#her development could have been a bit slower and more detailed since she had lot of time (chapters) to do so

[donaviolet]

himiko yumeno for the character bingo?

yesss the ultimate silly magical girl!!!! she used to be my fav character when I first got into danganronpa >:3

bonus Himiko because this one took me way too long:

[s-brant]

Pirates and Princesses (8/8)

(gif: @beccs) (PART SEVEN) (SERIES MASTERLIST)

Summary: JJ must confront his childhood trauma when returning home for the first time since his dad went to jail and prevent it from sabotaging his new relationship. Meanwhile, something sinister happens at the Chateau that brings Y/N face to face with her grief over John B’s death.

Word Count: 13.4k

Warnings: Angst, implied sexual content, strong language, parent/child abuse, mental illness, post-traumatic stress disorder, grief, and fluff.

A/N: Welcome to the final chapter of Tokens! This one has a little bit of everything in it, but it also has detailed scenes about JJ and his dad, so proceed with caution if you’re easily triggered by that topic. The love you guys show this fic warms my heart so much, so thanks to anyone who stuck with this story until this chapter. Hope you enjoy it!

Now that she has been sentenced to both punishments, one as a consequence of the fight with Kacey and the other as a consequence of the stunt she pulled with JJ to break out of ISS, Y/N can confidently say that out of school suspension is superior to in-school suspension by a long shot. Instead of sitting in a humid room with Alec for the duration of multiple school days, she's allowed to stay home, go out surfing, and do whatever she wants in lieu of doing classwork.

She promised herself not to make it a habit, promising the invisible presence of John B that she likes to pretend follows her around that she will never get herself into trouble again, but she sees no problem in enjoying her suspension while it lasts.

For the first few days of her suspension, JJ skipped school to spend it with her. Their memories of the conversation they had at three in the morning on Sunday were fuzzy, but not missing entirely. She noticed a difference in his behavior for the first few hours after they woke up under the tree together for the second time in one week. It wasn't a difference in their relationship or how he treated her, it was a difference in him.

He was quieter than usual as they cleaned up cans of beer and tossed them into the recycling, sending pictures to Kie while she was in class after she made them promise not to throw them in the trash. Rather than cracking jokes or making casual conversation with her, JJ made his way around the yard with the recycling bin in his hands and his head in the clouds. It disappeared as the day progressed, but for a little while, he wasn't completely there.

Today, he went into school instead of ditching to spend extra time with her in between shifts at work and time spent with their friends. Since they can't exceed three consecutive absences without a doctor’s note and he doesn't own a printer or laptop to forage the header from a doctor's office, he had no choice but to part from her this morning.

He bites his lip to contain his smug facial expression at the recollection of her wake up call for him. The hand holding his locker door open for him to lean on in the midst of his not-so-wholesome thoughts of her squeezes the metal hard enough to turn his knuckles white.

The curtains weren't shut all the way when they fell asleep before midnight last night, allowing a shaft of sunlight to shine in and land on his face. But that wasn't what woke him up from the dream he was having. In fact, the reality he opened his eyes to was a hell of a lot better than any dream he remembered.

Most of his memory of those moments spent suspended between consciousness and unconsciousness consisted of feeling her pressing a kiss to his shoulder, then her hands rubbing up and down his waist to slip lower and lower until they settled on the waistband of his underwear. It was then that he woke to find her looking up at him for permission from where she peppered kisses along his chest.

Their eyes met right as she kissed the edge of his nipple with this pleading, needy look that he took pride in causing without actively attempting to. She woke up on the brink of coming undone from a pleasant—to put it tamely—dream about him. With a glimpse at the time displayed on the alarm clock, it didn't take much for her to roll over to wake him up.

It ended with her beneath the sheet, finishing what she started Friday afternoon until he was clutching the pillow beneath his head in the midst of his orgasm. It happened so fast, a fault of how hot he found it to wake up to her wanting him so badly, but it felt slower than it truly was in the early morning haze of exhaustion they felt.

The memory as he relives it is as heady as it felt the first time around. He sees it in fractions; her eyes looking up at his, warm palms finding the familiar planes of his muscular body with the exploratory touch of someone who's never traveled it before, and the intense sensations he felt at the end...It's easy for him to stand here and lose himself in it. Despite the class he has to go to, he bargains with himself for one more second spent in the paradise of his memories before he has to come back to reality.

Reality, as his shitty luck would have it, comes in the form of a familiar feminine voice chirping from behind his back as he replays his morning bliss.

"It's good to see you're alive and well, Maybank."

He decides, based on who he knows he'll see when he turns around, that he might invest in a sharpie to write "Bang head here" on the inside of his locker door for instances like these where he'd rather suffer brain damage than speak to someone he can't stomach the presence of.

When he turns to see Kacey with one arm still stretched to hold his locker open, he doesn't bother concealing the genuine reaction from his face for the sake of her feelings. Any care he had for her and her feelings was thrown to the wind as soon as she decided she could steal from and put her hands on his girl last week. However, after a second of thought, a condescending smirk finds its way to his face.

He says, jerking his chin to vaguely gesture at her bruised up face, "Purple really suits your complexion. It makes your eyes pop, don't you think?"

Though the swelling of her black eye has deflated in the days since the fight that’ll soon tally up to a week, the verbal jab hits right where it intended to if the light leaving her eyes tells him anything. She bounces back after a second, though, ever the relentless pest they've come to see her as.

She offers a sickeningly sweet, yet fake smile to mirror the one gracing his striking features and spins so her back meets the locker beside his, allowing herself to invade his space further.

A collection of Y/N's stickers decorates the inside of his locker door that he briefly entertained the idea of designating as a place to bang his head against. They range from girly, glittery ones to those he willingly picked when she gave him the choice. Whenever they're at his locker together, she sticks one on the inside, and the evidence of the habit catches Kacey's wandering eyes.

Her fingertips brush against the surface of the sticker-covered metal while she ignores his protest of, "Can you not touch my stuff?" to inspect them. Since one of the Pogues in particular is famous for her endless supply of stickers, her expression sours at the thought of the girl responsible for them.

She spares him a quick glance out of the corner of her eye as she continues to analyze the sticker collection against his instructions not to, asking, "Why weren't you at the bonfire?" A failed attempt at a seductive look in his direction makes him fight not to roll his eyes. "After how last year's ended, I thought you wouldn't miss it for the world."

JJ doesn't bother to take a second to think things through before he reaches to slam the door closed with her hand still outstretched inside of it. Watching her pull it away just in time to avoid jamming it in the locker probably pleases him more than it should, but he can't help it. His hand catches on the edge of the door, halting it in place right before it closes where her hand previously rested.

She doesn't look too happy with him when he opens the door with no harm done except for the drop of her stomach when he initially pretended to swing it shut on her bruised knuckles. She didn't get many shots in on Y/N when they fought, but apparently it was enough.

He doesn't bother with the fake niceties she's giving him after the disrespect she showed him, his friends, and, most importantly, his girlfriend. The fact that she thinks she has any right to breathe in his direction, let alone flirt with him, after she stole JB's bandana is criminal. 'Cause not only did she mess with Y/N, she messed with John B on multiple levels, and his loyalty to his best friend hasn't disappeared with death. Kie and Y/N told him everything she said about their departed friend in the locker room last Thursday.

But he's smart enough to know what'll hurt her more, so he doesn't go for the general scolding he imagined giving her in his head. Since he was told everything about the encounter in the locker room, he knows she's still holding their history together near and dear to her heart.

"We stayed home," he says, casual and cool as always, with added emphasis on the first word, "You know how it is, my girl doesn't like parties. Especially not ones with kooks."

Hook, line, and sinker.

She scoffs, "Your girl?"

Looking at her now, he wonders if she was always this stupid, or if this is a new development she's had in the year since he last spent more than a minute or two at a time with her. It’s easier to trick her than it was with Kie and Y/N a few days ago, and those poor girls flew into that trap like moths to a flame.

"That's what I said, isn't it?"

The ire is visible in the way her face tenses up in places, her lips pressing together a little more firmly and her forehead creasing between the brows.

"Doesn't your, um, history bother her?" she asks, and he's gotta give her credit for being a sneaky little shit when given the chance. The girl takes every possible opening she can to strike for a potential weakness. "No offense, but you kinda get around."

He shrugs this time, deciding to drop his casual act and aim straight for the jugular.

"She likes having someone who knows how to fuck her right, actually, but I really appreciate the concern."

Much like Kie's reaction to their matching tattoos in the hot tub the other night, her jaw is unhinged to meet the unswept hallway floor they stand on. It makes him wish Y/N weren't suspended in order for her to see the gobsmacked reaction Kacey has to the harsh dismissal. Though he wouldn't want to incite an extra round of the Kacey vs Y/N WWE showdown by having her watch another girl flirt with him and essentially call him a slut upon rejection, he knows she'd get a kick out of it.

This one's for you, baby, he thinks with a quiet laugh to himself and turns his focus to the sticker collection she so lovingly crafted.

There are plenty of summer themed ones left over from the same pack he gifted her for her birthday with the surfboard sticker she used to tease him, as well as a newer genre of Valentine's Day stickers she started using the closer they grew since first getting together. They're mostly different colored candy hearts with corny phrases ranging from "U SXY THING" to the classic "BE MINE" and one printed with "ANGEL" on it—his favorite by far.

However, others are random ones from her endless stash built up over the years from birthdays and holidays deemed worthy enough by her dad to stop by Dollar Tree for a new pack, so the one he sets his attention on is likely meant for teachers or coaches to give to their students. The opportunity appears too good to be true to him when it clicks, but it isn't.

He peels the sticker off of the locker door, careful not to disturb the ones around it, and leans in closer to her to place it on the front of her tank top.

"Leave us alone or I won't stop her next time," JJ says lowly, past the point of civility, then backs away to slam his locker shut for real this time as his voice raises back to a normal volume, "And keep John B's name out of your mouth, got it?"

All she can do is look down at the sticker placed on her shirt with squinted eyes to try and read it while he walks off in the direction of his next class. It tears away from the fabric with a soft noise, and when she finally reads it, she rolls her eyes.

“Good Try!”

​​Walking out of school to see the Twinkie parked in the usual spot Y/N takes when she isn't suspended is a delightful treat he didn't know to expect after a rough day in class and his run in with Kacey. His head was hung low on his way to Kie's car to hitch a ride to his house before going home to the Chateau, since he had some things to pick up with his dad out of the picture for the near future, but then he heard her greet them.

JJ's body melts into hers upon contact, and he nearly pushes her up against the closed passenger side door of the van with how hard he hugs her. Though he doesn't want to acknowledge it, his dad has been living in his thoughts more than usual today. Ever since he texted him goodbye, he's been withdrawn inside of his head more and more, and after today's inconveniences, the rising anxiety of his plan to visit home has him two seconds from losing his mind.

Her eyes widen at his zeal, meeting Kie's concerned gaze from over the shoulder she rests her chin on. She stands with her keys swinging around her finger as she watches the couple embrace one another. In an answer to the silent question Y/N asks her in their stare, her lips mouth the words, "His dad," to her.

Deep down, Y/N had a feeling.

It began with his impromptu request to run away with her a few days ago and extended into his uncharacteristically reserved attitude the next morning that receded somewhat, but has yet to fully disappear. There is a part of her that's upset that he hasn't come to her to talk about it, to communicate the way they swore they would, yet she also knows it isn't that simple.

She has to remind herself that she knew what she was getting herself into with him. That's not to say that dating her must be a walk in the park for him, it isn't.

She knows based on the amount of times he had to hold her as she cried, or the time he curtailed her panic attack in this very parking lot, that she hasn't made it easy for him in the aftermath of John B's death. But it's because she knows how it feels that she has such patience with his communication issues.

It's not a conscious choice most times, it's an involuntary blockage preventing the words from being spoken no matter how desperately they long to be. They may have made a promise, but she won't chastise him for succumbing to the same pitfalls as her. It’d be hypocritical.

"Bad day?" she asks.

Her voice is tender with him, prodding gently for a clue as to why he pounced on her on sight. He sinks further into her arms at the sound and lets the sanctity of her touch sway him into submission. Everything about her sets him at ease, if only for a second. Her hand lifts the beat-up red hat from his head to allow the other to brush through his hair.

There's a hum of agreement that she feels vibrating through the center of his chest into hers, and her arms pull tighter around his shoulders in response. This time, when she looks up to see Kie there, she's waving a quick goodbye and setting off toward her car, clearly giving JJ the space he needs.

"We can go to the beach," she says softly, "I have a towel in the back of the van, we can just lay there and talk about it if you want."

The idea of her kind offer to him should add to the comfort he finds in her embrace. It should make him nod and whisper his gratitude to her for being the one person that knows him better than anyone, but it brings him back to the gloomy headspace he was in before seeing her.

It started as a minor distraction when he first arrived at school after carpooling with Kie. It followed him in the quieter moments, only making appearances when he wasn't distracted with more pressing matters. It began as that and built the closer the day came to ending. The sooner his inevitable visit back to his childhood home came, the more he lost himself in his fear, reverting back to a state of helplessness he now occupies with no small amount of shame.

His bottom lip trembles with the urge to cry.

"Can we stop somewhere on the way home first?"

The last place she expected him to drive the Twinkie is here.

As they made their way down each street, taking each turn necessary to bring them closer to the house he seldom let her go to over the course of their lifelong friendship, she felt her heart begin to race. And now, as the van rolls to a stop in the yard in front of his house, she has swallow back the lump in her throat at the sight of it.

She has only been here a few times.

The first time, she was seven years old.

It was a sweltering summer morning in the Outer Banks for her and John B as they set off to retrieve their friend after he missed their plans to meet up at the Chateau for a day of having fun, riding bikes, and playing on the boat. Pirates and Princesses was her favorite game to play with them because JJ would switch roles with her halfway through when she grew tired of being the damsel John B had to rescue from the most cruel and vicious Captain Jesse James Maybank.

The HMS Pogue would rock beneath his feet as he marched across the deck of the boat and took her place as the kidnapped Princess Routledge. He handed off his "sword" to her, a stick he found in the yard, and stood at the edge of the boat with his hands behind his back as though he were a tied up damsel in distress for her to hold captive. The sun setting behind them laid a picturesque backdrop that made the scene all the more vivid to their imaginative young minds.

The boat floated in the afternoon current as John B approached the pair with his best pretend face of worry for the fair Princess Maybank, who had the sharp sword of the pirate queen pressing into his throat with the threat of death should he have tried to escape.

Sometimes, she'd let John B advance on them and tie make believe rope around her wrists and ankles while he and Princess Maybank claimed their victory. Other times, they'd get backed up until the heels of her sneakers hung off the edge of the slippery deck. One move from her brother would have her yell something along the lines of not taking either of them alive, then she'd let her and JJ fall back into the marsh together with gleeful laughs infiltrating the humid air upon their return to the surface.

On the day he didn't show up, none of that happened. She and John B rode their bikes together along sidewalks until they pulled into a driveway marked with the address number he remembered from the other time he sought him out to play before.

Y/N didn't understand what they were hearing when they pushed their kickstands down and called out for their friend, but John B's little face blanched at the sound flooding out of the opened windows of the dilapidated yellow house. It was a combination of banging against the walls, glass shattering, and childlike shouts of frustration and pain. Her big brother placed himself in front of her protectively when the front door opened and smacked against the side of the house, but it wasn't his dad storming out of the house, it was JJ.

His eyes widened at the sight of the siblings standing there, and his heart dropped to his stomach at the realization that they heard it. Maybe not all of it, but based on how the girl peeking out around John B's shoulder looked at him, they heard some.

The van is parked in the exact same place their bikes once were, the exact place she and John B stood years ago when they were first confronted with the harsh reality about their best friend's home life, and he looks like he has fully backpedaled into the state of mind his childhood self inhabited. Even when he turns the key in the ignition and lets the rumbling engine sputter down in silence, he sits in the driver's seat with his lip drawn between his teeth in thought.

Yet as soon as she summons the courage to say something, he takes a deep breath and opens the door without a warning or the typical instruction for her to stay in the car. He doesn't tell her to follow him in, nor does he order her to stay out as he used to when his dad still lived inside. He gives her the choice to make on her own, and, when faced with the opportunity to support him or stay outside like the confused little girl she once was, she chooses the first option.

Her swift steps kick dirt up from the earth onto her ankles as she follows him out of the van to the front steps of the house. She tries not to make her concern for him as evident as it'd be without her intervention on her way up the porch, but it's impossible to erase every sign of it from her face.

It isn't a particularly special or scary house. It's a normal home that'd likely look more inviting if JJ were still living here to mow the lawn and tend to the household upkeep his father saddled him with since he was old enough to be put to work. But she knows better than to trust the street appeal. As he takes her hand to lead them through the threshold of the haunted structure, she is overcome with a sense of creeping trepidation that she can't shake.

"You're sure he isn't here?" she asks.

The entryway is crowded with stacks of mail his father wasn’t bothered to open, as well as empty cardboard boxes that once held cans of beer that are scattered, empty, in various places around the house. Her question is answered by the state of the rooms they breeze past in the direction of his bedroom, but she needed something to say to fill the silence. With them, they usually don’t feel uncomfortable not speaking to each other, but this feels different.

The way he stares out in front of him with his hand squeezing hers hard enough to cut off circulation unnerves her more than the tainted energy of the house itself. He isn't himself. He's a shell of the JJ they know and love, the JJ who is most comfortable tucked away in the safe walls of the Chateau with their friends, not here. If anything, how he is while he's here is the antithesis of his behavior while living with her.

Ever since John B died, he's practically moved in with her. When they're hidden away in her house without the reminders of his home life in sight, he's usually the caretaker of the relationship. It comes naturally to their dynamic, both with him being slightly older and his promise to take care of her, but everything is flipped here. It's an alternate reality for him, or, perhaps, actual reality smacking him in the face after a carefully constructed two months in utopia with her.

They come to a stop in front of his closed bedroom door.

"He's gone," he says, not even sparing a glance at her for reasons she can't decipher, "He texted me a few days ago to say goodbye."

With that, he turns the doorknob and lets the door swing open to reveal the bedroom she only saw one other time.

The second time, she was thirteen years old.

It was a Friday.

Since his dad was supposed to be at work, they stopped at his house on their way home from school exactly like they did today so he could share with their friends what he got from his cousin the night before. Being the good girl she was, she didn't even know what he was showing her when he dug it out of the backpack in the bottom of his closet.

Her brows furrowed at the ziploc bag, more specifically the contents inside of it. She was knelt down on the floor in front of the opened closet door with her shoulder pressed up against his to inspect it. The dried green cluster of a plant didn't look like anything she'd seen before, and she couldn't help but ask him what the hell it was rather than react the way he knew the others would.

"What is it? It looks like dried up moss."

JJ laughed and pulled another bag with rolling papers and a grinder stowed inside.

"It's weed. My cousin Ricky gave me a discount since—"

He halted mid-sentence abruptly enough to startle her, his head turning in the direction of where he heard a trunk pulling up to the front of the house. Her stare was still set on where he was holding the plastic bags in his hands, and she noticed, after he stopped speaking in reaction to his dad coming home, that his hands began trembling. It was so minimal, she almost didn't catch it until she saw the bag wavering under the light coming in from his window.

Before she could open her mouth to say anything more, she felt his hands on her shoulders shoving her into the closet. He followed in closely behind her and crawled in until they were both crammed into the confined space together. With the closet doors shut in front of them, he clamped a hand over her mouth, whispering in her ear for her to be quiet.

She stands with her arms crossed over herself in the center of his room, and though nothing has yet to be said or done to convince her anything is wrong, that's the exact reason why she feels so unnerved by the entire experience of coming here.

He's silent.

The closet doors are wide open as he stuffs the rest of the clothes he had yet to bring to the Chateau into the biggest bag he could find. He rips through his belongings in a fit of melancholy driven anger. His thoughts are swirling with similar memories to the ones she conjures from being here again, but his are tinged with a darkness hers don't have, even with hearing him crying in pain as a child and hiding in the closet with his hand smothering her mouth to evade his dad.

JJ visibly grimaces at the memories he's forced to relive in flashes with every glimpse he gets of the room he spent so much time hiding in. It used to be more tolerable to be here, or at least easier to suffer through. At least he was used to it before, but he got so accustomed to life somewhere else that the second he was confronted with coming back, he started to fall apart.

Whatever he can't live without, he finds space for it in the bag and prepares to leave the rest behind. But every object he touches and step he takes around the room brings him back to the person who he spent his adolescence simultaneously fleeing and wanting more from. More notably, it brings him back to the train of thought that has been nagging him ever since he texted him over the weekend.

The third and final time she came here was over the summer.

It happened right before Hurricane Agatha waged war on the island, when none of the Pogues heard from JJ for two days after he said he had to go home to help his dad with something. She didn't want to track him down to his house after they went over twenty-four hours without a single message. She didn't want to have to go back to the house that gave her chills to think about, let alone go to again after they hid in his closet when they were younger, but he gave her no other choice.

What was she supposed to do except go check on him where he last said he'd be? After all, if she lived in the hazardous environment he did, he'd do the exact same for her. If their friends were involved in her thoughts at the time, they would've gone out on a limb to say he would've gone beyond what she did to protect her if the situation were flipped. If he knew someone was hurting her, he would've come in swinging first and asked questions later, but, in her defense, he strictly told her to never come back to his house. By walking over in the first place, she was breaking one of the fundamental rules of their friendship.

Nevertheless, she found herself crouching around the side of his house to find his bedroom window and check if he was in there. Kie and Pope weren't aware of what was happening with his dad yet, but she and John B accidentally found out years ago, so she wasn't wondering why he wasn't answering them, she was wondering if he was alive.

Part of her truly thought underneath it all that Luke might've killed him. He might've been too drunk or high and went too far when beating him, too far to the point where he didn't want to risk going to jail to take him to the hospital for help. She couldn't live with herself if she didn't check, and if he got pissed at her for showing up against his wishes and didn't want to speak to her ever again, she could live with that.

She knocked on his window in a cadenced beat loud enough for it to heard through the room but not any further. After the first series of knocks, no one came to the window. It ripped her heart to pieces to wonder if she'd see him again as she continued to knock and allowed the sound to increase in volume in hopes that maybe he was asleep, but it didn't bring anyone to the window.

It wasn't until she turned back around to go to the front of the house again that she bumped right into the solid wall of his chest and was pushed back up against the house. The question of what she was doing there was on the tip of his tongue, but she said something that stopped him from asking it.

Her arms were thrown around his shoulders in a desperate bear hug.

"Oh God, JJ, you scared me half to death!" she cried into the front of his shirt, "I thought he killed you!"

He can't help but think of it as he packs his belongings away for a final time to bid his hellish childhood home goodbye: What kind of life are they going to have together if they can't get off this island? Running away may have been an idealistic drunken fantasy for him to entertain after his conversation with Pope got him to admit his true feelings for her, but they both know his consistency can't be trusted.

One moment, he's planning to tell her. The next, a day like today comes along, sweeps his legs out from beneath his body, and he's questioning whether it's worth it to force her to put up with his fickle commitment to her. It isn't fair to her, is it?

Right now is just about when he'd normally start to hyperventilate with an oncoming wave of panic, and he does, but he can't let it fully sweep into him with her here. He fights the urge to smack his head with the heel of his palm, as if that'd forcibly remove the poisonous thoughts infiltrating his mind and ruining the careful work they've done together to remedy their issues with communicating their feelings.

Just like you ruin everything, a thought whispers in the corner of his mind. What made you think this would be any different?

His actions around the room have turned somewhat aimless and distracted, which she notices as soon as he starts to disintegrate into a mess of heavy breaths and self-sabotaging thoughts. She picks up on the shift in his energy as soon as the anxiety starts to wash over him, and she'll be damned if she continues to stand here quietly to let it happen.

It's one thing if he's being silent because being here upsets him, or if he simply doesn't know what to say, but she refuses to let him tailspin into a mental breakdown without doing something to stop it. Whether he knows it or not, after what they went through with him trying to push her away last week, she knows what's occurring within his mind right now.

He flinches at the feeling of her hand grabbing his shoulder to turn him to face her at first, and when she reaches again with her other hand to try to hold his hand as he cries, he shrugs off her touch.

"JJ..." she lets the solemn sound of her own voice murmuring his name trail off, "it's just me."

His head shakes at her consoling words. Everything else inside of his mind is so earth-shatteringly loud, he can't drown it out with logic or reason to bring himself away from the memories of his dad. Those intrusive thoughts keep attacking him with doubled, then tripled force the harder he tries to resist them, and he's so exhausted from it. All of it—the memories, his dad going to jail, and his inability to accept her love to its fullest extent without convincing himself she'll abandon him—is exhausting.

This time, when she rests her hand on his shoulder, he swats it away as the frustration of today crushing him with the force of an avalanche. Not to hurt or scare her, but to get her hands off of him before he bursts out of his skin with the sickness it stirs in his stomach. So detached from himself, he anticipates pain from every touch she gives him, and he knows it hurts her.

JJ hardly recognizes his own voice as he backs away from her a step and says, "Don't."

He can tell it hurts her based on how she looks at him immediately after, but he can't handle being touched right now. How did this happen so quickly? It was overwhelming when they first parked outside, but as soon as he stepped foot inside, it was as if a switch was flipped inside of him and all of the buried feelings he kept hidden over the past two weeks exploded into this.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to—"

"You need to leave. I just-I can't breathe and"—He still refuses to look up from the ground or see her face as he paces around the room with no real intent in mind—"You can't see me like this."

That is what breaks her out of her soft spoken, timid attitude to handle the situation the way it needs to be handled. Their natural dynamic worked best for him to take charge when she had her panic attack because JJ acts first and thinks later. He saw that she was in distress and jumped in to help her before things got worse rather than allowing her to keep him at an arms length where he couldn't do anything about it.

Taking a page from his rule book, she takes action.

The room surrounding them is in a state of disarray from him searching through it for the items of clothing and objects now stashed in his duffel bag. There are multiple obstacles in her way as she steps between them like navigating a minefield to reach him after he backed away in instinctual fear, but they don't stop her from reaching him. Nothing could.

Y/N walks right up to him and reaches to grasp his face between her hands, forcing him to stop pacing around and actually look at her for the first time since they arrived her so he hears what she says. To say the least, the way he looks right now is enough to make her cry. There are tears welled up to the brims of his blue eyes, his lips are downturned with his sobs, and he's staring at her like she's about to strike him.

She says it as slowly and clearly as she needs to get it through his head, "He's not here," and before he manages to squeeze out another word of doubt between his rapid inhalations, she cuts in, "Take deep breaths."

He isn't listening to her.

The movement of his chest that hits hers from how close they stand to each other has yet to settle into the familiar pace she remembers from nights of falling asleep with the rhythm of his breaths beneath her head.

