#i am like. ninety percent sure there will be more in this universe

[woso-dreamzzz]

Magda's Princesse

Hardersson x Child!Reader

Part of The Big Adventures Universe

Summary: A look back at your birth from Magda's perspective

Magda is already at the airport when she gets the call. She recognises the caller ID instantly and a smile appears on her face as she answers it.

"I'll be there soon," She says," I'm just about to get on the plane."

"You need to call Emma," Is what Pernille answers.

Magda's just about to get her ticket checked. She stops. "What?"

"You need to call Emma," Pernille repeats," And tell her that you'll be sitting the next few games out. You're busy."

Magda, for some reason, is feeling especially stupid because she just can't quite grasp what's being told to her. "But I'm not?"

"You are!" Pernille snaps before she lets out a groan of pain," Because I will be damned if I push your baby out and you run back to England a few days later."

Magda slumps into her seat in shock. "But...You can't be having her now! She's early!"

"By two days." Pernille sounds like she's gritting her teeth. "I'll send you the hospital address. I don't care how you do it but if you miss this, Magda, I will not be happy."

The line is dropped.

Magda is a tight ball of worry the entire flight. She's drunk two glasses of wine to ease her worries before cutting herself off in case she accidentally drinks herself into a coma before getting to the hospital.

She's one of the first off the plane and through border control. It takes half an hour to get her luggage and then another to find a taxi that will get her to the hospital.

Fischer is waiting outside for her, guiding Magda inside without little fanfare.

"She came to visit us at training," Magda's national teammate tells her," And then she went into labour."

"And the baby?"

"Fine so far," Fischer replies," Nothing to report."

Magda bursts into the room and attaches herself to Pernille. "Am I late?"

Pernille gives her a look. "Does it look like you're late?"

No, it certainly doesn't and Magda breathes a sigh of relief. "I think I scared Nilla. I left all my luggage with her."

"She's got spare keys," Pernille replies through deep, calming breaths as she works through another contraction," She can take your stuff to my place."

"Is it bad?" Magda asks sympathetically, letting Pernille squeeze her hand," The pain?"

"I've been told it will get worse," Pernille says," The nurse said I'm only five centimetres dilated. We could be here for a few more hours. Have you called Emma yet?"

Magda shakes her head. No, she hasn't. She was a bit preoccupied with making sure that she didn't miss the birth.

"We have time," Pernille says," Call her now and tell her."

●～●～●～●～

It's early in the morning when you make your appearance.

In solidarity, Magda does not go to sleep even though Pernille tells her to multiple times. She doesn't because if Pernille is suffering then it doesn't stand to reason that Magda gets to relax.

She's glad about it too because you come very early in the morning and if she was sleeping, Magda is ninety percent sure that Pernille wouldn't have been able to wake her up.

But you arrive with a lot of fanfare and even more screaming.

The doctor looks at you before turning around to get your weight from the nurses while Magda mops up Pernille's sweaty forehead and pulls her in for a gentle, loving kiss.

"You did it," She whispers," She's here."

Pernille, still exhausted, manages a smile. "She's here."

"For the mamas," The doctor says in stilted English.

He passes the bundle into Magda's arms.

You're finally quiet, swaddled securely in the baby blanket your parents had picked out for you weeks ago. You're staring up at her, with wide unblinking eyes. Your mouth is open and sucking on the air, rooting for milk already.

There are wisps of hair on your head and Magda gently unwraps you. You whine a little at the loss of warmth but quieten instantly when you are laid on Pernille's bare chest.

She looks down at you with a soft look. Her finger came up to stroke your cheek. You turn your head, lips searching for milk but catching her finger instead.

She coos at you as you suckle on her finger, eyes drooping shut.

Pernille looks up at Magda, who has her camera out and has already taken pictures she knows are going to be framed on the wall of her London home.

"She's here," Pernille says again with a watery smile.

"She is," Magda replies. She joins Pernille on the bed and gently strokes your little wisps of hair. "Look at her. We've done so well. She's so sweet."

"You make beautiful babies," Pernille says with a smile.

Magda laughs. "You can't say that to anyone. I've already gotten annoyed with the teasing about me knocking you up."

"Mm," Pernille laughs too," But you did knock me up. I've got the outcome right here."

Your eyes are open again, blinking to adjust to the light and your new outside surroundings. You suck more heavily on Pernille's finger.

"I think she needs a feed," Magda says.

●～●～●～●～

They're discharged from hospital the next day and Magda hovers incessantly when they take you back to Pernille's apartment.

Your nursery has been set up for weeks now, in anticipation when Magda had last visited and raided the local IKEA, building everything herself.

You're dressed up snugly in a bunny onesie, your feet kicking as your finally placed in your crib - which had been immediately moved into Pernille's room when it became clear that neither she nor Magda wanted to be separated from you.

"Hi, princesse," Magda coos.

You kick your legs again.

"You're so pretty, yes you are."

You're kicking becomes more repetitive as you stick your fist in your mouth.

"Look at those legs go. You're going to be such a good addition to Sweden when you're older."

"You mean Denmark," Pernille rasps. She rubs her eyes, having just taken a quick power nap. "I'm not raising my daughter to wear a Sweden jersey."

Magda rolls her eyes playfully. This conversation had been happening ever since they found out Pernille was pregnant. "We'll see."

Pernille picks you up gently, supporting your head before guiding Magda to the rocking chair, slowly placing you in her arms.

Magda leans down to kiss your head and breathe in your unique newborn smell. She smiles. You stare up at her.

A camera sounds and Magda doesn't even have to look up to know Pernille is grinning.

"That's getting framed," Pernille says," I think I'll put it on my bedside table. So I can remember this moment with you and the princesse."

"We need to give her a name soon," Magda says as Pernille crouches by the rocking chair and pulls the onesie's hood up onto your head, making it look like you have floppy bunny ears. "We can't keep calling her the princesse."

"Mmm." Pernille's finger strokes over your cheek. "I know it wasn't on the list but I like y/n."

"y/n," Magda repeats," Is that your name? Are you a y/n?"

You kick your legs out, catching Magda in the ribs.

"That's a pretty powerful strike, princesse. I think she's giving us her approval."

Pernille's eyes are so full of love that Magda almost bursts into tears. "I think so too. y/n Harder-Eriksson."

"y/n Eriksson-Harder."

"We've got another day before the trip to the embassies. We'll argue about her last name later," Pernille says," What matters right now is princesse has a name now."

"It's a very pretty name."

[pipermca]

Feedback Fest 2024

In honour of International Fanworks Day (today! February 15) I am posting some fic recommendations that I've made in the past. (I am super swamped at work and can't write up any new recs, but I previously rec'd these over on my main blog over the past few years. I'm collecting them together again here on my writing blog!)

These ten rec's are in no particular order, and all are in the Transformers fandom (with some crossovers). Ratings and pairings (if relevant) are noted.

(I also had to split this list into two parts because I waxed too poetic about these fics. See my reblog for the next part. 🙂)

Frivolities by @neveralarch (G, Megatron & Starscream). Summary: “My correct form of address is in my ID tag,” snapped Starscream. “Use it or lose your tongue.” My comments: I love this story. I love it so much I’ve recommended it to people who would ordinarily never read Transformers fanfic, simply because I think they’d appreciate what the author is doing. They took canon and fanon, and from it alchemized a story of dysphoria and wanting to be seen and acknowledged in a way the character wants, and wrapped it up in a tidy package that hits like a truck, and have I mentioned I love this story! (makes fists) Read it!

Working Through It by @trinarysuns (M, Skywarp/Thundercracker/Marissa Faireborn). Summary: “TC,” Skywarp says, “I’m, like, ninety percent sure that humans don’t have interface cables.” Thundercracker squawks and almost knocks him over trying to get the script out of his hands. My comments: I can’t say enough about this story. I love it and it pushed so many buttons for me. Not even smutty buttons, just interaction buttons: humans interacting with giant alien robots, old loves reuniting, logitical issues of interspecies getting it on… Tumblr deleted my review of this story, (SIGH) so I reposted my review on DW here. It says a lot more about this fic!

The Soft Rush of Black Static by Monstrosibee (NR, Bluestreak/Prowl). Summary: Prowl doesn’t know a lot of bots on this newly salvaged Cybertron, and he definitely doesn’t know the bot intruding on his construction site. My comments: While this fic is essentially a fix-it fic for a story from the Aligned continuity, it just destroyed me. You can read the basics of what happened between Bluestreak and Prowl on TFWiki (at the end of Chapter 7 of The Covenant of Primus) but it was devastating to actually read how upset Prowl was by what happened. This short little fix-it brought all those emotions back and then healed them. I loved this.

Someone You Might Have Been by @astolat (T, Megatron/Optimus Prime.) Summary: I didn’t love him because he wasn’t you. My comments: I'm rec'ing this because it's just pure "this is exactly what I want to read!" for me. This is a delightful mashup of the Shattered Glass universe and G1, in which the Optimus Primes from each universe get (temporarily) swapped. It’s an amazingly heartwrenching MegOP story.

Crash Site by Slyboots (G, Breakdown/Knock Out). Summary: June Darby does not believe in aliens, or in haunted highways, or in government conspiracies, or in any other small-town folklore. The new mechanics in town are uncanny, all the same. My comments: I am a sucker for Transformers: Prime fics, and one of the (it's canon! suck it Hasbro) ships from the show that I love is Knock Out/Breakdown. But besides that, I just love the vibe of this story. You can feel Knock Out and Breakdown in it, even if June doesn’t really see them, except out of the corner of her eye. And I am SO HERE for the idea that the two of them got some lovely downtime together before the events in TFP.

[aemonds-little-belle]

FEELINGS SOLD SEPARATLY

CHAPTER TWELVE (THE BURN)

Modern!Aemond x Reader

Notes - TW (Burn mentions, First degree)

TAGS - (REPOSTED FROM AO3)

Alternate Universe - Sugar DaddySugar BabySugar Baby AUAUokay this is a whole ass story that's just one long ass brain fartliterally i am just coming up with this on the spotlow key really love it thoughSugar Baby/Sugar Daddyobviouslytalks of class issuesaemonds been hurt in the pasti think there will be some sexy stuff eventuallywait fuck i didn't mention this is a modern!aumodern!AUAlternate Universe - Modern Setting<3Aemond "One-Eye" Targaryen is Bad at Feelingsstop that was recommended but so accurateI don't know how to do tagsI'm SorryI promise it's goodAnd no one diesand it's just so classically a sugar baby/ sugar daddy au it hurtsreader works at a cafe ... obviouslythis will follow a similar storyline to the show just modern and also not at allFamily Issueswait probably dom/sub vibes tooDom/subLight Dom/subclearly i don't know where this is going yetmy readers are always written fat because i am fatso keep that in mindSlow Burnit's so slowbut I think it's greatlike genuinely two idiots in lovebut they take soooo long to noticeUghI love fanfiction

“Okay.” Y/n sighed as she walked back to the counter, phone in one hand, apron in the other. “I did the quiz.” 

“And?” 

“I’m ninety eight percent a submissive.” Y/n whispered, showing  her phone screen to Eyla, the number and the word ‘Congrats!’ now in her line of sight. 

“And how do you feel?” She asked. 

“I don’t know.” Y/n mumbled, putting her phone down before tying on her apron. “It’s not like it’s going to do anything. I’m not going to bring any of this up unless he does.” 

“Why not?” 

“Because I just became a sugar baby four days ago.” Y/n began busying herself with the coffee makers once more. “I don’t think I’m ready to jump feet first into a whole new dynamic this soon, a much more serious one too.” 

“That’s fair.” Eyla sympathized, she was sure the idea would be overwhelming if it was her in the opposite position. “Do you think he’ll bring it up at all?” Y/n shook her head ‘no’. “Well has he said anything that makes you feel like he wants something more than just a sugar baby relationship?” 

Y/n sighed. “Last night he might have?” Y/n questioned, her body on autopilot as she began getting some drinks ready. “He kind of insinuated he wanted to see my lipdsomthels.” Y/n blurred the last few words. 

“Really?” Eyla sassed, her hand on her hip. “Come on, say it like a big girl.” 

Y/n took a deep breath. “I was pouting because he wouldn’t show me his other tattoos.” She began, Eyla raising her eyebrows in amusement. “And he said my pouty lips were cute.” 

“Okayyy.” Eyla encouraged her to keep going. 

“He said they were cute, but he’d rather see them do something else.” 

“You’re kidding!” Eyla squealed. “Y/n why didn’t you lead with that! You bitch!” Eyla laughed, throwing a towel at Y/n. 

“Because I don’t know if he meant it, you know, in a non friend way.” Eyla rolled her eyes. “Maybe he just meant he wanted to see me smiling instead of pouting.” Y/n offered, shrugging her shoulders. 

“Smile my ass.” Eyla scoffed. “He wants you on your knees, his dic…” 

“Eyla I sweat to the gods I will …” 

“I’ll stop, I’ll stop.” Eyla laughed. “But seriously? I think he wants more, a lot more, from you.” 

“Can we just move on?” Y/n pleaded. “As fun as it is to talk about this, I don’t want to get my hopes up.” 

 “Sure, why don’t you grab some sugar from the back, please?” Eyla batted her lashes. “And put your phone in your locker, I don’t need the police here about another stolen phone.” Eyla happily changed the subject, distracting Y/n from the previous conversations. 

“Right, sorry.” Y/n chuckled, grabbing her phone and quickly doing as asked, her fake lock easily removed, phone placed atop her jacket.

+

Getting sugar was a crappy job, the bags often breaking open, spilling sugar everywhere, and even just holding the bag got your clothing sticky, the task uncomfortable and something Eyla almost always tried to get out of. “Hi, what can I get you?” Eyla happily asked, relishing in her new found freedom of not getting the sugar from the back. 

“Two vanilla lattes please.” The one Woman said, her tone mocking in a way, as if Eyla should have just guessed what they wanted without difficulty. 

“Eyla!” Y/n shouted excitedly as she walked back to the counter. “I found a bag without any holes!” A smile was plastered on her face, pride swelling in her chest. 

“No way, that’s unfair.” Eyla pouted. “You should have left it for me.” 

“Oh please, remember when you left me the bag with an entire rip down the side? And then didn’t warn me about it?” Y/n raised her eyebrows. 

“Y/n?” A slightly familiar voice called out. “The Flea Bottom feeder, right before my own    eyes once again.” Nera chuckled, turning to the woman beside her. “This is Y/n, Aemonds new little whore.” 

“I wouldn’t call her little.” The second woman chuckled, looking Y/n up and down. “Huh, honestly I expected more from Aemond.” The women tutted. 

“Sorry, who are you?” Y/n asked, Eyla off to the side, still making the women's coffee, but ready to step in whenever necessary. 

“What?” The woman’s eyebrows furrowed, Y/n’s words clearly bothering her. “What do you mean who am I?” She looked to Nera, who shrugged her shoulders, though subtly surprised herself at the interaction. 

“I’m sorry, should I know who you are?” Y/n tried to remain as neutral as possible, though just the sight of Nera played on her nerves ever so loudly. 

“I’m Alys, Alys Rivers.” She said so smugly, as if she was waiting for a grand reaction. 

“Okay, nice to meet you.” Y/n nodded her head and walked off, picking up a coffee pot to make another order, the two women heard whispering behind her.

“I was Aemond’s Sugar Baby, and you took him from me.” Y/n froze. “Which is shocking, I mean who would want to be seen with someone who screams charity case!” She happily continued. “It’s so unlike Aemond to stoop so low, I mean really, do you think it’ll last? That he’ll keep you around? You’re just another whore f…” 

“Fuck!” Y/n screamed, the sound of spilled coffee filling the room, Y/n holding her hand out as her chest heaved. “Fuck!” Y/n began walking to the back, the sink in the bathroom her destination, the tears in her eyes limiting her vision, slowing her down, but she eventually found her way, the sink turned on immediately. “Fuck.” She whispered, too many emotions, too much physical pain, too much everything getting to her all at once. “Eyla!” Y/n cried, her hand under the water throbbing, the skin clearly irritated, her sobs drowned out by the running water. 

Eyla could hear Y/n in the back, the cries faint, but still there, the entire shop looking through the small opening leading to the back, trying to get a glimpse of anything. “Look, everyone, I’m going to have to close the shop early!” She yelled, trying to ensure she had everyone's attention, the crowd mumbling objections, though many began to file out. “I know, and I’m sorry. We’ll be open tomorrow as usual.” She explained, walking around the counter and urging people out, a few regulars wishing Y/n well as they left. “Fuck.” Eyla whispered as she flipped the ‘open’ sign to ‘closed’. 

“Eyla?” Y/n called out again, the running water still loud. 

“I’m going to get you some stuff, okay! I’ll be just a second!” Eyla shouted back. “Or twenty minutes.” She whispered to herself as she devised a plan, pacing a little before nodding, her walk to the back locker area a quick and determined one. “Fuck, okay.” Eyla tried to hype herself up. “I’m just calling a Targaryen, really, it’s not that big of a deal!” She whisper yelled, shaking her head back and forth. 

“Eyla I don’t know what to do.” She heard Y/n call out again, her voice sounding more and more shaky, the emotional breakdown just as prevalent as the physical one. 

“Just keep running it under some water, Y/n, you’re going to be fine!” Eyla lied, she had no idea how bad the burn was, or how much of her hand was burned, she was panicking. “Just, just getting something!” Eyla opened Y/n’s locker, her phone picked up, the screen turning on. “Shit okay.” Eyla panicked slightly, not knowing the password, though she soon realized there was none. The phone was newer than hers, but the contact list was one of the only things available on the screen, and Aemond’s contact the only one other than hers. “Come on, pick up, pick up.” She begged. 

“Little dragon?” A deep voice boomed from the other side. 

“Awww, wait, that's a really cute nickname!” Eyla cooed, a smile concealing the panic on her face. 

“Who is this? Where is Y/n?” Aemond quickly responded, clearly agitated. 

“Right, sorry.” Eyla took a deep breath. “I’m Y/n’s co-worker, there’s been an accident, nothing too serious, but she’s burned her hand.” 

“Okay, I’m on my way.” Aemond could be heard shuffling around, the sound of his dress shoes clicking along the tiled floors in his office building. 

“Um, look, she’s also really emotional. Right before the accident two girls came in and said some pretty shitty stuff.” Eyla admitted. 

“Do you know these two girls?” Aemond asked, ready to deal with whoever caused this. 

“No, but apparently you do.” Eyla said. “One said her name was Alys, and that she was a sugar baby of yours before...” 

“So you know about Y/n …” 

“Who do you think talked her into seeing you?” Eyla scoffed. “Dude you’re terrifyingly hot, she was ready to run the second she heard your voice, you’re welcome.” The mood quickly switched, Eyla back to her regular playful self, the fear of Y/n dying slowly fading. 

“Okay, I’m going to be there in, at the most, ten minutes.” Aemond huffed, his pace picking up as he made his way to his car. “Can you just keep her as calm as possible until then?” 

“Will do.” Eyla said, her sentence hardly finished before the line cut off. 

+

Aemond knocked on the glass door like a mad man, his hair all down, his hands anxiously running through it his whole drive over, shirt sleeves rolled up, a few buttons unbuttoned and his coat discarded in the car somewhere. “Hi, sorry.” Eyla whispered as she opened the door.

“Where is she?” Aemond all but yelled. 

“Just in the bathroom, to the left in the back.” Eyla pointed, trying her best to smile. 

“Y/n?” He called out as he got closer to the back, water running and soft cries guiding him to her. 

“Aemond?” Y/n croaked, crying even harder as she saw his blurry figure. 

“Hi, little dragon.” Aemond took in the situation, Y/n sat on the toilet, her hand draped into the sink, the water running, tears streaming down her cheeks and her non burned hand picking at her jeans, a few threads pulled out. “What happened, Hmm?” He asked, stepping into the room and crouching down, his hand resting on her knee, her hand laying atop his instead of destroying her jeans. 

“I.” A quick sob wracked through her body, Aemond’s hand rubbing soothing circles on her knee as the other reached for her face, cupping her cheek. “I spilled coffee everywhere, and I burned my hand.” She wiggled her hand in the sink, some water splashing over the edge. 

“Hmm.” Aemond hummed, standing up, leaning over quickly to give her forehead a quick peck. “I’m going to clean you up a bit, and then we’ll go home, okay?” Aemond kept his tone calm and soothing, his mind raging silently at what Alys had most likely said, what her words caused. He wished to storm to her house then, but he knew Y/n needed more help than she did protection at that moment. “Look at me.” He said, Y/n’s eyes finding his, her chin tilted up as he stood before her. 

“Aemond.” Y/n whispered, tears still streaming down her cheeks. “I’m sorry.” She cried. “I know you were working today, and I really didn’t want Eyla to call you, you can go if you want, I’m really, I’m fi …”

“You’re not fine, little dragon.” Aemond finished her sentence. “You needed help, so I’m here.” 

“And your work is okay with that?” Y/n sniffled, Aemond’s thumb and forefinger now holding her chin, his eye trained on her. 

“Hmm.” He smirked. “I’m the boss, little dragon. Remember? I make the rules, I don’t follow them, same goes for my job.” 

Y/n cracked a small smile, Aemond’s presence calming, his smile, albeit a smirk, allowed for a break in the panic. “My hand really does hurt.” Y/n blurted out, not sure what to do with Aemond’s hand on her chin, and his unbreaking eye contact. 

“I’m sure it does, little dragon.” Aemond hummed, crouching down again to wipe the tears off her cheeks with his thumbs, his touch gentle and soft. “I’m going to get my first aid kit from the car, Hmm?” Aemond asked, Y/n nodding as he stood, wishing he would hold onto her face just a little longer, wipe her tears for just one more second instead of leaving, but he walked away, his hair swaying messily behind him. 

“Y/n?” Eyla knocked on the doorway, offering a sympathetic smile. “He’s super hot.” 

“Eyla!” Y/n laughed, her good hand wiping a few more of her stray tears, rubbing her nose against her sleeve slightly. “You’re right though.” Y/n let out another chuckle. 

“How’s your hand?” Eyla asked. 

“It hurts, but it’s fine, I’m sure it’s nothing.” Y/n weakly smiled, her words remaining her of the throbbing pain that was radiating through her hand. “I’m sure I’ll be back tomorrow with a cute bandaid.” 

“And hopefully a billion dollars for being a brave sugar baby.” Eyla teased. 

“If I had a billion dollars I would never step foot in this place again.” Y/n laughed. 

“What?” Eyla gasped, her hand pinned to her chest dramatically. “Not even to see me?” 

“I would take you with me you fool.” Y/n tilted her head, Eyla thanking her over and over. “How long do burns take to heal?” Y/n asked, looking at her hand. 

“I don’t know.” Eyla shrugged her shoulders, looking towards the sink too. 

“First degree burns take about a  week to heal.” Aemond turned into the room, a relatively large first aid kit placed next to Y/n as Aemond stood over the sink. 

“What if I have second degree burn?” Y/n questioned, Eyla stepping away to leave them be. 

“You don’t.” 

“How do you know?” Y/n’s eyes were tearing up, the water now turned off, no longer giving her an ounce of relife. 

“You’re racking up quite the bill today.” Aemond hummed, lifting the first aid kit to the sink and opening it. “First you don’t let me know you’ve been hurt, then you say you’re ‘fine’ instead of explaining how you really feel.” 

“I’m sorry.” Y/n breathed, her chest rising and falling rapidly, the pain amping up more and more. 

“I’m not done yet, little dragon.” Aemond tutted, shaking his head in disappointment. “You didn’t accept that my answer was final.” Aemond chuckled. 

“Aemond, my hand hurts, I’m not thinking the right way, please…” Y/n begged. 

“Are you trying to get out of a punishment?” Aemond raised his eyebrow, thoroughly amused. 

Y/n’s eyes widened as she realized her mistake. “No.” 

“So now you’re lying?” Aemond’s voice somehow got deeper, more intimidating. 

‘It’s a teacher talk.’ Y/n remembered Eyla’s words, though she had only known what a dominant was for a few hours, she felt quite sound now when it came to saying Aemond was one. “Yes, I’m, I’m sorry.” She admitted, eye’s now looking at the ground, Aemond patting some sort of gel onto her burn. 

“Hmm.” Aemond hummed. “Are you going to behave now?” Y/n nodded her head. “And are you going to take your punishment like a good sugar baby would? Or would you rather keep making a fuss about it?” He teased. 

“I won’t make a fuss anymore.” Y/n said, still not meeting Aemond’s eye. 

“Good girl.” Aemond quietly hummed, Eyla heard concealing a squeal from outside the room. “Come on, let’s get you home.” Y/n stood up, Aemond’s hand immediately falling to her back leading her out of the room. “Where’s your stuff?” He asked. 

“Just in here.” Y/n pulled on the lock, opening her locker and pulling out her coat. “Um, Eyla do you have my phone?” She quietly asked. 

“Yeah, sorry.” Eyla smiled, handing Y/n her brick of a phone. 

“Do your locks not work?” Aemond asked, standing a few feet away from the two, a lock in his hand, the thing clicking as Aemond closed it, then effortlessly opening it without trying. 

“They’re just for show.” Y/n admitted, walking towards Aemond, his face twisted in anger, confusion maybe. 

“Real locks are cheaper.” He looked to Y/n. “Why would you need fake ones?” 

“Mr Waxley checks are lockers sometimes.” Eyla added. “He doesn’t like us being able to hide things from him.” 

“So he makes you vulnerable to theft?” Aemond sounded like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing, his eye squinted slightly as he tried to understand how this could possibly make sense. 

“They look like locks, Aemond.” Y/n grabbed the lock from his hands, hanging it back on her locker. “No one knows they're fake.” She reasoned. 

“Hmm.” He hummed, although he let the topic drop at that moment, he was already thinking about how to circle back to it.

[ann-i-inthestars]

I CANT DECIDE

Arranged marriage!! Or expanded batch!! Or western Jessix!!

THE THREE??

For you, I shall do a bit out of all three! (Though, you might have seen ninety percent of the Arranged Marriage one already)

Arranged Marriage:

A Tech/Hunter/Echo au set in a whole different universe, where to keep his planet safe from the Empire, Hunter is entered into an arranged marriage with their two closest allies- Tech and Echo's planets.

----At first, they seemed harmless. A true delegate wanting to negotiate a better price for their exports. But it didn’t take long for them to begin demanding things. And then the demands became threats when Hunter’s father refused to give in. Threats that escalated to a promise of taking the planet from them by force if they did not give into their demands. 

