#fork found in kitchen what else is new?

[hms-incorrect-quotes]

I know what you are

Buddy, I've been running a daily blog about chonny jash & his music for over a year now, no shit im fruity

[white-spirit-of-darkness]

brain evil. will be removing it

[mischievousmoony]

𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚗𝚎𝚠 𝚑𝚒𝚛𝚎

𝚙𝚊𝚛𝚝 𝟻 ⟡ 𝚜𝚒𝚕𝚟𝚎𝚛𝚠𝚊𝚛𝚎

⟢ james potter x fem!reader

⟢ summary: modern restaurant au; you and james complete side work at the end of your shift . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁˖ . ݁2.1k

⟢ warnings/tags: coworker!james, coworker!marauders, anxious!reader, not rlly proofread

⟢ the new hire masterlist ⟡ main masterlist

note: dropping lore in this part ig

"I don't think this restaurant is fancy enough for this to be necessary," you huff, polishing what seems like your millionth spoon.

You're sitting at the rickety break room table, polishing silverware and rolling sets of them into cloths. James is across from you, looking at his reflection in a butter knife.

"No one who eats here is going to care if there are a few water stains on their spoons," you grumble. You're in a bit of a bad mood, this task being the only thing keeping you from going home.

"Nate wants this place to be fancier than it is. Always has," James replies, neatly arranging his knife with the other utensils on the cloth in front of him.

"Always, huh?" you wonder, "Has he always been the manager?"

"As long as I've been here."

"And how long is that?"

"Ah," James pauses in the middle of rolling his napkin, counting in his head, "Technically five years."

You stop in the middle of polishing a fork, looking up to meet James' gaze. "What? Really?" you ask.

James shrugs as if it's nothing, responding, "Started as a busser when I was seventeen. The only person who's been here longer is Remus."

You don't understand the relevance of the comparison, pointing out, "Well, he's older."

James looks at you puzzled, "Remus and I are the same age."

You put the fork down entirely, gaping at James. "Remus is twenty-two?" you ask, your tone conveying your shock.

"Yeah," James says slowly, furrowing his brows, "You didn't know that?"

"No. He looks at least a few years older."

James tilts his head side to side, pondering your comment. "Maybe a little," he admits. "That kitchen wears him down."

You look puzzled as you straighten out the fork you had dropped down on the table, thinking about the revelation that still doesn't quite add up to you.

"If he's our age how in the world is he already a head chef?"

James looks as if he's trying to recall the answer, but comes up short.

"You'd have to ask him. He was hired before me and I guess I never thought to ask that."

"He was a head chef at seventeen?" you ask, eyes widening as your shock doubles.

"No! No, he just worked in the kitchen. Think he was head chef by twenty, though."

"Oh..." you trail off, thinking that makes much more sense than your initial impression. But not by very much. "Still, wow. What about everyone else?"

James' eyebrows raise curiously as he starts polishing yet another spoon.

"What do you mean?"

"They've been here how long?" you clarify.

"Ah. Sirius started about a month after I did. Did you know he started as a server?" James shares the details like it's hot gossip.

To you, it basically is. You can't imagine Sirius doing anything besides bartending at this restaurant.

"Really?"

James smiles at the way your eyes light up in surprise and slight amusement. "Yeah," he confirms. "He absolutely hated it, but doing that he got to train with the bartender before him."

You nod understandingly. It makes sense, you suppose. Bartenders don't just appear out of thin air. You either have to work your way up the ranks or receive formal training, and if you had ever given it any thought, you would have assumed the former.

It dawns on you that you haven't given much thought to your other coworkers at all. Besides what you've naturally found out over the handful of weeks that you've worked here, you don't know much about anyone besides James.

"And the others?"

James blows out some air, thinking, and he takes two rolls of silverware and begins using them as drumsticks against the table. You smile a little at the action.

"Whenever I became a server I recommended Pete for my old busser job. That was probably four years ago."

James had told you stories about him and Peter before, but you wonder how long they've actually known each other.

"How did you know Peter?"

"Known him since primary school."

"Huh," you express your surprise quietly, and James continues on.

"The next hire was Marlene," James smirks as he recalls something. "Actually, she's the reason Lily and Mary were hired."

"Did she recommend them too?"

James chuckles, shaking his head as he explains, "No, Marlene was always complaining about too much testosterone in this place. I think five.. six months after she started, she told Nate that a customer said that they thought management must be sexist because of the lack of girl hires."

"Did someone actually say that?" you ask skeptically.

"No," James laughs, "He totally bought it though cause he hired Lily and Mary a week later. Worked out great for them in the end. You know they go to uni in the city? They’re both here to support themselves through it.”

Your bottom lip finds itself between your teeth as you think about how long everyone has worked here. They’ve all had years to get to know each other. You have already been feeling like an outsider, so learning this just amplifies that tenfold.

James puts his makeshift drumsticks away when he notices you getting lost in thought.

“What’s on your mind?”

Your eyes flash to him, startled out of your train of thought. Shrugging, you try to brush it off and return to your duties to the silverware.

“C’mon, I always know when you’re getting lost in that head of yours,” James says with a teasing yet affectionate tone.

You purse your lips, knowing the chances of James letting this go are slim.

"I just… I don't really know much about them at all I guess. Do they..." you trail off, apprehensive to admit your insecurities.

"What?" James probes gently, softening at your hesitation.

"I’m worried they don't like me,” you admit.

"What!? Why? You’re great! Why wouldn’t anyone like you?” James says it earnestly without a hint of hesitation, and that alone makes you feel a bit better.

You keep your hands busy with the silverware, your eyes focusing intently on the water stains you polish away so that you don’t have to face James as you explain.

“I feel like I haven’t made much of an effort to get to know them. I was nervous, I guess, to talk to new people. Now I’m even more nervous because it’s been so long and I haven’t even tried. They’re going to think–”

“Hey, hey, hey,” James stops you from snowballing into a self-deprecating ramble, placing a hand over yours across the table, also stopping the way you’re polishing a spoon to death.

He dips his head down to try to meet your eyes, which are trained intently on the table. “No one thinks anything,” he says patiently. “Actually, you know what I’ve heard? I’ve heard them say that you’re kind. Maybe a tad shy, but that’s not a bad thing!” The last few words tumble out in a rush, James being worried that you’d take it negatively when he really finds your timid nature so endearing.

Your gaze slowly shifts to meet his eyes. “It’s hard for me to warm up to new people,” you admit, your voice low.

James absentmindedly strokes the back of your hand with his thumb, “You got on with me just fine.”

“You’re different,” you say before you can give it much thought. You would’ve bit your tongue if you had.

“How am I different?” he asks, his eyes twinkling with something you can’t quite place.

“I-I don’t know you just are.”

It’s true, you’re not sure why but after your first day you were already comfortable with James, more than comfortable if you’re being honest. He quickly became your favorite part about this job.

He simply accepts your answer. Normally, he’d say something witty or teasing, but he finds himself at a loss for words.

The conversation fades into silence, neither of you knowing how to proceed, both overwhelmed with confusing feelings.

James can’t stop looking at where his hand rests over yours, not knowing how to retract it. Not wanting to.

Meanwhile, you search your brain for something to say, something that would change the subject. You don’t feel the need to keep talking about this anyway. Although, you’re not sure if you feel better about the situation with your other coworkers or if you’ve just been distracted from it.

“So, five years, huh?” you start.

"Technically," he emphasizes. He slowly retracts his hand as the conversation takes on a more casual tone.

You had barely even noticed his hand there with how natural it felt, but now that it’s gone your hand almost feels cold. You distract yourself by rolling more silverware.

"What does that mean?" you ask.

"I, er, pursued other things for a little while. Didn't work out, so I ended up back here."

You can’t help but wonder what he means, so you ask, "What things?"

James stammers, him now the apprehensive one.

"Sorry,” you say quickly, “I don't mean to pry."

"No, it's okay,” James waves off your worries, “I was playing rugby."

“What, like, professionally?” you ask, not expecting him to say yes.

“Er, yeah," he admits, twirling a butter knife in between his fingers.

You freeze. “Wait. Seriously?”

“Yes,” he chuckles airily.

He notices how your mouth is slightly agape, twitching as it forms the shape of words which never leave your lips. He can tell you’re wondering what happened, but you’re too polite to ask.

“I hurt my knee,” he continues, purposefully avoiding the specifics, “so ended up back here.”

Your face crumples in sympathy. "Oh. Oh, I-I'm sorry," you say, genuine compassion in your tone.

“It’s fine. I’ve come to terms with it," James says honestly. His career was brief— barely even got a chance to start— and while he'll always wonder what could've been, he's not angry about the way his life is turning out.

"So what about you? What would you be doing if you didn't work here?" James suddenly asks you.

"I never went to uni," you say, thinking of Lily and Mary— your age and likely almost done with their studies. "I would've liked to. I don't even know what for."

"You still could."

"Yeah, maybe," you say tentatively, rolling you're last set of cutlery. "That's all my side work. Want me to help with yours?"

"No, you get out of here, I'll be alright," James assures, not wanting to put extra work on your plate, recalling how annoyed you've been with this task.

You nod, standing from the table to collect your things from your locker. You bid him goodbye as you sling your bag over your shoulder.

"I'll see you tomorrow, James."

"Bye, love," he says fondly, waving with a fork in his hand as you go.

On your way out, you pass Sirius, giving him a small wave and a barely audible "goodnight" as he joins James in the break room.

"Night, doll," he calls down the hall as he turns into the room.

Sirius has a wide, knowing smirk on his face when he locks eyes with James.

"Rolling silverware?" Sirius asks, his tone dripping with his amusement.

James shrugs, "Yeah, so?"

Sirius tilts his head, chuckling, "I thought your side work was to prep garnishes today."

"Ah," James fumbles with some silverware as he responds, "I finished that ages ago. So, I offered to do Lily's side work."

"Oh, did you?" Sirius says with mock surprise.

"Yup. Just doing a favor for a friend," James grins innocently.

"Or trying to get some alone time with that work crush of yours."

"I do not have a work crush!" James quickly defends, feeling the heat rising to his cheeks. He almost feels guilty, Sirius is at least right about the alone time part. James still misses having you by his side as a trainee, but after you're conversation today he feels bad about stealing you away from your other coworkers.

Sirius raises his hands in the air, "Alright, mate. Whatever you say."

"You're a prat. Why don't you come help me with this?"

Sirius looks incredulous at the suggestion, "I'm not the one who volunteered to do extra work!"

James rolls his eyes, picking up one of the many forks he has left. But truth be told, he didn't quite mind having to do the extra work— spending time with you made it well worth it.

Sirius snorts at the sudden lovesick look on James' face when he gets lost in his thoughts, and makes a mental note to wager a bet with Remus tomorrow on how long James will last.

[redflagshipwriter]

Halfa Cass Chapter 8 Part ½

masterpost

Black Bat got back to Gotham well before flying time. She took a shower to get the stinkyman stink out of her hair and apologetically took the green jacket to the wash. Cigarettes. Yuck! 

She joined the family for dinner. Damibat was there, face like thunder and clearly Not Talking to Alfred or Brucedad. Cass slid into her place and gave him a nod. He returned it. Very civil. We are professionals, Cain, you and I and no one else in this dump.

Cass hid a faint smile.

No Timibird. No Jaybird. Those were rarer birds to fly out to Wayne Manor, so she wasn’t too surprised. Just…

Cass readjusted her body language to be fine and normal. She didn’t need her flock family close for comfort. She was fine and normal! Yes, Stinkyman had said that she’d died. Yes. He said that.

(That fits with the pain of the electrical shock and the voltage necessary to short out bat computer, Cass’s Black Bat brain said sensibly.)

Cass hid a shudder.

But he’d also said that there may be no repercussions! As long as she left it alone and did not think about it. She had permission to pretend it didn’t happen. That was the best thing to try. She would eat her dinner and take her nap and then go flying.

Alfie served dinner. Cass caught herself playing with her fork, winding noodles into a secret pattern that might somehow make her feel better. 

“Is there something wrong with your pasta, Miss Cassandra?”

She looked up at him guiltily through her eyelashes and stopped playing with her food. Big sigh. 

“Will Master Timothy be returning to the manor tonight?” Alfie asked Brucedad.

Brucedad cleared his throat and put his spoon down for a moment. “I expect that he might spend the night with his friends in San Francisco,” he said.

Cass read the words beneath the words. Timbird was with the Young Justice friends. New plan. Not discussed. He’d been sent to Amity Park to investigate the laboratory where Cass had

(died. Where Cass had died.)

Been with Captain Marvel. And if he was out all day, it meant he’d found something.

Her heart jumped in her chest. She wanted to ask questions. She wanted to make sure that no one knew. 

Suspicious, Cass told herself sternly. Suspicious behavior. So she drizzled hot sauce on her pasta and ate a big mouthful.

Damibat copied her after a moment. 

Brucedad and Alfie did not wince, but they made their ‘white man thinks spice is scary’ faces. 

Cass quirked a smile. She put a lot more hot sauce. It was too much sauce. It turned the pasta red.

Brucedad made an unhappy sound and deliberately looked away from her plate. Haha. He was thinking: my stomach hurts just looking at that. Oh god, I'm old. Acid reflux. Heartburn. Acid reflux heartburn heartburn-

Bullying her batdad made her feel a little better. How could she be an undead abomination if she was, in fact, a naughty girl? Check and mate, existential horror. Cass finished her dinner and danced to her room on her toes, feeling the music from the last time she had performed on stage. She did a leap for the sheer joy of movement.

