#he rather generously removed it towards the end of the day even though it wasn't scheduled for that and only charged $600

[californiaquail]

its teeth were rotting out of its skull AND it had a hideous oozing necrotic tumor on its leg! which had "only been there since saturday"

we have the worst smelling dog on earth in today which is saying a lot

[rays-of-fire-and-ice]

Returnal: Winter

Two Weeks of Hitsuhina 2024: Days 12 & 14 - Birthday & Winter

Rating: K/General

Setting: between the ten-year time-skip and No Breaths from Hell oneshot, but as this is a companion piece to Returnal: Summer, it’s five months after that fic.

Synopsis: on his birthday, Hitsugaya returns to where it all began for him. Hinamori comes along to help him put the pieces together.

AN: a belated birthday fic! I didn’t intend to write a companion piece to my other Two Weeks of Hitsuhina submission, Returnal, but when I was coming towards the end of writing that one, the idea for this one came to mind and I couldn’t not write it. It’s why I ended up including Summer in the title of that fic, to differentiate it from this one.

Some of you may recall a fic I wrote years ago that explores Toshiro's origins a bit. I wasn't happy with how that one turned out, and I've been looking for an opportunity and idea to try it again. Prepare for an angsty one, I wanted to explore an aspect of Toshiro's character that I think doesn't quite get explored enough and it led me to write some potentially out-of-character moments; but I promise there’s fluffy hurt/comfort here too.

Finally, while I would love for you to also read Returnal: Summer, you don’t have to have read it to understand what’s going on here.

I hope you all enjoy this one!

_____________________

Hitsugaya doesn’t startle at the bang of the party poppers, nor at the streamers that fly from them and brush over or land on his uniform.

“Happy birthday!” Rangiku, Hinamori, and Granny all cheer in sing-song.

He’d sensed Hinamori and Rangiku’s reiatsu as he’d approached his childhood home, and had an inkling before arriving they’d had something planned since yesterday. Hinamori said he should visit the Junrinan tomorrow, and Rangiku tried to wipe a secretive smirk from her face.

He can’t help but let out a sigh while he smiles. “So, this is what you two were up to.”

Rangiku and Hinamori exchange a surprised glance.

"There's no hiding anything, from the captain, huh?" his lieutenant whispers to her.

"He's always been perceptive," Hinamori whispers back with a shrug.

"I can hear you from over here," Hitsugaya half grumbles.

“Now, now, come here, Toshiro,” Granny says, waving him over. “Your candles will start to melt.”

It’s only then he notices the cake on the table in front of them. Although small, it’s rather elaborate, with strawberries on top of puffs of cream around the edges, and his name written beneath ‘Happy Birthday’ in icing. The candles atop and a lantern near the back of the room cast the small space in a warm glow. For a winter’s night, it’s rather cozy.

He removes his shoes before stepping up to living room and kneeling opposite the three at the table. All the while, they smile at him, and Rangiku makes a comment he doesn’t quite catch, but it makes Granny chuckle and Hinamori suppress a giggle.

 “What’s so funny?” he asks.

Rangiku waves a hand towards the cake, “Nothing! Now go on, make a wish and blow out the candles.”

He’s tempted to snark back that wishes are for children, but refranes with Granny present. Even if he wanted to make one, he has no wish he wants granted. He's always lived ascetically, his work life is always hectic and he had little interest in material things beyond their practical use -- though his ice sculpting was an exception in that regard.

So, he blows out the candles, and his smile returns -- smaller and indulgent this time -- at the clapping and quiet cheers before him. He doesn’t really bask in it. There was a time where he would’ve considered all of this a fuss, one that embarrassed him and would leave him flustered. A small part of him still cringes inwardly, but as the years went on, he came tolerate the attention and appreciate the efforts they made.

For him, it's another birthday. Another year to add to the decades he’s been alive. He’s never ungrateful for those who choose to celebrate his birthday, but he’s rarely been happy to celebrate it himself. With a quiet huff of a chuckle, he wonders if he’s getting old.

“Shiro-chan?”

He rolls his eyes. “Captain Hitsugaya, Hinamori.”

“Oh come on, sir!” Rangiku says while she the room to light two more lanterns. “You’re not going to enforce that while we’re off duty, are you?”

“Says the person who just called me ‘sir’,” he mutters. Then, louder, “But yes, I am. Regardless of whether I’m duty on not, it’s my rank to both of you.”

The two of them sigh, and Granny just looks on, smiling proudly.

“Well, regardless, it’s another year,” Hinamori says, handing him the knife.

“Indeed,” says Granny while picking off the candles from the cake.

“And he’s barely aged a day,” Rangiku teases, causing Granny to let out a chittering laugh.

He wonders if he should chime in, but he feels no need to. He watches them, knife ready to cut through the cake, while they remove the candles and Hinamori sets the plates out for each of them. His lieutenant brings over the two lanterns, putting one down on the table and another in the opposite corner of the room. It’s a peaceful scene, the kind he’s become accustomed to since the Seireitei’s victory over the Quincy.

After he cuts the cake and serves each of them a slice, they settle around the table and enjoy it in mostly silence. There’s a bit of quiet chatter between the three of them, sometimes including him, but they otherwise leave him be. He prefers it. He’d rather watch the people in his life be happy, he’d come to realise, and takes no offense with them excluding him.

Yet the thought evokes something tight and hollow within him, something he swallows back with a chunk of cake. It’s not the first time he’s experienced it, but it had been decades since the last bout of it.

“Oh! Wait!”

He blinks at Hinamori, who fiddles with something at her side before lifting it into view. He frowns at the box thrust at him.

“I probably should’ve given this before we cut the cake,” she says, her smile rueful. “Sorry, Hitsugaya-kun, but here! Happy birthday!”

A gift. He briefly glances at Granny and Rangiku, and when the latter shrugs, he knows it's only coming from Hinamori.

He’s slow to take the box from her. A blue bow has been tied around it, and there’s a tag that has his name. Why did she go to the trouble to decorate it like this, let alone buy him a gift? She usually gives him something handmade, like a box of sweets and biscuits, or a drawing she did or an ikebana arrangement.

He unties the bow and pulls the lid off. When he lifts up the mug within, Granny lets out an impressed ‘Ohhh’ while Rangiku turns to Hinamori and comments, “That’s the perfect gift for him! He was just saying the other day he needed a new cup!”

“Oh really?” Hinamori gasps. “I had no idea!”

“It’s beautiful,” Granny says. “And I do know he loves his tea. It’s a nice gift, isn’t it, Toshiro?”

It’s glossy surface glimmers in the lantern light. It’s mostly black, but there’s a slip of brown at the bottom, and pouring over the rim like water is a deep blue, which also fills in the inside. He can’t imagine how much this must’ve cost her.

“I got it while we were in the World of the Living,” she says to him. “It’s why it’s not like the cups you see around here.”

“That was five months ago, right?” Rangiku asks.

“Yeah.”

“Wow! You really planned ahead!”

“To be honest, I didn’t think of it has a birthday gift at the time, but, well…”

“Thank you.”

Everyone turns to him. He stares into the mug. “Thank you, Hinamori, this is a really good gift.”

“Oh, I – I’m glad you like it!”

“I’ll be sure to use it starting tomorrow.”

Rangiku lets out an amused huff. “Goodness, sir, you don’t need to say that!”

The evening falls back into quiet chattering as they finish their cake slices. After they’re done, Hinamori prepares tea leaves and Rangiku starts boiling the water. He'd wanted to help, but both insisted he stay where he was -- "It's your birthday, afterall!" Rangiku had reasoned, much to his chagrin.

He let Granny have a look at his new mug and watched as she marvelled at the colors and design. She’s never been to the World of the Living, has only ever heard about it through his and Hinamori’s stories. She probably didn’t even known about the tradition of having a cake with candles to blow out until recently.

She's always lived a quiet life, but since he left her, it's gotten even quieter. Thankfully, others who’d grown up in the area and considered her a grandmother figure have assisted her in his absence with foraging and shopping. It’s one less thing he worries about.

But other things, like if she’s feeling lonely or can’t handle household chores, sometimes prey on his mind. She’s always been an independent spirit, and is more capable for her age than some in the district, but that didn’t mean she had her bad days.

She wasn’t exactly young when she found him either.

The thought brings that feeling again, gripping his throat and chest. The living area and kitchen space, a room he’s known for decades and had always been a source of nostalgia and comfort, is suddenly too confined.

“I’m going out,” he says, standing and making his way to the back. Rangiku gives him a quizzical look, but Granny only nods with a smile. With her back turned to him, he doesn’t see Hinamori’s reaction.

A cold breeze sweeps over him when he steps outside and closes the door behind him. The snowfall is gentle and sparse, floating more than falling to the ground. The light from the windows is a bright orange glow, casting on the veranda and ground. He hears quiet chatter within, but can’t make out what the three of them are saying.

He stands on the veranda for several heartbeats, gauging if being out in the open is enough to assuage this constraining emotion. It calms, but still stews in the back of his mind.

He thinks of one place, somewhere he should’ve gone before coming here.

Hefting his scarf higher up his face, he steps off the veranda and walks into the woods. He looks back briefly when he leaves the orange glow cast on to the ground, moving into the night’s darkness. He let’s out an iota of reiatsu, allowing it attach itself to anything nearby in case they need to come find him.

He wends between the trees and flora. If one were to see him right now, they’d think he was just taking a quiet stroll through the woods; it’s anything but that. Despite not taking a beaten path and going at a slow pace, he knows exactly where he’s going to.

The bare branches rattle above his head, and there’s a distant call of an animal somewhere deeper into the forest. The clouds obscure most of the crescent moon that barely lights his way. None it scares him. He knows this place, has always felt a connection to it, particularly during winter.

He passes through clearing, strides across a rickety bridge over a frozen creek, and comes to a part of the forest where the trees are spaced out from each other as if trying to avoid one another.

When he finds the chopped tree trunk, he stops a short distance from it. The roots are thick and winding, arching high off the ground, and bending and twisting around each other before plunging into the soil. His feet crunch as he walks to the trunk, getting heavier the closer he approaches.

There was nothing special or distinctive about it. It’s only when Granny told him about its’ significance while he was a young boy that he came to see it as anything but an ordinary tree.

The tree had once stood tall, towering high over his head like all the others around it. He remembers the birds in the branches, the cool shade the leaves provided on hotter days. He'd sat in it's branches a few times, but it didn't offer him the view that other taller trees did.

He’s found animals huddled beneath the roots, taking shelter from the snow and wind. The trunk offers little shelter, but perhaps it was better than nothing. He recalls the time he found an injured rabbit, it’s leg and paw bleeding. It was a death sentence in winter, and he couldn’t bare to let it suffer like that. He’d brought it home, only for Granny to say they couldn’t help it. She’d brought him along to give it to another resident in the Junrinan. They eventually found a family who had a rabbit already, but the whole time while Granny spoke with them and then thanked them, their focus had been solely on her.

Then at some point a wild storm had snapped the tree in two, and not long after, someone had come and chopped what remained down, leaving only the stump and roots. It hadn’t been the only tree affected by the decades, a few were also cut down or had been snapped in half, but they were further away, almost out of sight from his.

He remembers bringing Granny to it after discovering it'd been cut down. She hadn't been as sad as he'd hoped.

"It's a shame it was cut down," she laments, even while smiling. "It was also a shame that the storm snapped it in two. I really thought it sprout anew." Her expression brightens as she points to the stump. "But look, Toshiro, you can see the rings now. You can see how old it is."

"What good does that do?" he'd groused.

"Well, it tells you how much it's seen. It seems like a very old tree, perhaps even as old as the Junrinan. It would've seen a lot."

"Trees don't have eyes, Baa-chan.”

"No, they don't, but who's to say they don't have senses that don't help them see their surroundings? Everything is alive here. It lives for years, and even when it passes away, it lives on here in some shape or form."

He'd shaken his head, perturbed by her ramblings. Even so, as the years went on, and he kept coming back again and again, he did find himself looking at the rings.

Today, he’d meant to come by earlier during the daytime, where he could better make out the number of rings in the wood. He’s lost count for the number of times he’d tried to use those rings to try figuring out at what point he had been been amongst its roots.

The feeling returns thick and fast, clasping around his throat, making him feel heavy in the chest. It's something both heartfelt and dreadful, and he doesn't want to acknowledge the source.

Memories of his day in the World of Living with Hinamori five months ago come up unbidden. She’d remembered having a sibling and parents. What did that feel like? Would it be the same for him when Granny passed away? Unlike like her, however, he'd remember Granny until he died in the Soul Society. Given the de-zombification process he underwent during the war against the Quincy, that time will likely be coming sooner than he expects.

“Shiro-chan?”

He startles. Looking to his right, Hinamori stands a short distance away, a shawl wrapped around her shoulders and a scarf wound around her neck, brow pinched in concern. She holds a round, paper lantern, the one Granny would take to festivals. The candle within is steady, but at even the slightest movements, it flickers.

“Are you okay?” she asks, coming closer. “You weren’t out the back so I came looking for you.”

The slight stagger in her steps betrays just how worried she is. He reigns in his expression to his usual stoicism. “I’m fine, just wanted to go for a walk.”

He doesn't miss the brief tug in the corners of her lips. She comes to a stop at his side and her gaze falls to the tree trunk. She raises the lantern to illuminate it. “You’re back here again.”

He says nothing, simply staring at the rings in the wood.

Several times during their childhood when they were in the forests, he’d ended up coming back here and she tagged along. Eventually, after much badgering on her part and convincing himself he can trust her – because somehow he’d befriended her -- he told her the story behind the tree.

“Did you follow my reiatsu here?” he eventually asks.

“I did sense it, but honestly” – she lets out a weak snort – “I just followed your footprints.”

He glances past her. Indeed, his footsteps are still visible in the snow. He gives a quiet ‘humph’.

She blinks at the nonplussed response. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

Now that she’s asked a second time, he feels he owes her a more honest answer, but it doesn’t reach his lips. “Why did you look for me?”

“It’s like I said, you weren’t on the veranda.”

“You knew I’d come back, though, right?”

“Well, yes, but…” She lets out a sigh. “You seem -- I don't know...out of sorts. Is it because it's your birthday?"

He rolls his eyes. “You know I don’t care about celebrating my birthday.”

“And it’s fine that you don’t, and it’s okay that you feel about it the way you do. But still, you’re not usually like this. You’re not normally this quiet and…” She purses her lips. “Did something happen?”

His gaze narrows at the trunk.

“Did you not like your gift?”

He shakes his head. “No, I like the mug. I appreciate it.”

She relaxes at the softness of his response. She lets out another sigh, this one quieter, and shuts her eyes. “I’m sorry. Rangiku-san and I had this surprise planned, and we just wanted to make sure we hadn’t done anything to upset you. We know you don’t really celebrate your birthday, it’s why we chose to do something quieter with Obaa-san.”

Great, now she’s feeling guilty. “Stop that. I don’t mind what you and Matsumoto did.”

She opens her eyes. “Still, I probably should’ve asked you what you wanted.”

“And you know what my answer would’ve been.”

She the corners of her lips tighten, but she says nothing.

“I…don’t mind that you and Matsumoto do this.” It’s a hard thing to admit, but he continues, “Like you said, you keep it quiet, nothing loud or big. I prefer it that way. If you want to do it, then you should keep doing it. I don't mind if it's...if it's you three.”

Her smile is like the sunrise melting the snow. He hates the thump his heart gives seeing it.

“We do it because it’s fun," she clarifies, "but also because we want to show you that your birthday is worth celebrating, even if you don’t believe it yourself.”

Is he truly that transparent to her? No, she’s known him for decades, three years shy of a century now. She’s also always been good at reading people, even when she doesn’t fully know what’s going on in their heads, she can at least something has changed in them.

“If you don’t want to tell me what’s on your mind, then that’s fine," she continues. "We just want to make sure it’s not something we did, and if it were, what we can do to make amends.”

You could never hurt me. It’s not entirely true. She had a few times, but all those instances are either forgiven or there was no need to forgive in the first place.

At his silence, Hinamori returns her attention to the chopped trunk. “Why did you come here? Because it’s your birthday?”

“I usually do,” he answers.

“Funny, I don’t think you’ve ever mentioned it.”

“It’s not exactly something that comes up in conversation. Besides, I’m used to being here on my own.”

“Oh…then, do you want me to --?”

“It’s fine.”

Another silence, but it’s filled by the wind picking up, ruffling their clothes and rattling the branches of the other trees. A thin dusting of snow washes over his shoes. He shakes it off and crosses his arms into his sleeves. He tries to ignore the awkwardness and think of something to say. They could head back, and he can bury whatever is going on within him somewhere deep, until it rises to surface again later -- no doubt in the late hours of the night when he's trying to sleep.

“It’s amazing.”

Hinamori’s voice is so soft Hitsugaya wonders if he heard her right. He quirks a brow at her.

She gestures to the roots at their feet. “There you were in the middle of winter at night. That kind of weather is something most Souls can’t bear to be out in, but here you were, alive.”

Involuntarily, the memories of Granny recounting how she found him flutter before his mind’s eye. She’d been out foraging for roots and vegetables, then collecting firewood. The day had grown dark quickly and a blizzard descended upon the forest. She’d lost her way home, stumbling through the trees, trying to not get suffocated by the wind and snow.

Amidst it all, she heard a baby crying and followed it. When she saw him from a distance nestled among the tree’s roots, she thought he was an animal, until she realised the crying was coming from him. She found him wrapped in a blanket, with only a tuff of white hair and one his eyes peaking through. She took him home and the rest is history.

“I suspect Hyourinmaru kept me alive,” he offers. “Before they're even aware that they have the capabilities or a zanpakuto spirit, a Shinigami’s powers can emerge in different ways.”

Her eyes brighten. “Yes! I didn’t realise it when we were kids and you would dress in fewer layers in the winter compared to others, but when I thought about it, your tolerance for the cold must’ve been because of Hyourinmaru’s powers.”

Her gaze darkens to sombreness. Quietly, she crouches and gently lays down the lantern before resting a hand on one of the roots. “Even so, no one could’ve known that at the time. Not to mention you were a baby, your powers wouldn't have been anywhere near as strong as they are today. I don’t understand how someone could leave…” She bites her lip, the rising anger dying immediately. “Ah, sorry.”

“Don’t be.” His monotonous tone only makes her wince. “It happened. I was left here.”

That feeling clutches at him again, tightening his throat. He swallows against it. If he speaks his mind to her, would it go away? It’s rare that confiding to her makes him feel worse afterward; he can’t even remember the last time it had gone badly. “But what if I wasn’t?”

“Uh?”

“What if I wasn’t abandoned by any parents?”

Hinamori’s brow furrows and her eyes widen. “What are you saying? That you were kidnapped and left here?"

It sounds like a scenario from one of the novels she reads. "No, that I didn't have any parents to being with."

She blinks, bewildered. "But everyone has parents.”

With some gumption, he meets her gaze. “What if I didn’t? What if I was just…there? Created by something else.”

"How would that be possible?”

“Kurotsuchi did it in his labs with Nemuri. What’s to say it hasn’t been done in ways beyond methods like this? There's so much that's been created here long before Twelfth Division was created, before any of us were born or brought here.”

Hinamori slowly stands, her gaze flickering between him and the chopped trunk before them.

“Is this because of the rumors?" she eventually asks. "The ones about you being the reincarnation of a heavenly guardian?”

“No, of course not.” His stomach drops and that feeling, hollow and tremulous, rushes through him.

Utterly flummoxed, Hinamori shakes her head. "Hitsugaya-kun, what...you're not making any sense."

