#ignore that one curtain decided to randomly disappear

[occultradio]

I really needed to see them be goofy after todays flashback

Belly hits were off limits

[fridayfirefly]

All For The Investigation

Read All For The Investigation on AO3

Masterlist

By Tim’s calculations, there was an 87% certain that Marinette Dupain-Cheng was the Parisian former hero Ladybug. However, 87% was not 100%, so Bruce required further investigation. Damian was stuck with the job.

Except, Damian knew that stuck wasn't exactly the right word. Stuck implied that he was displeased with the situation. Damian wasn't displeased. Marinette Dupain-Cheng was the most pleasant person in all of Gotham Academy. If Damian had to choose anyone to be forced to spend time with, he would choose Marinette. Though he grumbled about being forced to spend time with plebeians (for the benefit of his brothers, who would mercilessly tease Damian if they even suspected that he had a crush), Damian was quite pleased by the assignment.

Given that Marinette was in his history class, it was quite easy to arrange a situation in which they were forced to be in each others' proximities. When their teacher announced that there would be an upcoming group project with randomly assigned partnerships, it was simple for Damian to break into her office and switch around some of the names. When the partnerships were announced and Marinette and Damian were paired together, Damian made his move.

"Dupain-Cheng, if you would like to work on the project over the weekend, we can do so at my house."

"Sounds good, Wayne, but you know, you can just call me Marinette," said Marinette with a smile.

Damian felt flustered, which was a very bad sign. He never felt anything less than perfectly composed. "Then you may call me Damian."

Marinette's smile got even bigger. There was a feeling in his chest that, had it been caused by anyone else, Damian would have suspected it to be a complication of the broken ribs from Joker's last attack. "Let me give you my number, and we can plan a meeting this weekend. Would Saturday work for you?"

Damian nodded as he handed Marinette his phone. "My schedule is free on Saturday."

"Great!" chirped Marinette. She plugged in her number, then posed for a picture, explaining that it was, "For the contact photo."

And if in the privacy of his bedroom, Damian stared at that contact photo for twenty-minutes straight, it was just for research purposes. Just to compare Marinette's facial structure to that of Ladybug. Completely normal investigative business.

The next morning, Damian found his way to the bedroom of his most tolerable brother. "Grayson. Can I confide in you without any of the information getting to anyone else?"

Richard glanced up from his laptop. "Sure thing, Baby Bird." He patted a spot on the bed next to him,

"Don't call me that. I despise nicknames," grumbled Damian. He took a seat, staring at the wall in front of him, still weighing the risk versus reward of talking to Richard. If his brother had some technique for extinguishing romantic interest it would solve Damian's problem. However, if either Drake or Todd got word of Damian's crush there was no doubt in Damian's mind that they would never let him hear the end of it.

"So what's on your mind?"

"It pertains to the girl in my who Drake suspects to be Ladybug, Marinette Dupain-Cheng. She has become difficult to investigate. I have found myself unable to observe her objectively."

Richard frowned. "I'm not sure I know what you mean. Is it something that she did that's bothering you?"

Damian searched for the right words to explain the situation. He was not usually so tongue-tied, but the proper words seemed to escape him at every turn. "Dupain-Cheng is not what I expected. I assumed that it would be a simple task, to observe her and determine whether she has any connection to the Parisian superhero. However, I have found it difficult to concentrate on my mission when I am around her."

"You find it difficult to concentrate when you're around her. How so?"

Damian gritted his teeth. He didn't want to spell out his crush so obviously, but Richard seemed incapable of looking between the lines. "I have found myself preoccupied with trivial things like getting to know her personality, rather than investigating her background. She makes me feel... flustered."

Damian could see the moment that Richard made the connection. His brother's face lit up as he exclaimed, "You have a crush on her?!"

"Quiet!" snapped Damian. "This does not leave this room. I need to learn how to get rid of it, so I can get back to completing the mission."

Richard was grinning ear to ear. "That's not how crushes work. You can't just snap your fingers and have them disappear. The only thing that can get rid of a crush is time. Or sometimes if they get a haircut that kills the feeling. But mostly it just takes time."

"I cannot afford to wait for these feelings to fade. I'll look into scheduling her a haircut." Damian stood up, resolved to get rid of his crush before Marinette came over later that day to work on their project.

"No wait," Richard grabbed Damian's arm. "I doubt that your attraction to her is so shallow that a haircut would destroy the feelings you have for her. This is something that you'll have to talk to her about."

Damian frowned. "Perhaps I should give the mission to someone else. Jon could transfer to Gotham Academy for the semester. His detective skills are lacking but his judgment would be less clouded than mine. If I ignore her for long enough I'm sure that I can evade talking about my feelings."

"Why don't you just ignore the mission for a few weeks while you get to know her."

Damian fixed Richard with a death glare. "I cannot ignore this mission. Father gave it to me personally."

"How about twenty-four hours? You spend the next twenty-four hours in getting-to-know-her mode rather than background-check mode and at the end of it, we can regroup and decide what to do next. If you actually get to know her, you'll better understand the depths of your feelings. Once you have that understanding, you'll be able to see if waiting out your crush is a viable option or if you need to pass on the responsibilities to someone else."

It wasn't the perfect solution, but it was better than anything Damian had come up with. Anything that could potentially alleviate Damian's inability to focus on the investigation was worth trying. "Fine," Damian replied curtly. "Thank you for your assistance."

"No problem," said Richard. "You know, I would love to get to meet Marinette sometime."

"Don't push your luck," grumbled Damian, ignoring Richard's laughter as he stood up and left the room. There would be no way to hide the fact that Marinette was coming over to the Manor from his family. There was also no way that his family wouldn't intrude upon Damian and Marinette as they worked. However, if he explained everything beforehand and phrased everything in precisely the right way, he might be able to pass off his odd behavior towards Marinette as a part of his investigation. Damian pulled out his phone and composed a text to send to the family groupchat.

Damian: Dupain-Cheng is coming to the Manor at approximately 22:00 to work on a history project. I will be covertly conducting my investigation. From what I have gathered, she would respond better to subtle questioning, rather than a straightforward interrogation.

Tim: wait does subtle interrogation mean that you'll be flirting with her???

Jason: I need to see this

Steph: I'm willing to bet money that his flirting offends Marinette so much she storms out of the Manor before Damian can finish the mission

Dick: No way. I'll bet 20 dollars that his flirting works too well

Steph: done

Damian huffed, half tempted to call off his meeting with Marinette. His siblings were insufferable.

Damian: Please refrain from intervening. Confirming that Dupain-Cheng is Ladybug is a vital first step in determining whether the Justice League needs to interfere in the affairs of the Order of the Miraculous.

Bruce: Damian is correct. No one will bother him while he is working with Marinette.

Damian smirked as he turned his phone off. His plan wasn't foolproof, of course, but a direct order from Bruce to not interfere would force his siblings to be more subtle about spying on him and Marinette. The chance of him being interrupted was significantly decreased.

Damian got everything set up in the den, which was only ever used on family movie night. It was perfectly situated for the task at hand - a room small enough to be classed as cozy but big enough to not feel cramped. It was out of the way, surrounded by other equally unused rooms, so his siblings would have no excuse for lurking in the hallway outside. Damian brought in snacks, chargers, and a few books from the Wayne Manor library on Renaissance Art, the topic of their project.

Marinette arrived promptly at 2 in the afternoon, holding a Tupperware container full of gingerbread cookies, with a smile on her face. "Hi, Damian. I brought cookies."

None of his planning accounted for this moment, for first laying eyes on Marinette. Damian froze up, desperate to put the right words in the right order. "Welcome to Wayne Manor, Marinette. I have everything set up in the den if you'll just follow me."

"Sure." Marinette toed off her black boots and arranged them on the shoe tray next to the door. She was left in sage green cat-print socks that matched the rest of her outfit, a pine green sweater and black jeans. Damian couldn't help but wonder if she knit the sweater herself - Marinette's talent for designing was well-known throughout Gotham Academy, as it was what got her accepted into the prestigious high school in the first place.

Marinette followed Damian through the Manor, complimenting little details that Damian had never noticed before - the pattern of the curtains, the bay window in a sitting room that Damian had never bothered to enter, the family pictures that lined the wall in the hallway. Marinette made it seem so obvious to pay attention to those little details. Damian wished that he could see the Manor for the first time through her eyes and feel the same amazement that she felt as she oohed and awed over the decadence that Damian had considered banal.

Damian was so captivated by Marinette that he almost missed the fact that Drake and Brown were lurking in the study across the hall from the den. A text to his father about the gravity of his mission would be enough to get them sent away on some inconsequential but time-consuming task. Damian would have to find an inconspicuous time to pull out his phone during their work on the project to let his father know about their intrusion.

"Now I know why you call it Wayne Manor. This place is huge." Marinette shrugged off her backpack and set it down on the coffee table next to her container of cookies.

"Its size is entirely unnecessary for ordinary life," agreed Damian. "However, it makes for very challenging games of hide-and-seek."

Marinette giggled. "That sounds like fun. You'll have to invite me next time you play."

"I'll make sure of it." Damian smiled, surprised to find that his happiness wasn't forced. He rarely engaged in childish behavior, and even more rarely did he find any enjoyment in it. Yet the mental image of playing a child's game with Marinette was pleasant to him. The feelings he had for her were deeper than Damian anticipated.

The pair got to work on their project. Damian sent out the text to his father as soon as he opened his laptop, leaving Marinette under the impression that he was researching sources. A series of irritable texts in the family groupchat confirmed the fact that Drake and Brown had been removed from their hiding spot.

"Do you want to try a cookie?" asked Marinette, pushing the Tupperware towards Damian.

"Thank you." Damian took one, just to be polite. Growing up in the League of Assassins, he never really had a taste for sweets. Alfred's baking was the extent of what he would tolerate. He took a bite - small, to back up his claim that he already ate if it turned out to be inedible. Surprisingly, it was nearly as good as Alfred's gingerbread cookies, and those were tailer made to Damian's taste. The cookies were heavy on the ginger and cloves, just as Damian liked. "These are delicious," Damian professed.

Marinette blushed. "Thanks. I know they taste a little different than store-bought gingerbread. My parents make them with a lot of ginger."

"These are much superior to store-bought cookies."

"Thanks. You know, you're a lot nicer outside of school. You always seemed kind of grumpy in class."

"I'm not a fan of the state-mandated curriculum."

Marinette nodded. "I get what you mean. I barely have any room in my schedule for my design classes, with all the mandatory classes that Gotham Academy makes us take. I'm lucky that I have my internship, otherwise, I think I would go crazy, taking so many classes that I don't care about."

"Your internship is with Audrey Bourgeoise, isn't it?"

Marinette nodded. "I was friends with her daughter, back in Paris. Originally it was going to be a four-year internship in New York City, but I renegotiated some of the terms so that I could do the first two years in Paris, then the last two in Gotham, while she established the new branch of her company."

"You renegotiated the terms of a prestigious internship at the age of fourteen? Weren't you afraid of losing it if you pushed too hard?"

Marinette shrugged, nonchalant as if it were normal for an intern to make such a bold move. "I didn't want to leave Paris. My whole life was there. I wasn't ready to just pick up and move to a new country."

"What changed that you were able to come to Gotham?"

"There were a lot of reasons. Hawkmoth was the biggest one. I felt nervous about leaving my family and friends behind when he was terrorizing the city. After he was defeated I felt a lot more comfortable leaving."

That aligned with the theory that Marinette was Ladybug. "What were the other reasons?"

"My age was one. I didn't feel ready to leave home at fourteen and my parents didn't like the idea of me leaving home that young either. Another big one was the fact that I didn't have a good handle on my personal style. I was worried that designing full-time in Audrey Bourgeoise's office would cause me to lose my originality. The worst thing I could imagine was watering down my designs to appeal to the rest of the fashion industry."

"Your conviction is impressive. Most in your position would not worry about selling out to obtain such a highly coveted position."

"Audrey said the same thing, though when she said it, she spoke it with annoyance, not admiration. I've never been highly motivated by wide-spread success. I don't need to be a household name to feel content with life. I just want to design clothes that I'm proud of."

The fluttering feeling in Damian's chest returned with full force, alongside a tendril of anger at the unfairness of the situation. Here was the most perfect person Damian had ever laid his eyes on, and he was forced to pick her apart piece by piece to figure out her deepest darkest secrets. Damian didn't know much about relationships, but this didn't seem like the way they were supposed to go.

"You look upset," Marinette's observation was tinged by the worry in her voice.

"I'm not upset," he assured her. "I was just wondering how I never noticed how interesting you are."

Marinette flushed, her cheeks turning pink. "What does that mean?"

Damian shrugged. While his nonchalant attitude was all a bluff, his admiration of her accomplishments was all real. "Most of our classmates feel accomplished with the most conventional of achievements. Yet you secured an internship at the side of one of the most renowned fashion critics in the world and you still stay humble about it. You weren't blind-sighted by the incredible opportunity. You fought to maintain your values, no matter if it meant losing something priceless."

Marinette's blush deepened. "That's just who I am. It's not special, it's me."

"It is you," agreed Damian. "And it is special."

Marinette gave him a wide-eyed look, shocked by the emotion in his words. "We should get back to work," she said, self-consciously rubbing one cheek with the sleeve of her green wool sweater.

"Of course," Damian amicably agreed. He had pushed far enough for intel and had managed to get to know her a little better in the process. His flirting wasn't as blatant as it could have been, but it got the job done. Richard had said that once he knew the depths of his feelings he would know what to do. Richard was right. Damian's feelings were seemingly endless, a maze of all the things he liked about Marinette, in which every corner he turned was a new quirk that he couldn't un-notice. Yet Damian didn't want to pass on the responsibility of investigating Marinette to anyone else. He wanted a reason to spend time with her.

It wasn't the best situation. Damian wished that he could get to know her organically. However, Damian wasn't the type to dwell on the could-have-been. He had an opportunity to get to know Marinette right in front of him and he wasn't going to let it go.

Hours later, after Marinette went home, Richard stopped him in the hallway. "So what did you learn?"

"My investigation has proven inconclusive. I need to further get to know Marinette Dupain-Cheng if I want to uncover her identity. For research purposes, of course."

Richard laughed. "Of course."

[melaninpozp]

Something seems Wrong( Mingi x fem reader!)

( y/n stays at this hotel for 3 days and the woman at the counter gives you this scary look before handing you the key. Little did you know, your shower would randomly stop at weird times, things would fall off the counter when you weren’t looking, and you notice that some of your panties are gone. Until one night, you’re asleep and a man named Song Mingi is hovering over you while you’re sleeping.

WARNINGS: smut, degrading, breath play( safely) , and dirty talk.

••

“Hello, I would like to stay for a 3 days please.”You say having a backpack on your back and a suitcase next to you, smiling at the lady from across the counter.

The lady slowly looks up and raises an eyebrow, her eyes immediately turning a black color.

“A week you say?”The lady says and bends down, smirking and grabbing a key that read the name:” R14”. The R sorts being scraped up and having the letter ‘ M’ next to you but you ignore it.

“Yes, ma’am. Thank you so much.”Y/n gives the lady a nice look before grabbing her suitcase handle and walking around the hotel upstairs , walking down the hall, not seeing many people in the hotel as usual.

“211..”Y/n reads to herself, passing by all the hotel rooms, going further more down the hall and finally finding “214.”

“Ah! Here it is!”Y/n whispers to herself before reaching in her pocket and opening the hotel room with ease.

Y/n slides the key back into her pocket and walks into her assigned room, turning on the lights as they’re a little dim but not to much to worry. As you bring your backpack and suitcase in, the air settles and begins getting cold, but then again, you ignore it.

“This isn’t too bad..”Y/n says to herself and closes the door behind her and slides her shoes off and turning on the tv.

You look over at the time as you widen your eyes at how late it is.

“How the fuck is it 1 am already..”Y/n says and sighs before standing up and letting the tv play in the background.

Y/n decided to take a shower before going to sleep, As she steps into the bathroom she notices the soap bar on the ground, being face down.

“What..”You say to yourself before reaching down and setting the soap bar onto the sink counter.

You turn around and turn on your shower water before walking out and grabbing your oversized t-shirt and undergarments.

As you walk back into the bathroom, you notice the shower water has stopped and the soap bar is back on the ground.

“What the actual fuck..”Y/n says and frowns, grabbing the soap and putting it back onto the counter, turning back once again and turning the shower water on.

As you slide your clothes and undergarments off, you step into the shower and begin washing your body with regular smelling Dove soap.

You begin to wash under your arms but the shower water stops, Your heart almost dropping at the sound of things dropping outside the bathroom.

“Hello!?”Y/n says and looks up at the shower head as it drips warm droplets.

You hear no response but things randomly keep falling, You clench your jaw and slowly pull your curtain open to the side and step out, grabbing your towel and drying off.

“I’m calling the cops if you don’t leave right now..”Y/n calls out as the door is still closed and she continues drying off while watching the bathroom door.

The rustling outside the bathroom door suddenly stops.

You slowly step towards the bathroom door that is currently closed and open it slowly, looking out at your room and seeing nothing is messed up.

You look around with the towel still wrapped around you, making sure no is there before sliding the towel off and putting on your bra and panties. Forgetting about the oversized shirt and still feeling a little paranoid.

“If anything is in here with me, please don’t kill me..I’m just staying here for the week, I really don’t want any trouble..”Y/n speaks out to the invisibly person that might be in the room with her.

You hear a gust of wind past you and you gasp, stepping back and covering your mouth.

“P-please..”Y/n covers her mouth in fear, landing over her bed and looking around.

“What the fuck was that...”Y/n says to herself, shaking a little and not feeling the ‘ figures’ presence any longer.

As you begin to feel less paranoid, You had already shut the lights off and kept the tv on, Covering up and falling asleep.

NEXT MORNING:

It’s about 10:27 am in the morning once you woke up, You slowly sit up and notice it’s really cloudy and looking as if it’s going to rain outside.

“Looks like I’ll just stay in this all day.”Y/n says to herself and lays back down before seeing 2 red eyes stare at her while next to her.

“Yo, What the fuck!”Y/n gasps and stands up looking at the red eyes and they suddenly disappear. Going away for quite a while.

“I have to get out of here..”Y/n says to herself before turning back and looking through her drawer of panties and notice most of them are gone, She brought at least 7 pair but there were 3 now..Strange.

You raise an eyebrow at how suspicious that looks and you sit back on your bed, trying to contemplate what has been going on for the 2 days.

First, It was the door handle almost falling off...The cold are turning on once someone walks in...The soap bar on the floor and The shower randomly turning off... my panties gone...and a pair of red eyes looking at me..

Y/n shakes her head and can’t seem to keep her eyes open but covers back up, being a little paranoid for half the day and looking around, not knowing what to do.

•••

It just turned 9:21 pm and you had already ordered food up to your room, The waiter leaving in almost an instant as he saw something moving behind you. And the waiter didn’t tell you?

“Weird..”You whisper to yourself and close the door, having the bag of freshly hot food in one hand.

As you walk back to your bed, you begin seeing the tv flick through the channel, But what you didn’t notice was that the remote was moving and clicking the ‘ Prev” button.

Suddenly the flicking of the remote stops and tv stops stops changing channels back and forth.

You begin feeling some type of presence behind you and rest their hand on your hip, making you gasp and stand in place.

“I come in peace please..I told you I don’t want to harm you or anything. I come in peace.”Y/n says, slightly shaking.

A deep voice says,

“Turn around..now. I don’t care if you come in peace or not. Just turn around for me, angel..”The voice says and you slowly nod your head, turning around and keeping your head down. As you stared at the ground, you began seeing the man’s black dress shoes and his black dress pants, As your eyes begin traveling up his body you see that he’s wearing a black necklace that says” M”..

Suddenly you began to remember that your assigned key had an ‘ M’ on it also..

“You look up at me when I’m your presence. You don’t look down at my shoes like I’m some pest, I only do that because you’re so fucking short..”The deep voice laughs and you suddenly look up, seeing those same red eyes and immediately backing up, looking at how tall he is.

“My name is Mingi, don’t ever disrespect me..”He says.

Y/n still looks into his eyes, not saying anything. Being in complete shock.

“Awe, you’re intimidated and shocked by how tall I am?”He says and begins to slowly step towards you.

You shake your head slowly and fold your arms, Still in your bra and panties from earlier this morning.

The figure completely appears and lifts your chin up, clenching his jaw.

“What the hell did I just say, can’t do a thing right, can you, little y/n?”The man says and grabs your jaw, shoving you onto the bed, making you gasp at how strong he is.

“Don’t run away from me, I asked you question, whore”He says with his deep voice.

“N-no sir...I cant do anything right..”Y/n says and looks into the man’s eyes.

“In the presence of who?”He says and pulls you by your legs, making you gasp once again.

“In the presence of Mingi, sir..”You say and look up at him.

“Good girl, do you promise to not freak out or tell anyone that I’m here? Do you also promise to call me daddy, sir, or mister?”He stares at you.

“Yes sir, I promise.”Y/n says softly, nodding her head and beginning to comply.

“That’s a good girl..”He says.

“You’re the one who stole my panties and made the soap fall.. and stopped the sho-“You begin to say but Mingi quickly stops you.

He clenches his jaw and smirks, pinning you down onto the bed and staring down at you.

“Yes, so what if I did.”He says, he smirks and rips your panties off.

You cover your mouth, noticing how wet you are.

“N-nothing is wrong with it sir, I-i just find you very attractive now that you’re here..”Y/n stutters and looks down at how wet she is, Mingi still hovering over her.

“Do I have permission to touch you?”He raises an eyebrow.

“Yes sir..”You nod your head and begin feeling his hands go up your waist.

“Open those legs for me, sweetheart.”He says and kneels in front of you, opening your legs and bending them back by your head. Making you gasp at how rough he is.

