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defensivelee · 2 months ago

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Alien Alien: Then I the Mark of Ingratitude Stand

I didn't know if I should post this but I wanted to feed y'all because I haven't been able to write a single thing since the....Shit that has Gone Down. It turns out it's hard to write Six Lives, a story about fascists, on the side of the fascists kek

So! Have this, a rather unusual story I've gone with here in Alien Alien focusing on the sole human of this verse, the Earl of Marlborough. He's now brought back to favor and is in charge of the Duke of Gloucester, a sickly hybrid much like the King himself! He may be just a bit out of his depth, however, when he's faced with a vision of what is supposedly the boy's glorious future.

CW: objectification, dehumanization, implied/referenced sexual assault, violence, descriptions of gore, child death.

Something had changed in the sound of the King’s walk. It had been a long time since the change had begun, but it drove Marlborough mad now as it drove him mad then, as he listened to the King approaching.

There was a great inconsistency to the walk of four limbs, with sharp boots at the back and thick claws at the front. One hand, as it came down, sounded harsh and scraping, and the other sounded lighter, with a more graceful cling! as it hit the floor. That was the hand that so ached now; that was the hand that had been equipped with narrow claws made of metal that appeared to Marlborough more like those of an eagle than of a natural Defender of the Faith. They dragged along the floor as the King stalked forward, as he let out a heavy sigh through his nose like an exhausted horse.

Marlborough turned around to face him. When he had first met William, he was the same size he was now; oh, certainly taller than a human, of course, but he seemed to take little space up in the galaxy even as he would arch his back and hiss at any perceived slight or threat. He was still the smallest full-grown Asterothiriot Marlborough had ever encountered.

He had grown no larger, and yet as he walked past Marlborough could suddenly see why this one believed he ruled the stars themselves. Perhaps it was the age that now showed on his face, or the stiffness of his tail, or even the slitted pupils, but now it seemed he was almost deserving of calling himself a king like the ones that had come before him. He was just almost a full tendril-tooth.

Almost. The power behind his leap up towards the window reminded Marlborough of who had truly raised the hybrid prince. The six suspicious eyes blinked at him, one by one, as their owner sat back with his tail curled in front of his arms in a manner that reminded Marlborough of the cats on Forte Solaria.

What does he want? He waited for William to say something before giving him a hesitant curtsy. His face never failed to flush as he did so.

“Do you know why you're here?” William asked.

“No,” Marlborough said. Sarah had seen something, of course, and she had said that nothing bad could come from this audience, but that was all he knew. It was the Princess Anne's powers who were stronger, but she hadn't brought up anything important, either.

“Oh, perfect,” William said with an uncharacteristic purr. “I get to surprise you.”

“How thrilling,” Marlborough said dryly. “Did you want me to be your exhibition here instead? I would prefer it; nobody passes through as much.” He started stepping away. “Though I can't see why that would warrant such privacy.”

“Stay,” William snapped, and Marlborough froze. “It isn’t that. Quite the opposite, actually.” He lowered his head, his antennae twitching as if he'd just sensed something that displeased him. “Do you remember how it maddened the tendril-tooths here to see a human become an earl upon my arrival?”

Marlborough couldn't help but laugh. “Yes, as it did you.”

“Hardly.” William flicked his tail dismissively. “Why should I care about the species of my subjects? As long as they don't belong to those vicious, drooling fortune-tellers, then I don't—”

“I'll remind you that my family is made up of said fortune-tellers,” Marlborough said coolly. “And so is your government now. It has been more than a decade; are you still not used to it?” He blinked innocently up at William, who looked up and growled.

“That doesn't mean I have to like it,” he said. “One step can't cover seven steps. I would always rather work with humans and robots than with those conniving beasts who think they rule the universe.”

“Do we still talk of the same species?”

“You are a human, my lord, you would do well to remember that!” William leapt down from the window, and Marlborough drew back as the King began to circle him. “That’s the only reason I still tolerate you. Otherwise I would have—” He raked his claws across the floor. “Killed you myself.”

“And you expect me to be honored,” Marlborough said.

“Yes.” William nodded once. He stood up fully so that he was taller than the human, the spikes on his tail slicking back with a sharp rattle. “You know, I never liked the practice of...human art. ‘Tis frivolous and obsolete, especially when I’ve found a far better use for you. No, even after what you did...” He twitched one antennae to the side. “I never liked it. Truly, I would have preferred killing you.”

Marlborough had heard it all by now; he’d heard about how the King so hated to use his body as artwork, to keep him there as decoration while he spoke to his ministers, and how unnecessary he thought the whole practice, but that he was driven to it by expectation. Expectation! What William had refused to follow since the very day he’d arrived here!

No, he knew that while William derived little enjoyment from gazing upon his body, he still wanted some way to remind a human of his status here. William must have known that he knew, but as they stared at each other, they remained silent, both daring the other to speak.

“Maybe you should have,” Marlborough said at length. He didn’t truly mean it, not really, but with every passing day he’d stood there, death had seemed more appealing than the endless weight of, ironically, what little he wore.

“No. There’s still one last thing I need you for.” William tilted his head to the side. “Well, a few things. I couldn’t have kept you there forever.”

You might have been happy to, Marlborough thought, but he listened intently as the King spoke.

“The heart-eaters are spreading like a virus,” he said, “even through this peace. For how long do you think a sickness can be suppressed?” He shook himself as if the thought unnerved him. “I need your eyes to see them, and the rest of you to defeat them if— when King Louis becomes hungry again.”

“I can’t do that now,” Marlborough said with a growing amusement. “Not without—”

William interrupted him with a hiss. “I know, I know.” He took a deep breath, then said, “The late Queen left me with this knowledge, and she is not the only tendril-tooth here who is now aware of your value. So you must return to your command. And then you and I can put this whole mess behind us.” He flexed his false claws. “But this is not forgiveness.”

“I wouldn’t think so,” Marlborough said. “I could die without it.”

“You could stand to be a little grateful, human.” William stepped closer until Marlborough could smell the blood of unfortunate prey on his breath. His eyes seemed to be focused on being unfocused, with an appearance that Marlborough had only seen in starving wolves.

“In a sense, I am,” he replied. “But I’d been expecting this.”

“So you did know!” William bared his teeth accusingly.

“Not through the visions of my wife,” Marlborough rushed to assure him. “Nor did I expect it today. But I thought that you would realize that your preferred human can only take you so far.” Keppel was a fine, clever creature, as he’d been when Marlborough had first found him, but even William must have known that his future lay elsewhere.

“Enough.” William let out a rumbling growl. “How far do you think you can take me?” He turned away, the tip of his tail brushing against Marlborough’s shoulder. “There is one more thing, my lord.”

Marlborough straightened up at the address. “Yes?”

“I ask- I command you to take up another position you may not be used to,” William said. “That of the Duke of Gloucester’s governor.” Seeing Marlborough’s confusion, he added, “I know a tendril-tooth might have been more logical, but I wouldn’t like him to be ruled by those monsters from the very beginning.” He flicked his antennae in the Earl’s direction. “Besides, the Princess trusts you more than she trusts any Asterothiriot, save for your wife.”

“You want a human to— pardon me saying this, but you want a human to guide an animal into its adulthood.”

The sentence had hardly left his lips when William lunged at him with a snarl, throwing him back against the floor. Marlborough winced as his head hit the ground, as he felt the King’s claws dig into his shoulders. This he’d been expecting as well; it only surprised him that it took so long.

“An animal?!” William snapped his jaws in Marlborough’s face. “Is that what we are to you?”

“Well, you’re not human.” Marlborough turned his head away as he spoke, staring blankly to the side. “I was merely stating a fact. The little prince deserves better, someone who can teach him to hunt and fight the way his species knows.”

“Oh, he does, doesn’t he?” William sneered and stepped off of him. “But he already has me. Having you will only be his first disappointment.” He waited for a moment, then snapped his jaws again. “Stand!”

Marlborough obeyed, and William continued. “Truth be told, I want you to give him a taste for blood.”

You could have done that yourself, Marlborough thought, staring at the claws that had just been held so close to his neck. Even if he knew that William wouldn’t kill him, even if his presence commanded little fear, he had never gotten used to it.

“In the prophecies the Queen left me before she died,” William said, “you seem to appear more frequently the closer that I get to joining her.”

“She told you when you would die?” Marlborough asked, startled.

William nodded slowly. “But that doesn’t concern you. Show that boy a fraction of the boldness you have shown me, and I know he will survive.”

“Your Majesty, I—”

“He will survive,” William repeated, silencing Marlborough with a wave of his tail. “And you will be there to see it.”

✭✭✭

He had played with the Duke of Gloucester before, entertaining him with a laser pointer or a squeaking toy, and he had observed how little energy the child had as compared to Marlborough’s own. Oh, he could run as swiftly as his mother, and bark as loudly as his father, but it tired him quickly, so that he preferred curling up to sleep in between unsuspecting tails.

“So you are telling me the human is mine now?” Gloucester was bounding about William’s feet, swatting at the lashing tail. He was quite a sight, his appearance being mostly of his mother’s species, save for his blank eyes and the lack of protective spikes at his belly. His tail, too, was shorter, and as of now, he only had two horns.

“More accurately, you are the human’s,” Anne said, her eyes glinting with amusement. “But you must show my Lord Marlborough the same respect as you do everyone else.”

“Your Highness,” Marlborough greeted the little prince, who now stared at him with wide eyes.

“Marlborough!” Gloucester stood up, his tail wagging. He was very nearly Marlborough’s height already. “Does this mean I get to see Lord Churchill more often? Will he come and teach me more of his battle moves?”

“I think he can teach you more than just that,” Marlborough said. “But yes, he will be here, as your Master of the Horse.” He knew his son would be pleased with that news as well; he was already quite faithful to the little prince.

“Master of the Horse,” Gloucester repeated with shining eyes. “What does he know about those mechanical creatures?”

“Well, he will learn at your side—”

“You, my lord, you can ride real horses!” Gloucester bounded back towards his mother on all fours. “So can I, I’m almost his exact weight! It would be possible, right?”

“You can, but you shouldn’t,” William replied before Anne could say anything. “The body of a Bocca della Verità is designed to run at a speed far greater than any horse could achieve. Besides, I can’t imagine it would be too comfortable.” He bowed his head to lick the prince in between his erect ears.

“You know, on my planet, Your Highness, they would hunt on those very horses,” Marlborough said. “They would ride on in after a fox— do you know that creature, the fox?”

“You mean to tell me that foxes are real as well?” Anne’s eyes widened, matching the awe of her son’s face.

“Yes, but they were nowhere near as cunning as the stories say they are,” Marlborough said with a chuckle. “They would always run, and they were the noisiest animals I’d ever encountered.” Save for your kind, he added silently, though with no malice behind the thought.

“But we are not on your planet, my lord.” William flicked his antennae back.

“Neither are we on yours.”

The spikes on the King’s tail began to shake, but Gloucester seemed to break the spell with an excited bark. “Oh, I want to show you how I’ve been hunting! I- I learned a new trick the other day from your son.” He began to bounce excitedly on his talons, unsteady as they slid across the floor. “I’ve never missed a mouse since.”

So the first thing Marlborough did with his new charge was watch him hunt. He had always hated joining the Asterothiriots when they were hunting, be it tendril-tooth or Defender or Canis magnetar— he could never do anything but watch. Worse than that, he had no idea how to carry himself like the hunters did, so silently and effortlessly across the forest floor without ever alerting their prey. He, though smaller than them, always managed to break a twig or rustle leaves, and the prey would run off before his companions could catch it. It was as if they had a sense he did not have, as if they knew what lay after every corner.

And perhaps, for the tendril-tooths, such was the case. Certainly not for little Gloucester, however. There was a silent understanding among them all that, like William, as a hybrid he would be unable to ever receive visions. He had long passed the age when the powers normally revealed themselves.

Still, his hunting was worthy of praise. Marlborough watched him from his place high in a tree, where he would not disturb Gloucester. The prince was stalking quietly, if a little clumsily, through the plants, keeping his body low to the ground. His tail lashed behind him as he paused and opened his mouth wide to drink in the scent of the air. Curiously enough, he had been born with the tusks of a female member of his species rather than the open, outward teeth of a male, but Marlborough wouldn’t have liked to imagine him with them, anyway.

Gloucester crouched down low, tensing before pouncing forward. Marlborough sat up as the boy leaped in the air, then suddenly his talons fell beneath him awkwardly, eliciting a yelp from him. There was a squeak up ahead, presumably the mouse scurrying away. Gloucester seemed unable to push himself up on his legs to catch it.

“Damn!” Marlborough hissed under his breath. He jumped from the tree and ran over to Gloucester, kneeling down at his side. “Your Highness?”

“I let it get away!” Gloucester growled, his ears flopping to the side. “Forgive me, I lost my balance—”

“There are more mice in the forest than you could ever hope to catch in a lifetime,” Marlborough said. “There’ll be another chance.”

“I will hunt them all!” Gloucester declared suddenly, throwing Marlborough off of him. “You see the King cough all the time, and he’s hailed as one of the best hunters in the galaxy!”

“And so will you be,” Marlborough said. “But he cares little for his health. You must, or your mother will for the rest of your life.”

Gloucester hummed thoughtfully. “Is it bad that I want her to?”

“Trust me, you won’t for much longer.”

“Maybe that is how it works for humans.” He sat back, puffing out his chest and rattling the spikes on his back. “Not I, sir. I will honor and love my mother for as long as I have left.”

The odd phrase sent a chill down Marlborough’s back, but he had no time to reply before he heard steps from up ahead. He tensed for a moment, his hand reaching for his sword, relaxing only when the animal showed its brilliant, delighted face.

“Did you miss a mouse, John?” Godolphin let out a chirp of laughter before he set the strange animal down, larger and with scales as compared to the mice Marlborough had known throughout his youth.

“You know I didn’t,” he answered. Beside him, Gloucester sprung at the mouse’s body, sniffing it so loudly that it was difficult to concentrate on Godolphin’s subsequent words.

“We ought to combine your way of hunting with ours one day,” he said. “You can ride me to flush out the stag-rabbit.”

“I- I have done so once,” Marlborough said hurriedly. “And once was enough, thank you.”

Godolphin cocked his head to the side, and Marlborough remembered too late that his species could smell fear. Though he did not remark upon it, Gloucester did.

“Show me what you did, sir, I can still smell the mouse’s fear!” he cried. “How is this?” He crouched back down in the same manner he had before, his tail wagging with excitement.

Marlborough looked expectantly at Godolphin, but he only laughed and nudged him with his tail. “You must show him. You’ve seen us hunt before.”

“Aye, and picked up nothing.”

“You must not think so.” Godolphin butted his head against his friend’s shoulder. “Just because you cannot join doesn’t mean that you were never there.”

Marlborough hesitated, then stepped forward and caught Gloucester’s tail in the air. “First of all, you already alert your prey, in particular the birds above, that you are here when you move your tail so. They sense a change in the wind even before they hear the whipping about. So keep it stiffly up in the air.”

“Like this?” Gloucester stuck his little tail out, and Marlborough nodded.

“Very good. Besides that, it also helps you keep your balance when you jump. It may not be enough to halt your condition,” he added delicately, “but it never did any harm. Now, also, keep your head up so that your tusks don’t brush along the ground.” He placed his shoe under the prince’s chin and lifted it up. “And your ears erect and still.”

Gloucester winced a little but obeyed. “Then the crouch is perfected?”

“Not yet,” Marlborough said. “Your swiftness is impressive, but you would be swifter still if you raised your body slightly from the ground. You only lower yourself when you are about to pounce.”

“And then?” “Then step forward. Be careful where you put your feet.” He walked past Godolphin and stood some distance away. “Pretend I am the prey.”

Gloucester nodded and began to stalk towards Marlborough. He was very careful, indeed, though he still lurched a little from side to side every time he paused. Marlborough turned to Godolphin, pretending to be distracted.

“A fine mouse you caught there. Did you give it a soldier’s death?”

“What?” Godolphin blurted. “You mean, did I ask God to accept it into Heaven?”

“Of course, so that you may hunt it again in death. Then you’ll have plenty to eat when you get there.” He patted Godolphin on the tail, and the tendril-tooth barked out a laugh.

Just in time, Marlborough looked to the side to see Gloucester leap towards him, throwing him against the ground. He couldn’t help but let out a sharp gasp when he landed, the prince’s weight full on his chest.

“Well done, Highness!” Godolphin said after a moment of Marlborough’s heavy breathing, evidently realizing that he couldn’t speak. “I didn’t even hear you coming.”

“Churchill taught me that pounce,” Gloucester said as he stepped off of Marlborough. “And now his father has taught me the stalking part of it. Thank you, my lord.” He dipped his head for a moment before scrambling up ahead, his tail knocking into a tree when he turned sharply into a clearing.

Godolphin rushed to help Marlborough back up with his horns. “Can you breathe now?”

“Y-Yes, I just- I felt the strength of that pounce,” he managed, resting a hand on his chest. “He’ll be a vicious king.”

“With your help, no doubt.”

They followed Gloucester out into the clearing, where he lifted himself up onto a boulder and lay contentedly. The sun bathed him in red, causing his growing mane to blaze like fire and the perpetual glow of his eyes to dim. His pose was like that of a portrait of the King that Marlborough had seen once or twice, where he lay with his tail curled closely inwards and his gaze fixed upon the viewer, illuminated by a candle beside him.

I hope William IV will be kinder to me, Marlborough thought. The boy was already popular with the people, and he could only imagine that he would continue on that path.

He was startled by a sudden hiss from Godolphin beside him. “Look at him!” he said. “Covered in red!”

“‘Tis only the sun.”

“The mother star is calling to him,” Godolphin went on with wide eyes, ignoring the remark. “At once every Bocca della Verità must see this as well— their heir wading through a sea of his enemies’ blood!”

✭✭✭

The Earl of Portland was now back in France, though he had gone willingly this time, on embassy for his master. Heaven knew how the creature had reacted when he found out he had to return to the place that had caused him so much pain, as Lord Albemarle told it, but at least the heart-eaters now knew exactly what would come from their twisted games. And he would not be made a subject of them any longer.

So it was the said Albemarle, the beautiful Arnold van Keppel, who spent every waking hour at the King’s side. It seemed to content them both, for every time Marlborough saw them together they were purring, though it was Keppel who outdid William in sheer volume.

But that was merely every waking hour; in the unholy hours of the night, Keppel spent time in what should have been his quarters, but were more like a small, yet winding, laboratory where the body parts of robots hung from every surface. They gleamed unnaturally under the fluorescent lights, which were far and few in between, leaving Keppel shrouded in darkness as he worked.

“Do you ever sleep?” Marlborough asked as he entered the room. It always smelled of burning metal here, a foul scent that would give him a headache if he stayed for too long.

“Ah, my lord!” Keppel looked up from his desk, miraculously having abandoned all the robots for tonight in favor of whatever he happened to be writing. “Took you long enough. How was the Duke of Gloucester today?”

“He goes very well in his studies and training,” Marlborough said, “though he oft reminds me of the King with how the sun tempts him to sleep. ‘Tis a curious thing, for there is not a drop of Defender blood in him at all.” He shrugged and leaned back on a table, where a disembodied android’s arm seemed to reach towards him. “But I have seen naught but dedication from him, from the very moment I began as his governor.”

“So you like him.”

“I am not displeased with my post.”

“And you have me to thank for it,” Keppel said, a sly smile growing on his face. “Well, a few others, too. But mostly me. I finally told the King about our history on Forte Solaria.”

Marlborough winced. “Oh. What did he say?”

“It was hilarious, by the stars,” Keppel said hurriedly. “He was so mad— oh, it was kind of hot. But like, mad at you, too.”

“For having saved you?” Marlborough rolled his eyes. He would never please this one!

“Yes! Well, mad that you were the one who did so, anyway.” Keppel laughed. “But it must have done something, because a few days later he made you the governor and a Lord Justice and everything was great again. Right?” His eyes widened slightly. “Things are better now?” “Very much so,” Marlborough said, though he failed to hide the irritation on his face. “But it’s not that easy. You must have told him— I was trained as a soldier there, not a whore!”

“And I was trained as a whore, not a soldier,” Keppel said, stepping up beside Marlborough to swing his hips against him. “Yet look at us now! The Asterothiriots have quite changed our destinies, haven’t they?”

“Not always for the better.”

“Trust me, it’ll only get better from here,” Keppel said, “if you don’t fuck this up. I mean, look, you have a future king in your care! God knows if you’ll live long enough to see him on the throne, but as he grows, I’m sure he’ll find ways to appreciate you. But seriously—” He stepped closer all of a sudden, raising his head so that his gaze was equal upon that of Marlborough. “Do not fuck it up again.”

“I’ll fuck up whatever I think needs fucking up,” Marlborough said, though for once he realized he’d long exhausted his disdain for the King. Whatever would be, would be, and it was all decided under William’s torn and bloodstained claws. He was not malicious, Marlborough decided, just a nearsighted fool.

“As for you, Keppel,” he said, changing the subject, “what do you do in here?”

“Me? I’ve started work on my future bride,” Keppel said with some measure of dismissal, though Marlborough could tell he could hardly contain his excitement. Had he found a match already?

He decided to fall into the trap. “Who is the woman on your mind?”

“Oh, her name is Geertruid and she is as beautiful as I am and endlessly clever,” Keppel blurted. “And very strong, too! I can introduce her to you, actually.” He took Marlborough’s hand and led him to the back of the room, where a large blueprint was pinned to the wall, displaying what would eventually be a full, lovely woman.

“Who is also a robot, of course,” Marlborough muttered. Turning to Keppel, he said, “Are you seriously going to marry her?”

“I hope so,” Keppel said, his eyes shining. “If she falls in love with me once she’s finished. I’ll give her some time, but I really hope she does. She’s going to be perfect.”

“You know half-ass deserves a failure,” Marlborough said. “So I would trust you to make her, as you say, perfect.” At the praise, Keppel grinned. “But that’s not what I was asking. Has a robot ever married a biological Asterothiriot before?”

“No, but why shouldn’t she?” Keppel patted the concept of his wife on the head. “They make devoted partners, much like yourself. See, I thought you could get by that.”

“I could,” Marlborough said. “I just didn’t think you would be so open to the idea considering my Lord Portland. I didn’t like androids before, and now I never will.”

“Oh, but he’s very easy to shut up these days,” Keppel said with a shrug. “I don’t know. I think I could grow to like him, honestly. I think I already have.” He walked over to his desk, where he had left a letter unfinished. “I was just writing to him.”

“You grow so close to him that- that you send him letters?” Marlborough picked up the paper cautiously. Now that was truly unexpected; if Keppel wanted to scold him quickly, he would have sent a message through Portland’s communications system. But a letter meant something else.

“W-Well, it’s not wise to send messages directly to him,” Keppel said, his face beginning to flush. “That’s never secure. Neither are letters, sure, but nobody would think that a robot’s letters are anything of importance.”

“I do hope that the heart-eaters have begged for your forgiveness already,” Marlborough read a passage out loud, “though I know that such humility is below them and their King. They owe you much, however, for though they’ll not say it out loud, you have rid them of a heavy weight on their tails, that of the late King James. Much as they laud him, I am certain that they wanted him gone, too. Still, I know that these are memories that you keep purposely away from your core, so I will stop speaking to you of them and instead remind you of my devotion—”

“Alright, that’s enough! Give it here!” Keppel lunged at Marlborough, who laughed and turned away, holding the letter high above his head to continue reading.

“—and I would that I was there with you, to be at your side before you must face those hated creatures, and tell you that you are always loved—”

“My lord!” Keppel climbed up onto the table, but Marlborough turned around again and clutched the paper closely.

“—as I am sure the Countess with you shall never let you forget. As for myself, I can only say that—”

At this Keppel sunk his teeth into Marlborough’s shoulder, prompting Marlborough to drop the letter with a yelp. Keppel leapt forward and took the letter, placing it back on the desk and glaring at Marlborough. He blushed a deep red, down to his snarling lips.

