#flash fic

[insomniac-dot-ink]

The Angel Wire

No one knows what to do with the angel tangled in the power lines. The poor thing’s body was wrapped around and around the sparking wires. A twisted-up ball of heavenly light. The face was obscured by a bent halo—a golden glow that sometimes oscillates like bad television signal. The wings float loosely in the air, all twelve feet of silken feathers, ragged and torn at the ends.

A storm had felled the trees and the poles and anything taller than a chicken coup in one swoop. Anyone who dared cross the puddles and debris had to risk being electrocuted by the live wires or blinded by the angel’s weakly pulsing light. Cooing sounds emerged from the angel, sad little calls for distant ears.

The creature would periodically make a break for it too—wings going taut and rising in a flurry of trumpets and frantic flapping. The electrical wires held fast, twisting against the angel’s soft flesh and pushing back. It fell, it always fell, back into the nest of wires and would make those weak cooing noises. I was an ornithologist before all this town, town, town and couldn’t help but think, pigeon.

The chaplain went first. He got down to pray under the angel’s bent body, close as he dared and in the mud. Everyone knew he wasn’t but a few weeks off the drink and his hands still shook when he lifted up the cross. The nun, she was retired but we still called her that, caught the 921 bus to the next town that same day.

Some said she was going to the next town over to get a proper priest. Others said she had crossed herself and high-tailed it out of there. What bad luck it was going to be to have a dead angel in our town electrical wires.

All this debris and only the birds can get close enough to it, flapping around the angel's head and perching on its mighty back. They call to each other.

Davie, who I had once loved, offered to fetch his shotgun and put it out of its misery. The youngest one there, a girl named Clara, cried so hard she had to be walked back and forth down the lane three times. We opted to put “shooting a messenger of above” on the back burner. We gathered up wire cutters, holy books, rubber boots, and a good tree-cutting ax from the mess of our homes and piled them up. We'd wait a day or so at least, watching the angel and all silently hoping it would make it out on its own. 

I wasn’t a praying woman anymore. My house was a testament to a lot of broken things before it was ever leveled by the storm. But I didn’t have any little ones to walk up and down the lane and my car had survived just fine and I owned the best pair of binoculars out of anyone. So, I kept vigil–it was the least I could do. 

I sat and watched and sometimes cooed back when the angel let out long melancholy ooo's. The relief trucks were late if they were even coming and I drank in small sips from my third water jug. The chaplain came at sundown and he passed me a better drink from his flask. I wasn’t a praying woman anymore so I took a long sip and passed it back.

“Think it’ll make it out?” I asked, nodding at the angel, and the chaplain took a longer drink. I gave him a small smile and elbowed the man. “Glad you stayed, at least.”

He nodded again and began to pray, never taking his eyes off the wires up above.

The girl came when the day tucked behind the trees into full dark. She was a darting, quiet thing and I nearly missed her rustling through the grass.

“You shouldn’t be out here,” I told her tiny form at the edge of the puddles. She drew her knees up under a big sweater.

“I have to make sure he doesn’t try anything . . .” she said and I knew she was talking about Davie, who I could no longer love.

 “Does your mama know you’re out here?”

She mumbles from inside her oversized hoodie, “I can’t let ‘em do it.”

I sighed. “He won’t, not with me here,” I said and waved her over. I made the little girl climb into my lap to stop her shivering and the chaplain gave us all a blanket to huddle under. The angel flapped those dirty wings and cooed.

“Can I see?”

I let the little girl use my binoculars to make out that bent halo and loose curls. She got fingerprints all over the lens and I tried to ignore it.

“I want to be a meteorologist one day,” Clara said, unprompted. “So I can warn people about stuff like this.”

I snorted. “And I want to be a poet.”

“Hush,” Markus says to me and then to the little girl, “I’m sure you’ll make a great weather lady one day, Clara.” The chaplain gave a punished smile and it made me want to make fun of him just enough to stop it. Clara frowned.

“Did you always want to be a chaplain?” she asked in return, a bit meanly, and the chaplain didn't answer.

I cleared my throat. “Do you think that’s what it was trying to do? Trying to warn us?” “Or maybe it was just unlucky,” Markus says, rubbing a hand down his long face.

I snorted. “A bad day at work.”

“Does god allow for bad luck?” asked the little girl and the question hung limp and loose like those wings.

“Why don’t we ask it?” I say, and we laugh, weakly. We call out to the angel–questions and praise and hopes for tomorrow that we’ll get it out. Or maybe we'd have to get the shotgun tomorrow. The glow of the creature is so weak. Near midnight, the girl suggests we go looking for its trumpet. If it had been there to warn us, it might have carried a horn, and if it had a horn, we might be able to summon help from its friends.

We search, feebly, avoiding the sparking wires and the upturned wood and metal. We go around in the mud on our hands and knees until we match the trapped creature. Though, we never do figure out what to do with the angel tangled in the power line. The night was long and bitter and we didn’t have anywhere else to be, the drunken chaplain and family-less woman of the birds and that little girl.

Before dawn, I am asleep, we are all asleep, dead to the world like the day will never come. And in the morning, the wires are loose on the ground and quiet. The angel is gone and a relief trucks have come. A part of me hopes the creature made it out. The birds after all peck at the wires on the ground. A part of me is relieved to see that Davie is here and he has all his supplies in the back. The trucks arrived and the power company remembered us enough to cut off the power.

I have nowhere to be, and walk the little girl home. Gloria is happy to see her and offers me a place to stay the night. I tell her my car is just fine. Still, she says, just a night.

The window in the guest room faces the electrical wires. They’ll rebuild them one day because you can’t waste the material all the way out here. Clara will go off to college one day. The chaplain will leave the drink for good, he will, and the church in the same breath. I will write a poem one day and it won’t be any good.

The poem will be about the electrical wires outside my windows. How I don’t know if the angel made it out, but the birds still perch there. They preen and sing and fluff. I count them one by one in the pre-dawn light. Some are flesh and blood. They clean the feathers of the ones that aren’t. Pearly blue jays sing, barely visible, and letting out forgotten songs from yesteryear, and there are fewer ones in the proper light. The angel wire they call it. Year after year, the birds return with their bodies or without them, to sit one by one in a line. Pearly outlines preen their living grandchildren and sing to lost mates and fluff invisible wings, and I close my eyes and listen to the ghosts.

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

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[risingoftime]

A NIGHT TO REMEMBER ⟡ HOBIE BROWN

Hobie hadn’t realized that he butt-dialled your number while fantasizing about how it would feel to fuck you. In the midst of it all, he realizes that he might have an audience.

a/n: cause i can’t get him out of my head₊˚ෆˎˊ˗ 18+

part i | part ii

Hobie’s life had been in a constant state of unrest. If he wasn't fulfilling his duties as Spiderman, he was practicing and performing with his band Spider-Slayers. It had been a late night, and the only thing that brought him to peace was you. He found himself thinking about you more than he would like to admit. He had tried his best to keep his distance, knowing all too well what happens when people get entangled with him. But Hobie couldn't stop envisioning your sultry voice and soft lips. He wondered how your perfect frame would look bent over, pussy exposed all for him. Hobie was curious about how you would sound while getting fucked, if you moaned or whimpered when cumming and if he could make you do both. Shifting in his bed, Hobie became increasingly aware of his growing erection.