Like always, Hunter’s parents reached out to their allies in request for a united front, but to everyone’s surprise, they hesitated. Two didn’t even reply, Uchatania and Mabraitune, however, said that going against the so called Empire with nothing at stake for them could be detrimental to them and their people. No matter how much they wanted to help. Hunter understood. His father, however, did not.

“Who do they think they are! We would be coming to their aid if it was the other way around!”

Expanded Batch:

An au where the bad batch is Captain Hunter and his 10 younger brothers, because the other experimental clones survived past infanthood. Excerpt is Hunter and his Mandalorian trainer.

----Hunter’s eyes went wide and he eyed the sticks. “Blade? Like, like swords?”

“Exactly! You are proving to be a fast, excellent melee fighter and that is what I am going to train you as. You’ll pass marksmanship training and have a blaster as back up, of course. But you, my Hunter, are a swordsman through and through. And we’re going to make sure everyone knows it.”

“Will the Kaminoans allow it?”

“They cannot control what I teach you. They put you under my protection, more or less made you a member of my clan, and I can and will teach you whatever I see fit.”

Hunter’s eyes widened. “Your, your clan?”

Jelvi nodded, kneeling down so they were more or less eye level with each other. “Yes. You are, without a doubt, Hunter of Clan Rho, House Mereel and anyone who tells you otherwise will have to deal with me. Understood?”

Western Jessix is posted, as Mar'eyce, and I dont have the next bit written yet. Thought I had! OOPS! But, the next chapter starts with them finding a settlement, and Jesse stealing clothes for them. Which, will include a dress to put on Kix. An accident, he claims.

[mxnkeydo]

so scarlet (it was maroon) ✧ sokeefe

✧ ship: Sophie x Keefe

✧ what to expect: it all went down went a book went soaring across the classroom but sophie never expects it to end the way it does. acrylic smeared on cheeks, pigment-stained clothes, and a whole keefe sencen later, maybe she never despised him as much as she thought she did.

✧ genre: romance, fluff, humor, sarcasm - enemies to lovers trope, human au, and a love triangle to torment you guys 😈

✧ word count: 1.58k

✧ warnings: mild use of swearing

✧ link to masterlist

✧ link to chapter six

✧ link to chapter eight

✧ A/N: I LOVE THIS CHAPTER SM AHHHH i hope you love it as much as i do!!!! (i know this chapter is all fluff, but be prepared for some angsty chapters ahead...MUAHAHAHAHA)

✧ taglist: @swans-chirping-in-the-distance @somerandomhuman080 @foxglove-and-foxfire-lover @carolineforbae

reblogs would be most appreciated! :)))

***

CHAPTER SEVEN

“Why the hell is your shirt so wet?”

Keefe stopped in his tracks, mentally bracing himself for an argument or a lecture. Slowly, he turned to face his father.

“It’s nothing,” he settled for, trying to escape the situation, but Cassius took one big stride closer to grip his son’s varsity jacket by the collar. Keefe whipped his head to the side; the cigarette smell coming from his mouth was too much to bear.

“Oh, but it’s something,” his father insisted. “What did you do this time, you useless delinquent?”

“I got paint on my shirt, that’s all!”

“Well. Wouldn’t expect anything better from you.” Cassius snorted. “No dinner for you tonight. Go up to your room and stay there, you hear me boy?”

Keefe’s rebellious streak suddenly emerged and he shot back, “I’m not ability challenged, you know. I can hear just fine.”

Cassius shoved him back so hard, Keefe hit the wall with an “oof”. His father only laughed cruelly and strolled the other way like he hadn’t just abused his only son–whose elbow was probably damaged from the impact. Keefe gripped his injured arm and scurried up the stairs, half in fear and half because he needed to get away from everyone. There was someone who could make him feel better, but he was too tired to call her. Plus, he was ninety-nine percent sure she wouldn’t want to be around a depressed kid who didn’t have his feelings set straight. In this state, he would most likely embarrass himself in the worst way possible. It was better for everyone if he was left alone.

Just before Keefe went to sleep, he removed the false bottom from his drawer and rummaged through. Once his fingers brushed against a spiral notebook, he pulled it out and settled in his bed, taking off his shirt to wrap it around his arm like a sling. And with a deep breath, he pressed his pencil to the paper.

Keefe let his hands completely take over, drawing curved lines and shading different sections. He drew two perfect eyes, tiny flecks surrounding the iris. He sketched her full lips, her blinding beam, the way her left eye had more lashes than the other since she always pulled on them.

When he was finished, he was left with a portrait of Sophie Elizabeth Foster staring up at him with a wide, innocent look. Keefe gripped his notebook, not able to take his eyes off her. How a girl like her had come into his life so suddenly, he didn’t know. But the universe seemed to taunt him with the fact that she would never be his.

The funny part? Keefe already belonged to her.

✧✧✧

Sophie and Keefe had just stepped into her house when her phone rang with a notification. “What now?” Sophie sighed as she pulled it out. Keefe leaned forward to see but the glare of the lights made it extremely difficult. He watched Sophie instead, as her eyes widened and her brows rose far above her hairline. 

“What happened?” Keefe dared to ask, only to be hit by the Foster frenzy Sophie was going through.

“Oh, shit! I am so sorry, Keefe, I can’t do our session today. Fitz and I have a date at four that I can’t cancel. I don’t even have time to get ready!”

Keefe wilted visibly at his ex best friend’s name. Out of the corner of his eye, he glanced at his watch: three thirty-six. 

“It’s fine.” At his tutee’s agitated expression, he said, “It’s fine, Foster. Really. I don’t mind.” But in his head, he thought fiercely, oh, but I do mind. I mind very much.

That very thought evaporated when Sophie shot him a grateful smile, leaving his brain blank and useless for anything other than gawking at her. “Thank you so much,” she said in one breath. “I’ll drop you off on the way, alright?” Leaving no room for an argument, she dropped her bag at the bottom of the staircase and dashed up to her room.

Silence. The ginormous gold clock hanging on the living room wall ticked mercilessly. Keefe pinned his eyes to the minute hand and watched it make its way around the circular surface.

3:37

3:38

3:39

Once that got boring, Keefe began to explore the house. It was extremely quiet, of course; Grady was probably at work, and maybe Edaline was out running errands. But even with no one present, he could still imagine the joyful memories made here: baking in the kitchen, games in the main room, happy meals in the dining area. Upon the sight of that glass table, Keefe was brought back to the time when Sophie invited him to dinner. It was ridiculously awkward, of course, but that didn’t mean he hated it entirely. In fact, it was probably his first time in ages having home-cooked food with other people; he and his father usually got takeout and ate in their separate chambers.

At this point, Keefe was near the stairs, admiring himself in the mirror hanging off one of the walls, flexing his injured elbow. And at this precise moment, Sophie chose to emerge from her bedroom. 

The soft taps of her converse jolted him out of his narcissistic trance, causing him to look up. Once he set his eyes on her, he couldn’t bring himself to look away. 

Unlike Biana, Sophie wasn’t much for sparkles and extravaganza, yet somehow she managed to make everything look good. Keefe ran his eyes over the simple white crop top, her denim shorts, and the pink and blue flannel she’d thrown on over it as she descended like a regal queen. Her hair was down as usual, like a graceful waterfall, but she’d braided it in a half-up half-down hairdo. She was gorgeous, she was stunning, she was beautiful, and Keefe couldn’t help but stare.

Sophie looked at him through her lashes. “Keefe? Keefe! C’mon, let’s g–”

It all played out in slow motion. On the second to last step of the stairs, Sophie yelped, tripping over her own feet, arms pinwheeling in an attempt to regain balance. As she fell backward, Keefe grabbed her hand and planted his on her back, promptly preventing her from splitting her head open on the steps. 

Ohmygodohmygodohmygod, Keefe thought in a blur of thrill and shock. Because in this position, with Sophie in his arms, her lips were closer than they ever had been before. In the next few seconds, their choppy breaths synchronized with one another like a harmony to a melody. For some reason, Keefe seemed to feel everything but nothing at once. It was a curious emotion, one he’d never felt prior to Sophie’s appearance in his life, but it resurfaced every time he was within a six-feet radius of her. He was one-hundred percent sure Sophie could hear the wild, hysteric beat of his heart.

She was a mess of gorgeous chaos, he could see it clearer than anything in her eyes. He looked at her fondly, savoring the moment before it ended; Keefe knew it was only for a few seconds, but to him it lasted an eternity

She has a boyfriend, an unelpful voice sang in his head. Clearing his throat, Keefe pulled her to a standing position.

“That was quite the fall, Foster,” he said to break the tense silence. A bright red color crept onto Sophie’s cheeks. “You really know how to make a dramatic entrance, don’t you?”

“I didn’t fall,” she muttered defiantly as they walked to the door, still flustered. “I just— attacked the floor.”

Keefe lifted one eyebrow. “Backwards?”

“I’m freaking talented, okay?” 

“Whatever you say, Foster,” Keefe said, grinning like a maniac. A minute passed before Sophie glanced over again and said,

“Quit smirking at me!” 

“I’m not smirking.”

“Well stop laughing at me, I’m serious!”

“I’m not laughing!” Sophie crossed her arms, frowning. Keefe could sense the irritation building up inside of her and couldn’t resist feeling somewhat proud that he was able to get a rise out of her so quickly.

“Then quit whatever it is you’re doing.”

“This is just me with a cheery disposition, a ray of sunshine in the mist of bleakness! Don’t put a cloud over my sunshine– OW!” 

Sophie was the one smirking now, her arm still outstretched from flinging her purse at his head (with a surprising amount of force that Keefe hadn’t anticipated). In her eyes was an evil glint, the one he’d seen when Ms. Clarette had forced Sophie to apologize for smacking him with that book of hers.

When she brushed her hair out of her face and strided towards her car, he swore he spotted a hint of a genuine smile on her face. Out of the blue, he wondered what ran through her head when someone said his name. Did her stomach flutter nervously like his did? Did she feel giddy too?

Of course she didn’t. She had Fitz to think about, didn’t she? She already had someone to fawn over. 

But he just couldn’t stay mad, seeing her cute pout while she struggled to open the car door before realizing she hadn’t unlocked it yet. Keefe snickered, stopping abruptly when Sophie shot him a glare that could kill.  “Just get in the fucking car, Sencen,” she said exasperatedly. Trying his best to forget his crush was going on a date with his ex best friend, Keefe gave her a mock salute.

“Aye aye, Captain.”

[riahlynn101]

Day Twenty-Three: "Who's There?"

Trigger warnings: Implied/referenced murder, implied child neglect, and children in distress.

Set in the FNAF movie universe.

--

“Who’s there?” Mike asks. 

It’s the middle of the night. The house is quiet, save for the rattling of the furnace in the basement and the old foundation settling. His family went to bed hours ago, but not before shutting Mike in his room. 

(“A safety precaution,” his mom said. “Just until we can get your sleepwalking under control.”)

Which would be fine, but….

…there’s a reason he leaves his room.

A Spider-Man comic book is flung off his nightstand. It hits the wall with a soft thump. Mike closes his eyes, breathing deeply.

Mike turns on his side. Maybe it’ll be less scary if he closes his eyes. (It never is). 

Something heavy falls on the floor, but he’s too afraid to see what it is. As far as Mike cares, it could be his walkman as long as whatever is doing it, leaves him alone. 

There’s a sudden clattering sound, like heavy rain on a tin roof.

“Stop,” he says, pulling his blanket over his head. “Please.”

The clattering gradually gets louder, until it's the only thing Mike can hear. He cries, putting his hands over his ears. 

His bedroom is flooded with light. Under his blanket, Mike’s eyes are protected from the sudden assault.

“Mike…?” 

His comforter is pulled off his head.

Mike slowly sits up, putting his hands down. “Garrett,” he sniffles, “what are you doing up?”

His little brother sits on his bed. He shrugs. “I heard you crying.”

“I’m fine.”

“You don’t look fine.”

“Well, I am,” Mike huffs, wiping at his eyes. 

“Was it a bad dream?”

“....Yes….” He draws his knees to his chest, staring at his lap. 

Garrett leans in, unprompted, and wraps his arms around his older brother. Out of reflex, Mike hugs him back. “What- what are you doing?”

“Hugging you?” His brother answers in a no-duh, voice. “Mommy hugs me when I have bad dreams, I thought it might help you.”

Mike swallows heavily, blinking back tears. “Uh…thank you, Gar.”

“No problem. Do you want me to get mommy?”

“No.”

“Daddy?”

“Definite no. I’ll be okay.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, but thanks.”

“Okay, but if you get scared, you know how to find me.” Garrett hops off the bed. He goes to turn the light off.

“Wait,” he calls out. His brother looks at him. “Can you please leave them on. I’m…” the word scared goes unsaid, but Garrett seems to understand perfectly. 

“Okay. I don’t like the dark either,” he says. “Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.”

Mike flops back down to sleep. In the light, his room doesn’t feel as scary. His parents might be angry that he’s running up the electricity bill, but he has no other choice.

It didn’t always used to be like this. When he was younger, his father would leave him home alone all the time, and he never got scared once.  But ever since…. 

Mike throws the thought out of his mind. No, he doesn’t need to think about that right now. He needs to go to sleep. There’s school tomorrow, and he has to get up early to walk Garrett to school. 

The heavy rain on a tin roof starts again, louder than before. 

He sits up, feeling more secure with the light on. Whatever it is that’s screwing with him, can’t hurt him while the light’s on. At least that’s what his mom says, and she’s very rarely wrong. 

Mike climbs to the end of his bed. Cautiously, he peeks over the footboard. A bunch of marbles lay scattered across his floor. 

He sighs in relief, sliding out of bed. Mike can be a little absent-minded sometimes, so he probably just left them on the edge of his dresser and they fell off. 

He should clean them up before morning, though. The last thing he wants is his overly-excitable little brother running and falling on hundreds of marbles, or his mom for that matter. She’s constantly complaining about her back, and Mike is ninety-nine percent sure that the way to fix it is not by having her break it. 

Grabbing the baggie they came in, Mike starts scooping them into his hand, and putting them into the bag. The wood floor beneath his feet is cold, and he misses the warmth of the blanket. He yawns, exhaustion finally setting in.

The lights flicker.

On.

Off.

On.

Off. 

“Michael….” 

On. 

He tenses, the marbles slip through his fingers, clattering to the floor. 

Off.

A cold hand touches the back of his neck. 

On.

His breathing becomes shallow. 

Off. 

“I’ve missed you.”

On.

He shudders. All the alarm bells are going off in his head, but Mike can’t bring himself to move.

Off. 

The hand is removed from his neck. “I’ve been trying to talk to you for soooo long, Mikey. Why are you ignoring me? Are you mad at me?”

On. 

Mike moves forward, crawling over the marbles he hasn’t gotten a chance to clean up yet. His heart beats fast. He can hear the blood rushing in his ears. 

Off. 

“Don’t run away, please, I really, really miss you.”

On.

Whoever, or whatever is speaking to him is blocking the way out, so Mike makes the split-second decision to hide under the bed. He army crawls as fast as he can, before the lights turn off again. 

Off. 

He whimpers, nails digging into the floor. Mike squeezes his eyes shut, trying to imagine that he’s safe in bed. 

Next to him, someone sighs heavily. “Are you done?”

Shaking, Mike forces himself to turn his head. There, laying in the same position as him, is the subject of all his nightmares. Charlie Emily, Henry’s daughter, and the girl his father killed. He hasn’t thought about his father in years. Not since Mike was put into the foster system. 

Everytime Mike closes his eyes, he can see his best friend covered in gashes, a large pool of blood beneath her. 

“I’m sorry,” he whimpers, cringing away. “I didn’t know. I-I thought-”

“Shhh….stop being silly. I know you didn’t mean it. He tricked you.”

Mike looks at her, wide-eyed.

Charlie smiles. She looks just like the day she died, before he trusted his father when he said to lock the door. Whole and alive.  “It’ll be okay, Michael. Trust me.” Her expression turns serious. “But I need you to do something for me.”

Wordlessly, Mike nods. 

“Okay, so….” She leans in to whisper in his ear. 

The next morning, Mike’s mom finds him under the bed, fast asleep. There are marbles on the floor, and the comic book he begged his parents for is laying haphazardly against the wall. She lightly shakes him. 

He blinks blearily. “Morning?” 

“Yep, and I see you had a busy night.”

Mike looks at her, confused.

But his mom has seen that look a million times. “Don’t play dumb, Mike. You know you shouldn’t be playing after bedtime.”

“I…didn’t?” 

His mom sighs. “Don’t argue with me, okay? Just don’t do it again.”

Despite having no idea what she’s talking about, Mike mumbles an agreement under his breath. 

“Good.” She kisses his head. “Now, get ready. Garrett is eating breakfast, and I saved a poptart for you. Remember to look both ways before-”

“Crossing the street,” Mike finishes. “I know, I know.”

“Okay, and-”

“Don’t talk to strangers, even if they promise you candy.”

His mom sighs. “Good. You’re all set then. Your dad and I won’t be home until late tonight. Our boss is making us work overtime today.”

“That’s fine.”

“Take care of your brother. Don’t tease him too much.”

Mike makes a face. “No, promises.”

She pinches his cheek, getting to her feet. “Be good,” his mom says in a warning voice. “I love you.”

“Love you too.”

His mom pauses in the doorway. “I know we’ve had to work a lot these past few weeks, so as long as you two behave, we can go to the park this weekend.”

Mike smiles. “Really?”

“Yes, but you have to behave.”

“Deal.”

His mom returns his smile. 

The door closes. Mike frowns. He can’t remember his dream from last night. It feels just out of his reach, but he knows it was important - whatever it was. 

Maybe it will come back to him later.

[anxiously-going]

Sacrifice

I listened to almost all of Year Two of Welcome to Night Vale today so enjoy a sad little idea of what may have happened when Cecil called Carlos back at the end of the finale

Carlos took a deep breath and hit the answer button on his cell phone, still at ninety-seven percent battery. "Hi, Cecil," he answered cheerfully given the situation, it was also cheerful in general, but tinged with a slight sadness, like a paper slightly damp just at the edges.

"Hi, Carlos," Cecil replied, not cheerfully at all, but rather a sort of somber tone that indicates a resignation to an uncertain situation. "I'm sorry I missed your call earlier."

"That's okay," Carlos assured, his tone still light, though perhaps slightly less so. "It was a busy day!" He chuckled. "There was a lot going on, so it's okay, Cecil. Honestly...it's probably better that I had to leave a voice-mail. It was hard, and waiting for you to call back has been hard, but I think it would have been harder if we had spoken."

"I think you're right," Cecil agreed. "Let's face it, I would have cried that way too. Hah."

"Oh, Cecil," Carlos murmured softly, hearing the tears in his boyfriend's voice. Not literally tears, of course, but the tightness in his voice that indicated the presence of tears. "I'll figure this out, I'm going to find my way back to you, I promise. For now, Night Vale is safe and that's the most important thing."

"It's not fair," Cecil whispered, slowly losing a battle with his emotions. "You helped save Night Vale, you should be here to celebrate with us. With me. I know that's selfish, but...after everything that's happened...I want you here."

"It's not selfish to want. Sometimes revolution requires sacrifice and I'm not alone. I'm with the army of giant masked men and women who also helped to liberate Night Vale! We're celebrating here too. But we're not from Night Vale, we didn't belong there according to the universe."

"Then the universe is wrong!" Cecil said sharply, taking a gasping breath around the knot growing in his throat.

Carlos's chest ached, hearing Cecil so upset reminded him why he was secretly relieved that he hadn't answered his phone before.

"Night Vale would have fallen if it weren't for you," Cecil continued, despite his failing voice. "How can the universe say you don't belong here when you being here saved the town?"

"But it didn't. My leaving is what saved the town," Carlos argued gently. "And that's okay."

"It's not," Cecil cried.

"I believe in you," Cecil answered, his voice calmer, not because he was less sad, but because he meant what he said, he did believe in Carlos and that gave him confidence and that confidence gave him comfort, and the comfort gave him strength to be brave like Carlos was asking him to be.

"Cecil, sweetie, it's going to be okay. We can still talk and send pictures. We're not completely separated from each other and we will be together again one day, I'm sure of it. But for now, it's just like living in different cities! It's a little more complicated because time is especially weird here even from Night Vale, but we're not completely apart from each other. You've been so brave, Cecil, but I need you to be brave a little longer. It's going to take me a little time for figure this out, but I'm going to do my best and get back as soon as possible."

Carlos smiled. "That helps a lot. I love you, Cecil. This time and space between us will be temporary. A short term sacrifice we have to make for the good of the city."

"I love you too, Carlos. I know that sacrifice is often required of revolution, and I am glad that it will be less permanent for us, but I will not be happy about it."

Carlos laughed and it was like music to Cecil's ears. "That's okay. You're allowed to be angry or sad or whatever you need to be. You should go celebrate with Dana and your family though. Give Janice a hug for me, okay?"

"I will," Cecil promised.

"And give Khoshekh a treat for me."

"I will," he promised again.

"And try to get some rest."

Cecil paused. "I'll try."

"I love you. Goodnight, Cecil.

"Goodnight, Carlos. I love you too."

[wrienne]

My Cheating, Amnesic Fiancé 2

Chapter 3: The New CEO

 “You can not be serious.”

Se-Eun and you were at small café close to where you lived. The two of you had spent the Saturday afternoon shopping, or well, to be more specific, Se-Eun had been shopping while you just followed her around, too nervous to initiate the conversation about your father’s health. Now that you had finally told her what had happened during the dinner as well as the consequences - namely that you were quitting university - you felt an immense weight lift from your shoulders. Ever since you had told Se-Eun the truth about your involvement with Jungkook, both historically and emotionally, you had decided to continue relying on her as the best friend she was.

Only, you didn’t think you would be able to ever tell her about Jung-Hyun’s tattoo.

You wiped the condensation on your plastic mug of iced coffee with your fingers, then dried your hand on a napkin. “I am,” you said dejectedly before you sipped the beverage. “Dad is too weak to run the business any longer. And I can’t blame mom for wanting to stay with him.”

The creases between Se-Eun’s eyebrows immediately faded at the last thing you said. “I get that, too,” she said quickly. “But still, you’re not even twenty-one. Are you seriously going to quit university and become CEO of a company as big as Phoenix Inc.? Don’t you guys own, like, ninety percent of the export and import industries in all of South Korea?”

“I’m not really sure,” you admitted with a slight blush. Now that you thought about it, you didn’t really know much about the company other than what your parents had told you, which wasn’t much. Your father had never been poor, and although your mother had also been born into a somewhat affluent family, they had made sure to raise you as any middle-class child and kept you away from family business. You had attended public schools and been forced to do your part of household chores, even if your parents had always employed cleaning staff.

That’s why your mother’s decision worried you. Because even if you knew and had always known that your ultimate fate would land you as the CEO of one of Asia’s largest corporations, you had thought you would learn more about the whole business aspect during university and then be slowly integrated into the position.

You had never thought you would have to become CEO practically overnight. But then again, your parents probably hadn’t thought that either.

“Well, the exact number isn’t important to the conversation.” Se-Eun had already finished her drink during the time it took you to tell her about yesterday, and ate what remained of the whip cream topping with the small spoon she had grabbed for the cheesecake the two of you had shared. “And I promise, I’m not trying to bring you down or anything, but are you really qualified for this?”

“No,” you said truthfully. “I’m not.”

“That’s reassuring to hear.”

“I won’t be completely alone,” you said a bit hesitantly. “Jung-Hyun will help me.”

Se-Eun’s eyes widened. “Is he still at your company? I thought he would leave after… you know.”

You averted your gaze in a mixture of embarrassment and shame. Because even though Se-Eun had assured you that she was fine with you and Jungkook, you didn’t know if what she told you was the truth. You of all people knew just how obsessed she had been with him for years, and it didn’t sit well with you that you had “taken” him from her. And although you knew you ought to talk to her about it, you couldn’t bring yourself to mention it.

There was also the fact that you hadn’t told Se-Eun that Jung-Hyun didn’t know about you and Jungkook, and that you weren’t really going to tell him at least for now. Not until you had found out more about him - and the tattoo he wore.

“It’s not a bad position,” you said half-heartedly. “He was appointed as the director of…” You scratched your head. “Er, something.”

“You really know nothing about your family’s company, huh?”

You returned your focus to Se-Eun and found that she wore an amused expression. “Unfortunately,” you said with a grimace. “Can we please change subject to something else? I’m just doubting myself more and more right now.”

“Well,” began Se-Eun as she picked up her phone from her purse. “Have you been watching that new drama about a gumiho and a shaman?”

“You know I don’t really watch dramas,” you told her.

“Yeah, but I thought you might make an exception of this one since Jungkook is singing one of the title songs. Hasn’t he told you?”

You frowned and leaned closer to her and her phone. “No.”

“Oh.” Se-Eun suddenly seemed uncomfortable and stopped unwinding her bundle of earbuds and cables. “I think I know why.”

“Why?”

“The song is a duet. And the other singer is Park Yi-Jae.”

“That can’t be why,” you said, even as your hands balled into fists underneath the table. “They’ve broken up and told their managements about it.”

“You said that almost a month ago,” said Se-Eun a bit hesitantly. “And I still haven’t heard anything from either of their companies.”

“They’re probably waiting for the right opportunity,” you said defensively. “I bet it’s just some kind of PR tactic while this drama is running.”

“Right. Yeah, probably.”

Se-Eun didn’t sound convinced. And although a part of you agreed with her, a bigger part refused to doubt Jungkook. Whatever your relationship now was, you knew he deserved your trust. And that’s what you kept telling yourself as you watched the trailer on Se-Eun’s phone. That’s what you kept telling yourself as you watched the clip of Jungkook and Yi-Jae singing the duet together in a studio environment.

That’s what you kept telling yourself as jealousy rose like bile in the back of your throat, forcing you to down all of your iced coffee in one go in an attempt to cleanse your palette.

“Good luck on Monday,” said Se-Eun when it was time for you to part. “You’re definitely going to need it.”

“I need more than luck,” you grunted.

And you did. When Monday morning rolled around, you barely knew anything more about Phoenix Inc. than you had when you spoke to Se-Eun. You had been too busy emailing and calling Korea University Business School in order to explain your abrupt leave, something that concerned the principal since your parents had been providing significant funds to the university ever since you were admitted. It was a matter you couldn’t comment on, which made the conversation somewhat awkward. And as if that didn’t take up vital amounts of hours where you should have probably researched Phoenix Inc., what remained of the weekend had been swallowed up by your visits to Gangnam Severance Hospital. Your father looked fine, but judging by the constant creases in your mother’s forehead, you would be a fool to assume the best.