"Very little about our world does." It's a defensive response, one he regrets saying immediately.

Ever since he came back from the World of the Living, he'd considered on and off his origins, and an belief had floated back to the surface, sticking to his mind like ice to glass.

There was a time when he fully believed he didn’t have parents, that he’d simply appeared from nothing. As if the forces that drive the worlds brought together the coldest elements of winter and formed him amongst the tree roots. It’d be like one of those tales Granny told him and the other children, but the reality of it was not fantastical. Still, it’s better than considering the alternative.

Having said it aloud, however, he realises how strange he sounds. How...childish it sounds.

"All right, maybe that is what happened," Hinamori concedes. "Given your powers and abilities, they're beyond most Shinigami's capabilities. It might be hard to imagine someone with such power being born from two Souls."

He thought he'd feel a vindicated by her words, but they only worsened the feeling running through him. It makes his heart both clench and beat faster and his breathing slightly labored.

"But then, even if that is the case, that you don't have any parents...what does it change?"

The question stuns him. His widened eyes return to her, but her gaze, soft and forlorn, is on the tree trunk.

"You were still left here, alone," she says, struggling to get the words out. "You cried out until someone found you. Whether it was due to your powers alone or because something create you, you survived. That you survived on such a night is incredible."

He swallows against the tightness in his throat, but it doesn't alleviate it. He stares at the roots at his feet, trying, as he had many times, to imagine himself there. A baby, so small and fragile, who shouldn't have survived.

"I can't say for certain if I'm lucky or not that I'm still aware that I was brought here from the World of the Living," she continues, "but what I do know is the circumstances of our births don’t determine who we are." She raises her head to him, a soft smile shaping her lips. "I’ve met a lot of people who have taught me that. You helped me remember that five months ago."

He can feel an argument on his tongue, about how it determines the lives of nobles and higher-class Shinigami, or the those in poverty. To be born in either environment has to fundamentally inform how someone sees themself and the world around them.

As if sensing the counter argument, she sighs. "Of course, I can only speak from my own experience, I suppose. Perhaps it's better to say...it's up to an individual how much they let their birth determine who they are. For me, knowing I was brought here and had memories of life as a Human for a time, I know I can’t go back to that old life, and I will more than likely never see my old family ever again. Just because I had forgotten them and the place I once called home doesn’t mean they don’t live on in me, that I was a bad person to forget them."

Her eyes rim with a film of tears. Hitsugaya raises a hand. "Hinamori?"

Her smile widens and she shakes her head. "I'm okay, just remembering our day in the World of the Living. It's hard to describe what I felt that day, and I still can't believe I acted the way I did."

"It couldn't be helped."

"And that's how I was able to cope. Because you were there with me, helping me. As Shinigami, it’s expected we forget our past lives for a reason. It’s inevitable, because to start a new life, the old one must be wiped away. Still, you stood there with me and let me try to remember. You let me decide if I wanted to face it or not, whichever path I chose, you would be there for me, right?"

The constricting feeling recoils for a moment, but he says nothing, only biting the inside of his cheek against the warmth that flushes through his chest. He'd hardly done anything, had actually felt he was helpless while watching her get so distressed. Yet he still knew that if she left that place she'd regret it.

"But that’s all besides the point," she continues. "That life is gone. Those Humans are gone. I’ve chosen to think they’re still a part of me, even if it’s on an unconscious level, and I know there’s more to me than the past I don’t remember anymore.”

It feels like she's taken him on a long and winding road. With a steady breath out, he asks, "What're you getting at?"

"I'm saying you’re more than where or when you were born.” Her smile widens a fraction. “And if the circumstances of your birth really matter that much to you, I'll be here with you to work through it, like you were for me in the World of the Living.”

She would. She’ll help him, no matter how far he went with this. He’s moved, but not enough to shake off this feeling. "Try telling that to the residents in the Junrinan."

He immediately regrets the words leaving his mouth when her smile falter. "Children don't know better, they need to be taught."

"It wasn't just them either. It was everyone, Hinamori."

Her gaze wavers between something harder and something he feared was pity. It set him off. He tries and fails to bite down the harsh words that spill out of him. "They may have been ignorant about the source, but they knew. They knew something was off about me, made me different. Made me dangerous. Do you remember what they use to call me? Do you remember how they treated you for being near me? Baa-chan got off lightly, because everyone knew her, but even then, I know they wanted to question about why she took in a freak of nature."

She lets out an alarmed, choked-up sound. "Stop it!"

"Do you think the instructors were immune too?" he continues, ignoring her. "They wanted to know where I came from, who my parents were. When they found out about Baa-chan, they couldn't believe it. When I told Cap -- Kurosaki about it when he was captain, he couldn't believe it."

"He wouldn't have --!"

"Judged me for it? No, he didn't. Matsumoto didn't either. Children found alone and adopted into families is the norm in the Soul Society. But aside from you and a few others, no knows that about me. They see the prodigy. They see the captain of Tenth Division. I can't be anything less than that."

Anger flickers across Hinamori's face. "But that's the thing, Shiro-chan! You've always tried to live up to what others thought of you, whether you thought you had a choice in it or not! Don't you see?" She falters, letting out a quiet, shaky gasp. "You’re more than your powers and abilities. You're more than the child prodigy the instructors and captains said.  You're so much more, and you can be even more if you want to. You don't have to be what others think you should be, or even what you think you should be."

Without warning, she closes the gap between them and takes one of his hands into both of her own. As she speaks, her voice quivers, "You might have been made from nothing or you might have been left here by someone. The point is you're here with us, and you've done so much good, and you're a good friend, my...my best friend, even."

She raises his hand, bringing it close to her bowed head. "So please, don't say such things about yourself. Don't think your abandonment makes you lesser or call yourself a 'freak' again, please.”

A gasp is wrenched out of him as the sensation come crashing down on him. His heart constructing and beating in his ears, his mind racing with her words.

Oh. He’d been weak. It hits him like being bounced off a wall. The tears rimming the edges of his eyes shocks him just as much as it does Hinamori.

“Shiro-chan?” she gasps.

"I..." he lets out a breath that completely takes the air out of his lungs. When he tries to breathe back in again, it's a struggle as he nearly doubles over. "I don't know what just happened."

Hinamori's hands slide away from his and come to rest on his shoulders. "Maybe you need to sit down."

He pulls his hand out from hers and sits back on top of the trunk. He only realises what he's done when Hinamori eyes him uncertainly, but he feels no need to move. She ends up next to him. Given the cramped space, her thigh pressed against the side of his and her shoulder resting against his. He barely registers it, trying to blink away the unshed tears.

"It sounds like you had a lot on your mind," she says, tentatively.

"Yeah." He slouches forward, resting his forearms on his knees. He doesn't trust himself to not cry if he starts speaking. How had it gotten to this point? Like it always had, with him throwing whatever bothered him so far away he could almost forget about it, until it inevitably finds him again, and he would just throw it away again.

He only believed he was created by something greater because he couldn’t face it. That he likely did have parents, and they did not want him. A birth from nothing was fitting for the child prodigy bestowed with the powers of the most powerful ice zanpakuto and the capability and aptitude to become a captain of the Gotei Thirteen at such a young age. An abandoned child belonged to a Soul who’d been ostracized, even by the very people who created him.

Looking through his bangs, Hinamori is waiting, expression concerned but calm. If he does end up shedding tears, at least it's only her witnessing it. It wouldn't be the first she has, but he hopes this will be the last.

“I’m sorry,” he apologises, “What I said before was uncalled for.”

“I’m sorry too,” Hinamori says, ashamed gaze falling to her lap. “I was harsh.”

He shakes his head. “You weren’t. What you said was true.” He swallows, and the tightness eases away, leaving a rasp in his voice he tries to ignore as he continues, “When you recalled your old life, I got to thinking about where I came from. It hasn't bothered me since I was a child, I don't understand why it is now."

Hinamori takes hold of his hand again, keeping it between them, but she says nothing.

He loosely curls his fingers around hers and straightens, casting his gaze to the sky. The clouds have parted, giving them a decent view of the stars. This far away from the Junrinan, there's so many of them. "It might be this peace we've enjoyed for the last eleven years. It makes one reflective, like when the war against the Quincy came to an end."

Hinamori nods, but again says nothing.

"I never expected to think about this again, I thought there was nothing further to consider.” He lowers his head. "Baa-chan raised me, and yet a part of me wants to know what happened that night. I’ll never get that answer..."

"It's wanting that closure but never getting it." Hinamori squeezes his hand. "Maybe you could, if you go investigating into the past. There must be records of some kind you can look into. I'm certain there's birth records kept by medical practitioners in the districts, and with Junrinan being one of the higher districts, there's a great chance of record keeping being accurate." She winces. "But then, if you were born in another district and ended up in the Junrinan, then it might be a different story."

She keeps going, offering suggestion after suggestion. He finally looks at her. The glow of the lantern at her feet softens her features, changing the color of her eyes to amber and her hair to a honeyed brown.

Here she is trying to offer him ways to help find his past. She said she's stay by his side in this. She'd also said he was more than his birth. Of course she would. She can see beyond the parts of Souls that most zero in on. She acts like they’re another trait, something that might inform her judgement of them but they didn’t make up the whole of a Soul.

He remembers his days before the Academy. Before the Seireitei, he’d struggled to find his place in the Soul Society. He’d thought it would be by Granny’s side, living with her and helping her with chores. That purpose became harder and harder to commit to whenever he saw Hinamori return from her breaks at the Academy, and a part of him always tried to snuff out the longing to be where she was. He didn’t trust Shinigami, but he trusted her and was jealous of the people she got to meet, how they seemed to understand each other

He'd been searching for that understanding for most of his childhood, and hadn’t really found it until he became a seated officer. Had it stemmed from not just from his reoccurring dreams, but from not knowing how he was born as well?

His free hand brushes over the tree trunk’s rings. If Granny was right and this tree could somehow see things, it would’ve seen who left him here. It would’ve seen that and more and never be able to share it, only it’s age once it’d been cut down.

No, this isn’t about closure. It’s about living up to something he doesn’t always have to be. It’s about wanting to be stronger for her, for everyone. It’s about that helplessness he’s experienced time and again, whether it was in battle or in comforting Hinamori. It about the grief of a young boy who couldn't understand why he'd been left behind on such a night.

It’s a quiet revelation, one that doesn’t even make him shed the tears still blurring the edges of his vision. It only makes him let out a long, quiet breath that fogs in the air. And with it, the feeling recedes entirely.

Hinamori is still talking, because of course she is. She’s still trying to help, still sitting with him even when she doesn’t know what’s going on in his head or when he doesn’t give her a clear answer. He would never think of one who had been abandoned as a child as being lesser of pitiable, but he doesn’t extend the same courtesy to himself. She saw it as something to be a part of him, not all of him, and that he had survived as an amazing feat. She didn’t see how he did, and no else did either. It's a lonely thought, but comforting all the same.

“There’s no use.”

She stops, widened eyes blinking at him. “What?”

He smiles. “Even if I did go looking, it’s not going to give me what I really want.”

Hinamori frowns. “Shiro-chan?”

He sighs, rueful. “I’m sorry, I’ve put you through a bit just now. It’s…hard to explain.”

He expects her to press him further, to try and understand him, but her expression shifts from bewilderment to something softer. Does she think this is like her experience in the World of the Living, when she couldn’t articulate to him the emotions she experienced? Perhaps they are.

"Can I ask, then, what do you want?"

It's said so earnestly he wishes he could give her a clearer answer. maybe one day, when this is far enough behind him, he can tell her then.

For now, he clarifies, "I can live without closure. I have so far. Baa-chan will always be the person who raised me. She’s my family. I have lived a life since that day, been defined by many things. My birth isn't really one of them, it hasn't been for a long time now.” He bring his free hand over their joined ones. "Thank you."

Hinamori tilts her head, trying to process what he'd said. After a long moment, she lets out a long sigh. "Oh, Shiro-chan, you can be confusing sometimes."

"Quit it with the nickname."

She ignores him. "So, you don't want to go looking for your parents?"

He shakes his head. "I think it's best to leave that in the past."

"If you're sure, and if you change your mind..."

"I know."

"Okay. Then, are you okay now?"

"I'm better."

She slips one hand out to rest on top of his. "I'm glad." Then, half teasing, "Though I'm not sure exactly what I did to earn a rare 'thank you' from you."

He snorts. "You don't need to." He withdraws his hands and stands. "Come on, we should head back."

Their trek home is silent but companionable. He wonders what is in store for him when he returns. A dramatic lecture from Rangiku that he had them all worried? Granny disappointed that he didn't tell her he was going for a walk?

When his childhood home comes into view, he finds neither. Granny stands on the veranda, a shawl around her shoulders. The wind sweeps a few stray strands of hair across her face and flutters the ends of her garments. Her lips are devoid of her usual smile.

“Baa-chan!” Hitsugaya rushes away from Hinamori, slowing only when he reaches the stairs. “You shouldn’t be out here! It’s freezing.”

She shakes her head. “I’m fine, Toshiro.”

She steps forward. While he’s down on the ground and she up on the veranda, she a few inches taller than him. It’s strange like this, he hasn’t been able to meet her gaze without tilting his head up since he was a young boy.

He lets out a quiet, startled sound when she places a hand on his cheek. To his relief it’s warm; she mustn’t have been out here long.

“I was worried,” she says. “I know you’re able to take care of yourself now, but I wasn’t used to you being gone for this long. Are you all right?”

He almost crumbles again. She’s the last person he ever wants to for worry for him. He nods, solemn. “I’m all right, Baa-chan. I just needed to get some air and think on a few things. Hinamori was with me.”

That elicits a smile from her. She briefly looks over his shoulder at Hinamori, giving a subtle nod “Of course helped you."

He can't decide if he's annoyed and comforted by the fact she knows their bond too well, that his childhood friend is capable to pulling him out of dark places.

“Don’t be afraid to tell her what you feel, Toshiro.”

His eyes widen. How far away is Hinamori? Can she hear them? “What?” he hisses.

“I’ve seen the way you look at her, your Lieutenant has as well.” She lets out a huffy laughter at his rapid blinking. “Don’t keep her waiting.”

“W-What are you --?!”

“Now, now, you should come inside.” Then, to Hinamori, who's steps he hears coming up behind him. “I’ve poured the tea you prepared.”

“Oh, thank you!”

Granny gives his cheek a gentle pinch before returning inside. Hitsugaya is left dumbfounded and wishes the cold would cool the heat radiating from his face.

"Are you all right?" Hinamori asks when she steps past him. "Your face is all --"

"Fine." With stiff steps he heads back into the house. "Where's that tea?"

Hinamori lingers behind as he steps through the doorway.

Rangiku, sitting at the kotatsu, rears her head back at the sight of him. “There you are!”

“You act like I’ve done something wrong,” he snarks.

“Wel, you did! You walked away on your birthday!”

“I thought, by your logic, I COULD DO WHATEVER I WANTED ON MY BIRTHDAY.”

“Well, yeah, but…No, now you’re just twisting my words!”

Granny chuckles as she brings over the tray with the pot of tea. “I think we should all discuss this over some tea, no?”

Hitsugaya removes his shoes and Rangiku leans forward, setting up the cups for Granny to pour -- including the mug he'd been gifted. She glances back at him and gives him a smirk, while he rolls his eyes.

“I bought this brew from the South Second District,” Hinamori says, coming back into the house. “I hope you all like it.”

“It smells amazing,” Rangiku comments.

“I’m sure we will,” Granny chimes in.

Hinamori stops to look at Hitsugaya. She has that searching gaze, the once she uses when she wants to make sure he’s okay. He only returns her stare, letting her see he’s fine now. Satisfied, she grins sweetly – and again his haeart thumps in an embarrassing manner he barely manages to conceal from his face – then blows out the candle in the lantern and sets it aside, takes her shoes off and scarf, and joins the other two at the kotatsu.

Hitsugaya closes the door behind him, but remains where he is, watching them again. Rangiku hands Hinamori her cup, Granny puts the pot of tea aside and sits back, and Hinamori thanks them both for preparing it.

He thinks back to earlier in the night, when Rangiku had asked him to make a wish before blowing out the candles. He doesn’t have one still, because as sentimental as it was, looking at the three before him – his lieutenant who set him on the path to discovering who he was, his grandmother who chose to raise him, and the childhood friend who never left him behind no matter the distance – and thinking of the people in his life who aren’t here at this moment, he had everything he wanted. He’ll be damned if he’ll ever admit it aloud though.

“What’re you smiling about?” Rangiku asks, smirk returning wider.

He doesn’t have the strength to over it up. “It’s a nice night.”

That turns her smirk into a smile.

“Why are you still back there?” Hinamori adds, turning her head over her shoulder to see him. “Come on, there’s a cup here for you too.”

[babiebom]

When You Fall (III)

A/N: I have made a masterlist for sdv and in general! I don’t have many things to read yet but hopefully you want to stick around for when I do!

Tw: anxiety, mentions of death

Wc:2.8k

Previous Next Masterlist

‘To our valued JojaMart customers:

 Our team members have removed the landslide caused by our drilling operation near the mountain lake. I’d like to remind you that our drilling operation is entirely legal (pursuant to init. L61091, JojaCo Amendment). Responsible stewardship of the local environment is our top priority! 

We apologize for any inconvenience this accident may have caused.

As always, we value your continued support and patronage!

-Morris,

Joja Customer Satisfaction Representative.’

Your frown increasingly deepens as you read the letter sent by Joja. Landslide? Mountain lake? You hadn’t left your farm in days to even know that there even was a landslide. After putting the letter away, you spend your time tending to your crops. It had been a week since you had planted your parsnips, and though you were new at this, looking up the time it takes for them to grow, you think they would be ready at the end of the month, at least you hoped they would be ready to harvest then. You only had so much savings to get you through learning how to farm.

You had decided that clearing out the rest of the land would have to wait until the winter months, you had no time to learn to farm, fish, clear the farm, and now you had an entirely new place to explore when you hadn’t even ventured out past your own farm very much. You had still only been to the beach and the town, which is virtually nowhere and everywhere all at once. 

Sighing, you kick at the dirt next to the patch of parsnips you had growing, having only 15 seeds and therefore only 15 things to sell meant that you wouldn't last long at all. You knew you had to go into town at some point, and you had enough money to at least buy enough seeds so you could make money. You just wished that interacting with people wasn't something that you dreaded, it would make it a lot easier if you were at least the same level of social that you were before. 

It was difficult getting yourself to even the edge of your farm, and the second you crossed the gate your body began to feel as if it were going to cave into itself. You dragged yourself towards the town, the travel time almost doubling from your hesitation. 

The sun beamed down brightly onto the pavement, reflecting straight into your eyes. You groan as you continue on your trek into town, the sight of people making your heart sink. Hoping you would avoid everyone was dumb, but that hope didn't need to be crushed that easily. 

The closer you got, you could tell that it was just the mayor, and who you think is Maru going into the clinic. Quickening your pace, you hope he leaves you be, but knowing how old people are you doubt that will be the case. He stands in front of the clinic, off towards the side just watching what you can only tell to be absolutely nothing. Maybe he was bird watching…?

Stopping just on the edge of where he's standing, you try to think of a way to avoid him, but going all the way around, in a path that you weren't even sure existed was more trouble than what you hope is a short conversation. 

"Farmer!" His voice rings out before you can even get yourself moving again. Letting your eyes focus on him, you can see that he's looking at you curiously, as if you were someone to be studied. You force a smile to your face, walking towards him with a step so preppy you can tell that you look goofy. 

