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ha-hatdog · 4 years ago

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all in a day's work / daisuke kambe

somebod requested a badass reader? sorry for this very late update. online classes is kicking my butt. you wanted either a scenario or a headcanon so i decided to make both. long scenario/headcanom mashup ahead.

requsted by anon: Hii!! I just want to say first of all, that I just discovered your blog and I just fell in love with it, keep going you’re amazing❤️❤️ soo can I ask for a Headcanon or scenario (it’s up to you) where Haru has a female friend who works in modern crimes prevention and is really badass (like she knows how to fight and all that stuff), so one day she helps Daisuke and Haru in a investigation in which a fight starts and Daisuke gets impressed by her abilities and develops a crush on her (????)

UNEDITED

It was another mundane morning for the the Modern Crimes department. The room was oddly colder, and the civil servants occupying the compact and simple space secluded themselves with their own businesses. Mahoro Saeki sat on the couch partaking in an unhealthy snack she had shipped from a foreign country, Kamei Shinnosuke was browsing through the internet and more than once using to his advantage the global connection that comes with his access to the computer in order to satisfy his habits and indecent hobbies, Yumoto Teppei tuning in to the occuring horse race in an international channel in his device, Nakamoto Chosuke merrily bading his time reading through documents of recent illegal activities assigned to his care, Kiyomizu Yukihiro fiddling with yet another craft he made out of wood and glue, Kato Haru awaiting the telephone to sound off and have another indiviual summon him for a petty crime, and Kambe Daisuke seated far from the othere, legs crossed and chin resting on his knuckles as he appraised the tranquil area.

Haru slammed his hands on his desk and threw his head, moaning in disdain. "Why isn't the phone ringing?" Whined he as his posture was regained after a moment or so. His eyes, lit with pure frustration and impatience, glared at the telephone, as though threatening without verbalizing his objective would somehow make it ring. "Come on, ring, you stupid phone. How come you always ring whenever I don't want you to and don't when I do?"

"It's a slow day." Remarked Kamei, not takint his eyes off his computer as he regarded his colleague. "Try to enjoy it. You can have all your action some other day."

Haru leaned against his chair, back sliding against the backrest and the back of his neck hitting the edge of his leverage. "Not everyone has weird hobby to keep themselves entertained." Countered Haru, and a pout formed on the blond male's lips at the comment. "This job is what keeps me from going insane."

The offended male turned his swivel chair to face Haru, face scrunched with the same attribute he exuded, "Oi, don't say it like that. It's bad if you describe it like that."

"It's weird without even having to add the adjective." Saeki chimed in between her chewing, humming as the flavor of the chip formerly cinched in the possession of her fingers travelled to her taste buds.

Kamei whipped around to her position, shoulders tensr with the taste of truth and reality, both of which ignored in favor of living in bliss. "It's nor weird. It's perfectly normal for men to be looking at those . . . sort of inappropriate . . . videos." His words trailed off as he came to realization that his own defense betrayed him.

"I agree, but not at work." Haru simply retorted. "Would you want to see me cooking a whole feast inside the precint?"

Kamei looked up in ponder, mouth curling as his thought process stuttered before he presented his inquiry, "Do we get to taste the food you made though?"

Haru stared at the blond man with an impervious mask decorating his appearance, unimpressed with how the man broached the metaphorical event served to him. "Never mind." Shaking his head with amicable dismay, Haru turned his seat to a half circle, arms taking space upon the the armrests. His line of sight crossed over the facile yet minimalistic design of their room, the dull colors of the walls an addition to his disinterest until it landed on a brooding and well vested man.

The referred individual had boredom etched all over his striking features, the lack of events occuring in the Modern Crimes he could invest his time in had him in a bad mood although showcasing it to his colleagues was not his cup of tea. He and Haru were different, and how they handle themselves in this patience consuming day was one of them.

"I'm surprised you're still here." Haru conveyed with a vestige of astonishment. Truly the older man had no such ability that could understand the complexity of his wealthy counteepart. Most days, whenever days were a little too slow for his liking, he would up and retreat back to his home (mansion seems more of an appropriate term to refer to his household) but lately, he had been spending more time in the precinct, and Haru did not know how he should react to this development, or devolvement. His comment floated in the density formulating inside the office, and everybody present swiveled their heads to await his response. "I thought you'd be back in your house now. No cases today, it seems. No games to entertain yourself with today."

"Tell me something I have yet to know, Inspector Kato." Retorted Daisuke, and a tick mark grew on Haru's forehead, but his displeasure to his rude counter was ignored as Daisuke brought his fingers to his ear. He spoke, enough for others to hear his statements. "HEUSC, locate the nearest and most recent crimes occuring within the area."

Haru rose from his seat, alarmed. "Oi, what do you think you're doing?"

Daisuke did not respond to Haru and awaited his butler's relay of information. It did not take more than a few seconds until it has accumulated enough information to submit to his master. "A few streets away, a murder of two took place in a bar called Denyr. Investigation is in process currently."

Daisuke removed his hand from his earpiece and looked towards a flabbergasted. "You heard HEUSC. Let's get going." Daisuke stood up from the couch, dusting himself off before making his way towards the door.

"Wait a minute," Clamored Haru, and Daisuke looked over his shoulder to gaze at him. Haru gritted his teeth, irritated. "You can't just up and go and do whatever you want! This is not your call! We weren't called so we'll just disturb everyone else who's already there."

"Aren't cops allowed to interfere in crimes or disturbance in peace whenever they want? It's their job." Said Daisuke. "And besides, you're just as eager as I am to do something other than waste the entire day waiting for the phone to ring." Then he frowned. "Unless, I'm mistaken, of course. I have no qualms leaving you here. I'm sure you'll be useful for warming up your chair for tomorrow."

Haru growled at him. "You stupid . . . " He grunted and took his jacket off his chair. "Fine! I'll go with you, just to keep you in check!"

“Wait a minute,” Exclaimed Saeki, causing Haru and Daisuke to turn just as the latter had began turning the doorknob. The pink haired female abandoned her seat in favor of giving them a standing and patronizing narrowed glower. “Haru, aren’t you forgetting something today?”

Haru looked up in thought, trying to recall what Saeki was implying. Nothing significant manifested in his line of thought and he turned to his colleague with a frown conjuring in his mien. “Uh, I don’t think I’m forgetting anything.” Answered Haru.

Daisuke grunted, displeased by the interrupting. “Then let’s get going.”

Daisuke pushed the door open and stepped outside. Haru was following suit, shrugging his jacket on when Saeki called out for them once more, particularly the older officer. She had her arms crossed, an unamused pout forming on her brims. “Haru, don’t be stupid!” Clamored she. “I can’t believe you forgot what today is!”

Haru let out an exasperated sigh. “I honestly can’t remember what makes today so important.” Said he. “What is it?”

Kamei rolled his swivel chair back, making sure to reveal himself from any obstructions blocking his form. “Eh? You of all people forgot (Your Name) is coming back?” He conveyed and whistled right after. “That’s surprising, and disappointing. I’m sure she won’t be thrilled knowing you’ll be the last one welcoming her back after her hospitalization – her best friend, her partner in crime.”

Haru’s face fell upon acquiring the information relayed to him. His mind refreshed, finally remembering the time when you took your time from resting in the hospital just to tell him you were soon to be discharged after the outcome of you recklessly electing to throw yourself in front of him when the perpetrator pulled the trigger and shot a bullet his way. You were fortunate enough to have the cylindrical metal projectile imbedded nowhere near any of your vital veins, but due to your blood loss as well as the stacking strain and stress in your body forced you to be admitted in the care of the hospital. Haru was sure you were not supposed to move when you selected to take your phone and call him because he can hear the nurse in the other line scolding you, telling you to end the connection and to rest easy for the remaining week. He could only miss you more – he knew how much you hated doing anything but police work. Haru couldn’t believe he forgot about that since he distinctly remember hardly being able to be consumed by sleep when excitement for your return filled him.

“Shit, it’s today.” Cursed Haru as his shoulders dropped. He slapped his palm against his forehead, groaning. “My God – how can I forget? I’m the worst partner ever.”

Daisuke glanced at Haru, bemused. This was the first time he had heard over this (Your Name) woman. To him, Haru was always a lone wolf who preferred to be alone in his work unless he was required to have a companion with him. Or maybe because it was loyalty to his said partner kept him from going to missions with another. Daisuke looked back at Saeki and Kamei, “Who’s (Your Name)?”

Haru wanted nothing more than to hide your existence from Daisuke. You already had so much in your plate and having a rich bastard interpolating with it was more than you can handle, especially after being hospitalized for quite a while. But it was inevitable for the two of you to meet seeing as Daisuke seemed to be taking a strong liking with playing cop and were in the same department as him. So resigning with the concept of keeping you away from Daisuke, Haru let out a deep sigh. “(Your Name) is another cop in our department. She’s my partner.”

Daisuke blinked at him. “Someone can actually put up with you?”

Haru angrily show his fist to Daisuke, irritation swathing his figure. “What was that? I should be the one saying something that! I don’t know how Suzue-san can put up with your rich ass!”

“Maybe if you’re rich, you’ll know.” Countered Daisuke.

Before Haru could grab hold of Daisuke’s collar, the latter efficiently evaded his attempt to do so and stalked off into the corridor, adjusting his pristine suit as he ventured away. “If you want to stay here and wait for your partner, fine by me. I can go alone and handle the murders all by myself.” He said without looking back to meet Haru’s hardened gaze. “I’m sure this (Your Name) person is more important than the safety of other Japanese citizens.”

“O-Oi, I haven’t even decided yet! Don’t assume I’m not going!” As much as Haru wanted to be the first person to greet you back to work, he too loved justice and cared about the people who wanted to live in peace. Clicking his tongue out of annoyance, he turned to everyone left in the room, and all of them returned his gaze with bemused expressions. “Kambe and I will be quick. We’ll just drop by the crime scene and then cime back. I’m sure I’ll be able to return here before (Your Name) can. If not, tell her I’ll be back soon.”

***

daisuke was never inclined to pursue a romantic relationship. ever since witnessing his mother died, his life had been reserved into finding the truth. but little did he know, his perspective in love and romance will change, and hary will most certainly freak the fuck out

the two police officers arrived in the crime scene in a short amount of time. with how daisuke was speeding, it was understandable they would get there fast and very understandable how haru's whole life flashed right before his eyes. daisuke was actually tempted to go even faster but opposed to it after a while as he did not want to deal more with haru's tantrum after he recovered.

of course when they arrived there, the detectives assigned to the case shooed them off because they're not part of the investigations.

daisuke knew how to deal with them, of course. he brandished stacks of yen to include them in the case and the detectives were like 👀 because you know, who doesn't want extra cash?

haru didn't bother complaning anymore and just went to work. he wanted to get back to the station as soon as possible and welcome you first. best friend efforts, get a best friend like haru.

haru: "i scout the ground floor, you go upstairs - AND NO SPENDING MONEY YOU RICH BASTARD"

daisuke:

haru:

daisuke:

haru:

daisuke:

haru:

haru: "and - "

daisuke left before haru could finish his sentence. really daisuke just stayed and didn't answer him just so he could piss haru off. it worked nonetheless and daisuke can hear haru cursing at him as he walked upstairs

but we all know whatever daisuke does pisses haru off so so it didn't matter.

daisuke went up to the second floor if the bar and he saw how thrashed the place was

overturned tables, fallen chairs, broken bottles, reeks of alcohol, smears and pools of blood but everything seemed pleasant to look at compared to the two corpses that laid out on the floor with police tapes around them. it looked like a small massacre occured in there, and thay surely was the case

head smashed, chunks of flesh scattered, broken skulls but daisuke merely stared at them blankly

he wasn't disgusted nor disturbed. seeing his own mother's corpse was enough for him to deem gore as just another normal addition to his life

like another detective, daisuke began looking for clues. he searched the entire place like the good and professional detective he is -

who am i kidding - the first thing he did once he sees the condition of the second floor was, or course, ask HEUSC for information. screw asking them from fellow detectives when daisuke has his own ai butler

ahh perks of being a kambe

daisuke: "heusc, tell me the exact number of people that attended this bar between nine am to twelve in the afternoon"

heusc: "understood"

it did not take long until heusc responded

heusc: "the exact number of people who attended genyr is twenty seven. twelve in the ground floor, twelve in the ground floor, fifteen in the second. there are two dead bodies found in the second floor - "

daisuke snapped his head to the ceiling as soon as he heard a soft creak emit from over him

daisuke stared at the ceiling for about a moment before askint heusc - "look at the footage from the surveillance cameras surrounding the the bar. how many people fled outside?"

daisuke heard another creek above him, and this time he was sure he wasn't alone

and his unknown companion would love to have him in the same state as the corpses

and heusc replied: "twenty four"

daisuke closed his eyes, "is that so?"

heusc: "one person remains inside the building"

daisuke dropped his communication with his ai and positioned himself to a clean posture, back straight and hands tucked inside his pockets

daisuke: "you can come out now. no use hiding. i know you're here"

no response

daisuke clicked his tongue, "i heard you moving around in the ceiling the entire time i'm here and it's only been two minutes. you're not as discreet as you think you are. reveal yourself now and i'd consider lessening your time in jail."

still, silence greeted him

daisuke was growing irritated by the lack of answer given to him.

daisuke: "a coworker of mine needs to be back at the station right now for a reunion with his girlfriend - " daisuke paused as he imagined haru having a girlfriend. " - so let's keep this short and simple. surrender and as i have promised earlier, i will try to get you lesser years in prison"

but daisuke was not intending to keep this promise. even he knows giving a generous offer to criminals would weaken their resolve

but again, there was no answer

but he expected this

he always does to every case he gets handed with, or forced his hands to

daisuke observed the ceiling through a blank lense before sighing "if this is how you want things to go down, then so be it"

daisuke touched his earring and deliberately increased the volume of his voice as he spoke to heusc - "heusc, purchase the bar and its neighboring buildings and set a bomb for twenty minutes. tell the others to get out of here as soon as possible" he sneered at the ceiling. "i don't mind dying inside this bar with the suspect. it's the norm for a police officer to risk theit lives in the name of justice"

he sounded like haru for a moment there

heusc responded immediately: "understood, sir. balance: unlimited"

it was after that statement did a response come to light

the ceiling above daisuke broke as a firm kick broke through the fragile material

daisuke jumped away before a slim figure of a man dropped down from the hole

before daisuke could move, the man dashed pass him and out of the room, his oustretchrd hand barely grazing the bloodied clothes he wore

daisuke didn't waste time and recovered from his stunned state before following after the perpetrator

daisuke kept losing track of the man from time to the time and when he got down to the grounr floor, he saw no sign of him

nobody was present inside the bar anymore per order of heusc and money

all except for haru of course who immediately ran out of the place he was scouring and back to the main room

daisuke knew he heard heusc's order to leave the building but

haru will always be haru

haru, upon seeing daisuke's solemn state, asked: "what happened"

daisuke: "the man - did you see him?"

*haru, confused noises*: "what man? who?"

daisuke: "the man who killed the peple upstairs - he was still here and he ran down, didn't you hear him?"

haru: "no, i didn't - " his sentence was cut off when a figure suddenly lunged at him

lo and behold the criminal who was hiding behind an overturned couch

haru and the man tumbled down to the ground, fists and feet swinging wildly. daisuke watched as haru struggled to acquire dominance over the situation

daisuke: "heusc, identity of the killer"

heusc: "sakatoshi matona, a former bouncer for genyr until he was let go without reason"

haru strung out profanities and grunts as he and the matona rolled on the floor, trying to pin the other down. with a boost of strength, matona managed to get the upper hand and he put all his weight on haru. his hands found haru's neck and began strangling him

daisuke was like aren't you cop? win you idiot in the inside and haru was like aren't you a cop? help me you bastard in the inside. just the norm for the reckless and seemingly suicidal cops

haru: "gwet hiff op opp mii"

heusc: "transalation: get him off of me"

daisuke took action after that. he pulled matona off of haru and immediately socked him on the face

matona stumbled back but daisuke underestimated the time he would tske to recover and he tumbled back as the criminal retaliated with a punch of his own

daisuke dodged the assault but in the process, temporarily losing his posture. matona took this as an opportunity to continue his line of attacks, landing a few good hits on daisuke but majority of the time, he failed

daisuke recovered from the initial shock matona has inflicted him with and returned to momentum ane he was preparing his attack when bam - haru kato

my day be so fine then boom - haru kato

daisuke's eyes widened when haru, after standing up, tried to lock matona's arms to prevent him from moving anymore but instead, his chest met with an elbow

air was taken away from him and haru staggered backwards, clutching his chest and matona seized him

daisuke cursed and shot forward to help him but stopped when matona took haru's gun away from him and pointed it towards haru

matona: "stand back or i'll shoot"

haru raised his hands in surrender but daisuke did not

and haru was: ?????!!!!! tryna get me killed????!!!!

daisuke: "i can keep my promise, you know"

matona pointed the gun at daisuke

matona: "how can you when you're just a lowly cop?"

daisuke took out his cigar and lit up

daisuke: "yes, because a lowly cop can just buy buildings with a single command from an ai"

matona growled "rich, snobby, uncaring, and a liar. you're just the same like the people i killed"

daisuke opened his mouth to reply when a feminine voice cuts in

"finally, a confession. now we can get this over with"

before anyone could react appropriately, matona felt a hand take hold of his stolen gun and tore it away from his grasp before a heel sunk into his stomach, causing him to spit out blood

daisuke saw her, a woman standing with such grace, confidence, and strength with a gun in her hand and a smirk on her brims

daisuke couldn't move not from shock, but with admiration

who was this woman?

and what was this thudding in his chest

doki doki

his face was hot, very hot

and so was the woman

"( YOUR NAME )???"

daisuke turned and saw haru gawking at you

haru: (@[]@!!)

daisuke: （－－）

also daisuke: is that really (your name)? haru's partner? haru's girlfriend?

daisuke: hmp hmp（｀ー´）

you turned to both of them and daisuke was blown away with you that he nearly fell

he thinks you're very pretty

V E R Y

doki doki

you smiled widely at them: "haru, it's so nice to see you again" and then you turned to daisuke

daisuke froze and his cigar dropped

you glanced back at haru: "you already replaced me?"

haru: "tf no! rich boy here wanted to plays cops for a while so he went to our department. you know me, i could never replace you"

daisuke glared at haru

it waa obvious he was trying hard not to upset you (though you didn't look like the type who would get easily offended)

plus he's pushing a single and narrow minded narrative about him towards you. what if you hate him?

but you didn't and merely smiled at him, ignoring the criminal trembling from the pain of your kick

you: "my name is (your name)"

daisuke.exe has stopped working

jk that won't happen to daisuke

for now at least

daisuke: "kambe daisuke"

you, smiling: "nice to meet you, kambe daisuke!"

haru: "how did you find us here?"

you: "was gon get a drink before i head to the station but then i saw police tapes and stuff"

haru looked alarmed: "YOU WERE GOING TO DRINK RIGHT AFTER YOU GOT RELEASED FROM THE HOSPITAL"

you turned away from them, facing matona: "you can continue scolding me after we arrest this killer, haru. sorry in advance for haru, daisuke. he can be pretty overbearing and protective"

daisuke: "i can tell"

haru was offended okay?

you were already teaming up with daisuke to tease? betrayal.

haru: "how dare you (your name) - "

you did not let haru to finish his sentence and starter beating the shit out of matona like DAMN GHORL

daisuke and haru watched from a distance as you expertly used the gun to your advantage without pulling the trigger. you used the metal to hit him in fragile parts of his body in order to limit his movement

daisuke gawked at you

he has never seen such fluid execution for an arrest

daisuke looked: O-O

haru, seeing him, smugly crossed his arms and said: "you get to see how amazing (your name) is as a cop. she's my partner"

just as he said that, you pinned the criminal down on the ground, gun discarded, your one hand straining his arm behind his back and the other pinning his other hand on the ground

you: "i just got out of the hospital. how did i still win?"

daisuke suddenly frowned

oh, right. she's haru's girlfriend.

several minutes later, you successfully managed to arrest sakatoshi matona and the other detectives came to take him. but of course, you made sure you, daisuke, and haru were getting the recognition

like hell you were letting someone else get the glory for your efforts

you returned to daisuke and haru, smiling

they were talkiny when you hugged haru from behind

you: "haru i missed youuuu. it was lonely without your annoying butt looking out after me all the time"

haru flushed red

haru: "if you didn't catch the bullet for me then - "

you: "and let you get shot instead? nu uh, no way. i would take any bullet for you. right, daisuke?"

he felt speechless when you regarded him

daisuke didn't know what else to say to you so he said: "yes, i agree"

but somehow the the thought of you getting shot angered him

haru looked at daisuke, thinking: he acting kinda sus rn

you turned to haru and the two of you began catching up, smiling and laughing

you two looked comfortable so with each other. you two were carbon copies of one another, except you were ten times better, sorry haru

you two were made for each other

no wonder you're his girlfriend

you: "how's everyone in the precinct?"

haru: "still the same. everyone missed you"

daisuke: "are you two together?"

haru: 👁👄👁

you: *long ass laughing emoji*

haru turned very red, shouting: "WHERE DID YOU GET THAT IDEA"

daisuke: "you said you were partners - "

you: "i didn't know you liked me that way, haru - "

haru: "NO I DON'T KAMBE WAS JUST BEING A DUMBASS"

you tittered and turned to daisuke: "no, we're not together, kambe-san" you tucked a lock of hair behind your ear. "sorry if i scared you"

daisuke felt relief wash over him

daisuke: "i was just wondering. you and haru seemed very close so i was just making sure i wasn't misunderstanding"

daisuke froze with wide eyes when you leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek

and you whispered to him: "gotta work on being discreet when you look at me. i can practically see you chasing after me in the future with how you were looking at me. i'm flattered you find me that fascinating"

you turned to the shook haru: "i like this one, haru. we should bring him along with our cases"

you regarded them both: "anyways, i'll be heading over to the station first. i can write up the report and have man behind bars quickly. don't worry though, i'll make all three of us have the glory. i trust that you two can finish up here without me?"

the two men wanted to say something but both of them were stunned. you just kissed daisuke on the cheek and your best friend saw it. daisuke's eyes were wide and haru had his jaw dropping down

they still didn't say anything when you bid them farewell and just watched as you went to a police car with another cop where matona was and sped off

daisuke can feel his heart hammering against his chest

what was this feeling? it was so strange and . . . it's just strange, but he was not oppossed to thie feeling

in fact, he wanted more of it. as long as it came from you, it was fine

haru, however, was not

haru looked like he had seen the most horrifying thing ever

B E T R A Y E D

his best friend and this cop wannabe?

D I S G U S T H A N G

daisuke cleared his throat and turned to haru to say something but was met with a finger pointed at his face and haru looking vexed

haru: "you - "

the bar and the buildings nearby exploded beforw haru could say anything more. everyone except for daisuke was startled and sunk down on the ground

daisuke was not though. and he remained standing. not for the reason he forgot about the bomb he instructed heusc to plant but because

- you kissed him and he was self destructing

daisuke held back the smile threatening to tear through his face

haru: "w-what was t-t-th - "

daisuke: "i forgot about the bomb, sorry"

532 notes · View notes

dothwrites · 4 years ago

Note

Cas using Enochian pick-up lines on oblivious Dean. Dean doesn't get them, Cas feels rejected each time, and Sammy is done with it all! Can I have that fic, pretty please?

ah, this has been sitting here for a WHILE, so i’m sorry that i’m trash

lost in translation

---

It begins when Dean is pathetically trying to impress his crush.

Or at least that would be Sam’s take, if Dean cared enough to ask him.

Dean would rather say that it began with a simple misunderstanding, one which could happen to anyone.

He doesn’t ask Cas’ opinion of the situation (and Cas would say that’s the whole crux of the problem).

Whoever has the correct perspective, no one would argue about the beginning of the affair. It starts one afternoon when Dean is contemplating switching Sam’s creamer with buttermilk, just for a break in the monotony. Cas is with him in the library, his customary suit and coat exchanged for a hoodie and a comfortable looking pair of jeans which Dean suspects used to belong to him (there’s something vaguely familiar about that hole in the knee, and it wouldn’t be the first time Cas has pilfered his room for clothing; several of Dean’s shirts have ended up upon the angel’s body. Cas always seems perplexed when Dean calls him on his thievery, plucking at the shirt with faint confusion--Oh this? I found this down in the laundry room a few days ago and thought it looked familiar, do you want it back? And the question is phrased so forlornly that Dean can’t help but allow Cas to steal another article of clothing out from under his very nose.). Cas dresses down these days. And slouches. Right now, his chin is in danger of disappearing into his chest. The sight delights Dean. There for a while, he hadn’t been sure Cas was capable of relaxing.

It’s an overwhelmingly quiet afternoon. It’s nice, because Dean loves to spend time with Cas when there’s no imminent blood or monsters on their horizons, but it’s also boring. Dean sneaks a glance at Cas over the top of his book. Cas seems perfectly content to sit all day reading some godawful thick, leather bound tome. Dean finds himself less than content, but he doesn’t want to leave Cas. He sighs, shifting in his seat as he pretends to read. After a few more minutes, he sighs again, this time with a little more spite in the sound.

