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jamespotterthefirst · 4 years ago

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Fake Wife (Ethan x MC)

AKA: Fake Husband III

Pairing: Dr. Ethan Ramsey x F!MC (Dr. Lilac Allende) Word count: 2.7K Warning: Language Summary: A certain young doctor comes to his rescue when Ethan runs into an old flame. Part 3 of Fake Husband and Fake Husband, Part 2.

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The crowded banquet hall buzzed with laughter and conversation, the sound alone unnerving enough for Ethan. Add to that the countless doctors who vied for his attention and Ethan felt the need to escape at once.

In fact, he was desperate enough to do the unthinkable.

With the conviction of a suffocating man, he pulled out his phone and started to text.

Are you coming, Rookie?

It took him less than a second to realize the double entendre and to picture the tantalizing reply she would undoubtedly send. In a rush, he tried to send a second text to clarify. He was, of course, too late because a blip announced her reply.

I love it when you talk dirty to me, Dr. Ramsey.

She attached an emoji, as was customary, one that looked as though it was smirking in the same way she would have done if she was standing before him. Regardless, his throat went dry at the implication.

This is why I don't text, he returned, hoping to sound unaffected. He knew better than to expect her to buy that.

“Dr. Ramsey!” An older doctor approached him. “Enjoying the conference?”

“God, no,” he replied truthfully, which only prompted a belly laugh from his companion.

“Ramsey, you haven't changed a bit! Don't think I didn't notice you haven't missed one since Miami,” he pointed out with amusement. “Surely, they can't be that awful.”

Ethan took a swig of his drink, dispassionately watching their surroundings. Every year, he found himself convinced to attend, for old times sake, as Lilac liked to tell him. Despite the indifferent and irritated front he put up, Ethan enjoyed them.

He enjoyed them with her.

Inevitably, his mind traveled to that legendary Miami conference and to his favorite memory of her. The reminder of her full lips, moving against his for the first time and coaxing a yearning he hadn't felt until that point, made him restless to have her at his side. Without much pretense, he excused himself from the presence of the jolly older doctor and found a semblance of peace by the dessert table. He glanced at his phone, where her reply awaited.

Liar. I bet you're smiling right now.

A broad grin spread across his face despite his best efforts.

Are you ready to join me? I can't stand another minute being alone with these vultures.

Ethan could picture her in the hotel room upstairs, rolling her eyes upon reading his dramatic reply.

Almost ready… You can't rush art.

It was Ethan's turn to roll his eyes at that, though not without a smile. His poor, unprepared brain had only just begun to picture how tantalizing stunning she would look, when his phone pinged with an incoming photo from her.

It took everything in him not to choke on his drink. Hell, it took an insurmountable amount of sheer will power to remain where he was, instead of dashing upstairs to pin her to the wall.

Are you okay over there?, she replied.

There was no time to lie in his reply because a bout of loud laughter erupted from a group nearby. Ethan briefly glanced on instinct, ready to dismiss the interruption with a small huff and return to the tempting picture on his screen. His attention, however, snagged on the person at the center of the small crowd, the one who spoke with a lively cadence and who no doubt had been the one to make everyone laugh.

It had been over ten years since he had seen her last, and though she wore her blond hair much shorter, there was no mistaking those glacial silver eyes and the charming, effortless way she enraptured those around her. Statuesque and confident as ever, Dr. Fiona Bellington looked every bit like her former self, the girl both Ethan and Tobias had fallen desperately in love with.

His phone buzzed in his hand, bringing him back from over a decade ago in a rush. Ethan didn't read whatever it was Lilac had replied, instead, he quickly texted:

Never mind, don't bother to come down. I'm leaving.

Blood rushing loudly at his hot ears, Ethan hurried towards the door. The sight of Fiona set off a fight or flight response and Ethan gladly chose to flee, much too eager to avoid the specter of his past. He didn't make it far, however, before Fiona herself was standing right before him, impeding his path.

“Ethan?” she asked, though the recognition was evident in her heart-shaped face. “I thought that was you.”

Nothing in her perfect posture suggested she felt as uncomfortable as Ethan did. He, on the other hand, felt his face burn as he wished he could disappear into the tacky carpet of the banquet hall. Then again, that had always been their dynamic. Fiona, ever confident and graceful, and Ethan, quiet and awkward in her presence.

“Dr. Bellington,” he acknowledged at last.

Fiona laughed pleasantly at the formality of his greeting. “You know you can call me Fiona.”

Ethan didn't respond. His phone buzzed in his hand with Lilac's replies.

“How have you been?” She looked unfazed by his lack of response. Perhaps Ethan took a beat too long to reply, or Fiona was still in the habit of asking questions she did not care to hear the answer to because she added, “It's funny I ran into you. I just read your case study on Primary Hemophagocytic Lymphohistiocytosis in the NEJM.”

“Oh?”

What else could he say? In his hand, the buzzing became more frantic to match the content of Lilac's responses, no doubt.

“Very impressive, as always,” Fiona went on, undeterred.

They spent the next few minutes catching up, even if Ethan's side of the conversation was brief and detached.

“What a career you've had these past ten years.” Her silver eyes sparkled, making her look almost ten years younger. She fixed them on Ethan in a manner that was too calculated to be casual.

“All a result of hard work and dedication,” he deflected. His eyes abandoned the silvery spectacle before him—from Fiona's white blonde hair, to her eyes and dress—to instead find an escape route. Ethan had no moral qualms about being rude, but even he couldn't just leave mid-conversation. Then again, could it be called a conversation when his responses were short and noncommittal?

Fiona, seemingly oblivious about his escape plans, smirked and continued, “And an unmatched genius, Ethan. There is no need to be humble with me.”

Fiona moved closer to him, almost imperceptibly. His instinct was to step back, but the dessert table behind him prevented him from doing so.

Her sharp face lit up with determination and a hint of playfulness. “It's no surprise. You were always so…” Fiona allowed her gaze to fall to his chest, before slowly dragging it up to meet his eyes. “Driven.”

Completely unaffected, Ethan said nothing. The only source of discomfort stemmed from feeling trapped between the pastry-laden table and a woman whom he hadn't thought about in a decade. A woman who was determined to lay it on real thick with a charm that might have worked on him in another life.

Fiona, clever as ever, must have realized the lack of effect on her audience because she tried for a new approach. “I've thought a lot about you these past few years,” she confessed in a soft whisper. “I've always wondered if that mess with Tobias hadn't happened, if we could have…”

His jaw clenched reflexively.

“There's nothing more detrimental to progress than foolishly dwelling in the past,” he replied, face taught with tension, fist clasping his drink with formidable force. The words were the gentlemanly alternative to what Ethan really wanted to say, something along the lines of, “You fucked up, Fiona. And now Tobias, proving to be smarter than he looks, doesn't give you the time of day after he got bored. So now you're back, with your tail between your legs to chase after the now-famous alternative.”

As it turned out, his words were perhaps too gentle because Fiona considered them thoughtfully. Something akin to hope bloomed in her face, much to his dismay. “I absolutely agree,” she said. “Perhaps the best way forward is to break through any walls.”

At least she had the decency to look almost bashful, if a bit hopeful. Though utterly incredulous, Ethan scrutinized the woman he once fancied himself in love with. Had it really been love? It would be a disservice to his younger self to write it off as anything else. Fiona was intelligent and fiercely ambitious, not to mention charming and exceedingly beautiful. Anyone who knew her then would inevitably fall in love with her. But, as Ethan moved on and mended the fragments of a broken heart, he understood the ambition that drove her had always paired with a cruelty that tore down everyone in her path. He understood now that the love he had felt for her then was a tumultuous torrent, untamed and almost destructive but gone as quickly as it had appeared.

Misinterpreting his silence, she said, “Maybe we can get out of here and—”

Fiona did not finish that sentence because her icy grey eyes swiveled to something over Ethan's shoulder. Before Ethan could turn to look too, a pair of warm, familiar hands appeared from under his arms, sliding up his chest in a lazy line. Soon after, the lovely face of Lilac Allende appeared from over his shoulder.

The way she looked up at him was so adoring that something tugged at his chest.

“There you are, babe,” she murmured, her voice unfairly sultry, as if his heartbeat hadn't already spiked to astronomical levels at the way her hands touched him. “I've been looking all over for you.”

Ethan said nothing, unable to speak through the haze she effortlessly cast over him. How was she always so good at that? His eyes fell on the emerald green dress that hugged her pristine body. Ethan repressed a groan as he took in the revealing neckline and equally ensnaring leg slit. It was the very same dress that tormented him all the time ago through a social media post.

At the extended silence, Lilac's eyes widened slightly, prompting him to say something. In the most discreet way, she gestured toward Fiona and it hit him.

They were doing this again.

Ages after their initial fib, there they stood, about to sell the lie again, their roles reversed.

Without wasting another minute, he snared his arms around Lilac’s waist and pulled her to him, as naturally as the rhythm of the ocean. Her high heels compensated for their height difference and as Ethan leaned down, their noses were mere inches apart. “I was only gone for twenty minutes,” he informed her, swaying them slightly as he held her. “It's nice to know I am so thoroughly missed when I leave.”

Lilac raised her brow imperceptibly at him, no doubt taking his words as a challenge. The most wicked smile pulled at her lips, made more dangerous still with the way her body pressed tightly against his. She lowered her voice conspiratorially, “Speaking of thorough, you promised we could leave to our room upstairs so we could—”

Lilac made a show of noticing Fiona for the first time. “Oh, hello.”

The blonde looked at them through thinly veiled shock and disappointment. They disentangled though Lilac remained at his side, hand casually resting at his chest. The tiny gesture made it entirely too difficult to concentrate.

“Lilac, this is Dr. Fiona Bellington,” Ethan said at last. Lilac was not acting when she tore her eyes from Fiona before quickly glancing at Ethan. “Dr. Bellington, this is Dr. Lilac Allende,” he paused to kiss the top of Lilac’s forehead. “My wife.”

Uttering the word, even if it was a lie, sent his pulse into chaos.

Lilac shifted slightly to extend her hand in greeting but all pleasantries were forgotten as Fiona gaped at them.

“Wife?” Fiona said to Ethan in apparent disbelief. “I thought you didn’t—” she stopped and cleared her throat, regaining some composure. “I never took you for the marrying type, Ethan.”

“He wasn’t the conference type and look at him now,” Lilac returned cheerfully.

Fiona blinked. She seemed to remember her manners only seconds later because she plastered on a pleasant enough smile and offered her hand to Lilac.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” she said as they shook hands. “Ethan and I are old friends. We were at Johns Hopkins together.”

He fought the urge to grimace. He would hardly call Fiona his friend.

“Yes, he mentioned that before,” Lilac returned just as politely.

There was a slight twitch in Fiona’s smile, sending it from passably agreeable to almost forced. “Forgive my initial shock,” she said. “I never knew Ethan to believe in marriage. What was it you said about it being a senseless institution?”

Ethan’s shoulders stiffened, entirely too annoyed by Fiona’s petty maneuvers. He opened his mouth to bluntly refute her, but Lilac laughed beside him. “The speech about there being no scientific basis for soulmates? You were already that cynical in med school, love?”

Inspired, Ethan smiled lovingly at her and pressed a kiss to the tip of her nose.

“I hadn’t met you yet.”

Lilac froze at the words and he was delighted to see a blush tinge her face. Fiona, meanwhile, struggled to conceal her crestfallen expression, her smile appearing painful now.

“We should go if we want to make dinner,” Ethan said to Lilac, deciding that any minute they spent in the company of others instead of alone was a waste of time. “Dr. Bellington,” Ethan said with a nod as mode of farewell.

“It was good to meet you,” Lilac added before Ethan whisked her away, leaving a dejected Fiona behind. They were successful in concealing their amusement until they reached a deserted hall several doors away.

Lilac's fit of laughter was contagious and he joined her without reservations.

“We should go into acting in case this medicine thing doesn't work out,” he commented.

“You make it very easy to act.”

All traces of humor were gone from her face. Unable to fight back the pull any longer, he hooked an arm around her waist and pulled her until their lips met. She responded at once, her body conforming to his as though it was designed to do so, a little moan escaping her when his tongue traced a trail along her lower lip. By the time they pulled apart, completely breathless, his tongue and lips stung pleasantly as a result of her ministrations.

“Are you okay?” she murmured, her arms still wrapped around his neck. Her fingers caressed the angles of his face and Ethan closed his eyes.

“I'm fine. How did you know I needed a save?”

“Your text,” she explained. “And the terrified look on your face when I found you talking to her.”

Ethan raised his brows to his hairline, waiting for more. Lilac rolled her eyes and relented. “And I also heard her trying to get you to leave with her.”

He chuckled. “You're cute when you're jealous.” Lilac opened her mouth, cheeks ablaze. “You've nothing to worry about, Rookie. I'm interested in one person and one person only.”

“Who? Your wife?”

“She's not my wife yet,” he replied with a grin, aware it probably made him look sheepish. He didn't care. “But I do like the sound of the word.”

“Good. Get used to it because it will be true in a few weeks.”

The thought alone exhilarated him. Very gently, he took her hand in his, bringing his lips to the engagement ring he had placed there a few weeks prior.

“I'm counting down the days.”

Their lips met again in another passionate kiss. Ethan's hands fell to the swell of her hips, his fingers quickly descending to the slit along her thigh.

“This dress,” he breathed when they pulled apart. His eyes took her in shamelessly, marveling at how a mere piece of fabric made her look entirely like a goddess. “Did you wear it for me?”

“Yes,” Lilac allowed with a wistful sigh. “I was hoping to finally get some use out of it.”

Ethan flashed his fiancée a devilish lopsided smile. “Night's not over yet,” he whispered, pressing a hot lip against her neck. “And besides, I think its true purpose is to be a heap in our bedroom floor.”

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Prompt: Thank you anon!

Also, thank you to the anon who wanted Jealous!MC (kinda)

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Author’s Note: Oh how the turn tables...

THANK YOU SO MUCH for reading this series. Let me say this is not the last time I will use the fake dating trope because I love it so much.

Apologies for that god awful summary!

Finally, I hope you don’t mind me adding extra scenes for the Miami kiss rewrite. May the writing gods be with me because I am so excited!

- Bree

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@dulceghernandez | @lion-ess24 | @emotionalswift2 | @the-soot-sprite |

#open heart #ethan x mc #ethan ramsey #my writing #Playchoices

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unmaskedagain · 5 years ago

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Ladybug: A Young Avenger

Hey Everyone, I got prompt for a civil war ML crossover fic but I was really into Team Iron Man on Ao3 for longest of times and, after endgame, I kind of need some team fluff. So I tweaked the prompt. It’s still team Iron man; just… not the way you’d expect. (Also did anyone know else know that Penny’s last name was Rolling?)

It took Tony Stark all of five minutes to figure out Ladybug’s identity.

“Jarvis, buddy?” Tony called out.

“Yes, sir?”

“What’s up with teenagers and being bug-themed heroes wearing inappropriate costumes?”

The A.I took a moment before answering, “…I, for one, blame Vine.”

Tony sighed. First fifteen-year-old Peter Parker aka Spiderman. He took the kid on an as an intern the second he learned about Spiderman. Now fifteen-year-old Marinette Dupain-Cheng aka Ladybug.

He groaned.

What could he do? He needed help.

Captain America needed to be stopped. The Winter Solider needed to be taken down. Team Cap had gone too far.

It was war.

Getting Harley Keener, a mechanical mastermind to agree to be his intern was a bit like chewing nails but Tony always knew the kit would agree. Getting Peter Parker, a child genius with a bright future as a scientist, to agree to be his intern was a piece of cake. Honestly Tony could’ve asked for the kid’s soul in repayment and Peter would’ve asked if he wanted on a silver plate or if plastic was okay? Getting Riri Williams, an engineering prodigy to be his intern, was easy. Too easy; her mom practically threw her at him, all while making him swear into a recorder that he wouldn’t sue. No matter what. Introducing the kids to his labs made him feel like Willie Wonka hand-delivering the golden tickets.

They were all future scientists and engineers like Tony. They grew up worshiping at the altar of Stark Industries like ever future MIT graduate did.

Marinette Dupain-Cheng, on the other hand, was an entirely different beast who played an entirely different game. She was a fashion prodigy who had designed for stars like Jagged Stone and Clara Nightingale. She had interned for Style Queen Audrey Bourgeois, had her clothes walk the runway during Paris fashion week, and had a summer job that somehow lasted over a year, working for Miranda Priestly, the editor-in-Chief for Runway Magazine when the scary woman took over Paris: Runaway. Said job ended when Miranda when back to New York. Marinette only prayed to the fashion gods. So when Tony Stark, god of the nerds, showed up at her door, she only blinked once.

Said girl sat between her parents, with cool blue eyes glaring at him suspiciously. Luckily Tony was smart enough to bring Pepper with him.

Pepper Potts smiled at the family in front of her; two bakers and the daughter, who made the most delicious macarons that she ever tasted. “So you see, after Tony came across Marinette’s wonderful re-design sketch of his suit on her website, he was very impressed with her talent.”

“But to take Marinette on as an intern?” Sabine asked. “Excuse me, but Marinette has always leaned towards the arts than science.”

Tony gave the woman his best charming smile, “What is science if not another form of art. We both create, strive to better our talents, work to make names for ourselves; experiment and test out hypothesizes. Granted no one in my field ever created the disaster that was crocs.”

Marinette narrowed her eyes, “Didn’t your father help on the Manhattan Project?”

Silence.

Pepper cleared on her throat. “Tom, Sabine, before anyone agrees to anything I’d like to go over safety procedures in place. Would you mind stepping outside with me, I could use a bit of fresh air.”

Tony and Marinette just stared at each other as the three left the room. When the front door closed behind them, Marinette leaned forward, “What do you want?” Her patience had reached its end.

“Aren’t you being a little rude?” Tony smirked.

“Aren’t you a little old?” Marinette snapped back. “What do you want?”

“I want Ladybug’s help.”

Marinette flinched back in shock. Her heart raced in her chest. “How do you know?”

“I’m Tony Stark,” He shrugged easily, picking up a mint chocolate Macron. “I know everything.”

Marinette fought the fear racing through her, and steeled herself like Miranda and Audrey had taught her, “So Iron Man’s wanted Ladybug as an intern? So what does Iron Man get? What does Ladybug get? What does Tony get? And what does Marinette get?”

“You made clear distinctions,” Tony said approvingly, his business-side gearing up. “But I am Iron Man.” He said. “You come to New York for this spring break and for the summer. I get Ladybug’s help in handling a personal issue that has developed within the Avengers. Ladybug gets training from the Avengers. Marinette gets to add Stark Industries and a personal letter of recommendation from Tony Stark to her resume.”

“On the condition, that identities stay secret from the media,” Marinette crossed her arms. “I don’t suppose I can hide it from the rest Avengers for very long. And I get an additional letter of recommendation from Pepper Potts. Pepper takes my friend Chloe on as an intern; she’s the hero, Queen Bee. And only one who knows my identity, besides you. Also, I actually do get to help design your next suit. My expenses?”

Tony smirk widened. The girl knew how to cover her bases. She even wanted to have an Ally with her should things take a turn. “All paid for by me. First-class all the way. You and Chloe will stay in the Stark Tower on the same floor as the other interns.”

“Other young superheroes, you mean?” Marinette guessed, causing Tony’s eyes to twinkle in joy. “Spiderman, Iron Heart, and WarIron. Based on their sizes, I had guessed they were young; teenagers probably. Why didn’t you ask Chat Noir too? Or why aren’t you? Because you’re not, you would’ve mentioned it by now?”

“You mean the Agreste kid?” Tony said, not noticing Marinette’s eyes widen in surprise. “He’s not serious enough for me. I play games but he goes too far. Surprised you haven’t dumped him yet. Get a better partner.”

Marinette took a bit of a macron to get a moment to think. Adrien was Chat Noir. In retrospect, it made a lot of sense. Both were socially immature, and a bit naïve. Each had an idealistic view of things and didn’t let the real world break them of it. For example Adrien and his dealing with Lila’s lies. Chat Noir and Ladybug turning down his advances.

“Very well,” The bluenette finally agreed. “I agree to be your intern. Shall we discuss my salary now or later? Well, need to before I or my parents sign any contracts.”

It was Tony’s turn to narrow his eyes. Not one; not a single one of his interns: Harley, Peter, or Riri ever asked about how much they’d get paid. They’d all assumed it was an unpaid internship and was surprised when their contracts included a salary. “You’re a shark.”

