#i guess the technicality is that he's by definition more of a mass murderer. But bro your kill count's got to be in the triple digits by now | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

ateezmakemeweep · 4 years ago

Text

line without a hook.

mingi x reader; lovers to strangers au

word count: 13k

angst, fluff (tw: mentions of death)

you could personally never understand one’s desire to run as far away from their hometown as they could.

maybe it’s because you’ve had the privilege of growing up in a beautiful, prosperous place, with cozy winters, amazing festivals and snowfalls on the frozen lake before spring came and melted it away.

maybe it’s because you have fond memories tied back to this picturesque place, shops and restaurants surrounding the lake in a way that almost seemed too magical to really exist.

you’ve met so many different people purely because of that sight, men and women of different cultures and backgrounds always so eager to take in your hometown’s natural beauty.

fortunately for you, the lake ran right through your yard and acted as a place of solace where you could get away from everything in the busy, touristy town.

a place you went when you were feeling happy, sad, angry or when, truthfully, you didn’t know how to feel.

it’s also where you first met your boyfriend, one of the many come and go visitors, who introduced himself as mingi.

except he had walked right through your backyard like he owned the place, a small smile on his handsome face as he took in the sight of the frozen water.

he looked at it with such wonder and fascination, like he’d never seen anything like it before in his life; and you can remember that night, even with how you’re feeling right now, that he looked at you the same way.

it’s the only thing that reminds you, at some point, you two must have really loved each other.

two years ago - december 13th

you were hunched over your desk finishing the last of your final essay, only a page left before you could throw every syllabus away and rejoice at having two months of winter break.

it was a chilly night but you couldn’t help but be outside on the porch, a big warm sweater and fuzzy socks on as you read over your work so far.

you’d gotten used to the sounds of nature, the chirping of birds, pitter patter of animal feet and even the loud, slightly terrifying barks of deer.

but the footsteps crunching on the leaves in your driveway definitely weren’t those of chipmunks or rabbits, your strained neck craning over to see a tall figure walking right past your porch and deep into your backyard.

strangely enough, whether it be the frigid temperatures getting to you or the stress of finishing this paper, you weren’t panicked; the man technically wasn’t even on your property, he was right outside of it along the grass that turned to decking.

so you continued to make revisions and edit your paper silently, your eyes fluttering up ever so often to check on the mysterious, tall figure. his shoulders were broad and his hair was messy, that much you could tell from your spot on the porch.

when five minutes past, then ten, then twenty, and he had still yet to move or realize he was in someone’s yard, you decided to investigate - because one, how long could he really stare at this frozen mass of water and two, your head was pounding from looking at this stupid document.

so without an ounce of fear or hesitation, you wrapped your sweater tighter around your body and made your way down to the man.

your slippers were loose so the last remaining bits of snow were seeping into your socks, a slight grimace on your face when the coldness touched your skin.

the sound of crunching snow caused him to turn around, his lips quirking up into a small smile when you came into view.

it was when you got closer that you saw just how attractive he was, pale skin that glowed, plump lips that were slightly chapped and messy hair that looked even better up close.

he looked different than most locals and tourists around here, many of them pastel wearing men who wouldn’t dare stick an earring in their skin.

but the man in front of you had a completely different vibe, earrings and chains and a gray t-shirt that stretched across his broad chest despite the freezing temperatures tonight.

a few minutes of silence pass, neither him nor you concerned about filling it; it seemed as if he could’ve stared at the lake just as long as you could’ve wondered why the hell he liked it so much.

“aren’t you cold?”

more silence passed and for a second you think maybe he didn’t hear your blurted out question.

but then you discover he did when he looked at you with a smirk, the snow crackling underneath him as he shifts to take in your big sweater and pink slippers.

“no.”

it’s a short and simple response but his voice is somehow incredibly warm, looking at you with a twinge of soft light in his eyes before he opens his mouth again.

“why? are you?”

a confused smile pulls at your lips as you shake your head, looking over his bare (muscular) arms conspicuously.

“no. but i’m not wearing a t-shirt in december.”

he sends a smile your way, his large body turning allowing you to fully take in just how big he is. you feel incredibly small next to him and it should probably make you nervous - a large, stranger unwelcomed in your yard and staring down at you.

but there’s a weird sense of tranquility over both of you in this moment, the moon shining off the frozen lake as his gaze meets yours.

“well that’s a good thing,” he hums, your eyebrow quirking up before he continues. “because i don’t have a jacket to give you.”

a surprised chuckle leaves your mouth that has a smile spreading across your face and he feels his own doing the same at the sight of it.

“what makes you think i’d take a jacket from a stranger?”

his eyebrow raises after a few seconds of pondering the rhetorical question, his large hand suddenly coming between your bodies.

“my name’s mingi. i’m staying a few houses over at my aunt’s for the holidays.”

your lips purse together as you wrack your brain for which neighbor it could possibly be, remembering that the woman who brought you left over lasagna for thanksgiving mentioned her nephew was coming for christmas and new years.

she didn’t mention that her nephew looked like this or that he went onto the property of anyone he pleased.

“i’m y/n,” you say, taking your smaller hand in his cold one before a teasing smiles crosses your face. “and we’re actually standing in my backyard. so thank you for trespassing so politely, mingi.”

his eyes widen as an embarrassed look crosses his face, the small hint of pink on his cheeks just as endearing as it is humorous.

“i- i’m so sorry, oh, my god,” he chuckles out, your cold hands still intertwined. “my aunt said i could take the first road i saw to get to the lake. that there was a better view down here than from her house.”

and you can see in his eyes the exact moment his next sentence came into his mind, like he thought it was gonna be the smoothest and coolest thing he’d ever said.

“and it looks like she was right.”

the loud laugh that bubbles out of you is uncontrollable, mingi’s quickly following as his cheeks turn even more pink.

“sorry, i couldn’t help myself,” he mumbles sheepishly, sounding completely unapologetic as he finally pulls his hand away from yours; you try not to think about how much colder your hand feels now, quickly sticking it in the pocket of your sweater to compensate.

“right,” you quip, a tiny giggle leaving you as you crane your neck to meet his gaze. “but really, you should probably get a jacket if you’re gonna be out here a lot. you don’t wanna get sick and it can get pretty cold here.”

“will do,” he hums, his eyes roaming yours and making your heart jump in your chest; he really is the most attractive person you’ve ever seen.

there’s a few beats of silence as he cranes his neck to look out at the lake, eyes roaming what seems like every piece of frozen ice and snowy tree surrounding it.

“my aunt actually told me people sometimes skate on it.”

“yeah,” you confirm with a nod, taking the time to look at the beauty you take for granted every day. “it’s thick enough this year. sometime we’re not allowed.”

“cool,” he says with a smile, a slight shiver running through him that makes you frown. “so... can i come back here to do that?” he asks, his eyes hopeful and soft as he looks at you. “or should i use the real path?”

your eyebrows pull together at his question, confusion covering your face but only meeting his cocky, playful one.

“are you asking if we can skate together?”

he bites down on his lip so he doesn’t smile larger, his tongue peeking out just before his teeth make contact.

“yeah,” he hums lowly, the deep tone of his voice sending butterflies through your stomach. “i guess i am.”

your lips quirk to the side as you weigh out the pros and cons.

you’re on your own a lot and definitely miss talking to someone.

he’s attractive and funny and seemingly nice enough.

you know his aunt and can easily confirm his story, the chances of him being a murderer who moseyed into town considerably low.

the only con you can think of is falling on your ass in front of him and even that it isn’t such a deal breaker.

so you smile at him and nod your head, a melodic “okay,” leaving your mouth that has him smiling back at you just as sweetly.

present day:

you knew going to this dinner with mingi was gonna end in disaster.

you were both too on edge after your fight this morning, past the point of screaming and yelling for hours that, now, you’ll exchange a few harsh words at each other before falling silent.

you’ve learned that the tense silence after a fight is worse than screaming and yelling.

at least with that, it seems as if there’s still some passion there. there’s words being exchanged and feelings coming to the surface that both people feel motivated enough to express.

but with the silence, you’re both bottling it up.

deeming it useless and letting it brew and brew and brew until one of you goes completely over the edge - and more often than not, that person is him.

the car ride over is no better, not even the radio playing to distract you both from the building tension in the air.

your friends know immediately that something is up, yunho eyeing mingi and san eyeing you; yunho, san, seonghwa, and wooyoung had been your friends since elementary school.

you’d been through a lot with them and have seen each other at all your highs and lows.

throughout your two-year relationship with mingi, him and yunho had grown especially close and it was sweet to see; you knew it was important for mingi to have another friend in a place he didn’t grow up in and you were genuinely happy they created a great friendship.

“hey guys!” wooyoung chirped happily, already chowing down on the chips and salsa in the middle of the table. “how is everyone?”

and like he’s almost oblivious to the tension in the room, mingi only mumbles a grumbled “fine,” before he starts happily babbling again. you try a little harder to put up on a happy front, giving wooyoung a small smile as you talk to him about your last semester of school.

as the dinner goes on, appetizers turning to meals and meals turning to alcohol, mingi downs sangria after sangria before he becomes a lot more chatty.

“oh, shit, there he is,” wooyoung smiles happily, a drunken flush to his face as he pokes his arm playfully. “you were scaring me for a hot second. looking all pissed off and shit.”

“that’s because i was pissed off. still am, if i’m being honest, woo,” mingi says, a conniving hint in his tone as he finishes the last of his drink.

your eyes immediately move to him and you’re quick to narrow them, hoping and praying he doesn’t start round two in this public restaurant right now; but apparently, that’s exactly what he plans on doing.

“what’s with the face, y/n?”

mingi spits your name out like it’s the last thing he wants to say, a quietly snapped “nothing,” leaving your mouth.

san and yunho look to each other immediately, concern on both their faces as they feel the tension start creeping back up.

they knew something was wrong the second you both came in, have known things have been off between you two for months, and it was even more obvious when you immediately took the seats a few spots away from each other.

“nothing?” he asks, his voice deep and gravely due to his anger and the alcohol. “because it sure looks like you wanna say something.”

“i don’t have anything to say to you.”

“you never do, do you, babe?” he asks, his humorless laugh and vindictive tone making your skin prickle.

“did you even miss me?”

your eyes meet his from across the table when he finally speaks, your eyebrow raising as you two stare at each other blankly.

he had left two nights ago after telling you he needed space, not hearing a word from him until he came barreling through the door just a few moments ago at seven a.m.

you’d just gotten up to make yourself coffee, plagued with worry and upset over your fight and his lack of communication.

“maybe if you looked at your phone, you’d know.”

because how could he think you wouldn’t miss him? how could he think you’re actually okay with him leaving after every fight? not hearing from him for a day or two while you stay in this apartment and let your mind go off into every worst case scenario.

a humorless laugh can only leave him as he shakes his head.

“of course you’re putting the blame back on me. i just can’t make you happy, can i, y/n?”

“you staying after a fight would make me happy. but of course, you can’t do that for me, can you?”

he doesn’t say anything and instead just clenches his jaw painfully tight.

you watch it tick dangerously and instead of feeling anger or sadness, you just feel utterly defeated; you don’t know how many times you guys have had this exact conversation.

a fight will happen.

he yells, you cry.

you just want him to see your tears and obvious pain and stop the yelling.

hold you and kiss your hair and mumble that you guys are gonna figure this out and get passed it.

he leaves, you stay silent.

he just wants you to fight for him a little.

call him out on his shit and prove to his insecure self that you still love and care for him, even though he’s a dick. ask him to please stay because he wants to figure this out and get passed it.

but then he comes back and you’re both okay for a bit, just for the cycle to repeat itself over and over.

“is that why you leave, mingi?” you speak again, looking at him curiously as you shake your head.

“make me sit here and worry about you for days, while you purposely ignore me, just so i can tell you i miss you? is that what you want?”

the words are on the tip of his tongue. that yes, that’s exactly what he wants from you.

but the words are also on the tip of your tongue. that you want his first instinct to be to stay. to stay here and talk things out with you before immediately jumping up to flee.

he wants you to tell him you miss him but you want him to tell you he loves you, that he loves you enough to stay when you guys fight; but right now, neither of you are even sure if that’s true anymore.

“i don’t know about y/n, you guys,” mingi says suddenly at dinner, the drunken slur to his voice evident to everyone. “i love her but sometimes.... i think i actually fucking hate her.”

you feel your heart sink when those words leave his mouth, your face dropping just as the boys call out his name roughly.

“mingi, what the fuck,” san growls from across the table; but the boy is completely unbothered, shrugging his broad shoulders as he looks directly at you.

“how ‘bout you, babe? how do you feel about me?” he asks, leaned back against his chair like he’s completely calm, cool and collected.

“i’m not having this discussion with you right now.”

“you never want to have this discussion,” he mocks, the anger and rage in his eyes only making your blood boil even more.

“i’m getting tired of it, y/n. i’m getting tired of all this shit.”

his voice is raising and you’re becoming increasingly embarrassed, knowing that the last place for this blowout fight is in front of your friends in a public setting.

“mingi, this really isn’t the place to-”

“shut up, yunho, we’re gonna finally-”

but you’re not intending on doing anything, already feeling humiliated and belittled as you get up from your seat and walk toward the door.

you leave your bag and jacket so the boys know you’re not leaving, hoping and praying that your drunk asshole of a boyfriend follows you outside; and sure enough, two minutes later, you smell his familiar cologne when the door opens.

neither of you say anything for the first few seconds, him leaned against the wall and you facing him with your hands on your hips.

“what’s your problem?”

it’s the first thing you think to ask, looking at him with such concern and defeat in your eyes.

you hope he can see it but you’re sure he can’t, far too absorbed in whatever he’s been going through for the past few months to notice.

“i don’t have a problem.”

“you obviously do,” you snap, your voice raising as you take a step closer to him.

“you just embarrassed me in front of everyone and you’re acting like a fucking child. we could’ve had this conversation at the house instead of not speaking for days.”

“why? so you could just turn shit around on me or ignore what i’m saying?” he snaps back, raising an eyebrow as he looks down at you. “maybe we need an outside source to listen.”

“not our friends, mingi, and not at a public dinner when you’re getting drunk.”

“you always have an answer for everything, don’t you?” he snaps, his jaw clenching and eyes flaring as he continues to peer down at you.

“and it’s always on me. when we tried to talk this morning, you blew me off, too, y/n. it’s like you don’t ever wanna have this discussion.”

“because i don’t know what you want me to say, mingi. how many times do i have to repeat myself and tell you i don’t know what you want from me?”

“have you ever thought that maybe that’s the fucking problem, y/n? that after all of this, you still don’t know what i want from you? are you fucking stupid?”

“are you fucking stupid?” you yell back, the suppressed anger and rage you knew was brewing boiling over right here and now.

“you want me to tell you that i miss you when you leave every other week, mingi? why would i tell someone that who could give a shit? i could tell you i miss you or that i’ll miss you and you’ll still fucking leave me.”

“how do you know?” he snaps, “you’ve never tried!”

“i’ve never tried?” you yelp, tears of frustration burning your eyes as you look at him.

“what’s me texting you when you leave like a little bitch every single time? or me obviously worrying when you pull that stupid shit over and over? i’ve been trying mingi and you don’t care! you leave me crying alone every single time!”

he meets your gaze with fire in his eyes and you can only stare back with tears in yours, waiting for him to scream something before he decides to kick over the metal garbage can a few feet away from you.

you watch as it clatters against the side walk, a loud, deep “fuck!” leaving him as you watch him blankly. his chest is heaving and you can tell he doesn’t know what to do with himself right now but you also don’t know anymore.

because you’re shaking inside and out and feel like you wanna throw up, knowing that right now you both look like the worst type of couple; but it’s nothing compared to how you feel, how even though you don’t want to, you can’t stop yourself from acting out on these negative feelings.

“and if i never try, mingi, then just leave again,” you say, tears blurring your vision and a lump growing in your throat. “you can stay and come home with me tonight. or you can leave. at this point, i’m too tired to care.”

you weren’t surprised to go home alone that night.

watch as seonghwa and yunho helped your boyfriend to their car and promised that he’d be back in a few days; you were only able to sleep soundly that night because you knew he was safe with them.

but it didn’t stop you from crying yourself to sleep that night, the night after that and the night after that for the next week; the same would’ve probably happened the next night, too, at least for a little bit, had you not heard your front door open just after midnight.

you were getting in one last episode of your drama when mingi returned home, craning your neck back to see him lazily kicking off his shoes at the front door.

his head looked up to meet your gaze, the glow of the tv hitting him just enough to tell you he looked like shit.

he had dark circles under his eyes and his hair was tousled messily, like he hadn’t washed it since you last saw him. his face was sunken and pale as if he’d been away in the wild for months opposed to his friend’s house for just a little over a week.

but when he’s away from you, this is what happens each and every time - he can’t sleep or eat or function properly.

he’s only plagued with the thought of you, memories running through his mind or constantly wondering what you’re doing. if you’re safe and feeling okay or if something bad is gonna happen to you because he’s not there.

the couch dips next to you before you feel his skin graze yours, a quietly mumbled “hey,” like he just came in from work casually spoken through the air.

you crane your neck up at him to look in his sunken eyes, an uncontrollable frown on your face as you swipe your finger across his purple skin.

it’s the softest touch he’s received in a week and he’s missed it more than he cares to admit. shutting his eyes and smiling slightly when he hears you mumble “hi” back.

you bask in each other’s comfort and warmth for the rest of the episode in silence, your head resting on his shoulder and his arm wound tightly around you until the tv screen falls black.

you two walk into bed and he pulls you down with him, your head falling to his chest and his hands in your hair. you moan against him sleepily and it’s a sound he’s missed so dearly, tightening his hold on you as he feels his body immediately relax.

you’re both completely comfortable and at ease, days of worrying finally calmed as you’re beside one another again.

but even with this comfort, even with the familiar feel of each other’s skin and warmth soothing both of you, you know it won’t be enough.

because you still don’t say you missed him and he still doesn’t tell you he loves you.

a year and 11 months ago - january 10th

you weren’t sure if it was possible to fall in love in less than a month but it really felt as if you and mingi did.

from the moment you saw him two days after your initial meeting, skating together and braving the frozen lake together, your connection was immediate.

you’d spent everyday with each other, frolicking through the town in the afternoon before going back to your house at night.

you usually spent it cuddled up on the couch or making food in your kitchen, his arms wrapping around your waist before tossing you up on the counter playfully.

“you didn’t strike me as a chef,” you tell him, watching him stir a pot of noodles with a content look on his face.

“well, i didn’t strike you as a rapper either,” he says, a smirk on his face as a giggle leaves your mouth.

you learned that mingi was an aspiring rapper, him and his friend hongjoong trying to get their foot in the door for the past year. you listened to a few of their songs and even got a live performance from him, your eyes wide and cheeks flushed as you watched him.

in a fit of absolute astonishment, because you didn’t think mingi could get any more attractive, you blurted out that he didn’t seem like a rapper. that his personality was too “cute and charming” despite the deep growl to his raps and voice.

“i told you just personality wise,” you whine with a pout, reaching your hand out to squeeze his arm reassuringly. “but appearance wise, absolutely. you’re very tough. very cool looking. i’m scared of you.”

“you’re making this a lot worse for yourself, baby,” he hums lowly, another giggle leaving your mouth as you bite down on your lip.

“did your friend hear back from that producer yet?” you ask him curiously, your legs criss-crossed as you sit on the counter and peer up at him.

he looks over to see you staring at him all wide-eyed and interested, a soft, happy glint in your gaze that makes his heart pull in his chest.

he hasn’t even known you for a month but he’s never been this happy before.

he’s never had anyone be there for him the way you’ve been, dedicating their time to him and being so actively interested and supportive of his decisions; it also doesn’t help that you’re the most beautiful person he’s ever met, both inside and out, that made him extend his trip a week longer.

he couldn’t imagine saying goodbye to you yet and he’s still not sure if he can; he’s grown incredibly attached to you and it’s something he’s never felt before.

something all consuming and magical that’s making him incredibly vulnerable.

“not yet,” he mumbles, his eyes roaming your face.

your eyebrows pull together when you notice the way he’s looking at you, soft and sweet with a fondness that makes your heart flutter dangerously.

“why are you looking at me like that?”

a smile crosses his face as he lowers the heat on the stove, caging your body in and cocking his head to the side. he bites down on his lip when he sees your eyes widen, a large hand coming up to push pieces of hair out of your face.

“because i’m happy i met you.”

a small, touched smile pulls at your lips as you peer up at him, raising your own hand to smooth out the chain around his neck.

your fingers brush against his warm skin and it’s like there’s electricity coursing through both of you, your bodies close and hot breath wafting together.

“i’m happy i met you too, mingi.”

his heart soars at the way you say his name, eyes falling to your lips as he presses himself closer to you. you push yourself against the cabinets, swallowing the lump in your throat when you follow his gaze.

your tongue peeks out to lick over them unconsciously, your own eyes falling to his lips. you feel your stomach swoop dangerously, wanting so badly to feel them on yours - they’re one of the first things you noticed about him.

“y/n?”

“hm?” you hum, your eyes lingering on his mouth before hazily meeting his eyes; and there you see it, the soft intensity you’ve yet to grow used to.

you’ve seen this look from him more times than you can remember despite the short time you’ve known each other.

on the lake when you two were skating, grasping each other’s hands and giggling as you tried to keep yourselves from falling back.

in town when your hands bumped and you’d stop dead in your tracks to look at each other, completely unaware of the people around you giving each other knowing looks.

on the couch when you’d allow your head to rest on his shoulder, cuddling closer to him because the weather is really cold for january and you need body heat.

but it’s never been as strong as it now.

your heart’s never been beating this fast and you haven’t been able to feel his own pounding against his chest. probably because he was nervous to ask-

“can i kiss you?”

neither of you can remember what happened after he uttered those words.

just that one minute, he said it and the next, your mouths were connected. parting on one another’s as he completely caged your body with his.

your arms wound around his neck and he hummed contently against your mouth, slipping his tongue in when you started playing with the hair at the nape of his neck.

he had half the mind to turn off the stove before carrying you to the couch, your legs wound tightly around his waist as every hint of desire and want overtook you.

he plopped himself down as you situated yourself on his lap, lips never disconnecting. you moaned against him when you felt his body underneath yours, tongues colliding and mouths pulled into smiles.

his hands gripped onto your hips gently, pulling your body closer to his as your kisses grew hungrier and more intense.

you finally pulled apart for air with heaving chests and red, puffy lips, your eyes meeting and every hint of vulnerability and longing in them.

“i’ve been wanting to do that for a while,” he finally says softly, almost whispering it in fear that someone else would hear.

but this house is empty. it always is and it has been for quite some time.

until you met him and he completely changed your life.

now there were two pairs of shoes at the door and two empty cups in the sink. there was someone to talk to and someone to be in the silence with.

because you’ve learned over this past month that even a silence with someone else is way better than the silence of being alone.

“me... me too,” you admit shyly, a warm blush creeping up on your face. “i’m... really, really happy you’re here, mingi.”

his eyes widen when he sees tears well up in your eyes, his mouth pulled into a frown as he brings his hands to your face.

but you only shake your head before he can comment on it, placing your hand atop his before connecting your lips again.

he meets the kiss with the fervor you need, everything about it soft and sweet and passionate. like you guys know time is running out and you need to fit it all in.

“that producer got back to me and wants to meet in person so you’ll be home next week, yeah?” hongjoong asked mingi over the phone, the boy laid out on his bed a few days later.

he can only keep replaying the memory of you in his mind, the tone of your voice and the teary look in your eye when you told him how happy you were that he’s been here.

there was a certain type of sadness behind you that he hasn’t been able to shake, making it incredibly hard for him to pick a day to just pack up his car and go.

“i... uh. i don’t know, yet.”

“what?” hongjoong asked.

him and mingi had been waiting to meet producers for months, getting either put on a list or straight up rejected. and now when they have a chance, “you don’t know yet?”

mingi licks over his lips as he hears the disbelief in his friend’s voice, knowing that hongjoong won’t be able to believe this. they’ve been waiting for this moment ever since they were in high school and had the dream of rapping as a duo.

he was only supposed to be here for a few days and now it was almost a month. what could possibly be keeping him there? what could possibly have made mingi-

“what could you possibly not know, mingi? we’ve been waiting for this moment for years. you even extended your trip for a bullshit reason thinking i’d really buy it.”

“okay but my aunt really did need help around the house...” he mumbles because yes, she needed help around the house as she redid her bathroom but she was quick to hire professionals so, technically not a lie.

“so what, what’s your excuse this time? did you meet some chick?”

there’s a silence that stretches over the phone for what feels like hours, mingi attempting to find any words before hongjoong lets out a loud groan.

“a girl? mingi, are you fucking kidding me?”