His dick throbbed at the thought of you and was already hard in his boxers. Hobie had never felt a desire as strong as he had for you. His hand releases his boner from the constricting fabric, already sensitive with need. Hobie wrapped his hand around his dick, pumping himself vigorously at the thought of fucking you. His precum acts as a lubricant while he imagines how your pussy would feel taking him in. Oh, the things that he would do. Hobie’s hips made languid movements, keeping pace with each thrust into his hand.

“Oh fucking hell, you feel so good.” His lips remained parted, letting out a breathy moan. Hobie visualized his cock deep inside you, your pussy taking it all too well and milking every last drop of Hobie’s cum. “Just like that,” he gasped. His toes began to curl from the image of your eyes rolling back and begging him not to stop. You're so beautiful it pains him to slow his palms from bobbing up and down his thick length.

Hobie’s hips begin to stutter, and his core tightens as he grows closer to orgasm. His free hand grips the sheets as Hobie’s body tenses at the tingling feeling that erupts. Opening his eyes slightly, Hobie watches as his dick jerks with each cum shot, soiling his boxers and rubbing the creamy white liquid against his skin. The noises from the friction between his hand and dick make wet slapping sounds. Hobie’s breath hitched as his body trembled at the mercy of the thought of cumming inside of you.

Once he could get ahold of himself, he washed his hands and cleaned the mess he had made. Hobie hadn’t realized how slowly time has passed when fantasizing about you. Looking around his room briefly, he could not locate his phone. He heard a lewd voice coming out from the sheets on his bed. Throwing the fabric around, Hobie found his phone had called your number by mistake. Your heavy sighs and whimpers ricochet through the phone speakers like a sweet melody to Hobie. It was evident what you were doing on the other side of the call. His dick was already pulsating and hardening. Unable to remain quiet for long, Hobie cleared his throat.

“Hello, love.”

navigation | masterlist

[beannoss]

with you, all in tangles (1)

3 times Yor blows kisses to Twilight and one time Twilight blows a kiss to Yor

For the @twiyorbase fluff fest! No content warnings, T-rating; manga spoilers. One chapter per day matching the daily prompts. Today's prompt: Blush. Title borrowed from Cut to the Feeling by Carly Rae Jepsen 💕 Part 2 (2) ->

It was their third mission together. Something easy, the Shopkeeper had said. For you. We'll see how your Twilight performs.

And Yor was… Yor was seeing.

Their first two missions has been in his world. Tonight's was in hers. Loid-Twilight was backup for her, for Thorn Princess.

He was performing very, very well.

She had always known he was kind and competent and handsome, of course. She'd known that she sort of, kind of, maybe a little bit had something of a crush on him. It's just that it hadn't mattered and hadn't meant anything because everything they were doing was false and anyway, there was nothing about Yor which might draw the attention of Dr Loid Forger in that way. And even if somehow there was, Yor didn't... she didn't like that she had so many lies between him and herself. She struggled enough with that as they were; it made her dizzy, imagining what those lies might do if, if they became — if they became more than —

Then that horrible night happened. Yor learned about Twilight. Twilight learned about Yor. And they both learned about Anya —

Days and days passed with lots of conversation and lots of discussing and lots of disagreeing quietly while pretending in front of Anya that everything was all right (unsuccessfully, because telepath) and being very honest in front of Anya that she had nothing to worry about (successfully, because it was true and also because telepath).

Then WISE contacted Garden and Garden agreed to meet with them, and the conversations became negotiations which included Loid's Handler and her Shopkeeper, and now they were here and doing missions together.

And Yor was being forcibly reminded that she'd never really stopped fancying Loid. Twilight. It had only become more confusing. And it was getting more confusing by the second, because he was incredibly talented. Of course she'd already known that but she hadn't know he was talented like this. And she'd never really thought about men's bodies before except for how to incapacitate or kill them or how to defend against their attacks, but she was thinking about Loid's body now, and how he moved and how he worked and how his hands were very clever and his shoulders a very nice shape and he had excellent foot work and precise muscle control and his waist —

"Thorn Princess?"

Yor bit her lip as her cheeks heated, something fluttery in her chest, in her stomach, and flicked her eyes back to his face. "Mhm?"

Twilight’s expression was mild but she knew that particular light in his eyes: he was frustrated. "I'm not sure how we'll get through,” he said. “WISE's intel must have been outdated; there are more of them than we expected."

"Oh." Yor looked around. They were on some sort of ledge, surrounded by bodies, most she had evidently taken down. She reviewed the assignment. If she wasn't mistaken, the primary client was actually immediately below them, and there ought to be a promenade under the ledge she could use to access his suite. She was confident she could deal with whatever security were physically in with the client, so… "Can you distract these people?"

"Of course," Twilight said. And he often looked unfazed and assured, but how had Yor never noticed how appealing that was before? Something stirred, fluttered, again in her belly. He went on, "But we still need to get two storeys down."

"Is it two floors? I thought his suite was directly below us."

Twilight inclined his head. "The suite has a high ceiling."

"Oh, that's no trouble. If you don't mind distracting these people, I'll finish the assignment."

After a beat where Twilight held her gaze, he asked, "You don't need backup down there?"

"No, but thank you!" Yor said cheerfully. She rolled to the edge of the ledge, and, protected behind a very ugly statue, she stood. There was no railing around the ledge which seemed like a safety risk — what if children ever came up here?! — but was useful for her needs. She stepped back, until her heels were right at the edge. "Don't worry about that!"

"I — if you're sure." He didn't sound doubtful, though Yor couldn't blame him for some hesitation. This wasn't the plan after all and she had long since learned that Loid liked plans! He didn't tend to mind them changing but she suspected he preferred it when he was the one changing them. Still, he was reloading his guns, and then pulling something from his backpack. He looked up at her from his crouch. "Thorn Princess. Yor. Are you sure you don't want backup?"

Butterflies took flight, fluttering sweetly in her in her belly, filling her chest. The way he asked it… As though... as though he cared. About her, about her answer, about what she needed to do her job. She beamed at him, and Twilight looked stunned for just a breath, pink appearing high on his cheeks, and —

And Yor blamed what happened next on the butterflies.

"You don't have to worry about me!" she called. Then she winked, blew him a kiss, and stepped backward off the ledge.

For the whole second it took to drop, her cheeks burning hot enough to heat all of Ostania, her mind was filled with a shriek, What was that?!

Then she landed, and gun shots sounded overhead, and Yor stood. She twirled her stilettos as the guards inside caught sight of her. The work began.

Part 2 (2) ->

[beedreamscape]

When you thought you were in a contemporary rivals-to-lovers romance with touches of medical drama, but then they pull away your funds and you cry in each other's arms but you got hopes this might be your underdog moment, your chance to overcome adversities but then the bodies won't rot and the bodies won't rot and the bodies won't rot and J—'s eyes turn honey turn amber turn gold...

And maybe you've done something right but... they still won't rot and maybe he's crazy but maybe you're raiding a graveyard for him and it's the most romantic thing you've done in a while because maybe this isn't cute anymore, this isn't cool anymore, and he makes them move and he makes them walk and maybe this is actually the start of an apocalypse movie and here's where the disease begins.

Yet somehow the problem is still money and youtube comments and goverment lackeys and evil CEOs and bureaucracy and conspiracies and you were supposed to save the fucking planet, and now you're surrounded by meat and now he can kill and kill and kill and now the skeleton army doesn't sound absurd and now blowing everything up doesn't sound so bad—

And now you think you're tired of seeing the world in 2 by 35 and you just wanna go home and do Cappuccino Tuesdays and Popcorn Saturdays and walks on the beach with C— and dim lit nights with A—... but the movie isn't over yet and this is not your story to tell.

