#it's not technically shadows it's just bright where the surface is facing the light and dark where it's facing away from the light

[dravidious]

You're really really neat

I've been practicing the dark magic of computer graphics today! Unfortunately for my hubris I've been struck with the curse of the shadow crystal

[sirfrogsworth]

Hard & Soft: An Explanation of Light

I was watching a video from one of my favorite tech YouTubers, Mr. Whose the Boss. He was showing off some of his favorite tech and pulled out this tiny LED light.

And then he placed a diffuser on the front and said this...

"You can equip a softbox on the front which *massively* softens the light on your face."

Sorry, Arun.

No it doesn't.

I sometimes wish I could get a job as a YouTube lighting advisor. So many creators have to set up and use professional lighting but very few actually have an understanding of how their lighting works. And with just a little knowledge they could up their lighting game big time.

If nothing else, I could stop the plague of ring lights.

Ring lights are my nemesis.

*shakes fist at ring lights*

Arun repeated a classic myth. Diffusing a light does *not* make it softer. And despite the name, a softbox is fully capable of producing hard light. Especially if it is only the size of your granddad's wallet.

I'm afraid softboxes are a bit misnamed—much like how the tremolo system on a guitar is technically a vibrato mechanism. Tremolo is a fluctuation of volume, not pitch. Personally, I just stick to calling it a whammy bar because that is more fun anyway. And, like, what does "whammy" even mean in the context of a guitar? I'd rather call something by a nonsensical name than an inaccurate one, ya know?

What the hell was I saying?

SOFTBOXES!

They should probably be called "light homogenizers." Which is a mouthful, but more accurate.

Or, hear me out... WHAMMY BOXES.

Froggie Note: I am trying a color coding technique to help make the most important information stand out. Red means PAY ATTENTION and blue means "do your best to remember this." Let me know if this is helpful or annoying or if a different color combo is preferred.

Hard Light vs. Soft Light

Hard light is a less flattering light source that creates high contrast, sharp shadows, and accentuates texture.

Soft light is a more flattering light source that creates soft shadows and reduces texture like pores, blemishes, and wrinkles.

You can *only* get hard or soft light by changing the apparent size of a light source from the subject's point of view.

If you remember only three things about light, they should be...

Bright light = sharp photos, less noise Hard light = small light source Soft light = large light source

Now, it's important to remember that hard light is not *bad* and soft light is not *good*. In photography, the oft-used parlance "flattering" just refers to the rendering of facial features and blemishes. So you might use a more flattering lens to make sure faces do not distort or a more flattering light modifier to reduce wrinkles.

But there are situations where soft light can be very boring and hard light can be much more dynamic and interesting. But if you have someone who is insecure about their skin or has a lot of blemishes, you can mitigate that by making the light softer. But if you have someone with great skin and a lot of angular facial features, you might use a hard light to show that off.

Which of these do you prefer?

The one on the left was taken with a 7 foot diameter light source and is *very* soft. But the other had a 1 foot diameter and I think it is more dynamic and interesting.

You can also mix hard and soft light. And with something like a parabolic reflector or a beauty dish, you can even modify a light source to be hard and soft at the same time.

This technological terror of a light modifier is sort of like having 24 individual small lights around the edges but the entire surface of the reflector also acts as a single large light source.

And when it isn't atomizing Alderaan, it is taking photos like this...

This creates a falloff of light around the edges of her face, nose, and arms while also reducing the intensity of the shadows. Lenses with longer focal lengths prevent distortion of facial features but also flatten our faces. So a modifier like this can bring back dimensionality.

Neat!

Now I just need $8,000 to buy the Death Star light.

There are a ton of possibilities when it comes to modifying light sources, but most people typically want the main light on the subject to be in the realm of soft and use hard light sources as edge lights.

Also, everything is a spectrum and light is no different. There is a giant space in between hard and soft to play with. In fact, the hardest light possible would be cast on a subject floating in space.

And the softest light possible would be on a planet that has 100% cloud coverage that still allows sunlight to scatter through.

So, I have determined the surface of Venus to be the most flattering light in the universe.

Look at how dark and sharp that astronaut shadow is! And I'm sure Venusian photography would be quite popular if you wouldn't burst into flames.

On planet Earth, noon on a clear day would be the hardest light and a very overcast day would be the softest light.

How can the sun be both hard and soft light?

Well, the sun is quite large, but it is very small in the sky and very far away. It is the only thing humans can observe that is close to a "point" light source—the smallest light source possible that shines light equally in all directions.

But on an overcast day, sunlight scatters through all of the clouds and becomes a HUGE homogenous light source. The clouds become a singular giant light above us. And as you can see, the light is so soft the woman does not have a hint of shadow on her face. And shadows can draw attention to pores, wrinkles, blemishes, and other textures.

But wouldn't the smallest light source be a laser or something?

When photographers refer to a small light source we mean from the perspective of the subject being lit. This is referred to as apparent or angular size.

But you also have to account for the size of the area the light source can illuminate.

This is the area a laser can light up.

And this is the area the sun is able to cats cast light upon.

It doesn't matter if a laser is close or far away, it focuses light onto a very small area. But the sun lights up half the planet. So look at imagine the apparent size of the sun in the sky and compare its size to half of the Earth. In that relative circumstance, the sun is a super tiny light source.

And the sun becomes an even tinier light source on the moon because there is no atmosphere or clouds to scatter and enlarge it.

You can change the apparent size of a light source in two ways...

The physical dimensions of the light and the distance from the subject.

A light with small dimensions can be a large light source if it is close enough and if the subject is small enough. So a flashlight could be a large light source for an ant if that flashlight is directly next to said ant. But a flashlight could never be a large light source to a human.

However, we can enlarge small light sources with modifiers.

A modifier can be a softbox. It can be a piece of paper. A large poster board. A wall or a ceiling. Anything that changes the nature of a light source can be a modifier. But not all modifiers increase the size of a light source.

So, you can take that flashlight, shine it on a wall, and reflect the light to make a giant light source capable of producing softer light.

But what you cannot do is put diffusion material directly in front of a flashlight and make the light it produces softer.

When Arun put that diffuser on the front of that tiny light, he was not making the light any bigger. He was only making the light more diffused.

What does diffusion *actually* do?

Diffusion scatters light. It makes light bounce in all directions and keeps it from being focused. And while this is an important aspect to making a light source larger, it does not change the apparent size of a light source on its own.

Diffused light is homogenous.

A homogenous light source has the same intensity across its entire surface area. And that homogenization is the key to creating a better soft light source. It can *assist* in making a light source larger, but only if you know how to wield that diffusion properly.

When you shine a flashlight toward a wall, you increase the apparent size of the light source.

Fantastic! You now have a softer light. Mission accomplished.

But if you do not diffuse it, you will create a hotspot.

That bright hotspot will reflect more light than all of the other light reflecting off the wall. That reflected light has different intensities across its surface area and you end up creating TWO distinct light sources—one hard and one soft.

This can sometimes be desired if you want to create graduated light that falls off like I showed earlier. But if it is not controlled well with a specialized modifier a hotspot can cause more problems than benefits.

This can reveal unwanted texture, double shadows, cause harsh glare, and it may not achieve the desired amount of soft, flattering light you were hoping for.

However, if you diffuse the light from the flashlight before it hits the wall, the light will scatter and reflect off the wall more evenly. You will create a more *homogenous* light source that acts as a single entity of light.

Diffusion does reduce the overall intensity of the light, but that is usually a worthy trade off for the increased homogeny.

These pesky hotspots are actually a big problem with those cheap softboxes you can buy off Amazon.

Many of them do not have enough diffusion to create a single homogenous light source. So they end up with a hotspot that gives you that double light source effect.

I was able to fix this with my friend Katrina's softbox by adding a layer of tracing paper in front.

You can see the chip clip holding the tracing paper in place on the right side.

Photography is just problem solving all the way down.

A higher quality softbox will have a second layer of diffusion already built in to prevent this, so make sure the softbox has this feature before buying.

Or invest in a roll of tracing paper and some chip clips.

Softboxes are an ingenious light modifier when built properly. They take a small light, diffuse it, enlarge it, and then focus it toward your subject. It's essentially a paradox of scattered & focused light. And since all of the scattering only happens *inside* the softbox, it gives you great control over how that light hits your subject. And you can focus it even more by putting a grid on the front.

This keeps light from "spilling" off to the sides though it can reduce intensity a bit and create unusual looking catchlights in the eyes.

Whereas a cheap shoot-through umbrella kinda "shoots" scattered light all over the place and causes a ton of extra reflections off the walls and ceilings. That may end up giving you unwanted second, third, and fourth light sources contributing to your exposure.

You can see light hitting the left and right walls and the ceiling—those pesky photons are going everywhere! And while it is giving a soft, flattering result due to that umbrella being so freaking big, you have almost no control over the light and how it affects your background.

So, yes, a softbox can make a small light source bigger, but that doesn't always mean you will get "soft" light.

This softbox takes a 10 inch LED panel and creates a 12 inch light source. This is mostly a scam product.

The marketing says it makes the light softer.

And while that is *technically* true, I'm afraid people are going to be disappointed if they think this thing is going to dramatically soften their light. A small increase in surface area like that would only be dramatically different if you were lighting a little toy car or the hypothetical ant friend I mentioned earlier. Something the size of a person is not going to see a difference in softness. Not to mention you are going to decrease the power of your light by adding diffusion and have no softening benefits.

Photography gear companies love taking advantage of new photographers because the desire to buy more gear to improve the quality of photos is quite strong. This is jokingly referred to as G.A.S. or "Gear Acquisition Syndrome." And while there is absolutely gear you can buy to improve your photos (lights, lenses, tripods), knowledge trumps any piece of gear at any time.

So, no, this scam softbox will not make the light appreciably softer. The only way to make this light softer is to find a softbox that enlarges it more than 2 friggin' inches, bounce it off something larger, or bring it closer to the subject. Move your light as close as possible and you will enlarge its apparent size.

Or, conversely, you can move your light farther away to make it hard.

Meaning you can technically make a softbox a hardbox.

Seriously, can we just do the whammy box thing?

So, what have we learned?

Soft light is more flattering to skin and reduces texture and harsh shadows.

Hard light increases contrast, sharpens shadows, and highlights texture.

Neither is good or bad. Soft light can be boring. Hard light can be interesting. A mixture of the two often produces the best result.

The only way to make light softer is to enlarge the light source.

You can enlarge a light source by...

Increasing the physical dimensions with a modifier.

Moving the light closer.

Reflecting the light off a larger surface.

Diffusion alone does not make a light softer.

Diffusion makes a light source more homogenous by mitigating hotspots.

Softboxes create homogenous light that you can direct and focus.

A softbox can still produce hard light if it is really small or really far away.

We should call it a whammy box.

How can you use this knowledge?

Well, the first thing you can do is...

DON'T BUY A RING LIGHT.

YES, I AM RANTING ABOUT RING LIGHTS AGAIN!

That giant hole in the middle of your light is a great spot for extra light.

And as we just learned, a larger light source is softer. So unless you specifically need a ring light and know how to use it (facial close-ups, camera goes in the hole), you are better off getting the biggest light you can fit in your space.

Look at how much bigger this light is than if it were a ring light.

It's like all of these influencers are throwing perfectly good light into the garbage.

Sorry, let's try this again.

Once you avoid ring lights, how can you use this knowledge?

I know a lot of you reading this are not influencers or YouTubers or photographers. And you may be thinking all of this knowledge I just shoved in your dome is useless.

But here's the thing...

We all take photos.

And I think we all want our photos to look their best.

If you start thinking more about light when you take photos, I promise you will be able to improve their quality.

If you are taking a selfie, think about where you can go that has a larger light source. Perhaps you have a large window. Or you have a big overhead light or floor lamp that shines up into the ceiling.

I actually had this idea to create a mega light that could blend in with a house's decor, but secretly be a photography light for taking pictures of people and pets indoors at night.

Secret Photography Light Ingredients Cheap Floorlamp Dual Light Socket Adapter 9000 Lumen LED Bulbs

(Seriously, if you put that together, stick it in a corner, and turn it on when your kids or pets are playing, you will never have another blurry photo from inside your house unless they are going full zoomies.)

If you are outside on a sunny day, don't stand in direct sunlight.

Remember, THE SUN IS ACTUALLY SMALL, angularly speaking. Find a shady spot under a tree. Or put the sun behind you and face a big white wall so the reflected light smacks you in the face.

Walls are light sources!

The ground is a light source!

Remember that moon photo?

You were looking at the sharp shadow earlier because I drew your attention to the sun being a small light source.

But the surface of the moon... HUGE LIGHT SOURCE.

How do you think the front of that space suit is lit when the sun is behind him? Either Stanley Kubrick has a big reflector offscreen or the ground is a soft second light source.

If you can't make it to the moon, just wait to take that selfie on a cloudy day. I think overcast light is a little boring, but your skin will look buttery smooth without using those stupid Facetune apps.

You can also wait for good light. Sometimes sunset has some nice, soft directional light because it has more atmosphere to scatter, diffuse, and enlarge it.

If you are indoors, don't use direct flash on your phone. Never ever use direct flash if you can avoid it. But perhaps you are with friends and they all have phones too. Use one or more phones to bounce the flashlight off a nearby wall. Or open up a paper napkin and hold it just out of frame and shine light through it and diffuse it.

A piece of paper can even work!

Flashlight 3 feet away shining directly onto my face...

Flashlight shining through a piece of paper a few inches in front of it...

Flashlight shining through a piece of paper 2 feet away that is just out of frame...

I started with a small light source.

I then made the light source a little bigger with the paper, but the diffusion was too close and it created the dreaded hotspot of doom.

And then I made the light source as big as I could by moving the paper as close to my face as possible without being in the shot. This also gave the light more room to scatter and diffuse making it homogenous.

Froggie Tip: I was using a pretty powerful flashlight, so with a phone you might get better results *bouncing* the light off the paper rather than shining the light through the paper.

So, before you take a photo, just think about how you can make your light source bigger, brighter, and more homogenous and you might be surprised how much better you look.

ANYONE CAN DO THIS!

[sil-te-plait-tue-moi]

My heart is a bloodhound!

PART 1 ★ PART 2

Quick summary: It happens again, when the year festers into August again and leaves the two of you raw and vulnerable like open wounds.

Word count: 15K… 🤓

Warnings: canon-typical mentions of death, violence and injury (there is mention of like eating people but idk); grief; misogyny; Rust's personality; semi-public SMUTT T-T (MINORS DNI); same level of pretentiousness, maybe a little more, as the first part.

A/N: Holy fuck this sucked the soul out of me (wish Rust Cohle would suck the soul out of I MEAN WHAT), i am super proud of this though!! Went through many iterations and this was the least shit! 🎀🎀🎀 This is technically part two to The idler wheel but can be read by itself too. May or may not write other things for this guy but for the time being, I need a cleanse 😭 BUT please please enjoy and please please interact, i love reading comments and so many lovely people commented on the first part, im gonna do my best to respond to any/all this time 🤘MWAH MWAH

***

It’s difficult to differentiate between the thrill of being left alone here with him and the slow-sinking dread of the implications of that.

With the return of the musk of the summer, those three ruthless, windless, unrelenting months that would seem to drag on for several lifetimes when I was a kid, the memory of where I was last year—and the year before that, and the one before that—hangs brightly in my mind. Stale, not quite dead – so bright. Crawling with mildew.

Stepping into the bar had felt like entering another dimension. Maybe it was the suits that gave it away – every single God-haunted patron—the truckers, the farmers, even the old dog lying at a man’s feet—had turned, sensing foreigners as acutely as the immune system registers a bodily threat. I knew Johansson felt it: that dark pull over the back of the neck. But under Marty’s overconfident, swaggering lead, that winning smile, we soon assimilated. Skin swallowing a bullet.

God forbid you ever leave the town you grew up in. Shame on you if you don’t, though. How sanctimonious of me to change my mind and return after earning a spot amongst the lucky few escapees.

Something in this place still irks me.

At least, in Brooklyn, there was always noise: cries of a baby in the apartment over, the discord of traffic bursting through the streets below, the rush of a crowd, the overlap and slur of private conversations. At least the badness would stare you right in the face; at least people were evil to be evil. At least there were corners where things could hide, where it made sense for shadows to exist: all to explain the paranoia that stalked me.

But here?—it seems so open. Like, if a rare, hot wind would blow through a Louisiana town, it could do so in one straight path, through walls, through people, without ever getting disrupted. Everything is so light in the blazing sun, you can practically hear it: the hum of rays passing over every surface. Nothing should be able to hide. And, at night, with no sun, no rays, there is no noise. Maybe a dog. And ghosts. But perhaps it’s just the area in which I live. 

When Marty started drinking, flirting with the twenty-one-year-old barkeep, Johansson’s face had stiffened. He himself had never even touched a bottle of beer – devil stuff. We shared a look once the blond detective started gabbin’ like an idiot.

“Know what Maggie thinks?” he had laughed, slumping over the sticky table of the booth, big, sweaty palm choking out his drink. “She thinks you might be pissed at me.”

Johansson blinked hard to keep his nose from wrinkling, but, even then, he couldn’t keep from physically cringing away. “Who?” he asked, confused by those hazy, unfocused eyes.

Marty cracked a toothy grin – there was that slight gap between those front two, which had been charming at first and only managed to thoroughly disgust me now in moments like these – and pointed his finger right at me, accusing. “You.”

My stomach churned dangerously at the sight of him.

“Marty,” his partner had drawled, a low warning.

Waved away like a fly.

“Naw, it’s like—you��re on your high fuckin’ horse or somethin’.”

The words were spoken through a laugh, but I knew there was meat behind that so-called good mood. He was one of those people that tended to overcompensate. A mistake, an ill feeling. He liked to point out how I was alone, and often, too, poorly disguised as a passing joke, complete with one of those shit-eating grins that seemed to come so easy to him.

Shouldn’t he have been happy? Not only had he gotten our case, by then, but we’d handed it over with smiles on our damn faces. Nice enough to walk them through the original crime scene, introduce them to the key witnesses. Complicated. We didn’t have to do shit for ‘em, but we did. Hell, even that beer he was clutching to his chest was paid for out of the goodness of my own fuckin’ heart. Who was he to moan about the situation? He was the one who insisted on staying in the middle of butt-fuck nowhere, brushing off any and all pointed questions on whether his family would be missing him at dinner.

“You know, I’d rather you were pissed,” he continued, where, really, I should have just smothered him into silence.

Rust was staring into the side of his flushed face, iron-grey eyes like a drill, like he was thinking the same thing.

“Look, you’re smilin’ at me now, but I sure as hell don’t trust it, buck. You wanna bite my head off, don’t ye?”

Like I ever could have done that.

Though the familiar weight of rage curdled in my chest, I would never admit it to the likes of Martin Hart. When he got like this—jealous, insecure, whiny—I wondered whether it was just a temporary lapse, or if this him, this true him, just lay under the surface all the time.

It wasn’t that fucking hard to plaster on a smile and take what you fucking got – I did it all the time. He could dream of a different life, but this was the one we were dealt. Fact that his grown ass hadn’t accepted that by now twisted violently in my gut. Between the two of us, I was the one that knew this – so why did he get myfucking case?

In my head, I’d let Salter have it, too. How could I ever admit I had an ego? How could I ever admit I had a mind to wrench the teeth out of the sheriff’s fucking gums? 

But I have plenty of practice acting like things don’t bother me, which is why it was so easy to plaster on my amiable smile and laugh, “C’mon, man, you know it’s only ‘cause o’ the workload.” Not that you could comprehend that, lazy fuck. To Marty, my kind’s natural state was amiable—anything otherwise would be a defect—so I’d expected to convince him. “You’ll do right by it, ‘m sure.” 

If he were sober, I know he would’ve bought it – he could convince himself that the way of the world was right and I was only being sweet to be sweet, because he deserved it. 

But Marty was drunk. Piss-drunk, loud drunk. His mind was clumsier than usual, unable to muster the energy to jump points, ignore the evidence, like he did daily. I hoped I had the power—if I had to let the case go, I wanted to at least retain an into its goings-on—but there was only one way to really have power over men like Marty when they were drunk, and I had had no interest in being one of his girls. 

My partner twitched beside me, picking at some spongy, yellow fluff protruding from a thin split in the chocolate-brown fake leather of the booth. He was just as furious as I was beneath his fort of calm.

Marty took a swig of his beer. “She wants you over soon. Maggie. Barbecue or some shit.”

“Maybe you should go home,” Johansson interjected, sharper than intended. If I were him, with his body, with his life, I’d have hit the fucker—long time ago, too. I couldn’t, but Johansson wouldn’t. He didn’t lack the temperament for brutality—I’m not sure anybody does—but, rather, couldn’t justify it to a necessary degree in his head. “I’m going home,” he’d reasoned kindly – he made it sound so easy. “Just let me take you. It’s on my way.”

Itching to leave, to return to the comfort of his wife and his little daughter. Marty had always found Johansson’s fondness of them disingenuous, had disliked my partner as long as they’d worked in the same office. He complained to me once that none of his stories seemed complete. When I asked him what he meant by that, he couldn’t answer—but I knew.

Breath short in my chest, I had half-expected Marty to lunge over the table, scratch Johansson’s eyes out. Only, Rust leaned over, dipping his head down to mutter something quietly into his partner’s ear, which was all flushed red. 

And then he went willingly into Johansson’s car, stumbling through the still, open night into the backseat.

My partner had squeezed my shoulder goodbye – I’m not sure why I didn’t leave with him. Now, I was doomed to leave with Rust. 

There, he sits across from me, smearing the ashy tar of his half-smoked, flaking cigarette over the mottled glass ashtray dragged over to his side of the table, little circles, waves, absent-minded art. Has me transfixed, some hypnotist.

If I look down like this, if I sacrifice the opportunity to look at him, I earn his careful attention: this sits in the back of my idle mind. I’ve been taking advantage of it more and more since summer broke through the sweetness of spring, which has since curdled like milk, sour. His stare drags over my face like fingers – I can almost feel his touch pressing into the softness of my cheek, dragging over the ridge of the orbital bone. 

“You’re okay?” he asks after a couple slowed heartbeats, pulling me out of the honey-pit of my thoughts.

I dart my eyes up, breaking the spell – his observation retreats, clouds, and drifts away to fix on the broken clock on the wall, the one that reads one forty-five at eleven o’ clock.

Primarily, his question irritates me. Nobody asks “are you alright?” imploringly, not unless it concerns themselves and their own wants. Salter had asked me that, right after telling me he was pulling me from my case, and, then, I had thought about crying, just to unsettle him. But what good would that have done? He’d only asked “are you alright?” to test the waters, to see if there was a future possibility of letting him pull the rug out from under me with zero consequences. Again. I couldn’t win. 

But Rust doesn’t want much from me. He doesn’t even want the case, really, which just twists the knife even further. 

“You—you know I’m good in there, right? In the box.” I carve a jagged thumbnail into this message in the table, twisting the characters wider, or taller, risking splinters.

Why should I have to give it up? And to a fucking idiot? Marty wasn’t the one who stayed all those late nights alone at the office, wasn’t the one scoured over heaps of files under low light, wasn’t the one who took the fucking beating when the suspect fought against arrest. Marty was not the one who conducted an interview like that.

My mouth thins into a hard line, but I know the words will come out whether I let them voluntarily or not. Around Rust, it’s that way. I should’ve left when I could. 

“It’s just that—it was so weird,” I continue, my head pulsing with the unwanted memory of that cabin. Marty didn’t have to experience it, Rust didn’t have to experience it—but I did. “Not jus’ wrong, or sad. Makes me feel strange, thinking about it.” 

Often, the suspects underestimate me. Johansson’s broad shoulders and tough-set jaw come off as offensive—nothing like my voice, low and gentle, and my eyes, sympathetic and warm. I’m the mother who will never judge, who is spilling over with unconditional love.

Beneath this, though, I am good at the maths of the job, the connections. Though all detectives technically develop the same constituent skills—close attention to body language tells and other biological betrayals—I ain’t sure most understand the sensitivity and strength required to confront shit like this head-on. To not avert your eyes at the mutilated woman on the bed. To inspect her eunuched boyfriend’s severed appendage, to have steady hands when photographing the scene—with flash, of course, to highlight every detail with sufficient clarity—for evidence, which must be returned to and examined again and again, each time with greater fervour still. 

I could name a few who’d joke about a thing like that, to ease the burn of that image in their heads, to sleep better at night, to leave behind the uninvited, vicarious sensation of a knife teasing over the meat of their dick. 

But the boyfriend’s corpse, we eventually located separately in a cabin in the woods, laid into the basement freezer, so peaceful, such a brutal image. Pretty parts of him preserved for mauling.

And Salter has the fucking audacity to take it away. He wasn’t the one to see something like that, to feel sick to his very stomach, to gag and have to turn away, to cringe and writhe like his skin suddenly wasn’t his, like he ought to pick himself out. I’ve been reeling with that image for weeks, living with motion sickness, and have been denied the relief of vomiting. 

“So, you need me to get that confession.”

Rust comes back into focus, perfectly still.

I nod, the back of my neck prickling with mean goosebumps. “Campbell, his DNA was all over the bodies. He was proud of it, even.” My ribs still glow with the phantom-sensation of his brutal kick there when we located him. Stomach clenching, I struggle to remain level. “But there ain’t no way in hell she wasn’t involved. He denies it, but the house is registered under her name. Maiden name, Phelps.”

“I read,” he confirms. 

I tremble in frustration – I almost wish he hadn’t. 

“It’s just—this lady’s tough.”

Eyes darting over to the dim-lit bar, scouring the scuffed hardwood floor, I can feel my face growing hot with indignation. Christ, it sounds pathetic, like a whiny kid insisting on continuing a task all wrong in order to protect their damaged pride. 

“You know Johansson: once she starts with the tears, he can’t see past ‘em. Southern manners ‘n’ all: a crying woman is a delicate thing not for a man to understand but to comfort. But, with me, it ain’t the same. She doesn’t respect me.”

“What d’you mean ‘respect ’? Don’t need respect in this game.”

I scoff, which would’ve been a dire mistake with anyone else. “Y’wouldn’t know what I’m on about,” I tease through an easy smile, though I’m not feeling so funny at the moment.

He inclines his head down to me, an invitation to elaborate.

My boot feverishly taps against the floor, thrumming light like a jackrabbit on the run. 

I sigh, mouth twisting. “She keeps asking me if I’ve slept,” I confess. “Says I look like her daughter.”

For all my mothering, here comes a perp who’s desperate to play me at my own game.

I can see how intelligent she is: some hollow glint in her eyes with nothing behind; past that gleaming screen of kindness, something black, like a cherry pit.

Sitting across from her, it felt like looking into a mirror. Not just physically—though her skin is a similar shade to mine, her nails bitten and splitting like mine, and she looks close to what I imagine my own mother could’ve grown into. It was in the way that, when I smiled, she smiled. When I took a sip of my coffee, she would drink some tea. At times, it would even seem like she would speak in my voice: the pitch, the intonations, the phrasing all far too similar. I was reluctant to tell her my name. It reminded me of this folk tale, of these tall, dark creatures who only required your name to speak like you, to look like you, to replace you in your own life. Its victim would die—in some way or another. Wander the woods, eaten alive.

A harrowing feeling had crept over me, winter pressing against the two-way mirror – I was sure Johansson, on the other side, would pick up on it. Only, when I confessed my worries to him, he’d given me this doubtful look, and I really wasalone then.

“She’s playin’ you,” Rust states simply, tracing his fingers over his mouth like some pseudo-cigarette. 

“Yeah.” I grind my teeth together. Under the table, where he cannot see, my fingers curl into a tight fist, trembling with my secret violence. “And now Salter wants Marty to have it? Bull.” 

I should’ve socked him right in his dumb, slack fuckin’ jaw. One day, I will. 

“He don’t want Marty to have it,” Rust retorts smartly, a half-smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. His eyes are warm in the dark – I should’ve taken my chances, raced to meet ‘em, but I’m too late. “He wants me to have it.” 

Yeah, well, I wish what was mine would stay mine.

Even if I’m inclined to be pissed off at Rust by proxy, I just can’t be. The difference between him and Marty is that he actually pays attention, real attention, not the selfish kind. Just by watching, I can tell he knows exactly what he could say, how he could act, in order to appeal to somebody—which is why I find it so odd that he chooses not to. I sacrifice my damn dignity to keep myself palatable. He does not. As a result, he is not well-liked at the office – people tend to feel caught out by him; they don’t like to feel observed, known.

When did being seen become a threat? I thought it was intimate. Though, I suppose, a piece of shit never wants to believe they’re a piece of shit.

Everyone’s the hero of their own story. 

Rust slides Marty’s half-empty beer across the table to me, which I receive with a crooked smile and a quick hand.

“Sure I won’t catch whatever he had?” 

He shrugs. “Y’ain’t as deadbeat as the rest of ’em. Oughta drag you down to their level.” 

I snort. “What, you don’t think you’re deadbeat?”

He huffs. “I’m worse.” 

Bitter, the beer washes over my tongue, leaves that funny aftertaste I never really liked, not the first time, not the last. I don’t suppose I’ll ever turn one down though, not if it was offered to me: I’d accept it if only to win points with whoever it was, points I could spend at a later date. 

“Maybe,” I start, “if you were a little more deadbeat, you’d be popular. Go out with the boys.”

When he meets my eyes momentarily, smirking, I have to grip my hand over my knee, fingertips digging into bone, and consciously remind myself via mantra not to let my face freeze. He hums, voice smooth and low like liquor, “What, like youdo?”

I should be pissed off, really. Maybe I will be. Instead, though, I choke on the smart retort I had meticulously configured in my head, some quip that would’ve maybe interested him based on what caught him before. 

I don’t know whether it would have been worse pretending like it never happened. That’s my strong point: pretending. It’s his, too, when he wants it to be. Maybe we could’ve outlasted it – all we needed was stamina.