“I think you miss him,” Marlborough unhelpfully observed as he rubbed at his shoulder.

“You know what I miss, my lord?” Now Keppel smiled. “Your silence. Shut the fuck up.” He turned to sit back down, and Marlborough came up behind him, watching him dip his claw into the ink again.

“I see you mentioned the Countess.”

“So I did. I like her very much.” Keppel didn’t look up.

“Why? Because she takes care of him like you would have, if you were in her place?” Marlborough leaned in. “Did you always know it was impossible, this dream of yours?”

Keppel paused, at last lifting his head. “My lord, there was a time when I thought this here would be impossible for me.” He gestured at the letter with a sad laugh. “And now I write this...long, romantic bullshit, and it fools him. He forgets that I’m not from here, but he’ll never forget what I’ve taken from him.” He sighed. “So, nothing, then, must be impossible. Much less my dreams.”

Marlborough placed his hand in between Keppel’s antennae. Perhaps he had taught that terrified boy more than he had intended to, but what he told weren’t entirely lies, either.

✭✭✭

There was a grunting roar from up ahead, a vicious, but high sound that betrayed the youth of the attacker. Marlborough ducked his head and watched, hidden by the branches above him, but never, he knew, out of scent range for the boys.

The one who had roared was his son, who appeared almost like a full tendril-tooth save for his smaller ears and lack of horns. But he fought perfectly, possibly even better because he knew that he had fewer targets on his body than his pure-blooded counterparts. It seemed to Marlborough that everyday in the army he had seen torn, bloodied ears and chipped horns.

One day, perhaps Gloucester would see such injuries, and even experience a few himself. But for now, he was safe in the knowledge that his fight with John was only pretend.

He took it very seriously, however. He rolled swiftly to the side as John lunged forward, narrowly missing the prince as he landed on the grass. He scrambled back up to meet Gloucester’s claws in the air just before they came down on his head. The two batted at each other for a moment before Gloucester bowed his head, butting it against John’s chest. John cried out as he was flung onto the ground, where Gloucester pounced on him, nipping him in the neck.

“There, I won!” he announced. “If that had been a real fight, you would be dead.”

“Indeed,” Marlborough said, finally coming out of his hiding spot. “And why would that be?”

“Because he butted his head against my chest,” John said. He pushed himself easily out from under Gloucester. “An adult Bocca della Verità has very sharp, very large horns, which, if positioned correctly, could kill a man.”

“Correct,” Marlborough said. “And?”

“And then I bit him,” Gloucester replied. “We have venom in our mouths, so any bite could be fatal, but to the neck it is nearly instant!”

“Very good, the both of you,” Marlborough said, dipping his head towards the prince. “You may also think of your tusks as being especially deadly. Their length is unusual; God knows what it will be when you are king.”

“Oh, then I’ll have long, long tusks, just like the Queen.” Gloucester weaved excitedly about Marlborough, his tail wagging all the while. “I recall she had them even longer than Mama! It scared me at first, but she never bit me once.”

“I never saw her bite anyone,” Marlborough said. He searched the prince’s face for a hint of sorrow, but his eyes only seemed to gleam further with pride.

“If I could be as kind as her,” he said, “yet still command respect— that is all I desire.” He twitched one ear dismissively and sat back. “Alas, I know not how much respect this body of mine commands.”

“But you will grow, Highness!” John twined his tail around Gloucester’s.

“As large as your father and as fierce as your mother,” Marlborough added. He recalled Godolphin’s earlier half-formed vision; indeed, every tendril-tooth had seen the same, including Sarah. She claimed that it was less of a true vision and more of a sensation, a deep, sudden understanding of something no one but her husband and Godolphin had seen. To Marlborough, the matter was incomprehensible.

“John!” There she called him now. He looked up as she rushed towards him, leaving a startled Abigail Hill behind her. She was pretty the same way a dull sculpture was, and any personality she might have had was overshadowed by the presence of Sarah. It was always probable, of course, that she didn’t have one at all.

“What is it, my soul?” He laughed as Sarah stopped beside him, bowing low so that she could look him in the eyes.

“By the stars, you let them play too roughly!” She tapped her sharp tail against his chest. “What will the Princess say if she finds out her son tore a claw or landed too hard on the ground? You know very well how fragile his health is.”

“Ah, but this isn't playing.” Marlborough sat down beside the prince, who jumped back in excitement. “And even if it were, such games are necessary for their development. In the wild, animals learn how to hunt and defend themselves this way.”

“Are we wild animals to you, John?” Sarah asked with a playful growl.

“Why...only you.”

“And I suppose that means you are a domesticated one, aren’t you?” she said. “You could have fooled me when I first saw you.” She sat down beside her son, licking him once on the head. “Well, then, show me what you were doing if it wasn’t playing, Johnny.”

“Nay, Mama, we were training,” John said. “His Highness is already very swift.”

“I’ll get swifter still!” Gloucester jumped onto John’s lashing tail, and John yelped, standing up and kicking a talon out. Gloucester hissed and drew back as the claws hit him in the face, and John turned around to swipe down at his head. It knocked the prince easily to the ground with a grunt.

“Did you see that?” John turned towards Sarah with shining eyes, but something bothered Marlborough in the way that Gloucester had fallen. A mere swipe from a juvenile tendril-tooth had never knocked him down.

“Your Highness,” he said, lifting himself up on his knees to examine the fallen prince beside him, “are you well?”

“Yes, my lord,” Gloucester said. Unexpectedly, he crawled forward, lifting up Marlborough’s hand with his head and then letting it rest upon his mane. “I- I’m dizzy. That’s all.”

Though they nearly matched each other in size, the prince suddenly appeared very small to Marlborough, like a child of Forte Solaria. He was not a true beast yet, after all, like his aunt or grandfather, but still a boy, who had only dreamt of battle. One day, as the vision predicted, he would be the fiercest king this planet would ever know, but for now, he was young, lacking the scent of blood in his mouth.

“Then rest for a little while,” Marlborough said. “And you, Johnny, take care not to hit his head again.”

“I can handle it!” Gloucester cried, trying to stand.

Marlborough shook his head. “Not ‘til you’re older. If we can take care to avoid another migraine, then we must.”

“What kind of prince is felled by a single swipe?” John asked, and Sarah cuffed him behind the ear.

“Shut it!” she hissed. “You’re lucky the Princess wasn’t here. What kind of subject abuses their prince so? It was you who attacked him!”

“I only obliged because he attacked first—”

“Enough of that,” Marlborough cut in. “Sarah, they were training. But you,” he went on, glowering down at his son, “must take care of what words to use before your monarch in the future. You would never say that your opponent was weak just because you were strong.”

John sat up taller, his ears pricking up. “I- I see, Papa.”

“Now, tell him you are sorry.”

Rather than simply apologizing, however, John crawled closer to Gloucester, then fell on his back, exposing his armored stomach. Gloucester dipped his head.

“I found no offense, but you’re forgiven, anyhow.”

“Thank you, Your Highness.” John rolled back onto his feet and wagged his tail when he saw his father staring at him.

“By the stars, John, you would have the same look if he had just cut his head off in front of you,” Sarah said. “What is it?”

It was one of the first things he had ever observed when he had first arrived on this planet, and yet he had never gotten used to it, either— their apologies were physical. He recalled seeing the late King James, then Duke of York, falling before his grand brother, asking for forgiveness without words. And how easily it had been granted.

Marlborough shook his head. “Very good, Johnny. You learn quickly.”

His son may have, but as for himself, he knew he never would.

✭✭✭

There were few tendril-tooths that still unsettled Marlborough; even with their unnatural jaws and glowing eyes, he thought he could almost grow to love the species. Besides, it was hard not to love such features when his friends wore them well, when his children were born with the visions of the stars in their eyes and they still loved him with all their power.

And yet one Bocca della Verità he had never understood, though thankfully he was not the only one who felt this way. The Earl of Sunderland was an incomprehensible beast, a creature whose powers of foresight were nearly equal to those of the late Queen, and whose subtle movements confused everybody. When he was pleased, he would shake the spikes on his tail, and when he was angry, his tail would wag madly.

He seemed somewhat partial to Marlborough, however, which so relieved him, as under James’ rule, Sunderland had spoken fondly of the taste of human flesh. He was never the type to ask before snatching something up in his teeth, either, and William didn’t seem to mind the obvious insolence.

Presently Marlborough watched the tendril-tooth eat in front of him, his strange mouth making a mess of the cooked meat. Cooked— why was it cooked? He sat here on a chair too large for him, his eyes aching from having to narrow them against the harsh glow of Sunderland’s gaze, and still he wondered how much monster this monster was.

“I thought your species preferred raw meat,” he said.

“Well, I don’t,” Sunderland said. “I despise a bloody mess on my claws, my lord. But the thrill of the kill is not...lost on me?” He phrased it as a question, for whatever reason, his tendrils curling upwards in a grotesque grin.

“Hunting, as I understand it, is still a messy endeavour,” Marlborough said. Some hunters made it less so, but he had seen how at times the poor prey was so thoroughly dismembered that it would be shameful to bring it into the King’s presence.

“It doesn’t have to be,” Sunderland said. “Not if you kill your prey quickly and cleanly. With our strength, we can always snap the neck rather than tearing out its throat or biting it and leaving it to die later of its infected wounds.” His spikes rattled as he stood from the table. “In short, a death just the way you like it, my lord.”

Did he think he could get his way like this? Marlborough acknowledged his answer with a quick nod, but said nothing.

“Knowing that this food was caught...ethically, as it were, would you not like to have a bite yourself?” Sunderland came up to his side, bowing his head to sniff at Marlborough’s face. “It shames me to think that you are here, without—”

“Please, sir, I already refused once.” Marlborough turned away. “And your shame is only imagined. You know what I came here for.”

“Indeed.” Sunderland drew back. “To refuse me yet another thing— the union of my son and your daughter.”

There he went again, withdrawing into the metaphorical shell that Marlborough had dreaded, and had sought to keep him out of. His ears would relax, his tail would fall limp, every part of him became unreadable until the only emotion you would be able to gauge from him was rage. But there was no way to see how close one was to drawing his ire and venom, so from here on out Marlborough was alone.

“Forgive me, but your son is...” He trailed off. There was no way he could say this kindly.

“I know what my son is,” Sunderland said. “You, however, have said it yourself, many times before— we are still animals, are we not? Uncivilized as compared to the nobility and beauty of the human race.” He reached out to run his claws along a strand of Marlborough’s hair. “I understand why a little one like you would be afraid of seeing your very tame daughter run off with a feral creature such as Charles. But, John,” he breathed, the name sending a shudder through Marlborough, “you deny her what comes naturally to a member of our species.”

“I have denied her nothing,” Marlborough snapped, pushing the invasive talons away. “She has been allowed to grow as if her father were one of you. What I worry about is your son, not her. He is-”

Again Sunderland cut in, his claws coming around Marlborough’s chin to pull him closer until the brightness of his eyes forced the human to close his own. “He is what?”

“He- he only pretends to have inherited your power,” Marlborough said, his hand coming up to grip Sunderland’s wrist as he tried to wrench his head away. Every Asterothiriot, it seemed, would forget their strength when it came to handling him. “What has he seen but his own imagined fortune?”

“Of course, any vision to you must look imagined,” Sunderland said, letting him go. Marlborough fell back, one hand flying up to his neck, where he still felt the sting of the thorn-sharp claws. “Have you ever believed in our powers?”

“I never doubted them,” Marlborough said truthfully. “Nor you. But I am always careful to consider the source.”

“Very well,” Sunderland said. “So you believe in us.”

“Yes.”

“So you must then believe me when I say that I have foreseen a fine wedding, whatever your answer may be,” he went on. “I see you raising my son higher and higher when I am gone. I see that your loyalty to him will not bode well for you nor for your wife.”

“What loyalty?” Marlborough narrowed his eyes. “I know your visions can’t be wrong, but I hesitate to voice what the alternative might be.”

“You think I am lying.”

“There’s no other way to explain it.” Marlborough backed away. “Forgive me, but I know myself better than any vision, and I know that I’d never consent to...this.”

“You try to force your way out of your destiny?” Sunderland barked out a laugh. “You have greatness ahead of you, more than anything you could imagine! If you defy fate now, then when does it end?”

“I never thought you a Calvinist, my lord.”

“Ah, but unlike a Calvinist, I believe that you make your own fortune. Is that not so?” Sunderland dropped down to all fours. “And still the fortune of others. If you obey now, you can become the most powerful human this galaxy will ever see.”

“I don’t see how your son can help me,” Marlborough said. “He has made an enemy of nearly everyone.”

“He’s young,” Sunderland said. “Tell me who didn’t have enemies at his age. And even you now.” He turned away, his tail running under Marlborough’s chin as he did so. “It amuses me that you think you have a choice as a human. If your wife has already resolved on the marriage, then you will obey, either her or fate. But you will obey.”

“If anyone can fight fate, I trust her to do so.” Marlborough shoved Sunderland’s tail away, wincing as the spikes approached his eye. “If your son is truly as in love as you claim he is, then let him prove it to me in time. But I’ll not be shamed nor intimidated by a man who refuses to get blood on his claws even just to feed himself.”

Sunderland stopped, lifting his head, and Marlborough tensed. Was this his anger, then? He swallowed and met the brilliant pink eyes.

Come whatever may, then.

But Sunderland only sighed. “Ah, why should I force fate? You’ll be back here, my lord, whether I wish it or no. And I do.”

“If that be true, then ‘tis not for the same reason,” Marlborough said bitterly. “Is that all? Or do you have something more you wanted to discuss, since my resolution on this is final?”

Sunderland nodded. He sat down, his tail coming around Marlborough’s shoulders and pulling him closer. “I waited to tell you this, and indeed I hesitate to tell you now due to your...defiance of what you know to be true. But the Duke of Gloucester is nearly ten now.”

“That he is,” Marlborough said, though he couldn’t imagine why Sunderland brought the boy up. He had only ever looked upon him with a cold interest, and Marlborough shuddered to think what he already knew of the prince’s future.

“Your wife may have told you this,” Sunderland said, “of the vision all of us shared regarding the prince. We saw nothing that could be taken with either much joy or despair, though, for reasons that escape me, all that I spoke to rejoiced.” He snorted. “It was the most nonsense thing God could have sent us! The prince drenched in blood not his own? Why? He is naught but a child!”

“I was there when the vision was sent,” Marlborough admitted. “And I thought the same. ‘Twas only the sun that shone upon him. That you all read an omen in the stars at that moment meant nothing.”

“I did not say that it meant nothing, my lord, I only said that the meaning it did have was purposely made as confusing as possible.” Sunderland shifted on his claws. “But upon studying what I saw that day in closer detail, and looking even further ahead, I realize now that this omen was not meant for our eyes.”

“I see,” Marlborough lied.

“It was sent to all of us in the hope that one way or another, it would reach you.” Sunderland poked his tail against Marlborough’s cheek. “And so it has.”

“Sir, I- I’m very far removed from this world,” Marlborough said, stepping away and shaking himself. Every touch felt like the prick of a hedgehog’s quill.

“That doesn’t mean that you don’t appear in visions,” Sunderland said, turning to look at him. “I would venture to say that you are the one who appears most frequently in the stars as of late.”

“But a vision meant for me, my lord, that is—”

“Make of it what you will,” Sunderland snapped. “I would have you remember one thing, however.” He lifted his tail and ran his finger across a spike. A dark streak of blue appeared just under the claw, dripping down onto his wrist as he raised his talon up towards Marlborough.

“‘Tis human blood that is as red as the mother star. Not ours.”

✭✭✭

Having had his eyes shut for so long in the past, Marlborough knew well what the approach of certain Asterothiriots sounded like. This one was the easiest, with the sound of scrambling claws, heavy breaths in between— it was the Prince of Denmark.

He looked up and saw the huge Canis magnetar as he entered, licking his whiskers as he sniffed the air. “I heard we were making William’s mask today. I couldn’t miss that!”

Marlborough dipped his head in his direction. “Have you brought your own, Your Highness?”

“Ah- well, yes—” George turned around, his tail wagging slightly at the sight of his wife. She held a mask in her hands, presumably her husband’s.

“Maybe think twice of running up ahead next time,” she laughed, handing him the mask. “William, do you not think it is too soon? Your papa made his own when he was fourteen.”

Gloucester at last looked up from his place at the table. He had splinters of wood buried in his tusks and claws, and his fingers were stained with the ink that he had used to draw his design. Beside him, Bishop Burnet flipped the pages of a large book, showing the boy some of the older, more popular designs that the Canis magnetar typically liked to use for their masks. His tendrils twitched upon the entrance of the Prince and Princess as if he had just smelled something foul.

“No, Mama, the time is just right,” Gloucester replied. “Who in this galaxy has the power to defy the heart-eaters? ‘Tis the magnetar dogs! Bishop Burnet says that Papa’s species can harness their magnetic fields such that they can even control the presence of those ghosts.”

“Naturally, it depends on the person,” Burnet muttered, but Gloucester seemed no less enthusiastic. He held up the wooden mask he had been carving out. Just last year, he had started to learn how to cut and shape wood with his talons, in preparation for this very moment.

The mask, of course, was messy, and looked quite dangerous to wear in Marlborough’s opinion, but both George and Anne seemed delighted. George ran to his side and leaned over the table, his tail wagging so hard it swatted Marlborough in the face.

“Oh, ‘tis very beautiful,” he said. “How will you paint it?”

“I- I want it red and gold,” Gloucester said, his ears flicking back bashfully. “Like my Lord Marlborough’s uniform.”

“Unnatural colors!” George leapt back, nearly colliding with Marlborough in his shock. “Have you given any thought to this beforehand?”

“I can assure you that he has, Your Highness,” Marlborough said. “And he’s convinced that the design is possible. I trust him,” he added, seeing George snap his jaws in the air, “as a hybrid of the Canis magnetar and as a student of the Bishop.”

“Then I do as well,” Anne said. “George, show him your mask.” She flicked her heavy tail at Marlborough, beckoning him closer. “My lord, a word.”

“Yes?” Marlborough looked up at her, standing almost as tall as her father. Her presence, however, relaxed him more than it exhausted him, and she never asked anything unreasonable. At least, not of him, he liked to think. With Sarah was a different matter, but she was happy enough to obey her Princess, no matter the order.

“William is but a hybrid,” she said. “And as of now, he’s had no visions. If God wills it, his powers are only delayed, but...” The spikes on her tail shook slightly. “Our King is a hybrid as well, whose mother was a Bocca della Verità.”

“And he has no such powers,” Marlborough finished.

“Indeed.” Anne gave him a tentative smile. “I thank God for it, but he also lacks the powers of his father. No gift of foresight, nor silk in his wrists...” Her eyes widened. “What if it is the same with my son? If he inherits neither of our powers, what then? We don’t yet know if he has the magnetic field.”

“I believe that as long as he has the same eyes as his father,” Marlborough said, “his powers will show. That is, after all, how the mask binds itself to his face and body.”

“I hope you’re right,” Anne said, glancing at Gloucester. “I wouldn’t like to have lied to him this whole time. I thank you.” She tapped her tail lightly on Marlborough’s shoulder before bounding back towards her son. He was occupied with carving out designs onto the mask, though at times his father had to use his own sharper claws to cut into the wood.

This, too, was beyond Marlborough. He watched the excited boy from some distance away, always having to move this way and that to avoid the wagging tails. It was only when Gloucester looked up at him expectantly that he approached.

“My lord,” he said, “how do you fight the heart-eaters?”

“Well, to that there are many answers—”

“No, my lord, how do you fight them?” Gloucester asked. “You’re a human, with no venom nor visions nor anything. I know you can see them, but they can’t be hurt at all, can they? Not without gamma radiation.”

“No, but there are ways to ward them off,” Marlborough explained. “For that, we need the strength of every Asterothiriot— the tendril-tooths and their visions, the magnetar dogs and their masks, and the Defenders and their hivemind. There are even heart-eaters here who want to help us, who know the weaknesses of their species well.”

“God knows there are few,” Gloucester said ruefully. “So is that how you fight them? By commanding us on the field?”

“When they have enough robots to control, yes. But we rarely fight true heart-eaters on the field.” Marlborough laughed uneasily at the thought. “Their invasions work from within, as they destroy and infect the codes of our devices.” He gestured at one of the computer screens that had taken the place of a window not too long ago, which Burnet used often for his lessons. “From there, they are even more powerful than they would be if we fought them conventionally.”

“The Sun King can eat stars, though,” Gloucester said. His tail twitched nervously. “Could he do that with our planet?”

“Oh, could he?” George’s ears pricked up.

“Of course not, you two.” Anne rolled her eyes. “There is enough nuclear energy on this planet to kill him if the foolish idea ever came to him.”

Marlborough nodded. “The most powerful repellent, after gamma radiation, is your magnetic field. So if you finish this...” He tapped the mask that Gloucester held. “You will have nothing to fear.”

“Indeed, they will fear me in turn,” Gloucester said, his eyes glittering. “The moment that I put this on, they know to hail William IV!” He placed his mask over his eyes with a fierce growl.

Though Marlborough had expected the transformation, it was still always a surprise to see a Canis magnetar activate its field. Gloucester bowed his head, his claws keeping the mask held up to his face as something like a halo appeared around his head, glowing for a moment before disappearing.

“Oh, thank God,” Anne breathed.

But her relief only lasted for so long, as Gloucester suddenly dug his claws yet deeper into the mask. His other hand reached out to grip the table. A shudder ran from his ears to the tip of his tail, and then he tossed his head back with a shriek.

“William!” Anne instantly swung her tail around him and brought him closer. “What is it? Does it hurt?”

It must have, Marlborough realized, for he saw that the prince’s tail was growing dusky brown fur in place of its spikes, as were his ears, though they began to flop over as if the weight were too much for them. Much like the ears upon his father’s head.

“Of course!” Burnet hissed, coming up around Gloucester. “This child appears to be nearly a pure-blooded Bocca della Verità. To put on a mask and change so drastically could very possibly break some bones.”

“Then we must stop it at once,” Anne said. She licked anxiously at her son’s face as he convulsed in her arms, his cries sounding less human to Marlborough by the moment.

“Your Highness,” Burnet said, turning to George. “You may stop this by using your own magnetic field. It is stronger than his and will allow you to pull the mask off in the midst of the transformation.”

“I- I was thinking of it,” George said hastily. He placed his mask on his face, the same halo appearing around his head for a moment. His fur became bushier and caused him to appear much larger. He curled his lip back, revealing the sharper canines and extra teeth that grew there. He fell forward with a huff and took Gloucester in his paws.

The air felt heavier around Marlborough as he observed them, as George buried his teeth into Gloucester’s mask and began to pry it off. It was surely the conflict of the two fields, binding father and son together, though Marlborough knew that there was nowhere else George would rather be, anyway.

Poor child, he thought. Anne had been right to worry; if this was to be the transformation every time, Gloucester would never inherit his father’s powers, either.

Hail William IV. Marlborough repeated the phrase to himself. He heard the prince fall silent at last, and he looked up, realizing that the beat of his heart had become almost painful.

“How is he?” he asked, stepping closer.

Gloucester rested in his father’s arms, his whole body shaking as he sniffed, wiping futilely at the tears on his face. Anne lapped soothingly at his head, squeezing his hand in her own. The boy glanced up at Marlborough and swallowed.

“If I shall inherit the kingdoms, then England is in danger, my lord,” he whispered.

“Never,” Marlborough answered in the same volume. “The King has no such powers, either, and yet the planet remains. I am a mere human, but I remain.”

“And how? How have you done it?”

At this Marlborough dropped his gaze to the floor with a rueful smile. “That, Your Highness,” he said, “I cannot say.”

✭✭✭

The Duke of Gloucester recovered well, for the wounds left afterwards were only imaginary. The King had seemed rather disappointed in his letters, though not as much in the boy as he was with Anne, for reasons Marlborough couldn’t fathom.

