#i think i might try to do one of those preservation trips next year if i can find one in a location im comfortable with | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

p-antomime · 3 years ago

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s꩜ s꩜ft!

𖦹 minors don’t interact. ┊ wc: 4,2K.

𖦹 content: dom!hanma, unprotected sex, heavy breeding kink, impregnation, dub-con, praise kink, pinning, marking, overstimulation, mention of (m!) masturbation, cunniligus, squirting, implied fingering, pussy drunk!hanma + feral!hanma.

𖦹 pairings: mountain cat hybrid!hanma shūji x f!reader.

ᥫ᭡. request. | tokyo rev. masterlist! | taglist!

"I dunno... You've never been this far away, I'm afraid something might happen to you! When are you coming back?!", the cell phone was still attached to your ear and your head was starting to hurt from all the questions being asked.

And yet, a half nervous, half comforting giggle escaped your lips.

— Hina, seriously... you've called me every day since I got on the bus to go out of Tokyo and there are like... — You looked at the watch on one of your wrists that would soon have to be taken off as soon as you arrived at the fifth Subashiri station. — Less than twenty minutes ‘til I actually start climbing, you should have locked me in the house if you didn't want me to come to Fuji so badly.

"Girl, you were interested in this not even two years ago and you didn't even think it through before you went there, I’m just..."

— Worried, mhm, I know, you said it about two hundred times in just ten minutes of phone time. — You grumbled as you watched the huge perimeter of Mount Fuji get closer and closer while walking further and further. — And, finally, y’know that there’s no way I can become a good climber if I don't do just that: mountaineering. — Your tone came out as if you were mocking her concern, but in reality you were just a little annoyed that she was treating you like a child.

Although she was right that you hadn't thought through all the details of your trip to Fuji, that was exactly what was fun. To leave home without having a time or day to return, to be able to run and walk freely on the mountain with almost no worries because, although the metropolitan civilization of Japan was slightly removed for environmental preservation reasons, the place still had internal control and security.

That's what you valued: freedom. And mountaineering delivered this in the best and most natural way possible.

— Relax, Hina. — You spoke as soon as you arrived at the Subashiri station and looked around to see small food huts used to help people who were about to have a long day going up or down the mount. — As soon as I'm safely down, by the end of the day, and on my way home, I'll call you! But, if it gets too late, I'll try to find someplace to sleep around here and come home tomorrow for real, if that happens, I'll call you too, I won't leave you without information.

You heard Hinata babbling something to someone next to her on the other end of the line and didn't even bother to try to understand what it was as your feet walked to buy an energy drink.

— Besides... — Your voice rang out again as soon as the other girl was paying attention to the call again. — If I don't call you by, I don't know, seven o'clock at night, maybe a serial killer will have caug--

"Shut the fuck up! Or I'll come after you and make you come down off this mount in person, stop making those jokes, gosh!," a giggle escaped your lips, it was too easy to provoke her.

— Shush! Calm down! It's just a joke! Don't be so angry, stress is not good for you, y’know. — You heard her cursing at you on the other end of the call and, leaning the cell phone between the ear and shoulder, you called the girl on the hut with one hand. — Excuse me! Can I have one of those over there, the one with the green can? — Your hand pointed to the energy drink in one of the small refrigerators that didn't seem to be cleaned that often.

— 690 yen, miss. — The attendant said and you went to look for your wallet inside the backpack.

— Hold on, Hina, I'll be right with you!

While going through your backpack, you noticed the way the girl, who didn't look much older than you, looked you up and down a few times. As you faced her to hand over the money, she took a few seconds to put the energy drink in your hand and you raised a confused eyebrow.

— Are you going to the mount alone? — Immediately, you hung up with Hinata because you knew that maybe if that conversation was overheard by her, she would have a heart attack.

— Yes...? — You replied, taking the drink and going to put your wallet away again.

— Is this your first time?

— Here? — You returned the question and the girl shrugged. — Oh, is this the first time I've done this alone? Not really. — It was a lie, but the times you had climbed the mountain with a group of acquaintances, nothing had gone wrong.

— It's kinda dangerous for a girl, are you gonna stay here ‘til tonight? — You nodded, before opening a wry smile as you opened the can of booze.

— Anywhere is kind of dangerous for a girl, but anyway, I don't plan on staying too long on the hill, just a basic outgoing, y’know? — She nodded in agreement without saying anything else and went to put the money you handed her in the cash register.

— So, good luck! I hope to see ya coming by again before the food station closes. — You opened a small smile, watching Hinata call you again and put the cell phone in airplane mode so you wouldn't have to answer.

— Thank you!

It was your last direct interaction with a human being as you walked up the old steps to the main entrance that actually led to the wild part of Mount Fuji.

Some people were walking in the same direction as you and others were going in the opposite. Almost everybody was minding their own business, after all, everyone there was with the same purpose of trying to make the most of the direct contact with the best preserved environmental part of Japan.

There were more groups than single people and in the end, before reaching the highest point on the steps, you preferred to join one of the groups even if you were not going to follow the same path as them once the paths branched off up the hill. It was just a matter of initial safety.

Like it or not, the words of the girl at the food hut had sort of entered your head, but still, it wasn't as if you wanted to give up your adventure and besides, you were already halfway there! Giving up was not and never had been an option.

Eventually, your cell phone signal gradually disappeared. The transmission towers around Subashiri obviously did not have a great range until just beyond the paved floor of the different entrances to the Fuji base, and you did not even need to pick up your cell phone to see that. Logical thinking was enough.

Small leaves were crunching under the heavy soles of your specially made climbing boots and the sun penetrating through the tall trees reminded you that in one hand you still had the energy drink canister. And as you took it to the right while the group of people you had joined sporadically went to the left and slowly the sound of their footsteps became more and more distant, one of your hands went to open that can.

— Damn! Finally some fresh air! — You sighed with a deep breath tooking the drink to your lips and feeling it cool your throat slowly, it seemed as if your social and physical battery had increased as soon as your lips touched the entrance of it.

But, it was already a little warm, hot. And you inevitably contorted the face in disgust, you took too long to drink it straight, but, even so, finished it all just so you wouldn't have to throw it into the trees and could put it in one of the inside pockets of the backpack.

Soon after, it took almost ten minutes to fit the mountaineering equipment around your body. The harness placed around your hips and waist as an obvious safety measure being checked to see that it was indeed tight and without any untied buckles and the gloves on your hands in case you really need to climb high up the mount being checked by you to see that they were not slipping because of the heat.

And only then did you actually begin your personal adventure of climbing to the top or to the point where it was physically possible at the time of Mount Fuji.

There were even some paths already marked by soles of feet and heavy shoes on the ground lapped by grass, rocks, trees and bushes from so many people who had passed there before you. Also, there was no map or manual of exactly which way to go, you were going more by intuition than experience, and therefore further and further away from the first entrance you had passed – and that was the idea: to get as far away from civilization as possible and deeper into the heart of Fuji.

What's the fun of climbing a mountain or mount like this if you don't go as deep as possible? Or not explore all the possible options?

The more minutes went by, the more you found yourself hearing nothing but the faint, even delicate sounds of cicadas and small birds that would eventually hide in their cocoons as you passed by them giving small smiles as if the animals would somehow become less apprehensive.

And the more the air became thin.

The higher the altitude, the lower the oxygen levels.

Your partially gloved fingers tingled, and slowly, as you continued on your way at a slower pace than before, it seemed as if the pressure from the inside out of your lungs forced you to stop almost every ten minutes to catch the breath with one arm resting on a tree.

You could no longer even see the station with the Subashiri food huts, now it was just you, your heavy boots and the small, isolates sounds of defenseless animals coming from all sides.

And, in the middle of the silence, any noise becomes more amplified, as an arrow in the air your ears picked up something resembling grunts coming from somewhere diagonally across from you.

The first thought was to think that there was another person hurt, because it sounded like a human voice even though it seemed to purr in a few syllables.

Suddenly it stopped. The sounds stopped completely and you stood still in place waiting for it to start again, but five long minutes passed and nothing started again, so your feet started walking again. And immediately, almost the same second that the sole of the boot hit the ground again, the grunting started again.

— The fuck... — You hissed, looking around and searching for where the noise was coming from.

Eventually, out of sheer concern – and a mixture of curiosity, you found yourself moving out of the original path to approach a less treeless part, as if you were penetrating a forest that was not even known to you in those parts of Fuji.

The sounds getting louder and louder and you swallowing hard with a shiver running through your body as soon as your stupid mind started reminiscing about a bunch of horror movies where the character was too curious and ended up with a slit throat.

But what if someone actually was hurt? You couldn't live with the knowledge that you had the opportunity to try to help someone potentially injured and probably unable to walk properly and you closed eyes to it.

So your feet kept walking until they found the entrance to a cave with echoes of the grunts resounding and continuing to send shivers down your spine.

Before a "Hello" came out of your mouth, you covered it with one hand. If this was some kind of trap, you would be dead right there.

The girl in the hut had told you it was dangerous and yet you chose not to give up, so your feet stepped carefully into that cave so as not to tread too hard.

And there was even a strange smell in the air. It wasn't exactly bad, but it seemed to penetrate the synapses of your brain slowly and force you to keep walking inside.

Until, forcing your eyes a little to suit the only illumination coming from outside the cave, you managed to catch a glimpse of an almost completely human silhouette lying on something that was definitely impossible to discern what it was. Almost because there was a not very long tail moving from side to side in the same way a curious cat does when it is about to start exploring a new place.

Bright golden eyes with dilated pupils went up from the ground to your face and little beige fuzzy ears went up and down, your breath caught in the middle of the throat as soon as your attention wandered to the silhouette of that human yet animal-like thing and you could barely keep your focus on his hand wrapped around something between his legs that you obviously knew what it was.

Poor Hanma. He was literally just trying to relieve himself during his own mating period. And poor Y/N, she walked right up to him led by her own curiosity.

It had been a long time since Hanma Shuuji had the opportunity to see a girl this close, especially since he was usually not the most affectionate or loving hybrid with normal humans.

His eyes traveled down your legs covered only by the harness and the comfortable shorts slowly, until they stopped at the middle of your thighs. You had what he needed and wanted, definitely a pussy was going to be better than his hand wrapped around his painfully erect cock.

Your feet slowly started to walk backwards, eyes glued to the floor, heart beating fast against your chest. You knew you needed to get out of that place as quickly as possible, Hanma knew you wanted to try to escape from him.

And, even if you ran as soon as he got up from his sort of nest, you can't win a ground race with him. His body was more trained precisely to be able to chase and catch his prey.

When you least expected it, when the entrance to the cave was so close, a hand of the hybrid wrapped itself around your harness and pulled your body completely back almost so hard that you swore your feet briefly stopped touching the cave floor.

In the next minute that your eyes could assimilate, your body was lying against the soft surface of the same place he had been lying against previously and your breathing quickened at the physical exertion of trying to get up as you slammed against Hanma's chestplate and were forced to lie back down.

Honestly, Hanma was confused. Genuinely confused.

If you were a girl and he was a guy who needed your help to get off, why were you trying to push him away? Isn't that what girls and their pussies are for? To be filled with all his fertile seed?

Maybe a kiss would make you more tame for him, he almost always saw other adults up and down the mount doing that.

And when Hanma tilted his face and caught you off guard in a forceful kiss, your first action was to try to slap him and he held your wrist to stop you and bit your lower lip without much force so that you moaned in pain and let him slide his tongue into your mouth.

Your other hand absently brushed against one of his more sensitive than usual fuzzy ears and he let a moan, almost a purr, against your lips. And it would be a lie if that low, sly sound from him hadn't sent little sparks of arousal down your back and made your thighs press against each other.

His fingers dug into your harness and spread your legs apart so that he would be able to start rubbing his cock against your covered pussy, and the kiss deepened as your hands ended up caressing his cute little ears only to have the opportunity to hear and feel Hanma moaning against your mouth.

— Fuck! — His voice was hoarse as soon as you had to break the kiss to catch the breath and his hips kept rubbing against the middle of your legs and wetting your shorts with his pre-cum. — Do it again mhm! Your hands, 's so good! — His head tilted a little, indicating for you to continue flicking his ears and you realized that you didn't know how to do that without knowing how to apply the right pressure to make him enjoy your touch more.

— I-I don't... — You stopped talking as Hanma growled in your direction with his pupils gradually getting smaller.

— Do it. — It wasn't a request and your hands slowly began to run through his hair and ears calmly, not knowing what exactly hurt him and what was good.

His face sank into your neck and a few seconds later his mouth was licking and sucking there aggressively, as if he needed somehow to mark you without necessarily hurting you for other people to know that you were his, only his. To use and to break, like a cat toy.

His hands slid to grab your tits over your shirt and Hanma watched them fill his palms. "So soft!", that's what he was thinking.

Everything about you was so soft and nice to touch and squeeze, were all girls like that?

Just then, his treacherous and curious fingers fell upon your shorts and didn't bother to remove the safety harness first. Hanma only needed to rip the fabric and, hearing the sound of tearing, you looked at him incredulously even though you had spare clothes in the backpack that fell to the floor as soon as he pinned your body down.

— Don't fucking do that! Gosh, the fuck are you thinking?! — You shouted, punching him twice in the chest, and a shiver ran down your back as his gaze lifted to meet yours.

— Don't tell me what to do, human, it’s you who are the intruder here. — Hanma purred irritably before letting the fabric of what had been those shorts fall around your body. — I kinda like you, your body, you're all so soft, down here too? — His eyes fell on the wet bottom of your panties and two of his fingers brushed against your folds. — Oh, it's all slick and smooth and wet. — It was as if he was exploring your body and his ears were even rattling against your hands. — So, you need to be all filled up, don't you? And I need to fill you up.

Before you could answer or push him away, his face was leaning down and examining your pussy as he pulled your panties aside. The sweet smell of your pussy made his pupils dilate again, his back relaxed slowly and his tongue passed between lips.

It was a logical thing to taste you, Hanma knew this because something primitive clicked in his brain and told him to do it, but, ironically, he had no idea how good it would feel to run the tongue slowly over your folds and, in the end, suck on your entrance that he wanted so badly to fill with his seed.

You were soft down there too, but it was better than your neck or tits. It was warm, wet, tasted good to him and it was impossible for that mountain cat hybrid not to start sucking and licking you with the aim of getting more of your juices going straight down his throat.

And your hands caught in his hair, inevitably continuing to rub fingertips against his sensitive ears, while your head fell back and little moans escaped your lips without you even thinking to muffle them.

Hanma wasn't that skilled, but he was so hard at sucking you that it ended up letting you make whatever mess you wanted between his legs, his tongue pressing against your clit that he liked to feel squeezing and sliding into your tight pussy.

One hand slid down to pump his dick at the same rate as the knot deep in your belly began to tighten painfully and he guided himself from your moans and gasps to keep eating you out.

— S-Stop-mhm! — You tried to pull away from his face even though you were so close to cumming and Hanma held you in place with the hand that wasn't on his cock. — I, fuck, cannot-ngh!

In one long suck, your body surrendered to the soft mouth of the hybrid beneath you. The tips of your feet curling up and various spasms coursing through your back and thighs as your pussy gushed against his tongue and finally let him taste all of your juices.

Hanma didn't know what it was like to get pussydrunk, but he was definitely getting.

Your body slumped against the soft surface of what was his nest and you felt your head spin for long seconds, the only thing keeping you awake was the wet sound of his hand continuing to go up and down on his cock.

And he needed so badly to breed you and push his cum as deep as possible, so his hands articulated your body so that you were face down with ass up, your pussy completely exposed to be pounded by him.

Pulling you back by the waist, Hanma leaned over your back to rest his chin on one of your shoulders and drove his cock into your sensitive cunt without giving you much time to think and immediately slammed it inside you, deep and nice in the exact way he desperately needed.

A loud, almost too feline moan escaped from deep in his throat, and both your eyes and his rolled up as you felt yourself swallowing him to the base. And he didn't expect that as soon as he managed to bury himself inside your tight pussy, his cum-filled balls would immediately be emptied, breeding you for the first time and making his body quiver on top of yours.

— Fuck, you... feels so good! You swallowing me, 's so fucking good, I can feel you wanting all my cum and squeezing yourself, fuck! — His head dropped back and hands continued to pin you beneath him as his dick began to thrust inside your tight pussy and fuck his cum deeper with some of it dripping down your entrance and wetting his shaft and your thighs.

Small tears started to appear in the corner of your eyes, the overstimulation starting to take over your body as Hanma's balls slapped against your swollen clit and made your vision cloudy.

Hanma was railing you as if you were just another hole to be used, made for just that, and even with his brutal, animalistic rhythm, you could pick up on him calling you "my kitty" right next to your ear between breathless grunts and moans.

The only thing that reminded you that part of him was still human were these little lascivious whispers that managed to make you clench even tighter around his long dick that was ready to breed you again.

Your hips were beginning to show signs that they would be completely sore as soon as Hanma was done using you as a cocksleeve, but you didn't have time to pay attention to that: your body was cumming again almost at the same time as he was impregnating you again and making you take more of his cum inside your tight little pussy.

All while your completely tired body fell beneath his and his mouth was digging its teeth into your shoulder as a way of trying not to let himself give in to the more primitive side of his head at the idea of continuing to fuck you through your orgasm because Hanma Shuuji needed more.

Much more than you were willing or able to give him at that moment.

Almost against his own will, he pulled out from within your warm, wet walls and held you in his arms so that you were facing him and his lips could catch yours again in a hurried kiss.

Just as some of his seed began to leak from your entrance, two of his long fingers went to force it back in. And you moaned against his mouth as you felt yourself getting even fuller with them rubbing against your sensitive walls.

— I can't... fuck, can't do it again, a-anymore. — Your hands rested on his shoulders trying to pull away from his body and Hanma just tilted his face to start licking your neck again.

— We-- — You interrupted him.

— 'We'? There is no 'we’. — You squinted, looking at him irritably, Hanma's small ears drooped in an almost resentful movement.

— Hm? What do you mean? You're my kitty now, isn't it obvious? We're gonna stay here while I keep fucking my babies into you, you're mine now! — A grunt escaped him as he felt you trying to push him away again.

Good luck, you've now got yourself a new pet who, despite his dislike of humans, might make an exception for you for as long as you keep your legs open for him.

ㅤ🏷 tagging: @festive @wakaslut @strawberrysanzu @bontensucker @wakasa-wifey @manjiroscum @inu1gf @keisaint @saaraunicorn @ranilingus @dokidokimanji @mizurimirai @sleepy3 @kuroaka @slut4manjiro @zuuki @qudvxnkanx @manjirosdoll @hirwishin @izanaswifey @eriskaitto @horny-inarizaki-stan @mrsvaleska @goldenmnr @semisgroupie .

#hanma shuji x reader #hanma smut #hanma shuji smut #tokyo revengers smut #tokyo rev x reader #tokyo rev smut #hanma shuuji smut #hanma shuuji #hanma x y/n #tr smut #tw.dubcon #tw.breeding kink #tw.overstimulation

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agentbeeswrites · 2 years ago

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Just finished watching all 8 episodes of Paper Girls.

Is it worth watching? Yes. It's pretty enjoyable. The show is easier to follow than the comic book was. The acting is good, the writing is decent, music is great, special effects are mostly good. It deals with most of the same themes, except for the commercialism of Apple products that were ubiquitous in the books.

It is only 8 episodes and ends on a cliffhanger, so if that's a deal killer then maybe skip it. Or you could read the comic books and then watch the show. It makes the cliffhanger easier to handle. Maybe.

They did change enough that the events of next season are more of mystery than you might expect.

So much was changed that I can only begin to touch on it. Mostly, it was the sequence of events, but there was a whole thing with Larry that was made for the show, and the only characters that weren't significantly different were KJ and Mac. Their first trip to the future was changed to a slightly different year. They haven't gone way back in time yet, though the last episode ended in a time jump.

Erin was changed in a fundamental way and gets to angst about the ripples of that in her older self for a while.

Things that I liked:

Tiffany's future self has a very different story, but OG Tiff is still OG Tiff.

KJ found out some fundamental truths in a very different way that, IMO, was more fitting for a tv show and more satisfying, tbh. They're actually building up her relationship with Mac in a way the books didn't dedicate much time to.

I really liked the time that Mac and Erin spent together and grew their friendship. It showed another side to Mac and added depth to her character.

A different character got her period and had to figure out how to handle that. There's a hilarious scene where Mac nabs some tampons for her and they all wonder how they're used.

The music. It's clear that a huge chunk of their budget went to time-appropriate music, and I loved their selections. Great soundtrack.

The color palette. We still get to see the pinks, purples and blues that made the art of the books so memorable, though they're usually only present when some kind of timey-whimey thing is happening.

Things I didn't like:

Grand Father only shows up twice, I think. We don't get to see the multiple versions of him and how he explains/justifies what he's doing and why he's trying to preserve the timeline until the very end.

(Cutting here to hide spoilers. Don't read on if you want to remain relatively spoiler free.)

KJ taking a guy out early on and having to deal with the possibility that she killed someone for most of the show.

KJ punching Mac. Like girl, I know you're having a gay panic, but come on. Too far.

KJ not having her hockey stick with her for the whole thing. I guess the tradeoff is that we got to see her riding a motorcycle to save Mac.

Erin not having her bag with her the whole time. I know it wasn't really important, but it was one of those character details that shows how much they changed Erin.

Prioress practically being the Terminator. The way she tracked them and blended into each time as she tried to find the girls. I'm actually on the fence about this, but I'm leaning more to the "didn't like it" than neutral. She was the only one trying to track them. We only ever seen a team arrive once, and it was after a battle that they needed to clean up.

Everything with Larry. He's clearly a replacement for the old lady they encounter in the books, but the stuff with him took up significant time, while the old lady shows up in what? Two scenes? Maybe three? Narratively, I guess it makes sense as a way to introduce the idea of the STF Underground, but they never explain the war very well and that the "Underground" is just a few people in different times that were recruited to send messages through the paper (which does not seem to be a character unto itself like in the books) to the actual STF time travelers. Actually, that's a mechanic that doesn't exist in the show at all. For a show called "Paper Girls," this show has very few references to the paper.

It's a "Battle of the Ages," but that's never really touched on in the show. Eight episodes and it's only hinted at near the end. Come on!

Have you watched Paper Girls? What did you think of it?

#paper girls #paper girls spoilers #tv show review

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iiraven · 4 years ago

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Fool-Proof Plan

Pairing: Erwin x reader

Genre: fluff, comedy, smut, modern AU

Warnings: size kink, masturbation, squirting, fingering in front of a mirror, hair pulling, multiple orgasms, manhandling, degradation, praise, established relationship, slight dumbification, choking/ breath play

Word count: 4.6K

Synopsis: Erwin’s business trip leads you to realise you’re not as sly as you think you are.

Masterlist

Erwin Smith is a man capable of absolutely everything. He’s an amazing cook, an amazing masseur, an amazing businessman, and, most of all, an amazing husband.

There’s only one small shortcoming to the person you consider to be perfect. And that’s his inability to use any form of technology. Texting is bad enough with him signing his name after every message, but it’s social media that’s your husband’s true sworn enemy. Erwin might only be a few years your senior, but somehow your grandfather can comprehend the concept of Instagram faster than him.

“So, you just take pictures?”

“Yes.”

“And people respond to it?”

“Yes.”

“Alright but why?”

The conversation is nothing new, but you find it incredibly unfortunate knowing how talented he is at photography. If you two ever go someplace Erwin knows he wants to capture, he slings his camera over his neck, leaves his phone at home (“I won’t be taking any calls today”) and makes his merry way out of the house. You often eye the phone left stray on the desk, half-expecting it to chase you out of the house for abandoning it. Sometimes, for good measure, you slip it into your own bag. Just in case.

It’s for this reason that Erwin’s business trip puts you on immediate edge.

“It’ll only be for ten days,” he had said. “Sina Corporations takes their summits really seriously…”

“Ten days?” You repeated and Erwin gave you a soft smile.

“I’ll call you every day.”

It’s not like you have an obsessive attachment to your husband (well, that’s debatable), but breaking the routine of returning home to his warm hugs, listening to his day and then complaining about your own- it’s uncomfortable.

Erwin himself wasn’t looking forward to being away from you, away from home. Running Survey Corporations Ltd is no easy task; trying to balance the infuriating board and the long hours with his actual life is something only possible because of you. Time spent together is fine diamonds Erwin clutches onto and although he’d tried to reason with himself that it was only ten days, it wasn’t a trip he was looking forward to. He never said it out loud. But he didn’t need to. You can tell by the way Erwin’s lips linger on yours a little longer at the airport, as if to preserve your taste.

“Oi Erwin- hurry up.” Levi tries hard not to glare. But even the raven-haired man knows that being away from you puts Erwin on somewhat of an edge. You’re his rock, there to ground him when everything is chaotic, and a summit surrounded by the richest people in the world is as chaotic as it gets.

Despite it all, Erwin stays true to his promise. He calls you at least twice a day and although you could stay on the phone with him for hours, he’s often rushing between conferences and can only spare minutes of his time. Even when he does have an hour, talking to a disembodied voice (he still can’t figure out how to switch his camera back around) is not the same as having Erwin right beside you. It’s the way he squeezes your thigh when he’s focussing on what you’re saying or when he pulls you towards him so that you can lie on his hard chest which still makes you blush even after years of being together.

Because, yes, you miss his touch the most.

Not even five days in, you find yourself with your hands down your panties and a tall blond man on your mind. You’re soaked just thinking about him. His groans, the way he calls your name, the way he pounds into you as you lose your train of thought. Your fingers try to imitate his- their curve and how easily they find your soft spot- but it just feels uncomfortable. So, then you try rubbing your clit, and there’s temporary pleasure there, but not even close enough to tip you over the edge. Even your pink vibrator doesn’t cut it. You deny the fact that Erwin Smith has made you an incompetent masturbator, but you can’t keep up the lie for long and soon enough you give up.

It’s the next day that your ingenious idea kindles. It’s a fool-proof plan. A small flame that has you rushing to the bathroom for the best possible lighting. Erwin can still put his tongue to use at a distance- after all, it’s his voice you fell in love with first. To discretely push him in the right direction, you send him a few photos of yourself. Nothing too scandalous safe he’s in a meeting, but enough that he’ll gets the hint. Sure, Erwin has a couple of polaroid pictures hidden in his brown leather wallet, but he had shot those himself. You want to be a bit more spontaneous! And, honestly, at this point you’re desperate. You could swear you’re developing withdrawal symptoms: just the other day, you were actually temped to pick up a newspaper. It was terrifying.

This had to work. You can just imagine Erwin calling you, voice deep and gruff as he guides you through the process to make yourself cum as he showers you with praise. You feel giddy, eyes glued to the glowing screen, awaiting his response. Even your pink vibrator is out of the box.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t exactly go the way you had planned.

One hour after sending the photos you receive a panicked text from Hange. In the long paragraph, you understand that your poor husband couldn’t get the photos to load and decided to consult the vice president of his company who, upon simply clicking on them, saw you groping your soapy tits. Had it been anyone other than vice president Hange Zoe, Erwin may have broken his phone and quit right there. Thankfully, he only said, “I see” and then asked her where to find the smiley face Emoji.

“I’m so, so sorry Y/N!” Hange screams through the phone. “I’ll make it up to you, I promise! I could send you a picture of my boobs! I’ll go do it right now! I’m sorry! No- You don’t need to feel embarrassed! I won’t mind!”

“It’s alright Hange.” You laugh nervously. “You don’t need to send me anything, it’s really not that big of a deal.”

The whack Levi lands on her head is so hard you hear it through the phone. “Shut the fuck up four-eyes.”

So here you are now. Three days until Erwin returns, a vibrator you’ve given up on back in its box, and a husband who responds to your nudes with a smiley face.

But then Hange Zoe sends you something much better than a picture of her boobs.

The hotel that the trio were staying at- as most hotels do- has a spa. And if there’s one thing Erwin Smith adores it’s allowing himself to relax in a warm, steamy sauna. You’re not sure how Hange was allowed to join them, or how she was able to get her camera clear of fog, or how she was even able to take the picture without Erwin noticing. But you ask her no questions.

Followed by a winky-face is a picture of Erwin sat in the sauna, head tilted backwards, and eyes shut in the pure image of serenity. His arms are propped up on either side of him accentuating his biceps whilst still allowing a clear view of his sculpted body, the sweat running down his chest and abs, making him almost glisten. He’s completely naked except for the flimsy white towel across his lap which does absolutely nothing to hide his thick dick print. You shudder.

You feel like a teenager again, speechless at the sight of a quasi- naked man. Even though you’ve seen him like this thousands of times, you can’t help but fantasise about being trapped underneath him, hair falling onto his face as he loses himself inside of you. God, maybe you do have an unhealthy obsession. But it doesn’t matter. You feel even more like a teenager as you imagine scenarios of him returning home to recreate the picture before you. And with that, your mind is sedated for the next few days.

You have a fool-proof plan. Dress up in the shortest and tightest dress you own, cook your husband dinner, and then give him a blow job at the table so that he’ll never leave you again. It’s going to be just like in the movies and nothing will stop that from happening.

Something stops that from happening.

Just as you’re about to put the potatoes in the oven, Erwin calls. His flight is delayed. You whine through the phone and Erwin’s chuckle just about stops you from sulking like a child. You can be mature about this, right? He’s getting home eventually- complaining isn’t going to help at all. Patience is a virtue and yours has been tested many times before. This is, after all, nothing compared to the time Erwin tried to create an excel spreadsheet. So, you don’t press further. You simply tell Erwin that you miss him and then go find a pillow in which you scream for a good five minutes.

Erwin, on the other hand, is a lot less coveted with his annoyance. He wants nothing more than to strangle whatever and whoever is preventing him from returning to his lovely wife. In the hour journey, the entire plane can feel a crushing tension above their heads, so tense that even the child at the back seems to be holding in his tears.

Usually, Erwin prefers to spend his flights with a book in his hands, but he’s incapable for picking up the paperback and instead stares out of the window somehow hoping it will go faster.

After what feels like hours, the tight dress has gotten too uncomfortable for you to wear and you resolve yourself to eating the potatoes alone. You still don’t take off your lingerie, though. A two-piece black set with lace detailing that makes you look like a present ready to be unwrapped. It had arrived yesterday, and you had taken your sweet time admiring the embroidered flowers and soft ribbon holding the fragile piece together because you had falsely assumed that you wouldn’t have it on for long. You had in fact contemplated stockings but by the time 11PM came by you simply wrapped Erwin’s favourite robe around your body and tried to take your mind off things. Maybe you should have opted for your own robe because as the sleeves hung from your arms and the soft material effused his smell, it managed to make you feel even worse.

Staying up late was not a foreign feeling but anticipation quickly turns into boredom and you find your eyelids getting heavy. You pause the anime you’re watching and are about to shut your eyes when you hear the faint rattle of keys.

