#even in their adulthood their patrols through the edges of the trees and further up

[impossible-rat-babies]

realistically eyrie would only be a leatherworker and an alchemist, but the sirensong of having all the crafters is Very Tempting

[spiderman-homecomeme]

i’ll never feel you (if i don’t tell you)

🎄The Twelve Days of Promptmas🎄 - Day Eight

For @amyabbotts​ on your birthday, bb!! I hope you’ve had an amazing day!!! <3

dialogue:  “Oh come on, don’t get your tinsel in a tangle!”  

❆❆❆

i. 

It’s strange.

With how long Peter’s been Spider-Man—give or take six years—one would think that he’d be a little better at not getting distracted so easily. 

But when it’s things that remind him of the people he loves, well, he can’t really help it. 

He nearly misses his next swing, just barely grazing rough side of a building, when he sees the twinkling lights of the Christmas tree in the window of the coffee shop they’d frequent in high school. MJ’s favorite, of course, and that’s immediately where his mind had swan-dived into. Memories are funny like that. Even the simplest reminder and it suddenly all comes flooding back. 

The late night study sessions. 

The after-school hang-outs. 

Peter’s filled with such an overwhelming sense of nostalgia, his chest tightening, that he finds himself pulling his phone out and dialing her number without a second thought. 

It rings three or four times—he’s not sure—before the croaky, confused voice of his best friend greets him. 

“Hello?” She asks, her voice raw with sleep. 

“Hey! MJ!” Peter says enthusiastically, smile impossibly widening underneath his mask. 

There’s shuffling on the other end, no doubt her settling back into her bed. “What do you want?” 

Even though there’s a healthy dollop of annoyance in her tone, the sound only makes him grin. He’s always kind of liked it. 

“Oh come on, don’t get your tinsel in a tangle!”

She does not seem amused.

“Just swung past the Living Room, and uh—” He finds himself suddenly getting nervous, not quite sure as to how this is going to sound to her. “—Just… Thought about you. Wanted to call and say hi,” he sputters out, grimacing as he almost misses another swing. 

He perches on the edge of a nearby building. 

“At one in the morning?” 

Peter nearly falls off his spot as he pulls his phone back to look at the time. “Oh, shit—” He huffs out a painfully nervous laugh. “I’m sorry. I—I had no idea… what time it was.” 

“Clearly,” MJ quips dryly. 

“Sorry I woke you,” Peter says after a beat, reaching up to scratch the back of his neck. 

It’s silent for a moment before MJ lets out a soft sigh. “It’s okay,” she replies, exhausted, but there’s a warmth in her voice that’s enough to make his chest feel like it’s at least two sizes too small for his heart. It’s been so long, too long, since they’ve talked, and it suddenly hits him—a punch right to the gut—how much he just misses her. 

“So the Living Room, huh?”

“Yup,” he says as his grin widens again, his thumb tapping lightly against his thigh. “I was in the neighborhood and, uh, I saw that they had their tree up. In the window.”

“Oh,” Michelle breathes. “Cool. I haven’t been there in forever.”

“Really?” He finds himself asking, somewhat surprised that she could go so long without her favorite cup of London Fog in the entire world. “I mean, I haven’t either, but like, the amount of times we hung out there,” he huffs in amusement. “How much you spent on tea there.”

“I haven’t had a chance,” MJ laughs. “God, I miss that place.”

“You’re still in New York, Em,” Peter laughs under his breath. “You can go there anytime.”

“I know, but—” She pauses, and he can hear her shift around on her bed, a certain hesitance and vulnerability in her tone. “—It’s… It’s not the same…” Her words trail into a faint cough. “You know?”

It’s not the same without you.

Peter nods, though he remembers that she can’t see him. “Yeah. Yeah. I get that.” 

And he does. It’s the same reason he hasn’t been back. He tried once, in the beginning of freshman year, but it left him without that warm, cozy feeling he always got when he was with MJ. 

“We should—” Peter catches himself talking before he has time to think. “We should go there! Sometime… soon.”

He can almost hear the sleepy smile on MJ’s face. “Yeah, we should. That’d be fun.” 

“Yeah,” Peter replies dumbly, his voice strangely breathy. “Well, uh... I’ll let you get back to sleep. Lemme know when you’re free.”

She laughs sleepily into the phone. “Ooookay. Night loser.”

He knows if it weren’t for his mask, or her being on the other end of the phone, she could see the way his cheeks are dusted pink. 

“Night.”

His smile never fades as he swings all the way home.

ii. 

MJ’s fingers tap against her thigh as she has the world’s longest staring contest with her phone. It’s a dumb idea, she knows it is. In fact, it doesn’t even need to be an idea in the first place. Peter’s quite literally one of her best friends in the entire world. She doesn’t need to have a reason to want to call him so late at night. It’s a friend thing, what friends do sometimes. 