But he was pleased enough with everything else he had heard of Gloucester’s education, and so Marlborough kept him on the same path as before. He watched him hunt and fight from afar, listened to the intensity of Burnet’s lessons from behind the door, wore the discarded mask as Gloucester instructed, for the simple joy of seeing it used. If no otherworldly powers could affect Marlborough, then he didn’t see why he couldn’t indulge the prince on occasion.

What was curious to him was when Gloucester would drill his little army of tendril-tooth boys, fierce creatures that appeared more aggressive to Marlborough than their adult counterparts. He thought they might have liked him, but they were rather too rough and too curious for his tastes. They would nip at his fingers, sniff him everywhere, and knock him over with enthusiastic pounces, very unlike the usual care that his son would show him.

They liked him enough so that Gloucester began to use him as a sort of reward— obey me well, he said, and the human is all yours for the rest of the night. Marlborough didn’t mind this so much, for all they demanded was tales of the human galaxies and the occasional play-fight with him. What he minded more was a hint of the prince’s grandfather whenever he made such deals, and he thought again and again of what Sunderland had said to him.

Human blood is red. It had been so long since he had cared to acknowledge the scars on his thighs every time he dressed, and yet now they seemed to sting all over again. As red as the mother star.

And tendril-tooth blood is blue. As blue as the sea.

His eyes, as blue as the sea.

He was too relieved to forget this when he watched the boys train, and afterwards when he sat on the grass with them after a successful hunt. Gloucester would speak of whatever the imagined victory of the day had won them before curling up beside Marlborough, resting his head on his lap with his tail thumping the ground. He said that he liked the human’s hands, that they were softer than even his father’s paws.

It was during one of these sunsets that Gloucester told Marlborough his intention to take his little troop scouting elsewhere, where they could get used to fighting in a different environment and tasting unfamiliar scents. Upon overhearing this, John shot upwards and bounded towards them.

“Will we go somewhere, Your Highness?” he asked. He was now taller than his father, and attempted to be just as stern, but the way he seemed ready to pounce at everything that moved did not convince Marlborough just yet.

“You nosy boy, you weren’t meant to hear,” he scolded him playfully, pushing back on his son’s teeth as he stepped closer. “Sit down, if you must, since you’re already here.”

John obeyed, and Gloucester lifted his head from Marlborough’s lap. “To answer your question, yes, Churchill, we shall. I know not where, though,” he added, glancing back at his governor.

“I know of a place,” Marlborough said thoughtfully. “There is an abandoned nuclear power plant not far off from here. We mustn’t go in, but there are many discarded robot parts around the place that will make it difficult to smell anything natural. ‘Tis hard to battle in such conditions, but I have done it, and so you must learn, as well.”

“A power plant?” Gloucester tilted his head to the side. “Pray tell, why would we ever abandon such a source?”

“Long before your existence was ever thought of, the planet was in civil war,” Marlborough explained. “Which, I am sure, the Bishop has taken care to teach you.” He paused as Gloucester nodded, then continued. “Many power plants were destroyed in the process, or rendered useless by tampering or error or simply deemed unsafe after the chaos. This particular plant had nothing wrong with it, but the removal of certain software and securities in place made it susceptible to heart-eater attacks.”

“Was France not our ally then?” John asked.

“Indeed, but there are some places where we never want them to go,” Marlborough said. “So we left it as it was and it became something of a mass grave for old or defective robots.”

“So no one will bother us there,” Gloucester said, sitting up. “I have decided. We shall go there!” He wagged the tip of his tail. “But when?”

“Nay, must you make a decision now?” Marlborough laughed. He reached out to ruffle the growing mane. “I shall make you a deal, Your Highness. Your birthday comes soon, so you mustn’t wait for long— following it, I will take you there myself, just you, so you can see if it suits your purposes.”

“I doubt that it will not, my lord,” Gloucester said. “I trust you.”

“Oh, ‘tis a nasty place,” Marlborough said. “You might be surprised.”

Indeed, the prince didn’t have to wait long at all, for he was eleven years old just the following month. He was becoming a fine creature, as obstinate as his mother. He already showed, too, the beauty that befit the Stuarts, though his was less ominous and more sweet, innocent.

Still, his youth was shown more clearly to Marlborough that night, when he was surrounded by his adoring family and the curious courtiers, who all so dwarfed the prince with their magnificent horns and overgrown claws. If only William was there, to see how graciously Gloucester behaved towards them. Perhaps he could learn a thing or two.

But, as for himself, Marlborough was glad to be rid of William for the moment. Nearly every celebration at court before this had him be something of a decoration, listening in on every conversation but never welcomed by the King. Those nights were long, exhausting him more than any battle could. How strange it was to be so fearful of his own silence.

No, tonight the art was in the sky. The fireworks startled Gloucester at first, the spikes on his tail standing straight up as he ducked behind his father, but after a while he watched them with full attention. His wide, blank eyes reflected the stars.

“If hydrogen bombs were so beautiful,” he breathed, “we would all be dead, and I would blame no one.”

Afterwards, he was brought inside to dine with his guests; he was particularly proud of being the one who fed them with some of the larger animals he had caught. Marlborough watched them eat from a distance, having already done the same himself. The scent of blood reached him even from that distance.

“See him now,” Sunderland said as he came up beside him, nudging him with his nose. “The little prince so covered in red as we saw him then.”

Marlborough swallowed. Indeed, Gloucester’s face was stained with the blood of his food, though not to the concerning degree Marlborough might have imagined. Was that all the vision meant? That the prince would be as skilled a hunter as his uncle?

“Watch closely over him tonight.” Sunderland bowed his head. “For a deadly, unseen virus spreads through our planet like fire. I’d not like the King to be so incapacitated by another spell of that excessive grief of his.”

“What are you saying?” Marlborough’s eyes widened with outrage and bewilderment as he turned to face Sunderland. “Will- will he fall ill? Shall I take him somewhere?”

“I cannot tell you what to do, can I?” The tendril-tooth rattled the spikes on his tail and turned away. “No one can.”

A sickness that hit the prince hard enough very well had the strength to kill him; he was not yet as strong as every other boy his age. But Marlborough couldn’t imagine how or why it should happen here, when he was so happy and blissfully safe from all danger. He knew, though, that he also couldn’t afford to be blinded by the circumstances. Sickness came whenever it liked.

After the dinner he watched the Asterothiriots dance with growing unease, watching Gloucester as he weaved through the talons of dozens of guests around him. He seemed well enough, and yet—

“John, what are you doing?” Sarah bent over to nudge his cheek with her head. “You look ill. I told you that you don’t have to be here when we eat—”

“No, not that,” her husband said, looking away with a sigh. “Do you remember the vision your species had, but two years ago? About the prince.”

“Yes,” Sarah said. “Why do you think of it now?”

Marlborough hesitated. “Sunderland warned me that- that there is a virus of some sort— I know not what it is, but he seemed to tell me that the prince’s life is at risk because of it. Someone might carry it here...” He looked around. “Have you been warned of anything as of late?”

“Nothing about His Highness,” Sarah said, her ears twitching in surprise. “Nor have I heard anyone say a thing. Oh!” She straightened up. “The Princess did tell me before the fireworks began that she felt the strangest thing for a moment, that the aura of a dreadful vision had swept over her, but had disappeared as quickly as it had arrived. She knew not what it meant.”

“Well, then.” Marlborough glanced at Gloucester again. “I’d like to take him far away from here.”

“Wise,” Sarah said, “but Heaven knows if the Princess Anne will allow an end to the celebrations so early.”

“The warning came from Sunderland, so she must have reason to believe it,” Marlborough said. “I think she will.”

“Very well, then I shall tell her.” Sarah looked around for a moment before ducking to kiss her husband on the head. “It might displease her now, but she’ll be grateful later. You might have saved his life.”

“I hope I have,” Marlborough replied with another anxious glance at Gloucester. He was starting to feel dizzy, his head heavy. Perhaps she was right and the scent of the blood had gotten to him. He needed to get both himself and the prince out of here.

“Oh, John.” Sarah reached down to run her claws through his hair, her tail twining around his body. “Truly, what is it? I’ve never seen you worry like this, not since- since his reign. Or are you the one who is ill?” She dropped her hand down to touch it lightly against his cheek.

“N-No, my love, I only—” He leaned into the touch and sighed again. “I would that I had visions like yours. That I may protect everyone who is in need of it.”

“But look at you!” Sarah stepped back. “You never know what lies ahead of you, yet you carry on as if you did. Men would gouge out their all-seeing eyes for a fraction of your ability.” She brought his hand up to her lips, kissing it gently as she glanced to the side. “I must go speak to the Princess now. Be safe.”

She left him there alone, his body shaking slightly, feeling as exposed as if he were made to be artwork, after all. Now this was embarrassing; what a fool he was, being so frightened by something that may or may not happen, when all he had ever known was to be fearless.

Surely they all smelled what he had been told was the sickening scent of fear, but, once again, it was only Gloucester who addressed it. He trotted merrily over to Marlborough with his tail wagging.

“My lord! Does this not please you?” he asked.

“Yes,” Marlborough let out in a rush. “Yes, but it- it would please me more if— if Your Highness would remember how I promised that we would scout out the nuclear power plant after your birthday.” He bowed his head a little. “Now we shall.”

“Oh, can we? Right now?” Gloucester blinked in surprise. “Should I not tell my mama first, I’m sure—”

“I am your governor, and I say ‘tis very well,” Marlborough said. He took Gloucester’s hand in his own. “Think of this as an assessment. I will see how you track, how you hunt, perhaps even how you fight a real battle if we come across a larger animal. God willing, we shall not,” he added hastily upon seeing Gloucester lash his tail, “but it is now or never. You can take your troop there tomorrow if all goes well.”

“Tomorrow,” Gloucester repeated. He looked back at his mother, then shrugged his shoulders as if he were relieving some tension from them. “Very well. Let us go. Papa shall entertain them, he always does.”

They both waited until they were out of everyone’s sight, then hurried out while Sunderland was still the only one who watched them. Marlborough didn’t think too much about it; after all, the warning had come from him.

“‘Tis a strange time to leave,” Gloucester said as he bounded out under the stars, shaking himself. “Is something wrong, my lord? Why must we be so discreet?”

Clever boy. Marlborough fixed his gaze up ahead as he answered.

“No, but- but there might be. Worry not, however, I think we shall outrun it.”

“But if something is wrong, will my mama be safe?” Gloucester glanced behind him, then stopped in his tracks. “I will only go if you promise me she will be safe, and Papa, too.”

“With all my heart, I do swear it.” Marlborough bowed low. He prayed it would convince the prince, or he would be forced to tell him of Sunderland’s warning. And what good would it be to frighten Gloucester?

“Well...I did say that I trusted you.” Gloucester started walking again, and Marlborough followed him, relieved. “How far is this place, my lord?”

“We must go through your hunting grounds,” Marlborough said. “But we must be careful, the nocturnal beasts are more like to attack than their diurnal counterparts.”

“I will defeat them all,” Gloucester declared.

“I trust that you can, but ‘tis better to avoid an unnecessary fight.”

One moon was full, and two others had nearly caught up to it, so the prince’s eyes were thankfully not the only lanterns that lit their path. This time he seemed not at all interested in stealth as he crashed through the bushes and knocked his tail against the trees, likely scaring away any animals that may have been ahead. It must have been intentional.

It was a while before Gloucester spoke again, when the full moon had creeped ever higher above them. “I- I cannot smell as well here. Are we almost there?”

“We must be,” Marlborough said. By now he was starting to regret this; it was too dark and too late for someone the prince’s age to be out here. He might have retired to bed instead, and hide away safely under his covers, rather than run so far into unfamiliar territory like a common spy with a human as his only protection. The most extraordinary human this galaxy had ever seen, to be sure, but a human nonetheless.

You could have done this tomorrow, he scolded himself. But they were here now, and the prince seemed determined to press on.

“I smell water nearby,” Gloucester announced after another long silence. “There is something about it, though...”

“There’s an old pond here that the tendril-tooths dug out early on,” Marlborough said, remembering just in time before Gloucester ran up ahead to see it. “At first it was clean, but it has become such a mess of parts and oil that I advise you not to approach it. Even touching it would be dangerous— the water is conductive and it has electrical currents running through it that could burn you.” He reached out to pull back on Gloucester’s tail. “So stay away from it.”

“Oh, I promise I shall! Hurry, now, I’d not like our scents to be tracked here.” Gloucester scurried under the branches, and Marlborough followed him, hearing the flutter of a startled Cryptovolans above.

They came to the said pond, surrounded by hills of robot endoskeletons and armor alike, broken limbs and spent batteries piled together and leaking their contents into the water. The moon shone unnaturally off of the metal, which reached for what looked like dozens of tail-lengths around. If the trees grew here, Marlborough would say that they had almost become part of the natural order of things, but that was not the case.

“I like it here,” Gloucester said beside him, stalking forward on all fours. “There’s a lot of space to fight. And here, too, an unwitting enemy could fall.” He gestured to the pond with his tail. “I suppose the best point would be from one of the hills, right?”

“Yes, but don’t—”

Gloucester began to climb up the many robot parts, kicking down eyeballs and fingers behind him. “You, my lord, come up here! I’ll try to beat you back. My theory is that once you’ve made it all the way up, there is nothing that can take you from this spot.”

“Why is that?” Marlborough asked. He began to climb up the same hill that Gloucester had perched upon.

“Because of this!” Gloucester turned around and kicked at the parts underneath his talons. A heavy arm tumbled down towards Marlborough, causing the bolts he stood on to slide under his feet and nearly knock him over. He jumped off before the arm could reach him, wincing at the thump it made as it landed at its final resting place on the ground. That would have hurt.

“Very good,” Marlborough called up to him. “What moves should you use from such a position?”

“A high strike!” Gloucester demonstrated it by swiping his claws downwards through the air. “Right on their faces will make them run! But if they get closer, then I can kick them with the sickle-claw, like horses do.” He bent over on his arms and kicked out both legs behind him.

“Is that what we shall practice tomorrow?”

“Yes, that is—” Gloucester paused, his ears pricking up. “Oh, I can see the power plant from here!” He began to jump back towards the ground, but his claws slid out under him and caused him to practically roll down the hill instead. He seemed unaffected as he got back up, however, if a little shaky around his tail and legs. “May we go see?”

“I don’t consider it safe,” Marlborough said. He wondered if it was high time to return yet; the body parts here unnerved him more than he cared to admit. “Are you well, Your Highness?”

“Yes, so we should go!” Gloucester hopped from side to side like an excited dog. “Please, my lord, you know that I’ve always listened to you. I’ll stay right beside you.”

“Very well,” Marlborough sighed. “But if we go see it now, then we must go back immediately after. We’ve spent too long here already.”

“By the stars, we just got here! Come, come, then!” Gloucester nudged him forward, and Marlborough laughed and obeyed his prince.

It was a longer walk than he had anticipated, and he began to notice Gloucester yawning on the way there. But he seemed to shake off all exhaustion when they arrived at the crumbling building.

“It looks endless,” he said, looking from left to right. “And- and I smell water here, too, even over everything.” He tilted his head up and opened his mouth as if he were tasting the air. “‘Tis a very strong scent.”

“Nuclear energy uses water, of course,” Marlborough said. “Both to cool the fuel rods, and to store them. But I don’t see why there should still be any of it in use here.” He stepped through the large, shattered glass doors, Gloucester following close behind, and stifled a gasp upon seeing the abandoned reactor just outside the building. It obscured the sky that would have been so splendidly visible above the collapsed walls and ceiling, and just beyond it lay the even larger cooling tower.

“Would you look at that?” Gloucester ran up the noisy metal stairs that spiralled upwards, all the way to the top of the building. “It looks glorious from up here!”

“Get down, Your Highness, you swore you would be with me!” Marlborough called after him. “And who knows how well these stairs can hold you up.” He sounded more anxious than he intended, but such were his true feelings. This place was not meant to be disturbed, he could sense it.

“The stairs continue downwards!” Gloucester cried as he hurried down the steps, Marlborough’s heart skipping a beat every time he heard the boy’s talons slide for too long. “I see something down there. Can we go?”

“Very well, but then we must go back!” Marlborough joined him on the stairs, descending to the next floor, then the next, and the next.

The prince stopped abruptly in front of him, and Marlborough nearly stumbled over him. He was about to scold him, but he found himself silenced in awe when he saw the massive pool glowing in front of them. It seemed so large that it could have stored a couple of the King’s departing ships.

“So this is where it came from,” Gloucester said. He hopped onto the floor, slipping against the metal grating. Marlborough ran hastily after him. “What is this, my lord?”

“The spent fuel pool,” Marlborough answered. “I would have thought they had emptied it before they abandoned it.” He leaned over the railing, narrowing his eyes against his reflection before looking up again. There was a control station just on the other side of the pool, though the numerous screens were cracked and showed nothing but the radiation in the water.

With a pang of deep, primal fear, he realized there was a peculiar sound still coming from the station. The water was still, and thus silent, but over everything there was a sound like a dying animal, a high-pitched, brief little groan that repeated every five seconds or so. Were they the death knells of the machine?

“I don’t like it here,” he confessed to the prince, who was currently trying to reach the water with his talons. Marlborough sighed and pulled him back. “Did you hear me?”

“Yes, I—” Gloucester paused. “Do you hear that? Is it coming from the water?” He turned in the direction of the control station. “I would have heard it from the other floor. Has it only just started?”

“It comes from there.” Marlborough nodded at the cracked screens. “Did you truly not hear it before?”

“No.” Gloucester shook his head. “It sounds...like something not of this planet.”

The sound went on, impossible to make sense of in Marlborough’s mind. He might have called it beeping if it had not sounded so biological. He might have called it a humming if it did not stop so often.

“Are you ready to leave now?” he asked, turning to Gloucester.

“I- I suppose.” The prince kept his gaze on the screens, however, moving only when Marlborough nudged his shoulder. “My lord, I- there is something dripping from the cracks.”

“What?” Marlborough looked up, narrowing his eyes. He couldn’t see it from here, but he guessed that Gloucester had a sharper gaze. “How—”

“Your Highness!” A booming voice echoed throughout the room, causing even the water to ripple slightly. Marlborough instantly brought Gloucester in closer as the screens began to flicker on, making clear effort through the static and colorful, messy lines. He knew what this was— nay, who this was.

The screens buzzed and buzzed until they suddenly stopped, flashing black before dozens of red eyes appeared all over them. They blinked down at Marlborough and the prince.

“Your Majesty,” Marlborough greeted him dryly in French, bowing low.

“Your Majesty?” Gloucester repeated with a squeak.

“Oh, little prince,” King Louis said, his eyes appearing to soften. “What an offering you bring me, Monsieur Churchill. Yourself, the human who has been such a thorn in my side...and the Protestant heir.” A grin began to slowly spread across the bottom of the screen.

“He will leave now. Both of us will.” Marlborough stood up taller. “And you can forget that you saw us here. There is a peace, and I trust you will not violate it.”

“Ah, but how often I have waited for a chance such as this!” Louis cried. “Must you leave so soon? I have been dying to meet this illustrious Duke of Gloucester.” His multiple gazes darted rapidly around the room. “Have you not brought your son?”

“No,” Marlborough said. “And I never will. Good night, Your Majesty.” He turned around and began to lead the astonished Gloucester up the stairs, only for a couple of rusted nails to fall down the steps towards them. Marlborough then caught sight of a strange, misshapen android dragging itself towards them with its four arms down the stairs, complete with an old, tangled wig and a partially revealed endoskeleton. Its sharp teeth went nearly all the way around its head, and its jaws seemed to be repeated down at its belly, out of which a metal tongue dangled and hit the stairs.

It lifted its faceless head, a mess of wires with nothing recognizable save for the mouth. Marlborough backed away as the robot stood upright on its twisted legs, lurching forward in Gloucester’s direction. Gloucester yelped and hid behind Marlborough, the spikes on his tail shaking fearfully.

“What’s the matter, prince? Were you not excited to challenge me before?” The King’s voice came from both the screens and the robot, which moved the mouth on its stomach rather than the one on its face. “You want to be like him, do you not? William. My William!” His voice was becoming garbled by echoing, distorted laughs, but they stopped abruptly when he next spoke. “Once upon a time, I had him.”

“So I’ve heard,” Gloucester said with a nervous growl. “But you’ll not have me, sir.” He glanced at Marlborough, who was glaring at the screens. There was no way to fight him through those, as it seemed they were no longer functional and only served as a vessel for Louis. No, there had to be another way. Another answer that tempted him.

“Oh, Your Highness.” The robot took another step towards Gloucester. “There has never been anything in this galaxy that I wanted that I couldn’t have. Of course,” he added with a low hiss, “that doesn’t mean that your human friend here has not tried to stop me. It will be such a relief to finally have that body for myself and see what my dear brother James saw in it.”

“What is he talking about?” Gloucester bared his teeth and let out a ferocious bark. “You leave us alone! It is as my lord said; there is a peace!”

“Peace!” Louis scoffed, letting out a hideous laugh through the robot. “Tales for children. Why, should I let both of you live just to challenge me again later? There will be no peace in the universe until I rule it.” He raised the claws of the robot, wickedly curving towards the sky much like the sickle-claw of the tendril-tooths.

“Your Highness, I need you to get as far away from here as possible,” Marlborough said urgently, turning to Gloucester.

“But you-”

“Please, do not be afraid for me.” Marlborough pushed the hair from the prince’s face. “You can’t fight a heart-eater yet. When we return, I’ll teach you. But you must run, as far as you can, and never look back. There are robots up there he might be able to take control of, so you must take care to be especially swift.”

“I- I don’t—” Gloucester hesitated, and in that moment the robot lunged at him, snapping its jaws in the air right by the prince. Gloucester cried out and scurried to the side as Louis batted at his waving tail, trying to follow him up the stairs. For all the limbs the robot had, however, it seemed to have trouble crawling up them.

“Your quarrel is with me, Louis!” Marlborough spat at the screens once the prince had disappeared. “Leave the damn boy alone.”

The robot turned its great head towards him. “So it is. But it is best to kill a friend before he becomes an enemy, is that not so? You would know.”

“I’ve never once thought of killing a child,” Marlborough said. He slipped off his coat as the words rang in his head.

Killing a child. Killing a child. A deadly, unseen virus.

Sunderland and his cryptic prophecies! Virus, indeed, these heart-eaters as they devoured strings of code— but what deceit that monster played with. Had he intended to lead Marlborough to this very moment?

“What are you doing, you infernal human?” Louis’ eyes disappeared from the screen, being replaced by a huge, taunting grin. “Come to strip for me like you did for King James?”

No matter. Marlborough glared back at him as he kicked off his shoes. He was out of practice here, but at least it wouldn’t be the radiation that killed him, if anything did. He took a few deep breaths, and with the last one, the longest, he leaned over the railing and dove into the pool.

Distantly he was aware of Louis’ bewildered hisses above the surface, but he ignored them and swam deeper, fighting against the urging of the water to push him back up again and his own treacherous shaking. Though he kept his eyes shut, he tried to remember how the pool had looked before he had jumped in. The glowing had come from the very bottom, where the spent fuel rods were kept. As long as he could reach the bottom, he could find them.

He began to feel the weight of the water on him at last, pushing him down further. His ears, too, began to feel the pressure, so he lifted a hand and held his nostrils shut, attempting to exhale through them. He realized he had severely underestimated how long this would take, but at least Gloucester would have more time to get away.

He stopped when his hand hit something hard, and he could see the blue glow through his eyelids. He reached out and felt along the solid— yes, here was a rod, many of them. Perhaps there was a smaller one, though, like the ones that were used in robots rather than reactors. These were much too large to carry. He swam to the side, feeling along the rods until he came to one that ended rather abruptly. He pulled on it to break it free from the rod assembly, stifling a hiss of pain at the heat on his hands. At the very least, he knew he wouldn’t freeze here.

