#i COULD still be taller by a millimeter or 2... maybe | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

pickalilywrites · 4 years ago

Note

Can you please write a gabi x falco fic where gabi is slightly taller than falco (2-3 inches)? And she just finds various ways to tease him for this making him embarrassed. Maybe also have her carry him bridal style in the fic somewhere. I think it would be really cute, funny and wholesome! Thanks for considering my request! And aot shall be missed the end of an era.

Have a great day and God bless! All the best and take care! Happy writing! :))

thank you for asking for this ^^ it was fun to write. it took me a little while but i hope you enjoy it~

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Taller Than You

Falbi. Canonverse.

8098 words.

Read on Ao3!

Falco can accept being beaten. He’s never been the strongest person or the fastest or the smartest. In all honesty, he’s quite average and while it’s frustrating to never place first or even within the top three of his class, he’s come to accept that some things are beyond his control. Yes, he can work hard and hope to someday surpass his peers and graduate at the top of his class, but he has to work twice as hard because he lacks the natural talent that others were lucky enough to be born with. It’s frustrating sometimes, but that’s just the way it is and Falco is fine with it for the most part.

It’s admittedly a little less easy for Falco to accept his inadequacy as a warrior candidate when Gabi flaunts all of her accomplishments in front of him. She’s accumulated so many badges over the years, little medals made out of cheap metal that were already rusting when they were given to her that she still proudly pins to the front of her shirts, that Falco has lost count of just how many she has.

Really, Falco knows it’s his own fault that his list of accomplishments pales in comparison to Gabi. He’s not as strong and hardworking as she is. If he’s average compared to his other classmates, then he’s completely inferior next to Gabi. He never says anything when Gabi brags about how she’s beaten the record for shooting practice, the previous record which had also belonged to her as well, or when she manages to receive a compliment from one of the most hard-to-impress instructors during a military drill course. He just bites his lip and suffers through Gabi shoving all of her accomplishments in his face. It’s what he deserves for being such a pathetic warrior-in-training.

Gabi really deserves to let her accomplishments be known anyway, Falco knows, and he does like to listen to her list every single one of her achievements. He likes the way her eyes light up when she talks about whatever record she broke, how her chest puffs up, and how she bristles with pride. It’s only right that Gabi be so proud of herself. She’s a Warrior through and through, a person destined to wield a Titan, and undeniably the worthiest candidate in their class.

It should, then, only be inevitable that Gabi surpasses Falco in the only thing that he thought he could beat her at: height. There had been warning signs. For years, Falco and Gabi had been around the same height with Falco always a centimeter or two taller than Gabi, but lately it seems like Gabi has caught up.

The last few months, Gabi was always the exact same height as Falco. Falco would always hold his breath during his physical exam. Whenever his height was taken, he’d stand to his full height, raising his head unconsciously as if that would somehow give him an extra centimeter or two only to have the nurse taking his height to smack him on the head and tell him to stand properly. It shouldn’t have been a surprise when Gabi had finally surpassed his height by a centimeter. After all, she had already managed to beat him at everything else, but Falco couldn’t stand for it.

“You can’t be taller than me,” Falco says, hating how high-pitched and whiny his voice sounds. He bites his lip and turns to the nurse that had just finished measuring Gabi and his eyes flit back to his friend. “It’s impossible.”

“Denial is the first step to acceptance,” Gabi says as she cheerfully pats Falco on the shoulder. She’s elated, not even trying to hide the smug grin on her face. “Although, you should just accept it. I’ve beaten you at nearly everything else, so shouldn’t this be easy to accept?”

It should be, but it’s not. Over the past months, Falco had dreaded the idea of Gabi growing taller than him. He refused to believe it could ever happen. He could never beat her at anything except her height, and he clung to that worthless achievement fiercely even as it became apparent that Gabi was hitting her growth spurt much faster than him. Falco finds the reality of Gabi being taller than him is actually much worse than just imagining it. It’s humiliating to be beaten at something he thought he had, but he realizes too late that Gabi’s height is beyond his control and he can only stand there in disbelief as she stands there, chin lifted proudly as she subtly flaunts her extra centimeter in front of him.

“Measure me again, please,” Falco practically begs as he tugs on the nurse’s sleeve.

The nurse eyes him tiredly and shakes his head. “Can’t you see I have to do the rest of your classmates?” he asks, gesturing to the line of kids who are still waiting to be measured. “It’s a centimeter difference. You’ll outgrow her in no time.”

That’s not soon enough, Falco wants to say, but he doesn’t want to sound like a brat so he bites his lip from saying any more. When he turns around, Gabi is giggling behind him with her smug expression still pasted on her face. If she smiles any wider, her face might crack.

He tries to keep his head held high even though all he wants to do right now is throw a fit over something as pathetic as a centimeter height difference.

“You heard him,” Falco says. His voice is still that strange high pitch that makes him cringe inwardly. He should probably shut up now before he makes himself look more like a fool, but he can’t help it. If he doesn’t say something now, it’ll be like admitting defeat. “I’ll grow taller than you soon. Just wait.”

The smirk on her face is infuriating. “Sure,” Gabi says, but it’s clear from the tone of her voice that she doesn’t believe him. “We’ll see.”

But much to Falco’s horror, he doesn’t grow taller than Gabi. His height seems to stagnate despite the fact that he’s eating more than usual. He doesn’t get any heavier either, which just makes it twice as frustrating. It’s as if the food he eats just disappears once it enters his mouth. What’s the point of eating, Falco wonders, if it doesn’t help him grow at all?

Gabi doesn’t seem to have that problem at all. She continues to grow. It’s effortless like everything else she does. First, it’s that one centimeter height difference. Then it’s a few millimeters more, the added height so small that it would be negligible if it were anyone else aside from Gabi. Suddenly, it’s a whole centimeter and a half, then two centimeters, and finally two and a half.

“How are you growing so much!” Falco asks, looking at Gabi in disbelief. He can’t understand how she continues to grow while his own height remains stunted. His parents had assured him that his growth spurt would come soon, but he’s almost certain they’re lying to him because the difference between him and Gabi keeps growing. “This is impossible.”

To the nurse who’s busy taking measurements, Falco says, “Measure me again.”

The nurse doesn’t even look at Falco when he responds. “I’m busy,” he replies. He’s given Falco that response consistently for the past six months. It makes Falco want to tear his hair out. “I don’t see why you’re worried about it all the time anyway. You’ll grow soon enough.”

Falco is about to open his mouth and argue with the nurse when Zofia and Udo drag him away.

“Hey, don’t worry about it, Falco,” Zofia chides as she rubs Falco’s shoulder reassuringly. She sits him down at his desk where she begins to pat his head like one would do if they were comforting an upset child. “Girls usually get their growth spurt before guys anyway, so it’s only normal that Gabi’s taller than you right now. I’m getting pretty tall too. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m even taller than Udo.”

“Please don’t rub it in my face,” Udo says with a pained expression. He pulls out a chair and sits across from Falco, giving his friend a sympathetic smile. “She’s right, though, and so is the nurse. You start growing a lot soon. Me, too.”

“I want to grow taller now, “ Falco grumbles. He buries his head in his arms and sighs. Voice muffled, he asks, “What do I have to do to grow a couple centimeters taller?”

“Well, you could do some stretches,” Zofia suggests. She jumps back in surprise when Falco sits up and leans toward her.

“What stretches?” he asks. He scoots up to the edge of his seat, attentive.

“Oh, they’re just … they’re supposed to make you taller. I’ve only been doing them for a few months, but I’ve grown quite a bit in that time,” Zofia explains awkwardly. She looks around as if unsure if it would be appropriate to demonstrate in the classroom. Nobody is paying attention to them though. The rest of their classmates are either busy talking to each other or getting their height and weight measured and their instructor has left the nurse in charge of the class.

Udo purses his lips. “Why haven’t you taught me about these stretches?” he asks with a frown.

“You never asked,” Zofia replies, and Udo scowls at her.

“Well, what are they?” Falco asks a little impatiently. He stands up, ready to follow along with and memorize whatever instruction Zofia gives him.

“One of them goes like this,” Zofia begins and starts to demonstrate.

They’re easy stretches. Many of them are exactly like the ones that they do before they warm up for their physical training: stretching their arms above their head, twisting their torso back and forth, touching their toes, etc. Some are a little more unfamiliar to Falco: stretching your calves as you push against a wall, stretching your forearms and wrists, and hanging against a doorframe or a wall to stretch your shoulder and back muscles.

The key, Zofia explains while the boys do it half-heartedly, is to stretch enough to feel it in their muscles. If they don’t, then they’re doing it wrong. They also need to make sure to hold the stretches for an appropriate amount of time. It’s fine if they do it a little bit longer, Zofia tells them, but they absolutely need to make sure they hold each position for the minimum amount of time.

“And then you’ll grow taller in no time!” Zofia assures them cheerfully.

It’s working. At least Falco thinks it is, although he probably shouldn’t be so optimistic. It’s only been a few seconds after all, but he’s pretty sure he can feel his limbs lengthening as he stretches out his muscles. He’s stretching his arms when a question pops into his head that he hadn’t thought to ask before.

“Where did you learn about this anyway?” he asks Zofia.

It’s suspicious when Zofia doesn’t answer him right away. She avoids his eyes for a moment, looking up at the ceiling while she decides if she should respond. He gets a cold feeling in the pit of his stomach as Zofia rocks back and forth on the balls of her feet and she nibbles on her bottom lip. It makes him want to take back his question immediately, tell Zofia that he doesn’t care about who taught these stretching exercises to her anymore, but it’s too late. Zofia is already opening her mouth to answer.

“Gabi,” Zofia answers quietly, but her reply seems to fill the whole room.

Behind them, a horrible cackle begins and Falco turns around, horrified, and sees that Gabi has appeared as if the mere mention of her name had been enough to summon her out of thin air.

“Doing stretches?” Gabi asks with the smuggest smile on her lips. It makes Falco want to scream. She does a few stretches too, stretching her arms above her head, but she does it lazily. It’s almost like she’s mocking Falco. “That’s a good idea, Falco. Maybe you’ll be able to catch up to me someday.”

“I wasn’t doing anything,” Falco snaps, but Gabi just laughs and he can feel blush bloom across his cheeks. He scowls at her and says, “Those stretches probably don’t work. I don’t need them to grow taller than you anyhow.”

He means it, he really does. He isn’t planning on doing any of the stretches. Even if he does grow taller than Gabi, he knows she’ll comment on how well her stretches worked with that same smug smile on her face. Still, he finds himself absentmindedly doing them when he gets home, figuring that it can’t hurt to try.

»»————-　★　————-««

Gabi always finds new ways to annoy Falco with her height. It seems she’s not satisfied with bringing it up during every physical evaluation. She has to rub her few extra centimeters of height in his face every chance she gets even if it’s in the most mundane of situations.

Sometimes the way she flaunts her height is horribly blatant. It’s in the snide comments she throws casually at him, asking him what the weather is like down there or apologizing for not hearing what he just said because it’s so hard to hear him from her height. It’s not even as if he’s that much shorter than her. There are plenty of other people in their class that are a lot shorter than Gabi, but she only ever directs her height-related comments towards him.

“Are you done?” Falco asks as Gabi pretends to check their heights again.

She’s standing right next to him, her chin lifted slightly as she compares heights with him. Her hand goes from the top of her head and shifts over just a few centimeters over Falco. He swears she’s exaggerating their height difference because her hand is angled when she moves her hand above his head, giving her a few imaginary centimeters over him.

“Just checking,” Gabi says cheerfully to him. She gives him a grin and leans toward him. He knows whatever it is she has to say next will make him want to stick his head out the door and scream at the top of his lungs. “Falco, do you want to know if you’ve grown any taller?”

“No,” Falco says almost immediately.

Gabi ignores him. “Well, you haven’t,” she says happily. She walks in circles around him, practically skipping. In a sing-song voice, she continues, “I’m still taller than you, much taller than you. You’ll never catch up now.”

Falco grits his teeth and balls his hands into fists.

Gabi is still talking. “It’s okay, though. I’m tall enough for the both of us.” She’s wandering towards the cabinets now. Falco is all too familiar with what’s about to happen next. He knows all of Gabi’s methods to incite his short-man syndrome. She throws open the cabinet doors and looks back at Falco with a dazzling grin. “I can help you with so many things. Do you want anything from the cabinet? I can reach it for you.”

“No,” Falco says, but he knows Gabi isn’t listening to him.

She’s humming as she scans the contents of the cabinet. It’s full of different school supplies, most of them already used before because they’re second-hand from the Marleyan schools. Her mouth shapes itself into a perfect O-shape as she sees something that catches her eye. Falco is about to roll his eyes until he sees what Gabi is reaching for.

Normally, Gabi reaches for things that are just within reach. Sometimes she even gets things from shelves that Falco can easily reach himself. Not this time. This time, she’s reaching for the shelf near the top where the worn-out textbooks are. It’s not something she can reach without standing on her tiptoes and really stretching really far.

With just a glance at this situation — Gabi and her bull-headed stubbornness, the cabinet with its rickety shelves, and the textbooks that are so worn-out that they could disintegrate with a touch — Falco knows that it’s a recipe for disaster. If there were even a chance of stopping Gabi, Falco would step in and try to convince her to stop, but he knows any effort to do so would be futile. He should walk away and let her reap the consequences herself, but he doesn’t. Against his better judgement, he remains and begins to hover behind Gabi.

“Gabi, you really don’t have to,” he says worriedly. His hands flutter pathetically behind Gabi, reaching out to catch her in case she falls.

“Don’t worry. At my height, this isn’t anything difficult,” Gabi says with a toss of her head even though she’s having difficulty. The shelf is so tall that she can’t really see what she’s doing. She has to grasp blindly for a textbook and her smile grows wider when she finally manages to grab hold of one. “Got it!”

As soon as she pulls it from out of its shelf, she stumbles back and loses her balance. Rather than allowing Falco to catch her, Gabi flails about trying to grab onto something, anything, to keep herself from falling. Her hand grasps onto one of the shelves and for a moment Falco thinks everything will be fine. Gabi is suspended there, hanging onto the shelf with one hand while an old, musty textbook is dangling in the other. A beat passes and then two and then a horrible crack is heard.

It happens in slow motion. Gabi’s weight is too much for the shelf and it slips out of the cabinet, coming away with her hand as she falls onto Falco and nearly crushes him. The already unstable cabinet begins to crumble. The top shelf goes first, falling away, and the textbooks that it held drop onto the other shelves which all collapse in turn. The entire cabinet falls apart, its contents spilling on the floor, and Falco winces when he hears Instructor Andreas bellow their names.

“Braun! Grice! What the hell did you two do?” The instructor’s shout can be heard clearly in the tiny schoolhouse and every student immediately freezes at the sound of his voice. It’s never a good thing when an instructor raises their voice, especially Instructor Andreas.

“J-just … getting some textbooks, s-sir,” Falco stammers. Gabi is still on top of him, her weight crushing his lungs, and he shoves her off, jabbing her in the ribs to signal her to apologize before they get into even more trouble.

Gabi grunts and sits up in a more respectable position. She brushes off some dust from her school uniform and at least has the sense to look apologetic as she looks at their teacher. “Sorry, sir,” Gabi mumbles and Falco repeats a clumsy apology beside her. “I should have been more careful.”

“You stupid Eldians can’t help destroying every damn thing you touch, can you?” Instructor Andreas snaps. He spits on the floor in disgust. It’s enough to make everyone nearby flinch. He looks up at the two troublemakers with a scathing glare and jerks his head towards the open door. “Go out there and finish a full circuit. Don’t come back until you do.”

Falco’s shoulders begin to slump. A full circuit is nearly an hour of drills that is sure to leave him sore when he wakes up tomorrow morning. He wants to complain, but he knows one word will just result in a heavier punishment. He should just do it and get it over with now.

He’s about to get up and offer Gabi a hand, but he sees she’s already standing and offering him a hand up. Falco hesitates, but he takes it and lets Gabi pull him up. He knows she’s going to say something about it once they leave the schoolhouse and get out of earshot of Instructor Andreas, but right now he just wants to get out of here as soon as possible even if it means he’ll have to put up with more of Gabi’s short jokes later.

As soon as they step out of the wooden cabin and onto the schoolyard it begins.

“No need to thank me for helping you up,” Gabi whispers to him. She’s so close to him that he can feel her breath hot against his ear. “It’s probably difficult for you to stand up on your own with those short legs of yours.”

Falco scowls at her and gets started on the full circuit before Instructor Andreas can stick his head out of the schoolhouse and yell at them for fooling around.

It’s an hour of grueling physical exertion. The first time he had ever done the circuit, he was ten years old and a new recruit for the Warrior-trainee program. He thought he would die five minutes in. The first part was running around the field, which would normally be bearable except for the fact that the schoolyard is filled with little bumps and holes everywhere. Although he’s learned the best footing when running around the field, his calves still burn as soon as he makes it a half a kilometer. He’s hardly improved from the first time he had run through the circuit.

Gabi catches up to him quite easily even though he’s had a head start. Unlike Falco, she doesn’t break a sweat. She’s practically smiling as she passes by him. It doesn’t surprise Falco. What most people find difficult, Gabi can do easily as if it were as simple as taking a breath.

By the time Falco’s finished running around the field twice, Gabi is already starting on the drills that accompany the circuit: push-ups, curl-ups, pull-ups, any exercise that will ensure that they won’t be able to move a single muscle tomorrow morning. She’s a little red in the face now, her hair falling out of its usual bun and sticking to the sweat on her forehead, but she’s not as out-of-breath as Falco. Somehow, she’s still smiling.

“I hope you know,” Falco huffs as he nearly collapses doing his first push-up., “that this is all your fault.”

“Nonsense,” Gabi says easily. He’s not sure how she’s able to form words so easily. She doesn’t seem winded at all. “I had everything out of control.”

“You broke the cabinet!”

“I got the textbook,” she replies contentedly as if this is all that matters. “Something you could never do on your own due to your lack of height.” She gets out of her push-up position and sits down on her haunches so that she’s looking down on Falco. With an impish grin, she reaches out to give Falco a condescending pat on the head. It’s just a light touch, but it’s enough to send Falco face-first into the ground.

Falco raises his head and splutters, spitting out the dirt that had gotten in his mouth. “I didn’t even need that textbook!” he coughs.

He regrets shouting as soon as the words leave his mouth. His raised voice attracts the attention of Instructor Andreas, who pokes his head out the door and sees Falco collapsed on the ground and Gabi taunting him.

“Braun! Grice!” the instructor growls. His harsh tone makes Falco flinch, but Gabi simply turns her head. “I thought I told you two to complete a full circuit, not play around.”

The two give him a weak apology that the man only scowls at.

“Don’t apologize to me. Save your energy,” the man snarls. He pounds the doorframe twice and then points at the field that Gabi and Falco had just finished running around. “Start over. Do the circuit properly or else I’ll make sure you’ll be running laps around the field until nightfall.”

Immediately, the two get up and jog towards the field. Falco’s pretty sure he’s going to pass out halfway, but there’s no point in complaining about it.

“Sorry,” he mumbles to Gabi as they make their way to the field.

She glances at him, unbothered. “No worries,” Gabi says. She’s being uncharacteristically understanding, even jogging at the same pace as him. The two jog together in tandem for a few beats and Gabi speaks again. “Since you’re so short, it makes sense that you’d be short-tempered, too.”

Falco growls and speeds ahead, but he can still hear Gabi cackling behind him.

»»————-　★　————-««

Falco sits at the dining table shoveling as much food in his mouth as humanly possible. He’s not even taking time to savor the food. If he did, he’d probably notice that stuffing bread and mashed potatoes and carrots and chicken in his mouth all at once is a disgusting mishmash of flavors.

“Falco,” his mother says exasperatedly as he shoves an entire boiled egg into his mouth. “Can you at least chew your food?”

“No,” Falco garbles through the food in his mouth. A few crumbs fly from his mouth and onto the table. Falco doesn’t hesitate to wipe it away hastily with a napkin and wastes no time in shoveling yet another spoonful of mashed potatoes and gravy into his mouth.

His mother only sighs. She gave up hope on managing her son’s eating habits long ago.

Doing stretches doesn’t seem to be working for Falco, so he has started a new strategy to grow taller: eating his family out of house and home. At first he thought it would be fine if he just took in as much dairy as possible. He’s heard it said that calcium is what makes a person grow, but he became impatient when he didn’t see results the next day and just decided to eat everything he could shove in his mouth. Has it made his eating experience much less enjoyable? Absolutely, but it’ll be worth it if he can grow a couple of more inches and finally overtake Gabi in height.

“What’s happening here?” a familiar voice says. Falco lifts his head to see his older brother Colt walk over with a puzzled look on his face.

It’s been a while since Falco has actually seen his brother at home. After being chosen as the successor of the Beast Titan, Colt had been put on a more intensive training regimen that often started early in the morning before the Grice family was even awake and ended late into the night when everyone had long gone to bed. The only time Falco ever really sees his brother is on the training field with other soldiers when their training schedules coincidentally align. Falco thinks it’s the first time he’s seen Colt at home during the day since he was named Commander Zeke’s successor.

“He’s eating everything in the house,” their mother grumbles because Falco’s mouth is full of food and can’t speak right now. “The rest of us will starve at this rate.”

“That’s fine. Training really makes you hungry,” Colt hums. He shrugs his bag off his shoulder and lets it fall to the floor with a thud. He grabs an empty plate and cutlery from the cabinet and joins his family at the table. Colt is about to help himself to some dinner but he takes a glance at Falco’s plate, which is filled with a mountain of food. He raises an eyebrow. “I know you’re at that age where you eat a ton but isn’t this … a bit much?”

Falco swallows the food in his mouth and it slides slowly down his throat. He’s afraid it gets stuck halfway and begins to cough. He pounds at his chest with one hand and reaches for his glass of water on the table with the other, nearly knocking it over because he isn’t looking. Falco nearly has to down the entire glass before the lump of food is able to slide down his throat.

“Please chew,” his mother practically begs.

Falco ignores her. “I have to … eat more,” he pants. He’s beginning to taste the food on his tongue now, and it tastes terrible. It’s too sweet and too salty and there’s a weird film on his tongue. He gulps down more water before shoveling more food in his mouth.

Colt raises his eyebrows again. Since he hasn’t been able to speak to his family for a while, he’s missed out on quite a lot, including Falco’s current problem with Gabi and his height. His mother is kind enough to fill Colt in.

“He’s convinced that eating more will help him grow taller,” their mother tells Colt. She sits with her back against her chair and her arms crossed against her chest. Her eyes never leave Falco as she speaks. “There’s a girl that’s taller than him.”

Colt watches Falco, his head tilted to the side. “Isn’t it normal for the boys to be shorter than the girls at this age?” he asks. He thinks for a moment as he tries to recall what it was to be Falco’s age only a few years ago. “I think I was shorter than most of the girls in my class when I was your age, too.”