You stumble getting out of bed, knocking your shoulder on the wall before skipping four steps at a time and tripping on the robe at least twice as you rush downstairs. Erwin is barely through the door as you call out his name and he drops his bags right there to let your rush into your arms. You feel so small, so safe, so familiar, within them, as if you’ve returned to the space where you belong. He lifts you up to let you wrap your legs around his waist, your ankles barely crossing. He smells divine, even after hours of being stuck in an airport and his hair is still soft between your fingers. You look at him and the smile that spreads across his face wipes out any hints of fatigue that might have been there just moments ago.

Erwin kisses you and it’s long, deep, and he holds you impossibly closer to him as his tongue dips into your mouth. You don’t want it to end, but Erwin pulls back and says softly, “I’m home, my love.”

You can’t help but giggle. “Welcome home.”

You return to the kiss with a hint of desperation. Tugging lightly on Erwin’s shirt, you know he notices how your core is already warm, but still, he takes his time closing the door with his foot before finally noticing your attire. You’re about to make a sarcastic comment about his obliviousness but the way he looks down at you, at the small flower of lace peeping out from under the heavy robe, the way he slowly wets his lips, he leaves you speechless.

“You’re a gift.” He smiles sweetly though his eyes darken.

“Well, you’ve been working really hard,” You mumble. “You deserve a treat.”

The effect this man has on you is unbelievable. All that anger and frustration you had pent up now crumbles at the light caress of his thumb on your hips.

“Let me unwrap you,” Erwin says. And he walks you to your room, climbing up the stairs with ease as you cling onto him. You attempt to rub yourself against his hard stomach, but one look of warning makes you stop. He’s going to be doing things on his watch, tonight.

Setting you on the floor beside your bed, Erwin undoes the ribbon and you let the fabric pool at your feet. He immediately latches onto your neck, and you gasp, tilting your head to give him better access. His hands begin to roam, fingering the delicate lace of your panties and the straps of your bra as his tongue leaves a trail over your chest. It’s only when Erwin suddenly grabs your breast that you moan, body involuntarily pushing towards him.

He looks up through thick eyelashes and his hands moves to cup your face. You’re about to beg him to touch you where you need it most, but he whispers, “you’re so beautiful.” And you’re speechless again.

You suddenly lean in to kiss him, hands wrapping around his neck and it’s messy and your breath is short. “Please, Erwin,” you say to him between kisses. “Touch me.” You can feel him smile against your lips. “Please”. And before you can stop yourself. “I can’t do it myself.”

Erwin stills and only then do you realise your mistake. He pulls back and stands up straight, towering over you and you recognises that look. It’s the one of a lion who has just found a wounded deer.

“Oh?”

Fuck. He leans back and raises a brow expectantly and you try to look everywhere but at him. Maybe if you avoid eye contact, he’ll take it as a slip of the tongue. But your husband is not one to let things go. He’s intelligent, he knows exactly what you mean- you don’t need to speak for him to gather what happened, the image of you lying pathetically on the bed, hopeless and desperate. He smirks but stays quiet. Erwin likes it when you use your words.

“No-that’s not what I meant. I mean- you feel best and it’s just-“

You’re cut off by a hand on your scalp, pulling your hair back in one swift motion so that you have no choice but to look up at your husband dead in the eye.

“You were touching yourself whilst I was away, Y/N?”

“I-I mean...yeah…”

“I see.” His gaze is enough to make you gush. “And you weren’t able to make yourself cum.”

Your cheeks burn. It’s not a question, but you affirm it anyways. “No, no I couldn’t make myself cum.”

He’s silent for a moment and you’re not sure if it’s because he’s watching your worried face or because he’s wondering how he’s going to make that face look even more worried.

“I would feel sorry for you, but I suppose that’s what you deserve for touching my cunt without my permission.”

You gasp as he uses his grip on your hair to throw you on the bed. It’s effortless, the way his strength could so easily destroy you and yet he uses it to ruin destroy you in another way- just who you like it. Erwin undoes his tie and all you can do is gawk as he strips down to his boxers. He’s as hard as a rock and you tentatively reach out to touch him, but Erwin grabs your wrist. Without warning, you’re dragged to the other side of the bed where you’re placed to face your large floor length mirror. There’s only a moment of confusion before you understand why Erwin had been so keen on the somewhat awkward placement. He positions himself behind you and you withhold the urge to press your back against his throbbing cock.

“Don’t you take your eyes off the mirror,” Erwin commands, and you nod your head. “Use your words. Or do you need me to show you how to do that too?”

“Yes, sir,” You say quickly.

“Good girl.”

Erwin opens your legs, his hands gripping your thighs hard. You silently wish bruises bloom in their wake- it’s been too long since you’ve had your husband’s mark on you. A reminder of who you belong to. One hand stays on your thigh and the other moves to nudge your panties out of the way of your glistening cunt.

“I’m going to show you how to touch yourself,” He says in a low, rumbling voice. “And you’re going to watch closely and learn. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes sir.”

His fingers don’t tease your folds for long. Erwin is feeling merciful, because he simply gathers the slick coating your cut before immediately rubbing your clit. The moan that leaves your mouth is pornographic. You buck your hips but the hand on your thigh moves to pin you down, your body flush against his so that you can almost feel his bearing heart. You’re engulfed by him so small as he easily manipulates your body.

Erwin is overwhelmed by the options. Look at his wife unravel below him or stare at the mirror, where you have no place to hide.

“I should be punishing you, you know.” He presses his fingers down hard on a particularly tenter spot and you moan loudly. “But I need to show my dumb little girl how to take care of herself.”

“I-I’m not- ahhh.” Your back arches and Erwin captures your neck again, sucking viciously.

As his thumb continues its assault on your clit, two fingers find your tight hole, dripping and clenching around nothing. He can see in the mirror how your body is practically begging to be filled up. And fill you up he will. But first Erwin inserts a finger and groans at the warmth that greets him. He begins moving it and although you try to understand how he is able to stroke your cunt so perfectly, your mind is fogged and all that’s on your mind is your impending release. This should be a learning experience, but it serves only as a reminder of Erwin’s miraculous hands. He slips his second finger in and your moans only get lounder.

“Erwin, Erwin- they feel so good. Your fingers feel so good!”

You can see his smirk in his reflection, just before he speeds up and you have to grab his wrist to steady yourself. His fingers slam back and forth into your velvety walls. They suck them in, and he is able to find your sweet spot every time. Every single time. Your eyes roll back, you press against Erwin’s chest and your legs shake as you cum. The mess you make, leaking all over Erwin’s hands, your bed, your thighs- you try to look away, but he grabs your face to prevent you from doing so.

“Don’t you dare look away.” His voice is low, threatening. “Look how good I make you feel. Look.”

Your cheeks are flushed and the set that had made you look like a femme fatale, just hours before, is now yet another set that has has you pliant and submissive. “It seems that I’m the only one who can take care of you,” Erwin says. And you know he’s right.

Erwin lifts his soaked fingers to his mouth and his eyes flutter shut as he tastes you. When he opens them, you swear they’ve gone a shade darker. Wordlessly, Erwin slips from behind you to kneel in front of the bed. He removes your panties and holds them up to his nose, giving them a slight inhale before tossing them to the side and lowering his mouth.

“Erwin wai-“

And before you can warn him that your too sensitive- you orgasm was too strong, it’s too soon- his mouth has latched onto your cunt and Erwin is eating you out like a starved man.

“Ah-fuck, fuck, fuck,” You practically scream.

He sucks on your clit, his tongue doing what it does best. You look down, his eyes bore into yours and you know he’s remembering every expression you make as he pushes you over the edge. Despite your trembling arms struggling to keep you upright, your hand goes to grip Erwin’s hair and all you can think about is how soft it is before you cum again. Your husband doesn’t stop this time. His fingers dig into your soft hips to make sure you don’t move, to make sure that he catches everything on his tongue. And he can feel it before you do. The steady build-up of a feeling slightly familiar, but foreign enough that you warn Erwin too late. Your back arches and you squirt in his mouth and before your eyes roll back, you catch a glimpse of what you know to be a smirk in your husband’s eyes.

You can feel the sheets soak below you so try to press your legs together in somewhat of an attempt to hide the mess, but Erwin doesn’t let you. “Don’t be ashamed now, darling.” His voice is solid, domineering. “This is just you perfect body, doing exactly what I tell it to,” He says.

He could be talking about fruits and you would still nod your head dumbly.

The power Erwin has over you is addictive, and your body seems to know it too. As he kisses your thighs, licking off whatever didn’t find its way into his mouth, you can still feel a distant ache at your core. This time, you don’t need to use your words. As you lie weak on the bed, Erwin crawls over, engulfing your form. The lion is ready for his meal. He leans down to capture your lips in a gentle kiss. “I missed you,” He says. It’s the hundredth time, but you don’t tire of hearing it.

“I missed you too.”

Erwin shifts your legs, and you can feel the head of his large cock teasing your entrance.

“I missed all of you,” he repeats. “Your smile. Your voice. Your moans.” He pauses to place a kiss on your collarbone. “Your taste.”

He’s trying to be romantic, but you know why he stalls, and it makes you unable to graciously except the compliments. Erwin loves to hear you pine for him. And who are you to refuse your husband’s desires? So, you reach your hands out towards his shoulders, attempting to make him move if only a little bit. “Erwin!” You whine, and despite your weakness, you manage to push your hips forward, finding friction against his hard cock. “Please!”

Again, that smirk. He rubs against your clit. “My, my- you’ve come twice already and want more?”

Well, he missed your voice so you suppose you should let him hear it. “Let me be selfish, please sir?” You moan. “I need you inside of me.”

His cock twitches against you. And before you know it his hand is around your neck. “Such a good girl, using your words like that.”

He pushes inside you with a groan of relief, a low sound from his throat that causes his eyes to close momentarily.

It seems you’ve forgotten how big he is because as he stretches you out like it’s your first time, your mouth drops open and a string of curses emerges. Erwin would usually reprimand you for the foul language, but he’s too lost in the feeling of your tight cunt pulling him in. Using your neck as leverage, he squeezes tight so that he can push forward and when your eyes blur, overwhelmed with the pleasure and pain and the lack of oxygen intensifying it all, Erwin loosens his grip only slightly, and your eyes find his again. You don’t notice your mouth hanging open, too focussed on the way your body is accommodating Erwin’s cock again.

“Really big, ‘s really big, sir,” You mumble and Erwin grunts in response, his teeth clenching because he too is reminded yet again of how tight- how perfect- your body is for him.

When Erwin bottoms out, he stills for a moment, basking in your warmth and taking a moment to kiss your cheek, a gentle gesture compared to the hand still grasping your neck. Your cunt gushes despite you wincing about the pain, about his size, and soon he can’t help but move his hips. Erwin pulls back and thrusts deep. You scream him name, as you feel his cock dragging against your walls. Any idea of taking you gently has evaporated from Erwin’s brain and instead his hips snap back and forth violently, his tip kissing your cervix as he buries himself inside of you again and again.

His grunts are laboured as Erwin’s free hand pushes your leg up to your chest to allow him to thrust deeps and deeper. “Just like that- just like that, good girl. My good girl.”

The new angle has him brushing against your g-spot and you won’t last long. You know you can’t- not with him quite literally rearranging your insides. You have one hand clawing at his forearm and the other grips the sheets and you repeat a mantra of “Thank you, sir, thank you” in between your desperate moans. The honorific coming from your lips is too sweet to his ears and he’s reminded of why phone calls bother him so much- nothing compares to hearing your voice like this.

Erwin’s hand leaves your neck only to tug your bra down, letting your boobs bounce freely as he fucks you hard. You almost complain about the loss of contact but his tongue latches onto to your nipple and before you know it, you are coming all over your husband, screaming his name. Your nails dig into his arm as he nears his own release. Erwin’s hips stutter and he moans your name before throwing his head back in pure bliss as he cums inside of you. You wish you can capture that sight forever, but you don’t think any photo does your husband justice. It’s true- this is better than anything Hange could send.

Your breaths slowly find a slower rhythm in the post-orgasm silence. Erwin watches the way your fluids pool out of you as he pulls out, admiring the own mess on his lower stomach. You wince at the sore feeling and pull him towards you. This time, he follows your command. Breathless bodies mould into each other, finding their place after too long being apart. At the back of your mind, you know you should be making your way to the bathroom, but Erwin’s heavy body lying on your chest is enough to remind you to focus on the moment. For this is where you belong.

“You know, you should be flattered, Erwin.” You nudge his arm weakly as you lay together, bodies entangled in a random set of pyjamas you begrudgingly forced yourself to change into. “No one has better hands than you.”

He laughs. “I am flattered,” he says. “I just like teasing you.”

“No- you have a degradation kink.”

“Yes, that too.”

Even as you were taking a shower together, Erwin’s subtle attempts at having you admit you couldn’t make yourself cum did not go unnoticed. You suppose it’s an ego-thing, but then you realise it’s more. The power of being the only person able to bring you that much bliss is power Erwin thrives on. And despite the money wasted on your pink vibrator, you wouldn’t have it any other way.

“Still,” Erwin muses and a small smile plays across his lips. “I did expect the photo Hange took to at least help a little.”

Every muscle in your body stills and your eyes suddenly widen. Oh come on. You try to tell yourself that there’s simply nothing wrong with having a photo of your naked husband, but it’s more than that. You know it. Erwin knows it. And by the way he’s smiling, you also know that plastered on your face is the guiltiest of looks. In your poor attempt to escape his gaze by turning your back to him, Erwin chuckles and shakes his head, hugging you closer.

“That’s not fair!” You exclaim.

“It’s not?”

“No!”

You try to wiggle out of his grasp, but Erwin is made of steel. Why do you expect to get away with anything anymore? Erwin Smith is beyond two moves ahead- he’s finished the game before you’ve even started.

“Did you really think I didn’t notice?”

“Shut up!” You whine. “Why do you have to be such a smartass about it? Let me think I win.”

“Alright, alright.” Erwin chuckles and places a kiss on your forehead. “You’re my winner. Always.”

580 notes · View notes

archived-kin · 4 years ago

Text

caught in a twin courtship

note from kin: i’m going to be honest i only really wrote this because the title is fun to say, so it isn’t as cohesive as i normally would have wanted to make it

(this is an au where the twins aren’t separated by the unknown god! instead, just their world-hopping powers were stolen, and that’s why they’re journeying to find said god - to get their powers back so that they can go home. i’ve also excluded paimon since i kind of forgot about her while writing this haha)

(this doesn’t follow canon at all since reader and the twins just kind of start wandering about after the dvalin incident rather than heading straight for liyue oops)

fandom: genshin impact

character(s): gn!reader, lumine, aether, diluc, venti, jean

pairing(s): aether/reader/lumine

warning(s): i don’t think so??

genre: fluff with a little bit sprinkling of angst

you first meet the twins in the aftermath of the stormterror battle. it isn’t a glamorous introduction by any means - it’s pretty unflattering, actually - but it definitely makes a powerful first impression.

the group - aether, lumine, venti, diluc, and jean - are on their way back to mondstadt city, making small talk here and there, but mostly just walking in silence.

then they hear a yell in the distance.

jean and lumine both drop into a battle stances, venti leaps to hide behind aether with a very unmanly squeak of fear… but diluc, who arguably should have been the most alerted by this occurrence, just gives a resigned sigh and pauses.

a split second later, a figure comes speeding up to the group. you barrel up to diluc and immediately punch him square in the stomach, yelling “why didn’t you tell me you were going after stormterror?!”

aether and venti both give matching gasps of horror at the blatant disrespect, but diluc only shakes his head and catches your fist as it goes for another blow, this one aimed at his chest, and chastises, “calm down, i left a note.”

“i left a note,” you mimic, an absolutely awful impression that has you sounding more like a mosquito than the darknight hero, “fat lot of use that is when you aren’t even telling me where you’re going!”

diluc evades another jab at his arm and firmly sets his hands on both your shoulders, effectively anchoring you to the ground. you contemplate swinging your feet at his knees and knocking him over, or maybe shocking him with your electro vision, but ultimately decide that you might as well try to preserve what little dignity you have left in front of those three people you’ve never met before

so you stop with a defeated sigh and turn to face said three people to introduce yourself

it turns out that you’re diluc’s cousin and he’s been having to baby-sit you for the last few years after your own parents left on a ‘business trip’ to snezhnaya that they’re still not back from

you’re pretty sure they’re dead, killed by the fatui, and you say as much during your introduction without even the slightest sign of distress, which is a little unsettling

lumine’s first thought is that you’re quite the interesting character, what with the casual way you treat diluc, and how you don’t seem to question whatever situation lead you to meet in the first place

aether’s first thought is holy shit, they’re cute

one twin greets you in return with a lot more enthusiasm than the other, and venti the bard wastes no time in asking whether you have access to good master diluc’s wine storage

(you’d be shocked by the audacity if you weren’t just as bad as him when it came to shamelessness)

strangely enough, the fact that aether likes you so much actually makes lumine more wary of you than she was initially

aether trusts too easily, and from experience, that usually leads to disaster - and your flippancy regarding your parents’ apparent probable deaths rather inclines her to think that you might be a very dangerous person indeed

the three of you don’t see each other for a couple of days after that - you and diluc leave for dawn winery together, while the twins depart with venti to wrap their whole situation up, and jean returns to her duties in mondstadt city

all this time, apparently unbeknownst to even himself, aether keeps finding ways to bring you up in the middle of conversation

you’d only spoken to him for a few minutes and somehow that as enough to get him absolutely fascinated

lumine would be lying if she said she wasn’t still curious about you as well, but it gets annoying after aether somehow manages to mention how ‘mysterious’ your black cloak is in the middle of a conversation about why mitachurls are able to randomly set their axes on fire

luckily for these two, they happen to run into you the very next day!

you’re in the middle of taking out a ruin guard stomping around the thousand winds temple - a ruin guard that the twins had been meaning to take down themselves, which is why they’re here in the first place

at first they move to help you, only to stop short and watch in awe as you plunge down at the ruin guard from atop one of the enormous pillars, your polearm held steady in your grasp as your entire body seems to spark and glow with a deep purple electro energy

the sharp blade of your polearm goes clean through the top of the ruin guard’s head and shatters its core, and it sinks to the ground with a massive thud that echoes around the temple ruins, massive wooden limbs twitching and jerking as the last of your vision’s energy disperses from it

aether and lumine are basically star-struck

from there you spot them and call them over for a conversation, show them how to take apart a ruin guard’s circuits to get at the good parts, and somehow end up agreeing to journey with them across teyvat in their search for an unknown god who stole their abilities to hop from world to world as well as their apparent true power that allows them to wield all seven elements at once

the details are a little lost on you, but what you’re hearing is that you get to go on a cool adventure with a cool gal and a cool lad, so you’re pretty much all for it

diluc isn’t too happy about you up and leaving without so much as two week’s notice (partially because he has literally no friends apart from you and he’d get lonely without his little cousin bothering him all the time) but you simply tell him to deal with it and go anyway

(you do give him a big hug and promise to visit, you’re not heartless)

from then on you, aether and lumine become a dynamic trio like no other

it’s actually pretty damn spooky how well the three of you end of working together

aether and lumine had long since formed a style of fighting that meant they made up for each other’s weak spots and could attack in perfect sync, but then you come along and somehow manage to make their already pretty flawless formation even better

is it witchcraft? they honestly don’t know

considering you fit so well into their battle strategies, it follows that you’d also slot perfectly into their every day life

lumine is cautious at first, wondering if your presence would disrupt her and her brother’s long since pre-established routines, but you fit in so naturally that it’s as if you were there all long

maybe it it’s this that makes both twins slowly start falling for you - the comfort of being beside you and the familiarity that you bring are things that they struggled to find, being trapped in a world far from their own with no way to get out, and they unknowingly latch onto you like drowning men clutching lifebuoys

aether is the most obvious about his feelings - he starts waking up earlier just because he knows you do, sitting beside you as you stoke a campfire and keep watch for any approaching monsters, making quiet conversation as lumine continues sleeping. he tells you stories about his adventures in other worlds, including an encounter with a rather bigoted individual who is the reason that he keeps his hair so long while lumine’s has been cut short

he even starts taking his hair out of its braid before he goes to sleep so that he can ask you to braid it for him when he wakes up

lumine is a lot more subtle

she finds excuses to stand closer to you when, deliberately brushing her fingers against yours when handing you something. she listens far more attentively to you when you speak than anyone else, and she smiles far more in your presence, hanging onto your every word and gazing at you so intensely that it’s almost unsettling

of course, the twins notice each other’s feelings pretty easily

at first neither acknowledges it - it’d be far too messy for both to accept that they’d both fallen in love with the same person, let alone actually admit this to each other

but it gets to the point where it just isn’t ignorable anymore, and finally the twins decide to talk

it’s about as civil and sensible as they could hope for with the subject at hand, and they eventually decide to talk to you about it

and so, we come to an ultimatum. what will your choice be?

if you reject both, it’ll be hard to continue adventuring with twins who can’t look in your direction. neither resent you, of course, but the atmosphere has become so stifling that they can’t even make eye contact

it’s as if an enormous gap has opened up between the three of you. the twins are avoiding each other as well, unsure of how to handle the fact that they’re both in love with the same person and have now both been rejected by that same person. if anything, they should be becoming closer out of solidarity, but it seems that they can’t stand to be in each other’s presence as much as they can’t stand to be in yours.

the three of you still work together as seamlessly in battle as you did before, but once the final monster has been cut down and your weapons are sheathed, that connection seems to disappear again.

it’s aether who finally breaks the stalemate. he starts trying to start conversations as the three of you sit awkwardly apart from each other around a fire, and while the first few attempts end in stony silence and an awkward cough on his part, eventually you begin replying with some semblance of the humour you used to

from there things only improve - the three of you come to a silent mutual agreement to leave this behind you, and soon you’re all laughing and joking as you used to

lumine and aether both know that they cannot force you to love either of them, and they respect your choice. if anything, they’re the ones in the wrong for springing something like this on you so suddenly, and they start to feel a little guilty that they were essentially pressuring you into making a choice that you were never obligated to make

so they return to treating you as a dear friend, just as before. things are different now, of course, but they can only be grateful that you continue to travel with them and stay by their side; this situation doesn’t make them love you any less, even if you don’t love them in the same way.

if you choose lumine, aether will be understanding. the twins have been each other’s only support for longer than they can remember, and as the older brother, he’s well used to giving things up for his sister.

he’ll still be friendly and amicable, but he won’t seek you out as much as he did before. he starts braiding his hair by himself again, and stays in bed as late as he can every morning so that he doesn’t have to be face to face with you. just because he’s accepted this doesn’t mean that it doesn’t hurt.

sometimes, when the sky grows dark and you and lumine have long since fallen asleep beside each other, he wonders to himself - why is it that he has to give everything to his sister? he’s given away so much, so why couldn’t the universe let him have this one thing?

but he knows, deep down, that this is nothing to do with the universe - you simply fell in love with someone that wasn’t him, his sister at that, and he’s struggling to come to terms with it.

he wants to hate you, hate lumine, hate the relationship that the two of you have formed, but he just can’t. he loves the both of you in different ways that are just as important as each other, and he can’t stand to lose either of you. he’d rather throw himself off of starsnatch cliff.

so he’ll smile and bear it, even if it’s a battle to keep himself from breaking down every time he sees the two of you lace your hands together, off in your own little word, so near and yet so far from him.

if you choose aether, lumine will become cold. at first, that is. she’s never been as empathetic as her brother, always holding grudges and developing dislike much more easily. it had taken a lot for her to open up to you in the first place, and now that you’ve rejected her, it’s going to take a while for her to return to the same camaderie with you that she had before.

lumine does not begrudge aether for being the one you chose. if anything, she’s glad - aether is always putting her first and himself second, and she’s happy that he has someone like you, who lights his eyes up in a way that she’s never seen before.

but our hearts often betray our mind, after all, and lumine can’t help but scowl and turn away every time she sees her brother wrap his arms around your waist or press a kiss to your cheek. despite her best efforts, all she can think is why? why did you have to choose him?

she can’t bring herself to hate you, though. as much as it feels like her heart is threatening to split down the middle when she sees you smile and is reminded of something that she cannot have, there is an equal joy in the fact that her brother can be with the person that he loves so dearly. if anything, the two of you deserve to be happy together.

lumine would never do anything that could take that away, and so she forces herself to accept it. it takes several days of tentative conversation and barely held back tears, but eventually the two of you seem to return to the way you were before - all friendly jabs and light-hearted banter and little jokes exchanged over crossed blades.

but lumine knows that your friendship can never be quite the same as it was before. she’ll forever be holding you at arm’s length, terrified to let you get too close lest you see how much your presence affects her. she can’t let you know how much she loves you because she will never be the one who links hands with you as you walk down a long, winding path, or the one who holds you close under a darkening sky filled with stars - because that person is aether, and she would sooner die before she takes her brother’s happiness away.

if you refuse to choose, the twins will be at a loss at what to do. they hadn’t considered this scenario - that you had somehow come to love both of them.

the confusion becomes joy soon enough, though. they realise what this means - they both love you, and you love both of them! isn’t this perfect?

neither are particularly thrilled at the concept of ‘sharing’ you with the other, so to speak, but in the end they both equally want each other to be happy as they want you to be, so the logical conclusion is that they both become your partners.

they’re not too sure how this should work, nor what sort of label to put on it, but they come to you tentatively with the idea anyway

to their joyous surprise, you agree!

and from then marks the point of no return…

aether is definitely the clingier of the two. once he realises that he’s allowed to show affection and be close to you for no particular reason, he won’t stop - it’s as if he absolutely has to be holding your hand or be standing or sitting as close to you as physically possible. he’s always buying you souvenirs at every place you stop by, scaling trees to pick apples for you when you mention a craving for fruit, presenting you little treasures that he’s found with all the pride of a golden retriever.

lumine is a more subdued kind of partner, preferring to demonstrate her feelings with little things like making your favourite food for dinner or bringing you sprigs of flowers that she’s secretly been collecting in order to present you with them. of course, that doesn’t mean she isn’t physically affectionate at all - she presses perhaps even closer to you than aether when you sleep beside her, and somehow her hand finds yours at every opportunity she has.

the twins clash every now and then, as siblings often do, except that you’re usually caught in the middle. their arguments are little more than playful squabbles, though - things like play-fighting over who gets to hug you first after a well-fought battle, or who gets to hold your hand on the way to the next village (you have to step in and remind them that you do, in fact, have two hands)

in conclusion: why choose one when you can have both and prevent the unchosen from having endless amounts of angst?

#genshin impact #genshin impact x reader #genshin impact imagines #genshin aether #genshin lumine #genshin traveller #aether x reader #lumine x reader #traveller x reader #fluff #love triangle #kinda??#just a little angst #as a treat #genshin diluc #genshin venti #unedited

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baejax-the-great · 3 years ago

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Alternate Ending

Working on a fic that got derailed when Garrus and Shepard decided to make out. Figured I’d post this version here while spraying them with cold water on the other version.

Shakarian (AO3), Rated T, mild suicide mentions

“You know I thought those shield fluctuations were just my sensors getting confused by your teleportation act?”

Shepard barely glanced over her shoulder before going back to removing her armor. “Did you?”

It wasn’t until he saw a slug hit her in the shoulder that Garrus realized she really was launching herself into the center of the fray—and exploding—completely unshielded. “Shepard, what the fuck.”

She waved a hand in the air. “The dark energy—the way it—in order to—look it overloads my shield emitters, or, well, not exactly, I sort of overload them on purpose along with everything else—but they recover pretty fast. It’s no big deal.”

No big deal? He’d never heard her trip over her words like that. “You’re standing there with your hump out—”

“It’s really good body armor, not even scratched, and I don’t have a hump unless you mean my ass—”

“You’re a sinking pigeon!”

“What?”

She dropped her chest piece on top of the pile, the sound echoing through the armory, and they stared at each other in mutual incomprehension. Garrus wasn’t angry, not really, but he veered into distinct annoyance when Shepard started laughing, a quick burst of startled air as her shoulders dropped.

Had she really lost her last shred of self-preservation?

“The expression is ‘sitting duck,’ birdman. Anyway, why do you think I bring my best sniper with me everywhere I go?”

She turned back to her armor as Garrus huffed. “I thought I couldn’t hit the side of a barn.”

“You can’t. I was talking to the visor. You’re just its mobile weapons unit.”

“Huh.”

She tossed the armor pieces into her locker in a way that would have made any turian commander give her latrine duty for a month and kicked the door closed.

Kasumi’s words came back to him, and in spite of himself, Garrus laughed. “Dammit.”

“What?” she asked with a sidelong glance as she began unsealing her softsuit.

“Kasumi called me your emotional support turian.”

That gave her pause. She got her suit rolled down to her waist, just some thin civilian clothes up top now, exposing a dark purple lump on her shoulder. She shrugged. “Well if I have any emotions that need a shot between the eyes, I’ll be sure to let you know.”

Shepard had gone unreadable while she fussed with her legs, and the weird tension that filled the room had Garrus bouncing on his feet. It occurred to him that he was now just watching Shepard undress for no particular reason.

“You should get that shoulder checked out.”

She slammed her suit down in front of her. “I might be a sinking pigeon, but you are a mother hen. It doesn’t even hurt.”

On what may have been his most suicidal impulse to date, Garrus reached out and poked it.

“Shit.” Shepard snatched his hand, and the very real possibility of Shepard decking him floated through Garrus’s head. But she just threw his hand to the side and said, “Fine. I’ll hit the medbay.”

Garrus didn’t know what made him do it. Gun to his head, he couldn’t have answered. But with seemingly no rational thoughts left in his brain, he reached out poked her again, one turian finger into the soft flesh of her side.

She caught his hand, and this time didn’t let go. “What are you…?” She let the words linger in the air, a questioning smile on her lips.

And yeah, Garrus was definitely feeling suicidal because when he tried to pull away and she didn’t let go of his wrist, he poked her a third time with his other hand, or, well, he tried to, but she intercepted before he made contact, and now she had both of his hands in a tight grip on either side of her hips, and…

Oh. That was what he was doing. He was flirting. Apparently. Like a twelve-year-old who didn’t know how to just talk to a woman and instead provoked her with juvenile antics.

Shepard was provoked.

He gave another weak attempt to pull his hands back, but Shepard didn’t let go. Pulled him in tighter, and either she was an expert in turian flirting or she was lining herself up to headbutt him straight to Andromeda.

She wasn’t smiling anymore.

His heart was in his throat as her eyes traveled over his face, inscrutable. He realized he was leaning in even closer, looming over her, really, but he couldn’t figure out how to stop.

Just when Garrus was about to try to excuse himself to take a dive out the airlock, just to cool off, Shepard lunged forward with the weirdest headbutt of all time, planting her mouth over his. Garrus made a noise that was something like “grggghhll?” but Shepard had released his hands and they were back at their absurd stunts, grabbing her around her squishy human waist and pressing her against his body.

Whatever this was, it was happening. Shepard sure as hell wasn’t pulling away, one of her hands creeping up around his neck to hold his face more firmly to hers. Her lips were warm against his mouth, and her nose was sort of smashed into his cheek, but she didn’t seem to care. And now that she was in his arms, he did not want to let go. This was, she was—weird, but good weird. Soft and kind of wet and Garrus had no idea what he was supposed to do next.