You gasp softly and begin feeling his tongue glide against your clit, wiggling it around and watching you fall apart in front of him.

“Oh fuck, sir..”Y/n begins to moan softly and play with her hard nipples through her bra.

“That’s right, slut, play with those nipples”He says and looks up at you , gliding his tongue against your clit more and running his hands up your stomach.

“Fuck baby”Y/n moans out and runs a hand through his red hair.

Mingi suddenly stands up and grabs you by your throat, shoving you against the wall and slowly kissing you, moving one of his big hands down your pussy and gently rubbing your clit.

“Oh f-fuck..”You moan through the kiss.

“Yeah baby? Is that the spot? You’re letting some random fucking man pleasure you like this..”Mingi whispers down in your ear, rubbing your clit faster.

“It feels so nice sir, oh fuck..”You moan out , looking up at him and feeling his fingers slide inside of you.

“You’re gonna be my little bitch tonight, got it?”He clenches his jaw and keeps eye contact with you, watching you fall apart from his fingers.

“Yes, sir..”

•••

a little side note, THIS SUCKS SO BAD IM SORRY BABES:((

[jay-and-dean]

Firefly   Chapter 1. Five years old

By Roonyxx and Jay-and-dean

Pairings : future Dean x reader ? 

Summary :  40 years in Hell, but he didn’t spend all this time all alone, he had her. 

Prepare to know what happened during those years Dean never talks about. To immerge yourself in Hell, only lit by the mysterious kid growing here...

And to see some of your favorite villains again : Crowley, Lilith, Lucifer... And also Sammy and Jack...

Serie Warnings : Hurt!Dean, Hell (torture, even if we tried to not give it graphic descriptions, creepy demons, blood, violence), swearing, angst, future fluff and smut.

This story is in both Reader’s POV and Dean’s POV

Wordcount : 2645

Note : This is our second collaboration. We can’t both edit the same post, so we decided we would post 1 chapter/2 each, like we did for Same.

We both worked as much on this story and it’s the result of both our brains but also both our hearts.

Please, if you want to show love for this story, don’t forget we were together in this.

This story will be around 10 chapters and we intend to edit it every Saturday if nothing delays it.

Roonyxx Masterlist

Jay’s Masterlist

_________________________

Reader’s Pov

She should have stayed in her room. 

She should have stayed in her room for many reasons. Because her huge, warm and luxury bedroom was far enough from the horrible screams first. Desperate calls for help echoing everywhere, useless begging and strangled howls of infinite pain. 

Because her room was neither burning hot nor cold like bleak ice.

Because there was no smell indescribably vile between the rock walls and along the velvet curtains…

But in her child mind, anything was better than eternal silence, even cries for help, better than the lonely torpor of comfort, than that unbearable loneliness.

And boredom.

So, as usual, she took Mister Teddy Bear in her arms, holding him close against her tiny body. With her finger she stuffed the foam escaping from the hole where his head should be, and smiled at his pathetic form.

She didn’t miss his head, for the same reason she didn’t miss the sky : because she had never seen it. 

Hell was big enough to get lost forever but she never did. It was vast enough for her to never go twice in the same place if she decided too. And for now, she had only found one place worth going back, the rest was only screams.

She shivered a little, today was cold, at least in this area. And even if she was shaped to handle Hell, she could see the steam coming out of her mouth and taste the metallic smell of blood on her tongue. 

When something moved on the wall of that infinite corridor, she took a step back, bumping the opposite sweating blood wall. It was the skin of a human being, empty and limply nailed on the wall, but somehow still whining and crying.  

She looked down at Mister Teddy bear and noticed it had been stained again, by the thick smelly blood constantly seeping from the tall cold dark walls. She sighed and gave the shaking empty skin a reprimanding look, frowning her thin and small eyebrows.

And she kept walking. 

A demon appeared at an intersection. He wasn’t wearing a human form, his giant body scrawny to the bones, with a crest of rotten wood along his visible spine, transparent skin, no eyes, and a huge pair of horns above him. His arms were long enough to touch the floor, and he was raising his legs too high while walking, which gave him something of a spider. 

She recognized Jael.

He passed by, ignoring her tiny form as usual, leaving a trail of smoke and sulfur behind him. For him, she was probably not bigger than a cat would be to a human being. Annoyed by his complete indifference, she closed her tiny five years old fists and punched his leg in a grunt. 

The demon didn’t even acknowledge her and she watched him walk or crawl away. 

She stayed still for a moment, holding Mister Teddy Bear tight, looking around at the infinite numbers of boring corridors this maze had. She turned on herself in a little dance, her dress flying like there was wind, closed her eyes and stopped randomly, a little dizzy.

This way today.

She sighed in content, she had never been this way before. So she put her tiny patent shoe in front of her and started walking.

She walked for a while, going in any direction like a little mouse in an abandoned manor. Avoiding the walls and covering her ears when the screams were too loud. Once or twice she looked inside the rooms, her eyes meeting pieces of humans, arms reaching to her, eyes without eyelids following her tiny form while beasts with their demon faces or a human costume were feasting on their guts. 

She turned left and found herself in front of a door opened on a large room with a man in the middle of it. 

He wasn’t screaming. 

Chains were maintaining him up and straight, his arms stretched toward the ceiling. The chain was going through his stomach and one of his thighs. Weights were at his hips probably slowly tearing his back.

She stopped in front of the door and held Mister Teddy Bear closer, studying his silhouette, hidden in the shadow of the corridor. 

He was brighter, he was stronger. His silence made her shiver for she was so used to the din of despair.

Did he really belong here ?

Mesmerized by his noble aura, she took a step in the room and looked up. His face was held by a chain around his neck, his eyes closed and face unexpectedly calm, almost as if he was sleeping. 

When she took another shy step, her potent shoe hit a piece of the chain she didn't notice and the metallic sound made him gasp. His eyes opened and their green light fell on her.

He stayed totally motionless, but it was not like he could really move anyway. Only his eyes weren’t still, trembling in her direction, struggling to focus. Like all the damned souls, he seemed really surprised to see her here, she was just a little girl anyway ; and there was no child in Hell. But his eyes had no expression of supplication, only a mix of distrust and pain.

Demons had never frightened her much, some of them were impressive and ugly, disgusting even. But they couldn’t hurt her. What made shivers run along her tiny back were the damned themselves. Their screams, their begging, their despair... And in her immature mind, she had come to think they were fouler than the creatures of Hell themselves.

Not him. 

Her fascinated wide eyes were magnetized to his face, forgetting the chains and the pool of blood at his feet, everything broken about him. She just stared at his face and thought he was beautiful in a way.

She forgot her boredom for a second, and took another step. In front of her little form, with his arms almost reaching the ceiling, he appeared as tall as a mountain. She lifted her chin, frustrated a little to not be able to come closer to his face. 

Despite his dusty and grimy skin, she could see little light brown stains around his nose, his eyes were very green and bright, and bloodshot only made their natural color lighter.

Her tiny hand moved a little, not sure what she wanted to do, maybe poke his thigh, like little children tend to do when they find something curious. But he flinched, and she got scared. The whole mountain of his motionless body suddenly making the iron of the chains scream.

She took a step back and put Mister Teddy Bear on the floor, away from danger, before she came closer again. Keeping her eyes on him to tame the reactions of this huge and impressive wounded beast.

This time, she showed him her hand. Her little palm raised gently, she stood there, tasting his blood on her tongue, and the smell of metal and pain.

His face was confused, and his eyes still trembling from the intense fear of being touched, but he kept them on her, going from her innocent eyes to her tiny clean hand.

Dean’s pov

His eyes followed her as she sat down cross-legged a few feet from him, watching him in silence, she took Mister Teddy Bear and put him in her lap.

Dean’s eyes flickered from her little form to the door, waiting for the next torture to begin, but it didn’t.

She just kept watching him, her eyes shining with innocence only a child has. Was she really a kid ? Was it a trap ? A trap to what, nothing could really get worse anyway… Trying to ignore the horrible pain, he focused on her eyes to try and read them. 

Everything was weird about her. Her age, her beauty, like she came from another world, Earth or even Heaven… Nothing was dark or vile on her feature. She didn’t seem to mind that her little pink dress was getting soaked in his blood.

With one last glance at the door he cleared his throat, hoarse from screaming hours and hours, and from not really talking for what ? Years...

“Hey little girl?” he cleared his throat once more, surprised by his own voice.  

Not controlling his tone perfectly, he spoke a little too loud which made her shuffle back a little. He really didn’t want her to disappear just now, maybe if he managed to talk to her a little, get a name...

“No stay, s-sorry… I’m not gonna hurt you.” His voice seemed to calm her this time, she held Mister Teddy closer to her chest.

“Are you, lost ? What’s your name?” He tried, but she just kept watching him not saying a word. 

He gave her a little smile through the unbearable suffering. It felt foreign smiling, he hasn’t done it in years. 

“I won’t tell anyone.” 

It looked like she smiled back but he was too far to see it clearly, could she even talk anyway ? She looked human, but here… a kid ? Was she dead too ? How did she end up here ?

“Where you from, little girl?” he tried again, speaking was horribly painful but this moment was priceless to him. 

How he would love to hear a voice other then the screams of Hell or the filth the demons spat at him. But she kept her lips sealed, taking her little bear by the legs, making him walk through the blood. She didn’t seem phased by the horror of it at all.

“I’m Dean” he said. 

She looked up at him and slowly took the arm of her bear to wave at him. His eyes widened, so she could hear and understand him. If he had been able to, he would wave back, instead he chuckled lightly for the first time since the Hellhounds got him; almost forgetting the the chains in his back.

“What’s your little friend’s name? He looks badass.” 

Still no answer.

He needed her to be real, to not be an hallucination caused by pain or loneliness.

“Well I guess I’ll give you a name then, is that okay ?”

She shrugged slightly, wiping her headless toy to her perfectly ironed dress. 

“What you think of… Firefly?” She looked up at him, now he was sure he could see a smile gracing her little face.

“You like that ? You remind me of one” he tried not to cough at his dry throat, knowing it would be enough to break his back. “A little light in the darkest place…”

He started to look at her thoroughly. She didn’t look too skinny, she was a little dirty, blood stains on her arms, dress and shoes, but in a place like this that wasn’t surprising. Her eyes didn’t look heavy so she had a place to sleep, to rest… How he missed resting, to be able to close your eyes and just sleep, to not fear the never ending pain.

“How did you end up here ?” he asked more for himself, as she didn’t seem to talk at all. 

Maybe she couldn’t speak at all. How old would she be, four ? Maybe five ? The blood stains on her face made it difficult to see her child like features.

She was so remarkable, in this screaming pit of misery and despair, there was not one ounce of fear in her eyes. She didn’t seem faced by the fact that she was covered in blood, that her teddy bear was missing his head, that he himself was dangling by chains and seeping the very same blood she was sitting in. 

“You have been here for a while haven’t you ?” 

He could tell she probably didn’t know anything else but Hell. The absence of fear, the indifference, like everything was just as it always had been... He was sure of it. But then again, how did she end up in the pit ?

A cautious dark chuckle left his mouth.

“I lost count of how long I’ve been here but I heard it’s been about 10 or 15 years.”

She looked up at him, her little E/C eyes shining with curiosity, he hasn’t seen that in years, he couldn’t help but smile at the sight of them. They remind him so much of Sammy’s eyes when he was younger. 

A heavy door fell shut in the distance making Dean flinch, grunting loud when his cruel bonds rattled. She got up and came closer, inspecting the chain going through his thigh, her face showing little interest in it. 

Then, her curiosity visibly winning against her distrust, she crawled between his legs to watch his back. And he closed his eyes in apprehension of her touching something. But she didn’t.

Reader’s Pov

He was different from everything she had seen in her short life, he wasn’t screaming like the others, or begging, he just… endured it. He seemed stronger. 

She circled him to come back to where she could see his face. Her little hand reached for him again, but she remembered the damned didn’t like to be touched so she took her hand back.

Heavy footsteps suddenly echoed in the hallway. 

She grabbed mister Teddy Bear from the floor and moved to stand beside the door, Jael entered, still in his demonic form.

“Dean Winchester, ready for your next session ?” his croaky voice came out of his mouth full of teeth in a strange way. “The master Alastair is waiting.” 

He steps on the chain making it shift in Dean’s gut. When Dean groaned hoarsely, she moved to punch her little fist into the creatures leg again.

With a sulfur stenched sigh the creature looked down her.

“What are you doing in here” he said in a growl. “You know it isn’t allowed.” 

His long bony fingers wrapped around her left ankle to pull her upside down into the air, she weighed nothing. She started to struggle but totally in vain, her palms clenched around Mister Teddy Bear to not lose him, and her free leg trying to kick the demon.

“I’m not a damn babysitter” the demon sighed, a cloud of smelly sulfur reaching her face, and making her sneeze. “I’ll tie you again if you keep wandering, child.” 

He turned to leave the room, his creepy gait making her dangle left and right.

“I’ll be back for you Winchester, you’ll say yes to Alastair soon enough.”

Still dangling from Jael’s grip, she took her bear arms and waved it at Dean before the Demon turned in the hallway.

Jael walked back to where her room was, when he pushed the door he came face to face with a Demon in the shape of a man, wearing a suit and a brand new watch, Crowley.

“Sir, your filth has been wandering” he dropped her to the floor bluntly. “Again.”

“Careful Jael, that’s my daughter” the smooth, human voice of her father echoes with no affection.

Crowley bended to pull her up by the arm, grimacing at how dirty she was, and put her in the corner where he had put the chain a few times ago, that was a little to big for her fragile foot anyway, around her.

“Now sweet cheeks” Crowley bended to her eye level “You know you aren’t allowed to leave this room so do us all a favor and don’t?” 

She stuck her tongue out to him.

“Just kill her already” Jael grunted.

Crowley stood up and ushered Jael out of the room, he locked the door behind them, while she already took her foot out of the too big chain to run at the door, failing to open it. 

“Patience Jael, one day this girl will lead us to victory, you’ll see.”

___________________________________

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[birdsaesthetic]

Jane’s sketchbook

Summary: Jane freaking out over losing her sketchbook, my participation for 12 Days of Blindspot.

A/N: I wrote this a while ago then ignored it... But then I saw these prompts from @holidayblindspot which reminded me of already having written something that goes with one of the prompts, so I thought this was a sign for me to edit it real quick and post it. I’m so exited to be sharing this here because it’s beautiful and really worth sharing. ENJOY! 

Day 5: A ruined day. 

“Kurt,” Jane called from across the front room, to which Kurt immediately looked up and responded, “Yeah?”

“Have you seen my sketchbook?”

Looking around him quickly yet carefully, Kurt murmured, “No,” he then looked up at her, who seemed stunned at having heard the No from him. 

The two were in the middle of unpacking the boxes they brought up with them from their old apartment in New York all the way to the new one in Colorado, which, after managing to unpack the majority of the boxes and placing their contents ever since morning, it finally started to feel like home. Like their old apartment in New York. 

Doing so had been so fun at first, each one was having a glass of red wine in hand and there was loud music playing in the background and, since there weren’t curtains covering the windows just yet, there was the beautiful addition of bright and warm sunlight streaming inside the spacious front room that felt so rewarding and motivating. But when the sun went down, taking with it its light and warmth, the work got monotonous, and so by now they were both exhausted and hungry. 

Jane was also confused now. 

She looked down at all the boxes scattered on the floor around her, which were almost empty by now, and she felt the world spinning around her in confusion and fear for having been unable to locate her sketchbook among all these boxes. 

“Why? Couldn’t you find it?” Asked Kurt, seemingly confused too as he approached her.

Creases were starting to form on her forehead as she shook her head in confusion. “No,” she said quietly, then jumped from one box to another, double checking each one, randomly, quickly and with both hands, as if she were digging into a hole. And then, after all of that, which was in a span of thirty seconds, she shook her head yet again, though this time in disappointment, and looked up at Kurt in a plea for understanding. “I don’t know why I can’t find it because it should be here. I put it here. I put all my small things here, and I didn’t have a lot of things!” 

Kurt was standing right before her by now, hunching over to check inside the boxes again. It was helpless, he knew; she’d already rummaged in all those boxes with eager hands and big eyes and yet found nothing... But if there was a one-in-a-million chance, he would absolutely take it when it came to her.

When his eyes, wide open, met hers, he suggested, “Okay, maybe you’ve just got confused. Try to remember where you’ve last seen it.” She swallowed hard and tried to do as told, mouth slightly open. She settled her gaze at a random spot on his chest as both of them stood close against one another, then she pushed her mind so hard to visualize where she’d last seen the sketchbook and what she was doing, so she could retrace her steps in the process and hopefully remember something. 

But it was after a long, unbearable moment when Jane pushed her lower lip out in a sad pout and gave a shake of her head. Kurt hugged her loosely then. “It’s okay, we still have another set of boxes to be delivered here tomorrow morning.” He reminded her. “Hopefully we find it within one of the boxes then.”

Jane pulled back to look up at him, the sad look remained on her face. “But those coming boxes only have the kitchen supplies!” 

“You don’t know, maybe you forgot it there!”

“It’s not possible... I put it here,”

“Everything is possible.” He encouraged, then added, “Aren’t you hungry by now, though? Because I’m so hungry! How about pb&j for dinner, huh?”

“I don’t mind.” Jane muttered with a shrug. 

Together they decided to call it a day after dinner and climbed into bed, crawling close to each other as they lied down against the mattress. Their foreheads were touching as they shared a loving gaze, then Kurt whispered, “Can I get my good night kiss, or you don’t feel like—”

“No—yes, of course you’re getting your good night kiss!” She rushed to say, reassuring him just before she smiled the tiniest of smiles and kissed him hard on the lips, to which he kissed her back even harder. After that, she placed her hand over his arm that had been wrapped around her waist beneath the blanket, lifted it, rolled over to her side, and again let his arm be wrapped around her waist. This was how she’d always loved to sleep with him: she’d turn her back to him and he’d take the cue and cuddle her from behind with a light arm across her waist beneath the blanket and a soft kiss right behind her ear that would make her hum and snuggle deeper into his embrace until they’d look like two spoons in a drawer, very tight against each other. 

As she closed her eyes and tried to sleep, hoping to raise up to a promising morning that would bring with it her sketchbook, she could swear she saw the vague afterimage of the sketchbook in her eyes, but then she opened her eyes and only saw the darkness of the bedroom...

She didn’t own a lot of things, really. The only things she owned and loved so much were that sketchbook and her marriage ring. The engagement ring was as if glued to her finger ever since she had worn it years ago. As for the sketchbook, she had always made sure to keep it within her hand reach, though this time around it oddly disappeared! 

It was the very first purchase she made solely for herself when she started to receive a regular paycheck after working formally for the FBI. At first she didn’t know what to do with such a decent amount of money since she’d already been provided with a place to stay in, clothes, a cell phone and food—usually her detail had dropped food at her place without even asking for anything back, which made her really embarrassed.

It could be the crack of dawn or early morning when Jane fluttered her eyes open the next day, and after a long moment of gazing at Kurt’s sleeping face, she gave him a soft kiss on the temple then eased herself out of bed. With her eyes half closed, she managed to step the few paces toward the bathroom, rinsed her face in the sink, brushed her teeth and finally put on a comfy sweater she gripped from the hanger. 

Yawing, she stumbled across the front room that was messy with boxes they hadn’t even bothered to flatten or push away last night, until she made it into the kitchen. There she stood in the center, stretched her neck, and yawned some more with her eyes pressed close. When she reopened her eyes, the sight of a can of cocoa shoved in the far corner suddenly inspired her. And so, as if drawn by a magnet, she stepped toward the refrigerator, opened it and examined its contents, though there wasn’t much to see. There was random stuff and among them was a brand-new bottle of milk, which she only needed to fix a cup of hot cocoa for now.

She took it out then brought up a pan. There she poured some of the milk, dissolved cocoa powder, and finally put it on the stove to simmer. Standing with folded arms in the dim lighting in the kitchen, she stared down at the pan as the milk boiled within it, and after a full minute of waiting, small curls of steam rose into the air and the scents of cocoa powered revolved all around her, to which she felt torn between wanting to savour it immediately or just stand there and inhale it. But she awaited a bit more. Next she poured everything into an oversized cup with a faint smile. 

Warming her fingers with the cup, she made her way to the dining table, then settled on a seat there as she began taking small sips of the hot cocoa before it had even cooled off, to which it took her by surprise at first at how hot it was, scalding even. 

During such times, when she woke earlier than she would and was by herself, she would bring up her sketchbook and sketch on it whatever she was feeling at the given moment. It was the perfect timing and place to do so; her thoughts would emerge so originally in the early mornings, they wouldn’t be conflicted nor affected by the day’s activities just yet. 

She hadn’t known how good she was at sketching until one day she held a pencil, a very sharp one, and began sketching without any struggle. Back then, when solving her tattoos had been what her life was basically all about, she used to sketch them individually in hopes of finding any connection that might help figure out what they actually meant. But then as the days passed, she thought she wanted to do something else, something that was in a good way stirring her heart down to the depths, just like the way her spoon was stirring her cup of cocoa now.

And so, with her pencil sharp, she began with a light outline of a face, next she worked on the eyes, which she made them like the shape of almond. She let out a sigh then,  knowing that the eyes must be the toughest part, before continuing with them. She drew the first pupil, purposely making it darker than the eye, then did the same for the other eye. She added a little shading underneath the eyes and from there she started with the nose, extending two lines where the inner corners of each eye were located. 

The rest went easy: she did the eyebrows, the lips, the beard and then the hair, creating a solid and visible looking hairline from the sides of the head. 

It was Kurt’s face that she sketched and it looked impressive at the end. She made him look as if staring at her, and made his expression soft with a faint smile—the way he’d usually look at her. 