Her eyes search his face frantically, from left to right and top to bottom, for any sign of the person she's known for years, but she doesn't see him. Instead, she sees the same panicked child her and John B saw the first time they visited this house. It's uncanny how similar the expression in his face is. It feels to her as if she's been hurled back in time to the moment itself, and when she tries to think about what would've worked with him back then, she doesn't know what else to do except help him escape.

So, with the helplessness of having to watch him turn into a sobbing, incoherent mess, she decides to step into the darkness with him and do what seven year old Y/N would've done. Just like their games of make believe, of pirates and princesses, she assumes the role John B would have and rescues him from what holds him captive. It’s his own mind in this case, but, in the physical sense, it's the house.

She drops her hands from his face and takes his hand in hers to drag him out of the room. The packed bag sits on the floor in their wake as she pulls him back through the bedroom door and into the living room, not caring about what they came here to do.

It doesn't matter anymore.

The various rooms of his dad's house pass by them in a blur as she leads him down the hallway to the front door with one sole objective in mind: get him out of here. If he wants his stuff to bring back to the Chateau, she'll go back inside and get whatever he needs her to, but she isn't letting him inside of this house again. Not under her watch.

Thankfully, since he is undeniably stronger than her and she wouldn't have stood a chance, he doesn't fight it. He stumbles after her guiding hand the same way he always has, just like how he followed her back to the Chateau after she and John B saw him that day when they were kids. She led the way as he sat on the handlebars of her brother's bike, and he watched her hair flutter in the wind with the momentum of their bicycle spokes until the tears dried up.

He watches her drag him out of the home until they've reached the safety of the yard at the bottom of the porch steps, and as soon as the soles of her shoes meet the dirt, she feels his hand slipping out of hers.

"JJ?"

She turns around to see him clutching his chest, rubbing his hand along the front of his shirt over his heart as though it'll loosen up the tightened muscles preventing him from catching his breath. His body weight is leaned onto the railing of the porch steps for support. He's partially slumped on it, looking at her desperately, like she somehow knows the answer to every question screamed inside of his head, and she has never felt as useless.

"You're gonna leave," JJ says through the gasps and cries that leave his cheeks stained with tears.

When she reaches out again to help him remain upright without leaning over the railing, he doesn't shove her hands away as he did inside of his bedroom. It's a small battle won, but she takes it as a win nonetheless.

"What are you saying? I'm right here, I'm not going anywhere—"

"You're gonna leave! Everybody does! My mom, John B, my dad, and you"—his head falls to look at the ground instead of her, and she watches him work through it in his head—"I mean, look at me. You don't want this."

"Don't tell me what I want," she says.

Her voice remains as steady and calm as she can force it to be amidst the turbulent situation, but the way he said it...It takes her right back to sitting in the back of the Twinkie with him at the Cherry Bowl, except it's ten times worse. That felt like a break up, but based on what he's saying, this is one. She hasn't prepared herself for the heartache she feels in response to it.

"You don't want me, you just think you do 'cause I was there after John B died, but you don't. You're gonna go off, find some perfect guy that isn't as fucked up as me, and have a great life somewhere else, but it ain't here," JJ says, his breathing evening out with the distraction of the argument to keep him tethered tor reality, "And it won't be with me."

He can see it every time he's looked at her and debated saying those three titular words that have been floating around in his head since he first met her.

How could she want someone who can't walk into his childhood bedroom without breaking down, or someone who still has years-old scars from cigarette burns on his skin when she touches him? Her bright future contrasted with his pre-designated fate on the Cut, her personality better matched with someone more similar to her, her life continuing on whether he's there or not—it's his worst nightmare, but he's prepared to see it through.

What he doesn't expect is for her to hold her ground.

"You honestly think I'm buying into that bullshit?" she asks.

"What?"

She doesn't put it softly, she states facts with as much harshness as his cruel fantasy had, "You're trying to push me away and I won't let you."

Her typically sweet, soft features have hardened into a bitter expression he's sure he mirrors. The arms holding his waist to keep him upright move to climb up his chest and cup his face between her hands with all of the gentleness her face and voice don't have right now.

She sees right through him.

When he tries to look away again, to avert his eyes to make what he's trying to do easier on himself by not having to look at her when he does it, her grasp on his face holds firm. Her hands guide his chin back up so they're face to face, and he realizes what a mistake everyone makes in assuming her this dainty, broken girl whose only source of strength came from the brother she lost. She's a forest fire.

"You're not hearing what I'm saying—"

Y/N interjects, "I am hearing what you're saying, I'm just saying it's bullshit."

She refuses to let him off the hook, and though it frustrates him on the surface, deep down, it makes him fall in love with her all over again. Her insistence against his speech about her leaving him proves him wrong more than anything else could, 'cause he gave her the perfect chance to dip and she shot it down instantly.

The house looms behind them as a menacing presence that threatens to take control of him again, but she doesn't let it. She keeps his eyes on her no matter how many times he tries to look away and doesn't let anything get in the way of what she says next.

"You think that if you push me away and get me to leave you right now, it'll hurt less than it would if I did it later, and I don't accept that. I won't take the bait and let you torture yourself anymore, okay? I can't speak for anyone else, but I know I'll never leave you. Not willingly, anyway."

She looks into his eyes, and this time its softer, more loving, and he's never felt as understood as he does when she continues to speak.

"I'm in love with you. Whether it scares you or not, it's the truth, and I'll never stop saying it. If you think that your issues with your dad are gonna change that for me, you've officially lost your mind." Their noses brush as she leans in to ghost a kiss over his mouth and pulls away a second later to whisper, her forehead pressed to his, "I love you, JJ. Stop being so stubborn and just let me."

His next breath in trembles as he lets her words sink in, and he's stuck at a crossroads inside of himself without a clue of what to do.

The breeze blows her hair away from her face, the afternoon sunshine painting her golden, and when he sees her hair flutter in the air like it did so many years ago, he can't help but feel as calm as he did during their bike ride home. The further away he got from his dad and the house where it all happened, the calmer he grew, and it hits him at this moment that he's so taken aback by her confession to him, he forgot why he was so upset.

It's sobering. The intoxication of his panic hurtled him back in time to the frightened, childlike state of mind his dad's violent abuse often sent him to, but it was hearing her say those words he's feared for weeks that brought him back. Like the jolt of a defibrillator, he's roused back to life with more clarity than before.

She loves him, but, perhaps more importantly, she said she'd never leave him, and that is what he needed to hear more than anything. That is the statement worth more to him than the four letter word he has agonized over endlessly. No one else every attached the promise of "I love you" with the stipulation of it lasting forever. They said the empty words and contradicted it with their actions, but she hasn't done that. Her actions spoke the words long before her mouth did.

He sighs.

It's a deep, yearning sigh that sends him melting into her with the acceptance of what he's denied for too long. He savors the hands cradling his head, as well as the body pressed up against his that he has memorized down to every beauty mark and imperfection, and makes the right choice.

It isn't like it was the night at the Cherry Bowl, or the night he spoke to Pope about it. It still takes more bravery than he possesses to form the words, but there isn't a physical incapability stopping him anymore. It's just him against the trauma beckoning him into its trap again, and he won't let it lure him back into that house.

"Alright," JJ says to her through a sniffle in acceptance to her command, as if he were agreeing on afternoon surfing plans rather than something as monumental as allowing someone to love him, then continues onto with a timid tone, "I love you too."

Before he can watch for her reaction, she's surging forward through the few inches of space left between them to connect their lips in a kiss.

It's vastly different to the kiss they shared in the hallway at school last Friday. In contrast to that one, the reigning emotion within him that drives the kiss after the hesitant beginning doesn't lead them into increased intensity, it gets gentler. It doesn't explode into chaos and passion, it's a tired kiss that he never wants to retreat from. It's the physical manifestation of his feelings for her underneath the guarded exterior he uses to protect himself: gentle and yielding, yet undeniably powerful.

He feels her smiling through her tears against his mouth. In the face of everything that happened this afternoon, he doesn't feel like he should be smiling back at her, but he does. He smiles while kissing her with tears streaming down his face, still reeling from his traumatic response to coming home for the final time, and wonders how a person can feel such contradicting emotions all at once.

Y/N is the one who starts to pull away first, though it's only to check in on him. If she had it her way, she could stay here with him until the sun sets, but he did just come back from the brink of a full-blown panic attack, so she can't in good conscience ignore his well-being for the momentary bliss of their love confessions.

Her thumb brushes over his bottom lip, her smile drooping with worry as she asks, "Wanna spend the rest of the day on the boat? You always say being on the water makes you feel better. Maybe it'll make it easier to talk about it."

His Adam's apple bobs with how he swallows the lump in his throat.

"Can we maybe take baby steps for now? I don't think I can handle telling you all that shit yet."

It was already enough to allow her to follow him into the house, watch him break down into a fit of panic no one else has seen him in, and tell her he loved her, but it'd cross the line into uncharted territory to talk about everything between him and his dad so openly. Between the minor annoyance of dealing with Kacey to this hellish visit home, he thinks he's reached his quota on feeling uncomfortable today.

She nods in agreement.

"Baby steps."

Drawn back to each other by a force stronger than gravity, they collide again, but it isn't a kiss this time. It's a hug charged with all of the previously unspoken emotions they've buried inside of themselves for years, the same hug she gave him the last time she came to this house with the fear of his potential death lingering in her thoughts.

She throws herself at him with the same desperation she did that day and relishes the feeling of his muscular arms returning the embrace until their bodies are tangled together. She'd usually never refer to something as inherently affectionate as an embrace as violent, but it's the closest she can come to capturing how it feels as their bodies meet. It makes her lose her footing on the bottom step they stand on together, teetering on the edge she'd surely slip off of with the force if not for him keeping her steady.

He's about to say something, a thank you to her for calling him out on his bullshit and not letting him go that easily, when the grating sound of her ringtone blares from the back pocket of her denim shorts.

The contact popping up on the screen along with a series of frantic messages when she pulls away from him to answer shows Pope's name.

Pope You and JJ need to get back to the Chateau ASAP!!

The van doors slam shut behind Y/N and JJ as soon as it rolls to a stop in front of the Chateau.

Under the assumption that something dire happened, as in injury or death or catastrophic damage to the house itself, they bolted off of that porch faster than they knew they could move. She only turned back when she remembered the packed back of JJ's things they abandoned on his bedroom floor and, not wanting him to reenter the house, she brought it back to the Twinkie in record time.

They're preparing to trample up the porch into the house like a stampede of animals when they hear Kie calling them over to the backyard and change direction.

"No one's hurt!" she shouts, knowing that was likely where their minds went after everything they went through during the summer, "You have to see this though, I don't know who did it!"

Sticks and fallen leaves crunch beneath her feet on her way around the side of the house. Her mind races with the possibility of what could've happened that didn't hurt their friends but necessitated a series of texts and calls as frantic as the ones she received at JJ's house. She drove over here in defiance of the speed limit, something she rarely does, and prayed nothing terrible was happening.

It gave her flashbacks to when she found out John B and Sarah died in the storm. The pedal beneath her foot brought the van to an uncomfortably swift speed, then she remembered the sound of Shoupe's voice when he gave them the news. JJ warned her to slow down, then she remembered how it took multiple people to help her restrain him from attacking the new sheriff for letting his men drive their friends into their deaths.

At first, she doesn't realize what's wrong.

Kiara and Pope are standing and waiting for them across the grass near the large tree that sits as a centerpiece to their yard. Based on the body language screaming their frustration and the tears in their eyes, she can tell something bad did happen, but it's not clear what it is until she looks past them to the tree. More specifically, until she looks at what's on the tree.

"Oh my god," she whispers to herself.

Her hand is already up to cover her mouth and conceal the instantaneous frown besmirching her previously relaxed face. They both are stopped in their tracks halfway to where their friends are standing, and she can’t hear JJ's reaction over the rising volume of her hysterical thoughts.

Spray painted in red on top of their memorial for John B are the words "COP KILLER" in bold letters that conceal what they burned into the tree trunk for his gravestone. It sticks out from the beauty of the greens, browns, blues, and swathes of other earthy tones composing the scenery around the Chateau like a thorn amongst flowers, so much so that she wonders how she didn't instantly see it when they rounded the corner to come back here.

Yet that isn't the only thing amiss in the peaceful sanctuary they call home, there are random things strewn around the ground around the tree. An old t-shirt spray painted with the word "murderer" on the front, four ripped up envelopes, and a gorgeous mahogany jewelry box...broken on the grass.

The freshly turned dirt they had the contents of the box buried beneath is scattered around the trashed area as well. It clicks with her a few seconds late that whoever came here to do this must have seen the pinwheel she put in the ground to mark the "grave" and dug it up to add insult to injury.

She moves forward without consciously realizing it and stumbles until she reaches the first object of the debris field. Before this, she was doing a masterful job of holding in her cries, but as soon as she crouches down to pick up the pieces of the jewelry box, the lid snapped clean off the hinges to separate it from the bottom section, it comes rushing out of her against her will. The first unrestrained keen is the first thing to snap JJ out of his shell shocked trance.

He walks after her as fast as his legs will take him without breaking into a run, but she isn't letting him get close before she puts the box back down and shuffles forward to collect the torn letter remains. She doesn't want them to get blown away by the wind anymore than they already might have been, so she scrambles to gather the pieces until they're cupped in her hands to protect them.

"Why?" she asks and looks up at Kie and Pope with tears dripping down her face, "Why would anyone do this? Who would do this?"

Pope says, "My guess is as good as yours. We didn't see anyone leaving when we got here, so it must've happened before school ended. This is all we saw before we called you guys."

For a second or two, JJ is grasping at straws for why this happened and who did it like the rest of them are, but then something Pope said makes it click into place. It sets off a domino effect in his mind as he brings back the memory of a certain offspring of satan being absent from gym this afternoon despite being at school earlier, since his encounter with her before Physics made him, unfortunately, aware of her existence again.

His face is set in anger, jaw clenching with the tension of him grinding his teeth together, and he takes his hat off to fidget with it between his hands for a second. Their friends are too focused on her crying to see him contemplating it, but as soon as he speaks, they look up to see him setting his hat back onto his head in preparation to leave and track Kacey down.

Y/N's head snaps up from the torn letters in her hands to the sight of him storming off across the yard with his only goodbye being the words, "I'm gonna kill that bitch."

Her and Pope stare after him in shock, unable to put the pieces together about who that "bitch" is, but Kie doesn't miss a single beat. While Y/N is crumpled over on the ground in tears, she's rushing after JJ before he can approach the bike parked in front of the house. He doesn't even make it five steps before he feels her hands latching onto his wrist to stop him.

She asks, "Who the hell are you talking about? And why would they do this?"

His eyes narrow at her. His unreleased frustration for the situation in general and having to watch Y/N cry after an emotional afternoon together comes rushing out when he snaps at her.

"Kacey. She talked shit at school and I put her in her place. Now, if you don't mind, I'm gonna pay her a little visit."

He yanks his arm sharply towards himself to free it from her grip, but she's a step ahead of him. Quicker than he can think to stop her, Kie swipes the keys hanging out of his back pocket away and throws them to Pope, who, bless his heart, can't catch to save his life. The key ring jingles with its contact at the dead center of his chest, and she mouths an apology to him before turning back to face JJ.

"What the fuck, Kie?"

He makes to stomp past her and retrieve the keys from Pope only to be stopped by her hands reaching out to grab his shoulders.

"Listen to me, you can't go anywhere. Look at her," she whispers lowly enough to keep Y/N from hearing, pointing behind her to where she sits on the ground with Pope knelt beside her, "I wouldn't put it past Kacey to pull a stunt like this. I'm just as mad as you, but revenge can wait and you know it. She needs you."

The fury visible in his expression is subdued by looking past Kie's shoulder to see Y/N crying softly to Pope about the vandalized memorial.

The last time he saw her so distraught over something, it was the day they made the memorial and buried the box in the first place. She sits on her knees with her mom's broken jewelry box between them, shuddering with the sobs she has no control over, and pours the torn paper into the empty bottom half of the box. Exhausted to the core, she looks more like a sullen, kicked puppy than she does herself.

It makes his anger-fueled instincts that urge him to hunt Kacey down and do something, anything he can to make her feel the pain they do right now bubble down into sorrow. It's visible in his eyes when he looks at her.

Kie knows she's gotten under his skin when he sighs, sparing a parting glance to the bike in the driveway, and nods once at her before setting off back to where they're sitting in the grass.

Meanwhile, Y/N is stuck staring down at the disarray of her backyard with nothing but pain aching through her to the bone.

Her brother did wrong things sometimes as a consequence of being human, but never this, never something worthy of having his name dragged through the mud and being branded a murderer after his death. He stole scuba gear from Ward and broke dozens of laws in their hunt for the gold, but he never crossed that line into moral bankruptcy. Rafe did, and it kills JJ to see someone like Kacey do this to his best friend while hanging off of Rafe and his friends like a leech.

The fabric of his worn t-shirt is tarnished by the dried paint clinging to the front of it to the spell the lie written there, and her vision blurs with tears for what feels like the millionth time in the span of an hour. First, it was JJ. Now, it's John B, and she can't help but wonder if the heartache will ever end. It began to feel better over the course of the week, her grief for him slowly beginning to slip from her mind until now. Until the storm clouds converged again to batter her with another wave of it.

Through the deafening volume of her mind racing with thoughts and feelings to process what's happened, she hears Pope shuffling around to stand on his feet. Then, another person sits down in his place and scoots closer until their bodies are touching, and she knows it's him. She doesn't have to wait to hear his voice or look to see his face, she can tell based on the feeling of his touch and the smell of him she's so intimately familiar with, yet couldn't describe it aloud if she tried.

He doesn't smother her. He sits close enough to touch her and doesn't push it any further.

The background of the pale, cloudless sky frames him in the foreground like the subject of a painting—a living, breathing painting that she could study endlessly. The other trees planted in the yard's leaves flutter distantly behind him and try to draw her gaze away, but she keeps her eyes on him.

Maybe that's how it is, she thinks.

Maybe it'll get better and worse in a dance that'll only stop when they're no longer here to agonize over it. Maybe this is what moving on from John B will always be like. It'll feel like they've made strides in the right direction, then something will come along to shatter it to sharp pieces that'll reopen their stitched up wounds. If that's the case, at least the four of them have each other to lean on when it gets worse again.

JJ sits with her and lets her crawl onto his lap, resting her head on his shoulder, until the sun sinks below the horizon.

The gentle bobbing of the HMS Pogue at the surface of the water steadies her amidst her eddying thoughts. It keeps her present to the moment the way the ropes tying the boat to the dock keeps it from floating adrift into the marsh. It's a motion engrained in her from the start of her life until now from countless days spent on the water. Whether it be for fishing, swimming, or playing make believe with her boys all those years ago, it's as much a part of her as her personality or body itself.

JJ was right about one thing: being out on the water makes it easier to think.

He hasn't followed her out since she woke up before sunrise and snuck out of bed to come here. Despite her efforts not to wake him, he woke up when she disentangled her body from his, silently cursing the fact that they always cuddle so closely, and he tried to pull her back to him with a whine of displeasure in his groggy, half-asleep state. Sleep finally found them after hours of staying up together to talk about what Kacey did, unable to relax from the chaos of yesterday, so he wasn't prepared to wake up that soon.

"Go back to sleep, angel," she whispered as she hovered over him, brushing a chaste kiss to his lips that he was too tired to return.

That was the last time she saw him since this morning, and now that the sun has risen to its peak in the sky without her moving an inch from her perch atop the bow of the boat, she's begun to wonder if he's awake yet. It isn't uncommon for them to sleep in for half of the day when there isn't school or work, so it isn't surprising to her that he's just now waking up when she hears the back door to the Chateau opening and closing.

Unbeknownst to her, JJ has been awake the entire morning since she left bed.

They were so attached to each other yesterday night, he didn't have the time to put it together without her seeing and ruining the surprise, but once he heard the door to the porch close to signify her leaving, he kicked the blankets off of himself and got to work. He wasn't originally planning on starting so early, since they stayed up late into the night together, but once he woke up to the feeling of her sneaking out of his arms, he was too awake to fall back asleep.

The sound of his footsteps on the dock warns her of his approach, but she doesn't raise her head from where she rests it in her palms to stare out at the water.

"I was wondering when you'd finally wake up," she says.

There's another few steps, then the boat jostles with his weight stepping onto it.

He doesn't say anything to her in response. The only clue she gets as to what he's doing are the footsteps on the deck that lead closer to her until she feels him sitting down on the bow next to where she is. And she's about to open her mouth to ask if he's okay when he sets something down in front of her.

It's a shoe box.

Y/N turns to see him, eyes flickering over his tired face, and looks back at the box with furrowed brows.

"What is this?"

His hair is messy, exactly how it was when she left him in bed this morning, and if she weren't more focused on the mysterious box he plopped down in front of her, she'd be combing through it with her fingers. He's gotten used to those casual displays of affection from her; how she runs her hands through his hair on mornings before school when he forgets to brush it, or when she fixes a button on his flannel that he missed.

JJ's lips are tipped in a smile, and she can't help but blush with how he looks at her. She never used to see it, but he has always looked at her like this. Like he's hopelessly, utterly in love with her. Even before they lost John B, back when he'd expend all of his romantic and sexual attention on girls he hardly knew, he still looked at her this way.

He gestures at it and says, "Open it."

The lid of the box is coated in a freshly dried layer of blue paint to match the shade of the sky overhead. She knows instantly that he must have dug through the arts and crafts box she specifically labeled with a warning for him and John B to stay out. It's painted with aimlessly sloppy brushstrokes and stickers placed at every corner of the cardboard box, all of which she recognizes from the stash she kept under her bed alongside the India ink he borrowed last Friday.

As she gives him a skeptical look and reaches to lift the lid off of the shoe box, she makes a mental note to rewrite the label on the arts and crafts box without the warning for him to keep out. Since John B isn't here to steal anything from it and JJ never follows that rule anyway, it's redundant at this point.

Any skepticism is washed away from her face as soon as she flips the lid open to reveal what's inside. It leaves her speechless as she looks down at it all.

"JJ..." she murmurs in awe.

Sitting at the bottom of it is a folded up t-shirt she saw JJ wear multiple times, but never again since John B died. He refused to glance at the shirt his best friend gave him the year before they never saw him again, let alone dig it out of the corner of her closet where he keeps his things...until now.

But that's a scratch on the surface of all of the things about his gift that stuns her to silence. The next thing to catch her immediate attention is a picture she hasn't seen in years.

It's one that Big John took of the three of them together right where she and JJ are sitting. She was much younger in it, flashing a toothy grin with her arms thrown over both boys' shoulders. To her left, John B was leaning his head on her shoulder. To her right, JJ was wearing an eyepatch they crafted out of an old black shirt he stole from his dad. It was cut with the kitchen scissors and tied around the back of his head in a knot.

She brushes her thumb over John B's face, then sets the crinkled photograph back down atop the folded shirt and moves her attention to the last surprise.

Letters.

Torn up pieces of paper painstakingly taped back together sit one on top of the other, some missing pieces here or there, and it makes her mouth part in shock. Her hands shuffle the letters apart to see each one and recognize the handwriting: Kie's bubbly, swirling letters, Pope's neat cursive, hers, and JJ's chicken scratch writing that she's able to decipher from years of proofreading his essays.

She pictures him at her desk all morning while she was sitting out here, ripping tape off of the roll and arranging the puzzle pieces of the ripped letters until he was sure he got it right. It made him want to rip the hair from his scalp, but he sat there and pushed through the frustration to make it as perfect as he could for her. The missing pieces were primarily from Kie's letter, which fluttered away on a balmy breeze when Kacey tore it up and threw it to the ground, but the one he wanted her to have the most wasn't missing more than a single piece.

Y/N looks up from the letters held like a precious treasure in her hands to see him watching her with that same classic JJ smile on his face, but he doesn't let her get a word in yet.

"Go on," he says, leaning closer to pull his letter to John B out and place it on top of the pile for her to read, "I want you to read it."

"You didn't let me read it when I asked before though, are you sure you—"

He interrupts her before she can worry herself over it, "Dude, just read it. I promise I'm fine with it. I want you to."

The letters crinkle under her touch as she looks back down and smooths them out on the deck enough to read through the clear tape. With one last confirming glance to him for permission, she takes a deep breath and reads the first line.

Dear John B,

You really know how to keep a guy on his toes, don't you? You really outdid yourself on this one. I was so sure we were gonna make it, but I guess you had to go all Romeo and Juliet on us, huh? As long as you and Sarah are happy macking on each other in heaven, it's okay.

In all seriousness, I fucking miss you, bro. I miss you more than I realized a person could miss another person. Whenever I need to talk to you again, I don't know what to do. I guess that's why it's good that Y/N made me write this.

Also, I'm really sorry for—

"What does it say there? There's a whole chunk missing," she murmurs.

He scoots close enough to her that she can feel his body warmth radiating onto her through the shoulder of his flannel. Sunlight reflects on the silver rings decorating his fingers as he holds one side of the paper to tilt it enough for him to squint at.

"Macking, I think. It's supposed to say "I'm sorry for macking on your sister."

—macking on your sister. You can totally kick my ass for it, but before you come back from the grave to murder me, let me defend myself, okay? She isn't just another girl for me, John B.

I think you knew it before I did.

Last summer, you asked me straight up if we were hooking up behind your back after I kissed her in front of you on the porch. I laughed in your face, but you were right.

You saw everything before me, man. You knew I loved her since we were kids and waited for us to come to you about it, so that's gotta mean something, right? I hope it means you wouldn't be mad at me for this.

I swear I won't fuck it up with her, but you already know that. That's why you asked me to take care of her,. I didn't know why at the time but I do now. I won't let you down.

I'm keeping my promise.

- JJ

P.S. Don't miss me too much. We'll be shotgunning beers together up there before you know it.

There are tears blooming in her eyes when she lifts her gaze from the tattered paper to look at him again, but they aren't sad. For once, the tears slipping down her cheeks are happy tears, not born from grief, sadness, and pain, but bittersweet happiness.

They're caught staring at each other for a second before he asks her shyly, "It isn't too sappy or anything, is it? 'Cause I thought it—"

"C'mere," is the only thing she can get out before she's tugging him forward by the front of his shirt to kiss him.

JJ stumbles a little with the unexpected force of her pulling him to her, but he takes it in stride. He steadies himself and lets his hands shoot out to grapple for purchase on her waist, keeping her pressed up against him tightly as he kisses her back.

And it doesn't get much better than this, does it? This is it for him. He meant what he wrote to John B, he won't fuck it up with her, especially not because of his trauma with his dad getting inside his head and sabotaging his relationship with her. This is what makes everything worth it.

It brings happy tears to his eyes too.

She can taste the salt of them where their lips meet in the middle. It makes her smile, wrapping her arms around his neck and clenching the letters he mended for her in her fist to keep them from blowing away in the wind, and they both start to laugh into each other's mouths at the poignant feeling they both share but can't quite place.