“That’s what I’ve been telling him!” Mrs. Grice says. She gives Falco a withering look, but her son is too busy eating to notice. “He’ll catch up to them in no time at all. Eating everything in sight won’t necessarily make you grow any taller, Falco. Just eat normally and you’ll get your growth spurt before you know it.”

Colt continues to observe his little brother. He rests his elbow on the table and his cheek in his hand. “Are you really upset that the girls are taller? I’m sure the other guys in your class have already accepted it.” His fingers tap against the table as he thinks. After a moment, he stops and sits up with a suspicious expression. “Unless you’re upset because it’s not because it’s the girls but because of one girl in particular.”

Falco stops eating to glare at Colt. He means for his glare to look menacing, but he probably just looks ridiculous with his cheeks full of food like an overstuffed chipmunk.

The corners of Colt’s mouth quirk upward in a grin. “I’m right, aren’t I?” Colt says. He looks far too amused by this. “Is it … Gabi? It’s Gabi, isn’t it?”

“No,” Falco says with a mouthful of food. He manages not to spit out of any of it, but he kind of wishes he spit his food into his brother’s face. Colt looks as if he’s about to laugh about this whole thing, which only infuriates Falco more. How is any of this funny?

“How much taller than you is she?” Colt asks. He leans over the table with that same smile on his face, the one that says he finds all of this hilarious. “1 cm? 2 cm? 3?”

“She’s not,” Falco lies, but his voice comes out in a whine and he knows his face is scrunching up in a childish way. He wishes Colt hadn’t come home. “She’s not taller than me!”

“Okay, okay,” Colt chides. He starts to pile food onto his own plate and gestures for his mom to eat as well, probably deciding that it’ll be useless to talk to Falco about this topic any further.

The three eat together in relative peace — Falco still trying to eat everything in front of him without swallowing, his mother eating and occasionally rolling her eyes whenever she catches a glimpse of her younger son, and Colt eating normally as if this is a normal family meal. After a moment, Colt takes a brussel sprout from his plate and onto Falco’s. Falco doesn’t think much of it at first but then Colt drops another one onto Falco’s plate, then another one, and then another one.

Falco stops eating for a moment and looks at his brother. “What are you doing?” he asks after swallowing.

Colt stops what he’s doing and looks at his younger brother in surprise. “Me?” he asks as if he wasn’t sure Falco had been speaking to him. “I’m helping you, of course. Helping you grow taller.” He gestures at the brussel sprouts with his fork and then at Falco.

Falco wrinkles his nose. “With brussel sprouts?” It’s one of the few foods he’s been trying to avoid. While his plan is to eat everything, he does have his limits and brussel sprouts are one of them. He can’t stand them. They look like tiny little cabbages, but taste so much worse, their bitter taste lingering on Falco’s tongue long after he’s swallowed. He tries not to eat them as much as he can.

“Yeah,” Colt says. He raises an eyebrow. “You don’t know? They’re chock-full of all sorts of nutrients: calcium, vitamin D, magnesium, and the like. It’s supposed to help with bone growth. Helps you grow taller. Didn’t they tell you that in school?”

Across the table, Colt’s mother mouths, “Really?” Falco doesn’t notice when Colt answers with a subtle shake of the head.

Falco looks sullenly at the little pile of brussel sprouts sitting in his pile of mashed potatoes. He pushes them around idly with his fork. “They didn’t mention it in my class,” he mumbles.

Colt shrugs. “You guys probably haven’t gotten into the diet and health unit yet. They really emphasize it in the Warrior Trainee program, especially once you get chosen as a Warrior.”

Falco looks suspiciously at his brother and then at the brussel sprouts on his plate. “Really?” he asks.

“Really,” Colt says. He seems sincere, and Falco doesn’t know why his older brother would lie to him. It’s true that Colt would know what foods to eat now that he’s a Warrior. He would know what foods are good for growth and keeping up someone’s strength.

Reluctantly, Falco spears a brussel sprout with his fork and nibbles at it. He shudders when the weird metallic taste hits his tongue. With a grimace, he puts the whole thing in his mouth, gives it a few good chews, and then swallows it down. It feels like slime moving down his throat. He has to finish the rest of his water just to rinse the taste out of his mouth.

“That’s disgusting,” he shudders, but he spears two more brussel sprouts onto his fork and eats them. It’s just as bad this time as it was before. He’s not sure how he’s going to finish the rest of these brussel sprouts without puking. He screws up his face as he takes another bite of the foul vegetable. “‘This is the worst!”

“Eat up, brother,” Colt hums, loading Falco’s plate with even more servings of the offensive food.

Their mother waves her hand to get Colt’s attention and gestures at the salted anchovies. “These, too,” she says. “Colt, make sure your brother eats these. Weren’t you telling me the other day that they were a good source of calcium?”

“Anchovies?” Colt says with a furrowed brow. Then, as if he’s just remembering, he nods and makes a noise in understanding. He begins to shovel the fish onto Falco’s plate right next to the brussel sprouts. “Ah, right. They mentioned it was a superfood, something that helps you grow taller overnight.”

“Really?” Falco wants to cry. He hates anchovies even more than brussel sprouts. They’re always too salty and too fishy, the taste overwhelming both his nose and his taste buds. He thinks he really is going to puke. He nearly cries as he lifts a spoonful of the little fish into his mouth and his entire body shudders when the salty taste hits his tongue. He’s practically sobbing as he goes for another spoonful.

After a few more horrible swallows of brussel sprouts and anchovies, Falco notices his mother and brother snickering behind their palms. His eating slows and he puts his spoon down.

“These … really aren’t superfoods, are they?” he asks flatly. He already knows the answer even before Colt nods his head. If Falco’s stomach didn’t feel as if it were about to burst right now, he would be flipping the table over in frustration. Instead, he just lets out an exasperated shriek and storms upstairs to his room.

“Where are you going, Falco?” Colt asks after him.

“You haven’t finished eating yet!” his mother calls.

Falco slams his bedroom door behind him in response.

»»————-　★　————-««

Falco should have figured that Gabi would soon grow tired of teasing him and that she would naturally progress to the next best thing: completely humiliating him in front of as many people as possible.

She still stands only a few centimeters taller than him, but the brunette acts as if she towers above him like a giant. Whenever they’re standing beside each other, Gabi looks down at him, lifting her head and standing as straight as she can without standing on her tiptoes. She stares her nose at him, that smug grin on her face each time. Falco always rolls his eyes and does his best to ignore him, but he finds it more and more grating each time.

Gabi constantly uses him as an armrest, letting her elbow settle on his shoulder or, if he happens to be sitting down, on the top of his head. More than once, he’s scowled at her before waving her away, but it only seems to amuse her even more because she always laughs whenever he does. Normally, it wouldn’t bother him. The additional weight of Gabi’s elbow isn’t much, but it’s the meaning behind the leaning that bothers him so much. It’s only slightly better to just allow her to use him as a piece of furniture, but not by much. He tries his best not to grumble about it each time because it only makes her grin grow wider.

What’s the absolute worst, though, is when Gabi pats him on the head. She does it so condescendingly with the sweetest smile on her face. Her touch is light, affectionate, and utterly humiliating. He’s waved her away once or twice, but she always finds a reason to put her hand on top of his head: because he has something in his hair, because his hair’s a mess, because his hair is so soft. It doesn’t matter how well-meaning her reason seems. Falco knows her real motive: to remind him of just how short he is by infantilizing him in whatever way she can.

“Oh, Falco,” Gabi says in a sing-song voice. She’s already looking at the top of his head, her hand reaching out to touch his hair. Her fingertips brush against his golden blond locks. “You have something in your hair-”

“No, I don’t!” Falco says, whacking her hand away. He regrets it immediately because now Gabi is standing over him, her hands behind her back and her lips curled in an amused grin.

“How would you know that?” Gabi says. She steps closer to him, hand still clasped behind her. “You can’t see the top of your head, can you? But I can easily because I’m-”

Falco doesn’t let her finish. He’s already heard it too many times before. “Whatever is in my hair, I’d rather it just … be there,” he says firmly.

Gabi stops smiling for a second and then blinks once. Twice. Her mouth spreads into a wide grin once again. “Aren’t you funny?” she coos. She reaches out to pinch Falco’s cheek. It doesn’t hurt, but Falco can feel his cheeks turning red just from her touch. “You don’t care if your hair’s a mess? Or is it really because … you hate how small this makes you feel?” Her hand finds its way to the top of Falco’s head, patting Falco like he’s a dog.

“So, you admit you’re doing this to humiliate me?” Falco asks. It comes out less indignant and more embarrassed, Falco’s cheeks still flushed in humiliation.

“Oh, please,” Gabi smiles. “I can do much worse.”

Falco should have run. He should have turned on his heel and taken off as far as his feet would take him. He knows that look on Gabi’s face, that knowing smirk and that mischievous glimmer in her eye, and he knows that whatever is to come next is absolutely no good. For whatever reason, he stays rooted to the spot even as his eyes widen in horror as Gabi reaches for him, her arms enveloping him right before she sweeps him right off his feet.

“What are you doing?” Falco yelps. He’s jostled around in Gabi’s arms, his chin bumping against her shoulder and then her head as she tries to find a comfortable place to hold him. Somehow, his arms find a way around Gabi’s neck as he hangs on for dear life. “W-what are you doing?”

“You must be so grumpy being so close to the ground all day,” Gabi says breezily. She’s carrying him like a bride and swinging him around like he weighs nothing. “The air is probably stuffy down there. Isn’t it nice being up this high?”

Falco is about to retort that the height she’s carrying him at right now is much shorter than his actual height, but he doesn’t get to because Gabi begins to spin around. He has to hang onto her for dear life because he’s afraid she might drop him. By the time Gabi’s stopped, his head is still spinning and he thinks he can see stars even though the sun is still out.

She lets him down gently, but Falco is still swaying as he stands. He holds his hand to his head as he begins to get his bearings. With a wince, he glances over at Gabi.

“Are you happy now?” he grumbles.

Gabi smiles at him. She rests her elbow on his shoulder and the corners of her eyes crinkle as her grin grows wider. “Very,” she replies.

»»————-　★　————-««

He can’t believe it. Falco really can’t believe it. He’s finally growing taller, but it’s still not enough to beat Gabi. It’s just enough to decrease the gap between them. It’s a one centimeter difference. One measly centimeter, but somehow it bothers Falco more than when Gabi had been two centimeters taller than him.

“Can you just …?” Falco says, stepping nervously behind the nurse who’s already getting ready to measure the next person in line. He glances away when the nurse glares at him, but tugs on the man’s sleeve anyway. “I mean … it’ll only take a second. Are you sure I’m not, like, maybe a centimeter taller than you measured? You were measuring me pretty quickly …”

“Kid,” the nurse says, turning to Falco with a sigh. The person waiting in line looks mildly annoyed at the holdup. “How many times do we have to go through this? You know the rules. I measure you once, and you go.”

“Yeah, but-”

The nurse shakes his head and waves his ruler, gesturing for Falco to leave. “I have work to do.” The man sees Falco’s downcast expression and sighs. “If you’re really bothered just … get shoes with taller soles or something. That’ll do until you finally hit your growth spurt.”

Falco walks away, his shoes dragging against the hardwood floor. “As if I have the money to get new shoes,” he mutters. He stops when he sees someone in front of him. He probably shouldn’t be surprised that it’s Gabi standing in front of him looking as smug as ever.

“Hi, Falco,” she chirps.

“It’s one centimeter,” he tells her. He’s glowering, but Gabi doesn’t even flinch.

“It sure is,” Gabi grins.

“It’s one centimeter!” he says. He doesn’t know why he’s following her as she’s happily skipping away from him, probably to inform all their friends and classmates that she’s still taller than him. He just wants it to be clear: it’s only a one centimeter difference. “It’s not that much taller than me!”

He hates the way she stops and spins around, the way she stands so self-satisfied, the way she smiles at him with her shit-eating grin.

“It’s still one centimeter taller than you,” Gabi says.

Falco hates that the most.

»»————-　★　————-««

When it finally happens, Falco’s not as happy as he thought he would be. In fact, he’s not happy at all. Instead of celebrating the fact that he’s now half a centimeter taller than Gabi, he’s hovering nervously behind the nurse once more.

“Just one more time please!” he begs, tugging on the back of the man’s shirt. He doesn’t even flinch when the nurse swats him away like a mildly annoying gnat. “Are you sure I’m not even a little bit taller? Maybe like … a half-centimeter taller or even a whole centimeter taller than what you just said?”

“You’re as tall as I say you are the first time and not any taller,” the nurse replies. He turns his head to glare at Falco and wags the ruler in front of the boy’s face. “Stop begging me for remeasurements. I’ll start shaving off a centimeter from your height every time you ask.”

“Sorry!” he squeaks before scurrying off to sulk behind Udo.

Udo watches Falco amusedly as the blond shuffles around and mumbles unintelligibly under his breath. “I don’t see why you’re so bothered,” he tells Falco. “You’re finally taller than Gabi, so what’s the big deal?”

“It’s not enough,” Falco sighs. He runs a hand through his hair, tugging at his golden locks irritatedly. “I’m finally taller than her, and she isn’t bothered at all! Just look at her!” He points a finger where Gabi is happily conversing with Zofia. Either she hasn’t heard the news or she doesn’t care. Considering the fact that she hardly even flinched when Falco crowed his new height measurement at the top of his lungs to the class, it’s most definitely the latter. Falco just doesn’t know why.

“... Maybe she just doesn’t know?” Udo guesses with a weak shrug of his shoulders.

Falco shakes his head. “No, she definitely knows.” He’s not so sure anymore. “R-right?”

Again, Udo shrugs.

If Gabi doesn’t know, then Falco needs to make sure she does. Maybe she hadn’t heard him the first time. Maybe she was too busy talking to Zofia to pay attention, Falco thinks as he marches over to where Zofia and Gabi are. Udo follows for moral support, but he sighs as he does because he knows Falco will never be satisfied with the outcome.

Only Zofia turns around when he reaches them. Gabi continues to speak to Zofia, not noticing that her other friends have joined them. It’s only when Falco clears his throat that Gabi stops speaking and looks over at him, eyebrows raised just the slightest bit like she’s feigning surprise.

“Oh, Falco,” she says, smiling delightedly. “Have you been there long?”

“I’m taller than you now,” Falco says, not even bothering to answer her question. He puffs out his chest as he says this, straightening his back to assert his newly achieved half-centimeter height difference over her. “I’m half a centimeter taller than you, in case you haven’t heard.”

To his surprise, Gabi’s smile doesn’t falter. On the contrary, it grows even wider, much to Falco’s horror. “So I’ve heard,” Gabi says. “Congrats, Falco. Good job on surpassing my height by half a centimeter. I’m really happy for you.”

“You … you are?” Falco deflates. His shoulders are slumped in disappointment. If Gabi were to stand up next to him right now, their height difference would be negligible. He had expected her to be infuriated that he had finally beaten her at something. It’s surprising that she hardly cares at all.

“Of course,” Gabi says with a shrug. She stands up, but she doesn’t straighten her back or even try to stand on her tiptoes. She just stands there, half a centimeter shorter than Falco but she carries herself so confidently that she might as well dwarf him. “Enjoy it while you can, Falco. I’ll catch up to you soon.”

He can only stare in open-mouthed disbelief as Gabi all but swaggers out of the classroom. “H-how?” he asks, running after her.

Gabi shrugs as if she hasn’t figured it out yet. It’s like she really doesn’t care at all.

Udo and Zofia have followed Falco and stand behind him as he clings onto the door frame with a frustrated hand.

“She could probably grow on sheer willpower alone,” Zofia says as she pats Falco’s shoulder sympathetically.

“Probably,” Udo agrees.

Falco sighs, leaning against the doorframe. He should just give up now. He could grow a full meter taller than Gabi, but he’d still never catch up to her. Never, he thinks with a smile.

#falbi #snk #canonverse #falco grice #gabi braun #requests #asks #answered #hikoseijuroxiii

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haledamage · 4 years ago

Text

Wayhaven Week Day 2 - Feral

@otomefandomevents

Kira/Mason

this is NSFW / it isn’t any more explicit than the scenes in Wayhaven Chronicles book 2, but it is still smut

Kira moved her hand off the arm of the couch as Mason walked into the room, getting out of his way so he could perch next to her. She smiled in greeting, though she didn't look up from the file open on her lap.

From the corner of her eye, she watched as his eyes traveled over her body like they always did, a cursory inspection, ‘just enjoying the view’ as he called it. Then he paused and looked her over again, slowly, more deliberately.

He leaned over and plucked at the sleeve of the shirt she wore. “That’s my shirt.”

She looked down at herself. He was right, of course. While it was black like all her own clothes were, rather than the very dark red one he wore today, it was clearly much too big on her, made to fit someone both taller and broader than she was.

She shrugged, trying to play it off casually. “I guess you left it in my room. I didn’t realise it was yours until I put it on.”

“But you’re still wearing it.” He raised one eyebrow, and though he was smirking there was a hint of something tempting and dangerous in his eyes. Something Kira couldn’t resist trying to draw forth.

“Finders keepers,” she said, her grin sharp even though her face was red. “You want it back, you’ll have to take it.”

His eyes went dark at the suggestion in her words, smile wide and more than a little feral. He leaned very close, close enough that his lips brushed the shell of her ear as he spoke. “Maybe I want you to keep it. Maybe I want you in that shirt and nothing else.”

Kira wasn't sure how they got to the bedroom, wasn’t entirely sure when they’d made the decision to start moving, the journey a blur punctuated only by his lips on hers. She also wasn't sure which of their rooms they were in, if they were even in one of their bedrooms and not some random guest room, the brief glimpse of dark walls not enough to make a guess. It didn't really matter, not when Mason's hands were sliding under her thighs to lift her up, pressing her against the door as her legs wound around his waist.

The door at her back was hard and unrelenting, the man in front of her even moreso, and it should have been uncomfortable but it wasn't. She let herself relax, trusting Mason to be able to hold her up, and was rewarded with a deep, hungry kiss that made her skin tingle everywhere their bodies touched and would have left her weak in the knees if she were still standing.

She whimpered when he broke away, knowing she needed to breathe but needing him more.

He brushed his lips against any exposed skin he could find, every touch both gentle and electric. “Are you--” he started to ask, like he always did. She appreciated it, really she did, the way he always made sure she wanted this, wanted him, but she’s already impatient, desire making her blood rush hot in her ears and between her legs, so she interrupted him with a growled “yes.”

Apparently, that was the wrong move. He stopped, lips leaving her collarbone so that he could meet her eyes, his smile turned predatory, sharp and teasing. He somehow managed to loom over her even though the way he held her put her at eye level.

“Are you really sure, sweetheart?” His breath ghosted over her skin as he leaned close once more, lips mere millimeters from hers. She tried to close the gap, but he stayed tantalizingly out of reach. “We could go back to the living room. Spend the rest of the day on paperwork like good little agents.”

“Don’t you dare,” she said, but her threat lost most of its power when it came out as a needy whine.

“Then tell me what you want.”

“Fuck me,” she whispered. Her face turned bright red and she had to fight her own gut reaction to drop her gaze away, but it was worth it. He snarled, a sound that shouldn’t have been able to come from a human throat, hands clenching on her thighs for just a second. It sent heat slithering down her spine, pooling low in her belly. “Mason, please.”

That did the trick, though Kira didn’t know if it was the use of his name or the clear pleading in her tone that finally spurred him into motion. His lips descended on her neck ruthlessly, leaving a trail of sharp kisses from her jaw to her collarbone. When he bit at the juncture of her neck and shoulder hard enough that she could feel the hint of fang, just shy of breaking the skin, she moaned loud enough that everyone in the warehouse probably heard her. She really couldn’t find it in herself to care.

Mason rushed to undress her - though, true to his word, the shirt she'd stolen from him stayed on - before removing only enough of his own clothing for it to not be in the way. That was new; normally, he relished any opportunity to get naked, if only for the hungry way she stared at him, but clearly she wasn't the only one impatient this time.

He lifted her back up against the door and she reached a hand between them to guide him as he slowly pressed into her, their voices lifted in matching groans tinged with something like relief.

Then he started moving and all she could do is hold on, the position they were in leaving her completely at his mercy and he knew it. He took her slowly, determined to wring every noise out of her that he could, and she gave them up eagerly. She grasped at his biceps, his shoulders, clenching her hands in his shirt in an effort to pretend she could exert some control over the situation, but nothing she did made him move any faster. Her head fell back against the door with a dull thud, a whimper escaping her that resembled his name.

He cupped the back of her head to tilt it back down, somehow holding her up with only one hand while not losing his rhythm. “Eyes on me, sweetheart.”

She nodded, not able to do anything else as his hand slowly crept back down to her hip, caressing everywhere he could reach on the way.

He pressed his forehead to hers, their eyes locked, their moans and panted breathing mingling in the space between them. Kira brought one hand up to his face, brushing her knuckles over his cheek, the gentle motion at odds with the relentless, slow pace of their bodies moving together.

Mason’s breath hitched as her fingers trailed along his jaw until she tangled them into his hair, and he captured her lips in a messy, desperate kiss. The movement of his hips turned frantic, hard enough to make the door rattle as her back slammed against it.

“Kira.” It was broken and needy, somewhere between a whisper and a groan, and the sound of her name falling from his lips was what finally pushed her over the edge, keening and shaking with the strength of her release. He followed right after her with a ragged growl.

He kept holding her as they came back down and she was grateful for it. There was no way her legs would be able to support her right now. He pressed his forehead to her collarbone, breathing hard, and she carded her fingers through his hair as the room fell quiet.

Eventually, Kira was the first one to break the silence. “Fuck,” she said with a breathless laugh. “You are never getting this shirt back. I’ll wear it every goddamn day.”

He chuckled, and he didn't sound any steadier than she did. “Hope you don’t plan on getting any work done ever again.” He finally took a step back to let her stand up, keeping his hands on her hips until they were both sure she wouldn’t collapse, though her legs still shook like crazy when she tried to move.

He looked very smug about it. She couldn’t blame him.

“Pretty sure work is what I’m supposed to be doing now,” she said dryly as she tried to untangle her discarded clothing and tug it back on. Beside her, Mason was doing the same thing. “And I know it’s what you’re supposed to be doing.”

“This is more fun.”

She couldn’t bring herself to disagree. Especially when he pulled her close and kissed her again.

#wayhaven week 2020 #kira kingston #kira/mason #smut with feelings #(unrealized feelings but feelings nonetheless)#I'm not sure whether to say you're welcome or I'm sorry XD #kira and mason have been trying to talk me into this for months

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peterparkerstarker · 5 years ago

Text

Ice Blue

My gift for @understarkercover for the @starkersecretsanta gift exchange. I really hope you like this!

Post-Endgame, Peter is 18 and has spent every waking moment trying to find a way to get Tony back. He finally settled on building a portal to find a Tony from another world in the multiverse, Earth-616 to be exact, but things don’t quite go according to plan.