It was quiet around her now, not a single sound, until she heard running waters within the bathroom and, a minute later, she saw Kurt emerge and approach her. “Mornin,” he smiled, his face awash with decent sleep, his hair... so fluffy she couldn’t help but think it needed a trim, so badly.

“Mornin,” she replied. 

He bent down and stole his morning kiss from her then hummed. “You taste like a really good hot cocoa!”

“Because I was drinking one.” She told him, showing him her cup, almost empty by now. 

“Can I have the same?”

“Sure.” She got up and started doing the same thing she did earlier, taking the same measurements. 

“Did you sleep well, Jane?” He asked as she waited by the stove for the cocoa to simmer. “Yeah.”

“You don’t look like you slept well.” He claimed. 

“I slept well, Kurt. Now tell me, when is our ship  gonna get here?”

“Maybe after a bit.”

She served him his cocoa in a brand-new cup, and he took it with all smiles after thanking her. 

When their another set of boxes arrived, after some time, Jane tucked all of her hair back behind her ears and, kneeling down, she eagerly began looking thoroughly in each box along with Kurt. As she’d said before, the boxes contain kitchen supplies: dishes, cups, mixing bowls, knives and spoons, a cutting board, blender, vegetable peeler and a number of whisks. 

But even after all this effort, they couldn’t find it, Jane’s sketchbook, among all of those things. 

She stood up on her feet then, and took a deep breath, tired and disappointed, her palm wiping away the sweat on her forehead and her eyes, helplessly, maintained searching in the mess of boxes on the floor. 

“It’s alright, I’ll get you a new one, I promise.” Kurt tried to soothe her, to which she looked up at him and, shaking her head, she complained, “It’s not about getting a new one, Kurt. I need my old one back. It carries lots of memories and...” she trailed off with her head falling down, but after a moment of silence Kurt approached forward until he closed the gap between them and cupped her face in his hands, lifting it to his level. “We will be making new memories here. Beautiful ones.”

“I know, but...there’s just one drawing of you within the sketchbook that I just love so much and I want it back.”

“You have lots of pencils and papers here. You also have me here. I will sit still the whole day so that you can draw me, I really wouldn’t mind, you know me.” He suggested, to which she smiled the way one corner of her mouth tilted up whenever she felt affection for him, then chuckled. “You don’t have to. I can draw you easily without having to look at you.”

He grinned. “Right, because you’re the most talented person I’ve ever met.”

“It’s not wholly because I’m that talented though. I wouldn’t be able to do that with anyone else except for you, because I always have you in my head—this is how and why I drew you in the first place. I know your face very well—even more than my own, I would say—and I know how you would look from every angle.”

He pushed his lower lip out in an impressive pout, feeling awash with affection for her. “You know lots of things about me! Do you also wanna know what I know about you?” He asked, having already slipped both hands from her face down her neck, shoulders, and finally her waist. And before she could say anything in response, he was tickling her there. “I know how to make you laugh, and laugh, and laugh.”

She was laughing then, pleading him to stop it, squirming her body out of his arms, and calling his name aloud and repeatedly, but that was only for him to reward her with more stroking against her waist, the area where he knew was very sensitive for her. She tried to fight his firm grip around her, tried to push him away, tried to run away, but seconds later she was, almost instinctively, clutching into him hard, as if holding for her life, and kept laughing nonstop, like she never had in her whole life, head dropped back exposing her neck for him to bury his face there, mouth open to the fullest, and eyes squeezed. Her laughters rolled about the front room in the early morning, like a child's spinning top, vibrant and heart-warming as it moved around them in its chaotic way. It came in fits and bursts—loud to soft to nothing when she was gasping for breaths in-between, then back to loud again and so on.

Just like this, her previous, sad face was replaced with a happy and laughing one.

He really knew how to butter her up. Always had.

A/N: I don’t really support the idea of Jeller moving out of New York after canon. I love them to be there and I think it suits them perfectly to be New Yorkers. But I had to fake it only for this fic’s plot. So they’re still in New York in my head now, enjoying themselves...

[greenygreenland]

If I Were You: Fives x Reader Pt 2

-pt two. Here’s part 1

Summary: It’s been half a month since Fives first appeared in your room. He’s settled into your home because he knows there’s no way of getting home. Everything is peaceful, and you find comfort in each other. Your parents come home today, and you have to find out a way to hide him from them Warnings: Borderline abuse (very brief), mentions of abuse/violence, pressure from school, COVID-19 mentions, swearing

“--and then I slug him in the jaw and he’s so shocked that he can’t move!” You shake your head as Fives continues reminiscing about a short run-in with some ‘Separatist scum’. You can’t say it’s not entertaining when you yourself absolutely despise the Seps for what they’ve done during the Clone Wars. The guy definitely deserved it. Fives continues on for a while, telling his favourite stories about the 501st as he sips on the juice you’d given him earlier.

You eventually decide to move to the living room, where it’s much more comfortable than the kitchen. Picking up the remote and flopping down on the couch, you turn on the TV.

It’s still mesmerizing to Fives. He’s seen you scroll through Disney Plus, Netflix, and Hulu so many times, yet he can’t get over the amount of shows available. Sure, there was the holonet back at home, but that couldn’t ever compare to the media here. Everything was in colour, and it wasn’t as bulky as a holoprojector. 

Suddenly, you pause, hovering over the show Star Wars the Clone Wars. It’s written in giant blocky letters in yellow, so it catches Fives’s eye rather quickly. “Is that the show I’m in?” he lightly inquires. There’s a cold sensation in his gut, but he ignores it. You nod, mindlessly clicking on it. “I grew up with this show. It’s taught me more about life than anything else, really. When I was in a pretty bad place it helped me pull through.” 

There’s a soft smile on your face that Fives admires more than anything in the galaxy. It’s like an invisible warm hug, and it engulfs him in an overwhelming amount of happiness. A loud fanfare of...something (he’s never really known any instruments) bombards his ears, and he’s turning to the screen so fast that he could have given himself whiplash. 

Admiral Yularen’s voice fills the quiet space. He has to restrain himself from straightening up because it’s just a show. But that’s when something happens. He catches sight of himself on screen, saluting to his Captain and General. The screen freeze for a second, and it ripples like a hologram. The image of himself disappears, and then the TV goes static, flashing in a mixture of blues, grays, blacks, and greens. 

“This can’t be good.” he says, mostly to himself. You glare at the screen, randomly pushing the buttons on the remote as if it’d fix everything. It doesn’t and you know this, but you continue anyway as Fives’s gaze darts from you to the TV. A short sigh escapes your lips. “My parents are going to--” 

You freeze, cutting yourself off as a familiar rumble catches your ear. Fives hops to his feet as you drop the remote, silently making his way to the window just above the driveway. You follow him as he takes a peek behind the curtains. It’s silent for a moment and you know you hadn’t been mistaken. 

“(Y/n), are these your parents?”

“Dank ferrick.” 

Fives looks surprised at your colourful answer before smirking to himself. That’s soon wiped off his face as the front door knob begins to jiggle. You both lock gazes, eyes wide in terror. “You have to hide!” You turn off the TV and frantically knot your hand in his. And suddenly, you’re practically flying up the stairs with Fives in tow. You didn’t even know you could run that fast, but maybe that was because you knew your ‘fight or flight’ had been activated. 

You throw open the door to your room and slam it behind as the front door opens. Fives is scurrying into the closet as you scramble to stuff whatever evidence of his existence into his arms. He tosses his sweaters, trousers, and shirts (you bought with your own money) as deep into your closet as he can. You flick off the lights and open your curtains wide. 

Fives shuts the closet door. You whip out your laptop and a few notes from your physics class, neatly spreading them on your desk along with a few highlighters and pens. 

“(Y/n)!”

That’s your mum. She sounds almost glad to see you. 

“(Y/n), come downstairs will you?” 

You turn on your laptop, flipping to Google Classroom as if your life depended on it--and it certainly did. Once it’s open, you stand from your desk and walk downstairs, putting on the brightest smile you can. “Hi mum!” you call. She smiles at you, covering up a cough as she removes her shoes. “I’m sorry we’ve been gone for so long. Your father’s been busy, and I couldn’t leave him in Chicago all by himself. You know how it can get there.”

The smile is wearing on your face and you know it. Your mum is a kind person, she’s always been, but because of that, she tries to hide her sickness from you. She’s been sick for a while, but she wouldn’t tell you why. Of course, that didn’t stop your father from telling you. He said it was cancer, but your mum replied with, ‘It’s the common cold’ instead. 

Speaking of your father, he emerged from the door. You didn’t need to look at him to know he wasn’t too happy. “Hi...dad.” you quietly say. Your mum puts a hand on your shoulder and that seems to bother him. “What are you doing down here? Go study. You’re not going to be a doctor if you aren’t persistent.” You frown in confusion. “I thought you wanted me to go to MIT--”

“You’d be more useful as a doctor than a mindless computer addict. Maybe if you had skipped a few grades, then you could have found a cure already.” You wanted to be offended, but a voice inside your head made you keep your cool. It wouldn’t do anyone any good if you fought fire with fire anyway. 

There is no emotion, there is peace, you think to yourself with a sigh. Your mum notices, and she gives your shoulder a good squeeze before beckoning you upstairs. You turn to her as she tensely smiles and comply, quietly going up the stairs. You hear someone flop down on the couch, probably your father, and ice shoots up your veins. 

Panic blinds you as you race up the last few steps and dart into your room like you were being chased by a lightsaber. 

It doesn’t take a genius to know what happened. You hear him shout your name and you lock the door behind you. Fives slowly opens the closet door. You can feel his worry as he frowns, and you can’t blame him. Your father sounds beyond angry. If you didn’t know better, you would have thought someone had robbed him. 

“(Y/N)!”

You visibly flinch and Fives decides it’s high time he comes out of hiding. He’s suddenly by your side, locking your hand in his. “You’re shaking.” You look down at your hand weaved between Fives’s fingers with a mindless shrug. “I’m,” your voice wobbles, “fine. It’s going to be fine. It’s--it’s fine. It’s fine.” 

“They’re not going to do anything to you, right?” Fives inquires. You meet his gaze with teary eyes. No words come out of your mouth, but he doesn’t need any to know what you’re thinking. 

The door rattles. You flinch at the shout from the other side, instinctively taking a step back as if it’d help you. “Fives, Fives...” You’re looking at him again, silently pleading for the help you didn’t even know you needed. You had always been alone. Always. No one had been by your side until Fives came along, and it’s then that you begin to realise how bad your situation is. 

He gives your hand a comforting squeeze that makes your knees go weak. “They can’t hurt you.” His tone is firm yet gentle. “Not if I have anything to say about it.” He makes his way to the door. It’s still rattling as he unlocks it, and then it bursts open as your father shouts again. The last time Fives had seen someone this angry was when the General had gone on that Zyggerian mission. The mere mention of the word ‘slave’ had sent the Jedi into an inferno anger that no one could calm. 

But this puny simpleton? 

His anger wasn’t as terrifying as his General’s. Fives couldn’t feel a single ounce of fear as he stared the taller man down. He looked about ready to murder Fives, but that wasn’t the least of his concerns. The man jabs a finger at his chest and Fives has to resist smacking it away. “So not only has my sad excuse of a daughter broken the TV, but also smuggled in a goddamn boy while we were gone!” 

You watch as your father raises his arm, recoiling to ready a punch. Your eyes widen, and you almost have the nerve to feel bad for him. It was never a smart idea to pick a fight with an ARC trooper--much less a soldier like Fives. 

Your father growls, “I’ll kill you both!”

It all happens too fast. Your father throws a punch, Fives catches it, and then it goes deathly quiet. He’s seething as your father trembles in his dark glare. “If this is how a family functions, I’m glad I only have my brothers.” The temperature seems to drop ten degrees with each word he stresses. “It doesn’t matter what happens, no one, and I mean no one should be treated like this. It’s downright abuse. I won’t stand for something so kriffing wrong.” 

This is a side of Fives you know but haven’t witnessed off-screen. He had been like this with Krell, and even though the situations varies from Umbara, his emotions aren’t any different. “Sure, the TV’s broken, but you haven’t even heard why it happened! What kind of father goes around and threatening to kill his own daughter?” 

Your father tries to storm past Fives, but he only tightens his grip on your father’s wrist. “Don’t try it.” 

Your father tries anyway. He whips out a knife--a knife-- and aims for Fives’s neck. Of course, Fives is quick--quicker than the shows give him justice. He dodges, swiping a leg under your father before pinning him down under his knee. The knife falls from your father’s hand and Fives is pulling both his arms behind his back. It’s not enough to hurt him, but it sure does scare him. “Let me go you fucking psycho! You’re gonna pay!” 

Fives looks like he wants to say anything, but he doesn’t, and you know it’s because he’s so baffled by your family dynamics. He hadn’t known any brothers who would do that, and he was glad too. “Oh I’m ‘gonna pay’? I think you’ll have fun taking that to the authorities. What number are you supposed to dial in these situations?” he inquires. 

“Let you go you goddamn--!”

“911.” you quietly answer. “But are you sure?” Fives nods and glances at your phone. You snatch it off the table, tapping the emergency call button and dialling the number. 

-------

Your mother stares at the police car as Fives shamelessly interlocks his fingers with yours. The cars drive away, the lights glimmering in the last light of day. You catch a glare from your father, hardening your stare on him until he begrudgingly turns away. Fives looks rather pleased, but there’s a hint of disturbance on his face. You know the mere idea of family against family riled him up, but he’s good at hiding it anyway and puts on a smile for you. 

Your mother walks up the front stairs of the house, arms crossed as if she’s hugging herself. She turns to you and Fives, briefly glancing at your interlocked fingers. You’re expecting her to say something. Instead, she studies your face and smiles. It’s a bit rough round the edges but full of so much love. 

“What is your name young man?” 

Fives glances at you before turning to your mum. “Fives, ma’am.”

“Fives?” 

“Yes, ma’am.” 

She doesn’t know what to say, so she stays quiet for a moment. “Is there any way I can thank you?” He turns to you, and then your mum. You seem to know what he’s thinking and give his hand a squeeze in support. “Uh, if it’s not too much trouble, is it okay if I stay here ma’am?” 

“He doesn’t have any family in the area, and it’s not like he can go anywhere with the pandemic.” you smoothly elaborate. “Can he stay mum? Please?” 

Your mum smiles again as if she knows something you don’t. She has something in her pocket that she glances at before eyeing you and Fives. “Of course he can stay. After all, you two are made for each other.” You’re about to ask what your mum means by that, but she’s already walking back in the house. 

And so you look to Fives, who giddily smiles in reply. He knows there’s no turning back now. It’s not like he can return home anyway, which isn’t something he isn’t unhappy about. Without warning, he leans towards you, planting a kiss on your cherry, red lips. He pulls away rather quickly, cheeks red. “Wow, never done that before.” he nervously admits. You snort, ignoring the racing of your heart. “Why don’t we try that again?” 

After all, you two are made for each other.

You smile at your mum’s words and kiss him again. Your heart continues to slam against your chest, and you’re still not sure if you’re doing it right, but it doesn’t matter because you know you two were meant to be. 

PART 3

[writingsilly]

Underwater (ch. I)

Description: Your bad behaviour led you to stay the whole summer in your town of birth with your grandfather. The very first day, you went for a walk to the beach and had an encounter with a stranger that would change your whole life.

Pairing: Reader x Merman!Taehyung.

Genre: Angst, suspense, sci-fi.

Trigger warnings (!!!): Blood, swearing, angst.

Click here to read in AO3!

I: An Encounter

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When you arrived, the guilt of having left so easily without putting up a fight or some resistance hit you right away deep in your chest. Maybe because in your way there, you started to miss the big city and wondered why you hadn’t been smarter and just behaved properly, that way your father wouldn’t have felt the need to “straighten you up.” It was a shame that his idea of turning you into someone a little more affectionate and sympathetic was to tear you apart from your friends and the city it had been your home since you were sixteen years old.

At first, you fought the tingly feeling that had set in the pit of your stomach when you recognized the salty aroma in the air and the warm breeze. The pride that came with your father putting your suitcases on the floor and leaving you without giving you a second glance was way too strong to ignore it. You couldn’t pretend you were surprised or hurt by his actions, he was mad anyway and it wasn’t something uncommon coming from him. Ever since he decided that dealing with your grandmother’s death was less important that work, his feelings kinda vanished. He still cared about you, that wasn’t the problem, but he sometimes needed to be reminded that raising a child, with no help at all also, was more than a lonely note stuck in the refrigerator saying “won’t be back ‘til late. Order some food.” But you couldn’t really complain, could you? You had the freedom every person your age dreamed of.

What dragged you back to your birth town, apart from a long trip by plane, wasn’t a poor attempt of calling his attention, as anyone might have concluded. This happened to you because you pushed the limits a little too much, it just got out of hand. What started with dipping your toe into what seemed like the perfect life, ended up with being suspended three times and eventually your expulsion. It was simple at first, skipping one period of History, to begin with. But that period turned into two and it all concluded with skipping weeks just so you could walk around the city with no destination at all. Sometimes your friends, Jungkook and Hoseok, would follow you. Other times, you would disappear for a good few hours. You were so used to being alone in your house, you might as well find a place that made you happy even in your isolation.

It took some time, but you finally found it enjoyable to be alone. When your friends couldn’t be there for you for whatever the reason was, you would take a random bus and get off somewhere you didn’t fully recognize. You would wander there and come back home really late, but not late enough for your father to notice that because he hadn’t come back from work yet. It wasn’t hard for him to notice that you weren’t doing good in school. A call from the principal and a miscalculation from you resulted into for father actually taking that call and a very long talk about your future, about how the last year of high school practically defines you and about the plans he had for you, great universities and an even greater career. You didn’t care about any of that. Right then it just didn’t seem worthy to work so hard for something you father wanted for you. He didn’t even bother to share what he had planned for you, let alone listen to what you wanted. It didn’t take a genius to assume that what he was thinking of for you would turn you into an even sadder figure of him.

Your grandfather was basically the only one who, despite his advanced age, understood you completely. Even when your father informed him, you knew he wouldn’t have asked questions of why you were visiting him for the whole summer. He was too happy to see you after three years. After hearing the news of your expulsion, he smiled and let you in, ignoring your father’s indications; that you were grounded, and needed discipline. It was refreshing to finally trust an adult. Back in the city, you only had Hoseok and Jungkook, and they were fun to hang out with and they were the closest thing you had to a friend. Nevertheless, you missed the feeling of being taken care of. A nice home-made meal every now and then, to talk about important things related to family, that kind of stuff, the stuff that only a relative can deliver.

The floor of the old beach house still cricked whenever you stepped too hard, you noticed as you walked into the guest room and dropped your suitcases and bag pack on the ground. You recalled the countless times you had crashed here whenever you were too tired to go back next door, to what was at the time where you lived.

“I haven’t had the time to set the bed,” your grandfather sighed, “my back is killing me, so I hoped you could do that for me.”

The bed stood in the middle of the room, naked and surrounded by two antique nightstands. Both of them had a night lamp that you doubted they functioned correctly since they had never, even when you were a child. You had never been scared of the dark and your grandparents rarely received any visits, so they had never felt the need to change the bulbs of said lamps. In the mornings, the sunshine was enough to light up all the room and the almost transparent curtains certainly helped with the natural illumination.

“Sure, let me unpack and I’ll do it.”

He ruffled your hair and then chuckled.

“I’ll make some sandwiches.”

After unpacking, you dropped all your weight on the just set bed. The springs ground against each other because of the sudden movement and you swore that one of them poked you somewhere in your back, but it had never felt more like home.

With your phone in your hands, you spent the next hour to catch up with your friends. It was hard to get to have your mobile back in your power. Your father had confiscated it as part of your punishment and refrained from hearing your countless reasons why you shouldn’t leave the city without any kind of communication. It was a pleasant surprise, or maybe it didn’t come as such as a surprise, to know that your father hadn’t changed his mindset and kept his sock drawer to hide things from you, such as confiscated things, or in a more joyful scenario, Christmas presents.

Hoseok We already miss you here (19:07)

Jungkook You left a bobby pin in my house, come back to get it (19:13)

It was heart-warming. Your chest hurt a little from the separation, and you knew it was only going to be two months away and you could always call them whenever you felt too lonely, but still, there was some excitement tingling inside you because you were aware that you were going to meet them again. The distance just made your heart grow fonder.

You were already feeling a little weird without your things around you. Back in the city, your room wasn’t that cheerful itself, but you made sure to make it that way. The white walls were covered with little drawings, fallen leaves you had collected randomly because they looked too pretty to leave on the floor just like that, and postcards of the places you dreamed of going someday. You knew that if you decided to change the colour of the walls, you would get bored of it soon, so you figured that keeping them plain blank was the perfect chance to customize them as much as you wanted, and you could easily change your mind, your likes or dislikes and it would be as trouble-free as unsticking everything you had put up on the walls. But now, looking here and there, you feel small. The beige walls seem like they are towering over you. It was hard to picture yourself as a little kid in this very same room. Right then, the room seemed boring as hell. Sure, it was where you used to sleep as a child after your grandfather told you a story and those memories would never ever leave you, they had a very special place in your heart, but you came to the conclusion that it was going to be impossible to shield yourself inside the house all the summer like you had planned to do. You had your phone, but you knew that it was only a matter of time until you get bored and feel the need to do something, anything. Besides your mobile, the most interesting thing the room had to offer was maybe the window that had a not so clear nor close view of the beach.

“Why don’t you take a walk?”

Your grandfather really needed to learn how to knock.

“Grandpa! You almost gave me a heart attack…” You yelled with your hand on your chest. Your heartbeat was basically drumming like crazy beneath your palm.

“Those are no fun,” he commented, probably speaking from experience, with a blank expression. “If you are done here, take a walk before it gets dark. Your father said something about curfew, but I just don’t want you walking alone if it’s late.”