They pull away from each other to catch their breath after another moment of it, and she can't help but stare. How could she not when she feels like this? It’s less like he’s her boyfriend and more like a piece of her soul has attached itself to his with no hope of letting go in the near future.

"You're the best thing that ever happened to me," she whispers to him.

Plain and simple. No room for disagreement or a bashful rejection of the compliment. She's pulled back from him enough to hold his gaze and make sure he sees her seriousness, and there isn't anything he can do to refute her statement.

He brushes his nose against hers affectionately, dipping down to kiss her again, but when he leans back to see her face, he can't help himself.

"Ditto."

The rest of the day after their moment on the boat, locked away in their own little world where none of the monsters chasing them could sneak through and ruin it, melts away peacefully. After another half hour spent looking through the box together, of her thanking him over and over again, he hops off of the HMS Pogue onto the dock and extends his hand to her in the most gentlemanly manner possible.

His lips are curved into a smirk as he kneels down on one knee as though she's a revered royal and bows his head in subservience, "Princess Routledge."

Her hand fits in his warm, calloused palm as a perfect match, and she steps off of the boat onto the dock beside him with an expression to match his.

"Captain Maybank," she says in her most regal royalty voice.

Her stellar performance breaks into a laugh they share as he stands and throws his arm around over her shoulder to walk back to the yard. The cardboard box is tucked beneath one of her arms while the other slips around his side to hold him back, and her heart feels full with both the presence of JJ and John B alongside her.

They bury it together.

Tag List: @gabiatthedisco, @fangirlvoice, @black-syren, @apparrio, @particularcth, @planetdemon, @idk-ijustworkhere, and @krisphann

Also, now that it’s over, let me know what your favorite part was in the comments or tags if you’d like to :) I’m curious.

[danses-with-dogmeat]

could you do the anxious tics prompt with fo3 and new vegas companions? sorry, i think i’ve asked you to add characters a lot but i just really love your writing ^^”

FO3 and FONV Romanced! Companions react to Lone's/Six's Anxiety Tics

Here you are, my love. Please never feel bad about requesting more people! It's honestly what I live for, and I loooooove making content for the FO3 and NV folks, since I feel like there's a lot less written about them in general 😊

So thank you so much for the ask!

Here is the prompt with FO4 Companions!

FO3

Butch:

     The flash of large red-framed letters had caught Butch’s attention as the pair stood waiting to speak to Doc Church outside his clinic in Megaton. “Whatcha got there, babe?” he had asked, before realizing that it was, in fact, exactly what he had thought. Lone blushed as they looked up at him, hiding behind the pages of their comic book. “You really kept that? After all these years?” They had nodded to him, explaining that it was a sort of security blanket for them, that they could always count on reading the same story, seeing the same happy ending each time they looked between the pages, each time they felt uncertainty or stress, they could count on Grognak to see them through it. He grinned whenever he saw them with it, often curling up beside them, or leaning his head on their shoulder to try and read along with them. In these cases, Lone had to read the pages slower than they normally would, reading the same comic book over and over for the last 10 years means you can skim through it pretty quickly, but they don’t really seem to mind. Now they get to watch as this person that they care so much for enjoys the comic book they relied on and adored for so long.

Charon:

     The ghoul was curious about Lone’s tendency to nap directly after dealing with stressful situations, but he decided not to voice any inquiries. His companion would explain themself if they wanted him to know more. One day, they did. Lone had thanked him for always looking after them while they rested off their anxiety, and mentioned that it was something they couldn’t help. Charon had nodded at them, acknowledging their gratitude, before his blue eyes had narrowed in his effort to process the rest of what they had said. It seemed strange to him, sleeping off nerves... Wouldn’t that make it more difficult to sleep? He decided that the logic of it didn’t really matter, whatever it was that caused it, he would look after his partner as they took the time to rest. Soon enough, they would beckon for him to join them, leaning against his shoulder or laying their head in his lap as he kept watch over them. A scarred hand would come to run softly through their hair, or graze lightly over their arm as they dreamed away their anxieties alongside their watchful partner.  

Clover:

     Lone wasn't quite sure why, but it seemed to them that Clover was always so handsy whenever they became anxious. They had to admit, they didn't necessarily mind it, but she always seemed to get frisky at the most inopportune times. Meanwhile, Clover just can't seem to figure out why Lone is always casting hints her way in the middle of stressful situations. She gets it, she totally is picking up what Lone is putting down every time they draw their bottom lip between their teeth and gnaw away so suggestively, but do they really have to do that right now?! Once Clover finds out it's just Lone's way of coping with their anxiety, she feels sort of foolish… but that doesn't stop her from getting a little turned on whenever Lone does it, even though the timing is usually inconvenient for both of them. But after the trouble and stress has passed, Lone will certainly need to blow off some steam, right? If that’s the case, Clover is more than ready for it. 

Cross:  

     Cross often noticed when Lone had trouble focusing, she tends not to miss a thing, especially when it comes to her Lone. When she sees her partner struggling to keep their attention trained on the person speaking to them, she usually will step in and ask if the person can speak to her companion again at a later time. Her direct and clear way of speaking is a relief for Lone when they are experiencing tension, as their listening becomes almost ineffective when they are being spoken to during times of high stress or anxiety. Paladin Cross understands this, and pays particular attention to speak slowly and with great care in these times. Due to her affinity for speaking this way normally, she and Lone tend to never have issues with communication; which evidently, tends to keep Lone from becoming anxious when they’re around their partner.

Fawkes:  

     Within his first couple weeks of traveling alongside Lone, the mutant noticed their need to constantly snack. When he decided to inquire about it, and they hesitantly explained their habit to stress eat, he wasn’t sure he understood it, but he knew that he had his own ways of dealing with his nerves, which came in the form of wringing his hands whenever he became anxious. So, if this is how Lone deals with it, he will accept it without question. It wasn’t until one fateful day, when Lone had realized they were completely out of snacking material and they were on the brink of a breakdown, that they realized Fawkes had taken their words to heart, as he reached out a large hand, filled to the brim with an assortment of their favorite snacks from one of his pockets. All this time they thought he only kept ammunition in there, turns out, their partner always had a well-stocked stash of their anxiety-repellent hidden away for cases just like these. They smiled coyly as they took a box of snack cakes, and a tin of crisps, settling down beside Fawkes as he lightly ran his hand up and down their back as they leaned into him, their breathing already beginning to return to normal with each passing moment.

Jericho:

     The ex-raider always thought it was a little annoying, the way his companion would stutter at him every time something got dicey, or when they had to deal with some sort of verbal confrontation. It was painful to watch, and when he brought it up to them, and they stuttered back an embarrassed response, he realized it was well out of their control. It would still bug him, and he might make an off-handed comment about it every once in a while, but the more he saw that those comments weren’t funny to his partner, the more they glared at him as he laughed at his own rude jokes, he decided he should refrain from such talk. Lone hadn’t developed a thick skin like most wastelanders he was used to, and certainly not like most raiders; and he would have to constantly remind himself of that. After his realization, he wouldn’t say a word about their stutter again, and God help anyone who did. You mention his partner’s stutter, you’ll probably have one too by the time he’s done with you. If you still even have a tongue, that is.  

FONV:

Arcade: 

     The doctor almost flinched at the feeling of Six’s fingers wrapping around his thumb the first time they did it, but he managed to keep his composure and simply utter a sarcastic comment in response to their sudden action. But when their stress passed, and they explained that it was a tic of theirs that they had trouble controlling, he immediately understood. Not only was he a doctor (so you know, he has pretty extensive knowledge regarding things of this nature) but he’s also had his own lovely tangles with anxiety in the past, and can’t really blame Six for their habit (despite the fact that he has absolutely no tics of his own to deal with). However, his understanding of it doesn’t mean he isn’t going to make some sort of humorous comment on the action whenever it occurs. At Six’s annoyed expression he says that he is simply trying to lighten the mood a bit, maybe distract them with his humorous musings. Six thinks he must not have a clue that he exercises his own coping mechanism (ahem, sarcasm) whenever their gesture makes him uncomfortable, so they end up trying to keep themself from grasping onto his thumb to the best of their abilities. But, to be honest, they’re relieved when Arcade begins reaching over his hand to them in times of stress, his eyes avoiding theirs, and his comments going unuttered, but his thumb extending outward to allow easy access nonetheless. This gesture usually results in a kiss on the cheek for the doctor when his partner has gotten through their bout of stress.

Boone: 

     He had noticed it when he first met the courier, the way they couldn't look him in the eye. Boone hadn't been sure if it was just him, considering his constant need to wear sunglasses and his somewhat stoic demeanor, or if it was the way they were with everyone, but either way, he didn’t mind in the slightest. When he found that it was a result of their anxiety, he simply nodded to them in understanding, and the pair went on their way. The sniper honestly wasn’t big on direct eye contact himself, another boon of wearing sunglasses was being able to keep your eyes trained wherever you liked, and so people tended not to notice his own habit of avoiding eye contact with them. He threw the idea out to Six one night, and soon enough the pair wore matching sunglasses nearly all the time. And though, as he said, he didn’t mind Six’s habit one bit, the knowledge that they only looked people in the eye when they felt completely comfortable and at ease with them made it all the more special when they did decide to look into his eyes when the pair was talking, or sharing a tender moment. In those little instances, Boone liked to study the details of his partner’s eyes, committing their warm and vibrant glow to memory, paying distinct attention to their unique shape, and the way their pupils dilated as they gazed back at him. He only wondered if they noticed his eyes doing the same in return as he took in the details of the one he loved.

Cass:  

     The caravaner always tends to offer some form of alcohol to Six whenever she sees their leg shaking in such a way. Cass is familiar with the side effects of withdrawal when she sees them, and she'll try to help her partner to the nearest drink as soon as she can. When Six finally asks her about why it is that she offers alcohol to them when they’re feeling stressed, mentioning that it maaaaaay not be the most healthy coping mechanism for anxiety, she is a bit confused. They were anxious!? Strange, she only tends to shake like that when she hasn't had a drink in a while. With the knowledge that it’s a nervous tic of theirs, Cass uses it to her advantage to better tell when her partner needs to take a load off, or blow off some steam. At the sight of their leg thrumming away, she’ll give their thigh a pat to get their attention, and then ask if there’s anything she can do to help them. As luck would have it, a stiff drink does tend to give Six the time to calm their nerves, so that trend isn’t completely abandoned once Cass has found out the truth about Six’s habit.

Raul:

     "What's the matter, boss? Can’t find the right word? Lo siento, mi corazón, English isn't my best language, but I can try and help if you want." Raul is… confused at first. Whenever Six snaps their fingers, he can't seem to figure out if they're trying to find the right word to say, or if they happen to be looking for something, maybe they're trying to keep time, or make a beat? Maybe they’re counting something, trying to remember a phrase? Once they tell him it’s just a nervous tic they have, Raul looks a little embarrassed at the fact that he didn’t assume this earlier on. The ghoul tries not to pay much attention to his partner’s habit, since he knows it must make them a little self conscious when people point it out, but sometimes he can't help but snap along, trying to make a little song to go along with their own improvised rhythm. When Six does finally notice his contribution, Raul just likes to wink at them in response, flashing a playful little smile as they blush in embarrassment at the fact that he caught them doing their nervous tic.

Veronica:

     When Veronica noticed that her partner had pierced ears, she was ecstatic. Ecstatic, and jealous. She always wanted to pierce her ears, to find or make her own pretty little earrings to decorate herself with, but alas, ear piercings were certainly not within the limits of Brotherhood dress and decorum. Given her interest in them, it’s no surprise that she noticed the way Six twisted the backs between their fingers, twiddling the bits of jewelry absent-mindedly whenever they became stressed or nervous. Often times, Veronica would reach a hand out to gently pry their fingers from their earring, pulling their hand to her lips so she could give it a small kiss before bringing it to settle somewhere else, to keep them from damaging the little bits of jewelry in their ears that she envied so much. 

[gb-patch]

Ask Answers: August 8th

Well, doing big posts all together worked for a while but lately I’ve been putting it off because it takes a long time to get them done. I think I’m gonna try switching back to answering asks whenever I can fit it in and posting them one at a time instead of waiting until I’ve filled out one of these major collections.

But for now, here’s more ask answers! Thank you for the questions and for all the kind words along with them ^^.

Hello!! I'm here to ask if its possible to get  the game and its dlcs on steam and play it on android?

I’m afraid not. Steam doesn’t have Android builds on their own site and Steam is not cool with keys for other sites being given out for Steam purchases, so you don’t get the Itch version from buying on Steam.

Hello! Sorry to bother you but, I had a question, if we buy the Game on itchio do we get steam keys or would we need to purchase it twice? 

You would have to buy it twice if you want it in both places, I’m sorry. To repeat myself a little, Steam doesn’t like the key trading thing. Itch may support giving keys for another site, but the reverse isn’t doable with Steam and Steam doesn’t even really want you to get a Steam key for buying somewhere else either. So we just don’t mess around with that.

hey, sorry if this is frequently asked, but is step 4 free dlc or paid for? some of your sources are contradicting each other. 

It’s free! There’s a paid wedding DLC, but Step 4 itself is entirely unpaid.

Hello! I just had a quick question, for the Baxter and Derek DLC's will we be able to confess our feelings to them or let them confess to MC? or will it only be one way? (they confess to MC)

Both type of options will be available!

Hey there! I wanted to ask whether or not the Derek DLC is still on track to be released in August since on the steam discussion board it says it will be released mid 2021. I totally understand if it isn't, I'm just really looking forward to it! If you answer then ty! And keep up the amazing work :D 

It’s not, aha. Unfortunately, 2021 wasn’t easier than 2020 as we hoped so things are still slower than planned. It’ll come out late 2021 or early 2022.

Hi! Firstly I just want to say that I LOVE Our Life. I have played a bit of similar games but this one instantly wins for the best one! Everything about it is amazing! I just wanted to ask if Derek would ever lose feelings for MC, like if they make the deal and then MC gets with Cove would he move on? and even if you don't, after "losing contact" would his feeling fade or would he still like MC? 

If you don’t really keep in touch with him and clearly move on with your life, Derek will too and he’ll be over it. But if you are still close as best as you can be, he’ll still think the MC is special. Though, he’ll always support your relationship with someone else if that’s what’ll make you happy.

Hello! Sorry if you've answered this before but: 'How's Lee related to us? Though which momma? And does she share our player-chosen last names? Also, do you know if Noelani took Pam's last name or did it happen the other way round? 

She’s related to Pamela and Pamela’s last name is the one they use, so the MC has the same last name as Lee.

Will we be able to choose which (they or he) we tend to call Qiu by more often, or will it randomly change depending on the moment? 

Qiu knows which pronoun they’re comfortable with at a time and you’ll call them what they’re happy with. And it doesn’t change between lines, it takes multiple scenes or even full Steps for it to switch. So for extended periods Qiu will be totally a guy or fully agender.

Will Step 4 of OL2 have moments?

It’ll be an epilogue like it is in OL1, so it won’t have a bunch of different Moments.

Hello! Just a quick question, is Sunset bird from OL1 based on a real location? If so what's it called? I wanna visit it +_+

ps i love your games so much <3

It isn’t based on one specific town you can go to, but there are a lot of little coastal towns in Cali that have a similar vibe!

Heyaaa ( I hope you're all well ), umm… it might seem kinda stupid to ask but did Patreon members can have a key for the dlc's ( all the steps-released dlc ) even if they became a member this month or later ? (me? saying this cuz it's my case? maybe ;-;), and once again thanks for absolutely all the amazing works on all the games ! u-u 

You wouldn’t get the DLCs for backing there. The Patreon is for extra bonus content/early access, rather than being a storefront to purchase the normal DLCs. Rarely we give them out as a side gift, but it hardly happens and if what you want is the DLCs it’s best to ignore the Patreon and  buy keys for those directly from Itch or Steam. I’m sorry for the confusion.

Hey y'all, love what youre doing w/Terry. Trans rep outside of player customization is so rare and important to see more of so thank you so much. I do have a question and its that does he have a canon sexuality? I know Miranda was said to be straight ace but I dont believe anything was stated for Terry probably because he wasnt revealed to be a guy which changes things. Im also curious if well get answers on how long hes liked Miranda since he may have liked her in step 3 before she liked him 

Terry likes women and Randy likes men! And he did like Miranda back in Step 3.

Will the Wedding Dlc release at the same time as Step 4? 

They’ll come out separately with Step 4 releasing first.

I really love Our Life so much! I've spent over 20hours playing it even though I only got it a week ago! I was wondering if I could make a fangame for Our Life with a different love interest but same plot. Next-door neighbors romance, multiple steps, etc? I'll probably make it on Google Slides though- 

Sure! I hope you have fun with it and I’m glad you love the game.

How does Cove feel about poly relationships? 

He’s got nothing against them for the people they work for, but he’s 100% monogamous and would only be comfortable with a partner who was willing to be monogamous with him.

Idk if this has been answered before but will Step 4 include the option to advance your feelings towards Cove? 

Yep, you’ll be able to determine your feelings and what your relationship is.

In step 4 will there be a chosen to say we live with Cove even as just friends? 

Yeah, you can choose to live with Cove and that can be done when you’re friends.

I just played the game with the MC and Cove being best friends and omg it’s still so damn cute like the wholesomeness of it all is too much for my heart I swear ^.^  Now with that all said I was wondering can we still marry Cove? if we only love him as a friend like let’s say we’ve made deal with him similar to the one we can make with Derek because let’s real no one could compete with what the MC and Cove have even if they aren’t in love. 

It’s great to hear you enjoyed the friendship story! You can live with Cove, but you can’t marry him platonically. Cove has familial affection for the MC if they’re best-est friends. He wouldn’t think to marry someone he loves like family and even grew up with as though they truly were siblings.

Are you still going to be making a DLC for XOBD? :] 

Yes! We’re slowing adding voiced lines and fixing errors.

It makes me laugh that Shiloh's last name is Fields because that's what I put as my last name! So in Our Life when he talked about "Ms. Fields" picking him up I was extremely confused, lol. That dude mimics personalities so much that he stole my surname!

Oh, wow, that’s a very funny coincidence, haha.

hi !! i cant seem to be able to get the scene where mc is able to propose to cove despite being at the 'love' stage and telling him i'd want to get married, are there any other details that im missing out on? the options just dont appear at the end... 

Maybe you missed telling Cove you were in love with him even if you mentioned wanting to get married or you might’ve accidentally said earlier in the game that you don’t want to progress your relationship further with Cove. We haven’t removed them, so you can get the scene again. It’s just kind of easy to miss since there’s multiple requirements. You can read a little guide in the FAQ.

wait what di you need to do to be able to propose to cove? I've been trying but haven't had much luck 

You can check out the FAQ linked above!

does cove only develop a crush on the mc if the mc is also at crush/in love with him? 

Technically, yes. We treat the non-romantic relationship options as truly non-romantic since we don’t want to bait and switch people. But there’s nothing wrong with headcanoning that Cove does have feelings developing for the MC even before the MC has.

Is there a way to make/allow Lee and Baxter to date?

No, they just don���t have enough time together.

We also got a group of asks related to Tamarack in OL2, but I’m afraid the way they talked about people with larger bodies made me not want to post their words, even if the person didn’t say they’re trying to be hurtful. I will separate out the core question and answer it though, so people can know that info.

Does Tamarack lose weight in later Steps?

No, she doesn’t. As for the other questions included, to be honest, I don’t have to explain/defend having romance options of different sizes. I’m sorry if you’re dealing with unhappiness that’s connected to body image, if that’s where the negative emotions are coming from, but even so I can’t meet you on that level and pretend it’s a problem that needs an answer. A girl who simply isn’t thin being a main love interest is just not an unreasonable concept. Also, Tamarack isn’t a lesbian. Yes, she can date a female MC, but that doesn’t undo her actual sexuality, so I’m not sure where that one part at the end was coming from.

I wonder... can we "fight" with Qiu over leader status? 👀

Not really, haha. No matter how cool your MC is, they’re never gonna replace Qiu for the other kids around. So you can either partner up with him, follow him too, or not be a part of all that group politics stuff.

So when I play the game, sometimes I mentally call Cove “Covie/Covey” and that made me wonder, how does Cove feel about being nicknamed? Not like Romeo/Space Cadet/etc. but like pet names relating to his actual name

It’d depend on his age, personality, and your relationship with him! When he’s younger he’d probably be embarrassed, when he was grown he’d probably be more casual or happy about it.

will you be able to date baxter in step 3 while at crush with cove (but not dating him ofc) sorry if this has been asked already. i really love baxters step 4 design btw!! 

Yeah, you can be crushing on Cove and date Baxter if you weren’t already dating Cove. You just can’t be truly in love with Cove and then switch to Baxter.

I just got my friend into our life, and they adore shiloh and derek sooo will there be more of them in the second game? 

I’m afraid not. But you can see plenty more of Shiloh in XOXO Droplets/XOXO Blood Droplets, haha.

I see you haven't gotten any xoxo droplets asks recently but I'm still obsessed with these boys!! I was just wondering if Nate would curse under any circumstance? 

Yeah, Nate does use certain swear words (damn, hell, bastard) on very rare occasions.

Hi there! I have a question about the wedding dlc. Will we be able to plan a honeymoon during the planning stages of it or would it be something that Cove and the mc would rather plan later on? Thank you! Absolutly love the game by the way, definitely one of my favorite games! 

The focus will be on the wedding day itself. The topic of the honeymoon might come up a bit, but there won’t be any choosing of the exact location and such.

Hi! I have two questions and it's completely understandable if you only answer one/neither and I'm sorry if you've already answered either before! First, is there a set year in which OL:B&A takes place (ex: Step 1 being set in 2010 & Step 2 being set in 2016, etc.) or is it simply up to interpretation? Second, have you guys thought about doing a coming-of-age game where the MC has a tough home life or upbringing? (like one of their parents is an addict, a parent being transphobic whilst the player has the option to be trans, or having friends that are influencing them to do drugs, etc.) That's all! Thanks for making beautiful games. <3 

There is a set timeline!

Step 1: 2006 Step 2: 2011 Step 3: 2016 Step 4: 2021 

And we don’t currently plan on making a game like that. The Our Life series exists to be a safer environment for people to play around in and if we did do a brand new series that was harsher edged it’d be something more fantastical and/or plot-driven instead of a different type of modern day slice-of-life growing up story. I’m sorry.

i don’t know if you’ve already answered this, but do you have a guess on when phase 4 will come out? as well as ol2? i’m so excited for both of them, the inclusivity in this game is amazing, you guys should be really proud of it! 

Step 4 will be coming out very soon! OL2 is gonna take until 2023 to be anywhere near completion. But we might episodically release the Steps one at a time as they get done instead of waiting for three to be finished before launch like we did with the first game.

Hello, I was curious if there was an official or unofficial discord server for the game? 

We do have a discord! You can join by clicking this link HERE.

how long do you plan to keep ol's patreon running? 

Hopefully for at least a few more years.

Are you considering ever making merch? 

Yeah, but I don’t know when it’ll happen or what exactly we’ll make, aha. It’s something we want do, just nothing is set.

hi! i just found out about your game a couple of days ago on tiktok (so sorry if you’ve already answered this question) and i was wondering if y’all are ever planning to release it on iOS? 

I have no idea. It’s hard for a small group to get Apple approval and I honestly can’t say if it’ll ever happen or not. Maybe someday, though!

Hi, I love the art style of Our life and I would like to know if the artist has a Twitter? Also, could it be possible to fund more CGs for the game from him/her? So many times, I wish there was one like when the cutscene of the sunshower. 

That’s nice of you to offer. He doesn’t have a Twitter, at least not one that’s public enough to be shared with me. And I’m afraid not. The issue is that the CGs take huge amounts of time rather than there not being a budget for it. He’s gotta make CGs for Step 4, the DLCs, and new character sprites, too. There isn’t space in the schedule for even more. Sorry for that.

Hi, how are you?!

Are you planning on accepting new writers or is it always the same people who write your stories??

Thanks!!

Our Life: Beginnings & Always won’t be getting new writers, but we will be hiring a new team of writers for Our Life: Now & Forever eventually!

perhaps this counts as nsfw and I'm sure it has been answered before but what does Cove prefer, chests/boobs or butts? or perhaps both :3c thank you for this wonderful game (and the patreon bonus moment, it was worth all the waiting and more ♥) 

He’s a “chests of all shapes and sizes” kind of guy, haha.

i was wondering- did any of the writers actually grow up by the beach? as someone who's lived in a beach town all their life it really did feel nostalgic to play through our life 1 

I was born and raised in Cali! Though, not right by the beach. We still had to make trips out, but the setting is based on my own childhood memories of small beach towns we went through.

In Derek’s upcoming DLC, will we be able to reference the pact we made as teens? (love olba and xod/xobd so much btw you’re literally amazing) 

Yep, you will be able to talk about that!

Oh, sorry about the Cole being secretly L ask, then!

If you wanted context: Death Note is about this one guy who finds a notebook that kills anyone who you write the name of in there. The guy eventually develops a God Complex and starts mass killing criminals and stuff. L is the one trying to find out who is killing all these people.

Me and my sister first joked about it because I couldn't remember how to translate a word about the way Cove was sitting, so I just did the pose, and it looked a lot like how L himself sits! Then we just snowballed from there, with more and more nonsense connections.

That’s okay! Thanks for explaining. I’m sorry I didn’t know what you meant.

[hellomynamiseglaf]

🌰Chestnuts and Warm Milk🍂

My List of ~Favorites~ for Interactive Fiction and Visual Novels

(This is a work in progress so please bear with me)

Interactive Fiction:

The Wayhaven Chronicles (WIP Series in Development) - @seraphinitegames  (Look,,, I’m just... obsessed.. I can’t stop thinking abt it,,, and I'm..... sometimes, I read and I think I feel like I know what love is.)

Mind Blind (WIP) - @mindblindbard (I just,, UGH it’s so good. I can't even say that much because my feelings about it are so potent that everytime I see an update I try to tell myself to leave it alone to play larger portions of updates as a treat and everytime my willpower FAILS and I replay the demo like twice in a row)

Demon: Recollect ; Forsaken (WIP) - both by @bathalafiction (whew...WHEW!!! Are you kidding me?? ARE YOU KIDDING ME?? Look. I was attached to Demon: Recollect. I loved it. And then I played the Forsaken WIP and now I can't get over my absolutely BOMB character design for my player persona. Also it's kind of fun being considered a jerk in the game, because it opens up a lot of different options that I usually feel bad about taking)

Shadow Society - @carawenfiction (the concept is so interesting,, I dream of more. Also Quaiel...baby...)

The Soul Stone War - @intimidatingpuffinstudios (also whew!! I really enjoyed it and the characters all picture themselves really vividly in my mind for some reason.)

