#its actually 1 am i have school in five hours

[glitchmel]

Human Snases

Also I need to know,,, do people fw driller and also transfem dream

I love seeing Killer or Dream happy it heals me they're my comfort characters ;^;

Human Ink design belongs to @yeloenk he's actually so pretty sobs

Ink belongs to comyet

Dream belongs to Jokublog

Killer belongs to rahafwabas

[ladykailitha]

Paper Hearts Part 3

Thank you for the lovely response to this story, it makes me warm and fuzzy inside.

This chapter is just 2000 words of Wayne and Eddie being sweethearts to Steve.

Part 1 Part 2

****

Eddie led the way through his trailer to the kitchen past Wayne, who was sitting in his armchair reading the newspaper, a defeated Harrington limping behind.

“What did I tell you about bringing home strays, Ed?” Wayne huffed, a small, gentle smile on his face.

Eddie shook his head, his curls flying. “I’m just watering and feeding this one before I return it back to its owners.”

Harrington blushed and ducked his head. “I got lost.”

Wayne’s eyebrows shot up. He looked over at Eddie who nodded his confirmation.

“This is my Uncle Wayne,” Eddie introduced them. “This is Steve Harrington, Uncle.”

Wayne’s eyebrows stayed raised. Of all the people Eddie could have brought home, he was pretty sure this was the biggest surprise.

“You got your car?” he asked.

“This dumbass was out running around with his head in the fucking clouds,” Eddie scoffed.

Wayne’s glance at Harrington was far more appraising. He looked him up and down, taking in the sweat on his brow, the limping, the slumped shoulders, and vacant expression.

“You do that often, son?” he asked Harrington, folding up his newspaper.

Harrington just shrugged. “I like running to get out of my head.”

Wayne licked his upper lip slowly, calculating. “Uh-huh.” He looked over at his nephew, who had his hands on his lower back and staring at the floor. “There is some leftover beef from Sunday.”

Eddie jumped excitedly. “Yes! That would be perfect.”

He loped over to fridge and pulled out a Tupperware container. He set it on the counter. He got out two plates and a glass. He filled the glass with water and handed it to Harrington.

“Don’t worry, princess,” he huffed. “Our water comes from the same place as yours does.”

Harrington rolled his eyes. “I’m not worried about you poisoning me.”

“You’d be the first,” Wayne said with a chuckle.

Harrington furrowed his brows and looked between them in confusion.

“Surely,” Wayne said in amusement, “you’ve heard about Ed’s reputation going to that school of yours.”

Harrington shook his head. He looked down at his feet. “I mean, I hear rumors and shit, but I really don’t believe that he chased three freshmen with a hunting knife.”

Eddie threw back his head and laughed. “You would pick the one rumor that was actually true.”

Harrington’s head snapped up. “What? Why would you do that?”

Behind him the microwave beeped and Eddie hurried to get their food out. He piled on the food and handed it to him.

“Because they were trying to buy drugs off me,” Eddie muttered as he handed Harrington a fork.

Harrington blinked at him a moment and then nodded. “Is there an age that you do start selling to high school students?” His eyes went wide and looked at Wayne in panic. “I mean, if you were selling drugs. Not that you do or anything.”

Wayne chuckled and shook his head. “I am more than perfectly aware of my nephew’s side business, thank you. I wish he didn’t have to do it, but he hasn’t had a lot of choices in the legal employment racket, not for someone like Ed. But sometimes a couple of grams sold is the difference between not having to chose to pay the water bill or the power bill.”

“Uncle Wayne and I set down ground rules when I started dealing,” Eddie huffed. “One of them was not selling to anyone under the age of sixteen.”

“Yeah, that makes sense.”

Harrington ate his food in silence.

“Do you need to call your parents?” Wayne asked. “Won’t they be worried where you are?”

Harrington shook his head. “They’re going to scream the same amount if I was five hours late or on time. I’d rather just deal with it the once thanks.”

Eddie and Wayne shared a worried glance over his head. Eddie was far too familiar with that nugget of parental discipline, because that’s exactly what Al would do with him.

“You ready to go, Stevie?” Eddie asked as he set their now empty plates in the sink.

“Don’t worry about cleaning up, Ed,” Wayne said. “I’ll take care of it while you take him home.”

Harrington blinked up at Eddie after he used his given name. “Oh, yeah. Of course. Thanks for dinner and the water.”

Wayne nodded. Eddie led the way back out to the van.

“All righty,” he said, pulling his door closed. “You’re gonna have to give me directions, pretty boy.”

Harri–Steve blinked at him for a moment. “I thought everyone had been to my house at one point or another.”

Eddie raised an eyebrow. “Seriously, dude?”

Steve just curled his hands on his lap and then mumbled directions.

Eddie cursed himself in his head. He had gotten the other boy to come out of his shell a little bit while they were talking to Wayne, but now the lid had slammed shut.

Because Steve was right. Even though he only invited the popular kids, his parties always exploded way past the original guest list. But Eddie had avoided it when it was Steve’s place though. Dealing at Hagan’s or any of Steve’s former pals was easy enough, his van fit right in with all the vehicles no problem. But in Loch Nora? Yeah... that was like showing up to a funeral in torn up jeans and smelling strongly like booze.

“Let’s just say my van is a little more conspicuous in Loch Nora,” he said after they had driven in silence for a couple of miles.

Steve’s head snapped up. “Oh. Shit. Yeah. My neighbors might not call the cops on any of my parties but they would absolutely be on the horn if they saw your van parked anywhere on the street.” He picked at his nails. “I keep forgetting shit like that.”

Eddie risked a glance at the other boy, whose shoulders were rounded against being bullied.

“Dude,” he huffed, “the whole fucking school saw what you looked like when you came back after tangling with Billy that kind of damage leaves lasting affects. Don’t be so hard on yourself.”

Steve scoffed. “Asshole fucking cheated. Took a plate to my head and then just started wailing on me. Probably would have killed me too.”

“So what stopped him?”

“Being tranq’ed by his step-sister,” he snorted. “She was visiting a friend of hers. One Billy didn’t approve of because of the color of his skin. Billy threatened to kill the kid, so I hit him. Would have won, too, if he hadn’t fucked me up with the plate.” He took a deep breath. “Anyways, they had some tranquilizers because one of their parents were having trouble sleeping. She grabbed one and jabbed it into his neck.”

“Pretty brave thing to do,” Eddie conceded. “Sounds like there were two badasses there that night.” Then he shook his head. “So you got the shit beat out of you for defending little sheep and Wheeler still went for Byers? I don’t know, man, sounds like she wouldn’t know a good thing if it bit her in the ass.”

Steve huffed out a breath of laughter before he caught himself. He hid his smile under his fist. “Something like that, yeah.”

They pulled up to his house and Steve let out this strange little pained noise. Like it was relief and disappointment all rolled into one. A sound Eddie was far too familiar with.

“My parents aren’t home.”

Eddie looked over at him in curiosity. “How can you tell?” Because yeah, the front lights were off and the house seemed quiet, Eddie knew these houses were big enough that if there was a light on in the back of the house, it couldn’t be seen from the road.

“The garage is closed,” Steve huffed. “They only close it when they leave. They have to show off to the whole neighborhood the cars they drive.”

Eddie blinked at Steve in confusion. “Aren’t they worried someone will steal their car?”

Steve shook his head. “It’s insured, plus they don’t believe anyone would rob them in their fancy house while they’re home.”

Eddie looked up at the large house, so big it could only really be called a mansion. “Are they stupid or arrogant?”

“Both.”

“Look, Steve,” Eddie said, stopping him briefly. “I need to apologize and every time I see you you distract me. So I’m just going to come out and say it. I’m the one that shoulder checked you the day you hurt your hand.” He ran his fingers through his hair and sighed dramatically.

“You see, you had this far off look my uncle gets sometimes and the best thing to do is make a noise or bump into him. Just something that reminds him that his not where ever his mind is and that’s in the present. But I heard these assholes saying that they got their kicks out of kicking your stuff and stomping on your hand and I realized that it was my fault that happened and I’m really, really sorry.”

Steve stared at him for a moment. “Oh. Hey, it’s not your fault, you were only doing what you thought would help. I wasn’t spacing out or whatever. I was just feeling sorry for myself over a stupid holiday. But apology accepted, I guess.”

Eddie nodded, feeling a little bit better about it.

Steve hopped out of the van and he turned back to Eddie. “Thanks for the ride, Eds.”

He slammed the door behind him and walked up to his big, dark, lonely, still house and Eddie felt a small pang of something like pity for the guy. And wasn’t that a kick in the teeth.

When he got home, Wayne was waiting up for him.

“Did that boy get into any trouble when he got home?” were the first words out of his uncle’s mouth. Not so much as a ‘hello’ or ‘by your leave’.

Eddie shook his head. “They weren’t home. I don’t know if they went out to dinner without him or if they just went on one of their infamous business trips.”

Wayne cocked his head to the side. “What’s so infamous about them?”

“They leave so often,” Eddie murmured, “that Steve is pretty famous for the ‘rich kid, empty house’ trope you see movies these days.”

“He’s got friends he can stay with, doesn’t he?” Wayne pressed.

Again Eddie shook his head. “He blew up his friends group awhile back, called them all assholes and bullies over some chick. Then the chick broke up with him over the eldest Byers boy.”

Wayne patted the spot next to him on the sofa. “Tell me about this Harrington kid. You used to all the time, ranting and raving about something or another that he did and then you just stopped.”

Eddie flopped down on the sofa with a heavy sigh. “Like there wasn’t anything to tell after that, you know. He just faded into the background. Gave up his title of King of Hawkins High and then Friday happened.”

“And you found out he was being bullied,” Wayne finished. “I see. That’s got to be rough to go from being surrounded by people to not having anyone there for him.”

Eddie threw his head back onto the back of the sofa and let out a loud groan. “Like it’s my thing. Picking up the lost and the lonely. But this one comes with a lot more baggage than the others and I’m not afraid for me or the rest of my friends but...” He buried his fingers into his hair and screamed.

Wayne nodded. Eddie befriending Steve could make things worse for him and not better. But inaction might hurt the boy in the long run.

“Maybe do something for him that he doesn’t know it’s you,” he suggested to his nephew. “That way he knows he’s not alone, but your reputation won’t make things worse for him.”

Eddie frowned for a moment and then his eyes went wide. “Oh! I think I know exactly what to do!”

Wayne smiled at him. “I figured you would.”

****

Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8

Tag List:

1- @mira-jadeamethyst @rozzieroos @itsall-taken @redfreckledwolf @emly03

2- @spectrum-spectre @estrellami-1 @zerokrox-blog @gregre369 ​@a-little-unsteddie

3- @chaosgremlinmunson @messrs-weasley @chaoticlovingdreamer @maya-custodios-dionach @danili666

4- @goodolefashionedloverboi @val-from-lawrence @i-must-potato @carlyv @wonderland-girl143-blog

5- @justforthedead89 @vecnuthy @irregular-child @bookbinderbitch @bookworm0690

6- @anne-bennett-cosplayer @yikes-a-bee @awkwardgravity1 @littlewildflowerkitten @genderless-spoon

7- @cinnamon-mushroomabomination @dragonmama76 @scheodingers-muppet @ellietheasexylibrarian @thedragonsaunt

8- @useless-nb-bisexual @disrespectedgoatman @counting-dollars-counting-stars @tinyplanet95 @swimmingbirdrunningrock

9- @croatoan-like-its-hot @lolawonsstuff @moonshadows-13 @lololol-1234 @dotdot-wierdlife

10- @slv-333 @ravenfrog

[weepingicegiant]

HUGE TPOT 12 SPOILERS!

BUCKLE UP CHAT. CAUSE THIS IS GONNA BE A LONG THEORY!!!!!

Where do i begin?

So heres the thing, I watched TPOT 12 then took a shower right after. While taking said shower i took a moment to think about everything that went down. And thought of the wildest theory ever..

• XFHOV

LETS START FROM THE BEGINNING,

One and Three, right?

These two fellas have FINALLY appeared after 15 years! Why is that?

Here is the scene when X found out their value: 7!

Four, Seven, and X are celebrating and generally very happy. Who isnt happy?

Three and one.

Theyre clearly angered by this whole situation, but why? Who are they angry at?

Theres three possible options:

1. Seven. But that wouldnt make sense, huh? Basically every algebralien has SOME sort of grudge held against him, so its nothing new. Scratch that!

2. Four. Its possible, four has done alot of things. But thats not who im personally going to focus on. Well, partially at least.

That leaves one more person!

3. X. But why them?

"Theyre just a little silly dude, they did nothing wrong!" And youre right. Thats exactly why theyre a target.

• THREE AND ONE'S CAPYIVITY

Youre probably wondering, why am i focusing on X, and not four? Four is more of a suspect, after all.

Think about it this way,

Three is trapped in a prison inside of Four's school, so four put him there! (They are the only one with control over that place anyway.)

One is trapped inside of the moon. There isnt really any solid proof to prove my theory with this one, but she came out during TPOT. She clearly had the ability to escape and didnt seem tired out and/or surprised that she finally left her prison. One actually seems happy and collected, even going as far as "greeting everyone" once she's out. She chose to come out at this time, just like how she chose to mess with Two's show.

One also confirmed that shes an "old friend of Two's." If One is suddenly against Two after all the years of them knowing each other, Two clearly did something to her.

• MUTUAL CONNECTIONS

And youre STILL probably wondering, "Chim! You still didnt explain what X has to do with all of this!"

Four and Two hate eachother, this hatred being caused by Two when they stole more than HALF of the bfb cast.

(They seem to not be familiar with eachother when they "first" meet. Im not exactly sure why here HELP.)

But anyway!

Who does Four have a good friendship with? X!

Who does Two have a good friendship with? Also X!

X is what keeps them sane around eachother, the only main reason why they stick around.

If anything bad were to happen to X, Four and Two clearly have the power and ability to get back at whatever or WHOever caused this harm.

One and Three did something to X, and it resulted in Two and Four snapping.

• THREE'S PERSONALITY

Three has basically ZERO information on himself, we know nothing about the guy. But what we do know, is that hes agressive.

In the Number Playground Chronicles, we get an article that explains an event that takes place, Three being apart of it. The article reads:

(To reduce confusion, ill be adding the names for you guys to differenciate whos who.)

"(Five)Integer did not pick up the ball when dropped, and Three Integer, the person playing with him, became impatient. (Five)Integer was angry at (Three)Integer because, Three Integer could simply pick up the ball and throw it to (Five)Integer, and (Three)Integer and (Five)Integer could keep playing.

"FOAMING THREE INTEGER"

The horrible, tragic incident happened at 10:13 AM. Three Integer became Upset.

Three Integer at 10:16, Angry.

Three Integer at 10:31, Furious.

Three Integer at 10:24, and "Foaming."

Three Integer at 10:39, when he started to produce smoke.

(Five)Integer picked up the ball at 6:17 PM."

This event did truly happen, we can see the beginning of it play out in the first few seconds of XFOHV:

Three was so angry and REFUSED to even touch the ball. Five had to go pick it up themself HOURS after the incident.

Three also WILLINGLY closed the cell door after it was opened. He couldve escaped, yet he didnt. I have two possible reasons for this:

1. He's afraid of Four catching him, so he followed orders and stayed put.

2. Three's gone insane after a decade and a half of being all alone, to the point that he WANTS to stay inside.

• ONE'S MOTIVES

One seems like a friendly character, shes smiling in basically the ENTIRETY of her screentime, (minus the part when she conversed with Fanny.)

But something about her smile isnt right, its almost disturbing. The way she grins in the oddest situations,

She is seen with a list during the post-credits scene, with four names on it that are all crossed out, meaning they are "completed."

□ Bell.

□ Bomby.

□ Fanny.

□ Ice Cube.

Notice how all four of these contestants were in some sort of distress during that moment, and One helped them out! In exchange for a "favor."

1. She helped Bell escape elimination by removing her string (something that annoyed Bell constantly due to contestants activley climbing it.) And hiding her.

2. She helped Bomby escape elimination by hiding him.

3. She gave Fanny a new mouth, discarding the need to spend hours at a time searching for it in the ocean.

4. She gave Ice Cube a new pair of legs, allowing her to walk again.

What exactly does One need these favors for? Revenge against Two, of course!

● ONE AND TWO'S FRIENDSHIP

Theres a popular theory stating that Two was kicked out of the equation playground, this would clear up the confusion as to why they basically NEVER appear in the subscriber specials.

Maybe this is because Two hates math! They said it to Gaty in one of the episodes.

I also believe that One was also kicked out. Why, you may ask?

Take a look at this scene in the beginning of TPOT 11:

One's picture was hidden underneath Seven's. As if nobody(COUGH COUGH. Espcially four) wanted her to be mentioned so they simply hid her.

Maybe this is how One and Two became friends, two rejects.

● RANDOM THINGS THAT GET THEIR OWN SECTION CAUSE IDK WHERE ELSE TO PUT THEM

1. How the HELL did One get a mouth and... legs?

2. Judging by One's little room, she probably really likes space and astronomy, maybe thats way the moon was where she was sent.

3. Kinda freaky to think that One was there in the moon the ENTIRE time. Throughout every single episode of the series from BFDI 1A to TPOT9, and we never knew.

Yeah tbh idk what else to say this was just a little info dump cause my mind was PACKED. anyways yeah tell me if i missed anything anf let me know about your little theories and opinions on mine! :3

[crazylittlejester]

Unsure if you’ve answers this already, but what’s the rest of the chain doing in your modern au?