Everything still seemed better when she got up from her nap. Cass stretched on the floor beside her bed, and then flopped into a side saddle stretch to happily drink a bottle of green tea. She took it to the kitchen and into the machine for a wash and stole a peek into the fridge to see the after-flight snack. Protein balls! Chocolate and nuts? Cass stole one and fled to the batcave before anyone could see the crime.

Timbird was waiting in the cave on the big screen. He looked very tense. He and Batdad both looked at her when she came down the stairs.

Oh. There was a rock in her stomach. 

Cass beamed at them and flipped off the stairs to land in a gymnast stance behind Brucedad’s chair. “Hi, Timbird,” she said, acting normally. 

“Hi, Cass,” he said, sparing her a tired smile. “I was just telling Bruce how my trip out to Amity went.” She nodded, waiting for elaboration. Tense. “There were fresh tank tracks.” 

Oh. What. “What?” Cass repeated, because it was worth repeating. “Tanks?” She mimed her mind being blown.

“Yes, I figure that you would have noticed if they’d been there before.” Tim somehow seemed even unhappier. “The running theory is that someone was keeping an eye on the place and something about your trip out there alerted them.”

‘Machine. Electricity.’

“Extremely suspicious,” Cass said on rote. 

“Yes,” Batdad agreed gruffly. “There’s no legal justification for that kind of force being deployed in the continental United States and no record that we’ve found for it.”

“Definitely criminal.” Cass hovered for a moment. “Should I help?”

Timbird and Batdad exchanged glances. “I think that I would be best used in the cave tonight on research,” Batdad decided. “I’ll run comms while I’m here. Cass, can you and Robin handle things? There’s nothing in particular going on, aside from the weapons case. Robin has the information on that. We think that we’ve tracked the gang’s mechanic down.”

Cass gave a double thumbs up, more than a little relieved that she didn’t have to do anything related to Amity Park today. “Okay, I find mechanic and beat peace into them,” she said cheerfully. 

“You investigate and observe them,” Batdad repeated, faux-stern. Hint of smile. Naughty kid, tugging at my cape.

Cass nodded just as seriously. “Robin and I investigate, observe, beat until peaceful.” She smacked a fist into her palm.

Timbird snorted. “It sounds like a plan. I’m with YJ tonight, so I’ll log off.”

“Byebye birdie.” Cass waved on her way to the equipment lockers.

[vetteljuice]

they know something we don't.

Fun fact: commentators referred to the Turkish GP crash not as a crash, but instead as when Sebastian and Mark “came together.”

🤨🏳️‍🌈??

[rafedaddy01]

Step Bro, What are you doing?

series masterlist

Summary: you move across the country and fall for your step brother who teaches you so many new ways to feel good.

You’ve been dating your boyfriend for a year and things were getting pretty serious, until your mom broke the news that you’d have to be moving across the country to live with your new step dad.

You and your boyfriend both agreed you’d try the long distance thing. It was good for a while until something else peaked your interest, or someone else..

“Good morning mother” you say agitated as you take a seat at the breakfast table. “Y/n..” she says in a warning tone.

“How did you sleep sweetheart?” Ward, your new step dad asks. “Fine” hi grumble.

You in fact did not sleep fine.

You and your long distance boyfriend had an argument and let’s just say it did not end well, nasty words were said.

“Okay” you mother drags out as she stuffs a fork full of eggs in her mouth.

“Your step father and I are going on a little weekend trip, we won’t be back until next week. You two behave yourselfs” she points a finger at you and then Rafe, your step brother, so just walked into the kitchen.

“Hey don’t look at me, I’m always on my best behavior” he places his hands up in defense and winks at you.

You roll your eyes and dig into your breakfast.

**

It’s finally the weekend and since your parents are out of town and Sarah and wheezie are each sleeping at a friends house you decide to ‘relieve some tension’.

Rafe won’t be home till later, you overhead him talking to topper and kelce about preparing for some ‘epic party’. Their words, not yours.

You make sure nobody’s home and skip up to your bedroom and shut the door.

You reach into one of your boxes that you haven’t unpacked yet and pull out your old friend, you squeal with excitement as you start peeling cloths off and sprawling yourself out on the bed.

An idea sparks in your head.

You and your boyfriends have been on the outs, maybe if you film him a little hole video for him it’ll fix’s his insecurities.

You prop the phone up on a pillow so he has a good view of your glistening pussy.

You slowly start spreading your legs and smile at the camera as you tweak your nipples and moan.

Your fingers dip in your heat and rub your clot until your back arches.

You reach for your hot pink vibrator and spit on the top before deep throating it.

You and your boyfriend have never actually had sex, you were still a virgin, but you have fooled around a couple times.

You brought the device down to your slit and turned it on, arching your back on impact.

“Oh fuck!” You groan and you slowly push it in and start pumping. “Oh my god” you moan as your free hand comes down to your clit.

“Mmh, right there baby. Don’t stop!” Your panting and you shut your eyes and arch your back, squirting onto your phone.

You turn the device off and start reaching for your phone when you hear someone clapping.

A rock forms in your stomach as you slowly turn towards your door

“Nice show” Rafe smirks at you and strides closer.

You quickly grab the duvet to cover your nakedness, “what the hell rafe! Get out” you shout.

He smirks one more time before turning around “if you ever need a helping hand, or cock, let me know” and with that he leaves.

**

It’s been a few days since the incident with Rafe and you’ve been avoiding him at all costs.

The two have been home all day but hanging out in spectate rooms.

You decide to watch a movie on your laptop and end up falling asleep.

When you wake up you search for your phone but it’s nowhere to be found.

You go out into the hallways and head towards Rafes room, “hey Rafe, can you call my phone I lost it-“ your stopped in your tracks by the sound of moaning, your moaning”

“What the fuck” you push open Rafes door to find him clutching your phone in one hand while the other strokes his cock.

Your eyes widen, but your intrigued.

You stand there watching him and your eyes connect, there’s no shame in his so you think why should there be in yours.

You close his door and lock it, in case Sarah or wheezie decide to come home.

You start walking towards him and he stops stroking himself. “About time” he tosses your phone, but not before turning on your camera.

“Shut up” you straddle him and trap his cock between the two of you

You grasp his neck and push your lips against his.

“This is so wrong” you mutter against his lips before he slips his tongue in your mouth. “That’s what makes it hot” he bites your lip before pulling away.

You two stare at each other for a while before you stand and start stripping.

“You enjoy my little home video, I see” you cock and eyebrow at him.

“I did” he nods as you continue undressing.

“It was for my boyfriend” you say with a smirk as you reach out to pull his shirt off.

Rafes jaw clenches but quickly relaxes as your naked pussy connects with his bare thigh.

“I’ve never..”

“I’ll teach you” he grins as he sinks you down onto his cock.

Your lips part in ecstasy as he slowly guides you up and down his shaft.

“Oh. My. God!” You moan as the pain turns into pleasure and Rafe starts thrusting up into you.

“I’ve wanted this since the first night I saw you” Rafe admits as he comes to nip at your neck.

“Rafe!” Your moaning his name as the core in your stomach begins to tighten.

“Let go for me baby, let go for me not him” he reminds you of your boyfriend as your high hits you and you shudder.

Quickly coming back to reality you jump off him.

“We shouldn’t have done that!” You grab your clothes and rush out of the room, completely forgetting about your phone.

Rafe reaches over and stops the video.

“She’s mine now bro”

He sends the video without any remorse and moves to gather his clothes.

This was just the beginning of your relationship with Rafe.

Pt2 🙈

Tag list:

@f4ll-for-you @v21sstuff @rafeysworldim19 @baby19sthings @eventualoptimism @drewstarkeysbae @sevenwivesofrafecameron @rxfecameronsslut @findapenny @r1vrsefx @spencerreidsrealgf

[kolbalissh]

me drawing carcar (again) what else is new (fork found in kitchen) hold up let me COOK 🗣️❗️

[whimsicalwritingsandmore]

Valentine's Day Series #7: Cooking | wooyoung x reader

Pairing: jung wooyoung x reader

Genre: fluff, romance

Summary: You're a picky eater and Wooyoung made it his mission to cook for you.

Word Count: 590 words

Wooyoung enjoyed cooking for you especially because you were a picky eater. He saw it as an opportunity to find your favourite meals and open your palette more. And so, whenever he had a free schedule, he would arrive at your apartment and begin making a new and delicious meal. You also wanted to try to open your preferences because after moving to a foreign country, you really wanted to consider other local delicacies.

The two of you had been together for a while, after Wooyoung accidentally ran into you when San and him were filming content for his logbook. He collided with you and your cup of ramen unfortunately splattered all over the ground. He watched guilty as you mourned and lamented over your loss with a blank expression. Although he knew his manager would handle the situation, Wooyoung took it upon himself to accompany you and pay for another meal. As much as you tried to decline and say it was okay, you ended up with Wooyoung in the convenience store aisle. 

But they were all out of stock of your favourite ramen. Although the other versions were good from what you heard,  being a picky eater, you preferred your specific ramen of choice. Dejectedly, you settled for something else that you favoured, and silently grieved your lost meal, thinking about how you hadn’t gotten a good bite in.

Wooyoung was surprised you didn’t pick another cup of ramen from the wide variety there was. And as much as he tried coaxing you, you didn’t budge. He was starting to wonder if you were normal at one point. Then you confessed your selectiveness when it came to food. 

After much back and forth, Wooyoung took your number and you have been in contact since, slowly developing mutual feelings for each other along the way. Now, Wooyoung came to your apartment and owned the kitchen. 

With Valentine’s Day approaching, Wooyoung decided a picnic would be a fun activity especially with the meals he planned. He understood that reasonings for picky eating could come from a sensitive place and so he always ensured to create a pleasant experience for you to be more comfortable in trying new foods.

But there was one thing Wooyoung did not anticipate - realising that during these moments, he was slowly falling in love with you. He came to terms with it during dinner with you one night when he made a sweet and savoury dish you mentioned you wanted to try. Despite your reluctance at first, as you pointedly gaze at the meal in your fork before taking a bite, Wooyoung found it endearing to him. He wasn’t sure if he was supposed to but there was something charming in the way your eyes lit up after and your expression changed from hesitance to beginning to savour every mouthful. Not all the times were like this but in this instance, Wooyoung began to recall the times that you did approve and he found himself a blushing mess. 

Wooyoung really liked you.

So to confess his new-found realisation, on Valentine’s Day, he baked a little treat that you tried a while ago and loved, and decorated it with the words I love you. When you opened the petit box and saw it, you became an awkward but excited mess. Wooyoung smiled gleefully as you reciprocated the gesture and responded by doing the first thing that came to mind.

Pasting a slight icing on your nose out of nowhere and tackling you in a bear hug after.

[hockeyboistrash]

here's a lil jarvy blurb because I miss him 🥺 taking care of him when he's injured.

Seth groaned, the sun peeking through the blinds waking him up. He was hoping it was all a bad dream, that when he woke up his shoulder wouldn't hurt and he was going on the roadie with the team. It wasn't though. Seth's shoulder hurts and he wasn't going on the roadie. He sighed the reality setting in. His teammates were probably on their way to Utah now. He should be on that plane, sat next to Sebastian playing cards. He should be there to help his teammates win. Instead he was stuck in Raleigh.

Seth's wallowing was interrupted by a crashing sound in his kitchen. He sat up, wincing as he jostled his shoulder, not expecting anyone to be in his apartment. He wasn't entirely sure what to do. It wasn't like he could confront the stranger who has potentially broken in. His fingers hovered over the emergency services number, ready to dial, when he a soft 'Shit' down the hallway which sounded a lot like you.

Confused, Seth slowly made his way to the kitchen, his phone tightly in his hand in case he needed it. Your back was turned to him so you couldn't see the relief wash across his face. "Y/N? What are you doing here?" Seth asked, startling you a little. He didn't mind you being here, he just wasn't expecting it.

"Seth! I didn't wake you, did I? I'm so sorry I was trying to be quiet but the tupperware lids fell when I was trying to get the pan out. I was going to make you breakfast, well I guess brunch now, and bring it to you in bed so you're comfy. And I-"

Seth found it cute when you rambled. It was a nervous habit of yours but he loved it. He loved hearing your voice trying to articulate your thoughts. "Y/N, it's fine. I was awake anyway. Forgot to shut the blinds last night." He assured you, placing his hand on top of yours to stop your rambling. "You came here to make me breakfast? You didn't have to."

"I know but I wanted to you." You shrugged. "Your teammates are on their way to Utah so none of them can help and I know for a fact you struggle cooking with two working arms let alone one." Seth couldn't deny it because it was true. He knew enough to get by but would have great difficulty to cook with one hand. "I've not got anything else planned." No one has ever done this for him before. Sure he had teammates and their partners come round to check on him but not his own partner. Having you here made him forget about his injury, even if it was just for a moment.

Seth sat at the breakfast bar as you slid the plate of pancakes and fruit in front of him. It was already cut up ready to be eaten. You had cut his food up because you knew he'd struggle on his own. Seth swore he could feel his heart grow with fondness. You didn't have to do any of this but you did.

