#god do I roll me eyes on that so called gang loyalty sometimes

[spiralcookies]

Kieran my dearest most precious baby boy UwU.

[just-a-poor-boy-queen]

To the anon who requested the school prompts; I attempted to write something about a parent-teacher meeting, but I couldn’t come up with a believable way for both Freddie and Jim to attend, given that Freddie would draw way too much attention. I hope you don’t mind if I skip that one. Here’s your request for Freddie picking up Khaleel from school!

Part 36 of Jimercury Kid series

‘Fucking vultures.’ Freddie muttered under his breath, as he sat with Kashmira in her car and observed the small group of journalists who had gathered at the corner of the street opposite Khaleel’s school.

They always hung around there, holding out hope that the little boy might walk through the gates, and they would finally be able to snap a picture of his face to put on the front page of their shitty tabloids. But they were wasting their time. Special arrangements had been made to ensure that Khaleel always exited the school from the back of the building, where Jim or Terry would be waiting to pick him up. By the time the vermin from News of the World had set up their cameras, their target was long gone.

The school run was something that Freddie had always longed to be involved in. Perhaps it was selfish of him, but he just couldn’t help it. He wanted to be able to sit in the car and wait for his little boy to come bouncing through the back doors and into his arms. He wanted to help Khaleel put his seatbelt on and laugh when the child insisted he was a big boy and could do it himself. He wanted to sit in the passenger seat, Khaleel’s bookbag and lunchbox balanced on his lap while his bijou excitedly chatted away about what he got up to in class that day, while Jim turned on the radio and made faces at their son through the rear-view mirror.

He wanted to do what every other parent did. But he couldn’t, because he knew wherever he went the paparazzi would be hot on his tail. All sorts of rumours were still circulating in the press about Kenny’s origins. Some still believed he was the secret lovechild of Freddie and Mary, others reported that he was the result of a one-night stand with a fan and perhaps the worst was a statement made by an anonymous “inside source,” who claimed Freddie had purchased him from the Middle East for over fifty million Indian rupees.

He had resigned himself to the reality that there were some things in Khaleel’s life that he would just have to miss out on. Like end-of-year plays, and parent-teacher meetings, and taking the boy to and from school.

That was until Kash had came up with a rather genius idea.

Freddie’s private car would be easily noticed by the paparazzi. But hers wouldn’t.

‘There he goes.’ Freddie said as the Volvo in front of them pulled away from the pavement and began driving towards the back entrance of the school. ‘Be ready, Kash.’

‘Feels like bloody Mission Impossible.’ Kash laughed, keeping her eyes on the road ahead. ‘I don’t know how you put up with this every day. Why didn’t you just save yourself the trouble and stick to painting?’

Freddie chuckled despite himself. ‘Sometimes I wonder.’

He was glad they could still have conversations like this. They had briefly fallen out of contact after the whole ordeal with social services, but Freddie quickly realised that Kashmira wasn’t the one at fault and she had proved her loyalty to him by telling the truth. Even if they weren’t children anymore, defying their parents was no easy feat and poor Kash was withstanding the worst of the fallout.

‘How are they?’ Freddie asked quietly, almost hoping she wouldn’t hear him. But he should have known better; nothing got past his sister.

‘Not good.’ She replied, still looking out towards the road. ‘They keep asking after you, wanting to know if you’re alright. They ask about Khaleel a lot as well. I never know what to say.’

Freddie felt his jaw clench instinctively. ‘Tell them the truth. It’s been two years and he still has nightmares about what happened. He’s still scared to be left alone and can’t stand to be away from us for too long. It was months before he would go into school without clinging to Jim and begging him not to leave. Dr Atkinson says it may affect him for the rest of his life. You tell them that next time they have the nerve to ask you how Khaleel is doing.’

Kash sighed, glancing down at her hands which were gripping the steering wheel. ‘They really regret what they did, Freddie.’

Freddie rolled his eyes. ‘Don’t start, Kash. If you expect me to forgive them-’

‘No, I don’t.’ His sister cut in, her voice eerily calm. ‘If they had done that to Nathalie and Jamal, I wouldn’t forgive them either. I’m not questioning your decision. I just…’ her hands tightened around the wheel a moment as she lost herself in thought, ‘…I need you to know that they’re truly sorry. I know their apologies mean nothing at this point, but they’re not trying to justify their decisions anymore. They’ve accepted that they did a terrible thing and brought everything that’s happened upon themselves. They’re not asking for forgiveness; they just need you to know that they realise they were wrong.’

Freddie hadn’t anticipated such an answer. He was dumbstruck for a moment, tongue retreating behind his teeth as he allowed her words to sink in. As much as he would deny it, there was still a part of him that longed for the company of his mother and father again; he still found himself lingering by the phone on occasion, half hoping they might call or listening for the buzz of the intercom in case they decided to drop by. Knowing that they were truly sorry didn’t make the pain go away but it did give him an odd sense of comfort.

Before he could respond, he saw the Volvo pulling out onto the road ahead, slowly turning the corner until it was out of sight.

‘Here we go.’ A grin spread across Kash’s face as she belted herself in. ‘Keep your head down.’

Freddie ducked out of view as they passed the huddle of reporters, raising his hand to flip them off before sitting up straight in his seat while Kash cackled like a hyena. They drove up the street and turned the corner where the Volvo was sitting waiting for them.

‘Thank you, Kash.’ Freddie said gently, knowing they only had a limited amount of time before the rest of the students came pouring out onto the street. The last thing he needed was to be chased by a gang of schoolchildren at his age. ‘For this, and for telling me how Mama and Papa are. I appreciate it.’

Kashmira smiled at him, though it looked rather strained. ‘You’re welcome.’ Then she added, almost nervously. ‘You know I love you, right?’

‘Yes.’ Freddie replied, voice almost catching in his throat. ‘I know. I love you too.’

He opened the car door and went to step out, glancing over at the Volvo where Khaleel was sitting in the backseat, bouncing excitedly at the sight of his Baba. Freddie hesitated a moment, before turning to Kash again. ‘Why don’t you and Roger come over for dinner tonight? Bring the kids with you?’

Kashmira’s dark eyes batted in surprise, but she didn’t look displeased. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Jim’s making shepherd's pie tonight and he always makes too much, so…’ He shrugged in a rather lukewarm effort to display indifference, when in fact his heart was hammering painfully. To his relief, Kash smiled.

‘That sounds perfect. I’d love to come.’

‘About six ’clock?’

‘We’ll be there.’

Freddie nodded, the tightness in his chest finally ceasing to be. He wandered if he should embrace her, but decided he wasn’t quite ready for that step and simply said, ‘see you later,’ before shutting the door and making his way over to the Volvo.

‘Baba!’ Khaleel cried as soon as Freddie was near, and he rolled his window down so Freddie could poke his head through and start covering him in kisses. ‘You came, you came!’

‘Yes, I did!’ Freddie blew a raspberry into the child’s neck, making him squeal. ‘We better take you home and get your homework finished – Auntie Kash and your cousins are coming over for dinner.’

Khaleel’s blue-green eyes went wide with joy. ‘Are Dādī and Dādā coming too?’

Freddie’s smile disappeared and he briefly made eye contact with Jim, before saying, ‘I’m sorry, darling. Dādī and Dādā are very busy.’

Khaleel crossed his arms and pouted, ‘they’re always busy.’

‘I know…’ That familiar tightness returned to Freddie's chest, squeezing until it almost hurt to breathe. ‘But let’s not think about that now. Daddy’s making shepherd’s pie, and if you finish your homework on time, you can help him stir the pot.’

This seemed to put the boy in good spirits again and he spent the majority of the car ride chatting away to Freddie about his day as Jim drove them home, careful to keep themselves scarce from any prying eyes. When Khaleel eventually trailed off and turned his attention to the contents of his bookbag, Jim glanced at his husband in the passenger seat and murmured, ‘are you sure you’re okay having Kash over tonight?’

Freddie took a deep breath, staring out the window at the people passing by, not really caring if he was recognised. ‘I can hardly go about the rest of my life pretending she doesn’t exist.’

When this didn’t earn the chuckle he had anticipated, he sighed. ‘None of this is Kash's fault. I know she could have told me sooner about Mama and Papa calling social services, but what matters is that she did tell me. She chose me over them, which must have been the hardest thing she’s ever had to do. I’ve already lost most of my family, I don’t need to lose anymore. It's time to make peace.’

Jim nodded wordlessly, reaching over and gently grasping Freddie’s hand. ‘I’m really proud of you, sweetheart.’

Freddie lifted the Irishman's hand to kiss his knuckles. ‘Thank God somebody is, darling.’

This was a perfect mix of sweet and angsty. Lol at the beginning I thought it'll be about our dads picking their baby up from school and being all cute and adorable, then BAM, came the angst. But I absolutely loved it!

Someone recently asked in the notes of one your drabbles about any lingering trauma that Khaleel feels at this point in the series. I think they've got their answer now. It's plausible really, for a child to experience the after-effects of being so harshly separated from his parents. I can only imagine how painful it must've been for the real Freddie to be isolated from his parents at such a young age. Poor baby.

I am glad Kash and Freddie are mending their relationship. I often get the feeling that Kash was never too involved in Freddie's life, but had Freddie survived his illness, it's possible that they may have grown closer. In the context of what has happened in this universe specifically, it'll be a while before they're completely comfortable with each other. But I am glad that Freddie is making an effort.

The end was so sweet, my heart. The perfect end to all the angst💙

(More drabbles by writer anon)

(All the parts of this series can also be found under the tag #freddie and jim and their baby on this blog)

[vagrantblvrd]

jeremavinwood wtih battle buddies?

Hmmm.

Okay, so.

I’m going to do this with FAHC AU because look, okay, look.

That one FAHC AU where Michael’s just starting out with this whole life of crime business. Hired muscle for whoever wants to hire him and not much else. (No one wants anything else, and he’s fine with that.)

Somewhere along the way he meets Gavin, you know. Little bastard working for a crew that hires Michael on.

Some kind of hacker or tech guy and completely ignored by the other hired muscle and most of the regular crew because he’s this scrawny little British fuck.

Michael’s just there for whatever job he’s been hired for, so he doesn’t plan on getting to know Gavin or the others, which is his own mistake because Gavin?

God knows why Gavin is !!! about Michael almost from the start, zeroes in on him whenever he’s around and pestering the fuck out of him. Will make a beeline for him when Michael’s around and it turns into this odd little friendship after a while because once that job’s over they have these moments where they’re working for the same crew or just run into one another at random times.

And, okay. Gavin’s not the worst person to talk to with the odd way his brain works of his bizarre/ridiculous questions. The way he just plonks himself down next to Michael when he’s eating and starts rambling on about something or other for the longest time, but they’re not friends okay?

They’re not.

(...but maybe???)

Anyhow, Michael works crews and gangs whoever will hire him. Gavin’s this annoying thorn in his side and life is somehow not completely terrible.

Michael’s just starting to think he can have something good here if he’s lucky, careful, so of course that’s when things go wrong.

He’s working for some asshole and he’s got a bad feeling about it the whole damn time but it’s not like he’s got a lot of options open to him if he wants to pay his bills and the whatnot.

He’s definitely not surprised when shit goes wrong in the worst way and he has to make a run for it. Too much too fast and just enough time to warn Gavin to keep an eye out, maybe leave the city. (Just in case, because people know they know one another and it’d be a shitty thing for him not to warn Gavin.)

Michael ends up running all the way to Los Santos, loses whoever was chasing him in the city. (Loses part of himself too, but that’s not important because hey, he’s still alive, so yeah.)

And then, okay.

And then.

While he’s busy making a life for himself there he keeps running into this one asshole – wonders if it’s something wrong with him that this shit keeps happening, but whatever – who has the worst fashion sense Michael’s ever had the misfortune to witness with his own two eyes.

Moron who calls himself Rimmy Tim like that’s a real name and talks real big for someone so short. (Good thing he’s got the muscles to back that mouth of his up, though.)

This Rimmy Tim, guy, though.

He’s not like all the other goons and thugs in the city. Doesn’t really move like them although Michael can tell he’s trying to.

Yeah, no.

The guy’s got real training, right. Maybe former military or some law enforcement behind him, but whatever it was he’s not talking. Would rather wax poetic about some sweet new car he’s got Plans for one day, and all the way he’s going to ruin it with his hideous color scheme.

Drag Michael out to a bar and buy him drinks until they’re both too drunk not to get into a bar fight (or two, or more) and have to run from the cops that get called in to deal with the drunk assholes fighting over the stupidest shit ever.

Maybe, kind of falls into bed with him every so often, all these bad decisions and a life that probably won’t let them grow old and hey, why the fuck not you know?

Michael’s got his regrets and Jeremy’s (yeah, no, he’s shit at keeping the Rimmy Tim thing straight even when he hasn’t had a few) got his and anyway, anyway,  this thing between them isn’t serious. Just a friends with benefits thing, even if they really aren’t friends, you know?

Like, sure. Eventually they get a place together because they’re tired of living in shitty little apartments and if they put their money together they can afford someplace halfway decent because Los Santos can be stupid expensive.

It’s just a smart move on their part, really. Cuts down on expenses and other shit and if it means sometimes they just sprawl out on the couch watching some shitty movie together instead of hitting a bar and getting into fights all the damn time for no real reason, that’s a price they have to pay.

(And, like. If  “falling into bed together” sometimes means they don’t do the do and just sleep, that’s their own problem, isn’t it.)

But then because reasons shit happens.

They get hired by this asshole that neither of them can afford to say no to – offers they can’t refuse and by this point they’ve kind of gained a reputation for themselves. The kind that assholes can take advantage of because Michael and Jeremy are idiots and not as subtle as they think they are, and anyway, anyway.

This asshole has a problem and they’re just muscle hired on to help him with said problem.

This creepy, spooky bastard that’s just starting to make a reputation of his own here in Los Santos. Vicious bastard who wears s fucking skull mask (who does that?) and has taken to picking off their new bosses people/allies/etc.

Real vendetta kind of bullshit, and it’s gotten to be a Problem for the guy.

Enough that he’s hiring the best people he can get his hands on (threaten) and somehow Michael and Jeremy are grouped in there.

And then, okay.

Shit gets weird.

Because there are all these rumors and stories floating around this Vagabond character that just don’t add up? Things he’s done (said to have done) that one person, no matter how skilled, could have pulled off.

Michael and Jeremy are positive he has to have at least one partner working with him, if not more.

No other way to explain how he’s supposed to have dealt with a weapons deal up in Blaine County the same time he sniped a fucker in La Mesa. (Hell of a shot and while no one’s saying he’s not up to it, it’s   impossible for anyone to be in two places at once.)

More and more stories like that come rolling in as Michael and Jeremy work for this asshole, see the way the other hired muscle is getting picked off. The way their boss keeps losing allies and whatever else to the Vagabond. (And his partner, even if everyone else is so damn certain this guy’s a lone wolf or whatever.)