And yet…

It’s stupid, she thinks. This is how high school MJ would have acted at the idea of calling the boy of her dreams, Peter—not college MJ. College MJ is smarter than this. College MJ is over her tiny little crush on her best friend. For the love of God herself, they had coffee together just last weekend. Things are great. 

College MJ has a date next Thursday. 

A date that is cute and relatively nice. A date that seems normal, no superpowers in sight or secret identities to protect. 

A date that doesn’t really get her heart racing or face warming. Yeah, sure, he doesn’t really make her feel all fuzzy and gooey inside, but this is different. It’s not puppy-love. This is what adulthood is like. This is doggy-love.

Wait, no—

Fuck it. 

Before she can talk herself out of it, she’s tapping the little green call button next to his name, phone snapping to her ears as her legs bounce. 

It only rings twice before Peter’s answering. 

“MJ! Hi!” His cheery voice makes her smile on instinct. “What’s up?”

His voice strains slightly, and she can hear the wind whipping wildly around him, and she knows instantly what he’s doing. 

She almost can’t catch her breath before she starts talking. “Just, uh—” She pauses, wracking her brain for whatever bullshit reason she’d decided on before calling. “Wanted to say hi,” she finally gets out, wincing immediately at how nervous she sounds already. “You know.”

Peter lets out a faint laugh, one that makes her stomach flip involuntarily. “Oh. Well, hi to you, too.”

There’s something to his voice that always feels like a nice hug to her. It always has. Even as she’s grown out of her crush for him. 

“I, uh—” She swallows, laughing quietly to herself. “I also had a question. About… the homework.” Her voice fails her for a moment as she scrambles to think of what class it is that they have together. “In psych.” 

The wind on the other end stops, and she knows that Peter’s probably hanging or perched on someone’s roof. “Psych?” He asks. She can almost hear the confused scrunch of his brows. 

It’s definitely bullshit. She’s already done the homework. And odds are, Peter’s completely forgotten about it. He’s the one who’s usually calling her in a panic at nearly one in the morning the night before. Not her. 

“Yeah—” She replies, not confident in the slightest. “What was—what was the assignment? Again?” Her voice grows impossibly high at the end, and she wonders how long it’ll take him to see right through her lie. 

“MJ, do you really think I know what the assignment is?” The amusement in his voice somehow eases her nerves. Only a little bit. 

She laughs, shaking her head. “It—it was worth a shot, I guess.”

The wheels in his head are turning, she can hear, as a quiet falls between them, and she can almost see the the thoughtful expression on his face. 

“Uh…” Michelle shifts, her free hand toying with the strings of her hoodie. Her bottom lip caught between her teeth, she rifles aimlessly through her backpack, grabbing her Psych folder and fabricating some I’m-totally-looking-through-the-syllabus noises. “Found it,” she says after a beat. “It’s the questions at the end of chapter six. About Piaget.” 

“Ah, right. Right.” Peter hums. “Cool. Wait—so you haven’t done it yet?” 

Shit.

Shit shit shit.

“I mean—uh…” For some reason—she’s lying, that’s the reason—she can’t get any words out at all. Any knowledge of the English language has all but left her mind, packed it’s bags and ventured out into the world. 

“—’Cause… I could come over right now. And we could do it—the… the homework… together?” 

There’s an edge to his voice that she only faintly recognizes. It causes her pulse to quicken, her hands to sweat. 

And it also reminds her that yes, she’s already done the assignment. Is she going to tell him that?

Probably not.

Is she about to redo a whole-ass assignment that she’s already done? 

Probably.

“Yeah,” She breathes out, unable to stop herself. “That’d be good. That’d be cool.” 

“Cool.” Again, she can hear the smile in his voice. “Be there in fifteen?”

It’s almost impossible to get her heart under control, but she somehow manages. “Sounds good. I’ll probably—” She flinches, waffling. “—I’ll probably get a head start on it—on the reading. If that’s okay.” 

“Wooooooow,” Peter draws out, and she can’t help but laugh. “Fine…” He relents jokingly. “See you soon.”

“See ya.”

And with that, MJ hangs up, her entire body slumping onto her bed as she smacks herself on the forehead. If anything, this phone call is only further proof that she still has some “getting over” to do. Even though she thought—nay, she was confident—that she was safe from feelings, it’s still managed to come back and bite her in the ass. 

As she stares at her phone, at his contact picture, she can only think of how screwed she’s going to be if she keeps this up. She holds the phone to her chest, eyes squeezing shut as she lets out a long sigh. 

Fuck. 

iii. 

There’s a reason that Peter hasn’t gotten a new phone since high school. 

