#i also have a cold today. important information as to why i’m behaving more like a victorian child riddled with consumption

[incidentalblr]

all things considered i actually did pretty well with food today! i can’t remember whether it were soup or broth i had this morning but one or the other, along with some bacon slices and red pepper. then i had 5 meatballs around 5ish? 6ish? 7ish? i don’t remember. i had a small bit of chocolate too which was perhaps a bad idea but i needed a reward. oh and there was a brownie with breakfast. but i just had some beef broth from the roast my dad made some time in the last week and all things considered i think that was a better food day than normal actually! i drank three kombuchas also which is not an arfid struggle i just like kombucha. anyways. pondering my rosemary bread. it would hurt my jaw is all— it’s rather tough

[cuteykat]

Perhaps some angst/fluff if you're up for it? Maybe Shanks and Luffy who's s/o just wants them to take something seriously for once? But like usual they kinda just let other people walk all over them/insult them and they don't care? So their s/o who is nOT A FIGHTER tries to teach the bastards who insulted them some manners?

But she ends up getting kidnapped or something? Fluffy ending with angry Shanks and Angry Luffy? S/o finally sees them taking something very seriously.

I'd prolly be terrified watching them go from ☺️😘🙂 to 😠😡👿

Warning: mention of stockholm syndrome in luffy’s reading!

Word count: 2.5k words

Luffy:

It was a rainy day on a fall island. You and the rest of your crewmates decided on coming to the island for supplies but for the upcoming storm that was soon to come, they decided to stay here and stay in a hotel. Everyone had their room except you and Luffy to which you shared one. You both decided it would be nice to spend more quality time with each other and this afternoon you both decided to go on a date to a nice small restaurant. Everything was going great till Luffy started bringing up how he wanted to be a pirate king and people started laughing

“ Seriously?! King of the pirates?! What kind of joke is that!!” Laughter could be heard as more people smoke “ Are you that stupid?”

You try to speak up but Luffy stops you and smiles at you. You both get your food but all you could focus on was people laughing at him “ Luffy you aren't going to do anything about it?” You ask having your voice be laced with irritation

“ Why would I?” Your lover ask while shoving food in his face

“ Because it’s not right for being to make fun of you! Your dream is inspirational and is a part of you. Plus” you start to mumble “ all I can hear is people laugh at you and it hurts to know that you're just letting it happen”

“ It doesn’t bother me (name). You shouldn’t let it bother you either, it’s not like they are making fun of you” Luffy finishes up what seems to be his 4th plate before asking for more

The whole date was a disaster and you had it when people started throwing stuff at the man “We're leaving!”

Luffy goes to ask you why till he sees tears forming down your eyes. You both leave the restaurant not noticing how some people were staring at you.

Both of you get to your room and you sign hearing the rainfall and the thunder hit the ground. You put your hands in your face and when Luffy goes to hug you, you deny him “ Luffy I need to go for a walk. I’m not upset at you, well I am but more upset at the others” you walk to the door and give him an air kiss before opening the door and leaving to walk to the lobby

“ I love you Luffy, I just wish you wouldn’t let people walk all over you like that. Maybe I’m just not understanding his view on all this. I should apologize” you go to walk back but you feel someone grab you by the throat and feel a cloth over your mouth before passing out into someone’s arm.

An hour goes by and Luffy starts to get concerned. Usually, when you are upset you take a 30-minute walk at most, and not noticing it’s been an hour he starts to worry and goes to Nami’s door to which she opens looking confused

“ Has (name) come here at all?” Luffy asks to which the women look surprised

“I thought you two were on a date. She hasn’t come here. Did you do something lu-“ she sees Luffy start to worry before seeing women walk to them with an envelope in her hands

“ Monkey D Luffy. Open this when you are alone. It’s an important note for you” the women let out a small smirk before leaving having her skirt drag against the floor

Nami looks worried before seeing Luffy walk off but knows once Luffy has his mindset on something you can’t change it but decides to let everyone know about what’s going on.

Luffy goes back to his and your share room and opens the envelope reading the letter

‘ To the man who wants to become king of the pirates.

We heard of your little dream back at the restaurant and when you didn’t get angry at it we decided if you really could be strong enough to somehow make that idiotic dream of yours reality. So let’s play a game, shall we? You and you alone shall try to find out the base is in town. You have 24 hours before we leave. If you win you can take back your lover. If you lose we keep this adorable girl like ours.

You have 24 hours since the envelope was delivered to you. Have fun and if you try to get any help, the girl gets punished’

Luffy's aura intensifies. He’s filled with rage, he was gonna kill the bastard who kidnapped you if it’s the last thing he does. He storms off out of the hotel into the cold rain.

You were awake now being in a strong caged. Your limbs tied up to a wall with chains and only a small bowl of water like you were some animal. You try to pull on the chains to which you felt a shock of electricity go through your body making you scream. You see two men walk up to you as one goes to hold your chin

“ Such an adorable little pet aren't you? But as a pet we have a few rules you will follow. If you don’t you will be punished. The more you misbehave the worse the punishment is.” He stands up and claps his hand as one of his men now speaks

“ The rules are as listed, no pulling on your chains, no asking where you are, no begging for food, water, or any mundane things like that. No asking for personal information. No going against what the leader says. And rules that may be added to the list” the man leaves before a woman enters being beautifully dressed up and hugs the leader

“ I use to be his hostage but now I can’t get enough of him and I wanted a new plaything too and you seemed too cute to pass up. Don’t worry love, you will grow to love it as I did along with his other lovers. Who could deny such a beauty like him? A real pirate”

“ He’s not a real pirate-“ you start to scream being shocked again but with higher volts and start to cry. Your body goes limp against the chains. Your lips part as your breathing gets heavy. You were in so much pain already. Physically but also emotionally. You felt so weak and so scared. You wanted to fight back but couldn’t. You close your eyes wanting to see Luffy again and your crew. You wanted to be saved and held into your lover's arm and hear his laughter, to see his smile, to feel his heartbeat and feel warm in his arms “ Luffy...” you put your head on the ground having it be near the water bowl

“ Aw, is my new pet thirsty? Go ahead and drink up, I won’t deny you water. And if you behave you will get some yummy food later. And in 24 hours you can get so much more~” he smirks watching your figure. You were so cute, so beautiful. He wanted you to be all his, to make you his pet, his plaything.

Time goes on, hours felt like days to you. You were exhausted, wanted to be free wanting to be with Luffy. You couldn’t cry, Couldn’t scream couldn’t do anything except being a rag doll. You were starting to lose hope until you hear a scream from one of the henchmen. Your body lifted you on your own having your hopes start to be lifted and next you knew it you see him, your lover, Luffy. He was different from his regular cheerful self. His aura was strong, violent. It was pure anger and hatred.

“ Luffy” you call out quietly having your arms tug on the chain not caring if you get shocked.

Luffy looks over to you. He was concerned but he had to deal with the other problem at hand first. He grabs one of the men looking directly at them, daggers in his eyes. “ where’s your leader?!” Once the man answers he puts them down and finds the leader. You see Luffy walk away but the next minute you could hear screaming and crying. You had a feeling Luffy was taking care of the problem. Everything went silent for a minute as the cuff comes undone and the cage opens. You try to stand and go to him but your legs shake being in pain along with your arms and neck. Luffy scoops you up gently and hugs you like he never wanted to leave your side again

“ Let’s get you back to the hotel and have chopper check your wounds. I promise I won’t let those things happen again”

You nod your head and close your eyes falling asleep. You were exhausted. Luffy carries you back to the hotel where he brings you to chopper who looks surprised but starts to work on you carefully not wanting to hurt you. Luffy stays right beside you having his usual smile not come back yet.

After a bit you wake up to see your captain look at you. You notice he isn’t smiling and you move your arms ignoring the pain to grab his mouth and form it into a smile “ I don’t like seeing you this upset. I love you Luffy and I love your smile”

Luffy was still upset but seeing you awake makes him feel better and he starts to smile and put his straw hat on you before getting into bed with you and hugs you slowly going back to his regular self. You both make jokes till you fall asleep again. Your head on his chest and his fingers roaming your hair “ No one will ever hurt you again” He was gonna be the pirate king and make sure no one would ever hurt you again.

Shanks:

Today was a sunny day as you and your crewmates had stopped on an island to stock up on some things. You along with the rest of your crew were now drinking at a bar partying like usual. You sing and drank with everyone until some other people started making fun of shanks and throwing alcohol at him. You couldn’t stand it anymore. This was supposed to be a friendly party. You were getting upset and one-sentence sit your mind to ablaze

“ How are you even a pirate with one arm?!” They laugh and made fun of to which everyone just laughed off like it didn’t bother you, and especially shanks to who smiled and laughed it off

“ How is this not bothering you shanks?! You are the best pirate and you are gonna let them walk all over you? I can’t sit here and watch it!” You usually never yell and lash out but the alcohol you drank changed that “ You are not going to do anything?!”

“ Why would it bother me cutie?” Shanks says holding up his glass to which you pushed away causing the man to be shocked

“ I’m not gonna sit here and watch all this happen! I can’t stand when people make fun of the people I care about! I-I’m heading back to the ship!” You get up and walk to the ship to which shanks wondered why you were so bothered about it.

You walked to the dock until a man grabs you from behind pulling you close from the waist, a knife to your neck “ Do you belong to that red hair pirate? You know we are looking for some beautiful pirates to join us?” The man licks his lips to which you try to get away but the grip on your waist becomes are hard as a vice grip he cuts off part of your hair on digs the knife into your neck having a bit of blood drip “Don’t you dare try to run darling. We wouldn’t want to mess up your beautiful skin now, would we? Men!”

Three-man come up and tie your arms and legs together putting along with a cloth in your mouth and bring you to their ship which wasn’t that far but hard to see in the dark.

45 minutes go by and shanks get concerned. He knew you were drunk but the thought of you being hurt concerned him. He rather takes you being angry than hurt. He goes to stand up when hearing a flare go off and the other people that were there smirk and leave and before they all leave a smirk looking at shanks “ Make sure you have... everything~”

Shanks immediately caught on. You weren’t back and the leader had left and now they are leaving to a signal of a flare. He didn’t like this one bit.

Within a second he next to one of them holding him by the neck “ Where is she?!” His grip gets sharp and his eyes turn into daggers “ If you don’t wish to tell me you may not get your last word” he says with venom laced into his words. To anyone who pissed Shanks off was getting a death wish. The man and his crewmates caught onto this and regretted this decision by their leader.

The man being held by the neck speaks “ The docks on the right side of this island” he chocks out and falls to the ground to which shanks crew tries to follow him but shanks look at them giving them a signal to go to their ship.

Shanks walks to get to you, everyone who saw was immediately scared. Who dared to upset this man and what would happen to said person. People avoided him and when getting to the ship he didn’t dare to hold back the way he felt. She stepped inside having the waves shake and he sees a man holding you by the chin whispering sweet nothings in your ears.

You looked over and try to run to shanks but the chains kept you doing so but before you could say anything the chains were cut off making you run and hold your lover tightly. His arm holding your body to which he saw the man looking scared and backing away

“ One thing you should know. You may laugh at me, make fun of me and do what you think is funny. But the minute you hurt my crew and my lover, your DEAD” shanks picks you up and holds you walking away “ Let’s get you back love. I promise no one will ever lay a hand on you again darling” shanks start to carry you away but looks back at the men glaring at him to which he will never forget “ Your lucky you didn’t hurt her. There would not remain a single piece of you left”

Shanks gets you off the boat and brings you back to their ship where he holds you in his arm and the lap the rest of the night.

I hope you enjoy reading it!!

[ga-yuu]

~Kurama~Main Story Chapter 8~

This is my favorite chapter!!!!

Chapter 7

*

*

*

-------Part 1-----

Kurama: “...............I don’t like beasts that flatter me like cats. I’d rather....”

Benkei: “Have good sake and snacks?”

Kurama(smile): “You understand me well. Let’s quickly end this crappy battle and return to Hiraizumi in triumph.”

(....I wonder if Kurama is even aware.)

The expression on Kurama's face, which had been so bored just a moment ago, has changed.

To be alive and well since Benkei-san's arrival.

Benkei: "Hey, Kurama. Don't fight too hard. You'll have a hard time keeping up."

Kurama: "Don't give me orders. Killing four or five soldiers is nothing to me."

Benkei: "It's no use taking sense to you----Look out!"

(Ah)

After a quick kick to the horse's stomach, Benkei-san switches places with Kurama.

My body shook from the impact and Kurama easily supported me.

Kurama: "He has good instincts for a man of his size."

Benkei: "Why does size matter?"

The white blades of miscellaneous swords and swords in an arc as the horse in driven attack the enemy.

After that----

Enemy soldier 10: "RETREAT! RETREAT!

Kurama attacked and Benkei-san defended in the form that had somehow become solidified.

At last, the rebels succeeded in repelling the enemy.

Kurama: "That's it? Man, that didn't even pass my boredom."

Benkei: "Your leisure time may have given the enemy survivors nightmares for a while though."

(-----I got it! I finally understand the strange feeling I've had for so long.)

I remember a conversation I had with Kurama before I came here.

------FLASHBACK------

Kurama: "I will not allow Benkei, Yoshitsune's property, to die in vain, so that his sword and his soul may be clouded."

Kurama: "And."

Yoshino: 'And?"

Kurama: "Benkei is good at making snacks."

-----FLASHBACK ENDS-----

(I think Kurama probably meant what he said at that moment.)

(But I know that I, the enemy, saw it.)

If they didn't recognize each other, they wouldn't be able to work together in battle, they wouldn't be able to have a friendly conversation like that...

(Kurama seems to not realize....that he loves Benkei.)

-----Part 2-----

(Kurama seems to not realize....that he loves Benkei.)

What came to mind was the conversation we had on the way to this place with the soldiers.

-----FLASHBACK------

Yoshino: "But Kurama's words inspired the soldiers. If they'd only been afraid, they would have shriveled up, wouldn't they?"

Kurama: "In this army, my identity is supposed to be that of a kind of foreign warrior who helps Yoshitsune. That's why those who worship Yoshitsune so blindly are so annoyingly humble towards me."

Yoshino: " I see. Hmmm........"

Kurama: "I don't know what you're obsessed with, but I don't see the point in questioning me."

Yoshino: ".....I don't understand myself."

------FLASHBACK ENDS-----

(In the rebel army, Kurama has behaved as he wanted. But...)

Despite his overwhelming power, Kurama does not try to deceive or manipulate people.

How much does that inspire his side?

(Kurama himself is too uninterested to know how important he is in the rebel force.)

(And yet, he won people's hearts despite their awe.)

Kurama: ".....? This woman is not moving. Is she dead?"

A suspicious tap on my cheek brings me back to reality.

Yoshino(blushing): "Yes, I'm alive."

Benkei: "I thought you were scared because we're on a rampage."

Kurama: "She's not that kind of woman. .....Oh, I get it now."

Yoshino: "Eh?"

Kurama: "You obeyed my order when I said you to sit still like an ornament. I see you're finally learning to be promising."

In a good mood, Kurama played with a tuft of my hair with his fingertips.

Yoshino(blushing): "Um sorry, but I was thinking of something else....

Kurama: "What?"

Benkei: "......................! Okay, I have a lot to ask, but first....when did you two get so close?"

----"We're not", is what Kurama and I replied at the same time, to Benke-san's question.

.................

Benkei: "......And also fox princess, became our prisoner."

------Part 3-----

Benkei: "......And also fox princess, became our prisoner."

After Benkei-san and Kurama turned back to the rebels encampment and were greeted with cheers.....

Out of sight of the soldiers, I was being interrogated by Benkei-san.

Yoshino: "....What will happen to me now?"

Benkei: "At any rate, we will take you to Hiraizumi. We'll have to ask Yoshitsune-sama for his judgment."

Kurama: "I'll tell you what, I picked her up and I'll do what I want with her."

Yoshino: "Wait...."

Naturally, he pulls me by the shoulders and my vision turns black.

Benkei: "Huh? What's the matter with you, Kurama?"

Kurama: "This ordinary woman has taken me by surprise, either by accident or inevitably, with her crazy behavior. If I keep her in my hands, I might see something unusual again."

Benkei: "Humans are not demon's lapdogs."

Kurama: "It's strange. Until today I thought you were no better than animals."

Benkei-san facepalms at Kurama's words.

Yoshino: "Um....Benkei-san."

Benkei: "Just call me Benkei. You call Kurama by his first name right. Do the same for me."

Yoshino: "Eh? ......Okay."

(He looks scary....but from the way he treats his men, he doesn't seem like a bad guy.)

But still, I kept my face up feeling alert.

Benkei: "You're the enemy, but apparently you've swept the heart by our demon. I....sympathize with that."

Kurama: "When did she sweep my heart? Do you think I have a lot of free time for her?"

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

1. I feel like I've not swayed....

2. When you say it like that....(+4/+4)

3. You didn't know what you were doing?

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

Yoshino: ".....It's strange because when you say it out loud, I feel like I've not swayed at all."

Kurama: "....? What are you taking for granted?"

Yoshino: "Ehhh....."

(Well, for Kurama, it means he just did what he wanted to do.)

Yoshino: "Umm...Thank you for your concern, Benkei. But I would like to ask you one question, did the Shogunate get out of the war safely?"

(Maybe I shouldn't be asking this of my enemies but....)

(I have no other way to get information now...)

Benkei: "........The Shogunate has withdrawn. The damage was only moderate. But unfortunately....."

------Part 4------

Benkei: "........The Shogunate has withdrawn. The damage was only moderate. But unfortunately.....They have lost their precious fox princess, which is a painful split when you think about it."

Yoshino: "I........"

I squeezed my fingertips in disappointment.

Benkei: "On second thought, it might be a good opportunity for you to get rid of the Shogunate. Yoshitsune-sama is not the one who takes the life of a woman who has no intention to fight against him."

Yoshino: ".....It's harder to do than hearing it...."

Kurama: "It's hard? Why not? Wouldn't you rather live it up?"

Yoshino: "I want to live. But I am a member of the Shogunate, even if my time is short."

Benkei and Kurama: "...........!!!"

Yoshino: "Because today I learned...Benkei is a man who would die for his men, and the rebel soldiers have a bond that allows them to fight for their friends. Perhaps Yoshitsune-sama is worthy and noble to be a lord of such people."

Benkei: "......He is."

Yoshino: "That's why it's so hard to stay an enemy."

When I muttered this Benkei's face lit up.

Kurama: "You're weak, but you're going to hold your ground in enemy territory."

Yoshino: "If I don't, I won't be stronger."

Benkei: "You do wanna die young, do you?"

Yoshino: ".....I don' wanna die."

(But....)

Yoshino: "-----For he who is gripped by fear is as good as not alive."

Kurama: ".......!"

Kurama immediately realized where the slurred words had come from.

-----FLASHBACK-----

Yoshino: “So you chose not to kill him....?”

Kurama: “He who is gripped by fear is as good as not alive. What is the use of slaying the dead?”

-----FLASHBACK ENDS-----

Kurama: ".....Cheeky woman."

A smile appeared on Kurama's lips and Benkei's eyes widened as if he saw something unusual.

..................

(I can't sleep.)

There was no way that I could escape from the encampment, which was under guard.

I'm sitting in front of my tent, looking up at the stars when----

Kurama: "What are you doing here?"

------Part 5-------

Kurama: "What are you doing here?"

Yoshino: "OH, hey Kurama."

Kurama: "Don't raise your voice."

I saw Kurama looking down at me, apparently passing by on his way to his tent.

Yoshino: "Are you not feeling sleepy?"

Kurama: "Demons don't need sleep, unlike you humans. So I went to steal Benkei's sake and snacks."

When looked closely, Kurama was holding a sake bottle in his hand.

Yoshino: "Do you like sake that much?"

(He also seems to be obsessed with snacks made by Benkei.)

Kurama: "Sake is the next best thing to fighting the strong."

Yoshino: "Even better than flying?"

Kurama: "If it's delicious, then yes."

Kurama replied languidly and then suddenly pulled my arm.

Yoshino: "What....?"

Kurama: "I've got a good idea. Entertain me while I'm occupied with my sake and snacks."

.................

While I was in a daze, Kurama brought me inside his tent.

Kurama: "Come on, do it."

Yoshino: "Even if you say that....all I am good at is making medicines."

Kurama: "It's not worth talking about. You can only heal wounds, but can't win a fight."

Kurama sits in a daze sipping his drink feeling bored.

(I'm in trouble...)

Yoshino: "But if you save someone's life, don't you save your forces from diminishing?"

Kurama: "There is no power that can hold together the lives of so many. The moment a man is injured and dies, you know he was a weak man."

Yoshino: "I want to help all of them together, the weak and the strong, but...."

(No good. I'm sure this story will always be parallel.)

I took a deep breath and said out what I was thinking.

Yoshino: "Why does Kurama hate boredom so much?"

Kurama: "If you live long enough, you'll need stimulation. It's only natural. The soul seeks a grittier battle, a more polished strongman. All this fighting today has made my blood run cold."

(Surely, Kurama looked bored. But....)

Yoshino: "But Kurama seemed to enjoy fighting with Benkei."

Kurama: "What?"

Yoshino: ".....Didn't you realize that yourself?"

Kurama: "----What do you even know about me? I gave you the right to speak and now you're getting on my head."

In the darkness of the tent, Kurama's eyes seemed to glow, and I shuddered.

(Ah....)

A hand reached out and touched my cheek as if to test my reaction.

(I can't retreat here.)

This reckless war of mine has been going on ever since I met Kurama again in Kamakura.

If I stay frozen for one more time, I will never be able to stand up to him.

Yoshino: ".....I certainly don't know anything about Kurama. But still, the weak observe the strong."

Kurama: "................."

Yoshino: "At least it's faster for me to get to know Kurama.... than for Kurama, who has no interest in humans, to get to know me."

Kurama: "-----Those eyes."

Yoshino: "hmm?"

The fingertips on my cheek, come up within a touching distance of my eyeballs.

I didn't have to raise my voice because----

The emotion in Kurama's eyes was neither anger nor contempt.

Kurama: "I don't like your eyes. I hate the way how it's shining so strangely in the dark night."

Chapter 9

[mystery-star]

The Biggest Compliment – Spock

Pairing: Spock (AOS) x gender-neutral reader

Warnings: none

Words: 3944

Please do not repost my work on other sites or platforms!

-

Of course everyone in the 23rd century knew about Starfleet. But while you were certain that you would never join them, you had not believed that you would need to work together with their Academy one day. You hadn’t known what they wanted of you, when you had been told that your designer talent was needed. First you thought they might want to have new uniforms but probably a tailor would be better for this. Then you speculated over the possibility that they wanted a new logo. Or maybe it just was something like an advertisement for new recruits or so.

The thing they needed your help with, however, turned out be a test. Well, a simulation, to be exact. They wanted to animate the whole thing new. And not just animate, as you heard also the coding hat been redone, for whatever reason. After they had shown you what the old simulation looked like, you were introduced to your co-worker; the one who had written the new coding. It was a Vulcan and you didn’t know what to think of that. Not because he was not human but because you had never seen a Vulcan ‘close-up’ but hat heard a lot of, not so good, things about their race. As it seemed, also the instructor who was showing you around didn’t seem to be a big fan of him and leant closer to you before he left you in your new office.

“Don’t mind him, he can get pretty prissy sometimes” he whispered to you before he wished you good work and then left, leaving you alone with the man you’d spend the next weeks with. You looked at him for a while and didn’t know what to say.

“May I see what you have?” he asked. It was the first time you heard his voice and you had to admit, it sounded quite good.

“What do you mean, what I have?”

“I am certain you have already prepared something” he said it with such a certainty that made you feel bad that you had, in fact, nothing.

“No?” he raised an eyebrow “Look, I literally heard what they want from me half an hour ago. Before, they only told me that they needed my as a designer and I had no idea what it was” he remained silent and you didn’t like that “All I have are a few notes. I’m sure you couldn’t have made drafts beforehand if they just called you to their office for making a new code without telling you what it was about first”

“That is not quite correct. I have asked to reprogram the test myself and therefore have arrived to the meeting sufficiently prepared” you rolled your eyes

“Well as I said, I only took a few notes during the simulation I watched”

“May I see those?” he held out his hand to you

“It’s just the basics, like what notes what it is about. Because I was told that you would tell me exactly what you need” he still didn’t move his hand, so you sighed “Fine, here you go” you pulled out your PADD and placed it on the table. Because you didn’t want to give it into his hand if he behaved like that. He had a look then pointed at the title.

“The simulation is called Kobayashi Maru, not Cobrayoshi Moru”

“Well excuse me for understanding it wrong” he didn’t reply and continued

“What do you mean by ‘good ship’?”