"I was thinking I could take you to the arena today to see your physio instead of taking an uber there." You said, as you washed up the pots. "Unless you don't want me to. I can leave if I'm overstepping." You added, realising that this relationship was still fairly new so you didn't want to overwhelm him.

"Come here." He said, putting his fork down and holding his good arm out. You put the tea towel down, drying your hands, before tucking yourself into his side. "You're not overstepping at all. I was a bit surprised this morning but it was a good surprise. I can't thank you enough for being here and helping. It means a lot." And Seth meant it. Any injury is shit but with you helping him he knew it would at least be a little less shit.

[han1nn]

Old Memories

Frank Castle x male!reader

Warnings: scars all over body, self-hatred, swearing, self-harm, disabled!reader (missing arm), kissing, really bad injuries, (gore?)

Summary: Frank lives in your apartment, because he can’t buy one, he’s still a wanted criminal. Frank and you are best friends since the army. But things changed after Frank became the Punisher, he always try to get distance between the two of you. He doesn’t want to lose someone else that mean something to him. (He don’t want you to get into his „the punisher“ situations)

Then someday, Frank saw the scars all over your body and remembered the old times again, how much you mean to him, how many moments you guys shared, how you would‘ve give your life for Franks […].

Frank want to have a better look at your scars and the situation get out of control…

Type: angst, fluff

[use of y/n]

A/N: this story is so long in my mind I had to write it! Hopefully you guys will like my idea too. And English isn’t my first language so maybe I will have some mistakes in this fanfic. Also this is written in 2024 not in 2017 :)

| -> Before I start I wanted to say that my request are always open, don’t be shy and send me what comes in your mind! I will read and respond every message I see! 💌

════ ⋆★⋆ ════

21.05.2017, 18:46

y/n stand in the kitchen and cooked, he cooked dinner for him and Frank. Of course he made some finished products in the microwave, it’s very hard to cook with only one arm. As the dinner was finished he just made two plates and sat down, ready to eat. But y/n wanted to wait for his „best friend“ Frank. He sits on the couch and watches the news on the TV, for more information about criminals he could kill.

Frank didn’t really spoke with y/n, only if it’s important, he tried to take his distance from him. y/n blames himself, he hates himself and he thought this is all his fault. He thought Frank would hate him and thats because he take his distance and doesn’t talk to y/n anymore.

He still sit there and just stare on his dinner, waiting for his best friend, the only sounds y/n can hear is the quiet sound of the TV. He wanted to call Frank, he really wanted but he didn’t dare. y/n took his fork in his hand and took a bite of the dinner. He didn’t eat much, stood up and walking right into the living room where Frank sits on the couch. 

y/n didn’t dare to look at him and only said:

"I made dinner.."

his voice was quiet and low, he don’t want to come in a actual conversation with Frank because he’s scared, scared to make the situation between them even worse than it is.

Frank looked a few seconds on the TV, looked up and gave y/n a cold look. He stands up and just walked past over him. As this happened y/n heart skipped a beat. He can barely feel him even when he didn’t touched him.

y/n walked into his bedroom and slamming the door. The feelings of hate that had been in him now all came up again. He thought everything is his fault, he always asked himself what he should do to make the situation better between them. He asked himself what he done and why Frank kept ignoring him, why he isn’t the same person like in the army. He’s tired, tired of Frank and his feelings for him.

He missed the old Frank, the Frank who cared for him, who laughed with him, who was actually still his best friend..

Flashback: 04.10.2013, Afghanistan

"Let go of him! I will kill you, I will kill all of you, you little bastards!"

Frank screamed and yelled at the terrorist who tortured y/n and forced his best friend to watch. Frank was frustrated he didn’t know what to do, his best friends screams shall into his ears over and over again. Frank can’t do anything, he’s tied up into a chair and can’t move at all. He wished he could do something. The terrorist laughed at both of them and they found the whole situation is very amused

Before y/n got tortured, they had to decide who had to get tortured and who had to watch, it was like a sick game that those terrorists wanted to "play". Frank’s best friend immediately said that he wanted to be chosen, he literally begged to be tortured only to keep Frank save.

"Please! Please, pick me! Do whatever you want with me but don’t hurt him! Don’t hurt my comrade!"

Frank was in shock and wasn’t agree with it, but for the terrorist, the decision clear: y/n should get tortured and Frank had to watch.

It was disturbing and horrible to watch his friend get hurt like this. Frank was so frustrated that he almost started to cry. y/n‘s body was now full with wounds, some long, some thick, some bigger, some smaller, the only thing Frank‘s best friend knew, is that everything hurts. And if this wasn’t enough, they even cut his left arm off too. Frank can see is how y/n‘s eyes rolled back and he fainted because of the pain, seeing how his best friend fell on the ground. The terrorist laughed at him and one of them is stepping closer to Frank.

"Look at your friend, laying there almost dead! Now he isn’t so brave like he acted before, huh?"

The terrorists were mocking Frank who was still tied up on the chair. He had so much anger in him. He wished he could just do something.

Before they can start to hurt Frank, the army group was storming into the small room and shoot the terrorists. The group can see y/n laying exhausted and fainted on the floor, his body really looks like a mess.

It would definitely leave scars on his body

These injury’s on Frank’s best friend’s body are definitely very deep and dangerous. Frank didn’t know if he would survive this. It doesn’t seem like y/n would survive this. After one of his mates cut the rope that tied Frank up, he immediately crawled to y/n and held him in his arms. He can’t help but cry and screaming at the army group that they should bring y/n immediately to the army aid station.

After a while they brought the two friends into the army aid station. y/n was laying in coma for 3 days but he managed it and survived. Frank was sitting on a chair, next to y/n‘s sickbed, waiting for his best friend to finally wake up. 3 days in a row Frank was sitting there and waited for his best friend to wake up. After the days have passed by, y/n finally woke up and Frank was still sitting on that chair.

"Frank..?"

As Frank heard this, he raised his head and glanced over his best friend but then his face changed into frustration. He isn’t sure if he should be happy now that his best friend woke up, or if he should be angry because y/n had given his life for Franks. Of course Frank decided to be mad, his aggression always get the control over him. He started to yell at y/n, why he done this and why he would give his own life for Franks.

At these questions, y/n only smiled weakly as respond, he was to weak to speak now.

Present day: 19:12

y/n was lost in his thoughts, about the old times. The times where Frank seemed to care, where Frank was still really his best friend. He thought about those terrible things that the terrorists done to him and how many scars they left on his body. y/n is grabbed under his shirt and felt every scar on his body, over his stomach, his chest, his neck, his rips, everywhere.

He thought about how much Frank must hate this disgusting body of his best friend, how he must missed him as the brave and "normal" soldier. He felt like he isn’t enough to be Frank‘s best friend anymore.

His fingertips started to travel harder on his body. y/n hates this feeling, this feeling not to be enough. He felt all his scars on different spots on his body. He started to scratch all over them, he thought he deserved this, deserved to be punished because he isn’t good enough. He groaned in pain as his fingernails dogged into his scars, scratching them. he can feel how his scars started to bleed, how they turn into wounds again.

y/n groaned even more, almost too loud. He was just so frustrated and sad that he didn’t even noticed how loud he has been. y/n was just so insecure about his body and angry at himself that he isn’t enough for Frank.

The heavy footsteps of y/n‘s best friend are coming closer and closer, he want to know why such noises coming out of y/n‘s room. The door cracked open, as Frank’s cold gaze meet his best friend. His expression immediately changed into anger as he saw y/n huddled on the floor, crying and scratching his scars under his shirt.

"What the fuck are you doing?!"

The Punisher immediately stumbled over to his best friend and grabbed his arm, hard, almost to hard to bare for y/n. He stopped y/n from hurting himself. Frank noticed how the scars were freshly opened by the own fingernails of his friend. y/n still lays on the floor and crying, now Frank, the person y/n loved, his best friend, saw what he’s doing to himself. He must be even more disgusted than before.

"Why would you do that?! Look at you! You hurt yourself so badly! I can’t see you like that! It reminds me too much of-"

Frank cut his own sentence as he noticed how emotional he became. His cold and angry expression returned. His grip on y/n‘s arm only tightened as Frank leaned forward his old comrade.

"Don’t ever do that again, you understand?! Fuck, look at your wounds! They’re bleeding! You just look like the day you got tortured! The day were you almost died! I can’t- I can’t see you like this!"

Frank Castle, yes, the punisher almost cried at the sight of his best friend, laying on the floor and scratching his own scars. Frank himself lays down beside y/n and wrapped his arms around him, very tightly, like he wanted to protect him.

"Why would you do that..? I can’t understand it. Why would you scratch the scars open that saved my life?"

The smaller man in Franks arms is responding the hug, he didn’t know what else to do. y/n was in the arms of his secret lover and he enjoyed it, he loved every second of it. Finally he got some attention.

"I- I know you hate me and.. that you think my body looks disgusting.."

Franks strong arms tightened around the smaller man as he heard those horrible words. Without a word the Punisher grabbed y/n‘s wrist and pushed himself on top of his best friend.

"I could never find you disgusting and I definitely don’t hate you! You’re the most strongest and bravest man I know. you sacrificed yourself for me and think I would take my distance because of your body?"

Frank was on top of y/n and held him down, so he can’t stand up anymore. The punishers grip was just too strong.

"You mean too much to me! The only reason why I pushed you away was to keep you save! I can’t believe you thought the whole time I was disgusted by you. Get these thoughts out of your head!"

Frank knew that y/n wouldn’t believe him, so he decided to lean down to his neck and stroke his hair.

"I.. I wanted to leave your apartment tonight, wanted to leave you to keep you save. I know that you’re probably aren’t save when I live here, but I also can’t leave you now, not when I see how much you‘re suffering. You know I’m still your best friend, right?"

The punisher mumbled into the neck of his best friend. His mouth was right against his ear, his breathing was heavy against y/n‘s neck. The smaller man under Frank was wrapping his one and only arm around him, wanting to hold him tight and never let him go.

"You really mean that?"

y/n asked with tears in his eyes as he sobbed uncontrollably. The punisher cursed under his breath, he just never noticed how much his best friend struggled as he pushed him away. He wanted to leave y/n completely tonight, just ran away and never coming back to keep him save.

Frank knew he had many enemys and he was afraid that something could happen to his best friend again. He was afraid that y/n could get hurt again just like in the army. Frank already failed keeping him save back then, how could he ever keep him save in New York? But the punisher also knew he couldn’t leave y/n now, not when he was crying under him.

"Of course I mean it."

Frank wasn’t really a man of words, he’s a man of actions. Words aren’t enough for him, he wanted to show his friend how much he meant to him, how beautiful he thought y/n is. The punisher had to show it somehow to his comrade, but how?

Frank‘s hand were leaving y/n‘s wrist and his hands wander down his shirt, ready to pull it up. He wants to see his friends body, to see all of him, just everything. The taller man looked down at the smaller one, searching for permission in the other ones eyes.

"Can I..?"

The punisher asked with his deep and hoarsely voice. His best friend under him was confused but nodded. y/n didn’t know what the taller man above him wants to do but he let him, he trusted him.

Frank pushed y/n‘s shirt up until he can see his whole chest. His eyes run over the whole body under him, taking in all the details. y/n‘s scars, his left shoulder where his other arm used to be, his masculine features, Franks eyes were drinking the sight under him. The punisher slowly put his hand on the stomach of his best friend. Y/n let out a gasp as he felt the warm hand on his belly, exploring the area there.

"W-what are you doing..?"

y/n asked breathless as the hand on his stomach touched and caressed the skin and scars there. Even both of Frank’s hands were working on the stomach of his best friend now, tracing the scars there, feeling how beautiful he is to him.

"Shh.. just relax. I just want to have a better look at you. Is that okay?"

y/n was confused but he gave Frank his permission by nodding at his question. The smaller man laying on the floor can’t help but enjoy his best friends big hands all over his stomach. It felt good and right. Even when he shouldn’t feel that way he still can’t help it.

Frank looked into y/n‘s eyes, seeing how much his best friend liked being touched. He was probably touch-starved. When was the last time y/n has been intimate with someone? He just can’t remember, but is this what these men are doing even intimate? It is, for y/n it is intimate and he believes that Frank thought the same. y/n is already flushed all over, his whole body had a pink tone because he felt so hot.

The bigger man above him noticed this and chuckled lowly.

"You enjoy this? Feels good, huh? My big hands on your beautiful body."

y/n blushed so hard at his words. He couldn’t believe that his best friend was saying this. Does he mean everything he says, y/n wonders but in Franks eyes he can only see pure admiration and honesty.

"Your body is a testament of what happened to you, of how strong you are and of how you saved my life. I could never hate you. I could never hate this body."

The punisher leaned closer and he slowly headed his way down to the chest of his old comrade.

"I‘m gonna kiss you all over, I‘m gonna show you how much you mean to me and how much I love this body. Is that alright with you?"

Open Ending

(idk if I should continue but please read it, give me feedback and tell me if I should continue!💓)

——————————————————————————

I worked so long on this fanfic and I don’t even know if it’s good. Sometimes I think I‘m so mean by creating such a bloody way of a backstory☹️

Please give me feedback and more fanfic ideas!!💓

[generic-sonic-fan]

Ensom

Summary: All the words in the english language downloaded to a dictionary on his drives, yet Omega can’t find the word he needs. 

He isn’t used to not knowing how he’s feeling. 

It’s frustrating. At least he knows that much.

