#ff7 on the way to a smile
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FF7 NOVEL RESOURCES
A collection of links to fulfill all of your ff7 novel needs
Info
The ff7 novels are a series of books mostly written by Kazushige Nojima, depicting unique stories using the characters and world from ff7. These novels are separate from the games but stick closely to canon. Leslie Kyle and Kyrie Canaan actually originated from my favorite book so far, The Kids Are Alright: A Turks Side Story.
Most of these novels were published in Japanese first and later translated into English. Luckily, they can easily be found online for purchase or read through fan translations for free.
Youtube Audiobooks
The Lifestream on Youtube has uploaded a decent amount of audiobooks of the fan translations to their channel. I’d recommend checking them out if you’d enjoy that!
Disclaimer
None of these fan translations belong to me; all of the credit goes to those who spent the time to translate them. Most of them come from The Lifestream.net, as they’ve posted a ton of fan translations to their website. This list would not have been possible without their hard work!
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“Final Fantasy VII: On the Way to a Smile”
On the Way to a Smile is a short novel showcasing multiple stories about different characters. It takes place after ff7 but before Advent Children starts; acting as a bridge between the two.
OTWTAS - Fan Translations
| Lifesteam Black and White(complete) | Episode Denzel(complete) |
| Episode Tifa(complete) | Episode Barret(complete) |
| Episode Nanaki(complete) | Episode Yuffie(complete) |
| Episode Shin-Ra(complete) |
OTWTAS - Audiobooks
| Lifesteam black and white(complete) | Episode Denzel(complete) |
| Episode Tifa(complete) | Episode Barret(complete) |
| Episode Nanaki(complete) | Episode Yuffie(complete) |
| Episode Shin-Ra(complete) |
OTWTAS - Official English Copy’s For Sale
| Amazon | Ebay | Barnes & Noble | Abebooks |
OTWTAS - Extras
| Lore Summary | Differences Between the Japanese and English Versions |
| Fan Translation PDF of On the Way to a Smile and The Maiden Who Travels The Planet |
“The Maiden Who Travels the Planet”
The Maiden Who Travels the Planet is the only ff7 novel to be written by Benny Matsuyama. It follows the story of Aerith and depicts her experience in the lifestream. Unfortunately, it lacks an official English translation.
TMWTTP - Fan Translation
| Prologue and Chapters 1-7(complete) |
TMWTTP - Audiobook
| Prologue and Chapters 1-7(complete) |
TMWTTP - Extra
| Fan Translation PDF of On the Way to a Smile and The Maiden Who Travels The Planet |
“Final Fantasy VII The Kids Are Alright: A Turks Side Story”
The Kids Are Alright takes place before, during, and after Advent Children. It tells the story of Evan Townshend and his complicated history with Shinra. This novel also contains the original appearances of Leslie and Kyrie, and even includes some background information on Kadaj. The story is separated into two major sections, Part One: See Me, Feel Me, and Part Two: Who Are You?
TKAA - Fan Translation
| Part One and Two with Chapters 1-46(complete) |
TKAA - Audiobook
| Part One: See Me, Feel Me(complete) |
TKAA - Official English Copy’s For Sale
| Amazon | Ebay | Barnes & Noble | Abebooks |
TKAA - Extra
| Lore Summary + Artwork and Character Intros |
“Final Fantasy VII Remake: Traces of Two Pasts”
Traces of Two Pasts showcases Tifa and Aerith’s relationship and illustrates how their childhoods influenced their lives. It takes place sometime during ff7 remake and highlights the importance of the trust they have for each other. Similar to TKAA, this novel is separated into two parts, Episode Tifa, and Episode Aerith.
TOTP - Fan Translations
| Episode Tifa Pages 01-24(complete) | Episode Tifa Pages 25-39(complete) |
| Episode Tifa Pages 40-52(complete) | Episode Tifa 53-72(complete)
| Episode Tifa Pages 73-98(complete) | | Episode Tifa Pages 98-121(complete)
| Episode Tifa Pages 122-149(complete) | Episode Tifa Pages 150-208(complete) |
| Episode Aerith Scenes 1-4(complete) | Episode Aerith Scenes 5-9(complete) |
| Episode Aerith Scenes 10-14(complete) | Episode Aerith Scenes 15-21(complete) |
| Episode Aerith Scenes 22-27(complete) | Episode Aerith Scenes 28-35(complete) |
TOTP - Official English Copy’s For Sale
| Amazon | Ebay | Barnes & Noble | Abebooks |
TOTP - Extra
| Episode Aerith Translators Note |
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Before you leave, feel free to send me any questions about the ff7 novels. I'm lucky to own every en novel, and I'm always free to talk about them!
#ff7#ff7 novels#master post#ff7 novel list#ff7 novel#ff7 on the way to a smile#on the way to a smile#ff7 the maiden who travels the planet#the maiden who travels the planet#ff7 the kids are alright#the kids are alright#ffvii: the kids are alright#ff7 traces of two pasts#traces of two pasts
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he's fucking insane ur honour
#ff7#final fantasy 7#final fantasy vii#ffvii#ff7 on the way to a smile#on the way to a smile#otws#ff7 otws#vincent valentine#red xiii#nanaki#ff7 nanaki
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Really sad fact but in On the Way to a Smile, Red raises two bear cubs in a forest for the next two years between OG and Advent Children and the clubs eventually get separated him and he unfortunately sees that they were killed by hunters ;-;
#Poor Red xiii#he raised those clubs#like they were his own#i felt so bad for him#Elena gets mentioned around this chapter#but I don’t remember the details of that#on the bright side#Vincent comforts him like a good friend#final fantasy 7#On the Way to a Smile#ff7 On the Way to a Smile#ff7 book#red xiii#tw animal death#otwtas spoilers I guess#otwtas
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I would do anything for him
#the way i CRUMBLE over sephiroth’s genuine laughs and soft smiles in crisis core…..#and adding that tinge of loneliness to his eyes in rebirth?!?#im not okay im not okay im not okay#ff7 rebirth#ff7#sephiroth#my art#art#artists on tumblr
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Poking out of my hiatus to give a shout out and huge thanks to @crimson-sun! So happy to have a copy of this! It's so lovely and I cant stop smiling haha 😁 Congratulations on finishing such an amazing project!
#on the way to a smile#shenanigans#ff7#may your holiday be safe and fun if you celebrate!#it was unintentional but cant stop laughing at the roche keychain glinting in the sunlight
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This is after the Shinra building is hit and Rufus is moved to Kalm. Continuation of this
You sat on the bed in the second store of a house on the Shinra-owned property in Kalm. It was a miracle that Rufus survived at all. You should be concentrating on that fact but the chaos makes it difficult. Rufus is sitting in his wheelchair, staring out the window at the refugees from Midgar streaming into Kalm. You want to ask him what he thinks will happen next and what you should be doing, but you don't want to break his concentration. He's not even resting his cheek in his hand, like usual.
"This is just a transition to something else," Rufus says out of nowhere.
"To what?" The words are out of your mouth before you can stop yourself.
"No one knows the answer to that."
Of course. You shouldn't have asked. If only you didn't have to rely on someone else like this, your guilt says, joining the chaotic swirl of other emotions inside you.
"Not yet," Rufus adds, a minute later.
You go to ask him what he means so you can continue to hold onto the sliver of hope those two words bring you, but then the doorbell rings. It's too early for the Turks to return from their current assignment and also, they would call first. Rufus sits up straighter.
"Hide," he orders.
You obey immediately, sliding behind the bed against the wall.
The men who eventually break into the house argue with Rufus while you lie, frozen, in your tiny slot of space. It feels smaller and smaller the more the argument drags on. Rufus is bullshitting his way out of it best he can; you can tell. But he's in rough shape and can't fight his way out of this when words won't work. Ultimately, the men get frustrated with him and Rufus falls silent. What you hear them say each other tells you they're kidnapping him. It's not hard to figure out why. People want what others have, especially when desperate. The men carry your sliver of hope out the door.
After some silence, you pull yourself up from behind the bed. That they left the wheelchair behind somehow makes it much worse. You call Tseng.
"Hello." His tone indicates he's in professional mode.
"They took Rufus."
"Who did?" Tseng asks, without asking what happened.
"I don't know. They didn't say any names."
There's a pause and then, "Leave the house. Wait somewhere out of sight. I'm sending Reno and Rude to your location."
Tseng hangs up. You normally bristle at being spoken to like you're one of them but today, there's no time for that petty feeling.
You're taken to a Shinra company house in Sector 5, the only individual who is not a Turk that is being allowed inside. Admittedly, it gives you the only little bit of positive excitement in recent days.
So maybe that's why you're standing here, defiantly telling Tseng, "I can't just sit here and do nothing."
You're finishing up a private discussion before the Turks have a bigger discussion about what to do next. About how to find the president.
"I have to know you're safe," he says quietly, but with finality.
You feel chastised but then he presses his forehead to yours, his hand in the back of your hair, holding you like something precious. Right. He can't lose you, too. Not before they find Rufus. You knew you would have to be truly useless one day. It hurts. But you have to endure it.
"Sorry. I won't do anything. I'll be good."
Tseng hugs you tight and kisses your temple. Then he leaves your space, letting anxiety fill it in, to go talk to the others. You have to be good and sit and wait.
