#its funny ive had red hair and blue hair in the past and this is sort of combining them haha

[rekkamaiden]

"Day 67" (i'm so behind but I'm keeping the numbers) I wanted to finish this one earlier but for health reasons I was unable to until today. I'm really happy with how this turned out, honestly it's a rather proud moment for me so I hope you all like it too!

[duhragonball]

[FIC] Luffa: The Legendary Super Saiyan (155/?)

Disclaimer: This story features characters and concepts based on Dragon Ball, which is a trademark of Bird Studio/Shueisha and Toei Animation.   This is an unauthorized work, and no profit is being made on this work by me. This story is copyright of me. Download if you like, but please don’t archive it without my permission. Don’t be shy.

Continuity Note: This story takes place about 1000 years before 66 years after the events of Dragon Ball Z.

Hey, it’s the Hero Lab!

[1 July, Age 726.    Planet Plant.]

The latest reports from the frontlines were very encouraging.    The Tuffles were a stubborn enemy, but the Saiyans had managed to drive them out of the north quarter of Orange City, while the Truffle pushback in Cidertown had slowed to a virtual standstill.   Nappa smiled as he laid the report down and enjoyed the view from his new penthouse.    The blood of the previous owner still stained the walls and floors, but he rather enjoyed the scent of dead Tuffles.   It gave the place some much-needed personality.    

"You seem to be in a good mood today."  

Nappa looked up from the balcony and spotted a young Saiyan floating overhead.    He didn't recognize the man, but judged him to be part-alien from the color of his hair and the strange clothes that he wore.    He looked more like a Tuffle than a Saiyan, but the scent was proof enough that he wasn't Nappa's enemy.    Whatever the young man's parentage, his blood was nothing like the kind that decorated his new home.    

"Why wouldn't I be happy?" Nappa asked.   His thin mustache framed his smile as he crossed his arms over his massive chest.    "The Tuffles have been lording over us for years, and now we're finally taking over this planet, just as easily as I took over this apartment.    Before long, the Tuffles will be the ones begging us to let them stay on Planet Plant."

"I guess you're right," the man said.   "At least until someone stronger comes along and takes it all away from you."

"I like you, kid," Nappa said with a gravely laugh.    "You sure do know how to tell a joke.   What brings you here?"

"I had some questions," he said as he alighted on the balcony.  "I need information, and I heard you knew my father, so I thought I'd start with you."

Nappa eyed the man suspiciously.    "I know a lot of fathers," he said.   "None of them wore long black coats, or carried a sword, though.    What's your dad's name, kid?"  

"Vegeta," he said.  

Nappa laughed.    Then he looked at the young man more carefully, doing his best to ignore the blue eyes and the lavender hair that hung around his face.   Then he laughed harder.  

"Something funny about that?" the man asked.    

"I do see a bit of a resemblance," Nappa said.   "Guess King Vegeta II had a few 'unofficial' heirs over the years, huh?   Who knew he had it in him?   So which is it?   You want to blackmail the royal family?    Or were you hoping they'd give you a cushy civil service job?"

"Nothing like that," the man said.   "I just wanted to ask you some questions.    Nothing personal, just general background stuff."

"Yeah?  Well why should I help you?" Nappa asked.    "For that matter, killing you would probably be a smarter play.    One less would-be usurper for the king to worry about, right?  I’m sure your old man would make it worth my while."

"Oh, I probably should have been more specific," the young man said.    "My father isn't Vegeta the Second.    It's Vegeta the Fourth."    

Nappa gave him a sidelong glance.    "There is no Vegeta IV," he said warily.  

"Not yet, anyway," the man said with a knowing smile.  

"That's it, I don't know what your game is, punk, but I'm through playing!" Nappa said.    "You can tell your lies in hell!"  

He drew back his arm and threw a punch that would have killed most Saiyans on contact.    Nappa had made a name for himself on the battlefield for defeating entire companies of Tuffle mechatroops all by himself.    He fully expected to turn the young man's head into a cloud of red mist.    

Instead, the man blocked his strike with such incredible speed that Nappa couldn't even tell that he had moved.   In one instant, the man had been standing with his hands in his pockets.    And then in the next, the man was now gripping Nappa's palm with his thumb and index finger.    He squeezed slightly, and Nappa nearly dropped to his knees from the pain.    

"Nnnghhh!" was the noise he made as he struggled not to show how much it hurt.   His free hand reached up for his scalp, where he tugged at the tuft of thick black hair on his head.

"Look, let's cut to the chase, all right?   For you, this'll only take a few minutes, but I might be doing these interviews all night, so don't waste my time, okay?   Those Tuffles you're fighting might be pushovers, but I'm not.    So now that you know that you can't brute force your way out of this, what'll it be?"

He released Nappa's hand, and Nappa gasped with relief as he cradled it in his other palm.   He stared at his hands for a moment, then at the man.   Then he paused to consider the sword, and how much worse it would get if the young man decided to make use of it.    

"Heh.   Uh, yeah, sorry, Your Majesty.   I-I should have recognized you sooner.    Anything you want, just let me know, Prince... uh... Prince... What'd you say your name was?"

"I didn't," he replied.  "So, let's start with a simple one.    Have you ever heard of a Saiyan named Luffa?"

*******

[1 December Age 893, Earth.]

"Honestly, I didn't expect him to know Luffa.    Nappa didn't recognize her when she faced him on a Time Patrol mission, but he did fill me in on a few things."

By Age 889, the arcade game Super Dragon Ball Heroes had become a popular pastime, and the city of Hero Town became the global headquarters for the craze.    Gaming enthusiasts from around the world traveled to Hero Town to partake in the game, which was based upon actual events from the previous century.   Trunks had logged many hours in front of an SDBH cabinet, though his reasons had nothing to do with recreation.   For all its popularity, the game had a very strange secret.    It was the Capsule Corporation who developed the software, but the world within the game was actually made possible by the Time Patrol.   Deep beneath Hero Tower was the Hero Lab, where the Time Patrol occasionally conducted secret research and reconnaissance.  

"I don't get it, Master," said a teenage girl standing near one of the main computer terminals that surrounded nearly every surface of the Hero Lab.    "You formed the Dragon Ball Heroes Team to help you defeat Sealas, right?   So why didn't you come to us on this Towa situation?"

"Note's right, Trunks!" said a teenage boy eating mochi from a bag.  "I'm Goku's descendant, after all!   It's not fair to leave me out of a case like this."

Trunks deactivated the Hero Switch device and handed it to Anne, one of the scientists who maintained the lab.    His black trenchcoat and sword hung next to several labcoats on a metal rack in the corner, revealing the olive-green sweater he wore underneath.   He smiled at Note and Beat, and then Dr. Leggings, the project director of the Hero Lab, who was programming the next simulation.

"I understand where you're coming from, kids," Trunks said, "and I appreciate the offer, but it's not that simple."  

"Why not?" Beat asked.   "From what you've told us, Luffa's a Saiyan, right?   If that's all you needed, then I could have tackled these missions for you.  I'm a Saiyan, too."

"Oh, here we go..." Note grumbled.  She made sure to roll her eyes dramatically enough for everyone in the room to see.

"What?" Beat asked.    "It's true, isn't it?"

"Beat, even I have Saiyan ancestry," Dr. Leggings said without looking up from her computer terminal.   "After a hundred and thirty years of Saiyans living on Earth, it's not as uncommon as you might think."

"She's right," Trunks said.   "We have a lot of Saiyan-Earthling Time Patrollers back in Toki Toki City from the next century.   A few of the stranger ones call me 'Your Highness', but I try not to hold it against them.      Besides, if all I cared about was Saiyan blood, I'd go to my father for help.   So that's not why I recruited you, or Luffa, for that matter."

"Then why did you recruit Luffa instead of coming to us?" Beat asked.  

"Listen,” Trunks said.   “In my timeline, No. 17 and 18 had destroyed much of the world.   Son Gohan was the only Z-fighter left, and he was reluctant to train me.    He needed the help, but he was worried about me getting hurt.    I think eventually he decided he didn't have a choice.    He knew that if anything happened to him, there would have been no one else to defeat the Cyborgs.   But now I understand how his reluctance.    After he... well.... Later on, when I was on my own, I was determined to defeat them alone.   I wanted no part of my mother's plan to use her Time Machine to get help from Goku."

"But, Master, if you hadn't gone back in time," Note said, then you never would have joined the Time Patrol, or formed the Dragon Ball Heroes Team!"

"Exactly," Trunks said.    "Working with Goku and his friends in the past, I learned how valuable it can be to have allies.   It's not just about having extra hands to help with the hard work.   You can learn from each new friend you make.    And they can learn from you, as well.    I think that's why the Supreme Kai of Time created the Time Patrol in the first place.  So it wouldn't be right to keep turning to the same handful of allies every time.  Besides, I need you guys here, keeping an eye on things in Hero Town."

"Well, yeah," Beat said.   "I guess that makes sense.   But it's been so dull around here lately."

"Tell you what," Trunks offered.   "Once things settle down in Toki Toki City, I'll pull a few strings, maybe bring you guys in on a Time Patrol mission.   How's that sound?"

"Really?!" Note cheered.   She jumped into the air and kicked her heels behind her with excitement.    

"Awesome!" Beat said.  

"Don't get too carried away," Trunks said.    "I can't make any promises.   Ultimately, it's up to the Supreme Kai of Time.    But I think we can manage something."    

"I think we're ready for the next session, sir," Leggings said.   "Assuming these coordinates you gave us are valid.   Are you sure we can trust Nappa?"

"She's right, Master," Note added.    "He's bad news.   Just because you're stronger than he is doesn't mean he would have had any reason to tell you the truth."

"Which is exactly why I'm using Hero Lab to access the game world instead of traveling back in time," Trunks explained.   "Our research teams back in Toki Toki City are constantly using time machines to observe historical events, but they can't interact with anything or ask questions, because it might alter history."

"But the SDBH game is a simulation based upon the Scroll of Eternity itself," Dr. Leggings said.    "Meaning it's a nearly perfect copy of the real world, one that you can tamper with and not have to worry about permanently changing anything."

"Of course!" Note said.   "It's like how Sealas used the game to learn what changes he could make to alter history.   He used the game like a practice run for the real thing."

"Only, instead of changing the way things happened in the past," Beat said, "you're using the game to find out how things are supposed to have turned out.   But how does that help you learn anything about Luffa?"

"I asked Shenron to bring me a powerful ally," Trunks said.    "I should have been more specific about the wish, but I was kind of desperate for the help.   Shenron sent me Luffa, but she had no idea what was going on, and neither of us knows how to get her back where she came from.   She talked to one of our historians, and it's starting to sound like she's from some other part of the universe, or maybe from another timeline.   But wherever she's from, she's still a Saiyan, and not a descendant of Goku or Vegeta, like we are.    So I think if I go far enough into the past, I'll find some historical information we have in common, and maybe I can follow that thread back to her home."

"Phew!" Beat said.   "That sounds like a lot of work!  I'm worn out just thinking about it."

"You're not even doing anything," Note muttered.  

"There's no telling what kind of trouble I might run into in the simulated history," Trunks said.   Dr. Leggings has only ever run the simulation in a very narrow time range.   A few centuries at most.   I may end up taking the simulation into uncharted territory, and everything I know about Saiyans tells me that they had plenty of enemies to fight.    If things get hairy, I'll need some backup, and that's where you two come in.   I can't think of anyone better qualified than my two top students."

"Gosh...!" Note said.

"Yeah!  Now you're talking!" Beat cheered.    

Anne handed the Hero Switch back to Trunks.   The device was a powerful computer, but it looked like a black bracelet covered in glowing blue lights and a Capsule Corp. logo.   Trunks placed it onto his right wrist and prepared to activate it.  

"In the game world," he said, "Nappa told me that "Saiya" was a name for several planets colonized by Saiyans throughout history.   The most recent one was destroyed around four hundred years ago.    Hopefully, someone there will know more about King Rehval, or the Camelian Empire, or this Planet Nagaoka that Luffa once mentioned."

"What if they don't know, sir?" Anne asked.  

"Then I'll have to keep traveling backward until I find someone who does," Trunks said.   "Wish me luck."

"Wait, Trunks, one more thing before you go!" Dr. Leggings said urgently.

"Huh?   What's wrong?" Trunks asked.    He held up the Hero Switch on his wrist and pointed at it.   "Everything looks good on this end."

"It's just... are you sure you don't want to wear the Great Saiyaman 3 outfit for this mission?" she asked.  

"I'm positive," Trunks said.   Before anyone could object, he activated the bracelet, and vanished into the game world.    

*******

[12 May, Age 513.    Planet Saiya.]

"You picked a fine time to ask about the weather, stranger."

The Saiyan’s name was Reeque, and Trunks had no idea how old she was.   The small settlement he found on Saiya was it's largest population center, and they directed him to an old hag who lived in the wastelands.   Trunks found her easily enough, but then the blood-wraiths attacked, and they had to take their conversation on the run.   Powerful as Trunks was, his technology and ki were useless against the intangible creatures, and Reeque's warnings were enough to convince him that he should keep his distance.    

"They become solid every seven months," Reeque told him.   "Then we pay them back a thousandfold, but in the meantime, we run and hide until dawn.    They say the storms left them behind, but I doubt that.   Not even Luffa would be so cruel."

She carried a walking stick carved from some gnarled length of driftwood, but Trunks was impressed with how swiftly she crossed the rough terrain.    Her dark red robes flapped behind her back like the wings of some great ugly hawk.    

"I apologize for not making myself clear, ma'am," Trunks said as he hopped over a rock.    "The Luffa I asked about is a Saiyan, not a storm system."

"Well that's perfectly clear to me, boy," Reeque said, "but it doesn't change the fact that you're mistaken.   Only Luffa I've ever heard of is the one my great grandmother told me about.     Wiped out the entire Kingdom of Saiya in a single day.   The smart ones fled while they could.   The rest stayed, but only the hardiest few survived.   The environment here was harsh before Luffa, and it only got worse from there.    Without the supplies from allied worlds... well, you learn to savor the taste of roast blood-wraith."

"Then where did the Saiyans go when they abandoned this planet?" Trunks asked.

"Hell," Reeque said.   "If there's any justice, they went to hell.  Otherwise they scattered across the galaxy.     There was a kingdom on Sadala, but my life wouldn't be worth a zinc coin on that forsaken place.   My parents were banished, and they joined the usurper kings during the civil wars.    Fifty years ago, they tried to rebuild Saiya, like the name alone would restore their fortunes.   But there's nothing left here.  Nothing but blood-wraiths and ruin."

None of this was surprising to Trunks, since Nappa had told him this planet would eventually be destroyed altogether.   He had tried to arrive on Saiya well before that day, but it seemed like the destruction of Saiya had been set into motion long before whatever warrior finally put it out of its misery.

"And King Rehval?" Trunks asked.    "What became of him?"

"Why should you care, boy?" Reeque asked.    "You've come a long way in search of the dead."

"I think he's my ancestor," Trunks said.    "I, uh, I'm trying to settle a dowry on another planet, and they're very interested in genealogies."

"Social climber, huh?" Reeque said.   "Well, I can't help you with that.   Anything else you wanted to know?"

"The Camelian Empire," Trunks said.   "Do you know where I can find it?   I don't need exact coordinates, just a general idea will do.  Er, is something wrong, ma'am?"

She began to make a sort of rhythmic coughing sound from her throat, and Trunks eventually figured out that it was laughter.    "You're an amusing fellow," Reeque finally said.   "When I saw that purple hair of yours, I thought I might be seeing things, but my imagination isn't wild enough to dream up such silly questions.   Oh, I've spent countless nights like this one, running from bloodwraiths, but I think I'll remember tonight for a long time to come."  

"Then you can't tell me about Camelia either," Trunks said.    

"There's nothing to tell, boy," Reeque said with a rasping chuckle.    "The Camelian Empire fell more than three hundred years ago!"

*******

[23 February, 238 Before Age.    Chai I.]

"The ‘Super Saiyan’?   Now what in the world is that, Trunks?"

"It's a legend I heard when I was a boy," Trunks said.   "According to my father, once every thousand years, there's a Saiyan who surpasses the limits of what Saiyans can do.   They're considered the ultimate warriors.   Powerful, invincible, and with an insatiable craving for battle."

Rehval III considered this tale for a moment while admiring the bouquet of his wine.   At last, he took a sip from his glass, and sampled a bite of his fish entree.  Trunks waited patiently at the other side of the table.   The restaurant looked fancier than any Trunks had ever seen on Earth, in any century.   And this was merely a section of a minor administrative building in the Camelian capitol.      

"I'll be blunt, Trunks,” Rehval finally said.    “You seem like the kind of man who likes to get to the point, so I won’t keep you in suspense.   I have no idea what you're talking about."

"I see," Trunks said.    

"Do you believe in this legend yourself?" Rehval asked.  

"No," Trunks said after a pause.  "In my experience there's no such thing as an invincible warrior.  There are extraordinary Saiyans, but not necessarily one every thousand years.    There could be two or three, or a hundred, or none at all."

"I'll tell you what I think," Rehval said.   "I have heard tall tales of ancient Saiyan heroes.   Chanisp was said to have lived about a thousand years ago.    For all I know, they've been saying "a thousand years ago" for centuries.   I mean, a year ago, was anyone saying Chanisp lived 'nine-hundred and ninety-nine years ago'?   Of course not.   The round numbers make for better storytelling, but I deal in precision."  

Rehval paused his meal to point at a gold watch on his left wrist.    "My summit with the Camelian Imperial College begins in three hours and twenty-two minutes, Trunks.   I can't afford to offend the Camelians by rounding up.    Time can be a strict mistress."

"I take your point," Trunks said.    "And I appreciate you taking the time to speak with me."  

"Not at all," Rehval said.   "There aren't many Saiyans in this part of the galaxy, besides common raiders, I mean.   And you're a man of unusual manners and poise, Trunks.   You're exactly the sort of citizen I want in the Kingdom of Saiya.    I think you'd find life very prosperous under my rule."

"I am... interested in hearing more," Trunks said.    "Let's put it that way."

"Well, then, it's a good thing you found me during this gap in my schedule," Rehval said.    "I have all afternoon to convince you to come home with me."

Trunks smiled as though amused by his remark.    In fact, this had been his third attempt to speak with King Rehval III.   An earlier visit to the Camelian capital world gave him access to important diplomatic records, which showed him the exact date and time of an official visit by the Saiyan King.    Trunks found him on the first try, but he was too busy to talk.    Trunks reset the game world simulation and tried again, approaching Rehval three hours earlier, but wasn't able to catch the man's interest.    This time, he figured out that the key to Rehval's attention was to show interest in joining his cause.   Rehval’s Kingdom was the most powerful Saiyan faction in this era, but his subjects made up less than half of the Saiyan population, and Rehval was very keen on getting more Saiyans to rally to his flag.     Even half-aliens like Trunks were welcome, apparently.    

"Where did you say your mother was from?" Rehval asked.    Trunks was pretty sure Rehval had aims for establishing diplomatic ties with Earth, even if he had no idea where it was or if it was worth his time.

"The Yajirobe System," Trunks lied.  "It's pretty far off the beaten path.     But what were you saying about Chanisp?"

"Well, there are lower classes in every society, Trunks," Rehval explained.   "It's not something Saiyans think about much, but other civilizations have demonstrated it time and time again.    The problem is that, in disorganized societies, these lesser citizens don't understand that they have a duty to follow their betters.    And so, in their confusion, they turn to superstitions."

"Go on..." Trunks said.    He took a bite of his salad and chewed thoroughly.  

"They say Chanisp defeated a mighty demon and liberated the entire Saiyan race from slavery.    Did it actually happen?    Maybe.   Was he one of your father's 'Super Saiyans'?    He might have been.   How does any of that prove that there should be another one like him ten centuries later?   Oh, and the cycle just happens to reset in the present day.   So the tale expects us to believe that, at any moment, any one of us might miraculously transform into an invincible, demon-slaying superhero.   How convenient."  

"Well, when you put it that way..." Trunks said.    

"I'm not one to brag, Trunks, but as far as I know, the strongest Saiyan alive is sitting across the table from you.   That's not a challenge, or a demand for respect, just a statement of fact.   I'd have to be stronger to be the king, or I wouldn't be the king for very long, now would I?"

"Makes sense to me," Trunks lied again.   

He only brought up the legend to gain historical context.   Rehval seemed to enjoy discussing it, so that worked to Trunks’ favor, but what he had truly wanted to know was whether Rehval had heard of a golden-haired cryptid running amok in the galaxy.   He had not, which meant that there had been no Super Saiyan in this era, or that the Super Saiyan hadn’t appeared yet. 

"These legends are just stories people invent to convince themselves that there's a way out of their reality.     When the thousandth year passes, they move the goalpost, or invent a new story to replace the old.   'Oh, the Super Saiyan is real, he's just invisible and working in secret, but he really is here to help us all.'   That sort of thing."

"And that's why you're pursuing diplomatic ties with Camelia," Trunks concluded.  "You can't afford to wait for a messiah."

"The Saiyans are at a crossroads, Trunks," Rehval said.    "If our race is going to survive, we need to follow the same well-tread path as the Camelian Empire.    Statecraft.   National unity.   It's not as romantic as your father's legend, but it works.    It's a path that leads to prosperity.    If we all unite as one kingdom, under one law, then we grow stronger as a people.   That means forming alliances, brokering treaties, and all the other minutiae that goes with it."

"Well, this has been a very interesting discussion, but I'm afraid I need to get going," Trunks said.   He stood up from his chair and gestured to the waiter to bring his coat and sword.    "It's been a pleasure, Your Majesty."

"Wait," Rehval said.   "I thought you wanted to hear more about Planet Saiya.   The great society that I'm building there.   I'd like you to be a part of that society, Trunks."

"I'm sure you would," Trunks said as he put his arms through the sleeves of his coat.    "But I've already seen how Saiya turns out, and I'm already a part of the society you envisioned.   What's left of it, anyway."

"I don't understand."

"It's simple.   Your vision isn't all that visionary, Rehval.   No matter how strong you think you are, there's always someone stronger who'll come along to challenge you.   That's not a leader, that's a gunfighter daring someone to come along and defeat him.   I've grew up in a world ruled by strength alone, and you're half-right.   It is a well-worn path, but it doesn't lead to prosperity."

"What do mean you've already seen Saiya?" Rehval asked.   "Who are you?"

Trunks activated the bracelet on his arm, and vanished from the game world.    The simulated Rehval who existed within it was left with more questions than answers, though he would not ponder them for long.    Soon enough, the simulation would be refreshed, and he would have no memory of this encounter.

