian towns, was surrounded by dense fields of corn and lush green forests. It was only able to be accessed from a fifteen minute drive down country roads.

The town was rather ordinary. Those who lived their all their life and never left didn’t believe it was different than any other town. Those who visited felt strange there, as if it had birthed a culture known only to those who had lived there forever. The visitors, generally speaking, were right. Most of the townsfolk never even knew what was so odd about their town. Most of the people who left never came back.

***

The world was spinning, spinning, a dizzying swirl of bright fall leaves in front of her eyes, burgundy and violent crimson and goldenrod and burnt orange all at once. More of them fell from the trees with every gust of wind as she lay beneath them, drifting downward to rest beside their other fallen brethren. The sounds - the rustling of dead leaves, the melody the wind played as it wove between limbs - were comforting. Autumn had always been a time of magic. Anything in the world could happen, and that was why she was here.

She did not want to return to the house she’d stormed out of seven years ago. There was a reason she had left there in the first place. But here she was, being called back from the comfort of her new home, in a new town, with her new life states away, to crash in an old friend’s basement.

A lonely reddened maple leaf fell on her face rather unexpectedly as it descended toward the rest of its family. She sat up, taking the leaf gingerly between her fingers, and sighed. She thought of her childhood, of building leaf piles and jumping into them, as if that had ever been any fun at all, and everyone didn’t just end up stabbed by twigs or with bugs in their hair. But kids never cared about any of that, and maybe that was the fun in it all.

She was lost in her own thoughts by the time she heard the voice calling her. It had begun, quite ruthlessly, to rain, and the deep, billowy sound was whipped this way and that in the furious blustering wind. Despite it not being too far away, it was still almost lost to the storm. It was calling her inside. Reluctant, but willing, she conceded and headed toward the house, slipping in through the back door, pulling her worn green flannel tight around her It was meant to provide warmth and comfort, but seeing as it was entirely soaked in rain - as was the rest of her - it did no good for anyone, except for making her feel more cold.

The voice matched the man it came from. He was tall, a towering 6’4, a giant compared to her, who was not taller than a measly 5’3 (and by most accounts, was a perfectly even 5’2). He had an abundance of muscles from his work in a lumber yard. It seemed he had the lumberjack look down to a T, and it suited him well, with his black beard, long curly hair, and his assortment of solid colored gingham button-ups, soft with the same flannel material currently wrapped around her torso, only almost always far less wet. But looks, of course, were often deceiving, and anyone that knew anything about Cedric Perez would know that he was perhaps the kindest, most caring, most sensitive person they had ever had the pleasure of knowing.

“Hazel, you’ll catch your death in that rain out there, y’know. C’mon, we’ve got coffee for ya, kid.” Cedric said, beaming, as she slipped between him and the door, knocking into his arm on purpose. Hazel glowered at the towering man in the way only a best friend could, more annoyed than angry. Cedric Murphy was exactly one year younger than Hazel to the day, even though he looked like he was old enough to be her dad. Often, Cedric did indeed act like he was. Most people would say he was too nice and too caring for his own good. This did nothing to stop Cedric from being either of those things.

“Thanks, mom.” Hazel said, wrapping her arms around herself before she finally thought better of it and stripped of her flannel, leaving her in only an equally soaked black tank top. Hazel shuddered from a sudden rush of chill, before a fuzzy green pullover sailed its way right into her face. It was Cedric’s, of course, judging by the size of it, and Hazel gratefully slipped it on over her head, relishing in the warmth of the soft fleece. There in the kitchen, Hazel leaned back against the counter and slid slowly - and even a bit dramatically - to the linoleum floor, sitting with a thump. Cedric joined her there, slightly more gracefully, and handed her a blue mug decorated with small white stars, and steaming with a hot, caramel colored liquid, not unlike the warm shade of his own hand.

“Just the way you like it.” Cedric said, grinning. “Creamer. No sugar. Now drink up. You’re freezing.” Hazel was. This was not difficult to discern, as the shivers that took over her body were dramatic and obvious. “What were you doing out there, anyway?” Cedric continued, doing his best to sound very stern and accusatory. Hazel sighed, loudly.

“I was just thinking.” Hazel muttered over her mug. As much as Cedric liked to make fun of her for lying in the rain, he understood the simple need to be alone. Sometimes, thought Hazel, the cold and the rain understood her better than any person ever could. Cedric understood that, too, at least enough to give her many free rain-laying passes. There was a long moment where Hazel wouldn’t meet his eyes. She must have looked particularly tired or cold to Cedric, because he had left to get a blanket and returned with it, throwing it over her rather unceremoniously. Ordinarily, this gesture would have been seen as sweet or romantic, but this time it ended up just funny, as the blanket, much like the fleece, hit Hazel in the face and shrouded her. For a few minutes, she refused to move it. It was a wonder she didn’t spill a drop of coffee.

“Emily and Percy are downstairs,” Cedric said, taking a seat again in front of Hazel, and nudging her with his foot. She grimaced in a way that accurately described how she felt, although it didn’t seem to get the message across, as Cedric just kept on talking. “You know. Doin’ the do. Cuddlin’ naked. The body dance.” Hazel removed the shroud of blanket from her face for the express purpose of glaring daggers into him, before simply tearing her gaze away and shrugging.

“No one calls it ‘the body dance’, you egg.” Hazel scoffed. The situation was complicated. Emily met Percy during their junior year of high school gym class. They began dating a week after, and were essentially inseparable from that moment on, until just after high school, when they broke up for three months so Percy could go to Math Camp. When he returned in the fall, Percy and Emily fell into each other’s arms like long lost lovers once again.

“You wanna tell me again what the big deal is with the two of them?” Cedric asked, his tone taking on something far more serious than he had sounded even with his condemnation of the rain. Hazel shrugged.

“I just don’t know him. That’s all,” Hazel said. “I wasn’t really friends with Emily in high school, you know that. We might have spoken sometimes, but that was it. She was friendly to me. Guess time weathered away the deep loathing she had for me.” A silent pause, then, and a perfect moment for Hazel to sip her coffee. It was still hot enough to scald her tongue, and she savored the warm feeling of it as it entered her belly. Cedric remained silent, as if asking for more details. Hazel closed her eyes, feeling for the words, before she said, “We were inseparable in middle school. Together all the time, no matter what, basically twins; that sort of thing. In English class, we refused to be separated and talked our teacher into letting us sit next to each other every semester. Luckily, we were good students, and smart, and given the privilege of mostly doing whatever we wanted. When we were assigned to read books, we would make sure we read the book ahead of time, getting us out of class assignments as long as we passed the quiz we were given. We loved all the same weird things, too, you know? Weird clothes, anime, J-pop, books, alternative music: all the things that made you an outcast in middle school. But Emily was always more popular than me, if you could even call what she was “popular”. For all her strangeness, she was beautiful: tall, long blonde hair, pale skin, freckles, and the brightest green eyes I’d ever seen, as bright as emeralds.” Hazel paused here to steal a glance at Cedric, who was watching with a little knowing grin. Hazel pressed her lips together, and then let her face go slack. “I… might have loved her a little bit. We were like magnets.”

Cedric listened. He was good at that, listening. He always had been. It was part of what made him such a wonderful friend. His ability to empathize and understand and learn from others was unmatched. It came, he often said, from being almost always misunderstood, and treated like some kind of criminal delinquent. When Hazel seemed done speaking, Cedric nudged her again. “And?” He prompted, leaning forward. “So what? What happened between you two?”

“And then everything fell apart.” Hazel said, grasping her mug in her hands as tightly as she could, feeling the warmth of the drink within it seeping into her palms, warming her up. “There was one summer day in the woods… I thought it was going to be like every other day, but it wasn’t. I can still see it if I close my eyes, if I think about it. The smell of hot, rotting flesh, the blood… all the blood. And that was it for us. There was no going back.” Hazel closed her eyes, as if remembering. “I miss her sometimes, of course. Sure, once in a while we would talk, but that hardly felt like enough.” Hazel was glad for Cedric. Without him, she didn’t think she would have ever made another friend. She never felt lonely around him. He made the dark days brighter. He could make her laugh, and he always knew when all she needed was a good cry. Besides, the two were now the most inseparable of friends: approaching 22, one would think their interests would differ greatly from when the were younger. They’d be right, but not in the ways most would expect. Instead of j-pop, anime, and scene kid clothes, Hazel and Cedric’s interests lined up on an entirely new scale: both enjoyed punk clothing, rock music, comic books, Disney movies, and, perhaps most relatable, girls. They could talk about girls for hours.

“Then it was high school.” Hazel said, and looked up at her still-silent friend, who was staring with big, round eyes. “I was very gay, and you were there, big and burly by nature, and the new guy.” Cedric smiled. He remembered. He was protective by nature, too, and went out of his way to intimidate anyone who had anything to say about Hazel and her romantic interests. “And then there was Emily, smiling at me occasionally, letting me know that it was okay. That she was glad she knew me.” Hazel released a slow, long sigh, and grimaced. “And then there was Percy.”

Cedric opened his mouth, ready to offer encouragement to continue her little story. But he did not get so far. Just then, the basement door opened.

#writing #my writing #original #oc #fantasy #horror #ya #young adult #story #the fae in the forest #tfitf

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wonderlandmind4 · 6 years ago

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Café Crema Chp. 5

Summary: The first time was an accident. The second time was coincidence. The third time is just unlucky. The fourth time is getting out of hand and the fifth may or may not be with intent. Otherwise known as The One Where He Spills Her Coffee.

Pairing: Bucky x fem!Reader

Warnings: Language. Buckets of fluff. Alludes to Infinity War and the Snap as this takes place afterwards (so please, if you haven’t yet seen the movie, please do). Implied Smut…maybe…eventually. IW spoilers for this chapter

Words: 6.6k This is for @captain-ariel-barnes 4k writing challenge, which, congrats! This is my first ever writing challenge, with my first ever reader insert, so please let me know what you think. (gif not mine)

Fic Writing Challenge Prompt: “You Owe Me Dinner”

When Y/N wakes up a few days later, she’s nearly tempted to go right back to sleep. The temperature dropped during the night and she didn’t have her extra layer of the thick fuzzy blanket atop her duvet. She could feel the cold radiating off her bedroom window, and all she wanted to do was snuggle back up into the warmth of her bed.

She couldn’t though. Today was the day that YouTube Band and their demanding, prima-donna manager who finds it beneath her to organize events with lesser known therapy centers, were coming in. The band themselves seem to be super excited about it. It was just the horrible woman Y/N had been dealing with for the past few weeks that made her dread the day.

Forcing herself out of bed, Y/N got ready for the morning. She decided on a thicker pair of black pants, a cream colored long sleeve shirt, a quilted tan leather jacket with matching knee-high boots and a thick white scarf. She would be inside for the majority of the day, hoping to avoid the crisp weather despite how much she loves it sometimes.

Y/N arrived at the Center earlier than usual, making sure everything is set in stone before the band comes in. Colin is already there, usually when her sister has early work meetings, she brings him by. Y/N greets her nephew with a tight hug, signing and asking him if he wants to help her color a thank you card for the band. He nods excitedly.

After the card and coloring is finished, Colin spots Millie coming with her parents and heads off to see her with one of the other OT’s. Y/N takes this as her chance to find Elizabeth in her office, an orange crayon still in her hand. She knocks on her door frame, pulling the blonde-haired therapist’s attention away from her notes.

“I rode on Bucky’s motorcycle.” Y/N informs her as a greeting.

The OT quirks an eyebrow. “Is that a euphemism?” She deadpans. Y/N throws the crayon at Lizzie. She cackles when it bounces off her arm and lands on her desk.

“Why do I tell you things?” Y/N questions aloud.

“Because you seem to be incredibly infatuated with Bucky and you don’t know what to do with yourself.” Lizzie states, leaning back in her seat.

Y/N opens her mouth to deny it, but Lizzie beats her to it.

“Dave told me what happened that day. Don’t you think there’s something strange going on here?”

Oh something strange is going on alright, Y/N thinks happily, but she doesn’t voice it.

Lizzie continues. “Some mischievous version of fate messing with you both. I mean, it’s like you’re magnets or something being pulled towards each other. I’ve always been good at reading your face, Y/N. You like him.”

She’s about to deny it, but she can’t. Y/N sighs in defeat. “I think you’re right, Lizzie. Christ, that’s fucking terrifying.”

“Because he’s the former Winter Soldier, pardoned, now one of newest avengers, also dubbed White Wolf and has diplomatic immunity because of Wakanda?”

Y/N gives her a flat look. “Because I’ve never fallen for someone this quickly before. Somehow it feels…it almost feels like I’ve known him for months already.”

Her friend shrugs. “Sometimes it just happens like that. When you have a connection, you have a connection. I mean, you’re a grown woman, Y/N. It’s different to fall for someone quickly now, then it was when you were younger.”

Y/N remains silent, thinking it over. Sometimes people can just be enchanted by someone, and it can be so simple to just start a friendship; hell, even be blindsided by a spark of something more.

“Why did you ride his bike?” Lizzie questions after a minute of silence, pulling Y/N away from her thoughts.

“He said he was looking for someone to at look it.” She answers. “Which, he never answered my question about Tony Stark not looking at it or something. Anyway, I told him about my uncle’s shop, so we took an impromptu trip to Coney Island. We ate funnel cake and talked for a while. Then he brought me home and I-“

She clears her throat. “I kissed him on the cheek, said goodnight then practically ran inside.”

Laughing brightly, Lizzies says, “Y/N. That sounds like a date!”

“It was not.” Y/N disagrees vehemently.

The OT just shrugs, knowing she can’t convince her. “Well, did you finally get his number then?”

“No?” She asks confused.

Lizzie rolls her eyes and shakes her head. “I swear.” She mumbles amused.

Y/N chooses to change the subject then. “Anyway, I came here because I’m running to Ella’s, before the band arrives. Want anything?”

“I’m good.” She declines, tapping her travel mug. “That reminds me. The place providing lunch called to confirm again.”

“That’s three times.” Y/N shakes her head. “I’ll call them back, thanks.” She turns to go.

