#just floating aimlessly though the world

[vinecoveredgarden]

I'm just so tired.

[especially-obsessed]

Anchor

Summary: JJ wonders why you never go swimming with any of the Pogues. So he takes it upon himself to find out

Pairing: JJ Maybank x reader

Warnings: Fluff, angst, mentions of drowning/death, aquaphobia, mild swearing

Word Count: 3.1k

A/N: Enjoy <3

Masterlist

You peer into the water, watching the bubbles breaking the surface from where Pope had just dove in, nearly landing on John B’s head. You let out a soft chuckle, watching them play like there wasn’t a care in the world. Kiara was further away from the boat with Sarah, waiting for the boys to follow them. 

You wondered what it would be like to swim out here again. It would be nice not to feel left out anytime the group wanted to go swimming or surfing, even though it was a feeling of your own making. Your smile faded at the thought. 

Suddenly, you feel your body being pulled from the edge of the boat by two strong hands gripping your waist. Just as quickly, your feet are no longer touching the floor of the boat; they’re being swept out from under you. You feel a body pressed to you and look into his eyes, yours wild with fear.

“J, what are you-” you start, grasping at his biceps, struggling against his strong hold on you.

“Better hold your breath, sweetheart,” he says, moving closer to the side of the boat. 

You can feel his chest expand as he sucks in his breath of air and takes a step up. “No, JJ, no, put me down!” you scream.

But it was too late.

The two of you were already falling through the air off the side of The Snapper. You held on to JJ as tightly as you could, your stomach dropping farther than the drop off of the boat (which was even more terrifying because this boat was much larger than the HMS Pogue was).

Your body started to drift from JJ’s just before you hit the water, and there was no air in your lungs. You were petrified with fear. The water encompassed you, and you instantly lost JJ. The bubbles from your abrupt entry into the water surrounded you, tickling your skin. You opened your eyes under the water's surface and saw the outline of JJ’s body already making its way back up for air. 

But you were still sinking. Why were you sinking? What the hell was happening right now? You opened your mouth to scream for help, instantly regretting your decision. Water flooded your airways, seeping to the very bottom of your lungs. Your eyes were burning, and you didn’t know where you were.

Is this what drowning felt like? You fill up with water like a sponge until there’s nothing left for you to take in. You tried to move your arms in any direction you could, trying to move your body in any direction. The water was thick like honey, keeping your limbs stagnant. But you still weren’t moving fast enough. You weren’t going to make it to the surface. There was no time left. 

The corners of your vision started to blur before beginning to go dark. Your limbs were weightless, floating aimlessly in the water. You felt no pain, no fear. Your body was shutting down. You felt your body jolt upwards suddenly, just before your vision completely faded.

Before your eyes are even open, you’re coughing up water. Aggressively. Your lungs can’t fill up with air fast enough, and the water clogging your airways going in the opposite direction wasn’t helping. Your gag reflex kicked in, and you rolled your head to the side to try to keep yourself from drowning. Again.

“Oh my God,” you heard someone mumble. There were a few sighs, even a 'thank God'. You finally opened your eyes, but everything was blurry. You were blinded by the sun's reflection on all the white surrounding you. You closed your eyes, unable to see anything anyway.

From the gentle swaying you felt, you were back on the boat. Thank God. You rolled onto your back again and took deep breaths, still coughing every few breaths.

You opened your eyes again, seeing a blond mop of sea-kissed curls blocking the sun from your view. You could see the sun rays poking out in a few different directions past his head. It almost looked like a halo around his head. JJ was hovering above you, his hands placed on either side of your head, his legs straddling your hips. He looked into your eyes, worry written all over his countenance. It pained you to see him so upset. 

“What the hell happened?” someone asked. Pope. You recognized his hoarse voice instantly. He was somewhere by your head, out of your field of vision. 

“They jumped in together, and y/n just never came back up,” Kie said somewhere to your left. You turned your head toward her, seeing how worried she was. 

“You can’t get rid of me that easily, you know,” you said, trying to relieve the apparent tension surrounding you. Pope sighed as he walked to the back of the boat. 

“Apparently, we can,” John B retorted. He was standing next to Kie. Sarah was cradled into his side and smacked his chest lightly, even though she was smiling. 

 “You never said you can’t swim,” JJ muttered. You turned your attention back to the blonde boy still blocking the sun from you. You gave him a confused look, not processing what he just said. 

“You never told us. Why the hell wouldn’t you tell us something like that?” He asked, his voice getting louder. He moved himself off of you, allowing the sun to blind you in his absence. You squinted and attempted to sit up. Sarah jolted forward to help you. JJ was pacing, running his fingers through his hair. “If I would have known that, I wouldn’t have jumped into the water with you!” He shouted. 

“JJ..” you started, but he wasn’t stopping. 

“You could’ve died! You were just at the bottom of the marsh and-”

“It’s okay, J-” John B started, placing a hand on his chest. JJ brushed him off and shook his head. He grabbed his hat from the floor of the boat and fixed it the way he does so effortlessly. You looked up to try and meet his gaze, but he was looking anywhere but at you. He shook his head again and moved to the boat's cockpit.

You looked down at your hands in your lap, unsure what to do. Guilt washed over you. JJ started the engine and did quick work to get the boat going. John B patted your shoulder and smiled before walking towards the back of the ship. Kie wrapped a towel around your shoulders, goosebumps blanketing your skin as the salty marsh air whipped around you. Sarah and Kie sat on either side of you, wrapping their arms around you. They were keeping you safe in their own way.

You looked back up, trying to catch JJ’s eye, but he was looking out on the water, not so much as glancing in your direction. His jaw was clenched tightly, unwavering as he maneuvered the boat through the marsh.  

You felt terrible. Guilt was seeping out of your every poor. You felt nauseous. And your diaphragm hurts, like the feeling you have after you’ve had hiccups for an hour. 

“I’m sorry I didn’t say anything before,” you whispered to the girls. Kie scoffed, resting her elbow on her knee and placing her hand under her chin.

Sarah rubbed your back. “It would have been nice to know,” she said lightheartedly. 

“I just figured you were scared of sharks or something crazy. Even though they are very gentle creatures,” Kie added. You laughed (or attempted to). It quickly became a cough with even more water coming out of your lungs. You wiped at your mouth with the towel. When you looked up, JJ’s eyes were boring a hole into your skull. He looked away when he noticed you were staring back at him. It was going to be a long ride back to Poguelandia. 

