#but i stand by my promise to see this absurd project through to the end

[darsynia]

🔥 Stephen Strange x Female Reader (or if you feel like it, one of my OFCs 😉)

"I swear when I planned this, it went much more smoothly than how this turned out!"

Please and thank you 😘😘

So uh. I like this one SO much, I hope you love it! (I chose Stephen/Reader) Thanks for requesting a blurb for BLURB WEEK! Credit to @doctorstrangegifsparadise!

Summary: The bad guys Stephen has been warring against have finally caught up with the two of you at the worst possible time, and neither of you are going to stand for it.

Length/Warnings: 1,618 / LANGUAGE, haha.

Ruin Your Day

Stephen looks from the flower crown in your hair, the colorful sundress you’re wearing, and the flimsy sandals on your feet to the iron shackles around your wrists and says, “I promise you, this was not the way the afternoon was meant to play out.”

He’s just an astral projection, so you can’t do anything more than glare at him. “I thought you said they couldn’t find us! Are you okay?”

“I--” he starts to say, then looks over his shoulder. When he turns back toward you, his expression is fearful. “I’ll be right back.”

“Stephen!” you hiss, but he’s gone.

It’s cold in your new dungeon habitat, which is just cinematic, at this point. You and Stephen have been dating for just over eleven months, six of which have involved his fight against a pair of interdimensional travelers in search of the green stone he always wore around his neck. You’d taken to never saying its real name even in your head, Voldemort-style, not that this had ended up making much of a difference. 

Today was meant to be a break, an escape from the stress of those battles, a chance for you to finally see the sun. You’ve been holed up in a suite of rooms at the Sanctum for months, for fear of a mole at Kamar Taj.

At least today’s turn of events has made it clear that Stephen wasn’t being overly cautious by keeping your existence secret.

Well, Stephen wasn’t the only one keeping secrets.

You take a deep breath and clear your mind, connecting yourself to the fount of power all sorcerers draw from when they use the Mystic Arts. Your boyfriend doesn’t know that you’ve spent every free moment studying the texts in hopes of unlocking the abilities he uses with such ease. It was hard, and you’d only made the breakthrough a few weeks ago, but you’ll be damned if you’re going to play Damsel in Distress to these thieving, kidnapping assholes.

You’re not playing your hand early, either. In order to keep your abilities secret, you’d focused more on the subtleties of the Arts, things like eavesdropping, Far Sight, and the like. Honestly, if he’d waited another ten minutes, Stephen would have found you in seeming repose, your consciousness having gone walkabout.

As you pull yourself free of your mortal body, the thought that you haven’t actually practiced this very much occurs to you, but what are you supposed to do? Wait to be rescued??

Don’t be absurd.

Stephen has been counting to calm down for a good five minutes now, with no calming in sight. The necklace he’s wearing may be what his adversaries are seeking, but there’s another piece of jewelry in his pocket that’s just as valuable to him, and he doesn’t appreciate his plans being disrupted.

It took far too long to recognize that they’re in Sokovia, and even longer to contact Wong to gather an attack force. He appreciates the fact that he was able to connect so easily to you, and thus find the place you’ve been taken, but though that validates the question he’d intended to ask today, it doesn’t help the cavalry show up any faster. The whole building is warded fairly heavily, and the anti-portal provision stretches miles in all directions.

Either Wong’s going to need to call in the Avengers to borrow a Quinjet and a few supersoldiers, or they’re all going to walk to the rescue. He doesn’t know which is more insufferable.

Stephen drifts through a wall and finds a meeting, which is both useful and extremely insulting. There isn’t even a guard outside your ‘dungeon’ door! Safe in the knowledge that they can’t see him, he floats angrily around the table, swiping his incorporeal hand on the back of a few necks from time to time, just to make the (ahh yes. HYDRA. Completely unsurprising) goons in question feel uneasy. Once he’s finished gathering all the information there is to glean, Stephen makes his way back to a safe place so he can rejoin his body-- and runs into your astral form, on the way.

Your eyes are wide and surprised even though your jaw is set at a defiant angle, and god, he loves every infuriating, beautiful, inexplicable inch of you.

“Hi,” you whisper.

“Marry me?” he blurts out, right there in the middle of a HYDRA base, while you’re both incorporeal and very fucking busy. “And, for the love of Cagliostro, get back to your body so I can rescue you!”

“Goddamnit, Stephen!” you whisper-roar, throwing your hands in the air and sighing like he’s just demanded you invent time travel. “Yes, of course, but you haven’t heard the end of this!”

With that you float off in a huff, as if the two of you are in the Sanctum arguing over whether to order your favorite takeout again and risk someone figuring out where you are thanks to how specific your fucking food order is.

It takes Stephen a second to gather himself (was it ‘of course I’ll marry you’ or ‘of course I’ll head back to my body??’) --and then he can’t find you.

“First things first,” he mutters to himself, and heads over to his body as quickly as he can. Once he gets there, he does the thing he’s done every single day since he’d put the ring box in his pocket: feel for it, to make sure it’s still there.

That sends him into a Moment, as well. If he could, he’d draw on all the power that there is, draw it all into himself, and destroy everything and everyone that’s threatening you, molecule by molecule. Except, he knows if he does that, his own chemical makeup will be so compromised, he won’t be the man you love anymore.

That’s not acceptable.

“All right. We’ll do it the old fashioned way.”

Your astral form is busy drawing on little bursts of power to completely fuck up the electrical system in your captor’s rather quaint castle in Sokovia when a thunderous voice sounds from seemingly everywhere.

It’s Stephen.

You may think you are safe because you are numerous. You are wrong. Give me back what’s mine, and I will be merciful. Harm her in any way, and you’ll wish you’d never been born.

You fucking love it when he gets possessive.

It takes a little more effort than you should expend at once, but you manage to finish your task of complete electrical sabotage ten seconds after Stephen’s reverberating voice fades.

The only catch? You can’t see anything either. You roll your ghostly eyes in the dark and lift yourself up into the air, intending to float around until you find a window, and search for your barred dungeon room from the outside.

Unfortunately, the energy you spent affecting the real world in your astral form was too much, and you lose consciousness with just enough time to curse yourself for forgetting to read the warnings.

The power cuts out so soon after his speech that Stephen instinctively knows you had something to do with it. It reminds him of something he’d said three months into your relationship:

‘I never thought disobedience was sexy until I met you.’

He can’t wait to see you again, but it’s a toss-up whether he’ll yell or kiss you quiet. Probably both. Probably more.

Stephen doesn’t have time to contemplate in exactly which order he’ll punish you, or how much he’s going to enjoy it, because as he stands in shadow outside the castle waiting to hear from Wong, an aerial armada appears overhead.

The Avengers aren’t any more inclined to be merciful than he is.

You wake up in your bed in the Sanctum, weak as a kitten and almost as blind. You’re immediately filled with terror-- has your careless, untrained use of the Mystic Arts harmed you permanently?

“Shhh, sweetheart, I’m here, you’re safe,” Stephen says, his comforting hand brushing your cheek seconds before his lips press against your forehead.

“If you made that threat before backup showed up I’m going to kick your ass,” you say weakly.

“I would expect nothing less, darling,” he says placatingly. The fact that he doesn’t sound the slightest bit defensive tells you volumes about how worried he’s been about you. 

That prompts you to get emotional, and to cover it up, you dredge up your most indignant voice as you say, “Did you save me anyone to vanquish?”

“You’ll have to take that up with the Avengers, I’m afraid.”

“Jerks,” you sniff.

There’s a long silence, during which the two of you communicate mostly in hand squeezes and caught breaths.

“I’m proud of you,” Stephen says, finally.

“You shouldn’t be. I was reckless.”

“That’s just the thing. You weren’t constrained by me. I have a lot of power. I don’t want a subordinate. I want you to fight back. I want you to feel safe to get angry at me. I want--” He breaks off, and you use all of your strength to roll over and open your eyes. Stephen is sitting beside you, eyes bright with emotion, both hands clasped around yours.

“I love you too,” you whisper, “--but if you even dream of proposing again while I’m this much of a mess, I will marry Wong just to spite you. He’ll do it.”

The smile Stephen breaks out into is as relieved as it is bright. “He would, the asshole.” He pats his pocket and nods soberly. “Point taken. Maybe I’ll let you choose the spot, this time?”

“As long as you’re there, I’ll be the happiest woman in any dimension. Even if something else tries to ruin our day.”

[scenes-in-between]

Trust No 1 (Part One)

(Pre-episode)

“I got a motorcycle,” Mulder announces as he walks into the trailer. “Now I won’t need to bother Michael for rides anymore.”

Gibson blinks, stone-faced, his back ramrod straight.

“It’s okay, I paid cash,” Mulder adds, with a bit of an internal eye-roll.  Like I’d be dumb enough to use a credit card and put myself back on the radar. Relax, no one’s going to trace anything back to us.

“Us?” Gibson says, stiffly. “So you’re… you’re not…?”

Mulder frowns, confused. And then it dawns on him what Gibson’s actually worried about. 

“What, leaving? No, of course not. Jesus, Gibson, you really think I’d do that to you?”

“I know you’re thinking pretty loudly about getting on that bike and not looking back. And I don’t even blame you, but--”

“Oh, hell.” 

Mulder shuts the door and walks over to where Gibson is sitting. No matter how much practice he’s had at policing his thoughts, he still slips up all the time. And yes, of course he’s been thinking about going home, pretty much from the moment he saw the bike sitting parked at the gas station with a “For Sale” sign stuck to it. Of course he has. But it’s a fantasy; he’d never actually do it. No matter how little regard he has for his own safety, how much he’d be willing to risk if it meant seeing Scully again, he owes Gibson way too much.

“Gibson, I am not going to abandon you. Okay?” He concentrates, so there is no disconnect between his thoughts and his words. “I promise. Not after everything we’ve been through, everything you’ve done for me.”

Gibson studies him for another long moment, then gives the barest nod of his head and finally relaxes his shoulders. Mulder punches him lightly on the upper arm and gives a lopsided grin.

“I mean, I know I’m kind of an asshole sometimes, but come on. I’m not that big of an asshole.” 

***

Fifty-seven days. Just over eight weeks. That’s how long it’s been since Mulder’s last email, the one in which he warned her that he wouldn’t be able to write again for a while.

Not that his warning has stopped her from checking.

The internet cafe has become part of her routine. On Saturdays like today, when she’s not helping Doggett and Reyes in the field, Scully stops by with William on her way to run errands. A couple of days a week she doesn’t need to be at the Academy until noon, so she takes a morning walk to the cafe before her mom arrives to babysit. The baristas know her order by now - chai tea on the weekends, coffee with milk during the week - and are friendly but not chatty. It’s honestly probably too routine and predictable, or it would be if she were the one in hiding. She’s identified a handful of other “regulars,” but none that give her cause for concern; everyone here tends to keep to themselves. 

Chai in hand, she finds an empty computer and parks the stroller. William is dozing, bundled up against the late December chill outside, and the coffee shop is cozy and warm without being stifling. Scully has removed her gloves but doesn’t bother taking off her coat; that would be an acknowledgement of the hope that this time she will be staying longer than a minute or two. She tries to convince herself that she expects the empty inbox, that she won’t be disappointed by another day of radio silence, that her stomach won’t do a backflip at the sight of “3 new messages” because she knows they will all be spam.

It is a futile exercise.

Fifty-seven days. She’s managing. Raising this baby of theirs and molding young minds at the Academy and praying every night for Mulder’s safety. She has to believe this is temporary, and that eventually they can be a family again. A real family.

Suppressing a sigh, she logs off and tries to turn her focus to the day ahead.

***

The day after Mulder comes back with a bike of his own, it pours. Gibson is guiltily, but deeply, relieved. He wants to trust that Mulder won’t abandon him, knows all too well how people’s inner thoughts can be complicated and contradictory, but at the same time, he can’t help worrying.

The rain, however, does not dampen Mulder’s fervor. His trips to the larger library have been fruitful, and he has been hard at work on a plan to breach the facility that the old man in Gibson’s dreams spoke about. He spends the entire rainy day poring over everything he has printed at the library, papers carpeting the floor, seed husks piling up on the table.

***

The New Year arrives without fanfare. Scully doesn’t turn on the TV to watch the Times Square coverage (she hasn’t managed that since she and Mulder watched together, two years ago, in a hospital waiting room). For that matter, she doesn’t even make it to midnight. After William goes down for the night, she takes a bath, drinks a glass of wine, and crawls into bed.

On the surface, this year looks much the same as the last. She’s still alone, still wondering where Mulder is and hoping he’s all right. In truth, though, so much is different. She has William, for one thing, which on its own is a bigger difference than she can properly express. For another, up until a couple of months ago, she was hearing from Mulder somewhat regularly, receiving assurances that he was, at least, alive. She still worries - of course she does - but it’s nowhere near the same. She has good cause to believe, far more than she did a year ago, that he is going to be okay, and that they will eventually be together again.

That doesn’t make the waiting any less frustrating or the loneliness less sharp. But the absence of a constant, exhausting undercurrent of despair is both notable and welcome.

Next year, she vows to herself as she drifts off to sleep. We are going to figure this out and eliminate the threat, and next year he’ll be home. 

***

For all that Mulder intends, truly, to keep his promise to Gibson, the temptation to flee home to Scully continues to gnaw at him. Now that he actually has the means to do so, that he can envision concrete steps toward a way out of exile, it’s almost painful to pull off the highway in another town, heading toward another library, instead of just pressing on. But he did promise.

What he can’t resist doing, however, is writing to her.

It’s been almost ten weeks since their last correspondence, and even if it means he can’t return to this particular library again, he has to do it. His fingers tremble as he opens a blank email.

“Dearest Dana…”

[imeternallylove]

A Scandal in Belgravia - BBC Sherlock

Sherlock x Y/N Adler

(you can picture to Irene / adlock as well ><)

genre: lot of angst

words: 4,446 words

character: mention to John, Mycroft, Moriarty, and Lady Smallwood

summary: towards the end of this ep

(gif not mine)

Sherlock half-turns back towards. Inside the plane, he pulls back the curtain obscuring the passenger seating and walks into the aisle. The lighting is very low and it's hard to see. People are sitting in almost all the plane seats but none of them is moving or speaking or showing any signs of life at all. Frowning, he walks forward and looks more closely at the nearest passengers. An overhead light shows more clearly the faces of two men sitting beside each other and Sherlock now realizes the truth: they are dead. Although they're not yet showing any signs of decomposition, their skin is very grey and, they have clearly been dead for some time. He turns and looks to the passengers on the other side of the aisle, turning on another overhead light to get a better view. The man and woman sitting there are also long dead. As he straightens up, realizing that everyone on board the plane must be in the same condition, Mycroft speaks from the other end of the section.

"The Coventry conundrum." Sherlock turns as Mycroft pushes back the curtain and steps through into the cabin. For the first part of the ensuing conversation, he talks softly, almost as if out of respect for the dead bodies in front of him. "What do you think of my solution?"

Sherlock gazes around the cabin, still taking it all in. "The flight of the dead."

"The plane blows up mid-air. Mission accomplished for the terrorists. Hundreds of casualties, but nobody dies. Neat, don't you think?" Sherlock just smiles humourlessly at what his brother dear told. Mycroft finishes his speak. "You've been stumbling around the fringes of this one for ages– Or were you too bored to notice the pattern?"

Sherlock flashes back in his mind to the two little girls sitting in his living room. He lifts his head a little, remembering the creepy guy sitting in the same chair on a different occasion, holding a funeral urn.

"We ran a similar project with the Germans a while back, though I believe one of our passengers didn't make the flight. But that's the first I can describe for you. Sherlock, you're so slow, in every sense of the word."

Sherlock flashes back to the car with the body in the boot and the passport stamped in Berlin airport. "How's the plane going to fly?" Then he answers himself immediately. "Of course: unmanned aircraft. Hardly new."

"It doesn't fly. It will never fly. This entire project is canceled. The terrorist cells have been informed that we know about the bomb. We can't fool them now. We've lost everything. One fragment of one email, and months and years of planning finished."

Sherlock smirk with that, "your MOD man."

"That's all it takes: One lonely naïve man desperate to show off, and a woman clever enough to make him feel special."

"You should screen your defense people more carefully." Sherlock quirking an eyebrow

But Mycroft furiously, "I'm not talking about the MOD man, Sherlock; I'm talking about you." He slams the tip of his umbrella on the floor. Sherlock frowns, genuinely confused. He pointed at his brother's face with the umbrella, smile ironically, "the damsel in distress. In the end, are you really so obvious? Because this was textbook: the promise of love, the pain of loss, the joy of redemption; then give him a puzzle..." His voice drops to a whisper while he twirls the end of his umbrella in the air, "...and watch him dance."

"Don't be absurd. Mycroft."

"Absurd? How quickly did you decipher that email for Ms. Adler? Was it the full minute, or were you fully eager to impress to her?"

"I think it was less than three seconds." Your appearance was from behind Sherlock, "Luckily for our nation. He's a clever one."

Sherlock spins around to see you, Y/N Adler standing at the end of the cabin, dressed in a pencil dress in the mocked jacket like the first time he met her, but this time it's was dark blue, fully made up, and with your hair perfectly coiffured. This is The Woman at your immaculate best.

Mycroft ruefully to Sherlock. "I drove you into her path." He pauses momentarily. "I'm sorry. I didn't know."

Sherlock is still looking at you as you walk towards him. Then, you grinned as a victory. "Mr. Holmes, I think we need to talk."

"So do I. There are several aspects I'm still not quite clear on." The consulting detective faces you, but you decide to extrude him away softly, walking over to Mycroft. "Not you, Sherly. You're done now." You continue down the aisle towards Mycroft. Sherlock turns and watches you go as you activate your camera phone and holds it up to show his brother.

"There's more, loads more. On my phones, I've got secrets, pictures, and scandals that could topple your whole world. You have no idea how much havoc I can cause and exactly one way to stop me – Unless you want to tell your masters that your biggest security leak is your own little brother."

"What do you mean 'Phones'?" Sherlock, asking you from behind.

You cross your arm under the chest, "I told you. I misbehaved. And, I don't have just only one. I added it four."

Mycroft can no longer hold Y/N gaze and turns his head away, lowering his eyes.

-----------------

Sometime later, Mycroft has brought you and Sherlock to his residence. The older brother sits at the dining table with you seated opposite him. Sherlock is in the armchair near the fireplace a few yards away, half-turned away from the pair of you. The fingers on his right hand are repeatedly clenching while he listens to the other two speakers. Mycroft points down at the camera phone which is lying on the table in front of him. There is no aggression or threat in his voice as he speaks to you. "We have people who can get into this."

"I've tested that theory for you. To see how your consulting detective of London works. I let him try it for six months. Just jor you. Brother mine?" Sherlock closes his eyes briefly, grimacing slightly. Not turning his head to look at you. "Sherlock, dear. Can you tell him what you found when you X-rayed my camera phones?"

"There are four additional units wired inside the casing, I suspect containing acid or a small amount of explosive." Mycroft lowers his head into his hand. "Any attempt to open the casing will burn the hard drive."

"Explosive." You look at Mycroft. "It's more me."

Mycroft lifted his head and looked at you again, "some data is always recoverable."

"Take that risk?"

"You have a passcode to open these four. I deeply regret to say we have people who can extract it from you."

You calmly look at Sherlock. "Sherlock?"

"The four of the camera phone, there will be two passcodes: one to open, one to burn the drive. A special one to unlock four of them. Even under duress, you can't know which one she's given you and there will be no point in a second attempt."

"He's good, isn't he? I should have him on a leash – In fact, I might." You gaze intensely at Sherlock but he remains turned away from you and can't see your expression. "Oh. Almost forget, there is a secret thing of Dr. Watson and, Lady Smallwood as well."

"So." Mycroft looks more serious. "We destroy all of them, then. No one has the information."

"Fine. Good idea... Unless there are lives of British citizens depending on the information you're about to burn."

"Are there?"

"Nah. Telling you would be playing fair. I'm not playing anymore." You reach into your handbag on the table in front of your and take out an envelope which pushes across the table to Mycroft. "A list of my requests; and some ideas about my protection once they're granted."

Mycroft takes the sheet of paper from the envelope and starts to unfold it. You begin. "I'd say it wouldn't blow much of a hole in the wealth of the nation. But, then I'd be lying." Mycroft raises his eyebrows in amazement as he reads through the demands you have listed. "I imagine you'd like to sleep on it tonight."

Mycroft still reading with eyebrows are still raised, "Thank you, yes."

"Too bad."

Mycroft looks up at you. In the armchair, Sherlock snorts in almost silent amusement. "Off you pop and talk to your people. I recommended that would be better."

Sighing, Mycroft sinks back in his chair. Staring at Sherlock, "You've been very thorough. Ms. Adler, I wish our lot were half as good as you."

You look across to Sherlock. "I wouldn't play fair. You should know. All the phones here are my protection. But all of my phones have the same passcode to unlock." You grinned at Sherlock, he raises his head, looks at you with a confused look. "Oh, I surely won't do that risk. I knew the ways keep all my pieces of stuff in one. But, Mr. Jim Moriarty sends his love to me. Beg me for playing this game. I'd love to hear the begging for anyone." You stand up, "and this is a time for our nation. How lucky me."

"Yes, he's been in touch with us. Seems desperate for my attention," Mycroft's voice becomes more ominous, "which I'm sure can be arranged."

Unseen by the others, Sherlock's gaze begins to sharpen as Y/N walks around the table to sit on its edge nearer Mycroft. "I have had all this stuff, never knew what to do with it. Thank God for the consultant criminal. Gave me a lot of advice about how to play the Holmes boys. Do you know what he calls you?" You whisper softly, "The Ice Man..." You look across to Sherlock again. "And The Virgin."

Sherlock's eyes are starting to flicker back and forth, though it's not yet clear whether in reaction to what YN is saying or whether he's working something out.

"He didn't even ask for anything. I think he just likes to cause trouble. That's only what I can do, causing the havoc everywhere I stay on." Sherlock closes his eyes, listens to you and, sighs softly.

"And here you are, the dominatrix who brought a nation to its knees."

Sherlock's eyes snap open again. He is definitely working something out. Mycroft stands and appears to bow slightly to you. "Nicely played." Sherlock turns away, about to go and begin meeting her demands. You're smiling in satisfaction, standing up, confident that you have won.

"No."

You and Mycroft turn to him. "Sorry?" You look at him. Sherlock turns his head towards you both, "I said no. Very very close, but no." He stands and starts to walk towards you. "You got carried away. The game was too elaborate. You were enjoying yourself too much."

"No such thing as too much."

Sherlock walks closer and looks down at you. "Oh, enjoying the thrill of the chase is fine, craving the distraction of the game. You said you love detective stories– I sympathize entirely –But sentiment? The sentiment is a chemical defect found in the losing side." He bares his teeth slightly as he finishes the sentence.

"Sentiment? What are you talking about?" You chortle.

"You."

You smiling calmly. "Oh dear God. Look at the poor man. You don't actually think I was interested in you? Why? Because you’re the great Sherlock Holmes, the clever detective in the funny hat?" You saw the bitterness from his eyesight, a moment later, they change into the unreadable. He steps even closer to you, both bodies almost touching. "No."

He reaches out and slowly wraps the fingers of his right hand around your left wrist, then leans forward and brings his mouth close to your right ear. "Because I know you love me."

Flashback to you kneeling in front of him at the flat and putting your hand on top of his, then him turning his hand over and resting his fingertips on the underside of your wrist. In the present, you frown in confusion, while Sherlock tightens his grip a little around your wrist. He softly into your ear, "and I took your pulse."

"Elevated; your pupils dilated. Every time you played me."

Flashback to you kneeling in front of him, your pupils widening as you gaze at him. In the present, he releases your hand and leans past you to pick up the camera phone from the table.

"I imagine John Watson thinks love's a mystery to me but, the chemistry is incredibly simple and very destructive." Sherlock turns and walks a few paces away from you. You follow behind him until he turns and faces you again. "When we first met, you told me that disguise is always a self-portrait. How true of you: the combination to your safe. Your measurements; but this," he tosses the phone into the air and catches it again. "This is far more intimate." He pulls up the security lock with its 'I AM - - - - LOCKED' screen.

"You told me. This camera phone is your life," without breaking his gaze into your eyes, he punches in the first of the four characters with his thumb, "I think this further was your heart, and you should never let it rule your head."

You stare at him, trying to stay calm, but the panic begins to show behind both eyes. Sherlock continues. "You could have chosen any random number and walked out of here for everything you have done for five years. Because I know you. Loved to play the game that just in only your turn." He punches in the second character, his eyes still locked on yours. "But you just couldn't resist your feelings, could you?"

"Moriarty must just create the list passwords, give you to preferring. Made you play with the weakness of my brother and mine, but it was your weakness the same." Your breathing becomes heavier. Sherlock smiles briefly and triumphantly. "I've always assumed that love is a dangerous disadvantage... Over this, it depends on the defense for your life. But you chose the biggest mistake." He hits the third character, still gazing at you. "Thank you for the final proof."

He lifts his thumb again, but before he can type in the fourth character, you seize his hand and gaze at him intensely. "Everything I said: it's not real." In a whisper, "I was just playing the game."

Sherlock in whisper same to your, "I know." Gently pulling his hand free from yours, he types in the final character. "and this is just losing." Slowly Sherlock turns the phone towards you and shows you the screen. You look down at it, tears spilling from your eyes as you read the sequence which says:

I AM

SHER

LOCKED

You gaze down at the screen in despair for a few seconds, then Sherlock lifts the phone away and holds it out towards Mycroft even as the phone unlocks and presents its menu. Sherlock's eyes still fixed on yours, "there you are, brother. I hope the contents make up for any inconvenience I may have caused you tonight."