Greenwarden (WIP) - @fiddles-ifs (reading this is like thick fog.. but in a good way? I don't know how to describe it without pictures but this IF smells like fog over wet grass)

Divine Intervention (WIP) - @divineinterventiongame (the concept?? UGH SO GOOD. For some reason it's always the first game I click to check for updates)

Golden (WIP) - @milaswriting (😈😈😈😈)

Blood/line (WIP) - @bloodlineoffical (simply put,,, LARRY)

Supernatural in New York ; The Bastard of Camelot (both WIPs) - @llamagirl28  (UGH Both of these are so good in their own ways but equally as exciting to see updates for. I haven't consolidated my feelings much further than "my MC for SiNY is so cute" and "Mordred is a child" but they're all generally positive.)

Ace of Spades (WIP) - @steph-writing (I keep thinking about,,, con........)

Nevermoore (WIP) - @asteristories (AHHHHH.... let me say it again for those in the back: AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH)

Son of Satan: The Mortal Coil (WIP) - @sosthemortalcoil (YES.)

Shepherds of Haven (WIP) - @shepherds-of-haven (yes. I just have to sigh because it's very good and I like saying those funny little words of power. But also outside of the game I can only picture this game as a great, grey border collie)

Attollo (WIP) - @attollo (Also a very interesting concept, whoo... I almost forgot how immersive it was untill I played the demo again and was reminded of how 'into it' I was straight off the bat. Also the seperate, short little piece on the blog with Sysba was also really good and I had a dream about it the other day)

Into the Shadows (WIP) - @wynnakang​ (whooo.... I'm sighing again, but louder. I press restart and play the demo again)

A Comedy of Manors (WIP) - @sviyaginthegreat (I kept replaying options that I hadn't chosen before because I wanted there to be more lmao)

Fallen Hero: Rebirth - @fallen-hero (I think there's a sequel coming up? I haven't stopped thinking about this storyline since I finished it omg... the.. the details are really good and I've become ridiculously attached to my tragic villain? Character... she IS the standard for my reusable IF persona, or at least one of my most prominent ones ;-D )

Samurai of Hyuga (WIP series) - (I'm pretty sure multiplechoicestudios.com is the development blog for this game, or at least what I've been checking for updates..... this is a series with four book currently out.... and I've been playing through book 4 at slower than a snail's pace in a desperate attempt to prolong my experience. I really didn't think I was going to like it as much as I did but I got a little too into it and now I'm horribly attached to all the characters)

The Porthecrawl Witness(WIP) - @porthecrawl-witness (I'm pretty sure this is a WIP?? But ugh. SCREEEEEE- it's so good. It's SO GOOD. I really want to punch Talbot in the face. And Asher, if for a different reason. And sort of Staci just to try. Quinn is just a cutie I could never hurt him like that. Ugh but they're all so good and I forgot that I was reading a WIP untill it suddenly was over..... I'mfeeling really aggressive rn as I'm writing this, so please just note that the punch comment is meant as a statement on how interesting the concept and immersiveness of the characters and story is)

Forgotten Names (WIP) - by Alexandra_Zorila on the CoG Forum (turn the volume up. AHHHHHHHHHH!!! Look, look. It's..... delicious. It's SO interesting and I obsessively have a tab open on my computer to check for updates)

OFNA: Birds of a Feather (WIP) - @ofna (the vibes are so grey and smoky but the fog is definitely from a party smoke machine and the room is only dark because the walls are taped with those huge sheets of black construction paper that teachers use to cover their bulletin boards with... the game definitely falls in the 'dark and mysterious' genre but something just strikes me as really funny when I play it. Anyway it's good and it's in a lot if recommended lists for a reason. Also I'm very attached to my American Goldfinch)

More Things in Heaven and Earth (WIP) - @morethingsgame (in the same way that it's fun to play Guenevere in the Guenevere game or Mordred in The Bastard of Camelot, playing Ophelia in the sort-of Hamlet story is really fun. If anyone has read the Missing collection- which I absolutely love- by Margaret Peterson Haddix, this gives me similar vibes for some reason. Anyway, I really want to give Hamlet a hug and make him a flower crown or something)

A Tale of Crowns (WIP) - @ataleofcrowns (It's kind of not even funny how much I love this game... It's hard to even describe why I like it, just that it's so well rounded in terms of the story, characters, dialogue, and relationships. It's such an interesting plotline and it's pretty immersive. Also the first time I read the demo, there was an update as I was reading and the high that sent me on has very rarely been matched. Also Dara running to save my Crown in the tunnel?? 🤚😩🤭💓 ugh. UGH!! That's good food for my fool heart)

Scout: An Apocalypse Story (WIP)- @anya-dev (I'm usually not that into apocalypse themes/plots but I really enjoyed this game, and the plot was very good and intruiging... it really pulled me in and I like my character in the story a lot. I don't know why but it tastes like chikuwa, atsuage, and this specific type of carmelized onions that my mom makes sometimes)

Nothing left to burn (WIP)- @clowdee-works (......ouch. I *knew* what was going to happen and I STILL became attached to Drew)

Smoke and Velvet - @roast-ifs (It's good. And I am VEDY much into my character design. Also the story is really interesting, and I enjoy the setting a lot somehow)

Speaker (WIP)- @speakergame (very fun to play, and each update gets me more interested in the aspects of the plot. I also really like the little descriptions of what the characters think of the player)

The Nameless (WIP)- @parkerlyn (interesting plot, I like the characters a lot, and The aesthetics of this world are so interesting. Definitely had a good time visualizing what everything looked like)

Fields of Asphodel (WIP) - @asphodelgame (I think it's really cute so far!!! I like mythology in general, and the persephone/hades dynamic is *mwah!*... I like the way the story progresses in the beginning, and I think it works well in drawing the reader into the world. I also very much enjoy petting large dogs.)

...there are so much more.. and I have followed so many blogs.........

I'm not sure why I can't find it rn but there's this one WIP game that I really like where the MC buys a manor for like dollar and moves to go live there with her best friend and shenanigans ensue as they try to settle in and fix up the estate

Harbringer (WIP) - @harbringercog (....are you KIDDING me?? I was fully planning on just enjoying the demo and keeping a mental note to update the list sometime later,,, but this game... THIS GAME really made me fold. It's very immersive and regardless of how nervous the author claims to be after releasing the demo, it's of my humble opinion that those nerves can be calmed. It's very good. I was planning on procrastinating and reading a little bit and then going back to this essay I need to write, but somehow I got pulled in and ended up reading through the whole demo and it's apparent that I honestly had no chance of getting through this without becoming invested in the plot.... just... so good.. I'm very excited to see how this will progress)

Visual Novels:

Andromeda 6 (WIP) - @andromeda-six​  (I repeat: Obsessed, I come back every few months to see an update and I fall deeper into the hole every time...)

To the Edge of the Sky (WIP,, probably) - by Ajané (??) on Steam (I think, it’s been a while)

Next on my list to check out: Perfumare by pdrrook

Does.... does The Arcana game by Nix Hydra count as VN?? If so, then yes.

Similarly, the FictIF games are all entertaining, although Last Legacy and Heir to Love and Lies are my favorites rn (and.....unfinished....)

I also don't know if this counts, because I kind of consider Otome games to be their own genre, but on the Love 365: find your story by Voltage Inc. There are a bunch of fun stories, my favorite of which are: the Shinichi Kagari route on After School Affairs and the Saejima and Keiichiro routes on Bad Boys do it Better

..To be continued...

[qvid-pro-qvo]

a double shot for me (with a splash of you)

also known as a coffee shop au no one asked for, but i wanted. aaron hotchner x gender neutral reader.

word count: 8628

rating: teen, for lots and lots of coffee consumption, baked goods, and falling in love one cup at a time.

-

Penelope sees it first. 

Ever since JJ left, cases fall on her more and more. Those pesky paper files that the FBI insists on keeping around. Dark manila folders embossed only to be thrown away. It’s a shame, but those are the ones she has to take up to Hotch’s office. 

She makes the climb, moves to his door with purpose. Reaches out to knock, clutching one of her more muted pens in case Hotch needs one to sign. Not likely, but the last time she had one with a fuzzy pink thing on a spring, and the visual of Hotch signing one of their cases with that much... fluff made her eyes cross. 

Anyway. She’s up and in, Hotch giving his permission, and the files in her arms get placed in his box. 

“Just a couple of signatures,” she informs him. 

“Are these finished consults?” he asks, and she fills him on what details she can. It’s while she’s filling him in, though, that he lifts a mug of coffee to his lips. 

It’s a new mug. One that she’s never seen on his desk before. Definitely different, because the ones he usually chooses are the kind that the FBI keeps as standard issue, the ones that get stolen and restocked because they’re convenient and... just okay, as far as mugs goes. They hold coffee effectively enough, is what she’s saying. 

But this is a mug. A kind of cute mug, with a logo on the front of some coffee shop. It’s white, too, almost a shock on the more somber mahogany of her boss’s desk. 

“Garcia?” 

She realizes then that she stopped talking. Hotch is staring up at her, mug still poised halfway up to his lips, and she blinks, mouth falling open a little. 

“I’m - I’m sorry, sir. I was just admiring that mug you have. Is that place any good? It opened up pretty recently, right?” 

He glances at it. Seems to notice it for the first time as well, and his face softens. That’s the only way Penelope can describe it, as if looking at the mug makes him think of something... good. 

But when he talks, it’s like any other conversation. As if that little moment she spies doesn’t happen. Nods, face just on this side of neutral. 

“Yeah, I like their coffee. Fair prices, too, even with the knowledge that a building full of FBI agents are here to overcharge.” 

She chuckles, but it’s for more than the joke. It’s at the fact that Hotch seems that close to smiling himself, and she pulls back from his desk with a little grin. “All right, sir. Thank you.” Her head dips a little.

“Thank you,” he shoots back, and when she leaves, she thinks that maybe she’ll let that place be all his. 

-

The first time Aaron-With-Two-A’s comes into your coffee shop (distinguishing him from Aron-With-One-A and Aahron-With-An-H), you’re pretty smitten with him. You can’t tell if it’s the fitted suit and tie, the jawline, or the small smile he gives you when he orders, but by the time you serve him with an extra bright smile that he kindly returns... well, you’re in love. He could be the love of your life. Especially when he drops a tip in the jar. 

An exaggeration, of course. It’s not love.

Maybe.

Anyway, you see him walk out the door and at that point you know that you’ll never see him again. This isn’t the part of town that usually gets the suits, and there are shops closer to where they gather that he’ll probably use next. Your luck is shitty anyway, so anyone like that who brings you a little bit a joy would, of course, never return. You’re already a late bloomer, and known for your bad decisions, so while you’re very thankful for your job you know it’s not luck that landed you where you are.

But you suck it up, of course. You can’t afford to get distracted. You’re the only one working a shift in the afternoons, and that time is used for cleaning and second-guessing every decision you make, along with doing your best to make damn good coffee. 

But he comes back. More than once. Get his same order, a very plain black coffee with a couple of sugars, and you hand it over across the bar each time, sometimes going out of your way to put it in his hands. Smiling, your handwriting the scrawl on the cup that spells out his name. 

A-A-R-O-N. 

He’s becomes a regular, and you feel comfortable calling him that. It isn’t every day he comes in, not even close. Sometimes he’s gone for three weeks at a time, but he always trails back in, bright and early for a hot cup. Soon, you’re adding smiley faces to the end of his name, and the first time you do it you can’t help but peek out behind the pastry case to watch him see it. 

He smiles. You smile. It’s a win. 

Slowly small talk develops. It’s weeks, pulling little tidbits from him each time you take his order. Basically, what happens is you ramble for too long, he smiles and responds, and the process repeats. 

But he seems to enjoy himself, and you definitely are, and as long as the line isn’t held up, you don’t really mind.

Of course, the days aren’t all peaches and cream (though the peach galette you sell always tastes like it). One day, a slower Tuesday, you’re trying to hide the way your chest aches, after a particularly brutal phone call with your mother that brought tears to your eyes. 

Why are you wasting your time on this – this coffee shop? she had asked. Mocked. You gave up a lot for that dream of yours, and you’re just scraping by –

And you’d tried to explain. You really had. What it meant to you, to start this on your own, to get away from your past, your bad decisions, your spouse. From what was holding you back. But she snapped, and she scolded, and as you closed your eyes and hung up there had been nothing you could do but gasp for air.

Her words overwhelm you behind the counter, and you close your eyes tight at the memory, not realizing that at the same time, the coffee cup you’re holding overflows. 

The coffee scalds you. Because it’s fucking coffee. You let out a cry, dropping the cup all over the floor, grateful it’s only a cardboard one for to-go orders. It splashes your no-longer-clean jeans, and at that moment you’re done. You’re just done. Your hands are shaking, and burned, and you push to the sink in a gasped sob. Your hair falls in your eyes, gets shoved back, and once it falls forward again you reach up to pull at it overwhelmed.

Your name is called out, but you wave the hand that isn’t stinging, splashing water without meaning to when the faucet gets going. “I’m fine, just - just give a minute, I’ll get it right out.” 

“Are you okay?” 

It’s an innocent question. And you should be more put together, it’s a goddamn customer, but your already shitty day just peaks and you whirl around to snap before even processing who’s in front of you. 

“Do I fucking look - oh. Oh, my god.” 

It’s Aaron. With two As. The coffee you spilled? His. The voice. His? The look of concern, one that makes your cheeks flush with a red you haven’t felt in a long time? His. 

Of course. The one time you yell at a customer, and it just happens to the one you have a raging crush on. 

“I’m - I’m so s-sorry,” you stammer. “Like I said, it’ll be right out, I just...” You don’t even know how to recover, instead choosing to turn back to your hand, which luckily is not blistering. It’s just bright red, inflamed. The cold water over it helps, but you can still feel the undercurrent of the sting. However, you still have a job to do and you force yourself to pull way, moving to grab another to-go cup. “I’ll get you a fresh one, okay? Give me a minute.” 

“Put your hand back under the faucet.” It’s not an order, but his voice carries the weight of one, and you blink a few times to stop the tears before moving back to the sink, whimpering as the cool once more rushes over your skin. “Do you need me to go get anything? Is there anyone in the back to help you?” 

You can’t help your snort. It feels snotty with the tears that you’re just barely holding back. Why is he being so nice? You just make the coffee. 

“No. It’s just me this morning. Just my luck, right?” The crushing loneliness of that statement floors you, and you find yourself staring at the running water to avoid his eyes. 

The water is the only noise in the room, besides your occasional sniffle. After a moment, you force yourself to pull back from the water, eyes closing tightly as the pain ramps up again. And Aaron is still there, his eyes holding an intense kind of pity, and you realize his hand is reaching for yours. 

He clears his throat as you raise a brow at the gesture. “I’m not a doctor, but I have a third-grader at home. Burns are nothing new to me.” You give him a weak smile (of course, he’s a father), and he takes your hand gently, looking over it with that classic intensity. He’s furrowing his brow at it for a while, and the whole time he’s just... holding your hand. 

“Your professional opinion?” you ask in a shaky voice, and he hums, turning it over to look at your palm. He looks up at you again, and when he speaks it’s deadpan, brow furrowed. 

“I don’t know. I think we’ll have to cut it off.” 

There’s a beat, and then you’re sputtering out a laugh before you can stop yourself. He smirks before letting you pull your hand back. The pure shock of the statement brings you back from the edge, and the tears in your eyes seem to vanish as you realize you’re giggling, a hectic kind of sound. He doesn’t seem to mind the horrific noises coming from you, though, because he’s still watching you, one hand sliding into his pocket as his face relaxes.

“You’ll be okay. It’ll heal on its own – just make sure if any blisters appear you don’t pop them.” 

He gets a playful glare for his efforts, and you reach for a clean washcloth, soaking it in cold water and wrapping it around the affected hand. 

“Any other advice?” you ask him, and his eyes glance toward the coffee on the floor. 

“No. Fresh out, but. Let me help you clean up.” 

You huff out another laugh. Was he serious? “And ruin your suit?” You gesture to his whole outfit. Hell, he’s got a tie on that screams expensive, shoes that surely are the cost of a full day’s profit. “Trust me. Coffee smell stays with you. And once it’s bad, it’s bad. I’ll get it, after I make you another coffee, one you can actually take with you.” 

He doesn’t seem too convinced. For a moment, he looks almost like he’s going to ignore you, take off his jacket, and grab the mop. But no matter how much you would love to see that, you shake your head, and emphasize it again. “No. I’ll do the cleaning.”

Your stern tone gets him to lift his hands, in surrender. You smile, then, a real one, without much snot, and he starts moving towards the door.

“You’ll have a good day, all right?” He says it so… so confidently, so assuredly. And smoothly pulls out his usual two-dollar tip from his wallet, dropping it in the jar.

“You don’t want your coffee?” you call out, but it’s like he doesn’t hear you. And then he’s leaving, and you’re trying to think of what to say. Something, anything, to thank him for his kindness.

“Wait!” you cry out. You must sound desperate, because he stops and when he turns back to you, you’re rummaging around behind the counter. You almost completely disappear for a moment before you’re popping back up, your prize in hand. 

“Here.” The gift is thrust forward. “To say thank you. Really. You didn’t have to stay, and you did. And. I think my day will be better because of it.” 

He takes it from you, turning it over in his hands. 

“A coffee mug.” 

Suddenly, the gesture feels stupid, and your face flushes as he keeps turning it over in his fingers. “Yeah, I - I would’ve given you a ticket or something, for a free coffee and pastry, but I only printed those for the week of the grand opening. I’m sorry, really, it’s dumb, I can take it back, and we can pretend this never happened -” 

But when he looks up at you, you stop talking. The earth has stopped spinning, as far as you’re concerned. His eyes have wrinkles at the corners, because you suppose that’s what happens when he grins. You find yourself tracing them, unable to pull your gaze away. In this light, he looks brilliant. The shine of the early morning sun is dancing on his features, and you feel like an idiot for even thinking it but it’s all you can think. 

“I can just… I owe you,” you finally say, and to that he shakes his head. 

“No. This is – this is great.” And he means it, chuckling with it.

With a lift of the mug, he turns and goes out the door, leaving you a little agape as the world starts turning once again. And in that moment, the coffee smell is worth it, just so you can watch him disappear from view.

-

Rossi notices because he notices Aaron.

After all, the man’s life is… pretty routine. There are parts about the job that have him yanked all over the place, but the days that they’re at home, it’s methodical. A comfort in a way, knowing that some things never change.

At work before everyone else. Working the day away. Coming down for lunch (or not, depending what he (or Jess) managed to make at home for him and Jack in the evenings). Going back up, and working until everyone else leaves. He takes phone calls and meetings in his office, and every so often one of the team ventures up to interrupt, but. All in all, a pretty straightforward schedule most days of the week.

Dave doesn’t like to burn the midnight oil unless a book’s got him hooked, or get up too early unless there’s something in it for him, and so he’s always trailing in behind him, still before the others but at a time that’s sane.

Until one day. Aaron comes in a little later, later enough to catch the same elevator, and there’s a look on his face that’s a little… hurried.

There’s a cursory scan – no rumpled clothing, no identifying marks. And Aaron knows that he has eyes on him, because he ducks his head, not looking in his direction. Besides, Hotch isn’t exactly the type for one-night-stands, and so Dave rules it out with a nod and a press of the elevator button.

“Dave,” the unit chief acknowledges, and then steps off of the elevator once they arrive.

So. Something’s up.

Dave doesn’t confront him immediately, though. Just lingers, watches. Hotch knows that eyes are on him, but Rossi’s good enough that that doesn’t matter, especially when it happens again. Another elevator ride together,

“So,” he asks his friend, glancing at him out of the corner of his eye. “Who’s got you running late?”

There’s not an immediate answer. Hell, the guy almost looks chastened at it, like Rossi’s scolding him for coming in at 7:45 instead of 7:15. How dare he make it in only fifteen minutes before eight in the morning?

“There’s this… coffee shop I like to hit before work. Stumbled into it one morning, and…” Hotch murmurs. He pauses, and the numbers keep climbing.

“Yes?”

If anything, Hotch’s face seems to flame, working his jaw for a second as he considers telling Dave what he already figures. “The barista. Think they own it, too, and makes good coffee in the mornings.”

Rossi doesn’t say anything at first. Just chuckles, shaking his head a bit.

“Well. Have you gotten this owner’s number?”

The silence is very telling, and Rossi just laughs.

“Come on, Aaron. What’s the worst that could happen?”

“Well, a rejection, for one,” Hotch replies with a look shot Dave’s way, but the older man just shakes his head again.

“Rejecting a handsome FBI agent who frequently pays the bills? Nah, I think you’ve got it,” he says, with a hand reaching to smack Aaron on the back. It’s that he leaves him with, along with another call over his shoulder.

“Y’know, once you get the number, you probably won’t have to spend so much on coffee!”

-

The days continue to pass by. Slowly, and surely, your little place seems to get some attention. More customers, more regulars. You manage to remember the names of your people most of the time, too, when the late nights keeping books and thinking of new bakery ideas don’t run away from you. And with those days, Aaron remains.

He still comes in the morning, at the asscrack of dawn. Of course, you don’t call it the asscrack of dawn in front of him, but often you’re still yawning when he comes in and asks for his order. And with it, since he’s so early, he stays to chat more and more. Sometimes, you see him glance at his watch, and excuse himself in a rush, and you can’t help but feel a little thrill at the thought that he just… likes talking to you that much.

There’s worry with it, too. What if he just feels so obligated to stick around? Are you forcing him to stay back longer than he needs to? But those fears are squashed by the way he always looks back to wave at you, lifting the cup of coffee you made him.

Of course, right after that he’s gone.

It’s like he vanishes. No sign of him in the mornings, and you feel a little bit of sorrow over the loss. But of course, immediately there’s a bit of embarrassment with that sorrow. You barely knew the guy, was he really worth a bit of mourning? But he truly just disappears, and for a moment your head comes up with crazy explanations as a way to cope without your early morning conversations, deal with the continued exhaustion that weighs on you as your business grows.

All hope is not lost, however, because it’s another late night into early morning balancing books when you see Aaron next.

It’s been a couple of weeks. You don’t exactly know what he does, but you know it’s something that requires the suit and tie, so you figure it’s important. Maybe a business trip, or something else that kept him away from your shop, but either way, it doesn’t matter. Because he’s back, and he gives you a little smile when you take his order, even when you can only yawn your way through it. The conversations even flow, like they did before, another source of incredible joy.

“I’m so sorry,” you say, on the tail end of yet another jaw-popping yawn. “I don’t know what’s gotten into me.” Your hands lift above your head in a stretch, and his gaze drops to the tip jar where he deposits his normal amount: two dollar bills.

“We all have those mornings,” he says with a chuckle. “It’s not a problem.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you have a morning like this,” you tease. Your hands move easily, even in your exhaustion, making his usual order with a flourish. Two sugars, in a little to-go cup, coffee over the top to make sure it’s mixed in. “What’s your secret? Don’t tell me you’re an energy drink fanatic. I’d feel like you were going behind my back.”

“No, no. Just your coffee,” he returns, and it’s easy. Comes out of him without any thought. If you blush, you hope he doesn’t notice, because your face is turned to his cup to make sure it doesn’t overflow.

“You’re too kind.” Lid on top, secured tightly, and when you turn back to him and hand it over, he doesn’t turn away. His comment makes you feel bold, too, so the name you write on it has a winky-face instead of a smiley-face. “Don’t stay away too long, my good days always come when you’re my first customer,” you add, and something seems to… shift.

Because Aaron doesn’t turn away. Smiles at you, at the coffee cup, and then glances back behind him. There’s no one else in the shop, there never is this early – it becomes known around the city as a good place to get a quick bite later in the day, set up and do some studying for a while since the black cups of coffee can be bottomless. But he checks anyway and then passes his coffee cup from one to the other, reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out a little card.

“I was… politely encouraged by a coworker to take the leap,” he admits, and your heart is pounding in your chest. You’re offered the little white cardstock, and when you look at it, you see his full name. It feels like a momentous occasion, Aaron-with-two-As shifting to Aaron Hotchner. “And if you’re willing, I would love to go on a date with you. Get to know you more.”

Then there’s a pause, and there’s a cloud of… something. You watch it come and go, and the whole time you just offer the same smile, a smile that seems to rouse him of whatever he’s thinking about.

“But, if you don’t want to, I understand. My work life is pretty hectic, as I’m sure you can guess, and I know you know I have a son –“

“I would love to.”

It’s the easiest thing to say, because you feel it with every fiber of your being. Because Aaron Hotchner seems like a really sweet guy, who works in Quantico and still comes by your coffee shop every morning he can.

“Really, Aaron. I would. As you can guess, my schedule’s pretty routine, but I do close as of right now, so, our dinners might have to be later rather than earlier –“

“Dinners?” he says it with a small smile, and you flush at the slip.

“I didn’t mean to… assume anything, but. Whatever we get a chance to do, or keep doing, I would love to. Just. Give me a second.”

You don’t wait any longer. Your fingers move to your phone, input his number, and immediately send him a text, with your name. When his phone buzzes, you smirk.

“Now you have mine, too. Easy as pie.”

When he leaves, that day, it feels like something special. You don’t know what, just yet, but it feels new, and bright, and good.

Yeah, you think to yourself, I hope we get to do at least a couple of dinners.

-

Emily notices next.

It’s a later night. The whole team has their nose buried in something, whether it be a consult or a report or, God forbid, something for Strauss. There’s work to be done, and unfortunately the jet life is only a small part of it.

She’s working on a report that particular evening. This case ended a few days ago, but since shots were fired it’s taken longer to sort through. Positioning, discharge time, how many shots, where, at who, with who. A nightmare, but incredibly necessary, and she’s done with it soon enough.

Her coat mocks her as she rises to her feet. So close to picking it up, dressing, and heading out the door. But she mentally promises to be right back, that home is just a little visit to Hotch’s office away.

She climbs the steps, and is glad to see the door is cracked open, that warm lamplight is filtering out from the open blinds. It means that when she knocks, he’ll let her in.

A couple taps of her knuckles. She waits a beat, two. No response.

Huh.

Another tap. Tries to peek in, but the door is just open enough that she can only glance in with one eye. She’s not usually one to snoop without the pushing from Derek or Penelope, but her eyes are tired and she’s ready for a night in with Sergio.

Is he... is he on his phone?

His cell phone?

And smiling?

Her eyes widen a bit, and she pulls back immediately. At this point in the night, Hotch is nothing but business. Tired, like all the rest, and if he’s bent over anything, it’s a file he needs to sign off on. Maybe Jack. Maybe he got a picture from Jess…

But he’s... distracted. And she knows Hotch’s smile when he’s looking at Jack, and what she had seen is not that.