(Dean’s about three seconds away from kicking his feet and whining I’m bored, but Cas doesn’t need to know that.)

Cas mutters under his breath. Dean recognizes the guttural syllables of Enochian, which is Cas’ go-to language for when he’s saying something hateful and he doesn’t want to get called out on it. Tough luck for him, though, because Dean’s heard one of those words enough to parse its meaning.

“Did you just call me stupid?” he demands, slapping his book down on the arm of the chair.

Castiel looks at him, his eyes wide with surprise. “You...understood that?” he asks. “You understand Enochian?”

Not in the slightest, is what Dean should say. He understands one word, and that’s only because Cas uses it enough as an insult that it managed to stick in his mind. But something that looks like fondness, and admiration, and other nice adjectives which Dean would like Cas to apply to him, shines at the edges of Cas’ eyes. So he rolls his eyes a little bit (the audacity of Cas! Asking him if he bothered to study something which was not strictly required!) and scoffs, “Uh, kind of hard not to at this point, you know, what with...” He waves his hand at Cas, hoping that the vagueness of the gesture will cover a multitude of sins.

And really, he should come clean. If the past fifteen years have taught him anything, it’s that nothing good comes from lying to your nearest and dearest. But this is just a little white lie. Like when he was sixteen and he told Brandy Fletcher he could play a rocking drum solo, because he wanted to impress her and there was no way he would ever be called upon to perform such a task. This is just a little fib, made so that Cas doesn’t think he’s a fucking idiot.

Plus, there’s something which looks horribly similar to gratitude shining in Cas’ eyes. The emotion brims over until those baby blues can hardly contain it, and Cas looks so goddamned happy. Dean’s not a monster. He’s not going to take that away from Cas just so he can come clean with a Gotcha! moment.

Cas bites at his lower lip, looking uncommonly shy. Worry starts to stir in Dean’s gut, which is only compounded when Cas says something else in soft yet clear Enochian. As the new phrase doesn’t have the word stupid anywhere in it, Dean doesn’t have the slightest idea of what Cas is saying. The guilt squirming in his stomach gets worse when Cas looks at him, with gentle anticipation, as though he’s expecting a reply. Dean does what humans have been doing since the beginning of time when confronted with a language they don’t understand and smiles, wide and sunny, at Cas. Cas’ forehead creases but he returns the gesture. His eyes are still brimming over with emotion and the sight does something to Dean.

Dean begins to suspect that he may have started something which he is not equipped to finish.

---

After that, things get a little weird. Considering Dean’s general life, that’s saying something.

Dean catches Cas looking at him more, like Cas is having a one-man staring contest with the side of his face. Cas staring at him is nothing to write home about, but his looks have gained new intensity. It makes Dean’s innards squirm with worry as well as something deeper. He’s not willing to examine that feeling any closer, though it is pleasant.

As if the soulful looks weren’t bad enough, there’s also the thoughtful slant of Cas’ eyes to worry about. Every time he looks at Dean, he looks like he’s working himself up to something momentous. Since momentous decrees from Cas usually come hand in hand with world-ending events and revelations, Dean thinks he can forgiven for dodging Cas’ presence.

It does him no good: the bunker, for all its space, is only so large in the end, and Cas was once a heavenly messenger who has the patience of millennia. Add that to the fact that Dean needs to eat at least twice a day, and the game of Cornering Dean becomes a game of cards, in which the deck is stacked firmly in Cas’ favor.

Dean sneaks into the kitchen sometime between midnight and two am. If Sam caught him, then he would get a talking-to about the most appropriate times to eat, better digestive function, and the ravages of heartburn in a man his age, but it’s not his brother sitting at the table when Dean flicks on the light.

It’s Cas, who blinks owlishly at him, before his face splits into his brightest smile.

(Cas’ brightest smile is an awkward, crooked little thing. On a regular human being it would be considered unbecoming. On Cas, it’s a thing of glory.)

“Dean,” Cas greets him. Hearing his voice in that low, rough voice never fails to send a little shiver down his spine, and today is no different. “This is an odd time for a snack.”

“Yeah,” Dean says, a little lamely. The shock of finding Cas in the kitchen has kind of killed his appetite, but it’s not like he can turn around and leave. “Just, you know, had a craving. Why were you here?”

Cas looks around the kitchen, his mouth pursed. “I like it here. It’s peaceful.”

Dean looks at him, waiting for the punchline. “You were sitting in the dark, dude.”

“Oh. Well, I don’t need lights to see in the dark,” Cas says, as though the knowledge that his best friend has some freaky see in the dark cat eye nonsense going on with him isn’t the weirdest thing Dean’s heard all day.

“Great.” Dean opens the fridge and pulls out a container at random. He spares one second to hope that Sam got rid of all the moldy food before he samples the contents. “Well, I think I’m going back to my room now.”

He wants to get out of here, not so much because he doesn’t want to talk to Cas (he has no problem with late-night chats with Cas, it’s just that he would prefer such chats take place in his room, preferably in his bed, preferably while both participants were significantly less dressed), but because Cas is starting to get that look again, like he’s getting ready to drop an atomic bomb’s worth of shit on Dean in the middle of the kitchen.

“Dean.” Cas stands up. He twists his fingers together before he realizes what he’s doing, and then places them flat against his thighs. He takes a deep breath. Before Dean can stop him, Cas opens his mouth.

Low, rolling syllables flow through the kitchen, the harsh notations of Enochian softened by Cas’ voice. There’s a question in Cas’ eyes, and Dean would answer it, if he only knew what Cas was asking.

The kitchen falls into silence. Dean gets the distinct impression that walking away is not the appropriate reaction. If only he knew what the appropriate reaction was.

He settles for plastering a fake ass smile on his face and loosing a brittle laugh which threatens to shatter the lighting fixtures. The corners of his mouth hurt from the wideness of his smile, but not even the small twinge of pain can take away from the brief flash of hurt in Cas’ eyes.

“Yeah. You bet.” Dean barely restrains himself from giving Cas a big thumbs up.

Cas’ face, if possible, turns even more disconsolate. Dean’s stomach twists at the sight.

This would be the correct moment to confess. Cas, I don’t have the faintest idea what you said, but I’d really like it if you could say it again in English, so that I could maybe comment on it. Sorry I’m such a jackass.

Dean does not confess. He reaches out and claps Cas on the shoulder, almost buckling Cas’ knees under the friendly contact. Dean almost stops, but he continues to his room, trying to erase the memory of Cas’ stricken face.

---

It gets worse.

Cas says something in Enochian to him the next morning, a tiny, hopeful smile darting across his face. Dean gives him a weak smile in return and tries not to focus on the longing, almost desperate tone of Cas’ voice. “Ok, Cas,” he says, when it becomes clear Cas is angling for something more than a smile that makes it look like he ate some bad tacos.

Cas takes him by the wrist. This time the syllables which come out of his mouth are almost frantic. His eyes are wide and imploring, and his voice cracks on the last word.

The truth, Dean. Tell him the truth.

“Look, I’m sorry, Cas,” Dean says. Confronted by the weight of his failings and his inadequacies, he flees. All the while, he feels Cas’ eyes on his back.

---

It gets worse.

Cas continues to mutter Enochian at him, alternating between frustrated, hurt, mocking, and pleading inflections. Each time, Dean looks at him in a mixture of helplessness and shame.

The last time Cas tries, there’s a faint snap and tingle of grace curling around the room. Dean can taste it in the air, ozone and electricity, before it makes the lamp closest to him spark and pop. “Great, now you’re killing the furniture,” comes out of his mouth before he can stop it.

Cas recoils as though Dean reached out and slapped him. He says something else in Enochian, his voice small and defeated. He won’t even look at Dean.

If Dean were a better person, he would come clean. He would apologize to Cas and beg his forgiveness. He would take Cas’ scorn and irritation and lump it in with the rest of the shit that’s gone wrong with his life, and they would move past this.

Dean’s not a good person. Hell, he’s not even an okay person. He’s a piece of shit who got a hell of a lot luckier than he ever deserved, and Cas is just naive enough not to realize that.

---

It gets worse.

Sam walks into the library one afternoon with a dazed look on his face which means he’s just emerged from being caught deep in a book. He runs his hands through his hair and only then seems to realize that Dean and Cas are sitting at opposite ends of the library, deliberately ignoring each other. The tension in the room is thick enough to cut.

“You guys okay?” he asks, glancing back and forth between them.

“We’re good,” Dean says shortly, flipping a page of his book with unneeded aggression.

Sam flicks his eyes towards Castiel. Cas looks over the top of his book, his eyebrows twisted in a scowl. He mutters something most definitely not English under his breath, staring at Dean.

Sam chokes on nothing.

“You all right there, Sammy?” Dean glances at Sam, only to see that his brother’s face is bright red.

“Yeah, I’m great.”

Castiel says something else in Enochian, sounding more forlorn than angry. Dean didn’t think it was possible for his brother’s eyes to get any wider. “Something you want to share with the rest of the class?” Dean asks. He keeps his eyes on Cas, but the question is meant for both of them.

“I think you two should really talk,” Sam says, looking back and forth between him and Cas. “I think you’re both missing some information.”

“What do you mean--” Dean pauses as the obvious answer comes to him. “Hold on. You can understand him?”

“Don’t talk about me like I’m not in the room,” Castiel says, proving that he can speak English just damn fine when he wants to. Then, because Cas is an asshole whose main job is torturing Dean, he mutters something in Enochian.

Sam snorts.

If he didn’t know he would later regret it, Dean would put both of them in the ground.

“Well, if you want someone to talk to you, then knock it off and speak English!” Dean snaps. “I’ve got no idea why you’re babbling on like that and looking like I kicked your puppy when I don’t answer.”

Cas scowls, the full wrath of Heaven in his eyes. He starts what sounds like it will no doubt be a lengthy tirade (in Enochian of fucking course), before he’s interrupted by Sam.

“Dean doesn’t understand Enochian, Cas!” he shouts.

Two pairs of eyes snap to Sam. Dean’s are filled with furious betrayal, Cas’ with frustrated confusion. Sam ignores them both, rolling his own eyes to the ceiling. “Yeah, look, I’m sorry to cut in your drama or whatever, and I’m sure that you two could keep this up for another three weeks, but I value my sanity. Dean, nut up and tell Cas you don’t speak Enochian. Cas, stop running into a brick wall and tell him what you want. I mean, good God, it’s like I have to do everything around here myself!”

Sam’s complaining never ceases as he peruses the shelves for the particular book he’s looking for. Both Dean and Cas are referred to multiple times as idiots, sometimes assholes, and once even idjits. Throughout his litany of abuse, Dean and Castiel refuse to look at each other, though Dean does feel a telltale prickling at the back of his neck several times. Every time he looks at Cas, however, the angel has his eyes firmly fixed on his book.

Dean wonders if Cas would get more pissed if he told him his book was upside down.

“You ever think about how much pain and agony you could save me if you two assholes would just talk to each other?” Sam finally snaps. Arms laden with books, he levels a fearsome glare at the both of them. “For homework, neither of you are coming out of this library until you’ve actually talked to each other like rational adults. And if you make any weird noises, I’m going to smother both of you in your sleep.”

He stalks out of the library, leaving Cas and Dean alone once more. Cas looks up from his book, finally realizing it’s upside-down, while Dean puts down his own book. They stare at each other for a long moment, then speak at once.

“Why didn’t you tell me you didn’t understand Enochian?” “What were you trying to say to me?”

They stop. Dean swallows, gathers up all of his manly courage, and speaks.

“So what were you trying to say to me? It must have been pretty exciting to get Sammy clutching his pearls.”

Cas tilts his head. He considers Dean for a long moment before he crosses the space between them. Cas leans forward, putting his hands on the arms of Dean’s chair. The gesture boxes Dean in, a turn of events which Dean doesn’t struggle against.

“Why didn’t you tell me you didn’t speak Enochian?”

Pinned beneath Cas’ gaze, Dean squirms uncomfortably. Now that it’s just him and Cas, his deception seems childish. Would it really have been the end of the world if he’d told Cas he was too stupid and selfish to learn his language? It would have just been another disappointment in Cas’ life, but has it been worth these past few days of being at odds with Cas?

Heat flushes along the bridge of Dean’s nose as he mutters, “I wanted you to think I was smart.”

Damn super-angelic hearing. Cas doesn’t miss a beat, though his forehead creases. “You wanted...what? Dean, you are smart.”

He says it so naturally, as though Dean doesn’t struggle over translations or speaking Latin or cross-referencing indexes or any of the thousand other things that seem to come naturally as breathing to Sam and Cas. “Yeah, sure, I’m a regular fucking genius,” Dean mumbles.

“You’re capable of finding the problem with a faulty engine with a single look. You built your own EMF meter out of a spare Walkman. Despite your efforts to hide it, you’re very well-read, and you have an innate understanding of some fairly complicated mathematics. I’m not sure exactly what humans qualify as intelligent, but I feel as though all of those skills count.”

Dean knows his whole face is red. Heat prickles along the tips of his ears and down his neck. “Jesus, Cas,” he mutters. Unable to withstand the force of those blue eyes, he darts his glance down towards the floor. “Most people don’t start sweet talking until the third date.”

“Well, I’m an angel,” Castiel says, smugly, as though that solves every argument (not a bad strategy; that line’s worked for Cas for years. What else can you say after that?).

“All right, I answered yours, now you answer mine. What were you trying to say to me?”

Amazingly, Cas’ cheeks color.

“Come on, Cas,” Dean wheedles, when Cas doesn’t immediately answer. “I told you mine.”

Cas looks off to the side. He actually shuffles his feet before he answers, “It was just a thought. I thought, maybe, we could...Never mind. It was stupid.” He looks back at Dean and rolls his eyes, showing how ridiculous he finds this whole trial. “I guess, roughly translated, it would amount of something like ‘If only he were as decisive as he is pretty, then there would be no problem’.” He forces a weak laugh. “I said it in the heat of the moment. I was frustrated.”

Dean blinks in astonishment. Only one fact has managed to slip through the tangle of Cas’s words. “You think I’m pretty?”

Castiel’s blush deepens. “Anyone who has eyes would think that,” he says, a little roughly.

An automatic flush spreads across Dean’s cheeks, but he’s able to ignore that. He’s much more interested in what else Cas might have been telling him. “And what was something else you said?”

Cas coughs. “’Your eyes are bright as the sunrise, yet they fail to see what is in front of them’,” he says. If possible, his already rough voice has deepened.

“Another.”

Cas doesn’t pretend coyness. “’You had my heart from the first time I saw your soul’,” he says, in a near whisper.

Dean can’t hold himself back. He snatches Cas’ hoodie in his hands and drags Cas down to his level. Cas lets out a surprised grunt before he gracefully collapses atop Dean. He’s barely managed to balance himself on Dean’s lap before Dean’s lip are on his.

Despite Dean’s rushed actions, the kiss is sweet and almost chaste. Cas’ lips are warm and chapped and utterly wonderful. At first, they’re stiff, but only for a second. Then Cas relaxes into the kiss, sighing happily as his hand cups Dean’s cheek. Cas’ stubble scratches against his chin. He’s going to bear the marks of Cas’ affection later, and he couldn’t be more thrilled about it.

Cas parts from him, but not far. In fact, he’s close enough to Dean that when whispers a phrase in Enochian, his lips brush against Dean’s.

A shiver of delight runs down Dean’s spine. Now that he knows the gist of what Cas was trying to say to him, Enochian fills him with illicit glee. “What did that mean?”

Cas kisses him again, adding a cunning sweep of his tongue across the seam of Dean’s lips. “’Of all the stars in the heavens, you shine the brightest’,” he translates, resting his forehead against Dean’s.

Heat floods through Dean once more. It’s everything he ever dreamed of hearing. It seems impossible that he could have it. There should be a rule against it. Dean Winchester doesn’t get what he wants.

Except, apparently, Dean Winchester does get what he wants, as evidenced by his lapful of angel murmuring Enochian endearments into his ear. “Hey Cas?” Dean tilts his head to catch Cas’ eye. “When I first saw you, sparks flew. How would you say that in Enochian?”

Cas thinks for a second before a smile spreads across his face. “I’ll teach you,” he promises, before he pulls Dean’s face towards him once more.

(Sam’s warning about making weird noises makes a lot more sense now.)

#destiel #destiel fanfic #destiel fic #deancas #deancas fic #dean winchester #sam winchester #castiel #canonverse fic #fluff #dothwrites

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confused-stars · 4 years ago

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hawksweek2020 - Day 3: Crossover

@hawksweek2020 ___ Phoenix Drifting (or: it’s Pacific Rim time, my dudes) „I just don’t think this is a good idea.” Toshinori Yagi looked tired. That was really the only adjective needed to describe the man, and maybe the only one that was appropriate. Gone was the hero millions of people had watched on tv and cheered on. There was only this skeleton of a man who looked like a stiff breeze could knock him over. “How will we know if we don’t give it a try?” said Keigo’s handler, calm and rational as always. Yagi just shook his head with a long, drawn-out sigh. “I’ve drifted with Enji enough times to know what he’s like. And I can only assume it would be even more difficult now, after…” He trailed off, but no one in the room actually needed him to finish the sentence. “Assigning him a new recruit as a partner, and someone he’s never even met?”

But they had met, Keigo almost wanted to protest. He bit his tongue on the basis that there was no way Enji Todoroki would ever even remember the tiny brat he’d saved that day. Or that he’d recognize the young man he’d grown into. “The alternative would be him drifting with his son, you are aware of that?” the commission president pointed out, one perfectly shaped brow raised. Keigo sometimes wondered when she found time to do that. The world was sort of ending every couple weeks, and yet there were people who would just… sit down and have their eyebrows plucked. “Natsuo is a medic. He’s not a pilot,” Kayama said from where she was leaning forward on crossed arms, a tiny crease between her eyes. Keigo’s handler paused. “Oh, no. I’m talking about Shouto.” “Absolutely not.” It was the first time Aizawa had spoken since they’d opened this discussion. Keigo had been sure the man had dozed off at some point, but apparently, he’d been listening the entire time. Stupid, of course he had been. Never underestimate people, especially those that you know are skilled. “We’re not putting a kid in a Jaeger. He’d be ready, skill-wise, but he’s still a teenager.” “Todoroki specifically requested for his son to be partnered up with him,” the president said, unmoved. “He’s been training for this purpose alone. If Takami doesn’t work out, Shouto would be our fallback plan.” Aizawa’s glare was terrifying enough that Keigo wouldn’t have been surprised if someone was about to drop dead. “Takami’s barely more than a kid himself!” He gestured at Keigo, who couldn’t help but straighten up, making a low noise of offense in his throat. “I’m old enough to fight! I’m old enough to drift. My simulator scores are better than All Might’s ever were. I’m ready.” Aizawa scoffed. “Simulator scores hold nothing against a real fight, kid.” Though his glare wasn’t as prominent looking directly at Keigo. Seemed like his anger was directed at the commission. Which, understandable and Keigo could relate. But they knew what they were doing. He’d been trained for only this since he’d been a tiny kid. He knew he could do this. “They might not even be compatible,” Yagi said, almost placating, “Maybe we’re arguing for nothing. You know what Enji is like. Him and Takami don’t seem like a very good matchup at first glance.” “Enji wasn’t a good matchup with Touya, either, but he pushed through anyway. And look what happened,” Aizawa replied darkly. There was a ripple of tension, and then the dark-haired pilot stood from his chair. “It’s not like we can stop you from doing what you want anyway. I’m just putting it on the record that I was against this.” He paused. “No offense, kid.” And stalked off. Keigo didn’t… think he was offended. Was he?

__ The thing was, despite spending the majority of his life training to be the perfect Jaeger pilot, despite having honed his reflexes and his tactical thinking and his ability to make split-second decisions, Keigo had never actually seen a Jaeger up close. When he’d been saved by Enji Todoroki – callsign “Endeavor” – as a child, that had been before the Jaeger program had really been a thing. Or at least not in the public eye. No, Enji Todoroki had been a special ops agent at the time he’d blown the criminal operation Keigo’s parents had been a part of, and his fame had only come about a year later when the first Jaeger – Golden Inferno – had been revealed. Keigo had known from that moment on that he wanted to be a pilot, and he’d worked hard to get to his goal, until he’d been picked up by the commission’s scouts when he’d been eight years old.

So, no experience with real Jaegers. Only the training facility and the simulations. He really, really couldn’t be blamed for sneaking up onto the walkway to take a look. Surely with all the young recruits living here, this was something that happened regularly. Why shouldn’t Keigo be allowed to do the same? He was about to step into one of these soon enough, if he proved to be compatible with Endeavor. There was currently only one active Jaeger in this Shatterdome, along with two more being kept ready for pilots. They desperately needed another team out there to help against the kaiju attacks that had just been stacking up, and that was why Keigo was here. He felt… kind of inadequate for the task next to the Jaegers though. They were so much bigger than he’d been able to even imagine. Even stood on the walkway, at eye level, Keigo was suddenly and entirely aware of how tiny he was. How tiny he was compared to one of the kaiju, too. Actually piloting a Jaeger had to be quite something if it made you feel strong enough to take on those monsters. “Do you have authorization to be here?” That voice… Keigo turned his head with an easy smile, and threw a lazy salute at the man who technically outranked him. For now. And, hey, even if they teamed up, Endeavor would always have seniority over him. “No, sir, but that’ll change come tomorrow,” he chirped, dropping his hand again. Endeavor was frowning at him, but as far as Keigo could tell, he was always frowning. “… Takami, right?” Keigo nodded, wondering if Endeavor remembered his parents at all, or if that had just been one case in a long line of forgettable ones. If he did remember, Endeavor wasn’t showing any signs of it. Instead, he stepped up beside Keigo, leaning his arms onto the railing of the walkway as he peered up at the Jaeger in front of them. This one was a newer model, the finishing touches were still being worked out, and the colors were muted and grey. Keigo thought she would look beautiful in red and gold. “Do you trust yourself to handle her?” Endeavor asked after a moment. Blunt and to the point. Keigo kind of appreciated that. “I’m a quick learner, and a great pilot,” he replied, “And I’ll have an experienced partner to show me the ropes.” Endeavor turned his steely eyes on him. “I’m not here to pick up your slack.” Keigo raised his hands in a placating gesture. “Oh, I promise you won’t have to! I know what’s at stake here, and I’m ready.” That got him a nod. Endeavor turned back to the Jaeger. “… she has booster jets on her back, and she was built lighter than any previous models. She’ll be the first Jaeger with the ability to fly.” Keigo had heard that much. He knew it’d be more of a hover, but that they were working on full flight and would be modifying her when there were no immediate fights to be won. He leaned his elbow on the railing and rested his head on his palm. “Got any name ideas yet?” Endeavor was silent for a while. Maybe he didn’t care for frivolous things like names. He seemed entirely stoic, just like on tv, and in the one memory Keigo had of meeting him. “… Phoenix,” Endeavor finally said, voice quiet but still clearly audible in the relative quiet of the hangar this late. “I…” Keigo loved it. It was perfect. He could already imagine the accents of red in an almost feather like pattern, and the Jaeger had flames, too, because it had been built with Endeavor’s preferred fighting style in mind. “… Rising Phoenix?” he suggested. He could feel Endeavor’s eyes on his face, scrutinizing, but he was too busy staring up at their baby. “… if you can keep up with me in the drift, we can name her that.” “Oh, them be fightin’ words,” Keigo murmured, and he couldn’t help but smirk. __ Their compatibility was evaluated within a single fight the next day. As soon as Keigo went in for his first blow, he could almost physically sense something connecting them. As fast as he was, Endeavor blocked every single one of his attacks as if he’d known exactly where Keigo was going to move. And in turn, Keigo managed to dodge every one of his opponent’s slower, more forceful blows. It wasn’t like sparring with other recruits, or with his trainers. It was… lighter, like his mind didn’t have to be constantly running, his thoughts fading to a pleasant humming in the background. When they parted, Endeavor was smiling. Keigo returned his expression. And they were deemed ready to drift only an hour after that.