But, instead, it’s this. Looking across at each other and knowing exactly what’s going on in the other’s head. I can see exactly how he thinks of me, what he wants to do. When he tilts his head ever so slightly, my neck glows with a promise, like the movement was mine in the first place. When I would bite at the pendant of my necklace, he used to narrow his eyes, like he ought to yank the chain off my neck. But now, he looks on softly, so unlike him, his own fingers at his own lips. I know what it feels like – I’ve kissed him there, too. 

“Don’t give me that. At least Geraci would stop shit-talkin’ ye,” I manage, tearing myself away. “Swear he’s stuck at sixteen or somethin’. But—you don’t mind it, do you?”

He shakes his head. “‘f he was smarter, maybe I would. Jus’ likes the sound of his own voice.” 

The clock has replaced me as his focal point – I can’t help but feel jealous. 

“S’why I like you,” I mumble from behind my beer. “First time I met you, I thought you’d make me feel stupid.

That seems to get him. 

He blinks, a barely noticeable twitch. “Do I? I don’t mean to.”

Can I spin this? I’m sure, if I were a little more awake, I’d be able to spin this. 

Some evil part of me hopes to make him feel guilty, to trick him into feeling tenderness for me, though I know the pursuit of that would be in vain. The type of men I know how to work—creatures of habit that take the exact path you want them to, to believe that they’re the real seducers—Rust seems entirely separate from that. He can sniff out rehearsal and practice, that robotism, like a dog – he sees it enough in criminals, doesn’t he? That’s why he’s called in for favours across state police departments.

When I met him the first time, I shook his hand, smiled, friendly-like, only to be met with rigidity and stoicism. No trouble, of course: some people just are that way. Wild horses on the highway. But his quietness?—now, that had set alarm bells off in my head. Boys at the precinct were loud – you couldn’t pay ‘em to shut up about their weekends, their football, their college years, their fuckin’ yards. When I was first exposed to it, I thought I’d gain a lot of friends. But then I realised they weren’t so much talking with me as they were talking at me. It’s why they’re so easy to read: they just tell you everything you want to know right off the bat. Even their secrets are bursting at the seams of their fat mouths, begging to be released. 

But Rust?—doesn’t talk until he finds it necessary. It’s impressive. Before that, though, the trait was enviable. I had—have—no comparable method. Even though, at first, it can seem blunt, even cold, his eloquence is refreshing. Never running in circles – only determinedly forward. So intimidating, almost like a freight train – I have to consciously keep myself from jerking back and out of the way. 

How low he must really think of me then, to see me like this. And I know he does: he sees. Everything I might have done to prevent it perhaps even had the opposite effect. I hate, I burn, I curse: it’s ugly. I cry over cases I would’ve left behind in two months tops, anyways, onto the next. I obsess over just another woman in the box. I think about him almost constantly. 

“You don’t,” I mumble, wondering if I ought to be wishing myself far away. “Make me feel dumb, that is. Not me. Others, I can’t speak for.”

We’ll have to leave soon – no doubt, this local bar is used to slow days and early nights, a blissful routine rudely disrupted by two outsiders who haven’t even really shown them good business. I glance over at the barkeep, slumped over the scuffed wooden counter and flatly watching the football up on the boxy TV set, and I recall my first job. Then, too, I’d let men twice my age buy me drinks, flirted with them. Was worth the tip money. 

Rust hums, though I really wish he wouldn’t speak at all. “Don’t pay mind to what Marty said.”

My neck prickles. 

He’s not trying to console me, is he? No, that’s not like him. Besides, it’s not like any amount of coddling could reverse the merciless truths I’m constantly reminded of in this line of work – if I’ve learned anything about sympathy, it’s that it doesn’t fix shit. If anything, it’s just another complication. It can seem beautiful, but, really, it isn’t. I can miss it, miss its warmth, miss the kind, sweet nothings my husband would whisper into my hair on the hardest nights, but it never changed the fact that I would have to get up in the morning and do it again. Rust knows this, has maybe lived this, so he’s not trying to console me. 

Maybe he’s trying to defend Marty.

Sharp and sure, that anger comes lurching up in my throat, slashing and snarling. 

The sensible part of me—what I hope is the larger part of me—knows this is not possible. Rust understands Marty’s faults better than anyone, even himself, even his wife. 

“Thing is,” I mumble bitterly, “he really means it, don’t he? He just don’t show it.” I trace the warm, smooth rim of the bottle with a light finger, though my mind is currently toying with the idea of jamming it violently down the opening. “Maybe it means more that he does keep it hidden – at least some part of him knows it’s wrong.”

Placid in the periphery of my vision, Rust shrugs. “‘s what separates us from our killers. Feelin’ it ain’t the problem. Resistance is where strength is tested.” 

“Ego,” I chuckle darkly. 

He hums. “Fragile ego.”

Underneath my smile lies an uneasiness stirred by his criticism.

Rust is not gentle with his opinions – I don’t suppose that’ll ever change. Resistance is a losing game – not even he is immune to the impermanence of these things. I’m sure he said that to me once, on a night like this. 

I’ve never been very good at refraining from things. Even from an early age, I just couldn’t say no. Teenage years: alcohol, drugs, sex. If it was tossed my way, I’d take it, anything I could get, hungry to experience something. 

Ha!—maybe I actually am more like Marty Hart than I’d like to admit. He’s trying to be an adult, albeit really, really poorly. As long as he believes he’s a good, family man, then his reality is protected. But I know I’m rotten, really. One of the boys at the precinct will call me pretty—in that sick way somewhere between the unchecked lust of a man and his paternal right to claim—but, below, I know I’ve got sickness swimming through my veins. Not blood. Something accumulated over the years, maybe from pretending all the time. 

I feel like I want to cut things, break them. Told myself to hang on until I retire, but I don’t see that happening any time soon. I’ll break. What will Rust think of me then? 

Maybe I was his low point: that fault in resistance. 

Some awful, gnawing feeling collects at the pit of my stomach, like black tar. Must be all those cigarettes. 

“Wha’s in that head?” he probes suddenly, stealing razor-sharp, fleeting glances.

I shrug, swallowing down a bout of nausea. “I dunno.” And I really don’t. Behind the surface tension, I don’t know what I feel, only that I do, and it’s so, so much. “It kinda—makes me happy to see him like that: jealous. ‘Cause he knows I’m good, and he’s wondering why he’s finishing what I started. He knows he don’t deserve it. Not like I do.” 

My confession lingers in the air like smoke – I have mind to reach a hand up and wave it all away, or suck it down, deep, erasing reality. Fuck. I’ve always been a little off when reading into Rust’s quiet – with that tightrope he seems to have mastered, I know I should avoid any step at all—it could just as easily miss its mark—but I can never seem to help myself. 

I stare at him—and I think it makes him uncomfortable, though there’s nothing there, not any normal human reaction, in his face for me to draw from. That’s fine. In my gut, I’m pretty sure I’ve got it down.

“You want to be seen as competent,” he finally says, a simple-enough statement. 

I scrunch my nose up distastefully. “No, I want to be competent.”

“Well, what good is bein’ somethin’ if there’s no-one there to witness it?” 

Unable to press down an exasperated sigh, I close my eyes, roll them with all the subtlety I can manage.

Foul words push under my tongue, like vomit. 

I don’t know if I’m in the mood for this tonight: smart conversation. What feels like debate. Maybe if he hadn’t been given my case, I’d take him up on the challenge, but I’ve already lost. 

I eye him, try to figure out his game. 

“I dunno, Rust,” I tell him flatly. “I think that’s called having an identity issue.”

He cocks an eyebrow. “Most people do.”

My chest burns. “This isn’t a go at me, is it?”

Slow, he draws the ashtray towards him from across the table, as if the grind of the glass against the wood is a noise that ought to be savoured. 

I could be deaf, but reading his lips would be easy: “And how’d this be about you exactly?” 

I’m able to fight off the initial instinct to wince, the way in which he delivers the words, calm and deliberate, stinging like a slap to the face. What’s worse is the growing impression that he’s as bored of me as I am. 

With a furrowed brow, I watch him, heartbeat thrumming in my ears. 

“I ain’t out to get you, s’you can quit lookin’ at me like I kicked you or somethin’.”

Frowning shallowly and trying to pretend like I’m not, I glance away and commit to rearranging my face—but at the glimpse of that twitch at the corner of his mouth in my periphery, I know I’m only digging a deeper grave for myself. The noticeable heat of my embarrassment must please him.

Playing with the food. 

And I’ve got nothing to say to him—not a single word or phrase up to par, nothing to measure up to Rust’s clinical detachment, let alone destabilise him. He might’ve been reciting the coroner’s report. There’s nothing I can say to scathe him—and fuck, I want to leave a mark, prove to him that I can. I scan him for weakness, but either I’m still too stunned to see it or there is none. I have no plan of attack and no line of defence. 

Rust seems to soften in the knowledge of this. 

“I mean,” he begins, knowing now that I’m really listening, “identity ain’t fixed – it’s not permanent. I don’t scrutinise my appearance. I don’t mind my body, and my body don’t mind me. My personality hardly feels under my control – ‘s just somethin’ that is and will be—‘n’, I guess, will change, but only against my will, never because of it. Feels pointless to feel insecure about that.”

Is this supposed to be some fucked-up attempt at advice?

My priorities changed, but this place never has, never does, never will. So, it’s all dumb and the people are dumb and this bar is dumb and the boys at the precinct are dumb and, fuck, I wish Rust were dumb, too. I feel pathetic, and he does not alleviate that feeling at all. If he were dumb, I could laugh at him and make myself feel better. I could laugh at myself for sleeping with a dumb man. Instead, I think of him religiously and crave his approval. Afflicted with the knowledge that he needs to be corrupted to want me, that I’m awful enough to want it enough to corrupt him again. Tainted waters. It would be so much more comfortable if I could look down on him.

My skin writhes and ripples, and I know the only thing that would soothe it is if he touched me. Jesus and the sick man—or some polluted version of that.

My world swings under a bout of nausea as it begins to spiral – the beer does not help. 

Maybe he’s waiting it out, like I’m trying to. Forgetting is the wisest decision anyone could make, the most fortunate outcome. Though, my efforts are paradoxical: I think so, so much about not thinking about it all. 

“Sure seems like y’think about yourself a good deal, too, s’don’t you criticise me,” I mumble, clumsy. It’s a mistake to even open my mouth again – he’ll use it all against me eventually. 

Rust hums again, low, some muscle twitching in his jaw, like his body has no clue what to do when not blindly occupied with a cigarette. “Never said I don’t think about myself,” he rectifies, staring at the sweaty palms I’m wringing together tightly against the lip of the table. 

I allow my mouth to pool with saliva, trying to combat the increasing dryness of my mouth. 

“Guess the thinkin’ part is where insecurity comes from in the first place,” I add after swallowing.

When my eyes dart up to look at him, his are on my throat.

Immediately, I look away.

Maybe this is the bad kind of intimacy.

The intensity of his attention is looming, sifting through my thoughts like sand.

Sometimes, I think he has me figured out but just couldn’t care less about what he’s found. He’s feeling the power of my burning desire for him – maybe it amuses him. Maybe he’s waiting to mechanise it, letting me sit idle while a use for me finds him (if ever). Maybe I know things. Maybe I can break things open. Maybe he can take my cases from me. Maybe I can tire him out, put him to sleep. 

It’s almost worse that he hasn’t put me to work yet. 

Maybe it really was just something in the water. Maybe all I need is to visit somebody close to me. 

“Ever heard o’ that theory? ‘bout internal monologue?” Rust asks softly, leaning in and tipping his head down like only I’m worthy of hearing this here. 

My leg jerks and I can’t place why. I nod, face hot. 

“I think ‘s bullshit—‘bout some not having one. Think everybody’s got that voice in their heads.” He pauses, squints. “Mm, maybe that’s a little generous.” 

I laugh – I hope it makes him feel good. In truth, I know he couldn’t care less. 

“What d’you think it’d be like? No voice.”

The world seems so close right now, wrapping its fuzzy arms tight around us, buzzing in my ears, shadows fur-soft over my face. What does he want me to say? I wish he’d tell me, offer me respite. 

I shrug, and it’s honest, my resignation. “No voice don’t mean no thought.”

“Alrigh’. Then, what about no thought?”

I shrug again. “I like thinking.”

He huffs, angling himself back away from me. Have I disappointed him? Somewhere deep in the pit of my tummy, there’s that fleck of worry, something that tastes an awful lot like vomit. 

I expect him to finally stop talking. 

But “I get tired of it,” is what he says instead. “In between cases, or these—moments where I feel like I could burn a hole through myself ‘f I spent ’nough thought on it. ‘s heavy, like they weigh me down.” He pushes the ashtray away, his fingers the only part of him moving. 

Swept up in the rising tide of your own life, hurting around you in some never-ending circle or spiral of which you happen to be the centre. Swimming with black-eyed angels. I know how he feels – I used to feel that way. Maybe I still do, sometimes. Clinging on to the tenderness my husband used to have for me like it could save me from the guilt I would feel when I moved on. No-one would pull me out: that much was true enough. That memory of stability, of the good times, only depressed me, moving from Brooklyn back to Louisiana. Feeling small in my own life, like a piece on a chessboard, with no semblance of control, only duty, chasing this idea of who I used to be. Hunting down the bad men, wondering what upper hand is driving them across the squares, contemplating the carpenter that fashioned the pieces. Too big of a big picture can be detrimental. The fact that I know this to be true doesn’t make me an exception. 

“I think you’re tired of the things you think about,” I muse, a headache beginning to expand between my temples – perhaps the heat has finally gotten to my head. “Space better occupied by other shit.” 

I’m careful not to pay attention to Rust’s reaction, if there even is one, since the weight of his interest is pressing over my face where I really wish his lips would.

“Like what?” he challenges. 

His eyes glint with curiosity, a blade’s sharp edge. 

I bite my tongue. 

“You think you know me?” It’s more a statement than a question.

I shrug. “You think you know me, don’t ye?”

Though, he kinda does. I think he’s proud that he can read me, but maybe that’s me overcomplicating things. Maybe I’m just another person to him. I wonder if he thinks I’m predictable. Boring, negligible, painfully average. Good for one thing, and that one thing was a mistake, anyway. 

Look at him, now: his eyes have dropped to elsewhere, but there’s a soft smirk that curls up on his face, the hint of a pink tongue that traces lightly over his teeth. 

Geraci always talks shit about that look whenever Rust closes yet another case, securing a tough confession. “So fuckin’ up ‘imself, ain’t he? Jesus.” Sure, he pisses me off—for different reasons. I’ve long since come to the conclusion that he’s worthy of admiration. 

He smiles to himself – I don’t trust it. “You’re calling me arrogant.”

“Are you?” I press, gnawing at the inside of my cheek. I’m surprised at the tepidity of my voice, considering how I’m covered in boils and burns in my head. 

He doesn’t have anything to say to that, only hums in response, seemingly amused. 

“Doesn’t have to be a bad thing,” I murmur. “People are scared of bein’ known, so nobody really tries no more.”

“I don’t observe people for intimacy purposes.”

Then why does he fucking look at me like that? 

A year ago, I’d have put it down to my own desires warping my perception of reality. Really, he wasn’t interested; he was only paying me my due amount of scrutiny in order to keep his mental file of me up to date. Really, he didn’t want to touch me; really, he was just someone who fiddled with his own hands, maybe to remind himself that he could be his own from time to time. Lust is such a dangerous thing – any deeper than surface level, and it has the very strong potential to kill you. If you want something against your better judgement, do you really even want it? The haze of having Rust come so close to me is dampened by such doubts.

But at this point, he either wants me, or I’m crazy. Shit, maybe I’d rather be just that. I’ve seen his eyes like this—dark and bottomless—when hands were unzipping my skirt, or dragging over my skin. To deny intimacy? Now that’s arrogance. Anddelusion. Shit, and I thought he was so above all that stuff. Does he think I can’t figure him out?

Surely his opinion of me can’t be that poor. 

My hand cramps up as I punch down the instinct to pinch the bridge of my nose. 

“Sure you do,” I press. And I’m right. I hope I’m right. 

His stare thickens into something different, what I think might be a black, molten form of gratification. Then, it hardens, cools in a split second into these tough, jaw-breaker pellets. I’d say it was confrontational, but then his eyes flutter just as he happens to swallow thickly. Is that his pulse in his throat? 

I rub at my puffy eyes with a stiff set of fingers.

Rust drops his eyes, brushes his hand over the side of his blazer where his cigarettes are sitting warm and ready beneath. 

“What, you—lonely again or some shit?” he asks. 

I almost recoil at the sudden bitterness of his tone. 

I snort good-heartedly, but, really, the comment stings just right—he knows where to press—all the breath knocked out of my chest. “O-kay, Rust. That an accusation?”

“No. ’S an observation. Thought you jus’ loved those,” he combats flatly.

Chest burning, I have to save myself, jump ship, and look away. My mouth tastes like grainy bile. 

“You were lonely last summer. That’s why you came to me.”

The dim light above us flickers, his face phasing in and out of shadow before me like a candle in the wind. 

I roll my jaw. 

Does he look back on it with disdain? 

“No,” I snap instinctively, instantly burned by the satisfaction that crosses his eyes. 

My breath hitches plaintively. Every fibre of my body trembles and burns to defend myself. There’s not a single word that could repair his opinion of me.

“Or—yeah.” Shut up. 

I rub at my temple, desperate for relief – do they have pills for this shit? – which does not come. If he feels any pity for me, it certainly doesn’t show. 

The harsh line of my mouth trembles. “I just thought you understood me. Or made an attempt to, at least, but maybe that part was self-projection. ‘Cause nobody ‘round here’s like you. I know you think that’s stupid and I was being naïve or—” I swallow though my throat is dry as ever, “—or dumb, or somethin’, but that’s what I felt. At the time.”

His gaze is fixed on my neck.

“At the time,” he echoes. It’s a question, I realise after a couple moments.

“Yeah. Fuck y'want me to say, asshole? 'm not—I’m not gonna embarrass myself with you, Rust. That what you want me to do? Show you just how dumb I can get—?”

“Sure like to speak for me, hm?” he bites back quietly, making it so damn easy to run right over him, to feverishly stamp out that insufferable fucking softness to his voice. Shit, I wish he’d just raise it and yell at me already.

“—Yeah, whatever. You like this shit, don’t you? Y’think you deserve a fight?—well, I’ll give you one. That what you want? ‘Cause what?—what, you get to ignore me, pretend I don’t exist, act like you’re above fuckin’ me—” his eyes flit away, bringing my roiling frustration to a crest, “—No, don’t you fuckin’ look away,” I scold, a bite, jutting a crooked finger into his space. 

He obeys, but that look in his pale eyes is so hollow, it almost makes me feel bad for saying anything at all. Almost. 

I try to press down my anger, but it’s spilling over, now, far beyond things so trivial as control. I clasp my hands together in a prayer that they will finally listen to me and not move again. 

“Fact that you feel anything at all makes you feel like shit, huh?”

His expression has glazed over, cool and smooth.

Half-expecting him to walk out and rightfully abandon me here, I stare hard at him, like I might chip into that exterior. If I managed it, I’d slip it in my pockets as proof. Silently, I beg him to prove me right. 

“Sorry,” I snap. No, I’m not. I hope it cuts at him. “You do what you want, I don’t fuckin’ care. But, please, do not patronise me like that again, Rust.” 

God offers no help with the silent plea I send Him. He does not care, so I shouldn’t care, and that’s the end of things. I’ve survived worse natural disasters than him. He’s just a man, and this is just what happens with them. Still, the disappointment floods like poison under my skin. I’m a stupid girl, really. 

“I understand if you regret things, but you don’t have to say it out loud. It’s mean. But, fuck, I dunno, maybe you mean to be.” 

I take a moment to untangle the knot in my throat. He watches it all, quiet again, his eyeline sitting heavy over where the skin shifts and stretches over my neck. 

I adjust the collar of my shirt, fiddle with the gold necklace that sits hot over the contour of bone. Rust stares as I wedge the small pendant tightly in the vice of my thumb and forefinger. 

“Feels like you don’t even fuckin’ like me half the time. All the time.”

Christ, I should’ve left with Johansson. 

My heart is racing like a wild mustang – it’s a surprise, really, that that old hunting dog lying over by the bar hasn’t noticed, singled me out as something to chase, to kill. My belly’s exposed, soft and ripe and asking for it. I forget, sometimes, that there are things out there that kill things that kill, too. 

He doesn’t plan on giving me a break; I wouldn’t deserve it, anyway. “Wha's it matter to you if I like you or not?”

My cheeks burn furiously. 

I stare at that bone-bird tattoo that fledges from the nest of his sleeve. With the way my head’s spinning, it almost looks like its skeleton wings are actually moving, unfurling and ready for pilgrimage. 

“It don’t.” It’s a disgrace to myself to answer that god-awful question, but what’s more pathetic is the way I shrink into myself when Rust’s attention crowds in over my face. “I jus’ thought you knew me almost as well as I did.” 

“And currently?” he asks.

The moment hangs. 

“Just answer. I already know – just wanna see if you’ll lie again.” 

I close my eyes a second—mistake—and breathe, breathe in and then breathe out, shaky but slow. It’s no use. 

“Same.”

He nods. “Not better?”

I shake my head. “No, never better.”

Furrowing his brow, Rust tilts his head down slightly, a soft curl falling gentle over his tense forehead. “But you wanted intimacy.”

So it is intimacy to him? 

Maybe this should count as a win for me, but it certainly don’t feel like it. This isn’t the slow slip and slide of last summer’s end – though the heat had swallowed whole everything from here to the other side of the Mississippi, there was something so clipped about the words that left me, left him. I’m sure I was more drunk then than now, but, even so, my mind had been so level, like I’d done it all in my sleep. Now, here, I have done it in my sleep. I’ve revisited him a hundred times in my daydreams, but all that practice has left me for dead. I would’ve killed for an opportunity like this a month ago – it’s like he’s taunting me. It should be easy. 

Rust is smart enough to make me wonder if he wants me to feel this way. 

Intimacy is planned and eventual, whether that’s due to his power or some cosmic fate. Everyone knows the decision they’re going to make, somewhere in their brains, deep inside. People only ask for advice to condone their decisions, to spread out the responsibility, which, at the end of the day, still remains solely with them. Shit, he’s rubbing off on me: I sound like a fuckin’ asshole. 

No, all this thinking won’t save him from the sensation of human feeling, emotions. No amount of planning prepares you for skin-to-skin touch. No time spent evaluating can undo it either, and I’ve tried so hard. His way doesn’t work. 

“Everyone wants intimacy,” I end up rambling, voice thin and dry and brittle. “Even folks that don’t want intimacy want intimacy. ’s not love or sex, really, I don’t think, though those are good, too. It’s not a way to find yourself. It’s jus’ trust. Or companionship—”

“And that’s what you want?”

Carefully, I rake my eyes over his face. Does he ever flush from the heat? 

Hopeless and too muddled to bother with concealing it, I try to assess whether he’s displeased with me. I try to memorise this moment, so I’ll be able to turn it over in my head later, just another one of my crime scene photographs. 

“Dunno yet,” I confess quietly. “I’ve had partners. And partners. When I was younger, I thought I’d have this life packed chock full of amazing relationships, and these—connections.”

The soft, disappointed eyes of my husband come to mind, which haunt all my relationships. I’m so hungry for another body, for connection. Why does it seem so easy for other people? 

“Truth is, it don’t happen all that much. To me, at least. You?”

Surly and bone-tired, Rust shakes his head. “Didn’t have much hope for it growin’ up,” he admits. 

“But you wanted it,” I press, clumsy and clinging to the sag of his voice. Of course, he’ll pick up on the trace of hopeful, aimless, false victory that undercuts my words; he’s the only one who ever could. 

For a moment, though, I second-guess myself. 

It’s pathetic, really: I’d give almost anything to walk as him for a day, though, even then, I’m not sure I’d understand him any better.

Sometimes, my imagination runs away from me: in my dreams, I do. I wake under the impression that we’re one and the same, that, just maybe, he, similarly, is dreaming as me. It’s a pulsing obsession, difficult to conceal. Whenever a moment becomes still, I think about it: at night, he is transported; in his dreams, he touches with my hands, sighs with my voice, tastes with my mouth. Then, at least, that would explain these funny sensations I get in the morning: so weathered and worn, a strange ache in my muscles, like I’ve been sleepwalking.

How else could he know me so well? 

Or maybe I’ve really fucking lost it. Somewhere along the way – maybe after seeing that half-eaten body swaddled in thin cotton in its freezer cradle – I think something else took the wheel. Why that thing is racing towards him, I have no idea. It’s laughable, really.

Rust blinks calmly down at his hands. “Reckon the deniers are dumb?” he murmurs. 

Squeezing the bridge of my nose, I do my best to press back against the foul memory of dismembered limbs. Whoever had eaten the man—who was now beyond recognition—did they feel satisfied? Comforted with how forever close he was to them now? When I was small, I used to think sex was crawling into another person's body, like a cave, and letting all of their insides warm you, love you, wrap you tight. 

I swallow thickly. 

“Your words, not mine,” I reply through a tight smile. “Reckon it’s easy to find a distraction.”

"Have you given up?" he asks. “Finding a distraction?”

I don’t entertain him with a proper answer to that – I merely shrug and scratch at my scalp, tucking loose strands of sweaty hair back into the loops of my braid. Rust must be frustrated with me. To want a companion, to want the good life. Rivalling Marty in my delusion. 

He slides his hands into his lap, continuing: “Distraction is the way to peace?”

I shrug again – I think it’s starting to piss him off. “For a time, I guess.” 

“So, ‘s that how you’re takin’ quittin’? Think about other stuff whenever you want a smoke? Occupy yourself?”

Once I realise my leg is going dead, fuzzy from sitting still so long in this dark booth, I flex my thigh, flex my hands under the table, wide-open and then tight-shut, processing the blank slate of his gaunt face. I press my fingers into the sticky vinyl, delight in the interrupted drag of them up, up, up as they curl to fists, my shoulders up to my ears. 

When he says things like that, it makes it so hard to dislike him. I almost wish he’d ignore me, like he did the first couple weeks before it became clear to the both of us that it couldn’t be undone: his back constantly to me, sending messages only through Marty, refusing to look in my direction, like I might tempt him again into being a version of him he hated. At least, before, his coldness hadn’t been directed at me specifically. Then, it was a retaliation, a wall meant to keep me out. Where were his books on philosophy then?—to tell him that attachment leads to desire leads to suffering? That kind of suffering would be better than this kind. 

This is worse. This is so much worse. I’d rather not have something at all than have it toy with me like this. 

It takes a considerable amount of co-ordination to fabricate the apathy in my posture, my eyes, my expression, to compensate for the unease that pulses like a new artery in my throat – though, at the silvery glint that flickers in his eyes, I know it’s all for nothing. He’s already seen the hurt that, really, I can’t pin on anyone but myself. He’s raking his eyes slowly over my face. It’s fucking mean. Do me the favour of a mercy-killing, God.

I never even told him I was trying to quit.

“What,” I begin, concentrating very hard on keeping myself from stammering and from slurring, from crying and from grasping at his hand, “like that association thing?” 

I’ve heard of it, obviously. I know every trick at this point: old wives’ tales to the latest research papers at the state university library. It’s psychological: whenever you want something, instead, think of awful, gross, repulsive things, and make yourself hate it. I’ve tried it before, but it doesn’t always work. How can you convince yourself that one thing is disgusting when it’s undeniable how good it really was?

Rust nods.

“I mean, I tried it,” I tell him lowly. 

Overstatement: I tried it for approximately three days and two nights before I caved, unlocking the drawer in my study with shaky, desperate hands, hungry.

“But I’m always thinkin’ about it.”

Shit. He seems to have regained a nerve: Rust stares calmly ahead at me—not through me or just past me; at me. This is what I wanted, isn’t it?

He leans his weight over his forearms upon the table, on offence. Is this how he works his suspects? Well, shit, I’ve studied his methods from the privacy of the other side of the false mirror enough times to be able to answer that, actually: this is how he works his suspects. Initially, at least, to gauge their personality, their wants, their fears, what they need him to be. 

Thing is, I can’t pin down his intention with me. Is it just the satisfaction of the kill? Or maybe revenge for what I did to him last August. I broke down his walls: an unforgivable sin. I condemned him to the effort of building them back up, of shoving me out—if I ever managed to intrude in the first place. Maybe I deserve this. 

With his sleeves folded back, the dark lines of Rust’s tattoo jut out, growing along his tawny, leather-tan skin like lichen. I try not to stare.

His eyes complete a pre-emptive scan of my face, and, really, I know I should not let him see any change there in my expression, though my mouth twitches to frown. I try to gather my forces. I try to prepare myself for it, for that inevitable intrusion.

“‘f you’re so desperate for it, why’re you fightin’ back?” he asks, unblinking and cruel. 

My mouth twists, and I let it fall into the frown it wants. “‘Cause I wanted to feel better.”

It sounds dumb because it is dumb, even though it’s true. 

Low, he hums. He straightens, softens, and finally leans away. It’s like the vacuum around me leaves with him, and, there, now, it’s easier to breathe. 

He must note the way my chest rises and falls so stiffly, like there’s a weight resting over my heart. 

“Withdrawal’s a breeze, ain’t it?”

“You’re not fuckin’ funny,” I scoff, digging my nails punishingly into my palm. He smokes and drinks like he welcomes cancer, or hopes for it, so I don’t think we’re on a level playing field.

He quirks his head. “Well, do you?”

“Do I what, Rusty?” 

Amused, he rolls his jaw. Good – I hope I’ve provoked him. 

“Do you feel better?” 

I run my tongue over my teeth. “Sometimes,” I reply truthfully. “Not right now.”

He searches my face. 

“I can give you a ride home,” he offers. 

Fuck, and what will that be like? Ten times worse than this. I’ll come away the husk of a woman, worn down by his disapproval. My own fault for wanting anything from him in the first place, really. 

Teeth gritted together, I shake my head, ready to pull a muscle in my damn neck. “Didn’t mean anythin’ by it. Sorry.” 