"I'm certain they will." Mycroft takes the phone and Sherlock turns and begins to walk towards the door. "If you're feeling kind, lock her up; otherwise, let her go. I doubt Ms. Adler will survive long without her protection."

You stare after him, your eyes wide with dread. "Are you expecting me to beg?"

"That's what's you liked." Sherlock flatly said. He stops near the door, his face in profile to yours. You stare at him in anguish for several seconds, then realize that you have no choice.

"Please."

Sherlock doesn't move.

"You're right."

Now he turns to look at you.

You staring at him pleadingly. "I won't even last six months."

"Sorry about dinner."

Sherlock turns away and walks to the door, opening it and walking through. You watch him go, your eyes full of terror as the door closes after him.

-----------------

Baker st. It is pouring with rain. Outside Speedy’s café, Mycroft is standing under the protection of his umbrella, smoking a cigarette. He has a clear plastic wallet tucked under one arm and his briefcase is at his feet. John hurries towards home, hunched over and soaking wet because macho BAMFs like John Watson don’t take umbrellas with them. He sees Mycroft standing there and stops in surprise, then walks over to him. "You don't smoke."

"I also don’t frequent cafés." He drops the cigarette on the ground and treading it out [apparently not bothered about incurring a set fine for littering], he closes his umbrella, picks up his briefcase, and turns and walks into Speedy’s. John follows him. Not long afterward they are sitting opposite each other at one of the tables. John picks up his mug and looks at the plastic wallet which Mycroft has put on the table in front of himself. There is a sticker on the wallet saying 'RESTRICTED ACCESS – CONFIDENTIAL'. The big crack on the camera phone is inside the wallet on top of various documents. But surely it's Y/N's.

"This the file on Y/N Adler?"

"Closed forever. I am about to go and inform my brother – Or, if you prefer, you are – that she somehow got herself into a witness protection scheme in America. New name, new identity. She will survive – and thrive – but he will never see her again."

"Why would he care? He despised her at the end. Won’t even mention her by name – just 'The Woman.'"

"Oh. Is that loathing, or a salute? One of a kind; the one woman who matters."

"He's not like that. He doesn’t feel things that way. I don't think."

"My brother has the brain of a scientist or a philosopher, yet he elects to be a detective. What might we deduce about his heart?"

"I don't know." John sigh.

"Neither do I, but initially he wanted to be a pirate." Mycroft smiles briefly at John, then his gaze becomes distant and reflective. John told him. "He'll be okay with this witness protection, never seeing her again. He'll be fine."

Mycroft breathes in sharply. "I agree. That's why I decided to tell him that."

"Instead of what?"

"She's dead. She was captured by a terrorist cell in Karachi two months ago and beheaded." John looks at Mycroft silently for several seconds, then quietly clears his throat.

"It's definitely her? She's done this before. And Sherlock was-"

The big brother cut off. "I was thorough. This time. It would take Sherlock Holmes to fool me, and I don't think he was on hand, do you? So..." Mycroft pushes the wallet across the table towards John, then puts his elbows on the table, clasps his hands in front of him, and rests his chin on them, "what should we tell Sherlock?"

They look at each other for a moment.

-----------------

221B. Sherlock is sitting at the kitchen table looking into his microscope. Footsteps can be heard coming up the stairs and he speaks before John even comes into view. "Clearly you've got the news."

John stops in the doorway with the wallet in his hand. Sherlock doesn’t lift his head. Sherlock does not stop talking "If it's about the Leeds triple murder, it was the gardener. Nobody noticed the earring."

"Hi. Er, no, it's, um..." John takes a couple of steps into the kitchen. "It's about Y/N Adler."

Then. Sherlock looks up, his face unreadable. "Oh? Did something happen? Has she come back?"

"No, she's, er. I just bumped into Mycroft downstairs. He had to take a call."

Sherlock stands up and walks around the table towards his mate. "Is she back in London?"

"No. She's, er..." John gazes at the table for a long moment, then drags in a sharp breath and raises his eyes to Sherlock’s as his flatmate steps closer, frowning. "She's in America."

"America?"

"Mmm-hmm. Got herself on a witness protection scheme, apparently. Dunno how she swung it, but, er, well, you know."

"I know what?"

"Ah. Well, you won't be able to see her again."

"Why would I want to see her again?"

John smiles ruefully as Sherlock turns away and walks back around the table. "Didn't say you did."

"Is that her file?"

"Yes. I was just gonna take it back to Mycroft." He offers the wallet to Sherlock. "Do you want to...?"

Sherlock sitting down. "No. Why would I?" He looks into his microscope again.

John looks at his friend for a long while, considering his options. Eventually, he steps forward again. "Listen, actually..."

"Oh, but I will have the camera phone, though." Sherlock holds out his hand towards John, not lifting his gaze from his work.

"There's nothing on it anymore. It's been stripped and it's was damaged."

"I know, but I ..." Sherlock pauses for a long moment before continuing. "I'll still have it."

"Sherlock. I've gotta give this back to Mycroft. You can't keep it." Sherlock keeps his hand extended and his eyes fixed on the microscope.

"I have to give this to Mycroft. It's the government's now. I couldn’t even give-"

"Please. John." Sherlock extends his hand a little further. John looks at him, clearly wondering what to do, then finally he reaches into the wallet, takes out the phone, and lays it gently into Sherlock’s hand. Sherlock closes his fingers around it, draws his hand back, and puts the phone into his trouser pocket before returning his hand to the microscope. "Thank you."

John raises the wallet, "well, I’d better take this back."

"Yes."

John turns and walks out onto the landing, then pauses as if wondering whether to ask the question that has now come into his mind. After several seconds he turns around and comes back into the kitchen. Sherlock still doesn’t lift his eyes from his microscope. "Did she ever text you again, after all that?"

"Once, a few months ago."

"What did she say?"

"Goodbye, Mr. Holmes."

John looks at him thoughtfully. "Huh." The short man paces around in front of the kitchen door for a few seconds, wondering if there’s anything more he can say, then eventually turns and heads off down the stairs. As soon as he’s out of sight Sherlock raises his head and gazes across the room for a moment, then he reaches down to his own phone which is on the table, and picks it up, calling up his saved messages. Getting up and walking into the living room, he scrolls through the messages sent by 'The Woman,' all of which he has kept. They go on for a long time:

I'm not hungry, let's have dinner.

Bored in a hotel. Join me. Let's have dinner.

John's blog is HILARIOUS. I think he likes you more than I do. Let's have dinner.

I can see the tower bridge and the moon from my room. Work out where I am and join me.

I saw you in the street today. You didn't see me.

You do know that hat actually suits you, don't you?

Oh for God's sake. Let's have dinner.

I like your funny hat.

I'm in Egypt talking to an idiot. Get on a plane, let's have dinner.

You looked sexy on Crimewatch.

Even you have got to eat. Let's have dinner.

BBC1 right now. You'll laugh.

I'm thinking of sending you a Christmas present.

Mantelpiece.

I'm not dead. Let's have dinner.

Then comes the one reply he sent to her:

Happy New Year

And at the bottom of the list is her last message to him:

Goodbye Mr. Holmes.

Reaching the living room window, he looks down at the final message for a long time before lifting his eyes and gazing out at the pouring rain.

-----------------

Flashback to months earlier in Karachi. It is night time and there is the background noise of male voices shouting in a foreign language. Shaky camera footage eventually resolves into a clearer resolution, revealing Y/N kneeling on the ground in front of a military vehicle. She is dressed in black robes, her hair covered by a black headscarf, and is typing one-handed onto her phone. Standing to her right is a man holding a rifle with one hand while he repeatedly gestures for her phone with the other. She ignores him, refusing to hand it over until she has finished her message, which reads:

Goodbye Mr. Holmes

She presses Send and then gives the phone to the man. To her left, a second man walks over and raises a wide-bladed curved sword above her head, bringing it slowly down towards the back of her neck while he checks that his aim will be correct. Y/N stares ahead of herself, fighting her tears, then she slowly closes her eyes.

A couple of seconds later, the orgasmic sigh fills the air sound of her rang. Y/N's eyes snap open and fill with hope as she turns her head to look at her executioner. His face is completely shrouded apart from his eyes, but a very recognizable blue-grey gaze meets her own.

"When I say run, run!"

She turns her head to the front again. Sherlock pulls back the sword as if he’s about to strike the death blow, then he spins and begins to strike out at the nearby militia. Y/N stares ahead of herself, her eyes wide with disbelief that she is going to live. Slowly she begins to smile.

In London in the present, Sherlock smiles at the memory, then chuckles to himself as he takes Y/N's camera phone from his pocket. Tossing it into the air and catching it again, he looks at it for a couple of seconds.

"The Woman."

Sherlock opens the top drawer of a nearby cabinet he puts the phone into it and is about to withdraw his hand when he pauses, then puts his fingers onto the phone again and looks at it thoughtfully.

"The Woman."

Sherlock lifts his head and gazes out at the rainy city for a while, then turns and walks away.

"Aaah"

Y/N's high in climax moan noise rings on his phone. That's was the recording of the new sound. It was unexpected to him. He is just seen that the window in the living room nearby was open a bit. His laughter echoed throughout the flat.

Over his notebook, Y/N's fav lipstick box is placed on there. It's not just a simple high-end brand lipstick, it's the voice recorder and, she just sent Sherlock the text of how to use them.

just for fun :D

Moriarty was right in some parts, but not the whole part. He would skin Y/N, but he planned to a terrorist group that she used to have this information stored in, and these were some of the best allies against Moriarty. Not anymore.

So far, Y/N has forced to sit on her knees waiting for death to happen any minute, thought a lot of times that she can't be dead in peace for the rest of her life, but why it's so soon? Although she intended to cover safely, she has to admit that she was so shocked when Sherlock caught on. For this clever detective, Y/N can't say it was passionate, but it might be 'attractive and interesting,' something in common, both of them might be addicted to each other, there's no explanation to define he loved her back.

How to blame that detective for failing her mission? She has to blame herself. He was right. she loved him.

Urdu, where terrorists chat around the side, flashlights that shine in front of them, the sound of a big blade clogs her breath in a minute. The feeling of pressure around there makes Y/N feel difficult to breathe, her heart racing to blend back into despair. Anyway, it must be over. Here.

"Can I use my phone for the last time?" Y/N looked up and said firmly, she heard a little consultation, some people swore at her great deal but eventually sent it to her. Y/N picked up her phone, and she was shaking like a leaf inside, desperately.

Y/N Adler, without a family, friends, or lover, shouldn't have even taken her into her mind, but instead, there was one person she remembered in her last breath, that man, that intelligent detective, who she felt was so blunt and fun to beat, as well as yanking him, watching his unconscious efforts. It was, yes, she felt guilty about using him, it was quacky to feel like it's stuck in her mind. At least if it's good to say goodbye, she won't feel indebted anymore.

She doesn't deserve him. Not at all, Just a good man with a liar woman who happens to love him completely.

"Goodbye, Mr. Holmes."

Y/N presses send then gives the phone to the man. To her left, a second man walks over and raises a wide-bladed curved sword above her head, bringing it slowly down towards the back of her neck while he checks that his aim will be correct. Her eyes look at the ground, trying to calm herself as much as possible. A much fear tried to cry in her chest, but she went to die here. Y/N stares ahead of herself, fighting her tears, then she slowly closes her eyes.

A couple of seconds later, the orgasmic sigh fills the air sound of her rang out. Y/N's eyes snap open and fill with hope as she turns her head to look at her executioner. His face is completely shrouded apart from his eyes, but a very recognizable blue-grey gaze meets her own.

"When I say run, run!"

"RUN!"

Sherlock's thick hands pulled Y/N up, and it was unbelievable that she seemed to run faster than any time in her life. Her slender hands held the other hand tightly as if afraid of herself breaking out of his hands. Y/N thought he must have been exploring the path well, and he took her running in and out of the alley, swapping all over the place out of the terrorists. When Sherlock saw that they both were safe, he let go of the hand that held her, and then, It's an opportunity to hold the air into lungs. They're run with tight clothes covering their faces, heat, and sweat-soaked in their whole bodies.

"Are you okay?" He asked her, even though he was still panting, "I'm okay," Y/N replied simply, the dominatrix no more haughty. They still try to not look at the other side, no eyes. Sherlock could see the other eyes, but he felt faint in his heart, the same pale blue eyes as well. There were various glances in, doubt, impression, joy, but the glances he felt is the uniqueness of her in front of him. The glances of her, the naked body. "Don't look at me that way," Sherlock coughed a little.

"Oh, why, Mr. Holmes?" Y/N teasing him.

Sherlock laughed in his own throat, and before sitting down for a break, Y/N seemed to have nothing to worry about, so he explored his own body now wet with blood and sweat, he breathing more comfortably.

Y/N's voice was full of seriousness and doubt. "Answer me. Why you helping me?"

"Just promenade through," Sherlock finally answer her quietly, but they both knew it was a funny lie.

"Oh..." Y/N's sweet voice dragged long as if pretending to understand she burst out laughing a short before staring at the fortune. The consulting detective and the woman's eyes turned away from each other. Sherlock was irritated himself for making such an unwise excuse, so he came to grin. Sherlock took a deep breath before collecting his stillness, a solemn face as his usual looks, before turning around and saying to each other, "Oh, look at Ms. Adler, you don't actually think I'm interested in you-."

Crack,

A touch of stiffness to sherlock's head and the sound of pulling the trigger made him silent before flicking. Eyes slightly on himself, ah, he was too careless of her, Sherlock raised his hand, looking at Y/N incomprehensibly. "What are you doing?"

"Ur. I need your clothes to leave. Now."

"That's what I'm doing!"

"Stop talking and give it to me." Y/N's still holds the gun, "Got to learn to not trust to your big brother. Also you. Now, give them to me. Just take them off. I didn't want to slap you again, Mr. Holmes."

"Wait. Ms. Adler. I-,"

"Now!"

"Just playing fair! I've saved your life!"

"So there now. We're even. Karachi's a passageway wait for another me showing up. I had a double me in dozen. She's coming so late." Y/N kisses Sherlock's cheek, "You're good, find me. Y/N Adler, she is dead. The proof is my camera phone." Sherlock remains silent, disbelief at what she has planned. Y/N puts his stuff on, delicate smiling. "It's time for goodbye, now. Mr. Holmes."

Y/N walks away, lefts the Barker St.'s boy who helped her. Sherlock, even not in a good mood, knows exactly she was safe now. Where she's gone? Not that hard to find out. His intelligent face turns into a crack-up laugh, very, very satisfied.

Sherlock Holmes was too careless with her.

The woman.

[aomine-ryo]

Ah the requests are open! I'd like to request Aomine, Kise and Kagami reactions if their gf shouted 'i hate you' during an angsty argument. Of course she didn't mean but was very hurt. Thank you in advance and thank you for provoding KnB content 💙

Ah yes i love some good angst 😌 I hope you enjoy xx

Scenario: Kise, Aomine and Kagami’s reactions to their s/o shouting “I hate you” during an argument

Kise

Jealousy was an ugly emotion and you knew that. You generally never got that jealous with Kise though. Especially considering that he was constantly surrounded by other models and fangirls, you were surprisingly very chill with him. I mean, you couldn’t blame him, it came with the job. Plus you knew that you could trust him so it didn’t bother you as much as one would expect.

Recently though, Kise had been rather busy and he wasn’t able to spend as much time with you as he’d like. While that sucked in itself, he’d always be around other girls when you did have the time to spend with him, like during recess and after school when you walked together. And they were so obviously flirting with him, but he didn’t seem to have a clue.

You didn’t want to bring up though because you didn’t want to come off as a controlling person that restricted him from talking to others. So you ignored it for a while.

However, the amount of time he’d spend with you slowly lessened and lessened and eventually, on a particularly bad day, you finally snapped. You were meant to be walking home with him after school, so you waited for him at your usual spot by the school gates. But after a good ten minutes, he didn’t show up. Confused and slightly annoyed, you went back into the school in search of your boyfriend. While it didn’t take long to find him in the school courtyard, you began to wish that you didn’t because it just fuelled your already bad mood with rage.

He was just standing there with three other girls, laughing along with them as if he didn’t have somewhere else to be. You don’t get mad often- especially not in public- but your emotions had been building up for weeks and you were in an awful mood. Before you knew it, you were storming over to Kise.

“Y/N-cchi! I was just about to come meet you. Let me introduce—“

“Are you kidding me? Kise, I’ve been waiting for you for the past ten minutes and you were just chatting here?” you scolded, your volume causing all four of them to be taken aback. You shot the girls a glare, resulting in them excusing themselves to leave you two alone.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t notice the time go by,” he replied softly, hurt by the fact that you called him ‘Kise’ rather than your usual ‘babe’ or ‘Ryouta’.

“You’re the one who’s always too busy to spend time with me and now you’re here losing track of time with girls you barely even know!”

“They were just being friendly, what would people think of me if I just brushed them off?” he said defensively.

“Kise, they were far from just friendly. They were so obviously flirting with you. One of them had her hands all over you and you just fucking let her!” you yelled, becoming completely unhinged at this point.

“Y/N-cchi, you’re being ridiculous. Just forget about it. Come on, let’s just walk home, cool?” He said with a sigh, which only made you angrier.

“I’m not being ridiculous,” you said firmly, tears of frustration welling up in your eyes.

“Well, what do you want me to say?” He snapped, finally losing his cool too. “That I’m sorry my life doesn’t revolve around you?”

“You know that’s not what I meant! Don’t try to turn this around on me,” you replied, letting the tears roll down your cheeks.

“That’s what it sounds like to me,” he shouted. You felt a pang in your heart at the way he raised his voice at you and you felt yourself finally get thrown off the edge.

“I can’t believe you right now! I hate you!”

Kise’s expression immediately fell at the sound of those words. It quickly made him realise the absurdity of what he was saying.

At that point, you were so frustrated that you decided to just walk away, wiping the tears with the back of your hand. It took a few moments but Kise’s footsteps soon followed you. “Y/N-cchi wait! I’m sorry!” He said, hastily grabbing your arm to stop you. It took him a second to realise that tears had begun to blur his own vision. “Please don’t hate me,” he said softly.

You paused for a moment, feeling bad that you had made him cry too. “I don’t hate you,” you muttered, hearing the word come out of his mouth made you realise how harsh it sounded. “I wouldn’t be this mad if I hated you.”

“I won’t talk to them anymore. And I promise I’ll make more time for you. Why don’t we go grab a coffee or something together?” Kise suggested, interlacing his fingers with yours while the other hand reached up to wipe the tears off your cheeks.

“That sounds nice,” You sniffled with a smile, your anger and hurt finally subsiding. “I’m sorry for yelling at you like that. I was just scared that you’d think they were better than me.”

Kise pressed his lips against yours with nothing but care and tenderness, almost as if to reassure you that he was all yours without having to say a word. But just in case you didn’t understand, he smiled at you once his lips parted from yours, “You’re the only one I want. That won’t ever change- I promise.”

Aomine

As much as you loved Aomine, dating him came with a lot of work which could easily exhaust you if you didn’t have the patience that you do. He was dreamy, sweet and truly a piece of art in general, however he was also extremely lazy when it came to a lot of things. Homework, projects and reminding him of various commitments he had was amongst the various responsibilities you had taken on when you started dating him. For the most part, you didn’t care too much because you often managed to convince him to do it himself in the end, but there were times where he genuinely ticked you off.

One day in particular, you were rather exhausted after a long day at school and you were hanging out at Aomine’s house like you usually would. As he flipped through his gravure magazine next to you, you laid down on his bed, scrolling through your phone as a way to unwind. His phone began to ring, disrupting the peaceful silence that filled the room and he quickly picked it up. “Yo, what’s up?” he answered. “Oh shit that was today? I forgot... Fuck it. I’ll join some other time... Bye.”

Aomine put his phone down with an annoyed groan, making you curious as to what that conversation was about. “What’s wrong? Who was that?” you inquired, still scrolling absentmindedly.

“It was Kise. I was supposed to go play with him and the others today. Didn’t I tell you to remind me about it?”

“Oh right, you did. I’m sorry, it slipped my mind,” you replied.

Aomine clicked his tongue in annoyance, “Dammit, I wanted to play,” he whined.

You weren’t sure why— perhaps it was the tiredness— but you felt as though that comment was accusatory towards you and it sparked this feeling of anger within you. “Then maybe you should’ve remembered yourself,” you retorted, sarcasm oozing from your tone.

“Well if I could do that, I wouldn’t have asked you to remind me, would I?” Aomine replied, perfectly matching your tone, which made your blood boil.

“Why is that my responsibility? I’m constantly busting my ass trying to do shit for you. I’m your s/o, not your personal assistant, Daiki,” you snapped, your voice suddenly getting louder.

Whilst Aomine knew that you were right, his stubborn mind didn’t want to admit it. “If you had a problem with it, you could’ve just said so instead of making me miss out on my plans,” he said harshly.

“Oh so it’s my fault that you don’t have the mental capacity to remember things that go on in your own damn life?” you questioned sarcastically.

“Yes!” Aomine yelled back almost instantly without thinking.

You sat up and scoffed. “You’re despicable, Aomine. Go fucking play then. I’ll leave!”

“No, it’s too late now. I’ve missed it thanks to you,” he muttered, picking up his magazine again.

You narrowed your eyes at him in frustration as you angrily gathered your things. “I’m leaving. You’re the absolute worst. I hate you!” you shouted, clenching your jaw to stop yourself from crying.

Aomine froze upon hearing those words come out of your mouth. “You what?” he said softly, even though he heard you clear as day. He just couldn’t believe that you had actually said it.

“Nothing,” you mumbled, knowing you shouldn’t have said something so harsh when you didn’t even remotely mean it.

“You hate me?” he repeated, wondering whether his pride was really worth having you say words like that.

“I didn’t mean it. But you’re being ridiculous,” you said, still standing your ground.

“I’m sorry,” he sighed, standing up and approaching you. “I’m being such a dick. I’ll sort my shit out- I swear. Just don’t say those words to me, please,” he said, holding your face in his palms and desperately looking into your eyes, unable to fathom how much those words stung. He didn’t even want to imagine a scenario in which you’d hated him because it would absolutely wreck him.

Looking into those pained blue eyes, you couldn’t help but melt as your frustration resided. “I won’t say it again. I’m sorry,” you whispered assuringly.

Aomine placed a kiss on your forehead and pulled you into a hug. “I love you, Y/N,” he mumbled.

“I love you too, Daiki.”

Kagami

Kagami loved basketball. That was a given. You adored how passionate he was towards it and you it made you happy seeing how much he enjoyed the sport. However, sometimes you’d wonder if that was truly all he cared about. He’d spend almost all his time either at practice or playing around with his friends and he barely left any time for you anymore.

It had been a while since you’ve been able to spend time with Kagami and you had finally been able to get away with planning an afternoon with him after school at your place. You planned to cuddle up together with some snacks and watch a movie— it was going to be perfect. That whole school day you were incredibly excited; you walked around with a hop in your step and a smile on your face.

Finally, the end of the school day had arrived and you headed to meet Kagami outside school, like you’d agreed to. When you got outside, you saw him chatting with Kuroko and Hyuga but he quickly excused himself when he saw you approaching him.

“Hey beautiful,” he smiled.

“Taiga! I’m so excited for today,” you grinned, greeting him with a hug.

“Uh, about that,” Kagami paused and pulled away to rub the back of his neck nervously. Hearing those words alone made your smile quickly change into a disappointed frown. “The Winter Cup is around the corner and the team is gonna do a bit of extra practice today at the gym. Can I get a rain check on this date?”

“Are you serious?” you muttered, exasperation in your voice.

“I’m really sorry, Y/N. I promise I’ll make some time for you later,” he said.

“You say that, but you never do. You play basketball every single minute you get. Can you really not spare even a single afternoon for me?” you questioned softly, feeling a strange mixture of anger and hurt.

“Y/N, you know how important basketball is to me,” he replied, trying to meet your eyes but they were fixated on the floor.

“I do, but honestly, it seems like it’s the only importance in your life.”

“Don’t be like that. You know that you’re important to me too,” Kagami frowned, reaching to put an arm on your shoulder, but your frustration caused you to shove it away almost immediately.

“Well, you certainly don’t act like it,” you snapped back. “But whatever, go play I guess,” you shrugged, spite in your tone as you began to walk away.

“Y/N, don’t be mad at me— it’s childish,” Kagami called out, making you stop in your tracks. It was like he was asking you to get mad at him.

“Childish?” you repeated. “Kagami it’s not a fucking relationship if you’re not going to spend any time with me! I’ve been nothing but patient towards you playing basketball thinking that at some point you’ll set some time aside for me, but turns out you couldn’t care less about that!”

“We can talk about this later,” Kagami sighed, realising that you were in public. “I’m going to play. I’ll text you okay?”

“Don’t even bother texting me— you’re fucking outrageous,” you chuckled, finding it absolutely unbelievable how thick he was. “I hate you!”

Kagami felt his heart sink as he watched you storm off. Suddenly basketball became the least of his concerns. He couldn’t just leave things like this. It would absolutely wreck him. Almost instantly, Kagami rushed after you. “Y/N! Please wait!” he called out, quickly reaching for your hand to get you to stop.

While you did stop, you immediately pulled your arm away from him in anger. “What? Shouldn’t you be going to play?” you snapped, tears streaming down your face.

“That doesn’t matter. Just please, don’t leave things like this; don’t hate me,” he pleaded, feeling himself getting teary eyed upon seeing you crying.