"Mayor," you approach him with a hand out, "how are you?"

"Good! Good. Say, could you come with me for a moment?"

You stare at him, wanting to drop your jaw in how unlucky you were. "Um, I was just....going to…sure." You give up rather quickly, following the man on a path behind the clinic.

You want to throw yourself on the ground and cry at the thought of going on an extra errand, but the thought is put on a backburner as the two of you approach a worn down building. 

Leaves and vines covered the windows, looping and winding in and out between loose boards and holes in the roof and walls. A large clock sat completely still, not ticking or chiming as the hands were stuck in place, reading its last working moment, time frozen for it. Chipped paint, faintly reading 'Pelican Town' makes your heart clench for the old building. It was if the town forgot about it, left it behind for nature to reclaim it. Just as you left your grandfather behind when you got too old to think coming on a farm was any fun. Just how he and your parents left you behind, stuck thinking about the past with no one there to pick up the pieces to let you still function in the future.

"What an eyesore…" Lewis looks at the old building with a look you take as disgust. You choose not to respond as the old man turns and looks at you. "This is the Pelican Town Community Center…or what's left of it anyway."

You nod, letting your eyes run over the building, it didn't look as if it had been used anytime in recent years. Or even in the last decade. You couldn't remember it being used when you were a child either. But then again, you stayed on the farm mostly. Lewis turns and looks back at the building, his face morphing into that of sadness. 

"It used to be the pride and joy of the town… always bustling with activity. Now…just look at it. It's shameful."

You fight to control your facial expression, annoyance blanketing over your form. Isn't it his job to take care of the building? Surely he could've hired someone to patch it up?

"These days, the young folk would rather sit in front of the TV than engage with the community." Again, you think, your job. It was weird he was blaming the younger generations for him not keeping up with this building.

"But listen to me, I sound like an old fool." You crack a smile, letting a laugh slip through momentarily. He looks at you in confusion, so you shake your head and motion for him to continue on his journey to the past.

"Joja corporation has been hounding me to sell them the land so they can turn it into a warehouse…Pelican Town could use the money, but there's something stopping me from selling it…I guess old timers like me get attached to relics of the past…ah well. If anyone buys a joja co membership I'm just gonna go ahead and sell it." 

He sighs as if he was really torn up about the thought of having to sell the land. Again, you have to fight to control your facial expression. He sounded more convinced that Pelican Town needed the money from selling than him being attached to the building at all. And if he was so attached why'd he let it get run down. What all was there to do in a small town like this?

"Here, let's go inside." He moves and unlocks the doors, pushing them in causing a poof of dust to fall down like a waterfall on top of your heads. You cough loudly, waving a hand in front of your face. Lewis doubles down in front of you, launched into a coughing fit from the dust. You frown, swallowing a couple times to clear your throat and sinuses. You feel your throat burn as you swallow, drier than you had ever felt it before…well not drier than when you have a sore throat but y'know. 

When the two of you are done coughing, you take a moment to look around. The inside of the Community Center was just like the outside. Taken over by nature. It was sort of beautiful to know that even when humans are long gone, Mother Earth would take everything back. But at the same time, your heart breaks again for the old building. It was obvious no one had cared for it for years. 

You could tell that the building used to be beautiful, a dusty old rug laid sort of curled up, wrinkled. The layer of dust on it covered whatever color it was supposed to be. Above that was a brick fireplace, the bricks out of place, but somehow not caved in, a plaque on top of it with dusty imprints where you guess stars are supposed to be, there are six. You wonder where the stars went, but assume someone must've stolen them. What could they have been representing, you do not know. 

Lewis looks confused as he looks around, "hmm? What's this? I guess Vincent and Jas must've been playing in here". He stares at a small hut in the furthest left corner. You stare at it for a second, a weird feeling wiggling down your spine.

Lewis makes a sound from his throat, attracting your attention. "This place is even more dilapidated than I remember."

A green thing appears behind him, causing you to jump back. It looks unlike anything you've ever seen, sort of like a little ball, if it had tiny little arms and legs, and was less round and more like dough that has been sitting on a board for a while, the bottom slightly flat. 

"What?" Lewis turns and looks to where your eyes were glued. The second he turns around, the green thing disappears, causing you to jump again and you make a noise of confusion. "What's the matter? Are you ill?"

 It's like it's impossible for you to respond, confusion taking over your senses. Instead of saying anything, you rush towards where the thing had disappeared from. What the hell…?

"You saw something? Hmm…I wouldn't be surprised if this place was full of rats." He lets out a chuckle. All you can get out is a "no". It quite obviously wasn't a rat. Unless it was green, maybe the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles got their hands on one…? No! Whatever it was was absolutely no anything you had ever seen before. 

Lewis was now in front of you, but you looked through him. What in the world was happening? Were you going crazy? 

Another one of those things popped up behind Lewis again, and this time you believe it has to be playing tricks on you. Or maybe you were losing it and having hallucinations. Terrified, and a bit annoyed, you yelp loudly. Jumping backwards. The thing didn't look dangerous, but babies aren't dangerous and they could easily give you a black eye without trying. Lewis turns again to look at what you were staring at, but again the thing disappears just as soon as he faces it. "What?" You speak aloud, confused. 

 "You're worrying me, Farmer…" Lewis lets out an awkward chuckle, so you look at him assuming from the slightly afraid look on his face that you had to look deranged. Maybe he thought you were losing it too, you had just lost your family. You would think you're crazy too. 

"Look, I think I'm going to head home. I need some lunch."

Lunch…? Just how long have you been here? You literally just walked in. Checking your watch you see that it is in fact past lunch time. You had been in there staring for like an hour and a half? Maybe that's why he thinks you're crazy.

Lewis starts towards the door, then turns and looks at you, he hesitates for a moment before speaking. 

"Hey. I'll keep this place unlocked from now on ..maybe you can help catch that rat if you have some extra time. And maybe you can stop by the Saloon tonight. Meet some people." 

He leaves you alone in the building. Strange…I'll have to come back and explore this building further. You think, starting for the door. Just before you stop and turn around or maybe I can explore now. 

Pierre's closed probably later than it is right now, he had to be open for a little while longer at least, and the walk was less than five minutes to get up here. You had time…right?

You go further inside, passing the small hut and into the hallway. There's two doors, and then the hallway progresses. With fear in your heart, you choose to go into the door on your right and are met with an empty pantry, the shelves broken and splintered across the floor. 

Finding nothing, you return back into the hallway, moving to the door on your left. This time the room is bigger. The purple carpet is torn up as well as the blue wallpaper. The room is dark and empty except for an empty bookshelf, some piles of wood and a single glowing golden scroll in the middle of the floor.

Stepping into the room you get the same shiver that you got when you had first seen the little thing and the hut, but this time it's stronger, as if it were pulling your spine towards the scroll. The light was bright as you neared, yet somehow it didn't burn your eyes. It felt more…comforting than scary, but that didn't stop your heart from beating erratically in your chest. 

Picking it up, you can't read anything on the parchment. It looks like drawings, and even then you can't tell what they're supposed to be. Putting the scroll back down where it was, you leave the room deciding that exploring the rest of the place could wait for another day. Looking at your watch you realize that you had stayed another hour in the building.

Time had gone by way too fast, and you wonder just how long you would've been staring at that golden parchment had you not remembered that you needed to leave to get to the store. 

The sun was still bright when you left though you could tell that it would begin to go down soon, so you ran hoping that the store wasn't closed. Luckily you made it to the store in time, almost falling into the doors in your rush. The store was basically empty, except for a man at the counter. 

It was smaller than you thought it would be. Awkwardly you send a smile to the man and slink into the aisles, looking for any seeds you could buy. Luckily, finding them wasn't hard, especially with a great big SEEDS sign marking where they are. You grab a bunch of each kind, reading their descriptions and grow time as you walk up to the counter. 

"Hey, it's Y/N, the new farmer! I'm Pierre, owner of this general store. If you're looking for seeds, my shop is the place to go!" He looks down at your bunch of seeds happily and you almost immediately decide that you dislike the man. Who goes into an advertisement when introducing yourself?

"I'll also buy produce from you for a good price! A little agriculture could really inject new life into the local economy."

You nod and watch him scan your seeds silently, not really in the mood to talk. Your stomach growls loudly, and you frown looking away cringing slightly. Pierre laughs as he bags your seeds. "Looks like someone's hungry! Are you gonna stop by the Saloon later?" 

You swallow and nod, rummaging around in your wallet for money. You didn't want to make the situation awkward, but you also couldn't be arsed about making an effort especially when you've already decided you disliked the man. Taking your bag, you call out a goodbye as you rush from the building. With what little sunlight you had left you could use it to work before you showed the town your face.

Working took the rest of the day, by the time you were planting your new seeds the sun had long been down. Your stomach was growling constantly and louder every passing second. Unfortunately you had run out of little things you could eat, and you don't think if you even had the snacks that they would give your stomach what it wants. 

As you approach the Saloon, you're happy you decided to go here on a weekday, though it would probably be just as busy as it'll ever be because what else is there to do in a small town? The second you open the door, you're hit with the smell of food and bright lights.

It makes you nauseous and doubly hungry. Your eyes focus on the smiling face of a man behind the counter. The sight of him fills you with warmth and comfort, almost instantly calming your nerves. Well calming them mostly. 

"Well hello there! I'm Gus, chef and owner of the Stardrop Saloon." 

[rescue-ram]

trapper: 4, 24

hawkeye: 13, 25

Trapper

4) What they would do if they had one month to live.

🤔 I mean, I think first and foremost on his mind would be his daughters. Whether that's working overtime to make sure they're provided for, or taking time off to make a few last good memories in and try to be the truly present parent he never really was before... I think he'd opt towards the latter, but I do think his relationship with them would be his priority. As for Louise and whatever lover coughHawkeyecough he had at the moment, I think he'd want to be on as amicable terms as possible with both of them and try to make amends. He's ultimately going to prioritize materially providing for Louise and the girls, but I think as far as emotional and sexual connection and having some Life Affirming Terminal Illness Sex, that priority would go towards Hawkeye a lover rather than his wife- and he would definitely be getting in as much Life Affirming Terminal Illness Sex as possible every night after like taking his girls to the zoo XD It occurs to me this would be a delightfully dark premise for the Piercentyre Family Nightmare Road trip.... 

24) What they wish they could change about themselves

🤔🤔🤔 I don't think he beats himself up about the state of his marriage, but I also think he wishes that had worked out better. On a shallow level I think he wishes he was a better/less impulsive gambler. In the context of Courage, I think he's still working through desperately wishing he wasn't gay and is trying to be more authentic and less masked around others...

Hawkeye

13) What kind of parent they would be. 

Ah, I actually have very elaborate headcanons on this, strap in XD

So I think, even prior to GFA, Hawkeye is the kind of guy who would've found babies boring and their cries difficult to tolerate. Not that he would be a baby hater- I think he loves the concept of babies but would find the sensory reality overwhelming. Like after an hour or two he'd be sitting with a newborn like.... Now what, or try to care for a baby with colic who just cries and cries and Hawk would get very frustrated and anxious and become convinced something was Seriously Wrong because why won't she stop crying?? Post-GFA, I think he would really really try to be an attentive and supportive parent, because his own dad is so important to him, but his trauma would impair his ability to be present for his child or hypothetical wife/partner and he'd feel very guilty and ashamed of that, though I do think he would very quickly and proactively seek out therapy to help.

As a parent to a slightly older child, I do unfortunately think he'd tend towards neurotic abstraction and vacillate between forgetting to feed the kid and becoming convinced he's accidentally poisoned them- although he's extremely loving, playful, and supportive in between those extremes! I just think at the end of the day his passion is his work, and he would forget to pick his kiddo up from Little League or something because he got caught up on an emergency call. I also think he'd be a very difficult dad to live in the shadow of, not because of any real flaw but because he's so vivacious and high achieving it would be easy for kiddo to compare themselves to him and feel like they don't measure up.

In an odd way, and fortunately for his most popular ships, I think he'd be kind of an ideal step parent. He wouldn't get super jealous of the kiddo's relationship with their biological parents, and I think that one step removal would relieve some pressure and let him be the "fun" parent who can give advice the kiddo's parents couldn't and be a role model without having to take point in disciplining them.

25) What other people wish they could change about them

Oooh. Ok, easy pick, I think Margaret would love him if he was like, 20% more conventional.

I don't think Trapper would want to change much- early season Hawkeye was generally pretty stoic and cynical, but in the moments his sincerity and sensitivity shown through, I imagine Trapper was torn between really liking and admiring that part of him and wishing Hawkeye could be a little more distant and spare himself some pain. I also think there were a few points Trapper found him really truly sincerely annoying and wished he knew when to shut his mouth XD

I think there's a few points when BJ feels failed by Hawkeye in almost the same way that Radar sometimes feels, and wishes Hawkeye had less literal main character syndrome and could be more perfectly attuned to BJ and his needs, in an almost childlike way.

I also imagine that his dad really truly loves Hawkeye, but also doesn't entirely understands him and wishes on some level that he'd just marry a nice girl who'd look after him and settle down in Maine. Again, I think he loves him, but he really just wants Hawkeye to be happy and kind of sees his unconventional lifestyle (in canon his free love attitude, in fanon his bisexuality) as teeing himself up for disappointment.

[phanfictioncatalogue]

Sharing Body Heat Masterlist

a kaleidoscope of butterflies (ao3) - imnotinclinedtomaturity

Summary: Everyone knows that playing in the snow is just a good excuse for cuddling for warmth afterwards (or, two times Dan and Phil cuddled for warmth).

Blankets and Hot Chocolate Work Wonders (But Hugs Are Better) (ao3) - xlogophile

Summary: It's cold, it's late, they're upside-down, and Dan sucks at packing. Poor Dan. Luckily, he knows a guy.

blow a kiss, fire a gun (ao3) - The General Phanchild (orphan_account)

Summary: “If I don’t improve… he’ll absolutely obliterate me. And there’s nothing I can do to stop him.” Secret Agent “Gold,” or Dan Howell, is less than thrilled when he is forced to team up with new recruit “Amethyst,” Phil Lester. Phil is a former trainee; clumsy and overly apologetic, while Dan’s six years of experience have left him skilled and stealthy, yet completely emotionless. Throughout their mission to bring a mysterious super-villain to justice while travelling the city of Tokyo, Phil tries to come to terms with his illogical fear of Dan, while realising what Dan’s true intentions with him are.

Fireplace Cuddles - jilliancares

Summary: Dan likes to join Phil in front of the fireplace on cold winter mornings, and they’re obviously only cuddling to conserve body heat.

First Times (Friends don't love me like you do) (ao3) - sinking_wthatship

Summary: Dan and Phil were not dating. It was crazy how it probably wouldn't matter how much they said it, there would always be fans, friends, and even their families trying to get them to confess they were a couple. The thing was they actually were not. They were best friends; All best friends love each other, and share things together. And right, maybe where anyone would just share a cake or some vacations, Dan and Phil did share a flat, a job, their personal space, memories, food, a dream and so much more BUT it wasn't such a huge deal, Dan knew it. Except one day, while watching a best friend tag on people's first times doing stuff together, he actually starts to wonder if their friendship is really that typical, after all.

Or, Dan recalls a few of Phil and his not so friendly first times doing things together.

happy phantoms (ao3) - vvelna

Summary: Dan's flat is haunted, so she contacts a team of ghost removal experts.

snuggle up close, let me hold your pieces in place, even if just for a night (ao3) - natigail

Summary: It was just one thing after another really.

Broken down bus with a whole class of freshers.

Dingy hotel room that was cold as fuck.

No one wanting to share a room with Dan.

But then the TA Phil stepped up to the plate and defended Dan. Of course, it meant that the two of them ended up sharing a bed, and then the heater had to break. It's the perfect excuse for sharing body warmth and confessions.

Soaking up the thirst of the land (ao3) - TortiTabby

Summary: Phil reluctantly agrees to exploring a cave on the beach during their week off in Australia with Dan, Martyn and Cornelia. Sometimes "I told you so" just doesn't make anyone feel better.

The Winter Birds (Have Come Back Again) (ao3) - your_starless_eyes

Summary: The act of being cold itself is not so unusual. He’s sharing a bed with Phil “The Heat Vampire” Lester, for Christ’s sake. Somehow, Phil always manages to zap every ounce of warmth in Dan’s body and then snatch all the blankets. It’s an… endearing quality.

This is a different kind of cold though — one that’s stemming from the air around him rather than Phil’s icy skin.

Thunder Only Happens When It's Raining (ao3) - Nefertiti1052 (Succubusphan)

Summary: Dan meets Phil at the lowest moment in his life and is immediately enchanted by him, but nobody is perfect - not even those with good intentions and a kind heart.

This is the story of two imperfect people trying to do their best, to find love and strive in life. They gravitate towards each other at every turn, sometimes dancing in harmony, other times colliding.

Winter Cuddles (ao3) - goingintohiding (orphan_account)

Summary: Dan hates the cold. So of course he and Phil get snowed in at the cabin they rented. He's miserable until he finds a warm someone to snuggle against.~ Fluffy first kiss phanfic <3

[haleigh-sloth]

I noticed that you read Hell's Paradise and now I'm curious about your opinion on Jikka, Shugen and Shija. Those 3 aren't my favorite but they do intrigue me in different ways. Jikka is Jikka, no need for elaboration 😅. Shija... he's deranged but I felt for him and his goodbye with Gabi was bittersweet. Shugen though... Shugen can be a good friend to have around but only if you agree with his black and white morality. Also the way he exited the story was totally unexpected for me.

Out of the characters you mentioned, Jikka is the only one I genuinely LIKED.

I have no real positive or negative feelings toward Shija or Shugen and company.

I'll admit I do think Shugen and co. were introduced and removed rather quickly, and I really had no emotional attachment to them probably because of it. But also because Shugen was introduced as a character that obviously wasn't gonna have much development, and his two little followers didn't do much for me either. I think having them jump on the bandwagon of teaming up with the criminals was good, but it didn't really go much further...there wasn't much internal introspection that I can remember, and then Shugen honestly didn't change much at all and he died with his ideals intact, kinda unchanged. So ehhh I just...don't have much feelings toward them in general. It kinda sucks they ALL died like...I would have maybe changed that for the two kids and let them have the happy ending, but....oh well.

Shija I like a little more, because their characterization (being obsessed with Gabimaru) and fight with Gabimaru served a greater purpose with long-term payoff---> Shija confirmed that Yui is real in their attempt to convince Gabimaru to let go of his attachment to her (hence utilizing his characterization pretty well), and it gave Gabimaru all the boost in morale he needed and they all ended up winning in the end. So Shija I liked more, but I just couldn't get emotionally invested in their admiration/obsession with Gabimaru. Shija's death was just kinda....jeez. I mean I know they weren't meant to be a big time character but I just kinda don't get into the obsessive characters who insist dying by their obsession's hand ya feel, I don't feel anything. But I will say I absolutely LOVE Shija's design. Fucking absolutely love it. I might draw them one day, we shall see.

JIKKA though....

Of course, I like him. A lot. He didn't have a lot of time in the manga but he played a major role. His character type I almost can NEVER resist. The character type where you don't know if he's a good guy or a bad guy, where he's manipulative and treats everyone around him like game pieces to achieve a greater goal that nobody else is aware of/cares about. He literally did not give a single shit about whether it was "right" to team up with the criminals, he didn't care. He just went with the flow. And I like that in the end he really was on everyone's side, everyone being the people the readers should care about. His character type is the same as Shigure from Fruits Basket, Izaya from Durarara, and Mephisto from Blue Exorcist.