What he did was clumsily push her against the table and jostle her injured shoulder.

Shepard broke away with a hiss and a curse. She gave him a light shove, enough to knock him back two steps, though there was that smile again. Garrus’s hands, instigators of all of this, were now hanging limp by his side, no help at all.

Shepard’s eyes flicked over him. She absentmindedly ran a finger over her lips, which looked a bit pinker than they had earlier. “I’m going to, uh, I am going to go see Chakwas about this. The shoulder, not the uh—” she laughed “—You can… you can stay here and figure out what just happened. Yeah.”

Shepard left the armory in her socks, her softsuit still in a pile on the table. Garrus mirrored her earlier action, rubbing a finger over where her mouth had been just moments before. She’d left a little spit on him.

Weird. So, so weird.

After a minute, when his heart rate had slowed down to something approaching normal, he typed a query into his omnitool.

“That is what they call kissing?” he asked to the empty armory.

More importantly, could he get her to do it again?

He jumped when EDI’s voice filled the room. “The Commander has asked me to relay a message to you.”

He cleared his throat. “Uh, yeah. Go ahead.”

“She says that if you wish to continue your earlier conversation, you should wait for her in her quarters. She anticipates being done with Dr. Chakwas in about fifteen minutes.”

Garrus rubbed his thumb over his mouth again. Fifteen minutes was not a lot of time to learn… everything about human romance. “Thanks, EDI. I’ll, uh. Guess I’ll go wait. Ah, hm. You don’t have to tell her that.”

“Understood.”

Garrus shuffled into the CIC and just hoped nobody noticed that when he called the elevator, he had pushed the up button.

#shepard #garrus #shakarian #my writing #mass effect #me2 #first kiss #dumbasses in love #use my words? never #okay will you two let me write the real version now pls

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tickledpink31 · 3 years ago

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Epics of Ink & Light Chapter 8: Queen of Tarts

Summary: In which the first years prepare a tart to appease the ill-tempered Queen of Heartslabyul.

When you see an asterisk (*), there will information about a topic that appears within the story and will be explained in the author’s notes at the end of the chapter.

My Instagram Read on Ao3 Read on Wattpad

◐ ━━━━━ ºoº Minako ºoº ━━━━━ ◑

It was a quarter to four when Minako’s appointment with Dr. Radcliffe finished. She spent much of her appointment being made to blast a combination of light spells and her severely underdeveloped patronus at the magic crystal that she corrupted from the test. She barely cleared a quarter of the blot after twenty minutes. In the end, Radcliffe prescribed her with a potion to reduce her nightmares should she end up destroying her dorm in her sleep again.

Ace and Deuce might still be picking chestnuts. She and Grim should offer a hand, so off they went to find them.

On the way to the nearby woods, she kept staring down at the old camera that Crowley had given her a couple minutes ago. The shape of the lens was unmistakably her family’s mouse symbol. Grim had taken to walking in front of her rather than being carried like she usually did for him.

“It’s just an old camera. Quit staring and keep up with me,” said Grim.

“But…” Minako frantically turned the camera around so that the lens would face him. “The insignia! Camera lenses aren’t shaped like this, Grim!”

“Would you stop worrying about that? Your job is to take as many pictures of me— Whoa, look at all these chestnuts!”

They finally made it to the woods behind the campus. Grim was practically drooling over the amount of chestnuts on the trees and on the ground. His paw reached out to grab one but was promptly stopped when its spiny burr poked him.

“Yowch!” Grim pressed his paw up against his mouth to lick it better.

Minako rolled her eyes. She would have thought that he would have been smart enough to not pick up something so prickly. Absolutely no self-preservation.

“There’s a botanical garden nearby. It might have some supplies to pick them up,” she suggested.

The botanical garden was bigger than any greenhouse at Hogwarts. The outside was a massive glass dome surrounded by large shrubs of greenery. Inside, it looked like a jungle. The air was warm and many of the plants stood over Minako like giants. There were various exotic flora, some of which she did not recognize. She was sure that a lot of them were only native to Twisted Wonderland.

Grim sniffed the air, a smile plastered on his face that only meant that he was going to do something horribly idiotic for the sake of food. “Look at those fruits! One bite wouldn’t hurt.” He reached for one of the large, fuchsia berries growing on a nearby tree.

“No.” Minako smacked his paw away and pinned him to her side as she carried him. “Are you trying to pull an Ace? Big Bad Riddle might come here and chop off your head!” She made a menacing grin at him and curled her fingers to mimic a set of sharp claws.

“Eep! I mean— I’m not scared!”

She let Grim be for now, still carrying him securely. There didn’t seem to be a supply closet. Hopefully, there was a caretaker around here to help her.

While walking along the stone pathway, Minako’s foot collided against an uneven plot of land that felt strangely soft. She tripped on it and nearly lost her footing. She glanced back, thinking that it was some kind of plant, but no.

It was a lion’s tail.

“Hey.” There was a gruff voice coming from the bushes. “You’ve got some nerve stepping on someone’s tail.” The leaves began rustling as a figure rose up from it.

A tall and dark man emerged from the bushes. He had a mop of long, brown hair that was unkempt but braided on both sides of his face. A pair of lion’s ears sat atop of his head, seemingly flicking with irritation. Although he appeared to be groggy as if he had just woken up from a nap, his expression said that he was ready to snap someone in half. The scar over his eye didn’t help in making him look any less terrifying.

Ah, Minako remembered him now. This was Savanaclaw’s dorm leader.

I can’t take him on, and snapping back might get me killed, she thought. This was an entirely different situation from fighting with Ace. The leonine beastman standing before her was quite brawny and much older than him. Not to mention that she wasn’t ready for another flare-up to happen.

Choose your battles wisely, she reminded herself. Apologise then run for the hills if all goes wrong.

◐ ━━━━━ ºoº Leona ºoº ━━━━━ ◑

An irate grumble left Leona’s lips when he felt something brush against his tail. It didn’t hurt him, but it was enough to rouse him from his sleep. The scent of a human and a cat filled his nostrils. He was having such a good nap, and now whoever stepped on his tail has to pay.

He rose up with his fists clenched and scowled. “I was having such a good fucking nap. Then you just had to ruin it.”

His sensitive nose caught something else—the scent of a female. That’s when his eyes landed on the lone girl on the campus and her pesky monster cat.

The Afterglow of Savannah, Leona’s home country, was not without its cultural customs. Respecting all women was the law that everyone must live by and for a good reason too. The women of his country were outspoken and fearsome, including his mother. Many of them were among the highest ranking soldiers that served the royal family.

There was a huge commotion when the news of a girl attending the school broke out and Leona cared for none of that. He won’t fight her according to the laws of his country, but he didn’t plan on helping her either. However, there was something off about the way she smelled. It was hard to ignore it.

The human girl lifted the hem of her skirt ever so slightly and bent her knees in a curtsy. “I’m very sorry for interrupting your nap. I’ll be on my way.”

What the fuck?

Okay, now Leona knew that Mirror definitely made a mistake. That old piece of glass. The students of NRC apologise to no one, no matter how high-class they were. He expected a snarky comeback, something to put him in his place. But the new girl bowed her head to him?

“Stop that,” Leona ordered. “Aren’t you that weird, dormless herbivore? Why do you still have that ratty pest with you?” he added snidely.

“You’re a rude one,” huffed the grey cat. His mouth was promptly held shut by the girl.

Leona advanced on them. The cat can take the consequences for his owner. Every step forward that he took, the girl went two steps back. She then made an attempt to turn on her heel and run, but he seized her by the forearm. He felt her quivering like a mouse in his grip, which he didn’t see when he first saw her. She hid it well from his sight.

The smirk on Leona’s face fell when he detected another scent that clashed with the others—ink.

He began sniffing her wrist, taking in more of the human’s foreign but sweet-smelling magic. It faded into something earthy and metallic. Sorrow and anger have no particular scent, but he felt it for a brief moment and made his hair stand on end. His senses screamed, “Danger!” so he pulled away, still keeping his hold on her forearm.

It wasn’t just ink, it was blot.

All beastmen were familiar with the smell of blot, even if they’ve never witnessed an overblot before. What was practically nonexistent to a regular human’s sense of smell can be sniffed out by the keen nose of a beastman. There were days when Leona could smell when his own crystal was half-covered in blot before he could even look at it to check, so he would use it as an excuse to sleep it off until it went away.

But the difference between that and now was that the stench of blot was normally faint. With this girl, the smell was becoming more and more potent as he inhaled her scent. She should be dead by now with that much blot in her system.

It seems that by now, the human girl had dropped the niceties as she was cursing under her breath and trying to yank her arm away from him. Fat chance. She wasn’t getting away until he got answers from her.

Leona tightened his grip as a warning. “Oi, tell me, herbivore. Why do you smell like blot?”

The grey cat yelped and covered his paws with his mouth like he knew something. The girl’s eyes darted back and forth, trying not to meet his eyes.

“Let go of me!” she demanded.

“Watch what you say to me,” Leona growled. “Answer me and maybe I’ll forgive you for stepping on my tail.”

Leona could see how the girl was trying to pull her arm, the arm that he had grabbed, towards her waist but to no avail. He glanced down and realised that she was trying to reach for her wooden wand that was latched to her holster. It occurred to him that the wand lacked a crystal that all magicians needed.

That must be it. How long had she been using magic without a crystal? How much blot has she been amassing directly inside her body? And why was she still alive?

All of a sudden, Leona yowled in pain when the girl stomped on his foot. He had subsequently let go of the two perpetrators from the shock, allowing them to bolt away from his sight.

Leona hissed, trying to somehow ease the pain by massaging his foot. That little twerp was going to pay the next time he sees her.

◐ ━━━━━ ºoº Minako ºoº ━━━━━ ◑

Minako made a dead sprint for the back door without any supplies. Her new camera, its strap hanging around her neck, banged against her chest as she ran. Grim, who she was still carrying, let out uneven shrieks and cries like he was on a bumpy ride at an amusement park.

Now that she thought about it, she was probably going to pay for the consequences later for stepping on a dorm leader’s tail and his foot. And that question he asked was haunting her. Of course he could smell her curse! She practically reeked of it.

Minako took cover in the woods, crouching behind a large bush. She slowed her breathing, covered Grim’s mouth, and prayed that she wouldn’t be found.

For a couple minutes, everything was still. All she could hear was the soft wind in the trees and the tweet of the birds. Maybe it was safe to come out.

“BOO!”

Minako and Grim let out blood-curdling screams. Not caring who it was, Minako whirled around and blindly punched whoever decided to sneak up behind them. She felt her fist collide with the person’s face before he fell to the ground with a grunt.

“Ow! Minako, what the hell?!”

Minako opened one eye and found Ace sitting up from the grass and covering his nose. His expression was a mix of anger and pain.

“Ace, I’m so sorry! Let me see it.” Minako knelt down to her classmate’s level and gently pried his hand away from his face.

Oof. It looked pretty bad. Ace’s nose was bleeding and a bruise began to form on the bridge.

Grim, having forgotten his fear, began cackling and rolling on the ground. “That’s what you get for being a jerk!”

Ace snarled at him. “Why you—”

“Grim, shut up,” said Minako. She pulled out a handkerchief from her pocket and charmed it to an icy temperature so that it would become a pseudo ice pack. “I’m not good at healing charms, but I hope this’ll do.”

Ace hissed when she pressed the hanky against his nose. He moved his hand to hold the hanky himself. “Ugh, you sure know how to pack a punch.”

“You had it coming. I told you not to do that.” Deuce came closer, carrying two full baskets of marron chestnuts. A couple of them were still inside their husks.

“Shut it!”

“Hey! That’s a lot of chestnuts.” Minako cut in to prevent a fight from breaking out. “How many did you get?”

“We stopped counting at 217,” said Deuce. Then he paused before saying, “Are you alright, though? Your neck is uh…”

Minako’s hand flew up to touch her neck. Bad idea. She hissed, knowing full well that the curse had acted up again. She just didn’t realise it until now.

Deuce glowered and hit Ace in the arm. “That was your fault for scaring her.”

“Ow! Okay! I’m sorry, Minako!” Ace blurted out.

“No, no. Grim and I had a run in with a beastman at the botanical garden when we were looking for supplies.” Minako began rummaging through her bag for her potion.

“Yeah, I think it was the caretaker, or maybe it was someone from the banana dorm. He did wear a yellow vest,” said Grim.

“It’s Savanaclaw, not banana,” Minako corrected. “We ran into Savanaclaw’s dorm leader no less.”

“What?” Ace’s eyes looked like they were about to pop out from his head.

“Why don’t we head back to the campus? You can tell us on the way there,” suggested Deuce.

On their way to the infirmary to quickly fix Ace's nose, Minako explained her encounter with the leonine beastman. She did her best to stay calm when she told them how he was able to smell blot in her. When he grabbed her arm, it probably didn’t help that her fear and panic were setting in.

Deuce hummed. “This has been bugging me for a while. For a prestigious school, NRC has a lot of delinquents attending.”

“Takes one to know one, I guess,” Ace snorted.*

“What?”

“Nothing.”

Minako raised a brow and wondered what Ace meant by that. She decided to ignore it, seeing that it was probably none of her business.

“Say, where’d you get that old camera?” asked Ace.

Minako looked down at the ghost camera, realising that she hadn’t mentioned it yet. “The Headmaster gave it to me. He wants me to supervise the other students with it.”

“Wait a sec, that’s a ghost camera! My grandma told me about those,” Ace exclaimed.

Deuce paled. “G-ghost?” he stuttered out.

“Yeah, it captures a piece of people’s souls and projects memories of whatever I took a picture of.” Minako still felt uneasy about the lens resembling her family’s mouse symbol.

“Sounds like some kind of spirit photography,” Deuce shuddered.

“Make sure to get my good side when you’re taking photos of me,” said Grim.

“And me!” Ace pointed to himself.

Minako snorted. “We’ll see if you have a good side once your nose gets fixed.”

“Hey!”

At the infirmary, Ace’s nose quickly healed up when he drank a potion that one of the nurses offered to him. It was like he was never punched at all. Minako was relieved. Next, they headed to the school’s kitchen where Trey had just put the tart crusts into the oven to brown. He looked rather impressed when they plopped down two heavy baskets filled with plenty of chestnuts on the counter.

Grim’s jaw was wide open and his saliva pooled onto the table. “Imagine how big of a tart we can make with all these chestnuts!”

“Hold it,” Trey said. “You still need to peel them.”

Ace, Deuce, and Grim collectively groaned at the mention of more work.

Minako twirled her wand from its holster. “I’ll take care of it. I didn’t get a chance to pick the chestnuts after all.”

“Are you sure? That’s a lot of chestnuts.” Trey looked hesitant.

“Trust me on this. It’ll go faster.”

“Minako you’re a lifesaver!” chorused Ace and Deuce.

Minako was fairly confident in her non-verbal magic as long as her wand was still in her hand. With a flick of her wrist, all of the gaps of the half-open husks widened and the large chestnuts rolled out. She floated them over to the sink to be washed thoroughly, dried them, and scored the inner shells.

Trey had to adjust his glasses, looking astounded by her performance. “You did all that in just five minutes?”

“Hmph! I knew I picked the right henchwoman,” Grim bragged. “I can already taste that tart.”

“We just need to boil the chestnuts before we peel the inner shells, right?” Minako began filling a pot with water using the Aguamenti charm.

“I guess if you can do all that then the tart might as well be done.” Ace was already making an attempt to exit the kitchen. That traitor.

“Ace.” Trey stopped him before Minako could. “The dorm leader won’t accept your apology if you don’t help make the tart.”

Deuce joined in on the scolding, “And don’t take advantage of Minako just because she’s nice to you.”

“I never said that I was going to use magic the whole way through. This was just to make preparations easier.” Minako crossed her arms with a glare.

Ace grimaced and his shoulders drooped. “Ugh, fine. Let’s get this over with.”

As promised, Minako stopped using magic after she discarded the brown shells from the piping hot chestnuts. Making the chestnut base was where the real baking began. For the first few minutes, Ace was quietly muttering to himself about having to do the painstaking task of doing things by hand while keeping an eye on the simmering pot of chestnut meat and milk.

“Minako.” Ace beckoned her closer to him. He spoke in a whisper that was quiet enough for Trey to not hear. “Why aren't you using your magic? It’s unlimited, right?”

“Don’t you find baking therapeutic? I cook at least once every week.” Minako replied. In all honesty, she preferred to cook like a Muggle. If she wasn’t cooking supper for her family during semester breaks, she was spending her Friday evenings in the Hogwarts kitchens trying to come up with the best ways to make meat-free versions of British dishes. It was the best remedy after a particularly stressful week.

“Oh, I get it. This isn’t much of a chore for you.”

“It helps when you have a lot of hobbies. You should probably stop cooking that now before the paste burns.”

“Before you do that, we still have to add a special ingredient,” said Trey. He then pulled out a long bottle of dark sauce with a sharply-dressed walrus and clams on the label. “Just add a teaspoon of oyster sauce and the marron paste should be perfect.”

What? Minako wondered if she built up any ink in her ears from the amount of flare-ups she had today.

“Oyster sauce?!” Ace and Deuce, both equally flabbergasted, parroted back to him.

“It seems strange, but the briny flavour gives depth to the taste of the cream. Famous patisseries tend to favour young oyster sauce with the Walrus’ seal of excellence.” Trey was even showing off the brand label to them!

Minako couldn’t believe what was coming out of his mouth. She was scandalised. Scandalised, I tell you! This was a prank, it had to be. She didn’t care how twisted Twisted Wonderland really is.

“It’s so salty, though,” Deuce said.

“I mean…” Ace hesitated. “Chocolate does go into curry sometimes.”

Ace, no! It’s a trap!

“Nope. Keep that far away from the tart,” Minako bluntly stated. “Not one drop of oyster sauce in the sweets.”

“Minako, I’m pretty sure Trey knows what he’s doing.” Deuce made an attempt to rationalise the idea.

Suddenly, a snicker rang out. “I’m kidding. I guess that joke didn’t land very well with you, Prefect.” Trey chuckled into his hand. He turned to Ace and Deuce. “Next time, learn to take things with a grain of salt, you two.”

Ace choked, annoyed with the revelation. “Screw you! It sounded convincing enough!”

Minako breathed a sigh of relief. Consider yourself lucky, Trey. I’m not cutting you out of my life today.

The abundance of chestnuts resulted in them making so much marron paste that they had to use three bowls and three food mills to puree all of it. Trey must have taken that into consideration once he decked out four blind-baked tart crusts from the oven.

Trey, however, didn’t consider how much whip cream he needed for the chestnut buttercream. Deuce (bless his heart) offered to go get some for him at the school’s shop.

“While you’re there, do you mind getting a couple of other groceries too?” Trey began jotting the things he needed on a pad of paper: two cartons of milk, a dozen eggs, a package of aluminium cups, and five cans of fruit.

“That looks like too much to carry for one person. Do you want me to come with you? I need to see Sam again, anyway,” Minako offered.

“That would be great.” Deuce beamed.

◐ ━━━━━ ºoº Ace ºoº ━━━━━ ◑

“Ace, can I ask you something about the prefect?” is what Trey said once Minako, Deuce, and Grim were out of earshot.

“No, you can’t date Minako. You’d have to go through me first,” Ace snickered. He might have said that as a joke, but seeing someone dating Minako just didn’t sit right with him.

“That’s not what I was going to ask. It’s just…” Trey paused for a second. “Is she sick?”

Ace’s heart missed a beat. Damn it, Minako. If she didn’t like people knowing about her curse so much, then that girl should learn to keep her condition on the down-low.

“Everyone gets sick, don’t they?” Ace dodged the question a bit too nervously than he intended.

Trey frowned, not buying his reasoning. “The medicine she was taking didn’t smell like something you would use for common colds and flus,* and they had to call in a doctor for her appointment. We usually don’t do that, unless it’s an emergency.” His eyes shifted down and he scratched the nape of his neck. “I know she looks healthy now, but does she feel frail sometimes? Being in a new environment can be stressful—”

“New environment? How did you—” Ace paused, momentarily registering that being here was new for all first years. “I mean, yeah! She’s new. I’m new. We’re all nervous.” He covered his initial shock with another rubbish excuse.

“Ace.” Trey’s voice adopted a slight sternness. “The dorm leaders and the vice dorm leaders know that she was ripped away from her home by accident, and she can’t go back through the mirror for some reason. It’s just concerning because she was sent to live in an old dorm.”

Damn it, Crowley. Why did he have to tell them about that?

Now that Ace thought about it, the Headmaster clearly knew about her curse before he and Deuce did, and he still sent Minako to live in the old dorm. Sure, Minako has mending charms, but even with that, she could only make the conditions of Mugglesworth decent enough to live in for someone without a curse. The place was chilly, there were a few cracks in the walls that couldn’t be magicked away, and the floorboards were weak. When he woke up this morning, all of that literally fell apart. After that incident, it didn’t seem to matter that Minako could fix the dorm with a flick of her wand since there was a big chance that she might break it again even when she was awake and more in control.

Trey continued, “You’re her friend. I can tell that you know something. Or am I just acting crazy?”

“No, no! You’re not…” Ace trailed off. It wasn’t his place to tell him about Minako’s curse, but Trey was a lot more observant than he thought. He managed to back him up into a corner. “She is my friend,” he affirmed. “But this isn’t something you should ask me about. She gets upset when people find out about her cur— condition.”

Trey’s expression softened. “I guess you’re right. Can you at least tell me how she’s managed to live in Mugglesworth?”

“She’s fixed it for the most part, but I don’t think it’s liveable for someone like her at least. It’s cold there too, even the water supply.”

“I’ll bring a few blankets tomorrow. Then I’ll talk to her about you-know-what.”

Ace let out a sigh of relief at how he’s managed to avoid mentioning too much about the curse. Then his eyes opened wide when he remembered something.

“Don’t tell Minako I told you about it! She might hex me if she finds out!” Ace yapped.

Trey chuckled. “Are you afraid of her?”

“She paralyzed me yesterday! I don’t want to find out about what else she can do!”

Trey laughed even louder.

◐ ━━━━━ ºoº Minako ºoº ━━━━━ ◑

The door to Mr. S’s Mystery Shop jingled when it opened. Despite it being her second time visiting the shop, it still baffled Minako how she was able to find groceries here. Deuce eyed the crystal balls and voodoo masks with a childlike wonder.

Sam wasn’t there to spook them this time when they entered. Instead, they found him sitting by his counter, nose-deep in a book with his shadows looming above him.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Sam,” Minako greeted.

Sam looked up in surprise and he shut his book with a sharp snap. He quickly regained his composure by flashing them a charming smile and announcing his usual gimmick.

“Welcome back, little demons! Could I interest you in some grimoires? Jewels from a cursed temple?” Sam stood up from his seat, pulling out necklaces of precious stones and spell books with ornate bindings.

Deuce handed him the piece of paper that Trey had given them. “We just need the ones on this list.”

“Including my prescription and my job application. That will be all. Don’t listen to Grim.” Minako handed over her own papers, silencing Grim’s requests for more tuna cans.

Sam made a low whistle as he took a quick look at the shopping list. “Let’s see. A sweet line-up of whip cream, eggs, and a potion for nightmares. Coming right up!” He left to go get the groceries himself without at all mentioning the job application.

Fingers crossed. Minako really needed this job offer.

“Does he really sell whip cream around here?” Deuce began poking around through a rack of tooth necklaces. “These aren’t real teeth are they?”

“From the looks of it, they’re probably teeth from an alligator.” Minako could only hope that Sam was getting the teeth through ethical means.

Remembering to keep an eye on Grim, she watched him peer through the glass countertops displaying various voodoo dolls with signs that said, “PLEASE HANDLE WITH CARE!” in bold, red letters. Then she followed Grim over to the counter where Sam had been sitting.

“Don’t touch that,” Minako scolded him just as he was about to poke a large, crystal ball.

When she moved to pick him from the display, that’s when she saw it: the mouse symbol in the crystal ball.

Minako’s head was spinning and her breathing became heavier. Thankfully, she had enough awareness left to recall the first time this has happened.

“Deuce,” she croaked.

It didn’t take him long to pick up on the fact that her knees were about to give up on her. Deuce had put his hands around her shoulders and kept her steady. “You okay? What do you need?”

“Are you about to faint again?” asked a panicked Grim.

“Is there a place to sit down? I need to rest my eyes for a bit.” Minako’s eyelids were getting too heavy.

Deuce quickly walked her over to a bench by the door. Before she even got to thank him, she went out like a light once more.

Minako was back in that monochromatic world where the people were nothing but silhouettes attached to voices. She was met with the same room and the same two people.

“That will be the end of your classical magic studies for today. I want you to memorise everything you learned about magical ethics and get through page fifty of your language philosophy text,” the mother said as she put one text book aside only to put three more in front of the child. “Once you’ve finished all that, you’ll have an hour to study for your next potions lesson.”

The child, with his head low, grabbed a pen and opened up a textbook. He complied with, “Yes, Mother.”

The more Minako got to know whoever that lady was, the more she grew to hate her. All of that work and not once did she hear that woman talk about giving her son a break. Just as the lady was about to leave to run an errand, Minako made a move to grab her to perhaps knock some sense into that nutcase of a mother. However, her hand passed right through the silhouette’s body like she was a ghost.

Frustrated, Minako shrieked at her, “Your son is not a machine, you know?!”

Once again, the world shattered and she was back at Sam’s shop. Her arms and neck were stinging for the umpteenth time that day.

“Minako, drink it.” Someone had pressed her flask up against her lips. It was Deuce. “Hurry, before Sam sees your marks.”

Minako sat up with a gasp, unscrewed the lid of her flask, and drank from it. Just for extra measure, her hands flew up to cover her neck. She made a habit of doing that whenever she was nervous.

“I’m back!” Sam called as he walked in with arms full of grocery bags. He stacked them next to the register with a grunt. “These are quite heavy. I could throw in a flying saucer to carry them. It’s thirty percent off if you order now.” As if on cue, a miniature UFO with flashing light floated up behind the shopkeeper.

“Ooh, cool! Let’s buy it!” Grim was jumping up and down like an excited kid at a toy store.

“No thank you. We have what we need.” Minako placed thirty madols on the counter and scooped Grim up into one arm.

Deuce cleared the counter of the grocery bags, and they left the store in a hurry.

◐ ━━━━━ ºoº Deuce ºoº ━━━━━ ◑

“That was close.” Deuce breathed a sigh of relief, glancing back at the front of the shop.

Minako finally removed her hand from her neck. “Are my marks gone?” Her skin was clear of the cursed black lines.

“They’re gone,” Deuce said.

It was Minako's turn to let out a sigh of relief. She let her hand fall to her side before she grabbed a bag from the ground that Deuce wasn’t carrying.

“Tch! Why did you have to be so stingy back there?” Grim complained as they started making their way back to the building.

“Stingy? Don’t you think you should be more considerate of your dorm leader’s situation?” Deuce snapped back.

“Let’s not fight. I don’t want to get stressed again.” Minako’s rambling was what instantly made Deuce’s anger wane. “Deuce, you’re carrying a lot. Let me carry another bag.” Her free hand reached out to him, expecting a second bag to be offered to her.

Deuce had to politely decline, knowing that Minako must be a bit light-headed after passing out, “No, it’s fine. I always carry the heaviest shopping bags for my mom. She buys way too much whenever there’s limited sales.”

“I understand. There's been five mouths to feed at home ever since my sister got married, six if my brother’s girlfriend comes over, and we tend to eat a lot. So, everyone has to chip in with the groceries or Ate Flor will get mad,” Minako said. A nostalgic smile was beginning to etch onto her face.

“Ate Flor?” Deuce quirked a brow. It occurred to him that he didn’t really know much about his new friends at all. “Is that the name of your relative?”

“Ate'' is a Tagalog honorific for older sisters. Flor is our big sister’s nickname,” Minako replied.

Deuce didn’t know what she meant by ‘Tagalog,’ but he kept the conversation going anyway. “Is it noisy back at your home? I can’t imagine living with so many people.”

“It is! All of my siblings are horrible, including me. That’s why I spend way too much time biking in the forest alone during school breaks,” Minako said with a laugh. “What about you? I can’t imagine a house with less than four people.”

“It’s just me and my mom. Sometimes my grandma comes over to visit. I’m the man of the house, so it’s my job to do most of the heavy labour.” A twinge of guilt made its way to Deuce’s heart when his mother came to mind.

“That’s so sweet. It’s great that you care about your mother,” Minako cooed.

Deuce’s cheeks heated up that, but it didn’t really help quell his shame. Another dreaded thought that came to mind was that Minako had blurted out to him and Ace about her dead parents yesterday. She probably missed them.

I guess if she’s my friend and we’re being honest to each other, I should probably come clean, Deuce thought. In a span of two days, he’s seen that Minako was kinder than most of the NRC students he’s come across. She only seemed to get angry at the face of injustice, or when Ace and Grim were misbehaving.

“Actually, I have something to confess,” Deuce said solemnly. “I would always make my mom—”

“Deuce, look out!”

Crash! Crack!

Him and Minako were sent to the pavement after they collided with something hard, or rather someone. The eggs. The poor eggs. Half of them were smashed! The yolks were leaking all over the bag.

“Watch it!” Deuce heard someone snarl. He looked up and was met with the baleful faces of two upperclassmen. From their red armbands, he instantly knew that they were from his dorm.

“I saw you run right into us on purpose. We aren’t playing bumper cars, you know?” Minako retaliated.

“Are you saying it’s my fault, girly? Watch how you talk to your seniors!” The taller upperclassman harshly lifted Minako up from the ground by her shirt, causing her to let go of Grim.

Grim landed on his belly with a thud. “Deuce, do something!” he yelped.

Deuce pushed himself off the ground and got between Minako and the upperclassman. They were toe-to-toe. “Leave her out of this,” he growled. “I want you to pay for the eggs. Apologise to my friends and the little chicks too.”

The upperclassman scoffed. “What’s the matter? You’re making a big deal over some eggs.”

Deep breaths. Deuce’s eye twitched and fists were clenched.

“They’re still edible. If anything, we saved you the trouble of opening them!” The shorter upperclassman jeered, mockingly patting him on the shoulder.

And they laughed at him. They were cackling like those eggs didn’t matter!

How dare they!

“DON’T YOU TELL ME WHAT’S A BIG DEAL!” With white hot fury, Deuce grabbed the lapels of the taller upperclassman’s blazer. “Instead of hatching into chicks… we were going to use them to be a part of our delicious tarts!”

His arm swung back, and he delivered the first blow of many more punches to come.

◐ ━━━━━ ºoº Minako ºoº ━━━━━ ◑

Minako must admit that she had turned white as a sheet when that older delinquent had yanked her off the ground. Her and her stupid mouth. On more than one occasion, impulsively giving someone lip had gotten her into trouble as much as it served as a decent coping mechanism.