I don’t think ive ever really talked a lot about it like, in depth, but im more than happy to because i love my au and my silly guys :)

my bad for spelling errors i am Stupid 💔

Time: (46) Lives on the ranch with Malon. He worked full time as a mechanic before he met and married Malon, and he still works at the same place just SIGNIFICANTLY less hours because he’s also doing work on the ranch. He also plays guitar as a hobby, he played more when he was younger but Twilight’s BIGGEST flex in middle and early high school was that his dad owns some fuckass guitars

Hyrule: (20) He really really really likes rocks and being outside so he’s going into geology because he wanted to dig in the dirt and find special rocks. Sometimes Twi will text him like “bro where are you?” and if he even has service Hyrule will just send him a pic in the literal middle of fucking nowhere. Hyrule lives with Legend in the same apartment as Wars, Twi, and Sky, EXACTLY one floor below them

Legend: (20) Political science major, because he was running out of time and had to pick something. He’s not super sure what he wants to do, he has like, no plans, he didn’t think he’d be alive this long and have to DO something with his life. He works at the same little coffee shop as Sky, and those two are good friends. Every time Wars is being too loud above him (jumping, screaming, dancing) he will get up on his table and smack the ceiling and yell, or he’ll leave him angry voicemails. He left the dorms because he couldn’t handle being in the room next to Wars’s dramatic ass, he was DEVASTATED to discover all he did was move in underneath him

Wild: (19) He’s doing fashion/arts and he really really likes photography. He’s a retired skater (same as Wars) and on good days he can move around alright with minimal pain, but it’s not uncommon for him to use a mobility aid. He’s very good friends with Wars and sometimes they’ll fuck around at the rink together, other times when he has five minutes to spare Wars will drive him around and they’ll go to parks and just sit. They’re each other’s oldest friend and they both left a sport that was literally their entire world and its been hard to adjust to life without competitions but they’ve got each other. Wars makes a very serious effort to meet up with Wild 2-3 times a week

Four: (19) He’s a blacksmith, like his grandpa, but he got roped into this mess of a friend group somehow anyways. He finds most of them to be far too loud or dramatic, but they’re his best friends and he’s stuck with em

Wind: (16) He’s still in high school, but he does band and soccer. Wars took him skating ONCE because he used to babysit him, and Wind kinda got obsessed with the idea of what he calls ‘knife shoes’. Of ALL the people Wars has taken to the rink with him (who have no prior experience skating), Wind is the best. He’d be able to fuck around and play ice hockey with Wars, he’d get his ass beat if he went against an actual hockey player, but he can play a simple friendly game with Wars if Wars agrees to it

and then for anyone unfamiliar with the au!!:

Wars: (20/21; depends on what time of year I write the au in, because everything is just about their last year of undergrad and he’s a December birthday) He’s a retired figure skater who holds a world record and several gold medals, and he won the hyrule equivalent of the olympics at 18. He’s a dance major now, he’s been doing ballet since he was 3 and he never quit it, and he’s gone pretty much all day during the week because he goes skating for two hours before class, his last class ends at 5:30, and then if he’s actively in a show rehearsal ends at 10. Weekends are his only time to breathe but he’ll still have rehearsal from 1-6 and will hit the rink from like 10-11 unless Sky and Twi get on their literal hands and knees and BEG him not to because they miss him and “when will my husband return from the fucking war??”

Twilight: (21/22; his birthday is March) Bio/chem major with the intent to become a vet for ranch animals. He LOVES animals so so so so much, and he has a rather bad habit of bringing home sat wet creatures to his adoptive parents/aunt&uncle Time and Malon who just need a little extra love, including but not limited to: Several dogs, several cats, an injured bird, Warriors, a baby deer. Most of these things get taken care of and then released or Time helps them get adopted, and others get kept (at LEAST four dogs (including a very fluffy one named Wolfie), Wars, and two cats)

Sky: (21) English literature major who wants to become a teacher because he had an awful time as a disabled kid in school and he was made to feel stupid and he NEVER wants a kid to have that experience. It broke his heart to realize Wars had that experience too and still thinks he’s stupid, but Sky is determined to be the kind of english teacher you remember DECADES after you leave grade school because they were so important and changed your life. His gf Sun also loves english literature, and they go on dates to the library together and it’s just disgustingly sweet. He’s living out his best coffee shop romance au life because he does in fact work at a coffee shop and he did in fact fall in love with the girl who came in and ordered mint tea at 4 pm on the dot every day he just so happened to be working

[piesafterdark]

Chapter 1 of this is how we end/this is how we start again (my mlb fic)

Summary:

Ladybug dies taking down Monarch. Or does she? After five years, Chat Noir vehemently disagrees with her "presumed dead" status; her body was never found, after all. As he unravels this mystery, Marinette Dupain-Cheng reappears. So does a new butterfly-themed supervillain. ~~~~ “But if you don’t show up,” Ladybug says from atop the railing as she prepares to fly away, twisting to see him, “I won’t wait, I will do it alone.” "Then I won't be late." She didn't say anything afterwards, maybe she sensed what the future would bring, maybe she was just tired of him. All Chat Noir knows is that in the blink of an eye she was gone. And when tomorrow started, she was dead.

Plagg is hissing about a message when he shakes Adrien awake. It's 6:04 am, over an hour before he actually needs to be up and fourteen hours before they would meet for patrol. Plagg’s eyes, luminous green, are intense against the dusky blue sky outside; even the sun hasn’t risen.

We need to talk. Meet me at the spot. His heart races, clattering against his sternum. His hands quiver around his baton.

In seconds, he’s gone: bounding from rooftop to rooftop, cold winds rushing past his face and singing in his ears, following the path of faint moonlight towards his destination. With each leap he crosses the street-wide gaps between rooftops, further away from his prison-like house and closer to his best friend. The world opens up a little more with each leap.  

He feels like he’s flying; like he’s above the world.

His feet hit another rooftop. 

What will she want to talk about? Chat hasn’t been slacking. The last akuma attack was last Tuesday. They usually strategized getting the miraculous back during or after their patrols. He hasn’t let slip any hints about his identity, no matter how much he wants to. Chat respects her enough to honor her wishes.

The scent of freshly baked pâtisserie alerts him to his location, but Marinette would have to wait. He has a Lady to meet. 

He’d see her later, at school. They’d hold hands as they walked up the steps. She’d kiss him, not fake like in modeling, but with real emotion. Love and devotion. He’d whisper something back, something funny that would make her laugh. 

A stupid grin spreads across his face as the thought warms his windswept cheeks. In response, his stomach growls.

Hopefully Ladybug brought pastries. 

Chat Noir braces himself as he leaps onto the platform where they usually meet. The Eiffel Tower’s lights had turned off ages ago, but he doesn’t need the light: Ladybug stands by the railing, her silhouette haloed by the slow rising sun.

“You called, m’Lady?” Chat Noir bows. 

His eyes find hers and—

He doesn’t think about it. It’s been years since he was in love with her. He’s over her. He loves Marinette, he’s even said it.

The city unfurls beyond them, cloaked in dawn, slowly waking. A few windows glow with golden light, a reminder of their purpose.

They spent years of their superhero lives on this platform: staring at the city from the Eiffel Tower when nights were quiet to simple debriefs after an akuma attack to now, when Ladybug squirms with worry. 

“What took you so long?” Ladybug demands, voice higher than usual and trembling with what Chat hopes is a surplus of caffeine. 

“Missed me?” He condenses his baton and attaches it to its resting place above the base of his spine. He can’t help the coyness, it’s routine now. Reflexive.

She doesn’t smile like she usually does when he makes advances. She didn’t bring croissants, or any other pastry for that matter, when she normally would have. She always brought snacks for their optional meetings. He hopes she only forgot.

“What’s wrong?” His tail lashes behind him. 

“I know who Monarch is.” She plays with her hands, tapping her fingertips together, then intertwining them, just to pull her hands apart and start all over again. 

“Mérde! Why didn’t you tell me sooner? I would’ve—“ 

He reaches to hug her but Ladybug stops him.

Looking back, that was the heartbeat before it all ended. That frame of excitement and ecstasy that swirled at the center of Chat’s stomach. The inhale before the world shattered, sending shrapnel flying through the carefree identity of Chat Noir and ripping Adrien Agreste’s curated lifestyle to shreds.

What comes after this?

He should have immortalized this moment in his memory. Painted it thousands of times until he got the lighting right, fully appreciated the glimmer of sorrow in Ladybug’s eyes. He should have memorized the way yellow rose like a pyre’s smoke from the horizon, staining the powder blue sky. The way she contrasted against those colors like a blooming rose against gray foliage. Or the way his heart pounded to the steady rhythm of no more secrets, no more secrets, no more secrets on and on and on.

“Gabriel Agreste.” 

What? 

“What?” 

Ladybug’s body vibrates, she begins to pace, but Adrien just stands still. Like a nightstand or a bookcase, unable to move as if his joints were fused together, he just stands. At this point, he is just a piece of furniture, his mind repeating a mantra of Gabriel Agreste is Monarch which means Father is Monarch. Gabriel Agreste is Monarch. Monarch is my Father.

One plus one equals two. One plus one equals twelve.

“I think I know why.” Words spew from her mouth but Chat can’t bring himself not to listen. This was his Lady, after all. His Bugaboo. 

“It’s all about Emilie Agreste,” she looks at him meaningfully, “that’s his wife. She went missing a few years ago but she’s not really missing, she’s in their basement comatose because she used a broken miraculous—the peacock—and he wants to use the wish to bring her back. Don’t you see?” 

Don’t you see? No. I don’t.

She looks at him with furrowed brows and he thinks she’s gone mad. Maybe it’s an akuma. Maybe it’s the stress.

She tears her eyes away from his—whatever he’s feeling, he doesn’t know. Pain? Sorrow? Grief? This can’t be real. I’m at home dreaming. Maman is missing, Father’s not Monarch, Nathalie’s—

“How didn’t I see this? It’s so obvious! How could I not have noticed?” She’s tearing out her pigtails, dragging her fingers over her eyes.

She’s gone mad. She’s akumatized. She’s having stress hallucinations.

“Ladybug, how do you even know this?” he croaks. 

His mouth is dry, like sand cakes every crevice. His hands ball into fists until he registered that his palms held pinpricks of pain. 

I’m not dreaming.

His heart hurt. Was it bad his heart hurt? Was this what a heart attack felt like? Chest pain, shortness of breath, pain or discomfort in the jaw, neck, back, arm, or shoulder. Feeling nauseous, light headed or unusually tired. He counted the symptoms he read in one of his mother’s books. Maybe he was having a—

“He was my mentor and we worked long hours—“ she‘s already referring to him in the past tense “—but he always disappeared just before Akuma attacks and the Akumas were almost always people he’d just fired. Then—“

“But he’s been akumatized before,” he breathed out, trying to find the oxygen that eluded him.

“We—Tikki and I—think that it’s possible for holders to use their powers on themselves. And Tikki saw him transform! I saw him transform! Chat, please say you believe me.”

“I–But—How can—Are you sure?” Breathe in. “Are you really sure?” Breathe in. “How can you know that he’s Monarch, or that my—” he gasps, “ that Mme. Agreste was the peacock holder?”

He hates arguing. It’s why he never wants to inherit the company, too much arguing. Father—Monarch—says it’s the reason behind his gray hair. That and terrorizing Paris. 

Stop. 

Breathe out.

“You already asked that, Chat, and I know, okay? I know for a fact that M. Agreste is Monarch and if I could change that I would.” She bites her lip, but Chat feels nothing. No spark, no yearning. His unkillable crush is finally dead and he feels nothing but butterflies dying. “Mme. Agreste…I think…I’ll tell you when it’s over. I’d change it all if I could. But I can’t.”

Her eyes are wide and frantic. Crazed, but he believes her. Mérde, he believes her.

Does she think he knew? Not Chat, but Adrien? Does she think that he helped? 

Breathe. In.

“Does… Does anyone else know? What about Adrien—th-the son?” 

His voice comes out too high. Cold air sears his nostrils as he breathes. He squeezes his eyes shut.

“No… no, I don’t think so,” Ladybug says. “You, me, and Alya Cesaire are the only people who know.”

The sky beyond her lights up in sunrise; a righteous pink stains the clouds. From her point of view, he’d be drowning in the receding night. Alya Cesaire knew his father’s identity before he did. 

“But people will know soon,” she continues. “Tomorrow, Alya will post the evidence onto the Ladyblog. So to avoid any vigilante justice, we have to retire him tonight.”

“Tonight?” He couldn’t do it tonight. It’s too soon. “I can’t do it tonight. I-I have plans.”

“Then clear your plans! This is our job! This is why we’re Paris’s superheroes!” Her arms are spread like wings, gesturing to the city around them. “Our duty to the people! It's going to be over soon—all the stress, the worrying, the constant threat of akumas. We can go back to the way life was before Monarch!” Plastered across her face is something like a smile, but it’s too erratic. She’s gone mad. My Lady’s gone mad.

“I-I need time, Ladybug. Please, I just need some time to think. We’ll have Alya postpone the post, until tomorrow night, at least. Just give me until then,” he begs. “Then I’ll be ready. You and me, okay? We’re a team. Us against the world.”

They argued then, but he didn’t want to remember that, even if they were a few extra moments of basking in her life.

“Tomorrow morning,” she says after a moment of respite. “When Adrien Agreste is off at school. I’m giving you until then.” 

He gives her a watery smile, hoping that she understands the depth of his gratitude even if she doesn’t understand his reasoning.

Dawn had passed and he was now surrounded by the blue of her eyes. He suffocated under its weight. 

“But if you don’t show up,” Ladybug says from atop the railing as she prepares to fly away, twisting to see him, “I won’t wait. I will do it alone.”

He should have screamed at her that no, she shouldn’t. Should have grabbed her and covered her in bubble wrap and held her until the sun rose over tomorrow. That she would die if she did. That he would only be five minutes late. That she should have waited. That losing her would kill him—killed him.

“Then I won’t be late,” he says, like it’s a death sentence.

She didn’t say anything afterwards, maybe she sensed what the future would bring, maybe she was just tired of him. 

All Chat Noir knows is that in the blink of an eye she was gone. 

And when tomorrow started, she was dead.

[xoxoladyaz]

Steddie Bigbang #177: Infernally Yours is HERE!

Finally, after months of work I am SO HAPPY to start publishing my contribution to @steddiebang, a post-Season 3 AU in which Hopper doesn't go to Russia, the Byers family stays in Hawkins, and Steve Harrington finally agrees to play DnD with Hellfire. Chapters 1 and 2 are up today, chapters 3 and 4 will go up on the 9th, and the last two chapters (and the epilogue) will be posted on the 16th.

Here's the link to the story on Ao3 and a preview below :) I can't wait to see what you all think!

Listen. Steve Harrington knew that he had some sins to pay for, okay? He was kind of a stuck-up shit for most of high school and while he didn’t go out of his way to, like, ruin anybody’s day – cough, cough, Tommy Hagan – he also didn’t really reach out to anyone who needed help either. He’d led on a lot of girls before Nance, too, and if judging by the fact that the only girls he dated these days wanted a good time and not a long time, well, he had some work to do on the whole “relationship” and “finding everlasting love” front. But he’s done the work to be better! Granted, a lot of the work consisted of him getting beaten up and/or tortured by other people while protecting a group of unthankful little shitheads, but it’s still progress. And, not to brag, but he got Robin Buckley as a best friend out of the whole thing, so really, Steve Harrington’s not doing so bad on the whole “redemption” thing, thank you.

So why, why does the universe continue to torment him?

“ – and that’s when Lorcan Fairwood used Horde Breaker to fire into the pack of gnolls, dealing five points of damage to Kazar, the gnoll pack leader, and then Eddie said - ”

“Dingus,” Robin hissed, knocking her elbow into Steve’s and dislodging him from his thoughts. “Get Dingus Junior to knock-it-off with this dork talk before I knock him into the recent returns.”

Groaning, Steve rubbed his palms against his dry eyes and braced for impact. “We got it, Henderson, Munson’s the best thing to ever happen to Dorks and Demons - ”

“ – Dungeons and Dragons, Steve, I know that you know that’s what it’s called - ”

“ – and as much as I like hanging out with you, dude, these multi-hour play-by-plays aren’t convincing me that this nerd shit is, like, fun or whatever,” he finished with a sigh. Robin shot him an exasperated but grateful look and then slid her newest stack of freshly rewound returns his way.

“Shelving time, doinkus.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Steve rolled his eyes and reached for the stack.

Dustin snorted and kicked at the front of his desk, which, the attitude on this kid, seriously. “Guess Eddie was right.” 

Steve froze. What the hell does that mean?

“What the hell does that mean?”

Dustin snorted again before spinning to face Steve, his hands falling to his hips. “Eddie said says that jocks only care about other jocks. And jock stuff.”

“Hey, okay, first of all, there’s only one of us that’s actually saved your life multiple times and it’s not Eddie Munson, so jot that down,” Steve snapped, dropping the tapes back onto the counter (and ignoring Robin’s yelp as they tumbled everywhere). “And second, just because we don’t have the same interests doesn’t mean I don’t care about you, man. That’s a shit thing to say.”

Henderson folded inward, his eyes dropping towards the ground and voice losing its normal intensity. “Sorry, Steve.”

“And third – look, Henderson,” Steve sighed at Dustin’s drooping. (Look, he was a little shithead with the biggest ego in every room, but he was Steve’s little shithead and he hated to see him upset – even when it was his own fault.) “Maybe it isn’t like, totally boring in the moment or whatever, but getting a two-hour play by play after your game every Saturday isn’t doing a whole lot to convince me, man.”

“Well,” Dustin perked up slightly and cleared his throat, “we’re always looking for new members - ”

“Nope, no way.”

“Steve,” Henderson’s whining was out in full force now, “it would be so much fun! You wouldn’t even have to do that much work; I could help you get started and - ”

“No.”