No, I’m not. I ought to slap him, and then run away, back home, or back to my house, or to a brand new city. Or he could finally cuss me out, save me the wondering. Then, I could lick my wounds and they would finally stop reopening. 

I scratch at my scalp. 

Rust eyes my hand like he’d like to rip the bad habit away from my body. For a moment, I think he will—the tendons in his hand flex and writhe under the skin—but, no, he only brushes a thumb against the valley between his nose and cheek, and he holds his tongue for once. 

“Wasn’t offended,” he corrects firmly. “I’ll take you home.”  

Flashing with annoyance, my eyes dart up viciously to penalise him. “And what?” I hiss. 

He sits back, doesn’t answer the question.  

Jaw clenched, I wait to see if he’ll look away, but he doesn’t. 

My irritation soon fizzles through, condenses to a low, simmering understanding, steadily tended to by the intensity of his steadfast gaze. 

Oh. 

My eyes soften. 

Oh – I have him, don’t I?

He shows no signs of the tentativeness he had displayed last time—if Rust could ever be tentative. His eyes do not shift and scuttle around me; they meet mine, challenging my comfort. He does not tuck himself into a corner; he remains leaned over the table, just like that. How could I have known? 

I stare back, brow pinched in confusion. 

In the heat of last August, I’d peeled away from him knowing exactly how I’d convinced him he wanted me. Maybe I was evil for it – a good person wouldn’t use somebody’s faults against them, would they? And maybe that’s what it was: selfish. If he hates me, he’d be right to. 

Which is why I’m so puzzled that he doesn’t. Or rather, indifference was the baseline. Hell. And this? I don’t know. 

Swelling dangerously with the well-loved memory of his delirious mouthings over my skin, I grow rigid.

My temples throb and ache, the threat of tears still very real.

“Mind?” he asks – I watch, wide-eyed, as he pulls a pack of Camels from his pocket. 

Trembling slightly, I shake my head, though saliva is already pooling over the pit of my tongue, warm and soft, just like my desire. Luckily, he’s too preoccupied with his lighter to see it: how my body ripples at the scrape of his voice. 

The promise of nicotine dances like a phantom in the mouth, just from watching him place a cigarette between his lips. When he flicks open his Zippo, the sharp, shuddering candle of it taunts me, and I finally understand what they say about moths and flames.

I watch him take a long drag.

That all-consuming hunger lurches up in me again, and I swallow the warm spit that’s steadily been filling my mouth. 

Oh, Christ. This can’t be real. Desire shouldn’t be this bloody. Desire shouldn’t be the thing with teeth and claws, the ugly thing that tips into violence. Or obsession. With how often my thoughts return to us in the summer, I’ve wondered obsession as a possibility. The difference between myself and those who commit crimes of passion is control. Rust is dangerous for me. What is he thinking? What’s in his head? I ache to pry it open and explore, to swim close to him, for my skin to melt into his, to consume and be consumed. Not a moment’s peace, and that’s what I’m chasing, isn’t it? Peace and quiet?

I don’t have to say anything – he can read it all, mulling over the fine changes in my expression, the softening of my body, some pre-emptive instinct. Will he touch me tonight? 

With a cautious hand, ready to jolt back if met with teeth, I reach out to him and remove the cigarette from his pinched fingers—which he allows—then bringing it to my mouth, taking a drag myself, nice and slow, good and deep, a sigh, like home.

He watches me.  

“Don’t say anything.”  

And he doesn’t. He just watches, watches, watches as I take another drag. He shivers, and I feel it reverberate through my bones.

“What are you thinkin’ about?” I ask him softly, pressing down a quivering breath, smoking his cigarette. I’ve never mustered the courage to ask before.  

For once, though, I really don’t have to: I know exactly where his head is. Where else? He’s back in that room, infected by the drowse and drunken fever of August, with me, living it again. Where I’d coaxed him into the temptation, wicked as the snake in the garden. He should’ve pushed me to leave with Johansson and Marty – of course, I would’ve stayed. I’m a rotten thing, and my heart is a bloodhound. He’s the better of the two of us. I’ll take whatever of him I can get – anything. 

He meets my eyes directly, so hopeless, so raw. Is he asking? He shouldn’t be. 

But what will he have me do? I’m at his disposal, really.

“And?” I ask, throat dry. 

When he moves to speak, the words that leave him are low and slow: “You did something to me,” he manages. 

I scoff. 

“S’that a good or bad thing?” I ask.

Rust huffs like what I said was funny. More likely, though, it’s the way my eyes are so wide, the way my hand is pressed between my thighs, that amuses him. “Can’t decide.”

My mouth trembles as my eyes scrape over his neck, which I know, I remember, to be hot and alive, thick with it over the pulse. I was so high off of it: his warmth, his weight, his press. 

I indulge in one last drag, using the last scraps of my energy to conjure the pungent stench of rotting flesh in the cruel sunshine, the pick of eager flies and their cacophonous buzzing, the churn of vomit in the stomach. I look at Rust and try to do the same: the months of silence, his back decidedly turned to me, him accepting my case, and his arrogance and his apathy and his severity. He is a harrowing connection that I should rather not have made.

The technique doesn’t work. I don’t know why I thought, even for a minute, that this time would be different from the last. 

With him staring calmly at me, like I deserve it—the trap, the squirming sensation over my spine, the hopeless, unavoidable heat that claims my face—it’s just another arrow pointing to the same conclusion. Maybe we should just let August have its way with us again. Twin plagues.

Trembling ever so slightly, blood so warm, so thick, I flick ashes out into the tray between us. 

“I should put this out,” I mumble, though my hand yearns to return it to my mouth. 

“’s my cigarette,” Rust mutters.

“Sorry.” I offer my hand to him. “Want it back?”

I know what I must look like to him, pupils dark, the size of the moon, like a plate. Here, in the darkest part of the dark bar, I open myself to him, warm, molten, inviting. And God, this must be a dream—because I know what he wants, and I know that he’ll accept me. How we got here doesn’t matter anymore. Maybe he’s thought about it for some time, and only now, in a moment of stillness with him, have I even noticed. Too caught up in the fine details of a painting to think of the artist’s intention, which is always more important.

Silent, stare inexorable, he accepts the cigarette, only touching my fingers quick, like I’d burn him. Maybe I will. Serves him right: he was always going to haunt me either way. I ought to get mine while I still can.

The hunger laps at me.

I want to coax him open-wide. I want to peel away his demeanour and wrap myself close to him. Body heat is the best way to keep warm, isn’t it? I’m sure I read about that somewhere. It’s still fresh in my mind, like a cut. I can’t manage a day without playing it over at least once. I want it again: I want to breathe him in and let him sit in my chest and seep into every cell and let him be part of me that way, at least until the next breath.

He can see it in my eyes: the freneticism of my thoughts, racing like a storm, desires like bullets like rain.

“You ever think about what you want?” I try asking him, voice strained tight over my heart in my throat. 

“People only ever think about what they want,” he parries, batting away any trace of diffidence. He secures his cigarette between his lips, shifting. “Let’s leave.”

At his first movement, I slide out of the booth. 

Sometime during our conversation, the place emptied out. It must have been around when I finished Marty’s leftover beer that the weight of the locals’ beady stares—which had already faded to the back of my mind, in the same way that a dark alleyway can still make you uneasy though you know nothing would ever happen to you there—finally left me. There are no witnesses left to see me following after Rust like a dog, my body thrumming like the lone bug zapper out on the porch, which cracks! just as we exit. 

The broken clock reads three o’clock when we leave, but I know that, really, it’s only midnight.

Fortunately, the heat has cracked for once, like old, beat-up, splitting leather. Stepping out onto that night path, the breeze is warm and fragrant, dancing over my cheeks, playing gently with the loose threads of my hair. It’s a clear, blue, never-ending night – the dirt road which accompanies us is a long, winding, indigo river that spills unseen over the far, far horizon. The neighbouring fields—one a rolling stretch of grass; the other of wheat—are alive in the wind, flung one way on exhale, drawn the other upon inhale. 

Thank God for the noise of it: their rustling whispers, in a language we can’t understand; the soft whistle of a passing gust of air; the firm, crisp crunch of dry mud and dust under my boots. Thank God for the sway of things: the cradle of humidity; the press of my arm to Rust’s, which he permits only for a second, with his face angled away. Then, he slows, coming to walk just behind me, still parallel.

Flickering strands of long-grass brush my knuckles – I grab onto one, pull the seeds off it in an easy swipe, and scatter them as we go, one by one. 

Briefly, I glance over my shoulder. Sure enough, his eyes are fixed on me, on my every movement, like he’s making sure I’m actually real. The corner of my mouth twitches up into a smile. 

Rust’s cigarette flares between his lips. 

I scratch gently at my wrist, reminded of the flowing of my blood just beneath the skin, hot and thick.

You get nowhere in life just hoping things will fall into your lap like this—and, anyway, what good is getting something that you didn’t work for? Where’s the gratification? It’s artificial, feeble as plastic. Christ, it was even a struggle to get my head around Johansson and his propensity to dole out favours. I understood a write-up – won’t pretend I’m above ass-kissing – but tidying up the office kitchen and keeping quiet about it? I thought it was stupid: letting people reap the rewards of your own effort, and for what?

So, the buzz of earning Rust’s touch that first time?—shit, nothing compared. No drug, no high; nothing. I really thought I did something. Satisfied some secret ambition I didn’t know I held. To have him like that. To be able to replay that night, swallow it like a pill. To look at him and know what was underneath his clothes and his skin, and perhaps further inside, too. Shit, I took so much from him, but the mental gymnastics of the effort justified it, right? And, now, he’s going to give it all up again. Wants it, even.

Haven’t I played this out a thousand times in my head? I’ve seen the future—a number of futures—where I’m able to argue for his affection. Fight for your love – that’s what my daddy used to tell me whenever he was feeling sentimental after yelling.

I’ve had endless conversations with him in my head, edited accordingly as time passed, as he changed, as I changed, as the air between us changed. Possible flirtation seemed silly, futile, after a week. Sex appeal would go unnoticed by him – wasn’t like he looked, anyway. Not the type to chase tail. I found myself longing for him to please linger uncomfortably in doorways to rooms I was in, to leave things near me and come and collect them just after I was gone so that, maybe, he’d still feel the warmth of my presence and understand it was only ever warm that way for him. The idea of genuine confession always sprung up during the quiet nights alone together in the bullpen, but I was always able to talk myself out of it when he wouldn’t so much as glance at me after two, three hours.

It must be a million threads of conversation up in my head, which is why I guess it’s so hard to untangle the great knot and retrieve just one, because, now, there are no words that come to mind when it matters. Or maybe it doesn’t matter: I don’t think he needs convincing at all.

“What you so quiet for?” he asks faintly. 

When I look back, he’s stark against the brooding sky like some shadow-man. His outline hums like he’s pulling away into his own silhouette. 

I can’t seem to smile. “Nothin’.” 

He won’t push—at least, not on this—and I’m glad for it. 

Rust’s beat-up semi is all lonely sat in a dip up in the road, waiting for us. Same semi he’d driven me home in from work this one week I was getting my car fixed up, in which a series of slow, mutual interrogations would take place along the light-streaked highway. In the office, you were lucky to drag a full sentence out of Rust, but, alone, it wasn’t so hard to get him to talk at all.

Maybe I had just wanted to be better than him, to learn how he worked, how he was such a good interrogator, and bleed him dry. That was why I couldn’t look away: every choice in his demeanour could help me surpass him.

Even then, I learned to be careful with my looks. I had the feeling he’d morph into something else if I stared long enough, the way the shadow in the corner of your bedroom changes shape when you’re bone-tired. Sometimes, he would. And on the Thursday night of that week, when he had pulled over and thrown up, shaking, into the dark thrush, I hadn’t uttered a word as he climbed back into the driver’s seat. But, as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, I’d stared at him with the filmy eyes of a hungry nocturnal animal.

Then, at least, the curiosity wasn’t a burden. Not like it became when I drove myself home come that morning after.

I could tell it was different the moment I shifted awake, feigning a sleep for just a couple more minutes.

Dressed again and putting on a pot of coffee, his back was to me. I had shuffled up, pulled on my clothes, and I knew the stupor of the night had faded. So, really, when I stepped past him and he closed the door behind me without a word, I shouldn’t have been upset. 

When I reach the pick-up first, I twist to look at him. 

Rust has slowed to finish his cigarette at a safe distance, eyeing me warily.

He crushes the stub into the dirt, then glancing out into the long night. 

“Straight home?” he asks. 

I shake my head, and the rigid line of him gives just a little. It’s so dangerous to be seduced by your own influence, but the realisation that I’ve had any at all is fuel enough to the plea in my wide eyes.

Rust advances haltingly. If I move, I’m sure he’ll flinch and bolt. So, I test the theory: better to weed out what’s already decayed.

I angle myself towards him, open like a door. He tosses his jacket into the bed of his pickup, stepping through.

The heat seeps back between us, slow and thick like a flood of molasses, and it becomes very clear, suddenly, that we never should’ve tried to barricade ourselves. Pretty sure Rust’s known this a while, anyways: he’s the one who leans in for me, kisses me slow.

This time, his hands are quick to curl around my body, where the tension in that tight cord all down his spine has snapped. Or just eased up on him—but that’s unlikely. And unimportant. With his firm touch petting up my spine, climbing each rung, it’s all unimportant.

A pulse of arousal strikes me like an electric current as Rust pulls the blouse out of my skirt, his face close to me.

His tongue pushes into my mouth again, and I hum over the husk of nicotine. It’s a haze in the brain, one I’ve missed. My skin tingles and my thoughts warp in this leer, like a nic rush, only I haven’t had one of those in years and years.

I can’t exactly call what I’m feeling satisfaction. There’s no win to this. My teeth sunk into him so sweet last time, and the thrill of getting him, of tripping him up with his own desire, was almost as good as the actual feeling of him inside me. But it’s different now: so obvious, it’s funny. Though my first instinct is to doubt and pry apart, maybe want is the most trustworthy thing a person can feel. It’s animal and instinctive, and it’s inevitable, so it’s always true. Ugly, sometimes, but always there. There’s no room to question his want, because I can taste it on his tongue, I can feel it pressing over my stomach, I can hear it in the way he hums at the sear of my skin. 

It must be a favour to me: the blatancy of it all. For however direct he may be, I’ve always felt that Rust has these plans within plans. Nothing is as it is on the surface: you have to dig to get to the good stuff. It’s disorienting, having it all laid out for me. And I’ll take anything he gives me.

I don’t want to leave any room for doubt in his mind either. 

So, I clutch at him hungrily, so drunk on his warmth, and thump my back against the door he opens for me to close it again.

I don’t ask, and I’m glad that he doesn’t make me, only presses my body flush against the cool surface of his side-door, until the only part of me free to move are the fingers that curl over his arms, as if they could sink through the fabric and then the flesh underneath. There’s only dogs and ghosts out at this hour, anyway; eyes in the long-grass. No-one but them and him to see my hips jerk against the precise hand under my skirt. 

He hadn’t looked at me this much before. Even when my eyes go glassy and I have to blink hard to try and regain my smarts, to not finish too quickly, I know he’s staring at me like a scientist.

When the next needy noise is drawn from me, I bury my face into his neck to save myself the embarrassment of being seen like this, even though it’s pointless. His fingers are dragging aside the damp fabric of my underwear anyway, sliding through my silky desire. When his knee shoves between my legs to keep apart, he changes the pressure of his hand, circles tightly over where shame does not apply. Restraint is a man-made practice that never prevails over biology. I should know this. Still, though, my face is hot as I whine into his shoulder. 

Rust doesn’t ask me to look at him, not yet, and I’m so grateful for it. I bite into the meat of him at the push of one finger, then keen all the way to my toes at the hook of two, rocking against his palm thoughtlessly as he fucks the both of them in deep.

The clink of his belt buckle barely processes through the smoke of sticky eyes and open mouths and the press of his body. But the absence of his hand from my hip, of it working between us?—that’s what ushers normal sensation back into me. I recover from the limp slump against him, but not quickly enough to understand or resist him guiding my hand to wrap around his swollen cock, coated with spit. 

He grunts as he tightens my grip around him, coaxes my hand how he wants it. In the back of my mind, though, of course I remember. Only, his fingers are so far inside that my head is spinning, teetering on the precipice of another thought I know I’ll lose, one that dissolves at the slight scrape of nail, one that would never matter as much as the soft then firm press of him against my cervix. My eyes water, and there licking at me is only a faint, abstract impression of embarrassment when Rust grips over my jaw, calloused heel of his palm heavy on my neck, and hauls me away from the hiding spaces of his body’s crevices.

“What, you fuckin’ shy now? You wanted it, so look,” he mumbles, digging his fingers into the soft parts of my face a little more, like there’s some hidden button beneath the surface that can make my droopy eyes fly back open. There must be because, somehow, it works. He angles my face by the scruff of my neck.

I can only stand to look between us for a few jumpy heartbeats before my eyes settle on the comfort of his even face, which he seems to accept readily, breath hitching. He does not blink. The intensity of his observations hounds me, lights me up like points on a star, even when my vision smears and melts at the dizzying curl of his fingers. Lucky for my weak knees he’s got his hand over the nape of my neck, his thighs pinning my own. I shake against him, some pathetic thing, and tremble when he keeps massaging there deep inside.

“Don’t go dumb on me, girl,” Rust scolds quietly when my hand loosens around him, his own having to leave the heat of my neck and come down to correct the pressure, the pull. My head lolls without the support of his hand. “Ain’t gon’ say nothin’?” 

Words spill uselessly into a pool before me, slipping through my fingers. My pulse slams in my throat, lower, too, against his touch, each beat meeting him as he works me over again. 

What I manage is a choked noise, all clogged up inside. I have little to do with it: just a body, a heartbeat and a compulsion to be near, nearer, nearest to him. Half a mind that’s lagging worse than the computers at work, that realises far too late that the body is curling into itself again, so tight, so wet, and fuck, fuck. 

He removes his fingers, that slow drag, and tells me to turn. When I don’t—completely without, dull and aching—Rust twists and shoves me against the window, which goes cloudy at the breathy moan pushed up from my slack stomach. 

Slow-like, a cold hand snakes under my shirt, smooths up my burning spine, all the way up, all the way down, hooking in the waistband of my skirt, knuckles burrowing into the soft dimples in my back. My whole body shivers as he slides his palm over the back of my neck—a comfort for which I’m desperate to become familiar—and squeezes gently. If I keep my eyes open, all I can see of him is that black silhouette in the window, a reflection. A homogenous mass, humming at the edges, devoid of the detail of things: can’t see the way he drags his thumb up along the line of my spine, traces where it meets the skull; nor the way he steps forward, teases the air out of my lungs, enjoys it, tugs my hips closer to him by the gusset of the underwear webbed between my thighs; nor the way the cool metal buckle presses red lines into flesh. 

The sight of Rust doesn’t matter so much as the understanding that it’s him behind me, that it’s his truck my cheek is being pressed into, that it’s his—fuck—that it’s him sliding through the heat of me, so close. The tip notches and makes it all the easier for my eyes to flutter shut. It helps with the vertigo that follows the rough push of him inside. 

My fingers grasp for the little ridges in the door. Best place for them ends up to be under my mouth, though, to keep my head on my shoulders, to muffle the noises I was sure only animals made. My knee jerks sharply against the truck at the first white-hot pulse of pleasure – I hiss, smearing the drool at the edge of my mouth with the back of my hand, so glad he isn’t in clear enough line of sight to chastise me with his tendency to notice and never forget. 

But he knows—he must fucking know by now—because the heavy hand clasped over my scruff curls around my face, and Rust forces two fingers into my parted mouth, presses over my soft tongue. 

He pulls himself out just to feel the total length of me taking him again, so painfully slow. Feel the initial resistance, the spongy give, the sweet slip, the drag, all of it. So full, I feel sick with it. Overindulgence. Knocks me weak, doesn’t mind it when I bite down on his fingers to take most of the weight out of my sob. What I take from him, he takes from me—we’re even that way—so Rust, already with his nose flirting with the crook of my sweaty neck, nips over my erratic pulse, pushes his tongue over where I’m sure he can see the skin throbbing with the violence of it. Vampire. He could draw blood and I wouldn’t mind: he knows I need bloodletting. 

So fucking dumb to think for a second it could be sated by just one time. I needed it again before it even ended – I knew it in the split second he touched me. The grief of closure was as adamant as a shadow. Stupid. He must think it, too, because, shit, the snap of his hips is mean. Punishment: you should’ve known. 

“We ought’a be in your bed. I should be fuckin’ you through your bed,” he complains gruffly, his mouth dragging over hinge of my jaw.

I moan around the fingers in my mouth, which hook together with his thumb to pinch the fleshy inside of my cheek, challenging my lost focus. No matter. There’s nothing we can do now. 

The seize of my body doesn’t take him by surprise at all, not that I expected it to, and the words that follow are easy, like he’s been thinkin’ of them as loud and clear as day as it would be to speak ‘em: “Shit, that feels good, sweet girl, huh? Tha’s it, just take it. That’s good.” And he lets the warmth gush out before stuffing it back in. “You’ll take one more.”

I stare at the endless field to the side of us, melted over the curve of his door, shivering despite the humidity that always finds you around here. I choke more on my own tongue than his fingers as Rust fucks me slow, like I deserve it.

“Need it s’bad, huh?” he drawls into the shell of my ear. “Why you gone all quiet on me, baby?—thought y’wanted it.” 

He drags his fingers out of my mouth, daring me to speak. He slides his hand between my stomach and the side-door, gliding down between the thighs, smearing my dripping arousal over the skin. 

My toes curl tight again as he pushes deeper than before, sits there like he knows my mind will do the rest of the work. The grate of his zipper as he shifts draws a mangled sound from the pit of me, not hidden by the brace of my trembling arm. 

He zeros in on my clit, all sticky, and circles tight. I shudder. 

“Give in,” he says to me in a voice so low and soft that it barely reaches me above the high frequency splitting through my skull. He rolls that bright pearl between his finger and thumb. “You feel it?” 

Mindless and eyes all milky, I still manage a nod, grateful for the mean pin of his knees against my shaking thighs. 

He hums. “So give in.” 

Fuck, this is absurd. The mind can just about string two and two together when Rust lends a forearm beside my head for me to rest on, to grip over: so he’s pictured this, wanted this, for how long? I knew the stagnancy was a front, swallowed something else, but—my mouth goes wet and slack over his forearm at the languid roll of his hips—but it wasn’t realistic to imagine it was this. Rust struck me as someone incapable of reconciling himself with his wants. Shame over acceptance because he thinks it’s atonement. Should’ve known better than to think Rust believed in redemption. 

The silhouette in the window is looking over the empty road, scanning for cars that won’t ever come—but his hand is warm under the tent of my shirt, easing over my waist, slow, as everything clamps up, trembling, again. Body and a heartbeat, he tugs my hips back to him, again and again, until he’s a hot, shuddering line all through me, face in my neck, crushing the fight out of my lungs. 

His nose presses over my cheek, and his breath is coarse there, too, panting, when he lifts his heavy head. My throat goes so loose and open, greedily drinking in the sweet-sticky scent of him. 

“C’mon, now,” he says to me once he’s pulled my underwear back up, dragging the cool, damp gusset against the mess of me for good measure. He pinches my hip, then over my thigh, like that might get me to quit shuddering. “Time to go.” 

When I don’t move, he smooths a hand gently over my hair. Tucks a loose chunk of it back into the mess of my braid before deciding it’s best if he lets it loose completely. 

Rust winds down the window as he holds open the door for me to clamber onto the bench.

“Y’can sleep ‘f you want,” he mumbles once he’s got me curled up on the seat, leaning through the frame. He tilts his head – the shadows have always hidden his eyes, but I like how the pinch in his brow has melted away at least.

If I had half a mind, I’d use it to shove his face out my goddamn way. Instead, I settle for the narrowing of my eyes and a decided huff. “Won’t.”

Lie. I fall asleep like anything, mellowed by the sweet rush of wind over marshland, the spirit of it weaving inside, and the weight of Rust’s hand tucked in the tight bend of my knee.

[thoughtfullyrainynightmare]

2, 18, 20? For the writing ask game?

Of course! ^^

2. That makes me laugh

... I don't think I have one. The most you might get out of me is a smile. Maybe, maybe a chuckle. Which... would be this? I suppose

“But I do need be properly introduced to the…” she paused to clear her throat, “the other King, do I not? Or what are the power dynamics between him and Julius?” “Augustus is the King of Clover Kingdom while Julius is the highest-ranking official among us knights. To put it simply.” “So technically Julius is in command of the armed forces of the kingdom?” “No, Augustus has the final say.” “So… Augustus could… beat Julius in a fight…?” She asked with a tone, which made it clear that even she didn’t believe her question. Fuego burst into laughter with her question, him placing his hand over his face. “I take that as a simple ‘no bloody way in a frozen over hell would that ever happen’,” she remarked after his laughter had calmed down. “Which begs the question: why have someone so weak, self-centred, and-“ “Incompetent?” She paused for a moment, before continuing: “Your words, not mine.” “Just between us.” “Naturally,” she affirmed, sealing the promise with a peck on his lips. “But yes. Why keep someone like him on the throne?” “The nobles keep him there out of tradition. The rest of us keep him around as our scapegoat.”

18. From that one WIP everyone has that has no plot, just vibes

This actually did have a plot, but alas... I think I incorporated something from this to a whump piece

But as his gaze continued further down, he saw how her spear had penetrated through his stomach. And his blood had coated the already rusted surface of Acier’s spell that was crumbling away, the same as his. They both were still forcing out mana, forcing out mana in a world where magic was life. I see… you don’t… forgive me… I’ve been a bad son, and a bad brother…. I’m sorry mom… I’m so so sorry. I didn’t-, I didn’t know how to be better. I’m sorry… I’m sorry… His vision faded away as he felt his body breaking from under him. There was a yell somewhere far away. Maybe, maybe someone calling out his name. “I’m sorry… for… being… a bad… brother….” He still mumbled as the hands of death yanked him. Or at least he hoped that they’d be the hands of death. He thought them to be too warm for it, but the blissful arms of never-ending sleep were better than the arms of a demon. There was a scream. And he hoped it was that of the approaching dark cloaked harbinger.   But instead of the sweet release of death, what he could hear, as if a whisper, in his mind through the approaching frost and darkness, was the voice of Acier. "You... killed my son too... Didn't you..? I thought that he was going to grow strong... But I guess I was ...wrong...."

20. From a scrapped project

I think this is scrapped at this point

The light is always there. But it can be seen only because it’s set in darkness. There is the bright light above, but it needs to travel through the endless space to get here. The vast, the empty, and the unknown. And the sun… The sun is in that very darkness. It pulsates in it. It lives in it. Even if it doesn’t seem like it. Because what we see is light, all around, which makes people smile. It makes them happy, and casts away worries and doubts, though there has to be some shadows dancing around. Since that’s how light work. Where there is light, there are shadows. But. What people seem to forget, is that light may only thrive in darkness. There’s no need for a source of light, in light. But when it’s set in darkness, it’s warmth and comforting presence is valued far more. How ironic, if you think about it. People take it for granted, until it’s gone. Until there’s nothing but shadows, dancing over the walls. Until it’s cold. And dark. Night. The night sky… It’s so vast…. Endless. And yet, somehow… those small specks of light bring people hope. The distant suns. Because the sun is also a star. It is that, and so much more. It’s a source of hope. But now, there is no sun. And it’s getting dark.

[lynne-monstr]

Writer’s Month Day 3: Gold

The King’s Avatar, Wei Chen, Fang Shijing, Blue Rain, background wc/fsj, time travel

.

Wei Chen is still reeling when the golden glint of the trophy shines directly into his eyes. His teammates’ cheers fill the air, mixing with the deafening roar of the crowd. The strobe lights flash, but they aren’t bright enough to drown out the gold.

Elation turns to shock and then panic when the gold expands to fill his entire vision.

And then, with a single blink and a tug somewhere around his knees, it’s over. Wei Chen is alone in a cool, dark room, eerily silent after the roar of the crowd. His ears are still ringing, or maybe it’s the hum of the old computer at his desk.

His desk?

“...you even listening to me?”

The familiar voice nearly sends him toppling out of his chair, which is all kinds of messed up because he never sat down. He was just standing on the stage, grinning his face off after pulling off the impossible. Team Happy did it, they won. His old dream of winning a championship, finally made real.

A hand snapping in front of his eyes snaps him back to whatever strange reality he’s found himself in. He follows the hand up towards the person it belongs to—

And stares. His eyes have adjusted to the weak lighting, and what he thought was a shadow has coalesced into a person. And oh, good, the creepy disembodied voice wasn’t a hallucination.

“Shijing, is that you? What the fuck are you doing here.” He jumps at his own voice. Fuck, he hasn’t been this raspy since he was a kid in his twenties who still chain smoked.

A kid in his twenties.

No. Hell no. No fucking way, miss him with that shit. Wei Chen has read enough trashy comics to see where this is going, and he’s too old for this time travel shit. But the small printed date in the bottom corner of his computer monitor glares at him like the world's tiniest middle finger.

He pushes out of his chair and shakes his fist at the ceiling. “Nope. No way, send me back. I wanna touch my trophy, you bastards.”

The ceiling doesn’t answer but Fang Shijing does. “Are you drunk?” The look on his face is a combination of concern and exasperation, so familiar that Wei Chen has to clench his hands until all he can think about is the blooming crescents of pain in his palms.

Fang Shijing looks exactly like he remembers, with his clean-cut hair and clean cut face, his perpetually resigned expression whenever he thinks Wei Chen is slacking. Or about to get in a fight. Another old memory rises to the surface. For someone so uptight and proper, Fang Shijing could do the most obscene things with his tongue.

“I’m not drunk,” Wei Chen scuffs his feet to buy himself time. What the hell is he supposed to say to someone he walked away from eight years ago?

No, not walked away. Abandoned. Like the rest of Blue Rain.

