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1engele · 4 years ago

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daybreak | sal fisher x fem!reader - 8. solo

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[warnings: underage drinking, smoking, weed, near death experience?, crying]

"never have i dealt with anything more difficult than my own soul." — You leave the roof late in the night. Sal had gotten up and retreated into his apartment a little while earlier—but you'd decided to stay and make sure he didn't come back there.

Three days pass. They all consist of fleeting glances and irresolute tension. Things remain the same with the group dynamic, except for between you and Sal. Neither of you seem to know how to continue from that conversation on the roof. No one else notices, though. They'd never suspected anything from the beginning, it seems.

The beginning of your involvement with Sal involved a little bit of buildup and then a snap which resulted in a sexual encounter (or two).

Now it was a bit different. Now things were a little less lighthearted.

It's a Saturday—you'd planned to spend it inside as usual. That's until your phone starts ringing.

You flip your phone open, read over the contact, and answer the call.

"Hi, Ash."

"Y/N," she starts. You hear the excitement to continue in her voice. "There's a party tonight."

"Oh?" You get up from your seat on your bed.

"Some stoner Larry has connections with invited him and said to bring friends. He wants to bring us—save for Todd. He doesn't do parties."

"Wait," your eyebrows furrow. "Me?"

"Yeah!" She says from the other end of the line. "It'll be fun. Cmon."

You bite your lip nervously, anxiety knotting in your stomach. "I don't know. I've never really.."

Ashley is momentarily silent on the other line. She must be contemplating what to say to convince you. "Sal's coming too. Parties aren't necessarily his thing, either—so maybe you guys could try it out together?"

You open your mouth and then promptly close it. Something inside of you suddenly really wanted to go to this party. "Um... alright. Okay."

"Cool! What're you gonna wear?"

You look toward the drawer that contained your clothes and bit your lip. "Not sure yet. I'll update you on that."

"Okay, don't forget to text me! See you at eight."

The call declined from the other line. The phone that held the phone to your ear slipped into your lap. You pressed your lips together and tried to ignore the familiar feeling of sickening nausea and anxiety.

You don't rush yourself on getting ready for the party, because the time you're due to be done won't be for a while.

You take your time with the hours you have. You shower, take your time on eyeliner, mascara, and lipgloss—and finally decide on what you'll wear.

You decide on a square neck white cropped tank with short sleeves and your nicest pair of light blue, slightly washed out jeans. You slid on your favorite, sort of chunky white sneakers over white socks.

It isn't long after you finish when Ashley calls and informs you she's arrived at the apartments and Larry and Sal have already joined her out in the car. You give yourself a once-over in the mirror and then leave the apartment.

Your mother was nowhere to be found. She's either at work or drinking with her coworkers.

Once you've opened the door and climbed into the Ford Fiesta, you immediately realize your predicament—Sal is the only person in the backseat with you.

The drive there is decently long and painfully tense. Neither you nor Sal know how to speak to each other, so no words are exchanged beneath the heavy metal music emitting from the radio.

When you finally arrive at the party, it's recognizably crowded, drunken teenagers are flowing from the front door, in and out, and there's a good amount on the lawn. The newest radio hit is playing on a considerably loud speaker, and the vibrations are notable even from a distance.

"Woah," Larry says, staring at the house as Ashley pulls onto the side of the road. "Didn't realize he was so popular."

You all exit the Ford Fiesta and cross the road. You cringe as you watch someone vomit onto the grass, and another person ripping from a bong in the wide open.

Smoke flies into your face and your eyes as you enter the home. You cough, waving a hand as you blindly follow after your friends.

Eventually, the four of you find yourself on two couches directly facing each other. You on one, Larry and Ashley on the other. Sal is stood to the side.

Larry materializes a bottle of Fireball that you guessed he stole from someone on the way in, opens the cap with his teeth, and takes several gulps.

"Where did you get that?" Ashley laughs over the music, pulling the sleeves of her lavender sweater over her hands.

"Stole it," he looks to Sal and directs the bottle toward him. "Want some?"

"Sure," Sal replies, to your surprise—taking it from Larry's grasp and walking away and in your direction.

"You're drinking that?" You ask him, testing the waters.

"No, actually," you watch Sal round to the other side of the couch to linger behind you. "I'm limiting him. He'll thank me later."

Once he's out of your field of vision, you tip your head back and gaze up at him—your perspective on him being upside down. Your gaze zeroes in on the bottle of Fireball he's clutching in his hand.

"Hey," you say, meeting his eyes. "Give me some."

It was time to give him that excuse—the excuse to break the ice.

He leans in a bit, gesturing toward you with the bottle. "You want it?"

A grin pulls at your glossed lips. Instead of reaching for the bottle, you open your mouth and tilt your chin up.

Sal looks on for a moment but laughs once he realizes what you want. Everyone else at the couches seem decently distracted with each other and the overall environment—so he doesn't seem to worry about it too much.

He reaches his hand around and towards your neck, gripping your jaw in his fingers and holding you firmly. You feel his cold rings press into your skin when he tips your head further back just a bit—and then steadily pours a shot-amount of Fireball into your mouth with his other hand.

Sal stops at the right time, looks on as you pull back and sit up, and cautiously watches the back of your head as you assumedly swallow the whisky. But when you turn a bit in your seat to peer at him over your shoulder, you're holding your mouth closed and pressing a closed fist to your lips while soundlessly giggling.

"What?" He laughs, a hand moving to the top of the couch. He leans in a bit. "Can you not swallow it?"

Your shoulders shake slightly as you continue to laugh. You shake your head up and down.

"Do you need to spit it out?" Sal asks, his tone warming into concern.

You shake your head from side to side. You meet his eyes and swallow, gasping as the liquid slides down your throat and burns all the way down. You cough, the flavor of cinnamon and what tasted like Big Red gum overloaded your senses.

"God," you breathe out, giggling all the while. The alcohol is gross but you're feeling good. "It's not great."

"Yeah, that's why I'm holding Larry off, so he won't be puking his guts out later."

You look up to the boy, who's sat on the arm of the couch opposite to you. He's busy talking to some equally stoned guy, so you can't manage to catch his eye—but you catch Ashley's.

She had this look of astonishment on her face.

Had she been watching what happened? When Sal poured Fireball in your mouth?

Your face grew hot thinking about it.

Sal wanders away from you again, and you find yourself drinking more than you should. Eventually, your rationality disappears.

It's been a few hours and Sal hasn't seen you for a while. So when he hears about a girl wearing a white crop top walking across the roof of the house, he feels like he's going to vomit.

It takes him a record time of 6 seconds to get out of the door and onto the lawn. Upon looking up at the roof, his suspicions are confirmed. He shoulders past multiple people to place himself near the front of the crowd and gazes up in horror.

"Sal!" You yell, gesturing toward him with something between a wave and a point. "I'd recognize that hair anywhere!"

Multiple heads within the crowd turn away from you and towards him. He puts aside his social anxiety and the wave of unease that washes over his body and tries to focus on you. "Please come down," he rushes out, raising his voice just enough for it to be audible over the crowd.

You laugh like he's told a hilarious joke and he quickly realizes his mistake. That's the worst thing he could've told your intoxicated self. You move toward the edge of the roof, shaky and uncoordinated. "You want me to jump?"

"No!" He exclaims, his hands flying up, fingers splayed. "No. Don't do that!"

"Holy shit!" He hears Larry shout from somewhere closer to the front door of the house. Sal guesses he's just now catching wind of the current situation. Moments after, both of his brunette friends are at his side.

"What the hell is going on?!" Ashley yells, verdant eyes glued to the sight before them.

You lost your balance once again, but this time a bit worse—your foot catching on a shingle on the roof and effectively knocking the red solo cup out of your hand. It dropped onto the downward slope of the roof and the liquor inside of it spilled down the side.

Whenever Sal witnessed the toe of your white sneaker catch onto that shingle, he felt as though his very soul had been ripped from his body. Immediately after he watched you regain your footing and stable yourself, though—his heartbeat calmed to a steadier pace.

"I'm going up there," he stated beneath the chatter.

Both Ashley and Larry's heads whipped toward him.

"You'll kill yourself!" Larry exclaims incredulously. Ashley opens her mouth to assumedly second Larry's statement, but Sal cuts her off by walking away.

"Not before she does," he mutters, pushing his way through the density of bodies and forcing his way through the front door. His senses are disoriented like he's been submerged beneath water as the volume of the music scratched at his eardrums and pulsed the innards of his skull. Adrenaline courses through his blood like a drug whilst he shoulders past both mindlessly drunk and carelessly high teenagers.

Sal doesn't spare them a second glance, but their unconcern does remain in his mind. The fact that they're continuing their lives while he feels as though something that's growing into something of importance in his is about to be taken from him... it's mind-numbing.

He's never been an optimistic person, he's always tried to view things in the way they're most likely to happen—and all that's beneath that two-story house is a long drop and concrete. If you fall, you'll break your head open and you'll die.

He finally makes it to the stairs. He makes a break for it then, tripping over his own feet multiple times. Anything could happen in this amount of time, and he knew no one else was going to help him.

Sal's thoughts grow more and more disordered as he navigates the dark halls of the house. The music seems to have only grown louder, the deafening mixture of guitar and drums taunting him.

He remembers the window on the outside of the house. Sal estimates which room it would be, locates it, and approaches the door. He turns the knob, but it doesn't fully rotate.

The door is locked from the inside. Of course. Who would have a party and leave the bedroom unlocked so people could fuck all over your comforter?

He bites out a curse only he hears and prepares himself to force the door open.

Sal grabs the doorknob tightly, prepares himself, and rams the side of his body into the wood. He doesn't even feel the pain, just does it again, and again.

He goes until that half of his body is numb.

The door finally budges, and he wastes no time entering the room. He doesn't hesitate when he reaches the double-hung window he'd been seeking. He grips it at the bottom and pulls it up and open, clenching his teeth together painfully.

Sal stares out at the vastness of the night, the golden streetlights, and how they shine down on the crowd of people below him. They all seem to be looking at the same place, up, but not at him—and he can only swallow thickly.

Carefully, Sal moves to sit on the windowsill, gripping what was above him tightly, his legs outside. He then ducks to leave the room and shivers as cool air hits the front of his neck.

He starts walking the roof, steadily—like his life depends on it. Because.. it does.

Or yours. Yours depends on it.

"Y/N!" Sal calls as he finally reaches a point where you're in his line of sight. Momentarily, he's worried he'd scared you. But you turn your head, meet his eyes, and smile. Despite that, your face spells fear all over it. Something must have sobered you up a bit while he'd been inside.

"I'm going to come to you. Do not walk towards me!"

You blink lazily, because you were drunk, and nodded. You shivered, hugging yourself. It didn't seem to do much, though. Your arms were bare.

"Fuck," he breathes, gazing down at the fall that could await him if he misstepped and immediately reverted his gaze. Blood rushes between his ears as he steadily makes his way towards you.

"Please don't fall!" You suddenly exclaim, your hair tussling in the breeze. A strand blows over your face, so you quickly raise a hand to move it back in place.

He looks up from his feet and stares you in the eyes. "I won't," he affirms, you and himself, continuing across the roof. "Just stay put, okay?"

It doesn't take long to get over to you. He's mostly sober, so it isn't hard on that part. What's difficult is calming his steady heart.

He's not scared of falling. Not necessarily scared of injury or death. But he is scared of not making it to you.

Once he's at an arms reach of your shaking form, he reaches out a hand, palm facing the darkness of the sky.

You seem to read his mind, slowly grabbing his hand. Sal maneuvers your joint hands to where your palms press together and your fingers are interlaced. He doesn't know if it's the blood rushing through his ears or the distance from the ground, but it's as if everything below becomes very quiet.

You meet his gaze, your pretty eyes glossy with tears. The eyeliner you were wearing had just begun to collect beneath your lower lash line.

He squeezes your hand and leads you to be in front of him.

It's not long after that that he's gotten you off of the roof. Sal watches you slip through the open window before turning toward the density of people beneath him on the ground. He breathes in as he catches both Larry and Ashley's eyes—he can't read their expressions, but he wouldn't be surprised if there was shock written all over it—and then ducks back into the window.

As soon as the window is shut and it meets the windowsill once more, Sal whips his head toward you. "Y/N-"

Before he'd saw your face, and the language of your body as you were sat on the edge of the bed, he was going to scold you, and then go downstairs and find you some water and sober you up—all of that falls down the drain when he sees the stream of tears falling down your face. Every time you blink, more drop—quickly staining your cheeks with black makeup.

"Oh," he breathes, suddenly speechless. "Y/N-"

You attempt at taking a breath in, it seems—but it's a failure because it hitches and turns into a shoulder-shaking sob.

"I'm sorry," you cry, roughly dragging the tips of your fingers beneath your eyes. This only smears the running mascara further. "I'm just drunk."

Sal momentarily feels like breaking down in tears himself, that's how much this entire ordeal stressed him out. He approaches your trembling body and crouches down in front of you.

"Hey," he says, softly. "It doesn't matter whether or not you're intoxicated. Your feelings still matter, okay?"

You sniffle, still attempting to wipe your tears away, and reluctantly nod. "I'm sorry," you try again.

He places his hands on your knees and squeezes them firmly. "It's okay."

You jerk into a sob, leaning forward and pressing the side of your face on his shoulder. You slowly tuck your arms beneath his and cross them over the expanse of his back, palms flat on each shoulder blade. The convulsive gasps were hard to stop, making it hard to breathe.

Sal breathed out softly against the prosthetic, raising his arms and encasing them around your torso.

He didn't wonder about the reason for your tears. Assuming things wouldn't help you anymore.

"I don't know why I did that," you whisper, quieting yourself to swallow your saliva. "Maybe I do. I think I was trying to prove something to myself."

He finds himself holding you tighter, your chest pressed to his, feeling your heartbeat through the fabric that separated you both—oddly enough, even at this moment, it reminds him of that night in the car. You had been even closer to him then, though.

"It was stupid," you murmured. "Why would I do that, after what we had talked about last night?"

"What if we jumped together?" he remembers saying.

"Some things can't be explained," he replies earnestly. "You don't need to know why you did what you did. It was stupid, though. I'd probably walk across the roof of a two-story house for you again, but.."

You pull back and meet his eyes, your face wet. The majority of your makeup had been cried off and your lipgloss had been smudged.

You must've sensed his examination, breaking the visual contact and sniffling. "I know I look ridiculous right now."

Sal smiles. He knows she can't see it, but maybe she'll hear it. "I don't think so," he murmurs, looking off to the side. "I think that's a bathroom. You can clean up in there if you want."

You follow his gaze and then return your eyes to his and laugh a bit. You still sound drunk, he notes. Obviously. He'd poured a good amount of Fireball into your mouth and watched you drink plenty of other things.

"Feels kinda weird using a stranger's bathroom," you laugh, your breath hitching from the earlier crying.

Sal rolls his eyes humorously, gripping your knees tighter as he pulls himself off of the floor. "The guy who lives here is Larry's friend—and a stoner. I doubt he'd mind. And if he does get mad, I'll take responsibility for it. I forced that door through, anyway.."

Your gaze swivels toward the door, which is not shut but mostly closed. When he glances to where you're looking, he notices it seems a bit.. crooked.

He inwardly cringes. "I'll pay for it. Come on."

Sal follows you into the bathroom. You seem reluctant to enter first, so he does, opening the door and reaching to the side to turn the lights on. They do what they're supposed to—eventually. They're momentarily unresponsive before becoming alive—the illumination brightening the room with a dull yellow hue.

You step onto the tile and began to search for whatever it was you needed. You kneeled at one of the cabinets below the sink, opened it, and ducked your head lower.

"Oh!" You exclaim quietly, reaching in and pulling out two things. A bottle of half-empty makeup remover and a bag of some cotton rounds.

"Maybe he has a girlfriend?" He hears you say to yourself, standing up, nudging the cabinet closed with your foot, and placing the things you found beside the sink.

Sal reaches over and closes the door. He'd rather not have to witness the sight of some drunkards wandering in and fooling around on the bed.

"Lock it," you say. "I'd rather no one- no one see me like this."

His hand was already on the doorknob, so he just reaches down a bit and locks the door.

He watches you struggle a bit with the bag of cotton rounds, trying but failing to open it, so he reaches forward and delicately plucks it out of your grasp.

Sal slides the makeup remover over and pats the place on the counter it was previously. "Sit."

You peer into his eyes inquisitively but waste no time hoisting yourself up and onto the cold surface.

After that, he plucks the bottle of makeup remover off of the counter and douses the cotton round in the liquid. He reaches forward from the distance that your knees created between the both of you, but you spread your thighs and press the heel of your shoe into his lower back, pulling him in so he's between your legs.

Sal doesn't see it suggestively, because you're drunk—but he's glad you asked him to lock the door because, with his luck, Larry or Ashley would find their way into the bathroom and get all of the wrong ideas.

The firmness just beneath his navel presses into the edge of the counter as he cups one side of your face and began wiping away at the eyeliner and mascara and everything it messed up.

"Thank you," you say sweetly, blinking at him with appreciation in your eyes. "Where'd you learn how to do that?"

He remembers a silhouette. Her back was turned to him, golden hair cascading just past her shoulder blades. He remembers blue eyes that looked a lot like his own staring into a mirror, a hand which adorned a wedding ring wiping away makeup from the day.

"Read it on the label of the bottle," he replies, meeting your eyes and looking away.

As he's finishing up, he hears a rapping of knuckles against the locked door. He tosses the used cotton rounds into a trash bin in the corner and then locks eyes with you curiously.

"Occupied," he calls out, still looking at you. The knocking only gets louder, which makes you laugh.

"He said it's occupied!" You yell over the unintelligible music downstairs, your words breaking into a giggle. You press your knees against his waist, and he doesn't even realize it when his hands meet your thighs.

The knocking ceases, fading into a voice. "Is that you guys in there?"

Fucking Larry. Speak of the goddamn devil—that's what he would've said if he'd come knocking sooner.

The both of you seem to be thinking the same thing, locking eyes in terror. You quickly get off of the counter, and Sal unlocks the door and swings it open.

Sure enough, he's standing there—in all of his glory and highness. Larry blinks, the whites of his glossy eyes tinted red. He looks between the both of you before speaking. "Why were.."

"I had to pee," You choose to deadpan.

Sal feels himself grow even paler than he already is. "I came in.. after.. that."

Larry intakes a mouthful of whatever is in the red solo cup he's holding in his tan, lanky fingers, and swallows thickly. "Okay," he croaks, instinctively cringing as the alcohol passed through his chest. He gestured the cup toward you. "Uh..crazy stunt you pulled up there, huh?"

Sal saw your face shift in his peripheral vision. "Huge lapse of judgment," you reply.

"Nobody could tell who you were, so don't worry about that," the brunette smiles a bit. He returns his attention to Sal. "They've started playing country," sure enough, Sal hears the sound of a banjo from the speakers downstairs, effectively punctuating Larry's statement.

"Yeah.." Larry mumbles, sipping his drink and looking up and through his eyebrows. "Ash said to come find you guys so we can leave."

It doesn't take much, after that.

As you're leaving, Larry pulls the door open and furrows his brow at the condition of the hinges. "Wow. How old is this thing?" He mumbles.

Sal hears you snort.

The three of you descend the stairs, skirting past countless teenagers standing on the steps drinking or smoking. Sal makes the mistake of letting you fall behind and feels you stumble and smack him in the back. It's easy to steady himself, quickly gripping the railing—but he's concerned about you, so he turns around.

A guy with a cigarette balancing in his teeth is eying you with frustration pulling at his features. His gaze pulls from your face and down your body absentmindedly.

"Watch it," he murmurs.

"Sorry," you breathe, jerking your head away and meeting Sal's eyes worriedly. Keep walking, you express in the hues of your eyes.

Sal reaches forward and interlaces your fingers with his as he'd done on the roof. He makes a show of it, too—so the guy with the cigarette sees the rings on both of his hands. Sal gives him a distinct look when they lock eyes, rolls his jaw, and lets you lead him down the stairs, instead of the other way around.

By the time you're all nearly shot from weaving through the multitude of sweaty bodies and navigating through plumes of smoke thicker than fog, the three of you find Ashley petting what he'd assume is the host's dog.

No one questions it.

"You good to drive?" Larry asks, placing his cup on a nearby surface.

"Oh, yeah," she rises from her crouch beside the dog. The animal walks away, his golden tail wagging excitedly at the next person who would give him pets. "A gross sip of something put me off of drinking tonight a while earlier. And, uh.. the whole roof thing dried me out."

You sigh. "I'm sorry about that. It sobered me up, too."

She shakes her head, a wispy strand of light brown hair falling over her face. "It was stupid, yes, and I hope you don't do it again, but all that matters now is that you're safe."

Ashley blinks kind green eyes at you and smiles, reaching forward, taking your hand, and leading you away. Sal hears you laugh and follow after her as both of you head for the front door.

He turns to look at Larry once he loses sight of both of you in the crowd. He examines Sal with bleary dark eyes and looks as though he's about to say something, but he doesn't get to.

Even over the blaring country music, Sal hears a yell and then some fearful shouting. He whips around toward the sounds, which were toward the front of the house.

Red and blue flashing lights shine through the windows.

"Shit!"

"Ah, fuck," Larry groaned, nimbly wrapping his fingers around Sal's wrist and dragging him into the density of the panicked crowd. "Did you see where they went?"

Sal shakes his head. "No," he knows you're intoxicated. Panic settles in. He chews his lip, his eyes desperately scamming for a girl wearing a white top squared at the neck—you. "Y/N's had a lot to drink, Larry. If the police-"

"Don't worry about the Five-O, let's worry about the girls," Larry replies absentmindedly, keeping his firm hold on Sal.

"They must've gone to the Ford," Sal shouts over the music, which, for some reason, is still playing. "We were leaving anyway. I'm sure they're in the car."

Larry releases Sal and motions toward the back of the house. "There's a back door. I'll text Ashley and tell her to drive down the block and we can meet them on foot."

It was an agreeable plan. Waltzing out of the house and walking straight up to the car wouldn't be wise.

Larry does what he'd said he'd do. Turns out, Sal was right, they had made it to the car moments before the police had rolled up. Ashley informed him it was two squad cars and four officers. Seemed like overkill for a house party—but he wouldn't know. He didn't do this often.

When Larry was on the phone, Sal was very tempted to ask about Y/N, but refrained.

On the way to the back door, they crossed through the kitchen. Larry snatched an unopened bottle of alcohol of a brand Sal didn't recognize and carried it along with him for the road.

As soon as they made it out of the house, they both made a break for it, running between houses and into multiple different backyards on their way.

They slowed down once they were at a measurable distance from the party, gasping for air. Sal panted against the prosthetic, placing his hands on his knees and slowing his gasps into slow breaths, attempting to calm his racing heart.

They stood on the side of the road, the music in the distance (albeit a lot quieter) still pounding into the night.

Sal lowered himself down onto the curb. Larry joined him, raising the bottle he'd chose to bring with him to his mouth, and opened the steel cap with his teeth. He spits it onto the road and gestures it toward Sal.

"Bottoms up," he said, bringing it to his lips and taking several gulps.

Sal rolled his eyes playfully, eyebrows rising as Ashley's Ford Fiesta cruised down the road and slowed to a stop in front of them. He stood up from the curb and pulled Larry off of it as well.

They entered the car, sliding into the backseat. Larry continued to down the beer he'd found as Ashley turned around in her seat.

"The night's still young," she says. "Any ideas of what we could do?"

It's really not. Sal's a bit disoriented so he doesn't know what time it is but he wouldn't be surprised if it was 3 AM.

You then turn around in the passenger seat and grin mischievously. "Let's go to the lake."

Oh, great.

#sally face #sally face x reader #sal fisher x reader

174 notes · View notes

tennessoui · 3 years ago

Note

obikin 28,11 :3

kit to kit: oh, 28, knocking on the wrong door, that can be a cute modern quirky au

kit to kit: yeah totally sure !!! you know what it could also be? 4.2k of dark canon AU that is dub con due to identity issues that definitely ends with anakin tied to a bed with future plans of stockholm syndroming him!!!

(so read at your own risk here this is definitely on the darker side of these prompt fills)

28. Knocking On The Wrong Right Wrong Door AU (4.2k)

The storm’s picked up to dangerous levels by the time Anakin and his padawan have picked their way out of the smoking rubble of their ship and made it into the nearby town.

“Think of it this way!” Anakin yells over the howl of the wind. “The rain’ll put out the rest of the fire!”

The look Ahsoka gives him is cold enough to freeze the rain that’s pelting down on them.

“I hope Master Windu grounds you for destroying another one of the Temple’s ships,” she snips at him, looking deeply unimpressed with his dramatic expression of hurt and betrayal.

“No one keeps count of that stuff, Snips,” Anakin grins. “And anyway, if I get grounded, you’d definitely be grounded with me. As my Padawan.”

“I’d be promoted, actually. They’d knight me on the spot the first time I come back with all my ships intact.”

Anakin rolls his eyes and opens his mouth to say something, but there’s a crack of thunder loud enough to shake him to his bones and a seriously bright flash of lightning that connects with a wind-swept tree next to them.

“Shelter!” Anakin yells over the renewed rain. “Come on, Ahsoka!”

The town is small, but there has to be some sort of hotel or lodge or--

“We don’t have any credits, Master!” Ahsoka cries, running after him.

She’s right. All their funds were in their ship, and neither of them had thought to grab them.

Kriff it all.

He changes course as soon as they get to the outskirts of the village.

He pounds on the door of the first cottage they come across. Either no one’s in or they’re particularly unfriendly, because the door stays firmly shut.

He hits the wood harder, setting up a constant rhythm. In a second, they’ll run to the next house, but there’s something about this place that feels right. Surely if only Anakin could knock loud enough to be heard over the storm--

The door cracks open and warm yellow light spills out over the doorstep.

“What?” The man asks stiffly. Anakin can only see a sliver of his face--one blue eye, dark red hair, and a beard.

“Good evening,” Anakin says, putting on his best Jedi voice. “I am seeking shelter from the storm for myself and my companion. We--”

“There’s an inn next to the school in town. Goodnight.”

Anakin wedges his foot in just before the man can close the door. “Please sir, we don’t have any credits--”

“Unfortunate. Goodnight.”

“Please, sir. My name is Anakin Skywalker. I am a General in the War. Shelter us tonight and the Jedi Order will see you repaid in full!”

The man pauses and looks him up and down slowly. The door opens a little wider. “Skywalker?” He asks, sounding suspicious.

Anakin nods eagerly. He doesn’t particularly like dropping his name like that, especially not on strange planets, but he needs to get his Padawan out of the storm. “Anakin, yes. We won’t hurt you or anything, sir. I swear.”

“Come on, Anakin,” Ahsoka says from behind him. “Let’s just go somewhere else. Someone else will let us in.”

The man tears his gaze away from Anakin, the first time he’s done so this entire time, and looks over Ahsoka as well. He opens the door even farther. “I’ll let you in,” he decides and Anakin has to fight the loud sigh of relief. “But I would like you to give me your weapons for the night, please.”

The man looks back to Anakin with a smile. It changes the lines of his face, softens them until the man looks pleasant instead of harsh. He has a nice smile. He has a really, really nice smile.

“No--” Ahsoka starts to say, sounding offended, but Anakin, still dazed by the flash of the man’s teeth, is already saying, “Yeah, of course. Here you go,” and giving his lightsaber to the man as soon as he opens the door all the way.

“Thank you, Anakin,” the man replies with another one of those smiles. Anakin can feel his face heat up at the way his name sounds rolling off this man’s tongue. “And thank you, young one,” he says when Ahsoka reluctantly thrusts her own lightsabers towards him.

“I’m not young,” Ahsoka takes great offense and the man looks apologetic.

“‘Soka,” Anakin reprimands immediately. “Don’t be rude.”

She stares at him in astonishment. He doesn’t tend to correct her that harshly, even when she’s been snippier to foreign dignitaries. But the man doesn’t deserve an attitude from either of them. He’s letting them stay in his house! He’s gorgeous! He’s going to house them out of his own generosity for the night! He’s very, very fit!

“The sitting room is just down the hall and to the right,” the man says, with a tilt of his head. Anakin obediently pulls Ahsoka along. “I’ll just go grab you some dry clothes to change into.”

Behind him he hears the man lock the door. That’s good. Safety is important and he obviously seems a little paranoid. It’s now Anakin’s full time mission to make sure the man knows he can trust him. Them.

Them.

“I have a really bad feeling about this, Anakin,” Ahsoka hisses as he practically shoves her down the hallway and into the sitting room, which looks nice and cozy. There’s a couch and everything, with a Holo projector balanced on an old looking low table.

“I’m feeling much better about this than about our odds in that storm,” Anakin argues back in an undertone. There are footsteps above them, so the man’s bedroom must be on the second floor. Anakin wonders what it looks like, and Ahsoka seems to catch on with where his thoughts are because she hits him on the shoulder.

“You’d know what I’m talking about if you were thinking with your brain instead of your lightsaber, Master.”

He opens his mouth to tell her how rude that is and also how very wrong, as Anakin can think with both, thank you very much, but the man appears in the room with them before he has a chance to.

“They won’t fit, obviously,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly as if he’s embarrassed to have surprise guests in his house and not have their correct sizes in his closet. “But anything’s better than what you’re wearing now, I thought.”

“Yeah!” Anakin says eagerly. Ahsoka gives him an unimpressed look, crossing her arms. “I mean,” he coughs. “I’m sure they’ll be fine.”

The redhead gifts Anakin another one of his smiles. This one makes his blue eyes crinkle, which just might end up being his cause of death. Enshrine him in the Jedi Temple and at the plaque on his fee put “Here Lies Anakin Skywalker: Dead Because An Attractive Stranger Treated Him With Human Decency”.

His padawan rolls her eyes and takes her proffered stack of clothes. The man shows her where the fresher is and she stalks into it.

“I’m sorry,” Anakin apologizes immediately when the man turns to look at him with a lost look. “She’s just mad at me for crashing our ship. We were flying fine one minute and the next we have to make this emergency landing that turns out to be a bit--hard on the landing. And….you didn’t ask, did you? Kark. Sorry.”

The man smiles again with an amused shake of his head. “It’s alright, Anakin, I was wondering anyway.” He holds out the clothes for Anakin to change into and Anakin grabs them because it’s something to do that isn’t keel over from embarrassment.

Or, of course, kneel down to show this stranger how much he appreciates his kindness.

Anakin wills that thought--and it’s gorgeous mental image--away. He just hasn’t had sex in a while, not since he and Padme had gotten divorced. Usually, he needs that intimate connection with someone before he even thinks about sex, but maybe when he’s too horny it doesn’t matter anymore? Because he doesn’t even know this man’s name, but when their hands brush as he receives the stack of clothes, he feels as though the lightning from outside is shooting down his spine.

“Um.” He says, like the intelligent war general he is.

Has the man moved closer? Are his eyes dark or is it just the lighting? Is he interested in men? Is he interested in Anakin? Also, what is his kriffing name?

Anakin glances down at the clothes, preparing to ask at least one of those questions, before he realizes something. “There’s no shirt here?” He asks instead of anything much more pressing.

The man’s eyes widen and a blush spreads across his cheeks. “Oh, blast,” he mumbles, already turning to leave. “I’ll go grab you one, I’m sorry, I knew I forgot something.”

Anakin finds himself feeling hopelessly endeared by the man’s awkward flailing. He wonders if he’s managed to fluster the man. The idea feels amazing in his mind.

Grinning to himself, he starts shucking off his wet clothes. He can at least change into the pants while he waits for the man to come back, and if his timing is right---

He’s tying the loose pants tight around his waist when he hears footsteps in the hall.

Yes.

He turns around, shirtless, to glance at the man in the doorway, who’s stopped to stare at Anakin.

Anakin tries not to preen too obviously. Jedi training has done ridiculous things to the muscles of his back and chest, and he wants the man to look. To appreciate. To want.

And the man looks like he does. The man looks like he wants a lot.

There’s something dark and dangerous and wild and unrestrained in those eyes. Anakin wants closer.

He drops his shoulder and turns to face the man completely, letting him look his full. His gaze feels like a brand on every part of Anakin it touches. His hands tighten on the fabric of the shirt he’s holding when Anakin stretches his arms above his head as he yawns in a pathetically fake manner.

The man takes a couple of steps forward and Anakin stills in anticipation. He had thought he’d looked beautiful smiling, but this--this naked, dangerous want for Anakin that clouds his face--is so much more attractive. It would take one word from the man and he’d be on his knees. His back. His front. He’s not picky, he’s too busy feeling like his whole body is a live wire.

The door opens and Ahsoka’s deeply unimpressed tone effectively snaps the tension in the room. “What are you doing.”

“Getting dressed!” Anakin yelps, taking the shirt the man extends to him and putting it on immediately.

The man sends Ahsoka an unreadable but dark look before blinking a few times and smiling at her. Whatever had been on his face is gone and Anakin can’t help but think that he must have imagined it.

“Please, sit. Are you hungry?” He asks, rubbing his hands together. “Fixing you two a meal would be the least I can do for the galaxy’s heroes.”

Anakin flushes and preens as he follows the direction, the man’s praise wrapping like a warm blanket around his mind.

Ahsoka is less taken in, even as she settles in on the couch next to Anakin. “You could tell us your name,” she says, arms crossed. The look is ruined by the way the gray tunic the man has given to her is big enough to fall off one of her shoulders.

The man freezes for a second, barely noticeable if Anakin was not watching him as intently as he is. Then the stranger’s shoulders droop for a second and he looks so sad that actually Anakin doesn’t care if he never learns the man’s name. He’ll call him Dear for the rest of his life.

“Obi-Wan Kenobi,” the man eventually murmurs, sitting delicately on the arm of the comfortable looking chair and giving them a half-sort of smile. “At your service.”

Anakin’s eyes narrow at the name that feels like it should be familiar. Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan. It’s pretty. He likes it.

Ahsoka jumps to her feet. “Obi-Wan Kenobi!” she says and turns to Anakin as if that’s supposed to mean something to him. He blinks up at her in confusion. “You’re the Jedi that Fell after Qui-Gon Jinn died!”

Anakin rises immediately, brain trying to process this new information. Yes. Yeah. Obi-Wan Kenobi. They’d met. They’d met on Tatooine. Kenobi had been Qui-Gon’s padawan. He’d killed Maul after Maul killed Qui-Gon. And then...he’d left the Order. Anakin had been assigned another Master. He’d forgotten all about Obi-Wan Kenobi.

“I didn’t Fall,” Obi-Wan Kenobi corrects from his place on the chair. “Please, sit down.”

“You left the Order with Dooku!” Ahsoka accuses. “And you’re trying to tell me you didn’t Fall?”

Anakin’s hand goes to his belt automatically, but he doesn’t have his lightsaber. He’d given it to Obi-Wan.

“Look at my eyes, young one,” Obi-Wan demands in a cold tone. “Are they Sith-gold?”

Anakin hesitates. Obi-Wan has a point. His eyes are blue. And surely they’d know if there was another Sith afoot in the galaxy. Sith don’t like keeping quiet about themselves, from everything Anakin’s learned about them.

“You’re old enough to know how to hide that,” Ahsoka challenges immediately, which makes Obi-Wan wince.

“You don’t pull your punches, do you?” He asks with a forced laugh. Then he looks at Anakin, and his face turns pleading. “Anakin,” he says gently, slowly, Ah-na-kin, “I’m not lying. Please believe me. I--I didn’t leave the Order to join the Sith. I left because they wouldn’t allow me to train you, Anakin.”

Anakin feels like the shipwreck from an hour ago caused less whiplash than these few sentences. “Me?”

“Qui-Gon begged me to train you as he lay dying in my arms,” Obi-Wan’s jaw clenches and his face looks sad again. He closes his eyes as if to ward off the memory and when he opens them again they look wet. “When they wouldn’t allow me to, I realized there was nothing in the Order left for me. Dooku, my master’s master, came to me and asked me to leave with him. I had no idea that he would Fall. As soon as I realized what he had become, I ran. That’s why I’m here, Anakin. Please believe me. I have no involvement in the war, on either side.”

Force help him, but he does. He does believe him. He looks so honest, so heartbroken. This is Obi-Wan Kenobi? He can’t really say he remembers enough about what Kenobi had looked like all those years ago to know if the man in front of him could be an older version of the Padawan he’d met. He doesn’t actually remember anything about Kenobi, except--

“Hey, wait a second, you called me a pathetic lifeform!” Anakin says indignantly, a nine-year-old’s rage welling up in him at the memory.