[milflewis]

Soulmate AU

1.

When Sebastian first meets Nico Rosberg — and his hair more specifically — again after the crash, he nearly pisses his pants laughing.

“I see you have a type, eh?” He asks Lewis. He runs a hand through his own blond hair.

“Tell me,” he starts, leaning forward over Lewis’s left shoulder. Bono is saying something in the seat beside Lewis. Lewis’s face is relaxed and calm.

“Did you jerk off to Michael too? Blond, German, very fast. He’d fit in your collection.”

Lewis’s face doesn’t even flicker. When he asks a question about whatever Bono is saying, his voice is steady and quiet. They could be back in their regular driver briefings. Something in Sebastian’s chest swells up, pushing at his heart and lungs, mean and sour.

“Don’t worry,” he tells Lewis. “We all did. Can’t have you thinking you are special, hmm?”

2.

There are stories — old ones — that one hears over the years.

Stories of those who don’t meet their soulmates properly in life, and so join them in death.

Sebastian used to love stories.

When he opens his eyes after going into the wall too fast and too hard, he is standing beside Lewis Hamilton.

Lewis is talking to Ted, the camera on. His eyes are shadowed and his shoulders are curved slightly inwards.

When he sees Sebastian next to him, he startles, mouth falling open. “I — You.”

“Lewis?” Ted is frowning, concerned. “Are you alright?” He has a hand up as if to tell the cameraman to get ready to stop rolling. Or to zoom in on Lewis’s face. Sebastian isn’t sure.

“Um.” Lewis blinks, swallowing. He glances at Ted and then back at Sebastian.

Never let it be said that Sebastian isn’t ever helpful.

“He can’t see me, I think,” Sebastian says, and then mimes a blowjob with his hand and mouth, tongue in cheek, in front of Ted, who doesn’t stop staring at Lewis.

“Right, yeah,” Lewis says, as shakey as Sebastian has ever heard him. “Um.”

“Funny story,” Sebastian says, furious. He wants his dad. He stays looking into Lewis’s tired shocked face. He thinks if he sees his mom, he will never be able to stop crying “Turns out we are soulmates.”

“Lewis, you okay? Do you need a minute?”

Lewis inhales. Sebastian can see him visibly remember there is a camera on him. When he smiles, it is a thin slight of a thing.

“Sorry, man, what was your question again?”

3.

Lewis gets more curled in on himself as the year goes on, face thin. Quieter too. Him and Nico snap and snap at each other’s heels. Toto nearly has a stroke keeping them from biting.

Sebastian is self aware enough to know that he is not helping. That his commentary — one sided that it is as no one other than Lewis can hear him and Lewis rarely responds, not through words nor expressions — is only making things worse for him.

He can’t bring himself to care.

It drives the cold away a little. That short spark of satisfaction and victory when he pokes and pokes and pokes and Lewis keeps a straight face through it all.

Sometimes, if Lewis breaks, either in a flinch or an aborted eye roll, or god forbid, a laugh, then Sebastian can even make himself pretend that he is still alive.

“I have a question,” Sebastian declares. He is standing over by the window, looking out at the paddock.

Lewis ignores him.

Nico is saying something in response to James Allison. He looks tense. The entire room looks tense. Sebastian rolls his shoulders.

“Did you stop fucking Nico before I died, or do you only not like exhibitionism? I could leave if you want privacy.”

This makes Lewis look at him. It is a quick glance, cutting and sarcastic, eyebrows slightly raised. He somehow manages to look pissed and amused and embarrassed, all at the same time.

Sebastian smiles sunnily at him. It is often exhausting to be around Lewis, especially when he is like this. Lewis might be quiet, packed in tightly, but he spills over most of the time. No one can ever accuse him of being small.

“You are right, I guess,” Sebastian muses thoughtfully. “I would not leave you alone. I would be too bored.”

Nico wins. Nico retires. Lewis disappears home for the break. Sebastian follows his brother around for a few months, chattering at him, even though Fabian doesn’t ever respond. It’s not that different from before if he is being honest.

There is a Lewis light in his chest, always pulling. It’s not that bad of a sore, Sebastian reasons. Only a little achey.

4.

Formula One has started back up again when Sebastian follows the tug back to Lewis.

Lewis doesn’t say anything at Sebastian’s sudden appearance in the garage. His shoulders relax slightly though when Sebastian makes a quick quip about Valtteri’s blond — Seriously, Lewis, Sebastian thinks, half fond — hair.

He looks less like a scrunched up tissue someone used to blow their nose with. Sebastian tells him this. He catches Lewis’s badly smothered eye roll in the sleek reflective black of Mercedes’ desks.

He even makes Lewis laugh, startled, when he asks him if he managed to get laid while Sebastian was gone.

“So,” Niki says, sitting down beside Lewis in his motorhome. Lewis hums, pulling out his earbuds. Sebastian is slumped on the floor, back against the opposite wall. They’re waiting to be called for the post practise debrief.

“So.”

The half grin, all teeth and eyes squishing up, that Lewis sends Niki reminds Sebastian of Formula Three. His fingers itch for a steering wheel.

“Are you going to introduce me to your soulmate anytime before I die?”

Lewis goes very still. Stupidly, damningly, his eyes dart to Sebastian before he looks back at Niki.

Niki raises his eyebrows. He, eerily, manages to look Sebastian directly in the eyes. Sebastian waves. Just in case.

Niki’s expression doesn’t change.

Sebastian’s exhale could be a laugh.

“Well?” Niki nudges. “I am not getting older, you know?”

“Jesus, Nik,” Lewis says, automatically, like it’s rote. “I’ve told you. Stop making those jokes.”

“You’re the one who calls me ‘old man’.”

“It’s a term of endearment!”

Niki stares at him down. For the first time in Sebastian’s life — and death — he watches as Lewis Hamilton gives in.

“I don’t need to introduce you. You already know him.”

“Knew him,” Sebastian corrects. Lewis ignores him.

Niki watches Lewis for a moment longer. Lewis, resolutely, refuses to look away.

“This is ridiculous,” Sebastian informs him.

“Hello, Sebastian,” Niki says, and for the second time in not even five minutes, Sebastian wonders if Niki can see him. He doesn’t bother waving this time but it is a little freaky.

“I hate you,” Lewis tells him, sulkily.

“Yes,” Niki says, patting him on the shoulder. “I know.”

“How did you know?”

Sebastian isn’t sure if Lewis is asking how Niki knew that Lewis had a dead soulmate or how he knew that dead soulmate was Sebastian.

“Hmm, last year, you were weird. Weirder after Sebastian. Not how Nigel was, with Elio, or Michael, with Aryton.” Niki doesn’t take his eyes off of Lewis. His voice and face is softer than Sebastian has ever heard or seen. “Just. Weird. And still too, after Nico left.”

Lewis swallows thickly. “Right.”

“Some of me hoped.” Niki stops. He looks over at where Lewis looked earlier, when he is steadily refusing to look now. “When James died, I looked out for him.”

He shrugs. There is something hanging heavy in his face. “We knew each other too well in life, maybe. Or that was all the time we were given. More than most.”

“Yeah.”

Lewis meets Sebastian’s eyes. Sebastian looks back at him.

“And,” Niki says. He reaches a hand behind them and raps on the wall. “These are a bit thin too. I heard you talking to someone, once or twice.”

“Fuck off,” Lewis laughs. He scrubs an open palm down his face.