You paused for a moment, realising the weight of the words you spat out in the heat of the argument. “I didn’t mean that,” you said softly. “I just hate how I never get to see you anymore.”

“I know, I’m sorry. I’ll just skip out on practice today,” Kagami said.

“You don’t have to do that. We can hang out some other time,” you sighed and sniffled, not wanting to guilt trip him into spending time with you.

“No, I want to spend time with you now. You’re right. I play basketball all the time anyways. I need to give you attention too,”he insisted, reaching for your hand again and giving it a tight squeeze.

“Alright,” you said, wiping the tears with the back your hand. “I’m sorry about saying that I hate you. That was stupid.”

To your surprise, Kagami pulled you into a tight hug, holding you as if he was going to lose you. “That scared me so much, Y/N,” he admitted, resting his chin on the top of your head. “I love you so much. I genuinely thought I’d lost you.”

“I love you so much too,” you said into his chest, hugging him back. “I guess I was scared I’d lose you to basketball or something.”

Kagami kissed the top of your head. “You won’t lose me, I promise.”

[sirthisisa-wendys]

The Enforcers (Part 9): Geto Suguru x Fem!Reader

synopsis: the end is nearer than you think.

wc: 1.3k

tw: none

masterlist

The news comes as you and Suguru are working on the most recent deluge of files set to be released, despite the email you'd received.

"We should go in there and get them," you mutter, clicking away at the keyboard.

"We have to wait," Suguru replies tersely. You sigh loudly, turning back to the TV, which is droning on in the background.

"Oh, uh-- Pierre, we're getting word here that shots have rung out inside of CSB Headquarters, and-- oh my--" Sounds like popping - gunshots - echo behind the anchor, and you stumble out of your chair to grab the remote, turning up the television. The cameraman takes the camera and begins to run, and the screams of other protestors running away from the Headquarters in haste flood the sound of the reporter's panting as he runs away.

"There are shots ringing out inside of the building," you hear the reporter breathe. "We don't know what's going on!"

"Suguru--"

"I'm already calling the team," he mutters, leaning into his palm and rubbing his forehead. The reporter continues to try to articulate what's might be occurring, but it comes in stutters and shaky movements, and you can't tell whether the gunfire is coming out from inside the building or it's still contained inside.

"Pierre, we're getting news that law enforcement cannot - I repeat - they cannot get entrance into the CBS headquarters! The doors, windows, and roof have all been blocked and barricaded."

"Suguru!" you exclaim, just as Shoko bursts into the room followed by three other people.

"They're gunning each other down," Shoko grumbles, rushing over to the TV. "It's the only thing that makes sense."

"Why?" you inquire, but Shoko ignores your question, turning to the Leader of the Fallen Sun District with a look of resignation.

"Suguru, we can't go down there without risking fatalities." A chill runs down your spine, and you look over to Suguru in hope that he'll do what you suggested; that for once, he'll do the right thing.

"And what about those of us that are stuck in there?" He replies calmly, lacing his fingers together.

"We have to hope for the best." Right as Shoko finishes her statement, a loud explosion rings out on the broadcast. You all instinctively flinch as a burst of fire comes out from a set of windows.

"There will be fatalities, here." The reporter states. "There's no doubt about it."

Five hours later, you're still sitting in front of the TV, wondering how anything like this could have happened in such a short amount of time. The smoldering remains of the CSB headquarters are the backdrop for every channel, every new story.

Yuji, Nobara, Maki, Choso, Megumi, Noritoshi...

"The total count of missing people has climbed to five hundred and seventy-six. The debris from the headquarters covers a good percentage of the open field, and the confirmed death toll is still hovering at three hundred and twenty-four. No survivors have been found."

You inhale sharply, shoulders shaking involuntarily as you lean forward and place your head in your hands. Suguru and his team are working behind you on making some sort of plan, but you can't focus on any of that right now. All you can think about are the faces of your friends, the loving expressions, the way they cared for you...

And this is all your fault.

You helped Suguru release these files.

You gave him the ammunition needed to start this massacre.

You're responsible for--

"We have determined through an investigation that this attack was not only pre-meditated but spurred on by our own agents." Nanami Kento's voice cuts through the static in your head. You raise your tear-streaked face to watch the Head of Communications address the public. "For years, the Leviathans and Kitsune have worked together, but now, it appears that a rift in the two groups caused them to turn on each other and commit these atrocities."

"I fucking knew they would say that," one of the men behind you mutters.

"In light of recent allegations that we have conducted projects and initiatives aimed to promote and propel promising subjects to the Kitsune ranks, and thus disenfranchising candidates who would not have met those standards, we have decided to commence an internal investigation based on the evidence we have collected. The Grand Council will release those findings as soon as they are able. Thank you." The blonde man steps away from the podium and another person takes his place. But you turn to Suguru, who is frowning, hands gripping the edge of the table.

"This is absurd," you mention, but he averts his black eyes, looking at his lap. "They can't expect us to believe that every single Leviathan and Kitsune turned on each other." Suguru sighs, his eyes closing as he shakes his head.

"This is exactly what we expected."

_____________________________________________________________

No one can sleep.

Everyone is working through the night, attempting to make connections with their contacts in the CSB, planning out options, and watching the developing story with a vested interest.

You're laying in the bed, computer sitting in your lap as you search, again and again, refreshing the list of confirmed dead and praying no one you went to the academy with would show up on the list.

It's two am when Suguru's cell phone rings, and he picks it up, humming once as a greeting. He listens for a minute, then his eyes become wide and he stands, hair falling down his back as he leans his head backward and exhales deeply.

"We're on our way." When he hangs up, you all look at him for some kind of answer, some indication of what to do. "There are several cars that showed up just a minute ago, and they're full of people claiming to be from the CSB. And they want to speak to y/n and I." You shift out of the bed, standing with him in anticipation of putting up another fight.

"Wait, you mean..."

"I mean escaped Kitsune and Leviathans." Maybe your friends would be among them. "Everyone grab a jacket and your weapon. This might get ugly."

You all parade down to the main floor, where a collection of men and women with guns and vests greet the small team, every single face in the throng stern and unyielding. The armed militia stands at attention, waiting for Suguru's instructions patiently as he approaches and is handed two bulletproof vests: one for you, and one for him.

"Guard set A," Suguru calls out, slightly shifting his bulletproof vest as you attempt to adjust your own vest, pulling the straps extra tight. "Cover our back, face the escapees from the front. This could be a ploy to attempt to bring harm to the Fallen Sun District at close range." When Suguru sees you struggling with the clasps, he sighs and turns to you, continuing his instructions while his hands quickly readjust the straps so that the vest is snug against your body.

"Guard set B, cover our front. Y/n and I will negotiate with those who have arrived. If things go poorly, you all are commanded to shoot without prejudice."

"Yes, sir!"

"As for you," Suguru murmurs, turning to you and placing his hands on your shoulders. "Stay behind me at all times. Do not step one foot in front of me. I'm only saying this to keep you safe, as you're still assumed to be a hostage at this point." After this, you raise up on your tip-toes, lacing your arms around him. His hands slide to your waist as you whisper,

"Thank you for protecting me." He pecks your lips lightly, holding you close and exhaling into your ear,

"Thank you for trusting me again."

_____________________________________________________________

TAGLIST: @missbonekitty @wack0-genius @thankuary @jsqeeut @r-i-m-f-009 @sunfloweroranges @leanne-tamashi @girlruby23 @rein-icu @brownskinnedgirll @chanelmalandro @savantsoulfinder @jibe-gajima @chilledlucifer @amnxsia @kontentious @fuyuko26 @everybodylovescayrayray @flare-on @sammytamaki @meena-in-a-nutshell @falling-through-pages @naoyasdarling @vabybizzle

[monicashipslokius]

Soulmates, Actually Pt 4

(read part 1/part 2/part 3)

A sharp, shrill alarm blares before the sun has even risen, rousing Loki from a perfect slumber. Loki groans their disgust, but it’s muffled in the meat of Mobius’s shoulder.

“Easy, sunshine,” Mobius says, and the infernal man is actually trying to move.

Loki grumbles louder. Mobius, chuckling, eases Loki away from him and onto the pillow instead. It’s not the same - too soft and not nearly warm enough. Loki clings tighter around Mobius’s waist in retaliation.

“We talked about this,” Mobius says. “I have to go back to work today.”

Loki huffs in frustration as they let Mobius remove their hold and lower their arms to the bed. The pillow is a poor replacement.

For a moment, Mobius brushes Loki’s hair back away from their face. His fingers linger, feather-light, at the edge of Loki’s cheekbone. Too soon, the touch is gone.

“I’ll be back at six pm sharp.”

Loki rolls onto Mobius’s side of the bed and falls asleep again.

When they awaken, the sun is bright and the sheets are cool. Loki’s stomach rumbles. They groan as they pull themself out of bed and finally face the day.

The long, lonely day.

A week has passed since Thor’s departure - a week of Loki and Mobius redecorating and cuddling and learning each other.

They bought six plants of varying sizes, new drapes the color of the ocean, and a soft bedspread to match. Mobius fixed up the broken bathroom door, and Loki hung a few new art pieces and string lights.

The La-Z-Boy they arranged in front of a small boxy television set became a fast favorite.

“What did I tell you?” Mobius said the first time Loki relaxed deeply into the recliner. “It’s the perfect throne.”

Mobius may not understand color palettes, but the man knows comfort.

“It will do for now,” Loki told him, not wanting to give too much away.

Mobius’s smile never wavered. “Mmhm.”

Now, Loki drags themself to the kitchen to make a sandwich. Ten minutes later, they are perched on the recliner, plate on their lap, watching soap operas on television.

Claudio is surprised to find that his fiance Regina’s twin sister Georgina has been behind all of his misfortune, but the plot twist has Loki rolling their eyes.

“Amateurs.” Loki bites into an apple slice.

The hours tick by. Loki watches the anchor-shaped clock that hangs in the kitchen - much of their new decor has an ocean theme. But the more Loki watches the clock, the slower time seems to pass.

Time flew by with Mobius here. But without him...

After the soap operas, the courtroom shows begin. And then the news programs. Loki walks laps around the apartment while listening to the weather forecast for the third time - partly cloudy with a 30% chance of rain. The cost of gasoline is skyrocketing. The local high school football team might make county finals, whatever that means.

At quarter to six, Loki thanks the cosmos. Finally. Mobius will be home and put an end to this monotony.

Loki cleans up a bit, dusting some crumbs off the arms of the recliner. They place the plates in the sink.

Then, because they don’t want to appear too eager, they grab a book and stretch out on the bed.

Six o’clock comes and goes. Mobius does not arrive.

By seven, Loki is annoyed.

By eight, they are angry.

By ten, they are concerned.

Dubuque seems relatively safe. And Mobius has lived here alone for a long time before Loki.

But Loki has enemies. Many, many enemies. All of whom would be more than happy to get their hands on their soulmate.

Mobius is probably fine.

But what if he’s not?

At eleven, they are examining the photo of his office building that Mobius keeps on the dresser. Mobius had taken them to see it in the past week, though they hadn’t gone inside. It wasn’t too far a walk, if they recall. Loki is certain that they could find it again, even in darkness.

So they change into a black suit and hurry out the door. The Dubuque city streets are barren this time of night. Loki encounters no one on their trek to the office - until they barge through the front door and are stopped by a security guard.

Loki promised Mobius that they would not hurt anyone, so instead they create a projection of themself to distract the guard while they themself head toward the elevators. Following the signs for the data analytics department, they ride the elevator to the fourth floor.

They step off the elevator into a darkened field of cubicles. Each is the same - small desk, computer, and chair. All are empty. But Loki isn’t alone here. They follow a light through the cubicle maze and come to one that is occupied.

Mobius has a foot-high pile of files on his desk. He’s tapping at his computer keyboard with the index finger of each hand and peering at the small monitor.

“Mobius?”

Mobius jumps, then clutches his chest. He exhales when he sees Loki standing in the opening of his 3ft x 4ft cell. “Give a guy a warning next time.” He smiles. “But it’s good to see you. How’d you get here? Security let you in?”

Loki only frowns at him. “You said you’d be back at six.”

Mobius’s smile loses some of its brightness. “I have to work a little late. Next time we go out, we’ll get you a phone so I can call and let you know -”

“’A little late?’ Mobius, it’s been hours. I thought you were...” They won’t give name to their truest fears. That Mobius had been kidnapped or killed. Or perhaps that he had finally seen the true darkness in Loki and left of his own free will.

Mobius shakes his head. “Come on, Loki. It hasn’t been that long. It’s only...” He glances at his monitor. “Midnight? That can’t be right.”

“I assure you that is accurate.”

Mobius sits back in his squeaking chair, and rubs his hands over his face. “I’m sorry...” He releases a drawn out sigh and his whole body droops. “Boss was cheesed that I bailed on the conference. I have a lot of work to make up.”

The stack of folders towers over Mobius’s slouched shoulders.

“Would it helped if I -”

“You can’t kill him,” Mobius says.

Loki closes their mouth. Tries again. “He needn’t be killed. I could simply... frighten him.”

Mobius shoots Loki a flat look.

“Fine,” Loki says, disappointed. “But what is your intention? To stay here all night?”

Mobius side-eyes the folder mountain. “I’m going to have to.”

“No.”

Mobius sighs. “Loki -”

“This is a place of employment, Mobius, not a living space.”

“It’s my own fault. I should have come back sooner.” He rubs at the corner of one eye. “Maybe I should have stayed at the conference.”

The words stab Loki between the ribs.

“Magicking away was not my best idea,” Mobius says. “I shouldn’t have run from my responsibilities. I’ll never catch up on this work.”

More stabs, a thousand tiny cuts.

“So you regret everything,” Loki says, fighting hard to keep the hurt from their voice. They are disappointed by their own surprise, their own pain. They had thought Mobius was different. They should have known.

Thor was wrong when he said no one could hold Loki’s interest. It was the other way around. Loki protected themself by leaving before the other could get bored. They should have done that here.

But they thought...

Mobius is supposed to be their perfect match.

“No, hey,” Mobius jumps from his chair. That’s all it takes to put him in Loki’s space. Loki takes a step back. “That’s not what I meant. I don’t regret everything, just some things.”

“You regret coming with me when we escaped.”

“N-no,” he says, but not without hesitation.

“You could have stayed. They weren’t chasing you. You could have told them I brainwashed you and gone on with your day.”

“That’s not what I’m saying.” The bags are heavy under Mobius’s eyes. He’s tired, Loki knows that - but Loki’s tired too. Sitting, waiting, stressing.

The room sparks with tension. Loki’s pain festers under their skin.

And Mobius regrets.

Loki takes a breath, searching for calm. For understanding. For their soulmate. “Come home,” they say, “And we can continue talking in the morning.”

Mobius exhales again, too sharp. He places his hands on his hips and looks at that damned pile of folders again. “I can’t go anywhere.”

“Mobius -”

“This is my life, Loki,” Mobius tells him. “Data analysis is my life. You have to understand that.”

Something dark in Loki’s chest snaps clean in half. “This is your life. This.” They wave a hand around. “This tiny box in a sea of tiny boxes. Where everyone else has left you here in the dark. Where your employer buries you under papers so deep that you cannot find your way out of them. Is all this extra work truly because you left the conference? How often would you work late before I arrived?”

Mobius looks away, and Loki knows they’re right. The answer, too often.

“Are you at least receiving additional benefits for all this extra time spent here?”

Mobius still won’t look at them.

“They are taking advantage of you, of your loyalty, and you are letting them.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Mobius snaps, the sharpest he’s ever spoken to Loki.

Loki stands taller. They’re used to anger, to cutting words, to pain - more than they were ever used to kindness.

“I am trying to protect you,” Loki says.

“I don’t need protection from my job.”

For one wild moment, Loki thinks of grabbing those folders and tossing them across the room. They dream of throwing Mobius over their shoulder and saving them from this drab place and its tan carpet and eggshell walls.

Instead, they insist, “No, you do. You owned three photos when I first met you: one of your parents, one of a jetski, and one of this office. Can you not see how depressing that is?”

Mobius face hardens.

“You are meant for better things than this. When was the last time you even rode a jetski? Or had fun of any kind?”

“I’m an adult. I don’t need fun.”

“That is absurd.”

Mobius’s brows draw together. “Listen, not all of us could be born into royalty, and just go around doing whatever we want all the time.”

Born into royalty. A fresh sting, not one Mobius could know would hit so hard. But it does all the same. Loki steps backward from the force of it.

Mobius unhooks his arms. “Loki -”

Loki shakes their head. Mobius watches them, confusion replacing frustration, followed quickly by concern. He lifts his hand, but Loki steps back again, further out of reach.

“It’s fine,” Loki says, lying. “Stay as long as you like.” They bury the pain down deep. It’s familiar, an old, hated friend. “I wouldn’t dare dream of treading on your unhappiness.”

Mobius drops his hand. “I am happy. I am perfectly happy.”

“Good,” Loki says.

“Great,” Mobius says.

“Wonderful.”

“Fantastic.”

They stare hard at each other. Loki refuses to look away first.

When Mobius finally does, turning back to his cubicle and his chair and the stack of folders, disappointment floods through Loki.

They don’t wait to be dismissed, they turn and leave on their own.

*

Loki does not return to the apartment. Instead, they walk and they walk and they walk. They almost hope to be accosted by vagrants, so as to release some restless energy in a fight, but they see no one. They reach a river and follow it into a forest.

They sit along the riverbank and watch the sunlight crest over the trees.

Maybe they shouldn’t have surrendered the scepter. With the tesseract, they could have traveled anywhere. Now they are limited to the distance of their own two legs. Not that they would know where to go anyway.

The only place they want to be is back at the apartment with Mobius.

It’s evening when they eventually make their way back there. Their stomach growls, and they’re thirsty and tired. With some food and a good night’s rest, perhaps they could leave again with a plan this time. Hire a taxi to an airport and take a plane. Find a city of decadence and lose themself for a few decades.

They don’t expect Mobius to be home. It’s only shortly after seven, far too early for his beloved late nights. Yet as they place the key into the lock and start to turn, they barely have time to remove it before being yanked forward into the apartment and into a crushing embrace.

“Don’t leave me,” Mobius says. His arms are sure around Loki’s waist. His nose is buried in the crook of Loki’s neck and shoulder. His words are muffled by Loki’s forest-dirty suit coat. “I’m not happy. I haven’t been in a long time. Not until you. And not without you.”

Loki sags into his arms, and he holds tighter, keeping Loki upright. Keeping them safe. They close their eyes and let the warmth of Mobius’s body chase away the chill of the Iowa evening air.

“You scared the hell outta me,” Mobius says, voice shaky. “I looked for you everywhere, but I kept checking here. I kept hoping you’d come back. I’m so sorry.” Mobius leans back. He reaches up and cups Loki’s face between his palms. Gently, he rubs his thumbs over Loki’s cheekbones. “I want to be good for you.”

“How could you think you’re not?”

Regret shines in Mobius’s eyes now, more than it ever did during their argument. “I hurt you. I don’t want to ever do that again.”

Loki places their hand over one of Mobius’s on their face. “I hurt you, too, I suspect.”

“No, everything you said was right.” He swallows. “Work’s all I had for so long, and when I was back there, and they started piling it on... Everyone else in that office has always had someone, so before I would take on the extra work myself. It was better than coming home alone. It’s a hard habit to break. Loki, I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to do this.” But Loki still wants to hear it. Each of Mobius’s words are a balm over their pain. Mobius keeps going. He doesn’t even stop for breath.

“I lashed out at you, and I only did that because you were right. And I didn’t want to hear it. But then you were gone.”

“I’m here,” Loki says. “I’m here now.”

“I am a lousy soulmate.” Mobius smiles, but it’s too soft, too sad. “After so long alone, I don’t think that I know how to be with somebody. But I want to learn. I want to deserve this, with you.”

“Mobius,” Loki says, and their mending heart threatens to break again. “I am no great prize.”

Mobius starts to laugh. “I’m trying to be serious, Loki.”

“I am too,” Loki says, and whatever Mobius sees on their face stops the laughter. Loki studies the softness in Mobius’s gaze, the adoration, the great care, memorizing as much as they can, in case this is the last time they see it. “I’m a monster.”

Mobius, voice flat and unamused, says, “Be serious.”

“I was not born to royalty. Not like you think,” Loki says and waits. Dread rolls over them in waves, but Mobius does not react more than a slight cant of his head. “I’m not...” It would be easier to show him, but Loki can’t. If they do, Mobius will change all of his sweet words. He won’t stand to share this small apartment with them any longer, and Loki will be back on that riverside. “How you see me is not... how I am.”

Mobius is patient. Mobius waits. Maybe Loki wasn’t wrong about Mobius after all. Maybe Mobius, like them, is imperfect and a little afraid but trying.

Slowly, Loki pulls Mobius’s hands from their face so as not to burn him with the cold of their skin as they lift the glamour that hides their Jotunn form.

They want to look away, to hide from the horror they are sure to see on Mobius’s face, but simultaneously are too desperate to see any and every reaction.

Mobius’s eyes grow wide. His lips part. He blinks a few times.

“Loki,” Mobius says, and Loki braces for fresh heartache. But then he smiles, real and true and bright, a lighthouse in a lifetime of hurt. “Blue like the ocean.” The adoration never dims from his eyes. “You are beautiful.”

*

Mobius insists he doesn’t care, but Loki only feels comfortable again with their glamour restored.

“Either way,” Mobius says, and sends Loki off to the bathroom to shower and change. “I’ll have dinner ready by the time you’re done.”

When Loki leaves the tiny bathroom in their silk pajamas, they find the small two-person table lit by candlelight. Mobius stands beside it, wearing one of the dark suits Loki picked out for him at the store, with a deep green tie that’s slightly askew.

“What’s all this?” Loki asks.

“I know we’re soulmates, and our fates are destined and everything,” Mobius says, tugging at his collar. A bit of pink dusts his cheeks. “But some things should be done the old fashioned way. I want to win your heart, so I thought...” He clears his throat. “I want to wine and dine you. Properly.”

“Ah.” Loki slides further into the room, heart lighter than it’s been in the past forty-eight hours. All the lingering hurts are mended. And Mobius looks delectable in that suit, just as Loki thought he would. Loki strides right up to him, reaches out, and adjusts his tie. “You are attempting to seduce me.”

Mobius’s cheeks redden. He glances away for the briefest of moments before his eyes return to Loki’s face.

“You are everything a guy could want,” Mobius says. “More than I ever dreamed.”

Loki finishes fixing Mobius’s tie, but leaves their hands flat on Mobius’s chest. Mobius takes one and brings it to his mouth. He places a kiss to Loki’s palm.

Loki shivers, but not from any cold.

“Loki,” Mobius says, giving so much weight to the name - things unspoken, maybe not ready to be said, but are known - so known, and ready to be shown.

Mobius leans, and Loki stays very still, waiting, wanting but so, so afraid.

Mobius stops just out of reach. His breath hot on Loki’s lips, he asks, “Can I kiss you?”

Loki swallows all their fear and whispers, “Please.”

Mobius closes the distance and presses their lips together.

Fireworks ignite in Loki’s chest. Their heart thunders. Their hands itch for more, so they grab Mobius by the shoulders and hold, clinging, ruining the new suit and not caring at all.

Mobius cups Loki’s jawline, guiding them closer, tilting gently, positioning Loki just as he wants them. Loki goes willingly, opening their mouth as Mobius licks his way inside.

They should have done this long ago. They should do this all the time. This should never, ever stop.

Loki moans as Mobius’s fingers comb into their hair. Mobius breaks for air, tilts his head, and comes back for more. Loki holds Mobius so close, they are certain their heart beats straight into Mobius’s chest.

It’s perfect, passion incarnate, and Loki wants so much that they -

Loki’s stomach growls. Loudly.

Mobius smiles against Loki’s lips.

Loki groans as Mobius plants one more soft kiss and pulls away.

“Wining and dining time,” he says with a wink.

Loki is both endeared and annoyed. “I will have more of this.” His stomach grumbles again. “After dinner.”

Loki doesn’t miss the flush of Mobius’s cheeks, even as his easy smile returns. “It would be my absolute pleasure, and I mean that.”

[clumsyclifford]

lashton prompt: luke falling asleep on skype and ashton taking the opportunity to draw him, bonus if someone else finds the sketches before ashton shows them to luke

meghna this prompt is from almost a full calendar year ago. i am proud to report that after all this time i did in fact manage to set it in spideyverse because that’s how determined i am. more info in ao3 notes but it takes place in the summer before their senior year of high school, so after the events of everything else in spideyverse so far

read here on ao3

-

Ashton will have to thank Maya later for the tip about the Fine Arts Room. He jimmies the door handle and, as promised, the door swings opens to reveal a darkened room full of half-finished projects. They must really take the decency of humanity on faith here. Anyone could come in at any time and sabotage any of this work.

Ashton has less nefarious plans.

He sits at his usual spot but doesn’t turn any lights on; the big windows shine just enough moonlight into the room that Ashton can see the silhouettes of the furniture, and his laptop will be on in a moment anyway. Careful of the scattered pages over his workspace, he opens his computer and loads up Skype. 

Just in time for an incoming call.

Ashton fumbles with his headphones and plugs them in with one hand while he accepts the call with the other. The screen fills with Luke’s brightly-lit, highly pixelated face. Chin in his hands, elbows propped on his desk, hair a ruffled mess (from the mask, Ashton knows) — the sight of him fills Ashton with warmth.