“ – seriously, I can make you a character sheet so fast, and our party could really use another fighter anyways - ”

“No, Henderson!”

“ – besides, we haven’t gotten to hang out with you as much now that school started, and you know that Will’s having a hard time because everyone keeps calling him ‘Zombie Boy’ and he would be so excited to have you playing with us - ”

Shit, he’s pulling out the Zombie Boy card. Shit, shit, shit.

“Henderson - ”

“ – and, you know, I totally believe you and everything but Mike is pretty convinced that you’re still an asshole, especially with everything Eddie’s said, and this could be your chance to prove him wrong!” Dustin finished emphatically, his chest puffing with exertion.

Steve shot an exasperated look over the top of the Horror section towards Robin, who was pouting in mock-agreement with Dustin.

Traitor.

Sighing, Steve shoved Friday the 13th onto the shelf and dropped his gaze towards Dustin. “One game.”

Dustin let out a loud whoop, hopping in place and punching wildly at the air. “YES!”

“Just one game, Henderson, that’s it.”

“I’LL TAKE IT!” Letting out an even louder victory cry, Dustin raced for the door. “I’m going to get working on your character sheet right now – Wednesday, 3:30 in the drama room,” Dustin said, whirling around to point at Steve. “You’ll be there?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll be there.”

“YES! Don’t worry Steve, you won’t regret this!” Dustin beamed and then he was out the door, disappearing into the October sun.

[hey-heigo]

Chapter 1

Ok here we go

SEE HERE FOR GENERAL WARNINGS AND FIC SUMMARY

Some pre-chapter notes:

From what I know, very few blind people actually perceive their surroundings as complete darkness, and it's more common for people to still perceive changes in light.

For Byakuya, he has low vision, so he can see color and vague outlines, but finer details are more or less impossible. Get Gaussian blurred, idiot.

I'll include content warning tags before each chapter but if I miss anything please let me know.

Content warning tags: implied non-consensual body modification, ableist internal dialogue

next >

The first thing that Byakuya Togami notices when he wakes up isn't the unfamiliar classroom of his surroundings, or the uncomfortable position in which he was slumped over on the wooden desk.

Rather, the first thing he wonders is: Why are my glasses so filthy?

His surroundings are fogged around him as he blinks, squints, and tries to make out anything more distinct than a vague, fuzzy blob of color. He takes off his glasses and cleans them with a silk handkerchief from his jacket pocket, and puts them back on. And then takes them off again, places them to his mouth and fogs the surface, wipes them, and tries again. And then again, and again, until at last he sets slowly down the spectacles with a quiet 'click' against the desk, blinking slowly, deliberately.

It didn't make sense. It was one thing if his glasses were just filthy, though he couldn't imagine who he would let get close enough to dirty them up to this point, but it was another thing for him to be nearly blind without them. Even without his lenses, his vision was nearly 20/40 - and yet, here he found himself squinting his eyes to nearly shutting, and was still unable to discern even the large, colorful characters on the brochure on the desk next to him, even when held less than an inch away from his face.

Impossible, he thinks first. He must still be half-asleep, and he rubs his eyes, trying to wipe away some invisible veil, knuckling against his eyelids until stars burst in the darkness. But the fog still didn't clear.

The realization is a sick dread that settles into the pit of his stomach. He doesn't panic, because a Togami doesn't panic, but an old anxiety was beginning to grow, twining roots into his chest. He opts to ignore that and the rising beat of his pulse and begins flicking through his memories, logically and methodically, trying to think when and how this could have happened.

He woke up this morning at his usual five AM. He went through his usual morning routine until six, at which point his chauffeur drove him to Hope's Peak Academy by seven. He passed excited crowds of news reporters, fellow students, and crying parents, through the school doors...

And then...

Nothing. He rubs his thumb against the bridge of his nose, trying to come up with anything past stepping foot into the entrance hall, but all he gets is a nauseating blur, the memories turning to mush. Had he passed out? Did someone carry him here? How long had it been since then?

What time is it, he thinks, and looks up. His watch is as good as useless, the pearl hands blending in nearly perfectly with the egg-colored enamel face, so he scans the room for a wall clock, and finally locates a vague, white circle hanging above the dark expanse of the blackboard. The thin black hands aren't even visible to him, and he ends up having to stand directly below it to make out what positions they're pointing at. It was just before 8, which meant that it hadn't even been an hour since he first crossed the threshold.

It was possible that that would have been enough time to knock him out, blind him, and then leave him here, but Hope's Peak prided itself on its security, especially for its high-class students. And Byakuya had been surrounded by his bodyguards all the way until his unconsciousness. And he had made sure that the few siblings who survived his family's game of inheritance didn't have the resources or the will to try anything so petty as vengeance.

He rubs his eyes again, as if that would do anything. From what he could tell, he was in a classroom, likely still within the Academy, and it'd do him no good to stay in the room in the off-chance that his attacker returned. He needed to find someone - faculty, maybe, or one of his guards - and get his eyes fixed, first and foremost. And he wasn't so helpless that he'd let someone get the drop on him a second time, blinded or not.

But even with this plan in mind, he found his hand trembling as he set it on the doorknob, and he hesitates before he leaves the room.

The hallways are strangely empty, despite the earlier hubbub. There are no students running around trying to find their classrooms or their dorms, or exploring the facilities. There are no teachers either, offering welcomes and introductions, promoting the safety and warmth of the Academy. Rather, the place is eerily silent, and it unnerves Byakuya further.

He catches himself glancing around far too often, scanning desperately for any movement, and scolds himself for it. It was a show of fear, and one that he should have abandoned long ago, even when he was being chased by his older siblings in a wild game of power upheavals and assassinations. But between the lack of sound and the fact that his surroundings were entirely unfamiliar (and furthermore, entirely obscured), he couldn't help canting his head around like a nervous deer, trying to find even the smallest detail that could offer him anything.

He finally catches on to the low murmur of talking, however, and after a brief moment of consideration, walks towards the sound. If it was assassins, they would have to be very unprofessional ones to be speaking so casually in such an open space. And as he enters a large room, walled off on one side by a mass of steel-gray, he sees a few people standing around; none of them dressed remotely like an assassin, or acting like one, and he could even recognize the majority of them from their vague silhouettes and general colors, and the news article he had perused that morning about his fellow classmates. There was the broad frame of Sakura Ogami, the Ultimate Martial Artist, and then the wild, fluffed-up hair of Yasuhiro Hagakure, the Ultimate Clairvoyant. Even the wild pompadour of the Ultimate Biker Gang Leader, Mondo Owada, didn't escape his recognition, nor did the punkish, uneducated tone of his voice.

"Who the fuck're you?" The Owada-shaped figure grunts as Byakuya approaches, and he frowns at the rudeness, though he had expected nothing less.

He doesn't bother to respond right away, instead looking between those gathered. He counts thirteen blobs, which meant they were still expecting two more to join them to complete this year's class of sixteen. Standing closer, he can just make out some facial features when he squints; Owada's face in particular, has his brow scrunched in a look of disdain, and one person - Toko Fukawa, maybe? Judging by her braided pigtails - seemed to be watching him, though she quickly looks away as he turns towards her.

"Hey, I'm talkin' to you!"

"I don't talk to ruffians," Byakuya replies, not even bothering to face him and ignoring the indignant sputters as he walks away. Even if all these people were strangers to him, he felt better already, being among them. The safety of a herd was something that a Togami was usually above, but it was good to take advantage of such things during perilous times, such as now. And at the very least, it might be harder for him to get singled out.

"Excuse me," comes a different voice, though no less sharp or intense. This time from a straight-backed figure in white, and with dark, spiky hair. "My name is Kiyotaka Ishimaru. Please introduce yourself!"

"And why should I?"

Ishimaru wasn't as easily ruffled by Byakuya's brusque manner as Owada, though his stark eyebrows did somehow furrow even more on his pale face. "As a class, we should all work together to get along for our educational crusade! We all have already introduced ourselves to each other. Please do the same!"

He was annoying. But he had a point. If Byakuya was going to be living with these people for his high-school life, he might as well let them know how to refer to him...and he had a feeling if he didn't offer the minimal level of cooperation to Ishimaru, he would never see the end of it. "Byakuya Togami," He replies simply, and moves on before anyone can say anything else.

None of these people seem to be killers. He can't sense any killing intent, though he does get an inexplicable shiver as he walks by Fukawa, standing next to the twin, pale-pink fans of Junko Enoshima's hair, though he puts that down as the rank odor that comes off of her as he passes. He settles to stand a small distance away from all of them, and with his curt introduction over and him standing seemingly out of earshot, they resume their conversation, and Byakuya can make out a few phrases that equally reassure and unsettle him.

'Do you think he's...like us?'

'Must have. I mean, he was walking from the direction of the classrooms, right?'

'Someone should go ask him, can you go ask...?'

'Forget it. He freaks me out, glaring like that...'

It sounded like they were all in a similar state, having woken up in a classroom and found their way here. He wonders if any of them were also blind, or otherwise found themselves suddenly impaired, but it wouldn't do him any good to reveal that about himself now. No matter how much safer it was to be a part of the group, he couldn't let them know his weaknesses, not if it turned out that one of them did mean him some kind of harm.

Standing from this position, he can finally recognize where he was. It was the entrance hall of the Academy, and behind him was where the entrance should have been. But instead, as he reaches out to touch it, he's met with a sheer surface of metal, heavy and unyielding, and not the proud, hand-carved wooden doors that he had passed through not an hour earlier. Was this place not Hope's Peak, then? If so, where was it? And how did they all get transported here?

He clicks his tongue, annoyed. He'd had nothing but questions and unsolved mysteries since he woke up, and it frustrated him almost as much as his vision. He fights the urge to keep touching his eyes, settling on drumming his fingers against his elbow, and finally polishing his glasses lenses once more. At this point, the action was as good as meaningless, but the repetitiveness of the motion was calming, and he couldn't help the quiet glimmer of hope that maybe, eventually, it would clear up.

He hears the newcomer before he sees them, the quiet click of footsteps from the hall making his head jerk up. He doesn't recognize this figure, not even as they approached nearer; white hair and dark purple clothes, not matching any of the profiles he had seen. He hears the others and Ishimaru give them a similar greeting, and the figure responds, voice calm and feminine.

"My name is Kyoko Kirigiri," Is all they say. Like Byakuya, they don't offer anything more, and for some reason that puts him on edge. They're too much like him, too calculating and careful - not the same fodder as the rest of the class - and they strike him as someone who knows more than they're letting on. He hears them ask some questions, mostly in regards to the classrooms and how everyone got here, before moving to stand just a few meters away from him in silence. Not approaching him, nor letting themselves be approached by anyone else.

Dangerous, he notes. He mentally files this away, and pretends to be too focused on cleaning the nose-pads of his glasses to pay them any mind.

A few minutes later, their sixteenth class member joins them. Makoto Naegi, someone else who hadn't stood out to Byakuya on the roster, has spiky brown hair and a bumbling, wondering voice. Unlike Kirigiri, he takes his time to talk to each of his classmates, and he sounds friendly but confused. And a little dense, in Byakuya's opinion - his entire demeanor screams 'commoner'.

Byakuya doesn't bother to say anything as Naegi moves to stand before him, not even as he feels expectant eyes resting on his face. But it becomes clear that the boy had no plans of walking away until he got a name at least, so Byakuya sighs and puts on his glasses, and glares down at Naegi, his face no more visible than it had been a moment before.

"Name's Byakuya Togami," Is all he says. Naegi babbles some kind of greeting, but Byakuya is already not paying attention, gaze wandering. This one didn't seem as dangerous as Kirigiri, at least, or even particularly outstanding in any other way. That made him seem all the stranger; a seemingly unremarkable person in a school meant for remarkable people; Byakuya couldn't imagine what his special talent could be, if he had one at all.

He tries to focus his gaze on one of the banners on the wall. Royal blue and etched with gold lettering - if he tries, he might be able to find the letters that match one of his ancestors. He frowns, staring intently…

"Um, are you...are your eyes okay?"

Byakuya stiffens immediately, eyes snapping back down to Naegi's face. "What is that supposed to mean?" He hisses sharply, and Naegi startles back, surprised.

"Sorry! I didn't mean-you were just squinting, even after putting on your glasses, so I just-" he stammers, voice deceptively innocent. Byakuya feels his blood run cold, his fists clenching at his sides. "Um, I'll just....go? Sorry again?"

He doesn't relax until Naegi has scurried away, nails biting into his palms as he tries to calm himself. Had he really been squinting so obviously this whole time, or had that peasant just been absurdly observant? Whatever the case, Byakuya would have to fix that habit, or else, keep the others from finding out.

Never mind what he thought earlier about Naegi seeming harmless. That boy was probably the most dangerous one here.

next >

[catiuskaa]

new task: valentine’s day {ACTS}

A/N: reposting by acts! [see full version here]. wanted to see if this format works better (and yes i will squeeze everything in this one right here cause its amazing and i 100% worked my ass off on it)

PAIRING! seungmin x reader ; enemies/rivals2lovers!

SUMMARY: boring classes, boring classmates, boring assignments…to seungmin, everyone is boring even if he’s used to pretend otherwise, but you seem to get on his nerves. you, your stupid poem, and his stupid letter.

WC: 4.408k

CW: fluffy comfort, use of spanglish (not relevant to the plot, dw), use of text format, the reader is stupidly short (which i know all about), academic rivals, bad student reader x good student seungmin, mentions of the unability to deal with complicated feelings, mentions of masking feelings, slight hint of bullying, mentions of being followed, (pet)names: little one, shortie, shortcake, smallable, pretty, hyunjin as a walking therapist, and the ending is kind of a reference to a show i'm obsessed with (not gonna say it so i don't spoil it for you guys hehehe)

|PROLOGUE| |ACT 1| |ACT 2| |ACT 3|

[☆★🌷★☆]

{ACT 2: UNDER THE STREETLIGHT}

After avoiding Seungmin like the plague all Thursday, only looking at his back when you zoned off in class, Friday arrived earlier than expected.

You hadn’t been able to concentrate at all, the thought of his sweet taste lingering in your mouth, almost letting you feel the ghost of his lips pressed against yours.

“Hello? Earth to… oh, you’re awake, Jesus.” Abril looked at you with a smile, but she was unable to hide her worried look.

“Of course I am,” you mumbled, shaking your head sideways. “What’s going on?”

“You haven’t even touched your delicious and totally-not-overcooked pasta.” Lara mentioned the cafeteria lunch as she poked it whith her fork, full of humour. “It leads to believe that you’re dealing with something far more interesting that the technical drawing homework, that’s for sure.”

You bit your lip, hesitating.

“Is it because Henry Li has been ignoring you?” Noa mentioned softly.

You blinked, puzzled. “Huh?”

He’d been ignoring you? Now that she had mentioned, maybe that could’ve happened. Maybe you would’ve realized if you hadn’t been so focused on Seungmin and whatever-happened-that-cannot-and-should-not-be-remembered-every-five-minutes…

…or maybe you should look for an easier name for it.

“Uh, no, he invited me to this new place today, actually,” you brushed your hair with your hand mindlessly. “But I’m fine. Really. Just tired.” You smiled at the girls, and joined in at their conversation.

After lunch, you separated from Lara and Noa, who had literature, and Abril, who had been hanging out with a guy called Jeongin from her photography club recently, and so you headed to the study room.

It was a quiet place, quieter that what you had initially expected for a high school study room. Matter of fact, you thought it was a pity that the school closed it after class, considering that in that case you wouldn’t have to walk to the public library.

You opened the door silently, finding that there were barely any students, only three or four people studying silently. You were heading towards a lonely corner so you could listen to music in a high volume without having to pay attention if it could be heard through your headphones. Or maybe, considering that it hadn’t been a lie and that you had slept like four hours maximum, you could probably rest there until the bell rang.

You snickered when you looked to your right, finding someone struggling with the technical drawing homework that had been assigned that morning, the one that Lara and Noa had been talking about.

You gently tapped the guy’s shoulder, but spoke before he even turned.

“You’re missing this incline here,” you whispered on his ear, your arms coming above his shoulders, placing your hands above his, placing the square and bevel on the right angle. “It should be seen, but with dotted lines, get it? That way the side-view makes sense.” You added with a soft giggle.

“Oh, right. T-thank you…” he mumbled, not facing you.

You brushed it off as weird, but your sleepy self wasn’t bothered enough to notice or pry, and instead smiled, ruffled his hair and settled in your cozy little corner, placing your scarf in between your arms and rested your head on it, merely “resting your eyes”, but only if a teacher happened to come and check on the students.

Seungmin stared at your sleeping figure, eyes almost wide. He felt like his heart was going to explode underneath the layers of flesh. His hands tingled, his usually warm and sweaty palms missing the comfortable coldness of yours, so soothing and relaxing.

Either you had completely gone crazy, or he had fallen asleep trying to complete the stupid assignment. He knew you were good at technical drawing, it was one of the subjects were he wasn’t. It wasn’t a surprise when several students started asking you for help on their papers and assignments, considering that you were one of the few who was able to receive praise from the teacher, a middle-aged man with no kind of vocation with kids or teaching, by any means.

But it had never happened when he was the one in need of help, had you ever considered the idea of helping him.

He watched you, puzzled, as he had never done before, and maybe it would be the first time of many because Seungmin found himself liking what he was seeing, dare I say mesmerized by the image before him.

By you.

Your sleepy figure was as calm as he had ever seen from you, sleeping with little to no care in the world. Your hair remained stuck in a ponytail, which allowed Seungmin to notice that it left the skin of your neck visible, and despite the voice on his head saying that it was a behaviour quite like a man from the Modern Ages, just being so fixated at that small bit of skin, he couldn’t help but feel bashfully amazed.