Niki reaches over to pat his cheek firmly. “You are sleeping better, this is good. Keep it up.”

“Aye, cap’n,” Lewis says dryly.

5.

Jenson: you cheatying slag

Jenson: i knoiw 4 a FACT that you dont know all the wdcs off by heart

Jenson: usinh seb as your own fuckinh wiki is wrong

Jenson: always knew you were a cheater aty your core. fernando warned me about you LOL

Jenson: also. tell seb hes a nerd

[grtmnick]

In a voice that probably held more desperation than Regina would have preferred to show, she asked, “Can we please not discuss this while we’re in the middle of the town’s square?”

“But what were those noises I heard from your room last night?” Henry earnestly requested of his mothers.

“You heard your mom kid,” Emma interjected, “Besides, we were just wrestling anyways.”

A look of absolute mortification twisted Regina’s face. She brought her coffee towards her lips, trying and failing to stifle an audible groan.

[alastor-simp-page]

Memory Wipe #333

Slowly working my way out of writers block-

HERE HAVE SOME DOOMED YAOI FORDSQUARED *throws*

Memory Wipe Log: #333

I messed up. Again. As I always do, as I have done three hundred and thirty three times before. And I am sure I will do another three hundred and thirty three times again. 

I kissed you. Ford, I kissed you and I liked it. No, liked—loved it, thrived in it. Felt alive for a moment in this cold world slowly squeezing life out of us. That grip on my wind pimp lessened for a single moment. I was free from the chains that bound me to this Earth and I soared through a thousand heavens until I found you.

But now, I gotta do what always happens between you and I. Whenever we have a fleeting moment of whatever this is, whatever this strange, wonderful and mind breaking feeling is I die a few thousand times. It’s a feeling which I cling onto until I must push myself out of your arms once again. 

It’s selfish, I know. It’s selfish to want it and to reject it. It’s selfish to deprive you of it. I know you feel it too. The way your hand seems to savor every single touch you can steal, your eyes linger for too long and that strange pleasant silence that settles between each other after a long night. I see it and I know you see it in me too.

So that’s why I had to wipe your memory again for the #333th time. And after I finish this letter, mine too. I’ve seen in the old letters: you’ve been sleeping when I press the cold barrel into your skull or begging me to stop. I prefer the one’s where it slips away into a dream, it’s all a dream. It’s a merciful way to forget. 

Yes, I know it's selfish. It’s selfish to wipe your memory and mine too. But you know, feelings like these only lead to disaster. You have to understand, Ford. I’m doing it for them. For little Tate and dear Emma-May. Do you know how it feels tucking my boy into bed and sleeping next to a woman I’ve never loved? 

I do love her but not in the way you make me feel. I love her as a person and as the mother of my kiddo. I would do anything for them but you make me question it. You make me think about terrible things, Ford. While they’re sleeping soundly, I think about you. I lay awake at night thinking of nothing of you, cursing you and tossing and turning until the sun rises. 

My boy’s always asking when I’m coming home, hoping to play catch in the yard. He writes to me, you know, ain’t that sweet? He writes about the B+ he managed to get in English, he complains about his poor mother’s salami and he misses me. Emma-May doesn’t talk much whenever I come back. She smiles and kisses me on the cheek, and we have a usual family dinner.

It’s not the same, Ford. It’s different. There’s a thick suffocating air in my home that wasn’t there before. An air that only arrived when you breathed life into my world again. 

I think she knows. They say women always know and now I’m convinced. She knows what I am and I hate myself for it. I sit at that damned kitchen table every night now and all I can feel is the world crashing down on my shoulders. I want the roof to collapse on me, I want the rug to be pulled out from under me. Anything not to look in their eyes, Tate so unknowing and Emma-May ever omniscient.

Tate thinks you’re just a friend, Ford. And I thought so myself…but now I don’t know what to call you now. All I know is that I’m a selfish conniving bastard trying to save face for the sake of my family. 

Yet here we are at Memory Wipe #333 and after rifling through a few lives of what could have been, you’re not so easily forgettable, are you, Ford?

Damn you. Damn you and that beautiful smile that sends me spiraling into another dimension. A world where the fluttering all consuming feeling of you lifts me up and lets me fly. A place where a chorus has your name scratched on the walls of your throat, an everlasting symphony of your name. A universe where your eyes are etched into the skies, ever soft and ever gentle. 

Damn you.

I heard a long time ago that free will doesn’t exist. That not even multiverses exist where there are a thousand different scenarios and different versions of you. It’s either some all deciding being dictating our lives or…we were always going to make that one decision. No matter the possibilities, your mind and heart would only choose one, forever and always. 

Maybe that’s how I am. No matter the world, no matter the possibilities, no matter the consequences, in every world, I’ll choose you. Every single damned time, even if it tears me apart at my cosmic seams. I never had a chance, did I, Ford? You were always bound to be a force pulling me apart and putting me back together. 

Even if there are no other worlds apart from this miserable floating rock. I hope in one world, in another lifetime, I won't have to forget. Or perhaps one day, I’ll decide not to forget. 

But we both know, that’s the only option I’m picking, don’t we?  

-“Fiddleford OUT”

Technically following angstober (Day #1) yippee late as usual. i actually had an idea and inspiration to write yeee

[lectorel]

Paulina steals Spectra's schtick: a monologue

Yeah, I know about your whole 'one bad day'. Ever consider that maybe the problem isn't human nature? Maybe it's just you.

'Cause I had my bad day, considered going evil, decided it was tacky, and got into psychology instead.

Not that I need to be a psychologist to see how you work.

Deep down, you know that you're an boring, pathetic little man who can only effect the world through violence. You have nothing else to offer - you're just an overgrown and undersocialized toddler throwing a temper tantrum over not getting what you want.

No one cares about who you were before you decided to become a career psycho, but I bet I can guess the basics - you were an ambitionless loser in a dead-end job, silently seething over the world's failure to give you the attention and respect you desired.

Not that you ever bothered to do anything worth either. 

Then one day you got hurt. A mugging, a gunshot, falling into a vat of acid like a b-grade goon in a Saturday morning cartoon, whatever. No one cared, because you'd never cared about anyone in your whole selfish life. 

That was the last straw, wasn't it? Realizing that you could have died and mattered to no one. Someone stronger than you might have taken it as a wake-up call to improve themselves. You just used it as an excuse to start killing.

You were always a clown, joker. The saddest, dullest, most pathetic clown in the whole damn circus, and that's all you'll ever be.

[darnedchild]

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that Colin Bridgerton is a breast man, specifically the breasts of one Penelope Featherington.

Poor boy has dreamt of doing the most obscene things to and with her delicate bosom, distracting things, things he should be utterly ashamed of... Would be ashamed of if he thought there was the smallest chance that Penelope wouldn't welcome each and every touch.

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that Penelope Featherington longs to run her fingers through soft brown hair, specifically the hair of one Colin Bridgerton.

Poor girl has dreamt of wrapping his beautiful locks around her fingers, of dragging her nails against the sensitive skin of his scalp until his eyes close and his lips part in a barely audible moan, of grabbing a handful of hair and pulling him into her demanding kisses until he willing surrenders to her passionate demands... Should feel embarrassed by her wanton desires if she weren't absolutely certain that Colin would willing fall to his knees before her at the first gentle tug.

[wibzenadarksiderwithasoftheart]

The Sith

Part 4

As promised, more of The Sith

This time inspired by some of these prompts from @creativepromptsforwriting I think there will be eight this time round.