Arriving at the café, Y/N is relieved to find the line to be short. She’s only behind two people, glancing at the menu board as she waits. Her eyes light up when she sees the option for maple lattes, a sign that November has officially rolled around. She beams at Pete when it’s her turn to order, but he just glares at her.

“You tell Bucky I’m giving back his money.” He demands, pointing a nonthreatening finger at her. “A hundred bucks was too much.”

“Pete,” She chuckles, “it’s been like five days. He’s not going to take it back.”

“Well, maybe if you stopped distracting him, coffee wouldn’t haven been spilled and I wouldn’t be standing here trying to find ways to give it back to him.”

“Distracting?” She frowns.

“Yes, honey. Haven’t you seen the way the Sergeant looks at you?” Pete smirks, then pats her hand on the counter. “It’s the same way you look at him.”

Y/N is taken aback by his statement, and she can feel her cheeks warming up. “Please tell me what you’re talking about.”

“In all of your meet-cutes, each time ends with the both of you giving each other heart eyes.” Pete laughs softly. “It’s kinda adorable, actually. You’re both so smitten with each other. Coffee soul mates and all.”

“That’s not a thing Pete, and I have no idea what the hell you’re going on about.” She says.

Although her stomach has been filling with butterflies this whole time. She suddenly recalls her earlier conversation with Lizzie. She just didn’t know how obvious it was.

“He’s just…I just…shit.” She glares at him. “I hate you.”

Pete throws his head back, cackling. “I knew it!” He chirps gleefully. “You like him, Y/N.”

“I’ll have the maple latte, extra, extra large to help me deal with my irritating friends, please and thank you.”

He’s still laughing as he punches in her order.

“And the pumpkin French toast.” A saccharine smile on her lips.

Finally, he stops laughing and groans. “Dammit.”

“You said if I were to ask for them you’ll make them. I know just how much you love making them.”

“It’s a good thing you’re my best and favorite costumer.” He tells her fondly taking her card as payment.

Beaming at him, Y/N takes her card back and goes to sit at the same table she was at when Bucky crashed into her life. She clearly didn’t realize then how much they would see each other after, and how weeks later, they’re somewhat friends, and Y/N has developed a crush. She shakes her head at the memory and waits for her food.

Once she’s finished eating, she brings her plates to the counter, Pete scolding her for doing so. She bids him goodbye, grabbing her nearly empty cup of coffee and steps outside. For some reason, she can’t help the feeling of disappointment as the cold fall air greets her.

Y/N is only several feet away from the café when she realizes why. She had been expecting to bump into someone, and that someone wasn’t there. Abruptly, her side purse is buzzing, so she pulls her phone out to answer.

“Hey Liz-“

“They canceled!”

Y/N stops in her track. “What?”

“They cancelled, Y/N! That prissy manager called and pulled out! Said the band was above doing performances they aren’t getting paid for.”

“Are you fucking kidding me!?” Y/N spits into the phone. She isn’t directing it at Lizzie. “We are paying them! I’m so- oh my God, I’m so mad right now, what the fuck.”

“What the hell are we supposed to do? The kids are expecting entertainment today, they were so excited.”

“Of course she didn’t call me, she knew I’d lay it into her.” Y/N sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose.

“Y/N. What do you want me to tell the children?”

Dropping her hand away from her face, Y/N shakes her head in disbelief. “I don’t kn-”

She abruptly stops talking. Up ahead, halfway down the sidewalk, Y/N spots an all too familiar head of shaggy drown hair, and broad shoulders despite the black leather jacket. Her mind races, and it only takes 0.5 seconds for her to come up with an idea.

“Lizzie.” Y/N focuses her attention back on their conversation. “Don’t worry about it. I think I’ve got a solution.”

“What? Really!?”

“Tell everyone that the band couldn’t make it, they’re sick or something. But tell them I have a surprise instead. I hope I have a surprise. I’ll call you back.”

She hangs up, sticks her phone in her pocket, and starts brusquely walking back towards the café with determine, confident steps. Y/N downs most of her coffee only leaving a little at the end; four times of spilled liquid being enough to last her a lifetime.

She hopes this works, and she hopes her plan will go her way. Y/N is able to sneak behind a small group of women, and just as they pass the shop, she side-steps them, and knocks straight into a solid, vibranium made arm.

The purposeful impact causes her cup to tumble from her hand, and she makes no effort to stop it. Bucky however, reacts quicker this time, as if he was also expecting for this to happen again. His left hand shoots out so fast, Y/N can barely spot it. He catches the drink and his fingertips break through the thin material of the cup.

Bucky looks as if he’s about to be horrified again, embarrassed almost. Except when he realizes only a few drops of coffee are dripping to the ground, he tilts his head in bemusement. Y/N was rather impressed by his reflexes this time around, and she has to hide her amusement by rubbing her lips together. Bucky glances up at her, offering her a sheepish smile.

“Impressive.” Y/N quips. “How come you couldn’t do that the last two times?”

Bucky fish mouths for a few moments, it’s endearing. He seems to snap back to it and smirks. “Been adding coffee spilling prevention to my workout routine.”

The response makes her laugh. “Committed to your work, are you?”

“Absolutely.” His smirk evens out into a full smile. “What are you doing here at this time? Don’t you have that event today?”

“Actually, that’s why I’m here. I was wondering, if you aren’t busy or anything.” She bites her lips nervously for a moment, noticing the way Bucky’s eyes light up.

“That band I was telling you about, apparently their manager just decided to cancel the last minute and now they aren’t showing up. Which means there’s no entertainment for the kids today. Which sucks because they’re expecting a fun day, and I just really hate to disappoint them.”

Bucky reaches forward, gently placing his hands on her shoulders. “Y/N, take a breath, darlin’.”

“Right, sorry.” She grins shyly.

He returns it and she takes a deep breath. Satisfied, Bucky drops his hands away.

“Right. I was wondering if you could do me a huge favor? I was thinking, maybe having some superheroes come by instead? You, I’m asking if you can fill in for that band?”

Her eyes slip past Bucky’s shoulder. Steve has been standing there the whole time, arms crossed in a relaxed pose. His eyes are dancing with amusement and there’s a ghost of a smirk on his lips. His blue eyes shift between her and Bucky.

“Um, you too, Captain. If that’s alright?” Y/N shifts her gaze back to Bucky. “I mean, if you aren’t busy saving the world and all.”

Chuckling, Bucky says, “There’s not a pressing need for it at the moment, I don’t think.” He pauses for just a moment. “I’d love too, Y/N. I mean, we would- yes.”

Y/N feels her heart swell, and she swears it’s because he agreed and not because of the way his eyes reflect off the sunlight. Her bites her bottom lip, attempting to keep her smile tampered down, but it beats out. She beams at him, her mouth spread so widely her cheeks ache.

“Really!?” She confirms excitedly.

Bucky nods, opening his mouth to speak, but Y/N launches herself at him, wrapping her arms around his neck. He releases a soft grunt of air, catching her around the waist, the coffee cup falling to the ground. The all too familiar, comforting smell of leather and forest fills her nose, and Y/N realizes belatedly that she just fully crossed the line of personal space.

But then she’s thinking back to the few nights ago, when she pressed her chin to his shoulder, and when he caged her against his motorcycle at Coney Island.

Before she can get lost in the rhythm of his heartbeat against his chest, Y/N slowly pulls away. She doesn’t miss the way Bucky’s fingers linger and graze her sides though, and she needs to snap back into work mode before she can think too hard on it.

“Thank you!” She squeals, pulling out her phone again. “Seriously, you’re saving the day.”

“Glad I can help.” Bucky smiles, his cheeks looking a little darker in color. He pushes his hair behind his ear. “Is there a time you want us there?”

Y/N glances at her phone. “It’s almost nine now, so around 11? You can have coffee or breakfast. It’ll be for maybe two hours as well if that’s okay. We’re providing lunch too.”

“We’ll be there.”

“Great!” Y/N bends down to pick up the cup from the ground. “It’s six blocks from here, right on 15th and 7th.” Her phone begins to ring, and she shoots Bucky an apologetic look. “I have to run though, but I’ll see you in soon?”

“Wait.” Bucky takes a step forward to grab her hand before she can leave. “What if we get lost or something? Can I have your number just in case?”

Y/N moves her gaze briefly again. Steve Rogers just snorted behind his friend’s back, his head dropped back and staring up at the sky. His reaction makes her curiosity spark, but she ignores it in favor of smiling at Bucky.

“Yeah,” Y/N answers almost breathlessly. She mentally scolds herself; his touch and his question and his incredible cobalt eyes are affecting her. “Yeah. Here, give me your phone.”

He releases her to pull out his phone and unlocks it. Y/N takes it, her fingers grazing his as she does so. She quickly adds her number to his contacts, choosing the coffee mug emoji to put next to her name and sending a text to herself. She smirks when she hands him the phone, Bucky laughing under his breath.

“I really have to go though,” She tells him, beginning to back away. “Prepare things, and uh- I’ll see you soon.”

“Yeah, Y/N.” Bucky agrees, a rather soft tone to his voice. “See you soon.”

She waves at him. Abruptly she remembers Captain Rogers there as well, aware of her surroundings more now that Bucky’s scent isn’t clouding her head. She smiles awkwardly, then heads down the street. When Y/N is about to turn the corner, she glances back, sees Steve laughing with his hand on his stomach and Bucky punching his arm.

“Holy shit, Y/N, you’re amazing.” Dave whispers excitedly at her. “We’ve never had an Avenger come in before. How did you manage that?”

Y/N makes sure the little kitchen area they have is set up correctly. As she’s handing Dave a food receipt she answers.

“Helps when you literally run into one of them.”

“Oh my god,” Lizzie giggles from the doorway, catching their attention. “That’s what you did?”

“What, what did she do?” Dave questions, looking annoyed that he’s left out of the loop.

Clearing her throat, Y/N informs him. “I may have run into him. On purpose. With my coffee.”

“You’re going to give that man an ulcer from all the stress you cause him.” He shakes his head.

“This is, what-” Lizzie starts, “the fifth time now? Did you at least get his number this time? Or a real date?”

Y/N ignores them both as her phone vibrates. She pulls it out of her pant pocket, a spark of excitement igniting in her stomach. Instead of answering, she shows them both the screen.

“Now, if you are quite finished.” Y/N rolls her eyes fondly, “I’m going to greet them, and bring them up. Everyone’s ready?”

“Yup.” Lizzie nods, a proud smile on her face. “Go get your man.”

“I’ll hide any and all coffee.” Dave pipes in.

“If we weren’t surrounded by children, I’d say something rude to the both of you.”

As Y/N steps out of the elevator onto the main lobby floor, free of her leather jacket and scarf, she spots Bucky instantly. Next to him is Steve, dressed in his Captain America uniform, or rather, an older version. She holds back her chuckle, stopping by the front desk to allow them access and give them guest passes.

“Hi again.” Y/N greets brightly, stepping directly in front of Bucky.

He isn’t wearing that navy blue vest that he usually does in battle, but he did change from his casual gray shirt from two hours ago into a dark blue button up. It makes his already enthralling eyes pop vividly against the color. He’s kept his chestnut hair out of the bun, but tucked behind his ears.

“Hi.” He chirps back, a nervous tilt to his smile.

“I just want to thank you again for agreeing to this. Honestly, this means so- oh. Hello.”

Y/N stops mid-sentence, because suddenly several other Avengers walk through the doors. She can’t help her mouth from dropping in surprise. She glances at Bucky and Steve, then back at the others. Wanda Maximoff, Clint Barton, Spider-Man in his full suit since his identity is still secret, and Sam Wilson.

“Bucky?” She questions softly, “What-“

“I called them.” He interrupts her gently. “I figured the children might enjoy the day even more than just with a couple of 100-year-old men.”

Warmth begins to seep into her veins, and Y/N knows it has nothing to do with the heaters inside the building. The cheek aching smile is back, minutely shaking her head because she can’t really handle how thoughtful Bucky was. She only asked him and Steve, a last minute thing, and here he was, calling in his friends as well. Their little moment of just staring at each other is broken when a rich dark hand nearly shoves Bucky aside.

“Sam Wilson.” Sam introduces himself, a genuine smile on his lips but a spark of mischief in his eyes. “Nice to finally put a face to the name.”

Bucky winces, then quickly turns to introduce Y/N to everyone else. She shakes their hands, greeting them all brightly, then grabs extra passes. After Y/N hands them all out, she escorts them to the elevators. Before she presses the button to call the elevator to bring them up, she turns to give them the run down.

“First,” Y/N commences, “There’s about twenty-five children today. They’re all super cute and sweet and they have no idea you all are here, so thank you again for coming. It means a lot to us. Second,”

Y/N points to Bucky. “If they ask you to show them how to take your arm off, feel free to tell them no.”

A laugh startles out of Bucky’s mouth, the rest chuckling as well. “I’m assuming that’s not the first time they’ve asked someone?”

“They ask Lizzie, and Kristen, two of our Occupational Therapists, to show them all how to do it. They always try to trade their own prosthetic’s, but as they’re each individual and uniquely fitting, you can see the problem.”

“Tell them no, got it.” Bucky agrees, still laughing.

Y/N moves on to Wanda. “If they ask you to make them float in the air, say no.” To Spider-Man she says, “same if they ask you to web them to the ceiling so they’re hanging upside down.” To Steve –“ If they want you to bounce them on your shield-“

“Say no.” Steve answers for her.

“Basically, anything you think a child wants to do that’s even remotely a bad idea or dangerous, say no.”

“So, no darts then?” Clint pipes up sarcastically.

“Unfortunately, their throwing skills aren’t up to par to the great Hawkeye, so no.”

“I like her.” He whispers to Bucky, who just elbows him in the ribs with is left arm. Clint winces then glares at him.

Y/N shoots Bucky a triumphant look. “We have some activities set up, coloring and puzzles, that sort of thing. But this is just mainly a hangout session. Most of these kids are here every day, and the therapy can get grueling on them, so we like to give them something that’s fun and makes them happy. They all love you, by the way, so I hope this will make their day.”