Marinette hummed, “You should see me when there’s blood in the water.”

That was something Tony was looking forward to seeing.

The official paperwork was signed three days later; Marinette was officially a Stark intern. Due to go to Orientation for spring break in New York in a few weeks.

Those weeks flew by. She let Fu know she’d have to go back and forth for a few weeks. She didn’t bother telling anyone else. Her friendships in the class had dwindled dramatically. While most weren’t her outright enemies, her classmates tended to avoid her. If they couldn’t do that, they were beyond cold to her. It was Lila’s doing. She got her hooks into the class, who all wanted to tie themselves to the golden goose, and when it was clear that Lila and Marinette didn’t like each other, they picked sides. They chose their meal ticket over their lifelong friend.

Honestly, it made Marinette almost wish that Lila had lied about her instead; accused her of being a bully or something. Anything. Because at least then her ex-friends would have somewhat of a reason to be ex-friends. Even if it wasn’t a very good one. Instead, they were just bad friends all on their own.

Still, Marinette didn’t mourn their loss as she sat in the back of the class with Chloe on a Sunny Tuesday morning, and they were living for New York that Friday. She had a steadily rising career in Fashion. She had worked under Miranda Priestly and Audrey. From them, she learned it was best to drop fair-weather friends and how to spot wannabes, fame-seekers, and gold-diggers from three miles away.

She was happy with Chloe as her bestie. The girl had turned a new leaf and proven her loyalty to the point where Fu made her a permanent hero. And the Blond had been ecstatic when Pepper Potts had shown up at their door. She had hugged Marinette a full five minutes for getting her the internship. All while screaming with joy.

Both girls were excited to go. Though Marinette did encounter one downside. The night before, Jagged Stone and Penny Rolling; or as Marinette deemed them #RollingStone, called her. Or rather Penny did the talking. Jagged was trying to wrestle his newest jacket away from Fang’s teeth. Penny offered Marinette a chance to spend her spring break traveling around on tour with Jagged, as his personal stylist. Marinette had no choice but to turn the job down. She loved her honorary Uncle Jagged but she already signed the contract.

That morning Lila had spun another set of lies. The first was about helping Tony Stark fix his Iron man suit when she was traveling in America. The second was about the newest song Jagged Stone wrote about her. It was exhausting to listen to but the class hung on every word.

Bustier had just finished her first lesson of the day when she invited Alya to stand up.

The glasses-wearing girl grinned at the class, “So as everyone’s aware; there’s a class pool party is this Saturday; first day of spring break, baby!” The class cheered. “Everyone who’s invited should’ve gotten their invitation. Don’t want any drama,” She cast a cold look to the two girls at the back of the class. “Invite only. So no party crashers. Marinette, Chloe what are you doing this Saturday?” Alya smirked at her call out that the two girls weren’t invited; that they were the only ones who weren’t.

As if on cue, the classroom’s door burst opened and in walked Tony Stark, followed by a very apologetic looking Pepper, “Marinette; it’s time to go! Grab Pepper’s minion and let’s go.”

There were gasps from the class. Max sat up straight. Iron Man was in front of him, in his class, this was the best day of his life.

Marinette just sighed, “Did you kick the door open, Tony?” Disapproval clear in her voice.

“…No?”

“I can’t go now!” Marinette explained. “I have class. We weren’t supposed to leave until Friday, remember.”

Tony waved her off, “Details. Spring Break starts now. Queenie, Mari; chop-chop! New York is waiting!”

Bustier decided to step in. She may not always be the best teacher but she refused to allow a strange man, even if that man was Tony Stark, to take away any of her students. “Mr. Stark, can I ask what you want Marinette and Chloe for?”

Thankfully, it was Pepper that answered as she closed back the classroom door, “They have been employed as interns for Stark Industries. They’ll be attending orientation during their spring break at Stark Tower.”

Max actually fell out of his seat. Because this couldn’t be happening. Stark industries rarely ever took high schoolers’ as interns. Tony Stark only chose the best of the best. How could Marinette land the job?

“Marinette’s my intern,” Tony grinned. “Blondie’s Pepper’s. Who else is gonna teach her how to rule the world.”

A slow smile spread across Chloe’s face, “With an iron fist.”

Tony pointed at her, “You scare me. Pepper get your intern!”

The other students were amazed. Marinette was Tony Stark’s intern. Chloe somehow got Pepper Pott's attention. What had they missed? Why didn’t Marinette tell them? How?

“That’s what we’ll be doing this Saturday, Alya,” Chloe drawled. “In New York, hanging with the Avengers.” Causing Alya to flush with anger. “We couldn’t come to your pool party even if we wanted to. Which we don’t.”

“He found my sketch of a potential Iron man suit design,” Marinette explained, continuing the story Tony had told her parents. “He loved it and offered me the job a few weeks ago.”

“Weeks?” Nino asked. “And you didn’t tell us? Dudette, not cool.”

Alix nodded, her arms crossed, “Yeah I thought we were friends!”

Marinette and Chloe just looked at them like they were stupid.

Alya put her hands on her hips, “Mr. Stark, why didn’t you ask Lila Rossi to be your intern? She helped you with your suit before. She’d be much better than Marinette!”

The girl in question face turned bright red, “This can’t be happening.” Lila muttered.

Tony looked honestly confused, “Lila? Who’s Lila? No one ever helped me with my suit except the kids I already got as interns.” He looked at Pepper. “Do I know a Lila Rossi?”

Pepper shook her head, and turned fierce eyes towards Lila, “Miss Rossi, please refrain from lying about Tony Stark and or Stark Industries. Or we will sue you on the grounds of defamation.”

Lila squeaked. Sue? She couldn’t be sued. Her mother would kill her if she got a lawsuit from Tony Stark.

It was the rest of the class’s turn to look confused.

However, before anyone could ask any follow-up questions, the classroom door burst opened again. Jagged Stone strutted in, followed by a very apologetic look Penny and happy Fang with, what looked to be, the arm of a leather jacket.

“Marinette!” Jagged yelled. “What’s this about you not coming on tour? I need my favorite stylist, love.

Marinette just sighed, “Did you kick the door open, Jagged?” Disapproval clear in her voice.

“…No?”

The bluenette just shook her head, “I have plans this Spring break. I’m sorry.”

“Plans?” Jagged whined. “What could be better spending your Spring Break with a Rock Star? You can even bring your Blonde. Penny could use an assistant!” He paused, finally noticing it wasn’t just kids. “The bloody hell is Tony Stark doing here?”

The two famous men eyed each other. The women they came with just looked so done with the world.

Tony crossed his arms, “I got custody of Marinette for Spring Break; you snooze, you lose.”

“What?!” Jagged hissed. “She’s my designer.”

“She’s my intern!”

Jagged glared, “I knew her first. By rights, I get custody.”

“I have a contract that says otherwise!” Tony taunted the Rock Star. “Her future is Stark Industries.”

“Her future is Rock and Roll!” Jagged yelled back.

Both men glared at each other.

“Pepper!”

“Penny!”

Both women groaned. How was this their lives? Why what was this their lives? What bus full of nuns and orphans did they rob in a past life?

Penny smiled, “Marinette means the world to us. I’m her honorary Aunt Penny,” She held out her hand for Pepper. “Jagged’s her honorary Uncle. We’ve known her for years. Contracts were already signed?”

Pepper nodded, “Tony doesn’t play when it comes to his interns. He won’t budge. Trust me; we’ve done this three other times. Marinette’s his kid now, all but legally.” For now, Pepper didn’t bother to add. Every now and then she found discovered a new set of adoption papers with one of the interns’ names on it; one time she found three sets for all three. Plus if Tony kept hinting any harder, May was going to gut him. “She’ll be in New York for Spring break and all of the summer.”

“Summer!” Jagged whined. “He gets custody for summer too! No!” he shook his head. “Not happening. Call our lawyers, Penny. We’re going to family court!”

Tony blew him a raspberry. Tony Stark blew Jagged Stone a raspberry. The class could only blink, trying to process what was happening.

Marinette just wanted the earth to open up and swallow her.

“Marinette already designed your clothes for the tour,” Penny tried to placate. “They’re amazing. We can call and skype if we need any additional tips. We have a concert in New York over spring break so we can go and see.” They didn’t. But Penny would be damned if she could have one booked within the hour. Anything to stop jagged from mention family court again. “Most of our summer is free too, we can visit Marinette whenever we want.”

Jagged huffed but didn’t say anything.

“Well not whenever you want,” Tony teased.

“Family court!” Jagged hissed.

“Tony!” Pepper said warningly. She was not going to let this going to court. No matter how lovely Marinette was. “Be nice.”

Tony pouted.

Marinette raised her hand, “You guys know that legally my parents still have custody of me, right?” There was no answer. “Right?!” Nothing.

The bluenette just sighed.

Alya took that moment to break in, “Jagged, don’t you want to say hi to Lila? She’s right here,” Alya pointed to her bestie. “Oh, can we listen to the songs you wrote for her? Can you tell us how she saved your cat from getting hit by a plane?”

The look Lila gave Alya could’ve killed a thousand men.

Jagged looked affronted, “Lila? Who’s Lila?” He looked at his fiancé. “Penny, do I know a Lila?”

“No!” Penny glared fiercely at Lila. “Jagged Stone has never written a song about an underage girl before. He has never owned a cat. What parents and airline would careless enough to allow a child to rush onto a runway for a pet? Refrain from spreading any further slander. Or we’ll hit you with a lawsuit so fast you’ll get whiplash.”

“I’m allergic to cats by the way,” Jagged told the class. “All fur actually. That’s why I got Fang here.” He pointed the crocodile who had made its way to Marinette for cuddles. “I’ve had him for twenty years. He’s the only pet I’ve had all that time.”

Marinette rolled her eyes and took the crocodile in her lap.

“Twenty years?” Kim’s eyebrows furrowed. “Whoa, that’s long that we’ve been alive.”

Nino glared at Lila, “Yeah it is.” He finally realized the girl was lying. Most of the class had in fact.

“Enough of this,” Tony waved. “Marinette, Chloe, time to go. Leave the dinosaur.”

Bustier took a deep breath, “No one is taking Marinette or Chloe anywhere. Until I get a note from their parents verifying that is. I’m going to have to ask you all to leave.”

Penny and Pepper nodded understandingly. Jagged and Tony just looked shocked.

“But I’m Tony Stark!”

“I’m Jagged Stone, love!”

Bustier just rolled her eyes and shooed them out of her class. It took some handling, and eventually, the women had to drag the guys out. The teacher shut the door with a sigh of relief. She brushed off the imaginary dirt on her clothes. “Marinette,” She called. “If you could tell any future visitors to wait until after school to pick you up, with a note from your parents that would be most helpful.”

“Sorry,” Marinette blushed, a deep dark red.

Bustier walked back to her desk before pausing. “Is that Crocodile still in my class, Marinette?”

“…Yes.”

“I think he’s here for the rest of the day,” Chloe shrugged. “Unless you want to invite Jagged back?”

Bustier paused. No. Never again. “No. No. Fang can stay for the day.”

When the lunch bell rang, Marinette found that it was easier to avoid her classmates' questions, as they were too busy yelling at Lila. It wasn’t long after that Ladybug had to take down Lila’s seventh akuma form.

Marinette and Chloe left that night to New York. Somehow he managed to convince their parents that missing three days of school to study in the most advanced building in the world was a good thing.

When they got to Stark Tower, they were given a quick tour. Then Pepper took Chloe to show her where she would be working. And Tony took Marinette the workshop where three other kids were already working.

The oldest one glanced at her and snorted, “God he kidnapped another one.” He was the tallest in the room with dark brown hair and a smirk on his face.

The other two snickered.

Tony looked affronted, “Oh please; your parental units practically threw you at me.

The younger looking boy smirked, “Aunt May threatened to shank you next time you took me out of school early.” He had light brown hair and big brown eyes

The genius pointed, “You tell Aunt Hottie to leave me alone.”

“HI, I’m Marinette!” She waved happily. “He keeps mentioning he has custody. And I’ve become moderately concerned.”

“And you should be,” The other girl in the room laughed. She was a pretty brown-skinned girl with black wild curls. “Name’s Riri.”

“Harley,” Said the first boy who spoke.

“Peter,” The other boy introduced.

Marinette nodded and eyes them, “WarIron,” The pointed at Harley. “Iron Heart,” Then at Riri. “Spiderman, right?” She pointed at Peter.

The three looked at Tony with questions in their eyes. Tony raised in hands in surrender, “Hey, I told her nothing.”

Harley eyed the new girl, “You’re from Paris, right?” She nodded. “Ladybug, I’m guessing.” Marinette blushed. “Welcome to the Young Avengers, I guess. Why’d he bring you in?”

Marinette shrugged, “He said to there was a personal problem happening with the Avengers. He wanted my help.”

The teen froze. Peter just shook his head, “You didn’t, Tony!”

Tony looked sheepish.

“What?” Marinette asked.

Riri rolled her eyes, “That personal problem? It’s called ManHunt.”

“I’m sorry?” Marinette asked. She was going to have to hunt a man?

“It’s a game,” Harley explained. “Team Iron Man versus team Cap. One team hunts the other in a sort of hide and seek type of thing and tries to capture as many members as they can. Last time we played it, Team Cap crushed Team Iron man. It’s why Tony brought us all in. Revenge.”

Said Man didn’t look one bit ashamed, “Rules were since Thor and the Big guy are gone I can bring in whoever I want to replace them.”

Marinette tossed up her hands, “You brought me here to play a game?” Unbelievable.

“No,” Tony said. “I brought you here to take out the Winter Soldier.”

“Say what now?”

“Welcome to orientation,” Was All Tony said to her question.

The kids trained together for a week; Chloe, a girl named MJ who was Pepper’s other interns, and a boy named Ned who was a tech intern, were brought in as well. When it turned out that Kagami was in New York City for a fencing tournament. Tony was happy to bring in the scary girl as well. (And somehow get her mother to agree to let her stay for Spring Break) He made practice stealth and learn hand signals. Tony drilled them on the Team Cap’s strengths and weaknesses. They reviewed videos of previous missions until they had everyone’s fighting style memorized. Tony went over body anatomy aka where the best place to hit them was. They memorized plans and scenarios to take out each specific member of Team Cap.

The teens spent a lot of time in the lab creating gadgets to use against the Avengers. Each one straight out of a spy movie.

As far as Tony was concerned this was War. And there would be no prisoners.

Team Cap consisted of Captain America, The Winter Soldier, Black Widow, Hawkeye, Scarlet Witch, The Falcon, Antman, along with several Shield employees which included Fury, Melinda May, and Coulson.

Team Iron man consisted of Ironman, War Machine, Vision, Maria Hill, The Wasp, Quicksilver, Daisy Johnson, and a bunch of names Stark employees: I.E the interns. (Black Panther refused to participate. Though he and sister would watch from Wakanda.)

Each team had a total of thirty players; no more, no less.

The game would take place at the compound. Anything area within the compound legal territory was free to use. The living room would be home base and were all ‘out’ people had to stay. Until they were freed. Or until every member of the hiding team was captured and then it was Game Over. Everyone could communicate with their own team using special mics; normally only taken out for missions. However, those imprisoned in the home base couldn’t communicate with their team.

On Saturday, just before sunset; the main superheroes of the avengers met up. Tony facing Steve. Rhodey glaring at Bucky. Vision versus Wanda. Hawkeye to QuickSilver. The wasp against Ant-Man and the Falcon.

Steve smiled, “Tony.”

“You ready for war, Cap?” Tony asked.

“Training exercise,” Steve corrected his husband. “I trust your team is ready.”

Tony smirked, “Oh you have no idea. Your little spies are already hiding in the shadows.”

“Like your team isn’t?”

The alarm went off.

Tony suited up, “You have 1000 seconds, Steve.” His helmet shut. “I’d get running.”

Steve rolled his eyes. His team split up, running into the growing shadows.

The game had started.

Marinette waited, hiding in the shadows on the roof. Her ladybug costume was all back with little red polka dots; mostly easy to move around body armor. This wasn’t her actually Ladybug suit; Tikki, while willing to create a new suit design, decided it wasn’t a good idea to involve magic. So Marinette designed herself a new suit, and Tony help her trick it out.

Tony had pointed out the all-good hiding spots located in the Compound. She was the overly large landing pad. She forced herself to stay completely still. Even when she saw the Falcon take flight with WarIron right on his tail.

The smallest of moments caught on the corner of her eye, the glint of metal. An arrow, she realized. She smiled. Hawkeye.

She watched the man take stock of the room, looking in every possible place a person could hide. Unfortunately for him, Marinette had a bit of luck on her side.

“All clear on the roof, Cap,” Clint said into his mic. “I’ll keep a lookout from up here.” There was silence as he listened to Cap’s orders. “Okay. Will do. Stay invisible, got it. Over and out.”

The second the conversation had ended, Marinette through a smoke bomb at his feet. Before Clint could even finish saying, “What the he-” Marinette was on the attack. Using the smoke to her advantage, she swung her yo-yo at Hawkeye’s feet. The String wrapped around his legs, tripping him. Five seconds later, Hawkeye was hogtied on the ground.

Marinette touched her mic, “Tweety Bird down. Bringing him to home base now!”

“Copy that, Ladybug,” Tony said. “Be careful.”

Clint looked up at his assailant; expecting to see Tony or the Wasp, any avenger. Instead what he saw, was a teen girl with a scary blue-eyed glare on his face, “Who are you?”

Marinette leaned down, “Your reckoning.” She hissed.

“What the fuck!” He said as he was thrown over the girl’s shoulder and carried to home base.

When Marinette got to home base, she saw Harley putting a rather put out Falcon on the ground, Spiderman with five webbed up shield agents, Chloe had brought in two, Kagami and Riri brought in six. MJ and Ned both brought in one random shield agent. Marinette tossed Hawkeye on the couch.

It had been twenty minutes, Clint knew by the clock on the wall. Twenty minutes since sunset and the game had started. And they had already lost just over half their team to a bunch of teenagers.

Clint couldn’t help but wonder what the hell had Tony unleashed on them.

“Foghorn Leghorn secure,” Harley said into his mic. “Tweety in his cage. The shadows are all accounted for.”

“I’m Tweety,” Clint told Sam.

Sam paused. “…Am I Foghorn Leghorn?”

“Wasp and Vision on their way with The Blue Fairy,” Tony’s voice rang their ears. “They’ll play guard dog. QuickSilver is down; Miss Tuffit got him. Seven minions gone; Captain Hook and his jolly crew got them. Over and out.”

“Queen Bee, MJ, guard the Home base until they get here,” Harley ordered. “Guy in the chair, Mj, back on monitor duty. Fulfill mission Top hat ASAP.” They nodded and left the room.

Top hat was important. The two were trying to hack into Team Cap’s communications, once they did; it was game over.

“The rest of you complete the assignment,” He told them.

Then all split up again. Vision and Wasp arrived with Scarlet witch just as they were leaving. All three avengers gave the kids confused looks as they left.

It would take Marinette another hour before she came across another member of Team Cap. And she didn’t so much as come across, as she did respond to Peter’s cry for help.

“Captain Sparkles!” Peter yelled in their earpiece. “Training yard. I’m trying to hold hi-No I won’t give you back your shield! Hurry! Over!”

“I’m around the corner,” Marinette hissed into the mic as she ran for the yard. When she arrived it was just in time to catch the shield that was flying at her face.

She held the shield tightly in her hand, feeling like Wonder Woman, as she stared down Captain America.

Steve looked at the young girl who had joined the fight, “My shield, miss?” He was aware that Spiderman had landed behind him.

Marinette smiled sweet. Then she launched the shield at him with such brute force, he was lifted off his feet. “The Name’s Ladybug.”

Steve didn’t catch the shield in time and it bounced back to Spiderman.

Captain America glared at the two teenagers.

Then the fight was on.

Spiderman hits Steve with his shield, distracting him. The shield falling to the ground. Ladybug barges Captain America backwards. Steve shoulders her to the floor. Marinette lands on the ground; pain flaring across her shoulder. Spiderman punches Steve who just lifts him and slams him against the ground. Spiderman raises a fist but Steve twists it. A web shoots out of his hand, the sound of a small explosion fills the training yard.