The rod seemed to be light enough. He pushed himself back up and began to ascend, though it was made difficult by the continual sinking of the rod in his hand. He couldn’t go up too quickly, he knew, but he only had so much time.

Oh, Your Highness, you must be very, very far away from here. He began to exhale slightly upon feeling the pressure begin to ease, and finally gasped as he threw his head out of the water, his eyes flying open.

He was met with the robot glaring down at him just over the railing, reaching out with its claws as Marlborough surfaced. They hooked onto his hair, but he merely wrenched his head away and swung as hard as he could against the robot’s face with the rod.

There was a true, inhuman shriek from Louis as he fell back, his hand coming up to hold the head that had nearly been knocked off his neck. “What- but- but how—?!” he snarled, the screens going fully red and illuminating the whole room. “I’ve heard the rumors, but you are a mere human!”

Marlborough dragged himself out of the pool, the rod clanging against the railing as he climbed over it. “Well, on the planet where I was born,” he began with what he knew was a nasty smile, “we have long learned the concept of survival of the fittest. Generations of nuclear warfare have created millions of humans like me, who don’t give a flying fuck about what you send in those fancy-ass IGBMs!” He raised the rod high above him, but the robot jumped out of the way before he could hit its face again.

“So you think you’re clever, hah?” Louis barked. “I may feel all the pain, but you can’t kill me from in here.”

“Killing two kings would be quite a feat for me,” Marlborough said. “Even I would not dare, Your Majesty.”

“‘Tis rather bold of you to take credit for that great king’s death.” The robot backed away with another loud hiss. “Did you send us Lord Portland for that reason? Just to see the Asterothiriot who raised you so high be brought so low?” It dropped down on all six of its limbs, its tongue screeching as it dragged along the floor.

“Do you think I owe him everything for that?”

“Why, yes, that is how all of this works.” Louis raised the hindquarters of the robot and then leapt forward. Marlborough ducked low and tried to roll to the side, but the teeth came down on one of his legs before he could do so.

“Ah—!” He tried to stifle any subsequent sound from his mouth as the robot shook the limb fiercely in its jaws, still speaking as it did so.

“Do you truly hold grudges for so long?” he asked. “Oh, what did he do to you? Gave you everything that you have today? And all he asked was that you serve him like a proper human should.” He tore his head to the side, and Marlborough tossed his head back with a brief scream. The claws came up to pin one of his arms to the side, the one that held the rod. “Now, give me that.”

“No!” Marlborough sat up swiftly, ripping his arm out from under the heavy claws. He could tell he had accidentally drawn blood, and lots of it, but he was too angry to care for pain at the moment. He brought the rod down on Louis’ head again, and again, and again, hitting him harder with each time. It caused the jaws to close more securely around his leg, but once again, he couldn’t care less.

“Damned human—! Enough!” Louis at last drew away from his leg, and Marlborough took the chance to stand, though he felt as if his leg would shatter under him as he did so. The robot sat up, clawing at his waist like a lion catching its prey from behind. Marlborough then turned around and drove the rod straight through the wires on its head.

It was the King’s turn to scream, again, and Marlborough pulled the rod out with some effort, kicking the robot away with his good leg. As its head landed on the ground, Marlborough brought the rod back down into it, pinning it there. Louis screeched and thrashed, his claws digging into Marlborough’s arms, until at last he began to fall still, indeed like the dying animal he had sounded like when they had arrived.

“I never meant for Portland to kill James,” Marlborough snapped. “Let it be known that there are no favors owed simply because he did. I made my own fortune then, like I made it before, and I shall make it forever after!” He tore the rod back out and began to slam it relentlessly against the robot’s entire body instead, tears coming to his eyes as he did so. “And thus I killed him!”

The robot fell limp, and Marlborough looked up just in time to see Louis retreating into his screen, his physical form flying fearfully through the air. He glanced back in horror as Marlborough swung the rod out towards the control station, throwing it with all his strength against the middle screen. It landed just where he had aimed, the end of it sticking straight out of the center and shattering the rest of the screen.

“No one will ever harm that boy!” Marlborough roared after the fleeing King, who hissed and backed away from the screen, his ghostly, monstrous body glitching in and out of existence itself with the radiation that surrounded him. “Do you hear me, Your Majesty? Leave, or you will watch me dive back into this pool here, and this time I’ll bring a rod to kill you.”

Louis flicked what were currently his four ears back, all one hundred of his eyes widening. “You are a fool, Churchill,” he breathed, and then fled up the stairs in the form of a Forte Solarian stag.

Fool? Fool yourself. Marlborough leaned back on the railing as he slipped his shoes back on, drawing his coat about himself. The blood running out of him was warm, but it still caused him to shudder as it leaked through his wet clothes. He had to get back, with Gloucester safely at his side.

Ah, of course, he had to follow Gloucester. He began to climb laboriously up the stairs, wincing at the intensifying stinging in his calf. The wound wasn’t very deep, but nowhere near shallow, either.

He limped outside, into the woods, a chill running down his spine when he saw just how dark it was without little Gloucester’s eyes. He reached one hand out and began to follow the moonlight until he could see the gleam of the abandoned robot parts up ahead. Good; from there, he knew where he was going.

“Marlborough!” His heart sank when he heard the youthful voice cry out. “Oh, you’re alive!”

“You- you were not—” Marlborough gasped as Gloucester ran into his arms, his tail coiling around the human’s body.

“Pray, forgive me, but what kind of general would I be if I abandoned one of our best men?” Gloucester gave him a hopeful smile. “And I was right not to. You reek of blood. Come, we need to get you back quickly.” He nudged Marlborough on the back with his horns.

“You were supposed to run,” Marlborough said, though too stunned to sound angry. “How- how are you feeling?”

“Dizzy, as always,” Gloucester laughed. “But you know that isn’t strange for me. Why?” He glanced down at the pond as they walked past it, twitching his ear at his reflection as if in greeting.

“Then I am not the only one who needs to get back,” Marlborough whispered. He leaned against Gloucester. They had lived, but for how long, he didn’t know.

And then came the hated sound again, right behind them. The hum, or the beep, or the squeal, whatever it was. Marlborough had already learned to despise it.

Gloucester froze beside him, and they both turned around, facing the pond again. There was a familiar red glow emitting from it, a grin forming across the surface of the water.

Louis can attack here as well, he remembered, seeing the sparks fly around the edges of the pond. Oh, yes, now he knew what a fool he had been after all, to bring Gloucester here alone, where the heart-eaters loved to rest.

“Oh, moons above!” Gloucester yelped, turning around to run. Marlborough tried to follow, but he felt something cling onto his wounded leg, something large and nearly burning him with its heat. He turned around and saw Louis crawling out of the pond with those wide smiles of his, gripping onto Marlborough and Gloucester with a singular, large hand.

“Ah, now, be not so hasty,” Louis purred as he brought the two of them closer to his face like a curious boy to an insect. “Especially you, Churchill.” He plucked Marlborough out of his fist with another hand, gripping onto his hair and eliciting a pained hiss out of him. “Sweet doll, you deserve someone better than William to fully appreciate your beauty.”

“I hate you,” Marlborough grunted out as Louis squeezed him, a finger coming up to caress his chin. He tried to hide the panic on his face, turning his head away to look at Gloucester. There was not a hint of human nor android in him— he could not gaze upon Louis so plainly.

And yet, he did, his eyes wide with awe as Louis swung him carelessly around in his hand. They were truly, dreadfully blank this time, so unlike the excited boy Marlborough was used to.

The hand that held Marlborough morphed into an impish tail, flicking the human’s cheek with the narrow point. “See here, my child,” Louis cooed at Gloucester, dropping Marlborough onto the ground and lifting his tail towards the prince. “There is a taste of human blood for you here.”

Human blood. Marlborough groaned and sat up. He held his hand up to his cheek, realizing that he was indeed bleeding there as well. The pain was fading back again, even as he held his bloodstained fingers out before him. Human blood is red.

“Do you like it?” Louis asked Gloucester, who was hungrily lapping at his tail. “Yes, there’s a good boy. Would you like more?”

Gloucester responded with a sharp hiss and a wag of his tail. He tried to crawl out of Louis’ grasp, and the Sun King laughed, placing him on the ground.

“Very well, then. Follow your nose. There is your human.”

“Your Highness,” Marlborough huffed. He shuffled away on the grass as Gloucester approached. The prince opened and closed his mouth, tasting the air as he had before, with that terrifying, beastly emptiness in his eyes. “You know me well. Please—”

Gloucester lunged at him, and Marlborough cried out, rolling to the side to shield his neck and throat from the vicious, snapping jaws. “William!” he yelled, batting his fists out blindly at the snarling boy. “Look- look at me!” His body jolted as he felt the sickle-claws digging into his ribs. “William—!”

He caught the horns just in time before they impaled his chest, then twisted them sharply to the side, throwing Gloucester off of him. The prince screeched as he caught his haunches in the brambles behind him.

“William, listen!” Marlborough knelt in front of him. “You- you have to fight the madness. I know it is possible—” He jumped back as Gloucester swiped at him. “You wanted to fight heart-eaters, did you not? Fight them now!”

“Both of you are the most pathetic creatures I have ever seen,” he heard Louis jeer. “Your deaths would not be so great a loss to this galaxy.”

“Shut up!” Marlborough turned to glare at him, and in that moment, Gloucester broke free. He opened his mouth wide and pounced forward. Marlborough frantically held his arm up to shield himself just as the tusks would have buried themselves in his throat. Instead, they bit deep into what had been his uninjured arm, though much to his surprise and horror, this brought little pain with it.

Oh, I am dead. He tried to pull his arm out, and that was when the next agony hit, forcing a whimper out of him. Gloucester shook his head from side to side, up and down, clearly trying to tear the limb off. There was a move that William had once taught him, though Marlborough knew not if he remembered it—

Gloucester rolled violently to the side, taking Marlborough with him.

The human shrieked as he heard the harsh ripping sound beside him, as the prince tossed his head back triumphantly with Marlborough’s forearm hanging from his jaws. Marlborough collapsed onto the grass, panting heavily and staring up at the sky in shock. He had spent decades in the European Galaxy, and it was a child who finally took this from him.

And now I will die. He could feel the burning of the prince’s venom coursing through his body, and yet he was the coldest he had ever been. He heard Gloucester approaching, licking his bloodied lips.

“Oh, he has ruined you,” Louis said faintly. “Well, I suppose he can have you, then.”

“Murderer,” Marlborough managed through his frantic breaths. “Murderer. Murderer. There was- there was a peace.”

“Nay, no longer,” Louis said. “If I can kill you and this child, there is a chance yet that James’ son may come to the throne. And the rest is history.” His crazed eyes glittered as if he were imagining his glory already.

Oh, William, I have failed you, Marlborough thought, though to which William he spoke to, he didn’t know. His vision was blurring, from both the venom and his tears. He would have liked to die with Sarah beside him, he would have liked to see both his son and the prince follow him into battle.

He winced as Gloucester stopped in front of him, sniffing at his face. His breath now had that nauseating, metallic scent to it, and Marlborough could almost vomit. That was his own blood.

“Very well,” he whispered. “Bite- bite my throat, like I taught you.” He reached his hand out to run it through Gloucester’s mane, still managing to smile up at him. “It was an honor to do so.”

Gloucester blinked down at him, then bowed his head. Louis growled beside him.

“Go on, Your Highness, what are you waiting for?” he asked. “I hear they taste divine.” He ran his tail along the bottom of Gloucester’s chin.

The prince didn't look up. Marlborough could see his legs shaking as they had before, his claws tearing up the grass as if he were making some great effort to stand. At last, he lifted his head and darted to the side, biting into Louis’ dangling tail.

Louis curled it in with a yelp. “N-No, not me! By the stars, how did you manage to hurt me?” He turned his tail back into an arm and lifted it towards his face, watching the wound begin to go black. “Your- your venom. It works on me.”

What? Marlborough weakly lifted his head. How did Gloucester, of all Asterothiriots, have the power to harm heart-eaters? There was no man here who had ever managed to do such a thing with nothing but his numerous teeth.

No ordinary man, of course. But Marlborough realized then that the boy was irradiated, to what must have been a large extent if he had the ability to harm Louis. Every part of him could hurt the King now, including his venomous tusks. And thus the King could even be killed.

Ah, but a child killing Louis was too much to hope for, Marlborough knew. He watched as Louis sprung back, trying to shake the furious Gloucester off of his back. He hissed and snapped his jaws at the prince, who climbed onto his shoulder, digging his claws into it to stop himself from falling off.

“You treasonous child!” Louis unsheathed his claws, or rather grew his fingers even longer, sharper. “Must I do everything myself?” He lashed his tail down against Gloucester's back, and Gloucester opened his jaws in a wild screech. He slid off of the King, tumbling on the ground with a couple of pained yelps.

“Run!” Marlborough called after him, and Gloucester had only time to glance back at him before Louis sliced his claws right through his chest and stomach. Opened was the only word Marlborough would later use to describe what Louis had done to the boy— ripped him open as if he were a worthless soldier on the field rather than the royal child that he was. This boy who had just only turned eleven now saw the turn between life and death itself.

The force was enough to send Gloucester flying towards Marlborough, his body landing with what sounded like a painful thump before him. His head lolled back as if he were stunned, and his chest heaved as he fought to breathe. There was that deep, deep blue covering every part of his body and dripping endlessly out of it. It was equal parts beautiful and the most horrifying thing Marlborough had ever seen; the exposed innards of a tendril-tooth child.

“William,” he whispered. He began to drag himself towards the convulsing body. The desperate choking sounds coming from Gloucester's bloody mouth, blue and red, almost caused him to faint, but he willed himself to come closer. “William.” He repeated the name with a sob.

Louis blinked down at them both, seemingly unamused, though noticeably shaken with the spreading venom in his limbs. Marlborough glared up at him through his tearful eyes, daring him to say something, but the King only turned his apathetic stare away and limped back into the pond. The last Marlborough saw of him was his wounded tail, flicking at them dismissively as always.

“William,” Marlborough urged, looking back down at the prince he held with the arm that remained intact. His other arm he could feel becoming drenched in the blue blood, but he welcomed it, for it meant a chance to survive. No, he would survive, for it was the attacker's blood that was the only antidote for the venom. But Gloucester spilling out all the contents of his belly here would only save Marlborough’s life, not his own.

“You were so brave, do you know that?” Marlborough smiled through his tears, but then he truly could no longer hold back the shattering, near painful cries as he wept for the dying prince before him. Did he know he was dying? Was he aware of everything he was about to leave behind? His eyes remained fixed ahead, and he said nothing as Marlborough smoothed back his mane.

“Your poor mama,” he whispered. “How could anyone be ready for this?” He buried his head into Gloucester's bleeding chest. “Oh, forgive me, my child. I knew not that a liar and murderer awaited us here. Forgive me. Forgive me.”

He had to go back, he thought as he felt the venom's effects drain from his body. He could at least crawl some distance back before collapsing into Sarah's arms. Would she want him now, though, like this? His arm replaced by the immortal guilt of having let Gloucester die under his care?

“I'm so sorry,” he went on as he began to drag Gloucester back, holding him up close to his body. “I'm so sorry to all of the alien race. When- if you go to Heaven, tell God I said that.” He knew if was a fanciful statement. He was slipping on the grass with the prince’s endless flow of blood.

There came a point where he could not walk any longer, which disappointed him so, as he would have liked to at least bring Anne a body to bury. He collapsed against the ground, the sounds of him hyperventilating matching the labored breaths of the prince. Was it Marlborough that was dying with him, or was there a chance Gloucester could be saved after all?

Chance, ha. They would both die here, then. He knew they had not even made it halfway yet.

Suddenly Gloucester kicked a leg out at his side, and Marlborough grunted. It was nowhere near the pain of his open wounds, so he let it be. He turned to look at Gloucester's face, his breath being taken away upon seeing the familiar look in the prince's blank eyes. There was the boy, still alive even if he was fading quickly.

“Oh, little one, please,” Marlborough pleaded, feeling as if he could burst into tears all over again. “Just wait until you can die by your mother's side.”

Gloucester blinked up at him, and then he reached out towards Marlborough with his weak talons. “You, trumpet of the apocalypse,” he said faintly, though his eyes are as clear as ever. “The angel who saves us all. It had to be me— I was the sacrifice that so pleased you. Play for the end of the world, my trumpet!”

“Wh-what?” Marlborough wiped at his nose, his voice shaking. “William, stay. I beg of you. Stay. I cannot let them take something else from me.”

The prince had fallen still, and for a moment Marlborough thought he was at peace now, the madness and terror leaving him as he realized he was safe, and held. But the emptiness of his eyes had returned again, and his chest made no attempt to swallow up every last gulp of air.

“William.” It was all Marlborough could manage, the panic rising within him all over again. “William, listen to me. Wake up, my child. We're almost there. I told you we would take your little army with us tomorrow.” He laughed uselessly, imagining the boys all nipping at each other's tails and roaring with delight. “You are eleven now, and look how strong you are. You have so much left to do.”

So much blue; Marlborough was drowning in it. The blue of this child's blood, of the radiation in the pool, of that monster's eyes that had taunted him during those dreadful nights— he couldn't take it.

He dropped his head against Gloucester's shoulder and screamed his grief out onto the body, which remained of his size, but now seemed much too small to be so still like this. He screamed until he either fainted or he heard the frantic footsteps ahead of him, he couldn't tell which one came first.

“John, you— oh, John!” That was Sarah's horrified voice. “No, I- I refused to believe it, but— John, please! Look at me!” She licked his bloodstained face, and he could only blink listlessly up at her.

There came the name again. “William!” from a horrified mother, unwilling to take in the sight of her son in such a state. “William!” from a shocked, sickened father.

“It should have been me,” he said as he felt Sarah lift him up in her arms. “It was all me.”

“Hush, say no more. You can tell us all about it later. Rest now.”

Rest! Marlborough wanted to scoff. What rest was there for those who were still living?

#also known as the fic where you all find out that aa!marly is op as SHIT #i'm almost done with a lamentations chapter tho y'all just need to give me a moment #also yea u read those warnings right #who woulda thought tho #duke of marlborough (alien alien)#duke of gloucester (alien alien)#alien alien au

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captainderyn · 2 years ago

Text

[Fic] To the Brink

Summary: Five finally reaches a breaking point in his Imperial Intelligence career that jeopardizes not only himself, but the well being of Roslynd has well.

Warnings: Implied torture, implied past addiction

Notes: This was meant to be a prompt fill...it is instead a lot more than that. I ramble more in the tags lol. Hope y'all enjoy the first fic with Five and his new wifey...of course it'd be angsty.

This is set ~2-3 years prior to the start of the Imperial Agent story line.

"Cipher Five are you listening to me?"

Five tilted his head back against the tree he hid behind, the thorny bushes concealing him from view scratching and catching against the thick material of his uniform.

"I'm always listening to you, Fixer." He murmured, blinking up at the sun that dappled between the thick foliage above him. The green blurred in front of his eyes and he squeezed them closed before peeling them back open.

Shaking his head didn't work either and he scrubbed a hand across his face, keeping himself in the darkness as he focused in on the voice coming in through his ear piece.

Roslynd's voice encompassed him, the familiar cadence a balm to his fried nerves. He yawned, keeping a hand over his eyes to focus solely on her voice instead of the blaring light of his visor's HUD.

"...haven't received new intel since I briefed you yesterday. They've got their movements and plans locked down tighter than the Dark Council's donation history."

Her words blended together in a series of syllables and sounds, relaxing none the less. The soft clip of her accent wrapped around him and he didn't realize the darkness had changed around him until the scrape of bark against the back of his neck and her voice sharpened,

"Five? Cipher Five!"

Pulling his eyes back open, he let his hand drop back down. Rocks may as well have been dragging down his eye lids, "Mmm, I'm still here Fourteen, don't worry."

He could practically feel her displeasure through the comm channel. If they were in the same room, she'd be staring him down with that look on her face, where her brows drew low over her eyes and her lips pressed together until she figured out exactly how to professional rip him a new one. Her hands would be on her hips in the way she always fell into when irritated.

A pang went through him. What he'd give to not be sitting out here in this oppressive humidity of some backwater planet and instead back in Kaas City.

"As your Fixer, I think you should call off this stakeout and return to base. It's already been several hours with no changes in information. This is not sustainable for the mission."

As far as the record keeping software that monitored and scanned their secured comm channel to report anything off Imperial Intelligence cyber specialists it was just simple concern in Fourteen's voice.

He caught the edge in her voice though.

The HUD in his visor lit up, tracking a series of alerts. He scanned through the text, sifting through what information was actually important as the text disappeared faster than he could read all of it.

"Our targets have made their late arrival. The mission can still be completed."

"Cipher, I think its best to withdraw from this mission." He heard Fourteen clicking through screens through the comm, her fingers flying across the keys, "Your latest biometics--"

He palmed an adrenal stim from the pack at his belt, injecting it in one fluid motion. The location smarted from others he'd previously injected over the long hours of this stakeout, the rush of energy it gave like static through his veins. That was the last one he had in his pack. In yet another practiced motion, he pulled a fortitude stim as well, that one like a rush of cold, clarifying water through his mind.

"I only desist when I receive orders from Keeper." He reminded her.

An ache went through his chest, he wasn't sure if it was from the stims or from the stilted breath Fourteen loosed over the comm. It was the last bit of the woman beneath the agent he got before that cool, level tone returned.

"Understood. I expect you to report in no later than 1600 Kaasi Time. Standard recovery procedures will commence within the next day if that deadline is missed."

He didn't miss the slight waver in her voice on recovery. Gathering up his sniper rifle, Five hovered his hand over his ear piece, "Heard loud and clear, Fixer. Going dark."

The silence when he clicked off his calm set his nerves back on edge. Even when she was silently pulling up information to brief him on, Fourteen's company through the static was a tether to him.

He crept to the outlook he'd scouted earlier, pressing himself down among the swaying grass and pushes. A few thorny leaves scraped the back of his neck and he grimaced.

The last adrenal stim pushed his luck too far. He could feel his heart hammering erratically against the ground as he flattened himself against the earth, bracing his sniper rifle so he could zero in on the approaching targets. His hands were shaking and he gripped the body of his rifle tighter, peering through the scope.

Each blink felt too heavy, threatening to pull him under.

His target came into view, the speeder crawling along.

Taking a deep breath, Five steadied himself and aimed.

Fired a single shot.

And missed.

---

Roslynd flipped her wrist up, staring at the screen of her watch for the third time in the last three minutes.

15:55

15:56

15:58

She'd gone two minutes without looking, a new record. Instead of checking her watch again as she let the screen go dark, she checked her datapad. Nothing.

Checked her earpiece for any messages she might've missed. Not a single notification.

All of her other briefings and meetings were over for the day. The agents were packing up their things to leave for the night, closing down the building except for those working the overnight shift.

Roslynd herself was supposed to leave at 17:00, after Five reported in and confirmed the status of the mission. The hour she'd given herself after was to write up a quick report, to be finalized and sent to Keeper tomorrow morning.

She toyed with the ring on her finger, the stone catching the blue light of the sleeping data terminals.

Keeper passed by her office and she darted out the door, falling into step alongside him.

"Cipher Five still hasn't reported in." She tried to keep her voice steady, to not sound too harried. Inject just enough of her frustration to make it seem like she was just pissed off she may have to stay past her scheduled departure.

Keeper glanced askance at her, the wrinkles forming at the corners of his eyes deepening as he checked his chrono, "He still has time to report in."

"The mission was planned to take less than an hour, the other three were to provide a buffer for him to return back to base. You know how punctual Cipher Five is and I set the deadline for today to account for that, this is unusual behavior.”

The older agent studied his chrono once again, before fixing Roslynd with a long look. His eyes dipped down to where she was still fiddling with her ring with enough force that her skin was turning red. She dropped her hands, gripping them in a tense parade rest behind her instead.

“Fixer Fourteen, I think you should retire for the night, the Fixers for tonight’s shift will monitor comm traffic for Cipher Five’s report. You’ve put a lot of overtime into this mission. Besides, you have someone waiting at home for you.”