***.

"Your eyes are already saying yes, now I just need your mouth to tell me the same."

Instead of giving him what he wanted, his stubborn Jedi closed those stunning blue eyes, his brow furrowed in persistent concentration to deny him what he knew they both craved. 

Damn the stubborn boy, he really should know better.

"Darling," he purred and pressed even closer, placing a possessive hand on the younger man's hip. The Jedi not even flinched at their close proximity but remained obstinate still. 

"Do not seek to resist me, it is pointless."

He leaned forwards until their lips were mere inches apart, finally getting a reaction, even if it was just a harsh intake of breath.

“Give in, dear one,” he coaxed him with a honey sweet voice, dripping dirty and wicked promises. Triumph rushed through him when blue eyes met his again, defeat eclipsing them along with a far more passionate emotion.

"Say it," he ordered once more, his voice nothing more than a breath.

"Yes, master."

2. 3. 4. 5.

Master posts for parts 1, 2 and 3

[insomniac-dot-ink]

WANTED

You find the advert face down on the table. You’re picking up after your grandma. She insists her mind is sharp as a tack but her empty tea cups and loose handkerchiefs and day-old newspapers litter every surface. You scan the paper, and a part of you is sure there aren’t any more jobs like this.

The paper is yesterday’s paper and the various jobs match LinkedIn. Nannying and dog walker and kitchen staff. The advert, the one, is stark against the others. You read the tiny printed words over and over, always getting stuck on the word WANTED.

Your friends told you not to go: what kind of job asks you to meet in the middle of the woods? What kind of jobs has no website or contact info? What kind of jobs were advertised in the goddamn paper? You friends wouldn’t get it.

Anastasia, your best friend since third class, tells you to keep your “Find My Phone” on and call when you get there. She really wouldn’t get it. Your grandma tells you that this is the world, the other version of it, and you are her granddaughter. So go.

You walk the three and a half miles in your high heels. This job probably wouldn’t even expect high heels, but old habits die hard. You were once convinced in college your girlfriend cast a curse on you, the sleepless nights and a relentless rash proved it. Now that you’re an adult, an adult-adult, you don't think so anymore. If anything was a witch’s spell, it was LinkedIn. Hours and hours of youth wasted on the same go-around.

5 years of experience and 3 different references and no street parking but the bus is only a block away. You can walk, right? Unpaid overtime and shaving your legs to go sit for an hour in an uncomfortable plastic chair. That’s an unusual last name, is it a family one? Ah. I see.

You can walk for a long while. Your heels slup, slup, slup in the soupy ground and it takes you longer than you’d like to look around. The street lights dwindle. The trees gather. The path disappears. The woods are thick and unfamiliar and an iron fence rises in the distance. Despite the late summer heat, the air smells of frost. Maybe Anastasia was right–whether you are your grandmother’s descendent or not.

She comes out of the woods on rail-thin chicken legs. Her skirt is short, cut at a horizontal angle, and she looks like where the punk scene from the 80s went to die. She has a studded leather jacket and bleach-blonde asymmetrical hair. You shove your hands in your stupid suit jacket and check the skies. Half-moon, just risen, you’re right on time.

“You here for the advert?”

“It’s half-moon, isn’t it?” You say back and flash her a tight smile. You have a sudden sinking feeling about her ability to write you a paycheck. 

She looks you up and down. “Spirit?”

“Ghoul.” You shrug. “Yaga?” She sticks out one of her stalky chicken legs. “Servant of one. Two gens back. On my father’s side.” Your strained smile gentles. “I’m Katie. You?” Her smile sharpens in response. “Stephanie. Come on, let’s take a walk.” “Was that a real advert, Stephanie?” You saddle up beside her despite yourself. “Cause if you’re just here to pull my leg, know that I'm pretty hard to put down.” She lets out a harsh laugh that sounds like it hurts. “I’m counting on it.” She winks. “Now, not sure I know your line so well, what’s the difference between a ghoul and a spirit?” What is a spirit or ghoul? What was a gig worker or a salaried one? Perhaps a whole length away. Stephanie pushes a bush aside to reveal a hole in the iron fence and leads you through. The grass turns from wild heather to manicured green and you emerge into a field of rolling hills. Your skin prickles. You might be hard to kill, but maybe not to capture. You stay low to the ground.

“Can I be paid upfront?” Her breath smells of winter frost and fresh-turned soil. “You down that bad?”

You survey the trimmed grasses and gentle slopes, the unnatural prickle spreads through your skin to your bone. A house rises in the far-distance, and you swallow thickly. “Is this some Scooby Doo shit?”

“Come on.” She pushes your shoulder. “I’ll pay upfront. The only real question is if you’ve got a pair of lungs on you.” You toss your ponytail back. “For as long as you like. But, I gotta ask, are there really not any free banshees right now?” Stephanie’s smile falters for the first time. “Old world is dying,” she snorts. “Or just buried deep enough to feel that way.” “We’re still here.” “Still here.” She slips you two hundred and takes you to the side of a small lake. The water is murky and the edges form an unnatural drop. She hands you a lightweight dress, gauzy and impossibly white, and you wrinkle your nose. You looked back and forth between the far-distant house and the lake.

It took you the whole walk to place the gate and the house and the land: The Turnpikes. Built almost seven generations back and larger than ever. You couldn’t imagine. The old world was dying, but you supposed it was also just right there. You put the dress on and kick your heels off. Gathering your stuff, Stephanie gives you a big thumbs up and backs away. You take a deep breath, you don't need many, but you had a feeling it would count.

A light in the far-distant window turns on. You see your grandma in your mind’s eye, her tangled green hair and wicked little smiles. All this for two hundred? But ghoul isn't a banshee. You jump in feet first.

The wet and the cold and the dank water with no memory swallows you. You submerge in the tiny manmade lake, and when you come out, you come out screaming.

The fear of ghouls is an ancient one–something hard to kill. That can walk forever, fight forever, go Without forever. And you think, as you toss your head back, drip water, and let your lungs rattle in your chest, that you might scream forever too.

For two hundred bucks, a ghoul can be a banshee and a world can be made old and new and when you scream, you can scream until you’re made real again.

FIN

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

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[sulfurousdreamscapes]

He squats by the corpse, elbows on his knees, watching the blood escape the hole on the back of the dead man's head. There's no shadow behind him, even though he's right there in the open sunlight of the back-alley lot. When the police show up, they don't see him, and they don't hear him swear at them. The investigating officers could walk right through him, but still, he prefers to stand and step aside so the police can do their nasty work.

He craves a cigarette, any brand would do, but no one's invented a cigarette factory in the afterlife. There's no hot or cold in this realm, but even so, he gets anxious enough to need a drag, just to soothe whatever passes for his nerves.

Somehow, he also gets tired of standing. Do nerves exist beyond the mortal plane? He sits cross-legged on the concrete carpeted by grime and garbage. How many miles did he walk to make it here? Perhaps five, maybe ten. Distances have different meanings when you can cross through walls.

Back when he had that tingling feeling across his mind, the murder had not taken place. By the time he had arrived, however, the body lay dead and the murderer had disappeared.

He patted his pocket, hoping for a cigarette, but again, no cigarette, and no pocket either.

If someone knew this murder was going to inevitably occur, and that someone had somehow communicated it to him, then it implied he was in touch with some kind of omniscient entity. He refused to call this entity 'God', given that he had been an atheist throughout his life. Nevertheless, either an entity had alerted him, or he was exposed to some kind of supernatural phenomena that connect and bind the afterlife, much as physical phenomena bind the natural world.

