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uchihasakurawrites · 4 years ago

Text

Of T-Shirts and Monsoons

Rating: T for language

Summary: In which Sasuke proposes to a fuming Sakura in a cave in the middle of Rain.

Word Count: 2,243

A/N: Hello everyone! It’s been about seven years since I last wrote for this fandom (or wrote creatively at all, really). This random idea popped into my head while I was watching old SasuSaku AMVs, and I just thought I’d go for it! I have a few ideas for longer SasuSaku fics, so I wanted to test out a few drabbles/oneshots to shake off some of the rust since it’s been a while. Let me know what you think! Also feel free to send prompts my way. This was done in about an hour, but I hope you enjoy~

Cross posted on Ao3 and Fanfiction.net

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Sakura was fuming as she stomped into the cave, ignoring Sasuke’s wary gaze as she slung her pack to the ground with enough force to create fine cracks in the stone beneath it. She stripped out of her blood-and-rain soaked jonin vest and tossed it equally as haphazardly to the side, not sparing a glance to where it landed with a decided thwack. Sasuke rubbed the bridge of his nose and made quick work of using a small katon to set a small fire in the back of the cave. Typically, it wouldn’t be worth the risk of attracting unwanted attention, but he figured the benefits of not having to deal with an angry and cold Sakura were decidedly worth dispatching any rogues that were foolish enough to have followed them. Not that he and Sakura had left any of the nin in a state to pursue them, he thought with a smirk.

“Stupid Rain with it’s stupid freak monsoons and stupid rogue nin who ambush anything that fucking moves through their ‘territory.’ Sure, take out the fact that you’re bored in a time of peace out on civilians who can’t fight back.”

The clang of Sakura’s weapons pouch against the cave wall punctuated her impatience with the recent trend of rogue bands staking claim to smaller civilian towns and merchant paths. They’d managed to defend three different merchant caravans and liberated two villages from rogues in the past month and a half alone. She didn’t mind helping the civilians, of course, but why couldn’t these rogues get it through their skulls that this was peace time? She just wanted a little peace, dammit!

Sasuke crouched down next to his own pack to dig out a spare change of clothes. After just over a year and a half of traveling together, he was more than used to Sakura’s flinty temper and knew she would tire herself out soon. Best to keep out of it.

Sakura dropped to the ground to hunt for a clean shirt of her own. She pulled out shirt after shirt, noting with growing frustration that each was either covered in blood, lacerations, or sand. If she ever saw another grain of sand, it would be far too soon. A growl tore from the back of her throat.

“Stupid Suna with it’s stupid sand. Why the hell can’t some other village have poison experts so I don’t have to trudge through the damned desert just to collaborate on our new Inter-Village Poison Center? Who the fuck even came up with that idea?” Sasuke sent her a pointed look, knowing full well that she had fully supported Shizune’s initiative, which Sakura missed. “And why the hell can’t an epidemic break out in, I don’t know, the Land of Tea and not the middle of fucking Rain? At least then-”

Sakura nearly choked when she glanced up just in time to see Sasuke pull off his rain-soaked shirt and wring it out. No matter how long they spent together or how intimate they became, Sakura’s mind never failed to short-circuit at the sight of Sasuke’s bare skin. It didn’t matter where or how much - one glimpse, and her mind checked out. Although he would never express it outright, Sakura surmised that Sasuke knew exactly what his body did to her and used it to his advantage - say, when he was trying to distract her from a particularly troublesome conversation or train of thought.

It worked more often then she cared to admit.

Her sharp eyes caught the way Sasuke shifted his weight away from his left side as he moved to pull on a fresh shirt - crisp black with the Uchiha fan emblazoned proudly on the back. After a brief moment admiring his figure before it was hidden by the fabric, Sakura frowned at the inflammation beginning to flare up around his ankle. She cleared her throat and motioned for him to come over, tirade momentarily forgotten. Kami knows Sasuke would never admit that he had lost his footing for a moment during their earlier confrontation, unused to fighting on branches that had been rotted through from near-constant rain, and actually ask her to heal him. He’d become much more willing to allow her to heal him after a particularly difficult fight, but it was rare for him to outright ask for her assistance. She usually offered before he needed to.

She met his withering look with a hard gaze of her own.

“You,” she jabbed a finger in his direction, and he raised a brow, “stop being a stubborn ass and sit.” She motioned to the spot next to her with a touch more force than necessary. Sasuke didn’t budge and continued to ruffle through his pack. Sakura’s eyes narrowed.

“Sasuke-kun, --”

With a sigh, Sasuke fixed Sakura with a stern look and tossed her one of his extra shirts before coming to sit next to her. Laying a hand on Sakura’s shoulder, he formed the tiger seal to send a small katon over her skin to dry off the remnants of water that clung to her skin and hair. His jaw tightened at the blue-purple tint her lips had begun to take in the chill. A smile worked its way onto Sakura’s face when she realized the telltale signs of concern in his posture as he hovered near her.

“Change, Sakura. Then heal.”

His gaze dropped pointedly below her chin, and Sakura’s cheeks heated as she followed his eyes and realized her state of undress. Over the course of her rant, she had stripped down to her chest bindings and fitted shorts. Although Sasuke had seen her in far less, embarrassment washed through her as she scrambled to unfold the shirt he had tossed to her.

Her demeanor shifted when she went to slip it on. Sasuke glanced over when he felt Sakura stiffen at his side, brow furrowing when he noted the pensive look on Sakura’s features. Her eyes, previously a battle-worn seafoam green, took on a deeper, more thoughtful jade. She snagged her lip between her teeth, and Sasuke glanced down to see her fingers gently tracing the outline of the Uchiha fan printed on the back of the shirt.

Spine going rigid, Sasuke wracked his brain for the other instances Sakura had borrowed clothes from his pack - a shirt here, a poncho there. Her hands-on approach to fighting combined with the blood, bile, and poison that came with being a medic meant that her clothes tended to ruin more quickly than his. The sight of her rummaging through his pack for a spare change of clothes was a familiar one. What he hadn’t noticed, however, was that Sakura was always careful to select one of the few articles of clothing he carried that didn’t carry his clan’s symbol. He kept a few basics on hand just in case they needed to be incognito through a town that was still hostile towards the Leaf.

His mind jumped to the easiest explanation he could think of for her hesitation: she was ashamed. Not that he blamed her for wanting to distance herself from his clan’s marred legacy, but the very thought lit a fire in his veins that had him pulling away from her. Anger and bitterness combined with a pang of disappointment that he didn’t particularly want to address.

Sakura started, broken from her thoughts as she took note of Sasuke’s sudden change in demeanor. It was a testament to the time she had spent becoming attuned to the small giveaways of Sasuke’s emotions that she pieced two-and-two together. His flinty eyes shifted between the shirt in her hands and the cave wall as he refused to look at her.

With another quiet smile, Sakura carefully folded the shirt, laid it on top of her pack, and moved to stand next to Sasuke. She could feel some of the tension leave him when her shoulder brushed his, but his eyes remained stony.

“Sasuke-kun.” She waited for a moment before his gaze flickered down to hers, hoping that the softness in her own gaze would convey whatever she wasn’t able to in words. She placed a gentle hand on his bicep, hoping to ground him as she mulled over her words. Talking about the Uchiha Clan with Sasuke took a delicate touch, a touch she had learned after a short but explosive period of trial and error.

“Sasuke-kun, your clan’s history has nothing to do with why I won’t wear the Uchiha fan. Your legacy is a part of you, and I love you. All of you. Even the darkest parts that you don’t think love can reach. You know I’m damn persistent, and if I can wait this long to get you to accept that I love you, then I can wait as long as you need me to before you accept that that includes everything about you.”

She took a deep breath, averting her own eyes now that he had fixed her with an unreadable gaze of his own.

“Even if you won’t outright admit it, I know that your clan is precious to you. I’ve watched you carve the clan’s symbol into your kunai every time you replenish your stock. And I’m not an Uchiha, Sasuke-kun, so wearing the clan’s symbol - even casually like this, just feels like I’m not giving it the honor it deserves.”

Silence. Sakura was used to silence from Sasuke, and had learned how to interpret his different silences. There were the more distraught, brooding ones that required a bright, calming touch and the occasional pouty silence after she had smiled just a touch too openly at a flirty cashier; the explosive silences that she usually drew him into a spar during to release some energy and the frustrated, yet concerned silence when he thought she was too reckless in a battle.

This seemed to be one of his thoughtful silences - one that she didn’t feel she should interrupt. Noting with no small amount of satisfaction that most of the rigidity had melted away from his body, Sakura moved to turn back towards her pack.

“As for clothes, I’m sure I can put together something for tonight, so don’t worry about me. I’m pretty sure there’s a little merchant town not to far from here that we can stop by tomorrow to stock up on some new -”

Sakura swallowed her words as a cool hand enclosed her wrist and tugged her back. Her eyes widened when she found herself pressed to Sasuke’s chest with his arms wrapped tightly around her back. While Sakura was no stranger to small acts of affection from Sasuke - a forehead poke here and a sleepy arm around her waist there - it was incredibly rare for him to initiate a hug. In fact, she was pretty sure she could count the number of times he had hugged her on one hand.

“Sa-Sasuke-kun?”

He huffed into her hair, something between a laugh or a sigh - she couldn’t quite tell. So she simply decided to remain quiet, tracing her fingertips along his back as she waited for him to voice his thoughts. She swore Sasuke Uchiha was going to be the death of her when he spoke again and she quite literally choked.

“Marry me.”

The words were so quiet that Sakura nearly convinced herself that they were a figment of her imagination. A statement, not a request. She pulled back slightly, wide eyes meeting Sasuke’s steady gaze.

“W-What?”

Sakura winced as soon as she asked the question, knowing Sasuke loathed repeating himself (though it was a well-kept secret that Sasuke didn’t mind repeating himself for her and her alone). But surely he couldn’t hold it against her given the situation. He simply sighed at her request, arching a brow that said he knew that she had clearly heard him yet repeated himself anyways.

“Marry me and wear the damn shirt, Sakura.”

When she continued to stand in front of him with nothing more than a shocked stare, Sasuke huffed again and half-rolled his eyes in a rare display of amusement. Tonight seemed to be a night for rare occasions, it seemed.

Sidestepping Sakura’s frozen form, he retrieved his spare shirt from its place on Sakura’s pack, unfolded it, and gently worked it over her head. A warm glow replaced the earlier fire in his veins as Sakura came to and allowed her arms to be guided into the shirt’s sleeves.

Sasuke spent a minute admiring the fan on her back, pride burning in his chest at the thought of Sakura as the Uchiha matriarch. A small part of him idly wondered if his mother would be pleased to see her position passed on to Sakura. He liked to think she would.

Sakura turned towards him, feeling a tug in her chest at the vulnerability in Sasuke’s expression. She wasn’t sure what kind of proposal she had expected from Sasuke - hell, she hadn’t even been certain she should expect one at all. At least, not for a while. She certainly hadn’t imagined one of the happiest moments of her life to come in the middle of a freezing cave in Rain after treating a minor epidemic, getting ambushed by a plucky squad of overambitious rogue nin, and nearly drowning in a monsoon.

So yes, she hadn’t expected a proposal to come in this type of situation, but she had known her answer to this question for nearly a decade.

“Yes.”

#sasusaku #sasusaku fanfiction #sasusaku proposal #sakura haruno #sasuke uchiha #naruto fanfiction #sasusaku blank period #blank period fanfiction #sasusaku fanfic

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exhaustedfander · 4 years ago

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Hideaway: Chapter Eight

a03 link

1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / ?

word count: 2,140

*Emerges from the grave* I'm not dead! Hey guys, I know it's been forever and I really didn't know if this story was ever going to continue but I'm back with intentions of continuing till the end. I can't promise when each chapter is going to come out or the regularity because I've fallen out of the Sanders Sides fandom to a degree, but I have missed this story and I'm really excited to continue it.

In case anyone needs a quick recap, this begins just after the events of "Putting Other First", in which Roman and Logan are both very burnt out and Roman asks Logan to come with him into The Imagination for 'just a little while.' While in the castle that Roman has built, they spend many intimate moments while simultaneously avoiding their feeling for each other and their self-worth issues.

In their absence, Virgil and Patton grow concerned about them and ask Janus and Remus if they've seen them. In the end, after a tense conversation, Patton and Janus stay behind to keep an eye on Thomas while Virgil and Remus venture into The Imagination to try and retrieve them.

“Do you think Remus and Virgil have found them yet?”

Patton sits on the sofa, Janus draped over his lap with a book in his hand. He sets the book aside, his attention set on the fatherly figment, Patton’s face drawn in deep worry.

“I don’t know,” he answers, before adding, “But I’m sure they’re alright. Roman and Logan are bound to stick together. And I can’t see Virgil leaving Remus’s side.”

It’s become more and more difficult lying to Patton. Janus finds it almost humorous; he’s Deceit, for Christ’s sake. He should be able to lie to Patton with ease, as there are certainly times in which it’s definitely necessary. Considering their troubled past, and Patton’s previous outright hatred towards all things fibbing, it’s laughable that Janus struggles as much as he does these days.

But he reminds himself, they’re partners now. It was one thing lying to Patton when they were ‘enemies’, and another entirely when they grew closer. But now? Janus has a hard time choking down a mere fib, and this is one of those instances.

He isn’t sure that they’re alright, not at all. He certainly hopes so. He’s put faith in Remus and Virgil to put aside their differences and find them. He doesn’t doubt that they’ll be successful, but the cost of such an outcome weighs heavily on his mind. Roman may very well not want to be found. And when it comes to Logan, Janus just can’t be sure.

Regardless, at most, this is a white lie. Small and, as of now, fairly harmless. He wants to reassure Patton that everything will work out fine and wants even more so to reassure himself of this. Patton’s been on the cliff’s edge of despair of these last few days, Janus is doing everything to stop him from slipping over. But… there’s only so far, a person can go, only so far you can try to comfort those you love, and he knows this. It would be foolish to believe he could irradicate every one of Patton’s doubts. Still, he can’t help but wish for it.

“You’re probably right,” Patton responds after a moment. He’s lying too. Janus can taste the bitterness falsehood in his mouth, and the look in Patton’s eyes gives it all away.

He presses a kiss to Patton’s cheek, curling up in his embrace, his book, for the time being, all but forgotten.

Hurry Remus, he prays silently, Please, keep an eye on him, Virgil. Bring them home.

=+=

“Roman? R-Roman, what’s going on?” Logan asks urgently, swiveling his head around the now pitch-black field. The moment darkness enveloped the land, the unicorns scattered, whinnying as they ran deep into the thicket of the forest.

“I– its. It’s so dark.”

“Yes, I can see that.” Logan says, “Why is it dark? Where did the daylight go?”

Roman goes very quiet and though it’s difficult to do so in the dark, Logan can just barely make out the look of horror that’s spread across his face.

“Roman. Roman, what’s happening?”

“We need to leave,” he says after another moment of stunned silence.

“What?”

“We can’t be here,” Roman insists, grabbing for Logan’s hand and holding tight, “We need to go. Back to the castle.”

“Why? I don’t understand what’s going on,” Logan says, surprised to find Roman physically pulling him in the direction of the castle, “Roman– wait. What is the meaning of this? What's frightening you?”

“I– I don’t know. Logan, I don’t know, I- I don’t know what’s happening. But I know we need to get out of here. Something’s very wrong.”

Desperate for answers though he is, Logan, cannot ignore the way Roman’s voice wavers with utter terror.

“Will doing so help? Will it help you to understand what’s happening?” “I’m– Logan it’s dark. It’s s-so dark. I don’t like it.”

“Okay,” Logan says finally, conjuring a flashlight. He expects that Roman would’ve done so sooner, were it not for his frazzled state of mind, “We’ll go somewhere light. Come on.”

Roman grips his hand almost painfully as they hurry back to the castle. The lights all flick on in unison as they make it through the doors. Roman let’s go of his hand, sagging against the wall, his chest heaving.

“Hey, hey,” Logan says uneasily, watching as his friend struggles, “It’s alright. We’re back where it’s light, you’re going to be alright.”

Not long ago, Logan’s sure he’d insist that there’s no need to be afraid of something as harmless as the dark. People’s minds simply wander towards the worst-case scenarios when they’re in pitch-blackness. Furthermore, he’s certain that Roman in almost any circumstance would be appalled to have revealed the depth of this fear. Regardless, though, they’re here now and Logan will not point out any of those factors.

If he thinks about it for a moment, there may be a good reason to be afraid of this particular darkness. Roman hadn’t seemed to understand its causation the least bit a few minutes ago and he significantly doubts that’s changed much.

“Something’s not right. It’s wrong, Lo. Lo, it’s wrong,” Roman pants, his breath catching in his throat. “It’s dark and– and something doesn’t feel right. It – it feels like there’s someone…”

“Someone who, what? Roman, I don’t understand what you’re telling me.”

Roman’s eyes widen, the expression of terror on his face worsening.

“Someone’s here.”

The moment the whisper exits his lips, Roman’s body goes slack. He pitches backward, his back hitting the wall hard with a smack, and try though he does, Logan isn’t quick enough to try and stop him from sliding to the floor. Hastily, he kneels in front of Roman, searching him over as thoroughly as he can.

“Roman, are you injured? Did something happen?”

He racks his brain, trying to think about a moment in which Roman was out of his sight long enough to have harm done to him. But they’ve been together since they woke up and Logan can’t fathom how Roman might’ve found himself in some kind of parrel. He’s clearly in deep distress, and Logan’s trying to figure out why that might be as quickly as he can. Roman offers no answer.

“Are you ill?” He ventures thinking that might be somewhat more plausible, “Do you feel unwell?”

Roman shakes his head fiercely. He’s shaking like a leaf.

"No,” he bites out as the word hurts him. Logan’s trying to help him up but it’s as though Roman’s body has gone numb, the shivers that rack him only growing worse as each second passes. “No, it’s not– I’m not sick. Can’t you see; there is something amiss. They’re here, a-and, and they don’t want us to be here. They want to take us.”

Logan is not convinced Roman is well. Not with that wild, unfathomable save for terror look in his blown-out pupils and the shivers that refuse to leave him.

He thinks he should do something. what it is exactly is escaping him, but Roman is panicking and there must be some solution here.

Roman buries his head between his knees, clutching them tightly and making himself as small as possible. Logan’s heart hasn’t stopped hammering since the sun seemed to decide it would shine no longer.

“Roman. Please, you mustn’t be feeling well. Do you have, a fever, perhaps?” Carefully, Logan reaches to touch Roman’s forehead, only for the princely side to jerk away, suddenly standing on unsteady feet.

“I said, I’m not sick! It has to be a monster! A terrible, deadly beast! That’s the only explanation as to why I feel so… so…”

“So?”

“Afraid,” he mutters, “I’m afraid, Logan. You– you can’t let them take me, Logan! Or you! They can’t take us. They can't.”

For a moment, Logan’s mind turns to fellow sides. Roman couldn’t be referring to them with such dread… right? No, surely not. He and Roman aren’t exactly on the best of terms with them at the moment, but the state of their relationship would never warrant that worrying look in Roman’s eyes.

Unsure of himself, Logan says, “I won’t let anything happen to you, Roman. You’re safe here. I’ll keep you safe.”

He doesn’t have a clue what he might be keeping Roman safe from. Looking out the window, it’s hard to assess incoming danger in the sudden absence of the sun. but this Roman’s realm, a place he’s always been most in his element. As far as he’s aware, Roman’s felt content in this place and he doesn’t know why that would ever change.

Before he knows what’s happening, Roman is in his lap with his toned arms winding around his waist. He buries his face in Logan’s neck, shaking as the logical side holds him close. It’s strange, how familiar embracing Roman has become and, in turn, being embraced by him. Logan had never intended to become so accustomed to physical intimacy but now that he has, he hardly thinks it possible to stop.

If cradling him and promising protection might keep these unknown demons at bay, Logan will do so. When Roman’s head is clearer, he’ll try to get some information out of him. Surely there must be some way to understand what’s become of the sun – or the moon for that matter, for she too has vanished.

=+=

“What the fuck is going on?” Is the first thing Virgil asks when the lights go out. Remus must know, he thinks; he’s a part of Thomas’s creativity, for crying out loud! But when Virgil turns to him, his face now illuminated by the torch that’s he’s conjured, Remus looks as confused as he does.

“I don’t know,” Remus says, holding the torch of green fire in front of him, staring out into the otherwise inky blackness, “What did he do?”

“What did who do? What’re you talking about?”

“Roman,” Remus answers, “What the hell did my brother do? The timing in this place has always been weird but the suns never disappeared before.”

From his limited knowledge of The Imagination, Virgil can attest to that. He’s been here countless times with Roman, and a few with Remus, back in the day, and nothing like this has ever happened. He’d noticed the sun rising and setting at a hard to pin down rate, but this is just plain freaky.

“Do… do you think Roman knows what’s going on either?”

“He might, but–.” He pauses, a grave look settling over his face. “Virgil.”

“Yeah?”

“Does something feel wrong here?”

“Okay, you already know I’m anxious all the time, so I don’t know what you’re– oh. Huh. Are those…?”

“Eyes?”

“Uh-huh,” Virgil says, noticing what must be dozens of pairs of glowing emerald green eyes in the bushes and shrubbery around them. “Are they you’re doing?”

“Not this time, Storm Cloud.”

Virgil spares a second to dwell on the use of a nickname he hasn’t heard from Remus in what must be years now before realizing, far more troublingly, that Remus looks unnerved. He isn’t the type to be afraid of things in The Imagination or just period, yet his eyes are wide as he takes in the sights and sounds that seem to be closing in on them.

“Stuff like this isn’t usually anywhere near Roman’s side, right?”

“Nope. He’s got unicorns and fairies and shit. You think these are unicorns and fairies?”

Considering the sinister look in those many sets of eyes and the growls and snarls erupting from the greenery, Virgil’s inclined to say, Nah, not wholesome fairytale creatures.

Virgil had gone into this situation knowing all was far from well, but this exceeds those expectations by a lot. He’d thought maybe a standoff between Logan and Roman would be evident, but he’d never worried that The Imagination itself might be hostile.

“Remus, what’re we supposed to do?”

“We’re gonna find Logan and my shit-head brother is what we’re gonna do,” Remus says, suddenly brandishing his morning star.

“But what about–.”

“What, this? C’mon, we can handle this. Just stick close.”

And as much as Virgil wants to head in the opposite direction, what choice has he got? They can’t return back to the mindscape emptyhanded and what if these creatures are, like, trapping Logan and Roman here or something? He seriously doubts that train of thought, but there’s no going back, not when they’ve already made it to Roman’s side of The Imagination. They’re here to do something, and goddamn it, they’re gonna do it.

It doesn’t stop Virgil’s heart from racing as Remus slips a hand into his, giving him a squeeze. Whether or not Remus is trying to comfort him or himself, Virgil doesn’t have a clue, but either way, he’s not letting go. Not right now.

One step at a time, hand-in-hand, they walk into the lion’s den.

=+=

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7-wonders · 5 years ago

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Memento Mori

Summary: When being in the wrong place at the wrong time lands (Y/N) in the blood-stained hands of D.C.’s most notorious crime boss, Duncan Shepherd, she finds herself unexpectedly in his debt. Perhaps owing the dangerous man a favor would be more torturous if he weren’t so engaging.

Word Count: 3286

A/N: Here it is! The first chapter of my crime boss Duncan fic. I’m SO excited to share this labor of love with you all, and I sincerely hope that you enjoy it. Feedback is always much appreciated and, if you feel so inclined, I would love if you left a like or a reblog.

(special thanks to Caitlin @divinelangdon for helping me with this!)

EDIT: *clears throat* as far as I am aware, Mallory @lvngdvns was the first to write a mob AU for THIS fandom. Thanks, Mal. I’d like to remind everyone that mob AUs are not a new concept, so y’all can hop off my dick.

Chapter 1: King of the Underground

It’s not a route that she would normally take home after classes, but today, (Y/N) (Y/L/N) is running late. The maintenance man is supposed to be at her apartment to fix the kitchen sink in twenty minutes, and it will most assuredly be another week before he can repair it if she doesn’t get home to let him in. This shortcut, through alleyways and past abandoned buildings, is a tour of the dark underbelly of Washington D.C. It’s one that she doesn’t get to dwell on when running late; instead, she walks quickly and clutches her keys in her hand tightly, eyes up and darting back and forth vigilantly.

After taking this way home twice previously to today, (Y/N) quickly learned which alleys to avoid and which were safer to go down. The alley next to the butcher was safe, the stench of rotting meat causing even the most nefarious of characters to stay away. Bypassing the bridge meant she could dodge the junkies that traded drugs and needles there, and the abandoned set of warehouses were considered too “haunted” and “creepy” for most to venture into. With the rain that drenches the city today and (Y/N)’s lack of an umbrella, these deserted buildings provide the perfect cover as she tries to race home.

(Y/N)’s never seen another person in or around this empty strip, only mice and other small creatures. That’s why it’s so shocking when, as she walks quickly along the back wall, she hears voices from one of the rooms. Ducking behind a wall, she peeks in through a crack in the boards that had hastily been put up to cover a large hole.

It’s difficult for (Y/N) to comprehend what she’s seeing at first. A man with shaggy hair is on his knees, hands raised pleadingly in the air as he trembles. Others are positioned around the room, blocking exits and providing what she assumes is security. Security for what, she can’t be certain, since the most danger looks to be the man standing above what must be his prisoner.

“You seem to think that I’m some sort of idiot, Malakai,” the man with the artfully messy brunette hair says nonchalantly, as if he’s discussing the weather.

‘Malakai’ shakes his head furiously as he stutters, “No, sir, never!” The man in question walks a slow circle around his captive, teeth bared in a savage grin as he takes glee in the scared reaction that he evokes.

“Hmm, then why did you believe that it wouldn’t get back to me that you were attempting to make deals with people who are determined to take me, and my family, down?” The hostage pales, obviously not thinking he knew. “An amateur mistake; somebody makes a deal, and they foolishly believe that I don’t have eyes and ears everywhere around this city.”

“I-it was an accident, Mr. Shepherd, I promise.” (Y/N) slaps a hand over her mouth, stifling the gasp that threatens to force its way out.

She hasn’t lived in Washington D.C. her entire life, having only moved to the area for school. However, even somebody from the other end of the country would know the Shepherd family name. Although it’s never been said outright, it’s very much implied that the powerful family is involved in more than just politics. Their sudden prominence within the circles of the elite, the roots that spread everywhere, their influence on matters that don’t pertain to politics: it’s easy to make the inference that the Shepherds are involved in some “darker” activities.

(Y/N)’s heard rumors of what the Shepherd family is capable of. Drugs, weapons, disappearances, murder, and corruption are just the beginning of an extremely long list of grievances. This man, with his hand on his captive’s shoulder and a look that screams revenge, must be the head of the Shepherd family.

“An accident,” he teases, reassuming his previous spot in front of the man on his knees. “Unfortunately, you know all too well that we can’t have accidents.”

A gunshot cracks through the air, the bullet quickly and efficiently leaving a hole in the middle of ‘Malakai’s’ head. His eyes roll back into his head slowly as his body slumps forward, blood pooling from the wound on his head. The man who was doing the interrogating, Mr. Shepherd, glances disdainfully down at the blood before stepping back to avoid staining his shoes.

“I’ve told you time and time again that I don’t like a messy job, Langdon,” he calls to someone that (Y/N) can’t see.

If (Y/N) hadn’t just witnessed a murder, her first time ever seeing someone’s life taken from them, she would stick around to see who he’s talking to. She stumbles back in shock, unable to take her eyes off of the corpse lying on the other side of the repaired wall. Since she’s not looking, she doesn’t see the mouse that scurries over her foot. The shriek of fear that she attempts to hold back isn’t as muffled as she thought it would be under her hand, causing the heads of everyone in the room to snap up as they look for the source of the sound.

She holds her breath, hoping that the crack she was spying through is too small for somebody to look through if they’re not right up against it. Her heart, along with her hope, sinks when she makes eye contact with the pair of stormy blue eyes belonging to Mr. Shepherd.

“Shit,” he gasps.