If Wei Chen wasn’t a complete asshole, he would have contacted Fang Shijing when he got himself dragged out of retirement by Glory’s most obnoxious pest. Chalk it up to one more regret in a sea of mistakes.

I’m sorry, is on the tip of his tongue but technically none of that has happened yet. “I’m…”

Fang Shijing puts a hand on his arm. “There’ll be other matches. Don’t let it get you down.”

It all comes rushing back. This office, the familiar smell of old cigarettes, Fang Shijing sitting beside him as they talk through the strengths and weaknesses of their opponents and their classes. Fuck, Wei Chen has missed this.

He’s so caught up in a net of useless nostalgia that it takes him a moment to connect the year on the computer with Fang Shijing’s words. The date is familiar but he can’t place it. Eventually he blows the dust off his memories and remembers that, unless this is some kind of championship-induced dream, this is Season Two and Blue Rain is in the playoffs. The Wei Chen of this time had just come from a match. He’d been beaten badly, he remembers, his performance steadily declining as the season progressed.

Wei Chen looks down at his hands. They’re less lined than he remembers, a few less scars from when he’d fumbled his lighter while drunk. A laugh bubbles up in his chest that he doesn’t try to hide. He used to think he was so old. What a joke. The Wei Chen of this time was twenty-two, barely a kid himself. Fuck, who the hell let him be in charge of a team at that age? No wonder he fucked up so badly.

He shrugs, but doesn’t shake off Fang Shijing’s hand. “I’ll get ‘em next time,” he says, calling up his usual bluster.

And really, it’s just his luck to get royally screwed right when he finally achieved his greatest dream. Life has always enjoyed screwing him, he may as well bend over and enjoy the ride.

He looks towards the large window in his office, into the training room where a much younger Yu Wenzhou is sitting alone among the crowd of players, staring intently at his computer behind thick glasses. A wave of—Wei Chen doesn’t know what to call it—a wave of something clenches tight around his ribs and he fights the urge to march over there and tell that kid how good he is, how great he’s going to be.

Or maybe he should close his office door and get a firsthand reminder of all the things he and Fang Shijing used to do behind closed doors. Nothing like a good fuck to put off the tough decisions he doesn’t want to make. He shakes himself out of the thought. Nice to know that after all these years, he’s still the same asshole.

An uncomfortable thought hits him that, unless the weird gold thing comes back, he’s stuck here in the past. The thought of having to do all that crap over again makes his stomach churn. What’s he supposed to do, win a quick championship so he can go back home? Is this how that bastard Ye Xiu got to be so good—was he getting tossed through time every time he won?

The implications make his head spin. Wei Chen suddenly misses him, misses Happy Internet Cafe and its cheerful decor. He’s gotten used to it, the place and the people. He hadn’t realized he’d taken it all for granted until it was gone.

His eyes roam around the room, searching for a distraction. And fall once again on Yu Wenzhou. His replacement, who took Blue Rain to greater heights than Wei Chen ever could.

“What do you think of him?” he asks Fang Shijing, gesturing with his chin.

“Yu Wenzhou?” Fang Shijing frowns. “You aren’t thinking of dropping him, are you? He’s trying so hard to keep up.”

The strangeness hits Wei Chen all over again. No one talks about Yu Wenzhou like that, not anymore.

Another thought decks him like a sucker punch. Maybe this isn’t a cosmic fuckup. Maybe it’s a gift. Wei Chen doesn’t know how he got here or what he’s supposed to do. He knows what’s supposed to happen. He still remembers being blindsided by the kid he thought had no future in Blue Rain. The burn of humiliation is still seared into his brain, even after all these years.

And fuck, that’s today. The fucking date. No wonder it was familiar.

Yu Wenzhou won’t be able to beat him this early, not if Wei Chen is ready for him. The petty part of himself wants to use this knowledge to his advantage. The rest of him wants to kick his own ass for even thinking it. Wei Chen might be a dirty-playing bastard, but even he knows that what’s about to happen is a turning point for not just Yu Wenzhou, but for Blue Rain. For everyone.

What the fuck is he supposed to do with this? The championship trophy already feels far away, the immediacy of Blue Rain pushing against his senses and his memory.

Amidst the bustle of practice, Huang Shaotian sits in the center of the training room surrounded by a fawning crowd of people. Even from a distance, Wei Chen can see his mouth working at light speed, always talking, always moving. It’s a stark contrast to the way he looked at Wei Chen when they met in person for the first time in so many years.

An opportunity, that’s what this is. A chance to not fuck things up. Wei Chen can do this, he can do right by his old team. And when the time comes, he can still find Happy, the group of misfits who have become another family to him. He can commiserate with Wu Chen and be goaded into ridiculous shit by Baozi and watch Qiao Yifan be so earnest it hurts. Why shouldn’t Wei Chen get to have it both ways?

Inspiration strikes, golden bright in his mind. Playing by the book is for suckers, hasn’t he always known that? If you can’t get things the honest way, you play dirty.

“Should I be concerned?” Fang Shijing breaks him out of his thoughts. “I know that look on your face. Don’t think I’ve forgotten all the bars that look has gotten us kicked out of.”

“I’m older and wiser now,” Wei Chen says, laughing at his own stupid joke. He grabs Fang Shijing’s wrist and steps out from behind his desk. “Come on, I wanna show you something.”

Plastering an obnoxious grin on his face, he leads them out of the office towards the group of players.

“Who wants a game,” Wei Chen announces, stepping into the training room.

.

Part Two

[jangofctts]

Bloodsport (din djarin x fem!reader) (part one) 

rated: 18+

word count: 5.4k

warnings: smut, knife kink (no blood is drawn and consent is clearly given), blowjobs, vaginal fingering, din is sorta a virg duDE, alcohol, mentions of violence (reader punches someone in the face kwejrkejh), some gambling (sabaac) also please let me know if I missed anything!

a/n: oOf this is the first fic in sO LONG IM SO SORRY YALL KEHJRKEJH BUT ANYWAYS I HOPE YOU ENJOY

It’s been a couple months since Din’s stepped foot on the sandy nightmare of a planet. Went through hell and back and kriff—it feels like a lifetime ago. But the landscape before him hasn’t changed an inch, Mos Eisley same as always—busy with all sorts of scum and villainy he turns a blind eye to. 

Din hopes it’s not the only thing that’s stayed the same—selfish as it is. Someone as volatile as you is bound to catalyze and shift, so is the nature of life. A lot can happen in a month or two and it’s ridiculous to think that you would ever push your life to the side and wait for him to return.    

Turns out, you are here, still working as the resident mechanic. Though in the same elated breath of hearing that tidbit of news, it’s equally dissatisfying when he somehow misses you completely. You’re off planet, looking for power converters and electrical wiring—back in few days Peli promises. Maybe by the time his wild goose chase is over, back from the butt fuck middle of nowhere, he’ll get to see you— 

Nothing goes as planned—naturally. All Din finds is a man playing dress up, an oversized lizard, planetary drama he’s forced to resolve and—to top it all off—an attempted stickup. Maker—he’s not even worried about anything save for the kid and your speeder. The very same one now scattered over the sand in miserable heaps.           

At least some of it is salvageable…

By the time Din reaches the outskirts of Mos Eisley, the binary suns are smearing across the horizon like molten puddles of magma. Deep aches amass in his shoulders and back from the weight of the speeder parts, his gear, and the second pair of armor. Maker—it feels like his arms are going to be ripped off.

The baby babbles something incomprehensible. 

“Almost there, kid,” Din responds, sparing a quick glance down the baby. “How does soup sound?”

Instead of trudging back to the hangar, Din wanders to the cantina. Call it a hunch or just you and your aunt’s tendency to lurk around the premises, he’s certain he’s going to find one of you here. 

Din is right.

The moment he steps inside, he spots your mess of hair, the low solar lights illuminating the rich colors with a soft orange. The baby coos and blinks up at Din, his tiny clawed finger gesturing in your direction. 

Din hums. “Good job—you found her.” 

The child’s little teeth peek out, pleased with his discovery. Din steps into the doorway, down the carven stairs and over to your table. A older man—a ship rigger by the looks of his uniform—sits across from you, a game of Sabaac spread across the table between you. You’re winning. 

“Hello, Shiny.” You greet, dipping your chin in his direction. “Your armor is looking a tad ripe.” 

It’s true. The layer of slime coating his armor had baked and crusted under the suns—probably doesn’t smell too good either… 

“I killed a Krayt dragon.” Din states it with a twinge of smug satisfaction despite knowing how little something like that would mean to you. He could conquer three dozen planets and shower you in all the precious metals in the world and you’d still turn your nose up at everything.  

“And I curb stomped a centipede today—you aren’t special.” Your eyes never leave the set of worn cards you hold between your fingers, acutely ignoring him like you would an overly enthusiastic puppy. You inhale and scrape your right thumbnail along the edge of the hexagonal cardstock—it’s a subtle tell, one Din would more than likely miss if he were the unlucky bastard brave enough to sit at the other end of the table.  

“You playin’ or what?” Your opponent gripes. He scratches his unkempt salt and pepper stubble and quirks a furry brow. 

You lift your chin in scorned defiance and lay your hand down—full Sabaac. The man hisses through his crooked, clenched teeth and utters a curse as he shoves his winnings towards your end of the table.  

“Peli promised me information.” Din pushes, hearing the kid coo in curiosity as you begin shuffling the cards with practiced flare. “About others like me.”

“Do I look like my aunt to you?” You grumble. It’s the first time your eyes leave the perimeter of the game to look at him. They settle on the kid first with a guarded version of compassion, then leap to the faded green armor clipped to the heavy luggage, and then his visor. Your lip twitches at the green slime still coating the beskar. “I’m assuming my speeder didn’t make it.”

“A technical difficulty.”

You roll your eyes and snort, dealing out the cards then setting the stack in the middle. “Right…”

The background ambiance of the bar and the quiet rasp of cards fill the brief lull in conversation. Any other rational person would take the blaring hint to leave, but Din is just as stubborn as you are. 

“I don’t remember where the hangar is,” Din lies, cocking his head to the side in mock innocence, “could you show me?” 

The tip of your tongue peaks out of the corner of your mouth. The unconscious tic is not one of irritation—not yet. Though before you’re able to respond, your opponent beats you to it. 

“Yeah—I know where it is. It’s between fuck off and take a hike.”  

Din turns his head, the cool, even tone of his words sharper than shrapnel as he address the man. “I was speaking to her.”        

This is funny to you Din realizes—one of the tiny mysteries of your entirety clicking into the place of the puzzle map he’s conjured for you. 

“Well, I don’t have the time of day for cowards who wear shiny buckets over their head.” The man gripes into his drink, dark eyes flicking over to Din as he sizes him up. “What’s a Mandalorian doing out here anyway? Thought your planet exploded or something.”

The man’s ignorance irks him—sure. How could it not? But with years of harsh words and jabs at the foundation of Din’s very being, he’s learned to adapt. It’ll always sting no matter how many layers of beskar he wears but you on the other hand…

Your eyes spark, molten and bright like the last solar flare on the surface of a decaying star. Each encounter Din’s had with you, he’s bared witness to the deep well of your anger that fuels your being like the auto-mechanical heart of a droid. He’s felt the bite of your rage firsthand, but this anger—this is the tragedy of the delicate mayfly wings trapped between the black teeth of misfortune—the story of the boy who rammed a spear into the flank of an ancient beast that bites before it barks and gnashes its yellowed teeth in warning.

Din’s hand inches towards his blaster. He’s not willing to weigh the safety of the kid against your rash decisions, despite it being on his behalf.   

Though, just as quick as it appears, it recedes like the cool drawback of a tumultuous ocean. Din’s arm relaxes at his side as you release a puff of air. 

Your scuffed up fingers, stained with years of engine grease, scars and dirt, curl around your half finished drink. You stand, lay your cards face down onto the table and flash the stranger a feral grin.

Without a word, you toss your drink directly into the man’s unsuspecting eyes. In another breath, the pointed edges of your knuckles fly forward and hook beneath the point of his chin with a meaty thunk. The man’s head whips backwards and connects with the gravely wall—

Out like a light.  

Jaw clenched tight, you shake out your bleeding knuckles and gather up the strewn credits over the table. You shove them into the pockets of your jacket and side eye Din. “Restitutions for damages,” you mutter. 

The other patrons keep their eyes to themselves as the three of you hurry out the door. Only an apathetic glance from the bar tender serves as proof that something did, in fact, occur. No one wants to dirty their nose sniffing about where they shouldn’t be when they have their own business to safeguard.

The crisp night air rustles the stray strands of hair that escape from your ponytail. Ghostly moonlight carves the shape of your cheeks into an almost ethereal sight—one of those deep space creatures with pointy teeth and hellfire for eyes. Stuff of legends you’d never think to look in a dingy bar for.     

But he knows—Din knows that cool mask is just a front from what you hide. It is a hungry ghost that hounds your thin stretched shadow—what ifs and the glories of war you never really escaped. You forget that you are flesh and blood and ghosts are only air and echoes, nothing more. 

Din is sharp edged steel. A stray fragment of a shattered mirror, the lacerated reflection of a nameless purpose and a faceless existence. He’s torn edges and cracked glass but his heart beats within his chest with the blood of a thousand suns. Two souls under the umbrella of the word damaged but entirely different in nature.     

“No one—“ you growl, your voice a steady and lethal timbre that terrifies a part of Din’s unconsciousness, “—speaks that way to my friends.” 

Touching. 

“Don’t look at me like that, Creature,” you huff, staring down at the child who gurgles in return. “He deserved it—“

The reunion certainly wasn’t the one Din imagined, though it’s a relief to find that there’s no roughened edge like sandpaper over skin wedged between you. Picked up right where you left off—no questions asked and no inglorious retelling of how Din nearly died on the floor of a shitty cantina. There’s not a doubt in his mind that you'd laugh at him for it—it is sorta funny…   

The rest of the evening is spent walking back to the hangar, arguing over the fact that yes Din should take the couch instead of that miserable little hovel he calls a bed, and spend the night. He’d have to find some other mechanic to work through the night if he wanted to leave in the morning, because you certainly did not want to volunteer for that. And so—Din reluctantly takes the couch and agrees to let you tackle the monstrosity of fixing up his ship for tomorrow. 

He has to admit…the couch is a bit smaller than the length of his body, but it’s comfortable…maybe he’d buy a better blanket while he was here. As a treat.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- 

You purse your lips and whistle. “I swear each time I see it, it gets worse. Y’know, I know a couple guys selling—“ 

“Can you fix it?”

You fold your arms over your chest and roll your eyes.“Yeah I can fix it, jeez—no need to get your undies in a twist.” 

You try not to take offense, because hey—you’re offering him the info on the good deals on new ships (and at this point anything would be better than this old rust bucket). But if Din doesn’t want anything to do with that, then whatever. His loss.   

When you wander onto the ship, toolbox in hand, the Mandalorian tags along. Unsure if he doesn’t trust you with his things or just wants to hang out, it blankets the space with an air of uncertainty. Turns out it was neither of those guesses. All he does is throw open his stash of weapons, collect his pile of vibroknives, and set them on a table to polish and sharpen. 

Makes sense, you suppose. Everything has to be as shiny as his armor. 

You drop to your knees near the closest wiring panel you find. You wrench open the paneling and frown at the disarray of sparking wires and tangled cords. You organized these perfectly last time he was here. “Who the fuck junked up my rigging?”

Mando sits at the little table tucked away in the corner, brooding over his cache of weapons. He shrugs. “Could’ve come loose when I landed.” 

You roll your eyes at his half assed excuse and mutter a foul string of curses under your breath that’d make even Peli wince. It’s fine. It’s cool—no biggie. You can sort through this in a couple hours, maybe three. 

But of course rarely anything goes as planned. As time ticks away, arms deep in wires older than the kriffing Clone Wars, the distractions begin. The scrape of metal on durasteel makes the hair rise into little pricks all up your arms—you shoot a glare over your shoulder. Din tilts his head, your kneeling self reflecting within the ever dark visor, features scrunched into an obvious tell of annoyance. Huffing, you bury your head back into your task at hand. 

The second distraction arrives in the form of a quiet hum of curiosity originating from the Mandalorian. Out of the corner of your eye you see him bring a vibroblade up to his visor, inspecting the notch in the blade that disrupts the electrical current that flows through the weapon. Din then rubs his thumb over the handle of the vibroblade in a slow, sensual circle. You lick your lips and tear your eyes away. That shouldn’t be hot.

You furrow your brows and tear apart another wire, but the metallic tap, tap, tap of Din bouncing the tip of a different blade over the table is bothersome. You swing your head to your left, mouth parting to snap at him, but his hand—sans glove—brings you to a halting stop. 

It’s alluring, the way his long, weathered fingers twirl the knife with practiced ease—like silk through water and followed by the low hum of electricity meant to slice through flesh. Din tosses it in the air, watching it spin three rotations then catches it by the handle. Your lips purse when his visor meets your eyes. He spins it between his fingers.  

“Am I bothering you?”

Fucker.   

You scowl. “It’s fine.” 

The soft rasp of his thumb sliding along the flat of the blade entices the eye and damnit—he’s doing this on purpose. 

“Doesn’t seem fine,” he hums. 

“Well, it is.” You retort hotly. You snatch up your pliers and imagine you’re pulling his teeth out in place of the crooked paneling. “I’m currently thriving in my element.”  

Din hums, the sound buzzing with grainy distortion. “Do you want a closer look?”

You chew your bottom lip. He’s playing with an open flame and you with volatile jet fuel. 

“I don’t know, seems kinda lame from here.” You scoff, busying yourself by pinching and twisting another set of frayed wires between your fingertips. “A toothpick if anything.”

Din snorts behind you. The deadly whisper of beskar against the durasteel tabletop makes the hair on the back of your neck prick into points. You tense as heavy boots shuffle along the floor, the near silent rustle of armor tinkling behind you as Din steps closer. You’re slow to stand, even though the presence of the Mandalorian is no less than overbearing. You wipe your grimy hands onto a spare rag, continuing to face the paneling. You then turn, a coy smile threatening to break across your face. 

Stars Din is broad—and close enough you swear you’re able to see the perspiration of your breath fog the beskar plating. Your eyes follow the seams of the cuirass, across the leather bandolier and up to his helmet that’s fixed in an impassive glare of tempered steel. Your back bumps into the wall as Din takes another step forward, boxing you in. To escape you’d need to duck under his arm and yet…you refuse to move.   

Your breath catches as he languidly lifts his hand and taps the flat side of the vibroblade over your collarbone. The sharpened point tickles up the column of your throat, a crackle of nerves and your pounding pulse following in its wake. Din turns the blade to flat edge and pushes into the space right below your jaw—you squirm when he chuckles, the sound low and deep. 

“You like this…”

Din grunts as your hand reaches between his legs, squeezing the growing hardness there. “So do you.” 

Din circles his hand around your wrist with his free palm. Moons above his hands are warm. He murmurs your name—you shiver. “Tell me you want this—want me.”

A blush, hotter than the surface of Tatooine in the midday sun, rushes up your neck and pools into the apples of your cheeks. Maker you want him. With a shuddering sigh you nod—braving the scathing shrapnel of vulnerability. “I need you, Din—please.”

A low chuckle rumbles through Din’s chest. “Don’t think I’ve ever heard you say please before.”

Din drops his hold on your wrist as you roll your eyes. “Shut up, Bucket Head.”

The Mandalorian snorts and dips his head—gesturing towards the blade still lightly pressed against the base of your throat. “This ok too, Skitter?”

You flash him a wolfish grin. “Gonna fuck me with it?”

Din swears under his breath, crowding his body closer to yours. You hear his strained sigh as he dips his head closer, the beskar a chilly whisper against your cheek. “You’re depraved…take off your pants.”

You smirk, tear off your belt and shimmy out of your pants and underwear, bottom half now bare. His visor dips, entranced.  

Your heart leaps into your throat, your pulse roaring in your ears as he settles one of his bare hands over the swell of your hip while the other trails the blunt edge of the handle from your clothes collarbone, and down your belly. From your mid thigh he skates the handle up your bare thigh and then rests it over the crack of your thigh. Heat flushes through your entire body, a stark contrast to the cool metal of the handle. A shiver races down each vertebrae when he drags it over the swell of your cunt and then carefully pressing it against your clit. You gasp and arch into the light touch, your thighs involuntarily jerking as he increases the pressure. It’s cold, rigid and filthy. Who knows where that knife has been—how many lives it’s taken or severed through muscle and skin. 

You don’t find it in you to care all that much.    

He trades his hold on your hip to slide his hand into your shirt, palming and kneading your breast through your bra as you roll and whine against his fingers. The tight circles he's drawing over your clit burns through your abdomen, drags you closer to the precipice that you’re all ready so close to. Fuck—it’s been so long since you’ve indulged in this sort of pleasure.You whine his name as wicked heat licking up your body and spreading to each limb. You arch into him, the handle of his knife slipping through your folds as arousal drips from your cunt.   

Your groan as you tilt your hips into the handle, craving any lick of pleasure he’ll give. Your breath hitches as Din pushes the hilt closer to your throwing entrance, murmuring praise as he sinks the first couple inches inside of you. It’s cold—the knobby feel of the handle not too much thicker than one or two of your fingers combines. You huff and grab at his cowl, the warmth of his hand grazing your pussy each time he rocks his wrist forward. 

“You’re so quiet,” Din goads, pulling the handle free from your aching center. “You usually have plenty to say.” 

You shoot Din a glare, tongue weighed down by arousal to come up with a god retort. You lean your head back against the wall of the Crest and with a chuckle, Din’s hand leaves your shirt to pull you against his chest, the vocoder rumbling against your ear. The blade clatters to the floor and instead brings his calloused fingertips to your cunt. He softly rolls your swollen clit between his forefinger and thumb, delighting in the way you shake. “Be a good little thing and cum for me.”

Shit, you didn’t think it’d be that easy. Your body seizes as white hot heat ripples through your core. Stars, brighter than a dying sun burst behind your eyes, a high pitched cry filtering past your lips as shake and fall apart in his arms, your cunt clenching tight around the thick fingers he slips inside of you. 

You whine as he pulls out, little aftershocks of pleasure wracking through your body in wake of your euphoric high. You groan as he lifts your head and pushes his digits, coated in your juices into your mouth. You lick them clean, tasting the tang of your own arousal and the salt on his skin. “Fuck—that was good.”

You can only imagine that Din rolls his eyes. He takes a step back but before he can escape—

You drop to your knees, a wicked smile curling over your lips. The muscles in his thighs jump as your palms smooth over the outsides of them, then up to his narrow hips, your thumbs lightly massaging the ligaments that protects the fragile joints. Din sucks in a sharp breath when your fingertips hook around his trousers. 

“What are you doing?” Din asks, brushing a thumb over your jaw. 

You pause and glance up at him. You quirk a brow. “Was gonna suck you off, but if you have something else in mind…“ He hisses and tips his head back, flashing the underside of his chin as your hand leaves his hip to cup the heavy bulge tenting in his trousers. 

“Maker—“ He looks off to the side, inhales a choppy breath and then snaps his head back. “You’d…you’d do that?”   

You nod and flash him an encouraging half grin. “Wouldn’t have offered if I didn’t want to.”

Din mumbles an incoherent string of words under his breath and shifts his weight onto his right leg. His fingers touch your cheek again then tuck a loose hair behind your ear. “But—“

Moons above this man is straight out of some kind of fucking fairytale—arguing about getting his dick sucked—or not. 

Whatever.       

“Din…” His breath hitches at the sound of his name. “I’m asking you kindly to fuck my mouth—it’s cool if you don’t wanna, but my knees already kriffing hurt and—“

He cuts you off with a hasty nod. “Yes—stars, please.”

Fuck yeah.

You smile and slide your eyes past Din’s legs to the cargo crate shoved up against the wall. “You should sit—easier that way.”

He nods and shuffles over, lightly perching himself on the edge and ready to flee at the barest hint of well—anything.

Din’s knee jumps when you place your palm over it. You assume his nerves are from the nature of his occupation—trouble always strikes when you least expect it—and what better time would that be when his pants are around his ankles. “Relax—I’m not gonna bite—maybe.”

He makes a wary sound low in his throat as your fingertips hook into the waistband of his trousers and pull. Din lifts up as you tug the fabric further down his legs, tan skin and solid muscle following in its wake. Fuck…

You swallow, mouth feeling quite dry when your eyes drift between his legs. Din is thick, a rosy brown color, flushed at the tip and curling towards his bellybutton. Beads of liquid shine at the tip, dribbling down the underside and pooling into the dark patch of curls at the base. Din’s fingers hook over the side of the crate, squirming under the weight of your stare. 

Yeah—that’s gonna leave your jaw aching.    

You hear his breath hitch, magnified by the crackle of the vocoder as your lips descend over a silvery scar on the inside of his right knee. You pepper a trail of wet kisses and light nips up his thighs, and by the time you reach the crease of his leg, his hips mindlessly rock with need. 

The second the wet warmth of your tongue brushes over the tip of his cock, his hips jolt off the crate, a load groan echoing through the empty ship. It’s like striking a match to an open line of kerosene—devouring and explosive that’ll leave your delicate skin singed. You’re not nervous playing with fire if this barest scrap of wild heat is anything like burning to a crisp. 

Emboldened by his initial reaction, you wrap your hand around the base, pulsing and achingly hard beneath the velvety flesh. You flatten your tongue over the tip, lapping up the sticky liquid the slip the head of him into your mouth. His hands fly to your hair, tightening into fists as he throws his head back. The beskar scrapes over the durasteel with a sharp squeal, but you don’t find it in you to care about the abrasive sound—eardrums be damned.  

“Fuck—kriffing hell—“ Din snarls, arching his hips to seek more of your warmth. “K-keep going.”  

Your own rekindled arousal blazes hot in your core hearing his stuttered pleas. You pull away to catch your breath, feeling almost guilty for doing so at Din’s low whine of protest. He picks his head up, watching as you languidly jerk him off—entranced with the way your hand rolls over the leaking tip, back down to the base, then up again. You could keep him like this—tease until he cracks under the pressure and begs you for whatever iota of pleasure you want to give but—

You’re not that mean.    

Wetting your lips with your tongue, you part your mouth and slide nearly half of his length into your mouth. Din mutters something garbled, his hips jolting as you hollow your cheeks and bob your head.

Din shifts, arching his back and stuttering out broken whispers of encouragement. Placing your hand over his thigh, you can feel his pulse thrumming beneath your fingertips, wild and alive—something real beneath all that heavy armor and unforgiving helmet. 

“You—you look…” He grunts as you hum around around his cock, swallowing him down further. “Shit—you look so p-perfect like this.”

You groan and squeeze your thighs together, attempting to ignore the gnawing hunger snapping at your insides. 

Rolling your tongue along the underside of his shaft, your fingers slide over what your mouth cant reach—squeezing and gently coaxing him towards his high. He seizes up tight—yet, just when you think you’ve got him skidding off that precarious edge—

His hand fists your hair at the base your neck and yanks you off his cock. He huffs, breathy little pants as he folds into himself like he’s been punched in the gut, his head rolling forward onto his shoulder. Din shivers as he scrambles for control, beginning to loose that slippery foothold he’s so intent on maintaining. His cock, flushed an angry red and still slick with your saliva, twitches and throbs for the release so cruelly wrenched away. 

You let him catch his breath. The fingers tangled in your hair go lax and drop away to rest at his sides. You swallow, his previous skittishness suddenly clicking into place. “Din, are you…?” A virgin. Your question tapers off, unsure if it’ll embarrass and scare him off. 

“No,” he answers—not in a sharp way like you’d hear with a bruised ego—just stating a fact. “Just not—not this. Never had someone—stars—“

Your teeth roll your bottom lip between them, forcing your face to remain neutral despite the stroke of pride blooming singing in your chest. You’re his first—lucky enough to make this the best goddamned oral he’ll ever have. Something he’ll remember for years.  

“Do you want me to stop?” You ask, praying to the Maker he’ll say no. 

He shakes his head, sucking in another calming breath and unfurling himself. His fingers clench into fists then relax, crackling with pent up energy and unsure nerves as to where he should put them. You solve it by threading your fingers through his and placing them around you head. 

Your lips quirk. “You’re allowed to cum in mouth—don’t worry about it.”

His cock twitches as a quiet moan fizzles through the modulator. “You su-sure?”

“Oh, yeah.”

With a smile you bring your mouth back to his cock, tongue swiping up the entire length of him. Din groans as the soft warmth of your mouth slips over the flushed tip of cock, his thick length twitching as you hollow out your cheeks and suck. You bob your head as you slowly work him in further because even like this, hardly halfway into your mouth, you feel your lips stretching a bit too much around him. You groan and part your mouth wider, letting him sink into the soft warmth of your throat.  Din inhales, the sound shaky and unsure as his hips twitch with a few tentative thrusts. 

You take it slow—lifting your mouth nearly all the up to the tip then back down to the base. Din rolls his hips, helping you ease into the gentle pace. Saliva drips down his cock and over your knuckles making an absolute mess you have zero intentions of cleaning up. It’s his ship after all. Din swears as his hips stutter, your hand squeeing around him, trying to push him off that edge he so deserves. Din gasps your name, the pitch of his words knocking up to a lighter, more airy tone, warmer than melted butter. 

“Ca-can’t believe, it—ah—it fits.” He groans with astonished reverence. You preen under his praise. 

You swallow around him and grunt at the abrupt jolt of his hips. There’s no distinctive rhythm you can follow as you let him rock his hips into your mouth—seeking out his pleasure without a coherent thought in sight. Just a cacophony of gasping breaths and rough moans. 

You can feel is cock twitching over you tongue—he’s close—and when your eyes roll up to meet the darkened visor, he’s gone. He shouts your name and knots his fists around your hair as he spirals of that edge. You nearly gag from the force of his release hitting the back of your throat—cock throbbing and jerking in your mouth like he’s been denying himself release for months. His moans, fragile and gasping, filling the quiet space as his hips grind his cock deeper down your throat, his hands threaded into your hair acting as an anchor—the sole tether he has to the waking world. 