Well, there’s a lot of reasons; one, being the amount of times he drops the damn thing while out on patrol, or how many times he lands on it on the rare occasion when he’s getting his ass handed to him by some bad guy. The cracks on the screen have gotten so out of hand—weblike in appearance—he almost wouldn’t be able to read anything if it weren’t for his enhanced vision. 

Two, phones are expensive, and the last time Peter checked his bank account, he almost cried. 

And three… well… There’s definitely some sentiment with the old thing. There’s a bond that only comes with dropping it nearly ten stories onto the concrete, only for it to survive. That phone’s been with him since sophomore year. It still has a home button at the bottom—one that stopped working months ago. And besides, Peter doesn’t want to go through the whole process of learning how to work a new phone. 

He’s like an old grandpa, set in his ways, angry at the newfangled technology of the world. 

But then, after one fall too many… After realizing that he couldn’t hear anyone who called him…

Peter had known. 

It was time. 

The new phone is nice enough. One of the older models of the iPhone, so it still has that home button he loves clicking so much. It’s not so much different from his android; while he may act like a sixty-nine year-old-man, he’s still young enough to figure out new tech pretty easily. 

But if he could stop butt dialing people for maybe two seconds, that would be ideal. 

He picks up on the quiet voice almost immediately, sitting up in his bed, every muscle in his body on edge, ready for an intruder, before he realizes who it is. 

“Peter?” 

He scrambles, finding his phone under a folded over part of the blanket, seeing that he’s been on a call with MJ for at least a minute. 

God dammit. 

“Shit,” Peter curses under his breath, yanking the phone up and putting it to his ear. “Hey! Sorry. I—uh… I didn’t mean to call.”

“Butt dial?” He can hear the amusement in her tired voice, even at nearly two in the morning. 

Peter snorts nervously. “One might even call it a booty call.” He blanches almost as soon as the words leave his mouth, he coughs, covering behind a solid, almost dad-like throat clear. “I… did not just say that. Let’s pretend I didn’t say that.”

“Oh, no, you definitely did,” MJ teases, a shakiness to her words that he thinks sounds like laughter. “Is this a booty call?” 

He hates that he can’t really tell whether or not she’s joking, that there’s a smidgen of hope in his whole-chest that she’s genuinely asking, that maybe this will lead to something else tonight. 

But he doesn’t want to risk anything at all. 

“No!” He quickly says, feeling his face turn a deep shade of red, burning impossibly hot. “No, of course—of course not.”

It’s quiet on the other end for more than a few seconds. There’s a sinking feeling in Peter’s gut that he’s really said the wrong thing, for some reason. 

“Good,” Michelle finally replies. “I literally just had a date tonight and I dunno if that’d be fair to him,” she adds with a short laugh. 

Peter freezes in place, his heart plummeting into his stomach. 

A date?

“You—you had a date?” He finds himself asking before his brain can catch up. 

“Uh-huh,” Michelle replies simply, not elaborating. 

Peter swallows, his mind racing at more than a mile a minute. “Who with?”

“Some guy from my philosophy class,” she replies, nonchalance in her tone, and he can almost hear her shrug. “His name’s Harry. He’s…” She pauses for a moment. “He’s cool.”

“Oh,” Peter breathes, nodding, though he feels as though his vision has doubled. “How… How’d it go?”

“Really well, actually,” she says, shifting on her own bed—he assumes, he hopes. “We went to this really neat cafe by Rockefeller, then we went and looked at all the Christmas lights after. It was nice.” 

“Great!” Peter forces with a little too much enthusiasm. He clears his throat, almost as if to push his heart back down into his chest. “Did you…” He doesn’t know how to ask this next part, or why he’s even considering it. It’s none of his business. 

But he can’t help it. 

“Is he over there right now? Or—” He laughs lightly. “Are you at his place?”

MJ snorts. “No. I didn’t sleep with him.”

Peter hates how relieved he is. 

“Yet.”

And how quickly the relief turns back into existential dread. 

“How come?” Peter asks suddenly, then proceeding to kick himself for not having a better control over his dumb brain. 

Michelle lets out a weird laugh, nervous even. “I mean—I didn’t want to? I don’t know.” 

“Yeah. Yeah. Totally. I get that,” Peter rushes to spit out. He takes a moment, collecting himself. While there’s something strong tugging in his gut, something twisting and pulling, he wants to be happy for his friend—he should be happy. This is great. For her! 

But there doesn’t seem to be anything he can do about the bile rising in his tightening throat. 

“That’s… That’s awesome, though.” 

There’s silence on the other end. 

Two beats pass. 

“Yeah,” MJ replies finally. 

And it feels odd. They stay up most of the night talking, but it’s almost like there’s this unspoken thing between the two of them—all centered around that faceless guy named Harry. Every topic somehow reminds Peter of his best friend’s magical date—his words, not hers. Everything always goes back to that. 