NEXT: Burning Questions

[kevinwastaken]

okay so idk if anyones done this yet, but this has been in my mind ever since i got into omori lmao

so uhHhHhhh heres my idea for an identity v omori crossover! just because i think it would be neat

this is going to be a super long post (probably), so if you want to read it, just hit read more or whatever

i also want to say that some character choices are gonna be taken from my friend, @/kami.rikki on instagram. but she didnt think as hard on these as i did so like idk

there Will be spoilers for omori, so just be warned of that lmao

so as i said before, this has been on my mind for a HOT minute. and i think it would be a cool collab

for starters, this crossover will be split up (as is every other crossover) in two parts, with one hunter two survivors. i know essence usually have one hunter three survivors, but theres not enough characters for that, and six can be split up evenly sooo

i was thinking that the skins could be like the ones from the persona 5 crossover. like, they can be “awakened” in a sense. the base costumes will be the dream world versions of everyone, while the awakened costumes will be the real world versions. i wasnt here for the persona 5 crossover, so idk how many of those spirit things you had to collect, but i Do know that omoris spirit things could be. uh

well actually i dont know. initially i was thinking lightbulbs, like the one in white space, but the lightbulb isnt too important in the game i dont think? and im not sure about clams either. i know theyre dream world currency, but??

oh actually, maybe you can collect Something to awaken the costumes. because something is a representation of the truth in sunnys mind, and by awakening the costumes, you get to see the characters as their real selves. yeah lets go with that, you collect something from the essence

i swear ive been thinking this out shut up

the hunter costumes wont be awakened though, and i have a reason for this

anyway

part one

the characters that will be present in part one are sunny, basil, and aubrey. i chose them first because. ofc, sunnys the protag, basils his best friend and helped cover up maris death hes important to the story but anyway, and aubrey is <<33 yuh

so heres whos going to be who:

sunny/omori as wu chang

so let me preface this by saying that im not a hunter main. never have been, never will be. and ive never played wu chang. but i swear thisll make sense, im doing research

wu chang is actually composed of two characters, with two different stats: xie, the white guard, and fan, the black guard. i cant tell the difference while im playing, considering the fact that my ass is either running away or decoding. but theres a difference i looked it up

sunny would be the white guard. xie is a fast chaser, but has slow attack speed. ie, slow hits, slow pallet breaking, that stuff. this reflects how sunny is in the real world. he can run, yes, but hes still physically weak due to being locked in his house for four years and spending all his time sleeping. he would be better for chasing than attacking

omori would be the black guard. fan is the opposite of xie, having slow chasing speed but faster attack speed. this reflects in omori. omori is Very apathetic, and really, i dont think he would care to chase anybody unless it was for a quest. though, i guess killing survivors Is a quest for hunters, but. anyway

in battle, omori is a good fighter. his attacks are strong, (although not as strong as say. aubrey or kel. but who am i to say, the playthrough i watched had omori constantly sad) out of him and sunny, omori would be the attacker. so theres my choice for them

the umbrella can probably be switched for a knife. maybe an elongated knife. im not entirely sure, but i know the umbrella wont stay as an umbrella

basil as kurt frank

so i know what youre thinking. why is basil “the explorer??” hear me out this is actually a really good idea

the true best choice would be emma, since shes the gardener, but idv doesnt like giving characters skins of the opposite gender if you know what i mean. anyway

basil isnt a fighter. hes an assist, yes, but that was only for a crime four years ago. not my point, he wouldnt want to be in the action

i think he’d be a really good decoder. especially a good kurt

i originally wanted him to be prisoner, out of no bias whatsoever (/j) but kurt is a good fit for him

basil hides. he hides from things. he hides from the truth just like sunny, and he hides from others. albeit he still goes outside

i will not lie, i have a very personal grudge against kurt players. i dont want them to have anything because every kurt main ive come across was toxic to me specifically. but anyway

so one of kurts abilities is that he can go smaller to run around undetected and/or hide. i find this perfect for basil, because. yknow. hiding

his other ability is to find password pages and use them to decode ciphers faster. i think this would be funny because basils existence in headspace leads sunny to remembering the truth about maris death. i mean, if he werent in headspace, omori and the gang would continue going on adventures like nothing is wrong, so basil sort of speeds up the acknowledging process

this sounds dumb actually. but it makes sense in my head

anyway, the book would be turned into basils photo album, and he wouldnt have a backpack like kurt does. theres my answer

and finally,

aubrey as margaretha zelle

aubrey was actually really hard to pick out. none of the female survivors really fit her, aside from maybe coord, but i dont know what her gun would turn into. i will admit that her section wont be as detailed as basil or sunnys. but anyway my choice is with margie

aubrey imo would be a good kiter. she has strong stats all around, so i feel as if she’d be a great fit for margie. not to mention her speed boost when falling from large heights, which would make her a faster runner and harder to chase if used right. aubrey would be more physically fit since shes a fighter and seems to do a lot of stuff with the hooligans, which also helps prove that she should be a kiter. ANYWAY

so margie has these music boxes that can mess with the hunter, right? some of aubreys attacks can mess with enemies iirc. soooo theyre kind of similar in a way, arent they?

im not exactly sure what the music box can be turned into. maybe a small piano? aubrey cares about mari a lot, and the reason shes so pissed at everyone and rebellious is because she felt like everyone had forgotten about mari and moved on with their lives. so the music box could be a tribute to mari

i dont know how many changes they made with ann tamakis costume in the persona crossover, other than cosmetics for the skin only, so im not sure if the music box was changed at all. i can dream though

in the case that its changed, the blue box could be the song from the playground in headspace (yknow the one) while the red box could be the final duet song. but just with the piano, not the violin

essence

because yes, i thought about the essence too

of course, aside from the skins, there will be other stuff in the essence too. so itll be as follows:

for portraits, theyre going to be the neutral battle portraits from headspace. aside from basil and mari, who do not have battle portraits. theirs will just be of their neutral expressions with the neutral emotion backround behind them. i would add pictures, but the character pictures add up to six, so i’d run out of room before reaching part two

for graffiti, im not really sure. maybe everyones overworld sprites in headspace? along with maybe one of Something

for accessories, i actually have an idea of what thesell be. theyre going to be character exclusive accessories, just like how tpn did theirs

for aubrey, she’ll have mr plantegg. i was thinking of maybe having her bat as an accessory, but

OH ACTUALLY her bat could be a shop accessory that changes the music boxes!! probably an a tier tbh

anyway, the essence accessory for her is mr plantegg, and its there strictly for cosmetic purposes. for basil, he’d get either a pair of garden shears, or a basil plant, since yknow. his names basil. this is also for cosmetic purposes

they all are. i should say that now, the accessories are all cosmetic except aubreys a tier shop bat

finally, for sunny, im not entirely sure what to give him. i could give him a knife, sure, but then he’d have two knives because of the umbrella. maybe a steak? or a pair of red hands? im torn on this

and that concludes part one

part two

**PLEASE BE AWARE THAT MARIS IMAGE HAS THE PHOTO FROM THE TRUTH ALBUM WHERE SHES HANGING FROM THE TREE. IF YOU DONT WANT TO SEE IT, SKIP PAST IT. SHES THE FIRST CHARACTER IM PUTTING ON HERE

part two consists of mari, hero, and kel. do not separate them </3

here are my character choices:

mari as yidhra

so i know yidhra may seem like a weird choice. i originally thought of maybe mary, but this makes sense to me

yidhra herself will be mari. im not sure which version, but even though i have real world mari in the photo, maybe headspace mari would be better. nobody can see her anyway lmao

yidhras servants will be, again, mari, but she looks as she did when basil and sunny hung her on the tree. her hairs covering her face, with her right eye being visible. kind of like the girl from the ring, but anyway yeah

yidhra is the dream witch. she haunts your dreams and she haunts mine when i go against her. maris death haunts everyone, especially sunny and basil (whom know the truth of what happened,) so this just seems like a perfect fit

her death is “leeched” onto everyones minds (pun entirely intended), so attaching herself to survivors with only her death appearance visible is mmmm

instead of an axe, maybe her weapon can be the jump rope she was hung from? and it can be used as a whip? that makes the most sense to me idk

im not good at explaining things, but if you were to see dream witch in a match, youd know how good this would work

also brings a new meaning to “my thoughts will follow you into your dreams” HELLO

hero as norton campbell

so hero was kind of hard for me to pick too. i wanted him to be a support character, but looking around, there are. barely any that would work. my closest choice was victor, but?? the letters???? they dont correlate

hero doesnt give me kiter vibes, but nortons good at rescues too, as long as youre in an area with obstacles. and usually, when someone dies in battle, hero can make life jam to revive the fallen party member

nortons magnets are used to either bring the hunter closer to him, or push the hunter away. both can be used to stun with obstacles. while hero doesnt have any stun attacks that i can remember, he does have charming abilities that can be used to take damage for the other party members. so similar stuff? idk

i guess his magnets can be turned into chocolate chip cookies, since thats what he uses to heal everyone. if not cookies, then i dont know

oh actually one of nortons abilities is called “attract.” thats so funny if you put hero as him lmao

heros section is kind of short, my bad

kel as william ellis

come on. who else were you expecting me to use? its the basketball man as the football man

while kel is a fighter in battle, he can also be used as a backup healer. aubrey is the main fighter of the group, and hero is the main healer. so hes kind of a catch-all in a sense

kels an athlete. he plays basketball. williams an athlete. he plays football. need i say more

im not gonna lie, this is kind of a don tpn situation where it just Makes Sense that kel would be william

the football will probably be replaced with either a rubber ball or a basketball, depending on which skin youre using. the former is for headspace kel, the latter for real world kel

the buffs and debuffs for william makes sense on kel too. kel would probably have trouble with something as (probably) complex as the cipher machines, and the struggle and vaulting buffs show off his athleticisim

same with the football, using rush to rescue is such a kel thing to do

essence

for part two, there will be about the same things as part one

the portraits will be the neutral battle portraits, this time with the real world counterparts of everyone. basil and maris will be their neutral expressions on the neutral battle background. though, since mari doesnt have Real real world portraits, i guess they could use the one from the one i used on the mari yidhra picture

for graffiti, it can be the real world overworld sprites

in terms of accessories, theyre still cosmetic and character exclusive. maris can be the white egret orchid, since thats the flower that represents her. heros can be a spatula, as thats his weapon of choice in headspace. for kel, im not sure. hes using the ball as a weapon so???

maybe he can get a cactus, because thats his assigned plant

in terms of shop items, i think i know the perfect thing

mewo as a pet

mewo my beloved. nobody could ever forget you

mewo would be a hunter pet. she would be cool for survs too i guess, but considering both her owners are hunters.....

mewo would probably follow the hunter around, not really doing much. i think it would be Extremely funny though if every time a survivor was chaired, she just chilled next to them in the pose shes always in in white space

thats pretty much it. if you got this far, thank you!! i spent like two hours writing this whole thing out LMAO damn

[mysteira6]

FukaFlower - Visiting You

Summary:

Requested by Lil-flowie (on Wattpad).

Casting aside his fear to visit her… was a lot harder than he thought.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Prompt: “Flower gets hurt and is in the hospital. Fukase is worried for her.”

Hey there! It’s been a while. I still heckin love these two so don’t think that I’m gonna stop making these for a LONG time~ :3

Special one-shot this time because this was a request from my book on Wattpad! Hope you enjoy. ^^

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

“She’s in room 17,”

He quickly nodded once in thanks. “Thanks,” He replied gratefully before turning away from the receptionist and looking back at the hallway. White-clad nurses typing away on wheelie monitors littered the hallway, along with the occasional visitor walking back and forth between visiting their loved ones and chatting with other doctors. The sterile scent in the room conjured images of medicine and machinery in his mind, almost coercing him to shrink into the size of a ball, curled up and shivering on the floor.

Fukase hated hospitals. He didn’t want to have a reason to visit such a place that reminded him too much of what he had been through. By instinct, his left hand swiftly raised to touch his face, his bandaged fingers swiping against the grooves along his cheeks.

Come on, Fukase. Stop thinking about that. You’re here to visit the one you love, not to mull over your… stuff.

After giving himself a solid nod of confidence, the red-haired boy began to make his way down the hall, his crimson eyes looking out for the double-digit label that indicated which room his partner was staying at. It wasn’t too long before he found it, standing before the door as if waiting to be let in.

He held tightly to the bag in his right hand, the antiseptic scent still annoying him. Here goes nothing.

A turn of the doorknob later and the boy walked into a small room with walls of beige, satin blue furniture consisting of a sofa and visitor chairs aligned neatly against each wall while a longer bed sat in the middle of it all. Laying on said bed and tucked behind pearl-coloured sheets was a petite figure with gorgeous violet eyes, her smooth curls of white moving along with a strand of black hair as she turned towards her visitor. It wasn’t long before a small smile adorned her face, and Fukase found it very difficult to turn away from her upon seeing her beautiful smile.

“Fukase!” She murmured gleefully, and though she tried to step out of bed to greet him properly, the girl was reminded of her slight impairment when she felt a sharp twinge from her right arm, the thick plaster cast wrapped around her forearm reminding her not to move too much to agitate her wound. With a heavy sigh to herself, she eventually shifted back to her original position, only watching as the redheaded boy quickly trotted to her side, dragging a visitor’s chair with him as he placed his paper bag on the bedside table.

“Hey Flo,” He started, heart still fluttering at the sight of his partner’s pure expression. “How are you?” He was internally praying that the unease in his head had not leaked out into the tone of his voice.

“Alright, I guess,” The patient in question replied, motioning to her cast. “I just don’t know why my manager made me stay in the hospital for a hairline fracture on my arm. I’m pretty sure Xin Hua and you can take care of me fine,”

Fukase felt his cheeks heat up at the comment. He did like taking care of her when she was sick, after all. “I’m sure they just don’t want their ‘superstar’ singer to get hurt a second time. Besides, they did mention that your treatment would be covered by them,”

“But the food here is so plain,” She protested, a pout forming on her lips. “I’d rather just make my own food at home, even if I’m gonna feel pain throughout the whole thing-”

“Now that’s when I gotta stop ya, Petals,” The redhead’s tone deepened as he continued. “You know what your doctor would say; don’t move that cast around too much or it’s gonna stay there forever,”

She huffed impatiently. “Okay, I guess you got a point, but it’s still pretty boring around here-”

She was cut off by a jovial laugh coming from the boy now sitting next to her, accompanied by the sight of a familiar marshmallow coloured doll popping out of his paper bag, soon stumbling out of the bag and hopping onto her bed, taking a seat next to her lying figure as Fukase’s laugh slowly died out. “Well, I’m here, aren’t I?” He asked cheerfully with a smirk on his face.

The girl’s cheeks turned satin pink. What was she thinking? Here, she was being visited by her loving and kind boyfriend and all she was doing was complaining to him. Some partner she was.

Hoping to ameliorate the situation, she smiled warmly at him. “Thanks for visiting,” She softly spoke, giving another smile to the little doll by her left hand, who had been patiently waiting for her to acknowledge its presence. “I know you’re pretty busy and all,”

Fukase let out a small chuckle. “Hah. If by ‘busy’, you mean that I have to handle being teased all day by the Kagamine twins about ‘my girl’ being in the hospital, then yeah, I guess I have been a little busy,”

Flower narrowed her eyes, speechless. Ever since she started dating Fukase, it seemed that those 14-year-olds’ attacks on them would never stop, not even when they were not seen together in public. Sometimes, the snow-haired teen wondered if they liked it when her defensive boyfriend would come running after those gremlins after they let out a few teasing words to them.

In reality, as his girlfriend chuckled to herself (he assumed that she was chuckling about his comment about the Kagamine twins), Fukase could slowly feel a lump slowly forming in his throat. It was this room, he realised; this room was far too familiar to him. The pale walls closing in on his figure, that damn sterile scent of surgical masks and IV drips wafting through his nose, the chilly air that blew by from the vent on the floor, sweeping across his skin and forming trails of goosebumps all over him-

It was probably a miracle that he hadn’t completely succumbed to his memories, that he hadn’t shriveled into the size of a ball while sitting on the hospital chair, that he had not started shaking while reaching out to hold Flower’s left hand that wasn’t wrapped in a cast-

Left hand.

It was… her left hand.

Left hand…

Left hand.

Left hand. Left hand. Left. Left. Left. Left. Left left left left-

“Fukase?”

Her distinctive, powerful voice sent him straight back to reality, his eyes blinking once, twice, before looking over to the person who had called his name. In his mindscape, those words kept repeating themselves, the noises of his past ringing in his ears despite the fact that she pierced through it all with her own voice. Only when he noticed the expression in her violet-hued irises did he realise why she called him.

She had noticed him. Noticed him experiencing a flashback. The redhead felt ashamed.

“You know, I’d ask if you’re okay,” She said sombrely, breaking the momentary silence between the both of them. “But knowing you, I kinda have an idea of how you’d respond. And if I’m right, it’s not really a good thing…” She added, drooping her head a little.

“Flo, I-”

“I know. You don’t like hospitals, right?” The moment she said that was when the boy on the chair finally gave in to the fear creeping on his back, his arms wrapping themselves around his chest as if shielding himself from an attacking foe. Though he kept his gaze on her, Flower knew that he wasn’t really ‘okay’ with this.

“I figured as much,” She sighed softly, hoping that he wouldn’t hear her. “I’m really sorry that I had to burden you to visit me while I’m here, Fukase,”

“You don’t have to apologise, Flower,” He hastily replied, though the slight falsetto in his voice spoke volumes of what was going through his head. “I mean, it’s not like you made the accident happen,”

“Yeah, but still,” Seeing her lover look at her with fearful eyes so different from his usual gaze made Flower curse at her predicament; all she wanted to do was to step out of bed and hold the boy in her embrace. Just like last time.

Instead, she only muttered. “If I had been more careful…”

“ … Even if you had, there’s no telling what else could have happened,”

Flower didn’t respond to that, only looking down at her arm wrapped in white, silently cursing at it until she heard the sound of a chair shifting closer to her bed. A quick turn presented her with the sight of the scarred-face boy having his face petted by the living doll from before, its chubby hands threading through the plastic barrier of the hospital bed and patting the human boy’s cheeks as if to make a funny face out of it.

Had Flower not known that this little doll, Point, was sort of a parental figure to her boyfriend, she would have been merely amused at this silly sight.

But since Flower did know about Point, she also could tell that Fukase was really trying to get over his trauma just to make her smile. It was a common trait between the two of them; whenever Fukase had the urge to make anyone happy, he’d usually perform humorous antics with that little white doll. Likewise, in the moments when he was the most vulnerable emotionally, Point would be there to remind Fukase that he was not alone in the world anymore. That he now had someone else to talk to when his mind was a mess.

After their mini-episode of making funny faces in front of her (and inciting a little giggle from her), the red-haired boy sported a small smile, the fear from earlier mostly dissipated from his eyes.

“Flower…” He started, leaning his head against the fencing by the hospital bed, the light from the windows reflecting off of his scarlet eyes. “You know you’re really important to me, right?”

“Y-yeah?”

“So… Don’t worry about me being afraid of… this place…” He slowly declared, his voice building up confidence as he went on. “I know I tend to be dramatic about it, but I promise you; I’ll be okay,”

“Are you sure?” The hesitation in her tone convinced Fukase to up his determination in his reply. “Yeah. I’m not trying to trick you this time; I’ll be fine,”

“Besides, seeing you and having you next to me…” As much as he tried to hide it, the red on his cheeks was obvious. “It helps me deal with the memory, so… don’t be too worried about me, alright?”

‘Seeing you and having you next to me’

They were such simple words and yet… Those alone were enough to wash all of the white-haired girl worries away.

“Oh! That reminds me,” The young boy stood up suddenly, turning to the paper bag he brought with him and pulling out a petite white box with a handle by the top. “Here, I got you something. And don’t worry, I asked Xin Hua about what you couldn’t eat, and this doesn’t qualify as any of your prohibited foods,”

As Fukase placed the box in front of her, he steadily undid the box’s paper lock, revealing a single triangular slice of vanilla cake, its three layers stuck together by white icing filled with red slices of fruit while the top layer was completely covered with another layer of white and three white rosettes. The singular conical red item placed on the top of the cake was the last thing Flower needed to identify what kind of treat her boyfriend had bought for her.

 “A strawberry cake,” She noted without any traces of astonishment in her voice. “Why am I not surprised?” Though she was shaking her head, there was a pensive smile inscribed on her lips.

“Oh, well if you don’t want it, more for me-”

“What, no! Of course I want it!”

“Oh, really?” A mischievous grin found its way to the cheeky redhead’s lips as he spoke. “Judging by the look on your face, I was starting to think that you didn’t like it. Or am I wrong?”

His girlfriend was about to facepalm herself with her right hand until she felt a tinge of pain that signalled her to use her left one instead. “You’re ridiculous. You wouldn’t buy that for me and bring it here if you thought that I wouldn’t want it, would you?”

“So you’re saying that I’m a good boyfriend?”

The girl paused, though it didn’t take too much pondering before she arrived at a conclusion. Between him mustering his guts to visit a hospital, the hotspot of his trauma, and pushing aside that trauma to admit how much she meant to him, Flower was convinced that this time, Fukase’s passing joke was true.

Knowing that, she heaved a relaxed sigh, reaching out to touch his bandaged hand briefly. The sudden contact cued him to glance at her, taking in the bright smile that adorned her face. “Yeah,” Flower murmured sweetly. “I think you are. A good boyfriend, I mean,”

Her cheeks turned satin pink as she added the last part of her sentence, an unusually bashful smile slowly creeping up her lips. The redhead could only look on at her, frozen and unmoving, only taking in how adorable she looked under the rays of sunlight seeping through the windows of the ward.

There was no way to stop Fukase from chuckling light-heartedly. “Wow,” He muttered, breathless. “I… didn’t think you’d actually say something so sappy,”

The girl shrugged. “Maybe it’s my meds?” She sheepishly teased. “I guess I’m just feeling a little… affectionate today,”

“Hey, I’m not complaining,” Fukase teased back with a smirk. “Seeing you trying to flirt is cute too,” Flower didn’t have any time to respond to that before Fukase turned his whole body to the patient lying on the bed, a white plate containing the vanilla-coloured slice of spongy cake in one hand while his other gripped tightly onto a small fork. “Seriously though, you want this cake?”

She beamed at the prospect of eating something sweet. “Of course,”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

For the rest of the afternoon, the two teens stayed in that hospital room, sharing bites of a dessert that they both loved. Still, the sweetness from the delicious cake was nothing compared to their relationship.

A gentle, tender bond that was supported by their endless love and support for each other.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

They... They be cute... QwQ

[imasimpforstevengrant]

Why do we like this clown so much?

Change the "we" for "I" and you get an usual tag I use whenever I post my content in Tumblr. And it sounds funny at first but whenever you start diving into that phrase, the deeper it becomes. So, I finally have decided to share my thoughts about this strange but wholesome attraction to this deeply flawed character. It's not something I usually do since I don't know how to write down my feelings properly and also in english so please forgive any typos (I'm from Chile so don't be surprised lol).

So...Why do we like this clown so much?

Why was it that a character precisely designed to scare and to disgust the fuck out of us ended up unchaining a series of feelings that shouldn't have taken place in a beginning?

Let's take a look at the background: Joaquin Phoenix was cast as Arthur Fleck/Joker in 2018. The first image of him as the aforementioned character revealed a deeply disturbed man. We knew the plot. A man driven to insanity after a brutal history of abuse, creating concern in people if the upcoming film would inspire real life violence. Incel violence and mass shootings, more specifically.

(the image in question)

As 2019 arrives, the two trailers generated so much hype that media needed to fuel its concern about it. Since it wasn't your typical comic book film, media basically bombed our minds making us believe this film was going to be a total disaster, an excuse to cause harm to others among other nonsense, as if the film would justify everything Arthur would do in the film, eventually. As the release date is closer, the film receives thunderous applause and unanimous praise from critics. At this, fans rejoiced and expressed impatience to watch the film.

October 5th.

People left the theaters amazed, shocked and genuinely moved by the inhuman treatment Arthur received in the film. The fear media tried so desperately to infuse in us with all the incel bullshit and such turned out to awake one of the most positive, best feelings in humans:

E M P A T H Y

The word that so gloriously cleared away any dark thoughts or actions not only proves media was wrong but it turned out to ridicule it in way nobody will forget: Hundreds of people advocating for mental illness, calling out to the kindness that could change a person's bad day and questioning how politicians and rich people are indifferent to social problems proved how much as a society we have changed in comparison with the one shown in the film.

However, since we are on Tumblr, I'll get straight to the point and try to explain why the fuck does this clown has us dying out of love and compassion (and lust).

I. Background.

As nurturing as we women are for a biological matter, we see a man deprived of a good job, is on seven different medications, working like a slave to sustain his ill mother, putting aside his own health and well-being to look for her, struggling to make his dream of being a comedian despite everyone stepping on him, underpaid and treated like a freak for a disorder he did not ask to suffer, which makes it impossible to be indifferent to all the horrible ordeal that eventually will reach the limit of what he can tolerate without going insane. It is impossible to not say or think, at least, that someone (even if it's just one person) should stand for him just as it is impossible not to feel the need to throw ourselves at him to shield him from people who hurt him or simply offer him our shoulder whenever he has had a bad day, specially when he learns he was sexually assaulted by his step father.

This horrid behaviour terrifies newer generations because they get a taste of what being a social outcast was like more than thirty years ago in comparison with today, where there's more acceptance and treatment for mentally ill people like Arthur. We see in him someone who could have been saved with a proper education and emotional support instead of descending into madness as a criminal. Others simply saw themselves being treated like him at some point in their lives and couldn't help but put themselves in his shoes.

II. Personality.

TRUTH BE TOLD:

There's something called "attraction by proximity". It is the explanation to the eventual love you feel whenever someone doesn't catch your eye at first terms of physical attraction but his/her personality does attract you. This happens to be the base of this situation. His shyness, introverted nature, tenderness and innocent desire to make people laugh and put on a happy face awake some kind of tenderness we cannot resist. This combined with the gloomy background increases our understanding (but not justifying) of the bad decisions he'll eventually take during the course of the film. This traces a line of harsh, almost hurtful contrast of the violence he shows later on the film. Once again, it is not justified in any way but it is certainly understandable.

III. Appearance.

Arthur Fleck is unconventionally attractive.

This happens to be a plus for most women. He is out of the male beauty standards (no abs, not too muscly or particularly tall), which makes him even more unique. It is precisely the fact that he's not a model one of the reasons women love him. He could easily be your man next door or your colleague or the guy you always see but never dare to talk for fear to bother him Because it's about proximity. Arthur looks like your common neighbour. He's not meant to be your typical desirable male protagonist at all.

... And yet.

Jesus Christ, he's so fucking hot I can't even---

It's not about how beautiful his green eyes are, his long slender fingers, his hair or his smile only. It's the charm behind it.

Another "magnet point" is the way he dresses. I know he's impoverished and his wardrobe tend to be repetitive but it is so unpretentious, so simple that is hard to not fall for. The modesty of the shirts, ironed trousers reminds us of a mature man deeply withdrawn into himself, love starved and longing to be seen and loved by others, like a war veteran who still fights the most important war: with himself. Is someone who needs to be listened and understood.

AND OF COURSE WHAT'S NOT TO LIKE ABOUT IT?

He's also brought back the old gentleman outfit, white shirts, red/yellow vest, red suit and elegant dancing moves and the retro style of the film boosts this attractiveness.

People keep comparing him with the previous interpretation of Joker (Leto's) whose costume appealed to young women with a tattooed, gangster, mumble rapper crazy-guy wannabe which didn't connect with the audiences (young people in general). This supposedly was to match or even have a sexy, tormented and desirable villain like Marvel's Loki. We all know how that story ended but it's the link for the next point below.

IV. Transformation

This is a particularly strong point considering how much we loved to watch the process of this weak, powerless, forgotten caterpillar into a beautiful and visible butterfly that will gracefully stir its wings for everyone to see its colours.

When Arthur transitions to the Joker, it's so cathartic to see taking revenge on those who wronged him (even when we're not supposed to root for him) like seeing his shyness fading away into a vivid confidence when dancing half naked in the bathroom, or witnessing him making way to make his name known to people in Murray Franklin's Show:

Adding to this newly gained confidence, there's another turn on: the way he walks.

At the beginning, his pace is hunched and limping, displaying his submission to violence, which makes the viewer more satisfied to see his broken yet beautiful soul turning the past pain of his existence into art: he lets music guide his moves as a way to tell the world he's a new man by cutting most of the sick, evil roots that harmed him, that he's invincible, that no one can stop him. Watching this cathartic display of euphoria was the most iconic scene in the film, following his speech at the TV and the inevitable meltdown that caused Murray's death.

Going to further appreciation, even his clown make up is beautiful. Why? Simple. The combination of colours, shapes and the intimidating glare just embellishes even more the character.

The dark blue triangles in his expressive eyes makes the light green colour to highlight, specially in dark backgrounds, giving the impression he's piercing your soul whenever he stares directly at the camera. Same can be said about the red smile and emerald green hair. They boost an already intimidating look.

The cold and warm colours paint a picture of a man full of intense emotions, mirroring it in a simple yet masterful artistic way.

Another interesting point is the way Joker dresses. Usually we had almost every single live adaption of this character in purple coat, hat, etc. But this particular version is not following any comic, which gives more freedom to creativity and once again, out of the standards of what we could have expected.

Red is a colour related to passion, action, love, strength, motivation and excitement. As for yellow, it indicates freshness, happiness and enlightenment and finally, green. Green is renewal, growth and regeneration. Colours that represent a new stage in his life, a mirthful chapter at last. We finally get to see our battered, always humiliated protagonist (or hero) descending into madness, but finally free from his repressed man who held his soul captive like a bird to fly away, to never come back. An insanity that despite being his downfall, turned out to be his ticket to freedom as he walks to the light in Arkham Asylum dancing at the end.

Ladies and gentlemen: behold the film nobody asked... But the film we fucking deserved.

Thank you for coming to my TED talk

❤️💚💛

[maraudererasmut]

Black and White (Part II)

Part I

Part II

Part III

Part IV

Part V

Part VI

Part VII

Part VIII

Part IX

Part II:

Remus stood in front of a piece of art, plate in hand, filled with cubes of cheese and assorted crackers. He stared intently at the brushstrokes, the way they danced across the canvas, the texture of the paint. There was intention to every stroke, every line, every point where the brush kissed the canvas. It was purposeful.