Her plan was to paralyse the seniors first so that they could make a run for it, but it seemed that Deuce had already got that handled.

There was a kicker to it though when Deuce blew up on the seniors over a bunch of eggs. Did he really just say that they were going to hatch into chicks? Aside from the eggs, Minako supposed that she got hints of Deuce’s thuggish behaviour the other night at the mines. Is this what Ace meant earlier about how it takes one delinquent to know another? Maybe that’s why she felt a kinship with him the most. After all, she’s gotten into a few skirmishes herself when she was little.

Minako and Grim could only watch from the sidelines while Deuce sent a flurry of fists at the seniors. He was a beast. It wasn’t like Minako could jump into the fray and help with her curse being particularly bad today. Instead, she took to calming down Grim who was quivering in her grasp.

The seniors, despite being older and bigger, had no chance of landing a hit on Deuce. The navy-haired boy was as fast as lightning and he didn’t pull his punches or his kicks either. Even after they’ve become black and blue (and red if you count the hint of blood), there was no stopping Deuce.

“That’s six blows to your head for six eggs you broke!” he cried. That was either a lie or a mistake; it was more like ten blows for each delinquent.

Seeing the seniors finally recoil back instead of continuing to fight was when Minako decided that enough was enough. “Deuce, you can stop!” she commanded.

He didn’t listen. His fist swung again to strike the senior that he had tackled to the ground.

“You’ll get expelled for sure if you don’t stop!” Minako warned Deuce one last time.

Deuce’s fist paused, inches away from the senior’s nose.

The seniors, having been reduced to tears from the fight, quickly turned their heels and ran with their tails in between their legs.

“Amscray! This kid is nuts!”

“I’m sorry for the chickens!”

Deuce was breathing hard from the shock, like he had been possessed by some spirit when he fought then released right after. “I…” His tone had gone raspy and soft compared to the booming shouts he had displayed a minute ago. “I messed up… I promised her that I would become an honour student,” he croaked as he turned to her and Grim.

“What do you mean?” asked Grim. He had chosen to hide behind Minako, afraid that he would have another outburst.

All at once, everything was clear to Minako. “Deuce, did you used to get in trouble a lot when you were young?”

Deuce gave her a solemn nod and his head sunk low. “I was a delinquent back in middle school. I skipped classes, got into fights, called my teachers by their first names to disrespect them, and bleached my hair until it was fried.”

Minako remained silent, suppressing a burst of laughter when the image of a bleach-blonde Deuce in a leather jacket came to mind.

“The upperclassmen that I hung out with were just as bad as me, and I’d one up people by recklessly driving my magical wheel all over the place. I was so terrible that I used my magic to torment a bunch of magicless kids, and I know you hate those kinds of people.” Shame and self-loathing filled Deuce’s eyes. “Minako, I admire that you’re really put together. The teachers seem to like you, and you’re willing to put up with the likes of us despite the fact that it puts a lot of stress on you.”

“Put together?'' Have you met me?” Minako snorted.

“I mean it,” Deuce stressed. “I caught my mom crying on the phone while having a talk with my grandma. ‘Was I a bad mother? Would it be better if his father was around,’ she said.” He shut his eyes, his tears threatening to spill. “It was my fault. My mom didn’t do anything wrong. Then when the black carriage from this school came to pick me up, she was so happy.”

“You just wanted to make her proud,” Minako finished for him.

“I don’t want to make her cry again, so I vowed to become an honour student and make her proud of me.”

“Deuce…” Minako couldn’t find the words beyond his name.

Mom. Her mother. To Minako she was gone forever, including her father. She knew that she wasn’t the easiest child to raise. If anyone could recall her childhood, people would say that she could go from as quiet as a mouse to a brat who threw the worst temper tantrums. She was lucky to be raised by the most supportive parents that she could ever ask for, but would they be proud of her if they were still alive today?

“I promised that I wouldn’t go back to that person ever again… then I do something like this!” Deuce slammed his fists on the pavement, swearing under his breath.

Grim stepped out of his hiding spot behind Minako. “Hey, you can’t tell me that you’re just going to take every bad thing that happens to you with a smile.”

Deuce looked up in surprise.

“Grim’s right. Take it from an honour student who used to get into fights herself,” Minako admitted sheepishly.

“You? Even with your curse?” Deuce said with disbelief.

“I wasn’t always affected by my curse. There was a time I didn’t even know we had a family curse.”

“You know what? You should’ve kicked those upperclassmen around a bit more. Of course with my help.” Grim arrogantly puffed up his chest.

Minako sighed. “What we’re trying to say is that model students aren’t perfect. It’s true that violence doesn’t fix everything, but in this situation, I don’t blame you for fighting back. Just remember to choose your battles wisely next time.”

She could see that Deuce was still snivelling, so she made a hanky materialise from her wand. His cheeks and ears reddened when she offered to him.

Minako failed to suppress a snicker. “Are you falling for me, Deuce?”

Deuce choked at that. “Wha— no! I mean— I like you, but— No! I mean—” Out of words to say, he let out a frustrated groan and his hands covered his face in shame.

Minako laughed and laughed.

“It’s not funny.” Deuce was fuming.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Let’s go back to Sam’s and buy a new carton of eggs.”

Deuce sighed forlornly as he picked up a cracked egg from the bag. “May the chicks rest in peace.”

He wasn’t joking earlier. He really didn’t know how eggs work. I’m going to tell him.

“Um… Deuce, those eggs aren’t fertilised.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean there aren’t any chicks that will hatch from store-bought eggs.”

At that revelation, Deuce dropped the eggshells and went silent. Then he cried out so loudly in disbelief that it could be heard across the entire island.

◐ ━━━━━ ºoº ━━━━━ ◑

“Make sure to give it a sharp peak and place some chestnuts on top. Then dust some powdered sugar, and you’re finished,” Trey instructed.

“Oh, I get it now. It’s called a mont blanc because it looks like a snowy mountain,” said Minako. She made the final touches on her tart and marvelled at her work, feeling proud that she managed to do so well for her first time making a mont blanc.

Grim was grinning from ear-to-ear, just as amazed with how the tart turned out. “I want to eat it now!”

“Wait for a couple of minutes. Let me preserve this.” Minako angled her camera and snapped a picture. The photo instantly printed out, coming out black before the image appeared.

She looked over at Ace and Deuce’s progress. Ace’s tart looked just as good, but Deuce… Deuce’s mont blanc looked very deflated like a plot of land with a bunch of hills and not very mountain-like.

Deuce kept mumbling and muttering something along the lines of, “Eggs… all my sixteen years… what on earth did I believe in?”

Maybe he was making a big deal out of eggs.

Ace nudged her in the elbow. “What’s up with him? He’s been like that since you came back,” he whispered.

“Trauma from chicken eggs. It’ll pass,” Minako said. Then she looked over at Deuce who was ready to let go of his soul. “At least I hope it’ll pass.”

Cater’s head popped in through the door. “Hey, how’s it going with the tarts? Ooh! They look tasty! Totally Magicam-grammable!” He made his way over to Trey’s perfectly made mont blanc to snap a picture.

His sudden appearance made Ace scowl. “How convenient that you finally came over once the tarts were finished.”

“What do you mean? I came here to be the taste-tester.”

“Minako, pass me your tart. We’ll be eating that,” said Trey.

Trey cleanly divided her tart into six equal pieces after she handed it to him. Each slice sat on a crisp, white platter like a work of art to behold. Minako was only brought out of her stupor from looking at it when she heard the forks clatter against the counter.

“Thank you for the food!” Ace, Deuce, and Cater all said together.

“Thank you for the food.” Minako and Grim’s response was a bit delayed.

Minako dug her fork into her slice, guided the piece towards her mouth, and the taste was magnificent.

“Wow,” was all she could really say, but the others described it better for her.

“So good!” Ace took a couple more big bites until his slice was only half its size.

“It’s just like it’s been store-bought. No… it tastes better than that!” Deuce exclaimed.

“The sweetness isn’t too overpowering, but the taste of chestnuts are so rich!” Grim, ever the foodie, had a lot to say about the tart. Like Ace, he began to wolf it down.

“Ah, ah, ah. Don’t finish it yet.” Cater had barely taken a bite out of his piece. He didn’t even take a part of the creamy tart filling, only the crust. “Trey, work your magic.”

“Again? Alright.” Trey unhooked his pen from his pocket. “Everyone, tell me your favourite things to eat.”

Minako raised a brow, wondering where this was going. This wasn’t another joke of his, was it?

“I like tuna!” Grim blurted out. He didn’t stop there, “And cheese omelettes, and grilled meat, and pudding, and…” Drool dribbled from the corner of his mouth at the thought of food.

“I have to say cherry pie and cheeseburgers,” said Ace.

Deuce had to think of his favourite food for a moment. “Omurice… I guess?”

“Mine is grilled lamb with diablo sauce,” Cater said with an excited grin.

Well, if Cater was mentioning his favourite, then this probably wasn’t a trick.

What’s my favourite food? Minako didn’t know if she had a favourite. What food can I never say no too?

“I guess I can never get tired of veggie hotdogs and ube cream bread,” she said.

“What’s ube?” asked Cater.

Oh no. Did ube not exist around in this world?

“Oh, you mean the sweet purple yams from the Eastern tropics?” said Trey.

“Y-yes.” Minako sighed with relief. If she had to take a guess, the Eastern tropics must be Twisted Wonderland’s equivalent of Southeast Asia.

Waving his pen, Trey cast a spell on the partially-eaten tart slices. “Alright, here goes. Doodle suit!”

Cater dug his fork into the tart filling with vigour and eagerness, taking a much bigger chunk than he did before. “Take a bite of it now!”

And one by one, each person in the room was amazed at how the flavours of their tarts changed into their respective favourite foods. Some of them even tasted a multi-course meal in one bite, like Ace and Grim. They couldn’t get enough of it.

However, when Minako took a bite of her own tart, the experience wasn’t as fun. Yup. The taste was unmistakably a spicy beyond meat hot dog like the ones she would buy from the local diner in London. She should love it, but the creamy consistency of the tart filling did not blend well with the taste of hot dogs. She felt bad when Trey caught her shuddering.*

“I’m sorry. Is the texture throwing you off?” Trey was chuckling at her.

“It is,” Minako mumbled. The taste quickly shifted into the ube cream bread, which soothed the icky feeling. “The ube bread is a lot better, though.” It felt like a Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory moment with the three-course dinner gum, except she wasn’t blowing up like a giant blueberry… thankfully.

“I can change it to just ube bread if you want.”

“Yes please!”

Cater quickly finished his tart in a few bites before pausing to talk, “This is Trey’s unique magic. A pretty cool party trick when you’re on a date with a girl, don’t you think, Mini-chan?”

Minako felt uneasy at the way he winked at her. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Sooo…” Ace sounded a bit agitated. What for? “Your unique magic changes the taste of food?”

“Actually, my unique magic can overwrite the traits of something,” Trey explained. “I can even change the scent—” He waved his pen over his piece of the tart and it gave off a rosy fragrance. “—or even change the colour.” At his command, the tart’s cream transformed into a chocolate brown. “But this magic is only temporary like a doodle, so I called it ‘Doodle Suit.’ ”

“I wish I had that kind of power. Think of all the canned tuna flavoured food that I can eat. It’s so much better than Riddle's magic collar,” Grim said with a mouthful of tart.

Trey let out a nervous laugh, scratching the back of his neck. “I wouldn’t say it’s better than Riddle’s level of magic. My Doodle Suit is merely child’s play.”

“Don’t sell yourself so short. Thinking beyond food, it can be potentially powerful,” Minako commented.

She wasn’t intending on telling him what he can do with his unique magic, but the thought of having the ability to alter anything had so many possibilities. She excelled in something similar to Trey’s magic too, which was transfiguration. It was a complex and dangerous art to perform. How she managed to be three years ahead in that subject when she used to struggle with charms so much was beyond her.*

“I guess that’s true. Thanks for that.” Looking embarrassed, he began scratching his neck again. “It’s getting late. Ace, you can give Riddle the tart during the Unbirthday party.”

“Remember, it’s in two days.* Make sure you get to our dorm’s Rose Maze on Friday at four after school. Do not be late.” Cater placed an extra emphasis on the last few words.

Ace wrapped an arm around Minako's shoulders, which could only mean that he wanted something from her. “Minako, let me stay over again.” My God, he was even pouting for added effectiveness.

“Really? After…” Minako paused trying to think of a better way to describe this morning’s destruction. “After you-know-what?”

“Don’t listen to him, Minako. You’re just going to spoil him.” Deuce clicked his tongue in annoyance.

Grim crossed his arms, looking equally annoyed. “You have to pay us rent in tuna cans!”

“That’s not fair! What am I going to do? Camp out in the forest?”

“No, but Deuce and Grim are right. If you help me clean up and prepare supper, you can stay,” Minako offered. She gingerly elbowed him in the chest when Ace only responded with his grumbling. “Do we have a deal?”

Ace’s shoulders slumped in defeat. “Fine.”

◐ ━━━━━ ºoº Trey ºoº ━━━━━ ◑

The stars were beginning to shine and the sunset’s saffron hue was quickly fading. That was when Trey and Cater finally made it back to their dorm.

“It was nice of you to let the firsties have a sleepover,” said Cater. “But couldn’t you have let me stay over at Mugglesworth too?”

“No,” Trey told him firmly. “I only sent Deuce because he’s responsible enough and the fact that they’re friends. I know that you just want to flirt with the prefect.”

Cater let out a puff of air and pouted. “Killjoy.”

When Trey opened the door to the dorm, he was greeted by a tense feeling that was so heavy that it could knock him down. Something was wrong. The dorm usually wasn’t this quiet even in the evening.

“What’s going on?” Cater could sense it too.

They opened the doors to the lounge and Trey felt his heart stop.

So many students, with pained expressions, had their heads chopped off. Riddle took no prisoners. Not a single student in the room wasn’t wearing a collar. Their movements were tense, some rapidly looking left and right for any incoming danger. What happened?

“Trey, you’re back!” A redheaded second-year, Milo, came up to him with an abashed cry. As if his collar wasn’t bad enough, his face was all bruised and swollen.

Milo’s taller friend, Sutton, stood next to him looking much worse. Two bloody tissues were shoved up his nostrils, he had a half-healed shiner, and a few cuts on his cheeks and lips. It was obvious that he had a rough day. Their injuries must have been so severe that even the infirmary’s potions couldn’t heal them up completely.

“Did the dorm leader take off your heads for fighting?” asked Trey. It wasn’t often that Heartslabyul students got into physical fights, at least when they knew when Riddle wasn’t around.

“No, a first-year with a spade mark did this,” Milo admitted quietly.

“Shut the hell up! You didn’t need to tell him that!” shouted Sutton.

Did he mean Deuce? It can’t be. Trey told himself that there were other first-years with spade marks. It had to be one of them.

“Ten of us broke rule 256: ‘Past eight at night, one must drink lemonade with honey,’ ” Milo explained.

Trey’s heart clenched when he looked over at the coffee table where a cool pitcher of lemonade and half-drunken glasses sat.

“I know that following the Laws of the Queen of Hearts is tradition, but… at least let us eat or drink whatever we want! I almost got caught eating a hamburger steak on a Tuesday.” A first year began weeping into his hands.

“I can’t take this anymore. It’s stifling to keep living like this! Let me transfer to another dorm!” cried a student with hare ears.

Trey was at loss about what to do. He gave the distraught beastman a comforting pat on the shoulder, which he knew didn’t really help at all. “I’ll try to talk to the dorm leader about getting your collars off soon. For now, all of you should go back to your rooms.” It wasn’t a promise. Convincing Riddle to lift punishments was like walking on eggshells.

“I guess I should try and help win our Queen’s favour with some tea.” Cater sighed helplessly.

“Herbal tea, not black tea. I think rule 153 mentioned something about that,” said Trey. The last thing they needed was for Riddle to lose his temper on his second-most trusted dorm member.

As everyone left the lounge, Trey couldn’t help but think about how they were all in for a rough night, and it wasn’t just the neck pains from lying down in bed wearing a bulky collar. The punishments were becoming more and more harsher and frequent. It was like he was turning into…

No, Riddle was not that person. He was just misguided. His reign terror will pass, eventually.

It always does, right?

◐ ━━━━━ ºoº ━━━━━ ◑

Notes:

*“Takes one to know one, I guess.”— I remember how in episode 1-20, Ace picked up on Deuce's "bad boy mode". At this point, only MC and Grim knew about Deuce's past as a delinquent, so this really hones in the fact that Ace is pretty observant and smart. He might have picked up on Deuce's behaviour during their adventure in the mines.

*“The medicine she was taking didn’t smell like something you would use for common colds and flus"— This is based on the fact that Trey is in the science club. I'm pretty sure they had a club meeting for medicinal potions at some point

*However, when Minako took a bite of her own tart, the experience wasn’t as fun.— This idea was borrowed from Broken_Synchronicity's fanfic, Lost in Translation. When it came to that scene, I was like, "Oh yeah some people don't like certain textures mixed with certain flavours." Minako does not appreciate mushy veggie hot dogs, no sir.

*How she managed to be three years ahead in that [Transfiguration] when she used to struggle with charms so much was beyond her.*— I have a headcanon, at least for the modern times of the Potterverse, that while the students of Hogwarts cannot graduate early, they can still choose to be ahead in 1–3 core classes in school. Minako actually completed her 7th year studies for potions and transifguration during her 4th year of Hogwarts. She chose to do this because the professors were ordered to go easy on her in terms of workload to prevent her curse from acting up from stress. Minako wanted to prove herself as one of the brightest students in the school, so she pushed herself to excel in her two best subjects.

*"Remember, it’s in two days."— I remember when the braincell group first met Cater, he said that the Unbirthday party was coming in two days. Then later on in the same day, they said that the party was tomorrow. It could be a mistranslation or a mistake, but I'm going to keep it there because I need the extra day for the next chapter.

IMPORTANT NOTES: Okay, so I was gone for a hot minute. By January 11th, I will be beginning my final semester of college. Just as a warning, I will likely be extremely busy making my design thesis project from now until April 22. I will also be busy looking for jobs. So, what's going to happen?

Obviously, I don't want to drop writing this fanfic so soon. However, you might expect delays in updates. I'm also considering just writing out the chapters and posting it without the illustrations to save some time. I may or may not add illustrations to the posted chapters later on if I have time.

Thank you so much for reading and understanding and I'll see you in the next chapter. Have a happy belated New Year!

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ghstandpucks · 4 years ago

Text

Nothin’ Like You ~ Cale Makar

In honor of reaching over 200 followers, here is a song fic based on Dan and Shay’s Nothin’ Like You. I have a few requests in my inbox that I will be working on. If you have any, feel free to send them in using this prompt! Thank you for 200!!!

Master List

I remember when I first met you Sipping coffee in a corner booth You were twirling your hair And I just had to stare For a minute or two

Cale was with Tyson and J.T. after practice one Wednesday afternoon. The three of them decided to stop and get some coffee as it was a cold winter day outside. They were waiting in line talking about something E.J. had said earlier that day when Cale’s eyes landed on you in the back corner by a window. You had a cup of coffee and were staring at your laptop, completely oblivious to the world around you. He couldn’t help but stare as you wound and un-wound a strand of hair around your finger, every so often stopping to type something. Tyson kept talking as J.T. realized their defenseman was completely distracted by something. Following his line of sight, he chuckled. “See something you like? Or someone?” he chirped his teammate. Cale started to turn red as he looked away from you.

“I thought maybe I knew her,” he muttered. Tyson had stopped his monologue and was paying attention also now. He looked over as you had your head buried in a book, slowly typing something out.

“How did she carry all those books?” he asked with a slight laugh. Cale had noticed the numerous books you had scattered around the table. Didn’t people just do their research online now? “You like studious girls Makar?” Tyson elbowed him.

I was laughing at your stack of books Then you shot me that smile Hey beautiful girl, in your own little world Let me in it

“Man shut up,” Cale said turning on his friend. Unknowingly to them though, you had actually heard all the commotion. It was why you enjoyed doing your research in coffee shops; the garbled noises made it easier for you to concentrate. This doesn’t mean that you had heard what they said exactly, but who could really miss three hockey players walking into a small coffee shop in the middle of the week.

You looked up right as Cale was glancing back over at you. As you locked eyes, you sent him a shy smile and looked back down, trying to focus on your work again. Of course you knew who they were, all of Denver practically did. You were just an overstressed grad student with too many deadlines coming up though; he was probably just looking around the place.

The three of them ordered their coffees, and Cale noticed that you had looked sadly at your cup after taking a sip. He walked up to the counter and got the attention of the barista. “What did that girl in the corner order?” he asked, and was told it was a caramel latte. “I’ll take one of those too,” Cale said, paying for a second coffee. J.T. gave Tyson a look before he could say anything as they watched Cale walk over to you with two coffee cups.

You got all of my attention And you ain't even trying Yeah, you're my kind of different And I never seen nothin'

Nothin' like you

“Um hi. I hope you don’t mind, but I thought you could use this,” Cale said, announcing his presence at your table. You looked up, slightly startled as you had been engrossed in a thought you had while typing out your research. “Didn’t mean to scare you,” he chuckled nervously.

“No, you’re fine! Sorry, I had a train of thought going,” you sputtered out just as nervous as him. “Thank you, that’s very kind. What do I owe you?” you asked, instinctively reaching for your wallet. Cale shook his head.

“Nothing,” he said, trying to think of what the guys on the team might say in this situation. “Your number maybe?” he made a face like he couldn’t believe he just said that, and you couldn’t help but giggle.

“Um, sure, yeah,” you squeaked out, writing your number on a piece of notebook paper and ripping it out to give to him. “I’m Y/N,” you introduced yourself.

“Cale,” he said, taking the paper from you. He was about to ask what you were doing when Tyson called out to him.

“Makar, are you coming?” Cale turned toward his friends who had big, goofy grins on their faces watching the interaction. You blushed slightly at the thought of others watching you.

“I’m sorry. I’ll text you,” he stuttered out, putting your number into his pocket. You smiled softly at him and nodded.

“Thanks for the coffee,” you said and he smiled at you.

“My pleasure.”

Shades on spinning in a summer rain Dancing when there ain’t no music Just the right kind of crazy, baby

Cale had texted you like he said he would that same evening. You honestly weren’t expecting it, but felt completely giddy when you saw the unknown number and read his message. He explained that he would be gone on a road trip with the Avs for the next week, but would like to take you to dinner when he got back. You accepted and plans were made; the two of you talking regularly throughout the week getting to know each other better.

The Avs returned home on Thursday, and a few hours later Cale was at your apartment knocking on your door. He had brought you flowers and you couldn’t help but smile at the kind gesture. The two of you made your way to dinner, talking the whole time. He had just finished telling you a funny story from the trip, beaming at the giggle he had enticed from you when your food arrived. As you looked down at your plate, you started moving your head and shoulders in an excited fashion. “Are you dancing?” Cale questioned you with a chuckle. You stopped immediately.

“Oh my gosh, sorry. I tend to have a happy dance with food. It’s a weird family thing. I don’t even realize I do it until it’s pointed out to me,” you rambled on, face turning red. Cale shook his head.

“Don’t be sorry. I though it was cute,” he said in a low tone. You smiled and giggled nervously; Cale deciding then and there that he wanted to continue seeing that smile for as long as you would let him.

Something about you Rocking that rock 'n roll t-shirt Whole party dressed up But you just doin’ your thing Ain't nobody ever seen nothin' like you

You were working on your research the following Friday night, having the game on in the background. Cale had taken you out to dinner once more since your first date, and the two of you had been nonstop texting. The Avs had won, Cale scoring that night. After the game you were about to text him a ‘congratulations’ when your phone started to ring, the caller ID showing it was him. “Congratulations!” you said as you answered and heard him chuckle on the other end of the line.

“Thanks Y/N. Hey, what are you doing tonight?” he asked, and you heard a few wolf whistles behind him with muttered ‘shut ups’ coming from the defenseman.

“I’ve just been working on my research since I got out of class earlier. Why?” you asked, trying not to laugh.

“Come out with us. We’re all going out to celebrate,” he said in a more hushed tone, and you could imagine him trying to avoid the whole locker room from hearing.

“Cale, I would love to but I’m not dressed to go out,” you said.

“Who cares. Please? I would like you to come,” he pleaded with you ever so slightly. You looked down at your outfit, deciding it wouldn’t take much to put on some jeans quickly. Your Red Hot Chili Peppers shirt didn’t look terrible at least.

“Text me the address,” you said into the phone, and you could hear the excitement in Cale’s voice as he said he would.

When you're wearing them worn out jeans Purple untied shoestrings You're a light in the dark And you're stealing my heart like a gypsy

Showing up to the bar, you became a little self-conscious. Maybe you should have changed? The second Cale spotted you though, he thought you were the most beautiful girl in the room. The front of your band tee was tucked into your ripped black jeans, your white converse showing years of wear as they were no longer exactly white and the shoelaces were frayed at the ends. Cale knew you were probably stressed with your research, and yet you still had the softest smile and a sparkle in your eyes when you found him in the crowd. “You made it,” he whispered into your hair as he hugged you close. He felt you giggle into his chest.

“Couldn’t let you down,” you answered simply. Cale smiled at you and took your hand, leading you over to a table where some of the team was sitting.

“Coffee shop girl!” A slightly tipsy Tyson shouted.

“Oh my God,” Cale muttered as you giggled. You were introduced to everyone as you took a seat between Cale and someone he called Gravy.

“So what is your research on?” Gabriel Landeskog asked when you said you were a grad student at the University of Denver.

“The archaeology of Zoroastrianism,” you said, and caught many blank stares.

“Zoro what?” Andre asked.

“It’s an ancient Persian religion. Today’s modern practices of Christianity, Islam, and Judaism all have common ties to it,” you briefly explained.

“Wait, that was the religion Freddie Mercury practiced,” Sam Girard commented, looking interested. You nodded.

“That’s how most people have heard of it now,” you responded.

“What is your research trying to say about it?” he asked.

“So I’m basically writing a big literature review to make sure it is preserved in the archaeological record. It was the first dualistic religion in a time where civilizations had their pantheons to believe in. It spread with the Persian conquest, but no one they conquered was ever forced to convert to it. Now it’s a rare religion to come across, and their numbers keep getting smaller. With it being one of the oldest organized religions, it needs to be preserved and the traditions documented before we lose it all through modernization attempts.” To you, your explanation was simple and one that you had said many times whenever asked what you were studying. It seemed you had impressed the table though, and you slightly blushed as a few questions started flying your way. You didn’t notice Cale softly smiling at you while you talked about a topic that you loved so much; he couldn’t take his eyes off of you. His teammates noticed though, and boy were they going to give it to him at practice.

I love the way that you kiss me In front of everybody So baby come and kiss me They ain't ever seen nothin'

Nothin' like you

The following day at practice, the guys were giving Cale crap for how head over heels he seemed for you. The fact he hadn’t kissed you yet was another source of ridicule. Everyone who had met you ended up adoring you within the time span that you spent with them at the bar; and they could easily see that their defenseman was taken by you as his cheeks would turn red at the mention of your name. They were all happy for him, but that didn’t mean the chirping would stop.

They had another home game to play the following day, and Gabe convinced Cale to invite you and have you sit with Mel and Linnea. Later that day Cale went to your apartment and handed you his jersey, asking you to be there for the game. You couldn’t say no to him, not that you wanted to anyways. That Sunday you put on the jersey and headed to the stadium. Meeting Mel at the front, you quickly got along and enjoyed the game. The Avs came out victorious again, and you followed the captain’s wife to the locker rooms. You stepped aside as Gabe made his way over to his wife, feeling a little out of place. Luckily for you, Cale wasn’t far behind.

He didn’t know if it was from the guys comments or seeing you in his jersey, but one second he was smiling widely at you, then the next his lips were on yours and his hands on your waist. Without a second thought, you kissed him back, your hands holding his face to yours. You were both grinning ear to ear as you separated, chirps flying all around but all in good nature. Giggling, you hid your face in Cale’s chest as his face turned bright red.

Shades on spinning in a summer rain Dancing when there ain’t no music Just the right kind of crazy, baby Something about you Rocking that rock 'n roll t-shirt Whole party dressed up But you just doing your thing Ain't nobody ever seen nothin' like you, yeah

A year had passed and you were at the end of your grad program. You were set to present your research at the graduate fair, having been selected to present your research on behalf of your department. The Avs were scheduled to be flying back home that day, but Cale wasn’t sure if he would be there in time to see you present. You told him that it was fine, that you understood; and you really did. He was hell bent on making it though. You weren’t that surprised when you saw Cale sneaking into the back of the auditorium. What did surprise you was that half the team had followed him in. Having become good friends with them, they wanted to be there to support you too. As your name was announced, you swear you had the loudest applause.

You calmly presented your research, smiling at Cale when you finished and a few questions were thrown your way. Having worked so hard, the questions were simple to answer. Finding Cale afterward, he took your poster from you and the two of you made your way to his apartment so he could unpack from the trip. Changing into some leggings and one of his shirts, you showed him the bound copy of your 105 page thesis. He was so proud of you and couldn’t help but share the cover on his Insta story. The two of you cuddle and slept better that night then you had in a while. For him it was being back home with you, and you finally had the stress of your research gone since the first time you met him.

Nothin' like you Shades on spinning in a summer rain Dancing in the rain no music Nothin' like you Rocking that rock 'n roll t-shirt Whole party dressed up But you just doing your thing Ain't nobody ever seen nothin' like you, yeah

Once you graduated, Cale asked you to move in with him. You had secured a job at a museum as a curator in their Antient History section. Setting up an exhibit all morning, you met up with Cale at the same coffee shop you had met at two years prior later that day. “Sorry I’m late” you muttered to Cale as you found him. He smiled and gave you a quick kiss.

“You have nothing to be sorry about. I already put your order in,” he said as you sat across from him, taking a sip of the coffee he got you.

“You know me so well,” you hummed with a giggle, the caramel latte tasting sweet. Cale grinned at you.

“Technically, your coffee order was the first thing I learned about you, so I better get that right,” he chuckled. “That and you seemed like a huge nerd.” You faked offense, but laughed anyway.

“It was all those books that got you. I knew my tactic of sitting in a coffee shop would work for me one day,” you winked at him.

“It did. I’d never seen nothing like you,” he grinned, reaching into his pocket to take out a small velvet jewelry box.

Never seen, never seen nothin' like you Ain't never seen anything like you Mmm Never seen nothin' like you

Tagging: @yeahcalesy @avsfans95 @tysojost

#nhl imagines #nhl x reader #nhl fic #nhl fanfiction #cale makar imagine #cale makar x reader #colorado avalanche imagine #nhl imagine

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stardustdiaries · 4 years ago

Text

Frozen over - Dincember day7: Cold

☆ @dindjarindiaries ☆

Pairing: Madalorian x reader

Summary: The reader's body is intolerant to the cold and all sense of self-preservation is tossed out the window when the Crest crashes and Mando is out cold.