“Hey,” Luke says, smiling his usual cheeky smile. They’ve been texting sporadically, but seeing Luke’s face — hearing his voice — gives Ashton a fluttery feeling behind his sternum. Calum would call that anatomically impossible, but he’d do it with a smirk. “I can barely see you.”

“I’m sitting in the dark,” Ashton explains. His voice is a hushed whisper even though he knows it’s absurd to be paranoid. They’re supposed to be confined to their bunks by now, and the staff and counselors will all be asleep. The only reason he and Luke are calling now, past midnight, is because now is the only time they’re both available. “I’m in the Fine Arts Room.”

“Ooh, can I see?”

“I don’t want to turn on the lights,” Ashton says. “There are windows and stuff.”

“Are you not supposed to be there?” Luke raises an eyebrow and grins. “Ooh, is Ashton Irwin sneaking around?”

“Well, if we weren’t calling at the middle of the night, I wouldn’t have to.”

“Don’t they lock the buildings?” Luke suddenly looks concerned.

Ashton shrugs. “Maya told me that if I jiggle the handle, the door will open. She was right.”

“Go Maya,” Luke says. “I like Maya. Who’s Maya?”

“My new friend,” says Ashton. “She mostly paints. We’ve got a challenge going on about whether she’s better at drawing or I’m better at painting, since neither of us really use those mediums. Hannah — one of the other campers — is going to find something for us to both paint slash draw and then there’ll be an unofficial panel of judges. It’s pretty stupid.”

“You’re smiling a lot,” Luke says, and Ashton realizes he is. “Doesn’t sound stupid to me. You think you’re gonna win?”

“No,” Ashton says honestly. “I’m pretty awful at painting.”

“I’m sure you’re better than you think. How hard can it be?”

“That’s very rich coming from you, Mr. I-Can’t-Draw-A-House.”

“Hey, fuck off! I can draw a house, thank you very much.” Luke looks down at his desk and his focus shifts, and Ashton watches in bemused patience. As he waits, he draws a blank piece of paper towards him and grabs the nearest pencil lying around. His hands move almost unconsciously, drawing lines and curves and sketching the outline of something Ashton hasn’t quite decided on yet. Luke finally lifts his head up. “Here, see?” He holds up a piece of paper to the camera, where he’s drawn a box with an isosceles triangle on top for the roof, complete with a little chimney sticking out. “House,” Luke proudly declares. “Boom. Get fucked, Irwin.”

“I stand corrected,” Ashton chuckles. He hums. “They’ll probably just find us equally talented because painting is different from drawing and blah blah blah artsy hipster bullshit.”

“Stop dismissing the artsy hipster bullshit,” Luke says stubbornly. “I’ll have you know my boyfriend deals exclusively in artsy hipster bullshit.”

“You think my drawings are artsy hipster bullshit?”

“No, babe, I think you are artsy hipster bullshit.” Luke grins widely and then gets cut off by a yawn. Ashton bites back a very cheesy comment about how Luke should web himself up for being criminally cute.

“You know what, I’m gonna let you have that one,” he says instead. “Since I am at an artsy hipster bullshit summer camp.”

“I miss you.” Luke pouts. It’s a funny look on him. Ashton tries to imagine Spiderman pouting and completely fails. Sometimes it’s hard for him to reconcile Luke and Spiderman being the same person. That this adorable six-foot-and-change beanstalk who yawns on Skype is the same person who can do a double-backflip and land on his feet on the rooftop of any building. Ashton’s boyfriend stops crimes. What the fuck.

“I miss you too,” he says. “You seem tired.”

“I’m not tired.” Instant karma is a bitch. Luke immediately yawns again, this time much wider. “Okay, I’m a little tired,” he admits, smacking his lips like a child. “Summer break is deceptively boring. I…I run out of things to do all day, so I just kinda…keep patrolling. I might be wearing myself out.”

“Jesus, Luke, take it easy on yourself. Queens goes the entire school day without Spiderman’s protection during the school year. You can handle a break.”

“Yeah, but I might as well patrol,” Luke counters. “I have the time, and it’s not like I’m doing anything else.”

“I thought you and Michael were working on new specs for the suit.”

“It’s mostly Michael. Also, I think he’s kind of annoyed about the whole 24/7 patrol. He can’t work on the suit if I’m wearing it.”

“That is true.”

“But he’s been spending a lot of his time with Calum, anyway,” Luke says coolly. “So I figure he’s probably got other priorities.”

“Well, if you keep blowing him off to obsessively patrol the city, I can’t possibly imagine why he’s making other plans.” 

Luke stares through the camera. His shoulders slump. “Maybe. I hadn’t thought of that.”

“That’s why I’m here,” Ashton chirps.

Luke sighs deeply. “You’re not here, Ash.”

Ashton purses his lips and frowns. “That’s not what I meant.”

“I know, but I’m just saying. I miss you. I wish you were here.”

“Yeah,” Ashton says. He misses Luke too, more than is probably healthy. That’s what he gets, he supposes, for only having a handful of close relationships; Luke and Calum are his whole life, and not being able to hug either one of them for even a week has been pretty challenging. “But look, it’s only another week, and then I am all yours, I swear.”

“Don’t enable me,” Luke says, affronted. “You’re supposed to say things like… ‘You don’t own me’ and ‘I’m my own person’ and stuff like that.”

Ashton blinks, confused. “Uh…well, yeah, but we both already know that. I’m just saying I miss you too. But if it’s any consolation, Maya has ruthlessly mocked me for all the drawings I do of you. Like mercilessly. It’s actually kind of embarrassing.”

“That is super embarrassing,” Luke says, with a small, bashful smile. “You’re so fucking lame, Ashton.”

“Wow,” Ashton says. “You even sound like her.”

Luke giggles, which turns seamlessly into a yawn. “Hey, I came first. Maya sounds like me.”

“Luke, babe, just go to sleep,” Ashton says. “We can talk another night. Maybe one where you’re more well-rested.”

“I’m super rested,” Luke says in a monotone. “King of restedness, me.”

“Wow, I’m suddenly convinced.” Luke makes a half-hearted face at him and Ashton makes one back. The sketch under Ashton’s pencil has revealed itself to be Luke, yet again. Shocker. It really is embarrassing that Ashton defaults to drawing his boyfriend. If they ever break up, Ashton will be fucked.

“Are you drawing?” Trust Luke to notice. Although the fact that it’s taken him this long to notice means he must be slower on the uptake than usual. 

“Yeah,” Ashton says, because when is he not. 

“Drawing what?”

“Guess,” Ashton says dryly.

Luke gives a sleepy smile. “At least you’re predictable.”

“Luke, I’m begging you to get some sleep. We’ll talk tomorrow or this weekend or something, okay?”

Luke yawns yet again. “Okay,” he agrees, right hand propping up his head. His eyes flutter shut and then open again. “Okay, fine.”

“And please let Michael look at your suit,” Ashton adds. “You know he’s only going to make it better.”

“I know, I know, I just…” Luke’s eyes fall shut again. It seems more out of tiredness than distress. “If I give it to him, then I can’t use it.”

Ashton’s pretty sure if Luke’s hero complex gets any bigger he’s going to have to start renting out rooms. “It’ll be two days, tops,” he says. “Take two days off.”

“I wanna wait ‘til you’re back,” Luke mumbles. “Spend ‘em with you.”

“You spend most of your time with me,” Ashton says gently. “Spend them with Michael. Hell, spend them with Cal.”

“But I want…” Luke yawns. He lists sideways a little. “I want you.”

Ashton chews his lip. “I’ll be back before you know it,” he says. “You won’t be able to get rid of me.”

Luke hums absently. “‘Kay, g’night,” he slurs, but makes no gesture to hang up the call. He probably expects Ashton to end it. If Luke is as asleep as he looks right now, Ashton kind of has to.

The graphite on the sketch paper is smudging a little. Ashton glances down at the half-assed likeness of his boyfriend and has an idea.

Quietly, he grabs another blank page, moves his laptop back a little, and starts to draw.

-

They’re up bright and early the next day, and after breakfast Ashton follows a decidedly more lively Maya into the Fine Arts Room, where she takes her place diagonally from him at their table. They’re both mid-project; Ashton stacks and sets aside his scratch papers and pulls forth the drawing he’s currently working on.

“So? You talked to Luke?”

Ashton blinks and looks up at Maya. “Yeah,” he says. “Thanks for the tip, I meant to say.”

“Hey, don’t thank me, thank Cupid,” Maya says airily. “I’m on the side of love, baby.”

Ashton snorts and rolls his eyes. “Let Cupid know I say thanks.”

Maya hums. “Cupid says you’re welcome.”

They’re quiet while Maya gets herself set up — she has to put all her acrylics back every evening only to set them back out every morning, another reason Ashton prefers pencils over paints — and Ashton picks up his pencil and starts to draw. 

“Is this yours?” Maya asks, peering at Ashton’s discarded stack of sketches.

“Yeah,” Ashton says without looking. “Just sketches and stuff.”

“Wait, this is so cute.” She’s leaning over the drawing on the top. Ashton glances up.

It’s Luke from last night, soundly asleep over Skype.

Ashton had ended the call after about ten minutes of silence, enough time to get the rough outlines of all the important shapes. The video quality wouldn’t have lent itself to a good sketch anyway if Ashton had been chasing authenticity, but fortunately he knows Luke’s face well enough — both from drawing it and gazing at it in real life — to pretend the call had had a crystal-clear picture. None of it is colored in, but it’s as obviously Luke as all of Ashton’s other drawings. Somehow, though, this one feels more personal.

“Did you draw this last night?”

“Uh,” Ashton says, reaching for the drawing. He shuffles it between several other papers so an innocuous collection of doodles is now at the top of the stack, and Maya clicks her tongue in disapproval.

“Hey, I was looking at that. It was cute.”

“Yeah, it’s— it’s just nothing.”

“It’s not nothing, it’s adorable,” Maya says. She fixes him with puppy-dog eyes. “Pleeeease can I see it? I won’t show anyone. I’m studying so I can kick your ass in our competition.”

Ashton sighs. “It’s just Luke. You’ve seen millions of drawings of him.”

“But those were obviously from memory,” Maya points out, taking his non-answer as an affirmative and sifting through the stack. Ashton doesn’t bother trying to stop her. It’s not like he has anything to hide — or at least not anything Maya could figure out by looking at the drawing.

And in her defense, Luke does look cute as fuck in the drawing, because he’d looked cute as fuck in real life.

“For all you know, this one is also from memory.”

“You drew the screen, Ash, it’s clearly from last night.”

“Well,” Ashton says diplomatically. Then he abandons diplomacy, because Maya has located the drawing and is grinning and aww-ing. “Well do you blame me? He fell asleep on our call. It was adorable.”

Maya giggles. “You guys are so fucking cute,” she says. “Y’know, most people would be insulted if their boyfriend fell asleep on a video call with them.”

“He’s been really busy lately,” Ashton says. “And it was the end of the call anyway.”

“One day, I will have someone to draw me when I fall asleep on our Skype calls,” Maya says wistfully. “I’m putting the vibes out into the universe so it’ll happen soon.”

“Maybe you’ll be the one drawing them,” Ashton points out. 

Maya finally sets down the Luke drawing. She dips her brush in red paint, clearly intending to put it into her work, but at Ashton’s words instead brandishes it threateningly at him. “I won’t be drawing anyone, buddy.”

Ashton laughs. “But you’d date someone who drew instead of painted?”

“At this point?” Maya sighs theatrically. “I’d date just about anyone who did anything.”

Ashton laughs again. They work quietly for a few minutes. Ashton starts shading.

“Why do you only ever draw Luke?” Maya asks. “You said you’ve been together for less than a year. Who were you drawing before then?”

Ashton shrugs. “Uh, anyone, really,” he says. “People. There are a lot of pretty interesting people at my school, and besides, I’m from the city.”

Maya snorts derisively. “You’re from Queens.”

“Queens is in the city.”

Another derisive snort. “Queens is in the city the same way using ink stamps is painting.”

“That’s not even a little bit the same thing, at all.”

“You’re not a city boy.”

“I am literally a city boy!” Maya waves him off, but Ashton ignores her. She’s from Massachusetts. She has no leg to stand on. “My point is that there are lot of interesting people near where I live, too.”

“You didn’t ever, I don’t know, draw your friends? Calum, didn’t you say he’s your best friend from home?”

“Ah, yeah,” Ashton says. “Calum. Didn’t like when I drew him.”

“What, seriously? Why not?”

“I don’t know,” Ashton says, and it’s true. “He just asked me to stop drawing him one day so I did.” He hesitates. “...Mostly. Sometimes I still do. But if you knew Calum you’d understand why. He’s extremely good-looking.”

“Of course he is,” Maya says. “Any chance he’s single and/or interested in women from several states away?”

“No to both questions,” Ashton says sympathetically. “But good try.”

“Yeah, I figured,” Maya says good-naturedly, and they lapse into silence again.

It’s broken by Maya, again. “Do you show Luke the drawings you do of him?”

That’s a complicated question. No, Ashton doesn’t actively show his drawings to Luke, but Luke usually sees them anyway. Some of them are more private; Ashton keeps the one of Luke in the Spiderman suit sans mask folded up in the bottom of his socks drawer where he’s pretty certain no one ever looks. There doesn’t seem to be a point to showing it to Luke now, so long after he’d actually done it. But for the most part he’s not hiding his art from Luke; Luke sees what he sees, notwithstanding Ashton’s intention.

“Sometimes,” Ashton says.

Maya nods at the drawing of Luke asleep on Skype. “You gonna show him that one?”

“Uh, probably not.”

“What, why? It’s so cute.”

“I don’t know, maybe because it makes me seem like a ridiculous lovesick borderline creepy idiot?”

“Guys love that,” Maya assures him. “Or so I’m told. C’mon, why hold out on him when he already knows you’re basically obsessed with drawing him?” She taps the drawing. “And when he looks this adorable?”

Ashton breathes a laugh. “You have a point.”

“I always do,” Maya says, and she flips her hair dramatically.

Maybe Michael would let Ashton draw him. That would be a nice change from always drawing Luke and never drawing Calum. Maybe Ashton could just do it and then ask Michael what he thinks. It would be nice to have new muses. Ashton has spent a lot of time on Luke; maybe it’s about time he branched out again.

“Hey,” Ashton says, struck with inspiration as he watches Maya make brushstrokes across her paper. “Can I draw you?”

“Hell yeah, go for it,” Maya says. “I’m not sitting still for you, though.”

“I’ll live,” Ashton says dryly. Maya grins and laughs. A fresh page before Ashton and a new pencil in his hand, he studies Maya’s profile carefully and then brings his pencil to the page.

-

“Did you break into the Fine Arts Room again?”

“I don’t think it’s breaking in if it’s technically unlocked,” Ashton points out.

Luke squints but evidently fails to argue with this logic. “How’s artsy hipster bullshit camp?”

“Really good,” Ashton says, cracking his knuckles. His parents have told him repeatedly that doing so will give him arthritis, but Ashton suspects that’s more of a scare tactic than a fact. At this point he doubts even rehab could get him to stop. It’s the only thing Ashton can think to do with his hands when he’s not drawing. “By the way, remember the other day when you fell asleep on our call?”

I fell asleep at the end of our call,” Luke corrects him. “We were done talking.”

“Okay, weirdo,” Ashton says, shaking his head. “Well, anyway, Maya convinced me that I should show you this because maybe you’d think it was cute, or something.” He holds up the drawing of Luke.

Luke leans closer to the camera. Anyone else might have trouble discerning what’s on the page given how dim it is around Ashton, but not Luke. Luke has super-senses. His visual acuity is, like, a thousand. (Rough estimate.)

So when Luke’s face splits into a grin, Ashton knows he’s seen exactly what’s there. “Oh my fucking God, you sap,” he says. “I thought you just hung up straightaway.” 

“Nope,” Ashton says. “I’m just saving moments. One day I’ll have enough for a flip book.”

Luke’s expression goes all mushy and heart-eyed. “You’re unbelievable,” he says, fond and endeared. “I can’t believe you’re not bored of my dumb face yet.”

“Are you kidding? Have you seen your dumb face?” Ashton laughs. “It’s impossible to be bored of it.”

“Ashton,” Luke says, his eyes crinkling so much that the blue all but disappears. “I love you.”

And everything makes sense.

“I love you too,” Ashton says, struck by the realization that he does. The drawings, the midnight Skype calls, the death-defying trips around the city with only his faith in Luke to keep them afloat, the fluttery feeling — all of the colors lock into place, and Ashton can see the rainbow clear as day in front of him. He’s never been in love; of course he couldn’t tell. But there’s nothing else it could be.

“Oh, good,” Luke says timidly. “I was a little worried you wouldn’t say it back.”

Ashton glances from the drawing in his hand to the look on Luke’s face on the screen, and he cracks a crooked smile. “Then you, superhero, have not been paying attention.”

[rainbowvamp]

No Body, No Crime (Mercelot)

It's 4am and some of us don't know how sleep schedules work! Here's your angst fill for Mini @mercelotweek. Sorry in advance :)

Warnings! Death of Major Characters. Merthur, but Arthur is Evil. No Happy Ending. Check AO3 for more extensive warnings.

Summary: Merlin was the love of Lancelot's life. He could stand watching him marry someone else if it meant Merlin was happy. He could not stand watching that man get away with murdering him.

Angst, Morgana&Lancelot team up that canon adherent people won't like maybe?, unrequited love, pining, one-sided Merlin/Lancelot, except I head canon that it's not

----

“Lancelot, have I ever told you that your eyes are so warm?” Merlin asked, stroking a hand over Lancelot’s cheek. Merlin is so clearly drunk, but Lancelot still feels his face warm beneath the soft touch. He knows that Merlin doesn’t, couldn’t, mean that the way he thought, not with how head over heels he was with Arthur Pendragon, but… it still made his heart skip a beat when Merlin talked about him like that.

When he doesn’t answer Merlin just keeps tracing the lines of Lancelot’s face. Lancelot knows he should stop him, when he runs his fingers over Lancelot’s softly parted lips, but he doesn’t. Let’s Merlin’s hands stroke down his neck, shoulders, and chest, so obviously taking in his muscle tone.

“You’r beefier than Arthur. Did you know that? Not by a lot, not like Percival is, but… so much muscle.” He squeezes Lancelot’s bicep, and Lancelot swallows hard.

—

“Lancelot, have I ever told you that your eyes are so warm?” Merlin asked, stroking a hand over Lancelot’s cheek. Merlin is so clearly drunk, but Lancelot still feels his face warm beneath the soft touch. He knows that Merlin doesn’t, couldn’t, mean that the way he thought, not with how head over heels he was with Arthur Pendragon, but… it still made his heart skip a beat when Merlin talked about him like that.

When he doesn’t answer Merlin just keeps tracing the lines of Lancelot’s face. Lancelot knows he should stop him, when he runs his fingers over Lancelot’s softly parted lips, but he doesn’t. Let’s Merlin’s hands stroke down his neck, shoulders, and chest, so obviously taking in his muscle tone.

“You’re beefier than Arthur. Did you know that? Not by a lot, not like Percival is, but… so much muscle.” He squeezes Lancelot’s bicep, and Lancelot swallows hard.

—

Lancelot’s been waiting for Merlin for a little over ten minutes. Merlin tends to be a bit scatter brained at the best of times, so Lancelot isn’t particularly worried, but when Merlin walks in, looking flustered, Lancelot is immediately on guard.

Merlin pulls his chair out almost violently and is just barely politely to the waiter, obviously holding back a sort of curt near-anger that Lancelot didn’t see often. He ordered a glass of wine, their usual white, and only when the waiter was gone did he finally look at Lancelot.

“What’s wrong?” Lancelot asked him, and Merlin’s blue eyes were fiery, angry in earnest now.

“The sheets smelled like perfume.” Merlin speaks through gritted teeth, and Lancelot is at a loss.

“I don’t understand.”

“The sheets. Our sheets. Smell like perfume. I don’t wear perfume, and neither does Arthur.” He glared and just barely managed to be courteous when that waiter brought him his glass. Their Tuesday dinner was a tradition, and the waiter seemed to sense something was wrong because he brought the bottle and left it on ice at the table.

It took Lancelot a few second to process that, before he finally, stupidly said, “Oh.”

“Yeah, oh.” Merlin took a sip of his wine that was more like a gulp, but Lancelot didn’t say anything about it. “I can’t prove it. I don’t know who it is, but I just know he’s sleeping with someone else. And in our bed.” Merlin was seething, and Lancelot couldn’t blame him. He’d been pining after his dear friend for years, and if Lancelot had Merlin he’d never dream of anyone else, let alone bring them into his bed.

“You’re sure there’s no chance it’s your soap? Maybe he switched colognes?” He doesn’t believe this, but he hopes, because he loves Merlin, that Arthur wouldn’t betray him like this.

“I checked the entire bathroom. Nothing. Not the detergent, not his soap, nothing.” Merlin downed the rest of his glass in one swallow and when he reached for the bottle, Lancelot put his hand over Merlin’s.

“Maybe let’s wait until we have some food, yeah?”

Merlin glared. “My husband is cheating on me. If there’s ever been a time to get fucked up on wine, it’s today.”

“Yes, and you have every right to do that, but let’s get you fed first, so you don’t overdo it.” He guided Merlin’s hand back down the table and left his own on top of it for longer than he probably should have before releasing it. Merlin was still glaring, but Lancelot knew it wasn’t him Merlin was upset with. He’d just have to deal with it. His friend needed him.

“I’m going to catch him. I’m going to make him admit what he’s doing. The damn cad. Bloody prat. Fucking wanker.” Merlin is just muttering insults to himself now, and if the situation weren’t so tragic, Lancelot would probably have laughed at the absurdity of suck language coming from Merlin of all people.

“Is there anything I can do right now? You can stay with me tonight, if you don’t want to go back.” Lancelot offered, but before he was even finished speaking, Merlin was shaking his head.

“No, it’s fine. I need to confront him, and if anyone should leave, it should be him. I’m not the faithless one, and I won’t be chased from my own home.”

Lancelot nodded and when their food came, he didn’t protest the overfull glass of wine Merlin served himself before giving Lancelot a regular serving.

—

“Merlin, you should probably go to bed. Everyone else is asleep.”

It was Merlin’s Bachelor Party. A guys weekend away. They’d done a pub crawl in London of all places, and now they were all shacked up in a couple hotel rooms (on Arthur’s dime, so they were very nice room).

“You’re not asleep.”

“I’m also not drunk off my arse.” He smiled. After the decision had been made to call a car so Lancelot could drink, he’d had a few, but he wasn’t nearly as gone as everyone else had been. “Come on, let’s get you to bed.” And damn if he wasn’t kicking himself for phrasing it like that.

“Lancelot Du Lac, I’m engaged.” Merlin tries to feign offense, but he starts giggling too hard for it to be effective. Lancelot rolls his eyes even as his ears burn and he lifts Merlin up under one arm so that he get him off the bed long enough to pull the bed covers back and pour Merlin in.

“You used to be fun.” Merlin complained, and Lancelot laughed earnestly.

“No, I didn’t. You’ve just gotten more irresponsible.”

Merlin frowned but soon became distracted by the soft texture of the sheets. “Stay with me. I don’t like to sleep alone anymore.”

“I am staying with you. We already put Gwaine and Elyan in the other room.”

“No, I mean here.” He slapped the side of the bed beside him.

Lancelot was tempted, but ultimately shook his head. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Merlin.”

“Because you love me?”

Lancelot’s breath catches. The casual way Merlin says it almost drives Lancelot off the deep end. Years of secret keeping about to be toppled by a drunken night when Merlin was already engaged.

“You don’t have to say anything. I know you want it to be shecret. Shecret. See-cret.” He smiled when he finally managed to get his tongue to cooperate with him, then turned that beaming grin up to Lancelot. “I promise I love you too.”

“I-I- I need some air.”

He hears Merlin call after him as he leaves the room, but he ignores it. He can’t look at him, right then. He can’t see those blue eyes and those soft lips and pretend that he hasn’t just had his heart forcibly exposed. He can’t. He can’t. He can’t.

—

The next Tuesday, Merlin was nowhere to be found. He’d called, texted, done everything short of showing up at his house. When Merlin was a half hour late, too long even for Merlin’s scattered head, he got up from the table without eating, left more money than was needed to cover the water he’d been nursing, and went to look for Merlin.

He drove by Merlin’s work first, thinking maybe he’d gotten lost in a project except his car wasn’t there. He went inside, just in case.

Mithian, the very competent front desk worker that Lancelot suspected did more than work the front desk, smiled up at him.

“Lancelot! Are you looking for Merlin?” Her smile was just the tiniest bit tight.

“Yes. He’s not here, is he?” Lancelot feels his heart get heavy, suddenly. His chest is tight in a way it hasn’t been since his parent’s car wreck years ago. He swallows hard as Mithian speaks.

“No. No one’s been able to get ahold of him today. We called his husband, but he didn’t answer either.” Mithian has a distraught look on her face that even her usual calm demeanor can’t hide. It’s the same way Lancelot feels

“I’ll see if I can track him down. Thank you.”

“Let me know if you hear anything, please.”

“Yes, of course.” He nodded and left, making a mental list of places to visit.

—

“Lancelot!” Merlin scrambles out of bed far too early for someone as hung over as he must be. “I was worried. You didn’t come back. Why didn’t you come back?” Merlin looks him over like he might have managed to get into some trouble on his own for a few hours, and Lancelot shook his head.

“I needed to time to think. I’m alright. I’m sorry I worried you.”

“Sorry? Sorry? I put my foot in my mouth while drunk and your response is to apologize?” Merlin looks exasperated, and it makes one of Lancelot’s lips quirk up a bit.