#gender neutral reader#tseng x reader x rufus#angst#slight comfort?#tseng of the turks#my shit#ff7#ffvii#final fantasy vii#final fantasy 7#on the way to a smile#tseng x reader#rufus shinra#rufus shinra x reader#fanfiction#reader insert#reader-insert#this had me cracking open the book#and apparently i remembered important details wrong#oof
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Not even close to how I usually draw but I neeeeded to get the brainrot out and figured I'd share it..
Maybe I'll make it into an actual piece
#ff7#final fantasy 7#ffvii#final fantasy vii#advent children#on the way to a smile#vincent valentine#red xiii#nanaki#vincent offering to meet him once a year#they're everything to me#i love that they gave the old man a sense of humor#my art
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He wants to read, too.
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an older denzel concept while i tried to mess with my art - i like the idea of him not shaking his want to protect/help people and training towards it with cloud+tifa & co. in a 'safer-than-joining-the-military-as-a-minor-again' way :) 'full'/no border ↓
#the sword is inspired by the default SOLDIER swords and the fusion sword look... i like to imagine cloud gets help cobbling it together#i wasnt rendering metal sorry. sorry. sorry#final fantasy 7#advent children#denzel ff7#denzel strife#????????????????????#i like the idea of him growing out his hair! but unfortunately i feel as if ive just drawn goro akechi. so like. Man.#also ik he doesn't canonically have any scars but boy was going through the wringer in on the way to a smile#so fuck you. i think he has some. also i like the idea that the stigma leaves scars as well#i care ab denzel so much . can any body hear me its so dark i n here#kyda's art#think im gonna change my art tag .... sorry for hthe username change And tag changes im.#I'm what the kids call.... dissocative
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So... In "On the Way to a Smile", Rufus gets captured by some rich guy and and held in his basement. I don't know about y'all, but Rufus chained up in a basement dungeon with all red walls sounds... sex dungeon-y.
And it wouldn't be the first time FFVII had to have certain ideas (*cough* Cloud's original pole dance choreo that was removed from remake *cough*) removed/rephrased from the game or subsequent side material to save the age ratings.
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yuffie’s…..thoughtful note in on a way to a smile
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Hii! Your hcs are lovely and I like how you portray everyone. If it's okay with you, can I ask for some ASG hcs with Angeal and Sephiroth managing to make Genesis blush? I think it wouldn't be an easy feat so the times they do it is remarkable for everyone hehe
ahdjdj tysm anon! :) omg i’ve never actually thought about it, but now that i do i definitely think it would be a bit of a rarer sight! you are so right!
instances in which i think angeal and sephiroth can make/have made genesis blush:
- since he admired sephiroth when he was younger, it probably would’ve been a bit easier for sephiroth to make him blush closer to when they first met, primarily whenever sephiroth would give him any form of praise while they trained together
- any time they show genesis any form of soft/sweet innocent intimacy!!! angeal gently kissing genesis on the head, sephiroth lazily holding and cuddling him early in the morning, the occasional moments where they’ll both whisper sweet nothings to genesis, anything along those lines i believe would have genesis as red as his coat
- over time when sephiroth had started opening up more and started trying to show his love and affection towards genesis in any way he knew how, i think it would’ve gotten to genesis, especially the small little things, despite the slight awkwardness in how sephiroth would go about it at first
- he is very used to being the center of attention, but he’s almost always the one that draws the attention to himself, so he can’t handle it when sephiroth and angeal center him themselves, especially when they tease him and get all lovey-dovey about him
- because of angeal’s circumstances growing up, he doesn’t see the value in getting generic expensive gifts, so ever since him and genesis were young he would get genesis small little things here and there, and because genesis was raised basically the opposite in a wealthy family, he absolutely cherished those small gifts! and it evolved as they grew up to angeal giving genesis bigger gifts, but they were things he would work his ass off for! and though he’ll never admit it, the fact that angeal would go through that kind of trouble just for him means the world to him, especially because the gifts are far and few in between
- whenever angeal or sephiroth brings up something genesis likes or has mentioned before, it makes genesis feel so special because it means they actually care enough to listen to him, its something so small but makes him feel so loved
- generally any time they offer any kind of reassurance, praise, or compliment to genesis in a way that makes him feel genuinely loved, cared for, and accepted really!!! i feel like being accepted while being himself in any capacity by the people he loves will never cease to mean everything to him make him feel flustered
- not an instance in which they make him blush, but after they manage to get him to blush: i would just really like to think that if one of them manages to do it while the other isn’t paying attention, they’ll nudge each other or try to silently get each other’s attention so they can point out genesis’ blush! almost in the way people do when a cat does something cute and they wanna show someone else without distracting the cat! and i think that it takes a while for genesis to stop blushing once he starts, so angeal and sephiroth will start teasing him about it, which only makes it worse
#overall i think its just about the really soft small things!!! which in turn is rarer moments for all of them to get#i’ll be entirely honest i kinda confused myself somewhere along the way so i really hope this is along the lines of what you wanted!#ff7#ffvii#final fantasy 7#crisis core#asg#angeal x genesis x sephiroth#angeal hewley#genesis rhapsodos#sephiroth#completely unrelated but omg why are ppl so sweet when sending me asks 😭 everyone is so kind!#it always makes me smile! especially since its always compliments on things im worried that ive gotten wrong or i dont think im good at! <3
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Sketchember 38 - That time Vincent killed Nanaki for no reason, but with Vincent goofballs.
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It honestly annoys me how tifa is portrayed as a mother in Advent children. She's a nice girl yes, but she is in no way fit to play a role as a mother (avalanche was the reason denzel lost his parents). She's endangered Marlene countless times in the og and Denzel. Both were kidnapped and let's be real cloud playing a dad role was just as cringe. Both have their own issues and the developers really tried to make them some type of family which honestly in my opinion was a terrible decision.
Hmm this is a bit of a sensitive territory however this is Tumblr and we have free speech here, right? Lol.
You see, in Case of Tifa, she was actually pretty upset when Barret decided to go somewhere else and left Marlene behind.
And for Tifa & Cloud being Marlene's 'parents'- I don't think it is to be taken literally. It was Marlene who suggested that they become her 'parents' for a while and I can understand her. She's a little girl, with no adjacent families except her stepfather Barret. She still needs parental guidance & people to call family. And both Tifa & Cloud are the closest person who could do it for her while daddy isn't around.
Barret sounds a bit egotistical here but I can understand him too. I mean he has to find a way to provide for his little girl, he desperately needs a job and life is really difficult after the meteorfall.
Though I actually agree that both characters still have to sort their own issues instead of getting into a family commitment. But during AC Marlene never calls Tifa 'mom' though, they are more of a found family than anything. And all is well as end's well cause according to DOC guide here, Barret actually came back to live with Marlene.
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Quicksilver Girl [Yandere FF7!Remnant Trio x Reader]
Title: Quicksilver Girl [Remnant Trio x Reader]
Synopsis: You help a silver-haired man and his silver-haired brothers find their way in the city–didn’t anyone ever tell you not to talk to strangers?
Word count: 11,000ish
Notes: yandere, threats of violence, stalking, mommy issues
It was a solid testament to the bittersweetness of the world’s regrowth that the simple sight of an ice cream truck in the city made you want to cry. But for all the destruction that had rained on the city, that had rained on the world; for the terror that was Sephiroth and the near-destruction of the planet, it was these simple sights that healed (and hurt) the most.
It didn’t help that you had especially tender soft spots for children. Oh, soft spots for anyone, really–and your neighbors, the people you worked with, what was left of your family would attest to that.
When someone said they were hungry, you did your best to feed them. When you overheard someone weeping over a debt, you would lend a coin or an ear or a pen and paper to plot out a way to dig out of a deficit.
People’s troubles troubled you, and it made you feel better to take care of those around you. Friend and stranger alike.
“Soft hearts have no place in this world,” you’d overheard your father tell your mother one night, mumbling, half-drunk.
Maybe he was right. Maybe in a world like this, your soft heart would get you into trouble one day. Or it would be hardened out of you like water grooving its way into a rock, with time and troubles. An inevitable weathering.
But maybe you would be content to be the type of person who smiled and wiped away the edges of tears at the sight of a gaggle of children eagerly buying frozen treats, each running away with a smile–and often, already-melting ice cream–on their lips.
And it wasn’t just the children who wanted to reap the frozen fruits of the ice cream truck’s welcome arrival, you notice–a man, clad in what must be an entirely too-hot black leather outfit, awkwardly making his way to the front of the truck.
He runs his hands through his cropped silver hair–it almost glitters, in the sun–and looks up and down at the time-worn stickers plastered to the front of the truck. One of the children behind him huffs a little and stands on her toes, bending sideways to peer around him.
The truck driver says something, and the man frowns. He points to one of the stickers and waits, expectantly.
You can’t help but overhear the exchange that follows.
“If you don’t have any money, move out of the way. There’s kids that are ready to pay.”
The little girl shoves her hands in her pockets, fingers no doubt touching the precious gil she was able to borrow for the treat.
The man makes a noise, something in between a growl and a whine, as he looks behind him at the growing line of kids–and in front of him, at the unimpressed driver.