Din’s grip relents as the last few catastrophic waves tear through his body. He doesn’t move his hands, just lets them rest over your skull  as his chest heaves for precious air, a harsh crackle through the vocoder. You pull his still twitching cock halfway out, dragging the tip of your tongue below the frenulum while one of your hands circles the base of his length. Maker—he’s still going—

Last little dribbles of his cum spurt onto your tongue and drip over your knuckles still securely wrapped around him. His legs and lower abdomen flex when your hand falls lower to carefully knead at his balls, milking out his pleasure for all its worth. You let his softening cock slip from your mouth when he swears and mumbles your name.      

When you rest your back against the wall, he slips himself back into his trousers and joins you. You take a risk and rest your head over the chilly beskar pauldron. You’d never call this love—the word is much too harsh for this delicate string of seconds. Love means giving pieces of yourself to others like martyrs give their hearts to the sky—or risk fragile skin against the rays of an unforgiving sun. Broken ribs and clenched fists, immensity beyond comprehension—

“You should come with us,” he says with a hesitant mumble. Love is formidable—but you know that somehow, here, pressed against Din’s side, that this is right. In a golden way, a honeyed way, a path that tastes of blood, freedom and blaster smoke that will leave your lungs stained with blackened soot. Cowardice has long made a home inside of your soul, and he’s offering you a chance to shake off the layer of frost clinging to your bones and step into the gentle merciful dawn.  

“Yeah—alright, Din. I will.”

tags (only tagging some moots for now bc i have no clue what’s going on in this fandom anymore dbdndn): @goldafterglow @jango-fettish @djxrxn @blsmjoon @spookoofins @krissology @steeeeeeeviebb @teaofpeach @comphersjost @gummiishark @delusionsxfgrandeur @pettyprocrastination @huliabitch

[praise-the-lord-im-dead]

Good Soup

@inklings-challenge, I made a thing! Technically before deadline? It’s before midnight here, at least. 

It was warm in the little house, in spite of the October chill outside, and the butter was soft, melting easily onto the golden-crusted bread. Morning light came in through the window, the leaves outside glittering with autumn color and melting frost.

It was a soup day.

Maureen could feel it in her aching bones as she munched through her toast and sipped at her cup of red raspberry tea, staring out at the wild collection of dry vines that had been her garden this summer. She could see it in the bright, soft glint of the light, and the bony crooked branches that waved against the sky in shades of silver and steel.

Maureen eased herself up out of her chair, letting her joints adjust to the idea of standing up before she carried her cup and plate to the sink. You couldn’t rush soup, either, and soup was wonderful. Maureen took satisfaction in the comparison. (Soup also didn’t have to be ashamed of smelling like garlic and onions, though that thought she mostly kept to herself).  

She put her dishes in the sink, and was walking back to the table when something made her stop.

She looked out the window.

She blinked.

There was a pair of glasses on the kitchen desk—the print on the energy bill only ever seemed to get smaller—and she went to get them before she looked out the window again.

She might have mistaken it for a pond, maybe (it was round) or a car (it was metallic) or a trick of the light (sunlight blazed off the shiny surface brightly enough to blind anyone), but the simple fact of the matter was that it was in her garden, surrounded by pumpkin vines and frost-wilted leaves and kitchen scraps, where there had been no cars, or ponds, or anything, just a moment ago.

Hm.

Her coat and scarf were hung by the door, a pair of mittens in the basket with her keys. She was still wrapping the scarf around her neck as she made her way across the lawn, the frost-covered grass crunching underfoot wherever the shadows of the trees protected it from the sun.

The thing in her garden was actually a bit larger than a car. It was maybe a little smaller than the neighbor’s pool, though, and just as round. It was making tired ticking noises as she approached it, and, just as she got close, part of it popped open with a very loud hiss. Maureen jumped back.

The…person…that got out was blue. And scaly. It—they—staggered a little, looking down at the remains of her vegetable garden with apparent confusion, before turning to blink at her.

Maureen didn’t know what to do, so she waved.

The person tipped a little to one side.

Maureen had just enough time to think, ‘oh dear,’ before they toppled over completely, landing hard on the ground, face-first into the remains of her pepper plants. They were wearing clothes—something that looked like canvas, but was dyed a very bright yellow. There was a tear in the side of the suit, on their torso, and the tear was leaking sluggishly into the dirt, a viscous, black liquid the consistency of warm honey.

Oh no.

Maureen bent down, pressing a hand against the wound, and they made a soft, ragged noise, making her jerk her hand away again. She was shaking a little, which was silly. This was just a wounded person.

She bent down, lifting one of their arms over her shoulders. Their other five limbs dragged behind them as Maureen dragged them towards the house like an especially large harvest of squashes.

The hardest part was getting them into the house. Their scales kept catching on the doorjamb.

The warm kitchen felt like a blessing, when Maureen finally shut the front door. The alien took up almost the entire floor, like a supersized dead hornet. Maureen lifted the fabric away from their wound carefully. She couldn’t tell how deep it was, but she was willing to bet it could use a bandage.

She went to get her first-aid kit and some sewing scissors.

After she bandaged the wounds she could find (cutting the torso of the suit away revealed another puncture wound and several bloodied scales), she dragged the alien into the living room, closer to the floor heating unit. Scales meant lizard, which meant cold-blooded. Hopefully she wasn’t drastically wrong about that. She covered the alien in a colorful afghan and propped a pillow under their head, and then went back to mop up the mess on the kitchen floor.

It was still a soup day.

Ignoring the giant blue alien in her living room became easier when she retrieved one of her home-grown pumpkins and a butternut squash. She sliced both neatly in half, scooping out the seeds and seasoning the halves before putting them in the oven to bake.

She diced onions, and put them in the bottom of a deep pan with some butter. As that sizzled, she added crushed garlic, more butter, more spices. The kitchen began to smell like soup.

She washed dishes and left them in the drying rack. She peeked into the living room, the retrieved the heavy cream from the fridge.

Carrots. Check on the alien.

Water. Check on the alien.

Sweet corn. Check on the alien.

When she finally pulled out the small corded immersion blender, she was feeling a little frustrated with herself. It never took this long to make soup. (She still had to stop blending halfway through to sneak another peek into the living room. The alien hadn’t moved).

The soup was still bubbling, when Maureen finally shut the stove off. The sunlight was beginning to tip over into another golden hour. She glanced into the living room for what she told herself would be the last time.

The alien was sitting up. They were poking suspiciously at their bandage.

“Don’t make yourself bleed all over again,” Maureen called, and the alien startled. Badly, slamming into the coffee table. They stared at Maureen, making her suddenly very conscious of her ladle. Was it threatening? She put it down, just in case.

“Would you like soup?” she asked, hopeful.

They only peered at her in response. Quite suddenly, their eyes narrowed, and she felt something—like a buzzing, sort of, at the back of her head. She slapped at it unthinkingly, like she might slap a bug, but there was nothing there. The alien just jolted back, a little, and blinked.

“Oh,” Maureen said. “That must be how you talk.”

They just looked confused, so Maureen got two bowls out of the cupboard and filled them both with warm-smelling orange soup. She put spoons in, then carried them both into the living room, placing the alien’s portion on the coffee table, then sitting down on the couch and slightly over-dramatically eating a bite, before nodding at the alien’s portion.

“Soup,” she said. The alien still looked baffled, so she thought for a moment. She thought really hard about soup. How it was warm, and tasty. How it grew up out of the ground in ingredients and needed to be baked and fried and blended. How it was comforting and filling and good.

She thought really hard about it, and then—sort of threw everything she was thinking at the alien. Which mostly involved squinting really hard at them, and hoping she didn’t look like an idiot.

The alien looked at the soup. Then at her. Then at the soup again. Cautiously, they took the bowl, raising the spoon to their mouth to take a tentative bite. Maureen felt the buzzing at the back of her brain again, and saw brief pictures—her own thoughts of soup, dim and blurry, but also something else—a flashing series of things that she thought were strange plants, and other creatures like this alien harvesting and tending, talking and laughing as they made even stranger food. There was an emphasis on those images, a warmth associated with them. It was all different from anything that Maureen had ever seen in her life—beautifully different, but also almost exactly the same.

You’re right, she thought. It is better when you share it.

She wasn’t sure if word-thoughts translated like picture-thoughts did. But as they both sat in companionable silence, watching the sun slowly slip away, she wasn’t sure that a translation was needed.

[bitchassbucky]

Ｂｏｔｈｅｒ

📎Word Count: 2.2k

📎Warning/s: smut! minors DNI. mean!fuckboy!bucky x f!reader. unprotected sex. little to no foreplay, because, well, he just wants to get his dick wet. denied orgasm :( no aftercare too lol he’s an asshole in this one. messy facial! some heckin’ words.

📎A/N: jesus fuckiNG CHRIST okay this is one of my longer fics, i’m trying to get back into writing long fics again so, bear with me. fuckboy!bucky playlist to accompany you while reading this <3 

📎reblogs, likes, and comments are all welcomed! shower me with validation pls

📎Masterlist || Ask || AFTERDARK

The bass line and the drumbeat made your heart pump in sync. The room reeked of cheap drinks and expensive perfume—sweaty patrons swirling, mingling around, keeping their drinks cold, their hearts warm.

Chatter peaked when the band finished the song, a round of applause rising the frontman’s ego. The spotlight shone brightly on him, the stage lights hitting his back, lighting up his silhouette with pinks and purples.

He beams with adrenaline. All perfect smiles.

Slinging his stickered guitar to the side, he speaks into the mic, “thank you all for coming. We’ve been The Commandos. Goodnight!” The frontman flashes his million-dollar, megawatt smile and bows, earning another applause from the audience.

The rest of the band slinked out the back, bowing, giving out air-kisses and waves. Another band piles onto the stage, waving hello to the gathering crowd.

You sigh, the bottom of your shoes sticking to the dirty floor of the bar. The overhead lights of the bar a bright yellow contrast to the stage’s red hue. The beer in your hand condensing, the tips of your fingers damp in the process. The warmth of the place piling on your impatience.

Pushing yourself off the bar, you make your way to the back, one thing echoing in your mind. Familiar faces crowd your vision, sending a polite smile their way.

A door stands in front of you, the wood stained with stickers and posters and autographs. You knock twice before turning the knob.

“Where’s Bucky?” You say, leaning against the door frame. The door slowly swings open.

A blonde man, what’s-his-face, looks at you and puts down a pair of drumsticks, “‘Dunno what to tell ya, but he’s not here.”

Your roll your eyes, sending him a mirthless smile, “yeah, obviously. I was hoping if you could tell him to meet me tonight.”

Steve—you suddenly remembered his name—eyed you head to foot, a smirk plastered on his face, “Sounds important. Why don’t you hang out with us while waiting for him?”

A chuckle escapes your lips, “no, thanks. I’ll meet him outside.”

Steve makes a face, quirking a light brow to the rest of the group. All of them sharing the same look, “alright. Suit yourself.”

The clock ticks just ten minutes after 11, your patience growing thin as a needle. A gaggle of drunk patrons stumbles out the door when you spot him—leather jacket, distressed, ripped pants.

“Where’s my ring?” Without missing a beat.

Bucky’s lips quirk into a smirk, “whoa, baby, we fucked once,” he made you come thrice, “and you’re asking for a ring already?”

A shiver runs up your spine, whether it’s from disgust or something else, it wasn’t clear, “you know what I meant. I left my ring on your nightstand.”

“Deliberately, or…”

Your hands curl up in frustration, your left shin itching, “c’mon. Do you have it or not?” 

His intentionally undone boots scuffed against the floor as he stalks closer to you, his perfume invading your olfactory senses. Oh, he smells good. 

“D’you wanna find out?” His voice dropping a couple of octaves, whispering into the shell of your ear. His thick arms caging you against the bar and the wall. Fuck, he smells really good.

A feeble attempt to make room goes unnoticed, your breath hitching in your throat, “If you don’t have it on you, I’d gladly receive it through the mail.”

Bucky licks his tinged lips, a vein in his temple ticking—the lighting reflecting in his blue eyes, “why would I mail it to you when you can pick it up from my place?”

A rational voice in your head echoes, fighting with your impulse. The closeness of both of your bodies radiating warmth and electricity.

“Fine.” You relented, impulsivity is what got you there in the first place.

The drive to the place shouldn’t take too long, the little shit deliberately took the long way to his place. 

While you sit on the passenger side of his car, he keeps sending you amused glances. As if he couldn’t believe you’d willingly go with him tonight. Well, technically, it really wasn’t part of your plan.

“You wanna get burgers first?” He offers, lowering the music coming from the car’s stereo.

“I wanna get my ring back, Bucky.” You say, reminding him—and yourself—of what your agenda for tonight is.

He dismisses you, as per usual. And pulls over a drive-through of a local burger place, ordering himself a meal.

Instead of getting back out on the highway, he parks the car, rolls down the window, and eats.

“Jesus- fuck, Bucky!” You exclaimed in frustration, “look, if you want to waste my time, then-”

“Then, what?”

“Then go fuck yourself.” You left in a huff, swinging your legs and slamming the car door shut. Hoping that he’d go deaf in one ear.

Making sure that you’re well visible and in a brightly-lit place, you pull out your phone to book an Uber. Only to find Bucky making his way to you for the second time tonight.

“Hey!” Didn’t even used your name to call you, great work!

“I do have it, it’s really back in my place. By the lamp on the bedside table.” The truth lingers out on the night air, waiting for you to acknowledge it.

You meet Bucky’s statement with a wary squint, he meets your rightful doubt with a smile.

“No more stopovers.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Bucky’s place is a liminal space for you. 

The familiar shadows and corners welcome you, the surfaces on where your bare skin sat hissed at you. You stood by the doorway, not wanting to prolong the journey.

“Hey, c’mon, it’s just me. Sit down.” Exactly, it is him.

You shake your head, leaning by the wall like a stranger, “I’m good. You’re not gonna take long anyway.”

But instead of retrieving your jewelry, his form retreats to the kitchen. A few seconds pass and you hear the crack and hiss of a beer bottle being opened.

“Y’know, I think I’ll just get it myself.” You toe off your shoes, placing them by the door. Your jacket still hanging off your shoulders.

You passed by Bucky, walking towards a love seat, two beers on one hand, “hurry up, then. Got a drink for ya.”

Hazy images play by memory the last time you were here, his damn cologne seeping into your nostrils.

Your head hanging by the edge of the bed as he laps your cunt like a man starved.

The headboard supporting your balance as you bounce up and down his thick cock.

Carpeting that gave your knees burn as he fucked you from behind.

Like an etch-a-sketch, you shake your head to get rid of the scenes that made themselves known.

A shining glint from the bedside table catches your eye, you swipe the ring and stashed it down your jacket pocket.

Coming out of the room with your ring, your slight smile falters as you saw Bucky lounging shirtless. As rightfully so, this is his home anyway.

You steeled yourself despite the heat that’s making its way up to your neck, “uh, I already got it. Thanks, Bucky.”

He shoots you a look—a lingering one. Like a predator about to pounce on prey. His stare chasing the goosebumps under your clothes.

“You sure you wanna go? It’s–” he glances at his phone for the time, “–past midnight.”

“I can take care of myself.”

“I know you can.” The setup.

“How about I take care of you for a change?” The trap.

And then just as sudden as your arrival, you find yourself pressed up against the wall. The agenda of the night has already been forgotten.

Bucky’s mouth finds its temporary home on your jaw, moving down your neck. His large hands already clawing their way under your shirt, the suddenness of the moment stirring the heat in your belly.

Rushed hands and panted breaths meet feverish lips.

The moment his tongue slipped into your mouth was the moment where you lost all inhibitions. Your hands fly to his nape, tugging his hair, effectively making him moan into your mouth.

“You know me so well.” He purrs against your lips. Hitching your legs up his hips as he presses you harder against the drywall.

“Lots of people know you so well.” You bite back, knowing for a fact that he sees others behind your back.

“True,” he’s murmuring against your pulse point and you sigh, “you’re my favorite though.”

Your jacket clutters against the floor of his bedroom, along with his pants and your shirt. A yellow stream of light emits from the living room.

Bucky tosses you on the bed, sending the pillows crashing on the floor. Though the room is darkened with curtains, your eyes adjust enough to see him as he pulls your ankles towards him.

His abs are chiseled like a Greek god, his skin tanned, decorated with tattoos. His left nipple adorns a stainless steel piercing. Like the last time, he grabs your hand, trailing it along his torso, letting you feel his deep v-lines.

A lewd moan escapes your lips as you cup his hardening cock through his boxers. Thick and heavy, a perfect fit.

“You like it?” Bucky taunts, jutting his hips against your hand. You squeeze him lightly, earning you a deep groan from the man above you.

His hand suddenly tightens around your throat, pulling your head towards him, “I asked you a question.”

Giving him a small nod and a meek yeah seemed to have sufficed until he flips you on your stomach and forces your face down the bed.

Your skirt joins the growing pile of clothes on the floor. Your panties do too.

“You’re so wet for me, aren’t ya?” Bucky taunts, one thick finger swiping the wetness between your folds. Spreading it around as preparation. A muffled confirmation made him chuckle as he pinches your clit with intention.

Taking his leaking cock out of his boxers, he swipes the bead of precum from his angry-red tip. He takes his sweet, sweet time before even thinking about pushing into your pussy.

Bucky drags the head of his cock up and down your fold, earning a needy moan from you—coating his entire length with your wetness.

After seemingly an eternity on your side, the sheets already imprinted their impression on the side of your cheek. Bucky finally, fucking finally, pushes into you. A short, white-hot burn shoots through your nerves, making you whimper.

His hand stays on the back of your neck, pushing you further down the bed as he moves. Your pussy lips gripping his dick like a vice, “so fucking tight. God.”

Bucky’s chest swelled up with pride as he notices your fingers digging into his sheets, “no one can fuck you this good.”

The bed squeaks with both of your weight shifting as he reaches around you, his fingers working around your bud. The pressure of his upper body makes you gasp with every thrust of his hips.

He continues to work you—his fingers circling tightly on your throbbing clit, his cock nudging the soft, spongy spot in you. Your toes curl with red heat as your orgasm begins to burn up your legs.

“I’m gonna-- ‘m so close,” your pleas fell on deaf ears as Bucky chases his own high. His balls slapping against your skin, his hips stuttering as his cock pulsates inside your velvet walls.

He curses, grabbing your shoulder and flipping you upside, kneeling before you. His hand pumping his dick continuously as it twitches—the veins even more prominent.

“Open your mouth, I’m gonna cum in it.” Bucky orders and you obey. Your fingers finding their way to your abandoned bundle of nerves—your climax threatening to fade away.

Thick ropes of cum shoot over your mouth, painting your lips and chin white as he misses.

“God, fuck, look at your mess.” Bucky sighs, he’s already tucked back into his boxers and handing you a shirt—presumably to clean yourself up.

“You got your ring? Anything else?” The annoyance in his tone is evident. The clock ticks half past midnight.

You dangle your purse in front of him as a gesture, the wind picks up and your shoes are loose on your feet.

“Alright, well, you could wait for your ride here, I guess.” Bucky dropped the act the moment he got his dick in you.

“Yeah, he’s just around the corner. Thanks for the, uh, ring.”

He hums, looking at his phone. His thumbs dancing over the keyboard, “Try not to bother my friends again when you wanna reach me.”

You weren’t sure if you wanted to laugh or to smack the phone out of his hands, “yeah. Tried calling you but I’m pretty sure you blocked my number.”

A curt laugh echoes out from him, “‘m sorry. Out of habit. You know how it is.”

“Right.” And an awkward beat falls over the both of you.

A black car pulls up by the street and you silently thank the stars. By the time you turn around to at least do the right thing and bid Bucky goodnight, you find yourself facing a closed door.

[southslates]

you are lost without the waiting

for the @grishaversebigbang mini bang 2021!

lovely art was done for this piece by amethyst @amethystmoonart [here!] and door @doorhandle16 [here] ! these two were absolutely amazing to work with <3

Summary:

Inej made a deal with the devil. She had faith in him, for whatever reason. His eyes were black as dirt. They were cold. They were home.

In which Inej is Persephone, Kaz is Hades, and she chooses to stay.

ao3 link!

“Tell me you loved to destroy.

Tell me you need me. Please. You are the bones

of my spine. You are the ground beneath my feet.

You are made of deeper stuff than the earth

can give. Admit it: you are lost without the waiting.

― clementine von radics, letter from hades to persephone

Can you even imagine yourself in paradise?

Even the daughter of gods must know loneliness,

must sometimes want nothing more than to be

trapped in a hell of forevers. Thank me, you queen.

I’ve given you forever.”

/

Inej had been a wind spirit.

Technically, she still was. She didn’t feel like one anymore. She used to dance across rooftops and skies—her parents said she was a  gravity-defier. That there was no place in the world—no land, nor ocean—that could bind her feet—or her—to anything.

They were wrong. She had been taken when flying through the skies, swept away into a deep sleep until she woke up in a bed at the Menagerie. There she met Tante Heleen, purveyor of lost spirits. Heleen had told Inej that she saved the girl from a fiery fate, and that now she owed her an indenture. An indenture Inej paid by tending the lands the goddess reigned over and touching the men who let Heleen carry out her whims.

Inej had been a wind spirit, but she did not think she was one anymore. She could not break free. If she left the grassy fields of Heleen’s island world she would be caught and subjugated to an even darker fate. 

She stayed. She tended to the fields. She danced in front of gods with long teeth. She belonged to the Menagerie, the girls with lost spirits. She distanced the innocent who breezed through the flower fields from the one who balanced on rope. She felt like two people. She wanted to leave but had nowhere to go.

One day, airing out a field of daisies, she stopped. She could see a flash of color between the deathly white blooms, and held her breath as she reached out to thumb bright orange petals. It was a geranium. It had been her mother’s favorite flower.

In a moment of weakness and pain and longing, she reached for the stem and tugged it out of the earth. And then the ground opened, and Inej fell.

/

Inej felt as though she fell for days. She thought she would shatter into a thousand pieces when she finally hit the bottom of this well. She thought she would fall forever.

When she reached the bottom of the hole, it was an ocean. She found herself submerged in water and darkness, and pulled herself up until she felt dry air. The darkness stayed omnipresent. She couldn’t see anything. “Hello?” she called into a void.

For a minute, nothing happened. She could almost believe that she was nonexistent. And then something, a bullet, whizzed past her. She barely dodged it.

A light flicked on, and she saw a man in a bright orange waistcoat holding a . . . small cannon in her direction. She assumed it had dislodged the bullet that had almost torn her immortal life. The light disturbed Inej for a moment, but she found her balance quickly. She anticipated another attack, but the man just frowned in her direction. “Who are you?”

“Where am I?” Inej countered.

The man took in her silk dress and the painted spots on her face, and he seemed to come to his own conclusion. “Not anywhere you should be, goddess. Your kind are not welcome here.”

“Where is here?”

The man sighed. “My name is Jesper,” he said, then gestured to his side. “Welcome to the land of greed. I suppose I’ll have to take you to the boss.”

/

Jesper took Inej to a large black palace in the middle of . . . absolutely nothing. It wasn’t particularly enchanting, unlike the gilded arches of the Menagerie. The building seemed to speak to her, to warn her away from its obsidian glare. She wanted to turn back when Jesper gestured for her to enter, but she had nowhere else to go. Even if she could find her way to the surface, she would land in Hell that was simply more discreet.

And she was certain that she was in Hell. The land of greed, Jesper had said. The land of greed, of rocks and riches and death. What lay under the fanciful pretenses of the land Tante Heleen and men such as Pekka Rollins claimed to rule.

Inej didn’t know who ruled this land, but she was certain she was about to find out. She took one last look around the landscape, blank and dead and black, before stepping into the palace. The stone of the entrance cracked under her feet.

Jesper led her around dilapidated columns and stairs and walls, human architecture, until they reached a large room at the top of the palace. Even up here, Inej was distinctly aware of the stillness of the air. She felt as though a part of her was missing. She felt like a wind spirit again. When she looked down, she could almost see through herself. She required air to stay formed. This place was sucking out her lifeblood, and she could not find it in herself to care.

“Kaz!” he yelled. Inej startled at the sudden noise, but stayed deft on her feet as they approached a tall, lank, pale figure, sitting at a throne that almost seemed like a desk. There was a hat on the man’s head and a cane next to him. Inej frowned at it. She had met many gods and spirits, and none needed aids such as that. “We’ve got a four-hundred-sixty-three.”

The man looked up, and his searing brown eyes met hers. He didn’t break that contact as he stood up from his seat and gripped his cane. “I don’t know what your asinine numbers mean, Jesper. Speak proper. We have a guest.”

Jesper almost blushed at Inej’s side. She found herself entranced by this man she knew nothing about. “She fell from above.”

“Indeed,” Kaz said. He was unnaturally still. “So? Take her back up.”

“No!” Inej shouted. Jesper’s gaze fixed on her too, and he seemed a bit scared.

“No?” Kaz questioned. “Why would a wind spirit not want to go back to the lands above?”

“I’m indentured to Tante Heleen,” she murmured. “Please, I can help you.”

“Can you?” Kaz asked. She couldn’t let her eyes off him, either. His voice was a salty rasp, dead but safe. They stood in that silence for a moment, looking at each other, until Jesper cleared his throat.

“Kaz?”

“Put her in a guest bedroom,” he said easily. “Always fine to piss on darling Heleen.”

/

His name was Kaz Brekker, and he was greed’s guardian. Truly, he was the guardian of Hell, but few called him that. “Death does not bow to me,” he told her at breakfast the next day, a table length apart. He wore leather gloves and kept his cane close to him. It was topped by a crow’s head. Late at night, Inej had heard them flying around the palace. They were the only form of life she’d seen so far, though no wind followed. She was the faintest bit translucent. “Death bows to no man. But greed? It is my servant and my lever.”

Inej was a bit overwhelmed by it all. She was frightened of this new world, one of death and decay. She knew she did not belong. But she knew it was better than what awaited her above.

“How do you intend to help me, Inej Ghafa?”

“How do you know my name?”

“I make it my business to know all things,” Kaz said. “There is unrest in my fields, those of the deceased. You will learn why.”

“Why—”

“Yesterday,” he said, “you came with Jesper, bells on your ankles, bracelets on your wrists. I could hear my enforcer from a mile away, but not you.” He leaned close to her, several bodies apart. “Spy for me, won’t you?”

Inej made a deal with the devil. She had faith in him, for whatever reason. His eyes were black as dirt. They were cold. They were home.

Inej saw Jesper occasionally. He ensured that she had basic necessities, and he toured her around the land of greed. She saw rubies growing on trees, diamonds blooming from the ground. She met shades, those who had died centuries ago and entered the land crying for the saints she knew were above. The more days and weeks she spent here, the more see-through she became. She was almost afraid she would become one of them.

She made herself silent and danced through them. And when she knew what they spoke, she went back to the palace. She went to the river. She went to valleys and canyons, and she learned of the guardian of this Hell. She found peace in the darkness, in the stillness.

Kaz Brekker was a true  demjin, she was told. She was told he started wars himself, when he grew tired. She heard he controlled all the riches and corruptness above her.

She believed it, too. She ate twice a day with him, and then he did whatever demons did as she wandered the terrain of his domain. They spoke only occasionally. He tended to stare into her soul, and those looks always said more than words. Inej was a wraith, a ghost, but Kaz made her feel solid and seen.

One day Kaz Brekker asked her if she would like him to take her to the shadow fold. “You’re curious,” he told her, as though he could see inside her and also right through her. She wondered if he could. “It’s intriguing.”

So they’d gone on a walk through something dark and damp, sapphire-studded weeds carpeting the ground under their feet. The air was moist and still. The fold was somehow darker than the rest of this world, and it frightened Inej. As they stood at its precipice, she grabbed Kaz Brekker’s gloved hand.

She had seen him shy away from Jesper’s touch, seen him stay feet away from her. But when she held his hand that day, he didn’t let go. The next day he was not at breakfast, but there was a bouquet of flowers in front of her, studded with orange opal. Inej had never mentioned to Kaz her favorite flower.

/

The walks became a daily occurrence, and she slowly started to wring fragments of humanity from this immortal. Kaz Brekker enjoyed drinking wine and his work, the guardian of the souls of the worst kind of men. He was sure of himself as a monster. He asked her twice as many questions as she asked him.

If she wrung humanity from a demon, he wrung personality from a shadow. He brought her up into what she once was—until she remembered the wind spirit again. Inej talked of flowers and her friend Nina and how she loved dancing across rooftops. She talked of her parents and her siblings and the freedom of the air. Kaz seemed to drink her in, with his menacing, freeing gaze. He knew her. He saw her.

Once, she asked him why he wore gloves, why he avoided the river at the entrance of his realm, and why he used a cane. He only explained the latter, only said there was strength in being broken.

They didn’t touch. Inej grew used to the feeling of leather around her palm. Kaz seemed aloof, but he grasped her translucent hand through his clothing as though he never wanted to let her go. And yet she never felt stuck, or alone, until—

Until one day she woke up to Jesper forcing her back into her rooms. He seemed frenzied, and Inej went back to bed only to crawl out through her window when she heard loud sounds in Kaz’s throne room. She sat at his window and heard a voice which seared her invisible soul. Pekka Rollins, indeed.

“You must return her. She is indentured—”

“And you would think that something I would consider? I am your safes and vaults personified. It’s meaningless.”

“The girl belongs to—”

“The girl belongs to no one,” Inej heard Kaz hiss. “Go tell your Tante Heleen that Inej Ghafa belongs to nobody.”

Inej slipped a little at that admission, right into Rollins’ eyesight. He looked at her slight, ghost-like body with his eyebrows afloat—as though he’d won something. “Come, little lynx,” he cooed at her. “You don’t have to stay in this land anymore, with this demon.”

“She doesn’t want to come with you,” said Kaz. Rollins laughed.

“Found a new master already, have you?”

“I belong to no one,” Inej repeated what Kaz had said.

“Little girl,” Rollins said. “You would stay here? In a land of no sky, of death and decay and greed? You are a free spirit. Come to the world above.” His eyes traced her figure. “You are nothing here.” 