Warnings: Descriptions of the effects of extremely cold weather, soft!Mando, fluff aaaand I think that's it!

Word count: 2,553

A/N: I can't believe I actually wrote this- aH! I ♡shamefully♡ dropped writing a few years back, so I'm a bit rusty, but feedback is always welcomed and appreciated!

○●○●○●○

After months of travelling with the beskar-cladded Mandalorian as a mechanic, there are many things about said armored man that you picked up on rather quickly. Like how his actions we’re cautious, calculated and precise, or how he seemed to be a tad bit more protective than usual whenever you were out on a supply-run as he was after a bounty.

You also noticed how quick he was to pick up on your own quirks and needs as well.

It all began on one of your first bounty hunts with him, finding yourselves in a slightly-colder-than-normal planet as you followed the beeping of the tracking fob that was clutched in Mando's gloved hand. It wasn’t until the job was done that he took notice of your shivering figure next to him- even when you were wearing layers upon layers of clothing. His heart then dropped at the sight of the bright shade of blue that painted your fingertips.

He had then ushered you back to the Crest and did everything in his power to warm you up, even going as far as wrapping his cape around your shoulders in hopes that your trembling body would soon come to a rest. That’s when he found out about your body’s intolerance to the cold. Mando would then make sure to stock up on gloves, scarves and, he won’t admit this out loud, but he also made sure to buy you a cape of your own simply because he absolutely adored how his looked on you. That, and he loved matching with you, but that’s his own little secret.

Fast forward a few months of the Crest breaking down, run-ins with bounty hunters, late-night talks and hints of flirting, and here you are, stumbling through the hull of the fallen Crest. How you ended up in this situation was hard for you to remember, but the memory of the distress in Mando's modulated voice was enough to make you scramble up the ladder to the cockpit where you last saw him.

Rushing into the cockpit, your breath caught itself in your throat at the sight of Mando’s slumped figure- completely unmoving. Immediately, you fell to your knees by his side, your bare hands reaching up to his shoulders to give him a soft shake. “Mando?” The concern lacing your words was hard to hide when he didn’t respond to your voice. “Dank farrik, Mando please stay with me. Please.” you begged, noticing the icy coating that began to spread over the surface of his armor. With a sigh and a grunt of effort, you straightened his limp figure on the pilot seat and pulled down the cloth around his neck just enough to press your fingers against his skin. Once making contact and feeling his pulse, you let out a breath you hadn’t realized you were holding, but shoot, he was freezing.

You must have crashed on an ice planet.

Without much thinking, you tumbled down back into the hull and grabbed all of your blankets, scarves and capes after pulling on your gloves. Holding the bundle close to your chest, you sped to where the Child was put to rest on his little compartment. Upon seeing him, you ran through the same process of checking for a pulse and then proceeded to wrap him up with some of your blankets and scarves. Once you were done making sure the Child was safe from the bitter cold that seeped through the metal walls, you ran up to do the same with Mando. You finished wrapping the last of the bundle around his shoulders before your tried working the controls of the ship.

What happened? Zip, zero, nada.

The ship’s dead and considering that you had no clue what was wrong with it, you would have to do a full inspection as you waited for Mando to wake up.

You packed up your tools and quickly got to work, running checkups on the ship's inner systems and mechanisms, not being able to tell what was keeping the Crest from functioning the way it should. There seemed to be nothing you could do inside until you managed to fix the lights and you would need some of Mando’s help with that. Right now, all you could do was find out if something had gotten damaged on the outer side of the ship. Summoning all of your strength, you trudged through the deep blanket of white powder that surrounded, well- everything.

You have no idea where in the galaxy the Crest had crashed, but the snowfall was strong.

Quickly, you inspected the radiators, turbines and whatever could’ve been damaged before the ship even crashed.

And then you saw it. Dank farrik, this wasn’t good.

The left engine was royally messed up, looking as if it was mere seconds away from giving way right before the crash. It could take weeks to get it up to its usual functionality if you found the right parts for the full repair. However, you might just get it running long enough for you to fly the Crest to some nearby workshop- if there was even one on the planet.

After minutes of fumbling with your tools and hitting the wrong part for the hundredth time in a row, a string of curses flew past your lips, your breath being caught in the cold air before vanishing. To say you were cold was a complete and total understatement; you were sure you were mere seconds away from freezing to death. Your body shook violently as the frigid air pricked and attacked your skin mercilessly.

But you were stubborn- sometimes too stubborn for your own good.

With annoyance etched onto your features, you ripped your gloves off and tossed them to the side. After that, you were on autopilot, getting a better grip on your tools and doing the best you could even as your bones began to ache due to the weather around you.

Time apparently went by faster than you thought as the rapid sounds of footsteps clambering around the insides of the ship fell into your ears.

“Cyare!”

Your head snapped up, your nose stinging when you scrunched it in confusion. Shakily, you dropped your tools, wrapping your arms tightly around your torso as a sad attempt to warm yourself in any way possible. Maker, you’re pretty sure your fingers lost feeling a few minutes ago.

“Dank farrik- Cyare!”

You pushed yourself up to your knees with trembling arms, peering over the edge of the Crest and down to where the calls seemed to come from. There, you saw Mando, who frantically looked for you as he now held in his hands the bundle of capes and blankets you had previously draped over him.

“I-I'm up he-here, M-Mando!” you called, cursing your teeth for clattering so much. Gosh, your chest was tight.

At the sound of your voice, Mando whipped around, tilting his head up in your direction.

Maker, his heart dropped at the sight of you. Your nose, and fingers were a bright shade of blue and your hair was greatly dusted and soaked with the snow that got caught in it. Your skin was flushed, drained of its usual color. If he didn’t know any better, he would’ve thought that you were frozen solid.

“Cyar’ika,” he sighed, his modulator doing nothing to mask the concern that heavily dripped from his words. “Why would you- why would you leave without any protection?” His arms stretched out to show the bundle you had left him with for emphasis.

You forced a lazy smile, but you’re sure it came out more like a grimace. “I di-didn’t leave c-complet-tely unprotect-ted.” You started, “M-my gloves a-are, um,” you looked around, trying to find your discarded gloves. “s-somewhere around h-here.” At that, you clenched and unclenched your fists, trying to get some feeling back to your fingers.

Mando shook his head, tilting his helmet sympathetically at you. He didn’t answer right away. Instead, he took a step closer to the ship, his visor not looking away from your shivering figure. “Can you…are you able to climb down?”

Your heart warmed at his concern and you managed to give him a nod through all of your shivering. Slowly, you tried climbing onto your feet, only to trip back down and land on your frozen rear. With a weak grunt falling past your lips, you looked down at your feet, sighing in realization.

“Cyar'ika?”

“I, u-um, I ca-can't feel my f-feet.”

Mando cursed under his breath, with words travelling through the modulator as a simple crackle that’s whisked away by the cold winds. His voice is strained, almost as if he’s struggling to get the words out when he parts his lips. “Do you trust me?”

Almost instantly, a laugh erupted from your pale lips, the sound so soft and warm that he swore it could melt this entire planet in seconds. His heart fluttered as you looked at him with gleaming eyes, even if he could tell you were struggling against the cold to keep them open. “W-what kind o-of question is th-that?” You breathed shallowly; your lungs tired after your burst of laughter. “Of co-course I do.”

Was that what he wanted to hear? Yes. But…something about hearing those words tumble out of your mouth pulled heavily at his heartstrings. He smiled under the helmet, fully knowing that you weren’t able to see it.

Dropping your capes and blankets somewhere inside the ship, he walked back out and stretched out his arms to you. You looked at him with wide eyes, shaking your head rapidly.

“I thought you said you trusted me?” he tilted his head at you, arms still stretched out.

“I-I do, I j-just—”

Mando chuckled softly, “I’ll catch you,” he spoke up, watching how your freezing figure curled up into itself. “I won’t let you fall, cyar'ika.”

“P-promise?”

“Promise.”

Even with the tightness and stiffness of the air around you, your muscles somehow managed to relax and loosen up at the sound of his voice.

Or maybe it was how lightheaded you were starting to feel?

You crawled to the edge of the Crest, taking one last look down at Mando before squeezing your eyes shut.

Call it a trust fall of sorts.

With one final breath, you pushed yourself off the top of Crest and let yourself fall.

What were you expecting? Probably to gently fall into his arms in the most romantic way ever. But the truth? Let’s say that you somehow ended up lying on his beskar-platted chest as his back was pressed to the powdery ground.

Maybe it was the shock or your lack of feeling, but you hadn’t noticed how his arms were tightly wrapped around you. His chest lifted you up and dropped you softly as he breathed and you couldn’t help but laugh at what just happened.

“H-how graceful of u-us,” you breathed, a smile curling the corners of your mouth. “Too b-bad we couldn’t re-record it.”

Once Mando noticed how your body relaxed on top of him, he spoke up softly. “Cyar'ika, don’t close your eyes,” he pushed himself up with one arm and held you close to his chest with his other tightly wrapped around you. “Stay with me a little longer, okay?”

“Y-you're warmer t-than I’d thought yo-you'd be.” You smiled lazily, visibly struggling to keep your eyes opened and focused on his visor.

Carrying you bridal-style into the Crest, he gently placed you on the ground before taking off his gloves and cupping your face in his hands. He sucked in a sharp breath, frowning under the helmet. “You’re freezing.”

You snickered under your breath, letting your head rest against the metal walls of the hull as your eyes fluttered a few times.

“Hey, hey, stay awake, cyar'ika. I need to warm you up before you go under, okay?” Modulator and all, you could still hear the concern that laced his words tightly. “Can you stay awake for me?”

You hummed softly, the sound barely loud enough to reach Mando’s ears. Immediately, Mando ran off to the makeshift kitchenette that he somehow managed to fit into the ship. He grabbed a clean bucket from a corner and filled it with water hot enough to warm you up.

When he came back, he gently picked you up before placing you on top of a crate, lifting your feet just enough to dip them into the bucket. He then proceeded to grab a new pair of gloves from your compartment and slip them onto your hands. As he worked, he could see your body loosen up from the shivering slightly.

Draping your blankets over your shoulders, he dared release the question that dangled from the tip of his tongue.

“Why did you do it?”

“Why d-did I do what?”

He sighed, lowering himself onto his knees to be at eye level with you. There, he took in your appearance- flushed skin, blue nose, pale lips. You knew conditions like these could harm you more than they should- more than they would harm him.

“Why did you go out without your layers, cyar’ika? Why did you… why did you give them to me?”

You didn’t answer immediately. Your head dropped slightly before you looked back up at him. “Your armor,” you breathed.

Mando tilted his head, urging you to continue.

“It was frosted over a-and you were out cold.” You nodded at him, making him look down at the frost that had once again began to spread over the surface of his armor. “I then gave the child my other scarves and blankets, to make sure he was okay. I needed to keep you warm if I wanted to make sure you’d wake up.”

Mando’s heart plummeted to his stomach. Your body wasn’t capable of tolerating the cold like most could and you were still concerned about keeping him and the Child warm. He couldn’t wrap his mind around the idea of someone being so recklessly selfless.

His hands came up to your face, gently holding you so you could look at him. Without even thinking, you leaned into the warmth of his touch, sending his heart into a frenzy.

“Promise me that if this ever happens again, you’ll make sure to take care of yourself too. I can’t have you risking yourself like this for me.”

You pouted childishly, making his eyes soften as he continued to focus on you.

“Mando, I-"

“Promise me that, please, cyar’ika.” He begged, gently caressing your cheeks as he spoke.

Humming at his touch, you offered him a reassuring smile as you nodded softly.

That was enough for him.

As night creeped its way onto the sky, covering the land like a thick blanket, Mando has stripped himself of his armor- except for his helmet- and now held you in his arms. The warmth of his touch spreading through your body nurtured you back to health. Your eyes flutter a few times as he pulls you closer to his body, your heart swelling at the gentle gesture.

“Sleep, cyar’ika,” his rasp is gentle, almost as if he were afraid of startling you. He pulled your blankets tighter around you, smiling at how the corners of your lips curled up. “it’s my turn to keep you warm now.”

#the mandalorian #din djarin #grogu #grogu djarin #this is the way #disneyplus #starwars #dincember #mando #mandalorian x you #mandalorian x reader #din djarin x reader

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writersrealmbts · 4 years ago

Text

Cruise

Description: Part of the summer #btswritingbingo, hosted by @bangtanwritingbingo! For the Boating prompt. A summer cruise as a translator for world-famous band BTS: what could go wrong? WELL, the zombie apocalypse. In the middle of the ocean, are you safe? Or is there danger lurking in the deep?

Warnings: Mentions of death, violence (especially after the third content break), mild language? (I can’t remember if there’s language or not but I’ll tag it)

Posted: 06/11/2021

Tags: Zombie apocalypse au, Yoongi x reader

Angst?: 8,342 words

A/N: Oh look, another zombie au.

The engine was idling.

The radio was on, and everyone was listening to the broadcast in silence. The horror was slowly growing in your stomach.

“The country is overrun, we’re broadcasting from a locked room, and we aren’t certain how much longer we can hold out…how much longer we’ll be safe. We’ve had news from several other countries reporting the same conditions. They’re mindless, react to movement…don’t like bright lights…most active starting at dusk all the way through dawn. Don’t let them injure you. They hid the mutagen in vitamins and supplements. Whatever you do…don’t ingest anything from Biogene International.”

You swallowed hard, hugging yourself as background sounds of other voices and banging echoed through the radio

“Oh God, they’ve found us,” The radio announcer murmured. “I guess this is it. If you’re isolated from infestations, I suggest you stay isolated. Cut off the heads. And enjoy this last song by Andy Lange. God save us all.”

The radio started playing ‘Not Sure Yet’, and you just listened to it as your heart broke.

They finally ruined the world.

And you weren’t with your friends and family when it happened.

You were with your stupid ex-boyfriend that you’d just broken up with, the staff of the ship that hired you as an extra translator for the last group—a kpop group and their staff that were filming a vacation show of some sort.

And you’d have to be born under a mountain of rocks to not know that the kpop group was BTS, and in any other situation you’d be excited about helping them as a semi-casual fan of theirs.

But right now you really hated them, and their choice of this ship that employed your ex-boyfriend—even if you’d been the one to get him that job.

“So,” The spoken-of devil murmured, coming to stand next to you. “Sounds like the world is actually ending.”

You took a deep breath, because everyone could hear, and were subtly watching.

“Changes a lot of things doesn’t it?”

“Except one.”

“What?”

You turned to him. “I still would rather die alone than live my life with you.”

He sputtered, but you didn’t stay to listen to him try to argue with you, turning off the radio since it had turned to static and going to the other translator.

“Do they know?”

He nodded gravely. “They’re trying to check on their families.”

“Let me know if there’s anything I can do,” You told him, bowing slightly to the other staff and the boys before going over to some of the other crew. “How much food do we have?”

“Maybe enough for a week,” The cook, Lori, answered. “If I ration.”

“Do it. Same with water?”

“We should have two weeks, more if we cut back on showers, mopping, other excess water usage,” The first mate said, staring out at the horizon. “Hopefully by then we’ll know if there’s a safe port. The captain went to try and radio as many other ships as possible.”

“We should make sure none of that Biogene stuff is on the ship,” One of the engineers said.

The first mate nodded, quickly moving. “Everyone! We need to make sure that there are no Biogene products on this vessel. Please go check all of your pills and supplements, anything that could be pharmaceutical or…just check everything!”

You translated quickly, then went to check your own things. You didn’t have much that could be from that company, but you checked absolutely everything just to be sure.

Then you went to help the staff and band just in case.

They weren’t coming up with anything, so you headed for the captain’s cabin just to see if there were any more plans at that point.

Captain Cobden Alby was an elder man, who tended to become an Uncle, Brother, or Grandfather figure for anyone who’d let him look out for them. You knew him relatively well, because he’d looked out for you when you started working with his tourism company, helping foreigners book trips with him and accompanying them on trips to help out. You’d worked with him for the past three years, and he’d been kind enough to hire your then boyfriend when he needed a job—though you now understood his reluctance. You wished he’d been more reluctant.

“Well, y/n,” Cob sighed. “Guess this is a new chapter. Any ideas?”

“Islands will gain control more quickly, I think, and there are a couple uninhabited islands we might be able to land at if we get desperate. We have nets, so we can fish if we have to. And if we start getting stills set up now, we can provide ourselves with more water. Revert to basic survival, I think.” You chewed your lip. “But if we’re going to use an uninhabited island, I think we should find one and stick around it, because people are going to try and escape by boat and they might bring it with them. The likelihood of the messages and warnings reaching everyone is slim.”

He sighed and nodded. “Our passengers?”

“Scared. But everyone is checking for the products to dispose of them, as you know, and they’re trying to contact their families back in Korea.”

“Have you tried your family?”

You stared out at the water. “I’m afraid to.”

He nodded again, looking grim. “I’ve heard from a couple other ships. We’re going to have issues with food at some point, so the island idea might be good. Maybe we can work with the other ships as long as they stay uninfected to build a sort of safe-haven?”

“Maybe,” You agreed. “We’ll be breaking laws if we land on some of the islands though. Or fish near them. They are wildlife refuges right now.”

“Hon, I don’t think that’s as big of an issue as of yesterday,” Lori said, shutting the door. “We can respect the wildlife. It would only be temporary, right? I mean, things have to stabilize sometime, and I think the islands should stabilize more quickly.”

You didn’t have very high hopes for the islands stabilizing, unless they were able to quickly regulate who came in and out of the populace of Hawaii. But people were creative and there were thousands of boats and planes in existence.

“Alright, so we’re going to go near the closest uninhabited, and weigh anchor, just for safety. But we’re not going to do anything on the island or any fishing until absolutely necessary. We’ll get some water stills set up, and start rationing the food. Try to preserve some fruits, Lori.”

She nodded. “You got it, Captain. But you better get someone else on those stills. Not my division, you know.”

“I’ll get our engineer on it. Dobby will need to be distracted anyway. Y/n, you should go tell our passengers the plan for now.”

“Right. First, I want a thank you.”

“For?”

“Convincing you to invest in some backup solar power for the ship to run things like the radios.” You paused at the door. “How long can the engines run?”

“I made sure we had enough to last us a couple of months, and I’ve got us going slow to reduce consumption. But we’ll have to start thinking about how to move once we run out, which is why I think your idea for the islands is a good one. The ship would be a safety point, and we could use the life-boats to get back and forth. At least until we have some sort of relief. And we might be able to go somewhere before we run out of gas. You never know. This might blow over quickly.”

“Yeah. Maybe.” You went out to check on the idols and their staff again.

They had gathered in the dining lounge, and everyone was double checking each other to make sure that there weren’t any Biogene products.

“Everyone, I’ve just finished talking to our captain, and he’s asked me to tell you our current course of action,” You started, gathering the idols and staff’s attention to explain things. “We’ve communicated with some other ships, but our current course is to head for an uninhabited island and keep to the coast of that. We have the supplies to fish, and our cook is currently working on preparing the food for rationing. Our top engineer is going to work on making sure we have a constant source of drinkable water, but for now we’re reducing our water usage. We’re scanning the radio frequencies to try and find another source of information for what’s going on out in the world, but right now it’s very quiet. We ask for your cooperation as we continue to approach these problems calmly and rationally, and your patience as we try to figure things out.”

“Is food an issue?” Seokjin asked.

You shook your head. “Not at the moment, we’re just trying to make sure it lasts as long as possible, especially our fruits and vegetables. Anything in the kitchen that we can regrow here on the ship, we will attempt to do so. The ship was stocked for at least a hundred passengers, plus the crew, and since we don’t even reach sixty with the passengers and crew combined, we should be able to hold out for a while, we’re just trying to make our food last as long as possible, which is why we will likely be utilizing the fishing nets, so we can eat and still prepare for the future. Because we have had warning, we have time to prepare for the worst, but we are still hoping for the best. We are not giving way to fear. At the moment, all we’re asking is that you remain calm and patient with us.”

That seemed to be agreeable for everyone, so you bowed a bit and then went to check in with the other translator and manager to find out what you could do to help.

Yoongi intercepted you. “Hey, sorry, I know you’re busy.”

“It’s fine, how can I help you?”

“Um, actually, I was going to ask if there was anything we could do to help? It’d be…hard to just ignore the situation.”

“I understand, unfortunately, at this moment, we’re not even certain what we need to get done. When we do, I will let you know if there is any way for you to help. For now, we have solar power that you can continue to use for charging your phones, just in case you get a call from your families, and we can power the lights. Any extra batteries, try to save them.”

He nodded. “Okay. Shouldn’t they turn of the air conditioning then?”

You shook your head. “That would be inviting trouble. People get less rational when they overly warm or cool. Turning it off would reduce morale.”

He considered it, then nodded. “Okay.”

You nodded as well, then moved on to talk to their managers.

You didn’t sleep that night, helping in the kitchen and mulling over different ideas to try for powering the boat. In theory, with the engineers’ help, you might be able to convert the engines to wind power, or at least move the boat using wind power, if you were careful enough. But where would you get the parts?

And theoretically, some of the fruits and veggies and other things could be regrown.

But what would you grow them in?

Lori had some sitting in a shallow tray of water to start sprouting, and some would continue to grow in just water, but others would need soil.

“Wake up, hon,” Lori said gently, patting your back. “Cap’n wants you. Something on the radio he wants you to hear.”

You rubbed your eyes as you forced yourself up. “How long was I…?”

“An hour,” She said in a scolding tone, giving you a look of disapproval. “A young thing like you needs regular sleep. I could have done that in the morning.”

You shrugged. “My mind wouldn’t shut off. You were awake. Like you said, I’m younger.”

“You tried calling your family?”

You shook your head. If they hadn’t tried to contact you, then there would be no point in trying to contact them. Either the call wouldn’t go through, or there was no one to make the call. Or they just weren’t able to call because they had no means or it was too dangerous. Any way you looked at it, it was safer to allow them to try and contact you. They knew you were on a ship, and your father studied epidemiology, so he would know that the ship would either go down quickly or not at all, barring a few statistical outliers.

Your father always called you a statistical outlier.

“Here, take this up with you, find a spot where it won’t get knocked over that gets some sun and some shade. Okay?”

You nodded, taking the tray up with you.

“Y/n,” Yoongi called, waving.

You nodded your greeting to him and the others, trying to pinpoint a good spot for it, finally finding it on a table that was bolted to the wall.

“Is this what we’re regrowing?”

You jumped a bit, turning to the boys with a hand over your heart. “Um, yes. One of the trays, anyway. We’ve got more down there, but they aren’t full yet so…this is the first one to come up for sunlight.”

“Cool,” Taehyung whispered.

Yoongi looked it over. “It…doesn’t look like much.”

You sighed. “I know. But like I said, if all goes well, these should regrow and we’ll just start the process over again. But I’ve been summoned.”

“Summoned?”

“Y/N to the Bridge, Y/N, please report to the bridge.”

You pointed up at the speakers.

“Oh, and maybe bring one of the representatives with you.”

You sighed. “Um, know where your managers are?”

They all shook their heads.

“I could come,” Yoongi offered.

You considered for a moment, then nodded. “Okay, only to save time though, I’m not going to be the one to get in trouble—got it?”

He nodded, gesturing for you to lead the way.

Cob glanced up when you came in. “You’ll love this. Hey, Johnny, I got my person here, mind repeating that now?”

As Johnny started retelling his tale, you slowly processed and translated for Yoongi.

“They were near one of the islands of Hawaii, and sometime in the night they started hearing noises against the hull of the ship…” You paused, horrified. “The creatures…they can survive in the water, and swim. He lost three people when some of the creatures managed to climb aboard.”

Yoongi looked just as grim. “So we’re not safe, even on a ship away from shore?”

You didn’t know the answer to that. “He says he’s going to see how far away from shore they’re able to follow him. That will help us determine how safe we may or may not be.”

Cob thanked Johnny, then turned to the two of you. “Well, what do you think? Do we tell the others of this possibility, or keep it quiet?”

You weren’t sure how to answer that either. There were pros and cons for both sides. But there were more cons for—

“We don’t tell them,” Yoongi said firmly.

You met his gaze and nodded, translating. “It would just incite panic. We don’t tell them until we know that it is a possibility, and even then, we wait until we’ve calculated when they could reach us.”

Yoongi nodded his agreement.

Cob sighed. “Right. You’re right. I just….”

“Take a break. That’s what Jones is for, so you can take breaks. They’re most active between dusk and dawn, right? Then for now, we just slowly make our way to the proximity of an island, Jones can do that.”

He slowly nodded. “Yeah, he’s on his way, just wanted to try his brother one more time.”

You nodded, then signaled for Yoongi to head for the door. “I’m checking back in half an hour and if you’re still here, I’m kicking heads.”

Cob snorted, but didn’t respond further.

Yoongi sighed outside, leaning against the railing. “This is really bad.”

“Really, really bad,” You agreed, leaning next to him. “You okay to keep this from your bandmates?”

He nodded. “I’ll just say that he asked for a representative agreement from our party that he should head for the nearest uninhabited island, as a formality, obviously.”

“Sounds good. And I was there as a translator.”

“What name would you give these creatures?”

“Based on description? The only word I can think of is in English.”

“And?”

“Zombies,” You offered, giving him an apologetic look.

But he nodded. “That’s what we were saying last night. Jungkook said it first, I think we were all afraid of saying it, but he likes watching those kinds of movies, so it wasn’t surprising that he named it first.”

“But watching movies about it isn’t exactly preparation for the real thing,” You whispered, staring out at the ocean. You usually loved going out on trips like this, even if you were just a translator. This time, though….

“Part of me wishes we’d never come on this trip, but part of me is glad that we did.”

“I understand that,” You whispered. “There are a lot of things that I wish. There are a lot of regrets I could have about this.”

“Y/n!”

You closed your eyes. “Speaking of regrets.”

Your ex came over, half-glaring at Yoongi. “This guy bugging you?”

“No, but you are,” You replied, rolling your eyes and pushing away from the railing, walking toward the stairs. “Don’t you have a job to do?”

“I just wanted to make sure you were holding up okay—”

“Well, I am. There’s no need for you to check on me. I’m doing just fine. Please, don’t check on me again. You do your job and I will do mine,” You snapped, turning to glare at him. “I told you, I have no regrets breaking up with you, and even if I knew the future, I would do it again, and probably sooner.”

“Whoa, no need to be so hostile babe!”

“‘Babe’?” You sneered, resisting the urge to shove him over your shoulder and down the flight of stairs. “You never have, and never will be allowed to call me ‘Babe’.”

“Chill out!”

Yoongi pushed past him and grabbed your wrist, pulling you down the stairs after him while rambling in rapid korean about it being dangerous to fight on stairs and ‘that’s how people get murdered’ and ‘unless that was your plan, which I would vouch for you, but I’m not sure who would believe it’ with an added ‘besides, there are a few witnesses’.

Damn was that hot.

No.

Wait.

Yes.

No. No, no. No, no, no.

He was someone you were working for, he wasn’t allowed to be hot.

And his hand definitely didn’t feel strong and sinewy and attractive.

“Don’t walk away when we’re talking!”

Your hold on Yoongi’s hand tightened.

“Ignore him, come with me. Our security team will block him,” Yoongi said, not looking back. “We have a head start, unless he starts running after us. Why did you break up with him? I mean, I get it, but what was the main reason?”

“Cheating, threatening, trying to emotionally manipulate me,” You listed, doing your best not to look back.

“Figures.”

You could see that the heading of the boat was changing, even as you and Yoongi made your way down to where the other boys and their staff were waiting.

“Block the guy following us,” Yoongi called to the security team as both of you passed by them. “He’s letting the panic get to him.”

The security team easily blocked your ex, and Yoongi led you straight to the poolside.

Namjoon came over quickly. “Any news?”

“Nothing new. Just needed a formal agreement to their plan from someone in our party.”

Jungkook dropped onto a seat nearby. “Any new information about the zombies?”

Yoongi shook his head. “Same as before, I think.”

Jungkook tilted his head. “And what is it that we do know?”

“The mutagen makes people into crazed killers, who don’t like bright lights and can only be stopped by cutting off their heads. Strong mutants that can only be stopped by cutting off their heads, and appear to be decaying. I think the mutagen might stimulate muscle growth while suppressing the nervous system. If I’m understanding things correctly, anyway.” You hesitantly sat down, wondering if that would be okay.

“I don’t know exactly what that means,” Jungkook replied, looking a little lost but curious.

“Well, we know that they’re significantly stronger, but their response to injuries is non-existent. Our nervous system is responsible for sending signals to the brain,” You explained, still thinking it through yourself. “Because it isn’t functioning the way it’s supposed to, maybe the pupils aren’t contracting, or something which makes them more sensitive to light.” But that still didn’t explain how they could survive in the water like they did.

“That makes sense,” Yoongi agreed. “I mean, for me, not knowing that much about the human body.”

“Same, but I remember some things, enough to try and puzzle it out, I guess,” You replied, shrugging a bit and looking around. “I should see if there’s anything I can do.”

“Sleep,” Yoongi said. “You should sleep. You look exhausted. I’ll walk you to your cabin so that jerk can’t ambush you.”

“I don’t want you to go out of your way—”

“It’s fine. You’re our designated liaison between the crew and us. It’s important that you’re safe so that we can continue knowing what is going on without pestering the crew.”

That reasoning was fair, and you appreciated it.

But also, you could see it causing issues.

“Come on, I want to make sure you at least go into your room. You should sleep, you look exhausted, and we know that the zombies aren’t going to attack while it’s this sunny out.”

You squeaked slightly as he pulled you up and after him.

But you didn’t fight him on it.

“Which way is your room?”

You quietly gave him directions, following until he reached your door and then tugging lightly on his hand to get his attention before he kept going. “This is it.”

He glanced over the door and nodded. “Right. Okay. Try to sleep, okay? We’re pretty far away from any major population so it should take a while for any zombies in the water to reach us, if they even can. We know they can go some distance, but not how far that distance is. So, rest. We’re going to have to be more alert at night anyway.”

You nodded. “You try to rest too. It’s easier to lie when you’re well-rested.”

He looked a bit grim at that. “Right. Good point. Good thing I’ve always been one to rest when possible.”

You unlocked your door and started in, stopping when he gently caught your upper arm.

“Hey, thank you, again, for everything you’re doing. I know you probably feel guilty because you sold us this package and now we’re all here, but you have no idea how grateful we were to have a ship like this essentially to ourselves.”

You shrugged. “You were booking in the off-season. We were lucky anyone was looking for a ship to commandeer.”

He smiled. “Whatever you say. Sleep well, y/n.”

You watched him walk away for a while, then slowly closed the door, once more pushing down thoughts of how attractive your client was.

———

The first zombie crawled onto the ship during a storm.

You had been eating with all of the guests, looked out the window and did a double-take. “Dobby! Come here.”

Dobby, the head engineer, politely excused himself and came over to join you at the window. “What is it?”

You pointed. “Stern, crawling over the railing.”

He squinted as he tried to see, flinching as lightning flashed—but gasping a bit as he spotted the zombie.