“No fair. It doesn’t say anything about money here!” The young man jabs a finger on the truck and–did the truck rock just a bit? No, of course not–and crosses his arms over his chest. He’s almost like a kid himself, you think, and a familiar tugging sensation in your chest creeps in.
You’re already hustling your way up to the truck, fingers digging into your purse for a few coins, when one of the kids in line lets out a barking, sneering laugh.
“Everyone knows ice cream costs money! What’re you, stupid?”
Perhaps if you had been a moment later, it all would have gone wrong here. That kid would have been pulverized by an impulsive, angry punch and any bystanders would have fled screaming and you would’ve known to stay far, far away from this man and his silver hair and anyone else who showed up alongside him.
But you were a moment sooner, and nothing went wrong.
Instead, just as the young man turned towards the sneering kid, a scowl on his face, you were primly handing the truck driver enough coins for an ice cream bar.
“Please, let me,” you say, voice soft but firm–a I-won’t-take-no-for-an-answer tone, and the tension from the interaction melts as easily as the ice cream inside the truck under the hot sun. The truck driver shrugs and dips away from his window for a moment, before coming back and holding out a fresh chocolate ice cream bar.
The young man stares at it for a moment, then slowly reaches out to take it. The girl behind him doesn’t wait for him to move, bumping past him to get to the front of the line. And if you hadn’t just enabled him to get the creamy frozen treat he’d clearly wanted, maybe it would have bothered him.
But he doesn’t seem to notice. He simply stares at you, brows furrowed, gaze looking all sorts of ways. Surprised. Pleased. Annoyed. It’s an expression you’re a bit familiar with; the sort of mixed-emotions that come with favors you didn’t quite ask for, but wanted, anyway.
You don’t take it to heart. You smile and step back from the truck, and he follows–sticking the ice cream into his mouth before abruptly yanking it out, mouth half-opened, a bit of chocolate dribbling on his chin.
“It’s cold,” he says, shock at the edge of his voice. But the heat of the day and his outfit and the richness of the chocolate must overpower the initial trepidation, because he slowly sticks it back in his mouth, savoring it.
“Have you… never had ice cream?” You ask. You shouldn’t; you should just go, good deed done for the day.
But.
It’s hard not to be curious about him. His outfit is unusual; more like something you’d see in the old days. A roaming thug hired by Shinra, maybe. But they wouldn’t be out in the day, at least not anymore.
But it’s the rest of him that really stands out. Silver hair that, even cropped short, has a shimmery look in the fun. And his eyes are, well. Unusual to say the least. A vibrant sort of green, like a living light.
His eyes glance towards you, then towards the ground. Shame, maybe.
“Of course I have,” he lies, and your heart pangs just a bit. He wouldn’t be the first person in this world to grow up deprived. The soft, stretchy bit your hard pulls towards him, and you look around for anyone that might know him. Might have come here with him, before he got sidetracked with a sidequest for ice cream.
But there’s no one that you can see who might call this strangely dressed young man “theirs.” So you worry at your lip with your teeth, weighing the options, before finally asking–softly, kindly.
“Are you alone?”
“No.” He looks up at you with something like indignity. “I’m with my brothers.”
There’s a bit of good news. You smile. “Oh! I’m sorry…” But when you look around, there’s no sign of anyone that looks like a brother. The silver hair would be a giveaway, wouldn’t it?
He looks around, too, and after a moment, meets your gaze with a lost expression that you can’t help but compare to the kids around you.
“They were supposed to meet me here… at… at…” He huffs out a sigh, and pulls out a cell phone. The sight is surprising–they can be pricey, although they are getting a bit more common. He flips open the top and presses a few buttons with his thumb, before holding it up in your face. “Here.”
Oh. He’s in entirely the wrong spot. And if he’s not from the area, there’s no way he’ll find it alone. That soft, squishy part of you squeezes your chest hard and despite hearing your father’s mumbling disapprovals through the metaphorical wall of your mind, you offer another smile.
“That’s on the opposite side of town. It’s a bit of a confusing way… I could walk you?”
A few emotions cross his face. Surprise. Annoyance. And finally, a sort of mild distrust. Again, so much like the children around you. Children who grew up on or off the streets but in a world where the next day was never a guarantee. It hurts a little to see this expression on a grown man, however young he might be.
“Fine,” he tells you, half-mumbling. “If you want.”
“Well, I do want,” you answer cheerfully, and the surprise on his face doesn’t seem to quite go away even as he begins to follow you, frowning, shoving the rest of his ice cream bar in his mouth.
The stares you get as you escort this strange young man through the city are worth the feeling of accomplishment you get–warm and fuzzy and light–from helping someone out. Especially someone who seems so lost, in more ways than one.
As for the strange young man himself, he’s not much of a conversationalist–but you’ve never minded doing most of the talking. He seems content to listen, mumbling yeses and no’s, or occasionally asking you questions about buildings you pass.
He even tells you his name, after a while: “I’m Loz.”
And if you tell him your name, and he repeats it a bit gruffly, chocolate ice cream on his lips, is it wrong to find it a bit cute?
After all–
It feels good to help someone in need, doesn’t it?
–
There’s no mistaking it: the two men standing in front of an abandoned city hall (ruined, more like; no one had enough money to fix it, so the city hall was now in a repurposed hotel) must be his brothers. The silver hair with the same sort of sheen, and nearly matching black leather outfits. Part of you wonders if you ought to have gotten ice cream for them, but it would have melted anyway.
Neither of them look particularly excited to see you. Well, you can’t blame them. You are a stranger. There’s surprise tinged with a wariness and a not-so-thinly veiled irritation, at least on part of what looks to be his younger brother. Silver hair cut short and slightly uneven, like he hacked it off himself. The other brother looks older, with long silky hair that must, you decide, take forever to comb.
It’s Loz who breaks the tension, stepping forward, running a hand through his short hair. There’s still some chocolate ice cream left on his mouth.
“She uh, showed me the way. I got lost.” The brothers’ gaze roams over you. Loz holds up his ice cream stick. “And she bought me this.” When his brothers merely blink at it, he shoves it closer to them. “There was ice cream on it!”
It is the brother with longer hair who speaks first. Smooth and calm, and you get the image of one of those upper-crust salesmen, the kind who could convince someone to buy a motorbike they couldn’t afford in a thousand years.
“I see.” His gaze turns to you and there’s something in those eyes–the same as Loz, but vaguely different. Whereas Loz felt like a lost dog with a–haha–bone to pick, his gaze feels a bit more intent. Like it could pin you to the floor, if it wanted. “Thank you for assisting our brother,” he says, voice as silky as his hair.
The younger brother scoffs at that. Scowls. Won’t even look at you.
Well–you were never one to outstay your welcome. Clearly they have business here, and it certainly doesn't involve you. So you smile at the brother with the long hair and then turn to Loz, half-grin on your face.
“Well, I’ve got to get going. I’m glad you found your brothers! Bye! Be safe, okay?”
You raise your hand and wave and Loz–to his brothers’ surprise, it’s written on both their faces–waves back.
“Uh… bye.”
As you walk away, you can’t shake the feeling of three pairs of eyes on your back.
–
You never expected to see Loz again. Or his brothers. Yet it is exactly these three people that suddenly walk through the doors of the diner you waitress at, and how could you not notice? The diner itself seemed to freeze as soon as the door swung open, and a trio of young men with matching silver hair and leather outfits walked through.
While everyone else was keen to stare, you were quick to welcome them. It was hard, being the odd one out; well, in this case, the odd trio out.
“Good morning,” you chirp, menus already cradled in your arm by force of habit. “I’m glad to see you!” And you were, a little, in the way you were always happy to see anyone you’d helped again.
Predictably, Loz is the only one who smiles at you. It’s a shy sort of grin that almost seems out of place on his muscular frame.
“Hey,” he says. “Someone said you worked here, so we… uh…”
In hindsight, this was perhaps the only chance you had to sidestep the horror to come; the only chance to realize you were being sought, and that to be sought by three young men with strange clothing and stranger hair was no simple thing.
But hindsight is never there when we want it to be, and instead of taking the phrase for the warning it ought to have been, you let it wash over you.
“Yep! I’ve been working here for a few years now. Why don’t you sit down?”
They follow–the youngest first, you realize, and the other two fall in line as you lead them to a corner booth out of the way. Less stares, you think. But what a very strange family dynamic, indeed. From the friends you knew with siblings, it was the oldest who called the shots. But then, the world wasn’t exactly rightside up anymore, was it? Things changed all the time. Even sibling pecking orders.
You dole out the menus as easily as you dole your smiles. Each brother picks up a menu in turn. The youngest looking at it with something like scorn, Loz furrowing his eyebrows, and the brother with long hair and a smooth voice quickly taking in the fare.
“Do you need any help deciding? We’ve got a bit of everything.”
The brother with the long hair sets down his menu. “May we have three waters?”
You don’t need to jot it down–lots of practice, and all that–so you nod. “Of course! And what can I get you to eat? I’m pretty partial to the sandwiches here myself, but–”
His smile is smoother than his voice, and it’s almost unnerving, almost enough to make you take a step back, when Loz interrupts, mouth pouting, eyes downcast–
“But I’m hungry!” As if on cue, his stomach growls. And not for the first time, you’re struck by how new he seems, despite his appearance and demeanor. And clearly, despite these what-should-be expensive leather outfits, this trio of siblings has fallen on hard times.