She knew he was referring to her barely corporeal form. His words still stung deeply.

“I am freer here than I could ever be,” Inej said. And yet she knew the hard skies of Kaz’s world were dulling her sensibilities. She didn’t want to leave; but she would have to soon, if she didn’t want to fade into the fold itself.

Pekka appeared as though he had more to say, but Kaz stood up in protest to his unsaid words, ghosts in the air, leaning on his cane, something truly—truly  demonic in his eyes. “If you do not leave now, Pekka Rollins,” he said, “it is your mortal son who will suffer. Kaelish, isn’t he?”

The man left. His words stayed in the air. Inej was in a nightgown and Kaz was dressed like a monster, but she felt as though she had the power in the room. His gaze did not fall away from her. “He was right,” she said. She was fading. 

“I know,” he said. He stared at her enough to know that she did not have much time left before she became invisible. “You would never be able to pay off your indenture.”

Inej knew this. She knew that he could give her all the riches of his realm, and she would never pay off her indenture. “I have no choice.”

He walked across the room and pressed a gloved hand to her cheek. “Greed is my servant,” he said. “And my lever.”

The walls started shaking, and Inej fell away from Kaz. She could feel leather on her face. 

Then she saw darkness, and nothing more.

/

Inej woke up in a field of flowers. They were jeweled, and they were orange. They smelled like dirt and decay. She wanted to spend the rest of her life in that field. She lifted her hand and saw herself, all of herself.

When she stepped forward, she was back home. She heard the news soon afterward, that the entire Menagerie had fallen into Hell. That the guardian of greed had taken the woman who loved it above. That the girls forced to be animals were free.

Inej was home, and yet she was not home; how did she explain to her people of the air that she yearned for a place with croaking birds, cloaked in darkness? She did not—Kaz Brekker made it his business to know all things. It was six months later that she found a fresh geranium in a field of flowers outside of her cottage.

She fell again. This time she didn’t fall into water, but the open embrace of a demon without armor. She thought she would fall forever. She thought she could find peace.

[cudan2]

One Last Surgery

Spring Break Shadowing Part 5.1

Carlisle Cullen x Reader

Word Count: 2,043

Summary: You finally find out the reason for going to the children’s hospital, but you’re more distracted than usual today and Dr. Cullen can tell. 

A/N: Tell me why part 5 of SBS takes up over half of the whole series? I’ve had this sitting in my drafts for 5 months because I keep adding more to it smh. Now it’s too long so I’ve decided to split it up into 3 parts (in addition to parts 6 and 7). I’m making the final edits the rest of this part now - 5.2 should be posted in like two days.

Anyways, this is technically the beginning of  #1 and #2 on my headcanon list.

Masterlist

XXX

Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital is only across the street from Doctor Cullen’s office, but it seems to take forever to get there. You trail the doctor like a lost puppy through a skyway and a series of corridors before eventually reaching the right building. Different is definitely an understatement.

Gone are the linoleum-tiled floors, the abstract paintings lining the hallways, and the stark white walls. Instead, there are bright colors everywhere you look. Artwork featuring various galaxies and planets scatter throughout the hospital, and giant stars are imprinted along the floors; even the whole atmosphere just feels different.

You don’t get much time to analyze the differences though. Doctor Cullen is wasting no time to reach the destination, and his long legs aren’t making it any easier to keep up.

“Not that I don’t like surprises, but any chance you can tell me what we’re doing in the children’s hospital now?”

“Impatient, are we?” Doctor Cullen chuckles. He stops at an elevator and pushes the up button, only giving into your question once he catches a glimpse of your pout. “Alright, you win. Are you familiar with a cleft palate or cleft lip?”

The elevator dings, the doors sliding open with it. You shake your head no and get on the elevator with him. He presses the button for the floor and then leans against the wall, arms outstretched on the handrail, and gives you an explanation. 

“A cleft is a gap or split occurring in the roof of the mouth, upper lip, or both. It is due to improper joining of the tissue during fetal development. There are no definitive known causes as of right now, but it’s believed that the environment and genetics can play a role.

The hospital has its own craniofacial team, but I was asked to join this particular case given its more complicated nature. Hanna became one of the first patients I treated when I came to Columbia,” Doctor Cullen finishes fondly, a smile gracing his lips.

“What makes this case complicated?” you ask.

“Hanna was born with a bilateral complete cleft lip and palate, meaning her lip cleft is two-sided and continues into her nose. It took quite a few surgeries to repair the lip, but now the next step is to repair the palate.”

The elevator reaches the floor and dings. You follow Doctor Cullen out and continue prodding him with more questions, which he is more than eager to answer. It’s incredible how knowledgeable he is. Granted, it is his job to know these things, but you couldn’t begin to imagine yourself being able to even scratch the surface of these topics, not to mention give a mini lecture on it.

You’re soon standing at the door to a patient room while the doctor asks Hanna’s parents if you can observe. They readily agree, and Doctor Cullen motions for you to come in.

Inside the room, you see an infant that can’t be more than a year old – Hanna.  She’s sitting upright on the bed, leaning against who you assume to be her father. You notice two fading scars going up into her nose above her lip. Her mother is waving a stuffed toy around her, but Hanna’s attention is fixated on the blonde doctor.

“Y/N, allow me to introduce you to Hanna’s parents, Anthony and Linh Pham. And this is Doctor Giselle Adamou, who will be working with me on the surgery,” Doctor Cullen gestures to the older doctor in the room.

“It’s nice to meet you all,” you say politely.

Pre-op goes differently than what you’ve gotten used to observing this week. There is no case presenting given the lack of residents on the case. If anything, this is what you would expect out of a non-teaching hospital.

Doctor Cullen re-explains the procedures to Hanna’s parents, but halfway through, Hanna crawls to the end of the bed where Doctor Cullen is and attempts to stand, arms outstretched as if to say, “Up! Up!” Bewilderment is not a word you would have associated with him, and yet you catch the brief widening of his eyes that betray his usually calm demeanor.

“I think she wants you to hold her,” Linh comments.

“I can see,” Doctor Cullen muses. “Do you mind?”

“She’s all yours.” Linh picks her daughter up from the bed and hands her to the doctor. The sound of Hanna’s elated laughter fills the room, and you can’t stop a small smile from appearing on your own face. A cute baby and a gorgeous doctor? You don’t know who to thank for the sight.

Meanwhile, Hanna starts playing with various pens in Doctor Cullen’s breast pocket while Doctor Adamou continues where her colleague left off. You try to pay attention, you really do. Like Hanna though, your attention lies on someone else, and that someone else happens to be Doctor Cullen.

The more you study him, the more the minute features you never noticed about him before seem to pop out to you. Under the bright fluorescent lighting of the hospital, the dark purple circles under his eyes are more apparent than ever. How ironic for the preacher of health to lack sleep himself. His eyes, which you normally consider to be a vivid golden, are darker than you initially thought them to be. They are liquid pools of dark amber, speckled with dustings of gold and flecks of black. There isn’t a single blemish on his face that you can see either, further confirming your belief that this man is truly the most attractive person you have ever met. Either that or he must have one hell of a skincare routine.

It’s unnerving how young his appearance is. Skincare and diet can only do so much for a person, right? Doctor Cullen has to be at least 35 at the minimum, yet he could easily pass off as someone from your own school.

“Any last minute questions?” you hear Doctor Adamou ask and snap back into reality. By missing nearly everything the older doctor talked about, you already know you’ll be so screwed if and when Doctor Cullen decides to interrogate you on this case.

Neither parent has anything left to say, so Doctor Cullen gives a reluctant Hanna back to her mother. She lets out a cry and his expression softens.

“I know, sweetheart. I’ll miss you too, but I need to get ready for your big surgery, okay? I promise you’ll see me again in a few hours.” His soothing voice does wonders for her. In an instant, Hanna quiets down and her frown is replaced with giggles and smiles again. She waves the two of you off, and you both take your leave with Doctor Adamou trailing behind you. You’re not even halfway out the door yet when Doctor Cullen starts testing your knowledge again.

“Y/N, what procedure will we be doing to repair Hanna’s cleft?” 

You do not have this one in the bag whatsoever. You wrack your brain for information that could help you, but Doctor Adamou interjects before you get a chance to say anything.

“Why does it not surprise me that you’re treating students like interns already, Carlisle?”

“I am merely advancing the education of next generation’s doctors,” he responds.

“Whatever you say,” she laughs. “Don’t scare off Y/N though, or we won’t have any doctors left in the next generation.” She turns to you after picking up files from a nearby counter and says, “You come running to me if he pushes you too hard, alright?”

You grin. “For sure.”

“Good. I look forward to seeing you both in the OR,” she says before heading off.

You like Doctor Adamou. Each surgeon you’ve met here so far has had such different personalities, yet each also has the charisma and confidence to take control of a room and command respect. You, on the other hand, could barely get your own friends to listen to your own words. How are you ever going to get on the level of all the amazing doctors around you?

“She saved you there,” Doctor Cullen comments, leafing through Hanna’s charts as he walks you into an empty elevator to the operating floor. Oops, it’s just your luck that he noticed your lack of attention during the pre-op. “It’s unlike you to be distracted. Penny for your thoughts?”

The elevator doors shut, and he looks up from the chart, his eyes falling onto yours. He has that twinkle in his eyes again – the one that brings warmth to your cheeks and could make anyone weak in their knees. You know it’s silly, but a single look from him could make you spill any of your deepest and darkest secrets, yet a part of you also knows that he would keep it. You’re not naïve – you know it’s dangerous to put so much faith into a man you only met this week – but there’s something about him that told your instincts to trust him from the very beginning.

Call it intuition, or maybe it’s just plain stupidity, but you sure as hell aren’t going to tell him about how you got distracted because of his pretty face.

You hesitate for a moment and let out a sigh. “How do you do it?” He quirks a brow, momentarily perplexed, and you attempt to find the right words. “How do you make all of this look so easy? How do you know what the right thing to say is? Or trust that what you’re doing is even right? How did you know if this was all meant for you? This is really dumb, but it seems like everyone here was born for this job, and then there’s... me.”

There’s a slight sense of dread starting to form in your stomach. You’re unsure if what you asked even made any sort of sense and wonder if you gave too much away. Giving any reason to second guess your abilities is like digging your own grave when it comes to this career. Expressing uncertainty is one of the biggest taboos of the cutthroat world that is pre-med because schools would not accept students that aren’t absolutely, totally, and completely sure about this path.

You’ve wanted this for so long, yet there’s still a part of you that doubts if you would be enough.

Rather than going straight to gowning and scrubbing in for the surgery, Doctor Cullen grabs your hand and leads you down to an abandoned hallway, only letting go once the two of you are hidden in an alcove away from any prying ears or eyes.

“What are you doing? Shouldn’t you be getting ready for surgery?”

“We have a few minutes to spare. Y/N, please know that I understand how you feel,” he says softly. “There was a time when I questioned my own abilities as well… whether my perseverance could overcome adversity. It took quite some time to reach where I am today.  However, without enduring those trials and tribulations, I would not be here. With time comes experience, and it is that experience that allows me to perform my job the best I can.”

His voice reminds you of a gentle breeze, rustling the leaves of a tree on a cool summer night when he continues speaking in hushed tones. It brings a blanket of reassurance, a sense that things would eventually be alright.

“I have said this before, but I see enormous potential in you. You still have a great deal of time to grow and develop your skills. It’s easy to get caught up in comparing yourself with others, especially given today’s societal standards, but I believe you are much more capable than you may think you are. Everyone’s journey is different and yours may not necessarily be as linear as you would prefer. In due time though, I have faith that you will succeed.”

What he says is exactly what you needed to hear.

The swell of tears pricks at your eyes and start blurring your vision, but you blink them away quickly, fighting the urge to wrap your arms around the doctor. 

“Thank you, Doctor Cullen.” Your voice is barely above a whisper.

“You’re very welcome. Now, I believe there’s a little girl waiting on us.” 

XXX

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@jelly-fishy-babie @notahappytree @anxiousgoldengirl

[pinkhairedlily]

Chapter 11 - Student Council President Sakura / Graduation Chapter

SCPS AO3 | PREVIOUS CHAPTER

Youtube playlist for your reading accompaniment

They held a run-through of the graduation ceremony on the last day of class and technically the last day of the trio’s high school life. Unlike their first general assembly, Uchiha Sasuke was to deliver the graduation speech but not without great sulking from Haruno Sakura who landed a close second despite ranking first in their final exams.

And obviously, not without Sasuke trying to give up his speech privileges by campaigning instead for Sakura.

In the end, all three of them were granted speech slots – one for Sasuke as valedictorian, Sakura as student representative, and Naruto as the school’s first national MVP. It was this debacle that led the three of them to brainstorm in an empty AVR after the dry run.

“Done!” Sakura yelled like the diligent student she was. “Let me look at yours!”

Sasuke presented her a blank paper while saying, “It’s all prepared in my head”, and Naruto showed her his baseball doodles.

“Oh God, you’re all so hopeless.”

Then the electricity suddenly got cut off in the AVR. Sakura expected the boys to screech in surprise and cling to each other, but she only heard silence in the dark. She jumped in her seat when the doors opened with a loud bang, a confetti splash, and the lights coming back to life.

Sasuke and Naruto were still in front of her, holding two bouquets of irises and yellow roses. Behind them were the old and new student council members with other students holding a large banner saying Thank you, Student Council President Sakura!

She started to leave her seat to come to them, but they gestured for her to stay on her seat. In front of the room, the large monitor beeped and showed a compilation of videos.

Sukehiro Aoi, an alumni and currently an intern in an animation studio. “Hello, Ms. Pres. You once asked the body to submit a publication material for an event of the student council, and I sent mine through a dummy email with no expectations of winning. I wasn’t comfortable with the public seeing my art. I was afraid of the unsolicited remarks so sending it anonymously gave me some relief. You chose it however, and you knew how big a credit was to an artist. I was really scared when you were able to hunt me down just by my watermark, but my name in the info blast caught the attention of a school board member and referred me to this animation studio. It was the littlest thing, but you handed me my dream.”

Watanabe Kota was a year below them. He has a small frame, round thick glasses, and battled with face acne. “Ms. Pres! People never had much confidence in my physical appearance, so I don’t know what you saw in me when you asked me to take over the school radio. But here we are – we’re airing daily and we even produce documentaries and radio programs. Thank you for seeing what I didn’t.”

Ito Amanaya, a typical jock in the football team, muscular and came across as intimidating, but he had the gentlest cadence. “I was bullied by the same group that bullied your dynamic duo. When you ran them off, you also saved my life. Thank you, Haruno.”

Kimura Shinze, a classmate in third year, beautiful, popular, and the captain of the cheering squad. “Hope you’re having a great day, Ms. Pres. Remember that time when the class was guessing who were our crushes and I blurted out that it was a girl, you told me thank you for telling us. That was…a big deal to me. Thank you for that gesture.”

Himurata Aoi, president of the koto club. “Sakura, I know you had many people come up and confessed to you so when I did try, I was glad that you didn’t give me a bullshit reason like you’re not into girls. You turned me down because you have someone you already love. I am thankful for your honesty.”

The biology teacher, Takahashi Kande. “Student council, thank you for your mental health program. As a single father to twins, I don’t have the luxury of time to sit in a couch and sort out my issues. To be able to do that in my workplace during breaks is a heaven-sent gift. You saved me and my family. Thank you.”

Many more messages came on, from a classmate she lent spare change to, from a staff she helped clean, from countless students who she wasn’t aware she gave kindness to.

“Why….” She asked breathlessly.

“You’ve been beating yourself lately. We thought you needed some reminding,” Sasuke muttered, under his breath, the bouquet still in his hands. “You left some pretty big footprints, Ms. Pres.

“You might not have noticed,” Naruto jested. “But this is always innate and natural to you, isn’t it?”

“Why did you bother so much?” She was reduced to tears.

“It was Naruto’s idea.”

“Huh? You did all the compiling though!”

“Shut up, it was me,” yelled the current president.

“Thank you, everyone.”

--------------------------------

It was a weekend, but Sasuke requested Sakura and Naruto to meet him at the school gates. He only gave the time and place, and he knew well enough that they would be there – no questions asked.

They stood there, minutes earlier than planned, a first but nothing more unusual than homebody Sasuke asking them to go out on a weekend. Sakura wore an oversized rust shirt over a pair of muted cotton blue trousers tied with a brown leather belt and tan fisherman sandals, her long hair kept in one single braid at the back. Naruto probably expected a fancy lunch with his outfit – black silky long sleeves over gray pants and black loafers.

Sasuke, high on impulsive decisions, wore bright colors, a complete departure from his usual neutrals; mustard vest over a deep violet polo, baggy pants, off white converse, and a white fanny pack. “Well, we’re mostly dressed for comfort, except for that idiot beside you.”

“What do you mean dressed for comfort? I borrowed these loafers from my vice-captain and my feet aren’t used to them,” Naruto whined. “Besides, aren’t you taking us out to a five-star meal, Mr. Valedictorian?”

“Wow, what a way to show off.” Sakura pursed her lips in annoyance. “Don’t worry Naruto, I got your next café order.”

“Ah no. It was just something we heard from the grape vine.” Naruto scratched his head and carefully glanced at Sasuke. “Grumpy got his trust fund today.”

In bated breaths, they waited for him to respond with a scowl or a retort, but he just nodded. “Come on, we’ll miss the train.”

They traveled for three stations and disembarked on the fourth, Sasuke sandwiched in between the two, his shoulders pillows again to their heads and yet such burdens were light as cotton. The surfacing emotions since last week were taking hold of him, but he needed to pull through somehow because breaking down while commuting was one thing he did not really see doing.

“Word just got in. The house was turned over this morning,” Itachi told him over the phone.

“Impeccable timing when I’m also moving abroad next week.” Sasuke pulled out his Bleachers vinyl and anticipated another lonesome lull for the night.

“Do you miss the cream puffs?”

“Nothing comes close.”

“Hmm. I’ll pay for the rental fee of your car.”

In Itachi’s defense, while he was an afficionado of escapism, he also knew how to read between the lines. “Watch me get a Mercedes-Benz.”

“I have a good driving playlist.” This only meant math rock, and Sasuke wanted something to scream his lungs too.

“Don’t need one.”

“Treat your friends to dinner, okay? Gotta go.”

“We’re walking?!” Naruto almost limped out of the train. Sasuke took one look at his heels and saw that they were bruised red. He took off his converse and socks and gave them to him.

Sakura whipped out a small first-aid kit and covered the rash on Naruto’s heels. “Hey don’t look at me like that. Brought it just in case we’re going on a day survival tour. A camping would be nice too.”

“Did you scrub your feet, idiot?”

“You think so low of me grumpy. Of course – last week!”

With Naruto now comfortable, the three resumed walking on the unfamiliar residential area. Sasuke gestured for them to enter a bamboo forest on the far side of the main road. Hidden in the shadows of the clumped stalks were a small opening, the growth hampered and ground rid of grasses and weeds; many people have also chosen this shortcut, walked through the forest, did a little nature bathing, and emerged behind the bakery, still there, still standing, still operating.

Sasuke tapped on the large glass window cum counter on the front and bought three sets of cream puffs.

“Oh, it’s you,” the old baker greeted. “You brought your friends over? You always buy one set.”

Sasuke offered her a smile, briefly glancing to his periphery where Sakura was fussing with Naruto’s feet, and nodded as he accepted the paper bag. “It’s on the house, kid.”

“You brought us to stalk someone’s house?” Sakura dug in one paper bag, bit the puff in one bite, and with full mouth, she sighed. “This is heaven.”

“It’s our old family house, before the accident that is.” Sasuke also took out one puff and munched on it, ruminating on the sight before him, a two-story house with an imposing façade, his mom’s climbing hydrangea gone and cut by the new owners, beds of roses and daisies already withered, but the wisteria tree on the vacant lot beside continued to grow and shade what he supposed were the children’s rooms. It was in his third bite that he saw the tomato fruits he planted, alive and full with harvest. “Do you think my parents know?”

Naruto slid an arm across his shoulder and grinned sheepishly. “Then they would be happy ghosts or maybe they would voluntarily move away to give the new owners the opportunity to make it a happy a home like yours.

“What part are you gonna miss?” Sakura asked, halfway through her set of puffs.

“The sight of the wisteria before I sleep and after I wake up, and the sunlight in my parents’ room. My dad liked to make these suncatchers for my mom. The play of light was a good morning greeting, she said.”

“What’s your funniest memory?” Naruto sat on the grass, uncaring for the stains that would taint his good pair of pants.

“It was probably Christmas when I was seven, and Itachi had this big idea to bake a cake, but he swapped the sugar for the salt and we were wondering why it wouldn’t make a custard. Our parents still ate it, saying it was a very salty version of dark chocolate cake.”

“It was a good home,” Sakura patted the space between her and Naruto and Sasuke sat down cross-legged too, dipping his hand on the paper bag with the last cream puff.

“It was a good home,” Sasuke agreed as he bit into the last vestige of his family memory. He was suckling the powdered sugar off his fingers when he realized he was already crying, and the two were downright sobbing on his either side.

Such an embarrassing sight to see; he wondered what would the new owners feel if they looked out their windows this instant and saw three teenagers breaking down on the road across. It was honestly stupid and laughable to a point, considering how funny it was for grief to become lighter when someone else cried with him.

Naruto was sniffling so much that he had to offer his handkerchief to him. “I forgot to tell you guys. Hinata confessed to me during the cultural festival.”

“Oh my god. What did you say?” Sakura took a tissue out of her bag and dabbed her eyes. She flashed an apologetic look to Sasuke who already offered his hanky to Naruto’s fluids.

“Ah, what else? I had to reject her.” Naruto sneezed on Sasuke’s handkerchief again. “I told her I was in love with someone else.” He slyly glanced at his raven-haired friend and pursed his lips which Sakura quickly caught.

“Who is it?”

“Sasuke also likes someone.”

“Shut your mouth, blondie. Point is already moot. Besides, we’ve already been rejected.”

“Who are these people and why don’t I know them?” Sakura genuinely looked offended. “I could have vetted them!”

“Exactly why it was fortunate you didn’t meet them,” Sasuke said as an excuse though he pegged Sakura for not being that naïve. She, thankfully, let it go and gathered their trash. She dropped the bomb as she was brushing the grass blades from her trousers. “My parents are divorcing. Such a travesty not to have them show up on graduation day, and I thought I did a great job.”

The two, ever so sure, held onto her hands in case she was trembling again.

“Let’s get that five-star dinner,” Sasuke suggested, “and we need to rent a Mercedes-Benz.”

--------------------------------

Graduation Day

“Let’s welcome to the stage, class valedictorian, Uchiha Sasuke.” Kakashi was the officiating faculty today so she expected difficulty going through the event, but for some reason, he slipped into her mental back burner, no longer taking up room in her active consciousness. That was a good step, she smiled to herself. Her smile became wider as Sasuke got up the stage.

His fans club’s cheers were heard outside the auditorium, and the graduating class chuckled at the quick interruption. He cleared his throat and started his piece.

“Please get it on record that I was coerced to do this speech. Then again, I also had a hand on the turn of events that led me here today, in front of you. And it’s a little too on the nose, but I came to high school with a clear set of goals – have high grades and lead an uninteresting life. I accomplished the first one rather easily, and it’s a good metric for the future that’s upon us right now. Good grades land us good colleges. Good colleges land us good jobs. Good jobs land us good life.

But it’s not the sole benchmark as I have learned lately. You see, my second goal really missed the mark. Good life can also mean good friends, fun experiences, a caring environment, a complete family. If you ticked off each one, then that’s very notable. You have the four-leaf clover, and it’s a rare blessing. I only ticked off three, but that goes without any regret. If you only have one silver lining in your high school memory, then that makes us all the more human. And if there’s none, there is still is still a whole stretch of possibilities we can discover to find one. Thank you for your kind attention.”

Sakura was pretty sure she heard several sniffles across the student body. “The bastard delivered a good speech,” she muttered to herself.

“We would like to welcome our first national MVP, Uzumaki Naruto.”

Outside, the school band played the cheering anthem for his last national games. The cheerleaders also did a routine in tribute to him. That made him well up when he got to the podium.

“Wait oh my god, I’m tearing up so much.”

Sasuke grunted loudly and went back the stage to hand him a handkerchief which Naruto quickly used to wipe his snot.

“Thanks Sasuke. How can Kakashi-sensei let me follow after that rousing speech, and before Sakura too. It’s kinda evil.”

Laughter broke out.

“Well, this one’s a bare minimum. I didn’t have any goals or expectations, unlike genius grumpy over there. I just wanted to live my life like an ordinary boy. Someone said that how you spend your day is how you live your life so I did just that – ate ramen, slept in class because I am a growing kid, and played each arcade game until I won them. I also believe in serendipitous – thanks Sakura for this word, for the spelling and meaning – serendipitous coincidences. I just pitched and batted for former captain Haru one afternoon and now we landed in the national finals. I had loneliness for a friend, but now I’ve got all of you. And you know what else, the magic of working together. We wouldn’t have stepped foot in the nationals if it weren’t for your collective help. When we work towards a common goal, that also gives us common happiness, right? It’s infectious, a bouncing energy that gets thrown around and still makes it one piece. So wherever you will be after this, believe it!”

When Kakashi called her name next, she thought she was deaf, the noise around her collapsed in muted decibels. It took a minute before her fellow classmates shook her and motioned for her to quickly come up the stairs. Her silver-haired teacher looked so concerned in the shadows, but for what it was worth, she was civil and calm enough (at least in the matters concerning him) to nod at him in quiet exchange of assurance.

It was because she saw both of her parents at the side with a bouquet of roses. She struggled with the paper she brought with her although she had it memorized in her head; she even went through it flawlessly for three times last night. Tears blurred the words and the mere shock of the sight of their togetherness disabled her mental function to string coherent thoughts. She also started hyperventilating, her breaths coming faster than what her lungs could pump.

Then she felt Kakashi’s hand on her shoulder, a steady presence, and it reeled her back to reality. He tapped the mic and the feedback echoed. “Ah, Ms. Haruno had some technical issues. Again, let’s welcome former student council president, Sakura.”

Sasuke and Naruto in the front were almost standing, but she flashed them a smile as if to say she was okay now. “Hello, good day to our honorable guests and graduates. I think it’s safe to say that Sasuke and Naruto provided really good words of advice. So I have nothing more to offer, but to share my gratitude. Everyone was saying the student council did a good job in its programs, but it was actually the lot of you who made this possible – from your activity suggestions to participation and feedback. After all, you were the makers of your memories.

Earlier last week, my councilmates and friends reminded me how small actions go a long way – a smile, a wave across the hallway, a short exchange of good morning and see you soon, and I thought, aren’t we all just an accumulation of these small, little things? As such, it was what you think your insignificant moments were that pushed us to deliver you the best. It was the passing comment, the top-of-your-head tips, the interlude stories we hear during lunch breaks that allowed us to give you grand gestures and memories we hoped were worth keeping. And if we could start to use that perspective as well in our lives then maybe the uncertainties of a future wouldn’t be so heavy on us. We will face tomorrow with a lightness in being.

In behalf of the student council, thank you for allowing us to serve you.”

She bowed at a level where her torso was almost aligned at her hips, and she was confused with the lack of reaction. Sakura sighed, mulling over the deficiencies in her speech, but she straightened her back to a sight of a standing ovation and a thundering applause.

Then, she let her tears fall.

--------------------------------

“Why would you let Kakashi-sensei take the pic?” Sakura hissed at them.

“Just this one time, Sakura!” Naruto grinned.

“Sakura, you’re out of the frame,” Kakashi remarked. “Okay good. Say cheese.”

In spite of her recent heartbreak with him, she permitted herself to bask in fleeting cordiality. “Cheese.”

“Grumpyyyyyy.”

“Idiot blondie.”

Kakashi took three more shots and handed the camera to the trio. He almost turned away when Sakura caught his sleeve.

“Just one more,” she said. “With you.”

Sakura shifted to the front, almost kneeling with the camera angled for a selfie, her two friends beside her looking equally annoyed as the other, and Kakashi behind them, his hands on either head, smiling with his deceptively charming beauty mark.

It was the last picture of their high school life.

--------------------------------

The three were rushing through the airport crowd fifteen minutes before the immigration closes gates.

“Here!” Sakura slid a folder on the large pocket on Sasuke’s bag. “It includes your passport, your flight details, your valid IDs, your itinerary, and letters from us! Don’t forget our Friday video calls!”

“I can’t see. These tears are bullies,” Naruto said through tears. He was continuously wiping his eyes with his sleeve.

“And If I don’t get on my flight because you made us eat ramen for one last time and the orders took too long, I’m gonna have you cursed by a witch and a shaman!” Sasuke growled. The guards were starting to close the gates when a sobbing Naruto sprinted and basically tackled the guards on the floor.

“Sasuke come on, hurry up!”

“Drink your vitamins! And if you miss cream puffs, I’ll teach you how to make them.” Sakura was trying hard to keep pace with Sasuke’s brisk walking, but she ended up breathless anyway.

The three of them finally reached the immigration entrance, and Naruto was profusely apologizing to the guards for the interruption. Sasuke showed his documents, wheezing as they looked at it. They gave him a thumbs up and opened the gates.

The two were already slumped at the floor, waving without words, and exhausted from the clock race. Sasuke was almost through when he remembered something he forgot. He muttered a quick sorry, ran through the opening, and hugged his two friends.

“I’ll miss you.”

[starr-fall-knight-rise]

Humans are Weird, “Chain Song.”

This one might be a bit cheesy, but I was feeling something feel good this morning. I hope you guys like it. 

The Commander  said it was the furthest human colony away from earth, and in fact, it was the furthest colony away from any sort of civilized society as far as anyone knew. The people who lived here had volunteered for the job and had been sent by the UN to pay of debts, prison sentences, or simply as a way to avoid homelessness. And now their job was to mine the asteroid fields for precious metals , usually by hand as spare equipment was hard to find and was rarely sent this far out in the system.