And he doesn’t want to know anything more. 

But he keeps asking questions, hating each answer more and more. 

Their goodbyes are short, yet drawn out too long, as if the other is waiting for them to say something, anything.

But neither of them do. 

And at this point, it seems like neither of them ever will.

iv. 

Michelle’s not sure what time it is when she steps back into her apartment. Moonlight slips through the cracks in the curtains. She’s greeted by pitch black as she nudges the door shut with her foot, her hand fumbling on the wall as she feels for the light switch and clicks it on. 

It’s in the same state she left it in; spaghetti dinner for two still set on the kitchen table, the candles at the center cold and unlit. She hadn’t had time to clean up after the call, not taking a moment to put anything away before grabbing her coat and running out the door. 

Of course, she’d made sure to let Harry know—though it’s not like it mattered really. He’d already accidentally made plans with his friends tonight anyway, completely forgetting about their date. 

It’s fine though.

He’d told her he was sorry, to call when she heard more, etc. 

Yeah, sure, he didn’t go with her to the hospital, but again. It’s fine. 

He would’ve just been in the way. 

There’s an ache in her chest and back as she kicks off her shoes, her movements almost zombie like as she limps over to the couch and slumps down on it. Her eyes are burned dry, the lump in her throat from earlier never having left. 

It had been five long hours sitting in the emergency room with her parents, almost five and a half since her dad had first called. When it had started to seem more and more like an overnight stay, both her parents had sent her home, promising that it would all be okay. 

And while she does believe them, it still hurts. 

Her phone buzzing in her pocket startles her, and she looks down, seeing Peter’s name lighting up her screen. 

And just at that sight, she feels the faintest warmth growing in her chest. 

“Hey, Pete,” she says softly, curling up into the couch. 

“Hey!” He says, his tone filled with cautious positivity. A beat passes before he says anything else. He sounds as if he’s bouncing off the walls with questions. “How’d it go? Did you make it home alright?”

“Yeah…” She trails off, sighing shakily. “Yeah. I did. Thanks—” She pauses, swallowing. “I, uh—actually just got home, so I was—I was about to call you.” 

“Good, good. Don’t uh—don’t worry about it.” He huffs out a gentle laugh. “How’s your mom?”

“She’s doing a lot better,” MJ replies honestly. “They’re keeping her overnight but everyone’s really… really optimistic. She’s coming home tomorrow.” 

“That’s great,” Peter replies, the warmth and smile in his voice making her close her eyes. “I was… I was actually wanting to know if you wanted me to come over or something? Just as a distraction.” 

Her brows furrow slightly. Peter was supposed to be on a mission, doing Avengers stuff in Philly. “Uh… Aren’t you… Stopping some mass arms deal with Cap? Or something like that?” 

Peter stammers for a moment. “Yeah, I mean. I was… But I… I talked to Sam and Bucky about it and uh—yeah they were more than glad to get rid of me.” He chuckles. “I think Kamala's down there now with them.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, as soon as you called I left.” She can hear a tint of nerves to his tone. “Sorry I didn’t make it to the hospital when you were there.” 

“It’s okay,” MJ replies sincerely, already touched at the fact that he’d dropped everything to come support her. 

“At least Harry was there, right?” He asks.

MJ finds herself sucking in a breath, a faint anger flaring in her chest at the reminder. “No. No he wasn’t.”

“What?” Peter blurts, a certain edge to his tone. “Why?”

“He uh—” Michelle hesitates, not knowing entirely how to say anything at all. “—he had other plans, or something. But it’s fine.”

She can hear Peter about to say something on the other end, but she cuts him off. 

“You can come over though,” she says, frustration welling within her as her vision blurs. She sniffs. “I could use a friend,” she half-jokes. 

Peter doesn’t seem to laugh with her, but his voice softens. It’s enough to make her heart ache even more. 

“I’ll be there in ten.”

v. 

“—yeah, it’s like the billionth time he’s done this, but—” MJ starts on the other end, her tone laced with a calm pettiness and frustration. “It’s whatever.”

Anyone else talking to her wouldn’t notice. They’d think she doesn’t really care all that much, but Peter instantly picks up on it. 

“You’d think he’d be better at… you know… being in a relationship,” MJ jokes, laughing nervously. “I mean, he’s fine with his friends, so…”

Peter’s silent on his end, unsure of how to respond without butting in too much, giving too much of himself away. 

He’d wanted to like Harry, he really did. If MJ liked him, that was all the proof he needed. But there’s been too many slip ups, too many times where his best friend’s casually mentioned being stood up or brushed aside by her new partner. Too many times where Harry’s just forgotten about plans and gone out with his friends instead. 

“I just—” MJ pauses, and he can hear a tint of hesitation in her voice. “I just wish I didn’t have to like… convince him to hang out with me, you know?” 