Oh, your damned soft heart would get you fired one of these days.
“You know!” Your voice is a bit too high, a bit too chipper. “We actually just had a table return some dishes because I got the order wrong… I was going to have to just throw it out and eat the loss but, if you guys wouldn’t mind taking them?” You smile, a bit crooked. “It would really help me out.”
Loz grins.
The brother with the long hair’s eyes widen, just a fraction, before they return to their serene-like stance. “Thank you,” he says, softly.
The youngest frowns, his lips curling into a bit of a sneer. His brothers look to him, and you’re struck again by the topsy-turvy pecking order you see in them.
Finally, he sighs.
“Fine.”
–
The brother with the long hair, you finally learn, is called Yazoo. And the youngest–his name cannot be pried out of his own mouth, and it is Yazoo that tells you–is Kadaj.
They don’t say much about why they’re in town, and you don’t pry. It must be hard enough with everyone staring at them, whispers slinking over from the other tables. Well. With their silver-shimmer hair and leather outfits, it would be hard not to notice them.
Still. You do your best to put them at ease.
Maybe that’s why, when their meals are finished, Yazoo asks you:
“Do you know of a place to stay in the area? Somewhere… affordable, please.”
Your heart–soft, stupid thing–pangs. There isn’t much in the way of affordability anywhere, but you suspect they already know that. But you know a few people, can pull in some favors.
“There’s lodgings above the cafe,” you say, pointing to the staircase in the far corner. “It’s where I live, actually! I’ll tell them you’re looking for a place to stay, and we can work something out.” You don’t tell them that “work something out” usually means you picking up extra shifts for free in exchange for someone else getting a discount, because then they might decline your offer, and who knows where they’d end up?
“That is… much appreciated,” Yazoo replies, weighing his words carefully. Loz looks between his brothers and decides on a nod.
It is the words of Kadaj–his first words properly directed to you without a grimace or huff–that surprise you the most.
“Yeah,” he says, and both his brothers look to him with something akin to surprise of their own as he looks up at you, his own mako-green eyes catching your gaze. “Thanks.”
–
It is not quite a surprise that you see the brothers every day. Neither does it shock you that Loz, in particular, seems taken with you; he follows you around the cafe, and you even wrangle him into collecting used dishes when the normal busboy decides to skip out on his shifts.
He doesn’t like the customers–none of the brothers seem to–but he always beams when you thank him for his hard work. It makes your heart pang, just a bit; where were these three before all this, that simple praise makes him look so happy?
It is, perhaps, Kadaj’s turn that genuinely surprises you. For within the days, the weeks, he goes from sneering at you to quietly popping up by your side when you least expect it.
When you’re out for a morning errand, he asks to come along, sometimes not saying a word the entire time–sometimes asking questions about everything he sees, which you happily (if a bit sleepily) answer.
When you’re sitting in the cafe on a rare free hour, reading a book, he (with or without his brothers) slides into the booth and wants to know what you’re reading, and why you’re reading it, and how long you’ve read it for–
When you’re in the back on an overnight shift, doing dishes, he shows himself in the doorway and asks why you’re spending your free time scrubbing other people’s messes.
“It’s not my free time,” you tell him, once. “I’m working.”
He scoffed. “Do you always work all day, then all night?”
You smiled, perhaps a bit of a grimace, given the hot water and occasional wad of tobacco you had to crape off a plate. “Oh, It’s just–I’ve got some extra bills to pay, so I pick up late shifts sometimes.”
And something in his gaze then–did he know about your deal with the owner? Picking up extra shifts when your bleeding heart got the better of you?--made you want to look away.
“You shouldn’t work at all,” he muttered, as he pushed himself from the doorframe and left.
Well.
It was a nice sentiment, but not a realistic one.
–
One day, Kadaj is not downstairs with his brothers in the cafe when you come down in the morning, apron freshly tied. It is only Loz, sitting in the booth, turning an ashtray over and over in his hands with an almost fittingly ashen expression on his face.
“Loz?��
His head jerks up at the sound of your voice, and you swear–it couldn’t be a trick of the light–that there are tears in his eyes.
Instantly, you swoop down into the booth, reaching across–fingers grazing the ashtray and taking it from his fingers. He clenches them, keeping them hovering into the air, until you (bold thing) grip his hands in your own.
He stares down at your hand like it’s a foreign object.
“What’s the matter? Where are your brothers?”
His gaze pulls away from your hands and there’s no mistaking the watery lashline this close up–he has been crying. A pang in your chest makes you squeeze his fingers. Poor dear. Poor Loz.
“Kadaj is–there’s something wrong with him.” His lips pout, and up close, you can see them quiver.
“What’s wrong with him?” You keep your voice soft and slow; like how your teacher used to talk to you, when you fell on the playground and couldn’t articulate what happened through your blubbering lips.
“He’s…” Loz frowns, squeezes his eyes shut. “His head is really warm. And he’s coughing!” He says the next part too loudly, and a few early-morning heads turn towards the booth. “I think he might be…” The word dying does not come out, but it’s there, written in his worry-stricken face.
You fight against the urge for an indulgent smile. Instead, you squeeze Loz’s hands, and he makes the softest noise of surprise. “It sounds like it’s a cold.”
Loz frowns deeper. “A… cold?”
You do smile, now. Not out of pity but that sense of warm upcoming accomplishment: if there’s any type of crisis you’re completely capable of handling, it’s a simple cold. “Yes. Let me get some things together, and we’ll go take care of him, okay?”
Loz pulls one of his hands from your grip, slow and reluctant; but only so that he can wipe away his tears with the back of his hand.
How endearing–if strange–these brothers have come to be in your eyes, you think, as you begin to create a mental list of supplies to bring up to their room.
–
For once, Yazoo does not look perfectly serene and put-together. He looks–well. Frazzled. Hairs out of place, a dull darkness lining underneath his eyes, and you sense a sort of soft fracture in his expression that widens when you step through the open doorway, Loz just behind you.
There are a million things that enter your mind when you enter their rented room–how sparse it looks with so few personal items, for one; how uncomfortable it must be for them to squeeze into the small space, for two–but foremost on your mind is that Kadaj is never going to get better like this.
Curled up on a bed wearing his full leather outfit, shivering, sweat plastered to his forehead. You can see the remnants of where Yazoo has attempted to tend to him, but in all the wrong ways–not that you can blame him, considering how inexperienced and naive these strange silver brothers can be.
Kadaj is so out of it that he doesn’t realize you’re in the room for a few long moments. When he does turn his head, his gaze narrows.
“Who said you could come?” He murmurs, bitterly. “Go away. I’m not well.”
Your lips press down and your hands find themselves moving to your hips. You feel like your mother, in more ways than one.
“That’s why I’m here.” You glance at Loz, at Yazoo, then back at Kadaj. “You’re not well, and we’re going to get you better.” You take a glance around the room–at blankets strewn about, none of them on Kadaj to keep him warm; at half-empty glasses of murky liquid that may or may not have once been milk from downstairs; at trash, bits and bobs, things that make the place cluttered–and your thoughts click into place.
“Loz, Yazoo,” you say, gentle, but firm, as you set your bag down on a thankfully clear side table. “The first thing is to get this place clean. People heal better in clean spaces.” You nod towards the cups, the blankets, everything else strewn about the room. “You two clean that up while I get to work on your brother, okay?”
There’s a brief moment where the two brothers glance at each other, then at Kadaj, sick and sweaty on the bed. He huffs out through his nose and turns away, which must mean something to the two of them, because they both get to work on clearing up the room.
It’s cute, in a way.
It would be cuter if it didn’t leave you with a sense of pity in your stomach; just how did these three grow up, if this is how they lived?
But there would be time to think about that later, when Kadaj was better.
You’ll start with his choice of sick outfit.
“Kadaj,” you say, lowering your voice, taking a step forward. “You need to change into something more comfortable. A loose shirt and trousers.”
He doesn’t look at you, not yet. Instead, he curls in further, and says, low but clear: “No.”
Ah, there’s that stubbornness from when you first met rising forward. Pride, too, you think. Well–what man wanted to be sick and weak in front of someone else? Especially someone he followed around like some sort of strange puppy with increasing frequency.
Your hands go to your hips. A well-practiced gesture your mother used to give you when you were equally stubborn. “Kadaj,” you insist. “You are going to change into something more comfortable. No ifs, ands, or buts.”
It’s like the air gets sucked out of the room. Loz and Yazoo pause, each of them halfway to picking up something strewn about the room, looking to Kadaj. Kadaj, for his part, seems to scrunch. His expression, his body–before he looks to you with an expression almost as unreadable as the ones he gives you in the kitchen on certain evenings.
Mixed in with the urge to roll your eyes–men could be so dramatic–is a sprinkle of uneasiness in your stomach.
“Fine,” Kadaj mumbles, finally, unfurling on the bed and sitting up. You pluck up a discarded sleep shirt and what appears to be sweatpants and hold them out. When Kadaj takes them, you just manage to resist the urge to smile–you don’t want to poke his wounded pride, after all.
As he leaves to get dressed, you finally attend to your supplies. Inside of your bag is a hefty container of freshly made warm soup–your mother’s recipe, of course–and a batch of cold medicine. The sight of it makes you want to hum; it’s nostalgic, these trinkets from the days of being-cared-for.