Suddenly, he noticed you licked your lips, your eyes still closed and your small smile never faltering, but that made something start to flutter in his stomach, as if a whole lot of butterflies had been awaken at the sight of you, tranquil, and sweet, and cute, and he forced himself to stop looking at you abruptly, wondering why he had done that in the first place.

Licking your lips only made Seungmin aware of how dry his were, and action plus the thought of your lips immediately brought back what had happened on Wednesday.

Crazy. He’d gone completely crazy.

He felt his hand slowly approach his lips and he grazed them with his fingers, almost able to taste your chapstick back on his lips. Because he had been able. All Wednesday night. And a small part of him wanted more of it.

He blushed, scratching his eyes. He hadn’t slept shit, his mind betraying him every time he attempted to close his eyes instantly going back to the memory of how you stared at him after your kiss, dark pupils, and red lips, and so ridiculously gorgeous that it made Seungmin wonder why whenever he saw you he resorted to his first line in code: being mean.

He never used that side with anyone. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t tried, because small, teasing and slightly unhinged Kim Seungmin had tried to be himself in middle school, and… well.

Let’s just say that it didn’t work like expected.

But everyone loved dorky, funny and sweet Seungmin. Even with the difference with grades, that had definetely not been appreciated in his early years, nowadays people would see that as a part of him, and he recieved praise for it, not only from teachers, but also nice classmates, who sometimes went to seek help from him.

He just needed to pretend for a bit. Smile here and there, and put on a sheepish act of bashfulness that despite it not being natural, it wasn’t totally bad. It wasn’t like middle school.

But then you came in the picture.

Something about you made Seungmin want to tease you. To see you finally look at him after battling in your head if you even should, and then, sometimes when you were mad enough, you’d glare at him, and he couldn’t help but grin. Your cheeks flushed in anger that creeped up your body, how you looked at him through your lashes or how you’d tease him back. The first time you had done that, his brain’s chemistry had changed, he was sure of that.

He didn’t care about the mean remarks, and that now seemed almost obvious, considering what had happened almost two days ago in the school bus.

But it got impossible to miss when Seungmin noticed your sleepy self shivering in your slumber. With a mental groan, careful of not making any kind of loud noise in the study room, he slowly got closer to your corner, and tried to close the windows near it. And failed, because the stupid windows were old and rusty, only able to move them a bit.

He bit his lip, arguing in his head. Would that be enough? No, it probably wasn’t, right? Yeah, it couldn’t be. Considering that you always wore thin clothing, always borrowing your mates’ jackets…

…it couldn’t possibly hurt to do a bit more, right?

Seungmin approached you further, and shook a hand close to your face, but you were dead, as still as a fallen tree, despite the sunlight that enetered throught the windows glowing on your face, the Sun in winter, that brought little to no warmth, made you shine in his eyes.

He’d see you in the public library a couple of hours later. It didn’t mean anything. He could probably tease you for sleeping in school later. Yeah. And then he’d ask for his jacket back.

Seungmin was lost in his thoughts as he carefully settled his jacket over your shoulders, and he froze when you sighed deeply, surrounded by a familiar warmth and a cozy scent that you didn’t know you had missed or needed until then, but you didn’t wake up.

He blinked when he noticed your phone in your hand, the screen suddenly turning on. He giggled at your wallpaper, which had a silly joke on it and a funny doodle of a banana.

But then his eyes trailed down to the notification that had made the phone turn on.

[3 new messages from: henry li🫧]

> sorry i didn’t get to see u yesterday, had to sort smth out!

>guys.its.totally.a.real.address.wdym.lol

> it’s the address for later, shortcake 😉❤️

…huh?

Seungmin blinked once. Twice. Nah, his glasses had to be deceiving him. Then, another notification popped up.

> can’t wait to see you ❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥

He winced silently.

Ugh. What a cringy choice of emojis.

Did you really like this guy?

He frowned, going back to his place in the study room.

Ugh.

He didn’t care, obviously. Why would he care? That wasn’t his business. Never was, never would be. Not like he was interested. Pffft, no. Not at all. Yeah, nah. That kiss had been a one time thing. Totally. 100%. He wasn’t thinking about it again. Nope. Nor did he want to kiss you again. Not in a chance.

Just… ugh.

It was just that… no. Scratch that. No further comments.

He sighed as he went back to his work, feeling a sudden inspiration hit him as he took out a blank paper for the English class valentine’s assignment, but not before he looked at you again, then shook his head, turning the music back on in his headphones. He started writing, drafting, and throwing papers away, getting slightly desperate at his perfectionism.

He sighed. His eyes trailed off towards you.

Slowly, words started to flow in his head. Pretty sentences, things that he had kept hidden in the back of his mind. Maybe it could be good to let it all out. It couldn’t hurt. Yeah.

So he stared writing. Vomiting word after word. And he finished earlier than expected, with two papers.

One was perfect for the english assignment. It was boring and dull enough to be handed in for a school work, but good enough for his perfectionism.

And the other… was something different.

Something that had only happened because you were there, in front of him.

He stood up, letter on his hand. He leaned against the table you were sleeping in, and settled the jacket further on your shoulders. He sighed, grabbing a pen from his pencil case, folding the letter and signed it.

Maybe it was a bad idea, he thought as he picked up his stuff from the table and adjusted his glasses on the bridge of his nose.

He looked at your figure once more before heading out.

It had been to check if you were still asleep, of course.

Just to check.

Yeah.

[☆★🌷★☆]

Your phone vibrated in your hand again.

And again.

And again.

With a groan, you silently accepted that there was no way you could fool an inanimate object into believing that you were still asleep.

But when you yawned and looked around and didn’t find the posters in your room, but rather a whole bunch of tables and chairs, your eyes widened.

It hadn’t been your alarm but a phone call that had awoken you.

“Y-yeah?” You mumbled, picking up the call and quickly taking your backpack and scarf and rushing out of the study room, taking a quick scan and making sure you weren’t leaving anything behind.

“I’m heading to the club now, shortcake.” A low voice greeted. “Are you getting ready?”

Who…?

“H-henry?” You frowned slightly.

You heard him snicker through the other side. “Yeah?”

Fuck, shit, fuck.

“N-nothing! Nothing, I, uh, I was just doing my make up. Y-you know.”

What? You frowned, even more this time. No, that didn’t make any sense. You always blabbered about how you never did your make up for clubbing because the one you owned was cheap and never stayed on anyways.

“Sure, yeah.”

It didn’t seem like he had noticed.

“You can head there before me. I’ll go there eventually, yeah?”

You heard him snicker on the other side of the phone call. “Ok, baby.” He cleared his throat, stuttering a bit. “Y-yeah, I mean, I’ll uh… get there in a bit. Don’t rush.”

Only then you felt that the wind from outside wasn’t freezing your bones like usual. You squinted at the jacket you were wearing.

“Henry, did you…?” But he hung up.

It probably was him. Yeah. That’s why he had called you. To make sure you’d wake up.

Besides, there were little to no people who’d do such a kind gesture towards you, and even if the jacket was pretty much your style and it smelled like heaven, it didn’t feel like something any of the girls would keep around.

So, why didn’t it made you feel giddy that Henry had given you his jacket?

You kept on running through the hallways and catched the bus that was usually there for students who had extracurricular classes, unlucky people who had to stay in school late in Fridays. You never had, using Fridays to be a bit lazy or to start homework sooner just to hand it in earlier than Seungmin.

Oh.

Friday.

Seungmin.

The library.

You bit your nails, staring through the window.

Would he wait there for long?

What was he going to do once he figured you weren’t going to show up?

Were you… feeling guilty?

No… that… that couldn’t be, you chuckled dryly. Mean decisions against Kim Seungmin didn’t spend too much time on the judgmental side of your brain. You just… teased him back. And he’d take it. And double it. And so on.

So why did this feel too mean?

Could it be because of whatever-happened-that-cannot-and-should-not-be-remembered-every-five-minutes?

Could the fact that it had been the best thing that had happened in a long while?

Well, fine.

Not just ‘thing’.

A kiss.

And for fuck’s sake, what kiss.

You groaned and grunted, sprinting home as soon as the bus stopped.

Why did it always have to be him?

You entered your room and burst open your closet. The jacket was cool, you thought. And if you were going to see Henry, you could just wear it and hand it back to him in the club.

It was vintage, but its warmth engulfed you as if it had been handmade. Its funky designs and patterns looked cute, and its grey color contrasted well with it. You chose the first dress you saw, a tight black dress with no sleeves that you would’ve discarded as too short if you had more time, but it wasn’t exactly something you could’ve bragged about.

Jacket, dress, high socks, boots, wallet, phone, keys, headphones… yeah. You nodded, checking all of the boxes in your mental list, and started hurriedly walking to the address he had sent.

You hoped you weren’t going to be too late.

[☆★🌷★☆]

“Pick up, pick up, pick up…”

“The number you are trying to call is turned off or out of coverage. Please, leave your message after the—”

You hang up, tired of hearing that mechanic voice over and over again.

You looked around you, and there was nothing that looked like a club. You had tried to enter the building that the address lead to, but it hadn’t got well.

A strange figure opened a small window and gave you a look, almost disgusted. It took you a second to understand that they were wearing a mask, with dark lace and other colours. But just when you were about to speak, the window slammed close.

You blinked, puzzled. Where the fuck was Henry sending you? What kind of club was this?

You had started to roam around the building, trying to call him —and failing misserably, because the damn guy couldn’t pick up the fucking phone for the life of him—, but now you were starting to run out of ideas.

It was past 12pm, your legs shivered with every slight wind that swooshed your way, and there was no one that was going to pick up the phone. Not Henry, that ridiculous imbecile, not Lucas, who always bragged about having his phone in night mode, so nothing would get to him until morning, and not the girls, because Noa had her phone turned off, Atenea was most likely sleeping, Abril and Lara hadn’t picked up either, and your list of close friends who could possibly pick up was… that.

And no one was picking up the fucking phone.

You were about to keep on ranting about how disgustingly bad this was turning out to be, but you heard footsteps coming your way. You looked around, but didn’t find the source. With a frown, you walked to the building again

Placing your hand on one of the windows, who were dark and almost impossible to see through, you could notice that in the dim light from what could be seen outside, Henry was well entertained with a certain kind of company, so much that he couldn’t even pick up your phone.

You closed your eyes and leaned your forehead against the tinted glass. Of course. Yeah. That made total sense. It was Henry, after all. He had always been known to be kind of an asshole anyways. It couldn’t possibly come out as a surprise the fact that he actually was.

You shook your head and mentally mocked him and the blond girl he was kissing.

Henry Li could go to Hell.

Guess there was nothing left to do now. You had dumped Seungmin, and Henry had dumped you. It was an ass move over an ass move. Maybe you kinda deserved it.

But then your thoughts ended in a halt, because you swore you could feel a shadow starting to follow you from a distance.

They were behind you, but not too close, and due to their hoodie it was imposible to distinguish their face.

So you started walking. Turning left. Right. Left again. Right. Just kept on walking. Don’t look behind you. They’d probably just leave. This had to be your imagination, 100%.

But when you took a peak, the silhouette was not only still behind you, slowly walking towards you, but a slight bit closer this time.

You swallowed dry, gulped, even. Your heart tightened in your chest. What kind of joke was this? Your eyes were tearing up. You were tired, and this was mental. Adrenaline rumped through your body, and even if you were already lost, you kept on walking.

You took your phone from your pocket. Think, think, think. Who could you call? Who could pick up at one am? You scrolled down your list of contacts, until for a reason you don’t fully get, your eyes stopped at a certain name.

—> seungmeannie

It couldn’t possibly hurt to try… right?

You sniffed almost silently, and pressed call.

One beep.

Two beeps.

Three beeps.

You started crying a bit louder, unable to hold it back.

“Eh, hi…?”

“S-seungmin!” You sobbed, smiling. It was the first time in your life you had been that happy just from being able to hear his voice, raspy and low.

“W-what?” He stopped talking, and you guessed that it was because he hadn’t figured out who was calling him so late at night. “Do you know what time it is, you fun-sized dingus?” He groaned sleepily at the phone.

You bit your lip and sniffed.

“Wait. Are you… crying?” His tone had changed.

“I-i’m sorry about t-this eve-ening.” You sobbed, failing to hold back the tears, hugging the jacket that was still on your shoulders.

“Are you drunk, little one?” You never thought your shoulders could relax as fast as they had when his soft tone of voice called you that stupid nickname.

“N-no, I… I went to this stupid club, with-“

“With Henry, yeah.” The way he said his name, as if he wanted to put that stupid bitch in a box and send him to the end of the world took you by surprise.

“B-but um, he’s not picking up my phone and I…” you gulped. Taking a peek behind you, you shivered. “I think someone’s following me.”

“Wait, what?” Seungmin had never stood up from bed as fast as he had done that night. “Where are you?” He asked to the phone as he randomly picked a sweater and his glasses, biting his lip as he struggled to put on his shoes.

“I… I don’t know.” You sobbed. “I started walking away so he’d go, but it didn’t work.” You mumbled, sniffing. You felt so stupid.

“Everything’s going to be fine, yeah?” It was the first time in the whole afternoon that you felt like that statement could be true. Because Seungmin was going to help you. “Don’t hang up. Tell me what buildings can you see. Try heading away from small alleys. I’ll find you.”

Seungmin rushed out of his appartment, not before scribbling down what was happening in a post it note and left it on his mother’s bedside table.

“T-there are some restaurants, but they’re all closed.” You started, dubious as how was this going to work. “There’s a road to my left.”

“Can you name any of the restaurants, little one?” Seungmin had a hunch, and he huffed, sprinting to the plaza closest to his appartment.

“I just passed by a Mexican, I think.” You sniffed, Seungmin’s soothing voice working like a charm and calming you down slowly. “In front of me, I think this is a Japanese… it’s called Ginza.”

Seungmin chuckled, feeling relief flooding his body. “Y-yeah, ok! I- god, yes, I know where you are. Keep walking straight ahead. There should be a park, right?” He started running, hiding the fact that he’d have to rush and make the usual fifteen minutes it could take him to arrive where you were and make them five.

He needed to see you and make sure you were safe.

“I… shit, yeah! I can see it!” You went back to crying, a smile planted in your features.

“I’m almost there. You’re doing so well, little one.”

You felt your cheeks getting warmer at that. Walking a bit faster, you looked behind you, finding that the silhouette was still there.

But Seungmin was close. Seungmin said everything would be fine.

“S-seungmin?” You mumbled at the phone, wanting to hear his voice, so soothing and warm.

“Under the streetlight, silly.”

You heard the beep that sounded when Seungmin ended the call, but he was there, tangible, a couple of meters away from you.

You chuckled, happy to see him for the first time ever, and crying away the pent up stress and worry, you ran off to him, and clung your arms around his neck tightly, unbothered at the need to stand on the tips of your toes to do so.

Seungmin stuttered, still panting from the marathon he had ran to get there, 100% baffled at this. But it was ok. You were there. You were safe.

“T-they’re still behind me.” You whispered against his chest.

He could feel your nervousness on your tone, how scared you were judging by how strongly your arms closed behind his neck, and hesitated for a second before hugging you back, his arms pulling you closer by your lower back, keeping you grounded and so weirdly safe in his grasp, and it felt so strangely comforting coming from him that your eyes swelled with more tears.

You couldn’t see or feel the person behind you anymore, but Seungmin did, somewhat clearly.

The only thing that his mind made up that moment is that for the person to leave, they’d have to believe you two did know each other.

And Seungmin’s heart beated loudly in his chest when your grasp loosened and you stood back on your feet, allowing him to see how your lip trembled, how you were holding back tears and how you looked at him with a million emotions hidden in the colour of your eyes. He had never seen you cry before.

His hands itched to touch you again, a sudden need to comfort you that overwhelmed him.

So he did.

His hands cradled your cheeks, his thumbs brushing away your tears, and he pecked your lips softly, smiling at your baffled face. His arms engulfed you in a comforting hug that smelled so much like the jacket you were wearing.

He looked behind you, and the silhouette was nowhere to be found. As if it had never been there before.

“It’s ok.” Seungmin whispered in your ear. “I’m here now. You’re safe. They’re gone, yeah?” His arms rested on your shoulders as his slender hands stroked your hair. “No one’s gonna hurt you now, pretty.”

And you started to cry on his shoulder, because not only then you realized how bad you had needed a hug, and not even the fact that it had been a hug from him that you had secretly yearned for, but because none of your excuses made sense now.

There was no ‘fake’ or ‘real’ Seungmin.

Whatever he was, fake or not, stood in front of you as he hugged you under the streetlight.

And you sighed as he cooed at you softly, because deep down you had known for a while.

It was time you came to terms with it.

[☆★🌷★☆]

[pariskylar]

Part 3: Rude

Monday: August 30, 2021

Beatrice, bitch please. you know who I be nothin' else, none other the number one stunner.

she pulled up to The Thrombey Mansion for her second week of work.

working for Harlan has been very uneventful, borderline boring. all she did for the past two weeks was take calls, email business people back and proof reading. proofing was the only part of the job she actually enjoyed.

she entered the house and went straight to Mr. Thrombey’s Office.

“good morning.” she signed her time sheet.

“good morning.” Marta greeted.

and as usual Harlan said nothing.

ignoring that she pulled out her iPad, where she had transferred the planner and began briefing him about his schedule today.

“today you have a doctors appointment at 8:30 AM, a meeting with Mr. Walt Thrombey at the publishing company at 11:30 AM and and dogs have a vet appointment at 1:00 PM.” she read off.

