#five nights at ojs au

[gelatinzz]

oh wait i’m goated

me when i mix my 2 biggest hyperfixations togethr liek a beast,, might draw more of this later

mephone design and style test reveal i guess

[kingdicemrwheezyflowertor]

What are some head cannons for Tugs and your Five Nights at Freddy's au?

I hope I'm not bothering you

You’re fine; Well here we go again!

Let’s start with TUGS:

I have mentioned in the past that the Tugs all knew the Titanic, well I don’t believe I mentioned that on the anniversary of her accident; They don’t do their work and Pay tribute.

In the show; They ended with Bigg Freeze (If going in a particular order), That was the last time any of the tugs were in Bigg City Port due to financial problems. (Before being sent to Sodor in the AU)

OJ has been protecting Zebedee from Johnny Cuba for years because OJ knew about Johnny’s Abusive Behavior.

Zak has a real habit of messing with people’s hair. Styling it; Playing with it, It doesn’t matter. He loves messing with it.

Don’t mess with OJ if you are a thief. That boy will Usain Bolt after ya and Tackle ya to the ground HARD! Even with his age; The Muthafucka DEADLY!

I have stated before that Ten Cents was adopted by Hercules after his mom’s death. Ten Cents has learned to cope with this by knowing that his family has always been there for him.

Zorran may show that he’s a big man and doesn’t care about his team; Deep down, He does care and it’s always slipping out.

Zip and Zug has Autism and it’s very far into the Sectrum. The first person to find out about it is Zorran (Who feels Hella guilty and becomes their papa)

Zak is VERY FLEXIBLE!! So flexible that he can do the girl from the Ring so well it scares Ten Cents and Sunshine.

Big Mickey almost had to explain himself to OJ and the others on what happened to him after the Munitions accident but he didn’t have to.

Now time for Five Nights at Freddy’s! Get ready; This is gonna be intense.

Toy Freddy has Welding/A Physical Scar on his Chest in the shape of an “X” due to a incident that almost left him decommissioned.

The Glamrocks have met the original Fnaf gang as well as the toys and the Sister location gang.

Withered Freddy is a Depressed Bear who only wants to be on stage again, The toys thankfully give him that chance at night.

Original Freddy is very oblivious to Toy Freddy having a crush on him (Because TF saw Freddy liking someone else and didn’t wanna embarrass himself)

Chica; Toy Chica; Nightmare Chica and Glamrock Chica are all great cooks! As well as Sisters; Including Withered Chica.

Springtrap and Toy Freddy have been a couple for a few years until the two talked because Springtrap loved Ballora (William Afton and his Wife kinda shipping idk)

Golden Freddy has been angry at Springtrap for years (Evan mad at William)

There is only other one Afton family member that is alive; Yeah, it’s not just Michael. It’s their son Bec (Bec belongs to my wife @lovedevildice4ever ; Thought it would be nice if I mentioned Bec.)

Glamrock Freddy is in a Poly relationship with Monty and Glamrock Bonnie (Who got fixed up thanks to Gregory and Bec).

Gregory knows a lot of things about Robots and about the Pizzeria because of the newspapers and because of looking at broken robotic machines.

Gregory views Glamrock Freddy as his father and he views Monty and Glam Bon as Papas.

Sundrop and Moondrop get their own separate bodies thanks to Gregory.

When Gregory chose to Stay in the Pizza plex; He was able to save Glamrock Freddy in time by getting the other Glamrock animatronics to come help.

In Fnaf 3; Bec was not happy when he realized he had to deal with his dad who was Springtrap.

There is one animatronic that Bec hates and that would be Funtime Freddy. BonBon is cool to Bec; Not Funtime Freddy.

Little Fun Fact for ya if you all haven’t noticed by now (Though some of you have but Idc I’m gonna say) But my Sona is literally Toy Freddy but Light Blue and having my kind of Hair.

[aquamarineicecream]

Rewind Sanders Sides Superhero AU - Chapter 3

Ao3 Link

>Chapter 1

>Chapter 4

The door clicked shut quietly after Roman entered, but it failed to go unnoticed by the man sitting at the kitchen table. The man turned around in his seat, fixing his cool gaze on the shapeshifter.

“You’re late.” The man’s midnight blue eyes narrowed behind his thickly framed glasses. Roman looked almost sheepish as he walked into the kitchen.

“Things didn’t exactly go to plan today. I’m guessing Pat and Dee are still out taking care of everything, right?” Roman opened the fridge, looking for some of his favorite jam to devour as an early breakfast. Logan stood up and crossed the length of the pristine kitchen to refill the mug Roman hadn’t previously realized he had been holding.

“Actually, they returned hours ago. However, judging by what happened upon their arrival, it would appear this mission will prove to be infinitely more difficult than we had originally foreseen.” Logan paused when he noticed Roman digging through a drawer in the fridge. “We ran out of Crofters, if that’s what you’re in search of.”

“What?! I thought we still had half a jar left!”

“Unfortunately for you, it was eaten while you were out gallivanting around an unfamiliar city.” Logan leaned back against the counter and took a sip of his coffee, watching as Roman closed the drawer while shooting Logan a betrayed look. “Regardless, you need to sleep, Roman. I know you stayed out until late the past few nights as well.”

“I’m fine,” Roman answered dismissively. He decided to make himself a mug of peppermint tea as a substitute for his lack of jam. “Just tell me what happened with Messana. Did something happen with the cleanup? Because if they want, I can help with that,” Roman volunteered while waiting for the microwave to beep so as to signify that the water in the mug inside it was hot enough for tea. Despite his offer to help appearing casual, his voice became strained at the thought of Messana having died, and he kept his eyes trained on the appliance in front of him in a successful attempt to hide his pained expression from Logan.

“You won’t believe me if I tell you. I still am not certain that Deceit and Morality were in their right minds when they came to the decision they did.” Logan took another sip of his coffee thoughtfully when, as if on cue, Patton walked into the kitchen, followed closely by Deceit.

“Good morning!” Patton said, sounding chipper as per usual. “Roman! It’s great you’re back safe, kiddo. I was worried you were gonna be out roamin’ all night!” Logan cringed at the bad joke as Deceit groaned, but Roman just laughed.

“Hi Pat. It’s good to see you too.” He got out his mug of water and put the tea bag in it to buy himself a few precious seconds before turning to greet Patton with a bright smile. One that, despite his best efforts, fell just short of reaching his eyes. “So, how was Dee and your day on the mission?”

“It was pretty good. Better than I thought it would be, actually,” Patton replied as he got a carton of eggs out of the fridge so he could start making breakfast. Roman chuckled at Patton’s response.

“Spending a day with Deceit was that bad, huh?” Roman joked.

“No, I didn’t mean that,” Patton hastened to clarify. “It’s just that yesterday didn’t have any killing in it. And any day that there is one less death in the world is a good day for me.” Roman only nodded understandingly in response. “Logan, do you want any eggs?” Patton asked in a feeble attempt to change the subject.

“No thank you, Patton.” Logan took a sip of his coffee, completely oblivious to how his coworker’s hopeful gaze lingered on him whenever he looked away.

“I’ll help you cook,” Deceit offered. He, unlike the logical one of the group, had always noticed the longing looks Patton cast in Logan’s direction, but he knew it wasn’t his place to intervene. He knew that in time everything would work itself out.

“Thanks.”

“And Logan, I’m making you some eggs whether you like it or not. You can’t survive off of coffee alone,” Deceit insisted. Logan tried to look annoyed, but Deceit saw right through him like usual.

“Really Deceit, that’s not necessary -” Logan started but cut himself off when he saw the other man’s determined expression. Logan finally conceded. “Thank you for cooking for me.” Both Deceit and Patton caught the hint of a smile and ever so slight blush on Logan’s face. Patton quickly turned away, attempting to busy himself with the food in front of him, taking extra care to keep his expression as neutral as possible. Deceit sighed heavily, exhausted with how much was always left unspoken whenever the group was assigned on missions together. Despite what Logan seemed to think, Deceit wasn’t unaware of how Logan’s eyes always followed him whenever the man thought Deceit wasn’t paying attention. In fact, Deceit was rarely ever caught unaware about anything as he always made it his business to be the most informed person in the room at all times.

A loud, overly-dramatic groan in annoyance broke the silence that had fallen over the kitchen as Roman pulled himself up so he was sitting on the counter.

“You people have no sense of priorities!” Roman exclaimed, only pausing for a brief moment when he saw the confused looks he received from his teammates before continuing. “What happened with the target?” He was tired of being kept out of the loop for so long. He had finally finished making his tea, so he dropped in three sugar cubes before stirring it and took a large sip, waiting expectantly for one of the other three to answer him.

“If you’re talking about me, I haven’t been murdered yet, just so you know,” a sharp, unfamiliar voice answered for the others. Roman involuntarily spat out his tea in the direction of the new voice, drenching the bitter emo in it.

“Creativity!” Logan instantly scolded. Virgil sent a death glare in Roman’s direction as Deceit just tried to smother a laugh.

“Why is the target alive? And why is he in our kitchen?!” Roman demanded, the shock still evident on his face.

“So sorry to disappoint you,” Virgil remarked sarcastically. Roman regarded him with a cold look before turning his gaze to the others.

“Will someone explain what’s going on here?”

“It wasn’t mutually beneficial for us to eliminate Messana so instead of fulfilling our orders, I decided to spare him and take him in as a new recruit,” Deceit stated calmly.

“What? But that’s not your job. And you know we can’t just ignore our orders.”

“It’s not your place to question my decisions, Creativity.”

“Well you know better than to not listen to our Superiors! Now all our necks are gonna be on the line.” Roman crossed his arms resentfully. Virgil ignored their conversation as Logan handed him a dish towel to dry off the tea on him.

“Breakfast is done!” Patton interrupted, trying to stop their conversation from going any further. Luckily, his attempt worked. Deceit and Roman reluctantly kept their opinions to themselves, resorting to glare in each other’s direction instead. Patton served five plates with eggs and toast before handing each man their helping. “There’s water, milk, and OJ in the fridge. Feel free to help yourselves.” Patton opened a cabinet with glasses and served himself orange juice after getting it out of the fridge. He surveyed the others once before going to eat at the dining room table. Deceit and Logan each served themselves water before Deceit went to his room, still irritated with Roman. Logan hesitated for a moment, unsure of where to go, before deciding to join Deceit. Patton ducked his head ever-so-slightly to avoid meeting Logan’s eyes as the man passed by his seat. Virgil couldn’t help but notice so he opted to join Patton, leaving Roman alone in the kitchen once more.

“Thanks for making me food.” Virgil practically inhaled the food before him, along with the orange juice he had served himself. Morality smiled at his companion.

“I’m happy you like it, kiddo. But take it easy, your breakfast isn’t gonna sprout legs and run off your plate,” Morality joked good-naturedly. Virgil looked slightly embarrassed when he seemed to realize just how quickly he had gulped down the food.

“Right, yeah. Sorry. I’m just still pretty hungry.”

“I can tell. Just make sure you don’t get a stomach ache.” The pair ate their food in silence after that, until Morality finally decided to break it once they had both finished. “Virgil, I hope you know that when we first met, I really didn’t want to hurt you. And I feel really bad. I’m really sorry for almost…” Morality trailed off before quietly adding, “...y’know.” Virgil stayed quiet for a moment, unsure of what to say to Morality’s apology.

“But you still almost did,” Virgil finally said slowly.

“I know but I really didn’t want to,” Morality explained. “And please try not to hold it against Dee because I know he didn’t wanna hurt you either.”

“If you didn’t want to do it, then why did you almost go through with it? Why is following your ‘orders’ so important to all of you?”

“Because - “ Morality started before quickly cutting himself off. He seemed to be mentally scolding himself. Meanwhile, Virgil’s interest had been instantly piqued by what Morality hadn’t said.

“Because?”

“Nevermind,” Morality responded swiftly. He tried to give Virgil a reassuring smile though the other man could see through it. “Anyways,” he started again, attempting to change the topic, “You don’t have to call me Morality all the time. My name is Patton.” Patton smiled at Virgil again but this time it seemed genuine.

“Okay, Patton,” Virgil answered, trying it out. “Well, you already know my name, so..” Patton only nodded in response. He stood up and took their empty plates and glasses to the kitchen. Though the hero wasn’t in his usual costume like Deceit had been earlier that morning, Virgil noticed that Morality still wore his suit’s pale blue gloves. Though curious, Virgil decided against asking Patton about it. Virgil felt that he was already intruding enough as it was just by being there, so he wasn’t going to pry.

“You can go to the living room if you want,” Patton called back from the kitchen, where it sounded as though he was washing the dishes. Virgil took Patton up on his invitation, standing and walking through the doorway into what he assumed was the living room. He was relieved to see he was right.

Virgil walked into the room towards the couch in front of the TV, which was currently on a news channel. He had been planning on sitting on it to watch whatever the breaking news was, so to say he was surprised when he saw Creativity sprawled across it was an understatement. Though they had met in the kitchen less than twenty minutes earlier, he had been too tired to put together all the pieces of how he knew the man before him. Virgil felt like an idiot when he realized that this was the same man he had, quite literally, ran into yesterday at Wal-Mart. Even though at the time of their first meeting Creativity hadn’t had his cape nor his scarlet and gold Colombina mask, Virgil still mentally chastised himself for not having realized why the man seemed so familiar.

But yet, even after he placed Creativity as the world-renowned hero, there was still something about him that felt so familiar, so known to Virgil. But he knew that was impossible. After all, he reminded himself, he had never met an actual superhero before yesterday. Virgil took a step back from the couch, but his attempt to escape undetected was in vain as the strong man before him angled his head to study Virgil.

“How come whenever we meet you’re always leaving?” Creativity asked, a playful gleam in his lustrous gold eyes. “I get it, the mask can be a bit intimidating,” he added as he took off the intricate mask and set it down on his broad chest, at the same time almost imperceptibly putting on a mask of another kind. With the physical mask having been removed, his expression and tone merged to complete the reckless and cocky aura he was reportedly known for having. Virgil didn’t move, staying still as he stared at where said mask had been placed for just a bit longer than was socially acceptable. “I mean it, you might as well sit down and stay a while instead of just standing there reenacting what it must have been like to be a victim of Medusa.”

At last, Virgil caved, deciding that he might as well stay there and wait for Patton to come, regardless of how annoying Creativity was. And he especially wasn’t going to be scared off just because he was alone in a room with a stranger who was also annoyingly handsome.

Virgil started towards the couch again, trying to look more confident than he felt. Since there was no space on the couch thanks to the other man having his feet up on one arm of it and his head laying on the other, Virgil went to sit in a wooden chair near the edge of the room. In turn, the superhero in question quickly sat up, ignoring his mask as it fell onto his lap, instead motioning for Virgil to come sit by him in the now vacated space on the couch.

“You’ll be much more comfortable here.”

Virgil came closer yet again, this time sitting as far from the stranger as possible. The other man chuckled quietly to himself at Virgil’s actions.

“I swear I won’t bite.” Creativity regarded him warmly with a hint of a smile playing on his lips.

“Didn’t your eyes used to be purple?” Virgil replied as he looked back up from the man’s lips to his stunning eyes. Creativity frowned for a moment.

“Do you like the violet better?” His gold eyes instantly melted into the royal purple color Virgil recognized.

“You can just do that like that?” Virgil asked, clearly taken aback. “Just think about wanting them purple and - boom - they’re purple? It’s that easy?”

“Of course it is.” Creativity appeared slightly puzzled by Virgil’s surprise but he disregarded his confusion, choosing instead to talk about what he considered to be more pressing matters. “Now, I believe we got off on the wrong foot, Surly Temple.” Creativity flashed Virgil one of his most dazzling grins before continuing, “So how about starting over?” Creativity’s proposition was met with a frown from his companion.

“Do you always just go around giving people nicknames?” Virgil looked unamused.

“Yeah, pretty much.”

“And by saying we ‘got off on the wrong foot’, you’re talking about how the first time we met you ran into me and then chased me across a parking lot and how you spat tea on me earlier, right?”

“Technically, you were the one who ran into me and the only reason I chased you is because you ran when I called you. And as for the tea, it’s not my fault you just happened to be standing where I was facing. I think that one was really your own doing,” Creativity argued good-naturedly to an unimpressed Virgil.

“Whatever.” Virgil feigned reluctance for a moment. “I guess we can start over.”

“Fantastic.” Creativity gave Virgil another perfect grin.

“Are you usually this energetic?”

“Yep!”

“I guess I’ll get used to it,” Virgil said, sounding resigned though it was obvious he was just pretending.

“Are you usually this gloomy?”

“Yes.”

Creativity seemed to think this over for a moment before giving an overly dramatic sigh. “I guess I’ll get used to it,” he replied, mimicking Virgil’s former expression before beaming once more. “I’ll have to if you’re gonna stick with us for a while.” Virgil rolled his eyes and glanced in the direction of the TV to try and suppress a smile. “You are going to stay here for a while, right?” Creativity questioned, and Virgil could've sworn his tone almost sounded hopeful.

“I make no promises, but yeah, probably.”

“That’s music to my ears, Doctor Gloom.” Creativity looked proud of himself when he saw Virgil roll his eyes yet again. “Now, to the introductions. I’m Roman, though I’m sure you already know me as Creativity from the media and everything.”

“Yeah, I’ve heard about you before,” Virgil confirmed. Although he knew Roman already knew his name, he chose to say it anyway, just to make this feel as normal as possible. Well, as normal as meeting a real-life superhero and learning his secret identity could be. “I’m - ”

“Virgil,” Roman cut him off. Roman spoke with an excess of certainty and intimacy, as though they were old friends who had known each other for years. There appeared to be more than just confidence behind the name which seemed so natural to be said in his melodic voice. It was as if he had said the word a thousand times in a thousand different ways yet Roman knew there was never a day that would come when he would grow tired of speaking it. In fact, it sounded almost vulnerable, and though it was only the other’s name, it felt as if it was the answer to both a hundred questions and none. Roman got lost in Virgil’s dark brown eyes as his own took on a tinge of red that somehow complemented the violet perfectly. They stayed like that for close to a minute, their eyes locked on each other, neither wanting to look away first. But after that moment passed, they both quickly turned to awkwardly stare at opposite walls.

“I - um - they told me your name. My Superiors, I mean,” Roman said finally. Virgil uttered a simple ‘oh’ in response. The silence stretched on after that, Roman and Virgil both turning to focus on the TV as a distraction from what had just happened between them which neither of them dared to offer an explanation for.

“Turn it up, please. I would like to hear that report.” A clear voice rang through the room, cutting the tension the man speaking hadn’t known was there. Neither Roman nor Virgil had heard Logan enter. Both had been too absorbed in their own thoughts. Roman finally focused on what the reporter was saying as he grabbed the remote from a small coffee table near him.

“....there seems to be no telling when the authorities will be able to get this fire caused by the gas explosion under control. Until now, we can only hope that help will arrive for those in danger before it’s too late. Back to you, Jeff.”

Virgil’s eyes widened as he took in the raging fire behind the woman speaking before the image on screen changed to show the other reporter back in the studio. Virgil turned to the other two with a look of horror.

“What are you doing?” he demanded. Logan simply pulled the wooden chair Virgil had been planning on sitting in earlier closer to the TV so he could continue watching without responding. Roman shot Virgil a questioning glance.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, what are you still doing here? Why aren’t you leaving already to go help those people?!” Virgil suddenly seemed upset at both of their lack of urgency.