“i really like her, hongjoong,” mingi tells his friend, a sweet genuineness and innocence in his deep tone. “i really, really like her and i... i don’t think i can leave her yet.”

he reluctantly opens up to hongjoong about you, telling him that you’re in school and live alone in this quiet little lake town. that you and him have been spending every second together and he’s never felt this way about anyone before.

“i’m happy for you, man, i really am,” hongjoong says, never having heard his friend talk like this before. “but i mean... is she worth changing your plans? what the hell is there for you?”

he wants to say that you. you’re there.

the girl he’s known for less than a month but has gotten him so tight around her finger - and once he leaves, will still be here.

except she’ll be within the walls of her house all alone again, in a town based off people coming and going where she’s never seemed to have a stable relationship with anyone.

where she now knows what it’s like to spend every day with someone and look forward to their company every morning and night. spend hours talking until the sun rises and sleep until it’s dark out.

“i wouldn’t be changing my plans that much. i still have our music, hongjoong. we can still do shit even if i live here.”

“live there?!? hongjoong blurts out, “you’ve been there for a less than a month, dude, that’s fucking crazy. you’ve barely know her and you’re gonna move there?”

“i can’t leave her.”

he didn’t think at the time that it was crazy. he didn’t think he’d ever come to regret that decision because, at the time, he really couldn’t imagine leaving you.

he couldn’t picture himself hugging you goodbye and telling you that you’d keep in touch via texting and facetime.

he couldn’t picture going back home with a genuine smile on his face when it felt as if he left behind something, someone, would could make him the happiest he’s ever felt.

he couldn’t picture that he’d ever come to resent you because when he told you he was gonna consider staying in town longer, a bit more permanently, the smile that lit up your face was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

“really?” you smile, jumping up from your spot on the couch and running over to him.

you’re so smiley and happy and bouncy until you’re not, your face dropping ever so slightly when you look over his face.

“but wait... what about the producer? did he ever answer?”

“he did. hongjoong’s meeting with him tomorrow.”

your eyes widen at the news but he’s quick to cut you off, bend down and press a long, lingering kiss to your lips before scooping you up into his arms.

“but i told him there was something better for me here.”

present day:

he wasn’t sure when the resentment started.

he just knew that, one minute he loved you, and the next, he started to question everything.

it could’ve been from seeing hongjoong’s success, album after album and talk of him all over social media right in his face every day.

it could’ve been his lack of success, pursuing a music degree via online school while still keeping up with his previously established career as a rapper; it was enough to get the bills paid and keep his name lingering around but that’s all it was now.

it could’ve been that all of his passion was gone and he blamed you for that; because if it weren’t for you, he’d be with hongjoong now. he’d be making money and feeling inspired and at the peak of his creativity and motivation.

but he loves you, right? he loves you more than he’s loved anyone in the world and he made the right decision.

“sometimes i question if i made the right decision.”

it was a relativity quiet night for you and mingi, the past few days calm and uneventful, so you knew a fight was bound to happen soon.

and with that statement, it seemed as if the night was quickly headed in that direction.

“what do you mean?” you ask, looking up from your textbook.

he was sat on the love seat opposite you, computer in his lap and a beer on the side table as he watched you. he’d been wordlessly watching you all night and you hadn’t been sure what to make of it.

now, you can see, he might’ve been watching you with disdain.

“i mean i sometimes wonder if i made the right decision in staying here. just... so quickly not accepting that producer’s offer with hongjoong’s.”

his words hurt you more than you let on, your stomach sinking and knotting as you let his words sink in.

you had asked him for weeks after he made that decision if he was sure.

if something he worked so hard on and something he looked forward to for so long was something was worth giving up.

and anytime you asked, he’d say the same thing.

“you’re worth it.”

you wonder now if he said it so many times to qualm your ever present worries or to convince himself. tell himself over and over again that, yes this girl is worth staying here and no, i won’t come to resent her.

it’s something you worried about in the beginning but faded with time.

because your love grew stronger and you both became more secure. your relationship was the closest thing to perfect you’d ever experienced.

but not now.

now it’s a fucking disaster.

“where did that even come from?”

you can hear to your own ears how shaky and unsure your voice sounds. it’s filling you with as much shame as it does embarrassment, knowing that you can’t even talk to your own boyfriend openly and honestly.

without feeling upset, like you know you have to walk on eggshells or can’t express how much he’s been hurting you.

“i don’t know, i’ve just been thinking,” he hums, taking a swig of his beer as he adjusts himself on the couch.

you don’t know what to say so you don’t say anything, only humming lowly as you nod your head.

you lick over your lips as you look back down uncomfortably, blankly staring at the words of your textbook. your brain can’t absorb any of the terms or phrases on the page, the sinking, awful feeling in your stomach taking over.

you can’t even remember how long you’ve felt like this.

when butterflies turned to this gut wrenching, awful feeling.

like the feeling before a plane takes off or you have a presentation to do or when the one person you’ve loved in this world has decided they don’t want you anymore.

“i stayed for you.”

the words you feared hearing pierce the air and you hold back a shaky breath, biting the inside of your cheek so harshly you’re hit with the metallic taste blood.

you look up and see his eyes narrowed in on you, tears burning the back of yours as you beg them not to fall.

because you can’t keep crying in front of him just for him to ignore you. to just watch you lose it with a blank look in his eyes, instead of holding you or attempting to soothe you.

“i couldn’t leave you alone in your house,” he begins, like the words he’s rationalizing in his head are coming out of his mouth uncontrollably.

“i wasn’t ready to leave you yet and i didn’t even think twice about how i would feel in the future. because i was so fucking consumed by you, y/n.”

there’s an obvious and palpable pain in his voice and it makes your gut wrench even more; you hate that he’s in pain but you’re in pain, too. you were in pain before him and now you’re in pain because of him.

“i’m still consumed by you but i feel...angry now. i feel so fucking angry, y/n, and i don’t know why. i don’t know if i’m mad at you or myself but i know i stayed for you. if i never met you, i never would’ve stayed here and now i feel like i’m stuck.”

“but i never asked you to stay, mingi,” you whimper out, the tears quickly coming to the surface.

they’re a mix of sadness and frustration, because it hurts so much hearing this, the obvious regret in his words, but it also makes you mad - that was his choice and his choice alone.

and it’s like he knows that too. because he doesn’t say anything in response, just continues to stare at you with a look in his eye that breaks your heart.

“i asked you so many times if you were okay with doing that,” you begin after moments of silence, your teary, wet gaze meeting his. “i asked you again and again because i knew you’d come to regret it.”

“i’m not saying i regret it, i’m just saying i-”

“you’re saying you stayed here for me like it’s my fault,” you say, shaking your head as tears leak from your eyes and down your cheek. “like i asked you to and like meeting me was your downfall. but i never told you to and i would’ve never ever expected you to.”

“what, so i was just supposed to leave you alone?” mingi growls lowly, emotion behind his tone that’s almost masked by the brashness.

he can’t help but feel all of this coming up, all of these feelings he’s been going through these past months and making him a completely different person.

“why would i have left you when i knew i loved you?”

neither of you focused on loved being past tense, probably because it’s a fact both of you know by now.

“i didn’t want anything else but you in that moment.”

“do you want a prize, mingi?” you snap, every defensive and defeated emotion coursing through your veins.

“you could’ve left me alone. you could’ve just left the way you wished you did so fucking badly. you would’ve saved yourself all of this obvious regret.”

“you think i regret staying with you?” he asks, his voice low and deep as he rises from the chair.

his frame is tall and broad and looming as he walks closer to you, standing over your chair as you sit there and stare up at him. his eyes roam your face and he follows the few tears rolling down your cheeks, his hands stiffly hanging at his sides.

he used to hate seeing you cry.

it used to make him wanna destroy whatever was hurting you. he used to kiss your tears away and wouldn’t let you leave his arms until you were smiling and laughing again.

“well, what do you call this?” you whimper quietly, sniffling and stuffy and feeling small tears stream down your face.

“you basically said if it weren’t for me, you’d be happier with your life. and i... i was so happy when you decided to stay, mingi, i’m not gonna lie to you. i was so happy because i knew we would love each other so much,” you whimper out, the knot in your throat making it difficult to speak.

“but i also knew that one day, you would probably regret it and resent me. it’s why i asked you over and over and over again. because i was so scared this was gonna happen.”

his mouth grows dry as he licks over his lips, a burning behind his eyes as he hears your voice break. he’s quick to shake his head and blink away the tears, though, because he knows if he starts crying, he’s never gonna stop.

“i thought you would leave with me eventually,” he’s finally able to get out, his throat clogged and voice gruff as he voices his innermost thoughts and wishes.

you compromised for him once, why wouldn’t you do it again?

“i thought if you actually loved me the way you claimed to, you’d be able to go.”

“well, i was always honest with you about that too,” you murmur, feeling utterly defeated and guilty as you meet mingi’s glossy eyes. “you know i never intend on leaving.”

a year and 5 months ago - june 19th

he learned about your parents accident on the 4th year anniversary of their death.

he had noticed that week you were especially gloomy, a sad look in your eye and the fake smile on your face making him cling to you just a bit more than usual.

and apparently, you had noticed too.

“mingi, are you okay?”

the words were muffled against his shirt, your face pressed against his chest as the two of you lay on the couch. his hand had been running up and down your back gently all night, like he’d been trying to calm you without any words.

like he knew there was something wrong, even though you hadn’t said a word.

his eyebrows pull together in confusion, placing his fingers under your chin. he lifts your face as his eyes search yours, that sad look behind them masked by a soft curiosity.

you’re trying to hide your pain because you think he’s hurting and that alone only makes him even more sad.

“of course i am, baby. but are you okay?”

you can’t find it in you to say yes so you only nod shyly, a small smile gracing your face as you look at him.

his eyes are full of such warmth and love that it makes tears prick behind your eyes, dropping your gaze quickly as you bury your face back in his chest.

the movement causes him to swallow nervously, adams apple bobbing as he presses his lips to the top of your head.

he knows something’s wrong. he knows something’s very wrong but he doesn’t know what happened or what’s brought this on.

“you can tell me anything,” he mumbles against your hair, his arms wrapped tightly around your body. “you know that, right?”

because he also noticed that you started seeming off when he mentioned moving in together, looking at apartments in town for himself before getting the idea to live with you.

you guys are already together all the time, it only made sense for you two to live together as well.

but he could tell immediately the idea unsettled you, you clutching desperately on to him as you muttered that you’d think about it.

at first, he would’ve assumed you didn’t wanna go that far with him. that it was too serious a commitment and you were completely uncomfortable with that.

but it was the way you were clinging to him, burying your face in his chest like you were begging him not to leave you that made him realize something deeper was going.

it’s why he dropped it at first. looked for apartments on his own with the idea that, best case scenario, you’d move in with him too.

could that be what’s wrong right now? you dealing with moving in with him and fears coming from that? or something else entirely?

he just knows that when he starts to hear you cry quietly into his chest, he needs to know what’s been wrong because he hates seeing you like this.

“hey, hey, hey,” his deep voice mumbles, large hands pulling you from his chest and wiping at your face. “what happened, baby? what’s wrong?”

and since you started crying about this, remembering the day and the circumstances around it so well, you won’t be able to stop. you can only continue to cry into him, tiny sobs wracking your body as you clutched onto him tightly.

“i... i can’t.”

you couldn’t talk, you couldn’t breathe, you couldn’t tell him, he wasn’t sure.

that’s why he shook his head and pulled you back into his chest, the warm safe place you’ve come to know so well and usually calmed you whenever you needed.

“i don’t know what’s wrong but i promise you’ll be okay,” you hear him mumble against your head, his hand running up and down your back gently. “i’ll try to help you in any way i can, baby, but i’m gonna need to know what’s wrong.”

but he can’t help you bring back your dead parents.

he can’t help you time travel the way you so desperately wish you could to tell yourself not to go on that senior trip.

that if you didn’t go, your parents never would’ve driven you to the airport and they never would’ve gotten in the car accident that took their life on the way back.

you’d spent a week in a foreign country while they spent a week in the hospital, your aunt and grandparents dealing with the repercussions before you came back and said your goodbyes in a dingy, hospital room.

mingi doesn’t know how long you both sat there in silence, your cries muffled against his chest and his arms wound tightly around you.

he loosened his hold immediately when he felt you try to pull away, watching as you stared at him, wiped your eyes and told him everything.

“my parents died four years ago, today.”

he watches with soft, sympathetic eyes and a breaking heart as you tell him about your guilt.

how if you just decided to stay home after weeks of begging them to go, they’d still be here.

“they didn’t have the money but i begged them for weeks, mingi,” you tell him, tears in your eyes and voice thick with emotion.

“i wanted to go so badly because all my friends were going and i was too selfish to see they really couldn’t afford it.”

he can tell you’re not done talking so he only presses his lips together and grasps your hand tightly. squeezes it reassuringly as his thumb gently rubs back and forth against your skin.

“they both worked overtime for two weeks straight and gave me the money the last day it was due. and i barely thanked them,” you remember, the scene you’ve replayed in your mind hundreds of times flashing yet again.

you jumped up from the couch and snatched the money from their hands, throwing your arms around them in a quick hug before screaming your thanks and running up to your room to tell your friends.

“a drunk diver hit them on their way home from the airport and the doctors couldn’t believe they both didn’t die on impact. a-and no one in my family could even call me so i said my goodbyes when i got home, in the hospital.”

you look to mingi with tears streaming down your cheeks and you see wetness in his own eyes, his hand grasping onto yours tight.

“i couldn’t even talk to them one last time. or hear their voices. i don’t even know if they heard me.”

your voice breaks off after that, not being able to handle recounting this after years of staying silent about it; he’s the first person you’ve talked to about this besides the counselor you saw a few months after their death.

he pulls you in his lap and wraps his arms tightly around you, rocking you back and forth as he presses his lips to your head.

your eyes are closed tight as you focus on his breathing and soft murmurs. his deep, full voice muttering sweet nothings and quiet reassurances.

that your parents did hear you and they loved you till the end.

that it was no one’s fault but the driver who decided to get in a car after getting drunk.

that you shouldn’t put any blame on yourself, because your parents would want you to be happy and thriving.

“i know but it’s just hard,” you tell him, you teary face pulling away from his wet chest.

you look around the living room full of books and wooden furniture, a family portrait hung above a cluttered-filled desk; it was taken when you were ten and you remember hating that day because you had to wear an uncomfortable dress and tights.

“i don’t know how i’m ever gonna leave this place,” you voice aloud to him, one of the many concerns that muddled your mind when you started deciding on college or jobs or moving in with your perfect boyfriend of almost a year.

“it’s the last thing i have of them. i don’t... i don’t know if i’d be ever to leave this place, mingi.”

not after what happened last time.

not wanting to leave the house you grew up in to strangers who would create more happy memories and replace the ones you made with your own parents.

his face contorts into one of sympathy and pain, his heart breaking as the obvious guilt and dread is in your eyes.

he’d always seen a bit of torment behind them but you were always able to smile.

laugh with him and tease him and push whatever demons he knew you had aside; but he started seeing it again when he mentioned moving in, fear and anxiety and discomfort that he hated to even see behind your eyes.

“i don’t know how that will effect us, it’s something i’ve thought about a lot recently,” you confess quietly, playing with the edge of the blanket nervously. “especially when you mentioned us moving in together. i... i want to, so bad, because i love you and i think it’d be fun. but... i can’t leave.”

your tears start up again and a frown crosses mingi’s face, his body hovering over yours as he takes your face in his big hands.

he wipes at the tears threatening to slide down your cheeks before placing his lips on your head, breathing slowly and calmly against you as his warm breath wafts over you.

“baby, i understand completely, i really do,” he says, everything making sense now but... “but i don’t think your parents would want you to... limit your life like this.”

because you obviously had an interest in seeing the world. you obviously wanted to see different places and cultures and sights in the world that even your precious little town doesn’t hold.

but he can see tonight isn’t the night you’re gonna see that, if the way you shake your head and bury yourself back in his chest doesn’t show that.

and because he loved you more than anything else in the world, he understood it. held you and kissed you and made sure you knew he’d be by your side in whatever way you needed.

it was with his patience and love and unconditional support that you were able to live with him. keep your parents house as a sense of security but slowly move yourself out of it.

leaving a toothbrush at the apartment, a few sets of clothes, some shampoos and soaps until one night, you were waking up and falling asleep with him every morning and night.

present day:

the fight that ended you and mingi was over a trip to disney.

something meant to be so childish and fun and innocent morphing into a blowout, gut-wrenching fight that left the two of distraught.

hit both of you with the realization that whatever you once had had fizzled out and turned so horribly toxic, you were both losing yourselves.

it had started with yunho, san and wooyoung planning the trip, mingi over their house one day after the tension in the apartment got too much. he had scoffed when san mentioned it at first, wondering what business they had as college going twenty-somethings booking a trip to disney.

“it’ll be sweet!” san said, “we could go to the parks for a few days, everyone loves roller coasters! and then we can drive down to the beach, go surfing and go to bars and shit. it’d be so much fun, guys.”

and the more all of them thought about it, the more excited they got. looking at flights and car rentals and getting all their swim suits in order - that was until mingi came back home a day later and informed you of these plans.

“me and the guys were talking about booking a trip to disney,” was the first thing he said to you. not a hello or how are you or sorry for leaving and making you worry for a week.

“oh?” you hummed quietly, looking up from your spot at the kitchen sink; you’d made breakfast for two just in case he came home early but it was another serving of eggs and bacon in the trash.

“yeah, so is that something you’d wanna do?”

there’s something off about his tone that you immediately pick up on. snippy and on edge and defensive, like he’s already fully prepared to break out into a fight.

because he already knows you won’t do it. you won’t leave the 70 mile radius you’ve trapped yourself nor will you even try to go out of your comfort zone for him and you or anyone else.

and quite frankly, he’s grown really fucking sick of it. call him selfish or call him someone looking out for you, someone who knows this type of living isn’t normal, he can’t deal with it anymore.

“i... well i mean...how would we get there? and when?”

“we were looking at flights three weeks from now,” he says, carefully observing your face with slightly cold eyes. carefully waiting for the next hint of a breakdown he’s not gonna properly respond to.

you bite the inside of your cheek as panic starts to stir in your chest.

you haven’t been anywhere since the accident. you’ve gotten yourself so used to this environment that going anywhere else seems terrifying.

but you’ve seen how bad things will happen when you try to venture out. you left to do the same and it cost your parents your life - who’s to say you wouldn’t get your karma soon?

leave mingi without a girlfriend he doesn’t even care about anymore or your grandparents without a granddaughter you can’t help but feel they blame for their child’s death.

tears are quick to prick your eyes as you try to push down all of these feelings, looking down at the floor in a move mingi already knows is dismissive.

you hear him scoff and it sends a flurry of emotions through you, not even needing to lift your head to know he’s shaking his head.

“figures,” he hums lowly, making extra noise as he puts down his bag or plops down on the dining room chair. “i don’t know why i bothered asking.”

“mingi...” you begin breathlessly, guilt and shame and sorrow filling you.

“no, y/n.”

his voice is firm and hard and makes you meet his gaze, the look he’s throwing you icy and completely empty. he’s done and you’re done and there’s basically a ticking time bomb between you two.

“you didn’t even let me give you an answer.”

“because i know what it’s gonna be!” he roars, feeling stupid for getting excited when he knew damn well you wouldn’t be able to leave. “i know you’re gonna make up some bullshit excuse about school or work or money and you’re gonna say no.”

you can’t say anything because you know he’s right. but what he doesn’t know is that you’re trying. you try every day and every week and every month to push yourself out of your comfort zone and it just doesn’t work.

you’ve tried going away with him and you’ve tried expanding your horizons - you’e even moved out of your parents house to live with him. but it’s hard when you’re constantly reminded by the fact that your decisions ended a life.

while it was technically the drunk driver’s fault, your survivors guilt heavily outweighs that. intrusive thought after intrusive thought until you start to question why you’re even still here, too.

“i’m trying, mingi,” you say, your voice shaky and defeated. “i’m trying but you don’t even see that.”

“how are you trying?” he asks, watching your dejected form a few feet away from him. “you haven’t done anything different since you moved in with me. we’ve been living the same life for the past two years, y/n.”

but you just remember how patient he was when you first tried moving in. how he was so patient and kind and gentle and was everything you needed him to be.

but he can just remember how much he loved you. how patient and understanding he was, not fully grasping the severity of what happened to you and how incapable he was of dealing with it.

“i’m... so fucking sick of it. i’ve grown to be so sick of you and i hate that, y/n. i hate feeling like this but it’s the truth.”

“and you don’t think i am?” you blurt out, the dam of tears breaking as you hear him say those specific words to you - i’ve grown to be so sick of you.

your frame is smaller and fragile and you’re like a shell of the person you were when you first met as you make your way up to him, looking over him with all the pain and exhaustion in your eyes.

“you don’t think i’m sick of feeling this way? of seeing how much you obviously hate me and are over this when i can’t stop feeling this way? because i’m sorry it’s been inconveniencing you, mingi, but it’s been ruining me, too. sometimes i can’t even believe i’m still here.”

the last part of your sentence stirs something in him but he can only focus on your broken state. watching as you grow weaker and weaker because of him.

“you haven’t even been helping me,” you suddenly say, words quiet and soft-spoke but filled with an obvious hurt. “i... i don’t know why you’d even wanna go on a trip with me because we’d just fight, mingi. we’d just fight and i’d cry and you’d leave me. th-that’s what we keep doing.”

tears burn the back of his eyes, a knot growing in his stomach so big it feels like he’s about to puke.

“because i don’t know what to do anymore, y/n,” he say, his voice less harsh but still holding a certain degree of bite. “i tried so hard with you and nothing seems to work. i loved you, i still love you, and i was there for you and i tried so hard with you but... i don’t know how to help you.”

“you think yelling is the way? or leaving me is the way?” you laugh out manically, tears rolling down your face that you desperately try to reach out and wipe. “you’re sick of me but i’m sick of you, too. i’m sick of feeling this way and i’m so fucking sick of thinking you still love me.”

“you don’t think i love you?” he asks, rising from his chair and making his way over to you.

his looming height should make you nervous, the way he’s looking down at you and threatening to trap you against the counter should make you nervous, but it doesn’t.

because coming to terms with this right here is the worst part. the conversation you’ve been avoiding for months and the obvious change in what you two have become.

“i don’t,” you say, finally meeting his gaze and seeing hurt and anger swirl behind them. they used to hold such a sweet softness that would sometimes make you feel better, even if just for a little bit.

“because even if you do, you’re still sick of me, right?”

one year ago:

“what if you get sick of me?”

the newest compromise had been his family coming here to meet you.

you and mingi had booked refundable tickets for a week in his hometown, a part of you wanting to desperately prove you could do something for him. something that would make him happy and maybe prove you love him a little more than you can convey.

but the second you got on the highway to the airport, you knew you weren’t gonna be able to.

memories played through your mind of you in the backseat of your parents car, laughing and talking with them as you promised to be careful and take a lot of pictures with them.

hearing them tell you they loved you and were so happy you were able to go after all.

and then you’d looked to the other side and see in your mind a car hitting the other. spinning out and smacking into the divider as an eruption of fire, car parts and the chaotic screeching of breaks echoed through the air.

mingi had to pull over to calm you down, bring you back to the real world in the form of hugging you close to his body and his hand running through your hair.

“i’m- i’m sorry, mingi, i’m sorry, i-”

“sh, you don’t have to apologize, baby, there’s nothing to apologize for,” he hums against your head, pulling you over the console to rock you gently in his lap.

he was warm and broad and soft spoken and everything about him made you feel safe. you couldn’t grasp at the time how or why he was so understanding and sweet but you didn’t even wanna question it.

because he was the one thing in your life that made you feel okay. that you had him and he had you and there was nothing that could be that bad if you had each other still.

he didn’t let go of your hand once as pulled onto the highway, got off the exit and made his way back home.

he guided you back into the apartment and told you to go lay down and that he’d be there in a second.

he cancelled the flight and called his mom, telling her you guys got rained out and that, if it was okay, he’d pay for them to fly out here next week.

the bed dips a few moments later, broad strong arms wrapping around your waist before you’re pulled into his chest.

it was after a few silent minutes stretched between you two, the calming rise and fall of his chest against your back, your small voice pierced the air.

“i’m sorry, mingi.”

he could tell you were gonna cry before you even started, turning you in his arms as he pulled you closer to him.

“baby, i already told you you don’t have to-”

“but i do,” you cut him off, lower lip trembling and stomach knotting guiltily.

“i... i don’t think this is normal, mingi. i should be able to move on with my life and travel somewhere. i wanted to go so badly and meet your mom but i-” your voice breaks as tears fill your eyes and you try to catch the breath threatening to suffocate you.

“i’m scared i’m gonna be like this forever,” you say quietly, looking up and meeting his soft, sweet gaze. “i’m scared i’m gonna be like this forever and you’re gonna become tired of it.”