So maybe there's some kind of gravity, or electromagnetism, some rain cycle or food pyramid - something that exists here that he simply doesn't know, and won't know, unless science finds a way to tap into the afterlife. Does the afterlife have its own scientists? Would they have figured out why he can sense murders before they take place?

Imagine, he thinks, if he could communicate the knowledge of the murder to someone in the living world. A tragedy averted. But who knows, with how complicated the world is, maybe a tragedy prolonged, or a tragedy deepened, or both. In the end, it's not his business, he decides.

Finally, the body is lifted, and a shadow remains where it formerly lay. He walks up to this shadow, as invisible to mortals as he is himself. He touches the shadow and it darkens his fingertips. Are those really fingertips? Or is he imagining them to be fingertips?

He hears a sharp inhale, and turns to the head of the shadow. The dead man shows up.

"Good afternoon." The first words that the newly arisen man hears. "I'm moving on now, but have a good time with your travels. You'll see a lot of corpses. Awaken one when you want to move on. Try to beat the others, even if you can't see them. Goodbye."

[beannoss]

with you, all in tangles (2)

3 times Yor blows kisses to Twilight and one time Twilight blows a kiss to Yor

For the @twiyorbase fluff fest! No content warnings, T-rating; manga spoilers. One chapter per day matching the daily prompts. Today's prompt: fall in love. And a note: @cantareincminor pointed out that pt 1 reminded of fanart of Yor blowing kisses to Twilight and it turns out there are at least two (2!) amazing pieces out there: this by @tazuransi and also this by @une08! They're both so cute and funny, they must have sunk into my brain, giving inspiration for this fic 😍😘 <- Part one (1) | Part three (+1) ->

Yor waved to Anya as the school bus pulled away and jolted a little in surprise when Twilight took her hand as soon as she'd dropped it from her wave. At her jolt, Twilight loosened his hold, murmured, "We don't have —"

"No!" Yor tightened her hand around his, bringing it up to her chest impulsively. "I'm just... I'm not used to this yet.”

Twilight studied her, and Yor held his gaze through her blush and against the urge to shy away. After a moment, he tipped his head, smiled a little. "All right," and he tugged gently, bringing their hands down to hang between them. "Shall we?"

Strictly speaking, the hospital where Loid worked wasn't exactly on Yor's way to to work. But since... since two days ago, they had walked together each morning. Twilight first, yesterday, to city hall, and now Yor, today, to the hospital.

Two days ago was when Twilight had said, Nothing needs to change, but there's something I want to tell you, and Yor had looked at the stiff hold of his neck, the uncertain cast of his eyes, the way his breathing was just a little elevated, all signs he was nervous, except that while Twilight often felt much more than he was comfortable with, he was never nervous and so she had flustered which had set Twilight to withdraw into himself in a way Yor had learned meant he was trying to think quickly to avoid panic, which made her fluster more, until finally Twilight had blurted out his feelings, and

And everything had stopped.

And Yor had breathed out.

And Twilight looked a little stunned when she smiled at him, even though she felt a little tremulous. When she said, Oh, I feel the same, she had told him softly. I have for months.

And everything had changed.

Or, she supposed it would be more accurate to say, everything was in the process of changing.

Twilight tugged her hand again, and Yor took a step forward, and then, just like that, they were walking together. "Will it be a busy day for you?" he asked.

"Mmm, no, I don't think so," Yor said, looking off to the side to consider. "Actually it's a little quiet at the moment." And in case he was asking about her other work, she added, "No reason for overtime."

Twilight made a thoughtful noise. "So you'll be home for dinner?"

"Mhm, should be!"

"I'm glad to hear it," he said, voice warm in a way that sent little shivers all through her body.

"And your day?" she asked, giving a little swing of their hands between them to release some of those shivers. She felt Twilight's eyes slide to her when she did. Knew he'd be tamping down on some amusement if she looked. Yor bit her lip against her own.

"My day should be fairly normal," Twilight finally answered. "I don't anticipate any extra patients."

"I should hope not," Yor said darkly: extra patients really meant side missions. "You have too much to do as it is. She must give you a break."

Twilight was quiet for a moment, then said in an undertone, "I'll let her know to sleep with one eye open. That she's on your list."

Yor gasped — Does he think I meant I'd break Sylvia — ?! Turned to him urgently. "That isn't what I meant! I would never —"

But Twilight was looking back at her with a mild expression, his eyebrows raised over eyes bright with humour.

"You're teasing me," she accused, and Twilight grinned slightly, "Possibly."

"Loid," Yor complained. But she knew she wasn't fooling him. Her cheeks were warm and her smile was too wide, too pleased, too there. Twilight had been trying to teach her some small amount of acting and subterfuge. She had so far taken to it poorly. 

But, she could tease him, too. Yor lifted her chin, saying, "I'd only do something like that if you gave me very, very good reason. Or,” she raised a finger on her other hand, which was a little awkward, carrying her bag but she ignored that. “Or,” she repeated seriously, “If you ask very, very nicely.”

"I see," Twilight said, and Yor could hear the smile under his serious expression. "It’s always useful to gain insights into the decision making of your employer. I'll bear that in mind."

"Mm. It’s very complicated,” Yor told him lightly. “But I’m sure if you work hard enough at it, you’ll come to understand.” Then, the fizzle of delight overwhelmed, and she laughed. 

Taking her by surprise, Twilight drew to a stop, pulling her around to face him. She opened her mouth to ask what he was doing, when he ducked down, pressed a swift kiss to her cheek.

Yor touched her fingers to the spot he kissed, and blinked up at him as he withdrew. He gave her a small smile, and just as he made as though to keep walking, Yor darted up onto her toes, ducking under his hat to kiss him quickly on the lips.

As she spun away, tugging his hand to continue walking, a quiet, "Hehe!" escaped her. Beside her, Twilight let out a soft breath. It was a sound she had come to understand he made when feeling... When feeling something tender. If he thought Anya was cute, or if he thought Yor was, was... was something. She shied away from naming what that might be. But he was feeling tender, anyway, and that kept her smiling. She was feeling tender, too.

It wasn't long from there to the hospital. They stopped across the street from the entrance, hesitating. It's all so new, Yor thought, looking up into Twilight's soft expression. She felt as though she didn't know what to do so much of the time, and certainly didn't know now. But it wasn't as stressful, this not knowing. This was Twilight after all. He never minded when she didn't know.

And it seemed like he may not know exactly what to do, either.

"Well," he said after a moment. "Have a good day, Yor."

"You too, Loid!" Yor rolled up onto her toes, dropped back down again. "See you later!"

"Mm," Twilight agreed. He looked for a moment like he might kiss her again and Yor's breath caught. But he glanced at the hospital, and evidently thought better of it. With a final squeeze of her hand, he let her go, and started across the street.

Yor waited. She probably should leave too but… She wasn't ready to go. She tightened her hands around the handle of her bag, wanting to watch him for as long as possible. So she stayed, waiting to see him in.

He knew, of course he did, with the finely honed instincts of his trade, that she was still watching. Just before the door he turned, raising his hand in a wave.

Yor lifted her hand to return the wave, then on impulse brought her fingers to her lips instead. Kissed them and blew the kiss to Twilight with a wink.