“Marta is taking me to my doctors appointment.” he said while stacking three different piles of papers “these need to be proofed.” he handed them over to her.

she nodded waiting to see of he had anything else to say, but of course he didn’t. she took her assignment out to the front porch. she sat tailored style on the bench pulling out her sticky tabs, red pen, post-its and the matching highlighters .

and began her reading. this is the shit she loved. well introduced characters, well thought out details. this is why she wanted to be an editor.

forty five minutes later she proofed seventy percent of the first chapter and Harlan and Marta came out the house.

“we’re off to the doctor.” Marta said helping Harlan down the steps.

“ok, well be safe.” she said automatically.

pulling out her phone she saw the time read 7:56 AM. she’d been out there for nearly an hour and her bones and joints felt it. she stood from her seat stretching and loosen up her joint.

standing up straight she grabbed all of her supplies and moved to the steps.

after two hours she was finishing up the second chapter when she heard the revving of a car engine. she looked up to see an old school BMW flying up the driveway. she put a tab where she just finished reading sitting up properly, ready to greet whoever the guest was.

when the car door opened out stepped a white man with brunette hair sporting slacks, a striped shirt and sunglasses. he slowly made his way to the house.

“hi, how may i help you?” she asked as he made his way up the steps.

he totally ignored her and went inside. she grabbed her keys that had her mace on them. she sat the papers aside and grabbed the iPad, rushing in after him.

“um, excuse me? sir?” she followed him into Mr. Thombey’s empty office. “um, sir.”

“what?” he turned to her finally acknowledging her existence.

his presence was a bit intimidating, causing her to take a few steps back. he rolled his eyes making an exit from the office.

she switched the latch on the mace.

“um, do you have an meeting set with Mr. Thrombey?” she followed him.

“a meeting?” he asked seemingly confused heading for the stairs

“yeah, like an appointment.” he turned from the second step with the same confused look “you know when you set a time to talk to someone.”

“i know what a meeting is, i’m just confused on why i’d need one. i’m his grandson.”

that’s Ransom?

“oh, the one with the bi-weekly visits.” she closed the mace.

“yeah.” he said with faux enthusiasm

“well Mr. Thrombey had a doctor’s appointment today, but he’ll be back any minute now. you can wait for him in his office.”

he didn’t say anything just going back to his office, slamming the door behind him.

she huffed, snarling. there’s alot of thing she can take, and has, but one thing she can’t stand is an unnecessarily rude person.

there was no reason for him to come in that aggressive and to be that harsh.

she made her way back to the front porch to try and finish up her assignment

her alarm that was set 10:45 went off, but Harlan and Marta wasn't back yet. she didn't have Marta's number so she had no choice but to wait this out. she re-scheduled the meetings and vet appointment, while waiting. she was chewing on her pencil eraser nervous. she was 99 percent sure she was gonna lose her job.

after the most daunting 42 minutes Marta and Harlan finally pulled up.

she stood up from her seat grabbing her bag and rushed to the car. once the car came to a full stop she opened the door and help Harlan out.

“Mr. Thrombey, we’re late for your meeting with Mr. Walt.” she closed the door and walked to her car as fast as she could without dragging him. “i called and rescheduled the meeting for 12:00 and push the vet appointment for 1:30, i just need to get the dogs in the car and we can go.” she tossed her bag in her backseat, before taking off to the backyard.

whistling at them she gained their attention.

“come.” she squatted down waved them over.

they ran up to her.

she stood up straight and began jogging to her car with them her following. when they got there Mr. Thrombey wasn’t in the car.

“what the hell?” she said under her breath.

“i took him to the meeting with Walt.” Marta said from the side of her.

“oh, well thanks.” Jaz nodded "um, can i get you number." her social anxiety began to kick in.

"just so when you take Harlan places i'll know, y'know" she over explained.

"no, yeah, i get it." Marta pulled out her phone handing it over.

"personal or work?" she asked pulling each from her pockets.

"both?"

Jaz nodded handing them both over.

Jazlyn (Personal): (504)-xxx-xxxx she entered her personal number first then her work number Jazlyn (Work): (857)-xxx-xxxx.

they exchanged phones back.

she looked at the new contact in her phone, Marta :) (857)-xxx-xxxx.

"um, thanks."

"no problem." Marta nodded.

they walked back towards the porch. she took a seat on the bench and Marta went back into the house.

she set a new alarm for 12:30.

the dogs ran up to her, tails wagging.

“hi, babies.” she giggled at them scratching behind each of their ears.

one tried giving her a kiss but she dodged it.

“no kisses, just rubs and hugs.”

she spent the next 50 minutes cuddling the dogs and trying to calm herself down from mini freakout she had.

what the heck bro. that was so rude and inconsiderate. he could've told me that he was going to have Marta take him to the meeting. and why the hell did the receptionist let me change times if he was already there?

while in the midst of another freakout her alarm went off. she sighed getting up from her seat, heading back to the home.

they tried following her in the house.

"sit." she commanded "stay." they obeyed.

she knocked on the office door.

“come in.” he called from the other side of the door.

walking in she saw Harlan and Ransom sitting across from each other.

“um, i’m taking the dogs to their vet appointment.”

Ransom scoffed at her turning back to his granddad.

rude

“ok.” Harlan nodded

“is there anything you need while i’m out?”

“no.”

she nodded leaving the room. she grabbed the leashes from the hooks on the foyer.

-

after taking the dogs to the vet and a long day of doing nothing she went back to her townhouse.

"hey, baby." Tia greeted her from the couch.

"hi." she kicked off her shoes at the door.

she sighed flopping next to her, handing over a pint of Ben and Jerry's.

"lemme guess, boring day today?" she grabbed a spoon from the bowl on the coffee table.

for the past week she had been complaining non-stop about how freaking boring it was to work for Harlan.

"no, stressful." Jaz shook her head unbuckled her belt.

"how?"

"he had a doctors appointment and Marta took him. i was supposed to take him to his meeting at his publishing company, but he had Marta take him." she began to explain taking her pants off. "but he ain't tell me shit, so i'm running around thinking i'm finna get fired. i rescheduled the meeting. they come back talking bout 'i took him.' then his grandson came there almost giving me a heart attack."

"his grandson?" T asked around a bite of ice cream

"yeah, Ransom. he fine, but he rude as hell."

"how fine? you know my fine and your fine are two different fines." Tia pointed the spoon at Jaz.

"as fine as you can get for a white boy." she shrugged pulling her hair back. "i'm finna shower and take this makeup off, then we gon talk about them crazy ass people you work for." she stood up.

"good because bitch i got some shit to tell you."

[yearnforag0ny]

The MD and DVM; Chapter 1

Author’s note: hii omg this is the first fanfiction I’ve written in about five years now loool…I wrote this because I’ve never seen a harvey fic where the farmer is a veterinarian, and I have seen many questionable things said about farming. I work on a farm, and I am working towards going to veterinary school, so I felt my knowledge might contribute to a unique Harvey fic lol correct me if I’m wrong, tho, and please let me know if I should continue this! Crossposted on ao3 under xxdeaduniverse.

spring 1

You had always loved your grandfather’s property. His death almost broke you. However, you were delighted to find that he had left you his farm, Cinnamon Meadow. It was a quiet slice of heaven nestled away in Pelican Town. It still had all its old charm, just some added overgrowth and a lack of crops and animals. 

You graduated from veterinary school a couple of years ago. Visiting your grandfather’s farm ignited your love for animals, and it only grew the older you became. After eight years, you earned a bachelor’s degree in animal science and were officially a doctor in veterinary medicine. 

Since your veterinary school was near Zuzu City, you picked up a job offer at a clinic in the heart of the city and worked almost exclusively with dogs and cats. It was incredibly fun; however, you had forgotten your initial dream of working with farm animals instead of small ones. So when your grandfather died, you were happy to see he left you the farm in his will. While living in Zuzu City, you would visit Pelican Town every so often to say hello to your grandfather, but more so because Marnie was a client of yours. She called you whenever her animals were having the slightest of health issues. You were happy to answer her calls because it meant you would see cows, catch up with Marnie, and say hello to your grandfather. 

You sighed while you stood on the porch of your grandfather’s old house, which was technically yours now. It was a beautiful spring day. You didn’t realize how much you had missed the sounds of birds chirping. 

Marnie interrupted your peace by slamming the front door on her way out of the house. 

“Whoops! Didn’t mean to let that door slam,” She chuckled. You smiled at her. You were so grateful she agreed to help you move your stuff today. 

“Well, that was the last box,” She sighed in relief. “I’ve gotta run. Shane has to work a shift at JojaMart, and I need to watch Jas. You should stop by Robin’s house today so she can start building you a coop!” Marnie exclaimed, smiling at you.

 “Yeah, I probably will. I want to get this place up and running as soon as possible,” You said, looking out onto the land again.

“I’ll be at the saloon Friday night. You should stop by and introduce yourself to everyone then,” suggested Marnie. 

“That’s a good idea, actually. Gives me enough time to do some work and mentally prepare to meet all the new people,” You chuckled. Marnie rolled her eyes. 

“They’ll love you. Just come by whenever you’re ready, okay?” She winked at you before walking off towards her farm.

You waved goodbye and groaned once you realized you would have to clear some overgrowth to build a chicken coop. You cracked your knuckles, grabbed your axe from the porch, and got to work.

A couple of hours of hard work later, you had a small clearing of land by the farmhouse. You decided that would be enough hard work for today, you weren’t sure when Robin would close up, and you haven’t unpacked anything in your house at all. You set the axe back on your porch and made yourself look somewhat presentable. You noticed your cat, Horace, had already taken a liking to the new digs. He had plopped himself on top of a pile of boxes. Horace was a fat, tuxedo tabby cat and essentially your best friend since you had adopted him your junior year of college. You gave him a pat on the head before heading out to Robin’s.

You admired the peace on your walk to the mountains. At some point, the hours must have melted away because three o’clock. You finally noticed how tired you were from moving in and doing physical work on the land. However, your dreams of dozing away were cut short. The walk to Robin’s was not as long as you had anticipated, though, as her house suddenly appeared hidden behind pine trees. You took a moment to admire her house, assuming she had built it herself. Wooden with a blue roof. You liked it. Once you spotted the telescope on the left, you immediately wondered how beautiful the skies must be here. You hadn’t seen a sky free of light pollution in years.

You cautiously opened the front door to see a counter with a ginger woman standing on the other side reading a newspaper. She looked up when the door opened, smiling at you. 

“You must be Y/N! I’m so glad to meet you finally. I heard someone was moving into Cinnamon Meadow, but I didn’t know so soon. I’m Robin,” She said, coming out behind the counter to shake your hand. You shook it, happy to realize she wasn’t startled by some stranger entering her home. You smiled at her.

 “Hi. Marnie said to come see you if I wanted anything built, so here I am,” You chuckled. Robin looked delighted. 

“Well, sure! What were you wanting to have built?” She eagerly questioned. It was easy to see she was excited; not many villagers in Pelican Town needed new construction. 

“I’m going to get Cinnamon Meadow up and running again, so I’ll need a new chicken coop. And then a barn. And probably house renovations. I need a lot done,” You sheepishly rubbed your neck, wondering if this was too much to request all at once. Robin defied you and lit up even more. 

“Great! I can get started on the chicken coop tomorrow!” She exclaimed. 

“Deal.”

~

After paperwork and settling payments, you returned to Cinnamon Meadow to continue yardwork. You felt so relieved that the coop wasn’t too expensive to build. You had been saving up since you paid off your tuition, and you were finally happy to invest some of the funds into your future. Around six o’clock, your exhaustion won over your ambition, and you decided to settle down for the night. You unpacked enough kitchen supplies to scrounge up some frozen dinner, took a hot shower, and promptly fell asleep with Horace in your small bed around eight.

You slept better than you had in ages. You even had a dream where your farm was complete, cows and all. But you knew something was missing. Or rather, a special someone. What was the farm if you had no one to share it with? You thought to yourself within your dream. You had always told yourself you didn’t need to be with someone, that as long as you made yourself happy, it was all that mattered. But you still ached for it. Your dream was cut short by a particular fat cat lightly smacking your cheek. 

“What the–Horace!” You exclaimed.

 “I was sleeping so well…” You sighed. You checked the time on your phone. 6 AM? Might as well get up now and get some yardwork done I guess… You thought to yourself with an elongated yawn. You realized you were a little sore from all the work yesterday. You groaned, knowing there would be more to come today. Slowly, you pulled yourself out of bed and organized some food for Horace. As expected, he flew to his breakfast and you figured you should do the same for yourself. A cup of coffee and one granola bar later, you pulled on your favorite pair of overalls and stretched. Today was going to be long. You intended to clear more of the land and buy and plant seeds.

You headed outside to start working and saw Robin hammering away at the coop. Her enthusiasm for her work made you smile. 

“Morning, Robin! Any coffee for you?” You greeted. 

“NO THANKS!” She yelled back with a smile. You wondered why she was screaming before noticing she was wearing headphones. You chuckled, grabbed your axe, and went straight to work.

Around one, you figured you should take a break to go to the store. You briefly recall Marnie mentioning a place called Pierre’s. After trading your axe for your wallet, you started heading in the general direction of town. It was another beautiful day. Are all the days here going to be as lovely as they have been? You wondered, smiling to yourself. You noticed that the change of scenery from moving here had already positively affected you.

You walked into town and focused on the square before you. It's small but adorable. Lamposts and trees lined the square, along with a few buildings. The one before you was the doctor’s clinic, with Pierre’s store on the other side. You briefly wondered about the town doctor for a moment. You knew you should get yourself checked up sooner rather than later. After doing farm research in your undergrad, you unfortunately found out the hard way that farm work was no joke. You filed away this thought for later and walked into Pierre’s.

The general store was small but had everything you could ever need. The older gentleman with glasses behind the single register smiled at you.

 “You must be the new farmer! Y/N right? I’m Pierre. It’s so nice to have somebody new in town!” He exclaimed. You wondered when the last time somebody new moved into Pelican Town. 

“Yeah, I’m Y/N. It’s nice to meet you,” You smiled back. 

“I’m so sorry to hear about your grandfather. He was a great man. Sold me the best crops,” Pierre sighed. You felt a tinge of grief bite at you, pushing it away immediately. 

“He was a good man. I fully intend to restore the farm, though, so I’ll have some crops for you,” You chuckled. Remembering what you came here for, you grabbed a bunch of random seed packets and essentials for your kitchen. You accidentally bumped into a woman with bright green hair in one of the aisles. You quickly learned she was Pierre’s wife, Caroline. 

“You should come to the aerobics class here on Tuesdays! Great way to get to know everyone,” She smiled. The thought of any more exercise than you already had to do on the farm made you cringe. 

“Maybe,” you tentatively said before mentioning it was good to meet her and heading to checkout. You went right home afterward, excited to plant your new seeds. You may have been a little ambitious when you started tilling the dirt; the field you created was large. You also knew if you wanted to make money anytime soon, it would be from crops.

It took forever to till, plant, and water the field. By the time it was 6, you were wiping sweat off your brow and decided that was all you could take today. You headed into your house to make a proper dinner from the groceries you picked up at Pierre’s today: homemade pizza. You savored every bite—your first meal in your first owned house. The thought made you smile. After a shower, you watched TV, cuddling Horace before finally falling asleep for the night.

The following two days seemed to blur together. At some point, you went to Marnie’s to catch up and buy chickens after Robin was done with the coop. You were overjoyed to finally have animals back on the farm and made a mental note to return to Robin’s on Monday to have her start building a barn. However, today was Friday. The day you were going to the saloon. You thought about it–stressed about it–while doing your farm chores that morning. Was everyone going to like you? Would they insist on kicking you out of Pelican Town? Or would you drink enough to forget these irrational thoughts and let go? You decided on the latter. 

By the time five o’clock rolled around, you had showered and started getting ready for your first night out on the town. You threw on your favorite pair of jeans and a sweater with some jewelry. After a little makeup and tweaking your hair, you decided you were ready.

Walking out the door, you felt a cold spring breeze on your back. You were immediately grateful you picked a sweater. As you walked towards the saloon, you looked up at the sky. The sun had just begun to set. It was your favorite time of day. A part of you felt like having drinks on your porch alone instead of being crowded by strangers in a bar, but you knew better than to be a hermit tonight. You had told Marnie you would be there, so you would. 

You could hear faint music and laughter inside as you approached the saloon. A warm glow of light emitted from the windows. You took a deep breath and walked in. The villagers were having so much fun not many even noticed you came in except Marnie. She sat in the center of the bar, smiling and waving at you. A wave of relief washed over you. You smiled and sat down 

next to her.

“I’m so glad you came! I’ll have to introduce you to everyone,” She said, handing you a glass of wine—even more relief. You gulped to soothe your nerves. One by one, Marnie introduced you to some people in the town. You knew you would struggle to remember some of their names after tonight. You met Emily, tending the bar, along with Gus. Leah, an artist who had also moved to the valley from the city. Pam, who seemed like the local drunk. Willy, a sweet fisherman. Marnie pointed out other people; you determined Demetrius was married to Robin because they were dancing together. Some younger kids in the other room were Sebastian, Sam, and Abigail. A young woman with glasses suddenly sat herself next to you.

 “Marnie, is this the new farmer we’ve all been hearing about?” She questioned, smiling at you. 

“Yup! Y/N, meet Maru,” Marnie motioned to her. 

“Hi,” you shyly said with a smile.

 “Y/N is a veterinarian,” Marnie blurted out. You nodded. 

“Good to have another scientist in town,” Maru giggled. “Dr. Y/N, then?” She asked. You laughed. 

“Oh, no, please don’t call me doctor…except when I’m looking at your animals,” You winked, and they laughed. Maru looked in the other direction of the bar, and you saw something go off in her brain.

“I should introduce you to the only other doctor in town,” Maru giggled. 