((I had accidentally written a much longer dub/noncon ending because I didn’t remember at first that it’s something they didn’t want. I may eventually post that, but I wanted to be super respectful of their wishes and cut that ending for this iteration of the fic. I decided to leave it much more open ended in this version))

cw/tw: starker, Peter is 18, angst, fear/anxiety, Superior Iron Man, kiss

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

It had taken him weeks to get it right. So many perfectly good bananas wasted for the cause. He’d needed something living to test out the portal, and May had just bought a whole bunch of them, so they seemed like the perfect test subject.

Now, though, staring down the face of this long, ebbing tunnel, he regretted his decision not to do a little more testing. See, the thing is that Peter hadn’t actually tested it on something that wasn’t just peel and potassium. And he was suddenly realizing the myriad of things that could, and probably would go wrong.

Ned had encouraged him to try it on one of the science department’s lab mice, but Peter couldn’t bear to see them locked in their cages, so how could he even think about sending a helpless, defenseless creature into a portal of his own making? He shuddered at the thought, wiping back tears. He didn’t know if they were for the mice, for Tony, or maybe even for himself. He didn’t have time to think too hard about it. He knew he’d lose his nerve to step through if he did.

See, the thing about bananas is they have no real way to return to this dimension, so he could only hope they’d made it through safely. If his calculations were correct, and they usually were, he’d be stepping into an alternate dimension, one that Dr. Strange visited often, Earth-616 he’d called it.

Dr. Strange had said it was almost entirely like their own universe, save for small details. Clint was apparently blonde and had an over-fondness for purple, which Peter could hardly imagine. And Dr. Strange had mentioned one time that Tony’s eyes were blue, not brown, but he was still the arrogant asshole they all loved.

Blue. Peter had fallen asleep every night since the battle dreaming of blue eyes. It wasn’t his Tony, he knew it wouldn’t be the same, but he had to try. If this Tony was anything compared to Peter’s, he had to fucking try.

And according to Dr. Strange, 616 Tony was still alive and annoying the fuck out of him every time he went to visit that universe. Peter had grasped on to any small details about Earth-616 that he could, eager to gather information, but also trying his best to not seem too desperate.

Thankfully Dr. Strange was too preoccupied with an ancient text he’d been spending weeks decoding to really give Peter too much thought. He’d answer Peter’s questions distractedly, and then shoo him away, vexed that this one book was giving him so many difficulties.

Peter had collected all that info, created a unified plan based on some old arc reactor teleporter plans he’d found in Tony’s lab, and thus the portal was built. A few weeks spent fine tuning his calculations, and he was finally going to take the plunge tonight.

He shivered, adjusting his backpack on his shoulders and steadied himself, trying not to freak out about what he was about to do.

Don’t think about how this is really stupid and you might get stuck there, if you can even get there, and that if your math is even one millimeter off you could get spliced into a trillion pieces and oh my god I missed that one question on the Calc test last week. What if I made a mistake on this? Nope, nope, blue eyes. Just breathe and think about blue eyes. Blue eyes.

And with a shaking breath, Peter crossed into the unknown, vanishing like a blip in the night.

--------

Brightness. It was almost blinding compared to his dim bedroom back in Queens.

He didn’t know where he was, but it certainly wasn’t his room back home.

Blue eyes, that’s what he’d been thinking about as he crossed over. It was certainly possible that intention could play a factor in the math of multiverses. Had his preoccupation with that one thought altered the portal?

But no, he realized, his eyes finally focusing enough to take in the world around him. He was in a room, bright white and sterile, a clean off-putting design that felt alien. Everything too pristine, untouched.

He looked around for some sign of life, some indication of where the hell he’d ended up, but saw nothing besides modern uncomfortable furniture and a white, perfectly made bed.

But just as he was crossing to the door, something caught his eye, a math textbook from 2 years ago that looked oddly familiar, tucked under the bed. He pulled it out, immediately recognizing the crumpled corner from when Ned had dropped it out his window as a joke gone too far. It was his… but why was it here?

This must be his room, Peter realized. The portal wasn’t made to travel you to another location, just another universe.

But why was it so... different?

Peter heard a ringing, a low dulcet chime coming from a stark white phone sitting on the dresser next to the bed. Extremis Industries, the brand label proclaimed. The caller ID said Tony.

He stared at it, transfixed in horror and glee, still too shocked to process it all. Tony was alive in this universe. He had to answer.

“H-hello?” Peter stuttered out, mentally kicking himself for sounding so childish on the phone.

“Peter, I’ve been waiting a long time for you to arrive.” The voice was lower, smoother and more silky. But it was, unmistakably, Tony.

“Tony! Oh my god, Tony it’s really you!” Peter felt tears welling up, willing himself not to let them fall.

Tony let out a laugh, something deep and more biting than the Tony he knew, but he brushed the thought aside as he launched into a rambling explanation of what had happened and why he was here. This Tony seemed all too aware of what Peter was saying, as if he were merely humoring Peter’s explanation, but Peter didn’t care. He was just so glad to be able to talk to Tony again.

Before long Tony was offering to send over a car to whisk him back to his offices, where they could talk in person. Peter eagerly agreed, desperate to see Tony, to hug him tight. He tried not to think about all the other things he wanted, things he’d never had the courage to ask for with his Tony. Maybe he’d be brave enough with this one. Maybe this Tony would want all the same things he did.

Within 5 minutes a buzz alerted Peter to the sleek white car waiting on the street for him. A stocky driver ushered him out of the apartment, which was an equally sleek white building, no longer the brownstone he knew so well. He vaguely wondered where Happy was, and why the streets looked so… dirty in comparison to the clinical design of his building, but before he could really process it, he was whisked into the back of the car, and the too-dark tinted windows obscured his view.

He settled into the back seat, trying hard not to fidget, thinking through everything that had happened, everything he wanted to say, trying to shove down the delicious excitement of maybe, this time, finally having the relationship with Tony that he wanted, not just a student learning from him, but an equal, a peer, a lover. He shivered, the thrill of kissing him, touching him, fucking him, running through his mind. Maybe this time things could be right.

And then before he realized it, they were stopping in front of a massive building, looming like a warning in the back of his skull. Dr. Strange had said there were only little differences in this world, hair color and little personality traits. But this world seemed so different. Too different.

He shoved those thoughts down once more, choosing instead to focus on his goal. Tony. Blue eyes. This was all happening so fast, too fast, but he didn’t want it to stop. So he had to keep moving forward.

An elevator, sleek doors closing soundlessly, and suddenly he was soaring a thousand feet in the air, his stomach dropping as the floors raced past, too fast for his mind to process.

With a quiet ding, the elevator stopped, opening onto a seemingly empty hallway. White and modern and empty, not unlike his room back home. It felt cold, lifeless, and Peter felt himself growing even more nervous as he made his way down the hallway.

Just as he was wondering where to go next, a figure appeared. White armor, with black undercasing and an electric blue glow radiating from it. The man turned, and he saw it was Tony. Or at least this universe’s version of him.

Without thinking, Peter ran to him, held him tight and finally let the tears he’d been holding onto fall, sobbing into Tony’s chest. He was taller than the Tony Peter had known, more muscular too, it seemed. But he held Peter tight, like his Tony would’ve, and in that moment he didn’t care that things were so different, because Tony was the one constant, the thing in his life that would always be the same, right?

Joy turned to confusion as Tony ducked his head down, grasping onto Peter’s shaking chin, holding him steady as he kissed Peter. He didn’t know who this version of Tony was, but he was just so grateful to have some iteration of Tony back in his life.

“You’re here now, safe with me, and you’re not going anywhere been waiting a long time for you to show up,” Tony said with an icy glint in his eyes.

Peter swallowed and nodded. This may not be the Tony he wanted, but something was better than nothing, right? He sure hoped he was right.

#starkersecretsanta2019 #starker #superior iron man #multiverse travel #gift fic #understarkercover #my fic #my writing

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orangeoctopi7 · 5 years ago

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History Repeats Itself

: Chapter 1 : Chapter 2 : Chapter 3 : Chapter 4 : Chapter 5 : Chapter 6 :

The boys resumed working on the Time Tape right away. Ford showed his brother how to carefully use the tiny file to grind off the excess bits of metal from the miniscule framework of circuitry. Once Stan got started on his own, the young genius got to work taking apart the Time Tape’s casing, and preparing to replace the circuitry. As they worked, the only sound was the scraping of the file and their mother taking the occasional call for her phone psychic business downstairs.

Ford was trying to tease the damaged circuits out of their casing with the tweezers he’d used to clean the sand off the new circuits. After a few failed attempts, he threw them down in frustration.

“Where are my needle-nosed pliers!?” He shuffled through all the tools and parts that had accumulated on his desk.

Stan shrugged, then winced as his arm throbbed again.

When another few minutes of exasperated searching didn’t turn up anything, Ford decided to head back downstairs and see if there was a pair among their father’s tools.

“Hey, gimme another ice pack while you’re down there?” Stan requested. The ice bag he’d been using had become nothing more than a sweaty bag of lukewarm water.

“Sure.” Ford nodded as he left the room.

Since the bag no longer soothed his aching arm, Stan picked it up and plopped it into their trash bin before resuming his task of filing down the new circuitry. The water from the bag coated his fingers, making his grip slippery. The next time his right arm throbbed with pain, his fingers twitched, and the file slipped out of his hand. He instinctively grabbed it with his left hand… and snapped the circuitry he was holding in half in the process.

Stan just stared down at his hands blankly for a couple of seconds before what he’d done sunk in. “...Crap…” he breathed. His stomach twisted and his heart rate skyrocketed. Way to go, screw-up, you’ve ruined one of your brother’s important projects yet again!

No. No, this wasn’t going to be like that. Stan looked around frantically, for a place to hide the evidence, for an escape route, he wasn’t sure. Then his eyes fell on the soldering iron. Of course! After thirty years of rebuilding the Portal, he knew how to use one of those! He could still fix it! Sure, Ford had said it was too big for such delicate work, but Stan was willing to try anything at this point.

He laid the circuitry back down in the sand mold as carefully as his shaking hands would allow. It wasn’t a perfect fit, many of the sand grains had been picked away by the first molding, but it would have to do for now. He held the soldering spool and the hot iron just a few millimeters above the first break in the circuitry. He tried to hold his hands steady as a molten drop of metal dripped into the sand, but his emotions were running away with him. His thoughts kept on circling, screw-up, screw-up, screw-up, repeating on an endless loop in his head. His breath was coming in irregular gasps, and his vision was blurring. Instead of sealing the break, the drop of metal was just a couple of millimeters off target.

“C-c’mon!” Stan grunted, sticking the tip of the soldering iron into the molten drop and dragging it to the break in the circuit, like one would drag a fountain pen through a drop of ink. All he ended up doing was melting the metal on either side of the break.

“No. No! No no no!” Stan’s frustration and fear bloomed into anger, and he slammed the soldering iron down on the desk, leaving a scorch mark in the hard plastic surface and snapping the tip of the iron right off. He stared mutely at the smoldering tip as it slowly burned a hole in the carpet. How could things have gone so wrong so quickly?

His instincts were telling him to run, but what good would that do? He was still trapped in the past with Stanford, and he’d just sabotaged their chances of fixing the thing they needed to get home. How would Ford react when he found out?

It won’t be like with the science fair. The logical part of Stan’s brain reasoned. You’ve both learned from your mistakes and grown since then.

But Stan had never been very good at listening to the logical part of his brain. The rest of his brain could only remember all the times he’d messed up before, and how his life always seemed to start a death spiral from there.

He heard footsteps coming up the stairs, and froze. He’d run out of time.

“I’ve got your ice pack. Sorry I took so long, the needle-nosed pliers were all the way down in the pawn shop. I guess dad needed them to work on an old clock someone--” Ford stopped short when he took in the devastated expression on his brother’s face. “What happened?”

“I--I--” Stan stammered, struggling to form coherent words, much less describe what he’d done. “I’m sorry-- my hand slipped-- I didn’t mean to-- no, no excuses-- I tried to fix it, I swear!”

“Hey… hey, it’s ok.” Ford rushed forward and wrapped his brother in a hug.

“It’s not ok!” Stan cried. “We need to go home, and I just ruined the thing we need to do that!”

Ford glanced over his brother’s shoulder and took in the broken circuitry and the snapped soldering iron. He quickly unplugged the iron before it caught anything on fire, but then returned to comforting his brother.

“Stanley, it’s ok, it was just an accident.”

Stan frowned down at the ground. “It’s always an accident.”

Ford gently took his brother by the shoulders. “It was delicate, I could have snapped it just as easily.”

“Yeah, but you didn’t. You didn’t break the iron either.” Stan held his head in his hands and gave a hollow laugh. “I could’ve burned the house down. That’d be a new low, even for me.”

“You need to stop beating yourself up so much. Nothing was broken that can’t be fixed.” Ford assured him. “I told you I can form the circuits again, it’ll only take a couple of days and a new soldering iron.”

Stan groaned. “Yeah, nothing that can’t be fixed except the school's property.”

Ford scoffed. “I literally could not care less about the school’s property.”

“And your desk.”

“Trust me, I’ve burnt plenty of holes of my own in that desk.”

Stan just swallowed back tears and leaned into his brother’s shoulder.

Ford patted his back awkwardly. “I’m not mad at you. I’m sorry I always got so irate all those other times, but I’ve learned my lesson since then.”

Stan was maybe on the verge of feeling better when they both heard the familiar sound of an oldsmobile pulling into the parking space behind the pawn shop. Filbrick was home, with his usual sense of timing. Ford could feel his brother tense in his arms.

“...Maybe he went out for drinks with the coach and he’ll just go straight to bed.” The young genius hoped. Thankfully their father was more of a sleepy drunk than an angry drunk.

The heavy footfalls coming up the stairs didn’t sound like a tired, drunken stagger. They heard a muted conversation between their parents, and then the footsteps continued up the second flight of stairs to their attic bedroom.

Ford held the ice pack up to Stan’s face.

“Wha-- Ford, what the heck?”

“It’ll mask any swelling or redness from… your hormone-induced emotional outburst.” They didn’t have time to argue over whether or not Stan had just been crying.

The heavy footsteps stopped, and the door swung open. Filbrick was barely an inch taller than them at this point, and yet his impassive face loomed over them like a colossus.

“You two left without tellin’ me. Do you have any idea how worried I was?”

“Not worried enough to come looking for us, apparently.” Ford answered flippantly.

“I had to go use the payphone to call your Ma when neither of you came back in time for the Somners fight!” He informed them. “So not only did I spend money I shouldn’t’ve had to, I cut into her precious client time. You know she can’t take customers during the day anymore because of the baby!”

“Oh…” Ford had forgotten about that particular detail. “Sorry.” He was mostly sorry for his mother. “It was my fault, I was really anxious to get back to my science fair project.”

“And you,” Filbrick turned to Stan, who quickly lowered the ice from his face. “You left without collectin’ your pay! What kind of imbecile does that!? I had to collect it for you.”

“Oh, heh, whoops!” Stan forced on his best con man smile. “Guess I must’ve hit my head one too many times in the ring.”

“How many times have I got to tell you boys?” Filbrick shook his head. “All the brains or charm in the world can’t buy you a meal in your stomach or a roof over your head. What’s it gonna take for you two to man up and start takin’ your futures seriously?”

The two brothers remained silent, both knowing better than to try and answer this rhetorical question. Still, the irony was not lost on them.

“Well, since you’re obviously not responsible enough to handle this money on your own, I think I’ll hang onto those winnings I picked up for you. Taking out the cost of the payphone, any potential revenu your mother might’ve lost while I was on the phone with her, and a holder’s fee, there should be just enough left for me to pay off your parking ticket.”

“Th-thanks, dad.” Stan said meekly.

“Don’t thank him, he’s taking money that’s rightfully yours!” Ford said indignantly.

“Ford!” Stan hissed, elbowing his brother hard in the ribs. He cast a wary glance up at their father. “H-he didn’t mean it!”

Filbrick stared down his rebellious son, his expression as unreadable as ever behind his dark glasses. Ford glared right back, unwavering.

“Let me clear something up for you, smart guy.” Fibrick growled. “You live under my roof. My sons. My dependents. So until you two turn 18, any money either of you make is technically mine. You’re just lucky me and your Ma make enough that we don’t need to take any of it from you.”

Stan squeezed his brother’s arm tightly and whispered in his ear. “Ford, please, don’t. Just let it go. Please.” He wasn’t sure if he was pleading with his brother not to correct their father’s grammar, or his understanding of how parental stewardship and dependents worked. Thankfully, Ford lowered his gaze and nodded.

Filbrick nodded stoically back. “And clean this room up, it smells like burnt plastic in here.”

#Gravity Falls #Fanfiction #Stanley Pines #Stanford Pines #Filbrick Pines #my writing

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hoodoo12 · 5 years ago

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Beetlejuice Squared (2/5)

Mature. Brightman!Juice/f!reader/Blum!juice. Smoking, anger, possessiveness, propositions. Part 1

“What the fuck?!” the Beetlejuice you were leaning against exclaimed, sitting up abruptly, half-dislodging you from his side.

You fumbled the joint so you didn’t drop it as you were jostled. “Hey! Watch it, Beej!”

The new Beetlejuice threw his gaze around the room with narrowed eyes and dramatically waved his hand in front of his face. “Jesus christ,” he coughed. “What’s with all the weed?”

His eyes landed on you. “Oh, hello.”

“Hi!” you replied.

Whatever was happening, Beetlejuice’s dope smoothed out all the edges. You pushed yourself off the specter you were leaning on, shoved the still lit joint back into his hand, ignored his protest and his other hand that tried to keep a grip on your shirt, and got off the couch. You took a step towards the newcomer. “Who’re you?”

“I’m the ghost with the most, babydoll,” he replied. It was such a cliché you rolled your eyes, but you also couldn’t help but smile.

This was Beetlejuice, but not quite Beetlejuice. Although dressed in the striped suit you’d come to expect and with the same swept up rat’s nest of hair and scruff on his face, he was taller--much taller!--than the Beetlejuice you’d spent the evening with so far. Made bold by the smoke you had partaken in, you looked him over thoroughly, taking his hand (and finding his nails were solid black); straining on unsteady tip-toes to peer into his face (discovering his eyes were darker amber than the other Beetlejuice’s and his teeth were slightly less sharp).

He seemed as curious about you as you did him, and permitted the inspection with an air of amusement. You kept a hand on him, dragging your fingers lightly over him as you walked in a circle to look at his back. He watched you the entire time with a slight smile on his face, his head rotating completely around to keep track of you.

When you were where you started in front of him again, you left your hand on his chest and said, “Beej--”

“What?” they both answered together.

The new arrival didn’t have the same voice. It was less gravely. Less rough. You liked it. You stared up into his eyes and didn’t turn back to the Beetlejuice on the couch as you continued.

“--is this one of your clones?”

The reaction to the question was immediate, from both of them. Once again they spoke at the same time, over one another. “The fuck, babe?” the Beetlejuice on the couch spit. “How could you even think that guy was my clones--” “A clone?” the Beetlejuice in front of you said, offended. “You’ve got your hand on me, do I feel like a fucking clone--”

They both finished at the same time, “--that’s fucking ridiculous!”

The combination of a bottom-of-the-lungs rasp and a smooth voice merging together gave you a shiver.

“No,” you ceded, still looking up at the specter you were next to, “I guess you’re not a clone.”

The new Beetlejuice gave you a wider smile and reached forward to take your waist. His voice dropped a little, like he was talking only loud enough for you to hear. “That’s right, babydoll. Thanks for the invite. So tell me, what’s your pleasure?”

There was a literal growl from Beetlejuice on the couch, and in the next instant, you were yanked away from the other, wrapped up in a tight, protective hug from behind. From over your shoulder, Beetlejuice hissed,

“Back off, asshole!”

The new Beetlejuice held his hands up a moment. “Hey, dick. She called me. Breathers don’t do that unless they want something, and from the state of things here, I think I can guess what that might be.”

Beetlejuice held you against his bare chest tightly and another warning growl slipped past your ear.

Taller Beetlejuice looked over the two of you. “Babydoll, you called my name three times and here I am. For you. What can I do for you? Probably more than he can . . .”

“Hey--” you objected in Beetlejuice’s defense, and the other snorted a laugh.

“He’s gotta use the Netherworld’s primo weed to get you going? That doesn’t seem like a demon who can make things happen without a little outside assistance.”

You felt a little surge of protection for the Beetlejuice you knew best. “The weed was later, after we’d made out. I don’t need it to get hot and bothered, it’s just a bonus.”

The Beetlejuice holding you chuckled. He spun you, unprotesting, on your heel, to face him.

“That’s sweet, babe,” he told you, and lifted the joint held between his first two fingers to his mouth again.

He took a drag and held it in, then tilted his head and lifted his eyebrows at you. Reading his intention, you tilted your head too. With your hands flat on his chest, you stretched towards him until your parted lips were only millimeters away. Beetlejuice breathed a column of smoke directly into your mouth.

You got most of it too, before you smiled and tendrils of the thick smoke escaped. You held it in for a long moment, practically feeling the smoke permeate through your lungs, letting it settle heavily throughout your body all the way down to your fingertips and toes. Finally you let the remainder of it out, smiling languidly at Beetlejuice. Shotgun smoking with him always made you feel warm and mellow. Maybe the smoke picked up something in his lungs that transfered to you? You didn’t know, but it made you feel good.

Your smile was slow and there was a tingle in your extremities and in your groin. You didn’t step away, and pressed a sloppy kiss to his lower lip. Beetlejuice caught you around the waist with one arm as he raised the joint and brought it to his mouth again. You caught him staring directly at the other specter with a smug air and open challenge on his face.

Taller Beetlejuice scoffed and rolled his eyes. “Still doesn’t change the fact she called me.”

“She called me first, asshole!” Beetlejuice said with his arm still around you.

“And then she obviously decided to call someone better!”

The affects of the weed kept you slowed down for a moment, so you didn’t object when Beetlejuice released you and took a step between you and the second Beetlejuice you’d managed to summon into your living room. Still, you said, “Hey. Beej? Beejes? Beeji? Bees?” Trying to determine the plural of the word struck you as funny, and you cut yourself off with giggling.

“It was a fucking mistake. You’re a fucking second string, honorary mention, cheap knock-off of me--”

“Someone’s got their panties in a twist. Feeling threatened ‘cause you know she’d choose me over you? Chicks like tall guys,” the newer arrival stated dismissively before he addressed you again. “Come on, babydoll, you wanna have some fun with someone who doesn’t need chemical enhancement to show you a good time?”

Beetlejuice responded to that with a snarl, while the other turned back on him with a comment on how he probably couldn’t even get it up at this point.

It slowly dawned in your fuzzy brain that there were two Beetlejuices slowly circling each other like two alpha predators looking for an opportunity to attack. Both of them had red shot through their hair, and there was a faint crackling in the air, like right before a lightening strike.

That cleared your head pretty quickly. The last thing you needed was your house torn apart in some spectral, demonic, dick-measuring contest. Especially when all you’d really wanted to do tonight was get laid.

