#but then these children who love their wire mother so so much show up. half dead void devils. vile beings.

[feralthembo]

i actually like ballas as an antagonist. hes believable. hes just some guy some fuckin nepo baby. whatever the orokin equivalent of a tech ceo was. this guy was like space roman apple guy. i want to put him in a jar and study him like a bug.

[realiv0]

Olena Zelenska: "We do not give birth to children to hide them in the cellars of Russian missiles"

Scriptwriter, producer and first lady of Ukraine, the war caught her as much by surprise as the rest of the Ukrainians. After spending the first months away from her husband, Volodímir Zelenski, she has returned to kyiv, where she receives EL PAÍS in the Presidential Offices converted into a bunker.

Walking into the room next to Olena Zelenska's office is a constant reminder that these are not normal times for Ukraine. Behind a landscape of concrete blocks, anti-tank hedgehogs, barbed wire and three military checkpoints, you have to turn on the lamp on your mobile phone so as not to stumble through the rooms of the Presidential Offices, in the center of kyiv. The sandbags that cover the windows practically do not let in the light. The constant walks of armed uniformed men clearly show, in case there is any doubt, that we are in a country at war. Telephones are prohibited in the room and the recorder that will record the conversation has to pass the mandatory control of the military.

There was nothing to suspect that Zelenska (Krivii Rih, 44 years old) would one day represent her country as first lady. After studying Architecture, in 2003 she married Volodymyr Zelensky and started working as a scriptwriter at his television production company Kvartal 95. She never liked public exposure. She found out about the jump into politics from her husband. He simply told her that she forgot to mention it. In her first year in office she was heavily criticized for her lack of public presence. But the brutal Russian invasion has pushed her to narrate to the world the disasters of a war that began on February 24 and has no sign of ending.

Zelenska receives EL PAÍS in the first face-to-face interview that she grants to a medium in Spanish. After spending the first two months of the conflict in a secret location far from kyiv, she now seeks to gain prominence. In the conversation of almost an hour and a half, she remembers the worst moments, when it seemed that the Russian troops were about to take over the capital, and the high bill that she is paying both the country and her family. Her and her children, she says, have rarely seen Zelensky since Vladimir Putin decided to invade the country.

After a few courteous words in English, she answers in Ukrainian and smiles when she hears the questions in Spanish: “I love how it sounds because it surprises me every time. It's a pleasure to hear it."

In her life there have been two radical changes. The first, in 2019, when she became first lady. And the second, on February 24, when Russia invades Ukraine.

My life totally changed when my husband was elected president. No school teaches you to be a first lady. Unfortunately, one has to learn it on one's own. I have had to change many things, learn, especially how to communicate. In February, not only the life of the first lady, the mother and the wife changed, but also that of the entire Ukrainian people. We live in an eternal groundhog day. We just hope that day is over.

During the first two months of the war, he traveled with his two children to a place that he prefers not to detail and the president stayed in kyiv at the forefront of the country's defense. How were those days? Was she afraid she would never see her husband again or have to flee the Ukraine forever?

I did not choose to leave kyiv. Circumstances forced me. Yes, she was afraid of never seeing him again, but just like any Ukrainian woman who has had to separate from her husband because he had to defend the country. This war has made us live horrible moments. Like when the Russian Army was very close to kyiv. We were surrounded and there was a high risk of them entering. I was afraid that I would never see my friends and loved ones again. We live with that continuous hope of overcoming everything and defeating the war. But the fear does not go away, it persists. This same night the anti-aircraft alarms have sounded again. You can always wake up in the middle of the night and think: "Now it could be you", as has happened in the Russian attacks on cities like Kremenchuk, Odessa or Mikolaiv

What memory do you have recorded of those days?

Sometimes I would wake up in the morning and think, "What a nightmare I had tonight." But then I realized that it was not a nightmare, but reality. It's our life. We do not give birth to our children to have to hide them in cellars from Russian missiles. We want them to live. Assuming that reality, understanding that we have to live in spite of everything, makes us even more desperate. But we have to do something. Not doing so would be much worse.

How has it affected family life, you and your children, ages 17 and 9?

Much. We are still separated, because my husband lives where he works and we see very little of each other. My children want to see his father, hug him. Yesterday, my son asked me when that war will end so we can have dinner or sleep together. To watch a movie or read a book. We have to get over it so it doesn't affect his mental health. My daughter is a teenager in a difficult period. She is going to enter the university, but she cannot see her friends or move around the city for security. She doesn't know if she will be able to go to study. Of course it affects them being separated from her friends, not being able to play. In their mobile games, in Minecraft, they have the built-in anti-aircraft alarm. I hope we get through this and give them back their life and their childhood.

When you married Zelensky, he was a fairly well-known actor and it never crossed your mind that he might go into politics. What expectations did you have then of the family you were going to form?

Of course, I did not marry the future president, or even a TV star. I expected nothing more than to find a friend, a companion, a husband for life and the father of my children. He has fulfilled all my expectations: to be the best father for my children. He is the person who has never failed me, I have never doubted him.

Zelensky entered politics as an outsider. Before the war his popularity was on the decline, but since February he has become an international icon of the resistance. With such high expectations, are you afraid of letting them down?

I don't think my husband is an outsider or that he ever has been. Simply, he has gone through different stages. At first he was very popular, then he went down a bit and now he is perhaps the most popular Ukrainian president in history. But his goal is not to be popular at this price or to be on the front pages of world newspapers. They ask for many interviews, yes, but the weapons are not given to them. And that's what he fights for. He is a man who is determined to win. And if he wins, he will win the whole country. And we will do.

In the days before February 24, when the United States warned that the Russian invasion was imminent, Zelensky tried to lower the alarm. He said that the Ukrainians could peacefully spend this summer on the beaches. From his house, as a family, what perception of real danger did you have those days?

We felt quite a bit of tension months before the war. Every Ukrainian sensed it in one way or another. But no one, not even myself, could imagine that something of such cruelty could happen in the 21st century, of such illogical destruction without any pretext. It is normal for the president of a country to try to reassure his people in a dangerous situation. I don't usually comment on my husband's political messages. But I can tell you that February 24 was a horrible test for us. Something so terrible that we don't even remember what happened before.

How and when do you think this war can end?

We all know how it will end. But we don't know when.

And how will it end?

Of course, only Ukraine's victory is possible.

We have seen indiscriminate Russian attacks on civilians, such as the one on the Kremenchuk shopping mall, in which dozens of people were killed just going to do their shopping on a Monday afternoon. What explanation do you find for these acts?

This is not a war with a political argument. All these statements about the Nazis in the Ukraine make no sense. They want to exterminate us as a people, they want to fight against what we are, against our way of being, resisting and loving freedom. They would prefer us to be their subjects. We want a future in which we can exercise that right to exist and to be free. It is pure terror that they want to spread so that no one can ever feel safe. With that fear, they don't want us to raise our heads. But they get the opposite. We are uniting and, despite everything, we are resisting and fighting for our lives.

As first lady, she has been the subject of much criticism. How have you coped?

At first it was quite painful because there were a lot of nasty comments. It took me time to understand that I can't react when someone criticizes my behavior, my appearance or my style. It wouldn't let me move on. I do not use social networks for my personal communication, only to communicate my activity. There will always be criticism. You have to use them constructively, to improve and overcome mistakes. But to tell you the truth, it hurts me more when my husband is criticized.

The recent NATO summit in Madrid discussed the role of the wives and husbands of country leaders in the 21st century. Which do you think it should be?

It is a very important role. Last year I organized in Ukraine the first summit of first ladies and first gentlemen to be united and come out of the shadow. I don't feel comfortable as decoration for the president. Being first lady means carrying out many activities in the social field, and we can do them together. When the war started, they all supported me a lot. Brigitte Macron [wife of the French president] has targeted children with cancer to offer treatment in France. Agata Duda [Polish First Lady] also supports our refugees by creating spaces where they can read books in Ukrainian or study Ukrainian history. I also asked them for support in organizing camps for children in the summer. We must change our role, the so-called soft power, to improve humanity.

How can you contribute to the struggle in your country?

Before the war, it promoted development projects. Now it's about saving and helping; and do it quickly. We have projects like the Convoy of Life, which served to evacuate 550 children suffering from cancer at the beginning of the war. They were first transferred to Poland and from there to other countries. With Books for Children, 100,000 books have been distributed in countries with Ukrainian refugees who could only take out a small suitcase with the essentials. And we pushed for a very important long-term national mental health program. 60% of Ukrainians feel psychological stress as a result of the war.

Traveling through Ukraine, the enormous suffering that the war is leaving is impressive. Almost anyone tells harsh stories of family breakdown, deaths, separations. When peace comes, what measures will have to be taken to heal these psychological wounds?

All this will leave many traces. The great project that I mentioned will analyze the specialists we have, the ones we are going to need and how we are going to train them. I am collaborating with the first ladies of the United States and Israel, who have experience in the post-traumatic treatment of families who have suffered wars. We have already promoted an online course with Israel for 100 psychologists and another 25 will receive training there to later train others in Ukraine. We need financial help for this project. Some will overcome the traumas and others will suffer consequences for a long time. It will be difficult to promote the program, because we are in the middle of a war, but we have to start now.

The EU has just accepted Ukraine as a candidate country for accession. What are the most urgent social reforms that Ukraine must undertake?

I am not a politician. In my position I do not have an opinion on certain things. My work focuses on the social sphere, outside the Government. But Ukraine has already been moving closer to the European Union for some time. We have been at the gates for quite some time. And in this we are different from Russia, where a few years ago family violence was decriminalized. Russia is totally outside the civilized world. In Ukraine, the human being is at the center of social policies. I am fighting to promote gender equality programs, against family violence, women's rights. All of that is in process.

There are young LGBTI Ukrainians fighting this war against a homophobic regime like Putin's. But in this country there is neither homosexual marriage nor civil unions and aggressions against members of the collective increase. What measures are necessary to advance their rights?

In Ukraine there is a lot of tolerance and freedom of expression, a much higher level than in our neighboring countries. But perhaps the political changes will come when society is more prepared to accept them. We are in the process of development, and all those human rights are also developing.

The war has also impacted the linguistic debate. Many Russian-speaking Ukrainians have reacted to Putin's bombshells by switching to Ukrainian. You and her husband come from a majority Russian-speaking city. But some people warn of the cultural loss caused by the gradual abandonment of Russian. To which model should Ukraine go?

In the city where we were educated, Russian was spoken, but in the surrounding villages, Ukrainian was used. I finished school in Russian, but when I entered the university in 1995 I already took classes in Ukrainian. We are not experiencing an abrupt transformation, because we have been an independent country since 1991. It has been more than 30 years of transformation. A country, a State, has its coat of arms and also its language. And here is the Ukrainian. You can speak any language in the family, but all Ukrainians understand and can speak Ukrainian. Now some do it as a form of protest. As always, Russia has achieved the opposite result to what it was looking for: trying to Russify us, it has Ukrainized us. Sometimes people say that change is very difficult for older people. But my mother, who is 70 years old and has always spoken Russian, is beginning to use Ukrainian at home.

Is the objective then to walk towards a monolingual country?

In a state like Ukraine there is one language, which is Ukrainian. All other languages ​​have the right to be used. It's your choice. There are also millions of Ukrainians living in Russia, and there has never been a Ukrainian school there. When a Russian school in the Ukraine switched to Ukrainian, in Russia they protested saying it was discrimination. But if you fight for something, you have to be symmetrical. A Russian is worth as much in the Ukraine as a Ukrainian is in Russia.

The international community has reacted to the war by opening its doors to refugees and with economic aid. But in Ukraine they complain about the slowness in the arrival of weapons.

I'm not going to ask for weapons, it's not my battlefield [laughs]. We look forward to that help and assistance, and we appreciate all that we receive. We like to know that the world sees that our fight is fair. I want to thank all the accompaniment of these horrible months. No war belongs to others. It could happend to you.

(Everything google translated)

Here are the pictures:

Source: https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Felpais.com%2Feps%2F2022-07-16%2Folena-zelenska-no-parimos-hijos-para-esconderlos-en-los-sotanos-de-los-misiles-rusos.html

[tenthgrove]

500 Followers Celebration!!!: Part 1 (La Squadra Backstories)

Hey! Thank you so much for 500 amazing followers! Every single one of you mean so much to me!

Part 1 of this celebration is, as the title suggests, my headcanon backstory for each of La Squadra. As some of you know I was at some point in the process of writing a full multi-chapter fic on this, but since that unfortunately never came to fruition beyond the first couple chapters, here is a shortened version of the stories that were originally planned.

Part 2 is going to be a little something I wrote a while back but never felt brave enough to send to more than a few people. That will be seeing the light of day soon. ;)

Risotto

Risotto Dante Nero was born in a small, poor farming village in Sicily, somewhere in the vicinity of Catania. His parents were a young, dysfunctional couple who weren't ready for a kid in the first place. Seeing their newborn son had 'evil' eyes was the last nail in the coffin for them, and they gave the baby up to his paternal grandmother when he was only days old.

Despite being shunned by his family over the aesthetic defect, Risotto was able to form a close bond with his older cousin, Domenico, who would eventually move in with him and his grandmother after being disowned by the family himself. Domenico helped Risotto find friends, and was the main reason why the next few years were the happiest in the young boys life.

Unfortunately, Domenico was struck and killed at age just 19 by a drunk driver, a millionaire from Milan who on top of his intoxication, was driving incredibly fast. Risotto never recovered from the grief; his personality was altered drastically and he eventually dropped out of school. His grandmother indulged him in his revenge fantasies, believing that he would never seriously carry them out. This proved the biggest mistake of her life.

At age 18 Risotto left home to hunt down Domenico's killer. Despite the years of preparation he was in way over his head and was eventually forced to make a deal with Passione for the resources he would need to break into the mansion and not get caught. But the newly initiated mafioso found that revenge did nothing for his grief. Now, he simply had nothing to work for.

Risotto fell into a deep depression for the next two years, doing his duties as a low-ranking soldato for Passione but feeling utterly empty inside. It became so dire that after becoming injured in a fight with a stand user, he welcomed what looked to be his impending death.

But Risotto did not die that day, being saved by an associate of the gang and rushed to hospital. After hearing word that Risotto had defeated a stand user, Prosciutto became interested and approached Risotto for help with a hit he had been assigned to. Risotto agreed and Prosciutto developed a liking for the young man. A few months later, when Prosciutto was tasked with forming a specialised squad for assassination, he remembered Risotto and requested he become the team’s captain. Risotto was put through at once for receiving a stand, and was seated at the head of the brand new La Squadra di Esecuzione.

Prosciutto

Maiale Crepuscolo was born the daughter of a powerful Don in Naples, and his much neglected wife. Raised in luxury, he came to resent his callous father, especially when the man continued to behave adulterously despite his wife’s failing health. The death of Mrs Crepuscolo was a huge blow to her 16 year old son. It was around this time that Maiale discovered his male identity and chose a new name for himself: Prosciutto.

Mere months after the death of his wife, Don Crepuscolo married his pregnant mistress, a young woman by the name of Loreta. Despite the circumstances, Prosciutto and Loreta got on very well together, and the young man confided in her about his transgender identity, to be met with her full support. Any faith that Prosciutto may have had in his father before was immediately lost when Loreta was thrown out onto the streets by her new husband, along with their infant son Pesci. His sole reason for doing this was that he had become tired of her, and the baby's crying.

Without his father’s knowing, Prosciutto continued to wire Loreta and Pesci money through his hefty allowance, and counted down the days until he could graduate highschool and become eligible for his mother’s inheritance. The very day he gained access to it, he cut his father off for good.

The next few years of Prosciutto’s life were the best. He went to a prestigious university to study politics and afterwards found work as a journalist. With his father no longer an issue, he medically transitioned and upped the money he was giving to his half-brother and former step-mother. Everything was going perfectly.

At age 24, Prosciutto received a visit by members of Passione, who informed him they had annexed his father’s gang and killed him. As much as Prosciutto insisted they had been estranged for years, the men maintained that Prosciutto was still considered a threat, and could only be allowed to live if he joined the gang. Worse, they threatened him with Pesci’s life. Prosciutto knew he had no choice.

Over the next few years, Prosciutto worked his way up. By age 27 he was granted the privilege to develop a stand, and was quickly pushed into the assassination business as a result of its deadly power. At that time, Passione had no designated assassination team, and individuals ordered to carry out hits had to go running around for volunteers if they needed help on a mission. This is why Prosciutto had sought out Risotto.

When the order to form a hitman squad was given, Prosciutto was initially primed to become the captain. However, he was strongly against taking this role, as Loreta was starting to show signs of chronic illness and Prosciutto wanted to make sure he could still take care of Pesci if it became necessary. Tasked with finding an alternative, Prosciutto initially approached his old friends Sorbet and Gelato, who had been part of the squad sent to confront him after the death of his father and had kept in touch out of pity. The pair were cleared to join the team, but were not trusted by the team’s superiors to become captain. And so, Prosciutto turned once more to Risotto.

Sorbet and Gelato

Sorbet and Gelato could not have been born in more different circumstances, the former in absolute poverty, and the latter in comparative privilege.

Sorbet’s mother was by no means a bad woman. It was just the case that through her crippling addictions and mental illnesses, she was in no means equipped to care for her 6 children, forcing Sorbet, the eldest, to pick up the slack. Though he loved his siblings the young Sorbet resented this role and was easily tempted by a street gang at age 12, who offered him escape from his miserable life through drug peddling. Sorbet began to drift from his family more and more. He soon disappeared from school, and became completely estranged from his mother and siblings.

By age 17 Sorbet had developed a reputation in the gang for ruthlessness, and was approached by its leader to carry out a number of assassinations. He soon became the group’s designated hitman, and was paid generously for the role. He was still however, functionally homeless.

Gelato was born to an upper-middle class family in Minsk, Russia. The youngest of four boys, his parents had been hoping for a girl, and their resentment only grew when it became clear the young Gelato was both autistic and ADHD. He suffered from extreme emotional neglect.

When Gelato was 13, the family moved back to Italy where his mother was from. Though he preferred it here, the problems with his family continued and Gelato was eventually kicked out at just 17 years old.

Following the word of a friend, Gelato made his way to Naples and found work running an illegal bar for a street gang in exchange for a room to sleep in. The same gang, incidentally, that Sorbet was working for. The two first exchanged words when Gelato found Sorbet beating up a patron who had been abusive to him, and decided to join in. Within weeks, they were lovers.

One night, while Sorbet and Gelato were asleep upstairs, the police raided the bar. In a panic, Gelato shot two, and Sorbet took out a third. The fourth got away. Knowing they would be hunted, the pair begged refuge from their gang but were denied. They were not a powerful enough syndicate to deal with something of this size. And so, with only each other, Sorbet and Gelato fled Italy.

They were on the run for two years, passing through just about every country in Europe at least once. As a means of surviving, they took on assassination contracts from local gangs and became very skilled, but of course this only turned up the heat to catch them. Eventually, it got too much, and in a final desperate bid to avoid capture, the pair went back to Italy to plead their gang to reconsider.

What they found now in charge of Naples was not their gang, but Passione. A capo by the name of Pericolo listened to their story, and agreed eagerly to dissuade the police from pursuing them in exchange for their loyalty to the new gang. Sorbet and Gelato agreed at once, and developed stands soon after.

Formaggio

A Naples Boy through and through, Formaggio was born in the central city to a large, loving family. Owing to their poverty, all the aunts, grandparents and cousins lived in one house. Although many were part of the mafia, it was always stressed to the children they were under no obligation to choose such a life. Nonetheless, many of them still did.

One night, Formaggio’s eldest brother Miguel sneaked off from the house, telling nobody but Formaggio. His goal was to seek initiation into Passione. The young Formaggio pleaded to come as well, but was told he was not ready yet. Miguel returned a couple of hours later, carrying a metal arrowhead. He told his brother that something unexpected had happened, and he needed to go now, but it was vital Formaggio told nobody of this meeting. He promised it would all be worth it in the end.

Years passed, and Miguel did not return. Then one day- a hastily-written letter, addressed solely to Formaggio. In his final message, Miguel apologised for the absence and announced that he did not expect to survive the next few hours. However, if Formaggio wanted the answers to all that had transpired, all he needed to do was recover the arrowhead that he had last seen Miguel with all those years ago. Most likely, it would have been returned to where he found it, address enclosed. Saddened and eager to understand what had happened to his brother, Formaggio followed the instructions and broke into a heavily guarded warehouse. He found the arrow, just as Miguel had said, but failed to understand how this could solve his problems.

Formaggio looked for a way out of the warehouse, and was suddenly set upon by the guards. He ran for the exit and tripped, impaling himself on the arrow. Little Feet came forth at once, stunning the guards. Not wanting to deal with whatever that was, they called in Risotto and his newly built execution squad, based nearby, to deal with it.

Fortunately, the assassins’ skills were not needed. In spite of the circumstances Formaggio met the assassins with charm and cooperation. Risotto phoned his superiors to see if killing the man was really necessary, and they agreed it wasn’t, provided Formaggio became Risotto’s business. An agreement was reached, and Formaggio was inducted into the hitman squad. It would take two more members for Formaggio to piece together what had happened to his brother.

Ghiaccio

Ghiaccio was dealt an awful hand in life. Poor, and with parents that hated him, he had little respite as a child. He was autistic, but never diagnosed, and had visual impairments that were never addressed. His fondest memory was of a bizarre couple he met as a child, a dark-haired, dour man and his blond lover, who kept him company after his mother walked away from him in anger at a shopping mall. She came back, unfortunately.

When Ghiaccio was 15, a frantic knock sounded at his door while his parents were out. Answering it nervously, an equally frantic man stood on the other side brandishing an arrow-head. He introduced himself exhaustedly as Miguel and begged for shelter- he was being chased.

Before Ghiaccio could answer a squad of men burst onto the porch and attacked Miguel, dragging him out of view. Ghiaccio was thrown to the ground and told in no uncertain terms to speak of none of this to anyone. It wasn’t until later he realised the arrow had accidentally slashed him.

At that time, Ghiaccio’s soul was not fit to manifest a stand, but it was close. And so, Ghiaccio began to suffer the slow, agonising fate that some in his position fall victim to, his half-manifested stand slowly sucking the life from him. His parents didn’t even have the heart to call a doctor.

Two months into this agony, Ghiaccio heard something outside his room. His parents. They were talking about what to do if he died. He’d had enough. He snapped.

And so, Ghiaccio’s soul reached the point where it was strong enough to bare a stand fully, after having already partially manifested one. This unheard of situation created a stand with no physical form, but unspeakable power. A surge of ice broke out around the house without Ghiaccio even meaning it to, killing his parents at once. His sickness gone, Ghiaccio got up from the bed. What the hell had just happened?

Convinced he had lost his mind, Ghiaccio fled, but left a trail of unexplainable events behind him. Realising they were dealing with an unaccounted stand user, Passione had Ghiaccio hunted down and propositioned to join them. Terrified and with no other idea of what to do, he agreed. With a stand like this, there were only 2 options: La Squadra and La Unita. La Unita had no interest in an impulsive teenager, so Ghiaccio was sent at once to La Squadra.

The group was reluctant to house a teenage boy as an assassin, but took him in nonetheless. Formaggio was grateful for the crumbs of information Ghiaccio could give about the fate of his brother. Sorbet and Gelato couldn’t shake the feeling they’d seen the boy before somewhere.

Illuso

He was an only child. There was nothing particularly wrong with his relationship with his parents, but nothing particularly right either. There just… wasn’t a connection. They were a middle class family, well to do but nothing special. An arrogant boy, Illuso struggled to make friends, though he did become somewhat close with a boy in the year below him named Formaggio, for a short time.

When Illuso was 15, his parents came to him with a proposition. A distant relative of theirs was in possession of a large castle, but could not pay for its upkeep any more. The man had asked if Illuso would be interested in becoming a live-in caretaker, to be paid less than industry standards but still a lot by the standards of a 15 year old boy. Illuso agreed at once, and moved out of his parents home in a matter of days.

At the castle, his loneliness only grew. The place was closed to visitors and had no inhabitants apart from his new employer, who even then only lived in the castle 4 days a week. Illuso thought he was okay with this life, but the effect on his psyche was indisputable.

Then one day, the castle had a break-in. Illuso was accosted by a young man named Miguel, who had been squatting in the cellar for days and believed the castle was abandoned. The pair came to an understanding, and Miguel proposed that in exchange for his silence, he would give Illuso something amazing. He pricked him with the arrow.

Thrilled with his new power, Illuso agreed to keep Miguel’s existence a secret and the pair co-existed for many years. Illuso learned that Miguel had stolen the arrow from a gang named Passione, after discovering its power and making the decision to take it on impulse. Passione is still hunting him, hence the need to hide.

But eventually, they found him nonetheless. Illuso and Miguel tried their best to fight but it was an uneven battle. Miguel fled with the arrow, chased by one half of the attacking squad, leaving Illuso to deal with the other half.

But against all odds, Illuso survived, using his stand to eliminate the attackers one by one. Eventually the last attackers gave in and fled, The next people sent to confront Illuso came with a deal: join Passione, and all will be forgiven.

Despite his stand’s power, Illuso’s superiors disliked his attitude. After a few months of being thrown between teams, he was saddled with La Squadra.

Melone

The middle of three children, Melone was born to an upper-working class family in Florence. His parents were eccentric-academic sorts, who encouraged Melone and his sisters to act without regard for social convention. Though intelligent, Melone was never quite top of the class due to his inability to stay on task. Still, he got into a decent university and had plans to become a gynaecologist.

In his second year, Melone was approached by a poor couple seeking antenatal care for their pregnancy. As they explained, they were in a gang and could not go into public care for fear of their identities as criminals being discovered. They pleaded Melone for whatever rudimentary checks he could provide, just so they could have some assurance their baby was okay. Melone agreed, and met with the couple several times.

Over the course of the next year, Melone gave similar services to a couple more women who were recommended to go to him by the first patient. It was only a matter of time before the university discovered what he was doing, especially once he started stealing equipment to improve the quality of his examinations. Melone was expelled and referred to the police, but one of his patients got Passione to bribe away his charges. Unfortunately, this put him in their debt. Melone told his family he was simply going away for a while.