"What do you think of it?"

Remus glanced to the side, where a young man in an expensive looking suit had sidled in beside him. Remus raised an eyebrow and smiled politely, taking in the man's appearance. He had rich mahogany skin, almost a burnt umber. It took a cool tone in the stark gallery lighting, but had a hint of redness just beneath the surface. The man had dark hair, a warm black, just a shade lighter than his suit. He was wearing a burgundy tie with yellow ochre stripes, matching his completion perfectly. He had red-framed glasses that sat on the bridge of his nose, ever so slightly askew. When he grinned, the man flashed a set of ivory teeth, perfectly straight and sparkling in the light.

"It's nice. You didn't paint it, did you?" Remus responded with a grin. It was Remus' own little joke, funny only to a particular few who had the same odd sense of humour as himself; nice was never used as a compliment.

The man returned the smile, russet eyes gleaming with something akin to excitement.

"If I said yes?"

"Then I'd tell you that your work is lovely and congratulations on the gallery show." Remus nodded, keeping his feigned confidence.

"And if I said no?" The man asked, a twinkle in his eyes and a crooked smile tugging at the corner of his lips.

"Then I'd tell you the work is adequate… for a contemporary piece of abstract painting. It's a pity that it's been done a thousand times before." Remus finished his thought with a grin of his own.

The man let out a sharp laugh, garnering the attention and glares of other patrons of the arts. Remus chuckled along, happy to have met someone who didn't take the art world so seriously. 

The man thrust his hand forward, grinning from ear to ear.

"James," he said, beaming.

Remus smiled and grasped the man's hand, giving a firm handshake. 

"Remus."

"Pleasure to meet you, Remus."

"Are you an artist?" Remus asked, trying to glean more information from his newfound acquaintance. James laughed again, running a hand through his already messy hair. 

"Me? No. Not even a little bit. I couldn't paint to save my life!"

Remus gave a casual shrug, glancing around at the other pieces of art on display in the gallery. 

"You don't have to paint to be an artist."

James shook his head with a playful sigh.

"Alas, I was born without a creative bone in my body. My wife, on the other hand…" James nodded towards the artist statement located next to the painting.

Remus felt the colour drain completely from his face as he realized James' implication, immediately regretting his decision of engaging the stranger.

"Oh, I am so sorry— " Remus began.

"Don't be!" James laughed, giving Remus a playful nudge with his elbow. "She hates this one, too."

"But I— "

"Honestly! She was gonna toss this one, but Sirius insisted on using it for his exhibition. Matched his aesthetic, apparently."

Oh.

James and his wife knew Sirius. Sirius Black. Owner of the gallery and curator of the show. Perhaps if Remus asked, he would be able to convince James to facilitate a meeting for him. 

"Oh!" James' exclamation interrupted Remus' thoughts. "I have to go. Sorry for cutting this short. It was a pleasure meeting you, Remus. I hope to see you around." 

Remus flashed James a well-practiced smile as he shook the man's hand, internally regretting not asking more about Sirius. As James disappeared into the crowd, it dawned on Remus that he had forgotten to exchange business cards with the other man. He groaned as he popped a cube of cheese into his mouth, mentally berating himself for his terrible networking skills.

"Ladies and gentlemen," a voice called from across the room, and Remus glanced up from his plate. "And everyone in between... I would like to welcome you here tonight, to the opening of Black and White."

The man who was speaking was unlike any person Remus had ever seen. He had alabaster skin that looked like it could have been carved from marble for all its perfection. A chiseled jawline, cheekbones so sharp, they could cut steel. His eyes were a shade of silvery blue, the exact colour of the sky on a perfectly stormy day, deep and expressive and frustratingly unreadable. He was wearing a navy blue suit with fabric that shimmered slightly in the light, paired with a tie that matched his irises. The man had long, dark hair, tied back in a slick ponytail, a brush expertly dipped in a bottle of ink. Remus couldn't help but admire this man who captured the attention of the entire room, his presence captivating the audience, radiating remarkable power and grandeur.

"As many of you know, this project has been in the works for some time now. Our exhibit, Foreshadow, is a perfect representation of things to come, of what you can expect to see from the gallery in the future. So, without further ado, enjoy the wine and the food and most importantly, the art!"

A round of applause broke out amongst the audience as the dapper man gave a dramatic little bow before turning away and greeting some of the gallery patrons. Remus couldn't help but stare as the man clasped James' shoulder, a bright smile flashing across his face. He shook the hand of a woman who wove her arm through James', presumably his wife. 

All three of them radiated light and joy, a warm glow surrounding them as they talked and laughed, greeting one another with broad smiles and kisses on the cheek. Standing alone by the edge of the room, Remus couldn't help but feel a pang of jealousy. He longed for the types of interactions that these people had, the types of lives that they led. Living in the lap of luxury, these upper-class people had no worries, not a care in the world; they were able to follow their passions and have the security blanket of financial stability to catch them if their plans failed. 

Remus finished his plate of appetizers and turned towards the door. Today had been long enough, he didn't need to make it harder on himself by dwelling on things that could never be. 

"Remus!" A voice called out, right before he had reached the exit. He turned around to find James waving to him, a gregarious smile spread wide across his face. He beckoned Remus over and after a moment's hesitation, Remus decided to join the trio.

"Remus, this is my wife, Lily. She's the one who did that painting you were admiring." James gave a playful wink as Remus felt his chest tighten from embarrassment. 

Lily was tall and slender, with auburn hair that cascaded down past her shoulders. Her pale skin was dusted with freckles, Pollock-esque and surprisingly alluring. She had emerald green eyes, shining with the same depth that a real gemstone would, sparkling facets each releasing a different shade of brilliant green. Ruby read lips were parted in a genuine smile as a flush of pink spread across her cheeks.

Lily groaned and rolled her eyes before offering her hand for Remus to shake. 

"Please tell me he's not referring to the one near the entrance," she said, her smile never wavering.

Remus grasped her hand and shook it before responding.

"I had been looking at it earlier—" Remus began, unsure of where that sentence was headed.

"I can't believe Sirius put that one on display! It's wretched! It's so… derivative. It's been done a million times before. I think this idiot just liked the colours."

Remus smiled, grateful for Lily's honesty and humility. She was the type of artist that Remus could see himself working with.

"Speaking of this idiot," James said, turning to the person that Remus assumed was the illustrious gallerist. "Remus, this is Sirius Black. Sirius, this is Remus. We met while discussing art."

Remus extended his hand to Sirius, keeping his smile polite and professional, despite the sense of awe and terror threatening to bubble out. Sirius shook his hand, a confident smirk playing at his lips.

"A pleasure," Sirius said in his posh accent, his stormy grey eyes endless pools that Remus found himself sinking into. 

"The pleasure is all mine," Remus offered before tearing his gaze away.

"What is it that you do, Remus?" Sirius' question made Remus' heart skip a beat. This was his chance. The opportunity fell right into his lap, presenting itself on a silver platter. 

"I'm an artist, actually." Remus' cheeks were beginning to ache from his forced smile, but he kept it up. "I've been looking for the right gallery to show in for some time now."

"Well then," Sirius responded, his eyebrow raised ever so slightly, the corner of his mouth turned up. "You'll have to stop by with your portfolio at some point. I'd be remiss if I didn't give James' friend an opportunity to show me his work." He put a particular emphasis on the word friend, as if he was entirely aware of the fact that Remus and James had only just met a few moments before.

"That would be amazing, thank you!" Remus had to strain to keep the excitement from his voice and remain calm in front of the gallery owner. 

"Excellent. In that case, I'll see you around, Remus." Sirius turned, gave Lily a kiss on the cheek, patted James on the shoulder, and went about mingling with his other guests. Sirius' lips wrapped around Remus' name hung precariously in the air, filling Remus up with a sense of— something— he didn't quite know what.

"Thank you," Remus sighed, feeling eternally grateful to James and his kindness.

"It was all Lily's idea," he said, flashing his wife a look of admiration. "She's the mastermind in this family."

Remus turned to thank Lily, but she cut him off before he could even begin.

"You're welcome, Remus. It was a pleasure meeting you. I hope to see you again soon."

As the couple walked away, Remus couldn't help but stare at their backs in disbelief. 

Did that really just happen? Had Remus actually just connected with one of the most influential names in the London art scene after a happenstance conversation with a stranger? As he walked back to his flat, the memories of the night replayed through his mind, over and over again, wondering how on earth he got so lucky. 

[unlocklist]

Whats the story behind your oc? The one with the red and blue hair and eyes? :)

Ok u know what i dont know if ill ever have a concrete story for her at all outside this vauge daydream bubble ive had for the past year n a half but basically!

the goverment where she lives doing secret testing with radiation on missing kids and just the different effects because in this world theres like other elements of radiation i guess u know like maybe when exposed to some it gives them powers anyway her name isnt Riley Jones really but shes part of a group of (R)adioactive (J)uveniles ///i know. its cringe but. I thot it was funny and a good excuse to make more/ anyway she escapes her abusive lab testing with the help of some defective caretakers (my oc Nevada mainly) and shes like on da run or whatever MAN i really just be goofin

Theres more but ive already expozed myself too much considering i could lead you in one billion directions depending on what art i was trying to give background for JSOAPSKDNLSMS

[cheswirls]

it’s your extension (let me extend) 1/6

[ small preface: this is one giant 30k oneshot. its meant to be read as a oneshot, especially with the formatting. ive divided it up for sa week bc i think it fits all the themes collectively, but on day 7, ill post it all together as a oneshot. probably definitely on another platform, ill link it here, though. each piece is around 5k words, and i cant promise each one will fit the day’s themes exactly. collectively, all the themes are in here somewhere. it’s not gonna align perfectly. 

with that all out of the way, i hope you enjoy! ive been working on this for a little over a month, now. if you recognize the au it is, you won’t notice many changes, but i like how it came out anyway. if you don’t recognize it, get ready for a ride.

also thanks to @saboace-week​ for hosting ! ]

he reminds ace of his mother.

light, blond hair hanging just past his nape; piercing eyes that hold an array of emotions, none of them harsh; fair, fair skin, and if he squints he can envision a smattering of freckles dusted onto his cheeks, not unlike his own. he cards a hand through the hair; his eyes narrow. 

he can see her.

the scar catches him off-guard. it’s not noticeable until he parts the hair a little, but then there it is, stark as day, red ragged lines breaking up the pale skin. it’s not until he takes off the old sweatshirt functioning as a pajama top that he realizes the extent of the damage.

the red ran all down his left side. cutting into his shoulder, up his neck; circling around his ribs, and he turns to see it nearly to his spine on his back; down to his thighs, to his knees, just barely on the border of red on his calves; his arm is littered with white scars and red burn marks, and he finds himself growing curious. whatever it was from, it was Big. 

it was intentional.

ace blinks and the movement echoes in the mirror, blue eyes gazing back at him. and he blanches, finally waking, finally realizing no, this was not normal, this was actually happening he brings both pale hands up to his face, tries to hide his eyes. his breath stutters.

a shrill alarm sounds and he jumps, spinning around to find a discarded phone on the bed going off. he moves over to it and it reads koala on the id and he panics and taps ‘ignore’ and lets his heart calm down.

the alarm goes off again and he jumps again and picks up the phone, almost ready to turn it off, when he finds its an actual alarm going off. ‘you’re late at this point’, it reads. ‘good luck’, it reads. 

ace turns it off and takes a seat on the bed, head falling into his hands. stringy blond locks fall around him. 

what the fuck. this isn’t what he wished for. he wanted-

and he sits up, sudden, limbs jerking in protest. he climbs the rest of the way onto the bed, towards the small window in the corner, and pulls a blind open, peering out.

a view of goa greets him. traffic, towers, teems of people absolutely everywhere.

ace slowly closes the blind, turns around, and sinks back onto the bed. he takes a deep breath, in and out. 

“THIS ISN’T WHAT I MEANT!” he shouts from the top of his lungs. when he said he wanted to live in the city, to be in the city-

when he wished he were reincarnated as-

“am i dead?” he breathes. only the quiet answers him back.

-

sabo rolls over in his sleep, prying his eyes open. he breathes out in a huff, squinting as he realizes he can see through the slats of the door. what, did he fall asleep at his desk again? and then fall out of the chair? that seemed a bit impossible, so then why . .

he tips his head, and his cheek brushes fabric, and he hums, realizing there was something under him under the floor. 

before he can process that, the door slams open. sabo’s eyes widen as he’s met with little feet, and then he looks up, meeting the gaze of a scrawny kid.

“ace, get up already!” the kid snaps. “we already ate all of the food! if you’re not ready in ten minutes, i’m leaving you.”

he slams the door back into place, and sabo lies there, eyes blown and mind wide awake.

he’s so taken in by the kid’s words that for a second he finds himself scrambling up, counting down the seconds, remembering the time limit.

then he turns around and realizes he was asleep on a futon and he was in a wooden room and he trips on his way to look out the window before grasping the sill, raising his head above it, and his jaw drops as he’s met with a sprawling lake view, and of a whole community painted into the sides of a mountain. no, not a mountain, his mind helpfully supplies. the sides of a crater.

he blinks and his gaze zooms until he’s gazing at his own reflection, except it’s not him in the window. it’s a boy with tanned skin and long, black hair that fell just to his shoulders. they were broad, and he frowns, looking down as he runs a hand down the washboard chest, bare. damn. his eyes catch on a red band looped around his wrist, tied in a sloppy knot. he tugs and it comes loose, unraveling easily, and he hums as he spies a few other colors near the end.

“ace! let’s go!” a voice calls from somewhere deeper in the house, and sabo scrambles to his feet again, dropping the band on the ground. he swivels his head until he spots a uniform hanging from a closet door. it’s nondescript, so he hopes there’s only one school in this small town, else he go to the wrong one.

. . on second thought, with the kid leading him, maybe not.

he patters over to it, pausing once he grabs the hangers to look at his reflection in an actual mirror. oh. okay. so this was actually happening. he was in the body of someone named-

he stops. blinks. no. this had to be a dream, right?

he throws the white shirt over his head, tugging the collar down, and hums to himself in affirment as he works on the pants. right. this was a dream. had to be. 

he’s slipping on the jacket when the kid barges in again, comes over, grabs him by the back of the jacket, and begins to shove him out of the room. “now! come on! we gotta go!”

“o-okay,” he voices, marveling at the change in pitch to what he was used to. deeper, slightly. he spies the red band again and lunges for it, tumbling out of the kid’s hold for a moment. “wait,” he breathes, grasping it, and then the kid’s on him again, pushing him towards the door.

“ace!” he whines. “come on!”

“luffy!” a voice calls from somewhere below. they exit the room and sabo spies a figure near the bottom of a staircase. “you’re going to be late!”

“coming!” luffy yells, still pushing him as sabo struggles to get his bearings, still grasping at the change in scenery. he clutches the red band tightly.

-

ace stumbles from the room, marveling at the change in height. the guy had a few on him, that was for sure. he moves down the hall, passing the simple furnishings until he’s in the frame of the kitchen entry, nose twitching at the smell of stale food.

a woman looks up from her phone at the small table for two, eyeing him for a moment before humming and looking back down. after another moment, she removes herself from the chair, shuffling around some dishes. “what was that shouting about earlier?” she asks, gesturing for ace to take her seat. he does, sliding down and picking up the extra pair of chopsticks.

“uh, nothin’,” ace mutters, mouth already full of leftover food.

“right.” the woman rolls her eyes, but she’s smiling a moment later. “well, i’m out. there should be another train leaving in half an hour. you have until then to get ready.”

“‘kay,” ace mumbles, nodding as she waves and exits the room. a moment later, a door shuts from the end of the hall. ace finishes the food soon after and sighs, setting the chopsticks down. 

school, then. 

he wanders back into the bedroom and approaches the uniform hanging from the back of a chair. the first issue was getting there, which . .

he glances at the phone. koala would know, right?

but, as soon as he thinks it, he lets the thought go. 

he opts to take a picture of the crest stitched to the blazer instead, doing a reverse image search to determine which goa school it belonged to. a result pops up pretty handily, and he hums, putting it into a map. oh. so, it was pretty far. he glances to the window again.

after a moment, he searches the map for the nearest train station. not close either.

  . . . his gaze moves back to the window.

ace sighs, slumping where he stood. there was no way he was catching that next train. he’d be lucky if he made it there by noon.

why was city life so hard?

after he’s gotten dressed and grabbed a bag, he stuffs whatever he can think of down into it. phone charger. notebook. wallet. pencil. sketchbook? he blinks, eyeing it for a moment, then shoves it in as well. no harm, right?

he moves back across the apartment and pauses at the mouth of the kitchen, gaze fixed on the small dishes still set out on the table. sighing, he slides the backpack off his shoulder and steps forward. right. there was no gramps to clean them up, so he’d have to do it himself then.

he pauses again after locking the front door, keys halfway shoved into his pocket. he didn’t even know this guy’s name. well, it probably wouldn’t be long until he did, but hopefully it wouldn’t cause any problems.

catching the train is a rush. ace sits in a seat very close to the door, sighing as everything begins to move. while he waits, he takes out the phone again and looks through it, trying to find anything to help him out. he ends up tapping on a social media app, and when the screen loads, hums.

“sabo, huh?” he mutters under his breath. okay. he could work with that.

-

sabo doesn’t have to worry about luffy guiding him, because they run into some people he apparently should know.

“ace!”

the word is a single, concise syllable, spoken loud and with momentum, and, more importantly, from right behind him. sabo jumps, just about crawls out of his skin, and spins around to see a girl just about his height looking at him funny, lips pursed, and a hand poised to chop his head. he steps back more, glancing over at luffy, who huffs out a sigh.

“i’ll meet you at home,” he says, motioning to a fork in the path ahead. one slopes down, curving a little around the cliffside, and the other continues upward, towards the crest. “whatever’s going on, i hope you’re over it by then.” with another odd glance, luffy tightens his hold on his backpack straps and takes off down the path. sabo is left alone, and turns to watch as a boy approaches the girl, and therefore him, as well, pushing a bike at his side.

“nothing’s going on?” he mutters, even though that’s an obvious lie. whatever he’s doing, he’s doing it wrong.

“are you sure?” the girl says, crossing her arms. “because it looks like you couldn’t even be bothered to brush your hair this morning.”

sabo blinks, reaching up to tug on one of the black strands. he thought it’d been naturally unruly. guess not.

“whatever. let’s go already.” she turns and nods to the other boy, then grabs sabo by the arm and pulls him into a walk alongside them. her eyes turn down and she makes a little noise in the back of her throat. “you brought your ribbon and you’re not even using it?”

sabo glances down as well, spying his impulse grab hanging from his hand. he lifts it. “ribbon?” it didn’t look like it.

the girl shrugs, waving a hand. “might as well be. look, if you didn’t have time to do your hair, you can just say so. but we’re not even there yet. i have a mirror if you need it.”

she fumbles for her bag, searching through it, and then frowns. “nevermind. hey, kidd, you got one?”

“always,” he boasts, passing over a small pocket mirror with ease. sabo takes it, frowning. he looks down and attempts to pat the hair down, and then glances again to the band in his other hand. so, if it functioned like a ribbon . .

well. that made sense.

he hands the mirror back and holds the band in his teeth, using his hands to situate the long black hair. then he grabs the red with one hand and strings it around, until it held the hair in a loose knot. he glances over at the other two after finishing, waiting for approval. the girl shrugs after a moment. 

“good enough, i guess.”

sabo sighs out in relief, and then they’re in front of the school and kidd’s parking his bike and something chimes in the far distance. they grab for each of his arms and pull him through the front doors, moving quickly to a classroom. it’s not until they’re inside that he realizes another dilemma. people were still moving in, and there were open seats.

he reaches back to grab the girl’s arm, a small look of panic fixed on his face despite his best efforts. “where do i sit . . ?”

her eyes widen, and she stares at him. and stares. stares.

then, very calmly, she blinks and points to a desk near a window, almost in the corner of the room. sabo just nods, head down, and moves toward it.

-

ace moves down the hall slowly, still paging through a twitter feed on the phone. there were background shots of a classroom, and it had a high window, which meant the second floor. if only there was a glimpse of a number, then he’d really be set-

“sabo!” a shout echoes down the hall, making ace throw his head up. a redhead marches toward him, looking pissed, and he blanches, turning the phone off and trying to straighten out.

“uh, whatever i did, i can explain,” he says, because ace has always been about resolving conflict. then he mentally slaps himself, because that was the worst possible thing he could’ve said. he didn’t know the first thing about sabo, much less what he did to piss off the girl so much.

“you better!” she huffs, stabbing a finger into his chest. ace takes it with a wince. “ignoring my call like that! how dare you.”

so it was his fault, then. “i thought it was my alarm,” he says quickly. “it went off right after your call. sorry.” okay, so maybe not exactly true, but it would work. he eyes the girl in a new light. so this was koala.

she crosses her arms over her chest. “which one? had to be the ‘you’re late anyway, so hurry up’ one, right? how can you be here at noon?” she sighs. “it’s lunch, for god’s sake!”

“sorry,” ace says again.

her lips purse. “fine. i won’t press. c’mon, it’s stuffy in here, let’s eat outside.”

eat. his expression changes as he realizes. koala glances at him and rolls her eyes.

“you forgot lunch, didn’t you?”

he did, and he’s kinda hungry. he claps his hands together. “please share?”

“you’re lucky i like you,” koala mutters, jerking a door open.

koala insists he come to a cafe with her after school, and ace’s mouth waters at the thought. the closest they had out in fuusha was an old vending machine on top of the crest. inside, it’s crowded with people, but koala squeezes them into a two-seater and props up a menu, then begins rambling about the day. ace tunes her out, eyes widening as he glances at all the pictures. he wanted to try them all.

“that’s a lot of money,” koala comments, and he realizes he’d spoken aloud. ace looks up, then digs in his bag, looking into his wallet. he lets out a sigh.

“yeah, guess you’re right.” he hums, flipping the page and spotting a piece of cheesecake dripping with strawberry sauce. his mouth waters again. “then, i’ll just take this one.”

halfway through their meal, ace’s phone pings. he picks it up carelessly, smiling, too busy enjoying his cake. the text makes him reconsider.

koala pauses in her movements upon noticing his expression. “what’s wrong?”

“i’m late for work,” ace tells her.  apparently.

“oh, you had a shift?” she waves him off. “go, then. i don’t mind.”

“yea, thanks.” he stands, pocketing his phone, and stuffs the last of the cake into his mouth in a big bite. koala doesn’t comment.

he walks off a few paces, spins around on his heel, and comes back to tap koala on the shoulder. “uh, where do i work again?”

her brows raise to her hairline.

-

sabo wakes slowly.

he’s balanced on the edge of the bed, curled up like he doesn’t know there’s supposed to be a drop. it’s jarring, and as soon as his phone begins to vibrate, his body jerks and he’s on the floor, crashed in a heap with the comforter curled around his legs.

with a moderate groan, he reaches up and silences his phone.

the door opens a moment later, as he’s rubbing his head. red hair is his only giveaway before shanks is fully in the room, peering down at him. “whoa there, kid. took a tumble, huh?”

“i’m good,” sabo mumbles, sitting up. he blinks, screwing his eyes to cast the sleep away. “had the strangest dream.”

“let’s talk about it over breakfast, kay?” he jerks a thumb over his head. “makino has it ready.”

makino is already gone, too, apparently, because it’s just him and shanks at the table. it only sits two anyway, so it’s not often all three of them eat together. still.

sabo squints, picking up his chopsticks and trying to recall. “i was some kid living out in a mountain village for a day. had an annoying little brother and everything.”

shanks hums, swallowing his bite of food. “sounds boring.”

sabo snorts. “great, thanks for your input.” he pauses again. “it just . . felt so real.”

later, sabo will go back to his room and pick apart his backpack, confusion on his face for every random item he pulls out. he pauses at one point, hand wrapped loosely around the spine of his sketchbook. definitely didn’t remember taking that out of his room. what did he even draw, he thinks, flipping through to the last filled page-

he stops. his hand trembles. the forgotten page flips over, and the front half of the book hangs limp in the air. he stares at the page.

‘who are you?’ is written there, in big, blocky letters, scratched over and over by a worn pen.

-

“are you gonna play with your hair again?” luffy asks, entirely unimpressed, as he pulls open the door to ace’s room, looking to his elder brother warily. ace blinks the remaining sleep from his eyes, sits up fully.

“what?”

luffy huffs. “nevermind.” he begins to slide the door shut. “at least you’re up today.”

ace frowns at the comment, then immediately turns to look out the window. the sun was barely peeking out over the edge of the crest, as usual when he woke. he sighs and stumbles to his feet, electing to ignore luffy’s comment. 

breakfast with garp is a quiet affair. he eyes ace warily, but doesn’t say anything out of the ordinary, more of the usual. ace has to pull luffy away from the table, again, per usual. he sighs as he closes the front door, wrapping his scarf tighter around his neck. luffy grumbles at his side, wiping rice from the corner of his mouth.

he takes luffy halfway to school, then watches as he runs down the path with zoro and nami, sprinting in a race to see who can reach the grounds first. ace continues up the slope by himself, and doesn’t stop until he’s sliding his classroom door open, tugging his scarf a little looser in the heated environment. 

he’s sitting his bag down on his desk when the door slams open, and he turns calmly while a few others jump, entirely expecting this kind of entrance. lami pinpoints him immediately and stalks up to him, kidd not far behind. ace stands at attention, turning to face her-

and makes a noise of protest as she grabs his cheeks, pulling his face closer to hers for easier inspection. 

it’s a few tense moments of silence before he frowns, features distorted. “can i help you?” he says, words muffled by the pull of his lips. lami’s frown mirrors his own, and she releases him.

“are you back to normal?” she says, hands on her hips. ace only turns to look at kidd behind her, silently asking for help. the edhead steps up with a muffled snort.

“you were . . weird, yesterday,” he admits. “your hair was a mess, you were all spaced out, you couldn’t remember where you sat-”

“you got all of crocus’ questions right!” lami snaps. “his insanely hard, out-of-thin-air pop questions! you got them all right. answered like it wasn’t even a challenge. like you knew the ins and outs of the material already.” she crosses her arms. “you better not upstage us all again today.”

ace blanches. “what? you’re lying. that’s impossible.” and his hair . . ? he reaches up, fingering the braided cord that held the black locks in a high ponytail. 

lami shakes her head. “no, i’m serious. you were weird yesterday.” she echoes kidd’s words and the redhead nods, confirming. 