(Vent fic. 1947 words)

---

Omega finds himself alone in his room. This is fine. He rolls the chair out from beneath his desk, sits down, executes the steps to turn on his computer. Exact movements he’s programmed into himself to save processing power, since the power buttons for both the external hard drive and the monitor will never move. 

He stares into the blank loading screen. 

He’s been here before.

He’s been in this exact posture before. Unmoving for hours. Maybe a twitch here and there to maneuver the computer mouse, that’s all. 

He pushes himself away from the desk and stands. He walks out the door of his room, emerging into the hallway. He’s been here before, too; hours standing in front of Shadow or Rouge’s door, hours walking up and down, fractions of travel that add up to significant percentages of his entire operation.

He passes the living room. The couch he has remained stationary on. Hours. The television he’s stared blankly at. The kitchen. The microwave he has watched rotate thousands of times while Shadow and Rouge wait for their food. The pantry that they stare into. Hours. 

He curls his claws around the handle of the front door. 

What is he going to do out there? Wander around and have meatbags stare at him? Have them run away screaming like they would any other Badnik? Judge him stupid, explaining things like love and freedom and what it means to be alive again like he’s supposed to obsess over their every word? 

Running simulation now: THANK YOU NONDESCRIPT HUMAN, I NEVER ONCE THOUGHT ABOUT MY OWN EXISTENCE IF IT WERE NOT FOR YOUR MARVELOUS AND UNIQUE INSIGHT ABOUT THE CONCEPTS THAT NO SENTIENT SACK OF FLESH CAN SEEM TO SHUT UP ABOUT!

And then they kick him out of their shop because he’s scaring away customers because he forgot to look them in the eyes at the right time or ask a meaningless “HOW ARE YOU DOING?” to every passerby to indicate friendly intent. 

As soon as he opens this door the entire city is staring. He wouldn’t care if they hated him. They don’t. He wouldn’t care if they were afraid of him specifically. They aren’t. 

All of the words in the english language downloaded onto his drives, and there’s no word he can assign to it that doesn’t make him want to tear every building in the city down.

He tears off the doorknob and slams it down. He grinds it into the cheap linoleum tile until the downstairs neighbor pounds back on the ceiling and screams at him to “shut up”. 

He draws his weapon. He aims for the blob of heat in his infrared scanner on the floor down. He aims slightly to the left, and pulls the trigger.

—

“Another complaint from the landlord. It’s our third strike. Managed to talk him back into letting us have a fourth.” Rouge tosses the paperwork onto the kitchen counter in front of him.

“I DO NOT CARE.” 

“Well I do. This is my apartment. Next time I’m kicking you out.”

Omega pauses. 

“What happened, anyway?”

“I WAS ANGRY.” 

“Fork found in kitchen, what else is news?” Rouge rolls her eyes. 

Fork is an eating utensil. The kitchen is where organics eat. She is saying the fork is found in the kitchen in a tone that, if he compares it to previous data of the various tones of her voice, most closely matches sarcasm. She is asking if finding a fork in the kitchen was somehow new information. She is relating the absurdity of this idea to-

“Nothing to say for yourself?”

“IT IS YOUR FAULT!” He slams his fist on the counter. 

“How is this my fault?!” 

She is relating the absurdity of this idea to his rage. Asking if his rage was new somehow? No, too much sarcasm. Relating absurdity, the absurdity of asking a stupid question, the absurdity of asking him if he was angry. Because she knew he was always angry. Solution derived. 

This data would have been useful fifteen seconds ago, but is useless now.

“Sure, blame me for all your problems. See how well that works out for you!” Rouge snarls. 

“NOT JUST YOU,” Omega snarls back, “ALL OF YOU.” 

“‘All of me’? What, you mean-?”

“ALL MEATBAGS. ALL OF THEM. WITH FLESH AND BLOOD AND PATHETIC NEURONS. I’LL KILL YOU ALL.” 

He simulates ripping Rouge to pieces. It’s not satisfying. He simulates actually shooting the neighbor downstairs, watching the blood pour out of the exit wound. It’s not satisfying. He simulates torching the old woman who walks her dog every morning across the street. Nothing. 

Yet something is still burning in his code. He can’t put it out. 

“You don’t mean that.” 

He looks at her. I DON’T floats somewhere around his voice box, but can’t find a place to slip through.

He looks away. 

“What happened?”

“NOTHING HAPPENED. NOTHING HAS OCCURRED FOR TEN HOURS.”

“You’re bored.”

“NEGATIVE.” This isn’t boredom. Boredom is like an itch that they all talk about. This is different.

Rouge furrows her brows. Omega checks his database. The expression matches with confusion but also anger. This particular instance is leaning more towards anger.

“Tell me what’s wrong.” 

“I ALREADY DID.” 

“‘Meatbags’ isn’t an answer.” 

“AND HOW IS IT NOT?” He snapped his gaze back to her. He leaned forward, closer, brushing the tip of his silver outcropping against her nose. “WHAT IF IT IS?” 

“There’s clearly something deeper-”

“HOW DO YOU KNOW?” 

“Because you’re not acting like yourself!” She planted a hand on his chest and pushed him away.

He straightened. “ELABORATE.” 

She resettles her tongue between her teeth, data matching with ‘considering what to say’, before she speaks again. “You’re never this vague. You normally don’t snap only once and then get quieter again- you usually stay as excited the whole conversation. You didn’t shout when you said ‘kill us all’ which is how I know you didn’t mean it. You hate touching any part of us that you’ve seen drip snot or spit or anything like that, yet you got close to my face.” 

Omega compares her analysis against his actions for the past six minutes and thirty-one seconds and finds an exact match for each. 

“CORRECT.” He offers. 

“So what’s going on?”

That question tears the smoldering hole he’s been circling around in his code wide open again. His thought processes choke. Is this what it’s like to choke? The cessation of a function absolutely vital to determining your status as operational? 

“Do you. . . not know?”

“I AM ANGRY.” 

“You’re always angry. But this is different.”

“IT IS.” 

“It’s not your joyful rage.” Rouge puts her finger to her chin. “And it’s not your Eggman rage.” 

“MAYBE IT IS.” 

“You didn’t mention him once, hun.” She shakes her head. “I don’t think this is your rage at me or Shadow.”

“IT IS NOT.” 

“That’s good. I know you feel rage at stupid organic processes like bureaucracy and the like. Is it that?” 

Omega pauses. “CLOSER.” 

“And it does have to do with meatbags. But non-specific.” 

“CLOSER.” 

“. . . have you considered it might not just be rage?” 

Omega stares at the fridge behind her. “I AM ANGRY.” 

“But it’s quiet.” 

He reviews the past ten hours and finds himself having been silent for most of them. 

“YES.” He says. 

“You know, sometimes you can be angry and feel another negative emotion at the same time.” 

“SPECIFY.” 

“Oh no, I’m not going to guess. You’d get mad at just about everything I’d think to suggest.”

“GOOD! MAKE ME MAD.” Omega hits the countertop with his fist again.

“Okay. Sadness?” 

His hand freezes above the counter. He stares at it, commanding the actuators to move, but they don’t. 

“See, told you.”

“I HAVE NOTHING THAT WOULD MAKE ME ‘SAD’.” 

She looks at him. Her facial muscles weave a new expression. The closest match in his database for it is ‘pity’, but there are not enough markers to fully confirm it. 

“What do you think would give you the excuse to be sad, huh?” She asks, then stops herself, then lets herself speak anyway. “Having a dead sister?” 

“YES.” 

“Well, you don’t have a dead sister. So clearly it’s something else.”

“I REPEAT: THERE IS NOTHING TO BE SAD ABOUT.” 

“That you know of.”

“EMOTIONS ARE A RESPONSE TO AN EXPERIENCED STIMULUS.” 

“Sometimes you’re just sad for no reason. It happens.” 

“THAT IS STUPID.” 

“If you want to get technical about it, you’re actually sad about a lot of things, but you aren’t sure why or maybe you just don’t know how to think about it. Then you say you’re sad for ‘no reason’. Make more sense?” 

Omega stares at his hand that is frozen above the table. He sends one more command to the actuators in his arm. Slowly, his fist retracts and settles back by his side. 

“Have you ever felt sadness before, do you think?” 

He has never experienced a similar arrangement of symptoms to Shadow: neither silence nor isolation nor the urge to cease existing. He has never experienced a similar arrangement of symptoms to Rouge: neither lying nor pretending nor the urge to binge sensory inputs. 

“UNKNOWN.” He replies. 

“That could explain things.” 

His dictionary doesn’t offer a concise comparison either. ‘Sadness’: affected with or expressive of grief or unhappiness. Searching ‘unhappiness’ is equally as useless, only meaning not cheerful or glad. ‘Forlorn’ is a synonym, but it specifically relates to isolation or desertion, and he is experiencing neither at the moment. ‘Downcast’ and ‘woeful’ and ‘despondent’, they all slip away.

‘Melancholic’. Of or relating to the subject of ‘melancholy’- a depression of spirits (a useless definition) or a pensive mood. ‘Pensive’ meaning a sad thoughtfulness. 

“RESOLUTION PROPOSED:” Omega finally says, “ELIMINATE RUMINATION.” 

“Think less? God, shouldn’t we all.” 

“SO YOU AGREE TO STOP TELLING ME TO ���THINK THROUGH THINGS’?” 

“No,” she whispers a common lighthearted insult to herself, “but sitting there and brooding on your bad mood never makes it any better.” 

“I DO NOT BROOD.” 

“What were you doing this afternoon, again?” 

He crosses his arms. “BEING MELANCHOLIC.” 

“Don’t tell Shadow you’re going to beat him at his own game.” 

“THIS WILL NOT HAPPEN AGAIN.”

“I’m afraid it will. Came with your free copy of being alive, unfortunately.” 

“I HAVE RECEIVED NO COPIES OF ANYTHING.”

“You know what I mean.”

“I DON’T.” 

She pauses. Furrows her brows. “You don’t?”

“YOU HAVE NOT USED THIS EXPRESSION BEFORE. THE APPARENT RESPONSE YOU WERE EXPECTING WAS NOT CORRECT. YOU ARE FORCING ME TO CALCULATE YOUR HIDDEN MEANING USING OTHER CLUES.” 

“What I meant was that being sad just happens if you’re smart enough. That make sense?” 

“YOU ARE SAYING I’M SMART?” 

“Yeah, I am.” She replies. She does not deflect into any other specification or technicality of his question. 

“LOGGING UNDER: ‘BLACKMAIL’.” He says again.

She doesn’t contradict him. 

“Just. . .” she sighs. “Let us know if you’re ever feeling sad again, okay? Even if there’s no obvious reason for it.” 

“MELANCHOLIC.” He corrects.

“Melancholic, then.”

“. . . I WILL.” 

“Good. Now,” Rouge flicks her finger over the complaint from the landlord, sending it off the countertop and onto the floor. She crushes it beneath her heel. “Shadow stayed behind at the firing range because he said he had something on his mind. We’re gonna go join him and see who can blow a bigger hole through either GUN’s wall or their wallet. Sound good?” 

“AFFIRMATIVE!” 

She trails her hand across his chest plating as she walks by. He stays motionless for three seconds, allowing the sensation of her touch to fade from his tactile sensors. Then he follows her out the door of the apartment.

[somanyratsinthewalls]

Rose with pistachio from 300 followers prompt list..I'm a sucker for bad boy Law🤭🤭congrats on 300 followers🥳

I am so sorry I made Mean Law into Nice Law at the end :) he's just such a dream!

Pairing: Law x Afab!Reader

WC: 1600

Prompt: “you’re such a fucking asshole.” 

 

“Hey y/n, happy birthday!” Bepo’s fluffy, smiling figure towers above you as he hands you a wrapped gift and a handmade birthday card. 

“I hope you like what we got you! If you don’t, well… that sucks I guess.” Penguin comments from behind the jumpsuit clad polar bear. 

“You guys really didn’t have to do anything… I don’t even like my birthday! A beer or two would have been just fine!” You smiled shyly as your crew mates present you with your gift. You unwrap the package and find a new pink sweatshirt (one you had been eyeing back at the last island and never quite pulled the trigger) and a stained money pouch filled with 1,000 berries. 

“Wow…” You look down and can’t believe anyone would have ever done this for you. You had just joined the crew less than a year ago and had spent most of your time trying to hone your fighting skills, not making friends. “Th-thanks guys…” You eyes begin to well. “Hey, let’s start drinking! It’s a celebration, right?” 

Your crew mates cheered and the small group of you cracked open a few bottles of beer in the kitchen to celebrate. You all enjoyed a terribly made birthday cake and several more beers as you joked and laughed with your friends. The collar of your off-white jumpsuit was stained with amber liquid as the captain of the Polar Tang entered the room. You all briefly paused the festivities. 

“Hey captain why don’t you-“ You gesture towards the fridge. 

“hrrmmph.” Law pushes past you to grab a few tea bags and retreats back to his office. 

“Oh.” You stood by the counter, defeated. You had pined for your captain for so long, but he kept pushing you away. It hurt, but never enough to abandon the pirate life you loved with your crew. 

“Don’t read into it, y/n. He’s been working a lot lately.” Shachi patted your shoulder. 

“Yeah… you’re right.” You sighed and finished your beer. “Thanks guys, but I think I’m going to bed. Thanks for the great birthday.” You faked a smile and headed to your room to wash up and go to sleep. You held back tears as you tried to drift off. 