You were almost dry by the time JJ had the boat docked. Pope had made his way back to the front of the boat to check on you. He checked your pupils and made sure you didn’t have a concussion. He confirmed that your chances of surviving were almost 100% (because, of course, we could die at any given second). 

Everyone unloaded off the boat, JJ being the first to take off once everything was tied down. He walked up the ramp to the shop and sat behind the counter. He took his hat off and ran his hand through his hair again before putting it back on. He was pacing back and forth, checking on random things in the small store space. Kie waited up for you as everyone made their way back to the house.

"I'll catch up," you told her, glancing at the shop and back to her. She gave you a sympathetic smile before turning and following the others. You unwrapped the towel from around your shoulders and laid it across the railing leading up to the shop. You walked up slowly while making sure not to sneak up on him.

But he knew you were coming.

JJ had his back turned to you, looking out on the water now. You could see his chest moving quickly. His hands were resting on the railing. He used his hands to pull his body forward, bringing his mouth to rest on his hands.

“J, I’m so sorry,” you said, crossing your arms over your chest. You stared at the back of his head, trying to read his body language.

“I don’t understand,” he said quietly. He shook his head and straightened his back, turning around to face you. You stared at his face. He no longer looked angry. He was upset, eyes red and bloodshot. Tears threatened to spill from his eyes.

This wasn’t carefree JJ Maybank, reckless and altruistic until the day he died. This was JJ, vulnerable and terrified, cracking open right before you. All you wanted to do was rush up to him and hug him. Tell him that it was all just a fucked up joke and that he didn’t need to be worried. He could go back to being his energetic self and not worry about you anymore. 

But you knew it was time. It was time to tell him the truth. 

You sighed deeply. Before you could form the right words to start, JJ huffed and put on a stern face. He wiped aggressively at his cheeks, thinking that your sigh was a sign that you weren’t going to justify yourself, that you thought he was being stupid and overreacting.

No, he wasn’t about to stick around for that. He started to walk away, trying to brush past you and get away as quickly as possible.

You caught his wrist before he could get too far. “Stay,” you practically whispered. You held his wrist in your hand. JJ refused to look at you at that moment. You took in a shaky breath. “Please,” you begged. JJ sighed and threw his head back. He slowly turned around, and you let go of his wrist. He kept his gaze lowered to the ground, leaning against one of the wooden beams, studying a knot in the floorboard. When you examined his face, you could see the fallen tear trails. Your heart broke in half. 

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” you started. He still didn’t look up. You could see his nose twitch as he sniffled. You continued anyway. “I should have said something months ago. Hell, I should have said something the first time we went out to surf the surge. But I was scared you guys would judge me.” You paused, still trying to look him in the eye. You moved closer to him, your face inches away from his. You gently lifted his chin with your hand, forcing him to look at you. His eyes were red, and his jaw was tight. You moved your hand to cup his cheek. You felt him lean into your touch slightly. “But…I know how to swim, J,” you said slowly. JJ’s eyes went wide, a multitude of emotions wracking through his brain. He started to pull away from your hand unknowingly. You quickly dropped your hand from his cheek and turned your back to him. You thought he was rejecting your touch, his anger unforgiving. The guilt was engulfing you, swallowing you whole. You felt terrible. 

There was an uncomfortable pause, the silence deafening. You could hear your own heartbeat threatening to beat out of your chest.

“What happened then? Why didn’t you swim?” He asked you. JJ followed you to the edge of the shop where he stood earlier, staring out into the horizon. You just shook your head. Now, it was your turn to avoid eye contact. JJ was leaning on the railing to your left, and you focused on everything and anything to your right. 

“When I was seven, my dad took me out in the marsh. A quick fishing trip, nothing fancy. Some daddy-daughter time. But it all went so wrong. My dad, he…” you stopped, choking on your words. You swallowed harshly. JJ stared at you intently, slowly putting the puzzle pieces together. “I was stuck out there for three days by myself,” you whispered. Realization dawned on him.

You were the Marsh Girl. 

Rumors still went around about the Marsh Girl. People said that her dad went out there and killed both of them, leaving the boat behind as the only evidence. Or that the girl pushed him off the boat and claimed that it was an accident.

The news said a girl was found after three days of being out there, but the name was never released, so of course, kids made up stories. JJ’s worry and anger melted away. He didn’t dare move closer to you, afraid that the slightest movement might shatter you into dust, letting you fall between the gaps of the dock and taken away by the murky water below. Instead, you turn to face him, building up the courage to look at him when you say this. 

“My dad...he must have had a heart attack or something and lost his balance. I was too young to remember all of the details. But when he went over the side of the boat, he took me into the water with him. He almost drowned me," you took in a shaky breath, reliving the memories in a flash second. "When we jumped into the water today…I don’t know what happened to me. I saw you going back up to the water's surface, and I was just…stuck. I wondered if it was how my dad felt when he went into the water. He could see me getting to the surface but couldn’t make it back up himself,” you stated calmly. You close your eyes, unable to look at JJ. Another second, looking at his shattered face, and you would break yourself. “J, I know how to swim.”

“What?” he didn’t mean to say it; it slipped out before he could stop it. JJ mentally smacked a hand over his mouth. He studied your face to see if you were messing with him. 

“I can swim,” you repeated. 

This whole time, JJ thought that he almost drowned you. He had always wondered why you never went into the water with everyone else. He figured it was so that you could keep up on your amazing sunkissed skin or because you didn’t want to get your hair wet. He knew you weren’t that superficial, but it still had crossed his mind. He never in a thousand years would have guessed that this was why you didn’t touch the water. 

“y/n, I almost killed you,” JJ said, fear seeping back into his every pore. The thought of losing you, especially at his own hands, was suffocating. He felt a sharp pain in his chest, unable to control his now erratic breathing. Noticing his panic, you closed the distance between the two of you and placed your hands on either side of his face. You used your thumbs to gently wipe away the stray tears that fell from his eyes. 

“No, no, J, this is not your fault. You didn’t know.”

“I should have known. I should have just asked you why you didn’t ever swim with us. Lord knows I’ve bothered you enough times about going with me,” he dropped his head again, feeling defeated. You gently pushed his face back up, forcing him to meet your eyeline. 