Finally, Y/N hits the button and the doors to the elevator ding. She allows them to board first, following after Bucky. As the doors slide shut, she subtly taps the back of his hand, his skin warm and smooth. They share a quick look, Y/N mouthing thank you once more. Bucky’s fingers graze over her knuckles briefly, before pulling back and disconnecting their contact.

Anytime, He mouths backs.

The surprise goes over much more enthusiastically than they all expected. Each kid is ecstatic, all taking turns and hugging each Avengers several times. Once the hugging and the loud chirps of names calm down, a few of the kids begin to take each different hero’s hands and tugs them to a corner or table to the center.

Bucky lingers behind Y/N. He looks a little apprehensive around the kids, as if he isn’t quite sure what to do exactly. She proves herself right when Bucky leans closer to her.

“I haven’t really done this before.” He confesses in a whisper. “What if they don’t like what they see? What if they don’t like me at all?”

“Impossible.” Y/N says way too quickly. She catches herself too late, and clears her throat, ignoring the heat in her cheeks. “They love you, Bucky, honestly. A superhero who helps save people, who helps save the world, who also shares something that is apart of them?” She glances at his bionic arm, half on display of dark blue and lines of gold with his sleeve rolled up to his elbow.

“You think so?” He asks, like he needs reassurance.

Y/N nods her head to a different part of the room. “I do, Just Bucky. See?”

His gaze follows hers. An older girl, Maliyah who is eight, is shyly waving at Bucky. She’s one of their newer kids to the center, sitting in a wheelchair as she is only just beginning to learn how to walk again with her new prosthetic right leg.

Bucky shoots Y/N an inquiry glance, and she nods encouragingly. Bucky walks over to Maliyah, meeting her half ways as she was coming over to them. She gestures to the wheels of her chair, showing him blue and gold design of the wheels, modeled exactly in the pattern as his arm.

Y/N stands there for a few minutes, watching the interactions. None of the children seem disappointed that the band didn’t show up, and she’s just glad that she was able to bring other people in to make their day. The smiles and giggles of the kids in the center reminds her of just how much she loves her job.

Unfortunately, she still has emails to answer and phone calls to make, so Y/N is in and out of her office for the next hour. Between phone calls for future events, including the upcoming holidays and fundraisers, she leans against her door frame to view the Avengers entertaining the kids.

Wanda is twirling her fingers, showing off some of her powers as she lifts crayons and markers into the air. Some of the younger children clap, and a few of the older boys stare in awe at her. One little girl is attempting to braid Wanda’s hair, and bless her soul, the Avenger sits there patiently.

Sam is making a group of older kids laugh hysterically as he retells a story of him flying through the air. Apparently, he had taken flight and some how forgot it was Fourth of July and was dodging fireworks all night. He’s animated in his storytelling, and with permission from Lizzie, picks up one of girls and zooms her around to demonstrate.

A light tinging noise pulls Y/N from looking at Sam to the other corner of the room. Captain America’s new shield is sitting on one of the coloring tables, and Steve is just allowing one of the youngest kids to tap out a beat with his prosthetic hands. Steve smiles over the boy once and a while, then he goes back to drawing pictures with the four other kids surrounding him.

Clint has found Colin, and they are sitting quietly in the corner playing with Legos. Every once and a while, Colin will take pieces from Clint’s pile and throws them a few inches, giggling every time Clint dramatically crawls over to get them. They make a game out of it, and he even surprises her when he signs to her nephew.

Spider-Man has a group of girls and boys, all asking him questions. They range from how he can stick to walls, to if he can control spiders like Ant-Man can control ants. He shows off to the kids by flipping backwards and they all clap giddly and laughing.

Y/N moves her gaze around the room until she spots Bucky. Millie has attached herself to his side, marveling over their shared left arms. Maliyah is still next to him, holding a smaller boy, Jacob, in her lap. He allows both Jacob and Millie to play with his arm, curling his fingers and tracing along the lines of gold. Maliyah, who is extremely bright for her age, seems to be asking Bucky about the scientific making part of his arm, and he seem just as intrigued to answer her the best he can.

“This is amazing.”

Dave’s voice pulls Y/N from her thoughts, ripping her eyes away from Bucky. She has no idea how long she had been staring at him for, but the look on Dave’s face says it was a while. She nods in agreements.

“Careful, Y/N.” He jokes quietly. “Your fond is showing.”

“Hush.” She hisses at him, elbowing his side. “This is strictly for the children.”

He goes to respond, when the phone rings in her office. Y/N sighs tiredly, beckoning behind her. Dave nods his head in understanding as she goes back to work.

There are times when Y/N wonders how she has so much patience when it comes to seemingly heartless people. She’s been on the phone for the past hour now with a big sponsor of Loving Arms. She listens to their rambling, her leg bouncing rapidly, her fingers pinching the bridge of her nose. Her stomach is churning, and it’s beginning to make her patience ware thin.

“I just don’t understand why your company has abruptly decided to drop our Center.” Y/N repeats for the tenth time. Her voice is harder, colder at this point. “You’ve been a sponsor for us for years, and suddenly we’re too small a scale for you?”

“We’re sorry.” The man Y/N has been speaking with doesn’t sound apologetic at all. “There just isn’t enough publicity.”

“Alright, so tell me. How am I supposed to let these children and their families know that they can no longer afford therapy sessions and prosthetics because you decided to give up on them? That you dropped us because, what, we aren’t good enough? Sorry, we only care if your facility is rich because that’s the only way we’ll even remotely associate you with us. You guys are doing a stand-up job there.”

“Well, unfortunately, Ms. Y/L/N, that isn’t our problem. That’s yours and your Loving Arms-“

“I’m going to stop you right there.” Y/N snaps, a fierce protectiveness washing over her. “You do not have the right to drop us, pulling your sponsorship away, then bad mouth my Center. We care about our patients here, and we don’t heartlessly hound them for every last one of their pennies. Thank you for your business, but I think we’ll be fine without you now. Have a lovely day.”

Y/N hangs up the phone rather harshly, smacking it back down on the receiver. She leans back in her chair, dropping her head back and growling at the ceiling. A soft knock on her doorframe snaps her head forward again.

Bucky is standing there, holding a plate of food as an offering. There’s a slight look of guilt on his face as he walks in.

“Brought you some food because Dave said you’ve been cooped in here for an hour.” Bucky explains, setting the plate down on her desk. “I was wondering where you were.”

“How much did you hear?” Y/N sighs deeply.

“Enough to know that people suck?” He shrugs offering her a sympathetic grin.

She chuckles and he takes that as his cue to enter her office. He hands her the plate of food, but as his arm moves closer to her desk, she makes a point of moving her empty coffee mug to the opposite side. Bucky glares playfully at her before his mouth morphs into a smirk as he sits in the chair across from her.

“I got you everything because I didn’t know what you liked.” He explains, pointing to the array of chicken nuggets, fruit, a wrap and a sandwich.

“Thanks, Bucky.” Y/N smiles appreciatively at him, popping a grape into her mouth. “How’s it going, Mr. Popular?”

Bucky chuckles softly, and the noise makes her heart flutter a little in her chest. He pushes back his long hair with his hands, his eyes lighting as he just stares at Y/N for a few moments.

“You were right.” He answers quietly. “They seem to love me.”

“You’re an inspiration to them.” She tells him truthfully. Bucky scrunches his nose. “Do you not believe that?”

That same look appears in his eyes again, the same one that she noticed when he returned her shirt. The one he had when he invaded her personal space and caged her between his arms against his motorcycle. The one that makes her heart beat just a little bit faster.

“I do when you say it.” Bucky whispers, suddenly twisting his fingers together. “Because I think that’s what you see in me.”

Confidence seems to take over Y/N, because her response is something more of a confession. “I see a lot more in you, Bucky.”

He blinks in surprise. “Y/N-“

She doesn’t get to know what he was going to say, because the phone rings. Y/N has to tear her gaze away from Bucky, something much harder to do, and glances at the ID. She rubs at her temples with her fingertips, shooting him an apologetic look.

“I have to answer this.” She winces, already dreading talking to those sponsors yet again.

Standing, Bucky nods. “Good luck, I’ll try catching you later?” He asks, hopeful.

Y/N nods, smiling brightly at him before picking up the phone.

Needing another round of coffee after that second phone call, Y/N make her way to the kitchen. What she sees in the activity room halts her in her tracks. She hides herself half behind the wall, leaning against the frame.

Bucky is kneeling so he’s on a closer level to Colin. Her nephew is pointing at his arm as he tries to speak, but can’t form the words properly. Colin begins signing quickly in his excitement. To her amazement, Bucky smiles brightly and signs back to him. Colin makes a happy, enthusiastic sound, throwing his hands in the air.

The little boy proceeds to grab Bucky’s hand, allowing Colin to play with his arm as Bucky gently pokes at his cheek, making the boy laugh loudly. Y/N watches on fondly, that damn warm feeling coming back and spreading throughout her body. When Bucky looks up for a moment he meets her gaze, and he’s calm and bright and any reservations are long gone now.

It makes her heart flutter. She bites her lip to contain how big her smile is, and Bucky blinks, then looks away, a light tint to his cheeks. Y/N turns away, leaving them to have their cute little time together.

Y/N sighs as she gets off the phone once more, proud at herself for not yelling at the band’s manager, but also happy that she was able to put her in her place with sharp words, and that they will no longer be reaching out in the future. When Y/N leaves her office, the center is missing several super heroes, and one in particular.

“Where’d Bucky go?” She inquires aloud.

“They left remember?” Dave answers, holding a trash bag. “You were on the phone when they were saying goodbye?”

She vaguely remembers someone stopping by her office, but then leaving when she was in the middle of talking. Y/N hurriedly makes her way downstairs, hoping she can catch him. When the elevator doors slip open, Bucky is already out the door. Y/N quickens her pace, catching the door before it closes and nearly stumbles outside. Thankfully, he isn’t far at all, so she leans forward to catch his left hand.

“Bucky, wait.”

He turns, eyes wide in surprise, but a smile on his lips. Steve motions the rest of them will be waiting and continues walking. Y/N releases his hand, waving goodbye at the rest of the Avengers.

“Sorry, Y/N.” Bucky begins with a small shrug. “I was looking for you, but you were on the phone. We got called for an urgent mission.”

“Oh, I won’t keep you them.” Y/N says lightly, about to go back inside.

“No,” He shakes his head quickly, stepping closer. “I wanted to say goodbye to you.”

She ignores the anxious flutter of wings in her stomach. “I just really wanted to thank you again. For agreeing to come in the first place, and you didn’t have to call anyone else, but you did. You made them all so happy, Bucky. Thank you.”

“I was happy to do it.” Bucky tells her, “and if you ever want me- us- to come again, we would in a heartbeat.”

“I appreciate that.” She expresses honestly, smiling. “They really did love you, I hope you know that.”

“Thanks.” Bucky chuckles, rubbing the back of his neck. “They’re all amazing kids. Colin’s your nephew, right?”

“They really are.” She agrees wholeheartedly. “And yes, he’s the light of my life, that one. Well, I’ll let you go hero it away then. Thanks again.”

“Anytime, Y/N, really.”

She nods. “Well, you have my number now, so, y’know. Warn me when you want to meet up and spill my coffee again.”

“I promise I’ll warn you ahead of time.” He laughs. “Have a good day.”

“Have a good mission.”

They linger for just another moment, then she waves because apparently she can’t stop, and turns back to go inside. Except, the shy expression on Bucky’s face just now, and the genuine, good heartedness of the man standing before her reminds her of everything she’s been feeling lately.

It’s slow, but it’s there. It sparked on the day they met, and it’s been burning like embers. It’s growing, and as Y/N has told him before, sitting on that bench sharing a funnel cake, she’s not going to hold back. She gains confidence and spins around.

“Actually.” Y/N pipes up. Bucky turns around as well walking towards her. “That reminds me.”

Bucky raises his eyebrows in question, waiting for her to elaborate further.

“It’s been like, five times and like twenty coffees at this point, spilled in various ways and the majority of it on me.” Y/N pauses. “I think you should make it up to me.”

Bucky goes from looking slightly guilty, to bemused in two seconds. He opens his mouth to speak, but she beats him to it.

“You owe me dinner.” Y/N states lightly, but with confidence she is faking because she’s nervous as hell.

He frowns, looking like he’s trying to comprehend what she just said. It only takes a few moments for realization to dawn on his face. A slow smile stretches across his full, pink lips, crinkles appearing at the corner of his eyes.

“Come again?” He asks, but there’s mirth dancing in the water that makes up the color of his eyes.

She bites her lip briefly before letting it go. “I think you owe me dinner.”

Then, Bucky laughs, a softy breathy little noise. “I think you’re right, Y/N.” He steps closer to her. “That, I would love to do.” Suddenly, his face falls. “I can’t tonight though.”

“I know,” Y/N nods in understanding. “Avenging and stuff. I get it. No rush. Just, let me know when.”

She waves once more, and attempts to leave again, but fingers wrap around her bicep. His grip carefully pulls and spins her back around.

“7:30.”

“What?”

“Tomorrow. 7:30. Is that alright?” Bucky inquires nervously.

Y/N beams at him, her heart rate speeding up. “Yeah.”

“Good. It’s a date.” He smiles, then reluctantly let’s go of her arm. “I really should be going now.”

“Is…” Y/N starts, “is it dangerous?”

Bucky scrunches his nose. “Might be, we don’t know for sure yet.”

She frowns fleetingly, concern flooding her chest. Y/N raises her hand to touch his chest. She realizes her little move, then quickly removes her hand in favor of grabbing his left one. She squeezes his fingers, the cool, smooth vibranium reminding her that he’s more than capable of taking care of himself. It doesn’t stop her next words though.

“Be careful.” She tells him quietly. Her eyes locked on his to convey how serious she feels about it.

Bucky comes closer, lifting his right hand. His fingertips graze along her cheekbone, before tracing the length of her jaw, sending a thrill of goosebumps scattering across her skin. His gaze drops to her mouth for a second, before snapping back up.

“I will, Y/N.” He promises, offering her a private smile.