Commander Vir explained that their colony was technically outside the reach of GA control and was actually positioned in unclaimed airspace as far as anyone knew.

IN essence, these people were alone in the universe as far away from anything as anyone might be, and only receiving supplies once or twice a year.

The planet on which they lived wasn’t really a planet at all, but an exoplanet about the size of pluto, which they were steadily mining for it’s precious metals to be sent back to earth.

At that moment the Harbinger cargo bay held all the equipment these people would need to make the components to complicated mechanical devices including computers implanted electronics and projection screens for military installations.

They took a wide turn through the asteroid field, where, they could already, occasionally see small mining cycles with one or two riders floating on the back, one working to mine the metal and another working to make sure they did not float away from their post. Their ship was barely noticed as they passed by, except for when they got close enough for their shadow to fall over  the working figures.

They crested over another large asteroid, in a surprisingly tight belt and came across the small exoplanet around which much of the debris circled.  It was nothing special at first, smaller than the moon would have been back on earth, but a closer look at its rocky, dust-covered surface showed evidence of sustained human life: metal towers, footprints, vehicle tracks, and more branching outward across the entirety of the minuscule exoplanet.

On the bridge most of the crew was thinking the same thing. As the docking bay of the little planet came into view-- welded together by way of thousands of scraps of metal into an amalgamated monstrosity of a construction-- all of them shivered at the thought of living in such a desolate place. Commander Vir, while thinking the build was cool and well worthy of best-selling science fiction novel or action movie, found the place more than a little depressing to look at, as there were no stars nearby to light the dark little planet.

There was simply the space around and the human made lights which lit the docking bay surface.

Dr. krill was under the impression that the entire thing needed to be scraped and burned, so they could start over. He could not imagine how many deaths and injuries had been sustained creating this place.

Sunny had no real opinion, though her brother Cannon couldn’t help but find a strange and melancholy beauty about the place, as it was, somehow a statement of survival, and a symbol of hope to him rather than a demonstration of sadness.

The commander pulled up to gently maneuver their ship into place in the docking bay, which had slowly opened for them. Even the door to the docking bay looked as if it had been patched together like the most patchwork of quilts. On the outside of the docking bay figures in antiquated space suits: bulky and difficult to maneuver waved at them from the platform.

The door behind them closed, the sharp metal silent in space until the exact moment where the interior was pressurized. Commander Vir unbuckled his seat and ordered a small team to follow him as the dock workers secured their ship into place.

Stepping out into the musty air was a strange experience.

The docking bay echoed with voices and metal clanged constantly against itself.

The floor below them, the ceiling above them, and all around the ground and walls were made out of a patchwork of material. Rusted street signs, and caution signs were pinned up against the walls as in decoration.

Graffiti stained the metal with bright colors in pinks and faded yellow.

Small lights whirled overhead, dim and fading towards their last breath.

He was just beginning to think of how depressing it must be to live in a place like this when a figure approached them from the back their arms wide. They all blinked in surprise as the smiling figure burst into peals of delighted laughter and enfolded the commander in a full contact bear hug.

The man was at least two inches taller than the commander and had muscled arms that were about as big as the other man’s head. His teeth shone white against his dark skin and his wide, honest eyes. His dark hair was braided back into long plates that hung down to his lower back.

He pulled out of the hug and then kissed the commander on either cheek leaving him standing stunned and confused as he moved onto the rest of the party. He did the same for everyone alien or otherwise despite having no idea who he was.

Then he stepped back to stand before them.

The commander frowned in confusion, looking the other man over.

His garb was…. Rather unexpected for a place like this. His shirt was sleeveless, but the shirt he wore had been dyed a bright yellow and was drawn about with patterns and stained with dust. His pants were a bright green and tied with ribbons made in red from the top of the leg down to the lower knee. And then there was the metal, Just like the walls and floors it looked like it had been welded together using scrap pieces for parts, and he wore it like armor on his chest, and on his exposed arms like some sort of armor, though it looked more decorative than anything else.

He raised his hands out wide to either side, “I am station master Jicari and welcome, to the Paxicar mining colony.” His voice was deep and melodious resonating with a kind of accent that none of the could quite place. The smile never left the man’s face, “we are pleased to see outsiders, we don’t get many visitors.”

Looking around the room, they could see other figures going about their work. These figures too were brightly colored, and decorated in scrapped metal.

They waved enthusiastically at the newcomers.

Commander Vir scratched his head in surprise.

“Please, we will unload your cargo, and I will show you to our lovely home.”

The group glanced between each other not entirely sure if lovely was the right word for it. Krill was definitely thinking tetanus, but the captain shrugged. He liked this man already and his strange clothing.

He waved them forward with a smile that never faltered, and together they clopped over the metal flooring and up a set of stairs  where neon signs hung on the wall flickering slightly with disrepair.

They passed more men and women in the hallway all of them still dress in bright colors and decorated in metal. One woman wore a headdress that encased her ponytails in rings of metal all the way down her back. Another man wore a helmet that had delicate patterns of silver crawling down his cheek and around one eye.

And everywhere they went the people smiled at them.

Happy laughter echoed from the tunnels to their right and left.

At one point a group of children raced past the down the tunnel giggling and laughing bright rainbow colors flapping behind them in the darkness of the tunnel.

The spaces were not so cramped as they thought it might be and none of them felt claustrophobic walking down the hallway despite its low ceiling, exposed wires, and piping.

A dim blue glow emanated from the distant end of the hallway giving the metal interior a sort of atmospheric haze. 

Commander Vir thought he could hear the sound of rushing water.

“I…. Forgive me for sounding ignorant Mr. Jicari.”

“Just jicari will do.”

“Very well…. Then , lie I said, I don’t mean to sound insulting or anything but…. Your people they seem so…. Happy, and colorful. I haven't seen anything like it, not on earth, or Mars or anywhere else in the galaxy, and…. Well.”

His booming laugh echoed down the hall, “And you are wondering how a group of metal miners taken from prisons, and off the streets could find more happiness than those who still live on earth?”

He frowned a bit, “I was going to be more delicate about it, but yes.”

He continued to smile, “Because we have nothing.”

Commander vir frowned, “I’m confused.”

The man patted him on the back, “Of course you are.” The man patted him on the back, “You must understand, Adam that when we came here we had nothing, we had the clothes on our backs and the strength of our hands. Back on earth you can go and you can get rich and you can buy things. But the secret about things is that they do not make you happy. You think that getting a new car can make you happy, that going on exotic vacations can make you happy, well that is not the case because after a while you get used to that new car and soon enough exotic locations are commonplace. You will never be happy unless you find that happiness inside. Happiness is a decision we here have chosen.”

He glanced back at the small group that trailed behind him and smiled, “We are happy because we have nothing, and nothing forced us to look inwards at ourselves. The people who are not happy are not forced into it. They may do what they wish, but it is much better to be happy than it is to wallow in misery for our circumstances.”

The Commander nodded. He wasn’t entirely sure it was that simple, but he was willing to listen.

“And because we did not dwell on how miserable we could be, we made something beautiful, we tried to create with our hands, brighten our days with colors, and smiles, and laughter and stories. We created a culture of happiness.”

They continued to glance at each other, but as they were passed by in the hallways more hands waved at them and more smile were exchanged.

Jicari paused turning to look at them with his deep black eyes lined in wrinkles, “You are about to see the gem of the asteroid belt, something no outsider has ever seen before because they don’t bother to visit our “sad little mining colony.”

He stepped forward motioning them to follow.

And.they did as told stopping in their tracks eyes wide at the massive cavern that stood before them. What rose up before them was a beautiful city, not conventionally beautiful like it was made from white marble, but beautiful and strange in its construction. Gravity mats had been placed about the curvature of the inside of the exo planet allowing the city to climb the walls in a slow parabola upward. The buildings themselves were multi-leveled rising up into the darkness and lit from inside with a thousand little lights. Open cables and wires spilled down from the top of the buildings hanging downwards towards the streets.

The street itself was a walkway on two sides with a canal going down the middle. And the water there was crystal clear and lined with a strange green moss. Neon light lit the cavern with a hazy blue and pink lighting the people and their colorful garments from all sides.

The water sparkled with the pink and blue light as if it had been sprinkled with fairy dust.

Machinery melded with metal and was occasionally covered in delicate green climbing moss.

The people were not idle. Sparks flew from their hands as they worked to repair the buildings, some on the bottom floor and others high in the air. The sound of mallets and chisels rattled through the cavern.

A few people stood on metal rafts that slowly drifted down the length of the river.

And as always that purple blue haze backed everything lit form inside with that light pink, yellow and blue light.

They were walked through the city listening to the rhythmic clatter of tools, and the soft murmur of voices. The city had looked very small from the outside, but perhaps that was just their perception of how small the exo planet was. In reality the interior was quite large though it was not one hundredth of the interior.

Reaching the edge of the city, they could look upwards and see thousands of feet of open rock face being chiseled away by hand using pick axes and drills. Many of these people were held in place on wires or stood precariously on the edge of ledges without anything to hold the in place.

The group of them craned their necks back staring up at the massive walls of stone and a thousand lights that crawled across it reaching up into the darkness finally to be obscured by the blue haze.

“Its…. beautiful.” The commander was surprised at himself for saying it, but it really was true..

Jicari smiled, “it is beautiful, yes.”

He motioned them to follow, and they continued to do so winding up a few short switchbacks towards the base of the wall. Moss grew on either side of them adding a greeness to a place that shouldn’t have been green 

They were close to the wall of stone now able to see the workers and hear the clattering of their pick axes as they continually worked the stone . Sometimes they worked alone, and at other times they worked in teams of two, one person holding a chisel while the other used a mallet to beat herder into cracks within the stone.

Jicari turned to look at them and put a finger over his lips.

The group tilted their heads in surprise.

Then Jicari began to whistle.

The tune that he began had an immediate rhythm sharp and piercing enough to carry itself on echoes upwards to many of the workers at once. Krill grew woozy and had to steady himself against Cannon’s open arm as it began.

As soon as the whistling began there was a sudden dynamic change in the sound and movement of the workers. A short pause and then a clatter as all the pick axes and mallets hit at once following the beat set out by Jicari’s whistling. What had once been a clattering amalgamation of noise now turned itself into a steady pounding rhythm.

They listened in awe as the beat spread upwards as all the waiting humans latched on to the beat allowing their work to be the base for the music.

Jicari’s whistling continued, and voices followed soon after humming along with him at a steady pace to match the rhythm of their song. 

Krill was having a tough time staying awake 

The Drev and humans were having a tough time not humming along.

“Join us.” Jicari said, “Understand why we are happy here.” he motioned them forward, and the commander was the first to follow, interested.

And like humans do they began to match the song of the other humans humming along with the rhythm as Jicari lead them over to the wall.

They were met by a group of other miners who smiled openly and handed over pick axes to the newcomers still humming as they did.

“For some reason, I get the feeling you are getting free labor off us.” The commander teased quietly.”

Jicari just grinned, “Perhaps, but you might find you get something out of it too.”

The commander took the pick axe resting it against his leg as he pulled of his jacket and then his shirt. The marines followed his lead, and even the Drev were invited to join.

Krill floated next to Jicari half in and half out of consciousness. Jicar gently set him on the ground before walking over to join the newcomers.

The group of humans and Drev waited with their tools in hand for Jicari’s lead.

He lifted the pick axe and brought it down on one of the down beats, and then he began to sing. The beat was slow and steady carried by the thunder of axes against stone and the shedding of sparks. The rhythm had spread itself all the way up the wall until the entire cavern was echoing with the beat.

Each beat allowed for the worker to swing back and build up enough momentum for the next hit.

Slowly the new humans followed the example of the others, until, just like that they were following the same beat pattern. Their bodies swaying back and forth almost as if they were dancing. It took the Drev a bit longer, but soon enough they were one with the wall of humans.

Jicari’s voice was deep and powerful reverberating up the stone and down the line to the next human who took up the song with him. Her voice rung like a clear bell locking the beat into place as, one by one, other voices joined the song.

At first, it was a melancholy song about the stone and the axes, and the people who carried them, but as more voices joined in the sadness was replaced as hope took over weaving itself in through the music as an entire human population worked as one.  They sung about their home, about their families returning to a chorus of stone and hope  that didn't mind death so much, or the blackness, or the void separated from them by walls of stone.

It wasn’t long before the new humans understood the chorus and began to sing along with the workers sweat slicking their backs though they never dropped beat for a moment. Even the Drev continued to hum along, their powerful base voices lending a power behind Jicari’s words as they all continued to sing.

From where he sat half conscious Krill could see the humans as they swayed back and forth swinging the pick axes in slow under hand arches to gain the momentum they would need. And then came the powerful overhand throw that tighten the muscles of the back and sent rivulets of sweat dripping down onto stone. Muscles flexed fighting against the stone returning the force.

He couldn’t say how long they kept that up, thought it seemed longer than it should have been a somehow the song lent energy to arms that should have failed, Still when the songs finally died away some time later, they backed away from the wall panting their shoulders heaving as sweat dropped down their faces.

Commander Vir leaned against the axe wiping sweat from his hairline.

Jicari shouldered his axe, “Did you know that when humans sing their heart beats synchronize?”

“Really? I didn’t know that?”

Jicari smiled, “yes, and that is why we are so happy commander. This chain song helps us keep time while we work. It goes back to the traditions of many who came before us, laborers who worked on the trains, and slaves who worked in the fields, and builders who came before them, singing to keep in time for work but also to build hope.” 

He believed him, it was easy to see why, and that is why they stayed on the colony for a few days working alongside the people. The commander wanted them to feel what they had felt on that first day wanted to figure out how to bring it aboard the ship.

Cannon was the first to figure it out, secretly secluding himself where he could listen slowly writing with inspiration from the music.

When they were getting ready to leave he handed his work to the commander, who seemed surprised but pleased and sent the image of his work on with a message.

Jicari stood next to the commander and slide waving as the other humans slowly drifted on to the ship for departure.

Cannon began to hum.

Jicari turned in surprise, and it was the Commander’s turn to whistle, the clear tones ringing through the docking bay and into the cargo hanger. He was the first to pick up the tune followed by Ramirez and some of the other marines.

Jicari beamed wide and hummed along with them as this new song filled his docking bay, one about flying into the unknown, surrounded by dangers, into the blackest void, but being happy about it because they were those whose hearts couldn’t stay in one place too long.

As they stepped onto the ship, He could hear the echo of voices rising up, as it slowly spread through the hallways, up onto the bridge, and down into engineering, until the entire ship was connected by a chain of voices, somehow all together  despite being so far apart.

Jicari waved them off doing his best to remember the lyrics to the Harbinger’s song, so he could sing it to his people later.

And hat was how cannon became the first known Drev to compose a song. A song that took its roots from the chain songs of exhausted human laborers thousands of ears in the future, looking for hope, but secretly made with the idea of Drev training combat in mind.

The song would be used on the harbinger for both, to bolster productivity, moral, and for the Drev to keep time during training fights.

All a lesson learned from Paxicar, the happiest place in the universe. 

[bnha-butterfly]

Synopsis: Sakusa could never have imagined he would die like this, and he definitely didn’t know he would love like this either

Warnings: this story includes graphic depictions of drowning, major character death (technically but not really)

W.C: 1.9k+ words

A/N: based off of this post that I made a while back and the fact that I really want to play dungeons and dragons. Also I really wanted to write that drowning scene and I spent three days on it.

This was beta read by @ramelanin Who is easily one of my favorite writers on this platform. Ramen I love you. Mwah <3

Sakusa struggles as he is pulled from the berth of the ship for the first time in weeks. The air is so salty he can taste it. It’s smell is strong, it's almost nauseating but he’d prefer the salty smell and taste of ocean air then the stagnant air of the sleeping quarters he’s been kept in since he’s been forced on the ship. His hands are bound tightly in heavy metal cuffs and the skin around them is an angry red color. Rubbed raw from how long they’ve been on him.

It happens quickly. Almost so quick that he doesn't realize what’s happening until he is falling several feet from the deck of the ship to the churning waves of the ocean below. His skin is bathed in warmth as he plummets. His screams muffled by the tape placed over his mouth, and for a second he wonders if this is what Icurus felt like when he fell. The warmth of the sun was soon replaced with the icy cold feeling of the waves encompassing his body. He tries to stay calm. Knows that if he panics he will drown that much quicker. So he tries to hold his breath. Kicks his legs in some futile attempt to swim or at least break the surface of the water.

His mass of curls float upwards as he continues to sink. The sea water stings his eyes but there is a dull pain in his chest that is so much worse. 

Don't panic. Don’t Panic.

 He repeats the words like a mantra in his head. But how can he not panic when he knows this is how he will die. His chest burns a searing white as he tries to focus on anything else. He lists off anything he can think of in an attempt to avoid the way his chest feels. It’s just so hard to do that with the way his lungs cry out for oxygen. Aching for something he cannot have. 

Don’t panic. Don’t Panic.

 The sun's rays twinkle down at him, tinted blue from the water and filtered through the floating strands of his hair.

 Don’t Panic. Don’t Panic.

 At this point his body is holding his breath on autopilot. The flame in his chest grows hotter and hotter the longer he lasts and he just wishes he could pass out from the pain. His body gives up. The need for air is so fierce that his body just relaxes. His shoulders drop, there is no more flailing or kicking or anything. 

Don’t Panic. Don't Panic. Don’t pani-

 Panic.

Panic because there is  salty ocean water that he can feel fill the back of his throat. This is how he will die. He tries to sputter out whatever is there but it is no use. Not with the tape over his mouth. His vision warps, and the edges of it turn dark. So with his face turned up to the sky, sunlight twinkling through the water down past strands of his hair to him in a taunt, casting shadows over his face his vision goes black. 

Sakusa wonders if he is dead. He attempts to open his eyes but he can’t even tell if he  succeeds. His surroundings are dark and wet and cold.  His body still encompassed in water. He must be dead, and for a second he lets his mind wonder if his body will ever be recovered, or if he’ll just decompose slowly amongst the fish and crustaceans. His mind does not linger on those thoughts long as he feels a hand caress his cheek. It is warm and comforting and he cannot help but lean in to the touch. 

“It is such a shame to see such precious cargo tossed overboard.”

A voice chimes. He can't quite pinpoint what direction the voice is coming from and to his surprise it is not muffled or gargled by the water. Water. He is still surrounded by water….isn’t he? He must be, right? He can fee-. He can't feel anything. Not the cool water or his fingers flexing as he attempts to move them. All he can feel is the hand on his face. Don’t Panic, he finds him telling himself once again. 

The hand on his face retreats and he cannot help the way he instinctually moves his face to chase after the touch. Eliciting a chuckle from whoever or whatever it is that is talking to him. He can’t remember the last time he had felt a touch as soft and warm as that one. 

“Wouldn’t you like to get even with the people who did this to you?”

“Get even? You mean revenge?” Sakusa says and realizes that the tape is no longer over his mouth. He hears his own voice and just like the voice of whomever it is speaking he doesn't sound muffled or gargled by the water.

“Yes revenge. I mean…could you really be satisfied dying here?” 

Sakusa takes a second to think, and in that second he is reminded of the burning in his chest. The way his vision warped and dimmed. In that second he feels just how scared he was. The way realizing he was going to die made him feel helpless. He hated feeling helpless.

“I don’t want to die here” Is the only answer he can muster up, voice shaky. 

“Then open your eyes and take my hand”

Sakusa opens his eyes and is surprised when they are not met with an assault of salty ocean water. Instead standing in front of him eye to eye is the most ethereal person he has ever laid eyes on. Illuminated by what little sunlight reaches them.  Their hand stretched outwards between the two of them. He takes in his surroundings. Pitch black. It is almost like the two of them are standing within the void. The only light is the one that shines above them. He tilts his head up and the sun stares down at him, filtered through water. Twinkling down at him the same way that it did when he was drowning. He flexes his fingers and his toes. Stiff, but at least he can feel them again. 

He returns his attention to the person in front of him. Although, he isn’t sure if he can really call them a person. They are beautiful, yes. But, the sides of their face is speckled in scales reminiscent of a serpent and if he looks closely their eyes glow dimly. They wink at him and he is suddenly made aware of how hard he must have been staring at them.

“What will happen if I take your hand?” 

“You won’t die. You’ll get that revenge I can tell you crave.”

“What do you get out of it?”

“I mean what does that matter? You said you don’t want to die here and I’m offering you a way not to.”

He stares down at the hand.

 Just like that he’d be alive again. Just like that he could get even with the people who tried to kill him. So he takes a deep breath and shakes the outstretched hand. A bright yellow light emits from where both hands are latched together.

“You made the right decision” The voice says, and he doesn’t even have to see their face to know that there is a smile on it. He wonders what he just got himself into as the light from their joined hands dim. 

“What now?” He asks as he gazes back up into dimly glowing eyes. 

The person tilts their head, caresses his cheek. “Just one more thing and then you’ll never have to panic again.” The hand moves from his face to play with the soft strands of hair at the base of his neck. 

He goes to ask another question. But, as this person’s palm comes in contact with the untouched skin at the base of his neck he is met with a searing white heat at the point of contact. His eyes widen and he goes to pull their hand away but the grip on the base of his neck persists. 

“Don’t Panic.” They say. “Trust me.”

He isn’t sure how he’s supposed to not panic when the burning persists. How is he supposed to trust someone he has only just met? 

“The sooner you relax the better it will feel.”

So he tries to relax. But, relaxing isn’t really possible when it feels like there is a piece of red hot metal being pressed into your skin. His vision warps and darkens and he passes out from the pain. 

When Sakusa comes to, he finds himself coughing up water. A side effect of drowning he supposes. He checks his surroundings, and is surprised to see he is in a humble looking room. A bed, a nightstand with an oil lamp and pack of matches next to it, and a mirror across the room close to the door. Sakusa gets off of the bed, pushing the sheets aside and goes to look at himself in the mirror. He feels pins and needles in his feet but ignores the sensation. 

He stands in front of the mirror. He looks okay for the most part. His hair is a mess and his eyes look as if he hasn't slept in a few days but that’s about it. He isn’t clad in the billowy white linen shirt and black trousers he died in. Instead, he stands in the mirror wearing a cream colored cotton shirt and brown trousers. His skin smells of salt and he could crave nothing more than a decent shower, or even a half-decent shower. He feels his stomach growl and sighs. Food. He’d need food first, then he could get a shower.

 He takes a second to attempt to straighten out his appearance. He runs his hand through his hair a few times, and as he does that one of his fingers graze a rather tender spot on his neck. He turns his head ever so slightly and gently brushes his hair out of the way to get a better look, and there on his neck clear as day is a deep red circle of what looks like brambles with four overlapping diamonds in the middle. He touches it cautiously as he inspects it. 

Just as he decides that the door to his room opens. He takes a cautionary step backwards and then he sees the same person from before. Just as ethereal and supernaturally beautiful as ever, although this time there are no serpentine scales adoring their face. No dimly glowing eyes and no long, pointed, sharp looking nails. 

“Good you're finally awake! I thought you would be out for an entire week” 

“You..you're the person from earlier”

“If by that you mean the person who kept you from dying then yes.”

“What did you do to me?”

“What is it with you and asking questions? We don’t have enough time to discuss all that. You’re probably hungry and there’s complimentary meal in the tavern downstairs if you’re stayin in the inn. So why don’t you stop asking questions and we get you some food instead?” 

As if his stomach knows he's going to disagree it makes a noise in agreement, and he isn’t left with much room to refuse. “Fine. But, when we’re done you’ll explain everything to me.”

“We'll see about that. You’d think you’d just be happy you're alive.” They say with a roll of their eyes. “Let’s just go get some food into you and see what this little fishing port has to offer.”

Just like that Sakusa finds himself being led downstairs hand in hand with a person he has only really just met. But, he doesn't panic and instead wonders what he has gotten himself into. 

[lluvguts]

sore eyes // boreo

pairing: adult theodore decker / boris pavlikovsky

 genre + warning: some angst, swearing, implied sex

word count: 1778

summary: theo and boris have been hiding some things, and theo finally cracks

words in translation: Птица- the bird // Такой идиот - such an idiot

read it on ao3

A text message from Theo’s phone echoed, then resonated in the dark; the ceiling was haloed in the screen’s soft blue light moments before returning to black. Different sheets that held familiar smells. Theo reached out from under the blankets with a sleepy hand for his glasses and stopped cold.

Kitsey: Hey you! Still spending the night at Hobie’s? Wanna grab a bite to eat in the morning? I can swing by the shop :) xoxoxo ♡ ♡ ♡!!!

A rustle next to him. Theo set the phone back onto the hotel nightstand with a hollow clatter before Boris could turn over and inspect. The barely there tickle of his hair against Theo’s bare neck, a subdued breath from behind warming the still air. Boris extended a hand to pull Theo’s upturned shoulder back down into the sheets, murmuring nonsensical Polish—words that would have soothed Theo, in years prior, but now only made him lie unmoving around his touch. The refusal to accept; the wave of shifting light casting foreign shadows along the walls, an inky blue prelude to dawn. The city awakening, another night unfurling into the real world: leaving Theo unsure how to place his relationship with Boris among the daily trivialities of his own life. A piece that does not fit anywhere, no matter what age or chapter they decide to burst into. It simply would not work.

Theo knew Boris was not asleep—his undressed body was emanating delicious heat, closeness that made Theo flinch as he neared. With his back to the curtain he was bathed in shadow, accentuating his downturned jaw and angular form—all the more resemblant to Theo of a sculpted Hermes, or that of a Baroque painting: shaped hues of milk white and hushed blue contours that dipped into the crevices of his body, the brief suggestion of color, only a brushstroke of width, blooming under his sharp cheeks.

His hand the only thing touching him. It crept lower, a delicate dance of fingers across skin, towards his exposed abdomen until Theo flung out a hand in warning. Ironclad grip.

“Boris.”  

But he only chortled out a tired laugh, his dark eyes open and one expressive brow furrowed.

“What? Are you still upset over your bird that you cannot enjoy? Let me touch you,” Boris ignored his request—along with the hand locked onto his wrist—and continued to tease with soft touches that drove him mad. Theo brushed Boris’s hand away and sat up.

“Stop. I can’t do this anymore.” Theo said and pulled the thin bedsheet over his middle.  

“Cannot do what? Have fun? If this is about Птица, you know there are ways to get it back.”

Theo could not address the crippling shame he felt about the painting. The years of its guarded presence holding Theo afloat. Gone. “I can’t..I can’t keep hiding. It’s wrong. And technically, this is an affair.”

“Hah! Affair,” He spit out the word like it was poison to his lips, “As if snowflake would care. She sleeps with her love, why can you not with yours? Hmm?”

Theo did not reply. “We are adults, Potter. Grown men. She can do what she likes the same as we.” Boris went to the nightstand on his side—Theo’s heart sped at the curve of his taut skin, how his bare hands had felt every scar, caressed each shoulder blade, trailed a finger in unadulterated bliss down the dip in his lower back—his toned muscles twisting as he reached for a cigarette. The days spent craving his body against his own, how desperately Theo missed it during the daytime: a fact he couldn’t face in the present moment, not with him so close, his lips soft even in a sneer.

“You make this sound like it’s an acceptable thing.”

“What has it been these past ten years then? Vegas? Was that something you forgot?” Boris spoke around the cigarette, his voice icy and holding every drop of contempt for the lost time they spent emerging into adults—the things left unspoken finally dusted off and frowned upon.

“Like how you forgot to reach out to me all this time.” Theo said bitterly

“Pfft. Is different thing. Don’t change the subject.”

“I’m not. It is directly connected and you know it.” Theo crossed his arms.

“Is directly connected,” Boris rolled his eyes and mimicked him.

“So what then?” Theo asked over Boris’s  imitation, his voice growing louder, “Why come all the way out here? Why stay? You could have left the second you saw me in that pub. An easy way out, really. With the painting lost forever and all.” Theo felt the anger rise from where it had been sitting vacant all these years; he had no issue with the bite behind his words, or what it might do to their secret nights spent together. Kitsey might be happier with Cable but it didn’t matter to Theo: he couldn’t live with the shame it would cause if the Barbours found out about Boris, or Hobie. Having to come clean.

Boris leaned up against the headboard—completely bare and unashamed in the fact—to point a finger at Theo. “I stayed for you. Hah! I even took painting for you. If not, would have no reason to be back. Would never see you again.”

Theo let out a mirthless laugh. To conceal the knot of worry threading its way into his mind. “That’s your excuse? To ‘see me?’ We were childish and stupid in Vegas. Apparently nothing’s changed.”

“Fuck you.” Boris stamped out the cigarette and  rose from the bed, facing the curtained window and allowing Theo to gaze with confliction at his back. His dense set of black curls magnified in the filtered sunrise. “Thinking I can come back, we can be together, like this. With no worry. Такой идиот.” He muttered to himself.

But he heard him. Theo crawled across the bed and took Boris’s forearm to spin him back. “What did you expect Boris? You can show up in my life, let us have a few good fucks and think everything’s alright? The same?” He had a pained expression flash across his face, his eyes once bright but were now shaded with emptiness at the brief moments he had hope.

“Of course not,” Boris said quickly, but Theo knew that fallen face, even now he did a poor job at hiding what he was feeling, “I came here on business trip. And found you! Was fate that brought us together. Don’t you see it, Theo? And now is fate asking us to be here.”

“Fuck fate, Boris. You can’t just expect me to drop everything and go. Hell, even be sleeping with you. I’m engaged to be married, you have a wife—or was that a lie too? I practically own the shop, I can’t just up and leave Hobie like that. I have a life here.” Theo ignored the ache in his stomach remembering the sight of Boris, after ten years, finally seeing him. The joy that overcame him, the memory of how it made the fierce wind that afternoon not as harsh; his tired eyes had lightened when his arms found his shoulders, small mannerisms never forgotten.

“You expected me to drop everything, that day. In Vegas I had a life, and still you wanted me to go with you. What is so different now?” Boris wiped his face with a rough hand and glared at Theo. His black eyes glittered with hidden emotion: regret for what could have happened, their future dangling by a what-if.