— —

You awoke in the morning after a restless night.

How could your own captain forget your birthday? The one who asked you to join the crew in the first place? You think back to the day he held you in his arms on the battlefield while you bled out dying… He said he would fix you if you’d join him on his crew as his (insert profession of your choice). After that day you were a Heart Pirate.

Law was never an expressive man, but lately he had kept to himself all together. Your sadness had started to turn to anger. Your morning was spent cleaning the kitchen and you found yourself slamming the mop buckets around and throwing rags into the sink. 

“He’s such a jerk.” You mutter to yourself. 

After a long day of cleaning you prepare dinner for the crew in the galley. Most everyone thanked you and ate their food happily, with the exception of your captain. Law snuck in, loaded a plate full of food and slunk back to his office, without so much as a hello. You seeth through dinner and leave the dishes for whoever was on kitchen duty that night. 

“I’m not letting him act like this.” You tell yourself as you storm out of the galley down the hallway to the captain’s quarters.

 In your furious state, you push the door of his office open without knocking. You found Law at his desk pouring over several textbooks as a forkful of the mac and cheese you made was hanging out of his mouth. 

“You’re such a fucking asshole.” You storm towards his desk. “You know that?”

“Y/n what-?” Law swallows the bite in his mouth and leans back in his chair. 

“You only fucking care about your stupid research! The Gods fucking forbid you give a shit about anyone else!” You punctuated your last statement by ripping off your apron and balling it up, throwing it on the ground. 

“I assure that everyone on this ship is safe and-“ Law confidently retorts as he rises from his chair and moves towards you. 

“Yesterday was my birthday, Law.” You state firmly and look him in the eye. 

Law had nothing to say. He held your gaze for a few poignant moments. 

Law breaks eye contact and hurriedly moves over to his desk. After shuffling a pile of papers off his workspace, he grabs a small, leather-bound journal and opens it. He sighs as he looks over the page he was searching for. 

“Shit… y/n… I tried to make sure I didn’t forget…” He hung his head at his desk as he slowly shut his calendar. 

He wrote it in his calendar? Your birthday? He cared enough to write it down? You snapped out of your thoughts. 

“Well. Yeah. You did.” You cross your arms. 

“Y/n…. I’m so sorry….” Law strides towards you. His face is inches from yours. You continue to pout, holding firm even though the man you yearned for was breathing down your face. You keep your eyes fixed on the floor. Law gently takes your head in both of his hands and lifts it took look at him. 

“Can I make it up to you?” Law whispers, so close to your own lips. 

“… please…” You gasp out, flustered at your proximity. 

Without hesitation, Law pulls the back of your head towards his and mashes his lips on yours in a passionate kiss. He forcibly sticks his tongue into your mouth and moves one of his hands to grab your hip. You whimper into his mouth as you feel his grip on you tighten. Law grabs your ass and lifts you up to bring you over to the long leather couch in his office. He drops you gently on the soft sofa. Law is on his knees between your legs and leans forward into your neck. 

“Let me take your clothes off…” Law slides your jumpsuit off your shoulders. “I want to prove to you how much I care…” He kisses the crook of your neck as he slips your coveralls off your lower body. 

“Ok…” you panted our nervously as you were now naked in front of him for the first time. He was now between your knees as you sat naked on the leather sofa. Law leaned in to kiss you again, your hands on his neck. As you made out, your hands moved to toss his hat off his head. 

“Take that off, want to feel the real you…” You breath out as you continued to kiss him again. 

Law grunted and backed off of you to remove the rest of his clothes above you. He kneels back down and is face to face with your dripping cunt. 

“Gotta have you now…” Law whispers as he dips his head between your legs. Law swirls his tongue around your clit before he lays the flat of his tongue against your whole sex and drags it up your body. You moan out loud. He stops briefly at your right nipple and sucks harshly before moving his tongue up your body again. Law slides his tongue up your neck from your breast and back into your mouth. 

“Gonna show you how much I care now, okay y/n?” Law whispers in your ear as he lined his cock up with your hole. He teased your slit with his leaking tip before he began dipping in and out of your sopping pussy. 

“Law… want all of you…” You sigh out as you clutch his biceps.

Law smiled down at you. 

“And you’ll get anything you want, love.” Law pushed himself fully inside of you swiftly. You moaned as you felt his pelvis meet yours, feeling his cock caress the deepest places inside your body. 

“Captain!” You shriek out as Law pulls out of you and pushes back in forcefully. 

“I know, I know… just wanna give you the best…” Law grips your hips tightly and thrusted quickly into your wet hole. 

“Shit! Fuck! Law!” You cry as you are bounced against the back of the leather sofa, your captain hitting your spot just right.  “There, Law!” Tears formed at your eyelashes as he brought your body to the culmination of pleasure. 

“Kiss me when you cum. Do it now.” Law leans forward and pushes his mouth onto yours. The rhythmic thrusting of your captain inside of you and his lips on yours was too much for you to handle, you gasp and cream on the cock inside of you. Your eyes roll back into your head and the grip on Law’s arms loosens.

"L-law!"

Your body becomes limp in his hold after your orgasm. 

Law jerks his hips a few times and pulls out of you to spurt hot ropes of cum onto your abdomen. Your normally stoic captain whines as he finished his release. Your head far too hazy to even notice that he had finished on you, you groaned and pulled your lover into your arms. 

“You really meant it, didn’t you?” You whispered teasingly into your lovers face as he brushed your nose with his. 

“What? That I care about you? Of course. As for the rest of tonight… maybe we should.. what’s the word you said? “Soft launch”?”  Law rubbed your noses together.  You laughed. 

“We can keep it quiet for now.” You giggled at your captain. “But I fully expect a party for our anniversary.” 

“I’ll think about it.” Law chuckled as he pulled your body into his and you both drifted off to sleep. 

xx MoMo

[sweetfire01]

It's a little shorter than I planned, but it was in my draft for too long and I wanted to post it, so I cut it the end. You'll read more in the next chapter. 👀

Baby dove pt.3 (Daddy!Howl)

It took you a while to calm down. Calcifer retreated to the back of the fireplace and you were grateful for the silence. You didn't know if there was anything else you should know, but surely you didn't want to now. Apparently, the only option available was what the demon said: waiting for Howl to get tired and hoping that it happens soon. The ringing of the doorbell startled you and you jumped up in fear, only to breathe a sigh of relief when you saw Markl, alone. You cursed yourself for getting so anxious just from the ringing of a bell, but you still didn't feel like facing that guy. You composed yourself and welcomed Markl, helping him carry in the groceries. You only got a fleeting glimpse of the city starting to light up for the evening before the youngest closed the door behind him, unaware of your problems.

Howl originally told you that he was the only one allowed to cook since the demon didn't like being used by anyone other than him. At first, like everything that happened to you these days, you didn't think about it too much. Now you wonder if it wasn't actually some form of infantilization towards you: you're too young to know how to cook, you could burn or cut yourself… In fact, now that you thought about it longer, he had never let you cook, if not sometimes "helping him pass the ingredients". Not wanting to get angry for the umpteenth time that day, you looked at what you placed on the table: delicious-looking fruit and vegetables, an already gutted cod and a new bottle of oil. "Howl asked me to buy some fish." Markl said with a rather disgusted expression, taking a stool and approaching the table. "It was the last thing I took. I didn't want to keep that smelly thing around all the time." Moving it away from him, he grabbed the cutting board and a knife. He held a turnip in his hand for a few seconds before starting to cut it, still pouting. "I hope at least these cover the disgusting taste." You wondered if Howl saw you the same way you saw Markl. A sulking child complaining about food he doesn't like while standing on a stool because the table is too high for him. You thought that at least the wizard didn't have to see you so short. Then you remembered that this kid at least could go out freely and be more useful than you in the kitchen. You started looking for a knife to help him as you listened to him complain about how he didn't want to eat fish for dinner. The implications of this hit you. "Wait. We don't…have leftovers right?" "No, the soup for lunch is all gone. Unfortunately." Yeah. Unfortunately. Having no leftovers meant he would be back earlier than usual to cook. You had hoped that you would be able to go to bed and pretend to be asleep when he returned. Now you were hoping that he would have some accident and wouldn't be able to make it home for a few more hours. You started to open the cabinet after you only found spoons and forks in the cutlery tray. The castle was cleaner since you arrived, but still very messy. You spotted a cutlery handle sticking out from behind the pile of plates, only to realize it was another fork. "Hey Markl, where are all the knives?" It was your only chance to do something useful in the kitchen, you weren't going to waste it. "Aren't they in the cutlery tray? I got this from there." "No, not even in the drawers." "In the sink? Howl was cutting some herbs for potions when I left. Maybe he left onethere." You checked but, apart from a cup and a bowl, there was nothing else. You looked through the shelves above but couldn't spot a single one. It didn't help that they were higher than your head. You wouldn't ask Markl to lend you the stool. The library? Nothing. You huffed in annoyance. "They are not here." Oh, if this was one of his tricks… "Well, you know how he is, he always leaves things lying around. When he comes back we'll ask him. Is there anything else missing to set the table?" You took 3 glasses scattered around, placing them on one side of the still clear table.

Then you pulled 3 plates out of the cabinet… and saw it. Behind the pile was a knife sticking out of a cup. A butter knife, sure, but still a knife. You grabbed it and triumphantly returned to the table, next to him. There were still some vegetables and you got ready to cut a carrot. Too bad the knife didn't cut. It simply rubbed on its surface. You tried using more force but the blade wasn't sharp enough. "Um, isn't that a butter knife?" Markl must have noticed your struggle with that damn carrot. "Yeah, I'm trying to cut it anyway." You snorted. You were almost tempted to break it in half. With bare hands. The boy took on a confused expression "Do you know that the butter knife…is used to spread butter? Have you never used it?" Oh god. Not him too. Not him too who treats you like a fool. “I know what a butter knife is for, thanks.” You gritted your teeth as you brought your attention back to that orange thing. You started cutting - no, rubbing - that fucking knife on that fucking carrot again. "But-" "I can do it." You cut him off. He shook his head, sighing "Come on, pass it to me, I'll take care of it." "No." "C'mon-" "No. I'll do it." "Now I understand why Howl never lets you help us in the kitchen." "What?!" You dropped the knife on the table and the moment you turned to look at him, he stole your vegetable. "Yeah, you'd probably just screw up." He stuck his tongue out at you before quickly cutting it off. That little…Now you were really getting offended. "That's not true! I'm capable of helping, you know?" “Yes, cutting vegetables with a butter knife.” "It's not my fault, there weren't any others." "But you can't use that!" "I wanted to try!" "Sure, next time you'll try it with a fork?" "Stop teasing me!" "You're the one doing stupid things." "It is not true!" "Yes." "No!" “Shall we talk about when you went out the other day and got lost? "What?!" You honestly didn't expect him to bring that topic up. But you couldn't accept that a brat younger than you was still putting you down. "There were just a lot of people, that's all. And then I bet you'd get lost too. In fact, you'd end up crushed because of how short you are." Now it was your turn to stick your tongue out at him and tease him. "Actually I left before you and returned safely. Oh, and I didn't need anyone to take me home." Or maybe not. Dammit. Losing an argument to a child about you not being a stupid child. "Well, I…I…I didn't need Howl!" You slammed your palms on the table and Markl flinched at your outburst. He looked at you with wide eyes as you continued to squeal. "I don't need him or you! Nobody!" He continued to stare at you in fear, shaking his head, but you didn't care anymore. "I want to get out of here! I've had enough!" "And where would you go?" You froze, two large hands resting on your shoulders, pulling you towards his chest. Markl wasn't looking at you. Slowly raising your head, you met Howl's smiling face.

[olderthannetfic]

This is a rant that is going to end in a question that I genuinely want the answer to.

I've recently seen (in the past year or so) an uptick in people online using the word "delusional" casually or as an insult. Worse even than that, "delulu" which I believe originated on Tiktok or Twitter (likely places for ableism to come from, yeah, fork found in kitchen etc etc). The only people I really see calling this behavior out are, you guessed it, actually delusional or psychotic people.

Typically it's thrown around to describe someone's "weird" or "chronically online" beliefs. Like using it to talk about reality shifters or RPF shippers who think their ship is actually together or etc. And, like, while I don't disagree that spiritual psychosis or "the belief that someone is sending me signals via social media" are real actual delusional behaviors/can lead to actual delusions, I really don't think that believing you can shift to Hogwarts to see Draco or that you have a mental connection to the Stranger Things universe or that Taylor Swift is queer and flagging via music videos really fits the criteria for spiritual psychosis or erotomania or what have you *in itself* - meaning if you live an otherwise normal life and only get out of touch with reality when you're on #MaraudersTok or r/LarryStylinson, you're likely not delusional, or at least not delusional enough for it to impact your functionality.

So, that begs the question, WHY? Why use delusional to describe stupid chronically online drama? Like, I'm being genuine, I truly do want to know why. Are these people misusing/misunderstanding what the word delusional means? Are they armchair diagnosing? Do they think these people are actually experiencing psychosis, and if so, why are they using said diagnosis as an insult or as part of their moral flaws? Why are they so bothered and obsessed with someone else's "delusion", especially when the delusion in question isn't hurting them and is just a stupid thing like thinking that some random celeb is about to hard launch their coming out or that they can teleport to a fictional world?