“I heard shouting; is everything okay?” Patton asked in concern as he came into the living room at what felt to Virgil like long last.

“There was a gas explosion not that far from here and there are people in danger,” Virgil answered anxiously.

“Oh. I hope those people are okay. And that the firefighters get there soon.” Patton moved another wooden chair so he could sit by Logan.

“They just announced that the fire department arrived along with an ambulance,” Logan informed him.

“That’s good. The firefighters should be able to put out the fire soon then.” Though Patton meant well, Virgil tensed at his words, his hands helpless fists in his lap. The sharp pain of his nails digging crescent moon shapes into his palms was ignored as his face flushed, making his anger evident to the others.

“This is stupid. I can’t believe it. Any one of you could easily go there right now and save those people, but instead you’re all just relaxing and watching it happen. You should be saving those people's lives! You aren't heroes if you only save people sometimes and then the rest of the time decide to take a day off just because you feel like it. It doesn’t work that way. It can’t work that way! That’s just not right,” Virgil spat fiercely, glaring at each of them in turn.

Patton looked down, trying in vain to hide his shame by staring at the floor. Logan, on the other hand, clearly had words as sharp as knives seconds from spilling from his lips, but he instead swallowed hard and elected to say nothing, in favor of looking back at the reporters on screen in the hope that they would be able to avoid an argument. Roman was the only one of the other men in the room to return Virgil’s glare as he spoke indignantly.

“You make it sound so easy but it isn’t. You have no idea why we do or don’t get involved in stuff like this.”

“Well I know that from an outsider’s perspective, you look pretty heartless by letting these people get hurt!”

“You can’t just come into where we stay and judge and insult us without knowing the whole story!” Roman shouted with a wide gesture to the room at large, as if to prove his point.

“Then tell me what can be more important than doing what is basically the job description of a superhero.” Virgil crossed his arms expectantly, his eyes still flaring with anger.

“I don’t have to explain myself to you. You’re just a former target that we took in for some stupid reason.”

“If innocent people get hurt today, that’s on you for not doing anything when you could,” Virgil snapped coldly.

“Oh, that’s rich coming from you of all people considering you murdered two civilians in cold blood,” Roman fired back, internally regretting the low blow the second the words left his lips. Virgil’s gaze hardened savagely.

“Don’t you dare go there,” he warned. “You don’t know everything that happened that day.”

“See? There you go! You can’t call me a bad person when you don’t even know anything about a hero’s life or saving people!” Roman pushed his guilt to the back of his mind as he argued back, his grand gestures now bordering on frantic as he furiously tried to make Virgil understand.

“Stop it.” Logan’s measured voice interrupted Virgil just as he opened his mouth to retaliate.

“He was the one who started it! You know why he shouldn’t be saying stuff like that since you know how things are for us!”

“Frankly, I couldn’t care less who started what, Roman. It just needs to stop.”

“But - “

“Now.” Logan cut Roman off as he fixed his piercing gaze on his coworker. Roman glowered at the other man for a moment before crossing his arms and looking away. Logan turned back to the man on the other side of him with concern evident in his expression.

“Are you alright, Patton?” He murmured softly to the kind man who gave a small nod in response. Patton still looked guilty despite Logan’s quiet reassurances that he wasn’t to blame.

Virgil missed this quiet exchange, his gaze still fixed on the wall directly behind Roman. The hero hadn’t known it, but his words had struck a chord with Virgil. Virgil squeezed his eyes shut before slowly opening them again, trying in vain to focus on what he knew was actually before him and not what he saw and heard in the place of reality.

Ear-splitting screams shattered the peace of the night. The barrage of berating seemed endless. A shattered glass, an accident, had been the start of the nightmare that the night had become. A thousand apologies were given, but none was good enough. None would ever be good enough. He would never be good enough. Louder and louder, angrier and angrier, the night grew with each passing second. It was all too much. He needed it to stop. He couldn’t bear another minute. Tears streamed down his face but they had no effect on the others in the cramped room. A small, frail body hit the floor with an unnerving thud, bruised, unlike the hand that had struck it. Flesh touched stone, corrupting and corroding the cold surface with every encounter. A boom echoed through the night, the sound stretching to fill every formerly placid space, invading every secluded niche within the area. The body was thrown from the floor, blown clear across the street and landed with a sickening crunch of bones breaking. Night turned into day as bright light filled the atmosphere. Pieces of broken foundation decorated the orange sky for a moment before everything came crashing down on the two charred corpses still lying in the ruins of the childhood home. For one moment after all the chaos, the world was silent once more before sirens began to reverberate through the now empty space.

It was too loud. Everything was too loud. Virgil grabbed the remote in front of him, desperate to turn the background noise off. He was almost successful. Almost. Virgil watched in horror as the plastic corroded beneath his fingertips. Roman, noticing this out of the corner of his eye, immediately shrunk back from the now dangerous object. Virgil quickly dropped it onto the floor but it was too late; he had already had too much of an effect on the object. The remote control exploded before their very eyes. Patton recoiled at the cacophonous noise. Logan appeared just as startled for a moment before straightening his glasses in an attempt to regain at least a bit of his composure.

“Looks like you could use some training.”

Virgil jolted in surprise as he heard the unperturbed voice coming from the figure lurking in the doorway. None of them had heard him enter thanks to the small explosion, but Virgil was starting to get unnerved by the way Deceit just appeared in places.

“I'm sorry, I - ” Virgil started, but froze when he saw Deceit hold up a hand to silence him.

“We cannot train him. It is prohibited. We are breaking enough rules as is simply by taking him in.” Logan was the first to address what Deceit had said. Logan spoke in his usual, level tone and though there was truth behind his words, Deceit merely brushed off Logan’s concerns.

“Well we can’t exactly have him keep blowing things up all over the place, now can we?”

“I suppose not,” Logan conceded. “But we must take caution in the manner by which we go about it.”

“Of course we will. And since you’re so good at thinking things through and you’re great at planning, how about we work together on setting up his training? Would you like that?” Deceit knew Logan wasn’t likely to pass up on such an offer, so it was no surprise to him when the other man agreed. 

“Alright. I suppose it is acceptable that some training is conducted, so long as I’m there to keep everything in check. And it would help to learn more about Messana’s power. For research purposes, of course.”

Deceit smirked at the studious man. “Trust me, you won’t regret this.”

Next Chapter>>

Tag list: (let me know if you want to be added or removed)

@milomeepit , @captainhadeslover , @yep-another-fander , @pattson , @lala-the-rebel , @artistictaurean , @ironwoman359 , @ab-artist , @wicked-rosie , @starsinger , @superarrowholockian , @shapoodle , @virgil-the-virgin , @fun-with-colors , @theloveliestsweetspongy , @anastasialestina , @inferablossom , @confused-pat , @midnighteclipse98 , @silversmith-91 , @pattons-second-cookie , @harboring-hatred , @creativenostalgiastuff , @sadb0tt , @today-only-happens-once , @thelogicalloganipus , @the-shark-boi , @mantha-has-fallen , @averaillisa , @emochechirecat , @camillenicole , @thedukeofdeodorant-main, @time-out-for-thee , @sandersstuffsblog , @letsmoonkid , @iampengwing , @5150brotherbear , @approximately12lbs-of-ducks , @bexxbeauty , @elvis-has-been-dug , @ollyollyoxinfree , @magsnine , @littlewolf432 , @logical-princey

[cutepastelstarsalior]

I love how the five night at Freddy fandom have it own subgroup of Mini fandoms! 💕 you like the afton family? Bam! While au and art of them? Like the OJ animatronic? There a bunch of fanfics and shipping! Like sundrop and moondrop? Guess what friends? Sooo much art of them! I love it!!! Love when fandoms have thru own mini fandoms

[itsanerdlife]

Get the details for this summer below!!

This summer is all about AU! With IW ripping apart everyone. I’m looking to put y’all back together. So here we go. This is all AU nothing in the actual Marvel Universe or Kingman (we all know I’m Eggsy trash as well). So I’ll only be doing series, for my four favorite men. >Peter >Steve >Eggsy >Frank

What I have planned:

>Peter or Steve???

>CEO Eggsy Unwin (Learning to love again story);       After getting your heart smashed to pieces and the countless cuts you received putting the damn thing back together, you’ve created a set of rules to live by. 1. Don’t Get Attached. No matter how pretty the face or smooth the tongue. 2. Hook Ups Only. No more than four and never at your place. 3. You’re Not Friends. Friends leads to attachments and feelings. 4. Don’t Share Details of Your Life. What more do you need than ‘Don’t Stop’ or ‘Do it again’?      It was smooth sailing till your hook up one night, turns out to be the man who just took over the company you work for. Now he’s your boss and you can’t escape him and the way he’s watching you, well like he’s seen you naked. He’s saying all the right things and doing every right thing. He wants more than a hook up, more than one night. You refuse, you’ll stick to your rules, right?   Till your ex makes a comeback, less Justin Timberlake and more OJ trials. He’s begging for another shot, and your boss? Well, hell if looks could kill your problems would be solved. You’re not even sure quitting your job could make this better. But lying sure as hell didn’t help you. Now you’re in deep with your boss, and your rules can’t save you.

>Single Dad Peter [Doctor Reader] (finding love again, learning to trust, story)      After too many blind dates that were so bad, you felt sanitary showers were needed after, you’d given up on dating. Who had the time with a career as a doctor? Till you have his daughter getting stitches on your table. He’s gorgeous, and surely married? No ring? Gay? No not with the way his eyes are raking over you. No, he couldn’t be interested in you, your luck was never that good. Right? Widowed, he thought the only love he’d have was for his daughter Mae. But she wants a mom, needs a mom. With the help of his adoptive brother and father, Peter strikes out into the dating world. Bad date, after bad date, leaves him not holding out hope. One fall and five stitches from the most attractive and sweet doctor? His luck couldn’t be that good. Could it?

>MC Steve (Second Chance story); He left to find himself. Too young and dumb to stay and stick through it. He took your happiness with, but left you something.    The little girl you were growing. He doesn’t know and you weren’t in a hurry to track down the man who broke your heart.    You don’t need him. Still don’t. The two of you are just fine. That’s what you keep telling yourself, at least. Till Steve Rogers comes barging back into your life. Everything comes rushing back. He’s gorgeous, dominant, frustrating, and dangerous. You want to send him away for good. Stand your ground, but he’s so hard to resist. But if he finds out about his daughter, there is going to be hell to pay.   And Steve always collects.

No this is not all I have. This is just the start of things for the summer. This starts this month, and goes till August! So settle in, keep your eyes peeled. Don’t worry I never say no to a tag. Get ready for an AU Summer Peaches!!

[wickedlittleoz]

Steve is seriously sick, Billy doesn’t know, Steve needs to tell him before it’s too late!

I apologize in advancebecause this turned into a bit of a Walk to Remember AU, but the only thingthat came to mind when I read the prompt was ANGST. Thank you, though, nonny,no one’s ever sent me prompts and now I feel like an actual writer XD

It was getting worse.Had been, for the last five years or so, but the meds had managed to hold itback for a while. Not anymore, though.

He had days. Some ofthem he was perfectly fine, all smiles and disposition, laughing and singing (terribly out of tune) with Dustin in thecar, days in which you wouldn’t even know his body was self-destructing cell bycell, 24h a day.

But then came the dayswhere he could barely get out of bed, the very rise-and-fall of his breathingmade him sick, and he was so weak that his hand was shaking when he reached forthe phone by the bed to call Nancy and tell her he couldn’t make it to school.

He couldn’t even blamehis parents for not sticking around much. The treatments were expensive, thedoctors were states away. They had to overwork themselves to keep up with thebills – and now as it appears it was worth shit. Steve was getting worse andthe doctors were, all of them, hopeless.

At first he was toldhe wouldn’t make it to high school. Then he did. Freshman year they started anew treatment that worked wonders for a while. He made it into the basketballteam, played better than anyone else on the team, scored the most points in theregionals and brought the cup home. He became King Steve, life of the parties, masterof the basketball court, professional heartbreaker.

Then they told him hewas already stretching too far. He wouldn’t live to see college days, and Steveactually overheard a doctor tell his parents not to worry about saving money.

But he didn’t care. Hefelt that he was making the best of his life. Going to parties, bossing theschool, hooking up with whoever he wanted. He just wanted to be a normal teenager, doctor appointments andmeds were a secret he didn’t mind struggling to keep.

When Nancy came along,though, that’s when it really hit him. Steve had never been in love before. Shecrawled into his heart and into his life, and sooner than later, she saw one ofthe bad days. Steve had to tell hereverything. He cried and she held him, and when he thought she was going toback away out of his life, she did the very opposite.

His entire body hurtthat day, but his heart ached the worst, filled with so much love.

But he always knew shedidn’t love him as much as he loved her. Sure, it hurt when they eventuallybroke up, but she was better off with Jonathan, who had a long, promising lifeahead of him.

He thinks it wassomething to do with the Upside Down. Being down there must have messed withhis body in a way – air pressure or some expensive scientific bullshit – thatit simply stopped fighting. Bad days jumped from one every 15 days to once aweek. Halfway through the day he would suddenly feel his chest tighten, hisbreathing become erratic, his head begin to spin.

He actually passed outon the court twice before Nancy talked him into signing out of the team, healthfirst, she had insisted. Steve would rather leave than watch Hargrove win themthe championship from the bench, anyway.

It was a bad enoughday without said mullet-wearing asshole cornering him to ask what the fuck hethought he was doing, giving up the team. Steve gave him a generic excuse, hewas sick and couldn’t play anymore. When Hargrove insisted, told him to just“take some cold pills and a bowl of soup��, he nearly broke down crying, becauseSteve wished it was that easy.

Here they were,though, with Billy lying on his chest as the morning sun filtered in throughthe curtains. It was a Bad Day, capital letters, because while Steve knew hehad to get up and take his meds – and should get to it before Billy woke up –,he was dizzy just laying there and breathing.

He sighed, carding hisfingers through the blond curls, and felt the tears wet his cheeks before evenrealizing he was sobbing.

Steve wanted to tellhim. Had to, before he ended up in the hospital and someone in a white coat andzero intimacy to the boy on his chest told him Steve wasn’t coming back home. Billydeserved to know, because he didn’thave much longer. Steve felt it.

Ever since he andBilly had gotten past the fighting and teasing, they’d realized it was allsomething else. Electricity brewed and built around them for days followingSteve resigning from the team, until one night the storm just… Broke. Steve wassitting in his BMW, waiting for Dustin, and when he first caught a glimpse ofthe curly-haired boy and the blast of fiery color that was Max, Billy wassuddenly at his window. Meet me at thewoods tonight. Seven. Don’t be late.

He was almost late, acoughing fit taking the best of his nerves. But Billy made up for it, made himfeel good and wanted, and despite the physical exhaustion, Steve felt the healthier in days.

Their thing had grownquickly, at first just hot, needy fucks whenever Steve’s parents were away andhe had the house. But at some point (most probably when Billy showed up withhis face all fucked up and opened up about his dad) feelings got involved.

Now Steve realizedthat for the first time since this madness had started he actually wanted to live until graduation, andafter. Wanted to run away to California straight out of prom in Billy’s Camaro,blasting rock songs all the way up to the coast, making love in shitty motelbeds and just being young and reckless and inlove.

He feared, as hepinched his nose to stop the sobs, that Billy wished for that, too.

His finger came backred and gooey with blood. Steve sighed, suppressing a cough, and gently pushedBilly off his chest. Billy murmured something unintelligible, but continued tosleep, and Steve slowly teetered his way to the bathroom.

It took a while forthe bleeding to stop, so long that when he finally emerged from the bathroom,Billy had made them breakfast. He smiled, bacon grease smeared over his lips,making them look even plumper, and Steve’s stomach churned. He spun on hisheels immediately and braced the sink.

His body was shakingshallowly with the force of it. He’d had nothing to eat and it was just acidand blood.

Then Billy was there,a warm (clean) hand on his back, brows furrowed in worry. Steve couldn’t helpthe tears, but he washed his face before Billy could see them.

“You okay?”He asked, arm snaking around Steve’s waist when he pushed away from the sink.

“Yeah,”Steve responded – lied –, avoidingBilly’s eyes as he wiped cold sweat off his forehead.

“Sure you don’twanna–”

“No,” healmost jumped and definitely spoke too soon, because Billy’s brows furrowedeven further. So he gave his best attempt at a comforting smile and kissedBilly’s still naked shoulder.

He knew Billy didn’tbelieve him. But he just couldn’t face a hospital with Billy at his side, notyet.

So they spent the dayinside, going from the couch to the bed, with eventual stops at the toilet.Steve fed off salt crackers, OJ, and milk whenever it seemed that Billy wasgoing to comment on his lack of appetite. But mostly he just clung to Billy, asif trying to make the best out of their last moments.

It felt ominous.Imminent. As if he subconsciously already knew it was going to happen and when – soon.

Suddenly his chestfilled with a sort of warmth as he looked up at Billy, blond curls splayedaround his head like a heavenly halo. Steve felt happy, so happy, strangelyhappy that he’d had the chance to be loved.

“We need totalk,” he announced around eight, as they lay on the couch. Billy’s hand,where it rested on Steve’s stomach, grip loose around the remote, jerked intoaction, turning off the TV. He sat up, gently pushing Steve off his chest, andthey were suddenly face-to-face.

“What’swrong?” He was grinning, but Steve could see it in his eyes that Billy wasworried.

He stopped. How didone approach the subject of death? To Billy, of all people, who had lost hismom and found home in Steve’s arms, and given Steve so much love and will tolive. How could he have the courage to tell Billy that it was all going to endand there was nothing any of them could do?

He was sobbing, tearsleaving dark stains on his sweatpants, even before he started to speak.

“I’m sick,”he managed between sobs, eyes lingering on his hands. He heard Billy chuckle unamused.

“Yeah, Inoticed.”

“No Billy, youdon’t get it,” he sniffed, mustering the courage to look up. Billy’s facewas a mask of confusion, that quickly became worry and he scooted closer toSteve when their eyes met. “I'm–I’m dying.”

Billy was silent for aheartbeat. Then two. He watched Steve’s face, his eyes, as if searching forsomething that pointed that this was nothing but a tasteless joke.

But Steve’s wide, wet,dark eyes were truthful.

“What do youmean, dying?” He asked hesitantly, voice but a soft murmur.

Steve felt his throatclosing as he tried to speak. He choked, and coughed into his hand, and Billydidn’t miss the blood on his palm this time.

“I have leukemia,”he said, more to his hand than to Billy. They both watched the blood with asort of awe for a moment.

“When?”Billy asked darkly, the way Steve knew he did when he was trying not to cry.

“I don’t knowyet,” he said, wiping his hand on his pants, and Billy held it and lacedtheir fingers. “I’m going to see the doctor next week, but my body’sjust… Not fighting anymore.”

As if to prove apoint, another coughing fit shook his body. He wasn’t sure if the tears in hiseyes were his crying or coughing.

He felt Billy’s eyesscorching him. Steve remembered, then, a few nights ago, as they lay spent onSteve’s bed and Billy traced his ribs with the tips of his fingers, he hadlaughed and said he should probably feed Steve better because he was gettingtoo thin.

Steve had dropped 10lbssince then, hipbones jutting out sharp enough to cut or break, most likely thelatter. But Steve liked the idea of Billy cooking for him. Made him feel caredfor.

“And where thefuck are your parents?” Billy spat angrily, and Steve saw in him his 14-year-oldself, pissed at the world and whatever god there was that Steven Harringtonfrom Nowhere, Indiana had been chosen as the self-destructing time bomb of thedecade.