Keeper always had a habit of caring for his agents too much, giving them more leeway than many of the Sith breathing down Intelligence’s neck wanted. Treated them too much like people, with lives outside their work instead of means to an end.

She blinked against the burning in her eyes, trying to keep her voice from sounding too robotic as she said, “Will do, Keeper, thank you.”

Knowing damn well she’d be returning to an empty apartment, with only the fluffy feline Agent to greet her. That she'd be lucky to get more than scattered minutes of sleep tonight.

She didn't miss the knowing look Keeper sent her way before bidding her good evening and leaving her standing in the hallway. She simply chose to ignore it.

---

Three days.

The longest thirty-six hours of her life. Hours that wouldn't pass faster no matter how much she paced, how much she tried to work away.

Nights spent awake, trying to quiet Agent's own pacing and yowling as he refused to settle into Roslynd's lap and insisted on searching for Five.

It was twenty-four hours after Roslynd left headquarters that recovery procedures were enacted and a team was sent to the backwater planet Five was meant to be on.

Roslynd had watched their progress from her office, tuned into the feed from their comms and watching their progress on the map spread on her second monitor.

They found him trussed up in a backroom of their targets' hideout, so bloodied, swollen, and bruised that their identity scanners threw errors. One of the junior ciphers on the recovery team cut Roslynd's access to their HUD visual feed.

Roslynd cut her own access to their audio feed soon after, when their questions to Five returned near-unintelligible, garbled answers. What had they done in twenty-four hours?

Rocking back in her chair, she scrubbed her hands over her eyes, pressing so hard she saw stars.

"Fixer...?" A tentative voice paired with a knock on her door. She nearly leapt out of her skin, thankful that she'd already closed out the tabs she'd been keeping on the recovery team, "Keeper wants to see you in his office, something to do with your current mission."

Her stomach dropped, but she pushed her chair back anyway and walked on shaking legs to meet Keeper, putting any indication that she knew more than she was supposed to far, far down inside her.

"Fourteen, you look awful." Was the first greeting she got as she closed the door behind her and pulled the blinds as he motioned for her to do.

She fell into a parade rest, pressing her lips together, "I've been concerned about the mission, sir."

"Then you'll be relieved to know that the mission was a success. Cipher Five eliminated his assigned targets."

It took everything in her for her only reaction to be a tilt of her head and a quirk of her brow, "Oh? So the mission is a success."

Keeper scrubbed a hand across his jaw, frowning at something coming through on his datapad. The blue light cast deep shadows over his features, "With collateral damage, yes. As you've probably guessed, Five was compromised in the field."

She knew, she knew and it still ripped through her heart with enough force that her knees quaked and her head went light, "Tell it to me straight, sir. What condition is my agent in."

My agent. My assigned field partner. How would his failure reflect on her. Nothing more.

Still, Keeper motioned for her to sit, steepling his hands when she did. Everything about this was so far beyond acceptable protocol. As Fixer she was not entitled to this information, all she needed to know was that the mission was a success.

She was focused too hard on keeping her breathing steady and her eyes dry to care what Keeper did or did not know. At least the blinds were drawn, at least no other eyes were watching. She clenched her hands, clasped in her lap, so tightly that her knuckles popped.

“Preliminary data suggests he hit his targets then experienced some manner of incident. The remaining adversaries took advantage of that lapse to take him into custody and attempt to extract information from him.”

Information that he wouldn’t have given, especially not after only twenty-four hours, though the mere thought sent a lurch through Roslynd’s stomach. She stared hard at the screens behind Keeper until she felt like she could breathe again.

Keeper’s voice softened, no, quieter, so that she had to lean forward to hear, “I’m placing him on medical leave upon his return. Clearly something is going on, and I’d rather my senior Cipher be out of office temporarily than lose him all together.”

“Thank you.” She got out from behind the lump forming in her throat and nodded along as Keeper picked his voice back up, returning to that clinical tone.

“As Fixer you are not permitted to debrief him while the medical staff perform their evaluation of him. However, as you’re the one most acquainted with working with him, I would like you to see to it that Cipher Five makes it to a taxi home.”

Roslynd glanced up at Keeper, at the raised eyebrows wondering if she’d deny it. She didn’t have the strength to, “I’ll make sure he makes it home, sir.”

“Good,” Keeper looked older now, worn down and weary. How difficult it must be to watch his agent get picked off like flies on the daily and so rarely be able to do anything, “Dismissed, Fourteen. The shuttle is set to arrive by evening.”

She tried to remind herself as she busied herself with her remaining work and placing an order for supplies to be delivered to their front door by the evening, that things could be worse. Plenty of agents didn’t return from these kinds of incidents after a paltry two days of being MIA, plenty didn’t return it all.

Instead of soothing her, it only gaped the pit in her stomach further until she found herself paralyzed in her desk chair, spiraling down all the what ifs. She was stuck thinking circles around the folder tucked in her desk drawer at home, where Five had methodically laid out all relevant information, desires, and plans for her if he were to ever not come home, when another agent came to notify her of Keeper’s order to retrieve Five from the medbay.

It wasn’t another younger agent, but another cipher. One of the few remaining from her and Five’s graduating class from the Academy. The one agent Five would probably consider a close friend outside of the office.

Cipher Seven gave her a grim smile, “You look like shit, Ros.”

She aimed a withering look at him as she gathered her things and slung her bag over her shoulder. She tried and failed to keep her hands from shaking. Her muscles would ache tomorrow from all her trembling, “Keeper said the same thing.”

Seven snorted a laugh and it eased some of her tension. It couldn’t be horrible news if he could laugh, “Do you know how he is?”

The cipher slung an arm around her shoulder as they walked, waving off the few nosy agents trailing them. A breach of decorum, most certainly, but headquarters was well past closed, and they’d been here long enough to bend a few rules, “You know Val, pissed off as ever that something went wrong in the first place.”

She pursed her lips at the bold usage of Five’s name, even a nickname. He hated using it anywhere near Intelligence. No matter that his full legal name was written in his files. It was his little bit of paranoia that he clutched closely, the same paranoia that kept him from wearing his wedding band.

She supposed the last few days was proof as to why exactly he did that.

“I’m serious, Rhys.” She snapped, but breathed out a sharp breath from her noise and softened her voice, “Keeper didn’t tell me much.”

She knew Rhys had a habit of diffusing with humor, but there was no place in her shot nerves for jokes or light comments. He was lucky she could speak at all. Thoughts of that stupid folder still threatened to steal her concentration.

Another reasonable, yet agonizing, part of Five’s need to have everything meticulously in place.

“Shit, sorry, I know.” Rhys winced, “As far as I’ve been told he’s better than when they found him. Nothing that isn’t just superficial. The team that found him says he’s slept off whatever cocktail the bastards used to try and get him talking.”

Another piece of her relaxed, and she blinked towards the ceiling, “Good. He seemed…off when I was on the comms with him before it happened. He wouldn’t listen to me when I told him to back off the mission.”

Close friends as they were, she couldn’t bring herself to share the sinking feeling that she knew exactly why this mission had gone wrong. Something in her stopped the words that Five was hurtling down a dangerous path, getting closer and closer to some edge she couldn’t see because of the demands placed on him.

Rhys already knew that Five had barely been home, sent on mission after mission by Keeper on behest of his higher-ups. He could infer enough from that.

“He’s going to have a fit when he learns that Keeper put him on forced leave.” was all Rhys offered. The ‘it’s necessary’ went unspoken, even if it meant Rhys was going to be picking up the slack.

Roslynd kept a remarkable leash on her composure as they slipped into the medbay. She was even more impressed with how steady she kept her voice as she leveled a look at Five and simply said, “Keeper’s directed me to make sure you find yourself a taxi home.”

If she looked like shit, then Five looked like death. Though he’d been given a pair of loose black pants and long sleeved shirt instead of his dirt and blood stained uniform, that didn’t hide his face. His eyes flitted up to her from beneath deep bruising that extended over his nose all the way down to his jaw.

The hands that circled the cup, filled with whatever concoction the med droid was harassing him to drink, were no better. His knuckles were scratched and cut up to the point she wondered how he held the cup at all.

Superficial, Rhys had said. Superficial still hit her like a punch to the gut. It took everything in her to nod at the medical droid and ask, “What is my agent’s prognosis?”

Rhys slipped beside her to help Five up. She didn’t miss the way Five winced or the way he moved like his entire body hurt. Nor did she miss the heated, quiet conversation between the two friends as Rhys stabbed a bendy straw into Five’s styrofoam cup and snapped at him to drink up.

It was a sweet bit of normalcy as the medical droid pulled up its diagnostics, “Cipher Five is recommended limited activity until contacted by his supervisors with further instruction. It is also recommended that Cipher Five cease usage of adrenaline based stims.”

The droid padded off to the next curtained off area, its monotonous voice picking up again, but Roslynd’s eyes were fixed on Five. He had his eyes fixed on the ground, focused on putting each foot in front of the other and snapping at Rhys to keep his hands off when his friend attempted to help him.

At the weight of Roslynd’s stare he glanced up, expression going unreadable at whatever he found there.

Rhys walked with them until they were out on the taxi pad. He had his uniform jacket pulled up over his head against the incessant drizzle, stopping just shy of the roof’s overhang.

“Get home safe.” he told them both before looking at Roslynd, “And don’t worry about coming in tomorrow, Keeper already doesn’t expect you.”

The old man was watching out for them once again. Roslynd didn’t have the energy in her to give anything other than a nod. That was all she’d been able to muster consistently: nods.

Even if her head was beginning to spin too much to even manage that. The lack of sleep and her inability to keep much down was catching up with her.

Five glanced over her shoulder before sliding close enough that their arms brushed. Then his fingers hooked through hers, his thumb brushing over her ring. The gentle touch was enough to bring tears to Roslynd’s eyes, that slid down her cheeks and mixed with the rain as the taxi finally pulled up.

He kept their hands interlocked, his thumb brushing over her knuckles, all the way home. Until they slipped through the door and with it slipped away Five and Fourteen.

She pointed to the couch, a silent command, and he toed off his shoes to obey as she shrugged off her rain soaked jacket. Agent careened from the bedroom, chirping and brrup-ing with his feathery tail straight up in the air.

In the short time it took her to hang up her jacket, Agent already claimed Five’s lap, purring so loud that it seemed to shake the entire couch. Roslynd tucked herself on Five’s other side, falling against him as his arm looped around her waist and pulled her close.

He grunted in pain as she connected with him, but tightened his hold when she tried to scoot away. She relented, resting her head on his shoulder with as much care as she could. She didn’t even know what beneath his shirt looked like. If it was anything like what they’d done to his face…well. He’d be sore for a while.

“I thought I’d lost you, Val.” she finally broke their silence.

Five leaned his head against hers, his hand trailing up and down her side as she added, “What happened?”

“I don’t know.”

She hadn’t realized the rough gravel to his voice until now. Did that mean that when they…had he been…? She squeezed her eyes closed against the unbidden images of the pain they’d inflicted on him, on the shouts and screams that must’ve been torn from him to shred his voice like that. His arm tightened around her.

He cleared his throat, though it did nothing to help, “I remember taking out our key targets, then nothing until I woke up in their safe house. I don’t know if I passed out, or if they hit me with a neural detonator, or a concussive shot…”

Roslynd reached out to brush her hand over Agent’s furry head. The cat pushed his head into her touch, paws frantically kneading Five’s stomach.

“Stims again?” She kept her voice neutral, even as she felt Five slump next to her, as if he’d been waiting with baited breath for her to bring it up.

“I didn’t realize how bad it was getting again.” He scrubbed a hand through his hair and she followed the motion, watching him card his fingers through strands that were going gray at the temples.

She hadn’t realized how often he’d been gone, how often Keeper had been sending him out on missions until she stopped to wonder how she hadn’t noticed yet. She was so used to working with him on the job, to speaking with him daily but…she hadn’t seen him for more than a few days at a time in three or more months now she realized. And most of those days had been spent sleeping, resting with the stress their job put on them.

Her stomach sank and she turned her face against his shoulder, steadying herself in his warmth.

“Keeper is granting you leave.” She admitted into his shoulder, not amending that ‘granting’ was a pretty word for ‘forcing’.

“I know. Rhys told me.” Five sighed, “I’d also talked to Keeper before this mission about transferring to a position here for a little while.”

She hummed in interest, trying to remember if he’d already mentioned this before.

“I didn’t want to get your hopes up, but Keeper wants me to take a stint instructing at the Academy. Wants me to evaluate the cadets for potential cipher designations.” Five interlocked their hands again, “I can’t keep going like I am and I don’t want to spend more time away from home than not.”

He’d been working like this for over a decade of his career in some capacity or another. The Cipher designation was a risky one and each time he left the odds stacked further and further against him. He and Rhys were already an anomaly. Most of the Ciphers they’d graduated with were nothing but names on the memorial wall now.

Roslynd allowed herself to sink into Five, take in the fact that he was here, that he might be staying here, and at Agent, purring so hard still she was surprised he still had breath.

Her little family. Their little family.

Together, okay. Not broken, not lost.

“I think that would be perfect.” she murmured, realizing in the silence after that Five had fallen back asleep, his breaths soft against her hair.

#captainderyn writes #swtor #swtor fanfic #imperial agent #oc: Five #oc: Roslynd #they still need an otp name i cant think of anything #Keeper is a real one for definitely knowing they're together but not saying anything outright #hey see how it says Rhys takes over Five's position for awhile...you know how I say the odds are stacked against career Ciphers...#I'll leave that as some food for thought #fun fact see how Five gets to go teach students at the Academy #you know who's at the Academy getting taught....Era :)#it all comes full circle I was delighted when this clicked for me

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megan-is-mia · 2 years ago

Note

81 and 102 from the V2 prompt list with stalker Ghiaccio. P.S thank you for coming back from your unofficial hiatus, we missed you

(Lol it wasnt supposed to be a hiatus, I had to fight the medical industry for a few months so they'd give me drugs to function. I'm good now so there should be many more fics in the near future. I missed y'all tho) 81. “I feel like I’m suffocating when I’m not near you.”

102. “I think about you when I touch myself…I’m always thinking about you.”

(Yandere! Ghiaccio x Fem! S/o)

(Y/n) knew she was being stalked, but she would be damned if she would let her stalker know that she knew he was stalking her. As long as she acted like she was ignorant of his existence then hopefully he wouldn’t do anything more than he already was. Unfortunately, that was not the right way to go about things as she was just now finding out as she was dragged into an alleyway and pinned against one of its walls.

“Fuck I hate you, you’ve been such a pain in my ass” Ghiaccio snarled out as he pushed (Y/n) harder against the wall. “Ever since I saw your stupid face I’ve been having trouble focusing at work and I’ve been getting fucking sloppy” he went on, his teeth grinding together in irritation. “I thought if I followed you around for a bit I’d figure out why you’re plaguing my mind but it didn't help!” he punctuated these words by squeezing the girl’s arm.

“Instead now I feel like I’m suffocating when I’m not near you” Ghiaccio complained loudly. “Well? Whatcha gotta say for yourself dumbass?” he added, catching (Y/n) off guard and making her stammer unintelligibly for a few tense moments. “I… I’m sorry?” she offered weakly. “I’m sorry but I don’t even know who you are?” she added unwisely as the young man squeezed her arm again.

“Of course you don't know who I am, you’ve been fucking ignoring me all this time” Ghiaccio grumbled. “Let’s fucking fix that, I’m Ghiaccio and don't you forget it (Y/n)” he added pressing his face into the crook of her neck. Something about the action seemed to bring him some kind of peace and his grip loosened a bit. Not enough for the young woman to escape but enough that it no longer hurt severely.

“I think about you when I touch myself…I’m always thinking about you” the young man muttered his voice soft now, even loving in tone. (Y/n) felt a shiver go down her spine as the blue-haired male pressed a kiss to her throat. “I know this is a bad idea, but I don’t care… I need you. I tried to ignore the way i felt and stay away from you… fuck that noise” he went on speaking to himself. “I work my ass off, i deserve some happiness. If I gotta steal it then so fucking be it” he spoke as if having come to a decision. (Y/n) was about to speak up and ask him what he meant by these words when a piece of cloth was pressed against her face. She tried not to breath in the cocktail of chemicals that wafted off the material but she failed and soon she was unconscious. The next time she woke up she found her hand chained to a headboard and Ghiaccio’s head in her lap…

THE END

#jjba part 5 #jojo's bizarre adventure part 5 #jojo part 5 #jojo vento aureo #jojo golden wind #yandere jjba part 5 #yandere jojo's bizarre adventure part 5 #yandere jojo part 5 #yandere jojo vento aureo #yandere jojo #jojo #jjba #yandere jjba #jojo's bizarre adventure #yandere jojo's bizarre adventure #Ghiaccio #Yandere Ghiaccio

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jungw8ns · 4 years ago

Text

GOING TO AN ESCAPE ROOM WITH ENHYPEN !

PAIRING: boyfriend!enha x gn!reader. GENRE: established relationship, fluff, crack. WARNINGS: profanity (not that much tho), mentions of death (?). WORD COUNT: 100 - 200 each member.

HEESEUNG:

the two of you were so pumped playing an escape room together for the first time that the other people in line had to calm you guys down (which was trully embarrassing to say the least 🤐🤐)

he was looking at the ranking board filled with pictures of players that had succeeded in the shortest amount of time and he just wanted nothing more than to see both your faces on there

but anyways, we all know how competitive heeseung gets 🕴️

oh boy let me tell you, this guy WAS SPEEDRUNNING IT but not the kind you were thinking

the second the timer had started he was literally SPRINTING AROUND THE ROOM LOOKING FOR CLUES YET COMPLETELY MISSING THEM 🏃‍♂️💨💨💨

while he was busy running around, you were picking up the little details in the room and in no time managed to open a few locks

"y/n look i found– oh 😐😑😐"

HE WAS SULKING PLSSS 😭😭😭

when you noticed him standing from afar staring at you with his arms crossed, you called him to solve this one puzzle you already did

*gasps* "oh no! babe i don't understand how to do this, please help me 😔😔🤥🙏🙏"

he had to bite his lower lip to stop himself from letting out that cocky grin but it got out eventually

"oh it's so easy sweetheart, just put this here and then voila! 😉"

when the two of you escaped you suprisingly got to take a polaroid with him home after ranking 2nd in the records

heeseung was the one who held onto it tho, placing it underneath his clear phonecase for safekeeping <3

JAY:

GOD THIS DUDE

THE ESCAPE ROOM WASN'T EVEN THAT SCARY AND YET EVERYTIME YOU GUYS OPEN A LOCK OR A DOOR HIS FIGHT OR FLIGHT INSTINCTS COME UP 😭😭👊👊

"y/n stay behind me >:(("

"um, babe, you do realize that's just a door right?"

"WE'LL BETTER SAFE THAN SORRY?? THE STAFF COULD'VE PROGRAMMED IT TO GROW LEGS?? 😵🧐🧐"

you knew you shouldn't have played horror games with him a few nights ago cause he looked like he was about to lose his mind 😔

you had to shove his ass aside and move on to the next mission cause the both of you knew that he was stalling 🏌️‍♀️

jay was being extra clingy the whole time you were playing, he'd either link arms with you or hold hands (he's literally so adorable) 💞💞

BUT THEN YOU THOUGHT OF DOING A PRANK ON HIM

while you were roaming around the room trying to solve a puzzle, you saw this horse mask on a nearby table

and so you made sure jay was distracted and put on the mask

you could've NOT worn the dusty old thing but where was the fun in that?

"jay can you come here for a sec?"

you hid behind the wall beside the door frame waiting for him to come into your sight and attacked him

now, how about we guess what happens next?

a. he faints

b. he runs away

or c. he slaps you in the face and forces you to buy him food for the rest of the night

if you guessed c then YAY! YOU'RE CORRECT 🥳🎉🎉🎊

THIS HOE SLAPS YOU AS HE SHOULD

"$##/@+(+'£%(:?!!)&£**/*%@"

when he finally takes off the mask like those scenes in scooby doo he's never felt so betrayed in his life

"i- I TRUSTED YOU 😭😭😭 YOU BETTER BUY ME FOOD LATER, I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS, THE BETRAYAL???? LITERALLY UNPROVOKED?????"

he wouldn't stop side eyeing you until you guys finally pulled up on the mcdonalds drive thru

"hi, can i get two um– bts meals please? 😒😒 and two oreo mc flurries 🙄🙄 and also large fries 😐😐"

sane (1/3)

would be trailing behind you like a little puppy (i love him so much 😭😭😭)

he either has his arm linked with yours or held hands every five minutes

JAKE:

really focused on the puzzles he's doing but the second he hears you call out his name for help he's there beside you with the sweetest smile

but anyways, mans was POPPING OFF the entire time you were playing

he was solving problem after problem in no time (he wanted to impress you is why he activated his inner flash ⚡⚡) but he did let you play tho, the last thing he wanted to do was make you pissed at him for hogging all the games

def buried jake with compliments and forehead kisses right after ❤️__❤️

and so the two of you got out in like an hour and a few which you were very proud of

"you were so cool today babe, good job !!"

"aww thank you angel 😊😊"

sane (2/3)

SUNGHOON:

would be linking pinkies with you the whole time, only letting go whenever the both of you had to solve something that needed two or more people

there was this one game tho where he had to arm wrestle this literal hand lever to open the door to the last room (yea...don’t ask why, the staffs were pretty weird 😬😬)

it made him enjoy the experience a bit more as it was only the two of you playing instead of getting accompanied by strangers

HGAWAHSGDHSGHDA PLSS THIS GUY

“oh this’ll be easy, y/n step aside, i’ll handle this 😏😏😏”

idk if you were supposed to think about how handsome he looked with his serious expression on and his veiny hands coming into frame or be worried for him because the lever was REAL HARD to pull that his veins looked like they were going to pop any second soon, you stepped in and helped him tho cause you were a good s/o <3

from a spectators point of view, the two of you looked like y’all were about shit your pants but the two of you eventually succeeded on beating it, immediately dragging him to the next room which had a sofa in it, laying down to catch your breaths

cliché moment ahead ⚠️⚠️

the two of you shared a few laughs before standing up on the empty space, held hands and started to jump in circles to celebrate your success 💃💃

yupp, y’all were never going back to that hellhole again

very stubborn at first, he wanted nothing to do with the game but then you held him at gunpoint by saying:

SUNOO:

"please just this once or else i'll revoke your mint choco ice cream rights 🔫🔫🔫"

"BUT IT'S SCARY IN THERE BABE :((("

"it won't be that scary sunshine, besides, i'll be ready to 🤜💥 yk?? trust me babe i would never let anyone hurt you <33"

kinda pissed since you blackmailed him into the place and also bc he wanted to play bumper cars and dance mania but he yea he caved in pretty quick 😋😋

(y/n let him play his games in peace tf >:(((( )

once you guys got in tho he realized how normal it was and that it was not terrifying at all

THE EPITOME OF CLINGY OMFG

he wouldn't stop back hugging you and you couldn't bring yourself to push him away to play the games so you just let him walk behind you with his arms on your shoulders 😩😩

(y'all were walking kinda funny but don't tell sunoo that 🤫🤫🤫)

yea the two of you ended up escaping with a whopping 2 hours and a few minutes

but it was the effort that counts so A+++++ for the both if you 😜👍👍👍

sane (3/3)

JUNGWON:

was the one who suggested going, he even searched on naver about really good escape room places to visit and was overall really looking forward it

he liked going to places and having fun with you so it wasn't a shock how his eyes were literally crescents and his dimples were so evident

yea he literally rushed the both of you to the place that you were the first in line 😵

while waiting for the staff to finish setting up he was playing with your connected hands like 🖐️✊🖐️✊ (so precious 💞💞)

"y/n why are you taking so long 😭😭 what if they close and we end up not solving a single lock, hurry up por favorrr 😩🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏"

when they finally lead you to the room he was kind of surprised that they had separated the two of you into different spaces (like the one with txt where they had the answers to the other member's puzzles yk???)

he was locked inside a telephone stand while you were handcuffed in the main room

dw the two of you reunited after a few minutes cause jungwon was rushing his lock to get to you 🤭

you both were progressing at an average pace and it made you guys a lot more closer (not that you guys weren't before but you get what i mean)

after you guys escaped the two of you went to eat curry and talked about the whole experience 😋✌️✌️✌️

this boy literally dragged you in the escape room with him

NIKI:

HE DIDN'T EVEN GIVE YOU TIME TO REFUSE HE JUST 😐👉🚪

"ok masterchefs, in order to test your abilities we must go through series of puzzles and make it out alive, understood?"

he tried ignoring how confused you were and went on to try and get you guys to escape

HE'S LAUGHING AT YOU FOR WHATEVER REASON AND OBV YOU LAUGH ASWELL CAUSE WHO WOULDN'T??? his laugh is so contagious pls 🤖🤖 he was so close to d wording cause he couldn't breathe from laughing too much

yea.. you guys spent so much time laughing at each other for being so dumb at this that you ended up playing 'till closing time

spoiler alert: he fails on doing anything cause the second you made eye contact with him this child collapses 😍🤩

GIRL SO EMBARRASSING 🤡🤡

THE STAFF KICKED THE BOTH OF YOU OUT AND NOW YOU GUYS WERE BANNED FROM THE PLACE ☠️☠️

"haunted house next weekend???"