I will never not love those character types, the ones who act like they're the chess player and every other character in the manga is a chess piece or they just try to manipulate shit from the sidelines.

And in 3 out of the four characters like this that I like, the ultimate motive at the end of the day is always a positive one (Izaya is just a bastard lmao). Jikka ended up being a positive force AND he had no issue letting the other two criminals go, and even helping Gabimaru get back to Yui in a place where they could live freely and safely. And up to that point he was acting like an evil ass at times, it was great. I love love love those types of characters they never fail to entertain me.

Also side note, Jikka's facial hair reminds me of Aizawa ak;dng;akj

[phantomenby]

Shitlings Chapter Two

Part one

I would rather eat shit and die than get on a bike with your show pony looking ass

It was hot when you woke up, and something heavy had been placed on top of you in your sleep pinning you down, arching your neck you glanced up to see your thick weighted blanket and groaned as you pushed it off of you and onto the floor in your tired state. Before bed you had remembered only having a thin bed sheet to cover you, keeping the window open to cool you since the night was already too warm. Assuming it was gramps being funny and thinking you would be too cold you thought nothing more of it and curled back up in an attempt to return to your slumber. Nanook had no such plans and had already begun scuttering around the upper floor when she heard you rustling, barging through your door with a bang and launching herself onto the bed, all 60 pounds of fluff suffocating you.

"Shit-fuck, Nanook!" You fought to push her off of you, only succeeding in breathing in handfuls of fur, "SAM! Get your beast, Samantha-" you heard him running out of his room with Michael following behind, clearly woken by your screams and expecting the worst. They made no move to remove the dog who was still spinning in circles above you but as soon as she spotted her golden boy she bounded towards him, effectively pushing him to the ground as she licked his face.

"N-Nanook c'mon, not this-" he was cut off as a ball of slobber fell into his mouth, retching in disgust as Mike leaned against the doorway, laughing and red in the face as he took in the scene before him. He pulled her away and brought Sam to his feet, ignoring the glare he received from his brother as he began walking away.

"Next time you scream for help I ain't helping you! Murderer or not."

Mike shook his head at you, returning to his room, leaving you sprawled out on the bed, still recovering from the violent attack which had just occurred. Clearly you were now too awake to go back to sleep, adrenaline still pumping through you, glancing at the clock beside your bed you realised it wasn't as early as you had thought.

9:03

No wonder Nanook was so restless, the long trip from the day before combined with an entirely new environment was sure to make any creature buzz with excitement. Dragging yourself out from under your covers, not bothering to neaten them up as you stumbled downstairs, hunting for your favourite mug that mom had already packed away in one of the kitchen cupboards. Fortunately, gramps had his own coffee machine and had put it on a little over an hour ago, it was cooling down but still warm enough to drink from so you poured yourself a generous cupful. Sipping on the bitter drink you began to walk through the bottom floor, taking note of all the taxidermy animals that were covering every available surface, a large Moosehead was above the fireplace and its eyes bulged out awkwardly.

For some reason hunting was a common practice in the Emerson lineage, while it hadn't been passed down to you and your brothers there were still certain things you had been taught. It was no secret that your family were descended from something different to the common man, it hadn't taken to Michael as well as it had to you and Sam but anyone with decent eyesight could see your slightly elven features, pointy ears, and bright eyes that made you stand out in a mortal crowd. Your mother had hidden it from your father though, not wanting him to get involved as she sought out a simpler life away from gramps' mystical adventures, not like it had worked out in the end.

She taught you a lot, all about wards and healing magic, providing books that you and Sam had spent hours diving into and practicing with. Mike had joined you on occasion but preferred to focus on his own physical abilities rather than interacting with the metaphysical world that was hidden from mortal eyes. More importantly, you had all sensed something coming from the gang of bikers yesterday, even Star and the kid walking with her had an air of something dangerous to them. You didn't dwell on it but you made sure to mention it to Lucy on the way home last night, apparently gramps knew what you were talking about but wouldn't divulge much more than a simple warning to the three of you to avoid anyone who set off those kinds of warning bells in your head.

That wasn't particularly useful since half the people you met yesterday seemed like the kind to drag you into an alleyway and take everything you had.

Shrugging as you headed back upstairs, no longer wanting to be stuck in your worn pajamas as the sticky sweat beneath them clung to you. You took your time showering in the shared ensuite, scrubbing yourself down to the bone and lathering banana body wash across your skin, stopping once your skin was bright red and the smell had taken over your senses. As you went into your room you shivered and realised the window you had left ajar last night was now fully open, the lace curtain in front of it swaying with the morning breeze, closing it you pulled the thicker curtain over it to hide yourself better as you looked in your wardrobe for what you wanted to wear.

It was going to be hot all day so you grabbed some slightly loose grey basketball shorts you had stolen from Sam and a white shirt with 'NYU' plastered along the front in bold letters, lastly, a long-sleeved red and blue flannel to tie around your waist in case the winds changed while you were out exploring. Once you were dressed you slid on your socks and some sneakers before heading back to the kitchen with your empty mug, glancing out the window you could see Mike working on his bike, clearly intending to take it out tonight to impress Star. She was beautiful of course, though the way Mike had stalked her through the crowded boardwalk was a little creepy. You would have to stick with him tonight, knowing where Star went those for men would soon follow, and you didn't want to risk them hurting your brother.

You were going to explore early, during the day you had a feeling they wouldn't be there to bother you, and you had every intention of finding whatever gems you could in that thrift store the two golden-haired demons had cornered you in. You called out to your bother, informing him of your plans as you brought your bicycle to the front of the house, riding away swiftly into the dusty roads that led down to the beachfront.

-

By the time you arrived it was past eleven, Mikey had told you Sam had already gone off to visit the bookstore you found him in last night, something about weird friends being better than no friends. They had grilled Sam about vampires the entire time he was there, thrusting a small comic into his chest to read, supposedly holding all the information one would need to know about slaughtering the creatures of the night. You had both laughed at their insistence that eating garlic was like drinking acid to them, knowing that vampires historically had a fondness for it, garlic bread was invented by a Roman vampire too after he had cooked some into his bread.

Your mouth began to water and it was then you realised you hadn't grabbed any breakfast before you left, letting your senses lead you towards a small diner across from the market stalls you had seen last night and heading in to chow on some breakfast goods. A thick stack of fluffy pancakes was in front of you as you watched people walking by, still consisting of the mostly punk youth that you saw on the drive-in, along with a few people heading to and from work.

It was a welcome sight compared to the large swathes of people who had flocked to it last night, you hoped it was purely because of the musical act and that once it was finished you could visit and not feel like you were entering an ocean of sweaty bodies. Thinking on it you decided you would go again tonight, it was best not to let one bad evening ruin what had always been a safe place for you. Only this time you would stick to just enjoying the sights and keep the shopping to the day while normal folk were out and about, the creatures from yesterday evidently preferring to be more active in the evenings along with everyone else in Santa Carla.

Finishing your food and leaving a small tip you headed out, letting the sun's warmth embrace you, you could never get tired of this. If you were honest it was what made the move even more bearable, both Phoenix and Santa Carla were constantly warm, the only difference was no dad and more sea.

Spotting the familiar thrift stall from the night before you got to work, with fifty dollars still in your pocket you were going to be unstoppable.

-

It had been a good couple of hours and the sun was no longer as high in the sky as it used to be, and while shopping had been a rewarding experience, carrying it all the way home was not. You had struck gold at the thrift store by finding a bin full of shirts ranging from fifty cents to a dollar, even if they didn't fit well you could tailor them and wear them as pajama shirts. As you continued the trek you heard a familiar growl building up behind you, sighing in relief as your older brother pulled up and stopped beside you.

"Having fun there bud?" He smiled at you, eyes twinkling over his shades, scooting forward so he could let you climb on behind him.

"Haha Mikey, do us both a favour and get goin, I think if I don't cool down soon my sweat will make me melt like the wicked witch of the west!" At that he laughed and set off, speeding along and moving much more efficiently than you had. Within fifteen minutes you were home and your legs a lot less achy.

With a pat on his back you were walking inside, trudging up the steps to your room with the bag handles digging deep grooves into your wrists. The pain was worth it though as you fell face-first into your bed, you couldn't rest long as you were still an absolute mess but the cool sheets welcomed your toasty self with a sigh.

Glancing at the clock you saw it had just gone half-four and there would still be some time before dinner, nuzzling back into the sheets you closed your eyes, your body dragging you down into sweet sweet slumber.

-

Waking up was not as peaceful, Sam had decided if you didn't get up for dinner you would perish and had chosen to throw shoes at you until you got up. It took a good couple of throws before one got even close to you, you wondered why he never thought to use his abilities instead of his awful aim but you doubt he would do more than shrug at you.

Catching the boot before it slammed into your back you glowered at him, barely lifting your head as you kept his form in your sights, that smug face grinning sheepishly at you.

"Dinners in forty sleepyhead," he ducked the boot as you threw it back at him, laughing as he ran back downstairs to help your mother or bother her into making something fried and greasy to eat.

Pushing yourself up and stretching like a cat you gave yourself a quick sniff, wincing as you remembered you hadn't bothered to shower once you were home. Heading into the bathroom and grabbing a towel you decided to take a lot less time than earlier, still scrubbing your skin but not until your skin looked like it had been raked over, and grabbing your mom's rose and berry body wash instead.

Drying off and rubbing some lotion into your skin, realising just how scratchy it had gotten after neglecting yourself throughout the move. Once you were satisfied you headed over to your closet sans towel and threw it open, you knew it would be cooler outside tonight and while you weren't human you could still get sick. Choosing your mom jeans again along with a dark blue turtle neck that would cover you up nicely, deciding to pair them up with some rugged doc martins and thick woolen socks so you wouldn't be limping by the end of the night.

Heading to the kitchen you smelt your mom's meatloaf and mac and cheese, she was prattling on to Sam about how he would eat what she made or he can learn to cook himself, unsurprisingly he was debating it and you dreaded to think of what dreadful concoctions he would make. Sitting down and tucking in you hummed in delight, there was nothing better to you than a freshly cooked meal by Lucy, the only thing that would improve it would be if she used some of the weed gramps was growing outback.

As the sun went down behind you your mind wandered, dreading to think of the night being that would be out soon.

-

The boardwalk as usual was full of life, a Saturday night in summer never disappointed. But the boys had something different on their minds.

You.

They hadn't stopped obsessing over you since they had felt your presence in town, something was different about you and the energy you held. Craving nothing more than to be around you and have you in their arms. But their usual methods of seduction failed as you ignored their charming smiles, soft touches, and bared chests. You were a challenge they would gladly accept.

Expecting to see you again tonight they sped down to the boardwalk, parking in the usual spot and sending Laddie and Star off to entertain themselves for the evening. Star had already attached herself to Michael, luring him in with the sway of her hips and tug of her hair as she let him chase her back to them the other night. He would be the means to an end they needed to get closer to you, especially since they had already spotted him parking his scrawn red bike a little further down from them by the beach.

You weren't with him though and they frowned when they noticed, they could still feel you though. Hiding somewhere in the crowds. Paul was itching to go and find you, along with Marko whose owlish eyes gazed on ahead from his position at the top of the railing.

"Spotted," they all turned to look at his words, trying to follow wherever his gaze had found you. And there you were, wearing a cosy turtleneck and the same loose-fitting pants as yesterday. Gazing around at all the rides, with their bright lights reflecting in your eyes.

Perfection.

Marko had already hopped down and began heading towards the crowds that blocked the path to you, people parting naturally as Paul and Dwayne followed him slowly like a panther stalking its prey. David stalked behind with his hands in his coat pockets, watching as you continued on exploring, unaware of the danger you were in.

It would be easiest to corner you, slowly leading you to a quiet part of the boardwalk you wouldn't be familiar with, your poor helpless self would be forced to rely on them to find the way back to the safety of your brothers. Soon enough you had turned to glance behind you and had immediately spotted Dwayne's tall form peeking through the crowds, to your left was Paul and your right Marko, they could hear your heart rate pick up as you turned into a passageway through the shops.

Marko was quick to tail you, smiling like the devil as his lithe form moved between hidden spaces you weren't aware of, relishing in the smell of your fear as you realised how close he was getting. Paul had taken it upon himself to climb above the stalls and was following along above you, grinning down at you like a lion as he lazily smoked a blunt. Being a vampire allowed him to move quickly without much thought and quiet enough so you wouldn't notice him, not that he would have minded seeing your scared face looking up at him like a kitten fallen into the arms of a beast.

David and Dwayne were using the shadows to move, letting Marko take the lead in nudging you in the right direction, one of them occasionally jumping out and laughing at you when you tried to get back to the safety of the boardwalk crowds. Where there would be too many witnesses for them to hurt you.

-

It had been going fine.

Had being the operative word

Michael had gone shopping with you, for some reason he was obsessed with the idea of getting a leather jacket and some cool jewelry, but you hadn't protested since it would allow you to spend some time with him and explore without being harassed. So you had hoped.

It wasn't long before you lost him in the crowds as he walked towards a piercing booth where a girl was watching her friend get her first ear piercing, clearly, neither were coping well with it as they held hands in anxious anticipation. You didn't miss Star approaching him either, whispering something into his ear that made his head snap back, he immediately began following her like a lost puppy eager to please his new owner, disappearing as she lead him back to the opposite end of the boardwalk and away from you. Despite letting it happen you couldn't ignore the feeling in your chest telling you something was afoot, like a deeper plan was being played out.

I mean sure Michael was cute, blessed with your mother's gorgeous pixie genes, but he was still a massive virgin and always too scared to approach pretty girls who swished their skirts at him. Suddenly, as though a spell had been placed upon him he had fallen within a day of being in your new home. It felt wrong.

Your attention was soon taken from you as a group of rowdy surfers pushed past you, carrying you along with them as you tried to escape from your position in the middle of the group, stumbling towards the stalls you had been followed through the other day. Huffing as you finally grounded yourself, holding onto the side of one of the shops as you rubbed the dirt from their clothing off of you. Glancing around you realised you were far from where you wanted to be, trying to spot the light of Max's video store where mom worked as you thought about hiding there or asking to drive her car back home.

Fuck

Ahead of you was an even bigger obstacle, one of the boys from the other night, the tall brooding brunette who had rubbed against you like a cat in heat. He met your eyes with a dark smirk, making slow strides towards you. Bristling with anger you went to head further down the boardwalk, hoping you would be able to find the comic book store Sam had gone to so you wouldn't be left alone with him.

"Ah!" You let out a yelp as you turned, coming face to face with the cherubic blonde, he had bent forward so he could look closely at your face. Goodness knows how long he had been waiting for you to turn. Creep.

"Where ya goin' kitten," he began dragging his hands down your arms but you pulled away from him and pushed him back, scoffing in disgust.

"Away from you, take the hint weirdo."

His eyes gleamed, shining with an unknown emotion, and at that point, you realised you were nothing more than prey. Backing away slowly he followed, soft short steps as he forced you deeper into the pathway behind you, cornering you like a wolf would with a bunny in a forest.

"Oh I don't think you want to do that hun, c'mon me and my boys are plenty fun."

"For some reason I doubt that."

"Ahh but you don't know do you," you tried to go round the corner to your left but were stopped by the platinum blonde, he blew smoke in your face and laughed mockingly, reaching out for you.

"Marko, Marko, Marko. Don't scare them now, I'm sure they know better than to refuse our company."

Your heart was going a mile a minute and you knew you would have to be smart about your escape, the area you were in was not familiar to you and you were sure the four of them knew it like the back of their hands. You could feel more than the two you could see though, their energy buzzing around you, it was dangerous and dark and you wanted nothing to do with it. Glancing behind you and further into the dark of the empty alleyways behind the stalls you saw it was empty and knew it was your only chance. With one last look at them, you turned and sprinted, narrowly missing the hands of the brunette as he reached out to grab you from the shadows.

Laughter echoed all around you but they made no move to run, almost as though their strides were carrying them fast enough, you wouldn't check behind to see though lest you trip and lose your momentum.

Looking up you saw a shadow covering the moon, there he was, the blonde who had wrapped himself around you last night. His face looked almost inhuman in the moonlight, his eyes glowing...

Shit

You knew now why you felt how you did, why when they were near the air became dark and cold. They were predators. Inhuman ones at that.

Fucking vampires.

Knowing now what you would have to do you ran towards a pathway which would cover you from above, it was dark, almost pitch black and you summoned all the energy you could as you recited the spell in your mind. Feeling your body become surrounded in a soft glow, your skin tingling with a pricking sensation.

Poof!

Slowly you opened your eyes, your form still tense as you looked around, you had appeared beside the boardwalk only at the start of it. Next to you were some stairs leading back up to the walkway and looking down you realised you were tucked into a corner of the beach where no one could see you. Above you heard the familiar voice of your brother, Michael, who was still walking with Star.

Taking a moment to compose yourself you headed towards them, intending to get him onto his bike and home with you, far away.

-

You had vanished. It had been going perfectly and you had just vanished. Nothing left of you besides your scent.

Marko, David, and Dwayne were already round the corner to capture you, knowing this was a dead end with no escape. Paul began to climb down behind them when your heart stopped beating. Or so they had thought, expecting to find a corpse, but instead finding empty air.

They were stunned, if someone came up and slapped them in the face they might have thought they were touching a statue with how still they were standing. It was really quite comical. David was the first to snap back and his movements brought the rest of them with him, Paul was still slightly convinced his dealer had given him something other than pot at that moment.

"David," it was Dwayne who spoke first, looking at his leader who was biting down on a cigarette. His question was unspoken but they were all thinking it.

Where had you gone, it wasn't possible for you to slip past them, not only was it four against one but they were able to hear every movement you made. The air smelt funny too like someone had burnt rubber. It put them on edge not being able to sense you anymore, even as Marko and Paul checked every crevice and lifted the cloths covering the tables in the empty stalls to see if you had hidden yourself there.

Either way, it didn't explain how your heartbeat had just stopped. It wasn't possible for a human to do that and you definitely weren't a vampire. Not yet.

"Seek them out, if we can still feel them they're not far from us. I'm sure there's a door they must have found, Marko look harder, Paul use your nose."

They worked like a pack of bloodhounds, the young blondes utilising their primal skills to search for you while David and Dwayne poked around for your mind, still feeling your emotions running wild.

"Stop." Three golden eyes looked up at him, David's smile growing as he looked back in the direction of the open walkway, "they're still here., somewhere nearby, I can feel them through Star"

"Where?" Marko rose up from where he had crouched down near the floor, feeling around for any loose boards.

"Somewhere further back I think, but they're still moving, lets go."

-

As you watched Star you wondered why she too held that same energy, it was merged with something vibrant but it was as though there was a black hole in the centre, absorbing the life from her. She wasn't a vampire though, her heart still beating softly in her chest and cheeks flushed as Michael tried to flirt his way into getting her to grab dinner with him.

Intervening you ran up behind them, shouting his name and pulling him out of his enamored state. He looked behind at you in concern, noting how you were flushed and shaking, your chest beginning to constrict as your running caught up with you.

"What's up?" You didn't answer, letting yourself lean against him as he wrapped you into a hug, Star watching on concerned. She had thought by now the boys would have taken you away somewhere, small thoughts of theirs pushing into her mind as they chased you. They grew again as they realised you were with her, telling Star to keep you occupied.

"I wanna go home Mikey," your breathing had evened out and you squeezed your eyes shut as an unwelcome feeling grew in your chest. They were coming for you, having figured out where you had disappeared to.