“The ship, this Kobayashi Maru that is in distress”

“Then please describe it accordingly

“As I said” you hissed “this are only first notes”

“Besides, I already have defined the amount of the Klingon warbirds to five, so your note that reads ‘ca. 4-5 enemy ships’ is inaccurate”

“I counted them on the screen of the simulation I watched. And apparently that wasn’t good or else you wouldn’t have reprogrammed it, right?”

“I have solely noticed inconsistencies in the coding. The animation itself was not much flawed”

“Okay” you took a deep breath “How about we sit together and you tell me exactly what you want, so that I can get working on it?”

“For now, I solely need one of the animated warbirds”

“But that’ll take hours to make. I could make a sketch in 5 minutes or so”

“I need a three-dimensional model of it”

“Well, I don’t have one right now. The only ship that I can offer you as a model of a cruise ship. Or no, maybe we also have one of a science fiction starship somewhere”

“I do not need a cruise ship or a random starship” he explained that he needed the actual ship that would be used in the simulation so that he could finetune the programmed movements with the animation.

“Good then give two hours and you’ll have a draft-model. I can still change it later on when you have calibrated it”

“Very well” he gave a nod and you sat down at the desk that had been prepared and started unpacking your stuff before you got working on some sketches. Suddenly, you noticed that someone was standing behind you and you turned around.

“Please don’t do that”

“What are you referring to?”

“Looking over my shoulder. It’s distracting. I can’t work like that” he raised an eyebrow but left you alone.

-

About half an hour later you were ready to present him your three drafts of the ships.

“I only requested one”

“Yes, but I made three versions. Drafts”

“I have not asked for drafts, especially multiple ones”

“Do you have any idea how design works? Obviously not or you’d have done the damn animation yourself” you muttered the last part “I always make drafts for a client after they told me what they need, which you didn’t even do, so sorry if I don’t get it quite right on the first try.”

“I have informed you that I need to have a model of a Klingon warbird”

“And here you have three drafts” you pointed at three models “Which one do you like best?”

“I do not like them” you had to bite back a sigh and a part of you just wanted to smack him right in the face.

“Good” you said, taking a deep breath and picking up your stylus “Then what would you like instead?”

“I would have preferred if you had invested all your time into one model instead of three”

“Look, I will put more work into one of them, just tell me which one is the best”

“They are all flawed” at least you now totally understood what this other man had meant with that he could get prissy.

“Well it are only drafts” you explained “Don’t Vulcans do drafts?”

“We do not prepare several different versions if only one is needed since it would be a waste of time”

“Good speaking of wasting time; just tell me which model you want me to edit and make it perfect”

“No matter how much work you will put in it, it will always stay an animated model and therefore will never be perfect”

“Which. Ship?!” you hissed gesturing at your PADD.

“This one” he pointed at the second draft “However….” You had to fight not to roll your eyes. Of course you knew there was a ‘but’ coming. You did your best to not become upset when he told you what mistakes you had made on your draft, while you made notes on the most important points. A part of you wondered how long you could take it before you just broke his nose, cut off his ears, ripped off his bangs or rammed your stylus in his eye. Or all together.

-

While you started to get working on the chosen model, Commander Spock took the draft to link it with his coding, while you tried to make the starship as authentic as possible which was not so easy without an accurate source or idea how it looked like except for the description you had gotten. When you left for the day, your client seemed to be a bit disappointed that you could not finish the model already. For that reason you decided to come an hour earlier the following day but to your dismay, the Vulcan was already there

“Did we not agree that you may start at 0830 hours?” you had been in the office for three seconds and already were pissed off by him again although you had tried not to be anymore.

“Yes but since I didn’t come as far as I wanted yesterday, I decided to come earlier today. The sooner I get the animation done the better” because it meant, among other, that you would be rid of him. Luckily, you didn’t need to talk to him that much today. But then he requested you to get a second model for the second ship. “Give me a second”

“I doubt you can create an accurate model in a second”

“Just watch and see” you tapped on the model you were already working on and duplicated it “there. Took me a little under two seconds”

“You cannot just duplicate the model”

“Oh but I can. I can also centuple it” you glared at him, tapped the model again, called up the settings and set the number of duplicates to 100 and when you returned, the whole screen was filled with ships “There. That should occupy you for a while”

“As I already said, there are only five ships that I need for the simulation. Besides, I cannot use these duplicates. If you wish to copy your models, you need to use a template”

“Well okay” you said “But that’ll take me a couple of minutes” he gave a nod “Why thank you, (Y/N)” you muttered to yourself “Thank you for your co-operation and withstanding my coldness”

-

Because he wanted all ships to be visually different, you decided to change minor details on them before you gave him the new model. Once you had prepared all ships, even the Kobayashi Maru, you needed to take care of the surroundings for which you designed the space, of course in the dimensions that Spock had told you. Then you set your models into it and adjusted their positions so that they more or less corresponded with the coordinates that Spock had programmed for them. When he had a look at the model he raised an eyebrow

“What now?” you asked, knowing that something did not please him at all.

“The positions of the Klingon warbirds one, three, four and five need to be adjusted slightly” At least he was now calling the ships by numbers and not the stupid model names he had given them in his code. It had taken you almost two days to get him do that and you had just written his model name onto the according ship in ugly red letters so that you knew which one he was talking about. “Move ship one 2.3 millimeters to the left and 1.8 millimeters down, ship two….”

“Woah wait… I never heard anyone saying decimals of millimeters. This model doesn’t even accept them. I can give you half millimeters but not point three or point eight. Besides, no one can actually know if the ship is perfectly aligned when they do the simulation. And if we align the weapons right they will still hit the ship if they enter the coordinates of the ship”

“I know but I wish that it is as accurate as possible. Speaking of accuracy” he explained that the surroundings were not accurate either because the constellations were wrong and did not look like this ad the place the simulation took place

“In other words you want me to fucking re-align every single star correctly?”

“It does not need to be completely accurate, yet I do ask you to adjust their positions so that it does have more similarities with the coordinates where the simulation occurs”

Well, in contrast to you I don’t have a fucking stellar map saved in my brain” he walked away and then handed you a PADD, explaining that it would turn into a 360° stellar map if you opened the correct program and entered the coordinates you wanted.

-

So you just spent the following three days on redoing the whole surroundings, this times even with micrometers as unit so that you could adjust the ships perfectly as he wanted. At times you found it easier to agree to what he wanted and have more work instead of discussing with him, which would result in you doing as he wanted anyway. You hadn’t even been able to make it clear to him that sometimes you need to be polite and say please and thank you, to which he replied that such formalities were illogical since they did not change anything about the request and that he would never say please in an order to subordinates.

Since it was a bigger project, it took up several weeks of collaboration with Spock and somehow the thing that bugged you most about working with him was the fact that you had to admit to yourself that, despite everything he did or said, your stupid, illogical heart had managed to develop romantic feelings for the Vulcan. You didn’t know if that just was because of his appearance or if it also was his almost dominating behavior that made you feel that way. One thing was for certain; the more you worked with Spock the stronger these feelings got. So, you were a little relieved when the semester started again and he wasn’t around all day but spent a great part of his time teaching classes. But at times that also brought problems because you had learnt that sometimes it was better to just ask him if he was okay with something sooner rather than later because if he wanted you to change many things about it you’d have more work later on. So you would just leave your office and go looking for him instead to show him what you had done. He had forwarded you his timetable so that you knew where to find him at which time. If you found the correct classroom, of course.

“Spock, I think I finally could make the final….”

“Can you give me three minutes?”

“Fine but then don’t complain that we’re three minutes behind in schedule” you muttered

“There is no such detailed schedule. I even do not have a fixed date on which we need to be finished but rather a time interval”

“So that means we don’t just have one more month but two in total?”

“Yes” you gave a nod

“Good then I’ll let you finish your stuff”

-

One thing you always loved about your work was to see it in action. In that case that was, when everything was finished so far that some test people could make the simulation to see how everything was working. It was mainly to test the simulation itself, to see if the coding worked but you had been asked to be there as well so that you could have an eye on the animation and make sure everything happened in life time and correctly. You were quite proud when you noticed that almost everything was working perfectly fine and that there only were a few details you had to change. As well as some details on the ships themselves because Spock still was not perfectly happy with them.

“And?” you asked after four goes at the simulation

“What do you wish to know?” Spock asked

“Well what you think of it”

“I have noticed that there are a few instances that you will need to go over” you crossed your arms

“What?” you couldn’t believe that this was his answer and to your dismay he started listing up some flaws.  “Stop” you growled, making him raise an eyebrow “I know that there are some imperfections but I’m sorry that I’m not as perfect as you”

“I never claimed that I was perfect. I am a being and all beings are flawed”

“Wow that I got you to admit that”

“To claim that I am perfect would be a lie and highly illogical”

“You and your stupid thinking in code”

“The assumption that I think in ‘code’ is not correct”

“But logical. You think logically, as a Vulcan. Coding is pure logic”

“I see, yet the conclusion is still incorrect” you sighed

“Wow, you’re never ever gonna compliment me or my work, huh?”

“It would be illogical to point out points that do not need modification anymore. Therefore I only tell what you will need to work on again”

“Well but I’m human and we sometimes need reassurance that what we did is good!”

“As you can derive from my statement, your work can be considered as good, when there is nothing that I ask you to change about it”

“You don’t get my point, do you?”

“I do but I do not think it is necessary to point…”

“Just one compliment about my work. I stood your behavior for weeks now”

“Four weeks, five days and 3.6 hours to be exact”

“See, even worse. You have to be so precise and perfectionistic every fucking time”

“However, if you had a problem with something you would have addressed it”

“No. Because humans don’t always do that. But I am complaining now”

“Very well. What do you wish me to change?”

“Well you could make just one simple compliment or something that you like about the way I work on this project” he raised an eyebrow and was silent “Or are you just as fed up with me as I’m with your behavior?”

“You work highly focused” you let out a huff

“Well at least something”

“Besides” he added a bit more quietly and after a pause “I find your hands and fingers to be pleasingly shaped and they move gracefully”

“Okay that was hella unexpected” and even a little creepy “Did you pay that much attention to my hands?”

“When you were showing me something, yes I was at certain times” you frowned. How could he still have noticed so many flaws in your work then if he had just stared onto your hands?

“That is a little weird, don’t you think?”

“No”

“No?”

“Hands hold a different value on Vulcan” he explained that their hands were extremely sensitive and often were something like a symbol of love in their culture.

“So if you told that another Vulcan… what would happen?”

“Usually, Vulcans will only compliment their bondmate’s physiology”

“Hm okay. Are bondmates something like a spouse?”

“Or what you call fiancés”

“But back to my question, what would happen?”

“I cannot say because some might react emotionally in such a situation”

“So you’re saying that you’re not acting emotionally? Like never?”

“We are sentient being so we all will act emotionally at times, whether we want it or not”

“Okay. But what do you want to do, now that you told me how much you like my hands?”

“I have never stated that I like them” you frowned

“That sounds like something is bothering you”

“It is of no consequence”

Come on, tell me. You already told me you like, no wait you… whatever, find my hands pleasing or how you’d want to formulate it. And now something is bothering you”

“I was wondering… whether you would let me touch you”

“And you ask that?” you just took his hand in yours and ran your fingers of the other hand over the back of it. His hands were softer than you had imagined but also colder. When you looked up at him, you saw a slight green blush on his cheeks and smiled “Suddenly so flustered, huh?”

“Touching hands is something rather intimate in Vulcan culture”

“Oh” you let go of him “I-I’m sorry. I didn’t know that” but maybe you could have thought about it, considering what he had told you about the meaning of hands on Vulcan.

“I did not tell you, therefore you could not know” he said “You do not need to reproach yourself” you gave a nod and were surprised when he continued “In fact, I have found it rather pleasing” you smiled. For some reason you just held out your hand to him again and he actually took it. Well not really, he more or less just traced his fore- and middle finger over your skin, making you shudder a little

“You’re right that feels nice” he raised an eyebrow and placed his other hand at your back and pulled you closer, then lifting your head and leant down until your lips were inches apart

“Do you mind?”

“Not at all” you breathed and then his lips were on yours. For some reason you could not really say what you were feeling and you wondered if it was right to do this, you were working with him after all, at least for now. Contrary to what you had imagined, he was a pretty good kisser and his fingers still were stroking yours and while you liked the feeling, you wondered if it felt even more sensual to him. When you felt him pull you closer, you thought that this probably was the case and felt yourself smiling into the kiss. You placed your free hand at the base of his neck and pressed your whole body against his. He didn’t seem to mind but some seconds later you parted, looking at each other

“Perhaps we should not have kissed”

“We should” you corrected and leant up to do it again and he responded immediately. This time, the kiss came to a more abrupt end when suddenly the door opened. You let go of each other and quickly stepped apart. While Spock turned to the visitor, one of the people that had tried out the simulation, you touched your lips which were still tingling from the kiss, making you smile

“I’m sorry, if I interrupted something or came at an inconvenient time I can just go and well… leave. We can discuss it later”

“I will be with you momentarily” Spock said and told him to go to a briefing room. You awkwardly played with the hem of your shirt, not sure what to say.

“Well, I should get working on my faulty animation then”

“It is not faulty, (Y/N)” was there a difference in how he said your name now? You had had a long time until you got him to call you (Y/N) instead of his formal for of addressing you with your surname and he had allowed you to just call him Spock in return.

“Was that just another compliment?”

“If you wish to take it as one” he replied and you gave a nod, wanting to return to your workstation, but he took hold of your wrist

“Huh?” you asked

“I do not know what humans will do after such occurrences but on Vulcan, the logical conclusion is that the two individuals will start a relationship”

“You’re asking me for a relationship?”

“If you approve of it”

“I…” you looked down but then found yourself nodding “Yes. I think so”

“Very well” you didn’t know if there was something like a tiny curl in his lip that may have been a little smile. This made you smile as well “I suppose that the discussion will take up the rest of my time at work. Would you be amendable to accompany me to dinner later?”

[ninak803]

Elitist Nightmares

Here it is! I promised you a new thing & here it finally is! Thank you @whataboutmyfries for working on this with me! It’s so much fun & I love the ideas you’re giving me! Can’t wait to see what the other chapters will bring us.

This is a wolfstar thing, but there are also @lumosinlove‘s lovely characters in here! Thank you for creating them, we all love them so much.

So enjoy y’all!

Chapter 1

Remus

Remus was standing in the small, overheated office. He had goosebumps nevertheless, but they didn't come from the room temperature or because he was feeling cold. 

They came because of his new mission, which he had just received. He knew it would come eventually, just the when was unclear. Until now. 

And he knew it had to be him, he was the best for this job.

He tucked the inconspicuous folder neatly under his arm and blinked against the darkness in the room to make out his boss’s silhouette

“Be done by the end of this month, Lupin.” a low voice said.

He turned around without another word and left his boss's office.

Remus was packing his backpack when his phone rang. He looked at the screen but didn’t recognize the number. That was weird. Just a few people had this phone number; and he knew all of their numbers by heart.

He picked it up.

“Hello?” Remus said.

There was a short moment of silence.

“Is there Remus Lupin?” a male voice said. It sounded young, with a southern accent.

“Who are you?” Remus asked, disgruntled.

“Oh yeah. I’m sorry. I’m Leo Knut. Dumbledore gave me your number. I’m sorry. I should have said that right away.”

Ah. So he called on Dumbledore's behalf. It must have something to do with his new mission.

“How can I help you?”

Remus looked at his watch. He didn’t have the time to make small talk right now, so this Leo Knut better hurried up a bit.

“I get the feeling that Dumbledore didn’t tell you the slightest thing about me, did he?” the caller sounded irritated.

“Well, I don’t know who you are or why you’re calling me, so obviously he didn’t. And hurry up a bit, could you? I don’t have time for this right now.”

Remus knew he sounded unfriendly and harsh, but he wanted to start this new job today and for that he still had a lot to prepare.

“I’m sorry, I know, but I’m your partner for this mission.”

“My what? My partner? I don’t work with partners. This must be a mistake.”

“Uh… No. Dumbledore told me himself.” Leo said.

“Okay, okay. We shouldn’t be talking about this on the phone. You know where I live, I guess? Be here in 10 minutes, we can talk then.” 

Remus didn’t wait for his answer and hung up.

He sighed.

A partner? Dumbledore knew pretty well that he was working alone. He didn’t need a partner, damn he didn’t want a partner!

Damn it.

Remus finished packing his backpack. He had put a water bottle, a pen and a notebook in there. He still needed some energy bars and apples just if he became hungry. Just in case.

The doorbell rang, and he went to the main door to open it.

Remus scanned his visitor quickly with an experienced look.

In front of him stood an approximately 1,85m to 1,90m tall, blonde boy. Remus guessed he wasn’t even 20 yet. His smile was bright and his blue eyes friendly. He had a grey streak of hair; he noticed. He wore simple blue jeans and a dark grey shirt, nothing remarkable. Good.

Remus stepped aside to let him in, then he closed the door behind them.

Leo held his hand up for Remus to take it, then shook it gently.

“Hi. I’m Leo Knut. Nice to meet you.”

Remus nodded.

“Nice to meet you. Here. Sit down, please. We have some talking to do.” 

Remus led him to the kitchen where Leo sat down on one of the chairs. Remus took two glasses out of the cupboard, filled them with water and handed him one of them, then sat down across from him.

“Merci.” Leo said as he took the glass.

“You’re from the South. Louisiana?” 

Leo nodded.

“New Orleans.”

Leo then filled him in. 

Dumbledore had forgotten to inform Remus that he will have a partner for this mission. It felt more like he didn’t tell him on purpose, because he knew Remus would protest. He didn’t need a partner and Dumbledore knew this damn well.

But Leo also said that he was new to this, and he needed a teacher and there wasn’t a better one than Remus.

He sighed.

“Okay, okay, you can work with me.” The younger ones' eyes lit up at that. “But we need rules. First you do as you're told. No acting on your own. Don’t question what I’m doing, I give you explanations when the time’s right. You have to be on time. And you’re staying in the background, don’t complain about it. Got it?”

Leo nodded.

“Okay. Good. So you know what we have to do next?”

“We’re observing Sirius Orion Black, heir of the Black Family, 25 years old, next one in power.”

“Right. This will take us some time. We need to figure out his habits, get to know the places where he goes. We simply need to get to know him but, and this is most important, he must not notice us. Never. And then…”

“Then?” Leo tilted his head.

“Then, when the opportunity arises, I'm going to kill him.”

---

Leo and Remus agreed to meet tomorrow morning at 5:30 am again, then start their investigation.

Remus sighed and sat down on his bed. This job just got a lot more complicated than he’d thought. There was a reason he usually worked alone: It wasn’t the safest job in the world and if something went wrong, which it usually doesn’t because he was careful but you never know, he was the only one to get hurt and no one else, only his life would be destroyed. But now there was Leo, and he seemed eager to learn, so Remus just had to be extra careful. Maybe it was good to have a second pair of eyes to watch for once. This was the most important mission Remus ever received. 

The Black family were the ones ruling the country, Orion Black to be more precise. Officially his wife Walburga didn’t have to say a thing in state affairs, but everyone knew she was holding the strings.

They had two sons: Sirius Orion Black, their oldest son and heir to the imperium, and Regulus Arcturus Black, the younger one.

This country had a democracy once, but it was long gone now. The Black family was in power now for the 6. generation and they didn’t plan on letting go, if anything they just made their position stronger and clearer over the years. And they weren’t good for the country, they weren’t good for the people. The only thing they were good at was making themselves richer and all the other poorer. There was a huge gap.

The plan was to finally end their reign with ending their descendents and then bring back democracy to this country.

Sirius

He woke up to a knock on his door. The sun was already shining through his bedroom window; the birds singing noisily and Sirius turned around, pulled his sheets over his head and closed his eyes again. He really didn’t want to get up. If he gets up, he has to deal with his family again and he just didn’t want to.

There was another knock on his door, more persistent this time, followed by a voice:

“Sirius, open the door. It’s me. I know you’re awake.”

Sirius sighed and got up. He unlocked the door, opened it and stepped aside so James could come inside.

James, a mess of black curls and blind without his glasses. His valet, his bodyguard and, most important, his best friend. His only reason he wasn’t completely insane by now.

Sirius walked back to his bed and sat down, still just in his underwear and a t-shirt, but he didn’t care, not in front of James. He had seen him worse, much worse.

“You’re here to bring me today's agenda, I assume?” Sirius said with a still hoarse voice from sleeping.

“You assume right my friend.” James answered and sat down next to him on the bed.

James smiled at him, a gentle and honest smile, not like the false and mean ones he received from his parents.

He told him what he had to do for the day. Being at this meeting, showing up at that meeting, having dinner with his family and some apparently important people. If he was lucky, he had some time to himself between meeting number two and dinner today, so that was a ray of hope at least.

“And now you should get up, take a shower, put some clean clothes on and get some breakfast. Your parents are already gone, don’t worry. Regulus is still waiting for you though, he told me to catch you.”

James got up and headed for the door.

“James?”

The other boy turned around and looked at Sirius, an eyebrow raised.

“Thanks. For sticking around.” 

“Of course.”

James smiled at him again and then left.

After showering, Sirius went into the dining room, where his brother was still sitting at his usual place. 

The table was filled with more food than any of them could eat: There were croissants, different kinds of fresh bread, pastries and fresh fruits.

Sirius sat down and reached for the coffee pot.

“It’s empty.” Regulus said without looking up from the newspaper he was reading.

Sirius wanted to say something, showing his brother his annoyance, but Regulus spoke again:

“I already ordered fresh coffee. Should be here any moment.”

Almost at the same moment one of the servants showed up and filled Sirius’ cup with fresh, steaming coffee.

“Thanks.” he said, not sure if he was talking to his brother or the servant.

He drank his coffee and had some fruits before he noticed Regulus eyes lingering on him.

“What’s up, brother dear?” he asked him.

“This dinner today is important.”

Sirius rolled his eyes.

“Shut up, Reggie.”

“Don’t call me that. You have to behave for once, don’t be… just don’t be you. Behave.”

The anger rose inside of Sirius. He should not be himself? Then who the fuck was he supposed to be?

“Didn’t Mom and Dad have time today to give me The Talk, or is that why you’re doing this?”

“Oh, I bet they will do it later. Just listen to me, it’s important. This dinner is important for the whole family, okay? You’re part of the family. You’re supposed to be the heir, act like it then.”

Sirius got up and left the room without another word.

He wasn’t hungry anymore.

[sparklingchan]

Tipsy Turvy || Choi San(Ateez)

Pairing : Reader (fem.) x Choi San

Word count : 5k+

Warnings : Cuss words , alcohol , hangover , mentions of over drinking, not proof read.

Genre : Fluff , a tiny bit of angst , romance , friends to lovers au.

Description : You have a complicated relationship with San , and the alcohol in your system makes it worse ( or better).

Author's Note : So with all honesty , I have NO idea how people behave when drunk so I searched it up and wrote this 90%  based on that ( and 10% on  my friends’ advice). I hope at least one of y’all get the horrible pun in the title  -_-

Please do reblog , like and comment if you like this. My DMs are also open so if you want to gimme a review , feel free.

Enjoy!

The coffee in the cup must have gone cold by now, because the moment you touch it’s surface ,you don't feel the same sting as you did a few minutes ago.

Not that it tasted good anyway. You're almost glad you didn't have to drink it but maybe, right now, you could use a sip or two to spare yourself a few seconds of peace.

"The coffee is wonderful, isn't it? It's my favorite one." The man in front of you - Mike - needs to seriously give you a break, or else there will be blood on the streets. Literally, "I'm glad you like it."

Does he not see the clearly disgusted look on your face ? Or was he so sure you'd like this drink just because he ordered it without even asking you?

"Yeah ,its fine." You sigh , touching your lips to the mouth of the cup and then putting it back down. You're not drinking that already tasteless and now cold coffee. No way.

"So ,y/n, since we're expected to give our parents an answer after this date, I'd like to know about your opinions first . And please be honest. I would hate to upset you." He says , scratching his chin .

Your eyes widen at the unexpected string of words. This is the first time since this stupid date began that he actually asked your opinion on anything.

"Well," you begin, your mind filling up with tons of words that you'd waited patiently to let out , "Marriage is a big decision. At least for me. And this is all too fast. I just hope we have enough time to know each other before our parents set the date."

He nods his head , “ I agree, I agree. Its important . Right."

You furrow your brows. His reaction seems very forced. Like he really didn't agree with you , but for the sake of it , he's agreeing.

"And what kind of qualities do you look for in a man,y/n?" You want to roll your eyes at the question but you pull your lips up in a smile, not quiet touching your eyes but enough to convince him. You wonder why he was trying so hard to save a date that had been going downhill from the moment he sat down in front of you. You guys clearly didn't like each other, and the spark was missing.

A spark you'd only ever felt with one person.