She knocks again. A lot louder, and when he responds, it’s quick. But not quick enough. There’s a beat, and she narrows her eyes.

“Come in.” 

She pushes into the room, file in both hands. Immediately her eyes drop to his desk, but his cell is gone. She looks up at him, and he’s looking at her, like nothing’s the matter, like he wasn’t just smiling at his phone –

“Prentiss?” he asks. Brows furrowed at her, their permanent state. 

She’s brought back to reality. Because that’s what this is, reality. He was probably just... looking at a picture, or a video, or… something. “Right. Sorry. Just finished up my report for the Douglass case. Wanted to drop it off before I headed out.” 

“I’ll sign off on it tonight,” he tells her, and he bends over an open file on his desk. Like nothing ever happened. “Thank you, agent.”

She thinks on that, jogging down to her desk. Glances behind her at the shine of the light from his office. Pulls her coat on, flicks her hair over the collar.

Huh.

-

Getting to know Aaron Hotchner is a joy.

It’s a little complicated, finding a date that works for the both of you. Not because of anything other than clashing schedules, and it’s a good learning experience to realize that Aaron Hotchner is always on call. But there are points when he’s home, and free, and you finally are churning enough profit for someone else to close in the evenings, so the nights are what work the best.

And dinner is… great. It’s fantastic, really, and you get to know Aaron Hotchner as that, not just Aaron with the great smile and lines at the corner of the eyes. Well, he definitely still has the great smile, but now you know the whole person.

He tells you about his job, what it means to him, and it feels like you’re truly getting to know him. You can tell he’s passionate about what he does, helping people, and you find yourself enthralled by the way he speaks about his position, his team.

“Sometimes it hurts, knowing what we’re leaving behind when we fly back,” he tells you. “But. I also know there isn’t any other group of people I could this with. None of us are perfect, but when we’re together I know we can get the job done.”

Aaron doesn’t get animated, exactly. His passion is a quiet one, simmering deep within him, right where his heart is. He doesn’t talk with his hands, gesticulate or raise his voice. No, he talks with his eyes. In the way he locks gazes with you, looks up at you from the meal, in the way they crinkle with his little smiles and get warm when he mentions his son.

You’re captivated.

And he gets to know you, too, a little. A lot, really, and you feel like you’re rambling, but you’ve got his full attention, a little smile behind his clasped hands as he listens to you wax poetic about the inherent romanticism of owning your own café.

Well. Not really, but it feels like it comes pretty close to that lecture (a different lecture, for a different time).

After all, it’s your place. It’s a place for the college kids in the mornings and the evenings who suck down your cold brew incessantly. It’s a place for the workers at after sunrise, who just want a quick treat before sitting down and doing real jobs. For the curious in the afternoons, who run their fingers over your bookshelves and sit down for a place to think. It’s a place for the nerdy, and the lazy, and the studious, and the dreamers. It’s yours, and it’s kind of romantic.

“I know it’s not a lot of people’s dreams, to open a café. It’s… childish, as my mother would say,” you tell him. “But it’s more than just a shop to me. It’s owning a business, running something on my own, creating new things for people to try. It’s perfecting my bakes, and now, teaching others to. Coming up with recipes is one of my favorite things, even more than the latte flavor of the month. Giving people a place to come and be comfortable, y’know?”

You’re rambling again, and you find yourself hiding behind a sip of your wine, but he’s nodding. Like he gets it.

“I don’t think it’s childish at all,” he tells you, in a tone that makes your heart swell. “A dream is a dream, isn’t it? We all have them.”

And maybe you’re putting a lot on Aaron Hotchner, but it’s nice to get to know someone who understands, even just a little.

One date turns into two, and then three. They’re spread out, over a couple of weeks, the two of you stealing a few hours when you can. It’s the dating life of two very busy people, but neither of you mind. Each pairing of dinner and drinks is full of life and laughter and a little bit of something else.

You feel so guilty when the next time you’re meant to spend time together, another late evening, has to get pushed back. Aaron had warned you that the first cancellation would probably come from him, but it’s you texting at 5:30, letting him know that your usual closer bailed because of the flu.

It’s not a problem for me to take over, but it means that I’m going to be here until 10:00 or 10:30 cleaning up and prepping the dough for tomorrow morning. :(, you say, and add the frowny face for effect. You prefer them over emojis, just because you can’t draw emojis on coffee cups.

Frowny faces are pretty serious, he quips, but your little chuckle is weak when you read it in between orders.

I’m so, so sorry, I know it’s last minute.

Don’t worry, he texts back, quick as can be. I promise I understand. We’ll just do next week.

You’re sure? I can try and find someone to cover for an hour, at 7:30 or so.

Don’t put that stress on yourself. Next week, and it’ll be extra special to make up for it.

So that’s that. Your heart breaks a little knowing you won’t see him, but his words make you feel a little less guilty. Only marginally, really, but you have other things to focus on, like the onslaught of cleaning that comes after the doors are locked.

At 9:30, you’re sending the last stragglers away, which gets you a late start to cleaning up. Your stomach is rumbling, too, because dinner at your home didn’t end up happening.

But at 10:00, when all seems lost, and you’re realizing that 10:30 is going to be more like 11:00, Aaron’s there.

At first you don’t even realize it’s him. You’re so focused on scrubbing and cleaning the espresso machine that the person standing outside isn’t even a thought. But then your phone buzzes, and when you look over, it’s him, with a bag of something that looks like food.

You going to leave me out in the cold?

You snort at the text, shaking your head, lifting your hands and showing the suds to him through the glass. “Two minutes,” you mouth over, and he smiles at that. At you.

You’re hurrying to wash and dry your hands on the towel at your waist, and when you make your way to the door he hasn’t stopped smiling at you. The door unlocks with a clank, and when you pull it open the cold air rushes in, along with Aaron Hotchner. Of course, it’s hard to acknowledge him, when you can smell what he brought you.

“Aren’t I the one who’s supposed to be making it up to you?” you remind him, but there’s something weak in your voice when you feel him pull you into a hug. With it, you feel his lips gently press against your hair.

It’s exactly what you needed. A break, some food, and him. And even though it’s only for a short moment, fifteen minutes while you scarf down what he’s brought you, knowing he was there is what pushes you through the end of the night.

And the fact that Aaron sticks around to stack the chairs, his jacket off and sleeves rolled up?

It helps a little bit, too.

-

Derek’s embarrassed, but he’s the last to catch on. And only because it’s right in his face. 

To be fair, he wasn’t exactly looking. There were other things to worry about, bigger fish to fry, and Hotch’s love life wasn’t exactly top of the list. But Emily mentions the possibility, and then Garcia, and then even Rossi makes a comment that gets him a dirty look from the boss.

Coming together to gossip about Hotch’s love life is at the very least entertaining and watching the team watch their boss becomes Derek’s pastime. Emily swears that he’s always texting someone with a grin on his face, and Garcia informs them of Hotch’s newest mug and his eyes as he did so (yeah, his eyes). Rossi doesn’t play along as much as the others would prefer, but he has a glint in his gaze when they bring it up.

Derek even does his best to spy, peek around corners when he knows Hotch is close, but even with his best efforts, he comes up empty-handed. For a minute, he almost thinks the team is pulling a prank on him, but his girl insists that something’s up.

“Baby, the look on his face. I’ve never seen such a wistful look at an innocuous cup of coffee before.” The two of them are lingering in her office after a long day, his offer of a ride home keeping him behind while she finishes something on her screens.

His snort comes with a shake of his head. “I���d believe it was indigestion at this point, over… what? A fling?”

“It’s Hotch,” Garcia laughs. She reaches up, poking Derek in that arm. “You really think he’s the type of have a fling? No. Whoever it is, they matter, and matter enough that he has not let that mug come off of his desk. He uses it every day, Derek. Every. Day.”

Point taken, but Derek is still skeptical. It’s a coffee mug.

He takes the bait, though. He watches and waits. Observes. But Hotch is often a door that stays closed.

Until everything seems to go to shit one day and he has to open up.

It’s a really bad case, and the jet is a last-minute decision. The whole team thinks they’re going home, after just landing back, and end up with thirty minutes to pack for a plane back to Nashville. Sure, Derek understands, but he has plans he has to cancel, too (plans that Emily teases him relentlessly about once it all calms down). Overall, not the best way to end the week.

Everyone goes to make their respective phone calls, or at least, those that need to. But before Derek can put his phone up to his ear, moving to the conference room for some privacy, he hears him.

Hotch.

He’s just on the other side, and talking softly, but the sudden shift means not much else is happening besides last-minute packing. So Derek hears, and he eavesdrops.

And he listens.

“I’m so sorry to do this to you. I know that there wasn’t any warning –“ Hotch immediately starts, but whoever is on the other end must him off. He follows it up with the slightest hum and it’s… warm. It makes Derek’s eyebrow lift, but he keeps his distance, tries to glance around the corner.

Hotch is sitting, leaning on the edge of the round table. His legs are crossed, and his face is tilted downward. He looks pained, with the furrow in his brow, but the person on the other end seems to be talking sense. After all, Hotch lifts his hand and wipes, and the furrow is gone, and he’s smiling again.

“I know, but. Putting it into practice is still hard for me. Jack… he’s… he’s a strong kid, but I know days like these are the hardest.”

There’s some more words from the person on the other end of the line. Hotch smiles, a small private thing and Derek sees, in that moment, what Penelope means. About it being… different. And in that moment, Hotch is thrown back to Haley, and it looked like for his boss to get to talk to her.

There’s an echo of that here.

“I owe you, really. Jess will come and relieve you as soon as she can… Okay. Thank you, again, and I’ll call you when we land back in Nashville, okay? And if I could talk to Jack, then… Perfect. Okay. Have a good night, yeah?”

Derek’s gone, before Hotch finishes his conversation. His hand is holding his phone up to his ear, walking down towards the stairs. But there’s no one on the other end, and all he can think about is how Penelope is going to say how much she told him so.

-

Three dates turn into ten. There are dinners and lunches and time stolen when the two of you can. There’s coffee in the mornings and decaf in the evenings. He teases you for it, your downright addiction, but a couple of kisses that taste like French vanilla follow it.

It’s sweet. And you like the way he tastes even without the coffee on his lips.

However, you know it’s more than just sweet dates. There’s layers to Aaron Hotchner, ones that get peeled back alongside yours. It’s opening up to each other, on walks after dinner. Those are good, the two of you, side-by-side, because it’s an even playing field. No bar between the two of you, no coffee shop, no badge. Just. You both.

You tell him about home, and what it meant to leave. He’s seen the impact of your mother, the way she winds you up and leave you hanging, but you tell him about the tan line on your ring finger. The way you were left broken and nowhere to go but away to follow a dream, because the dream was the only lifeline you had left. What else could you do, with a hobby and a throwaway degree in business admin?

He tells you about Haley. About her laugh, about her smile. About the way they would poke and prod and teach each other until the two of them were rolling on the floor. You see how much he loved her, how much he loves her still. And when he talks about Jack, well, there’s nothing that can stop him from absolutely gushing, and you don’t want him to. Seeing this just affirms that Jack’s the luckiest kid in the world to have a father that cares about him so much.

There are layers, to each of you. But like a good chocolate-filled croissant, the insides are worth it.

And you get to meet Jack, and Jess. Finally, it feels like, after hearing so much about each of them. The four of you end up going to the zoo, on a weekend, an outing with Aunt Jess and Dad’s new friend, and by the end of it you’re smitten with all of them. Because Jack gets a lot from his father. A fierce protectiveness, a kind heart, incredible perception, and a love of chocolate ice cream.

“Do you like chocolate?” he asks you, suddenly, as the four of you eat your scoops from the vendor. Hotch and Jess are chatting, so they don’t hear the question.

“I like chocolate a lot,” you tell him. “What about you?”

He seems to ponder it a second, before shrugging, taking a long lick of his cone. “It’s all right. Second favorite to mint chip, but above cookie dough.”

You laugh a little, seeing the logic. “I see. I think if you switch cookie dough and mint chip, we’re on the same page there, buddy.”

He nods. “What about my dad? Where does he go?”

It’s a jump you can’t connect, and you raise a brow at him, stopping in your tracks and Jack doing the same.

“On the list. Of things you like. Where’s Dad go?”

“Oh.” Your cheeks are flushing, and you realize that Jess and Aaron have stopped their conversation, are watching the two of you. But there’s only one true answer, and you smile at him. “Well, he’s at the top of the list, Jack. I really like your dad, and… I hope I can keep spending time with the two of you. And Aunt Jess, of course.”

There’s a beat. Jack takes a long lick of his cone, getting some on his nose, and then shrugs again, a little bashful as he looks at you again.

“Yeah, that’d be cool. I like talking to you. And Aunt Jess doesn’t like chocolate, so I like that you’re on my team.”

You try to ignore the warmth that immediately floods you, especially when you look back behind you and Aaron is watching, his head ducked behind his cone so you can only see the edges of his smile. “I like being on your team, too,” you agree, leaning forward to offer a napkin, and Jess just chuckles, the four of you continuing on your merry way.

Things push forward. And some days are harder than others.

It’s complicated, after all. The more you learn about Aaron’s job, the more you realize how much he gives to it. And some of those days leave him worn down. You do your best to support him, to support all of them. And in return, they do the same for you.

The call comes in the middle of the day, and when you see it’s from Aaron you immediately smile. Your hands are elbow deep in a yeasted dough you’re kneading for fresh cinnamon rolls, but you’re able to lean down and answer it with your nose.

“Just a second, sweetheart.” You pull your hands from the mess, move to lift your phone to your shoulder and trap it with your ear. You feel a crick in your neck immediately, but it’s worth it. “Hey, sorry. I’m at the shop. Didn’t want to put you on speaker.”

“It’s okay,” he returns, and he sounds tired. Even in two words, it seems like he has to take a breath, to steady himself. “How’s the day going?”

You shrug, humming as you continue to work the ball of dough under your knuckles. “It’s all right. Ashley is running the register and Ben’s helping her work the front. They’re doing a good job. Makes it easy to focus on the good stuff.”

Aaron chuckles, just a little. It’s reserved. “You should bring some samples home to Jack, then. He loves taste-testing for you.”

There’s a pause, both in your hands and your response.

“Just Jack, then.”

His breath comes out again. Long and low. “Yeah. The case… we thought we had it solved, and then. Something came up. We’re flying back again, waiting for the jet to refuel.”

You know what that means. Even if he doesn’t often tell you, directly, outright, you know that it means another body. Another life lost. “Oh, sweetheart.”

“I had already called Jess, told her I’d be picking up Jack. Would you mind going to get him? I don’t want to jerk her around.”

“Of course.” It’s immediate, and you glance at your watch, blowing off remnants of flour. “He gets out at 4:00?”

“Yeah. I’m so sorry to do this to you, I know there wasn’t any warning –“

You click your tongue. “It’s not a problem. You know that. Besides, this dough rests overnight, and I can do some experimenting using your incredible oven, hmm?”

Aaron just lets out a little chuckle. There seems to be some relief there, but you can’t tell right away. “I know, but. Putting it into practice is still hard for me. Jack… he’s… he’s a strong kid, but I know days like these are the hardest.”

You nod, giving your neck a little stretch as you lift your shoulder to carry the load of the phone. “I know. It’s hard for him, and for you. But it’ll work out, okay? Just promise me you’ll be safe, for all of us.”

“I owe you, really,” he tells you. “Jess will come and relieve you as soon as she can…”

“She doesn’t need to rush. We’ve got it.”

And with that, you know it’s a load off of his mind. One you can take from him. “Okay. Thank you, again, and I’ll call you when we land back in Nashville, okay? And if I could talk to Jack, then…”

“I’ll make sure he’s available,” you reassure him, and his little sigh is… just what you needed to hear. To know that his head will be where it needs to be when he flies.

“Perfect. Okay. Have a good day, yeah?”

“I will. I love you.”

It comes out. Automatically. Your hands stop working again, and you feel color on your cheeks. Aaron doesn’t say anything either, and the two of you seem to sit in a kind of dangerous limbo.

But then he just chuckles. A sound on the receiver, like he’s standing to his feet. “I love you, too.”

“Be safe.”

It’s a gentle farewell, and you can’t help but stare at your phone as it resumes its place on the countertop, staring at the screensaver you have. The two of you, and Jack, looking up at the camera.

It works. It’s complicated, and comes from nowhere, but it works. The three of you, working together to build something special. You’ll never replace Haley, but you don’t to. It’s new, and brilliant, and happy, and you find that you have another dream taking shape, one that has the Hotchners front and center.

-

(And Reid? Well.

Spencer’s not unaware. Spencer actually puts all of the pieces together before almost anyone else, including your identity.

“I think you’ll find that I’m what you would call perceptive. Very perceptive.”

That’s what he says to Derek, at least, when he asks him how he already knew who the mystery date was. Dave offers Hotch a plus-one to a night over at the Rossi mansion for the team and their significant others, and Hotch actually takes him up on it. That’s when they meet you, for the first time, but Reid’s the only one who doesn’t seem to be surprised who walks through the door.

But no one else has been to the coffee shop that’s on the mug, or has seen the person that Hotch has been texting and calling, and… well.

Spencer has had the pleasure of doing both all in one morning. Because next to the coffee shop you work at is a bookstore specializing in rare editions, and one day Spencer decides to go before work.

He adds a little eyebrow wiggle to his words for Derek’s sake, too, which gets him punched in the shoulder.

It’s worth it.)

-

“You didn’t have to bring me breakfast,” you tell him, crossing your arms over your chest.

It’s a little firm, especially since you now know that Aaron’s drives have been fifteen minutes longer to stop at your place. The direct route to the FBI Headquarters breezes right by you, and getting off and stopping is definitely out of the way.

But he doesn’t care. And truly you don’t, when it’s him and you realize that the bag he has contains one warm sausage roll, and a glazed donut, fresh from the shop by his place. that melts when you bite into it. “I know you didn’t eat anything, and you hate trying to snack on the stuff you have yet to sell in the morning,” he says. Shrugging, as if it’s that simple, because to him, it is. “And I wanted to.”

“Did you get something for yourself, too?” you ask him.

“I wasn’t the one who had to leave in a hurry, was I?” he teases. His eyes are deep and dark, and you get caught in them when you catch his meaning.

Your face turns a crimson that he smirks at, leans forward to make it brighter with a kiss on your cheek. “Well, I wasn’t the one who was insisting on some last minute… affection,” you shoot back, but all that elicits is a low chuckle from him, all bass and gravel. “Besides, Mr. Profiler – question with a question. You didn’t eat, did you?”

He doesn’t answer, choosing instead to lean against the countertop you’re sitting on, watching as you pull out the two treats and placing them on some napkins you have right at the front. But his non-answer is definitely a ‘no,’ and you give him a look.

“One day I’m going to teach you to take care of yourself as well as you take care of others, okay? Here. We’ll split ‘em.”

You snag a plastic knife, and get to work, and soon there are two perfectly portioned plates of pastry in front of the two of you. It’s early enough that customers aren’t exactly a problem, and so you don’t feel guilty sitting on the counter when you know you’ll wipe it down, or leaning down to kiss some glaze off of his lips since there’s no one to see or an order to distract you from.

Of course, neither of you notice the eyes that happen to glance in the window. Not when Hotch is standing between your legs, facing away from the glass, and not when you pull back just to look into his eyes, and in the end it doesn’t matter that a tall and lanky fellow profiler managed to sneak a peek.

Because that’s when you start to feel that your luck has really changed. The early morning before the workday, when the world just starts to come alive. There, in your shop, before the sign has even been flipped to open.

And there, in your coffee shop, as you sit on the counter, you realize that Aaron-with-two-As, standing between your legs, could possibly be the love of your life after all.

tag list: @emilyxprentiss // @genevievedarcygranger // @quillvine // @falcon-arrows // @afuckingshituniverse // @sercyan // @sparklingkeylimepie // @kianagilder-blog // @alexxcorona113 // @mandyandy22 // @thedeaddrop // @angelsbabey // @lolychu // @icyprincess // @gabbygabbie // @cevanswhre // @roses-and-grasses // @mayaaaa // @baadmaxx // @ssaic-jareau // @mooneylupinblack // @rachelxwayne // @greenie128 // @dilaudidwinchester // @stylesboy // @grandpascurtains // @softbibxtch // @winterscaptain // @hurricanejjareau

[capricxs]

so you’ve been roleplaying for years... things change, the way the community does things shift, and sometimes there’s new skills you need to pick up and adjust to in order to make your time rping as creatively rich and fulfilling as it can be. one of those things that’s become extremely important is plotting & hcing. either in groups, in indie, or doing 1x1s, these two are the foundation to your interaction (unless you’re the type to wing it). sometimes when i interact with people, it seems they don’t really click with this process, so in the guide below, i’ll help to explain why these are so important, and how to do it in a way that not only gives you a rich plot, but helps inspire and keep your writing partner engaged with you.

disclaimer --- this is just my personal experience and opinions being shared. i am not the end-all-be-all on how to interact with writing partners. this is just here to get people to begin thinking about things they otherwise wouldn’t have thought about.

questions regarding this help post can be found here. let’s jump in!

WHY IS PLOTTING & HCING SO IMPORTANT?

firstly, rp has changed a lot since the days of launching into an rp or writing a random starter for a new follower. things are a lot more established and regardless of if you’re in a bio/skeleton rp with pre-written connections, or you’re in a new plotless group or indie and you’re coming up with them on your own, it’s a major foundation to your writing experience, so don’t treat it lightly!

secondly, regardless of format, and with the shifts in rp culture, behind the scenes plotting & hcing is crucial to the development of your plot & characters. as writers, we take more time with our replies so development on dash happens a lot slower. personally i don’t mind that, but i don’t want that to hinder my writing experience so i like taking things behind the scenes to help build up dynamics and situations so the whole relationship isn’t based off one or two threads/instances.

lastly, it helps to keep things inspiring. sound dumb? you bet, but that’s the way the cookie crumbles baby. so many times i have plotted ships, sibling relationships, best friends, or other core relationships, and wanted to sink my teeth in relationship lore and background and dynamics, only to be returned with “hahah yes! i love that!” now i understand this is never ill-intentioned, but it does suck the muse right out the situation. if you do not validate & expand on your partner’s ideas, it’s not going to make that writer’s ideas feel appreciated or loved. the way to tell them you love their ideas? sink your teeth right back and send an equally meaty response right back!

PART ONE: SO YOU WANT TO PLOT

you don’t need this post to tell you how to come up with plot ideas, that’s a whole different guide, but let’s say you’re in the brainstorming process. you’re throwing ideas back and forth based on your muse’s two backgrounds and seeing what sticks. what is SUCH a downer, is when a writing partner is just ... not contributing. yes, we are all guilty of the line “i’m open to anything!” but try and limit yourself to using that line once in a conversation. hell, i prefer it when a person doesn’t even say it at all and they’re HONEST. if i come in guns-a-blazing and i ask ‘what plots do you need filled?’ if a person responds with ‘i need someone who hurt my muse’ there’s two option, i fill that plot, or i don’t. it’s that simple. don’t be afraid to say what you want, the worst that can happen is the person says ‘eh, i don’t really think that fits my character’ and you come up with something else! but when you’re already passionate about the idea, you’re setting yourself up for such great success!

so what do you do when your one (1) braincell isn’t working and you can’t come up with any connection ideas? two options, you can either go to one of the dozens of guides for basic connection ideas and give your partner something, or you can look at the other person’s bio, and your muse, and try and find connections between them. both of these are painfully easy! i’m a personal fan of the latter as it seems a bit more grounded and juicy than the former, but those can be twisted into something great too! **if you’re in a group setting, even asking what that person’s other connections are, and piggybacking off of that. these create super spicy connections. example: you find out muse a is muse b’s ex, and your muse, muse c, is best friends w muse b, so it’s safe to assume your muse c will probably not get along with muse a.

this important thing is not to make your partner feel like they’re doing all the work. because that’s never fun, and truthfully, it doesn’t make that person want to write with you if you’re not also putting in the elbow grease. plotting is fun, not a chore! make it a party!

PART TWO: NOW YOU HAVE TO BACK IT UP

you’ve got your plot now, congrats! and you’re so excited. but now you need that plot to be fleshed out a bit. there’s some history there so you’ve got to establish it. in comes the powerhouse--- my favorite part to this whole thing: HCING. it’s the most laid back, and in my opinion, creative part of the rping process. truthfully, i enjoy it more than threads because of the absolute insanity you can dig up. but i only love it if my partner can hand it back just as i can serve it.

maybe you’ve never quite thought that this part was that important, but i can assure you, if a person is giving you 3+ sentences about the dynamic of your characters, they’re trying to hc with you, and if you don’t enrich them, your dynamic is going to wither away.

i brought up an idea in the first part of this guide that’s extremely important to how you hc with your writing partner: VALIDATE & EXPAND. it’s the idea that no matter how much or how little your rp partner gives you in terms of an hc, you respond to it with a validation, which can range anywhere from ‘i LOVE that’ to as simple as a key smash and the pleading emotion, or even repeating a fraction of what they said to show you understand their vision. but then you have to back that up with expanding on that idea. hcs could be about a situation or about your writing partner’s character, so expand on how your character feels and reacts to things. it’s beyond discouraging when i write a whole idea out, explaining how my character feels in this emotionally intense setting, and my writing partner only gives me the validation portion, and now i have no idea how my opp’s character thinks, feels, or interacts.

see, a point i mentioned above is the fact that threads don’t work like they used to. and that’s fine! but hcing is an easy and fun way to make up for the fact that we take time with our threads now. if you’re rping to find rich, in-depth, satisfying dynamics, it’s going to take many many months to get your understanding of your opp’s muse, and the relationship they have, hcing fast tracks that process. i’m writing with you, i love your muse, give me the dirty details, i promise it’s not obnoxious. the more your give back, the more you will receive. so why wait around, sitting on our thumbs for me to fully get a grasp of your character’s voice, and your character’s thoughts, when we could do that on chat and have a grand time.

but now you’re thinking to yourself: okay, but how exactly do i validate and expand? and for that, we go to EXAMPLE-BOT 3000 !! not a real bot, unfortunately, but example bot has dug up a personal interaction i’ve had hcing. for context, this is a 1x1 writing partner i’ve had for years. we have an excellent dynamic and they are perfect. they have also given me permission to use our convos as example.

here is my message [ CONTEXT: this is a sandbox-star-wars-esque verse]

Okay but I had a thot in the shower,,, where the best thoughts are had. And what if,,, after this meeting and they part ways and such and it was just another weird occurrence in their lives, blastis gets a mission and it’s either to protecc salia or like guide salia across the galaxy to do something smth and save some lives or whatever. And ofc not because she couldn’t take care of herself but he has smth she doesn’t that gives an edge or just a close loved one of her’s didn’t want to see her get hurt. So you have these two traveling across the galaxy,,, sometimes arguing bc she can manage herself but he’s just fulfilling the mission. And them both kicking but. And all the steamy tension and cliches.

let’s break this message down before we get into the response. first, hcs don’t have to be formal. they are the most fun when they’re less together and don’t rely so much on “sounding good”. you’re just rolling off the top of your brain, chatting like you would with a friend, don’t worry too much on formalities because this isn’t the place for that.

i am also presenting my idea in a way that is confident, and with plenty of ideas to work on. i am involving my partner’s character but not godmodding. i am taking things i have learned from character introductions (like salia being independent and empowered, and wanting to do good/help others) and not disrespecting them, but having her take part in the plot. there are also small bits at the end of this idea that are little nuggets to build off of.

let’s look at my partner’s response.