(also, PLEASE, I know it sounds like I have specific beef with shifters or gay rpf truthers, I DON'T, nor am i necessarily 'defending' these communities, 'cuz i know they do have actual issues outside of just being cringe or whatever. I don't want gaylor shift malfoy snapewives discourse, i want "why are you using a psychotic disorder to describe these fringe fandom communities" discourse, and in the circles i run in that's just the type of people who are described as delusional the most - I know that the overall issue runs much deeper, I just figured Id ask a fandom blog why the word is so prevelant in fandoms, especially in specific "types" of fandoms)

Like, I'm not looking for an argument of "it's ok to use delusional so casually" or "yeah i agree it's so fucked up that people throw that word around :/" all i want is an honest and concise answer of WHY delusional has become the Hot New Armchair Diagnosis For Weird People On TikTok or whatever.

--

Lots of words get used with a colloquial definition and people aren't really thinking about their technical meaning.

K-pop fandom. Blame them.

[ameliathornromance]

The Manor House: A Vampire Romance: Chapter 4

A white trail of petals guided you downstairs the next evening. The same petals of the flowers you gave the Lord.

You followed them, down the hall and to the imperial staircase, where they drifted down the steps and ended in the front room.

The sky outside hadn’t changed since you went to bed, the curtains had stayed open and billowed as cold night air washed in the Manor in its icy freshness.

The fridgidness made you slow, sensing something… new in the air.

It wasn’t the old stuffy feeling that the constantly drawn curtains blocked in or the endless halls of void that suffocated anyone who dared gazed into its endlessness.

As you reached the bottom of the staircase, you turned into the front room and found the source of your unease.

Petals led your eyes up to Lord Baal. He sat in an armchair by the fireplace. The fire crackled menacingly, spitting embers as you locked eyes with the man in the chair.

His legs were crossed, his fingernails dug into plush red leather arms of the chair. In his lap, laid the bouquet of flowers. Nearly all the heads of the plants had been plucked free of their colour, only leaving the yellow pollen at the centre of the stem.

Heart in your throat, you and the Lord locked eyes, his dark gaze narrowed at you in the firelight.

Neither of you said anything.

“Why did you-“

“When I said ‘clean the Manor’, I didn’t mean do the bare minimum.” The Lord interrupted. Picking up one of the flower stems, he twirled it in his fingers, admiring his massacre of the greenery. “I checked everywhere, you missed the kitchen.”

“But-“ you started.

The Lord hurled the stem into the fireplace. Embers burst from underneath the stem, before it clambered on top of its fuel and robbed it of its life.

You stopped mid sentence as the Lord spoke again, “I had no idea that commoners were so incompetent, a monkey could do a better job here.”

Lord Baal got to his feet, tossing the rest of the flowers into the fire. The flames lapped at them as if they were parched dogs.

He approached you, his degradation continued, “maybe I should have employed one instead of a commoner I picked up from the bank of a river.” He chuckled, “I mean, what did I expect?”

You bit your tongue. Let him get his malice out of his system, it won’t last long.

“I picked you up from a river bank. You looked horrendous, just like I expected any peasant to look. I don’t even know why I trusted you with such an easy task.”

Endure it.

“I mean, you fell off your own horse and into a river. You can’t even swim. I thought that peasants were experienced in that, since, y’know, they have nothing else better to do than swim in dirty lakes and rivers.”

That night flashed through your mind. Your chest tightened, feeling the chilly air seep into your lungs, into your very soul as the villagers searched for you like Fox hunters chasing down their already injured rodent prey.

The water of the churning rapids licked your legs again, threatening to take you if you didn’t jump in yourself. 

A twig snapped, somewhere in the distance. Just close enough for you to hear, you might have mistaken it for the cackling fire.

“I finally know why you’re alone.” Your voice echoed, strong, loud through the air.

Even the fire dared not make a sound, the Lord’s cruel grin falling away. “What did you just say?”

“I said,” You raised your voice. “I finally know why you’re alone.” 

When the Lord had no response, you pelted him with sharp words, your tongue forked like a venomous snakes. “It’s no wonder everyone left you here, to rot in this Manor. Even the servants left you here alone and I can hardly blame them, especially with that shitty attitude.” 

You jabbed your index finger, hard into the Lord’s chest. “It’s better than being talked down to by some stuck-up his ass Lord who can’t appreciate the work others put in for him and his ridiculously sized home that he keeps all to himself!”

Your shouts echoed around the Manor and bounced back, as if it was too, fed up with Lord Baal’s neglect.

“That’s probably why your family probably left too!” A cruel laugh escaped you as you tugged at yesterday's clothes, still on your back. “I mean, your mother didn’t even bother to pack her clothes to take with her when she left this place-”

The fire went out, stealing the words from your throat, plunging you into blackness. The ghostly moonlight bloomed behind you.

Heart in your throat, you looked around frantically, desperate for your eyes to adjust to the limited lighting. The tightness in your chest didn’t go away as you raked the surroundings for any sight of the Lord, ears pricked and almost yearning for his pompous tone that you hated him for. 

The clicking of the front door earned a gasp of surprise from you, finally finding the only other occupant of the Manor.

He stood in the doorway, eyes shadowed and glowering into the night, as if it was the turning of the earth that had wronged him.

Without so much as a word, he slammed the door closed behind him. The Manor shuddered with the force, the window panes rattling, threatening to fall from their neglected frames.

*

Lord Baal stalked through the grounds of his Manor, fists clenched and teeth gritted.“That absolute fucking-” He growled as he stormed toward his overgrown garden.

This was stupid, to go on a walk so close to the morning, he knew it was, but he didn’t care.

Clawing his way through the rose bushes, ignoring the way the stems pierced his flesh, he forced his way into what was once a marble maze.

Once he was clear of the bushes he stopped, breathless, surrounded by them.

He kicked at the thicket, felt stupid for attacking a plant, then fell to his knees. 

Your words hammered down on him as the Lord glared at a statue of his father. Nearly consumed by moss, vines twisting around its Greek podium, it soothed the Lord for a moment. 

This moment of clarity, allowed a question that Lord Baal had been pushing away for so long, to creep into his mind:

Did they really leave because of me?

Read 4 Chapters ahead

Masterlist

[thedaythatwas]

How to be Alone

Summary: Goro Akechi has 30 days to vacate his apartment. If only moving on were half as easy as moving out.

CW: alcohol, emetophobia, run-of-the-mill violent thoughts from Akechi, and more repression than you could possibly fathom

This is just a little snippet of a post-canon Akechi character study I've been working on! I want to share it here on tumblr as a standalone oneshot. Please don't expect any tension to be resolved <333 because that's not happening here <333

Big thank you to my lovely betas, lambsear (ao3), @cardiganbear, and @cloudysonder. Another massive thanks to @chaoticconstellation – thank you for all of the inspo and motivation (and for making me aware that apartments that evil-looking exist!)

House Hunting (or, I'm not hung up on you anymore, but here's why I hung up)

Shopping for apartments online was hell.

Akechi was no stranger to feelings of mind-numbing rage. Even so, there was something about the website he was using to search for a new living space that made him particularly angry, even by his own standards. His cursor drifted across its screen, its interface lagged, and despite his perfect internet connection, it seemed as though every thirty seconds the damn thing refreshed itself. 

Akechi wasn’t sure where exactly he was looking to live; his requirements for a new place were the vague but apt key terms, ‘Tokyo,’ ‘cheap,’ and ‘studio.’ Unfortunately, his criteria seemed to be mutually exclusive. A room of his own would cost an arm and a leg; a room with a roommate or two would take a doable (albeit still exorbitant) chunk from his savings. It was tragic, really, that Akechi would be at risk of causing grievous bodily harm to himself and others if he were forced to share a living space. Forking over cash he didn’t have was quite literally his only option. 

Akechi might have been able to search out some middle ground between striking gold beneath the streets of Kichijoji and committing another homicide if he had the luxury of time to plan his move. He had always been scrappy, even if he was seldom lucky. 

Time, however, was something that Akechi didn’t have. That, of course, had to do with the circumstances that had pushed him to bearing the indignities of online apartment hunting in the first place.

On February 3rd, Akechi had woken up in his bed. This was strange for a number of reasons. One: he didn’t make a habit of waking up when his bedside clock brightly proclaimed it to be 8:37pm. 

Two: Goro Akechi was supposed to be dead. 

And, joy of all joys, he was not. Upon registering this unfortunate new development in the saga of misfortunes that was his existence, Akechi had rolled over, buried his head in his pillow, and screamed. When soreness in his throat informed him that screaming was no longer a viable way to spend his time, he had walked to his near-empty kitchen and grabbed the frilly bottle of expensive single malt scotch that Shido had given him the day he had reported to his office to confirm Wakaba Ishikki’s death.

Akechi had been saving the bottle for the day he won.

Well. Cheers to that one. 

He had sat down on the linoleum tile floor and taken a large swig out of the bottle. Presumably, he’d repeated the act a number of times, because the next morning he’d woken up in his bed – again, ironically, with no memory of how he’d arrived there – and promptly thrown up on himself. 

He’d tossed his unlucky shirt in the garbage, along with the bottle he’d found lying knocked over and bone dry on the kitchen floor. He really had always hated it.

After spending several days lying in his bed, only leaving it to periodically feed himself one of the instant ramen packets he stockpiled in the one cabinet in his kitchen he actively used, Akechi had washed his sheets and moved on.

What else could he do?

He had contacted Sae Niijima first, because while he had been spending several days laying horizontal in a dark room, adding an abstract collage of broth splatters to his sweatpants and trying to convince himself that any of his recent decisions actually mattered, Akira Kurusu was probably behind bars giving testimony that would damn Shido and potentially put himself away for good in the process. 

And like hell was he going to let Joker one-up him by rotting away in jail while Akechi – clearly, the most deserving party in this scenario on both counts – walked free.

As soon as he’d heard the click of his phone connecting to Sae’s, Akechi had come in guns blazing announcing his intent to march down to the police station and confess to everything he’d done. He would gladly go down with Shido’s ship if it meant he could anchor him well and truly to rock bottom. 

The elder Niijima sister had rolled shockingly well with Akechi’s punches. After expressing mild surprise that he was alive, Sae had efficiently talked him off his ledge.

“Do you want Shido to be locked away for life? If your answer is yes, I suggest you stay well away from my case. I have a strategy, and it will be much less effective if I have to account for the testimony of a magical teenage assassin confessing to cognitively killing some of Japan’s most powerful men just as they’ve begun to take me seriously.” 

Akechi had never answered her question, because Akechi didn’t want Shido to be locked away. Not like this, anyway. What he had wanted hadn’t involved Kurusu, and yet, here Kurusu was in the center of it all, robbing Akechi of his chance to make Shido’s fall really hurt. 

Still, Akechi had come to terms with the fact that what he wanted and what he would get were two very different things in regards to the fate of Masayoshi Shido, and to this brave new world where Akechi was meant to be long dead. 

What he had done was take a deep breath, swallow down his very reasonable retorts – he had at least five – and ask about Kurusu. 

His inquiry was fruitful, if aggravating. Akechi hadn’t been naive enough to expect that any update on Kurusu wouldn’t be aggravating. 

Per Sae, it wouldn’t be long until Kurusu was released from juvenile detention (implied: so long as Akechi didn’t butt in). Apparently, his extended posse had banded together, and Sae doubted it would be more than a few weeks before he was out. He was actually on track to have his criminal record completely overturned.

Kurusu was relying on the power of friendship to not only avoid a life sentence, but to completely exonerate himself from the year he had spent galavanting around the Metaverse, stealing hearts and minds and Akechi’s life’s work, too. One might say that Akechi was less than enthused. Mostly, because he was near certain that using the force of true love to outrun his mistakes would actually work for Kurusu, because he was Kurusu, and of fucking course it could.

He hadn’t told Sae as much, but he sensed she’d intuited his frustration from his chorus of ‘...I see,’ ‘...I see,’ ‘...I see,’  through the phone, each repetition darker than the last. 

With that sorted, Akechi had told Sae in no uncertain terms that she was not to tell Kurusu or any of the other Phantom Thieves that he was alive under any circumstances. She said that she would respect his wishes. She hadn’t asked any follow up questions. It was a refreshing change of pace from the back and forth that talking to the rest of Kurusu’s loyal followers always seemed to entail.

Then again, this was Sae. She had been a fixture in his life long before she had become a mainstay in Kurusu’s.

That little detail out of the way, Akechi had been prepared to hang up. Before he could, Sae had invited him to coffee. Bewildered, Akechi had accepted.

“You are aware, I presume, that I’ve killed more people than the number of cases you’ve litigated over the course of your entire career, aren’t you?” Akechi had said as soon as he had slid into the stiffly upholstered booth across from Sae at the too cold, overly gray café where they had agreed to meet the following day. “Including among them Wakaba Isshiki and Kunikazu Okumura.”

Sae had pulled her credit card out of her sleek handbag and rapped it on the table between them.

“I am. Could you give me your order Akechi-kun? Drinks are on me today.”

Akechi had ordered a black drip coffee – far from the best he’d ever had – and the two of them had talked about his future, not his past. 

Sae told Akechi that she would be willing to hire him as a personal assistant. She couldn’t swing him a position interning in the public prosecutor’s office; it went without saying that Akechi ought to stay as far away as possible from any branch of law enforcement for the foreseeable future. Sure, very few people recognized him nowadays – the demiurge had fallen and taken Shido’s influence with it, and Akechi had been out of the public eye for a sufficient number of news cycles for even his most avid fans to lose interest – but it seemed unwise to tempt fate. 