"Its difficult to describe ideal types but yeah,I'd like someone who's compatible with me and loving and well.. obviously respectful." You say. Mike chuckles at your answer , as if amused by it, "I was expecting you to say you wanted someone who's rich and handsome like...me , honestly. But it's alright." You wonder if he actually hears himself because he really sounded like a self absorbed piece of shit right now. And you'd really do anything to escape from this date.

"Well , I guess not. " you reply with a chuckle. In all honesty, you yourself don't know what your ideal type is. It's not about the conditions or requirements that a person fulfills. It's not a job , it's a connection. You can't confine people to certain criterias. It defies the whole purpose of that connection. And even if you did have qualities you looked for in a man , everything would always end up pointing at only one damn person. You push his images away even before they can surface into your mind.

"So anyway, as I was saying before the coffee arrived , my dad bought this really pretty yacht for me last month and it's super amazing to - " and you shut him out completely while he continues blabbering and you quietly sip the disgusting coffee in front of you.

You really want to groan now. Like on his face. Putting emphasis on how draining and boring this whole conversation is for you.

But all you do is smile and nod.

You were going to reject him the moment your parents set you up on a date with a ' nice and charming bachelor '. What side of Mike did they find even remotely nice or charming? You would never know. But one thing is sure now ,you will at least not have to deal with your parents pestering you for marriage after you reject Mike.

The weather is extremely humid today , despite it having rained in the morning so without a doubt , you'd spent your day indoors , reading a book and drinking unhealthy amount of fruit punch.

"Are they still upset ? " your parents should have seen it coming ,really. The rejection was as inevitable as the rising of the sun every morning or the setting of the sun in the evening. Yet , your parents are pretty disappointed at the decision even after three days since that stupid date. You , on the other hand are happy to have gotten rid of Mike - even if it meant your parents being angry.

Your younger brother , Jongho ,sighs into the phone, " What do you think? They really thought you'd finally marry now."

You don't really blame them though. Not at all. That's what they were always taught ,weren't they? Graduate high school, finish college ,get a good job and get married. The full circle.That is all they've every known yet you find yourself upset at the fact that they didn't consider your unwillingness to this marriage ( or any other marriage) at all. You're just barely starting to work ,you cannot throw away all of that to be a good wife and daughter in law. Sure Mike is the son of some rich man who does business with your father, but economical relationships cannot be a basis for a marriage.

"Well, I can't help it . I'm not marrying that asshole at any cost. " you huff , " He is so creepy and weird. Let mom and dad stay pressed. I don't care."

"Is it just because you didn't find Mike interesting or something else?" Jongho asks.

"I guess? " you reply, scratching the back of your head.

"You know , y/n, I understand that you don't want to get married and whatever but we both know there's a solid reason behind it and I am sick of you denying it all the time." Jongho is too honest for your liking. Too brutal , no sugarcoated words. Just the truth.

And the truth stings.

"Shut up." You grumble, fiddling with the book in your hands , legs dangling from the edge of your bed, " I told you not to mention it ever again?"

"Y/n, you love him. Okay? You have loved him for seven years now . It is high time you shoot your shot or else you'll end up with some rich asshole who doesn't give two shits about you!"

He's right,of course he is. His words are not really an opinion or a vague prediction of the future. Those are facts. But hearing him say all that out loud makes your blood turn cold in your body. Fear creeping through every inch of your skin , making it hard to think clearly.

"I don't think it matters if I love him or not. I gave up on him. We haven't spoken much ever since college ended. " you say.

" You didn't give up. You just ran away instead of acknowledging it. There's a difference." Jongho replies , " And for your kind information it's only been six months since college got over. You need to stop talking like it was twenty years ago or something. "

You chuckle at his last phrase, grateful that he's trying to uplift the weirdly tense mood. "I don't think I can do it , Jongho. I want to. I really do but I don't think he likes me back." You admit.

"You're delusional if you think he doesn't like you back, y/n. All the late night car drives, movie dates , eating unhealthy food late into the nights - San loves you too. Obviously he does."

You sigh ,running your fingers over the rough page of the book in your lap. 'Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.' The words read out. The tightening of your chest increases.

"He was just being nice." You mutter.

Jongho sighs loudly from the other side , "Okay , believe what you want . I can't handle both you and mom-dad together, okay? Spare me your bullshit. Bye."

Wow, talk about being a rude, disrespectful child !

You are usually not the one to point fingers or put blame on other people , but you really despised your best friend right now. And you have every right to do so. Your best friend is the main reason why your parents are so desperately trying to get you married and see you settle down and have kids and whatever. Jisoo is the epitome of every good quality all parents desire in a daughter. She's perfect. Even more than that sometimes.

"How's your husband?" Your question doesn't sound very genuine - the words slipping out of your tongue like they were being forced out. But Jisoo seems to let it go.

"He's good , really good. " She replies ,taking a sip from the only can of cola you had left in your fridge. She passes it over to you.

"How lucky ." You mutter , taking a sip of the same drink.

"I know what you're thinking ,y/n. I know your ass is upset about everything that happened with Mike but things take time. Okay? I married early because I wanted to." she says, reading right through you like you were a book she'd read millions of times ,"If you don't want to marry , don't. Stop blaming yourself for not finding good guys." " I wonder if I'll ever find anyone even remotely nice, Jisoo. The only few guys I've been set up on dates with are not my type and well , Mike ... I don't know. We're just not compatible." You complain , " And besides I'm so terrified of marrying a guy I barely know."

Jisoo sighs , "Then marry a guy you've known for a long time."

"Who are you talking about?" You frown. You know exactly who she is talking about but you want to hear her say it. Say his name which you dare not even repeat to yourself when alone.

"Choi San ,of course. The love of your life ,your sun and stars , your sweetheart. " she says , her dreamy eyes widening to exaggerate her point.

You slap her arm hard , almost a little too hard. But you're convinced that she deserves it. "Ow !" She yells ,rubbing the sore area on her arm.

"That name is forbidden in my vicinity." You say.

Okay ,maybe now you are the one who deserves a slap. On the cheek. You couldn't believe that his name still fills your stomach with butterflies and causes your heart to beat so fast that you feel dizzy even though you claim that you're over him.

"No, it's not, y/n. Come on ,dude. You're still not over him. You will never be unless you confess and face the supposed rejection on your own. Only then you'll find it in yourself to seek other guys , unless that's not what you want." She jabs her finger on your shoulder softly , "That, or you can marry San himself. It's very simple ,really."

Now that she put it that way ,it sounds even more complicated and it sends your mind to a voyage into the sea of memories that you rarely even acknowledged anymore( or at least ,you tried to).

San's pretty eyes and alluring smile , the soft hold of his hand on your arm as you run to the movie halls just five minutes before it closes , the warmth of his hugs that you so dearly loved , his silky black hair that you've wanted to touch on so many occasions and the day you were sure he had leaned in to kiss you but your annoying brother decided to call just at that exact moment. You almost wish you could go back to your university graduation day , and wait a little longer for him after the event got over and tell him that he meant the world to you. More than he could ever imagine. You really wish you had waited that day.

"Jongho has this stupid theory that he likes me too. He's making me even more confused. " you say.

"At least Jongho has more brain cells than you. That kid deserves an award or something." Jisoo replies , chuckling.

"He's not a kid. He's just a year younger than me and you." You deadpan. Great, your best friend and brother are now on the same team.

She rolls her eyes , "Yeah , you are a kid too. Only a kid acts so naive and stupid when everything they've ever wanted is right there in front of them. Hell, even a kid would realise that San loves you !"

Jisoo talks a lot , but her words are never empty or vague. She says whatever she wants to and has to. And she is always able to make a point. But you're a dumb bitch who likes to pretend she's still not in love with her childhood sweetheart and is looking for love somewhere else.

"Anyway, can we go for a drink?"

"Glad you finally asked." Jisoo grabs your arm and drags you out of the house.

Your favorite bar in the entire world has to be the one you've been going to since you were in high school. From your first time drinking to vomiting in its toilet after having way too many vodka shots , from dancing with your friends to crying alone in a corner , that place has seen it all.

Coincidentally( not really), its Jisoo's favorite bar too.

"Okay, y/n. I think you should stop now. That's enough."

Coincidentally also ,you happen to not have a good alcohol tolerance yet an endearing desire to drown your sorrows in those glasses.

"No, I'm not even properly drunk." You whine ,your words only barely making sense to Jisoo. She grabs the glass away from you.

"Come on , let's take you home. " she tries to pull you from your seat , "Can't believe I thought it was a good idea to drink on a weekday."

"No, no, Jisoo. " you resist , pushing her away. " I want to..stay. here. I like it here. It's so warm and cozy . If I go home, I'll cry. I hate home. It's so ugly. Ew. This place is so pretty ."

Your vision is so blurry that your brain can't even form clear images anymore. You see Jisoo's form after squinting hard enough.

"You won't cry. I'll take care of you, y/n. Come on." Jisoo is so insistent you have to hold yourself back from punching her. Her lucky ass would never understand how much in pain your heart is in. And how much the alcohol helps in forgetting all that even just for a few minutes.

"You go home. I'll stay. I'll stay here for as long as I can. Away from all you blood suckers." You slur. And then giggle for no apparent reason.

Jisoo heaves a sigh ,sitting beside you. "Are you going to come with me or do I have to call San to pick you up?"

That was a threat. Jisoo always uses the same one and somehow, it always seems to work. Not today though.

"Hah! Joke's on you ! He doesn't care about me." You point at her face , giggling again.

San? Taking care of you? Funniest joke of the year.

"He does ,y/n. You know he does. What are you being like this?" She asks , rubbing your hand comfortingly. "I see the way he looks at you."

"He probably has a girlfriend already. He always posts romantic shit on Instagram. " you say ,resting your chin on your arm.

"He doesn't have one. I know he doesn't. He probably posts all that for you." She says.

You want to believe her but your brain feels fuzzy and foggy now. Like the sky on winter mornings.

"I want to see San, Jisoo. I miss him. I miss him so much. " you keep muttering under your breath , "Take me to him. I miss him."

Jisoo stares at you - wide eyed and slightly annoyed. Your low alcohol tolerance will get you into serious trouble one day.

"We can see him tomorrow. Let's go home now. Now." She pulls your arm again.

You push her off , "I said I want to see San ! Right now! Take me to him!"

You have never yelled at anyone while in a drunken state before so the sudden increased volume of your voice scares Jisoo. She let's go of your arm.

"Okay, will you come home after meeting San?" Jisoo asks ,taking her phone out to call a cab.

"Yes. No. Depends. I never want to be away from him." You say. "Take me to him , please. I haven't seen him in months. Years. I don't remember how long. Do you think he'll recognize me?"

Shaking her head , Jisoo makes a mental note to never take you out for drinking again.

San lives a few minutes away from your own apartment, but with traffic sometimes it takes almost an hour to reach his apartment.

Today must have been your lucky day because the traffic was almost negligible. Although you don't remember the journey to his house , you do remember his familiar voice greeting you and Jisoo like he had almost expected you both to arrive at his door this late at night.

"She was throwing a tantrum that she wanted to see you. So I brought her here. I hope it's not a problem. " Jisoo says in her sweet voice that she uses on everyone but you and her husband. You scowl.

"Hey, I wasn't throwing a tantrum! " You hit her arm again , but she puts on the fakest smile when San looks at the both of you with a confused face.

"And she's not very sober right now." Jisoo admits ,sighing. San presses his lips in line , observing you as play with the hem of your tshirt and your eyes are focused on his face. You never had so much confidence in a sober state. He knows this because he's seen you like this a million times before and hopefully, if all goes well tonight , he might see this state in the future too.

His stomach does a back flip when you stick out your bottom lip in a cute little pout.

"It's okay. She can stay the night here. I believe you have something important to tell me ,y /n?" San asks, titling his head.

You nod , beaming with happiness. Your eyes never leave his perfect face and his beautiful black hair which he decided to tie in a small ponytail tonight and his toned arms and his breathtakingly sweet dimples as he leads you inside, bidding goodbye to your bestfriend. Jisoo must be very relieved right now ,you think.

"Do you need a glass of water ,y/n?" San asks you , as he takes you gently by the arm to his bedroom. His alert eyes are always on your steps ,making sure you do not trip on anything.

"No. " you giggle. You're so happy to be with him alone at last that you can barely contain it . "I missed you ,San."

He laughs at your words ,shaking his head in disbelief as he makes you sit on his warm ,fluffy bed.

You've always wanted to sit there.

"Waoowww , this bed is so soft. " you swing your legs up and down with a big grin on your face , "I want to sleep on this bed. Oh my god ,awww."

San sees you lean down against the headboard and laugh at the ceiling, pointing out peculiar patterns . You look very content right now ,he notices. Your flushed cheeks , big , curious eyes , messy hair , yet he thinks you look beautiful like this - raw and natural and pretty.

"San! Sit with me, come here." You say , patting the empty space beside you.

San obliges without a question. He pushes you gently to the other side of the bed , himself settling beside you , careful not to do anything that makes you uncomfortable.

"What it is that you wanted to tell me ?" San questions, his fingers reaching upto your forehead to remove the strands of hair that cover your eyes.

"Promise me you won't be mad. " You hum into his touch ,wanting nothing more than to wrap your arms around his body and snuggle into his chest. But even with alcohol in your system ,you know better than to do that.

"I promise." He replies with a toothy grin. His head leans on the headboard beside yours , his beautiful brown eyes drilling into yours ,making your knees go weak and heart flutter. And if it were possible to replace all blood from your body with physical adoration for Choi San ,you would have done it already. "Pinky promise?" You ask again ,lifting your right pinky up in front of his face.

Sighing , he connects his pinky to yours then pressing your thumbs together, "Pinky promise."

You take a deep breath then as naturally as ever ,the words you've always wanted to say roll out of your mouth , "I like you. "

San's breathing gets stuck in his throat , his whole being as if swallowed into a black hole for a few seconds. He stares at you like you were suddenly someone he'd never seen , never heard of before. Like you were a stranger that caught his eye in the mall. Like a gemstone he'd found while digging the ground. Like a precious falling star on a cloudy night.

"I-I mean we have known each other for sometime now. It's normal that you like me. As a friend." He stammers.

You roll your eyes , " I did not mean as a friend ,you idiot. I meant I like you as a man. You're so stupid, gosh." You punch his arm.

His heart skips a beat. He'd always known deep down his heart that this confession would happen one day or the other - but he had always hoped it would be him to say it first ,not you. His ego is a teeny tiny bit hurt.

"I know you don't like me , " you whine , your excited tone now suddenly switching into a sad one , " I know you won't date me."

San frowns at this new melancholic side of yours.

"Why would you think that?" He asks.

"I just know ,okay?" You say ,tears filling your eyes , " And that's why I agreed to an arranged marriage."

"You must have met someone nice then?" He takes his hand in yours.

Jongho was right - you love him. So much that it hurts to look at him ,knowing that one day you'll have to marry a man who isn't him. It hurts like someone is pressing a hot metal rod onto your skin.

You start sobbing.

"No! Of course not ! I don't want anyone but you! " You yell , a little too loud , " But my parents are still insistent about it. How do I tell them that I can't marry anyone else because I'm so in love with you?"

That's another new piece of information for San. But this one makes his heart drop into the deepest pits of his stomach , making him go numb for a few seconds. You were almost taken away from him, just because he'd always put your relationship in a complicated situation. You had almost held someone else's hand on the alter. You had almost ended up in someone else's arms.

The image of you with another man nauseates him and he decides to stop being a coward . Right now ,right at this moment .

"I like you ,too, you idiot." He says , not quite meeting your teary eyes." Don't go find anyone else. I'm here. I really am ,y/n."

His sincere voice washes over you like the first showers of monsoon - refreshing and enchanting. You feel like melting into a puddle under his gaze.

"I wasn't planning on anyway. " You sniff and rub your tears away. He leans in closer to your face , rubbing your cheekbones with the pad of his thumb. And you , being the shameless person you are , stare at his kissable, pink lips. If you lean in a little more , they'd touch and you could finally kiss him. You really want to . Would he mind ?

He presses a soft kiss on your forehead , pulling you into his warm embrace.

"I want to go to sleep and wake up like this every morning." You mumble into his chest , your hand playing with the hem of his t-shirt. "We will. I promise." he replies. The thought itself makes him feel warm inside , "I'll talk to your parents about the arranged marriage thing. They love me more than they would any other guy out there."

Your parents in fact do love San. Whenever they met him , they'd be filled with praises for him. Although a little jealous , you could easily see why San was so easy to like.

"You smell so nice." You say abruptly , drowsiness slowly taking over you , your eye lids getting heavier by the minute.

San's chest vibrates as his laugh fills the room , "Thank you, y/n."

"Will you be here when I wake up? You aren't going to run off, right? " You are just spewing out random sentences at this point but he doesn't complain either way. He likes this honest and vulnerable side of you.

"I'll be right here. Don't worry. " he whispers ,running his fingers through your hair , "But I'm pretty sure you won't remember anything tomorrow ."

You laugh, a big hearty laugh as you finally find enough courage to lightly wrap your arm around his torso. "I'll remember, San . I never forget."

San rubs your head soothingly , smiling to himself, knowing that even if you forget about it in the morning , he'll really be there to remind you of it. He'll be there by your side, as he always has been.

Every hangover is like a cycle that includes pain , regret and a promise to never drink so much again yet you somehow always seem to be struggling with the last one.

And the inevitable headache that follows makes you feel like someone had thrusted millions of knives in your head.

It hurt. Badly.

You stir in your position ,groaning at your throbbing head.

"Woah , good morning , sleepy head." San purrs into your ears , his early morning voice sending chills down your spine.

Wait. San? Choi San? With you in his arms? On a bed?

You sit up at the speed of a lightning bolt , breaking away from his warm embrace and crawling to the farthest corner of the bed. You look around the room , your heartbeat in your throat , taking in the unfamiliar surroundings that reminded you of what you might have done while in a drunken state.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

Your eyes scan San, his sleepy face pressed to the pillow and his lips curved in a smile. His white t-shirt hangs loose from his shoulder, exposing the skin near his collarbone and his black, messy hair covering half of his face.

And even in panic mode , your first thought is that he looks ethereal with that early morning glow. Is this what being whipped really means?

"Y/n, don't tell me you forgot what happened last night. " he says ,visibly annoyed. He forces himself up in a sitting position as he runs his fingers through his messy hair.

You look away from him , adrenaline rushing through your veins as you try to recall last night's episode. Surely ,you didn't sleep with him since both of you are fully clothed and you didn't feel sore anywhere. Thankfully.

"Y/n? " he calls you again but you don't reply because your brain is way too occupied at the moment.

You remember the sound of a very weird combination of words leaving your mouth last night and an even weirder combination of words leaving his. And that's when it hits you - you had confessed to him. Full on movie style. All those years of daydreaming and trying to keep everything a secret gone into vain , your heart placed naked in front of him.

"Oh fucking hell." You hold your head in between your hands ,closing your eyes.

Maybe this was all a dream and if you focused hard enough ,you'd wake up in your bed , alone and yearning for the man supposedly in front of you. But that would still be better than this.

"Y/n, it's alright. You don't have to be embarrassed. " San says, inching closer to you.

You sigh. It's not a dream and you have to face him now.

"I-I'm sorry for whatever I said last night. I didn't mean to make you feel uncomfortable at all. I don't know what had gotten into me." You say, rubbing your forehead.

By now , San is kneeling right in front of you, his galaxy filled eyes never leaving yours.

"I should be sorry , you idiot." He says , gently tapping your forehead ," if I wasn't such a coward and had confessed to you earlier , everything would have been different now. But better late than never , right?"

You gulp hard.

Now is the time to wake up , y/n, I'm going to be super pissed if this turns out to be a dream, you wonder to yourself.

"So..what you're saying is - "

"I like you , yes. Not as a friend , not as a classmate. I like you as a woman and if you agree to this ," San leans in dangerously closer , "Then I'll like you as a girlfriend, too."

You didn't need time to agree to this. You didn't need a second thought. You only need a small tug at your heartstring , which happened everytime you see his eyes focused on you and only you.

"Yes." You say.

His face breaks into a massive grin as he wraps his arms around you , with yours around his torso. You can feel the fast beating of his heart against your cheek as you snuggle into his chest .

"Thank you. Thank you so much." He whispers into your hair. Your cheeks are burning red by now but it's alright. It's a good type of burning. You can come to like it in the near future.

You don't know how long it is before he finally decides to pull away , much to your dismay.

"I'm going to make breakfast . Are pancakes okay with you?" He says , his arms by his side but his body still close to yours.

"Yeah. Obviously. " You loved his pancakes, as a matter of fact. Once, Jongho had even forced you to confess to San during your college years just so he could eat those delicious pancakes whenever he wanted to.

"Okay. You can go freshen up in the bathroom by then." He then unexpectedly takes your face in his hands , inching closer to yours with every passing second, " Don't miss me too much though."

You pout, playing along , " I already do."

And just like that , he presses his soft , luscious lips to yours, enveloping them in a quick kiss.

"Bye." And just like that too , he runs away into the kitchen , avoiding confronting what had just happened while you are left frozen and shocked and petrified and all synonyms of those words in the English dictionary.

But you hear him hum his favourite song softly from the kitchen and your shoulders relax.

Relax , y/n , you tell yourself , it's just San and he is your boyfriend now.

[aahsokaatano]

King I would love that essay about Changing Channels

Fjdjshjdhdjd thanks for reading my tags Jesse you're the real VIP here.

Okay SO "Changing Channels" is the 8th episode of the 5th season of Supernatural. I give this information bc it's important in looking at the context of the episode - now I've complained a LOT about how SPN is terrible at giving us canonical timeframes within the episodes (y'all i was SHOCKED to discover the first season is supposed to cover a little over a year's worth of time, I thought it was like... 4 or 5 months) so I can't say for sure how long before and after the other episodes happen in-universe around "Changing Channels" BUT

The episode before is "The Curious Case of Dean Winchester" where Dean and Bobby bet years of their lives in a game of poker with a witch. The episode after is "The Real Ghostbusters" where Sam and Dean end up at a fan convention for the in-universe Supernatural novels.

Why am I pointing this out? Because it's important, please, no audience participation, this is like a Brian David Gilbert panel.

[under a cut bc this got...... STUPID long. Who knew I still had this many opinions about SPN in 2020?]

Okay first of all I wanna talk about the cinnamon topography of this episode - I love the way the first 5 seasons are shot because you really feel the americana gothic horror aesthetic they were going for (I have a whole ‘nother rant about the first 5 seasons vs the last 10 but thats for another time). Everything is a little washed out and grey-toned, the camera angles generally serve to make Sam and Dean appear even taller than they actually are (larger than life - again, another post for another time), and there’s honestly a LOT of shots from the ‘monster’s’ perspective, which is really neat! I’ve said it before (on another blog - YES i have a dedicated spn rant blog, don’t @ me hdjfhfjfh) but the episode that really got me hooked on spn back in the day was the second one, about the w*ndigo. Yes, it’s a racist, culturally appropriating shitstorm, but the way its SHOT is fantastic. I’m honestly not a horror fan, but that episode could have easily relied on jumpscares and they DIDN’T and it was scary as all fucking hell and just - fuck okay getting off topic. 

In “Changing Channels” we get that distinctive grey-washed tone in the beginning and the very end of the episode, but the middle? When they’re in TV Land? Everything is bright. Almost comically so, I mean - okay look at these two shots of Sam (apologies about the crappy phone pics, netflix won't let me screenshot)

This one is from the start of the episode, in the "real" police station

And this is from a little later in the "TV" hospital

Ignoring that my phone is washing him out a lot in both pics, you can still see the warmer tones in the hospital shot as compared to the cold greyness in the police station one

Okay, now look at this picture

Dean inside the Impala, and those warm tones are back. Why? Because even though Sam and Dean believe that they’re back in the “real” world, they aren’t - so instead of the grey-washed shots that we’re used to, its the bright and warm shots that we see in “TV Land”! So the viewers pick up, even if its just subconsciously, that the boys aren’t out of the woods yet - everything is still too bright to be the in-universe reality we’ve come to expect from SPN by season 5

Which is also why i love this shift so much

These shots are literally SECONDS apart. The first is in "TV Land" and the second is in the "real" world. I have some red strip lights behind my bed, which are reflecting off my laptop screen - notice how much brighter they seem in the second picture? That’s because literally all of the warm colors have been drained out of the shot. As soon as Gabriel snaps them all back into “reality,” things get so much colder.

Okay, so the second thing I want to talk about is some of the very pointed dialogue choices within the “shows” the Winchesters take part in. Not between Sam and Dan and Gabriel, but from the, for lack of a better term, NPCs within the shows.

In the hospital, Dr. Piccolo tells Sam that he is “the finest cerebrovascular neurosurgeon I have ever met - and I have met plenty! So that girl died on your table; it wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t anybody’s fault. Sometimes people just die.” Standard cheesy soap opera dialogue - but lemme just swap some words here and - 

“You are the finest hunter I have ever met - and I have met plenty! So that girl died on your hunt; it wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t anybody’s fault. Sometimes people just die.”