Altogether, Bucky ceases contact, dropping his hands and stepping away. He waves once, then turns and follows Steve who had been waiting for him. Y/N catches the smug, yet proud expression on the Captain’s face as he wraps his arm around Bucky’s shoulders.

A cold breeze picks up right at the moment, and Y/N ran outside without her jacket or scarf on. However, she doesn’t feel the bite of the weather, just the blooming touch of heat leftover by Bucky.

****************************************************************

Previous Chapter 6

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possibilistfanfiction · 7 years ago

Text

i got all the parts i wished for (it's an ache & it shines through me)

[anyway someone said they wanted carm & laura & their baby running errands n stuff etc on a cold november day so here u go, this has no real substance & is rly just gay]

i got all the parts i wished for (it's an ache & it shines through me)

is it a sign? or just a landmine?/ or a feeling roaming free?/ it's overtaken me/ gonna hold it 'til it dries up/ or pocket it for another day/ if it's me i cannot give up/ i'd rather that she stayed/ oh, slack jawed me/ can't you see?/ there's so many rhythms and harmonies/ & i'm walking the dog back —sylvan esso, “slack jaw”

the morning is the kind of harsh bright that tells you that winter will happen soon, that this is one of the last days you can comfortably wear sneakers and spend time at the park without freezing. you yawn once, just waking up, and when you turn over, there’s your wife and your dog and your son, all sound asleep, all various degrees of small. you watch them all for a few minutes, curled up and tangled, and your chest hurts, because they’re the most beautiful things you’ve ever seen. you think they get more beautiful every day.

eventually, your stomach grumbles and carm cracks an eye open with a little smile. she’s tender with you, seemingly more so as time goes on, soft and sweet and honest. ‘good morning,’ she says in german, then yawns and shakes her head and says it again in english.

‘good morning,’ you say, and you want to kiss her but you can’t—you look down at your son and your dog again and she laughs, shifting to tickle both of their tummies. your dog scrambles around, trying to stand up, while your son squeaks out a little, delighted laugh and then babbles, reaching for you while he also has a death grip on carm’s hair. his eyes are a blue you don’t think you’d ever seen before until you watched them open for the first time.

you are so full of love in this moment, on this cold morning, that it knocks the wind out of you. carm looks at you curiously, because your breath catches and you feel like you might cry, but then she’s kissing your cheek and your dog is licking your son’s foot, which is making him laugh, and they’re all kind of a mess, and you just close your eyes and listen.

carmilla does things carefully now. not in a way that worries you—she’s not scared of hurting you, not timid. she just—cares. takes her time to make you dinner before you get home from work, a recipe she’d learned years ago in mumbai; just yesterday you’d watched her sit on the floor and rub waterproofing wax into all of your winter boots, working it in patiently with her hands, taking special effort along the seams.

you know why—the most special, quiet reasons. it’d taken you two years to convince her to go to therapy—four broken hands that hadn’t healed at vampire speed, more nightmares than you could possibly keep track of, and a lot of withholding sex—but she’d gone. with carm, you’ve learned that you need to go slow, with just about everything, but especially this. when she’d been in therapy a few months you’d suggested an emotional support dog for her, especially for during the day when you weren’t there. she’d certainly been enjoying her trust fund time, but you’d come home from work to her cowering in the shower, shivering, freezing and despondent. you’d come home to her sitting in the snow on your back porch in february, drinking whiskey and watching the sunset, and it was so cold out her eyelashes were coated with the remnants of frozen tears. you’d come home to carm hurt in so many ways, or reliving that hurt, tiny and beautiful and deeply sorrowful.

so you’d done your research and when you’d brought home a puppy to foster—his fur deep, deep black, his eyes light grey, with a sharp face, missing a leg; he was pulled out of rubble from a hurricane in the south—carmilla had held him very carefully, pet the length of his body with incredible gentleness, and smiled up at you. she’d decided to name him wittgenstein, so you’d insisted on calling him wit, much to her frustration. he’d very quickly become an important part of your family, and they’re scared of the same things: thunderstorms, sudden loud noises, when the subway gets stalled underground.

they’d healed, and it’d been years before you brought up the idea of children. when you had, though, carmilla had agreed much more quickly than you ever thought she would—but she had gestured toward your small, sleeping dog, his little sweaters in the corner and his organic dog food and his leash and snowboots, and then shrugged. you’d laughed and kissed her but you had understood: she is full of love, and she has always been full of care, even when it hadn’t seemed like it.

you’d adopted max months later, and carm had been terrified of him for a few days, you’re pretty sure. but she’s a fantastic mom, which you’d watched bloom and grow. she speaks lots of languages to him, whispers little songs when he’s crying. he seems to really like grabbing onto her hair, and she always gets up at night when he’s fussing.

the first time you’d brought him to visit her at work, in her little office with a mess of papers on the desk and what you’re pretty sure is hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of first editions and journals from famous philosophers on her shelf, she’d led you to a small café near campus, and a group of her undergrad students had run into you, and they had all melted at seeing her with this tiny, beautiful baby. she had grumbled but eventually laughed, his fingers curled around one of hers.

this morning you put max in his room, let wit stay by his playpen, and then walk back to your bed with carm trailing behind. you’re both laughing and you feel young again, you feel twenty again, when you lay this girl down beneath you and kiss her deeply, when you pull her body toward yours until she’s gasping your name in the golden light through the window. the hints of winter sun.

you lazily take a shower together, and you wash her hair, which she almost never lets you do. you kiss there too, although it’s without pretense, this intimacy. you get dressed in an easy rhythm, having shared this space for years. it strikes you sometimes at how profound and intense these ordinary moments of love are: of course you have fallen in love with her grand gestures—sneaking into palaces to dance at midnight, proposing on the roof of the philosophy building in the middle of a meteor shower.

but you hadn’t realized the magnitude of your love until you were grocery shopping years and years ago, and you had been getting vegan burgers from the freezer aisle, and when you had found her after she’d wandered off, she was closely inspecting pears, peering at them intensely. you’d been so floored by your fondness for her—this odd, brilliant, almost quotidian creature—that you still remember it now.

and this happens all the time, your love for her. when she’s making coffee and curses slightly when she spills a few grounds, then sighs and gets a clorox wipe from under the sink, when she talks quietly to max, when she smiles at you while you’re on the subway, holding your hand and not shaking at all.

today you have to run errands, but they’re not really important, so you bundle max up in his stroller and put wit’s sweater on, then his little boots. they’re really fucking cute, so you make carm wait so you can take pictures of them. she slouches and sighs but she’d put on a hat and a scarf and a legitimate weather-appropriate coat without having to be convinced or reminded, so you take it as a win.

she walks wit while you take the stroller, and you make her stop in victroire and of course she’s the one to find something; you go to jimmy’s for another coffee, chat with tahir, your favorite barista, throw the ball for a few minutes for wit at trinity bellwoods. it’s cold, and so you stop in at kenzo for ramen, try to feed max little tiny bits of noodles without making too much of a mess. you go to f as in frank and carm spends an inordinate amount of time trying on vintage sweatshirts, but she’s in a great mood today so she models them very seriously, which makes you laugh. it’s the only reason she does it, you think, which makes you love her more.

eventually, you can tell she’s getting tired, and max is getting fussy, and wit is panting. you make them all go with you to pick up groceries, though, the only real errand you’d had to run. you walk back with them to your little brownstone on euclid, and you’ve worked it out well enough by now that you can push the stroller, walk the dog, and hold her hand.

when you mention this, she laughs.

‘we really are parents then, hey?’

the tiny inflection at the end makes you stop, and take a deep breath, and she stops too, worriedly.

you shake your head, kiss her with all your might, so softly, right there in the middle of the sidewalk, golden leaves falling around, the last gasp of fall before the barren branches and snow. your son is babbling and your dog is shuffling around your legs, and carmilla—your wife—sniffles, just barely.

you back up and it takes you a second to form words, because her eyes are so dark and brimming with tears.

‘that was just very canadian of you,’ you tell her. ‘the “hey?”.’

she rolls her eyes with a messy, teary laugh. ‘that’s what caused a kiss like that?’

you shrug—you know you don’t have to explain it to her, not really.

she smiles, a grin, and you know what that means. ‘laura, i’m wearing blundstones.’

‘oh my god,’ you say, start pushing the stroller again as she jogs to catch up.

‘i have toque on—from roots.’

‘you’re an idiot,’ you grumble, but you’re laughing too.

‘i’ll make old fashioned’s with maple syrup while we watch degrassi tonight.’

‘i literally hate you,’ you say, but you glance over at her, dark hair and eyes and the prettiest skin, her warm heart and her beautiful brain, the golden light of the day waning, shimmering.

‘i love you too,’ she says, and reaches out to take your hand.

#tbqh carm & a therapy dog matter so much to me #he's a lil pharoah hound if u wanted a visual #also peep that lorde vibe #carmilla fanfiction #wow a fuckin throwback hey #read me #possibilistfanfiction

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teamkaiforever · 7 years ago

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Don’t Forget - Part II

Kai Parker x Reader word count : 4 999 summary : continues the story from PART I keep reading after the cut ☺ * not my gif __________________________

Kai hated seeing Y/N like this. It had taken a lot for him not to compell her to get inside the house with him and put a boundary spell around it so she wouldn’t leave. He had explained to her that they know each other and asked her to come back inside with him so he can prove it , promising to let her go if that’s what she wanted. However , he doubted he’d actually be able to let her go. Ever. Specially not in that moment , when Y/N had no idea who she was or who anyone was really. Kai let her sleep in the bed by herself , taking the couch downstairs. He spent the entire night awake , listening in on what was happening upstairs. Y/N was tossing and turnining in her bed for a couple of hours and then fell asleep. Kai , however , didn’t get a wink of sleep. All night long the events from the day before kept repeating in his mind and he wished there was a way to change things. There wasn’t a spell to get her memory back , he couldn’t compell it to return either. Unfortunately that’s not how things worked. Magic and vampirism could do a lot of things but apparently helping someone get their memory back wasn’t one of them. In the morning , he climbed upstairs and waited sitting on the desk chair until she woke up. His hand reached inside his pocket where he had left the engagement ring. He looked at it for a moment and then returned it in its original box , placing it in one of the desk drawers. Y/N was waking up and he didn’t want to risk it. Part of him wondered if this morning when she wakes up her memory would be miraculously back , sadly no such luck. “Morning.” she said sleepily. “H-have you been here all night?” Kai smiled at her , shaking his head. “No. I just woke up downstairs a few minutes ago. Came to check up on you.” Y/N studied his face for a moment before pulling the covers off her. Her feet found their way in her favourite fuzzy slippers and she walked towards the window to see the sun just about to raise over the house on the other side of the street. A sigh left her lips. She could feel Kai’s eyes on her the entire time. The pain in them was so visible it added a crack to her heart. “Do you want to go downstairs ? Get something to eat ?” he asked. Y/N nodded. A few minutes later they were already downstairs , sitting in the kitchen. Y/N wanted to learn more so she kept asking him questions. Kai was more than happy to answer all of them. It took a bit of effort but she was making sense of them, slowly putting the pieces together in her head. “So … you are my boyfriend ?” she asked , wrapping her hands around a cup with white tea with lemon. Kai nodded. “And we have been living here , together for four years.” “Yes.” he managed a small smile. He sat on the opposite end of the table , barely taking his eyes off her , as if at some point she might suddenly decide to run away again. “After we had to leave Mystic Falls after my sister’s wedding.” Kai had skipped on the parts about him murdering his entire family and all about the Prison Worlds. He could see her mind spinning at all the things he had already told her and didn’t want to push it too far. Google wasn’t very explanatory and Y/N didn’t like doctors so he thought he’d wait it out a few days. Perhaps her memory will return on its own. “Why did we leave?” she wondered. “Family drama.” he said. “We didn’t get along and it was best for us to leave. But its fine. I don’t really miss them. You are all I ever wanted and all I will ever need.” He smiled at her. “Do you want a sandwich ? It’s been quite a while since you have eaten.” “No. I’m actually in the mood for a giant steaming hot oatmeal bowl with nuts and chia seeds and -” “Dried mango , coconut , papaya and banana chips?” he finished smiling. Maybe she hadn’t lost her memory completely after all. “And a drizzle of maple syrup , in the form of a spiral.” “How did you - ” “It’s your second most favourite food after chocolate chip pancakes with coconut whipped cream and maple syrup.” he smiled looking at her amazed face. “Give me a few minutes. You will love it.” Y/N watched this stranger , the person he said she loved and tried to remember. The more he talked the more she believed him. He had said they had had a fight and she stormed out of the house , crashed her car not too long after. Details were a bit fuzzy for her , but she remembered the car crash. Sort of. Y/N remembered pain , feeling like she was dying and then someone had shown up , but the rest had been deleted from her memory. Kai had shown her pictures and promised to show her some of their home videos later. Y/N wanted to remember him , to remember what they had had before someone pressed the DELETE button and took it all away. Her mind was fighting to bring even a snapshot of a memory but nothing came to her. The following days were pretty much the same. Kai had insisted on sleeping on the couch until her memory comes back. He didn’t want to overstep or push things. It wasn’t like he could sleep in the first place either. Y/N losing her memory had been the last thing he had expected to happen. It hurt him seeing her like this - wondering around the house , looking at things and not remembering any of it. They’d talk for hours , looking at pictures. Kai would point at the people and tell her stories about the events on them , skipping on the whole supernatural world bit. Sometimes something flashed in her eyes for a split second but it vanished as quickly as it had appeared. Their blonde neighbour stopped by a few times the following two weeks but he didn’t even bother to open the door. Kai could hear her coming even before she had left her house and had no intentions on having anything to do with her. Specially not when his girl was this fragile. “Aren’t you going to open ?” wondered Y/N , listening to the doorbell ringing. “Must be important…or some family relative coming for a visit. Your sister maybe ?” “It’s just some bible salesman or something.” he said looking at her with loving eyes. “I would much rather sit here with you than deal with them.” Kai’s eyes hadn’t moved away from her the entire time they had been watching one of the home videos from the first days when they had moved into the house. Apparently they both loved working with the camera a lot , because there were dozens of movies to see. Just recently they had caught up on everything they had shot before leaving Mystic Falls. It was mostly walks through the woods or hanging out at some bar or in one of her friend’s giant houses. Kai had told her the giant house belonged to the Salvatore brothers , old friends of hers. Y/N appeared to have so many friends back home , it made her realise how much she must’ve loved Kai to leave it all behind as quickly as he had said.