“You had no way of knowing,” you reassured him, smiling a little. You stroked your thumb across his cheekbone and felt him lean into your touch. He closed his eyes tightly. 

“The thought of losing you…” he sucks in a jagged breath. He won’t let the thought go. He can’t. The images of your lifeless body floating in the water, replaying over and over again like a bad movie montage. “I was the one who pulled you out of the water. You weren’t breathing, and I-” 

You quickly pulled JJ’s face down to yours, connecting your lips gently. You couldn’t think of a better way to ground him. To keep him from spiraling again. He was stiff for only a second, his brain not catching up to what you were doing. Maybe you shouldn’t have done this. 

Then his face pressed closer to yours, his lips pushing deeper into the kiss. You smiled into him. JJ’s hand moved to your hips, and he squeezed gently. Your hands slid down to his neck, and you pulled back, seeing JJ's toothy grin. His eyes were still red and puffy, but he was smiling. He was downright giddy, swimming in a wide range of emotions he didn’t understand. But you grounded him.

You were his anchor. 

“Would now be a bad time to ask if you wanted to go surfing with me tomorrow?” He asked, teasing. You smacked him on the chest and let out a genuine laugh. JJ pulled you into a tight hug. One that told you he was never letting you go. 

From the shore, you could hear the Pogues hooting and hollering, witnessing your very public display of affection. But you didn’t care. Nothing mattered now except the sweet, broken boy before you. Your entire world.

Your anchor. 

“Why don’t we go ahead and give them a real show,” JJ whispered in your ear. You squealed as he started to pepper your face with kisses.

Taglist: @pogueslandia @milkiane @bjrmaybank @strnqer

Masterlist

A/N: I desperately needed to write something happy after watching season 4 <3 This is unedited, so please ignore any typos or stupid grammatical errors.

Likes, reblogs, and follows are never expected, but greatly appreciated! These let me know I should keep on doing what I’m doing! (:

Please check out this post for useful mental health resources.

[atlasthegreatest]

Into the Void / Laura Kinney x Male Reader

Which, Y/n L/n and Laura Kinney reunite in the Void, rekindling their relationship and vowing to stay together.

Word count: 2306

A/n: This was requested by @jacenradio7. Enjoy it!

The stars had burned out here. In the Void, time seemed to curl in on itself, weaving a tangled knot of moments, memories, and regrets. It was neither light nor dark—just an endless expanse of nothingness. Y/n floated aimlessly, weightless and untethered, with only flickers of distant dreams to remind you of who you once were.

And then, he saw her.

Laura.

Her silhouette stood out against the Void like a glimmer of something real, her presence cutting through the nothingness. She wasn’t a dream or a fragment of the past—she was here, as vivid and dangerous as Y/n remembered. The last time he had seen her, life had been simpler, though their parting had not.

Y/n’s breath hitched, but Laura’s expression was unreadable, the same guarded look she always wore, as if emotions were things she had to hide in her pocket, like claws that could slip out without warning. But her emerald-green eyes locked onto him, and the weight of those unspoken things between them rushed forward like a tidal wave.

“Is this real?” Y/n asked, voice uncertain.

Laura tilted her head, her brow furrowing slightly. “Feels real.”

Y/n took a step closer—or what passed for a step in the Void—and her presence became more tangible. Even here, her scent—leather, pine, and something sharper, like adrenaline—lingered around her like a memory etched into his senses.

“I didn’t think I’d ever see you again.” Y/n’s voice cracked, betraying the emotion that surged to the surface.

Laura’s lips twitched—almost a smile, but not quite. “You think you could get rid of me that easily?”

Y/n let out a dry laugh, though it was more out of relief than humor. That was Laura, always toeing the line between affection and sarcasm, hiding her heart behind barbs and sharp edges.

She closed the distance between them with measured, deliberate steps. Her hand lifted, hesitating for a moment before her fingertips brushed against his jaw. The touch was tentative, unfamiliar—like she wasn’t sure Y/n was real either. When she found him solid under her hand, her fingers curled against his cheek, and a strange softness flickered in her expression.

“I missed you,” Y/n whispered, the words falling from his lips before he could stop them. They felt fragile, too exposed, but in this place where nothing was certain, he couldn’t hold them back.

Her eyes searched his as if weighing the truth of his words. And then, in a rare moment of vulnerability, Laura whispered back, “I missed you, too.”

The admission hung between them, delicate and raw, but it was enough to break whatever invisible barrier had kept you apart.

Without thinking, Y/n reached out, wrapping his arms around her, and pulling her close. For a heartbeat, she tensed—old habits, old scars—but then she melted into him, her arms sliding around his waist, her head resting against his shoulder.

In the Void, there were no clocks, no calendars—just the two of them, floating in the stillness. And for the first time in what felt like an eternity, Y/n felt grounded. Not by the world beneath his feet, but by her.

Her voice was a whisper against his neck. “How did we end up here?”

“I don’t know.” Y/n stroked her hair, the strands soft between his fingers. “But if this is a dream… I don’t want to wake up.”

Laura pulled back slightly, just enough to look at Y/n. Her gaze was sharp, cutting through whatever haze had surrounded him since arriving in the Void. “It doesn’t matter where we are.” She touched her forehead to his, her breath warm against his skin. “What matters is that we’re here. Together.”

Her words were an anchor, tethering Y/n to the moment. The weight of everything—the pain, the distance, the longing—slipped away, leaving only the certainty that whatever this place was, it couldn’t take her from him again.

Y/n leaned in, and Laura met him halfway. The kiss was slow, deliberate—a promise made in silence. Her lips tasted like something familiar, something Y/n thought he’d lost. She kissed like someone who had fought to survive and found something worth living for.

When the kiss ended, Y/n stayed close, foreheads pressed together, his hands tangled in hers. The Void remained vast and empty, but it didn’t matter.

“Where do we go from here?” Y/n asked quietly, his thumb brushing over the back of her hand.

Laura’s smile was small, but it was real, and that made all the difference. “Wherever we want.”

———————-

The kiss lingered in your mind as their foreheads remained pressed together, breath mingling in the stillness of the Void. Laura’s hand was still in Y/n’s, her thumb tracing absent circles across his knuckles. For a moment, the silence felt sacred—like the rest of the universe could wait.

But reality, even in a place as surreal as this, couldn’t be avoided forever.

“Do you remember how we got here?” Y/n asked softly, unwilling to break the moment but needing answers.