"BET"

NOTE – god they were WAY funnier in my head but yeah.... i love them so much AND OMFG HAVE YOU GUYS SEEN HEESEUNG’S SELCAS LAST NIGHT???!?@??#?@?!?@ HE’S NOT REAL WTF ⁉️❓❓⁉️

also, idk why BUT EVERY TIME I SAVE A DRAFT the paragraphs get scrambled?? £!?) 6=6) 🤣😂💔💔🤣🤣😂💔 it's so annoying but anyways, ilysm pls stay safe and have a great day <33

#enhypen #enhypen drabbles #enhypen reactions #enhypen imagines #enhypen fluff #enhypen x gender neutral reader #heeseung x reader #jay x reader #jake x reader #sunghoon x reader #sunoo x reader #jungwon x reader #niki x reader #jungw8ns

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erensproudsimp · 4 years ago

Text

Experiment

Hange Zoe x fem! reader Oneshot

⚠ Sexual Content Ahead ⚠

Summary : Hange and you have been dating each other for quite some time. One day due to rain, you went over to Hange's and hehe hot stuff happens.

I've used they/them pronouns for Hange due to them being non-binary, hope y'all don't mind. :)

"HANGEEEE!" screaming down the hallway near the university laboratory, you entered said place joltily.

By this time all the science students were used you to coming by everyday while causing a ruckus to meet your significant other. You couldn't help yourself being always excited to see the only person who could make your day a million times better and today as usual you had something interesting to show them. Well, by interesting you meant something random you saw that day and just picked it up to give it to Hange. Never were they ever weird out by this as they were as eccentric as you.

"Look what I found today!" proudly bringing your hand close to their face to show them the red rock you saw in your yard.

"Heh, as usual my dear y/n, you never fail to fascinate me," they chuckled eyeing the objet closely.

"I shall add this wonderful rock to my series of collection of stuff you keep bringing to me everyday!" smilingly Hange took it.

This brought a faint blush on your cheeks as just the thought of Hange keeping the random stuff you bringing daily made you feel somewhat special.

" Sooo, what are you working on today?" you questioned them while looking at the equipment on the table.

"Ohohoho you don't know what I've just made!" they excitedly said dexterously arranging the mess to show you.

While they were enthusiastically explaining to you her recent invention, you couldn't help but stare at their jolliness. The way they made absolutely anything sound captivating just spellbound you. To describe it, it was like a meteor shower falling enlightening the night sky which you could gaze for hours, yeah, that's how Hange was.

"Hihi, that's awesome! I'm so proud of you!" you praised her happily.

"Hehe, I'm glad you appreciated my invention, after all I am your better half," haughtily they said which made you subconsciously smile.

Right at that moment a loud thunder was heard making you jump. Since morning it's been cloudy and you really hoped that it wouldn't rain in the evening as it would pose a problem for you to travel home by bus. The droplets were hitting hard against the window panes indicating it was a heavy shower. Disappointment filled your being.

"Noo, now how would I reach the bus stop on time with this weather," you complained utterly dejected and tensed.

"You know y/n, you can always ask me for a ride in my car right?" Hange said while pouring a clear liquid in a testing tube.

"I know but I don't wanna bother you."

"Oh come-on y/n, how can you ever bother me?" they reassured, "and if you really don't want to sound like a trouble then come over to my appartment. It's win-win situation, you reach home and I would get more time to spend with you."

"W-what, Hange please, ugh okay then I'll come with you," sighing you responded.

Waiting for Hange to finish up whatever they were doing but it wasn't as though you as a finance student would understand it to be able to help her out. Instead you were scrolling on Tiktok when they came up to you without warning making you jerk, "GOSH HANGE! YOU COULD HAVE CALLED FOR ME."

Chuckling, Hange grabbed your hand to make you stand up. Losing your footing, you fell in their arms which they gladly grabbed you. Giving you a brief forehead kiss, they proceeded to drag you to the parking lot. At first you didn't process the action making you scream but when you got the hang of it, you ran alongside with them hand in hand laughing.

Hange unlocked the car and you got into the front passenger seat. Both of you were laughing while still catching your breaths.

"Now off to my house we gooo!" Hange yelled as you were wearing your seatbelt.

Throughout the whole ride both of you conversed about each of your days and the daily news.

"Can you believe that Sasha and Nicollo are finally going out with each other? I always knew that they were a match made in heaven," you rambled as Hange listened to you intently while also focusing on the road.

"I mean I could see it happening seeing their compatibility and the way they complete each other, just like you complete me," Hange added.

Her last words made your face heat up which you hid by looking outside. Luckily for you, you finally reached your destination. It wasn't the first you came over to her appartement so you took her keys and ran inside. Normally her place would be messy like a dumpster because that human barely had time in her hands to take care of their house but for once it was spotless clean.

"Did Levi come over?" you asked them, hand on your hip.

"I-yeah. Yesterday he did. But I swear I'll try to be more responsible from now on!" Hange affirmed.

You took a deep breath and asked, "so what are we eating tonight?"

"I don't know y/n, you choose," they replied kicking their boots off to enter the residence.

"How about we order Pizza?"

"Sure thing love," grabbing her phone to order said food, Hange said.

"How about you go take a bath while I take out plates?" you suggested.

"I mean only if you're willing to join me," they smirked while leaning on the door.

Out of embarrassment you threw a pillow laying on the couch at her, "NO!"

"Sad, I was really hoping for some fun in there," they replied before running into the bathroom as you were about to hit them with another pillow.

While you waited for her to come out so that you in your turn could go freshen up, you arranged everything to be able to eat. Having such nights with Hange is always something you've dreamt of doing but you never had the courage to ask.

A few moments later, Hange came out with hair dripping wet which they were trying to dry with a towel. Damn they looked hot in that condition. Before you could start simp over them, you excused yourself to go bathe.

Feeling the warm water touch your skin evaporated all your stress from you as you relaxed. Coming out of the bathroom wearing Hange's clothes, you went to sit next to them on the couch. You noticed that the pizza had already arrived so you took a piece of it to eat. You two watched this popular series called 'Attack on titan' together until the pizza was finished.

Throwing the pizza cardboard in the bin, you went to see Hange already laying on the bed. Scooting to them, you placed your head on their shoulder as they held you tight with one arm and the other holding their phone. You were watching memes with her laughing when suddenly there was a video of two girls kissing came up which made your heart beat faster. You could tell Hange felt so as well as she swiped quickly to prevent awkwardness.

A little bit of tension remained in both of you yet no one made the first move. It kept growing as you felt their hot breath on your face because you were leaning on them.

Feeling bothered and assuming that Hange wasn't going to initiate it, you snatched their phone from their hand and kept it on the table next to the bed for you to straddle on them.

Shifting yourself to be more comfortable, you leaned down to smack your lips against theirs. Still processing whatever just happened, Hange went with the flow. For this moment at least. Hands on your ass, they squeezed them as you laid your body on theirs.

Lips still crashed against each others and tongues still fighting over control, Hange's minds began to fill with sexual fantasies that they could enact on you in this precise moment.

Pulling back from you, they settled your body on the bed to go search for something in the wardrobe. They came back with a blindfold facing you.

"Do you mind if I take your vision away for a while? I don't want to ruin the surprise of what I'm going to do to you."

Gulping hardly you took the black cloth and blinded yourself.

"Good girl," Hange praised giving you a headpat to continue their rummage.

With no warnings, you were pushed on the bed lightly. At first you didn't understand what was going on but that was before you felt a rope on your wrists which was being wrapped around them individually then pulled upwards signaling it was being tied down to the bed. The same thing was done for both of your legs.

Anticipation mounted in you as you felt hands running from your chest to your stomach.

"I hope that the ropes are not too tight, are they?" they concernedly asked.

You shaked your head to say no still having the blindfold on.

"No? Well, then I think you would love this being in your mouth," they said coming closer to you. You were expecting her to stuff her fingers in but it ended up being something you certainly didn't anticipate at all.

Holding your head up, they made you wear it. Initially it was uncomfortable but you managed to deal with it as it only turned you on more. It was a gag ball.

You laid your head on a pillow desperately craving Hange's touch but of course they were still searching for something.

"Don't worry y/n, I'll come to you as soon as I find that one thing I bought last week I wanted to test out," Hange spoke from the other side of the room.

Trying to keep your growing lust in control, you fidgeted with the device in your mouth.

" Ah-ha! found it, now wait for me y/n, I'll fuck you into oblivion soon," their voice coming out breathless.

Feelings the sides of the bed sink and a presence hoving above you, you became more excited to what Hange was going to do this time.

Their soft lips colliding again against yours as their hands ran down to unbutton your shirt leaving your bare chest naked as you weren't wearing any undergarments. For a few seconds Hange didn't do anything. As you were ripped from your eyesight, you couldn't see that Hange was in fact staring at the prefect roundness of your boobs displayed to them .

Unable to contain themselves, they ran their tongue on one of your breasts while the other was being fondled with their hands. Your breathing was quickening at their doings. Out of nowhere they bit your nipple softly making you bit the gagball stifling a moan.

Going lower on you they pulled down your pants while they kissed you on your bellybutton. Without warning again you felt a pain on your hip and teeth leaving your skin. Biting you again on the other side of your hip, Hange caressed your inner thighs. This time you couldn't contain the moan as it escaped your mouth through the gag ball.

Looking at your entrance, Hange saw that though they didn't yet completely lay hands on you, you were soaking wet. Then they assumed that it was probably from the long amount of time you had to wait for them.

You heard the opening of the cap of a tube. Your mind raced through all the possibilities of what it could be.

But of course it was the least thing you could expect as you felt something touching your cunt.

It was a lukewarm rubbery thing that was being ran through your swollen folds.

"Wanna guess what it is? Y/n," Hange said as you felt the object or whatever it was penetrate you. An 'hmm' came out of you as your back arched graciously making Hange widen their eyes.

"Ahaha, y/n you beautiful creature! You never cease to amaze me the more I explore you,"Hange complimented pushing the thing deeper into you.

" Lemme reward you for blessing me with his gorgeous sight and return you back your vision, "they continued.

Your insides felt empty as Hange had to remove the item to open the blindfold. You must say you had quite of the shocker to see them. Straddling you was a Hange that you didn't recognize.

They were wearing a black lingerie delicately complimented with black thigh highs and on their pelvis area was a strap-on-dildo.

"I wanted to experiment this on you," they gave you a light smirk before positioning themselves in front of your pussy. Taking the small bottle thrown on the bed nearby, Hange opened it. It was lube. Dropping quite some on the dildo, Hange jerked it to spread the lubricant.

Placing their hand on your hips for support, Hange inserted it again.

They couldn't describe how much they ravished to look at you in this state. As they were thrusting their hips in and out, the room became filled with your moans and Hange's name.

"Yes y/n scream my name louder. Make the neighbours hear how good I'm making you feel," Hange panted.

'Hmmm Hange I'm getting close, go faster please, "you begged them.

Taking your wishes into consideration, Hange did not double up the speed but rather trippled it. You were practically shaking on the bed as your screams got louder and louder.

Not late enough, you released yourself on them. The pleasure was so unbearable it almost hurted. Panting on the bed, you looked at the ceiling to regain control of yourself. Then looking back at Hange, only to see that they were already staring at you lovingly.

"Can you untie me now? I need to pee," you coughed.

"Ahaha, no piss on the bed," Hange declared as you were startled by their statement.

"Just kidding lemme help you refresh yourself," Hange joked making you feel relieved.

End.

Thank you for reading this. :)

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deexchanel · 3 years ago

Text

Wrong Idea

Word Count: 1,055

Pairing: Loki x BlackFem!Reader, Thor x BlackFem!Reader

Warning: Swearing, Angst.

Summary: Y/N does get back on Loki for him not always being around but it doesn't turn out right and he has to slice a couple of hands-off, not exaggerating.

A/N: I had to find the most sluttiest outfit for this one shot and I'm proud, I know everyone that's reading this looks so good in this.

"Loki you're leaving again tonight?"Y/N sat down at her expensive vanity. She was fresh out of the shower and wanted to spend time with her boyfriend. Loki kissed his beautiful girlfriend's forehead then proceeds to grab his wallet.

"Darling I will be back before you lay down to rest. Brother and I need to handle some business and I will make it up to you."

Loki and Thor handled business for their father together. The Odinson family was at the top of the empire and the brothers did whatever they needed to keep it that way. Y/N came into the picture 8 months ago, right along with Sapphire. They became best friends and spent a lot of time together when the brothers are out handling business.

"Ransom will be here for security purposes; please let him know when you are to leave." Loki rolled up his sleeves to his dress shirt. She hated when he had to leave; Y/N rubbed in her facial care muttering.

"Yes, Loki."

Loki noticed the sudden behavior Y/N was giving him. When she gets that way, her mind creates devious plans that usually don't turn out well. "Y/N don't act like this, my love. Whatever you have plan up your sleeve, kill it."

Y/N rolled her eyes from him knowing her too well, "I don't have anything plan." She got up from the vanity, wrapping her arms around his waist. "I love you and I will be up when you get back. Please be safe baby."

Loki gave her a peck on the lips, letting his large hands rub on her ass a bit."I love you more my love, I'll be back in no time."

---------

Y/N indeed had something planned.

She convinced Sapphire to come out and party at the same club the brothers were doing business at. Gold Bar was the name and it was lit. Both girls stared in awe at how live the club was.

Sapphire pulled Y/N over to the bar for drinks. "Loki is going to lose his mind when he sees what you're wearing." She pulled at Y/N's pink mini dress.

"Do I care? No, he needs to stop putting his work before me. Now let's go have fun!" Y/N drowned the five shots in front of her. Sapphire shrugged going along with it; deep down she was scared she was going to get caught by Thor but fuck it, it's hot girl summer.

"These hoes don't know what life's about!!" The girls yelled letting the alcohol take over.

--------

An hour in Y/N was fucked up to the max, everything was spinning in her eyes. She has lost Sapphire and was trying to stay focused on finding her, but the alcohol in her system is saying otherwise.

"Excuse me miss, let's dance." A random man came out of nowhere. Y/N was now scared and regretted this whole coming-out thing.

"No, I'm good."

"I didn't ask."He grabbed her waist pulling Y/N to his chest. His hand traveled down to her ass ignoring her obligations to stop. Y/N tried to push him away but he was too strong.

"Let me go!"

"Shut up and dance bitch!" He raised his hand as if he was going to backhand her and Y/N flinched. But, instead, the man's arm was sliced off and fell to the ground. Y/N stared in horror seeing him yelling, clutching his bleeding arm. Loki stood to the side of him holding his dagger in anger.

"Touch what's mine again and I won't hesitate to slice that other one, you puny mortal."Loki's voice laced with venom, giving him a sinister smirk once he was finished as the guy shook his head rapidly. Y/N stared in his eyes seeing how dark they were, frightened her.

Not saying another word, Loki grabbed Y/N by her forearm basically dragging her out of the club. "Ow Loki.." She whimpered hoping he would realize his grip was too tight. When they got closer to the truck Y/N spoke up again, she was losing feeling in her arm.

"Ow Loki you're hurting me!"

Loki let go not even looking at her, he let go of her arm opening the door for Y/N. "Darling get in the truck."

"Loki have you seen Sapphire? I haven't seen her all night. Baby, please tell me you've seen her?" Y/N pulled out her phone, but Loki snatched it out of her hand.

"Darling just get in the truck," Loki repeated again trying to keep his composure. He knew that Sapphire was safe with Thor but he would tell her that when she got in the truck. Tears fell down Y/N's cheeks, she was sobering up.

"Forget getting in the truck Loki! I have to go find-"

That pushed his last button.

"Y/N get in the truck and I'm not going to ask you again!" Loki yelled pointing into the inside of the truck. Y/N obeyed getting in the backseat, heart pounding.

The car ride was silent and since Y/N put him in this mess, she decided to say something first. Wrong Idea.

"Loki I wasn't...I wasn't thinking."

Loki didn't even look her way. "Wasn't thinking? That was very obvious when you decided to wear that dress. Y/N this whole little idea put you and Sapphire in danger. You weren't thinking about nobody but yourself Y/N!"

Y/N dropped her head, "I'm sorry Loki okay? I was jealous."

"Jealous of what darling? I do this business stuff for us! Yes, I might have to work more than usual but that doesn't change my love for you." Hearing her sniffles made him look at his beautiful girlfriend.

"Stop crying my love, come here." He held out his arms for her to crawl in his lap which she did. Loki held her, placing a kiss on her forehead. "I'm sorry for yelling at you."

"I'm sorry for everything baby, please forgive me." Y/N cuddled up to his chest. "I love you Loki."

"I will forgive you, my love." He moved some of her hair from her face. "I love you too darling and don't wear this dress again without me."

"Yes sir."Y/N leaned forward placing her lips into his.

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

Y'all I tried my best to write Loki the best way possible. I love this one-shot though!

I tried not to make it too corny.

I feel like he's the type of boyfriend to let you wear whatever you want as long as no one else tries to touch you.

Credit to @sourpatchspinster for commenting first, I hope you like and if not, I loveee feedback!!!

stay slutty my friends.

#thor x you #thor x black!reader #thor x reader #loki x black!reader #loki x you #loki (marvel)#mcu loki #loki layfeyson x reader

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blueberryrock · 3 years ago

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Strawberry Buns (Inktober Day 14 Pippin x Reader)

A/N hello! I didn't have too much motivation to write today, but I do hope y'all enjoy this little fic! This one is loosely based off of this! It has always given me Pippin vibes ngl, enjooooy!

(Rules, Requests, and More)

"Pippin!" Y/N cries out, watching the curly-haired Took in question running down the long and winding path down towards the Shire's markets. "Wait!" Gripping her flowy green dresses, Y/N happily chases him down.

The dirt road crunches against her bare feet, reaching the entrance of the markets, she disappointingly watches Pippin's head disappearing into the crowd. With a long groan, Y/N slowly walks out into the crowd, the smell of freshly cooked meat pulls her attention away, but with a sigh, Y/N kicks a small rock and looks for somewhere to sit.

It seems she was always chasing the Took, whether it would be head-on into mischief or away from it. Y/N never minded it, she always loved the situations Merry and Pippin dragged her into, it was a pleasant change from her normal life. Finding a small stump, Y/N angrily folds her arms over her chest. He said he had something to show her, but as soon as they had left Bagend, he didn't slow down or let her catch up, Pippin quite literally left her behind.

From her elevated seat, Y/N still doesn't see Pippin, after brushing off any dirt from her dress she slides off the small stump, Y/N debates on checking her and Pippin's "secret spot," but wonders if this was just a flook, just a joke to get her riled up.

Grumbling to herself, Y/N turns towards the hill she just had run down, mad that she now has to walk back up in the heat. But then she feels someone tap on her shoulder, making her whip around to find the messy-haired Took.

Balling her hands into fists, it takes everything she has not to hit him. "I was wondering where you wandered off!" He says with a small grin.

"I didn't wander off, you were running too fast! I suppose you don't know how hard it is to run in a dress!"

"I suppose I don't, now come on, we've got to go!" Pippin says, grabbing Y/N's wrist to drag her behind him. With a yelp, her feet drag on the dirt ground and nearly make her trip, but she quickly catches herself and runs after Pippin.

As they duck and weave past other Hobbits in the market, Pippin leads her far past the entrance/exit, through the winding path into the forest. Y/N knows where she is being led, it was where they had first met, it was after she....misunderstanding with her parents.

He had brought Merry with him of course, they were looking for something sweet to add to"their" picnic of produce. Y/N had thought that they sought out the apple tree she was high up in because they heard crying, but the first thing he had said to her was "can you toss me an apple?"

She nailed him in the head.

But of course, Merry had seen her overly read face and had asked what was wrong. It took gentle coaxing from Merry and the small mention of strawberry buns from Pippin for Y/N to slide out of the tree. But it has been a few years since that day, they've made it a small tradition to always return back to the tree, no matter the circumstance.

With the cleaning in sight, excitement builds in Y/N's chest, the golden sunlight shimmers off the large apple tree. From here she can see the small buds of growing apples, with Pippin stopped ahead of her, Y/N grabs her dress and runs even faster than before.

She doesn't stop where Pippin had, instead Y/N runs a few extra feet to place her hand on the trunk. "I win!" She exclaims breathlessly. Her legs feeling like jelly under her dress, Y/N slides down the tree to rest on the soft grass.

"I didn't realize it was a competition," Pippin frowns, before sitting down next to her with a huff.

"It always is!"

"Every time?"

"Each and every!"

"Well prepare to lose next time," he says, his green eyes focused off into the forest before them. "But I got you something," Pippin grins, digging into a pocket in his vest. "I just hope it didn't get too squished."

A small dusting of blush covers Y/N's face as she curiously watches Pippin pulls out a lump wrapped in brown cloth. Hanging it gently to her, Y/N begins to untie the small ribbon holding it together. "It better not be something odd again Pippin," she says, remembering last year's little meet-up.

Throwing the ribbon to the ground, the cloth falls back to reveal a very pale pastry with a huge strawberry chunk in it. "Oh, you shouldn't have?" Y/N says, clearly seeing that it is...or is supposed to be a strawberry bun.

"I made it myself," he says. "I apologize if it isn't cooked fully, I had Merry helping me."

"Well, it is only fair that you get to eat it and potentially die with me," Y/N says, tearing the "bun" in half.

"W-what?"

"I am joking," she giggles. "It seems to be fully cooked." Handing him his half, Y/N takes the honey-covered strawberry chunk and pops it in her mouth.

"Hey!" Pippin protests. "You said we're sharing!"

"You also said it's my bun! And I get to deem how much I wanna share," that earns her a large scowl. Pippin grumbles to himself before shoving his half of the bun in his mouth with Y/N following suit. "It is a little bit chewy, but it isn't half bad!"

"Thank you," Pippin mutters, leaning back against the tree with a sigh he closes his eyes and hums a small tune.

Y/N observes him warmly with a smile, the rustling of the leaves above them paints golden light and shadows all over his face, making his wild hair shinning against the rest of him. Resting against the tree with him, Y/N closes her eyes and slowly moves to rest her tired head on his shoulder, smiling to herself when she feels him freeze underneath her.

"Me and Merry we're going to go to Farmmer Maggot's place again," he says, making Y/N tilt her head up to look at him. "Did you wanna join? Maybe we'll find Frodo 'n Sam out there."

Y/N lets out a snort. "I highly doubt we'll find Sam out there," she says, quietly reaching out to grasp his hand. "But I would be delighted to join you Pippin, where ever you go."