They’re pretty sure it’s a matter of time until they get picked off, because of course, and are making half-assed plans to run for it before that happens.

No loyalty to their current boss, and anyway, neither of them plan to die for someone like him – so of course, of course, that’s when they have their first run-in with this Vagabond asshole, you know?Checking on an operation their boss is getting antsy about and oh, hey, there’s that fucker with the skull mask.

Flesh and blood and not this bogeyman the stories insist he is because Michael clips him with a shot when the guy gets the drop on Jeremy.

Lucky shot, really, because the bastard’s too busy staring at Jeremy to notice Michael until the last moment and it’s a clusterfuck, really.

Jeremy with his own little flesh-wound from one of the Vagabond’s knives and Michael freaked out at the close call. (At Jeremy going all quiet and locked down from it, and Michael was too worried to push because he’s never seen Jeremy like that in all the time he’s known him.)

Their boss is not pleased when they tell him what happened, because by the time they got there everyone else was dead or managed to escape and it was just the Vagabond waiting for them, and the clusterfuck that followed.

They get yelled at, because of course, and go home to lick their wounds in private and wait for their boss to call them for the next job.

Michael’s worried because Jeremy’s acting weird okay, even for him. Doesn’t say a damn thing until Michael’s patching him up and then it’s.

Fuck, it’s Jeremy’s Tragic Backstory, isn’t it.

This whole mess of a story of a government agency Michael's never heard of and a partner (that whole bit about Jeremy and his regrets) Michael’s pretty sure Jeremy was involved with or wanted to be, and this suicide mission they were sent on to cover up their agency’s dirty little secrets.

One that got Jeremy’s partner killed and damn near killed Jeremy, had him faking his death and hiding out in Los Santos and eventually meeting up with Michael and the whole downhill ride from there. (Because really, okay, really.)

Jeremy just. Telling Michael everything about his past this this weirdo partner of his he definitely loved even if they never Talked About It and Michael having the worst feeling why -

“And, uh,” Jeremy says, worst kind of smile on his face as he stares down at the floor, drops of his own blood while Michael was patching him up, “I’m pretty sure he just tried to kill me.”

Awkward laugh as he looks up at Michael. “Us, I mean,” because the Vagabond took a swipe at Michael before he ran, tossed a throwing knife his way although thankfully it missed.

And Michael, okay.

Just.

“Great,” Michael says, because what else can he say? “That’s awesome.”

Anyway, anyway.

They try to carry on best they can after that, go through the motions when it comes to their boss although now they’re less worried about what he might do and more interested in why the Vagabond’s going after him so fucking hard.

Do a little digging – Jeremy knows a hacker in Matt, and Michael knows a guy who knows almost everything there is to know in the city in Alfredo – and then they make the worst goddamned choices ever.

Go looking for the Vagabond and whoever he’s working for and it ends up with them having these altercations where the bastard thinks they’re trying to kill him.

Clearly working for the bastard he’s going after for whatever reason, and the fact they’re looking for him means they want him dead and it’s just. Worst Scooby Doo shenanigans ever.

Results in more close calls and flesh-wounds and Jeremy getting all worked up because okay, yeah, that is definitely that asshole Ryan and goddammit, he just wants to talk, so fucking stop shooting at him!!! (Also, quiet mopey Jeremy with Michael off to the side wondering why the hell his life is the way it is.)

One night Jeremy takes off to find Ryan without telling Michael, so of course it goes horribly wrong, you know?

Michael and Jeremy’s boss being suspicious of the two of them not putting their hearts into working for him and putting a tail on them, and anyway.

Jeremy finds Ryan and actually gets to talk to him without the two of them shooting at one another or getting involved in another stupidly awesome knife fight. (Like, hardcore awesome because Ryan helped train Jeremy in knife fighting back in their agency days so it’s all that training Ryan gave him plus whatever Jeremy’s picked up on his own since and the two of them being almost evenly matched, but I digress.)

And, okay. Some of that did happen, but Jeremy managed to talk to Ryan, get him to listen and just when he was making some headway into getting Ryan to believe that Jeremy and Michael don’t want to kill him their boss and his flunkies show up and drag the two of them off to “have a discussion”.

Michael is like, goddammit, when he realizes Jeremy ran off because he knows where he has to have gone, even if he doesn’t know where. Is about to call Alfredo or even Matt for help when he gets a text.

Unknown number and suspicious as hell. Just an address and something about knowing where Jeremy and Ryan are, but he doesn’t have a lot of choices.

Goes to the address and it’s definitely a trap. Shitty apartment in a rundown building and the kind of place people disappear all the time, and that’s when he hears footsteps behind him and a gun being cocked and turns to see that little bastard Gavin, of all people.

Looks a hell of lot different from the last time they saw one another. Older, thinner (not in a good way) and exhausted as hell.

Holds the gun in his hands like he knows how to use it, and this edge to his smile Michael doesn’t remember seeing before.

It sucks, it does, because what's happened since they last saw one another can’t have been good to have Gavin looking at him the way he is. Like he’s not sure he can trust Michael, even though there was a time Michael knew he did. (The way he trusted Gavin.)

Still.

Jeremy and Ryan and all that.

(And that’s a hell of a shock, realizing Gavin was Ryan’s partner in all this...whatever the two of them have been doing. The sniper who killed that asshole in La Mesa while the Vagabond dealt with a weapons deal in Blaine County and so many other things. Shit Michael never thought about Gavin doing, even though some part of him knew with the shit Gavin used to say.)

This uneasy truce until they get Jeremy and Ryan back (and not wanting to think about what happens then, because talk about confusing and mess as hell) and just.

Work together to figure out what happened. Go to Alfredo and Matt and piece shit together and then cobble together some incredibly risky, half-assed plan to get their idiots back.

(Because Gavin talks about Ryan the way Michael does about Jeremy and oh, man, that’s another kick to the chest because way back when there was a part of Michael that wanted to have Plans involving Gavin, if they ever got lucky enough to be in a position they could have plans, you know? But anyway, focus on the now and Jeremy and Ryan and deal with everything else later.)

Shenanigans and terrible plans that almost get them killed, so it’s a relief when Jeremy and Ryan meet them halfway through them after escaping from whatever locked room they were being held in. More shenanigans in all of them escaping and leaving the building to burn to the ground behind them and then, like.

Talking.

But also patching one another up, and Ryan watching the way Michael’s careful with Jeremy and vice versa. Michael watching Gavin fussing over Ryan and seeing the look on Jeremy’s face and oh, Jesus Christ, this is definitely nothing Michael ever expected in his life because fucking Christ, what even is this?

Ryan and Gavin telling him and Jeremy how they happened to meet up in Los Santos a few years back. Gavin having wandered over after a series of events he glosses over in the most infuriating way (and Michael being weirdly, exasperatedly fond about it) and oh, hey, that’s a creepy bastard in a cheap mask,  is it?

Ryan thinking Jeremy was killed on the suicide mission their agency sent them on and faking his own death and just. A lot of shit involving conspiracy theories and the whatnot that resulted in the Vagabond coming about because mission of vengeance and the like.

Ryan coming to Los Santos because the last people behind the conspiracy were here, and meeting Gavin and the two of them teaming up because why not. (Mostly Gavin not leaving Ryan the fuck alone, and maybe needing something to focus on himself, and he liked Ryan, didn’t he.)

And then, just.

Shenanigans.

The two of them working together, no one knowing about Gavin because Ryan was the focus, wasn’t he? Wanted people paying attention to him – especially the ones he was hunting – and it was better (safer) for Gavin to stay in the shadows.

And then the whole clusterfuck with Michael and Jeremy and everything that happened afterward until this most recent bullshit and just.

Where to go now that Jeremy and Ryan know the other’s alive (And wow, that’s going to be a lot of Talking and Conversations in the future for them, assuming they survive to have them.)

Also Michael and Gavin and their whatever is going on there. (More of this Talking and Conversations, one assumes.)

Ryan trying to get Jeremy and Michael to leave town, leave everything to him and Gavin, as if that would actually happen and Michael watching Jeremy tear the Vagabond a new one. (Gavin trying and failing not to laugh, because Ryan really is an idiot.)

Michael shrugging when Ryan asks him what he thinks because fuck if he knows, you know? But it’s obvious to him Jeremy’s not going to let Ryan and Gavin tackle this mess on their own anymore, and he’s kind of invested in Jeremy not being dead, so.

Yeah.

The four of them working together to bring this asshole (and the others Ryan and Gavin have been targeting) down, and all these Feelings springing up as they do.

Those quiet nights spent staring at whatever plans they’re working on. Other sleepless nights where Michael finds Ryan brooding or Gavin working on something on his computer. Jeremy working the heavy bag – because of course there’s one set up wherever Ryan and Gavin are working out of – and Ryan wandering down to watch him.

Wistful glances and all that good stuff. Lingering touches and so on. Patching one another up after a fight or going after another target.

Michael picking up on Ryan’s restlessness and goading him into a fight – sorry, sparring match – even though he knows he’s outmatched.

(Jeremy got hurt earlier and Gavin took him to a discreet doctor they know and it’s the two of them in whatever base Ryan and Gavin are using and it’s a mercy, what Michael’s doing even though he knows he’s going to get his ass handed to him.

And, sure. It looks that way at first, but eventually Ryan gets his head out of his ass and realizes what Michael’s doing/did, and it goes from being this potentially dangerously idiotic thing Michael instigated to. Like. Something almost fun?

Ryan teaching him some hand-to-hand moves he learned in his agency days, and Michael managing to throw/pin him just as Jeremy and Gavin get back and it’s awkward as hell because wow, compromising position they’re in?

But it just gets a thoughtful look from Jeremy and Gavin – the two of them sharing a look before smirking and laughing at Michael and Ryan and just what the fuck is that about, huh? - and other such things.

Final battle/whatever with the baddies and close calls and all that and the four of them being all ??? about what to do now that things have been settled?Because look.

Feelings and emotionally constipated assholes, right?

Someone proposes that it wouldn’t hurt if they continued working together – the Vagabond’s reputation and ones Michael and Jeremy have earned for themselves. Gavin working from the shadows, watching their backs and looking out for them and they really do make a hell of a team.

Picking up jobs/heists that Alfredo and Matt toss their way, and the slow realization that oh shit, they’re hot they face on a near daily basis because Feelings and lack of jealousy and general appreciation for the other three being unfairly attractive assholes until they get their shit together.

Because reasons.

ALSO.

ALL the cats, because Gavin and Jeremy and the stray population in Los Santos. (Also a pupper or two,  because Michael and Ryan and the stray population in Los Santos.)

At some point Geoff and Jack happen along, and when the Fake AH Crew becomes a thing they need a hacker and some asshole who knows almost everything that happens in Los Santos and just.

It turns into a mess, is the thing, a horrible, horrible mess. (The worst.)

[magic5ball]

Nature Trail to Hell Arc IV: Megamart of Darkness (9)

Chapter 9: Dropping the A-Bomb

           I just stood there, having no idea what to say or do. It was like looking in a mirror at the grim, jaded hump of crap you know you’re going to be in ten years if the scholarship doesn’t work out. It was a sight that would bring most grown men to their knees, so considering I was a little kid at the time, it was a wonder I was even standing at all.

Yet somehow, I managed to spit words.

“T-the water.” I trembled, “g-give it back.”

He looked at the glowing plastic bottle in his hand. “Sorry kid, no can do. This here’s company property now. But if you want, I’m more than willing to sit down for an adult conversation.”

The way he said those last two words made my blood freeze, no small task when the ‘sun’ was shining so bright overhead. 

He gestured over to an area at the foot of the inflatable volcano, where two plastic chairs and a table rested. On top of the table were several Red Solo cups and a bottle of Crystal Springs Bottled Water.

“Like I said, its’ been awhile since I’ve had company. Besides the Wegmart Company, that is! Ha!”

My feeble ten year old mind struggled to grapple with the fact that someday I would find jokes like that funny. One of the most horrible experiences of my life.

But what could I do? Thanks to stories from my gangster days, I knew darn well what this A-Bomb was capable of, and I wasn’t really in a position to take chances. So I followed him to the tables, trying not to think about how Bokrug should have been here by now, despite his lumbering movements.

Naturally, I didn’t make a peep. If there’s one thing I learned from comic books, its’ best not to set these friendly-lookin’ types off.

When we did get to that table, first thing the guy did was offer me some of that crisp, refreshing, bottled water. Though the heat from the lava made it really tempting, I knew I’d never be able to live with myself if I did.

“Suit yourself, kiddo.” He said, pouring a cup of his own. “We aren’t that different, you know. In fact, you’re a lot like me when I was little…”

On the outside, I stared like the teacher was about to bring the whipping stick. On the inside, I wanted to scream, because long talks with my Dad had taught me where this was going.

                                                      .   .   .

“When I was your age, I also went to a Summer Camp, it was called Camp Salmon or something like that. Anyway, the counselors running the camp were mean. Like, really, really mean, so the second I could I dashed right on out of there and into the woods. Sound familiar?”

Naturally, I didn’t say a word. Throat was too parched, anyway. A-Bomb laughed.

“Oh who am I kidding?! Of course it does! I know because Wegmart has surveillance cameras everywhere!”

He pressed something under the table, and from the ground emerged a device made from a bunch of big screen T.V.s hastily duct taped together, several flashing images of my adventures over the summer. The rest showed the frozen foods aisle, where my feathered allies were getting ‘ahem’, ‘cleaned up’ in the most gruesome way possible.

“Like you, Watterson Tostig, I went into the underworld and escaped. I too, was inducted into a gang of dinosaurs. I, too, became God of Roadside America. But at the end of the day, guys like us have to settle down and face reality. Wegmart saved me, kid, and if you’re willing, it’ll save you too.”

All that time, I didn’t turn away from the screen. I couldn’t.

“I thought I could spend the rest of my life hiding in the produce aisle. But I was foolish back then, a rogue vagrant eating grapefruit peels. Until THEY rescued we. The founders of Wegmart took my withered ghost and showed me the way to love, happiness, and most importantly, low, low prices!”

Yeah, yeah. The low, low price of a human soul!

“I was weak at first, but the kind folks at Wegmart saw my talents as a brown bagger and before I knew it, I had my own private toothpick in the faculty room! After that, they put me into production.”

Here’s the thing about young me being stoic: even at the best of times, he was kinda bad at it. Sometimes I even wonder if he had some kind of attention deficit. Not saying little me cocked an eyebrow at the mention of ‘production’, but he looked at me like I did before he went on yammering again. 

“Oh yeah! You’re not in the know of company business. Right!  See, our store used to have a 3D printer they would use to take the employee of the month and just clone him until they had an entire staff of the perfect worker! And yours truly has held the position for ten years!”