It was 7.23, and about forty minutes before you were supposed to arrive at the front desk of Phoenix Inc.’s Seoul headquarters, yet you wouldn’t stop fidgeting where you sat in the backseat of the BMW. Checking your appearance in your phone, you couldn’t help but notice how tired and young you looked even with makeup. How were you supposed to announce your father’s retirement to a board full of people who had probably spent as many years in the business as you were old? How were you supposed to assume the leader position in one of the largest companies in the world?

But most importantly, how were you going to look Jung-Hyun in the eye after what you had seen at his hotel room?

Your arm was burning by the time the car came to a soft halt outside the main entrance of  Phoenix Inc.’s Seoul headquarters. The fifty-eight-storey building reached probably over two hundred meters from the pavement you stepped out onto, and even though you had driven past the giant edifice numerous times before, you had never been filled with as much dread as now. For now it was no longer just a building.

It was your building.

“Do you want me to follow you inside?”

You glanced over your shoulder to find Jong-Yeol having rolled down the window on the driver’s side. His eyes were concerned, and you saw that he was already on the verge of unlatching his safety belt.

“I’ll be alright,” you assured him, though your voice trembled. “It’s just a bit overwhelming.”

Jong-Yeol nodded. “I’ll be ready to pick you up whenever,” he told you.

“Thank you,” you said, and sent him a smile. A smile that rapidly faded after he had driven off with the BMW, leaving you alone.

Your legs were trembling as you ambled toward one of the biggest revolving doors you had ever seen. The air was heavy with humidity, and you were already sweating underneath your attire, which consisted of creamy white blouse, a dark blue blazer and a matching skirt. You had initially felt comical in the outfit, like you had stolen the pieces out of your mother’s wardrobe and was dressing up, especially since you had paired it with high heels. Looking at yourself in the mirror at home, you had felt overdressed, but upon entering the building, you saw to your great relief that the other women were also dressed similarly to you, if not even more proper.

But still, your greatest fear remained. Would anyone take you seriously?

The foyer was huge. With windows covering every outer wall and countless of bright lamps beaming down from the crazy high ceiling, you were dazzled by the amount of light that filled the space. Big blocks of black glass in different shapes and forms danced across the inner walls, and you could practically see your reflection in the matt, glassy gray floors. White leather furniture and dark wood contradicted the The interior was boldly designed with . You could see your mother’s taste permeate everything, and fleetingly wondered how your parents’ office spaces looked as you strode toward the front desk, which was a wide, circular desk of marble centered against the wall opposite to the revolving doors.

“Hello,” said the receptionist, a woman only a few years older than you, and greeted you with a sweet smile. The name tag read Hwang Ji-Woo. “What can I do for you, Miss?”

You opened your mouth to answer, but closed it almost instantly. What were you supposed to say? If you said you were the chairman’s daughter and there to report said chairman’s retirement, she would probably think you were crazy. Your profile was somewhat public due to your involvement with Jungkook and his family, but judging by Hwang Ji-Woo’s reaction, she didn’t have the slightest idea who you were. And since your father’s arrival at the hospital had been yet to be reported, nobody knew the state of his health.

“Miss?” She furrowed her neatly plucked eyebrows slightly, a hint of concern entering her eyes. “Is there something I can do for you?”

You were just about to tell her who you were when someone said your name from behind. The familiar voice made your body stiffen from head to toe, and you had to stifle your urge of just ignoring it and walking away. Mustering whatever pieces of courage you could gather in your nervous state, you slowly turned around and framed a polite smile.

Dressed in a dark suit that fitted his tall, broad-shouldered frame perfectly, Jeon Jung-Hyun came to a gradual halt in front of you. His black hair was perfectly combed, a luxury watch peered out from underneath his sleeve and his briefcase was undoubtedly a brand name product. He definitely looked like he fit into the environment, and at first glance, anyone would have found him strikingly handsome. Clean-shaven with a masculine, broad jaw and  a straight nose, he was very easy on the eyes.

Nobody would have suspected him of being involved with one of South Korea’s most notorious gangs.

“Jung-Hyun-oppa,” you said before you could think. Immediately, you cringed. “Oppa” wasn’t the most appropriate of ways to address someone at work, especially someone who was your subordinate in rank. Your earlier fear of appearing like a child in her mother’s clothes rushed back to you with full force, and you felt your face grow hot underneath his scrutiny.

To your even bigger embarrassment, however, he also bowed to you.

“I didn’t expect you this early, huijang-nim,” said Jung-Hyun in that stiff, somber, no-nonsense voice of his. His brown eyes, which were so similar to Jungkook’s both in shape and colour, regarded you without any emotion as he straightened up.

Or at least, that’s what you would have thought if you were a mere observer. You had gotten to know Jung-Hyun well enough by now to see the faint nuances, would it be in his body language or his actual demeanor, and you realized without any doubts that he was wary of you.

And even if you hadn’t, the fact that he addressed you as huijang-nim said more than enough of his attitude toward you.

“‘Huijang-nim’?”

Suddenly remembering Hwang Ji-Woo, you gave her an apologetic smile. “He’s just joking,” you said quickly, reading the shock in her eyes. “Thank you. I’ll be able to handle myself from here.”

Ji-Woo’s smile was uncertain, and you cursed yourself for the poor first impression she would have of her soon-to-be boss. Turning back toward Jung-Hyun, you tried to ignore the frantic beating of your heart as you gestured for him to follow you. He merely nodded, and you led him away from the front desk where a few deliveries and other employees had started to gather around, stopping next to one of the windows.

“Is there somewhere private we can talk?” you asked quietly.

“I’ll take you to your father’s office,” said Jung-Hyun monotonously.

You swallowed. “Alright.”

The two elevator rides to your father’s office were quiet. You constantly battled with your urge to scratch up your arm, and even though you found yourself starting a conversation on several occasions, they never led any further than the state of the weather and your father’s condition. Jung-Hyun didn’t look at you, and you had a hard time looking at him, too. Because every time your eyes traced over his figure, you kept recalling the tattoo on his shoulder.

You kept recalling the blood on his hands.

Speaking of which, he still wore the engagement ring. You took it as a good sign, particularly since you had decided to keep it on for the day as well. It felt heavier than usual, and you had considered leaving it home, but when you caught Jung-Hyun’s unreadable eyes flicker toward your finger, you knew it had been a good decision to wear it.

If you had to be Jung-Hyun’s fiancée in order to find out more about him and his tattoo, you would remain his fiancée. For despite his reserved, and a bit unapproachable nature, he wasn’t a bad guy. There had to be a reason why he carried that tattoo.

There had to be a way for you to help him.

Your father’s office was, unsurprisingly, schemed in your mother’s favorite materials and colours, meaning rich wood and marble clashed with glass and metal in various modernistic shapes. You circled the spacious room once and took in the view from the topmost floor before you sank down behind the massive desk in the rear center of the office.

“Well,” you began in a light attempt at humour, “how much of a kid running around at their parent’s job do I look like?”

Jung-Hyun had waited silently in the corner of the room while you looked around but now stepped forward, stopping only when he was directly in front of you, on the other side of the desk. “Not much at all, huijang-nim,” he said, his eyes downcast.

“Don’t call me that,” you blurted, more exasperated and annoyed now than self-conscious. You understood why Jung-Hyun might want to keep up a facade when there were other people around, but now that you two were alone, he had no reason to behave differently. He shouldn’t be addressing you with honorifics since you were both younger and more inexperienced than him, and he definitely shouldn’t be avoiding your gaze.

“You’re the new chairman of Phoenix Inc., are you not?”

“I am.” You hesitated, but then said it anyway. “But nothing has changed between us.”

You despised lying to him, but you didn’t know what other way you could confront Jung-Hyun about his secret. He would never tell you about it if you broke up the engagement, and you couldn’t just continue with your life after what you had seen. Jung-Hyun didn’t strike you as the gangster type, which meant there was a chance he had simply been dragged into it due to circumstances. You needed to know the truth, and the truth better not be the opposite.

For if Jung-Hyun proved to actually liked belonging to a brutal syndicate like the Hwan Song Sun Pa, you were going to have to report him to the police. And that meant Jungkook would find out.

Perhaps that is what was the most compelling factor about Jung-Hyun’s secret. You didn’t want Jungkook to get anymore hurt than he already had been. Because even though you knew he was strong, strong enough to endure the life of an idol and all that it entailed, strong enough to make it through a life catastrophe like amnesia, he wasn’t invulnerable. He could still break.

How would he feel if his only sibling, a brother he already had a very strained relationship with, was a criminal? How would it affect his career, his dream?

How would it affect someone who had already been betrayed by everyone else in his family?

No, you needed to hope for the best. You needed to believe that Jung-Hyun was just as surprisingly gentle he could be at times, and that it wasn’t just a farce. You needed to wish that Jungkook’s brother was a better man than their father - and someone Jungkook could eventually come to lean on.

You needed to know why Jung-Hyun had the hangul sign for “Son” tattooed on his right shoulder.

“But you… you saw my tattoo.”

You nodded. “I did,” you affirmed.

“And you know what it means?”

“Yes.”

Jung-Hyun’s eyes narrowed ever so slightly. “Then you should also know how dangerous it is for you to get involved with me.”

“We’re engaged,” you said pointedly. “Did you think you could keep it a secret away from me forever?”

He didn’t respond.

“You’re smarter than that,” you continued, fueled both by your frustration and Jung-Hyun’s coolness. “I can’t marry some criminal.”

“I’m not a criminal.”

His normally stiff and somber voice adopted an icy edge and you found yourself stiffening in your seat. Jung-Hyun hadn’t raised his voice more than a notch, yet you caught yourself holding your breath, suddenly too scared to exhale.

“I’m sorry,” said Jung-Hyun hastily, his tone returning to normal. “I just cannot stand hearing anyone call me that. Because I’m not. Not anymore.”

You had never heard Jung-Hyun speak in short bursts like this before. Although he didn’t really speak that much in the first place, it always felt like he weighed his words once or twice before he released them. You were almost too startled by both his outburst and his uncharacteristic lack of composure to realize what he had said.

“‘Not anymore’?” you echoed.

Jung-Hyun nodded stiffly, once.

“I want to help you,” you said after a long pause where you had tried your best - and failed - to read Jung-Hyun’s expression. “I want to believe you, but I can’t just accept the fact that you’re supposedly some kind of ex-gangster. I need answers. I need the truth.”

Jung-Hyun stood there unmoving, silent, for a while. You felt like you had put an ultimatum before him, and indirectly, you had. And while you weren’t going to marry him either case, you did have a choice of reporting him to the police. Unless he explained himself, that’s what you were going to do.

“Let’s talk then.”

Your eyes widened. You hadn’t expected him to give in this quickly; you had thought you were going to have to pester him for weeks until he finally gave in. Maybe you should have just tracked him down and confronted him earlier.

“But not here and now.” Jung-Hyun’s eyes were impossible to read as he continued. “I would like some time to prepare myself.”

“What about over dinner this Friday?” you asked gingerly, while simultaneously wondering whether it was too little time.

“Are there going to be more than just us two?”

You raised an inquiring brow. Jung-Hyun averted his gaze. “Have you told anyone about my tattoo?” he wondered.

“No.”

“Not even your parents?”

“No,” you said truthfully. “We’ll eat and talk just the two of us.”

“Okay.” When Jung-Hyun’s eyes found yours, you spotted a shadow of relief flicker past just momentarily before it disappeared. “Friday it is. Do you have a place in mind, or do you want me to find one?”

“Ah, well.” You cleared your throat. “I didn’t really think that far. We can eat wherever you want to.”

“What about the Monarch?”

You smiled at the brief reminiscence. “Sounds good.”

Jung-Hyun produced his phone from the inner chest pocket of his suit and tapped something into it. “Do you know what you’re supposed to do here today?” he asked.

You grimaced. “I think so,” you said. “Mom said that she had arranged a meeting with all the presidents of Phoenix’s other business units as well as the head of the finance departments here in South Korea.”

“I have a list of the formers’ names here,” said Jung-Hyun and extended a piece of paper he had extracted from his briefcase. “The head of the finance department’s name is Kim Ju-Min. He’s one of your mother’s favorite employees.”

“She likes money, so,” you said jokingly as you surveyed the list. To your relief, each name came with a small description of their position and a picture, which made the prospect of meeting them already a little less scarier. “Did you make this?” you asked when you were done.

“Yes.”

You gave him a smile. “Thank you.”

His eyes softened infinitesimally as he placed a folder almost as thick as the briefcase he took it out from on the desk. “Here’s a file on all the employees stationed in this building,” he said in response to your wide eyes. “Your mother instructed me to give it to you.”

“What am I supposed to do with it?” you wondered skeptically.

“Your father has memorized the names and faces of everyone working here. Perhaps your mother want you to do the same thing.”

You had to use both of your hands to budge the heavy folder and glanced at it from the side. “This has to contain at least a thousand pages,” you said in disbelief.

“There are twelve hundred and forty-eight employees placed at Phoenix Inc.’s Seoul headquarters,” said Jung-Hyun, confirming your guess. “You have a lot more men and women working for you in other parts of the country as well as the world.”

“That’s going to be really hard to hear,” you muttered as you opened the folder.

“Pardon?”

“‘You have a lot more men and women working for you in other parts of the country as well as the world’,” you repeated stiffly, your eyes locking onto the picture of the first person in the folder. “To hear you say that… it’s kind of scary.”

“Is it because of the responsibility, or the power?”

You raised your gaze to found his. “Both,” you said quietly.

Jung-Hyun’s expression didn’t change, but the look in his eyes was a lot gentler now. “I’ll do my utmost to aid you, (Y/N),” he said, his stiff, somber tone sounding unusually soft. “If you have even the slightest of doubts, don’t be afraid to ask me.”

You didn’t know why your heart started beating faster at this, and so you did your best to ignore it. Clearing your throat, you pushed the folder aside for later inspection. “Is there something else for me to do here other than announce my dad’s retirement?” you asked.

“I emailed you your schedule,” said Jung-Hyun. His brief glimpse of tenderness had vanished completely and his features were neutral as he glanced at his phone. “The meeting with the presidents is at ten. You don’t have anything before it really, but the rest of the day, you’ll be meeting with the other department heads and preferably some director’s too. It’s absolutely vital that you make a good first impression on everyone and make sure they can look up to you as the new chairman and owner of this company.”

You gulped. “How long is that going to take?”

“A handful of hours, I would say.”

“Should I do something productive before the meeting?”

Jung-Hyun’s lips curved slightly. “Probably.”

You regarded the folder in the corner of your eye before checking your phone. It was 8.24, and you had probably gotten two hours of sleep the night before. Even though you were too antsy and nervous to feel any tired right now, you knew you were going to end up half-passed out by the time the meeting was due.

“Would you like some coffee?”

“Please,” you said with an apologetic smile.

Jung-Hyun nodded, and turned around. Just when he was about to exit the double doors leading into your father’s office, however, you stopped him.

“Do you know where there’s another chair?” you wondered. “If you’re going to help me, you can’t be standing around all day,” you added when he seemed on the verge of protesting. “I’m going to have neck pains looking up at you everytime we’re in here. Besides, isn’t it some kind of violation against employees rights to have them stand around like statues?”

The smallest of smiles appeared on Jung-Hyun’s face. “No, but I’ll have someone bring a chair before I get back.”

“I can do it myself,” you said.

“You’re the owner of one of the largest conglomerates in the world,” said Jung-Hyun, a trickle of amusement entering his voice. “If people see you hauling around a chair with your own hands, they’ll think you’ve lost your mind.”

“But it’s just a chair,” you tried.

Jung-Hyun shook his head. “You need to think about your image,” he told you firmly. “You need to be the leader everyone else here can follow.”

“Will people really think less of me just because I can carry a chair myself?” you wondered dubiously. “I mean, isn’t it better for them to see that I can do things myself?”

“Perhaps if the company is smaller and more tightly knitted together,” replied Jung-Hyun. “But that’s not the case with Phoenix. A majority of your employees will rarely ever see you. One of those few times they do cannot consist of an image where you’re moving furniture. You’re the face of this company - you have to be what everyone else hopes to achieve. That’s the only way you’ll be able to lead other influential and rich figures.”

It wasn’t like Jung-Hyun to speak for such a long time at once. You were both surprised and concerned by his words, and mulled them over after he had left. Because if you were to trust Jung-Hyun, which you did, that meant you had forgotten perhaps the most important and difficult hurdle that stood in your way of being the new CEO of Phoenix Inc., both outwardly and inwardly. Something you now realized you had no idea how to achieve.

The image of a leader.

When you heard the double doors opened ten minutes or so into your examination of the folder and its contents, you were startled by Jung-Hyun’s quick return. However, when you looked up from the papers, you found yourself looking at a stranger. Since there had already been a man leaving a chair almost immediately after Jung-Hyun left, it couldn’t relate to that either.

“Who are you?” you called out, admittedly suspicious since he hadn’t even knocked.

The stranger strode toward your father’s desk with purpose and an easygoing smile, bowing only when he was close enough to speak at a normal volume.

“My name is Kim Ju-Min,” he said, remaining at almost a ninety degree angle as he continued. He was of average build and height, and neatly cut hair framed a slim facial structure dominated mostly by a pair of large eyes. He was notably young and attractive, and probably wouldn’t have a difficult time finding dates if he wanted to. “I’m the head of the finance department here at the Seoul headquarters. Jung-Hyun contacted me a few minutes ago and told me you had arrived.”

“Oh.” Feeling a bit foolish, you quickly rose from the chair and held out a hand. “I’m (Y/F/N).”

His hand was small and a bit clammy as it grasped yours. “I know,” he said as he straightened. “Your mother has already told me about the situation with your father. Is he still at the hospital?”

You nodded, feeling a thick lump in your throat at the mention of your father’s health.

Ju-Min gave you a sympathetic smile. “He’s a strong man, your father. He’ll get better in no time.”

“I hope so,” you said numbly.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to make matters so personal.” Ju-Min’s eyes were dark and apologetic as they found yours. “I only came to say hello and introduce myself, but look how quickly I made this whole atmosphere dreary.”

“It’s alright,” you assured him and sank back down into the chair. “Jung-Hyun told me you’re my mother’s favorite employee. Is that true?”

Ju-Min laughed. “Ah, I don’t know about that,” he said as he scratched the back of his head. “But I’m quite good with money.”

“Then it must be true.”

He laughed again. “I’m glad to hear that he thinks I’m your mother favourite,” he said. “I just try to do my best here at the company.”

You saw his eyes glide curiously across the folder and the papers that were spread across the desk. With a quick smile, you gathered all the papers and pushed them aside. “I’m trying to memorize the names and faces of everyone working here,” you explained.

“We have name tags,” said Ju-Min as he pointed at the tiny sliver of metal that was fastened onto his suit. “And there are at least a thousand employees here. Nobody will blame you if you can’t recognize a few of the regular staff. Just remember the big fish.”

“The department heads and everyone above?”

He chuckled. “No, they don’t really have that much power. The presidents of each business unit will suffice.”

You glanced at the list Jung-Hyun had given you. Though it went against your personal beliefs to put aside some people in favor of others, there was no way you would be able to memorize everyone that worked in the building. It was just not feasible, especially not when you had at least a thousand other things you needed to learn.

“Ah well. I got to run. I have a meeting in five. Will you excuse me?”

You returned your attention to Ju-Min and smiled. “Of course,” you told him. “It was a pleasure meeting and talking to you.”

He sent you a carefree smile. “The pleasure was all mine,” he said. “I hope we’ll be able to talk some more soon. I would like to get to know you some more.”

“If I have time,” you said, unable to actually give him a better response. For who knew how busy you were going to be from now on?

“Certainly.”

With that, Ju-Min left. When the double doors closed after him, you plucked the list with the seven names and faces from the desk and read through it. Although the computer was password protected, you managed to research each name quickly on your phone. Nothing of either relevance or importance came up, however, and so you used the remaining time before the meeting to discuss each president with Jung-Hyun, who had returned with coffee.

When it was time for you to head down to the meeting room, you were trembling in your high heels. You were glad you had met Ju-Min so that there was at least one more person there who you recognized, but upon hearing that everyone of the presidents were older than fifty and had been doing what they were doing as long as your father, you had been unable to refrain yourself from scratching up your arm.

It was completely silent inside the conference hall that Jung-Hyun led you into. Nothing but the sound of your heels and the fast beating of your heart filled the silence as you approached the head of the table, just as Jung-Hyun had instructed you to. Jung-Hyun himself followed you like a shadow, but backed away when you had reached your destination.

Ju-Min gave you a brief smile from his position at the table. You would have smiled back, but were too nervous to even breathe. Ju-Min and seven men more than twice your age had all rose in tandem as soon as you halted by your chair, and waited for you to get seated before they, too, sank down. The silence was palpable, as was the tense atmosphere.

“Greetings,” you said when you thought you could control your voice. The word came out quiet, half-strangled, and you felt your face grow hot, but your forced yourself to meet each and everyone of the table’s occupants’ eyes. “My name is (Y/F/N). I do not know if my mother has contacted any of you already, but I’m here to officially announce my father’s retirement. Due to health reasons, he cannot hold the position as chairman of Phoenix Incorporation.”

“May he be well soon,” said the man sitting two seats away from you, to your left. You recognized him as Han Do-Hyeon, and apart from being the oldest one there, he was also the president of Phoenix Inc. Heavy Industries, which was the part of the company your late grandfather had conceived at the very start of Phoenix.

The others murmured their assent. You waited for them to quiet down before you went on.

“I will be taking my father’s place,” you said with much effort. “I know I’m very young and not very experienced, but I will do my best to lead this company. I hope you will all support me like you’ve supported my father and his father so that we can together bring Phoenix more success.”

You had expected at least one person who would voice their opposition, but to your shock, everyone around the table rose once more. They bowed deeply, before saying almost in perfect union: “Yes, huijang-nim.”

The rest of the meeting passed in a blur. You remembered fragments of it later when you had lunch with Jung-Hyun, but you were too busy wanting to hear his opinions about your performance to care about what would most likely be important information. He kept assuring you that you had been fine, but you continued overanalyzing everything about yourself as you returned to the Seoul headquarters and visited each floor to announce your father’s retirement and his replacement, which was you. You were exhausted by the end of everything and nearly fell asleep as soon as you entered the BMW.

But that’s when your phone vibrated.

“Straight home?” asked Jong-Yeol.

You shook your head as you read the message on your phone. “Swing by the BigHit Entertainment building.”

“Shouldn’t you rest today? You can always see Jungkook another time.”

“I’ll be fine,” you lied.

Besides, it wasn’t Jungkook who had texted you.

[saltyfishdream]

Let's say that I was glad I didn't discover AO3 until the summer before I went to secondary school, or nobody would ever know how tainted I would’ve become due to excess consumption of fanfiction from a large variety of animanga fandoms.

Since I was a kid, I tend to be full-blown obsessed with nearly every single fandom I stumble upon, so for a few months you’d see me having my personality revolved around some anime series— until the series ended on TV and a new one was aired. Then I’d just quickly move on with a new (un)healthy obsession on the new series, and repeat the procedure until literally the end of time if the TV didn’t break down when I was in fifth grade. I definitely did not scream or stomp or cry or throw tantrums to my parents for weeks on end then (before my parents introduced me to something that took me into the world of fandoms, that was another long story).

In first grade I was obsessed with Yowamushi Pedal and the first arc of Tanken Driland: Sennen no Mahō. That was when I had my first ever anime crush that everyone who knew me would’ve called me “delulu” if the word was invented in 2014. Yes, you heard me Mom. I will finally admit that I had a crush on Onoda Sakamichi back when I was six years old so you can never tease me about it again. (inserts villainous laugh)

In second grade it was Haikyuu and the second arc of Sennen no Mahō; Pokémon throughout the whole third grade as I was obsessed with Pokémon Go that year, while I watched some reruns of other series I had watched before; and Digimon Universe (with a healthy mix of Haikyuu if I remember it correctly) in fourth. I also remember watching two or three shojo anime series and a gajillion more sports anime but none of them left a deep enough impression on me to remember.

I thought my obsession levels were quite normal back then, at most rushing back home by 5pm on Thursdays and Fridays so as to not miss a beat of that 20-minute episode (with ten minutes of ads) and throwing tantrums when I was late for an episode but there was no way I could immediately turn on a TV to watch it. Or solely talking about that one series I was watching back then and never other topics— and if my friends didn't watch the same anime as I did, they weren't my friends at all.

But then a few months ago I decided it was about time that I wanted to experience some first-hand cringe nostalgia myself by reading all my writing homework back when I had extra English classes. To my surprise, ninety-nine percent of them were fanfiction. Most of that portion consisted of Pokémon and Digimon Universe as I only had sufficient vocabulary to write decent enough stories starting from third grade, but I did spot a few Haikyuu and Yowamushi Pedal references from earlier works. And my teachers back then did not care. Maybe they weren't interested in what I watched that they didn’t even take note of the Japanese names I used for the characters.

Boy, I am sure that I could've been the youngest fanfiction writer on AO3 if I discovered the site earlier. Like, imagine, when most people started writing in their early teens I would’ve been on there since I was eight. My parents said that I was literally addicted when I asked them about my history with anime as a kid.

However, my obsession did help me as a coping mechanism then. I would say that I was a happy kid in primary school, although my experience getting along with other kids and my teachers suggested otherwise. The details were already blurry, but I’m quite sure it was nothing close to good. I guess I would’ve gone insane or became depressed if there wasn’t a thing like anime that could anchor me to life. Then I realised that I wasn’t stupid back then to grow oblivious to my mistreatment. I was just escaping. Anime was a safe haven to me as a child. And I never knew it.

Everything took a turn for the better for the past few years of secondary school. We got a new TV after moving house, but I stopped watching anime after having a few new friends and a brand-new obsession with Percy Jackson. Nothing went terribly wrong. I may not be the most popular kid on the block, but I at least have friends. My grades are quite decent. I became the vice chairperson of a club. I should be happier than I was in primary school.

Sike, no. Everything went crashing down as my mental health hit rock bottom over the summer. To put it down to three words, I was hopeless. And in the nick of time I remembered one of my friends recommending an anime series— Blue Lock to be exact— to me right before everything in my mind was going to be worse than ever.

So that night I binged a few episodes, just to distract myself from my feelings long enough to hold out to the next morning.

Then— BOOM— I was staying up until 3am, reading every single fanfic I could comprehend on AO3 and spending every waking moment dedicated to the fandom instead of studying for that very important test a few days later.