__ They had an audience, Keigo knew. Everyone was anticipating a successful drift, and everyone was worried what would happen if it didn’t work out. No pressure. Keigo felt good about this, about himself. They could do this. Right? It didn’t matter that Endeavor had so many years on him, that he’d lived through what had happened to his first and second co-pilot, that their traumatic memories were probably about to mix up and create an incredibly explosive cocktail… Keigo took a breath and exhaled slowly. He needed to focus on his surroundings. The feeling of the suit against his skin, the lights of the cockpit, the voices in his ear. “Takami.” Keigo jerked his head over towards Endeavor, who was standing calm and seemingly ready for the challenge ahead. “Yeah?” Endeavor frowned at him. “Don’t think too much. It’ll only distract me.” “Roger that,” Keigo murmured. Because that was so easy. Damn, what if this didn’t go right? Then they would lose so much more time trying to find a suitable copilot for Endeavor, and one for Keigo, too. This needed to work. It had to. “Initiating neural handshake,” said a voice that Keigo was too nervous to assign to any one of the people he’d just met yesterday. “3…2…1.” He was standing over an empty hospital bed, the sheets still mussed up from the body that had been in it only minutes ago. “It was my fault,” he murmured, fists clenched at his sides. A hand touched his shoulder. “Enji…” He whipped around and glared down at Rei, and she shrunk back from the look on his face. He was twelve years old and had just broken a bone for the first time. He lay on the mat in the training hall, trying desperately not to cry as he clutched his arm. “We’re not finished, Hawks,” said the trainer coolly, “You won’t be able to take breaks when you’re in a Jaeger. You’ll have to keep fighting with broken bones. Now, get up and use your other arm.” He was holding onto a gun, heavy and comforting in his hands, and leading his men down a darkened corridor. He was in his bedroom with his father sneering down at him. “I know you’ve been stealing from me, little brat. Using my own teachings against me, are you?” He gave his men a hand sign to swarm out as he pushed through the next door on his own. He cowered from his father’s wrath, tiny body shaking. “N-no! No, I haven’t! I haven’t!” He’d taken food, but that wasn’t… he’d needed it so bad… he’d been so hungry… “D-Dad, please, I promise, please don’t-“ “Dad, please!” Touya was backing away from him with tears in his eyes and bruises on his face. “I’m tired, it hurts. Can we stop now? Can we please stop?” “Don’t hurt me!” “You promised we could stop if I did well in this one!” “… losing connection…” “… unstable…” “… rabbit…” Touya went up in flames before his very eyes, the entire cockpit was on fire, and he was burning, too, but he didn’t even feel it in his desperate attempt to rip himself away from the controls and get to his son. “Dad!” The door to his bedroom was kicked open, splinters of wood sent flying as a broad man dressed in black pushed his way inside. “Step away from the child.” He looked down at the little boy curled up on the ground, trying to make himself small. God, he looked so much like Touya like this, so scared. Enji looked back up at the man he’d come here for. At Takami. Keigo looked up at his savior, at the gun in his hands. He scrambled to his feet and hit behind the stranger’s legs, clinging to him as if he was bound to disappear any moment. Enji’s grip on the gun was unwavering. “Don’t let him hurt me… please don’t let him,” Keigo whimpered. “I won’t,” Enji replied. Keigo held on tighter. “… stabilizing…” “… fuck, that was close.” The vividness of the memory began to fade, only bits and pieces fluttering through their joined minds now. Seeing the man who had saved him on tv. Forming the word ‘Endeavor’ on his lips for the first time, in awe. Shouto, two years old, putting another block on his tower and clapping his hands. Walking into his new home at the Commission headquarters for the first time. Being given his uniform. Toshinori smiling at him at they stood in front of ‘Golden Inferno’ together for the first time. Toshinori on the floor and coughing up blood. His mom yelling at his dad’s friends, pointing a gun at whichever one moved closer to her. Holding Rei’s hand in the park. Passing his first piloting test with flying colors. Fuyumi’s awe as she saw his Jaeger the first time. The name ‘Hawks’ given to him by another recruit. Burn scars running along his body, but none hurt as bad as knowing Touya was gone. Pickpocketing strangers on the street and trying to buy food with the money before he was expected back. Giving Natsuo a piggyback ride. Shooting a gun in the training range. Facing down a kaiju with his partner at his side. Keigo raised his hand. Enji did the same. They brought their fists together. “Neural handshake initiated.” The memories stopped. The connection flowed freely between them, almost like a lazy stream of consciousness. Keigo gave Enji a playful, mental nudge. Enji huffed on his side of the cockpit. “Let’s show these kaiju who’s boss, eh?” Keigo asked, both with his mind and out loud. He could feel determination, and amusement, and relief. “I’ll show you how it’s done.” Hawks, Enji thought, I won’t let you down. Keigo… Hawks smiled and leaned into their connection, allowing himself to feel the exhilaration of it all. “We’re gonna kick some ass.” He mimicked an explosion with his fist, and Rising Phoenix did the same.

#bnha #hawksweek2020 #jaeger pilot keigo!!!#let's gooo #i could write 30k of this probably #there's also a bunch of other interesting stuff that's less keigo centric obvs #also in this it's actually afo creating the kaiju #is this more of an au than a crossover? probably #catch me never actually sticking close to the prompts #but i needed to write this like i needed air #the other option wouldve been a his dark materials crossover but those are hard to write focused on just one character #also i didnt know what to write for the test fight that hasn't been done a million times already #so i just rushed through it #but eh im sick rn and i just wanted to finish this on time so i can go lie down now #child abuse tw #it's definitely very strongly insinuated so tagging it #i dont know what im doing with endeavor here ive literally never written him as a sympathetic figure before???

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wingfics · 3 years ago

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just gave myself space buns for the first time and i'm thinking about reactions to it. specifically ignis, haru, and aymeric. word of warning these all get longer as i go bc i cannot be stopped <3

ignis just goes Straight As A Board when he sees them. he can't stop staring for a good thirty seconds. he can't even lie to himself about it. the circumstances surrounding this moment are entirely unremarkable within the context of their lives: an impromptu camping trip, a long drive into the mountains north of insomnia. as per usual, gladio was the only one to dress in anything resembling camping attire (although prompto had certainly made an effort with his new cargo shorts), but for the occasion, helenis had seen fit to dust off their high waisted shorts and baseball cap, likely stolen from noctis. (he's honestly pretty proud of how he manages to keep his eyes above their shoulders for most of the morning.) on the drive, helenis had pulled their hair into a ponytail, pretending not to notice as prompto braided and unbraided a lock of it. now, however, as helenis leans back to back with noct, posing for a photo with their brother, ignis just cannot stop staring. he's grown up around helenis, he's fairly sure he's immune to their... everything by this point (don't dwell on that don't dwell on that do NOT dwell on that), but he can still feel the pink climbing up his cheeks. worse still, his gaze slips unbidden to the line of their thighs, stretched out in a wholly artificial arrangement that only accentuates the arch of their back and the curve of their- a click from the camera spares him that line of thought and brings him crashing back into the present. fortunately for him, helenis doesn't seem to notice his thrall, still entirely focused on prompto and the camera. by the g-ds, that pout could start and stop wars. noct, however, is not nearly so beneficent in his ignorance. "see something interesting, specs?" the smug drawl does little to curb ignis' flush, but he's proud of his composure when he finds the breath to respond: "is that hairstyle new, helenis?" they brighten instantly the second their gaze meets his. "yeah! i've never tried it before, but i think my hair is long enough now- wh- hey!" distracted by the click of prompto's camera, helenis lunges for him, swiping at his camera with the typical care to make sure it didn't actually get damaged. safely freed from the floodlight of their attention, ignis finally breathes out for the first time in a while--how long had he been holding his breath?--and musters up as threatening of a squint as he can at noct's lazy, knowing cheshire grin. "not a word, noctis."

haurchefant very noticeably stumbles when he sees calanthe leaning on the edge of his desk, dark hair swept into two low buns instead of their regular braid. "dear warrior!" he gasps, scrambling with the stack of parchment that has almost slipped from his hands. "how fortuitous it is to see you again! what brings you to camp dragonhead?" calanthe looks up from the paperwork on his desk, and even after months, haru's breath still hitches when purple meets blue. they smile that small, familiar smile, ears swivelling to face him, and he hurries to set down the parchment on his desk before setting a hand on calanthe's shoulder. the muscle under his fingers shifts, but they don't seem uncomfortable with his touch. he can't help but beam at them, basking in his friend's undivided attention and returning it in kind. oh right, the buns! he inspects them more closely. "i must ask, are those a new trend?" he asks, nodding to their hair. calanthe's smile widens into something adorably close to a grin, one ear flicking in poorly-stifled affection. "no, merely a style i wanted to try. do you like it?" haurchefant couldn't stop his smile from broadening if he tried. "'like it?' why, i'm utterly taken by them, my friend! i wrongly assumed that you could not get more breathtaking, but let it be said that i have never been more pleased to be wrong." by the end of his little declaration, cal's eyes have narrowed affectionately at him, their tail twitching where it's curled around his back. "flatterer," they accuse without much heat. "but of course! lest my dear hero go unappreciated and their praises unsung!"

aymeric looks up from a zoning ordinance and directly into the wine-dark gaze of his warrior, this time blanketed in gentle reproach. "aymes, it's quarter til." he blinks once, twice at this before glancing over to the clock on his desk (a "gift", aka thinly veiled threat, from lucia) and grappling for a frankly embarrassing amount of time with the numbers, startling when he realises that it's a quarter til two, not midnight. "oh," he sighs, rubbing at his eyes and blinking away their sudden sandpaper. the lord speaker, reduced to monosyllables in front of the person of his affections. how far he has fallen in his creeping exhaustion. he's brought rapidly back to reality by cal snapping their fingers just under his nose, snapping him out of a sleepy daze that he hadn't noticed he'd fallen into. "hmm? oh, yes. i should certainly sleep. rest assured my dear, i will turn in for the night soon," he says, waving a limp wrist at the couch in the corner of his office. it's not the most forgiving surface, but it's vaguely horizontal and not covered in live bees. he's certainly slept in more uncomfortable places. "not so," cal hums, following his line of sight and stepping in between him and the couch. he looks up at them again, brow furrowing. "oh no- i assure you, dear friend, that the couch is more than adequate. i will be fine left to mine own devices." cal hums again, eyes sharpening, before their hand darts out to grab his wrist as he makes to shuffle through the remaining paperwork. "i'm afraid i'm insisting, lord speaker." their grip and gaze soften before they continue, "i will see you back to house borel before the second bell, or i will not go at all." aymeric can do nothing but gape at them for a moment, tired brain finally stunned into silence. "but- i must protest-" he tries, only to be silenced by calanthe's exhausted sigh. "ser aymeric. come with me. i would not make the walk back to house fortemps alone at this hour besides." halone be damned. for all calanthe's insistence that they'd make for a poor politician, they certainly know all of the ways to get him out from behind his desk. on the next exhale, aymeric allows the tension to drain from his shoulders, rolling his neck a couple of times before setting about tidying his desk. calanthe smiles.

as aymeric stands, the last of his work set aside for tomorrow (well, later today), he gratefully takes calanthe's proferred hand and allows himself to be tugged close to their side- and stumbles for a moment. are those... buns? cal blinks at him before responding with a drawn out "yes". whoops. he hadn't meant to ask that aloud. he must be even more tired than he'd thought. abandoning all pretense, he squints at his warrior's hair, wondering at the thought process behind it. "they're very.... fetching," he offers, and the way cal's nose wrinkles is counterintuitively endearing. "fetching?" they echo incredulously. "the best word you came up with is 'fetching'? twelve, you really are tired, aren't you..." aymeric shakes his head comically quickly, wincing as a headache starts to make itself known, before clarifying, "forgive me, dear, i thought you'd find the descriptor of 'adorable' disagreeable, no matter how truthful." though their face remains neutral, cal's ears betray them: one flicks back, a self-conscious response to flattery that aymeric picked up on quickly in the presence of lord haurchefant. "they're quite distinctive, too," he continues, still trying to find non-patronising adjectives, but calanthe cuts him off with a shake of their head and a fond half-smile. "oh, come on. off with you. estinien is likely still waiting." at aymeric's look of surprise, their smile grows a smirk. "yes, indeed. after accompanying me here, he issued a thinly veiled threat to make you come home before lauching himself over the rooftops back home. you know his wont." aymeric drops his head, chuckling at his feet before squeezing calanthe's hand again. as they lead him to the door, he thinks of his warrior of light, of his wayward dragoon waiting for him, and takes naught but a moment to lock the door behind him before setting off home.

#YES this got long YES i rly do love aymeric a concerning amount YES square enix owns my ass what of it #haru's dialogue is HARD to write #making it distinct from aymes is Tricky rn but hopefully w more exposure to both of them it'll get easier #mine #my writing #hcs #crush tag #ALL OF THESE LADS R CRUSH TAG CAN U BELIEVE IT #gd it's rly past time for a retagging huh #anyway. it's quarter til 1 here and like aymes i am Sleeby #where's MY warrior of light who will take me by the hand and coax ME to bed (ft one warm surly dragoon) D:

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mediaeval-muse · 4 years ago

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Book Review

Know My Name. By Chanel Miller. New York: Viking, 2019.

Rating: 3/5 stars

Genre: memoir

Part of a Series? No.

Summary: She was known to the world as Emily Doe when she stunned millions with a letter. Brock Turner had been sentenced to just six months in county jail after he was found sexually assaulting her on Stanford’s campus. Her victim impact statement was posted on BuzzFeed, where it instantly went viral–viewed by eleven million people within four days, it was translated globally and read on the floor of Congress; it inspired changes in California law and the recall of the judge in the case. Thousands wrote to say that she had given them the courage to share their own experiences of assault for the first time. Now she reclaims her identity to tell her story of trauma, transcendence, and the power of words. It was the perfect case, in many ways–there were eyewitnesses, Turner ran away, physical evidence was immediately secured. But her struggles with isolation and shame during the aftermath and the trial reveal the oppression victims face in even the best-case scenarios. Her story illuminates a culture biased to protect perpetrators, indicts a criminal justice system designed to fail the most vulnerable, and, ultimately, shines with the courage required to move through suffering and live a full and beautiful life.

***Full review under the cut.***

Content/Trigger Warnings: descriptions of sexual assault and violence, trauma

Since this book is non-fiction (and thus, has no plot or characters), this review will be structured a little differently than usual.

I first became aware of this book after hearing YouTuber Cindy (readwithcindy) gush about it in one of her monthly wrap-ups. Because I am passionate about women’s rights, feminism, and sexual assault survivor advocacy, I thought Know My Name would be an illuminating read. Though I do admire Miller’s courage and I do think her story is important and deserves to be told, I do not think this memoir was as strong as it could have been. Don’t get me wrong - there are some brilliant moments in this book. Any time Miller describes what her emotions were like during different parts of the investigation and trial process, as well as the moments when she links her personal experience to broader social phenomena (such as rape culture, sexism, etc.)... all of those were brilliant. For example, I really liked how she debunked the idea that a person can be either bad or good when talking about Brock Turner’s character witnesses; Miller rather put emphasis on the fact that a person can be both someone who does charity work or cares for friends and someone who commits sexual assault (p. 194). I also really liked how she described her emotions during the trial and went through what it was like to essentially be gaslighted by the court system. It shed a light on an experience that many, many victims never even get to, while also uncovering systemic problems. So, if all that is good, why didn’t I give this memoir a higher rating?

Craft.

The first thing that struck me was the inclusion of seemingly “superfluous” events which didn’t seem to have much significance in the memoir as a whole. In addition to descriptions of what it was like going through a trial, there are also sections that are more or less mundane - an account of Miller flying across the country to attend art class, living in Philly and doing stand-up comedy, going scuba diving with her boyfriend in the Philippines. On the one hand, I think it was a good attempt to make Miller come across like more than a victim - with all these events, she shows the reader that she has a life and is a person with interests, not just a woman who was assaulted. However, Miller had the tendency to let readers infer significance or suggest that an experience was more profound for her than it comes across to the reader. For example, her account of going scuba diving feels very much like padding: there are multiple pages describing going to the Philippines and learning to scuba dive, but the most reflection we get is the vague idea that Miller had to learn to “listen to her body” (without connecting the concept to the healing process, p. 140) and a declaration that living through the trial was akin to needing emergency air and using a backup regulator (p. 141). There are also random things that seem to make no sense at all, like the brief description of a man having a seizure on a plane (all Miller says is that she identifies with the family’s wish for privacy, but the point is so brief that I questioned if the anecdote was needed at all). As a result, the book felt padded and overwritten.

The second thing that struck me was the seeming lack of structure. While I do think that form can match function in writing, and an aimless, loose structure could have been used to mirror the aimless feeling of Miller’s life post-assault (or even the directionless feelings associated with constantly putting off the trial), I don’t think Miller executed this technique well. Instead, it felt like she was writing things in order as she thought of them or the order in which they happened without much regard for relevance. For example, Miller shifts from descriptions preparing for the trial to descriptions of her travels to having lunch with a friend without much transition or thought as to how one section of her chapter leads into the next (or how the chapters lead into one another). While I can understand a chronological narrative, I don’t think it quite works here because Miller tends to wander from point to point without much thought as to how individual pieces are coming together as a whole. The only places where I think her structure works is in the description of being cross-examined by the defense and the jury’s verdict, and that’s because they were more extended and unbroken than any of the other “scenes” in her book. Additionally, she includes some bits at the end of her book about Christine Ford, Donald Trump, Philando Castile, the #MeToo movement, etc., and while all these things felt thematically relevant to her story, she seemed to move through them too quickly for her commentary to have a real impact on me as a reader.

The third thing that struck me was Miller’s prose. Miller pads her writing with a lot of metaphors and adjectives, and for me, the attempts to make her book feel poetic or artistic only distracted from her story. For example, Miller likes to use “poetic” language to give readers a feel for what a setting was like (the court room, the hospital, the streets of Philly, etc.), but I think many of her sentences could have been condensed. For example, she uses ants to describe her surroundings three times in a single chapter (Ch. 4), and tends to put in multiple descriptors for things which don’t really have much significance in her story, even from a form=function perspective (such as the “stacked squares of gridded lights” on buildings and “warm steam” from the streets of Philly).

Overall, I found Know My Name to be a mixed bag. While I do think Miller wrote a brilliant, impactful victim statement, and some of her insights in her memoir are valuable, I ultimately think the book could have been condensed and more tightly (or at least “purposefully”) structured. In my opinion, the most valuable parts of this book are the descriptions of her emotions during the trial, the “fight” with Stanford after the trial, and the affirming words for victims that are peppered throughout the memoir as a whole. But that’s just me - I do recommend that readers make the decision for themselves, and if others find value in this memoir, then that’s what really matters.

#book reviews

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my-happy-little-bean · 4 years ago

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The Road Trip - Chapter 3

pairings: logicality (platonic or romantic, depending on how you view it) words: 2602 chapter warnings: swearing, crying chapter summary: obligatory side quest unlocked: explore a carnival (also have an unfortunate call with your mother).

note: the song featured in this chapter is from the movie "the half of it", sung by leah lewis :)

< previous chapter << first chapter

[read on ao3]

[masterlist]

*credit to art in this chapter goes to @lemonyellowlogic ✨*

---

A few songs and a lot of murmured arguments about dancing in the parking lot later, roadside assistance eventually came around to tow Logan’s car and drop the two off at their centre. They were told that it would take a few hours, confirming the fact that they were not going to make it to the Grand Canyon today.

“Well this is just grand !” Patton chirped as they walked out of the centre, Logan sighing alongside him. Without a ride, they were stuck with a day to explore whatever town they had ended up in.

“I don’t know if ‘grand’ is the adjective I would use…”

“It is grand, though!” Patton skipped in front of Logan, then turned on his heel to face him, halting Logan in his path. “We get a whole day to go on an adventure!”

“This in of itself is quite the adventure, wouldn’t you think?”

“And now we get more! ”

Patton grabbed Logan’s hand and twirled him around before dragging him along. He saw a hint of a smile as Logan sighed.

“I see that I do not have a say in this,” he mumbled, “so I concede.” And more dully, he added, “Adventure awaits.”

“Wonderful! Because ...”

Patton grinned as he stopped abruptly in his tracks, letting Logan catch up to him with a slight jolt.

He then pointed at a field across the road; and at a ferris wheel unfolding high up near the blue sky.

And then, with a glimmer in his eye, Patton grinned at Logan.

“I just found our adventure.”

---

It’s a yearly thing, one of the locals had explained to them. It would happen at the beginning of each summer, with residents from all over town coming to put a pause on work and put a start on something new for the coming season.

And it’s a chance encounter, Patton realized soon after, that this start had found them now.

“We gotta do everything!” Patton exclaimed, practically getting whiplash trying to take a look at everything. Logan chuckled.

“It is highly improbable that we will be able to, given that the car should be ready within the next two hours and this is a very large field housing many attractions–”

“Then we have to go everywhere we can!”

Without much warning, Patton grabbed Logan’s hand to drag him to the nearest attraction; feeling as if he was laughing– truly laughing – for the first time in forever.

And so began their afternoon at the carnival. The whole time, Patton was desperately pulling each moment he experienced close to his chest; worried that if he let go for just a split second, they’d disappear before he knew it.

They went from booth to booth, marvelling at the colourful stalls in the market section of the carnival that were selling various trinkets and souvenirs. The scene was laid out under small, vibrant flags strung above them, intersecting one another over the aisle of stalls.

Patton insisted that they would at least go in the small fun house that was set up with many mirrors, giving their reflection a wide variety of distorted shapes. Logan, at one point, got lost in the house. It took the help of a group of kids for him to return back to the entrance where Patton greeted him in hysterics.

And of course, no carnival experience would be complete without–

“Two words,” Patton said as he (with the hand not holding two sticks of cotton candy) dragged Logan to his side; “Carnival. Games. Booyakasha. ”

“That is three words, though I am not convinced of the last one…”

“Who cares!” Patton beamed. He outstretched his hand and slowly panned it across his and Logan’s vision, motioning at the aisle of booths in front of them. “The goal? Win a penguin. ”

Logan fought back a smile as he nodded.

They go to the first game they can spot; one with milk bottles stacked on top of each other. The person running the game, ever so eccentric and distracting, got to Patton on his first try.

“Oooh, this is a tricky one,” Patton murmured when all his shots missed. The man running the game tipped his bowler hat almost mockingly at him, to which Patton responded with a bright, oblivious smile. Logan sighed.

“It is a matter of observation,” he said, exchanging a five dollar bill for three balls. The man blinked at Logan, who didn’t notice as he stood in front of the tower of milk bottles. He pulled Patton beside him and pointed at them.

“See, there are small sandbags on the barrels on which the bottles are stacked upon,” Logan explained, leading Patton’s gaze with his finger. “That implies that the bottles are weighted. This conclusion is also reached when considering your second attempt at toppling the tower. You hit the rim of the top milk bottle and it barely moved, despite the force at which you threw it.”

“I am pretty strong...” Patton hummed. Logan rolled his eyes.

“The seemingly logical approach is to aim for the middle of the bottles, no? That way, all of the bottles topple at once, thus allowing you to achieve the goal of obtaining a penguin.”

“Perfect!” Patton grabbed a ball. “Let’s not milk our victory any further–”

“ But –” Logan snatched the ball back before he could throw it– “given the aforementioned fact about the weights, throwing it at the intersection of the bottles would, in reality, be an ineffective strategy– possibly the weakest point.”

Patton deflated. “Oh.”

Logan shook his head, staring at the tower of milk bottles. He took a step backwards, reeling his arm back as well.

“Hence,” he said, “the most effective strategy would be to take the tower out through its foundation; as without a foundation…”

Logan threw the ball and, with one swift thunk! , all the bottles fell.

“...the tower will fall.”

The man running the stand didn’t seem as smug as Logan did. In fact, he continued to stare at him, his eyes narrowing in his direction before they were hidden by the shadows casted by the rim of his hat.

Patton, however, squealed, wrapping Logan in a tight hug that made him drop the rest of the balls.

And Patton took pleasure in seeing Logan smile back; which he decided was a better prize than the bright blue penguin he got to take home.

---

“Mmm, I think it’s time for another bite of the funnel cake!” Patton exclaimed as he reached over to the paper plate of funnel cake in Logan’s hand. Logan, with a smirk, pulled his hand back, careful not to hit anyone else in line.

“No no no,” he hummed as Patton pouted. “I believe you have consumed more sugar than what is deemed healthy.”

“ Logannn.”

“Patton, please.”

Patton narrowed his eyes at him. “You’re totally just doing this so you can have more.”

“...Falsehood.”

“Logannn!” Patton whined, chasing the plate in Logan’s hand as he cut himself a bit of funnel cake. “You’re taking the side with the most sugar! What– what about what is deemed? ”

“Earlier, you had a sugar monstrosity in a cup,” Logan replied curtly, smiling a bit as he steadily spun around to avoid Patton’s grasp. “Not to mention the countless amounts of cotton candy…”

“I only had two!”

Logan gave him a look. Patton meekly smiled.

“The ones I bought while you were in the bathroom don’t count.”

“Why not?”

“...Because you weren’t supposed to know.”

Eventually, Patton gave up on chasing Logan and the funnel cake in circles; but he couldn’t help but smile as he watched Logan’s eyes light up upon eating it.

“Additional point,” Logan continued after a while, “we wouldn’t want you to get sick on the ferris wheel.”

“Who’s to say you won’t get sick?”

“Who’s to say,” Logan echoed, taking another bite as Patton grabbed at it again. This time, Logan conceded with a chuckle. Patton practically melted at the taste.

“It’s like summer in a cake,” Patton murmured. Logan smiled.

“I’ll be honest,” he said, still laughing as Patton ended up taking the plate of funnel cake into his own hands, “I did not expect this to be as...amusing as it was.”

“Told you!” Patton said, his voice slightly muffled by his chewing. “Funnel cake makes everything better.”

Logan chuckled. “Not what I was talking about but…I suppose you did.”