“baby... that’s never gonna happen,” he assures you, voice gentle but firm as he runs his fingers through your hair.

“and you’re not gonna be like this forever. we can get you help. and i can help you,” he says, his eyes looking into yours with such a raw honesty and love. “i... don’t really know how but i’ll do whatever it takes.”

“what if it’s not enough?” you ask, because at the time it’s like you knew just how bad this was gonna get. that even with as low as you felt then, it wasn’t even rock bottom.

“what if you get sick of me?”

“i won’t,” he reassures, pressing a long, lingering kiss to your head before settling you onto his chest carefully. “that’ll never happen because i love you, y/n. and i always will.”

present day:

in a turn of events, you were the one who left after that.

came right to the place you first met, except now the lake isn’t frozen over and the late-afternoon sun had just set.

his words were too harsh and reminded you too much of his broken promises.

you felt too weak and pathetic and completely hopeless, the tense silence so horribly loud between you two you left without a word; and he hadn’t said anything either.

and now, as you sit at the spot you’ve always come to and found solace in, you can feel why he was always so hurt when you didn’t ask him to stay. because even though you were fighting and even though you both hurt each other, you wanted him to ask you to stay.

to please not go because that would’ve been the last possible way for you both to see there was something still there - even though it’s plain to see there isn’t.

too many fights and too many words have been said. too many lapses of silence and too many unspoken thoughts that now when uttered are just hurting both of you.

you’re both too hurt and you both have too many things to sort through that you can’t do together.

one second you were staring down at the lake, your own broken reflection staring back as your feet hung in the water, and the next you couldn’t see. tears flooded your vision and sobs wracked through your body, loud, ugly, horrific sobs that you’ve been holding back for far too long.

you cry because you know it’s over with him, you know it’s been over for a while, but now it all feels real.

you cry because you know you need some help to get past all of the guilt you feel, how if you don’t get help, you’re never gonna leave this town and see what else is out there.

you cry because you don’t even know where to start and know, even though it hurts, you have to do it alone.

you’re so lost in your thoughts and the way your cries echo through the yard that you don’t hear footsteps approach you.

you don’t even know anyone’s behind you until someone bends down and pulls you into their broad, warm chest. a chest you know far too well and a body that hasn’t held you like this in what feels like forever.

he knew you’d be here and he couldn’t stop his legs from jumping in the car and coming to see you after you left. half because he knew this had to happen and half because he was far too scared for you to be out here like this.

he knew what conversation was gonna follow but he knew had to hold you one last time. he missed holding you and he missed wiping your tears away.

“i don’t know what happened to us, mingi,” you whimper into his chest, the tears that have been building behind his eyes finally coming to the surface.

he doesn’t know what happened either. he doesn’t know when or where you guys went wrong or when you stopped talking to each other. he doesn’t know when he stopped loving you in such a way that was all consuming, where he knew he’d do anything and everything for you.

“i don’t... i don’t think this is working. i don’t know what to do but i know i can’t do this anymore.”

“i don’t know what happened either, baby,” he mumbles against your head, his words wobbly and wet as he tightens his hold on you. it feels as if every part of is heart is breaking, for the way he’s neglected you and the way your crying against him.

“i’m sorry i can’t help you. i wanted to so fucking badly but now... i just, i can’t, baby.”

you cry harder as you shake your head against him, feeling him plop down and pull you into his arms tighter.

it feels every bit as heartbreaking and upsetting as you both knew it’d be. it’s probably why you guys put it off for so long. because even though you feel the love you used to feel, you both know nothing will change.

he’ll resent you and you’ll resent him right back.

he’ll say he stayed for you and tried to help you and you’ll say you never asked him to do any of it.

you both sit there and cry and hold each other until the sky falls dark and air turns crisp, the moon reflecting off the lake in a way that hasn’t changed in two years.

but everything’s changed between you both and it’s too heartbreakingly obvious.

“i’ll miss you,” you mumbled to him.

because you know he’s gonna go on and do all the great things he’s wanted to. move out of this town and pursue whatever dreams he put off for you, the girl he once loved more than anything.

“i love you,” he confesses quietly against your head. “i really really did love you.”

because he knows he still does, he knows he always will, but it’s not something either of you can bear to hear right now.

you both have said what the other needed to hear and when you guys part tonight, maybe you’ll finally start feeling better. fix yourselves and the damage you’ve caused each other and maybe reunite when the universe deems it right.

two and a half years later:

it had always been your dream to see the northern lights.

something about them had always fascinated you, how they almost didn’t see real or were just a figment of fake editing that would only ever be seen in photos.

but you had an overwhelming need to see them before your very eyes. see the sight before you and marvel in just how truly fascinating and beautiful it was.

so that’s exactly what you did.

you wrote down a list of all the places you wanted to see: the egyptian pyramids, the great wall of china, the taj mahal, the eiffel tower, all of the sights that you knew in order to see, you’d have to leave the perfect little town you loved so much.

it took a lot of attempts, a lot of tears and anxiety and frantic calls to your therapist, but finally, you were able to do it.

it was the third to last place on your 6-month journey around the world, jet lag getting to you immensely but an extremely fulfilling pride and excitement within you.

you were able to do it. see the sights and meet hundreds of different people and experience all the things you convinced yourself you didn’t need or want.

and you didn’t have a single regret until this very moment.

because the rookie mistake you made within this amazing, journey of self-discovery around the world was not investing in a parka.

the biting temperatures of alaska were surely getting to you right now, your glove covered hands over your ears as you trekked through the snow with other groups of (properly dressed) tourists during the aurora season.

you found yourself in a snowy, freezing field, tall evergreen trees above your heads as you waited patiently for the sky to change perfectly, a buzzing excitement and low chatter from the people around you.

footsteps crunching on snow filled your ears from every direction, your eyes on the trees and large sky above you. a harsh gust of wind whipped past you and you let out a tiny squeal, your hands shooting up to your red, wind-burnt face.

you could hear a quiet, low chuckle beside you, something about the strangely familiar sound sending a whoosh of butterflies through your stomach. you didn’t understand them at that moment, ignoring your bodies odd reaction and keeping your eyes focused on the sky.

it took hearing his voice, the same one you’d fallen in love with in your own backyard, for your eyes widen and quickly look over the snowy vast of land surrounding you.

mingi stepped in front of you, eyes full of amusement and pride and even disbelief, looking over your face with the same type of a fascination he had when he first met you.

“aren’t you cold?”

inspired by: line without a hook by ricky montgomery, ty tiktok

tag list: @mochibabycakes @atinyarmyx1 @middle-of-a-wonshua-sandwich @chrryhwa @baekhvuns @marksflvr @bunbaebae @markleeyeosang @inkigayeo @nlost21 @toffee-hwa @hyunjeansuniverse @cherryeonii

#so aha.... not the dystopian au #but i was inspired by a song in the car and this happened <3 #mingi #mingi angst #mingi fluff #ateez #ateez angst #ateez fluff #mingi scenarios #mingi imagines #ateez scenarios #ateez imagines

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yellowocaballero · 4 years ago

Text

Human Relations Snippet: Jon and Sasha versus Bad Telenovelas

This is a birthday request from @hihereami who wanted something very Latin American and an excuse to show me her favorite shows. This takes place in early Season 3, before Jude Perry but with Sasha working at the office. Jon fudged some stuff. It features incredibly stupid office dynamics, bad relationships, and a shared history that produced two very different people. Happy birthday, Ami!

CW as usual for Human Relations: explicitly discussed transphobia, references to 19th century racism, and a depiction of a platonic abusive relationship.

Sasha now understood that she was talking to an expert.

“Fine,” she said grudgingly, gathering the papers back up. She left out her great outline and timetable, though, because Martin should definitely appreciate it. “But the number one rule here is to keep up an active support system, right? Which means Jon needs more than just you.” Martin gave her a hilariously prissy look, which she responded with an equally prissy one. “He thinks we have a psychic bond or something.” They did but Sasha didn’t want to admit that. “Look, I’ve been harassing Jon for months about how shitty Jonah is. But if he’s going to listen to me, he needs to know that...I guess that I care about him more than I hate Jonah. That I’m not doing it out of spite or with some ulterior motive to get something out of him.”

Martin closed the manila folder, carefully attaching a label on it and writing down their coded filing system on the tab. “You don’t care about him more than you hate Jonah. You are doing this with ulterior motives. But it would be pretty hypocritical of me to care about that, so...he likes television? And he likes hearing about your life and the things important to you. He’s like this historical, cultural, political, anthropological sponge. I mean, he knows everything about everything, but it’s his passion. So if you want to combine the two…”

And, of course, once Martin said that then the answer was obvious.

Sasha liked to be the smartest person in the room.

The problem with people like Sasha was that, very frequently, they were the smartest person in the room. For seventeen years of her life Sasha had been remarkably and thoroughly assured that she would go places, she was really going to make all of us proud, she’s going to take care of us in our old age, Mrs. Pérez’s son just wastes every day with his girlfriend but here you are, studying all day with your complete lack of friends!

Once she skipped town - well, town, country, Americas, oceans - all of that had been replaced with shiny grades and the bragging rights of Oxford and the implicit looming pressure of her scholarship. Sasha had always been the smartest person in the room. She couldn’t afford anything else - not if she wanted someone to care, not if she wanted to get anywhere in life.

Every adult was somewhat of a child inside: happily ignoring a toy until it was taken away, at which point they would scream and scream. And when Sasha didn’t feel like the smartest person in the room - or, worse, others didn��t see her as the smartest person in the room - there was nothing tolerable about it.

Upon retrospect, workplace and academic discrimination, in addition to some healthy insecurity, bothered her so much that she sold her soul to the devil about it, but apparently this was an semi-common occurrence. Abuela had been right. Teach Sasha to doubt her again.

Mrs. Pérez’s son probably hadn’t accidentally sold his soul to the devil. He and his girlfriend were probably happy with their hard working but low-paying jobs, their cute little smattering of babies, and their mass every week. They’d have long, happy lives, and the amount of life-or-death situations they were put in were probably no more than usual.

Well. Sasha would literally rather die than do that, and that resolve had been tested very thoroughly. She stood by it. Sasha had never regretted a decision she made in her life, besides the ones that sold her soul to the devil, and also maybe some things about Tim. But most of her decisions were good. And even if they weren’t good, she stubbornly stood by them.

That’s why this was difficult. For all of Sasha’s insecurity reasons that, to be fair, had mostly drifted into the background of her life while she had been on the run for murder. And because it was Martin.

“Sasha, I’m not sure what help I can give you.”

Godfuckingdammit.

“Please?” Sasha slid into the seat across from Martin, giving him her best big cow eyes. “Don’t hog the emotional manipulation. You’re the expert in making Jon do what you want, just...work your magic!”

Martin looked up from the statement he was organizing shot Sasha an extremely flat look. Martin was extremely good at looking extremely unimpressed. “Because I’m the one who can magically make people do what I want.”

Sasha winced. “At least you didn’t sell your soul to a demon about it?”

“I know you tell yourself a lot of people do that to make yourself feel better about doing it, but literally nobody does that.” At Sasha’s double wince, Martin sighed. “Don’t listen to Jonah. You didn’t do anything a normal, non-satanic person wouldn’t do. If I could…” Martin trailed off slightly, staring a little in the distance, before shaking back to himself. “I’m not helping you manipulate Jon. That’s my place in this ecosystem.”

“Then we should team up,” Sasha wheedled. She reached into her briefcase - which nowadays contained little more than alcohol and Statements, she wasn’t sure that Georgie had been a good influence on her - and yanked out the print-outs before slapping it on the table. “See, I did research!”

Martin slid the papers closer to him, leafing through them quickly. Sasha waited for him to look very impressed and appreciative of how socially competent yet intellectual she was, but he didn’t look very impressed at all. “ “Help someone in an Abusive or Controlling relationship”, ‘3 ways to support someone stuck in a controlling relationship’, ‘How can I help someone in a toxic relationship’...”

“You aren’t going to deny it, are you?” Sasha asked heatedly. “Because Tim just does not get what I mean no matter how many leaflets I show him because he ‘framed me for murder’ or whatever -”

“Do not pretend as if you’re forgiven him for the murder thing.”

“I fucking hate his guts over it. I will never, ever forgive either of them.” Sasha’s heart spiked in her chest, and she forced herself to take a few calming breaths. “This is a problem. Jon and Jonah are a problem. I don’t think we’re in a position to take on Jonah right now - even if I am working on it. But Jon is a weak link here. We know he’s impossible to kill -” At Martin’s extremely alarmed look, Sasha quickly elaborated, “ - and I wouldn’t want to, although he would really technically deserve it with all of his human rights violations. It would be far easier, and a better use of our resources, if we got Jon to our side. Then hopefully those two could...blow each other up, or something.”

Martin stared at her, expression implacable. Sasha became abruptly aware that she had just threatened to blow up this guy’s semi-boyfriend, and resisted the urge to apologize. She wasn’t apologetic. This was what she had to do, and Sasha always did what had to be done. It didn’t matter if she hated Jon so much that she wanted him dead, when he would be more useful to her alive. It doesn’t matter if she knew that, deep down, Jon was an exceptionally kind and caring person who loved very deeply, and that who he was now was a product of a great deal of influences mostly out of his control. If he was who Sasha was going to turn into, given enough time.

She would stick to the plan. Sasha was going to get herself and her Assistants - including Melanie now, for some reason, who still refused to believe them about the psychic vampire thing despite how many times Jon confessed to it - out of this.

Finally, Martin said, “I’m not going to deny it, Sasha. I’ve printed out all those guides, I’ve read all of the books, I’ve done everything. I’ve been working on this since - I think since I decided that I loved Jon more than I hated him. I’ve got Jon’s trust. And, way more importantly, Jonah is convinced that I’m harmless. He doesn’t pay any attention to me. I think he, like, secretly hates it whenever Jon has someone - whatever. But he is obsessed with everything you do.” At Sasha’s disturbed look, Martin shrugged. “He micromanages. Jon complains about it. I don’t think Jon gets that he really spills the cards on all of Jonah’s plans when he gets drunk and bitches about him.”

Sasha now understood that she was talking to an expert.

“Fine,” she said grudgingly, gathering the papers back up. She left out her great outline and timetable, though, because Martin should definitely appreciate it. “But the number one rule here is to keep up an active support system, right? Which means he needs more than just you.” Martin gave her a hilariously prissy look, which she responded with an equally prissy one. “He thinks we have a psychic bond or something.” They did but Sasha didn’t want to admit that. “Look, I’ve been harassing him for months about how shitty Jonah is. But if he’s going to listen to me, he needs to know that...I guess that I care about him more than I hate Jonah. That I’m not doing it out of spite or with some ulterior motive to get something out of him.”

And, of course, once Martin said that then the answer was obvious.

*******

Sasha was now willing to admit that Martin was smarter than she was.

It was always kind of a crapshoot when looking for Jon. He was only around the Institute half the time, probably less, and he refused to buy a cell phone so anybody could stay in contact with him. Tim had also flatly refused, because Jon would inevitably go to him for help with figuring it out, and apparently that could take hours. Sasha had volunteered to help Jon with accessing some online archives, and apparently she had explained it so confusingly that Jon was left refusing to touch a computer for a month.

The farthest they could go was convincing him to take a Jitterbug for emergencies. Tim had taken great pains to explain the LifeAlert function, to Jon’s increasing lack of amusement. When Sasha had explained the adventure to Georgie, a known social media sensation over wine at their weekly girls night, she had found it hilarious and was very impressed.

“Jon must be really attached to you guys,” Georgie had said, carefully nibbling at her luxury chocolate. Girl’s nights with Georgie were decadent. “I mean, not that he doesn’t talk about all of you nonstop, but he can spend ten years incorporating the Beholding into every piece of technology in the country while willfully refusing to learn how to work a computer.”

Sasha hadn’t missed Georgie’s word choice - deliberately refusing instead of an incapability to learn - but something else in the sentence was stranger to her. “I thought he was all about all kinds of knowledge.”

“I hear that the future can be terrifying for a lot of people,” Georgie had said wisely. “No matter how much of it they experience.”

“Is it terrifying for you?”

“Goodness, no.” Georgie had flashed her a bright grin - not so much a showing of teeth as it was a peek at a bone-white skeleton. “I always know what the future holds.”

As it stood, Sasha got lucky today. She wasn’t forced to make Jon use his dreaded phone, and as a result she wasn’t forced to understand what the fuck Jon did all day. He was in the Magnus Institute, and when Jon was in the Institute there were three places he could be.

The Archives, which Sasha had just come from. The Institute Library, occasionally terrifying the graduate students and more frequently helping them write their papers. Sasha had heard that they had communally begun sacrificing one grad student to his hunger per week in exchange for study sessions. Which...she should discourage...whatever, it was probably ethical. Or, at the very least, voluntary.

The only other location Jon visited was Magnus’ office, where he could spend hours relaxing on the evil little bastard’s couch and annoying him. That was a last resort scenario, and was usually saved for complete and total emergencies.

Thankfully, today, Sasha found Jon in the ‘D’s. He was lying on his back, legs propped up on the bookshelf across from him, reading what looked like a very fascinating philosophy text regarding humanity’s search for aliens that Sasha silently resolved to borrow from him later. He didn’t look up when Sasha approached, so she carefully tipped a book off the shelf above him to fall on his head.

He yelped, dropping his book and sitting upright. He rubbed at his head, scowling, and Sasha saw that he had restyled his hair since the last time she had seen him. It had been growing long, but instead of cutting it and returning to his short twists styled into a loose curtain over his forehead he had pulled it back into a puffy bun. It was...somewhat more fashion forward than Sasha had ever seen from him. He had swapped his greatcoat for a primmer and shorter pea coat. Even his glasses were now thin-rimmed, circular, and kind of stylish.

“Oh my god,” Sasha said, “has Martin started dressing you?”

“Martin can barely even dress himself,” Jon said automatically. “It was Georgie. She said I have to ‘clean up nice’ if I ever ‘want a man’. What does any of that mean?”

“Isn’t it kind of weird that your wife is setting you up with someone?”

“The concept of monogamy becomes ridiculous after the first eighty years,” Jon said, also automatically. Then Sasha’s words sunk into his brain, and he flushed. “Georgie and I aren’t together right now! And she’s not setting me up with - how can you even consider - what makes you think I’m a homosexual -”

Sasha stared at him flatly. Jon gave up.

“Just let me know if I need to explain gay shit to you,” Sasha said. “It’ll cost a hundred pounds for me to explain queerness and three hundred if you want to learn about trans issues. Recompense for my emotional labor.”

“Young people think they invented these things. It’s ridiculous.” Jon stored the book back on the bookshelf behind him without looking, before carefully dropping his feet and rolling up. Sasha’s back ached in sympathy. Some people got all of the demon deal luck. “What does Martin say? ‘People are gay, Steven’? Historical figures are gay and trans, Sasha.”

“...are you a historical figure that’s -”

“I apologize for being a cisgender man that’s ruined your life, yes.” Jon arched an eyebrow at her as Sasha spent a second in confused agony over whether or not she was getting through to this guy. “I assume there’s no emergency, considering this conversation, so why are you here?”

There was no way to make this offer sound genuine. Jon would look for the catch - because there was one - or what she was trying to pull. There was something she was trying to pull, but she wasn’t about to admit it.

In the end, Sasha settled for a fragment of honesty in her heart. Jon always had a way of drawing that out of people.

“I haven’t watched my telenovelas in years. And I don’t know anybody else who speaks Spanish, and so much of it doesn’t translate that I refuse to watch it subbed with someone else, and they’re something I used to watch every night but now I haven’t seen them in years. And you speak Spanish. So.”

Jon stared at her, blinking owlishly, before his mouth twitched into a small smile. It flowered, moving from a hesitant movement of the lips into a real, close-lipped smile that sent his usually severe and sharp expression into something resembling excitement. Understated enthusiasm over novelty.

How weird, Sasha thought. That you could be 200 years old and still find excitement over something novel. Over something new. Or, maybe, over someone choosing to trust you with a part of their lives.

Or maybe it wasn’t that weird. How could someone keep living for that long if something as simple as this didn’t bring you joy? Sasha was only thirty four and she already felt so tired of life, all the time. Either tired or overwhelmed. She wondered if Jon still felt overwhelmed.

“Sounds like fun,” Jon said. “Can I bring my notebook?”

“...yeah, sure.” Sasha paused, almost uncertain. “Hey. When you get to, like, two hundred -”

“Technically two hundred and twenty.”

“When you get to two hundred and twenty, do you finally feel like an adult?”

Jon stared at her, faintly surprised, before his expression settled into something a little wry. “Anybody who says that they ever feel like an adult is a liar. That’s how you know that Jonah’s full of shit.”

Somehow, it was almost a little reassuring.

First time she had ever said that about Jon.

********

Their adventures, of course, were quickly throttled by practicalities.

Sasha suggested just watching it on a laptop, but Jon’s expression had wrinkled in distaste. Jon suggested just watching it at her place, but Sasha liked to pretend that he didn’t know where she lived. Far too much intimacy, and somewhat hilariously Jon seemed very awkward about being alone with a woman in her flat. Also they were still working, technically.

Martin, overhearing their argument in the Archives as Sasha collected her laptop, suggested Jon’s place, since it was pretty nice and cozy and close to the Archives. This forbidden knowledge, the shining proof that sometimes a little knowledge could be a terrible and traumatizing thing, the sheer mental image that imprinted itself behind her eyelids, shook Sasha to her core.

“For christ’s sake,” Martin said, “we are not fucking.”

“Sounds like someone who’s fucking our boss would say!” Tim called, from his position asleep on the break room couch. Sasha had spent roughly five hours yesterday convincing him that her plan to manipulate Jon’s psychological weaknesses was the most effective defense against evil fear powers that they had, and since he had lost the argument he was now resentfully napping on the couch. “If I walk in on you doing it in the office over a desk I’m going to fucking kill both of you and then myself!”

“Does this place have an HR?” Melanie asked, from where she was sitting at her desk actually trying to work. “Can I report all of you to HR? Please?”

“Jon can hardly fire himself,” Sasha told her sympathetically. “This shit will all make sense if you accept the fact that -”

“God, I get it, enough with the workplace hazing!” Melanie threw up her hands, as Jon unsubtly whispered something in Martin’s ear that made him blush. “You can all drop it now, it was never funny!”

“If Sasha just let me prove it to you,” Jon said, exasperated, “then you can see -”

Simultaneously, all three of them snapped, “Do not!”, cowing Jon immensely.

Tim was no help in problem-solving, since he was resentful that Sasha was doing this at all. He had been spending almost all of his time lately throwing himself into research into the rituals, into anything that explained the strange and obscure rigor of this universe. Jon only explained as much to them as Jonah let him, and the most he ever did was mysteriously drop off boxes that held a lot of information about clowns and sawdust.

He always seemed a little surly as he did it. Sometimes he looked very guilty. Sasha noticed, every time. She couldn’t afford not to.

All Sasha could try to do for Tim was help him. Their relationship had already been fractured by the way they kept secrets from each other, and although they both wanted to repair it they were forced to confront the fact that now they had to tell each other things. Accept help. Sasha hated acknowledging that she couldn’t do everything by herself, and Tim hated putting Sasha in the danger he relentlessly and suicidally threw himself into, but neither of them would let the other continue on their self-destructive path.

It wasn’t sweet. But it was the most solid and tangible proof Sasha had that they loved each other. Maybe it was the most solid proof anybody could have: that, in life or death, they’d choose wherever you were.

If Sasha followed Tim into whatever dangerous shit he was getting himself into, then he would be more careful. Tim wouldn’t survive it if he lost her, and she knew it.

Between her and Tim, and Jon and Martin...why did all of their relationships feel like mutually assured destruction?

Eventually, Jon’s solution was, as usual, the worst one. Jon’s solution to every problem always worked, but it was always the one thing that nobody wanted to do and that everyone hated. But anything else was either vetoed or improbable, and Sasha refused to back out once she committed to something, so that was how Sasha stuffed a laptop and an HDMI cable into her bag to trail behind Jon as they rode the elevator up to the third floor.

The number three rule of the Archives was not relevant right now (let Sasha have two cups of coffee before bothering her about how terrible their lives were). But the number two rule of the Archives was this: don’t fuck with Rosie. They both gave her their brightest grins as they passed, impeccably polite without actually asking if Jonah was inside. Rosie smiled munificently at them and complemented Sasha on her heels. They were in. They were now breaking the number one rules of the Archives.

The number one rule of the Archives was, of course, this: never talk to Jonah Magnus unnecessarily.

On the bright side, from this perspective Sasha could see how Jon worked his magic - that is, how he always entered Jonah’s office through kicking the door open and infuriating the other man tremendously. He actually took the time to open the door a crack first, completely silently and almost imperceptibly, before crashing it open in as annoying a way as physically possible.

“I need your fucking office!” Jon called.