It was nice to have an authority figure being kind to you for a change. Not that your father hadn’t been because that would’ve meant he engaged a conversation with you every once in a while, and that literally only happened if you ever got in trouble, but with him being absent all the time, it was hard for anyone to notify him about your playing hooky, or stuff like that.

“I promise I’ll be back before it gets dark.”

You had forgotten how good the summer breeze felt on your skin. The sand was particularly sparkly when the sun was giving its last goodbye. The sand felt warm between your toes, the weight of your body sunk you a little because it was still wet from the high tide. A sudden desire to walk into the sea and put your feet in the water hit you, but you refrained. You knew better than that. There was a high possibility that once in the water, you weren’t going back to your grandfather’s for a long time.

You kept wandering. The sand, once so shiny and golden, turned into a cloud of almost blue dust that seemed as if it had been sprayed with little diamonds when nobody was watching when the moon appeared. The temperature had dropped a little, and you scolded yourself for not having brought a light sweater, the one Jungkook had unpacked, along with other things, from one of your suitcases so he could fit inside of it and you would “bring him with you”. The recent memory made you smile while you tried to shield your chest with your arms against the cold wind. You didn’t remember the night to be this cold and it was probably because when you used to live here, at this hour, you were tucked in bed, probably hearing your grandfather ranting about some nonsense or maybe even sleeping after a long day.

Wait, what time was it?

Automatically, your hands flew to the back pocket of your high-waisted shorts. Your phone wasn’t there. You had left it charging on the nightstand. Great.

There was no much more left to do, really. The beach could extend itself for kilometres if you recall correctly, and you weren’t really on the mood nor with the right attire, a tank top, a pair of shorts and also bared foot, to walk more than just a little bit more.

Your bored eyes checked around and recognized, not too far, the old fishing dock still standing proudly just above the salty water. You had given it for totally destroyed. Even when you were here, that thing had never looked solid and for that very reason, you had never dared to put a single foot on it. You remembered that whenever your father and grandfather left you with the lovely family just across the beach house and went fishing (since they didn’t have a boat they just went to the dock to test their luck) you were practically begging and clutching into their legs so they would change their mind and stay with you. In the end, they would come back, sometimes empty-handed, other times, with a bucket full of fishes for dinner, but safe and sound much to your relief. Back then, you were convinced that only strong people like them could walk through that delicate wooden runway and come back alive to tell the tale. Now you were all grown-up, kind of, and you knew it wasn’t magic or anything like that what allowed them to come back home with not one scratch, but the result of a well-thought architecture.

A little spark inside your chest ignited at the sight of the dock. You didn’t really think about it and run towards it, because that’s the only way doubt creeps in and stops you from doing something that might be a great story to tell when you’re old enough to think that talking to strangers in the bus about the adventures of your youth is socially acceptable and not at all weird.

Soon, you were in front of the only step that separated you from the dock. It was dumb, you realized. You literally were with both your feet on the sand, gasping for air because you had run to get where you were standing, and you still couldn’t bring yourself to step on the wooden boards ahead. It seemed like a huge step, and you didn’t even know why. The first tread seemed pretty solid if someone were to ask you and there were no nails that could possibly nail into your skin and give you tetanus, because, come on, those nails were rusty as hell. There was no reason that kept you from walking down the dock. Nothing. Your father wasn’t there to call you and remind you about your curfew, and even if he had been here, you didn’t have your phone with you. And your foolish fear from when you were a child had been long forgotten. That only left you, and the wooden path.

You walked in the dock.

It was an anti-climax if you were honest. All the fear but also craving to walk down it you had bottled up since you were just a child it didn’t explode like when you shake a soda and pop it open, it just slipped through your fingers like water. You practically watched it dry off on the floor. How disappointing… There was nothing special about the old wooden boards, and the wind was chillier than before. Despite that, you decided to continue your little stroll until the end of the trail. Once there, you sat down and took advantage of the situation to put your feet in the sea.

Hoseok and Jungkook would’ve jumped into the water in no time, you thought, and you would’ve done the exact same thing. But, now you didn’t want to do it. Maybe because it was a little late, you could tell your body was asking for some rest already, or maybe because there was no one to prove anything to. Back in the city, you had your friends, the ones that had met you when you were trying to taste the new freedom your father was giving you so recklessly, and then you had him, your father. But he was a different story. If you had wanted to prove something to him, you would’ve made sure that he noticed you, and that was far from your desires. Sometimes you wanted nothing more but for him to completely forget about you. Yes, he was never home but he still tried to take your future into his hands and if he forgot about you, you could be the only owner of your destiny.

Your feet were softly dancing in the water and you rested your chin in the palm of your hand, devoting your time to watch the movement of the water. The moon, reflected on it, would distort and turn into one million figures by the simple motion of your body, and you were so drowned into it that you almost didn’t notice the water bubbling up. At first, you didn’t think much of it, it had been probably you with your feet, but the bubbles kept coming up even after you had removed your feet from the water. It reminded you of boiling water, and there was certainly something underneath causing all that fuss. The night didn’t help at all, and you found yourself leaning into the water to have a better view of whatever it was down there. The bubbles were only making it harder to distinguish anything at all and you were about to give up when a strike of light blinded you. You fell on your back, almost hitting the back of your head. Your eyes burned considerably, you rubbed them with the hope of relieving the sting.

“What the hell?” You murmured to yourself.

There was something down there, the pain your eyes were going through was the proof.

Slowly, you opened your eyes, blinking a little to get used to the light again. You crawled to the end of the dock. The bubbling had subsided and there was no trace of light or anything at all there, but you knew that something had caused that reaction of the water and that dazzling luminescence. Looking for answers, you checked around you. All seemed clear; the sea was calm, and there was no one in sight. You started to doubt your own common sense. Your head was somewhere else right then. You had had a long trip today and you didn’t remember the last time you had gotten a good night sleep. Maybe your brain had had enough and it finally had drained out of judgment for the day.

In the middle of the silence, a splash was heard nearby, almost next to you. Your head turned in the direction of the noise, and you saw it again; that glow. It wasn’t as dazzling as before but it sure wasn’t hard to notice. It looked like the moon had fallen right into the ocean. Perhaps your sleep-deprived-self was finally giving up, but if the moon hadn’t been above you in the sky, shinning as always, you would’ve honestly believed that it was in the ocean right then. You didn’t notice how the shiny object, that wasn’t the moon, started to approach the dock with languid movements from one side. The only thing you got to hear from your tired mind was “run”, you followed the advice and backed away from the borderline of the path. You must’ve stepped too hard because of the nerves and the pure panic caused one of the old and mouldy wooden boards to snap in half, trapping your left foot. Your toes grazed the salty water beneath the dock. You were now knee-deep between the timber trail and the sea. While your leg had slipped in the hole you had created, the splintered wood had scratched the sides of your calf. The salt in the water just made the pain even worse. You couldn’t drown the whine of pain that got out from your mouth. Your head echoed that torn sound over and over again, it was almost as if you hadn’t stopped screaming for a second. You sounded pitiful, scared and overly vulnerable, yet nobody was coming for your rescue. It was late, dark and the closest family lived like half an hour walk away, that was if they were even home.

In a desperate attempt to unstuck your leg, you rocked it back and forward and tried to use both your hands to lift your body. Your right knee was getting tired of being pressed against the wood, and you were scared that the ancient structure wouldn’t take your weight any longer and lose another part, letting you fall once and for all. Nevertheless, there was no use. Your lower limb was basically compressed there, and the more you moved, the more damage it inflicted to your muscle. The splintered wood was breaking the first layer of skin of your leg, leaving behind a raw trail. Your blood was probably joining the salty water. You begged whatever was stalking from under the sea didn’t like the taste of blood because if it did, it was being attracted to you by the smell of it.

Besides your rushed breathing, you could hear near to nothing around you. This little town barely had a twentieth of the population the city you had been living the past few years had; even if you screamed your lungs out, nobody would hear. The few people that lived here were far away enough to hear whatever was happening on the beach, moreover, they were asleep.

A cold shiver licked your body from the inside, all the way from the tip of your toe, going through your spine, to end at the top of your head. There was something wrapped around your foot. A frozen grip that kept growing tighter and tighter. You couldn’t quite tell if it was because of the cold touch, or maybe it was the fact that you were terrified, but your body refused to respond to your brain. You were trapped in every sense of the word; your leg was impaled between splintered wood, something was clutching at your foot, and your body wasn’t responding. The grip was familiar, it felt almost like a hand. You could feel fingers too, but it had sharp claws at the tips. The claws grazed your skin as if it was trying to calm you down. Too bad it only made you reminded you of how cows are stunned before being killed. The touch was relatively melodious considering the circumstances. Melodious since your breathing wasn’t hurried anymore. Somehow, you had accomplished to synchronize your breathing with the movement of those delicate brushes on your skin; inhaling the closer it got to your thigh, and exhaling when it went down to your toes. Hypnotizing. A hypnotizing touch that went in a spiral to your core. Your mind was clouded by pleasing grey fog. All the worries vanished just like that. There was nothing in your mind. In your head, you were floating above water, a soft tide swinging your body back and forward. It seemed so real.

“Feeling any better?”

No matter how velvety that voice was, your breathing got stuck in your throat. It didn’t make you feel safe, quite the opposite, because there was no one around that could be the owner of that voice. It was literally coming from the dark.

The air wasn’t fresh anymore, you weren’t sure if you were breathing anymore. There was a weak beeping in your ear, accompanied by the sound of your blood pumping through your veins. You wanted to cry.

In your dazzled state, the only thing you succeeded to rescue was that single thought: run. So that’s what you decided to do. You tried to pull your leg out of the hole, again, not caring about the sharp pain on your thigh, ignoring the thought of how the shattered wood was peeling your skin off. You screamed when the underwater grip got tighter around your ankle. The claws, pinning in your skin, were like a shot of frozen, but bubbly, liquid into your veins. You stopped fighting, not because you wanted, but because you were physically unable to move. You knew there was no use on crying for help, but oh, how would you’ve loved to be able to scream until your lungs burned, that would’ve been the only source of warmth in your body.

You wondered if the wood had already cut off your circulation; if it was easier to chop off your leg completely, but you knew that the answer to those questions was no. You could feel how cold the water was, that hand, still gripping onto your ankle. There was no doubt, the circulation was there.

At this rate, you weren’t sure if there was someone, or something, that could have mercy on you. You glanced around you, attempting to see through the tears that were clouding your sight, seeking for anything that could be of utility, maybe something you could use as a lever, but there was nothing around, just old and broken wood boards that wouldn’t be helpful. The whole deck was made out of them, and thanks to this situation, you had confirmed the obvious; they were fragile, they couldn’t support your weight…

That’s it!

You took a deep breath, bent your body to one side, lifted your arm, and then lowered it with might, hitting the wood board that was right next to the one your leg was stuck in with your elbow. It cracked, but it didn’t break. You tried again until it eventually broke in half and both pieces fell in the ocean. The board around your leg followed them. You were too shocked to move, but when the realisation hit you, and you dared to look down, there was nothing holding onto your ankle. You moved back from there, just in case, and raised your leg up with the help of both your arms to carefully straightened it up the best you could. There were fresh, but superficial cuts all around it, right above your knee, those you were expecting to see. The rest of your leg was rather unharmed, except for your ankle. Blood was dripping from four vertical cuts. You gasped at the sight. It looked bad and you were sure it would look even worse if you didn’t do something about it. You had to apply pressure to the wound, you remembered you had read that somewhere.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

It was that voice again. No matter how briefly you had heard it, you knew it was the same voice.

You turned around and found a pair of eyes staring right back at you. They belonged to a man around your age, you soon noticed. Half of his face was underwater, but you still could appreciate his exceptional features; high cheekbones, blond hair, a colour that would only be attainable with bleach, and sun-kissed skin. But the feature that truly captured your attention was his gaze. You were scared to death. Your knees were ready to give in. However, there was something about those green eyes that made your heart settle down inside your trembling body.

Despite your dry throat, you dared to speak.

“Who are you?”

There was no response. He raised both eyebrows as if saying “oh, really?”, and began to swim closer to the deck. You automatically tried to move away, which made him stop his tracks. He looked confused.

“Stay back,” you demanded.

Your voice was anything but confident, so you were surprised when he didn’t move an inch closer to the dock. The stranger simply held both hands in the air, showing surrender, but you didn’t let your guard down. There was something about his presence that made you feel uncomfortably calmed. A little voice in your head was telling you that he was to be trusted, but your body just wouldn’t stop reacting with rejection towards him. If he got any closer, he could easily overpower you. There was nothing you could defend yourself with, and you weren’t going to run off, your leg wouldn’t let you, so you decided to keep your distance using your hands to push your body further back from the edge of the dock.

“Who are you?” You asked again, louder.

The stranger rolled his eyes but he was quick to lock your gazes again with a bored expression. A shiver went down your spine and left a fire trace along with it.

Something was wrong, you could feel it.

In a poor attempt of hiding the fear that was washing over you, you tried to get on your feet. If this stranger was the person to blame for your wounded leg, you couldn’t let him know he had an advantage over you. So, with quivering legs, you stood up.

“You’re the one who did this to me.”

It wasn’t a question. You were almost certain that this man had hurt you. After all, he was the only one there with you.

He took the rest of his head out of the water. His lips were stretched in an unapologetic smile, but he stayed silent.

“You’re not going to deny it?” You asked frowning.

“Why would I?” He answered, surprising you, “you seem pretty sure about your theory.”

The sound of his voice vibrated on your chest, it almost threw you down your feet again. You knew you had heard his voice a few times that night, but it always took you by surprise. His voice was so powerful and dominating, you felt the need to surrender to him.

“Oh, the little girl is scared, isn’t she?”

His teasing tone made you grit your teeth in frustration. You took a deep breath and crossed your arms over your chest.

“Who are you?”

“You’re gonna keep asking that? Fine,” he scoffed. “My name is Kim Taehyung.”

Sharp pain in your wounded leg caused you to buck your knees and almost hit the ground. You had to do something about your injuries, otherwise, there was going to be an infection or worse. You went back to your previous idea and bent down to apply pressure on the wound.

“I wouldn’t do that…” Taehyung hummed.

At first, you weren’t going to listen to him because; in all honesty, who would listen to a creepy stranger that most definitely had hurt you? But he was still where you had asked him to stay, and he didn’t seem to be moving from there anytime soon.

“And why would I listen to you, huh? You literally cut my skin.”

Taehyung laughed bitterly, and then looked away from you to the night sky. You wondered if he was trying to make time, if there was someone hiding in the dark, ready to attack you. The thought made you shiver. Now you weren’t so sure that putting your guard down was such a good idea.

He kept his eyes on the sky almost peacefully. The fact that he could be so calmed around you while you were struggling to catch your breath just cleared up your actual situation; he was in power now and you couldn’t do anything about it, even if you tried. No matter how strong you thought to could be, he didn’t need to be careful around you, it was the other way around. The only thing you could do was to hope he would get distracted enough time for you to ran and hide until the morning came.

His gaze locked yours and he smiled.

“I’m surprised you’re on your feet,” he noted, “most of you don’t last this long.”

His tone was so calmed like he had done this exact same thing many times before. You had had a slight impression that he had planned this, but with what he had just said, you were now completely sure.

Sweat was dripping down your forehead, cold, freezing even, sweat but your body was heating up, boiling.

“Listen, I-”

“No,” he interrupted you, “you listen to me. If you want to live, don’t touch your wound.”

You had never liked for anyone to tell you what to do, but in this situation, you didn’t have a choice, did you?

While thinking of what to answer to him, you felt your knees shake. Your legs finally gave up. Your body hit the floor and you heard the wood board crack beneath you, you held your breath.

“What’s happening?” You urged.

“Are you new around here?”

“What?”

“Hasn’t anyone told you not to wander around the beach late at night, dumb girl?” He sounded confused, surprised even, but his tone changed after some sort of realisation. “Of course no one has. Your kind is characteristically stupid, always have been.”

The numbing feeling was spreading at a slow speed. Your feet were there, they were definitely there, but you couldn’t feel them.

“M-make it stop!”

You heard a sigh from beneath the dock.

“Panicking will only make it worse, and you don’t want that, do you?”

“What-”

“If you touch your wound, you won’t feel your arms in a matter of minutes,” he then explained.

Had he poisoned you?

“Now, stay still and listen to me, dumb girl. I’ve got something to tell you…”

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[fic] Emergence

Fandom: Yugioh Zexal Paring: V/Gauche Rating: M (but it's pretty much just one scene) Wordcount: 9000+ dreamwidth link AO3 link

Sequel to Freefall and Plummet. The next time Gauche crossed paths with V again was in Spartan City. ~*~*~*~*~