“Hey,” you said.

They ignored you, focused so tightly on each other.

You cleared your throat and tried again, more loudly. “Hey! Beetlejuice! Bhetlejuz!”

Their full names caught their attention. They both turned to you.

“I called you both here,” you exclaimed boldly, “so that means I get to choose what I want!”

Both Beetlejuices turned to you with dangerously dark expressions, staring at you from beneath their brows, like they both suddenly remembered you were in the room, standing before them scantily clad and looking like prey.

You pushed on. “So I choose both of you. Either you’re in, or you’re out. I’m happy to send either of you away if you can’t play nicely.”

It was a gamble; calling Beetlejuice up gave him power and you truly didn’t have much control over him. Still, you sweetened the deal by casually drawing a hand down your own side and subtly cupping your own breast before letting your hand fall to the hem of your shirt. Coyly, you lifted it a few inches as you cocked a hip.

They both looked much less dangerous with their jaws loosened. tbc . . .

#beetlejuice #betelgeuse #writing #fanfiction #Bright!juice #Blum!juice #musical beetlejuice #beetlejuice x reader

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annzybwrites · 5 years ago

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Truth or Dare: Coming Out Edition (Chapter 1: Information Time)

Read on AO3 | Donate to my Ko-Fi if you like | Ch 1, Ch 2, Ch 3, Ch 4, Ch 5, Ch 6

A South Park Fanfiction Relationships: Craig Tucker/Tweek Tweak, Kyle Broflovski/Stan Marsh, Kenny McCormick/Leopold "Butters" Stotch Characters: Craig Tucker, Tweek Tweak, Kyle Broflovski, Stan Marsh, Kenny McCormick, Leopold "Butters" Stotch, Token Black, Clyde Donovan, Jimmy Valmer, Timmy Burch Additional Tags: Established Relationship, mentioning of underaged sexual acts but nothing explicit, Swearing, Angst, Fluff and Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Fluff, Comedy Summary: Tweek does NOT want to attend the annual sleepover that his boyfriend and eight other boys have every winter, because he does NOT want to play Truth or Dare. He knows he’ll be dared to do so many embarrassing things!! But wait, wait, wait… the attention ISN’T on him? It’s on some of the other boys?? No way - there’s other gay couples in the school??

Chapter 1: Information Time

To say Tweek was nervous was an understatement. He’d chewed all of his fingernails down to the bed, pulled out three buttons on his shirt, and even ripped out some of his hair today, and still he couldn’t get rid of the shaky, quaking sensation in his stomach as he thought about tonight. Tonight, when he was attending a sleepover with nine other boys from school, including his boyfriend, Craig. It was a big sleepover they had tried to plan every year since sixth grade, sometime around Christmas. They were in eighth grade now, and Tweek had managed to get out of it for the past two years - the first year with a fake illness and last year with a real one. Don’t get him wrong, he’d love to have a sleepover with everyone, but he knew what would happen if they did.

He knew they’d play Truth or Dare.

And he knew that everyone would dare him and Craig to do embarrassing couple things! Or ask them embarrassing questions about their relationship!! And he really didn’t wanna be forced into that!!!

The only reason he was going this year was because of Clyde. He had said he didn’t care if Tweek was sick this year and that he’d just shove a face mask over his mouth and drag Tweek to Token’s house himself if he had to. Plus, Craig had looked so sad when he asked Tweek to try and be healthy enough to come, and there was no way Tweek wanted to see that look on his face again.

Currently he was finishing packing up for the night. Craig was laying on his bed with Stripe while Tweek was trying to fold his outfit for tomorrow, but shaking too much to do it right. “Ah!” he screamed in frustration and threw it on the ground.

“Tweek.” His bed creaked as Craig got off of it and walked towards him, Stripe resting on top of his hat. “I’ll fold, okay? Go grab your bathroom bag.”

“Right!!” Tweek shoved his clothes at Craig before walking stiffly to his bathroom. He didn’t want to do this! He didn’t want to sleepover!! He didn’t want to embarrass himself in front of everyone just for their amusement!!! Yet here he was, preparing for a sleepover he didn’t even want! He didn’t understand why Craig wanted to do it either! Surely he had already been asked embarrassing questions at the last two sleepovers! Why would he want to be asked more?! He groaned to himself as he opened up his bathroom mirror and grabbed his little travel bag of toiletries. He always kept a little bag filled with a travel toothbrush, toothpaste, shampoo, conditioner, soap, and deodorant. You never know when you’ll need to leave in a hurry.

When he came back to his room, Craig had everything else folded and packed up neatly in his little duffel bag, and Stripe was back in his cage. “Got it, babe?” he asked, his own sleepover bag slung over his shoulder. His face was as neutral as ever, except for the excited little rise in his eyebrows. It made Tweek relax a little. If Craig was saying it’d be a fun night, he’d try and believe him.

“Yeah, I got it.” He hurried over and shoved it in his bag before zipping it and standing up. “Let’s go.”

“Sure you got everything?” Craig asked, holding out his finger to start counting off. “Pajamas, change of clothes, underwear, White Elephant gift -”

“I got it, Craig!” Tweek huffed, bumping their hips together. Well, bumping his hip against the top of Craig’s thigh, but it was the same thing. “Let’s just go to this stupid thing already.”

“I don’t want you leaving the sleepover to pick up something you forgot,” Craig told him simply, the left corner of his mouth dropping every so slightly into a frown.

“I didn’t forget anything!” Tweek promised, looking away. “Can we just go?!”

Tweek could feel his blood pressure rising the longer Craig just stared at him.

“Stop staring!”

“Sorry.” Craig sighed, shoving his free hand in his pocket. “It’s just… I know you didn’t want to come to the sleepover for some reason.”

“What?” Tweek snapped his head over to him, eyes wide in alarm. “Why would you think that? I was just sick the last two years -!”

“Yeah, what a coincidence.” Craig rolled his eyes. “Tweek, just tell me why you don’t wanna come, okay? I wanna know.”

Tweek bit at his lip, looking down at the floor. His first reaction was to argue that he did want to go, but what was the point? Craig would just get mad at him if he kept lying. “All right, fine!” Tweek shut his eyes as he rattled off, “I just don’t wanna be asked stupid couple questions, all right?! I don’t wanna be asked how much we kiss or if we’ve talked about sex!! Or, or be dared to kiss you, or sit in your lap, or whatever they dare couples to do during truth or dare!!”

When Tweek opened his eyes again, he was surprised to see a slight pink tinge in Craig’s cheeks, his eyes widened about two millimeters all around. “... Oh.” It was obvious he hadn’t even thought about that. “Fuck, you have a point.”

“Of course I do!” Tweek hissed. He groaned and covered his face. “God, I don’t want to do this!!”

“It’ll be okay, Tweek,” Craig promised, stepping over to place a hand on his shoulder. “I don’t think the attention will be on us tonight.”

“Why wouldn’t it be on us?!” Tweek yelled, throwing his hands back to his sides. “We’re the only gay couple in the school! And Clyde is fucking obsessed with us, I swear!!”

“... Okay, we might have all of Clyde’s attention,” Craig admitted, “but I promise that’ll be it.”

“How can you be so sure!!?”

“Just trust me,” Craig spoke cryptically as he squeezed Tweek’s shoulder. “You’ll see what I mean when we get there.”

“You better be right, Craig,” Tweek mumbled, his left eye twitching.

Craig did his little frown again and kissed his forehead, dropping his bag to the floor. “Close your eyes.”

Tweek already knew what was coming and sighed. “Craig, I’m fine -”

“Please, honey?”

“Nnngh!” Tweek made a sound of complaint, but complied anyway and just closed his eyes, his left lid still twitching. He tried to keep his breathing even as he felt Craig dig his fingers into his hair, cupping the back of his head, yet he still jumped when he felt it: the slightest pressure of Craig’s thumbs against his eyelids, trying to relax his twitching with touch. He took a deep breath, letting it out slowly as Craig gently rubbed his thumbs from side to side, as if trying to smooth out a bed comforter. He was never quite sure how to feel about this. The touch did calm him down, Craig wouldn’t be doing this if it hadn’t proved effective before, but Tweek was still just so used to letting his twitches pass, or trying to calm them himself, that it felt strange to let someone else calm them.

After only a few moments, Tweek’s eye twitch was gone, and Craig finished his little relaxation technique with a kiss to both of his eyelids. That was Tweek’s favorite part, ever since he had read that a kiss on the eyelid meant “deep affection.” His whole face felt tingly after getting one.

“That was completely unnecessary,” Tweek mumbled, opening his eyes slowly as if he expected those lips to come in for another kiss. He felt heat on the back of his neck as he took in the small grin on Craig’s face.

“Maybe I just wanted to touch you, babe.”

Tweek knew he was blushing now as he pushed at Craig’s chest. “Ugh! Let’s just go already!! You know you can’t do stuff like that at the sleepover, right?!”

“I’ll behave,” Craig told him, chuckling as he slipped his hand in Tweek’s and picked up his bag again with the other. “Don’t stress about tonight, honey - you get three passes during Truth or Dare if you really don’t wanna do something.”

“Really?” Tweek brightened, already feeling better at the prospect of being able to skip something. “Sweet!”

“Yeah, sweet.” Craig nodded in agreement, and without another word they were walking off.

Tweek was always fascinated with how they walked together. Since Craig was almost a foot taller than him, really they shouldn’t be able to walk hand in hand so easily. But, since Craig had long, slow strides, and he had small, fast ones, he was able to take two and a half steps for every one of Craig’s, so it worked out pretty well. It always filled him with pride when Craig said that he was the only short person he knew who could keep up with him.

Pretty soon they had walked all the way to Token’s house, and Tweek’s nerves returned tenfold as Craig rang the doorbell. “Oh, god,” he muttered, causing Craig to squeeze his hand tighter.

“It’ll be okay,” he whispered. “I promise.”

“You better be right,” Tweek hissed just as Clyde answered the door, smiling ear to ear.

“Well, if it isn’t the lovebirds! So nice of you to join us, Craig, Tweek.”

Tweek shivered and looked away from Clyde’s accusing gaze, stammering nervously. “Yeah! I f-felt good enough this year!”

“Fuck off,” Craig told his best friend, flipping him the bird. “Leave Tweek alone.”

Clyde whined and latched onto Craig’s arm, not caring if his middle finger was pressing hard against his face. Since he was only six inches shorter than Craig, he was able to stare into those cold blue eyes much easier. “No way! I won’t have my best friend all to myself tonight - of course I’m sad!”

Craig rolled his eyes and pulled his arm back just so he could wrap it around his shoulders and give Clyde a one-armed hug. “You were the one who threatened to drag him here.”

Clyde latched onto him immediately, making Tweek smile. It was always funny to him how Craig had an emotional best friend and boyfriend while he himself was so emotionally bland.

“Because!” Clyde was exasperated. “I knew you’d just mope if Tweek ditched us for a third year in a row!”

Tweek exchanged a glance with Craig, who was a little embarrassed. “I wouldn’t mope -”

“Clyde!” Token’s voice was heard from somewhere in the house. “Who’s at the door?”

“TWEEK AND CRAIG!” Clyde yelled back, making no move to stop hugging Craig.

Token waited a good five seconds before calling again. “Aaaaaand are you letting them in?”

“In a minute!!” Clyde pretended to huff like one of the goth kids. “God, mom!”

“Don’t take that tone of voice with me, son!”

Tweek started laughing and put a hand up to cover his face. Their insistence to assign a “family roll” to everyone in their friend group was so ridiculous, but kind of endearing. “Oh my god. Who’s the dad, again?”

“Jimmy, obviously,” Clyde replied as if that was the most obvious thing in the world. He grinned and squeezed Craig as tight as he could. “And Craig’s my older brother!”

Craig smiled softly and ruffled Clyde’s hair. “The best older brother you’ve ever had.”

“Hell yeah!”

“Do I have a role?” Tweek was curious.

“Other than being Craig’s husband?”

“Clyde.” Craig shoved his friend’s head away before pulling Tweek into the house, the latter almost tripping from the sudden movement. “Shut up. Tweek can be...” Craig had to think for a moment. When he couldn’t come up with anything he decided to flirt instead. “Tweek can be the best thing that ever happened to me.”

Tweek blushed and looked away, squeezing Craig’s hand to let him know he appreciated the sentiment.

Clyde, on the other hand, just snorted. “Yeah, so your husband.” He slammed the front door shut as if to enunciate his point.

“Do you see any rings?” Craig pointed out logically, holding out his left hand for Clyde to see.

“We’re way too young for that!!” Tweek agreed, scrunching his face up as he thought about it. God, that was way too much commitment for an eighth grader!

Clyde sighed and came up between them, wrapping his arms around both sets of their shoulders. It was a little awkward for him because of the height difference between Tweek and Craig, and because the couple’s hands were still linked together, but he made it work. “Oh, you two. Just accept the future already!”

“That’s not ominous at all,” Craig snorted, knocking his and Tweek’s hand into Clyde’s stomach so he’d back off a little. “Come on, Tweek - let’s find dear old mom and dad.”

“They’re in the Entertainment room!” Clyde exclaimed excitedly, running off ahead of them. “And I have dibs on the left recliner!”

“Literally only you care about that.”

“Whatever, I still have dibs!”

Craig exhaled sharply through his nostrils in place of a laugh, which is how he usually laughed anyway. He glanced at Tweek, squeezing his hand to get his attention. “You okay?”

Tweek nodded. He liked how thoughtful Craig was to him. He knew Tweek didn’t want to be here, so he knew that this social situation would drain him more quickly than others, so he was checking up on him. It was nice. Just another reason he was glad they were together for real now. “Yeah, I’m okay.” Craig started taking off his shoes, so Tweek followed suit. “Ask me again when Stan’s group gets here.”

Craig did his short, silent laugh again, this time accompanied with a grin. He enjoyed it when Tweek got snarky. “Come on, you like those guys.”

“I know!” Tweek was distracted, adjusting his duffel bag over his shoulder as they walked. “But they still always get into major trouble! Just last week they brought live grenades to school - who does that!? Where did they even get them from!!”

“I think Stan’s uncle.”

“Why would he give grenades to children!?”

“Because he’s an idiot?”

“... Ugh !” Tweek pouted at him. “Always logical, huh?”

“Just call me Mr. Spock.”

Tweek snorted and bumped his hip against Craig’s leg. “I’ll call you Captain Dork instead.”

“Nah, that’s you.” Craig argued, smiling just a little more.

Tweek rolled his eyes, but he was also smiling as they made it to the Entertainment Room. And by “room,” think “theater with red carpeting.” One of the walls was completely covered with a giant television, minus the small shelf it was perched over that contained literally every game console on the planet. The opposite wall was a bookshelf full of DVDs and video games. The other two walls were a rich, red color with dim lights lining up the sides; one held a popcorn machine, soda fountain, and candy display case, while the other wall had a long, white, ornate counter that you could place whatever snacks you wanted on it. In the middle was a fancy, red-leather couch, two recliners, and a few bean bag chairs.

Clyde, Token, Jimmy, and Timmy were invested in an intense game of Mario Kart at the moment, but each of them greeted them with distracted grunts when they arrived. Token was laying on his stomach on a purple bean bag, Clyde was in his favorite recliner, Jimmy perched himself on the middle of the couch, and Timmy had his chair, of course.

“Where do you usually sit?” Tweek asked Craig, wondering how this room stayed so clean. He couldn’t imagine Token’s guests being very careful about not leaving stains.

“Here.” He pulled Tweek over to the other recliner, which was just small enough to ensure their sides would be comfortably pressed against each other. “We’ll fit.”

Tweek resisted the urge to smile and fell back into it, Craig following suit soon enough. “Lift our feet up, long arms.”

“Of course.” Craig snorted and pushed the button on the side of the chair so it would slowly bring their legs up. He started making a low, little “ooo” sound affect as it did, and Tweek had to cover his mouth as he started to laugh.

“Knock it off !” He buried his face against Craig’s shoulder, still laughing a little. “God, you’re so weird.”

“But you like it.”

“Hey, Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum,” Token called without looking away from the TV. “Your flirting is distracting.”

“I told you they were more mushy in the evening. Augh!” Clyde threw the controller down when his kart fell off the track and he had to be picked up by the little cloud.

“Timmy!” Timmy laughed and turned to give them a grin that made Tweek’s insides melt into his socks.

“Aw, come on, guys,” Jimmy spoke up, “leave them al-l-lone. We should be ha-appy for them.”

“I call next game,” Craig interrupted. His strategy was usually to act like all of his friends weren’t commenting on his love life when they all ganged up on him like this. Tweek smiled a little and snuggled into his side more, appreciating how level-headed Craig could be. “You know, when Clyde inevitably comes last.”

“Hey!” Clyde started to tear up as he glared at his best friend. “Why do you assume I’ll come in last!”

“Well, you are in last right now,” Token pointed out. “And it’s only the first lap.”

“You’re pr-pretty bad at this, Clyde.”

“Timmy.”

“Fuck you guys.” Clyde tossed his controller to Craig preemptively.

“Wise decision.” Craig nodded in approval before taking the controller and expertly making his way through the track.

Tweek was fascinated with the way Craig had mastered the drifting maneuver. He was up to sixth place by the second lap. “How often do you play this??”

“Not that often.”

“Craig,” Token argued, “this was like the only thing we’d play when you came over, remember?”

“Then why isn’t Clyde any better at it?”

“Because you’d always knock me off the track you jerk!” Clyde screeched, getting up from his favorite chair to go by the popcorn machine instead. “When are the pizza rolls going to be ready, mom?”

“You’re welcome to go to the kitchen and find out.”

“But that’s so faaaar!” Clyde complained as he scooped up popcorn into a bowl. “Someone come with me.”

“We’re in the middle of a game.”

“Tweek’s not playing!”

“What?” Tweek jolted when he was addressed, one of his eyes twitching at Clyde. He had been so absorbed with watching Craig race that he tuned out everything else.

“Come with me to check on the pizza rolls!”

“Oh!” Tweek started to slide out of his shared seat. “Sure, Clyde.” He was starting to feel hungry anyway. “What flavor?”

“Cheesy Taco!” Clyde grinned and wrapped his arm around Tweek’s shoulder as they walked. “The superior flavor, obviously.”

“I don’t know,” Craig argued, eyes still glued to the television. “I kinda like Macaroni and Cheese & Bacon.”

“Get outta here with your trash taste, Craig.”

“I like that flavor, too!” Tweek argued, nudging Clyde with his elbow as they walked.

Clyde grinned and nudged Tweek back. “You’re just saying that because he’s your boyfriend.”

“I am not!” Tweek huffed. “I have my own opinions!”

“Yeah yeah, whatever.” Clyde snickered and nudged him again.

Tweek glared and “tazed” him - or, rather, poked his side with two fingers to make him flinch away and laugh. Most people were ticklish in that spot. He quickly blocked his own sides with his hands so Clyde couldn’t retaliate.

“No fair!” Clyde pouted and tried in vain to move Tweek’s hands off of his sides. “Let me poke you back!”

“This isn’t Facebook - don’t poke me.”

“You started it!” Clyde puffed his cheeks out. He looked like a squirrel pouting with his cheeks full of nuts.

Tweek started laughing and shook his head. “You look ridiculous, man.”

“Whatever.” Clyde sighed and ran ahead since they were close to the kitchen. “What?!” Tweek heard him whine as he turned the corner. “There’s still five minuuuuutes!” He slumped his head down on the top of the stove.

“Don’t do that!!” Tweek pulled him back with a nervous crack in his voice. “You could turn it on and burn your face!!”

“Oh, geez.” Clyde paled and took a step back, staring at the oven as if it would burst into flames right then. He put his hands over his cheeks, whispering dramatically, “My pretty face doesn’t deserve that.”

Tweek sighed in relief and let go of his shirt. “So, we’ll head back now?”

“In a second.” Clyde grinned and looked both ways, making sure no one was spying on them. He leaned in, putting his hand up to shield his mouth from non-present prying eyes. “Has Craig ever told you about when he first fell in love with you?”

“... What?” Tweek could feel heat pooling in his cheeks. His eye started twitching again in confusion and nervousness at the weird turn this pizza roll adventure had taken them. “What are you talking about?!”

“He hasn’t, right?” Clyde grinned and dropped his hand. He still whispered, though. “You wanna find out?”

Tweek took a step back. Clyde’s whispering voice made his ears feel like ants were crawling around them and biting the insides. “You’re being really weird!!”

“It’s a great story. Surprising, anyway.” Clyde chuckled and crossed his arms. “When we play Truth or Dare, I was gonna make that one of his truths; ask him “when did you realize you loved Tweek?””

“Why?” Tweek swallowed, his mouth dry as he looked away. His stomach started flipping around like a gymnast. “I’m sure C-Craig would tell me if he thought it was important.”

“Not if it’s embarrassing.”

“Why would that be embarrassing?!”

“You’ll find out,” Clyde grinned, “if you ask him the same question! He can only pass so many times, you know?”

“Clyde!” Tweek frowned and started tugging at his hair lightly. He quickly let go and switched to grabbing his fingers instead; Craig had been trying to get him to stop grabbing his hair ever since he accidentally made his skull bleed that one time. “I don’t - ngh - wanna ask Craig something that will make him embarrassed! Gah! I’ll just, just ask him in private later!! Why do you even care about this?!”

“Because he’ll probably never tell you!” Clyde pouted like a squirrel again. “I think the story’s cute but he thinks it’s lame. You’d think a sap like him would love it, too!!”

“Whatever, man.” Tweek turned and started heading back to the Entertainment Room. He didn’t like what Clyde was conspiring. If Craig didn’t want to tell him when he first “fell in love” then fine! Whatever! They both knew how each other felt now so who cares when it happened? Tweek supposed he was curious, but if Craig was embarrassed about it like Clyde was saying then he didn’t want to force him. Craig never forced him to do anything he didn’t want to do, he could at least return the favor. Especially when it involved a stupid game of Truth or Dare.

Clyde raced ahead of him so he could crash into his favorite recliner, leaving Tweek to walk much slower into the room. As soon as he crawled into his own shared seat, Craig whispered, “Are you okay?”

“Ah!” Tweek jumped. He should have expected the question; he knew he was twitching thanks to Clyde’s questions and instigating tone. “I’m f-fine!”

Craig creased his eyebrows together and turned to Clyde. “Hey, take your controller back.” He tossed it over to him, whacking him on the shoulder with it.

“Ow!”

“Sorry. Just play.” He wrapped an arm around Tweek’s shoulders and pulled him closer, letting his blonde head rest on his shoulder. “What happened?”

“N-nothing…” Tweek grasped for Craig’s hand while he chewed on his lip. “Clyde was just being really weird! He’s going to ask you some “embarrassing” question during Truth or Dare and wanted me in on it.”

“What question?” Craig looked confused. “I’m never embarrassed.”

“Nnngh…” Tweek squeezed Craig’s hand over and over, treating it like a stress ball. “He wanted both of us to ask about when… when you fell in love with me.”