Patton watched as Logan looked up at the ferris wheel, the two inching closer to it as the line moved along.

“You know,” Logan finally said, “the car has been ready for a while.”

Patton deflated. “Noooo, we can’t leave yet! We haven’t gotten on the ferris wheel! And the fireworks haven’t started either!”

“We cannot do both, Patton.”

“ Pleeeease? ” Patton cried. “The car can wait– who knows when we’ll be able to do this again!”

A pause. For a split second, it looked as though Logan stopped breathing.

“I...I know.”

“Logan, it was a hypothetical question–”

“No.” Logan said again, “I know. ”

Patton rested his fork on the plate to look at Logan. “You know?”

Logan nodded.

“I know that we are supposed to leave eventually,” he said. “I know that I have been treating our destination as a priority, and I know that the employees at the emergency-auto-repair centre have notified me that the car was ready an hour ago.”

“...Ah.” Patton hesitantly took another bite of funnel cake. “So does this mean we have to go?”

Logan shook his head with a soft smile. “No. I don’t think we do.”

The cool wind hit Logan’s face as they were lifted to the highest peak of the ferris wheel; so high up that Logan could have sworn that the sparks from the fireworks were brushing against his cheeks, warm and sharp.

“Do you think you can have both?”

“Both of what?”

“A satisfying life,” Patton whispered, “and a satisfying end?”

Even as a whisper in the midst of such a thunderous sky, Patton’s voice continued to be all Logan heard.

He looked at Patton. The reflection of the light and sound exploding in the sky glazed over Patton’s irses.

Then, Logan looked back up, holding the cold metal of their seats.

“I think you can have both,” he murmured.

Patton smiled.

“Good.” He leaned on Logan’s shoulder. “Both is good.”

---

The phone rang three times before–

“Hi, mum.”

Logan jolted up, his head nearly hitting the wheel and his glasses lopsided in his hair. He blinked, looking to his right and noticed that Patton was no longer in the passenger seat.

But he was outside, his voice drifting through the window Logan had cracked slightly open for their stay in the parking lot of a rest stop.

He was pacing back and forth in front of the passenger side of the car, his phone to his ear. Logan stared straight ahead immediately, but did not close his eyes.

“Yeah, I’m okay,” he heard Patton say. “I’m just out of town for the weekend. Though, it’s looking like it’s going to take a little longer than a weekend.”

A laugh. “ Mum. I’m totally the kind of person who goes on spontaneous trips. I– yes, that time I went to the grocery store on my own totally counts! ...Well I would’ve given you the heads up had I known you needed a babysitter…”

Logan snuck a glance at Patton, who had suddenly stopped walking. It was quiet for a bit before–

“...Yeah, I went.”

Oh.

“It wasn’t too bad!” He watched as Patton laughed, rubbing the back of his neck. He felt as if he was watching a car crash. “It...well, it was exactly how everyone said it’d be!”

Logan sighed as Patton’s hand began to tremble.

“...I didn’t want to tell you like this.”

A hand quickly went to cover his mouth and Logan swore he saw tears run down his cheeks.

“...O-Of course I’m coming home.” It came out as a hushed whisper; to the point that Logan could barely hear him. Patton lowered his hand and opted to wrap himself in a tight embrace.

“I-It’s not your fault, mum.” It wasn’t an embrace, actually. It was more like he was holding himself together. “I– no, mum, it’s– it’s my fault, isn’t it? It’s– gosh, don’t kid yourself.”

More pacing. Logan’s eyes stayed fixed on Patton’s face.

“...do you really think it’s a good idea to make an Appeal?”

Logan’s blood ran cold. An Appeal, if passed, could ruin a Doctor’s life. If a Doctor were to get their diagnosis wrong…

“I– no, I can’t do it, mum,” he heard Patton whimper helplessly. “I– you need a reason to make one and even still, it’d be unfair. It’s the time I got – I can’t change it.”

A pause; then, more harshly, “Well, it’s their job to be unfair, isn’t it?”

Logan squeezed his fists tightly.

And then,

“I– I’m sorry .”

No more. Logan forced his head away from the broken sight, this time closing his eyes to try and tune Patton out.

Eventually, he heard the door open beside him and the thump! of Patton sitting down. Logan kept his eyes closed willing himself to go to sleep; but gave up on that as soon as he heard Patton begin to cry.

“ Fuck ,” he heard Patton hiss as he cried even harder.

“Patton?” Logan finally whispered, his eyes still closed.

“Sh– Logan!” It hurt more to hear him suck up his sobs and laugh. “S-Sorry, I didn’t know you were awake!”

“Couldn’t sleep.”

“I’m sorry,” Patton said, though his voice was softer. Logan winced; not the intended reaction.

His mind reeled thinking of a solution, and it took a painful few minutes of listening to Patton hold back his tears before it clicked.

“Would it be possible if you could perhaps...sing me a song?” Logan cleared his throat. “It could serve as a...a lullaby. So to speak.”

At this point, opening his eyes would be more stressful than keeping them close and imagining what Patton looked like.

Instead, he felt Patton brush against his arm as he reached over to grab his ukulele in the backseat before climbing back to the front.

And there was a moment of silence before, (slow, deep; ready...)

“Here we are,” Patton began, “took so long, came so far. ” His voice cracked a bit. “I slept half the way on your shou-lder…”

The melody was simple enough, nothing more than a few plucks on each string, then repeat. Logan took a deep breath, and exhaled upon hearing Patton do the same.

“Safe and sound, as the night tore and spun around…”

Before closing his eyes for good that night, Logan took one more glance at Patton.

He was playing his ukulele cross-legged on his seat. Despite it being so small in size, nothing could look as small as Patton did; his tears rolling down his cheeks and fogging up his glasses.

Logan felt his heart skip a beat.

And for a split second, he wondered if Patton even knew how special he was; how different he was from anyone he had ever met. He was different from everything he believed; entirely separate from the dark world Logan was so familiar with.

Logan wondered if Patton could even die when he was filled with so much life.

(But perhaps he could learn to love not knowing.)

Because despite all this– dark clouds hanging over their heads like a cruel prophecy– Patton smiled .

“And we had to get lost to be found...”

---

next chapter >

#TS Storytime 2020 Submission #gabbie writes things #the road trip #sanders sides #sanders sides fanfic #sanders sides fic #sanders sides fanfiction #logan sanders #patton sanders #logicality #logan/patton #human AU

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sowingseedsandshootinghoops · 4 years ago

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Charles Dickens: Societal Problems in “Our Mutual Friend”

Note on the text: Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens published by Walter J Black

Charles Dickens is one of the best novelists that the world has ever known. His knowledge of nature is so deep and so penetrating that it rings true even now.

He was a much better observer of human nature than he gets credit for. It has become vogue in recent times to see him as something of a caricaturist who only created characters that were one dimensional and over the top.

But look at the way he introduces the characters of Lizzie Hexam and her father Jesse, who are sailing on the Thames, to us. How he tells us so much about these characters with so little text: “Allied to the bottom of the river rather than the surface by reason of the slime and ooze with which it was covered, and in its sodden state, this boat and the two figures in it obviously were doing that they often did, and were seeking what they often sought” (2). With only a few words we know instantly that they are professionals and the image that comes to mind from these few words is as rich and detailed as if they had been given a paragraph’s worth of adjectives.

Again Dickens shows his genius in describing the minute details of human nature in the way that Jesse instinctively knows that Lizzie has noticed something on the river that he hasn’t: “What ails you?’ [asked] the man, immediately aware of [Lizzie’s change in attitude]. ‘I see nothing afloat’” (3).

It should not be a surprise therefore that someone who noticed the smallest details of human behavior, was also able to notice some of the broader details too. What Dickens seems especially interested in is the effect that education and money have on people. One of the things that he points out over and over again is how people who are in the privileged class often don’t notice how privileged they are and they aren’t aware of just how valuable those privileges are. People on the outside on the other hand are acutely aware of just how valuable those privileges are. Those who are educated, for example, don’t know just how much of a gift education is because “no one who can read looks at a book, even unopened on a shelf, like someone who cannot” (24). Lizzie is a poor girl who, as she tells her younger brother Charley, “would be very glad to be able to read real books” and who “feels her want of education very much” (40). She knows what the value of a good education is, which is why she sends Charley off to school later even though that means that she might not see him again. Contrast that with the image of the Veneering family who, although they are very educated and surround themselves with the crème de la crème of society, care so little about being educated that “any one who has anything to tell generally tells it to anyone else in preference” (18). These are the people who have the power and the privilege, and yet they cannot even recognize or appreciate the privilege that they have.

Along with access to education comes access to higher paying jobs, and all power that money has access to. Dickens was acutely aware of the power that money wields in both the micro and macro scale. In terms of the micro scale, look at how Eugene describes the way in which his father found him a woman to marry to his friend: “My respected father has found, down in the parental neighborhood, a wife for his generally not well respected son’. ‘With some money of course?’ ‘With some money, of course, or else he would not have found her” (198). A rogue like Eugene, without any money, is intolerable and unmarriable. But a rogue with money is a different story altogether.

Dickens is also aware however of the role that money plays on the macro scale. Just look at the way he describes what a gentleman with shares, the 19th century equivalent of a hedge fund manager, does:

He goes in an amateurish, condescending way into the City, attends meetings of Directors and has to do traffic in shares. As is well known to the wise in their generation, traffic in Shares is the one thing to do in this world. Have no antecedents, no established character, no cultivation, no ideas, no manners, have Shares. Have Shares enough to be on Boards of Directors in capital letters, oscillate on mysterious business between London and Paris, and be great. Where does he come from? Shares. Where is he going to? Shares. Does he have any principles? Shares. What squeezes him into parliament? Shares. Perhaps he never achieved anything of himself in success, never originated anything, never produced anything! Sufficient answer to all: Shares. Oh mighty Shares! (154-155).

No where is the difference between the haves and the havenots in this book more evident than in a conversation that Mr. Podsnap has with an unnamed gentleman at a dinner party. They are discussing a report which has just appeared in the newspaper regarding six people who have died that week, in the streets, of starvation. Initially Mr. Podsnap says that he doesn’t believe that that actually happens to which the gentleman replies that they

must take it as proved because [of] the Inquests and Registrar’s returns. ‘Then it was their own fault’ said Mr. Podsnap. . . . The man of meek demeanor intimated that truly it would seem [that] starvation had been forced upon the culprits in question. . . [and that] they would rather not have [starved to death]. . . if it had been agreeable to all parties. ‘There is not’, said Mr. Podsnap flushing angrily, ‘there is not another country in the whole world, sir, where so noble a provision of the poor is made as in this country’. The meek man was willing to concede that, but perhaps it rendered the matter even worse, as showing that there must be something appallingly wrong somewhere [in the system]. . . [and] wouldn’t it be just as well to try and figure out where? ‘Ah!’ said Mr. Podsnap. ‘Easy to saw ‘somewhere’; not so easy to say ‘where’! But I see what you are driving at. I knew it from the first. Centralization. No. Never. Never with my consent. [It’s] not English’. . . . [The meek man had no] favorite ‘ization’ that he knew of. But he was certainly more staggered by these terrible occurrences than he was by names of however many syllables. Might he ask if dying of destitution and neglect was necessarily English?. . . . [Might there be a way to ensure that the] laws [regarding the poor] were being properly administered? (190-191).

At this point Mr. Podsnap quotes Scripture by saying that the poor will always be with us and cautions the young man to not attempt the impossible by feuding with God. When the young man attempts to say that he is not trying to go against God but is instead just trying to help his fellow man Mr. Podsnap interrupts him by saying that he

must decline to pursue this painful discussion. It is not pleasant to my feelings. It is repugnant to my feelings. I have said that I do not admit these things. I have also said that if they do occur (not that I admit it) the fault lies with the sufferers themselves. It is not for me’- Mr. Podsnap pointed at ‘me’ forcibly as [if to add] by implication that it may be well for ‘you’- ‘it is not for me to impugn the works of Providence. I know better than that, I trust, and I mentioned what the intentions of Providence are. Besides’, said Mr. Podsnap flushing. . . with a consciousness of personal affront, ‘the subject is a disagreeable one. I will go so far as to say that it is an odious one. It is not one to be introduced among our wives and young ones, and I’, he finished with a flourish of his arms than anything [else] could, ‘And I remove it from existence’” (191-192).

Doesn’t Mr. Podsnap remind you of people in recent times who, when they were told of a tragedy that was happening nationwide to members of an under privileged class, initially denied that anything was happening, and then, once they could no longer deny the fact, proceeded to blame the members of that group for their predicament? People who even after they realized that they could not blame those people for the predicament which they found themselves in, said that everyone should just simply celebrate the progress that the country has made and stop talking about it because they were tired of having the conversation and it was making them uncomfortable? Does this remind you of anyone? No? Just me then I guess. . . .

Not only does society despise members of the lower class, but it scoffs at the attempts that many people of class make in order to be able to enjoy the benefits that are being offered to members of the upper class. When Jesse Hexam is being derided for being a waterman and something of a grave robber, he retorts that it is better to rob a dead man who has no need of money than it is to rob a live one which is what a lot of other people do. Similarly people condemn Bella for wanting to marry a rich man, but who could blame her? Given the way that society treats poor people, who could blame her for saying that she “hate[s] and detest[s] being poor” and that because she cannot make money, beg for money, or steal money, she is resolved to marry into it (435)? But that is the difference between the haves and the havenots. The haves make the rules and the havenots have to live by them. The haves live in a world where they have privileges that they are not even aware they have, while the havenots must struggle to get by in a world that seems stacked against them.

Charles Dickens was a very perceptive writer, and much of what he said about 19th century England still applies to America today. History doesn’t always repeat but it does often rhyme. It’s strange to know that people like Podsnap still exist today. We have a long way to go, but it’s important to keep fighting so that future generations don’t have to keep dealing with the same problems that we do. We must keep fighting.

#charlesdickens #dickens #podsnap #ourmutualfriend #poverty #poor #scriptures #underprivileged #privilege #rich #education #hexam #lizziehexam #money #stocks #shares #upperclass #workingclass

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vulpinmusings · 5 years ago

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Letters from Buxcord 2 - Razorback

After much delay, my RPG group returned to our Monster of the Week campaign for our second mystery. This time, Ash and his new companions look into strange happenings surrounding a rich family and an old slaughterhouse.

Samantha,

Any doubts I had about sticking around Buxcord are well and truly squashed now. It’s only been about a week since the Santa-squatch incident and I’ve already squared off with something much bigger and purely magical.

It started just a couple days after Christmas. I was trawling about town for more details on local legends in the hopes of finding some common sources or threads to follow, and wound up at Bayou Boating, the main tourist attraction in this small town. They had a list of “local cryptids” posted on the wall, but it included several creatures that, unless the names apply to different mythics than they do in Taryn, do not tend to live in or around wetlands. The one person on staff at the time – it is the off-season for boat tours – proved to be less than well-informed about the one local legend I asked him about. People occasionally go missing in the bayou after foolishly going out there on their own at night.

Well, I can’t really put all the blame for my not getting a lot of info on the clerk. I‘d only asked a few questions before I experienced a major pulse in the magic fields. It was almost a textbook example of the ripples caused by an inexperienced Mage casting spells beyond their ability. The pulse carried some lingering effects of the original spell, as I had a brief vision of a grinning shadow floating over the bayou. I set off in search of the source, but as messy as the spell had been it was also far enough away that the magic settled and the trail grew cold before I got more than a block.

Nothing else happened for a few days, until I crossed paths with Nollthep and Lea again. I hadn’t really seen either of them since the Santa-sqautch, and the simple fact that Nollthep was not in his shop and was asking after somebody should have tipped me off. Whatever that fellow is, he seems to work for some higher being and has little to no personal needs outside of running errands for his “Boss.” Lea is normal other than her instinctual persuasion magic, but her paths and mine just hadn’t crossed in the last week.

At any rate, we three happened to meet up at the local park where Lea was performing with some small-time Punk Rock band that sings in Spanish. That’s… I think the language matches best to Iberrian. Anyway, Lea’s singing was infused with a mesmeric effect that had everyone (except yours truly, naturally) in love with the whole performance despite her not knowing the language or the words very well. Nollthep wandered up to us after the show was over, asking everyone he came across if they knew of any Wiccans or anybody named Clemonte. When he got to Lea and I, his questions turned to the topic of whether or not humans need blood and hearts to live.

I don’t think I need to say how concerning that was, but I didn’t get a chance to press for details before our attention was stolen by a group of local law enforcement suddenly taking off in response to a call from a “Clemonte mansion.” That got Nollthep’s full focus, of course, and Lea finally recalled that the Clemontes were a wealthy but reclusive and disliked family in Buxcord. She alluded to some previous encounters with them that had left her particularly soured, but she agreed to lead us to the house.

The Clemontes live on a hill on the southern outskirts of town, with their driveway reaching all the way to the base of the hill. As mansions go, it wasn’t all that large, but the fountain in front had the ostentation of true Old Money. The butler who answered our knock at the door sealed the impression, and he would have turned us away on principle if Lea’s magic hadn’t kicked in and scrambled his senses enough to make him tolerant of three random gawkers intruding on his employer’s private business.

I don’t want to become to reliant on that kind of manipulation, but without the reputation I’ve got back home I might not have much choice for a while…

The police – a sheriff and two deputies to be precise – were in the living room questioning a young woman and paid us little mind as we peeked in for a look. The reason for the call was glaringly obvious: a disemboweled corpse had been hung on the wall over the fireplace with a graffiti-style pig’s head and the words “I’m back” scrawled in blood below it. A most disturbing sight, although only Lea showed any physical reaction. I, of course, am too experienced to let my revulsion get in the way of solving a problem, and Nollthep is too inhuman to even have a visceral reaction to such sights.

The sheriff and pair of deputies who were on-site were surprisingly fine with the three of us stepping in and asking our own questions. I’m hoping that it was just them thinking that we must be welcome since the we’d gotten past the butler, but it’s too early to rule out general incompetence yet. The girl was Sophia Clemonte and the corpse had been a security guard at the Clemonte slaughterhouse and had no reason to be in the family mansion. Sophia was shook up by the corpse, but she was more concerned about her younger brother, Cyril, who was missing. The police told us that the rest of the family were upstairs, so we decided to go up and interrogate them while the police were still busy getting Sophia’s story.

The Clemonte parents are named Archie and Penelope. Archie’s a bit of a boor and seems to hate magic on principle, while Penelope had the aura of someone with the talent for magic, albeit one she hasn’t used in many years thanks to her husband’s influence. From Archie, we got an explanation for what the message painted on the wall could have meant. About twenty years ago, an employee at the slaughterhouse had suffered a psychotic break after being fired and killed several people before committing suicide. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get more than that out of Archie before Lea insulted him and he told us to get out.

On our way out, we decided to check in on the last Clemonte, the eldest son Zachary. I didn’t get any sense that he’d inherited any of his mother’s ability, and he was callously unconcerned about the whole scenario and intent on heading out for a little walk despite all common sense.

Penelope caught up to us at the top of the stairs and, now out from under Archie’s gaze, opened up a little more about her history with magic as we headed back to the crime scene. She used to practice the Wiccan traditions, but gave them up years ago and hid her books away. Young Cyril had shown an interest in those books, and Penelope had given him one of the less dangerous tomes to look through. I convinced Penelope to show me where she’d hidden the rest of her books, and she took us to a surprisingly large room hidden behind a secret door in the kitchen. The room was full of not just books but all kinds of the stuff you typically find in the collection of those who follow ritual-based magic traditions. There was a book missing from the shelves, but it wasn’t the book Penelope had loaned to Cyril. Penelope said the missing book was primarily about summoning and controlling spirits.

(Be sure to clarify that I’m not talking about Spiriter Warlock stuff here when you relay this to the M’Dales. They’ll probably have a conniption otherwise.)

The sheriff had already had the corpse body-bagged when we returned to the sitting room, but I took a crack at searching the spot where it had been hanging, in case there was any lingering magic I could trace. I got more than I bargained for; somehow, I managed to briefly link myself to the mind of an otherworldly entity (other than Nollthep) for a few seconds. Demonic seems like an adequate adjective. I had to sit down and catch my breath, and Lea charmed the butler into bringing us some coffee while Nollthep went to search Cyril’s room and one of the deputies was sent out to bring Zachary back. Nollthep came back with the missing tome, and we discussed whether or not to let Penelope know about it. We opted to keep her in the dark until I’d had a chance to look through it.

After much too much time had passed without either Zach or the deputy returning, I felt a ripple of powerful magic underlaid with that same sense of the demonic and led the group outside to see what was up. Standing by the fountain, holding Zachary up like a stuck pig and with the deputy lying broken at its feet, was an 8-foot tall humanoid figure dressed like a butcher and wearing a leather pig mask that was bleeding from the seams. Reacting quickly, I wrapped the figure up in a Tangler while Nollthep produced a stack of playing cards and flung them one by one at the figure, as expertly as myself but without any spells attached. The thing barely reacted.

Lea ran over to try and save the deputy, but her magic betrayed her, draining life out of the man rather than putting more in.

I tried to engage the creature in conversation, just to establish that it wasn’t sentient, and then tried to see how it liked a bullet in the head.

Did I mention I acquired a revolver shortly after the Santa-squatch incident? It’s not my style, but without Carmilla around to handle the non-magical aspects of combat I have to make do.

Not that the bullet did any good in this event.

Nollthep tossed the spellbook to me and told me to try to find a counter-spell to whatever had summoned pig-head while he kept it busy. I quickly found a likely looking spell and started Weaving it together to the best of my ability. I hadn’t gotten far, though, before pig-head sensed the gathering magic and fled via dematerlization.

So, I learned that in this universe, evil spirits can sense when you’re trying to counteract the spell that summoned them to the mortal plan and can just get out of range before you’re done. That’s an unwelcome complication.

Once the dust had settled, an ambulance was called in. By some miracle, the deputy was still alive. Zachary, on the other hand, was missing all his internal organs as well as having bled out.

In the course of informing the Clemontes and the sheriff about what had happened in the driveway and some of our suspicions, Nollthep and the Sheriff got into a bit of an argument about whether or not magic is real. I could have gotten involved, but I was occupied with more important matters such as studying the spellbook and only rejoined the conversation when Nollthep left the room for a private conversation with Penelope and I overheard the Sheriff mention to Archie that there were reports of strange noises at the old slaughterhouse. Over Archie’s protests, the sheriff insisted that everyone stay put until the morning and left his remaining deputy to keep an eye on us.

Once the Sheriff was gone, I made it clear that I did not intend to wait around or leave the case in the hands of people who didn’t even believe in the existence of magic. I tried to conjure a basic mage-light to convince the deputy that I knew what I was talking about, but wound up with a tiny fireball instead. It was sufficient to convince the deputy, at least. Nollthep came back from his business with Penny and, naturally, agreed to accompany me. To my surprise, Lea also wanted to come along, because she figured that since I’d chased pig-face off once, the safest place to be was at my side.

It was a long walk to the slaughterhouse. It must have been abandoned shortly after the incident twenty years ago, because the place was empty and full of rusted equipment. I felt the presence of pig-face as soon as we entered the building. We decided that since pig-face had a… particular theme to him, we should start our search in the pork slaughtering section. The plan was to locate pig-face and figure out how to restrain him so he couldn’t escape while I cast the banishing spell on him.

In the pig area, we heard the sounds of actual pigs in the preparation pens and went to look. The things we found were mostly identical to normal pigs, but their eyes and teeth were more human than porcine, and they were munching on offal that included at least one intact human hand. Nollthep, working on the assumption that the pigs were sapient, attempted to cast a translation spell on himself and wound up just speaking gibberish and apparently losing his ability to comprehend Lea or me for several minutes.

Then we saw pig-face up in the rafters, holding a blood-soaked mallet. Nollthep produced his throwing cards and put some actual magic into them that briefly set fire to pig-face’s sleeve. The beast dropped down on us and walloped Nollthep. As I Wove a lightning bolt, Lea ran for cover behind me. She grabbed onto me briefly and, in that brief moment, the magic fell into place with my normal natural grace. The lighting struck pig-face, then arced off him and unlocked one of the pig pens. The pig-thing inside charged at Nollthep, but he swatted it up and into another pen with ease.

Pig-face came after me next, and I threw up a barrier to try and stop his mallet. I must have miscalculated, because the blow shattered the shield and knocked me back a bit. Could have been worse, I guess, but still…

Nollthep pulled out a chain of tied-up handkerchiefs and tried to tie pig-face up with them. It held for a few seconds, but not nearly enough time for me to even start the banishment. Lea suddenly ran off into the heart of the slaughtering area, and pig-face chased her once he broke loose. I got him in a Tangler, but it barely held him long enough for Nollthep to club him once. I heard Lea say something about finding the meat grinder that pig-face had first died in as I ran to keep up with the fight. I pushed past Nollthep and, in a bit of foolish desperation, tried to tackle pig-face and flip him off the walkway and into the machinery. You can probably guess how well that went. Pig-face had me by the neck and dangling over the suddenly active grinder before I could regain my balance. Nollthep whipped his hankie-chain around the specter’s arm to try and haul me out of danger, but pig-face resisted the pull and tossed a knife at Nollthep with his free hand. Then Lea found a meathook and chucked it at pig-face, and I was falling toward a mass of whirling blades and serrated rollers.