She runs before her brain even realizes what she’s doing, sprinting faster than she can remember running in a long time. Footsteps pound behind her, the echoing sound ironically reminding (Y/N) of gunshots. Once she bursts outside, she immediately searches for an exit that will give her the best chance of evading a horde of murderers. Ducking down, she crawls through a large gap in the bottom of a chain link fence. Those chasing her aren’t deterred, and one quick glance over her shoulder (stupid, she thinks, you’re lucky you didn’t trip over your own feet) confirms that they’ve decided jumping the fence is easier.

(Y/N) skids to a stop when she sees that a brick wall blocks her path to freedom. Making a split-second decision, she climbs up onto the dumpster and jumps. Her hands make purchase on the lip of the brick wall, and she summons all of the upper-arm and core strength that she has to start pulling herself up and over. It’s a struggle, and she tries to keep her legs tucked to her chest to prevent whoever’s chasing her from grabbing at her. She’s underestimated how tall these men (or women) are, and shrieks when her nails claw at the brick as she’s yanked down from the wall.

Her head cracks painfully against the pavement as she’s unceremoniously thrown to the ground. Scrambling back on her elbows, (Y/N) stares up at the two burly men who have managed to get her before she could make it over the wall. Hoping that they’ll show her some mercy, she holds up her hands in an ‘I surrender’ gesture. The men look at each other for a moment, as if debating what to do with her, and (Y/N) watches them optimistically.

A swift punch to the face knocks her out.

She doesn’t jolt awake in one smooth movement, eyes wide and glancing fearfully around. Instead, conscious returns slowly for (Y/N) (Y/L/N). Like pieces of a puzzle being fitted together, the blackness that had enveloped her is replaced, bit by bit, by a state of awareness. She tries to move when she realizes that she’s awake, but her arms refuse. Cold bites at her wrists, the telltale weight of some sort of metal weighing her down. Although her neck aches when she turns her head, protesting after sleeping in such an awkward position, she looks down and notices that she’s handcuffed to a chair.

Blinking quickly to adjust her vision to the shadows that envelop everything, (Y/N) tries to steady her breathing and not panic as she catalogues the room. This definitely isn’t the same room where she saw a man murdered. It’s small, maybe 8x8, and everything’s made of concrete. The walls, the ceiling, the floors: the room looks to be the same flat gray color. A small cart sits in the corner of the room, the only other furnishing besides the chair (Y/N)’s currently bound to. She kicks her legs uselessly, huffing when she sees that they’re bound by rope. Not that her legs being freed would do anything, since the chair is bolted to the floor, but it would still be a bit of a comfort.

She doesn’t need a mirror to know that there’s blood on her face, probably from the punch that knocked her out. Her nose feels off, like it was broken when she was hit. Maybe it is broken; of course, that won’t matter if she’s killed in this small room.

Quick footsteps sound in whatever hallway connects to the room (Y/N)’s being held hostage in, making her stare at the door as she tries to figure out what’s going to happen. Will this person save her, free her from her binds and lead her out of this mess? Or will they end her life quickly, using whatever method this mafia decides to be quickest and easiest?

The bright fluorescent lights flicker on as the door opens, momentarily blinding her. The man that stands before her is tall, his all-black ensemble making him look even more imposing. Two others, a man and a woman, stand behind him (the security detail for these deadly mafia personnel is a little ridiculous). He moves towards her slowly, each move calculated in its fluidity. What scares (Y/N) about this man isn’t the knife that he slowly twirls between his fingers; it’s his cold blue eyes that are completely devoid of any emotion.

His long blond hair, expertly draped over his shoulders, shines as he teasingly drags the flat edge of his knife down her cheek with a chilling smile. “You’ve caused quite a bit of trouble for my boss, are you aware of that?”

“I promise you that I had no clue what was going to happen,” she says seriously, eyes wide and pleading.

“That’s funny, all the little mice seem to say the same thing when they’re caught in a trap,” he hisses, tapping her nose harshly to make her wince in pain. “Now, you’re going to tell me who you’re working for, or your nose is going to be the least of your worries.”

“I’m not working for anybody,” (Y/N) insists. He nods as if he understands, but she can tell he’s only humoring her once he rears his hand back and smacks her across the face.

Her ears ring as her vision whites out for a moment, leaving her unable to hear the cry of pain that rips from her chest. She’s bleeding, that much is obvious. The large rings on this man’s hand must have opened up a couple of cuts on her now-swollen lip. He smirks, tangling his fingers in her hair and yanking her head back.

“I don’t like to repeat myself, (Y/N).” She doesn’t have time to wonder how he knows her name when she notices the knife he’s holding is now pressed against her chest. “Who do you work for?”

“Nobody, I promise! I was running late to get home--” shit, the maintenance man must be long gone by now, “--and I took a shortcut that I always take when I’m late. I had never seen somebody in that strip of warehouses before, so I stopped to see what was going on. I didn’t know what was happening until that guy got shot.”

“Well then, this must all be one big misunderstanding.”

She nods gratefully. “Yes! Thank you so much, you have no clue--” a searing pain erupts above her eyebrow, and she groans in pain. Her eyesight goes blurry in her left eye, and it’s only when she blinks enough to see the red tint that she realizes she’s bleeding.

(Y/N) watches in disgust as he lifts his stained knife to his lips and cleans the blood off of it with his tongue. He hums delightedly, leaning in close enough that his breath stings the array of cuts. His hot tongue laves at the still-bleeding cut, sampling her blood until it finally clots.

“Mmm, you’re just my type,” he jokes. In the blink of an eye, his amused expression changes to one of anger as he slams his hands on the arms of the chair. “Tell me who you work for!”

“I’ve already told you!” She earns another smack to the face for that, blood dribbling down her chin as she grimaces.

“Langdon,” a voice sounds from the door that she hadn’t heard open, making (Y/N) jump in her restraints. The man that she saw interrogate his now-dead victim stands behind the blond, a hand rubbing at the stubble on his face. “What did I say about making messes?”

Langdon sighs, rolling his eyes. “But it’s just so much more fun when I get to spill a little blood.” Regardless of his personal feelings, he moves for the door when Mr. Shepherd gives him a pointed look.

(Y/N) glares at Mr. Shepherd as he examines her in silence once Langdon has left. The security, she notices with a sideways glance, remains posted against the door. He fiddles with the sleeves of his expensive leather jacket, and she hopes it’s her defiant look that’s making him show a trait very uncharacteristic to someone who’s supposed to be a mob boss.

“It’s a shame my associate felt the need to bloody up such a pretty face.” He goes to stroke his hand along her face, stopping when (Y/N)’s spit lands on his cheek. Chuckling, he shakes his head. “Now (Y/N), there’s no need to be so hostile.”

“Give me one good reason.”

He doesn’t speak, instead grabbing a key out of his pocket and unlocking the cuffs that bind her hands behind her back. They fall off easily with a quick shake of her wrists as she pulls them forward and rubs at the chapped skin there. Mr. Shepherd takes out a knife and kneels, cutting the ropes tying her feet together. It’s an obvious ploy at attempting to gain her trust, but it’s one that, she reluctantly admits, works.

He holds out his hand, “Allow me to properly introduce myself. Duncan Shepherd.”

(Y/N) eyes his hand warily, hesitantly shaking it before snatching her hand out of his grip. “I would introduce myself, but you seem to already know who I am.” She falters when Duncan Shepherd sheathes his knife, thrown off by this sudden change. “You’re not...going to kill me? Or you are, just not with that.”

“It wasn’t at all difficult to find out everything about you from a few simple background checks. I figured, either you’re telling the truth or you’re the worst informant my enemies have hired yet.”

“You couldn’t have checked my identity before you sent your goon to rough me up?”

“I apologize for that, but it’s just protocol. As you may imagine, my profession leaves very little room for leeway.” Duncan smiles at her, setting his hands on the arms of the chair in the same way that Langdon did mere minutes before. “You do know what my profession is, don’t you (Y/N)?”

“Vaguely,” she says dryly, peeved at how he insists on repeating her name. “I’m not too acquainted with the sort of business you’re involved in.”

“So I heard,” he smirks. (Y/N) tries to steady her thumping heart, which had decided it was off to the races when Duncan’s eyes, which she could see now were varying shades of dark and light blue that created a hypnotic combination, twinkled in the fluorescent light and his smile showed off the slight dimple on his cheek. How pathetic of me, just because he’s cute doesn’t mean he’s not a mafia boss. “You really shouldn’t take shortcuts through notoriously bad areas. You never know what kind of trouble you could get into.”

“Oh, I think I have a pretty good idea.”

Duncan stands up straight, allowing (Y/N) to feel slightly more comfortable now that she’s not directly breathing the same air as he is. Frowning slightly, he turns to the security posted at the door and mutters something, the woman nodding and disappearing out of the door. (Y/N) and Duncan remain silent until she returns, a bowl of water and a clean towel in her hands. Taking the supplies from her, Duncan wrings the towel out and holds it out as an offering.

“Either you clean yourself up or I do it for you,” he says when he senses her reluctance, waiting expectantly until she finally gives in and grabs it from him. He watches her closely, examining every wince she makes as she tries to clean the blood off of her already-bruising face. “Hmm, now what do we do with you?”

The blood rushes out of (Y/N)’s face as her heart drops. “What do you mean? You know I’m telling the truth, so let me go.”

“I could do that, but you did witness a murder. Who’s to say that you won’t run to the police the second I let you walk outside?”

She wants to deny it and emphatically say that she would never do that, but they both know that would be a lie. Out of the frying pan and into the fire, (Y/N) thinks bitterly.

“The obvious answer, of course, would be to just kill you.” Duncan looks at her, taking pride in how she doesn’t even attempt to hide the fear on her face. “However, I believe you’ll be much more useful alive than dead.”

“‘Useful’ how?” Everything she’s seen in movies and TV shows about the mafia has her mind racing with the worst possible thoughts.

He ignores (Y/N)’s question, choosing instead to pull himself to his full height in some sort of a power move. “Prove to me that you won’t go to the authorities, and this whole matter will be forgotten.”

“How am I ever supposed to prove that to you?” (Y/N) asks hopelessly.

He shrugs. “We’ll find something that benefits the both of us.” At the horrified look on her face, Duncan shakes his head quickly. “No, nothing like that. I may be the head of one of the most influential families in Washington D.C., but I’m still a gentleman.”

“So then…”

“Think of it like running errands. Collecting dues, running product, gathering information on my behalf. You’d make a good little spy if you had the right training.” He goes to touch (Y/N)’s cheek, and she smacks his hand away belligerently.

“Don’t,” she warns. Duncan takes a step back, holding his hands up to teasingly show his harmlessness before he folds them behind his back.

“My associates will be in touch when we get something worked out.”

“Wait!”

Duncan ignores her call, instead motioning to his security to open the door for him. Before he makes his exit, he whispers something to the male guard. With one last nod of acknowledgement in (Y/N)’s direction, Duncan leaves her alone in the room again. This time, her vision isn’t cut off with a punch; it’s with a black cloth bag forced over her head.

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#Duncan Shepherd #duncan shepherd imagine #duncan shepherd imagines #duncan shepherd x reader #hoc #hoc imagine #house of cards #ahs #american horror story #michael langdon #michael langdon imagine

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izaswritings · 4 years ago

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all that’s left in the world | chapter five

Title: all that’s left in the world—

Synopsis: —is me.

Neku’s been shot and Shibuya is threatening to go the same way as Shinjuku, but just because the first Game is over doesn’t mean they’ve forgotten how to play.

Or: Neku deals with a nightmare city and his most annoying (and mathematical) partner yet; Shiki and Joshua commit an escalating number of illegal moves, Beat and Eri hunt down a stray Reaper, and Rhyme watches and waits for the counter-attack. Shibuya refuses to go down easy.

Fandom: The World Ends With You | TWEWY

Warnings: references to past canonical character death, self-esteem issues, vague descriptions of an apocalyptic event (Shinjuku at the moment of Inversion, etc), and Joshua, again. Please let me know if there’s anything I missed.

AO3 Link is here!

Previous chapters are here!

part five: joshua

Joshua opens his eyes to a wasteland.

Beside him Shiki Misaki has fallen to her knees in the dust and dirt, hacking up half a lung; Joshua politely gives her a moment to collect herself like the very considerate and understanding person he is, and steps forward, scanning their surroundings with a frown. Empty streets filled with white dust that clings to his hand like snow; the air smells of nothing, devoid even of the stench of smoke. A low fog has settled over the city, so gray and dense it could be mistaken for a storm, the buildings vacant shells and the roads worn smooth and featureless. It’s more than a ghost town—it’s a city hollowed, its heart destroyed, and Joshua frowns momentarily, picking up his phone, fiddling with the settings.

For the first time, no call goes through. “Interesting,” Joshua decides, and tugs at one lock of hair, twining the strand around his finger.

“W-what is?” Shiki asks, and Joshua tilts his head and snaps his phone closed. Her breath catches. Ah, she’s noticed the city. “Where are we?”

“Shinjuku, I believe,” Joshua says, and even though he’d guessed as much the sight makes him frown, disgruntled. Joshua’s always liked a good Game, but this one promises to try his patience. “Well. What’s left of it, anyway.”

Her eyes scan the wasteland, expression faltering. “That’s impossible,” she says, though she seems half-convinced already. Quick to adapt, isn’t she? Maybe this partnership 2.0 won’t be so boring after all. “That’s... how could this be Shinjuku?”

“Inversion,” Joshua sighs, and when Shiki’s brow furrows at the term he giggles and waves his hand. “A UG phrase. The RG and UG have merged here. The planes have gotten all tangled together—too many frequencies at once.” And, actually, liable to give Joshua a headache. He misses Shibuya’s song already. Ironic, considering his plans for it just last month. “Noise manifest in the RG, reality gets unstable...”

She’s pale. “And this is where Neku is?”

“Mm-hmm.” Joshua shrugs. “Unfortunate, isn’t it?”

“Yeah...” Joshua blinks at her, but Shiki has already stepped away, looking up and down the empty street. “I don’t understand. Where are all the people? And the stores...” She peers into a shop window and blinks fast. “Huh?”

“Oh?” Joshua steps up beside her, peering through the window, and then leans back, hands in his pockets and eyebrows raised. “My, my. That’s certainly something.”

The shop is empty. Not just devoid of people, but of anything—the mannequins stripped featureless and bare, even the fake features wiped away. The hangers hold nothing. The stands are empty. Even the picture frames on the wall, the art and decor put up just for flavor, have become hollow, the frames undecorated, the pictures turned to white noise.

Joshua lifts his hand, curious, and presses it against the glass. Against the blank slate of the store, he and Shiki and the colors they wear seem almost like a spotlight. Shinjuku is grey and cold around them, featureless and repetitive. Scrubbed clean of any life at all.

Joshua takes his hand back, frowning outright now. “Hm.”

“That’s so creepy,” Shiki says, drawing back a step. She shivers. “It’s like... anything that would have stood out, or anything that would have meant something...”

“A clean slate,” Joshua agrees, and rests his chin in his hand, thoughtful.

Shiki looks away, apparently unable to keep looking into the empty shop for long. “Is this... normal?” she asks, squinting up at the sky, like if she tries hard enough she’ll be able to see the sun. “For, uh... Inversions?”

Joshua giggles. “I have no idea.” It’d be a delightful mystery, if the situation weren’t so dire. He sobers. “This is the first time I’ve seen it myself. Though, I will admit...” He casts a glance at the sky, too. His eyes narrow. For a moment, there in the clouds... hm. “This doesn’t quite match up with the stories I’ve heard.”

“Creepy,” Shiki repeats.

“Quite.”

She rubs at her arms. “...Let’s go look for Neku.”

Ah, yes. Neku.

Joshua looks back at the shop, no longer smiling. His reflection in the display glass is pale and dim, faintly opaque. As if he isn’t quite there at all. He rubs at his arm, and wonders what Shiki would say if he told her Composers weren’t meant to stay outside of Their city.

Well, what’s done is done—he’s agreed to this, after all, and her reaction probably won’t be all that entertaining. Shiki Misaki, Joshua thinks, is too accepting. Adaptable to an annoying degree. At least Neku had a few moments of wanting to strangle someone before he compromised.

How funny, he thinks. The memory almost makes him want to smile, except he doesn’t feel like laughing at all.

In the dusty glass of the shop window, his own expression looks strange to him. Joshua turns away. He shakes his head and tugs at one bang, then drops his hand and sighs. “Yes,” he says, light. “Works for me. Lead the way, dear.”

She frowns at him, and he smiles back at her uncertain side-eye. And as Shiki picks her way across the city, and Joshua trails after her, he curls his hands to a careful fist, feeling the quiet tremor in his fingers with every step away from Shibuya, and cheerfully pretends that it hasn’t started after all.

It doesn’t take long for the first problem to rear its head. Ten minutes into the Game, Joshua and Shiki encounter their first Noise—and unlike how Noise are supposed to act, this one attacks on sight.

Joshua would suspect Taboo Noise, but no: normal Noise, just ten times more bloodthirsty. Shinjuku is getting more bothersome by the minute.

It takes a moment for them to work together—Joshua is back to summoning beams of light from his cellphone; Shiki apparently likes using her stuffed animal to rip the opposing side to shreds—but in the end, they sync up rather well, if Joshua is any judge. The Noise are nothing but static by the end. Joshua is half-way pleased. He’s missed this.

Shiki doesn’t look nearly so happy, however. At the end of their most recent battle, she kneels in the dust with the cat toy in her lap, staring down at it almost despondently. Joshua weighs his options, sighs, and goes to stand over her shoulder.

“Is this going to be a problem?”

“Maybe.” She opens her hands, glumly; Joshua looks down and tilts his head. “I forgot. Mr. Mew has a ripped seam. He’s fine for me to carry him, but...”

On second look... Joshua can see it. He presses his lips. “I hope you don’t expect me to do all the work,” he warns, coolly. “I hate working up a sweat, and this endeavor was your idea, Shiki.”

If she’s bothered by the over-familiar use of her first name, it barely even seems to register. Then again, she did offer. “Maybe I could stitch him up?” she wonders. “But I don’t have the right thread... I was going to buy some tomorrow...”

Joshua frowns at her, but Shiki isn’t even looking at him, mumbling under her breath. After a moment, he sighs—and reaches out, picking away one of the pins she’s clipped to her cardigan. He turns it in his hands, thoughtful. “Do you have any idea how you control him?”

She glances at him, startled, then looks uncertain. “Eh...”

He giggles, and flashes the pin at her. “Groove Pawn,” he tells her. “It’s a form of psychokinesis. You didn’t know?”

“Really?” She glances at the stuffed toy in her hands. “It always felt more like Mr. Mew was just doing his own thing.”

Interesting. “Maybe so, but without you to provide guidance, it wouldn’t be nearly as effective. It could be that your familiarity with the medium creates a stronger control of it... less direct commands, and more obeying of the implied commands—what you know you need?” Joshua tugs at his hair. “Hmm. You made him, yes?”

“Mr. Mew?” She hugs the stuffed animal to her chest. “Yes. Why?”

Joshua’s getting an idea. He smiles. “And your clothes?”

“I made those too, but why...?” She trails off, eyes widening. “You think—?”

“Worth a shot, isn’t it?”

She studies her sleeves, frowning slightly, considering. “I don’t know...”

“Try it,” Joshua cajoles. “Your pins will work here. The one nice thing about the merge between planes is that the Noise frequency isn’t needed to activate the pins. Lucky you.” Which is perhaps the only advantage they have in all this. But, regardless.

Shiki looks uncertain, but one last glance at Mr. Mew and her jaw firms. “Okay. I’ll give it a shot.” She rises to her feet, hand outstretched, and takes a breath. “Here goes!”

Silence. Nothing happens.

Joshua spins a strand of hair between his fingers. “...Have you considered—”

Thread cuts through the air like a whistling blade. Shiki screams.

Joshua, for his part, blinks over at what used to be a wall, and whistles through his teeth. “Wow,” he says, honestly impressed. “That’s going to be incredibly useful. Nice to see that you can pull your own weight after all, hm?”

Shiki doesn’t appear to be listening, but then, that’s little surprise. Her cardigan has been unraveled up to her elbow; the loose thread of the sleeve has reached long past its actual length and cut apart the air, slipping through stone like a hot knife through ice.

It’s like a net, Joshua thinks, and circles her, intrigued. It really is something. If she concentrates the threads, and focuses the force onto one impact point, she could cut right through the core of a larger Noise. Even the net of thread could cut apart quite a few of the smaller Noise, too... my, he thinks. Could she catch one? Fascinating.

His musing gets cut off by the loud, creaking groan of breaking stone. Shiki’s eyes go wide. Joshua looks up, startled, and steps back just in time to avoid a bit of rubble falling on his foot, as the building Shiki hit creaks, tilts, sways, and then ultimately tips back and falls apart into a burst of dust and debris.

Silence. Joshua stares. The building just behind the first, now walled off with ruin, also creaks, and then caves inward with a crash.

“Oh my god,” Shiki says, eyes wide and horrified behind her glasses. “Is that okay!?”

“…It’s fine,” Joshua says. A beat. He considers the rubble. “Well, maybe.”

There’s another pause, almost thoughtful. A wall on a third building goes loose and spills out onto the road. In the distance there is the sound of falling rocks. A small pebble rolls from the pile, taps Shiki’s shoe, and then falls sadly on its side.

Shiki covers her face.

“Useful, anyhow,” Joshua decides.

“Maybe this was a bad idea…” Shiki sighs, rubbing at her face. Then she lifts up her head— and at last seems to get a full look at her unraveled cardigan, because she blanches, and holds out her arms in horror. “Oh, no, my sleeve! I spent days on this!”

“I’m sure you can put it back.”

“Oh, you think?” She takes a breath, focusing again, and Joshua watches with interest as the thread pries loose from the rubble pile, pooling together and re-weaving back into the cardigan. Shiki peeks one eye open. “Did it work?” Pause. “It worked!”

Joshua claps for her. “Well done.”

She beams, then seems to remember who she’s smiling at and visibly falters. Joshua giggles at her. What a face!

“Um, thanks.”

“No problem at all.”

She tucks the stuffed cat in her arms, hugging it close as if in comfort, staring down at the ground. She bites her lip, then shakes her head and exhales hard. “I… never mind. I guess we should keep moving.”

He gestures. She looks at him for a very long moment, then nods and takes the lead, walking down into a small back-alley street.

Joshua follows leisurely behind her, one hand in his pocket and the other fiddling with his phone. He tries to place another call, but isn’t surprised when it fails once again. Well, he’s glad to still have the camera, at least, though he’ll have to be careful of its use. If he could find Shinjuku’s Room of Reckoning… though unfortunately, he has no idea where the Composer of Shinjuku might be located.

Hm.

He fiddles with it some more, as they walk, and the rest of the day passes by in routine—travel, fight the Noise that converge on them, move on. Joshua gets more in-tune with this new partner, and finds to some delight that their attacks mix well. Shiki is focused, direct, and methodical, as expected of her talent as a seamstress; she attacks her enemies one hit at a time until it falls, and then moves on to the next. Matched with Joshua’s habit of just blasting a general area and catching as many Noise as possible in the light, it covers a lot of ground. He flattens the ones he can without frying his phone—and she, in turn, picks off the stragglers.

After one such battle, Joshua touches to the ground and turns to smile at her, far more genuinely than before. He can say this for Shiki Misaki— in addition to being a living wrench in the works of Joshua’s plan, she’s also just a genuinely talented Player.

“This might just work,” he tells her, cheery, and toes a line in the soft dusting of ash lining Shinjuku’s streets. “I’ll admit, I had my doubts.”

She glances back at him, looking more confused than offended. “Then... why did you agree?”

“Hm.” Joshua tilts his head. “Why indeed?”

Silence, for a moment. Shiki’s expression flattens a little. “Okay. So you’re not going to tell me.”

It’s a little cruel, maybe, but this girl’s already thrown the first stone, back in the Shibuya River; really, this should be expected. “What makes you think you deserve the answer?”

His word choice is deliberate, and Shiki, of all people, sensitive enough to catch the subtext—her steps stutter, and she tugs the stuffed cat closer. “I... I didn’t mean it like that.” She eyes him again. Her fingers tighten. “You’re rude.”

He shrugs. “It’s an honest question. Really, Shiki, you haven’t changed much at all, have you?” He eyes her. “Wanting recognition is all well and good, but don’t go expecting it from me.”

She falters, steps stuttering in the dust. Joshua keeps walking, humming lightly. She doesn’t follow. He turns around. “We don’t have much time to waste,” he chides. “If you could, Shiki...?”

“How did you know that?” Her voice is tight. “How did you—”

“Composer,” he reminds her. “It’s my Game. I put in the entry fee requirement in the first place, you know.” Not for the reasons she probably thinks, but then, Joshua’s never claimed to teach kind lessons. “And you were Neku—my proxy’s—partner. Of course I kept an eye out.”

“Of course,” she echoes, a little hollowly. “So—so you know...”

That she is jealous? That she wants to be more than herself? That Shiki Misaki wants to be popular, and important, and at the center of it all? That she wants so much for herself she came to seethe at others who she thought stood above her?

Joshua knows a lot of things people wish he didn’t know.

“I do, yes.” He considers her, and sighs a little. She’s stepped on his toes, so to speak, but Joshua can relent where need be. “If it’s any consolation, you have changed.” Neku’s choice hadn’t been the only factor influencing Joshua’s unintended change of heart regarding Shibuya, though Joshua is never going to admit that out loud. “If this Game had an entry fee, yours would no longer be yourself.”

Green is a good color for Shiki Misaki. She’s still envious, even now. But it doesn’t fester in her anymore. She has come to learn her own strengths, started to realize her own Imagination— the value of herself. And Joshua will never, ever say it aloud, but he can admire that, a little. If all the world is secret gardens, then hers is finally growing again, no longer crushed beneath her own heel.

Shiki looks down like she can’t decide whether to be happy or offended about his words. Joshua shrugs and turns away. “It would probably be that ‘friend’ of yours,” he continues knowingly, and grins, a little wry. “Or maybe Neku?” The idea of Coco’s plot getting upended by something as a simple as an entry fee makes him snicker. “What a plot twist that would be, hm?”

“W-what?” And then her head snaps up, eyes wide behind the lens. “Wait, oh my gosh—entry fees— I completely forgot—” She stops, and visibly rewinds the conversation in her head. “There isn’t one?”

“Thankfully.” People really aren’t meant to play the Game more than once; Joshua shudders to think how much of Shibuya would have vanished if Neku’s fee had been taken again. “It’s more than the RG and UG merge. Whatever Game we’re playing...”

Shiki looks stunned. “There’s no Reapers.”

“Did you just notice? Well, anyway. That’s right. No Reapers, no walls, no mission mail...” Joshua frowns a little. “I’m... a little uncertain if anyone’s in charge of this Game at all.”

“What about that Reaper girl? Coco?”

“Let me reword. No one official, at any rate.” He leaves it at that, but deep down, Joshua can’t deny he’s getting uneasy. There is too much off—too much lack. A Composer encroaching on another’s territory is a heinous crime, and bringing an illegal Player with him? Even with his powers limited by sheer virtue of being outside Shibuya, that should have warranted some interaction, if nothing else. But no— instead they have been walking undisturbed, the city silent as a grave.

The Music gone.

It’s as if there is no Composer at all, Joshua thinks, but then—how is that possible? If the Composer were killed, both power and title would transfer to the killer; if the Composer were captured... well, the city still wouldn’t be like this. The power would live on and the Music continue. But this... what has happened to Shinjuku...

For once, Joshua can honestly admit he has no idea what’s going on. It’s kind of annoying.

“Either way,” Joshua says, with finality. “It’s not for you to know.” He smiles at her. “May we get moving again?”

And just like that, her hackles are back up. Sigh. “I’m just trying to be nice!” she snaps back, fierce. “Though I’m not sure you deserve it.” Her voice lowers. “You’re as bad as Neku was. We’re partners.”

“That’s a bit rude,” Joshua says, amused.

“Still. We made a pact. You could at least act like it. We have to work together!”

Joshua stares at her, a little disgruntled; Shiki crosses her arms and tilts up her chin and glares right back. For a moment Joshua considers pushing the issue, or perhaps ignoring her and continuing on anyway... and then, just as quickly, his annoyance fades, dull and tired. Joshua looks away first.

Shiki Misaki, Neku’s first partner in the game. Neku has learned a lot from her. And Joshua, though he is still only just able to admit this to himself, has learned from Neku in turn.