“...”

“Craig?”

“That little shit.” Craig looked away, but Tweek could still see the blush on his cheeks.

Tweek felt his stomach churn unpleasantly. Why was this story so embarrassing for him? It was obvious they were in love, so why did he not want to talk about when it happened so vehemently? Tweek started to feel a nervous insecurity, his brain trying to say that Craig didn’t want to answer because he wasn’t in love with Tweek. But that wouldn’t make any sense because Clyde had said he thinks the story is cute. Not falling in love isn’t cute!

“Tweek?” Craig spoke up, turning his head back to look at him with a small frown. “If you wanna know, I’ll tell you. I just really don’t want to talk about it in front of everyone.”

“I get that!” Tweek insisted, squeezing Craig’s hand tighter. “You don’t have to tell me tonight. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

“It’s not that I’d be uncomfortable,” Craig insisted, his blush more pronounced as his eyes shifted away from Tweek’s. “It’s just… that would probably be the one thing that would make me embarrassed.”

Tweek felt a painful lump in his stomach. “Why?!”

“What do you mean, why?” Craig creased his eyebrows together. “Wouldn’t you be embarrassed to tell everyone about when you fell in love with me?”

“No!” Tweek shook his head rapidly, keeping his eyes closed when he was done. “You can’t help when you fall in love with someone!”

“When did you fall in love, Tweek?” Token asked curiously, turning to look back at the two as he paused the game.

“Yeah!” Jimmy grinned. “I’ve never h-heard this story!”

“Tim my ~”

As everyone turned to stare at Tweek with their big, judging eyes, he had to admit that this was a little nerve wracking, but he wouldn’t call it embarrassing. “W-well, I guess… ngh…” He scratched at his neck, eyes cast down to the floor as he thought of how to say this. “It was about after a month of fake dating - you know, after that whole yaoi thing with the break-up and make-up?”

Clyde started snickering until Craig gave him an especially scathing look.

“We were g-going for a walk by the park,” Tweek continued, looking between Clyde and Craig nervously. Why were they looking at each other like that?! “A leaf fell in my hair and I started f-freaking out because I thought it was a bomb or a mutant bug or something, and Craig… just pulled the leaf out and talked to me calmly, telling me everything was fine, and we continued our walk like nothing happened.” Tweek smiled softly and reached for Craig’s hand, glancing at his eyes. “And it just… hit me how much I really did like him. And it meant a lot to me that, that’s he’s so accommodating to me and my anxiety, but still treats me like a person.”

It was silent among them for a moment, Craig’s entire face more pink than it was before as he stared back into Tweek’s large eyes in disbelief.

“Wow,” Token broke the silence first. “That’s… really sweet.”

“Gross,” Jimmy spoke next, “but sweet.”

“Timmy!” He stuck his tongue out and crossed his eyes.

“Timmy’s right,” Clyde snorted. “You’re both so sappy you should open up a waffle house.”

“Shut up, Clyde.” Craig swallowed and looked away before he kissed Tweek in front of everyone. “I really liked that story, honey, thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Tweek ducked his head down, noticing that his heart rate had increased immensely. Guess he was more nervous than he thought talking about when he fell in love.

“Craig’s turn!” Clyde chirped gleefully. “Come on, you have to tell us now!”

Craig opened his mouth to no doubt argue with his best friend, but then the doorbell rang.

“Looks like the troublemakers are here,” Token commented, getting to his feet to go answer the door.

“Now the real party can b-begin,” Jimmy joked.

Tweet groaned and curled up even more against Craig. “Oh god, I don’t want to do this.”

“Look on the bright side,” Craig whispered as he rubbed Tweek’s back. “At least fatass isn’t included anymore.”

Tweek snorted, a small grin appearing on his face. “Yeah, I guess that’s something.” About three years ago, Cartman finally got shipped off to some military school to teach him discipline. He still hung out with Stan’s group for a bit in the summer, but during the school year Butters takes his place as their fourth friend.

“Hey, dudes.” Stan was the first one to walk into the entertainment room, carrying a large box wrapped in red with a green bow on it. “Where should I put this?”

“Daaamn!” Clyde whistled, coming over to help him with it. “What the hell did you get?! This is bigger than Token’s gift!”

“Trust me, it’s not that exciting.” Stan sighed. “You can blame my dad.”

As the two of them carried their gift to the back of the room, Tweek realized that he hadn’t grabbed his own present out of his duffel bag. “Ack! We should put ours over there, too, Craig!”

“Oh, right.” They both started rummaging in their duffel bags for the gifts they had brought for the exchange. The used Christmas bags instead of wrapping paper, because neither of them were that good at wrapping presents.

Tweek looked up when he heard Clyde snort. “Wow, Kyle - nice wrapping paper.”

“Shut up.” Tweek turned to the redhead, seeing him glaring at Clyde as he held a long, rectangular box in his hand, wrapped in blue paper decorated with gold menorahs all over it. “You do this every year, God - I don’t have Christmas wrapping paper! Get over it!”

“Yeah, but it makes it so obvious to remember which present is yours which basically ruins the point of a White Elephant!” Clyde whined.

“Craig’s the only one who bags his present and you don’t complain about that!” Kyle snapped right back.

“That’s not true this year!” Clyde grinned, bounding over to wrap Tweek up in a tight hug. “Tweek brought a bagged gift this year!”

“Oh.” Kyle blinked, his glare melting into surprise. “Right. I… forgot you were coming.”

“Y-yeah, well,” Tweek smiled weakly and waved, his eyes travelling to the room entrance as two familiar blondes walked in. “I’m here.”

“Coffee bean!” Kenny greeted, voice muffled as always, but now by a brown bandana rather than his parka. “You made it!”

“It’s great to see you, Tweek!” Butters chirped, smiling adorably as always. It was no wonder he won the ‘cutest blonde’ award in sixth grade, even if Craig insisted that should have gone to Tweek. “You’re gonna have a great time, I promise!”

“I hope so!” Tweek’s voice cracked, so he quickly rushed to carry his bagged gift off to the back of the room with the others, Craig following close behind.

“You should pick my gift,” Kenny said, holding up a white box that had Christmas-type symbols crudely drawn all around it in red marker. “I think you’ll like it.” He winked, which cemented in Tweek’s mind to not pick that gift.

“You’d like mine, too!” Butters held up another white box with red, Christmas symbols all around it, though his drawings were more bubbly and cute compared to Kenny’s shaky, blocky style.

“Aw, they’re matching again,” Clyde cooed, clasping his hands together. “When’s the wedding?”

The question made Tweek jump a little, but Kenny seemed unbothered as he countered: “You still haven’t proposed, Cookie,” before brushing past him to drop his gift off with the others.

Butters following behind him with a roll of his eyes. “Come on, Clyde - Kenny and I are just good friends!”

Clyde blew a raspberry and waved his hand down in disbelief. “Yeah, okay.”

“Timmy.” He seemed to agree as he copied Clyde’s hand motion and rolled his eyes.

Idle chatter continued, but Tweek tuned most of it out and stared at Craig with wide eyes. It didn’t take long for Craig to pull him a little away from everyone and ask, “What’s on your mind, honey?”

“Kenny and Butters??” Tweek hissed, glancing over at the two who did seem to be standing a little closer to each other than usual. “Are th-they -?”

“Clyde highly suspects,” Craig interrupted with a simple shrug. “But, then again, he basically ships everyone in this school with somebody, so that’s not that surprising.”

“Didn’t Butters just break up with that girl from France?!”

“That was three months ago, babe.”

“Already!?” Tweek deflated a little, looking down at the ground. Where did the time go? It definitely hadn’t felt like three months since the time Butters cried through an entire school week.

“Yeah.” Craig reached over to rub Tweek’s hair, trying to soothe him. “It’s okay. Time moves weird here, I swear. But he’s super over her now, which is just fueling Clyde’s belief that he and Kenny are secretly dating.”

“No way…” Tweek felt hope rising in his chest. “So there might be another gay couple in the eighth grade?” That would take so much pressure off of them! God, it was always annoying and creepy to have adults take random pictures of them whenever they were on dates!! But if there was another gay couple in middle school, it would be more normalized and maybe they could just live their fucking lives! And, more immediately, maybe they wouldn’t be asked so many embarrassing questions during Truth or Dare if the attention was off of them! This was amazing!

Craig thought for a moment, shrugging and staring into his eyes as he admitted, “There might be two gay couples, babe. They’re just in the closet.”

“Are you SERIOUS??” Tweek yelled once more in shock and joy - though mostly shock.

This time Clyde bounded over to check on them, placing each of his hands on one of their shoulders. “Heeeyyy, what’s the happy couple doing over here?” he glanced between them in concern.

“Nothing!” Tweek smiled at Clyde to show everything was fine. “I’m just excited to be here!!”

Clyde blinked at him owlishly, and Token even walked over in surprise. “You’re excited now?” the rich kid asked.

“We thought you hh-hated being here,” Jimmy added, moving back towards the couch to sit down.

“Yeah, dude,” Stan nodded, hands in his pockets. “Why else would you have ditched us the last two years?”

“I was sick!!” Tweek squeaked, crossing his arms.

“Yeah, because we all believe that.” Kenny chuckled, his bandana hanging loosely around his neck as he stuffed his mouth with pizza pockets. Oh, they must have finished cooking while Tweek and Craig were talking.

“Don’t eat them all!” Clyde ran over to grab five from the plate Kenny was holding.

“Clyde, relax,” Token told him. “We have more cooking as we speak.”

“Yeah, dude.” Kenny held his plate over his head. “This is the most food I’m going to have all month.”

Tweek noticed Butters’ smile drop into a sad frown at that, but he just turned away and didn’t say anything. Why would he looked like that unless they really were closer than just friends? Wait, what was he saying - it was normal to care about your friends a lot, that didn’t automatically mean anything! Ugh, great, Tweek was going to be hyper aware of both of them and overanalyzing all of their interactions all night, wasn’t he? He sighed and tugged Craig back over to the reclining chair, starting to feel drained already. This was going to be a long sleepover.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

(Please consider donating to my Ko-Fi if you enjoyed!)

#south park #sp creek #sp bunny #sp style #sp fanfiction #south park fanfiction #ToD:COE #annzy writes

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violetnuisance · 5 years ago

Text

A Spark

The Pure Attract The Toxic - Chapter 2

a/n: I-I finally did it. Things start to get explicit in this one. Here’s the link if you’d rather read it on ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20988461/chapters/49910162

I dunno if my “read more” is working on mobile, but let’s pray

[[MORE]]

Travis could feel his pulse pounding in his ears as his hands tightened their grip around the strap of his messenger bag. Despite the dread filling his lungs, his eyes narrowed on his target. The mane of frizzy brown hair towered over the other students who sat at their respective tables eating lunch, making it easy to spot Larry from a mile away. The blond marched onwards, forgoing his own lunch. His stomach had been in turmoil all day, too nervous to digest anything. It wasn't until brown eyes snapped up to meet his that Travis paused for a second, losing his bravery.

Larry’s eyes narrowed as they caught Travis’s, and the blond swallowed. The look of intense displeasure crossing the brunet’s face was a stark contrast to the chaotic energy he exuded just the day prior. As Larry looked away from Travis for a second and excused himself from his lunch table, the blond could all but feel the annoyance radiating from the other. He continued to stand still, waiting for his death sentence as Larry approached him. The taller male’s hands were dug in his pockets and shoulders hunched as he glared down Travis.

“Come on,” Larry barked out as he grabbed Travis’s arm. The blond stumbled backwards, balance briefly knocked, causing Larry to only tighten his grip. “Without making a fucking scene.”

“You’re the one dragging me out of the cafeteria,” Travis huffed, letting him be pulled through the double doors and back out into the hallway. Larry’s bruising grip on him only lessened when the brunet scanned the area and found no wandering students.

“I wouldn’t have to drag you anywhere if you’d just stay away from me and my friends,” Larry retaliated. Travis felt his face redden as his temper rose. He jerked his arm completely out of the other’s hand, earning a huff from the metalhead.

“If I recall correctly, you were the one following me around yesterday,” the blond seethed. Larry’s gaze darkened and a snarky laugh pushed its way up his throat. Travis felt his temper drop to be replaced by fear as the taller male took a step towards him. Mouth suddenly feeling too dry, Travis took a step back.

“Don’t get so full of yourself,” Larry chastised, voice dropping to a low growl. The deep octave made the hair on the back of Travis’s neck stand up. “Just because I wanted to toy with you yesterday doesn’t mean we’re buddies or that I want you anywhere near my friends.”

Travis’s mouth worked for a second, trying to push words out, but his brain failed to find a snappy comeback quick enough. Larry rolled his eyes as the awkward silence grew between them until the blond wished it would have the mercy to suffocate him. He found himself staring dumbly at the taller male’s chest, feeling akin to a toddler who had just gotten chastised. No, he never would’ve considered him and Larry friends, but he didn't think it’d be quite this difficult to get the other’s acquaintanceship at least.

“Trust me, the feeling’s mutual,” Travis chose to say. Larry crossed his arms over his chest and shifted his weight to a side, obviously not believing the admission. “I was just going to invite you to a church service.”

“Why in the absolute fuck would I want to go to your church?” As if they were in a comic or animated show, Travis swore he could see Larry’s eyes visibly twitching, ready to deck the blond.Travis felt himself become hyper aware of how his hands clutched his messenger bag strap for dear life once more, too used to getting his lights knocked out by others to process that Larry didn’t have any true intentions of hitting him.

“I mean, I was just thinking-“

“Whatever you were thinking, you were wrong,” Larry deadpanned, eyes narrowing. Travis’s own eyes dropped down to stare at Larry’s shoes. He really wished he could call upon his usual venom, but he felt stupefied. Everything moved a bit too slow for him to process it fast enough to put on a facade. “And from now on, only talk to me when I approach you.”

Travis didn’t utter a word as he watched Larry walk away, long hair bouncing with every angry stomp.

/ / /

The lackluster interaction between them had left Travis feeling disgruntled. He never envisioned that he’d be able to conquer the wild beast that was Larry Johnson in his first rodeo, but he had been hopeful to at least make a millimeter of headway. Instead, the stony brown eyes of the other had shot him down on sight, refusing Travis before he even had the chance to open his mouth. Despite the blond’s overwhelming negativity with the situation, he realized that maybe not everything had crumbled to ashes like it appeared when he made his way to his trusty bicycle after the final bell had rung.

Mirroring the day before, Larry stood against the chain link fence by his bike. This time, the brunet held a lit cigarette between his lips, and Travis watched as the smoke billowed against the “No Smoking!” sign attached to the fence. He did his best to swallow the anxiety that Larry was just there to scold him more and held his chin up as he approached his own bike, determined to let the metalhead know that he had absolutely no control over him.

“Hey angel,” Larry cooed, taking the cigarette from his mouth. “Seems like you have a little more ‘pep in your step’ now.”

Just like that, Travis could feel his temporary control snatched from him by a mere pet name. A wolfish grin covered Larry’s lips as the brunet averted his gaze to let out a low chuckle while Travis stood in front of him, frozen. “What’d you call me?”

“Angel,” Larry answered, pushing himself off of the fence. Travis took a step back as Larry became a step closer to him. “I can call you something else if you’d like. Kitten rolls off the tongue easily, but maybe you’d prefer baby boy?”

“I’d prefer my name.” The words came through Travis’s gritted teeth. As soon as his surprise at the name had dissipated, his stomach had done a weird flip flop, but then utter annoyance took place. The male in front of him had no place to be referring to him so fondly, how one should refer to their girlfriend, not another boy-

“Earth to Travis, yoo-hoo!” The cigarette was back in Larry’s mouth, and the taller male had leaned in closer to Travis, waving a hand in front of his face. From this new, much closer, proximity the blond was overwhelmed by the reek of the nicotine. One again, he took a step back, this time quickly looking over his shoulder. It just sank in that Larry could get them both in trouble for smoking on school premises. “What were you fantasizing about so hard that you didn’t even offer me a nod when I said that I’d go to your stupid church?”

“Wait,” Travis’s head whipped back to Larry, “You’ll go?” The blond couldn’t keep the excitement and eagerness out of his voice. If he could just get Larry to go to service, he was sure it’d change the brunet for the better and maybe help cease some of the feelings going through Travis’s own mind when he caught himself staring at Larry.

“I’ll go to one meeting,”Larry corrected, holding up a single finger. Travis would take what he could get.

“That’s great-“

“But only if you let me drive you to my place tonight,” Larry interrupted, smile broadening as Travis’s own shrank. That wasn’t so great.

“Why?” It seemed that Larry’s grin only continued to grow, his insufferable tooth gap making an appearance now. The brunet drew his eyebrows together and shrugged his shoulders as if to exaggerate how “hard” he was thinking about the answer to Travis’s question.

“I dunno, thought we could have a little bonding experience before I show up at the Phelps Ministry, y’know?” Travis didn’t know. He didn’t know why they needed to bond before the Wednesday night service. Larry rested his hand on Travis’s shoulder, and the blond felt like he was being smothered. He swore his knees started to buckle when the bastard started to rub slow circles into his skin with his thumb.

“What about my bike? I can’t leave it here, didn’t bring my chain today,” Travis got out, thanking God for the excuse.

“Let’s throw’er into the back of my pickup truck. I have some cords that I can tie her down with if you want to be sure she’s safe,” Larry assured, a glint in his eyes that made Travis feel cold. The blond hugged his arms to his chest, heaved in a breath of air, and slowly sighed before nodding.

“If there’s a single scratch on the bike from the bed of your pickup truck, you’re dead faggot,” Travis snapped, surprising them both at the sudden shift in tone. Larry snorted, shaking his head.

“There you are. There’s the Travis I know and love to hate,” Larry deadpanned. The brunet’s own sweet facade fell at Travis’s words, and he jutted a thumb in the direction of his truck. “Go ahead and get in while I grab the bike.”

/ / /

Travis sat stiff, as if the tiniest movement from him would make the vehicle’s alarm go off, as he waited for Larry to tie his bicycle down. The truck was the kind that only had a row of front seats, no back ones. At the moment, Travis would’ve killed to have been able to sit in the back, farther away from the gremlin of a brunet.

“Alright,” Larry began as he swung himself into the driver’s seat. The whole truck heaved to the side under the offending weight, and the blond was duly reminded of how much the other had bulked up since freshman year. “Next stop: casa de Larry.”

“You live in an apartment, not an actual house. Wouldn’t it be ‘piso de Larry?’” Travis asked the question half because he was an ass and half because he had a Spanish exam next week. Larry shook his head and turned the key in the ignition. As the engine roared to life, Travis felt himself cave in even more.

“Maybe if my mom was from Spain or some shit. We never use that form,” Larry gritted, eyes no longer focused on Travis as he tried to maneuver the truck around an assortment of sloppy student parking jobs. In the silence, Travis noted that Larry no longer had his cigarette, must’ve stubbed it out before climbing in. He was thankful for that, not really wanting to be trapped in a small space with the obnoxious smell of a cig. The odor was already present enough on Larry’s clothes. “So why, exactly, am I going to your church? And don’t bullshit me Phelps. I know there has to be more of a reason than it being a good experience.”

“I dunno Larry. Why am I being abducted to your apartment? There has to be a better reason than bonding,” Travis echoed back, his sarcasm slowly but surely firing up again. Larry’s glare whipped towards him, frown pressed into his face before he let out a dry chuckle.

“Like I told you, it’s just bonding. I wanna get to see the big, bad Travis Phelps in a new light,” Larry replied. His eyes darted back to the road to make sure they weren’t going to crash before he looked back at Travis, gaze traveling up and down his body. The Christian felt like he was being undressed.

“What if I don’t want to ‘bond’ with you?” Travis sneered. Larry couldn’t help the smile that broke out across his face, and Travis couldn’t help but cross his arms back over his chest, trying not to completely ruin his front. They both knew Travis would be putty in Larry’s hands.

A touch against his neck made him snap his attention back to Larry. The brunet’s own eyes flit back and forth from the road to Travis as his free hand traced patterns on the side of the blond’s neck. The shorter male roughly swallowed, disconcerted by the weird yet soft interaction. “Don’t worry angel, we’ll only do whatever you want to,” Larry purred, fingers dipping down to trace the base of Travis’s neck before lightly tugging at his sweater’s neckline. “But something tells me that you’re going to want to do a lot.”

Just as the gentle touches started, they stopped, leaving Travis alight. He tried to blame his longing for the caresses on the lack of positive physical affection in his own household, but that debate came up short in his own mind. He didn’t have to mull over the reason for long however because Larry’s hand suddenly rested on his thigh. Travis looked to the other, to see what game he was playing, but the metalhead was focused on the road, signaling their conversation was over for now. At first, the hand didn’t bother Travis too terribly much. He grew accustomed to its weight and warmth, could almost pretend it wasn’t there. However, when Larry started driving on back roads and subconsciously squeezing the boy under him at every dip in the road, the blond began to mind the hand very much. He knew the other, for once, wasn’t trying to get a rouse from Travis, but this might’ve been the best show Travis put on for him yet.

While Larry’s hand was resting on top his outer thigh, his fingers were curled against his inner. And while the placement was nowhere near his crotch, it still made Travis’s head spin. Right now, he was sat up stiff and straight, legs almost completely shut together. If he actually relaxed, slouched a bit, and let his legs spread to a more comfortable position, the hand would surely rest a lot higher on him. Travis wasn’t a fan of how much the idea excited him, but another part of him certainly was. The Christian could’ve screamed bloody murder when he realized he was starting to sport a hard on from just having a hand on his thigh, Larry’s hand no less. Instead, he looked out the passenger seats window and steeled himself, trying to calm down.

However, as fate would have it, the bastard beside him started to rub circles against him, fingertips curving all too pleasantly against Travis’s leg through his shorts. The blond knew in the back of his mind that it simply wasn’t normal for even a less disciplined man than himself to get hard from a hand on their leg, but Travis felt like he was positively burning. He looked like he was burning too. In the window, he could see his faint reflection, and a vicious blush dusted his features.

“Only about fifteen minutes away from the apartment complex,” Larry stated, casting a glance over to Travis. His eyebrows immediately furrowed at the sight. “Jesus, do you have a fever? My mom just got over the flu, can't be bringing any more illnesses into the house.”

“No! No, I’m fine,” Travis replied, words tumbling out quick. He ripped his gaze from the window to face Larry, offering a nerve stricken smile. Larry stared at him intently, eyes searching his face before they suddenly dropped down to his crotch.

“Oh my god,” Larry began, grip on Travis’s leg tightening.

“Fuck you,” Travis spat, jerking his leg away from Larry. His whole body shifted from the brunet, legs clamped together, but it was still easy to notice the tent in his pants.

“Apparently you really want to,” the brunet mused. His hand hovered in the air, as if he wanted to pry the other’s legs apart and see how much damage he had done, but he thought better of it. His thumbs drummed against the steering well as he grabbed it with both hands.