“I told you. I just can’t. I can’t have sex with you anymore. Not like this. It’s wrong on so many levels—I have a fiancé, whether or not I love her. I still have ties. And I am in no way flying across the continent on some drug heist for you. It’s not my fault that you lost the fucking painting.”

Boris sighed. His face undeniably hurt. “So harsh, Potter. I do not know what time has done to change you, but maybe you do not mean things you say.” His smile was only a quirk of his lips, not reaching his eyes. Empty.

“And now, as I think. If not for your little bird, maybe we would have never met again. Last goodbye under that street lamp.” Boris continued, his face hollow. Theo didn’t like where this was going—the broken look in Boris’s eyes as he bent to pick up his clothes strewn across the carpet.

“Where are you going?” Theo asked with bated breath as he watched Boris button his pants, his overcoat, shirt.

Boris, who could never keep his mouth shut. Left without a word.

If only Boris could see, Theo thought, he was doing this for their own good. Because really, what else was there to do? Theo wasn’t chained to Boris, and neither was he. They were adults. They had lives to live—regardless of their love, the ardent connection that stemmed from boyhood, no matter how many times they tried to make it work.

This wasn’t a relationship. Theo had to tell himself compulsively as he gathered his own clothes off the floor and left Boris’s hotel room. To meet Kitsey, to pretend he was at the shop. That everything was going as planned. But Theo started to wonder: was there any way to make things the way they should? Could there be one?

So that Theo could wake to Boris’s sleeping shape in the morning, the face he loved, rather than Kitsey’s? Go their separate ways, different relationships, yet remain on parallel paths: could Theo ever imagine introducing Mrs. Barbour to Boris, while Kitsey stayed with Tom? Would she smile in the same tender, personal way that she often did when Theo was in the room?

Theo knew he had it all wrong. He was afraid of losing Boris; the shame that resided deep in his bones was only at himself—surfacing words: coward. Trapped. Isolated. Stuck in an engagement meant only for the bettering of others. Not what he wanted.

Stay. We can make it work.  

A dull, festering throb started at the base of his chest, worming its way to his heart. Clung to the back of his throat. Skull pounding a new kind of headache down the busy streets, searching with sore eyes for a familiar overcoat, thick black hair blowing in the wind. His life raft out of the choppy future he was forced to drown in.

Last goodbye under that streetlamp.

Theo: Boris. Call me.

[halothenthehorns]

All in the Family

Chapter 115: Hagrid's Tale

Warning for some blood and gore in this one

HPHPHPHP

The thick clouds allowed flickering, heavy light down into the valley below while the scream echoed all around.

Regulus groaned, wondering at the miracle they hadn't all broken their necks with every toss around they got as he found himself laying out haphazardly on several sharp rocks on a very rickety pile of more disheveled earth that would probably go down if he breathed on it wrong. He eyed a much more stable-looking bit a good jump away, but still hesitated to move, especially as he had no idea where the others were. The sharp gust of wind that buffeted him wasn't giving him much choice, he took off at a run as the ground began shaking beneath him.

His feet lost purchase, he tried to jump the rest of the distance in vain, and found himself scrabbling maddly for any kind of hold, legs kicking wildly and a panicked scream already ripping up his throat. The clouds flashed away again, giving him just enough time to catch at a misshapen divot in the earth that looked like someone with jagged nails had scooped it clean away, and made his hand a bloody mess as he snagged it and finally pulled himself onto even ground, avoiding the hole that had saved his life.

He lay face down for a long time, panting and shaking, probably having pissed himself, cradling his injured hands that were possibly broken, though his whole body was a sore mess so it was hard to tell what the worst of it was.

He didn't remember screaming, but someone must have been drawn to him. "Reg! Regulus," it was a call of recognition, so he didn't have the energy to bother rolling over, someone did that for him.

It was Peter, his face was ghastly, and Regulus's eyes flickered curiously around himself again. He hadn't been so out of it he shouldn't have heard him approaching, and he was still on a very rocky ledge that had no visible ways of climbing in this tricky light, how had Peter scaled up and down so fast- oh right.

"Where is, what-" Peter was shaking him a bit while patting him down as if looking for an injury while also looking all around carefully, and Regulus just groaned and pressed his face to his chest, he didn't know what he was trying to ask, he was too exhausted.

The two jerked at once though when they heard the scream, and Regulus forced himself to sit up properly and take in everything again. It was female, they could hazard that guess, but Evans or Alice they couldn't tell. They were not in Hogsmeade, these mountains were too big, too old, and the valley that kept flickering below in the bright moonlight held no hint of familiarity to any of them.

Peter squeezed his shoulder, and then gently eased him back away, going and standing dangerously on the edge as he continued to look for something. "Stay here, alright, he won't bother making this climb."

"What?" Regulus tried to slur in confusion, but a horrible realization was already creeping up on him.

"Stay here," Peter said again, with such authority Regulus let his butt get very comfortable as Peter vanished again, only the hint of a long bald tail visible for a moment before that too vanished.

At first Lily thought they were back in Hogsmeade somewhere, but she was fairly certain there was no lake this big down by those mountains, nor did she really think the fuzzy, mossy something she went slipping around on that squelched oddly beneath her shoes and caused said scream could have happened around Hogwarts, so it was with great trepidation she hauled herself free of the water with no clue what else was waiting. When she splashed onto shore, she didn't even try to hide her relief as Potter came sprinting up to her, a look of stark concern on his face.

"I, thought it was, a boulder, at first-" she panted in exertion as he skidded to a stop beside her, looking around wildly for the danger. She pointed a shaking finger back, where the ripped head was just visible in the dark water. He didn't even look where she pointed. Instead he grabbed her arm and began pulling her with such strength, she half expected to be lifted clean off her feet as he got them running.

Alice found herself staring blearly at a hastily put out gigantic firepit. The logs were still smoking, and dripping wet, and she coughed heavily as she tried to scramble away, only managing a few feet before she found herself in the open night, her mind still too hung on how someone had practically been burning six nearly tree-sized logs in that huge thing to really figure out the danger as she spotted someone groaning and hunched in on themselves not too far away.

"Frank?" She called in concern, jogging over regardless of who it was, they were shaking and her concern spiked higher when they didn't even seem to acknowledge her. That was not her boyfriend though, the build was all wrong, she'd already figured out as she got within arm's reach, but then she heard a horrible snapping noise start to occur, and came to a cold stop as she realized Remus Lupin wasn't dying.

"No," the moan was the last intelligible thing that would be forced out of his throat this night, as his eyes, already half mad, began pinning in on her.

He was already nearly doubled in size, his jaw forming first, teeth flashing and snout scenting the air. His skin was still twitching like live bugs beneath the surface before silver fur began sprouting out, but the bones in his limbs and torso were still snapping and cracking loud as fireworks.

She didn't scream. She did draw her wand, but not for any defence she knew full well wouldn't work, instead she spun on the spot almost calmly, a crystal clear image in her mind for a plan as she took off back for the mouth of the cave at a dead run.

A howl finally pierced the night as she pointed her wand, her voice didn't even shake as she said, "Locomotor Lignum." The damp, half-dead and burned trees would make a pathetic barrier, but the last one stacked itself in front of the entrance just as something huge slammed into it, already causing half of them to tremble and shake in place. "Colloportus," she shot next, but was already backing away into the darkness behind her. It was a choice between spelunking this unknown alone, or hoping that spell that was supposed to seal a door shut worked on her makeshift contraption that wasn't technically a door, and she wasn't going to sit around and find out as she imagined him already rearing up to try again.

She was right to run, as Moony's now fully extended jaws and claws began tearing away at the obstacle, the magic only slowing him, not stopping. He muscled his way into a gap, and began shoving and forcing himself through, not caring for the way his fur and body strained painfully as the smell was too enticing. His head and a whole front limb went through before a painful shoot of pain did stop him, and he pulled himself out snarling viciously at whatever had just bit his tail.

Padfoot stood there, hackles raised. Moony huffed in derision and kicked at him before turning back, only vague recognition and the promise of food was more tempting, but then the black dog tried to do it again, and Moony found himself distracted by fury as he turned on him instead, chasing and snapping at his heels in retaliation.

Moony was faster, but Padfoot was more agile, taking sharp turns and calculated jumps while his pursuer only knew to keep up, not watch out. By the time Moony grew tired of his pursuit, he had to stop and scent the air again for his prey, and then huffed in frustration it seemed gone. He instead found something of the most mild commodities in the air instead, and loped easily around, Padfoot now following at his side as if nothing had happened.

The two found themselves howling in unison as they turned it into a race, Padfoot easily spotting below what Moony's goal was. He wouldn't lie, Padfoot found this almost freeing. It was the most they'd been able to just run in so long now. Their muscles bunched and released with exhilaration, the flickering shadows meant little to their sharp senses, the ground was nothing beneath their feet. Moony finally came to a stop, not even panting, but dipping his head down and began drinking deeply from the lake.

Neither let their guard down so much that they didn't swing around at something approaching, but both relaxed at the same time as they recognized Prongs at the opposite end of the lake. Padfoot had always been Moony's favorite visitor, the other two were simply creatures that weren't edible, but the large black dog was as close to pack as he'd ever known in his life. Moony seemed in an oddly good mood tonight though, as he not only huffed in recognition, but also began his way over with his tail high as if looking for another chase.

Prongs bellowed a warning though, lowering his weapons and scraping the ground in challenge.

Only now did Padfoot understand why he hadn't simply come over to join them. He caught just the faintest hint of Evans's scent in the air, and knew her to be hiding somewhere nearby. Shoving Moony with all his weight, he redirected his course to the closest precipice instead, and Moony let himself be distracted once more, now sniffing the air for something much better to whet his appetite, the bloody water satiating his tongue well enough he found no hint of the red head for now amongst Prongs's heavy scent.

Prongs grunted in concern from behind watching them depart alone, but Padfoot only needed to glance behind once and let his tongue lull out for a moment to promise a safe return, he should definitely stay where he was.

They began their rocky ascent just as the book finally began, Hagrid's Tale. Padfoot huffed for the fortuitous location they were in fact where Hagrid had been all this time, and not back in his cabin. Only the most aware part of his mind recognized it was his brother reading, and for the first time Sirius allowed some part of himself to be grateful that Peter would have sought him out, would be helping him stay low and keep an eye on him until they got out of this.

The two raced up the sharp incline too, but the rocks growing serrated beneath their feet and the steep ascent soon wore them both out before they'd even gone halfway. Moony began bounding down instead, but perpendicular to the way they'd come up. He kept tasting the air all the time, and Padfoot realized he was attempting to leave the heavy perfume of giants all around them.

When they were back on even terrain  once more there was half a mountain behind them and the lake where he knew Evans and Alice were. He had no idea where Regulus and Peter could be, but he tried to assure himself that they must somehow still be either upwind or too far away. It bothered him he hadn't a single clue where Longbottom could be around here, but he'd probably spotted the problem before anyone and attempted to bury himself underground first thing.

Sadly, Moony couldn't go another whole stride before he slammed into the barrier, and snarled in frustration. He took off at a quick lope parallel to the invisible barrier perfectly instead, and by the time they'd nearly circled halfway around the outside of the valley Padfoot even began to relax at the intoxicating exhilaration of running just to run.

Moony ran on instincts, one more powerful than any others. Feed. He'd never actually done so though. He did hear things, like the words echoing all around them describing this place that he kept trying to veer away from as much as the scent of the predators he knew instinctively to avoid. The voice did not connect to him in a way that mattered, for it was not screaming. The wind whipped viciously in all directions, buffeting new scents across his nose barely before he had time to sample them, but none of them were familiar, the dark forest he'd run about in for some time now. It was better than the last place he'd woken up in though, the screams he'd heard for the first time in his life, the blood that he did not crave but only drove him more wild to have what was right there.

It was only because he was trying to recall the exact smell of it to savor that he found just a tease of it in the air, and turned eagerly back towards the mountains.

Padfoot listened with absent disinterest as Hagrid's story wound down, no giants would be joining their cause, and the gamekeeper's injuries went unexplained. Then Umbridge intruded, and he let a thundering growl rattle out of him in disgust.

It was that one second of distraction that allowed Moony to change course, and Padfoot to only follow for a few paces before scenting the air himself to see what had caused it. Then his own instincts kicked in, a beat too late.

Padfoot lunged for his jowls, but even before his loose grip had sunk in Moony was lashing out with his opposite paw and caught such a sharp blow in his ribcage, the sound snapped around them and blood began leaking from the black belly.

The dog fell to the ground, stunned and whimpering, but Prongs wasn't here to get him to back off, and now Padfoot could smell it too, and it wasn't his blood Moony was now advancing on with salivating determination.

Not again.

He would not allow Remus to even think he'd come close to killing when all this was over. Moony was not going to so much as look at Longbottom tonight.

Padfoot gathered his strength, and pounced, tackling Moony off course just long enough to lock his own canines into his hind leg, and held tight.

Moony howled in outrage, twisting and lashing out with teeth and claws to be released, but Padfoot just held firm, he couldn't have let go now even if he wanted to, which no part of him did as whimpers and cries began searing from his own throat as every tear after bite went into his left side unrelenting.

A part of his mind absently wondered if he was going to tear Moony's leg right off. The rest of him wondered if there was going to be anything left to shred away as his vision began tunneling black. He missed the tiny little body that appeared out of nowhere and bit down with oversized teeth right onto Moony's ear, which distracted him only long enough to toss his head and howl again.

Padfoot did not even seem aware of his own high-pitched cries continuing that drew Prongs's stampeding forward, head bowed and tackling the two apart.

Frank watched the whole thing from seven feet away, but it wasn't his bleeding leg or even bars holding him in place anymore. His pursuit to find Alice was not forgotten, but he also didn't have to worry anymore that she was the one in danger as the chapter concluded, and they were all uprooted once more.

[keelywolfe]

FIC: Welcome to Backwater ch.15 (spicyhoney)

Summary: Stretch is still dealing with the fallout of the last chapter. Like he needs anything else to happen right now?

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Read ‘First Step’ on AO3

or

Read it here!

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As hot as the days were, these last, lingering sticky days of summer, the nights in Backwater tended to cool off as soon as the sun began to dip below the horizon.

It made for a good time to sit out on the back porch for a quick smoke. Usually only tobacco, Stretch didn’t have Red’s resilience when it came to getting up the next day after smoking his atom bomb version of weed. The last thing he wanted was to give the local kids their first view of an ugly hangover, he’d leave that sort of education for their parents to dole out.

Most of the time, Stretch kept it to one cigarette. His first paycheck was better than he’d expected but it was still wiser to be frugal, so he stuck with his one cig and tried not to think about how that would have pleased his brother. Blue’d been trying to get him to quit for years now and in the past months whenever his bro brought it up, his ex always chimed in with a similar opinion on it, both of them citing statistics as if they were practicing for a damned public service announcement.

Quitting his smokes was something Stretch resisted for no damn good reason other than he didn’t want to quit, thanks, sorry for him trying to adult a little around here. All the nagging did was take the joy out of it and left him smoking out of resentment rather than recreation. Cutting down to one a day was milestone he’d never managed to get to back in Ebott. Not even when the Docs told him it might help with—well.

Anyway, tonight he’d decided to indulge himself; after the day he’d had, he figured he deserved to go through a whole damn pack.

The porch light was a stark, sodium-yellow and the furniture cast strange shadows in it, bones of the true darkness that lay beyond. Stretch sprawled out on the dusty old sofa, blowing lazy smoke rings up at the overhang covering the porch and occasionally tapping ash into the rusty old Maxwell coffee can that Red kept around as an ashtray. The other skeleton had already gone inside, and the living room windows were dark, a pretty big clue that he’d probably already headed off to bed. Early for him, but, eh, Stretch figured he’d had a hell of a day, too, and his guilt over his own involvement in that sat in his chest like a lead brick.

At his feet, the dog curled up in a tight little donut of fluff and Stretch absently pet him with his bare foot, wincing as strands of hair caught in his bony joints. The dog didn’t seem to care about the little yanks and tugs, only huffed out a contented sigh, pushing demandingly into the touch.

“dunno if you deserve pats,” Stretch told him absently. He tried for something resembling stern, though he didn’t stop petting, “you weren’t being too friendly out at edge’s place.”

The dog only snorted and rolled to his side, giving Stretch access to his belly for more rubs.

Stretch hadn’t even realized Red brought the dog along at first. Not until he hauled his bike over to truck bed, still flustered over the almost-could be-kinda-a-something that his boss/landlord’s timely arrival interrupted. Before he could even start heaving the bike in, the dog popped up like a slobbery jack in the box and began attacking Stretch’s face with kisses.

“wha—stop, you shit!” Stretch sputtered, laughing and trying to fend off the dog’s eager advances. The bike was heavier than a normal one and awkward to hold, and between that and the doggy love attack, Stretch lost his grip. The handbars swung into the side of the truck and shrieked their way down in a scrape of metal against metal as it fell, the rest of it finishing off with a loud clang. Not that it did any damage; Red’s truck probably only qualified as one by a technicality, held together by vague hopes, rust, and the liberal use of miles of duct tape.

Behind Stretch, Edge spoke up, “Here, let me help.” But the moment he stepped forward, the dog’s excited wriggling screeched to a halt and morphed into stillness couched with a sudden, unexpected growl.

“woah, hey, boy,” Stretch said with surprised caution. The dog hadn’t even growled when those guys in town were trying to use him as a pinata, too scared, maybe, but Edge wasn’t a threat so why the hell—

A low, deep throated snarl came from behind Stretch and the dog yelped, ducking down into the truck bed, cowering. Stretch whipped around to stare at Edge in disbelief, okay, yeah, that one wasn’t on his bingo card for weird happenings. "did you just growl at my dog?"

Edge only looked back steadily, "You have to assert dominance."

Well, uh, that was…it did seem to work, sort of. The dog chose that moment to abandon ship, scrambling up and wriggling through the little back window that led into the cab to curl up against Red. The moment he was safe, he looked at Stretch and Edge with wounded betrayal, like he hadn’t started it, the little shit.

Good thing the dog didn’t know what the memory of that growl was doing to the inside of Stretch’s pants, (fucking rawr). The pooch would never forgive him.

“quit traumatizing mutt," Red snorted. He ruffled the dog’s ears soothingly and the pup settled, resting his chin on Red’s femur as he looked up with a mournful ‘the big kids are pickin’ on me’ expression. "c'mon, armstrong, let’s hit the road, s’getting dark."

That woke Stretch up from his dual versions of shock and unf!shock. He grunted with the effort of heaving the bike into the truck bed, mumbling a grateful ‘thank you’ when a second pair of strong hands helped out, and he really, really tried not to feel the way Edge was pressed up against his back, a line of warm moving against him as both of them settling the bike securely in. It was only when Edge stepped back and took his fatal distraction with him that something clicked.

Wait. Not the mutt, but—

Stretch stuck his head in through the open window, looking at the skeleton and his dog, who pointedly weren’t looking back. “you named the dog mutt?”

“didn’t name it anything,” Red scoffed. He scruffed the dog, whose name was totally Mutt, gently.

“technicalities won’t save you,” Stretch told him gleefully, “there was a list on the counter, you had options, and you still named the dog…dog.”

That got finally got him a look, or more precisely, a glare. “could always let you walk home.”

That was true. Stretch abandoned ribbing without even getting to pun about it and climbed hastily into the truck. The door hinge squalled when he pulled open the door, flakes of rust falling in a shower as he slammed it shut. No wonder Red didn’t drive around much if this was his primary vehicle, but in the interest of not getting kicked out, Stretch decided it would be for the best to not bring up the rubber banded pile of newspapers Red was sitting on. He definitely wasn’t gonna ask how Red was reaching the pedals.

Edge rounded the truck to Red’s side, briefly outlined in the glare of the headlights. With the remains of the sun at his back, his eye lights were stark in the growing darkness. Bright crimson glaring in at his brother as he stood next to the truck, his arms crossed over his chest. “You could always come in for coffee.”

It wasn’t a question and Red didn’t answer it. “tell the kid i said hi.”

Edge replied tartly. “Tell them yourself.”

“heh.” A strange laugh, humorless and somehow still tinged with amusement. “see ya around, bro.”

Yeah, there was some kind of story there, all right, and Stretch was the guy who waited too long at the concession stand and came into the play during Act 3.

There was only one person who might give him any answers, since two-thirds of the people involved already turned him down and it was the same guy who didn’t even give Edge a chance to say goodbye, only threw the truck into reverse and with a clumsy three-point turn that barely avoided any of the flowerbeds, they were headed back down path that led to town, out of the woods.

The ride back wasn’t exactly quiet, the bumpy road and rattling complaints of the truck took care of that. But it was wordless, for a while. Until they got closer to the main road and the bumps smoothed out a little, droning hum of tires on asphalt an invitation.

“red—” Stretch started, slowly. He wasn’t even sure what he was gonna say yet, uncertain if he really wanted any other revelations tonight. He was feeling a little epiphanied out.

Red only sighed deeply, “pretty sure you, the kid, and my bro had a helluva chat, you sure you really wanna talk to me about it now?”

No. Yes. “maybe?”

The newspapers under him made a dry shuffling sound as Red shifted his weight to change gears. “one question, kid, that’s all i got answers for. choose wisely.”

Great, now he was on an impromptu grail quest.

Stretch hesitated over his options; there were so many, how could he pick only one? Like, why didn’t Red live with Edge and Frisk, why had he refused to even go into the house, and what the hell was up with Edge being so salty about it? Hell, there were deeper question than that, if he wanted to dig. How had they gotten out of their Underground to here, what happened to Red’s leg, so many whats and wheres and whys.

A look at Red showed he was grinding his teeth, his crimson eye lights focused solely on the road and at the end of the day, there was only one question Stretch really needed an answer to tonight, for reasons he desperately didn’t want to talk about.

He ran his tongue over his teeth nervously, looking down at his hands in his lap rather than the passing blur of road in the headlights out the windshield. “you knew who i was when you first saw me here, didn’t you. edge said you watched the tv when we first came to the surface.”

The joints in his hands creaked as they went tight on the steering wheel and Red exhaled with weary slowness. “yeah, i knew.” He slanted a brief glance at Stretch, eye lights flicking between him and the road. “gave me a hell of a start, don’t mind tellin’ ya. you were busy chasin’ beer cans and didn’t notice me almost fallin’ on my ass.”

“that’s why you helped me, isn’t it, when i first came to town?” The accusation that Red was ‘adopted’ him because he looked like Edge stung, but it was true enough, wasn’t it. Someone with his kid brother’s face, someone to feed and clothe and take care of, like he couldn’t with his own bro for whatever their secret reasons were. Like he was a fucking pet, another dog, woof woof, and the care that seemed so genuine that morning felt suddenly tainted, as stifling as his own brother’s.

“heh,” Red’s mouth twisted into a sneering smile, “kid, come on.”

Stretch said nothing. He could see the neon sign from ‘The Whistling Cow’ slowly approaching, looming closer, blurring in his vision and there was no subtle way to wipe at his sockets, he could only do it quickly and hope it wasn’t noticed.

A failed hope, like most. Red made an impatient sound, loud enough that the dog sleeping his lap stirred, then he said roughly. “yeah, okay, you reminded me some of my little brother, but that ain’t why i let you stay.”

Let it go, let it go, Elsa, you don’t have anywhere else to go. “then why?”

“‘cause i like ya, that’s why!” Red snarled. His ever-present grin curled into a grimace, tight and strained, each word as sharp as one of his jagged teeth. “been rattling around alone in this old shop for awhile now. been kinda nice to have someone underfoot, since i ain’t got goddamn feet. good enough?”

“yes,” Stretch admitted, a threadbare little word. It was, helped ease some of the pained tightness surrounding his soul to know that Red wasn’t simply another person who wanted to be around him not out of friendship, but mere circumstance. He’d had plenty of that in his life and all it left him with was an empty contact list on his phone and an emptier ache in his soul.

He startled at a hand awkwardly touching his own, bony fingers briefly squeezing before they withdrew. “stretch? you and my bro ain’t nothin’ alike. c’n trust me on that much.”

“is that good or bad,” Stretch couldn’t help asking. He thought of the little borrowed room he was sleeping in at night, his part time job hawking groceries, of Edge’s home in the woods with its beautiful gardens and delicious meals.

Red shrugged. He turned the wheel, guiding the truck into a parking spot that was nearly hidden on the other side of the shop. “beats the fuck out of me, just is, and it don’t matter, anyway. don’t care what the charts and graphs and shit say, ain’t no reason to compare ya. ya ain’t the same person. you’re you and bein’ you should be good enough for anyone.”

The engine ticked slowly as it cooled and Stretch thought of the way their landlord back in Ebott kept mistaking him for Papyrus, of getting bitched at once for a window he hadn’t broken or thanked for muffins he hadn’t brought. Not anybody or nobody, only himself, at least here in Backwater. “thanks.”

“s’fine,” Red grunted. “just don’t forget i ain’t your bro.”

“oh, fuck, no,” Stretch blurted out. He winced as he realized how that sounded. “i mean, you’re more like a mom, anyway.”

“heh,” That laugh was more a little more genuine, not much, but it was something. “fuck you.”

“nah, that wasn’t in the rental agreement.”

“and thank the fucking angel for that.” With a groan of hinges and a slam of the door, Red got out of the truck, the dog at his heels. He didn’t turn back to see if Stretch was with him, only went as fast as he could, cane swishing at his side as he practically ran into the house, the screen door banging shut behind him.

Stretch followed more slowly, stopping off at the porch and that was where he stayed, thinking about having a cigarette and not at all about giving Red some time to himself after having the asshole he was trying to help question his motives, exactly like an asshole would.

Mutt hesitated, debating for a minute over choosing between them before finally decided that Stretch was the victor, and whether or not that was because he thought Stretch needed watching over more didn’t matter. Stretch appreciated the company, anyway.

That left him here, smoking and watching moths flutter suicidally close around the porch light.

Stretch dropped a used butt into the coffee can and debated lighting another. On one hand, he was starting to feel a little nauseous from so much smoking, on the other, he sort of wanted to feel nauseous. Wanted to feel something that he could name.

What was the proper term for how to feel when you were living in a weird town with alternate version of yourself and your bro, which, by the way, one out of the two has been crawling up your top ten list of spank bank partners? If there was a definition for it, it was gonna take more than a quick google search to ferret it out.

He still hadn’t decided whether or not to light another when at his feet, the dog suddenly lifted his head, ears perking up.

“what is it, boy?” Stretch leaned up on his elbow, squinting out into the darkness outside the protective ring of porch light. “if this is about a kid in a well, you can tell timmy he’ll have to wait, this is not a good time—hey!”

A threatening line of fur rose up on the dog’s back as he let out a low, deep woof, nothing like the little growl at Edge earlier. Before Stretch could grab for him, Mutt was scrambling to his feet. He leapt off the porch and ran off into the night, fuck, in the direction of the forest.

“hey, wait! no, no, no, damn it!” Stretch shoved his feet into his shoes, wincing at the friction and almost immediately tripping over the laces. “not that way!”

There was barely time to hope he didn’t break his damn leg as he chased after the dog, following the little puff of whiteness through the dark as he tried not to go facefirst into anything. It was sheer luck there weren’t many obstacles in the path; town was in the opposite direction and there was nothing much behind the shop but parched earth and dead grass. Right up until the edge of the woods where saplings rose up in clusters, little ponds of greenery that led to the ocean of trees and that was where Stretch skidded to a halt, watching helplessly as that patch of white disappeared into the darkness.

Yeah, okay, he wasn’t about to go in the woods, ignoring warnings around this place was bad for life expectancy and Stretch wasn’t the kind of guy who’d feed weird critters after midnight.

“fuck, fuck,” Stretch muttered under his breath, pacing right outside the treeline and slapping away any sapling that tried to get in his way as he wracked his brain for what the hell he could do now.

Maybe if he stood outside and shouted at the damn mutt, he’d at least have something to follow back out. He wasn’t sure there was much else he could do, the townsfolk were nice, but he didn’t think asking them out for a midnight search party for a dog would go over very well.

Overhead, the bloated circle of the moon faded in and out from behind the clouds. He didn’t even have his phone, it was still in his bag on the porch, safely beneath that splash of light that seemed so far away now. Stretch dug into his pocket for his lighter, the rasp loud over the faint rustling of leaves overhead. It flared to life and the tiny flame barely illuminating the space around him, but it was better than nothing.

“mutt?” Stretch called tentatively, then more coaxingly, “c’mon boy, come back out!” He tried a few iterations of that with increasingly sappy endearments, feeling as stupid as he had when he’d tried them on his ex. The dog responded about as well, stubbornly refusing to bow to any version of baby, sweetums, or snooky that Stretch tried.

“damn it all to hell,” Stretch cursed softly. First, he’d gotten caught nearly macking on Red’s little brother when he’d said he wouldn’t, not a broken promise but still, then he’d blunder into giving Red’s traumas a quick poke, and now he’d lost the dog that he’d only just gotten for Red. He was obviously already pretty attached to the so-named Mutt and after hearing him vague about how he’d been lonely, it wasn’t much of a surprise.

But going into the woods after him felt a hell of a lot like making a bad situation worse.

Stretch sighed heavily. Nope, better not to chance it. Maybe if he brought out a bowl of food, the dumb mutt would smell it and head for home and—wait.

…what was that? Stretch tipped his head to the side, straining to listen.

He hadn’t really even notice that soft sound at its beginning, the soft lilt of a melody winding its way through branches and leaves out of the woods, a song he almost but didn’t quite know. It was the seductive peal of a silver laugh of delight, it was the delicate caress of the wind, the chuckling burble of a cool stream pouring invitingly over smooth rocks, and the intangible caress of unearthly desires

It was the alluring sweetness of a siren, the song of a temptress calling one who was no sailor into a dry sea and doom.

His vision was cast into paleness like the bloom of the moonlight, filling him to the brim until nothing was left within but that endless song. Without a single thought of his own left crowded in amongst the tangled notes in his head taking mastery over him, Stretch took his first dazed step into the woods.

tbc