“well, whatever,” he grumbles, turning away, a bit put-out. “i’m fine now. okay? let’s just forget about it.”

the door opens, and in ambles crocus, old hips still in desperate need of replacement. he takes a stand behind the podium and pauses as he finds ace. “hm. portgas.”

ace lifts his chin, eyes narrowing. after a few tense moments, their teacher turns away, looking back down to his papers. everyone finds their seats after that. 

-

‘who are you?’ echoes over and over in sabo’s mind, as much as he can allow it. school is vicious today, the teachers going hard and not leaving anyone a moment’s rest. it’s not until everything is done for the day that sabo can break away, and that’s when koala approaches him, a wary look marring her gaze.

“what’s up with being late yesterday?” her eyes narrow as she comes to a full stop right in front of him. “y’know, if you were gonna show up halfway through the day, why’d you even come at all?”

“late?” sabo blinks. as he could recall, he was here a half hour early, like today, like always. 

“yeah.” she huffs. “you were late to work, too. listen, are you feeling better, at least?”

sabo’s hairs begin to stand. “yesterday,” he says, very slowly, “i didn’t have a shift.” 

“what?” koala’s eyes begin to ignite. “then you just ditched me? what the hell, sabo!”

“what are you on?” sabo snaps back, trying to make sense of it all. “we were together all afternoon. we split crepes! remember?”

koala’s mouth opens, but she remains silent. her brows scrunch, and the fire dies out. “that was monday,” she recalls. 

sabo shrugs, still off-put. “yeah?”

“sabo, it’s wednesday.”

he blinks. blinks again. “no-” he begins, but before he can finish, koala’s whipped her phone out and is showing him the date.

he stands very still. a shiver runs through his body.

“why . . can’t i remember?” 

-

lami and kidd wrangle him away for the afternoon, walking while the bite of the cold wasn’t too bad. unluckily for him, the path they take leads into a head-on collision with one of dragons’ rallies. ace can hear his speech before he sees the crowd, and then he’s hissing to himself in panic, ducking down behind kidd’s lanky form. the redhead scoffs, but doesn’t move.

“i guess it is election time,” lami notes, gaze wandering over. 

“wonder why he bothers,” kidd says. “he’s bound to get reelected anyway.”

ace frowns, eyes still facing the ground. he doesn’t want to hear dragon, or see him, but most importantly, he doesn’t want dragon to see him.

a pause in the speech reaches his ears. lami moves closer to the pair. “hey, heads up-” she begins to mutter.

“ace!” dragon calls, and he closes his eyes, jerking to a stop. slowly, his eyes move until he meets his father’s over the heads of the crowd. he doesn’t look very pleased. “straighten out already!” he calls.

ace forces out an exhale and moves out from behind kidd, standing taller. he turns his gaze back to the road and starts moving, quicker this time. he feels dragon’s eyes on him all the while, but what’s more, the eyes of the crowd as they turn to face him, as they turn to witness the town mayor mocking his eldest yet again-

“don’t let him bother you,” lami says, once they’re out of earshot. she turns to kidd, giving him a pointed look. “hey, let’s go to your mom’s shop?”

“diner,” kidd corrects. he frowns, knowing more than anything that it wasn’t a question. but, well, it was still too early for dad to be home. “sure,’ he sighs, giving in. immediately, ace perks up at the prospect of food.

“sacha!” lami calls, just as they burst through the doors. an older woman comes out from the back room, wiping her hands with a towel. her gaze brightens as it lands on the three.

“oh! come in, come in.” she puts her hands on her hips as they all pile into a table. “so, how was school?”

“horrible!” ace groans. “crocus kept asking me all these questions i couldn’t answer. and only me!”

from beside him, kidd snickers. lami pokes ace with her elbow. “it’s because you were a smartass yesterday.”

ace huffs, slumping to the tabletop. “sacha, they’re being mean to me!” he whines. “please, the only thing that can help is food! please feed me!”

sacha rolls her eyes at the act. “sure. whatever you say.” she winks to the other two, already turning towards the back. “i’ll bring some stuff right out.”

“thanks, mom!” kidd calls. lami echoes his words, and then they’re both turning to ace, who’s still slumped against the table.

“hey,” lami says suddenly. “fuck dragon. don’t think about it.”

ace hums, head still buried in his arms.

if only.

-

sabo has the dream again.

he sets upright, and everything is at a lower angle, and pieces of stiff, black hair fall in front of his eyes. he hums, thinks nothing of it. okay. so it was a do-over dream. maybe he could do better this time.

luffy opens his door with a short bang some time later, and pauses for a moment to eye him with trepidation. sabo cocks his head to face him, but otherwise continues bouncing his newly-acquired black locks. he couldn’t help it -he’d never had hair this long. 

“breakfast!” luffy snaps. he closes the door with the same amount of force he’d opened it with, and it hits the frame harshly. sabo’s hand drops from his hair, finally.

breakfast is, unfortunately, not a quiet affair. sabo has to fight over rice, fish, soup -everything, really- until it’s all properly dished out. a little radio in the corner of the room blares out about town hall news, and sabo cocks his head to it as he nibbles on some meat, swiping his chopsticks out to keep Luffy from his rice.

“also, in regards to the upcoming mayoral election-”

garp has already stood up by this point, and pulls the plug on the old machine before the announcer could continue. he comes back to the table in the newly quiet atmosphere, and luffy sets down elbows up on the glass top, sighing.

“you really should make up with him already,” he grumbles. “both of you,” he adds, turning that glare to sabo. sabo only blinks, not knowing the context of the words, and chooses to resume eating in quiet rather than respond.

“it’s an adult problem, kid,” garp grunts, setting down his empty bowl. “go on, now. get ready for school.”

luffy lets out a long-lastings sigh as he throws himself to his feet. “right,” he says, letting the word drag out, and drags himself from the room. sabo sets down his rice bowl after his last bite, nodding to garp.

“thanks for the food,” he mumbles, standing as well. garp grunts, but grabs for sabo before he can pass by completely. sabo pauses, looking over his shoulder.

“don’t forget, the ceremony is in a few days.”

that’s all he says, then he releases sabo. he doesn’t know the context, again, so he just nods and hurries up the stairs back to ace’s room.

the red band isn’t around his wrist this time, and it takes a bit of digging around, but he does find it in a spare drawer. he takes a brush through the thick locks, then binds it into a low ponytail at the base of his neck. if a knot wasn’t right last time, maybe this was. he uses the band in place of an elastic, pulling it tight, and nods once he’s satisfied.

luffy is waiting for him downstairs. he bounces on his feet, using both hands and a loud voice to say bye to their grandpa. sabo just nods, and garp nods back, letting them go. 

lami and kidd run into him before the pathway splits, and luffy looks on in indifference until lami has him on her shoulders, and then he’s squealing with delight or annoyance -sabo can’t tell. it only takes a moment for her to set him on the handlebars of kidd’s bike, and the redhead breaks out into a jog, balancing luffy, who does enjoy this one -evident by him throwing his arms over his head and shouting in joy. lami loops sabo’s arm through her own and they follow at their own pace. when the pathway splits, they help luffy down and he waves them off, continuing towards his own school.

sabo finds his seat by the window, but once class starts, he can’t focus. it’s all stuff he’s learned already, so he spends time instead jotting stuff down in a blank page of the notebook. ace’s family was two people. his brother, luffy, and his grandfather. there’s a third person him and ace share in conflict with. he has two close friends, lami and kidd. kidd is the son of a electrical contractor -the guy who controlled all power out here in the town. which, technically speaking, seemed to be out in the middle of nowhere. the high school sat over the ridge, and it was all sabo could see for miles around -that was, nothing but rolling hills. 

“portgas,” a voice says gruffly, enough to grate sabo’s ears, and he looks up to find the entire class staring at him. his brows furrow, until he meet the teacher’s gaze, locked on him. sabo swallows, setting down his pen. 

“yes?”

crocus lets out an overdue sigh. “nice of you to finally respond. define ‘twilight’ for me.”

sabo blinks, then stands in one clean motion, nodding. “it’s . . a time between night and day,” he finally settles on, unsure of what the man was looking for. he’d gotten all the questions right last time, but they only served to annoy him. and also bring on more questions. sabo wasn’t exactly sure how to respond here to get it right this time.

crocus grins, and sabo feels a little nervousness run about. “not quite what i was looking for.” he gestures with his hand, and sabo sits down, confusion growing.

“‘twilight’ is neither day nor night. it’s a time when the two become blurred. where all the funny stuff happens. afterlight, in other words. right before dusk.”

“what about half-light?” kidd pipes up, hand slightly raised. crocus allows the outburst, humming.

“that’s more local dialect, but, yes.”

sabo lets down his guard again, and goes back to doodling, scribbling notes in the columns. 

he finds the diary after school.

it’s a small pocketbook, easily overlooked. call sabo curious, though, for upturning the room. ace is organized, and his small script is neat. reading through the entries doesn’t help, though. sabo sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. guess he had to do this on his own. well, for a do-over dream, he thinks he did rather well. if it happened again, maybe he’d get to finish learning what he only discovered this time around.

he’s settling down on the futon when a stray thought comes to mind. the words ‘who are you?’ scribbled in his sketchbook hit him out of nowhere, and sabo stands on the thin matress, gaze falling to the desk in the corner.

after a moment, he walks over, feet carrying him and hand reaching out for a small marker. he hesitates for a moment, then presses the ink to his skin, writing his name carefully.

-

sabo jerks awake, head fuzzy. shanks opens his door at the same time, and the blond has a conniption, about doing a front-somersault off the mattress. he lands on the ground in a heap, groaning.

“relax, kid,” shanks says. “it’s just me.”

sabo’s leg twitches. he lies there for a moment, only vaguely thinking about going back to sleep.

“ . . you okay?”

his phone starts ringing and sabo forces himself up to silence it. “fine,” he mutters, waving shanks off. with a shrug, the redhead leaves, closing the door behind him.

sabo’s gaze is fixed to his arm, now that he’s stopped waving it. his brow furrows, and he grasps his right with his left hand, bringing it closer. he squints.

there’s writing scribbled onto the skin. ‘sabo?’ it reads. ‘who are you? what are you?’

it was a dream.

right?

makino frowns at him as he enters the kitchen. “don’t cause trouble today,” she says quietly. sabo blinks, eyes widening and heart racing.

“what? what did i do?” he stammers. she only looks at him again, sighs quietly, and exits the room. down the hall, the front door closes.

“what did i do?” sabo asks koala, who frowns upon spotting him in the hall before class was due to start. 

“you got home too late, is my guess,” she muses. “makino called me, y’know. wondering where you were.”

sabo blanches. “did i have a shift?”

“ i think so?” she squints. “you headed off in a hurry. saw something, i guess. are you okay?”

he waves her off. “fine, fine.”

she looks at him for another moment before shoving the door open. “right.”

sabo goes straight home before his shift at the restaurant. on impulse, he flips to the back spread of his sketchbook, where the last note was. his eyes widen.

“i can’t believe i got to stop a real-life goa robbery attempt last night,” he reads. “sorry, i may have gotten scuffed up?” sabo takes a step back, and the sketchbook falls from his hands. it’s loud when it hits the floor. “what the fuck?” he breathes.

he pads over to the mirror, but there’s no marks on his face. without any airs, he strips of his shirt, twisting this way and that. ah. there, on his left side, was a small patch of bruising. luckily for him, it was on his burns, where all the skin was nerve-dead. he couldn’t feel a thing.

suddenly feeling lightheaded, sabo falls to his knees. his right hand comes up to trace the bruising.

“oh, sabo!”

he turns on his heel, empty plates balanced in outstretched hands. robin walks over the last few steps. “yes?”

“thanks for the other night.” she nods. “and for making sure i got home safe. that was really nice of you.”

the pieces connect, rapid-fire, and he works hard to only nod back. “no problem,” he murmurs, then ducks quickly through the door to the back. so, robin was the one almost mugged. she must live pretty far, for him to take her and be back late enough to cause makino to worry.  . . . that would also explain the weird looks he received from his other co-workers when he arrived. 

sabo sighs, taking a moment to pull his arms on top of his head, open his airway. then he’s poked in the back with a ladle, and his eyes open back up. moment over. he turns to see thatch eyeing him, a lazy grin on his face.

“what’s got you worked up?” he asks. before sabo can even think about not replying to his cheshire grin, zeff is yelling for him from across the kitchen. he moves quickly, picking up dessert trays and swinging out of the room once more.

he gets a text from shanks that has him calling as soon as he’s clocked out, pressing his phone between his shoulder and chin. it takes one ring for the redhead to pick up. “yes?”

“sabo! come straight home today, okay?”

“yeah, got it.” he sighs. “sorry . . about yesterday.”

“nah, don’t worry about it.” shanks pauses, and sabo can picture him physically waving the words off. “i know you didn’t mean harm. still, makino’s a little worried, so do her this favor.”

“got it. see you soon.”

sabo pockets his phone and pulls out his metro card in place of it, stepping fully into the train station. his head is spinning. 

it was a dream, right?

-

ace finds the diary, and it makes him sad before it gives him answers.

so i don’t forget again.

he’s found three, similar, pressed into the back of a crammed bookshelf. all of them have the same title. he finds his fingertips pressing into the burn scar around his eye. was it to do with this? was it all part of the same thing?

the last entries of the diary confirm his worries. sabo wasn’t aware of what was going on. he was slowly realizing it, but slowly was bad for ace, who knew from the first event what was happening.

i’m not dead. we’re switching bodies.

he was switching bodies with sabo triste, a boy his age living out in goa with his two guardians, makino and shanks. ace goes to sleep, and wakes up as sabo; he’d spent more time as the blond this week than he had himself.

‘stop writing in my sketchbook!!!’ is written right under his script on the same page, and ace traces the words carefully. he takes a pen and writes, right underneath, ‘surely one page is okay.’

he hesitates, then he writes, out to the side - ‘it’s not a dream.’

it can’t be a dream anymore.

[thinkaboutdobrik]

The Green Gate - Colby Brock

a/n: this is for my lovey dovey baby bubba because she was feeling down today k love u the most

plot: the last party at the trap house, and the reader and colby are flirting

sidenote: this story is all over the place bc ive been feeling all sorts of emotions writing this. but its fluffy!!!

-

Sitting on the couch with Katrina, Sam, Jake and Brennen, you were singing and dancing along in your seats to the music that was blasting through the speakers. Crowds of people were dancing and chatting all throughout the house.

There were people in the kitchen, in the foyer, in the livingroom and probably upstairs as well - the place was packed with people, enjoying one last party at the Trap House.

"Here, take this!" Brennen offered and handed you his red solo cup.

You gave him a funny look and laughed. "I'm okay, Brennen. I think I'll grab one for my self." you laughed, rejecting his half empty solo cup and pushed your self off the couch, using Brennens thigh for support.

"You guys want anything?" you turned around and asked the rest of your friends. They all shook their heads and you shrugged before heading towards the kitchen.

Pushing your way past the big crowd of strangers and vlogsquad members, you finally made it to the kitchen and landed your eyes on Colby's.

A wide smile fell onto Colby's lips as his eyes lit up when he saw you. "Y/n, come here." he yelled over the music, motioning for you to come over.

He loosely rested his hand around your shoulder and handed you a drink, before you leaned back on the kitchen counter.

"So, how's it going? You having fun?" Colby asked you in your ear, his breath smelling like alcohol - but not too much. He wasn't anywhere near as drunk as the people around him.

You nodded and smiled in return, turning towards him, looking him up and down as a small chuckle escaped your mouth.

"I like your suit." you giggled, running a finger down his chest as you examined his black, starry sweatsuit.

Colby laughed in return, popping his hip out, almost striking a pose. "Thanks! I'm feelin' kinda sexy in this one." he joked and raised his yellow tinted sunglasses.

You laughed in return and leaned your head on his shoulder, nuzzling up to him whilst he pulled you into a tighter hug.

"Check out the back yard, bro. People are jumping in the pool!" Jake exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air as he looked at you and Colby.

You and Colby shared a confused look, before following Jake out to the back yard. Colby loosely grabbed a hold of your hand, leading you through the crowd of people before you stepped outside.

Jake was not kidding when he said people were jumping in the pool. Some fully clothed, some fully nude. You gasped at the sight of the naked people in the pool, and Colby jokingly covered your eyes with his hands. "Don't look!" he laughed, turning your around away from the pool before wrapping his arms around you.

"Are you serious right now? Get a room!" Corey jokingly complained from behind you, laughing as he threw his hands in air.

Colby swung your body side to side and gave Corey a funny look.

You and Colby joined Corey and Devyn, and the rest of the guys around the firepit, laughing and chatting for what felt like hours.

After a little while all of you headed over to the pool to hang out with the rest of your friends and watch all the shenanigans going on in the water. People were jumping from the shark tower, other were lounging on floaties - despite how cold it was out, they seemed to have the time of their lives.

Listening to Corey joke about some of the guys inside of the house, Colby gently tugged on the end of your sweater. You turned around and looked at him confusingly.

"Come here for a sec." he whispered in your ear as he looked around, gently grabbing your hand and leading you towards the side of the house.

"In here." he whispered and opened the green gate, taking one last look around him before pulling you along with him.

You had no idea what he was up to, or why he was whispering so much. It almost seemed like he didn't want to get caught.

The space was tight and dark, and there were barely any lights causing you to trip over a few rocks and some sticks here and there.

"Ow!" you hissed and held onto your knee. Colby quickly turned around, and even though you couldn't fully see his facial expression you knew he was looking at you funny.

"Would you keep it down? I'm trying to sneak away here.." he mumbled with gritted teeth, giving you a funny face expression before he let out a small chuckle.

"Where are you taking me anyways?" you whispered and grabbed a hold of his hand again.

Colby was leading the way through the darkness, but before reaching to the other side he stopped mid way.

"What? What happened?" you asked in confusion, peeking over his shoulder.

Colby shook his head and chuckled. "Nothing. Just be quiet."

You did as he said and kept quiet and leaned yourself up against the wall.

Colby grabbed both of your hands, intertwining his fingers with yours.

"Your hands are so cold, Colby." you squealed as you felt his cold fingers. You put your hands together and brought them up to your mouth to gently blow on them, trying to get some heat back into his hands.

"Don't worry about that. But listen, there's something I've been meaning to ask you." Colby said, bringing your hands back down again, squeezing them a little tighter.

You smiled and tilted your head at him in confusion, waiting for his question.

Colby took a small step forward, inching closer towards you and you could barely feel his hips pressed up against yours.

"Can I kiss you? Sorry if that's, like, so out of the blue." he laughed, the alcohol in his body giving him enough confidence to finally make a move.

You giggled and looked up at him, leaning closer to him so your noses were brushing over eachothers, and nodded.

He placed his hand gently on your cheek, stroking it a little with his finger, and smiled before glancing down at your lips. Leaning in, his lips were brushing over yours and you could feel his warm breath lightly hit your lips before he finally placed a soft kiss on your lips. His lips were cold against yours, but that didn't stop the swarm of butterflies to appear in your stomach.

You wrapped your arms around his neck and pulled away slightly, smiling at him. "What took you so long?"

"I don't know. I guess I never-"

"Well, well, well. What do we have here?" a familiar voice came from beside you. Turning around, your eyes immediately landed on the blonde haired boy and the blue haired girl standing on the other side of the green gate.

"I told you they were a thing! Hellooo?" Katrina playfully punched Sam's shoulder, making him flinch and pretend to get hurt.

You buried your face in your hands and giggled, and Colby took a step forwards standing in front of you with his arms spread apart, covering you. "Back off, she's mine!" he laughed before clenching his fists, pretending to fight the two of them.

Colby playfully wrestled Sam a bit while you and Katrina stood on the side line, watching them, laughing your asses off.

"I won!" Sam cheered, throwing his hands in the air in celebration.

Colby sighed and ran a hand down his face, staring at the ground. You approached him and placed a hand on his shoulder and the other on his chin, tilting his head towards you.

"He totally cheated and you won for sure. Just let him have this little moment." you whispered and assured him, giving him a quick little wink before watching Sam and Katrina run away, cheering and laughing.

Colby scoffed and jokingly rolled his eyes. You cupped his face in your hands and smiled. "Come. Let's head inside." you said and grabbed his hand, leading him towards the house.

"Brooo, where have you been?" Brennen slurred as you entered the house.

Colby shrugged. "Just around."

As time went by, more and more people got too drunk to function and people had started leaving. You decided to stick around for a little while longer to help the roommates clean up around the house.

Cleaning up all the cups and empty beer bottles, you filled the garbage bag full of junk and threw it in the dumpster.

Everybody had done their chores for the night, and just about all the roommates had already gone to bed, exept you, Jake and Colby.

"Alright, I'm gonna head to bed, guys. See ya tomorrow." Jake said and stretched his arms and yawned.

"Good night, Jake." you smiled as he headed up the stairs.

Spending a night sleeping in Colby's bed wasn't new to you. His bed was soft and comfy, and big, and let's face it - Colby was a great cuddler, so naturally you wanted to stay the night, and he loved when you did that.

"Do I get to cuddle you tonight too or are you heading home?" Colby questioned from the kitchen as he threw away the last few cups in the bin.

"Colby, it's 5 am. Do you really think I'm going home now? You're not getting rid of me that easily." you laughed.

Colby approached you and picked you up bridal style, giggling at your reaction to how easily he picked you off the floor. He carried you all the way up the stairs before putting you down on his bed.

"Get comfy." Colby smiled as you tucked your self in and fluffed the pillows.

Colby slid under the covers next to you and wrapped his arm around you, pulling you close before leaving a small trail of kisses down your jaw and neck.

"Good night, Colbs." you whispered and wrapped your arms around his, intertwining your fingers with his.

You felt him smile into the crook of your neck, hugging you tight. "Night, y/n."

[basketofverbiage]

Hold On Pt 3

Here is part 3 finally! It took forever to edit because its so long. I had never planned to write a part 4, but now I think I might need to. We are finally past the angst mostly, so things are brightening up a bit.

Warnings: mentions of suicide attempt, hospitals, therapy, mentions of rape, mentions of miscarriage, shower with Jin (no funny business, all fluff)

Word count: 10,358

Part 1  Part 2 Part 4

When Yoongi had said that the boys were coming back to bring dinner, Y/n did not expect this. She had expected random takeout to suit all their tastes and just a low-key family meal. She did not expect Hoseok and Namjoon to drag a borrowed table in and cover it with a red checked picnic tablecloth and then put flowers in the middle. She did not expect Jimin and Taehyung to come in carrying multiple gift bags and Jungkook to bring soup that Jin’s mother had made. She did not expect that the boys would have brought both she and Seokjin changes of clothes either. She was totally at a loss for words and struggling so hard not to cry when Jungkook ran back out to the car and brought in the biggest bouquet she’d ever seen and his own Cooky plushie for her to snuggle. Y/n was certain that she was undeserving of the kindness and love of these precious men after what she had done. And when she opened the gift bag to see the silk pajamas in her favorite color, she cried for the million-and-first time that day.

“Noona, we just wanted to get some things that you could have to be comfortable in and have some pieces of home here with you since you probably won’t be able to leave yet,” Jungkook murmured as he hugged her tight. “We didn’t mean to make you cry.”

“Oh Kookoo, I’m not crying because I’m sad. I’m just a little overwhelmed. I don’t deserve any of this after what I did.”

“Yes, Noona, you do. We love you. You are our family. While we don’t know exactly what happened to bring this on, we know that we love you. Let us be your safety net when you are falling and your protectors while you heal,” Jimin piped up as he took his turn to hug her.

“You are so strong, Y/n-noona, but it’s okay not to be sometimes. Isn’t that what you always tell me when I’m overwhelmed?” Taehyung asked. “Let us be strong for both you and Jin-hyung for a while.”

While Y/n was being smothered in love by the maknaes, Yoongi and Seokjin had gathered extra chairs and brought them in. Namjoon had brought in a bucket of ice to go with the drinks that Jungkook and Jimin had brought to go with dinner, and Hoseok had begun dishing out the food. The boys circled their chairs all around Y/n’s hospital bed and they all ate and drank together, chattering and laughing and just being a big goofy family for a while. They had all been so worried and so scared for so long that the relief that Y/n really was okay had made them all slightly giddy.

Seokjin kept an eye on Y/n but let his brothers take the lead in her care and distract her for a little while. As everyone finished with the soup and passed around the pastries for dessert, Namjoon broke the lull that had settled on the room.

“Jin-hyung, Y/n, I just wanted to let you know that you are welcome to stay at the dorms with us for a while if you want. I know that going back to your apartment may be difficult at first, so I wanted you to know that I got Jin-hyung’s room ready for you. You don’t have to worry about anything.”

“Thank you, Joonie. We haven’t really discussed what will happen when we get the okay to leave. Y/n’s therapist will be coming in tomorrow so that we can have a long talk about everything and make plans. I want to make her transition as easy as I can. But I will have to go back. The bathroom…” Jin’s voice trailed off when he remembered the state they’d left the bathroom in.

“You don’t have to worry about anything. Hobi-hyung and I went today and I cleaned up the bathroom. It’s good as new. And Hobi-hyung tidied up the kitchen,” Taehyung spoke up gently and gave Seokjin’s hand a squeeze.

Y/n sat there in silence for a few moments before taking Seokjin’s hand in hers for some strength before beginning to talk to the boys. She told them everything that had happened, from the rape to her depression, and the culmination the day before. The boys sat in various shades of emotion from cold, blue rage rolling off of Yoongi in waves to the shock clear on Hoseok and Namjoon’s faces. Jungkook’s face was tinged red and had hardened in his attempt to keep the flashpoint of anger under his own skin, while Jimin looked worried and Taehyung looked slightly appalled.

“I just needed to tell you all everything. I didn’t want to have secrets anymore. I told Jinnie everything this afternoon, and so he’s had some time to process it all little. But hopefully my therapist will have some ideas of what to do and better management than just idle chatting from day to day and week to week. It helped some, but obviously not enough,” Y/n quietly finished.

“Y/n, thank you for trusting us with this. I’m glad you told me this. It actually opens the floor for me to tell you both what I spoke with Sejin-hyung about this afternoon. We both agreed that while there is about another month before we have any overseas tour dates or events, it is extremely important that you not be here alone. Sejin-hyung actually suggested this and I fully agree. You will be going with us when we go abroad. It may be a little overwhelming to do all that traveling, but I know you have the option to work from home on most of your assignments. You can continue with your work, just from other countries. We also discussed that instead of staying mostly in hotels, we will try to book houses or chalets in the cities we go to so that we are all nearby whenever you need us and you aren’t having to keep up with 7 different hotel room numbers scattered about a hotel. You can just step out of your bedroom and yell and we can all come running,” Namjoon explained.