Laura’s brow furrowed, the familiar intensity returning to her gaze as she searched her memories. “There was a fight. Something… big. And then nothing.” Her claws flicked out instinctively for a split second, as if her body were still reacting to the threat, then retracted with a soft snikt. “What about you?”

Y/n thought hard, but the memories were fragmented. It was like trying to hold onto smoke. “I remember looking for you.”

Her grip tightened almost imperceptibly. “You found me.”

There was something about the way she said it—soft and low, like an unspoken apology for all the times she’d pushed him away, for all the times she thought she had to handle things alone. And maybe, for once, she didn’t have to.

“We always seem to find each other,” Y/n said, his thumb brushing over her knuckles.

Laura glanced down at their intertwined hands, and a rare warmth flickered in her expression—like sunlight breaking through heavy clouds. “Yeah,” she murmured. “We do.”

They stayed like that for a moment longer, lost in the quiet comfort of each other’s presence. But then, the Void seemed to shift, the endless expanse rippling like a disturbed pond.

Laura’s eyes narrowed. “Something’s changing.”

Y/n felt it too—an unsettling sensation like the boundaries of this strange space were unraveling. The Void, as timeless and vast as it felt, wasn’t permanent.

“What do you think is happening?” Y/n asked.

Laura’s gaze swept the emptiness, her hand tightening around his as if she were afraid Y/n might disappear. “We might not have much time. If we’re… between places, we’ll get pulled back.”

“Pulled back to where?”

She shook her head. “Could be anywhere. Could be nothing.”

Her honesty didn’t surprise Y/n. Laura had always been straightforward, especially with him. No sugarcoating, no false promises—just truth, no matter how hard. It was one of the things he loved about her.

“If we get separated again—” she started, but he didn’t let her finish.

“We won’t.” Y/n cupped her cheek, his thumb brushing the edge of her jaw. “I’m not letting you go. Not this time.”

Her eyes searched his, and for a moment, Y/n saw the fear beneath her tough exterior—not fear for herself, but for him. For their life, she was terrified of building and losing. But instead of pulling away, she leaned into his touch, her hand covering his.

“I’m not letting go either,” she whispered, her voice steady.

And then the Void shuddered violently as if some unseen force was tearing it apart at the seams. A cold wind—if Y/n could call it that—swept through the space, pulling at his clothes, his skin, his very essence.

“Hold on!” Laura shouted over the roar of the collapsing Void, her claws digging into Y/n’s arm—not to hurt him, but to anchor him to her.

The world around them spiraled into a blur of light and shadow, ripping the two of you from the nothingness. Y/n’s grip on Laura’s hand tightened, every fiber of his being focused on one thing: not losing her again.

And then—

A burst of light.

Y/n hit the solid ground with a force that knocked the wind from your lungs, the impact jarring but strangely familiar. The world was no longer empty; it was filled with noise, color, and sensation.

Blinking, Y/n looked around and found himself sprawled on the floor of a dimly lit room—somewhere in the ruins of an old safehouse, with broken furniture and shattered windows. Rain pattered against the cracked glass, the smell of damp wood and old memories heavy in the air.

And there, next to him, was Laura.

She groaned softly, pushing herself up on one elbow, her dark hair clinging to her face. For a second, her eyes scanned the room, sharp and calculating, before they found him.

“You okay?” she asked, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear.

“Yeah,” Y/n breathed, relief washing over him like a tidal wave. “You?”

Laura gave him a small nod, and then—unexpectedly—she smiled. It wasn’t a full smile, more like a subtle curve at the corner of her lips, but it was real. And in that moment, it was everything.

“You weren’t kidding about not letting go,” she said, glancing down at their still-intertwined hands.

Y/n grinned, squeezing her fingers gently. “Told you.”

For once, she didn’t tease him. Instead, she just looked at him, her expression soft in a way he rarely saw. “Good.”

The two of them stayed there for a moment, hands still locked together as if the world outside didn’t exist. And maybe, in that moment, it didn’t.

No matter where they were—whether in the Void or the real world—they had each other. And that was enough.

Bonus Chapter:

The safe house was quiet, save for the steady patter of rain against the broken windows. Outside, the storm rolled on, draping the night in curtains of mist and cold air. But in the dim, flickering light of the room, warmth slowly settled between Y/n and Laura.

They sat together on the dusty floor, backs resting against a crumbling wall. The world felt heavy, like the fight to get here—wherever here was—had taken every ounce of strength they had. But Laura’s head resting on Y/n’s shoulder made it all feel worth it.

Y/n glanced down at her, tracing the curve of her profile. Even with her dark hair in disarray, dirt streaking her face, and exhaustion pulling at the edges of her eyes, she was beautiful in the way only she could be—fierce and fragile at the same time.

“You know,” he murmured, breaking the silence, “I always wondered if we’d get a quiet moment like this.”

Laura gave a small huff, a half-scoff, half-laugh. “Didn’t think we’d find it in the middle of… whatever the hell just happened.”

Y/n chuckled, brushing his thumb over the back of her hand, which was still entwined with his. “You think it’s over? The Void, I mean.”

Laura’s gaze grew distant for a moment, the storm outside reflecting the storm inside her mind. “Nothing ever really ends for people like us.” She turned to look at him, her green eyes softer now. “But maybe this is enough.”

“Just us?” Y/n asked.

“Yeah,” she whispered. “Just us.”

Silence settled again, but this time, it was comfortable. Y/n felt the tension between them begin to ease, the weight of their shared past slowly unraveling in the dark.

“Do you think… this is real?” The question slipped from Y/n’s lips before he could stop it.

Laura didn’t answer right away. Instead, she leaned in, her breath brushing against his skin. And then, without a word, she kissed him.

It wasn’t a kiss of desperation or fear, like the ones shared in the Void. This kiss was something else—steady, deliberate, and filled with a tenderness that made Y/n’s heartache. She kissed him like someone who had learned to hope again like he was the one constant in a world that never stopped shifting beneath her feet.

When she pulled away, her forehead rested against his, her voice barely above a whisper. “Does that feel real enough?”

Y/n’s chest tightened with something close to joy. He smiled against her lips. “Yeah… it feels real.”

For a while, neither of them moved, content to exist in the quiet together. It was a rare thing—peace. They’d spent so long-running, fighting, and searching that they’d forgotten what it was like to just be. But here, with Laura curled up beside him, her hand still in his, it felt like Y/n had finally found his way home.