Star was staring into space beside you, eyes focused on you and Michael.

"Why what happened? Did someone hurt you? You're shaking bug."

"I-I'm fine I just need to get home, please." He began leading you both away, forgetting about Star as you walked to where his bike was sat.

"Michael"

Shit

For a moment you had forgotten she was still there, now looking at you both expectantly.

"You promised me dinner Mikey," her voice was like honey and you felt a pull towards her, luring you in like a fish on a hook, your bother sighed beside you biting his lip.

"Gee, I'm sorry Star I forgot, bug d'you think we could stay just a little longer? You can stick with us the whole time I promise."

Looking up at him you begged with your eyes but he wouldn't budge, you had to take a better approach. Nudging his mind you decided it would be better to talk this way where Star couldn't hear you.

They're not human Michael

What

Not. Human.

He glanced back at Star, eyes widening as he began to feel it too. That gnawing feeling in his chest as warning bells ringing in his mind.

Wheres Sam

With humans he'll be safe, we can tell mom

Nodding he looked to Star again, "I'm sorry I'll have to take a raincheck on that," her eyes going glossy under his hardened gaze, mouth moving but not forming words.

You continued on, reaching his bike and bracing your hands against his shoulders to climb behind him, stopping as you heard the rumble of four other bikes surrounding you. Wincing in anticipation of a possible fight.

There they were, all four of them and the small boy, smug grins on each of their faces as they trapped Mike's bike with their own much larger machines. You were trapped and it didn't look like anyone was coming to your rescue any time soon.

"Where you goin' love," David relished in the sight of your tense form, admiring your flushed face, growling slightly as Michael pulled you towards him.

"Let's go bug."

"Nuh-uh uh, you promised our friend dinner Mikey, or did you forget?"

Michael glared at David as Paul laughed at him, irritation burning behind his eyes.

"I already told her I could do it another night, I'm sure she understands."

Star took this as her cue to put on a sad face, looking down to shy away from your brother, playing with her dress nervously, "you did promise Michael."

Her voice was sinful, and she knew the power batting her wide chocolate orbs had on him as he gulped.

"Why don't you come with us hm? Star on your bike and your 'bug' on mine," your head snapped up angrily, looking at the boy in front of you.

"I would rather eat shit and die than get on a bike with your show pony-looking ass," it was rather satisfying watching their faces fall.

Why was Star's lure working on your brother but none of theirs would work on you? Speaking of Star, she was still making doe eyes at Mike and he was definitely falling for it, his resolve failing as he looked to her. He glanced back at you.

No

Please

"W-what if Star rides with you?"

"So you will come with us," that smug grin was back and you pinched Mike which he ignored, nodding at David instead.

"Fine, Star come," she wasted no time climbing on behind him, letting his arm lift her up, "you know where Hudson's Bluff is, overlooking the point?"

Mike nodded, steadying himself as you climbed on, wrapping your arms tight around his waist, "I can't beat your bike."

"You don't have to beat me, Michael, you just have to try and keep up."

I'll kill you for this Mikey

I know

[pogueit]

First Aid Kit

Paring: Pope Heyward x Reader

Summary: You have an accident while attempting to do a new trick and Pope is the man for the job.

Warnings: blood ofc and general first aid stuff nothing too graphic tho!!

WC: 1,994

A/N: There's not enough Pope content!! SO I made some!! Pls enjoy some Pope and Y/N action!

THE GIF IS NOT MINE IT BELONGS TO @rue-bennett !!!!

Saturdays are not meant to be boring, but this scorching afternoon there was nothing to do. John B. went on his weekly date with Sarah, JJ scored a date with a kook he's been eyeing, and Kie was forced to go to a gala on the mainland, so it was just you and Pope alone in the chateau. He had been studying all day for an upcoming chemistry exam he has first thing Monday morning. You tried all day to get his head out of the books, but he was not having any of it. It wasn't until the late afternoon that you got him to go outside with you. Even though his nose was still deep in the piles of notes at least he was outside. You were skating on a horrifically uneven stretch of concrete that was oddly slathered in front of the chateau. Every time he could hear the wheels pop upwards he would snap his eyes to you, cheering you on when you stuck the landing. You were glad that he was far enough away to not be able to see how red your cheeks were. You've had a massive crush on the boy ever since Kie introduced you to the group. Your mom had just moved your ass down to the banks to get a fresh start far away from your poor excuse for a father. She managed to quickly score a job at The Wreck (where you were also forced to work part-time) as head chef. Your mom got on well with the Carrera's who only deemed it appropriate to force their daughter to hang out with you, being new in town and all. Kie wasn’t bothered at all and was glad to have another girl around. After hanging out with her for a single day, you wouldn’t hesitate to take a bullet for her. Kiara didn't introduce you to the knuckleheads right away, since she had taken a liking to you and didn't want to scare you away. The day that she did you remembered Pope had been the last one to say "hey" yet his was the warmest. After that day your stomach would erupt with butterflies whenever you'd even look at him and you would nearly die when your hands would brush against each other in passing. There was just something about him. Maybe it was how he didn't believe in stupid questions, except for JJ's of course, or how he would learn a new subject just to be able to help one of you ace an exam. It could be how the sun sparkled against his wet skin after a long day of swimming or surfing. How relaxed he looks sitting in the driver's seat of the HMS Pogue taking in all that the sun had to offer. You were glad the rest of the crew hadn't caught on yet, especially JB since he's already taken the role as your big brother, even though you're sure that you’re definitely older than him. He would never let you hear the end of it if he knew. The constant pestering, nudging, and side-eyeing would have driven you insane. Your mind slowly drifted back to the boy studying a few feet away from you. The thoughts of those hot summer nights in the cool water with him clouded your brain, so much so you nearly wiped out.

"You good!?" Pope's concerned voice made your head snap in his direction. You knew that the embarrassment on your face was very telling but you just shot him two thumbs up and got back on your board. You shake off any remaining thoughts from your head before attempting your new trick. You were sick and tired of random strangers, but mostly JJ and JB, yelling at you to do a kickflip whenever you were skating. After watching countless videos on kickflips you were basically an expert on them at this point and all you had to do now was actually stick the landing. You slid your right foot to the middle of the board so that your heel was just off the edge while your toes rested in the middle. You shifted your left foot to the tail of the deck and with all the strength you could muster you push down on the tail while your right foot flicked down on the edge of the board. It would have been a spectacular landing if it weren't for the random-ass pebble that your wheel landed on.

"Oh fuck, are you alright!?" Pope was by your side before you even realized you were on the ground. Falling came with the game and you were not fazed at all, since you've had grislier wipeouts than this, but that's before you saw the fountain of blood that poured out of your knee.

"Yeah, I'm fine dude-- I've had-- I need to--The bathroom--" you hobbled quickly into the bathroom at the chateau trying your darndest to not get any blood in the house. By the time you were able to sit down on the toilet, you were seeing stars. Your vision was slowly fading to black and you felt like you were going to vomit. You closed your eyes tightly as you pressed a clump of toilet paper to your knee, which pulled a hiss right from your lungs at the sensation. Promptly, you bit down on your bottom lip to keep yourself from letting out a scream. A light knock came from the door and it couldn't be anyone else but Pope.

"Are you alright in there y/n?" From all the pain you were in you could only hum out a yes as a response, but you knew that would not be a good enough answer for the boy.

"Yeah, just don't--" before you could even finish your sentence he barged in "--open the door, why don't ya". His eyes grew wide at the bloody mess you made in the bathroom, but then quickly softened at the sight of you. Your skin was flushed with developing perspiration clinging to your skin and your lips had gone pale as your lungs suddenly only knew how to hyperventilate.

"Uh, I don’t think it would be in your best interest to say that it looks like a slasher flick was filmed in here" his words made you squeeze your eyes tighter as bloody images flashed before you and it only got harder for you to breathe. Pope stepped inside the rather small bathroom and closed the door behind him. He picked up all the toilet paper you had used for your leg and tossed them into the trash bin before he crouched down next to you.

"Does it still hurt?" His voice was quiet, barely above a whisper, as if you would shatter if he spoke any louder. All you could muster was a tiny nod as the pain took up most of your energy. His hands then gently pried your hands off of your injured knee and inspected it. Since the cut had almost stopped bleeding completely, Pope, was able to see that the wound was deep but not enough for it to garner any stitches and it was free of any debris. Lucky for you because JB had fallen there a couple of weeks ago and Pope had to whip out the tweezers to get all the gravel out of the bloody gash.

"Hey, it's not that bad-- I mean it is bad but it could be worse-- I'm gonna clean it now" the boy got to his feet and helped you sit on the edge of the bathtub with your feet sitting inside the tub. He then washed his hands furiously to avoid infection and gathered all the supplies he needed which consisted of antibacterial soap, antibiotic cream, gauze pads, gauze rolls, and unconditional love and support. Pope helped you undo both your shoes and removed them along with your embarrassing Winnie the Pooh socks. He sat with his legs outside the tub to have easy access to the supplies. After he checked to make sure the water wasn't too hot or too cold Pope moved your leg so your knee was underneath the faucet. The wound's contact with the water wasn't as bad as you thought, but it could’ve been you were distracted by his soothing touches as he held you close to him. Pope was careful not to get any of the soap in the cut just on the surrounding area and when he was finished he made sure to clean the rest of your blood-caked leg up as well. Once you were all cleaned up, he padded your leg dry before he attempted to put ointment on the tender flesh.

"Is it going to hurt?" You squeaked as he retrieved the ointment from the countertop.

"It might sting, but it shouldn't, '' he reassured you, as he brought the ointment-covered q-tip to your knee, but you couldn't help that your knee-jerked away from his touch.

"Ow, fuck!"

"Y/n, I haven't even touched you yet"

"I know, I know, sorry"

"I promise it won't hurt, y/n, and if it does you can punch me or something" even if it did hurt that bad you couldn’t imagine hurting Pope in any way. He once again leaned back in with the q-tip and sure enough, it wasn't painful at all. The ointment soothed the burning sensation of the area which finally allowed you to relax. He then carefully put a gauze pad on the injury, before wrapping your knee securely with gauze. You slid off the edge of the grimy porcelain tub and onto the ground while Pope stood next to the sink and neatly tucked everything back into the first aid kit.

"Uh, thanks--" your words got lost in your throat when your eyes met his warm eyes "--um, dude?" You felt stupid when it came out as a dumbfounded question and the heat quickly rose to your cheeks. If it was any time for you to die you wish it would have happened right then.

"Yeah, any time, y/n" he shot an endearing smile in your direction and you've never wanted to kiss a man so much before in your life.

You both let the awkwardness settle over you. The two of you riddled with hesitancy, but quietly yearned to confess your feelings to one another. He needed to get out of there. Pope gave you a curt nod and a tight smile, but as he headed towards the door there was vacillation in his movements. Before you lost sight of him from the doorway, he turned back around determined.

"Y/N, I gotta--" you were soon on your feet as the last bit of courage you had for your lifetime allowed you to meet him halfway. He didn't bother finishing his sentence as he decided his actions would speak for him. Pope cupped your face in his soft hands and crashed your lips together. The kiss was sweet, sweeter than anything you've ever experienced before. His plump lips gilded confidently over your timid ones. As the fire inside of you diminished your shyness you shifted yourself forward onto your tippy toes to deepen the kiss. Your movements caused you to pin Pope against the bathroom wall and you could feel him smile against your lips. His velvet tongue dragged against your bottom lip for permission to explore you further and you were more than eager to let him.

"Fucking finally!" The familiar voice of the rowdy klepto caught you guys by surprise causing both of you to jump away from each other.

"I guess I'm forty bucks richer, I knew you had it in ya, Pope!" JJ beamed as he walked towards the two of you and you playfully rolled your eyes at the blonde-haired boy.

"Fuck off!" Pope giggled and slammed the door in JJ's face before he turned to face you.

"Now, where were we?"

[tulu-xuanwu]

Well, well, well, here I am, as promised, with a list of some of my favourite Word of Honor stories concerning a fairly niche genre of fiction that is generally dubbed Time Travel fix-it (although, in this case, I like to think of it as reverse transmigration) because I'm a sap for happy endings and preventing at least some of the deaths that the show made me go through.

(If any of the authors would rather not be included in this list, please let me know and I'll remove them)

come back for me even when im gone by heian

It's been three days since Zhou Zishu changed. Its such a small difference, Qin Jiuxiao knows its not even noticeable, not to the vice commanders that follow his shixiong, not to that insufferable Prince Jin. But he can tell, he most definitely can feel the difference. There's something in his eyes now, for the first time in years, his gaze look clear. All these recent years they were clouded by fog, a haze that's gone now.

Luo Fumeng has watched over the disaster that has been Wen Kexings life for a while now. Has seen the boy cover his grief and pain with lies and deceptions in a large tangled web. He's broken inside, but he hasn't given up on fighting yet. Wen Kexing burns with the need for revenge, he uses his anger to keep himself together even as his mind frays at the edges. She can tell the exact moment when his eyes change. One day he wakes, and something has shattered in them entirely. All the rage gone hollow. She doesn't know what happened, but it's causing him to fall apart.

Looking up, I find the moon bright by beautifulchildsandwich

Zhou Zishu opens his eyes.

Instead of waking up in the same place he has for the past five decades, he is sitting slumped by a desk in a room that he recognises, but wishes he didn't. He swallows harshly and stares down at the desk in front of him.

Seven long and thick nails lie on the table before him, along with a written record in his own hand on their usage.

My Grandfather is an Old Monster by phai6688

Instead of dying, Ye Baiyi wakes up 13 years into the past. He decides to kidnap Wen Kexing from Ghost Valley and offer the 15-year-old boy a better life. He wasn't anticipating how difficult it would be.

Not This Time by Ehann

One moment he is pouring every last bit of qi into Wen Kexing, feeling his life force fade. Wen Kexing is gone, and Zhou Zishu will not, WILL NOT be left behind. He pours his qi into the now empty vessel.

His last thought is this, “If I could go back-”

To Return Home by demoniqt

Given the chance to rectify their mistakes, who wouldn't want to change their past? For two immortals, their chance to do so comes once the celestial bodies align perfectly. They have all the time in the world to wait for it and while they do, they plan.

When the Orchids Bloom by Shadaras

Zhou Zishu had been given a second chance he never would have dared ask for, though it granted him nothing but his own memories and the ability to try again.

He wished there had been any surety that Wen Kexing would ride back on the wheels of time with him, but there wasn’t. It would need to be enough to have been given the knowledge to save himself, find a little more time and a little less torment, and work towards easing Wen Kexing’s heart and setting the jianghu down a less bloodied path.

[kaiparker-avengerssmut]

Their Doll 5

Throw a punch

B.Barnes x Reader, S.Rogers x Stark!Reader

series synopsis:  y/n Stark, all records of her non existent, and yet Hydra still find her. When she is kidnapped by a certain super-soldier and no one believes her, she finds herself searching for unexpected familiarity in her not-so-distant past.

Series Warnings: smut, violence, torture, swearing

Chapter Summary: y/n finally beats Bucky, he has a surprise for her when she returns from her first mission.

Warnings: smut, violence, mention of death/murder

A/n: The timeline in this has been altered, as there I things I wanted to include but I also wanted this fic to follow the storyline/timeline of Winter Soldier and Civil war.So for purposes of this fanfic, Peter Parker was discovered by Tony at a much younger age - when he was bitten - and has been an intern with him since, almost like a protégée.(For the purposes of this story Peter was bitten much younger too - more like when he was 9 or ten rather than 14/15)

Masterlist | Series Masterlist

3 years. 3 godforsaken, bloody torturous years. That's how long I'd been in this hell hole. How long I'd been repeatedly beaten up by my only form of solace daily. How long I'd been whipped for simply not being good enough to beat a super soldier. How long I'd endured endless torture. And today, today is the day that it will all end.

If there was one thing the last three years taught me, is that I should duck and run rather than throw a punch. At least that's what I thought, and I'd never really been willing to risk a broken jaw to prove my theory. That is, until today.

Come on, y/n, you can do this. The words were repeated in my mind, my own mantra, in order to psych myself up for what I was about to do. There was a fire grip on my arm - arguably much tighter than necessary - as the guards dragged my down the hollow hall to my training session with the Winter Soldier. Pft, more like two hours of humiliation and a sore ass, I though, a little smirk spreading on my lips at my own joke.

"What're you laughing about? Something funny, Stark?" The guard who had the grip on my arm spat through gritted teeth and the smirk was instantly ripped from my lips, instead reverting back to the hard expression I had been trying to maintain while around anyone who worked for HYDRA.

So basically everyone.

We walked in silence the rest of the way, like normal, and the guard roughly shoved my into the room by a hand between my shoulder blades, like normal. But today wasn't like normal - no, today was the day I was the one to throw a punch.

They removed the silencer from my head and let me take a gulp of water before The General was barking the order for us to begin.

I walked into the centre of the room, shoulders back and stare cold. The soldier's gaze matched mine as his cerulean eyes bore into my own, his jaw clenched and hands already curling into fists as I stood before him. We maintained the stare for a moment - almost as if the other was waiting for the other to make the first move, an open opportunity to take the win.

And so I did.

Using the speed I'd worked up to over time, I farted towards the soldier, ducking on a seconds notice as his metal fist flew out. I landed a jab to his stomach, one hard enough to make him cough slightly with the knocked up air but far from hard enough to actually make him stumble. Distracted, he barely noticed me as I slipped under him - through his legs out by his back, which I was quick to jump on. I let my legs wrap around his muscular waist and my left arm wrap around his throat, making the soldier grit his teeth and attempt to pry my arm away from his neck as he began to choke.

When he attempted to fling my forward, I tangled my right fist into his brown locks, yanking painfully and making the soldier cry out as I lowered my lips to his ear. Another thing I'd learnt in the past three years is that the soldier was only affected by my powers under two conditions:

One, he was off-guard or vulnerable - hence the choking - and two, I was as close to him as I could possibly get.

I began to him a soft tune - one I had discovered was most effective in lowering my opponent's defence and lulling them into a false sense of security. I practically smirked irksomely when I sensed his eyes rolling back in defeat and his assault on my arm falter - body falling limp and relaxed under the quell of my voice.

When I was sure I'd lowered his defences enough, I slowly climbed down from his back and admired my handy-work.

The Winter Soldier, stood dopey and barely lucid before me, without so much as the energy to even move his arm, let alone land a heavy punch like he normally would. I took my chance, the man nothing more than a pile of flesh and bones as my leg swept through his, bringing the soldier down the the ground with a loud noise that resembled a mixture of a crash and a thud.

Of course, the impact made my tune immediately ware-off and the soldier was now fully lucid, but I could barely contain myself as I punched my fists into the air triumphantly and a grin curled across my lips.

A lonely applause filled the tall room, bringing me back to earth as I realised the situation. Footsteps angled towards me, slow and calculated as the claps slowed to a stop, The General standing before me with a tight-lipped smile.

"Well done, Miss Stark." He congratulated, looking around him and outstretching his arms. "It only took you, what? Three years?" He mocked, the taunting laughter of the guards making me feel nauseous. But I kept my composure, returning his mocking, tight-lipped smile that didn't even dare go near my eyes - which were alright with anger. "And now your training is complete. We shall have to teach you how to use a gun, I suppose?" He said lazily. I clenched my jaw.

"I knew how to use a gun perfectly fine, General." I gritted and his eyes brows shot up as he turned to face his comrades.