Y/N had climbed up on top of a ladder at the far end of the room , to get a bird sight view of the room. Kai was sitting on the other end , holding his phone in his hands not taking his eyes off his girl. “We are going to tear that wall down.” said Y/N , pointing at the front wall of their bedroom. There was a moderately big window there but she wanted it bigger. Lots of light so she can draw there and enjoy the sunshine first thing in the morning. “The bed will go here and -” Kai dropped the camera at the far end of the room , catching Y/N in mid-air a split second later. “Thanks.” she smiled at him. Y/N had reached a little further off the ladder losing her balance. “How many times Y/N?” he scolded her , but it was a loving tone with a few pinches of worry added to it. “BE CAREFUL. What if I had been downstairs and you had fallen , breaking your neck?” “That’s never going to happen.” she smiled at him. “I know you will always be there to catch me.” her lips pressed to his briefly , only Kai appeared to want more.

Y/N blinked a couple of times trying to figure out how he had gotten to her so fast. It felt like a special effect but it wasn’t. Kai had dropped the camera on the floor , ending somehow angled sideways towards her and caught her less than a second later. No one is that fast. “How - how did you do that?” she wondered scooping out some of her ice cream. “Is it a special effect or something?” “Erhmm no.” he laughed nervously. “Look at me , but - don’t be scared. I’d never - I’d never bite you unless you want me to. Never had , never will.” “Bite me? What- WOW !” Y/N moved a few inches away from him seeing purple black veins flashing under his eyes and fangs coming out. He looked ready to sink his teeth into her neck in a split second. Only instead of fear , she felt surprise and excitement. Kai looked even hotter in that moment , she noticed. “I’m a vampire.” he said , lifting his hand in the air and a moment later one of the books from the bookshelf landed perfectly in his hand , as if he had reached for it and gone there to get it personally. “And a witch too. It’s complicated and a really long story.” “I’m dating a vampire.” she whispered. “My 17 year old self must think I am so cool right now.” Over the past few days she understood why she had fallen for him. Wasn’t because of his looks - though that had a lot to do with it. Kai was charming , like really charming. He talked a lot about pretty much everything , mostly about their lifes together telling her how they had met , how they had fallen in love. He always knew what to say to get her to laugh , and was so kind and sweet to her. Y/N could tell he felt guilty about whatever it was they had fought over before she had left. Like it was his fault she had lost her memory. It wasn’t his fault it had happened , that much she knew - the road had been slick , she could’ve crashed her car that day and lost her memory anyways. Y/N scooted over closer to him , leaving her ice cream on the coffee table. “Show me again.” “Show you what again ? The magic or this?” His vampirism showed again and her face changed , showing a look of complete awe. Her fingertips traced the purple black veins under his eyes and she scooted over even closer to him. Kai fought the urge to snake his hands around her waist and pull her close to him. Her eyes were fixed on his and he could hear her heart racing but then suddenly she pulled away. For a moment there it had felt as if Y/N , his Y/N had returned , or maybe he had imagined it. “And you can heal people with your blood?” Kai nodded. “What else can you do ?” she asked with curious eyes. He couldn’t believe she hadn’t jumped backwards and ran away like the first time he had mentioned vampires to her. All he could see in her eyes was curiousity , surprise and weirdly excitement. “Why don’t I show you ?” asked Kai , getting off the couch , reaching his hand for hers. He expected her not to take it but she did. They walked outside through the back door and into their backyard which led into a forest. “Can I .. um … Can I hold you?” “You are my boyfriend.” stated Y/N , a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. “Why would you ask me if you can do that ?” He smiled nervously. “Because you don’t have your memory and you might not want me to.” “Why wouldn’t I want my smoking hot boyfriend to pull me into his arms?” she wondered , taking his hands and placing them on her waist. “I might not remember us but that sounds ridiculous.” The moment Kai’s hands wrapped around her , she could feel a tingly feeling spread through her body. His chest pressed against her back and Y/N could tell his breathing was uneven and feel his breath on her neck. It all felt familiar yet not familiar enough. It was as if all her memories had been shoved through some door and were banging on it , screaming to get free but no matter how many times she checked her pockets and everything around her , she just couldn’t find the key. “You might feel a bit dizzy , but its a good kind of dizzy. I promise.” he whispered to her. A blink of an eye later they were running. More like Kai was running , wind swirling around them and everything seemed to blur - the trees had turned into a green / brown blur with a hint of orangy light seeping through them. She wanted to close her eyes but also didn’t want to miss a second of it. “Ta-da.” Kai let her feet down on the ground and Y/N felt her head spin for a moment. Her eyes took in the new surroundings - lots of trees behind them and ahead of them only the trees in front of her were in the distance. They were standing a few metres away from the edge of a cliff with a clear view of the valley ahead. “Wow ! That was AWESOME !!! … You are not planing on pushing me down that pit , are you ?” she teased, sitting on the ground and trying to catch her breath and calm down her stomach a bit. He had been right - she felt dizzy , but it was a good kind of dizzy , an exerilating kind. The view was breath taking. Sun was setting and the sky was every shade of yellow to orange to red , each color overflowing into the other. Over head there was a single star shining - Venus. Always the first one to show up. Tiny clouds around the sun looked like they were on fire. “Can I have your phone?” she wondered. Kai smiled reaching in his pocket. “Thanks.” Quickly Y/N took a few pictures , feeling Kai’s eyes on her the entire time. He was smiling at her , looking at her with curious eyes. “No. Never. Not unless I am jumping with you and I’m holding you the entire time.” he winked at her and sat down on the ground next to her. Y/N gave him back his phone. “Have we done this before?” “Maybe 10 or 15 times.” he winked at her , opening the camera app again and taking a picture of her. “Sorry. I couldn’t help myself. You look really pretty in that light.” “Why do you keep apologising and asking for my permission ?” she wondered. “I … I don’t know.”

They sat together , Y/N moving closer to him until her head rested on his shoulder. It felt really nice being in the fresh air , seeing all the pine trees and the clear sky. After the sun had set , Y/N laid on the ground , her hands clasped over her stomach as she stared at the night sky. Her shoulder was lightly brushing against Kai’s every time he or she moved. Weirdly the stars she remembered. It’s her life that came out blank. “Look. Its Ursa Major.” she pointed at one of the brightest stars on the horizon. “And thats Venus over there. - Why are you looking at me like that ?” Kai sighed. He had taken her to a doctor earlier that day (somehow she hadn’t forgotten her fear of them) and they had said that her memory might return in a week or a month or a few months. Kai wondered what her reaction would be when her memory comes back. They were spending more and more time together each day. Last time they spoke before her memory disappeared , it had felt like she doesn’t want to even have him near her. Everything was so strange and confusing in that moment. “Its … its just so strange seeing you like this.” he said softly. “You are still you. You like the same things , but its …” “Painful?” Kai nodded. “Can I tell you something ?” “Anything. Everything.” he said brushing his fingers through her cheek. Y/N didn’t move or push his hand away. “I don’t know .. um… ” she laughed nervously. “I don’t know what we had fought about that night , but whatever it is I think - I think we can figure it out.” “You really think so ?” “Yeah. I mean , its weird. I have this feeling .. I don’t even know how to explain it , but I just feel that what we had was stronger than whatever happened.” she smiled. Kai felt a wave of relief wash through his body. Whenever her memory returns , at least she’d remember the past 2 weeks and a half. Y/N would remember her words and everything they had done together. Maybe they still had a chance. “Do you want to go home?” he wondered. “No. Not yet.” she said quietly , gazing at the night sky again. “5 more minutes…” He smiled , knowing her 5 minutes would end up being ‘all night long’. “I really wish I remembered it all.” she whispered.

* * *

A MONTH AND A HALF LATER

Kai had left the house for half an hour to go to the story near by and do some shopping before Y/N wakes up. He had left her a note on the night stand telling her he’d be back soon. Only she had woken up before he had come back , finding his note first thing when her eyes opened. She turned the note in her hands , her eyes falling on the way the sunrays had fallen on the carpet. The way the light danced , mixed with the shadows of the tree branches outside sparked something inside her. Y/N got up , rubbing her eyes with her hands , her feet barely lifting off the ground , more like dragging themselves on the carpet. She sat on the comfy desk chair , her hand reaching for one of the pencils in the pencil holder , making sure its a 3B one. She searched for a sketch pad or a notepad on the top of the desk but found nothing. Her feet pushed back the chair she was sitting on and she bent over a little looking in the drawers. “There it is.” smiled Y/N taking out a sketch pad out of the top left drawer. There was something on it , she couldn’t quite pull the sketch pad out as easily as she thought. Her hand reached inside , her fingers wrapping around a tiny black box. As if from a distance she heard the sounds of the door downstairs open and close. However she had been lost in thoughts. Had Kai been about to propose before the accident? Y/N opened the tiny box looking at the ring inside. “You weren’t supposed to find that.” sighed Kai standing a few steps away from her. He wondered why Y/N’s eyes had lit up and she was smiling at the ring inside. “I -” “Yes.” she said turning towards him. “What?” he wondered shortening the distance between them , unable to hide the surprise in his voice. “Yes!” she repeated. “Kai .. I …I love you.” “Wait did -” “No. It hasn’t come back.” she said , her gaze falling at the ground for a second before meeting his eyes again. “I fell in love with you all over again..and eventually my memory will come back or not. Either way I want to be with you. Forever. I-” Kai hadn’t felt this happy since the first time she had said yes to him. He cupped her face in an instant and his lips smashed against hers. It had been nearly two months since the last time he had kissed her. Y/N’s hands hooked around his neck pulling him closer to her. Something stirred inside her , waking up after a long nap. “Don’t I get to ask the question at least ?” he said smiling widely , his eyes had started to water but he didn’t mind. Y/N was standing right there with a smile on her face , her eyes gleaming. Kai hadn’t imagined the day starting like this. He had planned to wait until her memory returned to try again. Y/N nodded and Kai took the small box from her hands , dropping down on one knee with a wide smile on his face. He took her left hand in his while not moving his eyes away from hers. Weirdly he felt nervous , even more nervous than the first time he had proposed to her. “Y/N , I love you. I was at my darkest when we met , and you - you showed up , turning into my light in the darkness. Meeting you changed my entire life. I wouldn’t be the person I am right now without you. My life without you has no meaning and I have loved you and will always love you , for a thousand years and even more. For all eternity. You are the most meaningful thing I’ve ever had in my life and … you are my entire world. There is no one else for me out there , no one who could even remotely touch my heart and soul the way you had. You have always been the only one for me and always will be I never want to be apart from you. Ever. Will you - will you do me the honor of becoming my wife and spending forever with me ?” Y/N had started crying , tears streaking down her cheeks. She would’ve said yes if he had just asked ‘Marry me?’. It seemed like he had prepared a speech specially for that moment. He looked so nervous and happy , Y/N could barely contain herself from saying YES before he had finished talking. Her life had been turned upside down and if it hadn’t been for Kai she would’ve died in that accident. It appeared he kept saving her - metaphorically and literally. Her heart fluttered and her cheeks flushed , feeling a swarm of butterflies flap their wings in her stomach. “Yes. Yes , a thousand times yes.” she said smiling , a moment later Kai put the ring on her finger getting up and pulling her into his arms. Kai wasn’t sure if he had let the moment take him , maybe he should’ve told her what they had fought about before asking her the most important question in his life. Only in that instant he didn’t care. All he cared about was Y/N was in his arms , her lips on his and she had said ‘yes’ to him.