When Sasha poked her head in behind him, she was treated to the sight of a terrified employee cowering in the hard plastic chair in front of Jonah’s desk. Sasha was well aware how that chair could feel like an electric chair. Across from him, Jonah looked distinctly unamused, already kneading his brow.

“I’m in a meeting, Jon.”

“Good for you.” Jon pointed at the door, and the employee silently scurried out. “Not anymore. Now fuck off, I need your office.”

Impossibly, Jonah looked even more unamused. “Fucking your Archivist on my desk in the middle of the day is a bit beyond the pale even for you, Jon.”

Sasha was immediately so fucking disgusted that she switched into Spanish and called him a great deal of incredibly rude things for an incredibly long period of time.

Talking over her, Jon said, “Take out your resentment over 1899 on someone else. We want your television, we’re watching Sasha’s programmes.”

“Right. Like how you and that boy Martin are always watching programmes -”

“Me cago en tu puta madre--”

“Honestly, Jonah, just because you had all of those men over for revision of your manuscripts doesn’t mean everyone’s as euphemistic as you are. And Sasha, that’s remarkably vulgar.”

For the first time, Jonah looked alarmed. “What is she saying?”

“Sólo porque tienes un rabo chiquito -”

“Go learn Spanish.”

“Ms. James, this is a professional office, and -”

“Melanie’s fucking right, we need a fucking HR.” Now this was a matter of pride. Sasha flounced into the office, collapsing onto one of the dumb uncomfortable leather couches facing one of those screens that rich people had in their offices to show their powerpoint slides or whatever. “I’m going to Stare you to death if you don’t leave us alone to watch telly.”

Hilariously, Jonah looked at Jon, alarmed. “Can she do that?”

Jon opened his mouth, before Sasha shot him a look. “She’s progressing amazingly rapidly. At this point, not even I know what she’s capable of.”

What a wingman. Jonah looked faintly uncomfortable, but he went back to his computer anyway instead of doing the rational thing and getting out. “This grant is due in three days, Jon, and I have no time for your little fancies. Do what you will, but leave me out of it.”

Sasha was not thrilled at the prospect of Jonah fucking Magnus hanging out in the background while Sasha and Jon watched telenovelas. She’d be outnumbered by the evil fear demons, for one. But Sasha had a sneaking suspicion, and maybe if she couldn’t genuinely stop this guy’s evil plans she could annoy him to death.

At the very least, it would make her feel better. Sasha was beginning to recognize the value of anything that just made you fucking feel better. Maybe Tim was onto something with constantly being a giant bitch all the time.

“Ignore that cunt,” Sasha said in Spanish, catching Jon’s attention as she stood up to plug in the HDMI cable and turn on the television. “I got crisps and chocolate in my bag, I’m putting on Marimar.”

“Is she insulting me again?” Jonah asked. “Jon, what’s she saying?”

“I’m afraid I only consume trauma,” Jon said, also switching to Spanish. His accent was fucking bizarre. He sounded like her great uncle, or an even worse version of Sucedió en La Habana. At her boggled look, he elaborated, “The Witness gifted me with understanding of all languages very early in my development, but it bestowed verbal fluency in...1910? Perhaps? I’m afraid that without a little practice and frequent use I’m a little bit stuck there. I was able to beat my Chinese and Russian into sounding modern, but I’m afraid that people now tell me my Chinese is somewhat 1960s and my Russian is fairly 1980s.” He scowled. “Why does modernity change so much?”

“I think telenovelas can fix this for you,” Sasha decided. She paused a beat as Jon sat down beside her, a careful distance away. “The Witness? Is that a weird translation thing? You called it the Beholding last time.”

Jon shifted, a little guiltily. In English, he said, “The term Beholding’s better...it’s more academic, and more people use it…”

“What are you two -”

“Is ‘The Witness’ your word?” Sasha asked, and to her horror she found her tone almost gentle. It was almost easier, in her own words.

This time Jon truly looked uncomfortable, and he shifted back into Spanish - perhaps, Sasha thought, because Jonah could not understand it. “Smirke contributed all of the nomenclature for this, and he never...well, none of Jonah’s little circle liked me very much.”

“Wow, wonder why.”

“Exoticism only gets you so far, I suppose,” Jon joked weakly, before sharply swerving the subject. “I always felt as if it gave me its own name. When I began to understand, really understand what it was and how we could feed each other...I felt as if it told me. And that’s what it told me. So it’s always been my name.”

Hm. Sasha wondered what it was like, to have your religion be - so tangible, so grounded. Sasha believed, and she had faith with all of her heart, but - well, you wouldn’t need faith if you had incontestable proof. Faith was about believing because you knew something in your heart. But Jon...when he had nothing else, maybe, he had this.

“I just put down ‘James’ because I thought it would make that small-dicked asshole more likely to hire me,” Sasha finally offered, her only equivalent for something like this. “Tell you what. Call me James Martinez, and I’ll curse the name of the Witness, okay? If you’d like me to.”

Jon brightened, and for a second Sasha saw her own faith in his brilliant green eyes. “My gift is shared with you, Sasha. Of course you can.”

It was not a gift. It was a terrible and disgusting curse, and it was one that Jon had inflicted upon her. But Sasha was playing nice...and this was knowledge, understanding Jon was knowledge that could save her life one day...and there was something strange about Jon’s hesitant and multi-barbed trust.

It had to be the trust of somebody who had it betrayed a hundred, thousand times. But he gave it so easily, and he reached out incessantly. Sasha knew lots of people who cared too much, although she had never been one of them - Tim and Martin, for one - but she could already see how it was making them a little bitter and jaded.

Jon wasn’t. Sasha didn’t know why.

So Sasha kicked off her heels, tucking her legs underneath her as she pulled up her favorite episode of Marimar on her laptop. It was a comfort show, having context wouldn’t help, she had rights.

“Okay,” Sasha began, a little aggressively, “we’re starting a lot of the way in, so I have to catch you up. Like a lot of telenovela protagonists, Marimar is a wholesome young girl who lives in a little sad hut shack on the beach and she can’t read. She’s raised by her grandparents and her dog talks. This is the essential premise of the show.”

“Wow,” Jon whispered, “just like me.”

“I - okay, you are not obligated to give me your backstory, but what?”

“Martin keeps calling me a ‘sad little Victorian orphan’,” Jon said defensively. “And dogs talk to me too!”

“...what do they say?”

“If you’d believe it, nothing interesting.” He paused a beat. “But Georgie’s cat is kind of a psychopath, if that helps.”

“That’s a stereotype against cats,” Sasha accused. “Just because humans don’t understand cat body language -”

“Oh, no, cats are lovely, my favorite animal. But the Admiral’s kind of a freak.”

“If you two are going to sit here and trash talk me in my own office,” Jonah said, aggravated, “then please at least take it outside.”

Actually, this was a great idea.

Sasha ran through the plot of Marimar, down to the love interest with the terrible chest hair (Jon and Sasha then got into an argument over chest hair that was so heated that Sasha suspected Martin had chest hair), the evil step-mother (they both agreed that women in soaps tended to fall within the madonna/whore complex), and the weird amounts of humiliation. Sasha loved to hate Mr. Douchey McChesthair in this one - he wooed Marimar and promised to raise her up from poverty, but he ended up ditching her when she wasn’t refined enough for him. She wins him back at the end with her nice dresses and inherited money, and they settle down with a baby and a big house. Sasha always hated the ending. Marimar should have become a career woman.

“It’s massively cheesy,” Sasha warned, finally playing the episode and letting the cheery theme song play, “so don’t sit here and point out the logical inconsistencies. We know. It’s part of the experience.”

But Jon just arched an eyebrow, unbuttoning his own pea cot to throw over the back of the sofa and lounge in his seat. “Watching telenovelas, in the office of the Director of the facility where you work, with his boss, in London, is the experience? And we’re all - how do you put it - evil fear demons?”

“You haven’t met my auntie,” Sasha said darkly. But she ended up shaking her head too, picking at her stockings a little. “The experience is...eleven pm, and the whole house is dark. The kitchen light is on, this flickering yellow thing that pops and buzzes. There’s cicadas outside, and somewhere you can hear someone playing music too loudly. Dad’s in his ripped up armchair, snoring. Mom’s on the couch, reading a magazine. They’re only half-paying attention, but it’s late, and you feel like you never get enough time with them. So you sit on the couch next to Mom, and because neither of them say anything you watch the show with all of your attention, just happy to be near them...it’s family bonding, you think. It feels like it.”

Jon was silent, staring at her. Not fixedly, or intensely - just looking, as if he was waiting patiently to see if she would say anything else. But Sasha trailed off, picking at her stockings, until she forced herself to stop. She didn’t want to say anything else. She was worried that he would know what she wasn’t saying. He always did.

“My grandmother couldn’t read,” Jon said finally, and Sasha fought the surprise. Jon never talked about this, not in any specific words. “But she would darn clothing by the fire at night. She did it for the neighborhood and earned some extra money.”

“What about you?” Sasha asked, hoping it was a safe topic. “What did you do?”

Jon grinned at her, sharp and amused. “I got into trouble.”

They both turned their attention back to the television, and Sasha silently mouthed the words along with the screen as Jon paid rapt attention.

It was later in the show, when Marimar was showing up all of the people who did her dirty when she was poor. She had a fine dress, lingering on the arm of her rich and kind of creepy father, and she walked around with her head held up high. Her old husband who treated her terribly saw her at the opera and he was stunned by how hot and cool she was now.

“Good for her!” Jon said abruptly. “Go find someone better, Marimar!”

“Oh my god,” Sasha groaned. “She ends up with him!”

“What!”

Quicker than Sasha would ever have expected, Jon got wrapped up in the episode. He gasped with her at the right parts, cheered at the screen whenever Marimar said something particularly sassy, and they booed whenever Douchey McChesthair showed up.

When Sasha glanced behind her - not that she did - she saw Jonah fixedly ignoring them. He was gritting his teeth a little. Every so often he would glance at the screen, obviously look terribly confused, then go back to his computer.

When the credits rolled Jon declared this second-hand trauma, which terrified Sasha deeply but raised interesting questions about her own future diet.

“It’s about the humiliation, fear, and voyeurism,” Jon told her. “Supernatural trauma and devastation tastes rather similar to these telenovelas.”

“...what do they taste like?”

Jon thought hard. “Taste, but if it was a feeling.”

“...what’s the -”

“What’s the feeling you have?”

Sasha was forced to concede the point, and put on another episode.

In this one, Marimar’s new dad tied tragically, and she very cunningly has him sign all of his money over to her. Sasha cheered her on very enthusiastically, and Jon agreed that Marimar was the definition of girlboss, but he found it kind of a dick move.

“I thought you hated pretentious, old money rich white Britons,” Sasha accused. She knew that Martin had been working on him and trying to convert him to socialism,, but it was slow going.

“I do hate entitled, old money people,” Jon said shortly. “But it’s hardly illegal to work your way up the social ladder and improve your station in life. Marimar isn’t putting the work in, she’s just inheriting all of this blood money. If she doesn’t make something of her life then what’s the point in all of that suffering?”

“You do know how social mobility is a lie fed to the lower class by the upper class to keep them complacently participating in the system, right?”

“I’m not saying many people do it,” Jon said, ignoring Marimar’s grotesquely fake sobbing, “but it’s possible. I’ve met plenty of people who worked hard and became successful.”

“Yeah, and those people were lucky. Most of us just sit around in poverty and suffer.” Sasha rolled her eyes, unwrapping her chocolate bar. “Not all of us can be Dr. Faust.”

“You didn’t sit around,” Jon said, turning to face her. Sasha didn’t meet his eyes, focusing on her chocolate instead. “You were smart, you worked your way up, you got your scholarship, and now you’re part of something far greater than yourself. You took what happened to you and you used to make you stronger, just like I did. Anybody can do it if they work hard enough.”

Sasha’s teeth clamped down on the chocolate.

Abruptly, stupidly, she got angry.

“I’m not better than the thousands of other trans women who got kicked out, Jon,” Sasha snapped, but Jon didn’t flinch. “I’m just luckier! I know I worked hard, but I’m not more - more worthy of what I have than the brave women back home who have nothing. And I’m not going to stomp on them to make myself feel better like you do!”

“I do not -” Jon started, outraged, but Sasha cut him off.

“You tell yourself that you worked hard for the security, money, education that you never got as a child! But you deserved all of that! That’s shit that anybody who lives deserves. But because you think of it as some kind of stupid reward, then it’s something that can be taken away. And when what you have can be taken away at any moment, then you have nothing!”

She cut herself off abruptly, unwilling and incapable of saying anything more. There were lines you couldn’t cross with Jon, and lines that she didn’t deserve to cross no matter how callous he was. She couldn’t accuse him of forgetting where he came from, or of betraying his people. Sasha knew well that Jon had never forgotten, not for a second.

He had just - twisted everything around. He had to justify to himself what he’d done, so he’d taken the truth and molded it to fit his own desires and call it holy.

It had killed her. It had killed her, how Jon told her that they were the same, but he did all of this shit to her anyway. But maybe that was no surprise: Jon hadn’t done anything to her that he hadn’t done to everybody else, and he hadn’t made any justifications to himself about his behavior towards her that he hadn’t made about everybody else.

You couldn’t live like he did with emotional honesty. Good people could do bad things - Sasha knew that better than anyone - but it required a truly disgusting level of willful blindness and cowardice that Sasha had never tolerated.

“Nobody gave me being a woman,” Sasha whispered, too full of - something, to even look at Jon. “I didn’t take it from anyone. I didn’t steal it. It was something that I always deserved, and that I always was. And because of that, nobody will ever take it away from me.” She exhaled heavily, forcing herself to stop shaking. “Nobody can make me something I’m not. Not even you.”

Jon stared at her, toxic green eyes wide and something foreign in his expression. It looked almost as if he believed her. Ha. “Sasha, I -”

“I swear, it’s like you two are making an effort to be as intrusive as possible. Jon, can’t you control your own Archivist?”

Jon almost jumped, as if he had forgotten that Jonah was in the room at all. Something in his chest seized closer, and a year ago Sasha would have just called it a twitch.

It wasn’t. It was an aborted, concealed cringe, seen only once before. But there was only one other person in this world who cared about that.

“Jonah!” Jon said, switching back to English immediately. “Sorry, we were just - having a really heated discussion about - uh, about -”

“Brujeria and how it changed when adopted by members of the Catholic church,” Sasha said smoothly. “I think his weird compulsion thing is just advanced witchcraft.”

“Yes! Yes, of course - you remember, I took inspiration from p - pagan rituals, you know, for our early work. I think you called it -”

“Bizarre?” Jonah asked, arching an eyebrow. “Jon, there were bones involved.” Jon silently pointed at the human skull taking up proud residence in Jonah’s cabinet of curiosities. “That’s different, a friend gave me that.”

“ ‘Have you seen Barnabas lately, Jonah’, I said. ‘He hasn’t seemed to have written lately’, I said. ‘Have you grown distant?’, I said. And you said -”

“Yes, he was very distant,” Jonah said dryly. “You hardly complained. You hated the man.”

“I hated all of your friends,” Jon said. He was smiling, once again relaxed with his arm spread over the back of the couch. Sasha furiously bit into a chip. “Didn’t mean you let them die.”

“Yes, but he was your least favorite, so I figured there was no harm done there.”

Improbably, Jon brightened. He smiled again, a curved slash of the mouth that had always been reserved for Jonah. It always spoke of secrets, a private joke. “You do care.”

“I’ll care more if you stop chattering when I’m trying to get us funded for another cycle.”

“Whatever.” Jon turned to face the screen again, letting the smile fall into a curiously blank expression. “Next episode, Sasha?”

“Sure,” Sasha said slowly. “But it only gets worse from here.”

It would never stop being weird how - well, maybe that was no wonder. How could Sasha begin to understand a relationship as strange and esoteric as theirs? Two hundred years in the making, forged by cruelty and passion? Two lives, intertwined so closely they fed in a parasitic loop, starving the other to feed themselves?

“Oh, I don’t mind a little tragedy,” Jon said. He spoke in English, vowels carefully rounded, posh accent meticulously stretching his words. “It’s the most entertaining.”

Sasha thought about print-outs. She thought about a many-eyed, malicious tumor of fear and pain consuming humanity alive. She thought about the face of God, and the tired and resigned face of Martin. When Sasha spoke, she stayed in Spanish.

“Even though she gets married to Mr. Douchey McChestHair at the end?”

“I’m sure he’s not all bad,” Jon said, and wouldn’t say anything more.

#my writing #jonathan sims #martin blackwood #sasha james #timothy stoker #jonah magnus #elias bouchard #tma #the magnus archives #tma fanfic #the magnus archives fanfiction #everything said about marimar is real #however inauthentic because I ended up using the funny or die recap #me: i am not writing any more hr #my friends: but what if you did?#been seeing so many weird takes about abusive friendships lately i feel the need to very pointedly ask the question #what is the nature of the power dynamic between jon and jonah?

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in-class-daydreams · 3 years ago

Text

The Splash Zone - Tsukishima x Reader (Oneshot)

Jurassic World! AUPairing: Son of Park CEO!Tsukishima Kei x Mosasaur Trainer!Reader

- Word Count: ~9,000

- Genres: Fluff, angst

- CW: Mentions of death, objectification of main character, sexual harassment-

Mango’s Introduction: Tsukishima the younger is a bit… prickly. Don’t say that to his face, obviously, because he’s technically your boss, but for all his personality flaws, he’s definitely excellent at his job and he cares more about the people around him than he lets on. He’s snarky with that mosasaur trainer more than anyone else, but you can tell he’s sweet on her. I guess you could call it the adult equivalent of pulling a girl’s pigtails on the playground. Uh, don’t tell him I said that, he’s my boss too.

(A/N: For all of you who were interested in this series, y'all waited nearly a year for less than 10,000 words, and I apologize, haha. It's been sitting 95% finished all that time, but I moved onto some other projects because I wasn't confident in my writing abilities. After a year's worth of writing exercises via different projects, I'm now okay with putting this out for all of you. I hope my next few projects (AoT and KnY) knock your socks off, but for now, here's a little journey about following your own convictions, featuring our favorite salty blonde.)

Tsukishima had it all. Money, looks, brains, and sure, his personality could use a little work, but he wasn’t completely insufferable. Most of the time. But if you asked him, his sour attitude was hardly his fault. After all, he was the heir to a multi-trillion dollar theme park, so it’s not like there were any consequences for him talking to people the way he does. For all he cared, he could be as snarky as he liked, considering he didn’t work with many people that were willing to speak their mind to him.

“Bite me, Tsukki.”

Well, except for a certain mosasaur trainer that was really grating on his nerves. Said trainer sat across from him from her seat in his office, arms crossed and jaw tense. Tsukishima tapped his fingers on his desk.

“Are you done throwing a tantrum like a six-year-old?” he asked. (Y/N)’s hands balled in her lap. She kept her mouth shut, glowering at the desk in front of her to keep her temper under wraps.

The blonde rolled his eyes. About fifteen minutes ago, he watched her kick in the door to the employee lounge and make her way over to the mosasaur staff supervisor. All eyes were on her as she moved towards him with murderous intent rolling off of her in waves. While (Y/N) was the one with the most control over the aquatic dinosaur itself, the supervisor was the one who hired staff, had them trained, made their schedules, and completed the other overall administrative duties. Their position was a catch-all and they were meant to do the primary inspections that made the mosasaur shows run properly.

Company policy encouraged open communication between colleagues, of course. Jurassic World Theme Park prided itself on proficient employee cooperation, as per the employee handbook and what the marketing team insists they say. Tsukishima just wished (Y/N) had opened her statement with something a smidge more polite than, “Are there any grooves in your fucking brain or is it all just smooth in there?”

After that hell of a conversation starter, she and the supervisor verbally ripped into each other. If Kei hadn’t grabbed (Y/N) by the windbreaker and dragged her into his office, he wouldn’t have been surprised if they ended up ripping into each other physically, too. To her credit, (Y/N) most definitely won, but that would have been a bigger pain in his ass.

“(Y/N), you can’t speak like that to people you work with. I heard what you said about him keeping an eye on his interns, and that’s his business, not yours,” he sighed. It was too early for this crap, especially since his assistant called in sick and hadn’t made him his morning coffee, and there were a million things to do in preparation for the board meeting today. He had better things to do than settle this stupid argument.

(Y/N) looked at him with disbelief, “You think I went in there to yell at him for fun? You have no idea what happened, Kei, how are you already taking his side?”

Tsukishima looked into her fiery gaze for a moment. He leaned back, brushing down the front of his navy blue button-down.

“You know that’s not what I meant.”

“But it’s what you said,” she shot back.

He pursed his lips. “Alright, I’m sorry,” he muttered.

(Y/N)’s mouth dropped for a moment, then the corner quirked up ever-so-slightly, “What was that, Tsukki?”

“Just explain before I lose my patience,” he snapped. His ears felt hot.

She laughed, “Because you’re the picture of patience right now.”

“(Y/N).”

Although the anger in her posture returned, she was able to remain more composed than she had earlier.

“One of the interns came up to me about an hour ago to ask me about the coding for the hydraulic lift.” (Y/N) threw her hands up and leaned back in her chair, as if that was the answer to everything.

“I’ll need some more details than that.”

She groaned in frustration, “There’s the mosasaur tank and the stadium

surrounding it, yeah? And partway through the show, the hydraulic lift lowers the stadium to the underground viewing area, right? Well, for all that to happen, the codes on the control panel have to be specific,” her hands moved fervently as she got deeper into her explanation. “The codes never change, but every morning, the supervisor makes sure they’re correct and I double check before the show. If the codes are incorrect, the stadium might lift too fast, too slow, too much, or not at all.”

Kei nodded for her to continue, to which she gave a grateful nod before going back into rant mode.

“Interns don’t have clearance into that area. He gave her his fucking badge so she could go in and do the checks without him. She shouldn’t have been down there and she definitely shouldn’t have been checking the control panel. Look,” she ran a hand through her hair, “I don’t want to tell the guy how to do his job. If he wants to train the interns how to run the control panel, then fine, it’s not in my job description to police that. But that brand-new, inexperienced, fresh-out-of-college kid was all by herself down there doing that idiot’s job. She could have gotten hurt. She could have gotten other people hurt. It was her supervisor’s job to train her better and to take better care of his interns and if I don’t raise hell about this kind of stuff now, then who will? So fuck that guy, he deserved to get yelled at.”

(Y/N) heaved herself out of her chair, “And now that everyone thinks I’m a raving lunatic, I’m going back to my office to change. Try not to need me.”

As the son of the owner of Jurassic World Theme Park, Tsukishima Kei was raised to do two things: work with dinosaurs and obey his father. When he was younger, he thought he would get to work with the dinosaurs as a trainer, regulate their feeding schedules, train them, and educate the masses about the wonders of science. But he was wrong. The future his father had in store for him involved dinosaurs, yes, but more along the lines of determining the cost of developing a new dinosaur or what characteristics are interesting to the general public so that the park can turn a profit.

Several years ago, when his father originally had her brought to the island, Kei had been skeptical. Out of all the candidates for the mosasaur trainer, (Y/N) had been particularly young, but for some reason, his father was insistent that the new mosasaur trainer be her. (Y/N) later proved and continued to prove that she wasn’t just qualified, but born to work with the mosasaur, Dolly, she called her. She cared for her with a deep passion that transcended interspecies boundaries.

(Y/N) was amazing at her job, and it was unfair of Tsukishima not to hear her out initially. There was a fine line between teasing as a result of mutual pining and just being a dick, and it seemed like Kei had crossed that line.

(Y/N) knew he was coming. That was one of the things she really appreciated about Tsukishima. He was a snarky asshole who liked to rile her up, and in the beginning, he was garbage at apologies, but over time, they’d apologized to each other so often that he no longer dragged ass over it. Once he realized he was in the wrong, he would find her immediately.

Tsukishima let himself into (Y/N)’s office, where he found her and the raptor trainer in deep conversation.

“Kei! Seriously, I could’ve been changing!” she yelled. She’d told him a million times to knock before coming in, but he rarely listened.

“Don’t worry, even if you were, there’s nothing to see,” he said teasingly.

(Y/N) scowled, “You wouldn’t know.”

Tsukishima scoffed.

“Anyway, Hajime, what else did that guy say?” (Y/N) said.

Kei frowned at the two cups from Tiki Smoothie in front of them. He wondered if Iwaizumi had brought her one as a surprise or if she’d asked him to bring her one. Both possibilities put him in a bad mood. Supposedly, they were just close friends, but (Y/N) forced him to watch enough Hallmark movies for him to know the friends-to-lovers trope quite well. It ranked just below childhood friends-to-lovers and just above enemies-to-lovers. He must have been staring at those cups for some time, because by the time he zoned back in, Iwaizumi had already finished his explanation.

“--train the raptors for the battlefield,” Iwaizumi finished.