Joshua sighs heavily, the sound as loud as he can make it, and lifts a hand to his hair, tugging at the strands. “Oh, fine,” he says, only a little sullen, because he has learned something from his time playing his own Game and to pretend otherwise is probably beneath him, or something. “If you really want to know, I’m beginning to suspect this Game doesn’t have a Composer at all.”

Shiki looks a little stunned. Possibly she never expected him to admit anything; Joshua tries not to feel too offended about that. After all, if this were a month ago, she’d be right. (If this were a month ago, he wouldn’t have accepted her deal in the first place— but that’s not important either.) “Oh,” she says. “...Oh. Someone—someone killed Shinjuku’s Composer?”

Joshua clicks his tongue. “Not quite,” he says. “Killing the Composer wouldn’t cause an Inversion. Neither,” he adds when Shiki opens her mouth, “would kidnapping, or anything else of the like. This city has no Music. It’s silent. It is…” And this Joshua doesn’t like to admit, because the very idea is enough to make his skin crawl, but it’s the truth: “It’s as if it has no Imagination at all.”

“Um,” Shiki says. “Which is... bad?”

“You remember that storefront?” he asks her. “Yes, it’s bad. Imagination is what the entire UG runs on.”

“Oh. Oh.”

“Exactly.” He huffs, irritated. “Unfortunately, whatever happened, I’m rather in the dark. This event has very thoroughly erased any clues left behind.”

Shiki frowns, looking thoughtful. “Is there a place for Shinjuku like there was for Shibuya? A river?”

“Of sorts. I don’t know where it is, though.” Unfortunately. Joshua likes mysteries, actually, but it’s a bit more fun when there’s actual clues to follow.

“I remember the Noise around the river were pretty strong. The station underpass in general, too. Like they were just drawn there…” Shiki holds the stuffed cat in both hands, looking down at it. It’s almost as if she expects the cat to talk back to her; Joshua stifles a grin. “I wonder if we could ride on them.”

Joshua blinks. Backtracks. “On. The Noise?”

She looks a little red, but shrugs. “I mean, could we?”

He almost laughs, but then he makes the mistake of thinking about it. With the thread… and, well, Joshua understands the Noise better than anyone else, so…

There’s a long pause. Joshua looks over to the Noise, far off down the street. He thinks about it some more. And it is with great regret when he says, at last: “Mm. Better not.”

Mr. H would never let him live it down. Also, less importantly, “While stronger Noise tend to gather around the Composer’s place, it’s not exactly a homing beacon. It won’t lead us to the Composer.”

Disappointing, though.

Shiki hums, but seems to accept that, tapping her finger to her chin. “Then maybe...” She trails off, brow furrowing. “If not the Composer, we could find where it all centered? Like the Inversion? It had to start somewhere, right...?”

She sounds uncertain, but Joshua straightens up. He’s not entirely sure the issue of Shinjuku’s Composer and the Inversion are so directly linked, but if one mystery can’t be solved, it stands to reason they should move on to the next. “It must have.” He tilts his head, then grins. “Ah-ha. I have an idea.”

“What is it?”

Joshua is already on his phone, flipping through the settings. When she approaches, he generously doesn’t shoo her off. “Here,” he says, and tilts the screen to her. The idea has emboldened him; his foot taps lightly on the ground. Finally, a place to start. He has no doubt they’ll run into Neku on the way there, if he gets this right. Neku usually finds himself in the center of a disaster. “A while back I had a few... adjustments made to my phone. I never did remove them. This camera can take pictures of the past.” He waves the phone at her, grinning outright now. “Pick a direction, dear.”

Behind her glasses, Shiki’s eyes are wide. She claps her hands in front of her face. “Oh! So if the Inversion started somewhere, we can see what direction it came from?”

Her excitement is rather charming. Neku never got nearly as involved in the everyday mysteries as Joshua did; this response feels pretty gratifying, honestly. “Exactly! I’m impressed.”

She giggles, a little. “This is so exciting. I feel like I’m in a detective movie.” She spins on her heel, stuffed cat swinging from one hand, finger tapping her chin. She points down a random street, a once-main road turned hollow. “How about there?”

“As good a place to start as any, I suppose.” Joshua snaps the photo—he already knows the time they need, thankfully. Shiki leans over his shoulder; Joshua eyes her briefly, then sighs and lets it go. He opens the photo.

Oh, how fun. White light, the buildings crumbling, terrified people beginning to fade out... but it is vague, source-less, and impossible to tell the direction from which it’s coming from.

Shiki blinks at it, though, her eyes flicking from photo to the ruins and back again. “Oh, I know that building! Isetan department store… I went with Eri once.” She frowns a little. “Hmm. So we’re near the station?”

“Valuable info, but not quite what we were looking for… Well, two more photos left.” Joshua tilts the camera. “Choose wisely.”

“Uh... well, if we’re near the station, um, maybe the government building? Oh, where was it…” Shiki squints down a street. “There?”

Joshua snaps the photo, then sighs. Shiki frowns too. He’ll give her this much: she’d been right about the direction; he can see the tip of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building and even some of Park Tower, but beyond the vague reddish light and screaming people, nothing indicates the epicenter of the event. Tsk.

“Last one,” Shiki checks, and at Joshua’s nod, worries at her lip. “Hm...”

Joshua considers it. His finger taps against the case. After a moment, his eyes flicker up. He’s never known Shinjuku too well, even when he was alive; he’d stayed in Shibuya most of his life, and then the entirety of his afterlife. “Have you been to Shinjuku before?”

“Well... once or twice. Not as often as Shibuya. Uh, mainly around the station. Why?”

He frowns at the screen, not really seeing it. “Can you guess where the center of the city might be?”

“That’s...” She trails off. Her brow furrows. “Um. Maybe? One second.” She takes a deep breath. “Er... where’s Shibuya from here?”

This, Joshua could answer in his sleep. He is so aware of the city it nearly dizzies him; he smiles to hide the sudden tremor in his arms. Ah, it really does set in quick, doesn’t it?

“To our right,” Joshua says lightly, and cheerfully ignores the headache spiking behind his eyes.

“Okay.” She bites her lip. “Then... from there, to... and then turn left... by Golden Gai, maybe…?” She trails her eyes across the ruined landscape and finally settles for a direction slightly north-east from them. “There? I think. It’s hard to tell, with the buildings all... you know.”

“That’s good enough,” Joshua decides. He lines up the image. Then he pauses. For a moment he frowns. And then, not entirely sure why, he lifts the camera, taking in not just the street and the buildings but also the sky, high above.

He takes the shot.

His fingers tighten. His smile widens, but there’s no joy in it at all. “Bingo.”

“Yes!” She looks at the photo. Her eyes go wide. “...What?”

The photo is exactly what they need, but neither is it a welcome sight. The distant high-rise of the buildings is turning to dust and ash. People are cowering in the streets, covering their heads. A pale white light, tinged faintly bloody with red, shines out through all the streets with a piercing glow.

And high above, settled in the sky like a brand, the Reaper’s skull bears down on the city, blood red and burning bright.

“Interesting,” Joshua murmurs, and thumbs the phone off. “I believe we just got our first clue.”

Shiki bites her lip, then seems to shake herself. “We know where to start looking, now. So that’s good.” She brightens, a little. “And Neku’s sure to be there! He gets in too much trouble not to find it himself.” She’s smiling outright now, and pumps a fist to the air, triumphant, turning to Joshua with delight. “We did it!”

He giggles at her enthusiasm, and her smile falters, falling awkward and flat. Her eyes catch on his face and she seems to remember who she’s talking to for the first time. Her smile fades. Her fist lowers.

Joshua considers her, shrugs, and turns away to mess with his phone. His hands are still annoyingly shaky from earlier. He doesn’t speak. Shiki doesn’t say anything either. The silence stretches.

When it’s clear she’s not going to break, Joshua sighs again and closes his phone, looking down at the case briefly before tucking it back into his pocket. “You really don’t like me, do you?” Joshua muses, and tucks his hands in his pockets. “What stories Neku must have told you, I wonder.”

“He told me enough.” Her voice is quiet again. “But you already knew about that.”

He hums, not really answering. Another silence. This time, Shiki looks away.

“I can’t forgive you,” she announces, apropos of nothing, eyes on her stuffed animal. She hugs it close. “Which sounds silly, doesn’t it? Considering you never did anything to me. But even if Neku does forgive you, one day, I don’t think I ever will.” Joshua keeps his eyes on the skyline, and half an eye on her; he sees her fingers tighten. “I don’t know why you did it, and even if I did, I don’t think I really care.”

Something hardens in her voice. Joshua waits, patiently, for her to finish. “Your point?” he prompts.

Her jaw clenches, and for the first time she seems truly angry with him. “You hurt Neku. You hurt him— a lot. I remember that much. He was crying. I’d never seen him cry before. You did that.” I’m aware, Joshua thinks. Her eyes are fixed on the ground, now. “And you hurt him after it was over, too.”

Joshua frowns, briefly, the barest flicker of an expression, and Shiki looks up and smiles at the sight, an expression that is half-hearted and small and not very happy at all. “Yeah. I figured you didn’t know about that one. Neku doesn’t either, I don’t think. But he— he wanted to see you again, you know? No matter my feelings on it, that’s still true. Maybe he just wanted to hit you, or yell at you—um, maybe he just wanted answers?” She shrugs. “Maybe all three. But he did want to see you again. Whenever we meet up, he’s always getting distracted, looking for someone else. And I’m not stupid. I can guess.”

He has stayed silent thus far out of some amused hope of getting this out of her system; now Joshua is regretting that. There is something ashy on his tongue, settled cold in his throat. He takes a thin breath and exhales it slowly, like a test.

“You never came,” Shiki says, simply, a little harder. She’s looking at him, Joshua can tell, but he keeps his gaze turned away, fixed on the sky. “Maybe you meant that as a kindness? I don’t know. That doesn’t really matter either. Because it hurt him either way.”

Another pause. Joshua closes his eyes, opens them, and then finally looks back at her. She glares at him—not angry anymore, not really, just stubborn, stiff and holding her ground. He considers her.

“I don’t think you’re a bad person,” Shiki says, at last, reluctantly. Joshua raises an eyebrow at her. She huffs. “Which kind of makes it worse, maybe. But I don’t. Neku doesn’t either, otherwise he wouldn’t be trying so hard.” Her chin lifts, determined. “You probably aren’t sorry for what happened. You’ll probably never say it; it’s not really my business. But Neku’s trying. I don’t know why, but he is—and you know, if nothing else, you could stand to try too.”

Joshua doesn’t say anything. She’s caught him off-guard with this—of all things, this is not what he was expecting her to say. And maybe that is Joshua’s fault. Hasn’t he learned this lesson already? Isn’t that why Shibuya’s still standing? They lost the Game, all of them, Neku and Shiki and the Bito siblings; they lost the game, but they had changed his mind. They had surprised him. They had changed him in turn too, even if Joshua still doesn’t quite know how to admit it.

“Just a thought,” Shiki says, hotly, and this time she’s the one to turn away. “I don’t know if you even… N-never mind. This was stupid, I told myself I wouldn’t— let’s just go.”

How silly. All of his little asides, and yet this is what riles her up. It probably shouldn’t surprise him. She’s broken into a Reaper’s Game just for the chance to help; likely Joshua should have seen this coming. It’s still annoying, though. Why has he agreed to this again?

But he doesn’t move. He feels weary, and strangely drained, and he pinches at the bridge of his nose with a quiet exhale. Hah. He could say he’s still not sure why, but then, that would be lying, wouldn’t it? And while Joshua is rather good at lying to himself, he prefers not to make a habit of it.

He thinks, once, he would have been angry at this. He’s not sure what to make of the fact he’s not. He’s not sure what to say at all, actually—and isn’t that funny? That doesn’t happen often either.

Mostly he just feels tired.

Joshua watches Shiki walk away, and lingers there, at the edge of the sidewalk. His gaze draws back, turning away toward Shibuya; he looks past the ruined buildings to the streets that are His and His alone. He taps his fingers against his thigh. Trying, he thinks.

But there is no time. And so Joshua pulls his gaze away, and leaves Shibuya and his thoughts behind him.

#twewy #the world ends with you #joshua kiryu #yoshiya kiryu #shiki misaki #neku sakuraba #joshneku #twewy fic #iza fanfic #fic: all that's left in the world

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pseudoneiiric · 4 years ago

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meta post: lili and her gender

let me go on the record to say that i fucking love lilian eyler with my whole heart, like, i typed all this out and im so fucking emotional about her! in the past, i've written things about hello charlotte and how the lgbt representation is... lacking, let's call it, and i've also made a few headcanon posts here and there about lilian's transition and her relationship with gender. so i thought, you know, let's actually write a whole ass thing about it. so here it is.

content warnings: gender dysphoria, suicide attempts, homophobia/transphobia in the original source material

PART 1: ETHERANE'S BAD TAKES so... etherane did not handle lgbt stuff well, like, in the slightest. lili is canonically genderfluid, as seen in one of those little profile things that etherane drew that doesn't actually show up in any of the games. but her genderfluid identity isn't handled well at all in the actual source material. actually, in general, hello charlotte is pretty transphobic. to cite one example, there’s this journal entry in hello charlotte 3 talking about “defective” charlotte vessels, and one of the things that can make a charlotte vessel “defective” is for them to be born amab or intersex. this already has some really bad vibes, but then we remember also that one of the big functions of charlottes is apparently for them to be sexualized (yikes!!!!!) and so we also get this weird kind of like, “trans people aren’t hot” kind of take?

but anyway. when it comes to lilian specifically, she never actually states in canon that she’s genderfluid or otherwise trans, not even in the spinoff visual novel, which, by the way, would have been the perfect place to address her gender identity, and she consistently uses he/him pronouns. we don’t actually get to see any of her thought processes about her gender at all — like at this point, i can’t even say it’s a non-issue because that would imply that they even mentioned her gender in canon. the only time we can potentially extrapolate from canon that lili might not be cis is when anri mentions that charlotte is lili’s self-insert oc. that’s kind of heavy-handed with the whole “charlotte being the female name for charles”, but that’s another matter. the point is, with the lack of any canon basis that lilian’s even vaguely questioned her gender, the reveal that she’s actually genderfluid with like, two pieces of artwork that are detached from the actual game feels very pxrfxrmxtxvxly xnclxsxvx (performatively inclusive) especially considering how.... etherane talked about lilian’s gender in particular within the actual canon material.

after all, the story behind lilian is effectively that, after she was born, her mother was forced to abort her second child, a daughter that she would name scarlett. doing so plunged her into a really deep depression that eventually took on delusional qualities. so ever since lilian was about three years old, her mother has been referring to her exclusively as scarlett, asking her to ‘ be a good girl ’ and similarly raising her as a girl. we can see here that etherane seems to have implied that genderfluidity is something that happens because other people make it so, and isn’t an identity and lived experience. (bad take!) although, albeit unintentionally, i think etherane did lay some groundwork to talk about lilian’s relationship with her gender, specifically with regards to her projection onto her oc, charlotte. in high school, when she’s more active on the internet, we see that she’s going by charlotte and using she/her pronouns. anri, her irl friend, is pretty openly critical of that, but she sort of brushes off anri’s complaints and continues to present as feminine online. now, there’s this fanfic writer who goes by the pseudonym “c”, and lilian very quickly takes an interest in him. the way she talks to c, who doesn’t know her irl, compared anri, who does, is just like flat-out like they’re completely different people.

compare, her with c:

to her with anri:

i also wanted to mention that lili does occasionally act more “femininely” with anri, but it’s never to the extent that she does with c, and in general, affectionate banter is sort of... outright ridiculed in their friendship both ways. see this one exchange:

anri: >:) always up for some roasting lili: right? <3 <3 anri: now you’re the one being gross

unrelated but it fucking kills me that anri was like “ily <3” and lili went “gross” so she went “kys” and lili deadass goes ��that’s better” like that’s what anri is referencing when she says “now you’re the one being gross” and im like... please just be healthy friends who don’t wish death on each other???

it’s also worth noting that c doesn’t know that she’s not “actually” a girl, and literally when they meet, she goes like, “it’s you who should be disappointed in me. charlotte turned out to be charles, whoops! i bet you were hoping that i’d be a cute girl.” and that’s... really depressing, like, she ended up really leaning into that cutesy side of her when she was talking to c and now she feels the need to be a lot more... sarcastic and bitter, like how she is with anri, because now c “knows the truth about her”, that she’s “actually been a guy all along”.

in any case, i think the intent that etherane was going for with this was kind of like... “lilian’s actually a repressed cis gay man!” which is . not great. it gives off this really gross vibes where it’s implied that since lili was raised as a girl and is into men, she got “confused” and started going by she/her online because she couldn’t come to terms with her sexuality or whatever. and that’s just such a bad take!!!

not to mention that a really important part of lili’s backstory is... her germaphobia. she has persistent delusions accompanied by visual hallucinations where she sees people as “parasites”, which visually manifests as them rotting or decomposing. because of that, she wears gloves all the time and is repulsed by physical touch. but when she meets c (whose real name is vincent) in person, she pretty much instantly goes for skin-to-skin contact with him, where she takes off her glove and holds his hand. and like, sure, that’s sweet, but that’s really not how mental illness... works. in the slightest. she doesn’t react at all when his hand touches hers, despite the fact that she has literally had panic attacks in canon from touching things without her gloves. and it gives off this implication that mental illness can be cured with romance somehow, and that’s a really bad take!

this feeds into fandom understanding that like, well, if lilian sees vincent as pure and allows him to touch her, then Obviously she’d let him kiss her, they could probably have sex, etc. and like... she’s canonically asexual though! and that brings us to the other implication, that asexuality is somehow... caused by something. like, there’s nothing in canon to state that lilian experiences sexual attraction (or even really romantic attraction, like i know etherane went off in heaven’s gate and did a lot of ship tease, but she never really outright says she’s crushing on anyone), but judging from the way etherane handled lilian’s gender identity, i have a sneaking suspicion that she established lilian’s asexuality with her mental illnesses specifically in mind. lilian’s autistic, germaphobic, has severe ocd, and she’s been sexually assaulted in the past. therefore, she must be asexual! that’s the sort of vibes i get from the game, and im not here for it. similarly to how her genderfluidity was handled, she makes no actual statement in canon that she doesn’t experience sexual attraction. the closest she’s ever come to this is when she says to anri in heaven’s gate that she is just straight up not interested in kissing (to which anri is like, “well what if it were vincent owo??” which. ugh. anyway). it just seems really strange to me to design a character with severe mental health issues with regards to physical touch and then just sort of treat it as a given that she’s asexual. it’s another example of etherane implying that lgbt identities are results of traumatic experiences or symptoms of mental illness and not an identity or lived experience. you can be sex-repulsed and not be asexual, and while i understand that many people do identify as ace due to trauma and other such things, it still feels like really bad rep when taken with the way lilian’s genderfluidity was portrayed.

PART 2: HOW “CHARLES” IS DIFFERENT FROM “LILIAN”

throughout hello charlotte, lilian identifies herself as a passive observer, someone who doesn’t directly interfere in events. this applies mostly to her existence in false realm, where she’s like... a god, and doesn’t want to interfere in the balance of the world. but i believe she also has always seen herself as an observer. in her very first scene, the one where she and anri are watching someone get bullied, she’s the one who tells anri that there’s no point in getting help. because her role is just to observe. to take pictures for anri, to be a good girl, to say yes to everything and to never express her opinions, feelings, thoughts.

and honestly, i think the main reason for that is that she’s dysphoric. whenever she talks about herself, she’s really self-deprecating, especially compared to when she talks about charlotte. i feel like the main reason why lilian detaches herself from the world and refuses to really perceive herself is because she’s fundamentally disgusted with her gender presentation. and like, we can see in the two times that she’s presented femininely (with c and in that one comic) that lili is just so much happier and more bubbly when she’s presenting as feminine. you can literally see her stop dissociating and becoming more present in the moment because she’s just. so much more comfortable in her skin. compare:

these pictures with this one:

it’s funny i was going to say that there is a picture where she’s presenting as masculine and actually smiles like a person, but guess what! she’s texting c! so she’s actually performing femininity!

but the point is, like... when she’s presenting as masculine, especially in the canon pictures rather than etherane’s art, she just doesn’t look... happy. and then we compare that to how much more present she seems when she’s presenting as feminine, and how much more comfortable she seems in being, like, happy! and cute! but there is a downside to this. and that is...

PART 3: DIFFICULTIES IN LILI’S TRANSITION

in my sort of... “main verse” for lili, i have it so that her suicide attempt failed and that she was somehow... saved from drowning. mother passes away and she starts to... soul search a little bit and find a reason to live, and somewhere along the line she starts to transition socially. that means she starts transitioning at a pretty... extremely vulnerable point in her life. in the year between 18-19 years old, she’d be a wreck. she’s growing her hair out, but she feels insecure about it. she starts to wear skirts, but only at home. she buys makeup and never wears it. it’s a long process for her, because it’s one thing to go by she/her online or to claim she’s just a gender-confused gay boy and a completely different thing to come out as a trans woman and to actually see herself as a woman and not some kind of imposter. considering that she was raised as a girl, she would have a large amount of guilt over transitioning, feeling like she’s going to be seen as confused, or that her gender identity is a direct result of her childhood trauma. but she’s not just worried that others will see her that way: she’s worried that she’s going to see herself that way.

and for a long time, she probably does see herself that way. for a long time, scarlett would probably treat her transition as some kind of attempt to personify her unborn sister and comply with perceived expectations rather than an attempt to feel comfortable in her own skin. she’d get nervous that she’s somehow becoming scarlett, because though she’s always thought it would be easier if she’d just been her sister, she’s never really wanted to be scarlett. she’d be scared to wear mid-length skirts, scared to put her hair up in a bun, probably even scared to wear red for a time, all because she’s scared of somehow losing herself and becoming her alter.

because of her caution and concern with identifying as a trans woman and not as the “safer“ gender identity of genderfluidity (where she can say she’s trans but never actually have to “push boundaries” by wearing feminine clothing or using any pronouns besides he/him), it would likely take her a very long time to take the step to medically transition. she’d likely never get any gender affirmation surgeries just because of how invasive the procedure is, but hormones would probably be something she’d look into once she’s much older and has a more stable income.

i mentioned before that before her transition, she uses dissociation and observation as a way to cope with her gender dysphoria. she saw herself as someone who didn’t really participate in the world, was a class ghost, invisible to everyone and a minuscule part of a vast universe. but upon transitioning, she’d feel much more actively self-conscious. once she starts to present in a feminine way, she’d feel like she’s being seen, like she’s actually participating in the world, and that’s both a blessing and a curse.

she’d be much more prone to stammering, especially when saying her name, and would blush far more often. she’d be afraid of saying the wrong thing or messing up somehow. and on top of that, she’d likely feel predatory for talking to others, always wondering if others find her cute or repulsive, always wondering if someone will perceive her and harm her in some way.

she’d very likely also feel really guilty about her own emotional experience. because she’s so used to being a passive observer, a puppet that only does what others want, she would feel like it’s selfish to be just... content. she’s so actively disgusted with herself before she transitions that she’s never allowed herself to be mentally present for a happy moment in her entire life. she always second-guesses, always dismisses positive things as a mere coincidence, and after she transitions, when she starts being more present in her life, she’d feel so guilty for just allowing herself to be happy.

because of that, she has some trouble with presenting as feminine consistently — she’d vary the “level” of her feminine presentation from day-to-day, where she might go full femme one day and another day stick with a beanie and a pair of slacks. she’s much more comfortable with presenting as more traditionally feminine when she’s at home or with trusted friends in a private space, but around 19 years old, she makes a vested effort to remain in public spaces. she’d time herself, saying, “for one hour, i’ll stay in this café while wearing a skirt, and then i can leave,” and she’d gradually increase the amount of time she spends in public spaces. and eventually, eventually she does end up feeling really comfortable with her gender presentation and falls into a more static sense of style. she really likes clothing design, so she ends up wearing a lot more dynamic outfits when she’s more comfortable with herself, and she probably also mildly gets into cosplay.

i also like to think that she reconnects with anri during her young adult years. either it’s like, right after her suicide attempt (i’ve written before that she’d had anri listed as her emergency contact and forgot to change it when she moved), or it’s at some point after she starts transitioning socially. i think it’d be really sweet for them to be friends in a more real way, and the sheer concept of anri teaching lili how to properly apply makeup and to set her hair is just so fucking sweet i might die. they both deserve to have friends so i think this is just a step up from hello charlotte canon.

#long post //#lilian eyler: study.#ive been working on this post for days. im fuckign emotional about her

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saiilorstars · 5 years ago

Text

The Girl in the Forest

Chapter 20: Behind the Barriers

// Story Masterlist //

Fandom: The Originals

Pairings: Klaus Mikaelson x Original Female Character

Pronunciation of OC’s name: Ma-leh-nee

Requested tag: @queenmj10

~ 0 ~ 0 ~ 0 ~ 0 ~

Chapter Summary: Finn makes his play against his siblings and leaves the ultimate punishment for Maleny: her biggest fear.

"It has been said that all love begins and ends with she who gave us life. A thousand years ago, my mother turned us into monsters, yet still she claimed to love her children, even as she vowed to destroy us. The noble Elijah, tormented by long-buried, shameful secrets. Kol, the wiley troublemaker, out for no one but himself. Finn, the devoted acolyte, his love all too easily walked by our mother's sick hate. Fierce Rebekah, willing to risk everything on the chance that she may one day find happiness. And me, the bastard child. My mother's greatest shame. Now, finally, we have defeated her, giving her the choice she never thought to give us, to live on as one of the monsters she created or suffer the slow, agonizing death she so deserves."

All in the meanwhile Klaus had been talking to Maleny, the blonde had been pouring some drinks into glasses, leaving him to give his common heartfelt speeches. She remembered it was one of his favorite things to do in the past, whether he wanted to admit it or not. After a win (although bittersweet) Maleny figured he deserved that much.

She turned around with a smirk, "You know, any other person would tell you you're an awful person for what you did to Esther…" she started walking back to him, the man leaning against the back of a couch, "...but she had it well deserved. So congrats," she held him his glass.

"That's all I get?" Klaus took his glass and gave her a sharp look, "Congrats?"

Maleny tilted her head, her smirk fading only slightly, "Oh? Like what? And I'd watch your answer because this," she pointed between them, "has only had 3 days so anything beyond a kiss is unlikely to happen."

"I was merely going to ask for a kiss but you apparently think so little of me," Klaus leaned off the couch and started for the threshold of the living room, when Maleny grabbed his arm, of course guilty now she'd judged him.

"Sorry, sorry," she apologetically smiled as he turned back to her, "I didn't mean to come off like that. Understand me a little, please. I'm not sure how to...deal with this thing for us - I don't want it to be different but of course it's going to be different and…" she was cut off by Klaus' sudden kiss.

"Do you know I'd actually forgotten how fun it was to watch you freak out?" Klaus asked afterwards, with his smirk letting Maleny see how he'd basically played her.

"You jerk," she hit his arm, and while he laughed she drank from her glass.

He snatched her by the waist, "Only the worst," he complemented himself, "But you already knew that..."

"Of course I do," Maleny feigned a sigh as she looked to the side, "I knew since we were kids you were a little mischievous devil. Buuuut..." she swayed her head until her eyes landed on his, "...I guess you were always my mischievous devil."

"Hey," Hayley cut into their moment with her call. They both turned to see the brunette hybrid coming into the living room, "So, has there been a plan devised?"

Confused, Maleny came forwards, "Hold on, I thought you were supposed to stay back with Elijah at the safe house…"

Hayley gave a wide grin and took Maleny's glass, "I did something better," she said and drank down the remainder of the bourbon.

"Hayley, this is no time for games," Klaus frowned and walked over to the woman as well.

"Calm down, it was nothing bad," Hayley dismissed his irritation, "So then, plan?"

"There isn't one yet," Maleny finally said, choosing to trust Hayley's decisions, "And the only one we did have Amarrah doesn't want to follow," she added with a huff. They'd tried to make Amarrah leave the Quarter for a while until things died down with Finn but the witch outright refused. She claimed there was no way she was going to let Finn Mikaelson get away with almost murder. She wanted payback, and payback she would get - she promised.

~ 0 ~

In the Lycee, Finn used a hammer to break a skull into pieces. Behind him was his father, Mikael, watching him create a spell.