#inktober 2021 #inktober day 14 #inktober #lotr #lord of the rings fic #lord of the rings #pippin #pippin x reader #pippin x you #pippin x y/n #fics #fan fiction #fic writing #fic #fan fic

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cottoncandy-jester · 4 years ago

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✨lie down darling Its time for a dream✨

Faking it (dad squad)

So basically this is what happens if the dad squad found out reader faked an orgasm before

This is of course 18+ and the reader is female

Daichi suwamura

Okay so daichi honestly was never worried about y'all sex life

Like you moan his name everytime why is he worried

It's when you and the rest of the karasuno group get drunk and play truth of dare

When it's your turn.. you're drunk off six shots of tequila and tanaka asks you to reveal your deepest secret

"okay okay! Sooo during me and daichi's fourth anniversary, we fucked and I may have totally faked it"

Wait what.

WHAT?!

Everyone else is laughing but daichi is over here having a mental breakdown

You did what?!

How many more have you faked?! Were they all fake?! Did he ever really make you cum?

It did not take long for daichi to drag you away to the nearest bathroom

You gasp when daichi pinned you against the wall his mouth attacking your neck while his hands roamed your body now gripping your hips as he ripped your panties off.

"faked an orgasm?! Damn it how many did you fake? Doesn't matter don't tell me. I'm going to fuck you against this wall and you are going to cum over and over til I know for sure you like having sex with me"

He fucked you until you couldn't think anymore, he also made sure EVERYONE heard it.

Tooru oikawa

You were having girl talk with the other managers and the topic of sex came up

They all assume he's some sex god which makes you laugh

Oikawa is honestly such a dork during sex that you couldn't help but spills beans

"honestly he was so nervous during our first time, It was so cute..though he didn't really make me.. y'know"

Oh BOY

News travelled fast and before you know it at 4am you had a pissed oikawa at your door

The loud harsh banging interrupted your sleep and you went to the door only to see oikawa standing there, your sleepy eyes trailed his body up and down and you noticed he was gripping his phone so tight his knuckles turned white, you didn't even get to speak when the male stormed inside and let's out a frustrated sigh.

"why are rumors about me being bad in bed spreading around?!"

"I dunno...maybe you have a hater, babe it's like 4am..why are you here?"

Oikawa snapped his head towards you before walking towards you anger fuming towards you before he gripped your arm tightly.

"everyone is saying you started the rumor, so tell me little cutie what the fuck have you been saying?"

Your eyes got wide as the conversation with the girls resurfaced in your head and you softly reached out to put your hands on his cheeks which made him relax but he was still clearly annoyed.

"sorry, tooru it was just one little story. Girl talk y'know and it's fine lots of people can't make their partner cum their first time you just ha-"

You were cut off by the male roughly pulling you towards your room, everytime you tried to speak oikawa would glare at you before demanding that you shut up. Once in your room he pushed you on the bed his ego clearing having dropped now that you admitted the truth.

"I am good at sex! I am Great! I just have to prove to you that you are with the best man ever"

As he spoke he started to strip before his cold glare landed on you before he crawled ontop and wrapped a hand around your throat.

"you are going to be begging me to stop making you cum once I'm done with you"

He made you tell everyone that you cummed extra hard that night, even if it was super embarrassing to say.

Tetsuro kuroo

You two were arguing

It started with him being jealous of a person at work flirting with you and it just blew up

Screams and swears shooting back at the other

Low blows were dealt

You both don't even remember what the fight was about

Then..you said it

"God you are so cocky! It's shit like that, that make me fake orgasms during sex"

He shut up after that one for sure

All he can think about was how many did you fake and how he failed as your lover

Why didn't you tell him you weren't feeling good during sex?

Kuroo remained quiet as he let his brain think, after saying it you quickly walked over and hugged him hoping he wasn't angry at you

"baby! I'm sorry I didn't mean it, I was just upset and you were just upset you forgive me yeah?"

"how many times?"

"that doe-"

"how many damn times?!"

You flinched when he forced you to look at him showing pain in his eyes and you couldn't help but be honest with him.

"only a few, during those times where I was just really sleepy that's it"

Kuroo let's out a shaky sigh before he peppered soft kisses along your neck. He was pretty hurt at the moment but he did want to make it up to you, plus make up sex was always good

"come, let's talk this out yeah?"

His tone was soft as he guided you to the bedroom thought talking wasn't the plan he had, he wanted to make you see stars and make sure he could actually make you cum.

Koutaro bokuto

Okay so maybe it wasn't a good idea to pump up bokuto's ego every time you guys have sex

All your praise makes him think he's the best in the world

But when it came time for a girls night at you and bokuto's place stuff starts to spill

You told bokuto to spend the night at akaashi or something but you didnt think he would come home

"sooo [y/n]! How is bokuto in bed?! We gotta know"

The question made you embarrassed while bokuto stood outside you guys' bedroom listening in

Yes dear wife tell them how my sex is the best in the world

"koutaro, tries his best. Sometimes he gets a little too excited and cums early so he gets too tired to finish and we end up cuddling before I can climax so I just fake it"

WHAT?!

Bokuto automatically swings the door open scaring both you and the girls

He is legit tearing up and about to sob

After, very quickly telling the girls to leave he cries into your stomach while you pet his head

"why didn't you tell me?! I would have made it all better"

"oh..kou..it's no big deal"

Your soothing which would usually work just wasn't working right now, bokuto sniffled as he looked up at you with tearful eyes, you were his baby owl and he couldnt even make you feel good?!

He couldn't believe that! No he won't accept that! Before you can respond bokuto pushed you down on the bed before starting to pull your pants and underwear off your body

"kou! W-what the hell?!"

"just let me do this please! I need to know that I can do this, I just want you to be happy with me..so..let me worship you"

You were shocked but shuddered at the feeling of soft kisses against your inner thigh, with one final sniffle bokuto was now focused on something else.

He proceeded to eat you out that night until you cummed so much that you was sobbing but by the end of it he was so happy to know that he can make you cum and of course he was more mindful about your needs.

Wakatoshi ushijima

Oh jeez

Okay so he makes it very clear that bedroom talk is off limits

What you two do in bed is your business hell you guys don't really talk about sex and spend more time just doing it

You are very tight lipped about your sex life but tendou Is a very stubborn guy

He is constantly asking you what's it like..mostly cause he wants to tease wakatoshi

After finally bothering you to the point where you wanna hit him you confess

"toshi is great okay?! I mean sure he has his moments of not really getting me there but it's good so stop asking!"

OHOHOHO HE HAS TO KNOW MORE

after explaining that wakatoshi tends to be boringly vanilla you expect him to let it go

No bitch this is tendou 'i give no fucks' satori

Proceeds to tease wakatoshi about it every chance he gets

"wow who knew you could be boring in all departments"

"sooooo, you really like it vanilla huh?"

Of course oblivious wakatoshi doesn't pay him any mind until a drunk tendou spills the beans

"guess who told me that you're boring in bedddd~ pfft she said you are so slow that it is like fucking a box"

You of course didn't say that but you were shocked to see wakatoshi at your door the next day

"did you tell tendou about our sex life?"

Well fuck.

you honestly should have expected this. You let out a shaky sigh as you merely avoided eye contact you felt pretty embarrassed and ashamed

"yeah, sorry toshi he kept bugging me about it"

"you telling him is not why I'm upset"

You were honestly shocked and looked up only to see wakatoshi's face close to yours, his eyes were intense and honestly gave you chills.

"did you say I was boring during sex? Is this true?"

"um..yeah but it's okay I mean it's still good it's just very..typical I mean we do the same stuff all the time and you just tend to be, slow"

Wakatoshi was a little shocked by your words but he calmly sighed and ran his fingers through his hair as he tried to think of what exactly he needed to do.

"then my future wife, allow me to spend the night making you feel good instead of myself, you can tell me exactly what I need to do in order to bring you to climax again and again."

And you did exactly that, he was quite obedient and even did things he never done before just so he can make you feel good.

#haikyuu smut #haikyuu imagines #wakatoshi ushijima #tetsuro kuroo #daichi suwamura #bokuto koutaro #oikawa tooru

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m-aster-of-spinjitzu · 3 years ago

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orange and gold

...I just need more Cole and Vania content, they seem like they'd be great friends.

Basically it's just 'Cole goes to visit her there, they almost burn down the kitchen, and make way too many puns', lol.

Set a few months after Master of the Mountain, but before Seabound or The Island.

Also yeah, I couldn't think of a better title, sue me- I just know that they wear one of the colours at some point, so... 🤦‍♀️😂

Trigger warnings: none I think? Huh-

Also, bingo!! I really need to learn better time management, dear freaking gosh- I hope I'm not too late though? I know it's like half a day late, eek- and I was supposed to post this earlier, but I ended up literally falling asleep while writing it😂

Thank you so much Fabro, for hosting such a cool event!:D Your comments on my fics literally never fail to make my day<3. And I'm so glad that I met so many awesome, really skilled people through this event too - it's been a lot of fun working alongside y'all:D, I wish I'd had more time to interact instead of posting stuff and vanishing lol, but exams be like:////

Prompt: cooking (does baking count as cooking? I realized too late lol-) from @ninjago-bingo 's warm board.

Word Count: 2497

---

Trying to escape from killer dire-bats hadn't been on Cole's to do list today - although the mountains were kind of beautiful.

It was a bit difficult to see them while he was being dragged to his death, but hey, didn't Jay always tell them to be more positive?

That was, until he made the mistake of looking down.

Miles of snowcapped mountains touched the pastel blue sky, but he was more focused on exactly how high he was from the ground.

Great.

Trying to swing back onto the Bounty, he didn't notice a golden-winged blur shoot past the bat, almost dropping their spear in haste.

"Let my friend go, or I'll-"

"Vania?"

She throws the spear at the bird, successfully knocking one of its wings.

Huh. She must've been practicing - throwing with accuracy while flying seemed kinda difficult.

"I'm so sorry!" she replies, grabbing his arm before he fell down too. She winces at the strain on her wings, almost dropping him onto the deck. "I was supposed to come earlier, but there was an issue with one of the mines, and it took forever to-"

"There ain't anything in this world that's managed to kill me yet," he replies jokingly, checking that the autopilot hadn't been damaged. "I doubt an angry bird is going to be the first."

"Didn't you mention that you became a ghost once? Pretty sure that means you were dead-"

"Shh, that's not an important detail," he jokes.

"If you say so," she replies with a grin. "Did I mention that Chompy's been tearing down the palace flower arrangements again?"

"Send my regards to the gardener-"

"Did you just make a pun?"

"Remind me why I decided to visit you again?"

"Because you love me?" she asks stepping onto the ground as the Bounty landed gently.

"I hereby crown you as my platonic soulmate," Cole deadpans, taking her hand. "Vania and Cole-"

"Destined to annoy each other for eternity," she giggles, swinging their hands up and down. "But seriously - thanks. I don't think I realized how much work being a queen was."

"What's it like?"

"I mean - I'm glad that people trust me, and they come to me if they have a problem, but the paperwork is a nightmare. I never get to go outside anymore, I swear."

"Paperwork? Also, you just invited me here for a week. I don't wanna disturb you?"

"Nah, I cleared my schedule, don't worry. And trust me, you don't want to know. Everything requires some sort of official written thing, and it's so boring-"

"Official? But you're the queen?"

"Well, yeah, but I don't really want to change something unless it benefits the people. Not after..."

Her smile dims, eyes straying to the palace walls.

Oh- oh.

"You're nothing like him," Cole says firmly, squeezing her hand. "I mean, if you need to take a break, or you can make your job a bit easier by cutting out something unnecessary, that's just gonna help you become a better queen. You've definitely got the interests of your people at heart, and that's the most important thing, you know? And well, uh, everything seems to be going great so far - you don't have to beat yourself up over someone else's mistakes."

"Thanks," she replies softly, her smile slowly returning. "Speaking of breaks, what do you think we should do this time?"

"You could show me around the city again?"

"You've already seen everything cool," Vania giggles, skipping ahead of him. "We don't renovate much - unlike you guys-"

"Hey, it's not our fault that our city gets destroyed every few months-"

"More like every few days," she teases, tying back her golden hair. "How about we find some dragons to adopt?"

"Tempting, but where would you keep them?"

"They could sleep in my room-"

She breaks off when she notices him laughing. "What?"

"N- nothing," Cole replies, in between laughs. "Jay and I just made a bet."

"On what?"

"How many dragons you've adopted. I bet at least six, he bet fifteen."

"Well, jokes on both of you - I'm pretty sure my advisor's going to throw a fit if I show up with another one," she starts, giggling. "We've got twenty living in the palace right now."

"Twenty dragons?"

"They're so cute! You just look into their adorable little eyes," Vania pauses for breath, continuing her animated gesturing, "and you can't help but wanna hug them!"

"Oh, Jay's going to be so mad."

"Aww, I'm sorry guys. They're just too adorable!"

"...Wanna hear a funny story?"

"Yeah, sure!"

"I actually used to be terrified of dragons-"

"No way!" Vania exclaims. "Y'all have been on a lot of adventures though, so-"

"Nah, we used to have our own dragons at first. They were pretty cool! I just- I'm a simple guy! Huge animals with wings are scary up close when you're barely a teenager."

"Or when you're really short-"

"We're the same height!" Cole exclaims, facepalming in a bit of a fondly exasperated way.

"I'm two years younger than you-"

---

"Ugh, whose idea was this?"

"Yours," Vania grins, sitting down on the kitchen counter.

"You were supposed to help me, not leave me high and dry!" Cole accuses jokingly, staring at all the appliances they'd found in the cupboards.

"'One must always be prepared for new adventures,'" she quotes seamlessly, waving one of- what was his name again? Mulch something? Oh! Clutch! Some explorer he was, leaving them to die in the pyramid - Clutch Powers' books in the air.

"Fine," he sighs, staring at the old recipe book she'd found in one of their back cupboards. "But you've gotta help me? I almost burned down-" "Woah, what? If you finish that sentence with 'kitchen'-" "In my defense, Kai was playing a prank on me-" "In my defense, I wouldn't like to explain how the queen of Shintaro burnt down the palace by teaching one of her friends to cook," she grins, flipping through the pages. "What do you wanna start with?" "Something simple?" "Have you ever tried baking bread before? It's a lot of fun!" "I haven't really had the time, but that sounds kinda interesting."

He skims the recipe, raising his eyebrows. "Wait, why does this take hours? I thought you said it was simple?"

"Trust me, it is," she laughs, adding, "besides, I still wanna hear about all your adventures!" "Uh... okay," Cole replies hesitantly, "but if this fails, I'm so sorry." "Give yourself some credit, you guys literally saved the world! Multiple times!" "Bold of y'all to assume we know how we did it," he laughs, only half-kidding. "Besides. I botched soup once."

"I've botched toast," she mock-sighs, smiling. "Pretty sure that makes us even."

"Lemme get this straight. You've messed up toasting bread, but you can bake it from scratch?"

"Trust me, I don't know either," she giggles, trying to open a brightly coloured packet of... something? Did flour come in packets that small?

"Uh, why are you opening something called 'feast'?" he asks, eyebrows creased in confusion.

"Feast," she echoes, trying to stifle her laughter. "Off to a... rocky start, aren't we?"

It took him a second.

"I already regret this," he jokes, facepalming. "But I'd say that your puns are, uh, gold."

"I've un- unleashed-" breaking off, she half-falls off the counter, laughing so hard her face starts to go red, "a monster."

---

"Uh, is it supposed to look like that?" Cole asks, frowning.

The mixture looked less like the dough he'd been expecting - more like one of Jay's inventions gone wrong.

Badly wrong, he thought, eyes widening at the goopy mess of foam that threatened to spill over the jug.

"The yeast?" Vania echoes, poking her head out of one of the cupboards. "Yeah, all good! It always looks a little gross, and you're gonna doubt ever eating bread again, but at least it doesn't taste like it's fermented-"

"It's what?"

"Yeah," she grimaces, exaggerating her disgust a bit. "If aliens ever fell from the sky, they'd think we were crazy for eating bread-"

"Aliens? I think we're a bit crazy!" Cole exclaims, trying not to laugh.

Vania smiles, then sighs, lugging a huge bag of flour onto the counter. "I can never open these bags properly," she starts, eyeing the the bag a bit warily, "and it always makes such a huge mess all over the kitchen. You'd think they'd make it easier for people to use, right? I swear-"

He jokingly puts his hands over his ears. "I can't hear you!" "But you know that I've sworn off swearing-" she replies, breaking off with a laugh. "Pun not intended - that actually made sense in my head. I swear!"

"No," Cole interjects with a grin, shaking his head. "You don't, remember?"

"See, this is why we're friends-"

"Friends? Is that all I am to you?"

"Oh, be quiet," she shoots back, exaggeratedly dragging a hand down her face. "I mean, sure, just because everyone thinks that we're dating doesn't mean that we-"

Wait. What?

"People think that we're dating?" he asks, clamping a hand over his mouth in a poor attempt to muffle his laughter. "I- I- really?"

"I know, right?"

"Even my friends thought so at first," he confesses, dragging a hand down his face. "I mean, as much as I love you-"

"I love you too," Vania replies, completely seriously. "Even if you'll always be more like an annoying-"

"Hey-"

"Sibling to me than anything else," she finishes, grabbing a pair of scissors. Cole watches, a little alarmed, as she stabs them into the flour bag over and over.

"Is it... supposed to be this difficult to just open the bag? Seems kinda stupid-"

"Well, er, they have this piece of paper with glue that you're supposed to pull away from the rest of the bag, but it never works properly and I-"

"Well, we could always make our own flour," Cole interjects, laughing. "I mean, I've got a scythe? Let's go!"

"Uh, but we don't have wheat growing here. I don't think it'd suit the climate very well?"

"Wheat a shame," Cole sighs jokingly, measuring out the flour (which had, finally, escaped the bag).

"Oh my gosh," Vania deadpans, "you did not just-"

"Yep, I did."

"You're horrible," she giggles, "then again, I was the one who started this whole debacle, so I think we'll share the blame."

"Debacle? Where'd you pick that one up from? Sounds kinda cool-"

"Oh, it's from a book someone wrote about you guys," Vania says casually, pouring a cup of water into the bowl.

"Hey, uh-" Cole starts hesitantly, twisting his fingers back and forth, then breaks off. "Why'd you read all that stuff about us, anyways? Adventure books don't really seem like something you read a lot, since we have similar favorite books. I mean..."

"Well, um..." Vania trails off, clearly uncomfortable. "Uh- I guess, well, it sounds kinda stupid, but I'd never really met anyone my age who wasn't a royal or something. I... er, I didn't want to be left out, you know?"

Cole thinks back to a scroll; a quest, a sacrifice. One that his friends never seemed to really notice, unless it was with horror or flinches. Not that he blamed them, but - joking about how he was much more useful to the team when he was freaking dead than he was before he'd stumbled and fell in the temple?

That had been a bit far, even for his best friend. Locks could always be picked or something, he didn't need to be a ghost to provide some sort of value-

Well, that's not completely true, is it? a small voice questions, and he can't keep his hands from shaking a little.

"Jay here thinks you're the least valuable ninja."

Not enough to be a performer. Now, not good enough to even be a ninja, apparently.

Well, he reminds himself firmly, you don't have to be the best - just stand up to those who are cruel and unjust.

Nothing but a scar that glowed warm orange occasionally left of the whole Cursed Realm ordeal, sometimes it was all too easy to forget - or pretend - that it had never even happened in the first place.

Other times, like when he'd dropped a glass of water on the floor and his hands hadn't stopped shaking for hours, or when he woke up screaming, expecting to fall through his bed again, it still felt like he was trapped as a ghost. Literally - and maybe a little figuratively as well.

Yeah. Yeah, I know.

"Thanks for trusting me with that," he replies softly. "And I'm sorry. That sounds... horrible, but, honestly, you're a pretty cool person, and I ain't just saying that because we're friends. People can be awful, and they can- they can leave, but you don't need to pretend to be someone you're not for people to accept you. I kinda know what it's like, and it's... just, uh, not great."

"No, thank you," Vania says, rubbing her eyes. "You're pretty cool, too. And I'm glad that we become friends, even if wasn't in the- the, er, greatest circumstances."

"Right back at ya. The fall was pretty terrifying, though," Cole says casually, as if memories of that nightmarish plunge into the depths of earth don't still send shivers down his spine.

"No, definitely! I was so sure we were gonna splat onto the ground or something, thank gosh we didn't."

"Yeah..." Cole trails off, reading the recipe they'd been following. "Oh- do we just leave the bowl somewhere for a few hours now?"

"Oh, yeah," Vania answers. "Other than clean up the kitchen, what else do you wanna do?"

"That's kind of you, but, ah, I don't mind. You can choose something."

"I don't mind either," she replies, covering the bowl with a dishcloth. "Seriously, I don't."

"Same here though."

"Really, I don't mind-" Vania breaks off with a laugh, adding, "Well, actually, there is something."

She doesn't elaborate, thoughtfully gazing out the window.

"Well, what is it? Don't keep me in the dark."

"Ugh, it's kinda stupid-"

"I'm sure that it's not- well, unless you want to try to jump off a flying ship with a homemade parachute to prove a bet to someone-"

"Do I even wanna know?"

"...uh, probably not. We're way too crazy sometimes, our Master has a hard time keeping us in check. Your thing, though?"

"Can I give you a hug?"

Cole blinks for a second, expecting some sort of punchline.

"That's your thing?"

"Well, yeah- I mean, I said it was kinda stupid-"

"No no, that's not what I meant. You're so sweet - that's all."

"Well, not more than you-"

"Nah, you're sweeter-"

"Let's just call it a tie," Vania says with a smile, reaching over to give her friend a hug. "Thank you so much, I swear- well, no, I don't, but you know, anyways-"

"Yeah," Cole replies, laughing softly. "I know."

12 notes · View notes

syubub · 4 years ago

Text

2021 Reading for BTS and the collective!!

Wow wow wow! I didn't disappear or get dragged away by a demon. No no, I just got thrust into unexpected shadow work and I now have an unhealthy obsession with sea shanties and a love of pasta.

I had this idea planned to be early in January but that didn't pan out so I'm doing it now. I have another yoongi reading in the works and another fun thing coming soon as well!!

I promise I won't bore you to death any longer but I hope you've all been doing well!!

Disclaimer: This is for entertainment purposes only and not to be taken as fact.

If this message doesn't apply, let it fly!

Cool cool cool.

Let's get it.

💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜

Oki. I first want to say that this I gonna be long lol. I did a meditation and gathered some little pieces of things y'all might need to hear and then I pulled cards for every month. The fountain tarot deck is the cards for us, the collective, and the rider-waite cards are for bts. It'll make more sense when I add picks and stuff. I did a little extra card pull for yoongi for the month of May too :) I'll make sure to type out all the cards in text so you know what they are (the pics are kinda wack.) I also used my pendulum to ask if there was a bts related event for every month and that's at the bottom. It's just to take in the possible energy for the month and something that could result from that energy!

LETTUCE BEGIN (hehe)

Starting with the section for the channeled messages. I want to reiterate that this was collective so if it doesn't resonate with you, the message might not be for you! Use your intuition.

(Enough talking. Damn)

So. As I said this was through meditation and connecting to the big column tree thing (I told my cousin about the tree/pillar and they were like,, "so basically a big energy dildo in the æther?" .... I CAN'T STOP THINKING ABOUT IT. h e l p m e) and asking if there was any messages or advice that needed to be delivered and it was... intresting?

Things came fragmented. So there was little messages like, "Its gonna be okay" and "things are changing for everyone" and "open your eyes if you want to see" (that's sassy.) There was one particular thing that was confusing me though. Straight up it was just "flower" on repeat and like a really bad picture of a flower? Like you could tell what it was but it was bad quality. Anyway, I was like "okay. Kindly shut the fuck up. Pls." And I wrote down flower, pink flower and rose. Sooo.... idk but there you go.