Marinette takes the distraction to trip Captain America and jump up. As Steve falls to the ground, Marinette uses the electro-shooters that Riri made and shocks the dear life out of him. It wasn’t enough to bring him down but then Peter added in his own shocking web-shooters.

Yet Steve still looked ready for another round of their fight. Marinette quickly picked up the shield and slammed it across his head. Steve Rogers fell forward in a slump.

Spiderman webbed up with quick-drying cement.

Both teens breathed heavily; struggling to catch their breath, tense from the fight. Marinette could even find it in herself to unclench the shield.

“Captain Sparkles is down, over,” Marinette said into the Mic.

“We’re bringing him in, over,” Spiderman added.

There was a moment of silence.

“…What the fuck?” They heard War Machine say.

When Marinette walked in with the shield in one hand and helping Spiderman carry Cap with the other, the avengers present quietly lost their shit. Kagami nodded, where she stood over Fury who looked more pissed than ever before in his entire life. Chloe stood over Coulson, who just looked put out. MJ and Ned looked overly pleased. Their mission had been a success but it only lasted long enough to get Fury and Coulson. After that, Team Cap was smart enough to ditch the communications, figuring something was up.

“Who’s left?” Spiderman asked in the Mic. “Over.”

“Stoneheart,” Kagami answered bitterly, referring to Melinda May, into the Mic so the team could hear them. “She took out Daisy and got away. Hill is after her now.”

“Jon Snow and Miss Tuffit,” Chloe said referring to the Winter Soldier and Black Widow. “Iron Man and WarIron are after Small fry. War Machine has eyes on Miss Tuffet.”

“I’m closing in on Miss Tuffit, over.” War Machine said.

Marinette looked at her team, pressing on her mic, “Guy in Chair, Mj, I want you on Stoneheart’s tail. Spiderman go be back up for the War Machine. Iron Heart, meet me on the Location 12. Over.”

“What are you going to do, over?” Harley asked.

Marinette clenched the shield in her hands, “I’m going to go tell Jon Snow that Winter Is Over. Queen and Dragon with me. Over.”

The battle with the Winter Soldier was epic. The showdown happened in the gym. It turned out they weren’t hunting for the Winter Soldier, the Winter soldier was hunting for them. The second they walked into the gym, the doors closed behind them.

Bucky jumped down from the rafters. He stared at the girls. He had seen them fight. None of them fought with any ounce mercy but plenty of skill. But they were clearly just kids. Just Dames in over their heads. He’d go easy on them. “Shall we, Ladies?”

Ladybug, Queen Bee, Iron Heart, and Dragon shared a look before giggling.

The Winter Soldier only just barely stood a chance.

The girls laid Bucky gently on the floor on home base. He grunted and glared at them.

A few minutes later, Tony and Rhodey walked in with the Black Widow. The last of Team Cap.

Tony smirked, “Game over.”

Rhodey shook his head, “Record time; two hours and four-two minutes. Beats the last one by about seven hours and sixteen minutes.”

Then they debriefed. Video of the fights and footage was seemed was shown so everyone could see where they could improve. The image of tiny Ladybug clocking Captain America in their head with his own shield was rewinded and watched seven times.

Tony fell over laughing, “I’m putting on Youtube!”

“I will divorce you!” Steve snapped but couldn’t fight the smile on his face.

Once The random agents of shield and Stark industries left, Steve glared at Tony. His team had gotten demolished. In record time. “You brought in outside heroes, that’s not fair.”

“No,” Tony laughed. “I brought employees of Stark Industries as agreed upon. Everyone meet WarIron,” Harley lowered his helmet. “Iron Heart,” Riri lowered his, “You know Spiderman already,” Peter took of his mask and waved. “MJ, and Ned” Both teens nodded. “Ladybug,” Marinette took off her mask. “Queen Bee,” Chloe glared as she removed hers. “Dragon!” Kagami took off her black mask. “The interns. Otherwise known as the Young Avengers.”

“Oh, fuck you too Stark,” Clint complained. “Did you see what they did to poor Bucky. He’s the deadliest assassin in history, and I felt they went a little rough.”

Bucky nodded with a wince, “Can I have my arm back.”

Steve looked at the bluenette still holding his shield, with a charming smile.

Kagami glared. She held the metal arm like trophy. “Spoils of War.”

Marinette giggled.

Being a intern was going to be fun.

#ml fic #ml salt #adrien salt #marinette dupen chang #Marinette deserves better #Avengers #stony #tony stark #team iron man #peter parker

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underpassgraffiti · 3 years ago

Text

post 4x14; buck, eddie, & falling apart.

aka some random blurb from a longer story i will eventually finish

tw/cw: blood & injury

In blood, there’s liquid: plasma, which is compounded of water, sugar, fat, protein, salts.

Eddie’s blood: in between his teeth and in the corner of his lips, doesn’t taste like water, sugar, fat, protein, salt.

Blood is fifty-five percent plasma.

On his skin: sticky, dry, tastes like copper and metal. Hemoglobin. Iron and oxygen, creating life, splattered across his fucking face in the streets of LA as fifty-five percent plasma and forty-five percent blood cells pooled around a dying man. Around Eddie. In his hair, on the asphalt.

“Buckley,” Mehta says, a blue sweatshirt in his hand, “take this. Get changed. Wash up.”

He licks his lower lip, tastes what’s left of Eddie, and nods stiffly to the barely composed captain he barely knows.

(The crane doesn’t scare him. Heights are nothing new.

The flare in the window some-storeys up is a promise: take me, take me, you fucking bastard, take me instead.

No one takes him. Eddie doesn’t wake up.)

A confessional to Bobby in the loft, and Buck’s mind doesn’t change.

Where angels fear to tread?

Take me instead, you fucking bastard. You took him.

Taylor tells him, “You’re not invincible,” or maybe it’s his mother, or: “You think you’re indestructible,” and the press of lips against his own is flavoured chapstick instead of oxygenated iron.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” she says, and in another life, he’d chase her. Red hair, red wine, red blood—Eddie’s blood.

Ana calls, and it doesn’t matter anymore.

Recovery isn’t linear. It’s what they all say. It’s what Dr. Copeland told him in his last session, an emergency the day before the vests became mandatory, and he had broken down and told her: I wish it had been me. I held Chris, and it should’ve been his dad holding him.

Eddie waking up isn’t linear, either. Ana hesitates around the bed once Buck’s had the opportunity to talk to him, to repeat what he told his therapist, to tell him, “It would’ve been better for him if it had been me who got shot.”

Ana touches the crook of his elbow, nodding towards the door, trying to dismiss him. COVID protocols dictate one visitor at a time, and he’s clearly outlived his stay; girlfriend trumps best friend.

He has a kid to take care of, to hold together, and he squeezes Eddie’s exhausted hand once before taking his leave.

Bobby taking a bullet; Athena walking through fire; Buck aiding her into the building to shoot the man who made him taste his best friend’s blood and take half his life away.

It’s so fucking much. It’s all so much.

He goes home (Eddie’s place, Eddie’s house, home) and holds Christopher as close as he can, breathes in green apple shampoo, the softness of cotton laundry detergent while Chris taps his cheek and murmurs, “We’re o-kay.”

“We will be,” he whispers, a secret between the two of them. Like on the fire truck in the displaced Pacific while death drowning around them. “I promise, kiddo. We will be.”

“Because, Evan,” Eddie stresses, his arm in a sling and the silver of St. Christopher against healing skin, “you said it would’ve been better if you had been shot.”

You’re not expendable.

The two of them sit in the stillness of the hospital room for an indeterminable amount of seconds, the weight of the guardianship like a balm on the copper between his teeth.

The world is a dangerous place—

Because, Evan.

Buck says, “You knew I wouldn’t,” and what he’s really saying is: I’ll take what you give me, let me love you, I love you.

When it’s just the three of them left in the house, with Eddie on the couch and Christopher nestled up against his side, Buck inhales sharply, excuses himself to the bathroom, and breaks.

It’s this:

Eddie is alive. His blood is soaking into the ground on an LA street, but Eddie is alive. Buck will never forget what it tastes like to have someone else’s blood in the divots of his cheeks, in the cracks of his lips, but Eddie is alive. Bobby is alive, with a stitched hole in his abdomen, but he’s alive. They’re all alive.

He sent Athena into a fire with a sniper, but she shot him down and took back a piece of all of them.

The cold tile of the bathroom meets his ass, and Buck shoves a fist under his teeth and bites down, the sob strangling itself on his knuckle.

Recovery isn’t linear, and Buck doesn’t have time to fall apart. His trauma is cyclical.

His universe is a casual sort of brutal.

#t: 911 fic #buck x eddie #911 fic #buddie fic

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funkzpiel · 5 years ago

Note

I feel like at some point on the road, Jaskier would have been like, 'I thought Witchers didn't need to eat as much as ordinary folks,' and Geralt would have been like, 'Well, we can starve for a lot longer,' and Jaskier would have been kind of irrationally angry about it for a while.

More Geralt whump? Fuck yes. Thank you for the prompt, I love it.

Jaskier didn’t notice – not at first, not for a long time. Despite his frequent travels with the white wolf of Rivia, he had never even thought to ask. Something entirely unexpected for a man as chatty as himself and it would not be the first or last time Jaskier kicked himself for not noticing. He had always assumed that witchers had very slow metabolisms or some other strange mutation that allowed them to better digest and absorb nutrients and make the benefits of meals last longer. After all, Geralt rarely ate.

Perhaps ‘rarely’ was too strong a word, Jaskier admitted, but even so he could remember just as many instances in which Geralt didn’t eat as he did.

But it wasn’t until he found himself sharing a fire with the man one night that the question finally came to him. It had been a long ride with few breaks; a ride that had immediately devolved into a fierce fight with a creature Geralt had been contracted to handle, quickly followed by another rough ride when the blasted thing had managed to fly away, wounded and bleeding. Thankfully it had left quite a trial to follow, low as it had been flying and bleeding as it had been – but it meant that the two of them were running off of fumes and Jaskier, for one, was unused to it.

Well, no. Not unused to it. He had known hunger in his younger days, back when he had first left Oxenfurt to start his travels as a bard. Fame did not come without its prices – unless one had a very generous benefactor to start with, of course. And the price had been crude, cruel and simple: play for free, get his name out there, and starve until his music had the hearts of enough folk tied around his fingers that he might then play for pay. He wasn’t always hungry, of course. There had been more than one maid or village lass who had taken pity on him, in love with his blue eyes and silver tongue in that way young ladies – bored with village life – tended to sometimes be. But he had known hunger and cold.

Even though the years had been long since those meager days, even now he could not help but think ‘I remember worse hunger pains’. That didn’t mean he enjoyed it though. And if Jaskier was good at anything – singing and writing and general charisma aside – it was whining and surviving.

He plucked the fluffiest bits of his bread from within the hardened crust of the loaf he had in his pack and moaned as that first tuff nearly melted in his mouth – too stale from riding to be properly soft, but hunger had blurred that line of reasoning into something far more fantastical and pleased.

“Gods above, I love bread,” Jaskier all but moaned, slumping on his log as if the taste alone had rendered him useless. He fluttered his lashes. Geralt grunted.

“Come now, Geralt. Even you with all your witcherly stoicism can’t deny that there’s nothing quite as good as bread after days of starving,” Jaskier pointedly out, plucking another chunk of bread and placing it on his tongue with another lewd moan – now purposefully so.

Geralt rolled his eyes, face canted down toward the fire as he stoked it with a stick, ensuring that the logs lay just right for the best flame. Jaskier continued on, too merry from his meal to stay his tongue.

“Food’s always best when drunk or starving,” he mused.

He remembered lectures about that, at some point in Oxenfurt. His studies, while fundamentally focused around literature in general, had varied. A good writer needed to know a little of everything, after all, and he was nothing if not thorough when it came to his craft. He could still remember an old bore of a professor going on and on about a human’s instinct to survive and that, when starving, food was often times described by patients to be far richer or more delicious than normal – even if that food was in fact bland or stale or generally something the patient might detest in regular circumstances. The body recognizes the necessity of eating, numbs the mind of any factors that might keep them from eating, and therefore everything tastes as if it had been delivered from the heavens themselves.

“Agreed,” Geralt said, setting his stick aside to stand. Jaskier watched him with childish passivity as the witcher went to Roach, filled a feed harness with grain or whatever it was he tended to give the ol’girl, and went about attaching it to her head so she might eat – obviously reminded of the task by their conversation. Then he attended to Jaskier’s horse as well, Daisy. That made something fond prickle in Jaskier’s chest.

“It’s stale and I don’t even care,” Jaskier continued to babble, breaking the hard crust off piece by piece now as he continued to consume his meal. Geralt grunted again, crouched by his pack again, and despite Jaskier’s assumption that the man was now finally fetching his own meal, the witcher instead returned to his place at the fire with his sword, a rag and some oils – and surprisingly no whet stone.

Jaskier rose his brows.

“Really, Geralt? I know you witchers have a frankly unhealthy relationship with your swords, but it can wait. Aren’t you hungry? Tired?”

Amber eyes met his overtop the brilliant flames of their fire. They seemed paler somehow, but the fire made it quickly difficult to hold the man’s gaze; even moreso to make out fine details. Otherwise Jaskier might have seen the hollows of Geralt’s cheeks beneath his riding stubble, or the dark circles that had made a home of the space beneath his eyes. Might have noticed he was paler than usual.

But he didn’t.

“Hmm,” Geralt said, eyes dropping back to his sword as he oiled his rag and began the lengthy process of cleaning it with the meticulousness of a witcher.

That gave Jaskier pause. He had seen the man fight. Geralt had described the Churt as a young adult, even though Jaskier couldn’t have imagined a larger Churt in his life. The point being: the Churt had been no babe, and while Geralt was a witcher of immeasurable skill, the beast had done its fair share of harm in turn. With the bend of its wing it had struck such a blow on Geralt’s right shoulder blade that it had tossed the witcher across a small clearing and into a try. Jaskier hadn’t imagined the wet pop he had heard at the time, nor had he imagined the gash the thing had landed on Geralt’s thigh and hip when it swooped down from above, talons first.

Geralt had excused himself to wash the worst of the fight off in a river, leaving Jaskier to settle Roach and start the process of picking up flammable tinder for the fire – something that once upon a time, he never would have trusted the bard to do. It made a little bloom of warmth grow in his chest at the thought even as dread slowly but surely began to curl in his gut.

He hadn’t seen Geralt take any salves or wrappings to the river. And if Jaskier was tired from riding without food, he could only imagine how ravenous he might feel after riding and slaying a Churt on just as empty a stomach.

“Geralt, come on,” he repeated, the cheer he had felt from his bread now weak in his tone. “You should really eat something.”

“M’fine,” the man said, focused on his task.

Jaskier felt his brows pucker into the slightest frown and not for the first time cursed Geralt for the wrinkles he would no doubt get because of the stubborn witcher and his stupid concepts of logic and reason – aka, his utter lack of either when it came to simple matters of health, wellbeing and general comfort.

Witchers, honestly.

But not for the first time Jaskier tried to quell his sharp tongue if, for no other reason, because he himself was not a witcher and sometimes they were able to do extraordinary things due to their mutations. He tried to keep his tone light as he asked, “Are witchers able to digest their food more slowly or something?”

Geralt snorted, but under the crackle of the fire Jasker could not tell if it was the white wolf’s attempt at a chuckle or not. Jaskier plucked another bit of bread from his loaf, stuck it in his mouth and looked at the witcher pointedly – expecting a real answer.

Geralt grunted, cleared his throat in a manner Jaskier might describe as ‘uncomfortable’ in witcher-speak – a tongue of body language rather than words – and when it became obvious Jaskier would not fill the silence for him or move on, surprisingly answered.

“In a manner,” he admitted.

“In a manner,” Jaskier repeated theatrically, as if this in fact explained all the secrets of the universe, and nodded his head sagely, “Ever a man of many words you are, Geralt. In what manner?”

Geralt blew a breath through his nose in a heavy huff, his eyes darting up in that way he did whenever he was gauging whether or not something was worth sharing with Jaskier. It appeared his distate for being badgered outweighed his dislike of talking about himself, because he kept his eyes pointedly down on his sword as he said, “Mutations.”

“Ah. I see.”

Amber eyes darted to him for a fraction of a moment – almost, dare Jaskier say, nervous; but he couldn’t be certain with the firelight. No, not nervous exactly… but without a doubt Geralt was anticipating something. Bracing himself, one might say.

His sword was already positively gleaming, but the man continued to focus on it as if it were rusted. When Jaskier threw a stick at him, staring at him pointedly, mouth full of bread, Geralt sighed – haughty and on edge.

“Witchers,” he said slowly, drawing it out as if unsure of how to proceed, “Adapt easily. Our bodies can speed or slow our metabolisms as needed.”

The bread in his hands felt suddenly too rough, too heavy. He had a terrible, awful feeling he knew where this explanation was headed, but he needed to hear it. Needed to know for sure.

“Geralt,” he said just as slowly if only to show Geralt that any cheerful playfulness in him had passed and that there was no escaping this conversation now. “What precisely are you trying to tell me? That you have an on-off lever for your hunger?”

Geralt blew out a breath through his teeth that stirred his messy silver hair. It was like pulling teeth, Jaskier thought, frustrated.

“We can starve a long time before it becomes a problem,” he finally said, clinical and blunt, as if he had said something mundane like ‘witchers are more flexible than most’ rather than ‘I can suffer starvation longer than mortal men before I’ll ever die’.

“Geralt,” Jaskier snapped, unsure of what he was even trying to say. The word had slipped past his teeth in a snap, unfettered and unabashed and wholly horrified. Geralt might have flinched, it was hard to tell past the fire, and finally Jaskier had had enough of the man’s cowering. He stood and rounded the fire – loomed over the witcher – and saw the nearly feral glint of the man’s eyes as he pointedly did not look at him. Eventually, words returned to him. “Tell me this is some utterly terrible version of a witcher joke. Humor really does not suit you, you know.”

“Sure, it’s a joke,” Geralt deadpanned, something tight about the way he held his shoulders.

“Geralt!”

“What?” He finally snapped, the word nearly a hushed snarl when his eyes finally darted up to meet Jaskier’s and finally – finally – he saw it. Geralt was thin. It showed in his face, scant of even so much fat as to fill his cheeks, and from this angle the fire cast dreadful shadows in those hunger hollows.

Gods above, his gear. That’s why he hadn’t noticed, at least not yet. They had not exactly found a tavern in some time – sleeping outdoors provided little opportunity to disrobe or enjoy one another’s company in comfort. He had thought it surprising that Geralt had kept his armor on for more, if not all, of the trip. Now he knew – it was just as much a cover as the fire had been.

“Take it off,” Jaskier said.

Geralt blinked slowly, caught off guard. Slow from hunger, Jaskier realized. Something no doubt made worse by the witcher’s difficult relationship with sleep.

“What? No.”

“Geralt.”

“I already did it.”

He meant his wounds, Jaskier realized, and for some reason that made him angry.

“Another lie!” Jaskier said in an explosion of hand movement, too wound up to settle his tendency toward the theatrical as he gestured at Geralt’s shoulders – at the way he was obviously favoring one side over the other, and continued, “I saw you go to the river. You didn’t bring a single salve with you!”

Geralt rolled his eyes – not so much a dramatic gesture as it was a minute flutter of his lashes – and said, “I’m a witcher, Jaskier. It’s fine.”

He had heard the story before. Witcher, in Geralt’s mind, appeared to be synonymous with ‘immune’. But even so, the man was generally good about salving and bandaging himself. His body was, after all, his greatest tool. And yet he hadn’t this time.

“You don’t have any food, do you?” He finally accused, catching on, “Or salves? Gods above, Geralt, why did you take this contract without those things!”

“Because I needed the contract to buy those things,” Geralt said through his teeth, nearly baring them like his namesake might.

It was an argument that was quickly going nowhere, and Jaskier could not exactly pin point why exactly there was a kernel of fury growing in his stomach, searing him from the inside out in a rising tide. Instead he just made an utterly exasperated sound at Geralt, took a step forward – ignoring the tension that bloomed in Geralt’s body in reaction – and shoved the rest of his bread into the man’s hands before stomping off to his pack with a frustrated, “Why didn’t you say you utter oaf!”

Geralt’s brows shot up.

“Jaskier, I can’t,” he said, eyes on the man as he held the bread loosely, his rag haven fallen to the ground. “This is yours.”