Ever since I was young enough to confuse Wegmart with Disneyland, I’d always noticed how all the brown baggers looked the same. Suddenly, everything made terrible, terrible sense. But worse was the realization that, just like those cereal box sweepstakes, the empty, dotted line cutout of a man could have easily been me!

“Shame they recalled the printer. Something about lead based ink. Or the clones having higher than normal rates of cancer. Really, I just signed the paperwork. But enough of the sad stuff, Watters! Let’s talk future! Because I’ve seen you in action and man, you’re just the kind of spunk to breathe life into this company!”

Least, I think that’s what he said. Bokrug’s running tardy was really nerving me up.

“So join me, Watterson! And let us rule the Wegmart like manager and employee!”

“No.” I whispered.

“Eh?” A-Bomb cocked an eyebrow, like he’d never heard the word in years.

And with that, I could stay silent no longer. The anger, the one that’d been boiling so steadily I me like the giant volcano we sat at the foot of, went full Krakatoa!

“Are you deaf, poophead?! I said NO!. And you know why? Because all you did was make a giant self-pity sob story for yourself, because you think that if you can drag me down with you into this Megamart of Darkness, you’ll feel better about stealing water from a bunch of geese! I’m pretty sure you could have gotten some from Rite Aid if you were willing to play fair!”

“Rite Aid doesn’t sell-“

“My point is, you’re just jealous of me because I’m not a cog in the machine like you! And that ‘we’re so alike’ bullcrap wouldn’t work on a five year old! So no, I won’t join you, because I might have sold my soul to a Tako Shak, but even I have stinking standards, you self-pitying TURD!”

A-Bomb stared at me, mouth agape for a few seconds. “T-the T-word?...”

“You heard me right, TURD!, so you better let me go unless you want more of the same! I’ll even tell my Mom, and you really don’t want to see her when she’s angry!”

“No, no, I get it…” he pushed a button under the table.

Another hole opened in the ground, and from it emerged what I can only describe as a nuclear missile made entirely of fuzzy orange Shampows.

“Your friends and family are holding you back, little bro! So how about I sweeten the deal: you join me, and I don’t rain Shampow down on your entire neighborhood!”

I tried to move, only to find myself stuck to my seat. Literally. The son of a snitch must have superglued the thing beforehand!

“So, do we have a deal?”

I didn’t say a word.

“Do. We. Have. A. Deal?”

Now I might have been a bit of a turd back in the day, but darn it, I couldn’t let an entire neighborhood get wiped from existence! Especially when the neighbor hadn’t even returned out lawnmower yet!

“Okay! Okay! I’ll join you! I’ll be your whipping boy. I’ll even stock Barbie dolls if I have to! Just don’t press hat button!”

And you know what the prick did? He kept putting his finger closer and closer to the launch button!

“But I thought you said you wouldn’t do it if I joined!”

“Foolish Watt! Your petty loyalties to the neighborhood make you weak! We must purge this from your mind so you can know true Wegmart! Just like my manager did to my neighborhood!”

But you know what the worst part was? He said this using the most condescending, prickish voice I could imagine.

Still, one thing needed clearing up.

“Hey A-Bomb? What was your neighborhood?”

Guy didn’t say a word, but the way he shut up after that spoke plenty.

“… They called it New Jersey.” He whispered.

I rolled my eyes, knowing full well it might be the last time I ever express sarcasm. Of course!

Time slowed to a crawl as I waited on the imminent destruction of everything I ever gave a crap about. Oh, I tried to see things from the half full perspective, but not even the knowledge my douchebag brother was probably going to get caught dab smack in the middle of the detonation zone passed out on the couch watching teen drama reruns could compensate for everything. At least A-Bomb was taking his sweet time pressing, probably so he could rub it in more.

In fact, he was taking a lot of sweet time. (Granted five minutes is pretty long for a ten year old, but still!) Then I noticed he was pressing the detonation button multiple times, each time faster and more flustered. I looked up, wondering if the Lord himself had intervened on behalf of little old me, even after everything. 

In fact, my salvation had come in the form of a certain goose, who grinned triumphantly, a plug and wire in his beak, machine gun cradled in his wings.

“Bokrug!”

The noble bird spit out the plug, beaming with triumph despite being so plucked of feathers he was practically naked. A-Bomb was, on the other hand, for the first time since I saw him feeling something other than calm, collected, or several other words you find in yoga advertisements. His face turned so red I figured he’d explode any minute, just like his namesake.

“YOU!” he leapt up from his seat, facing down the glorious gander. ”I had ONE chance to find happiness! ONE chance to have somebody to share this miserable job! Years of planning, plotting, scheming, and with one bite you ruined it!” He unsheathed those golf clubs from his back. “Do you know what its’ like to run a store with only clones of yourself?! With everyone knowing exactly what you do?! Its’ so, so BOORIIINNGGG!”

“Then perhaps you should have found a happiness that did not require the suffering of another.” He bared his beak, bits of Wegmart technology still stuck in them. “Or technology easily damaged by the humblest of beaks.” like he was emphasizing the point, he cocked the machine gun, maing probably the world’s most satisfying click. 

“Who do you think you are, my Mom?!” He spun his golf clubs around, making a combination of kung-fu poses and noises that could only be described as either really stupid or really racist. Possibly both.

“Bokrug-kun! You have brought great dishonor upon my house. Prepare to die!” he cried in the phoniest Japanese accent I ever heard.

“I’m Egyptian, you a$$hole!”

With a guttural roar, the waterfowl from hell charged in kind, raining bullets like hellfire.

It was the awesomest f*cking thing I ever saw.

[captainlordauditor]

300x3 7:02

300 words 3 times a week etc

I wrote this Tuesday and then just..completely forgot to post it. This is I guess the thing I’m gonna be poking at when I need a break from earth 988 but I’m staying in Batman? It’s basically the same concept of messing around with the timeline by moving up a character’s birth several years but with Jason, so I’ve labeled it earth 488. Timeline’s not super worked out so the ages are subject to change. 1729 words.

Warnings for brief mentions of drugs, CSA, etc, standard Batman warnings I guess

The kid’s in college when Bruce first meets him, or rather he should be; instead he’s hotwired the Batmobile and taken it for a ride, and Batman finds him several streets away from where he left it, grinning fit to burst, classic rock blaring out the open windows. He slams the brakes when he sees the local cryptid in front of him and stops just short of hitting Batman, but he doesn’t lose that grin the whole time.

“You gonna turn me in or what, Batsy?” His eyes are a rusty blue green like the water in the bay in the summer, and Batman sees a reckless storm in them. His eyes are like justice; his eyes are like liberty.

He should be angry, should be fuming, especially tonight, but he’s not. He laughed himself stupid when he found the car missing and it’s a struggle to keep himself from laughing again when confronted with the thief. “What do you think you’re doing?”

He tilts his head, easy, like he’s having the most casual conversation in the world. “Wanted to see if she drives as pretty as she looks.”

Batman sighs, watching him. “You must be very good, to get past the security measures.”

He shrugs. He’s too thin, too small, his jacket hanging off of him like Batman’s cape. “I do alright.”

The Bat glides over to the drivers side door. “Show me.”

He tries to drop the kid off at the only group home in the neighborhood, but the kid laughs his head off when he sees the building. “That’s my grandma's place,” he says. “Taught me all I know. She’s running a museum heist tonight, you know that?”

Batman’s heart stops. He turns his head, watches the thief in the seat next to him, his head rolled back against the seat. His red-black hair is mussed from the wind, his eyes are sparkling with laughter. He looks godly; he looks obscene. Batman wants to see him like this again.

“Goes to show, right?” says the thief. “Everything good in Gotham rots.”

Batman releases the parking brake. “That’s not true.”

“Sure it is. What’s rotting you, Batsy?”

“Which museum?”

He sees the thief again the next week, walking the Bowery without a shirt under his jacket. He saunters over to the Batmobile and drapes himself against the door, displaying his skinny bare chest for Batman to admire. Batman thinks of what it would be like to wrap him in the warmest blanket in the manor. “You finally here to rot with the rest of us, Batsy?”

“I thought you were a thief,” Batman says. 

“I’m whatever you want,” he replies, and Batman doesn’t know why he was so much more attractive stealing a car than when he’s openly flirting. “I can even be your Robin for the night, if that’s what you’re after.” He tilts his head, smile fading. “Is that what’s rotting you, Batsy?”

Batman’s jaw twitches as he clenches it. He’s heard the insinuations before, and he’s never liked them. “I’m looking for Two Face.”

The man’s face turns from contemplating the edge of anger to a hard determination. Batman decides he likes it. “Yeah, I know where he is.”

Batman doesn’t know what it is that makes him unlock the door and say, “get in,” but he does.

“I’ll miss work if I do that,” he says. He leans in closer. “Or I could give you a discount. Call it two hundred for the whole night.”

In this area, Batman’s sure that’s not his usual pricing. “I’ll pay you after we catch Two Face.” Last week he ran off before Batman could talk to him; he doesn’t want to lose another chance for conversation.

He opens the door and settles in the car, sprawls on the seat, opens the window, lights a cigarette. Virginia slim. “Heard his guys talking plans two days ago. Were in the next room over from mine for the night. Said they’re hitting the Lucky Dollar Casino.”

“That’s in Bristol.” Bristol has looser gambling laws. It’s an effort to control vice, send it out of the city. Batman can’t say it works.

He shrugs, watching Batman through heavy lidded eyes. Batman thinks of what it’d be like to take that cigarette from his mouth and kiss him gently. Instead he says, “If Robin smells that on the seats, I’ll never hear the end of it.”

He laughs, a quiet genuine snicker of amusement, nothing like the shrieks of thrill and irony he gave last week. Batman wants to hear that sound again. “Where is he, anyway?”

“It’s a school night.”

He gets his wish. “You’re a wonder, Batsy. Didn’t know you cared so much about that punk.”

“He’s not a punk.” Alfred used to say he spent too much time in the past; maybe so, because this is still his reflex when people use that word, even if he knows it’s not what they mean.

“He’s out here running around with you, isn’t he? Beating up robbers in a pair of booty shorts.” He takes a drag on his cigarette and Batman looks at him and wonders that he knows what he just said.

“It’s a leotard. Acrobat’s gear.” He ignores the thief’s snort.

Two Face gets away, but Batman gets the hostage he took, so he considers it a half successful night.  He comes back to the car where the other man is waiting, his feet up on the dash. He finished his first cigarette around the time they got here, but he’s already halfway through another one.

He taps his knuckles against the window, bounces his leg. “I know you said you’d pay me after you caught him, but I’m not waiting until tomorrow.”

“I’ll pay you tonight.” Batman starts the car. 

His name is Jason; he’s nineteen years old. Batman’s glad of that, because from his height and build, he thought Jason was younger. He feels less guilty about looking at him now.

He eats steadily, watching Batman like he knows the food won’t disappear but thinks Batman might. He doesn’t, not yet; he’s finding he likes Jason when he’s not acting a part, or at least when he’s toned it down. He has a good brain and a quick wit, even if his humor is a little raw. 

“Can you only steal cars?” 

He shakes his head, licks ketchup off his thumb. It’s not sensual at all, just a habit gained from starvation, eating every scrap of food, and that makes it all the better. His eyes meet Batman’s over his hand. “M’not so good with safes, but I can do windows and pockets fine. ‘M a pretty good shot. Can do explosives okay, if you give me a gun I can probably fix it. I know how to dilute coke and what to do if someone ODs on Harry.” He takes a long drag of soda through his straw, not looking at Batman. It’s the first time he’s avoided eye contact. 

After a moment, he looks back up. “I can conjugate German and translate Latin. Read the Odyssey a couple times. It’s better in Greek.”

His brain, unbidden, supplies him with the image of Jason laid out before him like a god, Bruce and poetry against his mouth. He would do for this Jason what Medea could not do for hers, he hopes, and win his loyalty.

 He banishes the thought. No, this is not Jason; this is Ganymede, and Batman will not be as Zeus. “Why work the streets then?” He asks instead.

He pauses, looking at his food and then back at Batman. He’s leaning forward over the table and there’s barely a foot between them. “I like it,” he says. It has the straightforwardness of honesty. “If I do drugs or enforcement I’d have to work for someone else. There aren’t any gangs here I like enough to sign away my soul. Not yet.” He slides his leg forward to brush up against Batman’s under the table, so lightly Batman’s not sure he’d notice it if it weren’t for his training. There’s no shock, no static, but it feels electric nonetheless.

“There are options,” he tells Jason. He doesn’t dare move his leg.

“I haven’t been to a proper school since I was ten,” Jason retorts. “What options do you mean? Drown in debt to get through college so I can get a job above the table? A corporation’s just the same as a gang, except you can’t snitch and send them to jail when they treat you like shit. Besides,” he leans back, doubling the distance between them, stretching it into an infinity, slips his leg away from Batman’s. “You arrested Maroni. You took apart the Blackgaters.”

Batman looks away. Those eyes are piercing him, bearing down on him like the god of justice come down to judge him. It’s a rude reminder, that he doesn’t always do good; a stab in the gut that his choice removed that of somebody else, somebody with greater stakes in the game. 

But Jason is right; Batman did arrest Maroni, and he did take apart the Blackgaters, for the most part. It’ll be a month or so before the void is filled where the fence was before, when the rest of Gotham is sure he’ll lose the trial. The Blackgaters will follow, only once they have a place closer than Penguin to sell the parts off the cars they steal.

And in the meantime, Jason will walk the streets. In December.

Batman never thought he’d feel guilty about arresting someone for a crime he knew they’d committed, but here he is. How many other car thieves are in the same boat? He almost wonders if he should let Two Face go, but then he remembers the shots fired and the hostage held tonight, and scolds himself for thinking such a thing.

Maybe Jason’s right, everything good in Gotham rots. Sometimes there are no good choices, no good answers.

He gives Jason his two hundred, in eight twenties, so it’s easy to break, tucks the lone fifty in his wallet over it and calls it a tip. Bruce Wayne may carry hundreds to give to the homeless like candy, but Batman doesn’t. He leaves it on the table beside the wrapper for a burger and when Jason goes to throw out his trash, he vanishes.

[thinkingisadangerouspastime]

killer queen

(in which the author is self-indulgent, aziraphale presents as female, and crowley is torn between holding on and letting go)

note: i definitely wrote this while blasting killer queen, but that was probably obvious

this fic was loosely based off this request by @olivianeesan! i really went wild with it but it was fun so hopefully all's well that ends well

i'd like to apologize in advance because my 1920s nerd had a field day writing this lmao

~*~

Go to America, they said. It's the perfect place to plant the seeds of evil, they said.

Well, they'd been right. But that didn't mean Crowley had to like it.

Of course, his dislike wasn't inherent to America, at least not necessarily. Though he'd never admit it, he'd been in a seemingly perpetual bad mood following his falling out with Aziraphale in 1862.

They hadn't spoken since. And 60 years had already passed.