“Only in your wet dreams, Johnson,” Travis growled, and Larry really wanted to go into a hysteria of laughing. Only the blondie sat beside him would deny his attraction while there was a raging boner in his lap. Instead, he slowed the truck as he pulled off to the side of the road. He never cut the engine, just let it purr gently as the vehicle came to a halt. The change in pace startled Travis, and he felt his heart start to race. At this point, he didn’t know if it was from anxiety or anticipation. “What are you doing? Why are we stopped?”

Larry shifted in his seat to fully face Travis now that he wasn’t driving. The coy smirk that seemed to be ever present on his face broadened as he once again looked Travis up and down. The Christian could feel the blood rushing in his ears as Larry bit at his own finger for a second, seeming to decide something in his head. “Say Travis, have you ever heard of road head?”

#feel free to reblog #sally face #larry johnson #travis phelps #laravis #larvis #trarry #larry x travis #larry johnson x travis phelps #sally face fanfiction #sally face fanfic #steve gabry #portable moose

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anistarrose · 5 years ago

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Ford in Amphibia - Chapter 2

Summary: Ford is subjected to mild bullying, and the gang decides to hunt an endangered species but makes an unexpected new friend along the way.

Warnings: none

AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19375102/chapters/47328493

The Beginning

This chapter references a few more episodes of Amphibia than the last one, but doesn’t spoil any overarching plot details past the first episode, so it should be possible to read even if you’re not caught up. This is starting to look like it’ll eventually wind up as four-chapter fic, so stay tuned for more!

***

Ford sat on the couch next to Anne, watching intently as she flicked through albums of photos on her phone.

“Here’s my cat, Domino — oh, and here she is again, in my parents’ kitchen! What a little troublemaker!”

“She’s quite precious,” Ford agreed. “You say you have music on this device too?”

“Of course!” Anne answered. “I’ve got all the best tunes — stuff to dance to, stuff you can sing along with, stuff to listen to as you think about how far you are from home and regret your life choices —”

“Do you have anything by Eurythmics? Or Talking Heads?”

Anne stared at Ford blankly.

“Or do you prefer classical? The Planets by Holst, maybe?”

“Uh, I’ve got All Star by Smash Mouth —”

“Mention that song again and you’re dead to me,” Ford growled.

There was an awkward pause, and then Ford sighed. “Sorry. I shouldn’t be surprised that we appreciate different aspects of human culture. You’re young, and I… left my dimension a very long time ago.”

“That’s, um — that’s too bad,” Anne stammered, not really knowing what to say. “Uh… do you want to keep looking at pictures?” she finally asked.

Ford didn’t say no, so she opened a new album. “Here’s some of me and Sprig, and of some wildlife we saw the other day — oh, and here’s where I tried to teach Sprig how to use the camera! You can tell because it’s all blurry and —”

“Wait!” Ford interrupted. “Go back! To the one with the caterpillar — er, the cat-erpillar, rather!”

“This one?” Anne pulled up a picture of a black, orange, and red cat-erpillar glimpsed from across a meadow.

“That’s it! See the flame pattern, and those prominent tufts on the neck? That’s the endangered Sunburst Mountain Cat-erpillar!”

“Whoa, are you like a conservation expert?” Sprig asked, springing onto the couch. “Do you need to capture it and get it to breed with others of its kind to save the species?”

“Quite the opposite, actually,” Ford told them. “I need a sample of its chrysalis for my own use — and ideally I won’t seriously harm any specimens, but you never know!”

Noticing Anne and Sprig’s mildly horrified looks, he went on: “Let me explain. For years now, I’ve planning a mission to a very dangerous dimension, of which the atmosphere is contaminated with just about every pollutant imaginable. There will be zero margin for error on this mission, but if I inhale too many of those pollutants, they’ll almost certainly hamper my performance. So for the past few weeks, I’ve been searching for a solution…”

He pulled a carefully rolled-up piece of paper from his pocket, and spread it out in his lap to reveal a detailed scientific drawing of the cat-erpillar and its cocoon, along with a sketch of a mountain with wisps of smoke emanating from the peak.

“Every generation of the Sunburst Mountain Cat-erpillar pupates near volcanic vents, and as a result, they’ve evolved so that their chrysalides absorb and break down a wide variety of toxins. I learned of their existence shortly after coming to your world, and I’ve been trying to track one down ever since in the hope that harvesting some of that chrysalis material would help me design an air filter to get around that pollution problem — but unfortunately, the location of Sunburst Mountain has been lost to time, since those vents are dormant most of the year. The whole time I’ve been here in the valley, I’ve just been stumbling around blindly without glimpsing hide nor hair of any of the right cat-erpillar species.”

He flipped his paper over, and pulled out a pen. “The period of vent activity should only last another week or two this year, and at this rate I’m probably going to miss it — but if you could tell me where you saw that specimen the other day, then I’d have my best lead yet!”

“Cool!” Sprig exclaimed, at the same time that Anne spoke up:

“I gotta admit, tracking down a lost volcano sounds like loads of fun, but… cat-erpillars are a lot more dangerous than they look. Sprig can tell you about the Domino Two incident — did not end well for anyone, except maybe Domino Two herself.”

“Oh, I know how to handle myself, don’t worry! I’ve conquered many foes more deadly than a mere —”

They were interrupted by a yelp as Hop Pop jumped straight up, slamming into the ceiling.

“Darn it, Ford, I know you mean us no harm, but every time I walk by here I think there’s an owl perched on our couch and my heart skips a beat!” He rubbed his head, and began collecting the books he’d dropped.

Sprig snapped his fingers. “That’s it, an owl! I knew he reminded me of something predatory!”

“What?” Ford scowled. “I do not look like an owl!”

“Uh, except you kinda do!” Polly chimed in, bouncing into the living room behind Hop Pop. “There’s your big wide eyes, and the way your eyebrows jump up and your head whirls right around whenever you hear something behind you — oh, and the way your cloak billows behind you like giant wings!”

“You’ve got to be joking! I —”

“Such a majestic and terrifying creature!” Polly went on, tugging on Ford’s cloak. “You are the swift and deadly hunter I wish to emulate! Will you teach me your ways?”

Ford’s mouth opened and then closed, at a loss for words, but Anne cut in.

“Hey, that’s enough. Owls are supposed to be wise, remember? Ford set his face on fire less than five minutes after we met him. I think that instantly disqualifies him from owl resemblance.”

Ford just shook his head as Anne and Hop Pop cackled.

“And did you see how he slept on the couch last night?” Sprig added. “His face was buried in a whole stack of pillows and his feet were practically out the window! No majestic old owl would sleep like that!”

“I still want to see him in action, though,” Polly declared. “What do you hunt, old man? Tell me so that I may watch you and learn your ways of stealth and dismemberment!”

“I’m not planning to dismember any endangered species if I can avoid it,” Ford corrected her. “But you’re welcome to come with me anyways. The more eyes who know this area, the better!”

“Ooh, can we take Bessie?” Sprig asked. “Anne can drive us!”

Hop Pop’s eyes narrowed. “I don’t know. I’ve got errands to run, and I’m not sure how I feel about letting you all run off without a chaperone…”

Ford stifled a laugh. “Hopediah, I’ve earned degrees in everything from cryptobiology to quantum physics — I’m basically the best chaperone these kids could hope for. Think of it as an educational outing!”

“Oh, well why didn’t you say so? That’s fine, then — just be sure to be back before nightfall!”

“Woo-hoo!” Anne cheered. “Time for an adventure with the weird hobo scientist from outer space that we adopted!”

“Adventure! Adventure! Adventure!” Sprig and Polly chanted. Anne joined in almost immediately, and after a moment, Ford did too.

***

“Okay, I think this is where we saw it,” Anne announced as Bessie the snail slowed to a halt at the edge of a clearing. The meadow was dotted with patches of mud, and seemed devoid of any life besides a lone chickfly that squawked and flew off as the gang dismounted.

“It looks… swampier than last time,” Sprig mused. “Did it rain over here or something?”

Ford knelt down in front of one of the patches of exposed mud, removing his glove to run a finger along the edge. “If anything, it looks like a creature tore up the grass at the surface while hunting here, revealing the damp earth underneath.”

“But these claw markings are huge! Whatever made them must be bigger than me!” Anne shuddered. “Ford, do you know why everything is so giant here?”

“Not for sure, but I can certainly speculate!” Ford’s face lit up. “For one thing, my preliminary scans have shown that there’s more oxygen in the atmosphere of this dimension than there is in the environment either you or I would’ve came from, which paleontology suggests may allow for life to grow larger.”

“Ugh, forget I asked,” Anne muttered, but Sprig bounded over to Ford’s side, eyes wide.

“Wow, really? If you and Anne keep breathing our air, will you get bigger too?”

“Not necessarily due to the oxygen concentrations,” Ford told him, “but that’s not the only difference between our dimensions! Gravity is slightly weaker here too, which most importantly means that it’ll be easier for the skeletons of megafauna to support their body mass, but also could cause Anne and I to pick up a few extra millimeters when our spinal columns expand. The effect should be subtle, but less weight pressing our vertebrae together means we’ll stand a little taller.”

“You’re not a majestic owlish hunter after all,” Polly groaned. “You’re just a nerd.”

“He’s a brave adventurer and he knows all about everything!” Sprig told her. “I want to be just like him when I grow up!”

“Two nerds,” Polly grumbled.

“Hey, guys?” Anne poked Sprig in the shoulder with a stick. “There’s something coming this way, and it’s kinda… on fire?”

“Where?” Ford leapt to his feet. “Is it a cat-erpillar?”

“No, it’s more like… an amorphous blob.” Anne pointed towards the creature, which had made its way almost halfway across the clearing. “I’d stay back, in case it explodes in our faces… oh, or you could just walk right up to it! That too!”

“Would you look at that!” Ford exclaimed, kneeling at the creature’s side. “I hadn’t expected to find any cryptozoological oddities I was familiar with here!”

“Cryptozoological?” Sprig tilted his head. “I thought that stuff was all bogus.”

“As in, like, cryptids?” Anne asked. “I saw a Moss-Man here once, does that count?”

Ford plucked a twig from the ground and placed it in the palm of his hand, which he then slowly extended towards the anomaly. The mass of its body seemed to be concentrated in a blob of mud that spilled across the ground with a radius of about half a foot and a height of about five inches at its highest point, from which several plumes of glowing green gas extended.

Two small, dark eyes blinked within the largest plume, and a muddy tendril extended from the creature’s base. For a moment, the mud began to pool in Ford’s hand, but then it pulled the twig back to its main body with a sudden slurp, leaving almost no dirt or moisture behind whatsoever. The twig vanished inside the muddy blob, and the creature gurgled in satisfaction.

Ford ran a hand through the fiery-looking plumes and Anne cringed, but he didn’t get burned. The creature’s flickering eyes widened as it responded with some semblance of a purr, apparently eager for more petting.

“Fascinating! I’ve encountered Scampfires back home, but I think this individual might be better referred to as a ‘Swampfire!’ Although technically speaking, there doesn’t seem to be any actual fire involved — I suspect it’s fueled by phosphorus and hydrocarbon compounds from that muddy blob of biomass, which undergo some form chemiluminescence to produce light without a substantial amount of heat.”

“Is it dangerous?” Polly asked. “Or will it help us on our quest?”

“Neither, I think,” Ford replied. “It seems perfectly content to just ooze along here and keep absorbing plant matter while we head on our way — although, I should really get a quick sketch first!” He pulled out a pen and notebook, adjusted his sitting position, and set to work.

“What happened to finding the cat-erpillar?” Anne groaned. “I thought that was some critically vital mission or something!”

“Oh, it is!” Ford told her. “But it’s not every day one gets to discover and catalog a new anomaly! You know, I wouldn’t be surprised if Swampfires exist in my dimension too, but are endangered due to habitat loss… Humanity really needs to do a better job of preserving wetlands and all the biodiversity they contain…”

Sprig peered over Ford’s shoulder at his work — a set of simple drawings, cartoonish yet detailed enough to capture all the details of the Swampfire’s form in multiple poses. “Wow! You drew that so fast!”

“Thank you, I’ve been doing this for quite a while! Now, Swampy, if you could hold that pose for just a moment…”

Swampy, naturally, chose that moment to bolt, darting back between the trees with surprising speed as its lights dimmed.

“Drat. Well, what I’ve got down here is still better than nothing —”

“Hey, guys?” Anne asked. “Is it just me, or did a really big shadow just pass over us?”

In unison, the four of them looked up. Above, a massive shape blocked out the sun — a shape with wide eyes, a pointed beak, and long, silently flapping wings.

“Scatter!” Ford shouted as the owl dove towards the clearing, and the children bolted as its talons raked the ground.

***

End notes:

Thanks for reading, feedback/reblogs are appreciated as always!

This was very fun to write, as fics with Ford often are, because I got to use him as an excuse to ramble about science! Since Sprig showed an interest in science in “Family Shrub,” I figured he’d be pretty inquisitive, and look up to the whole adventurer-scientist deal Ford has going on.

Swampy the Swampfire, also known as the best character I’ve ever written about, is based partly off the Scampfires from Journal 3, and partly off of the “will-o-the-wisp” ghost lights, which are believed to be a result of gases produced in wetlands by decaying plants. (The endangered due to habitat loss detail Ford mentions isn’t a joke, either — according to Wikipedia, will-o-the-wisp sightings are rarer nowadays, and it’s probably because wetlands keep getting destroyed. We need to save the Swampfires!)

#amphibia #gravity falls #stanford pines #anne boonchuy #sprig plantar #polly plantar #fic: ford in amphibia #rosalia writes fic

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sunsetscurving · 6 years ago

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Oh, Cruel Fate (Enemies to Lovers AU)

Ch. 11

ao3 link

The Demaurys and the Lallemants had been enemies for over one hundred years. And when Lucas first meets Eliott, he hates him with his whole heart even without knowing him, blaming him and his family for his life which is slowly falling apart. But when they are forced to live alongside in the same surrounding, something is changing between them. And this scares Lucas more than anything else.

Lucas tried to flex his hands which were held into fists the whole time since he climbed into Eliotts car. He looked out of the window, staring at the city rushing by while the lanterns went on and the lights on the streets started to twinkle.

Lucas had no clue where Eliott was taking him.

Eliott could kidnap him or just throw him into the nearest river. And yet… Yet Lucas trusted him. Because Eliott got him out of that hell also known as his former home.

“Are you okay?”

Lucas was dragged back to reality when Eliott addressed him. Lucas looked over to the other boy. Eliott was already watching the street again, holding tight onto the wheel. His hair was as messy as usual and the jumper he wore looked like he just threw it over himself in a rush. Maybe this was even the case after Lucas’ sudden message.

“I… I don’t know”, answered Lucas honestly and looked out of the window again. They seemed to leave the city behind, the more crowded place traded for empty roads.

“I feel nothing. I feel too much, I really don’t know.”

Lucas wasn’t sure if Eliott heard his words but the latter sighed deeply.

“I know exactly what you mean.”

“You do?”

Lucas raised his eyebrows in surprise as he turned his head to the other one and Eliott looked kind of shock, kind of panicked at Lucas’ question.

“I— I just have the same problems as you, Lucas. I’m the other part of your family feud, remember?” Eliott was now smirking a bit and on Lucas’ lips appeared a tiny smile.

“Your father… no one deserves to be treated like that, especially not his own son. I’m sorry, Lucas. I really am.”

Lucas heard the honesty in Eliotts voice and something inside him warmed at these words. He laid his head back, resting it against the seat he was sitting in.

“You don’t need to be sorry. I’m just really thankful that you picked me up.”

“I told you that you should contact me when you need me”, answered Eliott, throwing a shorty glance over to Lucas. “And I held my promise.”

“And you held your promise.”

Lucas smiled a bit and held Eliotts gaze for a second longer than appropriate. Eliott broke their eye contact to look on the street again and Lucas could feel his cheeks blushing. He was glad that Eliott couldn’t see it in the dim light of the car.

“You know…”, started Lucas quietly after some moments of silence between them. “I just want to be numb. I don’t want to feel anything.” He had the feeling that Eliott really understood him. That he could talk with him without being judged. That he… cared. And so he opened up, for the first time after weeks.

Eliotts gaze was fixed on the street and Lucas turned his head to see if there would come some kind of reaction from the other one. Did he went too far? Did he overestimated the relationship between them?

“Don’t say that”, he suddenly said softly as Lucas already thought of getting no answer at all.

“There… there are so many other emotions than anger or fear”, Eliott continued slowly while making eye contact with Lucas again, looking into his eyes the whole time. “So many other better emotions.”

Lucas was sure that Eliott could look straight into his soul. And he also was sure that Eliott could hear his fast heartbeat in this second. Lucas already opened his mouth to answer, as Eliott took a turn with his car, driving down an empty road.

“Where are you actually taking me?”, asked Lucas now with a hint of a smile in his voice.

Eliott grinned, his eyes now suddenly sparkling.

“It’s a surprise. You’ll love it.”

“And you know this why…?”

Eliott parked on the side of the road and leaned back, turning off the motor. Lucas looked out of the window again, looking for some kind of signs where they currently were. But all he saw was the forest around them, stretching on and on.

“Because I just know it”, answered Eliott and left the car with a big grin on his face, slamming the door shut behind him. Lucas was left alone with the silence of the car in this moment and he closed his eyes for a second, a smile blooming onto his lips. Eliott wanted to distract him, to be… alone with him.

And suddenly, Lucas was nervous. But not the nervousness that twisted your insides. The kind of nervousness that made you feel the adrenaline rushing through your veins, wanting more and more from that feeling.

“Are you coming?”, asked Eliott suddenly while opening the door for him. Lucas grinned now. The thoughts of his father slowly shifting into the background, his eyes only fixed on Eliott for now.

“If I wanted to kidnap you, I already would’ve done it.”

Lucas let out a short laugh and climbed out of the car, wanting to bury his hands in the pockets of his jacket. But Eliott was faster – he reached out and took hold of Lucas’ hand. Lucas was surprised for a little moment but… he didn’t act against it. He actually enjoyed this touch of the beautiful boy in front of him who was literally beaming with light. The weakening sunlight made his eyes sparkle, the reddish light turning him into some kind of painting.

What the actually fuck, Lucas.

“Come. Come on.”

And with that, Eliott pulled Lucas into the wilderness.

Lucas trusted Eliott. He trusted him and so he let Eliott pull him into an unknown location, climbing over branches and even a little fence. Eliott helped him, holding his hand the whole time during their walk.

“Eliott, putain, where the fuck are we”, Lucas said quietly while laughing. Eliott only answered with a smile and let go of Lucas’ hand suddenly. Lucas stood still for a moment where Eliott left him, the other one walking backwards while facing Lucas the whole time, grinning all the way. Lucas grinned equally bright, following him slowly. And suddenly, the branches parted and Lucas’ breath caught into his throat while his eyes widened.

He never saw this place before.

The last sunlight of the day was shining through the leaves, making everything look gloomy.

Especially the big, old ferris wheel right in front of Lucas.

“Tada”, said Eliott while his smile took in his whole face.

They were in an abandoned leisure park.

“Mais non…”, said Lucas with disbelief in his voice while swirling around himself for some seconds. This place was stunningly beautiful. He lived in the city for as long as he could remember but he never heard about this place before. It nearly felt enchanted – the abandoned attractions, the ferris wheel being covered in leaves and branches. Everything about this place felt surreal – and exactly right in this very moment.

“Do you like it?”

Lucas jumped slightly as he heard Eliotts voice close to his ear. He hadn’t seen the other boy moving and now Eliott was close behind him. Lucas looked over his shoulder and only realized now, that he was smiling from one side of his face to the other.

“It’s… it’s beautiful. How do you know this place?”

Eliott walked around Lucas so that he faced him again, his hands lazily in his pockets. Lucas tried not to check him out but fuck it, this boy looked so damn fine.

“As you know, my family is not the most easiest thing on earth. Like your family”, Eliott started and turned around, walking more into the leisure park now. Lucas followed him, his gaze fixed on Eliotts back.

“And when I ran away one night, I ended up here. Since then, it’s my… safe space. A place, where I can think about everything, where I can breathe again.”

Eliott suddenly stopped in his tracks, causing Lucas to run straight into him. He stretched out his hands to steady himself which landed on Eliotts broad back. Lucas could feel the muscles beneath his black shirt and he had to swallow. Eliott didn’t twist out of this touch and Lucas just stared at his back for some seconds, breathing in the others presence.

“And now you brought me here”, stated Lucas silently after some seconds and Eliott turned around at this. The taller boy was now looking down at Lucas, standing close in front of him and Lucas’ heart decided to jump out of his chest again.

“Yeah. Now I brought you here. Because you needed a safe space too. And my safe space is enough for the both of us.”

Lucas didn’t deserve this. Any of this. He didn’t know why Eliott treated him this way. Lucas smiled slightly, his gaze wandering from Eliotts eyes slowly to his lips. His mind brought him back to the scene in the classroom, just hours ago. It felt like years passed since this moment. Eliott seemed to realize the shifting of Lucas’ gaze and one corner of his mouth lifted slightly.

He knows what I’m thinking and he likes it, this little shit.

Eliott slowly leaned in and Lucas’ looked up to Eliotts eyes again, his heart beating hard against his rips and everything in him was wide awake.

Only a few millimeter separated them.

Lucas counted in his mind.

3…2…1…

“Oh, do you know why I love this place in the first place?”

Lucas was totally perplex as Eliott suddenly spoke these words in the little space between them, their lips only an inch away from each other.

“What—”

Eliott pulled away, a smugly smile on his lips, walking slowly backwards.

“It’s perfect to play hide and seek.”

And with that, he ran off and was gone.

“Are you fucking serious now?”, Lucas breathed quietly and looked around himself. This little shit decided to let him suffer and to be honest, he deserved it.

And then, he grinned.

“Okay, challenge accepted”, he called loudly so that Eliott would hear it.

And with that, he ran after Eliott in the direction where the other one disappeared. Eliott had the advantage of knowing this place so Lucas was kind of lost when he walked around between the old rides, climbing over big branches or old left overs from the leisure park.

“Eliott?”

He liked the sound of his name in his ears.

“Where are you?”

Lucas stood in the middle of the way, surrounded by abandoned attractions and the forest in general. It was slowly getting dark and everything kind of looked the same. He didn’t know how he should find Eliott here.

Suddenly, he heard the cracking of a branch and swirled around in the direction of the sound. He heard some quiet chuckle and saw the scheme of something disappearing. Lucas grinned and took off again, running after Eliott.

“Give up. I found you already.”

“Not true.”

Lucas stumbled as the voice came from a completely different direction. He looked over his shoulder, already quite breathless from his hunt, his eyes sparkling with light. He took a deep breath, running his hands through his hair.

“Okay, I’m giving up”, said Lucas after some seconds of scanning his surroundings, slowly starting to walk back.