AAAAH okay i love the idea!!! however shes a v. freelance kinda healer and doesnt really take official things. and she doesnt have loved ones that would know if there was danger - she can telepathically communicate with her own people but if she doesnt want them to know things they cant just. force their way in its a Closed Communication line not an open invitation into her thoughts asdfghjsh. But i could imagine that some guy or family hire her to find their children maybe who were lost on their adventure/mission with friends and the last message sounded like one was hurt,,, badly. and the other cant help for some reason. and they hire blastis to both protect her and later the people shes supposed to heal??

but anYWAY the Important part is ofc. the tension. and his big ass in her ship bc why would she?? take another if hers is right there. so hes gonna take that single bed and not complain. but ooof those two?? just kicking ass and being amazing. growing on each other more and more.

right off the bat is validation. and validation doesn’t have to be as direct as it is in this message. the validation is important here specifically, my partner showed they were interested and supportive of the idea i presented, but needed the plot to fit in their character’s story better. we see them making adjustments--- this is a collaborative experience so i alone shouldn’t be the one coming up with the plot, nor would i want my idea taken just as is. instead they mold it to fit what makes sense, getting more specific than my idea with a “mission purpose”. this is where the bouncing off of each other begins.

they then take the “bait” and start building on the tension our muses will experience (this is a ship afterall). while this is the beginning of our conversation, and there’s aren’t specific moments we’re working off of, this is setting the ground for future headcanons (see: the focus on sexual tension, living in a ship together, kicking butt), we are both mutually giving each other little tethers to take hold of. this is a very good start to begin working out the dynamic and situations these two characters are found in, with multiple different launch-off points.

CONCLUSION

there’s no right or wrong way to rp. even the tips listed here might not be applicable to your style, just having the idea in the back of your mind helps. the important thing is you and the person you’re writing with are having fun. you both are respecting each other’s time and ideas and creating a beautiful dynamic or world or relationship. this is a collaborative experience, and it’s important not to leave your partner feeling like they’re doing all the heavy lifting creatively.

hope this helped! as always, you can send me any questions you have in regards to this topic HERE. you can find a tag of answered questions in relation to this topic HERE.

[sadsilktrader]

Secret Admirer

I apologize for my extreme tardiness for posting to the Geraskier Holiday Exchange. This was written for @gotfanfiction 

A modern Geraskier AU in which Jaskier is receiving gifts from an admirer.

...

"I'm telling you Yen, the man doesn't even know I exist. It can't be him," Jaskier paced the living room of his small apartment, small watering can in hand, completely forgotten. His plants looked on forlornly. 

"Hm," she replied, he could hear the scritch-scratch of the emery board while she only half-listened to his prattling. "All I'm saying is that he was there at the pub the night you played and he lives in your building and he can hear you when you practice and those have all been the nights you've got gifts from your secret admirer." 

"Half the building goes to that pub, it could be anyone! Plus, he doesn't even know I exist. " He flopped dramatically onto the couch, spilling water on himself. "Anyway, I'll let you go do whatever important business you have to do. You'll be here before my show on Saturday with Triss, right?" 

"We'll be there. We just have to drop Ciri off at her dad's first. Now promise me you'll at least talk to him next time you see him."

"Maybe." He grumbled. 

"What was that?"

"Fine, fine! I promise!" 

"You better. I'm tired of listening to you wistfully sigh every time we speak."

"You're the worst."

"I love you too Jaskier, bye." 

The phone clicked. 

He'd met Yen online, a friend of a friend of a friend. They played DnD together, starting off as catty enemies and somehow developing into the deep friendship they had now. She was a good person, just a little rough around the edges. Well, very rough around the edges. 

She'd settled down a lot over the last few years when motherhood had fallen into her lap though. He wasn’t certain about all the details, they were close but she was a private person. She shared custody of her adopted daughter, Ciri, with her ex. He'd never had the pleasure of meeting the man but he'd heard enough about him to form his own opinions. Heart in the right place but not exactly open about his feelings. 

Sounded a lot like his own mysterious love. He sighed again, there was no way it was his gorgeous and stoic upstairs neighbor. The man was gorgeous and kind and lovely. He was tall and pale with silky white hair. Not to mention outrageously muscular. Jaskier had seen him in their apartment's gym working out on more than one occasion. It had taken every ounce of his self-control to keep himself from openly ogling him. He'd seen him feeding the feral cat that lived in the parking lot. Helping their elderly neighbors with their groceries. Playing with his daughter on the weekends. The man was too good to be true. Which was why he was absolutely positive he couldn't be the one leaving the gifts at his door. 

The mystery man was perfect but he, Julian Alfred Pancratz, college drop out, jobless, barely squeezing by with the money he made by doing odd jobs in the apartment complex and occasionally performing at the neighborhood pub, was an absolute mess. There was no way someone like the man would give him more than a passing glance. 

He sat up quickly leaving the forgotten, spilled watering can to the side to search for his notebook and pen. At least all the angst and longing seemed to also be a fantastic inspiration. 

...

He chewed his lip, the leather-bound notebook balanced on his knee. He strummed a few chords on his guitar before setting it back carefully down to scribble something down. 

The sun was fully set now and his balcony light had flicked on giving the small area an ethereal glow. He loved the process of writing and creating outside where he could feel the world around him. There was something about feeling the gentle breeze against him, the sun and moon shining down on him, and the fluttering hummingbirds that visited his feeder that just felt right.  

He stretched and yawned and was contemplating packing up for the night when he heard it. A barely-there, soft knock at his door. Eyes gone wide he all but threw his things down and ran to the door to open it. No one. As always. There was however a small box tied in a ribbon and a note attached. 

A voice so sweet deserves something sweet in return. -love, your admirer 

He undid the ribbon and opened the box. Inside was an assortment of homemade chocolates. He popped one in his mouth and let it slowly melt over his tongue. Dark chocolate, caramel, sea salt. He couldn't help the sappy smile that plastered itself on his face and would stay there the rest of the night. 

It had been a little over a month since the gifts started arriving. Most of the time they were baked goods or sweets of some kind but occasionally it was something different.  A clutch of flowers, a silver bracelet with music notes engraved, once there was even a picture of a particularly beautiful sunrise left for him. He treasured them all. 

He was a hopeless romantic down to the core of his being. He had never met his admirer but he was sure it would be love at first sight.

…

He was bone tired. He'd spent the day hauling furniture away to the thrift store and painting the walls of one of his elderly neighbors who was soon moving to a rest home. For all the work he was paid thirty dollars and a batch of very good snickerdoodle cookies. He knew it was all the woman could afford to give him and he was grateful for that. Not exactly enough to pay the rent but enough to buy a few groceries at least. 

He stood in the deli section, weighing out the pros and cons of value pack meats when he saw him. The man, his white hair hanging loose around his shoulders, dark jeans, and a leather jacket. His breath hitched and his mouth went dry. 

Gods how can anyone look that attractive just going to the grocery store. 

The man looked up, catching him staring. His eyes the color of amber and honey. He felt like a deer in the headlights caught in his gaze. A few faint scars visible on his face and neck. He couldn't help but wonder if there were more on the rest of the man's body and felt a blush rise to his cheeks. 

"It's leaking." The man said.

"What?"

"The honey ham your holding, it's leaking."

He stared at the gorgeous being before him for a moment longer before it clicked. 

"Oh fuck," he dropped the squishy package on the ground, ham juices splashing on the both of them. 

"Oh, gods I'm so sorry," he wasn't sure his face could get any redder. 

"It's okay, really. I've had much worse things spilled on me before. You looked pretty lost in thought."

An employee glared at him with a mop and trash can. He smiled awkwardly, wishing he could just disappear. 

"You're the musician, right? I live in the apartment above yours. I can hear you playing from my living room." The way the man said it had him wondering if that was a good thing or not. 

"I'm Julian, well Jaskier to my friends and fans." He mustered up the courage he usually reserved for the stage and gave the man his best smile. 

"Geralt. I'd shake your hand but," He nodded to his arms full of groceries. "You know when you go into the store thinking you only need one thing?" 

"Well, you're in luck," he gestured to his cart, "I just so happen to have the best cart in the store. Not a squeaky wheel in sight." 

"Are you sure?" 

"Absolutely! The life of a musician leads to a very sparse diet. More than enough room for both of us. Plus we're headed to the same place." 

Geralt had an amused smirk on his face that made Jaskier's heart skip a beat. Conversation between them came easy. Geralt was the quieter of the two but his dry wit and cheesy jokes had him laughing harder than he had in ages. Handsome and funny. 

They made their way back to the apartment complex walking slower than was necessary, he noticed. 

"So you have a daughter? I'm not stalking you or anything, I just noticed her around the complex sometimes."

"Ciri," he replied. "My ex and I share custody, its-" he sighed, running his hand through his hair, "it's a bit of a complicated situation actually. But they’re moving closer soon and that should help.”

The elevator stopped at his floor and he stepped off. 

“So, I’ll be seeing you.” he mentally berated himself for not being able to come up with something more clever. The door was closing between them and he suddenly shot his hound out, stopping the door. 

“Actually, and please forgive me if this is too forward, maybe I could give you my number and we could grab a coffee sometime? Or do our grocery shopping together again?”

Geralt chuckled before reaching into his pocket, tapping at the screen a few times, and passed it over. He added his number with the name Jaskier followed by a heart and music note emoji. The moment the elevator door closed he was dancing, groceries in hand, for his forwardness paying off for once. 

…

It was colder tonight but he still played outside until his fingers were near numbing. His cheeks were flushed red from the cold. After his run-in with the man, he felt like he was walking on clouds. The world was at peace and he was the luckiest man in the world. He’d almost forgotten about his secret admirer completely until the same soft knock came from outside the door. Today was different though. Today he was brave and he had left a note for his admirer to find.

I beg of you to reveal yourself to me. I will be performing at the Royal Oak this Saturday. Please, wear this token so I may recognize you amongst the other patrons. Love, Jaskier

He strained his ears and purposely walked slowly to the door, giving his admirer time to leave the gift and find his note. He swore he heard mumbling of words. He closed his eyes and counted to ten before opening the door. 

His note was gone and in place of it a container he opened to reveal a miniature-sized three-layered cake elaborately decorated with chocolate-covered strawberries. It was, as always, delicious to the point of sin. 

He felt a twinge of guilt. He didn’t want to string along his admirer, especially if things with Geralt turned out well. But he was getting ahead of himself. They had spoken once and here he was already planning their life together. 

…

The next few days passed quickly. His wish of getting more work around the complex had come true but he was, unfortunately, unable to do any more practice for his upcoming performance. Every day he came back to his apartment with every intention of playing only to wake up from an unintentional five-hour nap on his couch. 

To make matters worse, he hadn’t received a single text from Geralt, and since his sleep schedule was completely messed up he hadn’t caught a single glimpse of him since their last accidental meeting. He thought of swinging by his place to invite him to his show but decided against it. Maybe he needed some space? Maybe he had come off as too clingy? The doubts and second-guesses were mounting.

He arrived at the pub early to set up and get some practicing in before going on stage. Geralt wouldn’t be there but at least, he hoped, his soon-not-to-be secret admirer would be. Inside the note, he’d left a silver brooch of a songbird in flight. It was small but something he would instantly recognize. The glimmer of it from the stage lights would catch his attention. At least that’s what he was hoping. He felt more nervous about this performance than he had in a long while.

“You okay there Jaskier?” The voice came from behind him and he turned to see Triss, her curls down, beautifully framing her face. 

“Oh thank the Gods,” he hugged her tight. 

“Where’s your better half?” he asked looking around the growing pub’s crowd. 

“Outside on the phone. It’s her ex, they don’t argue often but when they do,” she made a face. “Something about him needing her to watch their daughter.”

“Doesn’t he only see her on weekends? What an asshole.”

“Right?” 

He felt more at ease with a friendly face by his side and felt even better when Yennifer joined them. He was smarter than to ask her about the phone call and instead chatted about everything and anything to get his mind off his nerves. Time went by more quickly now and soon it was time for him to play. 

The second he stepped on stage his demeanor changed. Gone was any trace of nerves and doubt. The stage was his solace, the place he could bare his soul to the masses, or in this case to the forty-odd people crammed into the pub. 

It was halfway through his third song when he remembered to keep an eye out for his admirer. He scanned the crowd hoping for the familiar glint to catch his eye but there was nothing. He chewed his lip. 

The third song blended into his fourth and fifth. Still nothing. He took a break to grab a drink. He made small talk with Yennifer who raised a delicate brow at him. 

"Alright, spill it. What's got you so distracted?" 

He finished his drink and let his smile fall into a grimace. 

"I left a note. For my admirer. I asked them to come tonight. I left them something to wear so I would recognize them and-" 

"And they did show?" She finished for him. 

"Nope. Wait how did you know?" 

"First off you're terrible at hiding your emotions, and second I was fucking right and you owe me.”

“What?”

She laughed, shaking her head. “I guess I’m partially to blame, I should have realized it earlier.”

“I- what?” he asked again. 

“Jaskier. Darling. Sweetheart. I was right.” she said the words slowly as one would do to a small dog. 

“Right about what?”

“Your admirer. It’s your neighbor. You never told me but let me guess. Pale, white hair, roguishly handsome, looks like he could snap you in half like a twig?”

“How do you?” He was feeling a little faint now like he was at the edge of realizing something terrible.

“Your neighbor, your admirer, and my ex are all the same person.”

His eyes went wide. It all made sense. All the clues were there but he had just been too dense to put them all together. He’d seen pictures of Yenifer’s daughter but he’d never spent more than a passing glance at Geralt's visiting daughter. 

“Oh fuck.” he sat down, suddenly unsure of his legs beneath him. 

“He called me right before I came in going on about needing to go out for a few hours and if it was alright with me if he left Ciri alone.” she chuckled. “I told him to not be an asshole and spend time with his daughter.”

Jaskier’s head perked up. Geralt had wanted to come. He hadn’t blown him off. 

“I have to go. Fuck, I can’t leave in the middle of a set though.” 

Yennifer waved him off, “I’ll sort things off here, you go to him.”

He kissed the top of her head and gave her a quick, tight hug. “You would tell me if this bothered you right? I mean, he’s your ex and all.” 

“I think you two would do a very good job at evening each other out, now go!” She smacked him on the shoulder and off he went. 

…

He ran home, or at least halfway home before running out of breath and proceeded to briskly walk the rest of the way. He was still trying to decide what to say when he found himself outside the door, sweating profusely and looking an absolute mess. He knocked on the door before he talked himself out of it. 

“One minute!” A voice from beyond the door answered followed by the sound of an oven door closing and the chain sliding from the door’s lock. 

The door opened. He looked beautiful, even like this, wearing an apron covered in flour cocoa powder. Especially like this maybe. 

“I’m friends with Yennifer and she said it was you but I didn’t believe her and I didn’t realize that your daughter Ciri was also her daughter Cirilla which in retrospect should have clued me in but-” he took a deep breath in. Geralt looked nervous and his rambling wasn’t happening. He started over. 

“You’re my secret admirer?”

The man blushed. “I am. Is that okay?”

“Very, very okay.” He smiled. 

“Would you like to come in? I was just baking. For you.” his blush deepened and Jaskier heart felt like it would burst with affection. 

“I’d like that very much.”

[bill-beauxquais]

Blogging my Bravely Default II Playthrough - Chapter 2

Here we are for a new chapter!

As usual, spoilers for up to chapter 3′s title card below the cut (so all of chapter 2, none of chapter 3), you have been warned.

Overall opinion: The game is still fun to play and while I sometimes laments being so slow, I like that I can play a lot without feeling like I’m goind too fast. On a story standpoint, I’m a bit bummed that this chapter didn’t really make any real progress in its main thematics, but on a gameplay level, it was fun.

Gameplay: I talked about there being more strategy in battle already, but I realise I didn’t mention why. Compared to previous games, it seems like enemies use brave and default a lot more, and they actually go into negative. It happened in previous game, but if my memory serve, it was only certain enemies who had this quirk baked into them. Also, nearly all of them have counters and immunity, preventing you from just braving 4 times and calling it a day (albeit it still works reasonably often).

However, I did notice a flaw as well in the balancing. Some sidequests (most notably, the mushrooms sidequest) only opened to me after I finished the chapter’s story, but they took place in a dungeon where every enemy was WAY underpowered. I’m still getting underdog bonuses in the story, so I’m not overleveled. I don’t know what exactly unlocked the sidequest, but I checked everytime I set food in Wisward. On the other hand, the sidequest boss actually took me some planning, while I basically Yolo’d all the asterisks of the chapter. Weird. In the end, the whole dungeon was simply a long corridor (every enemy fleeing from me), with one tough boss at the end. Jarring.

Speaking of dungeon, this chapter really made them a lot longer than anything the serie had until now. On one hand, they can get a little boring and frustrating after a while, but on the other, I do like that they allow you to really train your new asterisks by putting more time between each of them, so overall I’d say it’s a positive.

Speaking of which, I finally looked into what you get from the boat, and I need to mention the inclusion of JP orbs, to give you JP experience on the go. It makes it easier to level up jobs without having to grind with ill matched teams, which is a good idea, since ill matched teams are sometimes really unforgiving because of the immunities and counters mentioned earlier. You still end up having to train jobs the old fashioned way, but any shortcut is good.

Speaking of grinding, I was surprised that I didn’t need to grind even once, for now. I wouldn’t qualify the asterisk battles of underwhelming, they took me half an hour on average and demanded strategy and quick thinking or risk taking, but I went into most of them with in-training teams full of ill matched underleveled and redundant jobs and still won. For me, that’s just the right difficulty to be interesting without getting frustrating.

My favorite asterisk of this chapter probably was the Shieldbearer for more Gloria Tankness (I also noticed it pairs well with White mage for a tanky healer)  , but Ranger is good as well (but I’m biaised from the previous games. Always liked hunter). I appreciate that they changed red mage to be less of a watered down mix of Black and White, but I’m not sure I’m using it very efficiently. It just doesn’t seems to deal a lot of damage, and I prefered the old one’s design. This one looks a lot more boring. As for Artist, I’m not really using it very well for now either. I feel like there’s already tons of debuffing skills in other classes.

I didn’t really get the point of Wayward Wood, since you know where the correct exit is, there’s not much point in making a looping/”lost wood” kinda dungeon, because it’s not like you will get lost (unless you’re doing it willingly the first time just to see what happens). Maybe it’ll open other paths later, who knows.

Writing: Still good, albeit I think i prefered Savalon. I suppose I expected to see more of Elvis’s backstory and family, why did he come study magic, how did Lady Emma pass away... But nothing of the sort. I don’t think like it really helped see Elvis any more in depth, sure he is a good friend, but that’s something we already could infer. I would’ve liked to see his character broken down more.

I’m always happy to see dead kids stories (don’t get me wrong, I love kids, but I also roll my eyes quite a lot when writers chicken out on having anything bad happen to a kid in their stories) but I don’t know if this was strong enough to be the focus of the entire chapter. I don’t think it had any connection to Musa’s downfall or the crystals. But I could see Wiswald coming back later in the story to tie back into these themes, and maybe that was just the Wiswald introduction chapter.

With the dead kids, crazy people, greenery, hunter & red mage asterisks, and those darn Mushrooms and flower enemies, it’s also hard to shake the feeling of this being Florem.02, and Florem will always be extra special to me.

Writing - Theories: Definitely called it for Edna’s veiled ass, although introducing that silver haired lady just before almost threw me for a loop. I’m assuming she’s the traveler handing out asterisks like candies, and Adelle probably knows (or at least she knows her sister is related to asterisks in some way)

I don’t know if I mentioned it, but I had a theory back when playing Default for the first time, that asterisk made people crazy or at least, more extreme, and that’s why they all made the perfect little mascot for theirs each time. And also why Ringabel *and* Artemia in the anthology lost their memories when they lost their asterisk: it plays into their brain and personalities. So, nice to see theory confirmed by the sequel.

As expected of its unredeemable bosses, Folie kicked the bucket, which begs the question: I fully expect them to have another gauntlet like the previous games. So is a timeloop/universe hopping all but confirmed at this point, or will this be something else? Will the characters’ deaths be retconed or explained away? I feel like some of these characters could be redeemed in a timeloop, and stopped an saved before they do much damage. The asterisk are pretty much the ones to blame in nearly every case for the sudden change of heart of their holders.

I’ve got that flimsy theory that Shirley is Emma’s kid, based on a similar hairstyle, the fact the gambler asterisk pairs well with black mage, and that Shirley mentioned her mother leaving her father. Who knows. I liked Shirley.

Adelle is definitely crushing hard on Elvis, but I think he’s pretty much ace. Interesting to see how this develops.

Graphics: Gonna hand it to them, i was impressed that they actually made a unique model for Mona, all to use it for one cutscene. Long gone are the days in which they just reused Yew and Magnolia’s models for Altair and Vega, two majors characters. This is the kind of attention to detail we like to see here. No cutting corners. They even made a model for the paintings, too.

The fog effect was pretty rad as well, and definitely got me running a few laps like a giddy kid. You like to see it.

Elvis’ head looked pretty big compared to his friends, noticeably so. But I suppose Bravely Default 1 and second weren’t that much better, and even worse. The main 4 were DEFINITELY chibised compared to other characters (which made Alternis look like a baby in the Eternian team)

Performance: I noticed a bit less lag, but I also made the battle speed slower, this is probably related. Else, it’s the same things.

Music: Elvis’ theme is pretty good. I remember listening to the first drafts that were datamined from the first demo back in the day, and it was already my favorite.

However, I wasn’t a fan of Wiswald’s overworld theme, and the city’s was forgettable.

[johannas-motivational-insults]

Adora might be autistic too

Alright, most people in the SPOP fandom agree that Entrapta is autistic, as her coding is extremely obvious. However, some of us also believe that our beloved protagonist Adora is on the spectrum as well. She comes off as quite the aspie, and while Asperger’s is no longer a diagnosis in the DSM-V (but is in other manuals), it falls under the blanket diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and its diagnostic criteria is still useful in analyzing people for signs of the disorder. In analyzing Adora’s character I will refer somewhat to both disorders, with the understanding that Asperger’s is a specific manifestation of ASD.

I would like to preface this by saying this is a headcanon and people are free to disagree with me. Some of these characteristics I’m going to bring up could also manifest because of her very sheltered upbringing in a cult-like atmosphere or mental illnesses such as anxiety and complex PTSD (both of which she arguably has). I am autistic myself, so obviously I am inclined to interpret these symptoms this way, but to each their own. It’s also worth noting that Adora has a lot of symptoms that cross over with AD(H)D, a cousin disorder to ASD, and it’s totally possible she has both.

In any case, there is now enough evidence hinting at Adora’s neurodivergence (especially now that the Rebel Princess Guide has been released) that I feel the need to explain this theory in detail instead of just occasionally mentioning it. So here goes...

She’s naive/easily manipulated

This one doesn’t really need explaining, we’ve all seen it. Adora assumes people are telling the truth because why would anyone lie to her? That is such a relatable spectrum feel. She was handily brainwashed by Shadow Weaver in the Horde, while some of the others didn’t seem to swallow the propaganda so easily. This is of course partly because of the special attention and affection Adora got from Shadow Weaver, but she had to be vulnerable to manipulation in the first place for it to work.

Later, she trusts Huntara easily in the Crimson Waste despite Bow and Glimmer’s warnings about her questionable character. Adora happily follows her into a trap even once Bow and Glimmer tell her they're going the wrong way, reasoning it’s probably a shortcut rather than reevaluating her misplaced trust. This can be partly explained by how she‘s gay af for Huntara, but still.

(Interestingly, the episode cuts straight from this moment to the obviously autistic Entrapta going against her own friend's advice and refusing to give up on the portal machine despite the obvious warning sign of Hordak’s violent dismissal. Parallels, much?)

Her difficulty understanding other points of view

A lot of Adora’s conflict with Catra is predicated on misunderstandings, and she has a hard time understanding the effects her actions have on other people, Catra in particular. For instance, she misunderstands Catra talking about ruling the Horde together as being purely about power, while Catra’s actual goals are safety and Adora’s companionship. That miscommunication is not just Adora’s fault, but it illustrates that she has difficulty understanding other people’s needs and motives without being explicitly told.

This isn’t just a problem with Catra, either. In general Adora has a difficult time understanding other’s motives and feelings. For instance, she doesn’t understand Glimmer’s insecurity over Bow’s friendship with Perfuma at Princess Prom, and she can’t fathom why Entrapta would choose to work for an evil faction, going so far as to assume she must have been brainwashed into it. This is because, just like with Catra, she doesn’t understand that some people’s priorities are not the same as hers.

Autistic kids tend to reach developmental milestones at different times than neurotypicals, sometimes being way ahead and other times falling behind. One such marker that is usually slower to develop and often stays impaired is theory of mind, our ability to a) understand that other people have different perspectives and b) understand those perspectives. Adora’s difficulties being able to put herself in someone else’s shoes definitely lines up with this symptom.

She’s clumsy

For someone so athletic, Adora sure lacks coordination. This is a commonly cited symptom of people with Asperger’s, though it shows up in people with other forms of ASD too. In general, autistic people often have difficulty with fine and/or gross motor skills, and this can lead to being accident and injury prone. According to Catra in 3x05, Adora bumps her head a lot. That may have just been a callback to 1x01, but either way clumsiness has been part of her characterization since the beginning, one of her many loveable, adorkable qualities.

Her lack of social and self awareness

Adora can be painfully oblivious to her own inappropriate behavior. There’s several examples of this throughout the series, one of the more costly ones coming at Princess Prom. Shocked by Frosta’s youth, Adora fails to register how maybe this (in front of Frosta, with all eyes on her) is not the time to remark on it. She immediately realizes this was the wrong thing to say (or at least not something she should shout), but that small delay causes both her and Glimmer a lot of embarrassment.

Part of the issue here is that she loses control of her volume, which in itself is a common problem for those of us on the spectrum. This isn’t the only time we see her have this problem, either, and it’s amplified (tee hee) when she’s drunk/infected.