Obi-Wan blinks at him and then bursts into laughter. It sounds like rocks, sliding into the ocean. Sith don’t laugh like that. He can’t imagine Ventress laughing like that. Or laughing at all, aside from a sinister chuckle.

Obi-Wan wipes the wetness from his eyes and grins at Anakin. “I’d forgotten about that,” he chuckles, shaking his head. “You weren’t supposed to hear that.”

Anakin pouts. “I was standing right there.”

“Making moon-eyes at Queen Amidala, yes,” Obi-Wan raises a sardonic eyebrow. “I thought you were sufficiently distracted. She was quite prettier.”

Anakin’s first instinct is to say, I’m prettier, but that’s not actually appropriate, and maybe Obi-Wan wouldn’t agree with him anyway.

“Do you believe me, Ahsoka?” Obi-Wan asks, turning to her while Anakin is working on controlling his flushed face.

Anakin’s padawan is still standing, but looks unsure. “I...I don’t know.”

“Then we can talk more about it over a cup of tea,” Obi-Wan decides, standing up. “I’ll be back in a second.”

As he walks past the couch to get through a door that must lead to his kitchen, he brushes his hand along Anakin’s shoulder and neck.

Anakin would like to say he handles this touch with grace and aplomb as befitting a Jedi Knight, but the look Ahsoka gives him makes him feel much more like a pathetic lifeform than a Jedi Knight.

“We can trust him,” Anakin mutters to her. “I remember him.”

“It’s been years, Anakin,” Ahsoka mutters back. “Even if you remember everything he’s ever said to you, he could be a completely different person. He probably is.”

“It’s just a night, Snips,” he reasons. “And there’s no alternatives. And I think we can trust him.”

She hesitates for a second and then exhales. “Fine,” she agrees. “But I’m not happy about it.”

Anakin grins in response.

----

Halfway through tea, Ahsoka starts nodding off.

“Crash landing takes a lot out of anyone,” Obi-Wan says sympathetically with a wink at Anakin, who puffs up in indignation. Before he can say anything in defense of his very necessary landing, Obi-Wan has taken Ahsoka’s tea and put it gently on the table. “Come on, girl, I’ll show you where you’ll be sleeping. I have a spare room.”

Ahsoka goes easily enough, in a way that makes Anakin feel bad for how short-tempered he’s been with her in the past few hours. He’s been stressed, she’s been stressed, but she’s just a youngling still. She’s probably been exhausted for so long now.

“Could you put our cups in the sink, Anakin?” Obi-Wan asks as he leads the Togruta out of the sitting area.

Anakin complies immediately, carrying each mug like they’re something special and precious before dumping out the contents into the sink and filling each with water.

He thinks about washing them and putting them into cupboards, but he doesn’t want Obi-Wan to think that’s he’s rifling through his cupboards or anything, so he goes back to the living room to wait for him.

Obi-Wan returns just a few seconds later, smiling slightly to himself.

“What?” Anakin asks immediately. If there’s a joke that Obi-Wan finds funny, Anakin wants to hear it too.

“Just something Ahsoka said,” he replies, looking fondly down at Anakin.

Anakin’s feeling too persistent to be sidetracked by that though, so he raises both his eyebrows.

“That she’d skewer me on her lightsabers if I besmirched her master’s honor, no matter how much he asks for it,” Obi-Wan recalls with a perfectly straight face.

Anakin buries his blushing face in his hands instantly. “Force,” he mumbles.

Obi-Wan laughs again. It’s just as pretty as last time and it makes Anakin peek through his fingers.

“It’s alright, Anakin,” Obi-Wan soothes. “I told her I thought I would be quite good at resisting any sort of begging from you.”

Anakin’s first thought is, of course, Want to bet?, but that’s hardly a thing to say to a near stranger. Even if he is very handsome and he has looked at you like you’re a feast and he’s a starving man just a few hours ago.

No, Anakin. Bad Anakin.

“So that’s me for the couch then, yeah?” He says in a totally normal and not at all high-pitched voice, standing so he can go fetch a blanket.

The look in Obi-Wan’s eyes freezes him where he is. They’re filled with that same dark want from before paired with a promise. “If you’d like,” Obi-Wan murmurs and then just to make sure there’s no confusion, he holds out his hand. “Or….”

Anakin doesn’t even have to think about it before he’s interlacing their fingers.

-----

When Anakin comes to, there’s light streaming in through the windows in Obi-Wan’s bedroom. He grumbles and tries to roll over.

He can’t.

Both of his arms have been securely tied over his head, and there’s a gag in his mouth.

Really, his first instinct should be panic and not a sort of sleepy arousal at what Obi-Wan plans to do with him like this.

But no. The panic doesn’t set in until he sees Obi-Wan by the window, deathstick held between his lips as he listens to a holocall.

“Yes, Master,” Obi-Wan murmurs, exhaling a line of smoke out the window before turning to look at Anakin. He nods his head in greeting, as if this is a normal scenario. “Yes, he’s just woken up.”

When he turns his head back to the window, the yellow of his eyes catch on the sunlight and gleam bright gold.

“The padawan has been dealt with,” Obi-Wan continues, which makes Anakin lose any sense of calm he still felt. He’s cut off from the Force so he can’t feel his bond with Ahsoka. Fear and fury wash through him equally at the thought of Obi-Wan, this Sith lord traitor and dirty liar, dealing with Ahsoka.

Oh Force, she’d been right. She’d been so right. Had she paid the cost for Anakin’s blindness?

“Yes, Master. Tell Sidious he can expect his Chosen One kneeling before him in chains as soon as he deposits the credits into my account. I’ve sent multiple pictures already as proof that Anakin Skywalker is alive and bound.”

Anakin tries to yell through the gag, but it’s ineffective and only causes Obi-Wan to look at him with an amused eyebrow raise. “And awake,” the Sith traitor purrs into the comm. “Must go now. Remember, Dooku. My credits.”

With that, he ends the comm and stubs out his deathstick with a flourish, walking around to stand at the foot of the bed with all the grace of a predator who knows its prey is well and truly cornered.

“Good morning, darling,” Obi-Wan croons. “Sorry you had to hear that.”

Anakin glowers at him. He’s never hated anyone more than he hates Obi-Wan Kenobi at this moment.

“Your padawan is safe,” Obi-Wan starts, sitting on the bed by Anakin’s midsection and tracing a hand down his bare chest. Anakin twitches away from him. “No, really,” the Sith promises in a soothing voice. “I drugged her last night of course, but you have to admit she looked like she needed a full night’s sleep.”

The tea. Force, the tea. If Anakin had thought to check the tea, or to follow Obi-Wan into the kitchen and watch him make it, they wouldn’t be here in this position. He wouldn’t be here in this specific position. Force.

“And this morning while you slept, I carried her out to my ship--or Dooku’s ship, I suppose--and put her on route to the Jedi Temple. She’ll arrive in a day or so, probably. I even gave her food and drink to survive comfortably until then. There’s no need to worry.”

Anakin tries to convey the level of disbelief he has for that statement in a single glare. Obi-Wan shrugs languidly, hand still touching his skin in a way he’d enjoyed last night. His body hasn’t gotten the notice that it shouldn’t enjoy Obi-Wan’s touch anymore, which is making this whole bound and gagged thing really awkward.

“Well, for her, I suppose.” Obi-Wan chuckles and pulls his hand away so he can light another deathstick. He takes a drag and then exhales. “I’ll even let you comm her. It’s actually quite important that you do. You see, I told her that I would kill you if she tried to come back here without first going to the Temple. She seemed to believe me.”

He rolls his eyes fondly, as if they’re sharing a joke at Ahsoka’s expense.

“Like I’d kill you,” Obi-Wan huffs a laugh, shaking his head and bringing the deathstick back to his mouth. “I told her I’d let you comm her the second she lands. Of course, she will be surrounded by Jedi masters, who will be very interested in hearing my proposed trade deal, even if she isn’t. I will give them the name of Darth Sidious, my master’s master. I will give them proof enough to end the war and have him arrested and tried for his crimes. And they will give me you.”

Anakin feels his eyes widen at the words. It’s so unexpected that even if he weren’t gagged, he wouldn’t be able to think of a single thing to say.

“It’s perfect, really,” Obi-Wan murmurs, a hand coming up to stroke through Anakin’s hair. “Sidious thinks he is about to get his hands on you, as that has been the plan for weeks now. He has paid good money for you, you know. I almost feel bad for deciding to break our agreement. But you just fell apart so beautifully under my hands last night, darling. How can I give you up?”

Anakin shivers as the memory of last night washes over his mind. He’s never felt more ashamed and yet still guiltily pleased with his performance. The praise he's getting. Force it feels good to be praised.

“So Sidious thinks he will get you, the Jedi will get Sidious, Ahsoka will probably get knighted, and you will be where you belong,” Obi-Wan blows out smoke and then leans down to grin into Anakin’s face. Anakin has to tell himself not to look away. Those yellow eyes are filled with a recognizable lust. It had been so attractive last night. It’s still attractive now, if he’s being completely honest. Force, what is wrong with him?

Obi-Wan’s hand leaves his hair to press delicately on a new bruise on his throat. “You will be with me.”

#asks #prompt fill #tw: dubious consent #due to identity issues #i dont want to spoil it but if someone wants a synopsis before reading just message me directly!!!#always be safe with yourself <3 #even if this isnt like really dark i dont wanna oversell t #Obi-Wan leaves the Jedi order Au #sith obi wan #obikin #oh yeah it was supposed to be like 2k max #whoopsie #its a bit rushed at the end because i checked the word count and i was just exasperated #with myself

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darkacademicfrom2021 · 4 years ago

Text

The Dark Team (part 10)

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(Taglist: @lucywrites02, @louieboo87, @the-departed-potato, @jesuswasnotawhiteman, @idontknow296 , @beksib, @spythoschei, @geekwritersworld , @whatafuckingdumbass, @mysticunicorn7)

Warnings: adorable jerks.

As the sun finally came up (for what it felt like an eternity, a night with seven nights inside of it), you rubbed your eyes and greeted your teammates, who somehow were both already up and having breakfast.

“I was wondering when would you join us”, said Loki, covering his mouth with the manners of a Prince while eating a piece of something. “Barnes made dessert for breakfast”, pointed out more amazed than reproachful.

“Desert?”, you laughed. “A cake?”.

“Yes”, said Loki, very sure of himself, and Bucky rolled his eyes and chuckled, correcting him.

“It’s a pancake, Loki. It’s a normal breakfast in Midgard”.

“Actually, probably just in this country”, you added. “What do you normally have in Asgard?”. As you chattered, you started getting ready and fixing your hair, stealing a piece of pancake from Bucky’s plate. “Wow, I didn’t know you could cook. It’s actually great”, you said, tasting a mouthful.

“Well, as in Midgard’s nordic areas, back home it’s often fruit and bread, or porridge with dried fruits” he recalled distracted, and immediately interrupted himself with “are we not supposed to alert the rest of this?”.

“About Buck knowing how to cook? Yeah, I’m impressed, we should tell everyone”.

“I guess we should’ve told them yesterday, instead of going to sleep”, said Bucky, ignoring you. “Only God knows where that supersoldier is now”.

“I don’t, actually”.

“I didn’t mean... nevermind”, he sighed. “I'm calling Stark and let’s hope we don’t get too yelled at”.

You recalled yesterday’s events. You had so many dreams, you could barely remember being awake at all. First, the bearded man’s nightmare. Then, something about… the compound? Then, you remembered distinctly, Loki speaking Old Norse begging Thor about something. You remembered the phonetic of the words, but they were all gibberish now. Then, a last dream, something about buying rotten apples and being forced to eat them by Thanos. Your imagination surely was active on the nights.

Loki seemed paler than usual as he stared at you, without even blinking.

“What?”, you snapped him out of your head.

“You dreamt with me?”, he muttered, getting up and cleaning his plate with a snap.

"I also dreamt with Thanos".

“Don’t get too attached, I’ll be back to Asgard soon”, he promised, or alerted. Intentions unclear.

“I’m not attached”, you protested. You thought he’d smirk or be the smug idiot he usually was. He didn’t. Instead, he looked unsettled; disturbed even. “I didn’t dream with you on purpose, it was probably because of yesterday’s thing”.

“What thing?”, peeped in Bucky. “Oh no, did you two fuck?”.

“I didn’t let them die, big deal. I was just saving myself the amount of annoyance it would be to have Stank on my neck all week long if your blood was sort of in my hands”.

“Sounds like a lot of deflecting emotions to me, buddy”, said Bucky, and you chuckled.

“He’s just embarrassed he saw himself cry in one of my dreams from last night”, you mocked. He got up and you didn’t get to see his face, but presumed it would hold something near a death threat.

“You two have an intense bonding experience and decide to concentrate on it with more insults? You know, this is why you’re single”, added Bucky.

“It wasn’t a bonding experience”, you said, cutting-glass sharpness in your gaze.

“I’m not single”, corrected Loki at the same time, with an equally whetted voice.

Both Bucky and you looked at him with plate-wide eyes, waiting for him to elaborate. He didn’t. Neither of you asked, but surely shared a fair amount of desire to gossip about it. Oh, how much you wished to be able to tell Bucky about Loki re-reading Hamlet to reminisce about his beloved. But there was a line you wouldn’t cross in there; you knew where to stop.

“Mr. Stark”, you called through the earbud, “you there, sir?”.

“Painfully”, he answered. You connected the earbud to your phone and held it on speaker, so the rest of the team could join. “Tell me more about what I’m gonna yell at you three about”.

As you walked him through (almost) every event in the past twenty four hours, you could feel how his hands traveled all the way up to his face, and had to hold in a few sighs of disgust and utter hate towards… Well, you weren’t sure towards what, exactly.

“Are we grounded, dad?”, spat Loki with sarcasm.

“Listen, Rock Of Ages, if I could, I’d have you in a prison cell still to this day. Don’t push any buttons”.

“Come on, it’s been, what, nine years since he last fucked up something in here?” you defended him, not quite sure why. Loki grew nervous as Tony laughed obnoxiously at him.

“Sure. He didn’t keep fucking things up in here after that”.

“I can assure you I didn’t. How Odin manages his deals with Midgard does not concern me”, explained Loki, and you frowned at the mention of that name. Of course, Loki Odinson. That was where that name resonated from. Besides the Mythology. Though you weren't sure until where those stories were true or not; in there, Loki wasn't even Thor's brother.

“Going back to your current screw up, what happened to the civilians you frightened in the process? I imagine they didn’t realize about the new supersoldiers”.

“They should be extremely blind or idiotic to not have noticed, since the soldier jumped out of nine floors and survived”, answered Loki, looked at you up and down, and kept going “so, no. They have probably slept on it”.

“Wait, what?”.

“What?”.

“Nine floors? Pretty sure Capsicle and Barnes wouldn’t survive that either”.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”, you asked, concerned.

“I’m afraid so. Loki and Bucks won’t cut it, especially when we don’t know the number of new super-supersoldiers out there. And you’re coming back to the compound, directing the mission from the distance”.

“Are you kidding? I’m fine here. I’m all levels of mean, you said it yourself”.

“You’re too young and inexperienced in combat for these kinds of things, and they have special genetic advantages in their bodies, you know, the serum”, explained Tony as you rolled your eyes. But you understood exactly what he meant, and in fact, you agreed. “Do you understand?”.

“Yes; supersoldiers and Gods only”.

“Good kid. Now, Teleporting Popsicle, would you mind taking there with you the rest?”.

With an overly dramatic sigh, Loki vanished behind a party of green lights and reappeared in a matter of seconds in the same spot, holding carelessly Thor and Steve’s arms. Thor, for obvious reasons, was unfazed by the trip. Rogers, on the other hand, seemed about to throw up. There wasn’t anything balance would help with when your cells are reconfigurated inside and out in a fraction of a second. How the hell did he do all of that? You knew it was magic, but it still wouldn’t stop you from being absolutely astonished by it.

Loki arranged his hair behind his ears and locked eyes with you, followed by his typical smugly smile and a “thank you”, as if you were praising him in your thoughts. Oh, wait.

“I didn’t say anything”, you retorted, hoping to maintain at least a drop of pride left.

“You thought I was impressive”. You were going to correct him but realized that absolutely astonished was even worse.

“And since when do you offer gratitude?”.

“In case you wonder, yes, they’ve been like this the whole mission. You’ll get used to it”, said Bucky to Steve and Thor.

They started arranging their things and got updated as thoroughly as they could. Meanwhile, you stood exactly where you were the following ten minutes, absorbed in your own thoughts. Once you snapped out of them, Loki was still staring at you, standing in the same place too.

“What?”.

“I hate to break it to you, but…”.

“What?”.

“I’m your best option”.

“You’re my what?”.

“Your best option”.

“You’re not giving much context”.

“You’re going back to the compound. I figured you’d think about the mission or something about it for the past ten minutes you were zoned out, but apparently you only have room to think about how terrified you’re of that quinjet”.

Your palms got sweaty and a shiver ran through your spine by the only thought of remembering how heights felt under your feet, and how a simple machine wouldn’t stop you from landing on water and drowning, or crushing against a building and being burned to the bones until all you become is dust and…

“Hello? You’re spiraling again”, he snapped you back. “It’ll be just a blink. You won’t even notice”.

“Uh-uh. No, I’m not doing that. I’m waiting for whatever Tony sends to come and get me”.

“You’ll feel terrible”, he said, and he was right. For a moment, you considered accepting his offer. “And I’m the best”. His humble offer.

“I’m sure you are, but it’s not my best option”.

He sighed.

“Will you allow me to teleport you or not?”.

“Heavens, no”.

“Alright, you little stubborn human mortal”.

“Long nickname, you better come up with a shorter one”.

“Like what?”.

“I don’t know, something that bothers you. I’m not the one supposed to make your insults towards me”.

“Let me think”, he said, looking around the room. His gaze landed on the still unwashed plate of Bucky’s breakfast. “Pancake”.

“Not... that’s not an insult”.

“Why? They’re too sugary. They rot your teeth”.

“Yeah, but it’s not derogatory”.

“Fucking pancake”.

“It doesn’t cut it”.

“But what’s wrong with my pancake?”.

“It’s actually a pet name. You know, like the ones we said when we were in...”, but apparently that was all a distraction (of course, he was the God of Lies, after all), and when you were already thinking about how to explain to him why he shouldn’t call you pancake, he stood in front of you and held you by both sides of the arms, surrounding you almost completely, holding you still.

And just as he said, a blink later you were in the compound, perfectly fine. Peter and Tony greeted you as he pulled out and you stood there in shock. So, you really just needed some stabilization to not die in the intricate process of teleportation. Just before stepping away from you, he leaned over your shoulder and his whisper made your ear ticklish, saying “you’re welcome” with a grin. You didn’t look at him.

You started to gather all your stuff; papers, maps, laptops, and getting ready for the planning of the following steps of the mission as fast as you could, until you realized Loki was still there, and Tony and Peter were waiting for you. For what, you weren’t sure.

“Aren’t you going?”, you asked Loki.

“No, I’m staying, apparently”.

“Why?”.

“That’s what Stark was thinking, I don’t know”.

“Hey, Elsa, don’t read my mind, would you?”, snapped Tony. He was about to explain himself, but you kept talking to Loki, cutting his words.

“What’s wrong with you that you read everyone’s thoughts all the time? You know how unethical that is? It’s invasive”.

“You say that because you think slow”.

“Untrue, I’m actually a very fast thinker”.

“How would you know? You’ve never read anyone’s minds so, how could you possibly…?”.

You stopped dead on your tracks, and didn’t listen to what he was saying. That phrase. That exact phrase you dreamt with. The darkness. It was the exact same voice of the darkness, you remembered. It wasn’t darkness, it was his voice. Were you just imagining things? Too suggestionated? Definitely. How could you dream with something you’ve never heard before?

“Sorry to interrupt, you two seem to be having a long, unnecessary and avoidant conversation that could be resumed in three tiny words, as you did all mission long” interfered Tony, sick of listening to you two. Loki was observing you as heedful as he could; your thoughts had caught his attention. You couldn’t read his face. “So, I’m gonna cut it shortly”.

“What?”, you went back to reality. You needed to actively ignore Loki’s gaze on you to actually pay any mind to Tony’s words.

“The rest of the team has another mission, and both Peter and you are technically still kids…” and as soon as you opened your mouth to argue, he shut it “no, don’t interrupt me. You know I’m right. So, I can’t leave you two alone for the entire week”.

“Oh”, you understood. Peter’s innocent eyes shone at the idea. Yours, not so much. “So, Loki is our babysitter”.

“Yes”, said Loki, while Tony answered “No” at the same time.

"What about Happy?", asked Peter.

“I think we can manage perfectly on our own. Besides, what makes you think he’s more responsible than me?”.

“He’s an adult”.

“He’s seventeen in human years, and fucked a horse”.

“Wow, someone has been stalking my mythology”.

“If you two quarrel too much, Peter will tell me and I’ll be back with Clint Barton in charge of you three. So you better behave. Alright, I’m leaving”.

“Wait! What are the rules?”, asked Peter. You grabbed your face and Loki muttered what a damn nerd.

“Eh, don’t burn down the compound, I don’t know, kid”, said Tony getting inside his bright red suit.

“The bar is on the floor. Let’s play macarena”, you whispered.

#loki #loki x reader #loki laufeyson #loki odinson #loki fanfic #loki headcanon #loki fic #fanfic mcu #loki masterlist #laufeyson #loki friggason #loki x gender neutral reader #loki x avenger!reader #loki x y/n #mcu loki #marvel #marvel loki #avengers #tom hiddleston

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cablesscutie · 3 years ago

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Oh could you do 3 or 17 for the zutara fluff prompt please?☺️

I love both of these- thank you! I'm going to save #17 for a little later, so here's #3: “You’re everything I could’ve wanted and more.”

PART 1 // PART 2 // PART 3

Zuko flips down the visor in his car to fuss with his hair one last time. Mai and Ty Lee had insisted that he pull part of it up to keep him from hiding behind his hair like he was wont to do when he got nervous. In this particular situation, Zuko found that it made him extra nervous to know that he didn’t have that security blanket, scar on full display. This was why he didn’t do blind dates. This poor girl was already suffering through the awkwardness of an ex’s wedding, and now she was going to have to do it while pretending to be vaguely attracted to him.

Her text the previous night had included a reminder of the time and address, as well as an apologetic note that, hey I’m sorry to heap more awkward on this, but apparently this ex is friends with another of my ex’s and it ended Badly...and I might’ve implied that you were a little more significant to me than a blind date? Really I’m so so sorry and I can tell them you have food poisoning or something if this is too awkward, but really all you have to do is not mention that we’re strangers. Sorry!! He’d had absolutely zero clue how to appropriately respond to that message. His first impulse had been to think that of course he didn’t want to pretend to be her boyfriend in front of not one, but two of her ex’s. But Mai probably wouldn’t see this as too much for the favor he owed her. Then his brain had flitted unwillingly to the Instagram account Ty Lee had showed him, and before he could stop himself, his fingers were tapping out That’s fine - see you then.

“Okay,” Zuko sighs, gripping the steering wheel until his knuckles go white. He closes his eyes and pulls in a deep breath, holds it, and on the exhale unclenches his hands and forces himself out of the car. The temple rises up before him in a series of spires and exterior staircases, terraced gardens overflowing with practical plants rising up around all of it. He follows the trickle of people who seem like they know where they’re going, glancing about idly for a familiar face.

She finds him first, which he probably should’ve expected given that his face stands out pretty clearly. She’s also more petite than he’d expected. If she weren’t wearing heels, the top of her head would probably tuck easily under his chin. Zuko shakes his head quickly to erase the thought before it can take hold properly, which unfortunately comes at the same instant that she asks, “Zuko?” and leaves her blinking at him in utter confusion. “Oh. I, uh.”

“I mean yes!” he rushes to correct, reaching out to grab her elbow as she starts to turn away. “Zuko. Me. I mean.” Fuck, he’s such a moron. He clears his throat and holds out his hand to shake. “Hi, Zuko here.” There’s a familiar and terrible heat in his cheeks and spilling down his neck, and he wishes to Agni not for the first time that he could be anyone but Zuko right now.

Katara laughs at him, as she should, but it is a kind laughter, all dimpled cheeks and sparkling eyes. The pictures hadn’t done her justice. “Hi Zuko,” she says, taking his hand and shaking it. “Katara here.” He can’t help but return her smile, goofy as it probably comes across. “Thank you again so much for coming to this shitshow,” she tells him as she drops his hand. “We should probably head inside - it’s starting soon.”

Zuko offers her his arm to be escorted up the stairs of the temple. It’s an old-fashioned gesture that has always gotten mixed reception, but Uncle has drilled manners into him so relentlessly that he always falls back on them reflexively when in a panic. Luckily, she slips her hand into the crook of his elbow with a smile, and his shoulders settle as he guides them both. Along the way, she catches him focusing on the planters, and asks, “do you like gardening?”

“My mother did,” he says reflexively, and he turns to her in time to catch the very moment she registers the past tense. He wants to kick himself for setting up pity or prying questions, but she just gives his arm a slight squeeze and says,

“So did mine. The flowers blooming every summer was her favorite part of the year.”

Usually, he is precious with his memories, but hearing the echo of his own grief in her wistful tone makes him actually want to share his mother with her. “She came from a family of traditional healers, and wanted to keep up the knowledge, so she grew all kinds of herbs and wildflowers that were used in old cures.”

She hums, and they walk along in silence for another moment before she says, “Did she teach you anything?”

“She started to.” It’s bittersweet, his mother’s unfinished legacy. “I have her books though, so maybe someday I’ll finish studying them.” Katara smiles at him, part sympathy, part understanding. Zuko’s heart pounds. When her eyes meet his, he almost wants to hide because it feels like she can see too much.

“Did you learn any cures for nerves?” Katara asks, the sardonic dip of her voice a gift to lighten the mood. Zuko smiles back, starting to laugh off the heavy conversation, but a flash of something catches his attention.

Katara’s eyes go wide as he lets go of her to crouch down and carefully pick a purple blossom. He does it just the way his mother had shown him, finding the right joint in the stem to make sure it will grow back, and with a gentle bend and twist, it breaks between his fingers. The fragrance follows him as he rises and offers the sprig of lavender to Katara. In trying to indicate that she should smell it, he almost shoves it up her nose when she leans towards it, but she giggles and wrinkles her nose adorably. Her fingers fold around his as she slips the stem out of his grasp.

“Thank you.

“Mom used to put a little vase of lavender in me and my sister’s rooms to help us sleep,” Zuko explained.

“I feel better already.” She sniffs the flower again as she slips her arm through his again to properly enter the ceremony space, her eyes fluttering closed for a fraction of a second that steals his breath away. This is actually going well, he thinks in utter astonishment. I keep tripping over my tongue like a moron, but for some reason she seems to like it. A voice in the back of his head that sounds uncomfortably like his teenage self sneers, Wow, she must be really desperate not to look single. Must be some impressive ex’s. Zuko’s heart stutters and slows back to normal. Right. This is a favor. He needs to focus.

Not least because his distraction causes him to walk right into the man who appears in front of Katara. “Sorry,” he says reflexively, stumbling back. Katara’s grip on his arm has tightened, keeping him from dragging both of them off balance. Despite her small stature, she is rooted firmly, anchoring them both. He realizes why as soon as the guy pretends to dust off his sport coat (which is not particularly neat to begin with) and purrs, “So Kat, this is the new guy?” as though Zuko isn’t even there. So this is the other ex.

“Zuko,” he and Katara say at the same time, in the same steely tone.

The ex looks briefly startled, but recovers enough to shake Zuko’s hand. “The name’s Jet.”

Zuko has never met Jet before, and yet he knows from the curl of his smile that he has made out with several Jets at various parties in college. “Pleasure to meet you.”

Jet squeezes Zuko’s hand a little harder, just to the edge of macho discomfort. “Pleasure’s all mine.”

Katara scoffs - almost inaudibly, but it’s there - and Zuko can’t help but look to her and say, “It would be, wouldn’t it?” It’s the kind of snarky remark he and Mai used to share under their breath at their parents’ insufferable dinner parties back in high school. The two women are nothing alike, but there is something similar to the ease he feels with his best friend as he stands beside her. She bites her lip, and her eyes glitter with silent laughter, and Zuko feels a much gentler heat kindling under his skin. Jet manages to look confused and dismissive in one twitch of his ridiculous eyebrows, but returns his attention to Katara undeterred. His eyes linger as they trace obviously over the v of her dress’s neckline and admittedly tempting curves draped in navy satin before he flashes her a pair of puppy dog eyes and asks, “Save me a dance?” When she doesn’t immediately respond, he tilts his head and entreats, “For old times’ sake?”

Zuko is irritated to once again be entirely ignored, and the possessive part of him wants to snap at Jet that all of Katara’s dances are already reserved for him. Hard-earned self control wins out though, and Zuko manages to remind himself that despite his attraction and the ruse he is meant to be perpetuating, he is not actually Katara’s boyfriend. There is no real reason for him to be upset if she chooses to dance with Jet. There are several reasons for the flutter in his chest when her expressive face hardens to stone.

There is no excuse or cutting joke, just one word, a complete sentence: “No.” She gives him nothing to play off of, no buttons to push or entreaties to make, and he backs down quickly.

“Oh. Uh. Okay, I guess I’ll just...see you at the reception?”

“Yeah, you’ll see us there,” Zuko cuts in, mouth stumbling ahead without him. He puts too much significance on the word us, but seems to bother Jet, and Katara leans into his side, so he figures it’s okay. Jet lifts his chin in a parting nod to him. Zuko just meets his eyes evenly as the other man turns away to find his seat. Shaking his head as he watches the guy go, Zuko says, “Pft. If your friend invited that guy, I think you need better friends,” because he has no filter. And then he remembers yet again that he doesn’t know Katara, much less her friends, and he is overstepping all over this situation. His free hand comes up to smack himself in the face. “Shit. Sorry I’m probably screwing this up so bad; I’m the worst blind date in history.”

A small, warm hand closes around his wrist and tugs his hand away. Katara shifts to stand in front of him, blocking the rest of the wedding full of strangers from his view as his attention narrows only to the bounce of her hair and the crescent of her smile.

“You’re everything I could’ve wanted and more.”

Here's the prompt list!

#zutara #zutara fic #my writing #ask game

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office-to-fantasy · 4 years ago

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Hi could you do a shu x fem reader where he protects his s/o or reader from other vampires (at least more than 2) the vampires wanting to suck his reader or s/o blood cause her blood ( she is eve) in the woods

[This was kinda really different for me, so please do let me know what you think! Enjoy!]

Shu Sakamaki x Fem!Reader

(Diabolik Lovers Fanfic)

Shu cursed under his breath. He wasn’t usually the type to get mad, but if you had managed to spark something in his heart, there was no reason for you to not be able to switch his emotions.

You continued walking down the hidden path. The glow of the moonlight striking down on the earth ever so softly. You had left the mansion to think, you wouldn’t usually think to leave the mansion without Shu, but perhaps this one argument had you both going.

Shu didn’t seem to care too much as he laid on the bed without a worry, but you on the other hand, were seconds from reaching your limit. And you knew damn well he was aware of it.

Shu liked to see you in pain, but as it soon came to settle on you that he wouldn’t listen, you walked out the door.

Shu stayed in the same place, not caring as he felt a slight uneasiness settle from how you’d left. You’d never actually been mad at him, so seeing you that way had him excited but also annoyed as you wouldn’t be quiet.

You had left to get some air, and you could just picture Shu lying comfortably on your bed as he yawned and turned, perfectly okay with having made you feel this way.

Sometimes him trying to come off as though he didn’t care wasn’t a good thing, but you loved that man regardless. He’d made you feel so happy at every other moment.

But not today.

Shu walked out of the room, annoyed you had just up and left, at first he found the silence peaceful, a nice change from the rant you had been on. But as more time passed, the silence became deafening, even with his music.

He wanted to hear your voice.

Shu tried following where he thought you might’ve gone, but a lingering of your scent had him being led into the woods.

His wish to hear your voice became true as he heard rustling in the distance and your scream.

Shu’s eyes widened with panic as soon as he heard you. He quickly followed your voice, quick thoughts speeding through his mind.

Shit!

If she’s hurt, you failed to protect someone again.

You let her go out on her own, she’ll end up dead because of you.

Shu found you in a short few seconds as he saw a man with his hand around your throat, tightly pressing you against a tree. Your hands tried moving the man’s hands from your throat but to no avail, your breath was being restricted. The man’s face was in front of your face before lowering down to your neck.

Shu’s foot instantly met the man’s chest as he kicked him away from you. Shu quickly wrapped his arm around you protectively, holding you closely to him.

He wouldn’t let you go again.

His eyes looked around sharply, easily seeing the vampire before him that had just held your throat in his hand, and three others hidden around and on top of the trees.

You coughed, trying to catch your breath. You looked up seeing a whole new side of Shu you’d never seen before.

Pure determination. And all purely to keep you safe.

You held onto Shu, the argument you two had seeming completely worthless compared to this moment.

You’d rather argue with him a million times over than to ever have to experience a permanent absence from him, and he felt the very same as the man before him took a step closer.

“You give out a mean kick,” the guy said, wiping himself off where Shu’s footprint was left. He looked at you. “But I'm not here to fight you. I’m here for the sweetheart with the blood that could be smelled from miles away.”

Shu’s eyes narrowed. He loved teasing you about how you tempted other men, but to hear another man speak of you had him be completely possessive over you. Especially when they stared at you so shamelessly in front of him.

The man on top of the tree jumped down, walking towards you, giving a clear attempt to grab you.

If only it was that easy.

Shu wasn’t the least bit scared of these guys. It was easy to identify the halfers, creating three out of four of them being impure vampires.

The guy he so easily managed to get away from you was the stand out.

You held onto Shu tighter as the guy came to be less than ten feet from you.

“Shu, I want to go home,” you whispered to him.

Shu was caught slightly off guard, a hidden comfort making its way to his heart at those words. He glanced down at you before smirking.

“Lewd.”

He wouldn’t change.

Shu held you tightly as the guy came towards you at full speed, making it much easier for Shu as he lifted you and moved in his direction, his fist hitting the guy in the face at all the more speed he was running towards you at.

“So heavy,” Shu mumbled.

You looked at him in both shock and astonishment.

Did he just?

“This would be much easier if you cooperated, troublesome woman.” Shu smirked as he took your legs and wrapped them around his waist, pressing your body to his. “You did always say you liked this position.” He slightly chuckled.

A deep blush coated your cheeks as you slightly tightened your hold around his neck, hiding your face.

This man knew how to get a reaction out of you.

Shu moved as another vampire came towards you both. Shu quickly moved out of the way, dodging it as another tried coming from behind him.

You watched as the man came toward Shu, you would’ve spoken if only Shu hadn’t moved out of the way before you could make a sound. Shu moved and used the vampire’s momentum to slam his face into a tree.

For the first time, you’d never seen Shu get so physical, even if he made it look easy, you could tell Shu was focused. He dodged and made each and every vampire look like amateurs compared to Shu, a pure blooded vampire who knew a lot more than he led on.

The first vampire that had tried drinking your blood came quicker, striking earlier than Shu anticipated. He moved quickly and struck, knife first.

Shu’s balance restricted him from moving backwards, leaving the last option to move forward and away from the striking vampire. You held onto Shu tighter as you saw the knife directed towards Shu’s head. You moved quickly as you placed your hand over where you estimated it would hit, the knife cutting your hand in a stinging move.

You hissed, balling your hand in a fist as the blood dripped onto Shu’s clothes.

Shu smelled your blood and looked back at you in panic, relaxing when he saw you alive and reacting. “What happened?” he asked firmly.

You moved your hand back, showing him the deep cut.

Shu immediately took your hand and licked it, making sure it’d heal as soon as possible. “Idiot woman, why would you do that.” Shu turned to the vampire who’d struck you, a dark look taking over his face as he set you down.

He wouldn’t allow anyone to lay a hand on you.

Shu watched calmly as the guy once again plunged toward him, this time the man’s face contouring into fear as his body began turning limp in front of Shu. A knife perfectly plunged into the man’s chest.

Bullseye.

Shu let out a low chuckle. “She’s my woman.”

#request #shu sakamaki #sakamaki shu #shuu sakamaki #sakamaki shuu #diabolik lovers #diabolik lovers shu #diabolik lovers fanfiction #oneshot #fanfic #OftoFa

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twc-thoughts-you-didnt-ask-for · 4 years ago

Text

Mortality - Mason

Part 2 of my Mortality series. I was going to hold off on doing Mason’s but I can’t manage it, he’s my absolute favorite.