He found himself in a bumper car attraction very soon, climbing up the stairs and standing in the middle of the roadway. The cars were shattered around on the whole surface of that roadway – it looked like they were being left here in panic, no one caring about them anymore. Lucas stroked the surface of one of the tiny cars, his finger coming back stained with dirt. The last sunbeams were producing long and dark shadows on the roadway and Lucas really felt like being in a fairytale.

“Found you.”

Lucas jumped again when Eliott was so suddenly behind him, laying a hand on his heart in shock.

“Putain, don’t scare me.”

“You were scared?”, said Eliott with amusement in his voice, tilting his head to the side a little so that some of his messy hair was falling in his eyes.

It took Lucas a lot of strength not to reach out and brush the hair out of the other one’s eyes.

“I’m not scared. I was just… surprised.”

Eliott grinned and said nothing because he knew that Lucas lied and Lucas knew that he was a terrible liar after all.

“We should maybe leave, it’s slowly getting dark and—”

Lucas was about to walk past Eliott, when the other one grabbed his hand and pulled him towards him. The air was kicked out of Lucas’ lungs as he was suddenly pressed against Eliotts chest. Lucas had to lay his head back to look up at Eliott, the other one looking down on him with something so soft in his expression. Eliott was still holding his hand, not taking his eyes off of Lucas any second.

“I won this round”, said Eliott quietly and Lucas could do nothing else than staring into Eliotts fucking beautiful eyes.

“True.”

“And what is my prize?”

Lucas raised his eyebrows in a surprising expression.

“Your prize?”

Why is my voice so hoarse?

“My prize.”

“We never said something about a prize.”

“Now we do.”

Lucas felt himself enjoying the closeness of their bodies. Enjoying the heat radiating from Eliott and the scent of him, making his senses blur a tiny bit.

What the fuck is happening here?

“And what is it that you want?”, Lucas asked and went more and more quiet with every word. Eliott came closer again, like he did some minutes ago before their little game.

This time, Lucas didn’t count the seconds.

“I have something in mind already.”

And suddenly, Eliott laid his lips on Lucas and Lucas seemed to explode from the inside. His senses were suddenly not blurred anymore – every sense of him was wide awake and despite that, they were not able to grab what was actually happening here.

Before Lucas could understand it, he started to return the kiss, closing his eyes slowly. Eliott was a good kisser – his lips were warm and soft against Lucas’ and it just felt… right. Good. Perfect. The sun was warming Lucas’ face but his heart and his insides felt even more warm. The kiss was soft, Eliott being all careful as if being afraid to destroy Lucas otherwise, to break him.

But Lucas wouldn’t break.

Lucas was just starting to heal.

#TO EVERYONE WHO WAITED SO LONG #HERE YOU GO MY MECS #I HOPE YOU LIKE IT #*whispers* enjoy it as long as you can #skam france #lucas lallemant #eliott demaury #oh cruel fate fanfiction #skam france fanfiction #skam france fanfic

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josiewinters1999 · 6 years ago

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What It Feels Like 6

Rocket Raccoon x OFC (Willie)

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5

Summary: Willie awakes to find herself in The Collector’s gallery. She knows she has to escape... for Rocket.

Contains: Angst, fluff, feels, cursing, violence, really gross stuff for a hot minute

A/N: It has been forever and a day since I’ve uploaded and to my [5] fans, I’m so sorry. If you are reading this, thank you for coming back after my long absence and I hope this part is worth the wait. I’m actually pretty proud of it tbh. If you guys like this enough and I keep getting the time/motivation to work on it, I hope to extend it and add the other Guardians. Also, I’m thinking about starting up and writing about Willie and other characters, in her “canon” timeline (aka, the one I have meticulously planned out in my head). Drop a comment and tell me what you think of the story or anything I’ve proposed. And as always... enjoy!

The morning was just like any other; the alarm clock went off, he got up, dressed himself, and went into the control room of his ship. However, when Rocket realized upon entering that it was missing a certain person and all the comforting ambiance they produced, he felt his heart sink in his chest. Today was going to be a long lonely day.

He makes his way to the coffee machine, ready to brew himself a cup since Willie wasn’t there to do it like she typically did. With a drowsy paw, Rocket grabs the coffee and begins making the pot.

As the water brews, the raccoon’s distorted reflection grimaces back at him from the coffee pot. He crosses his arms and looks away, not wanting to be reminded how miserable he actually is. Brown eyes gaze across the common room of his modestly sized ship. On the table where he and Willie would normally be sharing breakfast, he spots his holocommunicator.

All the muscles in his body tense the second his eyes lock on it. He slowly makes his way to it, afraid he might startle it somehow if he’s too quick. It looks back up at him, almost begging him to make the call he so desperately wants to make.

Furry paws grasp the tablet and hold it feebly. It’s only been one damn day, his mind tells him. What could possibly have happened in one day? The voice of his conscious didn’t stop Rocket from wanting to make the call.

If I could just hear her voice one more time... his small fingers punch in her name and got to hit the ‘call’ button but stop in an instant, mere millimeters above the surface of the device.

She left you his darker side scolds him. She doesn’t need you and you don’t need her. Face scrunching up in anger, the raccoon throws the communicator back onto the table and returns to his coffee.

***

The space is still and stagnant, air not moving in any direction. It smells of plastic, harsh cleaning chemicals, and something foreign. Behind her eyelids, Willie can sense there was a light on.

Voices in the distance are muffled by a what sounds like a wall. They’re deep, masculine, and many. Mind not yet a full functioning, Willie is unable to translate and blows off the noise as the radio or television.

In her space, the Gallifreyan stirs, finding her position uncomfortable. The pain in her head suddenly catches her attention and her whole body winces. The sound outside her space changes from voices to loud thumps, each one increasing in volume before stopping.

Bang bang bang.

The sound of a fist on flat glass is enough to jolt the woman awake. She springs into a sitting position and makes the horrible choice of opening her eyes.

Flickering and humming fluorescent lights above her magnify the pain throbbing in her skull to levels unbearable. Raising a hand to shield her eyes, Willie squints, hoping it will help her focus.

The blurry room slowly starts to become comprehensible. There is a man standing above her with a wide, wicked smile on his face. He waves sarcastically as he bends his knees. His blue skin, black eye, and bloody lip make the Kree man instantly recognizable.

Too weak to make a rebuttal, Willie just snarls and the man laughs, his voice now being clear and understandable, “Not so tough now, are you, you stupid bitch?”

Willie’s memory suddenly comes crashing into her like a runaway train.Landing in Knowhere, going to her ship, having a smoke at her table in the bounty hunter’s bar, the fight in the bar, the fight in the alleyway, all while she was trying to get back to Rocket.

Rocket. Oh God…

One of the men from the alleyway steps up and pulls back his friend taunting Willie, “Come on Agron, let’s just let the man pay us and get out of here,” he leans into the blue skinned Agron, “this place gives me the creeps.”

Agron looks between his friend and his catch in the glass cage before walking away. This gives Willie a second to fully survey her surroundings.

Feeling a stiff, scratchy feeling on her skin, she glances down. She was now clad in a crisp, clean, white jumpsuit and matching socks. She feels a pain in her neck. Reaching up,she feels a small metal disk under her skin. Having used them on others before Willie knows exactly what its purpose is; electric shocks. Shifting to be on her knees, she crawls to the edge of the square enclosure. Peering out into the area outside it, she looks up and out at the vast storage area.

The ceiling seems to stretch on almost forever, receding into blackness as the items hanging in it begin to disappear. Hundreds of glass cases similar to Willie’s reach into the space above, each one filled with a different, rare creature.

Willie had heard many things about this man and had evaded his grasp many times by the hairs on her neck. Finally being in his care, in his glass case looking out, was something Willie had prayed she’d never see. Suddenly feeling light headed, she falls back onto the seat of her jumpsuit, the world before her becoming blurry.

In the distance, she sees three indistinct figures. The smallest of them hands something to the other two before they walk away. On the brink of fainting, Willie doesn’t notice the figure’s movement until he begins to finally come into focus at the edge of her tank.

He is slightly taller than Willie and wears a luxurious white fur coat draped over his shoulders, it’s hair matching that on his head perfectly. His tailored purple suit underneath oozed elegance and wealth. Wealth, Willie is now starting to realize, built on blood… blood like hers.

With straight perfect teeth, he grins at Willie like a passerby would grin at a cute dog. He bends his knees, purple fabric around them straining slightly. “Look… at … you,” his words were slow and full of pride, “After all this time I never thought I’d have one. A Time Lord. The last Time Lord,” he trembles slightly with giddiness, “And she’s all mine.”

“Jokes on you dumbass,” Willie grins back, “I’m not actually a Time Lord. I’m a Woodlander. We’re a different breed.”

The Collector stands, fixing his now lightly wrinkled clothes, “Makes no difference. You’re the last one left.” He looks back at her with a devilish grin, “You’re one of a kind.”

***

“I wish we could stay like this forever…” Willie sighs, rubbing the fur between Rocket’s ears gently with her long pale fingers. He grips her shirt tighter and smiles, inhaling her scent deeply. She smelled of cigarette smoke, tangy soap, and something distinctly Willie.

Curling into her side, Rocket can feel her warmth radiate onto him, the clear blue sky above him and the crisp wind completing the scene. “We can stay like this as long as you want baby,” He mumbles happily.

Willie furrows her brow, “We can?” The worry in her voice drains Rocket’s joy as he sits up to look at her. Her skin was perfect without a single blemish on it, like it had been airbrushed. “Why couldn’t we?” he asks, concern evident.

She brushes her vibrantly colored yellow hair back, looking up at the raccoon, “I don’t know.” Her hands find a blade of grass beneath her and twirl it in her fingertips as she continues, “Maybe because we shouldn’t be together.”

Rocket grabs her hand and holds it in both his paws, “Baby, we can do whatever we want. Who was it that made the rules of who can and can’t be together?” Her blue eyes glance at his hands and then back into his eyes.

“Don’t you love me?” the raccoon asks, deep brown full of worry. She only smiles, gracing his cheek with her free hand, “Of course I do. I always have.”

For a moment, time stops, the birds stop chirping, the clouds stop floating, and the wind comes to a halt. Willie’s warm smile is enough to last Rocket a lifetime. Her plump red lips turn upwards as she speaks in a low voice, “Rocket, I lo-”

The moistness under his chin wakes Rocket from his dream. Groggy and half out of it, he sits up, looking at the puddle of drool in his lap. Wiping the now cold liquid from his cheek, he looks at the clock on the ship’s console.

2pm. It’s barely past noon and he’s already bored himself to sleep. Living without Willie is harder than he thought it would be.

His hands tingle as if they really had just been touching Willie. He sighs, heart heavy and the images flashing through his mind. Rocket realizes he feels empty without her.

But again, her face, her real face, not the one in Rocket’s dream comes to mind; sunken in, covered in scars, nose crooked, and eyes permanently full of disdain and disappointment. The sight hurts just to think about. Hurt soon turns to anger and he clenches his fists around the armrests of his captain’s chair.

“Fuck her. Never needed that junkie slut crowding me anyways.”

***

Whenever Willie got any reprieve from being watched, by either The Collector himself or by one of his pink skinned minions, she searched her cell fervently. Top to bottom she looked for something that could get her out.

Fingers tapped, poked, and pried at every corner and seem of the glass. It was sealed tight, the only opening was the air vent above and Willie had already rubbed her fingertips raw trying to feel for a weak spot or anything she could wrap around her fingers to help in her escape.

Willie was beginning to learn the hard way how things work as a toy in The Collector’s box. Twice a day, every day, you were delivered food. The food was bland but kept you alive and healthy, just the way he wanted you.

When it was feeding time, you were told to get into position at the opposite end of your tank. This position consisted of you kneeling, ankles crossed and hands interlocked behind your head. Something you can’t get out of very easily.

The pink skinned girl would then open the door and carefully set the food down before shutting it and leaving. If you moved, she hit a button on the device strapped to her wrist and an electric shock powerful enough to make even Willie seize up would flow through your body, leaving you a sloppy mess on the floor.

Days passed, and many times Taneleer himself would come to just stare at the blond Gallifreyan in her case. Petting his fur coat like it was a living animal, he stared her down, grinning wildly and almost fondly at her. Every time, Willie would curse him, promptly earning her a shock slightly more potent than the ones delivered by the assistants.

Getting out of this place is going to be tough, that much was clear.

***

Willie lay in the dark on her back. The Collector knew better than to give her anything in her case so she lay on the bar hard floor, staring at the grey ceiling, its only features being the light, now dimmed, and the air vent.

Nine days. It had been nine days. Why hadn’t anyone come for her? Where was Rocket? Hadn’t he seen her getting pulled away? Willie thought, hands folded on her stomach. Then it hits her. Rocket doesn’t care. He’s pissed I left. No one is coming…

Her thoughts and potential tears are interrupted by footsteps in the distance. She sits up, crawling to the nearest glass wall. She sees one the cleaning ladies scurrying in, a bucket in one hand and a wad of rags in the other.

“Hurry!” The Collector’s voice is distant, quiet, but unmistakable. “He isn’t going to clean himself now is he?” he shouts and the girl only runs faster.

After watching the pink girl disappear in the sea of dimly lit glass cases, Willie watches Taneleer emerge, steps angry and swift with his less formal, more comfortable night coat flowing behind him.

With the excitement seeming to be over, Willie sits back, listening intently. She could barely make out the sounds of cleaning. The slosh of water, the squeak of clean glass, and the occasional sob from the woman doing the dirty work.

Some time later, the assistant comes back, wet rags inside the bucket of now dirty water. Head to the ground, tears trail down her cheeks and she briskly speed walks out of the gallery hall.

Eyes trained on her like a hawk, the wheels in Willie’s head turn. She feels the blood rush through her body and a hunger form in her stomach; a hunger she hasn’t felt in a long time.

If she wanted to get out of this place, she was going to have to do it the dirty way.

***

Hours passed and her instinct was telling Willie it was turning from night to dawn. The creatures around he were beginning to stir and the hall seemed more alive than it is at night. The Collector comes out to gaze upon his prizes while his entourage of assistants come around with carts full of food trays.

The one that typically fed Willie approaches her tank, tray in hand and cart at her side. She gives a look to Willie and the blond glares at her, asking her to assume the proper position for feeding.

As she kneels, interlocking her ankles and hands, the woman slides the glass door open and sets the tray down before swiftly exiting and going on with her route.

Willie gets up and stares at the food as it practically stares back at her. The tray was like everything else in her tank, white and clean. Perfect, just the way he liked things. It disgusts her and makes her yearn for freedom even more.

Angrily grabbing the food and sitting it on her lap, she begins shoveling it into her mouth, waiting for the perfect opportunity to carry out her plan. She watches the people bustle about, going from tank to tank until their carts are empty. They then roll out in an almost single file line, ready to return in an hour to collect the empty trays.

Finally alone, Willie checks one more time to see if the collector is near. Without the man or any of his minions in sight, Willie sits back hearts racing. If she was going to do this, she’d better hurry.

With no more food left on her tray, she leans forward, looking down at the floor. She gets on her knees, pulling her hair over her shoulders and opening her mouth wide. She takes a deep breath, squeezes her eyes shut tight, and reaches her long fingers down her throat.

There was only a couple other times she’s ever had to do this, and being nervous always made it harder. She forces them deeper and harder down her throat, feeling around to find that sweet spot that will give her the results she needs.

Feeling herself gag, she knows she’s found it. Pressing harder still, she gags more and more. Sweat seeps from her pores, worry that she’ll be caught tickling her stomach. Soon enough she gags one last time and a waterfall of sloppy puke gushes from her mouth and onto the floor by her knees.

Coughing while the last bit comes out, she pulls her fingers out, licking them clean first and then wiping the excess saliva on her leg.

Surely when the lady came to take her tray, she’d see the mess and have to spend a good amount of time to clean it.

Willie’s prediction comes true sooner than she had hoped when Taneleer steps out from behind the row of tanks next to her and see her sitting in her own filth. Glaring at the Gallifreyan, she fakes stomach pains and curls into a corner, trying her best to further the illusion.

The Collector’s face heats up and turns a deep shade of read, “Carina!” he shouts, almost loud enough to make the glass shatter. Quick yet light footsteps rush to his side, “Yes, master?”

He forcefully grabs her arm and jerks her, making her look at the state of his prized piece, “What is this? Are you trying to kill her?” Stuttering but not actually responding, Carina’s mouth opens and closes nervously. “Clean it up...” Taneleer barks into her ear. She nods and rushes off to get her supplies.

The Collector looks Willie up and down one last time before storming off in a rage. If he were to stand and watch any longer, he knows he would most likely scream at Carina the entire time.

Unable to hold it in, Willie grins. Perfect ,she thinks. Within a few more moments, Carina comes back with the buckets, chemical solutions, rags, and sponges needed to clean Willie’s vomit.

Willie begins to tingle with anticipation. Carina doesn’t even bother to say anything to Willie before sliding the door open. The Gallifreyan’s eyes go wide in excitement as she stares at the woman’s wrist and the device strapped to it.

Carina wets a rag and kneels, beginning to wipe the floor. Every second seemed to drag on for years and Willie felt like she did in the forests of her home; nervously excited with a certain insatiable bloodlust as she waits in the bushes to kill her next meal.

Soon the weak prey turns her back to re-wet her rag. The predator lunges forward silently and swiftly, grabbing her by her throat to silence any screams. Prey’s eyes go wide and fingers claw desperately at the suffocating firmness around her.

Willie drags Carina into her tank, through the mess on the floor and up to her chest. The blood pumps through her veins, adrenaline making her stronger and eventually she can feel Carina’s spine in her palm, so close she can feel the bumps in her vertebrae.

The woman’s pawing becomes softer and softer, her pleaing grunts becoming quieter and quieter. Eyes roll up into her skull and she goes limp and heavy in Willie’s hands. Willie reaches down to her wrist and unstraps the device that controls the disc in her neck.

Strapping it on her own wrist, Willie begins punching every button she can find. How the hell do I turn this thing off? Her mind panics. Suddenly there is a beep and Willie quickly prays to every God she knows that that has done it.

Her head darts from side to side as she emerges from her tank for the first time in over a week. Not a soul is in sight and the coast is clear.

She steps swiftly and quietly through the gallery, keeping herself as concealed as possible. She weaves between the rows of glass cases, the creatures and plants inside watching her in awe as she does the thing they all wish they could do; escape.

The door has to be here somewhere. Her mind races and her pores leak profusely as she frantically searches for the exit. Each row only leads to nothingness and Willie starts walking faster and faster through them.

Finally, a grand archway presents itself at the far end of the gallery, barely within view. Face lighting up with relief, Willie makes her way to it, confident and giddy.

“You!” a deep male voice grunts behind her. Her body tenses up again and she whips her head around to see the voice’s owner. The Collector stands down the row from her, Willie equidistant between him and freedom.

She sprints as fast as she can for the door. Taneleer reaches his wrist up to push the button on his device to slow her down. Nothing happens. He presses it again and looks up. She is still running, and alarmingly fast.

His heart tenses and he shouts, “Get her!” No one rushes to his aid and he runs after her himself. Willie reaches the archway and dashes out into the familiar streets of Knowhere.

Luckily there was a crowd and she soon absorbs herself into it, hiding herself in the swarm of bodies lining the strip. By the time Taneleer emerges from his gallery, she is gone. He looks down at his wrist computer again and see a red dot on a radar. “You’ll be mine again...”

***

Weaving quickly through the crowd, stealing the paranoid look over her shoulder, Willie looks everywhere for The Collector or his goons. She’s certain they are right behind her.

After walking the streets and not seeing any sight of them for an hour, she relaxes. She’s outrun them… for now. Willie looks down at her vomit and sweat stained jumpsuit. If she wants to blend in and get off this planet, she’s going to have to change clothes.

She desperately searches the streets for where her ship was parked prior to her kidnapping. That comforting and familiar empty space between two buildings was a sight for sore eyes. A bright smile spreads across Willie’s lips and she runs to her ship. She can’t wait to throw open the doors of that fantastic invisible box and-

Reaching the space, she runs right through it. Where her ship should have been is empty. Her ship is gone.

Willie begins to panic, “No…” she whispers. She frantically feels the air for it. Spinning in circles like a mad man she searches for something that isn’t there. “No,” she repeats. “No no no.” She stomps the ground in anger. “He took it. Taneleer Tivan took my fucking ship.”

She gazes back out into the alleyway, “I need a phone…”

***

Hanging his ammo belt up on the rack at the entrance of his ship, Rocket sighs. Jobs just don’t satisfy him like they used to. The rush of blowing something up and taking someone down just doesn’t get his goat anymore.

They used to give him a sense of fulfillment that satiated his core like a desert flower getting its yearly rain. Things are… well… different now. He knew deep down why, but would never admit it to anyone, especially himself.

With heavy limbs, he trudges to the kitchen. Bounty hunting can sure work up the appetite. Rocket steps on his small ladder to reach the top cabinet. Before he can even fully grasp the handle of the door, the holocommunicator on the dining table rings.

His movements stop. He debates whether he should let it ring out or if he should walk over and reject the call. Either way, he didn’t feel like talking to anyone. The raccoon returns to the task at hand and opens the cabinet.

In the background, the ringing stops. “Guess they didn’t want to talk either.”

Reaching into the cabinet he pulls out a box of food and begins preparing it. He pours the contents of the plastic container into a plastic bowl, sighing with tired eyes and feeble fingers.

The ringing begins again and Rocket growls to no one in particular. Teeth bared, he angrily looks over his shoulder at the table muttering to himself, “Can I not sit down for five goddamn minutes?” Eventually, the ringing stops once more.

Tension releasing, the raccoon takes his food and walks to the captain’s chair to eat it. As he passes the table and holocommunicator sitting on it. It begins yelling at him again, almost as if it knew he was walking by.

Angry beyond comprehension, he slams his food on the table, a few bits of it falling out onto the surface of the tabletop. “Who could it possibly be?” he shouts at the top of his lungs. He picks of the glowing translucent blue tablet and reads the message:

Voice Communication. A3-Sector B09

The code at the end was instantly recognizable to Rocket. It told the raccoon that this call was coming from Knowhere. But why? At this point, Rocket’s anger has subsided and curiosity is slowly taking its place.

Slowly, he takes his paw and taps the accept button. Immediately he hears a hustle and bustle in the background of the call, confirming this call was where the communicator said.

“Hello?” the raccoon’s voice is unsure.

“Rocket!? Oh thank God I was starting to think you wouldn’t pick up,” distinctive voice worries to him. It was shaky and scared.

Rocket’s heart drops at the sound of it and he nearly faints, “Willie?”

She smiles on her end, “Yeah it’s me.” There is a pause as she swallows nervously, “Rocket, I’m in trouble. I need you.”

Rocket opens his mouth to offer his assistance but is suddenly reminded of the full situation. She left him. She left him after he poured his heart out to her. She doesn’t deserve his help. “Why should I help you?” he grunts.

Willie almost chokes at those words, “What the hell do you mean? Rocket, please. I need your help. I’m stuck here.”

He only shrugs, “Sounds like a personal problem to me.”