More generally, one of the funniest examples of Adora’s poor social awareness comes when she barges into Huntara’s flirtation with the bartender in the Crimson Waste. She’s so focused on her task of recruiting Huntara that it doesn’t even occur to her that this is an intimate moment and intruding would be rude.

In the Rebel Princess Guide Adora also says she wishes Queen Angella would let her make some adjustments to the uniforms of the Bright Moon guards, which implies she tried to make these suggestions already. Maybe she figured She-Ra could suggest anything, but as both a newcomer and a royal subject that’s a bit of a faux pas. Chances are, that went right over Adora’s head.

She can’t read a room to save her life (literally)

This is another, more specific aspect of social awareness. Adora has difficulty picking up on the implicit rules (social norms) when she enters unfamiliar situations, and has a tendency to step on toes because of it. She also doesn’t understand when her friends try to nonverbally communicate what she’s doing wrong, and nonverbal communication deficits and problems with social awareness and insight are two major symptoms of ASD. One specifically listed example is “difficulties adjusting behavior to suit social contexts”, including:

Lack of response to contextual cues (e.g. social cues from others indicating a change in behavior is implicitly requested)

Unaware of social conventions/appropriate social behavior; asks socially inappropriate questions or makes socially inappropriate statements

Here’s a couple specific example of times where Adora misses or misunderstands nonverbal cues to change her behavior:

At her first Rebellion meeting she doesn’t realize that maybe she shouldn’t sit in the special-looking chair, and doesn’t clue in that that’s why everyone is freaking out.

In the Crimson Waste, Glimmer responds to the growling bar patrons surrounding them by suggesting that maybe these aren’t the kind of people they should be asking for help, but Adora persists. She jumps up on the bar and makes a speech trying to get directions (which is socially inappropriate for the context as well as dangerous), somehow missing all the scowls from the patrons as well as Bow and Glimmer’s wild gesturing.

Panic over unfamiliar social situations

Adora’s anxiety about going to Princess Prom could be attributed to many things, not just a spectrum disorder. Her obvious anxiety, for one, though to be fair there’s a high comorbidity between the two disorders. In any case, it seems the unfamiliarity of the situation is a sticking point for Adora in particular, while Bow and Glimmer are nothing but excited for their first ball.

Adora’s anxiety seems to stem mostly from being overwhelmed by the prospect of entering a new social situation with a whole bunch of unfamiliar rules to remember. She’s still learning behavioral norms outside of the Horde, and this is a huge jump up in terms of difficulty for her fledgling social skills.

To cope with her stress she goes overboard trying to prepare by making a conspiracy board of sorts, flash cards, and an obstacle course. And at the ball itself, it seems like she’s even rehearsed how to behave.

This probably isn’t only relatable to autistics, but it’s very relatable to us. Creating and rehearsing behavioral scripts is a common strategy to avoid embarrassing ourselves in public. Unfortunately, as we saw above, this works for about five seconds before Adora botches the whole thing by commenting on Frosta’s age.

Extreme stress over details

In general, Adora is a very anxious, perfectionistic person who hyperfixates on details, a very autistic trait. As mentioned above, this is wonderfully illustrated by her overpreparation for Princess Prom. She’s broken down the overwhelming list of rules in the invite into categories to make it more manageable, gone into detail categorizing people’s relationships to each other, and learned trivia about the guests in order to feel more prepared. Yet, somehow she missed the important fact that the hostess is only eleven years old.

Unfortunately this hangup doen’t only affect her, but also her friends and allies. The overarching theme in “Roll With It” is how debilitating Adora’s anxiety and perfectionism can be. Her eye for detail and ability to see flaws in plans is actually very valuable, but she gets so hung up on every possible thing that could go wrong that she can’t accept imperfect solutions with calculated risks.

Her propensity to be overwhelmed by too much information (like with the Princess Prom invite) shows up here too. Adora grows more and more frustrated and overwhelmed as more princesses join the planning session, adding more variables to deal with and more people to manage. She begins lashing out and shooting down every possible solution that doesn’t satisfy her need for perfection immediately. Her behavior looks like it may be headed for a meltdown until it culminates in an epic rant revealing all her anxiety and how it ties into her insecurities about her own imperfection.

Thankfully her friends are able to reassure her that she has support and doesn’t have to be perfect, but it’s an ongoing battle, one we already saw her struggle with in “Flowers for She-Ra” and “The Battle of Bright Moon”. It’s a strong tenet of Adora’s personality that is proving difficult to shake.

What she misses about the Horde

The recently published Rebel Princess Guide contains a list by Adora of things she misses about the Horde, and this list screams neurodivergent. I’ll go through it point by point, since there’s a lot to unpack here.

THINGS I MISS ABOUT THE HORDE

1. I miss the rigid schedule. It never changed, and I always knew what to expect.

Ritualistic behavior and an insistence on sameness are often seen in individuals with ASD. In fact, it’s a major symptom. Many of us have diifficulty adjusting to changing schedules, changes in diet, or even minor changes in our environment (such as placement of objects, boy do I have stories there). We need warning when things are going to change, and even if we know it’s coming it’s still a struggle to adjust.

2. I miss the constant sound of machines and whirring. In Bright Moon, there’s always music playing, or people laughing, and birds singing. It’s nice but it makes it hard to focus!

Autistic brains process sensory information differently from neurotypicals, that’s basically our disorder at its core. Over or under reactions to sensory input are common and in fact considered a major symptom, and this entry of Adora’s specifically refers to difficulties with sensory filtering. We have a hard time filtering out information that’s irrelevant to our current task, which makes us easily distractable.

3. Believe it or not, I miss my hard cot in the barracks. My bed in the castle is way too soft!

This ties into both the insistence on sameness and sensory issues.

4. Catra… sometimes.

This isn’t autistic, it’s just gay.

Speaking of which...

She’s gay

Adora's relationship with Catra has always been queer-coded, but any doubts about her sexuality were dispelled in season 3 by the way she fawns over Huntara like a baby gay over her gym teacher. Her obvious queerness might seem unrelated to the topic of autism, but those of us within the community can attest there’s probably just as many queer people among us as there are cishets. It’s so notable that there has been quite a bit of scientific research confirming people with ASD are more likely to be LGBT and gender atypical and exploring the cause of this link.

(This needs no proving at this point, but enjoy these gifs anyway...)

In conclusion

Overall, there’s a lot of hints and circumstantial evidence suggesting Adora could have ASD. Was this the creators’ intent? Hard to say. Adora is the protagonist and one of the most developed characters, so she’s definitely not a cardboard cutout or checklist for ASD symptoms (compare that to Entrapta, a secondary character whose behaviors can often easily be attributed to autism). It’s totally possible the creators just characterized her as naive and awkward and obsessive without realizing the implications of that cluster of traits together.

Regardless of authorial intent, it’s perfectly valid to look at Adora and see representation of the ASD community. The groundwork is there. And if someone else looks and doesn’t see it, or sees something else causing this behavior, that is also fair. No one is forcing anyone to accept this headcanon (or at least they shouldn’t be), but in return please don’t disparage it. Even if she is not autistic Adora is definitely autistic-coded, and we could use some more heros with the disorder, given how we’re mostly relegated to being villains and anti-heroes (not that there’s anything wrong with us filling those roles sometimes, but a little variety would be nice).

Adora is often referred to as a dumbass, but she’s actually quite intelligent, just sometimes slow to understand how she should act and how people feel. Still, she tries her hardest, just as she does with everything else. Adora is heroic and compassionate, even if she sometimes struggles to understand others. When autistic-coded characters are so commonly portrayed as cold and unforgiving, Adora is a sorely needed exception.

[stereksecretsanta]

Merry Christmas, a-wolf-and-his-boy!

For @a-wolf-and-his-boy. I hope you enjoy this work, I had fun writing it.

Read On AO3

*****

A Summer Night's Ball

Chapter 1 - The Ball and Garden

“Come on, Stiles. Everybody is going to be there and who knows, you might run into your mate!” Scott said. He was (unsuccessfully) trying to tug Stiles from his bed without ripping any blankets. “Sitting in a ball of misery isn’t going to help things. So Lydia isn’t the one for you, so what? You’ll find someone just as good.”

Stiles poked his head out of the cocoon of blankets he’d made to say, “Scott, there’s not going to be anyone as good as Lydia and I’m probably doomed to be alone for the rest of my very short life. Just because you met your mate at the masquerade ball doesn’t mean I’ll meet mine. Why is that even still a thing? There are better ways to meet people than dancing with a bunch of masked strangers that you’ll never see again.”

Scott made a grab for Stiles’ head, getting a handful of hair before Stiles could retreat back into his cocoon. “It’s the biggest event in the country and plenty of people go to see if they might find their mate.” Scott grew claws on the hand not holding Stiles and slowly brought it closer to the chunk of hair in his grasp. “So get out of bed or you’ll be getting a new haircut this minute.”

“Don’t mess with the hair, dude!” Stiles tried to toss the covers off, knocking Scott off-balance who ended up falling on top of him.

“No crushing the Stiles either. Get off of me.” Stiles shoved Scott to the side, who ended up on the floor given how small the bed was. Stiles got up and reached for his closet doors only for Scott to stop him.

“Dude, my mom and your dad got something for you to wear to it so go to the bathroom and change into the clothes hanging in there and then we can go.” Scott turned Stiles around and shoved him out of his bedroom. Stiles mumbled as he walked to the bathroom about the traitor keeping him out of his own kingdom, got in and saw a full suit hanging. Never had Stiles felt so betrayed since that time in school when Scott refused to watch Star Wars with him, only to end up watching it with Allison later that year. After changing into the uncomfortable outfit, Stiles got out and saw Scott in a similar suit, though thankfully not matching like a couple. Both of them were wearing half-masks covering only the upper half of their faces, one of the more traditional choices. The bright red mask Stiles wore was slightly less traditional but he’d already given in to wearing appropriate clothes, he wasn’t going to wear a boring white mask too. He’d worn it to every ball and he wasn’t going to break that streak for anyone, luckily it looked like their parents knew that since the mask matched with his suit.

“Well, let’s get going. Sooner I’m done with this, sooner I can go back to my den of despair, misery and hopeless pining.” Stiles said.

“That’s the spirit! Who knows, I still think you might meet someone.” Scott said.

“And that’s why I have you, a ball of infinite optimism and sunshine.” Stiles said. The pair got into Stiles’ old beaten jeep and went to the old castle near the center of Beacon Hills. The country’s royal family lived elsewhere (nobody sure where the Hales currently lived after their last home burned down. Luckily, none of them were hurt.) but the castle itself was still used for major events like the Annual Ball that happened in the summer on the solstice. Being a spark, Stiles knew it was one of the major days of performing magic and the ball was originally a ritualistic event performed by the community to shelter them from anything evil. Nowadays, there were quicker, easier and safer methods so the ritual itself had stopped but the gatherings took on a new purpose. They were a chance for people to get together and possibly meet their mate or let people gossip about the latest incident or talk business. It was a day devoted to love according to the romantics like Scott or business to the less romantic like Stiles.

They pulled into the designated parking lot, almost full because it had taken Scott a long time to drag Stiles out so the pair were late since it started at six pm and it was close to eight and sunset. Stiles was feeling a little jitterier than normal, his spark was acting up a little but he put it down to what always happened at this event. It wasn’t like that last year when part of the Hale family didn’t show up but that was a coincidence as far as Stiles was concerned. After walking past the security, they entered the crowded ballroom.

“I’m supposed to meet Allison near the refreshments table so I’ll be heading on over. Go socialize a little, maybe dance a bit. My mom should be floating around if you are really bored but I think she finally got your dad off for one of these things and invited him.” Scott said.

“Dude, you should’ve told me that earlier and I would’ve come without a fight!” Stiles said. He gestured a little too strongly and almost hit a woman next to the pair. She glared at him and walked away so he turned back to Scott. “We’ve been trying to get them together for ages now, I thought it was agreed we tell each other any developments pronto.”

“I thought you already knew! You always seem to know everything before I find out so I thought you knew about them coming together too. Look on the bright side, we might be brothers soon!” Scott held his hand out with Stiles giving him a high five. Scott turned and his face took on a dopey grin.

“Guess I can’t bother Melissa then. She’d kill me if I ruined her chance.” Stiles noticed Scott was no longer paying attention to him. He shoved Scott and said, “Go on, I know where your mind is.”

“Thanks, Stiles. I’ll see you in a couple hours. My mom said we could be out as late as we want so don’t expect me to ride back with you.” Scott blurted out and then took off running, knocking a couple people over in his rush to get to his mate. Stiles shook his head and walked the opposite direction, the band switching over from the high-paced song they had been playing when the pair walked in to something slower. Stiles spotted his dad and Scott’s mom on the dance floor, swaying to the song, his dad in a similar suit to him and Scott while Melissa was in a matching dress. It was obvious they have been planning this for some time now and Stiles was pretty disappointed he hadn’t seen this before Scott.

The area near the dance floor was crowded as can be, a mix of people leaving the floor and trying to get on causing a traffic jam with no end in sight so Stiles gave up on dancing after trying for a few minutes. Spotting an exit nearby, Stiles took it to get some fresh air and maybe see what else he could see in the castle. While it was generally open to the public, there were still some parts that were off limits that he might be able to see this time around, even though he’d tried last year and failed so badly his dad had to bail him out. The exit he took led to a hallway he’d been in before, with less guards around to block him from snooping luckily. He peaked in a few doors only to see empty rooms with no furniture. Some had obvious cobwebs in the doorways and dust stir after he opened the door so that was a major disappointment for Stiles. He’d been hoping for something interesting given he was never allowed in but the rooms were filled with nothing after nothing after nothing.

His last hope for anything of interest was the last door at the end of the hall. With a quick charm, he was able to unlock the door and exit into what must have been a garden. He hung his jacket from a nearby tree branch and placed his mask on top of it, glad for some cool air after being inside the hot room. Most of the gardens were open to the public so he figured he’d probably seen this place before during daytime. He turned to leave until he noticed the large white wolf statue in the center straight ahead on the path from the door. That was something he had never seen before. Stiles approached the statue, noticing that the fur was extremely detailed, every strand was lovingly carved. The wolf was posed as if to threaten any intruders, teeth bared as if in anger.

He was almost to the statue when he heard a growl which he jumped and thought came from the statue itself until he heard it again. Turning around, he saw a large black wolf, eyes glowing a haunting yellow, staring right at him and felt a shock at the sight from his spark. He froze and saw the wolf do the same before it took a deep breath and softly whined at him. Stiles had no clue what to do about the obvious werewolf and stood still, slightly trembling. The wolf crouched down and approached him, Stiles wanted to back away but doing that now would be a giant mistake. He had to hope that the wolf wouldn’t do anything to him for obviously trespassing on Hale property.

“Nice sourwolf. No need to get violent. I can go back to the party and we can forget I ever did something this stupid, okay?” Stiles held his hands up in surrender. The wolf was almost to him, still taking what he thought looked like a submissive stance, before it reached him and shoved its nose up against him and loudly breathed in. “Whoa there, don’t you think that’s a little too personal? Buy a guy lunch before you start sniffing him like that at least.”

The wolf rolled its eyes before it gently grabbed his vest and tugged him away from the statue and away from the door he had come from. He followed along since he didn’t have much choice, ending up approaching a small bench that was hidden further into the garden. He saw a basket full of clothes next to a small bump on that side of the bench but ignored it as the wolf shoved him at the bench. He flailed for a moment before landing on the bench, mostly upright. “Hey, be gentle! You could have nudged me and I’d have sat down.” The wolf turned, grabbed the basket by the handle with its mouth and walked behind a bush. “Oh, so that’s for you to change back. Might actually get to talk to the man behind the wolf, huh? Don’t take too long.”

A couple branches shifted and one cracked loudly while he waited, probably the wolf turning back into human form while crouched down, Stiles guessed. A hoarse masculine voice said, “You aren’t in trouble for coming back here. I didn’t expect to find my mate here but I’m glad to see the white wolf is still looking out for my family.”

The man came out fully only in a shirt and jeans, eyes no longer glowing a bright gold. It was hard to tell what his looks were from how late it was getting until the man walked right by Stiles and pressed something on the other side of the bench and lights sprang to life in the garden. The gentle glow illuminated all the flowers, breathtaking in how they were arranged like rays of the sun coming from the center where the wolf statue was vaguely seen from where they were.

Stiles looked the man over, his shirt was tight against muscles he’d love to see, stubble he’d love to rub his face against but the eyes were the man’s best feature. They sparkled in the light, flecks of gold and possibly other colors glittering within. His admiration of the man’s perfect body halted when he registered what he said. “What do you mean, mate?”

“Can’t you feel the bond? I knew from your scent you were my mate. I have been catching your scent at these things for years, today was the first time I’ve seen you. I never expected my mate to be the local sheriff’s son.”

“And who are you? You’re obviously a werewolf, you are allowed back here and are an unmated man so you have to be a Hale but there are a couple it could be.”

“Derek Hale.” Derek stepped forward, hand out for Stiles to grab. “Grab my hand and you should recognize the pull if you haven’t already.

Stiles looked at him, eyes slightly squinted, before grabbing Derek’s hand and felt his spark leap out of his skin, reaching deep inside the werewolf to embrace Derek, both man and wolf. Stiles lost his footing but Derek pulled him close, holding him steady against his chest.

“Now do you feel it?” Derek said.

“Yeah.” Stiles breathed out. It took a couple moments for him to steady himself but he didn’t leave Derek’s embrace. “So what do we do next?”

“I was hoping you can come meet my family, they’ll be thrilled to see I’ve found my mate. It will have to be after the ball ends, could I convince you to stay until then?”

“I think that can be arranged.” Stiles said, pulling Derek down to sit next to him on the bench. “Why don’t we sit here and get to know each other a little before you drag me in front of your family.”

“Deal.” Derek said. “But can I have a kiss first so we can seal the deal? I’d rather do that here under the stars, in the garden, with nobody around to see.”

“Fine with me, dude.” Stiles said.

“Don’t call me dude.” Derek said.

“I’ll call you dude if I want, sourwolf. Guess you’ll have to shut me-” Stiles said before Derek interrupted by kissing him, slightly too forceful and at an awkward angle that soon changed to something much more enjoyable.

Derek pulled away and said, “Good to know that works.” He kissed Stiles again, the garden hiding the pair from other eyes while they found ways to entertain themselves while waiting for the party to end.

TBC On AO3!

[marlonhart]

Happy, golden days! The first foretaste of life was mysterious and alluring, and it was so sweet to get glimpses of it.

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[2manyfandoms2count]

#MarichatMay Day 21+22

Embracing the French culture today, I liked the challenge of making our two lovebirds kiss on Bastille Day rather than on New Year’s Eve (the only two moments we get fireworks in Paris)! I hope you like it, thanks for all the support! xxx

@marichatmay

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Day 21: Fireworks + Day 22: Kiss

There are two teams in Paris for Bastille Day: on the one hand, the people who go on holiday in July, shunning the famous Eiffel Tower fireworks for a less urban scenery, generally on one of France’s coasts where the heat is less oppressive. On the other hand, those who holiday in August, by choice or otherwise, or those who simply don’t, who take all the celebrations as a compensation for not being able to escape. 

Marinette Dupain-Cheng and Adrien Agreste were on the latter team. Due to the success of her parents’ bakery, Marinette generally only got away from the City of Lights for one week at the beginning of August, business being slower as the Juillettistes returned and the Aoûtiens left. As for Adrien, it had been a while since his father had taken a holiday; the only travelling any of them did was strictly for business, and generally never in Summer. They were virtually the only people in their class left in the capital. 

Although aware of the other’s presence in Paris, neither knew how to reach out to suggest spending time together. And with both of their main wing people, Alya and Nino, away, it seemed like contact wouldn’t be made anytime soon. Unbeknownst to the two teenagers, both had considered visiting the other as their alter ego, and had even tried. Marinette had chickened out when she’d seen him sitting at his desk, not knowing how to justify her presence, and fearing she might reveal herself if she spoke with him. Adrien had simply not found her as he repeatedly swung by her place right after patrol, hoping to bump into her. 

Having seen Chat Noir snoop around outside her room, obviously looking for her, several times in a row, having made it to her place before she could, Marinette decided maybe she should take action before Chat could connect the dots. Feigning something about relatives coming into town, Ladybug bailed on him for patrol on the 13th of July, and Marinette made sure to be obvious on her balcony. She didn’t know what he wanted with her, but knowing she would be seeing him made her feel all giddy inside. He was pretty much the only person she talked to in person these days, apart from her parents. They both seemed slightly reticent at the thought of leaving each other at the end of patrol, and the thought that she could get some extra time with her (male) best friend made her feel better.

“Well hello, there, Purr-incess!” Chat’s smile was as bright as sunshine as he landed next to her. “I was starting to lose hope that I’d see you before the end of the Summer!”

“Awe, that’s cute, you really came to check on me?” She opened her eyes wide, exaggerating her surprise. She liked playing slightly dumb with him, although the more time she spent with him, the less she was inclined to do it. Something about wanting to impress him somehow? Had she not been thinking about Adrien so much she might have started thinking she was developing feelings for her partner.

“Well, you know, the bakery’s open, things had moved in your room between the first and the second time I came around... Just thought you might be there.” He shrugged as he scratched the back of his head slightly sheepishly.

“You must have been around when I was visiting my grandfather.” She half-lied. She did see him every other day, but generally in the morning, to make pastries with him. “Had I known you’d be coming, I would have changed my schedule around, though, it’s not like much is happening right now.” She smiled tightly, her gaze falling on the empty street below them. There were usually a comfortable flow of passer-bys at this time of the evening.

“I know exactly what you mean.” Chat sighed, leaning his elbows on the railing, his back slightly slumped. “I miss school.”

“You don’t mean that!” She gasped. “They’ll hear you and give you holiday homework.” She half-whispered, suspiciously looking around them. It brought a smile to his previously pouting lips.

“What are you doing tomorrow night?” He turned around, the railing now against his back as he looked at her, affection seeping from his eyes.

“Tomorrow? For the Quatorze Juillet?” She tilted her head, pretending to think when she knew the plan would be the usual, staying in with her parents, and catching the fireworks from the exact place they were standing in later. “Nothing in particular, why?”

“Want to watch the fireworks from a rooftop claw-ser to the Eiffel Tower?” Chat Noir had intended to ask Ladybug that exact question, but it was her loss for not showing up tonight. And he wasn’t going to invite her along, he had some catching up to do with Marinette.

“Sounds great!” She grinned, her smile spreading to her pretty blue eyes. 

“I’ll pick you up at 7pm then?”

“Can’t wait!” 

Chat left with a slight spring in his step, excited to spend time with his good friend. And also imagining how pretty she would look in the dappled coloured light of fireworks. 

---

He probably shouldn’t have been surprised by the fact she was carrying a basket full of provisions when they met up the next day. Leave it to her to think of all the little details that made events like this one perfect. His stomach rumbled at the thought of the T&S bakery quiche he could smell thanks to his excellent cat senses. He had reached for the basket (obviously to carry it for her, not to eat from it), but Marinette had flicked him lightly on the nose with a smirk at the sound, asking him to be patient.

Her confidence and playfulness had wavered slightly as they landed on top of the Agreste’s hôtel particulier. It was a prime spot to watch the show, being quite literally at the foot of the main attraction.

“Are you sure we can be here?” She asked, afraid to move too much. What if they were caught? What if Adrien caught them? 

“Paw-sitive. Adrien and his father are at an event tonight, no one’s Home.” Ha. She still looked slightly flustered at the thought of being in someone’s property, especially someone she knew. He wished he could tell her that actually Adrien was here, speaking to her, and that’s how he knew the others had a day off (Gorilla) or were in Tokyo (Gabriel and Nathalie). “I asked Adrien, don’t worry, he’s fine with us being here. And we agreed not to tell his father.”

The information seemed to appease her. Marinette smiled brightly at him and got the picnic supplies out, spreading a blanket at their feet to set their makeshift table on. He helped her lay out the food, amazed at the quantities contained in the basket. He couldn’t wait for the passion fuit macarons he’d spotted. 

They chatted as they ate, Chat happy to finally talk to someone about something else than his schedule and his piano rehearsals. He liked seeing Marinette so relaxed, and was glad the holidays helped her loosen up a bit. She always seemed quite stressed when they interacted at school, probably because of the amount of work they had. It checked out: Chat generally visited her at the weekend, when she had a little more time on her hands to unwind.

Marinette was happy to be with Chat Noir. She felt comfortable sitting close to him on the roof. The fact it was Adrien’s roof had quickly slipped her mind as he told her all about his adventures with Ladybug. She liked hearing him talk, he seemed so passionate and happy. Which wasn’t always the case when Ladybug met up with him.

The pair had shifted closer as the evening went by, to the point where they sat next to each other, facing the Eiffel Tower when the fireworks started. The sudden crackling, slightly deafening in contrast with the peaceful bird chirping and laughs that came from the nearby Champs de Mars, made Marinette jump and laugh in surprise, her shoulder now touching Chat’s arm due to their height difference. She instinctively leaned her head on his shoulder, marvelling at the light show. Chat’s arm automatically wrapped around her waist, as his head tilted to rest on top of hers.

“Do you know why the sound is delayed?” He whispered in her ear, bright colours erupting in the night sky before their associated ‘boom’ could be heard.

“No?” She answered, turning slightly towards him. His warm breath near her ear had sent butterflies flying in her stomach. Fireworks, she corrected herself, the innocent image of butterflies tarnished by Hawkmoth in her mind. 

“It’s because light travels faster than sound. So by the time sound reaches us, more lights have have had time to make it in the sky.” Said lights reflected very handsomely in his masked eyes.

“Interesting.” She smiled. Like the fact your lips look very kissable right now. She mentally shook her head at the thought. “You know, I never pegged you as a scientist, Kitty.”

“Physics is actually my favourite subject.” He smiled. 

“I guess there’s a lot I still don’t know about you.”

Their faces had inched closer as they spoke, not only because of the ambient noise.

“You know, I’d really love for you to know more about me.” Chat whispered, his lips mere centimetres from hers, taunting her. 

She gave in. 

It wasn’t much. Just a brush of their lips, really. But it caught both of them by surprise. Marinette felt frozen as she pulled away, her heart rate having risen far beyond what she thought was possible. She avoided his gaze, her cheeks burning. 

“I- I’m sorry, I don’t-”

Chat’s lips suddenly on hers interrupted her mid-sentence. His kiss was gentle, yet deep, tentative, yet just right. His hands, which had tilted her head up tenderly at first, now cupped her face, his gloves much softer than she would have expected against her skin. One of Marinette’s hands tangled in his hair at the nape of his neck, the other rested against his torso. She was glad to feel she wasn’t the only one whose heart had gone haywire. She smiled as his chest vibrated in a purr, momentarily masking his heart rate.