"She tried to show them mercy," Finn was angrily saying in regards to his missing mother, "If they've harmed her…"

Mikael scoffed and interrupted him, "Esther's mistake was believing there was anything left in your siblings to save," he moved up to Finn, "Together, my son, we can finally destroy them."

Finn was no fool to believe Mikael was suddenly so willingly on their side, but he played along as if he did believe, " Yeah. I'm happy to hear you say this, Father. Such a powerful man. I could use your strength."

There was a clearing of throat by the entrance of the Lycee, and both men turned to see a young woman fidgeting on the spot, "The wolves...they're um, they're gathered at the cemetery," she jerked a thumb behind her shoulder, "At the gravestone you asked for..."

Finn's anger died down slightly at the news, "Excellent, tell them to dig it up. Now."

The woman was visibly confused and made the mistake of asking, "Why?"

"You don't ask 'why' to my orders, you follow them," Finn snapped, angering the woman but this time she kept her mouth shut, "Don't make me repeat myself, Yamilet, dig it up."

The woman, Yamilet, nodded, "And then what?" she preferred not to ask anymore questions but she didn't want to have to talk to him again later on.

"Take the body deep into the bayou," Finn instructed with a deep, annoyed sigh. This is what happened when Aiden resigned his leadership for the wolves of the witches. Finn had to go and name another leader instead and unfortunately that one seemed like an even bigger idiot. "The others know what to do, then," he motioned for Yamilet to leave and with a nod she turned away.

Finn then turned back to his ongoing spell and continued working on it, feeling far more confident in his future plans. Revenge would never taste so sweet.

~ o ~

Cami drove up to the Mikaelsons' safe house and looked around the solitary house (or so she thought). She checked the directions Hayley had given her earlier just to see if she'd made a mistake somewhere along the way. Why would Hayley send her to an abandoned house? Or worse, a stranger's house. She stepped out of the car and looked around, focusing in noises and scents she could get a read on.

Eventually, she got a read on two very familiar people and hurried for the front door. She would've came right in but she figured that would only cause tension. Instead, she opted for the polite knock.

A couple minutes passed and no one opened up. With a sigh, Cami turned away from the door and looked about, "I'm gonna kill Hayley for this," she muttered under her breath and made way for the car again. She was only a couple feet away from the car when she heard her name being called.

"Cami, what are you doing here?" Elijah had appeared at the doorway holding a sleepy Hope in arms.

Cami turned around and saw him, momentarily fazed by the baby she hadn't seen in quite a while. She shook her head and took a couple steps towards them, "Honestly, I have no idea," she sighed and let her arms fall to her sides, "Hayley came back to the compound early in the morning and said Klaus wanted me here for something. I just didn't know that 'something' was 'someone'. But don't worry, I'm on my way back right now," she turned for the car actually meaning her words when Elijah gave an unexpected call for her.

"You should come in," he said, surprising her momentarily, "I frankly have no idea what I'm doing…" he nodded to Hope who was slowly falling asleep on his shoulder.

Cami gave a half-smile, "Well, I'm no mother, but...I did learn a couple things from Rebekah. Are you sure you want me to stay? Because I know what you requested days ago - you didn't want me here. And know that I wouldn't have come if I knew this was the place Hayley was sending me to."

Elijah knew she was right and still felt guilty for what he'd done. However, he wasn't very repentent of it as he believed it would've been the right thing to do, "I could really use your help," he insisted again.

Cami gave in with a nod, "First thing's first, we have to put that baby to sleep…" and with that she returned to the house taking on the role of lead babysitter.

~ 0 ~

Maleny strode into Hayley's room where the hybrid and Jackson had been discussing their future mystical wedding. She had finished a rather interesting phone call with Cami and had to come and see Hayley to pay her remarks.

"You sent Cami to the safe house?" Maleny demanded with crossed arms and a tapping foot, "You savage!"

Hayley smirked and glanced at the blonde, "I told you it was good."

Maleny sighed, "She's gonna kill you for this, I hope you know," her eyes flickered over to Jackson and immediately composed herself, "So you're going to marry my friend here? I have to warn you, her moodswings are horrible. I mean, I thought they were just because she was pregnant but it turns out Hayley's just naturally moody."

"Uh…" Jackson nervously looked at Hayley.

"Hey!" Hayley hissed and made Maleny laugh, "They're not," she assured Jackson, "I don't even have mood swings."

"Liiiiies," Maleny sing-songed from her place, "But listen, while I did come in for Cami's sake, I'm the messenger of the people downstairs."

"People downstairs?" Jackson repeated and once again looked at Hayley.

"I may have done a thing," Hayley raised a finger and stood up from her chair.

"She does a lot of things, fair warning," Maleny said to Jackson as Hayley walked past her.

"Mal, shut up," Hayley called from outside, "And go get Klaus."

"The messenger job continues," Maleny swayed her head in annoyance and turned to leave. She rushed over to go find the other hybrid, eventually after coming short in two rooms finding him with Kol - who was now staying with them apparently.

"Of course you two are drinking," Maleny rolled her eyes at the two brothers happily drinking some sort of wine, "Kol, are you even old enough now?"

Kol rolled his eyes while Klaus snickered, "Gee, Mal, like I haven't heard that one before."

"Give me time, I can come up with something better, I promise," Maleny came futher into the room and looked at Klaus, "You should go downstairs - Hayley's brought in vampires and the wolves and I fear for war, honestly."

"What's she done that for?" Klaus frowned at the news. There were so many things to begin doing and Hayley was wasting time with community meetings?

"I don't know but even Marcel's downstairs," Maleny pointed back, "I think it's something big."

The bottle Kol held in his hand suddenly shattered and spilled the wine all over the floor. Everyone looked around for the source of the shatterer to see Finn at the doorway.

"Where is she?" the man demanded, getting straight to the point.

"Well that's a way to greet someone," Maleny made a face and moved back to the other siblings.

"My, my, you look peaky," smirked Klaus who then looked at his younger brother, "Doesn't he look peaky?"

Kol agreed with a sarcastic smile, "He does look peaky."

Maleny rolled her eyes and whacked each brother on the arms, "Enough of the sarcasm," she scolded only to receive scoffs from both of them, "Did I say something funny?" she glared at each of them.

Finn was in no mood to withstand such a spectacle, "Don't make me ask again," he warned, "Where is she?"

"Well, I assume you're referring to our mother. Fear not, she's tucked away somewhere perfectly safe," Klaus promised with a wide grin, "You'll never find her."

"You think you've won," Finn shook his head and opened his arms, "Let's see how long that arrogance lasts, brothers. You'll both fall," he promised and backtracked but not before adding, "And you," he looked to Maleny, "I have something good planned for you."

Maleny swallowed down a lump in her throat and tried to remain at ease of the threat. Finn looked so sure of his threat Maleny could almost believe in it. As Finn got to leaving, Klaus slid an arm around Maleny, resting his hand on her back, knowing she'd been left shaken. It had been his concern that Finn would take leverage against him or anyone else by using the weakest - Maleny.

~ 0 ~

Down in the courtyard, Hayley was still trying to find a common ground between her wolves and the vampires, "You wolves are here because you want freedom. And, I promise you, if you stay, you will be free. But…" she glanced over to Marcel and his vampires, "We need as much help as we can get."

"My vamps and I are willing to stand with you against the witches," Marcel assured, "In return, all I want is a promise that there will be peace between our sides after the wedding."

One of the wolves, Jared, spoke up in outrage, "You're the one who spent the last one hundred years killing and cursing us!"

"Which means you might wanna listen to what I have to say," Marcel snapped.

Finn was coming down the stairs around that time and of course had to interrupt, "I see you're brokering a truce between mongrels and parasites! And just how long do you think that's really going to last? A month? A week? A day?" he laughed, "What you don't yet seem to understand is that the only thing that can exist between your two degenerate species is hatred, war, and death," he backed away towards the exit.

He stopped just outside the border of the compound before rubbing his fingers together and cast a spell. As soon as he put his hand against the doorway of the entrance. When the building stopped shaking, Gia was the first to try to get him only to come crashing into an invisible barrier that started to burn her hands as if she wore no daylight ring.

Finn now wore a clean smirk across his lips, "But, I imagine, given a little time confined together, you'll come to see things the way I do," he gave a wicked wave before leaving the place.

~ 0 ~

Upstairs, Klaus tried to see if the barrier was active as well. He tried getting out through the balcony of his bedroom but felt his hand begin to burn much like Gia's had done earlier.

Kol came into the room full blown panicked, "Did he really just trap us all in here?"

"He certainly did," Klaus turned around, "Which means we have a witch problem. You're a witch. Fix it."

"I'm already calling in Amarrah," Maleny rushed into the room holding a phone in hand, just as panicked - if not more than Kol.

"And what the bloody hell are we supposed to do about this?" Kol turned to her.

Maleny lowered her phone and stalked up to him, "You don't get it, do you? If this barrier stays up for long you and I," she tapped him on the chest, "become a three course meal to those vampires downstairs," Kol's eyes widened in realization, and horror, "Get the picture now?"

"Okay, we're gonna need a lot of help," Kol glanced back to Klaus who was smiling in amusement at the teen's horror. Kol hurried out to give a call out to Davina.

"That was a bit harsh," Klaus walked up to Maleny afterwards.

"And yet, it's the truth," Maleny wasn't too happy herself about the situation, "I meant what I said. If we're stuck in here a long time you are going to be fine but I am going to become dinner for the others."

"Not on my watch, love."

"Let's remember you called me lunch and dinner during the first days we met here," Maleny pointed at him, "Don't think I'm forgetting that anytime soon."

"I meant that playfully," Klaus tried clear his throat and tried putting away his smirk.

He had not meant that playfully...and Maleny knew it.

~ 0 ~

Elijah was leaving what he believed to be the tenth voicemail to Rebekah, now Angela Baker of course, to no avail. It'd been three days since she'd been switched bodies but hadn't made any contact with anyone since. Frankly, he was getting worried and being practically imprisoned in the safe house was driving him mad.

He returned inside the house and followed noise into the kitchen where Cami was bringing down a bottle of bourbon from a shelf, "Yahtzee!" she exclaimed and glanced back with a smile, "Ah-ha-ha! If there's one thing I've learned about you people, it's that there's always a bottle of booze around. Don't worry, though, Hope is down for her nap. You want one?" she gestured as she brought down a glass for herself.

"Sounds delightful," Elijah couldn't help respond with a hint of restraint.

Cami sighed and place down her glass on the counter, "I know you're only tolerating me for Hope's sake but really if I'm bothering you that much I could always just go and compel someone to help you."

"I'm sorry," Elijah looked to the side, cursing himself for doing exactly what he'd wanted to avoid in the first place.

Cami turned around to face him completely, "Did I do something that bothered you?" she asked in plain confusion. She really did not understand why Elijah hadn't wanted her to come along with the others. She tried looking for anything she could've done to offend him or anyone else he cared for but found nothing.

"This is about me, Cami. I assure you, you haven't done anything," Elijah promised her but it wasn't enough for Cami.

"Then why do I feel like I have done something?" Cami crossed her arms, "Is this something of Esther's? What, she told you having vampire friends is also a bad thing?"

"You're not a friend," Elijah sharply corrected her, leaving her startled and frankly insulted for a minute before he continued, "You're family. I'm sorry if I've made you feel anything less."

"I don't want your apologies, I want an explanation," Cami quietly said to him and picked up her bourbon bottle and glass, "And until you can give me one, I'll be in the living room having myself a nice drink - alone."

"Cami," Elijah wearily sighed as the blonde woman hurried past him. He was seriously hating Hayley for ever thinking of doing this foul trick of hers.

~ 0 ~

Amarrah and Davina arrived to the compound at the same time after being called upon by their friends. They stopped just outside of the courtyard where they knew the barrier was active.

"Thank God you're here," Maleny hurried up to the barrier with Kol coming in seconds later.

Amarrah could see the heavy group of people inside the compound and made a face, "Yikes, would definitely not like to be in your shoes," she remarked and earned equal irritated looks from both Maleny and Kol.

"Which is why we'd like to hurry up and get out of here," Kol replied and looked to Davina, "You ready?"

Davina nodded with a smile and looked to Amarrah, "We're ready."

"Please get it right," Maleny stepped back only to be yanked forwards by Kol, "Hey!"

"No, no, love, we're gonna need all the witches on this one," he smirked at her.

Maleny looked at Amarrah who was agreeing with a nod of her head, "He's right. The more power we have the better chances we can get the barrier down."

With a sigh, Maleny stood straight and beside Kol, awaiting to start the spell with everyone else. They chanted together the spell they'd agreed on before coming together and while it seemed not to be failing, it eventually rebounded everyone away from the barrier.

"What just happened?" Maleny fearfully looked around as everyone slowly gathered back together.

Klaus and Marcel went over to check on the progress, "Are we free to go?" Klaus asked urgently.

"No," Kol shook his head, looking at his hands in confusion, "the spell's locking us out."

"Vincent must be channeling something," Amarrah reasoned with her experience, "A dark object, maybe."

Of course neither of them could ever think Finn's source of channeling was coming from his neutralized father somewhere in a crypt.

~ 0 ~

Elijah once more left a voicemail for Rebekah, deciding if after the next time he tried there was still no answer he would be calling Klaus to discuss the matters. When done he entered the living room where, as promised, Cami was having herself a nice drink while scrolling through her phone.

"Do you know you have awful WiFi connection here?" she sarcastically asked without looking up from the screen.

"Yes, which is why I thought you would prefer this?" Elijah waved a Trivial Pursuit box in hand.

Cami raised an eyebrow, "Your solution to this problem - that's your fault by the way - is for us to play...trivial games?"

"It's either that or suffer the WiFi connection," Elijah plopped down on the couch chair beside her and set the game on the coffee table, "Take your pick."

"What I'd pick is for you to come clean," Cami put her glass down on the table as well, "Is that not one of the options here?"

"I ask for time, Cami, please?" Elijah sighed, "I would hate to be stuck inside this house with no one to talk to. Please?"

Cami stared at him a good while trying to put her best angry face on. But as the seconds ticked by and he upheld her look with his soft, brown eyes, she gave in with a small sigh.

"Fine," she raised a hand, and looked away, "but you're no where near off the hook," she reached for the box and began opening it up, "So you should probably let me win," she added with a mumble, making Elijah smile of amusement.

~ 0 ~

"Okay, so maybe we can...put a stronger spell over the one already here?" Maleny was in the middle of saying to Amarrah, Davina and Kol as they all thought of ways to break down the barrier.

"That doesn't make any sense," Kol shot her down with a look of irritation.

"You know what, this isn't what I do anymore, okay?" Maleny snapped at him, used to the more calm reactions of the others in regards to low abilities in magic.

"Maybe she's not far off," Amarrah got to thinking while she paced back and forth, "We just need to come up with something more coherent."

"Great, while you do that, Mal and I will do our best not to get devoured over here," Kol huffed.

"There's still time before any of that happens," Davina tried to calm them down with logical views.

"Maybe there's something in my mother's spellbook," Maleny gasped with the idea, feeling stupid she hadn't thought of it before. She motioned she'd be back and hurried back into the courtyard, bumping into Josh who'd rather clumsily came down the stairs, "Sorry, Josh, I…"

Josh was doubled over in pain but at the fresh scent of blood he raised his head, revealing an almost vamped-out face.

"Josh…?" Maleny, though concerned, stepped back.

"All I can think about is blood!" the young vampire said in what really sounded like agonizing pain.

Maleny looked around for some help and caught a glimpse of Marcel and Gia in the dining room, "Josh, wait here," she said but the vampire was in too much pain to hear. She made way for the dining room and became alert on the fact Josh wasn't the only one who seemed to be in pain. As she walked by, she could feel the vampires' eyes setting on her as...lunch.

"Okay, we have a problem!" she burst into the dining room and slid shut the doors in terrible fear.

"What?" Marcel barely had time to turn to the blonde when Gia fell under the same situation.

"Oh!" she doubled over.

"Gia!" Marcel went over to his friend, missing the wide eyes of Maleny behind them. Soon enough, Marcel doubled over as well and felt the tremendous hunger growing within.

Slowly, Maleny leaned off the doors, her breath hitching, "I think…" of course Finn had something to do with this sudden hunger they were feeling. She quickly opened the doors of the room, "Klaus!" she called frantically.

She hadn't needed to call so loud as he was already making way for the dining room, already seeing the problem at hand, "What the hell is going on?" he demanded as he reached the dining room, "Your vampires seem to think it's lunch-time!" he accused Marcel.

"It'a Finn, it's got to be," Maleny turned him to the courtyard where they saw all the other vampires feeling the same hunger while the wolves were in complete peace, "Do you realize the massive buffet they have…" she slowly hugged herself, "...including me...and Kol."

Klaus wasted no time in getting her away from the courtyard and into his bedroom where he shut the doors, "You're no longer allowed out of this room, love."

"For once I've got nothing against that," Maleny mumbled as he went for his phone sitting on his nightstand, "What are you doing?" she inquired when he began making a call.

"Getting us out of here," he pointed at her for a silent period before speaking into the phone - to Finn.

"Klaus! Willing to concede so soon?" Finn's sarcastic tone exclaimed through the other line.

Klaus rolled his eyes, "I merely seek to negotiate. You want our mother, I want out of this bloody compound. The economics of what comes next should be easy to grasp, even for you."

"You can't give him Esther," Maleny hissed, moving to take his phone away but of course was easily handled with one arm grabbing down her two hands.

"What I want, brother, is to exterminate the plague that is your kind," Finn was busy saying over the line, "What I want is to watch the flames flicker over your smoldering corpse-"

Klaus rolled his eyes at the tedious speech he was being forced to listen to. Even Maleny had stayed put when she caught some of the words being said.

"-What I want is to hear the silence once you finally stop screaming."

In the end, his impatience won the better of himself. Klaus made a static-y noise with his mouth, "I'm sorry, we must have a bad connection. Could you repeat everything you said after "What I want?"

"Oh, I'm so happy to hear that hunger hasn't yet sapped your humor," Finn had a good laugh, 'But, I should warn you, brother, if those vampires even attempt to feed, they'll find themselves ravenous. Unable to stop. So, every moment that you waste with me will only lead you to the inevitable carnage."

"Don't you dare do it," Maleny whispered to Klaus, while locked with his arm still more than ready to put up a fight, "Don't give him E-"

"Esther for our freedom. Do we have a deal?"

"Well, I think I know better than to trust your honesty. But, yes, if I find our mother unharmed, then I might consider granting your reprieve," was Finn's response.

"Saint Roc Number 1. The Delphine tomb," Klaus finally said and promptly hung up, also releasing Maleny from his grip.

"Are you kidding me!?" she erupted into angry shouts, "After everything we went to to put that demon woman down you'll just hand her over!? What in the hell are you thinking!?"

"Your safety if you haven't noticed," Klaus was genuinely surprised he'd managed not to shout back at her, "I'd like to prevent your demise and if that's the way to do it then so be it. Besides, when Finn sees what Esther probably chose she's not going to be escaping any time soon."

Maleny calmed down slightly but still had pursed lips and crossed arms, "I still think this could've been handled differently," she murmured and headed out for the doors when Klaus yanked her back.

"Where do you think you're going?"

"I needed to get my mother's spell book for the others to see if there's anything that can help. C'mon, even you know that's a good idea."

"Doesn't mean I like it," Klaus muttered but in the end opened the doors himself, "Let's go - but you're staying upstairs afterwards."

"If nothing works, believe me, I'll be up here out of my own accord," Maleny promised him with a nervous smile.

~ 0 ~

Cami was quite ready to throw the board game out the window with each loss she endured. She read off one card to Elijah, "What three European countries begin with the letter "A?""

"Albania, Austria, Andorra," Elijah replied almost instantly.

Frustrated, she flung the card over her shoulder and read off the next one, "Agh! Okay, hey! Who was the only U.S. president to earn a Ph.D?"

Once again, Elijah answered within seconds, "The rather tedious Woodrow Wilson."

"Oh, c'mon!" Cami went for the next card, "Who rode secretariat to the triple crown in 1973?"

"Ron Turket."

Cami let the rest of the cards fall from her hands as she glared at the man, "No! I refuse to believe that you just happened to know that! You were supposed to let me win because I'm mad at you!" with her pointing she accidentally spilled Elijah's drink on the table and partly on his sleeve, "I'm sorry!" she panicked and handed him a towel to get himself cleaned up while she took care of the table, "Sorry, I didn't mean to. I'm just kind of competitive sometimes and you just know literally everything there is to know which is kind of annoying and…" she trailed off when she noticed Elijah's furious scrubbing over his sleeve, "Elijah? Are you okay? Hey, Elijah," she reached out for his hand but instead was harshly grabbed her wrist. Momentarily alarmed, she remained still.

"I'm not as fragile as the others have said," Elijah quietly said and let go of Cami's wrist.

"I...I didn't think that," she nervously said, slowly taking her seat again. Feeling awkward, she coughed and tried going through more of the cards that hadn't been ruined with her accident. Thankfully, Elijah's phone went off to interrupt them.

"Rebekah," he barely got to say when the woman on the other line began to speak. Cami could hear everything perfectly and so when Elijah hung up, apologizing to Angelica Barker, the Angelica, she was just as distressed as Elijah.

"We need to call Klaus," she announced seconds later, "Because if Angelica is still herself Rebekah is...who knows where…"

Agreeing with her, Elijah began dialing again, this time for Klaus.

~ 0 ~

The vampires were getting restless in the courtyard, having to resist the urge to drink blood from the wolves.

"Things are getting testy out there. Come on, we better move this along," Marcel told Kol and Maleny inside the dining room. Maleny had brought down her mother's spell book for Kol to analyze.

"Okay, so Finn's boundary is too strong. But, we can cast a destruction spell," Kol pointed to an excerpt in the book, "It would temporarily neutralize all magical objects in the compound, including the compound itself. If it works, well, then it will give us sixty seconds to escape whilst the boundary is shut down."

"Alright, alright, that sounds good to me," Marcel nodded and urged them to get started fast.

"Um, there is just one little flaw," Maleny regretted to inform, "If the spell works, it will suppress all magical objects in the vicinity. That means your rings."

Marcel groaned as he realized what it meant, "And if we go outside in the sun without our rings, we're dead."

"Unless you wait for nightfall," Klaus offered but it did not do much.

"Agh," Marcel looked back into the courtyard where the vampires were, "They're also new. They're not going to be able to fight the hunger. We can't wait until nightfall. We're going to have a bloodbath on our hands before we even get close."

"Then we're going to have to start now," Maleny looked at Kol, "Can we do it?"

"Yes, but we'll need some things from the Lycee. I figured since Finn is out looking for Esther Davina and Amarrah shouldn't have a problem retrieving them."

"Good, so go tell them," Maleny nodded for him to go outside.

"What?" Kol frowned at the idea. He was barely calm with Marcel in the same room and she wanted him to cross a courtyard full of hungry wolves?

"I'm not going out there alone," Maleny crossed her arms, "You go. And hurry up," grumbling, Kol took the spell book and went out, making a dash across the courtyard to tell the other witches what the plan was.

~ 0 ~

After putting away the Trivial Pursuit game, Cami found Elijah once again staring blankly out the window in the living room. Though still crossed with him, she didn't stop worrying over his mental health. Esther had really done a number with him after all. If only she knew what he was seeing within his mind.

"Elijah?" she called quietly and walked him, "Elijah, are you okay?" she only heard the sharp intake of breath as a response, "Hey, I know you're worried about Rebekah…" she reached to touch his shoulder but he whirled and swatted her hand away. Cami gasped as his faced vamped-out against her as if she were the enemy, "Elijah…?" her tremulous voice called to him but he started going for her, " Elijah? Elijah, please. Calm down," but her calls did nothing as he backed her up against a wall. She shut her eyes in terror, "Elijah, please calm down!" she knew she could put up some kind of fight but the man was an Original in the end and far more skilled to fight. Perhaps one attempt of hers for a kick and he pulled her heart out as an instinct.

After a couple seconds of nothing happening, she opened one eye and saw Elijah was no where to be seen. She released the breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding and relaxed. She didn't know what to do next but in the end, Hope's cries upstairs called her attention. And needing it herself, Cami rushed to go attend to the infant instead.

~ 0 ~

The witches had gathered up their ingredients to begin the spell that would temporarily bring down the barrier for the wolves to escape from the compound. Behind them things were no better between vampires and werewolves. Fights were ensuing and blood was looming to be shed.

"We need to hurry," Maleny mumbled as she caught sight of even Cami's friend, Gia, getting into the fight. And though she was stopping a friend, she was looking more and more weary of the wolves.

"Okay, we're set," Amarrah announced and rose to her feet with Davina.

All four raised their hands in parallel to the others across the barrier. They began with the spell and seconds later a gust of wind came through and blew out candles they'd prepared. Kol was the first to try out the barrier, and upon seeing it was no more he called to the others, "It's time to go!"

Hayley had her wolves set for the escape and began urging them out, "Let's go! Now!"

Meanwhile, the vampires were glued to the dark corners of the compound, hiding out from the sunlight which would then burn them up.

"Remember, sixty seconds!" Maleny called for any last wolves still in the vicinity before she herself fleet to the other side.

Just as Kol was going to do the same, Klaus yanked him back to the courtyard. On falling down, Kol hit his head and earned a cut of blood.

"Slight change of plans, brother. I no longer have to treat you as anything but the treacherous liar that you truly are," Klaus blocked all ways for Kol to leave the compound.

"What are you doing?" Maleny frowned at this new brotherly antic she thought had just been formed.

"Rebekah is not in Angelica Barker's body because Kol didn't put her there," Klaus angrily explained while glaring at Kol, "Where is she?"

"Please! They'll kill him!" Davina pleaded, the sixty seconds almost up.

"Well, he should have thought about that before he betrayed our sister! Rebekah never made it to her new body, did she? And, seeing as you cast the spell and, well, you're you, I'd hardly call it an uncrackable case!"

"Are you kidding me?" Amarrah believed she would never understand what ran through the Mikaelsons' heads in regards to their siblings.

"Rebekah's fine, Nik!" Kol tried to assure, but his frustration and fear were getting the best of him, "It was a prank, nothing more than anything you lot have done to me, but I bet it's different when it's one of y... aah!" upon trying to cross the barrier he found it was back on.

"Oooh. Barrier's back up," Klaus smirked as the vampires started coming out of their dark corners, "And those vampires look oh-so hungry. Now, I was willing to welcome you back in my home! But you had to return to your petty, selfish jealousies! Well, let's see how well they help you survive when you're stuck in there!" he stormed off ready to go find Finn or Rebekah or whoever came first.

Davina was terrified as she saw the vampires getting closer to Kol, all overly hungry. Amarrah nudged Maleny from behind and whispered, "We can't really leave him there, he'll get killed."

Maleny deeply sighed, "Yeah, I know. C'mon, we need to go find Rebekah or another spell to get Kol out. Either way it's the only way to save his life."

~ 0 ~

Cami had set a restless Hope down in her playpen after a near hour of useless napping attempts. She'd placed a couple of her toys down for Hope as well then walked over to the empty crib to fix it up for when she hoped Hope would soon fall asleep later on. She was rather restless herself. Elijah was no where to be seen, Rebekah was apparently lost somewhere in a new body, Marcel and his vampires were still stuck at the compound going crazy with hunger and she was...babysitting. As much as she loved Hope she wished she could be actively helping in the Quarter.

Hope gurgled from her playpen and made Cami turn around, "Well…" the blonde considered out loud, "Stuck in a house with your innocent self isn't that bad either," she returned to the playpen and tickled Hope on the stomach, causing the baby to giggle, "Definitely not as bad," a couple more minutes passed by before she felt the presence of someone else in the house.

"I thought you left," Cami looked up from the playpen to see Elijah by the entrance.

"I owe you an apology," Elijah came forwards.

Cami shook her head, "I told you I don't need one-"

"Yes, you do," Elijah cut her off sharply, "My sister's missing, my family's in jeopardy, I am... uh, utterly powerless to help them. This is not a state of affairs I'm accustomed to."

"I can tell," Cami crossed her arms, "But, that's not what I needed and you know it."

"Yes, you'd like to know the reason of my sudden request," Elijah came up to the playpen, momentarily looking down to Hope who was more than interested in a teddy bear.