The Gallifreyan bites a lip and lowers her voice, “Rocket, listen. I’m sorry for how stupid I was being. This whole thing with our feelings just is kinda hard for me…” she sighs, “I… I shouldn’t have left. I really had no reason to except that I was scared. But trust me when I say I tried to get back to you. I really did.”

Tears welling in his eyes, Rocket tries his best to make it sound like he isn’t crying, “Then what the hell stopped you?” he spits.

“I was kidnapped!” Willie shouts, her voice going through the communicator and filling Rocket’s ship.

He is taken aback by this, “Y-you were what?”

The woman lets out a deep breath, “The Collector got me. He’s been after me for years and he finally got me. It’s a wonder I was able to get out.” She anxiously scans the crowd as she speaks into the communicator on the Knowhere streets, “I think he still might be on my tail though. Can never be too sure. I need to get this stupid thing out of my neck. How soon can you be here? Because I am dying to kill this piece of shit.”

“Willie…” he trails off, unable to think of what else to say.

“Please Rocket, I need my big man to come rescue me.”

His heart flutters and he smiles, “I love you,” he blurts out.

Willie sighs, grinning like mad, “I think I might feel the same.”

The smile on Rocket’s face couldn’t be wider, “Lay low for a while doll. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

***TAG LIST***

@animeaniseed @youralienfriend @fandoms-4-life0000 @groovy-bouquet-starlight @okie--loki @tara-jadet1ffen @rosaufyuniverse

#rocket raccoon x reader #rocket x reader #rocket raccoon x ofc #rocket raccoon #gotgvol2 #gotg #peter quill #drax #Gamora #i am groot #groot #mantis #marvel

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taekookstories · 7 years ago

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Chapter 4 - You Weren’t My First Kiss

My first kiss was with a girl I met at a christmas party 2 years ago. Daehyun had made me go then got drunk and within 2 hours he was passed on the bathroom floor, waiting for me to take him home. To be honest I didn’t remember the party very well. I drank a little, but so much happened in the small time I was there that I couldn’t even remember much of the kiss or how our lips felt against each other.

The girl asked me out the next day and I said no. I wasn’t interested in dating and I thought if my two best-friends had left me after us knowing each other since the second grade, what hope could I have of having a nice relationship. Jang-il had only died maybe two or three months before. The memories of what I’d went through were still fresh and Daehyun was taking it worse than me. In some ways my reasons for saying no was right but also very flawed, and now almost two years later I wondered what I would be like if I said yes.

Maybe me and the girl wouldn’t be together anymore, but maybe I would’ve been more outgoing, or had more girlfriends and not worried so much about work and school. Maybe I could’ve been living my life very differently from how it is now. I’m glad I wasn’t. Even though it took me a long time to feel this, I was happy, and I wanted to hang onto all of the good memories I was able to make.

It was summer and I was studying in our local library with Jungkook and Seokjin, whose parents had forced him to come with us when they saw us walking by. It was something about me being a good influence and him failing finals. He didn’t do much studying when we came, instead Seokjin rummaged through baskets that had left at our table as gifts from girls he never talked to. Jungkook was playing some video games on his phone, hiding it behind his book as if that could trick me.

A group of 5 girls walked up to us. I wondered if so many people had always come to the library and I was just out of the loop. I figured they were another group of girls trying to to get Seokjin to date them, but then I heard my name being called from a familiar voice.

“Taehyung.” One of them said. When I looked up I saw it was Eun Sang who stood next to her friends with a lunch box in her hand. She’d grown from when I last saw her, more taller and with longer hair than before. When she smiled there were no huge braces covering her mouth. She slid the lunch box onto the table.

“I made you some lunch. Your mom told me you’d be here” She looked at me expectantly. I looked down at the lunch then at Seokjin astonished face, then at Jungkook who looked like he was waiting for me to make my reply. Finally I looked back at her, smiled then said. “You didn’t have to.”

She shook her head and waved her hands dismissively. “No, no. I wanted to make sure you ate while you work.”

“That very… nice... of you. Thanks.”

Eun Sang smiled widely at me, and reluctantly walked away with other girls. I didn’t miss the phone numbers being passed in Seokjin and Jungkook's direction.

“How come I didn’t get any numbers.”

Seokjin laughed then said,“From what Jimin told me Eun Sang made sure you were off limits to other girls.”

I sat back in my chair then saw Jungkook eyeing me. “What?” I asked, he shrugged. “Aren’t you gonna play your video games.” Jungkook looked at me, wide eyed and flushed, flickering his eyes between his ‘book’ and me.

“What?”

“Nothing.” He said.

“Why do you keep looking at me then?”

“Am I looking? No, Is it illegal for me to look at you.”

“Wow, I’m going to get some drinks want any?” Jin stood.

“Do you wanna ask me something?” I asked.

“Just ignore me then. Alright you ungrateful-”

“Ask? No, there’s nothing for me to ask you about.” Jungkook replied. He was even more flushed than before.

“I’m leaving.” Seokjin had finally left.

“That’s it! You’re jealous. About what? Eun Sang? Seriously”

Jungkook glared and I glared back. Lasers were being shot back and forth between our eyes.

“It’s not like that. If I were to like you maybe I’d be jealous… but I don’t… like you, so I’m jealous... I MEAN NOT JEALOUS! NOT!.” He said.

Summer, was the most unstable part of my life. I lost people during this time of year, and maybe it was coincidental, but I always braced myself for the change. I felt uneasy not knowing if the change was to come this year or the next and it always ruined my summers.

Last summer Daehyun went to rehab, and this year I was spending it with his brother. Jungkook. I was glad that at least this time, this change was for the better, reading comics in Jungkook’s back yard was better.

“You leaving this summer right?”

Jungkook rested his book on his stomach. He was watching. “Mhm. Why you don’t like it, are you gonna miss me?”

I didn’t answer, to be honest I wanted to ask him about something else. It was nearly two months since his father said he was going to visit, and he rescheduled five times. I realized it wasn’t because Jungkook was afraid of his father visiting, he was afraid of actually believing he’s come. A father who neglected his son was the same as a father that was never there. Was Jungkook’s father any better than mine?

“What’s wrong?” He poked my side.

I shook my head resting my book over my face. “Nothing.”

There was a rustling on the hot grass and then a weight over my stomach. “Move. I don’t need double the body heat.”

Jungkook laughed and only move to make himself more comfortable.

“I’m thinking about getting a summer job.” He said.

“Don’t seem like the type to need one.”

“What’s that supposed to mean.” His weight was lifted off my body, but I soon felt his presence return, and then he moved the comic from my face.

“What’s that supposed to mean.” He was on his knees above me and squeezing my sides between his legs when he repeated his question again. I almost wanted to say ‘How intimidating’ in the most sarcastic and annoying tone I could muster, but I was tired and wasn’t willing to add to Jungkook’s unusual bickering habit.

“It mean exactly what I said and mooove… it’s hot.” I rested my arm behind my head and placed the comic back over my eyes.

“I don’t want to, and what’d be so weird about me having a job. I mean I followed my dad around work when I was younger and all he ever did was talk to people and sign papers.” Jungkook took the comic away, tugging it behind his back whenever I reached for it.

“I envy you overly simplified brain.”

Jungkook glared. “I’m thinking about working at the library. The lady at the library was looking for some help before.”

“You sure you can handle it. She’s very strict on the books being put in a certain way. Why do you think nobody's working there.”

“Shouldn’t be too hard. I never told you this, but I have great memorization skills.”

“Move. I don’t know if I’m getting annoyed or mad, or just all of the above.”

“You seem to be getting a bit heated there.” He waited a while. “Get it?”

“You’re spending too much time with Seokjin. You must memorize the most useless things when you're with him.”

I sat up, leveling with Jungkook who sat on my thighs. He smiled.

“Sometimes I wonder if I maybe only memorize all the good parts of my life, then I’ll forget about the rest.”

“Does it work?”

“Yes. But only for a little while. Some things are just unavoidable.”

“Like change?”

Jungkook nodded then smiled. “Change and work. Is it bad that I hate both?”

“No.”

“Do you hate it too? Change and work.”

I shrugged, leaning back against my arms. “Depends I guess. But change is also good, and work… It isn’t for everyone... I guess I’m one of the exceptions.”

“You guess a lot.”

“Ah, Whatever get off. I’m about to die from a heat stroke, and don’t you have a AC in your room? Why’re we out here anyway? I feel like I’m getting suffocated.”

“I didn’t want my mom and Min Jun, to hear me talking about work. They might start expecting things from me, you know?”

“Yes I know. God forbid right.”

Jungkook glared but didn’t say anything. He leaned forward, millimeters apart from me.

“What’re you doing?” I leaned further back but my arms gave out and I fell to my elbows. Jungkook hovered over me, holding himself up with his arms.

“Nothing.” He said. His eyes glinted with something in the most subtle way and then he smiled. “You just look handsomer up close. I think I might know why Eun Sang likes you so much. How do you feel? For someone who's off limits you seem to attract a lot of people.”

“Stop being an idiot and get off.”

“Jungkook, come inside quickly!” He looked up when Ji Su started calling, then looked back at me. He sighed, he looked like he was going to say something but then he never did. Almost reluctantly he pulled away then stood, reaching out his hand for me.

When we entered the house sitting in the living room was a burly man, in a black suit with thickly gelled hair. Min Jun and Ji Su sat next to each other making up small talk with him then Jungkook stopped.

“What is it? You alright?”

Jungkook looked at me and then the man spoke, “Son?” He stood, and slowly Jungkook made his way to him. Jungkook’s dad. The dad who stood him up countless times for 2 months was now here.

His dad looked at me, nodding his head in my direction. “Uh, hi. I’m Jungkook’s friend, Kim Taehyung.”

“Nice to meet you Taehyung.”

His father gave off a big presence. Him being just in the livingroom seem to suck everything dry, and made the air thick with tension. He was also tall, very tall. Next to Min Jun he made him seem like an old man, with how badly his back hunched.

“I should get going then.” I said.

Jungkook looked at me with sad eyes that I somehow came to understand, just like how over the months I understood how his eyes looked when he was annoyed, or angry, or happy. He was telling me not to leave, but then he said, “I’ll see you tomorrow,” and waved me goodbye.

I thought about Jungkook the rest of the evening, wondering if he was alright, if things were going good with his father or if they hadn’t. I thought about him more than I should’ve, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that Jungkook’s dad seemed familiar, like I’d met or seen him somewhere but when I tried to remember I came out blank.

It was late at night when I was watching TV with my mom that I realized who he was. On the news the anchors spoke about the new advancements Jeguk University was taking in student enrollment.

“I hope you’ll be one of them.” My mother said. When I looked up at the screen a picture of a man popped up. Jungkook’s father. The CEO of Jeguk Hospital and University.

Something clicked.

The missing pieces in Jungkook’s life that he never told me about now made sense. He told me his father was a doctor, he told me he knew the head of the University, and that he was an important figure in many people’s lives. He seemed well off when I first saw him, but I felt stupid not knowing he was a type of rich that was unimaginable to me, a type of rich that I had no chance of coming close to, and I hadn’t even known that.

I waited for Jungkook to text me that night when I went to bed. He always did, but that day he hadn’t. Still I waited to talk to him. To ask him about his father. To see if he really was the person I thought he was, and that I didn’t want him to be. I wanted Jungkook to explain. To tell me why he kept it from me, so I waited.

He didn’t talk to me the next day either, or the day after. Not a call or a text, and it’d even gotten to the point of where tried calling him, in the morning, the afternoon, and at night when I was supposed to be sleeping. I wasn’t mad at him like I was before. I worried. It wasn’t my right to mad at him for something he felt uncomfortable talking to me about, I had plenty of time to get in the mind set, while Jungkook stayed silent.

It was midnight by the time he texted me. Two words. ‘I’m outside.’

And he was. Staring down at his phone as he tapped his foot on the floor. He was dressed in nightclothes. Probably having walked to my place with how close our houses were.

“Jungkook.” He looked at me smiling, but they didn’t reach his eyes. “You okay?” He nodded.

“Think I can sleep over.” I look at him, but I didn’t know what I was searching for.

We went to my room. Jungkook stayed silent as we laid next to each other on my bed. He was thinking. I knew he was, and I didn’t want to burden him with asking questions about his father when I knew it was because of him that Jungkook was the way he was. I didn’t have to ask to know that much.

He turned to me laying on his side just as I did. A humid gust of wind broke in through my window, and I closed my eyes. I tried to picturing myself in Antarctica and with a happy Jungkook.

“Taehyung?” He said.

I opened my eyes then looked at him, or at least where I thought he’d be. “Earlier I asked you if you’d miss me when I left.”

“What about it.”

“You never answered.” He said, and then I heard some shuffling in front of me, and then Jungkook breath was against my lips. So close our noses had touched, and I closed my eyes again, my hands clawing at my pillow.

“Why do you want to know. You not leaving till the end of next month… Right?” Jungkook sighed.

“Right.” He said. “I’d miss you though. Jimin too, and Hoseok, and Seokjin.”

“What’s this all about?”

Jungkook moved in closer, so close we basically laid on the same pillow, but I stayed where I was, and I didn’t know why but I think I liked our closeness. Maybe I was tired, and maybe I really did miss Jungkook even though it was only two days without him. I guess I knew now how Eun Sang felt, but just as soon as I thought of it I pushed the thought away. I didn’t like Jungkook that way.

But then he did something I wasn’t expecting him to do. He kissed me.

And I let him. His lips soft and hot against mine, our noses bumped each others softly. He placed a hand at the back of my neck and pulled our faces impossibly closer. Again I let him. I felt hot again, my cheeks unnaturally warm and it wasn’t due to the heat.

Maybe I did like him in that way. I wonder if it was because of the way my stomach churned as he licked my bottom lip, or the way his fingers softly caressed my cheek, and maybe it was because I let it all happen. The world seemed to seemed to dissolved like water between my finger-tips, and all that was left was us.

Jungkook was the one to pull away, breathing unevenly against my lips as I tried to catch my breath. “You were right,” he breathed. His lips grazed mine. “Being this close is... incredibly suffocating.”

“Incredibly.” I said.

“I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep now.”

And so we both didn’t. He some how forced me out of bed and outside. We walked around the block twice with Jungkook fidgeting beside me. I learned that not only heat could be suffocating but also silence, and I felt like I’d pass out, the Jungkook held onto my hand, turning his head when I looked at him. I smiled.

Like the first night we spend under the stars, with Jimin beside us the stars shined brightly. Only this time, they were more beautiful. Jungkook hand tightening in mine as we passed again the same flickering street light.

“You haven’t asked me about my father yet.” He said looking straight ahead.

“I wasn’t sure if you wanted me to. Why? Did something happen?”

“Should something have happened?”

“Stop deflecting my question, and answer me.” I stopped walking. “Did something happen? Is that why you’re here.”

Jungkook stepped closer intertwining his finger in mine, then he kissed me. It was short, very short, but it sent my heart hammering into my chest.

“If I liked you,” He said, “I’d tell you, I’ve been waiting to this for months.”

#taekook #taekook fanfic #taekook short story #chapter 4 #taekook au #vkook fanfic #vkook scenario #btsvkook #vkook #taehyung x jungkook #jungkook x taehyung #jungkook x v #v x jungkook

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itwasmurderblog · 6 years ago

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Darlie Routier: Grieving Mother or Cold-Blooded Killer?

Timeline of Events

On June 6, 1996, Devon and Damon Routier were sleeping in the downstairs family room of their Rowlett, Texas home with their mother, Darlie, when they were brutally stabbed to death. According to Darlie, she slept through the attack and awoke to discover her sons had been stabbed and she had sustained several injuries herself, including a slash across her throat just two millimeters away from hitting her carotid artery. She claims a white, male intruder around 6 feet tall entered the home and carried out the brutal murders. Surprisingly, Darlie's husband, Darin, and infant son, Drake, slept undisturbed upstairs throughout the ordeal until Darlie screamed for help.

Once Darin came downstairs, Darlie ran to the kitchen to grab the phone and some towels, then called 911. Her frantic first words to the dispatcher were, "somebody came in!" She expanded on the situation by telling the dispatcher that she and her children had been stabbed. In court, Darin testified that he began to perform CPR on Devon as Darlie ran back and forth from the kitchen to Damon and then over to Devon. When the dispatcher questioned Darin as to what his wife was doing in the kitchen, he replied, "grabbing towels" and explained that it was in an effort to stop the bleeding.

Just one minute into the 911 call, Darlie can be heard speaking to Damon, telling him to "hold on." She continually speaks to her children, repeatedly telling them to hold on. Officer David Waddell arrives on scene approximately three minutes into the 911 call. He is the first responding officer. He would go on to testify that he instructed Darlie several times to attend to her son, saying she refused. However, one listen to the 911 call seems to debunk this claim as Darlie can be heard tending to the boys' injuries throughout. In addition, Waddell can be heard shortly after his arrival at the Routier home telling Darlie to sit or lie down, presumably to calm her down.

Four minutes into the call, Darlie begins to sound progressively desperate. She pleads with the dispatcher, telling him or her that the children were barely alive and would be dead if the paramedics did not arrive soon. Around seven minutes into the call, the paramedics were finally cleared to enter the home (an estimated two minutes after their arrival) and began to attend to the children. Devon was DOA. Jack Kolbye, paramedic, immediately began working on Damon, spending two minutes with him at the scene before moving him to an ambulance. It was at this point Kolbye began to "see the light leave" Damon's eyes.

Suspicious Activity

Perhaps coincidentally, but perhaps not, there were numerous reports of suspicious vehicles in the neighborhood as well as an attempted break-in situation a mere half-mile away from the Routier home an hour before the murders. On June 11, Mary Angelia Rickels, better known as Angel, came forward to police to tell them that at approximately 1:30 am on June 6, she heard what sounded like wood splitting and then a crack. She then proceeded to turn the porch light on and noticed two men, one stocky, the other tall. She went on to describe the taller man as blonde with a knit cap and jogging suit on. Presumably startled by the light being switched on, the men ran off in the direction of Willowbrook Drive. Willowbrook Drive leads straight to Eagle Drive, the very street the Routiers called home. About half an hour later, Angel says the men returned, this time with some sort of metal object, possibly a knife. They left once again after she turned off her bedroom light. The killer, or killers, could have easily arrived at the Routier home within half an hour.

Photo courtesy of Justice4Juveniles.

Numerous neighbors of the Routiers came forward to police in the days following the murders with claims of seeing a dark vehicle with a suspicious driver in the vicinity of the Routier home. One neighbor says he saw a white vehicle in the Routier driveway the night of the murders. It is important to note that the Routiers only owned a green Nissan Pathfinder and a Jaguar that was in the shop at the time. Their Pathfinder was confirmed to have been parked in the front of the home, as per usual.

Guilty Until Proven Innocent?

According to the prosecution, Darlie took the time between the stabbing of her children and the police arriving to cut herself in several places and stage the crime scene. This includes planting a sock with both Devon's and Damon's blood several houses down in the alley. How did Darlie have time to do all of this before the police arrived just 3 minutes into the 911 call? If she had staged the home, wouldn't that implicate Darin as an accomplice? He certainly did not wait until the police arrived to come downstairs; this is proven by the 911 transcripts.

According to the medical examiner, Damon could not have lived for longer than around 8 to 9 minutes after being stabbed. With the 911 call being placed at approximately 2:30 am and the paramedics cleared for entry between 2:37 and 2:38 am (another 2 minutes were spent attempting to save Damon before he was taken to the ambulance and sadly passed away), that leaves essentially no time at all for Darlie to have taken the bloody sock down the street, extensively harm herself, and then call out to Darin for help before calling 911. Damon simply survived too long a time after she called for help for her to have staged the scene in between the attacks and the 911 call.

Though Darlie's fingerprints were taken and recorded, investigators failed to obtain fingerprints from both Damon and Devon. To get prints from the two boys, their bodies had to be exhumed. Because the children were buried together, holding hands, not all of their prints could be collected. However, investigators were able to obtain some.

Naturally, there were prints discovered that belonged to the boys and Darlie, but there were also prints that did not match anyone in the family. Who do the prints belong to and does this lend credence to Darlie's story? The defense has been pressuring the state to run the prints through all databases to see if there is a match. Dallas County announced in November of 2018 that testing was being done on 10 to 12 items from the case, but they did not disclose what those specific items are. It is now April of 2019 and there has been no word on whether the tests have concluded and no results.

The prosecution strove to present Darlie as a cold and calculating murderer who simply wanted to rid herself of her children to lead a more narcissistic life. Eight days after the murders, Devon would have celebrated his 7th birthday. The Routier family chose to hold a "birthday party" at the grave site and invited a reporter from a local news station to record the event. In the recording, Darlie can be seen smiling and laughing while spraying Silly String at the grave site. Admittedly, this is extremely odd behavior after losing two children in a gruesome murder and being attacked herself. However, it is important to remember that everyone responds to grief and trauma in different ways. Maybe that was simply her way of coping with her loss. Then again, maybe it wasn't.

Final Thoughts

My first thought while driving deeper into this case was: If Darlie were trying to rid herself of her children to focus on more self-absorbed facets of life, as the prosecutors proclaimed, why did she let her youngest son, Drake, live? An infant is significantly more work to take care of than a five- and six-year-old. Wouldn't it also make sense for her to make sure both boys were dead before calling 911 if she were the perpetrator? Damon lived for several minutes after police arrived. There was a possibility of him telling police who had attacked him. It seems reasonable to assume she would want to prohibit that if she did, in fact, stab her children.

The prosecution team found an entry in Darlie's diary in which she mentioned she wanted the boys to "forgive" her for what she was "about to do." They took this quote and ran with it while ignoring the next lines in which she alludes to suicide, not murder, and tells the boys she loves them more than anything else and wants them to lead happy and healthy lives. This doesn't seem to be indicative of homicidal thoughts, just self-reflective thoughts of a depressed woman. Being suicidal does not usually mean a person is homicidal as well.

I have had a hard time finding a clear-cut motive for Darlie to have killed her sons. The "strongest" motive, in my opinion, would be the life insurance policies on the boys. However, upon further exploration, I noticed that the boys were only insured for $5000 each. The cost of the funeral was around $10000-$12000. This would mean that she killed the boys for a deficit. Why would anyone do that?

This case is one that has baffled investigators and civilians alike for over twenty years. I still cannot say with 100% certainty that I believe one scenario over another. What I can say is that Darlie had a right to a fair trial. The jury was expected to deliver a verdict that was undeniably true. I don’t believe this happened. There was an incredible amount of reasonable doubt in this case, but Darlie was given the death penalty. Is this because she truly is guilty of this heinous crime, or is it because the jury made an emotional decision based on circumstantial evidence? Is Darlie truly the self-absorbed, horrible mother the prosecution would have you believe, or is she actually a grieving mother and victim of a crime that may never be solved because of a confirmation bias?

#truecrime #homicide #guiltyorinnocent #murder #tcc #darlieroutier #texas #interesting #justice #casefiles

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