"Did you hear that, gentlemen? Looks like she doesn't need another three years to learn to fire a gun? My, my, haven't we lucked out with this one?" He mocked cruelly, coming back to face my burning eyes. He smirked, grabbing my chin between his thumb and his finger and angling my head up to meat his eyes. "Take her away, and get her ready for her first mission." He demanded, eyes churning with something that resembled pride, but darker. He kept his eyes on me as he spoke, before roughly jerking my chin away and letting the guards refasten the silencer over my mouth before they were grabbing and arm each and dragging me from the  training room.

The pulled me back down the hollow hall - passing my usual cell.

"W-where are we going?" I asked, swallowing heavily as they halted to a stop in front of an unfamiliar door and we shoving me inside. There was nothing gentle about the HYDRA guards, not that I ever expected there to be.

Once I was in one of them tugged the door shut, the other throwing a bundle of clothes at me, which I fought as the flew at my chest. I opened the ball of fabric out, finding a skin-tight leather tactile suit - red HYDRA symbol embellished on either arm and over my heart - along with underwear and some black tactile boots.

The men stared at me expectantly, eyeing me up and down by never making the move to leave.

"Aren't you supposed to give me privacy to change?" I asked sheepishly. As humiliating it had been to be whipped for three years the sight toppled in front of these men, the idea of willingly getting changed while they were stood staring at me like I was a piece of meat made bile ride in my throat.

"I highly suggest you get to it, unless you'd like us to help out, of course." One of the guards said with a sickening expression, making me grimace and begin to tug my shirt over my head.

"And how about you do it...slowly, if you don't mind, Miss Stark." The other remarked, arms crossed over his chest as he bit his lip and glued his eyes intensely on my body.

I gulped, continuing to pull the shirt over my head. Oh boy, this was gonna be a long day.

…

Blood and soot cakes my nails, the icky feeling of the grime a haunting reminder of what I had just done. I was in the shower room, scrubbing the mud and blood from my body as quickly and efficiently as I could. I was used to cleaning my own blood from my skin, but the feeling of someone else’s just made me want to-

I shivered, hands shaking the the brush tumbling out of my grasp and clattering to the floor. I braced a hand on the wall, letting my head hang forward as I took a deep breath, before looking back up and wincing as the cold water streamed over me.

No hot showers at HYDRA. I hadn’t felt the feeling of warm water rush over me since the last time I had a long bubble bath back home...

I shook the thought off, carding my fingers through my hair and attempting to pick the dirt and gravel out of it. My breath was ragged as I felt a hot steam of air on my neck, the faint tickle of fingers brushing over my hips and up my body until two large hands - one flesh, one metal - caged my head to the tiled wall.

“Soldier...” I moaned breathily, letting my eyes slip shut at the feeling of his hot breath hitting the back of my neck. It was an intoxicating feeling, really, especially after being void of affectionate human contact for so many years. The soldier buried his nose in my hair, inhaling deeply before bringing his lips to my eye.

“I can’t stay away from you.” He murmured, flesh hand coming down to grab a handful of my ass roughly before letting go. I almost whined at the loss of contact before I felt a harsh spank against my right ass cheek. What surprised me the most was the expected cry of pain did not escape me, but rather a moan of pleasure.

I could feel the soldier’s smirk against my skin at my reaction, my eyes still shut as his hand trailed over my hip once again, before slipping down my front and running a finger through my wet folds. I jerked away as his fingertip brushed over my sensitive nub, pressing my lips together to surpress a needy groan at his low chuckle, the sound going straight to my core and causing a pang of arousal to dance through me.

“Ever been touched here before?” He husked in my ear and o shook my head, almost in embarrassment. “No?” He checked and I shook my head again. “I’ll try to be gentle.” He muttered, but before I could protest his cold with gliding through my folds, now coated in my wetness and slowly sheathing itself inside of me.

A raspy moan tore from my throat, the soldier groaning behind me as his hand moved to my hip in a vice-like grip. His cock stretched me beyond my limits, and to say it was painful was an understatement. After a moment of keeping his cock fully seated within me, the soldier pulled his hips back slowly before slamming back roughly. A burn formed in my cunt and I let out another moan, dropping my head forward to to cool shower wall when he thrusted into me again.

After a few more thrusts the pain started to dissipate, instead turning into a delicious and pleasurable burn that sent tingles through me. When one of my hands reached backwards to grip onto the soldier’s thigh, he took it as a signal to speed up snapping his hips into mine until the only thing that could be heard were our skin slapping together, my breathy and broken moans and the soldier’s frankly feral and animalistic growls and groans in my ear.

A sharp gasp crawled up my throat when his hand transferred from my hip down to my core, two fingers flicking at my bungle of nerves. I could feel every vein, every ridge, every part of him as I clamped down around him, throwing my head back to rest of his shoulder as his pace somehow increased again - fingers drawing tight and fast circles on my clit in time with his thrusts.

My knees buckled as I came with a shout, falling back into him as my legs gave up on me. He let out a growl as his thrusts faltered, a few more strokes and he was shooting his load deep into me. I winced as he pulled out, falling forwards into the wall as I tried to catch my breath - breathing laboured.

As I turned to face the soldier, maybe pull him into a kiss, he disappeared. It was like he had gone into thin air. The only trace of him left was his cum dripping down my thighs, tickling my skin.

[slashbitch2]

Extra Complications PT3

Previous Chapter

"Don't bother coming back into work tomorrow."

Her words had been replaying in your mind since the final encounter, bouncing round like a taunting echo. It'd only been a week since you'd stopped working at Alchemex, yet had felt like a lifetime of boredom and fatigue. With no job or persistent villain to chase after, if you could even call Liv a villain anymore, there was no reason to get out of bed in the morning, nothing to stop you from moping around your apartment. The days blended into what felt like one long sick day, disregarding the occasional break to rescue a cat stuck in a tree.

Although, your only sickness was of the mind. Whenever you attempted to get some rest, your thoughts would inevitably drift to Liv; the cold, distanced tone to her voice, the look of betrayal in her eyes, how empty the week had felt without her. By the third night plagued with insomnia, you were starting to accept that your feelings towards her may be more than a simple crush. On the eighth night, you decided you ought to do something about it and began to formulate a plan.

Entering the building like you were still an employee would be almost impossible since anyone who left their job was rarely welcomed back with open arms. It'd also be better to avoid the security and CCTV cameras, which you'd learnt used face recognition technology. And finally, locating a security card would pose a potential problem, as walking round the facility until you happened to stumble across a janitor to steal from was unfortunately no longer a possibility. So, what was the solution to all your problems? Vents.

Which is how you found yourself scouring over blueprints like a cliched protagonist from a bygone age movie, but at least the irony hadn't escaped you, and thankfully laboratories generally required a great deal of ventilation, so you had multiple routes memorised by the time the bus had arrived at Alchemex. You'd spent the entire journey on edge, fearful that any fellow passenger might accost you for looking so suspicious. But apparently an agitated figure buried beneath a pile of blueprints wearing a spider-suit underneath a jumper was normal enough to be ignored.

Nonetheless, stepping onto the concrete ground of the car park was a relief which inspired a tad more optimism. Moreover, leaving the burdening stacks of blueprints behind further alleviated some of your anxiety. It felt like a final confirmation that this was your one and only chance, and you weren't about to mess it up. Even as the building loomed over you casting a shadow of uncertainty, nothing could discourage your determination.

There was the remarkable sense that you didn't belong here, though it was a familiar sensation. One that persuaded you to tug the mask over your head before darting toward the edge of the car park. It was your belief that as long as you stuck to the outskirts of the facility, few would pay you any attention while you were out in the open. Therefore allowing you to manoeuvre into position and take the quickest passage straight to Liv's office. Which is exactly what you did.

The first stretch of the vent system was a straight drop, a narrow plunge that went on for longer than anticipated. Like a slide with no angle of inclination and a lot less fun. You hit the metal base with an ungraceful clang, certain that your legs would've buckled upon impact had it not been for the lack of space to do so. Overall an uncomfortable start. The remainder of the journey was a lot of crawling and muscle cramps, your only incentive being the occasional grate to peer down which reassured you that your destination was drawing nearer. Everything was going to plan.

Until you heard her.

Olivia's voice rung clear as if from a dream. It stood out from the general ruckus, initially leading you to believe you were hallucinating, that it was some kind of audible mirage. Yet you refocused your senses and it didn't go away. She was almost directly below you, separated simply by a thin layer of metal. With renewed ambition, you crawled toward the nearest grate as quickly and quietly as possible, frantically lowering your head to find the perfect angle, all just to catch a glimpse of her.

"What do you mean the program hasn't worked?" Liv pinched the bridge of her nose, her words laced with an an uncharacteristic anger. You'd never known her to be an irritable person, she loved her job and every challenge that came with it. Was she uptight? Sure. Passionate? Undeniably. But never angry.

"I've tried rerunning and rewriting parts of the code. And it just doesn't work!" Some poor employee (Mark, if you remembered correctly) was fighting for his dignity below. You could see he was flushing, wildly flailing his hands around as he tried to justify his mistake.

"You've rewritten part of it?!" She repeated, volume rising in frustration.

"I- I thought I knew how to fix it."

"I told you not to mess with my work." She growled, stepping closer.

"With all due respect," He didn't back down, clearly caught off guard and unsure how to deal with an irritated Liv. "it's actually Y/N's work."

Upon hearing your name, you ducked out of view as if you'd been seen. Although, it was evident that this was not the case, so slowly you edged forward to peer down at them once more.

Liv's face had dropped at the mention of your name. But by the time you'd settled back in place, anger was already seeping into her expression, then was suddenly smoothed into disturbingly sweet smile. "Well, Y/N isn't here anymore. So I suggest you keep your incompetent hands off of things you don't understand."

Judging by her vague wording, you guessed she hadn't told anyone the real reason you'd been fired. A fond appreciation flooded your mind. Despite everything that had happened, she still respected your secret enough to keep it. You begun to consider that maybe Liv cared about you as much as you did her. Why else would she lie on your behalf?

Mark muttered an ashamed. "Ok." Then left to try and atone for his mistake.

Liv stayed where she was for another minute before taking a deep breath, shaking off her annoyance, and setting a determined path. You assumed she was heading for her office and were about to follow, but then paused. Was this really the best time for a reunion? She obviously wasn't in the best mood, and if you had to guess, it was likely due to your betrayal. Was it too soon to reappear in her life? You'd arrived here with the intention to apologise and make amends, however, you had no idea how Liv would react or what would happen after. If there would even be an after. She could attack you on first sight for all you knew.

No. You'd come too far to turn around now. You continued along the vent before you could overthink the decision. It would be foolish to turn around now: the end was in sight, and rapidly growing closer.

Reaching the final grate, you were greeted with the familiar yet new aerial view of Liv's office. It'd remained mainly the same since your departure. She hadn't even bothered to remove your lab coat, which was still carelessly thrown over the chair you'd frequented everyday. And Liv herself hadn't changed much either, disregarding the seemingly permanent anger lines upon her face. She was sitting at her desk, head in hand, mindlessly flipping through a folder. It occurred to you at that moment that she didn't look irritated, rather sad. Another unexpected emotion for her to display.

After a minute, she sighed, tossing the papers to one side and bringing her other hand up to crash forward into. She looked defeated, seeing her this way felt wrong. You honestly preferred the anger because it showed she'd maintained at least some of her usual intensity.

You sighed. It was time to fix this. With unsteady hands you delicately unscrewed the bolts holding the grate in place, careful to make as little noise as possible. It was as you were removing the final screw that you realised something: you had no idea what to say to her. No planned speech or prepared apology, you'd resigned to hoping for a spontaneous burst of thoughtfulness in the moment. You sat there for a minute, fidgeting with one of the screws while attempting to come up with what you would say. Should you start by apologising for breaking in, or for lying to her, or for applying to the job in the first place? You had a lot of things to apologise for.

And unfortunately, the chance to think it through any further was taken from you as the screw slipped out of your hand. You gasped watching it fall, hitting the ground with an faint thud. Although quiet enough for most people to ignore, you knew Liv was too thorough to not investigate. And as expected, following your sharp intake of breath was the sound of a chair scraping against the floor, then footsteps gradually approaching.

Liv appeared below you, bending down to inspect the screw before glancing up. Her eyes locked with yours through the mask and widened in shock.

"Hey." The casual tone to your voice sounded forced and you grimaced. But rather than dwelling on it, you dropped from the exposed hiding place and pulled off your mask. You smiled awkwardly, eyes scanning and overanalysing her reaction.

Liv stepped back to lean on the desk for support. Her mouth was agape, but otherwise her face was worryingly blank.

"If this is a bad time I can come back later."

Still no response. The room was drowning in a tense silence.

"Well, actually I probably can't come back." With no social cues to interact with, you began to ramble aimlessly. "I'm guessing you'll find a way to patch that particular security breach." You gestured up to the gap in the ceiling and laughed lightly. "Sorry about that. I didn't know how else to-"

You're cut off as Liv moves impossibly fast, grabbing your shoulders and shoving you backwards against the wall. A thousand different thoughts run through your mind at once, all wondering what she's about to do. The majority are focused on the possibility that she's going to hurt you in some way, although, even if she did have the intention to cause harm, you wouldn't fight back. You were tired of conflict, especially when it involved Liv.

She was standing close, breathing heavily and saying nothing. You couldn't help but let your eyes flicker down to her lips, the temptation to kiss her becoming increasingly vehement. So instead you forced your attention up to her eyes, which held an air of confusion.

"What are you doing here?" Her voice was deep, full of unvoiced emotions.

You licked your lips, glancing at her mouth one last time. "I came here to apologise. I didn't mean for any of this to go so far."

"You're lying." She backed away slightly and you immediately missed the proximity.

"I'm not! I just-" You stuttered, then admitted in a quieter voice. "I never meant to hurt you."

She inhaled shakily and swallowed, your eyes tracing the movement of her throat. "And?"

"And because I care about you too much to let you think I did any of this on purpose." You lowered your head, her invasive glare becoming overwhelming.

Soft fingers firmly gripped your chin, compelling you to look up. Her eyes displayed distrust, confusion which you suddenly feel the need to wipe away. You wanted to make your affection for her clear, but found yourself annoyingly speechless. All the recurring thoughts and confined confessions that had been plaguing you for a week suddenly gone from your mind. You were infuriatingly at a loss for words. Although, the warmth of her fingers against your skin reminded you that actions speak louder than words.

You leant in slowly, giving her sufficient time to stop you. She didn't move so you kissed her lightly at first, searingly next. Your arm shifted to wrap around her back tentatively and she moaned faintly in response. Although, it wasn't until you allowed her to take control that any remaining anger dissipated. At that point the kiss became bruising, her hold on you tightening as a wave of shared desperation rolled over the both of you. Before the desperation could reach its peak, however, you separated from her.

Liv was almost panting, her cheeks tinged pink and hair a mess. She promptly attempted to kiss you again, though you dodged the advance and she whined. Her mouth latched onto your neck, sucking at the skin there.

Your head fell back against the wall, dizzy from lust. "Does this mean I can have my job back?" You quipped, running a hand through your hair.

"Depends." She murmured in between kisses. "Do you have anymore secrets?"

"None that I can think of." You smiled, the prospect of returning to what you'd come to consider as normality was an appealing one. Of course there were things you would need to work through with Liv, and many, many extra complications alongside having a relationship with your boss. But nothing easy was ever worthwhile, and Liv was living proof of that.

"Alright. You're hired."

[chronicallylatetotheparty]

Float Like A Butterfly... Chapter 5: So Last Season

Summary: Now that Adrien is no longer Chat Noir he doesn't have to get hit all the time. Unfortunately, his luck doesn't seem to have gotten the memo... Or has it?

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

"So, how're you holding up?"

"Please, Adrien, it's my mother! I'm positively ecstatic!"

"Exactly. It's your mother."

Chloe looked down for a second before her eyes snapped back up, any doubts she had hidden in an instant. "She's finally coming back! I'll finally be able to show her what she's been missing." Chloe tossed her ponytail back to emphasize the unspoken Me. "Now, I've gotta go. Sabrina insisted we do an 'emotional support routine' or whatever beforehand. Ciao!"

Sighing, Adrien stared at his phone for a moment before putting it down. He knew Chloe was grateful for Sabrina's help but it was still a struggle getting her to admit it.

Or getting her to admit how much Audrey had hurt her.

It was one thing to travel halfway around the world for your career and leave your daughter behind. It was something else entirely to completely ignore her. In all the years since Audrey left Chloe hadn't received a single birthday gift, phone call or text message. Adrien would know. Chloe would've bragged about it endlessly if her mother had taken so much as two seconds to acknowledged her existence-

Adrien's foot jerked, striking the vanity table and making the connected mirror tremble. Heart suddenly pounding against his chest as tension built up in his forehead. Distressed expression reflecting back at him.

Breathe, Adrien. Breathe.

Slowly, he inhaled.

Then exhaled.

Again.

Good.

He was okay.

Adrien was okay.

Guilt pricked like a thorn for thinking of his own problems when Chloe needed him. Adrien crushed it with his anger and annoyance but it was still there. Like a splinter that wouldn't come out.

I hate you.

Swiping out of the video chat Adrien tapped on Nino's number. It rang... and rang... and rang...

He's annoyed with me. I did something wrong again and Nino doesn't want to-

Adrien smacked both sides of his face. No, dummy! Nino's just busy or something. Stop that!

It wasn't every day a teenage DJ provided the music for Paris Fashion Week, after all. Nino had to make sure all his equipment was working properly.

The door to his dressing room burst open.

"Adrien, your friend Mlle. Dupain-Cheng will be bringing the last article of the new Gabriel line," Nathalie announced. "Your father expects everything to be perfect for Audrey Bourgeois."

"Doesn't he always?" Adrien deadpanned.

Nathalie stared at his watery eyes before typing something into her tablet. "Your performance on catwalks only has a 99% success rate. He expects you'll do better."

Father thinks you're a failure just like everyone else. He-

Shut up! Adrien felt something heavy settle in his chest.

One of the makeup artists came rushing in and Nathalie gestured her towards Adrien. "Touch up his eyes," she instructed and then left.

Jaw clenching, Adrien sat perfectly still as the makeup artist did her job. He was never entirely sure what the staff thought about him. 'Professional' was a word that was tossed around a lot. That used to fill him with a little pride... Before all of this.

The last person to suggest that a thirteen year old mourning his mother wasn't 'professional' so much as he was 'depressed' had never come back to work... Oh. Adrien had forgotten about that.

Finishing quickly, the makeup artist left too. Leaving Adrien with his thoughts. He didn't want to be with his thoughts at the moment. They were distracting and Nathalie had not been subtle.

I hate-

His phone vibrated as it received someone's text.

Ni-Non: hey dude!

Ni-Non: it's crazy over here man

Ni-Non: break a leg! ;)

Adrien smiled as his unpleasant mood faded to the back of his mind... And if he saw similarities between his family and Chloe's, well, that's why he could empathize with her.

Adrien: That's theater but I guess there's not much difference.

Adrien: Thanks. ^_^

 ---------------

There was a knock at his door. Adrien stopped fidgeting in the awkward suit to go answer it.

"Hello, Marinette." Adrien smiled in greeting.

"Oh, uh, hello!" Marinette gave a small wave as she stepped up the short stairs and-

Adrien braced himself with one foot while his hands went to her shoulders. Steadying Marinette as she quickly removed her weight from him.

"Oh! Uh, sorry." Marinette looked away in embarrassment at having tripped into him.

"... No worries!" Adrien smiled as he shook his head. Marinette seemed... subdued. Reaching down to pick up the hat that had fallen. "Oh, no." The artificial feather Marinette made for his allergies had come loose. "I hope it's not too hard to fix it."