Melone languished around in Passione for a while. Though he did receive a stand, its lethal capabilities weren’t immediately clear, and so he remained in the lower ranks. His main respite was the bar scene, in which he got to mingle with many of Passione’s members from different squads. It was through here that he met Illuso, Formaggio and Ghiaccio of the execution team, and formed a friendship. Through them he even formed links with the group’s leader, Risotto.

The team were eager to help Melone advance to a better position, and aided him in exploring his stand. Eventually, he discovered how lethal baby face could truly be, outshining everyone’s expectations. Risotto was pleased to welcome him into the team.

Pesci

By the time Pesci was 13, it was clear his mother’s illness was terminal. Initially reluctant to involve him around the team, Prosciutto increasingly allowed Pesci to stay with them while his mother was at the hospital, since there was nowhere else for the young boy to go. As much as everyone tried to comfort him, he was terrified.

Two years later, it was clear Loreta was in her final weeks. Pesci dedicated as much time as he could to being with her, sleeping at her bedside more often than not. It was here that he first felt the strange occurrences begin. It would be subtle at first, the peculiar feeling of his mother’s heartbeat in his hands as he drifted off to sleep. It was comforting, then. It assured him his mother was still alive. Then, it got weirder, a long string extending from his fingers and into his mother’s chest. He thought he was just sleep deprived.

When the fateful day came and Loreta’s heart monitor stopped, Pesci felt a surge of panic. Desperate to find some proof this wasn’t really happening, his stand burst forth from his body and shot its hook into Loreta’s chest. Unfortunately, it was all for nothing. Loreta was dead.

As Pesci held the rod in his hands he realised this was far too real to be a hallucination. He could sense everything, the fading metabolism of his mother’s body and the vibrations in the floor. As the nurses confirmed the death, they could not see it. Why couldn’t they see it?

Prosciutto came into the room. With one look, Pesci knew that his brother could see the rod as well. He panicked and ran.

Prosciutto tried desperately over the next couple days to get in touch with Pesci. He knew exactly what had happened- clearly the boy had summoned a stand from the anguish of his mother’s death and had freaked out in confusion. That’s all completely understandable, but if Pesci isn’t informed of what his new power means soon, he could get himself into serious trouble. Especially if Passione found out.

And so, Prosciutto set off with Risotto to hunt Pesci down, eventually finding him at a run down park near his childhood home. Prosciutto comforted him and explained he knew what was happening, but if everything was going to be okay, he had to go with them.

[fruitcoops]

Would love to see a wired autocomplete interview with coops! 🥰

Anon, did you read my mind? These two have such chaotic energy when they’re given an outlet and it was a true pleasure to write it. Dorcas is exhausted. Sweater Weather credit goes to @lumosinlove!

“Wait, I want to pull the tab,” Remus said, tugging on the edge of the cardboard lightly as Sirius tried to hold it out of his reach without falling off his chair.

“I get to read it out loud for you and then we switch!” Sirius protested, smacking him gently on the head with it. The resulting bonk noise made them both break down laughing.

“You guys know we’re rolling, right?” Dorcas asked as she gathered a stack of cards in her lap, looking highly amused.

“Really?”

“Yeah.” She turned to the camera with a bright smile. “Welcome back to Lion Pride, hockey fans! I’m Dorcas Meadowes and I’m here today with Sirius Black and Remus Lupin to answer some of the internet’s most pressing questions. How are you two feeling?”

“Terrified,” Sirius said.

“The internet is like the Twilight Zone,” Remus agreed. “Who goes first?”

“Sirius, you’ve got a card already. Take it away.”

He cleared his throat and grabbed the edge of the first pull tab, ripping it off slowly. “That is so satisfying, woah. How tall is Remus Lupin?”

“I am five foot eleven and a half.”

“That half inch comes from your sneakers and you know it.”

“It does not!”

Sirius just smiled and removed the next paper slip. “What language does Remus Lupin speak?”

“I speak English and a little bit of French. Tried to learn Spanish in high school, but failed miserably.”

“I love the wording on this one,” Sirius said as he turned the board toward the camera. “Remus Lupin Green Bay Packers.”

“Dammit, now everyone knows my full name,” Remus sighed. “Uh, the Packers are cool.”

“I think people were wondering if you ever played on the team,” Dorcas said.

Remus raised an eyebrow. “Do I look like a football player to you?”

“Next question!” Sirius ripped the tab off and took a good section of the paper above with it. There was a beat of stunned silence. “I am…so sorry.”

Behind the camera, Marlene burst out laughing, along with most of the camera crew. “It’s fine, keep reading.”

“Okay, um…” Sirius squinted at the partially torn-off question. “Remus Lupin name meaning.”

Remus groaned. “I hate this question. Yes, it does mean Wolf Wolf. Yes, my dad’s name also means Wolf Wolf. Yes, my mother’s maiden name is Howell. I’m aware of the endless puns.”

“Don’t you mean a-were?” Sirius asked as a slow grin spread across his face. Remus grabbed the card and bonked him over the head with it.

“Remus, your turn.” Dorcas handed him a poster board and took the blank one.

“I’m going to be careful with this one, unlike somebody,” he teased, kissing Sirius on the cheek. “Is Sirius Black…related to Pascal Dumais?”

“In all the ways that matter, yes.”

Remus grinned when he read the next one. “Is Sirius Black missing a tooth?”

“No!” Sirius gave the camera an offended look. “I have all my teeth, thank you very much.”

“Is Sirius Black mean?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Reporters don’t like you very much.”

“The feeling is mutual. I love the fans though, most of them are so sweet.”

“Oh, I like this one. Is Sirius Black married?” Remus rested his chin on the top of the card and batted his eyelashes, making Sirius laugh.

“Almost! Ask me again in July.” Remus set the card on the floor and Dorcas passed Sirius a new one. “Does Remus Lupin wear glasses?”

“Nope.”

“Does Remus Lupin—I have never said your name so many times in one sitting, my god—does Remus Lupin have siblings?”

“Yup.”

“Does Remus Lupin—”

“Can you elaborate?” Dorcas asked with a laugh. “How many siblings? Names? Ages?”

Remus turned to the camera. “I have one brother named Julian and he’s ten years old. He likes piggyback rides, ice cream, and hockey.”

“Much better. Take it away, Cap.”

“Does Remus Lupin have allergies?”

Remus frowned in confusion. “Why do people want to know that? Uh, yeah, I’m allergic to some pollens. Spring is hell.”

“How many of these do we have?” Sirius asked as he tossed the board over his shoulder and crossed his legs.

“Quite a few! Loops, you’re up.”

“Where is Sirius Black from?”

“Canada.”

“Where does Sirius Black live?”

“The Lions ice rink. I set up a tent in the middle of the goal posts every night so that I’m never late to practice.”

“Sirius Black gay.”

Sirius paused. “I think we’re missing a couple words in there.”

“That’s literally all it says,” Remus laughed, moving it to show him. “Sirius Black gay. I don’t know, honey, Sirius Black gay?”

“Sirius Black very gay,” he confirmed. “Sirius Black thinks people need to have better grammar.”

“Is Sirius Black’s hair naturally curly?”

“No, I use a curling iron every morning to do each individual curl,” he said. “It takes me seven hours and thirteen minutes, and I use a full can of hairspray.”

Remus scooted over so Dorcas could hand him a new card. “He keeps a stopwatch and tries to beat his personal record every time.”

Sirius pulled the first tab away and immediately started laughing too hard to speak.

“What does it say? You can’t just leave me hanging!” Sirius turned the board around and Remus leaned down to read it. “Is Remus Lupin hockey? Yes. I am the entire sport of hockey condensed into one being. I’m coming for basketball next. Thanks for asking!”

It took a few seconds for Sirius to get his breath back. “What is Remus Lupin—”

“I thought we just answered that.”

“—what is Remus Lupin zodiac sign?”

Remus paused. “Is that the thing Pots was talking about the other day? With the quiz?”

“That was love languages.”

“Your zodiac sign depends on your birthday,” Marlene called. “When were you born?”

“March 10th.”

“You’re a Pisces.”

“I’m a Pisces!” he said brightly to the camera. “No idea what that means, but it sounds cool.”

“It means you’re two fish.” She laughed as Remus sucked his cheeks in for a fish face. “Very nice.”

“Thank you.”

Sirius was especially careful as he pulled the paper slip off the next question. “What is Remus Lupin first job?”

“The grammar of these questions is killing me. Um, I worked in the university bookstore during college.”

“On the list of ‘things that don’t surprise anyone’,” Dorcas joked.

“Did Remus Lupin go to college?”

Remus gave the camera a look. “First of all, I have a medical degree. Second of all, did people completely forget about the whole ‘about to be drafted right out of college’ thing? It was a grand total of four years ago! Google it!”

“That’s what they did,” Sirius pointed out, gesturing to the board.

“True.”

“Last one for this card: how old is Remus Lupin?”

Remus thought for a moment. “Y’know, I kind of lost track after the first few centuries. My turn…what is Sirius Black real name?”

Sirius glanced at the camera. “It’s Sirius Black? Is this a trick question?”

“There are people out there who think that’s a fake name,” Dorcas said.

“Um, okay. Yeah, my real name is Sirius Black, my brother is Regulus, my dad is Orion, and I have cousins named Andromeda and Bellatrix.”

“What’s your uncle’s name again?” Remus asked.

“Which one? Cygnus? Phineas Nigellus? Arcturus?” At Dorcas’ surprised look, he laughed. “Oh, I could go all day long with this. That’s the tea on old French families with weird-ass naming traditions.”

“This next one is similar: Sirius Black middle name?”

“Orion.”

“Fun fact: the first time I saw your full name, Moody had written it and I thought it said ‘onion’.” Remus laughed as Sirius’ jaw fell open. “Those three seconds were a highlight of my life. Alright, what’s next…what color are Sirius Black’s eyes?”

“Blue.”

Remus shook his head. “They’re gray, almost silver.”

“Basically blue.”

“There’s nothing basic about you, babe.” Remus slid the board onto the floor and passed Sirius a new one. “Hit me with your best shot.”

“Is Remus Lupin Canadian?”

“I wish.”

“Is Remus Lupin left-handed?”

“No, but a lot of people seem to think that I am.”

“Is—” Sirius cut off with a snort. “Is Remus Lupin scrappy?”

“Are you fucking with me?” Remus asked, leaning over. “Is that actually what it says?”

“Yep.”

“Scrappy? Really?” He shook his head, lost for words. “I mean, I guess. Nobody’s ever called me scrappy before.”

“I don’t like this last one. How much is Remus Lupin worth?” Sirius wrapped an arm around his shoulders and kissed his temple. “You’re priceless.”

“I’m worth at least half a PB & J, but only if you use the good peanut butter. If you use the shitty Skippy stuff, hand over the whole sandwich. My turn! Does Sirius Black have piercings?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know.”

“Does Sirius Black have an Instagram?”

“I do. Sblack12, if you want to see pictures of my friends’ kids and this cutie.”

“Is Sirius Black Australian?”

“Fuck off. I’m French Canadian, how the hell did anyone think I was Australian?”

“Sirius Black birthday.”

“I have one.”

“What is it?” Marlene asked. “I’ll tell you your zodiac sign.”

Sirius rolled his eyes. “November 3rd.”

“Scorpio bitch.”

“Hey!”

“On the bright side, Scorpios and Pisces are super compatible.”

“What a relief, I was really banking on our astrology compatibility,” Remus said drily.

Dorcas handed Sirius a fresh board. “First up: can Remus Lupin sing?”

“Eh.”

“The correct answer is yes. What is Remus Lupin like in real life?”

“I’m horrible. I kick every puppy I see and carry one of those sticky hands from arcades to steal candy from children.” A smile twitched at the edges of his mouth and Sirius’ cheeks turned pink from suppressing his laughter. “Like Spiderman, but evil.”

“What happened to Remus Lupin after college?”

“What didn’t happen to Remus Lupin after college?” he laughed, leaning back in his seat. “These past couple years have been bonkers fucking yonkers. I became a PT, got a secret boyfriend, and now I’m engaged and an NHL player. There were, like, three seasons of character development squished into eighteen months.”

“Alright, last one. Why Remus Lupin kissed Sirius Black?”

“Because he’s hot and nice. Also, because he’s my fiancé.”

“Is that the criteria for kisses?” Sirius asked. “I just have to be hot and nice?”

“Pretty much. You’ve got both boxes permanently checked.”

“Final card,” Dorcas warned as she handed it to him. “Make it count.”

Remus cleared his throat. “How does Sirius Black work out?”

“I rollerskate and hula hoop for six hours a day simultaneously.”

“How old is Sirius Black?”

“Ageless.”

“How did Sirius Black meet Remus Lupin?”

“Fun story, actually. You know the movie Ocean’s Eleven?”

“Are Sirius Black and James Potter—”

“Dating.”

“—still friends.”

“Damn, I thought I had that one.” He did a double take. “Still friends? What happened? I saw him an hour ago, tops.”

“You might have to google it,” Remus suggested as he slid the board across the floor. “That’s it!”

“Way to go, guys,” Dorcas laughed. “I know literally nothing new about you.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Sirius said as the two high-fived. “We were completely honest the whole time.”

She faced the camera with a poorly-hidden smile. “Thanks for joining us today, Lions, and remember to like and subscribe for more content!”

[scathecraw]

BBRae Week 2021 - Day 3: Into The Woods

“Summer camp has been so much fun, Rachel. Teether hasn’t cried once since the day after you dropped us off, and Tommy got first place in the obstacle course. You were right, we should have done a camp last year, too.” Melvin chattered excitedly on the office phone while Rachel listened patiently. “They’ve made a bunch of arts and crafts, and the woods here are so cool. They’re really old, and Gar knows so muchabout all the trees and animals and bugs.”

“And who is this Gar, Melvin? A new friendof yours?” Rachel’s emphasis was obvious, and Melvin’s blush was practically audible.

“NO! He’s a counselor. He’s really nice, but he’s really old. Like, 50 or something. You’ll meet him on parent’s day next week.”

Rachel didn’t remember anyone older than the director, a middle aged woman she had spoken to when getting them enrolled and again during drop-off. She suspected Melvin was fibbing to cover her embarrassment, but she brought it on herself by teasing the preteen. “I’m sure I will. Does this mean that you’re going to drag me out into the forest when I come? I thought it was going to be an afternoon of arts and crafts and then some campfire songs, not a forced march.”

“Duh. Arts and crafts are lame. Gar said that next year he’d show us how to whittle, which sounds better than making lanyards.” There was muffled adolescent shouting, and Melvin covered the receiver and yelled back. “I gotta go. We’re going swimming. I’ll call you on Friday. Love you, bye.” She hung up before anything could be said back, and Rachel was left with dead air while Melvin sprinted after her friends, untied shoelaces flailing behind her.

Arriving at the aforementioned “Parent’s Day”, Rachel wasn’t quite sure what to expect. The camp had at first seemed like a good way to get the three adopted children outside instead of rotting their brains, but the sheer noise of a few dozen milling, clamoring kids and groups of socializing parents made her wonder what she had subjected them, and by extension, herself, to. She was late, which probably didn’t help the situation, but she looked around the chaos in an effort to find her own three chaos engines. Instead, she was spotted.

A wild, dirty missile made a high-volume impact with her legs, nearly toppling her and babblingso fast that even Rachel’s practiced ear couldn’t discern what he was saying. She was wobbling and about to fall over when a firm hand caught her upper back and helped her regain her balance. “Teether, dude! I said you could go get her, not try to body slam her.”

Rachel finally planted her feet, acknowledged Teether with a gentle hand on his head, and looked up. And up. They both froze for an instant, but the tanned, blond man recovered first. His slack jaw snapped into a smile, and he said “Hi. You must be Rachel. I’m Gar, one of the counselors here.”

His hand was still on her back and heat radiated from it like afternoon sun. Her face had never fallen into the silly expression his had, but unconscious thought raced before she could regain her composure. ‘Definitely not fifty,’ she thought. “Hello. Yes, I’m Rachel, Teether’s mother.” She peeled Teether from her leg with practiced ease, and he sprang off of her and ran.

Gar realized that his hand still rested behind her, almost possessively, and retreated to a more respectable distance. He chuckled, nervously. “Heh. Um, Melvin and Tommy are with their friends, still, but we should probably get them. Ms. Waller asked me to show you around – she said you had just moved to the area?” It wasn’t a question, but he phrased it like it was. They began walking back towards the milling crowd of parents, children, and quite possibly enough noise to drown out a jet engine.

“Yes, it’s our first summer here. She mentioned that most of the kids made this an annual activity, but I didn’t think we’d be so strange as to warrant a personal detail.”

“Oh it’s nothing like that, it’s just that there’s not really many other summer camps around, and ‘cause we go from K-12, we get pretty much everyone. A lot of the other parents already know everybody. You’re not strange, just… new.” His eyes never left her, even as they began walking.

Back with the crowds, Melvin and a gaggle of similarly aged girls watch the two of them. One of them nodded decisively and turned to Melvin. “Okay. They’re too cute together. Look at how awkward they’re being.”

Anotherhuffed a little. “They’re just staring at each other. They should be holding hands or something, right?”

Melvin’s eyes narrowed critically. “It’s been like 10 minutes and they aren’t kissing yet. Gar’s probably too much of a nerd to do anything. We need to do something to make sure they know how perfect for each other they are.”

“Like what? They aren’t going to start making out in the middle of the crowd.”

An evil smirk crept across Melvin’s face. “Maybe not in the middle of the crowd, but what if they were all alone in the woods? Then they’d have no excuse not to!”

A look of awe crossed her companions’ faces. “That’s evil. I love it.”

But the smirk fell, half-formed plot evaporating. “But how could we get them out there alone? It can’t be anything serious, or else Rachel will ground me forever, and I bet she won’t even go unless we can trick her into it.”

“Could you just tell her you feel sick?”

“No.” Melvin shook her head slowly. “Then she’d either stay with me or just take me home early.”

One, heretofore silent, chimed in. “I think I know what we can do. But Mel, you’re going to have to make a lanyard.” She giggled at the disgusted look, and said “C’mon, we only have like 15 minutes before they start wondering where we are.”

Across the crowd and a million miles away, Garfield and Rachel were, in fact, being tremendously awkward as they watched the kids run and play. Gar fumbled his words and couldn’t decide to stare at her eyes, the curve of her neck, or decidedly anywhere except her. Rachel was the opposite. She answered in short, monosyllabic whispers and swallowed, trying to ease her desperately dry throat.

“So, uh, you said you just moved here! Do you have a job, er, of course you do, unless you don’t! That’s fine, too! Nothing wrong with… that. Yeah.” He trailed off, before gamely trying again. “So what do you do when you’re not, y’know, coming to summer camps?”

Rachel took a deep breath and centered herself. Gar started. “I’m not, like, annoying you, am I? I’m sorry, I tend to blabber -”

“No. I’m just… a little off-kilter. I’m a curator of antiquities at the museum.”

“That is so cool. Gar’s eyes were like dinner plates. “I love the museum! I always wanted to volunteer there, but I never feel like I have time between summers here and planning classes during the year.”

“Oh, you’re a teacher? Grade school or high school?”

“High school and occasionally some classes at the community college. I figured I was already teaching AP and college bio isn’t much different. I’m sure the kids get tired of me after the sixth year, though, heh.” He rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly, uncomfortably warm even for a summer afternoon.

“I suppose they wouldn’t let you teach so many years if you weren’t good at the job. Not that biology is my area of expertise.” She clarified, hearing his unspoken question. “I studied history and preservation, so a natural history museum is certainly a big change.”

“Wow, I bet. Still, nobody does what they expected to when they were in college. I got a bachelor’s in Environmental Science, but it turns out most of those jobs are just telling corporations what they want to hear.”

Rachel leveled him with a newly assessing gaze. “Believe it or not, so are quite a few jobs in archaeology. It’s what put me off of the field.”

“But hey, teaching led me to Jump and to Lake Titan Camp, so I can’t complain.”

While the two nominal adults conversed, a far more intricate conversation was happening in the craft cabin. Kole, a pink haired co-conspirator of Melvin’s, was creating a half finished lanyard in pink and purple while the rest strategized. “Okay, so I need to throw her off so she’ll agree. The pink and purple color scheme is good – pink for me, purple for her, but I need something to knock her off her game.”

“You could tell her something that surprised her, maybe. But what?”

Realization dawned. “Okay. This is a little mean, maybe, but I was planning on talking to her about it anyway. I know just what to say. Kole, how’s the lanyard coming?”

“I’ve got it to the perfect length. Just long enough that you might ‘Need a little while to finish it, pretty please.’” She held up the dangling lengths of string. “Everything ready? We’re running out of time.”

“Now or never. Let’s go.” Melvin took a deep breath and led them to the doorway.

Garfield and Rachel were deep in conversation. The initial awkwardness had faded, and while there were still sparks flying whenever they made eye contact, it was more a static buzz than the almost painful live wire sensation of their first glances. At some point they had migrated closer to where Teether and Tommy’s two groups had merged into a supercrowd of children all making noise, forcing them to stand closer to one another to be heard. They were in this huddle, all focus on each other except for both of their frequent check-in glances to the children. Rachel had dipped her toe into a hint of vulnerability to test the waters, quietly and without fanfare explaining that she had adopted all three of them from the same orphanage she had found herself aging out of.

Gar reciprocated. “That’s really incredible. I was adopted pretty young by some family friends. I know how complicated that sort of relationship can be, but it’s doing something amazing for all three of them.”

Melvin, seeing their closeness, hesitated, just a bit. She was messing with fate, a little. But she was certain it was for a good cause. And it was now or never, they were already cutting it close to “Shared Activity Time” for her age group. “Umm. Rachel.”

“Yes, Melvin?” Rachel saw that Mel was nervous. Melvin was never nervous.

“I want to finish a project for you, but won’t have time later. So, uh, I need you to find something else to do. During the Activity Time, I mean. I just want to finish making this. Please, M-mom?”

Time stopped for Rachel. She had adopted them six years ago, and there had never been a time when Melvin had consciously called her “Mom”. Forms asking for “Mother’s Name”, sure. Mother’s day celebrations, absolutely. Even a few mostly-asleep, teary pleas, but never, never while Melvin was in control of her faculties.

But while time had stopped for Rachel, it marched onward for everyone else. Melvin held her breath and waited for long, tense seconds, but Rachel didn’t seem to be coming back to her senses, so she hurriedly spat out “Okayloveyouseeyousoon,” and fled back to the safety of her friends.

Gar, too, was frozen. Not to the same degree, nor for the same reasons, but he felt like he had intruded on something intimate that he had no business being a part of. He looked around, helplessly as Rachel gaped. After several seconds of silence, he couldn’t not do something. “Uhh. Rachel? You… okay?” More frozen immobility. He waved a hand in front of her face. “Rae? You there? Do I need to get a doctor?”

She seized his hand. “Did… did she just call me “Mom”? Or did I have a stroke?”

“Yeah, ouch. She did. I’m guessing this was new?”

“I… Yes. She’s never… What… what do I do? Was she angry I didn’t answer? Where did she go?” Rachel began looking around for her.

“Whoa, slow down. She’s with her friends. She wasn’t mad, it seemed like she was nervous, but not scared. And what you do is let her come to you and talk to her like you always do, and just make sure she knows you’re okay with it. As long as you are okay with it, right?”

“Of course. I just thought...” Rachel trailed off.

“Then there’s nothing to worry about! She loves you and just told you how she feels. That’s a good thing. Let’s give her a chance to do whatever she’s doing. The rest of the kids are about to go do an activity, so we have time.”

“I think I need to get away from the crowd for a minute. I can’t believe I’m asking this, but is it alright if we just go for a walk?”

“Of course.” Gar’s grip had at some point shifted to be holding her hand back, and he led her down a dirt path towards a grove of trees. “This path is quiet and not too hard.” Her sudden harsh look had him follow up. “You’re not really wearing the shoes for hiking, Rae.”

“Hmf. And since when did I say you could call me Rae, Garfield?”

He looked stricken. “I am so sorry. I dunno what I was thinking, Ra-chel. Rachel.”

She narrowed an eye. “Rae is… acceptable, as far as diminutives go. Just don’t make a habit of it in public.”

“Cross my heart. Hey, at least being a little mad at me put your mind off of Melvin, right?”

“And now it’s right back. So very helpful,” she deadpanned.

“Easy come, easy go, right?” His smile grew a little. “I don’t wanna pry or anything, but is it really that surprising? She said you were her mom like, a dozen times during camp.”

“I suppose not. It caught me very off-guard, though. Teether and Tommy sort of switch between Rachel and Mom, but Melvin’s never really seemed like she even wanted that sort of, I don’t know, ‘Official’ title for me.”

“Listen, the whole ‘mom’ thing isn’t as scary as you’re making it out to be. You’re already giving her the kind of love a mom is supposed to, and she loves you. She talks about all the time with stars in her eyes. Being adopted doesn’t make her less your daughter. Rita Farr isn’t any less my mom for taking me in when I was eight, and Marie Logan isn’t any more or less important to me just because she’s not around.”

Rachel took a breath and sighed it out. “Thank you. That does make it easier.” They walked in silence for a short time. “Wait, Rita Farr, as in the movie star? As in, the philanthropist and art collector, married to Steve Dayton?”

He blushed a little. “Whoops, probably shouldn’ta dropped that so casually, I guess. Yeah. Steve and Rita adopted me when my parents died. It’s not always easy, but I love ‘em.” He watched her reaction carefully, hoping she wouldn’t suddenly start treating him differently for having such well-known parents.

Rachel schooled her face after having that bombshell dropped on her. “Well, if we ever meet we’ll be able to talk about some historic pieces she has that I wrote papers on.”

A beat passed, then Gar’s loud laugh broke relative silence of the forest. “Aw man, she is gonna love you.”

And just like that, the tension was broken. All the concern, the lack of balance, everything fell away, and the static buzz of easy conversation punctuated by something just a little too close to intimate for an average friendship was back.