"I would," agreed Cami, "but I don't see it happening any moment. I get it. You're troubled and believe me I don't like seeing you like this."

"And I don't like seeing you scared of me," Elijah said back, leaving her startled.

"I...I w-wasn't-"

"Yes you were, and that is exactly the reason I didn't want you here."

It took a minute for Cami to understand everything but even then she wasn't very clear, "You're ridiculous, do you know that?"

"Am I?" Elijah did his best not to raise his voice for his niece, "It's no use to lie, Camille. I saw your face - you were terrified. And justly so. I didn't want you here because I didn't want to hurt you. I didn't want you to see me like this. I am not the noble man you think I am - not the one anyone thinks I am."

Cami smiled a little, slowly understanding his reasons. She moved over to him and put her hands on his face, with thinking about it actually, "Hey, I like you because you're you. I'm not here for the noble stag title, I'm here because you're my friend and I want you to get better. I'm pretty sure everyone else thinks the same. And I get it, I get that you're dealing with things I have no idea about. But if you ever want to talk about it... It's kind of what I do, It can even be over a game of chess if you'd like. But fair warning, you will have to let me win that game or else…"

Elijah chuckled at her, taking her hands from his face and keeping them in his own, "I believe that sounds fair enough," Cami responded with her own laugh, hoping her blush wasn't too visible.

~ 0 ~

Amarrah and Davina were setting up runes of salt on St. Ann's church floor, right in front of the sacristy. The spell was meant to find the location of Finn for Klaus to finally get to.

"Do you guys get the feeling we're being watched?" Maleny came down the aisle from the entrance. She'd been looking out into the newest of festivals the Quarter was celebrating when she felt like there was someone watching her and preferred to go inside where it was a little more safe.

"I doubt it, Finn's too preoccupied blocking our spell," Amarrah huffed in annoyance as once again the spell failed.

"I must say, for a witch of your caliber, your spells are not particularly efficient," Klaus remarked to the French woman.

"Hey, I'm not used to going up against centuries old witches," Amarrah snapped, "We're doing our best."

"But it would help a lot if you would stop standing over us like a stalker," Davina added with a frown.

Maleny sighed and cut into the conversation, "Can we not do the fighting thing? It's a waste of time when we're all reaching for the same goal."

"Really?" Davina scoffed, "Because my goal is to get Kol out of the compound alive. Which seems to be about number ten on his list," she threw a glare towards Klaus who took it in with amusement.

"Number nine, at least!"

Maleny elbowed him for his childish remark, "Be quiet. She's not wrong - what you did with Kol was out of the question. But what he did to Rebekah was also out of the question. So, in other words, both of you," she pointed between the teen and the hybrid, "be quiet and get to work."

"Agreed," Amarrah held a hand for Davina, "Let's start."

Begrudgingly, Davina took the woman's hand and began chanting a spell together. As they chanted however, they began seeing visions of Finn doing his own spell.

"We saw glimpses of him," Amarrah gasped and looked at the others, "He's combining sacred objects. Totems. Representational magic."

"Where?" Klaus asked urgently.

The two witches returned to their spell in hopes of seeing more visions. Davina came to first and replied, "Lafayette No. 1. The Lyonne tomb."

"What exactly is he using for this spell?" Maleny dreaded to ask.

"He's channeling your parents!" Amarrah gasped in horror, "You people are sick."

Klaus hadn't taken it that way with his wide smile, "And here I thought I was the poster-child for least grateful offspring!"

"No time to be cocky," Maleny pointed at him, "With that kind of power under Finn's arm we're going to have some problems - bigger ones than the ones we already have."

"Then we need to get going," Klaus turned back for the entrance doors, but after taking a couple steps he abruptly froze.

"What is it now?" Davina rolled her eyes, unable to see his expressions from behind.

"Klaus…?" Maleny slowly said and turned to him just as he dropped to the floor, unconscious, "Oh my God! Davina!"

"Hey!" the teen scowled at the insinuation, "It wasn't me!"

Maleny frantically got to her knees and tried waking him up herself, "C'mon, wake up! Wake up, dammit!"

"This wasn't his choice, Mal," Amarrah forced the blonde to her feet.

"What are you talking about about?" Maleny shook her off.

"This has to be what Finn was doing with his spell, remember?"

Maleny blinked as it dawned her it was true. Just then her cellphone buzzed in her pocket and upon pulling it out she saw it was Cami, "Cami, I love you, but I don't have time-"

"Elijah collapsed and he's not waking up!" Cami exclaimed abruptly, "One moment we were talking and the next - bam! What do I do?"

"Elijah too? It's one of Finn's tricks, I'm afraid," Maleny ran a hand through her hair, "Listen, just...don't leave the house," and with that she hung up.

"So you have a plan?" Davina asked in high hopes. She realized if this was the case with all the brothers then Kol was left in the compound on his own with a bunch of hungry vampires.

"Hm?" Maleny blinked, "Oh I don't have a plan. I was kinda hoping the Harvest girl and the powerful French witch would have one," the three women looked at each other, completely lose on their next move.

~ 0 ~

Finn had built an elaborate form of prison for his brothers through the mind and was taking full advantage of it to get the information he needed. He did, however, release Kol simply to allow him to tell Marcel and his vampires what would happen at sundown - the barrier would come down and with the ravenous vampires being released into the festival blood would ensue.

"So," he proudly sat on a chair across Klaus and Elijah, "what shall we talk about while we wait for nightfall? Oh! I know! Let's talk about our parents."

Klaus rolled his eyes, "You know, I figured you wouldn't be kind to Mother, but imagine my surprise to learn that Mikael met the same fate! Bravo, brother."

"You see, the parent I was interested in talking about was your father. Your real one? I mean, you longed to know him your whole life, yet at the first opportunity, you murdered him! Why, I wonder?"

"Possibly the same reason you took out Esther. Severing parental ties has a way of freeing one up to recognize one's true potential."

"Quite," Finn agreed, "But, Esther was no fool. She pinpointed your wants, and knowing your true father was at the top of the list! No, something else occupies the top of your list of affections. And it's not your favorite city because I'm about to take that from you, using your own vampires, and I barely get a rise out of you! I thought maybe it was Rebekah, but you remain calm, even when the one who knows her fate probably just met his.

Elijah was making a round in the cabin pretending to be more interested in the decorations, "I am fighting the monumental urge to mount your severed head upon one of these walls…

Finn promptly ignored him and continued on, "I then thought it was your favorite brother, but Mother broke him into a thousand pieces, and rather than fix him, you left him to fend for himself God knows where. And Kol...well, he's not much of your devotion right now, right?" Finn shook his head but momentarily paused, smirking in that devious way the two brothers knew he had something else up his sleeve, "That really only leaves Kol and...Maleny?"

Klaus stalked over to the man on the chair, "She has nothing to do with this! Leave her alone!"

Finn sucked air between his teeth, "It's a bit late for that. See, my wolves are already acting on it."

"LEAVE HER!" Klaus momentarily forgot he couldn't even touch Finn and tried to grasp him from the neck.

Finn produced an aneurysm that forced Klaus to his knees, "I said she'd pay for this as well. That's the thing about her, she's almost a Mikaelson and with all the pain that comes with it. It's only a matter of time."

~ 0 ~

"Wake up!" it was now Davina who was trying to wake Klaus up...only her attempts consisted of hard slaps across the face, "C'mon! Wake up!"

Over at the altar sat Amarrah and Maleny on the small steps, both staring at the teen in resignation. There was nothing to do but wait for Finn to bring down the spell. However, as time ticked by and Kol's body remained at the compound - as the teen hadn't known that Kol had been returned - she grew more and more frustrated.

"Wake up!"

"Aren't you going to stop her?" Amarrah took her gaze off Davina to look at Maleny beside her.

Maleny had her chin resting on her palm and looked far too calm for someone whose practically boyfriend was being slapped by a teenage witch. The blonde hummed, "I figure this is a way for her to release anger. This way she wins, I don't lose either of them, and Klaus won't ever know about it."

Suddenly, the doors of the church opened with a blast and in came a swarm of Finn's wolves. Davina jumped to her feet at the same time Maleny and Amarrah got up.

"Maleny Rowan, we came to collect you," a middle aged woman, unlike the others a witch, stepped forwards.

"Good, no thank you," Maleny shook her head, "You can go now."

The woman rolled her eyes and glanced back to the wolves, "Well, you know what to do."

"Stay back!" Davina had pulled aneurysms on the looming wolves. Amarrah tried flinging others back but there was simply too many. Maleny quickly saw it would be tough to escape.

"Ah!" Amarrah gasped as she was yanked by one of the wolves.

"Amarrah!" Maleny tried going for her but then she heard Davina's gasp as well and turned to see the teen being held by another wolf.

The middle-aged witch stepped forwards once more, this time wearing a smirk as she probably knew what would happen, "Let's try this again, shall we? Maleny Rowan, we came to collect you. Will you go easily or will we have to tear the hearts out from your two lovely friends?"

"Don't go with them, Mal," Davina struggled to get free from her captive.

Maleny ran her hands through her hair as she questioned her best option. It was quite obvious and even she knew what she would have to decide for. With a shaky breath she stepped forwards, motioning she was coming in peace, "I go and you leave them alone?"

The witch gave a nod, "Of course. We've no interest in silly witches and certainly in an unconscious hybrid."

"Maleny, what are you doing!?" Amarrah angrily stopped fighting to glare at her friend.

"It's okay," Maleny assured, "When Klaus wakes up you'll tell him...and he'll know what to do," she lowered her hands and walked towards the group, "I'll go willingly."

The witch looked at the two wolves holding Amarrah and Davina captive, "Hold them until we're out of the building," she instructed and grabbed Maleny by the arm, "And know if you try anything we'll kill your friends on the spot."

"I won't," Maleny gritted her teeth and was pushed out for the doors.

Behind them Davina and Amarrah could only watch as Maleny willingly walked out with the wolves. They all correctly assumed she would come to rue the moment she walked out of the church.

~ 0 ~

"You should realize the trouble you're getting yourself into by doing this," Maleny warned in vain as she was pushed towards a car, now bound by the wrists.

The witch that had taken her, now identified as Ela, snapped her fingers for one of the wolves. She was handed some gray duct tape.

Maleny frowned at what was coming, "Seriously?" she momentarily stopped walking to turn to her but was pushed into a walk by a wolf behind, "You already have my voluntary kidnapping."

"Precautions," Ela plainly said and stopped by the car, opening up the door to the backseat. She pulled on the tape and cut it with her teeth, "Wouldn't want you shouting out to people you're kidnapped. Especially when there's a silly festival going on."

"You get that thing away from me," Maleny backtracked and hit a wolf behind, "No!"

Ela stepped forwards as the wolf behind Maleny grabbed her arms and kept her locked for Ela to place the tape over Maleny's mouth. Maleny now openly struggled against the two and went as far as putting her feet up on the side of the car so as to not be forced inside. In the end however, the wolves overpowered her easily and stuffed her inside. Ela rolled her eyes at the fiasco and got in after the blonde.

"Hurry up," she told the driver, another of the wolves, "Yamilet holds the corpse deep in the bayou."

"Yes," the driver nodded and started the car.

"And I wouldn't think about plotting an escape from the bayou," Ela warned Maleny with a smirk, "Finn has made sure it's very deep. It'll take you at least two days to get to the roadside," Maleny visibly swallowed hard and of course remained still. Content, Ela looked ahead as the car was finally driving off.

Maleny thought about the chances of her making an escape on her own. But there were wolves involved with their supernatural strength and she didn't feel like being mauled to the point of losing a limb. With no options, she had to sit there and let time pass as they headed to God knows where. The moon was up high and bright when the car finally came to a stop, and Maleny felt even more nervous when she realized they were actually very deep in the bayou - as Ela promised.

"Where the hell are we?" she whispered her demand as soon as Ela yanked the tape off her.

Ela got out the car and Maleny was escorted out on her side. The two wolves held her tightly around the arms and faced her in the direction of a cabin.

There was a young man standing by the threshold of the cabin, apparently waiting for them. Ela walked up to him, her eyes making a clear observation of the quietness in the area.

"Is it done?" she asked.

"Yes, just like Vincent, ordered," a young man replied. "She's down."

Ela looked back as Maleny was brought forwards. The blonde was nervously looking around, "What are we doing here? I don't get it..."

The smirk that broke across Ela's lips made Maleny fear there was a horrible punishment on the other side of the cabin door. With a motion of her fingers, the wolves half-dragged Maleny towards the cabin.

"We should get started, then," Ela declared as she entered first.

As soon as Maleny was brought in - and forced to her feet - she could see on a metal table her previous corpse, in perfect condition. Immediately she started shaking her head and trying to back away in horror as she assumed what was going to happen. She whimpered and threw her feet up in attempts to make it harder for the wolves to drag her closer.

"NO! NO! Please don't! Anything but this! PLEASE!"

Ela was clearly satisfied by the reaction and gave a small chuckle, "This is exactly what Finn said he hoped to hear from you."

"Please! Don't make go back to that!" Maleny was near to tears as the wolves forced her onto the table beside the one with her corpse, "I'm begging you! Not the curse! Not the curse!"

"Benson," Ela called and the young man that received them walked over, "Bring her in," she ordered.

With a nod of his head, Benson went into another room of the cabin. In the meantime, Ela walked up to the table Maleny was on and smirked.

"Are you ready little witch?"

Maleny was busy screaming her head off and budging against the ropes binding her to the table, "NO! NO! STOP! NOT THIS! I DON'T WANT TO GO BACK!" The tears fell like rain pouring from the sky. Maleny knew that this time Klaus would not be coming to save her - no one was.

Finn would have his way; he would make her pay in the worst way possible.

#the originals #klaus mikaelson #ocappreciation #ocapp #the originals imagines #klaus mikaelson imagines #the originals fics #klaus mikaelson fics #tvd fics #oc: Maleny Rowan #fic: the girl in the forest

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deceits-left-glove · 5 years ago

Text

My god.

I just found a really old logicality one-shot I made when I was very very very new in the fandom and dear god- I didn't think there was a time i wasn't a Janus Stan but here we are I guess

°•.•°•.•°•.

Patton PoV

As long as I could remember, I'd had a tattoo on my wrist. It was a cute little pair of glasses! My soulmark. There would be one other person in the world with that same pair of glasses on the same spot on their wrist! The thought had always made me giddy. There is someone out there destined to be with me, we've been looking at the same little picture all our lives! Like a secret museum just for us! Whenever I went out in public I would always look for peoples wrists. I didn't think about how weird it was until someone pointed it out to me. I didn't do it anymore after that. I was just scared of missing my soulmate! Imagine if you never found your soulmate! Knowing that you were destined to be with someone, and spending your whole life looking for that person, and then... I don't want to think about it. I was so so happy when I found out I needed glasses! I chose ones that looked like my soulmark, obviously! Then if my soulmate looks at my glasses, they would be reminded of their soulmark. I was on my way to the cafe to meet up with my three best friends. Logan, Roman and Virgil! I was scared I was going to be late so I was running. My cardigan fell off and I had to go back to get it. It was around my shoulders, as usual. It was cold outside, but I hated covering up my soulmark! And hate is a strong word. I just thought that if my soulmate had their mark covered, then them seeing mine could be the only way to find out. So I almost never covered it up. I was just glad my cardigan didn't fall into a puddle!

Logan PoV.

as long as I could remember, I'd had a tattoo on my wrist. A pair of glasses. It was my soulmark. I despised it. It was honestly a flawed method of finding the person you want to spend the rest of your life with. You could end up being the opposite of compatible. You could constantly argue and that would be an unhealthy relationship. I just think the whole thing is a falsehood. How can a mutated birthmark show the person you are going to be in a relationship with. It makes no sense and I just ignore the whole... Mess entirely. I have never intentionally shown anyone my soulmark and I never hope to in the future. It will always be covered, if not by a shirt then by that concealing makeup. I refuse to acknowledge my consentless tattoo other than when hiding it. I disregard it that much that when I was choosing my glasses, I found some particular frames rather familiar and didn't realize why until I was at home with too pairs of the same glasses. That was one of the few times I have face-palmed in my life. The other times are normally when Roman or Patton do something stupid. Like now, where I can see Roman at the counter trying to take three cups at once. I sometimes wonder how they are still alive. Probably because they usually have Virgil and I to reel them in from doing something overly dangerous. Like now, when i can see Virgil going over there to help him out with the other cups. With a ding from the shops bell, I watch Patton run through the door, hastily tying his cardigan around his shoulders.

Patton PoV

I rush through the door and meet Logan's eyes. I smile at him and go over to our regular table. I felt other eyes on me, but that was probably me almost running into the door in my hurry to get to my friends. I pull out my chair and sit down opposite him.

"Hi!"

"Hello."

"I told you you couldn't pick up all our drinks at once!" Virgil (that was the 666th word. I thought it would have been another character tbh ;) ) and Roman come over from the counter, each holding two cups. Roman has a chocolate milk and a black coffee, and Virgil has a mocha and a hot chocolate.

"I would have been fine!"

"Romano, buddy... you only have two hands." Virgil hands the hot chocolate to me from his seat, but Roman walks round to give Logan his drink. But there was someone walking past and -im sill not sure how it happened- Roman tripped, spilling the coffee all over it's the guy who was ment to receive it (logan). Oh no!

Deceit PoV (yea that's right! boom!)

From the moment I saw Patton pull out his chair I new what I had to do. He used his left hand. And on his left wrist was a pair of glasses. Just. Like. Logan's. I knew that wimp wouldn't do anything. When I saw his wrist he got all defensive. It's not like I did it on purpose! Jeez. Roman carrying the drink round just made my job even easier- I didn't even have to waste my drink! I stood up and knocked into him, and in an 'attempt to steady him' I pushed the drink out of his hand and onto Logan's left arm. Simple. He would either have to roll his sleeve up or take off his shirt- it was unbuttoned and he had a vest on, don't worry readers, I'm not making him strip (oi shut it you! Be grateful I added you into the story! Don't go turning into Deadpool) . Sure, I look like the bad guy, but I'm helping them, whether they realise it or not!

"The Empire has fallen!" Virgil sweetie, as funny as that was... Leave the puns to Patton. He knows there's a time and a place. This isn't it.

"Ooh ya-"

"Logan! Are you ok?" At this point I can see the barista run around the counter with a cold cloth. He will be fine, just a little angry.

"Oh! I'm so sorry!" I've got to pretend to be at least a little remorseful. I can't look like a complete villain! Then I lean closer to Logan and hiss in his ear "you're welcome!" He knew what I ment. I kept on walking to the bathroom so that it didn't look suspicious, and to stop Logan from going in there to sort out his arm. This was fun. I should help people With their Soulmates more often.

Logan PoV

That snake! Why did he do that! He knows full well how I feel about my soulmark and he is making me show it for no reason! I should never have trusted him with something like that!

"You're welcome!" What? Why would he say that. I'm stronger than him. I can show my soulmark just this once, nothing bad is going to happen, right? I roll my sleeve up and take the damp cloth Remy is handing to me.

"Well he was rude.. anyway! lo, are you like, good? That was some hot coffee, girl!"

"Don't call me lo, or girl. And you don't need the 'like' in there."

"That's the Logan I know! At least it had no, like, permanent side effects!"

"What does that even mean? It's coffee! Not a potion!"

"What do you mean by 'potion' ?" I'm not even listing to the conversation anymore. Patton is staring at the table and looking distressed. Before I can ask, he blurts out

"GLASSES!" He now has almost all of the shops attention. I take off my glasses to check if something has happened to them when he slams his arm down on the table, making all of us jump. Then Remy squeals. Drawing even more attention and confusing me even more. Then I notice Patton has a mark on his arm. It looks like a tattoo. His glasses? Wait. Oh..

I don't think he was looking at the table.

°•.•°•.•°•.

This is my first one-shot and overall I'm happy with it. And I don't really know what else to put here.. so..

~Cyan 🖤

°•.•°•.•°•.

bonus scene (3rd person)

Patton is babbling nonsense, Logan is flushed and completely unresponsive, Remy reluctantly hands a very smug Virgil 5 dollars and Roman keeps repeating something under his breath. Deceit comes back from the bathroom, struts up to the table like he owns the place and just

"You're welcome~*"

And then Roman, slamming his hands on the table and screeching.

"SEE IT'S JUST LIKE A DISNEY FILM!"

°•.•°•.•°•.

3.9 pages

1435 words

°•.•°•.•°•.

O O F

First person PoV! I outright talked to Deceit! He didn't even get a name! I'm going to regret posting this but growth is important y'all!

#i hate this #with every fiber of my being #welp #logicality #if anyone actually reads this I'll probably cry #lmao

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libraryscarf · 5 years ago

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i was thrilled to write something for @fast-moon for the @noragamisecretsanta2019. i hope you like this silly little slice-of-life, and consider it a sincere ‘thank you’ for all you do for the fandom. <3

we fish you a merry christmas

“That kid doesn’t get out enough,” Daikoku mutters, glancing into the loft where two figures sit eyebrow-deep in a pile of textbooks. Hiyori’s been putting Yukine through his paces as the final year of high school bears down on her, and it wouldn’t surprise Daikoku if she were on the verge of springing a practice test or two on her captive student.

“Whatcha doin’, peeping Tom?”

The voice at his elbow makes Daikoku jump. The goblinish smirk on Yato’s face somehow makes it exponentially more punchable.

“You’re one to talk,” Daikoku snarls. “Has Hiyori forgiven you for your little photo collection yet?”

Yato blanches. “That’s—that’s water under the bridge.”

“Should I remind her of when her sleeping face was your lock screen?”

“Waitwaitwait, I’m sorry, please don’t, Daikoku, I’ll do anything--”

Daikoku grins. That’s more like it.

“Don’t you think he’s lookin’ a little anemic?” he asks, motioning with his head at Yukine, who remains miraculously engrossed in studying despite the disruption right outside the door.

“Anemic?” Yato repeats stupidly.

Daikoku’s eyebrows pull together. “Peaky,” he clarifies. “Pale. Wan. Feeble. Insipid.”

Yato bristles. “You calling my boy feeble?”

“He needs some fresh air! All kids do!”

“He gets plenty of that when we’re on jobs,” Yato says in a dismissive tone, before withering like a sunflower under Daikoku’s freezing glare.

“You call scrubbing strangers’ toilets and picking up after your littering ass, ‘getting fresh air?’” he rumbles menacingly.

“What are we saying about your littering ass?” Yukine asks, his head popping into sudden view around the door.

“Respect your elders!” Yato and Daikoku thunder in unison.

: : :

“So where are we going?”

“Somewhere.”

Yukine grimaces.

“You know, Daikoku, it’s not that I don’t totally trust your intentions and all, but sneaking me out of the house, away from both Yato and Kofuku is…well…”

Daikoku grinds his teeth so hard his jaw cracks like a gunshot.

“Kid, for the last goddamn time, I am not a—”

“There you are!” Hiyori trots toward them, a backpack slung over her shoulder and a big, floppy sunhat bouncing with every step. Her arms are bare and freckled, like she’s been spending quite a bit of time outdoors.

“I thought I heard someone yelling,” she says brightly.

“I wasn’t yelling,” Daikoku grumbles.

“You were kind of yelling,” says Nora, silently manifesting right behind Yukine, who curses with such vigor that Daikoku and Hiyori both “shush” him.

“Please don’t do that again,” Yukine gasps, clutching his chest. Nora pats his shoulder in apology.

The four of them continue along the same path for about half an hour, until quite suddenly an arresting view opens up in front of them. It’s a small, sparkling lake, the surface of it as flat and peaceful as a mirror. Rocks, slick with algae, line the shores. Except for the monotone rill of summer insects, it is absolutely silent. To Daikoku, the existence of this place feels like a great miracle.

“Wow,” says Yukine, appropriately awestruck. Hiyori’s eyes are round. “This is so pretty!” she exclaims.

“Lots of fish live here too,” utters a small voice to their left. The three of them turn to see Ebisu, balancing precariously on one of the slippery rocks nearby, a hand shading his eyes as he gazes pensively across the lake.

“I protect this place,” he states almost casually, his eyes fixed somewhere distant across the bright water. “That’s why it can still be so quiet like this, even in the middle of such a big city.”

Hiyori, Yukine, and Nora look to Daikoku, as though expecting him to tell them he’d known this all along. He hadn’t.

Then Ebisu slips.

“Oh!” he cries, as his legs shoot out from under his tiny body. But before he hits either the rock or the slimy surface of the algae, Daikoku springs into action. Plunging shin-deep into the water, he snatches Ebisu from the jaws of what would almost certainly be a nasty concussion.

“Young master!?” Kunimi explodes from the edge of the trees, his face the color of a ripe plum and his suit a wrinkled, muddy disaster. “How did you get so far ahead of me?”

“Your guidepost is shirkin’ his duties,” Daikoku mutters.

“He is still fairly new to his job,” Ebisu says, seeming absolutely unbothered by his own close call with disaster. “He needs a few centuries to get to Iwami’s level.”

Kunimi reaches the edge of the lake and doubles over, heaving with exertion. After he regains his wind, Daikoku strides back to shore and hands Ebisu off to his disheveled guidepost.

“You’ll be joinin’ us then?” Daikoku jerks his head back toward Hiyori, Yukine, and Nora. Hiyori, having seen Ebisu safely back to shore, kneels and begins unpacking her backpack. Yukine and Nora watch as she removes a canister of bait and unfolds a long fishing pole.

“Fishing?” Yukine says incredulously.

“Yeah,” Daikoku says, walking over and taking the rod Hiyori holds out to him. “You three really need some off-time. This is one of the best ways to blow off steam.”

Yukine, looking a touch green, eyes the squirming bait in the canister Hiyori has just uncapped. “Couldn’t we have just played ‘catch’ or something?” he says mournfully.

Daikoku glances at him from the corner of his eye. “You wanna play catch?”

Yukine turns pink. “No! Absolutely not! It was an example! A what-if situation!”

A grin tugs at the corner of Daikoku’s mouth. “Got it, kid.”

After he hands out the fishing rods, it grows quickly apparent to Daikoku that he has severely overestimated the hand-eye coordination, as well as the capacity for silent waiting, of two of his three charges. Hiyori does quite well, having accompanied several summer fishing trips with her father, but not so well that she manages to actually hook anything at the end of her line. Yukine makes miserable noises as he applies the bait to his tackle, then becomes ensnared with his own fishing line and must be untangled by Kunimi. Nora refuses the fishing rod outright, preferring to wade waist-deep into the water, vanish beneath the surface, and reappear seconds later holding a live, struggling fish in each fist.

“Do I win?” she asks calmly.

“This isn’t a—” competition, Daikoku is about to say, but before he can finish, something streaks past him and plummets into the water, churning up waves like a school of piranha.

“If I am to win, I must know the method and the stakes,” comes a voice from the edge of the trees, and Bishamon appears with a small retinue of her shinki.

“Why are they here?” Yukine whispers out of the corner of his mouth to Nora, who is attempting to stack her growing pile of squirming captives against an errant boulder, but mostly succeeding in creating a sort of fish Slip’N’Slide down into the algae.

Nana’s messy head surfaces from the middle of the lake with a splash, and its owner gives a muffled whoop. “Hugh guht wuh!” she crows, teeth clamped around a struggling trout.

Daikoku hauls Nora back from her sixth journey into the lake to capture more innocent fish and plants her firmly next to Yukine with a fishing rod in her hand. “We’re learning with these,” he says emphatically, then begins to shovel her hard-won pile of scaly trophies back into the lake, where they thrash away from the shore as fast as possible, shimmering like little bolts of lightning beneath the water.

“Well then that’s just cheating,” Nora says, pointing at where Ebisu stands at the very edge of the shore, hand held safely in Kunimi’s. The water right in front of him is boiling with eager fish that are nearly throwing themselves onto the rocks at his feet. He leans down, reaches into the foaming mass, and effortlessly pulls out a fish.

“Seriously,” Daikoku says in despair, “Why is everyone here?”

A pink head pops out from behind Bishamon.

“I told them!” Kofuku says gleefully, then launches herself at Daikoku, tackling both of them into the water.

: : :

“So when you heard me say, ‘I’m taking Hiyori, Yukine, and Nora on a quiet fishing trip to the lake,’ what you actually heard was ‘Tell everyone in our circle of acquaintance there’s a big competition at the lake; be there or face eternal dishonor’?”