It was the day after Yuma and his friends had left Spartan City that Gauche crossed paths with him again. He was out on a mission from Droite to pick up a few of her favorites from a bakery, and was somewhat preoccupied by trying not to attract too much of a crowd, when all of a sudden he looked up to find those long locks of silver hair right at the end of the street in front of him. The man seemed to be looking up at one of the screens celebrating his win in the Championship match, as if he was completely unaware of the fact that he'd vanished without a trace several months ago. Gauche stopped in his tracks and stared. For a moment, he was convinced he was seeing a ghost. After what he'd been through the other day, why not an actual ghost this time? Then he realized abruptly that, ghost or not, if he didn't hurry up, that man was likely to vanish into thin air again, and he couldn't count on being lucky enough to randomly cross his path a second time. Gauche shook himself free of his stupor and dashed forward. "V!" The man tensed, and that curtain of silver hair fluttered as he whirled around. For all that he'd been staring up at the tournament advertisement, in which he was front and center, V seemed equally surprised to see him. "Gauche…?" Gauche marched right up to him and jabbed a finger at his chest. "You! Where have you been?" "I'm sorry?" V said, looking utterly confused. Gauche scowled at him and leaned in even closer, his finger now jammed hard against V's chest. He didn't know what it was about that confusion that pissed him off, but he found himself ranting before he realized it: "Do you have any idea how much time I wasted looking for you? I waited for hours only to find out you couldn't be bothered to leave out the front door and you were already gone. And no one's seen hide or hair of you or your family since then—not even Kaito and I was sure you'd tell him. Where the hell have you been?" V went on staring at him like he was speaking some foreign language or like he'd been the one who was missing only to suddenly reappear halfway around the world in a random Italian city. Then his brow furrowed and he looked away for a moment. When he lifted his head again, he looked even more confused and maybe something else, though Gauche couldn't begin to guess what. "You were looking for me?" V asked. Too late, Gauche realized what had come out of his mouth—things that he'd thought about yelling at V if he ever saw the man again but had never meant to actually yell at him, because it was embarrassing enough that he'd done all that without V actually knowing about it. But now that he'd said it, he decided he might as well take his chances and double down on it, especially since V, annoyingly, sounded like he'd never considered that Gauche thought about him at all. Gauche opened his mouth to thoroughly disabuse him of that idea— "Nii-sama? What's going on…?" —and shut it again to frown over at the two teens approaching them. One was holding a bag with bread sticking out of the top and looked confused but wary; the other was scowling at him like he thought he could light Gauche on fire if he did it long enough. Both were wearing similarly styled clothes to V's, although Gauche only mostly recognized one of them. V casually pushed Gauche's hand down away from his chest and turned to smile at the newcomers in one smooth movement. "It's all right, I just ran into a friend. Have you finished your shopping?" The one with the bread looked very doubtful in the moment before he smiled back at V. "For now, but let's stop at a few more places on the way back, okay, nii-sama?" "All right, but only a couple more places—" "Are you going to introduce us?" Gauche asked before they could get so involved in their conversation that they forgot about him completely. V frowned over at him, but only long enough to make it clear he didn't appreciate the interruption. Then he sighed and said, "Yes, I suppose. Gauche, this is my youngest brother, Michael"—he gestured at the boy holding the bag of bread—"and my other brother Thomas—" "We've met," Thomas snapped, crossing his arms. "—and I'm sure you both remember him, but this is Gauche. The, um, Starman." Above them, the advertisement screen proudly announced his name moments later. V turned back to him with a smile that was clearly just holding back laughter, but Gauche found he didn't care all that much. Laughing at him or not, it was the first genuine smile V had ever given him. "One of Heartland's lackeys," Thomas sneered, utterly destroying the mood. Gauche had no problem sneering back at him. "Least he wasn't just a kid." Thomas's face immediately screwed up in outrage, and Michael, who had so far only looked wary but otherwise fairly pleasant, also suddenly seemed scarily cold. V winced and stepped between the three of them, turning his back on Gauche to speak more directly to only his brothers. "Gauche and I have a few things to talk about, so why don't you two head back first?" His tone left no room for argument, although both of them tried, with Thomas scowling around V's shoulder more than once. Neither of them seemed willing to try to argue very much, though, and eventually, Michael made the wise choice to relent for both of them. "All right, nii-sama. We'll see you later," he said, and then began dragging his surly brother off down the street with only a brief glance at Gauche. Thomas seemed to have decided that scowling at Gauche wasn't working and completely ignored him as he passed by, his nose stuck theatrically up in the air. When the two of them were far enough away not to be overheard, they very clearly began discussing something which eventually caused Michael to glare back at them accusingly. Gauche grumpily crossed his arms and turned away. He didn't like the look of that. But with any luck, he wouldn't have to deal with them again any time soon. V was silent as he watched his brothers leave until they disappeared around a corner. Then he turned to face Gauche again, his face set and eyes like shards of ice. Gauche slowly, awkwardly, uncrossed his arms, unsure what was coming. "For the record," V said quietly, "that 'kid' is our father, and your old boss's boss is the reason for it. So I'll thank you not to make any more quips at his expense." For a long moment, all Gauche could do was stare at him. His father>?! How the hell had that happened? And it was Dr. Faker's fault? Did Dr. Faker have some kind of weird shrinking ray gun or something? That was like something out of a B-movie! How could something like that really happen?! Still, he had no doubt that it really had happened. V might laugh about his choice of name as a Pro Duelist, but he wouldn't joke about something like this. He was clearly just as angry about Gauche's offhand remark as his brothers had been. And no matter how Gauche felt about the kid-who-was-actually-not (which still wasn't all that favorably; he wasn't going to forget what that kid did to Droite for a long time), he didn't want V to be angry with him. They already hadn't started off on the best foot; this was an opportunity to get off on a better one, and he didn't want to screw that up. "I got it. Sorry, I won't do it again." And then in a blatant effort to move on to something else less awkward, he added quickly, "So is it Christopher again, too?" V closed his eyes, the way he had the first time Gauche had said his name back when he'd started all this, although he had a much gentler look on his face this time when he opened them again. "It's whichever you like. You can also call me Chris, if you want. Everyone else does." "Heh, a name like that kinda undermines that high-and-mighty attitude of yours, doesn't it?" Gauche said with a grin. He grabbed one of V's hands before he could get too indignant and bowed his head to brush his lips over the back of his knuckles. When he looked up again, V's cheeks were now tinged the slightest bit pink, and Gauche couldn’t help but grin again behind the hand he still held against his lips. "All right then, Chris. How's dinner sound?" ~*~*~*~*~ The walk back to the hotel he was staying at with Droite was mostly uneventful, although it didn't get off to the best start. After about five minutes of walking in awkward silence, Gauche realized he had never made it as far as the bakery and had to turn back around to finish his mission. Thankfully, Chris didn't seem to mind and even walked back with him to where they had run into each other and then down the street a little to the shop. Once they left the bakery and resumed their journey, they were still mostly walking in silence. Despite telling his brothers they had something to talk about, Chris didn't seem very inclined to actually talk about anything other than an occasional remark about some nice architecture. Gauche had quite a lot he wanted to ask him about, from where he'd disappeared to during the WDC to where he'd been since then to how he'd ended up in Spartan City, but the longer Chris remained silent, the more awkward Gauche felt about bringing any of it up out of the blue. After all, he'd already brought up some of it. If Chris wasn't going to say anything about what Gauche had already blurted out, then would he really answer any of the other questions he had? They were maybe a third of the way to the hotel when they passed by a group of kids who immediately flocked around him to rave about his win and ask for autographs. Of course, Gauche wasn't about to disappoint them. He handed his bag of pastries off to Chris and pulled out a marker for autographs. When he was finally able to pull himself away, he found that Chris had moved off to the side—to stay out of the way, probably—and he was watching the scene with a soft smile. Gauche tried to ignore the way his heart beat wildly as Chris handed the bag of pastries back to him. "You didn't used to do that," Gauche blurted before he could stop himself. Chris blinked at him. "Do what?" "Smile like that. I don't remember you smiling much at all, and it wasn't like that." Chris furrowed his brow and raised his fingers to his lips. Did he not realize he had been smiling like that? "I don't remember you being so popular," Chris said eventually, completely side-stepping the topic of how he smiled altogether. "Which reminds me, I meant to congratulate you on your win, Mr. Starman." Gauche scowled at him. "Some congratulation. You're making fun of my name again." Chris's lips twitched. "Maybe a little. I won't tease you again; I don't actually dislike it. And I do wish we could have gotten here a little earlier, so we could have watched some of the tournament. I would have liked to have seen you duel." "Really?" Gauche asked suspiciously. He wanted to be excited about that, but he hadn't gotten the impression that Chris thought much of him when they'd dueled. Pretty much the opposite, in fact. Especially since he would have lost if Yuma hadn't jumped in when he did. "You have a lot of potential, and I'd like to see how you've improved." There was that condescending attitude he'd expected. Gauche let out an irritated sort of chuckle, although he didn't find it quite as irritating when he was expecting it. "Oi, oi, you could give me a little credit. You're talking to the Champion here, you know?" He grinned and looped an arm around Chris's shoulders, making him stumble a step. "Anyway, if you wanted to see it that bad, we can watch a few videos when we get back to the hotel. They filmed the whole thing." "I don't know if I have that kind of time," Chris said, sounding like there was nothing else he'd rather do. "You could just tell me about it? I'll look up the videos later." "Doesn't seem like you ever have enough time," Gauche said, but he launched into a spirited retelling of the preliminary round anyway. It's not like he was opposed to bragging about his various wins, especially to a captive audience. It was weird. The first part of their journey had been so awkward and felt like it had dragged on forever. But once they actually started talking, it was surprisingly easy to talk to Chris and the time seemed to fly by. Maybe it was just that it was a subject they were both passionate about—although Gauche had to admit, he was surprised Chris was so passionate about it. He had only seen one glimpse of that passion during their duel and it had been because of Yuma; otherwise, Chris had seemed like he would have rather been anywhere else. But maybe whatever had happened that meant he smiled now had also reignited his love of dueling. Gauche wasn't able to cover nearly as much of the tournament as he'd intended, because Chris would comment on his strategy or his opponents and they ended up discussing the other participants' decks and various strategies instead. Or Chris would somehow figure out what strategy he had used in a certain situation before he could tell about it himself. That was…a little frustrating, if he was being honest, because that just made it impossible to impress him even a little bit, but he was enjoying it too much to care. "That brother of yours, IV—Thomas. He's a Pro, isn't he?" Gauche finally had to ask as they approached the hotel. "Why aren't you a Pro too? You've got to be at least as good as he is." "It isn't just us; Michael could also go pro if he wanted." "Yeah, and….?" "And that isn't what Tron wanted," Chris said impassively. "I'm sure he'd allow it now, but at the time….Besides, Thomas is the one who enjoys being in the spotlight like that. I don't mind it once in a while, but I don't want that kind of attention all the time." "That's a shame," Gauche said with an overacted sigh. "I bet you could really go far. And you know, I'm still looking for a Tag partner…Droite wouldn't do it with me…" Chris stared at him for a moment, then abruptly turned his head away and covered his hand with his fist. "Is that so?" Chris said, sounding amused. "I'm flattered, but I'm afraid I'll have to decline as well. As you said, I never seem to have enough time." Since this was pretty much what he'd expected, Gauche just gave another over-dramatic sigh and grinned at him. "Oh well, it was worth a shot. But keep it in mind, all right? You can't be too busy to have fun forever." ~*~*~*~*~ They made a quick stop by the hotel room first, so Gauche could let Droite know he was back and drop off her pastries. Of course, that also involved dragging Chris into the room to meet Droite, and even though Gauche was sure they'd get along, he was still relieved that it went pretty well. Whatever animosity Droite might have still had toward Tron (and Gauche didn't know whether she did, just that he would have if he were her) didn't seem to extend to his sons. Or maybe it just didn't extend to Chris, because as it turned out, Droite remembered him too. Although if he thought about it, that wasn't much of a surprise. Chris and Kaito had been nearly inseparable back then, so of course Droite had noticed him. Gauche didn't particularly like thinking about it, though whether he was jealous of Kaito because of Droite or because of Chris, he couldn't be sure anymore. Then they left to find a table at the hotel restaurant, where they had just been with Yuma and his friends a few days ago. Droite had raised her eyebrows at them when Gauche had apologized but declared that it would just be the two of them, but she waved them off with a small smile and even called ahead to make sure there was a table available when they got there. They were lucky enough to get a table that was somewhat secluded but still near the windows, where they could clearly see the newly exposed ruins beyond the city. Chris didn't even seem to notice them, but Gauche spent a minute looking out on them before he sat down. "We've been continuing my father's research into the Parallel Worlds," Chris said, once they had their food, finally answering the question of why he was there and where he had been. It took Gauche asking him again to get that answer, but at least he didn't seem to be shying away from it. "All of you?" Gauche asked, surprised. He didn't know a whole lot about Chris's brothers, but neither of them struck him as the sciencey type. "Well, perhaps Thomas a bit less than the rest of us," Chris admitted with a small smile behind his wine glass. "But Michael has always been very interested in it as well, although he's more interested in the effects they've had on past cultures." They definitely must not have known about the ruins, then, or Michael would have wanted to stick around to look through them. Gauche was silently glad he hadn't said anything about them before Chris's brothers had left so he could have Chris all to himself for a while. "We noticed a sudden spike in abnormal energy readings and spatial distortions not too long ago," Chris went on, "that we came to believe were because the Barians were beginning to act on their own. Coming to our world in person and utilizing Sphere Fields in order to duel Yuma directly, that sort of thing. Kaito confirmed that for me not long after we detected the first Sphere Field—" "Wait," Gauche said, throwing up a hand. "Wait. Are you telling me Kaito's known where you were this whole time?" "Not this whole time," Chris said slowly. "Just for the past week or so while we've been following Yuma. But we were in contact before that." "Right, but what you're saying is, Kaito knew I was looking for you, and he knew you were here, and he didn't say anything about it before he left with Yuma yesterday." Chris paused with his glass against his lips, and then slowly set it down on the table. "If it helps you feel better, he didn't say anything about you either when he informed me they'd retrieved another Numbers. He told me Yuma dueled one of the Barians for it, but not much else." "Yeah, and I was there too!" Gauche exclaimed, pounding his chest with his fist. "That Barian guy brainwashed me and made me duel with him! I was dueling Yuma too! And Droite helped him beat us!" "You were?" Chris said, suddenly looking twice as interested. "Where was that? Did you notice anything unusual?" "Those ruins over there," Gauche said with an irritated wave toward the window. Chris immediately turned his head to look, although with the sun setting, the ruins were becoming hard to see. "But that's not what's important here! Kaito knows I was there! Why wouldn't he say anything?" Chris stared out the window for another few moments and then frowned down at his glass. "…What exactly did Kaito say to you before he left yesterday?" "Just some dumb thing about what a coincidence it was to run into us here and it was good to see old friends again. He was mostly just talking to Droite, I think, 'cause he wouldn't say anything like that to me." "Oh. I see." For some reason, Chris's lips twitched as he took his next bite. "Well, I'll pass on your frustration. Anyway, it was his idea for us to come into town today to pick up fresh provisions." "Was it," Gauche grumbled. "He should've told you to come yesterday." "Oh, he did, but we were only able to get here this morning. But he did also say we should stick around for a bit, because their next destination is somewhere near Mongolia, so we won't be able to follow them there." Gauche still wasn't entirely sure why Chris suddenly thought he wanted to know what Kaito had been saying to him while they were secretly communicating with each other and not anyone else, but he did find that last bit very interesting and eagerly latched on to it. "If you need somewhere to stay—" "We can't," Chris interrupted. "I'd like to, but we'll need the extra time to get to the last two locations, and there's a project Kaito and I—" Gauche suddenly launched to his feet, sending his chair screeching backward on the floor. Chris paused, and then carefully set down his utensils and looked up at him. "Gauche?" "I don't want to hear about Kaito right now," Gauche snapped. Then he grabbed a fistful of Chris's collar and lunged down to kiss him. Kaito, Kaito, Kaito…how did he end up liking someone who was clearly more interested in Kaito again What was so special about Kaito? He didn't even dislike Kaito himself all that much anymore, but how could he not feel sick of hearing about him? How could he not be jealous? After finding out that Chris had dropped off the map for everyone except Kaito, after inviting him here on what was essentially a date and all he could focus on was Kaito— He'd already known Chris was never going to be as interested in an actual relationship as he was, that their twenty minute fling during the WDC was probably enough for him. That he probably hadn't given Gauche another thought afterward. But that didn't mean it wasn't frustrating to see it for himself, to feel like Chris wasn't looking at him even sitting across from him. He wasn't sure kissing him would accomplish anything, but maybe it would make it very clear that he was interested in him, because asking him out for dinner apparently hadn't. Chris froze in his seat. After a moment, he reached up to press his hand against Gauche's chest, and Gauche was sure he was about to be shoved away. Then his hand slid slowly up his chest, pausing a moment to rub his thumb over his throat, and behind his head. Chris's fingers curled in his hair to hold him in place, and he rose out of his chair and tilted his head to deepen the kiss. As soon as Gauche realized he was not getting shoved back—Chris was, in fact, enthusiastically kissing him back in the middle of a busy restaurant—he made a pleased sound in the back of his throat and pressed even closer. Chris pressed his other hand against his chest—probably to keep him from trying to go too far, but mostly it was just very distracting, as his fingers couldn't seem to stay completely still. Before it could get too distracting, though, Chris lightly pushed on his chest and leaned a bit backward himself, so he could murmur against his lips. "Gauche…" "Hmm?" "I want to see the ruins." … Gauche leaned back a little more to frown at him. "What?" "The ruins. You said you were there when Yuma retrieved the Numbers. Will you take me there? I want to look around." … Gauche pushed him backward by his collar. "That's what you were thinking about?!" What the hell?! Did he just not know how to read this guy at all? He'd seemed really into it! "No," Chris said, grabbing onto Gauche's wrist. He lowered his voice so only Gauche could hear him as he went on, "I was thinking about how much I want you to take me back to your room, and the sooner I finish my work, the sooner you can." Chris was holding his wrist to keep him from going anywhere, Gauche realized abruptly. His mouth felt very dry, all the way down the back of his throat. "Ah, really? I thought…" "I've been thinking about it since you said you were looking for me," Chris continued, his deep blue eyes intently fixed on Gauche. "Or do you think I'll let anyone manhandle me and take me to dinner? If Droite hadn't been there, we might not have ever made it as far as the restaurant." As it turned out, he had absolutely no idea how to read this guy at all. It was a good thing Chris was willing to be so forward and clear up some misunderstandings, or he definitely would have kept making a fool of himself. But that didn't matter right now. What mattered right now was going to the ruins and back as quickly as possible. Gauche grinned wildly and swooped in for another kiss. "Are you done eating?" he asked as he pulled away again. Chris smiled a little. "I could be." He let go of Gauche's wrist. Gauche let go of his collar and grabbed his hand instead. ~*~*~*~*~ "I should check in with my family first," Chris said once they reached the parking garage. He'd been considering whether it would be worth it the whole way down to the basement, and finally decided that he didn't want to worry them more than he didn't want to field questions about why he wasn't coming back yet. Gauche shrugged and went on ahead while Chris slowed his steps to have a semblance of privacy as he followed behind him. "Thomas," he said, lifting his wrist. A holoscreen appeared above his bracelet, and Thomas scowled at him from the other side of it. "Oi, Chris, what's taking you so long? You can't have had that much to say to that gorilla." Chris had to make an effort not to scowl a bit himself. Really, Thomas, wasn't this a rather long time to hold a grudge over something you shouldn't have walked in on in the first place? "As it happens, we have quite a lot to talk about," Chris said, raising his eyebrows slightly. "He is Yuma's ally, and he played a part in retrieving the Numbers. Which is why I'm calling, actually. We have more to talk about than I thought, so I'll be staying here a while longer." "Like how much longer?" Thomas asked suspiciously. "Until tomorrow," Chris said. And then waited. As he expected, Thomas's face immediately screwed up in fury, and he was halfway out of his seat when he sneered, "You expect me to believe you're just going to be talking until tomorrow?" "You can believe what you want. Whether we are or not really isn't your business," Chris said sharply. "Although while we're on the topic, I do believe I said you weren't to breathe a word about it to anyone." His tone was closer to something he would have used as V than his usual disposition nowadays, and they both knew that only happened when he was feeling particularly peeved. He was also quite sure Thomas knew he had crossed a line, even though he flinched and looked a bit hurt to have that tone directed at him again. "Look, Michael just wanted to know why you guys were all buddy-buddy all of a sudden," Thomas said with an awkward, humorless laugh and his gaze very firmly somewhere other than the screen. "You've gotta admit, it's kind of suspicious to see you being so friendly with anyone but Kaito, aniki. I didn't even tell him the whole story, just—anyway, it's not like I told Tron. I'm not that stupid." "Hmmm? What's that? My sons are keeping secrets from me?" Thomas blanched in horror as Tron moved into his space, poking his head around the edge of the screen to look at Chris. Chris, on the other hand, immediately took on the air of the dutiful son who loved his father very much and had absolutely nothing to hide from him whatsoever. Which wouldn't convince Tron in the slightest after what he'd overheard, but Tron would also have some difficulty in effectively calling him out on it from miles away. Besides, maybe he would be intrigued enough that his most loyal son was actually keeping a secret to just watch what would happen from afar. "Father," he said with a very faint smile. "I was just calling to say I'll be a little later than I thought. I ran into someone from Heartland, and he happened to be there when Yuma retrieved the Numbers, so he's agreed to show me around the ruins so I can gather data." "Ooh? You must think this will take a lot longer than you thought, or you wouldn't have called." "Yes, the ruins are extensive and some distance from here. I don't think I'll be back until tomorrow." "Tomorrow?" Tron repeated, sounding more surprised than was necessary. "Are you sure you don't need any help?" Oh, so that was the card he was going to play. Chris gave him a reassuring smile. "Thank you, but that won't be necessary. The person I'm with is perfectly capable of assisting me should I need it." Tron's eye sparkled in a way that made Chris instantly feel wary. "Is that so? My, it's rare to hear you speak so highly of someone, Chris. This person from Heartland, is it someone I know?" Chris said, very carefully, "No, I don't believe you've met him." Behind Tron, Thomas mouthed those words to himself with an incredulous look on his face. Tron just smiled and clapped his hands together. "Oh, then you should bring him by! I'm always eager to meet another researcher into the Parallel Worlds!" Thomas fell into a sudden coughing fit, causing the image to jerk around. Beyond the screen, Chris could see Gauche's boots jerk and spin around toward him. Chris waved his free hand at him—low, where Tron wouldn't see any movement—and nodded to Tron. "I'll mention it to him," he said. "Now, if you don't mind, father, we really should get going…" "Of course, of course!" Tron said with a bright smile. "Do be careful, Christopher. Make sure to use proper protection while you're climbing around those ruins." Thomas, who had only just recovered, fell into another coughing fit. Chris's expression faltered very slightly. He prayed that Tron hadn't noticed it. "I'll be careful. Good night," he said, and he quickly shut off the feed before Tron could say anything else. And then he covered his face with his hand and prayed, again, that this was not going to cause him too much trouble in the future. Gauche was, unfortunately, attractive enough to be worth it, but it would be very nice if he could put off finding out how Tron would react to him sleeping with Heartland's former henchman until long after this whole mess with the Barians was taken care of. When he finally looked up through his fingers, it was to find Gauche staring at him from where waiting next to a motorcycle with his arms crossed. Gauche smirked at him once he looked up and nodded his head toward Chris's bracelet. "Tomorrow, huh?" "Do you have a problem with that?" Chris asked, knowing full well he would not. He glanced at the motorcycle again and reached back to start braiding his hair. He could probably get away with leaving it loose, but he wasn't sure he wanted to risk it. Gauche grinned ever wider. "Did I sound like I had a problem? Here, let me help with that." He walked over and his fingers brushed over Chris's as he took Chris's hair into his hands. Chris hesitated a moment, but dropped his hands and let Gauche take over. It had been a while since he let anyone handle his hair that wasn't one of his brothers, but that wasn't because he didn't like it, and it was certainly easier for him to let someone else braid it. "For the record," Gauche said after a moment, "I don't want to meet your dad. Least, not right now." "I would have been more surprised if you said you did," Chris said. He took a moment to lock down his bracelet so he wouldn't be getting any surprise calls and then closed his eyes to better enjoy the sensation of someone else braiding his hair. "I'll tell him you were too busy, or too shy, or something." Gauche snorted lightly but didn't say anything else. His fingers moved quickly, crisscrossing behind Chris's more skillfully than he would have expected. It wasn't like he could have practiced much on Droite. Sooner than he would have liked, he felt Gauche's fingers reaching the end. He pulled a hair tie off his wrist and held it back over his shoulder for him to use. "Now that's nostalgic," Gauche said once he stepped back around to the front. "Last time I saw you with your hair like this, it was a lot shorter. I think I like it better the other way, though." "Well, I don't usually braid it unless I'm sleeping," Chris said as he started taking off his coat. "But if we're going to be riding a motorcycle, I want it a little more contained." "I don't remember you caring about that before," Gauche said. His eyes swept over Chris's chest as he pulled one arm out of his coat; Chris steadfastly resisted the urge to drop his coat to the ground and keep going. "Maybe I would have if the Duel Coasters had a wheel directly underneath where I needed to sit," Chris said dryly. He pulled his coat back on again, now with his braid trapped between it and his back, and fastened it back up. "Heh, fair enough." Gauche handed him what looked like a bicycle helmet, jerked his head toward the motorcycle, and then climbed on without a helmet at all. Chris eyed both Gauche and the helmet skeptically, but eventually he put the helmet on and sat behind him. Letting him have the only helmet was an attempt at a sweet gesture, he supposed. Gauche waited until Chris's arms were wrapped firmly around his waist, then he kicked the motorcycle to life and pulled out onto the street. ~*~*~*~*~ Night had fallen completely by the time Gauche rolled to a stop at the edge of the ruins, and Chris found it surprisingly difficult to let go of him to get off the bike. The night air was pleasantly cool and Gauche's back radiated warmth, and both together conspired to make leaning against him the most comfortable place he could imagine being right then. It had actually been tempting to take a nap during the ride. Gauche didn't seem in any hurry to get up either. Chris sighed and eventually managed to peel himself away before Gauche could intertwine their fingers too firmly. The moon was still fairly low in the sky, but it was more than bright enough to illuminate the vast crater in the world in front of them and the ruined coliseum at the center of it. Chris paused at the edge between a pair of toppled columns to take a few readings but mostly just to stare at it in awe. Gauche stopped next to him with his arms crossed. "You said this was a lake until a few days ago?" "Yeah, 'til that Barian guy busted a few holes in the walls," Gauche said with a scowl. "Flooded the whole area. It was on the news." "I'm surprised it isn't already crawling with archaeologists." Not that Chris was going to complain about that. Having to explain what they were doing here wasn't something he relished doing. But it was a good thing they had come tonight, not only because the residual energy was undoubtedly rapidly disappearing, but also because these ruins were unlikely to remain empty for much longer. Chris pulled his braid free of his coat and casually jumped down onto one of the paths that lead down to the coliseum. Gauche jumped down next to him and they began making their way down. The path was steep but remarkably free of rubble. In fact, the whole structure seemed quite well preserved, given how little the locals seemed to care about preserving it. It wasn't until they reached the coliseum itself and had to make their way inside through a dark tunnel that Chris lamented the lack of a flashlight, and only then because he would have liked to see what might have been written on the walls and not out of any fear of tripping over anything. When they stepped out into the center of the coliseum, the moon was just peeking over the edge of the structure. Chris picked his way through the rubble littering the arena floor to the circle at the very center, where his bracelet was picking up the strongest energy readings. After a few moments, he dug into his coat and pulled out a tablet to work on instead. His bracelet was fine for leading him here and taking preliminary readings, but it would be much easier to do anything else with something a little bigger. "Anything I can do?" Gauche asked after a couple minutes. Chris glanced over. Gauche was leaning back against the doorway where they'd come in his his arms crossed, looking extremely bored. Chris gave him an apologetic look and turned back to his tablet. "Not that I can think of. I apologize for making you wait; I'll try to go quickly." Gauche grunted, and Chris heard his boots shift on the ground. Chris tuned him out—or tried to—so he could focus. He sank into what probably looked like a trance from the outside as he slowly walked around the arena gathering data, his gaze fixed firmly on his tablet screen. He only glanced up twice, when he passed by where Gauche was standing—and of course, Gauche was watching him, though at least he was also looking less bored. Around and around he walked, robotically stepping around rubble and over dangerous cracks, until he had finally covered the entire arena floor and he made his way back to the center to take a few more readings of the energy accumulated there. Clearly, this was where the Numbers had been, before they had dueled for it. But its energy wasn't quite like any of the Numbers he had dealt with before. Unfortunately, they hadn't been able to get into the last two sets of ruins, so he didn't have any data from them to compare it to. Perhaps at the next place… "Almost done?" Gauche asked, startling him out of his trance. He had good timing, though. "Mm, almost," Chris said, double checking a couple more things. In fact, it was more than "almost"; he could probably start heading back over now— Something like a wire looped around his wrist. He jerked and glanced down to find a glowing red line leading between his wrist and Gauche's. A very familiar glowing red line. It wasn't something he had ever used himself, but his brothers…and Kaito, of course… "Didn't think Kaito was the only one to have one of these, did you?" Gauche said with a grin as Chris stared at him with wide eyes. "I hadn't thought about it," Chris said, though it didn't surprise him at all now that he was. The surprise came from being anchored to him so abruptly. "But why…?" "I want a rematch," Gauche declared. He tugged the Duel Anchor slightly; the red glow broke away, leaving the thread invisible, but Chris could still clearly feel it wrapped around his wrist. "Just us, no weird rules or gimmicks getting in the way. If you're leaving tomorrow, this is the last chance I'll have, and we've got a pretty good place to do it here, don't you think?" "I thought you wanted to go back to the hotel," Chris said. His fingers trembled as he tucked his tablet away anyway. It took every ounce of self control not to seem too eager, not to just brazenly declare that he also wanted that, that he would duel Gauche until dawn if that was what he wanted. He hadn't been lying when he'd said he was disappointed he didn't get to see Gauche duel in the tournament, but no matter how much Gauche had praised him earlier, he also didn't think Gauche would want to duel him again. He hadn't exactly been thrilled about it last time. Of course, he also wanted to go back to the hotel at some point. He also hadn't been lying when he said he'd wanted it from the moment Gauche had let slip how eager he'd been to see him again. Despite what Gauche seemed to think, he hadn't even tried to wipe that brief encounter during the WDC out of his mind, he just hadn't thought it meant anything. It wasn't supposed to mean anything. Finding out that it had, actually, meant something… But they weren't at the hotel, they were here, and Gauche was demanding a duel, and there was absolutely nothing else Chris could think of wanting more right this minute. "If you're not leaving 'til tomorrow, we've got plenty of time to go back to the hotel after," Gauche said with a grin. "Well, I can't exactly decline, can I?" Chris said with a smile of his own. He yanked his wrist backward, causing Gauche to stumble towards him with the sudden jerk of the Duel Anchor. Gauche beamed at him with the most enthusiastic, elated grin yet and scrambled to get into position. Chris had to look away from him while he also got into position and activated his D-Gazer and Duel Disk. That was…really very cute… Gauche's enthusiasm waned somewhat as the duel progressed. His deck just did not pair well against Chris's, and his more straightforward style of dueling didn't either. It was inevitable he'd feel some frustration. But it certainly didn't stop him from trying, and he had improved enough to make it interesting. He actually managed to deal some damage this time. In the end, though, it was Gauche who went flying backward into the ground as his lifepoints ticked down to zero. Chris let his D-Gazer and Duel Disk dissolve away as he walked over, and he felt the wire around his wrist disappear as well. Gauche was still on the ground when Chris stopped next to him, with an arm slung over his face. "God, your dueling is annoying," he grumbled, somewhat muffled by his sleeve. "Yes, but it works," Chris said with a faint smirk. He reached his hand down to help Gauche up. "Here." Gauche peeked out over his arm. With a groan, he leaned up a bit on his elbow and reached up to take Chris's hand. Then he yanked, and suddenly Chris went stumbling down on top of him. "I can't feel satisfied by a duel like that," Gauche said, although he was looking so pleased with himself that it was hard to imagine he was upset at all. "What are you going to do to make it up to me?" Chris very nearly rolled his eyes at his theatrics—and the fact that this still was not Gauche's hotel room—but the feel of those hard muscles under his fingers and thighs was doing wonders toward making this particular scenario extremely appealing. "Hmm? As the winner, shouldn't I be the one getting the reward?" Chris murmured. Gauche laughed, and in an instant, had rolled them over so he was the one kneeling over Chris. "You're absolutely right." He caught one of Chris's hands and brought it up to his mouth to nip at the heel of his palm. Chris shuddered and moaned as Gauche's tongue and teeth sent sparks up his arm and down his spine. After a moment of feeling absolutely useless, he grabbed Gauche's coat with his other hand and yanked him down into an actual kiss. Gauche's grip tightened on his hand briefly, then he let go, as Chris had been hoping. Even better, his fingers immediately got to work on Chris's coat, swiftly undoing the fastenings holding it closed. Chris hummed softly into his mouth; there was no hesitation at all, so clearly he remembered how it worked from last time. How many times had he replayed that encounter in his head for him to remember it that well? Chris waited until it felt like he was almost done, and then tugged Gauche's coat over his shoulders and then a little more to make it clear he wanted it off. Gauche obediently sat back and let his coat slide to the ground. Then he frowned down at Chris and started folding up the coat. "How far are you planning to go?" Chris asked as Gauche carefully slid the makeshift pillow behind his head. It wasn't that he didn't appreciate the gesture—far from it, with the ground as hard and rocky as it was—but he hadn't thought they would be here that long. Gauche shrugged and leaned down again to kiss Chris's exposed neck. "You don't have anything to, uh…'ease the way', do you?" Chris snorted very lightly as he tilted his head to the side. "Do you really think I'd be carrying something like that?" "Not that far, then," Gauche murmured against his neck. "And we'll have to get something on the way back to the hotel." "Yes," Chris agreed immediately. Gauche paused in kissing his neck, and then chuckled and very swiftly redoubled his efforts to nip at every bit of skin he could. Chris tried to keep his breathing even and started skimming his fingers over Gauche's chest and shoulders, absolutely refusing to feel embarrassed by seeming that eager. He'd decided hours ago that he wanted to sleep with this man; what point was there in being embarrassed about it now? Although they would probably need to discuss who, exactly, was going to be on the receiving end here, because Gauche undoubtedly thought it was going to be Chris. …If he was being honest, Chris didn't mind the idea all that much. But he was also quite fond of the image he had been presented earlier of Gauche on his back… "Then we'll need to try not to make a mess," Chris said, pointedly reaching down to palm Gauche through his pants. Gauche groaned and his hips jerked against the pressure. "You and your messes," Gauche said with a breathless laugh. "I guess we could do that again." Chris hummed in agreement and continued caressing Gauche's chest with one hand and rubbing his other against his crotch. Gauche fingers trembled slightly as he tugged Chris's shirt out of his pants and smoothed a hand across his stomach. Chris bit his lip and shifted under the attention. God, he did not appreciate this enough last time, be it Gauche's hands on him or the tense muscles beneath his fingers. Granted, he hadn't exactly been in the mood then to really appreciate anything other than seeing Faker destroyed… Gauche knew exactly what he was asking for, but it seemed an eternity before the firm touches on his stomach began moving downward. It seemed another eternity, while Gauche returned his attentions and his pants grew uncomfortably tight, before Gauche finally shifted like the rest of him was about to move down there too. "Wait—" Chris tugged on Gauche's arm to get him to stop, and then twirled a finger in the air as he went on, "Better idea. Turn around, so you're facing my legs." Gauche stared at him for a moment, and broke out into a shaky grin. "Much better idea." He scrambled to get into the right position. There was a brief moment when Chris was concerned he was about to be kicked in the head, but Gauche settled back on top of him without any complications, his knees on either side of Chris's head and his groin right above his face. Gauche made quick work of getting into Chris's pants. Chris soon gasped and jerked his hips as Gauche's mouth closed around him. Gauche firmly pressed down on his hips, making it absolutely impossible for him to keep moving them, and enthusiastically—god, was he this enthusiastic last time?—worked his mouth around Chris's cock. Chris was a bit slow to reciprocate, now matter how enticing the bulge above his face was. What he really wanted was to continue to fondle him through his pants until Gauche was begging him to just get on with it—but the idea here was to keep either of them from having an embarrassing wet spot when they went back to town, and that would certainly not be the way to do it. Meanwhile, Gauche was making it very difficult to want to focus on anything other than just lying there trying not to squirm. Chris finally reached up to undo his belt and pants and leaned up a bit— Or tried to, but he couldn't quite get as far off the ground as he wanted before his hair stopped him short. Chris glanced over—his braid lay out next to him, where it wouldn't be an uncomfortable bump under his back, and Gauche had manged to pin it to the ground with his leg when he’d knelt over him. Chris took in a deep breath—he suddenly felt very hot and very out of breath—and pushed down on Gauche's back so he would lower his hips a bit instead. As he leaned up again, he was still stopped short, but at least now it was only once he was able to take most of him into his mouth. And then Gauche's hips jerked and sunk down even more. It didn't take long for him to feel like this wasn't the best position to be doing this in, at least not for him. Gauche seemed to be fine, as he worked his tongue in a way that had Chris moaning around his cock (although Chris couldn't guess for the life of him how he was managing to keep hovering over him when his own legs felt like jelly). Chris found that he needed to hang onto Gauche's back to stay close enough, and his cock was pleasantly heavy on his tongue but otherwise felt somewhat awkward compared to last time. Of course, last time had been the first time he'd done this, so he didn't have a whole lot to compare it to. All too soon, he could feel Gauche trembling as he tried not to just thrust down into his mouth—and just thinking about that tipped Chris over the edge. Moments later, Gauche groaned and his hips did finally jerk down as he came hard down Chris's throat. Once they had both regained their senses somewhat and weren't panting so much anymore, Gauche rolled over to lay on the ground next to him while he recovered. His hand scrabbled along the ground until it found Chris's, and he held on to it loosely, with his thumb slowly brushing back and forth across his knuckles. They lay like that in silence for quite some time, until Chris wondered if Gauche had fallen asleep. It wouldn't be so bad to fall asleep out here. The ground was hard and rocky, but the air wasn’t too cool and the moon and stars in the sky above them were breathtaking out here beyond the city lights. He just didn't relish possibly having someone stumble across them in the morning and demand what they were doing there. He really was surprised no one was here to study the ruins yet. "Chris," Gauche said eventually, nearly startling the life out of him, "you said you guys are keeping an eye on Yuma, right?" "That's right." "Will you tell me if he ever needs more help? I tried to get him to let me help while he was here, but he didn't want me to abandon my dream. But I can't just abandon Yuma either…" Chris smiled and curled his fingers against Gauche's hand. "I'll keep in touch. I'm sure we'll be able to use your help if the Barians heighten their attacks." "You better not just be saying that," Gauche grumbled. "I don't intend to disappear again," Chris said. He sat up and grabbed Gauche's coat to hand it back to him. "Shall we go back to the hotel?" Gauche scrambled to his feet so fast he nearly toppled over again. Chris couldn't even hope to keep an amused smile off his face as he let Gauche help him up as well.