Or even - 

“You are the finest hunter I have ever met - and I have met plenty! So Jessica and Mary died above you; it wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t anybody’s fault [but Azazel’s]. Sometimes people just die.”

Keeping in mind that the NPCs are basically Gabriel’s mouthpieces, its easy to see why so many people ship Sabriel. I’d actually love to see a fic that explores them talking about this moment in particular later on and the kind of gentle forgiveness that Gabriel can give Sam... getting off topic again.

In an abrupt about-face, the herpes commercial (much meme’d within the fandom) is straight up Gabriel shaming Sam. Because if you replace “genital herpes” with “demon blood” it’s.... dark. And very intentional.

So that’s what I did! (I combined all spoken lines to make the message easier to read, rather than splitting them up across 3 speakers as in the episode)

“I’ve drank demon blood. I tried to be responsible... did I try. But now, after being forcibly detoxed, I fight my addiction every day to reduce the chances of passing back into that toxic mindset. Ask your loved ones about a demon blood intervention today. [...] I am doing all I can to slightly lessen the chance of drinking demon blood again. And that’s a good thing.”

Like... the subtext throughout this episode sure is. Something.

Okay this is getting ridiculously long so I wanna wrap up by talking about The Best Scene In The Whole Goddamn Show

I’m talking, of course, about Gabriel’s Confession

“Max,” you might be saying, “there are so many better scenes out there, even within the first five seasons!” and to that i say, again, no audience participation, please. Also, you’re WRONG and here’s why!

Gabriel’s confession hits every goddamn emotional chord that the fandom begged for on this show - fear, rage, grief, pain, guilt, and even, yes, absolution. 

Okay, here’s the scene again for those of you who don’t think about it at least once a week like me

Now this video is missing some of the conversation, but most of it is there, enough for you to see what I’m talking about. Gabriel up to this point has been, essentially, a nameless antagonist - this is the third episode he appeared in, and before this, we didn’t even know he was going by Loki. He was just referred to as ‘The Trickster’. But here, not only do we get a name (a real name at that), but we also get a glimpse of his backstory and a hell of a lot of character development in less than 5 minutes. I mean, Sam didn’t get this much character development throughout the entirety of season 1! There’s a good reason Gabriel has been a fan-favorite for a very long time, and I think a big part of it is this particular scene.

Because here, we get to see Gabriel being vulnerable. And we even see Dean show a little vulnerability, as he can empathize being the third party to explosive arguments between the two people who mean everything to him.

I mean... okay, it will never see the light of day, but I wrote a little bit of a Reverse ‘Verse fic (because I’m a sucker for Reverse ‘Verse) and this was the scene I started with. Not s1e1, not even the resurrection in s4e1, but this scene. Because this scene, more than any other, is critical to the way not only Gabriel’s (first) arc plays out, but also to how Sam and Dean conduct themselves for the rest of the season (and maybe a bit beyond, it’s been a hot minute since I watched s6 and later). Dean is angry but determined, he has a point to make, he is going to save Sammy and if he can’t do that, then he’s going to damn well die trying. But Sam... it’s after this episode that we start really seeing how bone-achingly tired Sam is. It’s after this conversation - where one of the other archangels, one of the few beings who can truly understand how powerful Michael and Lucifer are - says that there’s no other way around this that Sam seems to start inching towards giving in. Saying yes.

Sure, in the actual episode, he seems outraged by the idea, practically scoffs at it - “you want us to say yes to those sons of bitches?” - but it’s after this where Sam really seems run down.

I mean, look at the episodes before and after (HAH you thought I forgot about that first point I made at the very beginning of this post! I did, briefly, but I’ve circled back to it, thanks for being understanding). In “The Curious Case of Dean Winchester,” Sam behaves much as he did since the start of s4, which is to say, ‘annoying little know-it-all brother tossed into the middle of the apocalypse and just trying his best’ and it works well for the mad scramble for any scrap of information that’s happening in s4/early s5.

But in “The Real Ghostbusters” it’s different. This is another funny meta episode - except, while Sam and Dean are technically aware of the joke, they aren’t as amused by it as the audience is. And it’s not because of the ghosts. It’s because they’re just... done. Especially Sam. Dean has that nice little moment with the cosplayers at the end of the episode, but Sam... threatens to shoot Chuck. Sam ‘goes darkside’ more often than pretty much any other character in the show, but that moment is different. It’s a flat promise, not a threat. He’s not being an asshole, like he is after losing his soul. He’s just... done. And it’s obvious to see.

Gabriel’s confession is the turning point for Sam in s5, and it informs a lot of his behavior through the rest of s5, and possibly beyond! Like I said, I haven’t watched past s5 in a very long time, so I don’t feel confident enough to analyze that specific sort of character line, but I feel confident in saying that hearing one of the most powerful beings in the universe basically say “it doesn’t matter what you do - your destiny is unavoidable” and then he’s proven right (Sam says yes to Lucifer, and Dean eventually does say yes to Michael down the line!)... like, that’s really gotta fuck up your world view that was built on free will and throwing off the shackles of fate. Sam managed to avoid his ‘destiny’ in s2... but then it turns out that that wasn’t ever his destiny. Lucifer was his destiny.

Talk about an obscured view of the inner self.

[starr-fall-knight-rise]

Humans are Space Orcs “Christmas.”

 wrote this based on a request for fluff, so I have delivered the fluff. There is a certain group of you who will probably be a little bit made at me when you finish :)

But here is the token Christmas episode, and I hope you all like it 

“Alright, try it now.”

“But Commander, I'll have to pull power from the reactor core.”

“I said do it airmen, did it sound like a question?”

“Yes, sir.”

A sudden eruption of lights exploded about the mess hall, and down the hallways of the ship, thousands of tiny twinkling lights. Krill, having been walking to speak with the Commander paused at the entrance to the room and spun around in wonder. Lines upon lines of lights had appeared out of nowhere to be projected around the walls of the room and down the hallways of the ship. They weren’t  bright or anything, instead an almost delicate yellow in color gently twinkling like the light of distant stars.

“Get those overhead lights off,”

With a loud thud, the lights switched off, casting the room into the warm ambient glow of those thousand twinkling lights. He spun in a circle staring up at the ceiling, shocked to find a mosaic of falling snowflakes, which faded and vanished before hitting the floor,

“Give me more fall-off on that snow airman. Tomorrow better be magical or someone is getting their ass fired.”

He turned his head again eyes widening in geater wonder as they fell on the center of the room. The flickering, projected hologram of a massive tree. It was one of those furry looking earth plants that could reach higher than thirty feet tall, though this one only nearly brushed the ceiling. It stood in the middle of the room decorated by hundreds more twinkling lights, yards of red ribbon and shiny glass balls. Atop the tree, there was projected the human caricature of a star glittering with firelight.

Tongues of phantom fire licked against the far wall, under a mantle of stone and brick.

Krill turned in another wide circle as the strange lights flickered around him, reminding him strangely of the space walk he had gone on with the commander so long ago, stepping out into the darkness surrounded by stars, alone in the vastness of space, but where that had been cold and distant, this was a close warmness that filled him up from the inside and made him feel oddly warm.

Soft footsteps behind him and then a  pause.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?”

“What is it?’

“Realistically, more than four thousand years of pagan-christian and corporate tradition.” Krill looked up to find the array of glittering lights reflected against the human’s bright green iris. His voice grew soft, though it stayed warm, “More romanticized…. This is…. Home. This is childhood and imagination, and family wrapped in a box and tied with a bow. This is being warm when its cold and loved when you’re alone. This is comfort on the edges of space when earth is a trillion lightyears away and you may never go back.”

“Feeling a bit poetic today I see?’

The Commander shrugged, “Maybe a little…. Kind of homesick too.” he sighed, “This is the first year I won’t be celebrating Christmas with my family.” 

“Christmas?”

“Yeah, I’m not exactly sure what it meant to other people, but when I was a kid, it was mostly just a day to celebrate our family…. Mom loves Christmas, she goes all out every year, even when things were tight…. She always managed to make things special. One year dad snuck out in the middle of the night and left reindeer tracks in the snow to convince us they had been there.”

“Er, Reindeer?”

“Ah, never mind. I’ll tell you about it later. Important thing is getting everything ready for tonight. If you want to see the real magic.”

Krill stared at the commander as he walked away not entirely sure what the hell that was supposed to mean. He was trailed by a rather grumpy looking Glados. In the past few months the adaptid had grown to the size of a medium sized dog, and the Commander was, more and more, forcing her to walk on her own, Which she didn’t much like.

Krill glanced around at the lights one last time before returning down the hall and towards the medical bay. All across the ship crew members were busy putting up decorations, stringing strange fluffy streamers over the exposed piping. 

One crew-member, in a red and a green hat with a bell on top was hanging strange plants from the tops of doorways. He looked on in confusion before stepping into the medical bay greeted by Dr. Katie, who was wearing a red and white dress with a matching hat and striped leggings. She looked like a peppermint stick...

“Good evening krlll, are you ready for christmas?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about. Other than it's some sort of human holiday.”

“Yeah, it’s the one day of year where people get together and give each other gifts and stuff. To some people it means different things, simply a family day or to celebrate religious figures. Just sort of depends. Some people don’t celebrate it at all, but the Commander seems pretty big on christmas, so why not.”

“Why are you dressed up like that?”

She winked at him, “Because I’m an elf silly.”

“You know this is almost the first time in half a year in which I have no understood a single word coming out of your mouth. She simply winked and continued on her way whistling happily.” 

Of course the night came, and out of Character Dr. katie curled up on one of the hospital beds and fell asleep leaving Krill alone in the half darkness. He spent the rest of his time on the internet looking up information on the so-called holiday. What he found was a tangled mess of pagan-cristian-and corporate traditions just like the Commander had suggested. A lot to do with saints and demons and more information than he was willing to read all the way through at this moment. He wasn’t a xeno historian after all.

The night wore on, and he sensed a strange stillness in the air around him caused by the ambient light leaking in from the hallway, warm and fiery.

It was close to two in the morning when a knock came on the door to the medical bay. Dr. Katie stirred and sat up adjusting her dress as she ran over motioning Krill after her. Curiously he followed after her, stepping into the hall to find….. More than a strange sight. There was Conn, draped all over in glittering tinsel to add to his flowing ribbons. A couple other humans were dressed in the strange red and green costumes with pointy hats and bells on their shoes. Waffles, the dog, was sitting just before the door wearing a fake pair of antlers, her tongue lolling happily from one side of her mouth. Sitting with her were the three adaptids in similar states of dress glados looking cowed but a little more than miffed to be there. Both of them were covered in bells as well, and all of that strangeness arrayed around the weirdest thing of all,  a very large fat man in a blindingly red suit, and big white beard.

He moved forward ad Dr. Katie hopped over to join the strange party grinning and giggling as she patted waffle’s head. The dog licked her hand, “You make such adorable reindeer.” She reached down to pat Glados next, and the adaptid sulked, but didn’t try to bite her as she might have done with someone else.

“HO HO HO, Merry Christmas!” Said the big fat man, and looking up into his eyes, Krill suddenly grew very suspicious. He had only ever seen a shade of green like that on one human.

“What the hell have you done to yourself.” he demanded.

Adam raised an eyebrow, though most of his face was covered by a beard, “I have no idea what you’re on about.”

Krill was horrified, “Look at you…. How…. how do you gain that much weight in such a short amount of time. Are you mad? Are you ok? Are you going to die of a heart attack in the next fifteen minutes because something tells me this can’t be healthy.” He glared at the human, “When were you going to tell me that humans could just spontaneously gain an enormous amount of weight. Whatever this is, it is an immediate medical emergency. Plus the beard, some serious hormonal dis-regulation I can’t even begin to imagine what sort of-”

“KRILL! Its a suit, a costume, I didn’t just spontaneously gain weight.” The human adjusted his beard voice sounding more normal now that he wasn’t trying to make it deeper, “I’m Santa Claus? 

“And who is that supposed to be?”

“Well, he is the physical embodiment of the spirit of Christmas. Legend says, he lives at the north pole, and works with the elves making toys all year round. He keeps to lists, and on one list appears the name of all the well behaved children, and on the other list appears the names of the naughty children, he will check both lists twice, and there is no point trying to trick him because he sees everything. And then on the night of Christmas, he gathers all the presents into the back of his sleigh, which is pulled by nine magical flying reindeer. Then, he takes all night to to fly all around the world delivering presents to kids. Most of the time he comes down the chimney, if you have one. He will fill stockings (socks) hung over the fireplace with small toys and then put the big presents under the Christmas tree. If you were a bad kid than he wouldn’t leave a present, but a lump of coal instead. Generally it is recommended that one leaves some cookies and a glass of milk out as a thank you, oh, and carrots for the reindeer.”

….

There was silence for a long moment, “What  in the name of beelzebub's balls kind of story is that.”

Even through the beard he could tell that Adam was frowning, “Stop being such a Grinch. It’s a great story, to help kids behave, and keep the magic alive for a little while before you become and old cantankerous adult that doesn’t believe in anyone or anything anymore.”

“And what is a grinch.”

“A grinch is an angry green person who hates to see other people happy….. Arguably they also hate corporate Christmas, but I digress. Scrooge is also someone who doesn't get the point of Christmas, and both are definitely insults, now come on. You are joining me and my elves while we go deliver presents.”

Before he could protest, he was presented with pointy hat with a bell on it, and forced to follow as they wandered silently off down the halls.

Adam pulled out a clipboard, “Alright everyone, our list here says that approximately 85% of the crew celebrates Christmas, but we will still be delivering presents to everyone because we are nice and that is what we do. Nobody is expected to join in tomorrow but everyone is invited because we aren't trash humans.” Glados and Waffles walked at his heels as the rest of the humans followed behind lugging large bags over their shoulders, “Alright Katie, you’re with me in filling the stockings, the rest of you are charged with leaving a trail to the mess hall where the actual presents will be, one for everyone at least, no one is left out. Corporal, you get the people who don’t celebrate Christmas, and just leave the gifts outside their doors. Make sure to leave the notes for them as well so  they know they are invited if they want to come.” 

“Yes s…. Ur Mr. Claus?” 

“Damn Straight.”

“What about the Drev?”

“I am including them in the list of people who celebrate simply because I want them to have the experience once before they decide whether they like it or not. Everyone should get the chance to at least choose.”

It too nearly the next few hours to get things done. Krill Accompanied the Commander, Conn, waffles, and the Adaptids as they jingled quietly up the halls slipping into rooms where crew members had been instructed to leave socks hanging from their bed frames. 

On more than one occasion Krill watched as a very confused human, light sleeper, sat up and watched blearily as they exited the room with a confused look on their faces. Some seeming even amused. The heavier sleepers didn’t notice a thing.

They reached the Drev and Marine quarters at some point towards the end of the night, making it through one relatively quickly, but just as he was about to step into the last room, Glados growled and snapped at his boot. 

Commander…. Santa? Looked down and harrumphed, “Someone here is going on the naughty list.” Katie and Krill leaned forward as a light shined down on the delicate silver trip wire cut across the door.

Katie snorted, “Coal.”

Quietly, he stepped over the line and into the room Glados leaping behind him. “Alright which one of the naughty children is trying to capture St. Nick?”

Krill turned on his thermal vision and could see the vast majority of the marines were not sleeping.”

He turned to look over at Krill and Conn, who motioned in the direction of one of the beds. He walked quietly over leaning next to the ear of the ‘supposedly” Sleeping marine, “I see you when you’re sleeping Ramiez .”

There was an eruption of uncontained giggling around the room, which was rather strange coming from the large, muscular humans.

“Oh…. kinky.” A muffled voice whispered from somewhere.

More giggling.

“Is that you Santa?” 

“Guess who's getting coal for Christmas.” 

He turned towards the door.

“Wait, wait, Santa, wait! I have a question. “ 

He paused in the doorway raising his eyebrows at the marines who were sitting up, “What?”

“How did you get here without reindeer?”

He wagged a finger at them, “Very carefully. You better thank my elves, they had to get degrees in engineering, physics and rocket science to get me here. And what is worse, my Star-sleigh was pulled by a bunch of snarky starborn led by that one.” He pointed towards Conn, “he almost guided us into a black hole, so you better be nice and leave me out some cookies next year.” 

He stepped over the tripwire and back out into the hallway allowing the door to shut closed behind them.

Outside there was a trail of tinsel and strange footprints leading away from the doors and down the halls. He left the bag just outside the door with the rest of the stocking stuffers in it, not ever having intended to leave the marines with just coal.

They took one last jingling run up and down the halls for effect before retreating to the mess hall where they promptly passed out on bean bags by the holographic tree in front of the holographic fire. 

Glados crawled up onto the fake belly and curled up there glowering at anyone who got to close. Waffles and the other adaptids curled up just to the side.

***

Sunny woke up early the next morning thinking how odd it was, that strange tinkling sound in the middle of the night. She sat up looking over at the sock she had been asked to place in her room. She had been forced to borrow it from someone considering she didn’t wear socks, and was surprised to find something sticking out of it.

She wandered over and tipped the contents into her hands surprised to find an earth flower, and some miscellaneous items of use for her work down in engineering.

Curiously, she opened the door into the hallway idly munching on the flower, and found a trail leading from her door and down the hall. The scene surprised her, and she wasn’t entirely sure what to think. It clearly had the intention of being followed, and curious, she followed finishing off the flower as she came around the corner dropping the stem in surprise when she saw the room before her.

Hundreds of holographic lights, a tree, fire, piles of blankets and beanbags and lounging humans half asleep. Conn was floating up near the ceiling trailing tinsel. Krill was hovering beside the tree looking more than a little confused. Dr. Katie was moving wrapped gifts below the tree dressed like a peppermint stick.

Adam….. Well Adam was peeling off a suit that added about two hundred pounds to his frame. It seemed as if there had also been a fake beard and massive coat, as far as she could see. Took him a few seconds to wriggle out of the boots and oversized pants dumping them on a chair close by leaving him in a white shirt and military issue olive green pants.

He looked up from where he had dumped his costume and grinned at her.

She walked closer.

“Merry Christmas.”  

“Erm…. Merry Christmas?.... What’s a Christmas.”

“Apparently it’s a human holiday perpetrated on the idea that a magical fat man in a red suit, flies around the world on a magical sleigh pulled by magical non-flying flying mammal to deliver presents to children who were good…. Oh also he watches you when you sleep.” Sunny stared at Krill  in confusion.

Overhead Conn was mimicking voiceless laughter.

“Don’t mind him, he's being a little grinch as usual. Come on, we’re just waiting to give people time to show up, and then we are gonna open presents.”

“How did you manage to get something for everyone?

“Well I asked for help number one, but number two, what else am I supposed to do with my money. I mean I have a place to live, a place to sleep, entertainment, food, anything a guy could as for, so I just threw a paycheck or two at it. Otherwise its just sitting in my bank account collecting dust until I can find something dumb and nerdy to spend it on…. I thought…. Well I thought this would mean more than getting myself a light-saber or something.”

She stared at him for a long moment, “You are such a…. Sap.”

He smiled, “Maybe a little. I mean it's not much, anyway, but it made me feel good.”

She paused, tilted her head, and then hugged him. He seemed a little surprised one eye peering up at her from a four- arm embrace. He didn’t say anything until she let him go and he stepped back to look at her, “What was that for?”

“You…. well. You… deserve it. And I don’t think you get reminded enough.” 

She thought she saw a little bit of red creeping up his neck and he looked down at his feet, waving it off, “Nah, if you knew what went on inside my head, you wouldn’t say that.”

She decided not to argue with him, humans were horrible with accepting compliments sometimes. Instead she found herself sharing music with him as they lay on one of the beanbags waiting for the others to arrive.

He had his eyes closed appearing as if he was sleeping through she knew he probably wasn't . At some point he adjusted himself so that his head was resting on one of her arms, using her like a pillow. A few more people started to trickle in, including the marines, one of which, Ramirez, was wearing bright red footie pajamas and walked over to claim a bean bag just to the wide.

Adam opened an eye and looked over at him, “What the hell are you wearing.” 

“My footie pajamas.”

“Yeah I got that…..”

“Don’t diss the footies..” 

“ Yeah sure, anyway what would have happened if I stepped on the trip-wire?” Sunny lifted her head at the mention of a trip wire.

Ramirez grinned, “it would have been pretty glorious, that’s what, but guess you will never know.”

“Rude.”

A few of the other marines wandered in blearily, CJ, Davis, and maverick who took a seat cross-legged on the floor her short blond hair sticking up in all directions like the open wings of a bird.

Finally The commander determined it was time and began handing out the presents, first to the more introverted people, who he figured could take their present and head off if they really wanted. A few of the non-Christmas-people showed up just to hang out causing a sort of slow trickle in and out of the room almost constantly. 

Krill and Conn were both presented with gifts, Krill who just happened to get a little cube that was advertised as holding about a million different puzzles of all different types and at varying levels He seemed pleased, though he insisted on his patrol through the room to make sure the humans weren’t doing anything stupid.

Conn was presented with some sort of hand-held gaming system, actually relatively cheap compared to what they used to be. 

He loved it.

ANd based on Commander Vir’s smug expression, he had done it on purpose, probably to keep the starborn out of his head.

Sunny was standing at the back of the room watching the humans rather fondly, as well as the other Drev, who seemed to be enjoying themselves as much as the humans. Her brother and Maverick were causing trouble across the room and nearly giving krill a conniption. Watching all of this, she still noticed Adam approaching from the side holding one last box.

He held it up, “One more present left.”

She turned to face him, “For you.”

He held it out, “Well you, obviously….. I sort of waited till last because…. Well you technically got more than everyone else. My Mom sent a few things up, and I just added her gift to mine.”

Sunny took the box and looked up in surprise, “Your mom…. But she…. She hates me.”

A small smile, “I think she's come around. It’s just taken her a while. I think this is supposed to be an apology. It's pretty cute, I think you should wear it.” 

Out of curiosity, she opened the box and looked inside to find a piece of fabric neatly folded on top. With her upper hands she reached to unfold it, whatever it was it was made out of very warm material, “What is it?”

“I guess it's called a cowl. She thought it would be something she could make that wouldn't get in the way of you wearing armor, and, since you guys sometimes wear capes, it would also go with that. Here try it on.” He took it from her hands standing on his tip-toes to pull it over her head and shoulders. Turned out it was pretty much just a hood, unattached to anything and that really only covered the head and shoulders.

She peered out form inside, to see him grinning. 

It was a funny picture, though she could see out, really the only think everyone else saw was the end of her snout/beak peeping out from under the hood. She lifted her head, and the hood fell a little further over her eyes.

He laughed, and helped her pull it back a bit, “She thought since you guys are more… warm weather creatures, that you could probably use one of these on our expeditions.”

“You should tell her thanks, from me.” 

“I will.”

She looked back down inside the box and was surprised to find it was full of different kinds of flowers. She looked back up at him in surprise, “How did you get these out here.”

“Wasn’t easy, tell you that.”

She leaned down snapping one of them up rewarded with a very light fragrant flavor. It was pretty nice, but then she looked back at Adam to see him smiling nearly dropping the box when she realized, “You! Where is your present. Didn’t you get anything?”

He just broke into a smile, “Sunny, I’m friends with like seven different kinds of aliens, I Command an entire FLEET of spaceships, and have like 300+ friends. I got my childhood dream, so what else do I need?”

She paused sure he was right, but also feeling bad.

They stood there together, looking out at the room when Ramirez glided past still in his footie pajamas. As he did his eyes widened a bit and he paused a slow grin spreading over his face. Adam gave him a very confused expression, but Ramirez just shook his head and pointed up before gliding away.

In confusion both Sunny and Adam looked up. 

Sunny tilted her head.

“What is that?”

She turned her head down to look at Adam and found the man’s skin changing color again. “Er….. it’s…. That appears to be…. mistletoe .” 

She lifted her head again to stare at the strange plant, “Oh….. like in that Christmas movie….”

“Yeah…. Like in that…. Christmas movie.” 

“Oh.”

They both looked down at about the same time. The way the Christmas lights interacted with the UV patterns on his skin, turned the usually blue, turquoise pattern on his skin almost electric lightning blue. The green in his eyes was more potent with the way the light refracted in them. Little twinkling lights danced over the polished surface of her bright-blue carapace.

He didn’t look away.

Neither did she.

And then a small brown shape came screaming from nowhere cutting between them. They both stepped back in shock, and Krill roared past grabbing the plant from where it hung, “Reeeeeeeeeeeeeee! NO, NO, NO, NO STUPID IDIOTIC HUMANS HANGING POISONOUS THINGS WHERE ANY OTHER STUPID HUMAN MIGHT EAT THEM! I WILL NOT HAVE IT YOU HEAR ME. I WILL NOT”  and then he went roaring away trailing laughter in his wake. Slowly Sunny and Adam turned to look at each other before doubling over racked with fits of laughter. Adam ended up on the floor leaning against the wall, just below where Sunny propped herself.