Marinette looked down. "Uh, y'know, it doesn't really matter. This hat is a complete failure anyway."

"What? No, it's not!" Adrien rose to his feet quickly in shock. "Why would you say that?"

"Because... the queen of fashion, Audrey Bourgeois, saw it and hated it!" Marinette's hands covered her face, voice breaking. "I'm sorry, Adrien. I really messed up. I'm a total no talent!" Her arms wrapped around herself in a hug. "Please, don't put it on," she pleaded.

Adrien's heart went out to Marinette as she laid her insecurities bare. "Marinette, everything's going to be fine." He searched for the proper spot to reattach the feather,  fiddling with it as Adrien reassured her. "Your hat looks great. I think it's awesome and so does... my father." Adrien cleared his throat as he managed to fix her hat. "Otherwise he wouldn't have picked it for me. Look!"

Putting Marinette's hat on Adrien walked across the dressing room like he was already performing. Striking a few poses to ease Marinette's anxiety. "See?"

It seemed to work as Marinette gave a small smile. "You got that catwalk down," she complimented.

Adrien rubbed the back of his neck. "Really? Thank you."

"Ah-hem," Nathalie cleared her throat. "We have to go." Without waiting for Marinette she turned on her heel and started walking towards the viewing area.

Adrien rolled his eyes but smiled at Marinette's back as she hurried to catch up. Turning back to look at himself in the mirror Adrien scanned his outfit. The suit may have been generic and a few seams too close to last year's entry but Marinette's hat was fire.

"Okay!" Adrien was gonna go out there and make sure they recognized Marinette's talent!

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

Holding Marinette's hat to his chest Adrien stuck his head out in a decidedly 'unprofessional' manner. Spotting Marinette's family and a bunch of his friends in the first row. Adrien's blond head caught Nino's eye from across the catwalk and he gave him a thumbs up.

Adrien waved as he ducked back behind the corner before the photographers could take any pictures of the Agreste heir acting like a kid.

You got this, Adrien. Nino's DJ-ing, your classmates came -even though most of them don't care about fashion- with any luck Alix and Kim will tease you about it for the next month.

That would give Adrien the opportunity to dish out a bunch of jokes he never got the chance to use!

The music started; that was his cue.

You got this!

Adrien posed on the runway. Camera flashes already starting. Strutting down the catwalk Adrien smirked at Marinette. See? Stopping at the platform's end he posed in various angles for the photographers. Nino seemed to be enjoying himself too and that made Adrien's smile come much more naturally.

A small eruption boomed behind him and Adrien turned to see Hawkmoth's latest fashion disaster. Gasping, as his heart started hammering in his chest.

"A fashion show without the Queen of Style!? Glitter-ally unacceptable!" The akuma villain announced. "Where's that ungrateful Gabriel Agreste. I demand that he kneels before me!"

Ugh, what has he done now?

"My father isn't here," Adrien snapped in annoyance. Hearing people running for the exits.

"Well, then. If fashion disaster daddy isn't here I'll just have to settle for Agreste Junior! You're fired!"

Adrien's eyes widened as he stepped back. Golden glitter exploding everywhere as his body became numb and his senses dark-

-Glowing ladybugs swirled around him as Adrien had the disorienting feeling of laying  down when he could've sworn he'd been standing. Glancing around, Adrien realized he was now at the Eiffel Tower.

"Adrik- Adrien!" Chloe tackled him as he stood, throwing her arms around him. "I was so scared!"

Adrien blinked in surprise as Chloe set her head on his shoulder. Not letting him go... Adrien smiled as he hugged her back. Enjoying this genuine display of affection.

"Pound it!"

Head snapping towards the sound Adrien saw another Black Cat, this one a girl with long, reddish hair, fist bump Ladybug. They grinned at each other in post battle relief.

I hate you! I hate you! I hate you!

A chill to rival Frozer's ice covered Adrien from head to toe. It was one thing to see Ladybug working with a different Black Cat on the news. Quite another to have his replacement. Three. Frickin. Meters. In front of him!

Chloe didn't notice... Or rather Adrien didn't notice when she'd let go to help her mother. Who tried to fire her own daughter as thanks.

Adrien jerked his eyes away from the superhero duo-

I hate you! I hate you! I hate you!

-Away from the Miraculous holders and forced himself to listen to whatever the Bourgeois were saying. Ears ringing as Ladybug and the Black Cat talked about something behind him...

"Oh, mom. If only you knew what a great team we made!" Chloe trailed after her mother as they walked down the tower's stairs; attempting to capture her attention. "We fired a bunch of incompetents. It was awesome. We should really spend more time together! What if I went back to New York with you?"

"Don't be ridiculous, Casserole- Eh, Chloe!" Audrey dismissed. "First I have to get back to Gabriel Agreste's fashion show. And they better..."

Adrien's eyes narrowed as he looked down from the railing, his grip on it tightening. Heat from a growing indignation melting the ice he felt. What did she just call Chloe?

"Adrien Agreste, right? I can give you a lift back if you want."

His tensed body jerked in surprise as Adrien realized Ladybug was standing right behind him. Throat and chest constricting as his thoughts whirled. Spots darkened his vision as he felt lightheaded. Adrien's knuckles becoming white, the metal railing digging into his skin. A single thought rose above the ringing in his ears.

I don't wanna talk to her.

Giving his best model smile, Adrien schooled his features. "Ah, thanks but-" he pointed down, "-I should really check on them."

"O-oh! Of course!"

Ladybug's face was out of focus but Adrien could still feel the melancholy in her voice.

Powering past his queasy stomach Adrien made his way to the stairs. The sound of Ladybug's yo-yo whirring reached his ears; signaling her departure. Adrien took a shuddering gasp as he leaned against a metal pillar for support. Body suddenly limp.

Breath accelerating Adrien tried to calm himself. Why was he up here? Had- Had Audrey's blast mind controlled him? Again!? He couldn't breathe.

Adrien sank to his knees as he felt his skin crawl at the idea of that- that- asshole reaching into his mind and taking away his free will. He hated it! He HATED it!

Gasping as his rage broke him out of the panic, Adrien steadied his breathing... He wanted- no, needed to know what happened... Which meant getting up and moving forward... Forcing himself to his feet Adrien wiped the sweat from his brow and followed the others down.

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

"Remind me to tell your father to fire the person in charge of the Eiffel Tower elevators..." Audrie panted. "This is... unacceptable... utterly unacceptable!"

"Of course, mom. Oh!" Chloe glanced down to see what she'd stumbled on.

Adrien looked up as he fanned himself with Marinette's hat.

And dropped it.

He stared open mouthed at the small, black, octagonal box in Chloe's hands. Heartbeat leaping into his throat.

What the hell is THAT doing here!?

"Ooh! What's this?" Chloe turned the box around in her hands but didn't open it.

Adrien suddenly forgot his exhaustion and rushed to her side. The lie coming easily to his lips. "Oh, I recognize that! They sell them at antique shops."

"Ew, it's old! Get it away from me!" Chloe practically hurled it at Adrien.

Catching it easily. A thrill ran up Adrien's arms and down his spine as the box made contact with his skin. The hairs at the back of his neck standing on end.

Chloe dusted her hands and kept walking. Glancing nervously at her mother. Hoping Audrey hadn't seen her with something so outdated.

I hate you! I hate you! I hate you! The voice in his head said.

Shut up, Adrien told it as he stared at the unknown Miraculous in his hand. Heartbeat hammering in his chest. But it wasn't from fear. No, it was... anticipation.

The corners of Adrien's lips curled upwards.

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

Notes: Oh, would you look at that. I'm back! It only took... eight months!

[theartoflovingthomashunt]

An Afternoon Detour

[All Thomas Hunt x Alex Spencer Masterlists] [Red Carpet Diaries]

Characters: Alex Spencer x Thomas Hunt Book: Red Carpet Diaries Book 3 Word Count: ~1,000 Rating: General Prompts: ​@choicesaugustchallenge : road trip

Synopsis: Thomas and Alex take an afternoon detour to Solvang (California) on their road trip.

This takes place during RCD3 when Thomas struggling creatively and Alex suggest they take a short road trip. This is the third part of their journey but each is a standalone story: [Part One] [Part Two]

A/N: This has been in WIP for like 8 months. I was super inspired to write this side trip at the time, but haven't had the motivation since to complete it. Rather than leave it in WIP any longer, I decided to wrap up the snippets/scenes I had started and then, make a collage of their time in the Dutch town to show what they did/saw based on my original notes to represent the parts I didn't end up writing.

"Is this your surprise?” He looked around skeptically at the quaint Dutch town.

“Nope.” She slipped out of the car and walked toward the path.

Thomas quickly followed, taking her hand once it was offered to him. “What are we doing here then?”

“Walking.” She smiled, leaning further into his arm.

“Why?

"Walking is good for you.” She did her best to keep a straight face as she continued. “Remember what our dear friend Tucker Paisley said, walking ‘gets the blood flowing, grows your brain potential by, like... three times.”

“If I recall, Mr. Paisley was not fond of walking, preferring instead to let technology do it for him,” Thomas corrected, the corner of his lip twitching upward at the memory.

Alex shrugged and leaned closer to him. “Just because he didn’t practice this philosophy himself doesn’t mean he was wrong. Indulge me.”

The bright, cheerful flowers radiated under the mid-day sun, while the bold-colored buildings transported them into another world. Four wooden windmills stood watch over the many guests strolling the streets of the town out of time. The warm, pleasant aroma of fresh-baked bread, sugary sweets, and tantalizing treats wafted out of one of the town’s five bustling bakeries.

“Mmm,” she hummed, closing her eyes. “We must get some aebleskivers before we leave.”

His brow arched at her familiarity.

“I might have read some reviews when I picked this as a stop on our road trip tour." She pulled him forward. "Come on.”

🌷🌷🌷🌷

“You have a little—” Thomas touched his finger to the place on his face that mirrored where Alex had some jam on hers from the aebleskivers.

“Here?” She carefully moved her tongue along her lip in the opposite direction, a playful smirk claiming her mouth. “Maybe over here?”

“Allow me.” He lifted his napkin, but she pulled away.

“Nuh-uh.” She chewed her lip, leaning into him.

He exhaled noisily, sighing in defeat. He placed a kiss on the corner of her mouth, opening just enough to take in the drop of jelly.

Alex turned into him, capturing his lips softly in a chaste kiss.

🌷🌷🌷🌷

"What are we really doing here?" The question had been on his mind since their arrival. He knew they were doing more than walking.

"What do you mean? We're just having fun." Alex shrugged innocently, guiding him ahead toward the bronze Little Mermaid statue above the glistening reflecting pool.

While picturesque, the town was not one he would have anticipated being of interest to Alex. "And yet, I feel as though you have an ulterior motive."

"Who, me?" Her mouth fell open as she feigned disbelief.

His eyes narrowed at her, not letting the question go.

She sat on the ledge surrounding the serene fountain, patting the stone beside her. As he accepted her request, she took his hand, allowing her thumb to caress his skin. "I know you're struggling and more than you let on. I know this hasn't been easy for you, even when you try to hide the depth of your frustration. You're so talented—the most brilliant man I know. You need to get out of your head. This trip is about finding inspiration in both the familiar and unfamiliar."

His gaze fell to the cobblestone street at his feet, his fists clenching slightly. His lips pressed together, and his shoulders slumped forward. He felt like a failure and a fraud, completely unworthy of her. She had everything ahead of her, and his achievements seemed to be behind him. "You shouldn't have had to take time away from The Secret of Ninradell for me. Nurturing your own career is important."

"I didn't have to, I wanted to. And my career is important, but nothing is more important than you—than us." She leaned into him, resting her head on his shoulder. "We're a team. We help each other. For better or for worse, in good times and bad; there is nothing we can't overcome as long as we're together."

"Would you still wish to marry me if I wasn't everything that I was, all that I think myself to be?" He posed, unable to meet her gaze.

"Yes, of course," she replied immediately, without a moment's hesitation. "Thomas, I love you. Nothing will change that."

"How can you be certain?" He turned back into her, his eyes searching for answers.

"Would you still want to marry me if when we return Ninradell was ruined and my career was damaged as a result? If a gossip rag destroyed me tomorrow, would you still want me?"

"Yes." He nodded his agreement. "I will always want to marry you."

"That's how I know." She cradled his face. "What we have is stronger than anything else. I believe you will get through this, as I believe in us."

His head shook. "Your optimism never ceases to amaze me."

She smiled, wagging her brow at him. "I am quite amazing."

His lips turned up, "that you are."

Her cheeks warmed under his adoring gaze.

"I love you, Alex. No matter what the future holds, the one thing that will never change is how I feel about you."

"And I, you." She curled into him, letting the soft trickle of the fountain behind them create a serene soundtrack.

"Try something for me. Close your eyes for a minute. Listen to the melody of the water falling from the fountain and the rhythm of the horses' shoes against the cobblestone, the murmur of visitors like us making memories to treasure. Breathe in the fragrance of the tulips in the gardens. Let the light breeze dance across your face, tickling your skin and bringing with it the aroma of the delicious foods escaping the restaurants and bakeries." Alex spoke softly and slowly, allowing him time to process and attempt to draw inspiration from the small details around them. "The Little Mermaid story is about redemption. The statue behind us is filled with melancholy. She looks lonely, looking out into the distance, searching. I've seen that look on you. I know you're searching for what's next, for what's in store for you. You'll find what's right for you when you're ready. And nothing will stop you. You can't beat yourself up anymore. Unlike this statue, you're not alone, and you'll never be."

Thank you for reading and indulging me int his story even though it isn't finished and the parts here aren't as "polished" as I would like.

Tags in a reblog, please let me know if you'd like to be added or removed 💖

[andieperrie18]

Night at the Opera (R.Taylor x Opera singer reader) (prt.1)

PROMPT: Freddie's has twin who is an opera singer. And she meets her brother's band on her surprise arrival.

Freddie has a sister, a twin to be exact that they have been supportive of each other since they were kids. Y/n Bulsara loved her brother dearly and Freddie in vice versa. They are the first fan of each other when they achieve their dreams.

Freddie and Y/n both have the same dream and that is to sing and they are total fan of operas when their family first took to one in London. The male loved the idea of singing one day in a stage but he didn't want to be stuck in one genre but for Y/n she wanted the spotlight, singing a note higher that her own voice, the orchestra singing to her very voice and the crowd astounded by her voice that will send them to the heavens.

"All the shines of the thousand spotlights~

All the stars we steal from the night sky will---"

A knock from her room door woke her from her focus as she founds Freddie walking to the side of her bed, plopping to her left as he places an arm around her.

"Hows your lyrics coming up?"

"It's coming up pretty well, for me I guess." Her voiced slowly dropped to a whisper at the end.

"Come on now darling sister, you can't be thinking negatively at the moment. Mum, Dad and I we'll be there at your audition, if it makes you feel better, I'll be the first to applaud you." The male encouraged as she stared at him, her heart clenching from the huge amount of emotions the gesture is generating within her.

"You really think I could do this?" She tries to reassure.

Another wide smile glowed upon her brother's face before he placed a loving kiss on her forehead.

"Y/n buttercup, you will be the English Nightingale of London."

And the title was now forever etched to her heart. Y/n got her big break when she sang her first piece she had written for her brother in her first live audition opera where contestants like her will already have the biggest audience in the industry of music. And with her song, she sang to the world how her brother always been the best and the most hardworking person in the world despite his dislike to his own race. She sang, and sang that even her parents didn't even know that she could reach. She sung and sung her heart out that every lyrics hits Freddie to tears that had him screaming "WE LOVE YOU BUTTERCUP!! SO PROUD OF YOU" after the performance. And he kept his promise to be the first one to applaud followed by her parents then the whole audience, asking for an encore along the way. Although the whole performance is pure acappella with a few brilliant insertions of the conductor, she succeeds. Y/n landed a lot of projects and signing the week after. At first she didn't like it as she would be driven away from her home, her family's comfort but with another pep talk from her twin and her supported parents and other siblings, she went on her career.

As the year pass, the girl with a big drea, grew up to be a woman of vision. Every year the bigger her crowd grew, either the twice or thrice than her first one. Along her maturity, her creativity grew as well. Creating song after song that never fails to hit the very hearts of her audience. Her secret, she writes about her family.

"Y/n dearie, beta would be very happy to see you come home early! Oh he also said that he will bring friends as well!!" Your mother chirped through the phone as you could only smie in delight, you have been on tour from all around Europe for five years.

Y/n M/n Bulsara became Y/n Night, the English Nightingale of London.

Though Y/n told your handler that she'd rather prefer her real name, she just went along but always introduce herself in her real in parties. Her open mindedness and quick maturity from a girl to a woman didn't allow any bad critiques, comments and backstab to stain her good nature.

She always remember her father's word as it kept her standing on the top till the day.

"Good Words. Good Thoughts. Good Deeds." She would mumble to herself at all time when she comes to a party or before she comes to the stage to do her thing.

"I miss him so much mom, I miss you, dad and Kash. I can finally see your faces again." Y/n whimpers, as she thought of the long years of longing for the people she loved. How alone she felt.

"We all do buttercup. We all do and now your coming home! And I am so thankful Mr. Groban for allowing you to rest for a year!"

The call ended with her father switching with her mother, him crying through the call of how much he missed his darling buttercup. Y/n cried in so much joy that night, that she was getting antsy to leave her hotel room and hop in to her flight to London.

Now, she actually has one last show before her break begins and that is in London which was a perfect moment to have her family watch how much she has grown as an operatic singer. Cyrus Groban her handler and the conductor who had discovered her had always been kind and the old man would gladly and humble accept any request from her as he already saw her as his own child.

Roger Taylor sat beside Kashmira in the dining table with an attempt of flirting here. The table littered with conversations, Mary's father eyeing Freddie across him ever since he witness his mouth say quite informal words toward her daughter. It went for quite awhile until Freddie's mother began about their origin, about Freddie being born in Zanzibar. She began to distributing the photo album that contain all memoirs of the Bulsaras. Freddie left the table as he isn't really talking about his origin. Roger could tell that as he watched the said man from across the room trying to drown the conversation as he sings.

"Mrs. Bulsara, I was wondering but I kept seeing this girl with Freddie every once in a while in each pictures? Who is she?" Mary said, attempting to fix the rather awkward situation even the male across them had immediately smiled at the topic that was about unfold. To her luck, the mood did lift when Freddie's young sister Kash spoke in a rather lively tone.

"OH-oh! That's Y/n!! Our eldest sister and his twin. They were really inseparable back when we were kids!!"

Roger finally had a turn to photo album, he did notice the constant appearance of the girl y/n in each picture that has Freddie on it. The two would either had an arm on each other, or hugging. He found it quite adorable how the girl would have Freddie lock in her arms.

"She's hugger isn't she. You're looking rather choke up here mate." The drummer cracked earning a few laughs from the company.

"Y/n always had the best hugs." Kash muttered, looking rather sad at the end. Freddie walked behind her sister, placing hands on her shoulder for comfort as Kash held his hand in return from the gesture.

"I remember we would sing together while playing piano. She would always hit the highest note like it was nothing." Freddie told them while rubbing her sister's shoulder.

"She sings?" Brian smiled, his heart warmed with the way the siblings speak of their other sibling.

"In an Opera, she's really great. I am one day hoping I get to see her sing again on a stage."

Mary stared at her man as she marvel's the sparkle in his eyes as she he speaks of her twin sister like she was the best person in the world.