“These treatmentsare expensive, Billy,” Steve said tiredly, because his 17-year-old selfwas too far into acceptance to get heated. “Most of the doctors on my casearen’t even from Indiana. We can only afford these things because they’re always out working.”

“But–But thisisn’t right, Steve!” He stood suddenly, started pacing up and down like acaged animal. Steve knew the feeling, knew what it was like to feel like you’regoing to explode as you try to digest the information. “This isn’t right,it isn’t fair, you shouldn’t have to deal with all this… All this bullshit alone!”

“But I’m notalone. I have you and Nancy and the kids–”

“They allknow?” He stopped and stared at Steve, and he saw quick glint of jealously– he was the last to know.

“JustNancy,” Steve hurried to respond. He hadn’t yet been able to figure outjust how to tell Dustin. The boy had been through too much already for a kidhis age.

Billy sagged by hisside again, heaving a sigh. They were silent for a moment, the air heavy andtension nearly tangible, and the world around seemed to mimic them, suddenly tooquiet that he could almost believe it was a dream that he was close to wakingup from.

But Steve knew betterthan to cheat himself like that. It was no dream. It was very real, as real asthe weight and warmth of Billy’s hands between his two, his thin, pale fingersfeeling smaller than ever against Billy’s tanned skin. It was as real as theever-growing love he felt for Billy, the love that made his heart seem too bigfor his chest sometimes, and that had been his cure.

It was only because he’dbeen loved so deeply and intensely and honestly that Steve was not afraid.

They didn’t fuck thatnight, but neither of them slept, either. They lay curled into each other, as iftrying to mark the scent forever. Steve felt the tears Billy had been holdingback dampen his hair and pillow, and held him tighter.

Billy was right, itwasn’t fair. And as he gazed into those blue, blue eyes that had taken hisbreath away from day one, he wished someday Billy managed to get out ofHawkins. That he made it back to California, safe and sound, and started over.And that one day, when he sat on the sand to watch the warm and orange sun rise(nothing like the sad, cold and blue Hawkins sun), he felt the wind and heardit whisper in Steve’s voice, I love you,I love you, I love you.

[dansphlevels]

The Odyssey

Day 11 of 12 Days of Prompts

TW: bullying, homophobic slurs, language, drinking

Summary: High school au where Phil is bullied for being gay and Dan thinks he should have just stayed in the closet. But it just so happens Phil has a big family and can't get any studying done, and Dan’s house is the perfect place to study.

Length: 12k

Themes: highschool au, enemies to friends to lovers, bullying, boxer!dan, studious!phan, Homophobia, family/sibling drama

 "Stupid baby," Phil muttered under his breath. "Why can't they just move back again? I finished studying at one last night, and she didn't stop screaming until at least three." 

 "Stop whining," Greyson suggested, speed walking over to the fridge. "Naomi can stay as long as she wants, she's family. OJ?"  "Toss it." He did, and Phil caught it easily, his clumsiness forgotten when it came to food. "Family's overrated."  "Feel lucky. I tried for kids with Myrel for six years with no luck. Marrying your mother was the best thing I ever did. Five kids, just like that, and I didn't have to do anything!"  Phil grunted into his cereal. "Six, if you include the rodent."  "She's not a rodent, she's a baby. She's going to cry, you'd better get used to it."  "Who's going to cry?" Asked Tucker, hurrying into the kitchen and grabbing the cereal from the counter. "Amanda?"  "The rat," Phil explained.  "Amanda cries a lot too. I think her baby makes her sad."  "She's just tired," Greyson explained. "Hey, didn't you need a permission slip signed? Something for school?"  "Rocket museum field trip. I already turned it in."  Greyson leaned against the counter. "Really? Who signed it?"  "Mum did."  "That means he did," Phil explained to his bowl of cereal. He stared into it like it was trying to communicate with him, tell him the answers to his Calculus test or his problem with the baby. "He's getting good at faking signatures. You should see him do mine."  "Snitch. Greyson, would you like some eggs sir?"  "Yes please. But you're still grounded."  Tucker came up behind Phil and gave him a light smack on the back of the head.  "I need formula," Amanda declared, stepping into the already crowded kitchen. "Janie's crying again."  They all strained their ears to hear. Sure enough, the baby's wail sounded through the house from the upstairs, loud enough to hear but not loud enough to be bothersome. None of them had noticed yet; it had become a familiar background noise.  Greyson frowned in worry. "I thought you were still breastfeeding?"  "If I breastfed her every time she was hungry I wouldn't have time to do anything else. She's a hungry little baby. Lots of growing to do."  "She's fat," Phil corrected.  "Your mum."  "She's your mum too."  "Is mum up yet?" Sandy asked, coming into the kitchen and grabbing a bowl from the cupboard. Her old purple bathrobe that was two sizes too big dragged on the floor, her tangled brown hair falling in messy waves down her back. She sidestepped Tucker with ease, sliding in between the crowd of people trying to navigate the too small kitchen all at once.  A few of them shook their head. Phil continued to stare into his cereal bowl, not even eating anymore.  "She's sleeping," Greyson explained. "She had the graveyard shift."  "She did animal surgery at a graveyard?" Sandy asked, eyes wide.  "It's an expression. It means the late shift."  "And it wasn't animal surgery," Greyson explained patiently. "The clinic your mom works at has someone on site 24 hours a day, in case anyone's pet gets sick and needs help right away."  Phil's phone beeped, and he got up quickly, grabbing his backpack that was slung over the other chair.  "Have fun at school!" Greyson called out.  "Have fun selling used cars," Phil called back unenthusiastically. He walked right out the door without looking back, letting it slam shut behind him.  "He's a great kid," Greyson muttered. "Works hard. We shouldn't be too hard on him."  "School makes him boring," Tucker half agreed. "I like him better in the summer." --------  He wasn't wrong.  Phil rode the bus in silence, putting his backpack on the seat next to him so no one would sit with him. Headphones in, he pulled out his homework and started to review for his A-levels physics class.  Getting to school, he went throughout the day in silence. He talked to a few friends along the way, but all in all it was uneventful. He took a test and got another test back. B+. He'd have to do corrections.   When he got home, he went up to his room and started studying. He only had an hour until Tucker got back, and then the house would get progressively noisier and noisier until ten that night when it would simmer down, and he'd be able to study in silence again. Tucker had the top bunk, so he didn't mind Phil keeping his lamp on for most of the night, as long as the overhead light was turned off. However, sometimes his snoring distracted Phil.  After half an hour of reviewing, the rat started crying again and Phil was ready to stab someone. He changed out of his school uniform and into grass-stained jeans and a t-shirt and started going around the neighborhood, going through his checklist. Mrs.Henderson needed the hedges outside her house pruned every Thursday, and it was also the day he mowed the Howell's lawn.  An hour and a whole lot of sweat later- it was far too hot for November- Phil was knocking on the Howell's door.  It swung open after a full minute, revealing not Mr.Howell, but his son, Dan. "Hey Phil."  "Hey Dan. Is your dad here, I finished-"  The boy turned around, calling into the house, "Dad! Phil's here!"  They waited a few beats. Dan turned back to him. "How much do we owe you?"  "25 pounds."  "Jesus, you're ripping us off."  "Better your dad pays me to mow the lawn than make you."  Dan shrugged. "Probably."  His dad came running down the stairs, panting a little. "Phil! Good to see you!" He was a mess, almond brown hair sticking up almost at random. He stepped forwards and almost stepped on his son's foot if Dan hadn't stepped back.

 He scanned the front yard quickly then the boy in front of him. "How much is it again?"  "30 quid," Dan answered for Phil.  They both watched as his father emptied out his pockets, turning each one inside out hurriedly before finding the one with his wallet in it. "Ah ha! Here we go!" He pulled out a fat stack of cash, pulled off a few bills, and handed them over. "There you go. Payment for the week. Have any more leaves fallen?"  "No. That tree's been bare since the beginning of October."  He nodded quickly, stuffing his wallet into a different pocket than he'd pulled it out from. "That's great. And the lawn looks great, thanks for doing such a great job. I have to keep working now, but um, have a nice Thanksgiving!" He turned and hurried back up the stairs, skipping a few steps.  Dan and Phil watched him go. "It's two more weeks until Thanksgiving," Phil observed. "I'll see him at least two more times until then."  Dan snorted, still looking at the stairs where his father had sprinted up. "Yeah, he's a clutter-brain. Everyone tells me he's a genius, but... well, I have my doubts." He looked back at Phil. "He works in his office upstairs. All day. Sometimes doesn't even come down for meals."  Phil nodded, not really relating but at least understanding. "He's loud at night?"

 "Nah." He looked up, not really looking at anything in particular. "He hardly makes any noise in there. Sometimes I hear a crash, but that's just his clumsiness. He knocks down stuff every once in a while, but besides that, our house is usually dead."  "Must be nice. My house is always too loud to study in. You taking any A levels?"

 "Yeah, I'm in a few of your classes. Calc, and Lit. And forensic science, but that's not A levels."  Phil nodded, his cheeks a little warmer. "Sorry. I don't really talk much in class."  "I don't either. But I still look up every once in a while." He sighed. "I'm just procrastinating by talking to you. Have to write an essay. I'd rather throw myself into oncoming traffic."  "While I'll let you get to it then."  "Which one, studying or throwing myself into oncoming traffic?"  He shrugged. "Either or. But if you do decide to end it all, let me know so I can have your room. I'd be able to get stuff done so much quicker if I had some quiet."  Dan smiled. "Okay. I'll give you a heads up, put your name in my will maybe?"  "Definitely. See you around, Howell."  "See ya Lester."  As Phil walked home, he counted the money Mr.Howell had given him. Thirty pounds. Phil had been working for the Howells for at least a year now, and every single time he got paid he was asked how much it cost. Mr.Howell was clearly a cluster-head, and that was a nice term for it. ---  Phil knew he'd made a mistake the second the words came out his mouth.  The teacher was out for the period in general health and nutrition class, and no sub had shown up, so they got their desks all in a circle and decided to play a game of never have I ever. Phil didn't have any friends in this class, and he hadn't really talked to anyone in it recently, besides Dan, but that one time a week ago on his porch had hardly counted. Apparently, Dan and him had four classes together total. Phil had looked up in each class long enough to check.  The game was going fine for a few minutes. Phil, who never went out or did anything especially stupid, had most of his fingers up still. And then it got to the next person.  A girl, who smiled and proudly declared "Never have I ever kissed a girl."  Laughing, some people making noises and their friends put fingers down until someone noticed Phil didn't put any down. "Phil, did you put a finger down?"  He could feel his heart jump a little. "No."  All eyes were on him. "You've never kissed a girl?"  "I'm gay."  The reaction was immediate. Wide-eyes-open-mouths-chairs-scooted-back-worst-case-scenario "I didn't know there were any fags at our school!"  A few football players looked mortified. "We had gym together! Were you checking us out?"  "What? No!"  "Oh my God, he's kissed a dude!"  "That's disgusting!"  "I can't believe-"  "I'm sorry I'm late, class," the nutrition teacher stated, hurrying in through the front door of the classroom, coat and bag in hand. "My car had a problem and had to be towed, and my phone ran out of battery so I couldn't call anyone. Please arrange your desks back in their proper order, and we'll get started."  Everyone hurried to do as she said, doing their best not to touch Phil. They acted as if he had the plague, like his gay was contagious.  After a few minutes, they were all in their seats. Phil looked around and realized that there was a ring of empty desks around his seat. ---  Word traveled like wildfire.  After that class, he was afraid no one in the hallway would want to touch him. But to his surprise, only a few people seemed to know what had happened.  He practically ran to his next class. He sat down and put his head in his arms, mouthing the words it's going to be alright, it's going to blow over, no one will care, no one will care...  And no one in that class did care. Or so it seemed. Phil did his best not to look up.  He ate lunch in that class. Hopefully, already everyone in that God forsaken class had forgotten.  But by the time it was passing period again, it seemed like everyone knew. During lunch, everyone had been able to go on their phones and talk to their friends, and people stared at him in the hallway like he'd grown a tail.  "Gay."  "Homo."  "Lester, yeah, the boy with the black hair and the pasty skin-"  Phil put his headphones in at that point, drowning them out in music. He'd fucked up. ---  Dan answered the door that afternoon. As soon as he saw Phil, he scowled. "Dad! He's back!"  Phil leant up against the doorway, his breath shaky. Dan's expression made him want to curl in a ball on the floor. "Do you hate me too?"  "I'd be stupid not to."  "Because I'm a fag," Phil clarified.  Dan looked back, making sure his father hadn't appeared yet. "Because you can't keep your big mouth shut. Didn't you know that it'd ruin everything?"  Everything? "Everything?"  "I'm here!" Dan's dad appeared on the stairs, running down so fast it was a miracle he didn't trip. "How much?"  "25," Phil said quickly, daring Dan to correct him. He didn't need his help.  "25," Dan's dad agreed, quickly pulling out the bills. "Such a great thing you're doing, I'm sure everyone in the neighborhood appreciates it. I've always hated mowing the lawn."  "I've never minded it," said Phil, trying for an upbeat tone. "Good exercise."  "You kids need lots of exercise," the man agreed. "Daniel here does boxing. Great full body workout, keeps you healthy. Sorry, I've got to-"  "-get back to work," Dan agreed, glaring daggers his way. His dad didn't notice, just turned and left, back up to his office.  Phil turned to Dan. "I didn't know you boxed."  "I didn't know you were a fag," he sneered, turning and slamming the door in Phil's face.  He blinked. "Um, okay. Well... I guess I'll see you later too then." ---  "Anything interesting happen at school?" Phil's mum asked.  They went around, all of Phil's younger siblings sharing. Tucker got an A on his blah blah blah, Sandy got asked out by blah blah blah, and Phil's youngest sister, Anna, got made fun of for wearing her hair in a side braid when all the other kids wore theirs in a french braid.  "Kids can be cruel," Greyson advised, his paternal wisdom straight from a parenting book. "You can't let them get to you. The only people who are bullied are people who let themselves get bullied. You have to stand up for yourself..."  Blah blah blah. Blah blah. Blah. Phil was amazing at toning his family out at the dinner table. Now if only he could tone them out as efficiently when studying...  "And Philip? How was your day?" His mum asked brightly.  "Fine."  "Anything interesting happen?"  "No."  "How'd you do on that Lit exam?" Greyson offered with a smile.  "Fine."  ---  It was ten at night. Amanda was on her phone in the next room, the paper thin walls barely muffling her voice. On the top bunk, Tucker snored obnoxiously.  Phil closed his eyes and tried to think about Moby Dick. He had to study. He could not fail A-levels Literacy.  He was smart enough for this.  Would he have any friends when he went to school tomorrow? -------  Cereal. Backpack. Bus. School.  Yes, he still had friends. Yes, they accepted that he was gay. No, they didn't want to talk in the hallway. Yes, they were still his friends. You're right, you should have kept it to yourself, they said. You just royally screwed yourself over.  Class. Class class. Bus. Home. Study. Change. A note was stuck in the back pocket of his navy, school-issued trousers.  Faggot.  He threw it away, then thought better of it and tore it up, then threw it away.  By then Tucker was home, and soon Sandy and Anna were too. The house got louder and louder, and Phil's focus became less and less.  Finally, he gave up, tossing his folders and notebooks into his backpack, and heading out the door. ---  The bagel shop also sold coffee. However, it tasted horrible. Phil bought a small cup.  He chose a corner table and dropped his backpack, digging through it to find his materials, and sat down, immediately starting to write. He had to write a five-page report on the first half of Moby Dick, and he wrote without thinking.  Phil felt the presence next to him before he saw it. "Moby Dick? Interesting. You liking it?"  Phil looked up. "Hardly. What are you doing here Dan?"  He waved his bagel, making a duh expression. "I'm actually just leaving now. Enjoy the Dick book. But knowing you, I'm sure you will." He bit down on his bagel, reached out and knocking Phil's half empty coffee over, spilling all over the paper and his lap. "Oops."  He left, and Phil was left staring at the mess. Only half aware, he pushed his backpack and the book aside before the coffee could stain them. The pages he'd written so far were already ruined. He looked over them, trying to read what was written.  It didn't matter. Nothing he'd written had any sort of meaning or rhythm, and he'd used the same example at least three times. He balled the papers up and threw them away. ---   People pinched him in the hallway. He didn't know who it was but knew from the snickers it was the same people. He didn't react.  "Ooh, I think he likes it," a voice giggled. "Maybe he wants you to do it again."  "I bet he'd like it more if there weren't so many people here," another voice remarked quietly. "He'd be on his knees before you could snap your fingers, so desperate to get-"  Phil stuffed the headphones in his ears, turning his music on quickly. The louder the better. He tried to walk faster, ignore the looks. He really tried. ---  "Phil, anything new and excited happen at school today?"  "No."  "You've been giving the same answer all week! Surely something must have happened."  "No, nothing has. I presented that Health and Nutrition thing."  "Oh! That's nice, how'd it go?"  "Fine," he lied. "Can I be excused? I'm meeting with a friend."  He was exused, and as quickly as possible got his backpack and got over to the bagel shop. A cup of coffee in hand, he made his way to a table more out of the way than the first one, plugging in his music.  Peace and quiet, he thought, because music doesn't count as noise. My closest friend. ---  He couldn't afford to go to the bagel place every day. He was saving his money for uni, and mowing lawns didn't make that much.  The next Thursday, when he went to the Howell's house to collect his money for that week, Mr.Howell answered the door for once. "How much?"  "25 pounds. Is Dan at boxing?"  "Hmm? No, he's upstairs studying."  It took longer than normal for Mr.Howell to find and count the money. Phil shifted uncomfortably on the porch. "Dan's pretty lucky. I have to study at the Bagel shop by Main, my families so loud."  "Oh, you could always study here," Dan's dad said easily, counting out the pound notes. "Downstairs on the dining room table. Plenty of room, my wife works until nine most nights, and Dan studies upstairs, so there's plenty of room."  Phil blinked. "Are you serious?"  "Of course! You seem like a nice boy, I trust you. And you wouldn't be bothering either of us. Come over tomorrow with your study stuff, and you can just go at it. You seem like a nice boy."  On one hand, Dan hated his guts. On the other...  "Okay. Yeah, thanks Mr.Howell, I really appreciate it." ---  It took three days for Dan to notice him.  Phil let himself in after the first day, when Mr.Howell said it was easier for everyone. Then he studied at the dining room table, the house so quiet he questioned whether anyone was home at all.  He came back the next day, and the same happened. And the next day was shaping up to be the same, when Dan came downstairs to get a snack and stopped in his tracks. "What are you doing in my house?"  "Reconsidering my life choices," Phil answered immediately. "I should've taken easier classes. School is whooping my ass."  Dan walked over, surveying the mess of school supplied splayed across the table. "I bet you like that though."  Phil attempted a smile. It didn't work. "Just because I'm gay doesn't mean I'm kinky."  "You didn't deny it," Dan noted. Before Phil could defend himself, he was talking again, saying "But actually, what are you doing in my house?"  Phil rubbed his temples painfually. "Your dad said I could. I needed a quiet place to study."  "And you can't study at your house because...?"  Phil looked at him like he was an idiot. "Because I need a quiet place to study," he repeated, slower, as if to help Dan process it. "I have four siblings, not to mention the rodent."  "The rodent?"  "My sister had a baby. She never shuts up."  "The sister or the baby?"  "Both." Phil tilted his head to the side, considering. "Mostly the baby though."  "Cool," Dan deadpanned. "I'm going upstairs."  "Have fun."  He didn't respond. ----  Across Phil's locker, the word 'Twink' was spray painted, bright green. He tried to wipe it off with a wet paper towel, but it did nothing. ----  Beep. "The number you are calling is not available. Please leave a message, after the tone." Beep.   "Hey Peej, it's Phil, I was just wondering if you wanted to go the new movie theater sometime, check it out. I don't care what we see, um, you can choose. So... yeah. Call me back." Beep.  Beep. "The number you are calling is not available. Please leave a message, after the tone." Beep.   Beep. "Hey Mark, it's Phil! Do you wanna hang out sometime? It feels like it's been forever. So, uh, yeah, call me back!" Beep.  Beep. "The number you are calling is not available. Please leave a message, after the tone." Beep.   Beep. "It's Phil, I heard you and Julie broke up? Just wondering if you wanted to rant or talk about it or whatever. We could grab lunch or something. Um... yeah. Call me back." Beep.  Beep. "The number you are calling has been disconnected and is no longer available." Beep.   Beep.  ----  "I'm going to die," Tucker was saying, laying on his bed with his head hanging off the end. "I'm actually going to die."  "It's only report cards," Phil reassured. "You're smart. You'll be fine."  "I did horrible in Science this quarter. I didn't even turn in my notebook, I forgot. Mum's going to kill me!" He rolled over, staring at his older brother miserably. "I wish I was like you and actually liked school."  "I don't like school."  "That's all you ever do though. You go to school, then you get home and study. How could you not like school?"  Phil shrugged. "Guess I don't really like the people there. We don't really see eye to eye." ----  "Dunk! Dunk! Dunk! Dunk!"  "Better close your eyes, bum-chum!" Phil's head was dunked under, water pouring onto his face as they flushed the toilet. He sputtered for breath, the chanting and cheering being literally drowned out by water.  They let him go and he threw himself forwards on the disgusting bathroom tile, coughing and spitting, desperate for air.  "Funny. I always thought that you'd swallow."  More laughter. Phil wanted to cry, or die, or kill them or all three.  The bell rang, and everyone dispersed, leaving him in a wet pile of tears and toilet water. ---  Dan was staring at him.  Phil had done his best to dry off, but he could only do so much. He refused to let the bullies make him miss class though, especially Calculus. He already hardly understood the class, he couldn't afford to miss a full day of instructions.  Phil tried to ignore the other boy's gaze on him, instead listening to the teacher. "...I'm sorry, but I don't let anyone take home the textbooks. We have a class set of 30, and that's all the district will provide for us for the next 20 years, basically. However, if you'd like you can stay after school..."  Dan was still staring at him. What happened? He mouthed from across the class.  I'm gay Phil mouthed back. He didn't know if Dan understood or not, but the boy's eyes widened, and Phil could tell that he'd made sense on at least some level.  After school that day, Phil was studying where he always did when Dan sat next to him. "Finish Moby Dick yet?"  "Last night. It was amazing, a fine piece of literature, blah blah blah."  Dan nodded. "I hated it. I still have twelve pages left to go."  "The last bit isn't so bad. It's better with the end in sight."  Dan nodded thoughtfully. "Makes sense. On a scale of one to ten, how gay exactly are you?"  Phil almost got whiplash from how fast Dan had turned the conversation around. "Um... I don't know. I'm not that gay."  "You're lying," Dan observed. "I'm not going to hit you or anything. Or make you go swimming like your friends from earlier did."  "They weren't my friends."  "I didn't think so. Now come on, scale of one to ten, one being straight and ten being so gay that you-"  "Ten." Phil cut him off, not sure if he wanted to hear the rest.  Dan's eyes widened. "Seriously? So you'd-"  "I'm very gay," Phil agreed. "So gay that I've never kissed a girl and never want to. So gay that I can't even imagine dating a girl, or marrying one, ever."  Dan leaned forward, interested. "So you'd like, suck dick?"  Phil winced. "In theory."  "And you would like, take it up the ass, and-"  "God Dan, please shut up. Maybe. I don't know, are you offering?"  Dan's eyes got wide.  "It's... it's a figure of speech," Phil explained, backing up. "Not a real question. Now, can I get back to studying, or-"  "Yeah, yeah!" Dan stood up so quickly he almost knocked the chair over. "Yeah, I was just curious. You can go back to studying, you're just like... the only gay person I know."  "There's more of us," Phil said, trying to hide the annoyance in his voice. "Other gay people at our school, in fact. There have to be, the stats don't lie."  "Not that any of us would know it. After everything happening with you, you'd have to be stupid to come out at our school."  Phil scratched the back of his neck. "Yeah. I guess you're right."  "Yeah!" Dan took a step back, then shuffled forwards, bumping against the chair unceremoniously. "I'm going to go... study!"  "Okay," Phil responded with slight amusement. "Have fun."  "I- I will!" He turned around and almost ran straight into a wall. He quickly sidestepped, then was up the stairs, turning into what was assumably his room.  Phil shook his head, smiling only a little bit. ---  "The game's coming out in the New Year, but I want to preorder it now. Then I can get it as soon as possible. It has these super amazing graphics, honestly, I want to a design class or a graphic art class or something like that so I can learn how to do that sort of animation, because have you seen it? It's so cool! It's too expensive, but I'll get it anyways, I have some money saved up..." Phil trailed off, looking around. "Why are you all looking at me like that?"  Greyson was the first to clear his throat. "Um, it's just you've been so quiet lately. Is there anything new, or anything? You've been spending a lot of time away from home. New friends?"  Phil shrugged. "Not really. Just... the game I guess." His shoulders slumped forwards slightly.  "Tell us more about it!" His mum prompted quickly. It was the first time in a long time that she'd seen her son so vibrant, and she wasn't about to let him go back to sulking so fast.  Phil perked up. "Yeah, it's got these controllers..." ---  "No you spoon, it all goes back to the limit definition of the derivative. You have to define the variables, see, here..." Dan underlined a few numbers, gesturing with his pencil. "And then.... multiply here...." He was completely entranced in the work, marking and drawing lines connecting the dots, getting wrapped up in the math of it.  Phil didn't really remember how they got in this position, with Dan sitting at the table with him, showing him how to do the homework. Phil had had no idea, and he still didn't fully understand it, but it was becoming easier.  "Like this," Phil muttered, taking out another pencil and adding onto the equation Dan was writing. "You square it." 