(Y/N) raised an irritated brow, “Like dogs?”

The raptor trainer shrugged, “Apparently.”

“Did you tell him that’s not how raptors work?” she asked.

“I didn’t bother. He-- Sorry,” Iwaizumi fished his ringing flip phone from his vest pocket. “I gotta go, (Y/N), I’ll tell you more at dinner later,” he said on his way out the door.

“Okay, but I wanna hear about your thing with that pretty P.O. Manager later!”

The taller man stopped and gripped the door frame in surprise.

“Wha-- There’s no ‘thing’!” Iwaizumi sputtered.

“Whatever keeps your blood pressure normal."

As (Y/N) waved her friend off, Tsukishima rested his weight on the back of the vacated chair.

“What was that all about?”

(Y/N) sighed, making her way over to the wardrobe next to the door.

“Some military guy had a talk with Hajime about using the raptors for war. He said they’re better than drones because they’re not hackable and blah blah blah.”

“Does he realize that-- what are you doing?!” Tsukishima choked when (Y/N) dropped her loose gym shorts. Underneath, she wore plain navy blue bikini bottoms.

“Relax, Kei, you’re the one who invited yourself into my office. Besides, it’s not like you haven’t seen a girl’s bare legs, right?” she teased as she stepped into her dive skin. The tall young man moved to sit behind the desk. Forcing down his blush, he took on a snarky tone once again.

“Obviously. I didn’t think you had time for that kind of thing, since you’ve been cooped up with Darby for the last few years.”

(Y/N) shook her wetsuit at him, “Her name is Dolly! It’s always been Dolly and you know it, you little shit!”

“Language, (Y/N),” he smirked. What would my father say if he knew you spoke to me like that?”

“Oh, trust me, Malfoy, your father knows exactly how I speak to you, and he couldn't care less,” she snarked, looking pleased with herself..

The teasing glint in Tsukishima’s eyes wavered at the comment, though he knew they shouldn’t have. ‘Don’t dish it if you can’t take it’ he always said. He knew his father loved him the way any man loves his son, but Kei’s rank in his father’s heart in relation to money had always been questionable.

“Sorry. Too much,” (Y/N) said quietly. She pulled up her dive skin and removed her windbreaker, revealing a matching bikini top.

“It’s not your fault,” the blonde mumbled back. (Y/N) made her way around the desk. Leaning her weight on the edge facing him, she said, “Really, I’m sorry. That was in bad taste.”

Tsukishima waved dismissively, “It’s fine, you didn’t mean it. Just caught me off guard… Actually, I came to apologize to you for earlier.”

She grimaced, “I’m sorry for freaking out so hard. I didn’t mean to make trouble for you the same day as a shareholders’ meeting.”

“You’d be okay with making trouble for me normally?”

“That a serious question?”

With a light chuckle he said, “Right, right. It’s fine... I’m sorry for not

hearing you out. For what it’s worth, that guy is as good as fired.”

“Fired!?” she yelped, making him jump. “Wait, you can’t fire him!”

“Actually, I can--”

“Fine. As his boss, you legally could fire him, but I’m saying don’t. One, we can easily get him to clean up his act. Two, his wife is preggers. Gregnant. Pregante.”

“I got it the first time.”

“Just making sure.”

Tsukishima huffed, holding back a smile, “Worrying about someone whose head you were about to bite off two hours ago. That’s just like you.”

There was a gentle knock at the door and Yamaguchi, a paleo-veterinary intern, poked his head through the doorway.

“(Y/N), are you ready for the show? We have 20 minutes until start time,” he informed her with a sweet smile.

“Yup!” She stuffed her arms through the tight neoprene sleeves, “Are you the specialist on standby this time, Yama?”

The shorter girl turned around and moved her hair to the side in a silent request. Standing to his full height, Tsukishima pinched the sides of her zipper with one hand and pulled the tab up with.

Yamaguchi couldn’t help but laugh. His two friends stopped, (Y/N) with her hands holding up her hair, Tsukishima with his hands tugging on her suit zipper.

“What’s so funny?” his childhood friend asked. Yamaguchi just shook his head and confirmed that, yes, he would be on medical standby for the upcoming show.

“Close the door when you leave, okay, Tsukki?” (Y/N) shot over her shoulder on the way out.

“Good luck with your show,” he said simply. She frowned in confusion. Before she could comment, Yamaguchi rushed her out the door.

“--near the surface of the water, where it preyed on anything it could sink its teeth into, including turtles, small fish, even smaller mosasaurs, but don’t worry, that’s not why Dolly here doesn’t have any siblings.”

The crowd chuckled. Tsukishima always enjoyed when (Y/N) did the demonstrations herself. The guides did the jobs they were contracted to do, and maybe it was that he already knew how much she loved Dolly, but whenever (Y/N) did it, it always felt less like a show and more like the introduction of a close friend of hers. That was the truth, after all.

“You see, when Dolly was born, I was the first thing she saw. This caused something called imprinting, and if I just made you think about that freaky Twilight baby, I’m so sorry.”

Another wave of laughter rippled through the crowd. “And what that means is, Dolly and I share a special bond. She feels a special connection to me that she doesn’t feel for any other creature on this planet. When she was growing up, we communicated with this,” she held up a silver whistle.

“You can’t hear these sounds, but Dolly can. She knows the sound of the whistle, and that makes her think, ‘Oh, that’s my handler! Yay, she’s gonna feed me!’ Which is something I thought whenever my mom called my name during my teenage years.”

“She’s entertaining, isn’t she?” one of his father’s associates commented. Rather than sitting in the wide open arena seats under the beating sun, Kei’s father, the elder Tsukishima, sat up in an air-conditioned glass box high above the regular seats. Today, a group of shareholders and potential investors were performing their monthly assessment of the park’s assets. After going to every single one of these meetings since he was twelve, Tsukishima was more or less used to these meetings, but he was getting irked by the way a particularly sweaty, sleazy-looking businessman two and a half times his age was staring not at the tank itself, but at the trainer on the platform above it. If it weren’t for his father, he would have nastily told all of them to never take even a single breath in her direction.

“The girl’s gotten real grown up since we first saw her,” the man said, rubbing his chin.

‘Don’t look at her like that,’ Kei growled internally.

“Good eye, Yamada-san. She just turned twenty-one,” his father replied.

‘But that doesn’t concern you,’ Kei thought.

“Really? She looks young, but she seems so mature for her age,” another dirty businessman observed.

“You always did like the young-looking ones, you creepy old man!” laughed Yamada. Tsukishima bit down on his tongue so hard he had to remind himself not to bite it off.

“Ah, yes, I took her age into account from the get-go,” Tsukishima-san said. “By nature, the mosasaurus would only accept one trainer, and I brought her to the island at such a young and impressionable age that she would only listen to me.”

“And then you have a safe way to control the dinosaur,” one of the shareholders concluded.

“Exactly. And you’re right, Yamada-san, she’s grown up to be quite attractive. Shame she ended up so strong-willed, else she might have made a quality match for my son. Perhaps if Kei here can reel her in, he’ll make a wife out of her yet, right, son?”

The younger Tsukishima’s skin crawled as every pair of eyes in the room landed on him. He could just imagine opening his mouth and ripping them all a new one. What would Yamada say if he called him out on his predatory behavior? Or he could say, ‘Ah, Mr. Kawasaki, how’s that custody battle with your wife going? I hear she’s winning because the kids would rather live with her. Oh, Chairman Yang, I didn’t see you there! Have you beaten that nasty gambling addiction of yours? Goodness, from the looks of those eye bags and how badly your ‘designer’ suit is frayed, my guess is no.”

But Kei can’t say any of those things. He has too much to lose, should he compromise his position as his father’s heir and future CEO. The blonde glanced briefly out the window at the smiling girl talking animatedly about her most treasured friend. He mentally sends her an apology for being unable to defend her yet again.

Kei grit his teeth and finally replies.

“Yes, father.”

If he were born as anyone else, he could romance her properly, instead of passing glances, not-so-subtle flirting, and raging sexual tension. They wouldn’t have had to play the whole ‘will we or won’t we?’ schtick. But he was still Tsukishima Kei. He was destined to take over his father’s company, and by design, his partner would have to attend board meetings and brunches and wine and cheese parties. Kei had no desire to drag (Y/N) into that kind of life, but what’s more, (Y/N) would never agree to it. At one time, he considered asking her about it. Ask her to consider making that sacrifice for him. But at the end of the day, he never did bring it up to her because he was scared of the answer he’d receive.

Her enthusiastic voice faded back into his consciousness, “Enough of me talking. Is everyone ready to meet Dolly?”

They all turned back to the window at the sound of (Y/N)’s voice.

The crowd cheered in affirmation.

“What was that? I can’t hear you?”

The cheers transitioned into a deafening roar.

“Alright, for those of you in the splash zone, expect to get soaked in about ten seconds and counting.”

(Y/N) pressed a button, and the feeder crane slowly moved to dangle a heavy shark over the mosasaurus tank. The trainer leaned against her platform’s railing. She put the whistle to her lips, but no one heard any sound.

“You hungry, girl?” she asked the tank. There was no prior indication of any movement before the leviathan reptilian dinosaur leapt out of the water and easily snatched up its prey with its rows of hundreds of teeth. Its great mass seemed to linger midair for what felt like forever before sliding back into the water with a giant splash that had the crowd squealing with delight.

“Hold on tight,” (Y/N) spoke up as the stands started lowering under the stadium, “We’re gonna get to take a little closer look at our girl, Dolly the Mosasaurus.”

“How was your meeting?” (Y/N) asked upon her arrival in Tsukishima’s own office, finally free of her restricting wetsuit and hair still wet from her shower. Not looking up from his paperwork, the blonde grunted, “Fine.”

(Y/N) smiled and sat on the edge of the desk beside him. Both hands came up to zip her windbreaker.

“That bad, huh?”

“You sit in a glass box for 45 minutes with a group of men over fifty, and tell me you had fun,” he grumbled. Giving him a sympathetic look, she slid off the desk to place her hands on his shoulders. She gently massaged the tension from them. Lately, Tsukishima Senior had been giving his son more responsibility to “prepare him to take over the company,” which would have been a more believable excuse if the older man wasn’t relaxing by the pool and golfing with his friends 4 days a week. Kei leaned into her touch.

‘You are nothing like your father, though, Kei,’ she internally mused. Dragging her hands down from his shoulders to clasp in front of him, she hugged him from behind. Soothed by her presence, he wondered if he even needed to tell her how he felt about her. It seemed like she already suspected. Though, if she already knew and wasn’t saying anything, what exactly were her feelings on the matter?

“Today was so tiring, Tsukki,” she rested her chin on top of his blonde head. “This family was asking me questions, but their two irritating ass kids kept climbing on the primary railings, and the mom got mad at me when I told them to knock it off! Like, do you want your kids to get chomped by a genetically engineered dinosaur, Brenda? Then, she asked for my manager, and I’m like, ‘Bitch, I will literally throw you in the damn tank! There, that’s my manager, you entitled piece of-- ughhh!!” (Y/N) buried her face in Tsukishima’s shoulder in frustration. “I hate customer service! Fuck her! Fuck them kids!”

“You said that to her?” he teased. Secretly, he was happy that she was tired today. A Tired (Y/N) meant a Sweet (Y/N), and after those creeps were leering at her in the box today, he was just glad she was somewhere he could keep an eye on her.

“Suck my dick, Kei, you know I wouldn’t actually say that. I still enjoy getting paychecks,” her words were muffled by his shoulder. ‘Sweet’ is a relative term for her.

“I’d pay good money to see you cuss someone out.”

“You would, wouldn’t you,” she replied.

Tsukishima desperately wanted to tell her how he felt. It was getting really irritating that they could do stuff like this, but he couldn’t tell those sweaty old men in the box today to keep their perverted stares off of her.

Tentatively, he turned his head towards her, lips ghosting along her jawline. His heart sped up as her fingers tightened into his dress shirt.

When his arm slid around her waist, she was like putty in his hands.

“You-- You’re kinda giving me mixed signals here, Kei,” she said breathlessly. The taller male placed his forehead against hers. His eyes stared down at her lips as he debated the long-term consequences of giving into his desires.

“I know,” he murmured. “I’m sorry.”

(Y/N) brought her hand up to cup his face. They both leaned in slowly, as if moving any faster would ruin the tension.

“Don’t be…” she whispered.

The office door slammed open with a bang.

“Sir?” (Y/N) jumped back from him like she’d been burned.

“What?” he snapped at the intruder.

“Your father wants you and Miss (L/N) in a meeting right away.”

“Tsukishima-san, I don’t see why--”

“Of course you don’t, (Y/N),” Kei’s father cut her off, “You have a personal connection with the animal. That was the one oversight I made when I brought you to the island as a trainer.”

They sat in a boardroom, surrounding a large table with Tsukishima senior at one end, (Y/N) at the other, and the board members on either side. The blazing sunlight of Isla Nublar that shone in through the large floor-to-ceiling windows on the far side of the room contrasted heavily with the dark tension permeating throughout the room. Kei tapped his fingers against the table from his spot on his father’s right side.

Of all the ‘strategic investments’ his father made, this was definitely not one Kei could have predicted.

The girl took a deep breath, “With all due respect, sir, it can’t be a good idea to reinvent a new species of mosasaur. I think--”

“See, that’s the problem, sweetheart,” the sweaty man from before chimed in. “You’re not here to think, you’re here to look pretty, and to tell the dinosaur what to do.”

“I don’t appreciate your tone, Yamada.”

“I don’t appreciate your attitude, little girl,” he shot back.

Tsukishima Senior cut in, “Try to understand, (Y/N). The Indominus Rex has been a huge hit. The numbers say that these new hybrid dinosaurs are the next big thing. We can’t pass up an astronomical amount of money just so you can keep your pet.”

“My pet?” (Y/N) spat.

“Now, (Y/N), there’s no need to get hysterical.”

“Hysterical? My reaction is perfectly reasonable considering you want to euthanize the creature I’ve raised since birth, which, may I remind you, is something you people wanted me to do.”

“Doctor Wu and the rest of the genetics team is already engineering the genetics for a new mosasaur. Bigger, more teeth--”

“But they couldn’t engineer any more brain cells for all of you?!” she interjected.

“That’s enough!” CEO Tsukishima slammed his hand on the meeting table. “You’re like a daughter to me, (Y/N), but I won’t take this level of disrespect from you.”

(Y/N) rested her hands atop the table and leaned in, meeting his glare head-on.

“If you want to do anything to Dolly, you’ll need my help, and I will not do anything that can compromise her.”

“What a mouthy little thing,” one of the shareholders muttered.

“Give her to me, I’ll shut her up,” another said loudly enough for everyone to hear.

Tsukishima took a deep, stabilizing breath from beside his father.

“I chose you because I saw something in you. I never expected you to be this selfish,” the elder snapped, “You’re being unreasonable. Kei is barely older than you, and he understands that there’s profit to be made by replacing the damn dinosaur. Tell her, Kei.”

The room went silent. (Y/N) stared deeply into her friend’s golden brown eyes.

‘Don’t do this, Kei. They want you to become your father, but you are not your father. You are so much more.’

The younger Tsukishima felt like he was being crushed by an incredible weight. Whatever he did now, it would be nearly impossible to take back. If he chose her, his father may never forgive him. The problem was: If he chose his place as his father’s heir, would he ruin his relationship with (Y/N) forever? Which one of them could he live without? He closed his eyes and took a deep breath before opening them. His steady gaze met with (Y/N)’s intense stare. He hoped he sounded more sure than he felt.

“Yes, (Y/N). My father’s right.”

(Y/N) first looked surprised, then immensely disappointed. Realizing there was no one on her side, she sighed.

“I came to this island because I thought this company might be different. When you asked me to train the mosasaurus from birth, I was overjoyed at how much you cared for her development,” she made sure to stare into the soul of each and every dirty scoundrel in the room. “But I made a mistake, too. All of you are cowards. Selfish, soulless, money-grubbing cowards.” Blazing eyes finally landed on Kei’s wide golden brown ones. She aimed her final statement at him.

“Every last one of you.”

Kei’s heart squeezed so hard he thought his chest would collapse.

“Tsukishima-san!” a mousey-looking secretary burst into the boardroom. CEO Tsukishima clicked his tongue in annoyance.

“What is it now?” he snapped.

“It’s the Indominus! She’s escaped!”

Deafening alarms and flashing red lights resounded throughout the control room. Kei could barely hear his father barking orders to the security team. One of the technicians pulled up a giant map of the park on the main screen.

“She’s still on the outer edges of the park, but she’s moving fast, sir,” they said.

“Have the Asset Containment Unit get this thing under control. Make sure they use non-lethals.”

“Non-lethals!” (Y/N) yelled, outraged.

“We have 26 million dollars invested in that asset,” the elder Tsukishima growled.

Exasperated, (Y/N) threw her hands in the air. She avoided Kei’s eyes as she

turned and sprinted out of the control room.

Kei hesitated. Before he could chase after her, his father ordered him to stay put to help in the control room. Though it made him feel like he wanted to vomit, he obeyed.

Several hours passed and Tsukishima’s mind felt like it was at its breaking point. The monitors flashing red in the dimly lit control room strained his eyes to the point where he was convinced he’d need a stronger prescription after this. The beeping of the ACU team’s EKG monitors flatlining rang in his ears so loud he wished he would just go deaf. The Indominus was picking off their security team with ease, sometimes several members at a time. The young man rubbed at his temples.

“Tsukishima, we’re evacuating the rides on the outer edges at the park,” the lead Park Operations Assistant slid a map over to him. Taking a red marker, she circled a few attractions directly in the escaped dinosaur’s projected path.

“But I think these preparations insufficient,” she said, nervously twisting

the pen in her grip.

“We’d evacuate the whole park if it were up to me,” Tsukishima said under

his breath.

The assistant pursed her lips, “It’s a shame we’ll definitely be shut down

after this. You would have made a great CEO.”

“Are you flirting with me?” the blonde joked.

“Please, you’re so whipped for (Y/N) it hurts to look at you,” the assistant snorted in reply.

Before Tsukishima could make a snarky retort, both of their attentions were drawn to CEO Tsukishima, who had a large, middle aged man at his side.

“Kei, come over here!” the older man called.

Tsukishima handed the map back over to the assistant, “This is fine for now. If the situation escalates or if it doesn’t improve in an hour or so, close all the attractions on the west side of the park. I’ll be right back.”

The assistant grabbed his arm, “Tsukishima, that’s Vic Hoskins, the head of the private security force.”

“My father introduced us not long ago. What about him?”

“Commander Hoskins isn’t just a brute, he’s an ignorant one, and that makes him dangerous. If your father is listening to him, be careful.”

Tsukishima nodded gratefully.

“I will. I’ll be right back.”

He didn’t wait for the assistant’s reply before making his way to his father’s side, who pulled him off to the side. Hoskins had apparently taken his leave.

“The helicopter will be here in 10 minutes, make sure you’re at the helipad by then,” he told his son.

The younger Tsukishima’s eyes widened.

“What? Where are we going?” he asked.

His father turned to him, “Commander Hoskins has strongly advised us to get off the island. We can do our part in containing this crisis remotely.”

The younger man blanched, “We’re just going to leave? We still have people to evacuate, not to mention medical teams to coordinate, personnel to--”

CEO Tsukishima placed a hand on his son’s shoulder, “We can do all of these things remotely. Our first priority is maintaining our safety, and besides, the situation is in good hands with our employees here. It’s as good as contained.”

The CEO smiled and turned to leave. Kei didn’t move.

“Come on, Kei,” the older man urged.

Tsukishima took a deep breath.

“If the situation is ‘as good as contained,’ then why are we leaving the island?” he asked.

His father sighed, “I understand your concern, Kei, this is a safety issue--”

“So, you agree? You do think that evacuation is the correct safety measure?” Kei looked his father directly in his familiar amber eyes.

The elder shifted, “What are you implying, Kei?”

“I’m saying as long as we choose not to actively evacuate the island, we have a responsibility to our employees and to our guests to stay and control the situation the best we can.”

The flatlining EKG monitors were still ringing in his ears. If he left the island now, he’d never stop hearing the beeping of those monitors. They’d exist in his nightmares forever.

“Stay here, then, Kei,” his father’s voice broke him out of his thoughts.

He raised a brow, “Just me?”

“There’s no point to being in power if you refuse to reap the benefits of it. The helicopter is leaving soon. Join me, Kei. Don’t try to play hero when you’re not.”

(Y/N)’s face flashed in his mind. He couldn’t be sure where she ran off to after she left, but if he had to guess, it would have been to the main hall or to the infirmary to care for guests. Either way, she’d never dream of leaving the island with so much at stake. Neither could he, and the thought of leaving her behind made his answer clear.

“No, I’m not going. Have a safe flight.” He turned on his heel and marched back to the central console. To his horror, Asset Containment Unit Alpha had been almost entirely wiped out. Only 4 members of a 12-person team remained.

“They’re not gonna make it, Tsukishima, we need to tell them to pull back,” the P.O. Assistant insisted.

He nodded, “Do it.”

The woman quickly gave the order. “Has your father finally--”

“My father is vacating the island with the board members and other investors as we speak,” Tsukishima said.

“Why am I not--” the assistant’s phone went off. “Hello? ...You what?”

“What happened?”

She snapped her phone shut, “It’s--it’s Takeru, my nephew. He was visiting the park today, but my assistant says he got separated from her, and-- and--”

“Hey,” he grabbed her shoulders. “Don’t freak out. It’s not like you, and it won’t help.”

“You’re right,” she said shakily, brushing a lock of hair from her eyes. “I know I have work to do here, but I have to go find him, Tsukishima. I can’t--”

“I get it. Just go.”

The assistant nodded gratefully, sprinting out of the board room. As she

left, yet another assistant came for his attention and he was plunged back into the thick of things.

Meanwhile, (Y/N) stood at the doors of the underground lab. Her eyes were wild and her face flushed from exertion. The pristine, white lab was a stark contrast to the sweaty, panicked mob she passed by on her way here. It was as if the panic of the Indominus’s escape had no effect, save for the swarm of people in lab coats quickly packing up their equipment into thick armored suitcases. With the move in full swing, the lab doors were set wide open. In the chaos, she managed to slip into one of the adjoining storage rooms, where she found a large computer monitor. The bright blue screen was blinding in the dimly lit room. A profile displayed on the screen read “Indominus Rex.”

The young woman scrolled down the profile. She had to find out what the dinosaur was made of. The ACU would never survive without that information. They may not even survive with it. Finally, under the section titled “Genetic Makeup”, she found what she’s looking for. Before she could react to her findings, there was a sharp pain in the skill and she dropped to the ground unconscious.

Back in the control room, Kei gripped his cell phone tightly. Eighteen missed calls and (Y/N) still wouldn’t pick up. He couldn’t fight it anymore. He had a tech trace her cellphone and he hastily exited the room.

Once he left the building, Kei was greeted with what he expected hell looked like. There was a swarm of panicked park guests, sweaty and fearful. Several were injured from the sudden panic. Some had a haunted look in their eye that suggested they’d seen something that would haunt their nightmares for years to come. And where was his father? Safe on a helicopter, leaving all these people to fend for themselves simply because he could.

Kei was disgusted with himself. The Indominus had escaped hours ago. All this chaos could have been avoided by simply evacuating the park. But who cared about people’s lives when there was still profit to be made? Sure, he hadn’t actively supported his father’s selfishness, but he definitely didn’t object to it either. In all his indecision, ultimately, he was siding with his father. He was equally to blame for all this.

As Kei entered the underground tunnels, the screaming and cries of the panicked went silent. He realized he could hide away in the tunnels until the situation had blown over. Instead, Kei chose to press forward, knowing it wasn’t fair that he had that luxury.

The Mosasaur Stadium sat in the middle of the underground tunnels. From his view from the glass, Dolly, like her trainer, was nowhere to be found.

By the time Kei made it to the lab, it had been picked clean of equipment and personnel. All that remained were sterilized lab benches and pristine white walls. He found (Y/N) on the floor of an empty storage room. There was a nasty gash in the back of her head.

Kei kneeled and gently put two fingers to her pulse.

“Wake up!” he snapped at her. To his relief, her eyelids fluttered open. “Thank god. What the hell were you doing down here?”

“Ouch, my head,” she moaned. “I thought… the ACU… If they knew what the Indominus was made of…”

Kei nodded in understanding. He removed his tie to apply pressure to her wound.

“And? What is it?”

(Y/N) shook her head.

“I dunno. I think they hit me right as I saw.”

(Y/N) sat up, slowly regaining her strength.

“How much of the park has been evacuated?” she asked.

Kei checked his messages, “Almost everyone has been moved to secure locations or off the island completely.”

“What’s left?”

“The control room.”

She looked at him meaningfully and he nodded in agreement. Quickly dialing a number, he raised the phone to his ear.

“Evacuate the control room,” he said.