Kofuku’s wet hair smacks into her face as she nods at Daikoku. “Yep! Pretty much!”

Yukine glares at her, utterly betrayed. “You said you could keep Yato off my case for one day.”

“And I did!” she chirps. Yukine looks pointedly at Yato, who, once he saw Hiyori was trying to fish, could not be persuaded away from joining her. So far all he’s managed is to lose his bait, break a pole, and frighten away every single fish investigating Hiyori’s line.

“Okay,” Kofuku corrects. “But I tried. You didn’t give me enough Umaibō!”

“I gave you fourteen.”

Kofuku shrugs. “He’s insatiable.”

Yukine gazes forlornly down at his fishing pole. “Well, I guess it doesn’t really matter. I’m not gonna be able to catch anything.”

Daikoku grunts. Then he snatches a piece of bait from the canister, stuffs it in his pocket, and steers Yukine away from the crowd of people at the shore. Yato and Hiyori glance up at them as they walk off, and for a moment it looks like Yato wants to follow, but Kofuku (occasionally, if not entirely reliable), throws her arms around his neck and knocks him straight into the water.

“Try here,” Daikoku says, once they’ve reached a quiet stretch of shore on the opposite side of the little lake.

Yukine still looks skeptical. To give him a little nudge in the right direction, Daikoku pulls the bait out of his pocket, picks off the lint, and affixes it to the end of the fishing line.

“Trust me, kid.”

After a few failed casts, Yukine manages to send his line out far enough for any questing fish to bite. He settles down on the rock, and Daikoku crouches next to him, both their eyes searching the ripples.

Several minutes go by. Daikoku clears his throat.

“So…how’s school?”

Yukine’s mouth twitches.

“It’s good. Hiyori’s kinda strict, but she’s really smart and knows how to explain stuff.”

Daikoku rubs his chin. “Great,” he mutters. “That’s great.”

Yukine snorts quietly. “You know, it’s okay with me if we just sit here and fish in silence.”

Daikoku deflates in relief. “Thank god.”

After a few more minutes of wordless waiting, Yukine’s shoulders seem to loosen.

“I think you were right about blowing off steam,” he admits. “This is…nice. Even if I don’t catch anything.”

The edges of Daikoku’s mouth soften. “It ain’t so much about the catching,” he says. “It’s more about the sitting.”

Not particularly profound advice, but Yukine nods solemnly, like it’s the truest wisdom he’s ever heard.

Then, a tug comes at the end of the line.

#scarfwrites #noragamisecretsanta2019 #fast-moon #noragami #noragami fanfiction #i've never gone fishing.#my only experience comes from stardew valley and i'm pretty sure that's Exactly how it works irl

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robininthelabyrinth · 5 years ago

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Fic: Lonely, Dark and Deep - ao3 link - Chapter 6

Fandom: Naruto Pairing: Madara/Tobirama, background others Summary:

Hashirama was always going to have to leave Konoha behind one day, but no one was expecting for it to happen so soon.

Tobirama falls apart without his brother.

Madara, mad and bitter and preparing to leave himself, finds that he’s now without his best friend and responsible for a village he’d just about given up on.

And now it seems like there’s something not quite right with the forest…

———————————————————————————–

I’m sorry, Madara.

Tobirama can’t help but think of it that way, oddly enough. He wouldn’t have thought that that’d be the thought that keeps plaguing him, but somehow, it is.

Madara, who tried so hard – who helps when he can, doing whatever he can – doing far more than Tobirama ever expected, really. Someone to help with the paperwork, someone to share the burden, someone to keep him company, even a body to warm him at night…

It really has helped.

Tobirama would have been dead without him.

It’s not – it’s not a brother, no. But it’s something.

To Tobirama’s surprise, it’s more than the stopgap he initially assumed it would be.

Indeed, now that Madara is not insane, not driven mad by pain and anger and loss, not burdened by the curse of hatred, Tobirama can see why Hashirama liked him so much. Clever and creative, with a wit biting almost to the point of pain; compassionate, in his own way, behind the mask of a misanthropic grouch he likes to cart around – fond of children, who are fond of him in return now that he no longer looks on the verge of murder.

Exceptionally devoted to the village he named.

(Just seeing Madara reminds Tobirama of the best parts of his brother. To watch Madara walk through the village is to see Hashirama do the same, a missing shadow, and Tobirama thought that would hurt, but – it doesn’t. It makes Tobirama feel like Hashirama's only in the next room hiding away from them, fearful of the paperwork they’re going to make him do, and pretending that that is the case makes the days just barely bearable.)

Maybe if Izuna’s death didn’t lie between them –

But no.

It does, it’s there, and for all that Tobirama has retroactively learned regret, sometimes plays with seals that verge on breaking the flow of time itself if only he could go back to fix it, he can’t. He will always be the man who murdered Madara’s brother, and he can’t change that.

He can’t make Madara forget it, and that means it’s pointless to hope – to dream that they could ever be more than they are.

More than just a stopgap.

Maybe things would be different, if they were more than that – but they’re not.

And so the decision is easy.

Easier than it should be.

I’m sorry, Madara.

Tobirama promised the man that he would never to turn his sword against himself, and he intends to keep that promise – but there are times when a sacrifice is called for, and Tobirama would never sacrifice his students if he could sacrifice himself instead.

They're all exhausted by now, running on empty. Kiri has sent so many more shinobi to ambush them than they'd ever anticipated could be possible‎.

They've left a mountain of corpses behind them, but there are still more - the strongest ones, the most ruthless ones, the ones who are waiting until they've been worn to nothing before striking, the ones who will undoubtedly boast about having caused the demise of Konoha's best even as they stand on the shoulders of all who came before.

They're so tired - and no one is more tired than Tobirama.

He's been tired for so long. Nothing has mattered since Hashirama died, not really - he loves his students, he loves his sister-in-law and her children, he loves his village, but it's not enough‎.

Nothing is enough.

Even Madara, Madara and their half-unspoken thing, their stopgap, their it-might-have-been-if-things-were-different –

Well, in the end, he's not enough, either.

Tobirama misses his brother.

He misses his brother so much.

He misses Hashirama’s enthusiasm and his charisma, the way he saw the future of their village, of peace, like it was a physical thing. Tobirama’s nothing like that – for him, though he tries his best, trying to create a peaceful future is like walking through a fog following a map you’ve only ever heard of second-hand, now that the one who could see the way is gone.

His guiding light is gone.

He wants, more than anything, to see his brother again.

Tobirama wants to be clear, though, that no matter what Madara heavily implies (and sometimes states outright), he is not actively suicidal, or at least he’s not anymore. He hasn’t made any concrete plans to kill himself – and anyway, he can’t; he knows that, now that his mind is clear.

Hashirama entrusted the village to his hands, and he would never reject any gift his brother gave him, no matter how heavy the burden falls.

He will not let him down. He will not let the village down.

(He might let Madara down.)

So, he’s not suicidal. And if he sometimes wishes there was a jutsu that could simply make him not be anymore, without causing any inconvenience to anyone, well, that’s his own business.

It doesn’t matter as long as he doesn’t do anything about it.

But when he and his students agree that the only way for most of them to survive is ‎for one of them to act as a lure, even knowing that whoever volunteers for that will not come back alive –

The choice is easy.

It isn’t really suicide if it’s for a good reason, surely, and what better reason than to save his students’ lives?

(He knows he’s lying. He knows exactly what he’s doing, but – he’s so tired. He’s tired, and he misses his brother.)

His students look at him with hurt eyes, mouths shaping around cries of "no!" and "it's too soon!" in just the way his own did when it was Hashirama’s turn to leave him behind, but Tobirama knows that ‎they'll be fine without him.

They’re strong and skilled, and he’s taught them everything he knows; they’ve been refusing to take the graduation exams despite his occasional hints that they were more than ready, but he suspects that has more to do with wanting to keep him as their teacher than anything else.

And as for the village, well – Madara will be a good Hokage, and, if he refuses, either Sarutobi or Kagami would be eminently suitable to stand for election, and he tells them as much.

They will tend carefully to Hashirama's village, make it prosper, and they will live, and that's all he really cares about now, isn't it? That's all.‎

He can die easy, knowing that everything that really means something will be taken care of.

(If he feels slightly bad about dying before helping Madara complete his Rinnegan project, well, at least they’ve made some progress; Madara can surely finish the rest himself, if at a slower pace. Maybe that will help compensate Madara for losing the only thing between him and the role of Hokage, which Madara – although eminently suited for – very loudly does not want.)

It won’t be a bad death.

He can die easy‎ - and surely, surely if he dies in the forest, defending his brother's village and its children, then fate will not be so cruel as to deny him the chance to see Hashirama one more time.

Surely.

The decision made, Tobirama sends his students away and turns to face his enemies, dropping into a ready position. He may not have anything to live for, but he is as stubborn and spiteful as he has ever been, and he will not simply give in and let them kill him.

He'll make them pay for the privilege in blood.

‎The ensuing fight is long and painful - the Kiri nin are cautious of him, even in his drained and weakened state, even with a stab wound in his side inhibiting his movements, even with his sword arm partially dislocated, rendering every strike agony. They hang back, slicing at him from a distance, and he's not fast enough right now to avoid them.

Death of a thousand cuts, he thinks at one point, nearly delirious from blood loss. And I won't even be able to see the last one coming.

A nasty strike to his head has rendered him nearly blind, blood gushing out to drip into his already poor eyes; he's been using some of it to form bullets or dragons, red and fierce as iron, but his chakra is low, too low, and he can't spare the energy to wipe the blood away, much less heal himself.

He's going to die.

It's so close, he can almost feel it - he even imagines he can feel Hashirama's so-familiar chakra, rich with growth and tasting of green, rough-textured like bark and soft as moss. It's all around him now, warm and welcoming.

No, death won't be so bad, if it means he gets to see Hashirama again.

Not so bad at all...

"This won't do, Tobirama," a voice says, welcome and beloved, and Tobirama recognizes that voice.

How could he not? It sang him to sleep as a newborn; it was by his side his whole life; it has been so notable in its absence these past few years that just hearing it again is enough to send Tobirama to his knees, tears welling in his eyes and bile on his tongue.

It cannot be.

And yet – who else could it be but him?

Who else, but –

"Hashirama," he croaks.

As if summoned by his words, the forest springs to life around him, roots and branches becoming weapons, the trees themselves reaching for the Kiri nin who blanch and try to run.

Try, because no one ever escapes the Mokuton when Hashirama is really trying.

Tobirama can't tear his barely-seeing eyes away from his enemies as they die, the familiar sight of trees given life by Mokuton too dear a sight to miss. He can't bring himself to turn his head to look at his brother - his wonderful, beloved, dead brother, who remembers his name and remembers he loves him and whose presence is so much everything that Tobirama wants that he's suddenly convinced that he's been trapped in the most terrible type of genjutsu.

‎He can't turn to look, because what if it's not him?

What if it's a dream, a delusion, genjustu or even a henge – a pale imitation that's stolen his brother’s voice and power and is using it only to distract him?

Tobirama couldn't bear it.

If the Kiri nin wanted to make him die by his own hand, that would do it; they wouldn't need anything more than that. To give him the hope of Hashirama, and then to find out it was all a lie -

Even Madara in the worst of his madness would not have been so cruel.

Out of the corner of his eye, in the last dark blurry bit of vision he has left, he sees a shadow of something in the wood, large and overgrown and old, but before he can even wonder about it his senses are flooded with familiar chakra.

His brother’s chakra – his brother, unforgettable, vast and overwhelming, a little different perhaps than exactly what he remembers it being but still unmistakably Hashirama’s –

The next thing Tobirama knows he's being gathered up into Hashirama's arms, just the way he remembers from when he was just a toddler - lifted up in arms far larger than his own, surrounded and encompassed and protected by the feeling that has always meant safety.

No one could mimic that chakra, that feeling, not from such close range and against a sensor as strong as Tobirama, no one.

He’s overwhelmed by a wash of relief.

It’s not because he’s alive.

It’s because Hashirama is.

Somehow, impossibly - he's alive.

Tobirama opens eyes that he must have closed at some point to look, terror gone and replaced by a budding sense of joy, suddenly eager to look - ‎

Except it seems he didn't close his eyes after all. No matter how he tries, he can’t see anything at all, the blood loss turning the world around him into vacant blackness as his consciousness leaves him.

But ‎he can still hear.

"Sleep, Tobirama," his brother croons. "I'll take care of you - and I'll be here when you wake up."

Hashirama has always known exactly what to say.

Sleep snatches Tobirama away.

#senju tobirama #Uchiha madara #senju hashirama #my fic #lonely dark and deep #sorry for the EXTREMELY belated post #I've been dying at work recently #no one should work that many hours in a month

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eirian-houpe · 5 years ago

Text

The Library Beneath the Clock Tower - Chapter 31

Fandom: Once Upon a Time (TV)

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Relationships: Belle/Rumplestiltskin | Mr. Gold, Belle/Gaston (Once Upon a Time)

Additional Tags: Bookshop On the Corner, slightly AU, Cursed Storybrooke (Once Upon a Time), Alternate Universe - In Storybrooke | Cursed (Once Upon a Time), Eventual Smut

Summary: Storybrooke has no library, and neither does Belle, not since the library where she worked in Boston discovered her past as an inpatient at a mental hospital. Taking her future into her own hands, Belle travels to Storybrooke where her intention is to open up the town library, but all does not go according to her plan. Obstacles and false starts, and diversion along very wrong pathways interrupt her journey toward fulfilling her dream, as well as taking her rightful place and becoming a part of the Storybrooke community.

Read previous chapters on AO3

Chapter 31 - Questionable Choices

“Oh, my gods! What happened?” Belle rushed forwards to grasp Gold’s wrists in her hands and pull them toward her, at the same time looking into the car besides which Mister Gold still stood. Gold pulled his arms from her grasp and nodded his head toward the car.

“Someone’s dog got at one of the lambs,” he snapped, “I have to get him to the nearest emergency vet, and once again, I find the road blocked and you are at the heart of it.”

From the edge of the clearing, Hunter’s voice sounded, harsh and cold, in complete contrast to the tone’s he’d used before, when he had been speaking with Belle.

“There’s no need for that kind of attitude, Mister Gold,” Belle watched surprise briefly flash through Gold’s eyes, before Hunter went on, “Yes, Sir, I know who you are.”

“And am I supposed to be concerned?” Gold tossed back, then looked at Belle, and asked, incredulously, “And what exactly are you two doing out here in the dead of night anyway?”

“What I choose to do with my evenings, Mister Gold, are none of your business.” Belle said.

“Evening?” Gold raised and incredulous eyebrow. “You do know the hour is well past midnight, don’t you, Miss Marchland?”

“I’m well aware of the time,” Belle snapped, “And you’re my landlord, not my father, so the fact that I’m out at this time should be neither here nor there to you, Gold.”

For the first time she could remember she dropped all forms of politeness when speaking with him, even his title, and she crossed her arms over her chest defensively. It wasn’t necessarily that they’d been caught, ‘necking’ in the woods, as Ruby might have said, but the fact that Ruby might well have scolded her just as Gold was. What the hell was she doing?

Gold looked over at Hunter, and with his lip curled into a snarl, that was matched by his tone said, “Will you move your truck, or must I call the Sheriff to report your indecent attempts to defile our town librarian?”

Belle had no idea where the audacity came from, either for his accusation or the resulting slap she gave so hard to the side of Gold’s face that it left her hand stinging from it. He didn’t move, though he did rock back on his heels, and his face hardened, his lips pursing into a flat line.

“How dare you?” she spluttered, her face flushing scarlet.

“Miss Marchland,” he said, his voice deadly calm. “What do you actually know about this… man?” he said the final word full of mocking sarcasm. “Where he goes… what he does, traveling the country like some kind of privateer?”

“Well, I…” she started, subdued for a moment before she realized that she was letting herself get dictated to again, and snapped, “More than you and that’s for sure!”

Gold regarded her steadily for a moment before he looked over her shoulder at Hunter, who had stepped closer when her little altercation with Gold began.

“Do you think?” he said, his voice a steady, controlled mask against his feelings.

She frowned and turned sideways to both men and saw that each of them had their eyes locked on the other, and their expressions were the personification of thunder and hatred.

It was Hunter that moved first. He took a step forward, and slightly closer to her, enough that she could feel the heat from his body across the narrow gap between them, but Gold that spoke before he did , eyes still locked with Hunter’s as he said, “Move. Your damned. Truck.”

For a moment, Belle thought Hunter was going to refuse, but surely not. Under the circumstances, no matter how rude and horrible Gold was being, it wasn’t the lamb’s fault and she couldn’t believe that Hunter would be so cruel as to continue to let an innocent creature suffer. She jumped when she felt his fingers close around her arm.

“Come with me, Belle,” he said, and she frowned. The words sounded more like a command than an invitation, and that, along with her own thoughts, made her feel like she wanted to cry.

What the hell are you thinking coming out into the woods at midnight with a man you hardly know and don’t even have a real relationship with!

“I… I can’t,” she said after a moment and pulled her arm out of his grasp.

“But I have to g—” he said, and she felt as though she had curled in on herself. She knew his time was limited and that even without a pick up from the cannery, he still had deliveries that he had to make.

“I know,” she said, cutting him off. “And I’m sorry, but I—”

“The truck.” Gold interrupted coldly - furious.

Without a word, Hunter turned on his heel, and stalked back toward where the truck was parked across the track’s entry, snatching the picnic basket along the way. With a last look at the anger on Gold’s face, Belle followed. The least she could do was see him safely away, but he climbed up into the truck without a word and Belle felt terribly guilty for not agreeing to go with him.

Before he could close the door, she jumped up onto the step and leaned into the open cab, reaching for him with one hand, and grasping the front of his shirt. She pulled him closer until he was close enough to take his mouth in a kiss. He tasted of cheese and salmon, and a tangy fruity taste she could not identify. For a moment he seemed surprised, and then he slid his hands either side of her face and kissed her back, just as deeply.

She was breathless when the kiss ended and she was a little more hopeful that she hadn’t completely spoiled what they had been growing between them. She hopped down backwards, staggering a little when it seemed a little further down to the ground than she thought it was going be and stepped back as Hunter pulled the door closed. Then she heard the discordant roar of the engine drowning out the natural sounds, and it seemed somehow wrong in the quiet of Storybrooke, and the lights, when he turned them on, seemed suddenly too bright.

She stood back and folded her arms across her chest as she watched the truck slowly begin to pull away as though the effort of moving was almost too much. For a second it seemed like a metaphor of some kind, but she pushed thought away.

The roar of the truck’s engine was replaced by the purr of Gold’s car as it came from behind her, on the path that led into the trees. She bit her lip, feeling suddenly ashamed of the way she had behaved. She didn’t remember ever slapping anyone the way she had Gold and she expected him to simply drive on past and leave her at the side of the road. Instead, though he was already driving slowly, he brought his car to a stop beside her and wound down the window. In a completely contrary fashion, his thoughtfulness made her angry, resentful.

“Miss Marchland,” he said quietly but clipped, “I can’t leave you here by yourself in the dark; in the dead of night.”

“I’m fine,” she snapped. “I can look after myself - thank you very much.”

“I didn’t say otherwise,” he said, though his attempt to mollify her pride was somewhat negated by the words that came from him next, “However, since your ideas of ‘looking after yourself’ include climbing rotten trees, and meeting strangers for midnight picnics in perhaps one of the darkest spots in Storybrooke, you’ll excuse me, I hope, if I find myself unable to trust your judgment.”

“You arrogant—”

“Yes, yes, that’s already been established, so please, get into the car and allow me to run you home,” he interrupted. “This animal needs a vet and I’d rather get him there sooner than later.”

She huffed, and didn’t want to, so was somewhat disappointed with herself when she walked around the car, opened the door and got into the passenger side.

“Will he be all right, do you think?” she asked, glancing into the back where Gold had wrapped the lamb in a blanket of some kind and attempted to contain the animal in a box.

“I hope so,” he answered. “Time will tell.”

He drove swiftly back to Storybrooke, and neither of them spoke another word on the journey, not even anything more of antagonism between the two of them, and when he dropped her off outside of the library, he did not bid her goodnight, and she returned the courtesy just as he had given it.

Instead she stormed to the outside door leading into the apartment, anger knotted in her belly only she didn’t know at whom she was most angry: Hunter for implying a threat to Gold, Gold for his outright nastiness, or herself… for yet again making stupid choices.

#rumbelle #AU (slight)#cursed storybrooke #angst #eventual smut #the bookshop on the corner

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our-smooty · 5 years ago

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Flowerbeds and Fertile Soil: Chapter 4

Fandom: Good Omens

Rating: Explicit

Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens, )Anathema Device/Newton Pulsifer

Tags: Kidfic, Mpreg kind of, they can choose to present however so idk, Crowley Has A Vulva (Good Omens), Crowley Has A Penis (Good Omens), Aziraphale Has A Penis (Good Omens), Aziraphale Has A Vulva (Good Omens), OCs Galor, parenting, using your snake form to avoid confrontation, Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Pregnancy, if I missed a tag lemme know

Summary: They could do anything, go anywhere, all without the worry of Above or Bellow making a fuss. Even so, they mostly kept to their little patch of Eden, their cottage and garden and the simple life they’d carved out among the locals. Aziraphale opened a book shop in town, where he only occasionally sold any books (and the ones he did sell, were all modern and stocked specifically for that purpose). Crowley focused his attentions on the garden, and if he occasionally helped their elderly neighbour with her disobedient willow tree, then that was a secret no one needed to know. Lately, however, they had both been feeling rather restless, unbeknownst to each other. Aziraphale tried reorganizing his store, changing the way he tied his bowtie and even ate pizza –something he considered to be far too messy for him personally. Crowley had branched out into birdwatching, and then car maintenance (the human way), and even reading. Nothing scratched the itch for either of them.

Ao3 Link

My Ko-Fi

God did not play dice with the universe. She did occasionally flip a coin, though that was only to help her know which option she really favoured. There was a Plan, an idea of how things were meant to go, but sometimes She liked to step in and fiddle a bit. Other times, She thought it was best if She stepped back and let things take their course.

That was what She had been doing with Earth for the last few thousand years. She watched, and She waited to see what Her children--including the angels and the demons--would do with what she’s given them. She created the Metatron to speak for Her, to add even more distance, and things went as they did for a very long time.

She had Her favourites, of course. Mortals, angels, demons, there were always a select few She enjoyed looking in on when the fancy took Her. Of all of them, Her Crowley and Aziraphale were the most interesting. How they adapted, how they grew around each other and became so intertwined that even She could barely tell their auras apart. How they, or all the would-be protectors and destroyers of Earth, really understood humanity and Her creation.

Which was why, when She decided to look in on them again a while after everything, She was gravely concerned. It seemed that they had carved out a little life for themselves, and She was happy for that. But there was discord as well. A large amount of sadness and pain had begun to emanate from them both and it only took one quick look to see why. Oh, Her poor children. So worried about doing wrong when they were incapable of it. And there, just as She glanced over, were two more of Her children, both misguided in their endeavour to uphold what they thought was right.

This wouldn’t do. Those two, the former not the latter, had been through so much in the name of Her Ineffable Plan. They deserved a break and She would not allow anyone, even Her angel Gabriel and his demonic counterpart, to interrupt their well-deserved peace.

God hadn’t been down to Earth in a formal capacity for millennia. She dropped in once or twice a century to try some of the food, and listen to the music; to walk among the people and truly get to know Her creations. But it had been a long time since She revealed herself in Her glory on the mortal plane. This would be a special treat for all parties involved, if not marginally terrifying. Better to choose a more comforting form, one that wouldn’t make Her children quake in fear ( even if that may have been Her goal, just a little bit, when it came to Beezlebub and Gabriel; they had both been led so far astray).

She saw Aziraphale open the door, saw Crowley come up behind him take in the twin grimaces on their antagonist's faces. There was no more time to waste watching, She knew, and in a flash of Holy light, God was back on Earth, just a few meters down the block from one South Downs cottage.

“Crowley,” Beezelbub growled, looking right past Aziraphale. Conversely, Gabriel’s icy gaze was training on the angel, something restrained and dark hiding there. Crowley wanted to step in front of Aziraphale, to shield him from both their former bosses, but Aziraphale was taking up the entire doorway and refusing to budge even with Crowley’s insistent tugging at the hem of his jacket.

“Angel…” Crowley begged, but Aziraphale wouldn’t budge. “Angel get back!”

“Gabriel, Beelzebub. What a… surprise,” Aziraphale said in his best customer-scaring pleasant-but-cold tone. “To what do we owe this visit?”

“Don’t play games with us, Aziraphale,” Gabriel drawled in his usual, unaffected tone. “You know exactly why we’re here so cut the shit.”

Honestly, Crowley wasn’t sure why both of them were on their doorstep, only that it wasn’t good. Had it really taken Heaven and Hell a decade to figure out the switcharoo they pulled with the hellfire and holy water? Or were they finally tired of all the self-indulgent miracles the two had been performing and where here to put a stop to it?

“I assure you, I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Beezlebub took a step forward, their flies buzzing around all four parties in an incredibly vile fashion. Crowley reflexively tugged at Aziraphale again even though he knew it was pointless.

“Don’t be smart with me, angle,” the way they said it was so unlike how it sounded coming from Crowley’s mouth, and it made him twitch, “don’t you think we know everything about what you’ve been doing?”

“Did you forget about the back channels?” Someone, Crowley wanted to punch that smug look off of Gabriel’s face. “We know the--frankly disgusting--things you’ve been discussing. You know that creating more of those Abominations is forbidden. I didn’t think you’d stoop so low, but I’m not surprised.”

Crowley’s jaw tightened and his teeth began to sharpen into fangs instinctually. He felt Aziraphale stiffen as well, his hands clenching behind his back in a rapid rhythm. This was not what either of them had been expecting to happen, at least, not in this way. Maybe they shouldn’t have banked so much on their ruse keeping the Powers that Be away and sorted out an actual plan. Considering who they were dealing with, there probably wasn’t much they could have done outside of trading bodies permanently and that was not an option.

“Well I never…” Aziraphale blustered. It was hard for him to get the words out, and Crowley wasn’t in the state of mind to even try. Gabriel looked like he was going to try and barge his way into their home at any second to dispatch Heavenly justice, and Beezelbub just looked thrilled about the entire thing and Crowley had no idea what to do. He tried to grip onto Aziraphale tighter, to keep him close, but he knew it wouldn’t last.

“Don’t make this harder than it has to be. You both better come quietly this time and no ‘funny business’. God knows how you managed to get out of your punishments last time, but it’s not going to happen again.” Faster than either of them could react there were restraints around their wrists. Beezlebub was smirking waving their hand and adding fabric gags to the works. Both were tied too tightly, making Crowley squirm uncomfortably as his lips were pressed into his fangs. Aziraphale didn’t seem to be faring much better, wiggling frantically against the bonds.

“We aren’t using hellfire and holy water this time,” Beezlebub hissed, pushing past Aziraphale to grab Crowley. Behind them Gabriel did the same with the angel and Crowley watched as Azirpahale flinched at the unwanted touch. Oh Somebody was this how things were going to end? They’d barely gotten to make up, he hadn’t even gotten to kiss his angel in 2 days. “If we can’t destroy you outright, we’ll just make you wish we could.”

Crowley knew about the Pits of Hell. He’d been a few times over the years for various reasons (and sometimes no reason at all, Hell just liked to torture their employees and they were very good at it) so he knew what to expect. But Crowley had no idea of what Heaven would do to Aziraphale, could only imagine it’d been much, much worse than his own fate what with how insidiously harsh Gabriel and the other angels could be. He tried to struggle against his bonds and Beezlebub’s grip, desperate to save Aziraphale if not himself, but to no avail.

“Stop squirming you--!” A polite cough interrupted The Prince of Hell’s insult. All four beings on the steps snapped to attention immediately--it was impossible not to recognize that voice. Crowley wasn’t sure if they were about to be saved, or even further punished.

Gabriel was the first to recover, turning around to fully face the person-shaped Almighty without letting go of Aziraphale. “Lord, it’s such an honour that you would come here to personally witness the punishment of these tra--”

God held up a hand, the face of the corporation she was wearing impassive. The grip on his arms began to slacken and Crowley realized Beezlbub was gawking at the figure in front of them. To be fair, Crowley would have been doing the same if the gag allowed; this was the first time any demon had been in the presence of the Almighty since The Fall.