What was worse was that they didn't usually leave off on such a bad note. And even if they did, they would reconcile within a week or two. But this time, they hadn't.

Maybe that was what irked Crowley so much. The lack of reconciliation. Not to mention he wasn't particularly interested in digging through his emotions to figure out what else might be sparking his frustration.

(It was possible, even, that a part of him was afraid to find out.)

That being said, Crowley ended up being pretty successful in America. He was successful everywhere, of course, but Jazz Age America truly was the perfect feeding ground for evil. Americans were always looking for a little sin. Speakeasies, bootlegging, the stock market - corruption flowed through the veins of this country.

Currently, it was the middle of the night, but the speakeasy Crowley resided in was thriving. Men were drinking, flappers were dancing, music echoed around the room - in about a hundred years, he was sure this scene would be quite picturesque.

"Hey," a drunken man slurred, sliding into the seat across from Crowley. "Is it true?"

"Is what true?" Crowley muttered, taking a sip of his wine and moving his chair slightly away from the stranger.

"That Killer Queen is coming here tonight."

Crowley paused, processing the news. Interesting. Then he shrugged, not bothering to answer directly. The man appeared to take the hint and left, which was surprising, seeing as he'd smelled like he'd bathed in whiskey.

However, despite the lack of care that he presented, Crowley had to admit his interest was piqued by the man's question. The so-called Killer Queen was an infamous flapper that women hired to "test" their husbands' loyalty. She presumably seduced them to see if they were willing to cheat. It was only a thing among the elite, really.

(No one knew what Killer Queen's day job was, either, but a few rumors were floating around that she worked as a psychiatrist who focused on the trauma of abused women.)

Killer Queen was loved by half of the male population and hated by the rest. Despite this, no one could deny their attraction to her, including or perhaps especially other women.

If she did show up, Crowley had to admit that he'd be interested in meeting her.

"Oh my God!" a flapper with short black hair shrieked as she rush into the speakeasy, her feather boa slipping off her shoulders. "She's coming! She's really coming!"

Huh. Speak of the devil and she shall appear.

Crowley took another sip of his wine, then nearly choked on it as the Killer Queen entered the room.

He'd recognize those blue eyes anywhere.

"Angel?!" he sputtered. He cursed, almost biting his tongue as he realized it might have been better to keep his mouth shut.

Aziraphale glanced across the speakeasy, her eyes widening as she saw Crowley. Crowley tried to look away and pretend he hadn't seen her, but it was too late. As Aziraphale passed by his table, she sent him a look that said:

Meet me in a private room in ten minutes.

In reality, it wasn't her look that spoke, but rather her words were spoken telepathically into Crowley's mind. Sometimes being a supernatural being was convenient, even if telepathy did feel rather invasive. Tended to leave a person with an itch on the back of the neck.

Crowley found himself unable to take his eyes off Aziraphale as she walked away. The angel rarely presented as female, but he found her to be as beautiful as ever. The glittery silver flapper dress she wore hugged her curves in a way reminiscent of Bessie Smith.

Wait.

He was supposed to be angry at the angel. Not ogling her.

(Fortunately, Crowley had always been very good at multitasking.)

~*~

Crowley pulled the door shut after entering the private room, tossing his hat down on the table. "Fancy running into you here, angel. And as a flapper, of all the fashion trends to choose from."

Aziraphale's face turned a pretty shade of pink, and she fidgeted with the strings of pearls hanging around her neck. "I needed to, well, it was necessary to assimilate myself as a bit of a party girl, my dear."

"So I've heard, Killer Queen." Crowley sat down across from the angel, not particularly regretting the acidity of his tone. "You know, you could just admit that you came to fraternize with the American elite. Wouldn't hurt my feelings."

Aziraphale stared at him, her face revealing no emotion whatsoever. Then she sighed, tucking an escaped strand of her wavy blonde hair behind her ear. (The angled cut looked good on her, much to Crowley's irritation and attraction.) "I take it you're still... angry about 1862."

Angry? No, he wasn't angry. Betrayed, perhaps. Frustrated. Tired of the 60 years of resentment that still boiled inside of him. But not angry.

(How could he ever be angry at her?)

Crowley didn't bother to grace the angel with an answer to her question.

Aziraphale bit her lip, which Crowley noticed was an action cuter than it had any right to be. "Will you at least tell me why you're here? In America?"

Crowley shrugged. "Corrupting souls. Committing evil deeds. The like."

"Such as...?"

The silver ribbon that was tied around Aziraphale's forehead and threaded through her blonde hair was distracting, though not as distracting as the lower-than-usual cut of her silver dress.

Damn, he was whipped.

"Urging Prohibition along, for one. Inciting a bit of gang violence. I've already gotten two commendations for encouraging bootlegging and for my help in facilitating the development of increased organized crime."

Aziraphale chuckled, resting her elbows on the table and placing her chin on her hands. "I should have known your lot was behind Prohibition. The intention of the movement seemed too good to be true."

"Without Prohibition, there'd be no speakeasies, no bootlegging, no Al Capone. As humans say, the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. And while that's not literally accurate, it is what happened here." Crowley noticed that the angel's nails were perfectly manicured. The relaxed manner in which she sat was ridiculously poised. "Anyways. Care to tell me what you're doing in America, Miss Killer Queen? Besides the whole 'seducing humans to test their loyalty to their partners' affair."

Huh. That came out more bitter than he intended.

Aziraphale frowned. "Who told you that?" She rolled her eyes. "Trust me, my dear. I have not 'seduced' anyone. Besides, I only agree to help the women whose husbands I know are unfaithful."

Crowley raised an eyebrow. "And how are you able to tell, exactly?"

Aziraphale pursed her lips (which were painted a rich crimson, and Crowley couldn't stop staring at them), then sighed. "My dear... Trust me when I tell you that there is nothing more painful than being in a room with two people, one of whom is in love with every fibre of their being, while the other feels nothing. Worst is when they never have, and they never will."

For a moment, Crowley did not respond, simply staring at the angel.

He wanted nothing more than to hold Aziraphale close to him and kiss her senseless, to kiss her with the passion of someone who'd been in love for almost 6000 years.

But he couldn't. He'd never be able to.

An angel could never love a demon. Not like that.

And thus, therein lay the problem. He did understand. Or at the very least, he was deathly afraid that he did.

Crowley laughed. It was harsh. Bitter. "No, angel. I understand plenty." He stood abruptly, unable to be in her company any longer. "I've got to be going." If he stayed even another minute, he might say something he'd regret. "I know you have holy business to attend to. All that jazz."

Aziraphale stood, too, her brow furrowed in confusion. "But you've only just got here!" Her face reddened, and she broke eye contact with the demon. "Not to mention that it's been... It's been a while since we last saw each other, and - and had a chance to... Talk."

"I have to go," Crowley repeated. He grabbed his hat off the table. "I'm sorry, angel."

"No," Aziraphale murmured. "I'm the one who's sorry." She glanced at Crowley, her expression determined and her blue eyes steely. "But as I said 60 years ago, I refuse to be a part of your self-destruction."

Her stubbornness was as endearing as it was frustrating. "I know," Crowley said simply. He placed his hat on his head before moving around the table to get to Aziraphale, taking her hand and pressing a kiss to her knuckles, just above the silver ring on her middle finger. "I forgot to mention that you look beautiful," he said as he let go of her hand. "Maybe hold onto that dress for a rainy day. It suits you."

Aziraphale's face turned a deep shade of pink. "O-Oh," she stammered. "Thank you, my dear. That's - That's very kind of you to say."

Crowley turned around to leave, but was stopped by a hand on his shoulder.

"Wait." Aziraphale's voice was hushed. Her grip on his shoulder tightened, though not enough to cause any pain. "Will - Will I see you again? Soon?"

Crowley gently shrugged her hand off of him. He didn't turn to face her. "Goodbye, angel."

He was already halfway out the door before she responded.

"My dear boy... Be careful."

And then he was gone.

~*~

[rorykillmore]

and this one is for @spearitsandmonsters who requested an au with one of our more recent dynamics! i decided to do sly and emerald because i wanted to have some fun with our sly cooper au idea. i ran with the whole “em and merc get recruited for the sly 3 heist” idea. there were a lot of ideas i had to cut for the sake of focus and flow (god i NEED emerald interacting with dimitri someday) but i wanted to explore how she’d react to the panda king in particular, so!

merry christmas spear!!! here’s to another wonderful year of being friends -- okay, it hasn’t really been a wonderful year, maybe, but the parts with YOU have been wonderful. from all our fantastic rp dynamics and plots to the fandoms we plunge into together to the fact that we always seem to be on the same page when it comes to salt, you are and have always been a person i jibe with so naturally. it hasn’t been an easy year for you, and you’ve had to deal with a lot of ups and downs, but you’ve worked so hard to be present and kind to your friends despite that and to contribute to some great things to denny, so hopefully this fic honors that <3

“What does power mean when you only use it to destroy? Until it begins to erode at your very self?”  The Panda King sounds more bitter than Sly would have expected, although his anger doesn’t sound like it’s directed at Emerald.  “What does loyalty mean when the people who demand it would see you steeped forever in your own rage, or doubt, or self-loathing, for their better gain?”

The whole gang’s assembled (maybe too organized a word) by the time Sly gets back to the hideout with their two newest recruits.  And... Sly can see that Bentley and Murray, at least, have recognized them immediately.

“Oh,” Murray says, puzzled.  “It’s those guys.”

‘Those guys’, in this case, being Emerald and Mercury.  A rival duo of thieves who Sly admittedly expected to cause a few ripples, not only because they’d been competing with the Cooper Gang for months now, but because of the rumors that sometimes flitted around about Mercury’s more... less than savory work. 

It’s not worth the discomfort of immediately pointing out that Bentley’s newest choice of recruit has more blood on his hands than either of Sly’s do, but Sly has the defense ready all the same.

“Glad to know we’ve left such an impression,” Mercury notes dryly, while Emerald shifts a little at all the attention in the room being centered on them.

From where he’s perched on the couch behind Murray, the Guru murmurs an inquiry, and it’s Bentley who responds.  “Guru -- everyone -- meet Emerald Sustrai and Mercury Black.  Fellow thieves, former rivals, current...”

“Allies,” Sly cuts in firmly. “They’re here to help us with the heist, just like everyone else.”

“No, we just dropped by for pizza and drinks,” Emerald quips. The joke appears to be lost on Murray, who starts to look hopeful at the prospect.

“Well,” Bentley continues, still eyeing Sly, but clearly addressing the two newcomers.  “You already know Murray and I, obviously.  I’ll just run through the rest of the introductions briefly. This is the Guru -- our chief mystic.”

“He kind of does that... spooky illusion thing, too,” Sly tells Emerald, waggling his fingers for emphasis. “I figured the two of you might have a thing or two to teach each other.”

“Right.” Emerald eyes the Guru dubiously until, courteous as ever, he dips his head to her in greeting, and she seems to relax slightly.

“And Penelope, our RC specialist...”

“I would love to get a closer look at your weapons. -- You know. Since we’re  allies now, and all,”  Penelope tells them immediately, pushing her glasses further up her nose as she leans in to get a closer look. “I might even be able to make a few nifty modifications, if either you wanted...”

Bentley glances over his shoulder almost hesitantly, and Sly follows his gaze to where the Panda King’s bulky form is visible hunched over his desk as he tinkers with what looks like a few small explosives. He’s the only one, notably, who hasn’t joined the welcome party.  “And that’s...”

“The Panda King,” Mercury cuts in, his eyes glittering with interest and some other unreadable emotion.  “Yeah. We’ve heard of you.”

“Demolitions?” Emerald guesses his role, likely clued in not only by what the Panda King is doing now but by his long, infamous history of blowing up villages who refused to pay tribute to him. Bentley nods.

“He’s ‘reformed’,” Sly says, the sarcasm and doubt in his voice perhaps a little too clear. The Panda King himself doesn’t react, but Murray and Penelope are starting to look a little uncomfortable, and strangely, even Emerald won’t quite meet his eyes.

“Well,” Bentley breaks the silence after another stiff moment.  “We’ve certainly got the makings of a fine team, here. If I was the kind of person who liked to jinx things, I’d say Dr. M’s fortress didn’t stand a chance.”

Sly - who has already clued Emerald and Mercury in on the situation with his family’s treasure vault being heavily guarded by an evil super genius who bought the island it was located on - fills in the remaining gaps.

 “We, uh.  We have to fulfill our end of our bargain before we move out to the island, though.” Mercury frowns and Emerald raises her eyebrows, so Sly continues, “We promised the Panda King we’d rescue his daughter. In exchange for him lending us his services.”

“What happened to his daughter?” Emerald asks. Sly opens his mouth to answer, but before she can get a word out --

“She’s being held prisoner. By a military general who would force her into marriage against her will.” The Panda King’s rumbling voice cuts through the conversation, surprising everyone. Sly turns and sees that he has set down his tools at the table, and keeps still as he pushes himself to his feet.  “If you will all excuse me. I have some other preparations to make.”

He exits the room without so much as glancing at their new recruits.

“Wow. Just as charming as I’ve always heard,” Mercury drawls once he’s gone.

Emerald shifts beside him. “Never pegged a guy like that for being such a devoted father.”

Sly doesn’t particularly want to dwell on the subject. Instead, he shoots them both a friendly smile.  “Come on, I’ll show you where to get settled in. Luckily it’s a pretty spacey place for an inconspicuous thieves’ den.”

----

Later that night, he braves the cold to go sit on the hideout’s rooftop, letting the drifting snow settle softly into his fur as he tracks the guards below on their nightly routes. General Tsao’s certainly no slouch when it comes to security, but something about that makes this all the more satisfying -- being hidden right under his nose.

He almost doesn’t notice when a lithe, shadowy figure hops up to join him, but all things considered, there’s only one person it can really be.

“It’s freezing up here,” Emerald immediately complains.  “Why aren’t you inside?”

“Why aren’t you?” Sly teases back, twitching an ear towards her. “Getting attached to the pleasure of my company?”

He can practically hear Emerald rolling her eyes in response.  “Ha. You wish, Cooper.”

But then, to his surprise, she settles down beside him at the edge of the roof.  She must want to talk to him about something, then, and Sly patiently waits in silence without pushing her until she gets around to breaching the subject. 

“Let me ask you something. Did you just hire me and Mercury to piss off your turtle friend?”

Sly’s ears prick up in surprise.  “What? No. Why would you think -- ?”

“Things just... seemed kinda tense between the two of you, is all.” Emerald shrugs nonchalantly, gazing out at the view beyond.  “Sort of seemed like you didn’t like him inviting the pyromaniac along.”

“Well, I don’t.” Sly catches himself before he can sound too bitter, suddenly self-conscious and a little more clear on where Emerald might’ve gotten her impression that he only invited her along for petty payback. Sheepishly and feeling he owes her some kind of explanation, he draws a breath.  “...I just... don’t trust him. He was... part of the gang that killed my parents.”