They wandered together down the shady paths, miles away and only a few trees distant from the campground. Rachel didn’t notice the distance she had walked on the formerly dreaded forest hike, and Garfield forgot to try quite so hard with his jokes and wise cracks. They walked, hand in hand and only somewhat realizing how close they were to one another, shoulders nearly touching.

The spell was eventually broken, as they always are. They rounded a final bend, seeing in the distance the campground they had left, what, less than an hour ago? And the reality that they had left behind when they entered the sun-shafted canopies woke them up, and they found that really, their hands were quite slick. Had they been clasped together the whole time? And Rachel, especially, was starting to sweat from the heat and the walk. Garfield was suddenly nervous, after all, he never talked this much, not without making a fool of himself.

But even after emerging from that hazy dream, they held on, gently rising out of the fog and into the real world so no sudden movements could disrupt the memory, the closeness that two almost strangers that fit together like complementary puzzle pieces had shared.

It wasn’t even fully dispelled when their hands slipped apart to be wiped on cargo shorts or dark jeans, though the almost hidden flight from behind a few low-branched trees of blonde hair and untied shoelaces and quiet giggle quickly sobered them.

Garfield turned. “Was that -?”

“Melvin. Oh, that little brat, she is too damn smart for her own good. I would put money on her scheming to get us alone.” Rachel fumed and her face tightened into a mask of cold anger. “I can’t believe that she would manipulate me like this! How could she – How could she finally call me -” and the mask broke, shifting from anger to near tears in seconds.

Gar panicked. “Whoa, hold on, no. She’s not that cruel, I know it and so do you. We’re probably missing something. You just said you can’t believe she would do this – she probably didn’t. Rae I promise you, there’s got to be an explanation that makes sense.”

Rachel took a deep breath, followed by another, centering herself. “I am going to get to the bottom of this. Where would she be doing this “project” she made up?”

“The craft cabin. I’ll take you there, but I guarantee you it’s not as bad as it might sound.”

It was like the crowd parted for them without even reacting. No one looked at the worried counselor or at the steely featured parent, but nonetheless they found their path almost unimpeded. Gar held up a hand just outside the door. “Let me get you two some privacy. Please.”

“Fine. Do it.” Terse and unhappy, Rachel’s displeasure was apparent in her voice, and it made Garfield wince.

He opened the door to see five preteen girls, huddled and tittering. At least until they saw him and his serious frown. Then their eyes went wide, and they looked to Melvin in a panic. “Out, girls. Clear the room. Not you, Melvin.” He stopped her when she tried to take shelter in the middle of the pack. He turned to follow them, and glanced back almost pityingly, then shook his head and exited.

The girls all ducked their heads when they saw Rachel just outside the cabin and hurried off, racing to be the first around the corner and away from the ticking time bomb.

Garfield simply nodded, and left her to it. Rachel entered the cabin and saw Melvin almost trembling, and it broke her heart. She had worked up a head of steam on the walk and the wait, but seeing her precious daughter actually afraid stopped any real anger and left only a bitter emptiness.

Rachel wasn’t quite sure what to do with her hands. She settled on a vague, open armed shrug gesture. “Why, Mel? Was it just a prank? Just a way to manipulate me?”

Tears brimmed in Melvin’s eyes. “No, I just wanted to give you guys a chance to talk alone. I’m sorry I lied, I really did try on the lanyard, but I’m just bad at them so I had Kole do it. I’m sorry, I am.”

“What? What lanyard? Melvin, I don’t care if you had a friend help with a lanyard! I just can’t believe that you would call me your mom, just to trick me into talking to someone. I can’t tell you how badly that hurts me. I… I love you too much for that.”

“What!No, nononono, Mom, I promise that wasn’t a trick. I promise. I was gonna talk to you about it, but I just – I thought that if I – I thought that maybe if I just did it you’d just let me and maybe you’d talk to him and then it everything would be perfect. I promise. I love you, Mom. I do. And I was just trying to maybe make you not spend all your time watching me and talk to him. He’s really cool, and I could tell you like him, and he’s completely in love with you, and you’re perfect for each other. I was just trying to help you be happy!” She sobbed, breathless.

Rachel froze, then instinctively wrapped her daughter in her arms and let her cry. “Mel, you don’t need to worry about me. I am happy, I promise. I don’t need you to try to trick me into being happy. Hey, it’s okay. I’m not going to say I’m not mad, but I get it. You don’t have to trick me into talking to, what did you call him, “really old, like 50 years old” guys? If we talk, we talk. That’s how adults work.”

“No, it’s not! I’ve never seen you go on a date, and you just ignore people when they try to talk to you. I know it was dumb, but I had to try something ‘cause otherwise you’d just give him that serious face until he ran away, and he’s perfect for you if you’d just give him a chance!”

“Mel. Mel, okay. I promise. I will give him a chance. But you don’t need to be worried about me. I don’t need a twelve year old playing matchmaker. You should be doing kid things, not bad romcom plots.”

“*SNRK*. They’re not bad. They’re sweet. And you like them, otherwise you wouldn’t have so many of them.” She wiped her nose with the back of her hand and glowered.

Rachel internally cursed Kori. “If you say so. Now let’s sit here for a minute, then we can go wash your face and you can go hand out with your friends. And I will have a talk with Garfield, and you will not stick your nose into my dating life. Understand?”

“Yes, mom.”

It still startled Rachel to hear that coming from Melvin, but it also warmed her heart. She hadn’t even known she wanted it until it happened, but it was like a spoken guarantee that she really was doing things right, and her little family really was working.

They sat together and Melvin showed her the lanyard that she had made via Kole. Rachel put it on the silver chain she wore around her neck and let it rest beside her heart promising mostly to herself that it would be kept safe at home. Then, when Mel had calmed down, they headed to the bathroom where Mel cleaned the tear tracks from her dirt-smudged face and rinsed her red rimmed eyes. Rachel gave her a final kiss on the forehead, and sent her off.

Gar found her standing there, staring off into space against the wall of the concrete shack. He leaned against it and slid down to sit around the corner and next to her. “So.”

“So,” she said back.

“Not saying it just to confuse you?” He glanced at her, gauging her reaction.

“No. But she wasn’t against confusing me.”

His eyebrow cocked. “Not mad?”

“Still mad. Still going to be grounded, probably. But she did it out of love.”

“Y’know, I don’t want to say I told you so, but...”

“But you totally want to say ‘I told you so,’” she finished for him.

“Yep. So what now?”

“Now, I guess I do what I was going to do before we had all this to deal with,” she said, the soul of nonchalance.

“What’s that?” he said, and when she didn’t respond, he stood up and looked around the corner. “Rae?”

“This.” with only his head around the corner, she turned and kissed him, gentle and sweet, and far too short for either of them. “I’d like to go out sometime. I want to take you to a behind the scenes at the museum, and I’ll let you choose the restaurant.”

His head spun and his eyes were out of focus. His thoughts were like molasses and he could barely get out the word “Okay.” before she was gone, a little bounce in her step.

AO3 FF.net

[iatethepomegranate]

A fic in which Caleb buys a house in Rexxentrum with Beau and Yasha, becomes a professor, and learns how to be a person.

Chapter Summary: The sands of time stop for no one, and the Nein eventually go back to their separate lives. Caleb grapples with the responsibilities of his new position, invents the support group, and Astrid gives him some rather unsettling news.

Notes: Caleb and Essek's scene together is a little spicy, but not explicit. Chapter title is from In the Embers by Sleeping At Last.

*** Chapter 5: Like fireworks we pull apart the dark

Caleb was smiling when he got back home. Veth aimed her crossbow at him.

“Quick! Tell me something only Caleb would say!”

Caleb sighed and held up his hands in surrender; he should have expected this. “You almost inscribed a rune upside-down today. I lent you my spellbook.”

“I don’t know, man,” said Beauregard, lounging across Yasha on the couch and completely fucking with them. “An imposter could’ve interrogated Caleb and forced him to recount his day. Caleb is pretty squishy.” Caleb almost reminded her he had been taught to withstand torture, which he’d first told explictly her while compiling his testimony for Trent’s trial, but he didn’t want to ruin her fun.

“Oh, that’s very smart,” Yasha said.

“Thanks, babe.”

“Say something else,” Veth demanded. “Something not from today. How did we meet?”

“In prison. You stole a bottle of cherry wine. I had Frumpkin retrieve a piece of wire so you could pick the lock and then I set the jail on fire and screamed for help. The guards ran away and we walked out. We have been best friends ever since. You were also a goblin at the time.”

“But wouldn’t an imposter have asked about Caleb’s known associates?” Fjord supplied.

“Fjord, I can and will burn your hair off. And, unlike Aeor, it will not grow back overnight.”

“Ha!” Veth put her crossbow away. “Welcome back. Sit down. Cad’s making tea again.” She dragged him over to the blanket nest that no one had bothered to put away, and shoved him in it.

Essek poked his head out of the kitchen. “How was your meeting?”

Caleb didn’t want to get into it. “I took the job.”

“Woo!” Jester yelled from the kitchen. She poked her head out, just next to Essek. “Did Astrid like the cookies?”

“Ja. She says thank you.” Caleb felt fine, except from the fact he was fucking exhausted. He tipped his head back, landing on Beau’s shin, and closed his eyes. “Uh, Beauregard? She says to look into Headmaster Zivan Margolin, who is also the Archmage of Conscription. He’s a link to Trent. A weak one. Apparently he has been running his mouth about how he saw my potential from the beginning. Ludinus is uncomfortable with the implication and may throw him to the wolves to save his own neck.”

“I’ll pass it onto Yudala tomorrow. Take a nap while we wait for dinner.”

“The head of your school is also in charge of conscription?” said Fjord. “Wait. You’ve said this before.”

“A long time ago, ja.”

“Look, I’m only a few months old,” said Kingsley, who had been sprawled behind the couch the whole time, apparently. “And even I know that’s kinda fucked up.”

“No shit.” Caleb was half-sleep already, eyes closed. A small body curled up against him. Veth.

“Caleb, that’s really awful,” said Jester. “I’m so sorry.”

“Jester, I appreciate that, and I love you very much, but I am exhausted and cannot talk about this anymore.”

Caduceus saved him by bringing a tea tray into the room. “Let’s all unwind for a bit. Dinner will be ready soon.”

Caleb drank half his tea and fell asleep on Beauregard, who had to kick him awake for dinner. Well had to was a strong way to put it. Regardless, he shoved some food in his face and then went to bed with Essek.

****

Astrid sent him tidbits of information as more details of his professorship were finalised. He would assist Professor Weber with the beginner and intermediate Transmutation classes. He would also assist Professor Winterheart with the beginner Evocation class, due to his experience. He would also be on call to assist with other classes as necessary.

What really shook Caleb, however, were Bettina’s plans for Advanced Transmutation. She told him herself over coffee in the ex-smut shop.

“Astrid has assured me of your capabilities,” she said, stirring sugar into her mug. “And she’s of the mind that the Advanced students may need your guidance the most. You may end up with a few former Volstrucker students, if we can get them back in class.”

“That is a big if.”

“Ja. Would you talk to Astrid about it? I don’t want to overstep.”

“It has been on my mind. I will talk to her.” If Caleb hadn’t been dead on his feet last time they had spoken, he probably would have brought it up. It would take time to track all of them down, and Caleb had not been in the right headspace to handle that kind of work previously. But things were more stable now, even if he cried at the drop of a hat these days.

“Danke. Now, Advanced Transmutation. The advanced students start on the third week of term, so you will have had some time to find your feet. I want you to take the lead with them.”

“Bitte?” Caleb wasn’t sure he understood what she was telling him.

“I want you to teach the advanced students,” Bettina clarified. “I will be on hand if you need, but I think you can handle it once you have a few classes under your belt.”

“Bettina, I have no experience.” Caleb was about three wrong words from hyperventilating. This was ridiculous. And irresponsible.

“I know that’s not true, Mr Widogast. Sorry, Professor Widogast.” The slip was deliberate. Bettina used his first name most of the time. She was making a point of his new title. “Astrid has spoken to your expositor friend, who said you have been teaching magic to one of your friends for over a year, and that you helped her run a summer camp for adventurers in Nicodranas. Expositor Lionett also insists you are very good with children.”

“My friend’s young son, specifically. He is not a difficult child.” Well, Luc was a handful for his parents, but Caleb didn’t have to worry about controlling him like they did. “And… advanced students are teenagers, not toddlers.”

“I understand this is a lot to ask,” Bettina said evenly. “I am asking because some of these children have been through a lot. My inaction, whatever the truth of it, will not instill confidence. You put Trent in prison. You were an adventurer. You can relate to them. Not only can you be a safe person for them, but you are interesting. Teenagers respond best to people who are genuine, and genuinely interesting. Even the children who have not been pulled into Trent’s web have just been through a war. Some of them may have lost family.”

“Bettina, I appreciate you are trying to explain your reasons, but it is not helping.”

“I will be there in class for as long as you need my help,” Bettina promised. “I will only leave when you are ready. I promise. You can ask for help at any time. I will help you with your lesson plans and give you all the advice I can. You will be fine. I would not suggest this if I thought you couldn’t handle it.”

****

Caleb went back home after his meeting with Bettina. He was still worried, but he was having a decent day overall, so it wasn’t overwhelming him at the moment. He stepped inside Beau and Yasha’s side of the house, the scent of freshly baked bread filling his nostrils. It was almost lunchtime.

Most of the Nein had gone home by now, except Essek and Caduceus. They were in the kitchen with Yasha, inspecting a fresh loaf of bread on the counter. The top of it was sprinkled with rolled oats.

“I think it worked,” Caduceus said. “Ah, Caleb. Rye bread? Does it look right to you?”

It smelled like the Vollkornbrot Caleb remembered from his childhood. “Ja. This looks close to what my mother used to make.”

Yasha and Caduceus high-fived over Essek’s head. Essek’s nose wrinkled a little bit in a moment of endearing, petty irritation. Yasha cut the bread into slices and constructed a sandwich to take to Beau, who was at the Archive. She buttered a slice and shoved it into her mouth before she rushed out the door.

Caleb sat with Essek and Caduceus. The latter finished serving up the bread with a generous spread of butter.

“Did you start this last night?” Caleb asked. It was chewy as intended and tasted like home, maybe a tiny bit saltier, but that was fine.

“Yeah,” replied Caduceus. “You were pretty out of it. We looped Essek in once you were out of the house this morning. This one seems doable for Yasha to make without us. You might have to help her.”

“I can do that.” He used to help his mother with the bread whenever he was home. The memories were not too painful today, just an ache.

“How was your meeting?” Essek asked. He had been hesitant to leave Rexxentrum until Caleb was a bit more settled, but the hourglass was almost drained of sand.

“Good, I think.” Caleb chewed, mulling the whole thing over. “Professor Weber is giving me her advanced transmutation students.”

“You look worried,” said Caduceus.

“I am. It’s a lot of responsibility. She thinks the older students need me the most. As a safe person. I was their age when I… when everything went to shit. She thinks we may have a few survivors of the program in the class, and other students will have lost family in the war.”

Essek’s shoulders slumped. He ate quietly.

“And the Professor doesn't think she can be that person?”

“She insists she didn’t know what Trent was doing, but she expects the survivors will only see the face of someone who didn’t help them.”

“That is very self-aware of her. Do you feel that way?”

“No. But I’m not seventeen years old.”

“True. Well, I think you have the tools to help the kids, if you feel up to it.”

“I… maybe. Bettina said she’ll help me in class until I don’t need her anymore.”

Caduceus nodded slowly, with a smile. “You’ll be great.”

****

Essek and Caduceus had dinner at the house, and intended to spend a few more hours there before teleporting to the Blooming Grove, where Essek would trance before heading off in the morning, only short of one big spell instead of two. Caleb almost wanted to ask him to burn a second spell to trance here instead, but he knew Essek found the Grove calming. And one of the few places he didn’t have to worry about the Dynasty or the Empire. Caleb wouldn’t take that from him.

But they had a bit of time, which Caleb and Essek spent in their room together. Caleb let a few of his dancing lights float around the space, so he could see Essek for the last time in who knew how long.

“You were better today,” Essek said softly, slowly unbuttoning Caleb’s shirt.

Caleb watched him concentrate on the buttons, memorising his tiny frown that also graced his face when focusing on intricate spellwork. “Being here is getting easier. Thank you for the bread.”

Essek chuckled softly. “I did very little.” He pushed Caleb’s shirt off his shoulders. “But I’m glad it made you happy.”

“The best bread is the kind made by someone I love.” He shivered a little in the cold. Essek pressed his lips to Caleb’s shoulder, remaining there as the seconds ticked away. Caleb got to work on Essek’s shirt, finding the strings on the back through sheer muscle memory. He picked the bow apart and slowly unravelled the lacing. He pulled Essek’s shirt over his head and kissed his collarbone.

They had a few more hours. Caleb intended to treasure every second Essek could give him.

Essek pulled Caleb’s ponytail free and ran his fingers through the braids he had made that morning until they twisted apart. He cradled Caleb’s head as they kissed. Vulnerability between them had been hard won, and now it was as easy as breathing. Easier, sometimes.

They separated, and Essek slowly dragged his thumb across Caleb’s lower lip. “I will message you every day I can.”

“You better. Or I will hunt you down.”

Essek smirked, and it did things to Caleb. “And if I misbehave? Will you give me detention, Professor?”

“Essek, I love you, but never say that again.” Caleb shut him up with another kiss. “I do not want one of my last memories of you to be… that.”

“Not so adventurous after all,” Essek teased.

“We are not bringing our professions into the bedroom. That will not go well for either of us.”

“Hmm.” Essek’s eyes were distant for a moment. “You are… not wrong. Whenever I hear the word Shadowhand, I think of my mother.”

“Could be worse,” Caleb said dryly.

Essek wrinkled his nose. “Yes. Well. That has killed the mood.”

“I can fix that. May I?”

Essek sat back on his hands, raising an eyebrow. “Do your worst.”

“Challenge accepted,” Caleb murmured. He shoved Essek onto his back, straddling his hips. Essek was a lot smaller than Caleb, though the force of his personality and his floating cantrip had once hidden that reality. Now, however… Caleb could keep Essek in place with his weight alone. And Essek liked it when he used that objective fact to their benefit.

Essek’s lips parted, and it took him ten seconds of shallow breaths to find his voice. “Challenge completed,” he said breathlessly.

“It’s one of my many skills, Liebchen.” Caleb knew his voice became extra husky when aroused, and he knew how much it broke Essek’s brain.

Essek opened his mouth again, but nothing came out except a soft, breathy laugh. He reached up and pulled Caleb’s hair until Caleb leaned down and kissed him hard. The throaty mmph noise from Essek was satisfying as fuck. It was very easy to get Essek aroused at the right moment. The harder part was finding that moment. He was sensitive to Caleb’s emotions, and it was hard for him to get in the mood if he had even the slightest inkling Caleb was not having a good day. For now, at least, it meant what sex they did have only happened under the best circumstances. It was a far cry from the last relationship Caleb had been in, where most of the sex had been after a bad day, all three of them on the brink of falling apart.

Caleb pulled back a little bit to lightly brush his fingernails across the sensitive skin of Essek’s lower abdomen, just above his remaining clothing. Essek’s breath hitched.

“Caleb. Please.” Essek was flushing red beneath the purple of his skin, turning it a lovely plum tone. Caleb kissed his stomach, and slowly undressed him like a long-anticipated present he was afraid to break. Essek squirmed beneath him, no matter how hard he tried to hold still to make the job easier.

“What do you want, Kätzchen?” Caleb said quietly, stroking the inside of Essek’s bare thigh. Caleb never used terms of endearment like this in casual conversation. He liked to save it for special moments, specifically because he knew it broke Essek’s brain very badly to be called things like kitten or sweetheart in Caleb’s own tongue.

Essek let out a shaky breath; his violet-blue eyes were half-lidded and he was out of his fucking mind. “I want… anything. Everything. You. I can’t think.”

“I know,” Caleb said, sliding off the bed, just out of Essek’s reach. “I like it that way.” He slowly unfastened his pants, watching Essek twitch in a half-aborted attempt to move closer to him. “Stay right there.” He let them drop, kicked them aside, finished undressing. He lingered out of reach until Essek bit his lip, gazing up at him with a silent plea. Only then did Caleb climb back onto the bed, settling between Essek’s shaking legs. “Let me take care of you, ja?”

Caleb caught Essek’s lips in a messy, breathless kiss as their bodies fit together at long last.

Later, they lay together under the covers. Caleb had extinguished his lights. Essek could see him perfectly well. Caleb had almost left the lights on so he could drink in Essek’s features for a little while longer, but he was sluggish and borderline mindless from his most recent orgasm. He would rather spend what little concentration he had on running his fingers across Essek’s features so he had a few more memories to keep him warm until they could meet again.

“I will stay until you fall asleep,” Essek said softly. “Then, I will message you tomorrow after I leave the Grove.”

Caleb hummed quietly, not trusting his voice beyond that. This goodbye was hard every time.

“I’m proud of you, Caleb.” Essek kissed him, and then pressed their foreheads together. “You will be an incredible teacher. You already are.” Caleb swallowed against a lump in his throat. He was not going to cry. He was not going to make this harder for Essek than it needed to be.

Somehow, he managed to find his voice. “I finally had a good example.”

Essek chuckled softly. “That may be the one thing in my life I did right.”

“It’s an important thing you did right, but not the only one.” Caleb found his hand, twining their fingers together. His grip would slacken in sleep, letting Essek extract himself without too much difficulty.

“I try to remember that. Thank you. Get some sleep.”

Caleb didn’t want to close his eyes, knowing Essek wouldn’t be there in the morning. But Essek had to leave sometime, and he was giving Caleb every moment he could spare. So Caleb closed his eyes and relaxed into the pillow.

“I love you, Essek.”

“I love you, Caleb.”

Sometimes they didn’t need to say it. It was always true, whether or not they put it into words. Tonight, however, they both felt just a little more fragile, a little more vulnerable, and the words helped.

And then Caleb slept. The last thing he remembered was Essek’s fingers dancing sweetly in his hair.

****

Waking alone, Caleb tried not to be too dour in the morning, but given Yasha kept trying to find things around the house to keep him busy, he was clearly not doing a good job. He had to meet with Astrid (and probably Wulf) later in the day to discuss work some more, and he needed to bring up the Volstrucker survivors. Maybe Astrid had already been working on contacting them, but it wasn’t clear. It needed to be.

For now, however, he let Yasha drag him out to the garden. He liked having his hands in the soil, coaxing life out of the earth. After dealing so much death in this world, it was nice to put life back into it. He knew Yasha felt the same. It also let him reminisce about some of his less painful memories of home. Planting green beans with his mother.

It was also a little easier to bask in the afterglow of last night out here in the sun.

“Did you have a good time last night?” Yasha asked. Caleb was glad Beauregard was already at work. She wouldn’t tease him, but he knew she would have to restrain herself.

“Ja,” Caleb said quietly.

“He’s soft with you. It’s lovely.” She watched him, and she saw a little too well. “You miss him.”

“A lot, ja.”

“You’re good for each other,” she said. “I’m glad you have him, even if it’s not all the time.”

Caleb knew his smile was incredibly sad, but it was a smile nonetheless. “Me too.”

Essek’s Sending reached him in that moment. “Hello, love. I have arrived at my destination in one piece. A little further away than intended, but unharmed. How’s your morning?” A slight pause. “I love you.” Ah, he’d realised he had three words left.

Full of warmth from the sun and Essek’s word economy, Caleb responded, “Hallo, Essek. Glad you are safe. I am gardening with Yasha.” She waved. “She says hi. We had leftover bread for breakfast. Talk soon. Love you, too.”

“That’s very sweet, Caleb.”

He chuckled, and it sounded a little more fragile than he would’ve liked. “Careful. I will start crying again.”

“Hey, that’s okay. I’ve been crying a lot, too. I think it’s a good thing.”

Maybe. Caleb found it too unsettling to have that view on it. He stood up from the ground, knees damp with morning dew, and dusted the grass off his trousers. Establishing a garden here, and actually putting his own hands in the dirt this time, felt permanent. Unless something went very wrong, they were going to be here for a long time.

Yasha hadn’t had a stable home for years, either. And she also had awful violence and loss baked into her past, and terrifying blank patches in her memory. It was easy to spend quiet time with her, because they understood each other in a way the others sometimes couldn’t.

They enjoyed a quiet cup of tea on the steps linking the back door to the garden. Yasha was partway through repairing the fence back here, and she insisted on working with it alone; magic would end the project too quickly.

The sun reflected in her whitening hair, glowing like the radiance inside her. She deserved all the gentle mornings; she wore them well. Yasha gazed out at the barest beginnings of their garden, and she smiled.

“This suits you,” Caleb said.

“I’m getting used to it,” she replied softly. “After so long, I get to just be a…” She caught herself. “Well. I’m not a wife.”

“For now.”

She chuckled. “For now. It’s nice here. I get to bake bread, and grow a little garden, and welcome the people I love when they come home. And I get to love whoever I want. That’s all I ever wanted.”

“You deserve it. You deserve peace.”

Yasha smiled into her teacup. “Beau tells me that every day. I think I’m starting to believe it. What about you?”

A short question, with a complicated answer. “Sometimes. I do not know if I will ever feel like I deserve this without reservation. It is getting easier. Having a mission helps, I think.”

“We can do this,” Yasha told him. She said it quietly, but with every ounce of determination she had. Yasha had a lot. Caleb was struck by her soft strength, as he often was. Letting oneself be gentle after years of violence and pain was one of the hardest things to do. Caleb knew that all too well.

Caleb held out his fist, and she bumped it. “Ja, we got this.”

And he actually believed it. If only a little bit.

****

Caleb had an easier time walking into Soltryce Academy this time. Starting from a far more energised and calm place than last time carried him through the memories. Entering Astrid’s office was still a little painful, but he was strong enough to handle it.

Astrid and Wulf were seated in armchairs in front of the fireplace, reading. There was a pile on the table between them, and evident gaps on the bookshelves. They had rarely gotten to read books from Trent’s personal collection. The silent fuck you was vindicating, even vicariously.