“I have already seen what’s going on here, Gabriel. Under whose authority are you exacting this punishment? Because no one has consulted me, or the Metatron, on this matter.” Gabriel looked nervous. Eyebrows rising high into his hairline, Crowley felt himself begin to, impossibly, hope.

“They intend to create an Abomination, my Lord! And you decreed after the Nephilim--”

“Silence, Gabriel. And Beezlebub close your mouth, you’ll catch flies.” If their situation had been less dire Crowley would have giggled at the way Beezlebub’s mouth clicked shut on command. Instead he stared in awe at the unimposing, but undeniably powerful form in front of him.

“Now, if you had done things properly, and put forward your request for the Angel Aziraphale to be punished, you would have discovered, My Archangel, that My feelings on the matter are very different than yours. And as for the Demon Crowley, I was under the impression that Hell had made an oath to keep their distance, and a Demonic Oath is not something to be broken willy-nilly.” Crowley did make a hysterical noise at that, muffled as it was. Aziraphale glanced back at him and they shared a mutual look of “what the fuck is going on?”.

“Furthermore,” She continued, “if you had taken the time to check, you would have seen that there is no Law against the fraternization of Angels and Demons in any capacity. So tell me then, why you have accosted these two in their own home, and why you have been spying on them?”

Gabriel sputtered, chocking out half-words and phrases while trying to make himself look as small and apologetic as possible. It was hilarious to watch, but not as funny as the way Beezlebub was squirming under God’s benevolent stare.

“And you, Beezlebub. I will not pretend to order you about, but I want you to know that I am very disappointed. Is this really the kind of thing Hell is using it’s resources on or is this just a petty grudge you two have against these poor boys?” Beezlebub shrank and mumbled into their shoes. Crowley couldn’t hear what they were saying, but he had a pretty good idea. Taking advantage of their distraction he shuffled forward under his shoulder was just barely brushing Aziraphale's. His angel looked back again and this time there was a sparkle in his eyes.

“You will release them at once, and you and any other members of Heaven or Hell will never attempt to interfere in their lives again. Have I made myself clear?” Her tone was that of a scolding mother and it brought back all sorts of memories from before Crowley’s Fall. He’d often gotten into trouble and received similar reprimands. “You will answer Me.”

“Yes, Almighty,” Gabriel grovelled, staring down at his outdated shoes. Beezlebub did some more mumbling and grumbling but it seemed to be enough for God because She nodded decisively.

“Good. Now away with you both. I would like to speak with them Myself and I will not have you spying.” With a wave of Her hand the Archangel and The Prince of Hell were banished back to their separate realms. Crowley and Aziraphale stood motionless, still bound and not entirely sure what was about to happen next.

“Well, that’s taken care of! Oh, sorry, My dears, let me get those for you.” She gestured and their bindings disappeared. Immediately Aziraphale turned in towards Crowley just as Crowley’s arms opened, ready to receive him. God said nothing as they clung to each other; let them have a few moments to come to grips with the fact they had nearly been separated again and lived.

“I cannot stay long, as <y presence here often disrupts Things. Are you alright, My sweet Aziraphale and My star Crowley?” She asked. Aziraphale shuddered and nodded, obviously trying to pull himself together enough to say something. Funnily enough, Crowley was able to find his voice first, though it was shaky and off-pitch.

“Why d’You care? Dropped me into a pit of boiling sulphur not 6000 years back didn’t You?” Aziraphale made a shocked noise, his hands fluttering up to cover Crowley’s mouth, but it was too late. Crowley had spent a long time sending angry not-prayers Her way, and he wasn’t going to miss this chance to say some of them in person.

God looked pensive for a moment. “Your Falling is one of My greatest regrets, Crowley. You were so inquisitive, but also very kind, which is why I needed you down on Earth. I needed someone unafraid to ask hard questions. Besides, you would not have been happy in Heaven, you were not like the others.”

“That’s not an apology.” He wasn’t sure where this bravery was coming from, maybe he’d finally gone over the deep end. Either way, this was happening.

God smiled. “Would you accept any I have to give?”

No he wouldn’t, and the fact that she knew that made him want to pout. Luckily Aziraphale had found his words in time to stop Crowley from staying anything too stupid.

“Thank you, Lord. You help has been much... appreciated,” he said, wringing his hands and glancing behind him past Crowley and into their home.

“But?” She asked, amused. Aziraphale flinched while Crowley grinned, proud of his bastard angel.

“But only, I do think Crowley and I would like to sit down and recover from the whole ‘once again facing our d ooms” thing, so if I could be so bold as to ask if You had any other er, business with us?” It was phrased politely enough, but anyone who knew the angel would know that tone. Of course, She knew Aziraphale completely, but She also seemed to understand.

“You will be able to rest soon enough. I only wanted to make sure you were both safe, and to let you know something very important.” Crowley scoffed and tightened his hold on Aziraphale almost protectively.

“Another Great Plan?” She smiled and Aziraphale paled. Crowley couldn’t help himself from asking questions.

“No, nothing like that. I only wanted you to know, that you do not have to be afraid of being punished by Heaven or Hell. Or Me. You have My permission to live here, on Earth, as you like. However, you like.” She smiled beatifically, while also giving them a wink. “I won’t keep you any longer. Goodbye, Aziraphale, Crowley.”

And with that, God turned around and strolled down their front path and out to the street. As She walked along the roadside and eventually out of sight Crowley and Aziraphale remained frozen in the doorway. Again Crowley was the first to recover enough to speak.

“Did God just… did She just--?” he stuttered, his legs shaking from the slow wearing-off of the adrenaline that had kept them both standing. "Did she just give us permission to--?”

“Be fruitful and multiply?” Aziraphale finished, his voice airy and slightly unfocused. “I believe she did.”

A beat. Then Crowley unwrapped his arms from around his angel, instead bringing his hands up to grab at Aziraphale’s shirt collar. “Angel, if you don’t take me inside right now and fuck me, I’m going to scream.”

It was kind of a jump, going from fighting over how they could never have that, to jumping into bed without even discussing the logistics of things, but Crowley didn’t care. God Herself had just told them it was OK to do the one thing he thought he'd never be allowed to do, and that it would turn out alright. He had enough faith left in Her not to second guess this blessing.

“Oh dear, are you sure? We haven’t really talked about this, and it’s such a big step…” Immediately Crowley was stepping back. Of course, he’d misunderstood, he’d jumped the gun like always, he’d gone to fast. Aziraphale noticed and took initiative, keeping Crowley close with a hand on his lower back and leading them both inside.

“Don’t pull away dear, I only wanted to make sure. You were so upset before, and I know what She said but if you need more time I--” But Crowley was done waiting, and he mashed their faces together messily. Aziraphale made a noise of surprise, then quickly caught up to speed, taking Crowley’s face in his hands and cupping his jaw. “Really? You want to? With me?”

“Yes,” Crowley whined, rubbing their hips together insistently. “I do want to, but I didn’t think we could. But we can and I swear to Somebody we can talk more later.”

Aziraphale didn’t argue, he couldn’t really with the way Crowley was begging. They were both still a little shaky, which presented a problem when Crowley was essentially trying to wrap himself around the angel like the snake he was. It only took a few minutes before it was obvious they either had to move somewhere where they could lay down, or do it on the floor of their front hall. The second option sounded appealing to both of them just for the immediacy, but they’d spent hours picking out sheets they both liked, and it would be a shame not to use the bed at every opportunity.

“Upstairs,” Crowley ordered, taking the angel by the hand and dragging him up to the second floor. The narrow cottage stairs were Hell to get up while Aziraphale was behind him trying to undo his belt but Crowley managed. At least their bedroom was the first room at the top. The door was open and the bed was made, their usual bottle of lube waiting on the bedside table innocuously.

“Crowley,” the murmur of Aziraphale’s voice was sweet as honey and twice as thick. “I want to--”

“Yes,” Crowley interrupted, miricaling the buttons and fastenings on Aziraphale’s waistcoat open. “Whatever you want, I want it like that.”

“On the bed. Trousers off.” Crowley scrambled to do ask he was asked, thankful for the solidness of the mattress underneath him finally. By the time he got comfortable his skinny jeans and shirt had disappeared to Satan-knew where, and he wasn’t wearing any pants. Aziraphale eyed him appreciatively in the same way he’d size up a delicious brunch spread and it made the demon’s whole body tingle. He arranged himself in a way that he hoped was appealing, legs spread open and his arms outstretched.

“Don’t keep me waiting, angel,” he rasped, wiggling his ass against the sheets a little. The only other sounds were the fast wooshing of Aziraphale’s breath and a faint ticking from the grandfather clock in the hall. “Want you in me, if you don’t mind.”

With a snap Aziraphale was naked too, exposing his cock to the cool air and making Crowley’s cunt clench with anticipation. A vagina seemed like a good idea for this sort of thing and he’d already had one because it looked better with his skinny jeans. It was the least effort to make the changes to his Effort this way, to tweak things to be on, more or less. “Oh Crowley, so pretty… like a flower--a rose.”

“Sssshut it!” Crowley hissed, thrusting up and down against the air. He was making his needs perfectly obvious but Aziraphale was going so slowly. “You can compliment me later but right now I want to celebrate the fact we aren’t fucking dead by shagging until I can’t walk!”

Finally Aziraphale got onto the bed, his knees coming to rest along the backs of Crowley’s thighs, their sexes nearly touching. “I intend to hold you to that, love. But for now, I’ll give you what you want.”

The Aziraphale was holding his member at the base, guiding it towards where Crowley wanted it most. Had it really only been a few days since they were last together? It felt like another 6000 years. The tip gently nudged between his folds and it was familiar and good. Normally he preferred to drag things out a bit to get them both to the point of begging, but Crowley knew he'd lose his marbles if he had to wait even a second more for Azirpahale to be inside him.

“Get. On. With. It.” His growling was made less intimidating but the fact each word came out with just the hint of a whine. Maybe he should flip them over, really give the angel a run for his money. That was his plan until Aziraphale began to move forward, stretching Crowley out in that way that made him ache inside. He could remember the first time he’d seen Aziraphale’s Effort, and how gobsmacked he’d been; trust the angel to have a pornstar cock without even an ounce of shame about it.

“You’ve very wet, darling,” Aziraphale cooed, bending over to kiss along Crowley’s collarbones. “So beautiful, my lovely boy. Always ready for me.”

“Aziraphale--!” The angel’s hands were drifting down to Crowley’s chest, his waist, his thighs. Skirting around his clit with butterfly presses as he finally shoved himself inside with a perfectly rough thrust. “Yes, Aziraphale, more!”

Aziraphale hushed him, though he was making little gasps of his own every once and awhile. “You deserve everything, my starlight.” He’s playing with the hair at the base of Crowley’s neck, a rhythmic winding and unwinding that perfectly complemented the clenching of his stomach. Crowley mewled at the praise, spreading his legs wider and grabbing Aziraphale around the shoulders. The angel smelled like sweat and their garden and his favourite tea; all things that made Crowley’s throat tight and his eyes wet. To stave off the incoming sob he turned his head and connected their lips in a hungry kiss.

It wasn’t going to take long for either of them to cum at the frantic pace Aziraphale was setting. But that was fine because they had nowhere else to be, and nothing else to do other than to enjoy each other. They could spend years wrapped up in bed together if they wanted, though their mutual acquaintances might come looking for them after a while. Especially once their newest godchild was born, at least.

Which reminded Crowley what they were actually doing here. This wasn’t run-of-the-mill sex, this had a purpose. When Aziraphale came he was going to… and Crowley would… Oh he couldn’t even think it without his whole body flushing. Later he’d probably laugh at himself, how excited he got over such a normal, human thing, but in the moment it only made him moan harder. Knowing Aziraphale was going to cum inside him, and it was going to take and make something that was both of them mixed together. Satan.

“Let me--fuck!--let me ride you,” Crowley gasped, pushing at Aziraphale’s shoulders and trying to shift them. “Aziraphale let me--please!”

“Yes, yes.” And then they were flipping, Aziraphale’s cock miraculously staying inside him the whole way and wasn’t that fantastic? Crowley started a good pace, slower than before but with much more grinding. His clit--maybe a little larger than a standard human’s but he was a demon after all--could rub against Aziraphale’s pubic bone if he slowed down a little and got the angle right. It made the angel groan and lift his hips to give Crowley all the room he needed to work.

Like a ship's mast broken in a storm, Crowley tipped forward onto Aziraphale’s chest, hips and legs still working hard to bring them to completion. Strong but soft hands wrapped around his waist to aid in their movements. Sex had always been something Crowley enjoyed, even before he and Aziraphale had finally gotten together, but it had never been like this. Like pleasure was bursting from the seams of his corporation, and then love was filling up the cracks. He found his mouth level with one of the angel’s nipples so he kissed it, a weak action to express the overwhelming surge of emotion.

“Oh!” Aziraphale’s nipples were always very sensitive and Crowley knew that. “Crowley you’re so good. I-I’m going to come darling, I’m going to come in you--!”

Crowley felt, actually felt, the angel come inside him. There was wetness, and throbbing, and Crowley rode him through it into his own orgasm, which hit him so hard he actually screamed. He may have slowed down time too, just a little, to extend their pleasure beyond what would normally be possible. By the time he let things go back to normal, he was shuddering, curled up on the angel’s chest with Aziraphale’s hands in his hair, stroking softly. Everything was hot and damp, but in a way that was enjoyable rather than disgusting.

“Are you back with me, dear?” Aziraphale asked softly, continuing to pet at Crowley’s curls. “That was a wicked trick, turning off time like that. You’ve worn yourself out.”

“Ngk.” There was a burning in his legs and a breathlessness in his chest that was just this side of unpleasant. Maybe stopping time to prolong one’s orgasm was a little much for the human form he wore. “Angel?”

“I’m here, dearest. What do you need?” Aziraphale, ever the gentleman bastard, grinned. “You feel very good, so loose and relaxed around my cock.”

It was then that Crowley, in his post-orgasm glow, realized that Aziraphal was still hard inside him, rocking very gently as to not overstimulate the poor demon. The moment Crowley became aware of it, it was like he couldn’t get enough, whimpering pathetically into Aziraphale’s light smattering of chest hair with renewed arousal.

“You know,” Aziraphale started and his voice was soft but also had a dark, foreboding twinge to it, “it can take some couples many times to, ah, conceive. It would be in our best interest to, well, to give it a go as much as we can. Unless it’s too much for you.”

Maybe it was too much, but Crowley liked too much. Too much alcohol, too much speed (of the driving, and the illegal substance variety), too much Aziraphale. He loved it all, craved it even. Determined to show his angel just how on board he was Crowley ground down weakly. Not enough to get anything done, but enough that Aziraphale would feel it.

“I can keep going,” he mumbled, barely able to get more than a few thrusts in before his tired legs gave up. “I want it.”

Aziraphale smiled down at him and placed a kiss on Crowley’s head. “Good. Let me just--” Aziraphale tipped them sideways this time, then rolled Crowley over more so his back was against the angel’s chest. This time his cock did come out, and Crowley made a little noise of discontent as he felt come and his own slick leak out over his thighs. “Just a tick dear. Lift your leg? Good boy, thank you.”

If the angel kept going on like that Crowley wasn’t going to last, which was alright, because the demon would let Aziraphale fuck him for as long as he liked. Crowley would be happy to lay here and receive anything Aziraphale wanted to give him and to bask in the attention and love. Especially after thinking they were done for, especially after having to face the idea that one of the last conversations he would have had with the most important person in his entire was mostly an argument. The tears came back again and this time they ran down his face freely, soaking the pillow. At least he was facing away and Aziraphale wouldn’t see them.

Then Aziraphale was guiding his cock back inside and Crowley was throwing his head back against his shoulder. If possible, it felt even better than the first time. Crowley wasn’t sure if it was the extra lubrication from Azirapahle’s cum, or the oversensitivity, but he felt like he was floating outside of himself, tethered only by the grounding span of Aziraphale’s hands around his waist and the occasional jap to his sweet spot. Everything felt so good and perfect, like pieces slotting together to become whole again after an eternity apart.

“Love you,” he cried, unable to keep all of his messy emotions from spilling out. Crowley was a mess of tears, and sweat, and pure adoration. “Aziraphale I--oh shit--I love you!”

“Mmm, so sweet for me Crowley. I adore you, I want--” Aziraphale whined when Crowley clenched down at the praise. “I want to--to make you--you’ll look so good, carrying our baby--oh God, Crowley!”

Their previously slow speed began to devolve into something more rapid and desperate as they both reached their peaks. Aziraphale, ever mindful of Crowly’s pleasure trailed a hand down his chest and belly to grind his palm against Crowley’s clit. Not that it was strictly necessary; Crowley was going to come from the wet slide of Aziraphale inside him anyway. He forced his eyes to open and his head to fall back so he could both be as close to the angel as possible, and watch the moment when Aziraphale filled him with his come.

“An-gel,” he gasped, watching the way each thrust made a little come ooze from his swollen cunt. “Angel I--please come with me--Come with me!”

Divine Ecstasy, or something close to it, shot through him in blinding waves as he came. Aziraphale shouted as well, wordlessly clinging to Crowley and once again coming inside him. Crowley was shaking violently, his eyes rolled back and it looked almost violent even though it was exactly the opposite. He was carried away inside his mind and all he could feel was pleasure and love and peaceful, beautiful completion.

When he came back to himself his face was pressed into the pillows and he was making the most embarrassing little noises with each breath. Behind him Aziraphale was mumbling little nonsense phrases peppered with praise. Crowley focused in on that even though his body wanted him to focus on the fullness he could feel down below and the fact that Aziraphale wasn’t pulling out. He must have remembered from a few days ago, when Crowley complained and that send a thrill of confused, loving arousal through him.

“Ngh,” he forced out weakly, just to let Aziraphale know he was conscious and alright, more than alright even. “Az…?”

“M’here, Crowley, I’ve got you.” The demon sagged and flopped a hand down to his stomach over the concave expanse of his hips. Some strange emotions welled up inside him and he found himself crying again. Aziraphale must have heard the sniffles because he turned Crowley around and tucked him underneath his chin. “Shh, dear, it’s alright.”

“I’m OK.” He was, really. Things were just getting away from him a little bit. “M’happy and I love you.”

Crowley felt Aziraphale smile against his temple. “Oh good. I-I,” a pause while the angel took a deep breath, “I thought I was going to lose you again Crowley. First during our fight and then when Heaven and Hell showed up on our doorstep.”

“Me too,” Crowley whispered, tilting his head up. “I thought I fucked everything up and you were going to leave me, and then they showed up and--” Aziraphale quieted him with a kiss, hummingbird quick and soft.

“I know dear, I felt the same. But it’s ok now, and I’m sorry for pushing you before. I think--I believe I understand what you were worried about a little bit better.”

Crowley made a little noise of contentment and settled back down onto Aziraphale’s chest. “S’ok, it all worked out in the end.” He took one of Aziraphale’s hand and held it over his belly. “Besides, you know our kid’s gonna be half-demon right? You’ve got your work cut out for you.”

“They’ll be half-angel too, you know,” Aziraphale laughed, flattening out his hand over Crowley’s non-existent belly. “They’ll be something completely new.”

“Something we made,” Crowley agreed. “Can you believe it? I don’t think I can.”

Aziraphale’s hand wandered down, past Crowley’s stomach to between his legs. It was too sensitive, and just sensitive enough. Crowley whimpered pathetically and clung to his angel’s shoulders, not sure if he should pull away or try to get closer.

“Well my dear, I guess I haven’t done my job well enough then, have I? I’d better work a little harder to get you do believe it.” Limp with overstimulation, Crowley could only moan and take everything Aziraphale give him, which he did gladly.

#fanfic #good omens #gomens #ineffable husbands #crowley #aziraphale/crowley #aziraphale #crowziraphale #tw mpreg #pregnancy

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laurasauras · 6 years ago

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so, i think the main thing that bothers me about crimes of grindelwald is that it reinforces this idea that’s been bothering me for a while and that’s my growing disillusionment with jk rowling. this is a loooong post, so i’m chucking it under a cut. tl;dr, i've fallen out of love with the series and much like falling out of love with a person makes you realise that they were always kind of annoying, that’s what’s happening to me with her.

everyone and their dog (with the exception of jk herself) has realised that her inability to leave the books she wrote alone has stifled a fandom space that was one of the first wide spread communities that was outright encouraged to create and this is objectively a bad thing. the fact that her fans are being told the “correct” and “canon” answers to their big questions in the series is objectively a bad thing. fandom as a concept is a collection of people dedicated to consuming media in a deeper way; we reject the notion of passive viewing and search for meaning in the way that our high school teachers would be delighted in. i think enough people have talked about that that i don’t particularly need to.

here’s the thing that’s just hit me though: the saying “don’t meet your heroes” used to feel like a far off concept, because i wasn’t doing anything special enough to justify ever meeting my favourite author, and for over a decade if you asked me the “who would you have dinner with if it could be anyone in the world?” my answer was probably her. except now that has happened.

to clarify, i haven’t had dinner with jk rowling. but thanks to twitter, it kind of feels like i have. and the story goes the same way the cautionary “don’t meet your heroes” story always goes in sit coms. for the first half hour of dinner i was delighted to hear more about her thoughts when writing the harry potter series and learn tid bits that she never included. she mentioned the charity work she does, said she supported me no matter what and highlighted enough issues that gave me the impression that not only was my favourite author just as engaging in “real life”, she was also a good person. for the next little bit she showed me what else she was working on and i have always loved her writing style, so i enjoyed that too. i looked forward to seeing where she was going from there, to what new stories i could enjoy as i grew older.

and then she started talking about harry potter again. i was glad, at first. i thought i could never hear enough about it. but cursed child was bad. i like reading plays, i knew that wasn’t the issue. i decided that she had put her name on it but she had delegated the story to other people because i couldn’t quite connect the baby’s first fanfiction storyline with the woman i had grown to know over the rest of the dinner. and fantastic beasts was ... good? but so wholly unnecessary. i decided that she just wanted to keep giving to charity and this was how she was doing it.

and then, just when i was starting to hint that the dinner party was over and she could leave now, five minutes ago (really i just wanted to go to bed and pretend like the only things i’d ever heard for her were the words written in her books), it all clicked into place.

they’re all the same story.

harry potter was so successful because children connected deeply with the idea that one day a giant would knock on the door and take them away from the bullies and the boredom and into a world of magic. harry was an average boy who made mistakes and yet did remarkable things. and harry potter is, really, a very long, very detailed fairy tale. once upon a time there was a boy who lived with his wicked aunt and uncle. this is how he saved the world.

(i could easily make this argument for the casual vacancy and the cormoran strike books as well, but i’m going to stick with the newly franchised “wizarding world” for clarity.)

spoilers below for cursed child, fantastic beasts and crimes of grindelwald.

in cursed child, there were a lot of minor problems that niggled at me that are very similar to the things that niggle me about the twitter feed of jk rowling, she seemed intent on retconning her novels to have more meaning, in name dropping this, that and the other as if providing her fans with the ability to go “oh! it’s the trolley lady! i remember her! how cool that she’s significant and also a horrifying monster!” but my major grievance was with the “twist” that voldemort had had a daughter with bellatrix lestrange (in what time, seriously, when did she have the 9 months to spare) and she was going to bring her daddy back to wreak havoc. and this to me seemed like yet another “the ordinary person is more significant than you thought!” story, which seemed lazy. why did delphini have to be related to the two biggest villains in order to want to bring voldemort back? could she think of no other reason for someone to want that? (no, she couldn’t, she couldn’t think of any reason to siding with him in the first place other than “they’re the bad guys, the slytherins”.)

(another grievance i have is that jk rowling has no idea how to write a realistic villain. or rather, when she does succeed in empathising with why someone would hurt another person, she refuses to see them as a villain. snape and dumbledore would make very interesting antagonists, but she’d much rather have “he was conceived under a love potion and therefore is incapable of love” be a reason for doing great harm than “people have been telling him he was a fantastic person since he got top of his class in transfiguration and he is sure that he could make the world better if only people would do as he says without questioning him ever”. side note: jude law absolutely nailed the manipulative dumbledore vibe in crimes of grindelwald, that was literally the only good part of the film, that and the jangly cat toy thing.)

and okay, that was fine, i was just going to pretend that cursed child never existed. i think i am not alone in that camp. and the first fantastic beasts story was pretty good, nothing to write home about or like, remember after you’ve watched it, but a fine way to spend a couple of hours. and then she pulled the same move with crimes of grindelwald!

oh, guess what, this boy who was the main character in the first movie and now has no personality in the second movie, yeah, him, the one who was abused and who tried to hide his magic but it came out in explosive ways, yeah, he was dumbledore’s little brother the whole time.

because he couldn’t just be any abused kid. because again, the fact that it doesn’t make sense and the timeline does not fit is irrelevant. it’s punchy, it’s another name drop, it’s gonna make the audience gasp. i mean, it made me and the friend i saw the movie with laugh out loud, but the intention was there.

how could the perfect dumbledore family abandon a child like that? hey, this is starting to sound exactly like the tragic and complicated backstory we already got in deathly hallows! and hey, wasn’t that already kind of a reference to the way harry himself was treated?

i’m just tired. i’m tired of this new laziness making me re-examine the original series and realise just how shallow that was too. i’m tired of liking fanfiction more than any of the things she’s written. i’m tired of well meaning family and friends buying me harry potter mugs and slippers and whatever else for christmas because i was in love with this franchise from the age of 7 and i don’t have the heart to explain that the increasing consumerism of it is one of the many reasons that my love is firmly in the past tense now.

so, i don’t think i’ll be touching my harry potter fanfics for a while. it sucks to officially abandon projects i spent so many hours on but i went to try and reread so i could continue one and i’m tired of that world. i hope it isn’t forever. the books were such a huge part of my childhood and have absolutely influenced me as a writer. but for now, we’re on a break.

#harry potter #jk rowling #long post #crimes of grindelwald #fantastic beasts #cursed child #fandom

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ourdreamsrealized · 7 years ago

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Chapter Three: To Love a King

Chapter: 1 | 2 | 3

A/N: Wow…This was a long one, and I apologize for how much time it took me to get this out. School was very busy, and then once I had the time to work on this, I was experiencing writer’s block. It ended up being 16 and a ½ pages and 6625 words. I actually am quite proud of this chapter, and it will probably be the longest chapter in this series. I don’t think it’s the best I’ve written, but I am happy with it to post it here. I hope to have the next chapter for you guys sometime next week.

Fandom: Marvel

Pairing: Thor Odinson (God of Thunder) x Reader

Synopsis: When you meet Thor for the first time, he’s a happy-go-lucky hero in need of your help, but as more chance meetings happen and a relationship begins to blossom between the two of you, you begin to realize that there is a lot more to this amazing man than meets the eye.

Inspired by @champion-ofthe-sun‘s post: { x }.

Rated: R

Warnings: Sexual Themes, Mild Gore, Triggers (Such as War) & Language

“…and Mr. Lee in room 130 has been having some bowel issues. I got him up to the bathroom a few times, but I’m worried about how loose his stools are.”

You considered the nurse’s words, nodding your head as you looked over his chart. “Alright…I’ll have a stool culture ordered again. If it smells as bad as you’re suggesting, I want to make sure he doesn’t have C diff.” You shook your head with a sigh, handing her the manila folder and leaning back in the chair. “Until then, just as a precautionary measure, I want everyone wearing gloves when entering that room. I can’t put him on full contact precautions without a confirmed diagnosis.”

“Makes sense,” the nurse, Victoria, said, getting up from her chair. “Anything else?”

“No.” You chewed on your bottom lip, crossing your legs as you went over a few things in your mind.

“Well, then, get going. Don’t you have a date with Georgina’s son tonight?” Victoria asked, putting away Mr. Lee’s chart and pulling out another one from the cart.

“I do…” You got to your feet, placing your pen in your lab coat pocket. “It’s our third date, actually.”

“Then what’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” You shrugged your shoulders, lifting your arms from your sides for a moment before letting them fall back to place.

Victoria fixed you with one of the stares she usually reserved for a client or family member that was feeding her bullshit. A light, partially penciled brow was arched as she pursed her lips. “Liar. At this stage in the game, you’d be floating on air.”

“And who says I’m not?” you asked, coming to stand beside her, arms crossed over your chest.