“Everyone is accounted for, right?”

“Right. Okay. Show-time, I guess. Bernie! Clyde! Time to get the lights on and try and decapitate a creature!”

You kept scanning the ship to check for anything else. “Someone tell the captain!”

“Yes, miss,” Clyde called.

Yoongi joined you, looking out. “Guess we know how long it takes for a zombie to swim to us.”

“Yup. Seven days. But it looks weaker than I expected. Maybe it is physically tiring?” You folded your arms, wincing as the floodlights turned on.

It was hideous. It looked like a human, but the skin looked like it had been boiling, and the eyes were strange—the irises almost black, and far too large, to easily noticeable from the distance. It’s jaw seemed unhinged, the mouth hanging open and not moving at all as a guttural screech emanated from it.

“No wonder people are so terrified,” Yoongi whispered.

“I’d like to wake up now,” Hoseok whispered behind you.

“Let’s get to safety, everyone,” You said softly. “Head down into the hallway. Just like we practiced.”

The soft noises of activity soon followed, everyone hearing you in their horrified silence, and moving to act as you had all practiced in the evacuation drills that had started four days ago. There were about eight different contingencies and several ranks of command.

Yoongi’s hand slid around yours, fingers locking around your fingers, and he squeezed your hand slightly. “Assuming it’s contagious. How long do you think we can hold out against the majority of the population of the world being zombified?”

“I think we’re lucky if we last a month like this,” You replied quietly. “We have little fortification, a few sporadic ships that may or may not be able to provide us with help, and no signs of any government being able to assist those who have survived. We’re in a warmer climate, which probably isn’t helping, and we have no idea if this contagion can spread to or through animals.”

“And no way of finding out except through evidence.”

“Essentially,” You whispered, looking around the deck and checking the positions of the crew as they carefully surrounded the zombie to try and dispatch it—the storm not exactly helping matters. “Come on, Dobby.”

You both fell quiet as you watched the crew carefully, and successfully, dispatch the zombie, both breathing sighs of relief.

“The storm should let up soon,” Yoongi murmured.

You nodded, still watching the crew members to make sure they made it to safety.

A few minutes later the all-clear signal sounded over the P.A. system.

Yoongi tugged your hand lightly. “Come on. I need a break from everyone.”

“Then, go, I’ll cover for you.”

“Nah, I want you to come with me. You need a break from everyone’s expectations.” He squeezed your hand, and gently tugged you along.

“But, why do you want me with you?” You asked.

He huffed. “Because I do.”

“Okay,” You replied, still confused.

He led you to his cabin (which was one of the best) and locked the door. “So they don’t come barging in. They do that sometimes.”

You nodded, looking around the cabin casually, even though you knew what they looked like and had cleaned these rooms on more than one occasion.

“We were actually worried at first, because Hoseok gets seasick, but he’s being doing well. Sometimes it’s hard to remember that we’re on a ship.”

“And then a storm hits and you remember all of those movies and true stories about shipwrecks?”

He chuckled lightly. “Yeah. I don’t think I could face them all right now, especially since they’ll be figuring out that zombies can reach us out here. Let them think what they want about us not being around. Our video crew has been filming for posterity, and it’s exhausting. Who’s going to care about how we spent our days on this ship?”

“Well, if we survive, meaning the human race as a whole, I imagine one day they may use it to make a film about you,” You joked, watching the rain pelt the windows.

“You too.”

“Why would they care about an extra translator? No, I’d be cut out and replaced with a super-secret girlfriend love interest, who obviously is terrified and you would save her from the zombies, because the truth and accuracy are inconsequential, and what’s important is the story.”

“Not that you care,” He teased.

“No, never, why would I care. Like I said, I make for a boring story,” You waved it away. “Besides, their movie would probably have a better ending than what reality will give us.”

“Maybe not,” He whispered, also looking outside. “You’re looking at the worse situation, right?”

“Probably.”

“So, best situation is we’re able to survive. We get through this. We set up defenses and we help other people to defend themselves and join us in fighting against these zombies, and…yes, the world will be different, but it will still be here. I mean, there are people in all sorts of remote places in the world, and we hope they’ve been warned, but most of all, they’re there. They may be safe. And maybe some of the defenses of the different countries are still standing. Military bases, forts, bunkers…we have to believe that there is still hope out there. We just…don’t know how to gauge how much hope there is.”

You pulled out your phone, noticing that you still had a signal. Noticing that you had a notification. “We need to get you back to the other boys.”

“What?”

“Come on. We’re going to talk to your staff and get you set up for a live on YouTube.”

“You don’t really think that’s still—”

“I do.”

“Wait,” He pulled you to a stop and turned you toward him. “Explain.”

“You have over 50 million subscribers, and are one of the top boybands in the world. You go live, you might be able to help us figure out how many people are still out there. It might connect you guys back to your family. To the family of the staff. We might be able to get help with making our boat defensible, or we might be able to meet up with a naval vessel that has been unaffected. It’s a long shot, but any sort of chance is a chance we should take, right?”

His eyes widened, and he looked troubled, but he nodded. “Okay. Alright. But you should join us in the video as a proper translator.”

“No, you’ll be fine, we can write out a message for Namjoon to read or something. We can plan things out, what you guys say and all of that. If there are other people out there, members of army, maybe they could use a familiar face.”

He still held you in place. “Okay. Let me change.”

You nodded. “I’ll wait outside.”

He nodded, but didn’t let go. “Hey, y/n?”

“Yes?”

He smiled softly. “If we were destined to get stuck on this cruise ship, I’m glad destiny chose you to be here too.”

Your heart was pounding in your ears, and you felt too warm all over and you spluttered something out and darted out the door as your brain went into a complete meltdown.

“Playboy!” You mind screamed.

“Honeyboy!” Your fangirl screamed.

“BREATHE!” Your lungs shouted as you wheezed and slid down the wall of the hallway.

He came out a few minutes later, and looked at you slightly confused. “Um, why are you sitting on the floor? Did I take that long?”

“Nah, I’m just, you know, meditating,” You refused to meet his eyes because if you did you would start your freakout all over again. Stupid fangirl. It was the zombie apocalypse and all your brain was telling you was that he was glad you were there and he was looking at you and that he kept getting you alone and talking with you and….

And oh no. Oh no no.

Did he like you?

Zombies. Focus on the zombies.

He was holding your hand again.

Apparently, he’d messaged the other boys and they were already gathered and the staff were there setting things up, and you guessed the translator or Namjoon had told some of the crew what they were doing, because they were helping set up. And they were doing V-Live and YouTube at the same time.

You stayed behind the cameras with a small whiteboard to help when they got stuck and to give them further things to say in English to try and help.

You considered them having at least half a million views encouraging, but you could tell that even the BTS staff were disconcerted at the small number.

Eventually the boys were mostly just talking to continue it and reassure anyone that may be watching that for the moment they were safe, and that they hoped that everyone else was safe as well. That they hoped this would pass soon.

They talked about the food, Jungkook and Taehyung belted out a few bars of different songs at intervals, Hoseok did his best to be bright and hopeful, Seokjin and Jimin jokingly flirted with the camera, Namjoon made faces and cracked a joke or two, and Yoongi talked about the future. Yoongi talked about someday looking back on this, just as we look back, and being able to think of it as a historical event that the world conquered.

They had over four million viewers when they ran out of things to say and decided to end it.

“So, again, these videos are going to be posted as soon as possible, and we hope we can meet up with and help those who may be in similar situations, or maybe those who are trapped can get help through this. Even if we just brought a moment of happiness, we will find fulfillment in that. We love you, and hope to see you all again.”

Jungkook and Jimin were crying shortly after the cameras were off.

Hoseok hugged onto them, which prompted Taehyung to hug them as well.

Seokjin tugged the other two into their impromptu group hug.

You set aside the whiteboard and headed outside, the rain finally gone. It was lighter than before, and the sun was trying to peek through again. Not quite successful yet, but every here and there you could spot a beam of sunlight breaking through.

The waves were still pretty intense, but not as bad as they could have been given the storm.

And there were gulls.

Which meant the boat was close enough to a land mass that the birds could fly out.

You hurried up to the bridge, not bothering to ask permission. “How far are we from land?”

“Well, we’ve slowed down and drifted slightly off course, which may be a good thing, since that creature crawled aboard, but,” Cob gestured to the maps he was using. “According to radar and such, we should be able to see the island in about half an hour.”

“But if the zombie came from there, we could be in trouble.”

He grunted.

You sighed, staring out at the turbulent waters. “The island could only be so big, though, which means that if they did come from there, there couldn’t have been too many people there to begin with. Right?”

“Unless it came from one of the ships we were going to be meeting up with.”

“Are we going to die?”

“Not if I have any say in it.”

“Okay. Then we’ll circle around, do our best to fortify and defend the ship, and hope for the best.” You bit your lip. “Right?”

Cob placed an arm around your shoulders. “Take heart, lass. Do something fun, would you? It’s not the end of the world yet, and there’s plenty of daylight to be had. Why don’t you see if that cat-boy wants to go to the bush-whacked deck and splash some paint around. You can take the others there some other time, but he seems to help you lighten up.”

You were a little busy trying not to die from Cob calling Yoongi a cat-boy. “Yoongi. His name is Yoongi.”

“Right. Couldn’t recall. Lots of names to remember. But he reminded me of a cat. Not in a bad way—”

“I’m going to go paint in the bushwhack deck. Don’t expect anything pretty.”

“I don’t,” He laughed happily.

You weren’t sure you wanted to try and find Yoongi, so you resolved to go change into clothes you could paint in first.

“Hey.”

You jumped, squeaked, and lashed out—nearly missing Yoongi.

He looked at you with wide eyes, just sort of blinking while you processed everything that just happened.

“Hi. Sorry. Hi.” You covered your heart to make sure it was still inside of you.

“Where you off to?”

“Um, you know the deck that’s off-limits?”

He nodded, looking a little wary.

“That’s because it’s under renovation. So, the crew goes there to vent and get away from everyone else. So, I’m going to change into clothes that I don’t mind getting paint on, and I’m going to go have fun splashing paint on everything.”

“Ah.”

“Would you like to come with me?”

He glanced over to where the others were still gathered, contemplating it. “Just me.”

“You can tell them to sneak down at a later time.”

He nodded slowly, then more vigorously. “Okay. I’ll meet you down there in ten, and tell them to come down in an hour or something?”

“That works.” You smiled a bit. “See you there.”

He nodded again, leaned in and kissed your cheek, and then walked back toward the others.

Your brain short-circuited as you hurried to your room to change and go down to the deck to pull out the paint and brushes.

Yoongi didn’t say anything as he joined you, simply helped move the paints into the room you wanted to paint in. It was one of the rooms with windows, so it had some natural light. But it also still had a bed in it, so you had to cover that with the plastic tarps.

But Yoongi stopped you. “You rushed up to talk to the captain. What scared you?”

You shrugged slightly. “The seagulls.”

His eyebrows drew together. “Birds scare you?”

“The fact that they can only go so far from land without dying does,” You elaborated. “I just wanted to see if it was a fluke from a storm.”

“And?”

“We’re nearing the island. It will be visible in about an hour at the speed we’re going, which is the slowest speed possible.”

He nodded. “So the zombie may have come from there.”

“Possibly,” You whispered.

He swore, closing his eyes as he pulled you into a hug.

You froze for a moment, then relaxed into the hug, wrapping your arms around him as well.

“You wouldn’t be some insignificant side character, y/n,” He whispered. “You’d be the main character.”

“Yeah right,” You choked out.

He held you tighter. “You would. You definitely would. That would be the only way the movie would have any plot.”

He drew back, resting a hand on your cheek. “I would love to be your romantic interest in the movie too.”

“We’re facing the end of humanity.”

“Which is why it’s important,” He answered easily. “Which is why I want to tell you that I was interested in you from the day we met you on the docks. You’re intelligent, beautiful, and strong. Stronger than me, stronger than most people on this ship. Do you object to me being interested in you? The world has gone to hell, people won’t need a boyband when this is over. They’ll need farmers, builders, engineers, and families.”

“Families,” You repeated quietly.

He nodded, taking your hands. “Families. I can never leave the other boys, they’re my family, especially if my actual relatives….”

“I understand.”

“But…maybe we can live somewhere together. Near each other, but separated.”

“You understand I used to be an Army?” You double-checked.

He grinned, laughing. “Yeah. I knew it when you laughed at one of the jokes. Usually only army’s understand it. I think it’s sort of fitting.”

“I’ve got a concussion and I’m having a weird dream,” You said, closing your eyes because that was the only logical explanation.

Except he kissed you.

And dang was he a good kisser.

“GET AWAY FROM HER!”

You jumped, turning toward your fuming ex-boyfriend. “Oh my God, go away!”

“Take your hands off of my girl!” He bellowed at Yoongi.

YOongi frowned and pulled you closer. “What is he holding?”

You glanced down and realized it was some sort of pill bottle. “Oh my God…tell me those aren’t from—”

“It’s all a hoax, you’re doing this to try and torment me, right? I’ll prove my love for you is stronger than anything.”

“Don’t! Please don’t!” You started toward him, but it was too late.

You watched in horror as he downed several pills.

“There, see! I’m fine! It’s all a hoax so that these terrorists can take over!”

You choked a little. “You need to get those out of your system—now! Even if they don’t turn you, that’s enough to overdose!”

“I told you! I’m fine!” He yelled, but his voice had already started changing.

“We need to get out of here before he changes,” Yoongi whispered. “Windows?”

“Only if you want to go swimming,” You replied. “Grab the chair and throw it at him.”

“Uh….”

“Do it!” You ordered, hurrying to a paint can.

Your ex made an ungodly noise as the chair hit him and you were quick to follow, swinging the full paint can at his head with as much velocity as you could muster.

Yoongi grabbed your hand and both of you started sprinting away. “What do we do? If he goes up, he could run into any number of people?”

“We have to take care of it before he can fully change. We need a way to cut off his head.”

“I don’t suppose he’d hold still while we used a saw?”

“Probably not,” You answered, looking around as the two of you ran. Finally you spotted something useful. “Break in case of emergencies, right?”

Your ex made that ungodly screeching noise again, and his footsteps were unnaturally fast as they beat the ground behind you and Yoongi.

Yoongi hurried ahead and broke open the case with something he must have picked up, grabbing the ax.

You stopped to throw a piece of furniture in the zombie’s path, hoping it would slow him down or trip him up or anything that might give you the advantage.

The two of you darted upstairs after doing your best to block the door.

Then you took the ax. “Sound the alarm.”

He grabbed the handle of the ax. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“Leading him away from the crowd. We don’t have time to debate—”

He took it and started running. “Sound the alarm. He’s focused on me.”

You looked after him in horror, then quickly started running toward the nearest place you could trigger an alarm, ducking into a room so that the zombie wouldn’t see you, holding your breath.

Finally, you could hear it going after Yoongi.

You signaled the bridge then hurried after them, looking for anything that would help along the way.

Only to see Yoongi barely holding the zombie off, even in the bright sunlight.

You went barreling into it, all while your mind screamed at you and tried to tell you to stop.

Or maybe that was Yoongi.

But it gave Yoongi the space and time to swing the ax, catching the zombie’s neck and knocking it back.

You grabbed a lifebuoy and pushed it over his head, trapping his arms. “Finish him!”

And Yoongi did, though you both stared in horror at the by-product of your battle.

You met his gaze, swallowing hard. “Is this a dream?”

He reached out and pulled you away from the body. “We need to wash the blood off. Come on.”

You were shaking all over, so it was a miracle you managed to walk without tripping.

Dobby and the others hosed both of you down, making sure the water sprayed straight off the deck, then went to clean things while the Bangtan staff brought both of you towels.

“How did that get onto the ship in broad daylight?” Cob asked, hurrying up.

You looked up at him. “It was Charlie.”

“Charlie let it get on the ship?”

“No,” You answered, confused. “That thing…was Charlie. He had pills. Pills from Biogene.”

“You should have let me throw him overboard,” He muttered, petting your head, and then physically maneuvering Yoongi to check him over. “Good. You look unhurt. Wouldn’t want to cut your head off too.”

Yoongi was just a little stunned.

“Get them out of this wind!” Lori huffed, glaring at everyone and then ushering the two of you inside and out of the wind. “You need to get into dry clothing, come on. You, you’re one of his brothers?”

The boys all froze.

She gently shoved Yoongi toward them. “Make sure he gets changed and tuck him in. Marta! Get soup to both rooms.”

You didn’t object to her manhandling, just accepting it because Lori could take you if she put her mind to it, and she was right there ready to take you.

She bundled you in blankets after helping you change into dry clothing, scolded Marta for taking so long bringing the soup, and she force-fed you the soup.

When she had done that, you knew it was time to push a bit.

“I need to go talk to him,” You whispered, ignoring the trembling of your hands and the comforting call of your bed.

Lori looked you in the eye, evaluating you, then nodded. “Let me fix your hair.”

You nodded and let her work, not even checking her work before you and your blanket wrap were heading to Yoongi’s room.

His door was open, and the others were there, but he saw you, and he pushed himself up.

The others glanced over to see what had caught his attention, then seemed to all find an excuse to leave the two of you alone.

You wandered over to the bed as the boys left.

Yoongi looked up at you, eyes sad. “Are you okay?”

You shrugged, slowly sitting on the edge of the bed. “I now know that my instincts to survive are strong enough to kill someone that I know once they’ve turned. So…I’m dealing with that.”

He shuddered and reached out, pulling you down into his arms. “We did what was necessary for the survival of everyone else on this ship.”

“How many friends are we going to lose because of all of this?”

He shook his head. “Let’s not go there.”

You turned your head into his shoulder, fighting back the tears. You had to separate moments out by mere seconds: him kissing you, a moment, and then your ex turning into a zombie. There was a moment in there, that you wished you could imagine was longer.

His fingers stroked your hair lightly, then rested on your back. “But you know…I think we’re going to be just fine. We definitely need more weapons, but I think we’ll make it.”

“You know something I don’t?”

He nodded. “While we were downstairs, a naval vessel contacted the captain. They’re about a day away from us.”

“They know the zombies can swim?”

“They do. And they’ve checked all quarters and removed all Biogene products. They had a small issue at the beginning, but they’ve got it under control now. They’re going to meet with us, and we’re going to work together. They had some civilians that they rescued, and not enough beds, so we’ll take some of their civilians, and perhaps some of their soldiers.”

“And the government?”

“It’s…sort of functioning. Multiple ones are functioning on a…mild capacity. Enough to try and organize their military to reclaim lands.”

“So, where are we being escorted?”

“I don’t know. That’s about all the information that was received, I guess. I’m sure we’ll find out more when we meet up. But…it’s good, right? That we’re able to meet up with a naval vessel?”

You nodded. “As long as we don’t get overrun by zombies tonight.”

“What a bright side,” He chuckled, lightly stroking your back. “Y/n.”

You relaxed at the gentle tone in which he said your name.

“Whatever happens, let’s make it through this together? I don’t have too many skills that are usable outside of music, but I’ll do whatever it takes to take care of you?”

You peeked up at him. “Are you sure?”

He nodded. “Yeah. I’m sure. I might be relying on you, though.”

You wrapped your arms around him. “That’s fine. I can handle that. If you’re okay with me falling apart now and than.”

“I’ll try and hold you together,” He replied, squeezing you. “We’ve got a couple hours of daylight. Want to nap?”

You pushed yourself fully onto the bed and let him help you under the covers. “Yeah, okay. I could sleep.”

He smiled, taking your hand as you both lay on your sides, facing one another. “Sweet dreams, y/n.”

“Sweet dreams,” You whispered back, still studying him with your eyes half-closed.

If you could make it to safety, then spending your life with him would be great. Better than great.

“Don’t let the zombies bite,” He murmured, smiling slightly at the teasing, and the way you swatted him.

Then you let the subtle sway of the ship rock you into sleep next to the man you just might love.

#yoongi #btswritingbingo #min yoongi #yoongi x reader #min yoongi x reader #suga x reader #zombie!au #zombie au #zombie apocolypse au #bts fic #suga #namjoon #jungkook #seokjin #hoseok #jimin #taehyung

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sweetestlamb · 4 years ago

Text

Leave the Door Open

Summary: He doesn’t hate having someone in his house. Having her in his house but he knows he should.

Author Notes: Vincenzo was a roller coaster this weekend and I LOVED it every adrenaline filled, angst inducing moment of it all. They are pining in 4K and I had to write this. I am salivating waiting for their first kiss. I hope it’s crazy and impulsive and filled with ineedyouithoughtilostyou energy, it might be cliché but I am a simple woman. Until then I present more domestic(sometimes horny) Chayenzo moments this was very freeform I went in with nothing and just let my brain go crazy. There’s some angst again LOL oops

It’s unnervingly easy to get used to, having another person in his space despite his years of solitude and purposely pushing others away. Women had tried to sleep over before, sweat clinging to their naked skin as they coyly brushed a finger under the sheet trying to entice him to let them stay. It never worked. Not once. Sex was one thing- he loved being in control and hearing his name breathless on their lips as they writhed and screamed on his silk sheets- but sleeping over was a completely different animal and he was never stupid enough to give them that much leeway. It was dangerous for them to think this was something more than it was, he had an itch and they could scratch it. There were no feelings involved, at least from his end.

So when she showed up on his doorsteps and the urge to drag her into his arms overwhelmed him that should have been his first warning, danger danger do not proceed.

But she pushed past him before he could close the door in her face and unfortunately at the same moment he had a spasm in his hand and hesitated for just one second allowing her enough time to bulldoze her way into his apartment. He had contemplated kicking her still out but the look on her face stopped him in his tracks, she looked scared- ridiculously so. Even as she stuttered out nonsense about the suspicious hoteliers who wanted to harm her and made a show of swinging her bag as she told the story of the man breaking the lock on her hotel room, he could see the slight tremble in her fingers.

She was always a lightning rod of energy but that night it had been different. Her movements had been panicked and the urge to protect her overrode his self preservation.

It was a clear erroneous mistake on his part.

She’s comfortable around him, that much becomes clear all too fast when he wakes up to her swaying in the kitchen over a boiling pot on the stove- some kind of soup, he can smell the aroma of miso wafting across the room- but what catches his attention is her clothes, or lack of.

There is miles and miles of bare skin from his angle on the ground, her loose sleep shorts barely covering her legs and he raises an eyebrow as he takes in the top half of her body. Her wet hair drips onto the flowing pristine white shirt that is peeking out from beneath a cardigan. She’s taken a shower. Just moments ago, she had been naked in his shower, water cascading down her slim body curving over her breasts and sliding down her flat stomach in long slow streams until it reached her wet....

“Oh you’re awake! I made soup, let’s eat before work.” She brightly calls out to him, using his ragged oven mittens to transfer the steaming pot over to the low rising table in the center of his tiny living room.

His eyes savor her every move as she flounces over to him in that annoying way that he is starting to find cute. She carefully folds her legs beneath her bottom as she joins him on the ground, her smooth makeup free face coming into his line of vision. He’d always assumed that it was her lip tint making her mouth so red and plush and so goddamn alluring, but even bare the twin petals are too much for his sleep laden brain to handle. He sits up curling his blanket in his lap, balling up the material to better hide his little morning problem. He almost hopes this is a dream, it wouldn’t be the first time she visited him in one. They usually ended in sinuous screams and naked limbs twisting but sometimes they were like this, just simple moments that made him wake up with an ache in his chest. Those dreams terrified him the most.

“Yah! Are you listening to anything I’m saying?” Her voice cuts through the arousal thick fog in his brain, light pats on his cheek rousing him from his untoward thoughts. “What are you thinking about anyway? Why are you so distracted?” Her eyes narrow as she glances at him, slowly descending down his body almost reaching his groin and he flushes red coughing loudly before quickly moving closer to the table, hiding his lap entirely from her wandering eyes.

Their eyes meet in a tense lock and she looks curious and something darker that he has been seeing in her eyes the more they work together. He watches swallowing a groan as she leisurely licks her lips chasing the drops of soup that have escaped.

They don’t have time for this. There is so much to do and a part of him fears that she is using him as a distraction because she’s scared about her break-in, despite his constant warnings it had been her first real experience with how far Babel was willing to go to silence them, the first time she was in the line of fire. He had been her “hero” and that was evidently confusing her, making her think he was something better than he was. Contrary to the lie he had cowardly told her, he was nothing but a murderer. Once she saw him for what he truly was, she would want nothing to do with him- she was still a good person after all underneath her armor and brazen attitude.

He wants her and that is exactly why he can’t have her.

Those thoughts knock any desire promptly out of his body, he couldn’t forget that he wasn’t worthy of love.

Problem finally resolved he stands up, “Sorry I’m not a morning person. I need to use the bathroom, thank you for the breakfast. I’ll be back.” He can feel her eyes on him the entire way to the bathroom, those huge doe-like eyes that make him want to be a better man, but surely it’s too late for someone like him.

Right?

They had separated after work, him meeting up with Mr. Cho secretly to discuss the fate of the gold, it was another long conversation that left them with more complications rather than solutions and he can see the frustration on the other man’s face. He will have to keep an eye on that in case it becomes something problematic.

Something he has to handle, regrettably.

He yanks at the stiff ball of his necktie loosening it as he pushes his key into the lock and presses the door open, he hears her laughter before he sees her almost tripping on her black high heels carelessly discarded at the door. He pauses with a rumble, “First she breaks into my house and now she almost kills me at my own front door,” with a sigh he straightens the shoes, slipping off his own and stepping into his house slippers.

His heart lurches at the first sight of her, she’s wrapped up in the blanket he had placed around her quivering shoulders the night of the break in, only her head visible from the swaddle. She’s watching some variety show he has never watched but knows is popular here, a can of beer thankfully on a coaster on the table and too many empty bottles of soju. She turns to look at him when she senses his presence, that also disarms him because he is a man who can go undetected if he pleases and he had not made a sound upon his entry, yet she still knew he was here.

Then she makes him weak in the knees when she shoots a soft smile his way, her rosy lips slightly upturned but its the glow in her eyes that captivates him, those dark orbs come to life when they land on him as if they were waiting for him to flush with life and vibrancy.

“You’re home!” She calls out, still beaming at him and he stands frozen in the line of fire. She casually pats the cushion next to her, motioning him over as high pitched loud voices patter out from his TV.

Home. He has hardly ever used that word himself, long given up on the idea of having a place to call home. But seeing her like this, a fire that had been snuffed out a long time ago starts to rekindle, a desire he had long suppressed starts to bubble back to the surface.

I should leave.

He thinks foolishly, but he finds himself walking over to her, skin pebbling when a warm small hand reaches out and drags him the rest of the way from his suspended form.

“What took you so long? Why didn’t you answer my calls? I wanted you to get us some soju.” She snuggles into his arm as if this is normal for them, and with an urgent awakening he realizes that it is. Constant and casual touches flash in his memory, his hand on her shoulder as he escorts her way, her hands on his back as she carries his intoxicated body, arms wrapped around each other as they walk away from the scum that is Babel. His hands always find her body as if it’s a heat seeking missile and not once has she pushed him away, on contrary she moves into his touches and returns them just as frequently. As if they belong to each other, as if they are each other’s to touch.

What game exactly are they playing?

He has never lost before but suddenly it feels like his defeat is imminent.

“You already drank all the soju in the fridge? Are you an alcoholic? Should I have you admitted?” He grumbles trying to diffuse the situation but she chuckles at his words, resting her head on his shoulder now as she peers up at him with glossy eyes. His control wavers, fluttering like a flag in the wind.

“After everything I’ve done that’s the thing you want to get me admitted for?” She teases giggling into his collarbone and her breath ignites a flame on his skin that spreads like wildfire. “Oh. Why are you so red?”

He jolts up, only feeling marginally guilty when she falls head first onto the couch with his sudden disappearance. When she glares up at him he has to smother a smile at the cute affronted look on her face, he is a mafia member he shouldn’t use words like “cute” but he’s constantly breaking his rules because of her.

He escapes to his bedroom, surprisingly pigeon feather free the window securely closed for once and he looks back towards the living room with a smile, she was full of surprises. With a groan he pops his shoulder, letting the day’s tension melt away as he takes off his suit piece by piece, breathing easier when he unknots the tie and tosses it to his bed. When he is down to his boxers, he ambles over to his dresser taking out his silk pajamas- she loved to tease him about them but after running a sneaky hand over his arm, she has admitted that they felt nice on your skin- he had desperately wanted her to keep going. Dragging the bottoms on first he slides on the top, fingers on the top button when his bedroom door bursts open making him still his movement.

“Oh, I forgot to tell you that I ordered fried chicken that’s why I needed soj...nnngghh” her words trail off into nonsense as she sputters at him, eyes immediately locked on the lower half of his body and he almost laughs at her wide eyed stare before she walks closer, a hand outreached as she penetrates his skin with her unblinking stare. He can see the red blush spread across her bridge of her nose and he wonders if it’s from the alcohol she has consumed or if it’s something else?

She answers his questions with another step toward him, unflinching beneath his hard stare and he instinctively recoils, stepping back out of her reach but she double steps until they are inches apart, her fingertips hovering above his abs and then she closes the distance, stroking the ridges on his stomach making him groan, unable to contain the deep sound and he grabs her hand.

He can’t let his go any further.

“What are you doing? Haven’t you heard of knocking? What if I was naked?”

The blush covers her face completely at his words and he watches fascinated as her pupils dilate and a hungry look flashes across her pretty face.

She doesn’t look scandalized at the idea. He has seen that look many times. From her, more times than he wants to confront.

“Cha-young.” He states her name firmly, making her eyes snap away from his body at least this time she looks ashamed of herself for ogling him, but not tremendously so. It’s not lost on him that she hasn’t tried to leave the room once. “Don’t start something you can’t finish.”

It’s a warning. For both of them really.

It can tell by the twitch in her eyebrow she sees it as a challenge, without a word she grabs him by his shoulder tugging him closer until they are flush, her soft breasts pressing into his firm stomach and he groans when he realizes he can feel the flesh too vividly, she’s not wearing bra. Fuck.

“Who said I couldn’t finish it?” She retorts peering up at him with those gleaming eyes, too many emotions swirling around for him to pinpoint what is the driving force behind her actions.

His arms wrap around her waist, bringing her closer despite there being no room felt to do so. She moans prettily at his tight grip swaying unevenly into him.

She’s drunk.

He suddenly recalls all the empty bottles of soju on the table and he loosens his hold, he refuses to take advantage of her no matter how willing she seems right now, it’s the alcohol distorting her thoughts. He releases her waist and puts his hands between them.

“You aren’t in your right mind right now, we should stop.”

She shakes her head disagreeing, “I got drunk because I couldn’t stop thinking about you. The alcohol didn’t make me want you, it made me do something about it.”

He blinks at the comment feeling like her words are intoxicating him. His thoughts are incoherent.

“I know you want me too. Don’t push me away.” She pleads and he feels his resolve crumbling as he watches her bite at her lower lip, wringing her hands between them. She seems...nervous. Scared of his rejection.