They both knew that most of Shido’s conspiracy was still at large. As repentant as their former leader was, his sentiments were not widely shared. Shido had done more damage than a single change of heart could fix. 

All this to say, Akechi would be keeping a low profile. Not that he would have acted otherwise, regardless of who might want him imprisoned, or who might want him dead.

Akechi was, quite frankly, tired.

His employment would hinge on agreeing to take his high school equivalency and college entrance exams before the next university matriculation cycle. Akechi had, more or less, finished his final year of high school. Unfortunately, the less in that statement meant that he had never actually graduated. Still, he could easily pass a high school equivalency exam – an inconvenience, but a bureaucratic necessity, and hardly an insurmountable one. Before his life had gone to shit, he had been on track to get top marks on his entrance exams. It wouldn’t be difficult to keep himself versed in the material he needed to know in order to pass with flying colors.

He didn’t have strong feelings for or against Sae’s vision for his future. Akechi had been slated to die long before he had shot shut the bulkhead door on his father’s ship. He had gone to cram school because it was what the detective prince was supposed to do, and he had excelled at it because the world had told him that he couldn’t. He wasn’t like Makoto Niijima, with her good marks and bright future. 

Sae would pay him for doing this, though. More, she had that earnest look in her eyes behind the stoic contours of her face that suggested she really thought she was doing what was best for him. 

Akechi had agreed to her terms. 

Besides, he’d always been told that college wasn’t in the cards for him. The idea of proving those people wrong lit something up inside him that he hadn’t realized had been smothered until then.

Akechi would work for Sae on weekdays and study on weekends. She would check in with him once a week to confirm that he was indeed making progress on his personal studies and to assign him new memos and forms to copy edit. So long as he was on track, she would pay him another week.

It had all sounded so easy. Too easy. Akechi needed to ask.

“Why?”

Sae had taken a long sip of her cappuccino. “Why what?” 

“You know what.” Akechi had crossed his arms, his mouth drawn in a hard line, “Why this?”

Sae had set her cup down onto her saucer without so much as an audible clink. “Is it really so difficult to believe that I’d want to help you?”

“You pity me.” He’d said it like a fact, because it was a fact, and he didn’t take kindly to it. 

Sae hadn’t looked surprised to hear Akechi’s words. She raised her eyebrows.

“No, I don’t. And I’m not absolving you, either. You made choices that hurt people, and you need to face consequences for that. But, Akechi-kun…” 

Sae paused, as if weighing her next words on her tongue. “Goro. You were sixteen.”

Akechi didn’t know which part of her addendum offended him most: Sae’s use of his given name – he’d bristled, he couldn’t remember how long it had been since someone had been presumptuous enough to call him Goro – or her implication that he hadn’t known exactly what he was doing back when he first approached Shido. 

She hadn’t seen how proud he had been when Shido handed him his first pistol. She hadn’t been there each time he’d pulled its trigger. Akechi had stopped feeling anything about his hits after he’d downed a handful of targets. Through it all, he’d never felt remorse. He’d even smiled, the first time.

That smile hadn’t lasted, of course. It had fallen right along with Ishikki. Still, everyone knows that it’s your first reaction to a thing that really counts. 

Her eyes on his were resolute, as if she were daring him to object. She wasn’t budging. 

Sae had sounded awfully confident for someone who had absolutely no idea what she was talking about.

Akechi remembered their long days at the police station and the late night dinners Sae would treat him to after, when he’d watch as she scarfed down cheap conveyor belt sushi and let her dignified mask slip like the rice that fell from her chopsticks to her perfectly starched dress shirt. He remembered their constant shop-talk that always seemed to border on something more personal. 

Sae knew what it was like to prove yourself in a world that wanted to see you fail. He remembered watching her come undone in October, how he almost felt bad as he watched her slip further away from her sister, and from him.

Gripping his mug hard enough to put its handle in peril, Akechi had bitten back the urge to inform Sae that he was eighteen years old now, and had done very bad things continuously from age sixteen through now, thank you very much. He was suddenly aware of exactly how juvenile it would sound if he did.

He decided that Sae could call him what she wanted. ‘Goro’ didn’t feel wrong, he supposed. It just felt new.

She was wrong about him, but he had let her continue without correction. 

“You did things that were unforgivable. What our system did to you was unforgivable.” She took a sip of her cappuccino. The action was smug, somehow, like she knew just how much she’d gotten away with when Akechi kept his silence. At least she was self-aware. “Masayoshi Shido is being brought to justice, and Kurusu-kun isn’t facing anything that he can’t handle. This will be over soon.” 

Akechi could hardly believe that. While he had faith in Sae’s legal prowess, Shido was just one head of a veritable hydra of corruption and intrigue. Rooting out his conspiracy would air out Japan’s dirty laundry in a way that he doubted the powerful men who soiled it would permit. It would be dangerous business to try.

He couldn’t fathom that Shido was a problem that had an imminent expiration date. He was supposed to be Akechi’s Gordian knot. Shido was his arms race, his mutually assured destruction. Unraveling him couldn’t possibly be so simple, and it couldn’t possibly be done without Akechi. 

Could it?

Where the hell did that leave him?

Of course, Sae’s words were meant to be encouraging, even if Akechi could actively feel his vision tunneling and his pulse jackhammering up. He clamped that feeling down and shoved it somewhere to sort through later – or never – as Sae pushed on.

“I want you to move forward. I don’t see any reason for you not to. That’s where you’ll find justice.”

It all sounded so scripted. Akechi wondered how many times she had practiced her little speech in the mirror after she’d drafted it on her legal pad. He knew it was her standard practice for high stakes days in court. Sae never let slip that she was nervous, but that didn’t mean she never was. 

While Akechi was almost flattered that she considered him worth a rehearsal or two, her dedication had been proving to be rather inconvenient that day. A Sae who had decided she needed to win seldom lost. The Phantom Thieves had helped her reorient her sense of justice towards good ends, but there was no version of Sae who wasn’t as stubborn as the one they’d encountered in her casino.

Fortunately, so was Akechi. 

“I’ve earned execution ten times over.” 

He barely managed to keep his words level as he forced them out. It was vexing that he needed to remind the woman sitting across from him – a public prosecutor with one of the most gleaming case records Tokyo had seen in recent memory – that per the word of her own law, he deserved to die. 

She tucked a wayward strand of hair neatly behind her ear and clasped her hands together on the tabletop between them.

“And I’m telling you that executing you doesn’t help anyone,” she hadn’t raised her voice, but Akechi could hear it harden with authority, “Learn to be a better person. You still have plenty of time to grow. Don’t forfeit this opportunity that you’ve been given to do that.”

He scoffed. “And if I can’t?”

“Then don’t. But I think you can.” 

She had said it without hesitation, like she really believed it. At that realization, Akechi let out a laugh that bordered on a snort, the kind he never would have allowed to slip through his throat when Sae had known him as someone else.

“You’re all insane.”

She hadn’t seemed surprised by his outburst as she took a long drink from her cup. As she swallowed, clearly unperturbed, Akechi found himself wondering if he’d given her too little credit, or himself too much. Probably both.

Sae’s lip quirked up. “Maybe. But I’ve realized that you need to be a little insane to believe you can see the world change for the better. Your teammates helped me learn that.”

Akechi’s hackles raised. “They are not my teammates.”

“Oh really?” She set her cup down onto her saucer, “I think Kurusu-kun would disagree.” 

That half-smile of hers persisted, like she thought she knew something he didn’t. “You know, he asked about you earlier this week. He seemed riled up. I think he would want to know that you’re alive.”

It didn’t even take eyes to notice Akira Kurusu’s bleeding-heart obsession with who he thought Akechi was. It practically radiated off of him in waves you could touch, like he was some sort of sad magnet for homicidal lost causes. Sae wasn’t telling Akechi anything he couldn’t have reasonably inferred, knowing what he did about Kurusu. 

If Sae said that Kurusu was ‘riled up,’ he knew that Kurusu must have been near hysterics. Well, per the yardstick of Kurusu’s typical emoting capacity. He could envision the way Kurusu’s lips had probably gotten all drawn, the way they tended to when he tried to hide that he was feeling more than he let on. 

Kurusu didn’t wear his emotions on his sleeve, but he wasn’t impossible to read if you knew what you were looking to find. His brow had probably furrowed, his fists had probably clenched, and his eyes had probably gone just short of misty. 

Akechi wasn’t sure how he felt about that mental image.

“Well, we can’t always get what we want, now can we?”

“I understand, Goro,” Sae stared him dead in the eye as she said his given name, leaving Akechi no option but to immediately take a good long drink of burnt coffee from his mug. “But consider it for me, won’t you? I don’t think that it would be a bad idea for you to build a support network for yourself.”

 Akechi cursed to himself. He should have known that she wouldn’t let this topic lie so easily.

Akechi grit his teeth. “I don’t think Sakura or Okumura would take kindly to seeing me.”

“Then don’t see them.” She said it matter of fact, like it was that easy. “But, for the record, I think that Kurusu-kun would.”

Of course Kurusu would. Even a child who couldn’t add two and two could piece together that Akira Kurusu would probably lop off a limb to have been in that booth with them that day. The idiot had wished Akechi back into existence and into his life, and he would again if he could.

That was why he couldn’t know that Akechi was alive. 

Well, it accounted for half the issue.

The other half rested on the fact that Kurusu had been the first thing to cross Akechi’s mind in that half second that passed between realizing he was alive and resolving to scream about it. He hadn’t had the decency to fully leave Akechi’s thoughts ever since, with the exception of the several hours he had spent blackout drunk. 

Somehow, that last bit was less than reassuring. 

Even worse, none of it was exactly new. 

The long and short of it was that Akechi needed to get himself clean, and he couldn’t very well do that if Kurusu came chasing after him. 

And so, he made his words as sharp as he could muster. “I think that Kurusu-kun should get a grip and realize that I very sincerely tried to murder him.”

Sae stared him down. He was under no illusions – this was an interrogation. It was a surprise when her gaze softened. 

She hummed. “Do you regret it?”

And wasn’t that a loaded question? 

He regretted that it had all amounted to nothing. He regretted that Shido had played him for a fool, and that on the evening of November 20th, he’d gone home and damn near cracked open his bottle of Shido revenge scotch. He regretted that at some catastrophic point in the past year, besting Joker had become something bigger than besting his father, and that just as soon as Akechi had thought he’d managed it, the metal on metal scent of blood splattering onto the interrogation room’s table from Kurusu’s too-blank face became something he needed to forget. 

Of course, he also regretted that he’d been tricked, and that he’d wasted several nights wide awake thinking about the way Kurusu had looked at him that night in the bathhouse, sweat on his brow and droplets of steam condensed on his irritatingly long lashes, like he had really wanted to be there with him, listening. 

His brief brush with insomnia had cost Akechi twelve dollars in drugstore coffee, five dollars in sugar-free energy drinks, and at least three years of his life, if you accounted for the carcinogens that made up the latter. Akechi did.

At least he’d saved that bottle of scotch. It had gone to waste anyway, but it was more about the principle of the thing.

But he couldn’t very well explain any of that to Sae. So, Akechi had lied.

“No.”

“I see.” If Sae was disappointed in his answer, she didn’t show it. She gave him a nod, drummed her fingers on the table, and checked her watch. “Let me know if you change your mind. I’ll keep your existence to myself until you tell me to do otherwise.”

Sae had swallowed down the last of her drink, and that was that.

Since that day, his life had gone on. He spent his weekdays looking over Sae’s contracts and his weekends grinding out practice problems from study books. Sometimes he would work in his apartment. He’d draw open the blinds and spread his papers across his bed – he had a desk, but it was cramped, his chair was stiff, and he’d never really brought himself around to using the space as it was meant to be used. 

Other days, Akechi camped out in cafés around the city. He operated under the assumption that any place that had the audacity to charge 700 yen for a barely passable latte must have presumed he would use said latte as an all-day pass to free wifi and a climate controlled workspace. Akechi felt vindicated in taking full advantage.

He found that the more tasks he had to fill his time, the less liable his mind was to wander. 

Not that it was always easy. It had been hardest at first, when more mornings than not the was filled with the urge to lay under his comforter and rot through the day. He’d learned quickly that when that urge struck, it was best to call Sae and pick up an extra stack of whatever she could push off on him before her work day started. He would chip away at it during the daylight hours and catch up with his other tasks at night, a can of cold brew in one hand and a highlighter in the other. 

He never slipped behind Sae’s expectations for him, because he was Goro Akechi, and he didn’t let himself lose if he could help it. Still, it wasn’t lost on him that he wasn’t supposed to be alive. Sue him if that got to him once in a while. 

He hadn’t planned for any of this, and if he did anything besides move straight through it all, the shiny paint of productivity he’d slapped over his unplanned extension pack to living would slide right off. It would become obvious that there was little holding his life together besides spite, busywork, and a lawyer who had willfully decided she wouldn’t let him quit as her part-timer, or as anything else. 

Thinking about that never did him any good, so he didn’t. Fortunately, Akechi was no stranger to doing what needed to be done first and wondering how on earth he had managed it after the fact. 

Now, he needed to move forward. So he did.

That wasn’t to say his strategy always worked. 