“You have to convince him?” Peter asks, something flaring in his chest at the idea that anyone would have to be convinced to be in the same room as MJ. 

“Oh, no. That’s—that’s not really what I meant,” she huffs another laugh. “It’s just like… He always already has stuff planned with his friends first. He only ever really hangs out with me when they cancel on him, or something. It’s just… weird.”

“Have you…” Peter trails off, trying to steady his breathing and racing pulse. “Have you talked to him… about this?” 

“What?” MJ almost cackles. “No. Of course not. Why would I talk to him about this?”

“I mean, you are dating him aren’t you?” He asks, more venom to the question than he’d intended. 

There’s a silence on the other end, and for a moment, he wonders if the call’s been dropped. 

“Yeah, but you’re my best friend. I tell you everything.”

“He’s your boyfriend,” Peter says, his tone clipped. “I’m not.” 

The last two words come out before Peter can even think to stop them. Michelle goes silent again, the only sound on the other end being her sharp intake of breath. 

“No… You’re not.”

There’s something in her voice that he can’t quite place; something that makes his stomach leap up into his chest, into his throat. He swallows, waiting for her to say something else. He pulls his phone back to glance at the time, the numbers swimming together as his vision blurs. 

It’s nearly three in the morning. 

“I, uh—” Peter coughs, unable to stop the slight tremor in his voice. “I’m gonna get some sleep. I’ll talk to you later. I guess.”

He hangs up before she can respond. 

+i

Michelle’s not sure what brought her here, standing on the worn welcome mat in front of Peter’s front door at ten past three in the morning, her arms folded across her chest as she tries to work through what she wants to say to him. 

Well, technically, she does know. 

It’s been a week since their last call. Neither of them have spoken a word to each other since. Every glance in psych is ignored, either one of them rushing out as soon as they’re dismissed at the end of class. It’s been a week of the worst stomach ache she’s ever had in her entire life. 

And while she’d thought that breaking up with Harry might make that pain worse, it only provided some sense of relief.

It had been mutual, after all. 

He’d agreed, saying that he felt that he was getting too focused on his relationship and not on his friendships. 

Ha.

The relief hadn’t lasted long, though. All it took was the thought of that familiar curly brown hair and that stupid, dopey smile. And it was the sight of Spider-Man fighting off Rhino on the news that got her practically sprinting to his apartment without a second thought. 

Though now, the idea of facing him after such awkward tension makes fills her with a prickling dread. 

Her hand hesitates, hovering just above the door. She holds her breath, rapping softly on the dark wood. 

There’s no answer at first; she’s only met with the hollow echo of her knock throughout the empty hallway. Then, she hears a rustling from inside. She knocks again. 

Her lips quirk into a faint smile when she hears him curse, before opening the door. 

But her smile falls as soon as she sees him. “Oh, my God.”

“MJ!” He says, genuinely surprised. 

He’s battered and bruised, a long cut following the line of his cheekbone. Sweat and grime covers his face and arms, his hair matted and damp. His white t-shirt is wrinkled, and she can only guess that he’s just grabbed it from the laundry basket, her breath catching when she sees red bleeding through the collar and sleeve. 

And suddenly, she’s brought back to all those nights in high school, when he’d come tapping at her window, in a similar state, after she’d made him promise he’d always come to her when he needed help. It had been terrifying at first—as it is now and every time after—but she’d learned to push past the fear, fueled by the overwhelming desire to help her friend. 

And it hurts now realizing that he hadn’t thought to come to her. 

Without another word, she pushes her way in, grabbing his arm, stabling him before he can collapse on the doorframe. She leads him to the couch, gently guiding him down as he catches his breath. 

“Peter…” Her voices comes out in a broken sigh. 

A half-smile tugs at Peter’s lips. “I take it you saw that fight?” 

She gives him a look, one that makes his weak smile grow somehow, as she stands from the couch. “Where’s the—”

“—In the bathroom cabinet.”

There’s a tugging in her chest at how quickly he answers. She does her best to brush it aside as she grabs the med kit from the shelf, trying everything to swallow the persistent lump in her throat as she walks back out to him. 

She sits next to him wordlessly, her hands moving on their own as they rifle through the small box. It’s all muscle memory, she finds. When she looks back up at him, his eyes are on her. There’s a tiredness in them that makes her heart clench. But then, her attention’s drawn to the growing red stain pooling on his shoulder. “Take your shirt off,” she says, motioning for him to do so as she grabs a clean rag from the kit.

If Peter had the energy, she’s sure he’d make a joke, some comment or whatever about how demanding she is, or he’d quirk an eyebrow, or maybe he’d wink. 

Or all of it. 

Instead, he follows directions, wincing as he peels the shirt from his body, pulling it over his head and tossing it to the side.