 Dan stared at it for a long moment, blinking. "Um, no. You don't square anything. If you wanted, you could root it... actually, you probably wouldn't want to do that. Here, look." ---  It made more sense for them to work on their homework together. Phil didn't remember when it was decided, but one day Dan started bringing his work downstairs and working at the table with Phil, going over problems together and complaining back and forth. Dan was good at calc. Phil was better at Lit. Neither of them liked forensics. And both of them thought that generally, government class was stupid and signing up was a mistake.  They were talking one day when one of their phones went off in the pile of papers and notebooks scattered across the desk. "Get it," Dan suggested, nodding to the pile.  "Well it's not my phone."  "That's not my ringtone. You probably just usually have it on mute."  "Who would be calling me?"  Dan shrugged. "Well answer it!"  Phil jumped up, digging through the pile and flipping over his near-empty backpack, grabbing the phone and answering at the last second. "Mushi Mushi?"  There was some crackling at the end of the line.  Phil caught his breath. "Hello?"  Silence. Then, after a beat, a low deep voice growled "you have seven days to live."  "Dan, it's for you." Phil handed the phone over to the very confused Dan.  "Hullo." He paused, listening to the voice. Phil could barely hear it.  "Seven days..." it whispered guterally.  "Thank God," Dan mumbled in reply. "But can we speed up the process a bit? I have a test before that. Could you just kill me now?"  The voice seemed to consider this. "Not now. Tonight."  Dan clicked flirtily. "I'll light some candles. See you at 7." He closed the phone, hanging up with a grin. "Friend of yours?"  Phil shook his head, smiling lightly. "Nah, little brother. He got his own phone last week and has been prank calling people ever since. I'm actually kind surprised it's taken him this long to try it with me."  Dan laughed. "Amazing. I always wanted to have a little brother."  "I don't know. Tucker's all right, but I'd prefer to have my own room. Then I wouldn't have to come over and invade your space every day."  "You're not invading my space." The air seemed to crackle with electricity, or maybe something a little more dangerous. Then it disappeared. "Have you seen my room yet?"  "No. Wanna give me the grand tour?" ---  Phil had never had his own room. Dan practically had his own floor.  "There's Dad's office, which he spends about 23 out of 24 hours in, so it doesn't really count. But they technically sleep in their room downstairs, so I have loads of space."  Dan's room was at least twice the size of Phil's, and it looked even bigger with a double bed instead of the bunk beds that took up most of Phil's space. The bed had hidden storage under it for Dan's clothes, and next to it sat a nightstand crowded with figurines from animes, little mementos, and a few condoms.  "Nice," Phil said dryly, staring at the latter, which was out in plain sight.  "Um, ignore that!" Dan opened the drawer and swept the condoms and a bottle into it, closing it quickly. "No one ever comes in here, so it's not like I need to hide them."  "No one ever comes in here," Phil repeated, picking up an empty wrapper from the floor. "Yeah, I believe you."  Dan snatched the wrapper out of his hand, stuffing it in the drawer with the others. "Shut up." His cheeks had turned a bright pink.  "Why do you have two desks?" Upon further inspection of the room, Phil realized there were two desks inside of one, one in each corner opposite the bed. Only one had a chair by it, and that was the only one with papers on it. The other had a stack of discarded clothing on it, like it had been downgraded to a laundry hamper.  Dan looked where he was staring. "Oh, that's dad's old one. He gave it to me, like I'd have use for two."  Phil shrugged, glancing around. Nothing else was of much interest to him, unless he was willing to ask Dan more about the condom wrappers, which he wasn't.  "Wanna get a snack? I'm hungry." ----  The coffee tasted much better at the Bagel shop when he was sat at a table for two. It turned out, Dan was actually quite funny, though most of his jokes were horrible and caused Phil to snort so hard he almost directly inhaled his coffee.  Other new information learned: the bagels at the bagel shop taste about as bad as the coffee. Dan got one, and it was so stale he could tap it against the table and make a noise like horses galloping on pavement. Dan ate it anyways.  The whole building was so warm. Phil felt like he was wearing a woolen jumper. How long had it been since he'd felt so warm? Too long.  Dan smiled wide and laughed loud. And Phil did too. His cheek muscles ached from so much exercise after so much disuse. ---  Phil was just setting his stuff down on the Howell's dining room table when Dan called him upstairs. When Phil got to the top of the steps and peeked in his room, Dan was sitting in his rolling chair, the end of a pencil between his teeth. "Do you want to bring a chair up here? I don't get the Lit assignment." ---  There were few things that felt better than leaving school for holiday break. Actually, two, to be exact: leaving school for Summer Vacation and leaving school for good.  Dan whooped, tilting his face up to the starry sky and leaning back, stumbling only slightly. The brown paper bag he clutched in one hand sloshed around with his movement, the drink inside it still half full.  Phil's drink was half full too. It was strange- earlier that school year, he would've called it half empty. But lately, a lot of things were looking half full.  "I'm gonna to be an astronaut when I grow up," Dan slurred, stalking forwards, eyes trained on the stars. "'m gonna see the stars up close, and personal. Get all up in their space." He squinted, daring the stars to disagree.  "Is that what you're studying at uni-"  "Don't say that word!" Dan commanded quickly, cutting him off. "Evil. I'm in a good mood, satyr, don't ruin it with your talk of the future."  Dan's insults had been getting more and more interesting ever since they did the unit on The Odyssey in A-levels Lit. Dan had done an essay on the various ways mythology was ingrained in the culture of the time, and needless to say, he'd gotten a bit into it.  Phil took a big swig from his bottle, letting the liquor pour down his throat like molten lava, stinging and burning his tongue. They walked in curved lines, words slurred but brains still mostly aware. The empty space in their bottles wasn't enough to get someone drunk, but luckily for them, it wasn't all they'd been drinking that night.  "I hate parties," Dan mumbled. Most of his filters had been strewn on the floor, sloshed around and discarded like bad mouthwash. "Too many stupid people."  "It was your idea to go," Phil reminded him.  "Stupid," he repeated. "I don't even like dancing."  Phil raised the bottle to his lips and gulped, doing his best to wash the memory away. Dan had danced with a girl, some stupid brunette who was significantly smaller than him. They'd danced, and then made out, before Dan pulled away and spat on the floor. No one cared. It was too late and the air smelled too much like vomit and beer for anyone to care.  Phil wished he didn't care. "You like her?"  Dan didn't need to ask who he was talking about. "Not really. Just someone to dance with, someone to kiss." He sipped from his bottle, stopping to giggle lightly. "Not that you'd know anything about that."  "In my defense, I can't kiss people. Nobody around who'd want to."  "Oblivious potato you are." He cackled up to the sky, eyes gazing around as if waiting for Zeus to appear and pluck him from the ground. "'My name is nobody'," he quoted, smiling vaguely.  Phil shook his head, trying not to think about The Odyssey any more. Dan was referring to the passage where the brave Odysseus was face to face with the monstrous cyclops, Polyphemus. When asked his name, Odysseus replies 'My name is nobody'. Later, he stabs the cyclops in his one eye and escapes with his men, and Polyphemus chases him blindly out to the shore screaming bloody murder. When the other cyclopes on the island hear him and ask what's wrong, he screams 'Nobody stabbed me! Nobody stabbed me!' and Odysseus is able to escape.  He stared at the boy next to him, face illuminated solely by the thin scrap of moon that was visible. Phil wondered if he was thinking about the Odyssey too.  "She was a horrible kisser," Dan mumbled. "Tasted like cigarettes." He turned and looked at Phil sincerely, voice scratching out, "Don't smoke. I don't want any campfire kisses."   Then he stumbled forwards, continuing to walk, quoting: "'Of all creatures that breathe and move upon the earth, nothing is bred that is weaker than a man.'"  Phil giggled. "You should probably head home now. Sleep it off."  Dan nodded tiredly. His shoulders were weighed down visibly, as if he still carried his backpack jammed full of expectations and textbooks. "'There is a time for many words,'" hiccup "'...and there is also a time for sleep.'" ---  Phil awoke with a pounding headache and a light blush across his cheeks. ---  "Your friends can't come over on Christmas," their mum insisted. "Christmas day is for family only."  "Sweetie, let's not be unreasonable. They just want to have fun! What about Christmas Eve?" Greyson suggested, ever the mediator. Sandy stared at them from across the dinner table, her puppy dog face on maximum level.  She frowned, thinking it over. "Fine. But Sandy, only bring one or two friends over, we hardly have enough room for everyone in the house as it is. Phil, could you go to the store sometime this week and get hot coco and eggnog?"  "And whipped cream!" Sandy added excitedly.  "Probably need two cans," Greyson agreed.  Phil nodded, making a mental note. "And, um, if Sandy is having friends over, do you think I could invite someone too?" ---  Phil sat on the carpeted floor, leaning against the maroon couch. His hands were wrapped around the warm mug of eggnog, and he sipped it slowly, trying to savor it. He was only allowed one glass, as Greyson insisted that it was important not to start drinking too young. Needless to say, Phil wasn't about to tell him about his and Dan's activities the week prior.  Dan sat closely nestled next to Phil, also with a single mug of eggnog and an overly festive jumper. The main difference was, Dan's was black with a reindeer on it, while Phil's was covered in reds, greens and whites. When Dan first saw it he claimed Phil looked like an 'obnoxious candy cane', to which Phil replied with something that wasn't supposed to be sexual, but of course Dan ended up taking it that way.  Dan was very warm, and their arms pressed against each other, though Phil reminded himself that it was because there was so little space. Sandy and Anna had friends over, meaning that there were currently around a dozen people in the sitting area and kitchen, which were made even smaller by the almost invasive presence of the plastic Christmas tree. "We should get a real one this year!" Phil had suggested upon seeing Greyson carrying the box down from the attic.  "No can do," he'd replied easily. "Real Christmas trees are a potential fire hazard. Do you know how many people get electrocuted watering Christmas trees naked, a year?"  No, Phil had not know, and no, he did not enjoy that mental image.  Dan was quieter than normal, sipping his eggnog and observing the goings on of the family and extras.  Finally, Phil spoke up. "I'm glad you could come. Are your parents celebrating with friends?"  Dan shook his head. "Mum might be. But Dad's spending the night in his office. Hopefully he'll get up and go to bed before it's time to open presents."  Dan's father was an extremely intelligent man, with a spattering of fancy degrees and an extremely prestigious job. But Dan talked about him like he was a deadbeat.  "It's weird being here," Dan admitted. "I've never had siblings."  "I've never not had siblings. I used to hate it, middle child syndrome and all that. Now... I don't mind it as much."  "I bet not. Especially since you don't have to study at home anymore."  Across the room, Phil's younger sisters and their friends laughed loudly, talking in quiet, fast voices among themselves. In the background, the song 'Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree' played, and Amanda and Tucker danced to it on the small stretch of floor in between the kitchen and living room. Amanda looked happier than normal, probably since Janie finally managed to go to sleep and hadn't woken up since the party started. Tucker smiled too, though he looked a little embarressed to be seen dancing with his big sister.  "Come on," Phil urged, feeling a sudden impulse. "Let's dance."  He got up and pulled Dan to his feet, ignoring his complaints. "But I have two left feet!"  "I have four!" Phil retaliated, yanking Dan over to the tile floor and grabbing his other hand, spinning him.  "How is that even possible?" Dan complained, spinning and catching himself on Phil's hand. "Now I know why you're failing Calculus. You can't count!"  They swayed, doing something that almost resembled dancing.  "Everyone dancing merrily, in a new old-fashioned way,” The music played.  More people moved over, starting to dance along. Phil tried not to cringe as he saw his mum being tugged over to the floor, Greyson pulling her over to dance.  "I'm not failing Calc," Phil defended, intertwining his hands with Dan's more comfortably. "I have a B minus!"  "Potato po-tat-o." Dan spun him, and Phil only stumbled slightly. "You're right, you have no coordination."  "What's that quote?" Phil recalled. "'The gods don't give out all gifts at once..."'  "'Not build and brains and flowing speech to all. One man may fail to impress us with his looks but a god can crown his words with beauty, charm, and men look on with delight when he speaks out.'" Dan looked like he was somewhere else, reciting the quote easily. "'Never faltering, filled with winning self-control, he shines forth at assembly grounds and people gaze at him like a god when he… when he walks through the streets. Another man may look like a deathless one on high but there's not a bit of grace to crown his words. Just like you, my fine, handsome friend.'"  "Wow."  ‘Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree’ ended. Dan didn't seem to notice that there was no more music. He seemed to be staring at Phil's lips, his own lips parted slightly.  "Wow," Phil repeated again. "I'm genuinely impressed. I can't remember quotes for the life of me."  "They spoke to me," Dan replied with a shrug, trying to start swaying again to the beat of the new song playing, Let It Snow.  The weather outside is frightful. But the fire is so delightful. And since there's no place to go. Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow. ---  Christmas day was exciting, but not like it usually was. They each got a few small presents from their Mum and Greyson, and Amanda, Phil, and Tucker each had a present for each family member. Sandy and Anna couldn't be bothered to buy presents, but they were young enough that it was excusable.  After all the presents had been opened, the adults went into the kitchen and started preparing lunch, and Phil and Tucker wrestled around a bit. Phil may be 18, but he would never be an adult to his parents, just as Amanda had a job and a kid, but she still sat at the kids' table at family gatherings.  Tucker was small for someone his age, still in early high school, but he was a decent wrestler. Phil had the size advantage, but it was a pretty even match.  "I wanna do karate," Tucker said later, after they were done. "Or boxing. Or wrestling, I guess. Something like that."  A memory tugged at the back of Phil's mind. "Dan does boxing, I think."  "You think?"  "His dad mentioned it once," Phil explained. "I don't know if he still does, actually. He never talks about it."  "That's a weird thing not to talk about," Tucker observed. "If I did boxing, I'd probably never shut up about it." ---   "It's never come up in conversation, I guess," Dan explained, kicking off his snow boots. It was still Christmas Day, just a little later, and Dan had walked over to Phil's house to collect him. 'My house is quiet and I'm bored,' he'd explained, shivering in the cold. 'Come over?'  Phil had taken his first opportunity to ask about Dan's boxing, and sure enough, he boxed. "I go to practice three times a week, compete most Sundays, and train most nights before bed."  "And you've never thought to mention it?"  He shrugged. "It's not something I talk about. It's... weird, you know? I have like... a personality, that everyone knows, you know? And boxing just doesn't fit into it."  The two boys walked upstairs to Dan's room automatically. Phil sat on his bed. "Why not? Boxing is cool."  "And obviously I'm so cool," Dan muttered sarcastically. "I have like, negative two friends."  "You have me."  "Yes, there is that. But as you are the only openly gay student in our school, that doesn't score me much points." He winced. "Sorry."  Phil tried not to be offended. "Well, you're not wrong."  "If you wanted, you could use my locker at school," Dan offered quickly, desperately. "I don't use it. And then, you wouldn't have to see... you know..."  He was referring of course, to Phil's locker, which still had the word 'twink' spray painted across it. Phil had tried to scrub it away, but nothing worked. He'd reported it to the office, but to his knowledge, they hadn't even bothered to try to get rid of it.  Phil exhaled shakily. He hadn't thought about the bullies ever since the break started. He shook his head, changing the topic of conversation back to boxing. "You said you trained? Where?" ---  Phil had never realized that Dan's mom never parked her car in their garage. He also never realized that Dan's dad didn't even have a car.  "He's too much of a social recluse to have a car," Dan explained, leaning against the wall of the garage. Instead of being a space for parking cars, it had been converted into a gym of sorts, with a tattered old punching bag in the middle of the room. Pushed against the walls were boxes, some filing cabinets, and a new looking bench press covered in clothes and gloves.  "I don't use that," Dan explained, seeing Phil's eyes train on the press. "It's too boring."  Phil walked around the punching bag, observing where the material was faded or torn. A few spots were patched up with duct tape, and a few spots looked like it was about time they be patched up.  Phil noticed something out of the corner of his eye and walked over to where an open cardboard box sat again the wall. Dan realized what he was doing too late, and by the time he shouted "Wait!" Phil was already leaning down.  "Trophies?"  "I'm not any good," Dan promised. "Most of them are just participation!"  Phil pulled one of the medium-sized ones out. It was covered in a layer of dust, which he brushed aside. "Second place?"  "It was a small event!" Phil looked up, and for the first time noticed how panicked Dan looked. "Could you please put it back? Hey, I got the new Zelda game, do you want to try it out?"  Phil wanted to ask more about boxing. Obviously Dan was being modest; the box was stuffed full of trophies, and there were other boxes in the room. Did they contain the same things?  But when he saw Dan's expression, he knew there was no way he could push him any further. For whatever reason, Dan was ashamed of boxing, or something like that. Phil wanted to know why.  But now was not the time to ask. "Yeah, cool. Show me the game?" ----  Phil didn't not welcome school back with open arms.    Something had happened over the break. What, he didn't know, but everyone was glaring at him which such malice he wondered if he'd killed someone without realizing.  He pulled his headphones out, allowing himself to hear the chatter. His next class was on the other side of the school, and after he'd been walking a few minutes, he'd heard a shred of conversation that made him keep listening.  "....grounded. Chuck was caught sleeping with him-"  "With Lester?"  "Yeah! I mean, who else would he sleep with? It was a dude, and his dad got so pissed he beat him."  "Dude. How'd the fucking fag get Chuck to sleep with him in the first place?"  "I dunno, but now he won't be able to play in the game on Friday. We really need a win if we want to make it to regionals..."  Phil put his headphones back in his ears. Apparently, there were at least two other gays going to his school: Chuck, and another boy who'd been caught sucking him off. -----  "What happened?"  "Got in a fight."  "With who?"  "This guy at school." Correction: these guys at school. "We had a difference in opinion." ----  Dan prepared him an ice pack. "I heard the news. About, you know, you and Chuck."  "I didn't do anything with Chuck. I don't even know him that well."  "I know you didn't." Dan zipped up the bag of ice, handing it over with a towel. "Hold this over your eye, it should help the swelling."  "Doctor Daniel," Phil teased, taking the ice thankfully. His eye was beginning to swell shut, and his chest ached. At least he could hide bruised ribs. It wasn't so easy with the eye.  "You caught me at a bad time," Dan admitted. "I was going to practice now."  "Sorry. You want me to go, or... can I watch?"  Dan almost considered it. Phil could see the gears turning, but the awkward smile made his answer clear. "Sorry, I think you'd better go. I think it'll be a rougher workout today, I've got some... stuff to get out."  "Stuff to get out," Phil repeated. "Yeah, I can go. See you tomorrow?"  "Yeah, sure. And stop getting in fights, bruising doesn't suit you."  "That, we can agree on." ----  The rumors kept swirling. Chuck was not gay, it seemed, he'd just been put in an awkward situation and took advantage of it. "A mouth is a mouth," he laughed with his friends. "Trust me, I didn't want the fag to touch me but he wanted it so bad, you should've seen him. So wrecked." When his friends asked more about it, he replied quickly "No, I didn't like it! If he was a girl it would have been so hot though. He was so sweaty his hair got really curly- yeah, like that. Don't worry though, he'll pay for it. Trust me on that." ----  Dan was so sweaty his hair got even curlier than normal.  "Woah," Phil said as soon as he saw him. "Boxing practice?"  "Yeah. I'm getting ready for a big meet, have to be prepared." He took the strap of one of the gloves in his teeth, ripping it off easily. Phil tried not to stare too much. "Anyone else give you crap today?"  "Anyone not give me crap? It's fine, school's over. I don't have to see any of them again until tomorrow." He willed his voice not to crack, his hand not to shake. His head hurt from being slammed against the lockers.  Dan nodded, not making eye contact as he took the other glove off. "How's Calc going? I wish that he just let us take the book home, it'd be so much easier."  "It would." Phil didn't really know what else to say.  "I'm going to... erm, I'm going to do my homework in my room again. Come with?"  Phil's head throbbed. "Yeah. Sure." ----  Phil didn't know when he snapped. But if I had to say a moment in the altogether miserable week, it'd probably be when he was laying on the floor of the boys' bathroom, sopping wet from the swirly. After they'd dunked him in the toilet, they'd used him as a mop, swinging him around by his legs and splashing water on the ground for the back of his favorite hoodie to clean up.  Then they left him, far more interested in getting out of the school than they were in beating up the fag.  Phil laid there, not bothering to get up. His favorite hoodie was filthy, with dirt and toilet water and he didn't even want to know what else. And he was all alone on the bathroom floor, his bus having already left.  And something snapped.  Phil stood. He tore off his jacket and stuffed it in the trash can, hefted his backpack, and only made one stop before marching out of the school and walking all the way home. ---  Phil went home and changed out of his stupid school uniform into comfortable work clothes and went around, doing his yard work for the day. Then he went home, got his backpack, and marched to Dan's house, going straight up to Dan's room without knocking.  Dan wasn't wearing pants. "Phil! I didn't-"  "I stole something."  Dan blinked. "Um, what?"  Phil opened his backpack on Dan's bed, dumping half of it out and pulling out a Calculus textbook. "I was angry- I'm still kinda angry- and I'm failing the class." He paused. "And I'm not giving it back."  Dan blinked. It took him a little too long to process. "I'm not wearing pants." He repeated.  "You mentioned that already. I just stole a textbook."  "Yeah, you said that too."  They both were frozen.  Phil cleared his throat. "You can put on pants now. If you want."  "If I want," Dan repeated.  "I mean, I don't care."  "No, you'd probably actually prefer I don't put my pants on."  Phil scowled, messing with his backpack. "Don't put words in my mouth."  They were quiet for a few more moments.  "I'm going to put pants on."  "Okay." ----  Studying was a lot easier with the calc textbook. ----  "We could just sit on the floor," Phil suggested, eying the small couch wearily.  "Nah, this is better. Come on, hop up." Dan sat down, bowl of popcorn in hand, and patted the small space next to him.  Phil sat, the couch so small there was no way for them to sit without touching. "It's a good movie," Dan said, "so don't you dare fall asleep."  "I promise I won't," Phil laughed, snuggling up to his friend, albeit still cautiously.  Dan started the movie and leaned against Phil, his head on his shoulder. ----  Phil fell asleep during the movie.  But it was okay.  Because so did Dan. ----  "Oh, hello boys."  Phil had been half awake for a few minutes, not wanting to move. He was too warm, too tired, and besides, Dan was still asleep. "Hi Mr.Howell. We watched a movie last night, and fell asleep."  Dan snored, snuggling closer to Phil.  "I promise it's not as bad as it looks-" Phil started, but Mr.Howell cut him off quickly.  "Oh no, don't worry about it. I know about you two, Dan has boys over all the time. He didn't tell me specifically, but I notice things."  Phil blinked, still only half awake. "He has boys over all the time? What do you mean?"  "Well, not since you've been dating I'm sure. We've never talked about it, but I know he's homosexual, or bisexual, or whatever the kids call it these days. I'm not as oblivious as all that."  Phil blinked again. Apparently, Dan's dad wasn't that oblivious, but Phil certainly was. ----  Dan woke up a few minutes later.  "Crap, I fell asleep," he said as if that weren't already obvious. "Wait... don't tell it's morning already?"  "We both fell asleep," Phil admitted. He observed Dan as he stretched, pulling himself up. The words you're gay? got clogged in his throat, refusing to come out.  Just like Dan. Funny how that works. ————