“The old man had some interesting material,” Astrid said in Zemnian, skipping over the pleasantries. They didn’t need them at this point. She messaged him frequently enough that it felt like they were simply picking up a briefly dropped conversation. They usually spoke Zemnian when they did not have non-speakers to contend with, and Wulf followed suit. They would occasionally borrow a word or phrase from Common if the sentiment worked better.

Wulf snorted. “Pretty dry reading. You’ll like it, Bren.”

Caleb shrugged. “Once a nerd, always a nerd.”

Wulf set the book on the table, stretching; his shirt rode up a little bit and Caleb kept his eyes on his face with a great deal of effort. “If you want more colourful reading, the smut shop you were asking about is on the north side of the market.”

“Kingsley asked me.”

“Uh-huh,” Wulf said flatly.

“Listen, you cannot flirt with all my friends and then take that tone with me.”

“Just did.”

Caleb resisted the somewhat mild urge to scream. Wulf and Astrid were both very good at putting him off-balance, in very different ways. “Whatever makes you happy, Wulf. Astrid, can we talk about Advanced Transmutation? I am going to explode if I don’t talk about this in the next ten seconds.”

Astrid had been watching his exchange with a cocked eyebrow, but she smoothed out her expression and gestured towards a third armchair, closer to the fire.

He sat down, holding one hand out towards the warmth. “Astrid, I say this with all the respect in the world: what the fuck?”

“The advanced classes are in a delicate situation,” Astrid replied. “Professor Weber and I want as many of the Volstrucker program survivors back in school as possible. You are a better person to work with them than Bettina, and with any students who lost loved ones in the war. She told you her reasons, yes?”

“Yes.”

“Then what is the problem?”

“Aside from my lack of qualifications and the fact I never technically graduated from the Academy?”

“Bren, your practical experience outweighs all of that. Bettina will help you with the rest.”

“Astrid suggested you take the advanced students,” Wulf said casually, leafing through another tome as if he wasn’t throwing a bomb into the conversation.

Caleb felt an ache in his gut, and he had to close his eyes and compose himself. “Astrid. Why?”

“The Academy is about to throw those children into the world,” she replied quietly. “Whatever lessons you wish to impart, you have to impart them now. Not only that, but Bettina is not well-suited to teach survivors of the Volstrucker program. She has spent her entire life in the Academy. They will not take her seriously. Some may resent her for not doing something about the abuse happening right under her nose. She told you that.”

“How many survivors do you expect we will have?” asked Caleb.

“I am still trying to track them down,” Astrid replied, with an edge of frustration.

“I was meaning to talk to you about the Volstrucker.” Caleb had been racking his brain whenever he had the time and energy. There was no formal infrastructure to support the survivors of the program. If Caleb hadn’t met Veth, and then later the Nein, things could have gone very badly for him in so many different ways.

“Talk,” Astrid said.

“These people need help,” he said. “Unless we get that mental health support I asked for, we are effectively on our own. Even if the Assembly throws us crumbs, nobody can understand what it was like except others like us. We need to talk to each other. Regularly, if possible.”

Wulf’s eyes stopped scanning the page. “Do you really think Volstrucker will want to talk to each other about this shit?”

“Who else is there?” Caleb said plainly. “They--we deserve the chance to support each other. Regular meetings, if we can. A support group, I suppose. Low pressure. Just a group of people who understand each other going through yet another upheaval in a life filled with them.”

Astrid watched him closely, eyes narrowed in thought. “Interesting. I think I understand where this idea came from.”

“We got each other through a lot back in the day,” said Caleb. “But we weren’t equipped for it. There was no blueprint for what we were to each other, but we did our best. Until it wasn’t enough. And later, I had the Nein. I would not be here without them. I owe them everything. Not everyone has people like that.”

“I’ll find us a place and let you know,” Astrid said.

“Thank you.” Caleb had expected he would be a little emotional about it, so at least he was prepared to ward off tears. “Thank you so much.”

Astrid averted her eyes, gazing into the fire. “As for your job, most of the children in the program have been located. Some of their parents have pulled them out of school. I am… trying to talk them out of that. The last thing we need are traumatised, half-trained adolescents running around unchecked.”

Caleb was hung up on her wording. Most of the children had been found. “There are some unaccounted for?”

“Two. Felix and Nicolaus. They’re both seventeen.” Astrid didn’t need to point out why their age was a problem.

There was no time to panic; Caleb needed details. “What do we know about them?”

“I worked with them a little,” Astrid replied. “They are close, not unlike the three of us at their age. If we find one, we may find the other. They are from Blumenthal. The Crownsguard are keeping an eye out, but I do not trust them to handle this with the care this situation requires.”

“Specialisations?”

“Both Evocation.”

Caleb didn’t need to say aloud how bad this could be. Two missing Evocation wizards, on the edge of graduating the Volstrucker program, who had possibly had their memories modified and orders distributed. It had been a few months since Trent would have last had contact with them. The worst could already have happened. Then again, Caleb had been in Blumenthal not that long ago to visit his parents, and he hadn’t heard anything that would have given him pause.

“I was in Blumenthal a few weeks ago,” Caleb said. “If they followed through on an order, it was likely after that. I’d… like to think I would have noticed otherwise. Most people seem to agree that I am rather intelligent.” The dry humour probably wasn’t appropriate in this moment, but he needed to keep himself calm and sarcasm usually worked a treat. “In more recent times, I would assume word would have gotten back to you. Maybe we are not too late.”

“Optimism is a new look for you, Bren,” said Wulf.

Caleb would never call himself an optimist, but he could see why Wulf was uncomfortable, even if he hid it behind one part sarcasm and one part a veiled flirt. “Wulf, I have seen a lot of things in this past year alone that have… changed me. There was a time, not too long ago, when I did not expect to survive the week. And… look at us now. We are sitting here in Astrid’s office, reading Trent’s old books because he is stuck in a dark hole and cannot do anything to us. I spent the morning gardening with Yasha. My friends bought me a quilt because it reminded me of my mother. Things are better for me than they have been in a very long time. So, I am trying new things, like having hope sometimes.”

“Point taken,” Wulf murmured, averting his eyes. Tense. Uncomfortable.

“I’ll let you know as soon as I hear anything about the boys,” Astrid said. “Whatever happens… I think you should be there.

[ambrial-blog]

Blitzo and Barbie-Wire.

The garish light was almost blinding to his sensitive eyes. It stung his eyes as he recalls the last time he saw his sister. Both Fizz and Verosika were wrong in thinking Blitzo never cared. Blitzo did care and if he had to be honest with himself, he cared a little too much, loved a little too hard, and let the fear of disappointment ruin him. Blitzo remembers these stark white corridors and waking up alone, in a hospital room. A single naked lightbulb swinging over his head. Gritting his teeth, he soon realized he was strapped down onto a hard bed. His head felt woozy. He had to be given a butt-load of sedatives. He groans as the pain relievers wear off. Half of his body is burned, a bandage was wrapped over his left eye. And life looked abysmal to the young fifteen-year-old. Dried tears crested his eyes, making them burn and sting. He wanted to die. He was in so much pain and agony.

And the horrible part, the part he couldn’t stand, was that no one knew where he was or how he got here. There wasn’t much left back at Loo-Loo-land. Blitzo feared what Mammon would do once he got word that his amusement park went up in flames. Blitzo shudders. he could barely move, barely speak. His ribs were broken, wrapped in gauze. He lifted a shaky hand, closing his eyes as he felt the crude stitches in his chest. Blitzo was hooked up to a heart monitor and an IV drip. His amber eyes glaze over as he searches the empty room with a pitiful gaze.

A shadowy hand reaches out, gripping his wrist. Blitzo’s eyes fill with tears as his lower lip wobbles as his gaze fell into his sister’s tired eyes. She had been with him, never leaving his side, unless nature calls. Never straying too far.

“Are you okay?” she asks past the forming lump that lodged in her throat. Blinking past tears, Blitzo could only nod. His throat feeling raw. He sqeeze her hand.

Barbie-Wire took a shuddering breath. “Don’t worry B, I’m here and I’ll take care of everything. You're my twin after all,” Barbie says while reaching up. She gently wiped a stray tear from Blitzo’s eye.

“You’re my hero Blitz. If you didn’t push me out of the way, I would’ve met a grisly fate. I owe you my life, brother.” said Barbie. ” What are brother’s for” Blitzo answers. ”Where’s Fizz?” Blitzo asks, wincing with a sudden twinge of pain. ”He’s in bad-shape, little brother,” Barbie replies, but it’s not your fault she rushes to reassure him. ” What you two did could’ve cost you your lives. You're both lucky to be alive”

“Your lucky to be alive little B,” ” Who all died in the fire Barbie?” at first Barbie didn’t look at him. She had lost so much in the span of forty-eight hours.

Barbie-Wire didn’t look him in the eye. Swallowing thickly, she fought to get the words out of her mouth. That’s when Blitzo realized something was dreadfully wrong. Where was his mother?. His mother wasn’t here. He felt dread fill his stomach and his heart sank. His hand shook as his fingers ran over the stitches. His body flared with pain as a scream bubbled up his throat. He had killed his own mother in a reckless act of defiance. He had severely hurt his best friend.   Even though it was Fizz’s hair-brained scheme to surprise Mammon with a going away talent show. Barbie couldn’t form the sentence that lingered in Blitzo’s mind. She didn’t have to say a word. Blitzo just knew. What could be worse than knowing he had inadvertently killed his beloved mother?

Barbie-Wire rubs circles in his hand. She was two hours and nine minutes older than he was. She would often gloat about it. Grinding in that because she was older, she was always right. Oh Satan, how she hated being right tonight. It was bad enough she lost a mother. If the paramedics hadn’t pulled Blitzo out when they did, she would’ve lost him too.

They were all each other had left now. Their father was a lost cause, never sticking around. He had sent Tilla money to feed the children, but he never really wanted to hold them.   And he especially hated Blitzo, born with a heart defect. He saw his son as weak and it was the defenseless who were often killed for food. Tilla had run away, taking her children. She sought refuge in a traveling circus where she raised twins. Now that Tilla was gone, it was up to Barbie-Wire to fix this. ” She’ll always be with us. She’s right here, Blitz, Barbie spoke, pressing her palm against her brother’s chest. ” Mom wanted me to give you this, as a birthday gift,” Says Barbie, pulling out a little black oblong box. The scarlet imp bows his head. “You open it for me. “his voice is hollow and devoid of emotion. Barbie-Wire opens the box and there sat Tilla’s red skull choker: a crimson gleam catching Blitzo’s eye. ” Take it away from me, I don’t deserve this Barbie, you take it, she was your mother too” ” She was, but this is your gift, your inheritance, little B, don’t blemish her memory with your refusal” ” you're not alone Blitzo, I’ll always be there for your Fizz, he’ll forgive you. It was as much as his fault as it was yours.

_

Blitzo grew up loud and bombastic. He was seventeen now, with plans for starting his own business. Blitzo found it strange being alone around Fizz. he could never find the right words to apologize.     The scarlet imp felt uneasy as he had just pawed through his sister’s mail to find that his wayward father was in town. Stag had head about Tilla’s death. But that’s not what brought him to the greed ring. What had driven him out of his rat hole was who had received her heart from his deceased wife. A wife who had lied to him, and told him that his son was a still born to keep him from putting the impling out his misery when it was revealed to the nomad that his son was born sickly.

A wife who had divorced him over twelve years ago when the twins were born. To put it simply, he went out for a pack of cigarettes and a gallon of milk and never returned. Until now. He was coming to collect on Tilla’s life insurance, and turn his children over to Cam, a social security worker who worked for the Ring of Greed. Among the other rings, Cam was known as a crude negotiator. He wasn’t expecting Barbie-Wire to take charge. nor Fizzorolli to speak out against him. ” Stop this foolishness and quit hiding behind your sister. Man up Blitzo for once in your pathetic life,” Stag sneers. “Fuck off, old man. Neither of us wants anything to do with you, let alone see your ugly face. Go lick someone’s ass and stay out of our lives. It’s bad enough here, hisses Blitzo. ” Call off your bitch boy, growls stag. ” Don’t fucking call her that, you sorry excuse. A rat has more decency than you,” Blitz snarls, his eyes alight with a fevered hatred as Barbie pulls him behind her back.

“Grab your shit and go!” Barbie snaps, a feral hiss in the back of her throat, trying to keep Blitz from maiming his father. From within the big top, Fizz’s eyes narrow. His new extensions were in the mail courtesy of Ausmodeous. Fizz was wheelchair bound for the time being. His ears burn with rage. Fizz grins with his teeth. What the hell was going on?. did Stag really think he could split the twins up? If he did, he’d never see his best friend again. Blitz had stayed with him through the horrific surgery.   despite being attached to a heart monitor.

Fizzorolli didn’t want that. He wanted to keep Blitzo around, if anything, to rub it in his face that he wouldn’t be here much longer. He wanted to keep Blitzo all to himself. The young harlequin had suffered through a lot, and he wasn’t even an adult yet.   Stag sneers, barreling his chest up to Barbie, and narrowing his eyes at his daughter. ” Is that a challenge, little girl?” “No asshole its a promise!” Snarls Barbie.  _ 

It had been three weeks since they had last seen Stag, but he was always around. It unnerved Blitzo to see his father so nonchalant. When Barbie was always there for him, encouraging him, and supporting him from the shadows. Even when Blitzo found he couldn’t do the same for her, that no matter how hard he tried, he kept messing things up.

It hurt, it physically hurt, her to see her brother crumbling before her eyes and falling apart and down the seams. She knew he blamed himself. Barbie also knew that she had to keep her brother away from Stag. Tila was the reason he was alive, why Barbie tried so hard to keep Blitzo from falling apart. She didn’t know how to comfort her grieving brother, and Stag was only making things worse.

Fizzorolli was the embodiment of a toxic relationship. He strung Blitzo along like a lovesick fool. He was the one who introduced Blitzo to the limelight. Fizz was looking to sell Blitzo’s image to Lord Mammon or Ausmdodeous. Whichever paid the highest. Fizz made a promise to himself while back in the hospital. He would get even with Blitzo. No robo-Fizz would be complete without a broken-hearted harlequin. It took months of Barbie laying down the law, putting her foot down and refusing to have Fizzorolli over. the clown was trying to take away the only family she had left. Eventually, she pried her brother’s eyes open to the surrounding truth. They avoided Fizzorolli like the plague.   Fizz couldn’t sell Blitz if he couldn’t find him.

Blitzo was torn between the love of a sister and the tight friendship of a best friend. It was hard for Blitzo to admit to himself that Fizz was just using him.

On a chilly night, the theme park was empty and Blitzo was just walking around shutting things down and was readying himself to head back to the trailer park that was located nearby. Barbie wanted him by a certain time, and he was already running late.

A shadow lurks in the darkness, his glowing green eyes locked on Blitzo. A row of jagged, illuminated by the dying lights of the theme park. ” You’ve been avoiding me, my melancholy friend” ”it’s just your image. We could be rich, kings in our own right” ” Are you going to let your sister fight your battles, BlitzO, or isn’t your mother’s heart strong enough to wrestle me, if I win, I get to sell your image, and then I get to tell you I told you so when we’re basking in the limelight's glow. ”Fizz, Barbie’s right, you don’t know what you're doing!, the last time you got that look in your eyes you set Loo-Loo land aflame with that botched stunt. ” We set Loo-Loo land aflame,” Fizz growls, pouncing on Blitzo slamming his back to the ground. A clawed hand disappears up his shirt. Fizz rubs Blitzo’s chest, straddling his waist. Ugh! stop it Fizz, get your hand out of there!” Blitzo growls. Fizz uses one claw to tear his shirt open, bitting off the buttons with his mouth. ” It’s a win  - win, BlitzO, unless this is how you repay me after all of my hard work. It was I who talked to Mammon. I am the one who got you this job. I’m the one taking care of you, not Barbie!. I’m the one keeping your father at bay. Cam is right outside these steel doors. “Your safe inside Loo-Loo-land BlitzO nowhere else, unless you sell me your image so will never be apart. ” I need you BlitzO, I want you. Can’t you see how delusional your sister has become?  And how easy it is for us to be together, to stay together. ” Just ditch your sister” Blitzo shudders, feeling Fizzorolli’s hot breath ghost along his neck. Blitzo closes his eyes and moans and the jester grins down at him. ” I’ll make you pay for you’ve done to me, Fizzorolli sneers into his ear. “your mine. Whatever fancy little delusions you have masquerading as dreams needs to die BlitzO”

Fizzorolli was never the same. He was always hurting Blitzo to get a laugh, then blaming Blitzo for hurting himself when the jokes cut too deep. It sickened Barbie to see Blitzo being strung along like a hapless marionette. Fizz would lie in on thick too, especially when both Lord Mammon and King Ausmodeous paid a visit. Fizzorolli knew in his head that he’d get Blitzo to join him. He had a way of getting to the Harlequin that most didn’t have access to and if it was for King Ausmodeous stepping in a buying the lewd creature, he might’ve succeeded and she would have lost her brother to the inane clown. When Fizzorolli was gone, the only left one. Their father, Stag and Cam. Not to mention, she was beginning to see the telltale signs that her brother was substance abusing. Drinking large amounts of alcohol.

Blitzo began cutting. His face would lose all color. Barbie threw out all the razors when she caught her brother in the bathtub. His head bobbing above the waterline. slit wrists, blood spider-webbing across the tile. It broke her heart.

Barbie herself had nowhere to turn to. Bills were piling up and Mammon was breathing down her neck. She tries to cheer him up, tells him she loves him and kisses his bandages. But she was reaching her breaking point. That’s when she thought one drop of Beelzebub juice wouldn’t hurt her. Boy, was she wrong. Stag had slipped into the park late at night, and wraps at the door. Through the grief and misery Barbie was thinking about her brother. Blitzo opens his eyes as he feels someone crawl across him. Reaching out, Blitzo pulls Barbie to his chest and places her head above his heart and closes his eyes. He doesn’t say a word as Barbie burrows his head into his chest. ” I failed you, I failed mom, I’m nothing more than a washed up, rodeo clown, you're better than me” ” Shut up before I slap you,” Barbie says grumpily. ”I’d never forgive you if you took my brother away from me” she told him sternly, searching his eyes. Will get through this together, like we do everything else” To be continued. 

[heavenunderthemoon]

we deserved a criminal minds x greys anatomy crossover

IMAGINE:

Lexie and Reid

-overexcitable children

-they both skipped grades, are always the youngest in their friend groups

-they deserve better

-they don’t even have to date, but they would be such good friends🥺

JJ and Mer

-mothers 🥰

-definitely arrange okay dates for their kids and then sneak off to the kitchen for margaritas

-DRUNK KAROKE

Cristina and Emily

-do I even have to elaborate?

-successful👏independent 👏women👏

-probably go to bars together and have a competition to see who can get more free drinks from the “poor, hopelessly stupid men” who go there

-Cristina definitely calls Emily a nerd, bc Prentiss probably geeks out over something out loud by accident, but Emily makes fun of Cristina for the pictures she found of the Yang woman in which she had no!eyebrows!!!!!!!

Penelope and George

-text each other good morning every single morning

-Penelope definitely sends him a picture of a cat every single day and he shows them to Cristina who mimes a puking motion

-they go to movies, and to the mall when they have days off (which is so rare that when it happens they go crazy)

-by ‘go crazy’ I mean Penelope is telling him to ‘treat yourself’ and George ends up walking out with only two shirts but a massive stomach ache because he had been persuaded to eat half the pretzel cart’s menu

Hotch and Bailey

-disappointed parent energy

-would bond over stories of how stupid their “kids” are

-“my kids are dumber, they cut an L- vad wire”

-“No, my kids are dumber, one of them gets kidnapped, killed, or tortured every five seconds”

-but also they both love teaching their “Kids” and feel fulfilled by their work and they both have ACTUAL children that would probably get along just fine!!

Morgan and Karev

-macho men

-they go hunting and fishing and karev helps with renovating Morgan’s houses (even if he sucks at it, Morgan still lets him do it cause he brings good beer)

-definitely have a fist fight because they were jokingly saying who would win in one and when disagreements arose they put it to a test. Morgan won there was no winner

Rossi and Webber

-loving grandpa energy

-they both tell the same stories over and over again and no one ever tells them they already heard the story bc they don’t want to be rude but once the two meet, they finally have someone to tell them

-“You already told me that old man” is something frequently said between the two

-when Rossi learns about Webber’s alcoholism, he starts bringing sparkling waters, sodas, or juices (all expensive and very exotic) when he goes to the man’s house for dinner parties

-“it’s not for you, geez, conceited much? I happen to like juice” Rossi covers not so slyly.

-they both have daughters they didn’t know about

[ladydarklord]

The Mighty Boosh on the business of being silly

The Times, November 15 2008

What began as a cult cocktail of daft poems, surreal characters and fantastical storylines has turned into the comedy juggernaut that is the Mighty Boosh. Janice Turner hangs out with creators Noel Fielding, Julian Barratt and the extended Boosh family to discuss the serious business of being silly

In the thin drizzle of a Monday night in Sheffield, a crowd of young women are waiting for the Mighty Boosh or, more precisely, one half of it. Big-boned Yorkshire lasses, jacketless and unshivering despite the autumn nip, they look ready to devour the object of their desire, the fey, androgynous Noel Fielding, if he puts a lamé boot outside the stage door. “Ooh, I do love a man in eyeliner,” sighs Natalie from Rotherham. She’ll be throwing sickies at work to see the Boosh show 13 times on their tour, plus attend the Boosh after-show parties and Boosh book signings. “My life is dead dull without them,” she says.

Nearby, mobiles primed, a pair of sixth-formers trade favourite Boosh lines. “What is your name?” asks Jessica. “I go by many names, sir,” Victoria replies portentously. A prison warden called Davena survives long days with high-security villains intoning, “It’s an outrage!” in the gravelly voice of Boosh character Tony Harrison, a being whose head is a testicle.

Apart from Fielding, what they all love most about the Boosh is that half their mates don’t get it. They see a bloke in a gorilla suit, a shaman called Naboo, silly rhymes about soup, stories involving shipwrecked men seducing coconuts “and they’re like, ‘This is bloody rubbish,’” says Jessica. “So you feel special because you do get it. You’re part of a club.”

Except the Mighty Boosh club is now more like a movement. What began as an Edinburgh fringe show starring Fielding and his partner Julian Barratt and later became an obscure BBC3 series has grown into a box-set flogging, mega-merchandising, 80-date touring Boosh inc. There was a Boosh festival last summer, now talk of a Boosh movie and Boosh in America. An impasse seems to have been reached: either the Boosh will expand globally or, like other mass comedy cults before it – Vic and Bob, Newman and Baddiel – slowly begin to deflate.

But for the moment, the fans still wait in the rain for heroes who’ve already left the building. I find the Boosh gang gathered in their hotel bar, high on post-gig adrenalin. Barratt, blokishly handsome with his ring-master moustache, if a tad paunchy these days, blends in with the crew. But Fielding is never truly “off”. All day he has been channelling A Clockwork Orange in thick black eyeliner (now smudged into panda rings) and a bowler hat, which he wears with polka-dot leggings, gold boots and a long, neon-green fur-collared PVC trenchcoat. He has, as those women outside put it, “something about him”: a carefully-wrought rock-god danger mixed with an amiable sweetness. Sexy yet approachable. Which is why, perched on a barstool, is a great slab of security called Danny.

“He stops people getting in our faces,” says Fielding. “He does massive stars like P. Diddy and Madonna and he says that considering how we’re viewed in the media as a cult phenomenon, we get much more attention in the street than, say, Girls Aloud. Danny says we’re on the same level as Russell Brand, who can’t walk from the door to the car without ten people speaking to him.”

This barometer of fame appears to fascinate and thrill Fielding. Although he complains he can’t eat dinner with his girlfriend (Dee Plume from the band Robots in Disguise) unmolested, he parties hard and publicly with paparazzi-magnets like Courtney Love and Amy Winehouse. He claims he’s tried wearing a baseball cap but fans still recognise him. Hearing this, Julian Barratt smiles wryly: “Noel is never going to dress down.”

It is clear on meeting them that their Boosh characters Vince Noir (Fielding), the narcissistic extrovert, and Howard Moon (Barratt), the serious, socially awkward jazz obsessive, are comic exaggerations of their own personalities. At the afternoon photo shoot, Fielding breaks free of the hair and make-up lady, sprays most of a can of Elnett on to his Bolan feather-cut and teases it to his satisfaction. Very Vince. “It is an art-life crossover,” says Barratt.

At 40, five years older than Fielding, Barratt exhibits the profound weariness of a man trying to balance a five-month national tour with new-fatherhood. After every Saturday night show he returns home to his 18-month-old twins, Arthur and Walter, and his partner Julia Davis (the creator-star of Nighty Night) and today he was up at 5am pushing a pram on Hampstead Heath before taking the train north to rejoin the Boosh. “I go back so the boys remember who I am. But it’s harder to leave them every time,” he says. “It is totally schizophrenic, totally opposite mental states: all this self-obsession and then them.”

About two nights a week on tour, Fielding doesn’t go to bed, parties through the night and performs the next evening having not slept at all. Barratt often retreats to his room to plough through box sets of The Wire. “It’s a bit gritty, but that is in itself an escape, because what we do is so fantastical.”

But mostly it is hard to resist the instant party provided by a large cast, crew and band. Indeed, drinking with them, it appears Fielding and Barratt are but the most famous members of a close collective of artists, musicians and old mates. Fielding’s brother Michael, who previously worked in a bowling alley, plays Naboo the shaman. “He is late every single day,” complains Noel. “He’s mad and useless, but I’m quite protective of him, quite parental.” Michael is always arguing with Bollo the gorilla, aka Fielding’s best mate, Dave Brown, a graphic artist relieved to remove his costume – “It’s so hot in there I fear I may never father children” – to design the Boosh book. One of the lighting crew worked as male nanny to Barratt’s twins and was in Michael’s class at school: “The first time I met you,” he says to Noel, “you gave me a dead arm.” “You were 9,” Fielding replies. “And you were messing with my stuff.”