“And now it’s yours, you bloody idiot of a witcher,” Jaskier said back just as quickly, his tone almost lilting as he fell back into the comfort of jesting words to hide the anger in his gut that made him want to – he didn’t even know! Kick a tree, maybe? Punch a man? Tie Geralt down until he understood how to better take care of himself? Yes, that one. He busied himself with digging through his own pack on Daisy. His horse whickered at him cheerfully as he shuffled things around. He found another chunk of bread – this one smaller but better than nothing. He also pulled out a tin of cured meat he kept for emergencies, as well as a leather wrapped kit – crude at best – of what scant medical supplies he had come to find necessary during his trips with Geralt. Bandages, cheap salves, thread and needles. He turned back to Geralt, his findings in either hand, and nearly barked out a laugh at the sight of the witchere. The man had never looked more uncomfortable or out of his element, staring at him like Jaskier were a lion that might make of a meal of him rather than a wispy bard with bread, meat and medical items.

“You look as if I’ve revealed myself to be another Churt in disguise,” Jaskier said, coming closer now. Geralt moved, perhaps to stand, to flee, but not quickly enough – and that, in and of itself – convicted Jaskier on his path even more. He pressed a hand onto Geralt’s knee, cautious of where he thought the man’s wounds might be, and urged him back down onto the log as he took a seat beside him.

“Surely you’ve been without coin before,” Jaskier said as he delicately places the second loaf onto the cleanest bit of bark that he could manage, then the tin and medical supplies. Geralt looked like a cornered dog but Jaskier just kept talking, as if his babbling might ease the witcher into some modicum of familiarity and comfort. “I’ve seen you hunt. So why not hunt?”

He asked even as he knew why. Geralt had already hinted at it. With a metabolism that sped and slowed as needed, it meant that his body had burned most of its energy in the fight. Now it was slowing again, drawing the warmth from his skin as his heart beat dropped to an almost unnatural rhythm. Hunting took time and energy. It meant Geralt was now in league with most wild predators – better to wait for an ample opportunity that promised success than to blindly waste it looking for an animal in the woods at night. Better to bide his time, even if that meant a gnawing stomach.

“No point right now,” Geralt said, confirming his suspicions. It was strange to simultaneously see the man as a predator and yet realize that meant that, in this moment, he was vulnerable for the very same reason that he was dangerous.

“Right, of course,” Jaskier said idly, more focused on the task at hand now that he understood the problem, “Not to rush things along because I generally prefer to take my time disrobing my partners, but let’s go, Geralt. Eat your bread, off with your armor and such.”

Geralt stiffened, then held the husk back to him with a murmured, “It’s yours. I don’t need handouts. M’fine.”

The words ‘I’m used to this, it’s not a big deal’ went unsaid – and wisely so. Jaskier might’ve given him a motherly wallop for it. Instead he shoved the bread back toward Geralt with a quick, “Yeah, well, if it’s mine then that means I can do whatever I want with it. And I want you to eat it.”

That, in combination with hunger, seemed to finally cow the witcher into some semblance of obedience. He pulled a tuff of soft, white bread flesh from its stale husk and went about eating it with far less drama than Jaskier had. But the bard didn’t miss the way the witcher’s fingers nearly – nearly – trembled. For the first time he realized the problem might be far worse than a day or two without food. There was no telling how long the witcher had gone without before Jaskier had arrived to join him on his trek.

He realized with a start that he didn’t want to know. He didn’t want to know how long Geralt could go. He’d much rather focus on ensuring he didn’t ever go that long ever again.

Jaskier pressed into Geralt’s space with long arms and clever fingers, unfastening buckles and straps around Geralt as the witcher ate. He pulled off his chest armor and had to bite his tongue not to hiss. The witcher’s shoulder was a mass of purple – masked except for where it peaked out beneath the hem of his collar, but telling nonetheless. It’d heal, Geralt always did, but it didn’t mean the man needed to suffer while he did. He tugged at Geralt’s shirt, easing it over his head as he sighed, “For a man as adept and trained for survival as you are, Geralt, you’re an astoundingly huge idiot.”

“Wow, thanks,” Geralt mused, a chuckle blurred around the edges of the words, muffled as the shirt slipped over his head and—

Jaskier had to bury his teeth into his knuckles to avoid spitting out the first, dramatic invective that sprung to his tongue. But by Melitele’s tits, the man was deceptively built looking for a man as thin as he was at the moment. With his armor on he looked like a brick wall – tall, broad and built for tasks no normal man could handle. But beneath all that, even as muscled as he was, the truth remained that the white wolf was thin as a rail almost. He tried to remember the last time he had seen the witcher, the last time they had shared a room, shared each other’s company. He was a surprisingly lithe man for someone so accustomed to a job like witchering – but he hadn’t been this thin. He must have been decently fed, last he saw him, because now Jaskier could almost swear that if he had a hand on either side of Geralt’s hips, his fingers would nearly touch. An exaggeration, and yet, he didn’t want to try in case he was right. He could see every rung of Geralt’s ribs, every knob of his spine. His stomach curved inward, even the musculature of his abdomen less prominent that he remembered. And his hips; the way they jutted even while sitting…

Gods above, how long did he starve this time?

Even faced with so much suffering, Jaskier held his tongue firmly between his teeth until he was certain he would not badger the man. Geralt knew how thin he was. There was a reason why he had kept his armor on with Jaskier. He had known the bard would fret. He had tried to hide it. Hounding him now wouldn’t reverse the effects of Geralt’s stint with hunger – but it would drive the wolf away, keen as he was to avoid confrontation and care like a Labrador unwilling to be bathed.

“You put even my boyish figure to shame, Geralt. Going after my job, are we?” He joked because he couldn’t bare the silence. If it were silent for so much as a moment longer he’d babble. He’d babble, and that would devolve to nagging, and he needed the witcher to sit still, to trust him. To finally, finally allow someone to care for him despite his conceptions about what was or was not his, and how far he could push the limit of witcher mutations before he pushed too far. Geralt snorted, back shivering like a horse shoeing flies when Jaskier ran two fingers lightly over his bruising. It was swollen, puffy; hot to the touch. Dark as pitch, made worse by the flickering light of the fire. He opened one jar of salve, coated a few fingers liberally, then went about rubbing it into the man’s skin as gently as possible while still working it in to the muscle and damage before. Geralt moaned – Jaskier couldn’t tell if it were pain or relief, but he continued regardless.

“Hardly about to start singing in pubs,” Geralt mused, evidently just as eager to settle back into some semblance of normalcy. Unused to being the one being taken care of rather than doing the protecting. It rankled him something fierce, muscles tight under Jaskier’s hands.

“Yes, well, maybe you should consider it,” Jaskier said lightly, dipping his fingers back into the jar for more, “With a voice like yours, you’d be quite exotic for the trade. Women would swoon at your feet – if you can hold a tune, of course, very important. Pubs tend to feed their bards. Pay’s good, too. Better than…” he trailed off. It felt too raw, too cruel to take a shot at Geralt’s profession now when the wolf was so bare and vulnerable. Here Jaskier had taken his armor and his wrappings, both physical and metaphorically, and exposed the witcher for what he was: mortal, self-abused and exhausted. To go on felt like a moot point, like kicking a man while he’s down. It felt wrong to acknowledge once more that witchering was a thankless trade. Painful, even, when Jaskier knew Geralt risked his life often, protected thankless assholes that tried to fleece him often – and he starved himself to do it, too.

Geralt made a sound Jaskier couldn’t quite navigate.

“Eat the meat in the tin as well,” Jaskier guided the conversation away, tone light despite the way his breath hitched in his chest seeing Geralt like this.

“Jaskier, this isn’t necessary—”

Jaskier’s hands drew still on Geralt’s back. Something swollen twisted his chest and throat into something thin and strained as he said, “Please, Geralt… if for no other reason than to appease me. I may not have a witcher’s metabolism, but I’m tired as well.”

The tin squealed lightly when Geralt opened it. The same of dried pork wafted up lightly – stronger when Geralt took a slice and held it over his shoulder with a gruff, “At least eat some, too.”

Jaskier would have laughed if the whole situation wasn’t so fucked up. Instead he just hummed a pleased, “How thoughtful,” and took the morsel directly from Geralt’s fingers with his mouth, unwilling to touch it with his salve-greasy fingers. Geralt was more comfortable with that gesture than being taken care of, and Jaskier decided then and there that he’d have to work on that.

Geralt ate the jerky and Jaskier sent a quick halfhearted prayer of thanks to the gods on the off chance they were real even though he was pretty sure they weren’t and mainly enjoyed referencing them for how colorful they made his curses. Once the worst of Geralt’s shoulder was handled, he ran a hand over the rungs of his ribs down to the – sharp, too sharp – jut of his hip and asked, “Did you actually attend to those gashes or do I need to strip you completely?”

“They were shallow enough. Nearly healed,” Geralt grunted around a strip of meat. Jaskier looked at him pointedly, brows raised, and Geralt offered a grumbly, “Truly. It’s fine.”

Jaskier waited another beat for added affect before capping the jar with a soft, “Alright, Geralt. I trust you. But if they’re not gone in the morning, please put salve on them?”

Geralt grunted at that, and Jaskier took that as a sign of victory.

Much of the tension had eased from Geralt’s shoulders now, but there was still a great deal of exhaustion under his eyes and in the shadows of his cheeks. Jaskier wiped his hands clean on a rag, watching the witcher eat with a strange fondness in his gut he couldn’t quite name. He was unused to this, he realized. Not just with Geralt, but in general. In brothels or taverns or even with the witcher, his relationships had been centered around passion and drive. The need to fulfill his desires with lips and fingers and teeth. He had shared meals and treats after with maidens and men alike, of course, and had even himself been cared for some. But had never really done the caring himself and mostly certainly not in a context as benign as this. He had never felt the urge to. No one ever stuck around, after all, and both parties were only ever fulfilling the same selfish desires only…

This was difficult. Geralt was different. Jaskier wanted to help. They wouldn’t lay together, not tonight. There was no ulterior motive, no benefit other than… Well, other than Geralt’s comfort and safety. Jaskier’s hands stilled in his rag, gaze caught a bit wide-eyed on the snacking witcher when suddenly Geralt’s own amber eyes lazily caught his, no longer as edgey as he had been.

“What?” The witcher asked, the idiot.

“Nothing,” Jaskier chirped quickly, eager to cover the sudden revelation before he had time to properly turn it over in his mind and understand it. He tossed the rag at his pack and for once he was the one avoiding the witcher’s gaze as he said, “I was merely thinking about how lucky you are to have such a handsome and selfless friend such as me. Talented, charming and capable in the woods – you were born beneath a lucky star to have met me. What would you do without me?”

Geralt snorted again and that, Jaskier could tell, was a laugh. He grinned in return, back on familiar footing, and came to sit thigh to thigh with his witcher. Geralt hummed, curiously close to a cat’s purr, and Jaskier had the oddest urge to run his fingers through the man’s hair just to hear more of that sound.

“Starve a little longer, I suppose,” Geralt said, playfulness dulled by the truth in it. Blunt, daft ass of a man. Jaskier stretched his legs before him, forced himself not to go off on another tirade unless the witcher – too used to doing things only on his own terms – shut down after all the work the bard had done to loosen him up that evening.

“Yes, well, from now on what’s mine is yours, Geralt. I’ll pack accordingly.”

Geralt stilled.

“—Jaskier, you needn’t trouble—”

“If you’re starving you can hardly protect me or perform those heroic acts of inhuman deeds I do so love to sing and profit off of, can you? Consider it your cut in the fame you’ve brought me with your witchering,” Jaskier said cheekily, eager to cover his own vulnerabilities like the coward and hypocrite that he was. Something stole across Geralt’s face, something unidentifiable, and Jaskier felt his gut curl ever so slightly.

“Of course,” Geralt said. Jaskier felt the slightest bit of distance grow between them suddenly, their comradery turning the littlest bit stale. Guilt stabbed him lightly. The fire crackled. “That is why you come, isn’t it.”

It almost… almost seemed as though Geralt was disappointed by that – mildly, as witchers tended to be, and yet more poignantly because of that.

Well… he had stripped Geralt of his manly pride, his clothing and his illusions of not being a twig. The least Jaskier could do was offer some boon in turn. Even the playing field, so to speak.

He sucked in a breath, let it go slowly, catching Geralt’s attention because of it.

“It started that way, yes. Though not wholly for the stories or the songs… But now… Geralt, I would follow you even if there were no story to sing about in some pub,” he admitted. “If one of our trips just comprised of us dozing under willows by the river, I’d join you. I’d keep the songs just for myself. Sing them to you. Maybe it’d help you sleep.”

Geralt watched him for a long time. Jaskier began to fidget, his neck burning and no doubt red as the silence made his words sound more and more ridiculous. He was just about to say, ‘forget it, I’m just daft with exhaustion, you know how it goes,’ when finally, Geralt spoke.

“What would you sing about then,” Geralt asked slowly, carefully, “If not about whatever I killed?”

Geralt was staring at him, his face a blank sheet, and Jaskier felt prickly all of sudden, frustrated that the witcher could so easily hide while he was weak to expressing himself at the drop of a hat. But the moment felt important to Geralt regardless, somehow the bard could just tell. Perhaps it was his increasing fluency in the wordless speak of witchers. The worst of that dazed, hollow hunger-glaze had retreated from those amber eyes. Still there around the edges, but otherwise focused on him in a manner Geralt rarely allowed himself to do.

“I’d have plenty to sing about,” Jaskier said softly, his protective, charming mannerisms falling away layer by layer under those eyes. “I’d love nothing more than to sing about the white wolf finally enjoying himself for a moment – even if that moment were as benign as enjoying an apple freshly plucked from the tree. Even if it detailed only the litany of your snoring or the way the wind dances in your ridiculously white hair.”

Geralt snorted, a wry twist of amusement to his lips as he looked out into the night and said, “Enough. I’m not one of your conquests from some backwater village or high court function. Stop blowing smoke up my ass.”

He should joke. It was his cue to joke. Geralt was offering him an out. He should joke.

“I could sing even about this,” he said instead, his eyes traveling to the dark bloom on Geralt’s back – proof of his mortality despite the legends Jaskier had hand in crafting.

“Some song that would be,” Geralt grunted, “No one wants to hear about a half-starved witcher. Sour the mood immediately.”

“Don’t be so shallow, you’re cleverer than that,” Jaskier chided.

“I’m daft, I’m clever – which is it?”

“Believe me, the contradiction frustrates the hell out of me too, witcher,” Jaskier chuckled, the littlest bit of a frustrated grumble in the tone as he leaned in, crowding the man. “But I stand by it. Perhaps that should be the next song I sing: how to take care of your witcher. Help some other fool bard out there who also fell head over heels for their witcher.”

“Your witcher?” Geralt asked, brows raised.

“Ears like yours, I know you heard me, Geralt. A mouse farts and you wake up. Don’t play coy with me.”

Geralt actually let out a soft huff of a laugh at that.

“How to care for your witcher… you think you know how?” He mused, too weary to fight or snap, it would seem – made soft by the salve and Jaskier’s hands. Steadier than the witcher from those early days, so skittish and closed off.

“You’re still here, aren’t you?” Jaskier said, puffing up, proud. Geralt shook his head, exasperated, and Jaskier pressed, “I’ll start with feeding you properly, since you can’t be trusted to make sane choices. And anything after that, well… I’ll learn as I go!”

And that was as close to saying ‘I love you’ as he could get for now. The witcher too easily spooked, and he himself unfamiliar with this version of himself that loved beyond the first fuck. It wasn’t ‘I love you’, not yet. But if the witcher could show him his wounds, trust him with his back, well…

They were both learning as they went.

#the witcher #geralt of rivia #jaskier #gaskier #food deprivation/starvation #witcher biology shit #no beta we die like men #whump #prompt #witcher writing

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mihidecet · 4 years ago

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Sbi&co. D&D AU: Hbomb94

AKA: Tibi’s MCYT WritingTober, day 19.

A special thank you to @octopus-defence-squad for requesting an d&d version of Hbomb, I had a lot of fun thinking up things for him!

This is also my fill for “Survival (A tale of)” from @the-only-gamer-gost ‘s list of prompts, which has also been a lot of fun! <3

I do hope you’ll enjoy!

Hbomb has been his name ever since he left his hometown.

It didn’t serve any specific purpose, other than hiding his true name - not that it was impossible for an arcane user to simply open the backdoor in his mind and take a quick peek inside. But still.

It was a nice and simple way to separate his past from whatever adventures he was going to embark in, for better or for worse.

H must admit that he’s not proud of everything he’s done in his life.

Sometimes, coin and situations bring people to do things that they wouldn’t have normally done. He’s not fond of killing and the hits he gets are few and scattered around his life, like somebody stumbling a handful of times during a marathon, no matter how much they stick in his mind, refusing to let him go. But jobs are jobs.

And at least of that he is proud. He gets the job done, and he is well known for that. Not that he is generally well known, but still. He has gained enough renown that he doesn’t have to actively look for jobs anymore.

Still, the thing is.

Hbomb has been his name for almost forever, and yet that one time he almost doesn’t recognise it.

To be fair, the voice that calls it sounds more like a chorus of many different voices, speaking in multiple languages - H knows five different languages, ok, he’s not dumb, but he has a really hard time comprehending what it’s being said - and all coming from the same point a few feet behind him.

It’s both a whisper and a song, and to be completely honest all it does is creep him out, jump in his skin and hurry to sit up, hand moving to grab his longbow. Which is supposed to be right next to him.

Instead all he grabs is grass. Bright purple grass.

H blinks, confused, only then noticing that there is light around him, yet he’s sure he only went to sleep a couple of hours ago.

Then he looks up, towards where the voice came from, and he nearly screams - nearly being a key word, as his instincts tell him to scream and freeze at the same time, so what he ends up doing is let out an extremely high pitched “eh” sound that lasts about a couple of seconds.

The scene in front of him is both stunning and extremely disturbing.

Over fields of purple grass shines the light of two red suns, bright over the backdrop of a pastel orange sky. In the distance, a forest, but instead of dark green pines - or even bright purple trees- , all he can see are huge brightly coloured mushrooms.

And then, a few paces away from him, a figure sits, cross legged, gently floating over the grass - the strands seem to reach upwards towards them, as if attracted by some sort of gravity. While H is familiar with tiefling, the ones living in the material plane usually have only one set of horns, none of which pulse with silver light, and one set of eyes, instead of having most of their face covered in them.

Somehow, without the aid of any eyebrow, the figure seems amused. Maybe it’s the unnatural curve of their smile - are those additional eyes on the palm of their hands, or just tattoos? H really doesn’t remember drinking that much the earlier night.

“I’m going to excuse the damage you did to my creation, since you seem to be a bit lost. Don’t you know where you are, child?”

A flower takes flight from one of their horns, turning into a butterfly midway. H has no idea where he is.

The chuckle that resonates in the air around him sounds like wind chimes, and for a moment he’s reminded of an old friend, an old companion that he used to travel with, a bright eyed warlock who loved to wear flowers in her hair, simply because they would turn into butterflies as she fought.

H’s lips part in a small “oh”, as if he’s understood something, but to be honest he’s more lost than before. Surely the being sitting in front of him isn’t-

“No, I am not. She is one of my children, still. You came … recommended. Your skills have been evaluated, your deeds have been found worthy.”

That certainly piques his interest. Choosing to ignore how the individual in front of him is currently reading his thoughts - which is quite rude in his personal opinion -, he’s always been fond of Shubble, and she did seem like a reasonable and trustworthy person. Not to mention her cool as hell powers.

Still, one should be always careful when dealing with mind-reading beings.

“What do you mean? Worthy of what?”

“Capabilities. Powers.”

“Like?”

“Like you’ve never seen.”

“Would you be able to … elaborate? Please?”

“No.”

Hbomb is going to have a headache. Normally, he’d loathe such a conversation, and he would probably be quick to walk away. But it’s not like he can leave.

“Oh, but you can. I just brought you here to let you know you’ve been chosen.”

The cheshire smile on the being’s face is deeply worrying, especially since their mouth doesn’t seem to enjoy following the usual anatomical constraints one would expect to find in a mortal. And apparently now he’s signed a contract with them? When did he sign? Can he un-sign?

Another chuckle fills the air, this time sweeter and warmer, like a hug on a winter night.