They were in Dan’s bed. It was late, and they were both just a little drunk on exhaustion and booze. Not drunk enough for their thoughts to be incoherent or their voices to slur, just drunk enough for Dan to quote "The Odyssey" every other minute.  "You know you’re my best friend, right?" Dan said quietly. He was staring at Phil, his eyes slightly lowered. Phil sighed contentedly, his eyes trained on his 'best friend's lips.  "Yeah, I know. You’re my best friend too." Phil shuffled slightly, wondering if it’d be too gay to cuddle up closer to Dan. Then again, it sounded like Dan was also gay, at least partially. Maybe it’d be okay.  He was stuck. He was stuck, right in between wanting to kiss Dan and not wanting to lose him, because he knew that out of the two options, he could likely only choose one. And he couldn’t loose Dan.  Shoveling the sidewalks as quickly as he could just so he could be paid by the neighbors and get to Dan's house as fast as possible, just to study. Going to the bagel shop for a special treat and eating the almost indigestible bagels and coffee, because it was convenient and it was quiet and he’d go anywhere with Dan, really. He like being around him a bit too much, and eventually it’d probably screw him over, but for now, it was worth it.  They liked going drinking Friday nights. Always some party, and if there wasn't, there was always booze for sale. They didn’t drink every week, but they did when they could. When Dan was tipsy he often lost track of personal space, and he’d bump into Phil or stand so close that Phil would wonder if he was going to kiss him. But then he’d pull away, saying something about why the government had set them up for failure, or ramble on about textual themes. He loved quoting the Odyssey. They walked through an empty field to get home most times, and it was just out of the way enough that they could see the stars, and Dan would say something about how "It is the wine that leads me on, the wild wine, that sets the wisest man to sing, at the top of his lungs, laugh like a fool – it drives the man to dancing... it even tempts him to blurt out stories better never told." And Phil just listens and smiles and wonders if Dan somehow managed to memorize the entire Odyssey, or if perhaps, he recites it in the shower.  He loved Dan. That much was clear. He loved him like a best friend. He loved him a little more than that maybe, loved him like he was angry, loved him in spite and loved him in secret. And it seemed as though Dan loved him as a best friend too. And there was that love, that love that Phil had no idea what to do with, so they could drown it out with booze and homework and chit chat and stale bagels and complaining about their families/classes/experiences/lives, but you can never truly drown love, love can swim.  Phil wonders if there’s a quote about that somewhere in The Odyssey. The entire story is about a man, Odysseus, trying to get back home to his wife Penelope. The journey is painful and long, but when he comes home, it was almost as if he’d never left. Phil supposed that the love between Odysseus and Penelope was buoyant too.

———— "Because of you, Chuck wasn’t there for the game. Because of you, we lost."  Phil backed up, the three boys stalking towards him until he was flush against the lockers, banging against them with a little clanging noise from the cheap metal. He knew where this was going. Chuck stood to the side, cracking his knuckles. In front of him, Trevor was the one leading the assault, his dirty brown hair falling in front of his eyes. Caleb stood to the other side of him, dumping his backpack on the ground as if he didn’t want it holding him back.  "It wasn’t me," Phil insisted again like maybe this time they’d listen. They didn’t, just continued pressing forwards until Phil had pressed himself so closely against the locker he could feel its hinges digging into his back. Phil’s gaze fluttered from one boy to the next, looking for any signs of hesitation, some sort of human emotion. He found nothing.  He swallowed. "I have standards. I wouldn’t get anywhere near his dick."  The first punch came before he’d finished his sentence, a sharp pain across his face that made him slam back against the lockers. The rest came in rapid succession, his ribs, his face, his stomach. He doubled over, gripping his stomach and desperately trying to protect his head as fingers dug into his head and shoved him to ground.  "This is for being a fag!" Phil’s breathe was torn from his throat, forcefully expelled by a harsh kick to the lungs.  "And this is for costing us regionals!" Chuck's voice, and a swift kick to the head. Phil wondered if he knew that it wasn’t him who he slept with, and was caught by his father. Phil wondered if he cared.  Phil tasted blood. His body twitched away from every blow until he was curled up in the fetal position on the dirty school floor, and as he was being attacked on every side all he could think about was how stupid it was for him not to book it out of school as soon as he’d had the chance.  A filthy shoe made contact with his face, and he tasted blood. Phil covered his head with his hands, just wishing them to go away.  "What the fuck are you doing? Hey, get off of him!"  The kicking stopped temporarily, but Phil didn’t dare try to get up. There was a scuffle, and then a body was slammed against the locker.  Phil looked around quickly then scrambled to his feet, his assailants more busy with someone else. A new person had appeared, his body shoved up against the locker as he yelled back and forth at the bullies.  A balding teacher left his classroom, coffee mug in hand. He watched the fight for a moment, then retreated back into his room, locking the door behind him.  Phil was frozen in shock as Trevor was kicked backward, stumbling a meter then falling on his ass. The person was still shoving the other two away but somehow managed to rear his arm back and punch Caleb so hard he crumpled against the lockers.  Dan grabbed Chuck by his greasy blonde hair and yanked his head down, making contact with his knee. Phil flinched, taking a step back so he was leant against the wall, still catching his breath but in too much shock to move. Dan spun Chuck around and slammed him into the lockers with so much force Phil’s back ached in sympathy.  Dan was bleeding, a long scratch right under his eye from a nail or something. He had a split lip. But he didn’t look any weaker from it, hardly even seemed fazed.  He held Chuck against the locker, holding an elbow directly under his chin, but then adjusted his hands so he was holding Chuck still by his neck. Dan panted and wiped some of the blood on his face away. Chuck's hand came up to cup his own bleeding nose, but Dan slapped it away, pulling Chuck back and slamming his head against the locker easily.  "I hear you’ve been spreading rumors," Dan muttered. His voice was deep and gravelly, but he stared at Chuck easily, not intimidated in the least. "People seem to think that Phil was the one you were caught with."  To his side, Travis started getting up, but before he could Dan kicked him in the stomach so hard he fell back down. "Shh, listen." Dan brought his attention back to Chuck, who wouldn’t look at him. "Who was it?"  "It was you," he admitted. "You were the fag. You think you’re so special Howell, thought you could keep it a secret-"  Dan slammed him against the locker again, and Chuck shut up, his hands flying up to Dan’s hands still wrapped around his neck, trying to get him to loosen his grip.  Dan licked his lips. "Listen up, all three of you. Stop screwing with my boyfriend. Or they’ll be hell to pay."  He let go of Chuck, shoving him down onto his knees as he stepped back. "Feels familiar, doesn’t it? You on your knees. All we need now is a broken lock on your door and your raging father, isn’t that right?"  He took another step back, glancing over his shoulder and grabbing Phil’s collar, pulling him into a kiss. It was sloppy and tasted like blood, and Phil could still hardly catch his breath, and nothing was processing, because was Dan really kissing him?  Dan pulled away, but still held onto his collar. They stayed there a moment, eyes interlocked, when the next impact came.  Dan was thrust against the wall, stumbling to get up. Travis stood over him. "Cocksucker," he snarled, raising his foot to stomp Dans lights out. But Dan was too fast, grabbing his leg and yanking him down. They wrestled on the floor for a moment until Dan came up on top, muttering something about Travis being 'surrounded by cocksuckers' before landing another punch.  They started brawling for real, hitting and punching and clawing and before Phil knew it, he and Chuck were locking eyes and running over to pull them apart before they could kill each other.  Finally, a few teachers ran down the hallways, shouting something about stopping, and all five boys had just enough time to stand, regard each other harshly, and glance down one last time. "Fuck you," Phil spat, before balling his fist and punching Chuck square in the jaw before turning and sprinting away, Dan right on his heels.  He hit the door with so much force that it actually hurt, but everything hurt at this point and Phil was bleeding and so was Dan and they had to get away before anyone spotted them. They sprinted around the side of school, panting turned into exhausted laughter as they turned the corner and collapsed against the brick wall. It was that type of pained laughter that physically hurt, because Phil’s ribs were definitely bruised and maybe worse, and his hands were stained with blood, and he was definitely imagining things because Dan was there too, the area right under his right eye splotchy and red.  "I can’t believe-" Phil started, but they didn’t have all day for him to say everything he didn’t believe had happened, but somehow, through the pain in his knuckles in the ache of every breath, he knew it was real, it was very real. "You kissed me," he said finally, looking up at Dan with a look of respect. "You actually kissed me."  "After all that just happened, that’s what you’re thinking about?" Dan’s entire face was contorted by the smile, and he looked like such a wreck but Phil couldn’t care because there was no way he looked any better. "Sorry about that, by the way," Dan added, wiping some of the blood on his lips away. "I thought it’d be dramatic. Scare them off. Didn’t work that great."  "Yeah, no shit." Phil tugged on Dan's collar, pulling him close but stopping him before they actually collided. "Thanks. I appreciate it." He eyed Dan, the cut on his cheek, the split lip. "You look like a mess."  "You do too," Dan agreed. "I want to kiss you again."  Phil yanked him into another kiss, tasting of blood and exertion and sweat and a little bit like hot chocolate. "I’m not going to be able to stop," he admitted, halfway through the kiss.  "Its fine," Dan mumbled against his lips, not even bothering to pull apart. "I won't either."  They kissed for what could have been hours before Phil mumbled "My hand hurts," and they finally pulled away. ————-  "You’re doing so good!" Phil handed Dan his water bottle as he took his mouth guard out, wiping his sweat away from his forehead.  "Only a few more matches." Dan’s eyes had this far away look to them. He never had so much pride in anything but his competitions. It was one of the reasons why Phil insisted on coming every week.  Dan drank from the water bottle as someone jogged over, patting him on the back roughly. "Hey champ, nice match! Who’s this?"  Dan’s eyes sparkled as he looked at Phil. His lip had heeled, and the cut under his eye had faded, but he looked the same as he did the day they first kissed. Sweaty, with his hair plastered back away from his forehead, but so proud and happy Phil couldn’t help but smile.  "This is Phil. My boyfriend."  Phil’s heart literally fluttered in his chest.  "Oh yeah? Phil, do you box too? Bet I could find you a decent instructor, huh?" He nudged Dan’s side playfully.  Dan laughed. "Nah, Phil doesn’t box. The last time he punched someone, he broke his thumb. It’s a pretty good story though."  Dan’s friend's eyes widened with interest. He looked to Phil. "Oh yeah? Tell me."  "I don’t know, it’s a little crude. I doubt you can handle it," Phil teased.  "Oh come on, try me!"  "Well..." Phil tugged his bottom lip in between his teeth, looking at Dan as he tried to decide how mean he wanted to be. "It all started when Dan got sucked off by the most popular boy in school..."