“Sir, are you sure?” the voice on the other end replied.

“Positive. I’ll take care of everything when I get there,” Kei reassured.

“...take care, sir,” the voice said reluctantly.

“You too.” Tsukishima ended the call and looked at (Y/N), who was already standing. She steadied herself against a wall, her balance wavered slightly, but her eyes were resolute.

“Let’s see what we can do.”

The underground tunnels were expansive. As the mosasaur trainer stalked down the hall ahead of him, Kei forced himself to speak up.

“I couldn’t, you know,” Tsukishima said.

“If you have to talk to me, say shit that makes sense,” (Y/N) snapped.

“My father. He wanted me to evacuate with him, but--”

“What? You could’ve gotten out of here! Do you have any idea how hard shit’s hit the fan?”

“I needed to know you were okay.”

(Y/N)’s expression softened for just a moment, then she ripped her gaze from his face. She retorted, “Why? You don’t seem to have a problem with hanging me out to dry.”

“(Y/N), I was--”

“Would you have left if not for me?” she demanded, stopping and facing him with her arms crossed.

It took Kei a minute to find an honest answer.

“No. I wouldn’t have. I’m rich, I’m an asshole, but I wouldn’t have left all these people. Not when I have the kind of clearance to help them, and especially not since all this is my fault.”

(Y/N) looked at him, bewildered.

“Your fault? How on Earth is this your fault?”

Kei shrugged, “I knew evacuation was the only safe bet, but I was too much of a coward to tell my father so. At least my father is blinded by money. Me, I don’t have an excuse.”

(Y/N) walked on silently for a while, opening her mouth a few times to speak, but shutting it each time. Eventually, she gave into the silence.

They came to the underground stadium, where the massive fiberglass panes housed the park’s biggest attraction.

(Y/N) placed her hand on the glass.

“Dolly… You okay, girl?”

Something enormous splashed into the water. When the bubbles cleared, there was Dolly, swimming around the bitten carcass of a pterosaur, as if she was celebrating her catch. The reptile’s handler smiled weakly.

“Good girl.”

“(Y/N).”

Tsukishima took her by the shoulders and spun her around to face him. His tired eyes met hers. The blonde watched as the only person who really mattered to him glared back with a look of sadness, frustration, and betrayal.

“You would have supported them?” she asked sharply.”

“Look, I’ve been trained to follow orders my whole life--”

“And I’m sorry for that. But you can unlearn what you’ve been taught, Kei. You know how much I love Dolly! You knew, and-- and,” she gripped his shirt. The trainer hung her head in defeat.

“I thought you weren’t like your father.”

“I’m not, I promise. I’m sorry,” he whispered. This was it. He had to tell her. If he didn’t do it now, he never would.

“(Y/N), I lo--”

“No!”

Kei looked stunned, “No?”

“No! Dammit, Kei, I can’t do this with you right now. First, this is not the time. Second, you stabbed me in the back, like, two hours ago!

“I said I was sorry!”

“I get that, Kei, but for important shit like this, sorry just isn’t good enough, okay? Now, let’s get to the control room and get this dinosaur under wraps, then maybe we can have this conversation.”

Tsukishima pursed his lips, “Okay. Okay, I’m sorry for bringing it up.”

(Y/N) kept walking down the corridor, “Don’t be. Let’s just deal with the situation at hand.” The trainer produced a flip phone from her pocket. The person she was calling picked up on the third ring and she put the call on speaker.

“(Y/N)!” the familiar voice called in relief.

“Yama! You’re still doing okay?” she asked. The line went quiet for a while,

“Yams?” Another pause before the intern responded, “Yeah, I’m fine.”

She and Tsukishima looked at each other, “Yama, what happened? Are you hurt?”

“No, I’m not hurt, I just… Oh god, (Y/N), it’s Hinata,” Yamaguchi’s voice

cracked at the end.

(Y/N)’s breath caught in her throat, “What happened to Hinata?”

On the other end, she could hear Yamaguchi choking back a sob.

“He went to the aviary to check for survivors and I saw his vitals monitor. He’s flatlined, (Y/N), he’s dead.”

Tsukishima closed his eyes. The whole situation was snowballing so damn fast and there was so little anyone could do about it.

“No…” (Y/N) whispered, “Jesus, I’m sorry, Yama.”

“Me too,” he replied. Yamaguchi sniffled, then his voice stabilized, “Anyway, keep making your way to the control room. I’ll get into the database somehow and we’ll figure out how to stop this thing.”

“Got it. Please be-- ...careful,” she said softly.

“(Y/N)?”

She clutched her head, “It’s coming back to me now… Yamaguchi! The Indominus! I saw it on the database, could it be part raptor?”

On the other side, Yamagichi gasped, “They never let me see the file, but now that I think about it, it’s highly likely! I’ll contact Iwaizumi and see if there’s anything he can help with! Let me know if anything changes!”

“I will. Please be careful,” she begged.

“I will, and you, too, (Y/N). Tell Tsukki I love him.”

“I love you, too, Yamaguchi,” Kei replied. With that, the call clicked off.

(Y/N) inhaled deeply, “Hinata’s dead.”

“I heard.”

She shook her head, “Let’s just keep moving. I--”

Her eyes fixed on the tank where Dolly had just leapt out of the water for prey again. Bubbles flooded their view as the massive dinosaur crashed back down into her tank. (Y/N)’s mouth dropped open.

“Holy shit.”

“What is it?”

(Y/N) started sprinting down the corridor towards the control room, “I have an idea!”

‘You better know what you’re doing, (Y/N),’ Tsukishima thought. He paced the floor of the control room nervously as he waited for the signal.

Their plan was well underway, and it had gone surprisingly well, which was all the more reason for him to feel like something was going to go horribly wrong.

When (Y/N) originally told him what the plan was, his response was, “Fuck no,” but after Yamaguchi and Iwaizumi both agreed that it was their best bet, Kei relented, though not without voicing his displeasure extensively.

That girl was really lucky he L-worded her. Through the security monitors, he could see the T-Rex and the Raptors were tag-teaming the Indominus. They seemed to be making progress, but the whole group looked like they were losing steam.

The radio beside him crackled to life, making him jump.

“Kei? Can you hear me?” (Y/N)’s voice came through the machine.

“Loud and clear.”

“Okay, on my signal, cut the power to Security Fence 4.”

The button was red, marked with bold black letters, and had a plexiglass case over it. Kei pressed the “disable” button, making the screen read, ‘UNAUTHORIZED COMMAND: Please enter credentials.’ He typed, ‘Tsukishima Kei,’ placing his hand on the biometric scanner when prompted.

‘MANUAL OVERRIDE: Accepted

All the previously red buttons turned green.

“Okay. Ready when you are.”

“Good. Now, listen to me, Kei,” she said grimly, “You have to cut the power the moment I tell you to. The system has a backup generator that will kick in within 30 seconds. If it's electrified when we hit it, the jeep will explode and our whole plan is shot. That fence can NOT, I repeat, CAN NOT be electrified when I get there, do you understand?”

The male nodded weakly, then, realizing she couldn’t see him, said his affirmation aloud. The radio went quiet. On the screens, the Indominus dug it’s rows of razor sharp teeth into the T-Rex’s neck, throwing the creature as far as it would go. The T-Rex lay there and did not move.

The Indominus Rex roared in victory and went in for the kill. There was a bright flash of red further away as someone offscreen lit a flare. The light became brighter as the person neared (Y/N) and they tossed it into the jeep, catching the Indominus’s attention.

Turning away from it’s prize, the hybrid screeched in rage and took off towards the light. (Y/N) hopped out of the driver’s seat, placing something on the gas pedal and diving away from the vehicle.

‘It might be better if I stay in the jeep and drive it myself,’ he remembered her saying back in the control room.

‘Better for you dying. If the impact with the fence doesn’t kill you, you’ll either drown or Dolly will eat you,’ he’d snapped.

‘But what if--’

He cut her off, ‘But nothing. Put a brick on the gas and move out of the way. There’s no reason to put you in any further danger.’

Amazingly, Kei was the one who won that debate and that’s what brought them to the present moment, with (Y/N) scrambling up off the floor and sprinting out of the Indominus’s path.

The hybrid dinosaur sprinted after the jeep that was speeding towards the mosasaur tank. The distance between the two was closing at an alarming rate.

Just before the vehicle made contact with the security fence, the radio crackled to life, “Now, Kei!”

Tsukishima slammed the button.

‘SECURITY FENCE 4: Disabled’

Just before it made contact with the fence, the jeep’s metal frame crunched under the Indominus’s powerful jaws.

“Fuck!” Kei yelled at the sight. A few seconds later, the buttons turned back to red and the screen read, ‘SECURITY FENCE 4: Enabled.’

“Well, what now?” he yelled into the radio.

“Uh, I don’t--! Fuck-- I don’t know, I’m out of ideas!” she cried in response.

Having been given a break, one of the raptors jumped in, ready to finish the fight. The creature leapt into action to subdue the murderous hybrid, but with that size difference, she wouldn’t last long.

On the verge of panic, (Y/N) said, “If the jeep broke through the fence, Dolly would have noticed the prey, but the Indominus by itself hasn’t gotten her attention! She must be too deep!”

“Well, then, get her attention!” he shot back.

(Y/N) gasped, yanking her whistle out from inside her windbreaker, “Hold me up to the main PA.”

He reached over and jabbed the button.

(Y/N) looked up when she heard his voice over the speakers spread throughout the park, “Whenever you’re ready.”

As Kei keld the radio up to the PA, (Y/N) put her whistle to her lips and blew as hard as she could, the sound undetectable by human ears. They waited with baited breath as the Indominus flung the raptor aside, where the smaller reptile did not get up. The Indominus stopped and let out another bloodcurdling roar.

When nothing more happened, all Kei could think was, ‘We failed.’

Just then, quicker than Kei could comprehend, an incredible volume of water overtook his field of view. Water droplets obscured the CCTV cameras giving him a view of the action, and when they cleared, it took him a moment to register the massive aquatic dinosaur protruding halfway out of its paddock. It held the silver, spiny-backed hybrid in its ginormous maw of thousands of teeth. Crushed by a predator honed by millions of years of evolution, the Indominus writhed in pain and panic, but its struggle only opened more wounds in its flank. It screeched in pain or terror or frustration, Kei wasn’t sure. The only thing that mattered was the slick sound of Dolly sliding backwards into her enclosure, taking her prey with her. All that was left was dark purple blood, soaked pavement, a broken fence still sparking, and a crushed jeep.

“Holy shit,” Tsukishima whispered.

“Holy shit,” (Y/N) murmured in agreement before her knees gave out and she fell to the floor unconscious.

With the Indominus gone and the pterosaurs having been hunted down by the military, park guests were being reunited with their friends and family. Rescue teams were sent to canvas the park for survivors, though they were advised not to get too close to the mosasaur tank. Tsukishima shuddered, knowing that the mosasaurus was always fully capable of leaping halfway out of its tank, she simply chose not to, perhaps out of respect for (Y/N). If, by some miracle, the park survived, he’d have to enforce some serious regulations.

“Tsukishima-san?” one of the surviving guards came to collect him. Conveniently, Kei’s general demeanor kept him from flinching at being addressed the way he heard everyone address his father. The guard led him to a private section of the infirmary, where he saw (Y/N) sitting on a cot looking like she’d spent the last 10 hours in a ditch, though her injuries otherwise looked far from anything life threatening.

“Oh, relax, I’m fine,” she said when she saw the look on his face. “I just got myself all scratched up jumping out of the jeep. I’m not even that hurt.”

Kei scooped her up in his arms in relief.

“Okay, owie, owie, I’m not completely unharmed, stop, stop, stop,” she whined.

The tall male pulled back and stared down at her. The left side of her face has several cuts and she held an ice pack to her ribs on the same side. She had heavy bags under her eyes, but those same eyes shone with relief and delight now that the whole ordeal was over.

“I’d ask if you had brain damage, but you must’ve already had some to come up with such a reckless plan,” he scolded.

(Y/N) gaped at him, “Reckless? It worked! Don’t be mean, Kei, I did good today.”

“You would have done great today if you hadn’t come back to me injured.”

“Again, it worked, didn’t it?”

“I suppose,” he rolled his eyes. “But it would really do wonders for my blood pressure if the person I care about most didn’t have such self-destructive tendencies.”

She grinned at his choice of words, “What was that you called me just now?”

“Self-destructive.” Chuckling, he took her hand in his, pressing a gentle kiss to the back of it. “Are we gonna be okay?” he asked, not making eye contact with her.

Content, the girl smiled and nestled against her pillows. Her eyes slowly drifted shut.

“We’re gonna be just fine, Kei,” she replied. For a moment he thought she didn’t quite understand what he meant until she squeezed his hand gently. Tsukishima smiled in relief, squeezing her hand back.

“Kei?”

“Hmm?”

“I feel the same way.”

@delicious-peaches-blog

@unusproomnibusomnesprouno

@mac-the-oregonian

#tsukishima x reader #tsukishima kei #haikyuu imagines #haikyuu scenarios #haikyuu x reader #haikyuu x you

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murasaki-murasame · 4 years ago

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Thoughts on Higurashi Gou Ep22

All of this ‘the culprit’s motives are super shallow and they’re just unhealthily obsessive’ discourse is giving me war flashbacks to . . . . basically every other part of the entire When They Cry franchise, lol.

Thoughts under the cut. [Plus spoilers for Umineko]

I feel like at the end of the day we’re all just gonna have to agree to disagree about how we feel about how Ryukishi is handling Satoko as the culprit here, since I don’t really think any amount of social media posts detailing our interpretations of her character are gonna change anyone’s minds, lol. But I’m still gonna give my thoughts on her anyway because it’s fun, even if I’m basically just preaching to the choir.

To be honest, this feels pretty much in line with how Ryukishi already wrote characters like Takano and Beatrice, in terms of them having unhealthy obsessions that lead them to mass-murder. The amount of violence Satoko has caused is arguably worse than either of them, but they’re all pretty awful if you think about the reality of what they all did as villains.

Sorta like with how a lot of the old-school Umineko discourse went, I think people are too focused on the whole idea of Satoko hating studying, and ignoring everything else about her character and her circumstances. Although even then I feel like people are being kinda unfair toward Satoko about how strongly she feels about academics, but maybe I’m just biased because of my own history with schooling and the intense levels of anxiety and self-hatred that can go along with it.

Plus the fact that Satoko already has a long history of sever abandonment issues, and has basically always had HS that amplified her feelings of paranoia and persecution. It’s pretty obvious at this point that she never really got ‘cured’ in the first place, though it’s less important to think about HS as an in-universe fictional disease with it’s own rules, and more important to just think about it as a representation of real-life mental illnesses which aren’t bound by the rules of made-up brain-worm parasites and aliens or whatever.

Also, the Satoko that started all this looping in the first place was one who never dealt with Teppei returning to the village, and thus never went through her whole character arc related to that. The series is kinda ambiguous about how it handles the idea of people’s character development carrying over between loops, but it explains a lot about Satoko’s attitude here if you go with the idea that she never really had to overcome any of her trauma or coping mechanisms in the “good ending timeline”, and this is the consequence of that taken to it’s logical extreme. The idea of her view of the world being skewed by the fact that she only remembers the “good ending timeline” is also kinda lamp-shaded by the part where she hears about Rika’s looping and is like “oh yeah, that’s the month where we had that cool action movie stand-off with the Mountain Dogs :)”. By the time she really got to understand exactly what was going on beyond the specific timeline she had experienced, she was already way over the edge.

I get why people don’t like the idea of Gou ‘tainting’ the VN’s happy ending, but I honestly like the idea that it’s examining the consequences of how Matsuribayashi was such an overly-specific timeline where basically nothing bad happened and everyone just banded together to beat Takano. It kinda glossed over a lot of the personal problems that the main cast had in the rest of the series, and this really goes to show the effects of some of that stuff not getting properly addressed. It also reminds me that Minagoroshi is a timeline that even in the VN, Rika completely lost her memories of, so I can see how even post-Matsuribayashi she might have never let Satoko know about the details of that one timeline where she overcome her abuse.

I also feel like it only really got to this point because of Featherine’s meddling. In the original Matsuribayashi timeline, Satoko just started drifting away from Rika and ended up wandering into the Saiguden and meeting Featherine before anything actually serious happened in that timeline. I think that if she had just been left to her own devices and that timeline had just kept going, Satoko probably would have either found a way to reconnect with Rika, or they would have just slowly drifted apart for good. But then Satoko got given the power to time travel, and only started going off the deep end after going through another five years of identical suffering.

And on that whole note, it reminds me of how in Umineko, Lambda had a whole conversation about the idea of an abused person becoming an abuser themself if they’re given the power to lash out. Which is basically what’s happening here. Satoko is being given the tools to completely detach herself from reality and try as many times as she likes to get what she wants.

Which also reminds me that this episode in particular REALLY lays the Umineko parallels on thick, lol. Particularly the whole ‘Satoko is turning into Lambda’ thing, which feels just about 100% confirmed now. They straight up have Featherine bring up the exact same ‘monkeys using a typewriter’ analogy to explain Rika’s situation that Lambda uses in Umineko to explain Bern’s situation.

I know a lot of people don’t like the increasingly blatant Umineko tie-ins, and that a lot of people still think it might just be misdirection, but considering how much stuff in Gou has been surprisingly straightforward and predictable, I think it’s pretty much exactly what it seems to be.

Though to be more specific, this is probably more about the start of Lambda and Bern’s relationship, and their appearances in Umineko, rather than the very first origins of them as individuals, if that makes sense. Obviously the concept of Bernkastel as an identity has been around since Higurashi itself, and we’ve known for a long time that Lambda was the one who originally gave Takano her blessing of certainty, but we’ve never known the full details of how those two started their relationship, and Featherine’s whole series of name-drops in the last episode makes it seem like Lambda as a meta individual more or less already exists, with Satoko being an iteration of her. So I think they both technically already exist, but this is how the two of them come into contact and start their whole unhealthily obsessive relationship.

I guess it’s still possible that, even if she’s already existed for a long time as a meta individual, she hasn’t actually come up with the name ‘Lambdadelta’ for herself yet, and this might be where she does so. Even with the list of names Featherine referenced, she didn’t technically bring up Lambda’s name directly. So in that sense this might be ‘Lambda’s’ origin story, even if she already exists.

Considering how basically the entire story at this point seems to be acting in service of setting up the whole LambdaBern relationship dynamic no matter what, I’m becoming increasingly convinced that this will end with Satoko and Rika fully embracing their codependency and mutually ascending to the meta plane so they can stay together once and for all. There might still be human versions of them that stay behind in the real world and continue living normal lives, though.

At the very least, it feels like that’s the logical outcome of the whole Chekov’s Sword Fragment plot device that’s been hanging in the background for ages now. I think it’ll just be the in-universe explanation they use to show the mechanics of how exactly that process works. It’ll probably be used to ‘sever’ Satoko and Rika’s meta consciousnesses from their physical bodies and allow them to basically become witches.

Mainly I just can’t really see this having a ‘happy ending’ at this point, aside from the whole idea that maybe the severing process leaves behind ‘normal’ versions of the two of them who stay in Hinamizawa and go back to their normal lives. I dunno if that’d make people happy, but it’d at least be a way for Ryukishi to have his cake and eat it too, lol.

I just don’t think that there’s any real chance of this ending with them just talking to each other and agreeing to put an end to all this, though. For one thing that’d just feel kinda anticlimactic and honestly make Gou’s story feel even MORE pointless, if it just ends with literally the exact same ending as the VN with nothing really being changed. But I also feel like Featherine wouldn’t be willing to just let Satoko ‘give up’ without having one of them definitively win their current game. In general I just feel like Ryukishi should just commit to the story he’s setting up at this point, instead of just backing out at the last minute and circling everything back to the same ending we already had like nothing in Gou ever happened. If we’re gonna have this whole new story to begin with, it should at least have some lasting consequences.

Anyway, I think in the next episode we’re finally going to loop back to the Damashi arcs and see how they played out. At this point I don’t care too much about getting answers to the ground-level mysteries of those arcs, and I doubt the story will spend much time on that, but I’m curious to see how it progresses Satoko’s whole development through these loops, since I think she goes through some changes with her motives and methods over the course of them.

Specifically I think that the actual experience of being physically present in her own set of loops and causing so much pain and suffering started to get to her, and she might have almost given up in her own way during Tataridamashi and wanted to just stay in that arc, but things went south anyway. Maybe, if that’s what happened, Featherine basically let her know that she won’t let her give up, and will force her to keep looping until one of them ‘wins’ no matter what. Either way, I think that arc was a turning point for her. Like how she asked Featherine to arrange things so that Satoko can make sure that she and Rika’s loops are synced up, she probably asked Featherine after that arc to change the rules again so that Rika will start remembering the details of her deaths. At this point it’s pretty obvious that the Hanyuu fragment Rika was talking to earlier in Gou was more or less just Featherine putting on an act and manipulating her, so the scene of Hanyuu giving her the power to remember her deaths was probably just Featherine telling her about the rule change.

And going by how the Nekodamashi arc went immediately afterward, I think that rule change was related to Satoko becoming increasingly desperate to put an end to the loops as soon as possible. And considering how she was willing to spend so much time reviewing Rika’s hundred years of looping just to prepare for this, it’d make sense to me if she becomes desperate because she basically gives up, but realizes that she isn’t actually allowed to give up, so she has to try and make Rika give in as fast as possible. Either way it’s pretty obvious that Satoko’s methods start becoming more violent in that arc, and she basically tries to brute-force Rika into submission, leading up to the loop where she just spawn-camps her and straight up starts screaming at her to just stay in the village while tearing out her guts. It’s still possible that her attitude in that loop was just one big act, but I think that was the result of her being genuinely desperate to just have Rika give up once and for all, and her starting to crack under the pressure of doing all of these things with her own hands across so many loops.

So now we’ll just have to see how the confrontation between them at the end of Nekodamashi plays out once we get back to it. In the long run I just think it’ll lead to the ending I talked about before, with them using the sword on each other. The exact nuances of how that sorta ending might play out are up in the air, though.

Either way, I think there’s probably enough time to wrap up all that in two more episodes, but there’s still reason to believe that there might be some kind of sequel in the works. I don’t really want to bet on it, though, so I’m just gonna assume that there’s two episodes left and base my theories on that. In which case I think the next episode will go over the Damashi arcs and end with Rika and Satoko’s confrontation at the end of Nekodamashi, and then the final episode will wrap everything up. Considering that they both more or less know exactly what’s going on with each other by that point, there isn’t really that much that needs to be wrapped up. I think that will be the final loop we get, so it’ll all just come down to how their confrontation plays out, and what decision they come to about how to handle each other.

I honestly don’t really know how I think a full sequel would go, if it’s at least one cour long. Assuming that it’s not just a new Umineko anime that more or less continues Rika and Satoko’s arc via Lambda and Bern, but is a straight up ‘Higurashi Gou Season 2′. It just feels like there isn’t really that much that needs to be done to wrap things up, now that everything’s being laid out in the open, and Rika and Satoko are both aware of each other’s looping. They might switch it up so that they both end up teaming up to take down Featherine, but I kinda doubt that’ll happen.

I’m still hoping this is leading into some kind of new Umineko anime though, lol. That feels like it’d be the main reason for putting so much effort into this whole elaborate LambdaBern origin story we’re getting here.

I’ve heard rumors that there’s been listings for a 25th episode of Gou, so it’s possible that rather than another full season, there’s just one extra episode at the end. I’m not exactly sure what the point of doing one extra unannounced episode at the end would be, though. It might end up being a bridge between Gou and a new Umineko anime.

At the very least, if it’s just ‘Satokowashi Part 8′, it makes me wonder why they haven’t announced it yet, and why they didn’t just split that arc into two BD volumes with four episodes each, instead of having it be one big volume with seven episodes, and one random episode at the end for some reason. But if it’s more of an epilogue or a bridge of sorts between Gou and something else, with Gou’s story concluding with episode 24, then I guess it’d make some sense to do it that way.

We also know there’s gonna be a panel for Gou at a convention around when ep24 comes out, so if anything gets announced it’ll probably happen there.

Anyway, this whole episode can be summed up as “Satoko does a gay little psychological torture that pisses Rika off”, in the most morbidly entertaining way possible, lmao.

#murasaki reblogs #higurashi #higurashi gou

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artificial-ascension · 4 years ago

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I see stuff for "what would the Wammys kids be like as parents" but never "what would the Wammys kids parents be like" so here.