Just when they thought they'd stop laughing, they started up again.

“Damn…. Crazy…. Bastard.” Adam  Wheezed crawling to his feet

“Did you hear that sound he made?”

“Yeah, classic Krill….. Anyway.” He paused shuffling his feet, “Wanna go, push Ramirez over or something?”

“Sounds fun, I’m in.”

“Sweet.”

By the end of the hour, Ramirez was upside down in a pile of bean bags everyone laughing at his expense.

All in all, it was a pretty good Christmas

[slytherinknowitall]

Potion Fumes and Cauldron Leaks

Chapter 17: Falling For The Underdog

(Click here for chapter 16!)

(Click here to start from the beginning!)

Disclaimer: I don’t own the “Harry Potter” book series. The story of “Harry Potter” is the property of J. K. Rowling, it is not my intellectual property. There is no financial gain made from this nor will any be sought. This is for entertainment purposes only.

The following weekend, Severus found himself in a situation that he would have never thought possible – he spent the entire day with a woman.

Despite it being a Saturday, Granger had arrived at his private quarters quite early. While he usually woke up long before the rest of the castle, Severus had never really considered himself a morning person. He normally worked late and slept little, often waking up in a cold sweat after just a few hours of sleep due to horrible nightmares. So needless to say, he had been rather surprised when his apprentice had shown up at his door long before the house elves had even started to prepare breakfast. As he’d let her in, he had asked himself if perhaps she was suffering from the same problem as him.

The two of them had spent a lot of time together over the past week. Ever since he had given her unimpeded access to his rooms, Granger had come by even more often than before, and so they had often spent their evenings together. Everything inside him was still screaming that this was wrong, that they were becoming way too comfortable with each other. But yet, he could not help but feel a rush of ecstasy surge through his entire body every single time she walked into his sitting room.

He had given her the password in what had been almost a moment of mental aberration, and he had soon started to regret it. He had tried telling himself that the reason for that regret was that such an action was simply inappropriate for a teacher, but deep down, he knew that he was really just scared of rejection; scared that she would not take him up on the offer and that she would find it creepy and weird. But the next day, when he had come back from teaching the fourth year Slytherins and Gryffindors, he had found Granger in his sitting room, fussing over a small sandwich platter from the kitchens which was placed on the table in front of her. Severus still could not have described the emotions he had experienced upon seeing this. On one hand, he had felt massive relief. On the other, it had felt weirdly domestic for some reason; almost as though he had come home after a long day of work to a loving home – something which had been completely new to him.

Sometimes, the pair would be working on potions together, and other times, Severus would be sitting at his desk marking essays while Granger would curl up on his sofa as she studied. Today, however, they were doing what both of them loved the most: reading.

The Potions Master was seated in one of his big wing chairs, a copy of his favourite journal, The Practical Potioneer, in his hands, whereas Granger was spread out across the sofa as usual, deeply engrossed in his volume of Hélas, Je me suis Transfiguré Les Pieds by medieval French wizard Malecrit. Over the last couple of days, Severus had slowly begun to notice how eager she seemed to get her hands on classics from the wizarding world, and he did not exactly know how to feel about that – to him, it somehow appeared as though she was almost desperately trying to make up for the time she had spent growing up around Muggles.

They had both been reading in silence for a while when Severus stumbled across an especially interesting paragraph on the uses of Alihotsy in magical antidepressants. Opening his mouth to share this new piece of information with the knowledge-hungry witch, he looked up and instantly had to draw a sharp breath. Unbeknownst to him, Granger had shifted in her position a few minutes ago, and now her grey skirt had ridden up just far enough to reveal her toned thighs as well as barely the slightest hint of the subtle crease running horizontally underneath her behind.

Severus gulped. It was hard to ignore the way that the shadows of the fire burning a mere few feet away were dancing across her tender, milky flesh. Why was she wearing her uniform – a uniform with what now suddenly seemed like a ridiculously short skirt – on a day with no classes?! For a split second, the thought that she was trying to seduce him crossed his mind, but he quickly dismissed that. Never in a million years would Granger be the type of person to try to recreate a scene from a low-budget adult movie, especially not with one of her professors. And if he was being honest with himself, he would have found her appearance bewitching even if she had been wearing a potato sack.

Having long forgotten about what he had originally wanted to say, he blurted out the first thing he could think of. “I do have to say, I find it rather bizarre that Miss Weasley of all people would behave in such a manner towards you. I would be terrified of making someone even remotely angry if they knew of my deepest secret.”

Granger did not even look up. “But that’s not how friendships work.”

“What?” His eyebrows shot up in surprise.

“A real friend would never betray you just because you’ve had a fight with them,” she said as she pushed herself up into a seated position. Severus did not know if he was glad or disappointed that her legs were now covered again. “A promise is a promise. That fact doesn’t change just because you’re having a disagreement or because you don’t like each other anymore.”

Yet again, he was pleasantly surprised by her maturity; it made him feel a tiny bit less like a predator preying on an innocent girl.

“Plus, the real problem is Ron. I love him –“ Severus felt a slight sting at these words. “But he’s just so unpredictable sometimes. And at the end of the day, Ginny will always side with him, because he’s her brother, and Harry will do the same, because he’s his best friend and because Ginny is his girlfriend. All three of them are on the Quidditch team together, and they all share common interests. I am the odd one out, and so if someone has to leave the group, it will always be me first.”

Severus was stunned. He wanted to disagree, wanted to tell her that what she was saying was wrong – but he knew that it was the truth. Just like himself, she was and would always be an outsider.

“Anyway,” Granger continued, taking a look at her wristwatch. “I think I have to go. I still want to stop by the library to pick up some books before it closes. Thank you for having me, as always.”

And with that, she stood up, straightened out her clothes and put the book she had been reading back in its place on one of the countless shelves lining the dark room before making her way to the exit. But just as she was about to disappear through the hole in the wall, she lingered for a second.

“Professor Snape?”

Severus was caught off guard by how nervous she suddenly sounded. “Yes, Miss Granger?”

She took her bottom lip between her teeth. “It’s okay if you don’t want to, but the other teachers normally address me by my first name when I’m alone with them. So perhaps you could do that, too? Only in private, of course.”

Severus gave her a calculated look. It probably sounded nonsensical, especially after he had already allowed her into his chambers, but he was still somewhat afraid of getting too close to her. Wasn’t using her first name taking it a bit too far? But at the same time, her request flooded his soul with a feeling of genuine happiness.

“All right … Hermione.”

*************** *************** ***************

“Come on, Hermione, I know you’re in there! Open the door!”

The brightest witch of her age was surprise to hear what sounded like frantic knocking as she climbed up the stairs leading to her Head Girl suite. It was not long until she arrived at the top and discovered a certain redhead banging on her door.

“I know you’re really mad at me, but can we please just talk about it?”

“Ginny?” she said, making the other witch jump in surprise. “What are you doing?”

“Hermione!” Ginny exclaimed before running towards her friend at the speed of light and hugging her so hard that the two of them almost tumbled over. “I am so, so sorry! I know I treated you like crap, and for a stupid reason, too! I don’t know what got into me, I’m just so stressed right now, and I let Ron get the better of me! Harry is also sorry, but Ron is still mad, and so he feels like he’s sort of caught in the middle, and –“

Hermione took a step back and offered her a smile. “Gin, it’s all right. No hard feelings, okay?”

“Oh, you are truly too good for this world!” Ginny called out before moving in for another suffocating embrace.

Hermione could not suppress a chuckle. She was still upset about how she had been treated, of course; but she had learnt a long time ago that sometimes, being happy was more important than being right. War hero or not, at the end of the day, she was just a girl, and a girl needed her best friend.

Now that their frivolous fight was finally behind them, it did not take long before the two teenagers fell back into their old ways. They soon found themselves on Hermione’s bed, with countless Muggle nail supplies spread out around them, talking about this and that. However, the newest Hogwarts gossip was not really able to awaken Hermione’s enthusiasm like it usually did. Something had been occupying her mind for a few days now, and it took her a long time before she finally mustered up the courage to bring it up.

“Hey, Gin …” she said meekly.

“Yes?” Ginny replied, biting her tongue in concentration as she carefully painted the tiny nail of one of her little toes in a pastel pink colour.

“Um …” Hermione had absolutely no idea how to broach the subject. “I need your advice on something.”

It was only then that the sixth-year looked up.

“What’s going on?” she asked concerned.

“So …” Taking a shaky breath, she decided to just make it quick and painless, like ripping off a band-aid. “I think that I might be starting to like Professor Snape.”

Oh Merlin, she had finally said it aloud! After many sleepless nights of confusion, dismay and solitary pining, she had finally admitted it – to Ginny and to herself.

Too scared of her reaction, Hermione did not dare to look Ginny in the eyes. But to her surprise, the only response was a high-pitched giggle.

“Hermione, you like all teachers. So I’m not at all surprised that you like that tosser, too. Even though I do not know how you could, especially enough to become his apprentice and –“

“No, I –“ She rubbed the back of her neck with a trembling hand. “I think I might fancy him.”

“WHAT?!” yelled Ginny as she jumped to her feet, knocking over a couple of bottles of nail polish and spilling their content all over the comforter in the process.

“Ginny, please!” she tried to calm her down, but it was to no avail – the whirlwind that was Ginevra Weasley had already been unleashed.

“You have a crush on Snape? SNAPE?! The greasy git of the dungeons? The most hated teacher in all of Hogwarts? That Snape?!”

Her look was filled with nothing but disbelief and betrayal.

“Gods, I don’t know!” Hermione’s eyes were starting to burn and fill with tears. She could not help but feel embarrassed. “I have all of these confounding feelings, and I don’t know what to make of them, okay?!”

“Hey, hey, come on! It’s nothing to cry about.” Ginny hurriedly sat back down and rubbed her back reassuringly, though she still had horror written all over her face. “Even if we’re talking about Snape here.”

A salty tear rolled down Hermione’s blushed cheek. “I don’t even know when it started, I just –“ The words got stuck in her throat as she erupted into sobs. “How can I like a teacher in that way?! Like, maybe that could even get me EXPELLED!”

Ginny pulled her into a half hug. “Now, calm down, we’ll figure this out somehow! Why do you like him?”

Hermione sniffled. “I don’t know! It’s just that he’s being so nice to me!”

“Really?” Ginny tilted her head to the left, obviously doubting the statement. “Snape and nice?”

“Yes, extremely nice!” Hermione blurted out as she wiped her flushed face with the back of her hand. “You know, after our stupid argument, I felt so sad and miserable. But then he invited me over, and we had some tea, and he let me vent. He consoled me, Gin!”

In hindsight, the brunette would later realise that she did not know how exactly he had become aware of their fallout in the first place. She certainly had never openly mentioned it in front of him. But at that moment, with her raw emotions causing mayhem inside her mind, the thought did not occur to her even once.

“You’re kidding!” Hermione could only shake her head before she broke into tears again. “Hey, I’m sorry! It’s just hard to imagine that someone like Snape might actually have some real human feelings.”

“Well, he does! I feel like he actually cares about me, you know? Like, it almost feels as though he’s my friend. He even gave me the password to his rooms so that I would have somewhere to retreat to.”

“WHA–“ Clearly forcing herself to remain calm, Ginny took a deep breath. “Are you being for real?”

“Of course! I’ve been spending time there every day!”

Shocked, Ginny put a palm on her chest. “Hold on! Severus Snape, a grown man and teacher at this school, is allowing you, a beautiful 18-year-old student of his, in his private quarters where the two of you are completely alone? Ew, what a creep!”

“It’s not like that!” Hermione protested, her facial features contorting into a grimace. “Never once has he done anything even remotely inappropriate! We just work on something together or read some books, and sometimes we eat meals together. If anything, I’m the one who has taken it too far.”

“What do you mean?” No response. “Hermione?”

“I hugged him once …”

It was merely a whisper, but she heard her nonetheless.

“YOU DID WHAT?”

Hermione hung her head, burying her hands deep in her massive brown locks. “I hugged him in the Entrance Hall during the Hallowe’en Feast. We had talked earlier about how he didn’t want to come because of how much he hates dressing up, but then he surprised me by showing up with his teeth charmed to look like a vampire and … I don’t know, I just became so excited, and before I knew it, I was hugging him!”

Ginny could only look at her, baffled-eyed. “Did he, like, hug you back?”

She thought about it for a second.

“Yeah, I think so.” She scrunched up her face. “I liked it, too.”

No one said anything for a long time. Then, letting out a forced laugh, the redhead ultimately mumbled, “Wow, I … really don’t know what to say.”

“I’m screwed!” Hermione exclaimed as she teared up again.

Ginny let out a huge sigh. “Look, at the end of the day, you cannot help who you fall for. And while I’m certainly not a fan of the Dungeon Bat myself, you definitely could have done worse.”

Ignoring the other girl’s glare, she continued, “He’s smart, just like you, and according to what you told me, he’s also treating you right. And to be honest, he’s not really as ugly as we all make him out to be. So liking him is not as ridiculous as it might sound at first. Plus, maybe this infatuation is just a phase. So many girls get crushes on their teachers at some point. Chances are by tomorrow you’re already over it.”

She grabbed her hand. “The only thing I’m worried about is how friendly you two seem to be getting. This could actually get you into major trouble should anyone notice. And it will also not help you get over this silly crush if you keep seeing him this often. So maybe just try and distance yourself for a little while, ‘kay? I bet that once this whole thing with Ron blows over, your feelings won’t be all over the place like this anymore.”

(Click here for chapter 18!)

[i-am-a-bad-influence-writes]

The villain in your story - 1. The war

Series Masterlist - Bucky Masterlist - Full Masterlist

Summary: Sure, I could be your loyal lapdog, your sweet little slut, you biggest fan. But I don’t want to be. Why should I be loyal, sweet, or supportive when I receive none of those things from you?

Pairing: Bucky x OC (Roxanne Amy)

Word count: 1538

‘I’m booked for the week, but I can come over Saturday to take some measurements,‘ she tells the both of them, ‘will that be a problem?‘ ‘No, that’s fine,‘ James answers. ‘Great, now get out, I have more important matters to attend to.‘

Saturday. Why did she say Saturday again? Oh, right. Because she never has anything to do on Saturday because no one likes her. That’s not completely true. With her best friend, Tamara, she’s a different person, but since she moves they don’t get to see much of each other anymore and making new friends seems to be a bigger task than expected for Roxanne. Tamara had tried to get her to meant things with Stark and his superheroes since they needed her a lot, but that was a no go to Roxanne. Stark is business and so are his superheroes. And so she walks over to Stark Tower on a Saturday, dressed much more casual than she normally would. She has her gold rimmed reading glasses on, a pair of black, high waist pants, a navy tank top tucked into the pants, and an oversized green and blue flannel to cover her shoulders. As she steps inside, there is no tick, tick, ticking of red bottoms. Instead there is the thud, thud, thudding of black leather boots with yellow details. She walks over to the receptionist, who seems no less than surprised by her look. ‘I have an appointment with Stark and Barnes.‘ She gestures to the elevator. Roxanne nods and head over. The elevator automatically goes to her floor, because nothing in Stark Tower is normal. Everything is too much. Why be humble when you’re a genius? The elevator doors open and the first one she sees is Steve Rogers sitting in the common area. ‘Good afternoon Rogers,‘ she says, ‘do you know where I can find Stark and Barnes?‘ He looks at her in shock. It’s safe to say he hasn’t seen her dressed casual in a long, long time. After the accident, her attitude changed so much and though Steve stands behing Tony, he knows something is off by the way Tony treats her. And so he doesn’t really know how to behave around her. ‘Ehm, I-‘ ‘Miss Amy,‘ a voice calls happily. She turns towards the voice. ‘Docter Banner, how do you do,‘ she says with the slightest smile. The two shake hands as Rogers grows more and more confused. He thought she helt a grudge against everyone, but apperantly Bruce is the exception. Makes sense. ‘I’m good, I’m good,‘ he hums, ‘not as green anymore.‘ ‘I see,‘ she says, ‘say, I have an appointment with Stark and Barnes. Would you know where they are?‘ ‘I do not,‘ he replies a bit confused, ‘they didn’t say anything about that.‘ ‘Typical,‘ she sighs, ‘would you mind showing me where they usually hang out? Maybe we can find them.‘ ‘Are you alright miss Amy,‘ Banner asks with a confused laugh, ‘you are normally never this eager.‘ ‘Well, we’re talking prosthetics here,‘ she explains, ‘that happens to be my area of expertise these days.‘ Steve Rogers continues to watch in awe as the two get friendly. Meanwhile, Peter Parker walks in just as confused as Rogers but for different reasons. ‘Who’s that?‘ ‘Roxanne Amy, the most ruthless woman you’ll ever meet,‘ Steve tells him with his jaw still dropped. ‘She doesn’t look ruthless,‘ Peter comments to Steve. ‘No, that’s the whole problem.‘ Steve tells him, ‘she doesn’t talk much to anyone, is always judgmental, and never smiles.‘ ‘But she’s smiling to Bruce.‘ Steve rolls his eyes. ‘That’s the thing,‘ Steve replies, ‘she never does that.‘ ‘How does a person never smile?‘ ‘I don’t know, but she normally manages.‘ ‘What is everyone looking at?‘ The two jump as Loki suddenly appears behind the both of them. ‘Roxanne Amy and Bruce,‘ Peter tells him. ‘And who is this fair maiden?‘ ‘A bitch according to Steve.‘ Steve hushes him as he said it a little loud. ‘I didn’t say bitch.‘ ‘That’s what you meant,‘ Peter shrugs. ‘Doesn’t matter what I meant, you can’t say that about people,‘ Steve quietly snaps at him. ‘Hey,‘ Bruce calls over to the three, ‘do any of you know where Tony and Bucky are?‘ ‘They’re in the lab,‘ Peter calls back. Roxanne nods to them and goes on her way. Bruce walks over to the three. ‘Next time you call her a ruthless woman or a bitch, please lower your voice.‘

‘Ah, Roxanne.‘ ‘Miss Amy.‘ ‘Miss Amy, welcome,‘ Tony corrects himself and shows her where she can put her things. ‘By the way, please inform your staff when I’m coming over and tell your heroes to quit calling me a bitch,‘ she hums to Tony, ‘I’m doing you a favor here, so I’d like for them to at least treat me with respect.‘ ‘Respect is earned,‘ Stark argues. She shoots him a murderous gaze. ‘They managed before, I’m sure they can pretend to tolerate me,‘ she snaps at him and puts down her bag. Bucky watches her closely as she pulls some tools out of the bag she carried with her. Most tools are measuring tools, along with a voice recorder and some clay kind of substance. He’s curious about this “accident“ that seemed to have occured between the group. Why would they hate her if she goes out of her way to help him? ‘Okay mister Barnes, here’s what we’re going to do today,‘ she says before even sitting him down, ‘I’m going to measure your stump and the arm they gave you as well as your normal arm. After that I’m going to take a mold of the stump so that I can work on a new arm for you. Do you understand?‘ ‘Yes ma’am.‘ ‘Great,‘ she seems to display another small smile, but Bucky isn’t quite sure about it, ‘I will also be recording my voice during the measuring to make sure I don’t confuse myself. Are you ready?‘ ‘Yes ma’am.‘ ‘Take a seat.‘ Tony watches as Roxanne gets to work on Bucky’s stump, stopping whenever he flinches, winces, or moves. There is so much care in the way she goes to work and Tony wonders where all that care went. Right now she seems like a kinder version of herself, like someone who actually wants to make something better for another but every moment she speaks she spits venom. Except when she speaks to Bruce Banner, but Tony can’t figure out why he’s the exception. What also surprises Tony is that she’s very patient and careful with Bucky, even when he seems like he’s about to kill her for causing him pain. ‘All done,‘ she hums, starting to pack up her things. Bucky seems surprised she’s already done and so is Tony. ‘That’s it?‘ ‘I never said it had to take long,‘ she snaps to Tony, ‘this is the easy part. The hard part is making sure the thing fits.‘ ‘When can we expect the first prototype,‘ Tony asks her. ‘So impatient,‘ she sighs, ‘I don’t know. This is a much more high tech prosthetic than I normally make. I’ll be over when I have something that he has to fit or when I need more information. Mister Barnes, do you have any questions?‘ ‘Yes, is there any way you could make my current prosthetic a bit more comfortable,‘ he asks, a stern look still on his face but he knows she’s being nice for her doing. He can tell by Tony’s annoyance. ‘Sadly, no,‘ she says with a bit of a frown, ‘frankly, that thing is garbage and will probably destroy your shoulders. Excuse me, shoulder.‘ A small smile plays on Bucky’s lips at her little joke. ‘Can I give you my number so you don’t have to alert Tony every time something has to happen,‘ Bucky offers, but the lengthy explanation shows more than just easier communication. ‘Yes, that’d be great.‘

It only takes a few days before Bucky hears something from Roxanne. She called him to ask if he wanted to have a look at what she’s working at to see if he can work with the initial idea. And so he walks behind her tick, tick, ticking high heels as she shows him to her office. She’s a completely different person now. Her face is much colder than before and she almost seems angry. She sits him down and shows her screen to explain what she’s working on, and suddenly her whole demenour changes. ‘So, as I said, I want to design two prosthetics for you,‘ she tells, sounding quite excited about the whole ordeal, ‘I don’t know if there’s a certain color you’d like for it, but this is the idea for the domestic prosthetic.‘ She shows him a 3D model of a normal looking arm. ‘This one will be a bit less versatile than the combat prosthetic as it will be build with the intend to do every day tasks like cooking, cleaning, wiping your butt.‘ She shows another 3D model. ‘It will look like an ordinary skeleton from within and we’ll try to work with silicone and light metals or plastics to make sure it’s the same weight as your other arm, but not a burden on your shoulder.‘ Bucky nods with a satisfied smile on his face. ‘I like it,‘ he tells her. She grins at the sight of his satisfaction. ‘You seem really happy about this project.‘ ‘I haven’t worked hands on with prosthetics in a while,‘ she explains, ‘I mostly manage to company, but I love things like this.‘ ‘May I ask why you act so cold towards Stark?‘ Her face slips back into the coldness it held before. ‘No.‘ She opens another 3D model of the other arm while Bucky has to wrap his head around the fact she just refused his question. ‘I’m not that far with this one. I wanted the domestic one done first as Stark told me there are no missions at the moment and I want you to be comfortable moving around in your free time. But how do you think it looks.‘ ‘It looks good. I like them,‘ he says, a bit less enthusiastic than before. She sighs and turns towards him. ‘Listen, my feut with Stark is something that has been going on for a long, long time,‘ she explains, ‘it’s not a subject I like to talk about. I am only doing this because you looked in pain.‘ ‘You don’t even know me.‘ ‘I know a tortured soul when I see one,‘ she answers coldly, ‘and if I can do something to help, I do.‘ ‘Okay, I won’t ask about it anymore,‘ he agrees. ‘Thank you.‘

[the-goddess-of-mischief-writing]

The aftermath {2}

Chapter summary; After he left the gym, he hadn't been seen the whole day. But by the evening he appears, cheeks reddened from the chilly air and with a distant look in his eyes. What is the shadows that cling to yours and Bucky’s back?

Pairing: Bucky x reader

Rating: Mature

CHAPTER NO/ONESHOT: Chapter 2/2

Word count; 3.290

Warnings; of course caring Steve makes an appearance, heart-tugging angst, tooth-rotting fluff

Author: @the-goddess-of-mischief-writing​

SERIES MASTERLIST

"Have you seen Bucky?" You looked up at Steve which you ran into while, at this point, aimlessly walking around. His brows furrowed, eyes hinting in a confusion that wasn't present seconds earlier.

"I thought he would be with you?"

"He was this morning, we sparred until Nat came an interrupted"

"Did you really spar then?" He mused and you slapped his chest.

"Yes, we were very well sparring, thank you for asking Rogers", he laughed at your defensive outburst, but you continued without putting any more thought into it. "As I said, last time I saw him was then and I wanted to talk to him afterwards...", you trailed off in the end, not knowing how to word your thoughts. However, Steve, who knew you well enough to be your brother, noticed the shift and immediately knew what it indicated.

"How was he?"

"He seems to be good, don't get me wrong but", you hesitated to say the rest. The brunette had since long ago begun being able to talk about his problems more freely and by own accord. He often spoke to you, a reliable comfort he found, but he also went to Steve. The times when he didn't talk, like today, were few and far between and they worried you more than the topics he sometimes brought up.

"But?"