Reflex kicked in and I cast my Transport spell without thinking about how it would need to be adjusted. By pure luck, the spell not only worked but deposited me safely on the walkway away from the fight. As I made my way back to the action, I saw that my companions were in a bit of a panic thinking I’d just died (Nollthep apparently thought meat grinders just magically transmute flesh into meat or something and Lea didn’t see what happened). Lea’s grief was so great she actually summoned a big root up through the walkway and into pig-face’s arm just as the creature made a move to throw Nollthep into the grinder after me.

As for myself, I was starting to get annoyed. I’d cheated death by pure luck and pig-face was proving to very, very bothersome. Simply restraining him was no longer an option for me. He had to suffer a bit.

So I set him on fire. It didn’t do much on its own, but Nollthep threw on some sort of powder that exploded and knocked pig-face off the walkway. The creature threw the hooked chain from its belt and caught Nollthep by the shoulder, but I broke through the rusted chain with a simple Breaking before Nolly got pulled in after pig-face.

For reasons I don’t quite understand yet, being subjected to the same form of death a second time proved to be enough to end pig-face’s return to the physical world. Once he’d been thoroughly ground up, that persistent, buzzing sense of his presence vanished along with the human-toothed pigs. The gore they’d been feasting on remained, however. I took the hand I’d seen earlier for the police to check, in case it happened to have belonged to Cyril Clemonte. Nollthep went into a panic when I mentioned that theory and he swiftly dug through the viscera looking for anything that could be a heart. Once he found something, he vanished in a blink, presumably to deliver the goods to his Boss.

Lea and I returned to the mansion just long enough to tell the deputy what to expect when the cops went to the slaughterhouse and to hand over the hand. I then made sure Lea got home safely before returning to my hotel room.

When I arrived, I found a card on the bed. It invited me to visit a Madam Weaver, who apparently knows something that would be of use to me.

How useful it will actually be remains to be seen, but you may be seeing me or these letters sooner than I hoped.

With guarded hope,

Ash

#MOTW #Vulpin plays

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darkestwolfx · 5 years ago

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Rewards

This one took a bit of thinking, but then it came to me. I'm still planning to get all of these up by the end of March! Have faith.

13: Rewards

Full prompt: "The future rewards those who press on." – Barack Obama

Summary: Sometimes it seemed like your actions would never be rewarded. It will always come; some rewards just take longer to see.

Words: 1257

Spoilers: 'The Long Reach' [S3E25&26].

--------

He could easily have given up. All too easily. But there was lots waiting for him back home and he longed to see it again. So he'd push on, see where it got him, and if he lived another ten, maybe even thirty years, maybe even all of his life here, he hoped one day his efforts would mean something, bring him something.

But even if they never did, he wasn't going to give up. Because he had too much waiting for him back home to not even give it a shot of belief and hope. The chance to go home was worth more than giving up.

It might take a toll on him, but if it worked, if he could press on, survive and go home… well, there was no toll that couldn't eventually cure.

*****

It was hard. Hideously, atrociously – Scott didn't think there were enough adjectives to describe what it had been like.

There was nothing which covered losing your Father. Nothing. No way of saying it which made it better, no platitudes or euphemisms which lessened the blow.

Nothing anyone could say or do to make it better, no matter what they thought they could try.

The only way Scott could find was to keep going. To keep everyone ticking over.

*****

John had thought it over for days on end.

Agonising days with gravity not helping to lessen the headache. He'd been living on Five part time for ages now and with Dad gone… He moved up there permanently. He was better placed to help his brothers from up there.

And he had better resources. He scoured the oceans and the skies and space for weeks before he settled with himself that Dad couldn't be coming back from this one.

With the heaviest of hearts and tears that he wouldn't have shed on Earth, he decided to push on. He would do nothing for himself, or Dad, if he gave up.

So, wiping at his eyes, he answered the next call. And then the next, and the next, and the next…

*****

Push on, push onwards, keep going, don't stop, don't…

Don't nearly punch a whole in the wall might be a good idea.

He couldn't help being angry and upset, but he couldn't be because that wasn't what any of the people he rescued needed to see and it wasn't what his brothers were used to seeing. He was the calm, the artistic, the dispute settler… he wasn't the sort of brother who punched holes in his bedroom wall. No, that was Scott, and possibly (though hard to tell at a young age) Alan too…

He knew no one would blame him. How could they? He had just lost his Father, but he didn't want that to be the person he became. After all, that wasn't what Jeff Tracy would have wanted for him. So the man might not be around, but Virgil didn't want to let him down.

He decided to go on. For Dad.

*****

Gordon had never imagined it would happen so soon. He knew it would happen again, at some point it had too, but he'd always thought his parents would be old and grey before they went away; and yes, maybe that was a childish hope, but he had been a child, remember?

They were unlucky with Mum, to lose her like that and so young, but now Dad too? It didn't seem fair that neither of them got to grow truly old like Grandma and Grandad.

It wasn't fair, and he didn't like it. He wanted to lay in bed and wake up with it all having been a bad dream, or never wake up at all.

But that didn't get life back.

So he went on, hoping one day he could get it back.

*****

He didn't want to do anything. He didn't know how to and part of him didn't want to. What use was there? He was just a kid and schoolwork was rubbish and now he had no parents. His prospects in life seemed so small for Scott wouldn't let him near International Rescue yet, not save test flights of three to learn how to pilot, or little trips out with them, but nothing big; nothing dangerous.

But every day they went into danger, and Dad had gone into danger, and he hadn't come back. Ok, it had taken several missions before it happened, but it had still only taken the one to lose him. What's to say, it wouldn't be the same before he lost one – or more – of his brothers?

The fear and the grief were gripping, but his brothers helped him through.

And maybe continuing wasn't all that bad. Difficult, but not as bad as he thought it would be. The world wasn't- couldn't always be doom and gloom.

*****

Any one of them could have easily given up.

At any point.

But it took eight years.

Eight years of strife and heartbreak and hard work, and – although none of it was really about the reward – at the end they received the greatest reward of all for any rescue, and one that nothing could ever trump.

They had Dad; Jeff had his sons.

Brains had his friend, and Grandma had her boy back.

It was the unthinkable, the unimaginable, yet it was real. It had really happened. That was a fact the boys had to reconcile themselves to every day. It was something Jeff still had to remind himself of when he woke up in an actual bed. A number that Grandma had to correct every time she went to cook dinner.

There was one more of them now. Like there used to be.

"And to think," Gordon had begun after Dad had settled back onto the Island, "If we'd stopped International Rescue eight years ago, you might not be here now."

"We wouldn't have done that!" Alan had insisted, but it remained that there was a silent consensus around the brother's seated at the table: yes, we nearly did.

All it would have taken was for one of them to crack, to give up and stop, and down the whole thing would have gone like a stack of dominos. They lasted though, they held up because they were together.

Jeff had laughed, traditionally, stepping back into the role of Dad with ease. But underneath all that he knew how the boys felt. He couldn't deny thinking the same – not of his sons, oh no, he'd kept every faith in them! But there had been many tough days and nights when he thought… what if he just stopped trying to find a way home, gave up his efforts and just waited to see if anything came. But he hadn't. He feared nothing would have come if he waited on his laurels.

He didn't say any of that though, just as the boys didn't.

Instead, as Grandma busied herself dishing up Meatloaf Surprise – Jeff had already asked what the 'surprise' was only to be met with grimaces abound – he picked up where Dad's always should.

"Well, we're all here because you kept up the hard work. Mother, what was it that President Father used to like said?"

"Which one, dear?"

"Um… he was in power when I was born, wasn't he?"

"Oh! Yes, wonderful speaker! Let's see, your Father quoted it all the time… Ah ha, 'The future rewards those who press on'. That was it."

Well, that was definitely what they'd done, and now this was their reward.

#Thunderbirds #Scott Tracy #John Tracy #Virgil Tracy #Gordon Tracy #Alan Tracy #Jeff #ITV #CITV #Darkestwolfx #support your fanfic authors #downwithwritersblock #writers on tumblr #march prompts #ao3 #FF.Net #Tumblr #Rewards

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dbhilluminate · 5 years ago

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DBHI: Redemption- "The Open Door", pt. 3

ARE YOU A FAN OF DETROIT? DO YOU LIKE GAY SHIPS AND COMPLICATED, LOVEABLE BOYS?? Then please keep up with our fic, you’ll love it, I promise!

(Chapter art by dark_dumb)

**Co-authored by grayorca15

Characters: Trevor Langley, Dylan Fleur, Dennis Lenore (mentions of Rhea Fleur, Dahlia Fleur, Spencer) Word Count: 6,875

A rocky introduction leads to the beginnings of an unexpected mutual understanding, and an unlikely friendship more welcomed by one than the other.

• Archive link • Chapter Index • • Related Works • Characters •

Previous Chapter

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July 4th, 2041 - 9:18 PM The remainder of the trek back to the house was surprisingly short. Compared to the winding, off-road path their chase had taken through the trees, this road they traveled was a straight shot with only a few gentle curves right, left, and another slight left. It ended almost right back where they’d started- the trees opened up to a hill that sloped down toward the house, where the balcony stairs led up to the studio. Now that he had a moment and wasn’t just blindly running away from the house, he noticed that a grotto has been carved into the slope of the hill below the veranda, and made into a nook furnished with several lounge chairs and a few stone fireplaces for illumination and warmth. Small, open archway entrances on either side ruined the potential for complete privacy, but with the hill blocking the view at a distance, it seemed like the kind of space he’d like to pass the time in. Dylan trotted up the staircase while skipping two steps with each stride, draped his soiled cardigan and shirt over the banister, entered the house barefoot and shirtless, then grabbed another sleeveless cardigan off the back of a chair and threw it on without stopping. Trev crept in behind him with his hands in his pockets while minding the globs of paint on the floor that were still a little wet (even after nearly an hour’s drying time), then stopped to examine the room. It was exactly as he’d glimpsed the first time through, more of a studio to work in than a chamber to rest, even if the couch in the far-right corner from where he was standing (which was covered in blankets) said otherwise. The beamed, vaulted ceilings framed out to beige and walnut walls, otherwise covered in abstract impressionist paintings, displayed whatever work-in-progress charcoal sketches he’d been working on in his spare time. There were at least three tables, each home to a different art medium, the perimeter dotted with cloth-covered easels. A number of empty paint cans held dozens of broken-in paintbrushes among other drawing tools. A large, plastic tarp had been strung up behind the largest canvas to the left, protecting the wall behind. The fourth wall, the closest to his right, was taken up by a brick oven, a tabletop anvil, a metalworking workbench, and a pottery wheel, of all things. Stacks of books littered the floor, handfuls of canvases leaned against the walls, piles of assorted paint cans were arranged in small caches beneath the tables, on shelving, or stored in cabinetry like the one in the middle of the room blocking a trapdoor leading to the room beneath it. In the back-right corner (on the other end of the couch) was a deep, well-loved stainless-steel sink spotted with countless layers of dried pigments that had never quite washed off. The last thing he noticed was a ten-gallon aquarium filled with greenery and scratchy substrate, resting on a table in the back-left corner of the room next to the door; what it could have housed was a mystery, because the animal wasn't present. Altogether this was clearly the space of someone who spent a lot of their time trying to find their muse, and it was by no means a cheap vocation. The many paint cans alone ran into the hundreds of dollars, budget-wise, but the clue that most interested Trev sat opened on one of the tables: a ripped plastic bag, still half full of unfilled water balloons, next to an old paint encrusted funnel- also known as an ammo dump, in tonight’s case. Lovely. Langley feigned rubbing at his chin to hide a reflexive twitch. Surrounded by this breadth of creative thought brought to inanimate life made him realize how foreign it all was. He felt more like the outsider here than at any time prior this evening. “If this is the part where I state the obvious... I’ll skip it, if you prefer.” But Dylan said nothing of the sort. “What I’d prefer…? Or what you’d prefer?” His tone piqued from around the corner of the wall dividing the side of the room to Trevor’s right, and he glanced up from digging around in a laundry basket to flash him a friendly grin. “Cause I’d prefer you say what’s on your mind.” Fleur tossed him a white V-neck top and a pair of black joggers as he passed on his way across the room, presumably to give him the space to change, at which Trev had only hesitated long enough to be reasonably sure he wasn’t being watched. When he was satisfied that he was not, Langley slipped the slacks and jacket off, meticulously folded them both, and briefly inspected the top beneath before he took it off and decided to bag it as well. If he was going to change into something clean and dry, he might as well have gone the whole nine yards. All the while, he thought on his reply. Dylan probably expected him to disclose something in return, but what was more benign than talking about the weather? “What’s on my mind is how much I prefer not to say what’s on my mind,” he replied idly as he pulled the shirt on over his head and fruitlessly tried to finger-comb his gummed-up hair back into something neat so it wasn’t sticking out at such odd angles. “I was only going to say your space suits you. Obvious as it gets, right?” “Obvious? Or observational?” Dylan countered as he fussed with the canvas tarp over a six-foot square canvas against the opposite side of the room, unfolded the corners and pulled them out from under the wooden frame. When he put it that way, Trev supposed, one adjective did sound more negative than the other. “Regardless,” he paused just long enough to grab two fistfuls of the canvas tarp, then yanked; the fabric fluttered through the air and settled onto the ground beside him in a huge heap. “That wasn’t so hard, now was it?” he asked with a smile as Trev stopped beside him to examine the piece.

Removing the cover revealed a painting obscured by a few random splotches of paint deposited by the impact of water balloons, a sensation which he had been intimately introduced to that night. Even with chunks of the painting covered by mostly opaque layers of gesso, he could see what it was supposed to be: a man doubled over, hugging himself, fingers rending deep, clawed cuts into the skin of his ribs, the punctures leaking inky black shadows rather than life-giving crimson. The face had been turned away from the viewer, intentionally left obscured against a foggy, muddled backdrop of red, black, and gray. It was certainly a far cry from the hyper-realistic portrait hanging just outside the room- the erratic, emotionally charged brushstrokes, vivid colors, and sharp contrast of this piece were much more in line with what he’d expected after hearing about Dylan Fleur from his family members. The style was every bit as edgy and eccentric as he.