“There is no need to be afraid. You’re not bound to me, not like your friend is at least. Try to focus. Find the connection inside of yourself.”

H isn’t a stranger to meditation - his parent, being an elf, had taught him everything he’d needed to know. So he stares at the creature in front of him for a moment, waiting for any sign that he maybe probably shouldn’t do this, then he closes his eyes.

It takes him a moment, but once he finds it, it’s impossible not to see it.

There’s a thread inside of him. Like a string of silk, hanging, floating at the center of his chest. It floats towards his hand as he becomes aware of it, tangling between his fingers, moving on its own as if it were water, or wind. A snake coiling around in his hand.

While his eyes are closed and his mind is focused, the being’s voice resonates inside his mind, clear as the crystals their eyes were made of.

“Be good. Good luck, plane traveler.”

There’s a quick pulling sensation around his gut - not a bad feeling, per se, but certainly an unexpected one - and then.

Hbomb’s eyes open to the darkness of the night. He’s back in the same place he went to sleep in.

But now, there is a slightly luminous tattoo on his right hand, which gives off a feeble light: a purple snake, coiling around his fingers, and a remotely familiar drawing of multiple circles on his palm.

Digging around, looking for what the circles represent, takes a while.

But he does remember talking, a few months back, with an arcane scholar with a passion for creating things out of thin air.

That, on his hand, is a drawing of the planes of existence.

#mcyt writingtober #hbomb94 #dnd au #sbi dnd au #now sbi&co #also mentioned #shubble #octopus-defence-squad

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scorched-light · 4 years ago

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Here is my The Last of Us Part 2 review for anyone who is interested to know about the leaks and if the story was done any justice. The answer is the leaks were basically on point and no. No it was not. Spoilers below, don't read on if you're after a spoiler free review. Final warning: End of Game Spoilers for The Last of Us Part 2!!! Do not read if you don't want spoilers!

Okay. As someone who adores the first game, it pains me to say this but I'm so disappointed with this overpriced horror show. A complete deconstruction of the first game and the characters you developed a connection to therein. Just a complete brutality to basically every character new and old, and the whole franchise's reputation.

Joel announcing his name to a group of strangers he already seemed suspicious of despite knowing that people could be looking for him after what he did was so forced and out of character. This man hit a guy with his truck on the off chance that he might be faking his injuries. He was always super cautious, wary of strangers, and aware of his surroundings.

Ellie walking in on Joel getting beaten to death, GUN IN HAND, and not immediately shooting Abby was also incredibly ooc. Even if she was shocked, this is the girl who shot a man at age 14 to save Joel, here she charges in through the door instead of shooting when she's had years worth of experience shooting first and asking questions later. A lot of the ooc stuff she does after his death is excusable by her obvious trauma up until the ending, at least, but it's still bad writing.

Poor writing, not just in the overall story but also in terms of the characters, is literally used as a gratuitous stepping stone (AKA a shameless excuse) to get to all of the brutal, gorey violence. Not to mention it ends in a bleak way with no silver lining at all. Compare that to the way the first one, while bleak in nature still had its nice moments. Its moments of "ya know what maybe this hellscape is worth sticking around for." It made you feel things. The giraffe scene? Running out of the hospital holding Ellie as Joel gently, desperately tells her she's okay? Beautiful, complexly emotional moments But this game? I'd get more emotional fulfillment shoving fingernail clippings up my ass hole.

Don't get me wrong, I expected it to be bleak. The tone of the game is post-apocalypse. It revolves around death and the ugliness of man and yes yes it's all very grim. That kind of prepares you for how this isn't going to be a totally happy story. But everything they built up and established in the first game is just burned to the ground.

All the gameplay is basically the same as the first with some exploration buffs and NPC tweeks, companion AI feels clunkier now but a lot of the interactions between your people and between enemies outside of cutscenes feels very fluid and natural. That said, a lot of the stuff that's good about the game is done in flashbacks to when Ellie was younger. The actual current story they're telling had potential but the executuion is poor.

The game is trying so hard to get a specific reaction while blowing holes in why and how you should feel that way. We are supposed to empathise with Abby just because we are exposed to her when we're forced to play as her? We are supposed to think bad of Ellie when she killed Mel after Mel attacked her first instead of just pleading "I'm pregnant!"?

Abby killed the man that saved her life brutally and mercilessly. She wasn't able to empathise at all, but you are expected to empathise with her? She even goes on to have a similar, protective sort of relationship with Lev as Joel did with Ellie. Maybe not in a parental way, but the parallels are still there. A notable one is when she's carrying Lev bridal style in her arms off of the island, the same way Joel carried Ellie.

The writing even frames Ellie as being bad, killing a pregnant woman (even though she didn't know and upon finding out, falls to her knees and heaves), and frames Abby as good/the victim, helping and protecting Lev, a victim of transphobia, and slowly discovering and watching more and more of her friends as they die. They try to manipulate you as the player with bad writing.

It really could have been a good story had they spent more time on Ellie working through her feelings towards Joel and his decision to save her. Maybe Abby kills Tommy so Joel can know what it's like to lose a loved one, maybe Ellie is forced to join with him again on their journey for revenge, maybe she more or less HAS to face up to what happened while begrudgingly working with him. Especially after her constantly telling him she doesn't need his help.

He still could have died, maybe before they *really* fix everything. Maybe he gets bitten, that'd be poetic, he robbed humanity of the cure and then died to the infection. Ellie has to face up to the fact that he'd be alive if she had died, and he has to face that too. He also wouldn't have been bitten at all had he not been out for revenge in the first place, so his death would be the price of them wanting revenge for revenge, AND be a much better way of showcasing the cycle of loss being the cycle of revenge in a way that doesn't come across as incredibly redundant for the environment they're in. Ellie really would be The Last of Us. The last of the iconic duo that gave the series its incredible reputation. She could go on to kill Abby and realise it's not made her feel any better, now they've lost Tommy AND Joel, and nothing is going to bring Joel back.

ANYTHING would have been better than what we got. Joel's death 2 hours in was super premature and such a meaningless way to go for a character like Joel. Not to mention the character that looks like Neil Druckman spitting on his corpse but whatever, I digress.

All of this and the fact that the ending is not at aaaaall worth it makes this feel so incredibly soulless. They wanted to go down the route of "is there really a good guy in this kind of world?", and that idea could have worked even for the grim reality in which the story takes place. But then they butcher the execution, force you to play as the character who beat Joel to death for a massive portion of the game, and leave off with a terrible ending.

!Here come the end of game spoilers!

Ellie stated in the first game that she's most afraid of ending up alone, and they did that to her. She suddenly realises that Killing Is Wrong after slaughtering countless men and women to get to this moment with Abby. She is in the middle of drowning her and suddenly lets her live. This woman killed Joel, almost killed Dina. In fact, upon hearing that Dina was pregnant from a battered and bleeding Ellie, she says "Good.", and proceeds to almost slit her throat only that Lev stops her. But Ellie suddenly forgets all of that and lets her leave.

Ellie goes back to the farm she and Dina were living on with their baby only to find Dina has left, as she warned Ellie she would if she leaves for revenge again. The revenge Ellie didn't even get. She goes into a room and sees her guitar in its case. She pulls it out and learns she can no longer play the way Joel showed her all those years ago because she had her fingers bitten off during the struggle with Abby. She props the guitar up by the window, almost as if in memory of the man who taught her to play, and leaves it behind. She has no use for it now. Ellie walks through the field outside, alone. Joel dead. Tommy partially paralysed but his characterisation definitely got massacred. Dina gone. Cut to credits. Game over.

There isn't even a slither of happiness in this game. Was the lesson "revenge is bad"? Because if so, they should have rolled the credits as soon as Abby killed Joel and told players "if that made you uncomfortable, do not seek revenge." In big writing before rolling the credits.

Either way the ending would leave you shifting uncomfortably with a bad taste in your mouth.

I won't even go into how the trailers lied. "You think I'd let you do this alone?" Tell that to Abby's driver. I'm interested to see how quickly the price drops on the PlayStation Store. Even if it gets cheap, I wouldn't bother subjecting yourself to this trashfire.

#The Last of Us #The Last of Us Part 2 #The Last of Us Part II #TLoU pt 2 #TLoU2 #Ellie #Joel #Spoilers #The Last of Us Spoilers #The Last of Us Part 2 Spoilers

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floralovebot · 3 years ago

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Replying here since I am too lazy to try and put stuff under a cut. I used to be able to do that without thinking and now? Yeah my brain is like "It's Thursday? When did it become Thursday?" LMAO

I agree with all of your points on Fate Winx Saga. And no, I don't want Dane with Riven. Just on principle at this point.

It would be nice to understand why the show went in this particular direction with Riven though. Like you said, he could just have been a rebel with a cause. Hates authority and the system or is just uncomfortable with people. But no. He's just unlikable with no intention of remorse or repentance.

I might reevaluate his character if he properly apologized to Terra and Dane and it was sincere. After all people can and do change. And usually this kind of assholish behavior is reserved for guest stars and recurring characters who are barely seen and meant to be antagonists to our main group. It's mindboggling to me why the writers would have Riven be this unlikable and then expect for people to root for him. Then again, I saw he is a fan favorite character but the list also put him at number 10 of characters ranked by their likability.

I can get behind a bad boy/girl character if they are still charming and not too vile. But he and Beatrix are horrid. At least she has the excuse of being a villain. What's Riven's? Why is he BFF's with Sky but rarely hanging with him? Why is Dane now a jackass too?

And I agree that Riven will do all that shit and still be considered good and a hero at the end . And Dane? When the show decides they have enough of their other POC character (because Aisha still counts)? They'll kill him off for shock value without giving him a chance to redeem himself and it will be the "perfect" catalyst to show Riven wracked w/ guilt for his actions, furthering his man-pain. That's when the show will come out with him feeling remorse for his actions and try to explain it away with bad home life or maybe actual repressed sexuality--who knows? But it's too late to apologize to Dane or whatever, since he's now dead. So Riven will continue to fight the good fight in his memory.

I bet you that will happen. Ugh. The writers are idiots.

i completely agree! (and under the cut again alhgaldg)

tbh i think quite a few of us have an inkling about where dane's story is gonna go (aka dead). literally everything you said is exactly what i've been thinking since fate came out (which like,, yikes. says a lot about a show when so many people can tell you want to kill off your only characters of color). and plenty of others in the fandom have mentioned their thoughts on dane and what will end up happening to him. his death will probably have something to do with riven and beatrix and will only be used so riven can get his "redemption".

and honestly fate riven is such a huge disappointment. especially since they made riven and sky best friends (which like,, where did that even come from?). before fate came out, i was full on expecting moments where riven would fight with sky about him being a rich, privileged prince who's had his whole life served up on a silver platter (basically what happened in the cartoon), but instead we get them apparently being best buds but also lowkey hating each others guts and barely interacting? and sky isn't even a prince so riven doesn't get that as an excuse to fight him? he's just being an ass? like,, on one hand i was really upset that brandon wasn't there but on the other hand i was excited to see how they would show riven and sky being best friends and like,, it absolutely sucked lmao

and yes! i don't understand the thought process behind making riven just an asshole instead of sticking to what he was in the original and then building on that since they had the chance. i think it just really shows how much they don't understand these characters at all. people like riven because he's relatable in that he calls out privilege, hates authority, and has a hard time connecting with people. he's not just an asshole for fun. og riven actually tries to be friends with the specialists, he's just very bad at it at first. and he definitely has his moments where he is an ass, but we all agreed years ago that it's a defense mechanism so he can look tougher and not show weakness (not that that makes it okay, just a reasoning). but fate has shown that they don't understand riven or why the fandom likes him. they clearly assumed that young girls were just into the "hot bad boy who hates women" trope and didn't actually look at his character for who he is. if you have the time, i'd recommend looking at this great analysis of riven by @stellasolaris (if you see this sorry for tagging you i just think the meta is good adhglajd)! the writers on fate clearly didn't look into his character or what made fans like him and just made one off assumptions about his entire deal. and now fate!riven is this mega douche and literally everything people hate about anyone.

and i completely see where they're wanting to take riven, with him being one of the og specialists and a fan favorite. they're definitely trying to go "bad boy turns good boy" route and give him a redemption arc but like. not every character is zuko!! not every bad boy gets a redemption or deserves one in the first place!!! og riven got a (relatively) good redemption because he actually deserved one, fate!riven does not.

i have no doubt that beatrix is gonna do something that gets dane either killed or extremely injured which causes riven to have massive guilt and a random change of heart. then he gets his five minutes of fame with a bad redemption arc. no idea what's going on in rivusa land and i have no idea why it's still popular with fate fans but i imagine that if they do keep rivusa, the redemption will probably spark it. maybe sam dies too. probably. 😐.

#okay god this is super long too im sorry aldhgljad #i just have so many thoughts and all of them are negative #god.. i hate fate so much....#winx club #netwinx #GOD i hope this doesnt show in the tags PLEASE dont show in the tags #im just not trying to get into arguments with racists today #answered #deadlyladynightshade #but honestly if you have the time and want to keep talking about this #id love to hear more of your thoughts!#long post

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jaskierek · 5 years ago

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Part 2 of Destiny or Bad Luck? aka my geraskier post-breakup meeting fic

part 1

this one’s a bit long lmao

some people asked to be tagged so @juhavs @random-nerd-3 - some others asked for a part two but didnt ask to be tagged so idk

there will be a part 3...i think

---

Geralt hated this. If the silence left in Jaskier’s absence before was stifling, this was suffocating. The bard had barely said a word since they’d left the tavern the next morning, simply sitting on his horse tensely and riding beside Geralt and Roach. It was unsettling. It was setting the Witcher’s instincts on edge.

Geralt hadn’t said a word either, though that was not as unusual. He simply didn’t know what to say. How does one begin a conversation? Did he even want one? He wanted…he wanted…he didn’t know what he wanted, but he knew it wasn’t this, wasn’t this uncomfortable silence between them. It was as if someone had thrust a veil between them, keeping them apart. Geralt itched to tear it down, itched to find a relief from the quiet.

That’s what he wanted, he’d decided, he wanted to hear Jaskier’s voice. He wanted to hear the bard’s rich timbre in song, wanted to hear the lilt of his words as he rambled about nothing, he wanted…he wanted. It was an emotion he wasn’t entirely sure how to address.

He also didn’t know what the bard wanted. Geralt knew he was still angry with him so why did he come? Why did he agree to join him? What did he want?

And so, Geralt resigned himself to glancing at the bard every so often. Jaskier seemed to be making an effort not to look at the Witcher, allowing Geralt’s yellow eyes to trace over the curve of his jaw, his nose, to observe how the sunlight lit up the planes of his face. He didn’t know when he’d come to the realisation that he could sit and watch the bard for hours. He just knew that Jaskier was here and he was warm and he was safe, and that almost made the fact that his body had been drawn tight ever since he’d seen Geralt bearable.

The Witcher finally broke the silence once the sun had begun to descend in the sky, casting the world in a warm glow. He suggested they make camp for the night, earning a curt nod from the bard.

—

Geralt was setting up the fire, nursing the flames, while Jaskier sat opposite him, strumming absently on his lute.

He still hadn’t forgiven the Witcher, not entirely. He had built a wall around his heart to keep it safe but Geralt’s small, broken “please” had pulled out one of the bricks. He missed him, he’d said that, the same man who had refused to even acknowledge their friendship had said he’d missed him, had said he needed him. It filled him with a certain warm glow.

But he couldn’t go back to how they were before - wouldn’t. If he were to have any kind of relationship with the Witcher he would need some sort of affirmation of their companionship from the ever-stoic man.

He watched Geralt’s deft hands work the fire into something living. The flames lit up his stupidly handsome face. Gods, he hated that perfectly square jaw and he definitely hated his longing to run his lips along it and down his neck, onto the dip of his collarbone and the hard muscle of his chest.

“If life could give me one blessing, it would be to take you off my hands.”

The memory snapped him back into reality, his fingers landing hard on the strings with a jarring clang. Golden eyes snapped to his face. Jaskier didn’t know the extent to which Witchers could smell emotion but he knew Geralt sensed this.

“I’m fine.” He croaked, his voice not used to going so long without speaking. Geralt frowned, clearly not believing him. Thankfully he didn’t push. They sat in silence once more, Jaskier gazing at the fire, avoiding Geralt’s molten gaze.

“Play something.” The bard’s eyes found the Witcher’s once more, finding nothing but sincerity.

“What?”

“Play something.” He insisted, gesturing towards his lute. It was very Geralt of him, to ask Jaskier to do something without actually asking. The bard didn’t mind it.

“Play what?”

“Anything.”

Jaskier blinked. Right then.

How apt it would be to play a song of heartbreak and love, the gods knew how many he had written and learnt over the past year. But gazing into Geralt’s flame-lit amber eyes, he found he didn’t want to. Instead, he decided to play something else, something his caretaker used to sing to him.

“May you never lay your head down,

Without a hand to hold,

May you never make your bed out in the cold”

The slow but pleasant tune drifted out from under his fingertips, from out of his lips, filling the space between them. The melody was warm, comforting. It was a reprieve from the tension that had lain between them since they left.

“I know this one.” Geralt uttered after a while.

He remembered.

He remembered a song Jaskier had sung.

How many did he remember?

What else did he remember about the bard?

“You were sung this as a child.” He continued, almost to himself. Jaskier couldn’t help but smile, watching the Witcher’s own face brighten at the sight.

“Oh please won't you, please,

Won't you bear it in mind,

Love is a lesson to learn in our time,

And please won't you, please,

Won't you bear it in mind for me.”

Jaskier’s voice was shaky but his voice and his fingers continued on and he was smiling and even Geralt was smiling and he was looking at him and he was looking at him like he was the only goddamn thing in this world that he wanted to look at, the only person he wanted to listen to.

Jaskier felt something in his chest unravel as he watched the Witcher’s silver hair-framed face glow.

Glow at him.

Glow because of him.

He felt something in his chest - he felt the wall, the wall built around his heart crumble a little more.

“I like it.” Geralt said once Jaskier had finished. It was a simple sentence but the bard knew the Witcher, he knew he didn’t often speak his mind, or often speak at all.

“So you admit, I am a talented singer.”

“I didn’t say that, bard.”

Jaskier grinned. He felt it coming back, he remembered what it was like being in Geralt’s company, talking to him, bickering with him.

“Geralt, you hulking pillock, acknowledge my musical talent right now or I’ll kick you.” He had once said, the Witcher had simply snorted and asked,

“What talent?”

As promised, the bard had kicked him in the shins. Honestly, it had probably hurt Jaskier more than it did Geralt, but it had been worth it to see the small smile on Geralt’s face as Jaskier hopped around melodramatically, cradling his foot.

Geralt was smiling now. It was something soft and warm, something Jaskier could bask in.

But with a frown, it slipped, falling off the Witcher’s face.

Jaskier let his own drop too at the sight.

The silence returned.

“I’m sorry, Jaskier.” Came a quiet confession.

“I know, Geralt.” He did know, he did. As much as his reason warned him against it, he had trusted Geralt’s apology.

“But you do not forgive me.”

“I do not know. I do not know if I forgive you.”

He wanted to. He wanted to forgive him and simply enjoy his company without the tightness in his chest. Confusion reigned in him at the moment, not knowing whether he wanted to smile or cry in Geralt’s presence.

“If life could give me one blessing, it would be to take you off my hands.”

“What do I say, Jaskier?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

The fire rose between them.

“What do you want to say?” Jaskier asked.

“I…” began the Witcher, glancing down in frustration, “I want to…to confess to you without having the be the one to say it, I want you to simply know.” He looked at the bard imploringly.

“That’s not how it works, Geralt.”

The flames stuttered.

“I’ll go collect more firewood.”

Geralt turned.

Jaskier closed his eyes.

—

The next night they stayed at an inn, paying for two rooms despite not having much coin. Everything in Geralt screamed not to let the bard stray too far from him but he needed space, Geralt knew that.

Despite their conversation the night before, the air between them seemed lighter as they travelled, Jaskier occasionally humming a tune that Geralt found vaguely familiar. Now the bard sat waiting for him in a booth, grinning eagerly at the meal the Witcher was bringing over.

“Oh thank Metlitele.” He groaned as Geralt slid the plate over to him. He watched the bard shovel food unceremoniously into his mouth. He shook his head in amusement. Jaskier glanced up at him, spoon lifted halfway to his mouth. “What?” He asked. The corner of Geralt’s lips tipped upwards.