There’s a brief, almost fragile pause. “Oh.  Jeez. I’m sorry,” Emerald says finally, the sympathy sounding a little brittle, but not insincere.  “I... didn’t know you were an orphan. Me too.”

Sly glances over at her carefully, but she still isn’t looking at him.  “Kinda seems to be a common sob story in our line of work.” He keeps it casual, but his tone is gentle.  “Bentley and Murray grew up without their parents, too. ...What about Mercury?”

Emerald shrugs again.  “He grew up with his dad, but... honestly, from what I’ve heard, he probably would’ve been better off with no parents at all.”  She laughs bleakly, and it’s more than telling.  “Kinda funny how an actual mass murderer cares more about his kid than Merc’s ever did about him.”

Sly gets the feeling that this isn’t the kind of thing he should admit knowing to Mercury -- ever. Which means that... maybe Emerald trusts him more than he realized, if she’s sitting here talking about it. He opens his mouth, searching for words, but Emerald abruptly changes the subject.

“So why did Bentley invite the Panda King into your gang, if you guys have such a horrible history?”

Faced with the question, Sly can’t say that he thinks Bentley ever had any ill intent. And, of course, he’s always known that. “Because he thinks we need him, I guess. Even I have to admit, I don’t know of a better demolitions expert out there, and... that vault’s gonna be tough to crack.”

Emerald pauses, frowning.  “...Do you think... there’s any chance he could actually change?”

No, is Sly’s first, immediate instinct, but if he’s being honest with himself, it might be more deeply rooted in his own anger than any objective assessment of the Panda King that he’s made. He’s not sure whether or not he would safely call the Panda King reformed, but technically, he has already changed. He isn’t the same person he’d been when Sly had confronted him three years ago. And neither was Sly.

“I think we all change,” Sly says finally. “One way or another.”

It’s part of being alive. He thinks - suddenly and unbidden - of Clockwerk, who traded that essential spark of life for immortality, and wound up trapped in stagnant hatred for all of his supposedly eternal life. It’s almost enough to make Sly pity him.

The Panda King isn’t Clockwerk. Maybe it isn’t impossible for him to step beyond the various ways he’s trapped himself. And abruptly, Sly wonders why Emerald even asked.

He glances at her again, more thoughtfully, and smiles.  “You know... saving the Panda King’s daughter isn’t the only way we’ve helped out our new recruits. We helped the Guru protect his home back in Australia, and won Penelope’s flying competition.  I guess what I’m saying is... we kinda owe you and Mercury one too. If you ever needed help with anything.”

He senses - without really needing to ask - that she has some kind of past that she’s running from. Something altogether separate from her dead parents.

Emerald blinks at him slowly, cautiously, and Sly can tell she’s trying not to seem too surprised.  “...Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” she says finally, but something about it seems contemplative, like the offer is actually weighing on her.

So Sly only laughs, in no hurry to push her. 

“Yeah. Okay,” he agrees, and they watch the sun rise together.

----

It’s two days later when, in the midst of waiting in the van’s passenger seat for Murray to come out and drive them to their latest tag-team mission, Sly catches a glimpse of the Panda King approaching in the rear view mirror. 

He activates his ancestor’s invisibility trick before he can even really think about planning it -- maybe because a still suspicious part of him wants to see what the Panda King’s doing poking around out here on his own. Maybe just because he’s not really in the mood for a friendly chat with his former adversary.

But as the Panda King throws open the van’s back doors and begins rummaging around, Sly realizes that he’d been mistaken -- the Panda King isn’t out here on his own.

“Bentley has recommended we make use of these custom communication devices during the mission,” Sly hears him rumble to someone else.

And then he recognizes Emerald’s voice answering, “Well, he is the resident tech nerd. Guess we’d better take his word for it.”

Bentley must’ve had another mission for the two of them, Sly guesses easily. He’s not entirely sure how he feels about it -- but he’s starting to feel a little bad about eavesdropping.  He’d consider silently slipping away, if he didn’t have to conspicuously open the passenger side door to do it.

“His intellect is... more then sufficient,” The Panda King agrees carefully. “And the way he has modified that chair to compensate for his injuries, more than worthy of respect. I once believed that an old associate of mine was the most skilled inventor to have ever lived. Perhaps I was mistaken.”

There’s a pause, which Sly spends trying not to feel a reluctant glow of pride at one of his most bitter enemies praising his best friend.

“...The... people you used to work with,” Emerald ventures casually -- or ‘casually’, because Sly is starting to be able to tell the difference between when she means it and when she’s feigning it.  “Do you ever... I don’t know.  Question whether you were right to leave them?”

Sly pricks his ears, surprised. The Panda King’s brief silence suggests that she might have caught him off guard, too.

“It was not my decision,” he growls eventually.  “The organization was falling apart at its seams, thanks to Cooper’s interference.  In the end, there was hardly anything left to leave.”

“So does that mean you would you go back?” Emerald asks, still sounding idle. “If you could?”

“What does power mean when you only use it to destroy? Until it begins to erode at your very self?”  The Panda King sounds more bitter than Sly would have expected, although his anger doesn’t sound like it’s directed at Emerald.  “What does loyalty mean when the people who demand it would see you steeped forever in your own rage, or doubt, or self-loathing, for their better gain?” 

Emerald is quiet for longer, this time. When she speaks, her voice is a little softer, almost partially inaudible from Sly’s position.  “You remind me of someone I used to work with.  He had your... sense of integrity. I guess. Honor. Even when we were doing some pretty terrible things.”

And it only hits Sly just then why Emerald has seemed so cautiously, tentatively curious about the Panda King and Sly’s opinions on him up until now. He feels an unexpected pang of sadness for her, and remorse at the fact that he could have inadvertently given her the impression that he didn’t think it was possible to come back from... wherever she’d been.

“And did he ever walk away?” The Panda King asks more lowly.

“I don’t know. He always wanted Mercury and I to get out, but I... never really found out what happened to him, after we left.”

“Making peace with the past is never simple,”  The Panda King sounds thoughtful, or maybe troubled -- Sly can’t really read his tone, but it’s one he’s never heard before.  “And doubt along the way... is not a sign of weakness. Merely a symptom of wounds that have yet to fully heal. The only remedy is to move forward even still, and fight for the things that are dear to us. When you have something to fight for... that makes it easier.” 

“Like your daughter,” Emerald provides quietly.

“Yes. And what do you fight for now, Emerald?”

Brief silence, again.  “...I guess I’m still trying to figure that out.”

“I think perhaps... you are in the right place, then.”

There’s a shuffle as the equipment they needed is evidently located and removed from the van. And then the doors slam shut, and Sly can hear nothing more.

He drops back into visibility once he’s sure they’re both gone, complicated emotion twisting in his chest. The Panda King is the last person in the gang Sly would have ever expected Emerald to connect with, but maybe that’s his own oversight.

Maybe - whatever he thinks of the bear himself - his insight is valuable. To Emerald, at least. And maybe Sly is already more invested than he’s realized, because this makes it more valuable to Sly, too.

He settles back in his seat, closes his eyes and then opens them again, and tries to grab hold of that slowly building hope for the future.

[veronicassadboi]

🖤 Jeronica Secret Santa ❤️

To @vxj-veronica-jones with love. Merry Christmas. Thanks for your continual love and support of the fandom. You’re a real MVP. Sorry, all I can offer is angst as that’s my #Thing. Summer mentions because it’s summer on my side of the world. Sorry if it’s too much angst for the festive season but you can’t teach an old dog new tricks, right? Formatting is annoying because I’m posting this amidst travelling overseas for Christmas on my phone. I should face posted on AO3 instead of posting this long ass post that won’t work with a “read more” cut. Merry Christmas anywho ❤️

Be With Me

Warning: mentions of sex, gang slanging (lol), swearing, heart ache.

Summary: She pops up everywhere. In the taste of shakes at Pop's. The writing she left on his kitchen table that he hasn't been able to move. In the text messages he reads before he forces himself to sleep at least two hours at night. He's still learning how to perfect that, though. Because sometimes it's a messy forty-five minutes just before school. Or it's a solid sixteen hours and he's missed the whole fucking day. At the moment, there's no in between.

————————————|

Jughead lights up a cigarette. It just alleviates the urge pulsing through him but he takes them anyway; three deep drags in a row with rushing bloodstreams and noisy thoughts. Jughead turns up Tame Impala and lets the music drown him in noisy basslines and clashing cymbals - clashing thoughts. But his eraseture of his messy mind is a battle lost. He stubs out menthol cigarettes in the ashtray, watching it burn into itself, mystic wisps of smoke, but he reaches for another one. The urge he has for Veronica is pulsing faster now. As he flicks his lighter, he wonders how much her happiness would grow if she watched him light up his Serpents jacket the same way he burned this cigarette. Red hot flames, up in smoke….

What’s the price I pay for loving Veronica Lodge? He thinks.

Pure fucking torture is what I pay, the back of his mind reminds him.

Jughead’s craving for Veronica doesn’t feel much more than a gentle rustle in the breeze at the moment. It’s a welcome change to the raw throat burning he usually gets at four in the morning, at two in the afternoon; ten at night. He zones out of imagining Veronica’s sugary, honeyed calls and he feels lighter all of a sudden. In her zone. But he comes back down to earth, it hits him harder than it usually does; Jughead’s craving is sated because she’s here with him.

Though she’s with him, fears eats away when all he can think about is the skin scratching, blood thickening feeling he’ll get when she leaves.

Love is confidence. Confident is what he feels when Veronica is here with him. I’m undefeatable, I’m God-like right now.

She’s almost aerobatic – fucking artistic the way she flies through the air and it’s all because of him. She wraps her arms around his neck, dots sweet kisses. Skin tearing jaw bites that he can smell, cinnamon mixed with his favourite brand of menthol. He smiles against her as he tastes her skin, she tastes like she did at four in morning and during her break at lunch, the back wall of Pop’s knows the shape of her body almost as well as Jughead does. She tastes absolutely edible as her thighs creep up his sides, pulling herself up his body with her legs around his waist. “I missed you,” she tells him, scratching on his leather back.

Jughead feels his cheeks burn, his heart whistle; fingertips numbing all because of the girl around him. He hisses up courage, tasting her a little more. Saturating myself in her, he begs himself. “Tell me how much you love me,” He begs her. His fingers are pins and needles, his heart is tight in her grip.

Veronica  leans back as Jughead grips onto her ass, keeping her up with his mind trying to keep up too. “I want you to stay with me.”

He sniggers as his mouth fills with saliva; he’s salivating, - a man starved, hungry, feverish from starvation. His mouth feels dry now, not  keeping up. “What’s the price of loving me?” he ask her this time.

She raises an eyebrow. “That you can’t live without me.”

He groans against her; he fucks her against the wall.

When you love the way we love, who the fuck requires a heart? He asks himself.

Because it’s a pause in heart beats, it’s the lack of blood flow. He doesn’t exist anywhere else but in her.

He kisses her dirty; he kisses her until he can’t breathe.

They’re in the trailer. When they came in, the sun was shining so bright on the two on the floor. Now it’s just cold, dark and Jughead’s heart feels like a hoarder –  almost as if he’s keeping her all to himself and he won’t share her; he won’t let her loose. If I let go, she might not come back to me...

“I love you,” Veronica tells him. “More and more everyday.”

She’s glittery beneath the moonlight, dark hair turns midnight in the light. Skin turns tasty in the moon. She turns magical in here, he reminds himself. She’s supernatural right now. Every kiss on her lips tells the story of us, he knows, starvation, lust, love, dependence, poison, love, affection, pure, love, lost, love, needing, love, I can’t live without her. Love.

“Tell me how much you love me,” he asks.

“Come with me, we’ll go, Jug,” she promises. “New York.”

“Princess,” he prays.

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“I love you more than they do.”

“I love you so much, I go fucking crazy.”

“Go fucking crazy then,” she orders, “Do it, then you can come with me and we’ll start a new life.” “A new life,” he copies, “One where you love me happily.”

“I love you happily anyways,” she says with a sigh. “Even when it hurts.”

She’s purple painted toes digging into her blankets. She’s laying in satin kind of tired.

He feels cold without Southside on his shoulders. “Were you Southside?” she asks before even looking at Jughead standing at the trailer window.

“I was,” he says, catching in his throat.

“And?”

“And now I’m not.”

Veronica hums. “What time are you going back?” she says so thickly, Jughead can feel her words hitting him in the heart; sharp, harsh arrows. “Are you going back?” An arrow to the heart.

“No.”

She rolls over, her eyes are red bloodshot and her skin sun kissed in the dark. “So today you’ll pretend like you’re all mine?”

“Only if you pretend that you’re all mine, Princess.”

Veronica shakes the earth to give Jughead more than anything in the world. I am a man starved. I am greedy in loving her. I take all of her, nothing to spare.

She took all of him until there was nothing left to give her.

“Just be with me here,” she prays.

“I’ll be here.”

Jughead ignores the necklace that hangs around his Princess’s neck that his best friend bought her. Just like she ignores the smell of Betty’s vanilla on his own skin.

xxxxx

Jughead stares at the time on the alarm clock as it beeps to wake him up. He doesn't switch it off, he doesn't have the energy hit snooze. He thinks briefly on the time and he wonders what Veronica is doing at this exact moment. If his thoughts didn't betray him, then the smell of her in his sheets did. He woke up with her smell mixed with his smell and he knows he's fucking lying to himself when he tries to make out that he's unsure of how many days it's been since he last saw her fake smile. Thirteen. She pops up everywhere. In the taste of shakes at Pop's. The writing she left on his kitchen table that he hasn't been able to move. In the text messages he reads before he forces himself to sleep at least two hours at night. He's still learning how to perfect that, though. Because sometimes it's a messy forty-five minutes just before school. Or it's a solid sixteen hours and he's missed the whole fucking day. At the moment, there's no in between. She's the marrow in the bones of his fucked up days. Veronica Lodge is the marrow in his very bones. Veronica is him. Jughead punches a pillow as the alarm keeps going. He screams into the same one. He realises it smells like her, so he clings on a little tighter. And then he feels the ache in his jaw, the pulsing of blood in his split lip and then he remembers how he got here in the first place.

XXXXX

"You hate me, don't you?" Jughead asks his best friend. Archie Andrews wasn't a liar. And Jughead knows that Archie Andrews has a level of loyalty that the Southside wouldn't be able to rival. Archie Andrews also had a weird way of saying exactly what was on his mind even if maybe, Jughead thinks, he shouldn't. Jughead also wonders if he can count how many times Archie opens his mouth in an attempt to make up some lie, but, yet again, Archie Andrews is not a liar and it almost irritates Jughead that his best friend is torturing him in this way. "I don't hate you, Jug." Jughead sniggers, kicks his boots on the lino floor of the trailer and stops himself from rolling his eyes. "You hate me." "Betty still loves you she just..."