Would love to hear your thoughts on it :)

You can read Adam’s here

Dinah was in her absolute favorite place in the world, in the arms of her moody boyfriend. The lights were dimmed for their mutual benefit, so that she could see and so that he wasn’t in pain the whole time they were together. She lay atop him fully, enjoying not worrying about crushing him with her weight thanks to him not being human and listened happily to the beat of his heart while he lazily tried to braid her long, strawberry-blonde hair.

It was another night in the warehouse where she had a nightmare, but she really couldn’t say she minded if she were rewarded with this. Mason pretended to be huffy, as he always did, when she had the absolute audacity to ask if she could stay with him and snuggle.

“What do I look like? A body pillow?” he replied gruffy, all the while easing himself into a laying position with his arms open for her to crawl into.

“Maybe you do, you know, if I squint.” she had responded.

He scoffed at that.

And then here they were.

Between the panic from the nightmare and the joy of spending quality time with Mason, she really didn’t know how she expected herself to go back to sleep. It had taken a lot of really hard work to get Mason to get to the point where he accepted more... wholesome time together and she wanted to be awake for every minute of it for the rest of her life.

Her eyes opened at that thought. The rest of her life... how much did she had left in comparison to his forever? No, she shouldn’t dwell on it. She knew she shouldn’t. It would kill her mood.

Mason spoke as he felt her blink against his chest.

“I believe humans are supposed to be sleeping right now. Or at least doing a very poor job of pretending to.”

Human. Mortal. Finite.

“Ha-” her sentence began as she angled her face to look at him, but was immediately interrupted as one of the hands that had been playing in her hair covered her eyes.

“Shhhh.... lights out. I am not going to be the one blamed in the morning by Adam when you’re not at your absolute best in the morning because you stayed up.”

Dinah could hear the smirk in his voice, the meaning evident, as he added “Well, not without a very good reason to have kept you up, anyways.”

She knew that prying Mason’s hands off her face would be impossible, what with him being a vampire and her not being strong even by human standard, so she did the only thing she could think of.

She poked her tongue out and got his hand with it.

“Agh,” he exclaimed as he released his hand in surprise at the action.

Dinah pounced before he could say anything more inappropriate.

“Have you ever thought about doing it?” she blurted out and immediately regretted as she had meant ask a better, more thorough, question but she was too eager to get a word in before he could.

His eyebrows raised at that and his ever-present smirk took it’s usual place on his pretty face.

“As a matter of fact, I have. Beyond that actually, I’ve actually done it. And with astonishing little persuasion from a certain someone, I could be very ready to do it agai-”

“Ew, not that!” Dinah exclaimed as she propped herself into a sitting position in his lap.

If the heat on her face weren’t enough, he had that... glowy look about him as he did whenever he had successfully made her flustered to tell her that she was the brightest of reds.

“Ew?” he asked with false offense.

He propped himself into a sitting position as well, Dinah unmoving, as he placed his hands on her hips and brought his mouth to the usual spot on her neck. The spot where the pale scar from Dr. Murphy lived.

He placed a quick kiss to it and then said: “That’s funny, sweetheart, that’s almost the exact opposite of what you were saying the other nigh-”

“Would you turn me into a vampire?”

He backed away from her neck so quickly at that she feared that he would push her away altogether.

“What?”

All playfulness had left his face and tone.

Stretching her arms out and lacing her fingers being his neck, she took on a gentle tone- one that always disarmed him.

“I was just thinking about it, you know, how much it sucks that my mortality could separate us at any moment. I have such a large target on my back with my blood being what it is.”

Another scoff came out of him.

“I’m serious!” she exclaimed, at least Mason’s version of an exclamation. She really didn’t want to assault his senses and pelt him with questions at the same time.

“Seriously out of your mind if you think Adam would sign off on you dying, you mean.”

Dinah ignored such a ridiculous response with, “I could get sick.”

Mason rolled his eyes at that one.

“I’d like to see a supernatural try and get you sick since it’s impossible. And for your silly human illnesses, we have doctors and healers.”

“Fine, I’m gonna get really old and gross some day.”

His eyebrows raise.

“Three things about that: you’re tragically beautiful and destined to age well, that would take a very long time, and I would be lying if I said I wasn’t a little curious as to what it would be like to sleep with a woman that ages like wine. I’ve ever done it with an ol-”

Swiftly ignoring the “beautiful” remark, Dinah let go of his neck and slipped out of his lap without an ounce of grace.

“You’re impossible!” she said with a glare as soon as she balanced herself and smoothed out her clothes.

He did nothing more than look at her.

With that, she stomped in a way that he would not admit was cute to the door. Putting on her very best angry face, hand placed on the handle of the door, she looked back at him. Graciously giving him one more chance to take this conversation seriously.

He did not take it.

“Love you,” he said- followed by making two air kisses in her direction.

“Ugh!” she groaned and did the most polite door slam Mason had ever seen.

As soon as the door clicked, he speedily reached for a cigarette and lit it. He took a very long drag on it, exhaling a large plume of smoke. He ignored that his hand shook.

As much as she was angry at him, he was almost equally as angry at her. What kind of question was that? Every day he was reminded by Adam of her mortality. Every time a supernatural so much as looked at her, he was aware of her mortality. The mark that scarred her neck would forever remind him of her mortality.

The cigarette aided as sufficiently as it could to subdue his anxiety... his feelings.

In that moment he wished he were more like Nate... honest with complicated feelings that Mason wasn’t accustomed to. What he wouldn’t give to tell Dinah that she was the only love he’ll ever know for the rest of forever and that he really couldn’t stomach focusing on the fact that every day was a new day he could lose her. How easily he could lose the feeling of being alive that she gifted to him, asking for nothing in return.

“I would,” he answered to a question she had asked now that nobody was around to hear it.

He became aware of his phone pinging and had two notifications.

One message was from Nate, some kind of gibberish expressing how Mason really shouldn’t upset their Detective so much and should apologize.

The other was from Dinah.

I’m gonna haunt you for eternity

He smiled at the words, something that would irritate her greatly if she knew. While he knew she was just trying to jab him one more time to encourage the continuation of their conversation, he took them differently than she intended.

She would haunt him for eternity, in the best of ways. He had never been more pleased with a threat.

Go to bed, sweetheart

He messaged back.

A swift reply came immediately

>:(

And with a chuckle, he closed the phone.

#the wayhaven chronicles #wayhaven chronicles #the wayhaven chronicles detective #the wayhaven chronicles fanfic #twc mason #twc detective #the wayhaven chronicles mason #twc fanfic

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lifeofkaze · 4 years ago

Text

An Art of Balance #3

A/N: My head start on chapters is (already) dwindling, but whatever… Here you go, Chapter 3, enjoy!

Warning: mild swearing

Word Count: ~ 2.400

______________________________________________________________

Chapter 3: Charlie

To Lizzie’s astonishment, her friends kept their teasing to a minimum for the following week. Aside from Penny’s occasional prying and some suggestive jokes from Tonks, they all left her mostly alone as everybody resettled into their routines.

Skye was perhaps the longest to hold a grudge against her. Every so often she would make a snarky remark about “fraternising”, “competition” and “priorities”. But even she let it go as soon as her initial motivation to study wore off, and she fell back on her habit of copying all of her assignments from Lizzie.

Still, to avoid stirring talk about her and Charlie any further, Lizzie kept a low profile, concentrating on the vast amount of work the professors had started dumping on them instead. She’d seen Orion and McNully struggle with keeping up with their studies last year; but experiencing O.W.L. preparations first-hand was something else altogether.

“Honestly, this term is getting on my nerves already.” Skye slumped next to her on the windowsill in front of the charms classroom, where they were waiting for class to start. “So much work, so little fun. Can’t wait for the season to start properly, I’m itching to be back on the pitch again.”

Lizzie closed the book she had been reading. “Me too. I think Orion wants to find our new beater before we get back into practise though. I wonder who he has in mind to get a try-out.”

“Experience a try-out, you mean!” She snickered. “I swear, this guy is one of a kind.” She leaned back against the wall. “Remember your try-outs, back in the day?”

“How could I forget?” Lizzie replied flatly. “You, McNully and Orion were giving me nightmares.”

“But you made it in the end. With my help of course.” Skye eyed Lizzie’s bag that was resting on the floor beneath her feet. Sweeping down, she grabbed it and started rummaging through it.

“Speaking of help, my charms homework isn’t finished. Let me see what you’ve got.” She held the scroll up triumphantly before starting to copy its content down onto her own parchment.

“I am ever so glad to let you copy my work, do help yourself,” Lizzie remarked sardonically and picked up her book again. She had stopped her futile protests about two years ago.

They sat in silence for some time. Lizzie continued reading up on the counter jinxes they were covering at the moment, drowning out the noises of Skye’s writing and the chatter of her arriving classmates.

Suddenly, Skye shoved the parchment back into her face. “This is not one of your best works, if I may say so. I’d better go and ask Penny for help this time.” Skye got up and strode over to where Penny stood chatting to Rowan, leaving an open-mouthed Lizzie behind.

“All of a sudden my homework’s not good enough, or what?” she exclaimed in disbelief.

Skye just waved her hand in dismissal, already chatting to Penny, who flashed her a bright smile. Rowan left them standing, sitting down beside Lizzie, who had a bewildered look upon her face.

“What was that all about?”

“I have no idea. My homework doesn’t seem to be copy-worthy anymore. Apparently, Penny’s is, though.” Lizzie was still visibly confused.

“Just imagine, you are not the only one good at charms,” Rowan answered stiffly. “Other people can hold a wand as well.”

Lizzie raised her hands in defence. “Woah, easy there. That’s not what I was saying.”

Rowan shrugged. “It’s true though.”

Lizzie got up and stuffed her book back into her bag. “Whatever. You’re acting really strange lately, you know? If I have done anything to offend you, please enlighten me.”

Rowan pushed her glasses up her nose. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to snap at you.”

Lizzie snorted. “Right.”

When she saw general concern on her friend’s face, she felt her anger subsiding as quickly as it had arisen. “Listen, how about we talk this out over dinner. Just the two of us, like in the old times. What do you think?”

Rowan gave her a doubtful look. “The others will want to know why we’re ditching them.”

Lizzie shrugged. “So what? Can’t I have a meal alone with my best friend?”

A genuine smile broke on Rowan’s face at her words. “Alright, I’m looking forward to it.” Her gaze shifted to something behind Lizzie and she hurriedly got up. “Class is about to start, see you in a second.”

Wondering what had startled Rowan, Lizzie turned around. Charlie Weasley had dispatched himself from a group of Gryffindor’s and was making his way over to where she was standing. Lizzie cursed under her breath, hurriedly gathering up her things. She wanted to dart after Rowan, but Charlie was quicker than her. He caught her on her elbow, before she had a chance to walk away.

“Not so fast, sunshine.”

She cringed. Charlie had called her nicknames ever since she could remember. Given the raised eyebrows of Penny and Skye, she could make out over Charlie’s shoulder, the potential for misinterpretation clearly stood out to her all of a sudden.

Adjusting the strap of her bag on her shoulder she elbowed Charlie in his side.

“Stop calling me that.”

He eyed her curiously. It was unlike her not to come back at him with a witty remark but Lizzie wasn’t in the mood for banter. Despite her brusque reply, Charlie tilted his head and grinned at her.

“If I didn’t know better, I’d say you’ve been avoiding me this week.” He placed a hand on his chest in a dramatic gesture. “What did I do to deserve this rejection?”

Lizzie heard Tonks snickering and rolled her eyes at him. “Can’t blame me for wanting at least one week of peace and quiet before I let you get me into trouble again,” she shot back.

Charlie’s grin grew wider. “Ah, there’s my girl. Professor Kettleburn has asked me to help him prepare the Firecrab lessons for the third years tomorrow. Care to join me?”

She and Charlie had been helping with the preparations of the Care of Magical Creatures lessons ever since they had been able to partake in them. Having been good friends before, the work with the creatures had deepened their friendship considerably.

“Yeah, sure! But I need to be back for dinner on time.”

Their classmates had begun filing into the classroom, Charlie and Lizzie joining their ranks.

“Why, do you have a date or what?”

Lizzie searched for her friends until she saw Rowan waving and pointing to an empty seat next to her. She smiled.

“Something like that.”

She sensed Charlie’s curiosity. But instead of asking for further details, he just clapped her on the shoulder before he made off to sit with his own friends.

“Don’t worry, I’ll have you back on time, my lady.”

It was still blazing hot later in the afternoon, when Lizzie leaned on the railing of the wooden bridge connecting one of the castle’s side entrances to the grounds.

She had been waiting for Charlie for a while already, but she didn’t mind being to herself for a change.

Her gaze swept across the spectacular view she had of the castle grounds from up here. She squinted at the sun hanging low in the sky. Its light already had that slight golden hue to it that heralded the coming evening. If she breathed in deeply, she could almost smell the first hints of autumn in the air.

She idly toyed with the dragonhide gloves she had been carrying in her back pocket. Her mind returned to Rowan, as it had done ever so often over the course of the day.

Lizzie longed to find out what was bothering her friend. She was tired of the permanent tension between them, never really knowing what she had done to make the otherwise shy girl so touchy.

She rubbed her eyes. She missed Rowan terribly. Her other friends were dear to her as well, but the friendship with her was special. They used to work together in class, usually finishing their task before everyone else. Rowan always knew all the necessary theory, while Lizzie had a knack for the practical application.

Right now, most of the times she ended up working with Skye. As much as she valued Skye as a friend, she was a scholastic nightmare. She just could not be interested in what she was supposed to be doing if it didn’t involve Quidditch. She was either complaining about practise not having started or bitching about whatever Rath had done again to annoy her. She made finding the focus needed to perform advanced spells close to impossible.

Hurried footsteps approaching broke her out of her thoughts.

Charlie was running towards her, his face almost as red as his hair. No doubt he had been sprinting all the way down from Gryffindor Tower. He skittered to a halt next to her, hands on his thighs, gasping for breath.

Lizzie tapped her index finger onto her wrist. “Nice of you to join me eventually. What dragon has been keeping you?”

Still panting, Charlie managed to squeeze out a response. “Sorry – I – got – held up.” He took a deep breath and straightened himself.

“My brother Percy thought it appropriate to lecture me on ‘proper attire for handling dangerous creatures’.”

Much like Lizzie, Charlie was wearing only a shirt and some shorts.

“Apparently it’s dangerous to handle fire-shooting creatures without full-body protection,” he scoffed.

They had started walking down towards the creatures reserve.

“Actually, Percy is not wrong, you know.”

In their third year, when they had started to attend Care of Magical Creatures classes, they had made sure to be properly protected at all times. Professor Kettleburn provided ample example of what could happen if you took about handling magical creatures too carelessly.

But as they started helping him out on a regular basis, they had quickly established a routine of their own, which allowed them to dress a little bit more leisurely – as long as no younger students were watching.

Charlie grimaced. “I know he’s right, it’s just… He is always right. It hasn’t been a day since he arrived here, he hasn’t been lecturing me.”

He pitched his voice higher, imitating the condescending tone Percy Weasley had mastered at only eleven years old.

“No, Charlie, staying up past bed time is inappropriate. No, Charlie, you shouldn’t let them drink butterbeer in the common room. No, Charlie, you, as a prefect, should know this. Are you even listening, Charlie? I’m talking to you, Charlie. Charlie, Charlie, Charlie.”

Lizzie couldn’t help herself. With every step away from the castle she could feel the tension bothering her gradually vanish.

A small giggle escaped her throat, quickly growing into genuine laughter.

She fought to contain herself. “Merlin’s beard, Charlie. I didn’t know you had such a talent for acting.”

He chuckled, bowing down low. “There’s a lot you don’t know about me, puffskein.”

Lizzie giggled again, playfully shoving him. “Do you keep notes on these ridiculous nicknames of yours? And I know everything I need to know about you. Bill described vividly how you tried to turn your family rat into a dragon.” She pursed her lips. “Teeny tiny Charlie Weasley, dragonologist in the making.”

He shook his head indignantly. “Why, Elizabeth Jameson, that was science. I thought you’d have enough sense to understand that.”

They had reached the enclosure where the Firecrabs were being held. Gathering up their supplies, they set to feeding the creatures, chatting away over how they had spent the summer. Gradually, Lizzie felt herself relax more and more, losing herself in their work.

She watched Charlie stroke one of the younger Firecrabs under its chin. Suddenly feeling incredibly annoyed with herself, she walked over and knelt down beside him.

“You were right earlier, you know?” she said quietly. “I have actually been avoiding you, I’m sorry.”

He inclined his head. “I thought so. But why?”

For a split second, Lizzie contemplated telling him she had broken their agreement and told her friends about them kissing. He would probably be angry with her; Charlie didn’t appreciate being the centre of attention. She stood up. “Does it matter, really? It was stupid of me; I see that now.”

Charlie got up to his feet as well. “It does matter. If I have done anything to offend you, tell me straight to my face instead of running from me.”

Unbeknownst to him, he had almost echoed her words to Rowan earlier in the day. She could imagine how he felt.

She shuffled her feet uncomfortably. Formulating what had been bothering her made it sound even pettier.

“You know how everyone is always talking about us? Like they can’t grasp the fact a girl and a boy can just be really good friends? I’m so sick of it. Every time I talk to you or we’re down here, I have to answer questions from my friends. It’s just so…” she struggled for words, “…frustrating.”

Charlie looked at her in disbelief. “And that’s why you didn’t even want to talk to me?”

Lizzie bit her lip. “I told you, it was stupid.”

He shook his head. “You’re damn right about that.”

All of a sudden, he winked at her and gave her a lopsided grin. “Besides, would dating me be such a horrible thing?”

Lizzie could only blink at him wide-eyed, utterly at a loss for what to say.

Charlie burst out laughing. “You should see your face right now!”

When she didn’t join his laughter, he laid his hand on her shoulder. “Hey, I was joking, alright? Relax. Just a nice little joke to brighten up your day.”

Lizzie let out the breath she hadn’t notice she’d been holding. “Very funny, I can’t contain myself.” She glared, poking him into his chest with her finger. “Don’t ever scare me like that again.”

“No promises on that. But if it comforts you, I’d much prefer dating you if you learned how to breathe fire.”

She shook her head and walked past him out of the paddock, Charlie following close behind.

“Hey, Liz?”

She turned around. He was still inside the enclosure, resting his forearms on the gate that had swung shut behind her.

“Don’t listen to what everyone else is saying, alright?” His voice was earnest. “Screw what they are thinking. We are friends, you and I, don’t let anyone take this away from you.”

Walking back to where he was standing, Lizzie gave him a warm smile. The next instance, she was kicking the gate that supported his weight with her foot.

Laughing at the expression on his face as he struggled to keep standing, she finally felt completely at ease.

“Don’t worry. I won’t.”

#harry potter #hogwarts mystery #hphm #orion amari #orion amari x mc #orion x mc #lizzie jameson #art of balance #skye parkin #penny haywood #rowan khanna #charlie weasley #quidditch squad #the quidditch squad

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anika-ann · 4 years ago

Text

Errare Humanum Est - Pt.7

Of Monsters and Men

Type: series, soulmate AU series (part 1, part 2) x Supernatural

Pairing: Steve Rogers x reader (past?) Word count: 2490

Summary: ‘Nat’ and the boys are still on the road and to kill the time more than anything, they talk monsters and most importantly, witches.

You know what they say: speak of the devil and he shall appear.

Warnings: mentions of violence, monsters, supernatural elements, mentions of amnesia and interesting dreams and swearing (always)

Story masterlist

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“Hold onto me tight. Can’t have you falling off, doll…”

“You’re such a troublemaker-“

“I want to see you come undone first. Can I, doll?”

“Do I look unwilling, doll? I’m actually pretty eager to find out how long do you need to recover…”

“Eyes on me, darling-”

You jolted awake with a gasp for air, your eyes snapping open into sharp midday sun. It took you a second to realize where you were, what the low purr under your body meant, music on low volume and a male voice softly humming along.

You blinked, meeting Sam’s gaze as he turned his head to face you.

“Hey. You alright?” he asked, concern furrowing his features.

You took a deep breath, trying to ignore the blood rushing to your cheeks at the memory of the dream. They were bits and pieces, sweet and hot, yet leaving dull ache in your chest in their wake. You were absolutely sure this was your consciousness recalling moments with your soulmate, but you were unable to make anything useful of them. It was like chasing ghosts – eh, actually, did ghosts exist? What was it like, chasing them? Never mind-

You were supposed to be a ghost, because apparently you had died.

Alright. Shake it. Snap out of those messy thoughts.

The more awake your body got, the more you realized your chest wasn’t the only thing that was tense and it wasn’t only your neck that nearly cramped.

“Yeah,” you muttered finally, while Sam’s eyes managed to get really worried, still on you. “Just… call of nature.”

In more than one ways. Your bladder might actually burst soon, but you couldn’t deny your arousal either. Gee. Why did it have to be that kind of dream you had? Why couldn’t you see your soulmate’s face clearly instead? Nope scratch that, his ID would be better, complete with his freaking address.

“Hold on for about half an hour, Nat. I’d like to stretch my legs anyway and Garth should be waiting for us.”

You smiled at Dean despite him being unable to see it, his eyes focused on the road. It was sweet of him. You might as well be sweet back.

“Thanks, Dean. And you can turn the volume up, if it was low just because of me,” you hummed, holding back a chuckle when his hand immediately moved to the radio.

“Thanks, Nat. Wanna tell us what that dream of yours was about? You seem a bit shaky,” he nudged, surprisingly gentle. You would expect such approach from Sam, but he only glanced at you, apparently wanting to know as well.

You sighed, wondering how to put it without sounding like a horny teenager.

“It’s… I think they’re like memories? But they don’t make any sense,” you said in the end, casting your glance down, fiddling with the hem of your shirt, fingers interlacing and disjointing again. “It’s my soulmate, I know as much. Or, you know, I’m pretty sure. It’s nothing useful though.”

“I’m sorry,” Sam soothed, his voice genuinely regretful. You just shook your head, sending a sad smile his way.

“The only pattern is a… a pet-name, I guess.” Well, until now, it was just one. ‘Darling’ was new. “He keeps calling me ‘doll’.”

You didn’t know why you told them, you weren’t planning on it. Except they were so genuinely nice to you it hurt and you felt like honesty was the least you could give in return. Now, you could practically touch their surprise.

It was Dean who commented on it, but not in a malicious way, which you were eternally grateful for.

“Doll, huh? Maybe he’s a mafioso. Sounds like something from an old movie. Heh, maybe you time-travelled too!” he speculated out loud and you only gulped, not as amused as you should be. Was that a thing? Time-travel?

“God, I hope not,” Sam whined, effectively startling you. So it was possible?

“Nah, I bet it’s just him being a gentleman, ya know, the old-fashioned kind of guy. After all, how could he not, having such a… swell dame for a soulmate?”

Both you and Sam eyes Dean with wary and confusion.

“Since when you’re an expert on war era slang?” Sam demanded, amused surprise lacing his voice.

“Simpler times, Sam. Simpler times. You’ll understand when you’re older.”

Sam just chuckled, shaking his head. You laughed as well despite not quite understanding what it meant. You simply enjoyed the banter and teasing that was strengthening their brotherly love; you already caught up that much, that they loved each other greatly. How could they not? They were both absolutely amazing despite their differences.

People might find it strange for them to be so close at their age – not that you knew theirs precisely, or yours for that matter – but you thought it was endearing. If they killed monsters for living, their lives couldn’t be normal and conventional, could they? It spiked your interest once more.

“Alright. What can you tell me about what you do and how you get your money?”

“Not sure you wanna hear that, d-- now I have the nickname stuck in my head, dammit. It’s not a pretty chat, Nat. You sure?”

You nodded, but agreed out loud for the god measure. After all, Dean was still driving.

“Your choice. We hunt monsters. But let me tell you, humans are actually the worst… well, humans and witches…”

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Dean and Sam hadn’t even told half about the monsters that lurked in the shadows and you already felt overwhelmed, grateful when you reached Bedford and the older brother called his ID maker.

Garth was a nice guy, if a little overexcited and goofy.

He called you a madam, gave Sam a newest book by George R. R. Martin (who?), which seemed to excite the hunter greatly and Dean received a piece of apple pie. You couldn’t remember your life, but if you had, you were sure it still would have been Dean’s smile that was the brightest you had ever seen. Note to yourself; when repaying Sam and Dean, a pie and a book were necessities.

Your trio didn’t stop to chat with the man for long though – you needed to be on your way. Garth was apparently in the business of hunting, because he made a face way too similar to Sam’s at a mention of witches. You weren’t sure if you looked forward hearing about those; you guessed they weren’t wearing pointy hats and befriending cats.

The remaining hours to your destination flied; the brothers continued to educate you in monster food chain (people were usually the food, which you did not enjoy learning), briefing you on existence of things you could barely imagine. Also, they weren’t only friends with an angel, apparently – they were also on rather good terms with king of Hell.

“King of Hell?” you parroted, bewildered. What the h— heaven?!

“Yeah. Dean used to be bestie with him, too,” Sam quipped, half delighted at his brother’s annoyed face when sharing this fact, half bitter for pretty obvious reasons.

“Dude.”

“You keep the weirdest company,” you stated, your head buzzing with all the info you got. You grimaced when you realized that the company included you.

“We know,” Sam sighed, turning his tablet on. “But it’s not all bad. I mean, Garth, the guy you just met… he’s a werewolf and-“

“He’s a WEREWOLF?!” you yelped, causing the brothers jump in their seats and Dean jerk the steering wheel aside, throwing you all of balance.

“Christ, woman! Keep the volume low!” the driver spitted out as he returned to the correct lane, ignoring the honks of other cars. “I know, I know, shut up, I’m not drunk…”

“Sorry,” you blurted out on autopilot, your mind pre-occupied with the fact that the sweet dorky guy you had just met was a fucking werewolf.

It was Sam’s turn to apologize or he thought so. “My bad. I shouldn’t have just dropped that on you.”

“But he was so nice!”

“If you say so,” Dean assented reluctantly, voice dripping with doubt. You weren’t trying to figure out why he questioned such an obvious thing. It wasn’t your place. Not to mention you were still too astonished by the announcement.

Sam cleared his throat. “Anyway. We have two victims so far. Both are young women, Alicia Peters, 16 years old and Helen Sanders, 16 as well. They were apparently classmates, rather good students, but not friends. One of them was found three days ago, the other yesterday. They both sneaked away in secret, some other classmates claimed to them being… eh, giggly. They thought they had new boyfriends,” Sam summed up, while Dean nodded every now and then. “Why do you think witches? Could be dragons… which would be probably even worse.”

“…dragons? You’re joking.”

Dragons were real now?!

Dean ignored your incredulous remark. “Virgins, right? That’s what I thought. But check this out – according to the coroner, they had a puncture wound over their heart like from some very thin needle – or, more likely, a very thin straw, because their hearts were completely drained of blood.”

Your head was definitely spinning now, your stomach flipping over. You had been getting hungry before, but not so much anymore. You wanted to tune the conversation out, but it was inevitable to hear it. Your ears wouldn’t listen; it was like watching a train-wreck happen and being unable to draw your gaze away. Morbid curiosity played a part too.

God, you really were weird company.

“That’s disgusting,” Sam stated, his fingers moving swiftly over the screen.

You only hummed in agreement, trying to get the visual from your brain. Soulmate. Think of your soulmate and his sultry voice calling you doll. You took a deep breath, exhaling slowly, shocked that it actually worked. His voice washed over you, cocooning you in a soft blanket.

“Tell me about it,” Dean agreed darkly, but Sam held out his hand all of sudden, causing both you and Dean freeze.

“What?”

“They found two young men this morning. John Doe One and Two for now. They were…” Sam wavered, eyeing you in the rear-view mirror. Now he was checking with you? You guessed your face was pale as a sheet of paper, but hey, it wasn’t like you couldn’t just try and cover your ears. You nodded at him encouragingly and he shifted in his seat uncomfortably. “…found in one bed, stabbed in the heart and… ugh, with their… tools ripped off.”

Dean winced, while you just blinked. Did he mean like… wow. Oh, wow. You weren’t sure how to react to that.

“There was a note. We apologize for ruining such pure lives of the sweetest kind and as a prove of our remorse, we present their families with-“ Sam faltered in his speech, gagging. “Yeah, alright. Apparently, the missing part of their bodies was found with the… note. No need to go into details.”

“Yeah, Sammy, I’d be pretty grateful if we stopped talking about that. What now, though? Do we believe this crap?”

“You could have an ally,” you quipped shyly, receiving Sam’s sigh in reply.

“Brutal one, but yes. We need to at least check it out.”

“Yeah, but we get a lunch before that. I need something to comfort me. You traumatized my love muscle, Sam. Do you have any-“

“Yeah, alright, just… stop right there,” Sam stopped his brother, as if shielding himself from TMI by holding out his palm against Dean. “Got it. We need to stop for a bite.”

You giggled, the sound interrupted by your stomach growling. When had you got your appetite back?

“I guess lady in the back agrees,” Dean hummed, grinning in Sam’s direction. You laughed when you came to conclusion that he enjoyed making his younger brother uncomfortable, Sam making a face back at him as he realized the same.

They seemed like a greater pair of siblings the longer you spent with them.

It only took several minutes to get to the town and find a place to eat; Dean seemed to have a talent for finding food, which you appreciated immensely. You hadn’t been eating much, ashamed of using the brothers like that, so you were hungrier than you would be willing to admit. You had a sneaking suspicion that Sam was beginning to notice, because his eyes were narrowed as you picked the cheapest thing on the menu that appeared edible.

“You’re not eating,” he pointed out bluntly the moment the waitress left.

You just gaped at being caught and so shamelessly called out. Dean’s gaze shifted to you and now you had two men glaring at you keeping you company in the boot.

“I’m… not hungry.”

“Your stomach said differently,” Dean reminded you with his eyebrow arched in challenge. You opened your mouth uselessly, the protest dying in your throat at the intensity of his bright green eyes. “If this is about money, get your head out of your ass, Nat. You need to eat.”

“But-“

“But nothing. We’re having a desert,” he shut you up effectively, not permitting any objections.

You sighed, guiltily merging with your seat. A menu was placed in front of you, Dean’s fingers pointing at it.

“Actually, you’re picking one right now.”

You wordlessly obeyed, defeated. “I don’t mean to be difficult,” you whispered apologetically and Sam just shook his head with a smile.

“We know. And I get it, you don’t want to impose and use us, but… we chose to help you. Try to accept it, alright?”

You only nodded, determined to at least find the best dessert. The corners of your lips quirked when you found it.

“Looks like we’re in for an apple pie,” you decided, smirking in Dean’s direction. His eyes lit up and you couldn’t but feel the warmth around your heart at that. You actually did that, made him smile. Maybe you weren’t the worst company in the world after all. “Unless you’re sick of it after-“

Dean’s hand snatched the menu away, shutting it close. “Shut you piehole, Nat.”

Sam laughed as they brought your food.

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You were just finishing your infamous dessert, when the brothers stiffened at the voice coming from behind their back, the other side of the boot.

You frowned, not finding anything strange about the female voice with British accent.

“Thank you, darling. It will be all,” the woman said politely.

The moment the waitress left, Sam and Dean stumbled from their seats and towards the other boot. The tension in their shoulders only grew and they let out a ridiculously synched irritated sigh, multiple emotions playing on their face; you caught annoyance and a bit of anger for sure.

“Rowena,” Sam greeted her in pretended politeness and you couldn’t but check the situation out. They didn’t seem to be happy about running into their acquaintance.

You got a glimpse of a redhead sipping at her tea delicately, her pinkie raised as she held her cup.

“Hello, boys.”

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Part 8

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I adore that woman, I swear. She’s so classy and sassy.

Also, for those who haven’t seen SPN, I extended the guide at the end of chapter one - you’ll find ‘Chuck’ and ‘Rowena’ there ;)

Thank you for reading!

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forasecondtherewedwon · 4 years ago

Note

can you do #11 for spideychelle plz

Thanks to both of you, Anons!!

11. Secret relationship

find light

Pairing: Peter Parker x Michelle Jones (Spideychelle) Rating: E Word count: 13252

Summary:

MJ's got it bad for Peter Parker, but she's on track to be valedictorian while he sells weed at parties. Not the ideal person to get involved with if she wants to maintain her reputation as a serious academic. Solution? Conduct a relationship in secret until they graduate. But that only works for so long, and leaving high school behind isn't a guarantee that things will get easier.

She’s under no illusion about whether or not he actually quit smoking. When he speaks to her, there’s no hint on his breath, but the scrappy black hoodie he wears almost every day reeks of cigarettes. He has his forearm braced on the locker next to hers as he leans in. The only thing MJ’s ever felt before that’s anything like this is fear. She keeps her gaze straight ahead, sliding her textbooks carefully into her backpack behind her sketchbook. Associating with Peter Parker would be as normal or sane as walking into the shop class and gripping a live wire. Sure, she hears about him―who doesn’t?―but they do not interact. They do not talk, they do not meet. Though they’re both students at Midtown, their trajectories do not cross.

What she last heard was that he went cold turkey. That’s just a highly unlikely story for the guy who gets suspended weekly for walking down the hall with a cigarette dangling from his lips and sells dime bags at parties, making him simultaneously the most popular and most shadowy person in the room. The sanctity of her grades, among other reasons, is why she’s never approached him.

Because there’s no number of A’s that’ll make her stop finding him sexy, MJ slams the door of her locker.

It’s surprising to her when he jumps. But he doesn’t walk away.

“So,” he says, “like I’m saying, the project… Hey, asshole!”

MJ’s so wound up that she’s not sure how she manages to sigh when Peter’s attention is completely diverted by one of his buddies striding past, stopping so the two of them can perform some stupid handshake. They start talking about an upcoming house party and she decides she’s not a big enough idiot to keep standing there waiting for Peter Parker to remember she exists. She’s pretty sure he just found out when they were assigned this joint Chemistry project. Were this a different kind of joint project, she bets he’d show a little more interest. She’ll reward the teeny-tiny bit of initiative he demonstrated by coming up to her at all by doing the whole project herself. He’s astoundingly intelligent, she knows that, but he’s not the most reliable groupmate and she’d rather do double the work than receive half the grade. It’s senior year and she can’t afford that.

“No, wait, wait, wait,” he begs, briefly grabbing her upper arm when she turns to walk away. Apparently, his friend takes this as his dismissal and it’s Peter and MJ, alone again by her locker.

“I’ll do it,” she says. “Don’t worry about it.”

“What?”

“The project.”

“Shit! Would you? That’d be great!” He beams, then laughs at her expression. So it was a joke. Wow, nice one. “No, seriously, I really want to work with you.”

“No, seriously, I’ve got this,” MJ pushes back, feeling warmer the longer they talk, not only because he made a joke at her expense. His eye contact isn’t great, but when their gazes connect, it scrambles her brain.

“Well, it was assigned to both of us.”

“And both of us know who’s going to do it and who’s going to flake out.”

She stares at him in astonishment. She didn’t mean to say that out loud, it’s just that she’s never been fought on project responsibility before. Doesn’t Peter know her as the Girl Who Gets Good Grades? AKA the least thrilling Stieg Larsson novel of all time. Even if he doesn’t really register her presence as a classmate or a girl or a human being, she thought he would at least be familiar with the role she fills in their academic dystopia. If Midtown were an arrivals gate at the airport, she’d head for the welcome sign reading ‘Smart Girl’.

Peter laughs and it nearly sucks her in because it’s not designed to mess with her this time, but she walks swiftly away from him instead. No more touching. It feels too… unexpected.

“Good talk, Jones!” he calls jubilantly after her.

Nobody’s ever addressed her solely by her last name before. It sends a flutter through her as she slips outside.

―

“Ok,” Peter says the next day, spinning a chair around backwards and dropping into it. “What are we doing?”

MJ knows what she’s doing―reading Midnight’s Children in the library over lunch hour. His arrival is so visually demanding that she’s almost startled by her own proof of a sandwich in one hand and the novel in the other; beyond the disruption of sitting with her, he folds his arms on the chairback and she stares. He’s pushed up the sleeves of that trademark hoodie to expose his forearms, but what’s holding her gaze a moment too long are his hands. The rather beautiful fingers. The scarred knuckles that are his souvenir for beating the shit out of Brad Davis in the student parking lot last spring. She didn’t see the fight and doesn’t know which of the rumours about what started it is the truth. When it comes to Peter, she tries to put any information out of her mind.