He gave a simple “hm” in response.

“Excuse you, all I’ve eaten for two days is stale bread and a particularly thin rabbit. I intend to savour this, thank you.” Jaskier stated dryly. Geralt grunted again, turning his attention to his own meal. His smile refused to go away so he sat there, grinning like an idiot simply because the bard no longer looked as tense, as uncomfortable around him. He was hopeless.

“Do you play?” Came a gruff question from one of the men at another table once they had finished their meal.

“Indeed I do, good sir.” Jaskier replied, flashing him a smile and catching the coin tossed to him as the man told him to play something fun. “Well, duty calls.” He said to the Witcher, grabbing his lute and beginning to play a jaunty tune.

His playing was nothing like the night before. Where yesterday his voice had been all gentle and honeyed, it was now rowdy and sonorous. Geralt enjoyed watching Jaskier sing his indecent songs to a crowd of laughing people, laughter in the bard’s own voice too. He enjoyed watching it, yet a warm feeling settled in his stomach at the thought of the soft song the night before, as if it were a performance meant solely for the Witcher.

Geralt stayed and watched Jaskier perform all of his songs, telling himself it was simply to ensure that he wouldn’t get himself into trouble. He didn’t dwell too much on the true reason, not until Jaskier fell back into his seat, grinning at Geralt unabashedly. His hair was plastered to his brow with sweat and he was panting slightly, but he was beaming like he always was after a good show. Geralt found himself wanting to brush the hair out of his face, to gaze unapologetically into those cornflower eyes.

“That was a show and a half, wasn’t it?” Jaskier breathed, it seemed as if he was waiting for Geralt to respond but all the Witcher could do was grunt in confirmation. Thankfully, Jaskier knew the meanings behind Geralt’s grunts and he grinned at the acknowledgement. Geralt had to pause for a moment, the realisation of just how well Jaskier knew him settling in. Geralt had known the bard for much longer than most, he knew all of his mannerisms, what clues to spot to know just how tired the bard was and how much longer he could continue on for. He knew what Jaskier looked like naked and while he appreciated the sparse glances, he had always looked away, too afraid of what he’d feel if he looked too long.

And Jaskier knew him just as well, which terrified the Witcher. He knew his body, his scars, he knew his fears, despite Geralt never having told him and despite his constant chatter, he knew when Geralt absolutely needed silence. His blue eyes had managed to pierce through the Witcher time and time again.

“Jaskier, I…“

Those eyes were looking at him now, expectantly.

“You what, Geralt?”

“I…” A beat. “I-“ A pause. And then,

“I’m going to bed.”

Fuck. Shit.

Jaskier’s joyful demeanour dimmed.

“Right, yeah, ok. I’ll go too, then.”

Fuck. Shit.

—

Despite his foul mood, Geralt had managed to fall into a light sleep. He had hated watching Jaskier walk away from him to his own room. It was only one door down but the Witcher couldn’t help but feel like the bard had taken a piece of him. Now he’ll have to lay there until morning, incomplete, until the bard brought back the piece of him that he had taken…or more accurately, the piece that Geralt had willingly given him.

So, yes, despite his foul mood, Geralt was asleep - barely - but asleep.

That is, until he flung himself bolt upright in bed, nostrils filled with a stench he absolutely loathed.

Fear.

Not just anyone’s fear.

Jaskier’s fear.

Before his sleep-hazy mind could catch up, he was bursting through Jaskier’s door, Witcher eyes scanning the room and all its dark corners for danger. His adrenaline had taken over, his body itching to move, to fight, to protect.

“Geralt.” Came a small voice. Geralt’s eyes snapped to the bard sitting in his bed, an involuntary growl escaping the Witcher. It was in these moments that Geralt came to fear himself, to fear the animal that had taken over the man, but in the current moment he couldn’t bring himself to care, not when the room was absolutely soaked in Jaskier’s own fear. “Geralt.” He said again, almost pleading. Geralt couldn’t stop himself from moving at the sound.

“Are you hurt?” Geralt asked, his voice coming out more gravelly than he expected. Jaskier shook his head, silver-lined eyes wide as Geralt swiped his thumb across his cheek, wiping away the tear tracks. He felt the worry slip away slightly. “Nightmare?” Jaskier nodded, hand coming up to grasp the Witcher’s wrist tightly. The bard shut his eyes tightly and leaned further into Geralt’s hand, taking a shaky breath.

“Don’t leave.” He whispered. Even if he had wanted to, Geralt couldn’t say no. He slipped under the covers of Jaskier’s bed, pulling him close to his chest. He felt Jaskier grasp onto his shirt and bury his face into the Witcher’s neck. Geralt held him tightly, trying to warm the shaking bard. He swallowed down the lingering worry and adrenaline as Jaskier slowly relaxed, the tension leaving his tightly wound body as he exhaled into Geralt’s skin.

The Witcher’s chest ached. It ached in that entirely good and satisfying way. His nose was in Jaskier’s hair and he could smell the walnut and cedar of his soap that he saved especially for his hair, the smell of pine after spending a day trekking through the forest. He no longer smelt the fear that had clogged his nose and misted his mind. Jaskier was warm and he was safe and he was close.

The ache in his chest throbbed.

His arms tightened around the bard.

The bard that he…that he…

“I love you.”

“What?”

#this hasnt been proofread or edited sorry #im so tired #fic written #geraskier #my rambles #geralt of rivia #geralt #jaskier #jaskier x geralt #geralt x jaskier #geraskier fic #geraskier angst #the witcher fic

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brideofcthulhu10 · 4 years ago

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Hi! Uh so Billy aka Dwayne and I have the same birthday (June 23). I don't really like my birthday because I've never gotten to celebrate. I haven't had a party since I was a kid and now I just always spend the day sad and with no friends. If you wanna write something with the lost boys celebrating Dwayne and reader's birthday together, I'd really love it. (No pressure tho. I really love your blog and hope you'll have a great day ✨)

Aw, I’m sorry to hear you’ve not been able to celebrate your birthday for such a long time. Hopefully I can give you a little taste of a great birthday with the boys, and a very special (belated) birthday to you from myself and all of my readers, you are an honorary Fang Babe which makes you a part of a community that’s there for each other! If you ever feel sad, I got my DMs open 24/7 if you ever need to just vent up a storm! All are welcome.

Happy Birthday to You Both

Dwayne x Fem!S/O

Today was supposed to be special, yet the entire day everyone was so preoccupied with their own little lives that no one had even bothered to remember it was your birthday today. It was absolutely miserable. All the while your boyfriend Dwayne was currently tucked away at the abandoned hotel hiding away from the sunlight. Bursting into flames was certainly an occupational hazard. By this point the whole vampirism thing had come and gone, and while it did frighten you, nothing was more frightening than being without your dark crow.

Rather than stay at home to be ignored you opted to go out for the afternoon, browsing shops for a special occasion. No, not yourself. See, as luck would have it, June 23rd also held significance to Dwayne. Marko, one of the younger members of the coven, had told you two weeks prior it would be Dwayne’s birthday as well. You had to keep your own secret. Not at their request, but your own. Overshadowing his birthday would be dreadful, you hated the idea of taking it from him. Besides, no one remembered anyways.

Weaving through brightly lit shops, you pondered each piece wondering what would suit him best. Clothes were out, maybe a new skateboard? Just looking at the little white tags stuck to the back of them made you cringe. Okay, so that was out. You weren’t made of money.

There was an old mystic shop selling a handful of oddities, somewhere called Madame Medusa’s Mystical Boutique. A few interesting necklaces caught your eye, but one seemed to be directly calling you. It was a crow skull attached to a leather cord, bordered by two carved red beads on either side. Two thick black feathers were wedged between the beads. Gently you slipped it off the hook, running your thumb over the chilled, smooth surface.

“It’s a lovely item, isn’t it,” an elderly woman asked. Truthfully she startled you from behind the counter, almost making you jump a few good inches.

“O-Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t see-”

“Don’t worry dear, hardly anyone does,” she chuckled, tenderly plucking the skull from your hand. “Shall I wrap this up for you?”

“Oh- Well I wasn’t, I mean it’s nice but-,” you stuttered, but already she was shuffling towards the counter again. Boy pushy woman. You didn’t even know how much it cost, you weren’t exactly on a budget but you couldn’t be going on any big spending sprees.

“Hush now. He’s going to be waiting for you, somewhere nearby. I can guarantee that this is the one you’re meant to give him,” she insisted, wrapping the necklace under aged brown paper.

“Yeah, I’m sure he’d like it but-,” you couldn’t help but trail off. How- How did she know?

The woman pushed the little baggie your way, giving a tender smile before she began to hobble towards a curtained room behind the counter.

“W-Wait, I didn’t even pay for it!”

She waved off your concern, looking behind her shoulder while she parted the curtains in her path.

“Consider it a present from those who neglected you. Take it to him, you’ll see..” And with that she vanished behind them, leaving you stunned where you stood. Silently you glanced down at the small plastic bag, almost jumping in place when a dusty old grandfather clock began to ring through the store. One, two, three, four, five, six. Oh! It was already six o’clock. Crap the boys would be up any minute!

It didn’t take too long to spot the gang of vampires sitting on the worn, wooden banisters talking amongst themselves. Dwayne was just as eager to spot you, sweeping between the boys and lifting you up in his arms. “Happy birthday, princess,” He gushed, planting tender kisses all over your cheeks.

“How did you know? I didn’t-”

“My bad,” Marko spoke up. He leaned back from behind Paul to wave your way, as if he were waving a flag of defeat. Damn. You weren’t even sure how Marko figured out your birthday in the first place, there was just no keeping secrets from that guy!

Dwayne set you down, although he carried a much more concerned expression this time. “Why keep it a secret in the first place, Y/N?”

You fiddled with the bag still clutched in your hand with eyes cast downward towards your feet hoping a good excuse could get you out of just admitting you’d rather play backseat. But, you didn’t. Not that you couldn’t come up with any excuses. Rather, you didn’t want to be sidelined even for your boyfriend’s birthday. It was yours too, and for the past several years it seemed like you were constantly being set aside so that other things could happen. Your sister’s wedding, that trip to Colorado your parents took, grandma and grandpa visiting, your brother’s soccer games- everything seemed to take precedence over the celebration of the day you were born. And worst of all is you never got your Sixteen Candles happy ending. No one would really recognize they screwed up. You wouldn’t be apologized to with tearful shock when your parents realized they forgot your birthday, your friends- if you could even call them that at this point- wouldn’t try to cheer you up, and there was no handsome crush ready with a birthday cake to make it all go away. It’s like Dwayne already knew your feelings because before you could get a word in he pulled you into a crushing hug. Your head pressed against his chest. Sometimes you forgot he had no heartbeat and instead only listened to him rumble when he spoke to you.

“Just because today is for me, doesn’t mean it isn’t for you too, princess.”

Those words hit you harder than you anticipated. Your throat felt as if it were swelling, dry with each labored swallow, and a tight pressure squeezed the bridge of your nose. Inevitable tears eagerly rushed down your while burnt cheeks.

Dwayne only held you in place. He never let go until you were the one ready to release him, wiping away those pesky droplets of emotion staining you. “Now, I was saving this for when we took you to the hotel…,” he began with his hand jammed into his jacket pocket, rustling around for whatever it was he needed. “But, I figure maybe you need it now.”

A thick banded ring of aged silver sat in his calloused palm, an oval cut of turquoise clasped in place by a weaving border. Veins of black and copper split through chunks of blue-green paths. Rather hold it out to you, Dwayne tenderly took your hand into his own to slip the hefty piece over your ring finger. It nestled perfectly in place and you couldn’t help but let out a breathless laugh, slinging your arms over his neck. He already knew what to expect. Iron arms engulfed your waist and lifted you up. His stubble scratched the edges of your mouth when you crashed your lips into his. The sensation was overwhelming. It wasn’t just that he got you this, it was what he had gotten you.

Dwayne had often told you myths and lore on lazy nights when the hunting grew slow and the hours were long. Once you found yourself admiring a very similar cut of jewelry decadently adorned with many fine cuts of turquoise, finding your curiosity piqued when asking him what the significance was to all these pieces. Why was it such a commonly used stone in so much jewelry, especially with Native American tribes.

“From what I can remember,” Dwayne thought back at the time, leaning over you to admire the pricey baubles kept protected under a thick sheet of glass “, my grandmother told me that every tribe has always valued it. I mean, they all have their reasons. It’s a powerful gem that carries protection, life and strength. I’ve even seen it change colors depending on where you find it. I hardly ever saw it though when I was alive, even back then it cost a fortune.”

But now, through one way or another he’d remembered how you admired them from afar, yearning to have a ring like that of your very own. The one to five hundred dollar price tags always scared you off whenever you’d come to find them in stores- at least, the real ones. For once you didn’t care how Dwayne had acquired your gift. Gift! Oh!

“Oh, hold on,” You interjected between kisses with the little bag presented before him. “I um, got you something too. From that crazy lady in the mystic items shop!”

A warmth spread through your chest watching him lay the necklace over, the skull placing perfectly atop his many others. It suited him perfectly.

The whole night was just perfect. You spent the entire time going on rides with the boys after they spoiled you for dinner, later dragging you to the hotel where you realized what Dwayne meant earlier. There were streams of colored paper hanging off the rafters and old piping, red balloons tied to the furniture, and a banner of paper reading out “Happy Birthday Dwayne and Y/N” written in big, red marker letters. You couldn’t even make a wish when they brought out a cake for the both of you. After all, what more could be asked? They had already given you the most perfect birthday you could have ever hoped for.

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drunklander · 4 years ago

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Submission:

Why Roger MacKenzie is the Worst an Analysis:

It all begins way back when in episode three of season four. I am going to give Roger the benefit of the doubt and ignore the fact he flew across the ocean to see a girl that maintained about 0.3 seconds of conversation with him in which she rolled her eyes like five consecutive times. Let us not forget he popped up for Christmas without actually being invited which is creepy in of itself. At this point, Roger was saved by the grace of his Scottish charm and lost puppy façade. An illusion which will dissipate the moment he is allowed to open his mouth for more than two consecutive seconds because everything that comes out of it is complete garbage. Oh, Roger. I had faith in you, I really did.

Do not get me wrong, I wanted to like him. I wanted to like him so badly I almost ended up making excuses for him because… Are you not supposed to like a male romantic lead? Disliking him as much as I do feels so counterintuitive, but he makes it so damn easy.

Back to episode three of season four. I will never forget the image of Brianna sitting on the floor half naked, hugging herself, and telling Roger that the situation “is perfect.” Oof, I try to put myself in her shoes and how embarrassing and awkward it might have felt. How off putting it is and how it almost borders a rejection. Regardless, let us say that Roger’s intentions were not to hurt her; he still took absolutely no regard of her feelings. This is something he systematically does, putting himself at the center of every situation with no afterthought of how the person by his side might interpret things. Roger’s character demands empathy but extends none. In fact, he is so narcissistically woven in his own delusions, that I do not think he is capable of seeing Brianna as a living, breathing human with thought and emotions of her own. Roger’s character does everything in its power to erase Brianna’s narrative. Sounds familiar? Aye, to me too. History repeats itself.

What is supposed to be a romantic moment, in my eyes, turns into a cringe-fest. Really, Roger, you could not have thought of better timing to present your stupid bracelet? I will not even begin to wonder how long Roger has fantasized about Brianna during their separation. It seems to me that he simply projects an idea of Brianna onto her, expecting her to uphold this impossible standard, and when she indeed fails, he gaslights her into feeling bad about it. This, my friends, is the epitome of a toxic relationship. So, Roger created this fantasy (or delusion) of a proposal to a twenty-year-old girl that would pass well. Once Brianna shattered this fantasy, as is expected given that she is A TWENTY-YEAR-OLD INEXPERIENCED GIRL, Roger, as a defense mechanism, begins to shame her. Brianna did not even state that she was not interested in marrying him ever, just not now. But for Roger, it is all about: “I want you to say yes.” The ‘I want…’ narrative is the driving force behind his character. As I said, everything is always about him. I am sure all of you have watched the episode and there is no need to repeat the atrocious UNWARRANTED slut shaming that occurs there. Honestly, it reminded me of those guys on Tinder that are like “wow you are so beautiful” and once they feel rejected it turns into “fuck you bitch I never wanted you anyways.” All Roger had to do was tip his fedora and be done with it. BUT IT DOESN’T END HERE. Wow, you know? I thought he would learn a thing or two from this. But no, apparently growth is an impossibility for Roger MacKenzie. So, we proceed to episode eight of season four AKA the episode that had no silver lining except for Claire’s badass surgical abilities. Roger zooms in out of nowhere (a-la Steve Rogers style in Endgame, another atrocious storyline that involves men appearing where they are not welcome and robbing women of their voice) to scorn Brianna once again. “What do you mean you didn’t know where we stood?” Uh… Because there was nothing abnormal or worthy apologizing for after your last conversation? Wow, Roger, you really are that fucking stupid, huh? Blah, blah, blah, stupid conversation, then Roger decides to manhandle her unnecessarily because… Why the fuck not? That really gets Brianna hot and heavy, and let me pause here to say something I think is absolutely important. I love Brianna Fraser. I think that everything dislikeable in her character stems from the way she behaves when it pertains to Roger. I think she turns a blind eye, constantly lets things slide, and that her grand romance with Roger is written poorly. It is so unpersuasive that it makes Brianna feel so out of character when she accepts him back time and time again. I sincerely do not see how, why, or when she fell in love with his sorry ass. Brianna Fraser is one of those character that have the potential of being outstanding but are done very dirty for the sake of providing a narrative to a half-assed male character that nobody likes anyways. Anywhoo, let us return to Brianna and Roger getting down to business (EW). So, Brianna needs to remind Roger of his own convoluted, archaic ideals. The same ideals which made them fight THE FIRST TIME AROUND. I mean, those ideals were SO important that he felt the need to shame her the way he did. Are they not important now or is Roger just doing the convenient thing of thinking with his genitals? But of course, now that he had a lightbulb moment he has to backtrack; God forbid they sleep together unmarried as if he were not ready to do it ten seconds ago. Oof, the hypocrisy runs deep in this one huh folks? Brianna ends up finding out that Roger kept the truth from her about her parents’ death in order to keep her happy for the sake of marrying her. So once again, Brianna is reduced to a trophy that he needs to win – actually, I never thought he saw her as anything else. I wholeheartedly believe that Roger does not love Brianna, he loves the idea of himself with Brianna. They fight, he leaves her like a pussy bitch because she told him so and Brianna gets raped by Stephen Bonnet. So far so good? Now, I wish Brianna was at the epicenter of her own damned rape arc. I wish that the voice of female survivors was not erased once more for the sake of elevating the pathetic self-scorn of an unworthy male character. Do you want to know the moment I hate the most about season four? It is Roger’s stupid “I am an idiot” sermon. He had such a good shot at redeeming himself there, at admitting that he messed up, at accepting that he is at fault for everything that has happened to him thus far. That was too much to expect, now, wasn’t it? Instead he goes on raving and moping about love, and how he is an idiot that always returns though nobody ever asked him to, yada, yada. Again, all Roger can possible conceive are his own feelings. See, Roger is not wrong, he is an idiot, but for completely different reasons. Needless to say, he gets rescued and discovers the truth. And what is the truth? That his handfast wife was viciously attacked and is hurting? No, God forbid we focus on Brianna’s feelings for a moment. No, it is all about the fact that the rapist was Bonnet and that he might be the father of the child. That is what matters, right? The fact that another man put his dick in my woman, and not the fact that a woman has been forced to engage in coitus against her will. It is all about ownership. So, of course, Roger hesitates to come back. Of course, he is the one having the hardest time to deal with it, because he always has the hardest time to deal with everything. Oh, poor Roger. This is not about Brianna’s decision to keep the child because of the possibility that he might be Roger’s. This is not about Brianna’s ambivalence towards her attack because it took something from her, but also gave her something so beautiful. This is not about Brianna’s trauma, its aftereffects, and how it re-shaped her world. This is all about Roger. It has always ever been about Roger. Brianna is not a character in her own right, she is simply a plot device (you guessed it right) for Roger. The best thing this show can do is have him fall off a cliff and never come back. The only reason I will watch season 5 is to see Marsali and Fergus because they are the real MVP’s of this show.

OOF.

_________________________

Fucking. Preach.