“Do you make art or war with it?” he murmured as he approached, still distracted by the thought that the painting may have been a self-portrait. He could hear Dylan scoff as another stray balloon hit one corner of the canvas and splashed a clashing layer of green over the top of an existing spot. Trev flinched ever so slightly as it splattered just a few feet away; the movement reminded him to blink, not stare in such overt confusion. “What’s this supposed to be?” “Another failure, like me,” Dylan half-joked as he wandered away to find dry pants. With no reason to follow, Trev stayed where he was and gave the piece another slow look over. It counted as evidence of something- the act of depicting what he could only interpret as some sort of inner turmoil, rather than keeping it bottled up in one’s head, was a tried-and-true coping mechanism, but not something he himself could relate to. Trevor’s closest comparison was having a department sketch artist work with a witness to a crime to recall facial features and distinguishing characteristics of a person of interest, which was similar in its intent only to identify the concept of someone. “Only failure I’m seeing here are the new stains you added.” Tempting as it was to reach out and try wiping the unsightly green off the defaced piece, Trev contented himself with working out another stubborn flake of yellow clinging to his hair. “I mean, it wasn’t finished yet, was it?” “It was, but I didn’t like it anymore, I’m gonna start over with something different,” he explained, then added as an afterthought with a frown after checking a grouping of paint cans on the floor under the coffee table. “Gotta go buy more acrylic gesso before I can, though.” “And this is why you had balloons filled with paint? You were going to trash it?” “You almost sound offended,” Dylan teased, noting the way his brows lifted in reserved judgment at the idea. Trevor cast a corrective, brown-eyed glance at him, but stopped short when Dylan met it with a disarming smile. “I’m not, I just-... don’t understand why you’d put so much effort into creating something, only to destroy it.” “It’s common practice for artists to recycle canvases when they get sick of looking at old pieces and don’t want to stretch a new one,” Fleur explained in his most educational tone as he crossed his arms and turned to step toward him. “It might have been therapeutic to paint this at the time, but I’m ready to move on from what inspired it.” “And what was that?” Dylan swallowed the answer to that question; apparently, he hadn’t earned the right to know yet, but he was perfectly fine with that. It was just one less reason to get attached. Instead, the boy ventured another risk, his voice weaker with a hint of melancholy. “Can’t you feel it…?” Trevor clenched his teeth and shot him a sharp look, not in the mood for a guessing game. “You’re the one who painted it- so you tell me.” “I could, but that would defeat the purpose of painting it.” For a moment he gazed at the painting and seemed to lose himself in the feelings it evoked, feelings that were readable on his face clear as day, even if he didn’t want to see it. “Art is a wordless form of communication that makes it a hell of a lot easier to explain thoughts you might otherwise had a hard time articulating,” he explained with a sideways glance in his direction; already, Trev could feel the prickling sensation in the back of his mind, and he didn’t like it. “Why tell what you can show?” Trev scowled, more obviously this time. He could feel it, all too vividly, and he didn’t want to. That was the problem. It wasn’t the painting itself or who its artist was, it was the similarities of the imagery and the read-into meanings that hit too close to home for comfort. It was anguish if he’d ever felt it (and he had, after he’d lost everything he’d ever known to the rise of Purgatory, the day that Boston fell), and a deep desire to cut oneself open to bleed it out just to feel the release the bloodletting would deliver. It was dark, unnerving, and passively comforting to know they shared this common pain. And that was exactly why he refused to answer him. “Thing about art is, it’s not always meant to be permanent,” Dylan continued, undeterred at his audience’s voluntary silence. “Sometimes it’s transient, transformative- like pain.” “So, you’re saying that art is pain?” It was a suitable comparison, considering the subject matter of this particular piece, and just enough of a diversion away from the uncomfortable subject to merit a response. “Sometimes… yes,” Fleur answered thoughtfully, his green-eyed gaze too transfixed to pay him any mind as Trev eyed the ink on his skin one more time and took a closer look at the flowers on his left arm. In the case of tattoos, it was more than sometimes. “Why bother with it, then?” he asked, genuinely confounded by the contradiction. “Compulsion,” he stated plain and simple as he closed his eyes, shook his head, and lowered his chin. “The pain I suffer when I don’t create is often worse than briefly facing it to scream it onto the page.” “If you say so.” Much as he detested the urge to, Trev could relate. It was very tempting to go sour at the thought of someone at Cyberlife thinking to get creative enough to the point they would try to dupe one of their products (i.e., himself) into thinking it was the real flesh-and-blood deal. Had he the pleasure of making that person’s acquaintance, it would not have been a peaceable meeting of minds. To equate it to Dylan’s example, he was the canvas upon which something new had been redrawn. Then that second layer had been unceremoniously torn off, like garish wallpaper stripped away to reveal the bare panels underneath. No one ever asked the paper if it wanted to be removed, was the only difference. Far as it was concerned, who knew if it had simply been content as it was? Not a fan of the phantom ache that seemed to settle in between his ears, Trev shut his eyes to scratch at the leftover paint flakes above one ear. The oldest spot was turning stiff, and therefore itchy. “You sound a lot like your- sisters,” he commented, cracking an eye open once the scratching was done. “No coincidence, I’m sure.” Dylan attempted a faltering smile that spoke loudly of insecurity and he turned toward one of the tables covered in brush cans, and swiped up a chunk of brush soap. “If that were true, I’d be better off,” he mused morbidly as he returned to his side and reached for the worst of the clumps in his hair. “But I’ll take that as a compliment, ‘cause they’re the best people I know, even if they can be a little...” Trev smacked away his hand when he reached up to try and help get the paint out of his hair. He thought he had made it clear that with their game over, he wasn’t of a mind to be touched, but Fleur just chuckled in response and tossed him the soap and a comb before taking a step back. “...overbearing.” “You know a touch of that yourself,” the android countered with a grumble. “All the earnestness of you three combined…” He let the words hang unfinished and tried running the bristles into his hair, wincing as they stuck against the clumps before eventually pulling through with enough force applied. “It’s contagious in this family,” Dylan joked with a short laugh as he busied himself with filling a bucket with hot, soapy water and finding a couple of sponges. “Can’t really help treating everyone else the same ‘til I know their boundaries.” Boundaries. Trevor nearly snorted. If he’d really given a shit about those, he wouldn’t be wearing his loaned clothes and scraping paint out of his hair. If this was how Dylan treated family, then he actually felt sorry for Dahlia and Rhea. “My classmates rarely say hello to me outside of courses, yet here’s a whole evening full of coddling people to make up for it. Ugh.” He didn’t mean to sound ungrateful; it was just his reality. Even the instructors tended to give him a wide berth- with no official report delivered accounting for who he was, he supposed he couldn’t fault them for being leery of what they didn’t know, but that didn’t mean it didn’t hurt some days. “What are you, then...?” he diverted, after a brief pause. “A student, or a hobbyist?” “Third-year fine arts at Cranbrook Academy of Arts,” Dylan replied as he knelt to wipe as much of the paint off the floor as he could with some dry rags, then followed up with a wet sponge. “I do my schoolwork from home and video call to talk to my professors or participate in classes when I need to.” Another clue to file away in the growing dossier, one that sufficed to explain why he was such a homebody. The sight of him cleaning his own floors gave Trevor pause. If he’d grown up in a house this size, with a plethora of servants to do the work for him, wouldn’t it be logical for him to leave the mess for one of them to clean up? Yet here he was, humbling himself to scrub paint off the hardwood, already damaged by years of splashed oil and turpentine. “And when you’re not doing all that…? Pranks are it?” “Pranks are reserved for special occasions, and special people…” Dylan insisted as he crawled from one partial shoeprint to the next, dragging the bucket with him. “But I do a lot of this thing called sleeping, too… y’know?” He flashed him a small grin and popped his brows. “What about you? What do you do in your spare time that’s better than...” One hand gestured around the room at ‘all this’ was enough for him to understand the question. To immediately draw a distinction as one hobby being somehow better than the other, Trev didn’t care for that presumption. Not one bit. “I study.” He left his retort at two words and resumed brushing his hair, though the movements turned sharp and jerky, the more frustrated he became. As far as he was concerned, coursework was not inherently more rewarding than art, it was just what he knew; and by the numbers, he was already better at it than eighty percent of his classmates. Though, fitting in the occasional ride-along patrol with Dennis didn’t hurt either. It served to get him outside, at least. “And that which I’m expected to learn is as boring as it is privileged information, not for the general public to know. Not much else to it.” “So, you’re a student, too,” Dylan noted without looking up. The virility in Trev’s inner thoughts was lost on him, and for the best since he’d apparently misread his implication to begin with. “Believe it or not, I do like quiet nights in, it’s just that...” Dylan’s eyelids fluttered momentarily as he paused between cleaning spots on the floor. “...it does get really lonely.” That bordered on too close to his own thoughts. How was it their experiences could be so different, yet so universal? “And this is how you force people into spending time with you?” Langley growled quietly but a whine of distress slipped through as the comb finally snagged in the tangled knot he’d been brushing it all toward. Snagged and stuck. Fleur stopped what he was doing, walked over to the sink, and filled a brush can with hot water. “You know, you could have walked away the first time you tried,” he reminded as he strode back over, leaving it at that instead of further rubbing it in that he’d made the conscious decision to stay. In a wordless movement, he took the soap out of Trev’s hand, dunked it into the can, and lathered it into a frothy mess, then tried at touching his hair again. As expected, Trevor flinched away like a wounded animal; but instead of giving up, Fleur just took in a breath to steady himself, and waited for his feral instincts to subside. “You’re making it a lot harder for yourself than it needs to be. This will help, if you let it. Please.” In spite of the mess of mixed up feelings working overtime to push him as far away as they possibly could, Dylan still wasn’t intimidated by his snarling. How could he be so calm in the face of anger? Where everyone else would have given up, he’d persisted, against his better judgment. Whether it was just sheer stupidity or naivety, he couldn’t say, but the boy’s patience was admirable. Or, maybe, learned. Trev’s brown eyes shifted focus over his shoulder at the painting one more time and withered just enough to drain the tension out of his expression. He wondered just what his trauma could have been to have left such a deep, festering wound, and how he could have remained so patient in spite of it. Hesitantly, he lowered his hands, but not his guard; for the moment, he was tired of feeling so tightly wound. Fleur fingered the solidified chunk of hair and softly worked the soap into it from root to tip until he could feel the paint start to break down. The sensation of discomfort in Trev’s scalp subsided almost immediately, to his relief, but when Fleur reached for the comb, he snatched it out of the way and recoiled back to brush it out himself. No gloating smile or snarky grin came in response. Instead he just gave him the smallest hint of a smile as he watched him comb the knot out with considerably less effort. “Better?” A mumbled, disgruntled ‘Yeah, thanks’ was all he could offer in return amidst the combing. The paint came out easily now with the help of the soap, whether or not he wanted to admit that accepting his help had done him some good. The large, almost rubbery paint clumps rolled out with the lather in thin strands which dissolved into thinner pieces the longer it sat in the suds. As Dylan turned back to his cleanup, Trev made the short trip to the sink in the back corner of the room with the sofa and stooped to attempt to rinse the mess out of his hair. He took his glasses off to fold up and hook over the collar of his shirt. Even if it was only a partially-simulated shower, it still served to do what running water over the head at the end of a long, tiring day did best: it made him think, made him wonder… Trev reached for the faucet and turned it off, wrung the water out of his hair as best he could, then reached for a hand towel and rubbed as much of the remaining dampness as he could out of it. If Fleur was really such a misanthrope that he rarely bothered to come out of his studio, then what had made him want to try and get to know him? Or rather, what made him ‘special enough’ to want to pull such an infuriating prank? Somewhere between the boring and the interesting, he was on the more favorable end of that scale, and that necessitated investigation. “Why me?” he asked softly, his focus directed at the drain, towel still draped around his neck and hands gripped tight on the edge of the sink. Dylan paused mid-scrub and briefly met his eyes as Trevor looked his way. The look in them said everything and more, but Dylan answered anyway, in the simplest way he could. “...because you get it.” “Despite efforts to the contrary,” Trev noted pessimistically as he resumed brushing. This earned a quiet chuckle from his company, and Dylan paused to remain sitting on his knees for a few moments while cleaning up the last shoe print. “...you’re hardly the most difficult person I’ve encountered,” Fleur admitted, to his surprise. Privately, he wondered if Dennis knew this, and if he did, to what degree- the whole ugly truth, or just a partial account. Alternatively, to have anyone describe him as somehow not difficult gave Trev another reason to pause. He stopped brushing a moment to peel gathered paint crumbs from between the bristles and hesitated, the question hitched in his throat. “And if I was, would we be having this conversation?” “Knowin’ me…? Yeah, probably,” Dylan snorted as he dunked the sponge in the now-lukewarm water and wrung it out. “But it also depends on what you mean by difficult, because it takes a lot to piss me off- narcissism, chauvinism, egotism, prejudice, bein’ an asshole just because you can.” The last two terms actually drew a curl in his lip as he scrubbed harder to scratch the dried paint off the hardwood with the rough side of the sponge. “Fame chasing, glory-seeking, hurting someone because it’ll benefit you or because it just makes you happy to cut someone else down- that’s the kind of shit I can’t deal with in large doses, an’ I’ve met a lot of people like that in my life to know em’ when I see ‘em. So, you tell me, Langley.” He paused long enough to spare him a questioning look. “Are you any of those things? Or are you just hurtin’ and still a little too raw for comfort?” As he slid his glasses back on, Trevor swallowed, equal parts affronted and not that Dylan could see right through whatever he had passing for a mask. He blinked a few times to cover the involuntary twitch in his eyes, if not hide the nervous tremor in his throat that generated from nowhere to derail the sardonic retort he’d put together. And here he once thought getting away from Rhea and Dahlia would mean avoiding discussing this. A response to the former query and not the latter would be an answer in itself, no matter how he worded it, and that would have to suffice. “If I am those qualities in any measure, it’s not intentional. I… I’m still figuring it out.” Trevor focused on a stretched lock of hair and picked a few remaining paint clumps out, to avoid focusing on how hot his cheeks had become. “It’s- complicated.” “Well, take a breath, then, ‘cause as far as I can see, you’re not.” Dylan pushed himself up off the floor and stooped to pick up the bucket, then turned and looked over with a reassuring smile. “I can handle damaged, Trev. I’d be a hypocrite if I couldn’t.” The flush faded and Trev set his eyebrows in a flat line to mirror his mouth. It was nice to offer, but… “Not sure mine’s the kind of damage you’d care to hear about,” he deflected half-heartedly. “Then try me some time, you might be pleasantly surprised.” Part of him wished he hadn’t said it, but another, slightly larger part of him felt relieved at his offer. Persistence was starting to get through to him, or maybe he was just tired of arguing semantics. He watched as Fleur crossed the room, a rag and bucket in hand, and bent down to wipe up the small bits of yellow that had spilled out into the hallway. This whole encounter had started off so completely opposite, he was having a hard time believing he was still talking to the same person that had him so thoroughly pissed off an hour earlier. Instead of being at odds with a new enemy, he now found himself in the company of someone who was just as misunderstood as he- someone genuine, someone kind, someone with the potential to be a real friend if he was ever brave enough to venture out of his shell again. Which he had already begun to do, whether he wanted it or not. The charm had been one of the first things he had joked about, but self-deprecating or not, there had been truth in what he’d said: Dylan was magnetic and charismatic, much more so than he was repulsive. And out of the hundreds- hell, thousands of people he’d probably met and decided he wanted nothing to do with, he saw something in him that made him determined enough to dig his heels in and persist despite Trev’s resistance. In the end, he had taught him a valuable lesson about loosening up- and how accepting help wasn’t an admission of defeat, but a valuable tool in overcoming problems (as demonstrated by the comb now gliding through his hair with ease). He didn’t have to be alone if he didn’t want to be, he didn’t have to bury his trauma under so many layers of irritation and short-tempered reactions and never again trust another enough to open up. But he wasn’t quite there yet, brave enough to face the full scope of all that wasn’t on the agenda. Dylan had somehow managed to throw back the curtains on his gloom and doom and let the light in, but he wasn’t ready to open the window. “Not today,” he finally replied after several minutes of silence, not wanting to sound too much like he’d be willing to consider acting on his offer, if their budding friendship even made it that far; even still, the implication of his word choice was apparently obvious enough. Dylan smiled, more happy than mischievous initially, but because it was in his nature to not let things get too comfortable (which Trev quietly thanked him for), it tainted the otherwise lighthearted mood with coy suspicion. “You mean you might come back one of these days…? After everything I put you through…?” Instantly, Trevor backpedaled with a defensive finger point at his teasing. “Hey- don’t push your luck,” he warned, eyes squinty and head tilted. “It’s almost like I knew you were a good egg…” “Alright, that’s it- visitation rights have been revoked.” “What!?” Dylan’s fake-outrage was overpowered by laughter and a charming smile Trev found himself growing fonder of every time he saw it (and deep down, it terrified him). “But I just complimented you…!” “Keep it up, and I might just relocate to the next zip code, and change my name.” It might have been the best thing for him, if this kept up. “Oh, come on now, don’t be so dramatic…” Another ten minutes of idle banter elapsed before the world outside saw fit to make itself known again. Appearing with as little warning as he had the first time, Dennis Lenore didn’t knock. To find them right back where they began wasn’t a big leap of logic, having last seen them at the onset of the chase, although he probably did wonder why Trev didn’t simply return to the dining room. The sight of him perched atop one of the stools -in a fresh set of borrowed leisure clothes, listening to Dylan chatter on and on with a faint smile, a few stubborn flakes of paint still entrenched in his hairline- got an instant smirk out of him, though no questions were asked, about the fate of the suit or otherwise. “Well, I see you two are gettin’ along great.” His choice of adjective was enough to get a mildly-irritated glower out of both of them. This was, in part, all the older officer’s doing. ‘You’ll thank me later,’ he’d said, somewhat premonition-like. There was absolutely no way he hadn’t known what he was doing. Trev breached that new silence first with a mannerly stretch. “Yes, sir. Mr. Fleur is… different from what I expected.” “So, it’s Mr. now, huh?” Dylan teased with a sideways glance and a smirk. “Don’t get used to it,” he quickly amended once he realized how awkward it sounded, given how Dennis’ expression curdled a bit. “In any case, he was generous enough to not leave me a mess afterward.” “Hey, aftercare is important,” Dylan chimed in with a smirk and a ribbing nudge as he got up and passed Trev on his way to dump out the water bucket. The double meaning went over Trev’s head initially, but it came back around like a boomerang when it got an uncomfortable snort and a chuckle out of Lenore, and he flushed softly with an annoyed scowl. “Just glad to see you’re both in one piece.” “We had a rough start, but… we came to an understanding, of not understanding,” Fleur explained with a sideways wink in Trev’s direction that was met by a sigh and an eye-roll that somehow bordered on amicable. “It could have been much worse.” “Or better.” A sputtering choke on his next words at the evolution of Den’s expression from amused to devious did well enough to convey that the context had not been lost on him that time, but the blushing helped. “So does that mean you’re stayin’ the night, or do we need to get gone?” Trev sat up a bit straighter and practically jumped out of the chair as he made a note of the time. “I have classes tomorrow,” he reminded in nervous tenor, almost as if he’d completely forgotten. It was, technically, a few short hours away; even if he didn’t need to sleep, he could use a recharge after the events of the night. Thankfully, the courses were held during reasonable daytime hours, so there was still time. Looking less than compelled to back him up, Dennis shrugged and eyed him with no small measure of skepticism. “Don’t blow a gasket. You’ll only need a few hours’ recharge. Could stay and have a new uniform at the front door tomorrow morning.” “No, sir. I already-“ Trev’s stuttering insistence got the better of him momentarily, and he paused to take a calming breath. “Your suit is already going to need washing; I couldn’t impose any more expenses.” “Ah, give it a rest, Den… if he wants to go home, it’s fine by me. Wouldn’t want him to OD on my company the first night.” There was a twinge of disappointment in Dylan’s voice as he shut off the faucet and placed the bucket aside to dry. He crossed his arms and pulled the sleeveless cardigan shut over his bare chest as he crossed the room and set his gaze on the floor. The motion came across like curtains on a stage show being drawn closed. Reminded of the quiet, empty dorm room waiting for him back in the city, Trev was a bit taken aback at how he didn’t sprint right out the door. Given the chance, Dennis offering to arrange it so they might stay was and wasn’t tempting, for a multitude of reasons. On one hand, the realization that for the last half an hour, he’d felt more even-tempered and calmer than he had in months, insisted he stay; but on the other, paranoia that this wouldn’t (or maybe couldn’t) last compelled him to go and pretend none of this ever happened. Fleur’s upbeat mood suddenly deflating with the realization they’d have to pick this exchange up another day, was strangely not as satisfying to see as he’d thought it would be; if anything, it was a disappointment he understood, as much as he didn’t want to. But he hadn’t made any promises to come back, only to consider they stay in touch. That wasn’t necessarily a binding contract, or even a verbal agreement. Still, being the eagle-eyed detective that he was, Dennis read between the lines just fine. “I can always pull him off a patrol to send over as needed, Dylan. The socialization will do you both a world of good.” Trev hid another twitch by grabbing up the plastic bag containing his spotted garments, looked down at himself, then sidelong at Dylan. “I will need to return these at some point,” he debated audibly. The notion perked him up ever so slightly, and his eyes caught Trev’s flicker of brown with a sideways glance. “You can keep them if you want. You said you don’t have many clothes to begin with, right?” he offered as he meandered toward the painting and leaned one shoulder against canvas frame. “They’re not really my… preference,” he declined, but as expected, Dylan was un-dissuaded. One hand lifted and rapped a knuckle against the wooden stretch beam behind him with a grin. “Then maybe next time, we can throw this shit where it was supposed to go- maybe show you an old black an’ white?” Dennis squinted at the canvas, gleaning only a surface impression before mutely shaking his head. Nick probably wouldn’t have found this work along the same lines of ‘nice’, were he there to see it. Trev barely managed to not cringe; he still couldn’t understand his reasoning for why he’d want to wash away all that hard work with a new coat of paint. “I don’t know when that might be. I have- assignments to tend to.” Lenore called the excuse out for what it was and shot him a scowl accompanied by a light slap on the shoulder. “Stop lying, kid. It’s unbecoming of any policeman,” he scolded over his shoulder as he turned out the door. Dylan tossed Dennis an annoyed look that screamed ‘knock it off’ as he walked away, ineffective as it was when aimed at the back of his head, then turned back to respond to Trevor with an open-ended offer. His fingers nervously twitched and squeezed at his arm just trying to get it out. “Well… if you get lonely or want someplace else to chill, you know where to find me. I’m always here, don’t have much else goin’ on.” One hand extended to gesture around the room with a flourish and a chuckle to illustrate this. Decorated or not, it probably wasn’t as lively-looking as he made it seem. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.” To Trev, it sounded ideal. A chamber within which one was pretty much guaranteed isolation was the best possible setting to ‘introvene’, as the made-up term would imply. Dylan made a face, clearly not of the same opinion. “It can be, when you start goin’ stir-crazy from bein’ cooped up inside for so long.” And...? He wasn’t already half crazy by default? Trev scoffed, pushed his glasses back into place. “That’s what walks are for.” His second favorite pastime- it might not be as exciting as some alternatives, but after what he had been through, monotonous was right up his alley. “Yeah, and we’ve got a lot of land to do that on, and you wouldn’t even have to worry about running into other people…” Fleur raised his brows, probably expecting him to come around to the idea. “How’s that sound?” “Almost perfect,” Trev replied with a slight smirk that dropped as soon as it appeared. “But you’d still be there.” Dylan rolled his eyes, smiled big and shook his head. “C’mon… I thought we were past that.” “I also told you not to push your luck, but here we are.” “Who’s bein’ pushy…?” The coy grin lingering on his lips almost reached the apples of his cheeks. “I’m just gently planting seeds.” Artists had a penchant for using such poetic phrases, it was true. “So- what? You’re a gardener now, too…?” LANGLEY! YOU COMIN’ OR STAYIN’? “COMING!” Trev shouted back, almost jumping as he nervously made for the door. His own impulsive reaction to yell versus use the com left him cringing. “I mean- I’d say it was nice meeting you, but it was easily one of the worst introductions I’ve ever suffered.” Not the worst- it was up there, as far as he could remember. But it had also somehow segued into the smoothest recovery he’d ever witnessed. Not that he’d ever tell him that. Dylan chuckled again, perpetually amused. “Hey- Mom always said it was better to leave an impression than to be immediately forgotten…” “Yes, well, you’ve certainly done that.” Looking down at himself, Trev managed not to lose it to another flustered tirade. One way or another, these clothes would have to come back. “I’ll… drop these off when I can.” The look that crossed Fleur’s face was that of surprised contentment, even a little bashfulness. Somehow, he’d evidently gotten the response he’d been waiting for out of him, and it seemed even he didn’t expect to succeed. Before he could delay their departure any longer, he turned on his heel and made for the stairs, Dylan’s voice calling out to catch him just as he passed through the threshold of the studio. “Don’t feel like you need to bother with calling ahead, the door’s always open.” Letting Trev make the decision as to when that would be, compared to Dennis’ indirect attempt to force him into making a commitment on the spot, went a long way in fostering his slowly developing appreciation for Dylan Fleur, however irksome he was. Perhaps that was why he’d been finding it so hard to leave. After all, there had only ever been one other person he’d gelled with so quickly after meeting. Langley’s hand balled into a fist at his side as the tremor returned, his pace quickened to a trot down the bottom steps, and he nearly sprinted out the door to catch up with Dennis before he missed his ride home. He didn’t want to think about this right now, he didn’t need to be reminded of that gaping wound in his heart. That had been the real problem with this situation- the fact that he simultaneously saw too much and too little of a dead man in him. Maybe it needn’t have been so difficult, but he hadn’t wanted it to be this easy either.

#detroit: become human #detroit become human fanfiction #dbh #dbh fanfiction #dbh fanfic #dbhilluminate #dbhiredemption

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bibliothesoph · 5 years ago

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snowbaz flower shop au bc lord knows we don’t have enough of those

BAZ.

It's been a long day, but I still have one more thing to do. Since it's Daphne's birthday tomorrow and my father is an insufferable bastard, I'm the one who has to go pick up flowers for her. If it were any other day I wouldn't really mind, but I'm utterly knackered after my full day of lessons. By the time I make it to the flower shop to pick up the arrangement my father ordered, the store is already closed.

I sigh and pull out my phone to find an open shop nearby, praying that there's a half decent place that's still open. I know that my father will be upset that it's not the arrangement he chose (or, more accurately, that his assistant picked out) but I'm fairly confident in my ability to pick out a simple yet elegant arrangement. My father, who still totally refuses to admit that I'm gay, says I simply acquired my mother's good taste.

What a load of fucking nonsense.

Thankfully I find a place that's open. It's only a few blocks away and it's open for another hour so I should make it there with plenty of time to spare. I quickly make my way through the hoards of pedestrians and find the shop. When I enter, I'm really quite glad that my day has worked out like this.

There's a boy (who looks to be around my age) walking around with pots stacked high in his arms. He has the most gorgeous, untamed curls bounding off in different directions and piercing blue eyes that remind me of the sky. His face is splattered with a collection of moles and freckles that make him look positively adorable . I swear that my heart nearly stops when I see him.

Evidently, I seem (more likely the bell on the door, but I'd like to think that I had something to do with it) to have the same effect on him because as soon as I enter, his mouth drops open and he trips over himself, sending the pots clattering to the ground.

SIMON. Today's been a bloody nightmare. Ebb was sick so I had to skip my lessons and work the shop all by myself. Normally I don't mind running things on my own, but it was like the universe wanted to fuck me over today. I had to make five huge orders on top of the three that Ebb had set aside for the day, along with doing the daily plant maintenance. With one hour left in my work day, I'm totally knackered and just really hope that no one else comes in. I really don't think I could deal with another order right now.

But, just my luck, another customer comes in with less than an hour until closing. When I hear the bell chime on the door I accidentally trip over something because my annoyance has me distracted. The pots in my arms go flying and break into hundreds of clay pieces on the floor, sprawling out by the foot of the customer.

"Sorry," I mumble as I go to the back to fetch the broom and dustpan. I don't even look at the costumer—I'm far too embarrassed. Maybe Penny was right—maybe this is too much for me to handle.

When I return to clean up my mess, the customer grabs the broom and clears their throat. I slowly meet their gaze and, I swear to god, my heart nearly stops beating right there.

Standing in front of me is the most elegant bloke I've ever seen. I can think of about a million adjectives to describe him—hot, chiseled (but in a statue way, not a hunky way), fit, sexy, gorgeous—but I think that elegant (or maybe regal) is the best of them all. He's in a maroon button up and black trousers and he's got his lovely long hair that frames his face like he's a damn painting. He might be. He's perfect enough to be art, certainly.

"I..."

"Let me take care of this," he says, still holding onto the broom. Can I speak? I think my throat is too dry to even try. "I'd like to place an order for an arrangement, if that's alright."

I want to tell him that I'll make him a hundred arrangements right now. I want to tell him that I'll pay him for me to make him arrangements, but lord knows that I've never been good with words.

"O-of course. Uh, what's the arrangement for?"

I'd like to argue with him about the sweeping, but he's already gotten started and it makes sense for him to sweep while I work. He mist have realized that or he never would have offered.

BAZ. I don't really know why I decided to sweep up for him, but he's so adorable (even as he stammers over his words) that I couldn't resist. It does make sense, though. If I sweep, he can make the arrangement and we can get two things done at the same time.

Not that I'm itching to leave.

"My mother," I say. "Well, step mother. It's her birthday and my father wanted me to find something suitable for her. Elegant, you know?"

The boy nods and runs his fingers through his curls as he makes his way behind the counter. I continue to sweep dust, making sure to look up at him every few seconds.

"Right. Well...what's she like?"

I blink at him for a moment, totally taken aback by his question. Favorite color I would understand, but surely her personality doesn't matter for an arrangement.

"Why does it matter? It's a flower arrangement." I don't really mean for it to sound condescending, but I'm afraid it comes off that way. I have expect him to glare at me, but instead he just grins and his eyes get all bright.

"Each flower has a meaning, yeah? So when I make arrangements, I like to make them based off the personality of whoever the arrangement is for. It's like a physical collection of their personality traits, you know? It gives the gift more meaning. I mean, I can usually read people pretty well, but since she's not here..."

"Okay, then what would my arrangement look like?"

"Amaryllis, aster, iris, heather, and peony," he says, without batting an eye.

SIMON. "Amaryllis, aster, iris, heather, and peony," I say, without hesitation.

He looks at me like he's either very amused or very scared. "Care to explain your choices?"

I clear my throat, take his hand, and usher him around the shop to point out each flower. "Okay, well that's iris and that stands for royalty and I thought it was a good pick because you look posh and elegant. That's heather which is for admiration because... well, I can't quite explain it, but it seems like people look up to you. That one there is aster which wisdom, or, in some cases, devotion, but I think that's laying it on a bit thick. Next is amaryllis which is pride, but not in like a bad way or anything. The meanings can differ depending on what you read, but those are the ones I know."

I leave out peony because, to be honest, I'm extremely embarrassed that I said that.

Unfortunately, he notices that I left it out. "And peony?"

I swallow a lump in my throat. "I...uh... I mean, we'll, it stands for romance."

I really wish I could just, like, burst into flames right now. I look to see his reaction, but he's typing something on his phone. I'm a bit pissed, if I'm being honest, since I really just put myself out there and he can't be bothered, but I guess it's better than a painful rejection.

I leave him where he is and go back behind the counter to find a vase for the arrangement for his step mother (assuming he still wants it) and get the rest of my materials ready. I also grab some leaves, just for decoration. I think a touch of green goes a long way.

"Sunflower, daisy, hydrangea, and stock," he says after a moment.

Once again, I feel my heart stop.

BAZ. I know that those flowers would make for an ugly arrangement, but I think he understands what I mean because his smile comes back full force and that glimmer is back in his eye.

Admiration, innocence, understanding, beauty.

And I don't even know the bastard's name.

#simon snow #baz #rainbow rowell #carry on #wayward son #flower shop #au #fan fic #one shot #cute #fluff

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welllpthisishappening · 6 years ago

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Have Your Cake [And Eat It Too] (Part 2)

Killian can’t seem to stop moving. It’s a nervous habit. He’s a little nervous. Because they’ve been waiting forever and he’s been waiting forever and he really just wants them to be a family. Officially.

Emma needs to keep moving. To win. She’s very competitive. And she’s needs a distraction. Because they’ve been waiting forever and trying a bit longer and she really just wants them to be a family. Officially

Or: Another quasi Out of the Frying Pan sequel with the legal system and Kitchen Stadium.

Word Count: 8.4K of Emma Swan and Killian Jones being stupid into each other while cooking. Rating: Teen. But, like, a higher teen than last time. AN: Back at it again with the family feelz and the kissing and I did more food-based research for these few thousand words than I have in my entire life. Also, peanut soup is a real thing that they serve in Colonial Williamsburg and I have begrudgingly had it on more than one family vacation. As always, thanks internet for being awesome and reading the words I spew at you. I really will write that other sequel eventually. In the meantime, if you’ve got thoughts on what I should hoarding fic-wise, let me know.

This is also on Ao3 if that’s how you roll.

“It’s kind of intimidating, isn’t it?” “It’s a stadium, Swan.” “I really need you to stop referring to it as that.” Killian glanced at her, all smiles and bright, blue eyes that were going to be way more distracting than they should have been when there would probably be a considerable amount of very sharp objects nearby soon. But it had been that way for a week and it was closing in on Christmas and there was always something about Christmas in New York and snow and family and everything felt decidedly official and kind of like they’d been living in some kind of snow globe for the last week and a half.

Emma assumed things were consistently picturesque in a snow globe.

Or, at least, their snow globe.

It was a very strange metaphor. She wasn’t sure she’d ever actually seen a snow globe in real life. Maybe, like, at Macy’s.

Macy’s seemed like the kind of place that sold snow globes at Christmas time.

“Swan,” Killian said lightly, wrapping his hand around her shoulder to stop her from walking any further into Kitchen Stadium and now she was doing it too. It was, admittedly, pretty goddamn intimidating and absolutely enormous. “You went all distant there, love,” he continued.

There was a hint of worry in his voice. That did something absurd to Emma’s pulse. That might have been because of his hand. Maybe she’d buy Killian a snow globe for Christmas.

That also felt like a kind of lame gift after everything else, but everything else felt less like a gift and more like just their lives and Emma hoped the secret ingredient was good.

She hoped Archie didn’t bother her too much while she was cooking.

“I think you could fit, like, six of my studios in here,” Emma said, not quite an answer, but Killian hadn’t actually asked her a question and his eyebrows shifted when she spoke.

“That seems like a lot doesn’t it?” “This place is enormous.” “You’ve been here before.” That was true. She’d watched Killian cook on that soundstage or studio or whatever more times than she could count in the last few years, and he won every single time, some kind of kitchen wizard or a compliment that wasn’t nearly as lame as that, but they both kept calling it Kitchen Stadium, so maybe they were on even footing there.

And Emma assumed parents were just sort of supposed to reach a certain plateau of lame at some point – dad jokes for actual dads and official paperwork and she kept wondering if it was possible to smile too much.

She didn’t think so.

The secret ingredient needed to be something good. She would scream if it was festive.

“I know, I know,” Emma mumbled, resting both her hands on the front of his shirt and neither one of them had changed yet. They were, actually, almost early.

“But?” “But it’s...big.” “We’ve covered the size of the studio several times now, love,” Killian grinned. His whole face did something absolutely absurd when Emma made a noise in the back of her throat, a scoff and a groan and something Henry had picked up at some point as well. “You worried about stacking up against the competition?” Emma’s jaw dropped, air rushing out of her and she dimly wondered where their kid was, but that thought only lasted as long as it took to come up with a slightly scathing retort and both Ruby and Regina would be frustrated they weren’t filming this.