“About what? The project?”

“Yeah,” he replies, ostensibly in complete earnestness. “Where are we at?”

“Like, how much have I done?”

“No, I mean who’s doing what?”

“If you really want to help, I’ll send you jot notes when I’m done and you can do the PowerPoint,” she offers sceptically.

“Can do. But what about the rest of it? Let’s start working on it.”

Finally, MJ slips the piece of paper that’s her current bookmark between Rushdie’s pages, setting down her leisure reading and her ham-on-sourdough.

“What is this?”

“This is the library,” Peter tells her with slow sarcasm. “Sorry, I thought you’d been in here before.”

“What are you doing?”

“Trying to pull my weight, if you’ll ever fucking let me.”

His tone’s not annoyed, it’s almost teasing. All she wants to do is press her hands to her temples and think through how she might have fallen into an alternate reality housing a studious Peter Parker.

“Why?”

“All these questions! Because that’s what you do with projects, right? Teacher assigns them, you do them, grades and shit…?” He’s motioning with one hand to emphasize the oncoming flow of stages that seem to continue past ‘grades and shit.’

“I just didn’t think…”

“Oh, I know you haven’t been thinking about me.” Disconcertingly, he throws her a wink. “You were expecting a deadbeat partner.”

His words, not hers.

“Fine,” MJ agrees, to get past that wink. “Let’s go over to the computers and start researching.”

“Hell yeah.”

She doesn’t glare at him for his oddness, but once he’s seated next to her at the computer bay, she wishes she had. Maybe he would’ve sat farther away. He’s shorter than she is, and yet he kicks his legs out beneath the table and somewhere under there they grow long enough that hers are in constant danger of brushing them or twining with them or―the thought that horrifies her most―having their shoes knock. Shoe-to-shoe contact strikes her as something exceedingly flirtatious, like sending sexts through Morse code. She tucks her feet under her chair and crosses her ankles while they work. Which they do, in unanticipated companionableness. MJ ignores every one of her urges that tell her to slip her fingers through his where he cups the mouse, to lean in and grab his shoulder for balance as she looks at the website he found, to drag her chair close enough to wrap her arms around his waist, holding tight to the sweater that, logically, she never wants to touch because it stinks.

When lunch hour ends, she finds herself flustered and relieved.

“It was cool hanging out,” are Peter’s words of farewell.

Hanging out? Did they hang out? MJ’s almost too disoriented to find her locker and stow the remains of her lunch before her next class.

―

He keeps turning up. To their Chem class? Almost never. But her locker transforms into some kind of Peter Parker homing device without her knowledge and now he’s always swinging by. One time, her eyes dart back and forth from his face to the cigarette tucked (jauntily, brazenly, and―it must be said―idiotically) behind his ear. A teacher spies it too and Peter gets detention just standing there. His broad grin at Mr. Dell and the, “Aw, man, really?” he jokingly demands put MJ’s heart in a hammock, swaying wildly and beating in question as to why only this boy has a smile like that.

She seeks solace in Cindy. Initially, MJ divulges very little and her friend assumes that her current daftness is the result of struggles to find citable sources for her Chemistry project.

“Who’s your partner again?” Cindy asks over lunch.

“Peter Parker,” MJ says quietly. She tries to let her hair hang forward to shield her blush, but she’s far too slow.

“Oh, MJ.”

“Don’t.”

“MJ. You like Peter Parker? But he’s―”

“I know.”

“Damn,” Cindy says, which is more than enough to communicate how MJ happens to feel and also far too little to provide any clue about what to do. This is not the suffering she usually expects with group projects.

“He’s a smoker,” her friend points out, trying to be helpful by stating the most obviously off-putting thing about the guy.

“I heard he’s trying to quit.”

“I heard that too. Apparently, he has nicotine patches in his locker. And mints.”

MJ just buries her face in her arms and groans.

“I’m so screwed,” she says, voice muffled. “He won’t leave me alone.”

“Maybe he likes you.”

MJ laughs sharply into her sleeve.

“Maybe he likes you,” Cindy repeats gently.

“I can’t.”

“I know, babe.” Her friend squeezes her shoulder. “But you could.”

She lifts her head.

“I couldn’t.”

“You could,” Cindy refutes, gaining momentum. “You could do the project and then, you know, do Peter.”

“Shhh!”

They’re eating in the cafeteria and have the table to themselves, but still.

“Just a hook-up,” her friend says, as though she has any more experience with casual hook-ups than MJ does. They’re both firmly at zero.

“That would be insane. No. I’m not just going to hook up with my Chem partner. Would you hook up with your Chem partner?”

Infuriatingly, Cindy seems to truly consider this question. MJ wishes she’d focus more on the rest of the conversation.

“No. I got paired up with Betty. I find her too adorable to be hot.”

“It was a rhetorical question.”

“Well, if Betty ever asks you about me, you know what to say to let her down easy.”

MJ rolls her eyes.

“What if Peter keeps talking to me after we hand in our report and do our presentation?”

“Depends if you’re planning to nail him before or after.”

“I’m not planning to nail him at all.”

“You should at least plan a little. Use a condom.”

“Cindy, for real.”

“For real,” her friend insists, twisting to give her a hard stare. “You already got your college acceptance letters and you’re not going to let your grades drop just because you sleep with this one guy! You can do this!”

“He deals drugs,” MJ reminds her in a hushed voice.

“Not hard drugs. And you’re on academic decathlon. Lots of people have extracurriculars!”

“I can’t believe you. If this were the other way around, you would be freaking out over the very idea of being with someone like him.”

“I enjoy pushing you into things while I remain safely on the sidelines,” Cindy agrees, smiling brightly.

“This is terrible, but, if anybody found out… my parents, any of the teachers… his reputation would reflect badly on me.”

“You’re right,” her friend says. MJ drops her face back into her arms. “You’re gonna do it, aren’t you?”

MJ groans.

―

On the day of their presentation, Peter’s late, but he’s there. MJ perks up in her seat, which makes her frustrated with herself. He doesn’t even get detention for his lack of punctuality. She guesses this is because he so rarely decides to come to class at all that the staff don’t want to discourage him any further.

They aren’t up right away and their lab benches are a few apart (everyone organized alphabetically by last name), but he turns around to glance at her more than once. No backpack, but he has a binder with him, from which many loose pages poke. As long as a couple of those are their report, she’s thrilled. Although, she did also do the entire thing herself just in case. She almost feels bad for not trusting him. Then again, he was late and watching the clock stressed her out.

When they go up to present, he slaps his papers on the front desk and flips a red USB out of his sleeve like he’s flicking open a switchblade.

“PowerPoint,” he explains to the unnerved expression MJ can feel on her face. “You didn’t think I forgot, did you? If I can just…”

And he slips behind her to plug it into the port, sweatshirt brushing her back. Despite the self-assurance she has in the quality of her work, speaking in front of the class always makes her feel slightly ill, so she’s backed up nearly to the defunct blackboard when Peter makes his move around her. He could be going behind her to try to be subtle about the setup. Yeah, that’s probably why he didn’t cross in front where there’s so much more space. He smells intensely of the outdoors, like grass―grass grass―and she inhales it the whole presentation long. What was he doing before this? Playing tackle football where the field’s just been mowed? MJ delivers her portion of the information somewhat robotically, but Peter surprises her by darting around, making bonds out of chalk to illustrate the finer points of this organic chemistry assignment. His lines are brisk and sure and she stares along with the rest of the class. Yes, she does.

“That was a novelty,” he says, suddenly at her side so they’re walking through the door together when class is over.

“Which part?”

She glances back to see Cindy making an ‘ok’ sign at her, looking from Peter to MJ. MJ waves her off, trying not to get ungainly as Peter stays with her. Seems as though he’s intending to walk her all the way to her locker. She has no idea where his is, or what he keeps in it. What she can most easily picture is Bender’s locker from The Breakfast Club.

“Oh, the whole thing. Having the entire class looking at us, getting time to talk, standing up there with you.” He elbows her arm gently while he grins and MJ gives the most pitiful laugh. He’s impossible.

“You were weirdly impressive.”

Peter jogs ahead, then turns to walk backwards, watching her face as he continues to grin.

“Aw, I’m flattered. You think we did ok?”

MJ’s ready to say that of course they did when a little freshman darts down the hall. Instinctively, she reaches out and grips Peter’s wrist. Her hand slides as he halts. Their palms meet. His fingers flex around hers for a second before she shakes him off.

“Yeah,” she says. “Yeah, I think we did fine.”

He nods, now walking along at her side.

“Good.”

They get to her locker and Peter still doesn’t leave. She attempts to ignore him as she trades her Chem books for Geography, but he makes it difficult, pushing her locker door open all the way and producing a stick of chalk that she realizes he must’ve tucked into his pocket after writing on the board.

“What are you doing?” she asks when he blocks her view of the door with his arm.

“Shhh.”

He steps away after a few seconds and she sees that he’s vandalized her little magnetic chalkboard with ‘PP wuz here.’

“I need to get new initials,” he says thoughtfully.

MJ scoffs.

“What you need is a better understanding of personal property.”

“Don’t worry, Jones. Chalk wipes right off,” he informs her, like she’s unfamiliar with the substance.

She shakes her head in annoyance.

“But this you better be careful about,” Peter says, lowering his voice abruptly (goosebumps for MJ) as he deposits the chalk in the door tray that holds her Chapstick and a broken magnet. “I stole it, so it’s contraband. If anyone asks, you say you’re holding it for a friend.”

He gives her an irresistible conspiratorial smile and leaves her at her locker.

MJ doesn’t touch the chalk. She doesn’t touch what he wrote either.

“Hell,” she mutters.

―

“Your parents think you’re at my place and my parents will not be worrying about where I am until four in the morning. The greatest benefit of having an older sister,” Cindy lectures, “is that she broke our parents in on abandoning the midnight curfew.”

Still, MJ’s nervous. They’re heading to a party at Flash Thompson’s after the semi-formal dance. The lights on the bus are bright and MJ’s feet are tired from her two-inch heels, but she won’t be taking her shoes off on public transit. Uh uh.

“You just better stay with me,” she warns her friend.

“We’ll be inseparable until you shoo me away so you and Peter can be alooone.”

“Shut up. He wasn’t at the dance.”

“All that means is he’s more of a jeans-and-sweatshirt kinda guy. I bet he’ll be there. You wanna bet?”

“No, I wanna wimp out and go home,” MJ admits.

“I’m not letting you!” Cindy says cheerily, rocking into MJ’s side. “It’ll be good for you to see him outside of school. Maybe he becomes totally unappealing and you squash this crush like a bug.”

“Maybe.”

Cindy is a steadfast companion as they do a loop of the main floor at the Thompson residence. MJ gingerly carries a Solo cup Flash handed her, but she doesn’t drink. She has no idea what’s in it. She’s wary of both Flash’s taste and the sad mustache he’s trying to grow before graduation. Although she’s been to a few house parties over her high school years, arriving in a ‘60s-style burnt-orange minidress and heels makes her feel strange, obnoxious, and watched, even though everyone else is also wearing their nice clothes from the dance. Minus Flash, who has changed into party attire that strikes a balance between retro aerobics-wear and spring break in Florida.

It’s an hour before she concedes to herself that Peter isn’t here. She leaves Cindy by Betty and goes to the bathroom. Peeing, she checks her texts, which is dumb because there’s no way she’ll see what she wants to see; he doesn’t have her number. Working up her courage as she washes and dries her hands, MJ wanders through the big family room at the rear of the house. There’s a sudden burst of laughter as the back door opens―some people are out drinking and smoking on the patio, and then Peter’s stepping inside right in front of her.

“Oh,” she says.

“Michelle. Hey.”

His eyes are red-rimmed and it’s not from crying. She catches the movement of him slipping a lighter back into the pocket of his jeans. There’s something wrong with her that she finds him hot even in this state, isn’t there? It’s his looseness. The extra crinkle around his eyes as he squints tight to smile at her. He could be a cornered grizzly bear. That’s how much she feels the visceral impulse to not be around him. He will snarl and swipe and she will suffer. Rather than returning to Cindy, MJ shifts her weight, wanting to remove her shoes so she can step down and closer to Peter.

“Hi.”

“Hi,” she repeats, rigid with the fear of her own potential actions. It makes him laugh.

“You wanna go downstairs? I heard there’s pizza.”

“Yes.” It comes out strong.

It shouldn’t be this easy to go with him, to let him lead because he knows where the door to the basement is and she doesn’t. There should be checkpoints that ask if she’s sure she wants to proceed. Peter bounds down ahead of her and, at the bottom, turns to look at her. His expression is confused, then, quickly, so awed that it makes her blush and wonder if Sofía Vergara or some other bombshell is coming down the stairs behind her. But MJ’s own soles are the only sound against the carpeted hush.

“You look so gorgeous. Damn.”

The words could be meant only for himself except that he waits until she’s down the stairs and next to him to say them.

“You always look great,” he goes on before she can sever the intimate thread of the moment with a flippant remark about the male gaze equating beauty with value. “Fuck, isn’t time funny? I swear I was watching you walk down here for, like, an hour.”

You’re stoned, she wants to remind him. Why bother? Being compelled to state the obvious would only make her seem equally impaired.

“You wanna hang out with me?” MJ asks instead. This setting―the TV left on and a pile of pizza boxes on the sleek glass table the deep sectional curves around―seems more suited to it than Midtown’s library.

“Yeah.” He smiles.

MJ texts Cindy to let her know where she’s gone, then Peter eats pizza and MJ takes her heels off with a groan of pleasure that makes him sit up alertly before slumping back with a laugh. Everything makes him laugh. Missing his mouth with the pizza, the dreary Jason Statham movie they don’t bother changing the channel from, and MJ. So many times, MJ. Her dry humour rocks his THC-coated world and some of her horror at the evils of recreational marijuana use vanishes because he’s just so sweet like this, he’s so friendly. Somehow, he starts asking questions about the sketchbook he noticed she carries at school and, magically, there’s a pen in her hand and she’s doodling from his wrist up his forearm, roughing out the beginnings of a sleeve tattoo from the kooky ideas that stream from his lips. He watches her silently when she asks him to quit jerking his arm around and then it gets really quiet, apart from the occasional explosion onscreen. There are windows high up in the walls, level with the ground outside, and night sounds pulse in. Noises that are frogs and bugs but that, from childhood, MJ has always associated with the distant jingle of stars.

“I have to go now, Peter,” she murmurs when the movie’s over and he has his head resting back against the couch with his eyes closed. She collects her shoes and makes to climb over his legs, always sprawled straight out, but he catches her hand in his slack, warm grip.

MJ stares at his hand around hers and Peter opens his eyes and he stares at their hands too. An imagined scene of a haybale being pitched into a barn’s loft comes to mind at the feeling inside her chest, the sudden upward heave of her heart. She leans back and he sits forward, willingly releasing her when she half-turns away from him and grabs an empty beer bottle from the table. She lays it on its side and gives it a spin. While it’s still slowing, MJ stops it so it faces him. She can see Peter’s chest moving as he breathes, glancing from the bottle up to her eyes, probably trying to gauge her intentions. Thinking very little and feeling so much fear and want and freefall, she rests her knee on the couch between his splayed thighs and clutches the front of his hoodie in a fist that’s almost numb at the end of her arm. His eyes are locked on her mouth when she leans down to kiss him softly.

Peter’s tongue slipping into her mouth wakes her vagina up instantly.

“Uhmm,” she moans, parting her lips more and inexpertly attempting to copy what he’s doing because the pressure and the occasional sucking of her tongue are turning her on swiftly and utterly and she wants him this turned on.

His hands hardly touch her hips and she’s scrambling onto his lap, shoes cast to the floor. Peter adjusts her, lifting from below the highest part of her thigh and pulling her forward so she can’t fall backwards off the couch. She supposes. Her head’s hazy with the green-pepper taste of his mouth and the boy-smell of his skin. He seems hesitant about putting his hands any higher, since her already short skirt has hiked up around her hips with her legs straddling him, but then his palms land on her ass, over her underwear. They break the kiss, panting across each other’s tongues as MJ rocks her hips ahead and Peter’s steady, shaky hands press her against his hard groin. He makes a wild, desperate sound at her most tentative forward nudge.

She’s wet through her underwear, she knows it, but it feels so good to rub herself against the front of his jeans, knowing that she gave him that erection. His fingers caress the back of her neck, then dig up into her hairline as he Frenches her with the furious, winding nonsense of a rabid animal.

“Ah!” she gasps, clipping his tongue with her teeth as he tries to pull her in again and deeper. “Aah!”

He shifts both hands back down to her ass and steers her grinding, forcing her faster when the pitch of her voice climbs.

“God,” Peter groans into her throat when she stretches her neck, face naturally tipping upwards. “Fuck yes.”

He’s damp with sweat across the nape of his neck and down between the mounded muscle of his back where she tucks her hands. MJ drags against him until the entire inside of her body feels like it’s had tingling mouthwash poured into it and shaken around, sparkling, bliss like the scrape of a blade without puncture. She cries out, comes, then cries out again, hugging him close around the neck with her eyes clamped shut. Peter’s orgasm noise is a grunting huff and MJ draws back in time to watch his face. It looks as though his expression’s trying to melt right off his features, like she could thrust a spatula under his skin and lift his whole face off like a crêpe. She feels terrifically powerful.

After a minute of them shuddering against each other, she struggles back to her feet, feeling like someone’s grabbed her and spun her a million times. Dizzy with how fast it happened. That it did happen. Peter gives her a smirk full of the secret they now share because, yes, this will have to be a secret. She assumes he knows that.

Standing, he pulls the front of his baggy sweatshirt down to hide his crotch. MJ puts her shoes on and waits silently―brain buzzing―until he evidently understands that she wants him to go ahead of her. She has no interest in proceeding him up the stairs with the sodden underwear beneath her minidress. Her first priority after leaving this house and going back to Cindy’s is to get into her clean pajamas. When Peter turns and ducks in to kiss her after climbing to only the first stair, she’s startled but reciprocates, though the rush of getting off with him is being replaced by a different, more anxious rush as they prepare to rejoin the party. MJ nearly loses her footing at the realization of how easily they could’ve been caught. Jesus. This is exactly why Peter Parker is the guy for a hookup. A repetition is so inadvisable that he’ll never suggest it. She can’t be messing around in classmates’ basements, taking these risks. It’s not what a smart girl does.

“Wha’s happenin’ in the basement?” a guy’s slurred voice asks the second Peter opens the door.

“Pizza,” he says simply, and they escape.

MJ walks quickly away from the scene of the, well, not crime, but very private indiscretion, hunting for Cindy’s iridescent white dress in the family room, kitchen, and living room, where most people are still gathered. Disconcertingly, Peter hurries along at her side. She’s certain she feels the ghost of his hand on her waist when she stops suddenly to avoid the slosh of someone’s drink across her path. What is he doing? Doesn’t he see that they’re like spies, that they can’t be spotted together or they’ll be in danger of someone finding out? The story of her reckless kiss and the impulsive grinding it led to are in her every feature. They must be.

Aha, Cindy!

MJ taps her friend’s shoulder and leans in quickly.

“I’m ready to go,” she says.

Though she’s angled her back to shun Peter (for their own good), she watches her friend’s eyes move from her face to something behind her and knows he must be standing there.

“Ok, we’ll go right now,” Cindy agrees, reaching down and clasping her hand.

She tosses Abe and Betty a quick goodbye and they hustle to the door like the mice in Cinderella. Which reminds MJ to slip her shoes on. Just before they exit, she flings a glance back into the room and sees Peter laughing with his friend Ned, a cigarette already tucked behind his ear. Good.

―

MJ thinks Cindy’s asleep when her friend rolls over and asks what happened.

“He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

“No,” MJ assures her.

“You came out of nowhere and you had a weird look on your face.”

“Are you saying you don’t like my face?”

Cindy draws a limp arm out of the blankets and presses her hand to MJ’s cheek, lightly shoving her face away in joking response.

“But what went down?” she persists, then yawns. “You were with him, weren’t you? You don’t expect me to believe that he just came up behind you the second you came to get me.”

“No, I was with him.”

“And?”

She still feels it somehow, the unexpected, exhilarating kick of Peter kissing her and gathering her close and wanting her like that. Before he complimented her on the stairs, MJ hadn’t even known he was aware of her in that way, as anything more than a reliable project partner. If she reveals anything to Cindy, well, it’s like giving up something precious, no matter how much she trusts her friend. There won’t be a repeat of tonight. She’ll delicately wrap the memory in mental tissue paper, storing it neatly, preserving it well. She’ll be able to walk down the hall at Midtown, see Peter, and know she hit that. Non-penetratively. It counts. They are Pluto and Mercury. They do not talk, they do not meet. Their trajectories crossing was a once-in-an-infinity event that will not reoccur.

“We talked and… nothing happened.”

“Well, good,” Cindy decides. “I was thinking about you after you sent me that text and I thought―” She yawns again, triggering an echo from MJ. “―probably not the best idea. He’s just so unpredictable. You deserve more than that.”

“Yeah.”

“Man. Peter Parker.”

“Peter Parker.”

―

She doesn’t greet him warmly, or at all, when he returns to her locker. He doesn’t push and he doesn’t chase, though he definitely has the charisma for it if he ever felt like channeling that shit. Focused, his sweet charm could set a girl on fire like a kid roasts an anthill with a magnifying glass. Honestly, MJ’s surprised Peter doesn’t have a girlfriend, except that he probably prefers not being accountable to anyone but himself. She’s the same.

Even congratulating herself is stale by the day he approaches her again, there’s been such a gap between Flash’s basement and this Thursday afternoon. She’s waiting for her brother to pick her up and Peter lobs the cigarette he was smoking away. It streams thin smoke and rolls from the pavement into the grass.

“That’s littering,” MJ tells him.

For a moment, he just stares back.

“So, what’s up?”

“Waiting for my brother.”

A smile flashes and dies on his face.

“What’s going on?”

“Not much,” she says in the most casual tone, not looking at him at all. Her posture’s defensive. If someone walks out of the building and sees them, she wants them to find it impossible that they’re viewing Michelle Jones and Peter Parker talking. She wants them to believe their eyes are deceiving them.

His laugh is breathy but brutal.

“I did not think you were this girl.”

“What girl?” MJ darts an angry, sideways look at him. She won’t tolerate any ‘you’re not like other girls’ bullshit, even if he’s planning to turn it around and use it as an insult.

“Someone who messes around at parties and then acts like we don’t know each other.”

“I can’t honestly say that we do.”

“Ok, smartass,” Peter says sharply. She sees him dig in his pocket and extract a pack of cigarettes. He shakes his lighter out into his palm first, then plucks one free.

MJ looks firmly away from him before speaking.

“I heard you quit.”

“Habits, you know?”

“No.”

“No?” he presses. She hears the sound of him lighting up, like a piece of paper being ripped. Schik, schik, then the tear that goes right through. The soft blow of his first polluted exhalation. “Studying’s not a habit? Doing well in school’s not a habit? You could just quit?”

“Those things aren’t bad for you,” MJ informs him blandly, scanning the intersection a block down for her brother’s car.

“Something or somebody taught you to ditch the guy you fooled around with and that’s been bad for me, so I’d appreciate a little sympathy.”

She glances at him again, dropping her gaze to the motion of his thumb drumming his cigarette, tapping away the building ash. When he brings it back to his mouth for another drag, his cheeks pull in and further exaggerate the criminally-well-defined line of his jaw. MJ exhales with him.

“I didn’t ditch you, we ditched each other. Mutual ditching,” she explains. “I figured you’d want the same thing.”

“I don’t actually remember you ever asking me what I’d want.”

“Yeah, well, it’s done.”

“You think so?” he asks thoughtfully. He puts his hands in the back pockets of his jeans and traps his cigarette between his lips as he wanders over to the butt of the last one and stamps on it. She frowns in disbelief when he picks it up and takes it to the trash can.

MJ lifts her courage like she lifts her heavy backpack when she’s carting all of her textbooks home at once. Figuratively, she bends from the knees.

“You just want me to fuck you so that you can do the ditching after that. I’m not interested,” she says coolly.

“Uh, you kissed me. If anyone’s suppressing a desire to fuck, it’s you, Jones.”

“So you don’t want to fuck me?”

Who is she? She feels as large and obvious as Lincoln in his Memorial saying these words to Peter Parker, with his shifting eye contact and his nicotine hands.

"I’d like to fuck you,” he says, breathing out smoke and incredible nonchalance, “and I’m really into you and would definitely be down for you to stop acting like I ceased to exist the second I came in my pants for you. I don’t do that for just anybody.”

“Jesus, Parker, shut up,” she hisses, stunned. Violated. Aroused. No.

Peter abandons his easy posture and storms right up to her, turning his head at the last second to puff his mouthful of foul air over his shoulder. Minimal decency.

“Hey, if you’d told me that I was signing up for a one-off by going down to Thompson’s fucking basement with you, maybe I would’ve said no!”

“Really?” MJ blurts, too invested in the answer for it to be wise to ask.

“Probably!”

“If you’re so mad at me, then why don’t you just leave me alone?”

“Because I can’t! I can’t,” he says more quietly. He grips his hair with the same hand that holds his cigarette and she worries that he’ll burn himself, but whatever. “I happen to really like you, ok?”

She spots her brother’s car pulling into the school and immediately distances herself from Peter. They hold each other’s eyes as she gets in.

“Were you smoking?” Louis asks her while she buckles her seatbelt. “You better not let Mom smell that.” MJ rolls her eyes.

“No.”

“Good. Don’t start. That shit’s addictive.”

She looks out her window to see Peter still watching her as Louis puts the car in gear and they drive away.

―

If it would be weakness to message him on Facebook late that night and send him her number, then MJ is weak.

―

Their happy medium is smiling at each other in the halls, stopping by for a very short chat when they happen to be near each other’s locker, and making out fiercely behind the magazine shelf in Midtown’s library. MJ has this all under control. She’s admitted to herself that she’s still attracted to Peter―if there was any doubt that what happened in Flash’s basement had done anything but strengthen that attraction―and that, as long as they keep things fairly low-key, she’s curious. There’s more she’d like to do with him, but she doesn’t want the pressure or anxiety of anyone knowing what’s going on, not even Cindy. The judgement will kill what they have and what they have is chemistry in and out of the classroom. The surge MJ feels when Peter presses her back against the end of a bookshelf is incomparable.

He'd rather they were public, she knows. Fortunately, he doesn’t force her to break down point by point why it wouldn’t be a good idea. Doing that would teach her exactly how much she could hurt him and she doesn’t need that guilt. She likes Peter and she likes fooling around with him, but what she really likes is not getting caught. That, and knowing that she can stop this whenever she wants. The fact that he’s really into her means he’ll listen to what she wants from this non-relationship. MJ tries not to think of herself as manipulative, simply as someone who’s attempting to broaden their horizons in a closed-course physical agreement. She needs to believe in her own agency, especially since she saw how fast things can spiral when they kissed for the first time.

All they’ve done at school is kiss. Once, he accosted her at the end of the day on her way to decathlon practice and got his hands on her ass before they heard footsteps. They were separated, though MJ was sweating like a fiend, when Betty appeared. Peter’s presence surprised her and he had to lie about how he was considering rejoining the decathlon team to explain why he was nearby at that time of day. MJ’s glad it was a lie. Actually having him in one of her extracurriculars would be distracting and she needs to compartmentalize. Besides the Chem presentation, the little slice of her life she spends with Peter and the much larger slice that’s for school won’t overlap. Chem’s their only class together and they don’t share any friends, just acquaintances from decathlon.

Except Peter asks where she lives and it changes everything.

Technically, MJ’s aware that it’s not exactly an inspired idea to give her address to a small-time drug dealer. She doesn’t know what the precise consequences could be, but that’s the point! Control, good. Unknowns, bad. Still, she figures that Peter’s also just a seventeen-year-old like her. He’s smart, he’s cute, his hoodie stinks like smoke―except at parties, when it stinks like pot. His suspensions, aside from the Brad Davis incident, have been for dumb shit. He can’t be totally irresponsible, totally untrustworthy, or Midtown would expel him. Peter seemed to abandon his unofficial experiment on how far white male privilege would protect him after purpling Brad’s cheek and shredding the skin above his eyebrow. (She heard Brad got stitches, but the whole thing was covered by a gauze pad when he came back to school.)

But Peter makes her want things and it turns out, one of those things is wanting to know what he plans to do with her address. The afternoon she’s at home and hears clanging on the fire escape, she’s sure it’s him before she sticks her head out a window and sees him looking up at her from a story down.

“Oh, good,” he calls up. “I didn’t know which floor you were on!”

“What are you doing?! How did you reach the ladder?”

The ladder, which is tucked up eight feet from street level. The ladder, with its protective plate to prevent unauthorized users from touching the rungs for another three feet.

“Uh, jumped!”

“That’s all you have to say?”

“What else did you want? Knock knock?”

MJ rolls her eyes and retreats inside, where she drops the annoyed act and starts chipping at her flaking terracotta-coloured nail polish, heart racing as she secretly hopes she hasn’t scared him off. She paces, then strides to the living room, with its tall window that opens onto the fire escape Peter’s currently scaling. She turns her back for a second and, suddenly, his voice is much nearer.

“Hey,” he says, loudly through the glass. She spins around and he waves, smile lopsided and sweet.

A marble seems to fall down her throat and go swirling around her stomach because there’s a motion inside her that veers from ecstatic to terrified. Making up her mind, she crosses to the window and pries it up.

“What are you doing here?” MJ demands.

He looks confused by the question.

“This is where you live.”

“Nuh uh,” she says when he makes to swing his leg over and enter. “The sweatshirt is not coming inside. You’re not leaving the rank scent of that thing for my parents to smell when they get home.”

“Parents aren’t home? Huh,” Peter says, a high, sarcastic, and thoroughly dangerous noise with the way it makes her body react. Her brain starts trying to convince her it’s go time.

He behaves enough to remove his sweatshirt and knot the sleeves around the fire escape railing. Even takes his shoes off. If he behaved a little better, she wouldn’t see more than half of his bare back when he yanked the sweatshirt off and it dragged his grey t-shirt up with it. MJ has sat some major exams, held a chair during the most vomit-inducingly stressful decathlon tournaments, but seeing that much of Peter’s skin at one time is not something she feels equipped to contend with. Maybe she should tell him to put the sweatshirt back on. Maybe her parents don’t know what marijuana blended with cigarettes smells like. Maybe the scent will leave the soft surfaces of their rugs and couch before tomorrow, when Louis gets home from spending the night at his buddy’s place. Too late, Peter’s inside, and while that sweatshirt might be oversized, the t-shirt has to have been improperly laundered at some point in its life because it is tight. Is MJ breathing hard? No, it’s just the effort to shut the window.

“So, ’sup? What do you want?”

Sonofabitch laughs at her question. Not a guffaw, just a private little chuckle, as he holds her eyes.

“I had a question,” he finally says.

“About Chem homework?”

“About parameters.” She waits for him to continue. “Because, nobody knowing about you and me? I got that one.”

“That’s an important one,” MJ agrees, watching this boy like he’s something that bites.

“And that I probably shouldn’t try to do more than kiss you at school.”

She’s a little short of breath when she responds. Fucking window.

“Probably not.”

“But then, other locations. See, that’s where I get confused.”

“Do you?”

“I do, Jones,” Peter says solemnly, ducking his chin and looking up at her with eyes that promise, while he may be the sort that bites, he will most certainly not bite her. “I get confused.”

“Like Flash’s basement?” she checks, swallowing, gaze going from his mouth to his eyes.

“No. I know the rules for Flash’s basement. I’m a big fan of Flash’s basement.” He grins at her, a child’s smile. Innocent. “When I come here though, to your apartment, what happens? Do you have rules for this?” Peter takes a step towards her and they weren’t too many steps apart in the first place. “Tell me, Jones. What’s allowed?”

Her lips part for increased airflow. He’s done nothing―nothing but climb up the side of her building and request entry―but she doubts his thoughts are as inactive as his body’s unconcerned posture.

“My parents get off work in an hour. You shouldn’t be here.”

“Definitely not,” Peter agrees, still not moving. “I’m bad news.”

MJ edges towards him, eyes darting all over his face like crazy, and touches her mouth to his. She can feel him shudder. Then, Peter parts his lips wider and finds her tongue with his, everything staying slow, until they’re gripping the back of each other’s neck and clicking teeth in their haste. She feels gawky and foolish because the only kissing she’s really gotten used to is the easier pace they practice in the library so neither of them gets too worked up before having to go to class. His hands shift to cup the sides of her face and suddenly she doesn’t have to worry; he’s steering now. A moan quivers up her throat with his hold so tender and the motion of his tongue rough and confident. There’s an instinctual clench between her legs.

“Come with me,” she says, breaking away to lead him to the room right off the living room: her bedroom.

“My clothes stink, right?” he teases when he follows her in. “So I should probably make sure they don’t touch any―”

MJ kisses him quickly.

“Don’t be an idiot.”

She means it to be funny and persuasive, but there’s a moment where Peter’s expression freezes. His grin sours.

“No. Michelle Jones bringing an idiot to her room? We couldn’t have that.”

Her shoulders slump.

“I don’t think you’re stupid,” she assures him.

“Nobody does.” He smiles unconvincingly. “If I were, I’d be less disappointing. Nobody’s surprised by a stupid fuck-up.”

“You’re not disappointing. Or a fuck-up.”

Peter looks at her carefully for what feels like a long time.

“If I had you, I’d say I don’t deserve you.”

“You have me,” MJ counters. She kisses him hard, harder, until he wraps his arms around her and kisses her back. She’s proud of herself for saying, “I don’t deserve you,” before he peels his t-shirt off.

She doesn’t want him to think the sentiment’s just about his body, which it very well could’ve been because damn. He is cut. He is ripped. He is any other verb one could use to describe removing a coupon from a flyer. Peter must climb a lot of fire escapes to develop a body like that, reach for a lot of ladders to get those arms, and haul himself up and over a lot of railings to sculpt those abs. As long as he didn’t get the practice by visiting other girls―a quick knife of jealousy as he sits on her bed and she takes up the familiar position of straddling his thighs―she’s grateful.

His hands push her t-shirt up enough to grasp her hips as they kiss. When he doesn’t push for more, MJ takes a deep breath and sits back in his lap to remove her own shirt. Peter’s gaze is fast and eager and his palm is a revelation against the naked skin in the middle of her back. She’s only been touched like this in the pool, when Cindy would scramble onto her shoulders and they’d team up against Cindy’s cousins for a chicken fight, both teams inevitably toppling with a splash. This doesn’t feel like summer memories. Nor does the rigid bar in the front of Peter’s jeans that nudges between her legs when she shuffles forward.

To jump the hurdle of her inexperience, MJ decides to grope him where he obviously wants her. It’s also somehow less forbidding to rest her hand against the denim of his jeans than the warm skin of his chest or abdomen. Peter groans into her mouth when she rubs up and down the length of him, wrist twisted to position her hand right. Ok, good, she thinks. Good. Before thirty seconds are up, he’s letting go of her back to open his fly and lower his zipper.

“If you want to,” he breathes, eyes lowered like he’s either shy or staring at her chest.

MJ does want to, so she nods and grips him through his striped boxers. This is so much different. The warmth, the give at the head, and the feeling of him throbbing in response to her strokes prove that Peter truly does have a penis and it’s not just an object that she was fondling through his jeans. And, theoretically, he wants to put this penis inside her. What should be absolutely alien only makes her wetter. She kisses him to distract herself from the foreignness of holding this thing in her hand and recognizing how intimate it would be, connecting like that. Sliding her hand up, her palm runs across a damp patch in the cotton. He’s turned on, like she is.

She hesitates for a second all the same. At Flash’s, she made him orgasm. She knew it at the time and he reminded her later, in the parking lot. When it happened, he had his jeans done up, plus, she was in the middle of her own climax. In her bedroom―where her brother coming in to look for something he lost or wake her up early on weekends like an asshole has been the only young male presence since she was 12―it’s different. Undone jeans is different. All the attention on what she’s doing to him is different. So when Peter’s hands skim the waistband of her joggers, MJ’s relieved.

“Yes,” she says and closes her eyes, trying to remember to continue the handjob though her wrist is tired of this funky position, as his fingers slide under the elastic.

He has his fingertips on her abdomen, over the cotton of her underwear, then reversing, finding the edge of her underwear, and slipping beneath it. She takes in a deep breath as his hand moves lower.