You can say that it's just a hyperfixation from my autism, but some things just never change. I don't want it to change.

[renatedagmarmilada]

off sounds over from a lab.

“can you pass Francene’s M.A.” Francene (Powers) is a worker at the lab St Barths Human Research who has adapted and copied huge numbers of my poems, even copying some of my diary straight for the ‘Cosmopolitan’ Magazine. “She needs somehow to get to a higher level than you!” (me- Francine formerly didn’t have a school GCSE but is on the genius-maker machine of the lab..latest technology, brilliant stuff with evil usage by cheats.) ...and why not, they asked to have my M.A. failed and it was..though I have copies of the papers. Over the t.v. which they use constantly for their conversations(? – guilt?), they let me know it was actually a second….then my seventy percent Institute of Linguists was failed, “she needs no more education” though I am a mother tongue speaker. I was slow that time and didn’t keep a copy. Remember, always keep a copy of everything. I met one student when I was at University who complained that all Africans were down marked. I wouldn’t believe her then, I do now but with sadness as we had always placed education just below God and the British not much below that. “The Royals are all given automatic firsts,” put forward the lab, and one famous lady stormed to the University when it looked as though her son was going to get a fail and warned them, “don’t you dare.” and they didn’t..so the lab said…Though we come from large families, all, even back to my grandfather’s nineteen siblings, were all educated and most privately, our respect for education is was always so great. Pam’s daughter (of the Pensions Ministry) who was given my notes from off the lab machine was also granted an automatic first – for copying? She wrote identical work from my notes for which my University gave me a second..(I didn’t mind, my guy was a Cambridge man and very, very fussy to detail, word count and presentation)... all a bit of irony, as I had written them from a german language book, being tri-lingual and translating easily in my head. Poor girl had only to go to the Goethe Insitute of which she should have been a member if she was studying German at a reasonable University, and would have found an english copy there! Anyway the lab insisted she be given a first. Poor girl was then given a job in a Bank but didn’t have enough German to converse with the germans properly. You see it never pays to copy.  I tell all my students that. I must start telling them of these unfortunates who feel it necessary to cheat. God created a niche for us all, and cheating from others is always a stupid business, it catches up with you when you can’t do the work. At my orphanage I learnt from the nuns : several people always know, God, you and those whom you’ve cheated so others always find out. ‘Pensions Pauline’ has been used by the lab to cheat both my old mother out of loads of money, a refugee who lost everything, even our photographs and my baby clothes, a pensioner, they taxed her pension as a millionaire…as well as using her for experiment and myself and sons, too long a tale to go into, whom the lab had used as small boys and want to make sure they are not sued for it. She is still being used even at ninety. I find it slightly amusing, as we in Europe have been hammered for the things which went on in our education systems, and now I find that the Brits are worse, not better. “Keep this from the Minister.”.the bossess has said. I doubt the Health Ministry knows half of what goes on at that lab, a whiff of the bossess’s rear and that’s it, the men are lost..Civil Servants Dennis, Arthur and Arnold all…and Ministers alike… we all know men think with their penis.”She breezes into our office like fresh air, after our stale, staid old wives,” they admitted.  I was a stale,staid, old, faithful wife, so I am not sympathic with such snakes in the grass as this bosses. She destroys the name of all women who are trying to work in a man’s world and don’t want to sleep with every male who comes along, with her underhand actions and she could keep it out of the offices! The lab play with all the Ministries as part of their tactics.  A Junior Minister took all my family stories from of the lab machine, (they had processed us illegally and had us tagged?? I had headaches!) because, poor soul, he said they were better than his and then wrote them as his own to be published. I presume he didn’t write the lies the lab St Barths Human Research put about..”We laid down blacking lies about her evrywhere where we intervened remote and messed about.” But no, he would have been told and mostly people see me and realise. We were the naive ones, not most other people, having been protected by our service to those on High, who treated us so well. “we thought we could disable, cripple, discredit and destroy her work first before we release her at about seventy from when she was incarcerated at forty. I have all her letters here to the House of Lords, who will never see them and have deselected all emails for weeks now. We purge every so often totally, the rest of the time we allow small bits through.’’ (they put their own role plays answering for my friends on the tv but blocking real contacts, and try to give me ‘friends’ they choose. None works, nor do their ‘bondings.’That is what the tax payer pays for, idiots sadists to mess loyal citizens about. Thank goodness for sites like this one.) The lies are still biting, but I can only pray and hope God hears them to weigh the scales of judgement one day..but such rubbish makes up a ’’phase out’’ as they call it nowadays, the Austrian Lab called it a destruction programme too rightly. I was a bit miffed about the young Junior Health Minister though, as my family, the Feketes are without a shadow of a doubt descended from Mongolia’s waves in 1316 in central Royal Hungary, a far cry from the merchants of Israel of his ancestors and our other side, the Bertodis came from (Turin in )Italy with the Royal Entourage when the Queen of Genoa, Elizabeth married King Phillip of Hungary. However, I do feel sorry for him. I could have thought of fantastic stories for him had he let me know, incorporating his own peoples. I am a great one for culture! One Research person who is not white commented, ‘she’s still tribal.’ It must be awful to have so little pride in your ancestors..I love mine, the good, the bad and the evil… including that womanising grandfather of mine…so brave as a tiny, fat, round lion who shaved his hair to a Kojak from twenty seven years old because it had gone white and he didn’t want the ladies to know, as indeed was my temperamental, neurotic, clever mother, of such bravery she frightens even me, far more than the crooked rogue lab does, even at ninety years old. Well, Chagal adapted traditional Ukrainian cultural paintings but backed by western jewish money, he became famous and Mrs Miller of the lab, who had filled in all the forms, illegally I might add, in our names, wife of the axeman of the lab (a real swine, I know on my own skin) wrote our stories to the Women’s World, but by implication made them jewish, using a well-known jewish name as writer. Personally, I’d be ashamed and give them their quarter when ever I can but shame is not something which is part of an eye for an eye, I suppose. Her answer, we take any opportunity, regardless of shame. Sad! I won’t tell you of the ‘defilement programme’ they used all day by microsound during lectures…yet, another ‘cowboy’s weird theories’ tested. Biggest laugh of all..the lab Pakis been given my work to copy are now seriously sending it off for printing as their own cultural life and work!! European Jews and Europeans, ok dimwits and lovers of the lab bossess, but flippin-hell, Pakistanis!! I taught in Pakistan years ago, at the British Council and honestly, there is so much to write about there, it is totally not necessary at all. quote? The lab have made it easier for the Pakis over here and destroyed you loyal citizens we asked to work here after the war, who rebuilt our heavy industry. I don’t know how, but God will turn that one back at yous, believe me. A friend stabbed in the back is always avenged, somehow and anyway, one enemy is one enemy too many, even silent, socialised people like we. Hitler thought we were weak too, but felt our claws in more corners than he knew.

THE ARTIFICIAL MAKING OF GENIUS!

’’DO I HAVE PERMISSION TO MAKE BRILLIANT? THE SECOND FROM SCUNTHORPE ANOTHER OF HER CLASSMATES TO PUT ONTO THE LAB MACHINE WITHOUT THEIR KNOWLEDGE SO WE CAN THEN WRITE IN OTHERS HANDS ‘THERE WAS ANOTHER GIRL IN THE CLASS’

ANYTHING TO OUTWRITE OUR VICTIM FAY THE LAB AXE MAN’S DAUGHTER OF REDBRIDGE IS ALREADY BEING MADE BRILLIANT NOW STEPHANIE BOSSWELL VALERIE LOCKWOOD WENDY STAFF..WHICH SHOULD WE .. WE ALREADY USE THEM SIEVE THEM FIND ALL ABOUT THEM HAVE THEM ON THE LAB MACHINE.. THESE SCUNTHORPE GIRLS FORMERLY FROM DONCASTER ROAD CHURCH SCHOOL SCHOOL MATES OF OUR VICTIM AND HER FAMILY.’‘

But who cares, only YOUS at the lab. History will tell all. No it will not, the deeds of the last two decades have been totally covered and will never come to light.

Once upon a time you needed to be against the State, be a criminal, have a loose tongue, now it is called death therapy and pain therapy. So many deaths, lecturers, students and the rest. A system which is only about killing and making brilliant what is not, is a very bad start to a new world….

’’we destroy anyone we don’t like.’’ a Human Research person. IF ONLY I HAD SPOKEN LONG AGO!

FROM  the Automatic Answerer. Human Research St Barths. London.

The point being that such power should be policed and used more carefully under proper scientific conditions. Talk about bad science! The Americans have discovered some wonderful human-based technology here and readily admit they should have been more careful to whom they passed it on to, but can’t really be blamed as cunning, devious lying is the hallmark of this particular group. History has shown us that great power such as given this lab can be used to great good or to evil when used merely for personal stepping stones of greed and selfishness as this incompetent, corrupt rogue lab. These insane maniacs will ofcourse get golden handshakes from the same taxpayers’ money whom they have crucified on their altar of personal greed and useless power with a host of excuses such as, “by the end of the century it will be in use.” They said that in the ninetees too and the government is perfectly aware that the lab is ill educated to use this stuff properly. Their secret messing about with severely handicapped people is hardly the same as killing off talented, useful, working lecturer/ artists with ‘over-use’ (that’s what they blithely term as manslaughter) and all the rest of their horrid deeds in Universities and out.. the mad boss (a woman) of this system and most of their inadequately educated workers (some from Pakistan, unable to speak proper english half illiterate) actually believe stress is due to sexual frustration and treat it in a horrible manner (a G.P. just puts patients on a course of pills) They call them hot women and if mentally handicapped, at times use them when they have ‘heated’ them (I had thought that had gone out with Freud, who was a despicable character, no wonder the Chinese banned him for so long) I had read a couple of Freud’s books, so am aware, and can still remember whole passages he wrote so know what I am talking about. -you know, our east european women were suffering from stress from post war Europe and quite enough rape for years after coming here- it is merely that every nerve in the body reacts in stress and horror, as indeed with soldiers, their adrenalin makes them do uncharasteristic things..I as a teacher and artist should not have to tell a science person such simple biology – they even treated my dear lady with this rubbish, and yes, they have already said, once they find the youth elixir, they have promised the Royals it first, for which we and others in the population are being tortured with medical complaints remote… and Princess Anne is a woman who wants to win! Now what could be the meaning behind that quote? She wants a winning situation artificially, in her position…

[woso-dreamzzz]

Pernille's Princesse

Hardersson x Child!Reader

Part of The Big Adventures Universe

Summary: A look back at your birth from Pernille's perspective

It was, ultimately, a good idea to visit the Wolfsburg team.

Pernille was feeling terribly bad, all fat and bloated. She feels restless too, which is what actually prompts her to drag her heavily pregnant self to the training grounds to get some fresh air.

She's talking with Nilla Fischer, Magda's national teammate, when it happens. She sucks in as pain flares before something that she's been predicting will happen soon, happens.

"Are you okay?" Fischer asks, having caught the wince.

Pernille grabs her upper arms. "My water just broke," She says plainly," Did you bring your car to practice? I'd appreciate it if you drove me to the hospital."

"Oh..er...yeah, sure."

Pernille keeps a tight hold on her emotions as Nilla bundles her into the car and sets off to the hospital. Mainly, because she knows that after she's made this phone call, she'll have to be the calm one of the pair.

"I'll be there soon," Magda's voice says in greeting, a hint of laughter within it," I'm just about to get on the plane."

"You need to call Emma," Pernille says casually even though she's gritting her teeth and squeezing Nilla's wrist over the gear stick.

"What?"

Pernille thinks that Magda might be a little slow today. "You need to call Emma." Her words are short and sharp and it's all she can do from screaming from pain. "And tell her that you'll be sitting the next few games out. You're busy."

"But I'm not?"

Pernille wants to scream and cry but she's trying to stay strong and not have a breakdown in Nilla's car. It doesn't quite work because she snaps at Magda. "You are! Because I'll be damned if I push your baby out and you run back to England a few days later."

She can hear Magda's sharp inhale of worried breath. "But...You can't be having her now! She's early!"

"By two days!" Pernille hisses as another contraction hits her. "I'll send you the hospital address. I don't care how you do it but if you miss this, Magda, I will not be happy."

She drops the call when Nilla pulls into an empty parking space, leaping from the car to help get Pernille out.

"Worried mama?" The receptionist lady asks as Nilla flaps about trying to get Pernille seen.

"Worried friend," Pernille replies as she fills in one last form, handing it back over the counter," The other mama is on a plane to get here right now."

The receptionist winces in sympathy and flags down a nurse to take Pernille to her room.

Nilla comes with her but after a few hours and a text from Magda saying she's landed, Pernille kicks their mutual friend out.

"You're hovering and it's stressing me out!" She snaps as another contraction comes through. "Go and wait outside for Magda!"

Nilla leaving gives Pernille time to calm herself, taking in long and soothing breaths as she rubs her stomach. "Come on, princesse. Just stay like you are for a bit longer or I'll have to kill your Morsa."

She doesn't need to worry though because, no sooner has a nurse confirmed that she's only five centimetres, does Magda arrive.

"Am I late?"

Pernille's lying back on the bed, hand still rubbing circles on her stomach. She deadpans," Does it look like you're late?"

Magda relaxes significantly before saying with a hint of laughter," I think I scared Nilla. I left all my luggage with her."

Pernille waves a hand dismissively. "She's got spare keys. The nurse said I'm only five centimetres dilated. We could be here for a few more hours. Have you called Emma yet?"

Magda's guilty face says everything.

"We have time," Pernille says," Call her now and tell her."

She's right, of course, because your grand entrance to the world doesn't happen until early in the morning. It's absolute hell pushing you out and Pernille's ninety percent sure that she's absolutely wrecked Magda's hand from how hard she was clenching it.

She definitely screamed as well and she also doesn't want to think about the fact that the doctor had a view of her the whole time.

"You did it," Magda says as Pernille slumps back against the pillows," She's here."

Pernille can hear you screaming and she smiles, absolutely exhausted. "She's here."

She watches as the doctor passes a bundle wrapped in your baby blanket to Magda.

You've gone quiet and you're absolutely beautiful, Pernille notes, when you're unwrapped and placed on her chest.

You're rooting immediately and Pernille can do little but stare in awe at you.

●～●～●～●～

Getting you home is easy and Pernille makes Magda drag the cradle into the main bedroom, so they can get you easily at night.

"Look at those legs go. You're going to be such a good addition to Sweden when you're older."

Pernille rolls her eyes as she sits up in bed, having taken a power nap. "You mean Denmark. I'm not raising my daughter to wear a Sweden jersey."

"We'll see."

Pernille picks you up and marvels, not for the first time, at how easily you fit into her arms. She moves to the rocking chair and places you in Magda's arms.

You both look so sweet together, so soft and loving that Pernille has to take a picture - immortalising the moment.

"That's getting framed," She says with a grin," I think I'll put it on my bedside table. So I can remember this moment with you and the princesse." She crouches down to make you wear the hood, caressing your cheeks.

"We need to give her a name soon," Magda reminds her but her eyes haven't left you," We can't keep calling her the princesse."

Pernille thinks of the list they made, the one taped up to the fridge door. They had been going back and forth for weeks. She bites her lip as the name she had heard recently comes to mind.

She hums. "I know it wasn't on the list," She says finally," But I like y/n."

Magda repeats it with a smile, looking down at you. "Is that your name? Are you a y/n?"

You kick your legs, slamming them into Magda and Pernille smothers her laugh.

"That's a pretty powerful strike, princesse." Magda looks up at her. "I think she's giving us her approval."

"I think so too. y/n Harder-Eriksson."

"y/n Eriksson-Harder."

Pernille scoffs and rolls her eyes. "We've got another day before the trip to the embassies. We'll argue about her last name later." Her hand ghosts over your head. "What matters right now is princesse has a name now."

"It's a very pretty name."

[anghraine]

“threshold of a dream” - fic

Because I looked sadly at my dash, then looked at my wrist bandage, then went “hell with it.”

fandom: Star Wars

characters: Jyn Erso, Cassian Andor, Davits Draven; Jyn/Cassian

length: 2.8k

stuff that happens: Jyn manages that narrow escape from Scarif that we were cruelly denied and finds herself alone in the galaxy once more. Sort of.

(aka Rebelcaptain Appreciation Week, Day 1: Family)

Could a droid be one with the Force? She hoped so, not just for Cassian. The Force united everyone, didn’t it? Kay had been nothing if not someone, and now he was gone, like Papa and Saw. Like Bodhi and Baze and Chirrut, almost as certainly. The soldiers she’d hardly known, but who had believed in her, or in Cassian’s belief.

Everything had ended as it began, back on the streets of Jedha. Crowds of strangers, and the two of them, alone together. Jyn and Cassian, Cassian and Jyn.

The first time she landed on the Rebel base, Jyn didn’t recognize any of the voices shouting orders, snapping questions, offering explanations. Soldiers, droids, senators—it made no difference. Just a different sort of crowd. As ever, she was alone among strangers, with no one to depend on but herself.

She didn’t trust them. But Jyn wasn’t stupidly paranoid; whatever the Alliance might be, or do, or plan, it had to be a good sight better than an Imperial prison. And she understood revolutionaries, even ones like these, more hopeful and rigid than anyone with Saw had ever been. She could never quite wrap her mind around the Imperial true believers, everywhere in the prisons.

It wasn’t anything like home, like the family ripped away by this stupid war twice over. But it was familiar. She could work with this. And get the hell out, forever.

A month later, Jyn returned to Yavin IV in an Imperial shuttle, and she’d never been happier to see a place in her life. She didn’t even know what she said as they landed, babbling at Cassian through the dull pain in her head and muscles, the sharper pain where she’d busted up her leg. Speech for its own sake wasn’t Jyn, not usually, but—well, the same went for most of what she’d done in the last thirty hours.

She couldn’t fly. Cassian could, though, and he’d grated out can you talk? as soon as they escaped into hyperspace.

Of course I can, Jyn said, puzzled even as she stood behind him, watching his hands shake on the controls, and praying once more. But when crushed vertebrae flashed onto the scanner she’d dredged out of a medical kit, she realized: it was a request, not an enquiry after her vocal cords.

If he wanted her to talk, she’d damn well talk. So she did.

“Nearly there,” she told him now, pitching her voice above his laboured breaths. He’d be fine once they got to the base. This wasn’t like the Partisans, who always lived on the edge of desperation, with nothing but what they could build and steal. The Rebellion had resources, ships and uniforms and bacta. He’d be fine. “See? Right there. Home.”

Cassian didn’t say anything, but he managed to land the shuttle through it all. Skill or the Force or the painkillers she’d stuck into his veins, Jyn didn’t know. It didn’t matter. They were here now—not really home, but at least safe, for now. Who cared how they’d done it?

Still, as the ramp lowered and Cassian exhaled, sweat smearing the dirt and blood on his face, Jyn fumbled for her mother’s crystal.

May the Force of others be with you.

“We’re here.”

Cassian leaned his head back, eyes closed, and she felt outright grateful for the harsh gasps that meant he was alive, however painfully so.

Strange steps clattered up the ramp. Strange voices shouted for help, doctors, names, arms and bodies jostling as they clustered around Cassian, one of their own. But he didn’t talk to them, either, and it was all captain-this and sir-that, hardly even an Andor. They didn’t know him, except as pips on a jacket somewhere. Hardly more than they knew her.

For herself, she shoved off any hands that touched her, though her knees buckled, and her bad leg burned. Her throat, too. The talking, or—

Jyn twisted around. Below them, other strangers pushed two stretchers towards the shuttle, though it was more like running. Two?

“Jyn,” Cassian muttered, and she instantly turned back to him. The strangers were urging something. He needed to get up, or let them move him. No, he couldn’t. He was too tired, couldn’t they see? And they couldn’t take him from her, not now. She almost tuned out the voices, but one broke through her haze.

—in bacta for sure—

Bacta. Yes, he needed bacta. Jyn reached for Cassian’s hand, a little tentative until his fingers closed tightly around hers.

“It’s the Rebellion,” she managed to say. “They’re here to help. Listen to them.”

She didn’t know if he paid any attention to them, but he did to her. He also collapsed within a few steps, which would have horrified her if her own head weren’t spinning. Jyn fumbled for purchase, her hand landing on a narrow shoulder. She squinted, trying to focus.

“Cassian?”

“We’ve got him,” said someone in grey. Lighter than Imperial grey, but she still scowled, suspicious. “C’mon, you’d better lie down, too.”

“Why?” Dimly, she recalled that she’d lost blood, too. Maybe more than she’d noticed.

“We’re here to help and you should listen,” the stranger told her. She wasn’t listening, not really, but she decided to follow the path Cassian had taken. Fortunately, they seemed to want her to go that way, too, and they let her slump onto the second stretcher. Baze and Chirrut would think it funny, wouldn’t they? Cassian fainting, Jyn something like compliant. But they were gone. Everyone, unless they’d found some way of escaping, too.

Little sister and the face of a friend tangled in her head.

She didn’t count on that. And Kay for sure hadn’t escaped. Could a droid be one with the Force? She hoped so, not just for Cassian. The Force united everyone, didn’t it? Kay had been nothing if not someone, and now he was gone, like Papa and Saw. Like Bodhi and Baze and Chirrut, almost as certainly. The soldiers she’d hardly known, but who had believed in her, or in Cassian’s belief. 

Everything had ended as it began, back on the streets of Jedha. Crowds of strangers, and the two of them, alone together. Jyn and Cassian, Cassian and Jyn.

“You need to lie down, miss,” a different stranger said.

She was so tired. Jyn clutched her necklace, and obeyed.

An hour in the Yavin infirmary later, Jyn felt herself again. But if exhaustion and blood loss had made her hazy, it hadn’t made her wrong. She returned to the Rebellion as she’d arrived: a woman adrift in the galaxy, without home or family, who knew none of the people speaking to and around her.

In a horrific way, it seemed almost appropriate. A circle, now complete. But it wasn’t complete, she reminded herself, not quite. Just fear and grief lying the way they always lied. She remained alone because Cassian was drugged into oblivion, not because she truly had no one left. His injuries would put him in maddening pain if he regained consciousness—she couldn’t begrudge him that.

Of course, Jyn didn’t know for sure what she would find when he woke up, what shape not alone would take. She knew, though, that he’d had her back in one hell after another, as far as he was physically capable of. Beyond it, really, in the end. 

Before that, as they gravitated together in the hangar here on Yavin, Cassian had promised her—something, more in the tilt of his body and exchanged smiles than in anything they said. He’d looked at Jyn with her own awkward delight on the shuttle, and stared at her like the entire revolution lived in her skin after she kissed him in the elevator.

If she didn’t know exactly what it all meant, what she wanted it to mean, she knew what it didn’t. Instead of following her instincts and slipping away, demanding her promised freedom or some reward or other, Jyn insisted on seeing Cassian, and then all but welded herself to his bedside, fielding questions from there.

She wouldn’t have regretted it in any case; Jyn rarely wasted time with regrets, least of all when only one real choice opened ahead of her. But in the event, the next few hours only affirmed her decision. 

Doctors and nurses passed in and out, wanting to know when and how Cassian had acquired each injury; Jyn answered with as much precision and detail as she could. A few soldiers paid respects, deferential and solemn. The Rebellion, it turned out, was stretched far too thin to insist on rigid divisions of work; in a crisis, an officer was an officer, and Cassian had been tossed into full-on military operations more than once. His men liked him, or rather, respected him enough to do the work of liking. They gave her the impression of a stern but quietly personable officer, one who could carry off complex objectives with a handful of troops and a bootlace, and in most cases bring both troops and bootlace back home again. Namely, the exact impression she already had.

A couple of senior officers came by, too. Jyn only recognized one, Cassian’s general—a giant, fair-haired man who always looked at her like something he’d like to crush underfoot. She entirely returned the feeling; General Draven had to be the one who’d ordered Galen’s death, and no doubt the other terrible things that had left Cassian and his team hunting for something to make it all worthwhile. And he definitely was the one who’d all but accused her of manufacturing her father’s message in that failed Council meeting.

However, he did seem concerned about Cassian in his own way: droid-like, she would have said, if that weren’t an insult to Kay. And Draven’s rank extracted information out of the doctors she hadn’t been able to get on her own (not considered at risk of death or full paralysis, we won’t know more until he wakes up). So she grumbled out answers to General Draven’s questions, exact even as she glowered.

“You said he fell in the archive. How?”

She’d already answered this one at least four times. Since punching his smug, suspicious face wouldn’t accomplish anything, Jyn determinedly looked at Cassian. Someone had washed and combed his hair, which horrified her in a way she couldn’t define. Under the intense white light of the infirmary, it shone in shades of deep brown rather than black, his skin ashen.

“I already told you, he was covering me,” she said. “I had the plans. Cassian …”

Draven always said Captain Andor, like the doctors, like the soldiers. Jyn hadn’t heard a single other person say Cassian’s name since Kay died. She clenched her jaw and turned to face the general again, unimpressed by his looming height and open distrust.

“Cassian told me to keep climbing. Then he drew their fire. He shot down a deathtrooper, and another managed to hit him. He lost his grip and fell.” She always jumped ahead at this point in her account. Her nightmares were already plentiful and varied enough without focusing on that particular horror. But now she couldn’t help but remember the sound of it. The familiar exchange of blasterfire, something she’d thought herself inured to long ago. Cassian’s body crashing down and down, his spine smashing against a beam and then his body sprawled at unnatural angles on the platform below.

“I thought about turning back for him,” Jyn found herself saying. She hadn’t said that the other times, hadn’t meant to, perhaps ever. In the archive, she’d forced herself to keep going, her own scream echoing in her ears—Cassian! Cassian!—punctuated by the crack of his bones. But it wasn’t her first impulse. She had to repress that, the longing to throw everything aside and clamber back down, if only for what few moments seemed likely to remain to him, if any at all. 

Instead, she climbed.

“Really?” said Draven skeptically.

She glared. “Yes. But I knew—I thought it was pointless. He looked dead, and I had to get to the tower.”

For her father, her team, for the trillions who could die if she faltered. Cassian, of all people, would understand that. Remembering how he’d looked when he shot Krennic, when he gazed at her in the elevator, Jyn amended the thought. He had understood that.

Well, it was Cassian. Even dead, he’d probably haunt Jyn into eternity if she risked the galaxy for him.

“Miss Erso,” Draven said, “you have insisted that these plans contain a secret to stop the genocide of planets, an act of sabotage that your own father—”

“—who you killed—”

Draven ignored this. “An act of sabotage that your own father dedicated the last decade and some of his life to. You supposedly believed in that supposed message so strongly that you led dozens of good men into a deathtrap, and then you considered risking that for a stranger? You expect me to believe this?”