The fireworks around them were nothing compared to that inside of them. In fact, they didn’t even notice when the former stopped, too lost in their own bubble, on a Parisian roof on a hot Summer evening. 

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

book blogging #1: Dr. Tatiana’s Sex Advice to All Creation

by Olivia Judson, published 2002

Question: what do you think of when you think of books that are “fun” to read?

For me, a lot of speculative fiction comes to mind. Recent books that I found fun include Space Opera (Catherynne M. Valente), The Beautiful Ones (Silvia Moreno-Garcia), and everything by Sarah Gailey that I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading. Though I haven’t gotten ahold of it yet, I’m pretty sure Gideon the Ninth (Tamsyn Muir) is going to be spectacularly fun as well. 

These are books that aren’t necessarily my favorite stories of all time, but they have been some of my favorites to read. They’re all propelled by zany premises and whirlwind plots, enjoying themselves way too much for anyone to ever stop and worry about the parts that don’t make that much sense. When Sarah Gailey says “I have a crew committing a heist while riding hippopotamuses, do you want in?” I don’t ask questions. I just say yes and go along for the ride.

But there’s one major anomaly that always comes to mind when I think of books that I’ve had fun reading, and that’s David Sax’s The Tastemakers: Why We’re Crazy for Cupcakes but Fed Up with Fondue. It’s a 2014 work of nonfiction, and as the title suggests it’s an analysis of popular food trends and the forces that power them. The Tastemakers isn’t what this blog post is actually supposed to be about, so I won’t go into too many details, but suffice to say that I was engrossed despite the fact that I know pretty much nothing about the world of culinary trends or foodie fads - or cooking in general, if I’m being totally honest. But there’s something really delightful about learning things that are entirely outside your wheelhouse without having to worry about the material showing up on a test later. 

Given that I’m posting this on a blog with relatively few followers and that this is a write-up of a very niche book that was published eighteen years ago and could not be further from trendy, I’m well aware that anyone reading this is probably already at least passing familiar with me and what I do, so you folks might be saying, “Hang on, Makenzie. Are you seriously trying to say that this is outside your wheelhouse? The title on your Tumblr has been “Ask The Sex Witch” since 2015. You’re a whole sex educator, for fuck’s sake!”

Well, yes and no. Judson is a real-deal evolutionary biologist and gets into some pretty serious science in this book, which is pretty wildly different from what I usually do. I talk to people about sorting out their likes and dislikes, their boundaries, their sense of personal sexual autonomy, and so on. Although I definitely advocate for introspection and self-examination, I rarely go looking for answers far beyond the individual level. Judson asks big biological questions to figure out how some truly peculiar-looking behavior evolves: Why is it worthwhile for some animals to fight to the death trying to fuck? What’s up with some species of insects eating their mates? And who, pray tell, is engaging in the noble art of penis-fencing? Clearly, this is a totally different ball game on many levels.

(Speaking of ball games, did you know that the male shiner perch’s testes completely shrivel up over the winter? That’s rough, buddy.)

Offering sex advice to humans is hard enough, but Judson - writing as chipper sex advice columnist Dr. Tatiana - easily offers education to an impressively vast variety of species. The framing device of the book is a charmingly weird one. Each segment opening Dear Prudence-style, with a short letter from an animal badly in need of advice. The first chapter, for instance, begins with a query written by a stick bug called Twiggy (aww) wondering how to get her boyfriend to stop having sex with her after ten continuous weeks of intercourse. (Answer: Girl, he’s not gonna. Apparently that’s how he stops any other stick bugs from getting it in.) For the final chapter Judson mixes it up by formatting a discussion about the pros and cons of asexual reproduction as a hectic daytime talk show, complete with microscopes to view the tiniest guests and seating that offers both saltwater and freshwater tanks for aquatic audience members to sit in, like something out of Zootopia. 

(I haven’t seen Zootopia and the only thing I know about it for sure is that in one scene there’s a DILF-looking tiger, but I’m pretty confident in the assumption I’m making here.) 

Judson does an admirable job of providing pretty comprehensible explanations for a lot of evolutionary science, and while I did have to power skim through a few segments that were really beyond my grasp, it did make a pretty lively read out of the biological pros and cons of producing sperm bigger than your own body. It’s not exactly a book that’s difficult to put down, but I had a perfectly pleasant time reading it in the moments between doing anything else - eating a meal, resting in bed, getting some sun in my backyard - and even learning a little while I did so. I fully intended to use Dr. Tatiana as a break between the two installments of N.K. Jemisin’s Dreamblood duology, and it has served that role magnificently.  

Am I recommending this book to you? Not exactly, unless you’re extremely interested in evolutionary theories that are nearly two decades old or a science fiction writer looking to give your non-human characters some thoroughly non-human sexual habits. I’m not supremely interested in making recommendations with the blog in general, unless someone specifically asks for them; I’m hoping this will be more like writing up my personal thoughts about books and then hurling them into the virtual void like messages in bottles. If they wash up on your shore and you read them and come to the conclusion that this is something you, too, would like to read, that’s pretty rad. I love that for you! But it wasn’t necessarily my intent.

Strictly speaking, I didn’t even recommend this book to myself. In 2019 I tried to stay pretty intentional about my to-read list, really whittling it down to stuff that I actively wanted to engage with rather than anything that sounded vaguely not awful. I was hoping to keep that trend up in 2020, but like many other things that are much more serious, this whole pandemic situation has scuppered those plans a bit. I get most of my books by borrowing them from the public library where I work, and that’s been closed for nearly two months. Unlike many book bloggers I’ve observed I don’t keep a massive stack of unread books around at all times, so I’ve really been relying on the kindness of friends to keep me supplied in these trying times.

My friend Paige slipped me Dr. Tatiana’s (along with the aforementioned Dreamblood books and several volumes of Kurtis J. Weibe’s comic series Rat Queens) in exchange for some books I lent to her, because we all have to look out for each other in These Trying Times. I trusted her good taste, despite having no idea what the book was about and more than a few reservations. 

At other times I think this book might have sailed right over my head - not to sneer at the so-called soft sciences, but there’s a reason I gave up on my childhood dream of marine biology and got a sociology degree instead - but right now, as I’m finally adjusting to the slower pace of life in quarantine and remembering how to focus, I’m finding that it fits my needs. It’s unlikely to live on as an all-time favorite, but it’s something to do and gives me an occasional excuse to gasp and tell my roommate something absolutely wild, like the fact that spiders have two penises and that the dual arachnodicks are located on their faces, on either side of their mouths.

My basic understanding of evolution is that change rarely happens based on logic or reason, but by finding something that works and then sticking to it, no matter how improbable it may seem. When male elephants get horny they apparently develop an insatiable bloodlust and piss so constantly their penises turn green (yikes!), which is definitely not the most practical way to do things, but evidently it’s been getting the job done. Getting through quarantine has been sort of like that, has it not? A lot of behavior that might not be the most intuitive but is somehow enabling ongoing survival, like occupying myself with books that I might not have given a second glance in the halcyon before times.

That’s totally the same thing, right?

Right.

A note about the appearance of this book:

I’ve been talking a fair amount lately about my dislike for what I see as pretty transparently romanticized materialism in a lot of book blogging spaces, with an emphasis placed on acquiring and showing off as many pristine books as possible. I don’t own this book, and it looks like ass. It looks like Paige stole it from a library in North Carolina, which would not be shocking. When I noticed the large brown stain in the corner I jokingly asked if she’d dropped it in coffee, and she unflinchingly confirmed that yes, she had.

[bleedingmagitek]

Headcanon - Kefka & Terra relationship

Reminder: Information from the author 

Bases

Due to the main sources of inspiration taken thanks to the reading of stories written by other fans found both in FF.Net and in AO3 exploring a past between Kefka and Terra, more or less positive (that is, lacking excessive violence / sexual abuse ) but finding a Kefka already influenced by the side effects of the magic infusions when Terra begins to live under his physical and mental care, it is difficult that the same thing does not happen in the ideas that I was elaborating from an agreement with those stories.

Well, either in Insanity is Imminent or in Reminiscence Scattered, Kefka seems to have started it when Terra is a very young girl. (first years in Vector since she was taken from her mother)

I more or less, after doing calculations since at the beginning Kefka was with Terra, being five years old, which would make Kefka have twenty-two and following the timeline it would not be coherent If Kefka started the experiment at twenty lasting about five years approximate (counting the year of selection and the year of study and rehabilitation due to the side effects occurred) I have always seen Kefka also affected.

** Of course in the others, with its high level of abuse and bad vibes, Kefka appears before a young Terra already with the eccentric and characteristic appearance after the infusions apart from sadism ... **

Leaving thus the ideas of a Kefka before receiving the infusions or a Kefka whose effects during the period that the experiment lasted affected him in a slower way living with Terra as I have seen later in other stories on my part as whims that sometimes I want to try separately (Beautiful chemistry) or that changing the context or small details of it might work for me better (Alternative Universes)

It is when reading in the wikipedia that it is assumed that being under the control of Kefka at the beginning of the game implies a relationship between them, probably Kefka being in charge of Terra led me to opt for the idea of ​​Terra living in his residence instead of being confined as in previous written stories until being formed as a soldier and the implantation of the Slave Crown.

Although an assumption like so many others that can be found, it was quite consistent with what was seen in the stories that had inspired me so much or that had served as the basis for elaborating their own between agreements with the above and disagreements. The truth is that it helped me feel less nervous If I showed Kefka in a less intense line than in previous stories, ending up in a collection ...

In a word, the feeling that they convey to me and I want to convey is bittersweet because not everything is all the time sweet, easy or beautiful between them in their day to day, just as not everything has to be all the time ugly, creepy or abusive but there is a bit of both, sometimes even one of the good things happens in the wake of a bad one or vice versa. (Also, even when I have tried to show something good between them, it is still a bit disturbing) Precisely because of that, for having a Kefka already with a lot of lost sanity being Terra child and who does not know a Kefka with whom it would not have been as difficult to live as a tutor but at the same time I feel that this is what makes the relationship something in this way to show its progression more interesting because it does not even start in a very favorable way and only through coexistence can these little things be appreciated. As in a different way, each one ends up making a dent in the other. 

Relevant information 

- At first I did not give it so much importance because Terra is always shown like that but as I began to delve into the Esper world and the Espers themselves while developing Beautiful Chemistry or the first part of it, it struck me that from the beginning Terra possessed a human appearance instead of Esper having been born in the Esper world in which the only human would be his mother which led me to the reasoning that such a Terra (physically Esper) were to be immediately taken away and confined for scientific studies as with the rest of captured creatures. Otherwise, until Terra had shown her magical ability, she could have gone more unnoticed in an orphanage ... 

- I have already mentioned that if Terra is brought to Vector by Gestahl at approximately two years of age following the information that the game provides, Kefka would have an age at which he would be preparing to enter the experiment with Magitek so at that time it would not be possible that Kefka was who took care of Terra.

** However, I do not rule out the idea that briefly some encounters would occur between them, such as with a Celes who would become part of the next experiment carried out while Kefka was taken to be analyzed or something like that, although neither would harbor clear memories of the other or the event itself ... **

Therefore, Kefka and Terra would be presented by Cid at age six instead of at five, achieving a more or less satisfactory recovery of basic functions for the soldier, turning twenty-three but officially Terra is under his tutelage at seven.

Terra already looking like a human girl. Kefka looking different than when he was a soldier attracting all the attention of the girl. (Let's say that with whitish skin due to the use of ointments or paint and some makeup on the face) Here in opposition to what I have seen or read is where I liked the idea that Kefka initially did not sympathize the same way with her and some of that remains.

- Terra is very hesitant in her actions at first, often waiting for Kefka to give her indications, accustomed to little freedom to act under the care of caregivers, like the children who are subjected as subjects after the triumph that was the survival of Kefka in the first.

** Not because she is afraid of Kefka due to his appearance,  it fascinantes her at that time and that would already imply her desire to be around to see him better or to be able to caress his fabrics, if she is afraid, she would act differently. She would stay away, grab her stuffed animal, or keep quiet ... **

Causing exasperation in Kefka more than once, laughing at her until she gains confidence, beginning to act more freely, mainly around the house and then around the Imperial Castle.

- Let's see, being very sincere, I see Kefka having more defects than qualities when it comes to taking care of Terra in his day-to-day life, since as can be seen in the game, he lacks or loses the necessary patience to deal with a child In addition to experiencing abrupt mood swings, which does not make him a very good tutor or father figure for Terra, as in the story that inspired me, but at the same time reading other stories in which Kefka was quite decent with her encouraged me to love too. writing beautiful scenes like Kefka trying to play her a song or creating stories with her to tell her before sleep, of course giving Terra the magic of softening him up.

Unfortunately, in order to show that, I decided that it would be in episodes when Kefka totally loses his patience with her that he can treat Terra worse by grabbing her arm to lock her in her room or yelling at her hitting things, in the worst case If she even get to dare, to contradict him, he will slap her but generally being more intimidating and threatening than using physical punishment, only If he is not obeyed are carried out like this.

** Being in these moments where Terra does fear him paralyzed by the strong energy that sprouts to manifest as fire because her magic grows as she grows while the one that Kefka possesses is that of adult and previously powerful Espers so it would be pretty weak  ... Serving only to provoke him more **

- It is also precisely because of that instability that it is decided that Kefka, depending on the visits of those in charge in the matter and their observations, obtain or not help in the care of Terra or worse for Kefka that the duty of guardian falls on another of the girl being together with the occurrence of her using her own magic one of the reasons that make the initial attitude that Kefka had towards Terra change. As if finally realizing Terra's worth. 

The other obviously has to do with her magic. Going beyond burning this or that (accidentally) and being discovered by Kefka who will look for a way to repeat it, the moment Terra changes to her Esper form although she has a limited time, returning to the human calming down or fainting .

** Since I saw a fanart with Kefka and Terra in their other form, the idea that Terra originally looked like this but only manifests it instinctively in moments of lack of control as she adapts more and more to the human world, it seemed possible to me that Kefka felt double of attraction towards Terra like that, wild and wrapped in magic **

[summahsunlight]

This Way Became My Journey, Ch. 18

The Karvaian Prime Minister, Ayrel, was a tall, lanky man with pale skin, deep nasal ridges, and long, jet black hair, tied back at the nape of his neck. He wore long crimson robes made out of a material that looked like cotton, but felt like silk to the touch. Kathryn Janeway couldn't help but notice that his large presence also made the spaces usually occupied by Commander Chakotay and Counselor Barrett seem non existent.

When they had emerged from Rupor space, Janeway had ordered to rendezvous with a Karvaian vessel that would bring the Prime Minister to her so they could meet. It had taken Voyager three hours to meet up with the slower Karvaian vessel. She had skipped the pleasantries when Ayrel had transported to Voyager and brought him to the briefing room, where the senior staff, or what remained of them, were gathered at the table.

"Is it your custom, Captain, to have this many people present for a treaty negotiation?" Ayrel asked her, his black eyes scanning the room.

"Sometimes," Janeway answered, simply. "But we're not here to discuss the treaty, we're here to discuss the Rupor, and you know that." She gestured toward an empty seat. "Please, why don't you have a seat Prime Minister."

Cautiously Ayrel took his seat at the opposite end of Janeway. "To be honest with you Captain, I'm not sure I'm going to be much help. My people have sworn off dealing with the Rupor; they are ruthless warriors who will stop at nothing to keep outsiders out. So, we stay out of their space and they stay out of ours."

Janeway raised an eyebrow in a gesture that was eerily Tuvok. "You mean to tell me that you've known about the Rupor and what they are capable of?"

A look of guilt washed over the Prime Minister's face. "Well, yes, I suppose."

"And you failed to tell me or my diplomatic party the dangers of crossing out of Karvaian space?" Janeway questioned, her voice laced with controlled anger. "We tracked our shuttle to the surface of a planetoid. Unfortunately, the Rupor swarmed us and we had to retreat back into...friendlier space. My officers, if they aren't dead already, are not going to survive much longer out there, which means we have to act fast."

"I'm truly sorry about your loss-,"

"I don't think you quite understand, Prime Minister," Janeway interrupted. "It's not my people's way to leave officers behind. And I want you to know that I will exhaust every last possibility to rescue them. Your help would be greatly appreciated."

Ayrel looked around the group, noticing the same determined look in their eyes. He had never encountered such devotion and loyalty in the Delta Quadrant, and it prompted him to divulge a bit of information to their leader. "Several years ago one of our transport vessels had to alter course to avoid an ion storm, it lead them into Rupor space. They took refuge in a nebula until they came up with a way to modify their shields so the Rupor could not detect them. In effect it cloaked them. I would be willing to have my engineers beam over and help your people make the same modifications to Voyager."

A smile spread across Janeway's face. "Thank you Prime Minister, that would be wonderful."

Ayrel gave her a small nod of his head. "I'll send a team over right away. Hopefully you can be underway by morning."

By morning? Janeway thought, miserably. She had hoped to be underway a lot sooner than that.

"Is there anyway we could have the modifications done before then?" Tuvok asked. "Captain Janeway was correct when she said our people have very little time. We would like to be on our way as quickly as possible."

"Commander Tuvok's right," Harry Kim spoke up. "The sooner we get the modifications up and running, the sooner we can head back to the planetoid and find our missing people."

"I can pull people off of repairs if I have too," B'Elanna Torres said, "if it means the modifications can be done faster."

"We could also do them in route to the planetoid," Tom Paris suggested. "If we travel at maximum warp we could be back there by twenty three hundred hours."

Chakotay, I wish you were here to see them working together like this, Janeway mused, with a sense of pride running through her veins at her how her senior officers were sticking up for each other and working together.

The Prime Minister looked her gravely in her eyes. "I'm afraid, Captain Janeway, that tomorrow morning is the best I can offer you. The modifications are extremely complex; they have to be since you are trying to hide from the Rupor." His dark eyes became sad, "I'm sorry, I know that this must be difficult for you and your crew."

More than you know, Janeway thought, coldly. "Well then, let's not waste anymore time here because time is precious right now. Tuvok, escort the Prime Minister back to the transporter room and await the engineering team. B'Elanna, get your people ready to make the modifications. Harry, I want you to help B'Elanna; Tom, set a course back to Rupor space and come to an all stop just outside their borders. I want to be close by when those modifications come online. Dismissed."

She watched as the senior staff and the Prime Minister left the table, leaving the room and leaving her alone with her thoughts. Pinching the bridge of her nose, she could feel a headache forming behind her right temple. Tomorrow morning seemed so far away. And the prospect of what they could find on that planetoid frightened her.

"Paris to Janeway, we're ready to get underway ma'am."

Opening her eyes and standing up, Janeway pushed the chair away from the table and tapped her combadge. "Understood, I'm on my way." With one last look around the briefing room, she stepped out onto the bridge and called in a crisp command voice, "engage Mister Paris."

When Chakotay returned to "camp" around midday from his trek up the mountain to find water, he was surprised to find two things. One being that Sarah had developed a fever, despite his attempts to stall the infection's progress, the other thing being the sensors were blaring.

"They've been doing that for about five minutes," Sarah muttered. "If I was able to get up I would have checked them."

He had not even realized that the sensors had survived the crash. They're probably the only thing on this shuttle that did survive the crash, Chakotay thought. If he had known they were semi-operational, he may have been able to calibrate them to send another signal to Voyager. It had nearly been two days and they had heard nothing from Janeway or the others. Putting the storage containers of water down, he went to check what the problem was.

"Is it Voyager?"

"No," he swallowed. "An alien ship has just entered orbit, same warp signature as the one that shot us down. I think our friends have found us."

It felt like it was an eternity that she stood outside the Captain's quarters, nervously holding onto a PADD, contemplating whether or not she should reach out and press the chime. B'Elanna Torres wrung her fingers anxiously about the edges of the PADD and then with a deep breath reached out and pressed the chime. After several seconds, and no response from Janeway, she wondered if the Captain was even in her quarters. But she was sure that she had seen the woman leave the bridge hours before to relieve Tal Celes from baby-sitting duties.

B'Elanna reached out again and pressed the chime. From inside the quarters she heard a slumber filled call come back allowing her access to the room. Great, I woke her up, B'Elanna thought as the doors to the Captain's quarters swished open. The older woman looked confused to see her there and raised an eyebrow. "Lieutenant Torres?"

The PADD that the young woman had been holding onto was suddenly thrust into Janeway's hands. "I thought you'd like to see the latest report on the modifications to our shields."

Janeway took the PADD from her and pretended to be reading it over, but in reality was watching as B'Elanna anxiously took in the room, her dark eyes studying every last detail. Setting the PADD away from her face, she said, softly, "You didn't come here to just drop off a PADD; what can I do for you B'Elanna?"

B'Elanna's dark eyes snapped to her face. "I… how did you know?"

The Captain smiled and placed the PADD down onto the coffee table. "I've been in Starfleet long enough B'Elanna, but perhaps, call it mother's intuition."

"Mother's intuition?"

"A lot of people don't realize that being a captain and being a mother are quite similar," Janeway replied, with a gentle smile. "A captain is required to be the guiding force of their crew; a mother is…by nature the guiding force for her children. In that sense a captain always knows when there is something pressing her crew, just a like a mother knows that something is bothering her children. Now, what can I do for you B'Elanna?" she repeated.

It was at that moment that B'Elanna realized how human Kathryn Janeway appeared. When she had been forced to live on Voyager she had thought of Janeway as nothing but a self-centered, emotionless, Starfleet captain, hell bent on her principles. But right now, with her hair matted from sleeping probably on the chaise lounge where the baby now slept, her blue eyes reflecting exhaustion and worry, and her brow furrowed in concern for B'Elanna, the young Klingon was suddenly aware that she had perhaps misjudged Janeway. "I guess…I guess there are some things that I needed cleared up; you were the most…logical person to come too." Damn, now I sound like the Vulcan.

"I guess that depends on what you want cleared up," the older woman replied.

"Is it true?" B'Elanna questioned, "That you have no intention of going back to that planetoid to look for Chakotay and Barrett?"

A dark look came over Janeway's face. "Where did you hear that?" she asked, in a seething tone.

"That's the rumor going around the ship," B'Elanna replied, then added, for good measure, "ma'am."

"I don't know what you've been told, Lieutenant, but I am completely committed to getting my people back," Janeway responded, with an edge to her voice. "As a senior officer, you should realize that."

"I…you're right, I'm sorry for disturbing you ma'am," B'Elanna said, stepping back towards the door to leave.

An apologetic look came over Janeway's face. "No, B'Elanna, wait, I'm the one who's sorry; for a lot of things. It's been a long couple of days and I'm afraid that my mood is reflecting that."

"If you ask me," B'Elanna said, before leaving, "you shouldn't have to apologize; information was kept from you and now two officers are missing. You've held it together longer than I could have, and quite possibly a lot of other people as well…I should be getting back to those shields, good night Captain."

"Good night, B'Elanna," Janeway whispered watching her chief engineer leave hurriedly through the doors and disappear down the corridor.

"Paris to Janeway."

Janeway tapped her combadge. "Go ahead Mister Paris."

"You wanted to be informed when we reached the Rupor's borders, we're there ma'am," Paris responded, his voice drowning in exhaustion. The entire crew had been putting in double, even triple shifts in order to get the repairs and necessary modifications to the shields done. Tom had been sitting at the helm for nearly twenty four hours.

"Understood, hold our position here, and Tom…," Janeway ordered, "get some rest."

"Yes ma'am, Paris out."

Rubbing her eyes, Janeway decided it was probably best to heed her own advice. Snuggling up onto the chaise lounge with Ava, she reached out and pulled the baby close to her, closed her eyes, and drifted back into a fret filled sleep.

"I don't know how much further I can walk, Chakotay," Sarah mumbled from his side.

They had abandoned the shuttle what felt like hours ago and started the long trek up the mountain so they could make an even longer trek down the other side. But they had been forced to abandon the shuttle. The aliens that had shot them down had entered the system again, no doubt wanting to finish off the job. Chakotay had tried, to the best of his abilities, and using some old Maquis tricks, to make it look like they had died in the crash. Of course, if Voyager did indeed come looking for them, they would also think that they were dead.

We'll cross that bridge when we come to it, Chakotay thought as he steered Sarah into a cave, lugging the little equipment that he had managed to salvage from the shuttle, with them. Helping the young counselor down to the rocky ground, he shrugged off the med kit and pulled out the tricorder, running the hand scanner over her body. "Your fever's up and it looks like the infection is spreading. We'll make camp here tonight; there isn't much daylight left we won't be able to keep going once the sun goes down. Hopefully our friends took the bait and have left."

"In other words, my fever is the least of our problems," Sarah muttered, exhaustion clearly written on her face. Chakotay immediately felt guilty, perhaps he had pushed her too hard, she was after all seriously injured, on top of fighting an infection, and he had made her hike up a rocky mountain. He could almost here the holographic doctor's protests back on Voyager.

He gave her one of the blankets. "Let's hope it's our only problem."

"They aren't coming for us," she whispered, her eyes beginning to slip shut.

"Who? The aliens?"

"No, Voyager."

"Don't say that, Lieutenant, let's keep a little optimism here," Chakotay said. "That's an order," he added, as an afterthought.

Her eyes snapped open and looked at him, the sharpness long ago dulled out by the infection and fever. "I was taught at the Academy that sometimes, optimism is a lost cause, that as a counselor its best to dish out the reality."

"Well, what do those Academy professors know, any how?"

When there was no response from her Chakotay glanced to his right to see that she had drifted off to sleep. Its for the best, he mused, realizing that she was not going to fight the infection while babbling to him, she needed to sleep, to conserve what little strength she had left while they waited to be rescued. Voyager, where are you? That thought had haunted him since they had started their trek up the mountain, to get away from the aliens. He had thought Janeway would have been here by now, not letting some hostile race stand in her way. Had Voyager suffered the same fate as them? Was the starship nothing but a pile of debris in the middle of space, blown apart by a race that seemed intent on killing everyone that entered their system?

He rubbed a hand over his face, listening to the sounds of Sarah's labored breathing. His first away mission as Voyager's first officer was one disaster after another. Who knew that they would be fighting for their lives on some barren planet, seventy thousand light years from home, when they had originally set out on some diplomatic mission for Janeway? Certainly not him; after all diplomatic missions were usually peaceful missions.

Of course, nothing seemed to go according to plan out here the Delta Quadrant. Chakotay should have expected a mishap here and there. Is this what your life has come to Chakotay? Getting stranded on a barren planet with a dying woman is just a mishap? Was he so used to tragedy that a situation like this barely fazed him? He wondered when that had happened. Had it been when his father died? The suffering he had endured with the Maquis? Being stranded in the Delta Quadrant away from his family and friends? The shuttle crash? The list seemed to go on and on and he couldn't pinpoint the moment that he had turned his emotions off so tragedies were nothing but mishaps.

In the waning light of day he began to drift off to sleep, unaware that the tricorder was beeping a warning near by.