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[spnsimpleman]

The Unknowns: Twenty Three

This is a continuation for The Unknowns.  A one-shot turned into a long ass Prologue.  Part One.  Part Two.  Part Three. Four.Part Five.  Part Six.Part Seven.  Part Eight.  Part Nine. Ten. Eleven.  Twelve.  Thirteen. Fourteen.  Fifteen.  Sixteen. Seventeen.  Eighteen.  Nineteen.  Twenty.   Twenty-one.  Twenty Two.

Dean x Psychic!reader

Teaser/Summary: An AU sparked from a songfic challenge, The Unknowns is based on Season One Episode Nine, Dean met reader in Lawrence as a child and they created an unbreakable bond. At the end of The Unknowns, reader decided to stick with her boys because she felt something coming but she holds secrets; one she holds close to her heart and a few that she doesn’t even really know yet.

Word count: 3373

I stared down at the pretty calligraphy. I had snorted the first time I saw it and Pamela only grinned in response. A lot of my father’s family had thought this dream was merely a fairy tale and someone had taken it a step further by writing it down like it belonged in an old book or maybe had been torn from one.

Pamela had warned me multiple times that it had been translated too many times and rewritten to remove some of the flowery nonsense but I could hear her warning loud and clear, don’t waste your life hanging everything on a dream.

I think in some way she still blamed my father for leaving us too early because of his obsession but it might be the one thing that ends up saving my life, our lives. If it helps us in any way, could it really have been that much of a waste?

If I can’t figure it out, it just might. I shook my head and tried to focus.

A fair warning, powers shall bless and curse while some always remain stringently aloof. All will leave marks. To those who have the ability, to read and to choose, not only what legacy they shall leave behind, but what future they will set forth.

The same powers that whispered freedom into the ears of men at the Alamo on that November night when Halley’s Comet blazed high in the sky, a different kind of battle was revealed to an old warrior with spurs already retired. A vision of bloodshed and a solution, but only if he was steadfast with his time, his sweat and blood, and the iron and steel.  

A warrior’s sacrifice will prove fruitful if the solution stays on course and gripped by those destined to wield it against the evil that threatens them. The Marksman, Soldier, and Witness.

Below the text, someone added in a careful hand without the fancy swirls and ink,  

Samuel Colt built a weapon and thirteen bullets to end a war brewing between heaven and hell. The same night brave men lost their lives at the Alamo, the last sigil was carved in the revolver that would end a demonic plot and reign.

Entrusted to a fellow who appeared in the vision and held promise in his own right. Wesley Campbell bore a son that continued the line for generations, the weapon will pass through these hands until finally gripped by those destined to wield it.

The marksman, soldier, and witness?

Scrawled underneath in a familiar messy hand,

Halley's Comet- November 1835.

The Texans defeated at The Alamo- March 6th, 1836

Gun surfaced in 1920 with seven bullets in Chicago before disappearing again.

Marksman- Danny? Soldier- John? Witness- me.

My father had fact-checked what he could and added his own assumptions. Did he ever know Mary’s maiden name? Was it just coincidence that we ended up on that street?

Lips pressed against my neck in a sensual touch and I stretched my head to the side. Dean looked down at the paper as his hands smoothed around under my chest, “still reading over it?” I nodded and leaned back into him. “I thought your dream or feeling was four though. Why did you have something tell you four if this family thing is three?”

“I don’t know. I talked to Pamela about it too. She reminded me once again that it was just a dream and premonitions are not always clear but she did have a few ideas, only one that had any strength though.” He pulled me up, sat down, and yanked me into his lap. I chuckled but settled against him soothed by his energy swirling with mine. Even though he showered, he still smelled like grease and metal. He was so close to finishing Baby and I knew when he left I wouldn’t be able to go this time. My focus needed to be here and away from Sam.

Sam. My brother who could barely handle being in the same room as me.

He squeezed my side and nuzzled his face into my neck, grief and love surging through the bond and blending with mine, “what’s this idea?”

“Three is a strong magic number but Pamela said four is balanced and it would make sense since four always relates to stability. In some old cultures, and you can find it in almost every religion…” He pinched me again and I rolled my eyes, “okay, geez, she focused on Native American culture, the number four is sacred and she said the first thing that came to mind was the four sacred obligations of the Zia people; to develop a strong body, a clear mind, a pure spirit, and a devotion to the welfare of your people. She doesn’t believe in coincidence and she thinks the reason that came to mind is because we could break those four obligations up between the four of us.  Strong body, clear mind, pure spirit, and devotion to your people.” I worried my lip again, “although she spent a good amount of time in New Mexico where the Zia tribe lived so she could be...”

“I don’t get it.”

I blew out a breath and pulled away, “never mind. It still doesn’t mean anything.” He gripped my sides, not allowing me to leave his lap.

“Okay, come on, dumb it down for me.” I scowled at him and he chuckled, “sorry, I’m not dumb but I’m a little lost.” He pouted and I looked away, frustrated more by my lack of any progress than his attempt to distract me.

“It really doesn’t mean…” He turned my head to face him and his brow rose. His fingers playing against my jawline just skimming my lips. “Fine. Jess is the pure spirit, you are the devotion, I’m the mind, and Sam…”

“Wait, why am I not the body?”

“Seriously? You’ve been devoted to protecting us since we were kids.”

“So have you or did I just imagine a little girl holding up a bat to beat away a demon?” I narrowed my eyes and he chuckled, “okay, but this is just an idea? Because I’m not judging… I’m just...”

I punched him and he barked out a laugh, “we’re grabbing at straws.” I sighed, “I don’t understand why your dad thought it was us that the stupid dream was talking about when I know that Jess is supposed to be with us. That we’re supposed to be four, not three.” I scrubbed my face and pressed the heels of my hands into my tired eyes.

“You know what?” He stood, lifting me with him only to let me slide down his body until my feet hit the ground. He grabbed my hands, “enough of this for today. You need some fresh air.”

He pulled me toward the back door. “What are you doing? I don’t even have shoes on!”

He flashed that smile and despite the shadows beneath his eyes, it was blinding. “You leave them by the door, stop fighting me. You know you don’t really want to.” He stopped and turned as I bumped into him. “Actually, yes, fight me. You said yourself you’re grabbing at straws and we haven’t sparred in too long. You’re gonna get your ass handed to you if I don’t intervene.” He wiggled his brows, gave me a quick kiss, and then dragged me onward again.

My laughter, however scratchy, followed us outside. A good fight with him sounded wonderful, but anything with him was.

~~

I walked into the kitchen stretching my arms over my head. Dean had been right, of course, I needed to get out of my head. The stress had been knotted up my muscles more than I had realized. I smirked. There was no way I wanted to admit it but I knew he already felt it. There was no point in fighting it when it streamed through the bond completely awake because of our time together outside.

I bumped into a solid wall of muscles and winced. I was so busy thinking about this open wave between us that I completely lost focus on the world in front of my eyes. “Sorry,” I mumbled.

Sam walked across the room while I glanced around for Jess. No save there. I opened my mouth to say something else but nothing would come out. I snapped my jaw shut and winced at the stupid sound that echoed in the small room with too many acoustic surfaces. I rubbed my arms and moved to the cabinets Bobby kept some snacks in. I didn’t want any, I needed to get in the fridge. I glanced over and Sam shut the fridge door, a glass of orange juice in his hand. The one he would ultimately shove on me missing and completely jarring no matter how hard I tried to forget it.

The room was hollow, an empty void where I stood alone. My heart punched my ribcage, the rushing sound in my ears overbearing. I ached to tell him what I didn’t need to say, what I needed to say but couldn’t. Shouldn’t. There was nothing but empty space, an overwhelming silence that hurt more than anything I could imagine. I watched him from the corner of my eyes, the stiffness in his shoulders and arms, his back far too straight as he turned and strode out of the room without a word or a look in my direction.

My eyes burned and my vision blurred, the shelves in front of me weren’t even there. Memories crashed over me, more torture than relief to a throat too tight, a chest too full.

My laughter filled the room the second I saw my gangly goof. Sam held a glass against his chest with his forearm as he gripped another he carefully poured orange juice into, trying not to spill and incur Bobby’s wrath. “That’s what counters are for, pumpkin. Why do you need two glasses anyway?”

He glanced over and almost spilled the juice. “Shit. This is what I get for looking out for you.”

I laughed again and opened the snack cabinet. “Please, you give oj way too much credit.”

“No, you don’t take care of yourself. Everyone knows Dean isn’t going to help. The only vitamins he knows are flintstones.”

I shook a box of crackers and pulled them down. “I know and eat all the food groups.” I closed the cabinet and Sam was next to me holding out the second glass.

“Malnutrition is not only a third world problem.”

I glanced down and the juice didn’t sound half bad. “If I drink that will you leave me alone?”

He chuckled, “nope. Without me, how are you ever going to be as strong as you dream to be?”

I fought back the laugh, “okay, coach.” I narrowed my eyes, “but I’m not running 5 miles today.”

He grinned, “we’ll see about that.”

I closed the cabinet and turned. I needed water and a beer for Dean but my feet were so heavy. I rested my hands on the counter, my arms shook and I cursed myself. This was my own choice. This was what I had prepared for. My lungs screamed and I squeezed my eyes shut.

I snatched the water bottle out of the air, “hydrate.”

“I know,” I chuckled as he poured half of it over his head. He glanced at me and I knew that look in his eyes but didn’t move fast enough. He shook his head and I shrieked, “gross, Sammy! Damnit, get away!”

His laughter echoed in my head but didn’t match the man that couldn’t be around me, that couldn’t look at me without seeing the person who lied to his face, who allowed him to hurt for so many long months. This was mine to bear. I knew this would happen when I made my choice.

A searing pain in my chest had me leaning on the counter, my legs too shaky. I was strong enough. I had to be for him.

I was yanked off the counter and spun around before crushed in a familiar embrace. “Breathe, damnit!”

I knew what would come if I gave in to that desire, what I would unleash. “Y/n,” Dean’s voice cracked, “please. Just breathe. We’ll get through this.”

It was too hot in here, too heavy. Get me out of here.

BREATHE! His voice shocked through my system with an actual electric jolt.

I sucked in a breath and the sob was smothered by his chest. He lifted me up and moved. I couldn’t tell where and couldn’t care. I just let go while hanging onto him for dear life. Trusting him to tether me while I drowned.

“Not drowning. I got you. I’m right here. This will pass, we’ll get past it. Just keep breathing. I protect you, y/n. Always.”

The tears continued, my chest heaving out sobs I couldn’t control. I slipped into that place where his energy blended with mine, weaving through it and curling around it. I didn’t deserve escape but I couldn’t survive without him. At least I’d always have him.

“He’ll come around too. Just like you said. It’ll take time.” He whispered into my ear, his breath hot pulling me toward the surface.

I curled inward tucking further into his swirling green. The one thing I didn’t want to think, didn’t want to give any piece of reality to, slipped out, he hates me.

Never. You’re family.

But I knew Sammy. I knew his worst, most vulnerable thoughts. I knew how he felt about John during those years when things were tortured and crazy and things were just too much.

“I hate my own father, y/n. What kind of person does that make me?”

I touched his face, those eyes screaming and echoing the strong emotions churning with my own. “Human, pumpkin. It makes you human.”

“You’re different from him and you know it. We’ll always be different.” We weren’t moving anymore and he had me tucked into him somewhere soft or maybe that was just him.

I gripped him tighter and didn’t answer. I couldn’t because I didn’t have one.

~~

I believe there's a moment that everyone comes upon once or multiple times when they feel a future event coming. They call it gut instinct, women’s intuition, or sometimes a sign from above, but no matter what they call it or what rationale they give it, they all know that something’s coming, it’s going to happen no matter what and it's going to hurt. In spite of all that, they do it anyway because they also know it's the right thing, that it's supposed to happen. For better or worse. We just hope to hell it’s better. Or they don’t think they can change it because it’s already been written.

I don’t know which one is a better way to look at it.

I haven't had many moments where my intuition told me it was something I couldn't change ahead of time, but there have been a few. When I saw John at the motel the night Dean left me in bed; it had solidified a feeling I'd had the whole drive there but I ignored it because Dean was there and I was too excited to see him again. I could blame my sex drive but I have blocked things plenty of times because I didn't want to think about it.

But tonight, tonight I wanted to savor every inch of him, commit him to memory. I wasn’t clingy so much as I kept close within range so I could touch him at every chance. Sitting next to him on the couch finding any space for skin to brush, at lunch and dinner our hands sharing touches underneath the table, and then as we headed to bed, we moved together to the bathroom. We brushed our teeth, took a shower much like we had before but the touches were different, they weren't rushed or heated but slow, purposeful in a completely different tone. He dried me off, I dried him, and we pulled our towels around us for the walk to the bedroom.

Once behind the closed door, I thought we might lose that calm for frenzied action but we didn't. Dean peeled the towel away, each movement deliberate as if opening an unknown package. Before he touched me, I did the same to his. We stood naked in front of each other, taking in the person standing there. I could feel his melancholy, his longing, and that steeling; an armoring process he started when we were kids just before we had to leave each other. We knew tonight would be our last night for a while.

I shivered, an unfounded fear twisting in my stomach as I allowed my gaze to wander over a body I knew so well, but when I pulled at it, it fell away. The last time we said goodbye like this, darkness had been hanging over us, Dean’s possible death blocked from me. But there was no feeling of impending doom on the horizon this time, but there wasn’t one when he had come close to losing his life because of a damn taser either.

He closed the space between us and pressed his finger to my lips, “shh. Just us. Nothing outside of this room right now.”

I looked up into those eyes and didn’t need to say a word. He took my hand and led me to the bed. I climbed on but before I could crawl to the pillows, he grabbed my waist. I turned and knelt before him on the bed not having to question before his hands were on my neck, his thumbs brushing my jaw before moving up and over my lips. They were soft and tantalizing before moving over my cheeks and into my hair. His lips were next, gently teasing mine before pulling me in and pressing my body against his.

Sometimes it could be too much when he was constantly gentle, not demanding anything but more like gently lapping waves moving and discovering then taking what he'd found, marking it as his own. Tonight, it was perfect. We took turns exploring and memorizing, murmuring through the connection but not rushing the other.

When we finally joined in a slow, smooth stroke, my legs wrapped around his waist and we held each other there pulsing. Our foreheads pressed together, his darkened green gaze staring into mine.

I love you.

Forever and ever.

This was our memory. Our one moment we’d always want to keep the other in. We were both many things, both had so many favorite memories but this was where we always found ourselves. These were always the memories held closest to the heart, when we were joined in every sense of the word.

He finally kissed me and began a slow rhythm. We moved together, rocking, tweaking the position to find another until we found the one that was explosive, but still, he kept a torturously slow rhythm through each orgasm he coaxed.

His hands smoothing up my back, down my sides, gripping my hips. I pushed back into him, kneaded his thighs or his arms, and trailed my hands up his stomach and chest, smoothed my hands over the stubble on his jaw before pulling him down for a kiss. We changed positions, becoming a little more frantic when we felt him getting close and then finally wrapped our arms around each other, crushing our upper bodies into one as our last thrusts sent us reeling over the edge. My cries and his groans mingling in our ears until we fell to the bed, spent and yet still swimming on the high.

He kissed my forehead, my nose, and then my lips. “Perfect.”

I touched his face wanting to say that I didn't want to lose him but I didn't want to make this any harder than it already was. He kissed me again only this time he went deeper. You’ll never lose me because I will never let go.

No matter how hard it gets, I was still the luckiest woman on earth.

Twenty Four

@duchessofwinchester , @jodyri , @jencharlan , @deanssweetheart23  @torn-and-frayed , @chrisatplay , @mogaruke, @captainemwinchester  , @ashrod98 , @mrswhozeewhatsis , @caitsymichelle13  , @escabell , @thealyana , @michellethetvaddict , @ashch , @rashinyx2002 , @tamtamlov

[fox-and-benedict]

[Fanfic, 100% OJ] Awkward

Series: 100% OJ / Suguriverse Words: 2000 Characters: Sora, Nath Originally posted: March 29, 2017 (link here) A/N: This is where I first started messing around with the characterisations for Sora and Nath, and you can start to see the elements slotting into place. It’s also the point at which my little series becomes incompatible with canon, because in canon Nath is very dead. As a result, all the various Suguri series stories from here on out will have an AU tag. Also, Sora is a complete space cadet but I adore her.

Sora was not ‘lost’. That would imply that she, one of the finest soldiers of the greatest war ever known, did not have a sense of direction, which would be a very dangerous implication to make. She just didn’t know where she was, or where she was going. It was an entirely different thing.

Hime had sent her out with a list of things to pick up from town. She hadn’t specified which town, of course. Or even which country. Not that Sora could have told the countries apart, anyway. Things had changed since she had last explored the world, and she hadn’t had a great chance to take in the sights even then. She’d been too busy getting shot at. What Sora did know was that Hime was quite fed up with trying to eat scoops of ice cream out of a coffee cup, and wanted some cutlery. She also knew that Suguri could not be trusted to buy cutlery at all; the grey haired girl had been sent out twice earlier that week in search of proper tableware, and had come back with pockets full of things that were ‘close enough’, in her opinion. Evidently, Suguri had dangerous opinions, because in her world a fork was the same as a spoon and one-and-a-half castanets was dinnerware for the entire family.

Still, since Sora was absolutely Not Lost and had in fact never been lost in her entire life, she thought she might take some time to explore. She had at least found a town, which was a good start. It had knobbly, cobbled streets, the kind so old that they were out of fashion even before the war began, and the shops all had puns in the name ��� terrible puns, it had to be said. Sora felt like every shop owner had been given a Christmas cracker joke and been told to get on with it. Every few paces there was a wrought iron lamppost. It was oddly comforting.

She had just finished walking along the High Street (which was the lowest point in town) and turned onto Eastgate (probably east, definitely not a gate) when something in a shop window caught her eye. Sora had never been one for window shopping. She just moved to her objective, completed it, and repeated until she could return home. Part of her realised that it wasn’t actually her that did it; it was a mindset, brewed in the military. One more way that the war had followed her into the future. It would take time to break it, but she had time. More than enough.