“A stranger,” repeated Jyn. She almost laughed. “Cassian?”

He wasn’t the first to suggest it, of course. They all did, really: the droids who tried to get her to leave, the doctors who refused to tell her anything, the soldiers bewildered at the presence of an unknown woman at the captain’s side, even when she identified herself. Jyn knew those people believed that she hadn’t known Cassian long enough to know him at all. Certainly not long enough to have grieved anything but possibility—the idea of Cassian, not the man he was. To them, it must really seemed impossible that she’d even think of risking her father’s desperate gamble for moments with Cassian’s broken body.

Those people could go fuck themselves, Jyn thought. Draven in particular.

“Captain Andor is—”

A comlink around his neck buzzed.

“Draven here. Can this wait?”

Jyn supposed that was flattering, in its own way. But then his face, even more rigidly controlled than Cassian’s at first, went slack. His eyes widened, mouth dropping open.

“Leia? Now? Yes, yes.” He clicked off the com and favoured Jyn with his most ambivalent look yet. “We’ll finish this later.”

She shrugged.

An hour later, Cassian woke up. A droid had grumbled about tapering off the anaesthetics, so she half-expected it, but Jyn’s breath still strangled in her throat as he stirred. Draven and whatever enquiry might be forthcoming fled her mind. She didn’t say anything, didn’t move, just stared at him with hope thudding an anxious beat in her chest.

Cassian’s eyes flew open. “Jyn.”

She swallowed.

“Is she—Jyn—” He blinked around, licking his dry mouth as he tried to make sense of his surroundings.

He’d figure it out in another instant, but Jyn still rushed over, her mouth trembling and hands steady. Gracelessly, she reached for him.

“I’m right here, Cassian.”

He turned his head to see her, his unfocused gaze sharpening, familiar lines of strain creasing his skin. But a smile did, too, around both mouth and eyes.

“Jyn,” Cassian managed, fingers fumbling about hers. “You’re all right?”

Jyn did laugh now, for real. “I had a sprained ankle. You broke pieces of your spine. Yes, I’m fine.”

His grip relaxed, just a bit. But his dark eyes remained fixed on hers, almost unbearably intense. “You’re … you stayed.”

If the last few days had taught her anything, it was that Cassian had about as many people to call his own as she did. Superiors, subordinates, fellow Rebels, sure. But that was the revolution, the respect for a valuable agent or leader in the Rebellion, not—belonging. She’d discovered the difference between family and usefulness in a bunker six years ago.

“Of course I did,” she told him, every instinct screaming to back away. Jyn leaned closer, letting her own mouth curve. “Welcome home.”

Cassian’s smile deepened, pressing into his cheeks. Because of course he turned out to have dimples, at least when he looked at her like that.

“Oh, thank the Maker,” called a shrill, metallic voice from the doorway. “You’re awake, captain!”

They both turned to scowl at the medical droid wheeling towards them.

“The protocols, as I’m sure you know, require us to perform all treatment required for basic functioning, which have included—”

“Get to that later,” said Jyn. “What do you want?”

The flat blue face managed to regard her with profound disdain.

“The lesser procedures require permission from the patient or interested parties. Now we can move ahead properly.” Its voice went bright and high again.

“Right,” Cassian said. He braced himself and tried to sit up, ignoring the 2-1B’s sputtering. Jyn just moved to raise the back of the bed until he could lean back comfortably, and shot a triumphant glance at the droid.

“Interested parties have been here the whole time,” she said, sitting back down.

“Captain Andor has no listed family,” replied 2-1B.

Jyn snapped, “He has me.”

The man in question looked down at her hand, resting on the edge of his bed. Jyn, torn between defiance and embarrassment, was about to pull it back, but instead Cassian laced their fingers together again.

“Well, unless he wants you added to his personnel file—”

“I do,” he said instantly, then glanced over at her, wide-eyed. His entire expression went awkward and uncertain, even as their hands clung together.

Jyn, no less overwhelmed, felt at least some reassurance that she wasn’t alone in it. In one side or the other, or—anything. She managed an unsteady smile.

2-1B’s whirr emanated the long-suffering that only a droid could manage. “Very well. J-Y-N E-R-S-O, next of kin. Is that right?”

Nervous, relieved, exhilarated, she couldn’t quite look at Cassian. But she curled her fingers more tightly against his.

“Yes,” Jyn said. “That’s good.”

[slothgiirl]

the medic (keith x reader)

17k. something weird’s going on with keith, like alien weird. as the team medic, you’re concerned.

“So he is avoiding me,” you muse aloud, grabbing one of the pink alien food biscuits that were Hank’s latest experiment. Though it had been hours since Voltron had taken out the Galra Empire’s presence on this Balmera, you’d only just seen the last of your patients. Altean medical equipment did wonders.

After a battle, you were hardly surprised to find Hank in the kitchen, grounding himself as he cooked. You were surprised to run into Keith.

“Yeah,” Hank nods, “Probably trying to avoid another dental exam.”

You flush bright red, “His teeth fell out! Sorry for being concerned.” Between you and Lance, you’d managed to get a look at Keith. A fist fight with some alien species that was cooperating with the Galra had not gone Keith’s way, knocking out two of his teeth.

Shiro, predictably, had waved it off and accepted Keith’s insane explanation that his teeth would grow back on their own without question: given his hand waving of the red paladin’s eyes glowing slightly in the dark, more than any human’s should (human eyes didn’t glow at all!). Hindsight was twenty twenty.

The yellow paladin shrugs as he mixes orange noodle-esque things in a bowl.

Team Voltron was full of strong personalities. Add in Lotor and his friends dropping in, there was always something going on.

Hank just wanted to unwind from spending the past few hours destroying heavy duty mining equipment without hurting the planet. “So how are the biscuits?”

You chew on one, still bothered by Keith. Maybe Hank was right and he was trying to hide something from your keen gaze. You hoped not. Knowing the red paladin, and after two years in space, you certainly did, he’d rather suffer in silence until there was no other option than get medical attention. Back on earth with needles and scalpels, you understood, but in the Castle of Lions…

“Kind of like a rice cracker,” you tell Hank helpfully. “In a good got snacks at H-Mart way, not the sad quaker oats rice snacks.”

“Oh H-Mart,” Hunk smiles, “they don’t have those in space. They do have salt though. Found that at the last market we went to.”

“As long as alien food doesn’t poison us,” you comment. It was lucky that hadn’t happened. It was alien food. But not one negative reaction which either made humans some of the most hardy species or you were just lucky.

“Yeah,” Hunk chuckles, “I’ve gotten pretty good at recognizing what’s edible and not. I know Pidge said there’s some books, but my Altean is pretty bad.”

“Languages are hard.”

“Wish there was a space version of google translate.”

“Hunk-”

“Yeah.”

“That’s genius!” You look at the yellow paladin, wondering how a universe with speech translators never thought to do the same for written language.

“I know,” Hunk smiles while popping another tray into the oven.

—————

Lance finishes painting your toenails. It was a rare day when there were no space battles or rebel meetings. “Pidge,” the blue paladin whines, “let me paint your-”

“Don’t even think about it!”

“It’s supposed to be team bonding night,” Lance counters.

“Lance,” Allaura frowns from where she’s sitting with Shiro, “the castle’s night cycle has not started.”

“Well we can change it,” he counters, “there’s no up or down in space. OR day or night.”

“You can paint my nails,” Hunk offers. “Won’t last long though between the cooking and the vents I’ve been cleaning. This is a 10,000 year old castle. No offence,” he glances at Allura.

“No offence at all. The battles have taken their toll and I’m sure Coran appreciates the help. He is only one man.” She lets out a sigh. The only other remaining Altean was a bittersweet subject for her.

Hunk kicks off his shoes. “My pleasure. Literally. This Castle is so cool. The artificial gravity alone!”

You watch the paint dry on your toes. Only your big toes had actual drawings on them, strange alien creatures you’d all encountered over your time in space. The others were clear with green and blue swirls. “You’re a good artist Lance.”

The blue paladin winks, “I’m a regular old Michaelangelo.”

You laugh, “of course you are.”

“And I’m not just good with a brush,” he wiggles his eyebrows, more boyish flirting than anything serious.

You roll your eyes.

Pidge throws a cushion at Lance. “Oh please like you’ve got past the first date!”

“I have! Vivian Tran from Calculus.”

“Can you focus on my nails,” Hunk asks, but Lance is busy waving the thin brush in hand as he argues with Pidge.

“And Atticus from Cantonese.”

“Didn’t you drop that class,” Hank asks.

“Well, the hindi teacher was way nicer and didn’t hate me. I was good at drawing the characters though.”

“Can you speak hindi,” you ask, having taken French for your language fulfillment.

“Eh-” Lance shrugs.

“Can you flirt in Hindi is the real question,” you ask with a grin.

“He can’t even flirt in English,” Pidge points out scathingly.

“Hey!”

“My nails Lance,” Hunk grumbles.

“Right. Right,” Lance focuses back on his task, going with a yellow that matches Shay. “What language did you take Shiro?”

“English.”

“How many dialects does Earth have,” Allura asks.

“A lot,” Shiro tells the alien princess. “The Garrison pushes being multilingual in its program. Most cadets were already bilingual to start with, generally covering major languages.”

“Ah.”

“Got bored of the training room,” Pidge asks Keith as he walks in, flopping down on an empty sofa.

“It timed out.”

“Sure,” Lance immediately starts, a dog with a bone, “not like you couldn’t beat it or anything.”  

“You can’t even get past level 9!” Keith growls back, sitting up with a jolt, skin still slick from sweat and his cheeks were flushed with exertion.

Lance gets up, puffing out his chest. Oh boy, here they go again. The rivalry thing they had going on got old fast to everyone around them. While it did push them to be better paladins, it was annoying to hear. “Oh like you’re any better.”

Hunk takes the brush from Lance, finishing off his last toe on his own.

“I am,” Keith bites back, a growl still audible from his chest.

“Only because you cheat!”

“It’s not cheating!”

“How is it not-” Lance stops, furrows his brow, then grins. “You got a little something there.” And like a thirteen year old, Lance points and laughs.

Keith frowns, his hand coming up to his cheek.

Sure enough, Lance was right. Keith had a couple of angry red blemishes on his cheek.

“You have adult acne,” Lance giggles, immature as ever. He was always able to find an angle to everything. It was what made him such an excellent strategist.

“It’s not adult acne!” Keith scowls, scratching at the blemishes.

“Its been three years,” Lance retorts smugly.

You frown. “No. It’s been like two.” You look over at Pidge to confirm, “Right?” You were like ninety percent sure you were twenty.

“Two and a half,” Pidge answers.

“Ha! You’re twenty! Adult-”

“I don’t have adult acne!”

They’d fought over more meaningless things before.

If it was two and a half years, maybe you were twenty one? You frown. How old would you be before you ever saw your family again?

Stashing that depressing thought away, you focus on Keith and the red marks on his cheek like a line coming down to his jaw. “It could be a rash,” you utter thoughtfully. Pidge and you had already encountered a very itchy plant before. “Or space ringworm-ring line?”

For the first time in days, Keith looks at you, meeting your gaze. “It’s not a rash!”

You lift your hands up, “okay. Okay. Geez.” When it came to Keith, you didn’t push too hard. He was too stubborn for it to work.

Lance, however, “hey, it’s okay Keith-buddy, just use toothpaste.”

“Toothpaste makes it worse,” Hunk counters. “Not great for your skin either.”

“It always worked for me,” Lance counters. “Or a clay skin mask.”

“Clay? You mean that green mud,” Keith clarifies.

“It’s clay!”

“Clay would work,” you agree with Lance. “Hey it could be like a spa day!”

“I could go for a spa,” Hunk nods.

Pidge shakes her head, “right. I’m going to try and see if I can get a signal back home.”

Shiro looks over at you, “do you really think it could be something serious?”

You shrug. “No clue.”

Keith huffs, “Just drop it,” he states dramatically, headed for the door. He was over being the center of attention.

“So face masks?”

You nod, “want to try it Allura?”

“I would love to try the clay mask,” she smiles brightly.

——————

Te-Osh’s rebels had sent for Voltron, less fighting than rebuilding.

While you were no paladin, you had spent the majority of the day helping Allura take stock and synthesizing medicine, everything from serums to numbing gels. Just your luck the machine had overheated and given out on the last batch. It was a pretty large machine.

You stick your head inside, waving off the smoke. With your nails, you pry open the hutch and take stock. You were no Pidge or Hunk, still unsure how the thing even worked, but it was clear it needed a new regulator and starter. “Plenty of those lying around,” you utter, scrunching your face at the awful burnt hair smell. Your finger finds the ventilator button on your wrist controls, and there-the smell gets sucked out of the room.

“Is this a bad time,” Keith asks behind you.

Startled, you bang your head on the mental. “Keith,” flushing hotly when you look back and realize you were ass up in front of him.

He doesn’t even notice, grimacing, hand rubbing his nose bridge.

“What’s wrong?” You hurry to wash your hands.

Keith sits down at one of the medbay tables. “My skull feels like it’s being cracked open,” he explains flatly.

You look him over closely, standing right in front of him. “Where exactly,” you ask, frowning when you notice the blemishes had grown to a full blown rash, hot angry skin peeling and cracking like twin marks down his cheeks. You should have pressed. What if it was a parasite? Keith was half galra.

It was easily forgotten given how human he looked. Sure, the signs were there: his unhuman night vision, more strength than he should have, good ears and nose, nails that had torn through metal, but it all faded into the background.

“Does it itch,” you ask, raising your hand, fingertips hovering over the marks on his cheeks.

“Yes,” Keith nods, averting his eyes from your gaze, “mostly it’s hot. And my sinuses…all the way down to my neck. Hurt.”

“Hm,” you turn, reaching for the medical scanner. There was no way you could ever go back to being a medical officer at the galaxy garrison. Earth’s technology was ancient in comparison. “Hold still.”

“Alright,” he says seriously. Keith holds his breath.

You look up at him, in his violet eyes, and smile before laughing. “Keith!”

“You said to hold still,” he points out sincerely, before the corners of his lips turn up. Keith was an expressive guy, his smile lit up his entire being, a lightness in his eyes that made you smile wider.

“Let’s try this again,” you giggle, clicking the scanner and aiming right at his rash first. “Pew.”

He rolls his eyes, snorting. “You too?”

“Mine’s the only right one,” you wink, then look over the reading.

“Not even close.” He scratches at his cheek listlessly.

Whatever reason he had for avoiding you had worked itself out. You’d missed his company.

“Oh yeah,” you challenge, “then what’s the sound?” The readings came up clear. Keith was in perfect health. So not a parasite…space allergies? Those wouldn’t come up on the scanner.

“What is it,” Keith asks, noticing your pensive expression.

“How’s your sense of smell? Stuffy nose?”

He looks up, then takes a deep breath, “now that you mention it…I can’t smell your soap anymore.”

“What?” This was news to you. “You can smell my soap?”

“And whatever planet we’ve been on,” Keith fidgets, blushing as he ducks his head, bangs falling over his eyes, “the soil. It’s all different. But I can’t right now.”

That was worrying. But if the scanner said nothing was wrong…you had to wait and see. It might clear up on its own. You’d give it a day or two.

“Nothing came up on the scanner,” you tell him, “so it should go away on its own. It might just be allergic to something out here.”  

He nods, accepting your diagnosis.

“Let me get the medicine.”

“Mhm.”

You pass him a tube of gel and add that to the list of medication you need to synthesize once you fix the machine. Then grab a weekly supply of pain tabs. “Here.”

Keith pops one in immediately.

“Let me know if it doesn’t clear up in two days,” you tell him.

“Worried?”

“Eh, I can always set Lance on you again,” you snort. Shiro was a pushover when it came to Keith. He was no help.

Keith laughs, looking a little more himself. “I could take him.”

“You could,” you agree, “but don’t tell him I said that.”

He tilts his head, smiling. “Coming? Shay got food for us.”

“I’ve got to fix this machine first.”

“Need help?”

“Might ask Hunk or Coran,” you admit.

“I could-”

“No,” you cut him off, placing your hand on his shoulder, “go eat and rest. That’s an order.”

Keith leans into you. “Are you going to write me a doctor’s note too,” he asks, his delivery always so earnest you had to do a double take to figure out if he was joking or not.

“If I have too,” you stick your nose in the air. “I’ll even send one to Zarkon.”

Keith laughs easily. “Why didn’t Lotor think of that.”

You snort. “I’m going to check your lymph nodes,” you tell him, taking a step towards him again. “That okay?”

Keith tilts his head back, “Go for it.”

“Wow,” you chuckle, “who are you and what did you do with Keith Kogane.” You brush his hair out of his face.

“What?”

“Remember when you broke your arm,” you point out, gently pressing your fingers over the side of his throat, feeling the swelled bean shaped lymph nodes under his ears, behind his jaw. “And said nothing for like a week?” It had been your first year at the Galaxy Garrison.

“It was only a sprain,” Keith grumbles.

“Still!” You laugh, “I’m glad you asked for help.” Because this was still Keith and you didn’t want him to think you were laughing at him.

“Mm,” he closes his eyes as you trail your fingers lower, making sure it wasn’t too bad.

The fact they were inflamed at all worried you. You had no clue what was the space equivalent of antihistamines.

Keith’s breath tickles your shoulder, deepening and evening out like he’d finally relaxed. That was most of your patients once you gave them answers and they knew they’d be getting care and treatment. You liked helping people.

You pull your fingers back, ever the consummate professional. It was like the ghost of your garrison advisor was hovering over your shoulder. “They’re not too swollen if you can still eat. Can you still chew?”

“Hm?”

Keith opens his eyes. His expression is glazed and feverish.

“Keith,” you utter, worried.

“Yeah?” His gaze is heavy as it meets yours.

Your skin warms up because he wouldn’t stop looking at you like that.

“Any jaw pain,” you ask, focusing on the task at hand. You bring your hand up to his forehead. He was warm.

Keith leans into your touch, “no.”

“Good.” You bite your lip. Could it be some weird galra thing? Wouldn’t it have come up? You feel your own forehead. He was for sure warmer.

You were going to have to corner Coran about it.

Keith lets his eyes fall shut again and honest to god purrs, leaning into you.

Add cornering Lotor to your list.

You don’t pull away, figuring it was harmless. Lance, Hunk, and Allura were more prone to random hugs. You were more than happy to indulge Keith as well. He already wasn’t feeling well.

You wrap your arms around the red paladin’s shoulders, hugging him, “I’m looking forward to a break from Coran’s post mission food goo once I get done with the machine.”

“Mm.”

He was completely out of it.

His breath tickles your cheek.

“Though I’m not sure there’ll be any left if I don’t go there? Maybe I should grab a plate and then come back here,” you ramble. Keith had never sought you out for comfort. It was touching that he trusted you now. You’d been friends with the others before, with Keith and Shiro and the Alteans, you had skipped right over friendship and gone right to family.

“Oh.”

You look behind you.

Te-Osh takes a step back, “forgive my intrusion. I was unaware-”

Keith snaps out of whatever was going on with him. Bolting off the exam table. “It’s fine. We’re done here.” He hunches his shoulders and beelines for the door.

You frown, still processing.

“I can come back,” Te-Osh tells you, glancing between you and the door Keith had just escaped through.

You shrug. “No. I’ve got time. What do you need?”

“If you’re sure?”

Nodding, you smile, “yeah, what can I help you with?”

———————

“Here is where we will focus the blunt of the attack on. Keith, Lance, engage the fighters. Hunk,” Shiro explains, “you’ll be with me taking out the communications towers. We want to keep the damage to the minimum. The resistance leaders want the factory intact. Pidge-”

Pidge waves the Black Paladin off, “I’ve got the code written.”

“It really does come in handy,” Lance observes, “all those vents are Pidge size.”

The green paladin grumbles, “easy for you to say when you’re not the one crawling around in there. It’s not your knees getting banging up.”

“Well the galra are all like nine feet tall,” Hunk points out, “the vents probably aren’t that small from their perspective.”

Lance unsubtly glances over at Keith.

His rash had cleared up, but not before spreading. In its place were two purple slash marks running from his cheek to jaw, galra markings. No one had pressed…yet.

You were just glad it wasn’t some weird space parasite.

Her brother ruffles her hair, “Pidge sized! A micro pidge,” Matt jokes to himself.

She smacks his hand away, “five feet is a perfectly reasonable size.’

“She could still have a growth spurt,” you add, though it was highly unlikely.

“No,” Matt’s eyes go comically wide as he hugs his sister, “not my hobbit,” relishing in her embarrassment.

“Matt!”

“In summation,” Allura calls you all back to attention, “the paladins will take out Galra forces and Pidge will open the weapons factory up to Vexuin rebels to take over. I will be manning the Castle to ensure no fighters target the work camps and coordinating communications with the rebels.” She turns to look at you, “Matt and you will take down the sentries, freeing the people from the work camps.”

“No!”

Everyone looks over at Keith. The horror on his face is easy to read.

What had brought this on?

Shiro clears his throat.

Keith ducks his head, letting his bangs obscure his features.

“Why not,” Pidge asks grumpily, time was running out. You were all just ironing out the details, “your plans suck.”

“Pidge,” Shiro chastises.

The green paladin was right.

Keith fought the same way you played video games, caring about nothing but reducing the enemies stats to zero. He’d gotten great at teamwork, but he was hardly a strategist.

“Keith,” Allura asks, “do you have any legitimate reasons why Matt should go on his own?” And when she phrased it like that…

The red paladin crosses his arms over his shoulders.

Pidge taps her foot on the floor.

“Okay then,” Shiro takes over, “let’s get to our lions.”

“Coms. Come in earthlings!,” Coran chimes in over the system, “remember this planet’s atmosphere is toxic to breath, too much sulfur in the air, not to mention the heat will give you all a taste of the slipperies. And worse! So keep those space suits on Vol-”

“-Tron,” Lance grins back, having taken a liking to having a kooky space alien uncle.

You lock your helmet in place as Matt pilots the pod towards the work camps. They were just as grim as the first time you’d seen them. It was the same all over in many of the Empire’s work planets. They were at the bottom of the totem pole. There were some planets where the native species and Galra coexisted more or less peacefully, this was not one of them.

“So what’s up with Keith,” Matt asks you.

You shrug. “No clue. I keep waiting for Lotor or one of the Blades to drop in so I can corner them but he’s a picture of perfect health so I’m not worried.”

“But the,” he takes a hand off the wheel, motioning to his face.

You frown, arching a brow. You’d never looked at Allura quite the same after the way she had treated Keith upon learning about his heritage. It’s not like he’d been a completely different person, she’d known him for over a year.

Matt might be Pidge’s brother, but you weren’t about to let anyone get away with giving someone you loved shit. Especially not Keith who would just silently take it.

It made your chest ache, thinking about how sweet he looked when he smiled. He didn’t deserve any of it.

“What about it?” You stare back at him cooly.

Matt focuses back on landing the pod just beyond the sentires line of sight. “Nothing. Pidge figured it was nothing, didn’t even seem curious. I figured you might know, you two are pretty close.” He glances over at you meaningfully.

“We’ve known eachother since the garrison,” though you hadn’t really been friends. Keith had been kind of a loner. You’d tried to include him, having shared a couple classes with him here and there, but he’d never taken you up on any offer.

“Right.” He doesn’t sound all that convinced. “Glad to hear it’s all good. I caught the sneazles while in the work camp,” Matt makes a face.

You laugh.

“It was horrible! But also like an episode of spongebob somehow?”

“Space is weird.” You had way bigger problems and had seen stranger things by now. For fucks sake, you were saving dragon looking aliens from the Galra right now. This planet was like a silent hill game!

Thick fog obscured the rocky landscape. Even from within your suit you could smell the stench of rotten eggs. Yet this was home to the Vexuin.

Shiro gives the signal.

You take the safety off the taser gun Pidge had built for you. Anything pilfered off the Galra was too large for your small stature, just a hair shorter than Keith. The gun packed a punch, with enough voltage to take out the robots.

Matt and you get to work.

“Almost got it,” Matt mutters as you take aim and shoot.

Stupid damn biolocks.

“Hurry the fuck up,” you tell him, dodging a shot from another sentry before frying it with your own weapon. One shot, one sentry. You needed to take them down before they got close. The robots were durable and strong. You knew better than to think you could go hand to hand with one, you were a medic not a fighter.

“I am, I am,” Matt insists. “Ah there,” he grabs a taser flash bomb out of his pocket and tosses inside the sentry outpost.

You shoot again, trying to keep your hands steady. It was easy when it was just programmed machines. Nothing to feel bad about.

Matt and you rush inside, stepping over more fried sentries. You take position at the entrance, gunning down anything that makes its way towards the two of you.

“You in,” you ask him.

“Patience my young apprentice,” Matt says, laughing at his own joke, “it’ll take a moment for my worm to work its way through the software and give me complete control.”

The ground shakes as the main part of the battle takes place outside, at a monsterous factory that’s gray, chimney shooting out smoke. You can only see hints of lions shooting and Galra fighter ships lighting up the sky.

The sulfuric fog coats everything.

You taste rotten eggs on your breath.

Inside your suit, sweat runs down your back.

“Okay,” Matt chimes into the coms, “I’ve hacked the camps. Ready to open the gates.”

The rolling low grutal voices of the Vexuin rebel leaders fill your coms, “Good.”

“Go ahead Matt,” Allura gives the order, “Voltron?”

Pidge answers, “dropping in, should override their” static, “ticks.” Then an explosion reverberates in your ear where the communications device is.

“Pidge,” Keith yells out.

“Keith cover Lance,” Shiro grunts out, blasts audible from here. “Pidge?”

Nothing.

Matt’s face goes ghostly white.

“Pidge, come in Pidge?” Allura asks. “Paladins? Are you able to reach Pidge?”

“Negative,” Shiro replies, “Hunk, take the main gate! Time to land.”

“On it.”

“Guys,” Lance yells, “the shield’s down. Pidge hacked them.”

“Keith,” Shiro yells, “wait!”

“Fine.”

You decide to hope for the best. There was nothing you could do for any of the paladins all the way from here. “Turn it off,” you tell Matt.

He steals himself. “Right.”

The lights of the compound go out. Sentries power down where they stand, puppets with their strings cut. Locks disengage, and for the first time in decades, the Vexuin are free to leave the barracks free from Galra supervision.

You and Matt go out to meet them.