The storm outside began to ease, the rain softening to a gentle drizzle. The safehouse, though cold and abandoned, felt almost cozy in the dim light. Y/n pulled Laura closer, draping his arm around her shoulders as she tucked herself against his side.

“Think we’ll stay here?” he asked, voice low.

“For a little while,” she said, her words warm against his neck. “Not forever.”

Y/n nodded. That was enough. He didn’t need forever—just the here and now.

Laura shifted slightly, resting her head on Y/n’s chest, and he felt her breath even out. The steady rhythm of her breathing, the rain outside, the way her fingers stayed tangled with his—it all grounded him. Y/n wasn’t in the Void anymore. He was here. Together.

And no matter where the world took him next—whether it pulled him into another fight, another mission, or another endless night—Y/n knew one thing for certain.

He had Laura. And she had him.

In the end, that was all that mattered.

[romanitas]

friends, pals, countrymen, etc - here we are nearly ten years later with the final installment of my percabeth spy au. still kind of shocked after all this time i managed to finish it, but thanks for coming along for the ride! <3

here it is on ao3 ! this one's for you, spy au anons. -

Annabeth goes to the stupid aquarium. 

It takes her over a week to decide to use the tickets, if only as a favor to Sally. It takes her another few days of backtracking through old notes, determined to make sure she goes on one of the days Percy isn’t volunteering. She logics herself into it by determining it’ll be a conclusion - she’ll create the real ending for herself where she started it all first. One more visit, because she honestly doesn’t know if she’ll be able to hit up this particular aquarium ever again. She can say goodbye and create her own bookend. 

She wears her owl earrings, matched with a pair of leggings, with pockets, and a long tunic with an old jean jacket split open at one elbow. She doesn’t get to dress down much, with most of her wardrobe often carefully calculated for the task at hand. Today her only task is to look at some fucking fish and maybe get a strawberry milkshake from the overpriced cafeteria. She doesn’t even brush her hair. She thinks about inviting someone to come along, given she has two tickets, but she’s struck with the notion that she wouldn’t even know who to task. 

Reyna? Ridiculous. She’d get called out immediately for it being a bad idea. She almost texts Frank, but decides she needs to do this by herself. Maybe there’s a family she can pass off the other ticket to and that can be her good deed of the day. Sally would approve. 

She arrives at the lunch rush, slipping into the jellyfish quarter while most of the families are scurrying off to eat. She likes to say she thinks long and hard about her life, but mostly she allows herself to be distracted by the way they light up against the dark tanks. They float aimlessly and Annabeth wonders what the sensation is like as she watches them swim idly around, to be so weightless and mindless. 

She walks through the shark tunnel, dodging around running children. She spends a moment studying the arch of the tunnel itself, smiling to herself before she realizes. Maybe there’s a world out there where she did go the architecture route instead of espionage recruitment out of college. She doesn’t want to think about that, not when there are fish to observe. There are so many fish. Too many fish. If she’s honest with herself, they start to blur together after a while, and only the brightly colored ones stand out. 

Part of her hates to admit it, but she starts to feel calmer. Steadier. Like when she walks out of this place, she’ll be Annabeth Chase again and ready to stop moping like a goddamn idiot. 

She probably shouldn’t have saved the penguins for last. 

There are babies now, and Annabeth finds herself smiling at them in the tank. They don’t look too young, but she can’t tell how far from infancy they are at this point. She’s no expert. She just has wikipedia. She tries to remember what she’s read or learned about them, and even though she’d rather not think of the source, she’s not sure she’ll ever forget the facts. 

She’s watching one of the babies slowly and carefully slide into the water when she hears him. 

“Annabeth?”

Her entire body freezes, and she wants to disappear, maybe into one of the artificial icebergs. She looks sideways in the glass and finds the warped reflection of Percy Jackson staring at her from the left. Unfortunately for her desire to submerge, the glass is only transparent for eyes and not bodies. She takes a deep breath without moving her chest and slowly, carefully turns around, looking into his face for the first time in weeks. 

He looks tired. 

Percy stares at her, befuddled, but he’s made the first move by calling out to her. She hadn’t seen him. He could have just walked away and left her ignorant to his existence, but he hadn’t. And maybe it’s just his ADHD, but she selfishly thinks maybe he made the choice to get her attention - which means she has no choice of her own but to acknowledge him in return. 

She swallows. And then she gestures stupidly at the baby penguin behind her. “Did you know baby penguins have to be at least four months old before they can swim? It’s their feathers. They aren’t waterproof at birth.” 

He continues staring at her, and she has to fight the urge to literally run away. “I do know. I’m pretty sure I told you that.”

Shit, he did, didn’t he? She had pre-gamed enough penguin facts to steer their first conversation, but anything and everything she learned since came from his wealth of aquatic knowledge. “Oh. Yes. I just - there are babies now.” 

“Born just over four months ago,” he says, and his tone is the faintest bit teasing.

“Hatched by the males,” she adds on, without thinking. Like his attention to her architectural rants, she seems to have absorbed far too much about penguins, because she could keep going, and it’s only force of will that she doesn’t. 

His mouth quirks, almost a smile. She doesn’t know what to do with that. She wasn’t sure she’d get to see him smile again, stuck with the image of only his anger as a final parting gift. 

“Did you put a tracker on me?”

Annabeth doesn’t know what to do with that either, and she sputters. It’s ungraceful. Unprofessional. And she feels ashamed, despite the way his tone still sounds like a joke. “No - Percy, no, that’s - ”

He grimaces. “Sorry. It was a joke. I’m trying to not be awkward. It’s not working.”

She would very much like the earth to swallow her up. 

“I wouldn’t,” she insists, finally. Like she needs him to know that. 

He pauses. “Jason?”

Annabeth wrinkles her nose. She hates this turn of conversation, but she wants to let him steer it this time. “There were never any trackers.” 

“What are you doing here?” he asks, pivoting away on his own. 

“I’m visiting the penguins,” she says, with only sincerity. He studies her, like he’s trying to gauge how truthful it is. She fidgets, then adds on, “You weren’t supposed to be here.” 

He actually looks shyly taken aback. “I changed my days at the station. I thought it might be…” Safer, is the word he wants to use, she knows it, but instead he lets it hang in the air. “So I had to switch my day here too.”