When you turn, all three brothers are standing in front of the bed. It’s a bit like something out of a story. There’s the brief thought of being a governess to abandoned children, but it is brief; these aren’t children, and you are just helping out three young men who seem ill-equipped to deal with life on their own.
“Let’s get you tucked into bed,” you say, and you watch as Kadaj slowly climbs onto the bed, his face turned to watch you–like an animal, you think, afraid to turn around. All the while Loz and Yazoo stand to the side, looking anxious. For his health? Or waiting to see if he’ll huff about being told what to do? Perhaps, you think, a little bit of both.
And you haven’t even made him take the medicine yet. It’ll be the worst part, you know from experience. The taste is–well. It tastes like medicine. But better the taste of medicine than to be sick. That’s what your mother used to say.
It’s what you say, when you hand Kadaj the spoon, he takes it into his mouth, and promptly chucks it towards the wall.
“Perhaps there’s another medicine we could use,” Yazoo offers. Calm, like always, with a hint of something else underneath. It’s probably not the first time his younger brother has expressed… displeasure at doing something he doesn’t want to do.
“Nope,” you say, cheerfully, retrieving the spoon and doling out another dosage. “This is the best medicine in town.” You sit down on the end of the mattress, and hold the spoon to his mouth. “Here, we’ll do it the way my mom used to.”
You don’t miss the way Kadaj tenses; the way Yazoo and Loz tense too, the creak of their leather a telltale giveaway.
“One spoonful of medicine,” you murmur. “Then you can have as much soup as you want. Okay?” Kadaj eyes you warily, and you can’t help but smile, indulgent, soft. Like baked bread out of the oven. “I promise, the soup tastes much better than the medicine.”
There are a few almost ridiculously tense moments–you’re tempted to shove the spoon into his mouth, for goodness’ sake–before Kadaj opens his lips. You slide the spoon in and tilt it, and he swallows it down, grimacing all the while.
“There,” you say, beaming. “That wasn’t so hard! You’ll just need a dose of this every 2 hours–”
“What?”
Sometimes you can forget how young he seems–no, not young exactly. Green. Like he sprung fully formed out of the ground, all green shoots, and nothing substantial underneath.
“Every two hours,” you continue, ignoring his outburst. “And drink some soup afterwards. It’ll help with the taste and help you feel better.” The mattress creaks when you stand up and retrieve the container of soup, along with a second, medicineless spoon.
“I have to go in for my shift. If it’s too hard to eat, let your brothers feed you, okay?” You glance towards Loz and Yazoo and it’s briefly startling, the way they look at you. Like you’ve done some sort of wondrous thing by simply getting Kadaj to take medicine, by handing him a container of homemade soup.
“Thank you,” Yazoo says, almost slowly.
Loz cracks a smile–and cracks his thanks. “Yeah. Thanks.”
“Of course,” you don’t hesitate. You never have, when it comes to helping others. Especially, no–increasingly, these three–despite the sometimes off-putting greenness to them. Strange, you suppose, how they’ve begun to be woven into your life. “It’s nothing,” you finish, giving a wave as you leave.
But from the way you feel three pairs of eyes on your back–one staring longer, much longer, much harder–you get the distinct feeling that they don’t see it as nothing much at all.
–
You are doting and warm; inviting, like a blazening hearth stumbled on in the middle of some frigid night. A welcome, after being stuck in the dark for oh-so-long.
It’s a strange, blurry emotion. One he had never truly experienced until he met you. He tried to ignore it, at first. This strange sensation–this tug, this pull.
Loz did not try at all, he thinks. Yazoo held his own, but not for long. But for Kadaj, the idea of viewing you as anything but yet another human in the way of him and Mother was abhorrent. Unnatural. Obscene.
At least, it was like that. Until inch by inch, you peeled back the hardened shell, like a knife slicing away an apple. Like the potatoes he sometimes helps you peel in the kitchen. You don’t even know what that gesture is, how significant you should find it.
He likes it, in some ways. That naive core.
But right now, he can’t think about the things he finds appealing in you. He can only see ugly green, a nasty tinge that spreads through his veins, as you smile and dote and coo over a gaggle of children.
“Why is she wasting her time with them?” He murmurs, almost spitting.
They followed you here when you didn’t show up for your morning shift. It was easy enough to track you, all they had to do was find someone who withered easily under a well-placed scowl from Loz, and your destination was revealed.
An orphanage.
It’s sickening, the way you smile at these children. Like they matter to you. Like you would barge into their rooms and make them rest and drink medicine. Things you should reserve for him–and his brothers–alone.
“Perhaps,” Yazoo says, ever practical, “she’s getting paid. Perhaps she needed another job.”
Kadaj doesn’t resist the urge to scoff. “No chance. She wouldn’t accept money for this.”
Behind him, he hears Loz whimper. If he turned, there would be tears in his brother’s eyes, no doubt. The tears are irritating–he can be such a crybaby–but Kadaj would not deny that they were understandable at this exact moment.
It’s a betrayal, a wound. Every smile you give these damned children is stabbing it further in. It’s enough to make him want to dash forward, reveal himself, slash a silver path through the crowd of orphans and demand an explanation from your blood-spattered face.
“Brother,” Loz says, interrupting this fantasy and sounding as weak as the children you’re currently fawning over. “Do… you think she likes them more than us?”
Oh, you are maddening. Loz was perhaps the softest when it came to you. You, who gave him ice cream, who walked him across town like a lost child. You, who are currently making him cry.
It is Yazoo, as usual, who comes to his rescue.
“Of course not, Loz.” He can hear the reassuring smile in Yazoo’s voice, the way he talks Loz down from cries that go beyond sniffling. “She spends far more time with us, does she not?”
Loz hums in affirmation, as you say something–energetic, grin wide–to the children and usher them inside the orphanage.
All three stare at the empty doorway where you used to stand. The emptiness is palpable, creating an endless series of questions that lead to only one answer: you’re giving someone else what you should be giving them.
“Kadaj?” Yazoo doesn’t turn, and he doesn’t need to. Kadaj knows what he’s going to ask before he asks it. “Do we need to teach her a lesson?”
And oh, that thought is tempting. An apple dangling from a tree, half-rotting, desperately wanting to be picked before the last of its flesh went sour.
How easy it would be, to grab that apple. How easy, to teach you this lesson now, he thinks; to keep you from straying from the path you ought to be on.
But Kadaj is nothing, if not someone born to think about the bigger picture. And something in him, something he recognizes ought not to be there at all, is inclined to give you an ounce of mercy. If you behave.
So–
“Not yet,” is what he says, leather gloves creaking while his fists clench, imagining all the sweet things you’re saying to the children inside. Reassurances and treats. “We’ll give her one more chance.”
–
You are a naive thing who is not aware that you have one last pitiful chance, and you squander it just two weeks later.
To you, it is a casual announcement that you’ll be leaving for 2 weeks because you’re housesitting for someone in the sticks. A friend. The one that introduced you to the director of the orphanage.
“And who knows,” you say, a smile on your face, “maybe I’ll even hear back about that assistant director position soon.”
The nail in your coffin, not that you know it.
At least you are smart enough to pick up on the shift in mood, when the three of them look at you like you’ve just admitted you killed their childhood pet. Not that you can imagine any of them having something as mundane as an old barn cat.
“I’ll be back soon?” you try, offering the words slowly, something soothing held out on a platter. “It’s only for a little bit. My friend needs my help–” But you don’t even finish the sentence, because you get the distinct impression that it’s not helping in the slightest.
Yazoo–the most restrained of the three, you know, the most practical–moves forward, his shoulder angling towards you.
“You shouldn’t go. It won’t be safe. It’s better to stay here with us.”
Loz looks at him hopefully–it almost makes you feel bad, but Loz often does–and Kadaj simply stares ahead at you, like he’s been doing since you said you were leaving. There’s something petulant in his stare, but it’s glossy. Like it’s covering something else up. Something you don’t want to peel back and see.
Something that makes a soft thought that’s been there all along, too quiet to hear and easily resisted before, get just a bit louder.
Maybe, just maybe, when you get back–you should think about distancing yourselves from these three. It would be inevitable, anyway, if you get the new job.
But it can wait until you return. Some time away will do you good, anyway. You’ll be able to think more clearly at your friend’s house, out in the sticks, with nothing to worry about except insects getting in through a rip in the window screen at night.
For once, when you leave, you don’t feel their eyes on you.
They’re only looking at each other.
–
Your friend lives in the middle of nowhere. In a small house surrounded by dense forest, all signs of civilization reduced to the dirt road that was cut through the area years ago, connecting the sparsely placed houses with the rest of the world with chunks of dusty gravel.
Your friend lives in the middle of nowhere, with no neighbors in sight or sound. Peace and quiet, is what she said, remarking that you’ll have a chance for some actual alone time. Something you’d never get in the city, that’s for sure.
Your friend lives in the middle of nowhere, and it’s dark outside. There is no sound by the natural buzz of the world, insects, chirping, the hum of the night.
You are alone, in the middle of the woods, with no one around. And yet–
And yet someone is knocking on the door.
A firm knock. Intentional. One that makes your body jerk like a puppet.