“Sorry. Should I apologize for your foot instead.”

Merlin groaned and leaned his head against Lancelot’s shoulder. “You scared the shit out of me. I thought I’d fucked up our friendship.” Merlin’s hands wrapped around Lancelot’s waist in a hug, and Lancelot returned it easily.

“Nothing could ruin our friendship. Just… Please don’t ever do that again.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not, but I promise not to… be so blasé in the future.”

“Thank you.”

—

He drives by Merlin and Arthur’s house first, but their car isn’t there. He gets out and knocks on the door anyway, just in case. He has a key for emergencies, and he decides that this is an emergency. He lets himself in and goes straight to Merlin and Arthur’s bedroom.

He’s never been in here before, and the way that everything is clean and tidy feels wrong for Merlin. The Merlin Lancelot knows has always been messy, and chaotic. When they’d been roommates years ago, Merlin had never been able to keep his room any nicer than slightly unkempt, but the place is spotless. It looks wrong.

He knows he shouldn’t, but he goes through Merlin’s bedside drawer, looking for clues to where he might be. He tries not to think about the full bottle of lubricant he finds there, looks over the pads of paper, half written lists, books with dog-eared pages. This looked much more like Merlin.

As he’s sifting through pages, a half sheet, ripped along one edge, catches his eye.

Perfume

“Working Late”

Jewelry charge

Lipstick stains

5 months no sex

Lancelot shoved the list into his pocket on a whim and closed the drawer. Merlin had been talking about confronting Arthur. Maybe he had. Maybe…

Lancelot had never cared much for Arthur, but Lancelot could admit that even for Arthur, that would be too far. Lancelot leaves the house without disturbing anything else. Maybe Merlin and Arthur reconciled and went for a whirlwind trip to Fiji or something else ridiculous. Lancelot wouldn’t actually be surprised if they had. Merlin was impulsive like that and Arthur had money.

—

Arthur calls him later that night. Asks with the calmest tone that Lancelot has ever heard if Merlin had been by his place, or met him for dinner. Lancelot says no, and Arthur hangs up without even a pass at formalities.

—

Lancelot drives by Arthur and Merlin’s house. He means to stop, ask after Merlin, except…

Arthur’s car is missing. In it’s place is a sleek new white sports car. Nothing like the practical car that Merlin had insisted on.

Lancelot drives straight by, and doesn’t stop.

—

He hears from Gwaine that Arthur has a new girlfriend on a pub night of all nights. A woman who’s moving into the house with him. It’s been less than a month since Merlin disappeared, and Arthur had a new woman on his arm already? Lancelot and Gwaine had never been overly close, friends by virtue of knowing Merlin and being cared for deeply by Merlin, but even Gwaine seemed to pick up on Lancelot’s stormy mood.

“Don’t do anything stupid, mate. He’s not worth it. I know how much you cared for him.”

“Everyone cared for Merlin.” It’s a curt, snappish tone, so unlike Lancelot’s usual soft demeanor.

“Not like you did.” Gwaine takes a sip of his beer and calls the bartender back over, ending their conversation.

—

“And do you, Arthur Pendragon, Take Merlin Emrys to be your lawfully wedded husband?” Arthur’s tie is a bright red that compliments the blue of Merlin’s well. Lancelot can’t see Merlin, because he’s standing right behind him, in the position of the best man, but he can see Arthur, who looks… Well Lancelot is sure he’s in love, but if that were him, Lancelot would probably be on the verge of tears.

He reminds himself that everyone is different, and he tries not to judge Arthur on his wedding day. This is the man that makes Merlin happy, the man Merlin loves, and so Lancelot just has to accept that.

“I do.”

“And do you, Merlin Emrys, take Arthur Pendragon to be your lawfully wedded husband?”

“I do.” Merlin’s voice is a little thick, and Lancelot knows that means he’s holding back tears. Lancelot is holding back tears of his own, clenching his jaw to try and force his face to stay neutral. Over Arthur’s shoulder he catches Morgana’s eyes, and she looks at him in a way Lancelot doesn’t understand.

“Then by the power invested in me, I pronounce you married. You may kiss your groom.”

Lancelot looks away when Merlin surges forward to kiss Arthur, and Elyan, one of the other groomsmen, squeezes his shoulder. Lancelot doesn’t know if it’s sympathy or some strange gesture of happiness, but Lancelot uses it to ground himself while he waits for Arthur and Merlin to pull away from each other.

—

Lancelot sees Arthur and the woman as he’s taken to internally calling her later that night at the same pub. He’s sitting with Percival, nursing a glass of wine Merlin would’ve liked when he spots them. The woman is hanging on his arm, looking completely smitten, and Arthur looks like the cat who got the cream.

Percival caught the storm clouds in Lancelot’s eyes and followed his gaze before whispering “shit,” and rubbing his temples. “I think that’s Elyan’s sister.”

“I don’t care who she is. Arthur’s a bastard.” Lancelot grit his teeth and Percival reached across the table to put a hand on Lancelot’s elbow and hold him steady.

“Let’s not lose our heads. We can go if you want.”

Lancelot kept his gaze firmly fixed on them, still angry right down to his very core, but eventually, Percival squeezed his arm and broke his stare, making Lancelot snap out of it.

“I think that would be best.” He murmured, quiet in his rage to keep it from bursting form him.

“I’ll get the tab, go flag a cab.”

Lancelot nodded and left out the back so he wouldn’t have to walk by them.

—

“Morgana, I’m going to do something stupid.”

Morgana was in a black night dress, with her hair pulled back into a French braid, obviously getting ready for bed. “Well, hello to you too, Lancelot. What do I owe the pleasure of your company?”

“Can I come in?” He asked, not rising to the bait, and that seemed to get her attention because she simply stepped away from the door and let him in.

She walks into her small kitchen and pulls a bottle of wine from the fridge. She gestures at him with it and he shakes his head, but she still pulls a glass down for herself and fills it.

“What the problem? Does it have anything to do with a certain blonde airhead who I’d personally like to strangle?”

Lancelot tensed a bit in his chair. “Why do you want to strangle him?”

Her tone was too cool when she spoke, swirling the deep red wine in the glass in a way that was disconcerting. “He killed my brother, Lancelot. The fact I haven’t put a blade to his throat myself is only because I’ve got a child who’s very eager to come home with me. You can’t adopt with a murder charge.” Her face looks so sweet when she says it, but Lancelot can see the mirror of his own rage in her.

“You and Merlin were always quite close.”

“Closer than I ever was to Arthur. Blood only runs so deep. There’s a lot to be said for the connection of like-souls.” She smiled at took a seat at the table, made more dramatic by the flowing motion of her skirts. “So, what’s the stupid thing you’re planning on doing?”

Lancelot smiles half-heartedly. “If I tell you, you have to promise not to go to the police.”

Morgana’s smile turned evil. “Oh, do tell.”

—

They stay up half the night, and Lancelot calls himself an Uber home from hers, to establish a paper trail, as she puts it. The plan they’ve hatched is only half baked at best, but they had time to revise, make it even better.

They would avenge Merlin.

—

Merlin and Arthur have only been on holiday for three days when Morgana shows up at his flat with a bottle of wine, more food than any one person could possibly eat, and a sour expression.

“I hate that they’re so damn happy. It’s disgusting.” Morgana said, collapsing onto his couch.

The two of them had grown closer once Merlin and Arthur got engaged. Merlin was always talking about her, Arthur’s half sister who he almost liked better than Arthur, actually, too bad be wasn’t straight because if so…

“We’re supposed to be happy for them. They’re in love.” Lancelot said, but he took the bottle from her and broke the twist seal without being asked.

“Well, if my Arthur wasn’t such a cad, maybe I would be, but I know him. This is… I don’t know what it is, but it’s temporary, and Merlin doesn’t know that. It’s going to break his heart.”

“They did get married. Maybe it’s not.” Lancelot tried to stomp on the little part of himself that hoped it was temporary. He wouldn’t wish heartbreak on Merlin, even if it would give him a chance to be with the man of his dreams.

“You haven’t known Arthur as long as I have. It never bothered me before that he was like this, but I like Merlin. He’s probably one of my favorite people.” She huffed and took the glass Lancelot offered her, filled with wine.

“Mine too.” He sighed and sat down on the couch beside her.

“I’m sorry. This isn’t fair. I know you’re… well, everyone knows that. I’m sorry.”

“If Arthur makes him happy, that’s what I want for him.” Lancelot took a deep drink from his wine glass.

“You keep telling yourself that, Lancelot.” She sighed and laid her head on his shoulder, picking up the remote and putting on trash television.

—

“Lancelot, have you seen Arthur? I’m sorry to call, I know you’re not fond of him after everything, but… he didn’t come home last night.” Gwen calls him frantically about three weeks later. He’s sitting at the dock with Morgana, one hand draped over her shoulders. They were expecting the call soon, so they were spending as much time together as possible.

“I haven’t seen him. Hold on, I’m with Morgana.” He pulls the phone slightly away from his ear and makes a show of informing her of the news like her ear hadn’t been practically pressed to his phone as well. “Mor, did you hear from Arthur at all last night?” He tries not to smile to himself, but Morgana doesn’t even try to hide it.

“No, I haven’t. We haven’t spoken in a few weeks, actually. I don’t really want anything to do with him.”

“He’s missing.” He says softly enough that Gwen could still hear it. Putting on a show of being concerned was actually a part of their plan.

“Serves him right. Not like he looked very hard for my brother when he went missing. He’s probably drunk in an alley somewhere.”

“Mor, come on.” He sighed and put his ear back to the phone. “Gwen, do you need any help? We can be down there in a bit. Have you talked to the police yet?”

“No. I was hoping someone had heard from him. I was going to call Morgana next. Will you just call Percival and Gwaine and them? I don’t think they like me very much.”

“Gwaine likes you plenty, and Percival is just shy. Don’t worry about it. I’ll call them. You getting his work friends?”

“Yeah. Thank you, Lancelot. I appreciate this so much.”

“Anything, Gwen.”

When he hangs up, he and Morgana grin wildly at each other, triumphant that their plan is going to work.

—

Gwaine tells Merlin that Lancelot and Morgana are sleeping together and Lancelot never corrects him. It’s not wrong, necessarily, it’s just not what Merlin thinks it is. Morgana is aromantic. Lancelot is in love with Merlin. It’s just sex. But Merlin has these fanciful ideas about he and Arthur getting to be best men at Lancelot and Morgana’s wedding, that he immediately takes back because “of course it’s too soon to talk like that, but can you imagine?”

No. He couldn’t. He couldn’t imagine standing at an alter with Merlin behind him, instead of in front of him, but he just nodded, had a sip of his wine, and said nothing.

The rumor circulates through their entire friend group, eventually. He and Morgana do spend a lot of time together, for two people who aren’t dating but are sleeping together. A part of Lancelot wants to break it off, but the small smile on Merlin’s face every time he mentions his and Morgana’s relationship keeps him from doing it.

They feel like partners in this giant conspiracy to hate Merlin’s marriage, and their connection is the only thing that keeps him sane. Well, that and the very mandatory Tuesday dinners he and Merlin always have, no matter what.

—

Watching poor Gwen get carted off in handcuffs probably isn’t supposed to satisfy Lancelot, but it does, just a little bit. He doesn’t even feel guilty, because Prison is a better fate than Arthur or Merlin had.

She looks at him with this howling anger that Lancelot pretends not to understand. She has suspected him since a couple weeks into the investigation of Arthur’s death. How convenient that he’d managed to let it slip to the police that Gwen had taken out life insurance on Arthur. How convenient that the only person who could corroborate his testimony was Arthur’s sister, who had always hated her. How convenient that Arthur had disappeared on a night where he was supposed to have plans with her but canceled for some unknown reason that couldn’t be corroborated or exonerate her.

Yes. How very convenient.

[archangeldraws]

Reunion- Part two

A King Ghidorah fanfiction

Doraut AU

The human crew watches in awe and shock, as all of Ghidorah's heads lean towards their ship and look closely at the woman standing on the railing. She stretches an arm out, placing her hand on the beast's snout and smiles, tears streaking her face. She didn't look scared. Happy even. It was as if seeing a mother being reunited with her lost child. The thought itself was just absurd. How could a human be so happy to get this close to Monster Zero? That thing killed so many people, tried to take over the world, controlled other Titans and ordered them to destroy everything in their path. He even tried to kill Godzilla and died at his hand. Then some insane rich maniacs used his leftover parts to built a robot, again to kill Godzilla and that thing came back to life! How could this strange woman, who they'd only know for a few months and didn't know about any of the things that happened in the last 10 years be so eager to meet this murderous being?!

King Ghidorah studies the little being in front of him, as if he'd never seen a human before. The fact he's just been standing there for minutes, staring down at them and hadn't attacked yet was a miracle in on itself. Usually, and everyone knew it, Ghidorah attacks on sight. Usually, there was no hesitation. But this time the dragon seems unsure on what to do. The middle head's tongue snakes out, tasting the air. It was as if the woman and the beast were talking, without using words. She had explained to them before, that she could communicate with Ghidorah via telepathy since she was a child. And it.... It used to be her pet. What a strange thought. How could this being have ever been someone's pet? It's been on this world, encased in ice for 20.000 years and she says she was Ghidorah's old master and came from the future, 1.000 years from now. This doesn't make ANY sense!

Someone screams as Monster Zero's tongue lashes forwards, wrapping around the woman and picking her up. For a second they think it's trying to swallow her and they raise their weapons, ready to shoot. But it doesn't. It just... turns around and casually walks back to the mountain it came from. It didn't attack them, just... Took the woman and left. That's.... weird. “Should.... Should we do something, Sir?” A soldier turns to his commander, waiting for orders. The man that was his superior shakes his head. “No. She asked us not to do anything if we aren't in danger. Even if it killed her, we are not to engage. She wanted this. Monarch's orders.” Everyone on board stood still, not daring to move just yet. No one has every gotten this close to Monster Zero and lived to tell the tale. It's behavior was very unusual. They have to report this. In their fear they didn't even notice the rumble that came from the left head. A low grumbling sound from deep within it's throat. Like a purr.

Ghidorah leaves the ship behind. Ni thought if thrashing it with a tail, but Ichi decided against it. “Leave it be.”, he told his brother. He moves back up the mountain, back into their cave. He lays down, the middle head bending down to carefully release the tiny being wrapped in his tongue and looks at her with his usual emotionless expression. San was shaking with excitement. He wanted to dash forward and headbutt the human. Like he used to as a Dorat. Some old habits are hard to kill. But he restrains himself. Because now his happy greeting would crush her to mush, if he did so. “Explain yourself. How are you here?” Ni squints his eyes at the woman, not sure if he should be happy or angry. He decided on angry. “How are you still alive? We thought you died a long time ago. If you've been alive this whole time, why didn't you come sooner?! WHY?!” Ni roars, angry and hurt. Eva sighs, collecting herself and stands up straight. “I know you're angry and confused. I will explain everything. Things are not as you think.” “HOW DO YOU KNOW WHAT WE THINK?! YOU GAVE UP ON US! YOU ABANDONED US!!” “Ni, please. I didn't abandon you! Let me explain.” “EXCUSES!” “Brother, calm down! Let her talk. We'll decide what to do, after.” Ichi towers over Ni, looking down on his brother in a dominating manner. He's telling him to stay quiet. Ni huffs, seething with anger but he bends down submissively. For now.

After taking in a deep breath, Eva sits down on the ground. “Do you still remember the day everything changed? When they took you from me? It was horrible. I still remember the looks on your faces as my parents handed you over, just like that. They sold you. They didn't know what they wanted with you, but they didn't really ask either. All we knew was, that the government needed you to 'help mankind', but I didn't buy it. Why would they need Dorats to help mankind? Dorats were just pets, like cats or dogs. I didn't understand. I was just a child.... But I did promise I would come for you. And I kept my promise. Since that day I have been working hard to get you back. I studied hard in school, helped in charities and got in contact with activists. Anything that could have something to do with the government and Dorats. Over the years I managed to find my way to different kinds of people, until I ended up with a rebel group. We had some things in common. Like me they knew something was up, something bad. That our country's leaders were keeping secrets and doing things that were more than illegal. Like me... They had lost their Dorats. I figured out there was a pattern. All the Dorats that were taken had strong psychic abilities. So we collected more information, as discretely as we could. Some of them had connections. We found out that there was a secret lab, hidden down below Mount Fuji. We heard of terrible experiments going on there. That they were working on a biological weapon to take out Godzilla. That was their plan. They wanted to create a titan, one that was stronger than the king of the monsters, to take his place. A new king. One they could control. That's why they chose Dorats for their experiments. Because, unlike other animals, Dorats were a man made being, one that was more intelligent and easy to control through it's mind. Project: King Ghidorah.”

“How did you know we were still alive?” San snakes closer, looking sad. The information they were getting was very different to what they knew. Not that they knew much. The memories of their abuse was pushed back as far as possible, not wanting to remember what had been done to them. Then again, there were many blackouts in their memory.

“Like I said, the other rebels too, had lost their beloved Dorats. But the difference between them and you was, after some time, they had received their Dorats back. In urns....” she chuckles, though not in an amused way. “Those sick bastards. After their experiments failed, they burned the bodies and send their ashes back to their owners. So they could 'mourn' them. I never received yours. So I was clinging to the hope that you were still alive. Even years later. But.... There have been days I wished I would wake up to seeing three little urns standing on my dresser. Then you wouldn't be in pain anymore...” She coughs, rubbing some tears from her face. “I've been working with the rebel group secretly for about 2 years, taking on some Taekwan do classes, learning how to use a weapon, how to work computers... I was getting ready to come and get you. We managed to get some connections within the secret facilities. People who, like us, knew that this was wrong. And people who had changed their minds and sided with us. We snuck in. We thought we were prepared. And we were too proud. I lost many good friends that day. They either died or were taken.... I'm not proud of the things I've done. I left them behind and just kept on pushing forward. I was so determined on getting to you, I lost a bit of myself on the way... When I finally reached you... I didn't know what to think. You were no longer my three little boys, but instead.... A monster.”

Eva looks up to face Ghidorah once more, trying to read their faces. San looks sad. Ichi looks unmoved. But there was a glint in his eye. If he was feeling anything, he was hiding it very well. Ni... Ni always wore his anger on his sleeve. And now it wasn't any different. “Monster... Yes. Nothing we haven't heard before.” Ichi frowns a little. As if hearing that word come from her mouth actually hurt, for once. “We.... We don't remember any of this... You came for us? Why can't we remember seeing you?” San wore a strained look on his face, as if trying hard to remember something, searching his mind for anything. But there was nothing. “You can't remember because... You weren't there. Your body was, but your minds were.... trapped, or something. It was as if you were a zombie. I shouted your names. I touched you. I even kicked and punched you, just to get any kind of reaction! But there was nothing. Your eyes were so lifeless... When I found you... You were in some kind of underground enclosure. A prison, really. Chained down in every way possible, so you wouldn't be able to even move an inch. Not that you could anyway. When my touch and my voice couldn't reach you, I tried feeling for your minds. But they were just as empty as your eyes. But still, I knew you were still in there, somewhere. I could feel it! I tried to free you, releasing all those chains, but I didn't have enough time. Some of the scientists found me and attacked me. In the middle of our fight we somehow... activated something. I hadn't noticed it before, but they had managed to, I don't know how... Create a time portal. And that thing was big. Big enough for you to fit.” “A time portal? For what?” Ichi looks at her as if she was an alien, saying she was coming in peace. “That's the thing. They wanted you to kill Godzilla and take his place as the new alpha titan. But you weren't strong enough to take him on just yet. So they had the brilliant idea to send you back in time and kill him when he was younger and weaker. And then to use you to control all the titans and become the strongest power on the whole planet. But before they could get you ready, I destroyed their plans. In our struggle, the last of your restrains came lose and you were sucked into the portal.... Ichi, Ni, San... You were send back in time, 20.000 years from now. But we, you and I, were originally from the time 3025... We actually come from the future.”

It seems like those news actually shocked the golden demise, as Ghidorah sits down, taking all of this in. “Then.... How are YOU here?” Ni asks, looking tired from too much information. “I got sucked in as well. But the portal was unstable and kept changing its time settings and coordinates every few seconds. So I actually landed here a few months ago. We left at the same time, but now there is a time difference of 20.000 years between us. It's unbelievable that after so long, you are still alive! I almost gave up on finding you again. When they told me Godzilla destroyed you.... And how your brain was used for a robot... And how you came back to life. I-... I couldn't believe it, really. But here you are! And we can talk again! Our link is still there... I'm-.... I'm so happy to see you.” Eva chokes on her words, tears swelling up in her eyes again. “To hear your voices after all those years, it's like a dream. And I hope I never wake up from this!” “You... You're not scared of us?” San leans down, sniffing her. “I could never be scared of you.” “We could kill you, you know. We are no longer those Dorats you knew. We are no ones pet. We are KING Ghidorah!” Ichi says this, in a matter of facts. “I know... I know you could. And I came prepared. If you want me dead, you can kill me. I don't mind. I just wanted to see you, one last time.” Her voice is shaking. Not from fear, but from happiness. Happy to see them. King Ghidorah, Monster Zero, the golden demise, the one that is many. King Killer. Ichi, Ni and San. She sits before them, ready to receive death. She's happy, now that she got what she wanted. Seeing them, talking to them. Letting them know that her love for them was so strong, that she is willing to die at their claws if it makes them happy.

Ghidorah lies down on the ground, placing his three heads in front of the human before them. “Know this. If you leave us again, then we WILL kill you. Understood?” Eva looks up at Ichi. Even though he just threatened her, he didn't say it with as much malice as he normally would. He even smirked a little. “You better stay. Or WE will come find you this time!” Ni snarls, but the sound that came from him was more a purr than a growl. “We missed you.” San licked her carefully and purred even louder.

A few hours later, the ship was still there, the crew watched Ghidorah emerge from his cave again and approaching them. Did he kill her after all? Is he coming for them next? King Ghidorah growls at them, but the middle head reaches down once more. On his head? The woman. And she looks very much alive. She waves and shouts at them. “Thank you for helping me! I'll be staying here now. But maybe you can do me another favor? I'll be needing some necessities. Food, clothes, shelter and all that. You got a tent on there somewhere?”

What a strange request. A human, living among Kaiju? No human was ever allowed to step foot on this island. But this was good. With Eva living on Monster Island and with Ghidorah as her protector, they could study them even better. What's the cost of food, clothing and some electronics and everything she asks for in return for such valuable information? She even promised to help them study Ghidorah more, if he doesn't kill her. As long as they swear not to harm him in any way or use the information against him. So they hook her up with everything she needs. They built a new Monarch outpost near the island, nothing too big and send a small boat towards the island once a week to bring their new 'co-worker' everything she needs. At first she got a big tent that was placed inside the cave. Then Ghidorah allowed some humans to bring containers, to make a makeshift house inside his cave, so Eva could be warm during winter. But they were still cautious. They learned pretty quickly that Monster Zero only allows them near him as long as Eva was there as well. If she wasn't, he would revert back to his old behavior and attack any human vessel coming closer. But they can work with that. And the things they learned was important to them, to understand titans and help the world understand and live with them peacefully. Especially the weekly reports they received from Eva about what Ghidorah was up to, how he interacted with other titans, even Godzilla himself. Which they noticed, would apparently come and check up on the dragon. They learned that Godzilla seemed very surprised to find a human with Ghidorah. Eva also managed to snap some really interesting photos on that island. Of kaiju sub-species they haven't seen before and even selfies with Ghidorah AND Godzilla in the background. Even better when she send them photos of Rodan, who came to visit and Mothra as well. Knowing titans act so human like to visit each other and talk like friends was just... funny.

Read part 1 here- https://archangeldraws.tumblr.com/post/649687984452648960/reunion

(Eva is my human OC)

Do not repost my stuff

[sailingintothenight]

“HAPPY.” T.H. Imagine.

Tom meets a little angel and you, her mom.

A/N: After reading some stories about single mom x Tom that were totally adorable, I wanted to write my own story that ended up being longer than expected. I hope you like it, please give it a try. Thank you! (And If you have time, listen to Kim Taeyeon and her song Happy :)

With a long sigh, Tom closes the door to the room and falls to the floor, because the pain on his shoulders is as heavy as the whole world.

The melon-colored walls and wooden flooring gives the hospice a warm touch, but the air in his lungs is cold when Tom takes a deep breath that comes in, trying to find spaces to fill in his soul and empty body. There is no one around him, no paparazzi, no interviewers, no fans screaming his name, no excitement of being a movie star who shines for his talent and charm. His heart beats fast against his chest, like an animal that hit the cage's bars that keeps him prisoner: it is fierce because he is afraid, and he feels as if he were falling into a spiral of madness in complete solitude. His hands tremble because the self-control slips from them like the sand between his fingers, fingers that he uses to brush his somewhat long and wavy hair, pulling on the ends because the pain is a reminder that he is still alive.

"Why are you so sad?"

The world lets him hear a voice that seems covered in cotton candy, as sweet as the 4-year-old (soon to be 5) girl in front of him. Tom blinks, confused, watching the infant's small face and the way her eyes look back at him until it finds his sad soul. Her eyes are dark blue like the calm waters of the sea, blue like the summer sky, alive and full of curiosity behind her long lashes: two hidden treasures that were a gift from her father. But the color of those eyes contrasts beautifully with her chocolate brown hair that falls past her shoulders and her white jacket with bunny ears hanging behind, while a melody is heard from the headphones hanging around her neck, a feminine voice that sings in another language, but whose voice is of a warm color that even Tom can perceive.