Annabeth thinks she really should have accounted for that, because Percy can be obtuse but he’s not stupid. It was probably one of the first things he would have done, and she feels stupid for not considering it in her own plans. 

“Your mom gave me the tickets,” is what she says next in lieu of anything else. That’s part of why she’s here, duty to a simple kindness from Sally Jackson. 

Percy’s expression becomes puzzled. “You saw my mom?” 

Oh. That surprises her too. She assumed Sally would have passed it along. She nods. She does not say anything about her own conversation with his mother, because that means he really is here by pure happenstance, and she doesn’t know what to make of that. Everything about her interactions with Percy Jackson from the start has been pure calculation, and right now she feels like she is flying on the seat of her pants. There’s no end game, no goal, just spontaneity. 

Maybe she should lean into that instead. 

“She bought me a coffee.” 

“That… sounds like her.” He pauses. “I didn’t tell her anything. About - you know, your job stuff. All she knows is we broke up.”

He says it like it’s such a normal occurrence. They broke up, like a real couple does. They broke up, they’re no longer together, and not because she shot a man in front of him and lied about her entire existence. “She was probably too nice to me,” she admits. 

Percy looks up and studies her again, and she swallows nervously, both under his expression and the way he doesn’t refute her comment about his mom. “What did she tell you?”

There is a part of her that feels like she shouldn’t go there, but the other, louder, part of her doesn’t want to lie to him ever again. “She - she said you were miserable.”

His shoulders deflate. “Well. She’s not wrong.”

Annabeth stares at him. 

“Look,” he starts, running a hand through his hair. It makes the dark strands stick up in multiple directions, and she needs to clamp down on the urge to fix it for him like she used to. “I was really mad. Part of me still is. But… it was real to me, you know? I can’t just erase what I feel. I’m still working through it.” 

Her expression falls, her shoulders heavy too. “For what it’s worth,” she starts, not sure it’s worth much of anything, “I’ve been miserable too.” 

Percy’s face scrunches up. “Even though it was fake?”

She bites her lip. “I might have met you under false pretenses. But I wasn’t lying to you, when I told you it wasn’t fake to me anymore. I spent so much time with you that I found myself wishing more than anything else it was real. I promise. If you believe one thing I say, believe me now when I promise that I’m never going to lie to you again.” 

He looks up at her, green eyes scrutinizing her like she’s under a microscope. Instead of trying to hide or put up a front, Annabeth simply lets the unhappiness hang on her like a shroud. Her bag is falling off her shoulder, the dark circles almost feel physical beneath her eyes, and her hair is a borderline rat's nest. She was always very carefully put together in front of him, even when she was trying to appear casual. Nothing about her right now is pre-planned for Percy. In some ways, she’s glad for it. 

He just watches her, and his frown deepens. She bites her lip and resists the urge to look away at the penguins. 

“Okay,” he says, after a too long silence, and she stares at him like he spoke in Greek. “I believe you.”

Her jaw drops, but she smoothly closes it. Her voice is quiet, anxious, startled and hopeful all at once, and she can’t seem to compartmentalize any of it. “You do?”

Percy purses his lips, like he can’t believe what he’s saying either. “I’ve never seen you like this,” he says, gesturing, and Annabeth’s face goes red at her dishevelment. “It feels like I’m looking at the real Annabeth, you know?”

She barks out a laugh, then covers her mouth. “Sorry, that wasn’t - I’m just not really fit for polite company. Fish notwithstanding.” 

“Yeah,” he says, and he grins a little. “I think that’s why I believe you.” 

Annabeth swallows anxiously and blinks back a sudden onslaught of tears. “I’m sorry, Percy. I know it was my job, but you’re so… good. At some point, it started to feel like I wasn’t pretending. I realized I really, really liked being around you. Being your friend, being with you. You didn’t deserve me lying to you, regardless of how it started.”

The last time she apologized, they were arguing. Now he just looks at her. “Thank you,” he says. It’s not quite forgiveness, it’s not an ‘it’s okay’ or the standard follow up etiquette of apologies, but it’s better, she thinks, because it feels genuine. Like he is accepting the truth of it, that she is sorry, and the fact that he believes it settles in her in an odd way. 

“Are you still… you know. Uh, working?” 

She nearly laughs at his word choice. “I’m on break. And I’m not - I was pulled from the Jupiter Industries stuff. So I’m not… working.” 

“So you’re literally just here at the aquarium for fun?” 

She hesitates, though she doesn’t know why. “Yes. And, well, you know - Sally gave me the tickets. I felt like I should use them, after our conversation.” She pauses. “I think she’s worried about you.”

Percy runs a hand through his hair again. She knows he hates stressing his mother. She knows so many things about him that she can’t seem to put down. “She always worries too much. Can I ask what else she said to you?”

It’s phrased in a way that she could turn him down, but Annabeth has promised herself as well as him that she’s in the running to be honest. 

“She asked me if I wanted to fix things with you. I told her I didn’t know if I could.” It’s not all she asked. Annabeth just doesn’t know how to bring the other part up, or if she even should.

Percy frowns. “Do you… actually want to fix things?” 

Annabeth draws in a quiet breath. “I miss you,” she admits, and his face twists with surprise and what could be relief, but maybe she’s projecting. “But I wasn’t lying when I told her I didn’t know if I could. I hurt you. It’s not up to me to forgive myself for it, no matter how much I miss you.”

His frown deepens, but he doesn’t look unhappy - more like thoughtful. “I can’t believe she didn’t tell me,” he mumbles. 

“I don’t think she wanted to interfere too much,” she offers quietly. “There’s one more thing.”

Percy looks up at her. 

Annabeth swallows again, but this time she’s pushing down her pride. “She asked me if I loved you.”

He looks at her carefully. “What did you tell her?”

She keeps his gaze. “I said I did.” She curls in on herself a little. “I do.”

Something in Percy Jackson deflates, but not in a way that suggests loss. It’s like he’s stopped carrying a heavy box. His shoulders sink, even if his face looks as confused as it does lighter. “It’s like everything in me wants to believe it. And I think I do,” he starts. 

Annabeth’s stomach flutters. 

“It’s crazy. Like, it’s so crazy to me that you still love me, because everything about it is so… wrong? No, not wrong - but we started wrong. We started wrong, but everything I felt was still so real. The bad and the good. I was really scared at that restaurant, for the obvious reasons - but I think I was scared about what it meant for us too.” Percy puffs out a breath of air, and his eyebrows crinkle. “I don’t have a good sense of self-preservation.”