This gang aren’t hangers-on but the wellspring of the Boosh’s originality and its strange, homespun, degree-show aesthetic: a character called Mr Susan is made out of chamois leathers, the Hitcher has a giant Polo Mint for an eye. When they need a tour poster they ignore the promoter’s suggestions and call in their old mate, Nige.

Fielding and Barratt met ten years ago at a comedy night in a North London pub. The former had just left Croydon Art College, the latter had dropped out of an American Studies degree at Reading to try stand-up, although he was so terrified at his first gig that he ran off stage and had to be dragged back by the compere.

While superficially different, their childhoods have a common theme: both had artistic, bohemian parents who exercised benign neglect. Fielding’s folks were only 17 when he was born: “They were just kids really. Hippies. Though more into Black Sabbath and Led Zep. There were lots of parties and crazy times. They loved dressing up. And there was a big gap between me and my brother – about nine years – so I was an only child for a long time, hanging out with them, lots of weird stuff going on.

“The great thing about my mum and dad is they let me do anything I wanted as a kid as long as I wasn’t misbehaving. I could eat and go to bed when I liked. I used to spend a lot of time drawing and painting and reading. In my own world, I guess.”

Growing up in Mitcham, South London, his father was a postmaster, while his mother now works for the Home Office. Work was merely the means to fund a good time. “When your dad is into David Bowie, how do you rebel against that? You can’t really. They come to all the gigs. They’ve been in America for the past three weeks. I’m ringing my mum really excited because we’re hanging out with Jim Sheridan, who directed In the Name of the Father, and the Edge from U2, and she said, ‘We’re hanging with Jack White,’ whom they met through a friend of mine. Trumped again!”

Barratt’s father was a Leeds art teacher, his mother an artist later turned businesswoman. “Dad was a bit more strict and academic. Mum would let me do anything I wanted, didn’t mind whether I went to school.” Through his father he became obsessed with Monty Python, went to jazz and Spike Milligan gigs, learnt about sex from his dad’s leatherbound volumes of Penthouse.

Barratt joined bands and assumed he would become a musician (he does all the Boosh’s musical arrangements); Fielding hoped to become an artist (he designed the Boosh book cover and throughout our interview sketches obsessively). Instead they threw their talents into comedy. Barratt: “It is a great means of getting your ideas over instantly.” Fielding: “Yes, it is quite punk in that way.”

Their 1998 Edinburgh Fringe show called The Mighty Boosh was named, obscurely, after a friend’s description of Michael Fielding’s huge childhood Afro: “A mighty bush.” While their double-act banter has an old-fashioned dynamic, redolent of Morecambe and Wise, the show threw in weird characters and a fantasy storyline in which they played a pair of zookeepers. They are very serious about their influences. “Magritte, Rousseau...” says Fielding. “I like Rousseau’s made-up worlds: his jungle has all the things you’d want in a jungle, even though he’d never been in one so it was an imaginary place.”

Eclectic, weird and, crucially, unprepared to compromise their aesthetic sensibilities, it was 2004 before, championed by Steve Coogan’s Baby Cow production company, their first series aired on BBC3. Through repeats and DVD sales the second series, in which the pair have left the zoo and are living above Naboo’s shop, found a bigger audience. Last year the first episode of series three had one million viewers. But perhaps the Boosh’s true breakthrough into mainstream came in June when George Bush visited Belfast and a child presented him with a plant labelled “The Mighty Bush”. Assuming it was a tribute to his greatness, the president proudly displayed it for the cameras, while the rest of Britain tittered.

A Boosh audience these days is quite a mix. In Sheffield the front row is rammed with teenage indie girls, heavy on the eyeliner, who fancy Fielding. But there are children, too: my own sons can recite whole “crimps” (the Boosh’s silly, very English version of rap) word for word. And there are older, respectable types who, when I interview them, all apologise for having such boring jobs. They’re accountants, IT workers, human resources officers and civil servants. But probe deeper and you find ten years ago they excelled at art A level or played in a band, and now puzzle how their lives turned out so square. For them, the Boosh embody their former dreams. And their DIY comedy, shambolic air, the slightly crap costumes, the melding of fantasy with the everyday, feels like something they could still knock up at home.

Indeed, many fans come to gigs in costume. At the Mighty Boosh Festival 15,000 people came dressed up to watch bands and absurdity in a Kent field. And in Sheffield I meet a father-and-son combo dressed as Howard Moon and Bob Fossil – general manager of the zoo – plus a gang of thirty-something parents elaborately attired as Crack Fox, Spirit of Jazz, a granny called Nanageddon, and Amy Housemouse. “I love the Boosh because it’s total escapism,” says Laura Hargreaves, an employment manager dressed as an Electro Fairy. “It’s not all perfect and people these days worry too much that things aren’t perfect. It’s just pure fun.”

But how to retain that appealingly amateur art-school quality now that the Boosh is a mega comedy brand? Noel Fielding is adamant that they haven’t grown cynical, that The Mighty Book of Boosh was a long-term project, not a money-spinner chucked out for Christmas: “There is a lot of heart in what we do,” he says. Barratt adds: “It’s been hard this year to do everything we’ve wanted, to a standard we’re proud of... Which is why we’re worn to shreds.”

Comedy is most powerful in intimate spaces, but the Boosh show, with its huge set, requires major venues. “We’ve lost money every day on the tour,” says Fielding. “The crew and the props and what it costs to take them on the road – it’s ridiculous. Small gigs would lose millions of pounds.”

The live show is a kind of Mighty Boosh panto, with old favourites – Bob Fossil, Bollo, Tony Harrison, etc – coming on to cheers of recognition. But it lacks the escapism to the perfectly conceived world of the TV show. They have told the BBC they don’t want a fourth series: they want a movie. They would also, as with Little Britain USA, like a crack at the States, where they run on BBC America. Clearly the Boosh needs to keep evolving or it will die.

Already other artists are telling Fielding and Barratt to make their money now: “They say this is our time, which is quite frightening.” I recall Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer, who dominated the Nineties with Big Night Out and Shooting Stars. “Yes, they were massive,” says Fielding. “A number one record...” And now Reeves presents Brainiac. “If you have longer-term goals, it’s not scary,” says Barratt. “To me, I’m heading somewhere else – to direct, make films, write stuff – and at the moment it’s all gone mental. I’m sort of enjoying this as an outsider. It was Noel who had this desire to reach more people.”

Indeed, the old cliché that comedy is the new rock’n’roll is closest to being realised in Noel Fielding. Watching him perform the thrash metal numbers in the Boosh live show, he is half ironic comic performer, half frustrated rock god. His heroes weren’t comics but androgynous musicians: Jagger, Bowie, Syd Barrett. (Although he liked Peter Cook’s style and looks.)

“I like clothes and make-up, I like the transformation,” he says. Does it puzzle him that women find this so sexually attractive? “I was reading a book the other day about the New York Dolls and David Johansen was saying that none of them were gay or even bisexual, and that when they started dressing in stilettos and leather pants, women got it straight away with no explanation. But a lot of men had problems. It’s one of those strange things. A man will go, ‘You f***ing queer.’ And you just think, ‘Well, your girlfriend fancies me.’”

The Boosh stopped signing autographs outside stage doors when it started taking two hours a night. At recent book signings up to 1,500 people have shown up, some sleeping overnight in the queue. And on this tour, the Boosh took control of the after-show parties, once run as money-spinners by the promoters, and now show up in person to do DJ slots. I ask if they like to meet their fans, and they laugh nervously.

Fielding: “We have to be behind a fence.”

Barratt: “They try to rip your clothes off your body.”

Fielding: “The other day my girlfriend gave me this ring. And, doing the rock numbers at the end, I held out my hands and the crowd just ripped it off.”

Barratt: “I see it as a thing which is going to go away. A moment when people are really excited about you. And it can’t last.”

He recalls a man in York grabbing him for a photo, saying, “I’d love to be you, it must be so amazing.” And Barratt says he thought, “Yes, it is. But all the while I was trying to duck into this doorway to avoid the next person.” He’s trying to enjoy the Boosh’s moment, knows it will pass, but all the same?

In the hotel bar, a young woman fan has dodged past Danny and comes brazenly over to Fielding. Head cocked attentively like a glossy bird, he chats, signs various items, submits to photos, speaks to her mate on her phone. The rest of the Boosh crew eye her steelily. They know how it will end. “You have five minutes then you go,” hisses one. “I feel really stupid now,” says the girl. It is hard not to squirm at the awful obeisance of fandom. But still she milks the encounter, demands Fielding come outside to meet her friend. When he demurs she is outraged, and Danny intercedes. Fielding returns to his seat slightly unsettled. “What more does she want?” he mutters, reaching for his wine glass. “A skin sample?”

[slippinmickeys]

Five Seconds (8/8)

If you’d like to read this work in its entirety, you may do so here.

October 24, 2018

Scully was half-elated, half terrified when her children escaped from the cabin and their captor. It removed them from harm’s way, but gave the mercenary who held them a sole focus -- herself and the child she carried, and Mulder.

Luis seemed to be even more amped up by their escape, checking his watch and trying his phone twice as often. When she rose and requested a drink of water, the man stood so quickly from the chair he sat in that it fell backwards to the floor.

He stood, twitchy and suspicious, looked at her a moment and then nodded tersely. She turned to go into the kitchen when a powerful force seized her and she stumbled, grabbing onto the back of Mulder’s chair.

“Scully!” he said, alarmed. He rose and moved to her side as the gunman watched them, tense but otherwise expressionless.

The pain wrapped around her middle and went all the way to her back. She’d experienced back labor during her labor with William and remembered the agonizing sensation. This was the real thing.

“Mulder,” she whispered, dragging her eyes up to him. She saw realization dawn on him, saw the mix of tender excitement and abject fear.

“Oh, sweetheart,” he whispered, tilting his head to the side to look at her. They rarely used pet names for each other, but the sound of those words on his lips made her stalwart exterior crumple. Tears fell from her eyes. She looked at him and tried to tell him silently all the things he’d ever meant to her, and all the things he ever would.

XxXxXxXxXxX

“Here’s how it’s going to work,” the man said, to Lily. “We are going to unload the ATVs off of the trailer. We are going to drive them to the camp where your family is staying. You will be on one, your brother and I will be on the other. I will have a gun to your brother’s head the entire time. You try anything, I shoot him. He tries anything, I shoot him.”

Lily nodded, and she could hear Will swallow with some difficulty next to her. “My colleague at the camp… Is he alive?”

“Yes,” Lily said, not taking her eyes off the barrel of the gun.

“Good,” he said “Do what I say, and no one has to die.”

Lily could feel the weight of the burner phone in the front pocket of her sweatshirt and sweat broke out on her upper lip. Maybe, she thought, maybe she could still use it.

XxXxXxXxXxX

Scully grasped his hand tightly, eyes closed, breathing hard. As the night wore on and windows outside the cabin turned pale, her contractions seemed to be progressing as they ought, but she was in pain -- terrible pain -- and his heart clenched for her.

He hadn’t done this since Lily was born nearly two decades before -- holding the hand of his wife while she battled to bring his child into the world.  He still felt an overriding guilt for not being there for her during her complicated and troubled delivery of William.

He remembered walking down the hallway toward her room the day he was born, his breath shaky and halting, not knowing what he’d find. There had been a strange sense of deja vu as he approached her door that night, and he had an odd mental picture — an actual phantasmagoria — flash through his mind unbidden of walking in and seeing Scully, her hair shorter than she had ever cut it, her body on the bed thin and reedy -- most definitely not pregnant. He could still see it in his mind’s eye, Scully lying on her side in the hospital bed, wires and IVs coming out of her, a nasal cannula over her ears. She wore a teal hospital gown and the look on her face was one of horrified surprise. The flash had so disturbed him that he ran the last few feet to her labor and delivery room and crashed through the door, which knocked into the rubber stopper on the wall. There Scully lay, in a pink gown, her hair long and her face pale, but smiling, their son lying peacefully on her chest.

He shook himself of the memory and concentrated on his wife.

XxXxXxXxXxX

The man had Will unhooking the ATVs as he pushed them back and off the ramp of the trailer, his gun strapped to a holster on his leg. Lily had her hand in her pocket thumbing the phone, trying to remember which button was “on” from memory. She depressed the button and the ancient phone beeped once, the sound covered by the merc turning on and revving the first four-wheeler, luck on her side, for once.

He moved to the side of the van and pulled out a mid-sized black canvas attache case that had a biohazard warning patch on the side. He secured it to the back of one of the vehicles and then winked at her. Lily’s insides went cold, thinking of her mother.

He pointed at the ATV and looked to Will. “Hop on, William,” he commanded. They had not told him their names. Her brother mounted the four-wheeler, licking his lips nervously. The merc turned to her.

“You know how to drive one of these?” he asked her. She shook her head. He pointed, impatient. “Throttle. Brake. Get on.”

She did.

“You know where to go,” the man said, then revved his engine, the noise a loud mechanical crank in the sleepy peace of the forest. A flock of birds were startled into flight from the trees above, taking wing into the autumn sky, a flutter of panicked commotion.

XxXxXxXxXxX

“Mulder, I need you to promise me something,” Scully said weakly. She was tiring and had refused food. She was laying on the narrow cot by the stove and he was sitting next to her.

“Anything,” he said, brushing back the hair from her forehead.

“Don’t be a hero,” she half-whispered. “I need you. The kids need you. Don’t… don’t try anything.”

Luis, listening in from a few yards away, spoke for the first time in an hour.

“‘S good advice,” he sneered.

XxXxXxXxXxX

Lily slid the phone out of her pocket and took a surreptitious look down. It was on. She glanced back up to watch where she was going -- the trees here were much closer together -- saplings growing like weeds in a field. She had to swerve quickly to miss one and she heard the mercenary shout from behind her. Her quick turn had lifted the right side of the ATV’s wheels almost off the ground -- if she’d been leaning the wrong way or even at all, the whole thing would have gone over.

Straightening and watching her path on a fresh surge of adrenaline, she glanced once again at the phone -- there was a single bar of service showing. She was so shocked she almost dropped it. Licking her lips, she kept her eyes ahead and dialed 911, glancing down once or twice to make sure she’d entered it correctly. She pressed “send.” She was driving one-handed and was hoping the merc didn’t notice. Even with the roar of the engines, she could hear the phone dialing.

They were almost to the cabin. She could smell woodsmoke. If they cleared one more rise, they’d be there.  

The burr of the phone ringing was the only thing she could hear.

Up the rise, she knew the ATV was still right behind her, knew that there was still a gun trained at her brother's head.

"9-1-1, what... your emergency?" she could hear the dispatcher through static.

Then she was over the hill. The cabin sat before them, a squat building standing stalwart in a field of trees, smoke leaking from the chimney and sinking to the ground like an escher painting.

She felt the machine under her go over an unexpected bump on the right side and the wheels rise up slightly. She took a chance on creating enough of a distraction for emergency services to trace her call. She leaned hard left and gravity did the rest, tipping the ATV in what felt like a slow motion fall onto its side. Lily, wearing neither helmet nor seatbelt fell hard onto her shoulder, her head snapping into the earth.

She rolled, and the machine missed her leg, but the phone went flying out of her hand, arcing through the air and into the leaf cover. The other ATV revved to catch up with her and then stopped close to the cabin on a spray of dirt and leaf pieces. Then the engine cut, and she could hear the voice on the other end of the phone several yards away cutting in and out in static.

Stars burst behind her eyes like fireworks popping in the night. When her vision cleared, the man was standing over her, his boots so close to her face that she could smell the leather. Her brother was close, but was clearly wary of the mercenary, and she saw him take several steps backward toward the cabin, his eyes on his sister and the dangerous tableau before him.

The man before her lifted a foot and she braced herself for a kick or a blow, but instead he took several steps off into the duff and then once again lifted his heavy booted foot up and this time slammed it down hard onto the staccato-voiced cell phone in the leaves, the static turning into silence with an almighty metallic crunch.

XxXxXxXxXxX

Scully’s contractions were extremely close together. She was lying on the cot, her face a sheen of perspiration. Mulder almost didn’t hear the sound of the engines over her groan.

Luis, who had been watching Scully intensely, his brows knitted together, stood quickly when he heard the motors. There was a chaotic sound outside and then the engines cut, close to the cabin.

“About fucking time,” Luis hissed and then was out the door, leaving it open. Mulder looked to Scully and then, very slowly and deliberately leaned down and pressed a kiss to her forehead.

“No matter what happens,” he whispered, “I always have and always will love you.”

Scully nodded and then another contraction pressed on her and she winced.

“Mulder, I’m feeling really pushy,” she said.

“Shit,” Mulder swore, standing without much hope of doing anything.

Scully opened her mouth and let out an unholy yowl.

And then, from outside the cabin, they heard the unmistakable voice of their fifteen year old son: “Mom?!”

XxXxXxXxXxX

“Shut up,” said the merc to William from where he stood by the cabin’s door.

Lily rolled up to her knees and shook her head, standing woozily, just as the man Luis came barreling out the door.

“Where the fuck have you been?” Luis hissed at the other man.

“Get your panties out of your ass, Cardinal,” he said. “I’m here.”

“She’s in labor, you greasy piece of shit. We’re on the fucking clock.”

Another dump of adrenaline hit Lily’s bloodstream and she took several steps toward her brother, who was still looking at the cabin in alarm.

He nodded at Luis and unstrapped the black attache kit from the back of his ATV, walking to the open doorway, where he paused. He pointed to where Lily stood, not far from her brother.

“Watch these two,” he said, “and maybe don’t lose them this time?”

XxXxXxXxXxX

“...and maybe don’t lose them this time,” Mulder heard from the doorway. The voice was familiar, and when he looked to the man’s face, he was taken over by such an unholy rage that his vision quite literally tunneled, going black from the sides.

He’d launched himself before anyone knew quite what was happening, even himself. His body hit the other man’s full force and they flew outside, landing in the duff and scattering dirt from the force of their impact.

“Krycek,” he hissed, “you son of a bitch-” and then he reared back his fist and delivered a haymaker to the man’s chin -- all the pent of fury of finding Scully at the top of Skyland Mountain all those years ago crashing back -- Krycek’s head whipped back, spraying blood onto the O horizon.

XxXxXxXxXxX

She’d say this for her brother: his time on the ice had served him well.

Cardinal was as taken by surprise as everyone else by their father’s furious launch at the other merc, and Will, who had been standing several feet away, took the opportunity to grab his improvised hockey stick, which had been propped up by the door on the outside of the cabin and swung it with everything he had at the man. It connected with Cardinal directly across the temple; the dull, sickening thud the best thing Lily had ever heard. Cardinal hit the wall of the cabin and crumpled, sliding to the ground like bubbles down wet skin.

Her father’s head whipped around to see what had happened behind him, and Krycek seized the opportunity to kick Mulder hard, sending him flying backwards. Both men scrambled up to standing when Scully appeared in the doorway of the cabin, taking two shaky steps outside. Everyone turned to her.

“Mulder,” she rasped, looking at her husband, distraught, “I think it’s time.”

XxXxXxXxXxX

Mulder looked to his wife.

Scully then let out a scream and stumbled forward, grabbing onto a nearby tree for support. Lily dashed to her side without thinking, giving Krycek the opportunity to swing the gun he still held in his hand up to train it on both of them. Mulder’s heart rose to his throat.

From nowhere, Krycek produced another pistol, which he aimed at Will, who had been attempting to get around the side of the cabin after felling Cardinal. Mulder froze.

"This ends one of two ways!" Krycek shouted, stopping everyone in their tracks. There was a smear of blood running down his chin. "All of you dead, or everyone alive. I really don't care one way or the other."

Krycek flicked the gun once at Will, who dropped the stick and made his way over to his sister, who was still several feet away from Scully, who had taken a few staggered steps before slumping to her knees, knocked back by another powerful contraction, this one right on the heels of the last. She was panting, and swung her eyes up to Mulder drunkenly. Krycek had a gun on her and one on their children.

"All right," Mulder said, anguish gripping him, "all right."

He was out of options. He looked to the functioning four-wheeler that Krycek had come in on. Krycek could have Scully on it and to the county road in less than ten minutes. The other four wheeler was still on its side, smoking, the smell of gas and oil ripe in the air. He'd never be able to get to them.

Mulder looked at Scully. He looked at his children. Hopelessness rose in his gut like vomit, consuming and poisonous. He thought vaguely of bum-rushing Krycek once again, one last sacrifice to save those he loved.

The moment slowed to a honied drip. Five seconds to make a choice, each one ticking by more slowly than the one before it. One. He thought of Lily as a baby, of William; the newborn smell of their sweet red hair. Two. He thought of Olivia Kurtzweil, sitting across from him in his office. Lying dead on her own floor. Three. He thought of Samantha, her thick braids flying out behind her, laughing as she ran down the beach in Quonochontaug. Four. He thought of his first day of firearms training at Quantico. His instructor laying a pistol on the countertop and saying: “It takes only seven pounds of pressure to pull a trigger.” Five. He thought of Scully. Of their first meeting in the basement office, her bright seafoam eyes and her chipper little handshake. He thought of her terrified face atop Skyland Mountain, how her hands felt around his neck as he carried her all the way down. He thought of how she gasped when he touched her, of the dusky way her skin looked in the moonlight.

He moved to take a step toward her, but was shocked into stillness when a gun shot rang out out of nowhere and Krycek slumped to the ground. Mulder turned to where the shot had come from and there, standing in the middle of the Northwoods forest in a pristine white blazer and jeans stood Lauren, the archaic rifle that had adorned the deer mount on the cabin wall pressed expertly to her shoulder. Smoke wafted out of the barrel, and she slowly lowered the weapon.

“You stopped answering your phone, Fox,” she said. “We had a deal.”

XxX

Will and Lily were both facing away from where Krycek had fallen, looking at Lauren in surprise, and Mulder took three large strides to get to them before they could turn and see what was left of the man. He grabbed them by the shoulders, one hand on each of them and leaned down.

“It’s okay,” he said, in a quiet voice, “we’re all okay.”

Will turned into him and buried his face into his father’s chest. Lily put her hand over his and turned toward Scully, who was leaning against a tree, one arm wrapped tightly around her stomach. Luis Cardinal was still out cold by the cabin’s wall, his arm thrown out an odd angle. Mulder hoped it was broken.

“Can you guys help your mom into the cabin?” he said and both kids went immediately to her.

He heard the crunching of leaves and found Lauren at his shoulder.

“I called the county Sheriff before I came onto the property,” she said in a low voice, “I don’t know how long it will take them to get here.”

Mulder turned to her in full.

“Thank you,” he said, his voice shaky, “You saved my family.”

“You’re all the family I have left,” she said, “and you would have done the same for me.”

He pulled her tightly to him. She gave him a brief squeeze, the rifle she was holding pressing into his hip. She pulled back.

“Please tell me Dana’s not in labor,” she said.

“Dana’s in labor.”

Lauren took a deep breath and glanced down at the man whose life she had taken not moments before.

“Don’t look,” Mulder said gently.

Lauren nodded stoically and shouldered the rifle.

“There’s another merc by the cabin,” Mulder said, “alive. Can you help me secure him? See if there’s some rope or something inside?”

Lauren nodded and headed into the cabin, and Mulder turned to Krycek and pushed him over onto his back with his foot. The man was looking straight up with sightless eyes. Then Mulder noticed several pairs of zip ties that Krycek had had secured to his utility belt. He tried not to think of what he’d planned to use them for, and pulled one from the dead man’s waist.

“We need to make this quick,” Lauren said as she came out the door, her statement punctuated by a low, feminine moan from inside the cabin. Mulder’s gut roiled.

“Let’s go,” he said, and dragged Cardinal roughly by the shoulders to a medium pine not far from the cabin door. Mulder wrenched the man’s hands behind his back around the tree and Lauren cinched the zip tie on tightly. He gave a light moan but was otherwise still.

When they trotted back into the cabin, they found both kids at their mother’s side, wearing panicked, wary faces.  

Scully had settled onto the cot that had been set up near the woodstove. Her eyes were closed and her hands gripped the steel frame. Mulder asked the kids to collect clean linens and blankets from the cedar cabinet and then went back outside to pull Krycek’s body over behind a large tree, knowing he was disturbing evidence, but not caring. He didn’t want it anywhere the kids could see.

When he came back inside, Scully was propped up on pillows, Lauren kneeling next to her. They both turned to him. Scully reached out her hand and he walked over and grabbed it.

“Any sign of the Sheriff?” Lauren asked in a low voice.

Mulder shook his head.

Scully winced and squeezed his hand, gritting her teeth.

“Her contractions are one on top of each other, Fox,” Lauren said.

Lily had drifted over and spoke from Mulder’s elbow.

“Can you give me and Will something to do?” she said, “he’s kind of freaked, and so am I.”

“Hey Will,” Mulder said, “can you take the bucket to the pump and bring us water?”

“Yeah!” Will jumped up and grabbed the bucket by the kitchen wall and scooted outside quickly.

“Lily,” Mulder said, and she looked up at him. “Do you think you can help your mom?”

“Yeah, I can,” Lily said, and went to Scully’s other side.

Scully looked up to Mulder.

“I’m feeling really pushy,” she said once again and gave him a this is serious look.

“You pitch, I’ll catch,” Mulder said easily, trying to project a confidence he didn’t feel, and moved to the end of the bed. He helped Scully pull down her leggings and get situated back on the bed.

Scully was breathing hard and took another deep breath, trying to slow herself down.

“Lil,” she said, pausing to close her eyes and breathe through her nose, “you hold one knee, Lauren will hold the other.”

Lily nodded bravely and grabbed her mother’s leg firmly. Lauren did the same on Scully’s other side.

Mulder could see a bright thatch of hair already crowning between Scully’s legs and grabbed a clean towel, reaching forward.

“Oh my god,” Lauren said, just as Scully gave another almighty yell. The baby’s head was all the way out. One more push and Mulder caught his second son as he careened into the world, registering his complaints loudly for anyone who would hear them.

Will came banging through the door just as Mulder was placing the child on Scully’s chest, a full bucket of water sloshing over where it hung from his hand.

“The Sheriff is here!” he said, as he took in the sight before him.