And it was a thrill, his small smile, his small blush, the way he looked away but ducking his head like he was filled with some emotion he didn't know what to do with. She knew — she understood — Twilight was still learning that it was okay to feel nice and to feel good, and that those things wouldn't be taken away. That Yor wouldn't let them be taken away from him. And that, in particular, he could let Yor make him feel nice and good and safe. That had been from before two days ago, when they were trying to be good friends to one another alongside their other shared responsibilities.

That little duck of his head, that little blush, that little smile, was as loud for Yor as if he'd shouted something to her from across the street. 

She swung her bag, and had a bounce in her step as she turned to her office. The song she hummed was one of Anya's silly little happy songs, and Yor laughed to herself. Maybe Twilight wasn't the only one figuring out how to feel very good and very nice things. Glancing at her watch, she calculated the hours until dinner.

Part three (+1) ->

[beedreamscape]

When Augustine is being genuine, he calls her Joy. Always Joy.

All the bitting, the fighting, the snipping.

Joy.

Somewhere in the ether Cristabel and Alfred are tangled up, looking down at their myriad long play, hearing the rumors of who they were what they could've done to save him save her, if they were given five minutes, five words, five days... it's a broken record.

They were both beyond salvation, nobody likes a peace maker.

And yet, at the end of it, he calls her Joy and his mouth is dripping with honey and his chest painted with the desecrated remains of her heart.

And she calls him Augustine, all nine letters, and again very softly, pleadingly. Mean souled little man, that person, miserable ass, man-shaped worm, chattering imbecile, vile condescending son of a bitch. Augustine, Augustine, you promised.

He knows her like he knows his own soul like she knows the sternum, he knows her violence like the taste of blood in his mouth, knows her taste like the taste of in-season melons, like the taste of lives past.

She's quick enough in the draw to know every nasty little inch of the Saint of Patience's body down to the millimeter down to the composition of his genetic code down to the taste of his skin.

There's no practical application in that.

She needs not to wrap her arms around him to perceive the marrow of his bones. She needs not to see him to know it's his lungs and his lips and his breath...

He smells like nicotine. Yuck. Pfaugh. She will stain her hands so his remain clean.

My girl, my child, my chick, my dove.

My Joy.

I'm profoundly tired of looking at your face, sick of stirring in the storm of your eyes, I'll eat Cristabel's rotten soul at the red table of your rotten-peach heart instead, I'll call your ribcage my tomb, the pillows of your lungs my grave.

May I burn in your pyre, may our ashes be mingled and fuel a lonely star in the furthest loneliest part of the universe where none can bother our slumber.

Corrosive effervescence, poisonous delight, drunken familiarity.

Shush, my kiwi, my pipsqueak, my bleeding-heart dove, let us rest easy now.

Joy will show you what fervid decided devoted passion looks like - one last crack of this frail wishbone - Mercy will teach you a lesson in forgiveness.

[milflewis]

ok but mob au

1.

“You really didn’t know who I work for?”

When Yuki found out that Pierre’s boss is the Sebastian Vettel, the Lion of Singapore, and the unofficial heir to Schumacher & Co., he had only raised his eyebrows. Pierre took that to mean he had already figured it out.

Yuki blinks at him. “No.”

“But.” Pierre frowns. “Why did you — I always have so many knives on me! Is this not weird to you?” He gestures at his jacket which hangs open, showing four different perfectly sharpened blades tucked into the lining.

Yuki shrugs. “You are French, yes? You like to cut things. Like cheese.”

Pierre mouths wordlessly. Cheese.

“Anyway,” Yuki adds. “You are weird, so. This would not be weird.”

2.

The first time Sebastian meets Lewis, his runners are wet with Michael’s blood and Lewis’s hands are pressing his head into the glass door. His face aches, nose throbbing.

“Can I help you?” he says, or tries to say. It comes out vaguely smushed.

He pushes back a little just to see. Lewis lets him move half an inch before shoving him back.

“Jesus, Hamilton,” Sebastian hears Michael say. His voice cracks roughly. Sebastian nearly cried when the doctor told him Michael survived the surgery, that they got all the bullets out and he was in recovery. He swallows thickly, as the relief makes him all dizzy even now. “I know you got out today but c’mon, let him go. This is Sebastian — I talked about him.”

The hands on Sebastian’s neck disappear and he’s rubbing at his jaw when he turns around. “Ow,” Seabastian tells Michael. His cheeks are pale and his chest is wrapped in white bandages but his eyes are alert and he is grinning.

“Sebastian, this is Lewis Hamilton. Lewis, Sebastian Vettel. Mika says we are all friends here.”

He pats Mika’s ankle that is propped up on the bed beside his hip. Mika’s eyes stay closed, arms folded in his chair, chin on his chest. There are dark bruises under his eyes under now.

“Right. If Mika says so.”

Lewis steps back towards Michael’s bed, grabbing the duffle bag from where it was leaning against the wall. Sebastian looks at his bare arms, the tattoos that go all the way down to his fingers, the rings there. His jeans sit low on his hips. He needs a shave. Sebastian recognises him from his mugshot, even of his hair is longer now and his face is more lined.

They hadn’t had the time to arrange for Michael to share a cell with someone affiliated with them, and when they had got in contact with him, a week later, he had settled in well enough with his cell mate. By Michael standards at least.

Does not talk much, Michael had told Sebastian over the phone. Likes his fucking singing though. Stares at the picture of his dog. Do you think he is lonely?

When Sebastian had brought it up with Mika, the best person for this kind of thing when Corinna is away, Mika had only shrugged, and told him that he doesn’t think it is just Hamilton that is lonely, and that of fucking course anyone who could survive nine weeks in solitary with just Fernando Alonso as company in the next cell over is someone that Michael would find interesting.

Sebastian looks away from the breadth of Lewis’s shoulders in his white tank and pulls a face at Michael’s waggling eyebrows.

3.

“How old do you think I am?” Jenson asks, as Alex adjusts his long-rifle until it sits comfortably against his shoulder, supported by the flat roof they are lying on. 

Alex doesn’t answer, because he knows exactly how old Jenson is, and the fact that people continue to tell Jenson to his face that he looks ten years older than his actual age will never stop being funny.

“Ollie, how old do you think I am?” Jenson calls.

“Jen, leave the kid alone,” Alex says. “You could dye your hair.”

“Do I look like a man who would dye his hair solely to stave off questions about his age?”

“Yes,” Alex sweeps the street below them, marking the buildings bracketing the shop they are surveilling. “Ollie, how are you doing over there?”

He can hear him scramble around for a second before a burst of static. “Radio ready for orders, sir.”

Alex grimaces, still not used to that, as Jenson only laughs beside him.

4.

“Michael? We got him.” Eddie leans back against the closed door.

Michael hums, closing his leather notebook. He leaves his fountain pen tucked into the middle so he remembers what month of intakes he was going over.

“Send him in.”

The kid’s hair is long and dirty, falling into his eyes and around his ears. His knees are all busted up under his baggy shorts. His face is drawn and thin, and he is glaring at Michael, jaw clenched.

He goes all pale when he sees who sits in front of him. Seems like he didn’t know whose car it was.

“Jesus,” Michael says. “You’re tiny, how did you reach the pedals?”

This morning, the kid — Sebastian Vettel, Michael had asked around — had hot wired Michael’s car in under two minutes and driven away. Michael had watched from the restaurant’s window, amused and impressed.

Mika had been decidedly less so when Michael told him, ten minutes later, that they were going to have to order a cab.

“I’m not that short!” The glare intensifies. His eyes are kind of freaky, Michael thinks. Very big and bright.