Seokjin’s face immediately fell into a state of shock that Namjoon had already taken care of the request he had planned on making without even knowing why he needed it. And then he had taken it an entire step further.

“Namjoon-ah, I don’t know what to say,” Seokjin started.

“Don’t say anything. Y/n may be your girlfriend, but she is our sister. And we want to help. So please, let us.”

As the boys were cleaning up the room, Y/n stepped into the bathroom to freshen up a bit before bed. The nurses had removed her IV line earlier that day and had given her the okay to have a shower. Taehyung had brought in her shower items from home, and that helped. She would no longer smell like a hospital and hopefully she would feel less in shock and overwhelmed. In the blackness of everything she had been struggling with, she had never anticipated the boys to react this way. She honestly had fully convinced herself that Seokjin would leave her and she would lose all seven of them in one fell swoop; to think that they had gone to such efforts to make sure she felt their comfort and their love had her crying into the shower all over again. She tried to keep the sobs quiet so that they wouldn’t hear but was apparently unsuccessful because Seokjin barged in the door a few minutes later.

“Baby, you okay? I heard you crying…”

“I’m just…I didn’t expect any of this. I thought you would leave me and I would lose them too. I just…I don’t deserve any of you.”

“Oh Princess, you do. You did not deserve what happened to you when we were away, but none of us will let anything like that happen to you. In fact, if the police ever find who hurt you, we may have to lock Yoongi-chi and Jungkookie in the practice room to keep them from killing them with their bare hands,” Seokjin said.

She hadn’t noticed, but he had stripped down while she was standing with her eyes closed, forehead pressed to the tile of the small shower, and had climbed in with her. Seokjin pulled her close to him and kissed her forehead. “Let us help you, Love. You are no longer alone in this.”

Seokjin took the time to wash and condition her long hair while she cried a bit more about everything and mourned the tiny lost life she hadn’t realized that she was attached to before it was ripped away from her. After finishing slowly showering both of them, Seokjin helped her step out of the shower and dried her off himself, then rubbed her favorite amber scented lotion on her back, arms, and legs. While he dried himself more, she put on the beautiful new pajamas Jimin and Jungkook had bought her and brushed her teeth. Once they were both dressed and had brushed their teeth they stepped out into the room. Y/n still had her hair wrapped in a towel and her hairbrush in her hand, but before she could think about brushing her hair, Jimin pulled her over to sit in the chair in front of him and slowly and gently detangled her dark curls. He brushed her hair then handed the brush over to Taehyung, who braided her hair in pigtails so that it would be cute, but out of the way for sleeping. When she took it down in the morning, it would have beautiful kinky waves that she wouldn’t have to worry with styling properly.

The boys seemed to be playing a very unusual game of Hot Potato, and Y/n was the potato. As soon as Taehyung had finished with braiding her hair, Y/n got pulled over to Hoseok. Hoseok gently applied her nighttime moisturizer to her face then hugged her tightly for a few minutes. He would never tell, but he had been having flashbacks to the dried blood on the bathroom floor all evening and just needed to hug her to feel that she was really okay. He kissed her gently on top of her head and whispered something in her ear that made her smile softly and say, “I know, Hoseokie. I promise I won’t.”

Next to gather her attention was Yoongi. He had had time to settle his anger while she and Seokjin had been showering, and was much calmer than he was before. When Hoseok had finished with his time with her, Yoongi reached out and pulled her over into his lap. He hugged her tightly. “Love, it’s going to be a horrific battle from here on out. You’ve already been fighting, but by yourself. But the cavalry is here now, and we got you. Okay?” When she softly agreed, he let her up off his lap, only for her to be yanked into a tight hug by Namjoon. Y/n’s back was to the group, so only they could see the tears glistening in his eyes as he stopped being the tough leader and allowed himself to simply feel all the fear, sorrow, and relief of the last 29 or so hours. “I love you, Y/n. You are an amazing friend and sister to me. Please let us help. Please come stay with us when you get to leave,” he begged into her ear.

“I can’t promise that, Joonie-bug, but Jinnie and I will discuss it with Dr. Kang tomorrow and see what she says. If she thinks it’s a good idea, we will go from there.”

Finally, Jungkook got his chance. He had been so antsy while she was out of his sight. Y/n was the big sister he had never had and had been the first one he thought to call when things went well or if he was upset lately. So, when he had his chance he kissed her cheek then hugged her as tightly as he could. He was angry at the bastards who had hurt his Noona and it had triggered his protective streak. Jungkook did not want to leave the hospital but he knew that they all needed to go home and rest. Seokjin would stay and they would meet with Dr. Kang in the morning. She was meant to come round at 9:30 am and Seokjin had promised to call them all to update them then. So he squeezed her one more time and said, “Noona, Jin-hyung is going to be with you tonight. I want to stand guard outside the door, but my hyungs won’t let me. So I’m going home, but if you need anything, even just a hug, just call me or text me and I’ll be here so fast your head will spin.”

“Okay, Kookoo, I promise I will. Go home and sleep for a while, Baby Bunny,” Y/n giggled. The special nickname she had given him relaxed the tension in his heart a little and he felt a bit better about going home.

After another round of hugs, forehead kisses, I-love-yous, and please-sleep-wells, the six boys left Y/n and Seokjin to settle in for the night. The hospital bed was so small compared to their bed at home, but somehow, neither of them minded. The tight space was actually welcomed because Seokjin could feel every breath Y/n took and it quieted the voice that kept asking what if this is a dream and she’s really gone. It was nearly 11 pm when they were finally able to settle in for the night. Even with their nap earlier, Seokjin was so tired from the roller coaster of emotions they’d been on, and as soon as he was sure she was settling safely into dreams, he fell deeply into sleep.

Seokjin startled awake after having a strange dream about falling in a hole to find Y/n no longer in bed. At first, he didn’t think anything about it, but then he panicked a little because he had not left her side the entire time since she’d woken up. Just as he was climbing out of the bed to go look for her, she stepped out of the bathroom.

“Jinnie, it’s okay. I’m coming back to bed now. I just needed to pee.”

His heart didn’t stop pounding until she climbed back into the bed and curled up as close to him as she could get. He had a feeling that he might feel like that more than he’d like to for a while and was so glad that they weren’t leaving for tour for a bit. Even though she was going with them and he had that peace of mind, he felt like he needed her beside him constantly to make sure she had really survived. She drifted off to sleep again fairly quickly, but Seokjin laid awake for a while longer just allowing her deep breathing to comfort him enough that he could sleep again.

 Seokjin woke up again when the sun was just beginning to peek in through the window on the other side of the room. Y/n was still sleeping soundly with her head pressed to his chest. She looked so beautiful in the early morning light with her lips slightly pursed in her dream state and some tiny unruly curls bursting out of her braids. She still looked a little more pale than usual, but the doctor had said that the pallor would subside after a few days when her body had had time to begin remaking the blood that had been lost. While she’d had several transfusions, she had lost more blood than they’d reintroduced, so her body would just need to remake it. The doctor had also said that she’d likely feel a little colder than usual until her blood was replenished.

The clock on Seokjin’s phone said 6:37 am. He was usually leaving for practice around now, unless they had a special event. He had just decided to try to go back to sleep when the door squeaked open and Jungkook slipped in with 3 cups of coffee and what seemed to be breakfast.

“Jungkookie, what are you doing here so early?”

“I just wanted to bring you both breakfast, Hyung, and coffee too. I barely slept wondering how Noona was.”

“ ‘m fine, Kookoo. Wha time is it?” Y/n asked as she stirred around and opened her eyes.

“It’s 6:45 am, Baby,” Seokjin told her.

“Ugh, it’s ass o’clock. Why couldn’t you wait another hour or two?” she grumbled.

Jungkook laughed at that. “Oh my precious, sweet, lovely Noona. You never have been a morning person. But that’s okay. I came bearing gifts. I brought you a caramel macchiato and Yoongi-hyung made breakfast and sent you both some.”

Y/n blinked several times trying to decide if she’d heard correctly. “Yoongi-chi made breakfast? At ass o’clock?”

“Yes. He did. He made a breakfast pie, sliced fresh fruit, and sent toast as well. You should feel special,” Jungkook giggled.

“I’m amazed that he’s not pretending to be a rock. Is he sick?” she asked.

“No, Noona. I’m not sure he slept more than I did. We both were a bit worried about you still and had trouble settling down last night.”

Before Y/n had the chance to say anything to that, Jungkook began to unpack the breakfast he had brought in and the lovely smell filled up the entire room. Yoongi could definitely cook when he wanted to, and that showed through. He had to have gotten up super early to put together the pie alone, and Y/n was very thankful for his efforts.

 Yoongi had actually not slept at all the night before but hadn’t told anyone that. When he realized at 4 am that it was useless to kept tossing and turning about the bed, he got up and made coffee. As he sat sipping the liquid stamina, he had the idea to make breakfast. His mom had always made a breakfast pie for special occasions and had shown him how. If he made it, then someone could take some over to Seokjin and Y/n. In order to feed all of them, he knew he’d have to bake at least 3 pies so he got to work. The pies were finished, crust from scratch and everything by 4:45 am and in the oven baking away. Yoongi was amazed that he still felt antsy, so he began slicing up strawberries, a pineapple, and a watermelon to go with it. He had hidden away a beautiful loaf of one of Y/n’s lovely sourdough loaves in the freezer for a rainy day, so he pulled it out and sliced the entire loaf for toast. Since it had been frozen, he buttered the slices and toasted them in the oven as the pies rested before being sliced.

Their apartment smelled amazing, and one by one the boys drifted sleepily into the kitchen. The only one who seemed wide awake was Jungkook, and he wandered out towel drying his hair a bit more from a shower. With one look at each other, Yoongi and Jungkook had realized that neither had slept. Yoongi had prepared two containers with servings of breakfast to take over to the hospital but made a third quickly.

“Jungkookie, will you please take these over to the hospital to Jin-hyung and Y/n? I put breakfast for you in there too, and money for you to pick up Starbucks for you three on the way,” he said softly.

“Of course, Hyung. How did you know I wanted to get to the hospital right away?”  Jungkook questioned.

“You’re the only one here fully showered and dressed, and I think you slept less than I did last night. So go on, Kookie. Go check on them and report back. And make sure Y/n eats every bite of the fruit on her plate. She needs the vitamins to finish healing.”

 After they’d finished having breakfast, Y/n stepped into the bathroom to get ready for her therapist to come by, leaving Jungkook a chance to speak along with Seokjin.

“Jin-hyung, is she really okay?” he asked tentatively. “I mean, I know she’s not okay okay, but she’s alright physically now?”

“According to the doctor, yes. But we have a long way to go for her to be mentally alright. If I’m being honest, I’m not sure I’m okay. When she’s out of my sight, I start to feel panicky again. That’s something I need to get under control quickly so I don’t suffocate her.”

“I think it will be understandable for a little while, but maybe we can help with that too. I want to help Noona as much as I can. I couldn’t really sleep last night because I wanted to be able to protect her,” Jungkook admitted. “I really hope the doctor says she can stay with us for a little while. I think we would all feel better if we know she’s nearby for a bit. Otherwise, we are going to take over your apartment.”

Jin laughed a bit at that thought. “Eight of us crammed in our tiny apartment would be a stretch. It might violate the fire code, Kook.”

The bathroom door opened up and Y/n came out in leggings and Jungkook’s oversized hoodie. Her hair was down from the braids and parted to one side so her bangs laid loosely over her forehead. She still had on her slippers and put the pajamas she had removed into her duffle bag in the closet of the hospital room. She checked her phone while Jungkook and Seokjin chatted quietly, and giggled when she saw a message from Yoongi.

Eat well, Princess! I better hear that you ate every bite of the breakfast I slaved over! -Yoongi-chi

Thank you for making a beautiful breakfast at ass o’clock, Yoongi-chi. It was lovely. The only thing left was watermelon seeds. Y/n sent the message back then sat back down on the bed beside Seokjin.

“Jinnie, you better get ready. The hospital doctor said he’d come by before Dr. Kang, and it’s already almost 8.”

At that, Seokjin got up and headed into the bathroom to change clothes and freshen up before facing the looming medical staff. Once the bathroom door closed, Jungkook began packing up the empty containers he had brought breakfast in and set them aside. Y/n jumped slightly when he then climbed into the bed beside her where Seokjin had slept and pulled her into a hug.

“Noona, I just needed to hug you tight this morning. I couldn’t sleep last night thinking about you and worrying. I mean, I know Jin-hyung was here and would take care of you, but I wanted to be here too. I just feel extra protective of you now that I know what happened. And I’m sorry for that. I might drive you crazy with checking on you for a little while until everything settles down.” Jungkook paused for a second before adding, “Hell, who am I kidding? You are about to have 7 overconcerned guard-dogs for a little while, so I hope you will tell us to give you some space if you need it. I just know that with all of us worried, plus Sejin-hyung too, we might be a bit much to handle. But hopefully, if you can stay with us, we will be close by enough that we won’t be constantly bugging you. Has anyone called your office to let them know what is going on?”

“I’m actually not sure. With today being Saturday, I am usually off today and I had taken yesterday off.”

“Is there anyone I can call for you? I think you will need a bit more time away from work, and I’d be happy to run any errands you need,’ Jungkook offered.

When Seokjin walked out of the bathroom, his heart gave a sweet lurch upon coming out to find his baby brother wrapped around the love of his life. They were talking quietly, almost like they were sharing secrets, but Seokjin could hear their conversation now that he was out of the bathroom.

“I actually called Y/n’s boss the evening I found her. She told me that you can take as much time as you need to get settled and properly ready to work again before coming back. She also forbade you from stepping foot into the office before two weeks are up except to let her see with her own eyes that you are okay,” Seokjin laughed out the last part. “She really acted like she was your mom.”

“We’re a tight little office, you know,” Y/n said with a soft smile. “We have to take care of each other.”

Jungkook squeezed Y/n one more time, then released her and kissed her gently on the forehead. “I should go. I’m in Jin-hyung’s spot. Plus, I have to report back to Yoongi-hyung how much you both ate. If he doesn’t deem it well enough, he may show up to force feed you fruits.”

 Jimin sat curled up on the sofa in the boys’ apartment with a blanket thrown across his lap and his laptop propped on the arm of the sofa. He was researching the best way to help people who had lived through traumas, and wasn’t coming up with much luck. He wanted to do something tangible that he could hold in his own hands to help. Somehow, being able to see and touch something that would help would make him feel like he actually was contributing to Y/n’s healing process. She had done so much to help him heal over time and battle off the demons that rose up from time to time to shout that he wasn’t good enough or slim enough, and now he wanted to do something helpful in return. He kept finding things that said to make sure they had professional help. Y/n already had someone taking care of that aspect with her therapist and with Jin-hyung.

After reading several articles about PTSD and similar things, he realized that there may not be anything tangible he might be able to provide outside of hugs and love from time to time and just being there. While he was sure that this was something he could readily offer, he still wanted to do something special, especially if Y/n would be staying with them for a bit. That’s when the idea struck him. Y/n loved to bake. She had told him once that it helped her so much when she felt stressed out or pressured from work. He wasn’t sure what items they had in their kitchen related to baking as none of them ever bothered. If they were craving anything baked, they’d either order it from somewhere or ask Y/n to make it. The only baking items they had were flat cookie sheets that Jin-hyung put other pans on top of to make sure they didn’t overflow in the oven and the pie tins that Yoongi-hyung used to make the breakfast pies in.

Jimin spent another few minutes on Google trying to sort out all the things someone might need for baking and made a long list of things they’d need. He didn’t want to just order them online because they might not be here in time. Who knew that you needed some of these things? Like, what are pie stones? Who puts rocks in their pie? Hopefully, Y/n would know what to do with them, because they were on his list along with a special kind of mixer with a dough hook, several types of pans, mixing bowls, thermometers, and a plethora of other smaller gadgets that just seemed fun.

With his list in hand, Jimin knew he needed a shopping partner who would be as enthusiastic as he was, so he set out to find Hoseok. Hobi-hyung loved to shop and his sister liked to bake too, so if they got stuck picking something, they could always call her for help. Jimin finally found him holed up in the little studio at their apartment with Namjoon and Yoongi. They were working on arranging a rap-line only track.

“Hobi-hyung, can you go shopping with me?”

“What are you shopping for, Jimin-ssi?” he asked.

Since he’d already interrupted them, he told them his idea for something to help Y/n and his reasons. Then he showed them his list. They all seemed to like his idea, and Yoongi added a few things to his list.

“Buy the girl a proper rolling pin. I literally used a steel water bottle to roll my pie crust this morning. You also need to add cooling racks, some trivets, and a baking stone to your list. Find a square baking stone if you can. Most of them are aimed at baking pizza, and are round, but I know that Y/n uses one sometimes for some of her more finicky loaves.”

“Oh yeah! And you should buy that one mixer that comes in pretty colors. I bet they make a purple one! It won’t really match our kitchen, but who cares?” Namjoon added. He really had no idea about things needed for baking, but he’d seen commercials for stand mixers advertising all colors of the rainbow.

After chatting for a few more minutes, Jimin and Hoseok left the studio to go on their shopping trip. Just having a plan for everything made them feel like they were doing something more than all sitting around worrying, and it took the edge off the constant anxiety they’d all walked around since Seokjin had found Y/n in the bathroom two days ago.

 When Jungkook got home from the hospital, he washed out the containers that he’d taken breakfast in and loaded them in the dishwasher. After seeing Y/n with his own eyes and hugging her for a bit, he felt a bit more at ease. Seokjin had promised to let them all know what the plan was after discussing everything with Y/n’s doctors. Jungkook actually felt his lack of sleep starting to catch up through the coffee he’d had that morning. While everyone seemed to be doing their own thing, he figured he could nap for a while before Seokjin called. As he started down the hall to his room, he was stopped by Taehyung calling to him from his own room.

“Jungkookie, how was our Y/n? Did she eat well?”

“Yeah, hyung, she did. She seemed okay. A bit antsy to speak with the doctors and move forward with a plan. Noona still seemed a little bit sad, but after everything she’s been through, who wouldn’t be sad, you know? I’m more worried that all of us will suffocate her to death with our own worrying and fussing over her than I am about her. Noona is strong and she’s helped all of us so much. I know she will be able to bounce back eventually. It’s just going to take some time.”

“Yeah. How do you think we can help best? I know hugs and just listening and stuff, but I don’t want to overwhelm her. We are 7 men, and men are the ones that hurt her so badly. I want her to be here with us, but I don’t want it to make her be afraid either,” Taehyung confessed softly. “That’s all I’ve thought about since she told us last night. How often we all made her hug us when we got home, even if she flinched away a little. All the times she looked so exhausted like she hadn’t slept well, and she explained it away with work stress instead of telling us that being near us was ripping open her old wounds. I don’t want to delay her healing.”

Jungkook completely understood what Taehyung meant. He’d laid awake nearly all night thinking the same thing. “I know. I couldn’t sleep at all last night. I was so angry at those assholes that hurt her, and worried about her. I seriously wanted to camp out at the door of her hospital room as a protector, but Namjoon-hyung made me come home. But while she was getting dressed and stuff, Jin-hyung and I talked about it a little. He said that he was planning to speak with her therapist about it. If she gives the go-ahead for Y/n to stay with us, he’s hoping that Dr. Kang will do a sort of crash course with all of us. Maybe meet together with us as a group and give us an idea of what to look for regarding Y/n’s emotional health and also let us know the types of things that will help and will hurt. He also said that he might discuss meeting with her too on his own to help with the trauma of finding her like that.”

“That’s probably a good idea, Kook. I know you’ve been in their master bathroom. The entire white tile floor was covered in dried blood except for the place where she was sitting. I honestly have no idea how Jin-hyung and the paramedics didn’t track it all over their house. It took nearly half a bottle of bleach to get it all up. I ruined the mop I used and a scrub brush I found under the sink trying to get it all out of the grout. Hobi-hyung nearly passed out when he saw it.”

Jungkook paled a little at the thought of his sweet Noona surrounded by her own blood. He cursed under his breath, then said, “I can’t imagine seeing that. It’s horrific in my mind, but was probably worse in person. Jin-hyung said he’d call us all later and give us an update on the plan. I was going to try to have a nap first since I didn’t sleep last night. Wanna go nap with me?”

Taehyung just nodded and grabbed his pillow then followed Jungkook across the hall to his room. He hadn’t changed out of his pajamas that morning, and Jungkook had worn sweats to the hospital that morning. They curled up together in Jungkook’s bed. Even though they all had their own rooms for the most part now, in times of stress and worry, they tended to sleep better together. During the most stressful times of their lives just after debuting, they all slept in one room, and they tended to gravitate back together because there was comfort and safety in numbers.

 “Well, do you think Hobi and Jimin have bought out the entire kitchen store yet?” Namjoon asked. They had left 2 hours ago, and had promised to call when they got back to get help carrying everything upstairs.

“I don’t know. But I’ve been thinking. They are buying all the necessaries for baking except actual baking supplies. I used the very last of the little flour we had this morning. Do you think we should go buy ingredients?”

“We could. But I have a lifetime ban from the kitchen, remember? So I have no idea what goes into baking.”

Yoongi smirked a bit at that, then said, “I can make pie crust and that’s it. But we have the whole internet at our disposal. How about we start there?”

They both spent several minutes looking up recipes for things they knew that Y/n had baked before and started a list. By the time they were done, the list had 27 items on it.

“Who knew there were that many different kinds of flour out there?” Namjoon muttered as they did a final glance over the list.

“I didn’t. But there is one thing that we need to get that we can’t buy at the store. Y/n won’t use any leavening except her starter. Jin-hyung will have to get that from their apartment,” Yoongi said thoughtfully.

“We can send him on a special expedition for that later. Should we go ahead and go pick up these things?”

“Yeah, and we should probably let Jimin and Hobi know to call Tae and JK if they beat us back. But you know how Hobi gets when he shops. We will probably beat them back.”

 After three hours and meetings with two different doctors and a discharge planner, Seokjin felt drained. They had gotten the okay for Y/n to leave the hospital tomorrow with the agreement that they would both meet with Dr. Kang daily for at least the next two weeks and that she would stay at the dorm with the members; while she had not expressly stated that Y/n should not be left alone, Dr. Kang had heavily implied it, so it made sense for them to go to the dorm. It would also relieve the other members. She also had agreed to meet with the rest of the group to advise of triggers that Y/n may have from the trauma, signs of things to look for, and the best way to help with panic attacks or if she started to spiral downward again. Typically, after a suicide attempt, an individual would be hospitalized for 2 weeks minimum and on strict suicide watch. However, because of who Seokjin was and the amount of attention that the hospital was starting to gain from paparazzi photographing the guys entering and leaving, Dr. Kang made an exception for Y/n. Also, knowing that she was going to be essentially surrounded by 8 mother hens (all seven members and Sejin, who Seokjin had called to arrange the meeting between the guys and Dr. Kang), it had eased the doctor’s mind considerably. Seokjin felt exhausted by the entire morning and could only imagine how Y/n felt. She had fallen asleep almost immediately after the discharge planner had left and the nurse had come in to take her vital signs.

Y/n’s head was resting on Seokjin’s chest in the hospital bed. Her breathing was steady and even, and it was a miracle to him. It was a miracle that she had survived all the things she had. His eyes welled up with tears as he thought of how strong she had tried to be for him and all the things she had suffered through silently over the months. Why had she ever thought he would leave her for something not her fault? He felt so guilty; he still felt like he had been a horrible boyfriend and like he hadn’t loved her well enough. If he had, she would have known that he would have helped shoulder all of that burden.

She was right about one thing though. If she had called him the night it happened, hell yes, he’d have been on the first flight out of LAX he could have caught. Her wellbeing trumped ARMY every time. He loved his fans, he really did, but she was a higher priority. Y/n’s very existence kept the happy, playful Jin that ARMY knew alive and going, so she came first; she took precedence over nearly anything he could think of, with his brothers and family a very close second. His own wellbeing came third on that list, but he also knew that he needed to be careful with that ruling. He needed to take care of himself to take care of her and support her better. That is part of why he agreed to meeting with Dr. Kang on his own. He kept seeing flashes of her in that giant puddle of blood when he closed his eyes, and it made him want to cling to her more than usual. Right now, Y/n was vulnerable and still recovering from her suicide attempt, so she was more willing to accept his affections. But once she was feeling better and more able to do her own thing, his constant presence and need to touch her would drive her crazy.

Seokjin knew he needed to update the members so that they could prepare for her to come home and also to alter their schedules a bit, but for the time being, he was so tired. He decided that while Y/n was using him as her pillow, he might as well nap too. In a few hours, he’d call and update everyone, but for now he let Y/n’s deep breathing lull him to sleep.

 When Taehyung woke up a couple hours after curling up with Jungkook to sleep, the first thing he noticed was how quiet it still was around the dorm. It was 2:34 pm according to his phone, and everyone was usually up and doing their own thing by now. It was rarely ever this silent in their home. Just after checking the time on his phone, Jungkook’s phone starting ringing on his bedside table.

“Kook, wake up and answer your phone,” Tae grumbled, shaking him hard to wake him up.

Jungkook moaned then grabbed his phone. “Hello? You’re where? Oh. Yeah, we can come down. Gotta pee first though…Okay. Bye, Hyung.” Jungkook sat up on the side of the bed and stretched before tossing his phone aside.

“Get up, Hyung. We have to go down to help Hobi-hyung and Jimin-ssi carry some stuff up. They’ve apparently been shopping for Noona.”

While Jungkook headed off to the restroom, Taehyung went into his room and slipped shoes on and grabbed his key to get back in. Then, he grabbed a bottle of water out of the fridge in the kitchen to sip on before heading down. By the time Jungkook came out of the bathroom, he’d drank half the bottle. Jungkook finished the bottle off in the elevator down to the parking garage. When they got to Hoseok’s parking space and saw both the backseat and the trunk full of bags and packages, they were both a little surprised.

“Did you buy an entire shop, hyungs? We’re going to have to make two trips!” Jungkook exclaimed.

Jimin laughed, then explained, “I wanted to buy everything Y/n would need for baking, then realized our kitchen has no baking utensils. So, I made a list from searching on the internet of things she might need. Yoongi-hyung and Namjoons added a few things to the list, then while Hobi-hyung and I were out, we got some recommendations from a nice grandma at the shops and called both our moms and Hobi-hyung’s sister.”