Wammys Kids Parents HCs

Mello

Mello's parents were in an arranged marriage because of the mafia families they were in

They actually really liked each other so they didn't mind the arranged marriage

They were actually in an arranged marriage because they were the oldest kids of two of the most powerful mafias in Russia and the leaders of those mobs wanted to join forces and did that by marrying their kids to each other

Mello's uncle didn't like how things were being run and broke the mafia in two and went to war with his brother (Mello's dad)

When Mello's parents realized they were going to have a kid they moved to England and put his aunt (on his Mother's side) in charge

Mello's parents kept him a secret to keep him safe

Mello has his dad's eyes and hair and his mother's complexion

He had both of their intelligence

Both of them were really smart and hella chaotic just like Mello

They cared for him as much as they could without look suspicious to their neighbors

When Mello was 4 they got found out by their rival mafia and were killed

Mello wondered off and ended up at Wammys house afterward

Mello's status as the heir to a massive mafia empire was how he rose to power in LA

Matt

Matt's mom got pregnant when she was 17

Her boyfriend left when he found out she was pregnant

She gave Matt away to her boyfriend's cousin because she didn't have the time or money to care for him because of college

Matt's named after his dad

His dad's cousin was super rich and had his own wife and tree bratty kids who didn't like Matt at all

The kids hated him so much they convinced their dad to get rid of Matt and they abandoned him in Winchester because he had family there

Matt's dad's cousin only took him in to look better than his ass of a cousin

Matt is the spitting image of his mother but has his dad's hair color

Matt's parents are still alive so technically he isn't an orphan

He has abandonment issues and separation anxiety from getting trown out so much though

His mom actually married and had some kids once she graduated and had a good job

She lowkey feels guilty for giving Matt away sometimes

Matt's dad is a hippy who lives in the back of his van and plays video games while coding for money

Matt probably has a fuck ton of half siblings from his dad being a man whore but it's not like he'll ever meet them

A's dad was an English sailor and his mom was a Spanish lighthouse keeper

They met in Spain and fell in love and went back to England to get married

His mom worked as a lighthouse keeper in Cornwall while his dad worked as a sailor

They had tree kids, A's older brother, A and A's little sister

A and his siblings spent most of their time with their mom but their dad spent all his time off from work with them

A's dad was very thinly built and honestly he looked like the basic anxious sad boy A with brown messy hair and freckles

Of course he was a sailor so he was actually pretty strong and hella brave

A's mom had dark skin, black curly hair and brown eyes with a much sturdier build

She was really sweet but was lowkey terrifying if you got on her bad side

A would be a perfect mix of both of them if he wasn't albino, but really aside from his lack of pigmentation he has a good mix of their facial features

A's dad taught A and his brother how to sail and took them on short sailing trips with him

He was going to take A's little sister when she was old enough but he died before he could

A's dad died at sea and only died because he stayed on the ship to make sure his whole crew got off when the ship sunk

A's mom taught him how to garden, fish, cook, camp, hunt and really live off the land in general

She died falling from her lighthouse in a bad storm

The fact that both A's parents died trying to help people inspired him to try and save people too

Which led to him trying to take up the position of L so he could solve cases and help people, which ultimately also led to his death

His brother became a Royal Navey admiral and his sister became a marine biologist later in life with A and their parents as their driving factors so at least that's nice

Beyond Birthday

B's parents were in a shinigami cult and technically B's dad is the shinigami Armona Justin Beyondormason but B never found out until his shinigami dad yoinked him out of Mu to tell him he's part shinigami and he forgot to tell him while he was alive (he didn't forget he just kept putting off until B fucking died) so we will discuss his leagal male guardian who died

B's parents owned a huge farm in Japan and taught B how to take care of animals and how to garden

A's mom had a personal garden of herbs and fruits and she used to teach B how to use herbal medicine and how to properly spice foods and most importantly how to make jam

B and his parents looked similar when he was little but he stopped looking like them when he got older

They all had slim builds, dark hair and pale skin and the only thing different was the eyes

B had shinigami eyes obviously and because he was part shinigami you could actually tell he had they eyes by looking at them

B could also turn them off (but he only acquired that skill later in life) and when he did his actual eye color was a dark brownish red

His eyes were also really wide like but not L wide just a bit less wide but still kinda weird

B's dad knew he wasn't B's real dad but he still tookcare of him and taught him things

B was homeschooled because 1. They wanted to indoctrinate him into their shinigami cult when he was young and 2. They didn't want the other kids or teachers commenting on his eyes

His dad was kinda boring and there wasn't anything cool about him, he was super average but he was good at farming and business I guess. Anyway if he had actually been B's dad I feel like B would also be really boring but more like the kind of boring of an abandoned building in the woods but there's nothing there and nothing cool or spooky happens

B's mom was way cooler, she taught B a bunch of old Japanese folk tales and legends and other cultural stuff. She also gave him plenty of history lessons about Japan and the surrounding area, really B just got educated on the entire history or Japan and it's culture and it fed his deep love and obsession with anime and manga when he was older

His mom's grandmother actually dressed up like a man Mulan style to fight in WW2 so he comes from a family of Japanese patriots so what would you expect

His mom taught him to defend himself too and she probably should have taught her husband because he died in a mugging

B's mom died in a freak train accident and B almost died but his shinigami ancestry have him a super human healing speed and endurance so he survived just barely

L's mom was a prostitute who got pregnant by one of her customers

She died of tuberculosis when L was six months old

She looked a lot like L with wild black hair, pale skin, no meat on her bones and wide, grey, eyes

L's dad was just some rich guy cheating on his wife and L looked nothing like him

L's mom lived with her brother above his bakery and L continued to love there until he was 6 and his uncle tried to kill him after getting drunk

Near

Near got put on the staircase of Wammys house in a basket when he was little so no one knew his parents

Near's parents were really weird hermits that owned a toy store and yes all their stuff was definitely cursed

They were both very quiet but they were actually pretty nice they just acted very strange

The both of them were black and Near dose have their body types and facial features and just like A, he looks a lot like both of them he just lacks pigmentation because he's albino

Unlike A he does have his parents grey eyes because Near doesn't have ocular albinism

They decided to leave Near on the door step of Wammys House because...?

They just did

For some reason they decided on an orphanage way away, it was probably some weird choice they made because I don't the the fog told them but hey they inadvertently caused the death of a mass murderer 18 years later

Near's parents are still alive and living in their little store and Near actually tracks them down after a bit and hangs out with them and buys their toys

Near's parents also have two more kids and Near likes to hang out with them and help you younger siblings in their classes

#beyond birthday #nate river #dn #mello #death note #a dn #a death note #mihael keehl #matt #l lawliet #mail jeevas

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amaryllisblackthorn · 3 years ago

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theory/thoughts on maligula’s identity based on everything revealed so far (psychonauts 2 spoilers!!)

similarly to my other post, this basically involves an indepth look on things revealed in the peaks we’ve gotten into the game so spoilers especially if you don’t want to know what what may happen in the story beforehand based on close inspection of trailers and other stuff (including like, spotting concept art in the background of a video and such)

so based off of everything revealed about the game so far

lucrecia is almost definitely maligula. the only thing that’s an obstacle is the concept design of current lucrecia as a small old lady, but rn there’s so much indicating lucrecia’s maligula. there’s the imdb voice credit, there’s the fact that it’s the “psychic six” and not the psychic seven -- that lucrecia is the only one from the stumps at camp to be excluded from the stone tablet mural in hq while still having a depiction in the game on a stamp in ford’s mailroom mind level connected with the others which means she’s still relevant -- !!!

basically: she’s excluded, and also relevant in the game, which means there’s a significance to her being excluded.

maligula is also described in the recent Psychonauts 2 Developer Showcase as being one of the first enemies the Psychic Six fought. that certainly fits a former member-turned enemy, along with everything else.

maligula is absolutely related to the galochios, which means lucrecia mux is related to the galachios.

my current tentative theory is that lucrecia/maligula is zalto galachio’s wife who lost herself to grief after her daughter died and. became murderous i guess.

theoretically she could also have been a galachio who married out? but that’s why i said tentative theory.

the recent developer showcase stating that raz’s family history and the founding of the psychonauts being close/connected and the showing of the confrontation scene of maligula, helmut, and who i’ve been tentatively thinking is ford but could be someone else (like potentially lazarus or even some random dude) being shown when tim schafer talks about how ‘the aquatos have been cursed by a mysterious figure to all die in water’ seems to further support this. in fact, it seems to suggest that maligula and not zalto was the one to curse the aquatos -- which honestly kind of reminds me of how they changed the second head of psychonauts from being Herndon to Hollis.

technically there could be another reason for the galachios to hate the aquatos and kill raz’s grandfather other than the death of augustus’ mother since the backstory from the lipo document isn’t technically canon and is liable to changes (like ford’s backstory + involvement with the psychonauts for instance) but i really hope they keep that because i really like the whole twisted aspect of the galachios (whether it be maligula, zalto, both) tormenting the descendents of their daughter out of projected blame and hate when it’s also their family too like. i really dig that so i hope that stays the same.

maligula/lucrecia is also probably the reason helmut’s brain is separated from his body//that his location is ‘at the bottom of a frozen lake’ in grulovia -- where the aquatos were cursed to die in water -- on the letters in the mailroom level.

i’m sure there’s more to it and that im missing stuff but this is my tentative theory for now -- and i’m sure there are more people who had similar thoughts.

there is that concept design of current lucrecia as a small old lady that poses a possible threat -- maybe the lucrecia/maligula connection ends up being a redherring or something idk -- but maybe they ended up changing their minds during development or something. or maybe something else. idk. and that’s why i’m excited for the game haha

before i go i kind of wanna mention that before we really knew much about maligula and that she was a confirmed “mass murderer” i hoped it was gonna be marona/augustus’ mother than zalto would raise from the dead but she’d either turn on him bc he literally killed her and then her husband and did the opposite of caring for her son so why wouldnt she??? or do something akin to Mary Rose by J.M. Barrie where she’s kind of mindless/destructive with only focusing on finding her son who is still a baby to her; also there’d be a level inside zalto’s mind where raz would eventually make him deal with his grief and the guilt he’s been projecting and not dealing with for killing his daughter. i’m kind of sad this isn’t the case --- although i know whatever it’s actually gonna be is gonna ne great !!!! dont get me wrong -- but i still think this was a kind of neat idea so i wanted to write it down somewhere lol. basically i really want the marona’s descendants/galachio family connection existent and explored, which hopefully we’ll get no matter who maligula ends up being.

phew this was much longer than i intended it to be and kind of a mess but i kind of wanted to write my thoughts down before the game came out haha and the recent showcase kind of cemented some of my thoughts which stimulated me to do it

oh before i end i just remembered something i forgot that i thought about. i wonder why lucrecia's excluded from the mural tablet thing in HQ and from the "psychic six" but not from camp via the stumps?? interesting.

#psychonauts 2 spoilers #psychonauts 2 #psychonauts spoilers #psychonauts #ab analyzes #pn2 spoilers #ab: personal #;i could also be totally wrong but i like theorizing

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ceies · 3 years ago

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Heya! Same anon that barged into your inbox a couple weeks ago to gush about Padfoot and Hound despite never reading Harry Potter

Just read chapter 44, and despite all the tension from the chracters trying to figure out who exactly Kakashi actually is, I can't help but snicker how wildly underwhelming their guesses are compared to the real thing

Like:

Remus's thoughts about Kakashi: Charlie could surely not be working with a mass murder, he just accidentally apparated to England...

Harry's thoughts on Kakashi: Pff, we could totally take him on, he could be lying about his age, but we took on a basilisk and won! He's lying, how could we trust him?

Meanwhile: Kakashi was an apprentice of a man who was known for taking out whole armies of people, he likely has a high kill count at his age and had killed more people than Siruis was ever convicted of. He's a child soldier from another dimension, where their system of magic is completely different and their countries aren't even the same. He is so used to blood and death that he will resort to it if it means protecting the people that he cares so deeply for. Aka the Trio could definitely not take him in a fight

Not to compare apple to oranges, but it's hilarious how un-realistic Kakashi's real background is to the HP characters, who are working from the basis of their world unbelievable from what they could ever imagine

Also the irony in Remus's thought process where he was like "Surely Siruis wouldn't stoop that low to receive help from a child", when that's exactly what happened but not for the reasons he's thinking of

It was really interesting to read the theories and thoughts of different character's on Kakashi. Especially Remus's

He's the closest to empathizing with Kakashi's trauma but it's only the surface of how deep it goes

Also! I loved the way you went about Kakashi revealing himself to the Trio

Technically, Kakashi did surrender and decided to tell them everything, but he still acted casual and like a little shit. It was hilarious when he used a clone to lure them out lol

While it's understandable why Harry is suspicious and angry at Kakashi, it's going to make his story even harder to believe

But I guess that gives Kakashi an excuse to explain how Chakara works in his world/demonstrate it to get the others to believe him

Great update! Looking forward as to how Kakashi will explain his situation

Yeah, to be honest, i have a lot of fun with Harry specifically underestimating Kakashi..Thinking he could take him in a fight. 😂 of all these characters I think after all, Snape might be the most correct, though he too is underestimating Kakashi.

I didn't actually interpret it as using a Clone to lure them out, but quite literally what kakashi said: he passed them on the stairs lol.

Thanks so much for your kind words!

#harry potter #kakashi hatake #crossover

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theunvanquishedzims · 3 years ago

Text

The Michigan Fleet authors posted their AUs so here are mine

theunvanquishedzims: I have SO MANY Boat Boy ideas but I'm sitting on them because I came up with a bunch halfway through the book and they got jossed by the end rollerskatinglizard: Hah! Uhhh, sorry? I think?? theunvanquishedzims: (i.e. Basil gets sad and weepy over Rich and Liam flirting at a party, Trimmer plays fairy godmother a la ripping half his shirt off, giving him a pep talk, and sending him back out there to Win Back His Man) rollerskatinglizard: *whooping* theunvanquishedzims: Jossed so hard rollerskatinglizard:Okay, that's DELIGHTFUL rollerskatinglizard: Trimmer is the most terrifying fairy godmother rollerskatinglizard: Anything else? :Dc theunvanquishedzims: Lemme get my notes rollerskatinglizard: *gleeful wiggling*

theunvanquishedzims: Okay so I stopped reading when the Sympatico grabbed Rich during the storm and it took me a month or so to get back and finish, so I was under the impression that the ship was still being fixed in drydock and not, y'know, actually being crewed and sailed. (Trimmer yelling "just let her sink" hits reeeeeaaaallly different when you know that) rollerskatinglizard: Ahaha oh dang theunvanquishedzims: So the big idea was the gangsters needing something from the Sympatico. Not the general thugs and delinquents crewing the Sympatico but the actual organized crime of the Fleet, who were getting pretty used to using ships like the Sympatico to run their dirty deeds through. Except it's basically impossible to get what they need out of it, even when they drag out one of the old IST guys. He finally tells them Rich was the one who did the heavy lifting for the past few years rollerskatinglizard: Ooooh! rollerskatinglizard: What an interesting idea! theunvanquishedzims: Hang on I need to restart rollerskatinglizard: Ah yes, computers theunvanquishedzims: Sorry, that turned into a dinner break and running errands During which I came up with a couple new AUs theunvanquishedzims: Okay, back to mafia: they track Rich down, probably snag him after he's been out boarding. Off work, not expected back on the ship, tired from all the exercise, etc. They're not overtly threatening, just pick up his skimmer and politely suggest that he comes help them, and he probably goes quietly because there's like, six of them. I'm thinking only one of whom was actually posted on the Sympatico theunvanquishedzims: So they get back to the Sympatico. She's been temporarily decommissioned until the Fleet can fix her broken processes, but that's also a cover story by the mob. They want to clear out all the smuggled goods and information, but she's basically a ghost ship, silent and empty, and even the other IST guy couldn't get more than a few blinking lights. She's sulking basically, she knows they're not there to fix her so she's digging in her heels and playing dead. Like a toddler going ragdoll when they don't want to go to bed. theunvanquishedzims: They explain to Rich that they can't get a response and want him to take a crack at it. "Has she said anything?" "Who?" "The Sympatico." "...we didn't talk to it." "Well that's half your problem right there." theunvanquishedzims: At this point you should watch Show Yourself from Frozen 2, and the crystal scene from Atlantis the Lost Empire. Stepping into the place you've been called, making your presence known, and having a greater power reach out for you. Shiny lights, chasing the spark of life to its source, and having the power consume and embody you. Rich is used to it but it's probably pretty freaky from the outside, and way less magical-looking than a Disney movie. Probably more like when Magneto activated the machine in the first X-Men movie. Step up, turn it on, and suddenly it's sucking the life out of you, making you a living battery theunvanquishedzims: In my head I am picturing the glowing blue eyes, lights cracking along the skin like lightning or circuit patterns, the implants glowing in his temples, standing at a terminal like a star trek deck, maybe a faint breeze-like movement of the hair and clothes to indicate the sheer power radiating off of him. In reality it's probably more like he falls down, gets up, stumbles along to a good spot out of the weather, and curls up in a secluded defensible spot to stare emptily at the wall for a few hours while lights randomly go on and off around the ship theunvanquishedzims: Just being trailed by six very wary mafia dudes who have probably never seen someone mind-meld a ship, and definitely not solo. He's like a zombie, and when he does talk it's very clear he's talking for the both of them theunvanquishedzims: If any of them are in sync with the ship they definitely feel the !!!Rich you're back!!! vibe theunvanquishedzims: No idea how that resolves, I guess it depends on how powerful the mafia is. If they're the kind of entrenched criminals who are ongoing characters, then they have Rich scrub out what they need then dump him back on his skimmer to face the fallout alone. He might report it to the spooks? Or at least try to tell Basil and Mitch theunvanquishedzims: If they're not recurring characters then they were definitely being tracked by the spooks, who move in once the Sympatico comes back online. Rich has to answer some very tough questions but he cooperates fully and winds up digging up a LOT of dirt out of the Sympatico, now that the mafia showed him where to look. It's another one of the super traumatizing moments that makes him look cool and heroic. Oh yeah, totally got kidnapped, single-handedly piloted a ship, and helped bust the mafia, please stop talking about it, I need a nap, and also someone to go with me next time I go boarding. theunvanquishedzims: (And then I finished reading the book and found out that the Sympatico had a new crew and was out on the water with her AI still fried and broken, how did no one notice that)

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theunvanquishedzims: Okay I don't have Trimmer's voice well enough to write this fic so I'm feeding it to you raw: Trucker AU theunvanquishedzims: Rich is a long-haul trucker, much to the disappointment of his elder sister Angela, who is in law enforcement and thought he had a decent future in it too. Athena is a pro wrestler and totally down to support her brother traveling the country (and hopefully being in the same city as him sometime, she wants him to see her kick ass!) Rich wants to pursue a degree in [tech or engineering] but college is expensive, and trucking is a good way to make money, on top of which you don't have to pay rent when you're on the road. So he's saving up for school, probably listening to a lot of audiobooks, podcasts, and training guides while chugging along. theunvanquishedzims: Not nearly as bad or sketchy as the Sympatico, but life on the road can get pretty sketch sometimes, especially when you're alone. Enter Trimmer. Or rather, enter Rich into the middle-of-nowhere trucker stopover bar where Trimmer is getting his ass kicked. theunvanquishedzims: (Gonna go ahead and say the bar is called the Sympatico, and this is a very bad night to be there, which is saying something because any night at the Sympatico is a bad night to be there.) theunvanquishedzims: Fortunately, Rich is not trapped there by the cold uncaring waters of Lake Michigan, he can just turn around and leave when he sees the nightly fight brewing. Unfortunately, he has a weakness for cute twinks, and no matter how much the guy is insulting their mothers four on one is really not fair, so he winds up wading in, scooping Trimmer up, and murder-stalking to the exit theunvanquishedzims: [At this point I pause to stare out the window and wonder wistfully what their canon meeting was like, who approached who, if Trimmer just straight-up used his lunch to hire a bodyguard or if Rich did the "are you gonna finish that" puppy-eyes and Trimmer realized how easily he could be bribed, etc etc] theunvanquishedzims: In the Trucker AU Trimmer waits until they're outside to go feral goblin on the arm that's holding him, Rich drops him, and negotiation commences theunvanquishedzims: I don't have Trimmer's backstory nailed down, the "teenage runaway" archetype doesn't really suit someone with a large loving family, but safe to say that whatever lead him to hitchhiking across the Midwest he is determined to see through out of sheer bullheaded stubbornness. The only thing worse than calling your parents to bail you out with bus money home is calling your grandma. It might have involved stabbing a college advisor when the guy got rapey, he's technically not on the run from the law, he DEFINITELY is not on track to getting his degree. Halfway between college dropout and missing person. If he was wealthy he'd be backpacking Europe for a semester, but he's not, so he's hitchhiking America. And getting molested by truckers, because Trimmer can't have nice things. theunvanquishedzims: He is really not interested in getting molested by Rich! But, as Rich points out, he did just save him from getting stabbed, Trimmer doesn't seem to have any exit options for this backwater town, and holy #&$^ the bar's on fire. (The Sympatico burns to the ground that night, to the betterment of the world at large.) rollerskatinglizard: You have no idea how much I'm enjoying this But you should totally post it Splick and Roach would both scream in glee theunvanquishedzims: Rich and Trimmer get out while the getting is good, and it's nearly dawn before they finally hash out details. Rich offers to drop him off at the next town, but they're still pretty close to the epicenter of the mass exodus so the next few hundred miles are probably not going to be safe for Trimmer. By this point Trimmer has found a bunch of the old textbooks Rich bought secondhand to study in his free time and come to the conclusion that [this nerd is a nerd] his story checks out. Just a college kid trying to scrape together the cash to get an education and make a decent living. Reminds Trimmer of Trimmer. (Reminds Trimmer of Joey.) rollerskatinglizard: ;u; <3 Beautiful theunvanquishedzims: So now Rich has a little traveling buddy! Helps him stay awake on the long hauls, lets him use the carpool lanes, even reads to him out of the textbooks sometimes, with commentary. Trimmer is really smart and surprisingly easy to get along with. They nap in the cab, eat in diners, and share motel rooms. Trimmer unclenches a little. Rich is good about not asking personal questions. They definitely watch Athena's fights on tv more than once, much to Rich's chagrin and Trimmer's loud encouragement. He started fanboying over it to annoy and embarrass Rich, but it is surprisingly cathartic to watch someone get trash-talked and respond by just BODYSLAMMING their opponent. ("Why are you rooting for her, you're the biggest trash-talker I know," Rich mutters into his beer, face bright red as Trimmer whoops and high-fives the waitress he got to change the channel in the sports bar.) theunvanquishedzims: ("She would wipe the floor with me," Trimmer responds with a smirk, watching smugly as Rich tries to figure out if Trimmer is having impure thoughts about his baby sister) theunvanquishedzims: (They have already established that Trimmer does not have impure thoughts about Rich, that Rich DOES have impure thoughts about Trimmer, but as long as he stays in his own motel bed that's fine.) (Trimmer still sleeps with a knife under his pillow but doesn't bother in the cab, where their co-naps occasionally verge on snuggling.) rollerskatinglizard: <3 <3 <3 *perfect* theunvanquishedzims: They finally reach their destination. It has been [days to drive a rig between NJ and CA] and they make it there slightly ahead of schedule. Rich drops off the delivery, Trimmer comes face-to-face with the reality of the trip ending. He'd been hitchhiking for months and felt like he was going nowhere, and now a few days and suddenly he's crossed the entire country, and almost kinda maybe had fun doing it! And California's as good a place as any to stay, at least he won't freeze to death if he doesn't find a place to crash for the night. theunvanquishedzims: Then Rich comes back and hands him a wad of cash, pocketing a stack of his own. "Got a cash bonus for finishing early! And since you're the reason I made it here this fast, I just figured part of it is your share..." he peters out, trying to explain his reasoning. They sit in silence for a while, both thinking about Trimmer in California, far away from anyone who would want to hurt him, with a few hundred dollars in his pocket. theunvanquishedzims: "...Let's get lunch," Trimmer finally decrees, and Rich can't keep the relieved smile off his face. They renegotiate some things over lunch, and then go to pick up the next load to haul cross-country. Together. rollerskatinglizard: AWWWWWW!!!! *YES,* I love it!!! theunvanquishedzims: And then eventually they go to college together, and get their degrees, and good jobs, and meet the families, and Trimmer absolutely drags Rich to as many of Athena's fights as they can manage on the road. It's just to save money, things are cheaper when you split the rent, Trimmer hollers on the phone. You put a ring on that boy's finger, y'hear?! Hellbender hollers back. I am so glad the word moirail exists rollerskatinglizard: YES God yes Also this AU pleases me greatly rollerskatinglizard: Blessings upon you for it theunvanquishedzims: ...technically the Michigan Fleet takes place in a post-Homestuck world, so theoretically it could have time to enter mainstream lexicon. It's better than "bromance" theunvanquishedzims: JUST THROWING THAT OUT THERE >.> rollerskatinglizard: Yeah, totally different feel than bromance!