(#FuckYeahTeamFersali)

#stuff people sent me #submission #roger mackenzie #outlander fandom #*

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army-of-mai-lovers · 4 years ago

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Jet, Smellerbee, Suki (and now also Haru) part 4

part 1 (aka me hijacking @ecology-major-ikki ‘s post) part 2 part 3

warning for discussions of death

so they set off to Ba Sing Se, and all of them are keeping secrets from each other

Jet thinks Longshot might be dead, but he doesn’t want to tell Smellerbee, because he’s worried that if they can’t find Longshot, then that’ll mean they really can’t be a family again.

he also finds himself looking at Haru quite a bit but he’s not thinking about it he’s not thinking about it at ALL

Smellerbee knows in her soul that Longshot is dead, but she’s hoping against hope that she’s wrong. She keeps reminding herself that once upon a time, she thought Jet was dead, and now they’re together again, and they’ve got new friends too. Everything’s going to be okay. It has to be.

Suki and Haru sit down and have a real conversation about what might happen once they get to Ba Sing Se, when they can’t find Longshot. Haru wants to invite Jet and Smellerbee back to his village, to live with his family and Pipsqueak and the Duke

Suki is very against this on the grounds that Smellerbee is a Kyoshi Warrior and Jet was really happy on Kyoshi Island and was planning to bring all the Freedom Fighters back there

Haru points out, gritting his teeth a little, that nothing has gone according to plan for a while

The discussion gets pretty unproductive pretty quickly, and Suki and Haru decide to drop it. Jet and Smellerbee definitely pick up that there’s some tension there though.

Jet suspects that the tension has to do with some lovers’ quarrel, which is weird to him because Suki seemed so in love with that guy who doesn’t like him, Sokka

One night he asks her if she and Sokka are doing all right, and she frowns at him and says “we’re perfect, why do you ask?”

Jet shrugs and says that he’s noticed that she and Haru spend a lot of time talking alone

Suki clams up because she does not want to start the “Longshot might be dead” conversation right now, so she just says that it’s none of his business because she’s an absolutely terrible liar

Jet sees right through her of course, and very quickly comes to the conclusion that Haru must have a thing for Suki and Suki’s trying to let him down easy by hanging out with him all the time

And for some reason, the thought of Haru having a thing for Suki makes him angry

Then, Haru keeps asking Jet to hang out alone, and whenever they do Jet thinks it’s to talk about something important, like where Longshot might be, but no, Haru just wants to talk about his childhood or the fate of the universe or go stargazing or some shit like that

And Jet cannot go stargazing with Haru if he has a crush on Suki

So he keeps making up excuses to get out of hanging out with Haru one on one, and most of these excuses involve him hanging out with Smellerbee

Smellerbee, the Smart One, knows immediately that whatever’s happening between Suki and Haru, it’s totally platonic, and she can see Jet’s crush on Haru from a mile away, even if he can’t

Normally, she wouldn’t get involved, bc the Spirits know that Jet can get himself in and out of a relationship without her help, thank you very much, plus they have way more important things to worry about, but she can tell that this is a little (a lot) out of Jet’s comfort zone

Haru isn’t dazzled by Jet, like Katara was, and Haru doesn’t need Jet, like Zuko did. Haru is just a normal person who likes Jet and whom Jet likes.

and that is precisely the reason that Jet Cannot Get His Shit Together.

So Smellerbee puts her foot down one night and tells Jet that he cannot use her as an excuse to not hang out with Haru anymore

Jet, being the guy that he is, simply decides to hang out in the woods alone instead.

When they get to Ba Sing Se, tensions between the group are high. Haru doesn’t understand why Jet is avoiding him, he’s still not-quite-fighting-but-things-are-tense with Suki, and he can barely look at Smellerbee without thinking about the fact that he doesn’t think Longshot is alive.

So he suggests that they split up.

Smellerbee and Jet immediately flag this as a bad idea, since the Avatar has yet to deal with the Dai Li, but Haru insists they’ll cover more ground that way

Suki proposes a compromise: Jet and Smellerbee can stick together, and she and Haru will split up, and they’ll meet back at the same spot in three hours and if any one of them is missing, the others will save them.

Jet and Smellerbee aren’t happy about this, but they accept (though they both spend a lot of time warning Suki and Haru that Ba Sing Se isn’t safe and they need to blend in and stay under the radar as much as possible)

As soon as they all start asking after Longshot, people clam up. It’s really clear that they know exactly who they’re talking about, but they won’t say anything out of fear.

Finally, Jet finds a little girl, about Smellerbee’s age, named Yin, who’s willing to talk to him and Smellerbee about what happened to Longshot.

She says that he came to their family’s fruit stand last year, looking to buy some food, and while he was making his purchase, some Earth Kingdom soldiers started harassing her grandfather

Longshot punched one of them and told him that if he wanted to harass somebody, he could harass him

A fight broke out. It was six soldiers and only one Longshot, but he held his own until the Dai Li came

They dispersed the crowd and told everybody to go back inside, and so Yin and her family went inside, and they never saw a young man matching that description again.

Jet and Smellerbee regroup with Suki and Haru and tell them what Yin said. Suki and Haru look between each other, and Suki decides it’s time for them to talk about the possibility that Longshot is dead.

Suki tells them everything: how she and Haru have suspected that Longshot might be dead for a while, how they started arguing because Suki wants Jet and Smellerbee to go back to Kyoshi and Haru wants to invite them to live with his family and Pipsqueak and the Duke.

Jet’s absolutely furious. He spent all this time growing and learning to trust people, only to find out that Suki and Haru have been keeping this from him the whole time. Smellerbee asks him to calm down, saying that she also suspected that Longshot might be dead but she didn’t want to upset him, and she’s sure that that’s exactly what Suki and Haru were trying to do for them.

Suki and Haru agree with Smellerbee, saying that they were just trying to protect him, but Jet insists that he doesn’t need to be protected

and all of a sudden, he just falls silent

He’s hiding his face, but Haru can tell he’s crying, and gets up to go hug him

Jet leans into Haru’s chest, quietly sobbing, mumbling about how everything’s fallen apart

He expects Haru to say something reassuring so he can bite back and say there’s no bright side, there’s no silver lining. But Haru doesn’t. He just holds him, for hours.

Eventually, they all go to sleep, and when Jet wakes up in the morning, he’s absolutely chipper, no evidence of last night’s breakdown at all. Smellerbee’s a little concerned he’s been brainwashed again.

Suki asks him how he’s doing, and Jet says he’s doing absolutely fantastic. In fact, he thought of an idea.

They all think Longshot is dead, but everybody thought Jet was dead once. And look at him! So probably, Longshot’s being held in the Dai Li’s prison, and all they need to do is break in and get him

Smellerbee frowns and points out that breaking someone out of prison isn’t exactly a cinch, especially if you don’t know that they’re in that prison to begin with, but Jet insists that the Dai Li probably thought Longshot would be more valuable if he were reeducated than if he were dead, and they have an Earthbender on their side, so they can totally find him and break him out.

Haru points out that it’s been over a year since anybody’s seen Longshot, but there is no valid point that anyone could bring up that could deter Jet from this plan now.

Suki says she’s in, and after a bit of convincing, Smellerbee and Haru are in too.

They go down into the catacombs where Jet was held, on constant lookout for Dai Li agents. The deeper they get into the catacombs, the bigger they seem, and Suki worries they’ll never find Longshot even if he is here.

And then, suddenly, a voice behind them shouts “You shouldn’t be here!”

It’s a Dai Li agent. Haru and Suki start fighting him immediately, but Jet and Smellerbee just stare at him, slack-jawed, unable to move.

It’s a Dai Li agent. But it’s also Longshot

#i'm so sorry #longshot #jet #suki #smellerbee #haru #jetru #i swore to myself this was going to be the last part but ofc it is not #do not worry #i wouldn't write that and then just leave y'all hanging

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minjoonalist · 5 years ago

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Predilection | Chapter five

Pairing : Jikook x Reader [Feat. Taehyung]

Words: 1.8k

Genre: Angst, eventual Smut, fluff

Warnings : explicit wording, characters under the influence, bad judgement, (I will make it clear that the characters in this chapter are definitely of age.)

Description: you want him, he wants you, but he also wants him, and him wants you- but him hurt you. So You hate him.

+++

Its somewhere around 7:00 am in the morning and amongst all your fellow early classmates waiting to board the trip’s bus, you find yourself spacing in and out of your own head. Your stomach in knots, eyes puffier than usual and although you’ve tried to calm yourself through an entire night of restless tossing and turning - you just couldn't shake the miserable feeling of dread.

“ Y/n...Y/N?!” There's a hand waving in your face catching your attention. Like a trance being broken, your best friend watches worriedly while your eyes seem to snap open in shock. Seeing him, makes the question ring in your head for the hundredth time, the very one you lied to. Whether or not you found your own body betraying your emotions for the boy you hated.

You kissed him back.

Jeon jungkook knew what it felt like to have your lips moving desperately against his in such an intimate fashion. Your lips permanently painted with the feel of his impressionable touch. The event, unfortunately, was still on your mind heavy, your thoughts consumed within the strange dilemma that you’d somehow gotten yourself into and to make it worse- you now truly had no one to really talk about it with.

“Did you...D-Did you sleep at all last night?” Taehyung stumbles in front you and it if it weren't for the devastating guilt running through you, you wouldn't have noticed the very clear and real suitcase coming by his side. Which reminded you of your suitcase...and that you were really going to be stuck with those two for an entire week...

Focusing, You try to swallow in your very dry mouth, your eyes blinking slowly to take on the equally as sleep deprived looking boy. His eyes a bit dark all around, hair disheveled, and there's an alarming aura around him that you couldnt say you were used to.

Was he nervous?

“Me? Tae you look like you want to get hit by a train.” you retort yawning in exhaustion “something Tells me I'm not the only one who didn't dream of pillows and sheep”. Letting your bag down from your shoulder, you wince from your tense muscles screaming in agony and a sigh could be heard from him.

“Excuse you, but I did get some sleep- at least that was before you came panicking at my door.” he denounces while creating an evil glare.

“ we only talked for an hour, don't blame your obvious insomnia for yoongi on me” you spit back and while taehyung was too busy dropping his mouth to the floor, the scarce amount of your classmates had begun to fill in including your professor.

By then, the sun was beginning to rise even further in the sky and by the looks of all the tired faces surrounding you, you could tell it was almost time to depart on the trip - aka hell. Your nerves suddenly getting the better of you, you slowly start to sink further into the troubling mess of your emotions and just as you were beginning to realize how surreal your situation was, your eyes catch a notable figure in the distance.

Silver hair shining within the powerful breeze, as a ringed hand comes up to help keep it at bay. He struts up towards the surrounding crowd of students, catching multiple glances of onlookers, but whether or not he acknowledges them through his square rimmed shades, it remains a mystery. A black leathered luggage by his side, Jimin stops his stride just a few feet away from you and tae, however his focus remains on the phone held within his other hand.

“Oh great! The ballerina's here.” taehyung cheers sarcastically, meanwhile every fiber within your body was stilled from how aware you were of his presence. Okay...so this was still just a bit harder than you’d thought it would be...you think while taking a deep breath. As much as you wanted to pretend you felt absolutely nothing for the male hovering by the both of you, you couldn't deny the quickened pace within your chest when he suddenly snaps his head in your direction.

Your gaze quickly goes elsewhere.

“Tae I don't know if I can do this...” you swallow, a hard lump coming into your throat. You think you’re going to be sick…

“Do what?” Taehyung frowns, A deep crease in his brow from your confession, however it disappears once he puts its together himself. Both of his brows now shooting up towards his hairline “You're not thinking of Failing this course are you? Y/n we’ve talked about this, you're going to be fine. I’ve told you, you can stay the night with me and yoongi if you don't want to be on your own.”.

And just like that, You cast your gaze downwards, a feeling of hopelessness washing over. You suddenly find your feet a bit too interesting “ I- I don't know…I think this might be too much Tae. I know you w-want to be alone with yoongi and I...well I’d pretty much just be cock blocking you. Plus, I just don't know if I can handle being with them the way it is-” you stutter shakily.

Stepping closer, Taehyung pulls you into an abrupt warm hug, bringing you closer until your head was resting comfortably on his firm chest “ Hey, Hey- no matter what, I’ll be glad to have you around anytime. Besides, it’s pretty bold of you to assume I wouldn’t be pounding into min yoongi, because you're in the next room- I couldn’t care less if you watched.” he pulls back to look you in your eyes, a clear look of doting support across his features.

Meanwhile you scrunch your face up in disgust “I think I’d rather hear them before I hear you- at least I won't really be able to visualize their faces.”

Tae stares at you blankly before he lifts a brow “...You’re telling me, you wouldnt want to watch me fuck someone else...me? The unbelievably hot best friend who had you shirtless the first time we met?”

You cringe again “ You seriously have to stop talking about that night...I would like to not remember getting my heart broken and then having even my current best friend reject me.” you move to step away from him and more towards the slowly growing crowd. You never liked talking about the night you met Taehyung, because in all honestly- it was probably the worst night of your life. Unfortunately, it also happened to be the night jimin and jungkook had first debuted as couple and on top of that- you really dont want to venture back into a territory where sex was possible between the both of you.

Getting closer towards the others, you feel taehyung easily catching up with your walking figure. His arm comes naturally around your shoulder like always before he speaks “ Well of course I rejected you, you were completely heartbroken like an adorable sad puppy.”

“Wow this conversation just keeps getting better and better....By the way this is doing wonders for my confidence, just thought you should know.” you mutter sarcastically while trying to shove his arm off of your shoulder. He doesnt move it, instead catching on to the hurt hidden behind your sarcasm. He then uses his arm to stop you, the pressure of it keeping you from walking any further.

He rolls his eyes “Wait, because I don't think you understand. The reason I stopped wasn't because you were just some sad random girl. Well- actually yes it was, but it was also because…” he huffs “ You were also really sweet and innocent, you didnt deserve some asshole who was going to fuck you senseless and then disappear the next day. So I stopped and when you broke down then cried, I held you, remember?” he tries to put on a smile that opposes your bitter pout.

As much as you hated to admit it, Everything he’d just said was true. Taehyung did stop that night and you knew that, because you remembered that night vividly.

The both of you bursting through some random bedroom door for privacy.

Only moments ago you’d just seen your best friend and your crush making out in back the of a graduation party together and when you confronted Jungkook about it, he’d acted as if he had no idea what you were talking about. Angry, you stormed off, tears collecting your eyes and you made your way over towards the snack table to down an entire cup of vodka.

Moments later, A firm hand suddenly sliding it’s way onto your back that makes you turn to look at the culprit. Enters Taehyung. Dark hair, boxy smile, but red sultry eyes drinking in your poor body as he pulls you closer towards him “ You look like you could use some fun, want to go upstairs?” he would breathe slowly into your ear.

You remembered sliding your eyes back towards the raven haired boy that just so happened to be watching you and Taehyung like a hawk from across the room. Your eyes just barely being able to find him through the sea of people, An emotion swirling dangerously behind them.

In a time like this, Jungkook would already be there ready to save you when needed. But with the combination of anger, the vodka, and a growing euphoria of feeling Taehyung’s hands roaming all over your waist, you were certain you wouldn't need it.

Which brings you back towards the private room. Taehyung locks the door behind him, reaching for you to slam his mouth onto yours. The kiss is sloppy, aggressive and you were loving every second of it. His teeth nipping and pulling at your delicate lips before he’s lifting you up into his arms. A soft yelp leaves your mouth and he chuckles arrogantly into the kiss while walking the both of you further in. In a flash, he has you landing on top of the small room’s bed, his own body coming to hover above yours and you relish in the feel of his hips sliding between your legs.

As if a chill comes by, you suddenly shudder under him. The heated make-out warming you up enough to definitely have your panties soaked, but for some reason...you felt cold. Taehyung continues unknown to this, laying wet kisses from your mouth and down towards your neck. His own drunken lust, blinding him from the way your arms were desperately hugging him closer to feel any kind of warmth.

It wasn't until he suddenly sat up from you. His hands reaching for the hem of your shirt to pull it above your head and have you falling down onto your back. He takes a moment to look at your half naked torso, a look of appreciation washing over his eyes as he rakes them further up to stare at you.

He-

Why were there tears in your eyes?

+++

Chapter Five | Next Chapter | Masterlist

Taglist: @rkivemagic @peterrogers15 @sessi03 @brokencrownqueen @cainami @icedoutmywristtitanic @kawaiimusiccollection @toddsgirl27

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miraculouscontent · 4 years ago

Note

Pokemon anon again! I'd like to hear anything you have strong opinions on (either your personal ships, ones you dislike, etc). I just really like reading your thoughts, so whatever you feel like sharing is fine.

Welcome back, Pokénon!

And sure, I can do that!

Alright, so in terms of ships I dislike (I’m going to go with the English names just so I’m not constantly using both names)...

I guess I should get the obvious ones out of the way, because I’m not really a fan of either “Ash ship” extreme:

Poke//Shipping (Ash X Misty) and Amour//Shipping (Ash X Serena)

I don’t like either of them.

For Poke//Shipping, I have never liked aggressive tsundere characters and Misty is basically a textbook example of that. It’s not that I have a problem with strong/tomboy-ish (though honestly I don’t consider Misty a tomboy anyway) female characters, which I know it sounds like that when I have a distaste for characters like Alix too, but when they’re brash and angry and just so generically “TOMBOY GIRL POWER,” it grates on my nerves.

The idea of having an aggressive character - y’know - be aggressive to their love interest and then cue the sad music when the love interest argues with them or makes any sort of hurtful implication just... no.

Like, I want you to imagine the most sarcastic Clarity possible and then picture me as a little girl watching the scene where Misty is officially leaving the group, because that was literally just me like, “oh noooo, she’s goooone.”

It’s the same reason I don’t do Rocket//Shipping (James X Jessie). One character is too aggressive and the other character doesn’t even come close to balancing it out.

There’s also the fact that nothing comes out of Poke//Shipping. Misty is canonically crushing on Ash (*flashbacks to the friggin’ second movie where they shove it in your face*) but it’s just... there, not to mention that scene where Misty is talking casually to Ash like, “you and I will be married too someday,” which came completely out of left field and - whether for a joke or not - made little kid me very uncomfortable.

Like I said, it’s just there and doesn’t go anywhere, and Ash is already so oblivious that of course he wouldn’t get that Misty is in love with him. It’s basically a long-running gag of Misty pulling a surprised Pikachu face whenever Ash doesn’t understand that she likes him/wants to stay with him/literally wants anything specific from him.

As for Amour//Shipping, I did admittedly like it at first, but just--ugh, oh boy.

First, it’s shipping fanservice, kinda like Pokemon 2000 throwing a bone to the shippers except now it’s the whole two seasons. My followers know how I feel about fanservice just for fanservice and that’s basically all that Amour//Shipping is. That’s why Serena was already made to have met Ash when they were children; so the writers could get a “headstart” on all the blushy fanservice they could squeeze in on Serena’s end.

I fell off the ship sometime around Wulfric, particularly with the scene where Serena comforts Ash. Just that whole, “this isn’t like you,” and then trying to compare her contest losses to Ash’s battles as if Ash hasn’t been at this for seasons upon seasons and battles aren’t a completely different category because they involve actually watching one’s Pokemon get physically hurt (Pokemon battles are a sport, yes, but it doesn’t change anything; Ash also has a special Greninja so of course he’s going to be upset that having all this experience still isn’t enough to just sweep). Like, to relate to someone, yes, it helps to have something you can use as a mental comparison, but that comparison is (usually) supposed to stay mental.

Anyway, after Ash shouts at her because she doesn’t know how he feels at all (because she doesn’t) and he just wanted to be left alone (because he did), Serena throws snowballs at his face and that apparently helps make Ash feel better because Serena can do no wrong here and that just so happened to be exactly what he needed.

(I mean, that whole gym battle and what follows is already pretty trash but that solidified it for me. Basically everything XY&Z added were things I just didn’t care about.)

Oh, and Serena is also implied to steal a kiss from Ash at the very end of the season and you guys know how I feel about that. It’s mostly the fact that she’s so non-apologetic about it, just smiling and blushy and all happy whereas here’s me like, “Wait, I’m pretty sure we just missed a crucial step here??? Since when were you sure that Ash had a thing for you???”