It’s not fitting on the Cha-young he has grown to know and l...like.

With a sigh he steps forward much to her apparent shock, wrapping his arms around her in an awkward hug, complete with too rough pats on her back and he wonders if he did the right thing when she stands frozen in his arms but then she laughs brokenly before sniffling and burrowing her head into his chest. He can feel the wetness pooling on his skin, he hugs her tighter ignoring the voice in his head warning him that he’s letting her get too close.

it’s already much too late anyway.

He lets her cry on him until he hears admittedly gross sniffles and he starts to fear for his skin, tears are one thing but mucus is another. He might like her but there is still a line, snot is his line.

Thankfully, when he drags her away from him her nose isn’t running, just large tears streaming down her face. Looking at that face, he would probably allow her to drip snot on him; she looks so pitiful- it’s probably the first time she has allowed herself to feel her emotions and not put on a brave front for him.

He longs to tell her that it isn’t necessary, ever. He doesn’t need her to put on a show, he will accept her no matter what there is no version of her that isn’t perfectly imperfect in his eyes.

But he can never say those words to her.

“Let me put my shirt on and I’ll meet you in the living room.” He pushes her lightly, playfully glaring and shooing her away when she doesn’t immediately leave taking one final moment to ogle his body. He tries not to preen and fails horribly, it’s hard not to when the woman he wants so badly clearly wants him too- at least physically.

She whispers something that sounds like, “You don't have to,” and he raises an eyebrow watching her leave finally, with a long suffering sigh he stares down at his overly interested friend willing it away before dragging on his shirt.

it’s going to be a long night.

He can smell the delicious aroma of fried chicken when he finally exits the bedroom, she offers a leg to him as soon as he’s close enough and he easily accepts the food with a bite, letting her feed him until all that remains is the bone.

“You eat so well.” She praises and he flushes in embarrassment at her words, or more accurately at the feeling that swells up in his stomach at her deceptively maternal words. Unaware of his thoughts she continues feeding him until the food is all gone and she is looking at him with a satisfied grin.

He tries not to become too excited when she licks the grease from her fingers, before putting the bones on a plate.

“Here, have some wine. The storekeeper said it was popular in Italy.”

She places the rounded curve of the wine glass at his lip and he inhales the intoxicating scent, Barolo, he can already smell the sweetness of the Nebbiolo grapes that have been long fermenting, it’s not a cheap bottle of wine or easy to acquire, not even for him while living in their country of origin. She must have looked all over to find that particular brand here in Korea.

He stares at her with a softness he has never felt for another, not even her late father. This is bigger and more consuming, the respect he felt for the man seems to pale in comparison to the bundle of emotions he feels for his daughter.

“Thank you.”

She simply stares, before returning his gaze and he accepts the wine glass by the stem tipping the deep colored liquid into his mouth, flavors dancing on his taste buds and he moans freely at the delicious taste.

They are already sitting closely, too much so for just coworkers but she moves nearer at his subconscious response, their knees knock into each other.

“Is it that good?” She whispers breathless, staring at his mouth. Again.

He nods dumbly, freezing when he feels her hand on his thigh.

“Let me see.”

He watches in a daze as she leans closer to him, his eyes following her face as she draws nearer and then he closes his eyes, tired of fighting this magnetic connection between them, he’s only a man and a bad one at that, he’s not good enough to keep pushing her away. He waits impatiently to feel the swell of her lips on his and blinks his eyes open when he feels a sudden weight on the wine glass instead, her lips curl around the ridge where his lips had just been. Taking his hand in hers, she lifts the glass and tilts it back into her mouth swallowing the liquid in a deep gulp before she pushes it back towards him, with a loud smack of her lips before moving back to her spot on the cushion.

“Mmmmm, you’re right that’s really good.”

His tongue is heavy in his mouth and his brain isn’t functioning well enough to give a response beyond staring at her with his mouth gaped.

“What’s wrong were you expecting something else? Did I get your hopes up? It’s not nice is it? ” She teases obnoxiously tsking at him body loose on the arm rest opposite of him and he knows exactly what she’s alluding to, recalls her face as he had leaned across the small space of the car. She hadn’t looked scandalized in that moment either.

No, she looked ready to risk it all. He was the coward who couldn’t risk anything.

He leans back with a huff, folding his arms.

“I guess it’s true, revenge is a dish best served cold. Do you feel good about yourself?” He pushes his lips out, not pouting whatsoever.

Mafia men don’t pout.

She snickers from the left of him, poking at this cheek gleefully.

“Oh my god, are you pouting? You big baby! You did it to me first!”

He has no argument to that so he doesn’t refute the claim, he just silently glares at the tv not hearing anything despite the volume being quite loud.

“Next time let’s both be brave enough to finish what we started.”

He turns to look at her, blinded by the hopeful smile on her face.

Maybe he’s wrong and it’s more than physical for her too.

If that’s true, then he needs to sever this bond sooner rather than later.

He doesn’t reply to her, drinking more wine to occupy his mouth and she doesn’t push him, humming before turning her attention back to the tv.

He collects all her different laughs while they watch the mindless show, the soft giggles and the full body guffaws that make her slap his knee and spill over into his space, her long hair thrown across his lap. He gives up on stopping her and finds himself smiling at her joy, offering her water when she starts to choke from laughing too hard. He pats her back and rubs her until she can speak easily again, she’s seriously a hazard to herself and he tells her as much.

She cheekily replies, “That’s why I need you then, you’re my Italian hero.”

He refutes that claim but he knows that she’s right, he would destroy anyone who tried to harm one hair on her head.

Moments later when he hears her light snores, he turns the tv off and makes to stand up and put some much needed distance between them but she halts him with a gentle plea, “Don’t leave me alone please.”

He stills at her words, staring at her closed eyes praying that she’s dreaming about someone else. That those words aren’t for him, he doesn’t know if he’s strong enough to ignore her appeal.

When her head falls heavily on his shoulder again, her body distractingly warm pressed against his own he knows he should push her away it’s the only way they can both get out of this unscathed.

But his decision making is all but obliterated, so he stupidly leans his head onto hers, deeply inhaling the sweet vanilla of her shampoo instead, wrapping an arm around her shoulder and pulling her closer, dragging the blanket over both their bodies, silencing his heart when it jumps at her easily molding into him and softly murmuring his name from deep slumber, “Vincenzo.”

Just for tonight, he will let himself have this.

One night only.

It’s all he can afford.

#vincenzo #vincenzo cassano #hong cha young #Vincenzo #chaotic couple #killer couple #I love their pining it's everything

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emergingsentiments · 3 years ago

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Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha: Episode 10 (Repost)

Loneliness must have drawn you back here, says Hwajung to Chohui. But these could have been words for Dusik and Hyejin, too. The past and current entanglements of Gongjin’s love affairs, after all, run parallel to each other. For Chohui, her mother’s death and her brother’s migration left her solitary, so it only seemed natural to return to somewhere familiar. Hyejin, on the other hand, visited the seaside town to reclaim the memory of happier times, when her mother was still alive. Dusik’s reasons are still obscured but the glimpses into the wakes he’s stood vigil by are compelling reasons behind his return.

Home, as I observed in the first episode of Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha, is where the heart is and the hurts are.

Episode 10 unfolded like the turning point that it is. As the previous chapters tackled the inner workings of all our characters, especially the progress of Hyejin and Dusik both as individuals and in their romantic engagements, we saw how people began to confront their fears. Whether it’s Cheonjae’s anxieties as a has-been singer and as a single father to a rebellious Juri or Gamri’s quiet suffering in her empty nest, the melancholy that undergirds the town’s surface pushed each one to face their scars and losses. For all the comic relief she brings, even Miseon had to brave confusion and rejection.

In this page of Gongjin’s tale, however, the theme of battling life’s greatest antagonist is truest among Dusik, Hyejin, and Seonghyun.

Poor Seonghyun, so new to the town yet so quick to have been thrown into the maelstrom of Gongjin’s charms and tragedies. His greatest fear was being late. He missed opportunities before, including in the postcard-perfect moments of his youth. Always an observer but never the one observed; always watching over Hyejin but always a step behind others in the line. If he were dancing, he’d be out of rhythm, too busy trying to memorize the choreography.

He has rehearsed his lines a thousand times. Will they come out right? Here, Lee Sang-yi gives Seonghyun his most graceful and yet graceless moment. Making an abrupt u-turn on his way to Seoul, he returns to Gongjin — late once again. Hyejin, attacked by a wandering sexual predator in town, has been saved by Dusik. If the shock of the night’s crime were not enough, he confesses the next evening to a Hyejin that had just mistakenly implied her growing affections for Dusik. She’s just had dinner, too.

Full and formal, Hyejin listens to Seonghyun’s lonely and tense confession. Sangyi delivers the lines Seonghyun has held onto for years. It’s a speech marked by jitters, fretful glances, and a slowly growing blush. Once out, he tries to stop the tension by marking the scene as a take. But the clapperboard humor isn’t enough. Hyejin watches him eat alone. She has no appetite.

Hyejin, for her part, couldn’t be blamed. She never really saw Seonghyun other than a senior to be admired. Yes, he’s saved her from a jerk before. But years of absence have made the heart grow duller instead of fonder. She’s also just come from an equally awkward dinner with Dusik, who is celebrating his grandfather’s death anniversary. There is no room for another meal. The night before — the night of the attack — she had slept in Dusik’s home for the third time as well.

At the first visit to his home, she kissed Mr. Hong on impulse and alcohol. On the second, she carried the weight and fears of an inebriated Dusik. On the third visit, she is traumatized from the night’s break-in, so now slips in to Mr. Hong’s clothes and stays over, unable to sleep unless Dusik’s around with poetry. He reads to her...It is my job to fall in love with you while waiting for you the next day. The antidote to Hyejin’s fear, after all, is Gongjin’s son.

But what does Hyejin fear? Well, it’s simple. She fears what she lost — her childhood, to be who she is. As a young girl who lost her mother, she had to grow up fast given her father’s alcohol-tinged coping mechanism. As a young woman, she had to build walls after a harsh rebuke of her lowly appearance. So she covers her scars with pretenses — and fancy shoes. Her clothes are her walls. Her life has been planned out. She steers this career with distinct professionalism and ambition. But it’s never ruthless. A woman-child, her core reveals a soft, compassionate heart.

This is what Dusik brings out in her. It’s not something Dusik necessarily gives. The two, after all, have their losses but they are whole persons, too. Dusik’s unconventional lifestyle and ways have eroded the surface of Hyejin’s fortress. Like salted sea slowly breaking down cliffs. With Dusik, she regains the lost child, the one who laughs when pieces of crab meat are flung to Dusik’s face. If that was Seonghyun, Hyejin would have been profusely apologetic and formal. But Mr. Hong is different. Around him, Hyejin can be unguarded, vulnerable.

Dusik, on the other hand, always saw her in a different light. Carrying the weight of unexplained grief, Dusik knows exactly what’s hidden behind Hyejin’s front. But for all his bravado, he’s afraid, too. The people he loved the most have left him, leaving him with an unimaginable sense of guilt. It’s what keeps him tethered to the idea of boundaries. He only likes Hyejin as a friend. But his eyes, his actions — they speak otherwise. If he admits to loving Hyejin, then the prospect of fresh losses cripple him. He’s an engineering graduate, so he has made the calculations. And yet, this strange woman who has returned from a childhood memory is urging him to take those risks and forget those probabilities.

He took a stab on the shoulder, one that nearly cost his life. Isn’t that love — or even the semblance of it? Why does Dusik need to certify his affections with assurance? Gamri, Gonjin’s wisest daughter, sees through Dusik’s barricades. Life’s brevity, she says, demands risks but most of all, honesty with oneself.

These are words worth ruminating in the evening breeze at the town’s breakwater.

It’s the same place where Hyejin finds him.

After a trip to Seoul to forget the town’s powers over her and Miseon, she realizes the city’s offerings were no longer attractive. Everything reminds her of Gongjin. She can’t stop thinking of Dusik. As a grown-up, Hyejin had sought security. Her instinct of self-preservation made her hard. Drenched in a sudden downpour in Seoul, she remembers her rain-soaked self with Dusik at the beach. It is enough for her to understand.

These realizations surge from Hyejin’s adrenaline-filled confession. Unable to deny her growing affections any further, she takes the plunge.

The child faces reality with simple acceptance. In the presence of a vulnerable Hyejin, things freely move and are themselves. The effects are immediately clear. Like any sensible woman, Hyejin knows Dusik could all but reject him, too. Who drives back from Seoul to rant about love, right? But Dusik understands. The hours waiting for her return were sooner than he had anticipated. But the man had made his calculations. The formulas are no longer useful.

True to himself, Dusik fulfills his new duty. It is my job to fall in love with you while waiting for you the next day. So he returns the confession with the most reasonable declaration: a kiss, first tender, one that leaves Hyejin breathless. He speaks but yearns for more. So he lets his lips touch hers for a second time. A kiss now free from all the tentativeness of the night.

A few weeks ago I read several criticisms about Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha. It’s cliched. People only watch it because the actors are popular. There’s nothing exceptional about a love story.

Cliched, true. But there is a reason why there are cliches because they are true. Do people only watch because the actors are popular? Perhaps. Perhaps not. A love story doesn’t hold a candle to the more intellectual and uncomfortable narratives available for consumption, right? You know, the stories that deal with war and violence, politics and its lack of virtue, the more profound tales that explore humanity or its degradation. But I fear this is an effort to leave the commonplace, the domestic, and the personal materials unattended for the sake of what seems profound. Yet, the production of these “better” and more profound stories does not offer any solace from suffering.

For over a year now, we’ve been fighting the wrath of an invisible virus. It might even be true to say that for many of us, we’ve lost someone dear, someone deeply loved. If not, we know someone who has dealt with these losses. Given the lockdowns and restrictions, even grieving has been abbreviated. Our reality is sobering. We fear many things. So while I don’t hold it against people to choose the more elevated tales, it would be a shame to dismiss those who gush over a love story as uncritical and frivolous.

Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha resonates with and appeals to many because it reminds us of the things we’ve lost to the pandemic. Face-to-face conversations. The stability of a job. Family. Friendship. The pat on the back. Our grandparents. Our first love. A hand to hold. Dinner with friends under the warmth of incandescent light. Office conversations. Senseless chatter. The thrill of falling in love. The smell of the sea, and the sand on our feet. Our best friend. The normalcy of a leisurely walk. Dancing in the rain. People. Our community. The words we wanted to say. A kiss.

In a world where physical intimacy and closeness are dangerous, we feel our lips with our fingers watching Hyejun and Dusik kiss. And we remember the way we were. Kim Seon Ho was right in saying Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha is a healing drama. To love and be loved, after all, remains the ultimate catharsis.

#hometown cha cha cha #kim seon ho #Shin Min Ah #kdrama #korean drama #갯마을 차차차 #writing #love #drama #homcha

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prurientpuddlejumper · 4 years ago

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Being Fake Soulmates with Dr. Chilton (Part 6)

<- Part 5

Frederick Chilton x Reader | The Good Place crossover

Final chapter! Warning: The Good Place spoilers, and a timeline that makes perfect sense because Jeremy Bearimy, baby.

2,800 words

“No way. It’s too dangerous!”

“I thought you said we were in this together?” Chilton quirked a brow, eliciting a petulant grumble. You crossed your arms.

“Or maybe you think I’m expendable, so you’re willing to take risks with my life. Afterlife. Whatever.”

Frederick Chilton, who was not, as originally advertised, your soulmate, nonetheless clasped your hand with gentle tenderness. I would never do anything to hurt you is what a normal person would say in that moment, and perhaps his eyes said it, somewhere deep in their searching pools of green. But Dr. Chilton had a repressed way about him, tending toward overly clinical just stating the facts (or the sarcasm). Anything but genuine, vulnerable, sentimentality.

He guided you by your hand to sit down beside him on the baroque loveseat in one of his many living rooms, studies, and salons. After you settled yourself on the velvet cushion, he leaned his shoulder against yours in that quiet way he showed affection.

“After reviewing the town records,” he said, “I believe we may be the only two humans in the neighborhood. Some of the residents are far too dull—Chidi Anagonye, the moral philosophy professor who spent his life writing a single manuscript, Jianyu the silent monk—while others are too perfect—Glen, that one who is constantly volunteering, Tahani, the philanthropist. Real people have flaws, secrets, hobbies. I can only be certain of myself and you.”

“How’d you figure out I’m real?”

“I didn’t. I simply refuse to accept the alternative,” he said with a sad smile, and you began to think Dr. Chilton was sentimental after all.

***

Their voices were muffled even with your ear pressed to the door of Michael’s office—not that it mattered much what they were talking about. You were just waiting for the signal, and at that moment, it came. Their footsteps and voices grew louder as Frederick and Michael approached, and the door handle clicked.

“—which is why cannibalism loses more good-person points than defenestration but fewer than chewing loudly on a crowded bus.”

“Fascinating. I never thought about it that way,” said Chilton, looking genuinely disturbed.

You flattened yourself against the wall next to the door, thinking thin thoughts as the pair exited the office. A tall houseplant barely disguised your presence, and if Michael had any kind of peripheral vision, he would see you standing there plain as day.

But Dr. Chilton spoke animatedly, fixing him with a challenging laser-stare as he asked a probing follow-up question. Locked in Chilton’s eyes, Michael failed to notice the movement just behind his left shoulder as you slipped through the closing door before it could latch shut.

Safe.

Michael’s office was quiet and filled you with serenity in much the same way a teddy bear is filled with stuffing: forcefully and by no will of your own. Like the welcome room with its happy green plants and happy green words on the wall assuring you everything is fine, the office peeled your defenses away. Cream-colored walls yawned out around the perimeter, punctuated with bright windows, a portrait of Doug Forcett (a stoner from the 1970s who guessed, on a mushroom trip, how the afterlife really worked), and various artifacts of humanity enshrined like museum pieces, despite seeming perfectly mundane.

At the top of the room was a large mahogany desk.

Yesterday, Chilton watched Michael put away files in the desk that he wouldn’t let him look at. Chilton was certain they were the key to unraveling the mystery, so he suggested working together—he would distract Michael while you sneaked in to find the files. It was risky, but it might have been your only chance of discovering what was going on, and if there was a way to escape.

You began poking through the desk and found stacks of papers in an unreadable alphabet. The only thing you could read were lyrics to a genuinely terrible song Michael was writing titled “Love Train to the Cosmos.”

The last drawer wouldn’t budge.

Yanking the handle didn’t work. Banging on the side with your fist failed to unstick it. It was locked. Locked drawers were suspicious. The answers had to be in there.

You eyed a mountain of paperclips lovingly displayed on a pedestal labeled “Human Things.” Snatching two off the top, you unbent and re-bent the stiff metal wire, and inserted it into the lock. Faint clicks sounded as you turned and finessed the paperclip, feeling each pin in the tumbler slide into place. Then you gently turned it, and—pop. The drawer opened.

A single manila folder stamped TOP SECRET in threatening red letters rested inside, as if waiting to be found. You picked it up and opened it, and your breath caught. They were reports on “The Good Place.” The Good Place in quotation marks. Reports about you.

A pleasant bing sounded.

Janet materialized in front of the desk. For once, she was not wearing a cheery smile.

***

Frederick Chilton had always been a selfish man. Any opportunity that could advance his career and put him in the spotlight, he would take it no matter who it hurt. “Unorthodox therapy,” he called it in his private chats with Dr. Lecter. They bonded over their shared interest in unorthodox research before he learned Dr. Lecter was a cannibal. That would have been a clue to anybody else that it was time to change his ways, but Dr. Chilton spent the rest of his years just as selfish and petty—more so, even, as his disfiguring injuries gave him more reason for spite.

He could never accept himself as he was.

By the time he died, Chilton was an intolerable asshole who paid back the world’s cruelty with his chronic foul moods and acerbic sarcasm. He kept everyone at a distance.

And yet, here, in death, he found himself worrying over someone else.

The sun was shining in the ever-blue sky, dappled by lush green foliage before reaching the two men as they strolled the neighborhood below. Michael was built like a sapling with longer legs than he knew what to do with, making Chilton nearly jog to keep pace. He had a warm smile and an outgoing demeanor—always flattering Chilton’s ego and asking for his guidance. But something malignant hid behind those smiling eyes, and Chilton’s mind kept rushing back to you, hoping you were OK.

He hoped that you were safe. Not that the plan was going smoothly. That you were safe.

There was a difference, and Dr. Chilton noticed right away that his twitchy nervousness was not wrought of self-preservation. It was a new type of panic—worse than fear for himself, which he never thought possible considering the amount of terror he had experienced on his own behalf.

To distract himself, Chilton threw himself into the role of Michael’s assistant, focusing on his task of supposedly identifying psychological issues causing problems with the neighborhood.

“Our interviews should go in alphabetical order, under the pretense of a survey—a sort of afterlife census—to avoid suspicion. It should be feasible, with only three hundred residents—”

“We know,” Michael said coolly. His voice dropped from the usual friendly, flattering demeanor, slipping off like a mask.

“You know how you are going to handle the interviews? It is imperative the subjects do not suspect they are being studied.” Chilton swallowed, knowing full well that he was talking to the real Michael for the first time.

“Don’t play dumb.” Michael smiled an entirely different type of smile, twisted and clever with no warmth in it. “We’ve been watching you, Dr. Chilton. We knew you would figure it out eventually. It was only a matter of time before you saw through a psychiatric study.”

Chilton’s interest piqued at the same time his blood went cold. He wet his lips. “Is that what all this is, then?”

The pair came to a stone bridge that arched gracefully over a reflection pool. Michael stopped midway across, leaned one of his long, pointed elbows on the railing, and cocked his head at Chilton.

“You haven’t figured it all out yet? That’s disappointing. You humans really are so dense.” His tone was so mean that Chilton took an unconscious step back. Michael only laughed and told him there was no point in running away. “But I think you’ll want to hear what I have to offer,” he promised.

Most of what you had been told about the afterlife was true, Michael explained. There was a real good place, and there was a real bad place where bad people were tortured for all eternity. But the bad place had a problem: it was boring! Humans get used to physical pain after the first few centuries, no matter how creative the punishment.

“Once you’ve flattened a thousand penises, you’ve flattened them all. I’m trying to do something new here. Innovate!” said Michael with an energetic swoop of his hand. “Emotional torture can cause the same level of discomfort, but in a more sustainable and (more importantly) entertaining way. That’s what this neighborhood is for—to study you humans and find out what makes you miserable.”

And then he offered Dr. Chilton something that grabbed his attention. The opportunity to design bad place neighborhoods.

“You are asking me to help implement psychological torture?” Chilton turned over each word cautiously.

“Oh,” Michael scoffed, “Don’t tell me you’re concerned about the ethics? Doctor, I’ve read your file.”

Chilton winced. He had done truly amoral things in the name of discovery—things it made him sick to be reminded of. Strange, though. In the past, he would have been proud to be treated as a peer by a psychopath. Not ashamed.

“Think of it, the glory, the prestige. You would be designing the afterlife for billions of souls. You will be remembered throughout eternity as the man who reformed the bad place!”

“And my soulmate?”

Chilton blurted it without thinking. It sounded so childish and naive, and sure enough, Michael shook his head and had a long chuckle at his expense.

“There’s no such thing! I thought you knew,” Michael slapped his knee. “I made it up so you would torture each other! But once again, I underestimated the human libido. You people all think with your genitals, it’s—it’s gross. Humans are gross.” He made a face. “That’s why I need your help to design a better system. With your understanding of the human mind, we can make condemned souls miserable for thousands of years.”

Chilton couldn’t muster any enthusiasm for this plan, and Michael frowned.

“If it makes you feel any better, consider this the humane option. The alternative is going back to scooping eyeballs out with melon ballers and replacing them with live bees. What do you say, doctor? Join my team.” Michael extended a hand, and Chilton eyeballed it.

“Can my soulmate—”

“Not a soulmate.”

“—come with me?”

“This offer is only open to you.”

“So they will be tortured? Alone? For eternity? In a system I help design?”

“Nothing you can do will change that. They are going to be tortured—the only person you can save is yourself, if you decide to help me.”

Frederick’s brow knit together. He thought about refusing. He really did. Abandoning you seemed unthinkable, especially after your promise to each other to stick together. But he was a selfish creature, and choosing to be punished wouldn’t protect you. If he was lucky, by teaming up with Michael, he could design a more comfortable torture for you one day.

“Maybe this will help make up your mind,” Michael said. “Hannibal Lecter.”

“Lecter?”

“He’s here. In the bad place. So far, he has been especially resistant to traditional torture. I thought you might have a personal interest in taking a crack at him?”

***

On a floating, room-sized projection screen, Frederick Chilton shook Michael’s hand. Your head fell forward, shoulders slumping. The screen flicked off and dissipated into the office air.

“This is the 764th time he has failed,” said Janet, giving a sympathetic simulation of a sigh. “We were sure he was going to make the right decision this time.”

You shook your head. “Fame and glory? Revenge? He’ll never refuse those. Trust me—he died because of them and still never learned his lesson.”

“That is what we’re afraid of. Some people never pass their tests. Fun fact!” she perked up, “Hannibal Lecter’s test is working at a Burger King where he can only cook Impossible Whoppers, and his 19-year-old manager calls him pee-paw. He gets reset every time he eats a customer. His longest record is twelve hours.”

When Janet found you snooping in Michael’s desk, you expected to be dragged away, never to see Frederick again. Instead, she explained everything to you—the truth.

A long time ago, the bad place was exactly how Michael described it—a place where souls were sent to have their orifices filled with spiders for eternity. Then he decided to try something new. Originally, he paired you with Dr. Chilton hoping you would drive each other crazy. But no matter what happened, you kept falling in love. You kept supporting each other, and taking care of each other. The same happened with his other human test subjects—they kept improving and becoming better people than they were on Earth. Eventually, Michael changed, too.

He redesigned the bad place to be a test—a chance for human souls to earn their way into the good place. At the end of each test, you either pass and go to the good place, or your memories are erased and you start over again.

“So, what happens to me now?”

“You passed. You can go to the good place now, and spend the rest of eternity in paradise. The real one.”

“And Frederick? He’ll be alone?”

Janet nodded.

“Put me back in. Reset me, and make me his soulmate again.”

“Are you sure?” Janet asked.

“I’m not going without him.”

“He would leave you behind. You just saw that.”

“That wasn’t fair. Anyone would accept that deal. I would accept that deal!”

“No. You wouldn’t,” Janet said. “You passed your test a long time ago.”

For a while, a heavy silence fell between you as you processed this. Finally, you thought of the only question worth asking. “How many times have we had this conversation?”

“762.”

“Well then,” you said. “You know what I’m going to say.”

“I do. But you retain a vague sense of your memories from previous tests. At a subconscious level, you might realize you’re tired of this.”

You smiled. A big, genuine one that balled your cheeks and creased the corners of your eyes. “That’s not how I feel at all. I think I love him more every time.”

Janet nodded, but gave one last warning before erasing your memories again. “If he never passes, you could be stuck here forever.”

“Stuck falling in love with that insecure jerk over and over again for thousands of years? Sounds like heaven to me.”

“I thought you might say that.”

***

The first day, you really wanted to punch his pretentious snobby face for thinking he was so much better than you.

The first time you laid eyes on Dr. Frederick Chilton, he was waiting behind a mahogany desk with an ancient hardcover book in his hands. Not reading it—waiting, posed deliberately to be discovered that way, and give the impression of intellectualism.

“This is your soulmate,” said Michael, introducing you.

Chilton took a step back after shaking your hand and looked you up and down critically, as if he were appraising livestock. And right away, you knew there had been a terrible mistake. Who the fork did he think he—

Fork. Fork! Why couldn’t you say fork?!

***

Bright light streamed in through the open bedroom window. The weather was always perfect here, except when some glitch made it rain caviar and jelly beans. Or that time Frederick had a vivid nightmare, and organs began falling from the sky. Every day, something horrible seemed to go wrong in the good place. Things that challenged you and pushed your soulmate to his limits.

But most mornings were like this. Quiet. A time just for the two of you.

Your fingers lightly stroked his chest, delving into the soft hairs that rose and fell with his steady breathing. You pressed a soft kiss to his skin, then another, tracing a line of them lower, over a jagged, raised line down his abdomen. His scars let you know he was waking up. This was the good place—he didn’t have to let them show. Usually, he chose to appear as a younger version of himself, before all the indelible trauma. But on peaceful mornings like this, he would let them show just so you could soothe them. He never thought he would be that comfortable with anyone. That he could trust anyone so much.

Every day, you both knew you could overcome anything, so long as you were together.

#Frederick Chilton #Frederick Chilton x reader #The Good Place crossover #my writing

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chicgeekgirl89 · 3 years ago

Text

Where Hope is Left So Incomplete

Fandom: Teen Wolf

Characters: Scott McCall, Stiles Stilinski, Derek Hale, Melissa McCall, Chris Argent, Noah Stilinski, McCall Pack

Rating: T

Summary: Derek has one hand on the wheel and with the other he’s calling the hospital, speaking fast, leaving out any details that might raise suspicion. A werewolf at the wheel is definitely faster than an ambulance, but it’s still taking far too long. Scott is literally holding his friend together, he can hear Stiles’ heartbeat growing weaker with every passing minute, and despite his best efforts there’s blood leaking everywhere. “Derek,” Scott says as they squeal around another curve, “Derek I think he’s dying.”

A/N: This fic takes place maybe a year or two after the events of "Wolves of War." It assumes Isaac returned at some point, Stiles never went back to the FBI, Derek stuck around, and the war against supernaturals continues. Title taken from "Running With the Wolves" by Aurora.

Read on AO3

It’s an ambush. Or an assassination, Scott’s not sure which. He lets out a roar, eyes blazing, fangs bared, as steel bites deeply into his flesh. Turning he catches a hunter directly in the chest with his claws and hurls him through the air. The gash stings, blood dripping down his arm, swirling through dirt and sweat and turning his skin into a macabre painting. At least the knife is free of wolfsbane, the familiar burn is missing from his wounds.

His head is throbbing, it feels like his brain is being squeezed by a vice and it’s messing with his ability to focus, to hear, to sense where everyone else is. They’ve got some kind of device, an upgrade of the ones the Argents used to use and damn is it working.

He rips one of the devices from the ground and hurls it against a tree feeling some satisfaction when it smashes into a thousand pieces against the trunk. It gives him enough relief to take a beat and assess their situation; Derek is thrashing another guy nearby, and from the sound of things, he’s winning. What’s become suspiciously absent are Stiles’ yells. Scanning the woods he can’t make out his friend’s gangly form anywhere. Hopefully that means Stiles has done the smart thing and tucked himself away somewhere that the hunters can’t find him.

Monroe’s lackeys don’t care that Stiles is human, they’re just as happy to take him out as any of the rest of the McCall pack and they’ve made that perfectly clear on more than one occasion. Scott tries not to think about the fact that Chris needed surgery on his back last month for an injury he’d received at the hands of a hunter. Or that they tried to take Lydia six months ago and were only stopped by Derek’s quick thinking.