"Doesn't love what I've become."

Jughead can’t even come up with a string of truths. It wasn’t Betty. And it wasn’t love lost between him and her either. It was Veronica. Jughead continues to lie through his teeth, humouring his best friend. Trying not to think too loudly about his best friend’s girlfriend. Trying not to be too harsh about Betty.

Archie scrambles for words again. Jughead can tell. He's frantic and stumbling over his own tongue. He grabs Jughead by the collar and shakes him out, but Jughead can just feel boiling blood. "This stupid jacket is what we hate, but we love you, Juggie," Archie takes a steadying breath. "Betty loves you; I miss you, Jug. Veronica does too.” Jug wishes they were kids again. Way back when. When FP and Fred were best buds and they were back up in the treehouse. Or even not that long ago, when he was crashing on the Andrews floor and the biggest issue was Archie burning pizza. But they're not. Archie is a Northern Suburban Knight in Shining Armour and Jughead is a Southside Serpent earning new fangs while cycling with the training wheels still on. Hearing Veronica’s name made his arteries connected to his heart harden and stop pulsing, the blood was coagulating, stiffening and hardening. Archie's words only made him feel half the amount better, because 'I-love-you's' from Archie Andrews were dished out as often as 'hellos', Jughead doesn't think it as a dig at his best friend, he likes to think of it as Archie just has a big heart. But he sees his best friend glaring at the leather jacket on his shoulders and then he remembers how he got here in the first place. Jughead thinks quickly on everything that he has control over. He has freedom and the trailer is his. He can ride out at any time, there's no limit to where he can go. And then his chest feels tight, and his breathing is too shallow. He can't control his repetitive reading of Veronica’s last texts. Or the way he thinks the only way his heart is still beating is because Veronica Lodge is still on his mind. But the trailer is his, the bike is his, though not something he had initially wanted, Hotdog was his. And so were the bad thoughts, the mess of hair on his head, the dark rings under his eyes, the two hours sleep, the love he holds for Veronica, the cigarettes he all of a sudden acquired and the pills Sweetpea insists he'll like. They're all his. And then he remembers how he got here in the first place.

XXXXX

Toni has a body that is out of this world. Toni has a mouth with lips that look like they need biting. She has hair you can hold on to. Toni has words that make guys drop to their knees, Jughead knows, because Fangs told him. She gives him that taste of Southside without the pain. And when there is pain involved, Toni makes a good makeshift nurse. She's seen things before that he's only just learning about and she makes a good teacher. And if Betty was good at teaching him school work, then Toni is schooling him at life. He feels bile at the back of his throat when he thinks of Betty and Toni in the same go. But things are complicated and no amount of digging his snake pit further into Southside was going to change that. He couldn't be further from the North than he is right now. Even while sitting in the Red and Black with dust plumes glittering in afternoon sun, Toni is making a passionate speech about showing the true identity of Southside High to Riverdale. And as much as taking photos of the Football team and the Drama class that just so happens to have an uncountable amount of students with nose rings and belt buckles with studs on them, he can't help but think that Toni would have a better chance at portraying this place for what it was. A festering wound that is hard to cover up. "You've got some dark rings under your eyes, Forsythe," she says with a smirk. "You been up all night or something?" Jughead reads the bite of her lip and the wink of her right eye. He reads it dirty but he shrugs in reply. "Hmm," he says.

Toni knows secrets about him that no one else does. She keeps them locked up inside - Toni is the safest place he knows and one of the only places he trusts. “Veronica,” she says, slapping on a look of pity. She slinks behind his chair, pats his shoulder, ruffles his hair. "Don't worry, Juggie, if you love each other, you'll find your way back." Do marrow and blood every actually touch? He's not sure. He flickers briefly between thinking about how he and Veronica would find their way back and believing that they had never actually ever fucking lost each other. He flickers between words from Toni's lips and Veronica’s soul. He flickers between loving Veronica and then he remembers how he got here in the first place.

XXXXX

Veronica has been working at Pop’s alone. He can tell by the way her skin is slick and she’s an overbitten lower lip. He knows she’s tired, but she knows she works harder than anyone else. He knows the taste of her overbitten lips and the feel of her hair in his fists. Out of selfishness for his own battered feelings, he doesn't approach her. Or he might tell her how much he needs her. How he can't live without her. How he can’t fucking breathe. But he's at risk of looking like an idiot and his ego can't take another blow. Her shoulders slump, he watches her hand smooth over her face and then over her hair, she cranes her neck a little, leaning on the mop handle. He doesn't order, he walks out hungry. He kicks his bike before getting back on it. And then he remembers how he got here in the first place.

XXXXX

It's sick, because every punch from the Ghoulie sounds like Veronica’s name against his skin. He feels the Ghoulie’s knuckles sing against the right side of his jaw, his teeth grate against each other but he manages a swing too, weak with his left hand side. Princess, it ghosts. Somehow, the Ghoulie gets ahold of the scruff of his neck and he's trying to tackle Jughead down, but Jug is younger, faster, he spins out, spits blood on the floor and swings his right, stronger hand. Veronica, it sings against the Ghoulie’s nose. The Ghoulie laughs manically, "Yeah, you little Serpent’s tougher than you look, huh?" Jughead thinks ironically that the Ghoulie isn't right because if only he knew of the girl that has him crippled most of the time. But he shouldn't be thinking of her when he gets landed a blow to the temple. He's almost out cold when he hears Sweet Pea call his name. "Veronica?" Jughead asks the buzzing in his ears, it surely has to be her. But then he realises it's not because he remembers how he got here in the first place.

XXXXX

Jughead feels exposed and he tries to sit up quickly when he sees her, but he also wonders if maybe he shouldn't bother. He has to be dead to be seeing Veronica Lodge sitting on the end of his bed. Once upon a time it was sneaking through bedroom windows. Then crashing out on the overused sofa in the trailer. Then it was shouting, hateful words. Soft tender kisses in the rain. Wiping tears away in the booth at Pop's. Making himself physically fucking sick because love shouldn't be this hard, right? Veronica had promised him that their love was unshakeable, unmovable, limitless. She had promised Jughead that their love was as easy as breathing. At what point of their love did Veronica become a liar? He wonders.

When we chose to fall in love, he reminds himself. Nothing was harder than hushed secrets. Lying to the people they swore they loved. Now, she was so close that he could smell her perfume, but he could also make out the tracks and paths of her tears thanks to black mascara. And as much as Jughead wanted to look away, he was a man starved. He drinks her in, he soaks up her sun, he wants to feel pain in his palms when she's in his hands. But the way she drips disgust in him hurts him more than it hurts her. "Why are you doing this, Jughead?" she asks, a malicious tone in her voice. She shakes the room, she slams a fist down on the same pillow he does every night. "Don't do this Jughead," her tears fly. "This is crazy! It's dangerous." He thinks his love for her is the only dangerous thing around here. He reaches with a shaky, beat up hand and wipes her tears and she sinks into his hand, closing her eyes. "You know I’d do anything for you. And if that means keeping on the Southside to keep them from you in the Northside, then so be it." "Run away with me. Please," she begs. "I'm serious." She slides into the bed with him, shaking with cold even if it's warm outside. He wonders why she's so cold, why everything hurts. But then he remembers how they got here in the first place. He can't keep away from her. But then, he never could. He dreams of Springtime when he was a kid, riding bikes with Archie. And he misses that too. The old Archie. The one who wasn't so scared. The one that was funny. But Jughead remembers, they were all funny back then. He laughs lightly about Betty and how way back when, she used to be a pigtail kind of girl and not much has changed, only that she's now a single ponytail kind of girl.

He remembers when he wasn’t in love with the girl he shouldn’t be. When he wasn’t hurting his best friend and Betty. When things were simple. He prays for those days. But he couldn’t survive without Veronica, so the prayers are futile. Now he’s late nights in The Pembrooke where he’s kissed Veronica a million times after paying the price of Southside, he made it up to her with her thighs around his head and her nails in his hair. He laughed against the insides of her ankles and soft kisses on her wrist and for once, Southside was left on the floor next to her radio. Jughead lies in Veronica’s arms with her fingers still playing with a curl at the front of his face. "I want to go, V," he tells her honestly. "I want you and I to go, let's go, get out of here." It was crazy but Jughead knew it was doable. He had arranged everything, he had money, a car. He wanted to skip, get out of here. Veronica stops, tilts Jughead's head with her hands and gives him a serious look while frowning. "Are you serious?" "Do I look like I'm joking?" he challenges. She inhales sharply. "Leave all this mess behind?" He nods. He nods so hard, he feels like he looks stupid but he was serious and if he could, he would leave now. "You and me, Princess, what do you say?" She smiles. She kisses him a million times. He smiles against her collarbone and then he remembers how he got here in the first place.

XXXXX

It’s hot-sweat in the middle of summer kind of heat. It was sweat dripping from the tip of her nose. Veronica and Betty had been ice-cream-sweet all day. Veronica smacked her lips and looked up from shy eyes, whispered rumours and quiet laughs were painful. Her lips smack together with pleasure when she humours Betty; Summer heat carries summer secrets. Veronica keeps warm in the memories of last night.

It’s hot-sweat in the middle of summer kind of heat but Jughead was muted-twilight-tones with the sun setting on his skin. It was sticky tar pavements and sticky fingers against Veronica’s iPhone screen from summer sun when she messages her mom to tell her she’ll be late home but through the heat, Jughead still wore red Docs with long socks and sweat-sticky leather against his back. They stand outside his trailer with the overused door handle and the worn out paint that spoke volumes to her. Old. Muted. Worn. Sticky-summer-sun is setting on the worn out paint and made it seem a little colder than cold around here.

Jughead stands on a cigarette butt to put it out and nods at Veronica. “Tell me how much you love me,” he says. “Come on, Princess,” he says with a scuff of his boot.

“Nobody likes someone who’s so needy,” she replies, rolling her eyes.

He laughs quietly and reaches out to her shorts, hooking his lazy-long fingers in the belt hoop of denim shorts, pulling Veronica closer. Her hips bump his hips, her breath hitches in her throat as she feels him but his breath is breathing on her skin. Jughead’s mouth meets Veronica’s neck; his tongue dances on sweat-sticky, soft-aching skin. He kisses her. “Let’s see how needy I can get then.”

His words echo. His smile, though she can’t see it, is larger than ever. She can feel it; she feels his smile on her neck; on her skin. His hands? She can’t see them; she feels them, edging on the start of denim, popping her buttons,  second button,  third button, and the rest after that. She gives in with her eyes curious-kind-of-wide and her voice on his tongue.

“Where have you been?” she asks him.

“Gone,” he groans against her skin. “Preparing the world for you,” He keeps running his fingers on denim. Punishment reaches down and  starts doing denim up, never looking away from his leather jacket. But his fingers stop pulling and he steps back, running a hand over his face. “V...” he murmurs.

“Jughead,” she says strongly back. Loud in her mind. Smirk dancing on her lips. “Punishment,” she tells him.

He smirks to himself and shrugs his shoulders; exhaling loudly as he reads her erratic mind. “Tell me you’re not mad at me…”

“But then I would be lying,” she says putting her hands on  hips.

He pulls her by the hips again, bumping her to him again, making her weak all over again. “Tell me a lie.”

“Where have you been?” she asks him. He was supposed to be so much more than secret-whispers and smug-cocky smirks.

“Southside,” he says biting his lower lip and shoving his hands pocket deep.

His eyes flicker down to the dirt he’s standing on and his lips purse but she can read them and the words he’s trying to speak. “Stop going Southside,” she begs. Her hands finding his and pulling them up to her lips. “Just be here with me.”

Jughead sighs and his hands tighten in hers. He pulls Veronica’s hands to his lips this time, kissing them over and over. “I’m here,” he mumbles. “I’m here, I’m here, I’m here,” he repeats his prayer, on her knuckles, smoothing out fingers, running over her nails.

She feels them building in her chest first then it runs up into her mind; half-prayers and mumbled promises. “I can give you more than they can,” she promises. “I just want you to be here with me.”

He chuckles again and lets go of Veronica, pulling at belt loops again. “I’m always here,” he answers. “Always.” He was here but he’s not here. He was in her space but he wasn’t really here with her. “Tell me a lie,” he murmurs sugar-sweet. “Tell me a lie, tell me a lie,” he murmurs as he pulls her in; shoulders easing, anger still running electric through her. “Tell me you don’t hate the Serpents, tell me you’re okay… Tell me another lie.”

She pushes at his chest; shoving him away. Weak-handed, pissed-off-strong. “I hate that you don’t tell me everything.”

He sniggers at her. It’s all cocky-truths and rolled eyes. “That’s not a lie, Princess,” he says running his tongue over minty-fresh teeth. “That’s the worst kind of truth.”

“You’re right,” she whispers against his lips.

“We’ll be leaving, any day now, Princess.”

She’s lost in the taste of his tongue and his hands between her thighs.

XXXXX

The SS Camaro is in need of a paint job, but it's enough to do the trick. His heart races and the arteries barely open up but this time, not from pain. From pure, unfiltered excitement. Jughead is okay, but he's not at the same time. The sun shines through the window of the car and he knows it should be burning him, it's unnaturally hot today but he feels almost nothing at all. Crashing waves is what he feels in the tightness of his chest and freefalling right in the pit of his stomach. He's scared. He's worried. He'd give up his entire life just for this. Veronica is two minutes late but the way her hair swings with her brisk walk and her suitcase rolling behind her, he can see that those two minutes was part of his time well spent. She was here, and every step on the pavement as she walks to the car feels like they sprout dark petalled roses from the concrete and her smile is rooting itself in his veins. Just seeing her is completing him. He revs the engine, she opens up. They look at each other; Jughead lets Veronica peer directly into his soul and at one point, he feels her inside of him. She shuts the heavy door, it makes her flinch but she takes a deep breath, steadies herself, closes her eyes. Inhales. He turns on the indicator to signal out of the street but before he moves, he kisses her cheek. "I love you, Veronica." Veronica smiles like the sun in the middle of summer, burning him, charred skin. "I love you too, Jughead," she breathes. "Let's go." "Where to?" "Our new home," she laughs. "Anywhere!" Jughead remembers how he got here in the first place. Love.

—————————|

Lots of love,

@veronicassadboi

[yourjughead]

Loyalty

Sweet Pea x Reader 

Part 2

Synopsis: an alternative point of view to Athletes in which Reader is the boss Serpent Jrs and she has eyes for Sweet Pea but he had eyes for a cheerleader who only dates athletes.

A//N: not sure about this storyline or if it will have a second part, let me know if you like it. It's quite long and the time line is over many weeks if not months.

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

“I hear she only dates Athletes SP”

“So an athlete I will be Fangs”

“Oh god, I don't think they take delinquents on their prissy basketball team Sweet Potato”

“A bit of positivity ynn-ie, please" you rolled your eyes at your best friend who was ogling at the cheerleader across the quad. And not you.