"Hello there, angel." Tom smiles feigning courage, and stops being a defeated body on the ground to change his posture and squat to be at the (emotional) level of a girl. "What are you doing here alone? Where is your mum?"

Marley smiles sideways, the corner of her lip curling up as her right eyebrow sinks in with the depth of her thoughts: she's skeptical, because she knows something is wrong with him.

“My mom says that if you smile very, very big, you will feel happy immediately. It is a psych... psychological fact.” Marley struggles to say that word, because she is still 4 years old and her bag of words, as she calls it, is still limited.

Tom smiles slightly, not with happiness because something is pressing on his chest still, but because he’s amazed at the intelligence of a little girl who wasn’t older than 5 years old. And suddenly, a tiny, positive feeling runs through him with a super speed and leaves him as fast as it came, but Tom discovers what it is right away and clings to it with firm hands while his eyes, that are like chocolate, shine with the curiosity of a small child, too.

"Oh yeah? Your mommy must be very smart then.”

Marley shrugs casually.

"She reads a lot." She says it as a fact, and her clasped hands in front of her make her look like someone bigger's action, or so Tom thinks, taking in every detail of her without realizing it. "Would you help me with something? I can't reach the vending machine and I want a yogurt.”

"Oh, sure." He replies, still a little surprised by a baby's choice of words, and soon as he gets up, he feels ashamed of himself as he remembers that vocabulary seemed like a difficult word for him. "I'm Tom by the way. What is your name, angel?”

"Marley. Marley Rose."

Marley smiles at him, throwing her head back so that she can look him in the eye, because Tom is taller than she is. Tom can't help but smile, and can't help but feel the tickle in his left hand as Marley catches his to guide him - which gives him a warm feeling. She leads the way down the hallway that is quiet so late at night, towards the empty living room and to the gigantic machine that is challenging for her and her short stature.

"Marley, where's your mum?" Tom asks again, because although he’s a good person, he can't help but feel concerned about seeing a little girl alone.

Standing next to him, Marley looks at him and the light from the machine makes the corner of her face shine.

"She is with my Grandma. She gave me this dollar to buy something downstairs, but the machine doesn't have chocolate yogurt!”

"No way!" Tom says, speaking a little louder, making a slightly high-pitched voice to imitate her: and it makes her laugh a sweet tune, like the sound that keeps coming out of her headphones. "Let me help you get your yogurt."

Tom takes the bill from her small hand and inserts it into the machine, he presses the number indicated on the screen, and then the machine pushes the yogurt bottle towards the opening at the bottom.

"You did it. Thanks, Tom!" Marley presses herself against his body in a quick hug before reaching her prize, happy.

Tom smiles; he cannot help it when he sees her open her bottle, because she is so sweet, so innocent, and because something is recomposed inside him by feeling the pure aura of a girl who seems to hide in her words, the wisdom of a much older person.

"Come on, angel. Let's go to find your mum."

Marley nods, the bottle still against her lips as her small hand reaches for Tom's, and again, she guides him down the hall to the gray-door elevators on the other side of that floor. But the questions that Tom has in his head disappear the instant those metal doors open under the sound of a ding, announcing the encounter with a person on the other side, a young woman who looks at him under the seconds that seems eternal to him, as if the world had stopped in his favor only to make that moment last more than a few seconds.

"Mommy!"

Marley's voice is even sweeter because she recognizes her mom, the being who gave her life and, who loved her, more than anything in the world. Tom watches you get out of the elevator and it's then that new questions appear in his blank mind, questions that, while are quite obvious, are quite difficult to assimilate.

"Marley Rose Daniels, you had me worried." But you sigh in relief, because your fears leave your body the moment you see her again. At that very moment, it is when you realize who is the young man who is holding your daughter's hand, because you know that he has been walking those hallways for a while, but that is a story for later. "Hi, thanks for taking care of her, please don't think I'm a bad mother."

"No, I could never-" Tom says, and then, he realizes he's speechless: because you look so young, so pretty too, and right there, Tom understand why Marley got such a sweet face. "Don't worry about it."

"That's good. Thanks." You say, slightly embarrassed, and your gaze that falls to the ground meets your daughter's eyes. "You pinky promised me that you wouldn't go away too far, Marley."

"But mommy, there was no chocolate yogurt downstairs." And at that moment, Marley lets go of Tom's hand, her head held high as she approaches you because she is not afraid of you, nor the reprimand that never comes, and instead, her hand takes yours and she looks at you with her warm gaze and her eyes with the color that some considered cold. “Sorry.”

"Stop obsessing over that yogurt."

"Never!" Marley pretends to be upset and frowns, taking a firm stance that makes you chuckle, and that makes Tom chuckle, too, because that interaction between you and her makes him happy when he realizes that you two are only joking, as if you were best friends. "Mommy, this is Tom, Tom, she is my mommy."

And you chuckle again, because, although your name is not mommy, it makes you feel proud to be called that way.

"I'm her mommy, but my name is (y/n)... Daniels." You extend your hand towards him, and a tickle runs down his hand before taking yours.

"Tom Holland."

"I know." You smile, rocking his hand in yours, because his hand is still closed, still intertwined with yours.

"You know? Oh.” Tom chuckle shyly because the movie star title still makes him blush, and is a thought that prevents his brain from noticing that his hand is still taking yours while his heart is still wrapped in the warmth of your fingers tips. "Oh, sorry."

"Don't worry about it." You smile, giving him his past words as you clear your throat, so that your next words don't tremble under your shyness. "Well... I think it's time to go home."

"Yeah." Marley and Tom respond: he, in a whisper coming from between his lips before he can stop it.

You chucke, but pretend not to hear it as you press the button on the wall, the metal doors opening instantly under the usual sound. With Marley's hand in yours, you walk in with Tom behind you, taking his place inside the little spot next to her, but when you try to push the button to the basement parking lot and he, the button to the first floor, your hands meet inches away from touching again, bringing nervous laughter.

"Sorry." You both say at the same time, and the timing makes you giggle again.

But with the floors selected, the doors close and your chest clenches painfully, as if the closed doors cut off the air that you can still breathe.

"Don't be scared, mommy." Marley says sweetly, but her hand on yours gives you courage.

"Thanks, baby." And when you look up, Tom is too slow to take his eyes off of you, and they reflect the question you can easily see in his tender gaze. "I'm scared of elevators."

"It's okay." Tom smiles, as if he wants to give you courage, too. "We'll be out in a sec–"

But his words are cut off like the lights that suddenly go out when the elevator stops abruptly, giving way to the emergency lights that only project their light on your most absurd fear after seeing so many accidents on television. Your throat closes painfully, as the air becomes hotter than normal, and for a second, you stay where you are, your hand holding your daughter's as Tom approaches the wall to press the emergency button.

"It must be because of the rain." He says, in an attempt to keep you calm. "Don't panic, the lights will come back in a moment."

"I hope so." You whisper, suddenly weak, fearful.

"Don't be scared, mommy." Marley hugs you, and her small hands cling to the side of your body, like the heat that she shares with you as the courage she gives you to keep you calm. "But can we sit down? I'm tired."

"I'm so sorry, honey, you should be asleep by now." You say and take the bottle of her hand, sitting on the floor and placing yourself in a comfortable position so that she can sleep on top of you.

"Tom, come, sit next to us." She says, and Tom smiles, and although he feels shy, he sits next to you against the cold ground. Protected by her mom's heat, Marley smiles, her head resting at your chest height, and she hides her eyes behind her eyelids that close with the fatigue that her small body can no longer bear.

"She's beautiful." Tom whispers after a few seconds later, and his gaze stays fixed on yours so you can see that he's serious, and that he's somehow, he’s talking about her inner beauty, too. "She's really smart too."

"Thank you." You whisper back, maintaining somehow, the pleasant silence. "I do my best to raise her, I really do, but sometimes I feel like she raises me."

Tom smiles.

"She told me that smiling makes you happy, that it was a psychological fact. I didn't know that such a little girl could pronounce that word. I can't even say vocabulary.”

You chuckle.

“She is 4 years old but talks like a woman sometimes. And when she talks to my best friend on the phone, I swear they can talk for hours. I think it was not a good idea to teach her what Kpop was, because they both don't stop talking about it. Sophia even bought her an Ipod.”

"Oh yeah, I totally understand you..." Tom says, feeling a strange joy at noticing that you have one thing in common. "Danielle, my mate's girlfriend is crazy about kpop too.”

"Yes, I know..." You sigh, relieved to be accompanied in the dark situation. “It looks like we will be here for a while so... Yogurt?"

Your outstretched hand holding the bottle makes him see you're serious, and Tom smiles unable to refuse the gesture, so he takes it, his fingers brushing yours along the way, giving it an electrifying feeling.

"Wow..." He says after drinking a little. “I get why Marley is so obsessed with this. This is really good!"

You smile, and something inside you breaks: setting aside the pain, maybe it wasn't a bad idea to have moved to London.

[mrsparknamjoon]

01. the linchpin | reliability • kth

index | next

pairing: taehyung x reader word count: 1.900 genre: drama, light angst rating: pg-13 warnings: cursing au: ceo/office trope: enemies to friends to lovers tags: ceo!taehyung, office!au, best friend!yoongi, unresolved emotional tension, mutual pining, slow burn crosspost: ao3

summary: a predictable mistake in buying shares becomes the perfect opportunity for taehyung to show everybody in the company no one is above his rules. what he didn’t know was that his plan would backfire making him question what the real meaning of trust is

A/N: this story began as a drabble bc i love dramatic scenes, whether in movies, television or books. confrontation is always one of my favorite things about them so i decided to try to write one for the first time ever. clearly i still have a lot to learn but i hope you like it!

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Another meeting, another group of incompetent people that I can't believe I hired. Sitting at the end of a long wood table, I scrolled through my phone reading a few emails while all the shareholders took their positions. It was absurd that I had to call a meeting on Friday night because of a predictable and, quite frankly, stupid mistake but here we were.

“Mr. Kim, we're ready” my secretary said discreetly as she handed me a folder filled with documents.

“Thank you” I replied as I got up from the chair and started spreading the papers on the table in front of me.

“Good evening! First, I would like to thank you all for coming on such short notice. The reason for this emergency meeting is to talk about the purchase of a few Min Industries shares” I paused and gazed into the eyes of everyone present. Some of them were curious, tired, others frightened and one in particular very angry.

“I believe all of you realized that ever since it happened our company has started to fall into devaluation, thanks to someone’s stupid and hasty decision” I continued while looking at the documents before me. “I don't want an explanation about what happened or why it happened, just how we are going to solve it” I turned and faced my main suspect, “Today”

“Mr. Kim, if I may, I think I speak for everyone here when I say that there is nothing legally wrong with the purchase” said Lee Sung, one of our oldest and most efficient lawyers. Still, it was a matter of principle for me and everyone knew that.

“I understand, Mr. Lee, but this is not what I'm worried about” I began calmly walking around the table while elaborating my thoughts, “You see... although Min Industries doesn’t compete directly with us they have affiliates who do. Therefore…”

“Therefore it’s smart to buy the shares precisely because it gives us more control over the affiliates” said Y/N, interrupting me.

I couldn't help the smirking that escaped my lips. Y/N took the bait and it was all I needed. From the beginning, I knew she was the one leading the expansion project and everything was going well until she put my credibility with Min Yoon Gi in check.

Yoon Gi and I are old friends, practically brothers, but our families have a particular rivalry that has lasted for almost 50 years. It is nothing that explicit or dramatic. An outsider wouldn't see the animosity, for example. I see it as a truce, however, it's still a delicate matter for our parents and grandparents. When we both took over the businesses, we agreed that we would not repeat their mistakes and promised to interfere as little as possible in each other's company. If it was strictly necessary, we would have to talk before any steps were taken. That was the deal and that is why I was furious at Y/N's audacity to make a decision like this one. She was aware of our family's situation even if not exactly about what I had promised my friend.

“Are you serious, miss Y/LN?”

“Why would I be kidding?” she replied looking confused, twisting the pen between her fingers like she was bored.

“I have no idea, but to call that a smart decision, one that immediately impacts my company's profit, not to mention my personal reputation, seems like a joke. And a bad one to say the least” I said, staring at her intensely as I approached her chair.

The atmosphere got heavy and I couldn't care less. I was right and everyone knew it. Y/N took a risk, as she is paid to do, but the risk was not worth it and she needed to take responsibility for it. If it was anyone else I would have already fired without even calling a meeting. Luckily, she's a key part of the company and one of the shareholders as well so I decided to scold her in front of others to send a subtle warning that nothing goes unnoticed by me and that measures will always be taken, regardless of the level of the hierarchy. This is my way to send a warning because I don't do threats.

Y/N gulped and shifted in her chair, visibly uncomfortable with my proximity.

“So I'm going to ask you again, miss Y/N: are you serious?” I crossed my arms and tilted my head to the side, watching her try very hard not to lose her composure. I had known Y/N for a long time and she always managed to be as cold as me, yet on occasions where her professionalism was questioned her replies used to be impulsive.

“Mr. Kim, I'll be frank” she started, standing up and walking towards the pulpit next to the projection screen. “It was indeed a risk on my part to put Vante Enterprises ahead of such a high-profile acquisition and, for the embarrassment caused, I sincerely apologize”

“Why do I feel like there's a 'but' coming?” I asked, sitting on the chair that she left vacant.

“But"

“See?” I turned to Seo Nu sitting on my left. He laughed politely because I laughed first. Deep down he didn't think it was funny and just wanted to suck up to me. Clever.

“But I still believe that in the long run, we’ll reap great results… excellent results, in fact! Here's a chart” Y/N pointed at the screen in front of us and began to confidently defend her decision, clearly and calmly, completely different from the Y/N of a minute ago who I thought would lose her temper.

* * * * * * *

The meeting room broke out in applause as soon as Y/N finished presenting a chain of detailed information regarding the shares, and although I was surprised by the level of research she prepared, I was unable to hide my dissatisfaction as CEO by confirming that Y/N still didn't understand the problem.

“Could you guys excuse us?” I looked at Y/N and then at the other shareholders. Since the person responsible presented herself there was no need to keep putting on a show, right? I got up, buttoned my jacket, and returned to my original spot on the table to organize the papers I had left lying there.

While arranging them all in a pile, the room emptied and Y/N approached.

“You love to exaggerate things, don't you?” she snarled looking me up and down.

“You love to ignore the rules and interfere with what doesn't concern you, don't you?” I fired back mimicking her attitude.

Y/N stopped for a moment and studied my expression. For a split second, I could feel a question in the air as if she wanted to know if that's what I actually thought of her — a nosy and unprofessional person who ignored her superiors on purpose. I didn’t. She looked hurt. Still, her voice gave no indication that my response had affected her.

“I love my work! It's great and you pay me well” she said, taking the papers from my hand. “Oh, what do we have here?”

“Don't be childish, give me the papers Y/N” I motioned my hands and closed my eyes feeling exhausted.

“What are these projections? How come I have never seen them before?” Y/N's voice came out louder than before depicting a mixture of shock and disbelief. “There is no actual proof that these companies are connected, it doesn't make sense” she walked back to the pulpit, eyes glued to the documents to compare the numbers and references with the slides she had spent hours preparing.

“Y/N give me the papers, that information is above you” I demanded in a firm tone. “Besides, my intention with today's meeting was to get you to find a solution to your own mess but even that you weren't able to”

“How can I solve it if I don't have all the information, Tae Hyung?” Y/N lowered the papers she was gripping so tightly in front of her face and I could see red, teary eyes along with the angry tone in her voice. She hadn't called me Tae Hyung since college and that felt like a blow in my stomach.

“If I had known that the companies were connected I would have thought twice before buying the shares... I…” Y/N's voice failed but she cleared her throat and continued “...this is your fault!”

“Mine?” I asked dumbfounded.

“You left me in the dark and I made an important decision without having all the information” she pushed the papers onto my chest and started pulling the projector's wires angrily, “This is not what I call trust”

“Seriously? Are we going to talk about trust? Bit ironic, don’t you think?” I started chasing her around the room while she collected her belongings and threw them into a big purse.

Y/N snorted like what I just said was absurd.

“You know very well the situation between my family and Yoon Gi's. I always made it clear that we don't do business with them and yet you went there and did it” I placed my hand on top of her purse, preventing her from continuing what she was doing. “Where is my trust in you now?” I questioned her almost in a pleading tone.

Y/N pulled the purse off the table in one swift motion and I almost lost my balance.

“You know what? You're right. I was wrong” she said, looking defeated. “I shouldn't have shown interest in shares that involved Yoon Gi's company, but you definitely shouldn't have hidden these documents from me either” she continued taking a few steps back, slowly moving away from me. “And that's where you fucked up. You're still obsessed with secrets and rules, keeping everyone who tries to help you away"

“Wait a minute” I interjected. This was unfair, it was not like that.

“I'm not done talking” she gazed at me very seriously and I had no choice but to stop and listen. “I know that we have differing opinions on many things and I have teased you too much in the past 10 years with my analysis and requirements, but I never... I say never... would do anything that would harm the company”

“I know” I whispered, feeling kind of dumb for blurting it all out like that.

“It doesn't look like it” she placed the purse on her shoulder. “For me, you're trying to find a reason to get me out of here”

My jaw dropped in shock. Y/N had no idea how much I valued her work, and at this very moment, I didn't know what to say first. An apology? An explanation? A plea? I could have said anything, but I didn't. Not even a fucking sound. My mouth remained open as my thoughts flew through my mind at a frightening speed, making it look like I was confirming her impression.

“I’m gonna save you the trouble. I quit”

Y/N gave me what looked like a small bow or maybe a quick nod as if to excuse herself and then left the room without another word, leaving me leaning against the table without understanding what had just happened, finding myself, for the first time in a long time, completely alone.

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𝗳𝗲𝗲𝗱𝗯𝗮𝗰𝗸𝘀 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘆 𝗺𝘂𝗰𝗵 𝘄𝗲𝗹𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗱 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗮𝗽𝗽𝗿𝗲𝗰𝗶𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗱 𝗶𝗳 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗱 ❤ 𝗹𝗲𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝗺𝗲 𝗮 𝗿𝗲𝗽𝗹𝘆 𝗼𝗿 𝗮𝗻 𝗮𝘀𝗸! 𝗶 𝘄𝗼𝘂𝗹𝗱 𝗹𝗼𝘃𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗸𝗻𝗼𝘄 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝘁𝗵𝗼𝘂𝗴𝗵𝘁𝘀 𝗮𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘆

⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ revised version: 09.25.2021

[lyssismagical]

27 and/or 30 for the prompt asks if you want!

27 - “Why is there glitter everywhere” 

30 - “Detention? Again?” 

(I don’t know if those are from the right prompt list oops sorry) 

Soft Parent!Parkner w a splash of Irongrandpa

Days at Stark Industries as CEO were always long. Peter would forever be grateful he has the opportunity to work there, it’s better than anything he’d dreamed of as a kid, even after meeting Tony, but the gratefulness for being allowed this opportunity didn’t mean his days were necessarily made easy.

Nine to five, though sometimes later as much as he hated missing dinners with his family, with some of the smartest people he’d ever met. He gets told on an almost hourly basis that he’s too young to be CEO, that anybody else could do it better than him, that he could be doing more, doing better, that his commitments to his family were taking away from his work.

Work was work somedays.

But everything was made better when he got home to his apartment in Manhattan to greet his wonderful husband and children.

And today was Friday, meaning the Stark family and May would be visiting for their weekly dinners.

When he gets home, bone-tired and heavy with the day’s work, Harley’s laughter is what greets him first. It makes his shoulder just a little less tense.

“I’m home!” he calls out, kicking off his shoes and sliding out of his jacket. He rubs the exhaustion from his eyes, tries to make his mouth lift into at least a polite smile, tries to appear put together when he makes his way into the kitchen to greet his husband.

“Honey! C’mere! I need your opinion on something.”

Almost immediately, his shoulders slump, body aching to rest for just a second but responsibilities never-ending.

Harley’s waiting for him at the stove, spoonful of what looks like stew held out. “Try this for me?”

He does as asked, thinking for only a moment before saying, “Bit more salt?”

Harley lights up in a smile. “That’s what I thought! But Tony started going on and on about blood sugar and cholesterol and health issues.”

“Tony’s here?”

“In the living room. He’s watching the kids while Pepper and Morgan pick up May.”

Peter sighs, almost too harshly because he knows what that means.

And he’s right.

He walks into the living room to find a huge mess.

“Tony.” Peter has to pause, take a deep breath and try to fix his tone before he continues, “Why is there glitter everywhere?”

Tony looks up from where he’s sitting on the floor with two of their three children. “Art project?”

Sensing Peter’s annoyance, Tony quickly continues, “We’ll clean up as soon as we’re done! It’s not my fault this time! June started asking and asking about a craft.”

“My one-year-old child who is only just learning how to talk, asked you to make a craft with her.” Peter’s voice is dripping with sarcasm. He rolls his eyes hard when he sees the amount of glitter that’s in Ben’s hair.

“I’ll clean it all up, I swear-”

“It’s fine,” Peter says, raking a hand through his hair. As much as Tony promises he’ll clean up, Peter will be finding glitter in the house for weeks after this and he’ll be the one who has to give the twins a bath.

Before Tony can argue anymore, Peter heads off to his bedroom, needing to get changed out of his button-down and slacks, needing to take a shower but knowing he doesn’t have the time, needing just a second to sit down.

“Daddy?”

Peter turns, fingers stilling on his buttons. “Hi, honey, how was your day?”

“Alright. Papa took us all to the park to see the ducks and the squirrels. You okay?” Elizabeth moves into the room, sitting down on the edge of the bed, wide blue eyes focusing on him with an absurd amount of worry for a four-year-old. “Sorry ‘bout the glitter. I told Papa not to let Grandpa.”

“It’s alright, hon, thank you. I’m just tired from work. Do you want to do me a favour though?”

Elizabeth lights up, always prepared to do anything. “What?”

“Could you go tell your grandpa to let Papa watch your siblings while he picks up a cheesecake from the bakery?”

She giggles and takes off down the hallway, shouting, “Grandpa! Grandpa!”

Peter changes into loose clothes, Harley’s old sweater and pyjama pants because he can’t help himself from stealing his husband’s clothing even years into marriage. And finally sits down.

Harley appears only a moment later, quiet and doesn’t need to ask. He sits beside Peter, hesitates for just a second, and then wraps his arms around Peter. Immediately, Peter’s whole body relaxes into his husband, breathing evening out and muscles soothed.

“Thank you,” Peter murmurs, tucking his head into the crook of Harley’s neck, pressing a kiss to his jaw.

“Wanna talk about it?”

Peter shrugs. “It’s all the same stuff. I don’t know if they’ll ever get bored of telling me I’m too young to be CEO or that I’ve been given everything on a silver platter and don’t deserve it after all the work they’ve put in. I know they think I’m just some kid who got Tony’s attention, but I work hard, I went through a hell of a lot to get where I am, you know?”

“I know. You’re the hardest working, smartest person I know, sweetheart. You deserve the position more than any of those petty dumbasses. I don’t know how they don’t see how wonderful you are and I’m sorry you come home to this. I swear I asked Tony to keep the mess to a minimum and not to touch the glitter… I just needed a second to make dinner without kids on my feet.”

“But you’re…” Peter doesn’t want to ask the most insecure question there is. “You’re happy, though, right? Being a stay-at-home dad, spending all day with our kids. This is all still good?”

Harley smiles, kissing Peter’s head. “Of course I’m happy. I love you, I love our kids, I love us. I don’t think that’s ever going to change.”

“Good.”

Everything’s quiet for a second and then they hear the pounding footsteps of Elizabeth, followed by the doorbell ringing. A second later, chatting fills the apartment signaling Pepper, Morgan, and May arriving.

“We should go,” Peter says, smiling.

“You can have another minute, if you want. I can get May to watch the twins and Morgan to watch Liz while I make dinner with Pepper. You can take your time.”

Peter links their hands together, smile widening. “I’m okay as long as you promise you’ll be the one to vacuum the living room if I bathe the twins.”

“Anything for you.”

They head out of the room together, to greet their family, hand-in-hand. Pepper and May are already each carrying one of the twins. Morgan’s kneeling on the floor with Elizabeth, complimenting her hair and asking about school.

They all smile when they see the boys, taking turns to give hugs around the family.

Peter takes June from May, pressing a kiss to her forehead, trying to avoid the copious amounts of glitter on her. “What took you so long to get here? Traffic really that bad?”

“No, Morgan didn’t leave school at three. She was there until five.”

“Detention? Again?” Harley pipes up, wincing. He ruffles a hand through Elizabeth’s hair. “What did you do this time?”

Morgan grins. “There was this hot guy in my English class and I was totally staring which is why I saw him staring at the teacher’s chest! And I was grossed out so I followed him to Spanish where he stared at pretty much every single girl in the hallway! So I, may or may not have, slashed his tires.”

“And you got detention?” Peter asks, avoiding Pepper’s eyes when she glares at him for encouraging Morgan’s behavior.

“Right?” Morgan exclaims. “I couldn’t believe it! I told them like a hundred times that he was the one doing wrong, not me, but they said slashing his tires shouldn’t have been my response. But my English teacher was so grateful she gave him the responsibility of cleaning the classroom every day after school.”

Harley laughs. “Small victories, I guess. And I can’t really say much. I think my total number of detentions over four years at Rose Hill was something around four hundred. Anyway, I’ll be finishing up dinner in the kitchen, you wanna help me, Liz?”

“I’ll pop a wine?” Peter offers, needing a glass just as much as Pepper looks like she does.