They’re not supposed to be here. The pack has a perimeter and they’ve been diligent about not letting anyone through. It’s been over a year since anyone tried to attack them on their own soil. This is their turf, they’ve staked their claim. It’s a safe space, a haven, a promise of home and family and respite. At least it was. Until tonight.

Scott tries not to think about what it means that this group has gotten bold enough to sneak into the preserve in the dead of night. Tries not to think what would have happened if it were some of his younger charges who’d been caught unaware on patrol. As it is he and Derek are having a hard time holding them off.

His moment to plan is over as he’s assaulted again by a rather beefy hunter, one who is holding a knife so large it may as well be a sword. Scott lets out another roar, claws slashing mercilessly.

It’s then he hears a familiar yell and realizes that Stiles has not gone into hiding as directed, but has instead attempted to get the drop on the hunters. And of course he is armed with absolutely nothing but his trusty baseball bat, although given that he has the element of surprise, it’s working surprisingly well.

He drops two hunters in one, fell swoop and then looks up at Scott with a triumphant grin. “I knew this would come in handy someday!” he yells, raising the bat high.

Scott sends him a grin back. It’s a mistake, a horribly foolish mistake he realizes later. If he hadn’t been so caught up in the moment, if he hadn’t been so damn cocky about their ability to hold the line, what happened next wouldn’t have come to pass.

There’s a terrible, high pitched whine that has him clapping his hands over his ears in pain, and then the world explodes.

Scott feels his feet briefly leave the ground and then it comes rushing up to meet him again, knocking all the air from his lungs. He rolls onto his back, head spinning, as he tries to get a handle on himself.

Air slowly leaks back into his chest and he heaves a breath, pushing himself up onto his elbow. He can see Derek doing the same, several feet from him, shaking his own head as if he can’t quite remember what’s going on.

“You okay?” Scott chokes out.

“Yeah,” Derek says, though his face is bloody and Scott can see some shrapnel has torn through his shirt.

Scott is pretty sure he’s broken a few ribs himself, he can feel them grating in his chest as he continues to suck in air, but everything else seems to be intact. The hunters…not so much. There are several bodies parts lying around and considering his and Derek’s are still attached, it seems the hunters were felled by their own weapons. “What the hell was that?” he asks, attempting to get up.

“Some kind of bomb,” Derek says, getting to his own feet and scanning the area. “We need to get out of here.”

There’s a whimper, a pathetic, horrible, pained whimper and Scott comes fully back to himself because he knows, he knows without even looking who that agonized, awful sound is coming from. “Stiles!” he cries, spotting him sprawled and broken at the base of a large boulder.

He stumbles toward his friend, his own body perhaps more injured than he initially thought, and falls to his knees, eyes widening in shock and horror.

Stiles’ eyes are closed and his left leg lies at an awkward angle. Scott knows without even touching it that it’s broken, maybe in more than one place. But worse, so much worse, is the blood pouring out of Stiles’ abdomen. His shirt has gone dark with it and there’s already a puddle forming on the ground next to him.

“Stiles,” Scott whispers placing his hands over the wound, pressing down, trying with all his might to keep Stiles’ life from flowing out of him.

Stiles lets out a pained cry at the pressure and without even thinking Scott begins to pull, thick ropes of dark pain swirling under his skin.

“Scott,” Derek drops beside him, eyes still scanning the area for danger. “Scott we need to get him out of here.”

“We can’t move him,” Scott’s voice cracks in panic, but even in the midst of all this he still has a nurse for a mother and her words come tumbling out now. “He could have a spinal injury.”

“It’s not going to matter if he has a broken spine if we all die out here,” Derek says urgently.

He’s right, of course he’s right, but Scott is having a really hard time formulating any sort of plan right now. You think he’d be used to it, watching those he loves suffer for his choices, but he isn’t. It never gets any better, it just makes the hole inside his chest larger and larger until it feels like it will swallow him—

“Scott!”

Derek’s sharp tone brings Scott back to himself and he takes a shaky breath, trying to formulate a plan. “Yeah,” he says. “You’re right. We have to get him out of here.”

His whole body is screaming at him in pain but he manages to get Stiles into his arms. “You want me to take him?” Derek asks.

His own face is pale and he’s limping, clearly in no better shape than Scott. “I’ve got him,” Scott says firmly, even though his vision is swimming a little bit and his ribs are burning inside his chest.

Stiles lets out another whimper and Scott shifts him until his fingers find the bare flesh of Stiles’ arm and he resumes sucking pain from him as fast as he can.

It’s an endless trek to the car for all of them. Derek appears to be struggling, he’s clearly more hurt than he’s let on, they have all just been blown to bits after all. And Scott…Scott’s only focus is on Stiles and making sure that he gets jostled as little as possible as they stumble across the forest floor.

He hasn’t woken up or said anything, just letting out an occasional moan or gasp of pain and it’s beyond unnerving that the usually chatty Stiles has gone silent. Only his noisy breaths confirm that he’s still alive as they stumble along over the uneven ground.

By the time they reach the car Derek looks a little better, but Stiles has gone so pale it’s taking Scott back to the nogitsune days and it terrifies him. “How’s he doing?” Derek asks as he hits the gas.

“Drive fast,” is all Scott can say as he uses one hand to keep pressure on the wound and the other to sap pain from Stiles as fast as he can manage.

Derek has one hand on the wheel and with the other he’s calling the hospital, speaking fast, leaving out any details that might raise suspicion. A werewolf at the wheel is definitely faster than an ambulance, but it’s still taking far too long. Scott is literally holding his friend together, he can hear Stiles’ heartbeat growing weaker with every passing minute, and despite his best efforts there’s blood leaking everywhere. “Derek,” Scott says as they squeal around another curve, “Derek I think he’s dying.”

The wounds in Stiles’ abdomen are so eerily similar to Allison’s and Scott feels panic rise up in him again. He cannot lose someone again. He literally can’t survive it. Not this time. Not Stiles.

Derek spares a half second to glance back and then presses the pedal all the way to the floor. “Just hold on.”

“Derek, I think…I don’t know…should I—“ Scott trips over his own words, panic making them lie heavy in his throat. “Derek I can’t lose him.”

“I know,” Derek says. “I know, just hang on.”

“I think I…should I give him the bite?”

Even through the tears in his eyes he sees Derek stiffen in his seat. “Scott…”

It’s not something Stiles has ever wanted, something he’s flat out turned it down on more than one occasion. Stiles is not a supernatural. He’s just Stiles. He doesn’t need claws or fangs and he doesn’t want them. But Scott…Scott doesn’t want a world without Stiles in it.

“Derek,” Scott says urgently. He needs some guidance here. He needs Derek to tell him what to do.

“No.”

The weak, raspy response isn’t from Derek and Scott’s eyes drop downward to find Stiles staring up at him, eyes glazed with pain. “No I don’t—I don’t want it,” he rasps, sucking in a rattling breath.

“Stiles we may not have a choice,” Scott tells him, voice breaking.

“There’s alway….a choice.” Stiles’ eyes squeeze shut and he lets out a guttural moan. Blood bubbles from his lips.“Scott…Scott it hurts.”

“I know, I know it does,” Scott squeezes his arm more tightly and pulls harder, faster, drawing pain like a river through his own veins.

He can feel the wounds on his back and arms, the ones that had started to knit back together, begin to reopen, blood trickling across his skin, but he doesn’t stop, not even when he begins to gasp for air himself, breath coming in short pants as the pain goes all the way to his core. It’s like every nerve ending is on fire but he doesn’t stop, not for anything. Stiles doesn’t deserve to be in pain.

“Scott.”

His name is a terrified whimper and it brings tears to Scott’s eyes. “I’m right here Stiles. You’re going to be okay, I promise.”

Stiles’ eyes slide closed and his jaw goes slack. Scott hears his heartbeat stutter, then sluggishly let out another beat, as if it’s a candle trying to withstand a hurricane. “Derek!” Scott yells terror filling the car.

“We’re here!”

They screech into the parking lot and Derek is out of the car practically before he’s stopped it, ripping open the door so that it likely won’t ever close right again, and helping Scott pull Stiles from the car. If Scott had half a thought to spare he’d think about how many times they’ve lived through this exact moment, a mad dash to the hospital, an anxious wait for results, answers, hope.

But as it is he can hardly think anymore because all that matters is Stiles and drawing as much of his pain into himself as he possibly can.

“We need help!” Derek yells as they burst through the doors and within seconds Stiles is on a gurney and being pulled toward the ER. Scott runs alongside him, hand still glued to Stiles’ bloody, limp arm.

“You need to stay here,” one of the nurses tells him. Her name’s Claire, Scott somehow remembers. She’s in his mom’s book club. “Let him go. We’ve got him Scott.”

But he can’t. He can’t let his best friend go through those doors. Because if he does…that might be the last time he ever sees him.

“Scott!” Derek is right in his face, grabbing onto his arm and wrenching it away from Stiles because apparently Derek has the presence of mind not to lose his shit right here in the hospital emergency room.

Scott pulls away from him and reels back a bit, leaning against the wall, panting, eyes glued to the doors they’ve just pushed Stiles through. “Scott?” Derek is back in his face, eyes worried. “Scott are you okay?”

Scott can’t answer, his body has gone oddly numb, his chest tight. Black spots dance in front of his eyes and he can’t move, can barely even breathe. “Scott how much of his pain did you take?” Dereks asks, worry increasing by the second.

Scott looks at him vacantly. “All of it.”

And then he’s falling, Derek’s arms catching him as he floats away into nothing.

When he wakes up he feels weak. He can’t even remember the last time he’s felt like this. It’s like every bit of strength has been sapped from his body. He can barely even lift his eyelids, let alone a limb. Everything aches and throbs as if he’s burning up with fever or been hit by a truck.

He lets out a half a grunt as he forces his eyes open. “Easy,” Derek says and after a moment Scott’s vision clears enough to make out the other wolf sitting in a chair at the foot of his bed. He’s in a hospital room hooked up to several monitors, the cheap sheets scratching against his skin.

“Stiles?” Scott asks, his voice a broken whisper.

Derek shakes his head and Scott’s heart does an unpleasant lurch. “He’s in surgery. It’s…they’re still working on him,” Derek says heavily.

Scott looks up at the ceiling and tries to breathe, tries to stop the horrible sense of dread bubbling in his stomach. “What happened?” he finally manages.

“You almost killed yourself,” Derek says it mildly, in that annoyingly superior way he does when he thinks you’ve done something really stupid that he would never, ever stoop to do. But Scott can sense his restless fear under the surface, masked by sarcasm and biting comments. “You’re lucky you’re an alpha and Stiles is just a human. You know better than to take that much pain. You drained yourself dry. They had to restart your heart and give you stitches. You literally had to be sewn back together Scott.”

“I didn’t want him to be in pain,” Scott says, wincing as he tries to get into a more upright position. It’s futile, his limbs refuse to cooperate.

“Right because two dead pack members is so much better than one.” Derek glares at him. “It’s going to take you a week to recover from this. You couldn’t wolf out right now even if it was a lunar eclipse on a full moon.”

Scott sighs. He knows Derek is right, but it doesn’t change anything. “He shouldn’t even be a part of all this.”

“Yeah well, he may not be anymore.” Scott looks up and finds a glimmer of darkness passing over Derek’s face. For all his bravado and stoicism, Derek has a soft spot for Stiles. They all do. And losing him…it would be like losing the sun.

There’s a buzzing next to him and he turns his head enough to see his phone light up. “Oh yeah, Lydia called. About forty-five times,” Derek says.

Scott bites back a groan and through sheer force of will pulls himself upward, reaching for the phone. Derek under-exaggerated. He has over a hundred text messages from Lydia, Malia, Chris, Isaac, Liam…pretty much every single member of the pack. Plus his voicemail is full and there’s a backlog of missed calls. Most of those are also from Lydia.

“She’s on her way,” Derek says, holding up his own phone. “She calls for updates every ten minutes.”

Lydia’s at school. Safe. Away from all this. Or at least she was.

“That’s Lydia,” Scott says, stifling a groan as he reaches for his pants.

“Whoa, hey, what are you doing?” Derek gets out of his chair, hand outstretched to stop him.

“I need to check on Stiles,” Scott says.

“Um, hell no,” Derek says firmly, pushing him back against the pillows. “You basically died. Again. You need to stay right here.”

His mom chooses that moment to enter and Scott feels immediate worry. “Mom, Stiles, is he—“

“Still in surgery,” she says, her face tight and drawn. ��How are you feeling? And don’t give me that ‘I’m fine’ crap. I swear if you were still a kid I would ground you forever for doing this to me again.”

But despite the sharpness of her words, her hands smooth his bedsheets, fussing with them and his IV line until she’s satisfied everything is in its place. “I’m sorry,” Scott says.

She sighs and squeezes his arm gently. “I know you are. I know you all are.”

Scott swings his eyes back to Derek. “The perimeter?”

“Isaac and Malia went to check it out. Chris is going to meet them,” Derek says. “He’ll make sure no one else gets hurt.”

For the first time all night Scott feels relief. If Chris is there, the rest of the pack is safe for now. He’ll prevent anyone else from from getting blown up or shot or stabbed. “I need to get back out there.”

“What you need,” Melissa corrects him, tucking the blankets a little tighter as if that will somehow keep him down, “is to rest. All of you,” she says, shooting a pointed look at Derek that says she is not, and has never been, fooled by his bravado. “Stiles is going to need you here when he wakes up.”

Scott does feel exhausted. It’s as if all the strength has disappeared and even his bones feel bruised.

“Where’s the Sheriff?” Scott asks, thinking guiltily of the continued agony they put that man through.

“He’s in the waiting room,” Melissa says.

Derek stands immediately. “I’ll go sit with him.”

Scott nods his thanks. The sheriff is pack. You don’t let family sit alone through something like this.

“I have to go,” Melissa tells him. “But you stay put all right? None of that disappearing from the hospital or anything. Let someone else handle it for a change.”

He equal parts wants to protest that he doesn’t do that…and do that very thing. But right now his body feels glued to the bed. “Mom, I’m sorry,” he says again, because he is. So sorry. For everything.

She runs a gentle hand through his hair. “It’s not your fault. Get some rest.”

He’s sure he won’t be able to sleep but it’s possible she’s slipped a sedative into his IV because when he opens his eyes again he can tell several hours have passed and now Liam is at the foot of his bed. “Hey man,” he says worriedly as Scott opens his eyes. “You okay?”

Better maybe, okay definitely not. His body feels less leaden and the itching in his wounds tells him they’re finally starting to knit back together. “I’m fine,” Scott says, this time managing to get himself into an upright position that somewhat resembles sitting, although it fucking hurts to do it. “Any word on Stiles?”

Liam shakes his head and Scott feels another spike of fear. It’s been too long, way too long. Scott grits his teeth and slides his legs over the side of the bed, ignoring his shaking limbs and throbbing head. “Oh, I—“ Liam blocks his path and looks at him sheepishly. “Derek says I’m not supposed to let you leave.”

“I’m your alpha,” Scott says, pulling a card he rarely does. He’s not here to order people around and make them do things they don’t want to. “You listen to me, not Derek.”

“Yeah, I know,” Liam says, not moving. “But uh, your mom also told me not to let you move and…” he leans close, his voice low, eyes darting to the door, “I’m way more scared of her than I am of you.”

He’s an alpha werewolf and a grown adult, but apparently his mother stills runs his life. Perfect. Normally he’d ignore Liam and leave anyway, but he’s pretty sure a stiff breeze could knock him over right now so if it comes to a fight, Liam is definitely going to win.

The door to his room opens and Chris comes in looking battle weary. “Is everyone all right?” Scott asks immediately.

“Everyone’s fine. We’ve got guards all around the perimeter, human and supernatural. No one’s getting through the line again tonight,” Chris says. “We swept the whole area and didn’t find any more devices. I left Malia and Isaac out there. Theo was on his way too.”

Scott feels a modicum of relief. “Thank you,” he says, throat thick with grief and fear.

Chris nods to Liam. “Give us a minute?”

Liam heads out the door looking relieved. It must not be super fun to be on babysitting duty. How are you?” Chris asks, stepping closer. “Heard you did a number on yourself.”

Scott finds he can’t speak, tears rising up to the surface. He’s tired. Tired of fighting. Tired of losing. Tired of always being one step behind Monroe and her minions. Tired of worrying day and night that if he makes one wrong move he’ll lose everyone he loves. Tired of being the one everyone turns to for answers, when he clearly doesn’t have any.

And now his best friend, a person who deserves more than anything to be safe and happy, is dying somewhere in this hospital and there’s nothing he can do about it.

He folds, crumbling in on himself, hot tear stinging his eyes. Arms come around him, pulling him in for a tight hug, holding him like he’s a child again. “This is not your fault,” Chris says softly. “None of this is your fault.”

But it is. It all is.

Scott finds himself clutching at Chris’ jacket, fingers clinging to the rough fabric, desperately needing something to hold onto. “I can’t lose him,” he manages to choke out.

Chris tightens his hold. “Stiles is a fighter. He may not be supernatural, but he’s overcome worse than this. You have to hold onto that.”

He wants to. God he wants to believe that everything is going to be all right. But things seem so bleak and hopeless. They’ve been fighting for so long and all they’ve got to show for it is battle weary fighters, some of them little more than kids, and a mountain of loss.

Chris continues to speak, cutting through Scott’s strife and self pity. “You’re in the middle of a war. And I know how hopeless it seems. But you have right on your side. You have faith. You have love. All the other side has is fear. That’s a powerful motivator; but love, that’s a lot stronger. That’s an anchor. You know that. Allison knew that. Stiles knows that. So hold on. Hold on and rise up stronger to fight again.”

Scott takes a few shaky breaths and finally pulls away. Chris puts a hand on his shoulder and squeezes gently. “You good?”

Scott nods and swipes at his face, wiping away the moisture there. The door opens and his mom walks in. “Oh, hey Chris,” she says in surprise. Her eyes find Scott. “Stiles is out of surgery.”

Scott sits up straighter. “Is he…?”

“Broken femur, three broken ribs, dislocated shoulder, internal organ damage, and a hell of a lot of blood loss,” she says frankly. “It would be easier to list things that weren’t damaged.”

“Is he…” Scott swallows, afraid of the answer, “Is he going to be all right?”

“They’ve got him in ICU. It’s touch and go right now.”

“Can I see him?”

Melissa’s eyes shift briefly to Chris and then back to Scott. “Honey they haven’t even let his dad go up yet. And you aren’t back to one hundred percent yet either.”

Waiting is agony. Scott’s only comfort over the next few days is that Derek frequently sneaks up to ICU and back out again giving them essentially the same report every time; “He looks like a ghost. He’s still breathing. His heart is still beating.”

People drift in and out of his hospital room, Lydia, Theo, Liam, Malia, Isaac, Corey, Mason, all of them stuck in some sort of zombie limbo, unable to find any light or joy in the situation.

Scott still hasn’t seen Noah. According to Derek he hasn’t left Stiles’ side, not a surprise to any of them.

Scott feels himself improve physically day by day, but emotionally he’s a wreck. With every passing hour he feels the noose of guilt pull tighter around his neck. Even after his mom finally relents and gets him discharged, (at least this time they don’t have to explain his miraculous healing, there hasn’t been any) he stays at the hospital, wearing holes in the waiting room floor along with the rest of the pack.

He’s beyond grateful to Chris who has completely taken charge of their refugees, controlling the border, checking in with other packs out of town, even calling the London pack and advising them that they might need backup.

It’s three days later when Melissa comes briskly into the waiting room, a tentative smile on her face. “He’s awake,” she says and the room lets out a collective sigh. “He talked to Noah for a few minutes. They’re running some more tests now but things look good.” She takes in the bedraggled and traumatized group. “You all should go home.”

A few of them do, reluctantly and only at Scott’s insistence. Malia and Isaac have been splitting time between the hospital and patrolling and neither of them look like they’ve slept or had real food in days. But Derek still doesn’t go anywhere and Lydia is glued to the hospital as well.

It’s another day before Stiles is finally moved out of ICU and they’re allowed to see him one at a time. Scott lets Lydia go first and she returns, eyes even redder than before. “You okay?” Scott asks.

She nods but he can tell she’s struggling. “He just looks so…” she can’t finish and it lodges a lump in his throat as he walks down the hall to his best friend’s room.

He knows what Lydia means immediately. Just looking at Stiles is painful. He leg is elevated and he’s so pale he practically blends into the sheets and pillows.

Noah is sitting by his bedside looking completely exhausted and Scott feels a familiar jolt of guilt in his gut. “Sheriff,” he says softly by way of greeting.

“Hey Scott.” The sheriff’s voice is rough. “He just went back to sleep.”

“That’s okay,” Scott says, eyes trained on Stiles’ face. It’s enough to see him, to hear his heartbeat, slow but steady.

“How are you?” Noah asks. “I heard you got pretty beat up too.”

“I’m fine,” Scott says. He’s definitely not telling the sheriff that the most he’s managed to do in the last couple days is pop his claws and even that was a huge effort that had him doubled over and panting afterward. “Sheriff Stilinski I—“

Noah shakes his head. “Don’t even go there,” he says. “We all know who’s to blame for this and it sure as hell isn’t you.”

Then why does it feel like his fault? “He should have gone back to D.C.,” Scott says softly. “He would have been safe.”

“He was going to work for the FBI Scott,” Noah says. “That’s not exactly a guarantee either. And he’s only ever wanted to be here with you.”

The words do little to soothe Scott’s anguished spirit, but his time is running out, other people want to come and visit. He reaches out a hand to touch Stiles’ arm, a single spot that isn’t covered in tubes or bandages. He pulls, gently. There’s not much pain, the morphine and other drugs are working, but he takes what little there is.

He immediately feels light headed and breathless, like someone punched him right in the gut. His knees go weak, but he locks them into place and doesn’t stop until Stiles’ face smoothes out completely and he relaxes into the pillows.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers out, voice choking on tears that are once again threatening to fall.

He turns to go but spots dance before his eyes and he reaches out, grabbing onto the IV pole for support.

“Scott,” the sheriff is on his feet, hands reaching for him, his haggard face full of new concern.

“I’m okay,” Scott gasps, letting the IV pole go, trying to steady himself on his feet. “It’s fine.”

And then Derek is there, shoving an arm under his shoulder. “Are you trying to kill yourself?” he asks in exasperation.

“How did you—“

“I heard your heartbeat,” Derek says. “I had a feeling you would do something like this. Come on, you need to sit down.”

“What happened?” Lydia asks as Derek dumps a practically boneless Scott in a waiting room chair.

“Someone decided to take Stiles’ pain. Again,” Derek says. It comes out as a growl. Derek is furious.

Scott’s head is spinning and his chest has gone tight again. “Scott what the hell is wrong with you?” Malia asks.

“He doesn’t deserve to be in pain,” Scott groans.

“Well neither do you!” Liam says. “Scott if you can’t help protect the pack, that’s really bad!”

“Yeah, not to put any pressure on you, but Liam is kind of a crappy alpha,” Malia says, not nearly as quietly as she thinks.

“I’m right here!” Liam fires back indignantly.

“He’s moody,” Malia mouths, eyes wide as she points at him to convey her point.

“Scott you need to go home,” Derek cuts in.

“I can’t leave,” Scott manages. “He needs me.”

“He has literally the entire rest of the pack here,” Malia says.

“Scott,” Lydia’s voice is soft and she puts a hand on his arm, large eyes worried. They seem to be in that state constantly lately. Just another thing to add to his list. “You can go. We’ve got this. We won’t let anything happen to him.”

They don’t leave him much choice, especially not when Derek and Liam haul him up and out to the car. He’s really going to have to work on instilling more loyalty in Liam, because one menacing glare from Derek and he’s following the former alpha’s bidding like a lapdog.

Scott’s asleep before they even leave the hospital and he doesn’t wake up until morning, still fully clothed in his bed, minus his sneakers. There’s a note from Derek threatening him with further bodily harm if he shows up at the hospital before noon and a sheepish text from Liam apologizing for his part in last night’s debacle. And for accidentally bashing Scott’s head into a doorframe as he carried him upstairs.

It’s actually a few days before he gets back to the hospital. He wants to check the borders himself, make sure they are well and truly safe for now. And that steamrolls into him checking in with the new pack members, the other refugees and scraps of packs that have made their way to the safe haven Beacon Hills has become.

Lydia updates him practically hourly and he knows that Stiles is staying awake for longer periods, has managed to keep down solid food, is now able to feed himself, and hold a conversation.

And still Scott doesn’t return. Somehow it was easier when Stiles was still unconscious. He didn’t have to look at his friend’s eyes, to see the pain and what was likely anger there. Because how could Stiles not secretly hate him? If it wasn’t for him, for the bite, they would have gone on living their lives none the wiser. Stiles would be an FBI Agent, he would be a vet, and they would have just…lived.

Now it feels like they’re cursed.

The reasons that kept him at the hospital are the same ones that now keep him away. It’s weird. Any one of their misguided guidance counselors would probably tell him he needs to talk about that and examine it, but there’s no time. There isn’t time for anything but making sure everyone is safe.

Until his phone buzzes with a message from Derek. He’s asking for you.

And he knows, he can’t put it off any longer.

He waits until night, until he gets confirmation that everyone has gone home. Everyone except Derek. Derek won’t leave Stiles unprotected.

Scott pauses outside the door, a pit in his stomach that feels like a rock. He takes a deep breath and pushes the door open. “Scottttiiiieeee.” Stiles is all smiles and Scott can smell the drugs in his blood that are keeping him like that.

“Hey buddy,” Scott says, trying to force a smile onto his own face. Maybe in his drugged up state Stiles won’t notice that it’s fake as hell.

Derek is standing broodily in the corner and Scott flashes him a grateful look. If he can’t be with Stiles, he’s glad someone is.

Stiles is apparently still with it enough to sense a conversation going on without him and he frowns. “Are you the reason I have a personal bodyguard?” he asks.

“Someone tried to blow you up Stiles,” Scott says.

“Us,” Stiles says, holding up a wobbly finger of correction. “They tried to blow us up. I was just the only one who didn’t magically heal.”

“Yeah, I know,” Scott says, the weariness in his soul pulling him further downward at this reminder of Stiles’ human fragility.

Derek chooses that moment to slip out the door.

Scott rubs his hands on his jeans, uncertainty running through him like a river. Stiles may be drugged, but he’s still Stiles. “You want to talk about it?” he asks.

Scott’s head snaps up and he meets his friend’s gaze, eyes sharp and knowing. “About what?” Scott asks, still trying to come off as fine.

“About why you haven’t come by in days so that I had to deal with Grumpy Cat’s rather intense presence at my bedside vigil. About why you’re standing there castigating yourself over something that isn’t your fault.”

“I’m not—“

“Scott.” Stiles gives him a look.

He knows. Of course he knows.They’ve been best friends their whole lives, he knows Scott better than Scott knows himself.

“This was…it was way too close this time Stiles,” Scott says on a rush of air. “I was holding you, feeling you die and there was nothing I could do. And all I could think about—“

He chokes on his own words, but fortunately Stiles never runs out of them. “You thought about Allison,” he says seriously.

“And Aidan, and Boyd, and Erica,” Scott continues. “Deucalion. Brett. Lori. Stiles…the list…it’s too long. And if you get added to it…”

“Then it will have been my choice,” Stiles says and it stops Scott cold. “Because I chose to stay and defend my friends and family. My choice Scott. Not yours.”

Oh. Oh.

Stiles is still going. “You didn’t choose to get the bite. But you chose everything that came after. You chose to fight for the right things Scott. You chose not to be a monster. Not all monsters do monstrous things, right? Well I chose this. I chose Beacon Hills. I choose this pack. I choose you. I choose Lydia. I…” he pulls a face, “begrudgingly choose Derek. Because he’s big and menacing and good at keeping bad guys away.”

Scott cracks a real smile, a sliver of light stealing its way back into his soul. “He is good at that.”

“I do not choose Theo,” Stiles continues, on a roll now. “Ever. For any reason. I choose Jackson if and only if he stops being an asshole.”

“I got it Stiles,” Scott says, face begrudgingly pulling into a full on grin.

“You sure? Because I can keep going. Liam I can take or leave depending on the day and how annoying he’s being.”

“Stiles, I got it!” Scott says, a genuine chuckle sneaking out.

“There he is,” Stiles says, a smile on his own face. “That’s the Scott McCall I know. No more Gloomy Gus around here all right?”

“Stiles you’re in a hospital bed. You broke practically every bone in your body and almost bled out. I have a reason to be a little upset.”

“But I’m fine.” He looks down at his bandage covered body and reconsiders. “Well I will be. And so will you. Not that you didn’t also try to kill yourself on my behalf.” Stiles raises his eyebrows and Scott winces. “Oh yeah. Derek filled me in. On everything.”

“I just…didn’t want you to be in pain.”

“Yeah, well, while I appreciate the ever present existence of pain drain, you really don’t need to sacrifice yourself on my behalf. Again.” Stiles looks down as his hands. “But thanks. If you guys hadn’t gotten me here so fast…”

“Yeah,” Scott says, his eyes burning again. He’s cried more in the last week than he has since Peter bit him.

“You don’t need to take all this on by yourself Scott,” Stiles says quietly. “And you can’t protect everyone from everything.”

It’s a bitter thing to hear and he swallows it down painfully. It’s not like it’s the first time he’s been reminded of this, but he so badly wants to keep them all safe, to take them all back to a time before fangs and claws and glowing eyes ruled their lives.

“Scott?” Stiles says, eyes searching him for a response.

“I just want you to be okay,” Scott says heavily.

“I know,” Stiles says.

The two of them sit in the silence a moment, all the unsaid things, the weight of fighting a war they didn’t start hanging in the space between them. “I did take down two guys though,” Stiles finally says, breaking the tension.

“Yeah with your stupid bat,” Scott says, rolling his eyes.

"Oh it’s definitely time for me to learn how to use a gun,” Stiles says. “A big one. Possibly also a flame thrower. Or a tank. Scott, I think we should get a tank.”

“I’m not letting you out again in anything less than full body armor,” Scott says, sinking down into a chair by his bed.

“Oh! Yes. Body armor. We’ve got to have the budget for that somewhere right? Who knows that? Argent. He has to have some connections on that right? Legal ones?”

Scott sinks down into a chair beside Stiles’ bed and listens to him chatter on, feeling his own eyelids grow heavy.

“Scott? Scottie?”

“Mhhmmm,” Scott murmurs, body relaxing as sleep pulls him downward.

His best friend is alive. For now the border is safe. The pack is strong. And for the first time in a long time, soothed by the sound of Stiles’ voice, he falls into peaceful sleep.

#Teen Wolf #Scott McCall #Stiles Stilinski #Derek Hale #Stiles whump #Broken Bones #Blast injuries #Blood #Hurt Stiles #Emotional Hurt/Comfort #Lots of feels #Scott is a good friend #Scott is a good Alpha #Malia has the best lines by far #Teen Wolf Fanfic #Where Hope is Left So Incomplete

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