“It's neeeever going to wooork” your voice teasingly taunted as you slipped off the table you were perched on and sauntered off to your locker.

“Dude I thought you were crazy about yn?”

“I am but she's...I don't know it's complicated”

“Hmm a girl in our gang who we all love and respect, who can handle herself and is smarter and handier with ammunition than any of us combined likes you back, wow you are the definition of tragedy pretty boy” Sweet Pea shoved him off his end of the bench and he went laughing.

“No it's more complicated than that, she's our superior and she's...ugh it's easier if I just leave it and besides, Sarah over there will make a nice distraction”

~

Sweet Pea went to tryouts, dragging Fangs along. You and Toni sat on the bleachers watching them run up and down, doing all of the things that was required of them and it wasn't just your interest that was peaking. Sarah was enthralled by your bad boy basketball best friend.

Coach announced that same day that both boys made it onto the team. You being the first to see the list with their names.

“Pea!” You called happily to him running down the hall to meet him, seemingly forgetting his reasons for joining in the first place. You went to take him in a hug but instead you almost skidded into the back of a cheer uniform.

“Names Sarah Weatherbee, vice cheer captain, congratulations on making the team. C’mon, walk with me” you looked her up and down from behind before going to say something, being cut off by Sweet Peas goofy grin. She linked her arm through his and hauled him off. Toni joining your side with Fangs.

“Well, he's joined the darkside...oh and congrats on making the team Fangs” your somber tone was not lost on your friends as you slipped off to be alone.

~

You and Toni attended every basketball game you could, with Serpent work getting in the way sometimes. At first the change in Sweet Pea was subtle but then he asked Sarah out and she began changing him entirely. He no longer wore his Serpent gear unless at meetings, his hair was different, he didn't drive his bike opting for his car instead however the most significant change was he was simply never around anymore. At the start you’d all always go get dinner after games, now you were lucky to get a goodbye from him. This hadn't gone unnoticed by any of you.

“I wonder how he plays basketball with that stick stuck up his ass”

“Easy ynn you know he's just going for the girl”

“Yeah well he's got her and she's changed him into Malibu Ken” the three of you watched him, now on the other side of the quad, eating lunch with her.

“You still have me, I've not gone rogue”

“If only” Fangs threw a ketchup packet at you in rebuttal, the three of you laughing which seemed to catch Sweet Peas attention, if only for a second before it was dragged back by Sarah.

After lunch, Sweet Pea dug around his locker and you threw yourself against the one alongside his.

“Hey Sweet Potato we have a job tonight so cocktails at Buckingham Palace will have to wait till tomorrow”

“I have this family garden dinner thing at Sarah's so I can't"

“You can and you will” your tone went from playfully to blunt. Cutthroat, angry with anything that moves kind of blunt. He stood up to look you in the eyes for the first times in weeks. He really looked different, more polished.

“Is that a threat?”

“I'm sure you wouldn't want to find out. 8pm. Docks.” You pushed off the locker moving to leave but he caught your forearm before you could.

“Yn. I can't, I have this thing wit-”

“With the Serpents? Yeah it's called loyalty, remember that? Now I know you think a look out job is below your ranks and it's certainly below mine as your boss but I'm doing this to help YOU get back in good with the Seniors because they're not happy with your recent...alliances and besides, I can't do look out by myself” you pulled your arm from his grip, your voice dripping cold, you were over his ignorance and as you walked away he attempted the last dig.

“Can't do a little watch job by yourself?”

“Not that I can't, I shouldn't have to” the last dig was yours and you delivered it to him with you back turned. He knew the rules, no Serpent no matter their ranking was allowed do lookout by themselves, there's always strength in numbers. As soon as those thoughts entered his mind, they left it as Sarah made her appearance. He was falling for this girl who was honestly a witch and he didn't know how to break it to her that he couldn't go to her family's outdoor dinner.

~

~

Sweet Pea POV

I just had to go to that dinner. I did. Sarah wanted me there, I didn't have a choice. Yn will understand...I mean she might be a little annoyed I turned my phone off on her but she'll get over it.

“Sweet Pea!” Fangs came running into the private gardens, Serpent gear and all, what is he trying to do?! He's going to embarrass me!!

“Dude! Get out of here before someone sees you"

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?!”

“It means keep your voice down and unless it's important, leave” yes I was harsh but I was around important people and I didn't want to make a show of myself.

“Yeah? Well YNs car was ambushed and because of you she was there alone and now she's in the hospital so is that important enough for you Mr. Wall Street?” I thought I was going to be sick and Sarah being Sarah, chose the wrong time to come over and ask Fangs to leave.

~

Third Person.

You sat up in the hospital bed, it's cold steel frame burying in your back. A bandage over your forehead, eye threatening to close, lip crusted in uncleaned blood, a forcibly broken arm in a cast. Your one good eye focused on the wall and you jumped when your the door violently swung open and your body howled in pain for the movement. Sweet Pea put a hand to his mouth and seemingly stumbled to your bedside, collapsing on his knees to the floor next to you. His Serpent jacket gracing his shoulders for the first time in weeks

“Y-yn”

“Save it”

“No yn I have to apologise”

“Well apologizing isn't going to transport us back in time to before I was beaten with a metal bar now is it?” you cocked your head to one side sarcastically and tried not to show the pain the movement caused.

“I...I brought you this teddy, it's dressed like a nurse and-”

“A FUCKING STUFFED ANIMAL?! I WANT YOUR FUCKING LOYALTY NOT THIS” you took it from him with your slightly better hand and tossed it to your feet.

“Okay there's no need for all the swearing I know you're hurt but-”

“NO! NO FUCKING BUTS! YOU HAD AN OBLIGATION TO THE GANG TO BE THERE! You had an obligation to me!” Tears began to threaten your cheeks.

“They could have killed me tonight Sweet Pea, I've got internal bleeding and a cracked rib to name some of the stuff you can't see but you know what?! You not being there for me hurt way more than that beast breaking my arm over his knee. Just fucking leave me alone, you're so good at that" Sweet Pea stood slowly biting the inside of his cheek and moving for the door.

“You know yn, I will live with the guilt of what happened tonight for the entirety of my life and I hope I do because it's the least i deserve and I'm going to find the people who did this to you.”

“Alright Liam Neeson, take your special set of skills somewhere else” you went back to showing your anger instead of hurt.

“What can I do to help fix this yn, what can I do to being to fix this?”

“Go back to being the old Sweet Pea” you looking him in the eye for the first time since he came in. And although he was kind of blurry, you held as much focus as you could.

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“It means go back to the Sweet Pea who cared about his friends and his family and didn't try to reprimand me for fucking swearing. Go back to the Sweet Pea who had not only my back, but everyone's”

“what you mean break up with Sarah?"

“I never said Sarah. You came up with that one on your own” your naturally blunt tone was easily a match for his new forced one, even that had become a struggle in his new change and because timing was not her strong suit, in she came.

“Sweeties come on, I'm sick of waiting in the car can we just go alre-oh yn, umm you look umm...hi yn” you just narrowed your eyes at her before waving her off and sinking back down into the bed. Sarah didn't seem phased and caught Sweet Peas hand to pull him out.

“Oh wait Sweeties” you called after him sarcastically and he turned quickly, naively thinking you had a change for heart.

“Leave your jacket, you won't be needing it” once again you got the last dig in. He grunted as he tugged off the jacket and threw it on the hospital chair, Sarah then achieving in taking him away. You let yourself cry then, no longer able to keep up the idea of being strong. Soon you found yourself teary but in the arms of Toni and Fangs who got into the bed next to you to comfort you. Sweet Pea had once again left you but you always had them.

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

Part 2

Share if you like it Xx

[kookmingold]

JIKOOK AU [Based off Riverdale]

A/N: I’ve been watching Riverdale the whole day and decided I NEEDED to make a Jikook au based off of it so here you go. WARNING! I can’t write for shit and this is probably crap but oh well. If you want a part 2, let me know? ALSO THIS IS NOT EDITED AND ENGLISH IS NOT MY MOTHER LANGUAGE.

"Hey Chim" The brown haired boy, Taehyung, calls for his best friend.

"Yeah?" Jimin asks as he looks up from the notes he’s taken earlier in the day durning his English class.

"I’ve been wanting to ask you and don’t freak out or run away, okay?" Nodding, Jimin waits for his best friend to on with his question.

"Why is the southside serpent kid looking at you? I mean he’s been doing it for days and as hot as he is, it’s starting to freak me the fuck out."

Biting his bottom lip, Jimin glances over his shoulder to see no other than Jeon Jungkook looking his way with a sly smile on his oh-so-annoyingly-handsome face.

"I have no idea, why don’t you go and ask him for yourself?" Rolling his eyes at his pink haired best friend, Taehyung takes a sip of his milkshake before getting up from his seat.

For a second Jimin believes that he’s going to leave or maybe go to the bathroom but then it hits him. The exit and the bathroom is in the opposite direction.  

Quickly getting out of his seat and jogging after his best friend, Jimin takes a hold of Taehyung’s upper arm – stopping him dead in his tracks.

"What are you doing?" Innocently smiling down at his best friend, Taehyung pulls away his hand smoothly.

"What I was told too do-HEY SERPENT," And at this very moment Jimin can’t help but wonder why the hell he’s still friends with Kim Taehyung.

Looking away from the pink haired beauty, Jungkook shoots Taehyung a cold glare.

"What do you want rich kid?" Mint haired, Min Yoongi aka Jungkook’s right hand asks, a bored look on his face.

"Oh nothing, I just want to know why your serpent prince here has been drooling over my best friend for the past few days." Taehyung smiles. Jimin has a name for that smile: ‘I’m a wicked person who gives zero fucks about my own life’.

"Is he even something to look at?" Another serpent chuckles, his eyes scanning every inch of Jimin’s body. Never in his whole life time has the petite boy felt so naked and dirty.

Southside serpents. Jimin’s father would have his neck if he finds out that he even looked in their direction. They’re from the bad side of town, they’re the outcast. The people no one wants to deal with or been seen with – or atleast those in their right minds, like Jimin. Jimin is a good kid, or so the whole town believes. He does his homework, he get’s good grades, he shows up in every class, always helps people out, is a gentle and kind soul, never let’s anyone down unlike Jeon Jungkook. The southside serpents ‘kings’ son, only son for that matter and he is without any doubt going to be the next king of that pathetic castle. Jimin doesn’t doubt that for a second. The boy is tall, full of muscles, he wear the serpent tattoo with pride, ears full of piercings and god, don’t get Jimin talking about his lip piecring. He’ll never say it out loud but it’s the hottest thing he’s seen and he can’t help but wonder how it would be to pull on that bottom lip of Jungkook’s.

Shooting his gang member a quick look, Jungkook gets up from his seat – stepping closer to Taehyung with his stupid smirk not washing off.

"He kinda sticks out like a sore thumb with that pink hair, don’t you think?" Jungkook asks, glancing over at Jimin with his bottom lip stuck between his pearly white teeth.

‘God he’s so annoying!’ Jimin whines, obviously in his head.

"Oh" Taehyung dryly laughs, crossing his arms across his chest.

"The sore thumb here is you and your wanna-be bad boys, thinking you can walk in here acting like you own the place. I know your mother fucked another man and was mur-"

Before he can finish the sentence, a hand is tightly wrapped around his neck.

"Finish that sentence Kim" Jungkook warns, gritting his teeth in a silent but obvious rage.

"I’ll cut your head off and feed it to your scum bag of a dog, do you get that?"

Fear. Jungkook finally sees fear in Taehyung’s eyes and all of a sudden he’s back in the diner with Park Jimin staring at him. Fear. Jimin is shaking in fear, his beautiful eyes are holding fear..fear of Jungkook and what he can do.

Letting out a shaky breath, Jungkook let’s go of the brown haired boy – taking a step back. He wasn’t going to be like his father, he wasn’t going to be another devil in the line of serpent leaders.

"Taehyung" a small voice whispers catching Jungkook attention.

Jimin-

"Taehyung let’s leave" The pink haired boy states, not daring to look the serpent in the eyes.

"Please" he pleads, only for his best friend to hear.

 ****

"What was that?" Yoongi asks, as soon at they enter the serpent territory.

"The fucker talked about ma, I couldn’t let him get away with that hyung" The younger defends himself.

He’s right, Yoongi knows he’s right but he also knows how Jungkook wants to change for the better, for the serpents to be able to walk around with pride one day, to be the guy who’ll swoon Park Jimin off his feet. Yoongi knows.

"Yeah but fucking with the best friend of your little crush is kinda real stupid, don’t you think kid?"

Yes it is, but Jungkook wouldn’t take it back. Taehyung spoke about his mother, his biggest weakness. He asked for it, the whole town knows not to bring up his mother and if they do, they’re done for it. Even if it’s Park Jimin himself. After all, Jungkook is a serpent at blood.

"Just like you said hyung, it’s a little crush. My family, my loyalty to the serpents comes first and everyone else later."

That’s a lie. Yoongi knows, Yoongi always knows.

****

"Your dad is going to lose it when he sees those bruises around your neck" Jimin worries, gently sliding his fingers over the purple blue skin on his tan best friends neck.

"Well good thing he’s never home and I’ll just put some foundation on, don’t worry Chim."

"Don’t worry? Excuse me! That asshole may had killed you today and no one would have said a word!" Shrugging his shoulders, Taeyung gets up from his kingsize bed with a sigh.

"I’m the mayor’s son Chim, someone and that someone being my father would say something. Trust me."

"I guess you’re right, but please be careful" Jimin pats his hand before puling on his jacket and bidding his lanky friend goodbye.

****

Jungkook has always believed that he has a good hold on his temper, he knows what he’s doing and nothing can or no one can make him lose it. But no one has ever talked about his mother, no one dares to talk about the Jeon family. It’s an unwritten rule: Do not talk about the messed up Jeon family, they always find out.

Growing up, Jungkook was a vibrant and happy kid, he was what people called the sanity of serpents. The only one who was human, who felt and touched with care. He was full of so much love, so much life. He was a smart kid and some people even believed that maybe, maybe a serpent kid will make it out of this tragic down.

But the apple doesn’t fall from the three, Jungkook was no different. His father found his mother in bed with his brother, one week later and both of them were found dead on the highway right outside of Busan. Everything changed. The kindness his father had for him was gone, he was no longer aloud to talk with Northsiders. He was going to be the next leader, if he wanted it or not. Little jungkook didn’t know better at the age of eight and agreed to everything he was told. Like any kid would do to make their parent happy.

Pulling over, the young serpent pulls his helmet off, sliding a hand through his dark brown hair.

In the end he’ll just go down as another punk gang leader, forgotten and left in the dust when the right time comes.

The ring of his phone cuts through the night silence pulling him back to reality.

"What’s up?" Jungkook answers the phone.