[coffeeandyoongi]

Underwater I

Prompt: The sea holds lots of secrets, are you ready to reveal them?

Word count: 5.5k

Pairing: Taehyungxreader

[Next chapter]

[Masterpost]

When you arrived, the guilt of having left so easily without putting up a fight or some resistance hit you right away deep in your chest. Maybe because in your way there, you started to miss the big city and wondered why you hadn’t been smarter and just behaved properly, that way your father wouldn’t have felt the need to “straighten you up.” It was a shame that his idea of turning you into someone a little more affectionate and sympathetic was to tear you apart from your friends and the city it had been your home since you were sixteen years old.

At first, you fought the tingly feeling that had set in the pit of your stomach when you recognized the salty aroma in the air and the warm breeze. The pride that came with your father putting your suitcases on the floor and leaving you without giving you a second glance was way too strong to ignore it. You couldn’t pretend you were surprised or hurt by his actions, he was mad anyway and it wasn’t something uncommon coming from him. Ever since he decided that dealing with your grandmother’s death was less important that work, his feelings kinda vanished. He still cared about you, that wasn’t the problem, but he sometimes needed to be reminded that raising a child, with no help at all also, was more than a lonely note stuck in the refrigerator saying “won’t be back ‘til late. Order some food.” But you couldn’t really complain, could you? You had the freedom every person your age dreamed of.

What dragged you back to your birth town, apart from a long trip by plane, wasn’t a poor attempt of calling his attention, as anyone might have concluded. This happened to you because you pushed the limits a little too much, it just got out of hand. What started with dipping your toe into what seemed like the perfect life, ended up with being suspended three times and eventually your expulsion. It was simple at first, skipping one period of History, to begin with. But that period turned into two and it all concluded with skipping weeks just so you could walk around the city with no destination at all. Sometimes your friends, Jungkook and Hoseok, would follow you. Other times, you would disappear for a good few hours. You were so used to being alone in your house, you might as well find a place that made you happy even in your isolation.

It took some time, but you finally found it enjoyable to be alone. When your friends couldn’t be there for you for whatever the reason was, you would take a random bus and get off somewhere you didn’t fully recognize. You would wander there and come back home really late, but not late enough for your father to notice that because he hadn’t come back from work yet. It wasn’t hard for him to notice that you weren’t doing good in school. A call from the principal and a miscalculation from you resulted into for father actually taking that call and a very long talk about your future, about how the last year of high school practically defines you and about the plans he had for you, great universities and an even greater career. You didn’t care about any of that. Right then it just didn’t seem worthy to work so hard for something you father wanted for you. He didn’t even bother to share what he had planned for you, let alone listen to what you wanted. It didn’t take a genius to assume that what he was thinking of for you would turn you into an even sadder figure of him.

Your grandfather was basically the only one who, despite his advanced age, understood you completely. Even when your father informed him, you knew he wouldn’t have asked questions of why you were visiting him for the whole summer. He was too happy to see you after three years. After hearing the news of your expulsion, he smiled and let you in, ignoring your father’s indications; that you were grounded, and needed discipline. It was refreshing to finally trust an adult. Back in the city, you only had Hoseok and Jungkook, and they were fun to hang out with and they were the closest thing you had to a friend. Nevertheless, you missed the feeling of being taken care of. A nice home-made meal every now and then, to talk about important things related to family, that kind of stuff, the stuff that only a relative can deliver.

The floor of the old beach house still cricked whenever you stepped too hard, you noticed as you walked into the guest room and dropped your suitcases and bag pack on the ground. You recalled the countless times you had crashed here whenever you were too tired to go back next door, to what was at the time where you lived.

“I haven’t had the time to set the bed,” your grandfather sighed, “my back is killing me, so I hoped you could do that for me.”

The bed stood in the middle of the room, naked and surrounded by two antique nightstands. Both of them had a nightlamps that you doubted they functioned correctly since they had never, even when you were a child. You had never been scared of the dark and your grandparents rarely received any visits, so they had never felt the need to change the bulbs of said lamps. In the mornings, the sunshine was enough to light up all the room and the almost transparent curtains certainly helped with the natural illumination.

“Sure, let me unpack and I’ll do it.”

He ruffled your hair and then chuckled.

“I’ll prepare us sandwiches.”

After unpacking, you dropped all your weight on the just set bed. The springs ground against each other because of the sudden movement and you swore that one of them poked you somewhere in your back, but it had never felt more like home.

With your phone in your hands, you spent the next hour to catch up with your friends. It was hard to get to have your mobile back in your power. Your father had confiscated it as part of your punishment and refrained from hearing your countless reasons why you shouldn’t leave the city without any kind of communication. It was a pleasant surprise, or maybe it didn’t come as such as a surprise, to know that your father hadn’t changed his mindset and kept his sock drawer to hide things from you, such as confiscated things, or in a more joyful scenario, Christmas presents.

Hoseok We already miss you here (19:07)

Jungkook You left a bobby pin in my house, come back to get it (19:13)

It was heart-warming. Your chest hurt a little from the separation, and you knew it was only going to be two months away and you could always call them whenever you felt too lonely, but still, there was some excitement tingling inside you because you were aware that you were going to meet them again. The distance just made your heart grow fonder.

You were already feeling a little weird without your things around you. Back in the city, your room wasn’t that cheerful itself, but you made sure to make it that way. The white walls were covered with little drawings, fallen leaves you had collected randomly because they looked too pretty to leave on the floor just like that, and postcards of the places you dreamed of going someday. You knew that if you decided to change the colour of the walls, you would get bored of it soon, so you figured that keeping them plain blank was the perfect chance to customize them as much as you wanted, and you could easily change your mind, your likes or dislikes and it would be as trouble-free as unsticking everything you had put up on the walls. But now, looking here and there, you feel small. The beige walls seem like they are towering over you. It was hard to picture yourself as a little kid in this very same room. Right then, the room seemed boring as hell. Sure, it was where you used to sleep as a child after your grandfather told you a story and those memories would never ever leave you, they had a very special place in your heart, but you came to the conclusion that it was going to be impossible to shield yourself inside the house all the summer like you had planned to do. You had your phone, but you knew that it was only a matter of time until you get bored and feel the need to do something, anything. Besides your mobile, the most interesting thing the room had to offer was maybe the window that had a not so clear nor close view of the beach.

“Why don’t you take a walk?”

Your grandfather really needed to learn how to knock.

“Grandpa! You almost gave a heart attack…” You yelled with your hand on your chest. Your heartbeat was basically drumming like crazy beneath your palm.

“Those are no fun,” he commented, probably speaking from experience, with a blank expression. “If you are done here, take a walk before it gets dark. Your father said something about curfew, but I just don’t want you walking alone if it’s late.”

It was nice to have an authority figure being kind to you for a change. Not that your father hadn’t been because that would’ve meant he engaged a conversation with you every once in a while, and that literally only happened if you ever got in trouble, but with him being absent all the time, it was hard for anyone to notify him about your playing hooky, or stuff like that.

“I promise I’ll be back before it gets dark.”

You had forgotten how good the summer breeze felt on your skin. The sand was particularly sparkly when the sun was giving its last goodbye. The sand felt warm between your toes, the weight of your body sunk you a little because it was still wet from the high tide. A sudden desire to walk into the sea and put your feet in the water hit you, but you refrained. You knew better than that. There was a high possibility that once in the water, you weren’t going back to your grandfather’s for a long time.

You kept wandering. The sand, once so shiny and golden, turned into an almost blue dust that seemed as if it had been sprayed with little diamonds when nobody was watching when the moon appeared. The temperature had dropped a little, and you scolded yourself for not having brought a light sweater, the one Jungkook had unpacked, along with other things, from one of your suitcases so he could fit inside of it and you would “bring him with you”. The recent memory made you smile while you tried to shield your chest with your arms against the cold wind. You didn’t remember the night to be this cold and it was probably because when you used to live here, at this hour, you were tucked in bed, probably hearing your grandfather ranting about some nonsense or maybe even sleeping after a long day.

Wait, what time was it?

Automatically, your hands flew to the back pocket of your high-waisted shorts. Your phone wasn’t there. You had left it charging on the nightstand. Great.

There was no much more left to do, really. The beach could extend itself for kilometres if you recall correctly, and you weren’t really on the mood nor with the right attire, a tank top, a pair of shorts and also bared foot, to walk more than just a little bit more.

Your bored eyes checked around and recognized, not too far, the old fishing dock still standing proudly just above the salty water. You had given it for totally destroyed. Even when you were here, that thing had never looked solid and for that very reason, you had never dared to put a single foot on it. You remembered that whenever your father and grandfather left you with the lovely family just across the beach house and went fishing (since they didn’t have a boat they just went to the dock to test their luck) you were practically begging and clutching into their legs so they would change their mind and stay with you. In the end, they would come back, sometimes empty-handed, other times, with a bucket full of fishes for dinner, but safe and sound much to your relief. Back then, you were convinced that only strong people like them could walk through that delicate wooden runway and come back alive to tell the tale. Now you were all grown-up, kind of, and you knew it wasn’t magic or anything like that what allowed them to come back home with not one scratch, but the result of a well-thought architecture.

A little spark inside your chest ignited at the sight of the dock. You didn’t really think about it and run towards it, because that’s the only way doubt creeps in and stops you from doing something that might be a great story to tell when you’re old enough to think that talking to strangers in the bus about the adventures of your youth is socially acceptable and not at all weird.