“Can I have some?” Morgan looks to Peter despite needing permission from her mom.

Pepper rolls her eyes, not even bothering to answer as she heads off to the kitchen after Harley and Elizabeth, May in tow.

Morgan’s sixteen, not quite old enough to be allowed one, but Peter doesn’t mind bending the rules for his little sister. “Just a tiny bit and then you’ll be on juice like the little ones for the rest of the night, ‘kay?”

“Hell yeah!” Morgan exclaims, bouncing off to the kitchen. “This is why you’re the best, Peter!”

Peter stands at the door for a second, June still tucked against his side on his hip, a smile on his face.

Even if work feels hard somedays, even if his family drives him up the wall with their endless chaos, even if there’s glitter everywhere in his apartment, even if Morgan’s going through the worst of her teenage years, even if he’s one of the parents to two one-year-olds and a four-year-old, even if it’s hard, life is good.

He’s happy.

Taglist: @littlemissagrafina  @spidey-reids-2003  @romeoandjulietyouwish @c-artara @shadedrose01 @likeaphoenix13 @pj-hermes-tonystark-obsessed  @you-get-killed-walk-it-off @kitkatwinchester  @emo-girl10 @justme--emily  @hold-our-destiny @imalivebecauseirondad @spiderman-peterman @dykeragee @maryserrao @heeeyitskay @parknerandirondad @lilacsandlilies4 @loveliestdisappointment {Let me know if you wanna be added or removed}

[ohpsshaw]

~DFS Christmas Special~

No desire to draw lately, so I’ve been doing little prose sketches instead.

Just in time for December, here’s what turned out to be Uncle Jack taking Al Christmas shopping. This would be circa 199X B.G. (Before Glenn), making Al in his early 20s.

(Watch out if you have high blood sugar, cos this gets KINDA SACCHARINE.)

It had finally stopped snowing, thank goodness. The fresh white blanket reflected crisp light in through the windows, making him feel chilled inside. Luckily Pop was a comfort creature who kept a stock of hot chocolate mix in the pantry. Al never seemed to reach for it back at his apartment, but something about visiting home in the winter months made a warm mug feel as essential as a limb.

Uncle Jack had asked Al to accompany him for some holiday shopping later, and a chocolate briquette would be good to have heating his gut. He took it to the couch in the living room. Someone had dug up the old photo books and left them on the coffee table a few days ago. Flipping through, he noticed that half the pages were completely empty— photography had never been a popular concept in the Czar household. The preserved moments were of family trips and landmarks, rambunctious sepia-washed office parties, Al’s school portraits. Rarer was anything taken inside the house. One shot of himself at four or five years old, standing on the yellow-sunlit staircase and showing the camera a toy car, surfaced a memory of being coached to keep his mouth closed so as not to alarm a 1-hour photo developer. Thinking on it, it may have been more than coincidence that most of these were instant Polaroids.

Through the window, he heard the muffled sound of a car door, then: “What the fuck are you doing!?” Hey, Pop’s home. Al pulled back the curtain to watch the drama unfolding at the end of the driveway, where Uncle Jack had been chipping at the wall of powder the afternoon snowplow had left. Xav had just returned from morning errands and parked in the street, storming over the slush to stop his brother from working.

Cold air blasted from the foyer. Snow crunched as Xav shook out the snow shovel behind him. “Why was he doing this by himself? Did you become a quadriplegic when I wasn’t looking?”

Al flipped through the Rolodex in his head for the answer that would earn him the least amount of grief. He shrugged, as if confused by the absurdity of the question. “He didn’t ask.”

“I didn’t ask, Max.” Jack took the shovel back. “But you’re right, I should have. Reckon it was my vanity what did me in— I can’t stand to be upstaged by some young buck doing the same job in half the time.” He winked at his nephew. “Well, three-quarters.”

“Oh, fuck off,” Xav spat, the corners of his mouth curling up against his will. “You both know I’m not being unreasonable. You’re not a guest, Alan Henry. As far as I’m concerned, you still live here. You earn your keep during the day, and MAYBE I’ll consider putting on my robe and letting you suckle dinner from my left tit.”

Al choked on his hot chocolate.

“Shit. Careful on the carpet. I’ll get you a paper towel.” Xav left for the kitchen, grumble-exorcising demons as he walked. “If Papa caught one of us sitting on our ass while the other did chores...”

Why did Pop have to save his best lines for when people were eating? Bent over and lapping chocolate out of the crevices of his palm, Al thought he saw a piece of marshmallow among the bubbles. Heh... hope that didn’t come out of his nose.

“You still need me to shovel?” he asked Jack.

“Son, I would be honored,” Jack nodded, holding the shovel on the doormat like a knight leaning on an orange sword. “Gitcher boots on and you can finish the job before we head out. I’ll make sure your Pop watches the show from inside.”

Xav returned with the towels and a smirk. “Talking shit about me, Jack?”

“I was just sayin’ how you’ll hate to see us go, but you’ll love to watch us walk away.”

“Got that fucking right.” Al cleaned his face while Xav dabbed each of his fingers individually. An oddly tender gesture. “What are you two going out for, exactly?”

“Juuust... shoppin’. I need Alan’s opinion on somethin’.”

“Uh-huh.” Secrets being a rare and dangerous thing in this family, there wasn’t much question as to what this was really about. Especially between brothers who were as close as twins. But the holidays were about giving, after all, so Xav seemed to decide to give them the benefit of the doubt. A game is more fun when everybody plays along.

Truthfully, even Al wasn’t sure what they were going to get for his father. A successful family man hitting his sixties doesn’t want for much. By this point, Xav had enough neckties and “#1 Dad” mugs to be buried surrounded by them like a pharaoh. Jack could always steal the show by reaching into his deep D.D.S. pockets or by making a new piece of furniture, but the son was held to no such standards. Xav had simple hobbies, and he seemed to have the house exactly how he wanted it. Was Al too old to make a coupon book, redeemable for hugs and remembering to use a coaster?

Or maybe his gift to Pop could be giving college another shot. Dropping out had caused some... friction, a flint-strikes-wood situation that had led to Al moving out of the house, and eventually out-of-state. He had to admit, the independence felt good. Putting his shoes on the coffee table, not having to tell anyone where he was going... he’d definitely become more promiscuous. No independent murders, though, which was starting to grate on him. He’d realized lately that he had always expected to be allowed to do more, without his father and uncle. Maybe if he did what Pop wanted, things would calm down so he could move back to Michigan and use the cabin. But the idea of sitting in another classroom, taking notes on a subject he didn’t care about, all for the promise of 50 years chained to a desk... It made him want to sleep forever.

When the car pulled up to the mall, Al was not surprised at all by the entrance his uncle had chosen. “Mind if I peek in Sears?” Jack asked, as if wild horses could stop him.

Home improvement and appliance stores were another phenomenon Al only seemed to experience at home. The dusty, unvarnished smell and high ceilings had been a frequent backdrop during his childhood— for Jack, they seemed to be akin to a candy store. He was talented as a carpenter and repairman, and sincerely relished something going wrong with the house if it meant he could pull out his toolkit. He also liked to make things go wrong with human bodies on occasion, but there was a separate box for those tools waiting up at the cabin.

Two steps in the door, and a weary-looking holiday hire hit them up with a canned pitch: “...and I’m happy to help you find whatever’s on your list!“ Aggressive customer service, the bane of the paranoid shopper. Jack was the front line for shaking off overly helpful greeters, which Xav had called “the second-worst thing to come out of the 80s after Iran-Contra.”

“Just lookin’, God willing— I brought my conscience with me to make me behave,” Jack looked to his nephew. “Don’t let me buy a single screw, y’hear?”

“Got it. Bulk purchases only.” That earned Al a shove.

Salesperson successfully deflected, Jack ducked toward his usual corner: the big ticket carpentry goods. When Al caught up, he was running his hand over a table saw. As much as he loved his uncle, Al wasn’t particularly interested in watching him fantasize about cutting wood, or even bone. “You have a project in mind?”

“A bit of a science experiment, next time we play cards,” Jack’s pupils darted along the equipment, still in reverie. “I’ve been readin’ a book about crucifixions, and how they affect the body.”

“Oh, that’s seasonal.”

“‘Course, I won’t be able to try it ‘til next year. You think your Pop would let me pick out a rabbit by April?” Jack chuckled. He was not talking about the Easter bunny. “We can see if she comes back to life after three days.”

Al snorted. “Jesus.”

“Precisely. Y’know, Christ is usually depicted with holes in his hands, but in actuality, the Romans would have put the nails through his wrists.” Jack picked up Al’s arm to demonstrate, dancing fingers across his palm. “Ain’t much to take hold of in here. It’s too fragile and open-ended. But if you move up the arm,”— he pressed his thumb into the straightened portion of Al’s median nerve— “You can hook the radius and the ulna. Much better support.” Jack’s eyes flickered with glee. “And it hurts like a bitch!”

“Wait, are you going to go first, or last?” Playing cards was usually a once-a-year affair, and the night Al looked forward to the most. If Jack snuffed her out before he had his turn...

“Oh, don’t worry, son. Done right, she could last for days.” Not that she would, since Pop would probably have something to say about that. “I just want to try, er... doin’ as the Romans do. And who knows, maybe you’ll like it. Every bachelor eventually needs to have a girl nailed down!”

They cackled and then shushed each other, wincing like sneaky little boys at the idea that someone would hear them over the store’s ambient shopping muzak. They really shouldn’t talk like this in public, even with code words and euphemisms. Though over the years they’d learned that people can be experts at ignoring what’s right under their noses. Certainly none of the men had ever overheard anyone else planning a murder.

“It’s just a pipe dream, I’m still in the plannin’ stages,” Jack added. “Ain’t even got the lumber yet. So if you wanna put some packages under the tree that are, say, 4-by-6 and 72 inches long... I promise to be shocked when I unwrap ‘em.”

Al’s attention shifted over his uncle’s shoulder, to a shelf of handheld orbital sanders. Al was more of a hands-on kind of guy— he still got a little queasy thinking about Jack’s experiment to see which sandpaper grit was the best at removing skin.

“So what was it you wanted me to look at? I don’t think Pop needs a crucifix for Christmas.”

“Oh, I’m just killin’ time before our appointment.”

“Appointment?”

“At the photo studio. I want you to give your Pop a picture.”

“...of us?”

“Naw, just you.”

Al loved that. “Yeah, that’d be hilarious. Merry Christmas, Pop, I got you me!”

A pause. “Oh, you’re serious.”

“As a heart attack, son. It’s just what he needs.”

“Do you have, I don’t know, a backup plan?” Al faltered. “Something less self-centered? I’m not exactly his favorite person right now. He kind of thinks I’m a failure.”

“Alan, you are not a failure. You are...” Jack patted his nephew’s cheek. “An unbroken mustang who has not yet found his ranch. And your father is just tryna keep you from bein’ sold as horse meat.” He slid them into a far aisle for more privacy. “He worries about you a lot, and he misses you somethin’ fierce.”

Al chewed his cheek. “Well, talk to him about showing it sometime.”

“No, son,” Jack took him by the shoulder, looking around to make sure they were alone. “Your father cries. At night when he talks about you, he starts wellin’ up like a waif. He doesn’t need to hear that you know about it, but it’s the God’s honest truth. All he talks about is wantin’ you back home.”

“I think movin’ out has been good for you, and I’m happy you did it. But it wounded him to his core. You’re his heart, kid.”

Al wasn’t sure how he was taking this information, but he knew how he was supposed to. He scrunched his eyes closed and took a deep breath.

“Okay... If you’re completely sure he won’t think it’s stupid.”

“Are you kiddin’? He’ll put it on the nightstand.” Jack grinned. “And if you smile for it real nice, I’ll take you to that steakhouse in the plaza after.”

Al cocked an eyebrow. “You were gonna go there anyway.”

“Yes. Yes, I was. But won’t you enjoy your ribeye that much more knowin’ you’ve earned it?” Mmn, maybe. “Besides... did you have any better ideas?”

⬥ ⬥ ⬥

Come Christmas Day, Xav had unwrapped the waist-up portrait and just said “thank you”— which was worrying because he was usually much more verbose than that— and gone silent in his chair. At least he wasn’t mad. Al looked to Jack, who smiled knowingly and handed him a package to keep the gift exchange going.

Al figured it was because Jack had given him something funny, but then he heard his father breathe in sharply.

“Maudit tabarnak... you fucking assholes,” Xav’s voice sounded high and squeaky, like it was being squeezed through slabs of rock. He ducked his chin into his bedshirt collar to hide his face.

“You, fucking... why’d you have to...” He shook his hand at the framed photo. Oh boy, he really did hate it. The whole idea was idiotic. Al had sat in front of that artfully-mottled green backdrop and squinted for a man with a bow tie and no indoor voice for nothing, except for the sheer discomfort of it. And a ribeye steak with a baked potato.

Xav blinked up at the ceiling and gulped, his Adam’s apple fluctuating grotesquely. Eventually he seemed to find his voice again. “Why didn’t you tell me you were having pictures taken, so I could make sure he had his fucking hair combed?” He showed them the photo. “Look at his bangs— they’re all over the fucking place.”

Al had to admit, they did look a little wild. “Aw, shoot. Sorry, Pop,” he laughed.

Jack tutted. “I think it looks nice. Rugged.”

“That’s because you don’t know how to comb your hair either, Jack.” Xav brought the photo back into his lap, looking it over. “Looks like he fought a bear before sitting down. But don’t worry, I still like it. You look handsome, kid. Maybe I can find some space on my nightstand.” Al and Jack exchanged victory grins, and didn’t catch Xav wiping tears from both eyes.

[afternoonpoppy]

Camping

Poppy awakens from her slumber, aaaaaa! This was for a commission but also something I’d wanted to sit down and write for a looong while, so this finally got me to do it and I’m glad for that. This turned out longer than I expected but I had fun writing it, so I hope it turned out well!

A bit of a chill had started to creep into the night air, but Allister hardly minded at all. Being sat by a modestly-sized campfire with Wolfram beside him, there was plenty of warmth to go around. And besides, Allister was camping again! 

Sort of, anyway - it was honestly more of a meetup with friends for the evening, and they weren't even more than a twenty-minute walk from Allister's house. But the group had gotten a fire together, brought out a cooler with drinks, and even found some sizable logs to sit on. Allister preferred fold-out chairs, but his cousin Sadie had insisted it would make the whole night more 'authentic.' Plus, it did allow Wolfram and Allister to sit closer together. In all, they'd ended up with about nine people gathered together, some of them being mutual friends of Allister and Sadie, with others being acquaintances invited by said friends. The total was 'about' nine since Allister's coworker Vincent had shouted that they were going on an impromptu snack-run to the nearest convenience store thirty minutes ago.

"Honestly, I don't know what she was expecting to happen," Sadie was saying very emphatically from across the campfire. While the group had split off into their own conversations and activities, she'd recruited Allister and Wolfram into listening to the evening's third rant about the obnoxious roommate she'd been putting up with for the past while. "Like, she was gonna yell at me and then just expect me to finish cleaning up the apartment for her? I am under no obligation to do her laundry, thank you very much." 

Marcus, the other of Allister's two coworkers that had been invited, walked over to take a seat by the fire just in time to catch what was being discussed and followed up with, "I mean, you gotta remember, Sadie. This is the same girl that thought she'd just hand in a Wikipedia article for one of her college assignments. You think she thinks this stuff through?"

Allister's eyebrows furrowed as he stared into the fire and tried to parse that statement. "Wait, as in she plagiarized a Wikipedia article, right?" Surely Marcus hadn't literally meant -

"I mean, I guess it's still plagiarism if you download an entire Wikipedia page and send it to your professor, yeah."

Oh. Allister nodded, struggling for something to say to that, but quickly gave up. Even if that anecdote weren't so absurd that it demanded speechlessness, he'd been content to let his friends steer the conversations of the night. Allister was just glad to hear what they'd been up to as of late, as well as to have a chance to sit outside and enjoy the wilderness. Crickets chirped in the trees of the woods and stars coated the sky up above, making a beautiful sight. 

That sight had been one of his favorite things about moving out here from the city. The other being that he'd been able to meet Wolfram. Wolfram who had spent the first part of the evening nearly dozing off by the fire after the walk to the group's meetup spot, but looked to have regained some energy now that he'd been sitting down for a while. He hadn't bothered to take part in the conversation much either and had also been focusing on either the fire or the stars for most of the night.  Allister wasn't very surprised, though. Considering this was the first time Wolfram had properly interacted with... anyone else in this world in person, Allister was just glad to get him out of the house. Getting into the car was still a no-go, but perhaps that would be another day.

"So, Wolfram, what do you do, anyway? You work, doing the whole 'actually trying to learn' thing, what?" Sadie asked abruptly, apparently letting the previous topic rest for now. "I don't think Allister's ever mentioned."

Allister's eyes widened and he glanced at Wolfram. The two had long ago decided not to mention the whole... 'magic and other worlds' situation to other people for any number of reasons. Not least of all being concerns as to what sort of attention Wolfram would draw as a (somewhat, at least) practiced spellcaster. It wasn't as if the pair hadn't discussed what their cover story would be to other people, but it hadn't come up very much as of yet and Allister couldn't help but worry.

Still, Wolfram seemed unphased by the question and smoothly answered, "I'm a writer. Primarily focusing on short fiction at the moment."

"Whoa, cool," Sadie said with a grin. "What do you write, like, romance, fantasy, sci-fi? Romance? I'm into romance if you've got any of that."

"Apologies, no. It is fantasy, my current project is a series of stories taking place in the same setting, so right now much of my time working on it is spent on world-building."

Allister was impressed at Wolfram's confidence in that answer. Sadie nodded, reaching into the cooler near her for a drink. "Neat. I don't actually read a whole lot, so no promises, but I'll try and give it a look when it's done. Either of you guys wants a beer?" She held up an extra can and tapped on the side with one nail.

"No, thank you," Wolfram said.

Allister shrugged. "Yeah, sure, I'll have one."

Sadie aimed to toss it to Allister but realized the fire between them might pose a problem. Rather than stand up and walk around it, she settled for instead trying to throw the can around the fire at an awkward angle, which resulted in it flying off to the side and rolling across the ground a bit. Marcus stared at Sadie with eyebrows raised.

"Uh, I think we can let that one settle there for a while," Allister said, standing from his seat to grab a can from the cooler. "Let's not ask you to throw things when you've had alcohol."

Sadie objected by holding up her freshly-opened can and saying, "Hey, this is my first one, Alli!"

"That was a sober throw?" Wolfram asked.

"Wait, shit. Okay, yeah, let's say I was drunk for that."

For a while longer, the conversation shifted back and forth through various topics among the group. Eventually, though, Allister glanced over to the trees around the campsite. He leaned closer to Wolfram and asked, "Hey, you wanna go for a walk?"

"A walk?" Wolfram leaned against Allister's shoulder. "Where did you intend to go?"

"Nowhere, in particular. I just wanted to stretch my legs and get away from the fire for a bit. We don't gotta go far."

Wolfram thought for a moment, then said, "We walked here and have to do so again to get home, so I would rather not. Feel free to enjoy yourself, though, so long as you don't end up lost."

"You sure?"

"I'm not frightened of people, Allister," Wolfram said with a smile. "I can handle any questions your cousin directs at me. Either that or I can ask her something about her housemate and let her talk for another thirty minutes."

"Hmm, I guess so. Alright then, if you're sure. I'll make sure I can still see the fire anyway." Allister stood up, stretching a bit, noting that Sadie and Marcus had both wandered off to the rest of the group and were yelling into someone's phone at Vincent, demanding they return from whatever had distracted them on their snack run. Allister had meant to tell them he'd be back shortly but figured he wouldn't disrupt anything if he just stepped away from the campsite.

Once he'd gotten some distance away, he noticed how quiet it was out in the woods. He hadn't been aware of the background noise his social circle's chatter made until he could hear the contrast in nature's quiet cricket chirps. It was nice out here. Much more Allister's pace than when he lived out in the city with his family, but this was the first time he'd taken the time to stop and appreciate it even after moving out here.

He leaned back against a tree, occasionally sipping the beer he'd brought with him, and started searching the stars for any constellations he knew. The answer was none, he'd always been terrible at telling constellations apart and never knew where one ended and another began, but at least they were pretty.

Allister's thoughts were interrupted, unfortunately, as a strong hiccup shook through his chest. 'HUP!' He raised a hand to his chest in surprise and instinctively tried to muffle the next 'HMK!' to follow, his own hiccups startling him as they broke the silence.

"Why n - HULP - now..." he mumbled to himself. As usual, Allister's hiccups were fast and obnoxiously loud. Considering it was almost unheard of for his cases to start up with no reason, he cast an accusatory look at the beer can in his hand. "Thi - HUC - this is you - HIC - your fault - HUC-UP!" He sighed - or tried to with yet another hiccup interrupting - and turned his attention back up to the stars.

Allister had planned to try to wait out his hiccups in the hopes they'd stop on their own. He preferred not to return to the party only to be a distraction for everyone. Unfortunately, he did wait for some time, looking back at the campfire now and then and eventually checking his phone to see that almost fifteen minutes had passed. It was becoming apparent that just the same as the hiccups didn't typically start without reason, they wouldn't stop on their own anytime soon either. 

Allister grimaced at that thought. He had wanted to be back by now, but here he was instead, without even so much as a bottle of water to try to solve the problem. He hated what he was contemplating, but he hated leaving Wolfram on his own even more. So, without putting too much thought into what a terrible decision he was making, Allister inhaled deeply and held his breath. In the past, that had always been a terrible idea, but maybe that had always been a coincidence?

Successfully holding his breath with hiccups leaping through his chest every other second proved to be more difficult than he remembered, and it felt like he ran out of air much faster than he would have otherwise. And he was forced to give up that effort and breathe fresh air when his hiccups abruptly became faster.

Allister immediately regretted his decision. "Wa - HUP - wait - HUC-UP - please ju - HIC! HIGK - just - HUK-ULP - h-hold on - HIC!" His attempt at talking his hiccups into calming down did little to help. Even worse, they had gotten stronger and were starting to hurt now. Allister would have said it was because his own body seemingly wanted him to suffer, but he knew this was his mind's fault instead, for thinking holding his breath might seriously work this time.

"Allister?"

Allister jumped when he realized Wolfram was now standing next to him. When that had happened, he had no idea. "Fr - HUP! HIC-ULP! - Fram, I - HUC-UP! HIGK! - what - HIC!"

Wolfram reached out and patted Allister gently on his back, a look of concern on his face. "Everyone at the fire is currently engaged in a round of trivia about media that is flying completely over my head, so I thought I would come to find you. And it didn't take me very long to hear where you were... Are you alright? Those sound worse than usual, somehow."

Unable to form anything even remotely close to a proper sentence at the moment, Allister could only answer with, "B - HIGK-UP - bad ch - HIC! HUC-ULP - choices - HUP!"

"I'm not sure what that - oh. Allister, did you try to stop them by holding your breath?"

Allister nodded.

"Haven't you told me that's the one thing you absolutely cannot do?"

Allister answered with another nod and a whine between hiccups.

"And why in the world would you do that?" Wolfram asked. "From what I was last aware, there are plenty of drinks available that you could have cured them with instead. That's at least had a partial success rate before."

At first, Allister contemplated how to phrase the answer in a way that his hiccups would allow, then settled for pulling up a note app on his phone and typing. 'I didn't want to bother anybody. My hiccups aren't exactly subtle.'

Wolfram stared at the message, thinking. "I hardly think anyone present tonight would mind as much as you think. You honestly did not need to make yourself suffer like this."

'Suffer' sounded melodramatic, but considering he was still putting up with nonstop hiccup after hiccup, Allister figured it wasn't exactly wrong. 'I know it was a dumb idea. But everyone's having fun, and I didn't want to be a problem.'

"Honestly, Allister, you worry too much about these things..." Wolfram sighed. "Though I... have also hidden in a crate to avoid being seen with hiccups, so... perhaps I am not the best person to hear this from."

"You - HIGK-ULP - what?" Allister asked, too surprised by that statement to bother typing his response on his phone.

Staring down at the ground and fidgeting a bit, Wolfram mumbled, "I, um, it was rarely an issue back home but I... did have a particularly stubborn case at one point and... Hiding away until they stopped seemed ideal..."

"But a - HUC! HIC - a crate?"  

"It - I panicked, I was in one of the Academia Arcana's storerooms to retrieve spell materials and - and I heard someone outside the door - the details aren't important. My point is, I do understand but don't do this sort of thing to yourself in the future, please."

Allister appreciated the thought, smiling at Wolfram and nodding. "Don't w - HUP! HIC-UP - worry, I - HIC - I won't."

"Good. Now then, I'll fetch you some water. Wait here, I'll be quick about it."

After a minute or two, Wolfram returned with a bottle of water, which Allister accepted gladly, trying and failing to state his gratitude, "Th - HIGK - thank y - HULP - you, F - HUC-ULP - Fra -"

"Just drink it," Wolfram interrupted. 

Allister did so, drinking the water in quick gulps between each hiccup. It took a few tries, but eventually, they slowed down somewhat and finally came to a stop entirely. He waited for a few seconds, still unsure if he'd genuinely been cured at first, but then finally sighed with relief.

"Better?"

"Much," Allister said. "Thanks, Fram."

Wolfram smiled and leaned his weight against Allister's side. "Very good. Shall we be returning to the camp?"

"Hmm..." Allister wrapped an arm around Wolfram's shoulder. "It is getting a bit cold, huh? I guess we should." He paused for a moment, then added, "But... Hey, how about we have a real camping trip sometime soon?"