“Oh, sure, I’ve meant to meet them, actually,” You nodded. Maru took your hand and led you to a table near the jukebox. At the table sat two men having wine. One had long hair and wore a reddish coat, the other with glasses and a mustache wearing a green coat. Before you had time to think further, Maru set her hands down on the table. 

“Gentlemen, this is Y/N. She just moved into Cinnamon Meadow. Harvey, she is also a doctor,” Maru said with a smirk. You briefly wondered which one she was talking to before the man in the glasses smiled. 

“Is that right? I’m the town’s doctor, Harvey,” He introduced himself. You were taking him in. Handsome. Really handsome. It didn’t help you had a thing for mustaches, but he was also smart, evidently. 

“I’m a veterinarian. I planned on getting my MD for a while but decided I liked animals more than people,” This raised a laugh out of them all. 

“Good to meet you, doctor Y/N,” Harvey said, sipping his wine. The man with the long hair introduced himself as Elliott. You immediately let his name slip your mind because you were considering how you would further get to know Harvey. Marnie interrupted your thoughts by calling for you from the bar. 

“Y/N! Come here, you gotta tell me what breed of cows you want to invest in!!” You blushed. 

“I suppose I’ll see you later,” You said, mainly to Harvey. You could feel the alcohol working its way into your system, so it was probably best you get away from him now before you were completely drunk. Harvey looked a little disappointed. 

“Be sure to come see me some time to get checked up,” He quickly mentioned. You nodded, smiling; maybe you weren’t just delusional, and he thought the same about you. You walked back to Marnie, but every fiber of your being wanted to stay and have another drink with him.

[pocketramblr]

If the five ask game is still open: au where Aizawa is a quirkless hero?

An interesting ask...

1- So AfO really wants Erasure after seeing some second-year student at UA use it during the SF. And he and ujiko are kinda smart and so target the kid directly instead of just releasing a big monster kinda near where the kid will be and hoping he'll get hospitalized on his own and taken to Ujiko. So that means one day on his way to school, Aizawa looks down at a kitten in a box and is like 'wow i wish i could help this kitten but alas, i'm sixteen, depressed, have super low confidence due to being told i have a weak quirk for years, and am not All Might.'

And then AfO walks out of the alleyway and grabs him by the arm, hoping to quickly steal his quirk but Aizawa activates Erasure on instinct and tries to get away.

2- Shirakumo happens to take the same route to school, and walks up to see his friend getting manhandled and jumps in without thinking. The good news is that AfO runs off and does not take Aizawa to throw into nomu soup, and the cat is fine, the bad news is Aizawa blinked and Erasure got stolen before AfO left.

3- Aizawa is thouroughly shaken now to not have his quirk and is panicking. This is a crazy thing that shouldn't happen to a random kid like him. This is the kind of villain that All Might fights. Shirakumo picks up the kitten and umbrella and is like "So we get All Might then?"

Aizawa thinks he's joking, but he's not. They get on a train and head away from UA, towards Might Tower instead. On the way, Aizawa is catastrophizing, Shirakumo is trying to distract him, asking things like "so do you think that other guy is suffering dry eye right now" (Aizawa realizes he probably is, since his feel weirdly fine.) and "when All Might fights this guy and makes him give you your quirk back, what are you going to ask him to autograph? because i think this kitten deserves an autographed footsie." (Aizawa goes back to catastrophizing because what happens if All Might's quirk gets erased, actually, and even if he can beat this guy that's no promise he's going to get erasure back, and now that its gone he really misses his quirk!)

Shirakumo stops him and tells him very seriously that his quirk didn't make him want to help the kitten, or apply to UA, or train with his capture weapon, which means that even without erasure, he's sure Aizawa can be a hero if he wants to be.

4- So they get to Might Tower and the UA uniforms and Shirakumo loudly announcing that someone's quirk got stolen does actually get All Might's attention, because he's always looking for leads against AfO. Aizawa and Shirakumo tell him everything, including Aizawa telling him about Erasure's weaknesses and how to force him to blink. All Might thanks them, phones UA to let them know whats up, texts Torino, and tells Shirakumo and Aizawa to stay at Might Tower until he gets back from beating AfO's face in. (He also takes a Secret Gift from his american buddy David with him. huh. anyway.)

He gets back several hours later, with a broken arm and tons of bruises which kinda freaks the teens out since All Might Isn't Supposed To Get Injured but he's fine, and thanks them. He apologizes to Aizawa as AfO is now dead and can't return Erasure. Aizawa says not to worry about him as stopping such a powerful villain was more important. Shirakumo tells him to stop saying he's not important, and announces it'll be okay, because Aizawa's going to be awesome as the world's first quirkless hero, working at the agency with Loud Cloud, Present Mic, and Midnight. All Might says he looks forward to seeing their careers, but wonders if he should offer Aizawa a replacement quirk. [One day he'll ask and be told 'hell no']

All Might also gently refuses to autograph the cat Shirakumo holds up, but that's ok because they name him "Autograph" instead

5- Aizawa does indeed become the first quirkless hero, and is in an agency with his three friends after graduation- though Midnight leaves to form her own later on. They still work together sometimes. Loud Cloud, Present Mic, and Eraserhead (he was too lazy to change it) do have an agency rule tho- no one ever goes out on single patrols or missions, its either a duo while the other holds down the agency, or all of them together. Can't have any more kidnapping attempts! Aizawa grumbles about how tiring they are but is fine with it- it's actually a good strategy. Usually Shirakumo or Mic make for a distraction while Aizawa sneaks up from behind and uses his capture weapon, but sometimes he'll use a cloud to drop from, or help Mic manuver around quicker. They work well together, and are very happy at their agency.

Then one day, a ten-year-old with green hair walks in, and nervously asks if someone can become a hero without a quirk- he heard rumors that Eraserhead was a quirkless hero, but no one seems to know since he stays out of the spotlight compared to his teammates, and some people say he does have a quirk since he got into UA, just doesn't use it. Mic assures him that they can, because Eraserhead is indeed quirkless, he just has a lot of training and works with the agency so everyone's weaknesses- like Mic's hearing loss or Loud Cloud's impulsiveness- is covered by the others. Izuku, on hearing this answer, bursts into tears just as Cloud and Eraser return from patrol. Cloud asks why Mic made some poor kid cry while Eraser goes to find Autograph and plop him in the kid's arms to cuddle.

Izuku defends Mic and says it isn't his fault- he just got upset because he doesn't have any friends who would work with him to be a hero, because none of them think Izuku can be one without a quirk, none of them believe Izuku about Eraserhead.

Yamada, Aizawa, and Shirakumo, three young men who were once three teenagers that decided to sneak a cat into school and adopt it despite not being really prepared to take care of it, look at each other and all know something similar is about to happen.

[lucky-clover-gazette]

The Past is Beyond Our Control

Chapter 1: A Sheep in Wolves' Clothing

Rated T | Vio/Shadow | Modern Slasher AU (Heavily Inspired by Until Dawn (2015) | 4,241 words, more soon

"Six."

“Fuck me,” Vio groans as he finally grips the handle. Is he seriously about to run from a real-life actual murderer through a creepy basement, all while barefoot and wearing a fluffy purple robe?

“Five.”

Yes, Vio decides, ripping the door open. Yes, I am.

My entry for @fsfrightfight week 3! Look out for the second chapter next week. I apologize for posting like this, but the first half of my October was insane. Glad I can share work I'm genuinely happy with, now that I have a bit more time on my hands.

Read it on AO3 (RECOMMENDED) or under the cut (with author's warnings AT THE END):

11:04 P.M.

Coming tonight was a bad idea.

Vio pulls the fluffy purple robe tighter around himself as he pokes his head out the door. “Seriously, guys?” he shouts, to no immediate answer. “Even the scrunchie?”

Vio runs a hand through his hair, still damp at the edges from his bath. Great. He’s stuck for the night in a creepy massive lodge on an isolated snowy mountain, owned by the parents of a friend whose brother mysteriously disappeared one year ago. One year exactly, actually, hence the group reuniting while home their own families on college break.

It still makes no sense that Shadow would invite them all to return for the anniversary, but Vio just couldn’t bring himself to refuse. Not when it had been Shadow asking, and not when he still felt partially responsible for Link’s death.

Even with his low hopes for the evening, he still found himself disappointed. The second they all entered the lodge, after a long and cold walk from the cable car station, Zelda and Blake had been immediately at each other’s throats. Reed gets, like, exhaustingly emotional any time Shadow speaks, and Shadow is being weirdly avoidant despite him being the one to invite them all back. It’s cold, everyone either hates or feels indifferent towards each other, and the memory of Link—now assumed dead—looms over them all.

So Vio took a bath to avoid their bullshit. Sue him.

“Blake?” Vio calls into the dark hallway. The lodge is simultaneously open-concept and cramped, with a second floor revolving around the lower foyer’s fireplace and massive chandelier. Vio looks over the railing and furrows his brow. Where the others had been arguing around the fireplace just an hour or two ago, there is only darkness. “Reed?”

Vio flicks the hallway light switch, only to be confront by a single red balloon floating near the stairs. “What the hell?”

A grandfather clock chimes loudly. Vio thinks of the jumpscares in horror games he, Shadow, and occasionally Link used to play in middle school.

Shaking his head, Vio steels his nerves. He passes the balloon on his way down the stairs, half-expecting for the others to perform a jumpscare of their own.

“Guys?” Vio calls out again, his voice weaker than before. Not scared, but not exactly annoyed, either. Unnerved, for good reason—the lodge’s main floor is empty, dark, silent, and cold.

He spots another balloon across the foyer, next to a closed door. The home movie theater, Vio recalls from years of staying with the Farore twins over winter break. A chill runs down his back as he opens the door.

More silence and darkness greet him. Vio reaches for his phone to use its flash, but realizes that it must have been confiscated along with his clothing.

“Oh, come on!”

He turns to go back upstairs, but faces a closed door. Vio releases a startled yelp and reached for the handle, but somehow…

“I wouldn’t bother with that,” mocks an unfamiliar voice. It echoes around the room from an unseen origin, so distorted that the speaker is unidentifiable.

Vio stumbles backwards, bumping up against a leather recliner.

“I have so much to show you,” the voice promises. The giant screen comes to life, illuminating the framed posters from Mr. Farore’s most famous horror films. It seems to show some kind of camera feed, although it can’t possibly be live. Vio watches himself, from just a few hours ago, hiking up the mountain trail in a heavy winter coat.

“What the fuck?” Vio exclaims, gripping the nearby seat.

“A lost little lamb,” the voice narrates with almost deranged fondness. “Do you think he has any idea of what lies ahead?”

Vio watches himself leave the frame. “Why are you showing me this?” he cries, yanking on the locked doorknob.

“Why are you watching?”

The shot abruptly cuts to a new location and subject. Vio forgets his escape at the sight of Shadow, restrained against a wooden board in dingy dark shed. He struggles against the ties, glancing over to Blake, tied up in the same manner beside him.

“Shadow!” Vio cries as the modulated voice speaks again. Not to him, though—to them.

“Now for this experiment,” the voice says, “we'll need the cooperation of our two test subjects, Blake and Shadow.”

They both cry out in fear and rage, completely helpless. The camera pans away from them, now focusing on—

“Reed!” calls out Blake, shaking in his bonds. “Holy shit, get me out of here!”

The kindest of Link’s former friends stands behind metal bars, paralyzed in front of a large metal lever.

“But we’re going to need our brave participant to help decide,” the voice calmly continues, “which test subject will live… and which will die.”

Vio slams a hand over his mouth. Now visible in the shot is… is a fucking circular saw, on a track, which splits between Blake and Shadow. Both of them continue to panic, the camera fully fixed on their reactions.

“Shadow,” Vio says, his throat dry. Is this happening right now? Has it already happened?

Will it happen to him next?

“Please,” the voice says, with good humor. “Please please, everyone calm down. It's all very simple, Reed. All you have to do... is choose who you will save!”

There’s a loud noise as the saw begins to move, the grinding of metal almost drowning out the screams. Many thoughts run through Vio’s brain, but none of them matter—this is Reed’s choice, and it’s obvious who he will pick.

“I’m sorry, Shadow,” he says, pulling the lever in Blake’s direction. “I’m really sorry!”

Vio winces as the saw changes its track. Shadow’s screams echo through the room as sharp blades meet flesh, producing the exact sort of viscera one would expect from such an interaction.

As in, it cuts the man in half.

“I’m going to give you ten seconds,” the voice informs Vio, reminding him of his own predicament. “Nine…”

“No,” Vio whimpers, trying the door again. Still locked. “No, no, no…”

“Eight.”

There’s another door in this room, Vio remembers, reaching through the darkness behind the seats. It doesn’t lead upstairs, but it will get him the hell out of this room.

“Seven.”

If he could ever actually find the goddamn door.

“Six.”

“Fuck me,” Vio groans as he finally grips the handle. Is he seriously about to run from a real-life actual murderer through a creepy basement, all while barefoot and wearing a fluffy purple robe?

“Five.”

Yes, Vio decides, ripping the door open. Yes, I am.

The door behind him bursts open, revealing a sliver of light and a person’s silhouette. “Vio,” says the killer, his voice still modulated behind some kind of Halloween mask. He holds a large metal cylinder at his side, and clearly doesn’t intend to keep his ten-second promise.

Vio screams.

“Vi-o,” the maniac repeats in a singsong voice. His movement appears to be somewhat slowed by the weight of the heavy object.

“Shut up!” Vio growls, picking up a nearby vase and throwing it in his pursuer’s direction. He doesn’t stick around to see the aftermath, slamming the door behind him and entering the depths of Farore Lodge.

─────────────────

8:39 P.M.

They make their way down the basement stairs, leaving the others to argue in the foyer.

“Still use that home theater?” Vio asks, glancing over his shoulder at the room behind them. “You and your parents?”

Shadow smirks just a little, immediately calmer and much more like himself. This whole evening, he’s had an energy Vio can only describe as manic—forced enthusiasm that’s deeply off-putting, especially given the occasion.

“Mom and Dad don’t come up here anymore,” says Shadow.

“But you’ve been living up here for a while, like a gap year?”

“Sure. Like a gap year.”

Silence falls between them, again. Ever since Vio went away to college, things have been silent. And even before that, after Link’s disappearance… Shadow hadn’t exactly stayed in touch.

“You know, Vio,” says Shadow, just a hint of playfulness in his voice.

Vio matches it with a small smile. “Yes, Shadow?”

“I just wanted to say…”

“What?”

“It really means a lot to me that everyone came back this year. And y’know… that you came, Vi.”

Vio softens at the sentiment, despite his discomfort with the overall situation. “Shadow,” he says, “I’m here for you, really. Whatever you need, whenever. I understand that you might have needed your space this past year, but—”

“Watch your step,” Shadow warns, holding out an arm to stop him. So much for sentimentality.

“I think I can handle a set of stairs,” Vio scoffs. He pushes it away as they reach the basement.

Shadow opens the boiler cabinet and get straight to work, leaving Vio to look around. He and the Farores hadn’t spent a lot of time down here during their adolescent years, save for a few games of spooky hide-and-seek. Shadow and Link’s parents had always discouraged the boys from going beneath the lodge, and the boys mostly obeyed. It was all pretty much just storage down there—props from Mr. Farore’s horror films, Shadow had said, which were not dangerous but were very, very expensive. At some point Link had also mentioned a hotel or something down there too, connecting the lodge to the abandoned asylum on the other side of the mountain.

Seriously. Creepy basement.

“Sorry to drag you into the bowels,” Shadow tells Vio, surprisingly competent with the equipment. Although, Vio reminds himself, Shadow has always been good with mechanical stuff.

“Bowels,” he says, wrinkling his nose. “Gross.”

“You’re cute.” The response is automatic, which Shadow seems to regret. He clears his throat and tries again. “I just wouldn’t want you coming down here by yourself, y’know?”

“It’s definitely creepy down here,” admits Vio.

“Yep,” Shadow teases. “Not a place to be on your own.”

─────────────────

11:16 P.M.

Vio almost trips on that damn step.

“Shit,” he says, narrowly avoiding the hazard as the killer rips the door open above him. Vio thinks fast, cloaked enough in darkness to hide but not with enough time to make it much further. He presses himself against a pillar by the water heater, where he’d just been with Shadow only hours ago.

─────────────────

8:44 P.M.

“What’s this doing here?” Vio asks, reaching behind a nearby pillar. He spins the wooden sword in his hand and then points it in Shadow’s direction. “I haven’t seen this thing in years.”

Shadow’s expression shifts at the sight of it, a strange mixture of fondness and sadness. “Guess it’s been a while since we play-fought. I dunno, things just end up down here sometimes, especially if they’re not being used. Not sure where Link’s went, though. Not that it really matters.”

Vio’s face falls. He lowers the sword. “Shadow—”

“I know,” Shadow says, holding up a hand. “Save it for the couch.”

─────────────────

11:19 P.M.

It’s still there.

“Why are you hiding?” asks the killer as he makes his way down to the boiler room. That metal cylinder, whatever it is, hits each stair as he goes.

Vio weighs the wooden sword in his hand. No blade, of course, but it has some heft. He holds it against his chest and presses himself even tighter against the pillar.

“Why prolong the inevitable, Violet?”

Vio flinches at that. No one calls him Violet anymore, unless it’s on a legal document. He wouldn’t call it a deadname exactly, but there’s only one person who’s ever said it in a way that actually felt right.

Zero now, though, because Vio just watched that person get cut in half.

“Gotcha,” says the killer, peeking around the side of the pillar. He yanks the struggling Vio backwards against his chest, trying to keep him still. “So sorry.”

Vio freezes as a plastic mask is pressed against his face. It’s easy to recognize the familiar sensation of nitrous oxide, but this seems to be significantly more potent than what he’d get at the dentist. He’s terrified to realize that he’s getting dizzy already.