Annabeth can barely breathe. She holds herself back from reaching for his arm. “Do you think… we could start over, and do it right?”

Percy studies her again, wary but curious. “What, like a do-over?”

“I guess. A re-meet.”

“A real meet-cute?”

She cracks a small smile. “I mean, I did run into you randomly in the aquarium.”

“Happenstance fishes.”

“We’re by the penguins,” she corrects, automatically. “Happenstance birds.”

Percy cracks his own smile, dimple pinching his cheek. “Did you know the babies don’t swim until they’re four months old?”

Annabeth’s smile widens. “You know, someone might have told me that already,” she starts. “But I could use a refresher.” 

“I’m still on shift,” he says, a little awkwardly. “But I’ll be done in about two hours.”

It takes a few moments for what he offers to sink in. It doesn’t seem fair or right to her at all that Percy Jackson is here before her, yet again in front of the stupid penguins, willingly telling her when he’s finished - offering to spend more time with her. But it’s better this time. There’s no frustration on her part, no trying to drag it out of him - he’s offering because he’s also offering her a chance, and Annabeth knows she is going to take it, regardless of how much she deserves it. She’s going to work to deserve it. Neither of them were forced to be here. She isn’t coercing him into a date. She’s letting him lead it. 

And he’s still choosing to see her. 

“I still have to visit some octopi,” she says, nerves alight, “But I could meet you back here in two hours…?” 

Percy’s silence is scary, but Annabeth gives him the time. It’s a final shot for him to back out if he wants to, and she won’t even blame him if he changes his mind even now. But he’s Percy. And somehow, she isn’t surprised by his answer. 

“Sounds like a plan.” 

Annabeth is going to cry all over again. She holds out her hand instead, and even though he gives her a confused look, Percy takes it. She shakes it, relishing the feeling of his palm against hers, the warmth spreading through her fingers as he squeezes it. She thought she’d never get to experience his touch again. 

“Hi,” she starts, feeling silly, but allowing herself to run with it. No more thinking or calculating, she’s just going with this strange flow. “I’m Annabeth Chase.”

He laughs, his own smile edging on silly too. “Percy Jackson. Hey.”

“Do you work here?” she asks, trying not to smile and failing completely. 

He shakes his head. “I just volunteer. I’m a firefighter.”

“You got some kind of affinity for water?”

He breaks into a grin that’s almost a laugh. “I’ve always liked the ocean.” He pauses then, hesitation slipping into his face. “What about you?” 

She studies his face, the kindness and the anger and everything in between flashing through her head. She’s already memorized it, but she can still bask in it anew. She doesn’t really know where she’s going from here, least of all with Percy, but she once again opts for honesty, even if nothing comes of it. “I’m thinking I might get into architecture.”

Percy looks surprised. “Sounds like a big change.”

Annabeth pulls her hand away, straightens her shoulders. “Sometimes a person comes along and gives you a whole new perspective on things.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. We’ll see. I’m working on it. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking.” 

“I think,” he says, hesitating, “You should do what makes you happy.” 

She laughs. “Again,” she says, quieter this time, “I’m working on it.” 

“In case you haven’t noticed, you’re kind of hyper-competent.”

“Only kind of?” 

Percy snorts. “I just mean, you’ll probably figure it out.” 

She looks at him in wonder, that he could still stand there and offer a kindness to her after everything. It doesn’t surprise her, if she really thinks about it. She fell in love with him for a reason, after all. For a lot of reasons.

“I want you to know me,” she says suddenly, which goes against every single part of her existence as a spy, but Percy has already broken through all of those rules. She wants to be known, by him specifically, which is wildly scary and completely against all manner of protocol, but she is no longer lying to him. She promised. She promised and she wants to open up everything about herself that she’s kept quiet for him to witness. 

Percy’s mouth opens and closes like a nearby fish. “I know you like owls. That wasn’t fake.”

She blinks, and he gestures at her earrings. She touches one instinctively. “They’re my favorite. So is strawberry, and I do really love Gaudí, and I’m starting to really like penguins too.” 

“The penguins are pretty cool,” he says with a very small smile. 

A quiet settles over them after that, but Annabeth finds it’s not uncomfortable. There is going to be some awkwardness, but the thing about it right now is it doesn’t feel scary. All the scariest parts are behind her, and right now she is only looking at the new possibility of Percy Jackson in her life, in whatever capacity he allows. She’ll take any of it. He gets to set the pace this time, and she’s more than willing to allow it. 

“Thank you,” she says, finally. “For giving me another chance.” 

His grin is haphazard, lopsided, and maybe a little self-deprecating. “When I saw you standing there, there was a part of me that wanted to keep walking - but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. Maybe it makes me a little stupid. I really want to know you too. I want to keep knowing you.”  

“I’ve been stupid too,” she says with a shrug. “So we’re off to a great start.” 

“A start,” he says, huffing a laugh. “Not many people get to do that twice.” 

“No,” she agrees. “I thought I was coming here for an ending.”

Percy blinks at her. “I don’t really know what’ll happen, Annabeth.”

“That’s okay,” she says, breathing in deeply and relishing the way the air fills her lungs. She doesn’t know either. But that’s better than finality. “We can work on that too.”

His eyes flicker with a softness she knows she still doesn’t deserve, but she relishes in that too. “So… I guess I’ll see you again in about two hours?” He pauses. “We can get smoothies.”

“I like the Strawberry Whirl.” 

He pauses again. “I knew that had to be true.”

Annabeth laughs, and Percy beams, and she thinks somehow, some way, they’re going to be… okay. It might take time. She doesn’t know what it’s going to look like, fully expects a lot of difficult bridges, but it feels like a real chance she hadn’t expected. They could be friends. They could end up more. They could go absolutely nowhere and fall apart much more naturally, more smoothly, without blood and bullets - but she’s going to try very hard to avoid that. She’s going to be herself, and maybe that’ll be good enough for him to stick around. It’s the only way she’s going to enable the mere chance of it. 

As far as she’s concerned, anything involving Percy from now on is always going to be real. 

[malyce19]

Hi.

I’m working on coming back to the world of fic writing after a very long hiatus. TLDR I got sober and had a baby and my perspective on the whole world changed, as it does. So if you’ve liked my fics in the past, I’m sorry I’ve been MIA for so long. Here’s a teaser of what I’m working on right now. It’s called State Lines.