Even with all 4 of them carrying as much as they possibly could, it still took 3 trips to get everything upstairs. Then, it took a solid hour to unpack the bags and put all the different items out on the counter. Jungkook snapped a picture and sent it to Seokjin, captioned, “Did Jimin-ssi and Hobi-hyung forget anything Y/n needs for baking here at the dorms? They bought out two whole shops.”

 Namjoon and Yoongi had thought that going to a regular supermarket would be enough, but some of the items on their list were missing. Was buckwheat flour really something that had to come from a specialty store? And why is powdered milk so expensive? They were shocked at the cost of some of the bread-baking ingredients. They had never really considered how much those ingredients were or that they were even used. Namjoon had figured that the nuts and dried fruits for her granola recipe and some of the extracts might be a bit pricy, but the flour surprised him. She’d been spending loads of money on baking for them. They made so much more money than she did that Yoongi felt a bit like they had been robbing her. If any of the seven of them wanted a specific baked good, they just asked Y/n and the next day she’d show up with it. He felt a bit guilty about it since occasionally he’d ask for something extravagant just to tease her, and she’d make it anyway. Like that special dark bread he’d had when they had been in Berlin. Somehow, Y/n had recreated it perfectly. He had looked up a recipe and the list of ingredients was insane, including unsweetened chocolate, coffee, fennel seeds, molasses and rye flour among the list.

After around 2 hours shopping and 3 different shops later, they finally made it home and called Jungkook and Taehyung to come help carry everything up. Jungkook laughed when he saw what they had, and said, “I don’t know where we are going to put all this. Jimin-ssi and Hobi-hyung bought out 2 shops and they’ve eaten our kitchen.”

Even with that warning, Yoongi was shocked by the sheer volume of kitchen gadgets covering their kitchen island and most of the counter space. Thankfully, he and Namjoon had planned ahead a bit and had rearranged a shelf in their pantry to house nothing but the baking ingredients. They had also bought multiple canisters for storing the different flours and other dry ingredients that all had a chalkboard space for labeling the contents. With the help of the others, Namjoon and Yoongi were able to transfer them all to the pantry on their designated shelf. After they were finished, Jungkook snapped a photo of the shelf as well and texted it to Seokjin too. The caption on this one was, “Namjoon and Yoongi bought out the baking section of the supermarket and at least one specialty store. They decided that Jimin-ssi and Hobi-hyung were not going to outdo their efforts. While they were all out conquering shops, Taehyungie-hyung and I had a fabulous nap.”

When Y/n opened her eyes after crashing, the clock on the hospital room wall said 6:00 pm. She moved carefully so as not to wake Seokjin, who was still sleeping. After climbing out of the bed to use the restroom, she stopped for a second just to appreciate how beautiful he was even in sleep. How did I ever get so damn lucky, she thought to herself. She used the restroom, then washed her hands and brushed her teeth before stepping out into the room. Seokjin’s phone started vibrating on the bedside table as she was closing the bathroom door.

“Jinnie, wake up, love. Your phone is ringing.”

Seokjin startled awake then grabbed his phone. “Hey, Namjoon-ah. Yeah, we just woke up. No, I haven’t seen any messages from JK yet, but I’ll check them. Oh, okay. That works perfectly. We can update you when you get here then…See you soon.”

Upon hanging up the call, Seokjin mentioned that the guys were just parking outside the hospital and that they were bringing dinner. Y/n watched in amusement as his mouth dropped open and his eyes got wide. “Those boys have lost their minds,” he mumbled. “Well, Baby, you sure are in for a surprise tomorrow is all I will say.”

Before Y/n had a chance to question anything, the boys came crashing in the door with a variety of take out containers and beverages. Taehyung was also carrying another bouquet of flowers, which he shyly handed over while kissing her on the cheek. With Seokjin’s help, they wrangled up the table they had used the night before and placed out the chairs that had been stacked in the corner of the room. After spreading out all the different takeout boxes, they all just picked around at the random things spread out; while they had each chosen a specific meal, everyone just ate off of everyone else’s plates anyway, so they needn’t have bothered. After the silly dinner chatter quieted down, Seokjin filled in the group about the meetings with the doctors and the plan for Y/n’s hospital discharge.

“Namjoon-ah, Sejin-hyung will be calling you to let you know about the time for the meeting for everyone with Dr. Kang. I may or may not be in that meeting since I’ll be meeting with her daily. We also all will have her phone number in case we need it. For the first 2 weeks, Dr. Kang has said that she doesn’t want Y/n to be alone for extended periods of time. Now, while that means that we will all be hovering a bit more, Y/n is allowed 30 minutes maximum at a time alone. Y/n is an introvert, so she needs time alone; besides, going from living with one busy man to living with 7 busy men may be system shock for her to an extent and she’ll need time to process that,” Seokjin explained.

They all seemed perfectly okay with that idea. Hoseok and the maknae line were all loudly excited until Yoongi shushed them by reminding them where they were. After a bit, the group cleaned up everything and left to return home to finish their preparations for Y/n and Seokjin to return to the dorms.

Little did they know, they guys had begun preparing a small party to welcome them. In fact, Taehyung and Jungkook took a detour before returning to the apartment to buy party decorations. They didn’t buy a ton of decorations as they wanted to make a banner themselves, but they did buy some brightly colored streamers and some tastefully colored balloons and a few lightly scented candles to place around the kitchen and living room. Y/n had sent the three bouquets of flowers the boys had brought plus the two bouquets sent by her office home with the boys, so Jungkook also bought several vases to split up the larger bouquets. Then there could be flowers scattered throughout the apartment. The final stop they made before returning home was for a few gifts from the two of them. The others had already gone all out, so they wanted to have special gifts as well.

 The night passed quickly, but the discharge seemed to take forever. Dr. Kang had come in and met with Y/n and Seokjin before they could leave and did a full couples therapy session as a preparation for the upcoming weeks. After nearly an hour and a half of time with Dr. Kang and then a final hour-long examination from the hospital doctor, they were finally able to leave with discharge papers in hand. Namjoon had arranged for a car to pick them up and bring them to the apartment since Seokjin had ridden in the ambulance to the hospital and his car was at their apartment. Seokjin knew he’d have to go back to the apartment to pick up more clothes for the both of them and some other items, like their laptops, but Namjoon had assured that they should have most of the things they’d need for a day or so. They’d have time to settle in before returning.

Seokjin still had a key to the group’s apartment because he’d stay at the dorm from time to time when they had schedules at odd hours or if they flew home from overseas promotions in the middle of the night, so they didn’t have to knock on the door. Since Namjoon had arranged the car, Seokjin texted him to let him know that they were on their way. When they arrived, Seokjin unlocked the door and carried their bags in. He initially didn’t pay attention to the state of the room until he heard Y/n gasp. Then, he looked up and his mouth dropped open. There were royal purple balloons taped up in several places throughout the living room and a giant banner that said, “Welcome Home, Noona! We Purple You!” strung above the entrance to the kitchen. All 6 of the other members were standing in the entrance way with helium balloons and royal purple roses in their hands.

“Surprise?” Jungkook called out softly.

“Oh gosh, guys. You didn’t have to do this,” Y/n choked out, tears streaming down her face.

“No, but we wanted to, Noona,” Taehyung said, pulling her into a big hug. “Don’t cry unless they are happy tears. We are just getting started. You haven’t even opened presents yet.”

“Presents?”

Seokjin laughed heartily at that. “The boys got a little excited, Baby. I hope you are ready to drown in their affection.”

At that, Yoongi stepped forward and took Y/n by the hand. “We just wanted you to feel at home here with us. So we bought a few things so that you can do some of the things you love while you are here.”

When he led her into the kitchen, Y/n cried harder. Nearly every available surface was covered in bakeware. Just at a glance, Y/n saw a royal purple professional grade stand mixer that was still in the box, a set of glass mixing bowls, stainless steel mixing bowls, a flute pan, a baguette pan, whisks in multiple sizes, liquid measuring cups in three sizes, silicone baking mats, a baking stone, and loaf pans in 4 sizes ranging from individual to large. Y/n was in shock a bit, and was struggling to speak.

“This isn’t everything,” Namjoon said softly with a smile. He took her by the hand and led her into the pantry. “You have your own shelf, Y/nie. Yoongi-hyung and I tried to get as many ingredients as we could, but if we forgot something, let us know and we’ll go get it for you.”

Y/n was sobbing by this point. These beautiful men had spent so much time and money on equipment that they probably didn’t even understand the use for just so she would feel at home with them. She pulled Namjoon into a tight hug and croaked out a thank you, then grabbed Yoongi next.

“I just wanted to get something that could help, Noona. You told me once that you bake away your stress, and none of us bake, so we didn’t have anything you’d need. So, Hobi-hyung and I went shopping,” Jimin said gently when Y/n pulled him into a hug.

“Get over here, Hopie,” Y/n said through her tears, and squeezed him tight. “Thank you so much.”

“There are still more presents, Noona. Come sit down please,” Taehyung called from the living room.

Y/n moved toward his voice still in a state of shock and with tears streaming out of her eyes. Seokjin’s eyes were glassy too at the kindness of his brothers. The photos that Jungkook had sent had not done this justice; seeing it all spread out was overwhelming at best. Once they were sitting down, Taehyung and Jungkook pulled out a big beautifully wrapped box and a smaller box.

“Which do you want first, Noona?” Jungkook asked.

After thinking for a few moments, Y/n said, “The smaller one?”

Taehyung giggled then handed her the smaller box. Y/n took a moment to unwrap the lovely silver wrapping paper. Inside the box, there were 8 rings of varying sizes. She looked up a little bit perplexed.

“So, these rings are special. Do you see the pretty blue one in the middle?”

Y/n looked at him and nodded before looking back down at the rings.

“These rings are special. They are all connected together. The blue one in the middle is yours. When you wear it, it will be connected to all the others by Bluetooth on our phones. There is a ring for each of us as well. There is a small button on the underside of the rings. If we push those buttons, we will be able to feel your heart beating in real time. The same works with yours, except you will have to press your button a certain way for each of us. They have been programmed already, and I have a list of the special codes for each of our rings for you. All we have to do is connect them to our Bluetooth,” Taehyung explained. “Now, as long as we each are wearing our rings, you will be able to feel us with you no matter where you are. You never have to feel alone again.”

Taehyung took a moment to distribute the rings to each member. They were all slightly different and suited each one’s style, which amazed Y/n. How in the world had he made this happen on such short notice?

“Okay, now for my present. It’s much simpler, but I think it will help,” Jungkook said, plopping the box in her lap.

“Kookoo, it’s heavy! What is this?” Y/n pondered out loud.

“Open it and find out!”

After unwrapping the dark purple paper, Y/n opened the box to find a soft purple blanket.

“It’s a weighted blanket. I have a friend in Busan who has panic attacks, and she said that she has one and it helps so much when she is anxious or afraid. I’m hoping it will help you on your bad days. While we will always be there for you too, I know that sometimes you will want to be the strong one and try to deal on your own, and this is for those days.”

Y/n pulled him and Taehyung both into a tight hug. “Thank you both so much. I don’t know how to thank you enough.”

The rest of the evening was spent with Y/n and Seokjin trying to settle in a bit while helping the others to put away the bulk of the kitchen gadgets and running the new bakeware through the dishwasher. Y/n was so incredibly touched by the heart of these 7 men and kept pinching herself because she kept thinking she was going to wake up from a dream.

 Y/n was a little bit overwhelmed the first few days. She was not used to being around other people constantly and it was a little bit exhausting. Luckily, she found that when she was starting to feel that way, Yoongi would shoo the others away and take her to his studio. He liked to work in silence, and he was an introvert too, so he understood how loud the other guys’ personalities could be. Y/n savored her time with Yoongi-chi; she would curl up on the couch and nap, read, or play games on her phone for a few hours until she felt better.

The other member that seemed to constantly surprise her was Namjoon. If he noticed she was getting overwhelmed and Yoongi wasn’t around, they would put on hats and face masks and Namjoon would take her on a walk through the park near the apartment. When they were walking, Namjoon wouldn’t say anything. They would just slowly stroll down the path by the river and breath for a bit. When he was sure she was calm, then he’d start to chat with her. Without her knowledge, he actually used the rings that Taehyung had bought to measure her heart rate. He could tell when she was stressed without her ever having to speak up.

Seokjin was her strength. When she had nightmares and woke up screaming, he held her gently and sang to her until she settled down. He cracked jokes when he could to lighten the atmosphere and make her laugh. He went to therapy on his own for a while to learn better how to help her and to help himself, then went with her too when she needed it. On the days that Y/n nearly choked with fear, he guarded her from the other guys and shielded her from their worry and attention. And the day she hit her knees in the practice room from the pain of having lost her baby, he was there to hold her and kiss her and slowly piece her heart back together with his love.

There were days that Y/n was so angry that she needed to get energy out. Jungkook was her go to those days. He’d take her to the gym with him and let her beat the hell out of a punching bag until she felt better. He’d offered to spar with her once and had learned quickly that it was a bad idea. She landed a great left hook to his side and he hadn’t blocked in time; she felt guilty for several days after seeing the bruise she’d left behind and refused to spar with him again after that.

On the days when she had way too much nervous energy, then she baked. While he couldn’t help, Jimin would sit on a stool at the island and fetch ingredients for her out of the pantry. It always amazed him how she’d take a few things and make a dough. Bread was her go to on those days because bread dough loves abuse. She could punch it, slam it down, and smack it around, and the more she did, the better it would turn out. Jimin had to keep an eye on her sometimes though. After she had baked 8 loaves in one day, Jimin had to make her stop baking. He marched her out of the kitchen to the bathroom and handed her a bath bomb. After he heard the hot water start, he cleaned the kitchen and camped out on Seokjin’s bed until she came out. The soak in the tub did wonders for her and she settled down. After that, she’d talk as she baked and be careful not to overdo it.

Taehyung was a softer soul at times and acted as her music therapist. The days when melancholy threatened to swallow her whole, Taehyung would come up to her and say, “Hey Noona, have you heard this song?” He’d distract her with a variety of random music he found, and they’d curl up on his bed and share headphones and talk music for hours. After a while, the sounds would soothe her heart enough that her mood would shift.

Hoseok was the living embodiment of hope. Everyone knows that, but to Y/n he was also joy. Dark days with Hoseok meant going and taking over the practice room and booting anyone else in there out. Hoseok would lock the door and put on the goofiest songs he could find and they’d do the silliest dances they could come up with. Y/n nearly lost it the day he started their “HopeY/n Dance Therapy Session” with Baby Shark. But it always helped. At some point in their silliness, at least one of them would fall in the floor in a pile of laughter. Afterward, there was a bit more light in her world and a little less darkness.

[misskittydenoire]

Surprise! [Part One]

Title: Surprise! [Part One] Character(s) Mentioned: Tony Stark Pairing: Tony Stark x Offspring!Reader Genre: Fluff Rating: PG (eh, just a little language) Words: 2,432 Author’s Notes: I finally got a request! It’s from my friend NomNom! Thanks for the request, love! NomNom asks: Hiii! I was wondering if i could make a fic request. Can you write one of tony and reader, but reader being his kid that he just found out about? Thanks! Low key wanted the kid to be in college and whatever and is working as a barista and tony constantly trying to pay for everything but the kid keeps shutting him down lol. It’d be funny if she was the barista he always go to and when she found out, it was awkward until she went to the compound to tell him. I wanted to try something new with this request. I actually did my best and placed it in the protagonist’s point of view, that’s one. The second thing I tried to do was keep it gender neutral. This also ended up becoming a two parter because the story turned out longer than I expected! I really hope you guys like it! Summary: It has always been you and your mom. Since you were born, your mom has been there for you, has been your pillar of strength, and later on, has taught you to hold your own. You’ve relied on yourself and your hard work always. However, big news falls onto your lap and a new father comes along with it. A father who’s willing to give you anything in the world. A father who happens to occasionally save it as well. That father just so happens to be Tony Stark.

He stepped out of his silver Audi, fixing his tailored suit as he closed the car door with a small slam. His genuine black leather shoes softly hit the pavement as he entered his favorite establishment. Tony Stark survived on coffee. If it were possible, he would have a permanent IV attached to him filled with the caffeinated liquid. Instead, he walks through the glass door of a small cafe he frequents, a location that naturally knew his presence by the sound of his feet entering through the door.

“Hello, Mr. Stark! How are you today?” The portly owner greeted him with a wide smile, her cheeks flushed from her work. Her left hand still wiping down the table in front of her, preparing for the busy day ahead. He turned, his signature sunglasses on the bridge of his nose, and smirked. “Hanging in there, Susan. I need my fix again. You know me, can’t work without that magical brown juice that keeps me up and amazing.” She shook her head, accustomed to his remarks. Susan continued on, placing the small advertisement of their new product coming soon in the center of the dark wooden table before she moved on to another project.

A deep sigh escaped you. Another turn around shift that has been slowly draining your energy down to zero. If you take anymore of this shifts, you might as well sleep here. Attempting to balance college and your part time job is becoming too much to bare, however you sluggishly dragged your feet forward. College loans won’t pay for themselves, no matter how smart you are. One week closer. Just one more week closer to graduation and then you can finally collapse. The small red bucket of sanitizer fluid swayed back and forth before you placed it on the faux marble counter, a thin blue fabric floating above the water. Your mind concentrated on the mountain of worries, not paying attention to your surroundings. Your back was to the register, now wiping the same spot between the blenders for the umpteenth time.

“Uh, can I get some service here?” There was a sudden spike in your heartbeat, surprised by the unexpected voice behind you. You turned your heel, quick to smile, and address the first customer of the day when you looked at the cheeky smile plastered on their face. “God! You almost gave me a heart attack, man!” You exhaled heavily, as your hand clutched the middle area above your chest. Tony chuckled, tipping his sunglasses down the bridge of his nose. His brown eyes bright with joviality. “Sorry, kid. Didn’t mean to scare ya.” “Yes, you did.” “You’re right, I did. It’s always fun seeing you jump. It’s my favorite morning entertainment next to annoying the crap outta Happy.” You glared at him, feigning annoyance before breaking into a grin, “Ha ha. What can I get you, Mr. Stark?” “Ugh, don’t call me that. You make me sound old.” “You are old,” You quipped. “… I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that and chalk it up to childlike humor. How old are you again, twelve?” He answered, pushing the sunglasses back up onto the top of his nose. You rolled your eyes playfully, “What can I get you, Tony?”

He shrugged indecisively, and lifted his head to look over the many choices available to him. He pursed his lips as he pondered what to drink. The options were limitless, his deep brown eyes jumping from beverage to beverage.

“Here you go, Tony.” You said, placing the disposable cup with its cardboard sleeve in front of him. Tony looked at the cup, then to you. Back to the cup and back to you for the second time. You smirked, crossing your arms over your chest proudly. You shrugged nonchalantly before your shoulders dropped down again. Stark was about to speak when you interrupted him, a smug expression on your face. “You always look at the menu, taking about two minutes before you give up and ask for the usual: Americano with an extra shot and a questionable shitload of sugar. I’m surprised you don’t have diabetes by now.” “Well, one: I was going to choose something different this time. And two: This is my sugar intake for the day. The rest of the day I stay somewhat healthy. I’m doing great for a 34 year old.” “Aren’t you 48?” “Shut up.” He mumbled before he turned his heel and walked casually out the doors as you laughed at his reaction.

You shook your head, your laughter dying down as soon as you found yourself surrounded by a swarm of hipsters ready with their orders of organic soymilk, non-fat, chai lattes. Your chest underneath the dirty green apron expanded, quickly letting out an aggravated groan and widened a false grin. “Here we go…” You said to yourself.

The miniature Captain America shield hit against your keys as you stepped foot into the apartment. It fell back into your right jacket pocket, placing the article of clothing on the hook adjacent to the entrance. Your body screamed for release from the aches and pains it suffered standing for eight hours on tiled floor at work. While your brain pleaded for relief after five more hours of listening to lectures about the history of engineering. Your day was yet to be done, however. Piles of readings that needed to be completed for the following class and essays that still were in need to be outlined. Your professors have conspired to torture you until you’re in cap and gown. Juggling both work and school hasn’t been an easy road but you were determined to endure it till the end.

“Hi honey.” A soft voice greeted you.

It was your mother. She sat nervously on the couch you’ve been inhabiting for the past six months. She smiled briefly before her nerves set back into her small face. With open arms, she welcomed you back home once you realized that several pieces of papers written ‘I.O.U’ was no longer satisfactory for your roommates or landlord. You were her only child, of course. She wasn’t going to let you live in the streets.

“Mom?” You asked, confused by the soft frown on her face. “Sweetie? We need to talk,” She patted the cushion next to her, then placed her hand back on her lap.

You stared at her weary face. The wrinkles around her eyes were more apparent than usual. Whatever was plaguing her, clearly was taking a toll on her. You felt concerned, your feet sped towards her without losing eye contact. Your hands took hers, “Are you okay? What’s the matter? Are you sick? Are you–” “Sweetie, I’m fine. Breathe. You look like you’re gonna pass out.” She chuckled. You let out a sigh of relief, “With you and Mr. Stark, I’m gonna get grey hairs before I even turn 25.” “You’ve met Tony Stark?” She asked, surprised. You nodded, “Yeah, I thought I mentioned him to you before. He stops by the cafe often.” “I guess this makes it a little easier than…” “Makes what easier?” “Well…” She began.

“…So. You’re saying that my dad is Tony freaking Stark?!” You shouted, incredulously. You stood up, the blood rushing to your head in a flash which caused you to sit back down. It was your mother’s turn to nod. “Does he know?” Your fingers rubbed your temples, groaning from the rapid equations in your brain, attempting to wrap this situation around it.

She was still silent. She shook her head, worried that she has angered you. She couldn’t blame you. She has withheld this information for quite some time. “Why? Why have you kept this from me for so long?” You asked, exasperated. The secret was the least of your worries. It was the fact that your own flesh and blood omitted the truth. She’s not only the woman who gave birth to you but she was your best friend. Regardless of the fights they’ve caused, you’ve always told her the truth. This is different from, “oh, your fish is just sleeping,” or “eating your spinach is gonna make you strong like Popeye.” You knew the ins and outs of how you came to be but the origin was always vague. You see why now. “To be honest, I don’t know. I suppose because I thought it was for the best. It felt like it didn’t matter. We had each other, and we weren’t missing anything so it wasn’t like I needed him. Besides, at the time, he was a playboy. He had so notches on his bedpost, they were splinters. He wasn’t going to recognize who I was or even believe me. It was going to be more a fiasco and I didn’t want that in our lives.” She explained, tears welled in her coffee colored eyes. “Besides, it’s not the greatest feeling in the world to tell your only child they are the product of a one night stand.”

“Mom, I don’t care if you’ve slept with thousands of men. What bothers me is you’ve kept this from me when I’ve always been honest with you.” “Okay, don’t use my favorite musical against me… And it wasn’t thousands of men.” She grumbled. You gingerly wiped the pending tears before they fell as a smile surfaced on both of your faces. “… I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner.” You shook your head, “It’s okay, mom. It’s nothing therapy and vodka won’t fix.” She lightly smacked your arm as she sighed in relief. Her thin frame stood up, as if lightened by the confession of her past. She walked towards the kitchen, today’s dinner on the top of her tongue until she forgot a fire question she herself had. “…..Are you going to tell Mr. Stark who you are?”

Your eyes stared at the entrance of the compound. This man has never been really subtle, huh? Just a big ol’ A slapped onto the building. Through the glass paned doors, you could see the hustling and bustling of the agents and staff while you contemplated even going forward with this idea. You weren’t even sure he’d be here. However, you knew this matter wasn’t something to be spoken about at the cafe and it wasn’t something that you can say casually while you handed him his coffee. 

“Here’s your usual, Mr, Stark. Oh, by the way, I’m your illegitimate child you had from a one night stand you probably have no recollection of.” You muttered, feigning a grin as you replayed the impossible scenario you had in your head. Your right s/c hand clutched the piece of paper with the address of the compound, crumbling it as if it would will your feet to finally move. It didn’t. The roar of an engine drew closer, and you whipped your head towards the direction. Your e/c eyes widened as the man in question came into your line of vision. How the hell are you gonna explain this? Would he even believe you?

Stark noticed a figure as he got to the compound, and quickly knew who it was. What he didn’t understand is why you were there in the first place. “Y/N? Doing deliveries now or is this some special perk for yours truly?” He quipped. However, his tone shifted when you fully turned to him, your face holding a nervous look in your eyes. “Hey, are you okay? Did something happened? Are you sick? Do you need-” Well, nice to know that the 21 questions panic mode comes from him, you thought to yourself, as you held up your hands to pause his interrogation. “Hey Tony. Yes, I’m okay. Yes, something did happen but nothing that required stitches. No, I’m not sick,” You answered in a monotone before you moved on to why you were really there. “Actually, there is something I need to discuss with you. It’s something really delicate that I knew I couldn’t explain to you at my job. Can we talk somewhere private?” “Yes sure, kid.” Tony escorted you into the building, his arm directing you to the elevators. 

You took quiet deep breaths as you entered his office. The large room was twice as big as your living room and the furniture’s upscale appearance was far from any one you could afford. Your arms stuck close to your form, afraid that if you even as so touched the air around it, it would collapse. You weren’t even sure you should sit down when Tony offered you a seat because you were afraid you’d wrinkle the cushion. You only decided to accept it since Tony wouldn’t have stopped staring intently until you did. He sat on the opposite side on his work desk, his broad back leaning against his chair, “So sport, what did you wanna talk about? Must be something serious if you decided to come all this way from the city.” You began to twiddle your thumbs, “Well… I honestly don’t know where to begin here. This is a position I never thought I’d be in.” A short exhale escaped your mouth, your hands (though slightly clammy) gripped the arms of the chair as you decided to just come out with it, “I’m your kid. I’m not asking for money or any like that. I just found out a couple of days ago and I thought you should know too. You know, just in case you’d ever need a blood transfusion or something. Not that I want that to happen or anything. Just, you know… so you know.” Unfortunately, the execution was a little too quick for Tony to catch. The sentences were woven together that it didn’t make any sense. Tony blinked, “…Sorry, what?” “You’re… my dad.” The man behind the iron mask sat in front of you, frozen. And stayed frozen for about five minutes. “Mr. Stark. Are you still breathing? Listen, I know this comes as quite a shock and I don’t even know if you believe me. I’m willing to take a blood test, anything—” In an instant, he lifted his hand. “F.R.I.D.A.Y., can you verify this?” On it, sir. “Ow!” You released your left hand from the vice grip you had on the chair when you get a prick on your index finger. Within seconds, the AI returned. What Y/N is correct, sir. You are their biological father. You sat there, uncertain what to do next. Unintentionally, you nervously smiled, “…Mazel Tov?” Well, this could’ve gone a whole lot worse…

[lunartearrose]

Because i can't decide on what else to do: headcanons

Some assassination classroom headcanons about Gakushu, Karma, and Nagisa within the seven year gap. Or it all can be taken as just in general stuff because heck, it probably counts for other parts of their lives. Here we go!