“Come and meet your brother,” Scully said, smiling tiredly, sweat beaded on her brow.

EPILOGUE

Lily stood in front of the building nervously twirling a lock of hair around her fingers, over and over; a tic she’d had since childhood. Her father was parked not quite a block up the avenue waiting for her -- not totally out of sight, but enough to afford her some privacy. She glanced at his car's taillights once and then looked back at the old building with its colossal white columns and bright red brick.

She knew Travis's schedule well enough that she shouldn’t have been surprised when he emerged from the double doors of the Old Engineering Hall, but her heart skipped a beat anyway.

He was several steps out when he noticed her standing at the base of the old cement staircase, and he pulled up short, cinching his backpack once contemplatively before continuing his descent. He stopped in front of her, but made no move to touch her or talk. He merely looked at her, waiting for her to say something.

She gave him a tentative smile that he didn't return.

"Hi," she finally said.

"Hello," he said. He didn't sound angry or upset, merely expectant, maybe a little resigned.

She felt tears welling in her eyes, but she didn't let them fall. She couldn't think of a thing to say -- where to possibly start telling him her story. He must have sensed how overwhelmed she was, as he took a breath and said, not unkindly:

"You were supposed to meet me for lunch. You never showed up."

She pressed her lips together and nodded her head, remembering the feeling of being pursued through the student union, of holding her father's hand and running from Darlene's house, thinking she may have gotten her whole family killed. Of running through the trees. Of gunshots and the hot ozone smell of cordite.

"I called you," he went on, "I called you like thirty times."

"I didn't have my phone," she finally said, "I couldn't-"

"-you didn't have to ghost me, Lillian," he interrupted, "I was afraid something happened to you... I was about to call the cops when I realized that I didn't actually know where you lived." His tone was serious, a touch disappointed, and it made Lily's insides feel like iced lead.  

"My... my name's not Lillian," she whispered, and the tears finally fell from her eyes.

He tilted his head like a confused pup and looked at her, puzzled and upset.

So she told him. Everything. She took a breath and let loose with everything she and her family had been through for the last nine months. In a teary voice with hitching sobs, she told him about her family's genetic legacy, about going on the run, about how she had managed to feel safe and happy when she was with him, able to forget -- at least for a few hours -- about the dangers pressing on her from all sides. And finally about the last 72 hours and her life at the other end of a pointed gun.

He stood, staring at her in fascination and what looked like disbelief. When the last word of explanation had been said, she could feel her insides wilt a little in relief; everything out in the open, the last of her words falling out of her mouth and sinking to the ground, heavier than air.

“I… I would understand if you didn’t believe me,” she finished.

Just as she steeled herself for his withering incredulity and disbelief, he took one giant step toward her, dropping his backpack as he moved, and wrapped her in his thick, sturdy embrace. She felt herself melt into his caress like liquid, felt his hand come up to hold her head tightly to his chest, his fingers threading through her hair.

“I believe you,” he whispered, pressing his lips to her hair.

She experienced a relief so profound she gave an involuntary sob into the solid mass of him, as he murmured words of encouragement and comfort into her ear. She figured out in that moment what love was. It was this.

She wasn't sure how long they held each other, but he didn't pull back until she did, and even then he reached out and grabbed her face in both hands lightly, his thumbs rubbing her cheekbones in a gossamer wisp.

"Jesus," he finally said, searching her eyes with his intense hazel gaze. She gave him a shaky smile and a half laugh and he dropped one hand to her arm, leaving the other on her face, which she leaned into. "I don't know your real name," he chuffed kindly, "What do I even call you?"

She smiled, sniffed -- probably unattractively, she thought -- and closed her eyes once before looking at him with affection. "I'm kind of partial to 'Frisbee,' to be honest," she said. He leaned down and kissed her with everything he was worth.

[whump-town]

In The Woods Somewhere

Warning: country shit, you know? they kill a coyote...

this is just one long ass metaphor so...

Her scream pierces the warmth of the late autumn afternoon. Above her lazy ravens ascend to the sky, puffing little irritated calls to one another as they move away from the screeching child. At the commotion, the woods themselves seem to shift, annoyed with the agony-laced sound. Old tree branches splintering and the soft, unsatisfied chatter of life deep within.

She is seven, standing where the branches reach with hungry fingers out to her. Where her father tells her their property ends. The threat of what happens to curious children who trespass in the woods hums deeply in her veins. She’s drawn to the memory of the boy they found in the river last summer and standing around the campfire. Leaning into her father’s leg as he told stories about the beasts deep in the woods. Murderous, lustful things that will take carelessly. Going on even when her mother had hummed disapprovingly warning him with the simple mumble of his first name.

He’d turned to her hushed and high on the same adrenaline bucking her knees out from underneath her body. Foxes and Coyotes, he’d told her, they deceive the woods for what they truly are. “Smaller than what you think,” Roy whispered, smiling as she pressed closer. Curious but afraid, seeking his warmth as much as his comfort but begging for more. “Look like a wolf, you’ve seen a wolf haven’t you? Coyotes look an awful lot like them but brown and they’re ravenous little bastards.” There’s an intelligent glint to their eyes, unmistakable and haunting. It’s easier to conceive nature as consuming and destroying. But it’s simply untrue and to find yourself standing face-to-face with it is a daunting, demeaning task. To see in nature’s eye your own insignificance.

She hadn’t understood that word, ravenous, but had heard her father shout out into the field something about bastards before to know it was not good. He’d never meant it as any sort of compliment. He’d taken her hand a few nights later, guided her out to the porch, and held her skinny body against him. Shushed her when she’d tried to ask him what they were doing, trusting him blindly as a child does, but fearful of the depths of the night spread out before her. The clear sky above their heads hidden by the roof so she’d held him a little tighter. Heart pounding in her chest.

The first sounds just like a dog, her head swivels to identify exactly where it’s coming from. The second is shrill, sends a shiver down her spine and her fingers tighten on Roy’s shirt. It makes the hairs on her body stand tall, rocking her thin limbs in shivers. More erupt, some sounding so close she fears the creatures the sound emits from could snap and grasp her in its jaw from here.

“Coyotes,” her father rumbles, she can hear the smile in his voice.

They howl on and off, their presence so near. Feverish, she can feel it and knows there’s an untold but not inherently unused threat in animals that lurk just past the extension of the porch steps.

Despite the rolling cool air of September washing over Virginia, Haley is out in the backyard letting the sweater her mother had tucked around her fall off her shoulders. Jessica’s old overalls too short for her long legs, making them perfect for afternoons spent rummaging about in the dirt and grass. Her bare feet stomping against the cool grass as she runs, eager to just be. To feel the wind snap against her cheeks and the plush grass give under her feet.

Something rattles on the far edge of the yard, too far for her to see from where she is. It makes her pulse jump, but not pound as it does now in her little chest. A bird caged between ribs, beating its wings against her insides to make her stomach tighten with apprehension. It does not sing out, does not warn her of the danger she encroaches upon.

When she finds the live, snarling and snapping, creature ensnared in the fence but she’s not sure what it is. The sounds it makes, teeth barred but all mixed signals as it puts weight on its injured side and whimpers softly. Only to meet her every cautious move with a throaty growl but her curiosity is piqued and her ability to perceive the threat is diminished by it.

The animal, the size of a dog, snaps at her. Barring stark white teeth, sharp canines, covered in its own blood. It hunches low, pulled up on its front legs enough to distract her from the bangled sight of its left hind leg. To pretend to be every bit of a threat that it might be if not wounded. It moves too much and she cries out again, flinching when it whimpers as it falls limply back to the ground. Struggling to pull itself back up. The animal stills, laying on its side and heaving deep breathes.

That’s when she sees the blood.

She screams, oblivious to the ravens that take to the sky, black against the oranges of the sunset.

She’s played along this fence a thousand times, knows to not mess with it. The barbed wire won’t hurt her, Roy had struggled to explain this but she’d understood, in the end, that if she messed with it unnecessarily it could. Its intent is to keep the cows in the neighbor’s yard from wandering into theirs. She’d watched the cows brush up against the edges, scratching themselves against the edges that would tear through her pale, thin skin.

She’d touched the edges and, while they’re not inherently blade-like, she’d still marveled at how sharp they are. That was the end of it. But now she looks at the wounded animal at her mercy, succumbing to its fate be whatever it is. Sees the wire fence wrapped around the animal’s leg. The serrated flesh caused by the barbs and where the animal had been half-successful in chewing through its leg.

“Haley!” Roy runs to her, pulling her away from the animal but her eyes stay glued to it. The way it struggles to lift itself up to snap at the new threat, to bare its teeth and present itself as something it most certainly is not. Roy sighs when he speaks, placing his hands on his hips and shaking his head at the sight. “Nosing around where you shouldn’t have been,” Roy mumbles to it. He turns back to Haley, running the palm of his hand through his hair. “It’s just a coyote,” he explains, glancing back when the wounded animal falls back to the ground with a tired, pitiful snort.

“It’s hurt,” she says. She’s watching flies land on its back, moving over the blood. The wound is infected and the leg is useless. She knows what happens to lame animals. Feels the bird within her chest shake, beating against her lungs until they ache. “What are you going to do to it?” she asks but she already knows. Wild things aren’t tamed. They snip and bite no matter how you love them. She knows seeing the pink of the bones peeking through blood matted fur what her father will do but she’s blinded. She’s hopeful for this creature. Thinks of her kind father and the gentle way he bandages her wounds and knows he can save it. He can if he’ll only try

“Go back to the house,” Roy instructs

Haley shakes, “no.”

Roy turns around, caught off guard by the sudden conviction from his youngest daughter. The child that seems to follow him so blindly, her loyalty so deep it often scares him. But he remembers being her age, remembers looking at his father with that same look. Having curated this idea that he could save the world. It’s amazing to be on the receiving end of but it’s always a matter of time before every child learns the truth. That their fathers are just men. Horrible, awful men and feels a little light in him die. “Look away, Haley.”

She sees him reach for his belt, the belt he keeps on him while working outside. The only thing separating them from the creatures in the woods. She runs. Her feet hit the Earth hard and fast, screaming for her mother. Begging someone to see reason.

When the hammer strikes she falls as if the bullet has been lodged into her spine. Tears sting her eyes, pouring down her cheeks in rage, as she pulls herself back up. Her mother steps out onto the porch and Haley throws herself into her arms, sobbing and choking around the story. Missing details and so angry, so broken that he hadn’t even tried. Her father hadn’t even tried to help the coyote.

Her mother holds her, soothes her tears and they sit in the kitchen. Her sobs dissipating until she’s just hiccupping, face buried in her mother’s smooth skin. “Why didn’t he help the coyote?” she asks. Mothers always seem to hold the secrets of fathers and Haley knows this is no exception.

Her mother rubs her back, “sometimes, baby, no amount of help in the world can save something lost. Sometimes the only thing you can do is… mercy.” Her mother presses a kiss to her head, “daddy was showing the coyote mercy, Haley. That was compassionate. That was all he could do.”

She’d seen the blood on her father’s hands after he returned. Watched from the safe cocoon of her mother’s arms as he’d come in the kitchen door, letting it bang and clatter shut. “Daddy?” she hiccups. She presses closer to her mother, drowning out the memory of the snarl and hiss of the coyote with the sweet scents of her mother. Hoping the squeeze of her mother’s arms around her shaking body wrings her dry of the animal. “What did you do to him?”

Roy washes his hands, carefully working the blood off his skin and grunting to communicate he’s heard Haley but isn’t ready to respond. He doesn’t face his wife and child until he’s clean of it, the blood washed from his hands and from the sink. He dries his arms off slowly, taking his time to gather his response. Settling the back of his hips against the counter, crossing his arms over his chest, he looks at his daughter. Sees the tear tracks drying on her cheeks and that look in her eyes. He knows all too well the importance that will be placed on his next few words, sees the glint of a core memory forming.

She’ll base worth and sense off his next words.

He crouches down in front of her, taking one of her soft, small hands in his own. “What comes from the woods, must be returned.” All things must be returned. It’s why people are buried or singed to ash, to be turned back into the Earth. The way that Roy had dragged that Coyote as deep into the woods, as far he dared. Such is the way of nature, all things that are taken must be compensated for, and with his fingers curled into the cool main of that limp coyote, Roy had thought of his too curious daughter. Of the way she’d find herself back to that mangled heap of twisted fencing, staring at the animal's congealed blood. The curdled darkened crimson left on the cleared dirt. How long until she searched further? Sought to find better answers to questions she can’t form coherently with her tongue, little legs driving her to the trees.

They always talk back, the trees, and Roy had known what they’d say. Knew they’d beckoned her into their depths. He’d taken from the woods and they would take from him. With a sigh, Roy places the worn skin of his palm on Haley’s pale cheek. “I took him home,” he whispers. “Even wild things have homes.”

She’s fourteen when she meets a boy who moves like the coyotes that trot through the yard. The ones her father shakes his head at and tells her must be sick, they shouldn’t be out in the light like this. That familiar glint in his eyes, the impulsivity of what comes next is unknown to both but his shoulders flex. Long thin limbs waiting for her to move first, to establish if he’ll run or fight. Not the sort to turn his back to her. He’s looking at the crosshairs aimed at his chest and he knows any sudden movement will be his last.

She’s fourteen and found another wild creature she’s convinced she can change.

Sees that pink marrow, the dark crimson pooling and weaving through the tall grass. The fencing wrapped tightly around his lame limb, his dark eyes looking back at her and waiting to find what she’ll do next. If she’ll cut him free, withstanding his snarled bites until he falls limp with exhaustion and defeat. Heaving those panting breaths. She’ll wrap him in a blanket and drag him home. Shush his whimpers while she bandages his wounds.

She should have done what her father had and put a bullet in his head while it was still soon enough to call it mercy. Dragged his tired, broken body to the woods. Do as her father had instructed all those years before and return him to the woods. To his home because that is not her.

She’s seventeen, screaming for her father. Another mangled thing bleeding out in the field in their backyard, propped up against that old fencing. His blood soaks into the neck of his t-shirt, the material hardening, as he sits there panting. She’d seen him coming, his tall figure working its way through the woods. From her bedroom window, she’d waved at him, getting up to go greet him. When she runs out onto the porch she throws the light on, her beaming smile dying as she’d searched for him.

Roy tears through his backyard for his daughter trying to find the danger his mind buzzes with. He’s not surprised to find Aaron cradled to her chest, face a swell of wounds.

“What do I do?” she asks. She’s too old, knows better than to ask him to handle the matter. She knows what he does to wounded things and she knows he sees Aaron for what he is. He’s beyond saving but that’s a lesson she’ll have to learn on her own. That he’s no different than the coyote, in this very field, that had chewed through its skin. It would have taken its own leg off to escape the fence. How far into the woods would it have made it? On three legs, losing blood, and fighting an infection. How long until infection won out? Until something bigger, something stronger clamped teeth to its neck. Mercy. Not for the hunt but mercy.

Her father and Aaron lock eyes, just as that old coyote had before her father shot it. They share a wordless conversation and Roy turns away, taking with him that coveted mercy.

She’s too innocent.

She’s too hopeful.

There is no mercy in her love and she drags his aching, dying body up to her room. Looks past the infection set into his heart and corrupting his mind. She sees life in something dying so painfully slow, unable or unwilling to see desperation.

She brushes the back of his fingers against Aaron’s nose, watches his lips twitch as he slips into a fitful sleep. Lips falling and jaw relaxing under her touch until his breath ghosts over her cheek. He inches closer, making soft little noises. Wounded, punched sounds as he searches for something in his sleep. Finding it in her, wrapping his arms over her hips and pressing his face closer to her own.

She feels him relax in her hold and closes her eyes.

She’s taken something from the woods, knows this thing that aches so openly against her breast is not hers to have. It is simply a matter of time before the woods call him back. Before he slithers back to his tree and she’s left with the bitter mouthful of their actions. A sweet thing to undertake but soured as they lay with it.

He’s a wild thing she thinks she can tame. She can file down his teeth but it’ll be too late when he hurts her. He’s too big and she’s small and you just can’t change a man like him. He’s going to hurt her, kill her, and by the time he realizes what he’s done, it’ll be too late.

[kkeidawrites]

Her.

Her wings were tied to her back with a red wire. The smallest of movement the wire would sting her and her wings would go smaller. Cold iron is what the wire was laced in, a weakness she had the unfortunate to gain as well from her mother’s side of the family.

The cage that Alia was traveling in smelled like dried blood and it made Alia nauseous. It had only been a couple of hours since she was taken from her home and she prayed that Samuel had found Alucard in time.

Alia had seen these men before whenever she travelled into town to get food, they were hunters who searched for fairies and sprites. They take them back to their camps and use take away their wings to crush them into currency that is very valuable to the black market.

Flashback

After Alucard left, Alia tended to making dinner for her niece and nephew. It was a bit late to make a lot of food and she decided to give the both of them rice with broth and meat.

While she was preparing dinner, a glass had broke in another room and Alia rolled her eyes. Her niece was a curious little thing and liked to touch stuff that she knows she shouldn’t be touching.

“What was that?” She called out over her shoulder. Silence was all she received and Alia set down the small cut of meat on the counter to follow where she heard the sound.

“Desiana and Samuel, I asked you what that noise was, don’t ignore me-” she began to fuss but, once she entered her small living area her rant halted as her eyes widened.

Two men held up a sword to both her niece and nephew’s necks and the third man in the room sat in her lounge chair, fiddling with a dagger.

“Well, well it seems we have more than one fairy in the house, boys. Looks like our pay day has been tripled.” His eyes turned to look at Desiana and he grinned greedily.

“The younger they are, the more profitable their wings are.” His men chuckle darkly and Alia straightened her back. She needed to be careful about how she was going to approach this.

“Wait, you don’t want them.” Alia told him and the man turned to her with a raised eyebrow.

“And why’s that? They fairies too ain’t they?” He asked pointing the dagger at her relatives.

Alia quickly shook her head.

“No, they have goblin blood in them, they do not share the fairy blood like I do.” Alia says.

It was true, when her older brother married, his wife was half goblin and half slyph, her niece and nephew’s fairy heritage was too small of a chance for them to gain wings. Perhaps when they both grew older they would grow their wings then due to their slyph blood.

“I am the one you want, I have fairy blood.” She placed a hand on her chest and the man looked in her to see if she was fibbing.

“Prove it then.”

“What?”

“Prove that you are really a fairy and we’ll leave.” He tells Alia who stared at him in disbelief.

Sighing in annoyance, Alia closed her eyes in concentration and felt the power of her magic surge throughout her body. The sound of fluttering resonated in the room as her silver wings made their appearance.

Breathing out a sigh of relief, Alia’s eyes opened and suddenly she felt her lower body be seized and the feeling of being burned started around her arms and her wings. Cold iron. A fairy’s weakness, it was pretty difficult to find in this part of the country and it was very expensive. How did these guys get their hands on it?

Screaming out in pain, Alia fell to her knees and grunted as the wire squeezed her midsection tighter.

The man above her grinned darkly as he knelt in front of Alia, grabbing her hair and pulled her up to force her eyes to look up at him.

“Looks like we were in the right place then. Thank you for that demonstration, sweetheart” he releases her hair and Alia’s head laid back on the ground as the wire tightens again.

“We can go ahead and take our profits and get properly paid. Men! Bag her up! And make sure this place is searched for any other ‘treasures’.” His smirks widens as his men began to destroy her house.

Taking what they saw would be valuable and knock down anything that was in their way.

“What bout these two?” One of the two men who were still holding Desiana and Samuel, asked their leader.

The leader turned to look at the two children and scoffed.

“They’re nothing worth of value, get rid of ‘em.” He says and Alia’s eyes widened.

“No! Don’t hurt them!” She cries, as she moves to sit on her knees. The leader grabs the wire and pulls her to her feet and grabs the back of her head to make her grunt.

“Aunt Alia!” Samuel cried out as the man holding him held the knife closer to his neck.

“Run!” Alia yells with a whimper as the fist in her hair tightened.

“You said they had goblin and sylph blood. I don’t need them. You should have just kept your mouth shut, and maybe they would live.” He whispered to Alia and began guiding her out of her home as her niece and nephew screamed.

“You won’t get away with this!” Alia growls to the man then felt herself become airborne. She landed inside a wooden cage and watched as the gate closed with a heavy thunk.

The leader grins sickly at Alia and fixes the coat her wore on his shoulders.

“I believe I just did. Let’s load up and head out!” He whistles to his men who came rushing out of the house with large bags of valuables.

Alia watched in horror as her house was suddenly lit on fire. The screams of her niece and nephew made Alia lose a piece of her heart.

“No! Nooooo!” She screamed as she struggled in her binds. The jerk of the cage moving by the horses hooked up to it made Alia struggle harder.

“Samuel! Desiana! Nooo!” She cries as the burning of the wire sunk deeper into her midsection and her wings were separating.

Falling to her side, Alia felt pain on her body and also inside her heart. The sobs quickly left her lips as the heartbroken fairy was led away from her burning home.

She had lost everything. Her little niece and nephew. Her home. And she wouldn’t be able to see Adrian again and tell him how much she loved him.

‘Please Adrian. Please...help me.’ She thought sadly.

End of flashback

“Take her over there!” The leader of the posse that had taken her earlier yelled as she felt the cage she was in turn in a different direction.

“Make sure that the cage is locked nice and tight. I don’t want our little fairy to fly away.” He chuckles darkly at Alia’s passing cage.

The fairy glared angrily at the man and he grinned in return.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

With Alucard

The dhampir stood with his father in front of a mirror in the main gears room where the castle was able to be moved from place to place and Alucard watched anxiously as his father raised his hand to the mirror and the reflection shifted to show a camp.

Alucard was mesmerized by the large camp, how was this place not discovered by anyone?

“This is as far as the mirror will allow us to see,” Dracula turns to his son and Alucard drew closer to the mirror to see if he could spot Alia. So far, he had only seen creatures in chains and cages and a lot of humans guarding them.

“What is this?” Alucard asks and Dracula looks at the mirror once more.

“It seems to be a black market for supernatural beings. These camps have been stationed everywhere in the country. A posse that works on and off with the church.” Dracula clenched his fists at this.

He had seen these types of camps in his human years and each one were more brutal than the last. If the creatures they had hoarded did not live up to being worth any value they would destroy them then move on to the next one to see if they were the better choice.

“Alia!” Alucard’s cry for the woman’s name made his father’s focus return to the mirror.

The reflection showed the caged woman and Alucard’s face was almost smushed against the mirror to see the fairy’s deflated state.

Her body twitched and Alia’s body moved to the side to show her face. Her teeth were gritted and her beautiful hair was ruffled and it looked like someone had pulled on it.

Seeing the state she was in was all the information, Alucard needed as he adjusted his sword on his side and turned to his father with a scowl on his face.

“I’m going to get her out of there.”

“You cannot go alone.” Dracula told his son.

“She needs me!”

“There are too many men! You’ll be killed!”

“I don’t care!” Alucard yells at his father and Dracula took a step back in disbelief. His son had never talked to him this way.

“I won’t leave her alone! They’ll kill her and I refuse to lose her.” He tells his father and Dracula was at a loss of words.

“Adrian-”

“If this were mother you would be doing the same!” He continues and Dracula sighed placing a hand on his temple.

“I have told you before, Adrian. You cannot just go in the mirror head on without a plan. You’ll get yourself killed and I believe that you should bring someone with you.” Dracula said as he approached a door and grabbed the handle.

“And who would that be?” Alucard asked.

Dracula smirks at his son and opens the door as two people stepped into the room.

“I’m sure you are familiar with these two. It has been a while since you last seen them.” Dracula says as he steps back a bit to allow the two people to walk up to a shocked Alucard.

The one of the left placed a hand on their hip and a smirk lifted to their face.

“Don’t look so shocked, it just makes you look more like an ugly bastard.” They tease as the other pops their shoulder in discipline.

“Trevor, have some respect!” The smaller one fusses as the one and only Trevor Belmont scoffs.

“He knows it’s true Sypha, that’s why he still looks like that.” Alucard couldn’t believe his own eyes.

Trevor Belmont and Sypha Belnades were standing right here in front of him. His two traveling companions that had helped him in the past.

(A/N: I know this is not what Trevor and Sypha were originally in the game for but, since this is my story telling I decided to bend the tale just this one time.)

“What-How-” Alucard turned to his father and the older vampire smiles.

“I had contacted them to come by and thankfully they were in the town nearby to help you.” Dracula said.

“But, how-”

“Who cares about how we got here? What’s the problem?” Trevor interrupts as both Sypha and Alucard glare at him.

“I see you haven’t changed a bit, Belmont.” Alucard banters and turns back to the mirror which showed Alia’s twitching body.

“I need to help my...” Alucard didn’t know how explain his relationship with Alia and he cleared his throat.

“The woman in the mirror needs my help,” he moves to the side and allowed his friends to look in the reflection to see Alia as well.

“Is she...a fae?” Sypha asked in disbelief. Her eyes were mesmerized by her silver wings.

“Half fae, yes.”

“What’s so special about her?” Trevor asks and Alucard glares at him again.

“She was taken by the men from this camp and they plan to use her to sell her to the black market. I cannot allow that to happen.” Alucard says as he stares longingly at Alia’s defeated body.

Trevor and Sypha saw the look Alucard gave the woman and gave each a knowing look.

“Well, if you say she’s important then I supposed we have no choice.” Trevor says as he cracks his neck.

“We would be honored to help you again, Alucard.” Sypha told the golden haired man with a smile.

Alucard smiled at the both of them and nodded in thanks.

“So, how do we proceed?” Sypha asked.

“We leave by nightfall but, we need a plan on how to get her out without causing too much revealing of ourselves.” Alucard says.

“I believe I may have a suggestion.” A new voice spoke up and the four turned to the door to see Lisa there with her hands on her hips and a smile on her lips.

End of Part 6

1// 2// 3// 4// 5// 6// 7// 8// Bonus!!

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Here’s part 6! Sorry for the long wait I have been trying to find time to write this chapter and I finally sat down and did it so please enjoy and like, comment, and reblog and make sure to check out my other stories!