Your first thought–some kids playing a prank, knowing your friend wasn’t home–is quickly washed away. She didn’t have neighbors even remotely close nearby, and this was not the haphazard, giddy knock of some teenager being dragged away by friends, lest you catch them in the act.
So who…?
The knocking comes again. Louder. Slower.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
Then a more reasonable thought: someone is lost. Their car broke down on this shitty dirt road and this house was the first one within miles.
That thought gets you out of your seat, a cushioned recliner with a worn out cover, and you set down your book to attend to the stranger in need. How funny, that even when you’re meant to be taking a break, you’re bound to help someone out.
But when you open the door, nothing greets you but the night, lit only by the moon ahead and the dim yellow light hanging above your friend’s front door. Insects dash against the glass bulb, hitting it with a desperate ferocity.
Strange–you swore you heard a knocking. But as you go back inside, leaving the breeze and darkness and insects behind, it’s easy enough to wave it away. You’re alone, in a new place, it’s only natural to hear strange sounds.
The house settling. An animal in the woods. Some nocturnal bird, maybe, pecking at the window frame.
By the time you sit down again with your book and a quickly cooling cup of tea, you’ve already put the sound out of your mind, wiped away all traces of who-what-could-be-at-the-door.
It’s easy to get lost in your book now, without life pulling away your mind every few moments. Without the cafe, without the customers, without the familiar faces. Without–and it’s a guilty acknowledgement–three brothers trailing behind.
It is when you have just crossed that threshold of being immersed in your book that–
There is another knock at the door.
Louder, this time.
And oh, how unmistakable in its human origin.
Knock-knock-knock.
Not the wind or some wayward bird, but someone with knuckles, curling them up and rapping them against the door.
It takes you longer to get up from the chair this time. Something tight and low settles in your stomach–dread, taking root as you force yourself up and over to the door.
This time, you don’t open it right away. This time, you lean closer, pressing your eye against the peep hole, to see… nothing. Literally, nothing. Complete darkness, without even the light of the bulb above the door to give you a glimpse of the few feet in front of the house
Something has been taped over the peep hole. And it wasn’t there when you opened the door the first time.
That low dread in your guts begins to strum faster, tingling up and down your arms. You stare at the useless, black peep hole for far too long as you try to decide what to do–what to think.
Someone playing a stupid prank? Maybe. Kids who live out in the boonies and maybe heard from an aunt-uncle-cousin-brother that someone would be housesitting out here, and made the trek for some fun.
Someone trying to rob the place? More likely, you think. Just as easy for a robber to hear from an aunt-uncle-cousin-brother that the normal inhabitant would be gone, replaced by a stupid city girl.
Those options are the only two that really stick in your mind as you peel yourself away from the door and make a pitstop at the kitchen. Your friend was no gourmet cook, but she did have a large, sharp kitchen knife.
Perfect for slicing through hard vegetables. Perfect for–what? Defending yourself? If it was kids playing a prank, well, you wouldn’t dream of it. But on the chance that it was someone with less-than-good intentions… it might be necessary to defend yourself.
It might be necessary to have a weapon.
It just might.
–
A few minutes turn into an hour, and there are no more knocks on the door. No more unusual sounds. Nothing but the breeze and the insects, and your occasional hum as you read your book. Though your mind never gets fully engrossed in it; you’re on the surface of the world, ready to step out at a moment’s notice, if necessary.
But you no longer feel like your guts are ice and the idea that this was either some silly prank or game–”I dare you to knock on the door and run off!”--becomes stronger and stronger. Heck, maybe there wasn’t anything taped to the peep hole after all. Maybe it was just hard to see out of it in the dark. Maybe the light bulb went out.
Who knows. Not you, that’s for certain.
But that lack of knowledge becomes less frightening and more a simple, accepted fact. Someone knocked on the door, or someone didn’t. It was dark, and hard to see. You were overreacting, that’s all.
And as soon as that simpler–sweeter–accepted fact coats over the dread in your guts, you decide you’d like nothing more than to get dressed for bed. The book and tea and lamp light will seem all the cozier when you’re wearing your softest pajama set, certainly.
The knife is left next to the book while you head for the bedroom. It’s a cozy little room, with a warm bed and a quilted blanket that you think, if you remembered correctly, had been passed down in your friend’s family for at least two generations.
Or was that the plaid curtains, currently pulled over the half-open window, billowing ever-so-slightly with the mild night breeze? A nice breeze, inviting enough that you’re debating keeping it open all night, even now, as you slip out of your trousers and stand there in your underwear. Your pajamas are resting right on top of that maybe-antique quilt, and you pick up the soft pajama shirt and pull it over your head. They’re soft, light blue, one of the few things you’d decided to splurge on buying new.
Hmm. Actually… new curtains might be nice in your little room, wouldn’t they? Something to freshen it up, change it a little. Life had begun to feel more stale lately, more suffocating. You can’t quite pinpoint when, but–
A loud engine revs from the other side of the house.
Your entire body jerks and you instinctively jerk back so hard that you slam your elbow against the wall, pain radiating up your arm. The pain takes a backseat to the sudden numbness of the unexpected sound, the way your heart feels like it jumps out of your chest.
Your socked feet pad hard against the floor as you run, almost slipping, back to the front of the house. Your fingers shake as you yank back the curtains of the kitchen window, just in time to see a shape–someone on a motorcycle, the brightness of its headlight breaking through the darkness–riding away.
Instinctively, your eyes dart to the front door. It’s locked–good. That doesn’t make your heart feel any less jumpy. Maybe you should call someone. You can’t afford a cell phone, but your friend had a house phone. But who would come out here in the middle of the night?
Especially over what might be–could be, still could be–some stupid prank. Bored teens on motorcycles who have nothing better to do than scare the shit out of you.
Well. Let them scare you. Your heart begins to thud instead of pitter-pattering like some terrified rabbit, and you breathe in-and-out through your nose to bring down the panic. You’re okay. You’re an adult. And you have a knife, anyway. Should you need to scare someone off.
The house seems less cozy and more achingly empty as you creep back into the bedroom and finish getting dressed, slipping on soft pajama pants that feel less comfortable than they did yesterday.
Habit makes you force yourself to see the bright side. You’ll have a story to tell your friend when she gets back. And a story to banter about with customers at the diner, when you need to make that connection and get extra tips.
What a laugh–you finally get some alone time and someone decides to ruin it by being an asshole, and all you can think about is how to use the story to make more money.
It’s kind of funny, actually. What is less funny is the realization that hits when you go back into the living room and–
The knife is gone.
The knife is gone–it was right on top of your book. You remember setting it down carefully. You remember it cutting through the title of the book. You remember seeing it before you went back into the bedroom–
Well. Wait. Do you remember all that? Had you actually set it down before you went to get changed? Maybe you set it down somewhere and just thought you put it down on the book. Maybe you left it in the bedroom, or–you whirl, looking towards the open-floor kitchen–you set it back on the counter.
Or maybe, you whirl around, you put it by the front door.
Which is open.
Just a crack.
No.
You locked it. Didn’t you? Yes, you checked it, you must have locked it. You’re not aware that your body is trembling until you take those few steps forward towards the door, heart thumping again, listening intently for the sound of someone outside.
Kids. Pranksters. Robbers. Murderers. Whoever, whatever.
But when your sweaty palm grips the door handle and turns it, there is nobody there. Again. Just the night, just the insects. One dives for your face and you gasp, jumping back in the house and locking the door–surely, double checking–with a thunk of the lock.
The mind makes wonderful leaps and bounds when it wants to rationalize something. And that is what your mind does now. You put the knife somewhere else–you’ll find it in a moment; you were mistaken when you thought you locked the door the first time. Even though you looked at it after you heard the motorcycle outside.
A trick of the eye, a trick of the brain. That’s all it was. Some bored teens playing a joke and you’re out here alone, turning it into something much bigger than it needs to be. Your friend did tell you that it’s easy to get paranoid when you’re out here, in the dark, all by yourself.
The house creaks, she told you. Settles in the night, groans when the wind blows. Thoughts mush together, and there’s a brief thought that you ought to call someone, before you hear it.
A motorcycle. Again. This time, it comes from behind the house and you’re aware enough to immediately dash for the back door. There’s a window–shut–and you push aside the curtains. It’s harder to see in the back, with no porch light at all. But you do see wisps of engine smoke, the red lights of the motorcycle dash.
Stupid kids. Stupid, bored, mean kids. A brief flicker of sympathy–they must get lonely out here–is stamped out when the engine revs again and you jerk in surprise.
Well. Better to be bold than let them keep bothering you. With a swift motion, you undo the lock and peel the door back, just enough to take a step out onto the small pad of concrete outside the door.
Your mother always told you to pretend that your father was coming home, should you be caught alone by someone who ought not to be there. So the thought on what to say comes quickly, a half-remembered lesson taught to you on your mother’s knee.
“Hey! You’d better get out of here! My boyfriend is coming back any minute, and he doesn’t mess around!”
The words echo into the night, bouncing off the crickets of insects. The figure on the motorcycle doesn’t move.
“Liar,” someone whispers next to your ear.
You have just enough mental coordination to stagger backwards into the house as you choke on your surprised gasp, pushing the door shut out of pure primal instinct rather than anything resembling a cognitive choice. Likewise, your fingers twist the lock shut, and it’s only after you hear the steady thud of the lock that consciousness returns to you.