More messages were things like, "the block isn't in your head", "try calling forth that which you seek" and... February. Possibly there is specific (very very very loose) connection to the 10th-19th? I'm not to sure what or why but I'd say maybe look out for opportunities on these days and also maybe external events.

Continuing with dates. In the last this 21 and January 21 came up. It came up again but with 2 messages. So first, either 21st is a day where something is put into motion (possibly private or public) or announced and the second was "add them together dumbass" that's not very kind but 3. Again this has been discussed too but but but... maybe a signal of a third mixtape 👀 (not necessarily on the 21st per say but possibly in March? I'm really not sure).

Oki. I got side tracked like I always do and started thinking about tattoos and stuff and I really want koo to have a peony tattoo. I feel it in my BONES. It would suit him so well. and as I was thinking about tattoos I heard, "don't be surprised if yoongi gets/shows a tattoo this year" ??? What the fuck? I think maybe they messing with me but now I have hopes and I don't want them to be crushed and thrown to the wind :(

Back to normal stuff, "the theme is growth" I think that fits very well with the reading. "Blue might be a lucky color" self explanatory. It might be lucky. "Start practicing grounding and centering" this was LOUD. This will help you in how you react to events in the future. Really do practice this if you haven't.

This is where it gets a little weird. So, I got a message that said "start living as if you never existed." I am not a 100% sure what this means but I think I have a pretty good guess. I hate to make it sound weird like this but by sort of focusing on something that is so hard to comprehend (because our brains can't comprehend not existing very well) you kinda break the 4th wall? Like in Deadpool when he addresses the audience and is aware that he is a character played by Ryan Reynolds? anyway, focusing on something that seemingly impossible you kind of accidentally open up the floodgates for a lot of other things. I would say if you are not in the right headspace to do this don't do it but it can be a powerful way to break up the monotony of reality. The theory that everything happens simultaneously bc time isn't a linear progression events blah blah we are energy blah blah the multiverse blah blah.. Theres so so so so so so so so so much about this and how it applies to things that I could probably write you 10+ dictionaries worth of material but for the sake of simplicity and not wanting to write a novel right now, I will continue. The main lesson is to start challenging your perception of the world around you. Ask why and why and why and why. Essentially seeing cracks in the matrix. Pulling your head out of your cosmic ass, realizing that rose you're smelling is actually daffodil ect. It's not supposed to bring you fear but just kinda encouraging you to question all the things that you perceive as given truths.

I tried to make that sound cohesive but really it's such a big concept that I can't really wrap it up all nice and neat.

Oki. May and March are also important times.

Listen to your intuition and try not to take everything so seriously. I'm not saying to check out and go squat in the Himalayas but it's important to find joy in the now. Life is already tough enough so don't forget to watch a silly show that you like or change your hair to a style you've never tried, wear makeup in a very loud way. Just have fun and don't worry so much about things that you can't control. Listen to yourself and your intuition.

Well that was all over the place. Let's get on to the actual tarot part now.

For the record, the pictures are right to left.

January for the collective

We have the empress, the sun, 7 of swords and a fortune that says "act well your part; there the honor lies"

Hmm. Ngl I was a little confused to see the empress and the sun for January... I mean it hasn't been great. So I pulled clarity card 7 of swords. The 7 of swords is all about betrayal. It's about the deception and and actively getting away with things. This is people lying, cheating, sneaking and the works.

This makes much more sense!! The Sun card is usually about joy and success and happiness but in this case I see it as illuminating the betrayal. It's shining light on the deception and keeps the spotlight there. Its also an energetic card so I think that shows passion for uncovering the truth.

With the empress card too I think January is all about getting creative in all forms. Creative ways to protest, to mourn, to celebrate, to connect. Also taking in the abundance that we DO have. The beauty that surrounds us. I like to think of aphrodite energy for this. Its not just love and passion and creativity but is also asserting yourself and having strong passion for what you love and fighting for it. Did you know aphrodite was also called upon in ancient Greece in times of war? She was honored as a goddess of war but still a goddess of love, the sea, fertility ect. What I'm trying to say is that being a creative and "feminine" energy is in no way weak. Sometimes the most powerful things come from this energy. Love aggressively with good intentions. The point is that you should take whatever you're feeling and translate it into something creative or something you care about. The fact that covid is still a thing really sucks but take any rage, hurt, sadness, joy, love whatever and use that shit to make something amazing. Bake bread and punch the fuck out of it, paint your frustration, play hopscotch in higheels while you listen to heavy metal. You get the point.

Now January for BTS!!

We have the death card. (I only pulled one card bc I have things planned from this)

January has been... strange? To say the least.

This card can be a lot of things for them. I think this points to more maturity in their music? Like they've finally ditched the "shiny kpop boy band" label and are being taken seriously in the west. I also think that they're going through a musical/concept transformation~ I think it also signified the change in plans bc of the Grammys perhaps they had things planned an that fell through so they were forced to rapidly change plan/course.

For January: possible mixtape or announcement.

February for the collective

We have 8 of coins reverse and hanged man reverse.

The 8 of pentacles reverse talks a lot about self improvement. Doing that good good inner work and self care. Working on developing parts of you that you've maybe neglected. It's also learning how to work with how you are instead of wishing you weren't the way you are. If you have a therapist its a great time to maybe ask for any extra tips that you can practice daily to help you even more. Maybe exploring more into insecurities relating to finance or jobs or your passions. If you don't have a therapist but you have the means to get one I always highly recommend. You don't have to have "problems" to see a therapist. Everyone could use a non biased point of view that is literally trained to help you be you best self. If you can't get therapy, I get it. Shits tough rn but there's still things we can do to better ourselves like Journaling and reading therapy blogs or self help books (not the taky shit) or trying a hobby you fell out of touch with. There's also a lot of places where you can get therapy promise on the internet. Most importantly, better yourself in the way that you need. Take time in February to take notice of what you want to improve upon. The 8 of coins reversed does come with the warning not to get stuck in perfectionism. Go easy on yourself and if you find yourself getting frustrated when working on projects, try to take a step back and practice whatever it is in a fun way and then come back to it later

Hanged man reverse talks about knowing that you need to chill but you don't. You'll need too. Maybe you'll find yourself swept up in work and tasks and you're over whelmed and know you need to stop and catch your breath but you resist. Why? Well, perhaps you're trying to ignore reality by filling the empty spaces with things and stuff so you don't have to face what's bothering you. Not wise. Take time for yourself. There's also the flips side where people are just kinda stuck.. creative block. Maybe you want something to turn out one way and it just isn't, so your stuck and frustrated and can't move past it. Let go of your expectation of how it should be and let it be what it is. Go with the flow and maybe you'll see a new way to overcome your problem. You'll eventually get that break through that you need! The theme of February is about self improvement. Listen to yourself.

February for BTS

We have judgment.

Hehe yeah. This card is about rebirth and the inner calling. Letting go of the old to step into the new version of you. This is also a very spiritual card lol. This can talk about a new decision that you have to trust your gut on. This is a very significant card that screams comeback to me. It also can talk about sharing your struggles with a group of people and that to me sounds comeback ish. Maybe this will be an announcement in February, maybe they'll be working on it idk but this is ultimate comeback energy so I hope they utilize this for a big group project!!

February: possible BTS comeback (even my pendulum knows)

March for the collective

The chariot and justice

This plays directly off of February! With the chariot you're taking the self improvement that you've done and putting it to action! Now is the time to act on the dreams and passions that you have don't wait and hope for the best. March is about action and standing in your power.

Justice card is cause and effect and truth. What you do will have consequences good or bad. Not doing anything also has consequences. Cease the moment and make the best of it. You'll be taking responsibility for what you do. You start a business? Now you have the responsibility of running it and you get the credit. Stuff like that. Stand by your decisions with conviction and trust yourself.

There's also the side of justice that talks about bringing justice. If you've been wronged, you'll be brought justice if you stand up for yourself.

We also carry the continuous lesson of learning what we truly believe and challenge those beliefs!

March for BTS

Oki we have the hermit and the 6 of pentacles reverse.

Well... let's start with the 6 of pentacles reverse. This can really talk about being so generous and giving to everyone else that you forget about yourself. I think that maybe they might be over exerting themselves and giving so much that they're exhausted physically and emotionally as well. I think too, they take on so much of our pain like its their own? Idk but this would be a good time to do a large scale fan project to show them a little extra love!

With the hermit card it talks about a self introspection so they could be looking inward as a team and kinda evaluating their bond.

I also see this as maybe being alone as in they maybe can't physically go to the grammys? Or maybe they had been planning the rescheduled concerts and they had to be pushed back even further? Things like that. Regardless this signals re thinking/reevaluating the goals that they have and considering what direction to go in!

March: possible mixtape or solo project?

April for the collective

We have 6 of coins and 3 of cups reverse.

Let's start with the 6 of coins. It's about sharing. It can be about charity so sharing money via donation but also giving time, effort, energy to people as well. Giving knowledge is good too! It's an all round exchange. Maybe someone lends you money or you lend money to someone. It's give and take. It's a two way street. It's also a card of balanced finance. So money stuff should be looking promising around this time (for you U.S people this could point to more stimulus help as well)

And for the 3 of cups reversed... I see this as reopening of places and people struggling to find the balance. So think people who've been in lockdown celebrating by throwing a big party... yikes. This card reminds that we should be mindful of the long-term consequences that come with our actions.. maybe also people that are experiencing fear of being in public places now. This is only one facet though. Bc I think this also means in general, missing being with friends and having a renewed relationship because you've really realized how important it is to have these people that mean so much to you in your life. Don't forget that you have people that love you and want the best for you. Call them when you feel alone.

April for BTS

The heirophant

Mhmm. This one kinda gives me vibes that they'll be mentoring people? Idk but I see them more as the heirophant teaching what they've learned/ know to help guide others. HOWEVER this could also be them taking a new task under their belt. Learning something new. Since this is as a group reading I assume that this talks about the group as a whole. This card is also very tradition oriented so maybe they are taking lessons that are connected to traditional Korean culture? Maybe its for RUN or maybe its to incorporate into music and preformance. Think bts mma preformance but all of them learning together? Idk, it's just a thought (maybe wishful thinking). It also talks about seeking counseling so maybe they'll do yoongis idea from the most recent RUN.

This can also be them embracing this kind of leadership/ status.

April: I got nothing. It does feel like something though

May for the collective

Five of cups and queen of cups reversed

Five of cups is disappointment, regret and self pity. Now honestly this to me looks like possibly a tightening of restrictions yet again. Regardless of the situation that this is talking about, the best thing you can do is not wallow in the bullshit. You scrape yourself off the pavement and move foward. You'll need forgiveness of yourself and others and that if shit isn't going your way, you need to pull your head out of your ass and look around bc there's options out there. It's like drowning in a kiddie pool. Just stand up, dude. The water is like 5 inches.

Queen of cups reversed talks about self love and self care. It's more of that look inwards energy. Think about really taking care of yourself. May might be emotionally draining so you need to be ready to take care of you! Part of self care is making sure that your boundaries are well enforced.

Be on the look out for codependent behaviors. Check in with yourself.

The queen of cups is very intuitive and having it in reverse can talk about you not taking enough time to listen to it. Make an effort to meditate for like 5 minutes a day at least. Do something to let yourself connect to your intuition and higher self.

May for BTS

9 of pentacles

This about enjoying the fruits of your labor and absolute abundance and luxury. This could talk about them rolling in the dough after signing a new partnership or having a concert or something if the sort. This could also be a time where we see them buying new things like houses, cars and rings (lol) but also this could be them doing a very high production value project! Also namjoon and his bonsai army are thriving in this time!

May: possible concert or scheduled concert event. Activity of some kind.

Yoongi interlude

I asked for one card to give me an idea of what the mystical May 13th really is. I got: the star, 2 of cups, 4 of wands, the world and the sun.

Guys. I can't with this. 2 of cups is a card of union, romance, soulmate. 4 of wands is celebration, joy, homecoming, bliss. The world is completion and the sun is happiness, joy, marriage, enlightenment.

I've said it a billion times but that's some soulmate shit. So soft so cute and May will be eventful for his personal life.

June for the collective

Death and the heirophant reversed.

Wow wow wow death is transformation and a new chapter so a new way of life and something new/ different that changes how we see things. Again this could be relating to new covid things and new policies and stuff like that but also new as in new to all of us. Groundbreaking perhaps?

The heirophant reversed talks about teaching yourself. Being your own teacher and making your own path. This might be spiritual or otherwise. Challange what the world wants from you and instead listen to what you truly want bc you don't need anyone's approval. Continue to ask questions about why things are the way that they are.

June for BTS

Page of pentacles

Oki oki page of pentacles means a new creative venture and manifestation. Maybe something that they've been wanting for a while finally comes to fruition. This might be the start of a new project that they haven't done before or something cross genre? Idk but its a really good sign of being motivated for a new endeavor and manifesting any projects that they've ever wanted to do. Love this promising energy!!

June: idk

July for the collective

10 of swords and 9 of cups reversed.

10 of swords signals a painful ending. Also deceit. Its a necessary end to a long battle. The only thing you can do is control how you react in these situations. You just kinda gotta surrender into the pain and know that it's temporary. Take time to reflect on what happened and why and how it will help you grow.

The 9 of cups reversed talks about valuing stuff and material things over emotions and spiritual things. This can be talking about society in general, that we are becoming more aware to the fact that there is often more value placed on ephemeral items rather than humanity as a whole. This also can be talking about coming to the realization that we've been working so hard towards... something we don't really care about simply because we were told that it's what you do.

If you want something different to happen you have to put in effort. You can't be sitting in front of a water fountain being like, "damn. I'm thirsty. I really really want water so why isn't it in my mouth yet?" Like?? Hello? You have to take the first step, my dude.

Certainly don't try to do anything that would cost you finatial security or health.

You have the potential to find happiness within yourself. So try looking inside instead of looking outward.

July for BTS

4 of swords.

This is about rest and relaxation!

Taking time to meditate and take some time to look at what you've done objectively. Ots like the hermit in a way but much more focused on resting and relaxing so you can come back stronger and with better direction. Maybe they'll take a break for a couple days but I really see it as them reassessing options. Especially if July goes how I think it will. Maybe they'll film something like In The Soop again? Maybe we'll see bon voyage type thing? Idk. But it could be something kinda out of the spotlight? Maybe something more healing?

July: maybe something?? I'm not sure but it seems like something might be in store.

August for the collective

5 of coins and the wheel of fortune

Well let's see. 5 of pentacles talks about isolation and a negative mindset. This talks about falling on hard times but its a temporary set back. This energy can be talking about falling on hard times emotionally as well. In the card it shows a woman outside of a church shivering and cold but she's too busy thinking about all that she's lost that she doesn't notice the warm church that she could step into for shelter.

But then with he wheel of fortune that talks about fate/destiny, opportunity and luck so maybe this is a necessary loss so that a new door can open. This does kinda tie in with July as well. The end of something is painful but it's often a necessary thing. Might be a bit uncomfy but that's how things change. Again I see this maybe hinting more towards society but none the less it's definitely a theme for August to have doors closing and new ones opening so be on the lookout for that.

August for BTS

The devil.

Now don't fret. The devil talks a lot about choice. Most notably the choice between instant gratification and and something more substantial and the devil leans towards indulgence. It also has a lot to do with the shadow side. This could talk about ~scandal~ sure, but I think its more of a time where you become aware of negative patterns and you shine a light on that part you've ignored. On a much lighter note this card talks also about an incredible bond between people. It can be unhealthy if not given space or boundaries. Listen to pied piper and come back to me.

I also REALLY REALLY REALLY hope that this card points to this: sexuality. The boys have always been pretty pg when it comes to the topic of sex and embracing sexuality so I really do hope to see something more daring and grown up and exploring a tastefully sexy concept. On the same vain as sexuality this card also talks about kinks and stuff like that so don't be surprised if we get more outfits like fake love Era bondage harnesses.

August: ???

September for the collective

We have the world and 10 of wands reversed.

The 10 of wands reversed talks about carrying burden. Doing extra work and taking on more responsibility. Doing everything by yourself and carrying this heavy load alone will get you burnt out quicker than anything. You might be taking on too much and you'll need to prioritize what you really need to focus on. I also think there will just be a lot happening in September for a lot of people. It's a lot of working hard because you know it's good work or because it's what's right. This could be social responsibility that's placed on you or work responsibility. For whatever reason this burden isn't something you want to share with others because you think its yours alone to deal with. It's not though bc you'll figure out eventually that if it hurts so much you'll find a way to lessen the burden. 10 in tarot is all about the completion of a cycle and going through the wands cycle is hard work because for anything to be made of passion, you need to put the work behind it. The burden isn't forever, the heavy work load will lighten but this is you seeing things out. It's a good thing!

Especially considering this is paired with with world. The world is all about completion and that's what you're doing here is finding completion. You are seeing things out until the end but you just need to learn to give up some responsibility, lessen your burden.

This also talks about hard work being put into wider social spheres as well. Things like the vaccines becoming more widespread through the whole globe or at least better planing and infrastructures not related to covid. Things are looking up!

September for BTS

Knight of swords reverse

This bad boi is restless energy. It's being so pent up that you're ready to burst and you really want to take action but you can't because something is keeping you from taking that action. Again I do think this is kinda covid related in regards to touring bc if they do tour in 2021 its gonna look a lot different. This energy can be a bit impulsive and directionless so I think maybe they'll channel this into album material something? I'm not really sure tbh. I'm suprised this energy didn't show up earlier because it almost seems inevitable.

September: no clue

October for the collective

Ten of coins and the star reverse.

Welp let's start with the 10 of coins. Its about wealth, financial security, and long term success so this is a pretty prosperous time. This talks about the obvious monetary wealth and material wealth but also an abundance of opportunities. So this is definitely a good time to enjoy whatever consistency you have. This energy is really really abundant in the career space as well. So October could be very prosperous in the job field and you'll have likely found what it is you really want and could be successful at. This could be the actual act or just the idea. This is could also talk about investing in something for your future, this could be time or money.

With the star reversed it can talk about a loss of faith and a disconnection. This often points to feeling like you've just been forgotten or left out. Like the universe doesn't give a shit about you and left you out to die. Things might seem unfair but always try to look for the lesson that you can take from the experience. Seeing the 10 of coins and the star makes me think that a lot of people have kinda lost faith in their manifestations and also just in the concept of not living in a state of need. Especially if you see other people doing well and you've been trying so fucking hard but you haven't gotten a break. I know we hate to hear it but this can serve as a test of faith. Or rather an opportunity to get your shit in line and take a second to breath. Do something good for yourself and then continue on. This star in reverse serves to show you what no longer sparks joy and helps you find what does and what that initial spark was in the first place. Helps you get back to the original vision/ spark.

October for BTS

5 of pentacles reverse.

This signals the end of difficult times and getting that groove back. The last month was restless energy with no where to go but this month that energy is certainly put to good use. They might be figuring out what has been missing In their lives and starting to rectify that. They are definitely reminded that material wealth doesn't bring spiritual or emotional wealth. Might be also feeling a bit alienated too.

October: something is likely but idk

November for collective

Six of swords reversed and the moon.

Transition and change is prevalent. The 6 of swords is about leaving behind the familiar. Maune this is leaving a job, a new change in the status quo, leaving a relationship ect. The thing you have to keep in mind is just how amazing this is in terms of what it will do. It will alow growth!! And bring clarity!! Thos can also be societal as well, something being left behind in favor of something new. It's letting go and reflecting so that you can move foward.

This is strengthened by the moon card. The moon card is the subconscious and all the things that come with it. The anxiety, the illusion, the uncertainty. You'll want to deal with whatever emotions come up. The moon can signify a confusing time where things aren't what they seem to be. That's the illusions so you'll have rely more on intuition at a time like this. Your dreams might hold significance in this time as well. Listen to your guides and your own guidance because it will help you understand more than you did before this journey began. Using moon cycles to your advantage in November might really help you!!

November for BTS

7 of wands

Challenge and competition. People are envious of bts. We know this. But people will be challenging them for what they've gained: music industry domination. This might co.e in the way that people will spread vicious rumors in attempt to disenfanchise or possibly it will be a fair fight. It could also be a challenge/ battle for some other aspect that involves legal matters.

My best guess though is good old competition. Bts has proven again and again that they will continue to do what they do how they do but they will not be trampled over. In the best way this could renew some of that spirit in friendly competition. They will tear eachothers throats out for a pack of ramen so maybe a bit of competition will be good for them. It keeps life intresting.

November: nothin

December for the collective

Two of cups and the emperor!

Let's start off with the emperor card talks about stability and order. It can also signify being the "breadwinner" so its a good sign that you'll kinda be on top of your shit. The emperor is also an amazing leader so you might find yourself taking on a leadership role too! This is very organized energy that works very smoothly!

two of cups is such a lovely way to end out the year! It's love and partnership and attraction so if you aren't in a relationship by this time you might meet someone who strikes your fancy!! On a none romantic relationship note though, this card is also great for business partnership bc it signifies that you're on the same page and have the same goals in mind!

It's harmonious relationships and trust between them!! Love love love this energy so much! Cups are the suit of emotions and this card is so promising.

If you are in a relationship, this can talk about "falling in love all over again" like you're just reminded of how good they are.

December for BTS

Queen of cups

Intuition, creativity and emotional stability. They're using intuition to guide their moves foward with emotional maturity. They are in a place of knowing what they want and why. This would be a good time to work on an album or a book or to release them. The queen of cups is like the friend that you can tell absolutely anything and somehow they have a helpful answer. This card is really calm and it can also talk about subconscious thoughts.

I think that bts is maybe making more of a conscious effort to make sure that what they do is just as emotionally fulfilling for them as it is for us! They might be kinda pondering the future at this time and considering if this is what fills their emotional cup!

December: possibly a thing?

Now these cards are the vibe of the year and some advice.

For the collective (on the left)

Three of swords and judgment reverse.

The fortune says "accept the challenges, so that you may feel the exhilaration of victory"

The 3 of swords is about disappointment and hurt and heartbreak. It's about the emotional release that we all need when shit gets tough. Don't pretend to be strong. If you need to cry, fucking cry. This year is about letting go of expectations and do what you have to do to release so you can move foward and not have these things pile up.

You have to make an effort to not let yourself take on what other people think of you. You aren't defined by what some asshole says. You define yourself.

Judgment reverse is about self doubt and ignoring your path. It's being stagnant and being harsh on yourself. This year has a focus on building yourself up and noticing when you are not. Bring light to the things that are holding you back without harsh judgment for yourself. You can't beat yourself up. If you make a bad decision you know not to make it again. Take accountability and move on.

The oracle card is inner temple.

Seriously all the focus of this year is in self improvement and dear god, please take time to work on yourself spiritually!!! Everything you want to know is there if you take the time to listen. This should be a place where you feel safe and welcome. It definitely should not feel like something you HAVE to do.

For BTS

10 of swords and page of swords

The fortune says "you create your own stage. The audience is waiting" (how tje fuck?? This is the perfect fortune)

The 10 of swords is a painful but necessary end. This is accepting the current situation. They maintain focus for 2021 for them is adapting and keeping their spirits up.

With the page of swords it talks about new ideas and that kind of creativity. It's also a lot about communication so I really think that they'll be figuring out new ways to connect and new projects that will be prosperous.

The oracle card is Pleiades

This is what we talk about all the time. Bts has helped so many people want to be better and do better. They are uplifting humanity and giving people a sense if belonging. Bts finds you when you need them most 💜💜💜

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Wow I had to write this up over 2 days bc this was so fucking long. I need a nap. Idk if I'll proof read this before I post it so don't hate me for the mistakes (honestly, there's like 10,000 spelling and grammar mistakes in my other posts too 🙃)

I hope you guys enjoyed it and maybe this will be helpful to to have a forecast of some possible energy for you to look out for!!

Also bts bc I love them. I have another bts 2021 reading I'll do soon too!

Hope you guys are happy and well 💜

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