And this. This is different from grinding at the party. Being stimulated by another person’s hand is strange and entirely unlike rubbing against his crotch, with the temperature of his skin less than that between the labia he’s fingering experimentally and the movements outside her control. Though MJ does buck reflexively when Peter curls a finger inside her a little ways.

“Hey,” he whispers, choking when she remembers again about her part in this and squeezes his cock, “tell me how it feels.”

Instantly, MJ clams up. She’s a bird who’s forgotten how its wings work mid-flight. Flailing, plummeting.

“Um. Fine.”

“Fine? Dammit. Sorry, I was just trying to get you out of your head and I fucked up. Here,” Peter says, pulling his hand out and grabbing her thighs, “lie down instead.”

They disentangle themselves and lie down. Then, with clear thought, he drapes his body half-over hers, hovering. Her pillow props her head up high enough that she can glance at the swell in the front of his boxers. Shifting around has dragged his jeans down a bit.

“Can I put my hand here?” he asks, almost touching her stomach.

“Mhmm.”

His palm lands, fingers tracing the strip of skin above her joggers.

“Close your eyes. I won’t make you talk.”

With that promise and his hand resting inside her pants but over her underwear for several minutes and the lazy kisses he places on her shoulder, it’s easier to accept the feelings that come. His fingers work slowly, skimming and dancing. Eyes shut, she remembers his fingers on a cigarette, a stick of chalk, propped over the back of a chair in the library. The realization that it’s those same fingers gently rolling her clit makes her gasp. Peter groans next to her head in response, exhalation blowing her hair against her ear, which tickles. She opens her eyes and takes a cautious peek at him. His gaze is hot when she meets it. He doesn’t release her as he moves his hand lower to probe at her entrance again, only this time she’s even wetter and he’s fucking staring at her, cheeks a feverish red. Rocking her hips to encourage him, she puts a palm on his chest and slides it down, touching every inch of skin from collarbones to navel before his boxers get in the way. The wet spot is cold, so she tries to grip a little lower when she takes him in hand again. He presses his forehead to her shoulder and moans.

It’s so quiet, such a normal afternoon with the light fading and homework postponed, but Peter Parker’s hips are hunched around hers like he wants to mount her and she can no longer feel any disparity between the heat of his fingers and the heat inside her exceptionally regular underwear. He adds pressure and she gasps, hips bucking off the mattress.

“Shh, shhh,” he murmurs. “God, you’re so gorgeous.”

“Heard that one before,” she says, then whimpers, sweating between her shoulder blades and behind her knees.

“Shoulda brought my thesaurus.”

“Peter! Peter!”

His fingers arc into her hard and fast and she jerks her hand desperately up and down his dick. He swears with his lips pressed to her neck.

“Now you’re repeating yourself,” he recovers enough to taunt.

MJ’s eyes slam shut as she concentrates on making his strokes work for her, but she doesn’t let him off easy. Or, rather, she does, darting her hand down to flex her fingers around his balls, then pumping him rapidly so he never has a chance to catch his breath. Peter makes a noise like he was lying on a couch and a large dog jumped on his stomach out of nowhere. It’s a good noise. MJ enjoys it almost as much as she enjoys the way he jams his thumb down on her clit when his climax hits and scrubs mercilessly until she cries out. With the temperatures matching up and the satisfying twitches and caresses of his fingers, her vagina seems to have accepted his hand as part of her body. It certainly constricts around his middle finger like it’s not allowed to go anywhere. Uh uh. That’s hers now.

“If my sheets smell like smoke after this,” she pants as they lie together on their backs, “your access to this location is revoked.”

“I’m tryin’ to quit.”

MJ wants to be supportive, but she’s not sure she believes him.

―

She falls in love somewhere between Peter sneaking into prom to dance with her in the dark hall outside the gym where no one can see and graduation. It takes a long time for love to seem like a problem because what it feels like is the best thing she’s ever experienced. The only thing she’s ever felt such thorough ownership of. On four separate occasions, she almost tells Cindy. MJ starts to feel sorry for her friend that she doesn’t know. It’s neater than feeling sorry for herself because 98% of her time is spent wanting to hold Peter’s hand and only 2% is actually holding it―never for long, always in private―or because she can’t hug him after she crosses the stage at the rented convention centre to get the rolled up sheet of blank paper that they pretend is a diploma until the school mails out the real ones. He’s not even in the building.

Thanks to his phenomenal performance on exams―because he’s gifted enough to figure out the material day-of, not because he comes to class or studies―Peter is graduating high school. Unfortunately, his suspension, in tandem with the couple dozen detentions he earned this year, denies him the privilege of the ceremony. They aren’t supposed to be on their phones while it’s happening, but MJ misses him and surreptitiously texts around the folds of her black grad gown. Apparently, what he’s decided to do with his day is get really fucking high and the couple texts he manages to send her in response don’t make much sense.

She calls him afterwards, while her parents are talking to her teachers, everyone so happy to gush over the valedictorian (she saw the title coming from a long way away and gave the speech she prepared so many months ago that, by now, it’s lost all emotion). Peter’s voice is sickeningly lazy and also something she wants in her ear right now as she cuddles up to him. What MJ believes is that they’re better together. Over the phone, he says he loves her. Stunned, she replies, “You sound really far away,” and tries not to cry when she looks up and Cindy catches her eye from across the room. She’s just so happy. Everyone is just so happy.

She’s disappointed but not surprised when Peter defers his acceptance to Columbia―where she’ll be attending―to work for a year. His grades mean a more than respectable bursary haul and still, he needs money. His aunt needs money. It’s an expensive city. MJ and Peter talk and settle on the idea that things can only be better for them now. The college won’t give a fuck about her dating life the way Midtown would have. They can have their relationship in the open, no longer ending every conversation slightly sad because coming together is wearing on them, way harder than walking away.

MJ calls Cindy, studying music, and sobs for half an hour after her first week of classes. School is going well, but she hates it. Her classes interest her, but she wants to skip them all. Peter―yes, Peter, yes, Peter Parker―didn’t help her move into her residence like he said he would and she had to buy groceries alone and carry them back to this place that is not her home alone and what is she even doing who even is she and Peter, Peter, Peter, why can’t he just be here when she needs him?

She bristles when Cindy expresses true sympathy for her heartbreak. Heartbreak? This isn’t heartbreak. Heartbreak is for something that’s over and MJ’s relationship with Peter isn’t over. She cries all over again, and more ragged, after she and Cindy fight and end their conversation with a terseness that is an unwelcome intruder on the friendliness, the sisterliness they’ve always had.

But then Peter texts her after 1am that he’s outside her building, MJ lets him in, and he holds her in his arms the way she remembers. Her scholarly prowess guaranteed her a dorm on a quiet floor with single rooms. It feels natural to use this gift for what it was intended. Not uninterrupted study, but losing her virginity. She loves him so much…

…and that certainty grows more confused with every thrust.

She tells him the look on her face when they’re done is because she’s feeling a lot. She is. Just not the things she’s probably supposed to be feeling. Her feelings are prickly things, restless things. They toddle and swoop and disturb her peace as she tucks herself into bed and into Peter’s body. Against her cheek, his heart is steady. Is this all her? Is she crazy? There’s a black hoodie on the floor that won’t let her rest.

―

Things are on a definite uptick by the end of September. The nights grow deep and cold and velvety and the two of them stay out late. The stroll the familiar paths between the buildings of her campus with his arm up around her shoulders, playing with the string of her sweater; he’s trying to quit smoking again and needs something to twiddle between his fingers. It’s dark where shadows slice away from the moon and security lights and MJ would like to melt down into water, spreading through these lanes, touching everything in this place that’s becoming hers. Peter bobs up and kisses her temple. The world is for them.

He gives her a piggyback in her Spider-Man costume on Halloween. Over winter break, he casually admits to being Spider-Man and, hey, suddenly she gets additional wears out of that costume, putting it on every single time he says he’s coming over after that, just to mess with him. They end the year at the movies, kissing over their shared bag of popcorn at midnight (Peter ducks his head inside his sweatshirt to look at his phone screen and check the time). In January, it rains a lot, in February, it snows, and by the time the precipitation’s tapering off, she’s survived year one at Columbia.

Peter starts his first year that fall under a cloud that tries to claim MJ as its creator. Because she planned to no longer live in the dorms and he didn’t care whether he did or not, feeling infinitely older than the other freshmen (despite a measly year of age difference), he asked her to share an apartment with him. The question threw her back like a shove to the shoulders. Share an apartment? Share responsibilities, split rent, see each other every day, complete second year while he did first, then third and fourth. What if she did grad school? Moving out and leaving him in the lurch to find a new place or a roommate to cohabitate in the space they’d made theirs for three years, pretending to be adults and scalding coffee to the bottom of the pot. And if they lived together for years and years, what then? A ring slid towards her between takeout boxes one day and then Peter forever.

When he asked, she fished; MJ cast the line of her thoughts ahead through a clear five years, five more years, hazier the farther she tried to look. Then, she reeled it all the way back. It ran smoothly through their cozy recent past, but soon snagged. Snagged, snagged, snagged as she tugged it insistently back to high school. How much or little have they changed since she was the cautious valedictorian-in-the-making, he the assumed burnout, skipping Spanish to take on local crime?

She turned him down and, because he’s softened since stepping out of the outline of a seventeen-year-old badass who eats Brad Davises for breakfast, Peter wears the rejection in plain sight. Every day that she sees him, on campus or on a date, there’s something in his expression or the pitiful hang of his head. Some days, even his hair looks sad, she’d swear. Most of her wants to repair this immediately, but MJ can’t quite give in. Letting him have his way would mean beginning an apartment hunt ASAP―because this idiot is still reckless enough to leave student housing partway into the year and fumble his way through trying to get some of that money back. She likes her current roommates (three girls from her program) and doesn’t want the stress of uprooting herself. Besides, he’s not really just asking to share an apartment. He’s asking for her time, her constant presence. Eventually, if things were to go as she’s forecasted, her life. It startles her that this brash, playful, independent guy needs her. More than she needs him.

For a firm two weeks, MJ steps away from their relationship of approximately two years. She feels naked. Walking down the sidewalk, she feels vulnerable and shivers in the sunlight. On the weekend, she takes a train out of town to visit Cindy. It’s been a year since their almost-fight and they’ve spoken plenty since, but MJ’s been scared to relax into their friendship, fearing it would not bear her weight. Everything in Cindy’s city is new, MJ’s never been here before, with no trace of Peter anywhere but on the clothes she packed in her bag. Everything of her is still so much him.

“So, did you break up?” Cindy asks over lunch. They’re at a place that serves sandwiches so tall that they can barely fit them into their mouths for a bite.

“I didn’t want… I don’t think… we don’t need to talk about that.”

“MJ,” her friend says softly and love floods in through MJ’s porous exterior where sun and sound have only battered her since the last time she spoke to Peter. Tears roll down her cheeks.

“I don’t even know,” she wails, glancing around in embarrassment at this public place. Cindy pats her hands and dashes from the table to pay and bring MJ back to her apartment.

Her eyes itch and her nose runs and her body’s heaving with sobs like a violent coughing fit, so Cindy redirects them to a spit of a park. A bench.

“M, what happened?”

“Nothing! Nothing―” Gasp. “―even happened! But he loves me so much and I, I can’t stand him! And I love him!”

“Ok,” her friend says soothingly, rubbing briskly at MJ’s arm. “What do you want to do?”

“Can I stay here with you forever?”

“Of course you can, babe, but I don’t think you’re going to be happy until you resolve this.”

“I’m never going to be happy,” MJ corrects, and cries harder as Cindy pulls her head down to let her bawl into her sweater.

“You will. You always know when things aren’t right.” MJ shakes her head slowly against her friend’s shoulder, sowing her tears more widely. “Yes, you do,” Cindy counters. “You do.”

―

Breakup sex is what MJ talks Peter into. She never calls it that, but he knows. He meets up with her outside his dorm, breathing hard like he ran to make it on time. It’s their final good day together―day, not night, because she doesn’t want him to expect her to wake up in the morning feeling different, like they should stay together. She doesn’t want to stab him in the heart with the probable reality that she would slip out while he slept.

They stop and start, her to shake off her trembling and him to turn his head away for more than a minute. She really doesn’t want to think that he’s trying not to cry.

His clothes remind her of their first hookup at Flash’s party: different sweatshirt, same smell. Peter never gave up weed, just smoked less, but its earthy funk rises alongside the even more offensive stench of cigarettes when she gently pulls the hoodie over his head. She doesn’t comment. His choices belong to him. She’s never going to have to worry about her husband dying from smoking-induced lung cancer because that man won’t be Peter. That’s the thought that has her crumpling to her knees before she can perceive the world tilting out from underneath her, but he catches her and hoists her into his arms.

“Steady,” he tells her.

MJ cups his cheek, staring back into his bloodshot brown eyes. She watches his jaw clench and relax. Then, MJ smooths her hand over his ear, around to the back of his head, and pulls him into a kiss. It feels like they’ve been practicing this a long time and have finally arrived at the day of their performance. The nudge of his mouth is strong without being rough and as he sets her on the bed, her palm finds his heart hammering beneath his t-shirt. When Peter joins her, she rolls on top of him. There are no accidents of him manhandling her or her accidently pushing a knee into his nuts as she shifts. Everything is intentional, including the desire not to separate, MJ laid out the full length of Peter’s body. They flop back and forth as they remove each other’s clothes. It’s not a rush so much as the gentle tumble of laundry as a dryer winds down its cycle. They are. They’re winding down.

He scoots his hips lower and his cock prods her as she parts her legs, lifting because they’re on their sides. Peter sinks in by gripping the back of her thigh and pulling her towards him rather than thrusting up. They’re forgoing a condom because MJ’s still on the pill. She doesn’t know yet whether she’ll renew her prescription when she runs out. It’s tempting to stop and flush the chemistry from her body. Seeking something deeper, she hikes her knee up his thigh and Peter grabs it, hauling it to his hip. Soon, she’s sweating with her hand still on his chest, though there’s hardly room between them. Peter huffs as he plunges himself inside her with the opening salvo that is the reliable flick of his hips. MJ’s hand clutches his pec with his first serious thrust.

At the noise she makes, Peter tips her onto her back, but stays almost suffocatingly close on top of her, skin skimming skin. His forearms are braced on either side of her head. Careful, loving fingers brush against her temples, briefly making his arms a triangle with the top of her head as its peak. MJ looks up while he’s looking down, chin tucked so far that he must be watching himself move in and out of her. His hair is nearly in her eyes. She realizes they haven’t kissed since he entered her and panics, grabbing his chin.

Peter’s startled expression scares her, but then he slams his mouth down onto hers and ratchets up the speed and force of his thrusts. She makes such a variety of sounds, all running into each other, that it takes a little while for them to streamline down to one constant, “Mmmmm,” as he bucks, shaking her body. Her legs fall open instead of wrapping up around him because the way his proximity is rubbing her clit has her twitching from toe to hip. His hands clasp hers and pin them down on either side of her head; she doesn’t think twice―like she probably should―before twisting their fingers together.

She comes like a hiccup when his pubic bone pushes down against her clit, then slides away on a withdrawal, then returns because she detangles their fingers to clasp her hands to his hips, then his ass, and yank him back to her. Her head tips back, pulling her hair where it’s trapped against the sheet, and she breathes out his name in a gust: “Peter.” Though she knows he’s close, can feel him there at the end of his rope and see the struggle in how harshly he squeezes his eyes closed, he only goes faster.

“Come on,” MJ bids, sweaty and trapped by his weight, still clutching his ass with both hands.

“No,” he pants.

“Let go.”

“Can’t.”

Peter forcefully pulls her hand into his and locks their fingers securely together. And she stares up at him, baby-faced and overextended. He zigzags between school and Spider-Man duties and looking out for his aunt, trying to kick his bad habits while the stress of everything has him craving relief that much more. He’s spiraling. Whether it’s down, up, or just kinda in place like a carousal only depends on the day. He lives his life in a circle and when MJ observes him, she feels an ache compressing her heart. She wants to be there for him, not leave him, and she has to remind herself that she has been. While he flitted all over the place―high or just high up, navigating the city rooftop-to-rooftop―she walked below him with an outstretched net. One eye was always on him. She’s been reliable, present, giving, and she can’t keep being those things alone. This will never be because she didn’t care. The truth is simple and the most awful realization she’s ever had: he was right when he said he doesn’t deserve her.

All her life, MJ’s felt like she’s done a good job of recognizing her own worth. Now she has to prove it. It feels like she’s walking up to a checkout and realizing she doesn’t have enough money on her; she never dreamed it would cost so much to put herself first.

“Peter.” She’s frustrated now, and hurt. She clenches around him to encourage him over the edge.

“Unnhhh!”

She’s trying to think of something else to say, filtering out all the ideas that are too blunt or cruel (she doesn’t want to say anything too sweet either), but Peter orgasms seconds after he made that noise of pleasure as he fought against it. When he climaxes, tightening his grip on her hand, he moans, “Love you, MJ,” which is the worst thing of all.

―

She can’t know. She puts distance between herself and anyone who might tell her how Peter’s doing. She almost changes schools until basically every person in her life lectures her not to. She’s scared enough to accept her own cowardice. She lives in the background as she hasn’t done for a while, though she steps forward slowly over time―months and years. She puts herself first. She’s valedictorian at the end of her four-year degree and considers lying about bronchitis every day up until convocation, when she gives a haphazard, heartfelt speech that makes her brother cheer riotously from the audience. Valedictorian. First again.

Then the years just pass like they do. MJ’s chronically underpaid before finding a company that values her, though the job isn’t what she really wants to be doing. After hours, she paints. Just for herself. She moves in with Louis and that’s not as bad an idea as it seems until the year they host a Halloween party and her brother (now 33) bumps into Cindy (now 28) for the first time since she was one of his sister’s dorky decathlon friends. Cindy shows up dressed as a vampire, fake fangs and all, and MJ is highly suspicious when she notices the fangs are missing after Cindy went to ‘help Louis add ice’ to the bathtub serving as their cooler for the night. Whatever. They’re married seven months later.

Life is so funny. That’s what MJ can’t communicate to her small circle of friends at their corner booth of the bar as they do their damnedest to get her shitfaced on her thirtieth birthday. She evades and redistributes drinks amongst them, but she can tell they think she’s drunk. She doesn’t normally talk this much or open up so willingly. But she’s thoughtful tonight, with one less decade left to live. She smiles to herself, looking down into the glass she keeps wiping condensation off. She knows how they look―peepers wide and dollish because alcohol makes three out of five of them into glassy-eyed babies with false lashes askew. “I used to know this guy…” MJ tells them and Cindy’s hand bumbles across the table to clasp reassuringly around her wrist.

She continues to smile. She doesn’t know why tonight’s the night he’s on her mind. The rings that sparkle on her friends’ fingers, maybe. Age. Or the way the love of the people around her calls back to another love, the only partner she’s bestowed that word on, though she’s dated since. Love, she tells her friends, unlike life, is not so funny. It’s earnest and needy. It’s the hand that holds yours and it’s the hand that comes up to slap yours away. Her friends decide she’s sad and begin talking over and across her before she can finish. Younger her would set them straight, but she’s neither a cynic nor a pedant on her birthday evening, so she lets them cart her out of the bar instead. They’re like a flurry of babysitters or lady’s maids and it’s totally ridiculous as she’s the most sober among them.

While they’re putting their foggy heads together to figure out the rideshare app on Cindy’s phone, MJ catches a red flare out of the corner of her eye. A cigarette, a smoker. Normally, she gives those a hard stare to encourage them to rethink their choices, but now, she snaps her mostly-clear head away. Unlikely, her brain tells her. Unlikely. She swallows and watches her friends, giggling and all trying to get a finger on the screen to wrest control away from the others. To be MJ’s hero and secure her ride home. With a shallow breath, she turns from them.

He’s already looking at her in a way that says he wasn’t completely sure until she turned.

Peter pushes away from the wall and the cigarette trapped between fingers that aren’t his. The other man looks mildly curious, then gets over it and averts his gaze, continuing to sprinkle ash on the sidewalk. Not that she’s perceiving him anymore.

“Happy birthday,” Peter says, eyes speaking so loud.

MJ self-consciously touches the distinguishing button the girls pinned to her dress before they came downtown, but he shakes his head.

“No,” he tells her. “I remember when it is.”

“Oh.”

“Mine’s―”

“August tenth.”

“Yeah.”

One of her friends tries to call her over and MJ jumps, glancing back at them. She sees Cindy watching her cautiously. Sees Cindy touch their friend’s arm and redirect her attention. MJ looks back to Peter. She looks at his hands and can’t see the scarring in this light. Can’t see a wedding band either, but with his superhuman side-hustle, it’s possible he just wouldn’t wear one for fear of losing it.

“Night off?” she asks. These should be prime swinging hours for Spider-Man.

“Nah, I was out there until half an hour ago.”

MJ peers at him more closely. He looks a little tired, but not wiped like he used to look when he’d show up late years earlier. She wonders if he’s learned to take better care of himself, if he’s had any major injuries.

“Do you work set hours now or did you have to stop for a hospital visit?” She’s joking without any lift to her words and spies Peter’s quick smile.

“No broken bones tonight,” he brags. “I got hungry. I grabbed some food right before this.”

She meets his eye and watches as he summons something from himself.

“You wanna go inside and get a birthday drink?” he offers, jerking a thumb towards the bar MJ and her friends just left.

Her smile is gradual and regretful without permitting room for him to persuade her.

“I can’t,” she says. “I have to get home.”

MJ puts out her hand to him and when Peter grips it, she steps slowly into him, bowing her neck to rest her chin over the shoulder of his jean jacket, which doesn’t smell like anything in particular. His free hand presses high on her back. It’s tentative, but when she doesn’t pull away, he cradles her, arm encircling her more protectively.

“It’s good to see you,” he murmurs.

Before she backs off, she tells him that she still walks the paths at Columbia some nights, in the glow of Butler Library.

“That’s funny,” Peter says, letting his arm slide down so MJ can draw back and look him in the eye. “Not funny funny, but, you know. So do I.”

more clichéd tropes and prompts

#let's see how this one goes over lol #to quote Juno MacGuff: 'it would be friggin' sweet if no one hit me'#tw: smoking #tw: implied/referenced drug use #spideychelle #spideychelle fic #spideychelle fanfiction #peter parker #peter x mj #peter x michelle #peter parker x michelle jones #michelle jones #my writing

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bubonickitten · 4 years ago

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Summary: Jon goes back to before the world ended and tries to forge a different path.

Previous chapter: AO3 // tumblr

Chapter 17 full text & content warnings below the cut.

CWs for Chapter 17: panic/anxiety symptoms; brief mention of past self-harm (from last chapter); mention of past (canonical) blood/injury; brief allusion to past passive suicidal ideation; brief claustrophobia/Buried themes (in the context of a nightmare); some blink-and-you'll-miss-it internalized ableism re: ADHD (not explicitly stated as such); Jon-typical self-loathing, internalized victim blaming/dehumanization, etc.; discussion of low self-worth, fear of abandonment/rejection, and other Lonely themes; extensive discussion of Jon's statement consumption (so, general warning for restrictive behaviors re: 'eating' and self-hate re: addiction/compulsions); swears. SPOILERS through Season 5.

Chapter 17: Intervention

Even asleep, Jon is a flurry of movement. The muscles in his jaw tense repeatedly as he grinds his teeth; his limbs twitch and jerk and tremble; his fingers curl into his palms, fists clenching and relaxing at random intervals. The quick, erratic motions beneath his closed eyelids are accompanied by gasps and the occasional whimper. Impossibly, he looks even frailer than usual – folded in on himself and shivering despite the thick, oversized jumper engulfing his slight frame.

Martin sits on the floor with his side pressed up against the cot, his arm resting on top of it and his eyes riveted on the few inches of space between Jon and himself. Part of him wants to reach out, to soothe away the varying shades of distress flitting their way across Jon’s face; another part of him, quieter but nonetheless insistent on making its existence known, tugs him in the opposite direction, urging him to widen that handspan of distance between them into a chasm. Something about Jon’s ragged breathing keeps Martin rooted in place, his heart skipping a beat any time the pauses between breaths stretch just a little too long for comfort.

At least he’s breathing at all, Martin thinks with a pang. His hand twitches in an unconscious desire to check for a pulse – some secondary sign to reassure him that Jon really is just sleeping.

At the gentle knock-knock on the doorframe, Martin jumps. The door to Document Storage, already cracked an inch or so, creaks as it swings wider.

“Jon?” Georgie calls softly, peeking through the gap. “You in here? I was just – oh,” she says when she sees Martin. An instant later she notices Jon, tossing and turning on the cot behind him. “What happened? Is he okay?”

“He… well, he’s fine now. I think. Just… sleeping.”

“Wait,” she says, fully entering the room and approaching to watch Jon with genuine astonishment, “you actually got him to sleep?”

“Not really? He was having trouble staying vertical, so I told him he should lie down until the vertigo passed, and…” Martin shrugs. He’s still taken aback by the fact that Jon complied without argument. “I don’t think he was planning on falling asleep, but he was out as soon as his head hit the pillow.” Jon’s fingers spasm, brow wrinkling as he cringes and curls into a tighter ball. Martin sighs. “Doesn’t look very restful, though.”

“Oh, he’s always been a fitful sleeper. Even back in uni. He didn’t used to be that bad, though. Or – he was, but in short bursts. Not… drawn out like this. He’d usually wake himself up after a minute or so of…” She frowns as Jon goes taut in a full-body spasm. “That.”

“I guess the Eye doesn’t want the dream to end,” Martin says quietly. Jon twists his fingers against the sheets, gathering the fabric in a death grip. Martin’s hand twitches again, inching just a bit closer to Jon’s. He resists the urge to uncurl Jon’s fingers, to give him a hand to hold instead.

“Last I checked, the nightmares weren’t as nightmarish anymore,” Georgie says. “I mean, by his own admission, he treated mine and Naomi’s dreams like social calls.”

Martin tears his eyes away from Jon to glance at Georgie, a puzzled expression on his face. “Naomi?”

“Naomi Herne. He said hers was the first statement he took in person.”

“Yeah, back when he was still putting on the skeptic act. And she filed a complaint against him for being…” Martin smiles and shakes his head. “Well, Jon.”

“I’m not surprised,” Georgie says with an amused snort. “They seem pretty friendly now, though.”

“What, seriously?”

“Yeah. They do have a similar sense of humor. She doesn’t seem to scare easy, which probably helps. And she has a cat, so…”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“Jon… has trouble initiating when it comes to having a social life,” Georgie says slowly. “Just wanting to talk doesn’t strike him as a good enough reason to start a conversation. He worries he’ll just be an annoyance. It’s like he needs to come up with some concrete justification for reaching out. But Naomi is always excited to talk about the Duchess – that’s her cat – which means Jon is less likely to feel like he’s bothering her. Which also makes him less likely to talk himself out of sending a text. Plus, it’s a safe, normal thing to talk about, and he loves cats, so…” She shrugs. “It’s good for him.”

“Huh.”

“Yeah. Gives her an excuse to stay in touch, too, I think.” Georgie gives Martin a significant look. “Lonely, you know?”

“I…” Martin rubs the back of his neck, not meeting her eye. “Yeah.”

“Anyway, I thought… well, he said the nightmares weren’t as bad as they used to be.” Georgie frowns as she watches Jon’s lips twist, his teeth bared as he sucks in a sharp breath. “I don’t know. At least he’s actually sleeping. I don’t think he’s slept for more than forty minutes at a time since he got out of the hospital.”

“That was nearly a month ago.” Martin gapes at her, horrified. “How has he even been able to function with that level of sleep deprivation?”

“The same way he survived for six months without a heartbeat. And why he has to consciously remind himself to breathe sometimes, and has a tendency to forget to blink, and doesn’t have much of an appetite for normal food anymore. He’s not fully human –”

Georgie must sense Martin preparing to go on the offensive, because she holds up both hands palms-out, placating.

“I’m not saying that he’s inhuman, either. He might be convinced that he’s more monster than human, but he’s still a person. He’s just… different now, and he’s resigned to that, but he hasn’t yet gotten it through his head that there are people who will accept him regardless.” She sighs. “My original point was that he doesn’t have the same physiological needs that most people do. But he still does need to sleep from time to time. Sleep deprivation clearly takes a toll on him.”

“Figures,” Martin huffs, blowing hair out of his eyes. “He’s always treated sleep as optional.”

“Yeah,” Georgie says with a laugh. “He’s operated on a bare minimum of sleep for as long as I’ve known him. Part casual self-neglect, part allergy to the general concept of resting, and part legitimate insomnia. I told him more than once he should get evaluated for a sleep disorder, but… well, you know Jon. And now that he really does need less sleep than the average person, of course he’s pushing the limits even further.”

Martin looks down at Jon and thinks, as he has countless times before: He really does make it so damn difficult to take care of him.

It’s simultaneously heartbreaking and frustrating, even irritating at times – but somehow, whenever Jon doubles down, it only makes Martin do the same. It’s become such a familiar dance, a challenge even, and more often than not, Martin wins those contests of will: badger Jon persistently enough, strike just the right balance between expressing worry and wagging a finger, and eventually he’ll agree to take care of himself. In the beginning, he would grump and roll his eyes and drag his feet; as time went on, though, he became more receptive to it. Some days, he even seemed to enjoy – albeit in a guarded, almost shy way – being cajoled into sharing lunch or tea or conversation.

Unthinkingly, Martin brushes a lock of hair away from Jon’s forehead, damp with cold sweat. Wishes he could smooth the tension away as easily.

“Did you two talk about things?” Georgie asks.

“Some of it.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“I…” Martin bites his lip. “I feel like I shouldn’t want to, but I – I sort of do?”

“Well. I have some time to listen.” Georgie takes a seat towards the foot of the cot. “How’d it go? Bearing in mind this isn’t the tunnels.”

“It’s… a lot.”

“Mm. I can imagine.”

“I mean, he…” Martin runs a hand through his hair with a disbelieving, nervous chuckle. “He told me he wants to grow old with me?”

“He said that?” Georgie laughs outright. “God, he’s gotten even more saccharine than I thought.”

“It’s just – not something I would have ever imagined him saying? To anyone, let alone me.” Martin can feel his palms sweating now; he rubs them on his trousers, hoping to dispel some of the clamminess. “He just seems so… changed.”

“He is, but… maybe not as drastically as it might seem. Rather, this is him, just – without all the walls.” Georgie chuckles, shaking her head. “And less of a filter, apparently. Sorry.”

“Sorry?” Martin repeats, perplexed.

“He’s dumping a lot on you all at once. I can talk to him, if you want. Tell him to slow down, give you some space to process it all.”

“I… I don’t…” Martin pauses, coming up against an invisible wall between a daunting realization and the explicit acknowledgment thereof. He makes several abortive attempts at speech before he manages to voice the confession: “I don’t think I want him to?”

Left to himself for too long, Martin can feel himself start to come unmoored. The truth the Lonely is so loathe to have him accept, let alone speak aloud, is this: he doesn’t want that to happen. Not anymore. Being in the presence of others, actively taking part in a conversation, seeking comfort in touch – all of these things still feel grating, unnatural even, but a return to solitude frightens him in a way it hasn’t for months. It’s an old terror, one that he had become numb to since accepting the Lonely’s embrace. Now, it seems to have returned with a vengeance. The lingering, ambient discomfort that comes with human connection is quickly becoming preferable to that looming fear of absence.

Still, though…

“It feels like – going against my nature, every minute I spend talking to him, to you, to… anyone, really. I think I just… forgot how not to be alone?”

On some level, Martin wonders whether he ever knew in the first place. He’s had friends, certainly, but every relationship, no matter how ostensibly reciprocal, has been laced with an undercurrent of insecurity: a loud, nagging voice in the back of his mind, reminding him of the consequences should he allow himself to be too much or not enough. Always primed for rejection, he strove to make himself pleasant, to make himself useful, to make himself accommodating and unobtrusive and easy. Sometimes, he felt like an impostor, fooling people into believing that he was worth keeping around. He was always counting down the moments until someone would see through the façade to the inadequacy within, realize he wasn’t worth the trouble, and leave him behind.

“The Lonely… I don’t think I want it anymore,” he says, “but it feels – wrong, to leave it behind. Not me, somehow.”

“Hmm.” Georgie drums her fingers against her chin. “I can understand that. Isolation can become so habitual that it starts to feel like home, and anything trying to break through feels like an invasion. You start to feel safer alone, and you deny those moments when you catch yourself wishing things were different, because loneliness has become such a part of you that you don’t know who you would be without it.”

“I… yeah,” Martin says, taken aback by having it laid out so succinctly.

“In my experience, it helps to remind yourself that your brain is lying to you when it tells you you’d be better off alone. In your case, I guess it’s your brain and a supernatural fear god or whatever, but… unless you’re keen to fight a god, it might be best to start with your brain. That’s something you actually can exert some control over, with enough practice. And I think it might make it harder for the fear to get to you if you’re not trapped in the kind of mindset it thrives on.”

“I guess,” Martin says, looking off to the side. Once again, he rests his arm on the cot, his hand mere inches away from Jon’s, sheet still clenched tightly in his fist.

“But you don’t have to take it on all at once,” Georgie says. “If you have to set boundaries, Jon will understand. And even if he didn’t, you still have a right to enforce them. Not to sound cliché, but you shouldn’t set yourself on fire to keep others warm.”

The problem is, of course, that the concept of putting himself first is as alien to Martin as the idea of being… well, not lonely.

“I can hear the cogs turning,” Georgie says with a gentle smile. “Look, it’s easier to accept a concept intellectually than it is to actually apply it to yourself. There’s a learning curve. But it’s a lesson worth learning. Took me way too long to learn it myself. If it helps, start with – to use another cliché – ‘put your own oxygen mask on before helping others with theirs.’ Then you can move onto practicing self-care without feeling guilty.”

“What are you, a therapist?”

“Nope. I’ve just had several years of experience being on the receiving end.”

“O-oh. Uh, sorry –”

“Don’t be. It’s not something to be ashamed of. Anyway, at this point, I could probably fill out CBT worksheets in my sleep. With enough practice, it does start to become intuitive.” She shrugs. “Anyway, you can’t fix Jon, and I don’t think he expects you to. You can support him, you can care about him, but you can’t make him better. That’s true in any relationship, but… well, obviously it’s – a bit more complicated in this case.”

“I just… I want him to be okay, and I don’t know how to help –” Martin startles when Jon kicks one leg out violently, entangling himself in the sheets as he pulls it back and curls into himself again. Martin lowers his voice. “He – he was so starving he passed out, Georgie, he wasn’t breathing and it was like the hospital all over again and – and I don’t think I have any other stories I can tell that would count as statements –”

“Wait, you gave him a statement?”

“Y-yeah.”

“I thought he didn’t want –”

“I don’t know if he would have agreed if he was conscious, but he… he wasn’t waking up, and I didn’t know what else to do,” Martin says pleadingly, watching Georgie carefully to gauge her reaction. “He needed a fresh statement. Old statements aren’t enough, and he said new ones cause nightmares regardless of whether he takes them in person or not, so we can’t just give him new written statements that come in, and I – I don’t know what we’re going to do if he gets that bad again.”

Martin remembers the look in Jon’s eyes: glossy, glazed and almost luminous with an alien sort of hunger, but shot through with a terror more devastating than Martin had ever seen from him. The unflinching intent with which he hurt himself; the erratic rhythm of his breathing; the way his dilated pupils swallowed the irises just before he fell unconscious. He was lost to the world in those moments, alert but unresponsive, seemingly unable to hear a word Martin was saying.

And the abject horror on his face when he commanded Martin to stay away…

“He was… he was so scared. Of himself. He doesn’t want to hurt anyone, but he – he can’t think straight when he’s like that.”

“Shit,” Georgie says, pinching the bridge of her nose.

“I think working in the archives gives some immunity? I’ve given a few statements, before we knew how all this works, and he never showed up in my nightmares. Tim’s or Sasha’s, either, as far as I know. And I actually… well, I don’t actually mind giving him statements, to be honest? It’s – hard, to relive it, but it’s… cathartic, too. To get it all out, to be able to actually – describe it in words. Maybe I’d feel differently if I came in off the street – or was approached – and I didn’t know him, and wasn’t protected from the side effects, but – as it is, I would be fine giving him statements when he needs them, and that’s not – that’s not a huge sacrifice on my part, is what I’m saying. But I don’t… I don’t think I have any more stories to give.”