* * *

Y/N and Kai were in the kitchen cooking dinner together when the doorbell rang. They had spent the day cuddling and kissing , talking and laughing. Making plans for their honeymoon trip even tho they hadn’t even set a date for the wedding. If it depended on Kai , they’d get married that instant but he wanted to wait. Perhaps her memory would return though he didn’t know what that would mean for them. Kai kissed her deeply before going to open the door and it appeared whoever it was standing on the other side, he was not happy to see them. “Get your hands off me.” he said raising his voice. “You are the reason my fiance lost her memory. God , damn I wish I could kill you.” He sounded upset and there was no doubt in her mind whoever it was standing at the door would get their neck snapped. Y/N took a few steps carefully taking a peek through the kitchen door. Kai was talking to some girl , that much she could see. Her hair was blonde and by the looks of it , she didn’t like the welcome she was receiving. “I love her and you … you are by far the worst person to ever walk into my life. Even my father couldn’t destroy everything - ” said Kai taking a step to the left. “ - How dare you even show your face here after everything you did ? Or did you think I’d forget how you lied saying you wanted to ‘borrow a cup of sugar’ and instead jumped on me?” Y/N finally saw the girl’s face and it was like a switch went off in her brain. Her jaw clenched and she wiped her hands in the towel she was holding , tossing it on the couch on her way to the door. In a few large steps she got to them. Y/N held onto Kai’s arm , her heart racing like never before. Her mind was spinning and she was starting to feel dizzy. Twenty somewhat years of memories had returned all at once , bursting through the door they had been shoved behind. It was a lot to take in at once but above all memories , one surfaced clearer than the others. Kai looked at her with a look of confusion in his eyes , even more so seeing her smile innocently at him. “Oh hey Y/N. How are you?” said the blonde girl running her fingers through her hair. “I heard you lost your memory. Thats a bummer.” A bummer? thought Y/N tilting her head , looking at the girl from head to toe and turned towards Kai , stepping in front of him. “Do me a favour , hold me so I don’t break her pretty face?” “What?” asked Kai confused , starting slowly to put the pieces together. The girl’s smile faded away quickly from her face. Y/N felt anger burn through her veins. So thats what had happened. Now it all made sense. Kai would never cheat on her. How had she been so blinded by emotions that day not to realise this sooner ?! “You know what. On a second thought … step away from me.” she said smiling wickedly at the girl ,turning around and kissing briefly a very confused looking Kai. “This thing and I are going to have a little chat about boundaries… and if things go sideways, well. I have more Kai in me than I ever thought.” “You got your memory back. ” whispered Kai smiling , grabbing her from behind and twirling her around. Then quickly put his hands on the blonde girl’s shoulders. “Go home. Forget about me and Y/N and move at least 500 miles away from here.” He shoved her through the door , closing it with magic afterwards. “You robbed me of the great satisfaction of kicking her butt out my-” Kai’s lips crashed against hers , not letting her finish. This day just kept getting better and better. First Y/N had 'yes’ to him and now… he pulled away so suddenly from the kiss , she almost stumbled over. “Y/N, I am so sorry.” he said , his hands taking hers. What if she hates me now ? he wondered. “I should’ve never opened the door that day. That was my first mistake. I am so sorry for causing you so much pain. I never meant for any of this to happen and I feel so bad about -” “Kai..” “- everything that happened. She showed up barely two minutes before you did , I should’ve -” “Kai..” “- tried and compell her the moment it happened. It’s all my fault. I should’ve never let you go out through that door. If I had been late and you had died I never would’ve forgiven myself. Y/N , I love you. I love you more than I can put into words -” “Will you stop -” “ - and you mean the world to me. Without you my life has no meaning , but I’ll understand if you -” “MALACHAI PARKER!” Kai froze on the spot, looking at the ground. Of course she hates me. he thought. I hate me too. Y/N took a step towards him , cupping his face , lifting it up until their eyes met. “Damn you talk too much.” she smiled , a moment before pressing her lips onto his. “I should’ve listen to you. Shoud’ve given you a chance to explain. Instead I let emotions take over and nearly got myself killed.” “Wha- what are you saying?” Y/N placed her hand on Kai’s chest ,right where his heart is. His heart was beating so fast as if trying to run out of his chest. She slowly backed him against the wall. “We have to burn the couch.” she said starting to laugh a second later , her fiance laughing with her. Kai placed his hands on her waist slowly pulling her towards him. “You are an idiot.. but you are my idiot and I love you.” “You don’t hate me?” “I could never hate you.” she smiled pressing her lips to his. Kai pulled her into a deep kiss , lifting her feet off the ground and spinning her around again. He let her feet on the ground a few moments later and pressed his lips to hers. “I love you.” he said smiling ear to ear. “I love you too sexy eyes.” she smiled. “Come on , we have so much to talk about. Starting with picking a date for our wedding.”

MASTERLIST March / April 2017 MASTERLIST MAY 2017 MASTERLIST JUNE 2017

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its-cullenminating · 7 years ago

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A Crash Course In Apologies

Hey! Here’s my entry for DaiharuWeek2017 -- sorry it’s late, and not from any prompt, but I’ve been working on it for a while at this point and what better time to post it, right?

Anyways, you can read the rest of my works here or here. Thanks, and enjoy!

By Arceus, he missed Hoenn.

The islands, the moody storms, the smell of the tropical sea that’s so different from Johto’s grey, industrial spray. Johto was fascinating, by all means -- the Ice Path in particular, but it’s not Steven’s home. He went to learn, to study, and with three separate college-ruled notebooks filled cover to cover with smudged ink and diagrams, pages warped with highlighters and stuffed with pamphlets, he’s more than ready to return with his findings and add his new specimens to his collection.

There’s just one problem -- he went to Johto on an impulse. Something about being alive in the region he almost lost made him need to go, and he left overnight with only a note left in his home and an email to his father as warning. He’s been gone for eight months.

He’d given May his house key as a gift of trust -- much like with many of his other gifts, he can’t say why he’d done it, just that it had seemed right at the time. He hopes that she had gone to visit, despite the guilt that weighs in his stomach at the thought, and that she’d kept the Beldum.

May Maple is going kill him when she sees him.

He doesn’t know whether or not to be eager despite that fact.

His plane lands in Lilycove, tourist destination that it is, letting the lead in his chest sink below the asphalt. As much as he wants to enjoy those first breaths of familiar Hoenn air they’re shaky. Despite himself, he wants to get on the return flight to Johto. At least there, he wouldn’t have to crunch Devon Corps’ numbers.

“It’s about time you showed up,” Wallace says outside the airport, a hand on his hips and eyes alight. “It was getting pretty boring without you, Stone.”

Steven flashes him a small smile. “And here I thought I wasn’t much for company. Something about the mysteries of accounting being lost on you, if I remember right.”

“I don’t recall ever saying such a thing! The wonders of numbers are all my soul craves, Steven. Equations are what I live for!” his friend cries, throwing one dramatic arm over his eyes even as his face breaks into a cheek-splitting grin.

Steven laughs for the first time in a long while. The knot in his stomach loosens the smallest bit, and he breaths a little easier. “Well, I’ll have to remember that next time we go to dinner. There’ll be plenty to go around, what with all the work I have to catch up on.”

“Not our fault you flew yourself halfway across the globe on nothing but a night's notice.” Wallace shrugs, smile fading to a more serious expression. “What did you expect?”

“Exactly what I’m getting. Look, I know it wasn’t the smartest thing to do--”

“Oh, you can say that again--”

“But we almost died! Wallace, we almost -- I almost died. That meteor, Deoxys and Rayquaza, they could have killed everyone. Destroyed the world! I could have died without seeing,” he throws his arm back towards the airport, to the plane taking off to Arceus-knows-where, “anywhere else!”

Wallace crosses his arms, fingers tapping an irritated rhythm on his bangles. “You’ve been to other places. Just a couple years ago, there was that conference in Unova, and before that you went to Indigo Plateau --”

“That’s just it, though. Business. That’s not seeing the country. If I have specimens from another country, they’re either gifts or from the web. I wanted to see more than a glimpse from a skyscraper.”

There’s a long silence, punctuated only with the bustle of people around them and the irritated tapping of Wallace’s fingers on his arms. Under the weight of his friend’s glare, Steven lowers his own to find a shiny, if otherwise nondescript, rock on the asphalt. Iron pyrite inclusions, perhaps.

“I just wanted to live for a minute,” he finally says, hoping the remorse in his chest comes through in his tone. “I’m sorry.”

A weight settles on his shoulder, followed by a low chuckle.

“You’re an idiot, Steven Stone. A human calculator and a geology buff the likes of which the world has never seen, yes, but you, my friend, are a dunce.”

Steven squeezes his eyes shut, wishing he’d never left the Ruins of Alph. As much as he expected this, and as much as he knows he deserves it, by Mew’s teeth it still stings.

“And not because I don’t forgive you --” Steven’s eyes snap up to Wallace’s face and he’s wearing that smarmy smirk of his, one eyebrow cocked and his other hand resting on his hip. “Oh no, I did a long time ago -- but because you forgot one crucial detail.”

Everything in Steven’s body freezes; he doesn’t move, doesn’t breathe, doesn’t even think.

The smirk on his best friend’s face widens almost maliciously and Steven’s gut twists with anxiety.

“May doesn’t know you’re home yet.”

“I did you a favor, you know,” Wallace chirps as the two walk through Ever Grande an hour later. There’s a spring in his friend’s step so big it’s suspicious, and Steven can’t seem to shake the sense of impending doom that’s settled over him since Lilycove.

“And what would that be?”

“Thought it would be obvious. Johto really didn’t test your observational skills, did it?”

Steven sighs once, then again at Wallace’s laughter.

“Don’t be so glum, Stone!” he says, elbowing Steven in the ribs. “It’s more fun this way.”

“I’m sure you’ll all have an absolute riot at my funeral.”

“Drama always was your specialty. She’ll be happy to see you, stop worrying.”

“She’d probably be happier if you told her I was coming, Wallace.” Steven rolls his eyes at his friends’ wicked cackling and sends a prayer to whatever Legendary’s looking his way -- with his luck, probably none, but he has to try -- that this isn’t going to end in complete catastrophe.

They continue walking at a decent clip, but even though it’s only a couple blocks it feels like forever. What’s she going to do when she sees him? Hug him? Cry? Scream? She’s entitled to it, but if May is one thing it’s unpredictable. When he’d gone to Johto he’d hoped to learn more about her, where she came from and how she operates, but instead of going one step forwards he’d gone two backwards; there’s a part of her Hoenn carved, and the strange mix of the two cultures makes everything she does come out of left field.

In a world of numbers and patterns, where the days blend in without end, her unpredictability is addicting. Thing is, he doesn’t even know if she’s still going to want him around after his disappearing act.

He wipes his sweaty palms on his pants and hopes she will. Hopes for more than that, really, but by Arceus, if she’ll take him at all he’ll be happy. For the rest of his days, he’ll be happy.

Please, don’t let me have ruined everything, he thinks. Let me fix this.

“Steven?”

He snaps out of his trance, stare whipping up from the sidewalk to look at Wallace, who’s almost half a block behind him, one foot on the doorstep of a small white house, expression one of amused exasperation.

“You have an issue with the sidewalk?”

Steven shakes his head and speed-walks back to his friend, fighting the anxiety rising in his gut. Once Wallace rings that doorbell, there’s no going back, no way out.

His fight or flight instinct kicks into high gear and he almost books it back down the road, back to Johto, anywhere else but here, but then, before Wallace can knock, before he can even move --

The door slams open. There’s a shout, then another, Wallace is a blur of turquoise and white and Steven hits the ground. Hard.

On top of him is either a dumbbell the size of Kanto, or a Beldum. Two-hundred-odd pounds of excited, sentient metal, sitting on his chest like a Lillipup and making a high pitched ringing. Granted, the Pokemon is taking just enough of it’s weight off of him to keep his ribs from breaking as he squirms beneath it, but it’s going to leave a nasty bruise come morning.

“Ferrous!”

The Beldum immediately changes tune, and even though it can’t do much in the way of expressing emotion the low, apologetic note it hums out vibrates through his chest.

“What,” says a disgruntled-sounding May, “have I told you about jumping people at the door? You’re not a guard dog -- no, I don’t care who it is! You’re going to hurt someone.”

“I’m pretty sure your little pal just ruined my best suit,” Wallace mutters from the lawn. “I’m never going to get these grass stains out.”

The Beldum hovers off of Steven’s chest, still humming the apology as it floats to it’s trainer. Steven props up on an elbow, prodding his ribs with his other hand to make sure there isn’t any swelling while Wallace rights himself and May quietly scolds the Beldum he gave her. It’s normal, for a second, and he almost forgets he was gone before the reality of the situation hits him like a sack of bricks. He continues poking his chest long after May has fallen silent, and he can’t move through her glare.

When all is said and done, and Wallace has helped him up, nobody says anything. The Beldum hovers near May’s leg, Wallace picks at his suit and mutters under his breath, and Steven tries very hard to dissolve into air. In Johto, he imagined a hundred different ways this could go, how he could fix it -- apologies, gifts, anything, but now that he’s here...

There’s just nothing to say.

Wallace -- beautiful friend that he is -- is the one to break the silence.

“I feel like the front lawn isn’t the place for a battle of wills,” he says, flicking a ruffled turquoise lock out of his face. “Steven’s already publicly lost once. I don’t think his pride could handle another round.”

May’s gaze doesn’t break from Steven’s face; it’s hard and appraising, the same unrelenting grey of Johto’s sea. “Not until I get an explanation.”

“You should probably do that inside. I would stay, but I am a terrible third wheel. That, and I think I may have to replace my pants -- my ass is bright green.”

When she looks away to give Wallace a once-over and have a laugh at his expense, he takes a few deep breaths. His organs feel like they’re in a vacuum, collapsing under the pressure of his own emotion. He runs a hand through his hair, wincing at a bruise forming on the back of his head. He’s lucky, he supposes, that May hasn’t evolved the Beldum yet. If it had been a Metang, or even worse, a Metagross, he’d be a couple ribs short at least.

“You coming in? Or are you planning on standing there until you take root?” May snaps, breaking him out of his thoughts.

“I -- oh, well -- yeah,” Steven manages, and follows her inside. Wallace shouts a farewell and he gives his friend a short wave, but keeps his eyes on the light brown hardwood as she closes the door behind him and leads him into the living room.

It’s a simple space, with a dark brown overstuffed loveseat and two chairs to match, a small tv tucked into the corner, and a couple bookshelves lining the walls between windows. Knick-knacks and picture frames fill the spaces not occupied by well-worn novels. Nothing too expensive, but not entirely thrift-store chic like she was when they first met. And this small, brightly lit, comfortable room feels more like May than her younger, shabbier self ever did.

“Make yourself comfortable, I guess,” she says, gesturing to the seats.

Steven perches on the edge of the loveseat, hands folded and back ramrod straight. The couch is a tad too short for him, and his knees stick up just enough to make him feel like a teenager, all limbs and no grace. It doesn’t help that the Beldum settles next to him, excited and humming. May nods, satisfied, and turns towards the kitchen.

“Water or tea?”

“Water’s fine, thanks.”

“Yeah.”

The room feels different without May filling the empty spaces. When he left, she was still living with her parents in Petalburg, and nothing ever really felt her own. This space is teaching him more about her than their Championship battle, or her victory against the legendary pokemon did. A pokemon battle can teach him about will, courage, teamwork, the like. An educating experience, to be sure, but he never knew that she’s fond of sky blue, or that her favorite genre is, by the sheer number of books, sci-fi. Small things, yes, but damn if it doesn’t make him --

“Sorry, filter’s out. I hope tap is fine,” May says as she turns the corner from the kitchen proper. “Martin got a bit overexcited last week and flooded half the kitchen. I had to get the pipes fixed.”

Her Swampert, Martin, chirps from somewhere upstairs, a distinct throaty sound he remembers well.

May glances upstairs, an exasperated grin curving her lips for the first time since he arrived. “He’s not supposed to be upstairs.”

Steven takes the glass she offers, returning her grin with an awkward one of his own. She holds the smile for a second and if he didn’t know May’s nature as he does he would’ve thought everything is fine, but she sobers as she sits, legs crossed and eyes turning hard. The knot in his stomach tightens under her stare, threatening nausea.