"But something's wrong Steve. He didn't sleep well tonight but he didn't say it himself, neither why he didn't", you and Bucky had your separate rooms, although more times then not you slept in the same. Last night had been one of those which you didn't, you needed to finish work-related stuff, so by the time you were done you didn't want to disturb Bucky and resided on your own floor. "That's not all he's going back to old habits, he behaves like he did when he first came. He finds some comfort with me, but as soon as Nat entered he began closing up, not showing as much", you finished and you saw the worry in Steve's eyes lightened like a small fire.

"I know he still has his troubles, however, he hasn't behaved like this since, well, he got here. Neither has he mentioned anything that could’ve triggered it, not to me at least", you shook your head in confirmation, he hadn't told you anything that could be the cause of this either.

"I don't want to pressure him", the thought of asking Stark where the man had gone had passed your thoughts multiple times as you searched for him, but never happened. Bucky needed the time for himself, like anyone else, but you knew of the bad habit he had of thinking too much. "But neither do I want him to put himself down", you sighed. A move of continuing the walk was interrupted by Steve when you felt his hand on your shoulder. His eyes were the same calming blues that they always been as he looked down at you.

"Meanwhile just remember to not do the same to yourself, how much it ever is his habit, it's also one of yours", he told you and you smiled

"I'm the psychologist here", you and him both chuckled before he continued.

"And never forget he isn't far away, even if the fool wants to, he can't leave you. You mean to much to him", you wished Steve could feel the reassurance and warmth his words spread through you.

The blonde man did in fact, the radiance from you seemed to brighten and he knew your thoughts about Bucky always played a part in it. Opening his arms, he pulled you in for a hug. He always knew it was a way for you to anchor yourself, but he couldn't deny it did the same to him. Since the first time he'd done it, when your frustrated sobs rocked trough you during the conflicting thoughts you had about joining the team after what you've done, he'd found comfort in the display. He couldn't be more grateful for the help you gave him when Bucky joined. Without it and you, he didn't know how his friend would be, neither him for the matter. You meant so much to him and he knew you meant at least as much to the brunette. He was happy the two of you found each other.

"You should go, you never know when your brooding soldier returns", he pulled a burst of laughter from you while you stepped out form the embrace.

"Better do, don't want him finding me in the arms of his best friend", he couldn't help but laugh himself.

"Don't think I have a chance, you always liked brunettes more", you chuckled and felt joy push away the worry you earlier felt. "And neither do I want to fight someone with a metal arm again"

"Don't sound like such a brother", you jutted your finger in his ribs, a recoiling action following it. "And I'll hold him back so you can get a big enough head start", he chuckled while beginning to walk away.

"Good, I think I'll need it", you smiled and shook your head while heading the other direction.

You'd headed directly to Bucky's room after you'd eaten something, while doing so you passed Steve's. You knew the last-mentioned had numerous things on his schedule for the rest of the day, whereas the first-mentioned had none and that was why you wondered why both of their quarters were empty. For a few hours, you busied yourself with finishing up another mission report you'd brung. By filing the information it stopped your mind from wandering, wandering to your concern about Bucky. When the report was done you placed it on your left side on the desk, quickly grasping the folder on the opposite side. Opening it you read through some of the information for a future mission. You would go to Spain, together with Sam and Clint along with Nat as a backup. Sources confirmed an associate to Hydra, a millionaire who had sponsored their projects, had been spotted in his supposed vacation house there. He would be given some time to settle in, therefore the mission wasn't scheduled for about two more weeks. Your fingers gripped the page, intending on turning it but your eyes stopped on one word. Hydra. It didn't pass your line of thought regularly, but the word had an attachment to both yours and Bucky’s past.

Now it was well past afternoon and still no sight of your soldier. Expectantly you looked at the door as if he would have had a comically good timing. But no one opened it. He isn't far away. Steve's words made you sigh and put down the folder, only to pick up a book instead.

The bed was soft under you, the book an interesting one, but you didn't acknowledge either. You read the pages but felt like you would've needed to do it again to understand them. A noise you waited for and listened closely to hear was what pulled you out of your state.

"Bucky?" You looked towards the door, now open and showing him. Eyebrows raised high enough so that you couldn't see them as the rim of his cap hid them.

"Y/N? What are you doin' here?" He closed the door behind him as he shuffled into the room. The black cap was enough for you to notice he'd been outside, he never wore it otherwise. But the jacket over his henley, opened and slightly damp ensured your guess.

"I just wanted to talk", you put down the book, not caring if it closed as you would need to re-read it anyway. "But I couldn't find you after this morning", his gaze met yours as you walked closer and you still noticed the haziness they held. You didn't stop until you were close enough to lift your hand and place it on the side of his face. It was cold, bitten by the chilly air outside. His eyes dropped close feeling your, in comparison, warm hand on his cheek.

" 'Bout what doll?" He asked, new drowsiness lacing his voice.

"About what is worrying you", his eyes opened, as if his peace was disturbed. Eyes flickered over your face before he took a step to the side, your hand left in hanging in the air as he headed towards the centre of the room. "Bucky what's on your mind?" You softly called after him while turning so you could follow. He didn't stop, not until he threw his jacket, which he shrugged of while walking, over the couch's backside.

"It ain't anything important", he smiled but it looked hollow, like the one he'd given you while leaving this morning. You didn't believe him, his demeanour showing everything but him being ok. But you found yourself nodding, asking him something else instead to get the answer you wanted.

"So where did your daily adventure take you?" You circled his waist when came to stand in front of him and he smiled down at you.

"Took a walk, went to the museum...", he trailed off when he saw the look in your eye. For a second it looked like a light made them flicker and he knew you understood.

He visited the museum even though he, by now, knew what was on every information board. Idly walking through the massive building he hadn't fully stopped until the exhibition of the second world war. Watching the videos, looking at photos he'd beginning to think back to those times. Remembering how he'd been. While he walked around he'd created the scene from his imagination, when you'd done the same thing with Steve. He imagined how the two of you walked around until you stopped on a similar place as he, watching the holographic picture of him. He still didn't know what your reaction had been when his friend told you about him, but he knew how you reacted when visiting with him. Content and with a calm smile on your features you walked around, reading and looking at the historical things, that was what he witnessed. He noticed that it calmed you down and made your thoughts focused, a kind of calm heaven, one which also had become his.

You knew Bucky didn't go to the museum that often by himself and when he did it was usually something troubling him. His head dropped as soon as you presumed he saw your understanding.

"You knew from the beginning didn't you?" You opted to nod as he glanced at you. He sighed and you saw it came from the deepest part of him. You shifted your hold, from his waist to his face.

"I pointed it out this morning and I know it hasn't changed since", you stroked the opposite side of his face from what you did earlier. He watched you, while small strands of hair fell down from behind his ears.

"What did I do to ever deserve you?" You smiled at his question and took closer to hug him closer, although he stepped back, keeping a certain distance between you.

"I'm serious, what did I do to deserve you doll?" The nickname felt like a knife instead of a blanket. You recognised the look in his eyes, it was the one you remembered seeing when he woke up from a nightmare. Panicked and scared.

"You were and continue to be yourself", he shook his head, not accepting it as an answer.

"No, what have I really done?", he questioned and you noticed his voice cracking in the end. "I haven't been myself, not until recently when I'm becoming better. You haven't met the real me, you've only seen him in the museum".

"Bucky, look at me", he did and you continued when having his attention. "I have met the real you, I have gotten to know him and he's standing in front of me right now. I can't meet the man in the museum, because you know what, he is dead", you saw the glisten of tears when you gently stated it and the involuntary flinch. You hated to say it, but it needed to be.

"You can never be him again, too much has happened to you for it to even be reasonable", you watched him carefully as you inched closer. "You're still James Buchanan Barnes, the man I love, but you're not the same man as people read about in that museum".

Bucky hated that he knew what you said was true, he hated that he never would become his old self. But he saw it hurt you too. The tears he felt in his own eyes was present in yours too. You looked so small when standing this close, your gentleness radiating enough from him to see that you didn't want to hurt him. What you said then, however, caught him off guard.

"You should now, I tried every time to not think about it, but I knew since the start that you wouldn't be the same, it was impossible. But I never said it, never to you or Steve", he wanted to meet your eyes, but they were cast down, so he made you. Lightly hooking your chin on his finger he lifted it up, seeing the tears falling down. "You never knew that since you have gotten better, I started believing what Steve said", he knew what his friend said, that you'd been one big part of getting him better. It was true, he didn't feel comfortable with you in the beginning, but something with you always eased him. He found that sooner rather then later he enjoyed being around you, a comforting feeling always enveloped him when was.

"I started believing, but then it turned into hope", he saw the quiver on your lip as you continued. "It's an unfulfilling dream. My hope was that I could be the person who made your problems go away. I know it's silly, it doesn't work like that, I out of anyone should know", you huffed out a sad laugh. You looked up at him but your gaze never lingered on the same place for long.

"I feel like I'm not enough", your low muttered voice made his heart swell and a tear finally fell down his cheek.

It was with seconds notice you saw the tear fall before he pulled you close enough for it to be impossible. Your head rested against him and you felt your own eyes widen when he dipped his head only to press it into your hair and neck.

"Oh Y/N", his voice trembled and you were glad he was so close, otherwise you wouldn't have heard it. "Your enough, more then so", the hand on your lower back, the other between your shoulder blades cradled you closer. You hadn't noticed that you, as a reaction, had raised your hand to his neck, drawing unknown patterns on it.

"You've done so much that you never should feel like that", he raised his head from your neck to watch you. While doing so he shifted his hold. Instead of pressing you closer, he held your face in both of his hands. This made your arms fall, to rest on his lower chest.

"If anyone should, I'm the one. You deserve more than a broken man", you stared up at him.

"In your own words you may be a broken man, but you're my broken man", the first smile graced his lips when you said it and he let his forehead rest against yours.

"And you are my hope", your eyes fluttered close when you noticed his did. The gentlest touch of his lips to yours settled the unsaid promise. They weren't cold, not even chilled as you guessed they would've been before. The only cold that was present was his metal hand, the glove he wore when going outside discarded with the jacket earlier. He parted from you, his breath fanning over yours. You opened your eyes, staring back into his stormy blue.

"God I love you", he whispered, his lips so close they just touched yours. A smile formed on your lips, matching the one he had earlier.

"And never stop believing I won't love you right back", he chuckled lowly, the sound deep and soothing.

"I think I distinctly remember you saying that this morning", his thumb brushed over your cheekbone and when he stopped, you felt heat rush to the place by how he looked at you. He had a lovesick expression on his face when you took his hands in your own, reaching up to peck him on his lips, then nose and cheek.

"About that", you pecked him on the other cheek. "I remember something about a reward", a smirk conveyed his lips as you returned to them, lingering a bit longer, enough for him to kiss you back.

"I think I do too, now when you remembered me", the smirk was still on his face when he continued. "You owe me five of them"

"If I counted right, that was five kisses", you smirked and he lifted a brow, a smugness on his face. You bit your lip, trying to conceal the laughter that bubbled up.

"So that's the reward we go for, hm?" He slid his hands down, on the outside of your arms not to break up your grip. He encircled your waist and while you thought he would pull you close against him, he didn't. He started to walk backwards, pulling you along. His eyes were on yours the whole time and you couldn't tear away from his gaze.

When he reached the end of the bed he sat down elegantly, whereas you weren't as graceful. He'd tugged you down, your grip on his shirt tightened by instinct when you crashed down into his chest. He'd pulled you closer, so much you now straddled him, knees on either side of his hips. The pose elevated you, so he now looked up instead of the other way around. You glanced from his eyes to his lips, which was parted slightly.

"Well I should give you yours then", he uttered seconds before his lips crashed to yours. It was more intense than the ones you'd given him. One hand rested on your waist, its grip tightened and you didn't know if it was involuntarily or not, the other was entangled in your hair, angling it to his liking as he pressed you closer. The touch of his tongue made you refocus. You granted him entrance and by the intensity following, it wasn't long before you broke away in need for air. He trailed kisses to your ear and gingerly placed one beneath it. A shiver spread form the place and together with what Bucky said you felt your whole buddy buzz.

"I'm happy with you", he whispered.

Forever taglist: @flowerchild1216​ @haven-in-writing​ @krystallynx​ @lancsnerd​ @thejamesoldier​

Series taglist: @buckysforeverprincess​

[the-mangled-readings]

Project AI0.043 (Part 5.5)

lA/N: Sorry it took me a long time, but I been really busy lately but I promise I'm a get back to writing!

Pairing: Five Hargreeves x Reader

Story Summary: On the 12th Hour of the first day of October 1989, 43 women around the world gave birth. This was unusual only in the fact that none of these women had been pregnant when the day first began. Sir Reginald Hargreeves, eccentric billionaire and adventurer, resolved to locate and adopt as many of the children as possible. He got seven of them but never found the last one.

Chapter Summary: We get to know what happened to the Reader after Five left to the Present.

Warnings: Abuse, Violence, Language.

Word Count: 2,193

Tag List: @featuringcone9​ @lesbianismybitchname​ @fiveisadorable​ @here-in-never-land sweetingcas @whatawildone

PROLOGUE | PART 1 | PART 2 | PART 3 | PART 4 | PART 5 | PART 5.5 | PART 6 | PART 6.5 | PART 7

You watched the blue portal fade away right in front of your eyes, with your husband in it. Five was gone. He never meant to leave you behind, but you guys had already planned out everything since the beginning, but now that he was officially gone, your mind wasn’t at ease. All those years of being married, doing missions together, those nights where you guys would share each other's company, they were all gone. You knew he needed to come back to his family, to save them, and the world, but what about you ... You were his wife, and you were as important as his siblings. Weren’t you?

You were about to leave the area when everything stopped in time. You knew what this meant, she was here, and it wasn’t good.

“Well, well, well.” You heard a familiar voice from behind. “Looks like our beloved Five is gone for good.” The Handler smiled. You watched her walk around you like a predator, waiting to jump on its prey, but you notice her fidgeting, she would usually do this when she felt anxious. 

“Something troubling you Miss ...” You teased, earning a small scoff from her. “You know, for someone that was thaught to be a deadly mercenary, I must say, you’re going soft.” 

“Is that all you could come up with?” You quirked an eyebrow, making her roll her eyes. “No, Darling.” She finally stopped in front of you. “What I meant is that it’s a shame to see such a good Ace like yourself ...” She began to trail off, slowing getting closer to you. “Lower herself, just for a simple man.” 

“He’s not just a simple man, he’s m-” You argued but was quickly cut off.

“Your husband, yes ... I am very aware of the atrocities you guys had done. It’s like Bonnie and Clyde never died.” She teased. “But if I may, you guys were also partners at the beginning. Did it ever occurred to you that maybe ... just maybe, he might have been using you all along just to get what he wanted?” She quirked her eyebrow and a small grin began to form in her lips. You knew this tactic, she was trying to manipulate your mind, like in the past.

“He would never do such a thing. I helped him because what we do is not right ...” You argued, making your fist light up a little. She quickly took notice of this and argued back immediately. “No, but it is OUR job to kee-”

“WHO SAYS ITS OUR JOB, HUH.” You interrupted her, your eyes were now glowing. “Look, Anya ... We all have our purposes in this world, the moment we’re all born, and if we do not follow our paths, it causes an imbalance to th-”

“How do you even know that ... See, this is what I mean. This Organization is all about following guidelines, submitting to the rules, but it shouldn’t be like that. We need to let things happen on their own.”

“I’m afraid, we cannot ... Otherwise, how will the world keep its balance? Everybody is taught differently, according to their cultures, religion, and legacies. We trained YOU with logic and facts, so you could see things clearly, but I’m afraid that your emotions got the best of you once again, so I’m a have to terminate this project ... and start all over.” She looked down, searching for her black sunglasses. “What ... What pro-” You suddenly felt a sharp pain in your neck, it was warm and it spread quickly, making your drop to your knees followed by the floor. “I will see you in a bit, my Dear.” She smiled coldly and waved at you before you lost conscience. 

You suddenly woke up tied up in a bed, a shiver ran down your back, as you quickly recognized the cold and enclosed chamber, you began to panic. Its size was small but the ceiling seemed to never end. Your eyes darted everywhere, the small scratches and holes on the walls, made you remember why you were so scared of disobeying The Handler as a child.

“NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, YOU CAN'T DO THIS TO ME!” You yelled at the top of your lungs, with tears dripping down your cheeks. “LET ME OUT, OR I WILL BURN EVERYBODY IN THIS FUCKING BUILDING!” You clenched your fist but nothing came out. The only thing you could feel right now was anger and fear. 

“I’m glad to inform you that it won’t happen any sooner my dear, not after that little incident we had many years ago.” You heard The Handler’s voice echoed through the walls. “We modified the chamber, so it can hold your powers and absorb them, meaning you'll just become a regular human ... but don’t worry we’ll use them for a good cause, for now, you need to sleep.” 

Then a loud vibrant noise echoed through the chamber, making you feel lightheaded and nauseous. You tried to fight it but the more you tried you grew weaker and weaker. 

“No ...” You whispered. “You’re all going to pay for this ...” With an unknown force, you began to scream even louder, and move agitatedly, with the noise still ringing in your ears.

You didn’t know how or for how long you had been screaming, but now, your voice was almost gone, you felt tired and weak. Your body shivered from the cold. Your eyes slowly scanned the room and fell into a small figure, a girl, sitting by the wall, her arms crossed above her knees covering her face, making it hard to see her clearly, but you did notice some bruises in her arms, and she was wearing a gown, maybe she was another poor victim they tried using.

You slowly tried to sit up but she quickly jumped under the bed, now crying. 

“I won’t hurt you, I promise.” You tried to sympathize with the little girl, only hearing her crying stop. “You can’t help me.” Her voice was raspy and distorted. “We’re only going to make it worse if we fight, or have forgotten already?” You slowly raised your head, only to find the girl floating above you and looking down at you, her tears dripping down into your face. Her bruises slowly began to spread and darken her skin until she was completely dark. “BECAUSE I HAVEN’T!” She screamed, while her body caught on fire, dripping her remainings on your body, making you caught on fire too.

“NO!” You screamed, yanking yourself off from the dream and from one of the restraints while getting forcefully pushed back into the bed by one large male nurse. “NO! LET ME GO.” You punched him on the jaw, only earning the same treatment back. It hurt like hell, the chamber did a great job at absorbing all of your abilities because now you were spitting blood. 

You turned to the male and spit on his face, making him angrier but he was quickly pulled back by the other 3 nurses that entered the tiny room. Catching you off guard, one of the other nurses quickly injected you a yellow liquid, staining you instantly. 

“AH !” You yelled, yanking it off your arm, stabbing her on the throat, making her drop to her knees and bleed out on the floor.

“Claudia!” The large male nurse yelled and was about to throw you another punch when you heard a familiar voice enter the room. “Adam, behave yourself.” The Handler ordered. “Please, let us be, we need to speak privately, and Oh dear God, please take that thing away from here.” She turned away, pinching her nose, blocking the smell Claudia’s body was releasing, while the rest of the nurses carried Claudia’s lifeless body out of the room. “Dear, Dear, you really don’t know when to stop do you?” She finally turned to you, a mocking smile spread on her face.

“I was taught by the best if I can remember.” 

“That is true.” She nodded, still smiling. “Glad to know our training served you well.”

“Cut the bullshit, what do you want.” You snapped, making her frown. “My, my, someone is cranky today, aren’t we.” 

“What did that nurse inject me with, it burns.” 

“Well ... you put us in a very difficult situation, Anya. You see you’re the only one with enough power to stop the Apocalypse, and even to create one, so we can’t let you go ... and we can’t kill you either. So there’s only one appropriate solution, for these types of situations. We injected you with a neuro-acid which will put you in a permanent coma. Exactly what we had planned at the beginning ... ”

Your heart instantly jumped at the word “Coma”. 

“No, YOU CAN’T ...”

“It will be a simple and elegant way to ... put an end to our collaboration ... Just so you know, we will always be grateful for your help. Goodbye, my Dear.” You watched The Handler walk away, but you noticed another young woman standing by the door before being shut behind her. 

“That girl ... I remember her.” You said to yourself but the neuro-acid began to hit you immediately. Your breathing became heavier, and your vision was slowly becoming blurry. The room was spinning, and your body felt numb, it was like floating on water, but you couldn’t move nor speak. 

“No, no, no, no, no, n-” You thought before shutting your eyes.

You were now trapped inside your own mind, floating in the darkness and cold.

“Five ...” You whispered to yourself. “Help me ...”

“Poor thing ...” You heard a woman’s voice echoed through the darkness. “Such waste ... I thought you were stronger ... I guess I was wrong.” She continued. 

“Wh-who a- ...” You tried to speak, but nothing came out, you couldn’t even make a phrase in your mind. “I am what lives within you ... I’m that small spark that makes the REAL ... you.” She began. How did she even hear you, or even knew what you wanted to ask? “I believe I told you, I am part of you ... (Y/N).”

You tried moving your head around, but you couldn’t. “Help ... me.” You begged to the unknown voice.

“It’s cute how hard you try ... Look at you, you’re just weak, you’re flawed, helpless, you’re nothing.”

“Please, hel- ...”

All of a sudden, you regained your strength and sat up from the bed you had been tied up. The darkness changed into bright and warm colors, making a trail from the ceiling to right in front of you, and that’s when you finally saw the woman. Her skin was pale, and her hair was white, she was dressed in black, much to your likeless she kinda looked like The Handler, but also like somebody else, she was facing away from you. “Your mind seems to be troubled.” She asked, tilting her head to the side. You took a deep breath and sighed. “I’m ... Is this an illusion? Or a dream?” You asked, but the woman turned and stared at you blankly. “Only if you want it to be.” And with that, she turned away from you again. “What did you mean by I am what lives within you.” You slowly got up from the bed, walking towards her.

“I saved you many years ago when you were a child ... you were just a lab rat back then, they have been using for their stupid experiments. Their preservation of the time continuum ... It’s just a Fantasy, no one, but US can actually keep the timeline intact ... we can even alter it.” She finally turned to face you, her eyes were dark, lifeless, but her stare somehow had a heavy feel to it. “We’re the creators of Worlds, (Y/N). We can do whatever ... we ... want.” She spoke, raising her hand, the colors changed drastically, forming stars and planets. “When I came to this planet, I heard a call, YOUR call, they had been torturing you for years and I could feel it. They tried to understand the origin of your powers, but little did they know that they were just looking at the tip of the iceberg. (Y/N) do you have any idea of what you are truly capable of?”

“Why do you keep calling me like that ...” You asked, bewildered. “Because that is your real name before they stole it away.” This time, her tone changed into a more warm and comforting. “Your real name is (Y/N) (Y/LN). You were born just outside (THE CITY YOU WERE BORN), your mother and father, (YOUR PARENTS NAME), loved you dearly, but they had no idea of what they were getting into.”

“What happened to them?” You looked at her, tears falling down your cheeks.

“My dear (Y/N), this is going to be painful to hear but, now we have an eternity to talk about it, so let me tell you what really happened, from the beginning and to the reality you know today ...”

[starscheme]

With All My Heart

Disclaimer: This is a Stevinel Fanfiction! If you have a problem with this Ship, do not read it. Thank you.

Chapter One: Shifting Feelings?

“It’s done!” Shouted a joyous Spinel as she held up a carefully wrapped sky blue box tied with pink ribbon and pinned with a star. She turned her gaze to Pearl whom was sitting at the counter of the kitchen, watching as she celebrated. “Thanks for helping me to wrap it.”

“Of course,” replied Pearl with a smile. “I’m sure Steven will love it.”

“I hope so,” Spinel whispered happily as she hugged the gift box close to her chest. “I’ll go and look for him. I want to give him his present as soon as possible.” With a wave from Pearl, Spinel swiftly left the house and made her way down to the beach. It was already getting dark. Finishing up her gift had taken all day long.

As Spinel walked along the beach slowly, hugging the gift carefully to herself, she thought about the events that had brought her here today.

Like Pearl, Spinel belonged to Pink Diamond. However, she wasn’t a servant as Pearl was. Spinel was created to be Pinks playmate, to entertain and accompany her when she was sad. Spinel of course, was happy to do this. A garden had been created for just the two of them and Pink would visit quite often at first, but once she was given a Colony, Pink, Pearl, and Spinel left for earth.

Spinel was excited at the thought of a new place to play, but Pink insisted on trying to be serious so that she could prove her worth as a Diamond. Thus, Spinel would keep her silly antics to a minimum when they were around others and Pearl was put in charge of helping Spinel to behave. Because of this, Spinel began to find herself depending on Pearl for many things. She became something like a big sister.

When Pink decided to rebel as Rose Quartz, Pearl and Spinel followed behind her. To Spinel, she was still doing what she was made for, helping her friend. Even when she and Pearl were sworn to secrecy, Spinel felt like everything would be okay so long as Pink was happy. That was her job after all, to make Pink happy.