They were really, really good at flirting in studios.

“That sounds awfully presumptuous, Lieutenant,” Emma muttered, tugging on the shirt she’d never actually let go of and she had no idea how she was expected to cope with seeing her husband cook in a jacket that said Iron Chef on it. It would be a miracle if she didn’t fall over herself at some point.

“Not presumptuous. Just historic.” “Oh, God, that’s even worse.” “Track records or something.” “And far too much confidence. I’ve beaten you several times in cooking competitions before.” Killian’s eyebrows jumped and twisted, tongue pressed into the corner of his mouth as his hands found her hips and his thumb started tracing idle patterns against the hem of her shirt. Emma’s breath hitched, lips tugged back behind her teeth so she wouldn’t make any more noise or say anything decidedly sentimental.

They’d done enough of that in the last few days – muttered conversations in their bedroom and the kitchen, tucked against each other in the corner of the couch and everything seemed like a chance and an opportunity and Emma was certain they’d both set a record for consistent and constant happiness.

“I can hear you thinking, Swan,” Killian said. His thumb was a menace.

“I’m just considering how nice it’s going to be to take you down a few pegs this afternoon.” He chuckled, letting his forehead rest against hers and it was a miracle no one had found them yet. Emma assumed that had something to do with wherever Henry was. He was getting very good at running interference and being just as happy and excited and several other incredibly positive adjectives.

There was a color-coded countdown in the corner of the kitchen.

“I think your trash talk is out of date, love,” Killian mumbled. His thumb still hadn’t stopped moving. “I’ve got home stadium advantage here.” “I can’t believe you just said that.” “That’s a fact. One loss in several years is impressive.” “Yeah, so says you.” “So says several legions of very impressed fans.”

“Really think very highly of yourself and your fans, don’t you?” Emma asked, leaning back to smile or do something vaguely flirtatious because she knew he had a difficult time forming coherent sentences when she bit her lower lip. She grinned when he practically growled in response, eyes somehow getting sharper and bluer and possibly just evolving into a whole different level of trash talk, and Emma was only a little frustrated her plan had kind of blown up in her face.

Metaphorically.

She’d like to avoid anything blowing up while she was competing in Kitchen Stadium.

God, she hated that name.

“You don’t have a cookbook though,” Emma pointed out. She really could not think when he did that thing with his tongue. This whole thing was going to be a disaster.

It’d probably set viewership records or something.

“True,” Killian admitted. “But I did help come up with some of the recipes in the cookbook, so I’d like to imagine that some of it has to do with me.” “Nah, that’s not how that works at all.” “No?” “No,” Emma echoed. “And, you know, if we’re going to point out things you don’t have, you don’t have a very popular cooking show and your own legion of fans who, and I’m quoting Rubes here, totally lost their shit when you showed up with a different name on screen.” Killian threw his head back when he laughed, body shaking against Emma’s because, at some point, they’d decided to start occupying the same space and she hadn’t felt nauseous in awhile, but her stomach seemed to have different ideas in the moment and if he’d just move his thumb a few inches to the--

“Ah, yeah, right there,” Emma hissed, scowling when Killian grinned triumphantly at her. “God, did you just know that?” “Of course not, Swan.” “Why’d you move then?” “I had an assumption about your back,” Killian answered. “And your hips, honestly, because you’ve been complaining about them for the last few days--” “--I have not!” “No one is actually upset about the complaints, love, I promise.” “No one meaning you,” Emma corrected lightly, but her heart didn’t appear to get the memo about normal and they hadn’t said anything yet because there hadn’t really been time. There were character witnesses and worrying about paperwork and payments and they hadn’t even filmed the holiday special yet.

Emma should ask Killian to be on the holiday special.

That was, like, a thing now.

Killian nodded. “Yes, meaning me exactly. And probably Henry too, but I’d also assume he doesn’t want to talk much about your hips, so…” “Do you want to talk about my hips?” He laughed again, although the sound was a bit more strangled than it had been a few minutes before and Emma silently congratulated herself on that. They were seriously going to set records for Iron Chef. “I would love to talk about your hips at all times,” Killian said, sounding far more serious than those words should have allowed.

Emma was going to sprain her face muscles.

“Just my hips?” “I’m open to other options too, honestly.”

She burrowed her head into shoulder, an arm moving around her waist and her sneakers squeaked when she tried to find a few inches of space they weren’t both occupying. “I’d really like to beat you at your home stadium,” Emma mumbled, but the words lost a bit of their threat when spoken mostly into Killian’s collarbone.

“I’d really love to see you try, Swan.” “I’ve got some plans.” That gave him pause – quite literally. Killian tensed, like he’d been turn to stone or frozen and Emma wondered where the blast chiller was on that set. She should probably look around before they started cooking. Or after they took whatever promotional pictures she was sure both Regina and Ruby had demanded.

She hadn’t really been listening to the plans, had kind of tuned out anything that was her newly official family and she hadn’t been lying. It wouldn’t have mattered if the judge said no. It would still be theirs and them and some kind of collective unit that regularly cooked things on the weekend with color-coded schedules and matching looks of terror on their parental-type faces when Henry got hurt.

But, well, it was nice.

It was more than nice, but Emma’s hips were honestly killing her and it was only a matter of time until someone found them flirting in the studio.

“Are you guys kidding me?” Ruby asked, a lack of any real frustration in her voice. She almost sounded amused. Emma figured she also looked amused, but she wasn’t entirely willing to move away from Killian yet.

He didn’t let go of her either.

“You know we have a schedule,” Ruby continued. “It’s like...official.” Killian scoffed, and Emma still didn’t need to turn around to know that Ruby was glaring at him. “Sounds incredibly official, Ruby,” he said, fingers dancing along the ridge of Emma’s spine. “Where’s Gina?” “Talking to your kid.” “Aw, you did that on purpose,” Emma muttered, twisting despite Killian’s quiet objections and incredibly agile fingers and Ruby lifted her eyebrows in unspoken challenge.

“Did it work?” “I mean obviously. It got me to turn around, right?” “Is it going to get you to stop flirting with your husband and the father of your kids?” “Possibly, if you promise---”

Emma cut herself off, nearly biting her tongue in half in the process and she’d never seen that look on Ruby’s face before. Like she was torn somewhere between joy and euphoria and it was a feeling Emma understood in the pit of her stomach and the ache of her hips and Killian was never going to move again.

They were never going to be able to film.

“How did you know that?” Killian asked softly, and that was probably how it was supposed to sound when a person was trying to be threatening.

Ruby laughed. “I didn’t.” “What?” “I had several assumptions and thoughts based solely on what I know from sitcoms and, you know, high school health classes and kind of Mary Margaret, but--” “--The point, Lucas.”

Ruby’s eyebrows shifted again, some of that joy falling off her face and crashing onto the ground. She crossed her arms, twisting the fabric of her dress under her elbows and her eyes all but disappeared when she glared at Killian. He glared back. The secret ingredient was totally going to be something seasonal.

That’s how Iron Chef worked. “You won’t be able to cook like that,” Emma said. She turned on the spot, running her hands over Killian’s arm and the top of his prosthetic and he blinked, exactly, six times before he met her gaze. “I mean...that’ll make it easier for me to win and I’d like this to be an even fight.” He exhaled, tongue darting between his lips and eventually Emma would learn enough words to describe what color his eyes actually were. She hoped she figured it out before the kid they hadn’t actually told anyone except Henry about actually showed up.

“Definitely an even fight, Swan,” Killian said. “And I’m better at cooking when I’m slightly frustrated anyway. Something about using that emotion to my advantage.” “No one has ever said that.” “Several TV critics have said that and probably Eric.” “Yeah, but Eric is not a good source. He’s just nervous you’re going to put a shit ton of holiday themed items on the menu in Gowanus.” “No, love, that’s you.” “No!” “Eh,” Killian said, clicking his tongue at the same time Ruby made an almost identical noise. Emma gaped at them both, head on a swivel and something that felt like betrayal festering in her gut.

“That is absolutely untrue,” she shouted. Ruby scrunched her nose. “Aw, c’mon, don’t look at me like that! It is!” “How many times have you tried to change the dinner special in the last week?” Ruby asked knowingly.

“It’s a special! It’s supposed to change every week. That’s what the name implies!” “Once a night, Swan,” Killian muttered, dropping his mouth to the side of her neck and that one spot behind her ear that made everything else in several different universes entirely pointless. Ruby’s nose was going to sustain permanent damage. “You change specials on a daily basis. Not on an hour basis.”

“It has not been that bad.” “I hate to repeat Jones here, but eh,” Ruby laughed. “Ariel said Eric is legitimately worried you’re going to move to Gowanus.” “I am not moving to Gowanus.” “Just trying to put the previously discussed shit ton of holiday items on the menu.” Emma huffed, frustration and acceptance in the sound and Ruby grinned triumphantly. “Do you know what the secret ingredient is?” she asked. “Is it holiday themed?” “Why would I tell you that?” “Because you want me to win.” “You can’t cheat like that, Swan,” Killian chastised. His arm had moved again, wrapped around her middle with fingers that kept tracing patterns she was positive only he could see.

“You’re standing right here. If Rubes tells us what the secret ingredient is, then we’d both find out. Unless she wants to tell me in code.” “Do we have a code?” Ruby asked.

“Nah, but we probably should.” “Mary Margaret would really get mad if we came up with a secret code and didn’t include her. That’d almost be as shitty as force feeding the patrons in Gowanus holiday-themed food.” “Oh my God, no one is force feeding anyone anything,” Emma sighed. “Least of all holiday-themed food. That’s so aggressive.” “Fa la la la, la la la la.” “And,” Killian said sharply. “Speaking of Mary Margaret and your apparent knowledge of things that previously included her…” Ruby didn’t quite cackle, but it was pretty close, rocking back on her heels when the smile practically slid across her face. She hadn’t ever uncrossed her arms, but it didn’t look like a battle pose anymore. It kind of looked like she was trying to stop herself from jumping up and down or, possibly, crying.

They really needed to find Henry.

“Man, you are cranky when parenthood is impending, aren’t you?” Ruby asked, ignoring Emma’s muttered curses as she moved to the closest cooking station and promptly sat on top of it. Killian’s eyes widened slightly.

“It has nothing to do with that at all.” “Aw, that’s nice.” “Rubes, you are going to get whiplash from jumping through these emotions,” Emma said, swinging her legs out and she’d done it entirely for Killian’s reaction. Maybe cerulean was the right color? She’d ask Mary Margaret. Mary Margaret saw more Crayola crayon names than Emma did.

“Because no one has actually confirmed anything to me yet,” Ruby pointed out. “Why was it a secret? Is it still a secret?” “Why were you making assumptions?” “Because Will made a drink after your husband officially adopted your kid and you tried very hard to make sure that no one noticed you handing it to Killian.” “Maybe I just wasn’t thirsty.” “Oh, that was really bad, Em,” Ruby said, shaking her head. “Killian, wasn’t that really bad?” He didn’t answer, just pressed his lips together and did something entirely unfair with his eyebrows and Ruby sighed as if this were actually the end of the world and not some kind of best news ever in a way that led Emma to thoughts about snow globes. “Ok, whatever,” Ruby continued. “It was really bad. Also you got sick on set one time.” “What?” Killian asked sharply.

Emma rolled her eyes. “Ok, that didn’t happen.” “She’s lying,” Ruby whispered.

“I’m not! I didn’t actually get sick, I just thought I was going to and that’s like...it’s a thing. That’s how bodies work at that point.” Ruby nodded seriously, lips pursed together and the whole thing felt a little patronizing, but Emma could also see what might have been actual tears in her eyes. “I really don’t think anyone else knows. Does Henry know?” “Yeah.” She was absolutely crying. “God, I hate that.” “What?” Emma croaked, eyebrows pulled low and this could not have been part of the filming schedule. “Were those the words you were looking for?” “They absolutely were not,” Ruby admitted. “But I’m, like, kind of losing my mind and you guys are...I hate your stupid, emotional familial emotions. It’s just super nice and super something else that’s nice and picturesque and only kind of threatens to rot my teeth. And also how obviously flirting you were when I walked in on you.” “You’d think at this point you’d know not to walk onto set without announcing yourself,” Killian muttered. He pulled Emma against his side, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and they’d have to stop trying to touch each other when they started filming.

“I’m doing you guys a favor. It could have been Gina and she would not have been nearly as receptive to totally messing up the schedule as I am.”

“Ah, that’s probably true, actually.” “See, you’re welcome.” “What is the schedule, exactly?” Emma asked.

“Besides the flirting and the ever-growing family?” “You need to go back to school or something. Your sentence structure is all off. There’s Henry and,” Emma waved her hands in front of her, not quite an explanation or confirmation and Ruby clasped both her hands over her mouth so her squeal wouldn’t ricochet off the studio walls.

“Ok, ok, ok,” Ruby stammered. “Can I just ask a question? Jones, are you going to kill me if I ask a question? Also, remember that we are literally on set so you can’t kill me.” “Well, that answered that question, didn’t it?” Killian said.

“Ok, but that doesn’t actually make me feel any better.” “I’m not going to kill you, Lucas. Ask your question.”

“How long have you known?’ Killian tensed again, and Emma took a sharp breath through her nose, trying to keep her footing when she hadn’t actually moved at all. Ruby grimaced. “Remember the no killing promise,” she mumbled.

Emma clicked her tongue, glancing at Killian over her shoulder and it wasn’t like it was a complete secret, but it had been so different the last time she’d done this. And they hadn’t really been trying, weren’t actively not trying, but it was a surprise and in the middle of everything else and a lot and everything, again, and she desperately needed to expand her vocabulary.

So they’d told Henry – partially because he’d found Emma on the bathroom floor and partially because they were a them in a family kind of way that didn’t include secrets regarding the expansion of said family – but they hadn’t said anything to anyone else. They might have been a little selfish about that.

Killian shrugged.

And Emma was glad she’d taken that deep breath before, all the air seemingly rushing out of her lungs in one great, big huff of feeling and pre-show jitters and she was totally going to eat all of Killian’s food after it got judged.

“You can’t yell too loudly,” Emma warned. Ruby’s hands were still over her mouth, moving with her head when she nodded. “Uh, almost three months.” Ruby’s eyes bugged and the noise she made sounded strangled and a little desperate and she got some pretty good height on her jump. “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. Are you kidding me? Are you guys kidding me?” “Why would we joke about that?” Killian asked, and Emma swatted at his thigh. He caught her around the wrist, lacing his fingers through hers, and they didn’t have time for this.

“I have no idea, but seriously, you guys aren’t kidding?” Emma shook her head. “Not kidding. And you’re not really supposed to say anything before three months, so if you could--” “--Of course,” Ruby shouted. “Shit, yeah, I just…” She exhaled like she’d just run a marathon, finally moving her hands away from her mouth so she could wipe away tears that would only draw more questions and the clack of Regina’s heels at the other end of the studio sounded impossibly loud. “You guys going to flirt the entire time you’re on camera, right?” “Probably,” Killian nodded. “If Swan ever decides she’s going to get changed.” She turned, mouth hanging open and it couldn't have been very attractive, but Killian – her husband and father of her kids, plural and officially – didn’t seem to mind all that much. He ducked his head, catching Emma’s lips with his and putting his tongue to totally different use until she was threatening to melt on the floor and that would make it difficult to cook.

Emma figured she needed to be a corporal body to grip things. Or chop them. She wanted to change the dinner special at The Jolly later.

“Are you two honestly not dressed yet?” Regina asked sharply, Henry a few feet behind her with a smile on his face and excitement radiating off him. Emma glanced at Killian again.

“What were you doing, kid?”

He ran his hand through his hair – a move that had been growing more and more frequent recently, but Emma couldn't think about that if she was actually going to try and win this stupid thing. It was distracting. “Nothing,” Henry said quickly.

“Didn’t even try,” Killian murmured.

“That’s not true at all. I tried very hard.” “That’s disappointing, honestly.”

Henry laughed, jumping onto a counter as well and Ruby had taken her phone out at some point, explanations of stuff for the site that Emma was only half listening to while Regina made very attempt to turn them to stone with her mind. “Should be advocating for better lying?” Emma asked. “That seems very unparental.”

Ruby dropped her phone.

“You know what else is unparental?” Regina asked. “Not being on time to a set that is very scheduled and requires its talent to be wearing specific clothing with makeup so their skin isn’t shiny under camera.” “I really don’t think those are part of the rules, Gina,” Killian grinned.

“Put your jacket on. Get your face fixed and then cook something.” “Get my face fixed.” “You heard me the first time, I’m not sure why you need me to repeat it again. Also, your kid is not a very good distraction. So next time try harder when you want to make out on set, ok?” Emma wasn’t sure what sound any of them made – several gasps and one gag that definitely came from Henry and Killian’s fingers tightened around hers like he was trying to make sure his knees didn’t immediately give out.

“I feel like that’s kind of an insult to me,” Henry muttered. “I thought I was a pretty good distraction. And I helped, Gina.”

Her face softened slightly, not a full glare as she reached up to brush Henry’s hair away from his eyes and that should be studied because it always seemed too long no matter what kind of parental thing Emma or Killian did. “You did,” she agreed. “But I think you might have been playing favorites, a little bit.” “No, that’s not true at all,” Henry argued, trying to sit up straighter and jump off the counter and his gaze darted to Emma and Killian like they were going to ground him right there in Kitchen Stadium. That wasn’t really their game.

They desperately needed to change.

“What were you two doing?” Killian asked. Henry squeezed one eye closed.

“Making food decisions.” The door opened again, more crew and techs and Elsa mumbled a handful of questions because everyone’s skin was far too shiny to be camera-ready. They were probably going to be there for days. “Alright,” Regina snapped, tapping her right heel and Killian laughed in Emma’s ear when she jumped to attention. “Faces. Jackets. Cooking ready...ness.” “It’s not your best work, Gina.” “Get changed or I will fire you.” “Ah, no you won’t,” Killian said, saluting anyway and that should not have been as attractive as it was. “We’re going to pull record numbers with this, aren’t we, Swan?” “Definitely. But only because people are going to tune in to see the very impressive Iron Chef Killian Jones get defeated on his home turf.” “Home stadium, love, we’ve been over this.” “And I wasn’t listening,” she smiled, pressing up on her toes to kiss the edge of his mouth. He chased after her. She was winning. “I’ll see you back on set in a couple minutes, Lieutenant.”

She still wasn’t entirely sure what possessed her to agree to any of this – Regina had been trying for years, as soon as Killian moved a few boxes to the apartment three blocks away from The Jolly, but Emma had always waved her hands and shook her head and she didn’t really have a restaurant to represent anyway.

But then she did.

She had a joint partnership and something less clinical than that and Killian agreed to all that paperwork and official titles and other titles and he smiled every single time she tried to change the menu.

So, when Regina had asked, again, Emma was sure something in her brain had just short-circuited and she heard herself saying yes and she knew Henry would be thrilled.

She knew Killian would be thrilled to, but that was neither here nor there.

Because Emma was absolutely, positively counting on that very specific emotion to give her a bit of a leg up on her competition.

The lights were, somehow, even brighter when she stepped back onto set, any threat of shiny face defeated by several pounds of makeup and Ruby laughed softly when she and Emma moved towards her side of the Stadium.

“You’re playing games, Em,” Ruby accused. Emma shrugged, mostly because she couldn’t disagree and she was so goddamn happy she was only a little worried she’d explode with the feeling at some point during filming.

“Isn’t that part of the fun?” “You guys have a twisted way of flirting.”

“You know what the secret ingredient is. And don’t act like the flirting isn’t good for the numbers. I bet Zelena nearly had a coronary when she found out I agreed to this based solely on the potential for flirting that you guaranteed.” “That’s my job.” “Eh.” “Henry asked,” Ruby muttered, like that explained it and it absolutely did. “No one’s been more excited to get parented in their life, you know that?” Emma nodded. “Yeah, I do.”

“You better win.” “No pressure or anything.” “Nah,” Ruby promised. “You’re an incredible chef. And he’s...ah, there it is. The game within the game or something. Maybe that should be our tagline.” Emma’s head snapped up, teeth finding her lower lip on instinct and that couldn’t have been good for Killian’s jaw. He was frozen mid-step, feet not quite even when he came to a stop halfway towards his station and his own Iron Chef jacket was, admittedly, pretty impressive, but Emma had stolen hers from the back corner of The Jolly kitchen and Mary Margaret knew someone who did embroidery in Chelsea because of course she did and Emma Swan-Jones looked pretty damn good underneath the name of their restaurant.

“Oh, that’s not even playing fair, Swan,” Killian mumbled, taking those last few steps and someone yelled about crossing the line when he nearly stepped into Emma’s station.

She smiled. “I think I heard someone talking about mind games on a show like this once before.”

“Must have been the world’s biggest idiot.” “Nah, he’s got a very impressive history degree.” “Oh my God, it’s started,” Elsa called from behind the camera and Emma swore the lights got stronger. Like they knew or something.

“It’s not going to work, love,” Killian said. He leaned forward, ignoring lines and rules and Emma only kind of hoped he did that while they were cooking.

“Isn’t it? You just accused me of cheating, I think it’s working already.” “Nope. Not at all.” “Were you upset about Henry’s bad lying because you knew he got it from you?” Killian blinked, licking his lips and Emma’s mind drifted to several things it shouldn’t have while they were still on set and he was still wearing that jacket, but that jacket did something absolutely unfair to his biceps when he crossed his arms. “He picked the secret ingredient, you know. Gina told me while she was yelling about my face.”

“I kind of figured that out on my own, actually. Context clues.” “Maybe you’re the smart one in this competition. And relationship.” “Flattery will get you everywhere,” Emma whispered. “You going to be able to remember borders once we starting cooking?” “Depends.” “On?” “On what you start cooking.” She laughed before she could stop herself, the noise bubbling from the center of her soul or something equally absurd and each of them had a small platoon of sous chefs who were supposed to help them – they all looked equally and incredibly uncomfortable. “That wasn’t even clever,” Emma said. “I’m not even sure what it meant.” “Ah, but it got you thinking didn’t it, love? Pondering. Questioning. Possibly distracted.” “Was that your goal? To distract me?” “Wasn’t it yours?”

Someone sighed. It sounded like Regina. It honestly might have been Archie. Elsa was shouting about places and marks and those lights must have been industrial-grade. Emma was very warm. She didn’t think it actually had much to do with the lights.

Navy blue. That was another color in a Crayola 64-crayon box. “You should know,” Emma muttered, twisting her well-styled hair over her shoulder. “Something about battle plans and seizing the vessel.” “I honestly can’t take you seriously when you compare yourself to a ship, love.” “Was I doing that?” “Certainly what it sounded like.” “Weird. Something, something, capturing things, pillaging and plundering.” “The Navy generally frowns on that.” Emma hummed, a smile on her face still and always and possibly indefinitely and she jumped back when Archie moved into the middle of the set. “You two realize this whole thing has been filmed, right?” he asked, Emma shrugging and Killian nodding. He laughed. “Well, this is going to be interesting. Your kid picked the secret ingredient, was very adamant about eating all of the food and I need to do the intro now, so if you could…” He waved his hands, directing them back towards their stations and a bit more personal space and Emma let her tongue trail over the front of her teeth before she moved. Killian smirked.

“Mind games,” he muttered, and maybe she’d be able to cook with the butterflies in her stomach.

There were more staging directions and Emma tried not to move – far too aware of the gaze boring into the side of her head and he was probably worried she was standing too much because he was an idiot and read too many things and thought about everything and her cooking crew still looked a little nervous.

“Chairman, if you’d be so kind as to introduce our secret ingredient,” Archie said, already back behind his podium and there were, frankly, a shit ton of screens there. Emma jerked her head towards the table, a man in a suit that was only kind of intimidating to look at staring at both her and Killian and the cover flew into the ceiling when he threw his hands into the air.

“Good production value,” Emma mumbled. She wasn’t sure if she imagined Killian’s answering laugh, or how he’d been able to hear her, but she didn’t care about specifics and he smiled when her eyes darted his direction.

“Today’s secret ingredient,” the chairman yelled. “Is…. peanut buuuuuuuuter.”

Emma’s eyes bugged, mind immediately racing and trying desperately to come up with food ideas that weren’t just seventeen different forms of cookies and it took her half a second to remember she needed to move. The sound of Killian’s shoes moving by her helped.

“You got a plan yet?” Emma asked, skidding to a stop next to him and using his body to stop herself from colliding with the table.

“Swan, you can’t run like that.” “That is not an answer to my question at all. Compete with me.” “I’m more than willing to compete with you, I just would like to avoid injury if at all possible. And also I’m not going to tell you.” “Aw, that’s not fun at all.” “It’s a show, love,” Killian said, but he was still kind of laughing and throwing jars of peanut butter to the closest sous chef.

“Should I also be throwing things? Is that part of your plan? Impress the judges with your hand-eye coordination? Because that’s not fair at all.”