“Okay,” Georgie mutters to herself, rubbing her temples. “Okay. We… we’ll figure something out. Obviously, Jon needs to be part of that conversation. Maybe Daisy, too – Jon seems to trust her.”

“Why would he trust her?” Martin asks, incredulous, almost incensed. “She kidnapped him. She – she slit his throat, she was going to –”

“I know. I don’t really understand it either. But supposedly she’s changed a lot, and she’s an Avatar like he is. I get the feeling he might want her there.”

“Fine,” Martin says in a clipped voice, even though fine seems like a wildly inaccurate descriptor to him. “What about Basira? And Melanie?”

“Melanie… with Jon’s permission, I’ll invite her, just so she’s not out of the loop, but I doubt she’ll take us up on it.” Georgie frowns, rubbing her jaw absently. “As for Basira… I don’t know. Something Jon said…”

“What?”

“I’m…” Georgie pauses, tilting her head from side to side as she deliberates. “Concerned. About how Basira might approach the situation.”

It takes a few seconds for Martin to work out the implication. When he does, he pales, mouth going slack.

“You – you don’t think she’d hurt him?”

“I don’t think so,” Georgie says haltingly, “but there’s a chance she might put the option back on the table if she thinks he’s too dangerous. She wouldn’t like it, but… well, she seems utilitarian. I think she’ll do whatever she thinks she needs to do. And even if she doesn’t threaten him directly, I still…” She sighs. “Jon’s not in a good place right now, mentally. Frankly, I worry about exposing him to anything that might encourage a better-off-dead mindset, even if it’s just… perceived condemnation.”

“God, this…” Martin laughs, high and stressed. “This entire situation is…”

“I know. But we’ll figure something out. And in the meantime, make sure to take care of yourself too, alright?”

“Yeah,” Martin says, only half-listening.

“I mean it. Jon cares about you. He wouldn’t want you to run yourself into the ground on his behalf.”

Before Martin can respond, Jon jumps in his sleep again with a strangled gasp. Flinging one arm out, his hand brushes against Martin and seizes a fistful of his sleeve. Tightening his grip, he tugs on Martin’s arm to bring it closer, practically hugging it in a vice grip. Almost instantly Jon calms, tense muscles relaxing, pained expression going slack, a relieved sigh shuddering out of him as he nuzzles into the crook of Martin’s elbow.

Martin can feel his cheeks burning. He shoots a preemptive glower in Georgie’s direction, daring her to laugh – but she only smiles.

“Well, I’ll leave you to it,” she says, rising to her feet. “Text me when he’s awake, will you?”

“Y-y-yeah,” Martin stammers. “I’ll – I’ll see you later.”

He barely notices her departure, instead staring down at Jon with a vague sense of wonder. Jon holds fast to him like he’s a lifeline, and Martin can feel him breathing warm and steady through the fabric of his sleeve. The cold sweat on his brow seems to be evaporating now. Martin shifts his position to more fully face the cot. As he reaches up with his free hand to brush away the hair clinging to Jon’s forehead, a slow, shy smile begins to spread across Martin’s face.

It won’t be long before Jon succumbs to another fit of tossing and turning, but in the meantime, Martin simply watches him with faint awe and renewed affection. He’s never seen Jon look so at peace, and he takes the opportunity to memorize the sight.

When another shard of the Lonely shatters and crumbles away, Martin is too preoccupied to note its passing.

With a startled yelp, Jon sits bolt upright. Gulping down air in deep, ragged breaths, he looks wildly around the room, not taking anything in: it’s all visual noise, smudges of loud colors and sinister shadows, all of it closing in and bearing down on him.

Something next to him – close too close too close – moves abruptly, rising up and looming over and settling down beside him. Jon cringes away, only to find that his legs are pinned together by something, restricting his movement, and there’s dirt in his mouth, and dirt in his throat, and dirt in his lungs, and he cannot breathe, cannot breathe, cannot breathe, cannot breathe –

“Jon,” comes a voice – somehow both close and far away. “Listen, you’re – you’re okay, you’re safe.”

Trapped in that liminal twilight haze between sleep and waking, Jon gropes blindly for a handhold, an anchor, something real and solid and –

His hand collides with something soft, warm – wool, his mind supplies, and then:

…wool is able to absorb nearly one-third of its weight in water…

He shakes his head to chase away the stray scrap of trivia, digging his fingers into the fabric to ground himself.

“It was just a dream,” says the voice again – a kind voice, a safe voice – and Jon takes a shuddering breath, like a drowning man clawing for air.

Then a hand closes over his, and that light pressure is enough plunge Jon right back below the surface. He thrashes violently, desperate to break away from the throbbing litany of too close cannot move trapped held pinned in place screeching metal crushing in and down and down and down and Karolina beholds her encroaching fate with tranquil acceptance and the Archivist feels her skull crack and her chest cave in and her lungs collapse and still she smiles and she watches as the Archivist flails uselessly for an escape that does not will not cannot exist and the door bulges and splinters and explodes inward and the deluge rushes in and the Archivist is drowning, drowning, drowning –

The hand draws back, the pressure lifts, the train car finally collapses, and the last remnants of hazy sleep begin to disintegrate.

“S-sorry, I didn’t mean to – it’s – it’s just me, Jon.”

“Martin?” Jon chokes out, tightening his grasp on Martin’s jumper – wool, warm, soft, safe – still bunched in one hand. He reaches out his other arm to find a second handhold.

“Yeah. I – I won’t hurt you.”

Safe.

“I know,” Jon says groggily. The tension drains away and he sags against Martin’s side, breathing in slow, deliberate swallows. “’M sorry. Dream.”

The first time he’s slept, truly slept since leaving the hospital, and of course it had to be while Karolina Górka was dreaming. Of course.

“Do you… want to talk about it?”

“Buried,” Jon mumbles, face partially burrowed in Martin’s shoulder. Self-explanatory, he figures.

“Oh,” Martin says in a broken whisper. Jon opens one eye to see an expression of helpless pity on Martin’s face. “That’s…”

“’S okay,” Jon assures. “I’m okay.”

Reluctantly, he releases his hold on Martin and leans away. When he stretches – partly out of habit, partly to reassure himself that he can – there’s still something pinioning his legs. A spark of panic tears through him before he realizes that it’s just the sheets, tangled hopelessly around his lower half. With some difficulty, he manages to extricate himself and kick the blankets away.

“How long was I out?”

“Couple hours.”

“Have you just been sitting here the whole time?” Jon frowns apologetically. “You could’ve woken me.”

“Wake you when you were actually sleeping for once? Uh, no. How are you feeling?”

“Better,” Jon says simply. “I’d like to know how you’re doing.”

“I’m – fine,” Martin says. Jon raises an eyebrow. “Really, I – I am. I’m more worried about –”

“Me, I know. And I’m worried about you. I… don’t think you’re just ‘fine.’” Martin gives a noncommittal grunt. “I really would like to know where you are in all this. How you’re faring. How I can help.”

Martin remains silent, lips pressed tightly together as if to seal them.

“I know I was – distracted, earlier, but I… I really do want to help,” Jon tries again. “Please let me help?”

Something finally gives and Martin slouches with a sigh.

“I’m… still trying to figure it all out,” he says slowly. “I don’t know what I’m feeling most of the time, besides… worried, and…”

“Lonely.”

“Yeah,” Martin says with a wistful smile.

“You don’t have to be,” Jon says quietly.

“I know.”

“I’m not – I’m not trying to –” Jon sighs. “I just… I need you to know.”

“I know,” Martin says again.

Jon bites back the nagging impulse to ask all the questions itching on his tongue: Have you decided what to do about Peter? How Lonely are you now? Do you need closeness or distance? What should I be doing, or not doing? What can I do to take care of you? Where do we stand?

What do you see, when you look at me?

Jon looks away and shuts his eyes.

“I’m sorry you had to see me like that, by the way. It wasn’t my intention to frighten you. Or to…” He swallows, fighting back the nausea rising in him. “To compel you.”

“It’s alright –”

“It’s not,” Jon says brusquely. He makes a conscious effort to soften his tone before he continues. “I don’t want to be the thing that frightens you.”

“You’re not,” Martin says with a bemused frown. “I know you didn’t mean to use your powers on me.”

“You were afraid. I could…” Jon closes his eyes again and forces himself to say the words. “I could taste it.”

And the Archivist in him savored it.

“I wasn’t afraid of you, Jon. I was afraid for you. You looked terrified, and in pain, and you were hurting yourself, and I didn’t know how to help, and then I didn’t know if you were going to wake up, and… that’s what scared me.” Jon’s skepticism must show on his face, because there’s an intensity to the words when Martin reiterates: “Not you. Never you.”

“Never say never,” Jon says with a brittle, self-deprecating smile.

“I’m serious, Jon.”

So am I.

“I… I think we need to talk about where to go from here,” Martin says after a moment, averting his eyes.

“I agree.”

“You do?” Martin looks back to him, blinking in surprise.

“Yes,” Jon says, adjusting his position to sit cross-legged and pivoting to face Martin fully. “The others need to know what happened. I can’t be trusted not to hurt anyone –”

“No, that’s not what I –” Martin sighs. “I’m worried about what could happen if things get that bad again.”

“That’s what I’m saying. I came dangerously close to – to relapsing. We need some plan in place, some way to keep me contained so that I don’t –”

“Stop, stop, stop,” Martin says, holding up a hand. Jon tilts his head, bewildered. “I’m not – I’m not talking about keeping you contained, Jon. I’m worried about you. This goes beyond a compulsion you can beat with enough willpower. You were starving. You… you could have died.”

“We don’t know that.”

“Exactly! We don’t know, and I don’t want to find out.”

“Well, yes, but –”

“No ‘but.’ There has to be some way to keep you fed without hurting anyone. We just need to –”

“Martin, terror and suffering is the entire point. That’s what sustains it. Mine, my victim’s, doesn’t matter as long as it hurts.” Jon laughs, hollow and bitter. “It’s not like there’s an ethical way to – to harvest trauma –”

“We don’t know that for sure,” Martin says fiercely, “and I’m not ready to just give up. I would hope you aren’t, either.”

“I…” Jon busies himself with tucking a flyaway lock of hair behind his ear, using it as an excuse to break eye contact.

“Please, Jon.”

Martin takes his hand, prompting Jon to look up again. A familiar guilt rises up in him, shame at always being the one to put that expression of desperate worry on Martin’s face.

It’s enough to make him agree, albeit in a whisper, “Okay.”

“Right,” Martin says, giving Jon’s hand a brief squeeze. “Georgie and I were talking while you were asleep. She wants to be part of the discussion, so long as you’re alright with it.”

“Of course. We should probably tell Daisy and Basira as well.”

Martin appears to hesitate.

“I was thinking the three of us can meet first,” he says carefully, “and then we can open up the discussion after.”

“Why?” Jon observes the slight concavity that forms as Martin chews the inside of his cheek. “Martin?”

“Georgie’s worried about Basira’s reaction,” Martin says abruptly, “and honestly, so am I.”

“She needs to know.”

“I – I know, it’s just…”

“We have so few allies; we can’t afford secrecy and mistrust. And…”

And of all of them, Basira is the one Jon can trust to do what must be done if things go wrong. If he goes wrong.

“Basira is a strategist,” he says. “She’s good at viewing a problem from multiple angles, considering all the variables, predicting potential solutions and outcomes and then weighing them with a… pragmatic eye.”

“The pragmatism is what worries me.”

“I want her there,” Jon says simply.

“Okay,” Martin says, but Jon can tell he’s not thrilled about it. “What about Daisy?”

“Yes,” Jon says, not missing a beat. At that, Martin somehow manages to look even less thrilled.

“And Melanie?”

“I… I’m alright with her being there, but I don’t want her to feel pressured. She’s dealing with enough as it is.”

“Okay. I can let everyone know, but I think you should get some more rest before –”

“No.”

“Jon –”

“I need to confront this now. While I’m still… in my right mind,” Jon says, plucking absently at his sleeve with his free hand. “Sober.”

For a brief second, Martin looks ready to argue, but then he capitulates with a sigh.

“Okay,” he says, releasing Jon’s hand and standing up. “I’ll… round everyone up, I suppose.”

“Thank you,” Jon murmurs.

Martin glances back several times as he leaves the room. Jon waits until he’s out of sight before he puts his face in his hands, sighs, and tries to brace himself for a conversation he dreads almost as much as the Coffin.

A short time later, the group – minus Melanie – convenes in the tunnels, five chairs arranged in a loose circle with a sixth left empty off to the side. Sitting almost directly across from Jon, Basira watches him with eyes narrowed, arms folded, and mouth pressed into a firm line.

“What do you mean you ‘almost’ relapsed?”

“Martin suggested reading a new statement that came in earlier this evening,” Jon tells her in a straightforward near-monotone. Pushing through the discomfort it brings, he forces himself to meet her eyes when he speaks. “I agreed, without informing him that reading a fresh written statement has the same repercussions that taking a live statement in person does. I was going to feed, knowing that it would hurt an innocent person.”

“But you didn’t,” Martin says emphatically. “You stopped yourself.”

“Only because Helen pointed out the cognitive dissonance. Took a monster to remind me not to be a monster.” Jon scoffs. “Even then, I almost did it anyway.”

“But you didn’t,” Martin repeats.

“What about next time?” Basira asks, unimpressed. “When you get hungry again, what then?”

“That’s what we’re here to discuss,” Georgie says, assuming the role of mediator the moment she notices Martin’s scowl deepen. “We need to find some way to keep things from getting that bad in the first place.”

Thoroughly unnerved, Jon squirms in his seat. Basira has had him pinned under her stare for several minutes now, and she seems unlikely to cut him free any time soon. But what right does he have to object to scrutiny, given what he is?

“What did you do with the statement?” Basira demands. “The one you were going to read?”

“I… asked Martin to burn it.”

Her eyes flick to Martin. “And did you?”

“N-not yet –”

“Burn it. As soon as we’re done here.” She shifts her attention back to Jon. “Is there an alternative to new statements?”

Jon doesn’t miss a beat when he answers, matter-of-fact: “No.”

“Jon,” Martin and Georgie say simultaneously, with the tenor of a reprimand.

“I’m not – I’m not trying to be difficult,” he replies, finally breaking eye contact with Basira to look down at his hands. “It’s just… reality. I’m an Archive dedicated the curation of statements – of fear.”

“You never actually explained what that means,” Basira says. “You being the Archive.”

“It’s… hard to put into words.”

“Try.”

Jon sighs, taking a moment to collect his thoughts.

“The Archive is more than – paper and files and tapes. The reason it needs to be housed in a living mind rather than a mere building is because the statements themselves have a living quality to them.” He crosses his arms, brow furrowing as he struggles with his phrasing. “They need to be immersed in a steady supply of fear. A shelving unit, a filing cabinet, a hard drive, a cassette tape – those can’t provide the ideal habitat that they need to thrive. The Archivist is –”

“– simply a battery, a ready source of constant terror –”

He cuts the Archive off with a frustrated snarl, digging his fingernails into his arms.

“Hey,” Georgie says gently, “you’re alright. Take your time.”

Jon has to spend a few minutes counting breaths before he feels ready to try again.

“What I was –” He cuts himself off preemptively, half-expecting the Archive to intrude again. Once he realizes the words are his own, he clears his throat to recover from the false start. “What I was trying to say is – without a living consciousness to contextualize them, the statements are just… stories. When I consume a statement – read it, hear it, doesn’t matter – I See the events play out through the victim’s eyes. My lived experience of it is essential to the recording and preservation of the story. I need to be able to recall how it feels, not just summarize the major points of interest.” He sighs again. “And… that’s also the point of reliving the events in the nightmares. All of it is to keep the memory fresh. To keep the story – the fear – alive.”

When he looks up to see all four of them staring at him, he begins to rub his arms absently, increasingly self-conscious. He can feel the semicircle grooves leftover from where his fingernails cut into the skin.

“So… yeah,” he finishes awkwardly. “The Archive is defined by the statements and the fear that embodies them. The Beholding always hungers for more, and the Archive is a… a receptacle for all of its knowledge. The continual curation of new statements is what sustains it. Without that, it withers.”

“And dies?” Basira asks.

The question isn’t unkind, per se, simply businesslike: an eagerness to discover an answer heedless of whatever messy emotions it might elicit. Jon understands that impulse all too well. Not for the first time, he wonders whether Jonah had a secondary, hidden motive for recruiting Basira: a backup Archivist, in the event that his first choice be unable to endure the process.

“I still don’t know if it would physically kill me,” he replies, “but the hungrier I get, the more I forget myself. I’m liable to do things that I wouldn’t normally do, monstrous things.” He huffs. “And at the same time, giving in to that hunger will also make me more monstrous over time. It seems like… either way, I – I can’t avoid losing sight of… well, me. The human part of me. Whatever’s left of it.”

And wouldn’t losing himself be a death of sorts?

In a way, Daisy died the moment the Hunt recaptured her. What she became was her, undoubtedly, but only a small piece of her. The creature that Basira eventually killed… it was an echo of all the hated, feared parts of herself that Daisy had tried so hard to starve out. The rest of her – all the things that altogether made her Daisy – had long since been burned away.

If Jon didn’t manage to find a way out of that doomed future, he suspects that his ultimate fate may have been similar: all the fragile scraps of himself that still belonged to him, every sliver of personal identity, every shred of humanity crushed and buried beneath an ever-swelling ocean of dispassionate knowledge. The Archive would have carried on expanding and curating until, one day, it would have either collapsed under its own weight or simply run out of things to catalogue, then to waste away – but by then, it would have borne no resemblance to the original owner of its ravaged vessel.

Some endings play out in merciless increments. Jon has witnessed – has caused – more than his fair share of pointless, drawn out suffering. It would have been only fitting for his end to follow a similar path.

“Well, shit,” Basira mutters.

“What about statements given consensually?” Martin asks tentatively. “The one I gave you seemed to satisfy the Archive, or – or however you want to call it. And in the past when I’ve given you statements, they never gave me nightmares, so…”

“Anyone aligned with the Eye has a measure of protection from the Archivist,” Jon answers. “I was never privy to Tim’s or Sasha’s nightmares, either. Once Melanie and Basira started working here, their dreams were cut off from me as well. And… last time, Daisy ended up signing an employment contract after returning from the Buried. Same result.”

“Is it just the archival staff, or any Institute employee?” Basira asks.

“I… don’t know,” Jon says thoughtfully. “If I had to hazard a guess, I would say that it’s restricted to those most strongly connected with the Eye. Archival assistants, primarily. Possibly the research department, or at least those individuals who are the most… compatible with the Beholding, so to speak, though I’m not positive.”

Now that the question has been posed, Jon craves an answer.

“But – but experimenting isn’t worth the risk,” he says, mostly in an attempt to dissuade himself from pursuing the matter any further. He’s pleasantly surprised to hear the confidence in his own voice.

As if satisfied with that answer, Basira gives a tiny nod. Jon doubts it’s meant as a vote of confidence or as approval, but her posture does relax somewhat. He doubts that she trusts him by any stretch of the imagination, but for the moment she seems to have decided that he isn’t an imminent threat, at least.

It feels remarkably, disconcertingly like passing a test he didn’t realize was in progress.

Georgie’s eyes are fixed on the floor, her chin propped in her hand and a contemplative pout on her face. Martin has his lips pressed together, as if biting back an objection. Daisy is the only one looking directly at Jon. She hasn’t said a word since Jon gave his confession, but now her head cocked slightly to the side, as if she's weighing her words.

“I have a lot of stories from my Sectioned days,” she muses. “I could –”

“What would you say if I told you that you should go hunt a few monsters?” Jon says immediately.

“I…” Daisy stalls for a moment, and then gives a resigned sigh, understanding. “I would be worried that I wouldn’t be able to stop at a few,” she says grudgingly. Her shoulders slump as she adds, “Or at monsters.”

“Exactly.”

“But wouldn’t it be different?” she asks, perking up again. “The prey doesn’t consent to the hunt. The fear is taken, not freely given. But a statement – that can be consensual.”

“The Hunt cares about the terror of the prey in the moment. The Eye cares about the terror of the victim in the retelling. The consent aspect is only relevant in terms of whether and how it influences the fear. The fear is all they care about, and I doubt anything benign can come of consuming the fear our patrons want, consensual or no.”

“Do you remember what I said about harm reduction?” Georgie has been sitting quietly with her thoughts for so long, Jon startles at the sound of her voice when she rejoins the conversation. “We need to keep you from getting so hungry that it changes who you are, and new statements are the only way to satisfy that hunger. Correct?”

“Well, yes, but –”

“No ‘but.’ According to you, right now your options are statements or starvation.”

Struck with a fleeting impulse for petulance, Jon has to swallow a biting retort. It’s an old habit, hackles rising at having his own words turned against him – something for which Georgie has always had an aptitude. Between an impressive memory, an analytical nature, and a tolerance for confrontation, she’s never been shy to speculate on what’s really going on in Jon’s head at any given moment. That ability to dissect his motivations and insecurities and cognitive distortions – it used to feel like being flayed alive, all the vulnerable bits of him exposed and shoved under a spotlight.

It’s probably fair to say that his inability to weather that level of scrutiny was a big factor contributing to their eventual breakup: his guarded nature was incompatible with her more straightforward approach to relationships.

“I realize it’s not ideal,” she’s saying now, “but taking statements given with informed consent seems like the most ethical choice.”

“It isn’t just unideal, it’s – it’s –” Jon puts one hand over his eyes, rubbing his forehead and fighting back the urge to shout. “This isn’t a solution.”

It’s still feeding the Eye. It’s still capitalizing on other people’s trauma. And the stories Daisy has to offer… Jon has to wonder how many of them feature Daisy as a victim or a bystander, and whether those outnumber the ones where she herself is the object of fear. He’s taken statements from Avatars before. Some of them were indeed stories of experiencing fear firsthand. Others, though… the fear threaded through the statement came not from the teller, but from their victims.

Jon isn’t keen on siphoning off the secondhand terror of Daisy’s prey. Maybe he can’t afford to be picky, but if there’s one thing he’s learned, it’s that lines have to be drawn somewhere.

“We can keep looking for a better alternative,” Georgie says, “but for now… think of it as a stopgap measure.” Sensing Jon’s continued aversion to the idea, she continues: “If your own wellbeing isn’t enough to convince you, consider how you starving would affect other people.”

“It might make me more dangerous,” Jon says quietly.

“I mean – maybe, I guess? But that’s not what I meant.” At Jon’s blank expression, Georgie sighs. “When you suffer, it hurts more than just you. You have people who care about you. They’re sitting with you right now.”

“Still, I – I can’t ask that of –”

“Oh, come off it, Sims,” Daisy says, rolling her eyes. “You crawled into hell to drag me out when all I’d done was treat you like prey. And even after seeing what it was like, you went back in and brought me back a second time.”

“Yes, but –”

“If I sign a contract to work in the archives, it’ll stop you showing up in my dreams, right?”

“Yes. I’m – I’m sorry, again, about –”

“And it’ll keep new nightmares from cropping up if I give you more statements?”

“Well, yes –”

“Then what’s the problem?”

Jon opens and closes his mouth soundlessly several times.

“I – I – I don’t want you to sign yourself over to the Beholding just so I can – treat your memories like a – like a snack” – Jon flings one arm out in a sweeping gesture, supplementing the disgust with which he says the word – “without facing any consequences!”

He looks around at the others, arm still outstretched in the air, waiting for someone to back him up on this. When no one does, he huffs a bewildered chuckle and withdraws his arm to comb his fingers through his hair instead. Why is he the only one making a fuss about this? He thought he could count on Basira at least to raise an objection, but she’s just staring off to the side, apparently lost in thought.

“I was already considering signing a contract anyway,” Daisy says. “Basira said you had a theory that the Slaughter’s effects on Melanie were slowed by her connection to the Eye, yeah?”

“Yes,” he admits cautiously.

“We were thinking – maybe it’ll do the same for me with the Hunt.”

“Did it help last time?” Basira cuts in, as if she’d never tapped out of the discussion.

“I’m not positive,” Jon hedges. “It was a theory we’d considered, yes, but it’s not like we had much of a sample size to test that hypothesis.”

He wishes he’d thought to ask these kinds of questions after the world ended, when he actually had a chance of getting the answers. In his defense, he had a lot on his mind – and it’s not like he considered the possibility of coming back in time to actually make use of that information.

“And it didn’t entirely silence the call of the Hunt,” he adds, looking back to Daisy. “You still deteriorated the longer you refused to answer it.”

“Hm.” Basira’s contemplative expression returns as she withdraws to commune with her own thoughts again.

“Well, it’s not like I’m going anywhere anyway,” Daisy says with a shrug. “Basira’s trapped here. So are you. And I don’t think I can be trusted to leave here without giving in to the Hunt again. I have nothing to lose by signing a contract, and…”

Her eyes gravitate towards Jon’s throat. Mechanically, he reaches up to adjust the scarf around his neck, to ensure the scar there is covered. At the guilty expression on Daisy’s face, Jon has to look away.

“If it can help,” Daisy continues, “then I think telling some stories is the absolute least I can do after… everything.”

“How many do you have, do you think?” Georgie asks, once again settling into problem-solving mode.

“Don’t know. Several. A couple dozen? Maybe more, depending on how far we can stretch the definition of a statement.”

“I have a handful as well,” Basira says, her tone wholly unreadable. “Not many, but… a few of the things that happened while you were dead should count as statements, I think.”

“I – I couldn’t ask you to –”

“I’m not offering; I’m just inventorying all the options on the table,” Basira says with an air of finality.

Curiously, Martin seems to tense at Basira’s words, shifting restively in his seat and looking askance at her.

“How much time does that buy us, do you think?” he asks, throwing brief, surreptitious glances in Basira’s direction. “How long would a few dozen statements last you?”

“I… I don’t know,” Jon says, still altogether uncomfortable with the idea. “If I ration myself, then – a while, hopefully? Hypothetically? But…”

He’s loathe to elaborate, but when did keeping secrets and denying reality ever help?

“Last time, it kept getting progressively worse. I needed to feed more and more frequently in order to stave off the hunger. The side effects of abstaining grew more severe. I want to hope that it will be different this time. Maybe giving in to the hunger in the first place only encouraged the Archivist’s… evolution. Whet my appetite. It’s possible that refraining from hunting will… I don’t know, slow the process? Maybe? B-but at the same time…”

He trails off, lips parted, unable to say the words.

“Jon?” Martin prompts gently.

“It’s… I’m sorry, but I – I have trouble being optimistic about it. Coming back didn’t… it didn’t reset the Archivist’s progress. I’m the product of what I’ve done up to this point, even if I’m the only one who remembers any of it. I still have all the marks. And… the Archive fledged and thrived in the apocalypse.”

“Meaning?” Basira leans forward, watching him intently.

“The Archive is accustomed to a feast, not a famine. Millions of statements filtering through every moment without pause. Even when humanity started dying off – when there was less and less fear to go around, when even the monsters started to decay in that place – the Archive was still sated, because I could See everything. No matter how few and far between those pockets of terror became, as long as fear was being suffered somewhere, the Archive had a steady source of sustenance.”

It wouldn’t have lasted forever, of course. Everything has an ending. But that had still been a ways off when Jon left that place.

“I probably would have been one of the last things standing, by the end,” he says softly.

“And you think the hunger will be worse this time because you aren’t used to being hungry,” Basira says.

“More or less,” Jon mumbles, shamefaced. “Coming back to the past, to now… there was no transition between plenty and want. I – the Archive – was just… dropped into a – a habitat it was never adapted to survive in. It’s like a… like a non-native species, as far as this reality is concerned. Like taking a fish out of water and expecting it to evolve lungs on the spot.”

“Hm.” Basira cups her chin in one hand, running a thumb slowly over her lips as she thinks.

“I plan to ration myself as strictly as possible, of course. I just want to establish the possibility that things might – escalate, at some point.”

“If it comes to that, we can deal with it then,” Georgie says. “In the meantime, we should just…”

“Take things one crisis at a time?” Jon tries to temper his bitterness with a weak smile, without much success.

“I mean, yeah, basically,” Georgie says. “But in order for this to work, you need to be honest with us.”

“I – I am, I –”

“I’m not accusing you of lying, Jon. I just mean… well, you have a long history of ignoring your own limitations, and –”

“You’re not good at taking care of yourself,” Martin interjects. His cheeks go pink and he tosses an apologetic glance in Georgie’s direction. “S-sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

“No worries,” Georgie says. Martin looks uncertain until she grins and, still making eye contact with him, jerks her chin in Jon’s direction. “By all means, go on.”

Emboldened, Martin turns his attention back to Jon, who meets his eyes with no small amount of apprehension. If Martin is intent on compiling a laundry list of examples of Jon’s poor self-care – and judging from that worryingly familiar look on his face, he is – then he has ample material to choose from. Jon barely has time to brace himself before Martin launches into his lecture.

“You used to forget to eat. You never took lunch unless I hassled you. I had to nag you to go home at night.” He’s counting off on his fingers now, Jon notes with dismay. “You went through most days fueled by a maximum of four hours of sleep and frankly alarming amounts of caffeine. You insisted on coming back to work, against medical advice, immediately after almost being eaten alive by worms.”

Jon opens his mouth to speak – and promptly shuts it again when Martin gives him what Jon can (with equal amounts of affection and dread) only refer to as that look.

“You could barely walk. I had to threaten to forcibly remove you from the building before you agreed to go home. You spent the next several weeks sneaking – hell, limping around down here” – Martin makes a sweeping gesture with his arm – “where we found your predecessor’s murdered body, and –”

“Yes, yes, okay,” Jon interrupts, hands flapping anxiously. “I get your point.”

“I also had to threaten to withhold the Admiral from you in order to get you to go to the clinic to have your third-degree burn treated,” Georgie chimes back in. Jon glares at her; she looks far too entertained by the proceedings.

“I was – I was on the lam,” he protests. “I couldn’t exactly go waltzing about in public.”

“But you were perfectly willing to go chasing down Avatars, apparently.”

“I…”

“Oh,” she adds, “and today was the first time you actually slept since you woke up from a coma.”

“I was asleep for six months,” Jon mutters, arms crossed, bouncing one heel against the floor. “I think that more than makes up for –”

“You tried to pass off a stab wound that required five – five!” – Martin holds up five fingers for added (and unnecessary, in Jon’s opinion) emphasis – “stitches as an accident with a – with a bread knife.”

Somehow, Martin manages to sound as indignant now as he did on the day it happened.

“That was several lifetimes ago,” Jon says primly. “At some point you have to let me live it down.”

“It hasn’t even been two years!”

“Seriously, Jon?” Daisy, who has been hiding a smirk behind her hand throughout the entire exchange, finally fails to contain her stifled laughter. “A bread knife?”

“I – I panicked,” Jon says weakly, cheeks burning. “Martin cornered me in the breakroom and it was the first thing I saw, and I just –”

Martin starts in again. “You were actively exsanguinating –”

“Th-that – that’s an exaggeration,” Jon sputters, watching Georgie out of the corner of his eye to gauge her reaction. She’s shaking her head with a faint smile, and Jon… well, Jon supposes that playful scorn is preferable to actual scorn.

“– and you refused to let me take you to the clinic until I threatened to call an ambulance,” Martin finishes.

“I was –” Jon twists a lock of hair around his fingers as he scrambles for some way to save face. “I would have been –”

“I think it’s safe to say you have no sense of self-preservation,” Basira says, and even she has a hint of amusement in her tone now.

“They have a point, Sims.”

“Et tu, Daisy?” Jon says, hoping to garner a laugh – or, failing that, at least halt the relentless bombardment of admonishments. Daisy simply raises her eyebrows and folds her arms, unmoved.

“Do I need to revisit some of the things we discussed in the Coffin?”

“No,” he says sullenly. When no one else speaks, he continues, somewhat irately: “Are we quite finished with the roast session?”

“For now,” Georgie says. “The point is, don’t run yourself into the ground just to test the limits of what you can endure.”

“And don’t let rationing statements turn into just another way to punish yourself,” Martin says sternly. Then he bites his lip, speaking gently now: “You… you deserve better than that.”

I really, really don’t, Jon thinks. Having no desire to unleash another lecture, though, he keeps the contrary comment to himself.

“Besides, letting yourself get that bad probably makes things worse in the long run,” Georgie says. “Like walking on a sprained ankle. Maybe you can endure the pain, but the longer you ignore it, the more likely you are to cause even more damage, and recovery takes longer than it would have if you’d just attended to it in the first place.”

“Speaking from personal experience, are we?” Jon allows a hint of retaliatory smugness slip into his voice.

“Yes,” Georgie says, rolling her eyes. “That ankle is still weak. Which is why you should listen to me. Just… try to care about yourself even a fraction of how much others care about you, alright?

Jon sighs. “Point taken.”

“You can trust us,” Martin says.

“I – I know that. I do trust you. I’m just…” Afraid. “I don’t want you to –”

“– mark me out as something other –”

“– getting used to people making polite excuses not to look at me –”

“– it wears you down to be someone whom nobody wants to see – I called out again and again but nobody came –”

Frantic, he covers his mouth with his hand to halt the recitation; the words continue to pour forth undeterred, albeit muffled and likely – hopefully – too indistinct for the others to understand.

“– I remember shouting, recriminations, and I was abandoned –”

“– no one to blame but my own stupid self – blundering in where I had no right to go –”

A flash flood of restless energy breaks through the dam and then it’s racing through his veins, filling his mouth and his mind with white noise. He kicks one foot out and brings it stomping back down to the ground in a burst of sheer infuriation and near-panic. A crawling sensation travels up and down the length of his spine, a parade of feather-light pinpricks reminiscent of thousands of scuttling spider legs.

The slight whimper that works its way up his throat is thankfully stifled by the hand still pressed to his lips.

“Breathe through it,” Basira tells him.

Irritation flares to life at the reminder, but Jon forcibly snuffs it out before the spark can catch. Basira is only trying to help – and in a way she knows has helped before.

He breathes.

A frustrated noise – something between a snarl and a whine – spills out on his exhale, and he presses another hand atop the first as if it can render him entirely soundless. Before another wave of self-directed fury can take him, Jon coaxes himself to take another breath in through his nose. And another. And another, counting up until the pressure behind his eyes lets up and the static clears from his thoughts – at which point, he’s forced to confront the four pairs of eyes playing patient audience to his outburst.

Like a toddler’s tantrum, he thinks acidly, burning with humiliation.

“Sorry.” Although the scathing edge to the word is reserved solely for himself, he takes another breath before speaking again, lest the others assume the ire is directed at them. “Sorry. I’ll try to control it better.”

“It’s fine, Jon,” Martin says. “We know you aren’t doing it on purpose.”

“Anyway,” Basira says, her peremptory tone indicating a return to the subject at hand, “can we all agree that this is the best strategy for now?”

Jon looks down, tracing the weave of his scarf, focusing wholly on the texture of fabric against fingertips in a vain attempt to distract from the pins and needles still skittering across his skin. It takes a moment before he registers the silence. When he looks up, the others are staring at him. Basira raises an eyebrow, clearly waiting for his response.

“Even if I do agree to this,” Jon says warily, “I still – I know it’s a lot to ask, but I still need to be monitored for any signs of…” Although the question is meant for all of them, Jon shifts his gaze to make direct eye contact with Basira as he asks it. “Can you let me know, truthfully, if I – if it looks like I might… if you think I’m a danger?”

“Jon,” Martin sighs, “you’re not –”

“Yes,” Basira says decisively.

Martin glares at her, his mouth falling open with a combination of shock and protective outrage. Jon recognizes that expression, and he jumps in before Martin can get a word out.

“Thank you, Basira.”

Now Jon is the target of Martin’s glower. He looks offended, betrayed almost, as if Jon took Basira’s side in a dispute between the two of them. Again, though, Martin doesn’t get the chance to scold.

“Alright then,” Daisy says, stretching. “It’s settled. You” – her eyes swivel to Jon, their piercing intensity prompting him to sit up at attention – “come to me when you’re hungry.”

“Before you cross the boundary into ‘starving,’” Martin says, carving out an opportunity to chastise despite the interruption.

“Consider me a vending machine of horror stories,” Daisy quips.

Jon grimaces and rubs the back of his neck. “Do you have to describe it that way?”

“Oh, quit grousing.” With a flash of teeth, a wolfish grin spreads across her face. “What, would you prefer I write up a menu?”

Her expression turns solemn when Jon winces and looks away.

“Sore nerve?” she asks, suddenly and uncharacteristically delicate.