She hadn’t noticed how much her hands were shaking until she’d placed the cloth on the long cut along his chest. She takes a breath, her lips pressing together into a thin line as she starts to apply pressure to the wound. A moment passes as he stills underneath her, his body rigid. 

“Breathe, Pete,” she reminds him, half-joking, half-serious. 

Peter huffs in amusement. “Right. Right. Thanks.”

“Anytime.”

The red bleeds through the cloth, and she reaches with her free hand into the kit, grabbing another to pile on top of it. Though it’s silent between them, their combined thoughts seem to be louder than ever before. She can hear the wheels in Peter’s head turning, as spent as he is, and she’s sure her own are just as bad. 

Another eternity seems to pass before she can gather any kind of courage to speak. 

“I’m sorry—”

“—I’m sorry.”

They both freeze, gazes immediately snapping to each other’s, the two of them laughing lightly at the jinx. This time, Michelle finds it easier to meet his expression, soft and warm. “I, uh—” she clears her throat. “I’m sorry for… Last week. For dumping all of that… Harry stuff on you.”

Peter shakes his head, gently waving it off. “It’s okay. Harry’s a dick.”

That gets a snort from Michelle. 

“Absolutely. That’s why I dumped him.”

Peter seems to perk up at that.

“I’m sorry for… for hanging up on you and... for not being a better friend and just listening,” he says, shrugging. 

Her other hand comes up to push his shoulders down, stabilizing him with a gentle, warning look. 

“Dude, you’re an amazing friend,” she insists. “The best friend. You’re just—” She finds herself looking away, trying to find the words that she’s wanted to say for so long. To tell him how much he means to her, and how she’d been so scared that she’d ruined everything. “—You’re just always there, Pete. You somehow just always… know. I don’t know...” She huffs out a laugh. 

When she looks back up, there’s a faint smile tugging at Peter’s lips. 

“Just so you know, you can literally vent to me anytime about anything ever,” he promises quietly. “I think I was just being… stupid… and… and jealous. I don’t know.”

One of those words piques her interest. 

And it’s not stupid.

“Jealous?” She asks carefully.

Peter coughs lightly. “Uh. Yeah. Just… just a little bit,” he lies. 

Michelle bites the inside of her lip, holding back her smile. 

“Of what?” she presses, though there’s something in her saying that she already knows the answer. 

She just doesn’t want to get too ahead of herself. 

Peter rolls his eyes, scoffing faintly. “MJ—”

“—No, I’m genuinely curious,” she goes on. “What were you so jealous about? What could it be—”

Her words are cut off by his lips suddenly capturing hers. Her nose wrinkles slightly as she tastes the salt and dirt on his face, but as his hand comes to rest on her cheek, his thumb gentle as it draws a soft line on her skin, she finds that she doesn’t mind so much. 

He pulls back though before she can really enjoy it, and he laughs at her bemused expression. 

“Um.” She swallows, laughing. “Okay. I see now.” 

“Yeah,” he huffs, a mix of amusement and nerves. “I’ve kinda liked you for… a while now.” 

“That would’ve been nice to know,” she jokes, shivering with a newfound giddiness as she takes the cloth off his chest, relieved to see that his wound has stopped bleeding. “Like, a long time ago.”

“What?” Peter asks, shocked. He looks dumbfounded. Bewildered. So confused that she could have liked him before. 

“I’ve been trying so hard to get over you, dude,” she shakes her head, more at herself than anything else. “I mean, clearly it hasn’t worked but—”

“I’m not too late... am I?” he asks. Though he seems to be joking, there’s a genuine worry to his tone. 

“I wouldn’t say that,” she says slowly, almost too soft for him to even hear. Her legs are shaky as she stands to wet a new cloth at the sink, returning to gently clean his wound. “Maybe a little late but…” She cracks a smile. “That’s okay.”

“Good. ‘Cause—” He pauses, eyes searching her expression, a smile tugging at his lips. “I really like you.”

Her heart nearly bursts out of her chest hearing him say that, her face warming impossibly. She almost forgets to respond. 

“I really like you, too.”

And this time, she kisses him, slow and sweet, before pulling back and pressing her forehead to his.

“Also,” Peter breathes, laughing to himself. “Sorry I said I wasn’t your boyfriend.” 

A light chuckle bubbles up from her chest as she closes her eyes. 

Her smile grows as she leans in again. 

“We can fix that.”

[darrilshrugs-blog]

Hunters & Prey

I wrote another Critical role thing. I liked writing it. I hope you enjoy it.

Link on Archive of Our Own

Two hunters make their way to a grove in the woods, where their target lies. Are they the hunters still, or will they become prey?