There’s someone out there. No. Two people. One on the bike, and the person who spoke. You didn’t see them, didn’t even feel them next to you. Like they were some sort of ghost, only you know it’s not a ghost, because ghosts did not ride motorcycles.
Probably.
But now is not the time for debating the ins-and-outs of supernatural entities, as you head right to the house phone hanging on the wall and dial your work. The numbers twirl with each twist of the round dialer, leading you closer and closer to someone on the other end. The restaurant is open late; whoever took your shift should still be up and about, taking care of the stragglers, scrubbing everything up for the night.
It rings once, twice, and it’s a certainty that you’ll soon hear the blissful sound of someone picking up–when it cuts out.
Fuck, seriously? You hang up the phone and pick it up again. But there’s no dial tone. There’s nothing at all. You try again, pushing every button a dozen times. It’s clear, however, that the phone isn’t working.
The receiver hurts underneath your tightening palm. The phone ought to be working. The phone ought to be able to call for help. But it’s not, and you can’t.
And someone is knocking on the door.
Again.
A polite, firm knock that does not at all match the frantic beating of your heart. It doesn’t stop when you don’t answer, standing frozen by the phone. It just keeps going.
“Go away!” You all but shriek. The knocking pauses–they must hear you through the door–before it resumes. Just as politely. Just as firm.
They aren’t going to go away. The phone is dead. You need–something. Protection. Leaden feet take you into the kitchen, where the big kitchen knife may no longer be, but there’s a smaller one stuck in the knife block that should do in a pinch.
If you had to defend yourself–could you? The most you’d ever done before was kneeing some creep in the balls when you were a teenager, just the way your mom had taught you, way back when. But kneeing a creepy jerk who cornered you in an alleyway is different than dealing with two strangers in the dark, in the night, in the middle of the forest.
When you reach the door, knife gripped in your hand, the knocking stops. Your breath comes out in loud, nasal spurts as you lean in towards the peep hole. Which is stupid, you realize, because it’s covered and–
Only it’s not covered anymore. You can see outside now, the dimly lit front of the house all tinged yellow from the bulb. And it seems impossible, but that’s all you see. The dull grass, the forest ahead, shrouded in darkness. Insects bopping to and fro, heading up towards the light.
There’s no one standing in front of the door. No one could have been standing there, knocking, fist curled and firm. You would have seen them running away, or seen the edge of them; a leg, an arm, as they darted away.
“This is bullshit,” you mutter, and with a brazen sort of bravery rushing through you, you decide to tell these pranksters off once and for all. It’s the only thing you can do, with the phone not working. The door unlocks with a twist of your fingers and you step out into the night air, the hum of insects louder now.
“Hey!” Your voice seems to echo into the trees, where whatever nocturnal animals rest in the branches must flinch at the disturbance. “I mean it! Leave now and we won’t call the police! My boyfriend is–”
But you don’t get a chance to puff up the qualities of your imaginary boyfriend, because something loud and close and awful suddenly comes to life in front of you.
A motorcycle.
Revving its engine at the edge of the clearing where the dirt road connects this quiet little house to the forest trail. The headlight bursts through the darkness, unnaturally white, and with the help of the faded yellow bulb behind you can just make out the figure.
A young man with long silver hair.
It’s Yazoo. Yazoo, sitting on the motorcycle, revving the engine.
There is a brief rush of relief. A brief whirling thought of–Yazoo is here, and so his brothers must be here, and they can help you scare away these robbers or teens or whoever has been messing with you.
It’s a stupid rush, a stupid relief. It fits you well, you think. That the first thing you thought to do was smile and think your worries were over, because the trio of brothers you’d been helping decided to check up on you.
And then common sense hits you in the back of the head, and that relief is gone, replaced only with an ugly dread.
It is Kadaj and his brothers who knocked at the door. Kadaj and his brothers who revved their engines. Who whispered in your ear. Who are scaring you.
But–why?
“What do you want?” You mean to scream it, to put some kind of force behind the question; but the words come out all tangled and choked. Like a pitiful whine.
And then the world goes dark. The headlight turns off at the same time as the porch light shatters, and your body reacts with a jerk that nearly sends you to the ground. You can hardly see, just the dimmest bit thanks to the light bleeding in from the opening door, and you hear the sounds of sets of feet moving in the darkness–
They’re coming for you.
By pure luck, you fumble your way back into the house, slamming the door shut with silver glinting in your line of sight. The sound of the lock is melodic and you take a few steps back, as if they might just walk right through the closed door. Like ghosts in a folk story.
But they don’t.
And then you wonder if you locked the back door after all, and your socked feet slide on the wooden floor as you pound towards the back of the house.
It’s locked–yes, yes, yes–and you think about trying the phone again when you hear it.
A window rattling.
You locked the doors, but what about the windows? They let in the night breeze, pretty curtains billowing. And they might just let in so much more.
It’s a mystery how your fingers manage to work, with so much fear coursing through your body, as you rush from window to window, double checking the latches. Locked, locked, all locked, thank goodness. Your friend must have locked them before she left, and you’re glad for it.
But the sound doesn’t stop, and now you hear the sound of a window shifting and–
The bedroom.
You make it to the bedroom just in time to see a figure clad in black leather, silver hair shimmering like a curtain in front of his face, climbing through the open window. Limbs all tangled, like some creature hauling itself out of a dirty well in the woods.
One of them–it’s Yazoo, you realize, his hair skirting well past his shoulders–is in the house. There’s no time to run, you’ve got to hide. Then find a way to get out of the house and get help. The practical details–how are you going to find help in the middle of nowhere, in the dark, with no shoes on?--don’t matter now.
All that matters is that Yazoo doesn’t see you. So you jerk away from the bedroom, forcing yourself to slide along in your socks, and open the hallway closet as softly as you can. But you don’t shut it–you need to see.
And you do see. You see Yazoo emerging from the bedroom door like he belonged there, and didn’t just crawl in through a window.
Hiding inside the closet, it’s suddenly so easy to see why your boss thought you’d lost your mind when you started connecting with them. He’s–wrong, isn’t he? All three of them are wrong. The way he looks, the way he moves. Like some sort of sinewy animal, mako eyes almost flashing in the lamplight of the house.
He says your name, softly, in the darkness. It makes your stomach clench.
“Where did you get to?” He asks you. You don’t dare answer. Instead, you watch as he dips in and out of view, checking the rooms, the corners, the crannies.
Please don’t check here, you beg the world.
The world must be listening, because instead, he looks towards the back area of the house. The back door.
“Perhaps you went back outside?” He murmurs, and the sound of his feet approaching the back door, the door itself creaking open, gives you the precious moment you need to flee.
There’s no time for plans and proper thoughts. As soon as you realize Yazoo doesn’t step right back into the house, you throw open the closet door and dash for the front of the house. Fumbling fingers manage to undo the lock, and you fling open the front door–
To find Loz standing there, a half-grin on his face, an arm reaching out for you. You slam it shut and it bounces off his hand, catching it in the door as it slowly swings back open from the momentum.
Your brain registers his reaction–”Hey! Ow!”--as nothing but background noise as your own awful, incomprehensible noise of terror rushes from your pounding chest straight out your mouth.
There’s nowhere to run but the back door and you flinch sideways when you see Yazoo standing in the threshold, arms crossed. Instinct takes you to the only room with a lockable door, the bedroom, and you slam it shut behind you, locking it with a swift turn of your wrist.
The window–the breeze is still wafting in, those pretty curtains that did nothing to protect you billowing. The window slams shut with ease and you turn the latch, blocking the only other entrance to the room.
You just–you just have to wait them out. That’s all. The thought is stupid and pathetic and you sit down on the maybe-antique quilt with it, running it through your head until it dissipates into nothingness.
They’re going to get in. They’re going to get in, and then–then what? What do they want? To kill you, surely. Maybe something more. Above all, above even the terror, you just feel incomprehensibly stupid for trusting them. Not just trusting them. Liking them, even. Fuck–
Something slams against the door.
There’s another sound–a huff, a complaint. Loz?
Then that something-what-is-it slams against the door again. And again. And again. And you hear the wood splinter before you see it caving in, see the edge of someone’s shoulder splintering the wood.
Then a leather clad hand busts through the hole, reaching for the lock that did little to keep them at a bay, after all.
You’re lifting the window and pushing yourself through before they can even open the door, and if you had the breath (you don’t) you would surely let out a noise of triumph. They didn’t get you, they won’t. You’ll run–run until your feet bleed, until your lungs pop out–and get help. Someone on the road or someone else out there, cozying up in some middle of nowhere house.
The darkened vision of trees whip by as you dash into the woods, barely able to see in front of you in the darkness. You don’t know how far you run before you finally trip, a wayward limb or stump taking you out. The ground connects hard with your knees and your breath gets knocked out of your chest.
Get up, stupid, you think, just as someone’s gloved hand latches around your ankle.
You scream all the way to the house, digging your nails into the ground as you go; into the grass, at first, then the dirt of the backyard, and then scratching along the wooden floor as you try to claw your way to freedom.
The world goes topsy-turvy as you’re hoisted into the air–it’s Loz holding you, bigger and wider–and set down unceremoniously on one of your friend’s kitchen chairs. There’s a padded cushion on it. It’s red, with a dainty illustration of a flower embroidered in the middle.