“I could get used to this,”  Pidge calls out as everyone meets on the planet’s surface. Rebels come in from the forest slowly, making sure this is for real, before sniffing the air and calling out to their loved ones lingering around the liberated camp complex.  Their vision worked in the infrared, all the better to see on this planet. You’d need at least three showers to get the smell out of your hair.

Keith carries Pidge, careful not to jolt the youngest member of Voltron. She holds a leg stiffly, a sprain or fracture.

Matt rushes to his sister, “Katie!”

She waves him off, “I’m fine.” Then snaps her fingers, “Down.”

There’s a small smile on Keith’s mouth as he places her down on the ground gently.

Lance comes up behind Keith, ruffling his hair, and being every bit himself as he comments with a smirk, “good boy.”

The shorter paladin smacks Lance’s hand away, but it’s too late, Lance is already smothering Keith in a hug that turns into a competition, like always with those two. Keith shoves at Lance’s face while Lance tightens his grip on Keith.

Shiro clears his throat, “paladins.”

“A dobesh in the pod,” you ask Pidge as Matt gets his turn to fuss over her.

“Yeah. Landed right as an explosion went off,” Pidge frowns. “Not my best moment, but my program still did it’s job and,” she pats her bayard, “I took them out.”

“Can’t be that bad if you can stand,” you agree. Nothing serious but you’d be keeping an eye on her all the same. The faster she got into the pod and took weight off her injury the better. You didn’t want to exacerbate the sprain.

“The jet pack helped,” Pidge points out.

“Lucky you,” you grin.

Shiro and Allura are consummate professionals as they go over the last of the logistics with the Vexuin, “It would be wise to stay until your people have situated themselves in case the Galra Empire retaliates,” Allura states, ending her sentiment in a question, “but it is ultimately up to you.”

The Vexuin chatter among themselves for a moment before one speaks up, “we would not turn down Voltron’s help. A few quintants should be enough time.”

“Then we will make ourselves of service to you,” Shiro nods. “Please, let us know anything we can help with.”

A red scaled one smiles, showing off her many sharp and jagged teeth, “our people long to see the camp destroyed.”

Hunk offers, “I could help rig a controlled explosion.”

“Very good.”

“The system inside the weapons factory is down,” Pidge tells them, “but I can reprogram it to keep the Galra out so that you can decide what to do with the place.”

“Oh no you don’t,” you cut in, “Matt can take care of that. You’re going in a pod first.”

“Pod person,” Matt mutters under his breath with a snort.

“Then let us get to work,” Allura dismisses everyone.

Pidge tries to take a step, and almost falls over.

You grab her.

Her face goes crimson from the pain.

The adrenalin must have been keeping the bulk of the pain away.

Keith picks her up.

It’s not until you’ve loaded Pidge in for three vargas that you pull off your helmet, savoring the crisp clean air of the Castleship.

“I can still smell the sulfur,” you comment, wrinkling your nose.

Keith shakes his hair out.

You look at him thoughtfully, “must be worse for you though.”

“Why,” he asks, genuinely puzzled.

“Because your nose,” you point out, then frown, “your sinuses did clear up yeah?” He never said anything about it so you figured they had and he could smell fine again, but you weren’t sure.

“Oh. Yeah. They did.”

You smile fondly, “very convincing Keith,” you tell him, reaching out to him. He lets you run your fingers right under his ears, behind his jaw. Everything was in order.

A knot of anxiety dissolves in your chest.

“Well,” he asks, “satisfied?”

“Mhm.” You look at the purple markings on his skin.

Keith’s breath hitches. His gaze is trained on you, watching carefully.

“So if not rotten eggs,” you ask, slowly bringing your fingertips over the marks on the sides of his face, giving him every opportunity to pull away, “what do you smell?” You couldn’t help it. It was that scientific curiosity. Everyone at the garrison had ended up there because they were nerdy in some way: devoting themselves to some STEM field while other kids were watching cartoons. You’d had a stutter as a kid, self conscious about it too, so instead of trying to make friends you read your textbooks under your desk, racing ahead.

Keith’s eyes meet yours. There’s a level of vulnerability in his gaze that worms its way into your chest and all of a sudden you’re incredibly aware of how close you two are, the lack of space between your bodies, your fingers caressing his skin.

You look away, focusing on the marks. They were purple, which was obvious. His skin itself had grown purple, perfectly delineated.

“Like wet soil,” Keith explains finally, “when they just added fertilizer.” You wince, remembering the smell of the horticulture center wafting through the garrison’s campus during the spring. “And garlic.”

“I like garlic. I’d kill for some,” you tell him, sounding very much like Hank. You hadn’t expected to be homesick for food. “Best food they served at the cafeteria.”

“That’s not saying much,” Keith mutters, amused.

You chuckle, pulling your hands away from his face.

He leans forward, asking for physical comfort in a very Keith way: unsubtle and wordlessly, putting the onus on you to get the hint.

Pidge must have freaked him out more than he was willing to discuss.

You wrap your arms around his waist, hugging Keith. “Pidge’ll be fine.” Sure, she was younger and short, but she was more than capable of handling herself. “I’m more concerned about how she left the other guys,” you comment lightly resting your chin on Keith’s shoulder.

His shoulders shake as he laughs easily. “They asked to surrender to her personally.”

“That’s Pidge all right.” You glance over at the pod. She’d be back on her feet in no time.

Keith’s breath against your skin feels nice. Your heart flutters in your chest and you find yourself blushing and pulling away, thoughts racing as you realize just how much you liked this boy. You pull away, unsure what to do and suddenly finding it too awkward to be around him at all.

The start of a whine escapes his throat before he smothers it, looking away, as he lets his bangs fall over his eyes, effectively hiding his easy to read features.

“Let’s go help the others,” you say, fumbling to grab a med kit and click your helmet back in place, your face too warm and it must be obvious. You didn’t want to make things weird. You didn’t. But-

“I’m going to stay here until Pidge wakes up,” Keith tells you.

“Oh. Okay.” You nod. “That’s a great idea. It’s always confusing as hell to get out of the pods.” It was akin to waking up from a midday nap: completely confused and exhausted instead of rested.

Your skills would be more useful with the Vexuim than fussing over Pidge at the moment. And having something to do would keep your mind off Keith.

—————

“You know,” Lance comments, sliding up to you as you watch Lotor strut away from you after another failed attempt to talk to him. “If we bottled up whatever galra repellant you have going on, we could defeat Zarkon with perfume.”

You look over at Lance, trying to suppress a smile. “What would you call it?”

“Starlight.”

“That’s-that’s actually pretty great,” you tell Lance.

“I know,” he grins. Then the latino boy sobers up, “trying to find out what’s going on with mullet?”

You nod. “I even tried to corner Acxa,” you admit. For an eight foot tall purple alien, boy could she make herself scarce.

Lance’s eyes widened in delight, “like could and should peg me Acxa?”

You groan. “Lance, sometimes it’s okay to keep things to yourself.”

“I’m just saying,” he laughs, “the ship’s not that big…”

“It’s designed for six thousand people.” You’d learned that fun tidbit while practicing your Altean with Pidge.

“Like for real!”

“Yeah.”

“Ay dios mio,” Lance utters, “you’re screwed.”

You finally hit the motherlode.

Lotor and his generals are in a stately room that reminds you of the socratic lecture halls at the garrison, sofa arranged in a half circle, with Shiro and Allura. The former Prince had shown up for a reason beyond making a nuisance of himself. Allura looks at her wits end with him, as he smiles like a douche, her eye twitching.

She invites you in without hesitation, “take a seat next to me,” and effectively uses you as a human shield against Lotor.

Literally since you and Shiro were the only humans here.

“Everything has been thoroughly discussed,” Lotor comments dryly, snubbing you once more. Normally, you wouldn’t have cared but you were trying to get information out of the man. “Unless either of you have further questions?”

Shiro hums, rubbing his chin, “I know saddling you with a rebel ship or two will slow you down but I don’t see another way around it. A display of size on their part will go a long way to show it is an alliance and not the Galra Empire hy another name.”

Allura nods, a small smile on her lips as she looks over at Shiro, “The black paladin is right. It will be a steep hill to climb to show that you are not the Galra Empire. Their fears would be alleviated with the presence of the rebel alliance.”

Zethrid sucks in a sharp breath, “So that’s it then. We will always be scorned and merely tolerated.”

“Time,” Shiro sighs with a look of gentle understanding at the muscular woman, “they need time. You can’t erase 10,000 years of history. It is hard to extend trust after being imprisoned and enslaved.”

“The alliance has started coordinating with you and the Blade directly have they not,” Allura asks stiltedly. It was by the necessity of time that they had stopped going through Voltron first. Lotor might be too smug for his own good, but his team was effective at sabotaging warships and infiltrating Galra ranks to liberate prisons and cities, enough to turn the tide for the rebels.

Her feelings towards Lotor and the Blade were still tinged with suspicion, her treatment of them lukewarm at best.

Still, Lotor brushed it off and continued to help. “Well then, Princess, Shiro, we have a long journey ahead of us.”

Shiro nods.

They shake hands.

You stand up, ready to corner Lotor.

“But first a word Shiro, it is a private matter.”

“Yeah, sure,” Shiro leads Lotor away.

Your eye twitches.

That snake!

Zethrid and Narti walk purposefully away as Allura pushes in her chair, ignoring the last two of Lotor’s team. “Princess,” Acxa, tries. “Until next time.” She nods at you, “stay safe.”

Allura gives the woman a strained smile, hooking her arm with yours. Human shield.

“You too,” you tell her. She doesn’t wait, already halfway out the door. You sigh.

Ezor giggles, by far the friendliest and easiest to get along with of Lotor’s team. “Stashing food and water will cut down the embarrassment by half.”

“What?”

“Oh,” she shrugs, “I guess Lotor was right. Darn it! Now I owe him one hundred GAC.”

“Wait-”

But she scurries off.

“Ugh,” you kick the wall, tired of everyone being weird. The usual frustration with being caught up in a space war was just the salt on the wound.

Your toe throbs, “fuck,” you hiss.

“They are rather tiring to deal with,” Allura agrees, reading the situation wrong, “but it hardly calls for assaulting the Castle.”

“Sorry,” you flush red with embarrassment. “I just had a question for Lotor and he seems intent on never being in the same room as me.”

“Ah-,” Allura smiles easily, “Lance did mention that you were in possession of a Galra repellent.” The twinkle in her eyes lets you know she was in on the joke.

“Come, let us work our frustrations out with some introspection.” Which was just Altean for weird breathing exercises that supposedly helped you do alchemy. She had managed to rope you into practicing with her before.

“Anything to spare the wall,” you joke.

——————

You walk back from the library. It was a cozy room, especially when you dimmed the lights. The Castle was always so bright, designed with the Alteans sight needs in mind.

Sometimes you just needed some time away from everyone. You loved them, but spending years with the same people while floating through space…you had no clue how Shiro had managed it.

Getting a walk around the ship was also nice. It was easy to forget how big the Castle was when you mainly stayed on the same three floors. Just a couple months ago Coran had rediscovered the greenhouse. The plants were a little piece of Altea, and had quickly become one of Allura’s favorite spots.

The windows were wide portholes. It unnerved you still, looking out and not recognizing any star, any constellations.

A lump of homesickness lodges itself in your throat. It had been over two years, your siblings would have grown so much in that time. You certainly had. The last vestiges of childhood had gone from your face.

Acne cleared up even without Lance’s ten step routine.

You walk across the bridge, trying not to look down. The viewing platform was clear glass in space, you could lay on it. It freaked you out a little.

It was the only constantly dark place in the castle.

You still yelp when you spot Keith, his eyes luminous violet like a glow in the dark t-shirt. That should have tipped all of you off, but alien was not the first thing that came to mind when you previously believed aliens had never visited earth.

He whimpers, curling up further.

“Keith,” you gulp, focusing on him and not the glass separating you from the void of space. “What’s wrong?”

He looks up at you miserably, blinking sluggishly. “I have the worst migraine.”

“And you’re down here instead of getting painkillers?”

Keith shrugs. “It’s not as bad, quiet. Dark.”

You sit down next to him. “I can go get you something,” you offer, your cheeks warming up and it was ridiculous how you can’t even manage to act normal around him anymore.

“Coran already gave me a dose.”

“Oh.” You were hurt. You were supposed to be the medic. That was your role on Team Voltron.

You hug your knees to your chest, and look down at space. It was darker than the photographs back on earth. Not so purple and blue.

You weren’t Matt who was just as good as Pidge with technology or Allura who was the leader and a princess to boot, you’d just planned on having a late dinner with Hunk once he got over the motion sickness before Lance roped you into following Pidge. You weren’t a paladin.

Keith shuts his eyes. “You were with Allura. I didn’t want to bother you.”

“It’s no bother.” You swallow thickly, letting silence fall over you both.

You listen to Keith breathing, looking around the darkness of space for any familiar stars. You knew the space around Shay’s Balmerra, and Arus was at least a little familiar. But the universe was so vast and wide.

There were planets you’d only ever been to once, each with a different night sky. Some of them never even had a night, with multiple suns staving off a night cycle.

“Do you think Allura minds?”

“Mind what,” you ask.

Keith clenches his jaw, rubbing his temples. “That I look more Galra.”

Allura has always been harder on the Galra. For her, it had been such a short time since Zarkon had destroyed her world and her people. You didn’t agree, but you could understand where she was coming from, the pain still there as she continuously wore Altean mourning pink.

You look over at him, the outline of his body against the glass. “I think your marks look cool.”

“Bullshit.”

“I do,” you whisper gently, considerate of his migraine. Those were the worst. “They frame your face. You look nice,” you finish lamely, looking away. You look nice. Lance might say stupid things but at least he tried.

“What if I looked even more Galra?”

“Like completely purple and tall?” You couldn’t really wrap your head around it. It also seemed incredibly unlikely. Could his phenotype change so drastically? On earth the answer was no, but who knows how the Galra work. It was fascinating to see such a wide range of traits in one species.

He was also half human.

You worried if his body would even tolerate such a drastic change.

“Yes,” he says, not waiting for you as he rants in agitation, “the rebels hate the Blade and Allura doesn’t trust them at all and that’s not even mentioning Lotor.”

“That’s not true. Te-Osh likes Acza and Ezor. Lotor’s kind of annoying if we’re being honest, and I’m sure his being Zarkon’s son makes it a little hard to believe he’s on our side,” you try to reason. “And don’t write off the Galra who have changed sides or were in the camps right alongside other aliens.”

Keith says nothing in response, mouth a thin line as he thinks.

You wonder how long it’s been bugging him.

You want to reach out and hug him, but he isn’t Hunk. You’re not sure he’d want to if he’s not initiating the contact. So you don’t.

“Everyone knows how the last Galra paladin worked out.” A low growl in the back of his throat is enough to clue you in to how distressing this was for him.

Your heart hurts. “And everyone knows you’re not Zarkon,” you state evenly back. “We already know you’re Galra.”

Keith snorts humorlessly. You can’t see his eyes; they’re hidden by his bangs.

“The glowing eyes are not exactly subtle dude,” you point out, “not to mention your hair does the poof thing guinea pigs do when they’re eating, but not when you’re eating, more like when you get annoyed.”

“I-what!” His eyes go comically wide as he sits up. His dark hair does the thing, making him look like a character from those old Japanese kids movies.

You giggle, “you’re doing it.”

Keith tries to look at his reflection in the glass.

You blush, grateful that it’s too dark to see, and then realize that wasn’t true for him, so you look away, hoping he didn’t notice. “Yeah. I’m the medic, it’s my job to know these things. Like how Pidge has two webbed digits on her foot and Lance is allergic to flax seeds and bees.”

“That…makes sense.” Then he smiles, “still didn’t put two and two together.”

“Don’t be a smartass.” Reason number three thousand Iverson had it out for him back at the harrison. “And if anyone has a problem with you I’ll kick their ass.”

“You?” Keith snorts. “You wouldn’t even flip me during self defense.”

“You remember that?” You run a hand over your face, “I didn’t want to hurt anyone,” you always took forever to practice on your partner. And your weak arms didn’t help.

“That’s what the mats were for.”

“Still!”

Keith laughs at your expense.

You smile, taking delight in watching him smile and laugh and you wish it could always be like this and the war would just end.

Then you sober up. “You’re going to be okay, right?”

He doesn’t answer you right away.

“Keith-” you reach out, voice cracking. “You’re going to be okay, giant purple space cat or not, right?”

He takes your hand, squeezing it firmly. “Yeah. Don’t worry about it.”

“Good,” you utter, but tears bead up in your eyes anyway. It was terrifying watching someone go through something unknown that you couldn’t help them through for all your medical training. You knew how to set bones and run a pod…not whatever this was.

You trusted Keith.

He knew himself better than anyone. After all, he’d been right about his teeth growing back.

“You really are worried,” he whispers in disbelief.

“Duh.”

“I can smell it on you,” then he seems to realize what he said, and pulls away, ducking his head. Like he hadn’t meant to say so much.

“Really?” Learning about anything alien biology was pretty cool, you had to admit. Allura had once described colours that you couldn’t perceive. It was a fun talk. And then she’d made you meditate for alchemy stuff or so she claimed. It might have just been payback. “Is that new?”

“Yeah,” Keith admits, still drawn into himself. “Can we not-I already feel like enough of a freak already without,” he waves aggressively at himself.

You bite your lip, nodding. You wanted to say something, to get it through his head how you saw him, incredibly kind and fiercely loyal (to the point of taking on Zarkon by himself) and an endearing smile you never got tired of seeing.

You liked him.

The universe was lucky to have him as a paladin.

But you don’t know how to say it in a way he’d accept. And he asked you to drop it, so you do. “Right, I’ll just go then.” He’d been here first, and the glass made you nervous.

Could it withstand a hit from a galra battleship?

Keith opens his mouth like he wants to say something else, but he just nods, then winces, “Argh,” he groans as he curls up on his side, covering his ears with his hands.

You rush to his side, kneeling next to him, “Keith,” you utter softly, not wanting to make it worse.

His eyes are pressed close and for all your medical know-how, you’re at a loss.

So you running your fingers through his hair soothingly and wait for the pain to pass.

He shifts, laying his head in your lap as he whimpers.

You can’t stand to watch him and do nothing. You press your com, pinging Shiro and Coran. This was beyond you. He’d trust Shiro with whatever was going on and he’d gone to Coran. You respected that even if it did sting.

Your pride meant little so long as Keith felt comfortable and sought help.

“Shh, shh,” you whisper gently.

Sweat beads on his brow.

Whines escape his throat.

“Fuck,” he grunts, clenching his teeth.

He’s warm to your touch and that rouses another bout of worries. At this temperature it’s a fever, but he didn’t have the symptoms, the flushed cheeks and chills.

Keith curls up further, muscles stiff.

You’re helpless.

After what feels like ages, Shiro and Coran finally appear.

“Number four, Number five,” Coran claps his hands.

You hold out your hand, motioning them to shut the fuck up as Keith winces at the sound.

His hair is damp near his ears.

“Keith,” Shiro utters much more gently, kneeling down on his other side, “I’m here, I’ve got you.”

He raises his head, blinking groggily at Shiro, trying to concentrate through the pain, “Shiro,” he reaches for his brother who easily pulls him against his chest. Keith buries his head in the crook of Shiro’s neck.

You sit back, trying to get out of the way. Your hands are wet.

You look down and realize it’s blood. His ears-

Oh god.

“Number five,” Coran says gently, helping you up, “I’ll take great care of our Paladin. Why don’t you go get cleaned up.”

You don’t get any sleep that night.

——————

You were always struck with cognitive dissonance walking around colonized planets like Rahiri where the natives and Galra lived side by side. This was not a planet ravaged by the empire. The flora-like aliens in all shades of green with rootish limbs and leaves and petals for hair had assimilated into the Empire, achieving citizenship over generations. 10,000 years deca-phoebs was a long time. That was a huge source of tension in the Alliance, what to do with the world who neither wanted or wished to leave the Empire.

It was also a source of dark humor that no one spared the four of you a second glance despite two paladins of Voltron walking around.

Hunk holds Shay’s hand in front of you as they point and awe and drag their feet on the way to the space port.

“You could always stay with,” Hunk says hopefully, “we could just drop you off. Personal taxi service.”

Shay smiles back kindly, “that would be wonderful but I have been away from home for too long. I am, as you say, a homebody.”

“Aw, yeah,” Hunk chuckles, “I feel that. I like the ground. And dirt. Piloting is overrated.”

“Don’t let yellow here you say that,” Keith comments so dry, you think he’s serious for a second. Allura and Pidge had gone shopping for supplies. That was an advantage of a planet that had not seen war.

Hunk glances back, clearly having forgotten we had tagged along in case anything went down. “Yeah well, she’d like a small moon. Or an asteroid. There’s colonies on those.”

“Very true,” Shay laughs. “I think my balmerra is also like a moon. A beautiful creature. We have learned how to ask for crystals so we do not need to cut them.”

“That’s impressive. Did the books from Allura help,” Hunk asks.

As much as you liked getting to stretch your legs, seeing a different planet where the threat was not imminent, you didn’t like being a third wheel, or fourth wheel if you went according to Coran’s favorite numbering pattern. That inch difference between you and Keith mocked you.

You glance over at the red paladin.

His gaze kept flickering back and forth, around the street. The occasional loud noise of crates being unloaded made him jump.

“You good,” you ask Keith, cracking a joke so he’d know you weren’t judging him. “You see la llorona or Davy Jones?”

“Hm?”

“You know…a famous ghost? Do they have ghosts in space?”

Keith snorts, cottoning on. “They don’t even have ghosts on earth.”

You pull a face, “well that’s no fun. Seriously, you okay? Or have we been made?”

He shakes his head, glancing around again just to be sure. “So much for Zarkon’s finest.”

You laugh, following Hank and Shay into the space port. Shuttles were departing pretty consistently. Everything was in orderly fashion. You especially liked how no one was shooting at you.

“It takes some getting used to.”

“What does?” You watch as Keith shakes his head, making his hair fall back from his face.

Shay and Hunk go to the ticket counter, but you decide to find somewhere off to the side, wanting to give them privacy.

“Stuff.”

You roll your eyes at Keith, “you suck.”

He crosses his arms over his chest, leaning against the wall, looking anywhere but at you. “Lotor explained it to me and Shiro…what’s happening.”

“Oh.” You swallow, looking at Hunk and Shay hugging and saying their goodbyes yet again. They’d said them last night at dinner, this morning in the pod, and again when you’d split from Allura and Pidge. It was cute. They were adorable.

“Sorry.”

“Hm,” you glance over at Keith, not sure why he would be sorry about anything. He was the one getting screwed over by half of his heritage.

“You’re hurt.”

“You can smell that too,” you ask him, holding his deep gaze. There was an intense commitment to everything Keith did; it was reflected in the depth of his violet gaze. He didn’t do things in halves.

“Now I can.” He looks at his shoes, red dusting his cheeks. The red didn’t tinge the purple marks on his skin.

“So this is all,” you’re not sure how to put it, “nothing to worry about?”

“He said it was normal. But because I’m half there’s no way to know what to expect.” He looks away as he says it, stiff as he glances around.

The anxiety that had settled into your jaw since you’d had to wash his blood off your hands eases up. “Giant purple space cat,” you joke, nudging his side.

“Oh fuck no,” Keith grumbles. Even that furrowed expression that crossed his chiselled features made you feel all giddy inside.

Bad timing.

“I’m not hurt I-I just wish you trusted me,” you finally admit. It was silly. You felt selfish, so you tack on, “You know I’m here for you if you need me. We all are. I know Shiro’s your brother, but we’re your friends.”

“I know,” he sighs wistfully, “I do trust you…it’s just-it’s been hard. I don’t know how to feel about any of it and I’m not used to it either.”

“It’s fine,” you tell him, “I’m being silly, making this about me. As long as you know I’m here for you…I’m not trying to force you to tell me anything…” you cringe internally at yourself. The galaxy garrison had been made up of nerds, so it followed everyone was a character. It hadn’t helped anyone’s social skills.

You wish you could just go, I worry about you because I love you instead of stumbling through word vomit.

“Come on,” Keith brings you out of your thoughts, grabbing your hand and pushing through the crowd of people coming and going to different boarding gates, “I think Hunk’s going to need some comfort food.”

You glance around, finding Hunk’s form making it’s way to you both. He was wiping his eyes, bittersweet smile, making no move to really hide that he was crying.

“Let’s get back to Allura yeah,” he tells you both.

“Or,” you go with Keith’s idea, “we can get something to eat. Allura gave us a good hour or so.”

“Varga,” Keith supplies.

“Yeah, that.”

Hunk nods, “that sounds nice. It’s just,” he looks back at the departing shuttle, “it’s hard. It’s war and you never know when your going to see each other again but it’s not like she can just drop everything and I wouldn’t ask her too, if anything I’d like to retire there. Nice and quiet. Maybe open a restaurant…”

“Vrepit Sal two,” Keith offers.

“Could make it a chain,” you add with a smile. Hunk, like you, was not such a gung ho pilot. You had landed the flight simulation without crashing exactly once, for your final emergency protocol exam.

“Thanks guys,” Hunk grins, “but I think I’ll bring some earth out here. Give these people a taste of traditional earthlign cuisine.”

“So your menu’s going to be as long as Cheesecake Factory’s,” you ask with a silly grin.

“Maybe not that long. A burger, ramen, scratch that, pizza instead of a burger.” Hunk rubs his chin thoughtfully sniffing the air and following his nose to a food stand. You trusted him for food. He had a knack for combining goo and exotically colored food that screamed fake and poisonous into pretty great meals.

Keith was still holding your hand, not as a loose afterthought: every now and then he’d rub his thumb against the back of your hand and it sent a thrill down your spine.

You don’t pull away, wanting to savor the feel of his skin against yours even if it wasn’t that deep. You’d hugged and napped with everyone at least once, grabbing each other’s hands in the confusing crowded hovels of swamp malls (actual swamp malls and not places Coran thought of as a swamp mall).

You nab a table outside the stand.

Everything was in Galra which none of you could read. “Damn,” you mutter looking over.

Hunk glances at Keith without subtlety.

You were starting to think only Allura and Shiro could do subtly.

Keith raises a brow.

“Nothing,” Hunk looks down at his screen.

“Point and hope for the best it is,” you shrug.

“I love a good surprise,” Hunk nods, then looks down at his hands, “we’ll see each other again right? Shay…they’re pretty safe. And well…yellow’s got thick armour.” He sighs, resting his cheek against his fist, elbows on the table.

“Shay’s a badass,” you confort Hunk, “she figured out how to communicate with the Balmera and through the Balmera. She’ll be okay.”