[defenderrosetyler]

Always With You

Banner done by me; Pics are not mine

Word Count: Over 3.5k

Beta and some content added by @flamencodiva​

THIS FIC IS ANGSTY! There are death mentions, as well as well as alcohol intake. If you don’t like this or it triggers you, please turn away now! There are also spoilers for the 15x20 SPN Series Finale. Now, here are your tissues. Away we go!

It was just supposed to be a simple hunt. A simple hunt to kill some vampires. Y/N had been off doing her own hunts for a while after she’d gotten a call from the Winchester brothers that, after what had seemed like a long time coming, Chuck was defeated.  With the defeat of the vengeful god, it made Jack the new God and allowed him to restore the world from the devastation that he had caused with the removal of the whole universe, besides Y/N, Sam, and Dean. Then there had been the beautiful golden retriever Miracle as Dean had so named him. 

Y/N had met the Winchester Brothers during a routine werewolf hunt. It was just her luck that they were on the same case. A werewolf had been terrorizing a small town and killing innocent people, brushing it off as a bear attack. With the werewolf case solved, as it usually did, with all three of their brains working together to help save people and hunt things, the family business for Sam and Dean Winchester, and now for Y/N too. After working with the brothers and feeling a sense of family, she never wanted to hunt alone ever again.

This victory they celebrated after dealing with the vengeful god was finally over. All three of them had met back at the bunker and opened up a beer, and Dean smiled as he looked over at his younger brother and Y/N. 

“To all those we lost and saved,” Dean says, holding out his beer to Sam. Sam let out a chuckle, clinking his beer glass with his brothers, and allowed Y/N to clink hers as well. 

Like the brothers, Y/N had lost other people when she first started her hunting career. She had someone like Bobby for her, one who helped her with the lore she’d been unfamiliar with and ways to defeat them. She was still a novice hunter until she met Sam and Dean approximately 6 months ago, she found herself drawn towards Dean, but she didn’t tell him how she felt. Not right away anyway. Maybe this was her chance to tell Dean how she felt? No, she was still too much of a coward. 

Sam left the war room after their celebratory toast. Y/N and Dean both knew he had to work on contacting Eileen Lehey. Eileen and Sam always had a soft spot for one another, and the pair realized they were meant for each other. 

Dean cleared his throat as he looked over at Y/N, sipping whiskey from the glass he held in his hand. “What will you do now?”

Y/N sighed as she set down her glass, shaking her head. “I don’t know. I may head back home.” She says. 

Dean’s body slumped down a little at the thought of her leaving. She’d been gone when Billie had been in the bunker. When Cas had vanished, and she didn’t even know he was gone. Castiel had saved and healed Y/N on more than one occasion. This was more than Dean would have liked, but he knew it was bound to happen in their line of work. 

“I haven’t seen Castiel around, have you?” She added, finishing her bottle of orange hard soda.

Dean frowned and sighed, clearing his throat. He had to tell her, didn’t he? As he opened his mouth to speak, Y/N’s laughter rang out when Miracle had entered the War Room and jumped into her lap. Dean wasn’t about to ruin her happiness now. This is all he wanted for her. True he didn’t have his chance at an ‘Apple Pie’ life as he called it with someone special like Sam had with Eileen, but this was definitely something he wanted for Y/N. A chance to get out. 

Several weeks passed in the bunker, and a routine kicked in. All three of them would work on handling Miracle. They took turns feeding him, walking him, those types of tasks. Y/N found herself most afternoons curled up on one of the plush chairs in the Men of Letters library, catching up on some reading. Not knowing much of the Men of Letters, but she knew this was a hunters haven and something that was part of Sam and Dean’s history? She wanted to know more. 

This was one thing Dean loved about Y/N. Her intuitive nature and the way she wanted to fill her brain with as much knowledge as possible. It seemed to make her like Sam, a bookworm, but he didn’t mind. Dean found that attractive about her. 

As Sam came in from his run early one afternoon, he was looking at his laptop, brows furrowed as he read a news story he found.

“Sam? What is it?” Y/N asks as looking over at him as she walks in carrying a plate of Chinese. 

The aroma filled the room of mushroom and chicken with zucchini. It was a healthier choice than the other dishes that were available, which Dean teased her about on occasion. Y/N was a health nut like Sam. She’d been more focused on her physical appearance, but that was beside the point. 

“Well, I think I just found a case,” he said.  

Sam appeared to be in a state of shock at the randomness of the case after the amount of time between the defeat of Chuck and now. 

All three of them gathered into the impala, heading over to a small town that was holding a pie festival. Y/N shook her head as she saw the face of the elder Winchester light up. “Dean, are you sure about this?” Sam asks, giving his brother a skeptical look, raising his eyebrow as Dean nods. Clearly, you can’t keep the elder Winchester away from him and his obsession with pie.

A few minutes later, all three companions sat together on a bench. Y/N, as much as she wanted some pie, knew she could share with Dean, who had returned with an entire box full. It was like he’d grabbed every single slice that was offered. Sam had his own slice on a plate, but let out a deep, resented sigh. 

“Oh god, don’t give that sigh.” Y/N says giving Sam an objectifying look. This made Sam glance over at her, feeling confused. Apparently Dean heard it too. 

“That….That’s sad Sam sigh.” Dean tries to explain further, causing Sam to shake his head. Clearly it was a face of denial. 

“I’m not sad, okay? Just got a lot on my mind ya know?” He says. Sam knew what had happened to Castiel but wasn’t sure if Dean had told Y/N. This wasn’t Sam’s responsibility to tell her what happened that night in the bunker with Billie. Dean glanced over at his brother, and instantly knew what was on his mind. 

Both brothers seemed distracted and Y/N couldn’t figure out why. To lighten up the mood, she grabbed a small plate of pies with a whipped cream topping and moved to shove their faces into the dessert. A light giggle left her lips as she watched the shocked expressions of Sam and Dean as they attempted to comprehend what just happened. 

“Did she just..?” Sam says, a look of shock and awe etched on his face. Dean used his finger to clean the whipped topping off his nose. 

“Okay, I feel better now,” she giggled. They all needed a good laugh, given the mood they all seemed in since discovering the case. 

While the trio researched the case, a family was turning in for the night after the events of the festival, and the day overall. Mother kissed her children goodnight, as did the father. As the kids were headed upstairs to finish their evening routine, the father stopped at the doorway, seeing a shadow in the window, Followed by a knock at their front door. When he opened the door, he had a confused look on his face as there was no one there.

“Lyle?” The woman asks her husband, a worried expression on her face. 

“It's probably nothing,” Lyle shrugged, “just some kids….” His words are cut off as a machete sliced through his spine, cutting him in half. Lyle’s wife shrieked. Seeing this, the boys ran upstairs quickly to hide from the invader. Their mother isn’t far behind them. However, she was soon backed into a corner, unable to run or hide. Her children watched as their mother collapsed to the floor, dead. The echo of a boy shrieking filled the night. 

The following morning, Sam and Dean approached the house surrounded by yellow police tape and introduced themselves to the officer as Y/N examined the property. 

“Hold up, Feds, look into murder cases now?” The officer asks, raising an eyebrow at Sam and Dean, who’d introduced themselves as Kripkie, Singer, and Y/N as Agent Lemming.

Dean nodded, “Couldn’t help overhearing on the wire that one of the victims had its blood drained, right?”

The officer sighed and nodded, “Oh yeah, blood gone, puncture marks, it was really disgusting, and I’ve seen my fair share of murder cases.”

“The Mom?” Sam asks.

“Her body’s upstairs, but her tongue was cut off.”

“The kids were taken too,” Y/N says. “Were there any witnesses who can pin a description on who may have taken the kids?”

A female officer approached with a sketch pad and showed the trio the composite of the kidnapper/murderer. The photo shows a man with a skeleton mask. The officer excused herself, as did the Sergeant, leaving the trio nodding, thanking them for their time. 

The trio loaded themselves into the impala; Sam appeared to be racking his brain for something that connected the clues. “I know that face. I just can’t put my finger on it,” Sam sighed, irritated. Dean pulled the Impala under a tree off the main road. He knew what his younger brother was trying to remember. 

Y/N had the patriarch, John Winchester's journal, in her hands and froze when she saw the sketch inside the journal's contents. Dean blinked as if remembering the case.

“The kidnappings of ‘77!” They both said together

“According to the journal, he didn’t find much. But this is a common denominator between the two cases now,” Y/N says looking between them. “The blood was drained, tongues removed….I think we’re dealing with mimes.”

“Mimes or vampires,” Sam says.

“Vamp-mimes,” Dean says, attempting to merge the names together, earning a skeptical look from Y/N. “Son of a bitch.” 

“So, what do we do?” Y/N asks. 

“If these cases are a copycat of Dad’s old case, we need to head over to Canton,” Sam says. “We need to look for families that live outside city limits, around the age of 5-10 years old.

“Okay, so we need to look over the population of Canton and see who fits the bill,” Y/N says as they all climbed into the Impala, setting themself to get to work.  

They had followed the vampires over to an abandoned barn, Sam declining Deans wanting to use a throwing star, he gave it a huge resounding no, but Y/N managed to sneak it into her arsenal before they walked in. Inside it was dark and dreary. Being confronted by a vampire they met several years ago was a surprise for them, but the ambush, was a whole different surprise.

Y/N issued the two young boys back to the safety of the impala as the fighting began inside. Dean and Sam used their machete’s to chop the heads off each skeleton masked vampire. Y/N was knocked down to the ground, Sam rushing to her aid as he chopped its head off. Meanwhile on the other side of the barn, Dean was pushed into a pole, unseen till he felt it, had a metal rebar. 

Seeing Dean struggling, Y/N rushed over to chop its head off and watched it fall to the ground.

“Okay, I think that’s all of them,” Y/N panted, “Sam, go check on the kids would you please?”

Sam nods and heads to check on the two younger boys they had managed to save. Y/N looked at Dean and wondered why he wasn’t moving. They’d won, they could go home, and celebrate over some leftover pie from the festival. 

“Dean?” She asks “Come on, Sam’s gonna need help with the kids.”

A sad smile appeared on Dean’s face, he was clearly struggling. “I don’t….I don’t think I’m going anywhere.” 

“What?” Y/N breathed confused but she already had an idea about what happened. 

“There's something in my...Something in my back. It feels like it's right through me.” Dean rasped. Y/N walked to stand in front of him now, reaching around to his back and more tears welled in her eyes as she looked at him. Shaking her head, fighting the tears. She wasn’t about to cry in front of Dean.

“We-We can call for Cas, Cas can heal you!” Y/N pleaded. Praying for Castiel, praying that her angelic friend would be able to appear in a ruffle of his feathers and save Dean like he always did. Heaven rules or not.

“Don’t move me, Y/N/N, this thing is actually holding me together right now,” Dean says trying to put on a smile for her. Y/N moved to leave him, intent on calling for Sam for help or at least gathering the first aid kit she’d ensured was in the Impala at all times, in instances where Castiel’s healing ability wasn’t at their disposal to use. “Just-just come back and stay with me please?”

Y/N wasn’t about to let Dean be alone. He’d been there for her so many times, now it was her turn. “Okay, okay.” She nodded trying to compose herself. “Sam’s off taking care of the boys right now, we’re all gonna go deliver them to their families. Deal?” She suggested

“No,” Dean says, shaking his head, “no Y/N/N. I’m not going to be leaving with you and Sam. I mean, this is how I always told Sam that this is how I was going to go out. On a hunt, doing what we do, saving people and hunting things.” 

“Dean, for the love of God stop it!” She snapped, the tears now fully falling down her cheeks. “I’m going to get you out of here alive if it's the last thing I do!!”

“It's been a hell of a ride Y/N/N.” As hurt and as injured as he was, he gave her a stern look. “No deals, you and Sam are not bringing me back. We all know how deals turned out for us. Just, let me talk for a minute okay?” He asks. Causing Y/N to nod only and bite back her tears. “Remember, remember the day we met at the pool house? You were at the bar and uh…”

“You and Sam were playing pool,” Y/N chimed in to help him. 

Dean nodded. “You had busted my ass at pool, only because I let you, then you proved me wrong on the hunt that we’d done, saved my ass for the first time.” Dean chuckled sadly before coughing. 

“I don’t want you to go…..” Y/N sobbed, looking at him. “I can’t do this without you.” 

“I’m so proud of you, Y/N/N,” Dean says, “Besides, I’m never gonna leave you,” he whispered moving his hand to her heart, Y/N placing her hand over his. Gripping it tight as she possibly can without hurting him.  “Can you do me a favor?” Dean adds. 

“Anything,” she says instantly 

“Tell me it's okay to let go?” Dean asks. This makes Y/N finally let the waterfall of her tears fall down, resting her head against his. Chest heaving as she struggled to breathe. Where was Castiel? Why wasn’t he or Jack here yet? This was the one thing she refused to do. 

“Y/N/N, please?” Dean was practically begging on his final breaths. Y/N gathered her composure and nodded. A sniffle filled the air as Y/C/E met his emerald green ones. 

All Y/N can do is sob. “I’ll let Sam know you said goodbye.”

A single tear fell down Dean’s cheek. “I’ll always love you Y/N/N, I always have. Just been too afraid to say it.” Dean says struggling, on his last breaths. 

Y/N sighed and moved her hand to place it over Dean’s heart. She leaned in, pressing her lips to his, soft at first before dean deepened it. His tongue clashing with hers as they shared their first and last kiss., Pulling away, Y/N bit her lip, trying to suppress the sob that threatened to escape. Her heart shattered into a million pieces as she placed his hand over her heart. “I love you too,” she whispered, “It's okay Dean,” she paused to find her voice, “You can go,” she whispered. 

Dean took his last breath, his hand slowly dropping from Y/N’s chest where he had it over her heart.  Y/N kept her hand on his heart till it wasn’t beating anymore. She let out a scream of rage, sobbing at the loss of the one man she loved. Collapsing onto the floor, all hope abandoning her.. 

Upon entering heaven, Cas and Dean were reunited. As much as it pained Y/N and Sam to do it, surrounded by family and friends they’d known throughout the years as hunters, they gave Dean a hunter's funeral. Y/N watched the flames, holding back the need to jump on the pyre with him and meet him in Jack’s new heaven she is sure he’d have built. In order to numb the pain, after the funeral, one night as Sam slept, Y/N slipped out, heading off to find another hunt. 

Hunting seemed to help her not think Dean was gone, but then came the nights where she heard his voice in her head. Telling her to stop, slow down, and take a rest. One evening, after she’d been up for almost three days straight, Y/N decided to give in to her exhaustion and take a soothing bath. 

While in the tub, Y/N had opted to numb more of the pain she felt, by drinking Dean’s favorite whisky.  God she missed him, missed the way he flirted, missed how they would sing at the top of their lungs to annoy Sam. She just wanted him back.  As she continued to drink, the exhaustion mixed with the effects of the alcohol started to sink in. Her mind began to drift off, eyes fighting to stay open until they closed, her body sunk into the tub, head submerged, until she was engulfed by the water. 

The next morning, Sam went to check on her. He hadn’t heard from her in a few days and tracked her down to her motel room. At first, he thought maybe she was sleeping and tried calling her cell while banging on the door. That usually resulted in Sam meeting the end of the barrel of her gun. But after a few minutes, his heart began to pound with worry. Kicking the door down, he called out her name frantically, until he reached the bathroom. His heart stopped, torn at the scene before him. He let out a cry, both angry and sad at his fallen friend. Angry because she had left him alone, she was all he had left, and sad because he knew he didn’t do enough to help. 

With a heavy heart called 911, and a second hunter's funeral was planned. 

Y/N opened her eyes and looked around herself. The sky shone brightly, her skin feeling it’s warmth. She wasn’t sure where she was, but she could feel a familiar presence behind her. Taking a deep breath, she slowly turned around to see a familiar place she called home. 

Harvelle's 

The sign welcomed her and as she walked closer to it, she felt her heart warm to see the familiar mentor who had helped her long before she met Sam and Dean. 

“You’re an Idjit for doing all those hunts back to back you know,” her mentor huffed, putting the beer bottle to his lips and taking a drink. 

“Yeah,” she sighed, “but at least I saved people doing it, Bobby.” 

Bobby let out a huff, smiling gently at her, “He’s in there if you’re wondering.” 

Y/N nodded, making her way towards the door. Her hands shook as she placed her palm on the wood, and pushed it open. 

The bar was filled with laughter and music. As she looked around she saw familiar faces, faces of the people she had loved and lost along the way. They were drinking and dancing, music filling the air around them. As she continued farther in, the voices seemed to fade away as the man she was looking for stood at the bar, elbows leaning on the top as he offered her a cocky smile.  

“I’ve been waiting for you sweetheart,” he says with a chuckle. “Now, about that kiss.”

Tags: 

 @simsadventures​​ @mummybear​ @impala-dreamer​ @holylulusworld​ @snffbeebee​ @saxxxology @akshi8278​​ ​ @deansmyapplepie   @luci-in-trenchcoats @samskia-writes @winchester-fantasies​​ @talesmaniac89​​ @stusbunker​​ @idreamofplaid​ @cherrypiebbyblog​​ @cleighwrites​​ @jxackles​​ @flamencodiva​​ @wonder-cole​​ @msmarvelouswinchester​​ @downanddirtydean​​ @janicho88​​ @lacednleathered​​

[fikazephyr]

“You may have to fight a battle more than once to win it.”

― Margaret Thatcher

𝐚𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐬 :: the view from a high rise overlooking a city, the sound of ice clinking against glass, the feeling after a really good shower, living frugally despite having the means for luxury, orders made under a pseudonym, bloodied knuckles and poorly suppressed rage, a feather tipping the scales, an earth-shattering sob, a smile that could light the skies

𝐡𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐲 :: james hall was born a very lucky little boy indeed. his parents, james and renee hall, were salem natives that ran a successful farm. one could say they were the picture of a happy couple, and the couple became a gleeful trio with the birth of their tiger shifter. three years after the birth of their baby boy, renee came home with a new addition: james’ new brother david. the family led a picture perfect existence of the typical hallmark, cookie cutter life. 

perhaps it was the lack of incentive that pushed a young james hall into delinquency in early adolescence. there was no rhyme or reason to his misbehavior, and it was further motivated by his above average intelligence. he never had to go to class to pass his exams. his grades never slipped, and so his parents never interfered. they were happy so long as their boys were safe. some may call it bad parenting, neglectful eyes, any choice from the myriad of commentary made about children whose parents never truly interfere. 

his issue never caused grief. a teenaged james would stay out partying with people much older than him, but would always come home at the end of the night. if he didn’t, he let his parents know he was staying with a friend. he never left them out of the loop, and he was above all else a family man. he still is, intensely so. his life revolved around his loved ones, even when he wasn’t around to show it. he was the definition of bad boy with a heart of gold, always doing what his mother needed, always there to love and support his brother, always willing to lend dad a hand around the house. he lived a good first half. 

unfortunately not all fairytales have happy endings. it started in the blink of an eye, the fire. mere hours before, they had been celebrating a birthday in the backyard. they had been happy. a happy family. james only remembers flashes of what happened. waking up to his parents screaming at him to get david out of the house. the cracking of wood in the pressure of blazing heat. the feeling of every drop of blood in his body reaching the temperature of the flames around him. the firefighters holding him back from running in for his parents. the way his voice cracked in a half-sob, half-scream to them. MOM! DAD! LET GO OF ME, I HAVE TO HELP THEM! MOM! holding his brother as they both cried, his roars feeling louder than the flames consuming their childhood home. 

he’s never known a grief that stabs deeper. he’s never let himself. soon after the fire, the boys were sent to live with family in texas. james, having just turned 18, thought it would be best to get his younger brother out of salem. they left, james’ best friend in tow, and didn’t look back for years. the earliest years were the hardest, mentally and physically. james had already been struggling with substance use, and he feel further down the hole when they settled into dallas. his casual use of marijuana and alcohol became habits, which turned into experimenting in the party scenes. he had always been a functional junkie, masking it well from others. it never changed. he finished school and sped through college, earning a doctorate degree in half the time it would take a normal person. college was a cocaine-fueled hurricane of accomplishments, driven by the fact that he felt the need to take care of his brother even more. 

just like most things in his life, his plan to take care of his brother until he needed him ended prematurely when david enlisted in the military. james was no longer needed. who would want to be around the asshole that killed his own parents? the fire department stated it had been faulty wiring, but the blaze had happened in the middle of the dry season. james never had gotten over his habit of poorly putting out blunts. the guilt followed him well into his adulthood, pushing him deeper in the arms of addiction. and much like these continuous patterns in his life, something good followed the bad. a diversion from the pain that never ceased to appear. 

he broke into fame over night. the details of how it happened are fuzzy. it was probably another drug fueled adventure that wound up in something a little more permanent. before he knew what exactly was going on, he had a manager, a production team, and a new spot in the limelight. grateful for the distraction, he fell into the life of a hollywood star. he had homes all over america, and was constantly booked, making new music, doing tours. eventually, he lost touch with himself. eventually...he almost killed himself. he almost became the blooming star that died before their 30s, with a cacophony of possible killers to blame. he left the industry without so much as a goodbye to the music world. nobody knows exactly what it is that happened to the superstar.

now, three years later, james lives in an apartment in willow glenn. he had decided he needed to face his past--- thought, he still hasn’t really done that. he’s spent most of his time back in salem indoors, at home, at aa, or at work, and never officially told anyone of his return. he’s lived off of mobile delivery apps and skipping meals when they don’t feel necessary. he isn’t aware of what’s going on in town because he never leaves his apartment for very long, especially not for a week long celebration. 

𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫 :: pinterest, spotify

[hopelikethemoon]

The Aftermath (Javier x Reader) {MTMF}

Title: The Aftermath  Rating: PG-13 Length: 4000 Warnings: Pregnancy Complications (Ecelempsia, Seizures, lots and lots of medical discussions in this one)  Notes: You can find the Maybe Today, Maybe Forever Timeline here. Set June 1997. This is a really heavy chapter, ya’ll. As always I will assure you that things will be okay. But if you are at all triggered by pregnancy complications, discussion of seizures, medical discussions, or the effects of not being able to breast feed you might want to just skim.  Summary: Javier grapples with the complications around Sofia’s birth.

Taglist:  @grapemama  @seawhisperer @huliabitch @pedropascalito @rogrsnbarnes @thewallpapergoesorido @twomoonstwosuns @gooddaykate @livasaurasrex @ham4arrow @hiscyarika @plexflexico @readsalot73 @hdlynn @lokiaddicted @randomness501 @fioccodineveautunnale  @roxypeanut @just-add-butter @snivellusim @amarvelousmandalorian @lukesrighthand @historynerd04 @mrsparknuts @synystersilenceinblacknwhite @behindmyeyes-insidemyhead @exrebelshocktrooper @awesomefandomsunited​ @ah-callie​ @swhiskeys​ @lady-tano​ @beskar-droids​ @space-floozy @cable-kenobi​ @longitud-de-onda​ @cool-ultra-nerd​ @himbopoes​ @findhimfives @pedrosdoll​ @seeking-a-great--perhaps​ @frietiemeloen​ @arrowswithwifi​ @random066​

“You’ve got to hold it together, Javi.” Chucho told Javier, his fingers curling around his shoulder tightly. “You’ve got Josie and Sofía. They need their father.”

“She needs me too.” Javier hissed out, jerking his shoulder out from his father’s grasp. He knew what his father was trying to remind him. He didn’t want to lash out at him, but fuck. How was he supposed to think about the girls in a context where they wouldn’t have their mother? He couldn’t let those thoughts get to him.

He raked his fingers through his hair, before he rose to his feet. “Where the fuck is the doctor?”

“She’s gonna be okay, Javi.” Steve assured him, looking up at him from where he was sitting. “When has she ever let something like this bullshit get the best of her?”

Javier swallowed thickly, stopping mid-pace. “After all the shit she’s been through…” He really wanted to punch something. But he couldn’t really risk breaking his fucking hand. That wasn’t going to help with his guilt. Fuck. There was so much guilt. So much of the shit that she went through in Colombia had been his fault. 

And the stress. The goddamn stress was all his fault. She wouldn’t be laid up in the hospital if he hadn’t pushed a stressful situation onto her. He should’ve left the DEA shit alone. Somehow he’d managed to fuck up the birth of their second child. God, if he lost her....

The waiting room door opened slowly, a doctor appearing in the doorway. “Mr. Peña?” Javier couldn’t tell if the doctor had grim news or if the son of a bastard was born with that dourer expression.  

Steve stood up, clapping Javier on the shoulder. “We’re here for you.” He said something else, but Javier wasn’t entirely certain what it was. Everything seemed to focus in on the doctor who was waiting for him. Steve and Chucho felt like they were at the far end of a tunnel, the distance obscuring their voices. 

Javier waited for the waiting room door to close behind him before he spoke, “How is she? Can I see her?”

“She’s stable.” The doctor told him calmly, guiding him across the hall to a private room. He’d seen families come out of that same room with bad news. He truly felt like he was going to be sick. 

The doctor waited for Javier to sit, before he continued. “We have her sedated currently. Once we get her settled into her new room, I can take you down to sit with her.” 

He swallowed thickly. “Are we out of the woods?”

The doctor shook his head. “Not yet. Despite our best efforts, there were complications. She suffered a mild seizure, which was to be expected given her condition. Fortunately, the CT scan didn’t show any damage from the episode. We’ll get her scheduled for a MRI and prepped for a PET scan in the coming days.” He offered Javier a sympathetic smile. “As much as I’d love to send the three of you home tomorrow, we’re going to need to keep her for observation for a few more days.” 

Javier nodded slowly, trying to process everything the doctor had just told him. So many scans and the potential for something being wrong. Really wrong. “I just want her to come home.”

“She’s a fighter, Mr. Peña.”

“I know she is.” A brief smile spread over his lips. “She’s fucking incredible.”

“And we’re going to make sure she goes home.” The doctor promised him. “We’ve already started her on some hydralazine intravenously. It’s already started getting her blood pressure under control.” 

“Good.” 

“After she’s released she’s going to have to monitor the hypertension. She’ll be prescribed medicine to help stabilize it, but she won’t be able to breastfeed.”