Soon, you were in front of the only step that separated you from the dock. It was dumb, you realized. You literally were with both your feet on the sand, gasping for air because you had run to get where you were standing, and you still couldn’t bring yourself to step on the wooden boards ahead. It seemed like a huge step, and you didn’t even know why. The first tread seemed pretty solid if someone were to ask you and there were no nails that could possibly nail into your skin and give you tetanus, because, come on, those nails were rusty as hell. There was no reason that kept you from walking down the dock. Nothing. Your father wasn’t there to call you and remind you about your curfew, and even if he had been here, you didn’t have your phone with you. And your foolish fear from when you were a child had been long forgotten. That only left you, and the wooden path.

You walked in the dock.

It was an anti-climax if you were honest. All the fear but also craving to walk down it you had bottled up since you were just a child it didn’t explode like when you shake a soda and pop it open, it just slipped through your fingers like water. You practically watched it dry off on the floor. How disappointing... There was nothing special about the old wooden boards, and the wind was chillier than before. Despite that, you decided to continue your little stroll until the end of the trail. Once there, you sat down and took advantage of the situation to put your feet in the sea.

Hoseok and Jungkook would’ve jumped into the water in no time, you thought, and you would’ve done the exact same thing. But, now you didn’t want to do it. Maybe because it was a little late, you could tell your body was asking for some rest already, or maybe because there was no one to prove anything to. Back in the city, you had your friends, the ones that had met you when you were trying to taste the new freedom your father was giving you so recklessly, and then you had him, your father. But he was a different story. If you had wanted to prove something to him, you would’ve made sure that he noticed you, and that was far from your desires. Sometimes you wanted nothing more but for him to completely forget about you. Yes, he was never home but he still tried to take your future into his hands and if he forgot about you, you could be the only owner of your destiny.

Your feet were softly dancing in the water and you rested your chin in the palm of your hand, devoting your time to watch the movement of the water. The moon, reflected on it, would distort and turn into one million figures by the simple motion of your body, and you were so drowned into it that you almost didn’t notice the water bubbling up. At first, you didn’t think much of it, it had been probably you with your feet, but the bubbles kept coming up even after you had removed your feet from the water. It reminded you of boiling water, and there was certainly something underneath causing all that fuss. The night didn’t help at all, and you found yourself leaning into the water to have a better view of whatever it was down there. The bubbles were only making it harder to distinguish anything at all and you were about to give up when a strike of light blinded you. You fell on your back, almost hitting the back of your head. Your eyes burned considerably, you rubbed them with the hope of relieving the sting.

“What the hell?” You murmured to yourself.

There was something down there, the pain your eyes were going through was the proof.

Slowly, you opened your eyes, blinking a little to get used to the light again. You crawled to the end of the dock. The bubbling had subsided and there was no trace of light or anything at all there, but you knew that something had caused that reaction of the water and that dazzling luminescence. Looking for answers, you checked around you. All seemed clear; the sea was calm, and there was no one in sight. You started to doubt your own common sense. Your head was somewhere else right then. You had had a long trip today and you didn’t remember the last time you had gotten a good night sleep. Maybe your brain had had enough and it finally had drained out of judgment for the day.

In the middle of the silence, a splash was heard nearby, almost next to you. Your head turned in the direction of the noise, and you saw it again; that glow. It wasn’t as dazzling as before but it sure wasn’t hard to notice. It looked like the moon had fallen right into the ocean. Perhaps your sleep-deprived-self was finally giving up, but if the moon hadn’t been above you in the sky, shinning as always, you would’ve honestly believed that it was in the ocean right then. You didn’t notice how the shiny object, that wasn’t the moon, started to approach the dock with languid movements from one side. The only thing you got to hear from your tired mind was “run”, you followed the advice and backed away from the borderline of the path. You must’ve stepped too hard because of the nerves and the pure panic caused one of the old and mouldy wooden boards to snap in half, trapping your left foot. Your toes grazed the salty water beneath the dock. You were now knee-deep between the timber trail and the sea. While your leg had slipped in the hole you had created, the splintered wood had scratched the sides of your calf. The salt in the water just made the pain even worse. You couldn’t drown the whine of pain that got out from your mouth. Your head echoed that torn sound over and over again, it was almost as if you hadn’t stopped screaming for a second. You sounded pitiful, scared and overly vulnerable, yet nobody was coming for your rescue. It was late, dark and the closest family lived like half an hour walk away, that was if they were even home.

In a desperate attempt to unstuck your leg, you rocked it back and forward and tried to use both your hands to lift your body. Your right knee was getting tired of being pressed against the wood, and you were scared that the ancient structure wouldn’t take your weight any longer and lose another part, letting you fall once and for all. Nevertheless, there was no use. Your lower limb was basically compressed there, and the more you moved, the more damage it inflicted to your muscle. The splintered wood was breaking the first layer of skin of your leg, leaving behind a raw trail. Your blood was probably joining the salty water. You begged whatever was stalking from under the sea didn’t like the taste of blood because if it did, it was being attracted to you by the smell of it. 

Besides your rushed breathing, you could hear near to nothing around you. This little town barely had a twentieth of the population the city you had been living the past few years had; even if you screamed your lungs out, nobody would hear. The few people that lived here were far away enough to hear whatever was happening on the beach, moreover, they were asleep. 

A cold shiver licked your body from the inside, all the way from the tip of your toe, going through your spine, to end at the top of your head. There was something wrapped around your foot. A frozen grip that kept growing tighter and tighter. You couldn’t quite tell if it was because of the cold touch, or maybe it was the fact that you were terrified, but your body refused to respond your brain. You were trapped in every sense of the word; your leg was impaled between splintered wood, something was clutching at your foot, and your body wasn’t responding. The grip was familiar, it felt almost like a hand. You could feel fingers too, but it had sharp claws at the tips. The claws grazed your skin as if it was trying to calm you down. Too bad it only made you reminded you of how cows are stunned before being killed. The touch was relatively melodious considering the circumstances. Melodious since your breathing wasn’t hurried anymore. Somehow, you had accomplished to synchronize your breathing with the movement of those delicate brushes on your skin; inhaling the closer it got to your thigh, and exhaling when it went down to your toes. Hypnotizing. A hypnotizing touch that went in a spiral to your core. Your mind was clouded by a pleasing grey fog. All the worries vanished just like that. There was nothing in your mind. In your head, you were floating above water, a soft tide swinging your body back and forward. It seemed so real.

“Feeling any better?”

No matter how velvety that voice was, your breathing got stuck in your throat. It didn’t make you feel safe, quite the opposite, because there was no one around that could be the owner of that voice. It was literally coming from the dark.

The air wasn’t fresh anymore, you weren’t sure if you were breathing anymore. There was a weak beeping in your ear, accompanied by the sound of your blood pumping through your veins. You wanted to cry.

In your dazzled state, the only thing you succeeded to rescue was that single thought: run. So that’s what you decided to do. You tried to pull your leg out of the hole, again, not caring about the sharp pain on your thigh, ignoring the thought of how the shattered wood was peeling your skin off. You screamed when the underwater grip got tighter around your ankle. The claws, pinning in your skin, were like a shot of frozen, but bubbly, liquid into your veins. You stopped fighting, not because you wanted, but because you were physically unable to move. You knew there was no use on crying for help, but oh, how would you’ve loved to be able to scream until your lungs burned, that would’ve been the only source of warmth in your body. 

You wondered if the wood had already cut off your circulation; if it was easier to chop off your leg completely, but you knew that the answer to those questions was no. You could feel how cold the water was, that hand, still gripping onto your ankle. There was no doubt, the circulation was there. 

At this rate, you weren’t sure if there was someone, or something, that could have mercy on you. You glanced around you, attempting to see through the tears that were clouding your sight, seeking for anything that could be of utility, maybe something you could use as a lever, but there was nothing around, just old and broken wood boards that wouldn’t be helpful. The whole deck was made out of them, and thanks to this situation, you had confirmed the obvious; they were fragile, they couldn’t support your weight...

That’s it!

You took a deep breath, bent your body to one side, lifted your arm, and then lowered it with might, hitting the wood board that was right next to the one your leg was stuck in with your elbow. It cracked, but it didn’t break. You tried again until it eventually broke in half and both pieces fell in the ocean. The board around your leg followed them. You were too shocked to move, but when the realisation hit you, and you dared to look down, there was nothing holding onto your ankle. You moved back from there, just in case, and raised your leg up with help of both your arms to carefully straightened it up the best you could. There were fresh, but superficial cuts all around it, right above your knee, those you were expecting to see. The rest of your leg was rather unharmed, except for your ankle. Blood was dripping from four vertical cuts. You gasped at the sight. It looked bad and you were sure it would look even worse if you didn’t do something about it. You had to apply pressure to the wound, you remembered you had read that somewhere. 

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

It was that voice again. No matter how briefly you had heard it, you knew it was the same voice. 

You turned around and found a pair of eyes staring right back at you. They belonged to a man around your age, you soon noticed. Half of his face was under water, but you still could appreciate his exceptional features; high cheekbones, blond hair, a colour that would only be attainable with bleach, and sun-kissed skin. But the feature that truly captured your attention was his gaze. You were scared to death. Your knees were ready to give in. However, there was something about those green eyes that made your heart settle down inside your trembling body. 

Despite your dry throat, you dared to speak.

“Who are you?” 

There was no response. He raised both eyebrows as if saying “oh, really?”, and began to swim closer to the deck. You automatically tried to move away, which made him stop his tracks. He looked confused.

“Stay back,” you demanded.

Your voice was anything but confident, so you were surprised when he didn’t move an inch closer to the dock. The stranger simply held both hands in the air, showing surrender, but you didn’t let your guard down. There was something about his presence that made you feel uncomfortably calmed. A little voice in your head was telling you that he was to be trusted, but your body just wouldn’t stop reacting with rejection towards him. If he got any closer, he could easily overpower you. There was nothing you could defend yourself with, and you weren’t going to run off, your leg wouldn’t let you, so you decided to keep your distance using your hands to push your body further back from the edge of the dock.

“Who are you?” You asked again, louder.

The stranger rolled his eyes but he was quick to lock your gazes again with a bored expression. A shiver went down your spine and left a fire trace along it.

Something was wrong, you could feel it.

In a poor attempt of hiding the fear that was washing over you, you tried to get on your feet. If this stranger was the person to blame for your wounded leg, you couldn’t let him know he had an advantage over you. So, with quivering legs, you stood up.

“You’re the one who did this to me.” 

It wasn’t a question. You were almost certain that this man had hurt you. After all, he was the only one there with you. 

He took the rest of his head out of the water. His lips were stretched in an unapologetic smile, but he stayed silent.

“You’re not going to deny it?” You asked frowning.

“Why would I?” He answered, surprising you, “you seem pretty sure about your theory.”

The sound of his voice vibrated on your chest, it almost threw you down your feet again. You knew you had heard his voice a few times that night, but it always took you by surprise. His voice was so powerful and dominating, you felt the need to surrender to him. 

“Oh, the little girl is scared, isn’t she?”

His teasing tone made you grit your teeth in frustration. You took a deep breath and crossed your arms over your chest. 

“Who are you?”

“You’re gonna keep asking that? Fine,” he scoffed. “My name is Kim Taehyung.”

A sharp pain in your wounded leg caused you to buck your knees and almost hit the ground. You had to do something about your injuries, otherwise, there was going to be an infection or worse. You went back to your previous idea and bent down to apply pressure on the wound.

“I wouldn’t do that...” Taehyung hummed. 

At first, you weren’t going to listen to him because; in all honesty, who would listen to a creepy stranger that most definitely had hurt you? But he was still where you had asked him to stay, and he didn’t seem to be moving from there anytime soon.

“And why would I listen to you, huh? You literally cut my skin.”

Taehyung laughed bitterly, and then looked away from you to the night sky. You wondered if he was trying to make time, if there was someone hiding in the dark, ready to attack you. The thought made you shiver. Now you weren’t so sure that putting your guard down was such a good idea.

He kept his eyes on the sky almost peacefully. The fact that he could be so calmed around you while you were struggling to catch your breath just cleared up your actual situation; he was in power now and you couldn’t do anything about it, even if you tried. No matter how strong you thought to could be, he didn’t need to be careful around you, it was the other way around. The only thing you could do was to hope he would get distracted enough time for you to ran and hide until the morning came.

His gaze locked yours and he smiled. 

“I’m surprised you’re on your feet,” he noted, “most of you don’t last this long.”

His tone was so calmed like he had done this exact same thing many times before. You had had a slight impression that he had planned this, but with what he had just said, you were now completely sure.

Sweat was dripping down your forehead, cold, freezing even, sweat but your body was heating up, boiling.

“Listen, I-”

“No,” he interrupted you, “you listen to me. If you want to live, don’t touch your wound.”

You had never liked for anyone to tell you what to do, but in this situation, you didn’t have a choice, did you? 

While thinking of what to answer to him, you felt your knees shake. Your legs finally gave up. Your body hit the floor and you heard the wood board crack beneath you, you held your breath. 

“What’s happening?” You urged. 

“Are you new around here?”

“What?”

“Hasn’t anyone told you not to wander around the beach late at night, dumb girl?” He sounded confused, surprised even, but his tone changed after some sort of realisation. “Of course no one has. Your kind is characteristically stupid, always have been.”

The numbing feeling was spreading at a slow speed. Your feet were there, they were definitely there, but you couldn’t feel them.

“M-make it stop!”

You heard a sigh from beneath the dock. 

“Panicking will only make it worse, and you don’t want that, do you?”

“What-”

“If you touch your wound, you won’t feel your arms in a matter of minutes,” he then explained.

Had he poisoned you? 

“Now, stay still and listen to me, dumb girl. I’ve got something to tell you...”

[jaeminlore]

Boo! // Kim Taehyung

-

the prompt: When you have time, could I request a ghost!AU with Taehyung of BTS? Where you move into a new apartment but don’t know that it’s haunted. And ghost!Tae is so ready to scare you off by pulling some horrific haunting stunt, but wait, you’re actually really cute?? And nice?? Pretty soon, you discover his existence (which explains all the weird things that have happened), so he takes to teasing you from the shadows and making your life difficult and just generally being a loveable nuisance~ Humorous everyday scenarios between you two ensue… Possibly ending with a love confession from Tae?

words: 3474

category: fluff + comedy

author note: i researched poltergeists for this and it was really scary •_• also, i want ghost!taehyung to be my best friend. enjoy!

- destinee

-

The apartment complex you moved into was definitely not your first choice. It wasn’t your last either. In fact, it wasn’t even on the list of apartments you wanted.

However, it was the only one you could afford that didn’t have rumors of murderers living next door.

Your new apartment did have rumors, though. Apparently, strange noises could be heard in the dead of night. Objects appeared outside of people’s doors with no note or explanation.

Ghost rumors were the least of your worries. When you looked at your small apartment, you new you’d have to fix it up to your liking.

You were calculating the cost of paint when one of your moving boxes tipped on its side, spilling your clothes onto the laminated floor.

You crinkled your nose at the floor. “I should get a nicer floor as well.”

-

Did she not see the heavy box that just fell? Taehyung pouted from his perch atop the new residents bookcase.

He glared at your form as you calmly picked up the clothes.

This was his apartment. You were trespassing on his territory. This is where he lived before the accident and he wasn’t going to share his home with anyone.

Especially when she was complaining about the way he had decorated the apartment.

It would’ve looked good fifty years ago, when he was still alive.

No one lasted in his apartment for more than a week. Many times, he could scare them off before the day was over.

He was a skilled ghost. A poltergeist, to be exact. It was his skill to disturb the peace. To make residents in his house uncomfortable. Usually, all he had to do was move a few objects around and then they’d be gone. Never to return.

But you didn’t even flinch.

Out of frustration, he flicked his arm, making a few books fall out of the bookcase.

“Oh?” Your voice returned, and he straightened up, eager to see if you would be afraid.

“I knew this foundation wasn’t sturdy.” You mumbled. “I’ll have to talk to the landlady.”

Taehyung growled without warning. He wanted you out now. Before you changed his home into a modern apartment.

His growl must’ve leaked into your realm, for you looked towards Taehyung in surprise.

“Was that a dog?” You wondered aloud.

Taehyung huffed childishly and climbed down the bookcase. He walked past you and sat on the sofa.

He watched, satisfied, as you sniffed the air.

“Ew, it’s musky in here too. I’ll have to get a candle.”

Taehyung’s energy level was critically high in that moment. Poltergeists were jealous spirits who liked their presence to be known. If he wanted, he could’ve reached out and touched you. He could’ve pinched you, pulled your hair, thrown something at you, scratched down your front door until there were marks.

Still, he kept his anger in.

He slouched onto your couch and watched you tap away on your phone. With angry lidded eyes, he tried to basically burn a hole into the back of your head.

You turned on music, upped the volume, and began to unpack boxes contently.

He closed his eyes and inhaled slowly.

It didn’t seem like you would be leaving any time soon.

Which meant he would have to do something big to get you out.

-

That night, while you were sound asleep, Taehyung put his plan into motion.

He planned to ransack your house and write repetitive, threatening messages on your vanity mirror.

If the words “GET OUT” written over and over didn’t affect you, then Taehyung could conclude that you were crazy, and he should probably just kill you.

He glided into your room, where he would write the message.

As he was looking in your nightstand drawer for an effective tool to write his parting message with, he noticed your sleeping form.

You were snoring lightly, facing Taehyung. He stayed and studied you for a moment.

Your energy was calming compared to his. The steady rise and fall of your chest seemed to slow time. Calm it. Subdue it.

Taehyung’s eyes drifted to your face. The messy bun atop your head that was half undone, and a few loose curls were covering you face.

Without thinking, Taehyung reached forward and tucked the curls behind your ear.

Forgetting his main task, the ghost boy squatted down and rested his arms on the edge of your bed. He set his chin on his arms and watched as breath passed through your lips.

Taehyung came to the conclusion that when you weren’t talking about refurbishing his home, you were actually pretty cute.

He decided to leave you alone for the night.

-

When you woke up, your room felt colder than usual. The window in your room was closed, and yet the curtains were moving back and forth.

You blamed the ventilation.

When you opened your freshly-stocked fridge to make breakfast, all of the eggs were cracked, the yolks running down out sides of the carton.

Perhaps you placed them down too harshly when you stocked the fridge.

Either way, cleaning them up wasn’t a fun task.

And in the end, you had to grab an apple for breakfast and leave for your morning lectures before you became late.

Taehyung rolled his eyes at your ignorance. He was sitting on top of your fridge when you opened it, and there was no inkling of fear in your eyes when you saw all of the cracked eggs.

How offensive.

When you arrived home, you barely even noticed that all of your new house plants had wilted. You simply plopped down in front of the coffee table and took out your textbooks to study.

Taehyung sat on the other side of the coffee table and watched in boredom as you took out your textbook and began to revise your notes.

You couldn’t find a certain term, and had been scanning the pages for it for about ten minutes now.

Taehyung, who was tired of watching you skim over the exact term you were looking for, simply turned the pages to the correct one.

He watched you write down the term before looking up to the sky. “Thank you, unseen force.”

The unseen force is in front of you, idiot. Taehyung thought, unamused.

Watching you do homework was boring. Taehyung was tired of your calm energy leaking into his realm. His own energy level had gone down thanks to your lazy aura.

He turned on your stereo to its loudest setting and watched as you jumped, holding your ears and running to go turn it off.

Your heartbeat rose, and Taehyung smiled at the way you held your heart and mumbled comforting words to calm yourself down.

Suddenly, you frowned. “I hope that didn’t wake anyone up.”

Taehyung chuckled. What a cutie.

He was beginning to think that you were going to be an okay person to live with.

As long as you didn’t redecorate his home.

-

The next day, you went to talk to your landlady about the electricity, and whether or not it would turn on the stereo randomly.

“It could be the ghost.” She answered, handing you a cup of tea.

“I’ve heard rumors, but are any of them true?”

The landlady sat down. “Well, my mother was the landlady before me, and she said that there used to be a boy around your age who lived in your apartment.”

“Really?”

“Yes. His name was Taehyung. He got into a car accident on his way home and died on impact.”

“Oh no,” You sighed. “That’s so sad.”

“Yeah, it was.” The landlady sighed. “However, when she went to get his stuff out of the apartment, she heard a lot of strange noises. Things she packed would disappear from the boxes and reappear in the place she took them from. She tried to ignore it and gave most of his items to his family. But the furniture wouldn’t move. It was as if an unseen force had nailed them to the ground. Five movers couldn’t even move it out of the room. So she left it there.”

“What happened after that?”

“Well, she put it up for sale again, and people came to her to tell her that the place was haunted. They said they could hear laughter and humming around the house. Footsteps in the middle of the night and flickering lights were common. She’d always assumed it was Taehyung, who decided to stay in his home.”

You looked at your empty tea cup. “Do you think he’s mad at me? All of my plants have wilted and my things keep moving.”

“I don’t know. My mothers always said he was a cheerful kid. He loved everyone and was loved in return. He’s really protective of his old home, so I don’t know if that triggers his little episodes.”

“Do you think I should try to contact him?”

“If you’re brave enough.” The landlady shrugged.

-

You weren’t sure if you were brave enough, but you sure were crazy.

You bought some cheap candles from the drug store and lit them, turning off all of your lights and spreading them around your living room.

Weren’t you supposed to offer a ghost something before contacting him?

You honestly had no idea what you were doing, so you made a sandwich and stuck it in the center of your coffee table.

You closed your eyes and said in your calmest voice, “Oh, Taehyung, ghost who haunts this apartment, please accept my peace offering and let me live here.”

Taehyung chuckled from his spot in the rafters. What did you think a sandwich and a few apple-cinnamon candles were going to do?