They could not come to an agreement using nods, looks and hand signals, so they withdrew quietly from the clearing, back into the thick grove of trees, to make a plan. They have been well-schooled; they settle into a crouch, facing one another. Each bends to put their mouth just outside the pointed tip of the other’s ear. This way they can whisper at the absolute minimum volume, and between them, have a full view each other’s back, and the surrounding area. There may still be additional guard patrols this close to their goal.

“It’s another trap. It’s too obvious” he says.

It’s hard to believe that her brother was being the cautious one. It was usually she who had to stop him from charging in headlong; it fell to her to calm angered friends and authority figures, and occasionally, to flash a blade to get him out of more troublesome situations.

Maybe they were as much alike as everyone always says.

She had grown so weary of hearing it while growing into young adulthood, and outwardly, she resisted the comparison with utmost effort. Who had to know that it gave her such security and confidence to be so close to someone? That she never had to feel different, or totally alone, wherever she may be, because he was so like her?

This time, she is ready to throw caution to the wind. “I don’t know that it is a trap. I think we may surprise them with how quickly we’ve gotten here.” They had seen their target, in the open, unarmed and unarmored. His sword had been propped against a nearby tree as dozed, his head lolled over, sitting against a stump. “They may not be ready for us.”

Her brother scoffs, quietly, but clearly, in the shell of her peaked ear. “We can’t be reckless, or we risk getting caught. We’re up against some of the most dangerous people in the world, sister.”

“I know that, and I think this time, that we have the advantage. With the number of guards and alarms, and the dense- denseness-.” She couldn’t remember the proper word for a second, and a vision of their father correcting her lapse in vocabulary flitted across her mind and made her pause until she grasped it “… The density of the forest, they may have expected us to be carefully picking our way here.” She adds more to her case before he can object. “More likely, they think we’re skirting around the long way, from the south.”

She glances down from over his shoulder and into her brother’s face, which shares so many features of her own. She watches his dark eyes lose a little bit of their trained focus and watchfulness. He must be considering her words and going over their approach to the clearing in his head. All their time out in the forest (and maybe some of the elven blood running in their veins), provides them a base level of alertness, even when distracted. She was doing the same, after all - replaying their movements while keeping her general awareness trained on woods around her.

They had known their target’s location for more than a day, and had prepared accordingly. On entering this section of the Parchwood, they had immediately picked up on the guards patrolling the most straightforward approach. They had communicated via hand signal and decided against circling around the entire area. It would have taken hours, if not a full day. They had instead moved forward into the patrol area. They avoided detection by remaining absolutely still for more than a half an hour in the thick underbrush. Bugs and who-knows-what-else crawled over them, as the patrol passed mere feet away. They then took to the thick interwoven tree branches of the ancient forest, further eluding the sweeps of guards for another mile.

Tripwires, magical traps that would have sent flares skyward, and alarm wards had been thick throughout, but their observational and trap-disarming skills complemented each other well. They had also purchased some additional magical items just for such occasions. They had made excellent time through the remaining miles that brought them within range of their target.

She finishes her own internal recounting of their past few hours, and can see he has done the same. He looks her full in the face and nods. He is going to go with her judgement on this one. It means everything to her, having his trust, yet her gut churns at the possibility that her call could lead them foolhardily into a trap.

She leans into him, throwing him momentarily off-balance, part of a long-running game of theirs. She presses her mouth close to his ear once more. “We’ll take another quick look, and if nothing looks out of place, we blitz him. If it goes wrong, we start to make our escape to the south, the way they will think we came, but we circle around. We meet right here and wait out their chase. Maybe we even get another chance in the confusion.”

He huffs. “If this goes a bit wrong, it’s over.  But I do appreciate the positive outlook.” His mouth quirks up at the edge, as does hers. It’s a well-schooled expression of controlled amusement. They had observed it so often from their mother that they learned to emulate it.

They stealthily return to their vantage point of a few minutes prior and see much the same sight as on their first visit. The target is alone, without his sword, and napping. She thinks may even be lightly snoring, but that could just be her imagination.

His white hair makes him look older than he is, and his noble-bearing and rail-thin frame supposedly belies a vicious combatant. She has heard some of the stories behind all that, and the rumors that had reached her ear had only made her eager to someday learn the whole truth of the tale.

They are aware that the Lord of Whitestone is legendarily quick of hand, but they well are quite capable themselves. Even if he carries knives in his boots or elsewhere, they should be on him quick enough to render such concealed weapons useless. She knows he is no magic-user.

Her brother catches her eye, and nods. He is ready, waiting on her signal. She draws a deep breath, and her own dagger. She tenses her legs to spring forward and sprint across the clearing. She nods and they go for it.

They hit the grass of the clearing at a full run. No alarm is sounded, by man, beast or magic spell, and there is no evidence that their target has been disturbed. They close the thirty feet to him in seconds. He only stirs once they have each gripped his shoulders and is unable to resist as they half-lift, half drag him to his feet and back against another tree at the far edge.