There’s a long silence, punctuated by the occasional tap of a fingernail on May’s untouched cup and Steven’s small sips.

The silence wears thin as May waits for answer Steven doesn’t know how to give.

Thinner as Steven’s glass slowly empties, as the Beldum gets bored with the inattention and bobs away with a heavy hum.

Steven flinches when May speaks -- I should have spoken first, he thinks. Guilt blossoms in his chest and he stares at the small film of water in the bottom of his cup.

“I’m feeling there’s something you need to get off your chest,” she huffs. “I suggest you start. Now.”

Steven sighs, sets his glass on an end table and cards a shaking hand through his hair. One of the few perks of growing up as a businessman is learning to internalize everything -- casual, calming gestures that put both yourself and an upset opposite party at ease are practiced, facial features are schooled, and voices remain neutral. Good to utilize, when one’s head is clear and negotiations are on the table.

Bad, when one is actually trying to connect with someone. Someone that’s not as easy as Wallace, who will always be there. Someone who might not forgive him, no matter what he says or how he says it.

“I’m not sure what to say.” His voice is calm, steady despite the anxiety rising into his throat. “I don’t know how to make this better.”

“You could start with an apology.”

He steals a glance at her to find those beautiful grey eyes of hers still stormy with anger and confusion, and locked on him. The humor that was almost in her words didn’t make it onto her face.

“Right. I’m sorry, then. I wish that I had gone about it better, and I’m sorry that I hurt you.” It's awkward and harder than it should be to say, but her eyes soften the smallest bit.

May nods. “That’s a start. Now,” she says, leaning forwards, elbows on her knees and hands clasped between them. “What the fuck?”

He almost laughs at her tone, but something says that if he does she’ll deck him.

“I…” He takes a deep breath, hunches inwards for a second, pinches the bridge of his nose. “I had to.”

“Had to what?” she snaps. Her voice is hot, and she’s no longer Johto’s frigid spray but a hurricane brewing in Hoenn’s waters. That softness that was in her eyes a moment ago has been blown away in her storm, been crushed to dust in her sudden anger. This is the trainer that fought Groudon tooth and nail, that punched Maxie in the face, that won the Championship of a region she wasn’t native to. “What, in the name of the Burned fucking Tower, did you have to do?”

“Leave!” It explodes out of him in a fire to equal hers. “I had to go! I almost --”

The room is a dead kind of silent when he cuts himself off. Tension damn near sparks off the both of them -- he’s surprised that the arm of her chair doesn’t tear from how hard she’s gripping it.

“I almost died,” he says, and it’s almost a whisper. All the fire leaves him as quickly as it came, leaving him exhausted, defeated. “Me, you, everyone. We all almost… died.”

May stares, mouth agape, startled at his outburst -- he doesn’t think she’s ever seen him this way, angry and desperate and lost. He can tell she doesn’t know what to do with it.

“You mean Rayquaza? That debacle?”

“Yes. That debacle,” he sighs.

She finally, finally, looks away. He watches her eyes flit over the room: the ceiling, the walls, the pictures on her bookshelves, anywhere but him.

“I didn’t want the world to become a giant ball of fire before I’d seen it,” Steven whispers, dropping his own stare to his hands. Rough, after so many months of digging and sifting, but strong and long-fingered. Like they were meant to play an instrument, at one point, but Steven’s path in life had built callouses in all the wrong spots.

“It was a spur of the moment decision, I know, and not a smart one, or very well thought out, but there are some things you just have to do, you know?”

“I didn’t know it affected you that much,” she says, voice quiet and free of heat. “I never really considered it. I mean, you’re -- well, you. You bounced back so easily after the Elemental Incident, I just thought…”

He chuckles then, shakes his head and twirls his thumbs. “Me, too. Instead, it took about two hours before I had a panic attack, scribbled out a note, threw a Beldum on the counter and sprinted out the door on the phone scheduling the closest flight to Johto. I didn’t send Devon Corps a notice until I was at the airport, and Wallace didn’t find out until I was already there. Those first couple days weren’t very fun. I forgot to pack anything in my rush to get out the door.”

“That bad, huh? I know how it is. After Groudon, I didn’t get out of bed for a week. Couldn’t stop shaking, nightmares every day -- my parents were pissed. It made dealing with Rayquaza easier, though. What’s one more Legendary pokemon, right?”

“You,” he says with a small, hopeful grin, “are one of only two people I’ve ever met that can say that.”

“Guess life-risking escapades aren’t for everyone.” She shrugs, returning his fading smile with a half-hearted one of her own.

“A near miss with a meteorite is apparently where I draw the line, if it makes you feel better.”

She laughs, that kind of surprised bubbly sound that warms his bones to hear. It’s been so rare since May fought Groudon. “It does. Makes my reactions seem a bit tamer in comparison.”

“I’m sorry,” he says again, after the mirth has faded a bit from them both. “I should have told you, or given more notice, or something --”

“A phone call would have been nice.”

He frowns, twists the rings on his fingers. “I didn’t know what to say, to be honest. I didn’t even know if you’d want to talk to me at all after you found out I was gone.”

“Of course I wanted to talk to you!” she says, affronted. “I was worried sick, Steven! I love Ferrous, but he’s not your replacement. We -- I -- missed you.”

It’s his turn now to gape at her, eyebrows somewhere near his hairline and jaw sitting on the floor. He half expects his old etiquette instructor to snap his mouth shut with her ruler.

May isn’t Wallace -- Wallace is easy. When he says he missed Steven, it was friendly -- if a tad embittered -- and relaxed Steven. Let him know he was wanted, that his absence was noticed and unpleasant. May, on the other hand, is the one person that can knock eloquent and prepared Steven Stone, heir of Devon Corps., completely speechless. Because when she says she missed him, that she was worried --

He swears he hears what he feels, and by Arceus above, his heart misses a beat.

“Just…” she heaves, turning away from his stare even as her cheeks turn as red as her old tank top, “don’t do that to me again. We need you here, Champion or not.”

“I promise.”

She nods and he flashes a half-grin. The daylight outside has faded to brilliant, seaside orange. She follows his eyes and stands when she sees the sky.

“Come on. It’s been awhile since you’ve seen a proper Hoenn sunset.”

He follows her out the door and onto her doorstep. Behind them, Ferrous the Beldum hums happily, and nudges its way in between their legs. They can see the ocean horizon from her front door, and he can breathe.

In silence, shoulders pressed together, alone in all the world ignoring them, they watch the sun sink behind Hoenn’s ocean.

“I’m sorry I snapped at you,” May murmurs, placing her head on his shoulder.

“It’s okay.” His voice is just as soft as hers despite the heat in his stomach. He could fly, right now, could reach the stars appearing in the sky, but instead he just leans his cheek on her hair, takes in the texture and the faint smell of mago berries as an arm loops around her shoulders. “I would have snapped at me too. I was being...”

“An ass?”

He snorts, smiling into her hair. “That’s one way to put it,,” he says.

The sun’s almost sunk below the horizon when she speaks again, hesitant and careful.

“You promise that you won’t leave like that again?”

He pulls away to look at her face, at the caution and almost childish hurt written in the furrow of her brow and the purse of her lips. Once bitten, twice shy it seems.

“Here.” He holds up a hand to her, pinky finger extended from a fist. “Pinky swear.”

The grin that splits her face is blinding and relieved, full of something he doesn’t dare to name. She grips his pinky with hers and moves their hands up and down handshake style. “Pinky swear.”

“And so mote it be,” he rumbles, voice down as low as it can go, head bowed as if in prayer, ruining the effect on purpose with a shit-eating grin.

She laughs then, and pulls him back to her side, tangling their hands together in the process. Her head returns to its previous perch on his shoulder, and in content quiet, with only the sound of the ocean and the curious ringing of Ferrous as it examines something in the yard, they stare at the sky and the moon, reveling in the cool sea breeze.

She squeezes his hand almost hard enough to hurt and heaves a content, heavy sigh.

“I’m glad you came home, Steven.”

Something warm and bright and filling him like helium replaces that knot in his stomach. He clutches May’s hand, runs a thumb over her knuckles and watches her face turn splotchy in the yellow of the porch light. He missed her, by Arceus and Mew and every Legendary of every pantheon, he had missed her.

“Me, too.”

#the life of a fanfic author #My writing #hoennchampionshipping #daiharu week 2017 #daiharu #steven stone #may maple #pokemon fanfiction

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rewritingthestars · 8 years ago

Text

Pt.1 of that tfc wicca au that i said id write a year back but never did

Pt. 2

He came in with five different crystals hanging from his neck, a sweater twice his size, and hair the color of roses. He was attractive in a way that could only mean trouble, and Andrew went back to mopping the floor with only one eye on the mystery man and twice his usual caution.

But then the man turned his head and Andrew caught a glimpse of his eyes that made him freeze and had his mop crashing to the ground as Andrew stared, mesmerized. Maybe it was the late hour, maybe it was the sugar binge the other day catching up with him, or maybe it was the leftover brain damage of happy pills and head injuries making him delusional, but Andrew could have sworn that the moment his eyes met the strange mans' he saw his own death.

A reflection of himself, a flash of a gun, a knife, a screen of blood, an unmoving body in a dark and damp alleyway.

Andrew blinks, and the imagery is gone.

Andrew shakes his head and picks up the fallen mop. Behind the counter Aaron raises his eyebrows in surprise. He then turns away with a scoff at Andrew's cold glare, while Nicky not so subtly gawks at the new customer who has now gotten to the front counter, looking much more frantic and nervous then Andrew remembers him being just a moment ago.

Nicky doesn’t seem to notice the man's distress and smiles flirtatiously. "Welcome to the Foxhole, what can I-?"

"Please," The man cuts him off, flicking his eyes over to the door, "is there somewhere I can go to-" The man closes his eyes and takes a moment to breathe. When he opens them their color is dark and deep like waves of an ocean instead of the icy tundra from before, yet Andrew finds himself annoyingly as transfixed.

"Please, my ex is following me and he's, well, his temper.." The man drawls off and looks downward haunted, grabbing one of the crystals around his neck and dragging it anxiously on its chain.

Andrew frowns. The man's good, Andrew almost believes him. But there’s something off about him, something too cliche about his story. Nicky though is already hastily opening the door to the counter, obviously falling for the man's lie.

"Christ, of course, come on, you can hide in the storage room." Nicky pushes a disgruntled Aaron aside and opens the door.

The man gives Nicky a tentative but genuine smile that makes Nicky stumble as he holds the door open.

"Thank you." He says with such relief and exhaustion it couldn't be fake.

Andrew pushes the mop against a nearby wall to walk over to his cousin with a brow raised.

Andrew is just about to open his mouth when the bell over the door rings signaling a customer. Nicky's jaw tightens and fist clench and Andrew turns to the sight of a tall burly man with a shaved head and a deep set scowl on his face. His clothes are all dark and concealing, but its hard not to notice the obvious muscle on the man. As he walks towards them Andrews eyes flicker to bunched up cloth in places weapons are typically sealed to the confident form of a trained fighter. Ah. This most be the 'ex.'

Nicky forces on a smile and repeats the usual greeting, "Hi! Welcome to-"

"I'm looking for someone I think passed through here." The man interrupts. "Red hair, blue eyes, lots of strange pendants, he's kind of hard to miss. Have you seen him?"

Funny. The 'ex' seemed more like a professional thug than an unhappy boyfriend.

Nicky's forced smile strains but surprisingly he doesn’t give way more than that. "Sorry sir, doesn’t sound familiar. Would you like to order something? Our iced chai latte is to die for and-"

The man slams his fist onto the counter, startling the other two customers in the store and sending them scurrying out of the front doors. "Don’t fuck with me. I know he came through here, and if you don’t tell me where he is I'll-"

The man stiffens. He most likely dismissed Andrew as a threat with his short stature and apathetic gaze. A rather usual mistake. Also a fatal one.

"You’ll what?" Andrew says in a bored tone, pressing his knife deeper into the underside of the mans ribs.

The man grits his teeth but wisely says nothing.

"That's what I thought. I'm going to take a wild guess and figure you don’t want the cops involved, and I'd rather not have to mop up your blood. I just cleaned the floors and all the money in the world wouldn't give me the motivation to do so again. So here’s how this is going to go: I’m going to walk you to the doors, you are going to leave the store, and go back to whatever shithole you crawled out of. I see you so much as in a five block radius of my store and I will gut you like a dog. Do you understand?"

The man stands there for a moment, before jerkily nodding.

"Good choice." Andrew says and shifts his blade in a way to push the man forward.

The man walks cautiously and Andrew digs the point of his knife in deeper a couple times to keep him from getting any ideas.

"This won't end well for you you know, if you are keeping him." The man says.

Andrew flicks his a bored stare. "Was that a threat?"

"Not a threat. A warning. I know he may look all pretty and distressed and helpless but he's not, trust me, he's not. He's a liar and a manipulator and he'll get you killed I guarantee it. You kids have no idea what you're getting into."

Andrew stills for a moment. He can hear the truth in his words, hear some fear too. Andrew thinks of a flash of a gun in a dark alley and feels warnings go off in his head.

The man chuckles, "See? You feel it don’t you? That kid ain’t normal, he's not right. You put your toy away and I'll take him off your hands."

Andrew shoots him a cold glare and shoves him forward. "Stay quiet and keep moving."

The man growls in frustration. "Aren’t you hearing me? He's dangerous, he's not human!"

Andrew gives the man a full view of his face. "Ask me if I care. No? Then get the fuck out of my store."

Andrew promptly pushes the man out the door as the man curses him out. He watches as he walks down the street and turns from the block before going back over to the small coffee shop's counter.

Andrew slams his hands on it, startling Nicky, "What the hell were you thinking-"

The back door opening cuts him off and pretty boy walks out with a look around as if to make sure his 'ex' is gone, and then turns to Nicky with a smile, ignoring Aaron's glower and the obvious tension in the room.

"Thank you, most people wouldn’t have done that for a stranger, I appreciate it immensely."