Michael holds out a hand, level with his chest, and squints. He lowers it considerably. Sebastian looks like he wants to bite it.

“Of course not,” Michael tells him soothingly. Eddie gives him a reproachful look. Michael holds back his eyeroll but takes his hand out of reach of Sebastian’s mouth.

“I have a job for you,” Michael says, watching Sebastian’s eyes sharpen. He smiles thinly. “If you’re up for it.”

“A job. For me? What kind of job?” Sebastian tilts his head to the side, making his eyes wide. His curls tumble across his forehead. The whole effect is rather sweet, Michael considers, delighted. This will be interesting.

Mika has been nagging at Michael to stop picking up strays but he thinks he will agree with Michael on this one.

5.

Michael stretches out his back, legs interlocked at the ankles, until something clicks along his spine. He exhales slowly, sinking back into the shitty mattress.

They called for lights out fifteen minutes ago. Lewis is still in the bunk above him. Michael looks at the scratches across the metal rods. He had a good workout today, no interruptions, and his arms are nicely sore.

Seventeen minutes.

Lewis moves in his bed, rolling over to the right and for a moment, Michael thinks he will roll right off the edge, but then he is swinging down, silent. Michael holds himself very still.

"I am not interested in fucking."

"Yeah," Lewis says. "I heard."

Michael swallows. The sharpened edge of Lewis's plastic spoon presses into his throat. Lewis is dense and solidly heavy, knees on either side of his hips, one foot digging into his knee.

Michael has seen him fight. In an enclosed space like this, and unarmed, he isn't sure who would come out the better. His fingers itch with excitement.

"I found the picture you left," Lewis says quietly. The spoon doesn't move an inch. His eyes gleam in the dark like an animal.

"Okay," Michael says, not bothering to pretend not to know what he is talking about.

Lewis was fine this morning. He hummed to himself the entire way to breakfast, and he spotted Michael in the gym without even being asked. It wasn't until after dinner that he went all weird and still in himself.

Lewis presses down, just a little. Michael raises an eyebrow.

"Is he alive?" Lewis asks like he doesn't want to show his hand but is doing so anyway. His mouth trembles at the corners. Michael frowns at him. He has seen Lewis hustle in the yard at card games enough times to know that his poker face is better than this.

"Is he."

Oh. Jesus.

Michael laughs. It is too loud of a sound for where they are. He laughs anyway.

"You have issues," he tells Lewis, who only sends him a cutting look.

"That was supposed to make you feel better! Stop crying and all. You miss him, yes? Thought I could help."

Lewis stares at him. Blinks those animal eyes.

Michael makes a frustrated sound in the back of his mouth. He misses Mika. He never has to talk when Mika is around.

"He is being taken care of in that shelter you put him in. I had my people check. I was being nice! Friendly too!"

"We're friends," Lewis says slowly as if he expects Michael to say no.

"Obviously. You are being ridiculous," Michael says. "You think I would kill a dog? No!" He is a little hurt.

"You are the chief suspect in fifteen open murders," Lewis says, flat.

"Not of dogs!"

Lewis looks at him for a long moment before rolling his eyes. "How are you still alive, man? For real? I thought it was a threat."

He pushes off Michael and pulls himself up onto the top bunk, as silent as he climbed down at the start.

"No one else would see this as a bad thing."

He can hear Lewis roll his eyes.

"Literally every other person here would think you were sending a message. And not a good one."

"I was being nice!"

There is a clang of metal against metal, and their cell bars rattle. "Oi! You two! Shut the fuck up. Save the fighting or fucking for the morning."

"Gross, man," Lewis says, and Michael kicks at the underside of his bunk. "You are gross."

Maybe Mika was right when he said that Lewis might not take his generosity in the way he wanted it, Michael considers. He decides not to tell him. He would be too smug if he did.

He palms the sharpened spoon that Lewis had held to his neck and left on his pillow, beside his cheek. It is small and narrow. Michael presses his thumb against the slice, feeling it. He smiles, and tucks it under his sheet. He had needed a new one.

+1.

Sebastian had been small when Michael met him. All eyes and bony knees and dirty hair.

Then he opened up his mouth and his personality crawled out.

Michael has never looked back.

[whirligig-girl]

The aliens arrived in their toroidal flying saucers--enormous gossamer-like structures big enough to put Jupiter in the hole. They projected bodies down to Earth on long threads, and complained.

"What happened?" they pleaded with our planetary scientists.

An awfully open-ended question, but the planetary scientists threw up their hands and explained the current state of the field, about the theory of planetary aggregation and various hypotheses to explain how each of the planets ended up where they are today. The aliens nodded along skeptically at times, but they seemed especially disappointed by the Lunar geologists.

"Excuse us," their leader said politely, rising into the sky towards geostationary orbit on a great thread.

And so it was for the next few decades that the aliens set to work correcting what they saw as the great mistakes of the solar system's formation. Perhaps Venus never cooled down enough to avoid a runaway greenhouse effect, or maybe something about its specific volatile mass had been off. Either way, it was the first to be treated. By the time it was done, perhaps 20 years in, it was a blue world with brown continents and white clouds. While another saucer had come to work its magic on Mars, the first saucer returned.

"Eh, we'll need you to give planet two a good head start with the whole biosphere thing. We hadn't bargained on life starting up there halfway through the lifespan of the Sun. If it's no trouble, that is."

A new habitable planet provided the space program no shortage of funding!

Mars was finished, just a few years later, a comparatively simpler job. The aliens advised humans not to interfere with this one just yet, to perhaps give it a few hundred megaannum or so for the life to diversify and develop before contaminating it.

But the saucers didn't leave. They seemed to drift throughout the inner solar system. They took some curious expeditions to Europa and Enceladus--robotic NASA spacecrafts recorded deep probing threads piercing the ice--but didn't seem impressed.

They kept returning to the Moon.

At last, the aliens projected down on their long threads to a university. "You're sure that's how it happened?" they said.

The lunar-planetary scientists showed the alien ambassadors rocks from the Apollo and Artemis expeditions, computer simulations of various types of giant impacts, of synestias and hours-long instant formations and debris disks and gas instability, of an oversized iron core and large low-shear-velocity-provinces.

"We think the water on Earth may even have been delivered through a giant impact from a KBO, though there's some concerns about isotopic ratios."

"No, no," said the alien. "The initial coorbital hypothesis is the correct one."

The alien sighed--it had picked up human body language well over the past 35 years--"This just won't do," it said. It left the building, shaking its head. "It just won't do."

The planetary scientists ran after the alien, as it started reeling its thread back. "Wait!" they said. "What are you going to do?"

"This Moon thing of yours just isn't big enough to hold onto an atmosphere. I'm afraid it's not good enough."

The aliens rose into the sky.

Within a few months the Moon had been lost from the sky, and a years later had been relocated to the L4 lagrange point. The aliens came back, apologetically. "Terribly sorry," they said, "We're in the final phases of the plan," they said.

The Earth Emergency Government representative stepped forward. "Final… phases?" he said.

"Theia was always meant to be a trojan of your Earth, you see. Something must have gone wrong when the gas disk dissipated."

"I don't understand," the representative said.

"My apologies," the alien said, "I'm used to dealing with your planetary researchers."

Many masses of threads now fell gracefully from the skies. When they touched down, they effortlessly bored deep holes. The ground shook. The representative's heart rate skyrocketed.

"It's just that we're going to have to repossess the planet Theia now."