She didn’t like fighting Gems and she certainly grieved when the war ended with the diamonds final attack, but in the end, Pink was okay and that’s all that mattered. Wasn’t it?

As long as Pink was happy, Spinel felt she was doing her job. However, it was never enough. Pink never seemed truly happy, at least not until she decided to have a child. Pearl was beside herself, but Spinel didn’t truly understand what it meant to have a baby. Not until Steven was born did she realize that her friend, her entire reason for being, was gone forever.

It changed her. Her gem turned upside down and her grief was permanently scarred on her face. Her personality even seemed to shift. She could no longer cover everything with a smile and a laugh. It was harder to smile and the color seemed to drain from her world. Everything was so dark.

That is...until she finally met Steven. She had refused to see him with the others on their first visit, but when she came around and went to meet him, something else changed.

When she held Steven for the very first time and saw his smile, a warmth rushed over her and the light flooded back into her world. This wasn’t Rose, but it was her Gem. This meant that Spinel had a purpose again. It meant that Spinel had a reason to exist once more. That day, she promised Steven in tears that she would never allow anything to make him sad. She would be his friend forever and never leave his side. It was this day that Spinel was celebrating.

There was no way that Steven would remember this, but Spinel held that day very dear. It was the day that she regained something precious and ever since, Steven had become the most important person in her life. He was her favorite person on Earth and everything she did was for his sake. As long as he was smiling, Spinel was content.

With a happy sigh, Spinel thought of Stevens smile, hoping she would see it again once he saw what she had made for him. It wasn’t until she heard familiar laughter that Spinel was shaken from thoughts. It was Steven for sure.

“Oh! ST—-“ just as Spinel was about to call out to her friend, she caught sight of Steven, but he wasn’t alone. Standing beside him and laughing along was his friend Connie. The sight of this stopped Spinel cold.

It’s not as if she hated Connie, but something about the girl rubbed Spinel the wrong way. Ever since Steven met the girl, Spinel had been uncomfortable around her.

“Spinel?” Steven called out after spotting the Gem from the corner of his eye.

Spinel gasped and quickly hid behind a large rock. How long had she been standing there staring at them and why was she hiding now? She just wanted to give Steven his gift. Connie being there shouldn’t stop her from doing that, right?

It’s just...seeing Steven laughing with Connie, more and more recently it made Spinel feel...uneasy.

“Gotcha!!” Shouted Steven, peeking from behind the rock and shocking Spinel from her inner thoughts, causing the Gem to drop the gift she had been holding so tenderly.

“You dropped something,” Connie said apologetically as she leaned down to grab the gift box.

“Don’t touch that!!” Spinel shouted angrily.

Unfortunately for Spinel, her abrupt outburst had startled Connie as she was leaning down to retrieve the package. Connie flinched and attempted to back up, but her heel dig into the sand due to her shift in weight and Connie toppled over, her left knee landing firmly on top of the box, a noticeable crunch being echoed in everyone’s ears.

All three were stunned to silence for a moment before Steven quickly rushed forward and helped Connie up, taking the damaged box in his other hand and glancing at Spinel with sympathetic eyes.

“I-I’m SO sorry, Spinel!” Connie exclaimed nervously. “I-I didn’t mean to—-I was just trying to—-“

Spinel said nothing. Her vision had gotten a bit blurry as she stared in shock at the gift in Stevens hand.

Rationally, Spinel knew Connie was not a bad person. Steven would never hold someone dear like that if they didn’t have a good heart. Still, an anger was bubbling up inside of the Gem and she couldn’t be bothered to hear an apology.

Holding out her hand, Spinel kept her gaze down at the sand, hoping to hide her expression from them. She didn’t want to give Steven something broken like this.

Steven and Connie exchanged concerned glances before he handed the box back to his friend.

“...Spinel, I was just seeing Connie off. Will you wait for a second and I’ll be right back?” Asked Steven hopefully.

Again, Spinel said nothing. A lump had formed in her throat and it was all she could do not to have another outburst. So instead, she nodded slowly and turned her back to the two of them.

It was awkward to leave like this and Connie tried quietly to convince Steven that she should stay and talk with Spinel, but Steven shook his head and reassured Connie that it would be best to speak with Spinel tomorrow. It was late after all and Connie would miss her curfew. At least, that was part of it. Steven also knew that Spinel always had a rough time with Connie, so some time to cool off would be better.

With a defeated sigh, Connie finally agreed to head home, giving Steven a hug goodbye and offering one more apology to Spinel before warping away on Lions back.

Once she was gone, the silence only felt heavier. Steven turned to Spinel now and placed his hand on her shoulder from behind, knowing she didn’t want to be seen.

“She really is sorry. It was an accident.”

“I know it was,” muttered Spinel.

“...I can help you fix it,” offered Steven.

Spinel flinched and turned around now, masking her unsettled feelings with a smile.

“No need. I can handle it myself. We should head back home though. ...it’s dark out already.”

“Are you sure? I can just use my healin—“

“—I’m sure,” interrupted Spinel as she took Stevens hand and turned for the beach house to lead Steven home.

Clearly, Steven wasn’t buying Spinels happy act. She had done this all his life. Though he had tried to bring it up before and make Spinel talk about what was bothering her, she always smiled and said nothing was wrong. He hated it.

However, he didn’t want to upset her any further tonight. He simply squeezed her hand gently and sped up to match her pace so they were walking beside one another rather than Spinel pulling him along.

They walked in silence until they reached the door and Spinel swiftly stored the broken box inside of her Gem. She didn’t want Pearl to see it like that. She would have most likely scolded her for being careless with it.

Luckily though, no one was waiting in the living room when they got inside, giving Spinel a moment of relief. Pearl must have gone to fetch Amethyst at Little Homeworld.

“I’m gonna change for bed,” Steven informed Spinel as he slowly released her hand. “Call you up when I’m done?”

With that, the Gem felt lighter already. A genuine smile laced her lips and she nodded happily. “Of course!”

Spinel had made it a habit to sleep in Stevens bed since he was small. Even while he was living with Greg in that van. He was so small before, of course she was worried that something would happen to him while he slept. When he came to live with them here, she began to watch him sleep. Alongside Pearl of course. Though she would later just curl up beside him in his bed all the same.

As Steven was getting ready for bed, a chime rang out and a beam of light warped Amethyst and Pearl back into the living room. They seemed to be having a conversation, but once Pearl spotted Spinel, they stopped and the graceful Gem leapt towards Spinel with an anticipating smile.

“Spinel! Did Steven li-mph!??”

Spinel had extended her arm and clamped a hand over Pearls mouth with a ‘shush.’

Keeping quiet, Spinel shook her head, hoping Pearl would understand that the gift had not been given just yet.

Though she was startled at first, Pearl nodded her head and waited patiently as Spinel reeled back her arm to herself.

“Steven is getting ready for bed. I’m just waiting until he’s changed his clothes.”

Pearl frowned. “Now Spinel, you know I don’t approve of you sleeping in Stevens bed much anymore.”

“It’s not every night. ...anymore.” Finished Spinel with a blush across her cheeks. Pearl had seen to it that Spinel spend some nights in her own bedroom. For some reason, as Steven got older, Pearl got stricter about Spinel spending time with him. It was not something Spinel was happy about, but it was awfully hard to say no to Pearl. They had been together for so long after all. “...it couldn’t hurt to do it every once in a while, right?”

Pearl looked as though she wanted to argue this further, but simply exhaled in defeat. “Fine, but I don’t want you two up all night again reading or playing that card game. Remember, Steven needs his sleep.”

“I’m aware. ...but in my defense, it was a brand new game so it took us a little longer to learn the rules.”

Pearl growled in her throat and frowned. Which Spinel usually took to mean that arguing would only make Pearl angry.

“Spinel! I’m all done!” Called out Steven from his bedroom up the stairs.

“Goodnight, guys,” Spinel said quickly before turning on her heel and dashing up the stairs like a puppy that had just been called to its master. There was just nothing Spinel liked more than being with Steven.

When she got up the stairs, she looked around the room, but found that Steven wasn’t there. Confused at first, Spinel took a few more steps into the room until she was met with a something soft and sweet against the tip of her nose.

“Gotcha,” Steven laughed, floating slowly back to the floor. He had been hovering just above Spinel to surprise her, hoping to cheer her up a little with one of her favorite treats. He had tapped the large marshmallow to the tip of her nose to get her attention.

Spinels eyes lit up and she opened her mouth expectedly. With another light laugh, Steven placed the marshmallow gently into her mouth, feeling a sense of relief as he watched Spinel enjoy her snack so cheerfully.

“Only one though.” Steven insisted, knowing full well that she was sure to ask for more.

Looking slightly disappointed, Spinel swallowed her treat and nodded her head, “fine. Thank you, Steven.”

Though Spinel was still upset that she couldn’t give Steven his gift right away, the day hadn’t been a total failure. After all, any time she got to spend with Steven was enough for her.

Steven smiled at Spinel before yawning a bit. He then turned for his bed and get himself under the blanket. He had spent most of the day out with Connie and was actually pretty tired.

Spinel closed her eyes for a moment and changed her attire in a flash of light. Now wearing a pink shirt and pajama pants, she was ready for bed as well. The Gem jumped onto the bed, causing Steven to bounce a little, warning a laugh from the both of them.

Steven watched as Spinel got herself under the blankets. He had gotten so used to Spinel sleeping beside him that it felt off whenever Pearl would make her sleep elsewhere. The bed was too big without her it seemed.

Once Spinel got comfortable beneath the blankets, she noticed Steven staring down at her and her heart thumped against her chest to her surprise.

“Wh...what is it?” She asked bashfully, more confused over the pang in her chest than his gaze on her.

It wasn’t until Spinel spoke up that Steven even realized he had been staring. With a nervous flinch, he smiled awkwardly and looked away, feeling his cheeks begin to burn.

“N-nothing. Sorry. I was just uh...thinking about something.”

An embarrassing silence fell between them now and Spinel didn’t like it. This was supposed to be like any other night. Had she done something wrong? Perhaps Steven was still upset that she had raised her voice at Connie earlier.

“You should get to sleep,” tried Spinel, holding out her arms with a smile.

Steven blushed even further, looking down at her as she waited for him to lean down into her arms.

“You know, I’m a lot bigger now...” he replied before clearing his throat a little.

Spinels smile faded quickly. Clearly dejected, she brought her arms back to herself and tried to smile as is if to shrug it off.

“Oh, of course. I just thought you might...”

As her voice trailed off Steven took in a deep breath and cleared his throat once more, holding out his arms this time, his eyes fixed on the blanket to keep from meeting Spinels gaze. This was a little embarrassing now that he wasn’t so small.

Spinel perked up almost at once, leaning forward quickly and snuggling against Stevens chest with a smile. Perhaps he wasn’t angry with her after all.

Seeing Spinel cheered up once again, Steven smiled and sighed in defeat. Spinels moods always shifted so quickly and everything showed on her face. He just couldn’t win against her when she seemed disappointed or sad. Laying himself down a little more, he hugged her thin frame, resting his head just above hers on the pillow and closed his eyes.

“Goodnight Spinel...” breathed Steven quietly.

“Goodnight...Steven,” Spinel whispered in reply. Today hadn’t gone as planned at all. Hopefully she could get Stevens gift fixed quickly and try again. After all, it was something very special to her and she wanted him to have it. However, thinking about fixing the present brought her mind back to seeing Connie and Steven together. The image brought another strange feeling in her chest. More painful this time. It’s not like she hadn’t felt this before. The past year or so, it’s how she always felt when Connie was around Steven. It’s why being around the girl was so uncomfortable for her. She didn’t like the pain in her gut and she began to find...that she didn’t much like Steven smiling at Connie the way he did. These feelings...Spinel hated it. She wasn’t supposed to be like this. Steven cared about Connie and Steven was her friend. So that meant that Spinel should like Connie as well, right? Spinel didn’t want to be a bad friend.

Hoping to make the painful feeling disappear, Spinel snuggled in closer to Steven and closed her eyes tight. He always made her feel better. He always made everything heavy feel light again. Everything would be okay...so long as Steven was here with her. She was sure of it.

A/N: Thank you all for reading Chapter One. The next chapter will be out soon. You can follow the tag on tumblr or follow the story on Fanfiction.net

My username is the same on both platforms.

[ameliasnormandy]

Psychiatrist interview Number 1. Marvel Fanfic

              I am a little nervous about doing this because most of the time, the fanfic that I write is for a more niche group, and I’m worried about people not liking this, but I had fun writing this, so I thought that I would put it out there. If you enjoyed reading it, please let me know. If I have anything wrong, please be kind.

              Thank you, and I hope you enjoy it.

This is my first interview with Subject Sparkle. I gave her that name because she had glitter all over her hair. She quickly tried to explain it as a scientific experiment she had with her younger nieces. She would hate that I used that as her code name, but I think, for the time being, it’s the best that I can give her.  

              I will be letting her speak on her own. I will not be adding anything that I said to her, and I will be adding very few extra information to help make decisions about Subject Sparkle.

              The first thing that I asked her about was the blip, and that is where we will start her entry.

The Event happened (Any time she mentions the blip, she only calls it The Event). Arguing about that won’t change reality. We all had to do things that changed our lives forever. I became the primary caregiver for seven children under the age of 13 when I was 17. I will say, thankfully, I already had a well-paying job, and my parents left my siblings and me enough to survive. I wish that was all behind us, but everyone knows it isn’t. We can try and say it is. We can pretend that it was all just a bad dream, but it isn’t for us who were stuck here. My siblings hate the fact that their children don’t want to go home with them. I don’t blame the kids; how can I? I have three that don’t recognize their parents at all. I have been the only parental figure that they have ever known. I can’t ask them to just go with strangers. I taught these kids since I have had them that we don’t do that, yet these strangers want to take them home with them, and I have to tell them, no, it’s okay, you can go with them. They aren’t actually strangers. They are your parents that disappeared years ago because some guy snapped his fingers, but their back now, so everything’s cool. Let me be clear as I say this, it’s not my siblings’ fault, their parents. They were unavailable. But their unwillingness to understand where their children are coming from frustrates me. It’s not that I don’t want them to go back to their parents.

I have been overly stressed for over five years now. I knew that my siblings would come back too. I told people at first, but eventually, I seemed crazy, and I gave too much false hope to the kids, so I stopped. Of course, now that hope really wasn’t false hope. What a crock that was. So many people told me that I was wrong that I started believing them. I started believing that my dreams were false. Dreams… It makes it sound like they were wishes. It’s not what they were, not really. No, they were actual dreams when I was sleeping. Now, everything I say doesn’t leave here, right?

(Every time that there is a moment where I am speaking, I will make a paragraph break, so you know that I was the one that forced her thought to change)

Alright, it wasn’t just when I was asleep. It happened when I was awake. Only a few times, though, so it wasn’t like I was hurting the kids.

Right, you’ve said your not here to judge me, but I do have to be a little bit careful. So, I remember I was making breakfast. There was a sudden crack in my head like a whip or glass shattering. Before I knew it, I saw us all together again.

(Her hand was shaking, just a little bit, I thought about giving her a small break but knew that we had just begun.)

No, it wasn’t like I was seeing the future. It was more ethereal than that. It was more like a whisp of reality, a whisper of what could be. We would all be standing in this orange smoke. I would try talking to them, and they kept repeating this exact stupid phrase, “They will fix this, and then you will live out your potential.” You know the they my siblings are referring to. They (The Avengers, again it’s something that she refuses to say) were everywhere before this went down, and some of them are still everywhere. They even made an insulting TV show (I am unsure what she means by this. I hope you can find information about it) about one of them. I find it utterly offensive to what could have been a unique and awe-inspiring legacy.

Oh right, this is supposed to be about me. Though to be a little bit fair to me, they have a big part to play in all of our lives. Everything had just found its place. And it’s not that I don’t understand why they did it. I do. And I appreciate all that they did, all that they were willing to do. I got my siblings back, but that doesn’t change all the problems…

You’re right. Sorry. You wanted this to be about me. You know, when I was little, I dreamed of being one of them. I was different when I was younger. More self-assured. As I’ve gotten older, just as many people can say, the more I don’t know what I’m doing. I can’t even blame it on the Event; I was like this before it happened. I will say that it made it worse. (She had been fidgeting a lot, but for this one moment, she seemed to straighten herself and quickly look over at me) Can I be frank for a moment? Why am I here?

I wasn’t one of the people sucked in by the Event.

No, I get that.

That, however, doesn’t explain anything (She started playing with her necklace again).

Nice distraction, doctor. I got this at a flea market about two weeks ago. My sisters forced me to go, even though I’ve always hated those things. Too many people. Too loud. Nothing to focus on except objects scattered this way and that. I have always hated them also. Even when I was little. My mother would drag me there, basically kicking and screaming, but once we got there, you would be hard-pressed to find a better-behaved child. Mother always prided herself on the fact that I was so put together as if she was responsible for the change. She wasn’t, but I think that if I had told her that, it would have broken her heart. I was never trying to do that. My mother and I were never on the best of terms, but we loved each other, which was enough for both of us for most of the time. There were a few times when that didn’t seem like enough. You have got to be kidding me. I can’t believe that I was about to talk to you about my mother. I’m not looking to be a cliché doctor. You know it might take a little less time if I knew what you wanted me to talk about.

I know. Whatever I find important, but that isn’t true. You keep wanting to steer the conversation, and I am more than happy to follow where ever you want to lead me because the quicker you tell me what you want to know, the faster I can leave.

It’s not you personally. I just am not a huge fan of people in general. Look, doctor, I don’t want to be rude, and I hardly think I am…

My children. What about them?

What do I think of them?

That’s an odd question. Isn’t it?

Well, alright, they are great. Good kids. They all have their own personalities. I have one graduating this year. He wants to follow in the family’s footsteps, and I don’t mean disappearing for five years. That sounds like an insensitive joke, but that’s what he tells me every time he talks about it. I think it’s his coping method. I can’t stop him from needing it. He was 12 when his parents left. All of a sudden, his aunt that was barely older than him, was looking after him.

Oh, no, truthfully, he took on the role of helping me faster than anyone could have predicted. He wasn’t angry at me. I was surprised. I probably would have felt better if he had been angry too.

No, how could I have…

Did I say…

Alright. I was angry for a little bit. I wasn’t angry at my family. I was angry at them. They wanted to pretend to be heroes, and then they couldn’t save any of us.

Am I still angry at them? I don’t know. I want to be constantly angry at them. Sometimes, I think it would be easier to blame them for everything that happened. Sometimes I think that… You know, a lot of people get it, or they don’t. We saw them fail. They failed us. They failed the world that they had promised to protect. Am I supposed to forgive them for that? But then, I think about me. What about me? If I were in their shoes, what would my decisions be? Would I be able to handle what they did? No, I don’t know. It’s not that I don’t think about it. I do—a lot. I think about it to an extreme degree.

Alright, yeah. Sorry. What do you want me to talk about?

There you again, steering the conversation but not directly telling me what you want.

The necklace? You’re still on that?

Alright, like I said, I got it at a flea market with my sisters. They were the ones that got it for me. They think that I need to wear more jewelry. I don’t wear much jewelry now, nor really did I ever. I don’t know why. The rest of the females and actually most of my family wore a lot of jewelry. Well, not a lot of jewelry, but they wore it. I just never found it comfortable. Comfort is a big thing with me. I like comfortable things. I like feeling things that swallow me up in fuzz.

No, not really. You always feel the cold of the metal. Now, I am not judging those who like jewelry. Some feel like that is their security blanket, and that’s fine. I just don’t think it’s mine. Maybe it was my family’s. My mom and dad were both rich to some extent, and they came from affluential parents. So, they always had the best. So, did my siblings. I guess the way that I say that, it sounds like I didn’t have the best. I had things handed to me too. I knew it was happening too. I wish I could say that changed my life for the better, but it didn’t. I’m still not like them. I still have anxiety about everything.

Yeah, I guess that goes back to why I play with things. Usually, it’s a hair tie on my wrist.

No, I’m not wearing one today. My sisters said that I needed to make a good impression on you. They said that wearing a hair tie anywhere other than my hair would be unseemly. I’m not entirely sure why they felt the need for me to make a good impression on you. They seem to think that you want to take the kids from me. That isn’t what’s happening here, right?

Are you sure?

You’re scaring me a little. Maybe they were right; perhaps I should have prepared better. When I got your email, I just assumed… I guess that’s what I get for assuming and… Oh, god… I told you about the breakfast thing… Please… You have to… I mean, I would like you to… I don’t know what… Maybe we could start…

Alright, I’m sorry for panicking. Those kids mean everything to me. I just… I don’t think that I could handle knowing that I abandoned them in any way. I want to know that I did everything for them if I could.

So, you want me to talk about the flew market, but you just said…

I know. I need to stop panicking, but…

Right. So, my sisters and I were there, and we were talking. I remember we talked about how it wasn’t fair that none of the girls wanted to go with them and that I hadn’t forced them like mom had forced me. I told them that it wasn’t right of me to do that. I had never taken the girls or the boys to do something like this. I made them do things they didn’t want to do, sure. Museums. History walking tours. Science centers. I wanted them to learn something, but we also had a lot of fun. One time I took them to…

Oh, I guess our time is winding down a little.

You need me to get through this. Why?

No, there has to be a reason. I’m not comfortable talking anymore until I know what is going on.

Checking anomalies caused by the Event. Why is a psychiatrist doing that and not a government agent?

That doesn’t make much sense.

Let’s try again. What do you want from me? Just tell me.

No, answers. Just more questions. Alright, just for this interview, I will finish this. So, there we were walking around this flea market, and my sisters and I were talking, and I guess I can admit that I was getting frustrated with them when suddenly, objects started falling from the sky. I quickly went into mommy bird protective mode and got everyone under a gazebo. There was a time or two it was really close. I’m not sure how we didn’t get hurt, but I was thankful it didn’t happen. We found the necklace lying on the ground after that, and I was already buying things from everyone.

I don’t know why. We found out that all of the objects falling from the sky were from other people’s booths. I just felt like I was somehow responsible for it, though I don’t think that I could have had anything to do with it. I am sorry I can’t do any more to help you.

You would like to see me on Wednesday. Why?

I don’t know if I can tell you anything more about what happened.

Alright, I will see you Wednesday then.

This is the interview that I got with her. I will now be including the newspaper article about the flea market. I feel, though, that you all know a lot more about this subject than the newspaper has shown, but you gave me very few details, and I wanted to show you what I was working with.

Yesterday, several objects fell from the sky at the Westerly flea market. The items that fell from the sky were objects that had slowly disappeared from the flea market all day. Sally Marshall, a woman selling her necklaces, said, “I was getting frustrated. I would turn around, and there was another necklace missing. I talked to several police offices scoping the area and said that everyone was finding items missing, but they couldn’t find anyone stealing anything. Then out of nowhere, I heard something hit the ground, and one of my necklaces fell from the sky. Soon there were a lot of things falling from the ground. A dresser almost hit me. Thankfully, a girl with her dark red hair in a giant hoodie pushed me out of the way.” We tried to find this girl for comment, but she had already left. Some call this a problem with the blip and that more events like this will continue to happen the longer that everyone is back—more information on page 6.

[myglogic]

Menace (Park Chanyeol x Reader) | 03

03 of ?

Other parts can be found in my Masterlist in my bio!

Genre: Mafia AU

Pairing: Chanyeol x Reader, very light Jongin (Kai) x Reader

Word count: 3,7k

Summary: Y/N’s job is dangerous. Working for one of the most dangerous mafia gangs, EXO, was not easy and Carter was aware. Her newest mission was by far the hardest one. Pretending to be Park Chanyeol’s new secretary to find out more about his successful company. It was easy to kill people and do missions related to that. But it was not easy to not fall in love with Park Chanyeol.

A/N: Hi guys. I know it’s been a long time! I honestly do not have an excuse for why it took so long. But here it is! The chapter still isn’t the highlight but it is the start for the real drama! So stay tuned ♥

Your breathing was heavy. You tried to comprehend what just happened. An open window and a CD. Someone entered your apartment somehow. You were trying to look for any hints. You also grabbed your gun that was hidden in a closet. Back then when EXO trained you, they also showed you how to read all the signs of a break-in and how you knew for sure that your apartment was not bugged.

You slowly searched every corner of your apartment. There were no bugging devices or cameras. You closed the window and looked at the CD. The cover of the CD was empty. You were never scared. Ever. But this felt weird. For the first time in years, you were alone. You needed to handle this professionally.

You decided to take the CD, carefully analyzing it, just to make sure that it was safe. There seemed nothing wrong with it. You took it out of its cover and put it in the CD slot of your laptop. There were pictures of you and Chanyeol on it. You recognized them. Those pictures were from a few days where Chanyeol had meetings. You were walking the building. It was from work, nothing too bad, right?

Wrong. The next few pictures showed you and Jongin, Baekhyun and the others. You didn’t know when these were taken. You didn’t even remember what kind of day that was. You were in casual clothing, spending normal time with them.