Weakly craning his head, Vio is finally able to get a good look at Shadow’s murderer. A cheap Halloween mask obscures his features, but it’s not your average creepy clown or werewolf. It’s like… some kind of demented elf, with a pointed head and a goatee. What the hell was it called on the package, Guy You Definitely Don’t Want to Talk To at the Renn Faire?

Vio isn’t sticking around to find out.

Channeling every ounce of strength he has left, he shoves the wooden sword backwards into his attacker’s gut. The masked killer doubles over in pain, releasing him with a monstrous roar.

Vio’s head feels fuzzy as he runs across the boiler room-slash-cellar. He reaches for the door, but—of fucking course—

“Are you kidding me? NO HANDLE?!”

Removed and hidden, probably by Mrs. Farore, to keep the teens from exploring any further. Vio has to improvise.

The wine rack—he can work with that. Vio yanks it downwards, creating an obstacle for his pursuer. Among puddles of wine and broken glasses, a small metal object clatters to the floor.

“A-ha!” Vio sticks the handle back into place, passes the threshold, and locks the door behind him. The killer slams himself against it, but it’s not long before he gives up on that particular approach. His noises cease, leaving breathing heavily in an unfamiliar room.

His mind is clearing, which is good, because it’s pretty much all he has. He left his sword back near the boiler.

Vio turns to assess his current location, no longer familiar from his years of staying at the lodge. He sees a very dirty bed and a very broken dresser—must be one of the abandoned hotel rooms. One door to his left, and another straight ahead. The killer could, hypothetically, be making his way to either right now.

Vio moves forward. If this is a hotel, the door to the left likely leads to a bathroom. He’d be like a sitting duck in there.

His chosen path leads him to a long hallway, lined with several more doors and what looks like a defunct elevator. It’s one of those old-timey cage ones, with it cab stuck just a few feet above the bottom of the shaft.

He feels a hand over his mouth.

“Vio,” says the killer, noticeably out of breath. “Vi, holy shit, just let me—”

Vio bites.

The killer rears backwards, his mask shifting slightly and obstructing his vision. Vio sees his chance and literally runs with it.

He heads down the hall, but doesn’t go through a door. Instead, he slides through the crack beneath the elevator cab, pressing up against the wall at the bottom of the shaft.

Don’t move, Vio thinks to himself. Don’t. Fucking. Move.

From the hallway above, he hears loud pacing. The sound of doors slamming open and shut. Various curses and grunts of frustration.

And finally, thankfully, impossibly—

“FUCK!”

The footsteps reside. The hallway falls silent.

Vio stays still for the next twenty minutes.

─────────────────

11:44 P.M.

One Year Ago

Vio had been perfectly happy reading.

“We know your secret, bookworm,” Blake teases, holding the paperback out of his reach. The lodge’s warm fire illuminates Vio’s scowl.

“What the hell are you talking about?” he demands, looking from Blake to Grant to Zelda to Reed—his ‘friends,’ or rather Link’s friends, invited to the lodge for a weekend of teenage shenanigans.

“We’re helping you with your crush,” Reed enthuses, a little tipsy but earnest nonetheless. “It’s going to be soooo sweet. Like a movie!”

Vio raises an eyebrow, only growing more suspicious. They’re all high school seniors, can’t they be done with the stupid hormonal preteen nonsense? “I don’t have a—”

“Listen,” interrupts Grant, leaning slightly forward towards Vio. “We know you like him. And he obviously likes you. Prom is soon, don’t you want a date?”

“You have no idea what I want.”

“Aw,” Zelda smirks, cocking her head slightly. “I think he’s blushing.”

Reed elbows her. “Don’t be mean!”

“You don’t even have to lift a finger,” Grant continues, just as much a leader here as Link says he is on the lacrosse field. “We’ve arranged it all for you. Left him a little note on your behalf, told him to meet you in the guest bedroom at midnight, alone.”

“A promposal in the moonlight,” Reed swoons. “It’s perfect.”

Vio shoots out of his seat. “This is extremely inappropriate. You people have no idea—”

“We people might not have years of friendship with the Farores,” Blake says, “but we still care about them. And they talk to us about stuff.”

The implication, Vio knows, is that he is ‘stuff.’ A Farore has a crush on him, and he’s been running his mouth about it to his friends. Which Farore, Vio could easily guess—the same one he’s been secretly crushing on since eighth grade.

“It’s none of your business,” Vio argues, balling his fists at his sides. “Even if I… had feelings for him, I’d want to tell him on my own terms. Or he should tell me.”

Reed’s face falls, but Blake seems unfazed. “Too late. He’ll be there now, waiting for you.”

The grandfather clocked chimes midnight, as if on cue.

Vio wants to bicker more with these near-strangers, to explain how serious his feelings really are compared to their trivial promposal nonsense, and to make them feel terrible for assuming they could try to intervene. But Blake is right about at least one thing—it’s too late now. Vio’s crush is waiting for him, and he needs to minimize the damage of this ‘prank’ as best he can.

“You guys suck,” he tells the four, turning on his heel.

“Have fun!” Zelda enthuses, giggling. Vio flips her off and heads for the guest bedroom.

─────────────────

11:44 P.M.

Now

Eventually, Vio finds the courage to leave the elevator shaft. But with one or more of his ‘friends’ dead and a killer on the loose, it seems foolish to head back the way he came.

He knows that these hallways eventually connect to the abandoned asylum on the other side of the mountain. He could escape through there, hide out for the night, but then what? It isn’t like a serial killer is just going to give up at dawn. And who even knows what’s inside that asylum, or in the woods? There could be, like, wolves or bears or something.

Hiding or fleeing still seem like better options than fighting, though. Vio isn’t a fighter, he’s a thinker—but still, he probably can’t exactly out-think a murderer. Especially not one so meticulous with his use of audio, video, and elaborate death traps.

But something does still tug at him. During the chase, the killer was presented with several opportunities to quickly kill Vio. He could have strangled him, snapped his neck, or hit his head with the heavy metal gas canister. But instead, for some reason, the masked man had been determined to knock Vio out.

If only he had shown Shadow the same courtesy.

“Oh, shit,” Vio groans, finally glancing down at the ancient hotel carpet. Bloody footprints, in a steady trail, lead back the way both Vio and the killer came. With the amount of blood Shadow produced, Vio wouldn’t be surprised if his murderer is still tracking it around.

Oh Jesus Christ, it’s Shadow’s blood.

Vio refuses to let himself picture the most recently deceased Farore son, who went silent for nearly a year after his brother’s disappearance. However Vio had felt about Shadow before Link’s presumed death, none of it mattered after. And now it matters even less, because Shadow is dead too.

He supposes he should be more concerned about the others. If the killer has given up on him for now, does that mean he’s now hunting Grant, Blake, Reed, and Zelda? Vio doesn’t like any of those assholes, but he doesn’t want them murdered, either.

But… he isn’t about to throw himself in harm’s way to save them. At least, not right now. There had only been one person present at the beginning of this nightmare that Vio would have fought to protect, and his blood is staining the carpet.

“NO! NO, NO, NO!”

Vio freezes at the sound of a voice—his own voice, panicked cries from the theater playing on repeat.

What the actual fuck?

He picks up a fallen wooden beam, complete with a nail sticking out the end. Vio isn’t sure if he’ll be able to stomach using it, but hopefully he won’t have to.

He has to know. This is just too weird.

He follows the path of footsteps back into the hotel room, where it continues back towards the cellar. But other footsteps diverge, leading through the side door Vio hadn’t taken the first time.

The sound of his voice is coming from there.

Taking a deep breath, Vio pushes it open. It is indeed a small conjoined bathroom, leading to another bedroom. Vio slowly approaches a chair in the center of the space, only lowering his weapon once close enough to examine its occupant.

The killer has tied up a mannequin wearing Vio’s clothes—the same clothes he’d been wearing before he dozed off in the bath, whose absence leave him so vulnerable now. Beside the chair, a small speaker blasts his cries for help.

Vio was supposed to be bait. That’s why the killer wanted to knock him out. And in Vio’s absence, he improvised using a prop from one of Mr. Farore’s films.

It was smart, Vio has to admit.

Too bad he’s smarter.

Back in his jeans, sweater, and boots, Vio feels much more prepared to indulge his rising suspicions. Something is definitely wrong here, and it’s not just the murder.

“Oh, right,” Vio mutters, giving the mannequin a final once-over. He retrieves his scrunchie from its wrist and ties up his hair. “Okay, yeah, I can do this.”

Pointy beam in hand again, Vio follows the footsteps into another hallway down some more stairs. It’s completely silent down here, which honestly might be scarier than any kind of ambient noise.

He seems to have found himself in some kind of utility area. While the other parts of the hotel were decrepit and abandoned, Vio can still imagine them looking nice in their prime. Here? Not so much. These interconnected rooms are clearly not meant to be seen by guests.

But the killer has been down here recently, if he isn’t already here now. Again, Vio considers turning back— but more and more, he begins to question the danger of what lies ahead.

The first room he walks past is a meat locker. A freshly-gutted pig hangs on a rack, its blood dripping onto the tile floor. Footsteps, of course, lead in and out of the doorway.

The second room is not at all like a bloody meat locker. It’s strangely modern, full of modern equipment and furnishings. The surfaces aren’t dusty at all. There’s even a mini-fridge.

“Oh, no,” Vio mutters, examining a blueprint pinned to a corkboard. It depicts what the creator crudely named a ‘death machine’—a long board with straps, hooked up to a track with a saw. A fake prop torso is attached, beneath a hole for someone’s head to poke through.

Under the blueprint, Vio finds a stack of newspapers. He startles at the headline, which is accompanied by an image of Link’s year-old missing person poster.

SUSPECTED KILLER ON FARORE MOUNTAIN - COULD HE BE RESPONSIBLE FOR LOCAL TEENAGER’S DISAPPEARANCE?

“They’re fake,” Vio says, glancing down at an invoice from a printer. “It’s all made up. How could he—”

He winces at a nearby buzz. A very familiar phone rests on the workbench, its black case decorated with a pop-socket shaped like a ghost.

Vio still remembers the passcode—although in this case he kind of wishes he didn’t.

The most recent text is from someone named ‘Dr. Arrghus,’ who appears to have been communicating with the phone’s owner for a few months. Vio scrolls back to the beginning of the current day, trying to get a gist of the conversation between them.

1:34 P.M. A: Hi Greyson, it’s Dr. Arrghus. I hope you don’t mind me texting you, but this is important. I got your email. I don’t think that your plan is going to help. I think you need to stop what you’re doing and come to see me. 4:13 P.M. A: Please, pick up your phone. I’m getting worried. G: LEAVE ME ALONE A: When is the last time you’ve spoken to a person in real life? G: I’m fine. People coming later today A: I am concerned about your safety and theirs. 6:48 P.M. A: Greyson? 12:00A.M. A: Greyson, please respond.

Vio drops the phone, his hands shaking.

Holy shit, Shadow has lost his mind.

Holy shit, Shadow is ALIVE.

“I have to tell the others,” Vio says, because of course he does, what other option is there?

A response comes in the form of the pop and fizz of an opened soda tab. Vio turns to face the would-be killer, now unmasked, offering him a can of chilled root beer.

“Are you sure you need to tell them?”

Specific warnings of possibly upsetting things, but some are pretty spoilery. I HIGHLY encourage you to skip over if you want this to be experienced as intended:

A character has their clothing taken while bathing and wears a bathrobe for the majority of the first chapter. There is a reason this happens, and the character is not sexually harassed.

Gore is mentioned but not described in any detail.

Someone attempts to knock out a person with gas by forcing a mask onto them, but they're quickly fought off.

A character sees a disemboweled pig. Again, not described in detail.

[wearethekingdom]

Tell me about your trip bro >:3 seems like you got some really cool stuff!!

RAHHHH GNAWING. AT THE BARS IF MY ENCLOSURE RIGHT NOW!!!1!!!! i was hoping someone was actually interested in what i was saying cuz sometimes posting on here feels like talking to the wall. this is gonna be like really long sorry, you dont have to read it

ANYWAYS YES. So me and a couple other people went up to the north of ireland for a few days which was so so awesome sauce because i love drives. see i never say long drives because once someone got needlessly mad at me for calling it a long drive and started indirect posting about me but 4 hours is like the longest you could drive from one place to another here. so. its long for me kind of (ignoring my copious weeks-long US roadtrips)

we got to the place where we were staying at, the beds were so uncomfy think i wouldve slept better on the floor tbh BUT it's fine. we went to the shop because everything is like cheaper there and i got this blanket with ghost dogs on it for my dog cuz he likes covering himself in a blanket when he sleeps, its really cute so i had to get him a new blanket. then we tried to go out for dinner but told us we werent allowed in to the place we booked the day before because no minors were allowed in at that time like lad put that on your damn website then 🙏🙏 so we ate the random snacks we had bought earlier in our room, which was kind of way too delicious

DAY 2?!?!

We went to the Titanic museum cuz i like history and raujerng um it was fucking awesome, some of the workers there spoke irish which was so cool, i took some photos of stuff and i learnt so much about the titanic that i didnt know about. I also cried in the middle of one of the exhibits because i realised just the sheer amount of people who died and. yeah. but nah it was a great experience

then we went to some shitty science museum cuz it looked cool on their website but we were the oldest people there everyone was like FIVE. so we left quickly.

Then we went on a walk and it was super duper pretty, we also went swimming there, sea swimming my favourite thing EVER!! did some diving off the rocks, realy enjoyed that

For dinner we went to this like dinerish thing, it was really cool and the food was so tasty, we didnt get kicked out of this place (fuck yeah) I tried dumplings for the first time and they were actually really good like i didnt think i would enjoy them but yeah! i also got strawberry lemonade which i thought i didnt like for whatever reason but now ive tried it again i do!

DAY 3?!?!?

last day cuz i have school soon. SO we woke up super late and totaly overstayed but like womp womp owners didnt give a single shit. We went to the 2nd hand book shop where i got The Great Gatsby, Batman The Dark Knight, Lost in Translation, and even more than i showed so i also got Will Grayson Will Grayson, Catching Teller Crow, The Honest Truth and Wayward. They were all like 2 pounds which is so good cuz every book is atleast 11 euro back home cuz idk they dont like doing 2nd hand bookshops down there for some reason. Then we went to the vintage store where i got my postcards cuz i loveeee collecting old postcards with messages on them, the 1958 one is now the oldest postcard i own and its SO COOL LIKE AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA, im actually so happy i found it. Also got those 2 ceramic guys, the hippo and the bunny, if you got a name suggestion JJ let me know cuz i havent named them yet. Then we got on the road back home where we listened to shitty drill rappers and irish rebel songs all the way back

it was such a good trip and i am yet again sorry this is so long

[akaakeis]

sav the terriblest thing has happened......... i joined english coaching.............

okay its not that bad the guy was my ninth grade english teacher and hes kind of a w

i also found out my current english teacher is mentally ill and not one of her students got 90+ in english like..

#notmepls

ANYWAYS

this Means that i shall be offline when ur usually first online during the day on sundays tuesdays and thursdays throws up

ive alr been so busy and i was like omg #textingsav and then i realised we probably wont talk today and also the only time we'll talk is

wait omg no school tmr we WILL talk tmr which will be ur today

the way im just. rambling in ur inbox but its ok bc ur u and im me #neverdoingthisanywhereelse

next thing . wait i forgot im remembering

oKAY remembered 👍 ERM i got like a. 68 on my english test and apparently this mentally ill woman marked it wrong and i shouldve gotten an erm. wait calculating. at least an 88 LIKE GIRL WHAT THE FREAKKKKKKKKK

in other news erm why i cried in the last four days list .

i love my sister

i love my friends

english grade

teacher yelled at me

there was no garlic bread at home

i got disconnected from dti

i didnt want to get up and change

the electricity cut off five times and i couldnt play genshin properly

tumblr wasnt loading

86 eighty-six

hashtag periods i love periods

in other news i also love maths like i WAS a maths girl i AM a maths girlie i will always BE a maths girlie it is THE subject of all time and if anyone disagrees then they're wrong (unless it's u because what can i say. i always agree with cute girls🤷‍♀️)

also like i said id tell you about the smau but literally erm. i forgot.. what was supposed to happen.. i have two lines ill dm them to u or something 😭😭😭😭 WAIT I JUST REMEMBERED SOMETHING ELSE AND THEN I FORGOT IT IM GOING TO SOB.

OH YES spilling school tea

our chem teacher used to tutor this one girl and he flirted with her mom at 1am on wahtsapp and facebook and then his wife divorced him😭😭

this one girl's picture got taken. like a norm picture. and then her bf and some people fought over it. like physically. at coaching. LOL INSANE

english physics and chemistry departments of our school are failing everyone is underpaid and leaving

my english teacher is senile but we mentioned that already i think

ANYWAYSSSS UNINTENTIONAL YAP ASK I LITERALLY JUST CAME HERE TO SAY IM MORE BUSY THAN BEFORE LMFAO. look where we are. oh omg im so #scared #excited #terrified for us w/o u part 2 thats flipping SCARY IM SCARED anyways how are u? feel free to yap in the answers if u do answer it and uhhh take care stay safe love u mwa mwa dm me whenever

LINA MY LOVE!! this is gonna be long i fear. oh dear.... ok so english coaching is not fun good luck with that 😕

well at least the guy is cool ‼️

im sorry but lowkey... #wbk about that one i fear!! I ALWAYS THOUGHT SHE WAS A LITTLE MENTALLY ILL? IS THAT JUST ME OR

anyway if u dont get 90+ in english send her my way I WILL FIGHT FOR YOUR GRADE SO HARD you deserve a good grade!!! i can tell you've been putting in the effort + im proud of u!!1!!1!1

NOOOOOO WE WONT BE ABLE TO TALK AS MUCH 🙁 lwt me think so today is thursday and youll be on on mondays wednesdays fridays + saturdays as normal presumably? THATS OKAY i usually wake up latw on thursdays because i sleep late and its a whole mess... i was nearly late this morning harhar ANYWAY POINT BEING WE WILL STILL BE ABLE TO TALK TO WE'LL BE GOOD

girl me too <//3 was so locked in on tuesday you should've seen me writing my article for the magazine + writing out the rest of my speech and finalizing ITS SO BUSY RN ICB IT

these timezones are confusinf me hello i am so lost as i read this! 12 hrs apart w you ahead is all ik regarding this

ANYWAY WE WILL FIND TIME AND WE WILL MAKE IT WORK ITLL JUST TAKE A MINUTE FOR ME TO FIGURE IT OUT

its okay i live laugh love for ur asks actually im sitting in my room smiling as i type out this reply to ur ask... inbox yap hour MY FAV

A 68 IS ACTUALLY INSANE GOODBYE how did she screw up the grade so bad 😭 she can catch these fists for that one LIKE HOW DO U GET IT 20% OFF THIS IS NOT A CLEARANCE SALE MISS!!