“Yeah, she’s pretty freaking amazing,” Hunk blushes.

You order from an alien that somewhat resembles Ezor, all cotton candy color, and twiddle your thumbs, enjoying the rare moment of rest and relaxation.

“I could get used to this,” Hunk comments, savoring the strange dish he’d been served.

“Get a travel food show,” you tease, “I’d watch it.”

“It could be like this all the time,” Keith muses hopefully, “aren’t planets like this proof we could all get along.” He bites into the glowing blue lotus root shaped meal, and blinks widely.

“What,” you ask, looking over at him.

Keith grabs a napkin and spits out his food. “I think I just lost another tooth.”

“You think,” Hunk raises a brow, “how could you not notice a missing tooth?”

“Smile,” you nudge Keith sitting next to you.

He rolls his eyes, before fake smiling which was always so undeniably forced when he did it. You laugh, nodding, “yup, missing tooth.”

Keith frowns for a second, before continuing to eat.

“Oh,” Hunk utters, before he kicks your leg lightly.

You look up, meeting the yellow paladin’s searching gaze.

He looks at you with a knowing smile.

Heat rushes to your cheeks, the tip of your nose burning hotly, you look down, shoving a questionable sticky black slice into your mouth. It was easy to chew despite the sticky-ness, the flavor starchy and nutty.

There was no way this wouldn’t get back to everyone else in the Castle. No way.

They were all so nosy.

Oh fuck.

——————

“It sure is hot in here,” Lance says with a challenging smirk at Keith.

You roll your eyes.

Lance stretches, resting his arms against the back of the sofa, his hand tapping annoyingly against your shoulder.

Keith is unmoved. Or more accurately, Keith’s mouth twists as he tries hard to ignore Lance’s latest attempts to get him to remove his hat, a lime green thing that clashed perfectly as was his fashion sense, or lack of any fashion sense.

Pidge smacks her head, then peaks curiously at Keith: at Keith’s hat.

You flick Lance’s cheek. “Hey hot shot, don’t hug me when you’ve set the thermostat to ninety degrees.”

“Ninety five actually,” he winks, hugging you towards him. Ugh, you couldn’t do it. You’d already done away with your afghan coat, tied your lavender flannel around your waist, what more could you do. You didn’t have shorts in space. The skirts stored in the castle were breezy, but made you feel at risk of tripping over the hem with each step.

“Hm,” Keith voices, taking a seat, “reminds me of home.”

Hunk snorts, “really thought that through,” he tells Lance.

Lance is undeterred. “Could go higher.”

“I don’t think your cow would like that very much,” you point out.

The blue paladin sulks, looking down at you, “you’re just saying that because you like-”

You jab your elbow into his side.

“Ow! What ever happened to do no harm?”

“Technically,” you tell Lance, “I never graduated.”

“She’s got you there,” Pidge smirks from beside Keith. She was taking apart yet another radio. The signal had yet to reach earth.

“Thank you Pidge.”

She shrugs, “It’s true.” Then turns on Keith, “The hat, explain.”

He looks like he wishes he could merge with the sofa at that, slumping in his seat.

You decide to step in, “I’m going to turn the thermo down.”

Lance is quick to wrap his arms around your waist and pull you back onto the sofa, “come on, relax. Like mullet said, it’s homey.”

You throw him a dirty look.

“Keith?” Pidge side-eyes her fellow paladin. He’s sat up, gripping the sofa cushion so tightly he’s ripping hole into the ten thousand year upholstery.

“You okay there buddy,” Hunk asks.

“No.”

“Oh.”

Keith sucks in a breath, and with deliberate motion, pulls the hat from his head.

Oh.

Your eyes widen.

OH.

His ears had changed.

They weren’t nearly as alien as Allura’s, but no one would mistake their shape for human. Keith’s ears tapered up and out, portrudding, but it was more than just a pointed tip, the entire shape of his ears had transformed, resembling a butterfly’s wing. It was still human in color, but…

Hunk breaks the stunned silence first, “so are you going to like to end up purple?”

Keith ducks his head, wrapping his arms around himself.

No one else gets the chance to further interrogate Keith, or hear his own thoughts, because Allura calls everyone up to the bridge.

Lotor hailed the Castle of Lions. Everyone stands around the bridge while Shiro and Allura take the lead as usual. They might as well be twins given how well they got on, communicating differing ideas without undermining the other.

“There are nine warships in the system,” Lotor acknowledges, “I would be much indebted if you would do me the favor of sending Voltron for the aerial battle.”

“The Empire’s presence is still in its early stages,” Acza explains, “but their terraforming development for the planet will cause the destruction of the Talpidae living there.”

“Then we have no choice,” Allura clenches her fist, never one to sit back while there was something she could do about it, “we will provide air support. Sent me the coordinates so that I may Teleduv there.”

Lance is still obviously eyeing Keith’s latest development. It was readily visible, and you were fighting the urge to do the same.

But you weren’t also trying to flick his ears.

Keith growls lowly.

Lance sniggers.

Pidge offers Lance a piece of paper to make paper balls with.

Hunk sighs long sufferingly, having resigned himself to the more childish side of his two friends. They were terrors. Put Pidge and Lance together, and they were gremlins out of a horror movie made for elementary school teachers.

You slip your hand into Keith’s, squeezing reassuringly. It would take some getting used to like anytime someone got a new haircut, but you would. Like his atrocious boots, they’d become an endearing part of him.

Keith squeezes your hand back.

Shiro nods, agreeing with Allura, “have the Talpidae been contacted.”

“Very much so,” Ezor chimes in, “they’re funny little people. And their sensory-”

“The point Ezor,” Lotor sighs, rubbing his nose bridge.

“They sent for help to the rebels. We were closest to their system,” Exor elaborates with a shrug, “they do not have the background to fight head on, and will evacuate most of their people into bunkers, but they have been digging under the new construction and weakening the structural integrity of the Galra outposts.”

“Very well,” Shiro accepts, “Princess Allura and our chief medic will meet with the Talpidae as a show of goodwill.”

“Our only medic,” Hunk points out.

Keith growls, his hand squeezing yours hard.

You all look over at him.

“Red Paladin,” Allura says, trying to look as professional as possible in front of her least favorite of Voltron’s allies, “is something the matter.” She shares a look with Shiro, but otherwise looks unsurprised at Keith’s less than human ears.

Or maybe she’d make a great poker played.

“Can’t you meet with the Talpidae after the battle,” Keith utters harshly.

“They may need immediate tactical support,” Allura reasons, “we should be there in person to provide it.”

“It’ll be fine Keith,” Shiro adds.

Their words do little to calm Keith down. His dark silky hair puffs up. His grip on your hand tightens and you feel miffed. You’d been on the ground working triage before. You might not be a fighter or pilot but you could look after yourself.

You pull your hand out of his. “I really don’t see what the problem is,” you tell Keith pointedly.

“I’ll watch Allura’s back and she’ll have mine.”

Allura nods. “Our chief medic is correct-”

His ears twitch, “You’re not exactly a fighter.”

Shiro covers his face with a hand.

Your brows furrow. You’re livid. “So! I won’t be fighting. We’ll be in the bunkers with the Talpidae. It’ll be safe so it doesn’t even matter.”

“If it’s perfectly safe then you don’t need to be there,” Keith’s voice breaks, a whine escaping his chest but you don’t care, done with the conversation.

“Yikes,” is Ezor’s quiet whisper.

You’re not a paladin so you don’t care, you just stalk off the bridge ready to go scream into your pillow in frustration. Or better yet, go for a swim and scream underwater.

“Wait-” Keith follows you.

You ignore him.

“I just-,” he keeps trying as you stalk down the stairs, deciding your room was better after all if only because you could lock Keith out.

“Listen-,” he whines.

“I didn’t mean-”

“You didn’t mean what,” you round on him, hands on your hips, pissed off and maybe some of its was from being stuck on this stupid ship all the damn time but like eighty percent was earned. You might not be taking on a squad of Galra soldiers, but you could take one on if it came to it.

Keith at least has the decency to look miserable, sad chirrups in his throat as he crosses his arms over his chest and looks at the ground.

“Well?” You tap your foot on the ground.

“I just don’t want you to get hurt,” he finally manages. “Especially if you don’t need to be there.”

“But I do,” you counter, “There’ll be people running into those bunkers having escaped soldiers and sentries and the faster they get treated the better chance they have.”

“I didn’t mean it,” Keith repeats himself. “You-you can hold your own.” He looks up at you through his bangs, still hunched in on himself.

“Obviously.” There’s no heat, the anger having deflated already. It was just white hot ache in your chest, hurt at the idea that Keith thought you would get in the way, that you had nothing of value to add to the Alliance and Voltron.

You bite your lip.

Don’t cry, you think to yourself.

You were being dumb.

He was just being plain stupid.

“I mean it,” Keith repeats, “I’m sorry. I was just looking for an excuse to make sure you were safe.”

“Right, because Allura can handle herself but I can’t.” Your voice cracks.

“No,” Keith says in a rush, “it’s not the same.”

“Because I can’t fight?”

“That’s not,” Keith runs a hand through his hair, “It’s me okay. I’m-I’ve always jumped into things without thinking, but I decided to go for it, like breaking Shiro out but now I’m doing things before I even notice and it’s all these stupid Galra instincts!”

You swallow.

“I’m sorry,” he tells you once more. “I didn’t mean to and I’m sorry. No one thinks you can’t handle yourself. That’s why Shiro paired you up with Allura, because he knows you’re capable of watching her back.”

Your smile is fragile as you look over at him, “yeah?”

“Yeah.” Keith holds your gaze, looking as skittish as a stray dog. Another whine escapes his throat.

What the heck.

You hug him, “you’re such a dumbass.” You understood why he’d worry. This was war. Pidge was on a two man campaign with Shiro to get Matt to stay on the Castle, both scared witless that Matt might die on a mission with the rebels. Ulaz had died so everyone could get away.

You’d had patients in the last decaphoebs you could do nothing but ease their pain. You’d had patients that you couldn’t even administer anything for the pain because of how torn apart they were: guts spilling out, charred people shapes that you were surprised to still find breathing.

The images would never leave you as long as you lived.

“I’m sorry.” Keith buries his head in the crook of your neck, his breath tickling your skin sent shivers down your spine.

You hug him tightly, aware that every battle could be your last: the last time you saw him. “You’ve said that already,” you tease, memorizing the smell of him, stale sweat and something cloying that you had wanted to bottle up from the moment you’d met him and had never found on anyone else. As embarrassing as it was to admit to anyone other than yourself, Keith smelled good. Really good.

Most people smelled like nothing at all.

He stiffens.

“But it’s nice to hear again.”

Keith smothers a laugh.

You kiss his hair. Boys were so dumb.

He purrs.

You smile goofily, warmth building under your skin, and toes curling up in your shoes. You should say something. Right?

At some point?

Or maybe it shouldn’t be said under the looming threat of an upcoming battle.

Fuck.

You can’t decide, so you say nothing at all.

——————

Bombs still pelt the surface.

Your teeth chatter as the ground shakes even deep underground. Even more soil falls onto you. Your spacesuit was more oche than white at this point as you carry an injured Talpidae in your arms. It’s arm had been completely blown off. Sluggish blue blood oozed out.

Allura was last, tailing the group.

You reach the bunker.

The sentries had followed some of the feeling Talpidae into the tunnels, but they’d been sorted out.

The people here were strange, russet in fur colouring, with no discernable eye, just strange pink flagella protruding from their nose and large claws for digging. They stood at about Pidge’s height.

The bunker seals and you get to work.

Tourniquet here, pain patch there. There were so many of them banged up.

The fight continued on the surface.

The paladins had to form Voltron.

You and Allura work as a team, she takes the bruises and broken bones with no immediate risk of death. You triage the worst of the Talpidae, giving away your precious stash of painkillers to those you can’t save and are not in for a quick death, a Talpidae lies twitching, it’s nose blown off but alive. Another holds it’s hand, but shakes their head when they look at you. They weren’t going to make it.

Training kicks in and you focus on saving those you can.

Your hands stain blue from the blood.

Allura works alongside you.

You cauterize a Talpidae named Soedob’s hand, the claws on their right limb were gone, but most of it was spared.

“You smell Galra,” Soedob utters, blinking out of the pain induced haze as the painkiller kicked in.

You half hear, half don’t, so focused on the task at hand. It was easier to not stop until you were finished and could curl up and sleep and not think about blood and war and Zarkon.

“We have Galra allies,” Allura answers diplomatically, leaving the issue of the half Galra paladin alone.

It irked you.

“No, not them,” Soedob notes. “Those had a different aura.”

“Smell,” you guess, finishing off. You hoped the fighting ended soon. You supply was not unlimited. The castle had better facilities.

“Is that what you call it?”

“Our primary sense is sight,” Allura explains, giving you a long look.

You shrug. You hadn’t even seen any of Lotor and his team. There hadn’t been time. It had all been relayed over coms, over video.

“Another then?”

You swallow thickly, flushing with embarrassment because you both spent time around Keith but Soedob was only smelling him on you and it’s not like you had been doing anything intimate…well, it had felt intimate, hugging Keith, but it wasn’t anything like when cadets snuck into each others dorm room, shoving a sock on the door handle in the universal symbol of don’t bother us. “The red paladin is part Galra.” Mercifully, your voice doesn’t shake from the embarrassment, but you can’t look at Allura.

“Ah,” Soedob nods, neither outraged nor pleased.

Then there’s no more time, you have more Talpidaes waiting for medical aid. You give their own healers some of your supplies, freeing up Allura to find the clan leaders.

You can feel Allura’s questioning glance on you.

——————

“Team meeting in the mess hall,” Shiro calls over the coms system.

“Mess hall,” Pidge rolls her eyes, “it’s the dining room.”

You snort.

“I like to think of it as the dining room too,” Hunk offers. “I mean there’s only eight of us. It’s sort of like being home again.”

“Mess hall makes me think of the garrison,” you admit, falling into step besides them. “and the food.”

“Ugh,” Pidge groans. “That was the worst. Matt wasn’t kidding.”

“It does make the space packs easier to digest,” you muse, “maybe that was the point.” It took the garrison two years to get to Mars. It was funny, once you’d thought that was a long way from home.

“I liked the cheese garlic bread,” Hunk allows.

“Food goo,” Pidge grins, “or the garrison space food?”

“Food goo.” Hunk doesn’t even have to think.

“Food goo,” you agree. “Though not Coran’s paladin special.”

“You don’t even eat that,” Hunk huffs, half outraged half amused, “you’re always like well I’m not a paladin so…”

You laugh. “Seeing it is more than enough.”

The rest of the ship’s inhabitants are already there waiting for you. Lance is trying to teach Coran how to play slide, moving very slow as he claps their hands together.

Shiro and Allura are in easy conversation. Her mice scamper around her feet.

Keith looks absolutely miserable next to Shiro, folding himself into the smallest possible size, trying to disappear. It was hard to reconcile the Keith that was quiet with the Red Paladin that shot first and asked questions later.

You smile at him, excited to see him, but also figuring he could use some reassurance, whatever it was going through his head. Keith meets your gaze and the corners of his mouth turn up, before he ducks away.

You know better than to take it personally.

It was Keith.

Your toes curl inside your shoes and you bite back your smile, suddenly aware of how much you might be revealing and not wanting Lance of all people to start a meeting by commenting on it. For him, it might be all fun and games, but you weren’t sure what to do with these newfound warm and fuzzy feelings. You sure as fuck didn’t want to be called out on it.

You weren’t sure what to do about liking Keith so your current plan of action was: nothing.

“Thank you everyone for being here,” Shiro claps his hands together, his leader impression defaulted at awkward dad. He thought he always had to be on. Despite being the most trained out of us, he’d only just started his career during the Kerberos mission.

You wonder if he’d picked up his leadership style partly from Pidge’s dad.

“Where else would we be,” Pidge shrugs, never one to miss a shot.

“All the same,” the older man smiles.

“Yeah, no problem my dude, bro,” Lance flashes finger guns at Shiro.

You snort, taking a seat between him and Hunk.

“But seriously, what’s up,” Lance leans forward. “Or is this some lowkey way to keep us on our toes,” he winks at Allura who smiles indulgently.

“I await the news alongside you paladins,” Allura answers, hands resting in her lap. She looks over at Shiro.

The whole room turns to look at Shiro.

He had called the meeting.

Meetings tended to be informational in nature: updates about the expansive war, rebels hailing Voltron for intervention, the Blade passing on the rare bit of information, and the always popular distress signals. But Shiro and Allura both looked too calm for that.

Keith goes rigid, a spring wound up too tight.

Hm.

You wondered if the elephant in the room would finally be addressed.

Shiro puts his hand on Keith’s shoulder, smiling encouragingly the way a parent dropping their child off for their first day of school would, “go ahead Keith.”

The red paladin focuses his gaze on Shiro, his expression more sour than it’s been in a long time.

The past few years had done a lot to get him to open up to everyone on board, but right now, he looks exactly like the stubborn closed off cadet he had been back on Earth.

His ears twitch slightly. He manages to look even more taunt, and you wonder if he’s going to wave this off. Then, he lets out a breath.

His body is stiff, but Keith no longer pulls away from Shiro. He looks down at his hands pensively, nails cut to the quick. “Right.”

You can feel the nervous energy of the rest of the room, leaning in, waiting to see what Keith wants to say.

“Mhm, go on,” Lance says, chin in hand.

Hunk elbows him in the side.

“Hey!” Lance is about to start in on Hunk.

“Guys,” you snap, shoving Lance’s shoulder.

“Okay, okay,” Lance zips his mouth and throws away the key, “shutting up.”

“Looks like that didn’t work,” Pidge snarks.

“Paladins,” Allura’s clear commanding voice rings out. When everyone shuts up again, she nods at Keith, “you may continue.”

He looks up at everyone through his bangs, “I’m going through Galra settling.”

Hunk looks over at Allura, who was far more familiar with all this alien mumble jumble than anyone else.

Shiro squeezes Keith’s shoulder.

“And that is,” you prompt gently, before Keith hastily decided that was all he needed to say and left.

He meets your waiting gaze. Under the ship’s bright rooms, his eyes were obviously violet, heavy on the purple. He’s chewing his bottom lip like he isn’t sure he wants to go through with saying any of this and you wonder if he must be thinking of how weird things were between everyone when he learned of the alien part of his heritage.

Your mouth quirks up into a smile.

You were more than willing to stuff someone into a cryopod if they bothered Keith. He may be part of Voltron, tasked with defending the universe, but you’d make sure there was someone to defend him.

An embarrassing rush of heat bubbles under your skin. You look away, nervous.

“Shiro,” Keith asks.

Shiro nods, wrapping his arms fully around Keith’s shoulder. “Galra settling is when Galra,” he looked like he was trying to figure out exactly what he was talking about as he said it. Aliens were weird. “When Galra reach a certain age their appearance locks in.” Even Shiro looks a little puzzled. He was a pilot, not a biologist. You knew organisms back on earth who could manipulate their genotypes, generally sex changes with the right environmental conditions, but you weren’t sure there was anything comparable to whatever this was. “The Galra are apparently very adaptable in individuals. That’s why there’s such a range of them.”

Huh.

That explained the fur, range of tails, more reptilian looking once, and the eyes.

You wanted a Galra biology course, a full semester long one. What exactly caused such a plasticity in their phenotype? Did the trait have to be encoded in their genotype to appear or was there something freakier, Allura’s space magic, going on?

“-because he’s half human and we don’t go through anything like this it’s more painful than it would be. Lotor said the chameleonic abilities of Alteans helped him when he went through this,” Shiro finishes without a satisfying or thorough explanation.

At least Keith wasn’t dying.

Thank god.

Thank whatever freaky Altean magic existed in the universe.

“So,” Lance starts, “it’s Galra puberty.”

In a split second Keith loses any self consciousness about the situation, “it’s not Galra puberty!” His hair puffs up and you have to fight the urge to laugh, covering your face with your hands.

“There’s…” Shiro glances at Keith, before Lance and Keith could really get into it, “there’s more.”

Keith looks mullish, but ultimately gives Shiro the go ahead.

“Part of these..changes,” the black paladin explains, “have brought out some Galra instincts.” Clearly he was having as much trouble grappling with what this meant as Keith was. Your body suddenly deciding to change was no fun when you had no context for it. “Among them, the need to scent family…”

Pidge tilts her head, “is this like the most convoluted and emotionally constipated way of asking for a hug,” she asks Keith.

Keith smiles wryly, “pretty much.”

“Oh come here dude,” Hunk grins, engulfing Keith and Shiro in a hug.

“Ah number four,” Coran points up in the air, “I am now just recalling the galra that lived on Altea having explained this once, of course it didn’t occur to me because of the apparent dominance of your human genes.”

“So they’re actually co-dominant,” you muse as Lance drags Pidge along for a “group hug!”

“No.no,” Pidge makes a half-hearted effort to wiggle out, being a younger sibling herself, was used to being subjected to affection. She smiles even as she struggles.

“It would seem so,” Coran nods, “though not every gene.”

“Just these.” You wonder if there’s a space equivalent of the human genome project.

“Lance,” Keith yelps, “that’s my foot.”

“Buddy, I am not feeling the love here.”

“Is it working,” Hunk asks, peering at Keith, “are you going to turn purple now?”

“No one turns purple from hugs,” Keith replies, annoyed but makes no move to pull away.

“Thank you for trusting us with this Keith,” Allura smiles, her eyes crinkling.

“Get in on this too Princess,” Shiro motions over, before catching your gaze, “you too. Don’t think you can get out of this. You’re part of Voltron too.”

You snort, and join the group hug.

Pidge’s elbow is a bony thorn in your side and there’s the slight hum from Shiro’s prosthetic, but it’s a good mix of warmth and intimacy with the people you were closest to in the entire universe. Allura’s shoulder presses into you back and it’s sort of ballooned to ridiculous proportions, Keith somewhere in the center of it all, his hair barely visible to you.

“Add cuddling Keith to the chore wheel,” Pidge proposes.

Keith groans.

“How about we let Keith decide,” Shiro proposes.

You snort, knowing him too well. “Are you willing to take that risk? Died-from lack of hugs.”

Lance laughs.

Shiro looks convinced by your stellar argument.

“I’m not that bad,” Keith grumbles.

“You’re a terrible hugger,” Lance argues back. “You’re all stiff, like you’re enduring one of Iverson’s paradox sims. Not as bad as my abuelo but still.”

Keith lunges for Lance.

Someone topples over.

Everyone falls.

You laugh, smothered by limps and someone’s hair in your mouth…maybe Hunk’s? You don’t move, worried about kicking someone’s head.

From somewhere, Keith does that low rumbling chest noise that reminds you of a cat purring happily.

No one makes fun of him for it.

——————

“You should comb your hair before we take the pod down,” you tell Keith. You’d spent your free time before this alliance dinner scrolling through a datapad, trying to learn names, where they hailed from, species, things that may prove useful.

Half a varga ago, Keith had found you balled up on a sofa, and sat next to you, his way of asking for physical comfort. You’d obliged him readily, throwing an arm over his shoulders and spooning him as you both laid on the sofa. He was already in the paladin uniforms that Allura had dug out once the alliance became a reality instead of a loose string of rebel groups fighting the Galra empire.

You’re both short and slight, fitting together perfectly.

You squash any feelings you have, this wasn’t about you, it was about him. You’d done it a thousand times with Hunk or Lance, fallen asleep listening to Allura, why should Keith be any different? (You know why.)

He’s reading the screen with you.

“I doubt they’d notice,” he remarks as you scroll to a particularly vivid color alien race with sensory appendages sprouting from their heads.

“You have a point desert bum,” you tease, “I’d rather be a bum by a beach town. All surfer bro.”

“Can you even surf,” he asks flatly.

“No. Learned how to swim at the garrison,” you admit. “But tanning by the water has to be more appealing than roasting under the Texas sun.”

“I like the desert.”

“I know.” You were pretty sure everyone just liked their homes.

“It’s quiet,” he admits, “and watching how the sunlight transforms the landscape…”

“It’s too big and wide,” you admit, thinking of space. Flat land that went on forever…empty dark space that went on forever.

“Good for driving,” Keith smirks.

You laugh. Or course that’s where his mind went. “Sure, but it all looks the same, everywhere you turn.” It was disorienting. To be fair, you were a city girl. Your background noise was cars honking and people yelling even at four in the morning. The garrison had been a big adjustment.

“It’s really not. You just have to look.”

“I’ll trust my gps,” you counter, “not my sense of direction. I’d probably end up one of those cautionary tales about mirages and deserts.”

“You can’t really get a good signal,” Keith replies lazily, his body slack against yours, “out there. It’s best to mark a trail with chalk if you don’t know the area.”

“But you do, know it I mean?”

“Out past the Garrison? Mhm. All of it. We used to go hiking…before,” he trails off.

You press your lips to his hair lightly, before shifting, “my arms asleep.”

“Sorry.”

“I don’t mind.” You sit up, “it’s nice. I used to put my sister to sleep this one year she had nightmares almost every night.”

“You miss her,” Keith states, sitting up, looking at you with his intense expression. Having someone focused one hundred percent on you was a new experience. He wasn’t thinking of a thousand other things, just you.

“I do. I miss everyone, but,” you shrug, “I’ll see them again. Meanwhile you’re stuck with me.” You smile fondly at Keith. “I’m going to change before we have to go to dinner.”

“I’d take fighting Zarkon anyday,” Keith mutters, cringing at the upcoming show of diplomacy. There was so much smiling and hand shaking. It was exhausting to be that extroverted with a roomful of strangers.

Even Lance zonked out after these things.

“Knock on wood,” you laugh.

_____________

Treaties have been signed. A wrecked Galra fleet floats in space above the planet your on today, but today’s battle is won.

One of Lotor’s General’s is here, Acza. She’s wary, and surprised at the warm reception she’d received. She might be Galra, but she’d been crucial in taking down the Galra base’s shields. Biolocks, Zarkon should really rethink those.

You sip at your thick drink, warm and flavored like cinnamon oatmeal, that chases off the chill of the night. The idea had been to sleep, your hands still ached from all the sutures and stitches you’d woven, but Allura refused to hear it, dragging you along. There would be time for sleep on the Castle, she’d claimed, joyous to have helped another besieged planet.

“My congratulations,” a Blade utters from behind their glowing mask.

You jump, not having known there was even a Blade here. They were allies, yet their anonymity that made them so useful in information gathering, created a gap between you. You had no way of knowing who this person was. Their suit obscuring any details, the mask a rank.

You couldn’t even see their eyes.