The rope wrapped around you, pinning you to the chair, is not so dainty. It’s harsh and unyielding, digging into your skin as you struggle. All struggling does is make your breath come out even more ragged, until you find you can barely breathe at all.
Is this how you die? Tied to a chair, suffocating on your own fear? You can hear the wheeze of your own breath, feel the way your eyes hurt, wide and buggy.
Someone taps your cheek with their gloved fingers. Enough to startle you with a faint sting. Your tear-filled vision makes out Yazoo in front of you, crouched, a look of awful concern on his face.
“Calm down,” he says, in a way you might have admired before. He was always the one to calm down Kadaj, when he was being something of a brat. “Breathe in, through your mouth.” You do. “Now out through your nose.” You do, and he smiles. “Good. Now do it again.”
And you do, and you can breathe, and you don’t feel like you’re going to die choking on air; it doesn’t lessen the knowledge that they’re going to kill you some other way, now. But at least you won’t suffocate to death.
It’s a poor comfort, as your pathetic struggles fade to nothing, and you slump against the rope. You look up towards the three brothers you’ve come to know, each of them staring down at you with expressions you can’t quite measure up.
They’re going to hurt you, before they kill you. That seems like a certainty.
It’s Loz who steps forward first. You expect him to take a swing, to use those muscles of his to break something. Your jaw, maybe. A few fingers.
Instead, he sniffles.
“You don’t really have a boyfriend, do you?” The frown on his face makes you wonder if this is actually a dream. But it’s not. The rope, the pain in your sore feet, the sweat on your neck. Too real for a dream.
Yazoo looks towards you as he speaks, voice soft, edged with a warning. “Of course not, Loz.”
When his gaze deepens, you shake your head.
“I-I don’t. I was just… trying to scare you away.” How stupid that seems, now. A fake boyfriend to scare away these three, who could probably snap your neck with a gesture.
Loz smiles through the beginnings of his tears, and rubs at them with the back of his hand as he nearly chuckles out a response. “I knew it.”
It’s this that does you in–Loz smiling and wiping away his tears like any other day, like you’d told him they were out of strawberry ice cream then found a pint in the back of the freezer. How can they act so casual, with everything they did? With you tied up on the damn kitchen chair in front of them?
You burst out with the plea, tears prickling your eyes again, voice strained and terrified.
“Please, just let me go. I won’t tell anyone.”
Yazoo leans down, ghosting your tears with leather fingers. His expression is calm as ever. It would be soothing, in any other circumstance.
“We aren’t letting you go. There’s no use in getting upset.” It’s spoken so softly, almost sweetly. Bile rises in your throat.
“But what do you want? Why are you doing this?”
Your breath comes out faster again, no matter how much you try to slow it down. They aren’t letting you go; they’re going to hurt you; they’re going to kill you. The thoughts come out on an awful loop until the vision of Yazoo in front of you blurs away, and you hear the sound of a chair scraping.
It’s Kadaj, sitting on another kitchen chair, his arms wrapped around the back. He rests his chin against his hand and it’s like he’s looking at you for the first time. Mako eyes burn into your own and you wonder how they didn’t strike you as so wrong before. Before, you’d thought them pretty. Now you feel them pinning you, looking through you.
Kadaj–was he even human?
“You were going to leave,” Kadaj says finally, voice low and icy. You don’t know what he means, and it must show in your ragged, tear-stained face, because he scoffs. “You were going to leave us. For those orphans.”
Abandonment drips from his voice and your mother would slap you for the way something like pity still sparks inside your chest. Faint and buried down underneath the ropes, harsh and scratching, but still there.
They didn’t want you to leave them. Would they kill you, if you did? If they thought you would?
Words fail you, until they don’t. Until you’re promising stupid things, anything, to make them let you go. To make them not hurt you. To live through this night and then get home and gather anything sentimental and disappear into the world. You’d helped others do it, and you could do it, too.
“I won’t leave,” you offer, voice choking. “I promise. I won’t take the job. They–they didn’t even offer it to me, they probably won’t, I’m awful, I have no experience, they wouldn’t–” Your voice hitches and your lips wobble as you make your promises.
Kadaj stares at your mouth like it’s the most fascinating thing in the world, even as you end your pitiful diatribe with the words on loop. “I’ll stay, I promise, I promise, I’ll stay, I promise, I promise, I promise–”
Kadaj pushes the chair back and he and his brothers exchange a look between them. A secret language you’ll never be privy to, these looks; these wordless glances that say more than anything.
Maybe they’ll let you go. Maybe they’ll have their fun–the way Kadaj looked at your mouth did not escape you–and let you go. Or kill you. If they kill you, let it be quick. At least let it be quick.
Kadaj is smiling when he turns back to you.
“You are going to stay with us.” It’s a matter of fact that sits low in your gut as the three of them approach the chair. These three men, now strangers to you, all smiling down in a way that makes you feel sick.
You look at their hands for weapons–the kitchen knife, lost to the wilderness–but see nothing but the leather as Kadaj brings his hand up to your neck and gives it an awful squeeze.
The ocean rushes in your ears as the world goes spotty, then black–
And when you wake up, surrounded by three silver-haired brothers, you’ll be nowhere near this cabin or even the city. You never will be again.
Soft hearts weren’t made for this world, after all.
#yandere#yandere final fantasy#yandere ff7#kadaj#afterwitch writes#/slaps trunk#this baby can fit so many mother issues in it#I love these fuckers
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requests still open? insomniac anon is back
re fluff hcs with a reader who's on a trip? family, work, any reason; just some temporary absence/reunion scenarios
L. KENNEDY, C. REDFIELD, C. OLIVEIRA X READER (SEPARATE)
ೃ⁀➷ sypnosis; absence/reunion hc’s
ೃ⁀➷ warnings; none!
ೃ⁀➷ author’s note; bought ps plus iusy to play ff7 and ff15 again ermmmmm, this is mostly random bs i thought of on the spot😁, also i always think of re5-re6 chris and og re4 leon when writing these but its up to u😘😘, no proofread yikes
C. OLIVEIRA
you’d think he was grieving your loss by the way he was acting
doesn’t necessarily let it show too much into his daily life (for exp. work) but you can still notice he’s not as up beat as he usually is
sends you random photos of the things he gets up to whilst your gone, and half the time they’re things that make you regret even leaving him alone - such as something he’d made in the oven all over the floor as he dropped it by accident, captioned with a single ‘oops’
but you get some heartwarming videos here and there amidst all the chaos and random bullshit. like him fixing the piece of jewellery you’d complained about breaking for so long, or something as simple as him trying to learn to cook your favourite dish to welcome you back
sends you photos of him brushing his teeth every morning. send one back.
yet once you’re back? it’s as if nothing ever happened. INSISTS on being the one to pick you up, no ifs or buts
absolute bone crushing hug, spins you around whilst he’s at it before attacking your face with kisses. he’s missed you, okay?
L. KENNEDY
he tries to ignore your absence as much as possible
tries to keep his hands and mind busy at all times, simply to not think about you not being with him
sends a message daily, asking how you are and if everything’s alright. he’d prefer to call you, but he refrains from doing so as he doesn’t want to disturb you in any way ;(
but whenever you call, you best believe he answers literally on the first ring (if he’s not at work, yet even if he is he manages to somehow answer the phone) and has a small smile on his face basically the whole time you’re speaking with him
tends to start taking less care of himself once you’re gone due to him overworking himself to keep his mind off things. it’s a bad habit, he knows, and he’s guaranteed to have a lecture from you once you’re back
but he doesn’t mind like at all - subconsciously does it on purpose so you dote on him once you’re back but you didn’t hear that from me
long ass hug once you’re back, face buried in your neck as he simply takes in the scent of your perfume once more - until you comment on his eyebags and the lecture begins
a small smirk tugged on his face and a ‘what, worry that much ‘bout me?’
C. REDFIELD
workaholic at heart. so he works even more to make up for your absence
calls you twice a day without fail - once in the morning, once at night just to simply hear your voice and ask you about what you’ve been up to
won’t ever admit it, yet going to bed without you now feels strange. sure, he might sleep flat on his back half the time and be out cold most of the time when you’re just getting into bed, but he can’t help but miss the thought and feeling of you throwing your leg over his hips and snuggling against his bicep. he’s a simple man
hates when you leave because your cooking’s gone. there is genuinely nothing this man loves more than a meal home cooked by you, and having that stripped away from him is, to him, worse than having to deal with all the BOWs and shit at work
claire’s always asking him when you’re back for 2 reasons; 1, she genuinely wants to know to see you again and 2, she loves reminding chris of the fact you’re gone and winding him up about it. sibling love
will literally decide himself that he’s picking you up. whether that be the airport or a whole different city, he’s coming for you himself. you get no say in it
you come running at him and throw yourself against his chest, which prompts him to wrap his arms around you with a small grin on his face
#ೃ⁀➷. olka’s bs#re5 chris is literally mouth watering omg#my king🙏#chris resident evil#resident evil 4#resident evil 3#resident evil 5#resident evil#carlos oliveira x reader#carlos oliveira#leon scott kennedy x reader#leon kennedy x reader#leon kennedy#chris redfield x reader#chris redfield
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