HELP all of these reasons are equally valid 😞 periods really get me fucked up fr i think im about to get mine too smh

that is SO valid lina math is honestly a good subject 🙂‍↕️ not my fav but i honestly enjoy the class cause it's 1) simple for me 2) my tablemates are so odd to the point of being hilarious and 3) my teacher is gay and we found his grindr profile so i always giggle when i think about that HAHDBDN so math class is just heaps of fun

NOOOO I WAS SO EXCITED TO HESR ABT THE SMAU U NEED TO SEND ME THE TWO LINES U HAVE SOON!!1!!1!1 STOP I HATE WHEN THAT HAPPENS BUT IT HAPPENS TO ME SO OFTEN ITS AWFUL

ok THE CHEM TEACHER??? wow okay so thats crazy! HIS WIFE DIVORCING HIM TOO PLEASE SO DESERVED everyone point and laugh!!! L man!!!!

HELP WHY WERE THEY EVEN FIGHTING IF IT WAS JUST A NORMAL PICTURE THATS SO WILD?? 😭 like guys its not that deep </3

WHAT. so like is this hyperbole or is literally everyone going to leave bc of being underpaid and whatnot CAUSE THATS SO BAD 

senility✊😞 what a trooper/j

ITS OKAY I ENJOYED READING ALL OF THAT!!!  PLEASE PRIORITIZE ALL YOUR STUDIES THEYRE THE MOST IMPORTANT <3 I HOPE YOU DONT BURN OUT FROM BEING MORE BUSY THAN BEFORE BC I KNOW I DEFINITELY DID WHEN I HAD VOLLEYBALL.. SO TAKE THINGS EASY AND DONT STRESS YOURSELF TOO MUCH PLEASE!!! ILY ILY ILY!! oh okay so us without me pt 2 is probably gonna be BAD BAD cause it will b talking about how he was actually in love w eden since BEFORE he had moved and all that so itll be extra angst talking about before he had moved 😸 basically timeskips briefly showing how he gives you less and less affection as the time he leaves draws near AHAHAH ITS GONNA BE BAD

+ im alright!!! no homework for once in a blue moon so im sitting here relaxing i feel so good rn <3 i have an iced matcha latte and a cake pop I AM LIVE LAUGH LOVING

so i dont have much to yap about at this moment but i just got back from school SOOOO ill yap about that!!

starting off strong i woke up an hour + 15 mins late and had 20 minutes to get ready and eat... i was almost late this morning BUT i have fitness first thing in the morning on my a-days (we work on an a/b schedule!!) and my teacher always comes late to that!! so i had time to dress down and i BOOKED IT to the weight room + made it!! in that class we basically just do weightlifting + my usual partner wasnt there bc she had a golf tournament... so i was with some of my other friends for lifting!! was kinda thriving bc my other partner usually does heavier weights + they did lighter ones SO I WAS REALLY REALLY FAST W MY SETS i was very proud!!

then i went into second period (i have bio) and we were doing a lab where we examined some cells in onions, tomatoes, + the inside of our cheeks (ew) but basically we had to group up and im not rly fond of one of the girls that r in my group cause she doesn't talk much she just squeezes in to look through the microscope so it annoys me 😞 ANYWAY THE LAB WAS LIGHT WORK GOT IT DONE IN 30 MINS and then i had like an hour of free time after that so i asked for a hall pass and i roamed the halls for a bit 😸 after that i have to go to advisory + i was just helping people w math hw and doing some of the nyt games to kill my boredom (oh and drivers ed stuff!!)

at lunch i was just sitting with some of my friends and playing imessage games with them 😭 then we went into the gym and played volleyball for a bit!!

after lunch i had geo and i was taking notes like a madman i fear... dk if ive said this before but like ohhh man everyone makes a point of telling me how small my hand writing is its so annoying 😭 i heard that three times during class today and i was literally done LIKE STOP LEAVE ME ALONE PLEASE ‼️

theeeen i had my speech + debate CLASS not to be confused with my club!! i already finished my oratory so i just played games the entire period 😻 lots of fun would recommend!!! i just hate the teacher cause he's always telling me to go back to my seat WHEN IM HELPING HIS STUDENTS CATCH UP ON WORK like ok! sorry for trying to help you fix the mistakes you made when teaching them how to make their speeches! goodness! my bad! anyway hes my opp 😒

AND THATS MY DAY!! anyway take care stay safe i love you!!! MWAHH <3

[herarcadewasteland]

Discoveries Pt. 3 ♥

A/N: Yes yes its been a little while but I've been busy okay? and i’ve been fired so emotional things. thank you all for the support so far and i hope this makes up for the wait. 

Pt. 1    Pt. 2

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Stretching in your bed the next morning, you let out a large yawn as you adjusted to fall asleep again. Turning over in bed, you weren’t expecting the face of Fred to be right next you. You let out a startled scream as he laughed you, your eyes rolling as your shoulders shook with laughter. 

“What are you doing, Fred? It’s like 5am.”

“7am. You slept in missy~”

Groaning and flipping to face the other side of the room, your hair swung dramatically with you and into Georges face, who was crouched on the opposite side of your bed, expecting the trouble of waking you up. You screamed again and sat up with a huff, the twins high-fiving over your head. 

“Will you two just let me sleep for another hour at least?”

“No can do. You see-”, George started.

“We need to be at Diagon Alley by 8:30.”, Fred finished. 

You ran a hand through your knotted hair, partly in confusion and mostly in frustration. When it clicked in your head that you had to get some school robes adjusted, you panicked and half jumped, half fell out of bed. The twins backed your frantic movements with laughter as they walked down to the kitchen, the chatter of impatient and hungry Weasleys filled your ears. 

“Why do we have to wait for Y/N to eat?! It’s her fault for sleeping too long!”, Rons muffled voice fell into your conscious and made you speed up your hair and teeth brushing. 

Rushing down the stairs, you stumbled directly into Bill who caught you with a sigh.

“Clumsy as always, Y/N.”

You let out an almost ashamed laugh, your arms squeezing around Bill as he wheezed. Arthur walked in behind the both of you and ushered you into your seats as Molly set down the plate of bacon. 

“Finally!”, Ron muttered as he grabbed the plate of bacon seconds after it hit the table, his plate piling with food.

Food was passed around between the family, conversation filling the air as you ate silently. Your silent bubble was disrupted when Ron dragged you into an argument between himself and Percy. 

“It’s not my fault you have a bloody stick up your ass!” 

“I am a prefect, Ronald, which is something that will actually get me into the Ministry!”

Ron shot you a look of ‘oh dear god not this again’ and you laughed. 

“Percy, you do realize not being a prefect can get you into the Ministry. You just need good grades and the right classes.”

Percy snapped his glare to you, knowing you were right, and sighed. He had always had a sort of soft spot for you, knowing you weren’t actually a Weasley. Which was a dumb reason to not hate someone but you went along with it so not absolutely every child in the house had an argument with him every other day.

“I suppose you aren’t wrong, Y/N. I just have a better chance this way.”

He turned his nose up at you and you laughed, finishing off your plate just as the rest of the family had. The plates were cleared from the table as everyone dispersed to do their own thing. 

“Y/N dear, we must be going if we don’t want to be late. Come now, to the fireplace.”

You brushed yourself off and followed Molly to the fireplace, your hand wrapping around another handful of soft powder. Your eyes glanced up to your mum as she nodded reassuringly. You still weren’t used to it yet and you had a feeling it would take a little while to feel normal and not like you were being vacuum sealed into a plastic bin. With a sigh you threw down the powder and clearly stated “Diagon Alley”, and then you were gone in a swirl of green smoke.

Stumbling from the grate in The Three Broomsticks, you ran headfirst into a solid mass. Panicked, you looked around to make sure you were where you were supposed to be and slowly glanced at whoever you bumped into. Your wide eyes met narrowed ones surrounded by the same white blonde hair from the other day. You took a subconscious step back from the man just as Molly came through the floo, her hands finding your arms as she stumbled lightly into you.

“Mr. Malfoy. If you’d excuse us.”, Her eyes narrowed back at the man as he looked between the two of you, “Come on, dear, off we go now.”

She led you away with gentle hands, your head turning to look back at the man as you swerved through tables. Your eyes met one last time before Molly was tugging you past the door with a firm but gentle hold on your hand. As you met the bustling roads of Diagon Alley, you squinted your eyes at the sun, a frown tugging down the corners of your mouth as you stared at the ground, trying to avoid any ray of sun you could. Leaping between shadows to the fitting, you panted as Molly gently pulled you to a stop in front of Madam Malkins. You sighed and Molly chuckled lightly, her hand taking yours and guiding you in. 

“It’ll only take a minute. Don’t worry dear.”

~~~~~~~~~

“A minute my butt!”,  you exclaimed as you stumbled out of the fireplace in the Burrow, Fred sweeping you off your feet immediately and up to your room where a trunk lay on your bed.

“What is this? Why is my trunk out? What did you do?”

You rounded on Fred and George as soon as you were placed onto the floor, their faces innocent as could be as they watched you with crossed arms and very small smirks of entertainment. 

“You need to pack for Hogwarts!”

“We all have. Our trunks are-”

“-Waiting by the front door.”

“Only two are missing~”

You sighed and stared into the empty space, your eyes tracing loose threads along the seam as you nodded. 

“Okay, I’ll go bother Ronald after I’m done.”

“That's what we like to hear!”, the twins chorused as they walked from your room to raid the kitchen, if Mollys loud reprimanding was anything to go by.

The packing only took you a few minutes, most of your school things were in a separate drawer as it was so all you had to do was move them into the trunk. You finished your packing with relative ease and an overactive mind, the zipper closing breaking the silence you had been working in. WIth a sigh, you pulled your trunk to the top of the stairs before making your way to ROnalds room to aid him in his no-doubt messy packing. Your suspicions were confirmed when you pushed open the door to encounter the entirety of Rons wardrobe scattered around the room. 

“Ron, how? There is no way you had to destroy your room to pack.”

HIs frantic eyes met yours as he scoffed, “Well no, but it felt necessary at the time.”

You hummed and cleared a few spots across the room, handing things to Ron you knew he would want with him. His eyes followed you around when he wasn't haphazardly throwing things into his trunk.

“At least fold things!”, you stomped over to his trunk and folded piece by piece as Ronald sat and watched you with a blank expression until you reached his Chudley Cannon jersey. Then he reacted and grabbed it from your hands with a gasp, his own carefully folding it in a mess. You shrugged and packed it neatly with the rest of his things, the heavier items resting on top of his clothes as the lighter things went on those. 

“There. All done.”, you heaved a sigh as you closed the lid of the trunk, the click of the lock creating a satisfying noise in the otherwise silent room. 

“Thank you, Y/N~”, Ron grabbed you for an overly tight hug, your hands pushing at his arms as you wheezed for a single breath of air that wasn’t from Ron’s vicinity.

“Ok ok ok! I get it, just get it downstairs with the rest of them!”

Ronald let you go after a moment, his frame moving out the door with his trunk in hand as you followed after him.

“You made it sound like you brought yours down! But nooo look at what’s right here!”, Ron huffed and lightly kicked your trunk as he passed it.

“I said the rest of them! Never included mine!”, you shouted after him as you grabbed your own trunk and carried it down the stairs to see Bill and Charlie in front of the floo.

Molly gave the two a big hug with large containers of sweets being shoved into their hands after Arthur gave them a hug as well, Percy nodding a farewell from the couch as he read through the Ministry’s handbook for rules and regulations. 

“Nooooo~!”, you whined, “You can’t leave yet! You like... just got here! We didn’t get to talk about Hogwarts!”

The eldest Weasley boys chuckled and pulled you into their arms for a group hug, tears filling your eyes as they pet your hair lovingly. 

“You know we have jobs to get too, Y/N. We can’t stay to see you off.”

You huffed at them and lightly punched their chests as they smiled at you. A small nod moved your hair into your eyes as you grasped them tighter. While you weren’t as close to them as you were the twins, they had still helped raise you in a sense and that created a connection, plus you were their little sister. Blood or not, that created an even greater connection. Still not one large enough to rival that of yours with Fred and George but it was enough.

“Fine. Just send owls, okay? I wanna tell you everything!”

The boys nodded and placed kisses on the top of your white hair, their eyes slightly glossy as yours overflowed with tears.

“We will.”

“Absolutely we will.”, Charlie finished as he guided you to Molly’s embrace, Bill giving a last wave and goodbye to the family as he stepped through the floo with a call of his destination. 

Charlie gave a similar exit with a blown kiss towards yourself and your mom as he called out for the Ministry of Magic for Romania, however he pronounced it. Their departure set the family in motion as Arthur ushered everyone into the kitchen to go over the basic checklist of the things you would need for your time at Hogwarts. Most of the list was checked off smoothly, Ron mumbling under his breath that it was unnecessary until your dad reached an item he had forgotten and cursed. That got him a small ass-whooping from Molly as she urged him to go get what he had been missing. Fred and George mocked him as he ran up the stairs, your quiet giggles backing them until your parents shushed you all and continued with the list as Ronald slipped down the stairs to his trunk and frantically packed his wand. The list went smoothly after that, everyone having followed the list to pack, well... you had. The trunks were smooshed in the back of the Ford Anglia with a small extension charm, a suspicious popping noise coming from one of the twins trunks, a huff of air and confetti falling into the trunk as they stood rubbing the backs of their necks sheepishly. 

You were all set to head out for Hogwarts, all that was left was getting onto the platform and finding a seat. Easy enough, you told yourself as Fred and George popped confetti onto Arthur as he walked away, their lanky frames sprinting away from a charmed broom as it chased them across the lawn. Easy enough... right?

[justaboot]

Ahh, tagged by @hueberryshortcake (thanks! also this was the thing someone tagged me in and lost weeks ago so bless <3)

how many fics do you have on ao3?

omg 8, what even are they.

what's your total ao3 word count?

174,260 oh my GOd

what fandoms do you write for?

- I've only posted for DT but I've got a 10th Doctor/River fic in my drafts

what are your top five fics by kudos?

And a Sixpence in Your Shoe

In Situ

I've Got Time

Everyone Loves a Reunion (A come from behind win?)

Gentle as it Goes

do you respond to comments? why or why not?

- I try so hard to reply to everybody, but I've got weapons grade anxiety so sometimes I'm worried people will think I'm self-important. I've actually found I'm less likely to respond to tumblr mutuals? More anxiety? Unclear but I'm smashing my face into my hands at every comment.

what's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I can't handle ending on angst. Gentle as it Goes, definitely, but I hate it, I cannot handle splitting the party.

what's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Sixpence definitely has the most Disney Fairytale Everything Works Out ending, but writing I've Got Time's button fixed something in me I think.

do you get hate on your fics?

The first comment I ever got ever was DellaHate gbless, thanks AO3 User DellaDuckShouldDie for your insightful comment of "Della Duck should be destroyed."

do you write smut?

I've written it for other things, I'm not shook by it and its a great storytelling tool just like everything else, but not cartoon characters. I...I have one explicitly human DT fic that. I. Well. We'll see. Its a genre test run for something original and they're pointedly human, but I guess I'll cop to that one?

do you write crossovers? what's the craziest one you've ever written?

I hate crossovers stay away from me I cant wrap my head around it

have you ever had a fic stolen?

Nah. Where would you go with it, we're all in the same room.

have you ever had a fic translated?

No but that'd be so cool!

have you ever cowritten a fic before?

girlfriend and I made an absolute banger of a spn fic together on a 12 hour roadtrip. Its not written down but we've got it beat for beat.

what's your all time favorite ship?

The Doctor and River will never fail to make me lay down they're them I dont even know what to say

what's a wip you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

-I've got 1/3rd of an OG3 prequel episode fic written, but it has to be part of a series and that's just...not gonna happen.

what are your writing strengths?

oh god i dont know don't look at me dialogue? I get a lot of comments about in-character dialogue/behavior lets go with that.

what are your writing weaknesses?

I have "I'll finish it later, let me start this new one real quick" disease.

thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

I haven't done so, I'm fine with French but I'm terrified across the board of The Comment From A Native Speaker.

first fandom you wrote for?

Let me tell you about Tid, my halfling OC based on my Lord of the Rings Online character who played very little of the actual game and just ran laps around the shire. Elementary school core.

favorite fic you've ever written?

I am putting Sixpence on the award shelf for having finished something so big and I've Got Time was me getting a good grade in therapy. Right now I'm actually really proud of Dear Fellow Traveller? They're just lil kids and omg they're swimming in the Little Lake watering hole in the sierras I did that how did the author know

Tagging.... @writebackatya and @shychick-52