He chuckled, tossing another three containers and shouting about make sure we get some of the honey kind before turning back towards Emma and kissing her quick. “Try not to make too many cookies, Swan,” Killian grinned. “And as long as you’re impressed by my hand-eye coordination, I really don’t care.” “Idiot,” Emma grumbled.

“I love you, too.”

“Well, that’s kiss one,” Archie called from his station. “Who had a kiss within the first five minutes of competition?” He pointed towards Ruby just out of camera when she raised her hand, a wry smile on his face and Emma knew there’d be a graphic for this. She grabbed a container of honey peanut butter.

“Alright,” she said brusquely, addressing a team she hadn’t really been introduced to because she’d been too busy flirting. “We’re going to do a cookie. I know, I know, but this recipe is way better than anything Killian make--” “--That’s rude, Swan!” “Focus on your own food.” She smiled at the group around her, jackets that were far too white and far too crisp and she reached behind her back to turn on one of the half a dozen ovens she got to use. “The cookie’s our centerpiece, but we’ve got to do some other stuff too, obviously. You,” Emma pointed to a guy she thought might be named Rob, “start on a peanut sauce and I want us to start making noodles too. Udon because it’ll hold the sauce better. Then, uh...what about wings? Is that too obvious?” Maybe-Rob shook his head. “No, that sounds good actually.” “Well, thanks for the vote of confidence. Ok, ok, so wings and maybe a slaw? Something to go with the wings. Something with Sriracha!” “You may not want to yell that,” another guy who Emma was, like, ninety-two percent positive was named Devon.

“You’re going to give away secrets, love,” Killian called, and something dinged in the background. “What the hell is that?”

“A nickname counter,” Archie explained. Killian made a noise that was not entirely human. “The Iron Chef does enjoy his endearments doesn’t he?” “This is absolutely ridiculous,” Emma mumbled. “And if you take my Sriracha idea, you can walk home later.” “It’s Manhattan, Swan, I don’t think that threat holds much water.”

“Speaking of water,” Archie said pointedly. “The Iron Chef’s got a good amount of the secret ingredient at his station now. He appears to be boiling something, getting ready to make, maybe...a caramel? And it looks like that’s...what is that Iron Chef?” “If you can’t tell already, then we’ve got problems,” Killian answered, not looking up from the bowl he was mixing.

“Thoughts from our challenger?”

“He’s stress baking,” Emma said. She flashed a smile at the camera when one of the several thousand moved her direction. “And we need to make some Thai dressing for the dumplings we’re going to do. I’m going to start on that dough now.”

“That’s all sounding a little Asian influenced, love,” Killian yelled, cursing loudly when the counter or dinger or whatever it was called did it what it was supposed to do. “Can someone turn that off? It’s distracting.” “Stop flirting with your wife then,” Archie suggested. He’d left his station at some point, moving into Emma’s space when she grabbed ingredients she hoped would make acceptable dumplings. There was already flour under her nails. “Long time, no see, Emma,” he said, resting against the side of the counter. “What are you making?” “Dumplings,” she explained.

“Pork?” “Well, we’re doing chicken wings as well, so I didn’t want to double up too much.” “A worthy idea. You hear that, Iron Chef? Emma’s not going to double up on ingredients.” “That’s incredibly judgmental, Archie,” Killian groused. “And not entirely true. This show, by its very nature, requires us to double and triple and quadruple up on ingredients. You going to put some peanut butter in the dumplings, Swan?” Another ding.

“That sounds disgusting,” Emma said, shuddering for extra effect. “And stop trying to steal my ideas! You are cheating.” “It’s because I’m so annoyed with that sound.” “Archie’s right. Stop flirting then. Where’s the soy sauce in this kitchen?” Killian shook his head, a different bowl propped on his hip and Emma wondered if they’d get in a lot of trouble if she crossed Kitchen Stadium borders, tugged on the lapels of his chef’s jacket and kissed him for several prolonged and uninterrupted minutes.

Probably enough that it’d be as annoying as the dinging thing.

“No insider information,” Killian said.

“Here, Chef,” possibly-Devon said, handing Emma an unopened bottle. She dumped the whole thing in the closest bowl. It was way too big for what she was making. “And we’re heating up the oil for the wings too.” “You guys are the best,” she said. “You hear that, Lieutenant? My staff is so much better.” Another ding.

“Aw, c’mon,” Emma groaned. “That’s not an endearment! It’s a rank!” Archie clicked his tongue. “Ah, but you say it like an endearment, Emma. It counts.” “Wasn’t this just to distract Killian?” “No we’re equal opportunity distraction in Kitchen Stadium. What are you going to do to make your peanut butter cookies not quite so boring?” Emma gaped, and Killian laughed, working with his own deep fryer and she hadn’t been kidding about the Sriracha threat. “Watch and then eat them,” she seethed, pushing lightly on Archie’s shoulder like that would get him to move or get a camera out of her face. “Seriously, though, what are you baking over there? You know you have to make actual food, you can’t just make desserts?” “Yes, I’m aware of how the show works,” Killian nodded, clearly trying to avoid another ding and Emma could smell the chicken wings already. “It’s almost as if I’ve been on it before.” “If that’s supposed to be intimidating, it’s not going to work.” “I’m just looking to get a leg up since this secret ingredient was clearly chosen to favor you.” “That’s not true,” Henry called from the side, and whoever was in charge of post was going to have a hell of a time fixing all of this. “Someone better make me peanut butter chip pancakes.”

“Aw, shit, I didn’t even think of pancakes,” Emma muttered, sticking her tongue out when Archie clicked his again. “Seriously, that is what post is for.” Archie lifted his eyebrows. “They haven’t had to do this much work in years.” “God, you are rude when you’re on this show! Don’t you have to go ask Killian what he’s baking? Or at least guess? Do your hosting job.”

“You seem stressed, Emma.” “Because you won’t get out of my station.” “Those emotions hindering your cooking ability, love?” Killian asked, and he’d tried to get the ding on purpose that time. “And what do you think about banana and peanut butter pancakes, Henry? With cornflakes for crunch?” Henry perked up, Archie’s head falling into his hands because all of them refused to follow any of the rules. He was standing on something when he answered – a crate or something that probably had another camera in it and Emma was only a little worried about that because she’d been very worried about his ankle and Killian had been worse.

“Yeah, make that,” Henry nodded.

Killian beamed. “Deal! And they’re brownies, Swan. With peanut butter icing. You can try ‘em after I win again.” They got to sixteen dings before Emma threw a ladle across Kitchen Stadium.

They’d probably use that in whatever commercial was going to run to promo this whole, stupid thing and time was, suddenly, not her friend.

The key, in her head at least, to the perfect peanut butter cookie was to make the cookie the ends of an ice cream sandwich and because this was the Network and they thrived on stressing out their chefs, there was only one ice cream maker on set.

And it was being used when Emma ran towards it.

“What the hell is this?”

“I’d imagine it’s an ice cream maker making fantastic ice cream,” Killian muttered, coming up behind her and his fingers moved again and that really was the worst kind of mind game. She didn’t try to lean against his chest, but there were magnets or something and more sound effects and Archie’s voice sounded like white noise when she felt Killian’s chin hook over her shoulder.

“You used the same words far too many times in that sentence.”

He laughed against her, a breath of warm air that ruffled her hair and any attempt at styling had been pointless because she was a sweaty mess, covered in flour and something that might have been vinegar and oil if the smell was anything to go by. “Why do you smell like Easter?” Killian asked, Emma still holding a bowl of liquid that she really needed to become ice cream.

“I honestly have no idea,” she admitted. “You make your pancakes?” “Mmmhm.” “What else did you make?” “More insider trading. And several things involving peanut butter.” “You’re a food tease.” “Yes, absolutely,” he said, and Emma didn’t have to turn around to hear the smile in his voice. “You alright though? Not tired or dealing with aching hips or anything?” Emma twisted, eyebrows pulled low and she almost, kind of expected that look – like several suns and moons and she really wanted to eat those pancakes. “Is this a mind game?” “No. The opposite of that.” “That is stupid,” she sighed. “I can’t believe you got to the ice cream machine before I did. Why is there only one? Should we start a petition against that?”

“You know I love it when you get indignant over cooking supplies, Swan.” Ding.

Killian groaned, head falling forward and lips brushing over Emma’s forehead and there were several other dings and sound effects, one of which might have actually been the goddamn ice cream maker. “That shouldn’t count as an endearment either,” he muttered into her hair. “It’s your name.” “Eh,” Emma objected, leaning back to tap on the embroidery that Mary Margaret had actually paid for. “Not what the jacket says. So, you know, if you want to get--”

She didn’t finish. And the sound effects machine was going to self combust, several shouts from the metaphorical peanut gallery and both of their staffs and Emma hoped her dumplings didn’t burn because she was making out in the middle of Kitchen Stadium.

She slung her arms around Killian’s neck, standing on tip toes to reach him and his hands held steady on her hips, like he was trying to keep her there or preserve the moment or distract her from her frustrations regarding kitchen appliances. Emma didn’t actually get her fingers on his jacket, which was kind of disappointing, but she put them to much better use carding them through Killian’s hair and she gasped when his tongue darted across her lower lip.

“We’re going to scandalize an entire audience,” Emma said, but she didn’t pull herself away from his mouth, so she wasn’t really helping her own cause.

“I certainly hope so.” “Maybe the petition will be about us.” “That’d be entertaining at least.” “Are you not entertained?” Killian laughed, another kiss and a squeeze to her hip, thumb brushing over the front of her stomach quick enough that Emma was sure even the most advanced camera wouldn’t have caught it. “I have to get my ice cream out of the machine,” he said. “That’s why I came over here in the first place.” “So it wasn’t to make out?” “That was a benefit.” “High praise.” “I’m willing to share some of that praise before we get judged, love.” “Far too confident for your own food.”

“If you two are done being adorable,” Archie started, back with the screens and the notebook that Emma wasn’t sure he actually used and she’d been so wrapped up in the moment she hadn’t noticed the other person standing there with a camera half an inch away from them.

She hoped he hadn’t seen the thumb swipe.

It probably wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world if he’d seen the thumb swipe.

“Get your ice cream out of my way,” Emma said, doing her best to sound like she was even remotely annoyed by anything in the entire world.

“That’s the least threatening thing I’ve ever head, Swan.” “My cookies are going to be better than yours.” “I didn’t make cookies. Did you make soup?”

She shook her head, eyes falling on Killian’s back and the twist of his shoulders when he cranked the machine, and his ice cream really did look good when it fell into the bowl he’d gotten from somewhere. “Salad. Peanut soup? That sounds awful.” “It’s a colonial delicacy.” “Why do you know that?” “I know everything.” Emma made a contrary noise, sticking her tongue out for good measure, but that just earned her another smirk and twist of eyebrows and she barely finished putting together her ice cream sandwiches before someone called time. She exhaled, wiping the back of her palm across her forehead and looking at her dishes with something that almost felt like pride.

“Looks good,” Killian muttered, still on his side of the Stadium with his own food and--

“You made a hotdog?” “Gourmet.” “God.”

He grinned, all teeth and eyes and periwinkle wasn’t the right word either, but Emma was forgetting the English language quicker than she entirely appreciated. And she had to get judged. Killian had to get judged.

She explained her dishes, watching as plates were brought in and out and several prominent network personalities nodded and hummed and Emma kind of knew it was coming because Killian had only ever lost once and he’d gotten to the ice cream maker first.

“Congratulations on your win,” Emma said, and Killian rolled his eyes like he wasn’t a giant, competitive weirdo who didn’t desperately want to impress Henry every time he cooked.

“Ah, your cookies were the best thing either one of us made, Swan.” “You didn’t try them.” “Yet. And call it a very strong assumption.” “Eat ‘em first and then tell me.”

He mumbled something, words, probably, but the sound got caught in the air when his head tilted and someone hit the ding again. “The show is over,” Killian growled, pulling away long enough to curse a shadow that, upon closer inspection, looked very familiar.

“I know it is,” Henry said, jogging onto set and blinking under the lights. “God, it’s rough under here isn’t it? How do you see? Also, can I eat the food now?” “What do you want?” “Like...all of it.” “We feed you at home, don’t we?” Emma asked, Henry shrugged, making his way to the judging table and taking the seat the chairman had used during filming. He grabbed the pancakes first. Killian’s ears went red.

“It’s almost like you guys are good at cooking or something.” “Almost,” Killian repeated. “C’mon, Swan, I want a cookie before the ice cream melts.”

The three of them put a fairly big dent in the food by the time Ruby came back and demanded their presence for talking heads and a rather pointed reminder that Emma still had to film her holiday special and Henry’s smile could have powered the entire Tri-State area and some of Westchester when she asked both him and Killian to help her cook.

“I’d love to, Swan,” Killian said, arm back around her waist and fingers moving and confirming things and he made the pancakes when the episode aired a little over two weeks later.

And they made things even more official – more announcements and another drink Emma couldn’t actually drink later that night, an entire family that seemed to keep growing packed into the restaurant three blocks away from their apartment with smiles on their faces and tears in their eyes. Killian barely moved out of her space, but Emma’s smile seemed permanent and Henry kept talking about names and ideas and he used the phrase parents more than once, so she figured official wasn’t really all that bad.

It was the best.

#cs ff #captain swan #captain swan ff #captain swan fic #cs fic #WHY DO ALL FOOD NETWORK SHOWS ONLY HAVE ONE ICE CREAM MAKER #also #macy's absolutely sells snow globes at chirstmas

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lady-divine-writes · 5 years ago

Text

Near Misses and First Kisses

Summary:

Crowley has wasted over 6000 years not kissing his angel. He’s decided today’s the day … but things don’t go quite the way he planned. (2277 words)

(AO3)

Crowley breathes in deep, filling his lungs to capacity, then pushes out. Breathes in deep, then pushes out; in and out … in and out … the ritual resembling something along the lines of Lamaze breathing to the rhythm of Killer Queen blaring through the speakers of his car stereo.

If he were human, he would’ve passed out by now.

Driving usually calms him down, but speeding through the city streets at a hundred-and-ten is doing nothing to slow the rapid beating of his heart, nothing to soothe his scattered nerves.

So he focuses on the task at hand, the one he’s rushing to get to.

Wish fulfillment.

‘Today’s the day,’ he thinks as he zips his way to Aziraphale’s shop. ‘This is it. No more excuses. Today’s the day I finally kiss my angel.’

Crowley has the whole scene mapped out, plastered inside his brain. He’s been playing it thru over and over again, familiarizing himself with it so he doesn’t chicken out. As far as he’s concerned, it’s in the stars. It izzz written, he says to himself, mocking Beelzebub’s voice. He takes another breath in and out and reminds himself once again how it will go down.

Crowley will arrive and park in his usual spot across the street, which, of course, will be empty for him. He’ll saunter up to Aziraphale’s door, cool as a cucumber. He’ll knock, thus forcing Aziraphale to open the door and invite him in. He didn’t call ahead of time so Aziraphale won’t be expecting him.

Surprise.

The element of surprise is key.

Aziraphale will open the door, probably a bit put out that some rude customer not only dared to show up at his shop, but knocked instead of walking their happy asses on in. But when he sees Crowley, his face will light up the way it always does, with that angelic glow Crowley has himself convinced is only for him.

“Crowley!” Aziraphale will say, but Crowley won’t say a word. He’ll sweep his angel up in his arms and kiss him. It’ll be perfectly romantic – Crowley will make sure of that.

But as he turns the corner a block away, the grin that’s been growing on his face at the thought of it starts to fade.

What if that’s too forward for Aziraphale?

What if it’s too much?

It’s hard for him to believe, but he has been told he can be a bit much sometimes.

He turns the next corner and slams on the brakes, gripped by a case of mild panic, but it’s too late.

He has arrived.

A voice in his brain keeps repeating that it’s now or never.

If Crowley doesn’t kiss Aziraphale today, he might not find the courage for another thousand years or so.

And that would suck seeing as he’s waited 6000 years already.

What the heck happened to him? Why is he such a frickin’ train wreck? He wants to be sophisticated and devil-may-care like the demon that broke Aziraphale out of the Bastille. Where the heck did that demon go?

He should have kissed him then. Holy Hellfire! That would have been the time to do it, after he’d miracled those chains off his wrists. That would have been romantic as all get out – the dashing rogue kissing his damsel in distress while still in the clutches of the enemy, like right out of the pages of a Harlequin Romance novel.

Not that he has any idea what’s in those. He doesn’t even read.

Ahem.

His mind floods with hundreds of times he could have kissed him, hundreds of opportunities lost, each more romantic than the last. He could have done it after he miracled that stain off Aziraphale’s coat. Or the night he invited him to stay over, before they were both sentenced to execution, or before lunch immediately after. What was he thinking!?

He sighs.

No use looking back. Move forward. Live for today and all that crap.

He decides to stick to the plan for now. Depending on how Aziraphale reacts when he sees him (as predictable as that reaction should be), the plan is subject to change.

He parks his Bentley. He gets out. He saunters across the street and up to the front door, all according to plan. He raises his closed fist to knock, his vision clear in his mind. But before he gets the chance to knock, the door swings open.

Crowley responds with a choked off noise of surprise.

Surprise. Well, that part worked, he guesses.

“Thank Heavens you’re here! Come in, come in! I need your help!” Aziraphale says, whisking back into his shop so quickly Crowley barely catches a glimpse of his face.

Crowley takes a step in and closes the door. He follows Aziraphale, waiting for a break in the conversation so he can rescue his plan back from off the rails, but whatever Aziraphale has on his mind to say, he’s not done.

“Do you remember that estate auction I won a few weeks ago? On that Internet website you showed me called E-bay?”

“I … guess?”

“The books have just arrived!” Aziraphale stops at a low wall of cardboard boxes crowding the doorway to his back room and gestures at them with delight. “I may have underestimated the amount because I don’t hardly have enough space to store them. So I need to get them unpacked and inventoried ASAP! Would you mind lending me a hand?”

“Why not just miracle them out of the boxes?” Crowley asks, groaning mentally in disgust at the thought of unpacking, dusting, and organizing what must be several hundred musty old books … especially considering his plan. “Save yourself the time and trouble of doing all the dirty work by hand?”

Aziraphale shoots Crowley a venomous glare, his glow dimming as his smile falls into a thin, unamused line. “I’m going to forget you said that.” With only a beat in between, he perks back up. “Come on! Just an hour or two, and then we can crack open the bottle of small batch whiskey they sent along with it to celebrate!”

“But Aziraphale, I …”

Aziraphale looks at Crowley for the first time since he’s arrived. His excitement doesn’t fade, but he looks tremendously guilty.

“Oh, I’m sorry! You did stop over for a different reason, didn’t you? I shouldn’t assume …”

“No, no, no! No sorry needed!” Crowley can’t take this moment away from him. Aziraphale has been waiting weeks for these books. He remembers now. And he’s not going to stop him from enjoying them, no matter the reason. “It can wait. Let’s get started. The quicker we start, the quicker we finish, yes?”

Aziraphale’s face brightens again, the glow that accompanies it blinding. “Excellent! Yes! Let’s get started!”

***

“And you know, it took me a long time to get comfortable with the idea of this whole online auction thing.” Aziraphale giggles, pleased beyond belief at his correct use of the modern vernacular for this situation. “I remember back in the old days, auctions were held in barns and town squares and whatnot. It didn’t seem logical to simply enter a price on the computer and then wait to see if you’d win. But you told me that’s how things are done these days. You said it would be all right. So, in the end, I said to myself, Self, take the plunge! It’s an excellent opportunity to …” Aziraphale turns to his sullen helper and looks him over thoughtfully. Crowley hasn’t said a word since they started. Not an acknowledgement, not a grunt, no verbal filler, even now when Aziraphale has stopped talking. He’s running on autopilot, absentmindedly dusting books off and stacking them into a pile without even touching them. He’s here, yes, and doing what Aziraphale asked, but his mind is a million miles away. If Aziraphale didn’t know any better, he’d say that the demon is pouting. Aziraphale puts down the book he’s dusting and sighs. “Crowley?”

“Hmm, what?” Crowley’s eyes snap up, blank and confused and disappointed all at once, which are difficult emotions for serpent eyes to convey, but he manages it.

“My goodness, dear boy! What in the Heaven is going on with you?”

“N-nothing. Why?”

“You’re awfully distracted, that’s why. Have you even heard a single thing I’ve said?”

“I … yes … no … hmm?”

Aziraphale gets up off the couch he’s sitting on and moves to sit beside Crowley. “Please, tell me what’s going on. You’ve got me a bit worried.”

“Uh … okay …” Crowley’s eyes drift to Aziraphale’s lips so swiftly the angel doesn’t seem to notice. “I …”

Aziraphale breathes in softly, expectantly (since he’s waiting for an answer), and suddenly, Crowley decides this is it. The moment he’s been waiting for. He has Aziraphale’s complete attention. And he’s just inches away. He wouldn’t even have to make a big production out of it. A simple lean in will do. Move forward and kiss him on the mouth, quick and painless - probably not the best two adjectives to describe a first kiss, one he’s been waiting 6000 years for, but they’re the ones that pop to mind.

“Crowley?” Aziraphale says with honest concern. “Tell me what’s the matter? Is it something I said? Something I did?”

“I … I wanted to … well, I was hoping to …”

“Yes …?” Aziraphale leans in himself and Crowley’s brain short circuits. They are both perfectly poised for this kiss! It doesn’t get much better than this!

Crowley stops trying to explain, though he probably should be asking. But he can’t seem to get the words out. Aziraphale, may I kiss you? There! It sounds so simple in his head. But he didn’t practice that. No, what he practiced in his head was a smooth, suave, swashbuckling-type maneuver … that got kneecapped the second Aziraphale opened the door.

But he can recover, bring it back to that. He’s just going to do it, no warning so he doesn’t scare Aziraphale off. One little peck, that’s all he’s aiming for.

Jesus Christmas! Hastur got it wrong. Mr. Slick he’s not.

Crowley doesn’t understand it! He’s done hundreds of temptations on random humans and never had performance anxiety this extreme! Of course, he’s never actually kissed any of the humans he’s tempted. He’s never kissed anybody.

And Aziraphale isn’t a random human. He’s Aziraphale.

“Fuck it,” he mutters and shifts forward, Aziraphale’s lips mere breaths away. There’s no way he can screw this up. None whatsoever.

And eventually Crowley does succeed in kissing him, but it doesn’t turn out the way he’d planned - though, at this point, he has to accept that the plan has gone belly up.

At the last possible moment, the bell over the bookshop door tinkles, and Aziraphale turns to see who has come in. Crowley kisses him, yes, but on the cheek, not the lips. He hears Aziraphale gasp, and without thinking to, without meaning to, Crowley makes time stop.

Aziraphale looks around, looks at him, feeling in the pit of his stomach what Crowley has done. The look in his eyes throws Crowley for its utter imperceptibility.

Is Aziraphale angry? Does he feel Betrayed? Violated?

Does he hate him now?

Oh, God! What did he do!? What did he do!? Why didn’t he just ask? That would have been the best course of action, plan be dammed! And he knew it! He knew better! He’s so stupid!

“I … I-I-I-I-I … I’m sorry!” Crowley scoots back on the sofa a foot. “I’m so sorry! I should have asked! I shouldn’t have assumed …”

“You missed.” Aziraphale’s voice rises only slightly above a whisper, but it’s firm, clear, and now Crowley is thoroughly confused.

“Come again?”

“You missed, my dear.” Aziraphale puts a hand to Crowley’s cheek, caressing gently. With none of the fear, anxiety, or clumsiness of his demon companion, he closes the gap between them, tilts his head, and kisses Crowley on the lips. When Crowley doesn’t react, too stunned to think straight, Aziraphale kisses him again. He kisses him and kisses him till Crowley comes back from the recesses of his frazzled brain and starts kissing him back, his hand finding the back of Aziraphale’s head and bringing him closer.

No, it’s not a peck, and it’s not quick, but it’s also not ambitious, because that’s not what kisses should be. It’s an exchange, a communication. In that one kiss, Aziraphale tells Crowley how long he’s waited, how much he’s wanted, how patient he’s been, how frightened for never, and now, how much he loves him.

And Crowley says it back.

It’s also not painless.

There’s heartbreak in that kiss - arguments, minor insults, fears of loss, of never evers, of gone for all eternity.

Of mourning best friends.

As far as first kisses go, this one is magical.

Neither angel nor demon want the kiss to end, but there comes a natural pause, and in it, Aziraphale smiles. “Is that why you came over here today? To kiss me?”

“Mmm … maybe …” Crowley mumbles, his forehead resting against Aziraphale’s, in no hurry to be anywhere outside of these few inches. “Well … ngh … I … yeah. Yeah it is.”

“Good.” Aziraphale sits back slowly, straightening his vest, a silent cue for Crowley to start time again. “I’m glad.”

“Are you really?” Crowley’s body follows Aziraphale as he makes to leave the room, subconsciously determined to follow wherever he leads from this day forward.

“Yes.” Aziraphale’s eyes meet Crowley’s shyly before he stands to greet his customers. “You saved me the bus fare.”

#good omens #ineffable husbands #crowley x aziraphale #aziraphale x crowley #Frankie writes #good omens fanfiction #aziraphale #anthony j crowley

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