“Are you sure you’re okay with this?” The question is nearly inaudible, Jon’s eyes fixed on the floor.

“I wouldn’t have offered if I wasn’t.”

Fearing his voice might crack if he tries to speak, Jon bites down on his lip and tucks his chin to his chest, letting his hair fall to hide the others from view. He shuts his eyes for good measure and swallows hard, determined to head off the tears threatening to gather.

“Hey.” Daisy stretches out a leg and kicks his foot gently. It’s enough to make him raise his head cautiously. “I was just teasing. Really.”

“I –” It comes out as a croak. Jon clears his throat and blinks several times to dispel the stinging pressure in the corners of his eyes. “I know.”

“It is… so weird to see you two like this,” Basira says with an air of baffled wonder.

Jon notices Martin fidgeting restively out of the corner of his eye. When he looks directly at him, he sees Martin glaring at Daisy with a mixture of worry, suspicion, and resentment.

It isn’t surprising; he never really did forgive Daisy for what she did to Jon. Neither did Jon, for that matter, but… Daisy was so changed after the Buried, it was difficult to see her as the same person who dragged him into the woods. She was, undoubtedly – she was the first to admit that – but she was remorseful and wholly dedicated to changing her behavior, even knowing it might well kill her. She never asked for forgiveness, never denied the harm she’d caused, never tried to justify or shirk responsibility for her actions.

What she later became… there was nothing left of the Daisy who he’d come to see as a friend. For that Daisy, being reclaimed by the Hunt was a fate worse than death. Worse than the Coffin, even. She would have preferred to die as herself, and on her own terms – and the Hunt stole even that ounce of humanity from her. It made her forget that she didn't want to be a Hunter.

Jon dreads watching her waste away again, but not nearly as much as he fears the Hunt devouring her whole.

“People change,” he says, looking from Martin to Basira, hoping those two words can convey all the things he cannot say. They both look unconvinced, albeit in slightly different ways.

The silence drags on uncomfortably long until Georgie claps her hands on her knees.

“You never answered the question, Jon. Are you alright taking statements from Daisy? At least until we can find a better solution?”

“I…”

He glances around the circle, looking at each face in turn, trying to discern their opinions on the matter. Daisy gives him a reassuring nod. Martin has an almost pleading expression on his face, worrying his bottom lip between his teeth and wringing his hands in his lap.

Basira is… entirely inscrutable, much to Jon’s dismay. He didn’t expect otherwise, but he still wishes he could get a read on her, determine exactly how she categorizes him now. Probably not as a trustworthy ally. At best, perhaps she sees him as human enough to be suffered to live, but on thin ice and under probation. At worst, she sees him as an irredeemable monster and is simply keeping her opinion to herself for the time being.

Or – no, the worst might be what he was to her last time. She saw him as a monster, yes, and was fully prepared to put him down – like a rabid animal, he thought when confronted with that wording – if he became too much of a danger. It was comforting to know that Basira wouldn’t let sentiment get in the way if he had to be stopped. Less comforting was how she saw him as an asset: a dangerous tool to be used and then locked away once he’d fulfilled his purpose.

Granted, he gave Basira permission to use him – asked her to, in fact. It would be unfair to resent her for taking him up on an offer that he himself put on the table. If his powers could be used to help for once, he was fully willing to sacrifice his humanity to do so. After all, he was already too far gone, he figured – and everyone else seemed to agree.

Georgie certainly seemed to think so. Melanie told him outright that he came back wrong. He had likewise interpreted Martin’s avoidance as a comment on his having changed for the worst, at least initially. And he knew from the moment he woke up that Basira saw him as something other, as something more akin to the monsters they were fighting rather than an ally. He understood why they all felt that way, agreed with their assessments even, but it was soul-crushing nonetheless.

But even if he couldn’t have – didn’t deserve – trust or companionship, he still needed a reason, something to justify choosing not to die. If being wanted wasn’t an option, the least he could do is avoid being a burden. An annoyance. If approval wasn’t on the table, at least he could convince people that he was worth keeping around. And hadn’t that approach always been second nature to him? In a way, he didn’t tend to seek affection so much as try to avoid rejection.

Ultimately, though, pursuing that strategy started to feel sickeningly familiar. It wasn’t until much later that he realized why: between Jonah and the Beholding – and in all likelihood the Web as well – he’d grown accustomed to being seen as a means to an end, and that made it all the more difficult to see himself as a who rather than as a what. It’s a distinction he still struggles with – particularly during those times when the Archive makes its presence known.

He might not have much right to ask for trust or approval, but that doesn’t change the fact that he craves it – perhaps from Basira most of all. If even her opinion of him can change… well, it would go a long way in helping him to believe that he really does have a chance.

“Jon,” Basira says, snapping him back to attention.

Shit. How long has he been staring?

“We need an answer,” she continues.

Jon can’t help but wonder if this is another test. If he agrees, will she see it as further proof of his inhumanity, as evidence that he isn’t trying to resist? If he refuses, will it make her suspicious, lead her to believe he plans on going hunting instead? He’s never been skilled at reading between the lines, at interpreting social cues, at deconstructing the unspoken. The best he can do is ask questions and guess blindly as to the right way to respond – and agonize over the repercussions should he get it wrong. Basira has a way of making that already difficult process even more intimidating.

“Jon,” Basira repeats herself, growing impatient now.

“O-okay,” he says quietly. “It’s… worth a try, I suppose.”

She gives a curt nod. As always, it gives him no insight into her thoughts. He has no time resume brooding, though, as Martin draws his attention with an audible sigh of relief. When Jon glances at him, Martin graces him with a smile – small, almost shy, but genuine. Jon tries and fails to mirror it.

Apparently finished with Jon for the moment, Basira turns her attention to Daisy.

“Come on,” she says, rising to her feet and tapping Daisy on the shoulder. “It’s time for your exercises.”

Obediently, Daisy starts to stand, only for her knees to buckle beneath her. Basira is there to catch her.

“Been sitting too long,” Daisy grunts, embarrassment coloring her cheeks.

“Can you manage the ladder?” Daisy shakes her head, flushing darker. “That’s fine,” Basira says, though Jon thinks he can detect a hint of fear – maybe even melancholy – in her tone now. “Let’s just… walk for now. Wake your legs up.”

The two of them start off down the tunnel, Basira supporting half of Daisy’s weight as she staggers forward.

“Jon?” Georgie says softly.

“Hm.”

“Try to cut yourself some slack, yeah?”

Jon really can’t afford to do that, but saying so will only start them talking in circles again. Martin leans closer and places a hand on Jon’s knee.

“Hey,” he says, looking Jon in the eye with overwhelming sincerity. “We’ve got this, alright?”

“Alright,” Jon responds, and wills himself to believe it.

The three of them exit the tunnel in silence. It isn’t until Jon hoists himself through the trapdoor – Martin assisting in pulling him to his feet – that one of them speaks.

“Oh,” Georgie says, looking at Jon, “by the way…”

“Yes?” Jon says, apprehensive.

“Melanie asked me to tell you that she’s ready to talk, whenever you are.”

“O-oh.”

“I know it's not a great time –”

“No, I – I think I…” Jon nods. “I think I’m ready, too.”

“It doesn’t have to be tonight,” Georgie says hurriedly.

“I really am okay to –”

Martin looks ready to object, but Georgie gets there first.

“Okay, correction: it won’t be tonight,” she interrupts, fixing him with a stern look now. “You’ve had hardly any rest since coming out of the Coffin. I think you should get some actual sleep tonight. If – if – you’re feeling up to it tomorrow, we can arrange something then.”

“Fine,” Jon sighs. He knows better than to argue with the combined tenacity of Georgie and Martin.

And he has to admit, he is rather tired.

A little over a half-hour later, Martin and Jon are back in Document Storage.

When he suggests Jon go to bed, Martin is prepared for a protracted argument. Jon acquiesces surprisingly quickly, though, his only condition being that Martin get some sleep as well. It takes slightly longer to convince Jon to take the cot. Martin pulls up a chair and sits at the bedside, refusing to budge as Jon makes his counterarguments. Eventually, though, Jon starts nodding off mid-protest. It’s only a matter of time before he begrudgingly gives in – but not before demanding that Martin take the better blanket. With an amused shake of his head, Martin agrees to the compromise.

Jon slips between the sheets, Martin leans back in his chair, and for a long moment the two of them watch each other in silence. Jon’s hand rests near the pillow, fingers crooked loosely, palm turned up like an invitation. Martin has the sudden urge to reach out and take it.

Another minute passes before Martin realizes that… well, that’s a thing he can do now, isn’t it? What’s stopping him?

Slowly, tentatively, he extends his hand, lets it hover uncertainly above Jon’s, fingertips barely brushing. He applies the slightest pressure, giving Jon every opportunity to pull back. He doesn’t. Jon interlocks their fingers, curling them over in a firm grasp, and peers up at Martin through his lashes with mingled uncertainty and hope.

“Is this okay?” Martin asks quietly.

As answer, Jon lets out a contented sigh, eyelids fluttering closed as a sleepy smile spreads across his face.

“'Course,” he mumbles, already drifting off. “Always will.”

Martin will follow not long after, slumping precariously to the side, head lolling onto his shoulder, and hand still held fast in a warm, sure grip. It’s a posture that will undoubtedly leave him sore by the time he wakes up, but that discomfort will be overshadowed by the way he feels in these shared, quiet moments: seen, accepted, wanted, embraced.

Anchored, he thinks – and for the first time in months, no thoughts of Loneliness shadow him as he falls to sleep.

End Notes:

Jon: *feels safe for the first time in a literally unmeasurable amount of time and promptly passes right back tf out* Martin: oh no he’s cute

Jon's gotten a SNACK and a NAP now. I hope you're all happy. :P (Just kidding. Every time someone tells me to let Jon have a nap, I am also @ing myself - and Jonny Sims - with the exact same demand.)

(On that note, I find it funny that as I was writing this chapter and finally giving Jon the nap he deserves, he was ALSO finally getting the nap he deserves in canon.)

Citations for Jon’s Archive-speak are as follows: MAG 135; 130/067/066; 032/037.

Next chapter: Melanie gets some actual screentime again!!

#tma #tma fic #long post #the magnus archives

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another-snape-story · 5 years ago

Text

Start of Term Banquet

Chapter IX

The day when school was to open its gates for the students has come, and with it came a strange uneasy feeling, which made you doubt whether you should ever sign up for this.

Wrapped in a blanket, you shielded yourself from the sunlight, which started seeping through a narrow slit between fringed heavy curtains, wishing you could stay in bed till next week – or better till next year – and skip this whole procedure of meeting children and – what seemed even more frightening – running your first class. You grabbed a pillow and pulled it over your face, letting out a loud groan of displeasure. A moment later the pillow landed back on a mattress with a hard flop and rolled across the bed, in your opinion – prohibitively wide for one person. After a split second of balancing on its edge, it fell on the floor. You didn’t care. Staring at the ceiling, you regretted staying at Snape’s for too long last night, but once this thought crossed your mind, your lips stretched in a contented smile. No, this was definitely not something you should ever regret.

One of your feet touched the rug, and soon the other one joined it, when you finally found strength to sit upright. Getting out of bed has never been an easy task for you, especially on days like this. The only thing that made you up was a chance to meet your fellow Professor, who could probably give you a piece of advice on how to survive your first day of teaching. You didn’t feel like acting all thorny and standoffish around him; you already trusted him enough to share some of your insecurities. It just happens sometimes: you meet a person, and on a level deeper than human perception allows, you somehow realize you fit together, even though you might know not much about each other or even nothing at all.

“He’s certainly not there,” you told yourself, turning the handle on the staff room door, but still hoping he was. The more space of the room the opening door revealed, the less of a hope there left within your heart, which was replaced with bitter disappointment, once you stepped inside and didn’t find him. Regrettably, there was a short stature of Professor Flitwick instead. Not that you didn’t like him – otherwise, he managed to combine intelligence with sense of humor in such a pleasingly ingenious and simple manner, you couldn’t resist his captivating charm – but at the moment you just didn’t feel enthusiastic about any abstract conversation.

“A little nervous, ain’t you?” he smiled from above the armrest of a couch.

“I am…” taken aback, you admitted hesitantly. “How did you…?”

“I always feel nervous on the first day of the term, even after all these years,” he replied in a squeaky voice.

Later you thought it was even good you met no other than this tiny man. He definitely was a better person to discuss the issue which bothered the both of you, him – clearly – to a much lesser extent. He persuaded you that there was nothing to worry about and, considering indifference the worst of vices, expressed his approval of taking things close to one’s heart.

As much as Professor Flitwick helped you overcome excitement, there still remained something that gave you no peace. It was getting dark; the students were about to arrive. Busy with start of term banquet preparations, seemingly each of your colleagues scurried through the castle making sure everything was ready; even school ghosts gathered in the Entrance Hall to greet newcomers, but Snape never showed up. Neither actually did Dumbledore, yet his absence didn’t upset you in a slightest. Hoping to chase annoying thought away, you roamed the Great Hall, admiring the view of the floating candles under the ceiling enchanted to look like the sky above.

“Enjoying yourself?” a voice you had no trouble recognizing asked from behind your back.

“Just loitering around,” you turned to face the man wearing his regular black suit and impassive expression. No matter how hard you tried not to smile, the corners of your lips raised up slightly, and so – unable to resist – did his.

“Take your place, the students are already here.”

“Are they?” This news surprised you, since nothing betrayed someone’s presence.

“Come on,” Professor Snape hurried you, heading for the High Table. “You don’t want the crowd to trample you down,” his hand leisurely reached for your waist and froze mere inches to the small of your back, never venturing to come in contact with your body.

As the last word was spoken, children broke through huge oak doors floating the Hall and filling the air with cheerful buzz of excited voices. Amazed, you watched their chaotic maneuvers between benches in attempt to get a better place at the table, realizing how close you were to being engulfed in this swirling mass.

“I swear, Professor, if you appeared a minute later…”

“Save your gratitude for occasion more suitable in the circumstances,” he interrupted you in his typical monotonous manner, scanning the crowd with the look of anthracite eyes, which now seemed even darker than usual.

Attention switched from the man’s face, you noticed your other colleagues joining in. Headmaster was smiling broader than ever. Professor Quirrell caught his foot on the ends of his robe and almost ran into Professor Hooch, who was forced to grab him – overbearing enough – to jolt him back to balance. Aurora Sinistra, Astronomy Professor you got along quite well, happened to find her place on the other side of the table, so you had no choice but to stay where you stood, moreover, you had no reason for complaining – the company this evening prepared for you was more than acceptable.

“I can’t spot Professor McGonagall,” you whispered, leaning closer to Snape’s ear, as if it was a confidential matter.

“Of course, you can’t, because she’s not here,” was his plain answer.

Before you could open your mouth to ask for more details, the oak doors swung open again, and a line of paired up first-years entered the Hall, escorted by the one you were just talking about. Professor McGonagall led them up the teacher’s table, where the Sorting Hat was already awaiting to put children in their Houses.

“L-look at t-that young m-man in round g-glasses,” Quirinus perked up. “This is Harry P-P-Potter! I m-met him in the L-leaky C-C-Cauldron on the 31st of July! H-he was…”

“What were you doing in the Leaky Cauldron, Quirrell? You said you had some business in the Ministry,” Snape cut him short, focused on identifying the legend among other children. It wasn’t hard – he was the only one wearing round glasses. This very moment, rubbing his forehead, the boy looked in your direction. He seemed lost and confused, just like his peers waiting for their turn to be sorted.

“I d-did,” he confirmed, “it was earlier t-that d-day.”

“Don’t mind a glass of sherry before meeting authorities? You never stop surprising me,” Snape snapped disapprovingly.

“N-no, I just…”

“Harry Potter!” McGonagall called the boy’s name, and all the people – students and teachers – stared at him in at once settled silence. While the Hat took its time to decide in which House Harry belonged, Quirinus stuttered something under his breath, probably, trying to find an excuse, but no one was interested.

“Shut up, Quirrell!” you heard Snape’s annoyed hissing, and he stopped half-word, his face – paler than before – contrasting with purple of his huge turban.

“Not Slytherin, eh?” asked the Sorting Hat from the boy’s head, which almost disappeared in its shabby depth, and the man beside you grunted contemptuously, drawing your attention. But once Harry Potter was announced to be a Gryffindor, unimpressed, he pursed his lips, while the rest loudly cheered the little wizard, who walked toward his table looking like fainting from excitement.

“Wanted to have him in Slytherin?” you teased your gloomy colleague.

“Why would I even care?” Professor’s face twisted in disgust, and you giggled.

“So, you said, 31st of July. Wasn’t it that very day when Gringotts break-in took place?” you addressed Quirrell, when the last student was sorted and the feast began.

Snape, who was sitting between the two of you, frowned. “Indeed,” he confirmed.

“Did you see something strange?” your bent over the table trying to get a better view of the man’s face from behind tall black figure.

“S-strange?” he muttered, avoiding your curious glance. “I d-don’t think s-s-so. It was j-just as us-sual.”

“Just – as – usual,” Snape recited thoughtfully. “And how often do you drop in there, Quirrell… to judge about commonness of that place?”

“W-well I’ve b-been there a c-couple of t-times when I needed to f-find another b-book for my w-w-werewolves’ r-research and…”

“I thought you were studying vampires?” Snape clarified in a bored tone.

“I always t-try to l-learn something n-new, to k-keep abreast, you know…” Quirrell returned to his meal.

“So you must’ve heard they procreated a new dragon as a result of crossbreeding!” you exclaimed delightedly.

Snape’s brow arched in astonishment, as he slowly turned his head with ‘oh really?’ expression on his face to check if you’ve suddenly gone insane, or he just overheard something. Leaning on the carved backrest of your chair, you gave him a sign not to dispute, so that Quirrell couldn’t see it.

“Romanian Longhorn and Swedish Short-Snout,” curious what you were up to, Snape played along, naming first two species that came to his mind.

“Exactly! They called it Snout-Horn, but still can’t come to an agreement about its belonging to one of the countries. The argument maxed out recently! Taking into account that the dragon hatched in Slovakia, it’s quite a hot topic!”

“N-no m-matter, h-how they c-call it – it’s a b-b-breakthrough anyway!” Quirrell acknowledged, without showing much interest.

“Its horn grew way too long – and therefore too heavy – so the creature barely holds its head,” you continued vigorously. “Can you imagine!”

A master of self-control, Snape couldn’t help letting out a short snort, not believing he participated in this nonsense.

“What for was all that dragon thing?” he asked you after the feast, on the way back to your chambers.

“He never gives comprehensive answers,” you shared your assumption. “Just wanted to find out, whether he’s a fool or just pretends.”

Snape walked silently beside you.

“I got the same apprehension,” he admitted finally.

“You think he knows the one who did it? I mean… Gringotts break-in?”

“Too fast with conclusions, ain’t we?” a ghost of smile crossed the man’s face and vanished as fast as it appeared.

He was pretending too. You knew this question bothered him even more than yourself, but he wasn’t going to discuss it with you. Why? Didn’t he trust you? Did he consider it not your business? You felt hurt. You really cared about the Stone and the safety of the whole school, but no one seemed to appreciate it.

“Perhaps… Good night, Professor,” disappointed, you gave him a harsh nod.

Snape realized he’s just pushed you away – which was the last thing he wanted – but being not ready for such outcome, he couldn’t find words to fix this stupid situation.

“Good night, Professor,” he answered stiffly, surpassing your formality, and headed down the corridor to his private rooms, scolding himself for being too wary; and you remained standing where he left you – upset, frustrated.

Before offence could squeeze your heart and poison your soul with sadness and misery, Snape stopped in his tracks.

“Don’t let him become aware of your suspicions,” he said quietly, his head just half a turn in your direction.

“Professor?” you called him softly. Desperate notes in your tone prompted him raise his glance on you, and what he saw made him feel relieved at once. You were smiling.

“Rest,” he smiled back. “Your next day’s going to be full of impressions.”

<<<Previous Chapter • Next Chapter >>>

Tag: @diaryofafan17 @yul-is-sparkling @fullmoonshadowwrites @forthehonourof @mayumikurosake @redrehab @space-helen @fluffymadamina nadiigh @theworldisugly-22 @lukaerith-morningstar @sighsinkhuzdul @67-chevy-baby

#snape #severus snape #snape x reader #severus snape x reader #snape fanfiction #severus snape fanfiction

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whatshername-please · 5 years ago

Text

Out of the Water - Chapter III

Synopsis: You were very proud to be a mermaid, thank you very much. You didn’t want to be where the people were. Actually, you’d rather avoid it. Defending the merfolk was the biggest goal in your life… well, it was until you meet a certain pirate… it seems that your family really had a thing for humans, after all. Not that you’d ever admit it…

Pairing: Harry x reader

Word count: 3564

Part 3 of ?

Warnings: none? Possibly grammar mistakes? Also, some cuss words

A/N: English isn’t my first language, so I’ll probably mess up some tenses, grammar and stuff. Go easy on me, please. Feedback is always appreciated.

_________________________________________

“Maybe it’s contemporary art”

You pointed at the destroyed painting on the floor which made Mal stare at you in disbelief. Ok, maybe now wasn’t the best time for light hearted jokes.

Thus, it was probably better not to say anything about the curtains being all torn up since no one took notice of them…

Ben’s castle was not very different from the rest of Auradon: dead silent and a wicked atmosphere hovered in the air. Well, it was until everyone started searching for the king.

Everyone was calling for Ben but that made absolutely no sense, you thought. If Audrey had gone to the castle, she’d have turned Ben to stone or something, making impossible for him to answer. All the noise would just draw her attention, if she didn’t already know you were there which was very likely, by the way.

Really, why couldn’t she set Ben’s clothes on fire, break his favorite clock, shave his eyebrows? It’d have been so much easier to deal with.

Humans always had to make everything more difficult, hadn’t they?

You had gone through the whole the castle and found no one and also Dude had lost the track of Ben’s scent, the best option now would be to go back to Auradon Prep since it was the last place Audrey was seen at. But of course Mal wasn’t entirely convinced that the castle was empty and you were checking the last room left: it was a large hall full of coats of arms, vitrals and armors.

Why were there so many armors? Questionable decorating choice, if someone asked you. And unless Ben was hiding inside one of them, he wasn’t there either. Coming to Ben’s castle had been a completely waste of time.

“Hey!” someone called you, way too over-excited. “We weren’t properly introduced yet, I’m Gil”

The muscular boy extended his hand smiling widely at you. You shook his hand, presenting yourself.

“Are you a princess?” he asked. While Harry called you a princess with disdain, Gil appeared to be genuily interested in you, then again, he was fascinated by everything in Auradon, from the leaves on the trees to the berries in the bushes.

“I am” you answered him.

It seemed to be physically impossible, but his smile grew even bigger than before.

“I’ve never met a princess before. Your highness” he bowed and then looked at you with gleaming eyes “Have I done it right?”

Gil looked very proud of himself and it broke your heart. It was infuriating to think how many wonderful kids were stuck and forgotten on that Isle. For 20 years no one thought or cared about them, even now most people believed that the Isle’s inehabitants were dangerous and past redemption. You dared King Beast to look in Gil’s eyes and say he was a criminal who deserved to be punished for the rest of his life.

“Yes, you did. But you don’t have to do it, really.” you said and he nodded in agreement. Ok, you decided, out of Uma’s friends Gil was your favorite.

All you wanted to do was to find Audrey and go back home, but what was an already difficult task in itself was getting even harder because of Uma and Mal incessant bickering. You tried to ignore when Mal said she wandered what fried octopus tasted like. One thing that never entered humans’ head was that mermaids and fishes were friends, one day you were hanging out with a squid or a crab and suddenly they were fished and eaten by some unfeeling human. Sebastian still had nightmares about the time he got trapped inside your uncle’s…

Oh, wait. Did that armor just move?

Shit.

Everyone noticed it too, excepting Uma and Mal because they were too distracted fighting with each other.

“Girls!” Harry yelled “We have a situation here”. You wished you had a phone to take a picture of Uma’s face at this moment. She looked outraged by the audacity of Harry to cut her off.

At least now everyone was completely aware of that all the armors in that cursed place were moving towards you and ready to cut you all into tiny pieces. Drawing back wasn’t even an option since you were completely surrounded, the only chance you had to get out of this mess would be to fight.

WHY WERE THERE SO MANY ARMORS? If you survived this, you’d have a long talk to Ben about interior design.

Good thing everyone was optimistic about defeating them because, by your account, you were way outnumbered… not that Uma and Mal seemed to care since they were quarreling again. Evie was the one who got fed up with all the nonsense and stepped in and, while she tried to talk them into their senses again, you took the comb from your hair, ready to make it assume its true form. If Fairy Godmother didn’t have a rule against magic… or weapons being unnecessarialy used, you wouldn’t even bother changing your trident into a hair comb. You looked super badass carrying your trident around like the bitching sea queen you were…

Would be….

Whatever…

“Will you really brush your hair now, princess?”

That.

Mocking.

Tone.

Again.

You could either punch him right now or wait for an enchanted knight to do it…. but you had a better idea.

His eyes widened and his mouth dropped open when he saw the comb that had been in your hand the moment before become an imponent trident. You watched with delight that ridiculous smirk on his face change into a shocked face. It always amazed you the look people made when they realized that your cute hair pin could make someone bleed to death, and Harry Hook did not disappoint you.

That would answer his question about your fighting skills.

The jerk.

But you had no time to think any further about Harry Hook and his pesky presence, the knights were near and you had a battle to face.

————–

It was official, you hated the human world and the ridiculous armors they used as house decoration. If Belle and the Beast (did he even have a name or his name was really Beast? Whatever…) hadn’t decide that every single corner of that castle needed to have a knight’s suit, you wouldn’t have had to be dodging swords attacks coming from every single angle that you could think of. It didn’t matter how hard or fast you hit them or that they were too heavy to react because they were enchanted. They could be slow to strike, but they neither got tired nor hurt, so you could attack them as much as you wanted and it didn’t make any difference, you were just scratching the metal. They were many and you were only 8, this wasn’t a fair battle, at all

“We need magic to defeat those things” you shouted to Mal while hitting a knight right in his chest, he stumbled a little but regained his balance fast enough. At the same time that you avoided another hit, you caught a glimpse of Harry who was close to you and unaware of the armor approachinh him from behind.

C'mon Harry, turn around…

Gosh, you had to do everything.

The knight striked again, but you avoided the blow. Taking this as a cue, you ran towards Harry and, as you did so, you managed to knock down the armor that was ready to attack the pirate. The sound of metal hitting the floor made the boy turn his head, he saw the armour laying on the floor and gave you a surprised look; either the boy didn’t expect you were able to fight or he didn’t expect that you would put yourself at risk to help him.

“You can thank me later” you said already attacking another hellish knight.

Thank goodness Mal had heard you and decided to use her magic against the cursed armors and before you could blink, the knights stopped moving and fell in the middle of the room.

It was about time.

Everyone was celebrating the victory, there were no more Uma’s crew or Mal’s gang, all of them were friends and, well… it ended as fast as it started. In one second they were cheering and laughing and in the other they rememrebed they didn’t like each other. The friendliness lasted two seconds, it was a new record.

Both gangs walked away from each other, Uma and her pirates stood on one side, and Mal and the VKs stood on the other. Celia and you decided to stay away watching them from afar.

Evie, who seemed determined to make everyone to get along, proposed an icebreaker and it took all your willpower to not to laugh at your friends’ faces upon hearing this. You have never heard so many groans or seen people looking away so fast in your life: Uma was probably deliberating all the choices she did in her life and looked like she could use a drink, or five, while Gil was just confused. Carlos and Jay were clearly unconfortable and would prefer to sleep forever than to go through this, and the only reason Mal didn’t shut Evie down right at the spot was because she dind’t want to hurt the girl’s feelings. And Harry…

It was a surprise to you when he didn’t come up with some ironic comment. Actually, he looked rather astonished when Evie complimented him and it appeared he was about to reply her before Uma cut him off.

And then she and Mal restarted their usual bickering.

Maybe the icebreaker wasn’t a bad idea, after all.

“Summer School?” Harry laughed “No wonders she wants revenge”.

Not that you’d ever say it out loud, but the pirate had a valid point.

Finally, they decided on following Uma’s initial plan to the joy of the sea witch’s daughter. Apparently, Audrey was still in Auradon Prep, so the girls would go and check her room for clues, and the boys would look out for Ben.

Everyone was ready to leave, but before the team split you spoke up.

“Actually, I’m going with the guys, ok?”

“Why?” Mal questioned you, raising an eyebrow.

“Because if Audrey shows up it’s better that at least one person knows how to use magic” you explained.

“No, the amber is the only thing that can defeat her, you wouldn’t stand a chance” Mal was clearly annoyed that you were holding them back, but you ignored the whay she glared at you and went on.

“Even so, I may be able to hold her off with my trident. You, Uma and Evie got brains, strenght and magic. Jay, Carlos, Gil and Harry, on the other hand….”

Your eyes lingered on the boys in front of you who, you knew for a fact, would kill each other in the first opportunity.

“Too edgy” you pointed to Jay.

“Too pure” and Carlos.

“Too bubbly” Gil.

“Too…” you looked Harry up and down and shrugged “Honestly? I can’t even describe him.”

Mal went silence for a moment, deliberating whay you had said, while everyone else was staring at you with a look you knew too well. It was the famous “I can’t believe she actually said that” face.

“Fine, you proved your point” Mal finally declared and the ofended look on Jay’s face almost made you laugh. You’d have to apolize to him later… But right now you had a king to find before Mal snapped at you again.

You and the guys left the castle and followed Dude, who had detected Ben’s scent.

“I’m not edgy” said Jay with a pout, looking too adorable to be taken seriously.

“Didn’t you almost break your arm trying to learn R.O.A.R just for the sake of beating Chad? Or what about that time when you got into a fight with a guy twice your size because he said the only reason you won the tourney game was because everybody on the other team was scared to come near a villain kid? ” you asked him.

“Hey! You were encouraging me!” he reminded you, laughing about the incident.

“I was not” you denied, putting your hand on your chest in a mocking manner “How dare you to suggest I’d ever do something like that”. You tried to make a serious face, but broke into a smile in a matter of seconds as you remembered that day. "Did we punch him, though? I can’t recall".

“No, Carlos stopped us… he is too pure” the VK teased, and Carlos didn’t take it kindly. As he passed by the both of you, he hit Jay’s arm hard enough to make his friend yelp.

“Come back here, Carlos” Jay called and ran after him “I was only joking”.

You giggled.

Humans, what dorks.

Minding your own business, you kept walking silently. Your friends were ahead, making sure to not lose Dude from their sight. Things appeared to be safe, at least for now, so you decided to change your trident into its pocket version, and with one quick motion of your hand, it became a hair comb again.

“How do you do that?” it was Gil who asked and he seemed utterly puzzled by your trident.

“Oh, it’s magic.” you said while Gil observed with narrowed eyes you place the enchanted comb in your hair, the boy was staring so intensively at it that looked like he was wainting for the comb to burst into flames or something “It’s no big deal, really”

“Yeah, you’re probably used by it, right? But we don’t have magic on the Isle…” he looked down, ashamed of being impressed by something that was so ordinary to you, and you felt terrible. You didn’t mean to upset him.

“Oh no, I mean… I just never really thought about it…” you tried to explain.

“Of course you didn’t, why do people in Auradon would think how their lives are perfect?” Harry, who had been oddly quiet, spoke. However, if he were expecting you to ague with him, he’d be disappointed. The pirate could get on your nerves but you couldn’t be a hypocrite and deny all the privileges you had just because you were born on the “right” side of the barrier.

Of course Harry didn’t know that was how you felt about the barrier and took the lack of a response as an confirmation.

“How nice it must be to have everything, huh?” he tried to sound cynical, but you could hear the hurt and bitterness in his voice.

“King Triton has a trident too, you know.” Gil said absently, ignoring completely the tension between Harry and you “It was on the Isle two years ago, we almost got it”

“Yeah I know. I nearly killed my cousin when I discovered she messed up with grandpa’s trident” you remembered like it was yesterday. Your cousin Arabella decided she wanted to prove her worth by summoing a storm using your grandfather’s magical trident. If this wasn’t reckless enough, she also lost the trident that ended up on the Isle. Thanks to Mal and her gang the trident was recoreved before your grandfather noticed it was gone.

What a day.

“Wait, your grandfather? Are you…?” Gil’s eyes widened when he realized who you were.

“Yeap, King’s Triton granddaughter, that’s me.” you finished his sentence, very proud of being who you were.

“Then you are a mermaid!” the blond boy’s eyes moved to your legs and he frowned at them, as if he couldn’t understand what they were doing there “If you are a mermaid, where is your fishtail?”

You chuckled and explained. It wasn’t the first time someone asked you that, but you didn’t mind. Actually, everytime you had the chance to brag about being a mermaid, you did it.

“When I need to be on land I turn into a human”

“Uma is Ursula’s daughter, did you know that?” it amazed you how Gil was capable of saying anything in such a light manner. Most people would be very cautious about speaking of the former villain of someone’s family in their presence but not Gil, he definitely didn’t mind bringing the subject up.

If you knew that Uma was the sea witch’s daughter? IF YOU KNEW THAT. You have been talking about this girl for years and, in the past months, you literally hid her in your room. YOU DID KNEW THAT.

This was what you really wanted to say, but instead you laughed it off “I think I’ve heard her name a few times”.

“Is it his trident?” it was Harry the one making a question now and, for the first time, he seemed genuinely curious and not just being sarcastic or cunning.

“Oh no… it was a gift from him, actually. It’s not as powerful as his, though. But it’s good enough” one thing that never ever bothered you was to talk about your life as a mermaid. If someone ever decided to write a tale about you, people would stop thinking that every mermaids’ wish was to become human.

You just loved being a mermaid and nothing would ever change that.

“What can it do?” he inquired, taking a closer look at the comb in your hair. He was wondering about the damage that could cause, no doubt.

“It can control water, for the most part. But is also good to beat the shit out of my enemies”

He smiled.

Harry Hook had sincerely smiled at you.

Maybe people were right, maybe you were born on the Isle and were switched at birth with some kid from Auradon. It would explain your talent for befriending villain kids.

You have never made friends easily, better saying, people didn’t want to be friends with you because of your reputation of being temperamental and moody, which wasn’t entirely true. You just didn’t care about being on the spotlight or doing what people expected you to do. Did you have to to sing along with woodland creatures just because you were a princess? Your area of expertise was marine life, for crying out loud. Squirrels and mice freaked you out! Once, a guy asked you on a date and thought it would be a good idea to go to a sea food restaurant!

You weren’t moody, humans were the ones who had the emotional range of a barnacle.

Also, a lot of people in Auradon were too self-absorbed, they thought everyone had a lovely happy life like them. Everytime you brought the Isle up they said you were overreacting and that it couldn’t be that bad. You wondered if they could see the black clouds that covered the place or if they even remembered that all Auradon’s leftovers were sent there.

You tried to be patiente but sometimes -well, most of times- you could not help yourself and ended up speaking your mind. At least from now on, you could claim that you have never cursed anyone out of spite.

Thanks, Audrey.

“If we’re getting to know each other, I have a question for you” you said to Harry who arched an eyebrow, curious about what you were going to say “Is your accent real?”

He blinked in confusion, not sure if he had heard you right.

“Yes! What kind of question is that?” he was perplexed by what you asked. Harry wasn’t used to people commenting on his accent and the times someone had said something about it, it was always to make fun of him - and Harry always made sure they learned not to do it again. So, he didn’t know if you were serious or simply mocking him.

“I don’t know. I believed you were being dramatic, to be honest. The eyeliner, the coat… The accent could very well be part of your pirate aesthetic” You didn’t want to sound rude or anything, you honestly imagined the accent was only him being theatrical, but since he didn’t answer right away (not even a ironic remark), you added quickly “It’s a lovely accent, it suits you”.

At first, you expected him to shut you down or tell you to fuck off. However, as he didn’t reply anything, you thought you really had offended the boy. You were ready to apologize (you could be the sea bitch, but you weren’t rude…). Instead, he bursted into laughter and you frowned, not understanding what was so funny to make Harry Hook laugh like that.

That boy was completely unpredictable.

“It’s not an aesthetic, lass. I’m a pirate” it was the first time since you met that Harry seemed so amused and it wasn’t at someone’s expanses. “Why did you think this?”

“Well, you do walk around carrying a hook” you pointed to the sharp object he kept holding since the moment you laid your eyes on him.