"We won't have an oven for you to cook proper meals, then," Wolfram objected.

"I mean, I guess not. But you've never had s'mores before. Those are best when they're toasted over a campfire."

"I've heard of those... what are they?"

"Chocolate and marshmallows, Fram."

Wolfram's eyes widened at the statement, clearly intrigued. "When is your next day off? We can do it then."

Allister laughed and hugged Wolfram closer. "Okay, we'll talk about it when we get home. C'mon, let's head back to the camp before Sadie comes to chase us down."

[takingcourage]

A Bushel and a Peck

Pairing: Jaime x MC

Word Count: 1,850

Summary: After receiving payment for a job, Jaime and Arden get a little more than they’ve bargained for.

Note: Thanks, as always, to @krishu213​ for her request of “The smell of nutmeg and cloves around every corner” for Jaime and Arden. The prompts you choose are always so much fun! : ) 

Fiddling with the drawstring on her jacket, Arden raised her eyes toward the seasonal menu. It was all for show -- she’d known exactly what she was getting before she’d set foot in the shop -- but Friday afternoons always left her a little antsy and eager for home. As the woman in front of her stepped aside to wait for her drink, Arden exchanged smiles with the barista behind the counter. 

“The usual?”

“Please. Thanks, Stephanie.”

“Extra shot today?”

Arden’s lips pursed with momentary indecision. “Sure -- why not?” 

“It’ll be out shortly.” 

After completing her transaction at the register, Arden migrated toward the other end of the counter. A subtle vibration came from the front pocket of her bag, and she quickly withdrew her phone. 

Any plans for the weekend?

She smiled instinctively at Jaime’s text. Did you have something in mind? My schedule is surprisingly flexible. 

Good to know. 

Her brow was still crinkled at the cryptic text when she went forward to retrieve her drink, and things only grew stranger as she made her way back out of the shop and into her vehicle. If she’d been in a more present state of mind, she would have noticed the hints of nutmeg and vanilla that wafted up from the tiny hole in the lid when she took her first blissful sip. As it was, her thoughts were too trained on the mysterious message from her husband. 

Care to share?

I’ve got a project in mind for tomorrow. 

She swallowed a bit too much with her next sip. Had she been a less-experienced drinker, it might have burned on the way down, but she’d been immune to the heat for years. When her phone remained still, she settled back against the seat, slotted the keys into the ignition, and made her way toward home. 

Jaime was waiting for her in the kitchen, his hand slicing the air as he beckoned her in to join him. “You know those repairs I was doing for Mrs. Ellis this week?” 

Arden nodded and kicked her shoes into the corner of the dining room. 

“She couldn’t stand not being able to pay me for them, so she found another method of compensation.” 

That method became abundantly clear as Arden tiptoed onto the tile. From wall to stove, their counter was covered with heaping paper bags. “She gave you a kitchenful of apples?” 

“Two bushels,” he confirmed. 

She crossed to the nearest bag, hooking the side with an inquisitive finger. “Does she think we’re feeding the whole city? What on earth are we going to do with two bushels of apples?”

“I misspoke earlier -- it’s not actually quite that many. I did manage to give  a couple dozen away...”

“We’re two people, Jaime!” she interjected, turning away from the counter to face him. “I don’t think it’s possible for us to eat this many apples if we tried.” 

Jaime rubbed the furrow from her brow with a gentle thumb, then braced a hand on each shoulder. “That’s why I thought we could make a challenge out of it: we’ll see how many things we can make with them in a weekend. Apple butter alone will get us through at least a quarter of them, and we can make applesauce and pie filling too.” 

At the glimpse of his earnest brown eyes, the hilarity of the situation somehow caught up to her in a breathless laugh. “Jaime, this is ridiculous. We can find people to give them to --” 

“Or,” he countered, pausing for a moment in apology for cutting her off. “Or we can make them into something special before we give them away. But I need you with me on this. I don’t know if I can get through them all on my own.”

It was a hollow statement; Jaime was eminently capable of getting through anything he set his mind to, but she wasn’t going to leave him to drown in apples on his own. 

“We need a game plan,” she replied, words already a little distant as she circled the room in search of a pad of paper. Finding an unopened envelope on the table, she began making a list. “If you find the recipes you want, I’ll write down the ingredients we need. We can make a quick run to the grocery store, then pick something up for dinner.” 

Chinese. 

Arden chuckled at the silent interjection. “...then pick up Chinese for dinner. Are you trying to appease me for putting up with you?”

“Nope.” This time, his words were audible. “I’m just taking care of my wife.”

By the end of the evening, they’d accounted for every single apple. Double checking the recipes over cartons of takeout, the two of them shared more than a handful of giggles over the sheer absurdity of the situation. 

“What have we gotten ourselves into?” 

-----

By noon on Saturday, they'd enlisted her father’s help with peeling and slicing -- a process that would have been much faster if the Harry hadn't insisted on tossing pieces of discarded peel to the floor for Opie instead of into the bag for composting. Between the dog's valiant attempts to catch them and Jinx's determination to steal them from under his nose, the whole scene became very distracting.

Even so, there was no denying that his presence made the process go faster. Their last batch of applesauce was finished by 3:00, followed by apple butter some hours later. When the time came to break for dinner, they'd lined their counter with several jars to give away. 

"Just pies left to go," Jaime noted, consulting their list from the night before as Arden and Harry cleared dishes from the dining table.  

"I think that’s my cue to head on home. I don’t know the first thing about pies, except that I love eating them.” 

Arden resisted the urge to roll her eyes as she loaded their plates into the dishwasher. 

“We’ll bring one over tomorrow,” Jaime promised. 

Offering a half-hearted farewell over her shoulder, Arden’s eyes glazed as they fell back onto the final bag on the table. The pads of her fingers felt swollen from the repetitive motion of the knife, and she’d started to worry that no amount of handwashing would ever remove the sense of stickiness from her wrinkled palms. Even after the brief time away, there was a phantom tremor between her thumb and pointer finger. 

“I can finish these up tomorrow.” Jaime sank into the chair across from her, his own hand strong and steady as he reached for her leg under the kitchen table. “I really appreciate all of your help today. I'm glad we did this.” 

Eyes darting upward, she caught the smile she’d heard in his voice. His warm eyes sparked golden when she met his gaze. “I might swear off apples for the foreseeable future, but this has been fun.” With renewed vigor, she glanced back to the bag beside her. “And I’m not leaving you to do these on your own. We said we’d finish these tonight, and that’s what I intend to do.” 

He squeezed her knee, chuckling beneath his breath. 

“Stop!” she urged with an insistent whisper. At his raised brow, she clarified. “You’re thinking about calling me stubborn again -- I know you are.” 

Jaime rose and motioned for Arden to vacate her chair as well. “We can finish tonight, but I want to switch out. I’ll take care of the peeling and slicing. You can measure out the dry ingredients.”

“Deal.” 

Tucking her hair behind both ears, she set to work gathering ingredients and whatever clean utensils she could find. Most of their small stash of measuring cups and spoons had been used for previous recipes, and improvising was easier than washing what was dirty. 

“Are you using the 1/3 cup?”

Flicking the remaining crystals into the mixing bowl, she flashed the tin cup for his inspection. 

“To measure 16 cups of sugar?”

Flushing more from embarrassment than indignance, she scooted the 1/8 measuring teaspoon out of his sightline. He didn’t need to know her plan for the spices. “Don’t make me lose count!”

I could if I wanted to. 

His thoughts cut in, and she very nearly lost track of the scooping despite herself. Offering what she hoped was a stern expression, she retrieved her phone and found a playlist of pop music that had fallen from the top 40 charts a decade before. As she finished preparing the ingredients, she couldn’t help giggling at the memories attached to many of them: trips to the pool in the summertime, dances at prom, basement jam sessions with their very short-lived band phase... 

Jaime brought the bowl of apple slices to the counter, nudging her out of the way so that he could access the dry ingredients and the stovetop. She kept him company as he cooked and cooled, legs dangling from her seat beside the oven. 

Though the raw materials were much different from his usual medium, there was the same undeniable magic in watching him bring them all together. Under Jaime’s care, what started as a few basic ingredients no longer felt ordinary or simple. True to his intentions, the unexpected gift had become something special. 

Finally, the last bag had been sealed and the counters had been wiped down. With one concluding look around the room, Arden cranked the dial on the dishwasher and breathed a sigh of relief. Weariness grew with each step, culminating in a sense of fatigue that prompted her to collapse onto the mattress as soon as she’d made it to their upstairs bedroom. 

“What a day.” Jaime stretched out beside her, sounding much more energetic than she felt. 

Drowning a yawn, Arden tried to recover by taking a deep breath. Her nose shriveled as she realized her mistake. “Everything in our house smells like apples,” she moaned, tossing an arm over her face to try to block the scent. “I smell like apples.” 

He burrowed closer on the bed. “You smell like autumn. I’m getting notes of nutmeg and cinnamon...maybe a hint of clove. I’ll be dreaming of applesauce and pies all night.” Jaime kissed her ear playfully, then pulled away with a soft laugh. 

“Ughhh.” Showering would mean postponing bedtime, but she was starting to think that the delay would be worthwhile. 

“You have a bit of peel in your hair. Here.” He brushed aside a few strands to locate the tiny sliver. 

Prying open her eyes, she turned to face him. “And you’ve got cornstarch...or something... on your ear.” Arden swiped at it with a thumb, relieved when the substance came away easily. 

He caught her elbow as she dropped her hand, his thumb etching gentle circles into her skin. “We make quite a pair, don’t we?”

Arden’s eyes flashed with amusement; she knew he’d intended sentimentality, but the setup was too much to resist. “I have to say, that’s not quite the fruit I was thinking of,” she countered, already bracing herself for the well-earned complaint she knew was coming. 

With a well-deserved groan, Jaime leaned over to capture her lips in a sleepy kiss. 

[heartofether]

Bonus Episode #3 - Leave a Message TRANSCRIPT

[You can listen to the show wherever you get your podcasts, or go to our “Listen” page if you’re on desktop.]

VAL

Hey there! Val here with a couple of special announcements before our third bonus episode. First off, our season two release date has been set and will soon be announced. Before then, however, we have an abundance of teasers and bonus content coming your way. Be sure to follow us on Twitter and Tumblr to keep up with all of our new releases.

Second, do you want to talk to other Heart of Ether fans, either about the show or whatever else your heart desires? We now have an official Discord server! We have automatic roles, specialized channels, daily quotes and question of the day, and in the future, we may use it to host special events. The invite link is on our socials and our Carrd, and we would love it if you joined us!

Last but certainly not least: we all like tea, right? What about podcast-themed tea? That’s right, you can now buy The Heart of Ether-themed tea with the help of Adagio Teas! (not sponsored, just using the service) A portion of the proceeds will go to The Trevor Project, which helps provide crisis intervention and suicide prevention for LGBTQ+ youth. The link to browse our tea collection will be in the description of this episode, or on our socials if you want to look there.

Right, I’m done with my rambling. Here’s another bonus fluff episode—and this time I at least 90% mean it! Talk to you soon!

AUTOMATED VOICE

Please state your message.

[THEME MUSIC PLAYS.]

[THE DIALOGUE THROUGHOUT THE ENTIRE EPISODE IS SLIGHTLY MUFFLED, AS IF THEY ARE SPEAKING OVER THE PHONE.]

ROSE

Hi! This is Rosemary Quinn. Unfortunately, I’m not able to return your call right now, but leave a message and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible. Have a lovely day!

[PHONE BEEP.]

IRENE

Hey, it’s Irene. I just wanted to check and see when you’d be coming over? Text me and let me know if you have an estimate.

Oh, and my dad is going to the store, so I know you mentioned wanting to make brownies? Did you mean, like, from scratch or is just a box mix fine? ‘Cause I’m good with whatever. Just text me what you need, and I’ll ask him to pick it up. See you later! Bye!

[PHONE BEEP.]

IRENE

Hey. It’s Irene. Leave a message and I’ll get back to you. Thanks.

[PHONE BEEP.]

ROSE

Hi, Irene! I’m sorry to call, but you said you were having some issues with your texts, so I thought this would be a safer bet. Are you available after school today? If you don’t mind, I could really use some help with the chemistry homework. You seemed to at least kind of understand it, or maybe you were just pretending like the rest of us were. [SHE GIGGLES.]

I also just am not super fond of Mr. Morrison. Nobody is. I mean, I try to be nice to him, nicer than most other students, and I think he likes me for that. It doesn’t mean he’s actually willing to be helpful, though. I think he sees me as some sort of air-headed bimbo, which is both misogynistic and presumptuous. Olivia told me he might be retiring, though, so fingers crossed?

Anyways, would we be able to meet up and work on it together? I’ll buy you a coffee for your time. Just let me know! Oh, and no need to call me back, we’ll see each other at school most likely. I just thought I’d call and ask before I forgot. I’ll talk to you later, bye!

[TWO PHONE BEEPS.]

IRENE

Hey, are you still at the school? I try to have school spirit—sometimes—but events really aren’t my thing. Maddy seemed to be into it, though, so I figured you might still be hanging out with her.

Anyways, if you decide you’re done with it, I was thinking about going to Sonic and it’d be great if you tagged along? It’s not the same when I go by myself. I’ll pay, obviously, since I’m the one inviting you. Call me back if you’re interested, and we can work something out. Alright, bye.

[TWO PHONE BEEPS.]

[THERE IS THE SOUND OF DISTANT CONVERSATION AS ROSE TALKS]

ROSE

Hi there, Maddy just wanted me to tell you that when you get here, make sure you go through the back door so you don’t disturb her grandparents. They’re not in a great mood tonight. You’ll have to hop the fence, but if you need help, I can go down there. I’m excited to see you! Bye!

[TWO PHONE BEEPS.]

[THERE IS A SLIGHT BREEZE HEARD IN THE BACKGROUND.]

IRENE

Hey there, I just wanted to apologize for leaving in such a rush. It was just a lot, and I didn’t really, well. I honestly didn’t feel super welcome there? That’s not your fault, though. It was everyone else.

It just—I don’t want to sound rude, but it doesn’t feel like our “group” actually cares about me a lot? I mean, maybe it’s because of my interests, or because I don’t dress or act like stereotypical straight girls do. I’ve known them all since freshman year, but honestly? You’re the only one I’ve ever really clicked with.

They like you, though. Everyone does. I don’t mean that in a snarky or jealous way. Just in the way that…well, you’re Rosemary Quinn. Everyone wants to be your friend, I guess. You just have that aura.

[A BEAT, THEN, EMBARRASSED] God, I’m sorry, that’s such a weird thing to say. I’m really not good at this whole friends thing, huh? I’m surprised you’ve stuck around for this long. I called you to apologize—now for multiple things it appears—but also to tell you that if you’re looking for me, I went to the park. It’s like a five-minute walk from Maddy’s house, and I have my board with me, so that helped.

I’m sure you’re not looking for me. You’re probably having fun at Maddy’s birthday party. You texted me to ask if I was okay, though, so I guess that’s why I called. You always do. You’re the one person who’s consistently cared, who’s always checked in on me when my social anxiety kicks in and I decide to leave early. Is that how you are with everyone, or…?

Jeez, I’m sorry, I’m rambling. Just, sorry for running off, I’m at the park sitting on the swings if you need me. Bye.

[TWO PHONE BEEPS.]

IRENE

[SOMEWHAT DESPERATE] Hey, it’s Irene. Please call me back. I— [SHE HUFFS.] I really think we need to talk.

[TWO PHONE BEEPS.]

IRENE

[DEFEATED] This is my third time trying to call you. At this point, I’m pretty certain you’re actually ignoring me.

I’m not mad, Rose. I promise I’m not. It was—it was nice! I liked it. Really liked it, actually, um. But you ran off to go home before we could really talk about it, and now it really feels like you. Well. Like you didn’t mean to, and now you regret it.

[SHE GROANS.] I’m not saying that to guilt trip you. I mean, maybe I’ve got it completely wrong. Maybe you’re scared that I didn’t like it, which isn’t true. Which would mean that we’re just walking in circles around each other, worried about what the other thinks. It would be funny if I wasn’t so worried about you.

[A BEAT, THEN] Do you wanna know the truth, Rose? I’ll tell you.

[SOFTER] Do you remember when we were building snowmen back in December, outside of the school? You made one named—god, I don’t remember. Was it Queen of the Valley? Some sort of royalty. You always come up with such extravagant names for things, it’s…

Anyways, you said what would make it perfect is if it had a crown to wear. By some absolutely absurd coincidence, I had a paper crown in my locker. I had learned to make them during study hall when I got bored. The school was still open, so I ran back inside through the empty hallways to go grab it.

When I came back outside, you grinned, your cheeks rosy and your hair still a mess from the wind that had only just died down. You took the crown from me, and you looked me in the eyes, giggling. You said, “I could kiss you right now.” Then you ran to give her majesty the crown.

And I didn’t say it. Of course I didn’t. I was too scared of that feeling I felt. I felt so warm, even with a blizzard on the horizon, and that terrified me. I wanted you to kiss me, though. I wished so badly that you had, it physically ached.

I gazed at you there, as you placed the paper crown upon the Queen’s head, Maddy rolling her eyes, but still smiling. In the moment, though, I hardly processed she was even there. I didn’t even process the groundskeeper glaring at us, or the cars driving past as teachers left for the day. As I stared at you, it was like you were the only thing I had ever known, and all I remember thinking was, “This is what will destroy me. This will be my downfall.”

[A PAUSE, THEN, HOPEFUL] But maybe it doesn’t have to be. Because you did kiss me, in the end. I’m glad you did.

Call me back, please?

[TWO PHONE BEEPS.]

[THERE IS BACKGROUND NOISE HEARD AS ROSE STANDS OUTSIDE OF HER HOUSE.]

ROSE

[SINKING INTO DISAPPOINTMENT] Hi, Irene! Just, um…just making sure we’re still going to the dance together. I’m outside my house waiting. My mom’s starting to get pretty upset with me for not being gone already, and just uh…standing here like an idiot. Won’t let me come back inside, though, because she thinks that if I’m not out here, you’ll—actually, I won’t try to understand her reasoning. I haven’t been able to for the past sixteen years.

But, um…please let me know? I’ll be waiting. Goodbye.

[TWO PHONE BEEPS.]

[IRENE IS HEARD DESPERATELY TRYING TO GET HER SHOES ON AND GET OUT THE DOOR.]

IRENE

Rose, I am so, so, so sorry I’m late. I promise, I’m on my way, I’m literally—

[HER DAD CALLS OUT, MUFFLED BY THE DOOR, AND SHE CALLS BACK]

IRENE

Yeah, I’m coming!

[THEN, AS SHE'S HEARD RACING ACROSS THE CARPET] I don’t wear makeup very often and I kept messing up my eyeliner and by the time I looked at the clock—I’m sorry. I have no idea how I’m supposed to make this up to you, but I’ll be there as fast as I can, okay?

[MUTTERING, CURSING HERSELF AS SHE PACKS HER BAG] First dance I get with you and it’s the only one I’m late to. Of course it is.

[SHE'S HEARD WALKING OUT OF HER ROOM, THE DOOR OPENING.]

IRENE

Okay, I’m going outside now. I love you. See you soon.

[PHONE BEEP.]

[THIS TAKES PLACE SECONDS AFTER THE LAST ONE.]

IRENE

[SLOWLY] So. I just told you I love you. I didn't mean to, but if you feel that way, too, then great. If not, then just pretend it was a slip of the tongue and we can spend the rest of the night pretending it never happened! Yeah. Um. Yeah. See you soon.

[TWO PHONE BEEPS.]

[THERE IS AMBIANCE OF THE CAFE AND PASSERBYS AS ROSE TALKS.]

ROSE

Hi, I’m outside of the cafe now! I haven’t ordered yet, so we can go in together.

[A BEAT, THEN, SOFTER] I brought something for you. Early this morning, when dawn was just barely teasing the sky, I couldn’t fall back asleep. I have no idea why I woke up in the first place. Maybe my muscles knew something I didn’t. I decided to slip out through my bedroom window, though.

If my mom noticed, she hasn’t told me yet. She knew I was going out today, but I’m sure I’ll still come home to her sitting on the couch intently, giving me that look she always does. I don’t care. She can do whatever she wants.

I got on my bike and I rode out to the park—not the one we usually go to. This one is in the opposite direction. It’s much vaster, less playset and more nature. There were flowers that had just started blooming. I picked some with the gentlest hand I could manage. I wish I had thought to bring scissors, but I hope the flowers will forgive me for my carelessness.

I thought long and hard before picking each one, making sure the colors matched just right, that the sweet scent they produced was in perfect harmony. I tied them with a ribbon I had around my wrist, and sealed it with a kiss, just for you. It took me all morning.

[A BEAT, THEN, SHE GIGGLES] Oh, wait, I think I just saw you pull in. Okay, I’ll talk to you in a second—

[TWO PHONE BEEPS.]

IRENE

Hey. Just wanted to make sure you got home safe. I love you. Call me back when you hear this, okay?

[TWO PHONE BEEPS.]

ROSE

[LAUGHING] God, I must have just missed you. Yes, I got home safe. Thank you for checking, dear. Sir Griffin the Third says hello!

[TO SIR GRIFFIN THE THIRD] Hey, look, it’s Irene. Say hello!

[IRENE SHIFTS. SIR GRIFFIN THE THIRD IS HEARD PURRING. HE GIVES A SMALL MEOW.]

ROSE

[GIGGLING] I’ll talk to you later, I love you!

[TWO PHONE BEEPS.]

IRENE

[HER VOICE CRACKING] Hey, I just saw your texts about your mom. Are you okay? Do you need me to come pick you up? You’re more than welcome to spend the night at my place. My dad said you can stay as long as you need, so don’t worry about that, okay?

I wish I could do more to help. I wish I could make her stop. Have you told your aunts about some of the stuff she’s done? They sound like good people, from what you’ve told me. I know they live far away, but still, they might be able to do something.

Right, um, just let me know if you need me to come get you. I love you. Bye.

[PHONE BEEP.]

[THERE IS RUSTLING AS ROSE LOOKS THROUGH HER BAG.]

ROSE

Hi, I’m sorry to bother you. I just wanted to check, did I lose my bracelet at your house? I can’t find it anywhere. It’s the one you gave me, and I really, really don’t want to lose it. It’s like a good charm for me. Please text me if you find it. If not, it’s okay. It might just be somewhere I haven’t checked yet. Thank you, honey. I love you. Goodbye.

[TWO PHONE BEEPS.]

[THERE IS THE SOUND OF HER CAR ENGINE, ALONG WITH SOFT GUITAR PLAYING OVER THE SPEAKER.]

IRENE

Hey, I’m parked outside! It’s okay if you’re not done yet, I can wait. I know you like to take your time getting ready for dances, and it definitely pays off. You’re gonna look beautiful regardless, though, so just come out when you’re ready. Love you!

[TWO PHONE BEEPS.]

ROSE

[TIRED] Hi. I’m sorry to call you so late. To be frank, I didn’t expect you to pick up at all, but I know you’ll hear this in the morning. I hope you’re sleeping well, by the way. I— [SHE YAWNS.] I can’t sleep. That’s not unusual, but I’ve just been thinking a lot.

Do you remember when you fell in the creek? It was late autumn, and even though I pulled you out just seconds after, your teeth were already clattering. I wanted to cry, you looked so miserable, but you acted like it was hardly a big deal.

That one coffee shop was the closest warm building, so I had to take you there. One of the baristas brought out some towels for you, and even gave you a free hot coffee. I should visit them again one day, if they still work there. Maybe bring them a thank-you gift.

Anyways, I gave you my jacket, which you almost refused because you didn’t want me to be cold, but I honestly didn’t even notice it. Once we were almost certain you weren’t going to catch frostbite, we went back to your car and drove back to your house.

On the way there, while we were at a stoplight, you looked at me and said, “I’m just happy it wasn’t you.”

I laughed and said, “Well, it feels like I was in there with you. I got chills just looking at you.”

You said, “Is that how relationships work? We feel each other’s pain?”

And I said, “What happens when one of us dies, then? Will the other die, too?”

And you said, “I hope so. I can’t imagine life without you.”

“But what if you could just live your life for me?” I said. “If one of us dies early, the other should have to live double the life to make up for it.”

You hummed, and then said something I’ll never forget: “I may continue living, but that doesn’t mean I’ll like it. Life is so wonderful when you’re in the world.”

And I should have told you, then, that whatever wonder I bring is only because of you. Every time you smile, or say something stupid, or brush your hair out of your face, there’s a bit more color in the world. I think our colors bleed together, then. You are a universe in my hands and I love you more than both of our lifetimes could ever contain.

And I didn’t have the words to describe it all until right this moment. I couldn’t afford to forget.

So, I love you. In this life and the next. Goodnight, dear.

[TWO PHONE BEEPS.]

[IRENE'S DAD IS HEARD TALKING ON THE PHONE IN ANOTHER ROOM. ON THE MIC, IRENE IS HEARD QUIETLY CRYING. THERE ARE FOOTSTEPS OUT IN THE HALL. THE DOOR OPENS.]

DETECTIVE

[DISTANT] Ms. Gray, could I please speak to you?

[A PAUSE AS IRENE SOBS.]

IRENE

[QUIET, SHAKILY] Please pick up.

[PHONE BEEP.]

AUTOMATED VOICE

Today's quote is: “Foul smell of the things that we do to escape There is no glamour in this. No rock and roll. This is just endings. This is just grief.”

Kate Tempest in Hold Your Own, 2014.

[OUTRO MUSIC AND CREDITS PLAY.]