For Gakushu:

-got addicted to coffee and now constantly has a mug of the stuff with him. He's got different mugs to keep variety.

-his highest amount of coffee cups per day is 15. But thats just on record its no quota

-rarely ever sleeps unless someone knocks him out or he has a sort of crash

-everyone refers to him as Asano, even himself. One could say he's kind of having issues with a problem of being unable to separate his own identity from his fam, but if you throw this in his face he'll deny it and be extremely conscious about it for a while.

-morning involve him getting out of bed, having a bagel or something and lying to his dad's face about getting enough sleep. Lets all face it: they both lie to eachother about sleep and just kind of keep it that way, neither wanting to bother to fix their issues enough to validly bring up the other's

-gakushu, if ever involved in a scheme where nagisa would usually be put in the dress, openly volunteer to both spare the boy and reason it as upstaging, specifically because either karma or rio said "nobody does it better than nagisa". He does it better because he's actually confident with the look, and nagisa was pretty grateful.

-he still group texts his big 5 pals

-can imitate voices crazily easily

-nagisa is helpful for asano. He helps him figure out his feelings and maybe reveals what emotions he tries to cover up.

-he at some point wonders how he would look with long hair and one summer, against his father's wishes, Gakushu grew it out. And due to his superhuman devil fam genes, it grew out pretty quick and shocked his class

-actually pretty impulsive when it comes down to things. Things got a little ugly when he tried to quit his addiction, and so karma had to be summoned to stop gakushu from, well, drinking pure caffiene he extracted from basically sciencing a bunch of coffee.

-expert at other people, fool when it comes to himself

-has heard stories and hates nagisa's mom. Zero trust

-supports nagisa and karma in things, tho usually subtly

Alright! On to Karma:

-prankster that can't resist doing what he thinks is funny, especially if it involves Asano

-tries to remember to call Asano by his first name as much as humanly possible. Though Gakushu is longer saying wise, its the guy's name.

-texting nagisa at any opportunity

-adores guys, adores guys in dresses, and just. Yeah he's gay keep scrolling

-visits good old E class to pick the lock and hang out in the empty rooms. Keeping desks clean, doodling on the chalkboard, all sorts of that stuff. He doesn't admit it, but he sometimes cries soley because he misses people

-karma is really emotional but does a good job at surpressing this when he needs to and generally acting chill all the time

-would throw hands with any enemy if they return, especially takaoka the friggin bastard

-and yes, be will put his pals in dresses. Anything that looks nice, yes

-catch him off guard and he still gets that full face blush

-throw hands with him he dares you

-if its a fun impulse he will let gakushu do it, and in fact, encourage it

-visits the guy through his lil balcony. Wants to visit nagisa but nagisa is far away and it makes him kinda sad

-apprehensive and embarassed at first, but yes, he shall dawn the dress one time. Gakushu and nagisa have bunches of pictures. The tables have been turned

-finds it fun when people get passionate over things - this is why he likes to fight gakushu in academics and the occasional spar if the guy wants.

-will call u cute in that certain tone he uses for people

-supports nagisa's haircut. Like hell yes!!! Nagisa is being himself!!!!

Now, finallyy, Nagisa:

-really just polishing his already perfect assassin skills

-paints his nails so they look shiny like snake scales, like that metallic green that shines to blue to purple in certain lights. Who said nail paint had to be a girly thing? Especially when it looks so cool

-still working on getting his mom to leave him alone and undo some of the damage she's left him with. Also uses his knowledge on how to cope to help Gakushu get past his sleeping habits and air out the bits of toxicity that remain between him and his father. Remember, if you get more sleep than your jerky father, you're better than him and winning

-will decline crossdress requests until further notice. He wants to be comfy with his own body and until he can get himself away from the thoughts of his past with his crappy mom that still bother him, no skirts.

-goes to therapy because he wants to get better and get past feelings he has trouble with letting go

-the afformentioned boys love his spooky faces and smiles

-will give a cheek smooch to close pals if they ask him. Cheek smooch is platonic in his eyes usually!

-he and kayano are gossip buds and often talk over feelings. She supports him and he does his best to do the same

-he wants to visit karma but... there is so much schoolwork.... hfkjgh

-also! Deathly afraid of growing apart from his friends, esp. Karma

- "asano please for the love of god take the dresses mom keeps sending me i dont want them burn them"

-if takaoka ever became a problem again things would probably escalate to bloodshed this time

-he is still the best assassin and can definitely sneak into wherever his classmates or even where asano starts work to visit them

-will give other pals nails the snake gradient paint job. Karma's will have a firey scale look and asano gets a cool purple to lightish red

-suggested the new hairdo karma has

-rlly honestly just cool and love his friends and supports them

Thats all i can think of for the moment! Hope y'all enjoy these. Ive been writing a fic featuring some of these so i hope you enjoy these until im finished w that💖

[salty-donut-collecter]

Why Not?

Part Twenty-One

Part Twenty    {Masterlist}    Part Twenty-Two

Chapter Word Count: 1,108

Trigger Warnings: Negativity, panic attacks, possibly mentions of accidents and such

Please tell me if I need to tag anything else :)

*Also, I’m planning on having this story as a slow burn, so please be prepared ;)

Prompts: “Do I look like I give a fuck?”, “I don’t know what I’m feeling, but I’m feeling a lot of  it.”, and “Not to dictate your life, but drop your shitty friends.”

A/N: Happy reading! (Also, feel free to comment your thoughts! I love reading comments :))

Also, if you’d like to be added to the tags list, please let me know! :D

        _____________________________________________________

Sitting upright, you loudly sighed as you ran your hands through your hair. Your fingers tangled, you got them out, it was fine. It's all fine.

But what if it really... wasn't?

Your curiosity got the better of you as you sat to think. Well, you were trying to think, anyway.

You should-- no.

A pause.

Well...

It was illegal, but you wanted answers. They were so attainable, too.

So is imprisonment. You thought.

...

It only took you about five more minutes of battling with your conscience, and not long after that to hack into HYDRA's files, and the 'AVENGER INITIATIVE' files.

After that, it was just sorting through everything you thought was connected, and everything you thought was stuff to ask about another day. (An Example would be the weird shit you'd seen on some of the adoption sheets you saw.)

When you saw it, and you pieced it together, your breath just kind of... stopped. Your eyes went wide, and you felt a shiver down your spine.

Slamming your laptop closed, you begin to panic.

"Y/n L/n, are you alright? Do I need to inform..." that was the last thing you heard F.R.I.D.A.Y. say before the blackout that ensued moments later.

...

You woke up, strapped to a stretcher in the lab, an IV strip in your arm, and both Tony and Stephen at your side, staring at you intensely. The sound of a heartbeat-- your heartbeat-- rang out from the monitor next to you, telling everyone that you were awake, yet calm. You didn't really understand what'd happened for a few moments, but you started to remember what'd happened before you'd blacked out.

The file you'd put together under the 'AVENGER INITIATIVE'  having to deal with Micheal was printed and on the table next to you, a picture of your foster brother peaking out.

As you looked at it,  you felt the panic swell in your chest again. You didn't really remember why, until the golden America boy himself walked in with a glare that could kill off all the bloodlines of everyone in the building. (Or in simpler terms, he was not happy, and looked like he'd gotten literally zero hours of sleep.) You observed the hickeys on his neck, but decided to think nothing of it as you met his gaze with a stern look of your own. (Look at the balls on you, eh?)

"Steve, you look upset. Do you want to talk about it?" Bad move on your behalf, but you didn't so much as look as he clenched his jaw and fists, narrowing his eyes at you angrily.

You noticed the way Tony cringed, and the way Stephen held back a sigh. Your heart rate monitor beep faster, but you didn't visibly react in any other way. The panic in your chest was still there, but it was growing quieter in comparison to your quickly growing rage.

"You might as well tell me when my funeral is, cause y'all look like you're gonna kill me." You sighed, trying to lighten up because for some reason they couldn't. This had been far from the first time you'd passed out from an anxiety attack, so how was this time different? Did you actually die this time? (If so, why the fuck would they care?)

You heard a sigh come from behind you, which caused you not to flinch, but instead slowly look behind the stretcher as much as you could manage. It was Bruce, Natasha, Clint (who honestly look pretty happy and amused), T'challa, Rhodey, a pouting Wade Wilson, and finally, the infamous Nicholas Fury.

Aside from Clint, Fury actually didn't look mad at you. He looked more amused or impressed, and you had no doubt in your mind someone had called him cause they had no idea what the fuck they were going to do with you.

"Fury." you tried to nod.

Nick nodded back, then slowly moved past Banner to your "bed" side. After a moment of looking into your eyes, which you didn't really understand at first, he began to undo the straps of your arms. For the entirety of you being awake, you had barely moved, and the restraints hadn't moved much either. You were in an almost completely calm state, with understandable amounts of anger and panic.

Bruce reached a hand out, "Don't." he sternly muttered.

You felt a ping of something similar to betrayal, but you pushed it aside.

"She's not a threat anymore, Dr." Fury stared him down as he spoke, pausing on his job loosening the restraints, "She hasn't moved since she woke up, and she's in no position to be talked to." He undid the rest of the strap on your left hand, moving in to work on your arm's strap, "Besides, it's not like you don't have the ability to debilitate her without the straps is it?"

There was silence.

"That's what I thought."

The silence continued.

...

It didn't take long for you to be sitting on the edge of the couch in the Living room. What did take forever, though, was the conversation that ensued.

"Is anyone gonna tell me why I was strapped to a stretcher with an IV? Cause, not gonna lie, that's something I've been curious about." Y/n asked.

Everyone in the room was quiet for a moment. You wondered if it'd have been the same way with your siblings, or if they'd have gotten to the point with you by now. Well, you were almost sure that they would've gotten to the point because Micheal was really bad about hiding his feelings about other people's flaws. That's one of the (many) reasons people didn't usually like him. (He was also just really aggressive, but that's just a part of him now.)

Thankfully, Wade quickly got tired of all the quiet.

Unfortunately for him, he started everything off by laughing.

"C'mon everyone," he chuckled, "Why're you being so serious about this? You would've had to tell her eventually, so things are out of the way now, right?" he held a smile for a moment before quickly dropping it and rolling his eyes. "You all are seriously a bunch of stuck ups," he dug his palms into his eyes, "She was literally trained to find answers when she needed them, then you encouraged the behavior, and kept secrets from her. It's not that hard to think through and find her reasoning!" Another exasperated groan.

Steve gave Wade a side glare, "Are you blaming us for this?" he asked, his voice gruff and angry.

"Well, it's not that I'm blaming you captain red-white-and-blue-all-over. However, I will agree to you accusing me of saying that Y/n isn't entirely at fault, but that's mainly because she's not entirely at fault. Catch my drift?" Wade winked with a smile.

Steve was admittedly confused by most things that came out of Wade's mouth, but he nodded nonetheless.

"Who would you blame then?" Fury asked, looking more amused than having previously been. He moved forward, his chin resting on his hands as his elbows sat upon his knees.

"Well, Y/n hacked the Avengers and HYDRA and S.H.I.E.L.D., sure, but she also gathered all the information to put the pieces together and spare you guys the burden of having to go to her and tell her yourselves. She did you a bit of a favor. Plus, wasn't she doing what y'all were telling her to? Hacking people and finding information isn't just a HYDRA thing she can't get rid of. It's also a tiny baby thing that you took in and raised, encouraged to have grandkids, and live with you instead of in its own house where it belongs. You played the cool parent and said I'd rather you do it in the house when, heads up, that still causes addiction." Wade laughed, "And then it blew up in your faces!" he lightly exclaimed, his voice breathy as he let out a small laugh, "The funny part is how mad you are about this! It's like a tiny teen tantrum." his shoulders shrugged, "And it's so cute!" he squealed, patronizingly.

You smiled, Wade was your favourite for a reason. He was usually pretty funny, and he always stood up for the kids, unless it was a matter of safety. This, apparently, didn't seem to be a matter of safety and Wade thought you were completely fine and far from endangering anyone. Hearing that in his voice made you feel a lot better than you had waking up, and some of your panic went away.

"So... what did I do after I blacked out then?" You asked, surprised at how quiet you were being. Then again, it was really hard to follow the conversation. It was kinda like they sounded farther away than they were, and you were kind of zoning out.

"You just startled Steve and Bucky with some violent questions last night. You were reading his mind very violently, so your eyes were glowing as per usual, and it was dark so they didn't know it was you right away. They were very alarmed in their vulnerable state so they attacked you. You've been out for three days without anyone aside from Bruce, Tony and Stephen to see you. We called Fury yesterday to ask what to do since Bucky doesn't... " Clint paused, trying to find the right words.

"Randomly turn into a psychotic animal like you," Steve growled. (Much to your amusement.)

You smiled, "Wow, so venomous, Steve, I'm hurt. Truly." then mockingly snapped your jaw in his direction, laughing only moments afterward.

After another breath, you thought for a moment, realizing what you'd just heard about you doing. You weren't actually psychotic... were you? Your smile dropped and you were no longer looking at any particular person, but more so at the ground. You really like Steve and Buck. they were a cute couple, and they did a really good job of making sure Chloe was taken care of, and they loved Katie just as much, even if she wasn't technically their responsibility.

A sigh left your lips, "Look, Steve, I really don't mean to randomly freak out, and you should know that I've been working on it." You lick your lips. Huh, they're chapped. Not surprising. "And I'm glad you love Bucky enough to see past his flaws, but ignoring them is just plain ignorant." You look up at Steve now, starting to feel the anger again as he looks back at you, his eyes cold.

"I was with James while he was busy being the Winter Soldier. He trained me as his understudy for a long time, and if you really think that he didn't have control of himself back then I honestly feel sorry for you." You were lying, all you could feel was rage, but you didn't care. You'd feel sorry for him later.

"Bucky raged out just like me, if not worse. He had little to no control over his mind back then. It literally took him years of mental torture and assistance to get to where he is today with you. Now I'm glad that you love Bucky and I'm happy that he trusts you, but doing something so..." You were raising your voice now. You didn't mean to, but you also didn't really care. "So childish and fucking revolting! James was like a really scary father to me when I needed it and dismissing all of his progress, while trying to take a swing at me? Wow, Mr. Fucking America would he be ashamed of you! That's probably why he's not here right now, huh? You sent him away so he couldn't sympathize with me and try to defend me?"

Nat gave you a look you had yet to see and couldn't quite place. "Y/n, that's not--" You cut her off. Right now, there was nobody with high authority on your side, aside from maybe Nick Fury who still had yet to say something.

"Can I go now? I'm tired." despite the fact that you'd been out for three days (which, now that you think about it, kinda shocked you) you hadn't really slept. You were unconscious, not resting, not sleeping, unconscious. The more you listened to everyone talk to you, the more you just wanted to curl up and sleep.

The seconds passed by, and the room was silent. Every moment just weighed you further down. Fury was looking at everyone, who were just staring at you. Eventually, he and Tony locked eyes, and they nodded.

"Y/n, go rest. We'll call you to a whole team meeting later." Nick jerked his head in the direction of the door, and you took that as you que.

With that, you sighed, standing up and halfway through realizing you had a lot less strength than you realized. You stumbled and fell, which had Steve immediately on his feet to try and help you.

You could feel your eyes glow with anger as your gaze met his within a millisecond of him moving to help you.

"Don't fucking touch me." you spat, almost choking because it felt like you had broken your finger when you landed of your hands and you'd started tearing up.

Now, saying this any other day probably wouldn't have made Steve back off, but the sheer betrayal in your voice, the pure rage directed solely towards him, and the fact that you had choked up with tears in your eyes caused him not only to back off, but also caused him to regret the past three days of hatred he'd held towards you.

With that, you somehow managed to push yourself up and walk to your room, only daring to cradle your hand after you rounded one of the many corners of the big, now pretty empty mansion.

Sleeping wasn't easy at first, but once asleep you didn't dream (a true gift from whatever God was up there). Instead, you were in the void, softly breathing and actually relaxed once.

You were at peace.

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Taglist: @introvertedsin, @galacticalstarcat, @acidrain707

[mooleche]

A Story of Ink and Venom - Chap. 7

A/N - A shorter chapter for once! There’s a needle reference and a little blood, just a fair warning! Also one french term near the end, it just means ‘stop talking’, haha.

Tagged - @master-sass-blast @leo-writer

If you’d like to be added on or removed let me know! Enjoy! (❁´▽`❁)*✲ﾟ*

Chapter 7 - Awakening

They say that when you die, your life flashes before your eyes.

This was, well, true. I only say this because I’d experienced it myself when I was 20. Every memory was like a picture and every picture felt like it lasted a lifetime. It was hell.

After what had just transpired I fully expected to have the same result play like an old film projector playing its last tape. 

Only that wasn't the case.

I no longer sat breathing my last breath in the back of Renato’s lab. I blinked and was now sitting amidst a flower patch in a valley of grass. In front of me stood a woman.

Her back was turned to me, covered by a cascade of flowing red hair that ran through her pale hands like water.

“Oh Peter, this spot is wonderful,” I heard her call to me happily, and I frowned.

‘I’m not Peter’, I want to say, but I don’t get the chance.

A flicker of static hits me and the world goes black.

More voices now. They’re followed by laughter this time before the sound of glasses clinks together and I find myself releasing a content sigh. Only, the sigh isn’t mine, it’s that mans again, Peter. We’re at a restaurant. I’m looking into the woman's face this time, bright green eyes that light up as I stroke my thumb over her hand.

“When are you gonna let me put a ring on that finger, Red?” I murmur to her before she hides her blushing face away from me and stares out of the window. It’s a black abyss outside, but I’m met with the reflection of the man. He’s tall, broad-shouldered and clean-shaven, yet still somehow still manages to look youthful.

I ponder back to those words.

I never said that.

And I certainly didn't remember this place.

What was going on? These weren’t my memories.

Another flash hits me, this time with loud voices following.

The woman. She’s holding a knife at me now, green eyes alert with fear as I attempt to take a step towards her with caution. Another woman, an older woman, stands behind her with the same look in her wide eyes. We’re in a house now, there’s a broken vase beside me and my body is covered in a black skintight substance that fights me, or whoever I’m supposed to be, with every movement made.

“Peter, stop! This isn’t you!” the younger woman, the woman I’ve seen in all these ‘memories’ yells at me as I clutch my head. The voice is louder now, the urge to do something to stop her accusations growing with each passing second.

I want to tell her I don’t know what’s happening.

Instead, there’s a final flash before a blood-curdling scream hits my ears and I’m ripped from whatever strange dream I’ve been stuck in.

-

I shot up and released a startled gasp, gulping down air like my lungs had never experienced breathing before. What the hell was that? Who were those people? Those memories? Most importantly, where was I now?

A shrill beeping beside me alerted my attention and I turned to see what I could only guess was a heart monitor whose lines were now fluctuating rapidly as it tried to keep up with my wild heartbeat. I trailed the wire to my chest and delicately tore off the adhesive, immediately greeted with silence only dulled by the soft tune of what sounded like Claire de Lune to keep me company as I tried to recall what happened.

More wires. My thoughts were like sifting through a heavy fog until my eyes fell on the IV needle that lay nestled in my arm. I gritted my teeth before I removed it as delicately as possible, not like I had seen so many people rip it on in films and shows. I was met with the sight of blood that trickled down my arm in response.

Then it hit me like a ton of bricks. 

Renato. Phobus. The gunshot.

That terrifying black mass appearing before I-

I shivered at that thought, or maybe because all the sweat I had produced was now as cold as the room around me was. All I knew was that right now I had to figure out where I was and get some answers.

My vision blurred briefly in the dark area only to clear as I began to look around. It looked like your typical medical room; various machines lining the walls with a very neat looking nursing station for what I assumed were for various special procedures. 

It only occurred to me then that I had been in a gurney myself. I slumped forward and rubbed my face haphazardly to wipe any remaining exhaustion from my eyes before swinging my legs out to the floor. Even with my socks, the tile was ice cold, and like clockwork, a series of overhead lights blinked on at the sudden motion. I winced at the sudden brightness and fell back against the gurney to adjust to the change.

Nina.

The voice was deep and guttural in my head but so loud that I jumped in surprise. 

Who said that?

"Is someone here…?" I asked, voice dry and hoarse as if I hadn't spoken in weeks. I searched the room, even dared to wander to the desk nearby littered with papers and files. No one was there.

A menacing growl that faded into an ominous chuckle filled the air and I stumbled forward. My legs were a constant mixture of lead and jelly as I wandered through the large room before freezing in my tracks. Across from me in the reflection of a glass medical cabinet stood that creature's face where mine should have been. 

I released a panicked scream and stumbled back, falling flat on my ass as I missed the gurney and instead felt my mind grow dizzy with fear.

"This...this doesn't make sense...this isn't real, you’re supposed to be in jail…" I whispered to myself, hands shaking as the chuckle grew louder.

"And you're supposed to be dead! Funny how life works," it snarled smugly as I dared to stand and look at my reflection once more. 

The terrified face of a young woman stared back, black hair half matted to her dark skin while the other half fell in loose curls around her shoulders. There was no monster.

It was me. I was me again. 

I touched the fine black line that traveled across the bridge of my nose and sighed.

I must be hallucinating…, I thought loosely as I leaned against the counter for support, trying to ease my racing heart. I had to be, there was no other explanation to the sudden madness. This is crazy, I must be going crazy.

Not quite.

I gasped in horror, scrambling to catch myself as I jumped back from the counter like it was the culprit to the sudden voice. My eyes scanned the room desperately, settling upon the only door leading out to god knows where and I bolted for it, desperate to escape the memory of the creature that was haunting me.

Instead, it slid open to reveal Renato with a hand ready to knock, his mouth agape at me.

“Nina?” he gasped in surprise as my terrified appearance pushed past him into a brightly lit corridor. The flashes had returned, only this time I was not met with pictures but voices that overlapped one another. I clutched my head and closed my eyes, trying to concentrate on one but being met with many instead. I felt Renato grip my shoulders and call my name, worry in his voice. “Nina, speak to me. What’s going on?”

“Get off me!” I shouted, not because of what he said but because of what he now looked like when I looked up at him. He looked like that thing, that creature with its slick black skin and those long sharp teeth that snapped at me as I pushed myself away. 

I searched around me in a panic, trying to find an escape. The room was now spinning and I was losing my edge fast, unable to process everything happening. Renato called to me and I turned once more, seeing the face of a worried man I knew well and I grimaced. I felt like I was going crazy, in fact, I knew I was going crazy. Especially when I bumped into something hard and whipped my head around to see what it was.

Standing before me was a looming figure that stared down in what I could only guess was confusion. He was tall, taller than Ava or even Renato, but that wasn’t the strange part about him. It was everything else. He was covered in a fine blue fur that only seemed to end where his hardened facial features began and I gasped in shock.

“Miss, are you alright?” he asked me in a careful tone, but my hearing was muffled once more by those voices. Behind him, a set of doors similar resembling an elevator dinged open and I rushed past him, hearing both their voices call to me before fading as the doors shut and I was left alone once more.

“What’s happening to me…?” I whispered as I slumped against the cool wall of what was most definitely an elevator. Its slow hum confirmed this as it started it’s trek up and led me god knows where. I didn’t care, anywhere was better than where I had just been. My thoughts wandered back to Renato. Was that actually him? Was my mind just playing tricks on me again? 

Inside a dark chuckle rang throughout my head and I felt my heart pound once more.

What do you think is happening to you, Nina?

That voice again. I felt a chill run down my spine at it’s taunting tone and yet I couldn’t help but answer.

“I...I don’t know. What did you do? What are you?” I whispered frantically, feeling the elevator stop abruptly. Another flash went off in my head before it could answer, followed by a new voice, a calming voice.

Nina, can you hear me? He asked carefully. I nodded with hesitation before uttering a small ‘yes’ in response in case they couldn’t see me. This seemed to work as he continued.

Very good. Listen to me, you have to relax, he ordered, a voice that, the more I heard it, I swear I had heard before but just couldn’t place it. Another searing flash hit me and I found myself clutching my head in pain as the other tried to return. We want to help you, this is a safe place.

“A safe place…? I don’t even know where I am,” I whispered, pressing myself against the wall as my appearance took the form of the monster again. Its white eyes were narrowed into slits as it watched me, as if waiting to strike if I moved.

He’s lying, the other commanded. More flashes, little pictures of memories that I knew weren’t mine and yet they still invaded my skull like a hammer on wood. I had enough, I couldn’t take it anymore. He wants to hurt you, to use you-

“Get out of my head so I can think!” I shouted before bringing my fist to the metal door. I didn’t think it would leave a mark, I was never one strong enough for that. But I now stared at a heavy dent in the door that slowly slid open to reveal the outside and grimaced. I was greeted with silence, staring out into a room full of kids of various ages all staring back in shock at my outburst. There was nothing to say, what could I say after that other than ‘Where’s the exit?’ as I clutched my throbbing hand. A few lifted their hands to point to a corridor not far off and I uttered a small ‘thank you’ before booking it out of that room like a bat out of hell.

At any other time, I would have marveled the interior of this place. It was grand, filled with wooden architecture that even Ava would have gone gaga over. Right now it just looked like an endless nightmare of corridors that I had no escape from no matter how much I ran.

I struggled forward, my brain too muddled and my body beginning to grow too hot as I searched desperately for an exit. Anything to calm the chaos swirling around in my head. And just like that, the familiar voice popped in my head, this time stern.

Nina you have to stop, we can’t help you if you won’t let us.

“It’s too hot, I can’t...I can’t…” I whispered to no one in particular. Even if I wanted listen to him my flat out legs refused his request, desperate to escape this hallway of horrors. All I could focus on was making it outside. Outside would have cold air, maybe an escape to these voices. Outside was going to save me.