So yeah, I’m not a fan of either ship. I have vague opinions about basically all other ships (The ship between Ash and Iris aka ”You’re such a kid” girl can rot), but Poke//Shipping and Amour//Shipping are the ones I have the strongest negative feelings for.

Brock being shipped with basically anyone is a no no for me. The guy flirts with anything that moves and I have never found it funny or charming. The closest thing young me ever came to a ship with him was Luck//Shipping (Brock X Pike Queen Lucy) but that’s basically it, and it honestly could’ve just been me thinking the idea that Ash and Brock both getting together with Battle Frontier people (I was for Ability//Shipping - Ash X Sailor Maiden Anabel - at the time) was a neat idea and both episodes that featured the respective ships had BLUSH FUEL.

I recall being into Advance//Shipping (Ash X May) when I was young (I was a multishipper back then, you see) but I avoided thinking about it too much because I wasn’t a huge fan of Max (aka “Iris before Iris existed”) and Norman’s game counterpart infuriates me even to this day so I just didn’t want to imagine Ash having to deal with those sorts of things. Plus, looking back on it, he and May were little too similar (then again, maybe that’s why I liked it?).

I expected to enjoy Aurelia//Shipping (Ash X Lillie) when I was getting into the Sun&Moon seasons but it didn’t really do anything for me. I guess maybe I was so burnt out after Amour//Shipping that I wasn’t in a shippy mood anymore? Though, it could also be that their relationship isn’t as “balanced” as I would’ve liked.

Anyway though, as for the ships I actually really like instead of just being indifferent towards or outright disliking, the big one really is just Pearl//Shipping. I suppose it makes sense given that I’m not a multishipper, don’t like Brock enough to ship him with anyone, and most other travel companions are ones I either hadn’t gotten attached to or that I’d paired with Ash long enough that, once I got older, I couldn’t really picture them with other people because my memory of their moments wasn’t strong enough.

Yeah though, PEARL//SHIPPING, I ADORE IT. Like, I’ll try to explain it as best as I can without rambling, but basically:

Dawn doesn’t make excuses when she wants to go with Ash. No “my bike," no meandering, just really casual.

THEY SING THE JAPANESE OPENING TOGETHER AND IT’S RAD. “High Touch” is like, my favorite opening theme???? And they do a duet for it??? I just???? Yes???????

It’s the little things. High-fives are like, their thing. They traded Pokemon with each other which is like, really rare for the series and it made total sense. They both have a Pokemon they keep out of their Pokeball who doesn’t want to evolve (Piplup was the Eevee partner from Let’s Go before it was cool) and no, Misty’s Togepi doesn’t count because it was Gold and Silver’s posterchild. Ash and Dawn also both gave up a speedy physical Pokemon (Primeape and Ambipom respectively) so they could participate in some sort of Pokemon sport that doesn’t exist in the games while I scream in the background because I really like said Pokemon.

DAWN IS ASH’S CHEERLEADER. SHE LITERALLY CHEERS FOR HIM DURING GYM MATCHES. THAT’S PRECIOUS.

They help and get ideas off of each other, which I think is really cool. Them trading Pokemon just furthers that sort of dynamic.

Them just supporting each other in general. There’s a moment where Dawn takes a pretty harsh loss and Ash can be seen sulking like he really gets how she’s feeling.

It also helps that Diamond and Pearl were one of the better seasons of the anime. Paul is a solid rival, I really like the creative battle techniques like spinning and countershield, and just Chimchar in general honestly. I remember the baking episode “Cooking Up a Sweet Story!” vividly and all the feels it gave me.

Yeah though. It’s not any sort of OTP pairing or anything, but out of all of the anime Pokemon ships, Pearl//Shipping is probably my favorite. I’d probably ship them a lot more if they were a little older (like, on par with the protagonists of the Black & White games, who are closer to 14/15; it’s just easier to get a gauge on personality that way).

#non ml talk #other: ask and answer #((The Gen 4 seasons do have a few weird episodes obviously but basically all the seasons do.))#((I guess I don't think as much when I watch them (though I could roast XY&Z for DAYS) because the main media of the series is the games.))#((I liked Gen 5 the best in that case by the way.))#((Black and White and their sequels are my favorites.))

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presumenothing · 4 years ago

Text

wherefore // 几生轮回

unfinished nirvana in fire fic for @goodintentionswipfest

(aka the kimi no na wa au that i posted the first part of in 2018 before being once again reminded that i am physically incapable of plot. sections i-iii are complete, rough outline follows afterwards)

When Jingyan wakes up in another body, his first reaction is to be altogether grateful that he’s spent much more time at the borders and generally out of the capital than your average nobility. The slightest breath of unusually chilly morning air is enough to confirm that this is all the way to the border – of Liang and Da Yu, Jingyan suspects, much further north than even he’s ever gone.

(…well actually his first reaction is a flat startled “what”, right before he’d pinched himself to check if he’s still dreaming, but Jingyan figures anyone would’ve done the same anyway.)

The first bell of morning rings outside, and out of long habit Jingyan swings his feet off the bed and makes to rise before he can entirely realise what a terribly bad idea that is.

At least he manages to catch himself with a hasty hand on the bedframe. He’s even less coordinated than he was right after his growth spurt, when Jingyu-gege had kept a very straight face and not laughed at him at all.

That’s when Jingyan sees it: the ring of a silver bracelet around his ar– well, not his arm, but currently-his arm. Whatever.

He runs a light finger over the cool metal surface, over the deep grooves of an emblem that curls like flames and the shallower etch of a name. Lin Shu, it says.

Jingyan stands, properly this time, and goes to peer out the window, wondering if this Lin Shu can afford to take a day off. Whoever he is.

As it turns out, the answer to that is a resounding no, because Lin-Shu-whoever-he-is turns out to be the young marshal of this border army, as Jingyan swiftly finds out as he makes his way to morning drills.

Something he probably should’ve noticed right off, really, given the room he’d woken up in. Not large, certainly not by Jinling’s standards, but the noticeable lack of sharing made it a rare luxury in the barracks.

By the time he arrives at the training grounds, navigating purely on long-honed familiarity with army facilities, Jingyan’s already learnt to answer almost automatically to the many cheerful hails of “Young Marshal!” coming from the general outflow of people from the mess hall – many many more people than he’d been expecting, to be honest.

He doesn’t remember the actual numbers like Prince Qi probably does, but from personal experience Jingyan does know Da Liang’s border armies to be fairly impressive on the whole. Yet he’s never even heard of one this large, save perhaps Duke Mu’s army to the south.

It’s unmistakeably Liang’s colours they’re flying, though, alongside the same fiery emblem engraved on his bracelet, so Jingyan decides not to worry about it too much.

Either way it puts paid to his vague ideas of begging illness and staying firmly on the sidelines, though Jingyan finds to his pleasant surprise that this young marshal has trained some fairly competent lieutenants clearly capable of running the drills themselves.

It’s almost reminiscent of mornings in Jing Manor, honestly.

(And it could be worse, Jingyan thinks. “Young Marshal” is just a title, like “Your Highness” is, and after a whole life of answering to one it’s hardly a suffering to be addressed by the other – almost freeing, actually, even if he has to err on the side of caution by being much more taciturn than usual and hoping that the edge of exhaustion from sheer shock shows just enough to excuse him for it.

All said and done, though, Jingyan rather believes he’s done quite the good job of things.

Certainly better than whoever’s now in Jinling has probably managed, but as long as he hasn’t accidentally offended the Emperor or anything.

…Jingyan can only hope.)

–

ii.

This, as Jingyu-gege often says, is why Jingyan should never, ever jump to conclusions about things.

Admittedly this doesn’t backfire so much as it goes completely off the rails of his expectations, trundling like a particularly enthusiastic horse in the opposite direction.

Nothing terrible awaits when he wakes up back in his room the next morning, and a quick inquiry to Zhanying confirms that he definitely hadn’t entered the palace yesterday.

Jingyan breathes a deep if silent sigh of relief.

(A quick check of the outer walls turns up a scuff mark matching his shoe on the roof, so faint as to suggest that it’d only been left because someone obviously hadn’t entirely adjusted to his new height yet.

Fair enough, Jingyan thinks. He’d have done the same last night if he hadn’t been too tired from the sudden cold to sneak out and explore anywhere.

Maybe next time, he catches himself thinking, and pulls a face, because no, none of that.

That jinxes it right away, of course, as he promptly realises the morning after.

Jingyan stifles a shiver in the wintry sun, even colder now after a day in Jinling’s warmth, and thinks – really, Jingyu-gege would have a field day with this.)

Possibly the oddest thing about this, thinks Jingyan on the eighth day he wakes up at the border instead of Jinling, is that neither of them have ever thought to question, even once, whether this is really happening.

Or at least Jingyan hasn’t, and if Lin Shu’s wondered about it he hasn’t mentioned it either, at least not in the increasingly copious notes they’re leaving for each other.

They end up making a routine of things without much discussion about it, even though the setup in each of their rooms almost mirrors the other. Jingyan begins to stock more scrolls of paper and sticks of ink at his desk, keeps their correspondence in a hidden drawer within easy reach of his chair.

But Lin Shu apparently fears the cold as little as his relatively thin wardrobe would suggest, because his stationery inevitably is set up at the low table with only a cushion to sit on – admittedly quite a comfortable one, yes, but still unseasonably chilly for the stone floor.

Either way, what had started out as a simple way to update each other on the day’s events devolves into something else altogether, and Jingyan can even pinpoint the moment it happened: when Lin Shu had added also stop wearing my hair down you’re making me look like an idiot as an afterthought on the third entry, followed by oh and don’t eat hazelnuts squashed into too few inches of space.

Jingyan’s learnt enough of medicine from his mother not to take the second part lightly, but the first almost tempts him into putting a flower in Lin Shu’s hair just because.

But only almost.

Then you stop tying my hair all up like that first, he adds to his next summary, it’s giving me a headache.

The palace would give anyone a headache, he finds written almost musingly in the reply margin.

Jingyan rubs at his temple, and finds that he can’t even argue with that, really. So instead he pulls up a fresh sheet of paper and quickly outlines the basics of court etiquette, because the Emperor’s probably going to end up summoning Jingyan while he literally isn’t himself one of these days, if this is going to continue.

He has a feeling it will.

It takes Jingyan a whole month of alternating days to admit, not quite grudgingly, that he is rather impressed by the fact that Lin Shu is already the young marshal of such a large army at this age.

In his defense, he’d rather naturally assumed the worst when he first found out that Lin Shu was the son of the commander himself, but that was before seeing the genuine respect rather than mere tolerance he got from every last man in the army, even those thrice either his or Lin Shu’s age.

(It’s the Chiyan Army, Lin Shu writes back, the very turn of each stroke arrow-sharp with irritation. Chiyan! Army! Will you get it right, it’s not just any army!

And I’m literally a prince, Jingyan snipes back in his most practiced handwriting. Also, if you’re insulting my men…

Hardly. Zhanying deserves a pay raise and a better boss, Lin Shu answers, then adds, pointedly, Your Highness.

Probably just so he could use up the last bit of paper.

Jingyan scowls at that last scrawl before pulling out yet another fresh sheet and dipping his brush in ink.

As if he’s going to let anyone have the last word over him quite so easily.)

–

iii.

“I didn’t know you liked archery, Prince Jing-gege,” says Nihuang one afternoon when they’re resting in his manor’s study after an impressive practice bout. The young duchess Mu had gotten quite formidable enough to attract the rapt attention of the entire training field – or she would have, if Zhanying hadn’t promptly barked at all of them to get back to their drills right then.

(It’d almost tempted Jingyan into asking, really, whether Zhanying had noticed anything different about his fighting style on the days when it’d been Lin Shu instead.

Not that Zhanying necessarily knew anything, per se – but from the subtly helpful way in which his general had volunteered information that Lin Shu’s writings occasionally failed to convey, between the carelessly precise updates and snarky comments in the margins… Jingyan rather thought he did suspect something, at least.

Wei Zheng was the same, up north at the border, which was just as well.

Lin Shu doesn’t know how good he has it, really, that the Jing army has closer to seven hundred men than seventy thousand – all of whom apparently assume that their young marshal will recognise them. Which says something fairly impressive about Lin Shu, of course, but still. How fortunate for him.)

Both their fathers have been closed up in Yangju Hall all day long – all the palace servants had been dismissed, and he’d heard that even Xia Jiang and Xie Yu had been summoned in.

Whatever it is they’re discussing must be important indeed, he knows. It’s hardly unusual, for both the Marquis of Ning and the Xuanjing Bureau’s head officer to meet the Emperor, but Jingyan doesn’t think he’s ever seen the Duke of Yunnan even half as stern as when he’d arrived this time, both his children firmly in tow.

Mu Qing had been unabashedly cheerful as always, and easy enough to handle – Aunt Liyang had been more than happy to help. It wasn’t like two more kids running around the house would trouble her much further, anyway, what with Yan Yujin already practically living there half the time.

But Nihuang had declined her offer politely before asking to see the Jing manor’s grounds, which is how she’d ended up here, hands clasped behind her back as she considers the red bow in pride of place on his weapons rack.

At least the sparring earlier had worn away most of the tension in her features, though Jingyan can still see the trace of it in the graceful stiffness of her posture, and wonders silently if she too feels the same thing he does, the slight wrongness in the air.

He shrugs anyway, trying for relaxed. “I got back into practicing it over the past couple months. It’s quite a bit more enjoyable now that I actually have enough strength to draw the string back fully.”

Which is completely true, even if he’d only had reason to discover it because Lin Shu’s weapon of choice is bow and arrow, as Jingyan had found to his utter surprise.

Nothing like muscle memory when the muscles weren’t even yours to begin with – though he supposes that it’s a fair trade, since Lin Shu’s also had to up his own proficiency with swords and spears to match Jingyan’s.

Neither does he mention that he’d only bought this bow on a whim because it reminded him of the one Lin Shu used. A resemblance that the young marshal had swiftly noticed, from the way he’d filled entire swathes of paper with gleeful gloating, only punctuated by a brief note on how he’d restrung it and adjusted the tension to match.

(Jingyan had kindly reminded Lin Shu about the fact that he’d gone and taken one whole day off to go diving for pearls that time the Jing army had been at Donghai, apparently having completely forgotten that he wouldn’t be able to bring the pearl back with him anyway.

The answering blankness had somehow conveyed a very mulish silence nevertheless.

Jingyan had rolled his eyes before writing if you really want it back I can always ask a courier to bring it over, it’ll just take time to reach the border.

And money, came the reply, or do you think I’ve no idea how much it costs to send something from Jinling? Nah, just keep it and go spend that money on food instead, you’re like a stick.

You’re just jealous because I’m taller, Jingyan does not answer, because he can be the better person here, so instead he writes Tried my mother’s hazelnut pastries yet?)

Nihuang gives him an inscrutably knowing look, even though Jingyan’s plenty sure he hasn’t shown any signs of his thoughts. “Maybe you should teach Qing-er then,” she muses as she comes back down to sit at the table. “The way he’d always playing around, I don’t know if he realised that he’s going to take over Father’s position someda– huh.”

Jingyan glances up from where he’s pouring out another glass of cold water, and finds her attention apparently caught by the documents he’d left out on the desk. “What is it?”

At his nod of permission Nihuang lifts a half-familiar paper from the stack, and there’s a brief moment of alarm when he spots Lin Shu’s handwriting, though it fades when he realises it’s not one of their written conversations.

Luckily Nihuang doesn’t notice either way, too intent on reading. “This naval strategy…” she finally says, “it’s just like the one we received some time ago, when Yunnan was under attack by river.”

Jingyan doesn’t need to feign his surprise. “Really?”

Nihuang nods, smiling faintly. “It saved all of our lives.”

“Oh,” Jingyan answers a little dumbly, his mind spinning. All of this is quite real, obviously, everything has convinced him of that, but for some reason it hadn’t struck him how Lin Shu too existed in this same world as him, more than just another body he sometimes woke up in. Rather slow of him, he thinks wryly, Lin Shu would have a laughing fit if he found out.

The specifics of this paper escape him now – it’d been part of some grand point Lin Shu had been trying to make, he thinks, as if they didn’t both know he was just cribbing the strategy from Nie Duo – but Jingyan doesn’t even need to look at the paper to see that familiar handwriting half his own. “Do you know who sent it?”

Nihuang shakes her head, her expression clouding over. “Father refused to tell me who’d sent it, forbade me from even mentioning it to Qing-er.”

And as if everything’s just been waiting for this last piece to fall into place, Jingyan feels the thing niggling at the edge of his consciousness, just out of realisation.

“Jingyan-gege…” Nihuang says, slow and terribly hesitant, “what do you know about the northern b–”

“Your Highness!” comes Qi Meng’s harried shout from outside, and Jingyan has never been more infuriated with any of his men in his life. “Duke Mu is here, he says the Duchess is to go with him immediately!”

Jingyan looks across the table to find his own frown reflected fiercely back at him.

Nihuang rises, looking suddenly older than she is, and says, quietly, “Be careful, Jingyan-gege. I don’t know what’s going on but I don’t like it.”

“Neither do I,” Jingyan says honestly, and doesn’t press her for whatever it was she had been about to ask earlier. He stands to see her out. “You be careful, too.”

Nihuang nods firmly, then she turns and is gone.

(Spoke with Nihuang today, Jingyan writes before going to bed that night. I don’t think you’ve met her yet, she’s the daughter of the Duke of Yunnan.

You know, he finds written beneath it the next time he wakes up in his own room, it’s been a whole year and that’s the first I’ve heard you talk about any lady. And don’t say Xia Dong, she’s just terror manifest.

The raised eyebrow is clearly audible, even via text.

Jingyan snorts, grabbing the brush that sits ready and waiting, as always. Nonsense, he starts, then pauses for a moment before adding I think you’d like her.

He’s looking oddly forward to the reply, whatever it is: which one, and don’t say Xia Dong or even well certainly she’ll like me, all the girls do – though the last of that is nonsense, seeing as there aren’t really any more ladies hanging around the border pass than in Jing Manor.

But he never hears from Lin Shu again.)

–

iv.

Jingyan still finds himself in his room when he wakes up the next day.

And the next, and the next after that.

(On the eighteenth morning in a row he remains stubbornly stuck in Jinling’s oppressive warmth Jingyan punches the wall so hard it almost cracks cleanly in half – or maybe that’s just him.

Zhanying hurries up, voice tinged with ill-concealed worry. “Your Highness?” he says tentatively, except the words themselves feel like a shackle now.

Jingyan leans just slightly against the cool smoothness of the wood, and tells himself to breathe.

“Zhanying,” he says, finally, “what do you know about the northern border army?”

It’s the Chiyan Army, not just any old military! echoes Lin Shu’s voice in his head.

“…not much,” hedges Zhanying, and it clearly isn’t a lie but his eyes are also very wide.

The wrongness from before congeals into an ugly mess, settles decidedly in his heart. It’s the only thing he can be sure of not imagining.

Jingyan suddenly feels very tired indeed. “It’s nothing.”)

–

And then he finds out in the worst way possible: far too late, and all at once.

would have been: jingyan finding out the truth about what’s been happening, which is fairly true to kimi no na wa canon except that it’s everything at meiling instead of a meteor extinction event. in jingyan’s present time he finds the lin manor in absolute disrepair, asks questions of his mother that make both of them sad, and eventually forces a bodyswap to save lin shu and the chiyan army by… using the pearl somehow? and how would he stop this single-handedly anyway? never quite managed to figure either part out. though on his side lin xie is shown to also have realised Something was going on with lin shu (like zhanying realised about jingyan) and even if he doesn’t buy the “hey i’m from the future” shtick, he at least would be willing to hear out someone with a good idea of what’s currently happening in the capital, which helps.

anyway there would’ve been one section where we finally get lin shu’s pov which is when he realises what This Bloody Idiot xiao jingyan is trying to do and curses up a blue streak. from there this could’ve had one of two endings:

a HE where jingyan succeeds, lin shu and the chiyan army survives, and they forget but eventually find each other again (after remembering when jingyan sees lin shu doing archery or vice versa).

or a BE where jingyan doesn’t succeed and we end up right back in the canon timeline, dammit guys. optional extra being that changsu remembers for some reason even though jingyan doesn’t… but sometimes, jingyan can’t help thinking that changsu reminds him of someone. a person he’d forgotten? angst ensues. the end.

#nirvana in fire #nif #fanfiction #mine #WIP CLEARANCE 2K20

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