Javier nodded slowly. At least the doctor was talking about the after. Going home. That sounded positive. 

“Have you been down to the nursery to see your daughter?”

“No.” He rubbed at his forehead. “My pops went to see her.” Everything had been perfect. 

Sofía was gorgeous. 

They let him cut the umbilical cord. They let him be such an active participant in their daughter’s birth. Everything had been going in the right direction. 

But she didn’t look right. 

She was exhausted, which was understandable, but her coloring was all wrong. She looked weak. 

And then the seizure. 

Javier wasn’t sure if he’d ever be able to get that memory out of his head. It was worse than watching her bleed out on the ground. 

It had been maybe three hours. Maybe five. 

He hadn’t seen either of them since. 

“When do you think I’ll be able to sit with her?”

The doctor’s brows furrowed as he stared at him. “Here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to call down to the nursery and have them bring your daughter up to her room. That might be good for the three of you.”

Javier swallowed thickly and nodded. “Alright.”

“I’ll have a nurse come and get you from the waiting room.”

“Thank you.”

 ——

 It was another two hours before the nurse came to get him. 

Steve had gone home to help Connie with the girls and Chucho looked worn out, he wasn’t easily convinced to leave. Eventually, Javier won out because Stevie needed to be let out and he knew Monica had work. 

It felt wrong to care about anything outside of the hospital, but he knew she’d kill him if anything happened to that damned dog. 

But then the nurse came and he was ushered to her room. The floor was eerily quiet — it was after visiting hours, but the doctor had made special arrangements just for him. Even in the worst situation of his life, at least the hospital was treating him like he belonged. 

She looked awful. Hooked up to machines and monitors. Wires running from her hands, little censors stuck to her temples. 

“We’ve started decreasing her sedatives,” The nurse explained to him. “We’re still waiting for the doctor to look at her MRI—“ That must’ve been why it took so long. “But everything is looking really good, Mr. Peña.” 

The nurse gestured to the burgundy vinyl-covered reclining chair in the corner of the room. “We brought this in for you. In case you wanted to stay.”

“I do.” 

Javier looked away from her then, his eyes drawn to the bassinet Sofía was in. He knew he had to focus on her as well. She needed him just as much as her mother did. 

“When was the last time she ate?” He asked the nurse, moving towards the bassinet to pick up the swaddled infant. She cooed softly as she woke up and his heart melted. “It’s alright, daddy’s got you.” He whispered as he cradled her against his chest. 

“Half hour ago.” The nurse smiled. “Do you have other children, Mr. Peña?”

He nodded. “We have another daughter. She just turned four.”

“What a fun age.” She gestured towards Sofía. “If you need any help or if anything happens, there’s a call button on the bed. You’ll get one of us on the floor in here.”

“Thank you.”

Javier kept Sofía cradled against his chest as he moved towards the hospital bed. It broke his fucking heart to see her like this. There was nothing peaceful about being sedated. He had seen peaceful sleep on her and this wasn’t it. 

“You’ve got to wake up for us, baby.” He said gently as he gingerly curled his fingers around her unresponsive hand. “I don’t think you really got to see how beautiful Sofía is. She’s perfect just like her mother.” Javier looked between the two of them. “She reminds me so much of Josie at this age. She’s so little.” 

Javier sniffed quietly, trying not to cry. But he’d been holding it in for hours now. And there was a lump of emotion wedged in the back of his throat. Raw and painful. How was he expected not to cry when the love of his life was fighting for her life? 

He settled Sofía back down in the bassinet, before pulling the rolling stool over to her bedside. “This better be the last time I have to see you laid up like this, baby. I fucking hate it.” He took her hand again, rubbing his thumb over the back of her knuckles. “We’re not doing this again. We’ve got two daughters. We don’t need any more kids.” He lifted her hand up as he leaned over to kiss the back of her hand. “I’ll get the snip tomorrow, if it means never putting you in this position again.” 

Some machine beeped, making Javier jump a little. He glanced up, brows furrowed as he studied the monitors beside her. “They told me they’re decreasing the sedatives they have you on. I think that means you’re going to wake up soon.” Javier told her, squeezing her hand. “I wish I knew if you could hear me.” He rubbed his thumb over the back of her hand. 

Javier stood up, leaning over the bed so he could press a kiss to her forehead, his fingers tenderly brushing over her cheek. “You did such an amazing job delivering her, baby. I’m in awe of you. Your strength.” He let his nose brush over her forehead as he sighed. 

He studied her face, hoping to see some flicker of alertness. He knew she was going to wake up — she had to. But he wanted to talk to her now. It had been hours. He’d lost track of the time. 

“I’m so sorry, baby. This is all my fault.” He raked his fingers through his hair as he sank back on the stool. “I set all of this into motion. I should’ve known better, starting this shit while you were pregnant…” He shook his head. 

Javier pressed his face into his hands, letting the tears finally fall. It had been such an emotional day. The elation of seeing his daughter born, giving way to the fear of losing the woman he loved. 

The reality of the social worker meeting with him. Going over what his role as her POA meant, ensuring he understood what wishes she had made known in the document. His father had listened, because he hadn’t. He had been in shock. 

He couldn’t lose her. He’d lose his fucking mind if he went home to a house that didn’t have her in it. 

And it would be his fault. 

Sofía started fussing in her bassinet and Javier went to pick her up. “Are you hungry, sweetheart?” He questioned as he looked down at her. She had the longest lashes he’d ever seen on a baby. A nose just like her mother. 

Javier hit the help button on her bed, waiting for a nurse to turn up so he could tell them Sofía needed formula. 

He sat on the rolling stool beside her bed, feeding Sofía and talking to them both. He told his daughter all about how brave her mother was, how good she was. How much he hoped both of his children ended up like their mother. She was far too good for him.

Javier went through the bag of clothes she’d brought with her to go home. Not tomorrow. Not like they had planned. 

“There it is.” He smiled as he saw the stuffed dog that Josie had made certain she had with her. “Baby, if you wake up I’ll get you another dog. I know how much you love having Stevie.” 

He moved back over to the bed. Javier lifted her hand up and tucked the toy into her palm. “Josie wanted to make sure you had this, baby. It’s Bruno.” 

Her fingers twitched faintly and he swore his heart skipped a beat. 

“I’m right here.” He curled his hand around hers, rubbing his thumb over the back of her hand. “I love you, baby. Just rest, okay?” 

Her fingers twitched again, coupled with her lashes fluttering. 

“Hey.” Javier whispered, staring at her face. Looking for a sign that she was waking up. Three short squeezes, weak but there. 

“I love you too, baby.” He smiled, leaning down to press a kiss to her forehead. “I’m right here with you. I’m not going anywhere.” 

Her lips parted, inhaling shakily. “W-where is she?” Her voice was hoarse, barely recognisable as her own. 

“She’s sleeping.” Javier brushed his thumb over her cheek. “Do you want to see her?”

“Yeah.” She mumbled, her eyes still closed. “Feel weird.”

“You’ve been through hell the last few hours.” Javier said as he reluctantly left her bedside to pick up Sofía. “She’s beautiful.” He told her as he walked back over to the bedside, brows furrowed as he looked down at her. “You gotta open your eyes, baby.”

“Just wanna... hold her.” She said wearily. 

Javier frowned when she just laid there motionlessly. She was still clearly under the effects of the sedative. 

“I’m just gonna lay her on your chest, okay baby?” 

“Yeah.” 

He carefully maneuvered Sofía, keeping a hand on her back as he laid her against her chest. Sofía opened her eyes, cooing quietly as her little fingers grabbed at the hospital gown beneath her. “That’s your mommy, baby girl.” He whispered. 

“I’m so tired.” She whispered, her lashes fluttered a faint glimpse of her eyes before they fell closed again. 

Javier reached out and took her hand, lifting it up gently to hold it against Sofía’s back. “Do you think you can hold her?” 

Her fingers twitched as she flexed them, spreading them out across her little back. “She’s tiny.” 

“Two ounces smaller than Josie.” He smiled at her as her eyes opened, though they were still heavy and groggy. “You did so good, baby.” 

“Did I?” She blinked slowly, her eyes very unfocused as she looked at him. Her fingers moved again, weakly brushing over the blanket Sofía was wrapped in. “Javi…”

“I’m right here, baby.” 

“Take her. I don’t want to drop her.”

“Whatever you want, baby.” Javier leaned over the bed to scoop their daughter up, moving to put Sofía back in her bassinet. He stared down at her, fingers brushing over her cheek as she blinked slowly before falling back to sleep. He remembered how much Josie slept the night after she went home that first night. 

“I feel weird.”

He turned back to look at the bed, “Do you want me to call for the nurse.” Javier was already at her bedside, primed to press the call button. 

“They’ll give me more…” She gestured vaguely to her IV. “Wanna stay awake.” 

“You need to rest, baby.” He insisted, reaching out to cup her cheek. “But I don’t want them to sedate you again either. I missed your eyes.” 

She laughed quietly, sinking back into her pillow. “My eyes?” 

Javier nodded slowly. “Yeah. I was afraid you’d never open them again.” 

“And leave you to raise two daughters?” A weak smirk quirked at the corners of her lips. 

“I wouldn’t be able to cope without you.” 

She raised a brow, even as her eyes flickered closed. “Calm down, Romeo.” 

“Really?”

“Really.” She turned her head towards him and grinned as she opened her eyes slowly. She looked down then, picking up the stuffed dog that was still laying in her bed. “Was Josie here?”

“No.” Javier frowned. “She gave it to you to pack, remember?” 

“Right.” She said distantly as she sat the toy back down. 

“Do you not remember that?”

“Everything is a little hazy,” She admitted, reaching up to touch the nasal cannula in her nose. “I fucking hate this shit.”

“Oxygen is good for you.” 

She rolled her eyes. 

“There’s the woman I know and love.” 

“I’d flip you off but....” She taunted, staring at him a little harder then. “You look like shit.”  

“It’s been a fucking awful day, baby.” Javier pushed his fingers through his hair. “But they gave me this hideous chair over there to sleep in.” 

“You should sleep.”

“Don’t worry about me.” He shook his head. “This is about you. You’re the one who scared the shit out of me.” 

“Sorry.” She reached out and curled her fingers around his where they were curled around the side of her bed. 

“Why the hell are you apologizing?”

She shrugged, “I dunno.”

“Well, don’t.” He leaned over and pressed a kiss to her forehead. “I’m gonna get the nurse, alright? I think they were waiting for results. MRI? CT scan. One of them.” 

“Did someone let Stevie out?” 

Javier shook his head incredulously, “Yeah, pops went to stay with her.” 

“Good.” She smiled up at him. “I feel worse than I did when I got shot.” 

“You had a seizure.” 

“I did?” Her brows drew together, confusion marring her features. 

Javier nodded. “Is everything hazy?”

She lowered her gaze, picking at a piece of fuzz on her blanket. “Yeah. Tell them not to give me whatever they’re giving me. I feel really weird.” 

“You just have to stay calm. Okay?” Javier reminded her, reaching you press the button to call for the nurse. “That’s the key thing. Okay? If you keep your blood pressure down you’ll get to go home.”

“Home sounds nice.” She smiled at him, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes. 

Javier glanced at the door as it opened, “She woke up.”

The nurse beamed, “That’s great news, Mr. Peña.” She looked towards the hospital bed then, “How are you feeling?”

“As bad as he looks.” She quipped, looking at him as she reached for his hand. 

He squeezed her hand. “Nurse, she’s having… not memory loss, exactly but… confusion? Is that the medicine?”

The nurse checked her vitals before putting them up on the whiteboard across from the bed. “That may just be the sedation, but there is always the chance that she may also be experiencing side effects from the seizure. The doctor will discuss the postictal phase when he comes down.” 

She looked towards the hospital bed then, “Let’s do a little memory test, shall we?” She tapped the dry erase marker against the board. “Do you know what your daughter’s name is?” 

“Joséfina Peña.” She answered and the nurse frowned. 

“Our older daughter,” Javier explained.

The nurse nodded and wrote the name out on the board. 

“She has an accent above the ‘e’.” She corrected the nurse. “And it’s ‘f’ not ‘ph’.” 

“Do you know your newborn’s name?”

“Sofía.” She rubbed her lips together slowly. “With an ‘f’ and an accent over the ‘i’.” She looked towards Javier there. “We named her after Javi’s mother.” 

“Do you know what day it is?”

She shook her head. “I think… I came in on the thirtieth.”

“Thirty-first.” Javier squeezed her hand, before glancing back at the nurse. 

“It’s June second.” She supplied. 

“Shit.” 

“It’s okay, baby.” 

“When was she born?”

“The first.” 

She laughed quietly. “May first and June first.” 

“Easy to remember.” Javier leaned down and kissed her forehead. “You’re doing so good.” 

“Do you have any pets?” The nurse questioned. 

“A dog. Stevie Nicks.” 

“Very good.” The nurse wrote the names up on the whiteboard before making a big square around ‘PLANS FOR TODAY’. “It looks like the doctor still wants you to get that PET scan today. Once we get that over with you are one step closer to going home. We’ve just got to keep that blood pressure down.”

“How is it?” Javier questioned. 

“Good. Still a little high, but nowhere near as high as it was when she came in.” 

Sofía started crying and she sat up quickly, looking towards the bassinet. “She needs food. She sounds just like Josie when she was hungry.” 

“I know.” Javier cradled her to his chest, but he wasn’t giving her what she wanted. 

The nurse looked a little anxious. “Now, due to the medicine you’re currently on you’re not going to be able to breastfeed for a little while, okay?” 

“Oh.” She sank back against the pillows, “Can I… is there formula?” She questioned, looking around the room. 

“I can get that.” The nurse excused herself from the room then. 

“I know this fucking sucks.” Javier offered as he passed Sofía to her mother. She seemed stronger now, able to hold her without his assistance. “It’s not at all how we planned it…”

“It never is.” She said quietly as she looked down at Sofía, brushing her fingertips against her forehead. “She’s so little. Is she smaller than Josie was?”

“She is.” Javier rested his hand against hers. “She looks so much like her big sister.” 

“I’m sorry.” She glanced up at him. “I know this isn’t… this isn’t what you wanted.” 

“Hey, hey. No.” He reached out and brushed away the stray tear that slid down her cheek. “None of that, baby. No. All I care about is the two of you being healthy. You could’ve given birth in the back of our car and I’d still be the happiest man alive.” 

She inhaled raggedly, fresh tears spilling down her cheeks. “Can you take her?” 

“Of course.” Javier cradled the back of her head as he picked Sofía back up, rocking her gently in his arms. “Baby, please don’t cry. I really don’t fucking care about anything except you, okay?” 

“I’m leaking.” She admitted, covering her face ashamedly. “My baby is crying, my breasts are leaking, and I can’t fucking feed her!” 

“It’s not your fault.”

“It is.” She crossed her arms across her chest, trying to hide the damp spots forming. 

The monitor beside the bed started beeping and the nurse appeared seconds later with the formula and a look of concern. “What’s going on?”

“I can’t feed my baby.”

Javier’s heart felt like it was being torn out of his chest. 

“I’m going to need you to calm down.” The nurse said lightly as she passed the formula off to Javier. “You can still feed your baby with the bottle, okay? But I’m going to need you to calm down, otherwise I’m going to have to sedate you again.” 

“Please don’t.” She whispered, hastily wiping away her tears. “Please. I don’t want to feel like that again. Please don’t sedate me.” 

“Are you going to calm down?” 

Javier kinda wanted to yell at the nurse for the vague condescending tone she was speaking to her with. But that wasn’t going to do anyone any good. “Her breasts… are leaking.” He told the nurse, trying to intercede for her. “Can you get her a fucking pump or something? Please.” 

The nurse just glared at him, before she backed down. “That’s probably a good idea.” 

Sofía started crying louder, which only seemed to make the dark stain on her mother’s hospital gown grow darker. “Shh. Sweetheart, your mommy’s going to help you. Okay?” 

How would he have done this without her? How could he handle Josie and Sofía on his own? The mere thought made him want to join in with his girls and sob his fucking heart out. 

Once again he helped her take her daughter into her arms, nestled safely against her chest. He passed her the formula, watching as she brought the bottle to her lips and waited for her to latch on to it.

Javier sank down onto the rolling stool, head in his hands while she fed Sofía. He was so fucking tired and so fucking tired of feeling helpless. 

If his father and Steve hadn’t been there with him… he would’ve lost his fucking mind. He couldn’t imagine dealing with this in Colombia. There was no way in hell he would’ve been able to go back to the DEA and work, knowing she was incapacitated. She was a fucking fighter and it made him want pull the world apart knowing that she was hurting. There was nothing he could do. The decision he had made had gotten them into this situation. 

It was all his fucking fault. 

[tanoraqui]

I blame @professorsparklepants for encouraging me and @words-writ-in-starlight for innocently happening to think/reblog about the same crossover on the same night, pushing me over the edge. Also my unwillingness to work on long-term projects.

If Wei Ying hadn’t been in Yiling, and the Witch’s mountain hadn’t been exactly on the way from there back to Yunmeng, Jiang Fengmian would almost certainly not have stopped there. There were any number of ways to deal with the fact that the boy was, apparently, more his mother’s son than his father’s - water-breathing potions, air-filled chambers...

But there he was and there she was, and there was no harm in asking what a price might be. He could always walk back down the mountain empty-handed (except for the half-Merrow half-Daoine Sidhe six-year-old clutching his left hand.)

He knocked politely. There was no answer. He’d raised his hand to knock again when the door opened abruptly in the hand of a young woman wearing little more than underclothes, a wave of dark hair held back with a piece of painter’s tape. Her eyes were dark green and they darkened near to black when they landed on Wei Ying. 

“Where did you get that child?” she demanded.

“I found him,” he said, caught off-guard. Then he remembered his manners, and bowed from the waist. “Baoshan Sanren.” (One didn’t call her “Witch to her face.) “I am Jiang Fengmian, ruler of the Lotus Kingdom of the Undersea. I’ve come to ask - ”

“I know who you are, Jiang Fengmian.” In her voice, the words were a threat. “I want to know what happened to the child’s parents.

Before they’d started up the Witch’s mountain, Jiang Fengmian had impressed upon Wei Ying the importance of being quiet and polite and not drawing attention. Though the boy was clearly boisterously friendly by nature, life on the streets had also taught him how to behave otherwise, and he was now so quiet that it was almost worrying. Or perhaps it was the effort of the climb, and the daunting aura of the Witch.

Nonetheless, Jiang Fengmian tugged him forward. “This is Wei Ying. His parents, Wei Changze and Cangse Sanren...” The Witch’s hard stare made it difficult to skirt as usual with formal words. “They stopped their dancing, several years ago. I only just found Wei Ying.”

For a split second, Baoshan Sanren leaned on the doorframe like she needed the support, eyes as dark as a seal’s. Jiang Fengmian very abruptly remembered that Cangse, among her multitude of astonishing stories and incredible adventures, had once or twice alluded to not just knowing but living with this terrifying woman. This almost-certainly-a-Firstborn, though no two accounts agreed on whom her descendants might be.

His grip on Wei Ying’s hand tightened involuntarily.

Then it was gone; her back was straight and her eyes seaglass-green, and she turned as she said, “Well, you might as well come in. I don’t like to make deals on the doorstep.”

From the outside, the Witch’s house looked like a one-room hovel. From the inside, it looked much the same: cramped, dimly lit, cluttered with everything from teacups to fishing wire. The wooden floor was soft in a way that suggested mold, though the strongest scent was saltwater. If there was furniture, it wasn’t visible, aside from a small stove and single cupboard above it.

Wei Ying failed to conceal a murmur of appreciation as he stepped side to side on the squishy floor, shyness giving way to fascination. His gaze, and Jiang Fengmian’s, followed Baoshan Sanren as she retrieved three cups from the cupboard, filled them with leaves from her pockets and hot water from a pot on the stove, and presented them, somehow, all with two hands.

“You’ll want tea.” It wasn’t a question.

“You’re most gracious,” Jiang Fengmian murmured as he accepted a cup (instead, of course, of “thank you.”) Wei Ying dropped his hand to copy him, looking as excited about the tea as the squishable floor.

“So,” said Baoshan Sanren, “what do you want, King of the Lotuses? You’re clearly not here to introduce me to Cangse’s son.”

“Wei Ying is Cangse’s son,” he said, carefully, “in that he didn’t inherit his father’s ability to transform as a Merrow. I’d like to take him home, raise him with my own children, and I was wondering if you might know a way for him to...”

“Breathe?” she said drily. “You know there are common potions for that.”

“The brightest Tylweth Tyg in Gusu hasn’t alchemized anything that will last longer than a day,” he admitted. “And palace rooms with air...” His wife would hate that, it would be an infinite series of fights, and moreover, the ghosts of two of his best friends pushed at him. “Could you do something safer? More guaranteed?”

She made a neutral humming noise, and knelt down to Wei Ying’s height. “And you? What do you think of this?”

“I’d like to go with Uncle Jiang, please!” Wei Ying bounced on his heels, teacup in both hands and a bright smile on his face. “I’ll have a brother and a sister, and learn to use a trident, and instead of dogs, there’s octopi!”

If the Witch could be said to smile fondly, then that was almost certainly what she did. Jiang Fengmian pretended not to notice. 

“I need to taste some of your blood,” she said.

Jiang Fengmian made a noise of protest, but Wei Ying simply tilted his head in confused acquiescence. “Okay?” 

He looked around for a moment, visibly unsure what to do with his (already empty) cup, before setting it on the floor with a smile. Then, barely flinching, he bit his thumb hard enough to break the skin and held it out to the Witch.

“Is this good?”

Jiang Fengmian let out a breath. Right. Cangse Sanren had been the best bloodworker he’d ever met. He’d once seen her slice open her own wrist and use what spilled out to bind a dragon - a small dragon, but a dragon nonetheless. What tragically little Wei Ying remembered of his parents could easily include blood.

Baoshan Sanren swiped the blood off his finger and licked her own finger. “Yeah, that’ll do.” 

“I can arrange for the boy to breathe and swim and all the rest,” she said, standing, “as well as any Merrow, until he chooses not to. In return...two things.” She held up two fingers, and lowered one. “One, for as long as your bloodline rules the Lotus Kingdom, the Roane will be as welcome and safe in its borders as your own family.”

“The Roane?” Jiang Fengmian blinked. “Why - ”

“I’m giving you a price, not explaining it,” she snapped. “You’ll welcome the Roane, and listen to them if you’ve any sense, though that’s not part of my price.”

“I...understand the price being offered,” he said carefully. “The second element?”

She poked him in the chest with the force of a crashing wave. “I won’t ask the impossible - shut up about your family motto - but so long as that boy lives under your roof, you will do your utmost to make sure he knows that he’s loved.”

Jiang Fengmian relaxed. Ziyuan might be...neutral, was his hope, but he, at least, already loved Wei Ying simply for the sake of his parents - and he was a charming boy. A-Cheng and A-Li would take to him just fine, and no doubt the rest of the court would follow. And the Roane...he already tried to run a peaceful kingdom, for all the Undersea’s baseline of violence. It wouldn’t be any trouble to offer succor to a few seers.

“I accept your terms,” he said formally.

“Great.” Her smile was a shark’s, literally, and a shiver of power ran down his spine. It felt like the awareness of a weapon about to strike, when it was far too late to dodge.

She pulled a knife from her pocket and a somehow clean-looking from what might, beneath several layers, be a small table. “Now, I’ll need some blood.”

“What for?” asked Wei Ying, clearly feeling that some sort of tension had broken and he could speak again.

“You’re going to drink it,” said Baoshan Sanren.

Wei Ying hummed contemplatively, far too unconcerned for an average child.

So Jiang Fengmian let the Witch slice open his palm and collect a generous portion of blood - and then she took he teacup Wei Ying still held, long-since empty, and tossed it to the side, and beckoned him toward a door that hadn’t been beside the stove a moment ago.

“Come on, let’s get you changed - not you.” She pointed at Jiang Fengmian again. “You stay here. Sit wherever you want, this might take a while.”

“But - ”

“You wanted results, not a show,” she snapped. “They’re his secrets, not yours.”

Wei Ying looked back and forth between them, then took a few quick steps toward the Witch while smiling back at Jiang Fengmian. 

“I don’t mind!” he insisted. “I’ll just drink some blood, and then I’ll be able to swim?”

It came out as more of a question than he’d clearly intended, but Baoshan Sanren snorted. 

“You might still need to learn that. But you’ll have the chance.”

And she took him by the hand and led him through a door that couldn’t possibly lead to the Summerlands, there was no sign of it at all, no sense in the air...but where else could they be going? (Jiang Fengmian didn’t get a chance to see before the door closed behind them.)

What passed then was perhaps the most stressful twenty-three of Jiang Fengmian’s long life, and he had waited through the births of two children. He’d been looking for this child for two years, since hearing word of his friends’ deaths; he’d spent nearly as much time on land as in the water. He couldn’t lose him so soon - 

He heard the distant scream of a child in agonizing, unendurable pain, and his hand hovered over the knob to the door by the stove - still there, at least; not disappeared like some illusion. But he stopped himself. He had, after all, made a bargain with the Witch, and just because only stories said she’d once been of the Sea didn’t mean she couldn’t still wreak bloody vengeance on any of it who crossed her. 

He forced himself back, and not long after that, she emerged. Wei Ying was soaking wet and asleep in her arms - seemingly too big to carry for a relatively small woman, but she didn’t falter a moment as she passed him to Jiang Fengmian.

“He’s just exhausted,” she said, as Jiang Fengmian hurriedly adjusted his grip to check the boy’s pulse. “He needs rest and food, probably meat. He’s about three-fourths Merrow, now, so...you know your own diet.”

“I appreciate your help,”he said, instead of thank you, much less how?

“You’ll remember your promises.” It wasn’t a question and it wasn’t even quite a threat. Her eyes were as dark as the drowning deeps and that was the sort of place Jiang Fengmian had grown up, and now ruled, but it wasn’t at all comforting.

“I will.”

She nodded, and opened the door with a wave of her hand. “Now get the hell out of my house.”