Nicky smiles back with a look in his eye that makes Andrew kind of want to stab him. "I-"

"Yeah yeah, if you want to make it up to us buy a coffee or leave, we were suppose to close up ten minutes ago and minimum wage is not worth staying late for some weird asshole's bullshit." Aaron says irritably.

The man frowns and sends Aaron a glare that changes the color of his eyes to an almost unnatural tone of gray and Andrew must be losing it because he swears his pupils are disappearing in the hues.

Then the man looks at Andrew and his eyes are back to normal.

"Sorry for the trouble I caused. I’ll get out of your way."

"Wait!" Nicky shouts and Aaron groans loudly. "Ignore Aaron hes an asshole. I’m Nicky by the way, I, uh, didn’t catch your name?"

The man blinks slowly, looking a little surprised. "Neil."

"Nice to meet you Neil, well I mean, not really under the circumstances with your insane ex and all-"

Aaron rubs his temples, "Christ Nicky shut up and let him leave so we can go home."

Nicky makes an offended sound. "But-"

Aaron's hand clasps over Nicky's mouth. "Nope, it is 11:30 and I wanted to go home five hours ago."

"And I need to be on my way anyways." The man- Neil, smiles awkwardly and walks out from behind the counter only to pause near Andrew. "Though I don’t like being indebted to people, so let me repay you with some advice: stay away from Maple and Hall's Street tomorrow night. Best to get a taxi instead of walking." With that. The man left the shop, Andrew staring disbelievingly in the space he left.

"What the fuck." Aaron says. Andrew, for once, can't help but agree.

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

On Monday nights Andrew is usually the one left for closing. There’s not too many customers so there’s really only need for one person on the clock.

Andrew closes with time to spare and locks the doors before taking a cigarette out. He puts it between his teeth as he looks down the street. Maple street is two blocks over and filled with dark alleyways and muggings gone south. Its also in the same direction Andrew walks home to every night. He thinks of icy blue eyes and a knowing tone and a reflection of himself, a flash of a gun, a knife, a screen of blood, an unmoving body in a dark and damp alleyway. He's never believed in psychic shit, he's on the sharp end of skepticism and doesn’t believe in fate or ghosts or any kind of mythical force. Andrew takes a drag.

Five minutes later a taxi stops in front of him. He gets in.

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

On the news the next morning some night jogger was killed near The Foxhole Coffeehouse. He was shot twice, once in the stomach and once in the head around eleven o'clock.

It was on Maple Street.

"It means nothing." Aaron says heated. "A coincidence."

"A 'coincidence'? How can you say that, someone died on the street he told Andrew not to go to!" Nicky argued.

"You're right. Its not a coincidence. He's probably a gang member that knew shit was going to go down there!"

"Oh, come on Aaron, do you really think he looked like a thug?"

"His ex sure did, and who’s to say Neil wasn’t involved in his boyfriend's activities?"

"Shut up both of you." Andrew hisses with more emotion then he usually allows himself to let out. His nerves have felt shot and his skin tight and suffocating ever since he saw the news report this morning.

He needs to think this through. The logical part of him is telling him Aaron is right. That Neil is just another kid part of a gang in some capacity that led him to know about Maple Street. But the other part of him; the part that remembers every detail of his bleeding dead body after being shot, the part that can still hear the fear in the 'ex's voice, the part that knows Neil's eyes changed colors every time he looked at them; that part is screaming his mind into a nutshell.

But trusting himself would mean exploring the possibility of magic, an idea he hasn't contemplated since he was seven. It means realizing there's a whole different world of dangers that he is ignorant to.

In any case, Andrew has to find out. Not knowing is the worst outcome, and, as obnoxious and annoying as it may be, Andrew is interested. He is interested for the first time in years, by a boy with changing blue eyes and a fake name.

A voice in the back of his mind whispers dangerous and too risky.

Andrew tries to ignore the wave of excitement he feels.

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#andreil #tfc #My writing #my fic #wicca au #Neils a witch and andrews intrigued #im not very satisfied with how this came out so will I finish this?#who knows certainly not me

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hellobittersweetsymphony-blog · 7 years ago

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The Migration

I could hardly stand still as my watch made the dreaded jump from 11:59 PM to 12 AM. The chaos had begun again. Migrating month was the 31 days every being, on the planet of Imens, hated the most out of two years. My mother always said the journey from District 7 to District 8 was the reason families live in solitude. We no longer trusted each other. The journey to stay between the thawing and freezing parts of our massive planet, the process of matching the movement of our small star, was notoriously known to be the most difficult between Districts 7 and 8. According to our elders, paradise was alive in District 8. But, very few lived through the rigorous travel to see the sight.

My process of thought was interrupted by knocking at my door. “Cia, you have 5 minutes to meet your mother and I outside.” Dad said. I reacted to his words with a bit of shock. Migrating month had finally begun again.

I walked outside of our family’s shack. My mother and countless amounts of withered traveling gear were already perched on top of our white horse. My father was mounting our black horse. I had all all the travel and survival gear that father approved stuffed inside my pockets found around my many coats. I was ready. My mother quickly grabbed my arm and pulled me up onto the white mare. We were off.

Our horses were galloping onward. We were challenging the unknown. I wasn’t the least bit comfortable on the horse either, but atleast in this moment, I was safe.

“It was a great idea to leave at midnight, Clary. There is not a single migrator in sight. Not a rival in sight” Dad said to my mother.

“Yah, it was a good thing. We just have to hope we don’t catch up to the cold or worse, let it catch us.” My mother replied.

She was right. With our world being so big and our star being so small it was hard to time the departure date during migrating month perfectly. Leaving so early in the month put us in a excellent position to stay ahead of the cold. But, we also couldn’t move full speed ahead, because we didn’t want to catch up to the cold. So, our pace was not nearly as fast as migrations before. We needed to stay right with our star, but such a travel would be hard.

The next few days we continually rode for what seemed like thousands of miles on our horses. We stopped occasionally to sleep or to eat, but we journeyed hard. The weather had been the typical amount of cold, but as we journeyed farther and farther it was becoming more frigid. As days passed, my cheeks grew more rosey from the bitter kiss of the frost consuming me. Father shrugged off my concerns. He was not concerned about catching the cold. He was only worried of the cold catching us. The travel had been easy thus far, basically a golden brick road laid down for all the happy migrators. Though the travel from District 7 to 8 was known to be a challenge that few can survive. I was confused.

That night I fell asleep almost worry free. I slept well. During the night I could have sworn that something was biting my toes. But, I was too preoccupied with my dreams to ever wake up. I had dreamt about District 7 and the home we had built there. I imagined all the happy moments we had spent there, like the time dad had come home with the horses or the time me and mom perfected our maple taffy recipe. I loved everything about our home there. I hated having to migrate every two years.

It was a chaotic morning to wake up to, especially after such a peaceful dream. My toes had been frozen. Fear had been restored as we had realized a stronger cold had settled in. That wasn’t the biggest problem either.

“This isn’t possible.” Father said with a sense of urgency. “We have traveled so far and left so soon.”

“We must have lost our sense of direction. What can we do?” I replied.

“Cia, there is no way. I have been practicing the proper navigation procedure for months now. There’s something I am missing. Something unknown.” He replied.

Once he said this something sparked in my own head. The unknown was something I have read before in a dusty old book in my father’s trunk. “Heliocentrism. We are on the other side of the elliptical pattern now. The star is closer. It’s moving faster. It has passed us. It’s passed us!” I exclaimed.

Once these words echoed into my fathers ears, his eyes sparked. He looked into the sky. My father turned to my mother. The look they gave one another exchanged a thousand words. They quickly went running to the horses and jumped on.

“Cia, grab my hand.” My mother yelled as she was already pulling me up with her. My father and mother kicked their horses into a speedy galloping pace. I held onto my mother tightly knowing falling off was a big possibility.

Our horses had galloped long and far through the misty cold. Both were becoming tired, but the will to survive pushed them onward. I was cold and tired also. I had my head laid back onto my mother’s back. I rested till my neck grew sick of laying in such a uncomfortable position. Eventually, I had to raise my neck to stretch it the other way. As I raised it, I peered upward into the mist. The frigid air stung my lungs. But, the sight of what was ahead stopped my heart. Nearly 3 miles ahead stood a mountain range beyond compare to anything I have seen before. The icy frost had already marked it as its own. We weren’t moving fast enough. “Faster!” I yelled shrilly.

At this moment I peered over to my father's face. He wore a grim blank expression that I had never seen before. It was fear. A type of fear previously unknown; it was a hopeless fear. It was so strange to see your own father scared beyond his wits. I knew my mother felt the same way. Our horses were exhausted, but they'd be useless once we hit the mountain anyway.

I crashed my feet into our stallion’s lower tummy many times. Mother and I set a new pace towards the mountain. I believed there was hope. I can survive. I had to. My father and his horse picked up their pace too till finally we had reached it. We quickly jumped off the horses. I grabbed any spare necessities I could. My mom and dad both did the same.

I was the first to begin our journey up. I grabbed each ledge with all my might and hoisted myself upward. I climbed faster than I had ever climbed before. I pushed myself harder and harder as each of my heart beats rippled through me. If it wasn’t so cold, I would have been sweating every ounce of my fluid in my body. But, it was cold. It was very cold. My hands, face, feet, toes, and well everything ached because of it. I could hear my parents struggling below me, but I couldn’t waste the energy to think about them.

Hours had passed as I began to realize that my climb was becoming easier. The icy cliffs were beginning to flatten. I knew that within another hour or so we would no longer be climbing.

“The mountain! The mountain is beginning to flatten!” I screamed. But, as the vibrations of my screams entered the atmosphere so did another unexpected noise. A sharp, powerful tumbling sound echoed around me. I trembled out of shock, but climbed faster out of the instinct to survive. As I was climbing, I lowered my neck to see below me. Ice was falling from all sorts of spots on the mountain. The mountain could no longer hold the stress that the cold had made it endure.

Air quickly escaped my lungs. My ears became hot. My body became still, and my eyes remained glued to my struggling parents 70 feet below me. Falling ice was consuming them. But, my mother was too weak. She had grown beyond fatigue. She couldn’t even hold on for herself. My dad was holding her and himself on the cliff. He remained immobile from the weight of her hand and her dangling body all assigned to his own hand.

The ice continued to fall around them in big deadly chunks. My father looked up at me. I looked down knowing what must happen. I shook my head to him. He let go of her. My mother’s body descended downward into the mist below. We could hear her body conflict with the falling ice around her. It was an awful sound. My heart weighed more than my own body at this point. I was sure I could not lift it up anymore. I knew I had to conserve energy, but I couldn’t bear to see my father fall into the mist also.

“CLIMB!” I screamed down to him. He worked fast and efficiently. But, it still looked like a hopeless effort. The falling ice was nearing him more than ever. With every tumbling sound another threat to his life was made. I couldn’t bear to watch him fall too. So, I began to desperately climb again. I worked my way up farther than I would have imagined possible. Eventually the climb wasn’t as much as a climb than it was a excruciating hike. I still heard the tumbling noise. But, somehow I had gained the strength to look below for my father.

I peered behind me knowing what had happened. What I saw was not surprising. I saw the white continue to rip off of the rocky side and no sign of my father. He had fallen too. My ears had grown hot again. How could he ever leave me? I had no will to move on. I slowly turned my head back around to once again face my obstacle. Suddenly shock hit me like a wave. My father was there. He was there! He was at the same height I was just some distance to my right.

He was already running towards me. I stood still from the happiness and hope consuming me. We could do this!

“Run Cia! Run!” My father screamed. We started running up the gradual sloping mountain. We had to run around many tall, icy rock formations. If I didn’t hate the idea of death so much, this mountain could have been beautiful.

Eventually after so much running, I became almost incapable to open my eyes. My legs were stuck in a routine of just moving. I was at a matching pace with my father, but eventually I just closed my eyes. I let my legs take over. They gave their everything.

Suddenly thin air escaped my lungs as my knees smashed onto the icy ground. I had tripped. My patella crashed hard onto the solid surface. My body realized how much the cold was hurting it. “AEHHHAHHHHHHHHH” I cried out into the open air.

I layed there. I rested upon the ground. I closed my eyes. I was done. I was more scared than anything. I didn’t want to die, but I could do nothing.

Then I heard footsteps. My father picked me up. He brought us some way. I opened my eyes and realized he took us to an overhang. We were protected from the snow. I thrived on the little amount of warmth this natural shelter brought us.

“You need rest. We will stay here for a bit.” My father grimly told me.

“But, dad, what about the dark? The cold? They are both catching up. We will die from the cold.” I replied. It was true the ice surrounded every curve on our bodys. Breathing was only becoming harder. Blinking stung, because of the sharp shards of ice amongst our eyelids.

“We will be fine, Cia. We will! I have something for us. It will help.” My father said. But, the way he said this sent some questions into my head. He said it in a way of last resort. He reached into his innermost coat pocket and pulled out a syringe. “This is a serum that will increase our heart’s rate. It will keep us warm. We will make it, Cia. We will! We will make it!” My father’s voice cracked under the stress of his own emotions. “Move your coat Cia. It needs to go into your upper arm.” He finally said as a tear rolled down his face.

“Okay dad. We will make it. I know we will. In honor of mom, we will.” I bravely replied. My father injected the serum into me. The warmth was already spreading through me. Dad leaned forward and kissed my cheek.

“Go ahead and rest, Cia. I love you more than anything.” Dad’s broken voice proclaimed into the thin air.

I closed my eyes. “I love you, dad.” I said back.

I continued to rest with my eyes closed as the serum began to work. I reflected on all the good times I’ve had with my mother and father. My life had been so full of joy. My purpose had already been fulfilled. I loved my parents. I am happy. I peered out into the mist along the mountain. Such a formidable structure provided so much peace to my heart. This world was hard, but it was of an utmost beauty. Suddenly, the idea of death wasn’t so scary. The warmth within me seemed to dwindle in my limbs. It moved its way up into my brain. My head grew hot. I was shaking from the hammering just inside my own head. Something was wrong, very wrong. I breathed outward ready to wake up, but I was consumed by a bittersweet darkness.

#fiction #scifi #migration #survival #short story #cia #strong #planet #space #story #my writing

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