Don’t listen to him, the other commanded. I shook my head and rooted myself in place, suddenly unaware of where I was. In my hurry to run I suddenly found myself at a crossroads with growing panic spreading through me.

Nina, please-

NINA-

“Arrêter de parler!” I shouted to no one in particular. My voice must have carried through the halls because more children began to poke their heads out to see who was causing the racket. The eyes, the whispers, the incessant orders being given in my head were all too much. The room was back to spinning violently now and I could no longer keep up with anything. 

With a quick turn of my heel, I gathered up what remaining strength I had to head back to where I had been, to confront Renato or who I thought was him, for answers or help. Instead, I found myself smacking directly into something very hard. The heavy clang of metal contact rang through my ears before I hit the ground, only the faint whisper of ‘Bohze moi…’, being heard before my world turned black once more.

Finally, the voices had stopped.

[got-to-love-a-badboy]

Sinking part 3

Amy rolled over and hit the snooze button on her alarm, "ugh...NOT YET!" She shouted. After 5 minutes she got up out of bed and got in the shower, when she got out she decided to just let her hair dry on its own into beach waves, then she applied her everyday make up just enough to add abit of colour to her face.

She threw on some more of her yoga clothes and headed downstairs, she didn't start work until 11 today so she had an hour to chill, she was sat at the breakfast bar talking to her mom, she was asking how she's finding the job and if they are nice when the telephone rang, "il grab it" Amy said finishing her coffee and heading over to the phone.

“hello"

“hey Amy!"

“Hey Nancy! How are you?"

“I'm good thanks, are you working today? Me and Jonothan are going to the pool, we're gong to ask Jenny too" "Oh! Yeah I'm working, sorry Nance, but on my break I can come sit with you! Il bring a swimsuit "

“Yeah that would be fun! Anyway see you around lunch time!"

“Look forward to it bye!".

Amy hung up the phone and went back to the kitchen, "Nancy is finally making an effort to spend time with us! She's bringing Jonathan but hey will just be nice to see her" she told her mom, "I know how you feel honey but you will understand when you fall in love you won't want to be apart from them, it's like magic, you get butterfly's in your stomach when you see them!", Her mom told her but Amy just rolled her eyes, "gotta find somebody first mom, anyway I have to go grab a swimsuit!".

She headed back up stairs, she picked out an all white bikini and a towel, throwing them in her bag she shouted "see you tonight", as she ran downstairs out of the door and into her car. When she pulled up in the parking lot the first thing she saw was the familiar blue Camaro, she parked up and rolled her eyes, "I got this, I got this" she told herself before taking a deep breath in and out. She was still abit early so she went into the break room to see if anyone was there, but it was empty, she just sat down at the table and looked at the magazines on the table, she was interrupted when she heard "hey girl!" When she looked around she saw Heather walking in, "hey Heather! You ok" she asked, putting the magazine back, Heather came and sat beside her "yeah I'm good just finishing my shift, 10 minutes late, Billy only just got here" she said rolling her eyes, "he's always late, I mean he's cute and all but I have a life you know!" They both laughed, "have you met Billy yet? He probably won't introduced himself, he keeps to himself unless he wants something from you" Heather said before getting up to make a drink, "um yeah, we actually went to high school together, I didn't really speak to him in school but he spoke to me yesterday" Heathers head spinning around when Amy said that, "REALLY! What did he say?" Amy could tell she was one of the girls that threw theirselves at Billy just like in highschool, she wasn't going to send her in to a frenzy, so she lied "nothing much, John asked him to help me empty out the pool house, he was just basically telling me to not get the heavy stuff and asked why I was using the pool house" Heather was shaking her head "wow! Billy making small talk, he totally wants you, I mean look at the yoga costume who wouldn't" she smiled at Amy, "anyway I best be going my moms taking me to lunch" she said as she grabbed her bag from the chair, "see you around".

Amy put her head on the table and let out a deep sigh before getting up and going into the locker room, she put her bag in her locker and walked out to the pool, she glanced around looking for her friends but they weren't there yet, so she went to the pool house to set up. Once she had finished she stepped outside and as she walked by the sun beds she asked people if they wanted to join in with the yoga, not many people did, until she saw a group of moms, she recognise one as Nancy's mom, it would mean she had to walk past the lifeguard tower where Billy was sat, Amy thought about it for a minute and realised she was been dramatic, she started walking over to the women "hey!...Amy right?" She knew the voice so she looked up at Billy who took off he's sunglasses and put then the end of the arm in between he's teeth, "um yep that's me" she said smiling up at him, he began walking down from the tower, when he got in front of her he licked he's bottom lip and said "so I was thinking I could take you out after we finish here?" Amy was completely shocked "Really! ...Me, this is the most we've spoken in the 2 years you have been here" Billy gave Amy a deep chuckle, "I know, you just seem different and I want to get to know you" he said stepping closer to her rubbing he's fingers over the top of her arm, "come on ...I promise you won't regret it, if you don't enjoy yourself I won't bother you again" Amy thought for a second "ok then, but you should know I'm not like the Hawkins whores" Billy let out a hearty laugh "duly noted Princess" Amy couldn't deny the butterflies in her stomach, "ok good, I should go, see you later Billy" she turned to walk off and felt him grab her hand softly, "see you soon Amy" he let go and climbed back up the ladder.

Amy made it over to the group of moms "hello ladies! How do you feel about some yoga this afternoon?", Mrs wheeler was the only to answer answer, "if it gets him to look at us like he does you then were in!" All the ladies hummed in agreement, "I'm sorry?" Amy was confused, one of the other ladies nodded towards Billy, "the lifeguard, Billy, he doesn't look at anyone here, you think he would with all the girls in bikinis but nothing, that is until you started here" Amy didn't know what to say or where to look, "oh um ok then" she stood up and looked back at the ladies "it starts in 10 minutes girls" the women began packing their things up and followed Amy to the pool house. She noticed Billy wink at her on the way past she just smiled and bit her bottom lip. After what felt like the longest afternoon ever people finally began to leave the pool at around 6pm, Amy started waking to the locker rooms to get showered and changed.

She turned around when she heard someone behind her calling her name "Amy .... wait up!" She turned around to see Billy, "oh hey Billy" she said moving the hair from her face, "meet at my car when your ready, we can come back for your car after yeah?"Amy just kept walking and said "yeah sure", when they reached the locker room Billy grabbed her hand and said "hey, don't be so shy, I mean it if you don't enjoy yourself we act like nothing happened ok?" Amy smiled at him and he smiled back "thank you Billy" he nodded and they went in to their own locker rooms.

Billy's POV

I'm stood at the side of my Camaro waiting for Amy to finish showering and getting ready, When she walked out she looked stunning with her little denim skirt on, I can't get over how good she looks!, I smiled at her as she walked across the car park, "you look beautiful" I said when she was in front of me, "oh thank you" she blushed, "it's just the spare clothes I had in my locker, I couldn't go in my yoga clothes" she laughed, "god no, some guy would try steal you from me if you walked around like that" I said walking round to the drivers side, Amy shook her head and smiled as she got in "So where are we going" she said while doing her seatbelt, I began to reverse out of the parking lot, "I thought we could go for food? I know an nice place" She smiled at me again, "why you smiling?" I asked, She looked down then out of the window "it's just nice, I don't do dates" I could tell she was embarrassed, "why not?" I asked expecting her to say all guys are asses or something funny, "iv never been asked" she said looking at me biting the side of her mouth, "WHAT! You got to be kidding me, never?.... maybe it's because you were so quiet in school and didn't throw yourself at guys like the rest of the high school girls" she just nodded and said "maybe" she said.

Amy seems different to the usual Hawkins girls, shes pretty and she's smart, I know she did well in school, unlike me. I took this job because I had no choice but god only knows why she wants to come here every morning. We talk and find out bits about eachother as I drive to the diner. When we get there we walk inside and I put my hand on her lower back to guide her in, she looked back at me smiled as her cheeks began to go red, she sits in a booth and I slide in beside her, we take out the menus and decide what we are having, when the waitress comes over she is chewing her pen and looking at me, "what can I get you handsome?" I tell her that I will have a cheese burger, fries and a large cola, then I look over at Amy for her order "il have the same please" she didn't get a reply so I look at the waitress again who is still staring at me, "excuse me! the lady gave you her order!" I snap at the waitress who looks at Amy "I'm so sorry could you repeat that please?" She asks her, Amy tells her again then looks at the floor as the waitress walked off, I took Amy's hand and she looked into my eyes "typical Hawkins girl huh" I said and we both laughed, I took her hand and said "your really are beautiful Amy, and your work uniform is just an added bonus" biting my bottom lip "thank you Billy" she said as she laughed playing with my fingers, “I know you know don't normal do 'dates' and everything so thank you, Im really enjoying been with you Billy, and like I said before I'm not the like the girls you usually meet, if you don't like it that's fine we can leave now" she said rather nervous but also to the point, "what? No I'm enjoying myself too Amy, I mean I'm not going to lie to you iv had most of the girls in Hawkins but they are all the same, unlike you, your smart, you aren't throwing yourself at me and plus you're sexy as fuck, but you don't flaunt it like the girls around here. I admire that about you".

Amy smiled and covered her eyes with her free hand in embarrassment, she quickly moved it "they really do! They don't think twice about their actions and there's me who's never kissed a guy!" Once she realised what she said she let go of my hand and buried her face in to her hands as she muttered "shit" I have to admit I was shocked, kind of scared, could I Billy Hargrove like someone who was as delicate as this, would I break her?. I used my finger to lift her chin "hey it's ok don't even worry about it, take things at your pace, when your happy maybe I can be your first kiss" I said looking into her eyes. What am I saying this isn't me!, I thought to myself. "Ok! we have two cheese burger fries and colas! Enjoy guys" an older waitress said as she handed our food to us, "looks like your friend bailed on you Billy" Amy said joking, I laughed "oh well good job I have first prize right here huh" she smiled again shaking her head. We ate our meal and laughed and joked all night it was 11pm, we decided to head back to the pool so Amy could collect her car, we talked all the way back to the pool, Amy is so cute and funny, she really doesn't see how nice she is.

When we got to the pool I got out of the car and went round to Amy's side, she got out of the car carefully closing the door "thank you so much for an amazing night Billy I really enjoyed it." She said to me, I move closer to her, "I enjoyed it too, your really cool I feel stupid for not talking to you sooner instead of the other girls" I think she could tell I was getting annoyed with myself because she said "hey I enjoyed it that much I may even let you take me out again" we both smiled and gave each other a long hug, "il see you tomorrow Billy" she said as she turned to walk away, I stood up and held her hand and kissed the top of it, "looking forward to it already" she smiled and walked off causing our hands to separate.

I sat in my car for 5 minutes trying to get my head around what tonight was and how I felt, I'm Billy Hargrove I don't "like" girls! I play girls like a game, I get what I want and leave, always have but something is telling me Amy is different I mean it would be an achievement to get my way with her but it didn't feel right.

[xadoheandterra]

Series: The Burning of Solheim Title: The Path Untrodden Fandom: Final Fantasy XV Chapters: I | II | III | IV | V | VI | VII | VIII | IX | X | XI | XII | XIII Characters: Prompto Argentum, Ignis Scientia, Cor Leonis, Gladiolus Amicitia, Noctis Lucis Caelum, Gilgamesh, Cid Sophiar Tags: 10 years older!Prompto, Cor Leonis and Cid Sophiar the old guy duo, plot comes knocking, Noctis realizes some shit, introspective bullshit on the nature of Prophecy and being Chosen Summary:  Solheim was the height of civilization long enough that their ruins were ruins over 2000 years ago, and still had the power to function in the time of the King of Light. They should’ve realized something was very wrong the minute Prompto remarked on the lights being on, and yet no one was home.

The call came early in the morning from Cid to Cor. Out of the entire sudden party of six only Cor, Ignis, Gladio, and Gilgamesh where awake just yet. Ignis had only just stumbled out of the tent he shared with Noctis, hair sleep-messed and glasses half-askew for the motion. The King wouldn’t be awake for a few hours more, since the sun had barely risen over the eastern mountain ridge of the Ravatogh Trail, and Prompto seemed content to sleep in after the night they had the day previous.

Gilgamesh noticed the sound of the ringtone first, and he tilted his head Cor’s direction. The braid of his hair tumbled down his shoulder and mixed with the long, clasped bangs that framed the taller man’s face. The interest made Cor stiffen his spine even as the man asked, politely, “What unearthly sound is that?”

“Phone,” Cor said, voice tense because there were a scant few people who even had his number these days and would deign to call him. He dug the hone out of his Crownsguard fatigue’s while Ignis began to pull out food from the armiger to start on breakfast.

“Are omelets alright with everyone this morning?” Ignis called out to the camp as Cor finally got his phone out of his pocket. He stared at Cid’s number for the longest moment and let the phone ring, then shook his head.

“That’s fine, Ignis. I need to take this,” Cor said, stood, and walked off the edge of the Haven. He kept the party in his sights even as he tapped the answer call button and braced himself for Cid’s usual antics. “Leonis.”

“Well I’ll be damned, ya picked ‘er right up fer once. Was ‘fraid I’d need to give a second or third call,” Cid drawled along the line and Cor pursed his lips.

“Very funny,” Cor said.

“I guess hangin’ out with those boys is doin’ some sorta good fer ya, eh, Cor?”

Cor sighed and dragged a hand along his face. He turned from the camp for a moment and prayed for patience—and reminded himself that Cid was a dear friend even if he was almost forty years Cor’s senior.

“Old man,” Cor said tiredly, “why are you calling.”

“Who you callin’ old?” Cid harrumphed, then sighed a second later with a grunt that Cor presumed meant Cid had finally found a chair to settle into. A second later the faint groan of relief brought a smile to Cor’s face as Cid mumbled, “Ah, hells. I am old.”

“Admitting it? Will wonders never cease?” Cor teased lightly, and then shook his head and his face turned towards seriousness once more. “Although really, Cid. Why are you calling?”

Cor waited, half-turned to view the Haven once more. He watched as Prompto crawled out of the tent and scrubbed at his hair and his chin-fuzz with a wide yawn, and how Gilgamesh—who’d been staring and Cor really wished the other man wouldn’t; he was half-certain that Gilgamesh was going to stab him as time went on with how the man just looked at him—Gilgamesh immediately moved to grasp Prompto by the wrist. Cor might’ve found it odd how Prompto favored the well-worn travel clothing that they found him in compared to his Crownsguard fatigues if Cor didn’t realize that ten years instilled into Prompto some form of habit and figured for both Prompto and Gilgamesh the clothes were something of a comfort. Cor hadn’t missed the way that Prompto tugged them out of a very much red armiger compared to Noctis’ colder blue, or even Regis’ icy silver.

“It’s done, Cor,” Cid eventually spit out. “That EXTERNIS gal o’ yers delivered the tempered mythril yesterday and I jes got up an’ finished installin’ it inta place. Them boys are all good t’head on off an see that Oracle o’ theirs.”

Cor breathed out heavily and felt his shoulders relax just the slightest bit. Hopefully with the reminder that Lunafreya awaited them in Altissa, and the fact that the Royal Vessel was now operational meant the tenseness that each and every one of them were ignoring could be dealt away with for the more immediate problem. Honestly Cor felt thankful that the poor woman hadn’t gone and dragged Leviathan awake just yet, considering what a right mess to Altissa that would eventually be given the rumors Cor heard from the lips of Imperial’s and Hunters about the mess Titan made of Duscae and Cleigne.

Astrals, Cor thought disdainfully, were terrible weapons of mass destruction. They were worse when they were awake compared to when sleeping. Cor would never forget the day that Regis summoned Ramuh of all the deities from a dainty little crystal the bastard found back in their youth. It was one of Regis’ godsdamned adventures Cor was rather glad to not have been originally brought in on, if just the aftermath had nearly wasted a good chunk of Duscae for nearly ten years.

“We’re about six hours out of Caem,” Cor said eventually when Cid made an inquisitive ‘Cor?’ on the other end of the line. “Up in Ravatogh Trail.”

“What in tarnation are you boys doin’ all the way up there?” Cid demanded.

“Hunting,” Cor said dryly.

“Well finish up and get yer behinds down here, kid! I ain’t got all the time in the world to waste, ya know!”

“Yeah, yeah,” Cor let the smile cross his lips. “We’ll head your way as soon as His Majesty wakes up.”

Cid harrumphed. “Damn spoiled brats. Sleepin’ in when there’s work t’be done.”

Cor hummed in agreement. He didn’t bother to remind Cid that the magic of the Crystal took a lot out of its Kings. Cid knew that well in hand already. Lamenting Regis’ desire to sleep in had been nothing more than teasing between them, Clarus, and Weskham back in the day rather than anything serious. It was the days where Regis slept too much or too little that brought to mind worry; Cor wondered if they boys felt the same about Noctis. Still that ended the conversation pretty neatly, so Cor hung up without further word. He’d probably get an earful from Cid when they reached Caem for hanging up like that, but Cor didn’t quite care.

They’d be on their way to Altissa by tomorrow, and Cor could go back to figuring out what sort of bullshit nonsense Niflheim was up. This back and forth in occupation, and the fact that the gates to Insomnia were still closed, did not bode well to Cor. He had his own work he needed to get to, and while he cared for the boys he couldn’t stay with them. He wanted to—Six knows Cor wanted to stay with them and make sure they paid attention to the world around them instead of whatever nonsense they’d been doing before he’d been pulled into their messes—but they wouldn’t learn if he hovered. They needed to learn. They needed to be their own men.

Cor would only drag them down with his memories.

Noctis woke up to an empty tent, something he found himself steadily grown used to over the past several days. It still bothered him, like an itch that he couldn’t quite reach at the small of his back. For a moment he lay there and stared up at the ceiling of the tent in silence. He felt empty; a whole ripped through his chest filled with nothing reminded him of the days after he woke up to know Prompto was gone. Then Noctis breathed and closed his eyes—he felt for the bond to his retainers—

I offer my life into service—

—to guard and protect from all threats both within and out—

—as the blade to pierce through the darkness—

—never to be alone, forgotten, or without a companion in the moments where his steps may falter—

—for my King of Light, forevermore.

Noctis relaxed slightly at the feel of it—of his Hand, and his Shield, and of Prompto whose Oaths were so unorthodox that they didn’t have a title with them. He could feel where the pieces of themselves twined in with the pieces of himself—or the pieces that he could touch and use, as jagged and broken that they were. Ignis, Gladio and Prompto gave him something as much as he gave them something. Noctis shared with them his Light, the magic that family history claimed to come from the Crystal. They shared in return with him the stabilizing presence of their very lives.

“Okay,” Noctis breathed out and pushed himself up. He clenched a fist over his chest and sucked in a breath, only to release it a second later with another reminded, “Okay.” Fortified Noctis rubbed the sleep from his eyes and shifted onto his hands and knees so that he could craw out of the sleeping bag. It took a little focus, more than it would when the rest of his mind started to function beyond the haze of waking up and waking up alone, but Noctis eventually got the sleeping bag back into the armiger and his change of clothes out of it.

The young King spent fifteen minutes working through his clothes, half seated and half crawling in and out of each piece before he folded the articles of dirty clothing—something he did on rare occasion—and focused on the space in the armiger that held the laundry they hadn’t gotten around to yet. Sometimes Noctis couldn’t be certain if the clothes ever made it to the right part of the space of his magic, so tired like this, but this morning he wasn’t as dazed as he could be, so Noctis felt reasonably assured that the clothes made it to where he wanted and not, accidentally, at the top of Ravatogh.

Noctis sniffed at his Crownsguard fatigue jacket as he crawled his way out of the tent and made a slight face at the smell that wafted off of it—perhaps they needed to make a stop to the nearest laundromat, he thought with his nose scrunched up as he made his way into the brightness of the sun. It took half-a-second before the sudden blindness associated with light washed away and Noctis was able to drag himself to his feet.

“Morning,” Noctis mumbled, and accepted the fresh plate of breakfast from Ignis. He took a bite without even really looking, then paused to stare down at the plate almost uncomprehendingly when he realized it was eggs with a large whopping of bits of meat cooked into it. Noctis dug his fork around the omelet for a second and raised his eyebrows when he saw no squirreled away vegetables in the meat.

“Is something wrong?” Ignis questioned, lips tugged into a frown, and Noctis jerked his head up and around.

“What? No,” Noctis shook his head and stuffed another forkful of the omelet into his mouth. Zu eggs that they gathered out of the nest about two weeks back when they went and visited the Royal Tomb rumored to be nestled in the volcano itself, Noctis realized. They had a different sort of texture when cooked compared to most of the domesticated eggs that one could get at the marketplace. He knocked around the meat a bit more before he realized it was Spiracorn and not Garula. “Foods good, Specs.”

Ignis smiled, relieved, and Noctis flopped himself down into one of the camper chairs to finish eating. It wasn’t a lie, even—the food was good. The initial surprise had been from the fact that Ignis hadn’t bothered to sneak in any veggies. Noctis had grown used to taking that first bite in the mornings, only to taste something unholy followed by the need to dig out all of the pesky things from an otherwise succulent meal. Prompto would steal them off of his plate—the heathen loved vegetables for some reason—but instead there’d been nothing. Noctis tried to remember the last time he had a bite of food in the breakfast with the taste of some vegetable and found himself unable to recall.

With a mouthful of food Noctis glanced over to where Ignis had begun clean up of the cooking supplies with a hum. Had Ignis stopped sneaking vegetables in Noctis food out of some sort of regret? The man knew Noctis gave them all to Prompto, anyway. His disgust and distaste for the food was legendary and it took work for the royal kitchens to find ways to accommodate Noctis. The thought and care implied in the fact that Ignis had done away with vegetables in Noctis’ food was something he hadn’t even thought about until now.

Once the plate was cleared Noctis moved to wash it, only for Ignis to take it from him without a word and begin to clean. It gave Noctis further pause, surprised at Ignis’ nonchalance and it struck something within Noctis that left him heavy hearted. He looked over to Gladio who sipped at some water with a book in hand, then to Prompto who looked right at him with an unreadable expression. His wrist was grasped yet again in Gilgamesh’s only hand, and Noctis wanted to frown at it—but he’d seen the man wake up in the middle of the night with a sharp breath and twist around until he could grasp at Prompto’s wrist and found himself unable to.

It reminded Noctis of how he’d wake and seek out the feel of Prompto at his heart; how Noctis found comfort in the Oaths Promised that made ties to each of his retinue. He couldn’t be jealous when this ancient man didn’t have that comfort like Noctis. It made the young monarch wonder how other people sought comfort in those closest to them when they couldn’t feel the very souls bound to theirs. After a second Noctis turned away and looked over to Cor who stood off to the side with his head bowed low, and decided that if Ignis wanted to clean and Gladio wanted to read, then Noctis would bother the Immortal instead.

“Silver for your thoughts?” Noctis asked, and when Cor made a confused sort of sound in the back of his throat Noctis’ lips curled into a slight smile.

“I thought the phrase was gil for your thoughts?” Cor asked and Noctis shrugged.

“Maybe?” Noctis said and turned his gaze toward the sky. “Although I always thought it was crowns.” He looked over at Cor, curious. “Is it a currency thing, then?”

“Ah, yeah,” Cor blinked. “Is there anything you need, your highness?”

Noctis said a blunt, “You looked lonely,” to which Cor snorted and then shook his head.

“Of course.” For a moment the Immortal said nothing more, then stretched and looked over the camp with a critical eye. “Cid called this morning.” Noctis stilled, the breath stolen from his lungs. He knew what Cid calling meant. Aranea gave them a huge chunk of mythril before they left Lestallum to meet Prompto. Cor made sure the metal got delivered to EXTERNIS for processing, but if Cid called then it was probably already installed.

“I see,” Noctis said after a moment, head ducked down. The Royal Vessel—with it ready they could head to Altissa. Noctis would see Luna again, for the first time in twelve years. He knew she planned to summon Leviathan; he understood that she sought to forge the Covenants for him now, something he hadn’t truly understood until after the blessing of Ramuh completed itself in Fociaugh Hollow.

For weeks after Fociaugh Hollow Noctis wondered why Luna decided that they needed the Covenants with the Astrals. She knew just as well as he did that to wake them one after another like this was dangerous. Noctis anticipated the need to gain that Astrals blessings—he knew about the Prophecy in the loosest sense, and knew that as the foretold King of Light he’d need the Astrals to defeat the darkness, but he didn’t understand why now. He’d originally thought the darkness maybe meant Nifflheim after they attacked and stole the Crystal from Insomnia. Perhaps that was what Noctis had been meant to defeat—Insomnia’s ancient enemy.

Except Noctis knew he wouldn’t need all of the Six for something so paltry as a fight with another nation. Only Titan or Ramuh could lay waste to the entirety of the MT units Nifflheim could throw at them if needed. Then Prompto vanished and came back with talk about the Scourge and daemons and that these were a disease—that people called it the darkness when they didn’t call it the Scourge—and there was a Healer King tasked to end it. A Healer King still alive today and working with the very people who stole his Crystal and killed his Father, even, who was related to Noctis with some two-thousand year difference. What then did that make Noctis in the grand scheme of things? The second choice of the Six to fix what had been broken about the world?

No one really knew where the Scourge came from these days, or that it was even a thing beyond that at night daemons roamed the world and would kill you. They knew the Haven’s kept people safe, that lights kept the daemons out, but what else did they know about the fiends of the dark, really? Certainly, Noctis hadn’t known they were people, sick and malformed people, but they’d been people once and possibly could be again someday.

Ardyn failed to stop it, the Scourge; he grew sick with it instead. How could Noctis finish it then? Noctis whose magic was so terribly broken and mostly out of reach—who lacked the soul-weary Ring of the Lucii that his forefathers used to channel the Crystal’s blistering Light. All Noctis had were the Covenants, and even then Luna forged them so fast and so quickly that Noctis worried they’d even be able to get the remaining three after Leviathan without consequence.

“Your Majesty?” Cor asked, and Noctis blinked out of his thoughts.

“Sorry,” Noctis mumbled and gave Cor a hesitant smile. “Just…surprised.” Cor nodded and Noctis carefully relaxed himself from his tense thoughts. “Can you do something for me, Cor?”

“What do you need?” Cor asked, face serious.

“Find Ardyn for me,” Noctis said, words soft but with the bit of steel behind them that he rarely used. He looked over to Cor and watched the way the other man looked at him back, the way his brow twitched and his eyes narrowed. “I need to have a discussion with the Chancellor.” Noctis waited until Cor nodded before he smiled his thanks. “I’ll go let the others know to pack up then.”