“And who are you to judge? You have a magical trident in your hair.”

It was your turn to laugh, maybe Harry wasn’t that bad.

“Fair enough, I can’t argue against it” you agreed with him,

Upon hearing your words, his mouth twisted into a smug grin…

“I knew you would warm up to me, princess”

Yeah, you took back what you thought seconds before, Harry Hook was insufferable. You huffed in annoyance and walked away from him and his pompous attitude.

Humans were never worth the stress.

#harry hook x reader #harry hook x you #harry hook imagine #harry hook #disneys descendants #descendants x reader #descendants imagine #descendants fanfiction #out of the water

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chancellormatt · 4 years ago

Text

Just Another Orbit of the Sun

(Not Voltron. Just something I whipped up with last night, based off a dream I had. Might turn into a series)

New Years Eve - 2021

Miles didn’t care much for parties. They were loud, obnoxious and tended to keep him up on work nights. And of course, no awful party was complete without fireworks.

That characteristic hiss followed by a sharp crackle and burst of light had been a regular occurrence throughout the evening. It was starting to grate on his nerves. And if that wasn’t doing it the music of the non-stop parade sure was.

Floats, marching bands, the works were active in the street. As a result, the sidewalks were crowded. Some watched the display, cheering. Others stumbled in and out of bars or simply drank on the street in obvious displays of intoxication. No one minded. They were all too excited.

Miles weaved between and around these ones, not hiding his disdain, but not dwelling on it either. He, regretfully, had somewhere to be tonight.

No, Miles didn’t care much for parties, and New Years Eve was the worst party of all. Practically the whole world decided to forgo such luxuries as sleep for one night to celebrate the arbitrary end and beginning of a unit of time. Just another orbit of the sun. What was so special about that?

He'd hoped for a more reserved celebration this year. With the Covid pandemic of the year prior having neutered partying in much of the world, he’d been hopeful that this year would have been a repeat. But they’d had to go and make a vaccine. Even still he’d hoped people would’ve at least learned and recognized parties for the writhing, disgusting, virus-breeding cesspools that they were.

But then it happened.

He sighed, letting his gaze finally tilt up to the sky above. More fireworks crackled, but beyond those, distant lights burned in the sky. They weren’t stars. Light pollution from the city made most stars invisible. These lights were varied in color. Some were stationary. Others zipped up and down the skyline, earning oohs and aahs from watching pedestrians.

They were alien ships.

It had begun six months prior. Messages broadcasted from outside the solar system with insistent regularity. It had taken some time to decipher the messages, not on account of their complexity, but actually because of the lack thereof. Everyone was so busy trying to decode an alien message, that it was some time before anyone checked if it was actually something we already understood. English, at least at first, written in binary code. The message was three simple words:

We Are Coming.

Eventually it’d changed to Mandarin Chinese. Then Spanish, French, Russian and so on.

The governments of the world had naturally tried to hide this fact. They’d done their best. But the message had been spread too wide. Corporations had discovered it before long. And before even they could figure out how to monetize the discovery, the scientific community seized a rare bout of expediency. Astronomers wrote, reviewed and published journals on the monumental discovery in record time.

Gag orders had been circumvented, the internet had done its work, and before long the whole world had known the truth:

Humans were not alone in the universe. Aliens were real, and they were on their way.

Panic had naturally followed. There was the usual rioting and fear mongering, but the world had gotten used to that sort of reaction with disturbing efficiency.

Miles didn’t really mind fear mongering itself that much. A healthy amount of paranoia was good, so long as it was well balanced and didn’t end with you tossing molotov cocktails into department stores.

The next development had helped calm the masses. The alien’s messages had grown in complexity. They explained that they’d been observing humanity for some time. They’d seen our various trials and weaknesses, but also our strengths and victories. They’d decided to share some of their knowledge with us. Everyone needed help from time to time. Once, long ago, another species had helped them just as they now helped us.

A layer of cautious optimism settled after that. Many still didn’t fully believe. There was the usual round of conspiracies, like that it’d all been made up by the government and was a cover for satellite mind control devices. And there were also fears that the aliens were flat out lying and would pull a War of the Worlds soon as they were close enough to do so.

When their ships had first appeared in the solar system, real communications had begun. Back and forth between aliens and representatives of Earth. They answered all questions posed to them. Even started an Ask Me Anything on Reddit. Explained what their home planet was like, aspects of their culture, and gave very general explanations of their technological capabilities. They even told jokes and shared memes.

That’d won most people over.

The aliens had come off downright personable. These aliens were no longer a theoretical presence. They were real, communicating people. This was no conspiracy, you could see their ships with a good enough telescope for crying out loud.

And Miles had. He’d needed to see for himself. He’d never forget the chill down his spine when he’d first seen one of those ships hanging in the night sky.

As the months grew on the aliens had inched closer, only of course, after clearing everything with all suitable officials, be them governmental, scientific and even religious. They’d ended up setting up shop in earth’s orbit, with promises to come down and visit soon. However, they’d decided to wait until humans had completed their ‘celebratory solar rotation.’ The Chinese government hadn’t much cared for that reason for delay, but hey, they were still trying to hide the aliens from their masses so who cared what they thought?

So here they were, giving a light show to the whole world on New Year's Eve. Floats with little green men and every other depiction of aliens in fiction. The actual aliens had pointed out that most of these were wildly off the mark, but also didn’t mind the association. One of them even had ET as his profile picture.

That wasn’t to say the whole world had decided to simply trust the aliens. Contrasting the revelers were the classic doom and gloom types. Signs declaring: “End is Nigh!” “Alien Overlords Here!” “Nuke Them Before They Eat Us!” and so on and so forth.

They were loons, of course. And yet...some part of Miles found more kinship with the crazies than the people that simply bought all this. It seemed too...perfect. Aliens, it turned out, were kind of boring. Or so they wanted to seem.

Miles finally found the place he was looking for. A bar by the name of Terry’s Tap. Miles let out a sigh and walked inside.

The debautercy continued within. Drunk sang songs welcoming our new “Friends from the Stars”

Miles scanned the booths and spotted the architects of his annoyance: His two friends and roommates, Jack and Harper. They spotted him and waved excitedly. He rolled his eyes and walked over to take a seat beside Jack.

Jack was a six-foot, two-hundred pound, muscle-bound welder who couldn’t hold his liquor as well as his size would suggest.

Harper was a five foot two, ninety-pound blonde who worked in insurance and lived by the phrase ‘dance like nobody’s watching.’

They were tragically his two best friends in the world.

“You made It!” Harper exclaimed.

“Against my better judgement, I did.” Miles nodded.

“You’ve been missing a great night, dude. Did you see the parade?”

“I don’t see how I could have missed it.”

“Nah, don’t listen to him, the Parade is lame. In here is where it's at!” Harper declared raising her pint to the rest of the bar who cheered in reply.

“She was dancing on the bar earlier.” Jack informed “It was wild!”

“Now that I actually would have liked to see.”

“Well don’t worry, the night is still young!” Harper shook her arm, waving one of the waitresses over.

“Whatcha having?” The perky woman said, far more lively than anyone working on New Years ought to be.

“Just a beer.”

“Awe, come on man,” Jack shook his head. “Try something a little harder for once.”

“When’s the next time we’re gonna party like this!? It's New Years Eve and there are aliens above our heads!” Harper argued.

“Yeah…there sure are...” I said, eyes drifting out the window towards the lights in the sky above.

They noticed my hesitance and both sighed.

“Why the long face, hon?” The waitress inquired.

“He’s just suspicious of the aliens.” Harper said conspiratorially. “Thinks they’re all gonna probe us.”

“Ah.” The server said, understanding.

“I have a healthy amount of caution, that’s all. And I will be having a beer.”

The waitress nodded and walked off.

“You’re gonna have to come around to the aliens sooner or later.” Harper said pointedly.

“That’s what I’m worried about…”

“Here he goes again.” Jack let out a sigh.

“I’m just saying that I think they’re trying a little too hard to get us to put our guard down.”

Harper shook her head. “Look, why would aliens come thousands of light years, overcoming the very laws of physics just to try and pull an Independence Day? We’ve got no resources that you couldn’t find all over the galaxy. They’d benefit nothing from an interstellar war. It makes no sense. You’re just programmed by movies.”

“Maybe.”

Her arguments made sense. Harper was an intelligent woman. It really didn’t make logical sense why aliens from such an advanced society would harbor any malicious intent for what to them would be a primitive and relatively harmless civilization. That didn’t make the uneasy in Miles gut go away.

Mainly for the simple fact that human beings had accomplished an astonishing amount in their time on the planet and had still managed to be real pieces of crap when it suited them. Advanced technology didn’t equal and advanced people.

But there was really nothing he could do anything about it. In a few years China would control their economy, the ice caps would be melted, and everyone would have chips in their brain. Change, good or bad came. And there was little that one man like Miles could do about that.

The waitress came back with his beer. So he settled into the booth and started drinking.

“Alright,” Jack finally said. “I’m gonna see if any of these guys want to play a drinking game. Everytime a firework goes off, take a drink!”

Miles shared a look with Harper. It seemed they’d be carrying him home once again. She only shook a head and put down her own drink. She started bouncing to the song that came on on the radio.

“Welp, I’m gonna see if anyone wants to dance! I love this song!”

The night wore on and everyone kept partying. Even Miles wasn’t immune. That was perhaps the biggest problem with parties: They were contagious. He even found himself singing along with some of the drunks at one point.

But later, when 12 o'clock was approaching, things were really heating up. Fireworks blastest with little pause, and few in the bar were truly sober anymore, Miles being a notable exception. The nonstop partying of the night was fast-approaching its zenith.

And then it happened. Harper was singing along with a group of partiers, their words slurred and broken, when one of them swayed something awful. A young guy, that Miles would have described as extraordinarily ordinary looking, suddenly doubled over and vomited on the floor. It was a violent retch that made everyone around scatter. Some of it, tragically, got on Harper’s dress. She’d be moping about that later. But there were a few laughs and some even ignored it all together. But then the man fell to his knees quivering.

“What’s wrong? Just found your limit, buddy?” Harper asked, leading in to touch him on the shoulder comfortingly. She was too nice sometimes.

Then the man looked up, eyes hazy. The skin on his face had bled to shades of indigo in patches. People around him scattered backwards. His eyes focused and he seemed to notice that he’d become the subject of some attention. He looked down at his hands which were fast bleeding to indigo as well. His eyes twitched in a strange expression.

“Xfildrq’Hnin!”

With that peculiar non-word, the man sprinted out the door. Distantly, Miles heard the fireworks crescendo and a collective cheer outside. It was a new year. No one in Terry’s Tap joined in the cheer or kissed each other. They all stared at the door. Harper who’d actually touched the man and still had his vomit on her dress looked petrified.

Miles then did the only thing he could think of, and ran after the man.

He heard Jack curse behind him and chase after. Miles quickly caught sight of the man outside. It wasn’t hard. He was indigo after all. He was also one of the few people not gazing upwards to appreciate the conclusion of the fireworks show. Miles sprinted down the street, shoving people out of the way when necessary. The Indigo Man darted down an alley and Miles was hot on his heels. Jack might have been able to bench press an obscene amount of weight, but Miles had always been more of a track and field man.

Above, the crackle of fireworks light up what would have otherwise been a dark alley.

A fence split the alleyway halfway down. The indigo man didn’t waste a moment scaling it like a spider. Miles was fast after, but couldn’t quite launch himself right over the barrier as easily, so he lost some time.

They broke out onto a street parallel with the waterway. The Indigo Man was trying to put some distance between them. Miles redoubled his efforts. He wanted answers. Needed answers!

He was close, closer, just a little more...

Miles tackled the Indigo Man to the ground, sending them both tumbling across the pavement. But the Indigo Man kicked Miles off him in an instant and shot to his feet. Miles was up almost as quick. The Indigo Man had turned around to run in the direction they’d just come, but found Jack standing there, cutting off his escape.

“Nowhere...to run, buddy.” Jack panted out, spreading out meaty arms.

The Indigo Man looked back and between them, seeming to weigh his options.

“Now, how about you explain just what-”

The Indigo Man spun around and dove into the river. Miles cursed. They ran over the edge but there was no sign of the man. Just dark waters.

“...good job blocking him, we almost had him.” Miles eventually said.

“And what exactly was ‘him?’”

Miles looked up, past where the fireworks were beginning to die down, to scattered lights of the spaceships beyond.

“You can’t think…”

“I can and I do. Let’s get back to Harper.”

The walk back to Terry’s Tap was quiet. They found Harper crouched down near the pile of vomit. Miles approached, thinking she might have been in shock when she suddenly stood up and handed him a bottle. Jack Daniels.

“The guys over there-” She stuck a thumb over her shoulder indicating a group of drunks. “-said he was hitting this stuff pretty hard. Put it down like it was water. Bartenders hadn’t seen him around here before. No one else I asked had either.”

Miles nodded, taking the bottle. Harper always was good about getting the facts. Part of her job, Miles supposed.

“...I don’t think he realized he was essentially drinking poison.” Miles finally said.

“Really? But don’t uh...” Jack said, glancing over one shoulder, “...they know all about us?”

“It sure seems that way.” Miles said, distantly. “But if you pay close enough attention, they make plenty of mistakes and misconceptions all the time on their media accounts. I’d be willing to bet the bulk of their more ‘friendly’ material is auto-generated based on our internet patterns.”

“What, you mean like those generated memes?”

“Something like that.”

“What...does all this mean?” Harper finally asked.

“It means they lied. They aren’t going to be here soon. They’re already on the planet.” Miles finally looked up from the bottle, meeting the gazes of his two friends.

“We should get out of the city. Tonight.”

The entire bar seems to chew on that. Jack and Harper both nodded. The trio moved out of the bar, as inconspicuous as possible. Outside, those oblivious to the revelation continued to party. Miles decided he needed to make some calls. There were some other people besides just Jack and Harper that he wanted to have around in case...in case what? Miles looked up once more at those glowing lights.

They were up to something, after all. He really hated being right.

Ten minutes into the new year, and things were already far too interesting.

#new year #new years ev #2021 #short story #flash fiction #aliens #alien life

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missstormcaller · 5 years ago

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CAN’T FEAR YOUR OWN WORLD Vol. II Part 16 Full Translation

This is 4/4 of part 13 on the app (chapter 14 continued)

Rukongai

"What's the big idea with this thing!? We're not about to get dragged into this ridiculous dispute are we!?"

At the words of Candice who has gotten caught up in the aftershocks of Ikomikidomoe's struggle - the Zanpakutō which had taken the appearance of a gargantuan Hollow - Meninas replies in her usual manner.

"We were more or less dragged into it from the very beginning, I think…."

"But still, weren't we told in the beginning to simply knock the lights out of that so-called Fullbringer lot and then snatch them away!? So why in the hell are we now getting dragged into this conflict between a freak who looks like its had all kinds of overgrown Hollow condensed into it, and a bunch of Arrancar!? Come to think of it, didn't the number of Arrancar just double without us noticing!?"

Whilst using her lightning to crush the rocks that were being flung into the air, Candice pointed at the two female Arrancar who had newly emerged.

"Speaking of which, what's the deal with their style!? There's way too much emphasis on their figures don't ya think!?"

"Candice, you can't really speak for others though can you?"

Meninas spoke whilst observing the Holy Knights uniform belonging to the Quincy who had her chest on open display, but pretending that she didn't hear that, Candice initiates a counter-attack.

"Anyway, if this monstrosity isn't stopped first and foremost, then we won't be able to continue with our task."

Although they also had the option of making a brief retreat, it did not appear likely that Kurotsuchi Mayuri would tolerate such a thing.

That being the case, they should probably battle the gargantuan threat by taking advantage of this confusion, and at the same time, watch for an opportunity when the Fullbringers are off their guard. Even if it was impossible to capture the Fullbringers this time around, it was still a chance to analyse how their opponents fight among other things.

Thinking as much, Candice proceeds with the battle whilst paying mind to whether or not Ginjō's group would make an escape.

"Meni! Create an opening!"

"Alright."

Upon nodding in understanding, Meninas made an approach towards the feet of the great Hollow with slow movements, she slipped herself into a position that was located in her opponent's blind spot.

Then, the muscles in her arms that were still in their normal state are instantly made to swell, using her might she lifts upwards.

Just with that alone, the huge physique of 'Ikomikidomoe' is violently thrown off balance, and in a chain reaction, Ikomikidomoe is scooped up from the ground and sent tumbling down with great force.

"Ha! Nice work! Leave the rest to me!"

In a manner that appeared to aim for the spot where the opponent's balance had been weakened, Candice fired a volley of arrows entwined in lightning.

Moreover, as if to indicate that it was the finishing blow, she cast down the same "Electrocution" that was unleashed upon Ginjō and the others a short while ago.

The barrage of assaults, that were hammered out with lightning speed momentum in a very literal sense, blanket the surroundings with a dazzling light.

"That was close…! What the heck are those two doing! Do they not care that I'm also standing here!?"

Having evaded the lightning strike by a hairbreadth, Hirako exclaimed aloud as a cold sweat trickled down his cheek.

"Aren't those the Quincies that became Mayuri's subordinates!? …Yes, that's right. I should've known that Mayuri wouldn't worry about the welfare of myself or other fellow Shinigami."

Coming to accept this realisation by himself, Hirako maintains even more of a distance, he then shifted his gaze in the direction of 'Ikomikidomoe' who had been engulfed in the flash of the lightning strike, however——

"No good. There wasn't much of an effect."

'Ikomikidomoe' who had taken the form of a monster only moments ago, now adopted a spherical shape after folding its limbs, sitting neatly within the Rukongai as an ominous item of art.

In the next instant, a white haze gushed forth from the space around this colossal ball, and no sooner than that did an infinite number of small creatures sporting wings materialise out of said haze.

Though described as 'small', this is only in comparison with the mammoth build of Ikomikidomoe; the creatures who would appear to be Adjuchas level Hollows from outward appearance, begin to take flight into the air as a swarm.

Then, as if it were a protective response, they lunged directly at the aggressors —— at the pair known as Meninas and Candice.

Looking down at the Zanpakutō which continues to generate these small-scale 'terminals' spawned in the dozens, and hundreds, Hirako pulled a frown as he corrected his own perception of the matter.

"…I guess I was mistaken in calling it a huge robot huh."

Whilst maintaining the utmost vigilance towards Hikone who commands that Zanpakutō, and towards the man known as Tsunayashiro Tokinada who bestowed such a Zanpakutō upon the child, he continues speaking.

"This is like an entire 'country' sprouting legs and moving. It's not something we can deal with using orthodox methods."

As Hirako calmly dissects the state of affairs, Candice's group is forced into a disadvantageous position before they could even get a grasp on the situation.

"How can there be a Zanpakutō like this!? Or maybe I should be asking if this thing is really even a Zanpakutō at all!?

"That might be a little problematic huh…."

Using Heilig Pfeil the two continue to shoot through the swarm of beasts that were advancing towards them, however, much to the pair's regret, the enemy's numbers were far too many.

Meninas hit back with superhuman strength, and Candice with the power of her lightning strikes, yet in this current situation the creatures continue to be spawned with momentum that transcends their own, and moreover, there had hardly been any damage incurred on the main unit itself.

With a Galvano Javelin in each hand —— spears created by Reishi imbued lightning bolts —— Candice strikes the creatures down, however their numerical advantage far exceeds the quantity which could be dealt with effectively using only two blades.

"Crap…! If only I could use the power of my Vollständig…."

Originally Candice was able to manage six blades by utilising the wings produced by her Quincy Vollständig, but because of Yhwach's 'Auswählen' she ended up no longer being able to invoke Vollständig, as a result she has now become limited to handling two blades.

What's more troubling is that it was by no means the case that these creatures were charging at them in a wild and tactless fashion, rather they come in for the attack whilst calculatedly catching the girls off guard through controlled movements, almost as though they were a single organism despite being a swarm.

Although they are annihilated in one fell swoop by the lightning strikes firing in rapid succession from the sky, it was but a drop in the ocean.

"tch… did that just stir up a hornet's nest…?"

Though her exhaustion is quite significant after the barrage of assaults from a short moment ago, on the basis of acknowledging that, Candice attempts to unleash her 'Electrocution' once more, and in that very moment ——

"Just drop it. Your Blut Arterie will end up being burnt out before anything."

A voice which struck a familiar chord, rattles her eardrums.

"Whaa…?"

What exactly does it mean that this voice could be heard in such a place?

Before Candice's mind could process that thought, the 'answer' took form and came sweeping in to wolf down the swarm of beasts.

A long and narrow jaw that had made a sudden appearance, swallowed up several hundreds of these grotesque figures in a single breath.

As the abnormal jaw that had preyed upon the white beasts retracted back into a mouth, the owner of the voice gave utterance to her impressions of what she had consumed just now, coupled with a languid sigh.

"It's the same with those skeletal bastards from the other day… just as I thought, mass-produced goods are flavourless."

Floating in midair, is a young girl whose distinctive cold eyes peeked through from under her white Sternritter military cap.

After observing her form, Candice opens her eyes wide and gives a yell.

"Li…Lil!?"

Common sense would dictate that It was an impossible sight.

Having been separated over half a year ago, her companions looked for ways to somehow make contact with her from their position, however she had appeared before them ahead of anything that could actually occur.

In response to a stunned Candice, the girl with the cold eyes —— Liltotto Lamperd —— uttered a complaint in an exasperated tone.

"Jeez, the plan was to try and collect you by taking advantage of all the commotion, but it turns out your sorry asses are right in the middle of that commotion so just what the hell am I supposed to do now? What a drag."

"I-It's you! How are you here? Perhaps, you've come to help us!?"

"Didn't I just say that I've come to collect you? Listen when people talk bitch."

"I mean, you're really alive…. After I heard that you had turned against His Majesty, I… I thought for sure you'd-…"

Having even held onto the suspicion that, in the worst case scenario, Kurotsuchi Mayuri had lied about Liltoto and the others being alive, Candice raises her eyes to Liltoto with an expression that was a mix of relief and astonishment.

"Don't call that bastard 'Majesty'. Either way, it seems he's long gone."

As Lil said so, another voice could be heard coming from behind Candice.

"Wow, you're looking more rough than I expected. Too lame huh, Candice chan?"

With a twitch, a vein throbbed at her temple, before she could even rejoice at their reunion, Candice threw a backhand blow.

"Gigiii!"

Whilst effortlessly evading her fist, the black haired Quincy —— Giselle Gewelle —— raised her voice in protest as she smiled with only the corner of her mouth.

"Eh, don't drag out the end of your words, you make people's names sound like 'old man' you know." (TN: -- When Candice drags out Gigi's name above it sounds exactly like "じじい" which means "old man")

"It's wrong that you made Gigi mad just now."

Without exuding even a trace of an air that could be described as anything akin to a touching reunion, Meninas spoke in her usual manner.

"Wait a minute! Don't you think you're also accepting this way too casually Meni!? It's not like I'm the only one who can't read the situation is it?"

"If you want to complain, why don't we catch a damn bite to eat later while it goes through one ear and out the other. Anyway, right now it looks like we have to find a way to deal with that trouble over there first."

The swarm of beasts continue to gush forth from the white haze as unchanged as before, but perhaps analysing the abilities of Lil's group who were the newcomers on the scene, the swarm's current stance was watching the group carefully whilst encircling them at a distance.

Then, Gigi tilted her head in response to Liltoto's words.

"Huh? Deal with them you say… shouldn't we just make a run for it?"

"…That was the plan. Even if we did run away as is, I suppose it would be pointless if there are also bombs implanted in Candi and Meni's bodies."

"…gah!"

Although Candice had taken this possibility into account, she was once again struck with terror by having it pointed out through Lil who is the brains among this group of friends.

Rather than address Candice herself —— Liltoto proposes a deal towards the person at the other end of the communicator that was fitted to her clothes.

"You can hear me can't you, Kurotsuchi Mayuri. I'll cooperate with your so-called experiment. So in return, I demand the release of Candice and Meninas."

It was at that point, that a very distinctive voice echoed across from Candice's regulation cap.

"Dear me, that you actually made the error of believing that you are in any position to negotiate with me, how very conceited of you."

"Whoa!?"

Disregarding Candice who was taken aback by the voice that had suddenly slipped out from atop her head, travelling across the communicator, the voice speaks with a dispassionate tone.

"I didn't implant the likes of bombs in the first place. Thanks to the Central 46 and the captain commander who can't adapt to the times, I was very recently prohibited from implanting bombs into the bodies of subordinates. So long as you bear the name 'unit', the lot of you too, can only be treated as soldiers rather than tools. Good grief, what an oh-so benevolent gesture."

"Since we're on the topic of bombs, could that not mean that you've tossed in plenty of other crazy stuff?"

"Do you really think so?… Never mind, Quincies are now curio. I have no intention of breaking them so easily."

"Hold on!? What's the deal with that vague wording!?"

Paying no heed to the cries of Candice, Lil calmly continues negotiations with Mayuri.

Without dropping her guard against the surroundings even while they negotiate, the small units of beasts that were charging towards them at random intervals as a diversionary tactic, is 'swallowed whole' each time as she expertly moved the conversation forward.

"What I want is merely the freedom of Candice and Meninas, and the guarantee of their safety. They can be exchanged with a handful of fighting potentials among us Quincy, that doesn't sound half bad right?"

"Once you've attained that level of pretentiousness, it goes beyond comical and one can only feel pity. You may be curios, but as far as I'm concerned, the likes of Quincies are an area of research that has been fully exhausted. Did you actually think that the lot of you had that much worth?"

"If Quincies don't have that much worth, then what does it matter to at the very least part with only two, Candi and Meni? I suppose that would just about cover the cost of doing your chores. Also, this concerns you. You've already implanted something within me and Gigi too either way, haven't you?"

"Huh?"

Gigi raises her voice at this unexpected information, but Mayuri's voice makes a blunt assertion with a nonchalant air.

"Oh, even if they're fools, I can't say I completely detest those who are quick on the uptake. That Quincy named Ishida didn't even have the slightest clue until I told him."

"Why thank you. I pray that you're also the type who's quick on the uptake."

In response to Lil who was holding her ground against Mayuri, the voice streaming through Candice's cap resumes speaking with stifled laughter.

"If I refuse you here, do you perhaps intend to take your negotiations directly to the captain commander? My, my, if Hirako Shinji wasn't present, I could've had you silenced in secret."

"Maybe I decided to go to the trouble of showing my face precisely because another captain rank is present?"

"Quite the clever-clogs aren't you? Good grief."

"The danger that you are has touched our very core after all. That he didn't include you among the Special War Potentials, I can only imagine that Yhwach was off his rocker."

Following Lil's words, the sound of a heavy sigh could be heard coming from the communicator fitted to Candice's cap.

"I make no concessions based on blatant flattery. Well, it's true that your ringleader's eyes were as good as blind however. It appears that even if he could forecast the future, he wasn't able to see the reality."

Then, in a somewhat upbeat tone, Mayuri offered a concrete proposal.

"I want to dig up as much data as possible on that colossal mutant of a Zanpakutō, as well as the mock-up Shinigami trial subject standing on top of it. If the lot of you can do that, then I will upgrade your treatment from test subjects to at least the level of mercenary. And if you also happen to capture the Fullbringers while you're at it, perhaps I can even help you grow taller as a special reward."

"Unnecessary. Even If my physique and whatnot got bigger, it would probably only make me get hungry faster. So to sum it up, it's going to be us knocking the wind out of that huge freak right?"

"I don't expect you to go that far. After all, if a subject could be brought down that easily by you lot, then I wouldn't be interested in it to begin with."

"Tch… you underestimate us."

Perhaps regarding it as a completion of the deal, Lil voiced her complaint, following this she poses a question towards the colossal sphere that towers heavenward.

"I wonder if you think the same? Freak."

In response to a confrontational Lil, Gigi who was listening from ground level speaks up.

"Hey Lil, I can't stand it. Helping that black and white clown and all."

It was at this point that Mayuri's voice shot out from Candice's cap in seeming astonishment.

"Even your brain tissue has finally rotted away has it? Zombie girl. The one I was negotiating with is that girl with the big appetite. I never put the likes of you down as a fighting power from the very onset, so you can just go ahead and rot wherever you like."

"…Does someone who stole another person's zombies have any room to talk though?"

"Save it for later. I don't think this is the kind of opponent you can defeat by mouthing off."

Calming Gigi who mumbled in a voice filled with deeply held resentment, Lil raises her eyes to 'Ikomikidomoe'.

"Whatever you do, first things first, we have to silence that behemoth."

"…If you say so."

Despite the smile playing on her lips, Gigi's eyes revealed that she had actually agreed reluctantly, after heaving a sigh she issues instructions to a shadowy figure standing at her back.

"Go for it, Bambi-chan."

"Uunhh… I, do my best. Because Candi, and Meni, everybody… here…."

Then —— the battlefield which had been engulfed in white lightning only a short while ago, is this time made to be blanketed in the tint of red explosive flames.

"It's that girl with the bombs!? They just had to bring along that bothersome individual huh!"

Watching the zombie girl who came flying out from Gigi's shadow, Hirako involuntarily raises his voice.

As recollections of the moment he was almost blasted to death in the past are vividly resuscitated in his mind, a cold sweat trickled down his forehead.

Reishi bullets, which are fired one after another by the girl with dark red skin, make contact with the creatures spawned from 'Ikomikidomoe' and cause her opponent's body tissue to convert into bombs.

The hot wind from the chain of explosions which subsequently gush forth, vaporised the sweat on Hirako who was standing at a distance.

"…Gah! As reckless as ever I see. What can I say, I guess this means, sooner or later, I'll also have to consider my next course of action…"

Hirako releases a sigh and places a hand on his Zanpakutō, he whispered to himself whilst contemplating whether he should join a side in battle here, or whether he should allow the dust to settle by contacting Mayuri who was stationed further away.

"That Momo should've reported to Kyōraku san, so there may be some action over there too."

"Oh man, this is turning out to be quite a disaster huh."

Not withdrawing, but not actively participating in the battle either, Ginjō's group avoid the ripple effect of the assault whilst observing the situation.

"If we're going to retreat, I think now is our chance right?"

With a shrug of his shoulders, Ginjō addressed Tsukishima's remark.

"That was the plan… but didn't that brat say 'I'll get you to acknowledge me as king' or something?"

"…I see, are you worried about that?"

When Giriko mentions this, Tsukishima also opens his mouth to speak as if to say he understood.

"Ah, it's about 'XCUTION' isn't it?"

The 'XCUTION' he spoke of is not the group of Fullbringers who were once assembled by Ginjō in the Human World, he is referring to the 'XCUTION' they had heard about a few days ago, a new religious organisation which is making its presence felt in the Human World.

Whilst recalling the information he had gathered in the last few days from the 'newcomers in Rukongai', Ginjō begins to reveal his own speculations.

"…Going by those guys fresh from death, apparently this religious cult organisation known as 'XCUTION' already has devotees in the hundreds of thousands… somehow or the other, I can only imagine that some Fullbringer or Shinigami has something to do with this."

According to the account he heard directly from someone who was a believer in their lifetime as luck would have it, details around such things as the Rukongai and the Shinigami Konsō being noted among them in the creed of 'XCUTION', was almost entirely consistent with the state of the afterworld.

It can be said with certainty that this creed which mentions everything from the existence of Shinigami, Rukongai and Seireitei to the existence of Hollows, Hell and Hueco Mundo, is something that could only be written by an individual who knows about the 'afterworld'.

Nevertheless, in its midst, there was one sole part which deviates significantly from reality.

To be precise, it is a part that depicts the future and it is not yet known whether or not it will come to be.

—— {A new king will be born from the shadows of a turmoil spanning a millennium, and reign over the three worlds respectively.}

At first, Ginjō was of the opinion that the religious cult were associates of the Quincies, and that the 'new king' was perhaps referring to Yhwach.

However, he has heard that Yhwach's purpose was not to rule over the three worlds, but to eliminate the boundaries of the three worlds itself and return everything to the original plane of existence.

He believes that this very passage of the mysterious prophecy is the key to grasping the identity of the other party, it was his intention to even bring up the matter with Hisagi, the self-styled 'journalist' who made his acquaintance just the other day, and draw out the opinion on the Shinigami side.

Yet before he could put this plan into action, a direct hint appeared before his eyes.

"Well… in that case, whose influence should we be focusing on?"

Ginjō was not looking at the monster of a Zanpakutō called 'Ikomikidomoe', rather he cast his line of sight towards the child manipulating it who gave its name as 'Hikone'.

At that point, he noticed something.

Noticed that one of the Quincies who appeared later, slipped through the storm of the bombing raid and drew closer to the child Shinigami.

"Hey, kid. You said your name is Ubuginu Hikone right?"

What entered Liltoto's eyes, is the form of Ubuginu Hikone standing atop an 'Ikomikidomoe' who remained unscathed.

Only a few moments ago, they should have been subjected to the lighting strike unleashed by Candice several times over, but putting the creature that is 'Ikomikidomoe' to one side, she is taken aback by the fact that even this Shinigami who is its master was unharmed, at the same time she intentionally opens up a dialogue in order to probe for information on the opponent.

"Oh! You're the Quincy lady who showed up at Hueco Mundo that last time! Long time no see! It's amazing that you'd actually eat up the kin of 'Ikomikidomoe'! It was a pleasure meeting you!"

"I didn't want to encounter you at all if possible. Didn't you say you were going to become king?"

"That's right! Ah, well, to be precise, rather than saying that I am the one who will attain this feat, it is Tokinada sama who is being kind enough to make me king!"

"On top of being some hand-me-down for orders, you'll be just a figurehead king? Isn't there something you want to do through your own damn will?"

Although her manner of speaking was akin to provocation, Hikone doesn't even seem to realise that it is what's known as sarcasm and thus replied with an innocent tone.

"There is! What I want to do are things that are useful to Tokinada sama!"

"…So if this Tokinada guy you speak of told you to 'die a painful death', would you go ahead and die?"

"Yes! I would do my very best to suffer as much as possible!"

"…Oh, I see."

—— Damn. Talking with this brat is going to drive me crazy.

—— The way it fanaticises about things reminds me of that asshole Lille.

—— Nah, I wonder if this is slightly different from that guy, rather than fanaticism… how shall I put it?

—— I get the impression that the damn kid was set up to be that way from the very beginning.

Lil believed that this did not seem like someone she could get through to, but even so, she continues to question the child all the more.

Aside from the goal of extracting information, she genuinely harboured a suspicion.

"There's something I want to ask you."

It was regarding a certain Reiatsu intermingling within Hikone, which Candice and the others also perceived.

"…Have you ever heard the name… Gremmy Thoumeaux?"

Gremmy Thoumeaux.

The name of a boy who is reputed to be the strongest Sternritter, in fact, it was said that in all likelihood, no one could hope to defeat him outside of Yhwach.

That he is described as a boy, is purely because the body he had imagined for himself was that of a young boy, in actuality, both sex and age were unknown.

His true form is only a brain floating within a small container; a Quincy who 'imagined' (created) his very own body by using the power of the Schrift V —— "The Visionary" given to him by Yhwach.

Making one's imagination transform into reality as it stands, is evidently a phenomenon close to the power of a god, in the life or death struggle against Zaraki Kenpachi, he conjured everything from a huge meteorite within Seireitei to the vacuum of outer space.

In the end, he imagined power that could overcome Zaraki Kenpachi and made it his own, but because he couldn't completely imagine a body that was able to withstand that power, it resulted in his self-destruction, he awakened from his dreams, and his brain ceased all function.

Lil caught sight of the moment Gremmy disintegrated with her own eyes, she was also able to confirm that his Reiatsu had come to a complete stop.

She had no idea what happened to the brain container thereafter, nor did she have any particular intention to go searching for its whereabouts.

However, it was a separate matter entirely if one could sense Gremmy's Reiatsu coming from the Shinigami before her.

Perhaps by some chance this Shinigami figure is a mere mimicry, and in truth, something formed after the living Gremmy had 'imagined' it, Lil had surmised as much before posing her question.

"Gremmy… Gremmy san you say…? Aha!"

Suddenly, after a brief moment of consideration, Hikone's face lit up.

"Yes, I know that name! Tokinada sama kindly informed me!"

"……!"

Not expecting the child to return a straight answer, Lil widened her eyes a fraction and waits for Hikone to continue.

However, what is then narrated from Hikone's mouth, was an answer that Lil doesn't really want to hear.

"Gremmy san was apparently… a member among the materials, used at the time of my creation! That's right!"

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