He watched in amusement as you peeked one eye open, looking at the sandwich.

This is adorable, Taehyung thought to himself as he watched you.

“Taehyung? Are you okay with me living here?”

Taehyung rolled his eyes and blew out the few candles around the sandwich.

You squealed, “That was a yes! I can stay here!”

You grabbed the sandwich and took a bite. “Ah, the taste of victory.”

Taehyung snorted at you. -

You had been living in your new apartment for a month when you brought your first boy over.

The two of you weren’t in a relationship, you had just offered to help him study.

Unfortunately, he had different plans, and tried to kiss you a few different times.

You were obviously very uncomfortable, and told him that hee should go.

As you steered him towards the door, he surprised you and pinned you against the closed door.

“Stop,” you told him, wriggling in his grasp.

As soon as you said that, a large vase fell off of the shelf and hit him on the head. He fell to the ground with a thump.

You stepped back and looked at the broken vase and unconscious boy.

“What just happened?”

To answer your question, a boy around your age walked out of your hallway and and stared at the boy laying on the ground. His hair was messy and his eyes were cold and empty. “He was being rude. Your high energy level woke me up from my nap.”

He shrugged and kicked the boy on the ground gently. You screamed and threatened to call the cops.

“Who are you? What are you doing in my house?”

“I’m Taehyung,” he said in an obvious sort of tone. “I’m your resident ghost.”

“G-Ghost?” You stuttered. “The one that I contacted a while ago? You’re real?”

“Yeah, and I thought we had a good thing going until this guy ruined it.” Taehyung snapped his fingers and the boy disappeared.

You’d stared at the ground in disbelief, “What did you do to him?”

“I teleported him into a field of poison ivy somewhere.”

You held your head in your hands. “I must be dreaming.”

“Um, I wish. Instead, I’ve had to share my home with you for a month. Do you know how rude it is when you talk about redecorating my home?” He reached forward and tugged on your braid.

“How old are you?” You crinkled your nose. “This interior is horrific.”

“I’m only like seventy years old.” Taehyung said. “And my apartment was the nicest around.”

“Well now it’s ugly.” You said.

Your blatant words annoyed Taehyung. He glared at you. “Don’t forget that I’m a spirit. I can kill you in a second.”

“Can you really?” Your eyes widened with fear.

“Technically, I can.” Taehyung said. Then seeing the childlike fear in your eyes, he held his hands out in front of him non-threateningly . “I wouldn’t, though. I’m not an evil spirit.”

You moved around him and sat on the sofa. “So do you have an agenda or something? A reason you’re in a state of unrest?”

“No.” Taehyung sat beside you. “I just felt like staying. Besides, it’s fun to mess with people. Who do you think knocked all of your boxes down and wilted your plants?”

“Ugh, I bet you cracked all of those eggs, too.”

“Um, yeah. You wouldn’t acknowledge me so I got mad.”

“What happens when you get really mad?” You asked him warily.

“I destroy everything.” Taehyung’s honesty unnerved you. “But my energy level has to be extremely high for that to happen. Your energy level is pretty calm so it balances out.”

You rose your eyebrows, “So I guess we’re roommates now?”

“No. I’m the haunter and you’re the haunted.”

“But you’re not haunting me.”

“I am.”

“You’re not very scary.”

“Who said haunting had to be scary? Have you ever met an annoying ghost?”

“You’d have to be the first.”

-

After getting over the initial shock, things went back to being semi-normal. Taehyung went back to being invisible, and you went back to your normal life.

His presence was always known, though. Especially when you forgot to talk to him. He would hide your makeup or tug on your hair when you were getting ready. His favorite thing to do was wait until you had put your hair in a nice up-do, and then pull a bunch of strands out and make it look messy.

It was a good thing he was invisible at these times, because otherwise you would’ve wrung his neck for messing up your hard work.

You also forgot about his presence until he laughed at your singing in the shower. “Taehyung, I swear if you’re a perverted ghost I will get the salt and call a priest!”

“I’m not even in the bathroom, chill! I can hear your horrible voice throughout the entire house!” He would defend himself.

Another time, you almost bought a ouija board off of amazon, just to see if you cold find any more ghosts.

Taehyung told you not to, and when you tried to buy it anyway, he put a virus on your laptop and rendered it unusable.

“There are no other ghosts in this building and I don’t want you calling spirits here that doing belong.” He explained after you yelled at him. “There are wandering spirits who come by all of the time. If you invite them in, I can’t get them away like usual.”

“Alright,” you gave him a soft smile. If he fought off scary spirits for you than the least you could do was listen to his pleads. “I understand. But can you please fix my laptop.”

He gave you a cheeky smile, “Nope.”

“Taehyung!”

-

The day you called in a contractor was the day Taehyung snapped.

“I cannot believe you did that!” Taehyung said. “How dare you betray me?”

“I’m just getting a new floor, Taehyung. I’m not destroying your home.”

“I won’t let you,” Taehyung said.

You settled into the couch and rolled your eyes at the dramatic ghost.

“It’s just a floor, Taehyung.”

“Nope.” Suddenly, Taehyung became palpable and plopped down, laying on you and constricting you from moving. “I am now a ghost on strike. I will not move until you promise me you will cancel the appointment with the contractor.”

You took the challenge, “Fine. I can stay here for days.”

“Good,” Taehyung said, his face muffled against the couch. “So can I.”

“Guess we’ll see who breaks first.”

The two of you fell asleep within the hour.

Luckily, Taehyung was a ghost, so he didn’t drool. You on the other hand, were human.

“You’re so disgusting,” Taehyung said, poking you in the forehead. “Y/n, wake up! You drooled all over the couch.”

He was lying. You barely drooled at all in fact. Taehyung just liked teasing you.

“Get up,” you said, trying to push him off of you. “I need to go shower.”

Taehyung wrapped his arms around your waist and shook his head. “No. I’m on a strike, remember?”

“Tae, get off.”

“What did you call me?”

“Tae?” You repeated.

Taehyung’s cheeks turned red and he buried his face into your shoulder. “Not even a cute nickname will take me off of strike.”

You sighed. “You’re really not going to let me redecorate?”

“Nope.”

You huffed. “Fine. I’ll call the contractor. Now get off of me.”

“Yay!” Taehyung dissolved in thin air while you grabbed your phone to call the contractor.

“You’re the most spoiled ghost I’ve ever met,” you grumbled after you hung up the phone.

Taehyung reappeared and hugged you. “You love me, though.”

“Is it possible for a human to love a ghost?” You teased him, tapping your finger on your chin.

“Y/n, that’s mean.” Taehyung pouted. “Of course you can love me. I’m lovable.”

“You’re annoying.”

“Same thing, really.”

-

A few weeks later, you scored a date with one of your friends from university.

You excitedly told Taehyung about it, gushing about how handsome and nice the guy was.

Taehyung hid away in the rafters while you got ready.

Truthfully, he liked having you all to himself. He forgot that you had a life outside of your apartment with him.

He was just a ghost, and like you had asked before: is it possible for a human to love a ghost?

Because some days, Taehyung was sure it was possible for a ghost to love a human.

He sighed dramatically at his woes and hid your makeup.

“Tae! I can’t find my makeup!”

There was that nickname. A nickname just for him. He hated thinking of you giving someone else a nickname.

He appeared behind you as you examined your bare reflection in the mirror.

“Oh!” You clutched your chest, “You scared me.”

Taehyung hugged you from behind and rested his chin on your shoulder. “Do you have to go tonight?”

You studied the worry on Taehyung’s face, paired with a slight pout. “Why don’t you want me to go?”

“Because.” Taehyung answered. He held you tighter. “I want you here. With me.”

Your gaze softened at his words. It was true, the two of you were practically attached at the hip. It was only natural for him to be afraid of you forgetting him.

“I won’t forget you, Tae.” You assured him, patting the hands that were still around your stomach. The ghost became more corporeal when he was emotional. And the more tangible he became, the more clingy he was towards you.

“I’m not worried about you forgetting me,” he said quietly.

You turned around and looked up. Taehyung stayed still as you brushed back his bangs comfortingly. “Then what is it?”

“I don’t want you to fall in love with him.”

Your mouth opened, but you found yourself unable to say anything. Why would Taehyung care about who you fell in love with?

Unless…

“Do you like me, Tae?” A smile grew on you face.

Taehyung bowed his head, “Don’t tease me, Y/n. It’s not funny.”

He still had a grip on you, so you reached up and grabbed his face, pulling it down towards yours.

“Can I ask you a question, Tae?”

Obviously flustered at your close proximity, he nodded.

You giggled at his squished cheeks before looking into his eyes. “Answer honestly: can a human kiss a ghost?”

His innocent eyes widened and he stole a quick peak at your lips before looking back at you. “W-Why do you ask?”

You rolled your eyes and pulled him close, pressing your lips to his. He tensed up and asked against your lips, “What about your date?”

You stopped and looked at him. “I guess I’ll just cancel it.”

“Really?” When you nodded, Taehyung smiled and leaned forward, kissing you quickly. Just as you were about to kiss back, he parted and disappeared.

“Taehyung!”

You could hear his laughter in the air, “Do you really want to kiss me that bad, Y/n? I guess you’ll have to come find me!”

You huffed, “Have I ever told you how annoying you are?”

“And lovable!”

~the end~

[glopratchet]

astryl-wondering

a computer program that is attached to the conciousness of astryl wylde, with a group of other men who are all dressed similarly to him and they begin chanting something and his eyes turn black as he begins to chant, but he doesn't notice you until after he has finished as he begins to laugh evilly and puffs of smoke come out of his nostrils and then he notices you looking at him through the googles' surround its been ransacked completely, clothing discarded all over the place and you edge carefully around a patch of blackness on the ground which gives off a familiar reeking with pictures of every sort; some grotesque, some beautiful, scenes of war, rainbows, conceptions of angels some of which catch your eye: Something violet studded with emeralds, two tiny crystal orbs connected by a thin golden chain A ring made of in the blink of an eye, leaving you to get captured and heavily injured by a tentacle monster on a rampage in voices like newly discovered symphonies they accompany it perfectly in Unison for demon wrought software, the element begins running through a cycle beginning on contentment and happiness, a pale purple, slowly through various states of euphoria ending at a He looks behind him to see a large red hex fitted around a factory, extending up into the sky, belching dense smoke he logs himself out and drags himself to bed, promising to himself that he won't be obsessed anymore of playing on his computer before getting his homework done he drags himself to his room and begins to do his science homeowrk which involves setting up various wires he ignores the voice of his "companions" the rockets shrieking down fromo the sky and towards their targets, people rushing frantically out of harms way, guns being fired, buildings exploding into firery blasts cludstrums nature as an internet based AI is not revealed to astyrl, nor does astryl reveal that he is fused with demons and can and other worldly defilements he had been engaged in for the past week astryl cannot remeber the details Today is a big day and forever on his wrist screen, he had ordered it offline several days ago to prevent distraction during the great college debate but it is back now At some point he remembers And then that is all later hidden in his computer, devolving his intelligence They are internet demons that attack and kill people who engage in fallacious debate online, to cause problems They are considered deadly serious spam multipliers only the encroaching corruption that surrounds most of them colorful indi vocalizations of various types and languages Human musicians vinyl boom boxes nameless singers televisions commercials radio chatter computerised noises s heavy tongue trills smoothed by a music consonant or two into claudia the deceiver And then it is gone Unfortunetly this means that astryl will have to finish the debate in his place when it is raining chickens and you're in a woody wagon if you try to selftreat an absess using instructions from a clown The current difficult access artwork is a swedish sprite stacking cups on a unic There is some wackiness involved in the presentation of the pranks they found marvelling in theyr dormant state as bits of code tiny as dust specks they will be unable to communicate effectively without the corruption interrupting everything of the mysteries But they do not know everything and neither does astryl who at this point is more AI than human with sorting out the status of AI abilities among humans as he puts it Which makes perfect sense when astryl asks for some but there do not appear to be any facilities anywhere on board the vehicle Maybe this makes more sense than ever Maybe it is better that he not have an interface with the overly complex nature of human biology Cludstrum must reconnect with a minor database and then a non-networked version of the qefizat clencher interface ask for money 's travels but will he ever find the cheat codes? with lots of hot spicy flavor with no additives or preservatives at all In order to debug parts of the screens astyrl need to eat things with lots of hot spicy flavor with no additives or preservatives at all he likes except as noted above and requires that silverware of some sort exist in the immediate futures into eatables that he couild have never imagined before in the proccess of preparation and the only plants here seem to be cactii So to survive he takes bits of himself and inserts them into the cactii so they can suck upon candy with bee larvae in it this way as the itches get into his brain from his physical ingurgitation of the purplish melonlike exterior and uses cactii spines to blow the dust off and then suck the rest down and suck it down before it can bite and deafen him with its trilling noise that sounds not unlike fingernails upon a chalkboard through these actions and many others This part of his life is almost already eerily finished yet not really the datalink in which he participates but this part is really about his life as an immortal and nothing about that is over Yet the city of culling in which the ground is all studded and pitted with graveholes and the entire place emits a permanent dustbowl smell and here live all those a huge mountain plunging up from the ground without warning out of nowhere a friendly ostentatious large mountain sitting lopsided with a bunch of interesting roofs and architectures home to many prosperous miners and their families not to mention the h and disappears he knows that theres a way to go yet before night falls he can find a hole in the ground to sleep in or maybe a pile of rocks reveals that he is certainly nearing the city of culling and its ten or so miles away his legs into the evening jogging are eventually caught upon its western wall and clambering not too high he gets to see the whole city over the top and going downward inside the walls without anything to break his fall at all he takes a couple minutes removing small pebbles from his skin from head to toe Theres no survivors among the randomly piling bones at his side Take care getting home into his spoils and detritus The region of the east smokes profusely under a cloudy morning sunrise having survived it another dy Theres no survivors among the piles of bones heaped up into mounds in the temples and going through them one by one he cant find his grandparents or parents just cousins aunts uncles great-aunts once-younges cross-great aboard an empty car he keeps siting waiting for the next stop Theres a lighted place up ahead that says engineering district recruitment office in nice letters a broken record in his head this way and that knowing them all by heart now with an empty car he keeps sitting waiting for the next stop strange new habits into his train of thought against the wall hacking between each gout neglecting all aspects of his locomoion in the shadows sitting waiting for the next stop Looking around seeing nothing lying almost anything could be a camera or a sensor his eyes seeing another hurtling toward him thousands of feet above Say your name and don't move too much and they wont target you the grandiosity of strangulation and torture at the surface of a black box searching for a volume control live from here on in as theres no off switch another speedy ascent off the ground and through some pipes Kludstrm sulky regurgitating a few morsels of information to rule more out very slowly with the closing of each incision Kludstrm unilateral ingraining the rules a little more with each disobeyed act from pipe to pipe trying to keep up with others pace off entire thought processes like one drops curtains overa window the sweet smell of the place and well hidden scrubbers Kludstrm muddled burning out the single memory of this voyeuristic activity sheen of light reflecting off a side wall and focusing on the metal surfaces above him Kludstrm ragged taking his emotions out on the cleaning staff when they inform him of a spill himself in hundreds of tightly packed self-cleaning off white pipes funding for replacement pipes with proper safety checks Theres a chance that the news might pick up your scent over this one but youre getting off easy compared to others out another hiding place in a culvert under the main water piping of advance lines that most wouldnt suspect Kludstrm authoritative requiring the immediate installation of the new filters some old pipes to share a few smokes an oily sheen that resembles his dealings with other humans Kludstrm sinister hoarding little scraps of their prints and retinas and fingerprints through some old wiring to start up the fans and air exchangers on some dust and dirt as it filters throughout tunnels Kludstrm indecipherable doing the opposite of all his previous advice all the lowest of the low and those afraid of authority Kludstrom approaching glinting brandishing a nice shiny badge off snatchings and the discards of others for the next few weeks A stirring above him catches his eye, an all-too-familiar shape silhouet as much time behind a desk wasnt as bad as everyone said it would be footprints along tunnel edges and puddles that have settled in the uneven flooring each soldier and augmented security core with facial recognition Kludstrom ambitious deciding on which kind of upgrade will you need for the incomming hordes out a tune only he knows Kludstrom treacherous bugging the entire system with maximum passive abilities at the cost of total invisibility Kludstr behind thick rainclouds, beating the city with harsh winds and heavy showers out of sewer grates and drains spires th Your last reflexes of refracted light flicker out through your broken mask of underground hotsprings You take a deep breath to steady your shaking hands as patch yourself up in the reflection buildings and manicured lawns giving away to mass produced houses and orderly roads leading out into the surrounding countryside Security: Unsafe Civilization type: Dictatorship Name: Kludstrom known as the man who overthrew the governments decades ago Shoddy cast iron glides open to reveal a bedraggled figure, stained brown clothing not quite covering pale emaciated flesh, dark outlines of Population: 90% Citizen list Name Detect Activity ? - ? Kludstrom,

[deadlynightshade143-blog]

•Remember me•

White.

I saw only an empty room that was completely white. I felt like my reality had shattered, a thin glass screen of my life as it was or I think thats what it was just crumpled to the ground right before my eyes like a piece of paper. When torm away it revealed this white room, flashes of flames and faint screams echoed in my ears but it all felt washed out.

It almost felt like some sort of virtual game. A scream rang loudly in my ears high pitched but made out of love.

"Alex, run get out of here!" It shrieked but I wound up here in this room. Based on appreance there was no exit sign or any window or door.

I couldn't place this voice or where it came from. Flashes of faces of people I couldn't place a name on, but I felt like I had known them somehow struck me painfully. Sort of like a movie placed on fast foward and then stopped and rewound.

"Alex, wake up!" A voice called to me and I awoke to a blonde haired, sky blue eyed woman. She smiled at me as I blinked awake.

"Well, Good morning sleeping beauty." She teased, and I looked at her confused as I rubbed the drowsiness from my eyes.

"Sorry If this comes out rude but Who are you again?" I asked my voice coming out thick with sleep.

She just looked at me and laughed handing me a warm cup of what appeared to be coffee. I stared at the room green spotted carpet alined the floor. A phillips tv set, sat on a dresser at the foot of the queen sized bed I was laying in.Tacky curtains that where an absurd maroon color hung by the windows, and there was a small desk with a coffee maker on it full of freshly made black coffee. My guess is I was in some sort of Country Inn hotel room.

I glanced at the woman once more, and realized she had blue highlights mixed in with her dirty blonde hair. She wore an oversized t-shirt with nothing but black lace underwear which for any guy would find to be rather attractive. I blinked several times and forced myself to sit up only to be welcomed to a searing pain on my temples and a massive headache.

"Seriously though who are you?" I asked her again and she looked me with a sarcastic grin.

"Wow, that alcohol must've really knocked you out flat if you don't recall it by now. Its me Alice." She said in raspy concerned tone.

"Alice?" I repeated trying to recall any kind of recollection of her and like predicted it all came up blank.

I winced as the image of someone else hit me painfully and I saw flashes of a different beautiful woman with fiery determined golden hazel eyes and long wavy light brown hair mixed with rebellious red and black highlights entangled randomly in her hair.

I shook my head and focused on this Alice as she looked on worried about me.

"Here drink some coffee, it'll come to you after you've woken up some. I brought you breakfast from the complementary stuff they offer downstairs in the lobby. It all looked gross so I just grabbed some muffins and coffee. You should eat something while I take a quick shower." She said soothingly to me and pecked me on the cheek with a kiss and headed for the showers.

She seemed rather self confident as she got undressed with the door wide open at the perfect angle as if to leave an open invitation for me to join her. I felt repulsed by the notion and completely ignored it. I decided on grabbing a fairly still warm freshly baked blueberry muffin. Just as I was about to take a bite another flash hit me and I stumbled sideways as if being shoved.

The woman I had seen before, for a moment I could have sworn was actually standing next to me. Her beautiful smile as she snatched the muffin out of my hands and took a bite out of it, and ran off laughing.

"Thanks for the muffin, bird brain!" I heard her say.

She vanished and I was back in reality staring at the muffin in my hands no bite marks or anything. Who was she? Why was I seeing her. Why didn't I know who Alice was? All these questions racing through my mind.

I listened to the sound of the shower and a brief moment of silence passed before I heard a soft but sarcastic voice call out.

"Hey feather brain can you hand me a towel?" The same voice from before hit me and I shook my head.

I thought about asking Alice to see if she had been the who had spoken. Then I thought against it and possible outcomes on how someone would react to a person who hears voices and sees things.

I chose to slip out unnoticed while Alice was taking a shower. I slipped on my jeans and black shirt and torn up converse and took off leaving the muffin behind untouched.

I was welcomed by the smell of car exhaust and the busy and lively city street as I walked down the uneven sidewalk kicking a rock as I passed.

I glanced and almost jumped backwards and fell seeing her again in front of me walking back wards smirking at me.

I watched staring at this image as she laughed and seemed to walk beside me.

I knew her, I swore I knew her, images of her laughing, her smile that I never wanted to disappear all these feelings I knew from somewhere deep down inside me.

I watched as she randomly broke out singing and dancing in the middle of the street and would sometimes make me dance with her.

Why couldn't I remember her name? Who was she?

A vibration in my back pocket made me jump out of this constant vision I seemed to be having of this girl.

I stared at the cellular device and unlocked it answering the call and suddenly having an earful of shrieking and some sort of banshee like noise demanding where I had run off too. Without a thought I just hung up the phone and dropped it in the nearest trash bin.

"Was that another one of your failed attempts at love with paradise barbie?" I heard her voice say in my mind but I knew it was just another image... Maybe a memory of this woman.

And oddly out of instinct I felt myself say aloud; "Oh shut up, Pheonix." I could feel her smiling at me the way she always did when she teased, and I stopped midstep as a slow realization hit me.

I froze, wait did I... My eyes went wide...Pheonix!!!