This meant that the person, who broke in your apartment knew both your normal self and Lee Miso. That person knew who you were. You expected something like a threat. But there was absolutely nothing. What were they trying to tell you?

You decided to keep quiet and investigate on your own. If you would inform EXO then they might be in danger as well and do something rash. You had to make sure to be as discreet as possible.

Your night was restless but you managed to get a few hours of sleep. The next day at the office seemed normal. No one was behaving weird or anything. You needed to be careful. Suspecting was a part of the plan. Even though you liked your colleagues a lot, you had no choice.

You sat by your desk, thinking about last night’s incidents as the beeping sound on the phone brought you back to reality. Chanyeol called you and you slowly got up to see him. You didn’t see him after the supermarket incident. You really hoped that his mood was alright today.

“You called me, sir?”, you said as you entered his office and closed the door behind you.

“Yeah... You arranged a meeting with Daesung Electronics again?”, he said, his tone surprised.

Daesung Electronics was a company that Chanyeol wanted to partner up with for a very long time now. You messed up his schedule back then and he missed his meeting with Daesung Electronics. You knew that this was very important to him, so you went there personally and convinced them to give Park Industries another chance. They seemed to be impressed by you, so they said yes. You were very proud of yourself of course.

“Oh, yes, I did!”, you told him and smiled.

“I called them and they talked about you. They told me that you went there by yourself?”, Chanyeol said and looked at you.

“I messed your schedule up, Mr. Park. I knew that this was very important to you. I had to do something.”, you explained.

Chanyeol smiled. He genuinely smiled for the first time. “Wow. I thought that it was over for sure. Thank you.”, he said. “Seems like you’re not that useless.”

You rolled your eyes. “I’m just doing my job.”

“Don’t think that I didn’t see your eyes rolling!”, he said but in a joking way.

You grinned. “Sorry.”

He seemed... different. Yeah. It was like someone else was talking to you. You liked this Chanyeol a lot more than the hard-ass boss. “Oh and Ms. Lee?”, Chanyeol asked.

“Yes?”

“Please clear my schedule next week on Wednesday, okay?”, he commanded.

You wondered why. “Of course, sir.”, you nodded and left the room. What was his plan? You didn’t know why you were so curious. Maybe Chanyeol himself was starting to become interesting. He even opened up a little bit. Maybe you would be able to get information out of him. Maybe.

You went to the office kitchen to get coffee, just to see Kang Seulgi. “Hey, how are you doing?”, you asked her and got a cup.

“Same old, same old. What about you though? Looks like you’re getting the hang of your job?”, she said and smiled.

“Yeah. It looks good for now.”, you got a second cup to make some ginseng tea for Chanyeol even though he did not ask you to do so. “I have a question.”, you said.

“Shoot.”, Seulgi leaned on the counter and sipped on her coffee.

“Chanyeol told me to clear his schedule next week on Wednesday. Do you know why? Does he have special plans or something?”, you asked, getting more curious.

“Is next week the 27th? It must be. I think that’s his birthday. He does that every year. He never works on his birthday. Maybe he wants to celebrate. No one really knows what he does though. Why are you asking?”, Seulgi asked, raising her eyebrows in a suggestive way.

“Well... Chanyeol is a workaholic, we both know that. He wouldn’t just ask me to clear his schedule because of his birthday. It just doesn’t seem like him.”, you asked yourself.

“Why don’t you ask him yourself?”

“I’m not crazy, Seulgi.”, you laughed. “I have to work now, see you later!”

The evening arrived quickly and you didn’t even notice that you were alone in the office. Chanyeol’s schedule was busy as hell and you had to work your butt off to make no mistakes. Your job was not easy but you tried your best.

Still wondering, what Chanyeol was doing on his birthday, you decided to buy him a small gift. Even though Chanyeol seemed like an asshole at first, you knew that deep down, he was a good person. You went outside and wondered what you could buy for him.

On your way home, you encountered a teenager, sitting at the bus station you were heading to. His clothes looked like a mess. It was cold and he seemed to be freezing. He tried to close his eyes and get a bit of sleep. He couldn’t. His eyes opened every few seconds. It hurt you. Seeing such a young person like that. It was pretty late and you suddenly saw yourself in that boy. When you were around that age, you had lots of troubles too. Just like that kid. At least to you, he looked troubled.

It was cold. A winter night. Even though you did manage to work here and there, you couldn’t afford a motel on this particular night. You did know that you could go to a few places that supported people like you without a home.

But you were so tired. You were tired of this life. You weren’t a person to give up that easily but sometimes life forced you to feel down. You sat at a bus station. It was close to the bar you worked at. It was cold and you were shivering. Sometimes you wondered if you would die on the streets. You didn’t expect your freedom to be like this.

You had very dark thoughts every now and then. Thoughts that should never be said out loud. You were physically and mentally exhausted and drained. Maybe today was that day. The day you would finally give up. It was still better than living such a miserable life. Better than working in a bar, where disgusting men eyed you.

You couldn’t hold back your tears anymore. You gulped hard. Why were you like this? What did you do to deserve this?

Hugging your old jacket close to your body, you hoped that you would survive this night without breaking down. Your gaze was on the ground. Suddenly a pair of shoes appeared in front of you. You looked up and saw a young man. He looked around your age and had a sympathetic look in his eyes. He looked a lot better than you. Healthier, warmer. He had black hair and a very nice-looking bone structure. His clothes seemed warm, warmer than yours. You felt a pang of jealousy just because of his healthy state. You did not even know why you thought that, when you looked horrible next to him. You were ashamed of yourself.

“Hey, are you okay?”, he asked you in a quiet voice. “It’s very cold, you must be freezing!”, he said and put his scarf around your neck.

You looked at him with your glossy eyes. “I’m fine.”, you said, not wanting to show your vulnerable side to a stranger.

“I’m Jongin by the way. Look... just a few months ago I was in the same situation as you. You shouldn’t be out here by yourself.”

You coughed. “I said I’m fine.”

“You don’t look fine to me. I’m not telling you to come with me or something. But I do know a place you could stay at, just for tonight. It’s specifically for women, it’s just around the corner.”, Jongin said, with concern in his voice.

“Why do you even care? I don’t even know you.”, you were very defensive. Even though he didn’t look dangerous. But you trusted no one.

He sighed. “Okay then. But I will come back and you will let me help you.”

That was the first time you met Jongin. It was a rather harsh first meeting, considering the situation you were in. He didn’t give up on you and you were glad that he was persistent. You would not be here if it wasn’t for him. Who knows what would have happened? You could be selling and taking drugs. Or even worse, prostitution.

You didn’t even want to think about those scenarios. Of course, your life still wasn’t perfect. I mean you did kill and scam people for a living. But at least you didn’t have to sell your body for that.

That kid looked exactly like you, freezing and alone. You sat down next to him and just like Jongin, you gave him your scarf. “You shouldn’t be out here.”, you muttered.

He looked at you, panic in his eyes. You couldn’t tell why. “Uh, thank you, miss.”, he said. He was looking around him. As if someone was chasing him.

“Do you need help?”, you whispered. “If something is wrong, you can tell me.”, you assured him.

“You shouldn’t be talking to me… Take the next bus and leave as fast as you can.”, he said, a scared tone visible in his voice.

“Look if you’re in danger, I can help you out…”

“No. You should really mind your own business, lady.”, he said and got up. He ran without even looking back.

That was a weird encounter for sure. You couldn’t shake off the feeling that this boy was here for reason. You couldn’t put a finger on it though. Before you could comprehend what happened a very nice and sleek looking car stopped in front of you.

As the windows rolled down, you noticed Chanyeol sitting in the car. “What are you doing here this late? Shouldn’t you be home by now?”, he asked you.

“Oh, I kind of worked overtime. It’s no big deal though!”, you quickly said.

“Ms. Lee, you really shouldn’t be taking the bus. I mean the bus comes only once an hour at this hour. I can drive you home, get in.”, he told you.

“Mr. Park, you can’t keep doing this. I feel like I’m using you for free rides. It’s fine, really!”

“Get in. This is an order.”, he said in a serious tone.

You rolled your eyes and got in. “Are you this bossy with every woman?”, you asked him as you put on your seatbelt.

“Only to the ones that don’t listen to me.”, he smirked. “Mostly, they do listen to me.”

“Oh yeah, I forgot. You can be very intimidating.”, you smiled and looked out of the window. “I heard your birthday is next week.”, you said and looked at him.

He didn’t say anything at first. His facial expression was neutral. “Yeah, I guess.”

“Are you having a party or something?”, you asked.

“No. I never celebrate my birthday. Also, you shouldn’t be this nosy. I just told you to clear my schedule, not to ask me what I’m doing that day.”, he said in a stern voice.

You sighed. “Sounds like you are spending your birthday alone then. That is kind of sad.”, you said, rather to yourself than to Chanyeol.

He drove to your neighborhood and you started recognizing your surroundings. “You don’t even know what I’m doing. You are just assuming things based on what you’re hearing in the office.”

“I do not do such a thing. I am assuming things based on what I see with my own eyes. Ever since I started working for you, I didn’t see a family member or a girlfriend or whatever. You kind of seem lonely.”, you didn’t know why you were saying these things to him. Maybe you felt the same and talked about yourself. You were just as lonely as him, even if you didn’t want to admit it.

Chanyeol was just quiet. “My loneliness is none of your business, Ms. Lee.”, he said. You could see a flicker of emotion in his eyes. Maybe you hit a spot. Maybe you were saying the truth.

“Sorry, I just talked without thinking. I should take more breaks or something.”, you said looking down. “But still, no one should spend their birthday alone.”

He sighed and stopped in front of your house. “Okay. You really want to know what I’m doing, huh?”

“No, I didn’t imply that.”, you quickly responded. His eyes looked genuine for once.

“Look, how about you come with me? Since you’re my assistant after all.”, he looked at you. “You don’t have to work then. I’ll send you the time and the address, alright?”

You didn’t know why but your heart started fluttering. You wondered where he would take you. “O-Okay. I really didn’t want to be too nosy. I can stay at work if you’d like-“

He interrupted me. “No. I want you to see it. I’ll text you.”

After getting out of the car, you waved at him as he drove off. You looked around and made sure that no one followed you. It was weird for Chanyeol to be like this.

You sat on your bed and wondered what would happen on his birthday. You wanted to make sure to get him the perfect present. Taking your laptop out, you ordered his gift. He might or might not like it but at least you wouldn’t go empty-handed.

The 27th arrived quickly and you weren’t sure what was expecting you. Chanyeol told you that you should just wear casual clothing, so you went for a nice sweater with some jeans and white sneakers. What confused you to was that the address he sent you was an orphanage. Why would Chanyeol meet you at an orphanage out of all places?

Chanyeol arrived, again in his expensive car, and parked. “Well, Ms. Lee. You are probably why I would meet you here.”, he said and gave you a smile.

You looked at him. “Before you explain why we’re here… Happy Birthday.”, you said, a little embarrassed, giving him a little gift, wrapped beautifully.

Chanyeol was perplexed. He did not expect you to bring him something, especially a gift. “Ms. Lee, I appreciate that but you really didn’t need to do that.”, he said, rejecting the gift.

You sighed. “I want you to have it. See it as a thank you for not firing me already!”, you gave him a sweet smile.

Chanyeol sighed and opened the gift, just to find a new mug that said: Bring me my ginseng tea! You had to bring him that stupid ginseng tea every day in his favorite mug. You remembered that he dropped his special mug and it broke (you had to clean it.). It wasn’t a huge gift. What could you buy a man that already had everything he wanted? “Oh… a new mug.”, he couldn’t hide his smile. “At least no one will mix up my favorite tea now… Thank you.”, he said and gave you an even bigger smile.

You were relieved because you didn’t know how he would react to his gift. But seemed to genuinely like it. “No problem. I had to buy you something.”, you said. “Well, explain now. Why are we here?”

Chanyeol turned to the orphanage. “Well, I visit this orphanage every year on my birthday and bring some gifts for the kids in there.”, he explained to you as he opened the trunk of his car.

You saw lots of toys in his trunk, really expensive ones too. “Really? Why would you do that and keep it a secret like this? I mean you were really secretive about it…”

Chanyeol didn’t answer your question. “How about we go inside?”, he said and went into the building.

You tried to understand why he avoided the question but your heart still warmed up thinking about the fact the visited these kids every year instead of partying. You really wondered how his company, and Chanyeol himself, could be connected to the rival gang. He didn’t seem like the type to do illegal business.

After walking inside, you heard a few squeals of joy. Some kids immediately walked up to Chanyeol and hugged him. The kids took you by surprise and hugged you too. “Are you Channie’s girlfriend?”, a little girl asked you immediately. “Are you married?”

Chanyeol’s went as red as yours. “Oh, no! I am working with… Channie.”, you said, not trying to laugh out loud. Chanyeol glared at you after hearing his nickname and you just gave him a grin.

“Kids, I brought every single one of you something!”, he said brought in the toys.

An older woman came in and smiled. “Chanyeol is back. I almost started to wonder if he would come!”

You looked at the woman who seemed kind of familiar to you. “Hello, I am his assistant… Lee Miso.”, you said.

“Oh, Chanyeol brought someone with him? That’s a first!”, she said, excited.

“Like I said, we are only working together!”, you told her.

She winked at you. “Yeah, sure!”

You sighed. “Can you tell me why he does this?” And why was she addressing him so casually?

The woman gave you a sad smile. “Well, Chanyeol was one of those kids a long, long time ago.”

Then you remembered your research. You knew that he didn’t have much, to begin with. But you didn’t know that he was an orphan.

“His parents died when he was around eight and none of his relatives wanted to take him in… so he ended up here.”, the woman added. “But he never forgot about us.”

Once again, you had a warm feeling inside of you. You really should stop feeling like this but you couldn’t help it. He was a good person and deep down you knew something was off. He couldn’t be one of the bad guys.

Chanyeol walked up to you. “I guess you know why I am here instead of celebrating. I celebrate my birthday with these kids.”, he said and smiled at you. Then he hugged the woman. “Jangmi noona always helped me through the hard times here. I wasn’t one of those lucky adopted kids but she still took care of like my own mother would.”

The woman, Jangmi, started crying. “Of course, I do that with every kid. They need and deserve attention. Who else would do that if not me?”, she said and hugged him back. “I’ll look after the kids for now. Thank you for visiting Chanyeol.”, she said and went to the room where the kids were.

“No one ever dared to ask me why I took the day off, assuming that I would just party. You were the first person to ask me that. Why did you ask me?”, Chanyeol wondered.

“I only worked here for a little over a month… But it just doesn’t seem like you take a day off. You didn’t even want to go to Hawaii for vacation. I don’t know… Maybe it was a gut feeling?”, you told him, not really answering the question.

He seemed satisfied with your answer. “People might not see what I see. But you know what you are doing. You are a very perceptive person.”, he looked at you now. “Something about you is off… When I compare your CV with you… you seem like a different person.”

Your heart started beating faster. Did he find out who you really were? “You make mistakes but you fix them. You aren’t as perfect as your CV described you… but that’s what makes you Lee Miso.”, Chanyeol added. “There is more to you than meets the eye.”

You felt sad. There was more to you, that was true. He became an orphan at a very young age and you felt like one your whole life. Your past was not as shiny as Lee Miso’s and you wish your life would have went just like Chanyeol’s. But it didn’t and you had to live with the fact that you kill people for a living. That you faked being a completely different person and lied to the honest and hard-working person standing in front of you.

You felt not only sad but sick. Your mission was clear to you but now you had to work even harder to prove that Park Chanyeol was not doing illegal business, otherwise, he might be in danger. It wasn’t just a job anymore. You had to prove this man’s innocence. Your gut feeling told you that he was innocent and you believed it.

[flowerpowell]

The Boy Next Door (Colt x MC / Logan x MC )

PART ONE

A/N: Here’s the first part of my new RoD series! It’s an AU so many, many details are changed and differ from canon. It is also loosely inspired by a book titled “Thoughtless” by SC Stephens (it’s really good and I’d recommend reading it!). If you’re wondering why you’re on the taglist, it’s because you probably even forgot asking me to put you on it 😅 If you wanted to be removed (or added), let me know! I hope you’ll like it, I’d love to hear your feedback! (Also, forgive me any mistakes, it’s been a while since I wrote anything and it’s really late and hsajdaa I promise next chapter will be better!)

Rating: PG-16 (I have no idea how to rate things)

Word count: 1820

Tagging: @brightpinkpeppercorn @confessionsofabrokegirl @akrenich @lovehugsandcandy @walkerduchess @zaffrenotes @long-gone-girl @going-down-downtown @choicesthot @umiumichan @withoutanyconfidence @desiree-0816 @emceesynonymroll @emichelle @hellomynameisdevi @client-327 @liamzigmichael4ever @badchoicesposts @choicesarehard @poor-bi-choices @pixel-thirsty @blackcatkita ♥

Ellie Wheeler was not a confident, outgoing and spontaneous person. On the contrary, she liked having a routine, some sort of anchor in her life. She always had a plan and wanted to stick to it. There was nothing crazy about it, graduate highschool, go to college, find a job. She already did the first part, now she was supposed to go to another state and move in with her boyfriend so she could attend the university of her dreams and he could find a better job. And then everything would be great, just how she had planned it. Except that it wasn’t. Logan had to stay in California because his boss needed him and Ellie had to move here alone. Well, almost alone.

Logan did a few calls and arranged her a room in his old friend’s house. Colt was just a few years older than Ellie and Logan but he already had his own place and apparently nothing against her moving in.

“Here we are,” Logan’s voice interrupted her thoughts and she looked through the car window. The house was unexpectably big, as for someone who lived alone. Ellie noticed the backyard and smiled at the thought of studying outside. Even though the perspective of being here all alone (and Colt still was a stranger) was freaking her out, she tried to keep calm and be optimistic. At least she didn’t have to pay a lot of money for renting a room; apparently Colt owned Logan a favor. She wanted to know more, what kind of favor and what he did but Logan said it was something from the past and it didn’t matter.

Cautiously studying the area, she walked up to the door. Logan leaned down and retrived the key from behind the flower pot. He opened the door and Ellie met with the saddest interior of the house she ever saw. The house was pretty much empty. No decorations, only the most important pieces of furniture. It looked as if no one even lived there.

“Your friend must be a fan of minimalism I see. I hope there’s a bed in my room at least,” she said to Logan who only smiled at her in response.

“He must be out somewhere. Probably will be back later. But I do know which room is yours so let me show you!” He took her suitcase and led her up the stairs to her new bedroom.

Taking in the empty space around, she had a pretty clear picture of what Colt would be like. She was thankful Logan would stay the first night here with her so she didn’t have to meet her new suitmate on her own.

“I’m going to miss you so much,” she pouted when they were finally in her bedroom, just as empty as the rest of the house, but at least with a bed and a closet in it.

“I’m gonna miss you, too, Ellie,” Logan turned to her and kissed her softly. When they parted, he looked at her sad face and shook his head. “You know how I wish I could stay here with you. Be with you on your first day of school. But I have a good job back at home and I–”

“No, I understand. I’m just bummed cause I thought we were going to live together and have our own little house.”

“There’s always next year, Ellie. I promise we’ll have our own house one day,” he kissed her forehead and they went back to unpacking. When she was all set, Logan showed her where the bathroom was and she took a shower, wondering how this whole Colt guy didn’t even have a mirror in his bathroom. Was this house a museum? Did he even spend time here? Well, I hope yes, cause I don’t want to live alone in this big house.

Colt still didn’t show up when they both went to sleep, Ellie’s head on Logan’s chest. She was trying to remember how his skin felt on her skin, remember his scent, so perfectly Logan, so perfectly home.

When she woke up, Logan was still asleep and quietly, she left the room to make breakfast. She noticed the door to the room next to hers was slighly open so she decided to take a quick peek inside. Nothing surprised her, however, because apart from a few shirts on the bed, some magazines on the table, the room was just as empty as hers.

Sighing, she left the room and headed downstairs. She really needed coffee. As she entered the kitchen, someone was already there. No, not just someone. It must be Colt.

“Hey! You must be Colt!” she started cheerfully, extending her hand for him to shake. He turned to her and eyed her up with amusement in his eyes but didn’t take her hand.

“Hey, stranger. Coffee?”

“Sorry! I’m Ellie! I’m Logan’s girlfriend! We arrived yesterday but you weren’t here! I hope it’s okay! Thanks for the coffee!” Why am I yelling? Why is my voice so… squeaky?

“Yea, I figured,” he chuckled and took a sip of his coffee.

“We took a room next to yours, I hope it’s okay, too! Logan is leaving today, he was here only for one night,” she tried to explain and he raised an eyebrow.

“Not like that!!! Don’t worry, we didn’t sleep together like this, we just slept, you know, with our eyes closed, and– oh my gosh,” Why am I so awkward!!!! Her cheeks reddened with embarrassment as she watched Colt with, was it smile on his face?

“It’s okay, I don’t care,” he said before placing his mug in the dishwasher.

“No, really, we decided to wait,” she added and wanted to facepalm herself the second she heard what came out of her mouth. Why am I telling him this!!!!

“I really don’t care, stranger.” He saw Logan entering the kitched and nodded towards him, “How do you stop your little girlfriend from talking to me about your sex life?”

“She what?!” Logan’s eyes widened as he turned towards Ellie.

“I’m sorry, I had a word vomit, I only said I wasn’t ready so we’re waiting because I didn’t want him to think we don’t know how to behave when I said we spent the night here and– Oh my gosh, I need to stop,” she covered her mouth with her hand and left the kitchen. Why do I have to be so awkward? Why, Ellie, why??

Logan joined her after a moment. “Are you sure you can stay here alone? Maybe I should just resign and–”

“No, I’m fine,” she snuggled closer to him and he put his hands around her waist. “I just hate meeting new people. I’m not really good at this.”

“Yeah, I’ve noticed,” he kissed her hair and chuckled. “You really shared too much.”

She groaned, “Is it too late to find a new apartment?”

~~~~

The day passed more quickly than Ellie would want it to. After taking a long walk around the neighborhood with Logan, it was time for him to go. She was about to stay here alone, far away from home, from her family, her friends and now from her boyfriend too.

“I really wish you didn’t have to go,” Ellie sighed, handing a backpack to her boyfriend.

“Me too, love. Me too.” He stopped to kiss her and she put her arms around his neck.

“I promise I’ll be visiting you as often as I can! I have a few days off next week, I’ll visit you. And I’ll be here for our anniversary next month. You’re coming home for Thanksgiving and Christmas, so it shouldn’t be that bad!”

“Yeah, but not seeing you every single day sucks,” she pouted and Logan kissed her lips again.

“I promise it’s not gonna be that bad. Just focus on school and call me anytime you want, okay?”

She nodded and they kissed again before Logan got in the car and closed the door. When his car finally disappeared, she heard her phone ring. She smiled seeing a message from Logan.

“Miss you already, troublemaker xx”

~~~~

“Good morning! Coffee?” she greeted Colt who just entered the kitchen. He looked at her suspiciously but took the mug from her.

“Why are up so early? I thought your classes don’t start until ten,” he asked and she noticed how hoarse his voice sounded. He clearly just woke up, not only his voice indicated that but also his hair and his pajamas. Or rather the lack of it. He didn’t even bother to cover himself, he was wearing only his boxers and Ellie had to use all her willpower to look elsewhere.

“I couldn’t sleep, I’m so nervous I might throw up. Whoops, sorry, too much information, again,” she mentally facepalmed herself. Do I have any self control?

“S’okay, I think I already made peace with your oversharing tendencies,” he said and headed towards the living room. Ellie took her mug and followed him.

“What about you? Why are you up so early? What job do you have?” she wanted to get to know her new roomate a little but he only shot her an annoyed look.

“Are you investigating me?”

“No, sorry! I just thought since I already told you so much about myself so I thought–” “I didn’t ask you to tell me anything about yourself,” he interrupted her. “And there’s no need for me to tell you anything. We just live in the same house, we’re not friends or anything. You don’t have to talk to me.”

She wanted to say something but she was so taken aback by his coldness that she just stood there, watching him leave the room. Her phone brought her back to reality with a new message from Logan:

“Good morning! I love and miss you! Kick ass on your first day at uni xx”

She smiled but before she could type the reply, her phone rang again with another message from her boyfriend:

“Attaching a photo of me so you can’t say you didn’t see me today. Love you!”

Ellie quickly saved the picture and stared at it for longer than necessary. She missed Logan so much but that message comforted her. Even though she was alone in a different state, even though she was just about to start a new chapter of her life, and even though she was stuck with a human definition of pain in the ass, she knew she had Logan’s love and support and with that, she could survive anything.

With a bit more confidence, she marched into her room to pick a perfect outfit for the first day of the new chapter of her life.