The man’s blue eyes have sprung open behind his glasses, but any dismay at being rudely awoken and man-handled by two smaller, darkly-cloaked individuals seems to pass quickly as they manhandle him.

He lets out a puff of breath as his back connects with the trunk of the tree, but his first words are less of shock and more a pleased, detached observation. “Ah, ambushed by ruffians. I must have been more tired than I thought.”

Her breath is ragged and her muscles burn, but she can feel the rush of imminent victory pumping adrenaline into her system. “We got you!” Both she and her brother continue to swivel their heads, trying to cover all angles. Her left hand pins the noble’s shoulder back, while her brother’s forearm rests high against the taller human’s chest. Their quarry is over any surprise and might as well have been greeting guests in the great hall of his castle when he addresses them.

“I congratulate you on your quiet stalking skills, and commend your bravery at making a quick strike against your prey. However, I am not sure you have been as successful as you may think.”

He slowly raises his left arm; palm turned outward, and lifts his thick eyebrows at her for permission to continue. Receiving no threat, he moves his hand up to his face and uses his index finger to push his glasses back up on his nose. He then brings his hand to rest, palm still out, showing no aggression, above where her brother’s arm holds him, and near to his own throat. He speaks again “For I am not, in this case, Percival de Rolo, Lord of Whitestone.”

She cannot help herself. She glances at her brother. She can see the worry on his face, and feel it on her own. Have they been deceived? Is this an impostor? Neither of them has much experience with magical disguises or illusions.

Her brother is growing alarmed, and it comes through in his growl. “Then who are you? Tell us!”

“I’d be happy to.” The man chuckles at their confusion as he taps the top of his breastbone with the back of his hand. “I’m the bait.”

As his hand continues to tap his chest, his fingers scoop, impossibly quick, into the open collar of his dress shirt, and grip a black pedant that hangs under the cloth.

Immediately, and without warning, a massive fist is there, pressed against her back. She can see her brother also crowded forward in her peripheral vision.

“Hullo, lovelies!” It’s a gravelly, but happy, growl from above and behind them. As she turns her head a few degrees, she sees a slab of gray muscle and scars that can only be a Goliath.

The horrible realization at what is behind them is only made worse by the whoosh of incoming arrows passing well above their heads from off to their right. Two arrows thud into the trunk just above the white-haired human’s head, making him flinch.

Her brother releases their quarry and drops his hands to his side, already defeated.

She’s just mad.

“This is some dirty trick!”

A familiar voice rings out from the direction of the arrows. “Your enemies will not play fair, sweetheart.”

Her brother has taken a seat on the grass, sulking more visibly by the moment. “I believe we didn’t hear mother, but we missed Uncle Grog?” His head drops to his hands.

Father pulls her into a one-armed hug and brings her down with him into a crouch to show them both the necklace. “This is an old trinket of your mother’s.” Despite themselves, both the children smile at the father’s obvious and terrible pun. They can tell he’s pleased with himself by his tone. “It’s called the Raven’s Slumber, and it can hold, and then release a willing creature.”

“Like me!” Grog barks, and throws his arms wide, waiting for a hug. A lithe, but well-toned arm appears from behind and rests for a moment on his mountainous bicep. Then their mother walks around him and into view. She is dressed in an old set of dark leathers, her dark brown hair pulled back into the familiar braid that hangs now in front of her shoulder. She ducks under Uncle Grog’s arm to join them. He continues to wait for his hug.

Lady Vex’ahlia de Rolo gives both her children a short hug and a kiss atop their heads, and then leans over to give a kiss to her husband, who chides her. “A little close with the arrows, Vex.”

She gives him another kiss, this one to the tip of his nose. “I didn’t want to aim too near the children.”

He melts a bit, as he always does. “Mm. Makes perfect sense.” Gross.

Her mother stands, and puts her hands out to her children, join her. Their father also draws himself to his full height. “You did very well, children. The guards had no clue you were there, and you did a wonderful job with the alarms and traps. I’m pleased, and even your Uncle Vax would have been proud of your sneakiness and bold choice to attack first and ask questions later.” Her mother’s smile gets a little sad, as it always does at the mention of their uncle.

However, the cloud passes from her mother’s face as Uncle Grog tires of waiting and bellows out “Come here you de Rolos!” and sweeps the four of them into a crushing hug. “You did so good little de Rolo’s! You’re just no match yet for Vox Machina!”

Despite her disappointment at not winning this trial, she can’t help but grin at Uncle Grog’s enthusiasm, and sees her brother unable to contain a laugh as well. Their father seems less pleased, but he seems resigned to his huge friend’s affection.

She will have another chance to test herself against her family of legends, and maybe, someday, she will become one herself.