Roger, Deacy and Brian had never seen their lead vocalist be so compasionate about a person unless its Mary. The way he tells them about how he would bond with her sent smiles to their lips.

"Where is she?" Roger asked as he eyed a photo of Y/n where she is standing on a stage, singing with a smile.

"She's touring around Europe."

"WOW! She's a big time singer."

"You could say that." Kash answered. "She probably call us tonight.

Bomi and Jer left the table to get more photos, the table was drowning on and on about the child hood the Bulsara twins had.

" You all must really miss her." John muffled in his palm, staring at Freddie mainly. "We do."

Roger smiled at him as he was now rather intrigued with the existence of this second sibling.

"Ahh, I'd give anything to see buttercup again. I'd give her the biggest bear hug!!!"

**"Why don't you give it to me now then?" **

A female voice made everyone sitting by the table turn to its owner, except for Freddie who was stunned at the sudden familiar voice.

They eyed the female from the far entrance of the dining room. She had long (h/c) hair that cascaded down her shoulders with grace. Wearing a bohemian dress under white fur coat, her body perfectly shaped through the fabric and lastly a pair of beige open toe stilletos. Roger was eyeing her, not even bothering to blink at the moment. This person wasn't a girl like the ones in the photo anymore, this is a woman. Her chin up, as if she was some royalty.

Kash, was the first to react, removing herself from Roger's side and tackling the woman in a hug.

"Y/N!!!"

Freddie slowly spun to meet the gaze of his beloved sister. And ten strides across him stood his twin, his blurred like water as she stared at the beautiful woman across him.

"Hello Freddie." She smiled.

Waiting not a moment longer, the Parsini male strided towards his twin within seconds. His arms enveloping her waist and hers around her shoulders.

"You're home!! YOU'RE ACTUALLY HOME FOR MY BIRTHDAY!!"

Roger had his eyes on Y/n the whole time, barely even allowing himself to look anywhere. It seems that her arrival lifted the spirits of the people in that celebration, that it had completely tampered mood of their parents.

Mary, oh how the girl fell in love with her personality the moment she saw her speaking to her father, in complete sign language. She could see the sparkle in her father's eyes as he conversed with this woman and seeing the delight in her face made Freddie smile.

"When did you learn to sign language, Y/n? You seem a bit awfully good with it?" Brian opened as he had answered everyone's question in their minds.

"Oh I learned it when I was ten. I practically father to get me into classes as it always intrigued me on how people do it in the telly." Y/n answered, her voice flow like silk in the blonde males head from across her. Roger loved it, he can only imagine how his name would sound like in her voice.

"I have a reason to believe that one's a lie." Freddie pour a glass of water on Y/n's glass as she sent him a face.

"It's true!"

"Well yes darling, thats the second reason. But mum knew the real reason you did it. Don't you mother?"

Jer smiled at the question, her eyes lingering to her daughter.

"I went to her school one day to fetch her, I was waiting for her to come outside until her teacher came towards me and asked if I was her mother and if I could come with her."

Every ears and eyes around the room were trained on the mother.

"They led me to the school library where I found buttercup 'talking' to two kids about her age in the moving language. The teacher we quite curious to how she learned sign language just a few weeks after the foreign exchange students who had speaking disorder just came in. They told me that she's been attempting to talk to them since day one but because of their problem, they can't converse rather well."

Y/n smiled at the memory of her childhood as her father caressed her hand in pure delight. Kash rested beside her with her arm around her figure.

"You learned it for your friends? Wow, thats a very great thing to do." Deacy complimented earning a thankful nod from the female.

"Yeah, I did. Jean and Pedro have been my friends for quite awhile now and we still do. They finally got their disorder cured as they were to speak again after we graduated at uni. The two are working with me now."

"Your sister says you are an Opera singer. How's that career going for you?" Roger finally had the chance to speak, he almost jolted when she met his eyes, the way they glowed made his do aswell.

"Yes, yes I do. Oh! Which reminds me about my last tour. I would like to invite all off you to my last Opera performance for the year."

Freddie's face curled with the term last. Y/n saw this, she took his hand and smiled wider and brighter.

"Last, because I'll be on a year and half break." This returned him to his positive state but twice higher.

@mercurycrowley

[byneddiedingo]

Yuko Miyamura in Battle Royale (Kinji Fukasaku, 2000)

Cast: Tatsuya Fujiwara, Aki Maeda, Takeshi Kitano, Taro Yamamoto, Masanobu Ando, Kou Shibasaki, Chiaki Kuriyama, Takashi Tsukamoto, Sosuke Takaoka, Eri Ishikawa, Hitomi Hyuga, Yuko Miyamura. Screenplay: Kenta Fukasaku, based on a novel by Koushun Takami. Cinematography: Katsumi Yanagijima. Production design: Kyoko Heya. Film editing: Hirohide Abe.

In my brief and admittedly superficial exploration of Japanese cinema, I have often been struck by how postwar filmmakers take a rather harsh attitude toward the generation born after World War II. Even so hip a director as Nagisa Oshima paints a rather jaundiced picture of wayward teenagers in films like Cruel Story of Youth (1960), though suggesting that American influence at least helped push Japanese young people into delinquency. Masahiro Shinoda's Youth in Fury, made the same year as Oshima's film, focuses on the student riots against the Japanese-American mutual security treaty, suggesting that the political impotence of the young is to blame. An older filmmaker like Keisuke Kinshita, in The Young Rebels (1980), blamed the rebelliousness on parents, a familiar scapegoat. And then there's Kinji Fukasaku's Battle Royale, which subjects the problem of turbulent youth to what we might call a final solution: mutual extermination. In an era plagued by depression and unemployment, the government passes a population-control law: Each year, a middle school class is chosen and sent to a remote island where they are forced to fight to the death. If you're thinking this sounds a lot like The Hunger Games, have another drink. In fact, Suzanne Collins, the author of The Hunger Games trilogy, the first book of which appeared in 2008, has said that she never saw the film or read the 1999 novel by Koushun Takami on which it was based. Her claim is plausible: Battle Royale stirred up so much controversy in Japan over its violence that it wasn't released theatrically in the United States until 2011, partly because American distributors were scared off by memories of the 1999 Columbine High School massacre. Fukasaku's film is in fact like a bloodier, more barebones version of The Hunger Games movies (Gary Ross, 2012; Francis Lawrence, 2013, 2014, 2015). It's also funnier and scarier because it has been shorn of the Olympic Games-style spectacle of  the American movies. Instead, we get a "training video" in which a ditzy instructor (Yuko Miyamura), a parody of Japanese game show hosts, explains the rules: Each player gets a bag of supplies that includes a "weapon" -- ranging from a semiautomatic rifle to a paper fan -- and they are all fitted with monitoring collars that will explode if they try to remove them, as well as if the game ends on the third day with more than one survivor. The film, written by the director's son, Kenta Fukasaku, doesn't waste a lot of time on character development, except for two principal combatants, Shuya (Tatsuya Fujiwara) and Noriko (Aki Maeda), who fall in love along the way. There are also a trio of villains: Mitsuko (Kou Shibasaki), who relishes the thought of killing her classmates, and a ringer, a "transfer student" named Kazuo Kirayama (Masanobu Ando), who is really a psychopath brought in by the sadistic director of the game, the schoolteacher Kitano (Takeshi Kitano), to spice things up. There's another supposed transfer student, Shogo Kawada (Taro Yamamoto), who is actually a survivor of an earlier game, but he turns out to be a good guy, seeking revenge on Kitano for his girlfriend's death in that game. Aside from these characters, most of the players are nondescript, except for the computer geek, Shinji Mimura (Takashi Tsukamoto), who manages both to hack into the game's system and to construct a bomb he plans to use to take out the game headquarters. There is much vivid killing in the film, but it's paced so fast, and the characters are mostly so undefined that, except for the fact that these are kids killing kids, it's easy to get caught up in it all. It's not surprising that it's one of Quentin Tarantino's favorite movies.

[kindabraveandlittlestupid]

Its been almost two years and I am still a bit bewildered by the outcome of the 2016 election. Not the fact that Trump has taken over the Conservative Party (that was a long downhill trend that's existed for years) but rather the fact that so many Christian voters not only endorsed his candidacy but continue to support it despite all the evidence to show he is as far from the Christian Faith as he could possibly be.

I know some might want to disqualify me from this conversation most because I have stepped away from the Church. I was a Christian years ago and a part of me still carries that aspect of Jesus where Compassion, Love, and Sacrifice were the cornerstones of being a good person. I still very much apply that to my philosophy and lifestyle but the element of organized religion has left a sour taste in my mouth. Consistently seeing churches align themselves with nationalistic beliefs, avarice and populist anger worries me. There was in fact too many inconsistencies with the faith where we were told to love everyone without condition but more often than not the religious leaders would have their admonitions against women seeking health services, people practicing safe sex, the LGBTQ community and people of other faiths. So, in other words, it wasn't Christianity the faith that pushed me away and made me no longer believe, it was the Christians themselves who seemed to comfortably wade into these dark emotions and make it part of their politics.

So this article we will be exploring the Catholic concept of the Seven Deadly Sins and how they apply to Donald Trump (I am sure some of you are making some distinct connections already). I will talk about the concept of sin towards the end and how we are all subject to it (if you believe in sins, to begin with), the concept of forgiveness (which I spoke of before) and lastly a nod to the few churches in America that do believe in those values of Love, Compassion and Sacrifice and how they should be celebrated for being the outliers that still carry some semblance of decency.

“I like money. I’m very greedy. I’m a greedy person. I shouldn’t tell you that, I’m a greedy – I’ve always been greedy. I love money, right? “ - DT

I was undecided which of the sins he dwelled in the most, the truth is he seemed comfortable in all 7 but the 2 that seemed to define his character the most was Greed or Pride. I feel as though Trump could never happy without being remembered nor do I think he would care to be remembered without being rich. I suspect between the two it was Greed that started to push him down the darker path so we will focus on his wealth first.

The concept of Greed never really fit well into Christian beliefs, in fact, Jesus detested the wealthy believe those who kept wealth to themselves would find no easy entry to heaven. They coveted their possessions and tethered themselves to their riches and refused to give those up to be closer to god. Jesus himself says “Dear children, it is very hard to enter the Kingdom of God. In fact, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of God!”

Despite this message being so clear in the bible Donald Trump with his estimated worth of 400 million is still considered a godly man by the Christian community, in fact, he plays well the audience of the Prosperity Gospel who believes that wealthy men are endowed directly by God for their wealth. These are the same churches and preachers who ask their congregation to buy them multiple private jets and large personal properties to eventually receive their own personal wealth after giving to the ‘church’. What is disturbing the most is how many people seem to believe that this would be true despite Christ's literal words contradicting that message and how many devout followers fall into financial ruin while attempt to obtain this magical nirvana of wealth for Christians.

The fact is Trump has consistently put wealth before anything declaring bankruptcies multiple times and making financial withdraw from Russian banks to continue his ‘golden’ lifestyle he becomes accustomed too. This is the first and most prominent sin but don’t worry he makes strong cases for the others.

“Nobody’s ever been more successful than me.” - DT

Pride is nothing new for Donald Trump but it is most certainly his second (or perhaps first) deepest sin. The man literally brands his names to dozens of products and splashes it across his buildings in big gold letters. Some might claim this is brand recognition which are the same poor fools who associate Trumps name with success despite the evidence that most of his products fail (save golf courses) and once again the multiple bankruptcies that followed the man around.

I suppose we can give him some credit for managing to weather all the failures so well. I am sure people find that endearing quality and if he remained a businessman I might have been happy to let him dwell merrily in his field but stepping into the realm of politics when he fails in office we all suffer the consequences of his pride.

“Nobody is better on humility than me.” - DT

“If he says great things about me, I’m going to say great things about him.” - DT on Putin

Perhaps the third reason Trump entered the political realm is not that of Pride alone but also because of Envy as well. This trend started with a younger man who seemed to have come out of nowhere and not only caught the admiration of the nation but seemed to install a spirit of hope among the people, Barak Obama. Trump has since had a vendetta against the former President to try to remove any policy, regulation, or law that Obama put forward in his two terms. While Trump in the past seemed to have some liberal views any essence of progressive policies he might have moderately displayed in the 80′s and 90′s has been replaced with vitriol and hate for our first Black President and Liberals in general.

It shouldn't surprise anyone that he would hate Obama, Trump has been trying to get in the public good graces for years hanging out with celebrities, throwing parties, appearing in movies and making commercials but a lifetime of panhandling for Trump was achieved by Obama in just a few short years. Donny was the odd man out and he took his anger out on Obama leading the charge of the birther movement and sending ‘investigators’ to Hawaii to undermine the former Presidents credibility.  

I suppose the second element of Envy that we should talk about isn't how he was jealous in a negative way (Obama) but how he is jealous of dictators around the world who can simply do what they want. This is probably even more concerning than his Pride or Greed or other sins (save Wrath). He has turned coldly against long-standing allies and now openly praises China, North Korea, Russia, the Philipines, Turkey and Egypt where men have seized power and transcended the rule of law becoming literal Dictators. The admiration and envy the President has shown for these men and expressing how he wishes he could be President for life, thinking about suspending elections like them, attacking the Press and the Courts all scream budding fascist but still free American Christians remain loyal to his doctrine.

 “Knock the crap out of him, would you? I promise you, I will pay your legal fees.” - DT

The first thing that should be said is no one should ever be afraid of Donald Trump in a fight. Small hands and a sluggish body, a single strike to the chest would likely dislodge a piece of plaque in his heart causing him to die right there. We already saw him run from military service with ‘bone spurs’ and whenever he advocates violence is when no one can reach him and having someone else doing the fighting for him. So, in other words, the man is a huge coward.

On the other hand, Trump has influence, influence over his constituents and they are often willing to do as he asks. This is where cowardice hides best, letting other people fight his battles for him. Within his staff he lets other explain his mistakes for him. In regards to the police, he openly encouraged them to rough up suspects. In regards to the military, he is inclined to provide them with more and more funds as the state department remains depleted of diplomats. 

The fact is Trump does tap into wrath lashing out at anyone who does not fall into line with his doctrine. We have seen the high turnover rate of the White House of people who tried to influence him or advice him but his Pride won't allow it and so out the door, they go. This sin scares me the most because I think one day he might actually greenlight a real conflict with someone... calling soldiers to the borders to keep Central/South Americans out, attacking North Korea first (despite their budding romance) or attack someone else sending young men and women to die not because of National Security or some moral high ideal but because his pride was damaged and the armed forces to him is a tool to swing when he doesn't get respect.

“You know I’m automatically attracted to beautiful—I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything. Grab them by the pussy." - DT

Probably the most well-accounted issue with Donald Trump is blatant disregard for women. While Greed and Pride are the primary motivators that drive him, this is where he often reaps his rewards with a fair amount of collateral damage for his Lust. He has referred to females as pieces of ass, suggested women manipulative, said he would eventually marry a 12-year-old girl and would walk into changing rooms at beauty pageants because no one could stop him.

This is the same man who left two wives before moving onto his third and cheating on her too. He also joked about how he would love to date his daughter only we all know really he isn't joking, he would totally fuck Ivanka if he could get away with it. The fact is he is in a position where he can deny any wrongdoing and can use his ample wealth to pay them (the women) off or bury cases in the courtroom. There is no justice to stop him from molesting or assaulting women where ever he goes and to be frank I would not be surprised if he does it in the oval office with some poor intern.

“Can you believe that, with all of the problems and difficulties facing the U.S., President Obama spent the day playing golf. Worse than Carter.” - DT

Trump has hit a unique milestone having spent 22% of his time in office at his golf courses and single-handedly beat the number of times Obama was on the course in 8 years (36 times), just in 2 years with over 60 trips to the green. This is a low hanging fruit though as we all seen the pictures of the President's giant white ass golfing while we pay his expenses with our collective taxes. 

The real Sloth kicks in at the Whitehouse with his work day. He spends the early morning (9 AM to 11AM) with what he calls Executive Time where watches TV, Eats, Tweets, and Shits before he reaches his first intelligence briefing which he heard hardly holds his attention unless there are pictures, bullet points and his name inserted into the briefings. Just about 12pm he has an hour-long lunch (usually McDonald's) and proceeds into another hour and half of executive time IE Tweeting, TV, Shitting and probably eating some more. Before doing some light work and then retiring to his room and watching more Fox News where he live tweets policies as he watches the shows. 

Now, this is an account of his average day at the White House when he ISNT at his golf course and doesn't have some truck parked by the White House for him to sit in and act like he is driving. This is the 6th major sin and somehow Christians are not running for the hills and seeking better conservative candidates to support their values.

“I think the food is good. I think all of those places, Burger King, McDonald’s, I can live with it” - DT

We end off on Gluttony, I leave this one at the bottom because of the 7 sins its the only one that really doesn't affect us, it just his slow self-destruction from the inside of his gut (or heart) out. I imagine of all the things he has done this one simply makes him look the most relatable, he eats like most Americans do. Hell, even I make a late night stop at Jack in the Box or McDonald's even though I shouldn't. I guess what is most unsettling is how often he seems to be consuming McDonald's and the other fast food chains. On the road he ate KFC, Mickey D's, Pizza and Diet Coke ALL THE TIME, I don't think I can humanly do that. I don't think any of us can possibly do that without saying “Maybe today a Jamba Juice or Salad or just fucking water” but not Donald Trump.

So let's give him the benefit of the doubt and say the campaign trail is a hard place to make a proper meal but it didn't stop at the end of the election. He has a special button now for a coke being delivered to the Oval Office, he now has a cheeseburger before bedtime, he regularly orders chocolate cake from the White Houses kitchen and of course his Envy/Greed/Pride kicks in and whenever he has guests he has three scoops of ice cream while they are served one. I am not even sure why that pisses me off so much but it just shows how much of a douchebag he is that he makes sure he has more than everyone else in the fucking room.

“He knew what he signed up for.” - DT on LaDavid T. Johnson  

So Trump seems to embody literally all the sins in one human being, another achievement for the current President to put on his gravestone. “Sin. No one was better than me at doing them all.” I suspect if I was saying this to Trump supporter they would say something along the lines “We are all sinners, we all give into one of these at one time or another.” Which I would say yes, absolutely which is why we believe in the concept of forgiveness but forgiveness is a two-part exercise, on one hand, we need to be open and willing to forgive people as good human beings, while on the other side a person needs to seek forgiveness and express remorse for those sins. This is where Donald Trump fails and so do his Christian supporters who suggest we should forgive him for his past/current/future transgressions but I don’t think we should. No, not without remorse, reflection, and change coming from him for indulging in those sins. Trump is happy living in sin, he exercises them all daily with his lifestyle and these religious organizations seem to overlook this major character flaws in his morality for short-term political goals. This is where the moral fabric is tearing in society the most, where good people lend themselves to a man who sees’s them as a stepping stone for his own glory and they worship him for it.

I would feel remiss if I didn’t mention that no all churches follow Trump. There are a fair amount of churches that do not see him as someone noble or ethical and choose not to follow him. These churches, however, are the minority and outliers in the Christian Community and we should ask them to be the voices of descent to cripple the choke hold Trump has not only on the GOP but the religion of Christ itself. They should be denouncing him daily for his actions and if you know a church that doesn't support Trump then support them to raise their voice and make them sound like thunder so that those who have sold their souls or lost their way know they have fallen. Lord knows I am sounding preachy here at the end but I wanted to make it clear that there are good churches still and we should not bully them into acting because they have been meek in their response but rather support them and uplifting them higher than the mega-churches that have sold their souls to the Doctrine of Trump.

With Regards, Michael California