"Eastside hunters have seen your drooling after that cotton candy boy, Seokjin has been keeping eyes on the kid for a few days and so has someone else. And guess who it is, suprise suprise it’s the play dogs from The Eastside."

"Is he alright?" Jungkook isn’t one to panic or to show off his fear but the thought of those filthy eastsiders touching Jimin is making his head spin.

"Well…hyung brought him here and now we have no choice but to keep him here until your father comes back. You know the rules kid." And here Jungkook thought Yoongi was the smart one.

"What do you mean brought him in? Did he force him to come with him? Hyungvare you guys out of your fucking minds?"

Jungkook might want to keep the pink haired male safe but that does not by any means that his gang members will be kind to the boy. Or even let him live in peace for that matter.

"I’ll be home in five minutes, just leave him in my room and lock it. Make sure no one gets in or out."

 ****

"Listen if this is about what Taehyung did, I’m really sorry, okay? He says shit sometimes but he didn’t mean it. I promise you’ll never see our faces again, just please let me go home." Jimin rambles as soon as Jungkook enters his bedroom.

Shutting the door behind him, the serpent leans against the wooden door, eyes scanning the boy infront of him. Fear. Jimin is scared, he’s shaking and Jungkook is pretty sure the boy has been crying for the past ten minutes or so.

"We can’t let you leave" Jungkook states, sliding a hand over his face. This is not what he needed, he did not need to be the bad guy again. Not infront of Jimin.

"But why? I did nothing wrong!" The pink haired cries out, getting on his feet and facing jungkook.

He looks so small standing in front of Jungkook, in need of protection but the serpent knows that’s not the case. Jimin is smart, he might be scared but he isn’t stupid.

"You didn’t do anything wrong, but the eastsiders are after you and unless you want to die you have to stay here." Jaw dropping, Jimin takes a step back.

Eastsiders? They’re the ones who started all of this, the gang mess and the drug dealing. They used to rule Busan once upon a time, a time when the Southside serpents was just a bunch of edgy teenagers. Teenagers who later grew up to play with fire and knifes, who pused the Eastsiders off their throne and claim it till this very day.

"W-why are they a-after me?"

Clearing his throat, Jungkook bits his bottom lip. What should he tell him? "Oh you see I have this crush on you and they want to get back on us by using you against me." Yeah um no, not going to happen.

"They probably saw us talking at the diner…." He trails off.

"Saw what? You almost ending my best friend?" If they want to get back on Jungkook, why would they use Jimin? Are they blind? Didn’t they see that he was about to end Taehyung?

"I don’t fucking know, okay? If you want to leave, fucking go! If you don’t want to fucking die, shut your ass and stay here."

And Jimin’s left alone again, with Jungkook storming out and the door slammed shut.

"Oh yeah, this feels just like home.. "

[jameypants1-blog]

Reading Makes A Country Great MY PET GOAT Emergency 911 The Terror War begins Ignorance is Bliss stand Proud and United rally around the Flag cross your heart swear to Sacrifice thank the least among you for their military home invasion mass murder Service keeping Authority placated rock the Vote respect the Law and State's Finest army of police who serve and protect them, Respect the Honor and Authority of the blind justice arbitrated by ritual black robed Judges and the prejudiced juries of peers any skilled Liar can persuade to Verdict The educated are educated to Accept The Free are not Brave enough to Resist Swear to tell the Truth so help you God is an Obscenity and offensive to a populace bursting with the enlightenment of Science, the premise that Flesh is the Origin of Species and Intelligence a side effect of gas Love thy Leader Hate thy neighbor Kill and chain thy neighbor Earn your Keep Pay your Taxes Death is certain It is not the size of the horn but how it's used that betrays best gets praised for elite public service Performance How fortunate it is for leaders that men do not think, Hitler intimated, forthcoming as any candidate for Office who smiles kissing maggot babies and shaking fools hands telling each in line thanks for their support couldn't do this without them Hell hides behind details and simpering political correctness, kind words expressing best intentions the enemies of which are branded crazy and evil and dealt with. How fortunate men do not think. Lest leaders and the Hell they maintain be naked by Light of the Truth. You can handle the Truth. You can be brave and free. It's these so called elite who can't. Never ask what they can do for you or you for them. Don't give up your food stamps just yet they trade for drugs just don't Serve them, Loyalty to them is so universal I am ignored and insulted. In Contempt. That's the price of Love. Let's change that. Perception is reality is their constant refrain. It is not. Reality is this fraction of a single percent of the population is a basket of deplorables in perpetual conspiracy to violate and ruin every human being on Earth. It's shocking and horrific but people can handle the Truth. Here is Wisdom: Had a customer tonight guy in his sixties cropped back hair going gray one of those Freddy Mercury mustaches adopted by law enforcement to remind everyone they're tops cocksuckers not pigs bc pigs don't have mustaches. he was wearing a black tshirt and jeans, never seen him before, recognize most of the customers, we have the same regulars rotating through for the most part. He came in right after I did, like my second grill order after clocking in. Gave me the stinkeye, and instead of going to sit in the dining room until his order was called he stayed in the lobby, got behind the Pepsi ketchup fridge by register, from the nose up visible over the fridgetop. I was on second flip before I noticed him again, glaring at me still. Eye contact, rage in his eyes. Made his burgers to perfection, ignoring him but for sidelong peeks to see if he still there; he was still there looking pissed off. I strongly suspect him to have been involved with lie enforcement, that or ive got one of those faces brings out the hate in frustrated Dom bondage specialists. kept my face expressionless, sent the burgers out and he left not long after. Felt the loathing in the air leave with him. He hates me for my freedom, like to put me in cuffs and bugger me into some Respect for his Authority lavished from God unto Moses unto the Chosen People, the Elite, who gifted us all with the world's two biggest religions Islam and Christianity to refer to in the establishent of State, Islamic States still widely fundamentalist in extrapolations and ammendments to the fundamentals Law, even today stones striking pleading girls in the face until the glistening bone pulp shows, eyeball popped out shattered socket debt paid for her adultry of being raped by a man she wasn't married to, lacivious temptress women not tolerated, kept virtuous by Ordained killers sanctimonious witless butchers in judicious black robes black masks, love and peace delegates, spread the beautiful religion into Eastern Europe and jerusalm, effective Evangelical technique of the option to submit you are the slave of Allah, either submit or get your head looped off. Beautiful religion. The castles of Europe erected to fortify against the sacred Islamic state conquering all of Elite Europe, price of doing Business, business of giving people the business, keep them stoneage and in check until final act, today thousands of Muslim migrants fleeing Syria region where isis, the royal president, Russia and the United States are mass murdering the population in alternating sweeps all claiming success against the terrorists who are any one of the four mass destroyers depending on which regions fake news one watches, the cities in ruins, the people still left sparse and debilitated, the dregs, hundreds of thousands more turning sections of Germany France great Britain etc into ghettos, young girls being raped in public parks, a seven yo girl in France gang raped in Germany lone German teens stalked in the streets by packs of Muslim youth and beaten half to death teens boasting they will take multiple wives across region have dozens of children each and breed out the natives, conquer Europe with their cocks now that the dear leaders of the region had welcomed them in. Beautiful religion. on their knees five times a day to take a facefull of dirt groveling praises toward the black cube in Mecca which Abraham built and shat inside marking the turf, holy kabba, over ten feet tall and ten feet wide the wonder of the Islamic world which one day all of Islamic Europe shall pilgrimage to link arms and dance ring around the cubicle singing and shouting trampling each other then setting off across hard desert terrain, many every haj die along the route hail Allah that the prophet Mahomet, may he rest in stink took wandering the sand ocean from sand dune to sand valley to sand mount where pilgrims collapse into the sand and commune with Allah catching spiderwebs of shade from the spray of spindly limbed trees rising several feet high here and there, terrain as beautiful as Islam itself and straight to Judgement for those sun dried brain fried dead before completing the last leg of the blessed trudge to the sacrificial slaughter barns where depending on what slaves of Allah can afford to slice the throat of a variety of animals await blood ritual, goats camels sheep sand chickens and coming soon pigs once the half breed desert princes of Frankfurt introuce fat juicy pork weenies into the Islamic diet, blonde haired blue eyed pink bellied pigs recognized to be far too majestic to be interbred with Jews, fine swine imported from outside the East where the scruffy big snout kosher breed forages in feral packs, hear them oinking Hebrew and Yiddish gibberish rooting in alley trash like dogs, dirtiest animals in all of creation, howling and squealing together during crawl in place borg prayers tuned in to Abraham's outhouse ever amid ring around the square dancing, stumbling, trampled underfoot weaklings hoe down haj stop in the stadium built around the squat edifice that thousands may sit and cheer rendering inaudible the tinny prayers from around the globe every couple hours, dogs howling offended every prayer, kick the snarling curs at risk of losing toes and sandles get tangled up in black man dress and fall down surrounded by curly tailed rabbi and black dogs foaming at the mouth eyes rolling from echoes of lalalalalalalala eeeeeek eeeeeeek eeeeeeek barnyardesque broadcasts from loud speakers leading the haj hails between free time to marry and divorce multiple times a day and trade goats for girls to marry and divorce trade back for chickens or a dozen eggs if she's missing ears tip of her nose or digits from administering divine law rehabilitation mutilations, sometimes new divorcees only fetch a bucket of fertile shit, hobbled hunchback prolapsed asshole tounge sliced into fork for her hissing disobedience to swallow the donkey load of bountiful seed diligently fed her everyday in lieu of lunch meanwhile back at the last stop of holy haj long walk baby animals and ton tall spitting camels shriek and wail, hawk lunger loads of camel snot pink with slashed throat blood spew onto the walls, slick spots on the straw, bled out into tubs and running down beards drank in hot clotted toasts to Allah who the sacrificed animals were stacked like cordwood into earthen pits and burned to appease blessings to all and to all a good time at the hotel after parties where newly married couples meet, consumate, get divorced and the just single ladies reintroduced to next end of haj celebratent to be smitten and fallen in love until the boredom of domestic life after orgasm left him dissatisfied with this woman who used to be useful but went back to the singles mixer sore and cooperative awaiting true love perhaps next bus in full of blood spattered fresh inducties into the walkabout God's country for days purification event everyone owed it themselves to do at least once a lifetime to truly get the most out of Islam the impending new religion of the well served everywhere from Africa to Piccadilly square, to be renamed Mahomet Kaba King Boulevard erected in the center of the square a scale replica of the Kaba with Mahomet himself weilding scrimtar of faith from head to toe dressed in black mounted upon his goat horse chimera Pegasus thingy reared up like a reindeer representing the flight taken to heaven to lead the prayer circle in heaven where all had deferred to him to lead the prayer circle of Prophets in Allah's den, Jesus fresh as the Daisy he'd been since the day he'd cleverly avoided crucifixion by Jerry curling his big black bushy beard and sneaking out of town on his gf's ass while another fellow, whose beard was styled similarly to his and who had assembled a small crowd outside town to demonstrate a new stain removal product for even the toughest stains like days caked Hersey splats from loincloths see comes right out and with the herbal infused formula eliminates some of the stench of urine baked in since pissing it in a wine induced stupor earlier that afternoon as jews were known to do between assuming their posts begging for pennies outside the bank, that guy had looked and sounded like the upstart they were looking for and after his miracle product failed to impress the honorable pontus Pilate with any supernatural stain removal properties except when applied to soiled underpants, a demonstration he didn't need to see twice since his underpants indeed came out clean the first attempt, hardly a miracle but in a good mood since his ass felt and smelled so fresh after the man who kept persisting I am not the Jew you were looking for I'm just an alchemist with a revolutionary new product for removing stains the secret formula is just leavening soda and grapeseed pumice mixed with water and lavender leaves ofc it's not a miracle I am not the king of the universe I've never even met the guy no one does but he doesn't travel alone with a bucket of my new secret formula removing shit stains from underwear, he's a stand up magician or something, heard there's strippers too, Im just a humble asshole freshener your honor and feeling magnanimous floral fragrance of his anus clinging to the finger he scratched along his craft to sniff while contemplating opens the honorable Pilate said let's let these Jews outside demanding their picked pockets wallets and jewelery back stolen by the whores and at least a dozen confidence men known to be traveling with this wanted man who said fuck the centurions fuck the flag fuck hannaka fuck Elysian fields fuck the Senate fuck caesaer fuck Rome fuck caiphus fuck the Torah fuck yo mama and fuck all of you cringing sex slave submissives bending over and getting fucked everyday to earn wheat penny Caesars that aren't worth a tin shit except for your belief in Caesar says, Caesar says hail Caesar I say fuck Caesar render unto casear these piles of Caesars ugly cunt lips embossed nickles and dimes and shove em up Caesars ass let him go pawn these pieces of shit off on some other idiots bc we're Jews brothers and sisters and Jews don't need no stinking sick economy sicker fools who'd diminish themselves by going along with this madness, Caesar is a paper god you drunks this money charade is just a game and your the losers for playing so fuck him fuck Rome and fuck all these fake ass God's and curly tailed shit eating elites got us all playing along counting stacks of worthless legal tender whoopty Doo what caesar says and fuck his court of whimsy and don't bend over only ever acquire what he gives you and dont obey every stupid lie he tells you is the law, tell him to take this Nation of lies and the shiney lie sanctioned house chips he rode in on and shove it up his ass bc if you don't you'll all be spending your lives sucking Satan's cock doing as Satan says and get paid in Satan tokens worth your life loyalty and labors and in return a flag to admire and fight for a song of the murder glory of this shithole to cross your hearts and sing that all who hear it know how unified and proud you are and you'll be paid to with every Betrayal his crown can afford to give you now that you've given him lives to spend. Have a free flag coffin shroud a medal of Honor for service unto Casear human sacrife pin and a bedpan full of shiney Benjamin's to spend at super Caesars super savers everywhere Rome is maurading, hail Caesar full of grace give you nothing give him everything and that sumbitch drugged the watered down wine him and his whores and degenerates robbed us and fuck yes that's him I recognize the beard kill him set Barbarossa free and so despite insisting he was not their King nor a crook the wrong man was crucified that day and Jesus told this straight to Mahomet so you know it's true bc Mahomet word is gold then Jesus said I am the slave of Allah and Mo he's instructed me to let his biggest ho Mo lead the ass in the air prayers from now on bc I'm always broke have never tipped a red Satan cent to tithe and insist that Allah sound a dry heave so does every single thing you said Mo so you're deffo the man to lead prayer to that bullshitters bullshit, guess it keep you busy long enough not to butcher or mutilate anyone for five minutes at least. Raise your Voice be offended by this beastial religion we're diminished under by these sneering aristocrats who practice it, they're the crew can't handle the Truth. Lies are all they got. Be eloquent. Knowing and not choosing a side is just a mess. I bring you. Pallid incompotence hanging from a mic stand. Prime example of why there's no having it both ways. Fuck it 🌊 https://g.co/kgs/ACnHqS