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theunvanquishedzims: Speaking of Homestuck! Wanna hear the Helmsman AU? :3 rollerskatinglizard: YES PLEASE theunvanquishedzims: Okay gimme a minute to get my notes, it's not based on One of Our Submarines but I can't remember the fic title. Have you read the one where the kids redesign the helmsrig and use that to garner support for Feferi as Empress? Lots of political drama, Sollux-centric, [spoiler], and in the end they win *but at what cost* (((If someone knows what fic I'm talking about please link me, I can't find it.))) rollerskatinglizard: No, I haven't theunvanquishedzims: It's good, if you like the nitty-gritty of rebellions. The piece I'm cherry picking is the new Empress introducing a new way of helming that allows more freedom. Instead of a single enslaved lowblood being hung up in tentacle wires until they drop dead, it's something you can unplug from, allowing psionics to swap out, take shifts, etc. So Empress Clearwater (yay seadweller name) is dead, long live Empress Clearwater, and she shakes things up by introducing her new helmsrig and orders it implemented Fleet-wide theunvanquishedzims: I don't think this universe is as bad as canon but it's still pretty rough on the bad ships, and the Sympatico is a very bad ship theunvanquishedzims: Angie is still a security officer, probably fairly high-ranking as a greenblood. Athena is a pro wrestler. Sports are probably a bigger part of life in a Fleet that doesn't center around conquest. The three probably grew up in the same neighborhood, maybe dabbled in quadrants before settling on hatefriends. Oooh, or ash, Athena setting them up to talk out their issues over lunch and then heckle each other over their other quadrants could fit in that quadrant. theunvanquishedzims: Rich is, of course, a helmsman. It's rare for someone that close to jade to be so powerful, he was actually planning on a career in tech, but when he got called in for psionic testing he basically crushed it. Possibly literally. And olive is still technically a lowblood, so off to the helm with you. theunvanquishedzims: His first posting is the Sympatico, and it's a nightmare. The one bright spot (dark spot? How do trolls even. *insert rant about Kanaya being pastel goth not goth-goth*) theunvanquishedzims: The one bright spot is Trimmer, a technician whose survival method is to lock himself in the helm dock and stab anybody who tries to mess with Rich when he's piloting. It's basically how things work in the superstorms, but 75-90% of the time instead of a few times a year theunvanquishedzims: Rich can barely talk most days, they communicate via chat client, and even that requires a lot of brainpower so they can't do it when the Sympatico has to fight something or do difficult maneuvers in space, which is pretty frequently. But Rich keeps an eye out for Trimmer, directing him through the ship to help him avoid people and fights, and tweaking things like hall lights when things get hairy. I think at least once he turned off the gravity, it cost him but it got Trimmer out of a really bad situation and gave him an excuse to hole up in the helmsdeck for a few days until things cooled off theunvanquishedzims: But all that is in the past! There's a new Empress, a new crew, and a new way of helming! theunvanquishedzims: The Sympatico is one of the flagships to roll out the new helmsrig. The original crew was disbanded, culled, reassigned. Trimmer was allowed to stay (at Rich's request) to ease the transition. It's a big day, lots of media attention documenting the new helmsmen, and Rich is doing his best to keep calm. He had to do some physical therapy to stand upright and be able to walk from the big speech to his shiny new helmsrig, but as a fairly young recruit he's not nearly as bad off as some older helmsmen whose bodies have atrophied. He's still pretty skinny though, especially when compared to Angie and Athena, who he reunited with (for the cameras) #helmsmenaretrollstoo, #greenc3<green, #omgishipit, see things are much better now, people can reclaim their lives and quadrants, helming is something to be excited for not scared of, etc. Lots of propaganda, lots of attention, lots of pressure to get this right theunvanquishedzims: And then he walks into the helm and Trimmer is there. Rich would probably have had a meltdown if he hadn't been, but no one can tell because they're so calm and professional. They're both cleaned up and impeccably uniformed, the plugging in goes smoothly, and the Sympatico comes to life and lifts off into the sky into a sunset that would make a Hollywood director weep. The cameras turn off, great job everybody, and things return to normal. Except Rich and Trimmer have no idea how to handle normal. For the first 8 hours it's fine, it's good, it's a little weird that Trimmer looks so tidy and that Rich is sitting in a padded chair instead of being flesh-jacked by tentacles, but it's fine. They chat over text, a little stilted but plenty to catch up on theunvanquishedzims: Rich spies on the new crew and gossips about how boring they are and how weird the ship looks with everything cleared out and well-lit, and wow where did that section of storage come from? Oh right that used to be a hidden smuggling nook. Haha nook. See they're fine, they're laughing at the same old jokes. DEFINITELY weird that Rich is physically laughing. And then their relief shift comes on, with the new 2nd shift helmsman, and it's time for Rich to get unplugged for the day and go. Go to his room, which he has now, or to eat, which he can do now, or any one of a million things that normal trolls do, because he's a normal troll now. (This is turning out a little different from in my head but I like it.) He makes it about two hallways, walking silently side-by-side with Trimmer, before he breaks down. Or rather Trimmer breaks down. Or maybe they both simultaneously break, there is a lot of breaking happening, and it's not great that it's happening in the hall where anybody could walk by and where the new helmsman is almost certainly seeing them and possibly reporting them, and Trimmer's flight instincts are to run back to the helm where it's safe but Rich isn't there, RICH was the reason it was safe and he's not at the helm, he's right there in the hall. Rich, I know not how, picks up Trimmer and gets them to him room. It' close by, thank goodness, and it has a lock on the door, how weird, and Trimmer is there. He missed Trimmer so so much. rollerskatinglizard: ;u; <3<3<3<3 theunvanquishedzims: [The following scene contains content too graphic for wigglers under the age of seven sweeps] rollerskatinglizard: *laughing* Hardcore conciliation!!! theunvanquishedzims: From Trimmer's POV: Merrill requested him to remain a tech on the Sympatico. Makes sense, he was the only one who treated the guy like an actual troll and not a drooling mass of computational power. They got caught up, it's weird how clean and quiet the ship is, no fights to report beyond a spat in the cafeteria that turned out to be pitch flirtation. His shirtcuffs itch and he wants to roll them up but it's day one of the new empire and he doesn't want to get culled for being untidy on the Empress's pet project ship. There's so many other things to get culled for, anyway. And then shift is over. (Weird, he's used to working 16-hour days and sleeping in the helmdeck half the time.) And he has to unplug Merrill (double weird, he's not used to touching Merrill unless it's for a physical repair. Very aware of Rich as a physical person, especially when he's standing up and not obscured in a mass of tentacles.) And then they leave, together, which is WEIRD, because for sweeps Trimmer has been sneaking out of the helmdeck to go on a food run with Merrill texting him directions, and there's no Merrill on screen providing guidance to avoid fights, but there's not gonna BE any fights, and everything is the same but different and looks weird and shiny and there's a giant troll right next to him, stalking him, why didn't Merrill warn him?! rollerskatinglizard: Oh NO, ahaha, oh these poor doofuses theunvanquishedzims: From Rich's POV: he's been seeing these hallways for sweeps, but not from this angle, the ship is so familiar but so foreign to him, and he can't hear her, can't feel her, and he keeps reaching out for her even after all that training he did to get used to the new tech, there's still an absence and some part of his brain that says not being linked to the ship means something has gone catastrophically wrong and everyone onboard is going to die, TRIMMER is going to die, Trimmer is freaking out and hyperventilating next to him, Trimmer's running out of oxygen and the ship isn't responding to him to tell him what's wrong with the oxygen, and then Trimmer goes to bolt back to the helm but that's full of strange trolls and a new helmsman, and that knowledge is enough to shake him back to the situation at hand. He doesn't know where he finds the strength or the presence of mind, but he manages to grab up Trimmer and get them back to safety. It's just that safety is now his berth, not the helm. They're alone in his berth. And Trimmer is still freaking out. Sh-shoosh? Shoosh. Shooooooosh. theunvanquishedzims: Everything is diamonds and snow and beautiful shining crystals (in the movies that will someday be made about this day.) In the moment there's a lot more hyperventilating and snot. Basically, culmination behind the entire fic: do they actually have feelings for each other, or was it just about mutual survival the whole time? rollerskatinglizard: INCREDIBLY ADORABLE AND INTIMATE COMFORT, *YESSSS* Thank you yes, I'll have a dozen God that's splendid theunvanquishedzims: And they're both freaking out, Rich is hungry and physically tired and needs to do a lot of stretches, Trimmer is not used to Rich being huge and mobile and right next to him, and they both have crazy big trust issues, but...yeah, they're pale. They're so pale for each other, and it was so hard during the transition not seeing each other and not knowing how the other felt, not knowing how THEY felt, if they really had feelings or if it was all a bad situation. And now they know. They have feelings. And because they're trolls and not humans, they can flop on a pile and talk about those feelings in a non-platonic way, and Rich can pet Trimmer's hair and tell him how pretty he is and how Rich is glad that Trimmer got it properly cut instead of just hacking it too short for someone to grab, and how much he worried in the hall about not being able to see farther than his own field of vision to keep Trimmer out of harm's way, and how this whole thing is so weird and Rich is so scared but he's just really, really happy that Trimmer took the posting on the Sympatico, because he pities Trimmer and he wants him around and he was so glad that Trimmer wanted to still be around him too theunvanquishedzims: The media always depicts piling as either the traditional fairytale highblood freakout, or an extremely mellow ASMR-ish chillout with lots of hairpetting and horn polishing. Not two midbloods looting a mostly-empty room for enough junk to make a large enough pile to sit on, shrieking at each other about their feelings and how weird this is and why didn't you SAY something, me?! why didn't YOU say something?! Three SWEEPS we've been dancing around this! Well I didn't know if you felt the same way or if you just needed me to survive! Etc etc etc. Lots of getting up and stomping around , pacing the floor while ranting, trying to scavenge more stuff to throw on the pile. Rich owns basically nothing and it's the first time he's not judging Trimmer for keeping his room a garbage heap, even empty pizza boxes would be better than trying to make a pile out of two sweaters and a toothbrush. rollerskatinglizard: XDDD TuT aaaaah, YES theunvanquishedzims: Rich definitely rips off a wall panel and pulls out some wires, Trimmer doesn't even question it, they've lived and breathed this ship long enough to know what every wire does and which are nonessential to ship functioning. And with the wall panel crunched up they can pile stuff around it to make it seem less sparse, and wow it doesn't even matter that he pulled a panel down, this is HIS wall in HIS room now, he can "redecorate" as he sees fit, cue more yelling about how he doesn't know what to do with himself or his newfound freedom. The whole thing is just yelling and cussing and grabbing and shaking. It probably looks black from the outside, but they are swimming in palest cream. theunvanquishedzims: Eventually they give up on the pile. They go through Rich's entire perigee of snack rations to avoid having to go to the cafeteria, halfheartedly make fun of Rich's chewing, then crawl into the recuperacoon together. Thank goodness there was such a big push to show off how great helmsmen's lives will be, Rich scored a blueblood-huge 'coon and he's still skinny enough that they can both fit in it together. They sleep together, in sopor like proper trolls with proper lives as opposed to surrounded by pink tentacles and misery. Tomorrow they'll have to venture out for food, and do Rich's stretches and physical therapy, and head to their shift like the galaxy hasn't flipped upside-down, but they're handle that together. rollerskatinglizard: Oh help, my heart!! TuT It's SO CUTE, AAAAAAAH theunvanquishedzims: Okay my computer has been trying to shut down for the last three paragraphs so I think it's time to log off for the night, but I hope you enjoy the AUs, I will tell you more tomorrow rollerskatinglizard: Thank you so much!! Have a good night! theunvanquishedzims: (In the original version Rich and Trimmer came face-to-face for the first time since the Sympatico was busted up and Rich pulled out for rehab, and basically had a giant pale meltdown right there against the wall. There was purring, and crying, and confessions, all caught on film. Athena and Angie definitely saw. It had to be censored out of the broadcast. Someone uploaded it to Troll Pornhub and it won a Troll Pornhub Emmy for Truth in Journalism, which was not a category the Troll Pornhub Emmys had before, so congrats Merrill and Trimmer) rollerskatinglizard: *dying* oh my GOD Rich would blush so hard he'd keel over

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theunvanquishedzims: I woke up to the idea of Rich as Fezzik and Trimmer as Inigo Montoya (book version.) rollerskatinglizard: Hah! Oh man, delightful theunvanquishedzims: Soft-hearted giant and stabby little friend rollerskatinglizard: Yesss theunvanquishedzims: Only problem is Trimmer's grudge seems to be against the entire world, not any particular murderer theunvanquishedzims: But they could definitely take on the Zoo of Death together rollerskatinglizard: It could be both, in the AU! Specific grudge and also he hates everyone theunvanquishedzims: Instead of not being left-handed he pulls his feet out of his boots and surprise! More hands to stab you with Makes the acrobatics on top of the cliff more exciting rollerskatinglizard: *dying* YES Perfect! theunvanquishedzims: I don't know who the Man in Black of most beautiful woman in the world would be, but Rich catching them jumping out a window to whisk them away on horseback is lovely rollerskatinglizard: *strokes chin thoughtfully* If Rich is Fezzik, I think Basil might as well be the beautiful love interest, and Mitch is his farm boy turned dashing rogue theunvanquishedzims: Mitch and Trimmer sword fighting rollerskatinglizard: YES theunvanquishedzims: Mitch going through hell and back to save his lady love, then Rich shows up with the horses and says "hello pretty lady" and Basil is just swooning over him rollerskatinglizard: Mitch is pretty chill with Rich by then, he can handle sharing Rich didn't try *hard* to kill him, after all theunvanquishedzims: He even made it a fair fight instead of ambushing him He put down the rock and Mitch put down the sword and they tried to kill each other like civilized people rollerskatinglizard: *laughing* Yes, exactly theunvanquishedzims: Rich even helped bring him back from being mostly dead rollerskatinglizard: They're practically best buddies now! theunvanquishedzims: Which I imagine is 1000x funnier because Trimmer hates this guy and doesn't want to help him but he has info Trimmer needs rollerskatinglizard: Rich just being reprovingly like Come on, buddy, he's cool really I KNOW you bonded over your sword fight with him Don't lie Trimmer: HE'S STILL A DIPSHIT theunvanquishedzims: Trimmer: It was a little fun to take the boots off I guess, I don't get to do that often rollerskatinglizard: Hahaha yes theunvanquishedzims: Downside of being the best swordsman in the world, nobody can touch you. UNTIL NOW. Trimmer: I killed the guy but now I have nothing to live for. Mitch: Have you considered piracy? Stabbing people all day and all the rope ladders you can climb rollerskatinglizard: *dying* theunvanquishedzims: Now Trimmer's life goal is to reclaim his title of Best Swordsman, which means fighting Mitch a lot rollerskatinglizard: Which they both enjoy Sometimes Trimmer wins, sometimes Mitch does rollerskatinglizard: Roach points out that Liam would be Miracle Max theunvanquishedzims: I was just about to type that! rollerskatinglizard: Heee! Good brain wave theunvanquishedzims: You need a cure for death? Nope, sorry. You need to it humiliate my mortal enemy? Coming right up! rollerskatinglizard: YUP theunvanquishedzims: Slipping Rich the holocaust cloak "because it fits so nice" rollerskatinglizard: Pfff yes theunvanquishedzims: Which is said with a million more winky faces than the movie rollerskatinglizard: XDDD Naturally Liam is a much higher-libido mad scientist-substitute theunvanquishedzims: He doesn't have a wife he has like six boyfriend minions hanging around in various states of undress. He got fired for banging the king when he was the royal miracle man, he did a good job but the prince found it icky. rollerskatinglizard: *dying* YES theunvanquishedzims: Basil as Buttercup tho. Basil: Mitch is a good friend. :) Just a great buddy. :)) Kind of smelly but a nice boy. :))) Someone: *might possibly find Mitch attractive* Basil: What? Why. No. Why would she. I mean yeah he's smart and muscular and tan and broad-shouldered and has perfect teeth and his sweat glistens in the sun as he does his chores shirtless, but c'mon, he's not THAT much hotter than her middle-aged husband. No way. rollerskatinglizard: *snickering* rollerskatinglizard: My cowriters very enjoy this AU concept, btw, thank you theunvanquishedzims: Excellent theunvanquishedzims: Trimmer: I told him I was there to kill him and he just...ran away? Mitch: Who does that? rollerskatinglizard: *snickering* theunvanquishedzims: Basil being a slobby peasant until two minutes after Mitch leaves, then realizing he has to take care of himself if he wants to keep Mitch's attention, and only then starting to regularly bathe and brush his hair and work on his figure. rollerskatinglizard: Snirk! Sounds about right, doofus nerd that he is theunvanquishedzims: Then he becomes a princess and has two servants per limb to keep him clean and shining, so when Mitch sneaks into the wedding announcement crowd his first view of Basil is 1. clean 2. shiny hair 3. dressed like a queen

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General book chit-chat, no specific AU

theunvanquishedzims: I saw the post about the Sympatico crew having a very different view of Rich than his friends and now I am consumed with the idea of Rich being seen as scary by anyone who knows him for more than a single minute. Like, he flinches at the sight of a uniform, he can't stand to be in a room with more than one other person in it, and he's so busy working he doesn't really have time to go around carving out a territory rollerskatinglizard: Right? You'd think it'd be tricky, but apparently no theunvanquishedzims: And now there's video of him covered in kittens, and doing cool board tricks, and pretending a little barbel is too heavy to lift, and also he might be in the news for taking down a murderous conspiracy at the Mall. rollerskatinglizard: *laughing* Indeed theunvanquishedzims: Where did big scary monster Merrill go, who is this marshmallow rollerskatinglizard: What scam is he trying to run?!? theunvanquishedzims: Oooh, I pity the fool who is assigned to a boat with Officer Merrill. Double flinch response rollerskatinglizard: RIGHT? *OH SHIT, THERE'S ANOTHER ONE* And she's ARMED theunvanquishedzims: Try to blow off some steam by watching some wrestling, A THIRD ONE rollerskatinglizard: Some poor dumbass who sneered at Trimmer once ends up hiding out on a penny boat bc there's MERRILLS EVERYWHERE, IT'S NOT SAFE OUT THERE theunvanquishedzims: *dying laughing* I imagine a non-terrible Sympatico crew member meeting reformed Rich is like those Very Special Episodes where the hero's high school bully or childhood bad influence friend comes to town, and they're so nice and friendly and apologetic about what happened back in the day rollerskatinglizard: We actually have an encounter something like that planned! theunvanquishedzims: The hero's friends are all charmed and the hero can't convince anyone that it's all an act, he's secretly still terrible, look I'll prove it *does something that makes the hero look bad and the reformed guy look like a victim* Yaaaaaaaaay!!! Outside perspective is the BEST rollerskatinglizard: Rich and this random dude, both acting like the other one is a total menace Meanwhile, anyone who's known either of them since is like ....No?? He's a fine guy, perfectly reasonable Merrill, stop growling theunvanquishedzims: Two Spider-Men pointing at each other rollerskatinglizard: Hah! Yes theunvanquishedzims: Also the fact that Rich has gotten BIGGER since leaving the Sympatico is probably a shock rollerskatinglizard: OH yeah theunvanquishedzims: Richard "Cranky Because He's Slowly Starving To Death" Merrill rollerskatinglizard: I mean, it's a shock to Rich When he hits another growth spurt So it's definitely a shock to anyone else theunvanquishedzims: Oh yeah, he was like 17 when he was first assigned there, nowhere near done growing yet Richard "My Shirts Rip When I Flex Wrong" Merrill rollerskatinglizard: *snickering* He'd look so sheepish and disgruntled if someone gave him that "I flexed and the sleeves fell off" shirt theunvanquishedzims: I am so glad Trimmer got to him before, like, a gang could figure out he's easily bribed with food. Things could have gone so much worse, corruption-wise rollerskatinglizard: YUP theunvanquishedzims: I just finished Athena and the Midnight Chicken and WOW Rich was actually kind of close to giving in to peer pressure there, if Athena hadn't thrown herself towards the proverbial sword he might have let himself be talked into something he really didn't want to do. rollerskatinglizard: It's possible! Baby Rich is very weak to peer pressure theunvanquishedzims: If they had been smart and manipulative and laid the groundwork first it would have been even easier, not just "here's a knife let your ingrained killing instincts do the work" rollerskatinglizard: Yeah! It could've gone much worse theunvanquishedzims: In the wrong hands Rich would make a very good, very sad soldier But like, deep down inside sad where no one could see it. rollerskatinglizard: That was actually close to his original story when I came up with him

[I’ll check with Skates to see if it’s okay to post that bit]

theunvanquishedzims: I'm already nervous about those two Horrible Old Men rollerskatinglizard: Which two? theunvanquishedzims: My face went D: at the idea that there's more than two rollerskatinglizard: *pats u gently* theunvanquishedzims: The werewolf guy with the boys on leashes is the one that makes my instincts scream KILL IT WITH FIRE, but there's also the one with the scar on his face? I wanna say Arthur Carroway rollerskatinglizard: >u> Gosh, Zims, idk WHY you'd be worried about him Just bc my tablet keyboard knows how to spell Carraway That's no reason to be concerned! rollerskatinglizard: Maybe Splick made him the [tarot] Devil bc he's devilishly handsome! Did you think of that?? theunvanquishedzims: I am terrified of him showing up, I know I'll be cringing too hard to keep reading right away. Men who abuse positions of power are so squicky, I couldn't even stand to watch the Office and Michael Scott is like, the most benign example of the trope But yeah a guy like that getting to Rich as a younger more mallable person, fresh-faced and eager to please. Ugh. Such a bad ending. rollerskatinglizard: YUP theunvanquishedzims: William Sandgren is the other one, I think rollerskatinglizard: Fortunately Rich did get rescued originally! I don't do sad endings theunvanquishedzims: He looks cool, I don't immediately want him dead for my own safety rollerskatinglizard: <u< theunvanquishedzims: ...I will ignore that face and continue to think of him as the lesser of two evils for now rollerskatinglizard: Absolutely feel free! ^u^ theunvanquishedzims: When I thought about this earlier I imagined Liam actually being the one to start a pissing contest with Arthur. Rich guy vs criminal guy, my grandmother bedazzled the skulls of her enemies, your teeth would make a lovely necklace, etc etc "Well I'd love to get them around your throat" ;) rollerskatinglizard: You know Liam QUITE well theunvanquishedzims: I'm a visual learner, so all the illustrations are helping me flesh out characteristics. Liam smiling like a psycho while his face drips blood is very telling. rollerskatinglizard: Hah!!! Right? God, he's SUCH a little firebrand theunvanquishedzims: (Also, AU where Liam is the babydoll heir and Rich is the soldier mod bodyguard he climbs like a tree) rollerskatinglizard: We have definitely discussed that AU thoughtfully >u> It's good, v tasty theunvanquishedzims: Rich is all THIS GOES AGAINST THE RULES and Liam is all oh you like being told what to do hmm? >:3~ rollerskatinglizard: Rich: God this is SUCH a bad idea, I'm gonna get so fired Liam: Not if you're good enough at it! theunvanquishedzims: I imagine without a pregnancy they'd be able to keep it under wraps slightly longer than grandma Beaker rollerskatinglizard: True! theunvanquishedzims: "Under wraps" like everyone in the house can't hear them rollerskatinglizard: Pffff YUP theunvanquishedzims: Ugh now I'm remembering Trimmer being scared of Rich getting drunk and pushy and I'm sad again rollerskatinglizard: No one likes Rich's drinking except Rich rollerskatinglizard: It's okay tho, Trimmer trusts Rich more after that theunvanquishedzims:I think he'll figure it out given enough time. Rich: Well everyone drinks because work sucks. Basil and Mitch: Nope! Rich: Well I'm a soldier mod so it just LOOKS like I'm drinking a lot. Angie and Thena: Nope! Rich: Well I have trauma from the Sympatico so I need alcohol to deal with that. Trimmer: Nope! Rich: ...well I guess I have a problem then. :< Everyone: Yep! rollerskatinglizard: Indeed theunvanquishedzims: I am so curious about their origins, how the relationship developed, how apparently they had half a handjob between them and went NOPE NEVER AGAIN, how they wound up co-sleeping, if they ever cried on one another, etc etc rollerskatinglizard: I'm 100% certain that Rich cried on Trimmer at least once, while Trimmer awkwardly patted his hair and gently called him a wuss or something If Trimmer ever cried it would've been in the middle of the night, and none of them would ever mention it in the light of day theunvanquishedzims: Was that Trimmer's first posting? I know it was Rich's, so he kiiiind of didn't know any better, but Trimmer is older by a bit rollerskatinglizard: It definitely wasn't Trimmer's first, no, the latest in a long string of postings that went from okay to bad to worse theunvanquishedzims: Oh nooooooo No wonder he finally said screw it and got a solo boat rollerskatinglizard: Yep

#michigan fleet #boat boys #AUs are still my favorite thing #long post #richard merrill #joseph trimmer

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