She drifted along, wondering if the roll of notes Hime had given her would stretch to lunch. She’d already walked past five vendors hawking street food, and been tempted by every one; there was something about sizzling onions that called to her on a deep spiritual level. It amazed her that there was food from so many cultures, all collected in one place – it felt like the boundaries she had grown up with, the hate that existed between people, had loosened so much. Before, she could never have imagined being able to buy pad thai, falafel and paella within mere feet of each other.

“You look hungry,” a voice said from behind her left shoulder. Deep, feminine, but a little rough. One of the sellers, perhaps. “Sora.”

Not one of the sellers. Not somebody who should know her name. Her muscles tightened, her hands curled into fists of their own accord. She’d had her guard down, she realised. Been lulled into a sense of security by this peaceful place. She pivoted, eyes flashing, to face the speaker.

There was no weapon being pointed at her. No body armour in sight. No comforting hum from a personal shield. A non-combatant. With that established, the details began to pop out at her: a loose white peasant shirt reined in by a cropped navy jacket, the arms hanging empty by the sides. A skirt long enough to trail across the cobbled streets. Blue-grey hair, blue eyes. A familiar face.

“Nath,” she breathed.

“Oh? You recognise me. Unexpected. Ah. I’m not here to fight. I would show you my hands so you can see I don’t have a weapon, but… Well, that’s not a concern,” she said, and grinned almost sheepishly: the face of a woman who’d made a bad joke, and knew it. “Let’s have some tea. My treat.”

***

“I thought everything from the world before was gone.”

The tea room was very quaint. Hime would have loved it. Clotted cream, scones and red chequered tablecloths seemed to sprout from every surface. In the corner there was a great, leathery armchair with a night-table and a stack of thick books next to it. Every time the door opened – not constant, but often enough – a bell tinkled to announce the new arrival. Nath had ordered them a plate of biscuits, and a pot of tea; true to her word, she didn’t ask for any money.

“So did I. Bits and pieces turn up, from time to time,” Nath replied. “Could you pour?”

Sora nodded, and took the pot. Her hands didn’t tremble, although she was a little nervous.

“I didn’t die after our fight. That’s the silver lining, of being like me. They just… picked up what was left, and put me back together again. As easy as that,” Nath carried on, lightly. “A few little things went missing. They called me Humpty Dumpty for a while.”

“Really?”

“No.”

Sora raised an eyebrow. She’d never met somebody who could tell a joke and yet remain utterly, uncompromisingly serious. When Suguri or Hime told one, their eyes would light up, the corners of their mouths would twitch. You laughed, and then they would laugh, and everybody would smile. With Nath, it was like she was just going through the motions of a joke without really understanding what they were for. Like somebody had told her to do it one day, and she’d never stopped.

“…Are any of the others still around?” Sora asked. The question seemed to burn on the way through her throat, and when she finished, she could feel a strange, empty dread settle where it had been. Was she scared that nothing else had survived of the world she knew? Or scared that old enemies still remained to haunt her? She didn’t honestly know.

“Maybe. I hear rumours, now and again. I don’t follow up on them.”

A non-answer. It was enough, for now. Sora breathed deeply, let the smell of Earl Grey hit her airways. It was nothing like tea she used to see the soldiers drinking, the stuff they brewed overnight in tins and that was bitter enough to make you vomit if you drank it too fast.

“How are you going to drink that?” she asked, pointing towards Nath’s teacup.

“...You aren’t going to help me?” Nath asked, blinking. Absolutely serious.

A moment passed. “That… was a joke?” Sora tried.

“Yes. Watch.”

Nath seemed to close her eyes in concentration, and something moved in one of the long, billowy sleeves of her shirt. Sora realised then why the arms weren’t tied at the wrists, as they usually were for people lacking limbs; a bit quietly floated out of the cuff, and began to zip around the table.

“Old world technology. Still works, mostly,” Nath said, as the bit hovered around her teacup. It shot out a green ray that Sora immediately recognised as a tractor beam, one of the last big jumps of technology in the war. It was impressive that they had miniaturised it so far.

“You didn’t get prosthetics?”

“I did. But they wore out, and there were no parts to replace them. Some technology has come backwards after all this time. Not too many people get their arms blown off anymore, so the new stuff is a lot worse.” The teacup hovered level to her mouth, and she took a sip. “I heard you were dead, by the way.”

Sora said nothing. It wasn’t as though the assumption was necessarily wrong. If somebody stopped moving, you called them dead, didn’t you? She had just happened to wake up again, millennia later. An easy mistake to make.

“I was asleep,” she said, finally. “For years, and years.”

Nath’s eyebrow raised the slightest fraction of an inch, but she didn’t pursue the question. Instead she took a biscuit and began to nibble it daintily, as if showing off the control she had over her bits.“I wondered, you know. If I was the only one having difficulty adjusting. Have you noticed? In this world, even the serious people smile and joke all the time. I tell jokes, and nobody laughs. I can’t get used to it,” she said, looking away from Sora’s face. A troubled expression flickered through her eyes. “Do you ever feel that?”

Sora nodded. Hime never seemed to stop teasing; she was always ready with a quip and a dry smirk. Even Suguri, who rarely laughed outright, always seemed to be warm and approachable, a smile in her eyes if not on her face. It was difficult to talk to them, sometimes. The silence was too big.

“What were you doing before I stopped you, by the way?” Nath asked.

“Buying spoons,” Sora replied, without a hint of irony.

“...You slept for years on end, and then you wake up to buy spoons? How mysterious,” Nath said, and her mouth creased into a smile despite itself. “Look for Market Street, on the other side of town.”

“I see,” Sora said, and stood up. “Thank you for the tea. And the directions. I should proceed to the objective now.”

“Mm. I don’t suppose we’ll meet again. Maybe that’s for the better. But it was good to talk to you, Sora. I didn’t think I would ever get the chance.”

Sora looked at Nath, then; saw her rounded shoulders, the wistfulness creeping across her face. She wanted to say something, but the air was heavy, and she didn’t know the words. What would Hime do in this situation, she wondered? She pictured her new friend, the impish grin, the assured way she went about everything, and she was struck with an idea so stupid that she had to act on it before she thought about it too hard.

Leaving herself no time for doubts, she lunged across the table towards Nath and shot a hand towards her face. Nath flinched, but too slowly; Sora’s fingertips brushed against her cool skin.

“Nath,” Sora said, holding up her thumb. “I have your nose.”

“...what?”

Sora wiggled her thumb, tauntingly. “If you want it back, you have to come and find me.”

Nath looked at her, dumbfounded. Then, she coughed: a cough that rolled itself into a low chuckle that sprang from the very pit of her stomach.

“You must be the strangest ultimate weapon I’ve ever met,” she gasped, her eyes crinkled at the edges. “Very well. I’ll find you and reclaim my nose some other day.”

“I’ll make some tea for you when you do. I’ll use my new spoons,” the blonde girl replied, grinning. Then she turned on her heel and left, still holding her thumb above her head.

Nath didn’t reply. She was too busy chuckling to herself. What kind of world was she living in, where two women who’d tried their very best to kill each other could turn around and drink tea, and play childish jokes on each other? A better one than when they’d first met, she decided. Better by far.

“Excuse me… Are you alright?” one of the waitresses said, passing by. She was young, much shorter than Nath was. Not sure how to deal with this strange, armless woman, chuckling to herself in a tea-room.

“Ah… Don’t worry about me,” Nath replied, with mirth still ringing in her voice. “I’m quite ‘armless.”

The waitress looked at her for a moment -- then slowly, uncertainly, began to laugh.

[gelatinzz]

I don't know how I haven't been following you I love you work urgshd,,,um,,,may I please request more of the Five Nights at OJ,,,, or just,,,the fnaf au,,,i eat it up its so good

yupppp, here you go!!! THANK TOU, ALOS!! IMGLIGN

[marshmallow-phd]

The Beauty and The Tragedy

Genre: Angst, romance, Mafia!AU

Pairing: Sehun x OC

Summary: Wren was an American girl who just wanted to see a new part of the world. All she was looking for was a slight change of scenery, but when she befriends the wrong person, her whole life will change in a way she never could have expected.

Part: 1 I 2 I 3 I 4 I 5 I 6 I 7 I 8 I 9 I 10 I 11

**

There’s always a slight panic whenever you wake up in a place that isn’t home, that isn’t the typical mattress that your body has come accustomed to. Your mind has to play catchup with the other senses that have already gone into a frenzy. Eventually, memory kicks in and panic subsides. 

Waking up in the bright white bedroom in the house of a supposed mafia member caused that panic to stay a few moments longer, even after I remembered where I was and how I got here. As soft as the mattress was and as nice as the furniture pieces looked in their designated spots, this place was still as dangerous as when I first gained consciousness on the couch downstairs. That sense of worry, that teetering on the edge of fight or flight - it would be what kept me alive. 

Slipping slowly out of the bed, I glanced at the jeans I had thrown in the corner before falling asleep. With any luck, I would have my night clothes in time for bed again tonight. The horror of any one of them coming into the room while I wore only a shirt made my skin crawl. I narrowed my eyes at the door. There was a lock. 

Good. One minor point on my scoreboard. Still down by twenty. 

Still stiff from waking up, I stretched out my back and arms before noticing two duffle bags laying just inside the door. Cautiously, I walked over to them, crouching down and unzipping the larger black bag. It was overstuffed with recognizable shirts, jeans, and even a few extra pairs of shoes. The second bag was filled with underwear, socks, and the oversized sweater that I had been sleeping in lately due to the colder weather. A smaller toiletry bag was squeezed into one of the corners. Oh, thank god, someone even remembered that I had a uterus.

With the toiletry bag in hand, I made my way to the bathroom, desperate for a shower. I’d caught one whiff of myself and I was sure not even the cartel would come near me. Besides, the idea of scrubbing away where the men had carried me the previous day felt like the ultimate cleansing ritual. The hot water dotted wonderfully against my tense shoulders and neck. Occasionally, a fews suds of shampoo made it in the wound on the side of my head. It stung and I sucked in air through my teeth in response, but I would consider it worth it in order to get rid of any trace of that alleyway from my body.

I found a blow-dryer under the sink and once I felt that I was presentable (and brave enough), I left my room to venture downstairs to the kitchen, my stomach urging me along. Whenever I passed by a window, there always seemed to be a different man dressed in a black suit walking along the perimeter. It looked like even if I wanted to escape, I wouldn’t make it five feet without being snatched up again.

Leaving wouldn’t really do me any good anyway and, besides one particular host, the boys seemed... decent enough. Mafia members they may be, but they didn’t act like the Godfather, at least not towards me. They were dangerous, no doubt about that. Each one had carried a gun on them and, despite their smiles, had a coat of red dripping invisibly from their hands.

The kitchen was empty when I entered, surprising myself with the seed of disappointment that planted itself in my stomach. Kyungsoo was decent in the kitchen and, even if he didn’t actually live here, I was hoping breakfast had been laying in wait. However, it didn’t seem like any of the others were here in the house and Sehun seemed to imply that I was mostly on my own. I searched the cabinets, finding plates, bowls, and bread, among other normal kitchen supplies that I logged away for later. I swiped the bread, along with a plate and cup. In the fridge was plenty of butter and orange juice. While the bread was crisping up in the toaster, I searched for cinnamon among the spices.

“Gotchya.” Three rows in was a small canister of cinnamon. A nice sweetness for the morning. 

While waiting for the toast to finish, I noticed the plates from last night’s dinner still lying out on a mat on the counter.  Shrugging to myself, I began to put them away, a sad yet odd attempt to make myself somewhat useful.

“You don’t have to do that.”

“Shoot!” At the sudden voice, the plate in my hand slipped. It hit the corner of the counter, but I was able to catch it with my other hand before it shattered on the tile. Wouldn’t that have made Sehun like me even more.

Jongin laughed as he stepped further into the kitchen. “Nice reflexes.” He stopped and leaned on the counter to my left, now barely a few inches in between us. Though he wasn’t quite as tall as Chanyeol or Sehun, he still towered over my small five-foot-three frame. His eyes were… strangely kind as he stared down at me, but there was definitely a hint of mischief in them. “I’ll finish this up. Sehun should have done it earlier. It's his house.”

I didn’t let go of the plate as his fingers wrapped around the rim, unable to look away from the amber spiced eyes. The toaster went off, breaking the trance.

Jongin motioned me away with his head. “Go eat.”

Untrusting of my voice, I nodded and walked over to the toaster. With too much concentration, I buttered the toast and sprinkled on a small coating of cinnamon. Jongin frowned at the action, but I ignored it.

When he was done with the rest of the dishes, he joined me at the island, leaning on his elbows to close the gap in between us. Normally I would have hated my bubble being exposed like this, but for some reason, with Jongin, I didn’t mind so much. My heart was still pounding hard in my chest, but it wasn’t from fear. At least, it didn’t feel like fear. Not entirely. 

“Is that all you want to eat?” he asked with a raised eyebrow.

I picked up the second slice of toast. “Yeah. I’m still trying to wrap my mind around all of this so my stomach can only handle so much.”

“I know this seems scary,” Jongin said, softening his voice, “but ultimately we are trying to protect you. It’s not your fault that you got dragged into this. We can be reasonable and we know that you’re not involved in this.”

Finishing off the slice, I took a sip of OJ before asking, “How did you all believe me so quickly?”

“Kyungsoo,” he smirked. “He’s like a human lie detector. There’s something about his brain that lets him pick up on small clues that give away the lie. His observation skills are amazing, if a bit scary. He could tell you weren’t lying about what you knew, how involved you were.”

I let out a deep breath, thankful for Kyungsoo, but also a bit worried. Now that I’d found the chip, if they asked me again, I might not have been able to hide it.

“You know,” Jongin leaned in closer to me, causing me to look at him, “you have really beautiful eyes.” Blood rushed to my cheeks, sending a heat wave through my body. I scratched the back of my head, too embarrassed to say anything back. He laughed, “What?”

“Nothing,” I shook my head, my eyes falling away from his face.

Jongin bent his head, putting himself in my line of sight again. “What is it?”

“It’s, um-” I cleared my throat. “It’s just, no one’s really commented on them like that.”

His thick eyebrows pulled together at my words. “Really? That can’t be true. Stormy eyes like that aren’t found here, typically. Surely someone has told you before?”

I shook my head again. “Nope. People just usually stare at them. It makes me uncomfortable, actually when they do that.”

Like a switch, Jongin straightened, his eyes darting for anything to look at that wasn’t me. “Sorry.”

“No, no, no,” I waved my hands frantically, nearly knocking my glass over. I caught it just as Jongin reached out for it as well, our fingers grazing against each other. I pulled away first, occupying my hands with my hair. “You’re fine. Other people don’t talk about my eyes when they’re staring. It’s usually some dumb pick up line or other nonsense that’s coming out of their mouths. They all think since I’m a foreigner I should be easy.”

“The easy ones are never fun.”

I turned to see Jongdae smirking in the entryway. He leaned against the frame lazily, his hands in his pockets. The handle of a gun peeked out under his jacket. Pushing off, he strutted towards the two of us.

“Yixing needs to see you, Wren,” Jongdae removed one hand from his pocket to point at me. “He said he wanted to check the stitches. Kai, Suho needs to see us.”

Confused, I glanced at  Jongin. “Suho?”

“It’s Junmyeon’s official name in the organization,” he explained. “Only the inner circle calls him Junmyeon.”

“Oh.” I stood up, draining the glass of OJ and picking up my plate to take it over to the sink. 

Jongin quickly swiped both dishes out of my hands. “I’ll take care of this,” he volunteered. “Go on.”

As I passed Jongdae, he said with a cheeky grin, “He’s in the infirmary.”

Yixing’s back was to me when I arrived at what would probably be my least favorite room in the house. He didn’t seem to realize that I’d arrived, continuing to tinker with whatever tools were laid out on the steel bench. I cleared my throat to get his attention.

“Oh, Wren!” He smiled after looking over his shoulder at me. The dimple in his cheek made it impossible not to smile back. It didn’t feel like it belonged here, in this room or in “Sit down on the bed, please.”

I obeyed quickly. With the thin blankets wrinkling under me, I felt a bit like a child waiting to get their annual shots at the doctor’s office. Snapping on a pair of gloves, Yixing carried over a chrome tray holding cotton swabs and alcohol.

“Is it hurting you?” he asked gently.

I answered honestly. “No.” He pushed back my hair and readied a Q-tip. “It stung a little bit when I took a shower this morning, but besides that it’s fine.”

He nodded, concentrating on the task in front of him. I hissed as the alcohol hit the still mostly open wound. “Sorry. Don’t want you getting an infection. Just take extra caution when bathing. It shouldn’t do any damage, but better safe than sorry.”

“Alright.” I chewed on my bottom lip, curiosity eating at me. Yixing seemed to be the most open. “If I had a question or two, would you answer them, Yixing?”

His hands paused for a moment before he looked down at me. “If they’re something I can answer, then sure.” After throwing the Q-tip away, he removed his gloves and sat down on the stool in front of me. “What are your questions?”

Unable to look him in the eye, I stared down at my intertwined fingers. The tips were turning red, but I couldn’t loosen my grip. “You guys really are some sort of… underground criminal organization? A… mafia?”

“Just one among a few,” he answered honestly, without hesitation. “We’re arguably the strongest, though. One of, at least. Most others answer to us, ask us permission before moving anything through our territory. But of course, that means we have plenty of enemies.”

“Like the Chinese cartel?” I guessed. He nodded. “So, how come you’re with the Korean mafia? You’re Chinese, aren’t you?”

He narrowed his eyes at me. “What makes you think that?”

I giggled awkwardly. “Your name kind of gives it away.”

“Oh,” he laughed, showing that dimple again. It was a higher pitched laugh, almost childlike. “I guess that is obvious. Outside our circle I go by Lay. Hardly anyone knows I’m Chinese.”

Too curious for my own good, I couldn’t help but continue my search for answers. “How did you end up here? I mean, how did any of you end up here?”

Sitting back, Yixing ran a hand through his jet-black hair. “Most of them grew up in it. Junmyeon’s family has run things for about five generations now, Minseok’s family right along with them. Kyungsoo and Jongdae were plucked out of the orphanage. Junmyeon’s father found me in the streets while on business in Beijing. I’d witnessed a deal go down and, having mercy on a ten-year-old kid, he took me in, paid for my education. I guess he figured it’d be useful to have someone like me around.”

It took a moment for me to soak this all in, to keep the new names and backgrounds straight in my head. Out of these nine men, none of them had a choice in this life. Having that information made it really hard to hate any of them.

The watch on Yixing’s wrist beeped. When he checked the message, he sighed. “They need me at the meeting. I doubt you’ll really see any of us today. Last night’s events are bound to have some big repercussions.”

“That’s all right,” I replied, slightly relieved. “I think I need the space.”

“Understandable.”

We left the room together, but parted ways in the hallway. 

I headed back to my room, wondering how I was going to occupy myself for the rest of the day. The duffle bags containing my clothes seemed like a good place to start. Since I didn’t know how long I would be stuck in this mansion, it seemed like the best thing I could do was make this place feel like some version of home, however minute that feeling could be.

The walk-in closet was stocked with rows of empty hangers. So, one by one, I started filling them up, even going so far as to coordinate the shirts based on color to stretch out the time. Then I moved on to hanging up the pants, feeling a bit foolish as I typically put them in drawers, but since the hangers were there might as well use them. A waist high white dresser sat against the right wall of the closet, perfect for the rest of my clothes that couldn’t be hung or wouldn’t fit in the closet. Setting everything up like that felt as if I was permanently setting myself here. A proverbial nail at the beginning of the road. 