“I do. I can tell just by looking at you that you’re not crazy about him, just like you weren’t crazy about Jeremy or Kevin or Peter or…”

“Okay. Okay.” You stopped her by lifting up a hand. You didn’t need everyone on the floor to know your history. “What’s your point?”

“Don’t lead the poor guy on, and take some time off dating. It’s clear you’re not over something or someone in your past.”

“You would have made a much better psych nurse. You know that, Victoria?” A chuckle escaped your lips as you turned your back on her and made your way towards the break room. You punched in the code, your left five digits wrapped around the door handle.

“Yes, but I like where I am now.”

“Oh? And why’s that?” You glanced over at her, using your foot to keep the heavy door open.

“Because you’re my boss.” She winked at you before heading over to one of her assigned patient rooms.

You grinned stupidly at her comment, and your steps became lighter as you grabbed your work bag and jacket before heading out of the unit and down to the lobby. Once out in the late afternoon air, you relaxed some. It had been a long day, and, honestly, the last thing you wanted to do was go on another date with a guy you knew you weren’t ever going to be serious about.

Such a shame, too. He was basically the perfect package: good-looking, smart, a gentleman, looking to settle down, makes decent money, has future plans…

But he’s not Thor.

You mentally scolded yourself for that comment because you really shouldn’t have been comparing a mortal man who worked with a banking company to an Avenger/god. Plus, you hardly knew Thor. You met him only twice before, so your feelings for him were completely founded in physical attraction.

It was superficial, so why hadn’t you gotten over him yet? It’s been two years, for heaven’s sake!

It must have been the thousandth sigh that left your lips that day, but this one didn’t help you any. Maybe Victoria was right…Maybe you should step out of the dating scene for a while, just until you moved on.

You pulled out your phone, unlocked it, and found Nick’s contact information. You called his cell number, placing your smartphone to your ear as you descended the stairs outside the hospital building to the sidewalk.

“Hello?” Came out in a friendly baritone two rings later.

“Nick?”

“Yes?”

“Hi. This is Y/N.” God, this was really hard. Always was, and you were pretty sure it would never get easier. “Listen, about our date tonight…”

“You want to cancel.”

His voice was laden with disappointment, and, in that moment, you wished you still didn’t carry a torch for Thor. You could have seen a future with Nick; if you liked him as much as he liked you, the two of you probably would have gone the distance.

“Yeah…I’m really sorry. I just am not in the right state of mind for anything serious right now…” you scoffed, waving down a taxi. “I really wish I was.”

“…I do, too. But, if you ever do feel you’re ready for something more, you have my number.”

“You’d be the first guy I’d call.” You tried offering some comfort with that statement because, really, Nick deserved it. He had been nothing but sweet to you.

His chuckle was half-hearted, but he genuinely thanked you anyway before you both bid each other goodbye and hung up.

You closed the door of the yellow cab, telling the driver your home address before sitting back against the seat. You looked from your phone to the city outside your window. A particular tower caught your attention, one you had spent a lot of time in just a few years ago. It was the last place you saw Thor, and you couldn’t help but wonder what he was up to now.

The Avengers was on its way to destruction; the cracks were plain to see even during the events of Sokovia. Tony and Steve never saw eye-to-eye, and since no one really took an official leadership position after S.H.I.E.L.D. left the picture, the two most likely in the group were constantly butting heads while the rest of the members watched on, picking their own sides. Because of the drama and without a solid organization like S.H.I.E.L.D. to be your employer, you decided it was time to move on.

Of course, you only moved passed your time with the Avengers. Not with Thor. Perhaps, if you had had the chance to say goodbye, things would be different now.

Dwelling on the possibilities and what ifs made you choke up, so you forced yourself to think of less heavy things, such as dinner plans for this evening now that you weren’t going out and the list of things you had to do this coming weekend. Groceries, laundry, bills…The menial tasks.

Occupied by such things, transit time sped by, and before you knew it, you were in front of your building and handing the cab driver a couple of bills. You thanked him before heading up the stone stairs to the front door, and you were in the middle of opening it when you heard someone calling your name.

“Y/N!”

You froze at the deepness of the voice, knowing its owner almost immediately. You turned your head towards the direction your name had carried from, eyes widening as you took in the sight of both Thor and Loki, in street clothes no less. Although, the new garb did nothing to help either of them blend in. Thor was in jeans and a sweatshirt, but his long blonde locks were unmistakable. And Loki wore a pitch-black suit, his dark curls free from any bindings as he watched his brother come over to you.

“Thor?” You let go of the door handle, descending a few steps as a smile stretched across your face. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m looking for my father, Odin,” Thor replied, stopping on the sidewalk in front of your building. He pointed his umbrella at you. “Did you just come home?”

“Yes. I was working, but if you two need help…” you glanced at Loki, still a bit wary of him, before looking Thor in his beautiful blue eyes, “I would love to offer my services.”

And that was how you ended up here. The death of the king of Asgard, a long lost sister (that you knew about from mythology by the way), and a whole other realm away.

God, you hoped you would still have your job after this. When you agreed to help Thor find his father, you didn’t think it would take more than a couple of hours. Yet, here you were, months later in one of the most degrading outfits you had ever had the displeasure of wearing.

You honestly felt like princess Leia, with just a thin, gold-colored bra to cover your chest and a long skirt, in a similar fabric, that started at your hips and went down to your ankles. You’d think such a garment would offer some coverage, but, nope, both sides of the skirt had slits up to the waistband.

The Grandmaster had also insisted that your neck be exposed as well as your feet, so shoes and having your hair down was not allowed when you were in his presence. He also gifted you with gaudy, poorly made jewelry, such as large hoop earrings and a multitude of bracelets.

You spent most of your time with, surprisingly, Loki, with no hide or hair of Thor. It was disgusting watching the God of Mischief kiss up to the Grandmaster, but you couldn’t say you were doing much better. You remained mostly silent, deciding to pretend you were mute, when they first found you among the garbage.

You really didn’t know how you managed to avoid the orgy parties, but Loki had been kind enough to make up excuses for you. Although, there were a few times that you showed you outright refused to be involved in such behavior, especially with The Grandmaster, of all people.

Still, he was the least of your concerns. Bruce was on this planet, and had been for a while, long before you and Loki showed up. However, he was not himself. He was constantly in his Hulk form and was quite childish. He was the Grandmaster’s champion, and you had seen him in action; he was completely taken by the crowd. Hence, him being fine with staying here and obeying the Grandmaster.

Your other concern, which consumed most of your days, was Thor. Had Hela killed him? You hadn’t seen him anywhere on this miserable planet, and Loki had not gotten word from him either. The thought of him being dead was too much to bear, but you soon accepted that maybe that was what had happened. Why else would he not come for you or Loki?

“Mute! Drink!”

The Grandmaster’s voice broke through your thoughts, and you realized that he had been referring to you. The nickname, Mute, was given to you when you refused to give your actual name, and it stuck, unfortunately. Even Loki would call you by the name.

You moved from your spot, standing beside him, and poured some of the dark liquid from the pitcher you held into his gold gauntlet. He lifted his other hand to tell you to stop, and you did as he asked, moving back to your spot.

“Are you excited for this match, Mute?”

You nodded your head, suppressing the urge to roll your eyes. These competitions were getting rather mundane, considering you could always predict the outcome. If any contender even got close to defeating the Hulk, the Grandmaster would cheat.

“This one should be very interesting…” he smirked, sitting back in his seat as his giant hologram began to rile up the crowd.

You glanced at Loki, who sat across the box, leaning forward on his knees, elbows resting on them as he watched the challenger’s side intently. You wondered why he seemed so genuinely interested in this one; he usually only feigned enthusiasm.

Your gaze followed his to the contender’s door, seeing that it was now fully open. A small gasp blew passed your lips, and you brought up a hand to suppress anymore noise from your gaping mouth.

It was Thor. Even from all the way up above the colosseum, you knew it was him. Thor’s broad shoulders were unmistakable, and his muscular build was a dead give away. You had never seen anyone as big in stature as the God of Thunder.

But could he defeat the Hulk? Maybe, if it was a fair fight, but he wasn’t just dealing with the green mutant; he was dealing with the Grandmaster, who would not see his Champion lose.

You glanced at Loki again, and this time he caught you, nearly jumping when he saw your glare. He obviously knew that Thor was here, but he decided not to give you that tidbit of information. Why? Did he want his brother to be beaten to death?

What a stupid question. In the past, he would have done the honors, given the chance.

He would get an earful from you later.

Your attention turned back to the arena, where you saw Thor being booed relentlessly by the crowd. Above their negativity, the Grandmaster’s voice could be heard, announcing his champion.

You wondered how Thor would handle this. He did not know that he would be put up against a friend, but, somewhere in the Hulk, you knew Banner was there. Surely, he would recognize the Asgardian god, but then what? What would the Grandmaster do if his champion refused to fight?

Well–your eyes flickered to the Grandmaster for a moment before returning to the arena–you would soon find out.

The door that Hulk resided behind was torn to shreds as he entered the arena, his roar filling the air as he lifted his powerful arms. The war cry was followed by a shout of joy from the challenger, something no one was used to hearing.

You cracked a smile. Only Thor.

But your amusement was short lived as you watched the two converse. It was clear that the situation was escalating, but why? Didn’t Banner recognize Thor?

When Hulk rushed forward, his violent intent clear, you ran forward, placing your hands on the glass in front of you as you suppressed the urge to scream. You’ve seen what the Hulk could do, and even though Thor was his opponent, the Grandmaster would surely intervene if he got the upper hand.

This could only ever end one way.

Thor dodged his first attack, rolling to the side before bouncing to his feet. You bit your bottom lip, wincing from both the pain and how hard Thor was hit by the Hulk’s gigantic hammer. He skid across the ground, digging his weapon into the ground to eventually stop himself from flying further.

They then exchanged blows, Thor using twin blades, and Hulk still utilizing his supersized tools. You watched, holding your breath and nearly crying out when you saw Thor thrown into the colosseum wall, rock crumbling around him. He recovered, hitting his opponent back with a force much stronger, sending the green mutant through the colosseum wall.

The crowd went silent, and your heart stopped. As much as you worried for Thor, you did not wish harm on Bruce. He had always been kind to you, always inclusive of you.

Thor seemed to be as concerned as you, heading over to where Hulk had landed. You saw Bruce move, dazed and unsteady. You watched with bated breath as Thor held out a hand to him, an offer of truce, and you hoped the Hulk would accept it. He watched the blond god as he carefully approached, reaching out a hand…

For a moment, your racing heart slowed, and you felt joy, realizing that this must be it. This must be the end of the fight.

But it wasn’t.

Within the blink of an eye, Thor was being thrown around, the Hulk smashing him against the ground repeatedly. No mortal man would have survived the first blow to the head, even with the armor Thor sported.

Cheers erupted from the crowd as you looked on, tears prickling at the corners of your eyes.

Thor was sent flying, crashing to the ground with a horrible thud that you barely registered over the Hulk’s victorious roar. The spectators joined in, spurring him on, while the underdog got to his feet, now holding Hulk’s hammer.

The fight continued on, and it was a close one. There were times you were sure Thor would prevail, but then the Hulk would prove you wrong with a brutal attack. Eventually, it came down to just fists, no weapons, and when you saw him on top of the God of Thunder, repeatedly punching him, tears streamed down your face because you knew that had to hurt.

How could he bear it?

Then, just when you were about to give up completely, a bolt of lightening pushed the Champion off of his challenger. Now, it seemed Thor had the upper hand, and you had never seen such power before. He was a walking storm, each hit packing a punch that echoed like thunder.

The name being chanted from the stands switched. It was entertainment unlike any they had seen before. No one had given the Hulk such a hard time.

And that’s when the Grandmaster decided to do it.

In convulsions that made your own skin crawl to watch, Thor fell to the ground, and you couldn’t watch as the Champion took the opportunity and did what he did best: smash.

A sob escaped your throat as you turned from the glass. Almost immediately, you were in Loki’s arms, one of his palms on the back of your head, cradling it to his chest.

“Is he okay?” you whispered softly as the noise of victory died down.

“I can’t say, but I don’t think he’s dead,” Loki responded in a soft voice. “Not yet, anyways.”

Leisurely, deliberate claps reached your ears, and you lifted your head from under Loki’s chin to see the Grandmaster smirking at you. The expression on his face was enough to make you physically ill, but you held yourself back, pressing your lips together in a firm line.

“What a show, Mute,” he said, shaking his head as he stepped closer to you. “Were you really that taken with the Lord of Thunder?”

God. You wanted to correct him. God of Thunder. You clenched your fists.

“Well, I’ll be kind, then. Be grateful.” He laughed, folding his hands in front of him. “Since he and my champion are such good friends, I think I’ll allow them to be roommates. They can train together and give me more shows as good as this one. And, for providing such good entertainment, I’ll throw the Lord of Thunder a little bone…”

You narrowed your eyes at him, not sure you were following just what he intended to do with any of you, but you knew you didn’t have much of a choice.

“A bone?” Loki asked, a hint of malice in his tone as he tightened his hold on you.

“Why he no wake?”

You let out another sigh, reminding yourself to keep patient and calm, even if this was the twentieth time the Hulk had asked that question. “Because he was badly wounded, Hulk.”

“By me?” He almost seemed proud.

“Yes, by you,” you stated as you kept your eyes on Thor’s peaceful face. You moved carefully, so not to disturb him, as you dipped your cloth in a bowl of water the Grandmaster “oh so graciously” gifted to you. You wrung it out as best you could, keeping the lower half of your body still.

You had already examined most of Thor’s body earlier, looking for broken bones or any signs of internal bleeding. After the beating he went through, he should have had at least a few fractures, but there wasn’t a hint of swelling anywhere on his body, just a few minor cuts and bruises.

He really was a god.

“Why you hold him like that?”

Your cheeks flushed at the question. Why did the Hulk have to know why you were keeping Thor in your lap?

“It makes my job easier,” you answered. It wasn’t quite a lie. You could see a lot of his cuts closer up, and making sure you had cleaned them well enough was less difficult this way. “Plus, you won’t share your bed.”

Your green companion huffed at that, turning on the mattress to show you his back.

You shook your head at his childishness, wishing Banner would take over already. While Hulk did have his likeable moments, he had become quite the narcissist since becoming the Grandmaster’s Champion.

To say you were a little ticked off at him for treating Thor as an enemy was an understatement.

A groan from the person laying on your thighs made you still your hand, only gently dabbing at a particularly bad cut on his brow. Slowly, his eyes fluttered open only to be squeezed shut again as he lifted a palm to the top of his head. “Ow…”

“How are you feeling?” you asked, lowering the arm that was currently tending to his wound.

Thor opened his eyes again, gaze focusing on your face above his. “Y/N?”

“Yes?”

He shot up to a sitting position before groaning again, his body swaying slightly. You touched his shoulder, urging him to be more considerate of his condition.

Apparently, he was more concerned with your presence than his own well-being. He turned to face you completely, his legs crossed, blue orbs wide. “You ended up here, too?”

You nodded. “Loki arrived before me.”

“Wow…It is so good to see you!” he exclaimed, a boyish grin on his lips as he took in your appearance. “Are you okay? Did Loki look after you?” He paused, lifting an eyebrow. “Why are you dressed like that? That man…the Grandmaster? He didn’t lay a finger on you, did he? If he did, I swear to you, Y/N…”

You lifted your hands, attempting to calm him down. “I’m fine, Thor, really. Loki did watch over me…in his own way…And despite the get-up I am forced to wear, the Grandmaster has done nothing more than leer.” This knowledge seemed to placate the man before you, and he let out a heavy sigh, shoulders slumping.

His attention then shifted from you to the bowl and bloody rag next to it. “Were you caring for me?”

The way he phrased the question sent heat to your face, forcing you to bow your head. “Yes…Although, you did not need much first aid.”

“Regardless, I thank you for it.” He nodded, his calloused fingers brushing against your bare shoulder in a gesture of gratitude.

All was silent for a moment, save the Hulk’s snoring, until Thor parted his lips to speak again, his brows furrowed. “Your eyes are red. Were you crying?”

Slightly embarrassed that he had noticed, you chuckled nervously, still avoiding directly looking at him. “Oh…uh…I was at the match, and at the end, I thought you were, well…”

“Oh…You were watching the fight, then.” His baritone voice seemed flat. “It brings me great joy that you worried so much for me, but, as you can see, thanks to you, I am more than fine.”

“Yes. I seem to forget that you are a god.” You smile, trying not to dwell on his hand, which still rested on your left shoulder. It slid down to your palm, his fingers engulfing it as he brought your skin to his lips.

“Thank you, again. I seem to always find myself indebted to you.” His kiss lingered, and you knew you had to be red from head to toe because of it.

“It’s uh…no problem,” you replied, averting your gaze as his hands slipped from yours.

Thor got to his feet, turning as he took in his environment. “Where are we?”

“This is the Hulk’s room.” You stood, bending down to take the bowl of water from the floor. “He spends most of his time here or training.”

“I see…” he trailed off, heading towards the window. “Do you know how the Hulk got here?”

You met his gaze over his shoulder. “When I asked, he said he flew here.”

“Flew?” he whispered, mindful of the sleeping giant as he turned partially toward you, the sun illuminating the perplexed lines of his face. “How? He can’t fly.”

“I don’t know, honestly. I would assume the quinjet, but…” you shrugged, not quite confident in that assumption. You hadn’t thought to ask Hulk about it, and if it was on this planet, you weren’t sure it was in working conditions. Scavengers had probably dissembled most of it, selling or finding new use for its parts.

“That is very likely…” he said, falling silent as he looked over at Banner. He sighed after a few moments. “I’ll just ask when he wakes. We’ll need his help to escape.”

“He won’t want to,” you informed him, the corners of your mouth falling. “I already asked him if he would help me escape, but even when I begged, he absolutely refused to.”

“What? Why?” Thor’s brow knitted together.

“Well, I think he likes the attention he gets here. You’ve seen how they cheer for him in that coliseum.”

“I will talk to him,” Thor stated gravely, bringing a hand up to his face to stroke his beard. “We’ll need the help of the Valkyrie as well…”

“The Valkyrie?” Your face lit up like a Christmas tree, and you took a step closer to Thor. “They are here?”

He chuckled at your excitement. “One is. She’s actually the one that brought me here…But it won’t be easy to convince her…” His mood deflated as he said this. “She holds an immense amount of hatred towards me.”

“Why is that? From what I’ve read, they fight for Odin.” You shake your head, confused.

“They did…I don’t know what happened,” he exhaled, closing his eyes briefly. “This won’t be easy, but at least I have you on my side…” He trailed off, eyes narrowing as the focused on you.

Heat crawled up your neck as you withstood his intent stare, but it only got worse when he took long, deliberate strides to stand right before you, his hand lifting to touch the small, metal crater that was inserted into your skin. It matched his, and its purpose was no different. Should you act out, you would be punished.

You heard Thor’s sharp intake of breath, his lips pressing into a taut line. “Have they used this?” The tips of his digits caressed the skin near the obedience disk, causing you to unconsciously shiver. You prayed he didn’t notice.

“N-No…I haven’t given them a reason to.”

“Good.” His muscles relaxed, the severity of his expression disappearing some. “This complicates things. I have to find a way to get that off of you.” He withdrew his hand, backing away from you. “How long has he been asleep?”

“Huh? Oh…Hulk? He went to bed just before you woke up.” You blinked, cursing yourself internally for sounding like such a lovesick fool. You’d be beyond shocked if Thor didn’t know the effect he had on you and why.

“Shit…Okay. I’ll wait.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “I don’t want to get him any angrier.” He sat down by the window, resting his elbows on his knees. After a few seconds of silence, and you awkwardly standing after putting the bowl down on a table, Thor turned to you. “Come, sit. Tell me of your life since Ultron.”

You gave him a hint of a smile before moving to sit beside him, and he shifted in the seat to face you better. “What do you want to know?”

“Everything.”

Since the Battle of New York, whenever Loki showed up, you weren’t the happiest of campers. You could tolerate him, but you didn’t trust him as far as you could throw him; for good reason, too, because he did try to betray both you and Thor during your escape from Sakaar, just as the God of Thunder had anticipated.

Now, however, as you were attempting to defend yourself against an undead army, you were the happiest you had ever been to see the God of Mischief. You were never a fighter, and maybe with a safe place for the Asgardians, you could actually begin to help those injured.

Loki spotted you immediately, yelling to his people to board the ship before making his way over to you. Once he reached you, he grabbed you by the shoulders. “Thor has told me that you have the power to heal.”

“Well, in a way…” You were about to explain how you had no magical abilities, that your methods were entirely based on medical science, but you decided that now was probably not the time.

“Come.” He wrapped an arm around your torso, fighting his way back to the ship. “I have found a healer!” Loki announced loudly over the sounds of frantic citizens. They made a path for you, allowing you to get aboard the spaceship ahead of many.

As soon as Loki had declared you someone that could help, people were rushing forward with friends and family members, asking for your help. It was very had to do with very limited supplies, but luckily, many were willing to offer up parts of their clothing as bandages. Quite a few people also had jugs of water, similar to canteens, while others had filled them with some form of alcohol.

Despite help from many, you were one woman, and it was very difficult to keep up with the number of patients you were receiving, some far more wounded than others. You tried to prioritize, and it became clear that this was also quite the task. You could not see all your patients at once, so it was hard to determine who was more in need of care than another. You tried your best to recall your training, including the ABCs of prioritization: Airway, Breathing, Circulation.

Finally, a brave Asgardian offered up her services, followed by a few others. You quickly explained what you needed them to do, giving them those that came in with less complicated injuries. With more people helping you out, you moved onto those that were hurt fighting the undead. And, god, you had never seen so much blood…You didn’t typically deal with stab wounds or missing limbs on your unit of the hospital, but, with your knowledge of how the body worked, you knew what you had to do.

The sounds of agonizing screams as you cleaned deep lesions or bound gaping holes would haunt you in your sleep. You were sure of it. Without access to painkillers, it was very difficult to care for those in writhing pain. You would have given them alcohol, and some did ask for it, but you were reserving it for sterilization because it did better than water.

What really killed you, though, was when you were unable to save someone. Their loved ones would be circled around you, and with one look at the patient, you knew, even as an Asgardian, they would not survive. You still did your best, but by then, those around you would realize it, too.

You didn’t have time to mourn with them, to exercise proper family-centered care, as you were taught to do.

Tears would stream down your face as you moved to the next person that needed you, and it didn’t sit well with you. Your own heart would tighten because you didn’t deal with death often–you were in the business of preventing death–and it meant you failed. While the more rationale side of you knew that there was nothing you could have done, your emotions refused to listen.

It made it hard to concentrate, especially with the sounds of war right outside. At some point, thunder had joined the cacophony, and you wondered if Thor had been victorious against Hela. But the fighting would of stopped right? The steady stream of patients would have stopped. It didn’t. You were still overwhelmed.

Why didn’t it stop?

The ship began to move, and your head cleared enough for you to focus again. You had all the time in the world to freak out later.

More people rushed in–the last, you thought and hoped–and you quickly urged a man close to you. “Keep the pressure on his elbow, please!” He just nodded numbly as you got to your feet, shouting above the screams. “If anyone needs medical attention, please come to me!”

And then you were flooded again. More volunteers came forward.

“What is your name?” A man with dark skin and eyes unlike any you had seen came forward, lowering a woman to the ground before you.

“I am Y/N.” The words were hurried from your throat as you ripped some of the woman’s cloak to wrap around the gash on her shoulder. “Hold my hand,” you told her, and she nodded, wrapping her fingers about yours. She squeezed, hard, when you doused her wound with alcohol and then drenched it with water to, hopefully, deaden the alcohol’s effect.

“So you are the one he spoke of,” the man whispered, helping the woman to her feet after you had wrapped her injury. She leaned on him as he stared at you, studying your features. “You are the Midgardian that lifted Thor’s hammer.”

“You know about that?” you asked, a bit breathless as you ripped more of your skirt for bandages.

“Yes. I am Heimdell,” he introduced himself with a small smile. “On behalf of all the Asgardians, I thank you for your help.”

“It is no trouble,” you said before seeing to a man who had lost his arm in battle. On your way to him, shots rang out, and you froze, eyes darting to the man who held two guns, similar to those that you had on Earth. You turned to Heimdell. “We are leaving Asgard?”

“Yes. Thor has asked that we do.”

“But he is still fighting?”

Heimdell gave you a look, one that answered all the questions you had lined up in your head. Your chest constricted, making it impossible to breathe, but you ignored the feeling and marched over to the man that was in need of care.

If Thor died, he would not die in vain. You would save as many of his people as you possibly could.

But, as fate would have it, Thor was on the ship with Valkyrie and the Hulk minutes later, making a ruckus as he called for you. When he saw you, he did not hesitate to take you from whoever you had just finished tending to and bring you into his arms.

“You are well,” he said, chest heaving as he pulled you in closer. He smelled of sweat and blood, but you didn’t care. His hug calmed you in ways you did not understand; after just being through a war, something you had never experienced before, you were moments from falling apart.

You peered up at him, choking on whatever words you had for him when you saw…

“What the fuck happened to your eye!?”

And the blond bastard just let his head fall back, his one remaining eye squeezing closed, as his booming laugh filled your ears.

“There.” You took a step back, exhaling softly as you lowered your arm to your side. “I’ve never had to patch up an eye, but I suppose there is a first time for everything.”

“Yes. I suppose so.” Thor’s lips stretched into a grin, but something about it was fake. How could he smile in such times, when he had been through so much?

You stared at him for a moment, and, evidently, your scrutiny was too much for the god. “What?”

Moving to sit beside him on the bed, you took his hand in both of yours, peering at his face. “How are you?”

“What do you–?”

“This couldn’t have been easy for you. Hell, I’m still having trouble with everything that happened, but you’ve just been through a lot more than I have, Thor. You lost a father, you killed your sister, and your home has been reduced to space dust. And that’s just the main stuff.”

Thor chuckled lightly, but there was nothing cheerful about it. He put his other hand on top of yours, patting it gently. “All that happened, yes, but those are matters I don’t really have the energy to think about. What is really bothering me, is the role I must assume. I have people I have to take care of.”

You nodded, swallowing thickly as his blue eyes captured you, making you unable to look away.

“How do you do it?”

You leaned back in shock, not having expected him to ask you that, of all things. You scoffed, pulling away from him slightly. “I…Wow. Um…Thor, being a king and being a nurse are very different things.”

He shook his head, the wrinkles accompanying his laugh genuine this time. “You are wrong, Y/N. Your training, while not inclusive of the aspects of governing a country, does include the basic thing that a king must have.”

“And what is that?”

“Compassion.”

You giggled despite his seriousness. “Then why are you asking me what you already know?”

And for the first time since he met Valkyrie, you experienced a sight that set your heart aflame: Thor being embarrassed. He bowed his head with a tint of pink to his face. “I suppose you are right…”

“Thor.” You scooted closer to him, meeting his gaze. “You will make a fine king.”

The corners of his mouth lifted as he moved his dominant hand from yours to slowly brush your cheek with his knuckles. “Thank you. For everything. And I am sorry…So very sorry…”

Your breath caught in your throat as Thor sincerely apologized to you, and water blurred your vision of him. “Don’t apologize.” You begged. “Please.”

“Oh, Y/N…” You felt him touch the side of your face, fingers brushing the soft curve of it. “Do not cry.” His voice cracked as he said this.

“You know…” you sniffled, lifting a hand. “I just…I saw a bit what war is like today as well as its casualties…And despite the fact I should have been focused on what I was doing, maybe I would have saved a few more people…”

Thor hushed you, cupping your face in both his large hands, thumbs swiping away the drops that spilled down your skin. “You did more than enough. Asgard thanks you for it.”

“But…all I could think about was how much I didn’t want to lose you…” you sobbed, closing your eyes to avoid seeing his reaction to your confession. “And I know it’s selfish, but I don’t want to go back to Earth and just go on living like this never happened because I won’t be able to…”

Thor’s fingers stilled long before you finished speaking, and when all was silent, save your staggered breathing and the pounding of your blood organ against your chest wall, you felt warmth upon your tear-stained cheeks. Strong arms pulled you into a body that radiated heat, and supple lips brushed against yours.

“I won’t be able to, either.” The words were soft against your mouth as a palm came up to run along your temple. “I need you, too.”

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