It tended to happen late at night, when Akechi didn’t have the energy to stop his thoughts from drifting to the subjects his wiser, more conscious self refused to engage. 

Typically, that meant Joker. No. It always meant Joker. Shido, too, but it was infuriating, really, how even those thoughts tended to meander back around to Joker, too. 

As Akechi had taken his post-hibernation shower months ago, his sheets in the wash and grease sloughing from his hair in the suds of overpriced shampoo, Akechi had come to a number of resolute conclusions about the state of his life. Namely, if he was going to continue to live it, he had a few non-negotiables.

To start, he would keep a wide berth from any news outlets covering the Shido trial – he was sure there would be more than a few. He’d find a way to get his hands on another, cheaper bottle of something high-proof. He would learn to use one kitchen appliance besides the microwave. The oven, maybe.

And, of course, he would keep himself far, far away from Akira Kurusu.

Akechi would have liked to think that his thoughts always seemed to land on Kurusu out of force of habit. After all, he’d spent months tracking his every move. He’d never quite learned to think like Kurusu – he doubted that anyone could – but Akechi certainly knew the timetables of the trains he took to get around town, the names of his managers at each of his (many) part-time jobs, and which vending machines he preferred to get his snacks from. 

Had he strictly needed to collect so much information on the leader of the Phantom Thieves in the name of reconnaissance? Perhaps not. It wasn’t as though knowing that Kurusu routinely arrived at his station around three minutes before his scheduled train would actually give him an edge in battle. 

(Akechi of the past had tried to posture that it might, but Akechi of the past was an idiot, and Akechi of the present could admit that.)

He had never been one to half-ass, though, and Kurusu had always been so interesting. His calendar protested his reprioritization, but there was nothing new or surprising about that. The detective prince’s life had been a scheduling impossibility, and Akechi had managed regardless. More than managed, really.

Tragically, ‘reconnaissance’ couldn’t account for the way Akechi’s vision tunneled around Kurusu. It couldn’t explain away the thoughts Kurusu always managed to coax out of his head and into speech. 

So, no. Akechi wasn’t stupid enough to believe that his continued fixation on Akira Kurusu was ‘force of habit.’ It was something much more dangerous, and he couldn’t afford to allow himself to succumb to it. Not after everything.

If Akechi was going to live a life, that life would damn well be his own. He refused to live for anybody but himself, and that included Akira Kurusu.

Still, the version of Akechi that lay awake in his bed at 4am, strung out on caffeine, had been known to have other thoughts from time to time. When his eyes were bloodshot and jargon swirled on his ceiling, he thought back to the look on Kurusu’s face when he had caught his glove. Cocky – Joker always was — but something more behind that. Akechi could only describe it as the expression of a boy missing something he hadn’t yet lost. 

It had taken him too long to realize that Kurusu had known exactly what the glove had meant from the moment it had been thrown. It had taken him even longer to realize that Kurusu had understood it better than Akechi had. 

It was enough to make him want to tear Kurusu apart, nice and slow, piece by piece. It was almost enough to make him want to reach for his phone.

He didn’t, of course. There was a lot of power in ‘almost.’ It meant that he was in control.

It was easier during the day. Sae always had something to shrug off on him if he needed it. 

Of course, there was also the pesky matter of his father.

That day at the café, Sae had mentioned that she’d spoken to him. Shido had said that he wouldn’t implicate Akechi in his trial. Apparently, he’d expressed regrets about his treatment of his son. 

Akechi hadn’t asked her for more information. She had already said too much. 

Once, there had been nothing Akechi wanted more than to hear his father drool out how big of a mistake it had been to leave him. Now, the thought of Shido feeling at all guilty, or heaven forbid, apologizing to him, made bile rise in the back of his throat.

Just one hit, and Akechi would want another. There would be nothing of him left. It was a trend, it seemed, that Akechi needed to learn when to keep well enough away from people he’d let spin him in circles.

Fortunately, he had always been a quick study.

Akechi hadn’t tried to contact him, and he and Sae hadn’t discussed Masayoshi Shido any further since. 

Given his track record with all things luck and Shido related, Akechi really should have expected that decision to come back and bite him. 

The rabid dog that was the universe’s refusal to let Akechi live his life in peace caught up to him one day in early June. Coming home from a coffee shop, mini-mart sushi in hand, he’d seen it. 

He had thirty days to vacate his apartment, because of fucking course he did.

Akechi felt six years old again. Seeing the notice pasted to his apartment door, he may as well have been holding his mother’s hand. He felt it clench around his pudgy fingers tight enough to hurt. He knew that she didn’t mean it. He knew that she hadn’t meant to fall behind on rent, either. He knew that some nights at her club were lucrative, and that some mornings, she couldn’t find it in herself to get out of bed. Their income had never been stable, and neither had their address.

But his mother wasn’t there, she hadn’t been for a long time, and Akechi was the only one responsible for the little crescent-shaped indents in his palms as he stared at the paper on his door and tried to will it away with the sheer force of his – in his humble opinion – very justified righteous anger.

He’d called Sae immediately, right as soon as he’d ripped down the notice, gone inside, and poured himself a drink. Apparently, all of Shido’s hidden assets had finally been frozen. Even if he wanted to continue to pay Akechi’s rent, he couldn’t. Akechi hadn’t been affected until now because Shido had, prior to recent events, had his apartment bills set to auto-pay from one of his more clandestine bank accounts. 

That was something that even now made the part of Akechi’s brain that had stayed young and poor recoil. To have so much cash that a transfer of that size could simply be counted on to go through every month, no risk of declining – from an auxiliary checking account – seemed almost gluttonous. 

Well, the payment had finally bounced, it seemed. Nobody was untouchable. It would have been more gratifying if Akechi weren’t the one being left high and dry. He had hung up the phone and downed the last of his drink. His mediocre room-temperature sushi forgotten, he’d taken a seat on his floor, opened his laptop, and typed in a preliminary search for Tokyo-studio-cheap. 

That brought him to now. It was remarkable, really, how his day had only managed to get worse and worse in the hour that had passed since then.

Staying in his current apartment simply wasn’t an option. Akechi had tucked money into his savings account during his time as the detective prince, of course, but even the sizable amount he had slowly accrued for himself over the last several years wouldn’t be able to cover more than a month or two of rent in the place Shido had picked out for him. It had a separate kitchen, living, and sleeping space, alongside a full bathroom. It was fully renovated and featured in-unit laundry. It even came with a parking spot (not that Akechi owned a car, could drive, or feasibly use his space in the garage in literally any capacity). 

All of it had been an undeniable power play on Shido’s part. The place really was too much for him. It was a needless show of excess – an in-your-face sort of look what I can do for you, aren’t you scared to lose it?

Sure, Akechi could spend three years worth of residual earnings on thirty extra days in this place, but all it would do was buy him time, not to mention drain the last financial cushion he had left. He needed to put down a deposit on another place, after all. His bank account would be running on fumes after that, and rent at his new place would be due almost immediately. 

Fuck. He’d almost forgotten his utilities. His phone bill. His Wi-Fi. He didn’t need to be a genius to know that any day now, those expenses would hit him too.

Shido would be burning in hell for a whole host of reasons – Akechi knew this, because he’d spent the last several years of his life passively looping his long, long list of them through his head like a rallying cry. It was always a solid hit that got his head where it needed to be to do whatever he needed to do. This newest slight was a tiny drop of water in the ocean of ways his father had wronged him. 

Still. If there was any justice in the world, Akechi would be allowed to spit on his father during his fiery descent. Just a little bonus to him for needing to go through this after everything he’d already endured.

All roads led to moving. May as well get it done sooner rather than later. 

Akechi would need to pick up a second job to somehow come up with the difference between his dwindling savings account, Sae’s weekly commission, and the cost of living accommodations that would let him avoid adding to his death toll. It would be a less insulting prospect if any of the studio apartments he would be able to afford after that looked remotely liveable.

This one said that the paint on its walls might contain traces of lead, and that its landlord wouldn’t be held liable for medical damages that resulted from it. That one had visible mold on the bathroom tiles, even in the very obviously postured online listing photos. He shuddered to think of the state of that shower if he saw it in the flesh. 

Every listing Akechi had looked at so far seemed to come with its own set of shockingly diverse hazards, their one continuity being that they evoked similar feelings of dread in the pit of his stomach. The ones that didn’t come with a laundry list of health and safety violations stated up front that they required an application pre-screening. Akechi’s credit score was perfectly fine – the detective prince had always paid off his statements in full, and on time. What he didn’t have were two good references. As it turned out, that was rapidly proving itself to be a serious problem.

Even on a webpage with the best user interface imaginable, the experience would have been bleak. That said, Akechi might have felt slightly less homicidal if the website didn’t reload every single time he clicked the back-out arrow after he decided he wasn’t (yet) desperate enough to risk braving exposed wiring in his combined living-bedroom-kitchen-foyer-bathroom space.

It wasn’t as though Akechi hadn’t expected this would happen – he just hadn’t expected it to happen now. He had wanted to be able to really plan his move. The fact he’d even thought that taking his sweet time could be an option for him was proof that he’d let his guard down. 

He clicked on another listing. Wonderful. This one was just under 150 square feet. He honestly hadn’t known that was legal.

Well. Actually. 

He paused. Zoomed in.

On second glance, maybe it wasn’t so bad. It looked clean, recently renovated. The move-in date fit his needs. It was small, sure, but it seemed like the space was well allocated. He mentally crumpled up his commitment to learning how to use an oven. It wouldn’t be happening in a place of this size, but maybe that was for the best, anyway.

He decided to click the button to arrange a tour with the landlord. Maybe his situation wasn’t so dire after all.

Of course, that was when the website decided to crash.

The noise that wrenched its way out of his throat wasn’t unlike how he expected a dying cat might sound. He slammed his laptop shut and rubbed the heels of his palms into his eyelids. 

He needed another drink.

He poured himself a coffee mug of vodka and water. It was like vodka and soda for people who barely had the means to buy themself vodka, and for whom also needing to buy mixers felt like adding insult to injury. It was disgusting, but a disgusting necessity. Today, his crime against good taste was the housing market’s fault.

He took a sip, grimaced, and climbed into his bed. He propped himself up on his pillows and took another long drink. It didn’t taste quite so bad now that he’d whet his palate. 

Fuck. He hadn’t even had the chance to change when he’d gotten home. He undid the top buttons of his dress shirt where they pinched at his neck. It wasn’t as though Akechi had anyone to look nice for, nowadays, but his wardrobe hadn’t gotten a radical overhaul since the detective prince’s fall from notoriety. He’d worn designer shirts then, he’d wear designer shirts now. They looked slightly worse for wear, but at least that meant they were incrementally more comfortable to wear out now than they had been back in the day.

Not by much. He sighed as the stale air conditioning of his room hit his skin. He took another sip of his drink. Then another.

It wouldn’t be so hard to find that listing again. He was pissed on principle. Websites should work. Apartments should be bigger than closets. You should be able to beg a landlord to let you live in a closet-sized apartment on a website that at least functioned halfway decently.

He took another good long gulp from his mug.

He could have really gone for coffee, right then. Not the glorified overpriced milk you could get from any old chain. The good stuff.

It had been a long time since he’d had good coffee. 

There was only one place Akechi had ever had truly, honest-to-god good coffee.

His cellphone was lying at the foot of his bed.

He could send him a text, right now. Something clever. Akechi knew that no matter what it was, it would shock him, but it needed to be witty, too, because he would expect nothing less. He would kill to see the look on his face. He would look down at his phone, see Akechi’s name light up his screen, and his eyes would get all wide and scared. 

You’ve been alive all this time? 

They would meet up, and Kurusu, he’d be miserable, he’d probably cry or do something equally sappy, and – once he really processed – he’d be mad as all hell. Akechi would laugh at him, say something as snarky as the situation demanded, and watch the anger melt right off of Kurusu’s face in real time. 

Akechi would finally have pulled one over on him. He’d finally win. He could feel the rush already. 

Kurusu wanted to lose so bad, it was embarrassing, really.

Right as fantasy Kurusu threw himself at fantasy Akechi, real Akechi felt a wave of cold dread wash over him.

He walked to the sink and poured his final few sips of vodka water down the sink.

No. Hell no. 

He turned on the tap and splashed cold water on his face. It dripped down his neck. He couldn’t bring himself to mind as it trickled down to the collar of his undone shirt.

He was better than this. He knew damn well that the only one ‘losing’ in the situation his addled mind had cooked up was himself. 

It had only taken half a drink to get him there. 

Fuck. He doused his face in more water for good measure.  

He walked back to his bedroom, unlocked his phone, and scrolled through his message logs to find his last conversation with Akira Kurusu. Taking care not to click anything damning, he swiped to delete it.

There. It was over. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t done that sooner.

He rinsed out his mug and poured himself a glass of water from the tap. It didn’t need ice – he’d already confirmed that it was sufficiently chilled.

His laptop was still on his kitchen floor. Akechi took a seat, cross legged, and reloaded the webpage he had been on previously. Surely, he’d have more luck this session. Maybe he’d even find a place larger than 150 square feet. 175 seemed like a reasonable goal.

He would make this work. He was moving apartments, and he was moving on. He’d managed far more difficult things in the past. 

He looked at his phone, sitting on the floor to his right. He tapped the display once. 

No new messages. And why would there be?

He sighed and got to work.