I took extra time organizing the bathroom, separating the makeup from the cleansers from the shower supplies. The walls of the bathroom were white with gray accents on the trims and tile backsplash. It felt different from the rest of the dark wood aesthetic in the house, but I liked it. Almost as if this was my own little world, separated from the rest of the mansion and the dangers it possessed.

Unfortunately, even after making the bed and laying out my clothes to sleep in later tonight, the whole process only killed about three hours. Another two were spent just lying on the bed, staring at the ceiling, unmoving, trying not to think. Then, I remembered Yixing said they would all be out for most of the day and Sehun had said I could go anywhere as long as the door wasn’t locked.

Jumping up, I left to make my way down the hall. I stopped at every door, tugging on the handle to see if it would open. So far, the only ones that did were merely extra, unused bedrooms, each with a different color scheme. Though the temptation was certainly there, I didn’t dare open the one Sehun had pointed out as his.

Down on the first floor, I found a formal dining room with another door that led to the pantry, acting as a connecting hallway. It seemed an odd set up, but could also make for a quick getaway. 

Two doors in a row were locked, making me curious but with no way to satisfy it. The room I really wanted to explore was blocked by two large dark wooden doors. The keypad that kept me out was high tech, mocking me with its shining screen and box full of wires. Though still achingly curious, I gave up and moved on to the next door. It opened up to a home gym. Three of the four walls were covered in mirrors and the ceiling dotted with bright fluorescent lighting. There was everything from treadmills to free weights to a punching bag. Now it made sense why the boys had packed some of my work out clothes as well. I logged into my brain the location of this door and wandered around some more.

Eventually, I ran out of places to explore so I stopped by the kitchen, threw together a sandwich and headed back to my room. Scrawled out on top of the comforter, I finished off my pathetic dinner and stared at my dead phone. No charger had been packed, which was unsurprising. I didn’t see one lying around, either, so there was no way to power it back up. The black screen seemed to mock me. I wanted to know what on the chip was so important and if that’s what my captors were after. I couldn’t even be sure if I’d be able to see it on my phone. 

Jongin’s face entered my mind. What if I could somehow get the information out of him without being too obvious? 

No, I wasn’t that good of a liar or manipulator. I’d feel too guilty and would probably slip up. He would figure out what I was doing in two sentences. 

Tossing the phone to the side, I sighed heavily and closed my eyes. I was in a dangerous place. I had to remember that. I mustn’t let go of that. 

I didn’t leave my room for the rest of the day. 

**

A week went by and I was starting to get used to my new surroundings. Every morning was a battle to even leave my room, but once I was out in the hallway, I was able to relax. I still kept that mentality of this place being dangerous, but the lack of interaction or life-threatening situations made my initial arrival seem like an odd fever dream. Most of my time was spent wandering around the halls, trying to find any resemblance of an activity to curb my boredom.

Though they were constantly in and out, whispering in hushed tones as they passed me in the hallways. Their eyes would flicker over to me, following me as I walked on. It was uncomfortable, but ignorable. Until the day I was nearly run over by Baekhyun as I exited the kitchen.

“Whoop, sorry,” he laughed as he helped me restabilize my balance.

I stared at him, confused as to why he was laughing rather than scolding me for being in his way. He was so much like a little kid, it was hard to figure out how he could possibly be part of this dangerous life.

Baekhyun snapped his fingers in front of my face. “Yeesh, did I cause brain damage? Or am I just that pretty?”

I scoffed as I shoved his hand out of my face. “I’m just trying to figure out how someone like you is considered dangerous.”

“You’d be surprised at the chaos Baekhyun can cause.” Chanyeol walked up to the two of us, towering over all of us, including Minseok and Jongdae who followed closely behind. The former frowned at me, keeping his distance. Jongdae, however, closed the space between us fairly quickly, trapping me in as he leaned his forearm against the doorframe above my head.

“We’re all more frightening than we look,” he smirked down at me. I shrank back until the wood was digging into my spine. Trapped. I refused to look around and let him know that I was terrified. “But you seem like the type to be able to handle that.”

“Bad boys have never really been my type,” I snapped back. That’s right, Wren. Snap like a cornered puppy. That'll really show them. 

Baekhyun snickered. “Aw, why not?” 

My eyes flashed to him. Here I was, surrounded by men with guns and completely cornered. I crossed my arms. “My father’s a prosecutor. I was raised to obey the law. I have a general dislike of people who enjoy breaking it.”

“Prosecutor’s daughter?” Chanyeol laughed. “Then you should love bad boys. Bring the danger to your life that being the good girl leaves out.”

“Like Romeo and Juliet,” Jongdae added.

I rolled my eyes. “Life’s not a love story. In reality, falling for the bad boy will get you killed.”

“Sounds like you’ve got a stick--”

“Jongdae, back off now!”

All four of their heads whipped around to the sound of the order. Junmyeon, like a dark-lit savior, came stomping down the hallway with Sehun closely behind. The guys obeyed without question, shuffling back to give me space.

“Wren is a person we are protecting from our enemies,” Junmyeon growled, his face hard with irritation, “not a girl in the club. You will treat her with respect and not a mouse in a trap. Got it?” They nodded, the smiles wiped from their faces. Junmyeon moved his gaze over to me. “Any of them give you more trouble like this, you report it to me.”

I also nodded hastily, relieved that at least someone had my back. My eyes jumped to Sehun, who simply watched the scene with boredom.

“You all have something you should be doing. Get going.”

Without protest, they hurried down the hallway, leaving me alone with the leader and my handler in silence. I expected a sort of pseudo apology from Junmyeon, but I guess I expected a little too much. Instead, he gave me the once over and then continued down the hall. Sehun threw an unreadable look in my direction and followed suit.

**

After that, the boys were less... evasive. Around Kyungsoo and Yixing I was most the comfortable and didn’t feel the need to press against the wall every time I passed them. Jongin put me on edge in a different way. I wasn’t scared of him, but my mind told me to proceed with caution.

The one person that eluded me, however, was the owner of the house. Desperate for some sort of connection that I had no need for, I decided to take my explorations one step further. 

I’m not sure what exactly I was looking for - if anything at all. In the bedrooms that I had barely glanced at earlier, I now went back and searched them deeper. I felt silly looking under the beds and opening the empty closets. Maybe, I decided, I was trying to find some sort of evidence that Sehun wasn’t an emotionless robot. 

Each time I ran into the owner of the house he either glared at me or completely ignored me as if I didn’t even exist. While I wasn’t expecting four star customer service, it would have been nice to even be able to hold a five second conversation with him. But alas, the rooms that he clearly didn’t need gave way to no indication of who he was under the scowl.

Bored and having given up, I went back to the living room and sat down on the couch, unsure of where to proceed from there.

The house was quiet. I didn’t deal with this kind of absolute silence very well. It forced me to hear my own heartbeat in my ears, setting off a strange feeling of over self-awareness. Locating the remote, I switched on the giant TV that was mounted on the wall, not caring what channel it was turned to. The news flickered on, the weatherman talking about the outside temperature for the week.

After tossing the remote down next to me on the cushion, I pulled my knees up to my chest to rest my chin. I hardly paid attention as it went from the weather to a humanitarian piece to something political. 

That is, until the anchor announced a double homicide near the café. The camera barely got a glimpse of John and the unidentified man being zipped up in body bags before a police officer shoved it away.

“So far there are still no solid leads from last week’s homicide. One of the victims has been identified as Korean-American business man John Park. While the identity of the second man has not been released, it is believed that he is a member of the Marge, a notorious gang famous in the area. If they are involved, one can only assume the possibility of the involvement of the mafia group Ex-”

The TV went black, cutting off the reporter. I looked down to see the remote was gone. Standing behind the couch, Sehun frowned at the reflective screen.

“Reporters are always jumping to conclusions,” he murmured.

“So was she wrong?” I asked sarcastically.

“No,” he said matter-of-factly. “But there’s no evidence of our involvement at the scene, we made sure of that.”

I went back and forth on the next statement that sat on my tongue. Finally, it forced itself out.

“Which one of you killed John?”

Sehun silently stared down at me with narrowed eyes before putting his hands in his pockets and letting out a low whistle. “None of us. It was the other man you saw. He shot John. Chanyeol’s actually in a bit of trouble because he killed the man in reflex instead of bringing him back here. I wouldn’t say they were friends – not even close – but they’d worked a couple jobs together, so he had a soft spot for John. He shot the other guy without even thinking it through.”

I wrapped my arms around my legs tighter, staring down at the floor. “Why did he kill John? Do you know?”

He pursed his lips. “I don’t have a clear answer, but I suspect John knew something they didn’t want to get out. Or maybe he betrayed them. With John, it could be anything. He played all sides.”

I didn’t want to, but I believed him. I didn’t know enough to contradict him.  

“Come on. Kyungsoo’s made dinner.” He didn’t wait for me as he turned to leave, which wasn’t surprising. I slowly stood and followed him from the living room. My stomach roared at me, feeling neglected.

Undermining expectation, Sehun passed through the empty kitchen and into the dining room. The rest of the men were already sitting around the table, waiting. Jongin saw us enter and waved me over to take the empty seat next to him. The plate was already full of food so I hardly paid attention to my surroundings, focusing on the food entering my mouth, until Baekhyun poked my shoulder.

“How was your day?” he asked with an innocent smile. The question was so ordinary that it threw me off guard. It was a very different persona than the one from the other day.

I shrugged. “It was a day, I guess. There’s not really much to do around here.”

Baekhyun’s smile faltered. I wasn’t sure what kind of answer he had been expecting. “Well… what would you normally do?”

He caught me as I was taking a bite of a spoonful of rice. It took me a moment to chew and swallow without choking. “Um, I don’t really do a whole lot. I mostly just go to work and stay home. I watch a lot of movies and re–” Realization hitting me, I dropped my spoon onto my plate. “Shit!”

Jongin’s fingers wrapped around my arms protectively. “Wren, what is it? What’s wrong?”

“My job!” I groaned. “Since I’ve stopped showing up, it could cancel my visa and then soon I’ll have a warrant out for my deportation.”

“You don’t have to worry about that,” Jumyeon cut in. I stared at him in confusion but he kept on eating as if he’d only commented on the weather forecasted. “Your supervisor has been… contacted. Your position will be there for you once this is all done.”

I stared at him in disbelief. I didn’t want to think of how my supervisor was contacted or how Junmyeon was able to secure my job without a timeline of when I could go back. “Th-thank you.”

To my surprise, the corner of his lip twitched, as if he was fighting a smile. “It’s the least we could do since you got dragged into all of this.”

The table remained quiet, the only sound being from the scraping of bowls and clinking of glasses.

That is, until Jongdae decided to break it. “Hey, Baek, heard from Tae Hee recently?”

Baekhyun grabbed a roll from the basket in front of him and threw it at Jongdae while sending a panicked side glance at me. “Shut up!” The bun bounced off of Jongdae’s forehead. 

“Don’t you dare even start that!” Junmyeon ordered with such authority that Baekhyun slid down a little in his seat. Jongdae dropped the retaliating bun that he picked up from his own plate. 

“Who’s Tae Hee?” I couldn’t stop myself from asking as I looked around the table. 

Jongdae started laughing, along with a few other snickers from some of the other boys.

“Tae Hee is the perfect example as to why you don’t just pick a random girl out of the crowd to take home,” Minsoek explained vaguely.

Baekhyun, on the other hand, was not finding this funny. “I had too much to drink. I didn’t think she would stick to me like this!”

“So you have heard from her?” Chanyeol guessed.

“Not since I changed my number,” Baekhyun replied. “She was never supposed to have it.” He turned and looked down at me. “Do you know how frustrating it is to change your main contact number when you're the head of a major division in a very complicated underground organization?”

It was a rhetorical question. Of course I would have no idea, but I answered him anyway. Just probably not how he would expect.

“You guys just bring random girls home all the time?”

Shock fell on almost every single face around the table. It was a very naive statement for me to make. They were grown men and it happens all the time. I wasn’t sure if I expected them to be a bit more secretive about their homes or that maybe they all had significant others. A sudden horror ran over me. Would I be forced to see Sehun bring random girls who were free to leave once he was done with them?

Chanyeol, Baekhyun, and Jongin looked down at their plates, playing with their food with an awkward air. Sehun scoffed, shaking his head. I could feel my own face turning red at my question. I tried to determine if sliding under the table to hide would be a good escape or be just as embarrassing.

“S-sorry,” I stammered out. “I, um, I just–”

“Formal attachments are dangerous,” Yixing answered. “For us and for the other person. Not to mention it’s hard to find someone who can accept our line of work.”

“It’s not an every night thing,” Jongin insisted. “We’re people, too, and we get lonely sometimes.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.” I wanted to run up to my room. Jongin had been the nicest one to me here and now looked like a kicked puppy. “It’s just that I… well, I mean….”

“You don’t have to worry about that,” Junmyeon interrupted, understanding what I was trying to say. “We’re on high alert right now and liaisons like that are off limits. It’s too dangerous. And you never know what stalkers someone might take home.” He smirked at that last comment, staring straight at Baekhyun.

Baekhyun threw his hands in the air. “One crazy! I accidentally get one crazy and you guys never let it go!”

Rolling his eyes, Sehun stood up and left the dining room, taking his dirty dishes with him.

“You know,” Jongdae mused, “as our maknae, you’d think he’d be able to laugh more.”

Jongdae’s words ringing in my head, I watched over my shoulder as Sehun cleaned his dishes, rinsed them off, and set them on the drying rack. I never would have guessed that he was the youngest, just from the way he carried himself and his tall stature. He seemed to have the world on his shoulders from the way he took everything seriously and never really loosened up.

“He hasn’t been the same since–” Chanyeol started but was cut off by one scary look from Kyungsoo. I didn’t realize that such a terrifying glare could come from the chef. That urge to ask what Chanyeol meant burned on my tongue, but this time I was able to hold it back. It very obviously wasn’t my place. And I didn’t want that look directed towards me. 

Gradually, they all finished their food and left the dining room table, following Sehun in cleaning their dishes before disappearing all together. Soon, the only two remaining were Jongin and me.

“Do you guys eat here every night?” I asked to fill in the silence. Jongin’s plate was empty and was merely waiting for me to finish in my slow-eater ways.

“Not typically,” he answered after taking a sip from his glass. “With all the chaos going on, we’re having to conjugate a bit more. None of us are complaining, though, we love Kyungsoo’s food.”

I nodded, moving the leftover bits of food around on my plate with a chopstick. “And when you guys do have to get together, do you always meet at Sehun’s? Jongdae said he was the youngest, so I would assume--”

“No, usually our meetings take place at Junmyeon’s.” Jongin picked up my dishes along with his and went into the kitchen. I followed, not bothering to protest his gentleman-like actions. “His house is more convenient since it’s in the middle of the compound we all live on.” He turned on the faucet after rolling up his sleeves and started to rinse off the plates. I tried not to focus too much on his exposed, toned forearms, a constant weakness of mine.  

“I can do that,” I offered, feeling guilty that this was the second meal he was cleaning up for me. Gentleman or not, I could still do things for myself. I started to reach for the plates, but Jongin pointed the hose at me threateningly.

“Stop. It’s not a big deal,” he chuckled, squeezing the nozzle just enough for a few drops to jump out. “You’re the guest here.”

Giving in, I leaned my back against the counter, crossing my arms. “If Junmyeon’s house is more convenient, why do you guys keep meeting here? Not that I don’t enjoy the break up the company brings, it just seems weird if you all of a sudden change your meeting place.”

“Since you’re here, it keeps you better protected with us around rather than no one but Sehun’s men.” Jongin put the plates on the drying rack. “They’re good, but we all feel better with us around too.”

“Okay, then,” I pursed my lips. “Why don’t I just stay with Junmyeon?” That made the most sense to me. Leader equaled absolute protection. 

Jongin held up his index and middle finger, water dripping from his tanned skin. “Two reasons. The first being that, though Junmyeon’s place is heavily guarded by his men, Sehun’s place is actually more secure. He’s a big technology buff, so this place is wired up and locked down. I’m sure you noticed all the different locks on the doors.”

I nodded, tapping my finger against my chin. “And the other reason?”

Jongin cringed, rubbing the back of his neck with his hand. “Well, it’s kind of his punishment.”

“Punishment?” I screeched rather loudly.

“Shh,” Jongin hissed. “No need to be loud. But yes, his punishment. You see, it was Sehun’s idea to go after John during the meeting rather than grabbing him before. Junmyeon let him be in charge of the whole thing, but since things didn’t really go as planned, you got stuck here.”

Sighing, I picked up the linen towel and started fiddling with it. “That explains why he’s been so cold to me, I guess.”

“No, that’s just Sehun,” Jongin corrected before taking the towel from me. He dried his hands as I opened my mouth to ask a question, but he stopped me. “Don’t ask. I know what you want to know, but that’s where the honesty stops.”

I threw my hands up, palms out in defeat.

“Now,” he hummed, checking his watch, “it’s still pretty early. You said that you liked to watch movies, so why don’t we watch one real quick? None of us will be home at all tomorrow, including Sehun, so you should probably get quality time while you can.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. Quality time with Jongin. “Sure. Why not?”

We made our way back to the living room. It seemed like everyone else was gone and the house was back to its eerie quietness. Jongin sat me down on the couch and turned on the TV, switching it over to one of the many apps installed on its drive.

“Anything you want to watch in particular?”

“Not really,” I yawned.

“Romantic comedy?” he offered, a cheekily gleam in his eyes.

I shrugged, sinking down into the couch and ignoring what he may or may not have been secretly laughing at. “Honestly, I’ll watch almost anything.”

“Random button it is.” Jongin clicked on the little wheel in the corner and the streaming service brought up a movie at random. From the opening credits, it seemed to be some sort of Hong Kong gangster movie. I choked back a laugh at the coincidence. Even Jongin let out a chuckle as he sat next to me, leaving several inches of space between us.

Unfortunately, the subtitles were only in Korean and, while I could read it without too much effort, they were going by too fast for me to read them and then translate in my head. Combine that with my exhaustion and I hardly paid attention to the plot of the movie. About half an hour in, I fell asleep.

I woke up again to little jolts rocking my body. For a moment I ignored them and dug my face deeper into the couch cushion. Until I realized that it wasn’t the couch that I was snuggling up against. My eyes flew open and I looked up to see Jongin’s face only a few inches from mine. He didn’t look down at me even as I tried to squirm out of his arms.

“It’s okay, we’re almost there,” he whispered. The hallway was dark, the sun long gone and moon barely making its appearance in the sky. 

“You could have woke me up,” I gurgled.

Jongin laughed quietly. “You were too cute to wake up. It’s not that big of a deal. It’s this one, right?”

I looked over at the door, my tired eyes squinting at the door. “Mhm. It’s this room.”

Again, I tried to squirm out of his arms to walk into the bedroom, but Jongin held me tighter as he opened the door with the hand that had been cradling my back. He walked straight to the bed and laid me down on top of the blankets.

I propped myself up on my elbows and look at him as he headed back to the door. “You know, that was kind of pointless since I’ll have to get back up to change.”

“Not to me,” Jongin said softly. Without waiting for a reply, he closed the door behind him.

[gelatinzz]

this was supposed to be for christmas oops el oh el , merry fnaf christmas

some things of my fnaf ii (au :question mark:) i finished months ago and never posted