“For what,” you ask, puzzled. You hadn’t fought. Your skills made you most useful after the battle, trying to save lives and patch up wounds. It was important and emotional draining work, but you hardly won battles.

Because of the mask, you can’t get a read on their reaction. Blades. Spies. Maybe if you could see their eyes…

They nod, and walk off without explanation.

You watch them go, still confused until they disappear among the bodies loitering around, celebrating liberation.

It was a feat to disappear when you were eight feet tall.

First the Galra had avoided you like the plague, the black plague, now they were being cryptic as fuck.

You lean your head down, trying to sniff your armpits without making it too obvious. Was it the blood? Or the space bleach? That tended to linger.

You didn’t smell that bad. Certainly like bleach and rubbing alcohol…

You take another sip of your drink, looking around for a place to sit. You’d been on your feet for too long. You wanted to sleep.

Someone would find you.

You wander around. Smiling when someone notices you, and thanks you and you hurry to get away before they ask you a hundred questions. There were only eight humans in space. Well, seven and a half. You stood out.

They wanted Voltron, but you would do.

“There’s space here,” Acxa calls out.

“Thanks,” you plop down next to her, sagging into the seat. Oh, yeah, you were so freaking tired.

“Of course. You look dead.”

“Yeah,” you look around the rebel camp, “I’ve no clue how they have the energy.”

“It’s like that everywhere. This is their home,” Acza offers, “people fight hard for their homes.”

You nod, before looking over at the alien woman, “not avoiding me anymore then?”

She shrugs, not disputing the allegation. “No need anymore, now that you and Keith sorted yourselves out.” She’s so blunt about it. “Galra are so sensitive when settling. We didn’t want to cause any incidents.”

“Is this about the scenting?” You still hadn’t had time to read through the information you’d gotten your grubby little hands on.

She nods.

You put your drink down on the mossy ground. “Yeah, Keith explained it. Well, Shiro did, really. Lance is over the moon about having an excuse to bother Keith.” Now you really all were a family. You’d named it outloud.

Acxa’s brows furrow, “Lance?”

“I think he just misses his family a lot,” you offer. “We all do and while we’re family too, it’d be nice to see our family back on earth too.”

She frowns. “Keith and you are not,” she asks slowly.

“Me and Keith,” you flush, ducking away from her. “No-I, no. We’re not.” You should’ve gone back to the Castle the moment Allura turned her back. She would’ve never known.

Acxa’s frown becomes tinged with anger and worry, her hand grabs your wrist. “Galra have more than one type of scenting, between families, and between partners.”

“Oh.”

You try to connect the dots but your brain gets stuck between ideas. Scenting. Keith. You. You and Keith. It was right there but-

“Keith isn’t marking you as family,” she explains slowly, “he’s marking you as his partner.” Acxa waits until her words sink in before adding, “to do so without letting the other know…” She makes it clear what a social taboo that is.

But you’re one step behind her.

Did Keith like you?

You think back to all the times you’d been with him in the past few vargas, trying to pinpoint any hint: he’d smiled at you but he was happier now in general so it could be a coincidence…

“If you need,” Acxa offers, “I will help clarify the situation.” It’s an awfully kind gesture.

“No,” you say in a rush. “no. It’s-I think I need to go talk to Keith.” He’d known what he was doing…you could draw a thousand conclusions but nothing would be better than confronting him about it.

“If you’re sure.”

“I am,” you stand up, glancing around. During parties, Keith tended to find a quiet corner out of the way. He’d opened up, but he was still more of an introvert.

You find Keith lying stretched out in the shadow of a makeshift building, looking up at the stars. It’s his eyes that give him away, reflecting the light enough to be inhuman, nocturnal vision.

“We need to talk,” you wrap your arms around your body. You weren’t angry, just confused. Didn’t he know he could just come talk to you about it by now?  

Keith looks up, startled, then stands. “Alright.” He sounds resigned, a man sentenced to detention for a month which was janitorial duties at the garrison. It kept even the most smartass cadets humble.

You look around.

No one was really here. You could hear the music and people a bit further into the heart of the camp. Here was good enough.

“I talked to Acxa,” you start, “she said-” you look down at the trampled vegetation underfoot. It was embarrassing to your human preconceptions to even think, let alone say, which was why you were pretty sure Keith didn’t mean any harm. Scenting meant nothing on earth, where he’d grown up. “She said you’ve been scenting me, which like I know but not that way?” You look up at him as realization sets in and he ducks his head, looking away. “Is it true?”

He crosses his arms over his chest. “I-,” he takes a deep breath before ranting, the agitation and months of buried emotions flooding out, “I hate this. I hate that I can hear the conversation outside and smell which direction  Shiro’s in and how much my eyes hurt on the Castle from how bright it is but I don’t-I can’t say anything because I’m already enough of a freak. Before I was just the weird kid but now I’m just a fucking alien freak! There’s always so much going on and I don’t even know what’s next!”

You wait, wondering if there was more.

It was a lot of changes.

You couldn’t understand, there was nothing in your life comparable to your biology deciding to be a little more Galra after twenty years.

“And I tried not to-,” he admits, meeting your waiting gaze, “I tried to leave everyone alone so you wouldn’t,” Keith swallows, forcing himself to continue with an obvious disgust at himself, “you wouldn’t smell like me or whatever Lotor explained but I couldn’t-it was driving me crazy like this itch, this buzzing under my skull and seeing you guys with others-I thought I was going crazy until Lotor explained. And then when Lance would ruffle my hair or you would check that I wasn’t about to fall over and die and-,” he waves his hands in the air, “I would just zone out.”

“Oh,” you utter, recalling past events with a newfound understanding. Keith had been reaching out, all instinct even when he was trying not to be a bother. It broke your heart, how he always came from the perspective that he was an inconvenience.

“I did know,” he says in a small voice. “That-you…but I don’t know if it’s me or this, or all these things happening to me.”

Your expression wobbles. You bite your lower lip, trying to get a handle on it. How silly to worry about a crush when Keith was going through it.

“I like you, but I don’t know if I like you or if it’s just these stupid Galra instincts messing with my head.” Keith deflates, drawing into himself. “Everything

s…it’s been a lot.”

“I get it,” you utter, “maybe not the situation but I’m not mad. Though Acxa was ready to kick your ass and she totally could,” you try teasing.

But Keith flinches, looking away guiltily.

“I’m joking. I-I get why. It makes sense. It’s a lot to get used to.” You swallow, not sure what to do about anything either.

“Its a huge offence,” Keith utters, “that’s why she was pissed. Made worse because you can’t even tell…I-I couldn’t think straight and I…it took the edge off.”

“Scenting me?”

He nods.

You take a step towards him.

“I-,” Keith’s eyes meet yours, his attention entirely captivated by you. It sends a thrill down your spine. You’d seen how he could be when laser focused: on piloting, on training. “I know they say it’s wrong but you and Lance do stuff like that all the time. And I thought…I figured I could figure out how much of what I’m feeling is me and how much of it are these new instincts.”

“You don’t have to apologize,” you tell him. “I-you’re right, it’s whatever to me. Like, a Blade congratulated me earlier which was weird but fuck them you know? I can ‘smile and nod’,” you smile as fakely as possible to show what you mean, “through it so long as you’re okay.” He’d bled in your lap.

Keith looks a little unsteady, unsure what to do with your lack of anger. “You don’t-”

“So is it like galra marriage then?” You were curious as to what exactly the Blades were going to gossip about you and Keith.

He makes a choked sound. “Sort of. They bond. It can be broken but that generally means someone killed the other.”

“Let me guess,” you reply, “Zarkon fucked even that up.”

Keith nods.

“That guy’s the worst.” Your voice is light.

Keith snorts, smiling for a split second. “I won’t anymore. I’ll-”

“Keith,” your voice cracks as you out your hand on his arm to keep him from rubbing off, “if its really causing you all this additional confusion in too of everything…you can…” the words were too intimate to say, too charged with a sensuality that he clearly was figuring out. You were willing to wait. For him.

He was conflicted enough without you dumping your feelings on him.

“You don’t-”

You raise your hand, caressing the side of his face with the back of your hand, ghosting over the purple mark on his cheek, “I don’t mind.” Sure, you had a crush on him, you could admit that much, but more simply, you loved him.

This was a small ask.

Your gaze flickers to the tips of his ears.

You had washed his blood off your hands.

“Besides, shit’s hard enough. My arm falling asleep is a small price to pay if I can help you.”

Keith’s mouth quirks up in a smile.

You laugh, “come here.”

It finally sinks in that you weren’t just talking bs. You meant it, as you hug Keith, wrapping your arms around his middle. He smelled good in spite of the battle he’d been through earlier.

Without really thinking, you breathe in the scent of him.

Keith hugs you back, cuddling you against his chest, resting his chin on your shoulder.

You yawn. “want to sneak back into the castle?”

“Only if you tell Allura you’re the one who wanted to leave,” he deadpans dazedly.

You laugh.

——————

“Come,” Allura motions as you stand from one of the Castle’s weapons systems, “we must meet with the rebel leadership on planet.”

The planet was a farming camp.

The slaves were overworked and underfed and they had still revolted when they learned Voltron was near. Now, they were free.

“Princess,” Coran calls out, “it appears that number four is heading back to the ship.”

A pained expression crosses Allura’s broad features, her full mouth frowning, before she decides to pick her battles for the day. “I am sure Keith has a good reason for his actions.” She sounds like she’s trying to convince herself.

You don’t want to go down there either.

This entire last week had been spent synthesizing medicine and treating thousands of people made harder by the range of species. The garrison better give you that medical degree immediately.

“I’ll go check on him,” you say automatically, “he might need me to prep a pod.”

“Fantastic idea number five,” Coran believes your excuse.

“Let us know if anything happens,” Allura says, giving you a long look, before heading for the exit.

The central Galra soldiers had been taken out, but small bands of fighters were still fighting to their last breath. It’s why Voltron has remained on the planet.

The lions had roamed the landscape answering calls for aid and hunting down the last of Zarkon’s forces here.

You meet Keith in the red lion’s hanger.

He’s popping his helmet off, running a hand through his flattened hair. “I thought you were headed out with Allura?”

You shrug, suddenly feeling awkward. “I was, but I wanted to check on you first.” That was a normal thing to do for your friends. There was no reason to overthink things.

“I’m fine.”

He sets the helmet aside, working on undoing the armor off. There was dirt and dust but thankfully no blood to speak of, his or otherwise.

“Then I’ll see you there,” you ask.

Keith looks over, a kid with his hand caught in the cookie jar, his smile slight when he replies, “I’m not heading there.” Blunt. Concise.

“It is depressing,” you admit. There was so much resource allocation and need planet-wide.

He raises a brow. “Oh. Yeah.”

“Keith?” Now you’re wondering what the real problem was. “What is it?”

“Does it matter. I don’t need to be there. Shiro and Allura can handle it.” He looks away, suddenly very interested in the wall. Unlike the rest of the ship, the red lion’s hanger was dim, in a permanent night cycle.

Pidge’s work.

“I think the people would like all of Voltron present.” Then you make a face, “oh god, I sound just like Allura don’t I?”

Keith laughs, “just a bit. As long as you don’t make us all meditate…”

“It’s so boring. I fall asleep.” You smile softly, “Seriously, go down for a moment. Then you can hide out here.”

“I-I’d rather not.” He shifts uncomfortably. “Four out of five is is fine.”

“I’m sure they’ll understand,” you agree.

“I’m sure they’ll be glad.”

“Keith-” you start, knowing he already felt hyper aware of how his appearance had changed. Before, it hadn’t really ever come up outside of the team. No one would tell and if Keith wasn’t vocal about it…now everyone in the entire universe probably knew.

There were rebel Galra, mostly in prisons and work camps. Feelings varied.

“That’s not true,” you say, not sure if it was true, “you helped free them.” You shift your weight onto your other foot, “there’s a few assholes everywhere.”

He gives you a long look. “The Galra enslaved all these people.”

“Pfft,” you wave off, “you look like one sixteenth Galra. And-”

“They stare.”

“Because you’re a paladin,” you reason. “Pidge is also cranky about the attention.”

Keith sighs.

The paladin armor lies in a discarded pile.

You step forward to him, “anyone would be lucky to have you as a pilot. And Voltron sort of lucked out when the red lion chose you.”

Keith’s eyes widen as he looks at you, pink dusting his cheeks.

In for a penny, in for a pound, you lean forward and kiss his cheek, ghosting over his skin, “face marks and all.” You can’t meet his gaze when you pull away, blushing fiercely.

Why did you do that!

God, you were so dumb-

He cups your cheeks and brushes his lips over yours.

Oh! Oh.

“Is-is this okay-,” Keith starts asking.

You feel giddy, smiling before kissing him. Yeah, it was okay.

[fandomlovingfreak]

Welcome to Hawkins (5/?)

Eddie Munson x F!Reader

one two three four six

Rating: SFW (no lemon)

Includes: Friends to Lovers, Alternate Universe where Eddie & reader are around 24 (it’s still 1986 though) and Eddie isn’t from Hawkins, Fake/pretend relationship, begging to go along with a crazy plan, best friends, the proposal AU (loosely based!)

Word Count: 1146

MasterList Link I AO3 Link I Wattpad Link

Summary: When you slip up and tell your mom you’d be bringing your “serious boyfriend” home for your week-long family reunion, who else would you turn to but your best friend, Eddie?

AU that’s loosely based on “the proposal”  (aka I rewatched and am obsessed w Eddie Munson rn) Eddie is NOT from Hawkins in this fic!

Disclaimer: I do not own Eddie Munson or the Stranger Things universe. This work has not been created for profit or financial compensation, and is a transformative fair use work in accordance with Section 107 of the United States Copyright Act.

Notes: SO Thank you so much for loving on me and this story<3 I’ve appreciated all anons & comments (+ likes & reblogs) you guys don’t even know how much it means to me that you like my stories!

Oh and just in case anyones reading this... I have a new idea for a series with Eddie x reader but I’m not sure anyone wants it as I haven’t seen a lot of the same ideas come from anyone else... so I have another series for Eddie coming out soon!

y/ln = your last name, y/mn = your mothers name, y/dm = your dad’s name

enjoy!

It's like I've woken up in 1984. Same posters, same comforter, same light blue walls. Everything had been kept neat and dusted since the day I moved out.

Except for the wall of pillows cutting the bed in half, that was new. When Eddie had asked what we were going to do about the sleeping arrangement now that the motel was out of the question... I'd panicked.  

Sleeping in his studio apartment wasn't new, but in those instances where he demanded I sleep over after a night of overindulging in heavy drinking, I'd slept on the couch. Never once had we crossed the line of sleeping in the same bed.

Sharing a bed always felt too weird, like we were crossing some sort of line that blurred friendship into something more.

It wasn't like I was afraid Eddie would do something inappropriate or weird. I, of all people, knew Eddie wasn't like that. I'd seen him put himself between creeps and women at bars so many times during our friendship. No, Eddie would never do something like that to me; I trust him wholeheartedly.

"Eddie," I whisper towards his side of the wall. When he doesn't answer, I reach over the pillows to shake him awake. My hand brushes against cool sheets. Pushing up on my elbows, I peek over the wall, finding nothing but neatly tucked comforter.

"What the hell?" I glance around the room foolishly.

Nearly tripping over my comforter, I stumble out of bed. Throwing open the door, I slowly make my way down the familiar halls. The echo of Eddie and my mother's conversation slowly increases in volume as I inch closer to the kitchen.

"Would you like any more coffee?" Mom's voice is sugary sweet. I can tell she likes him, which makes my heart squeeze in distress. I hadn't expected her to like him this much. Maybe this was cruel... She's probably phoned her friends about 'my new boyfriend' this morning, gushing over how he complimented her last night. And she'd have to phone them again when we 'broke up'... I didn't think about how cruel I was being to my family when I had begged Eddie to pretend to date me.

"Sure, (y/mn)," he replies. I knew for a fact that the bastard hated coffee unless it was ninety percent cream and sugar. 

"(y/n)! Good morning, darling," mom says cheerily as she refills Eddie's cup. He's dressed in a pair of jeans and a light button-down I'd bought him. He looks cute, talking animatedly with mom as dad sits at the far side of the breakfast table with his newspaper.

"'morning," I say, sitting in the chair next to Eddie. Slyly, taking his steaming coffee mug from the table, I take a long sip before he can say a word.

Of course, he doesn't, only smiles, threading our fingers together on top of the table.

He's playing the role well, maybe too well.

"Do we have plans today?" I ask mom, distracting myself from how my heart is beating wildly.

"Well, since tomorrow is the picnic at Gam Gam's, I thought we'd go out shopping today. You haven't seen the new mall, (y/n)!"

"Oh, mom--" I try to think of an excuse.

"We haven't had a day just to us for years, (y/n)." I shuffle in my seat uncomfortably. Mom could guilt-trip you with a look. Words made it so much worse.

"Well, what about Eddie? I can't just leave him at the house!"

Mom shrugs, "Your father and he can spend some time together--"

Dad's instantly interested in the conversation, "Oh no, can do, sweetie. I'm meeting Ken at the Club in half an hour."

"I was actually hoping you could take Eddie with you to your little golfing match." Mom 

"It's a round of golf, dear, and I--" Dad looks at Eddie, clearly assessing how to get out of this.

My eyes meet Eddie's. He doesn't look pleased. A multitude of factors could be causing the light flush on his cheeks, my mother's meddling, or my father's outright rejection.

The least I could do is try to stop this before it happens, "Daddy, really, it's fine. I'm sure Eddie would be fine tagging along with mom and me--"

"No. If he wants to tag along, by all means." Another beat of awkward silence spreads across the breakfast table.

Eddie finally replies, all of us watching him intently, "Uh-- sure..."

Dad nods, "There's a dress code at the Club. (y/n), I trust you know the type of clothing is appropriate." He goes back to the Sports Section, the conversation over.

Anxiety runs through my body as Eddie shoots me another look. He wasn't happy about any of this. I just knew it.

"Could I talk to you for a second, (y/n)? Alone." Eddie says, pulling me to my feet. 

"Eddie!" My knee hits the top of the table as I stumble behind him into the living room.

"What the fuck--?" Eddie whispers.

"This isn't my fault!" I whisper back.

An indignant sound passes his lips. Eddie rolls his eyes, looking more like a pouting child than a grown adult.

I reach for his arm, "You should get ready--"

"I'm not going," he says in a hushed voice, 

"You said you would!" I whisper yell back.

"(y/n), I've never golfed in my life!" The flush on his cheeks darkens, staining his neck.

"You're going," I stand my ground.

"I'm not going."

"Eddie, yes, you are."

"I don't want to make a fool of myself in front of your dad!"

I don't know why he's complaining to me, considering he's the idiot for accepting my mom's third-party invitation, so whether Eddie likes it or not, he's golfing today. 

"Eddie! He's going to like it a lot less if you just bail on the plans."

"I really think he'll hate watching me be an unathletic dipshit a lot more than me just not being there, (y/n)."

The beginning of laughter tickles my throat. I cough to keep it down. He wouldn't appreciate it if I burst into a fit of giggles over the mental image of him missing the ball repeatedly.

Motion behind his shoulder catches my eye, and I notice my mother watching us from behind the kitchen wall.

Tugging at his elbow, I pull him closer to my body, "C'mon, I don't want them to think we're fighting."

"I'm not hugging you, (y/n)," he resists half-heartedly as I wrap my arms around his abdomen, pulling his chest flush to my body.

"C'mon, hug time." 

Eddie awkwardly wraps his arms around my body, frowning the entire time.

"You know you're a dick," he says in a low tone, hand moving up and down my spine. Jesus, he was good at playing this up.

I hum back in agreement, enjoying the feeling of his arms around me a tad too much.

**

Chapters:

one two three four

[softboydrew]

the graduate

When your boyfriend is a busy and booked actor who basically goes to work on the opposite side of the country, it's common sense that he wouldn't be able to attend small things.

Although, you'd say that graduating university is a most definitely a pretty big deal. Of course you told him about today, right? You're about ninety-five percent sure you told him over FaceTime calls and text messages… but he never really said that he would come or take off work.

Thats okay, you really don't fret over things that are out of your control. You'd find another way to celebrate with him, maybe he'd find the time during the month to come visit you and you'd be able to take him through your old stomping grounds. Maybe you could even go visit him, no big deal, right?

Wrong. The heart shattering reality that you had just received your diploma, that, let's be honest, put you thousands of dollars in debt. All you wanted was to know that you'd be able to walk out of the auditorium to your boyfriend who would shower you in kisses and congratulations. Instead you held your diploma in your hands and walked out into the city sidewalk, the campus you once called home was now something that would only be a memory.

The spring air made you smile lightly as you began making your way through the crowd of graduates and towards the fountain that sat in the middle of the campus park.

An itch of irritation slowly began to sneak in as minutes passed as you felt someone on your heels, you are not a stranger to the New York City tourists who don't know how to walk for the life of them but this presence made your skin prickle. Why were they so close? can't they see that you're wearing heels, so God forgive you if you had to pace yourself a little more than the average sneaker wearer.

"Excuse me!" you snapped, throwing your hands up at your sides before turning towards the person behind you. "Can you not be up my ass?"

Your eyes snapped towards the persons face and you froze once you realized who stood before you. His hands up in defense while his laughter echoed throughout the air between you two, his eyes crinkled at the sides making your heart burst at the seams.

"Woe, woe, woe, I'm walkin' ere!" he laughed making you cover your face with your hands.

He made it.

"What are you doing here?!" you happily whined as your boyfriend immediately wrapped your small frame into his large, muscular one. His chest vibrating as he chuckled.

"You think I'd miss your graduation?" he asked with raised eyebrows. You sighed, resting your chin against his chest while he caressed your back, his large hands felt comforting. They felt like home. "I'm offended." he sighed dramatically.

Throwing your arms around his neck, you couldn't help but let a few tears stream down your cheeks while he rocked you back and forth, his attendance meaning more to you than anyone could ever imagine. Long distance relationships were hard, especially ones where age difference came into play, Drew had a career and you were still attending school- so hours were always thrown off.

"You didn't tell me you were coming!! I can't believe you didn't tell me! I could have made reservations-"

Drew held out his finger motioning for you to pause, your mouth agape as he stepped back from you and held out his phone to show you his screen. "Pietro Nolita reservations are at six." he smiled proudly.

You clapped your hands together excitedly- of course he knew your favorite restaurant even though you've only raved about it once or twice around him. Your dress flowed in the wind as you jumped up and down, grabbing Drew's hands and leaning towards him to finally crash your lips against his. Drew hummed against you causing you to smile and pull away, resting your forehead against his with a smile.

"Congratulations, pretty girl." Drew said, cupping your chin into his hand before pulling you in for another tender kiss.

"Thank you." you whispered once he pulled away and wrapped his arm around you so you could lead him away from the crowded sidewalk.

You sighed in content while resting your head against his shoulder, your eyes scanning up towards the sky as you thanked the God's for gifting you with the most amazing partner you could ever ask for. You didn't even notice him pulling something out of his jacket pocket before he stopped you both mid step.

"I got you a little something, just so you know how proud I am of you and how happy I am that my girl is a graduate." he smiled, bitting his bottom lip while holding out a tiny beige box.

Your eyes raked his face and squealed after taking the box from his hand to open it slowly so he could watch you unwrap the white gift wrap. "Oohh's and ahh's" fell from your mouth as you pulled out the most delicate looking gold necklace.

"Drew..." you gaped, the necklace revealing an authentic heart shaped pearl in the middle. "th- this is so beautiful." you mused looking up at him with loving eyes. His tender glance causing butterflies to erupt in your stomach violently.

"You like it?" he wondered.

"I love it!" you nearly shouted, "Is that even a question?!" you added causing Drew to chuckle.

"Let me put it on you, beautiful." he urged.

Drew took the necklace from your hands and waited for you to turn around, his hands finding your hair and sliding it over your shoulder so he could put it on you with ease. His hands fell to your shoulders after he clasped the necklace around your neck, Drew pulled you against his chest causing your eyes to close in satisfaction as he kissed your jawline lightly.

"I have so much of you in my heart." he whispered in your ear, "So I thought I'd give you my heart even when we're far apart."

Your lips trembled at his words, gripping onto his forearms you turned your head to the side to look up at him to reveal his intense gaze. "You're like a dream." you giggled.

Drew shrugged while turning you to face him, his hands sliding down to your hips casing blush to shadow against your soft cheeks. "What can I say, the ladies love me." he teased.

"Shut up before I 'accidentally' feed you olives at the restaurant!" you poked fun at him, knowing he hates them.

Drew scoffed and bumped his hip into your's- causing you to laugh as he opened his phone to look at the gps so you could head to the restaurant.

-

taglist: @pogueslandia

[seat-safety-switch]

Long-distance trucking has long held a romantic quality in the fables of American literature. And why not? The ideal hero in all fiction is the transient. Some dude shows up, solves a small town’s problems, and leaves them wanting more. It’s easy to convince yourself that maybe if you could just get out of your squalid 2br apartment and instead into a 4-meter-square truck cabin for several days non-stop, you could change your life for the better.

This is the part where I admit that I’ve never considered doing it. Sure, I like driving, and I’ve driven for ridiculously long periods of time on much crappier stimulants than your average truck driver has access to. The difference is that I like driving for myself. When it’s hauling a transmission down from the bowels of the universe back to civilization? Sure, I’ll drive nonstop for about 40, 50 hours. Kay Bee Toys got in a new order of Kitschimals? Can’t do it, boss.

It’s important that you not take this position as some sort of inherent anti-capitalist sentiment. Such a position is only arrived at accidentally; the core motivator here is simply self-interest. And by that, I mean that I am only interested in myself. Simple math proves it out: if I spend 100 hours a week delivering frozen seafood, then that leaves less time for me to go pick up a shipping container full of shattered two-stroke lawn implement engines from a guy up north before the roads thaw out all the way.

Another reason is that long-distance trucks, being work vehicles, are ludicrously expensive to own and operate. You need to buy a bunch of larger tools, for one thing, and the trucks drink fuel like a diesel version of Kobayashi. Even the nostalgic 1970s GMC cracker-boxes are busy being picked up by well-heeled collectors. And forget about modern pickup trucks, which out-tow those half-century-old industrial tractors: they’re even more expensive, and the guy at the dealership keeps trying to tell me about all the self-driving features rather than cut me a ninety-percent-off “industry discount.”

So I’ll keep doing my runs in increasingly worn-out family sedans from the Carter administration. Besides, I don’t think anything I’d own would pass a commercial vehicle inspection checkpoint. Not enough meth in the glovebox.