“there’s no such thing as a clean break when your heart starts bleeding out.” - chance peña

Day 1

She sold her penthouse and bought the car. A gray sedan, plenty of room for all of the belongings she cared enough to travel with. Nothing flashy, something reliable and low maintenance that wouldn’t call too much attention to her presence as she made her escape. All that mattered to her was that the car’s suspension wasn’t impacted by all of the emotional weight she was bringing with her on this journey to nowhere. She should have said something, she knows that. But what do you say when you’re leaving everything and everyone behind?

She didn’t know where she was going, not that it really mattered. She’d been driving for two days, only stopping for gas and compulsory restroom and food breaks. The more distance she could place between herself and blonde haired blue eyed loves of her life, the better. So she drove, vaguely eastbound with stinging eyes and an aching heart.

Miles passed and the road lines started to feel like metaphors, lines in the proverbial sand. Endless expanses of pavement and exit signs beckoned her forward, the promise of anonymity and rebirth lingering somewhere on the horizon as she drove. As her old life burned to cinders behind her, she felt less like a phoenix and more like a nondescript speck of ash, floating aimlessly on the wind. And maybe that’s all she was now, without her.

Day 3

By day three, Lena had to stop to sleep. She’d pushed herself as far as she could, coffee and disgustingly sweet energy drinks sustaining her only to the point of blurred vision and shaking hands. So she found a slightly innocuous looking hotel a few miles off the highway in northern Texas, pulling her borrowed (now stolen) NCU baseball cap down as far as it would go to obscure her features as she checked in. It helped, she supposed, that the kid behind the counter couldn’t drag his eyes away from the football game he was watching long enough to look her in the eye, so being recognized wasn’t an issue. She paid for the room in cash, as she had with everything else on this trip, and she tipped the boy an extra $100 bill to ensure housekeeping left the room alone until she’d checked out. Leaving a paper trail would defeat the purpose of a clean break, and she couldn’t risk being recognized by a well-meaning staffer trying to offer more towels.

In the safety of a locked hotel room, Lena took her hair down and tossed the duffle bag on the bed. It was getting dark out, and she closed the heavy curtains to keep her eyes from searching the clear sky for familiar streaks of red and blue. It was only a matter of time, she knew, before her absence would become obvious. She’d left LCorp on sabbatical, leaving Sam at the helm for the time being, vaguely committing to take the reins again sometime in the future. Her new phone was blissfully quiet, Sam and Jess the only two she trusted with the number. News alerts about superheroes and aliens and secret government agencies were disabled, and all that graced her lock screen was a stock photo of some rainy trees.

As she sat down on the bed, exhaustion starting to settle into every nerve, she couldn’t help but wonder how the hell she got here. Not physically, that was obvious. She bought a car and drove for three straight days until she realized she was endangering the other drivers (though there’d been very few) by continuing on like this. She just didn’t trust herself to keep going without rest, so here she was, in a Hilton hotel in fucking Lubbock, of all places. Trust. That’s what this all boiled down to, wasn’t it? Misplaced trust, betrayal of trust, lack of trust where it was dutifully earned with literal blood, sweat and tears. Trust, broken and shattered and disintegrated in one fell swoop with her former favorite person’s too-little-too-late confession.

[miradelletarot]

Hello my lovely!

Here is a song to hopefully inspire you. Sending you love. <3

OK my dear @sorceresssundries. I truly hope you like this. I'm deeply sorry it took me so long to finish this, but I yeeted my soul from the depths so I could finish it. (Not beta'd so please no one come for me if there are any mistakes or anything.)

Just letting y'all know...It's sad, but tender. But also sad. I'm sorry, but also suffer with me.

Also uploaded to AO3 SFW, but cw for implied death. Words: 1453 ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Somewhere

Gale opened his eyes, blinking a few times until he adjusted to the sunlight that filtered in through the open window.

He sighed once he realized that he was once again alive to see another day. With an outstretched hand he slid his fingers along the empty sheets where Tav used to lay. The sheets were cold and vacant, but if he tried hard enough he could still smell their unique fragrance embedded into the mattress. Yet another reminder that they were no longer by his side, another day he must wake up alone.

Every day took more effort than the last to rouse his aging body from the bed that slowly became his prison. After a while, he fell into a routine. He’d wake, longingly caress Tav’s side of the bed, pad over to the bathroom and stare into the mirror vacantly studying the man before him, a man he no longer recognized. The years have clouded his eyes, his long hair and beard were unkempt and wiry, and it seemed a new wrinkle would appear every day. Why did he bother looking? There wasn’t anything to see anymore.

He shuffled to the kitchen and stared into the larder only to sigh and walk out without anything to eat, retreating to the terrace with a book that he would barely read.

Books were nothing more than words on old pages, strung together in meaningless clusters without form or understanding, food lacked flavor and excitement, his natural curiosity waned until it vanished into the unknown depths of forgotten brilliance. But there he would sit, the terrace his only refuge, and the comfort of holding a tome he’d never actually read.

The words on the page began to bleed together resembling spilled ink to his tired eyes. He sighed and set the book aside, resting his hands in his lap as he closed his eyes. For a moment, he took in the sounds of the sea below, slipping into a trance from the rhythmic ebbing and flowing of the waves rolling along the shore.

Astra navigabimus. More than anything these days, that incantation was the only thing that brought solace. Gale preferred his time in the Astral Sea, the most beautiful illusion he ever conjured, especially when he made Tav.

He stood at the edge of the astral waters, his bare feet kissed by gentle laps of water as he took a moment to center himself, and gaze into the expanse of his new reality.

Off in the distance was the small boat he brought Tav to their first time in the illusion. His crows’ feet deepened as he smiled longingly. He walked across a narrow path of stepping stones, traversing the empyrean sea until he reached the aimlessly floating craft.

Once he climbed in he could feel the depths of the water beneath him as the boat rocked, taking a deep breath and relaxing his shoulders as all the stress and tension he left behind in the material world melted away. His body ached a little less here, the weightlessness of the world around him made him feel anew.

“Gale, my love!” His eyes sparkled as Tav materialized before him, conjured together with shimmering stars and swirling colors. “You came back to me.” They smiled, their longing evident in their ethereal gaze.

“Of course, dearest. My heart beats only for you, my love.” He extended his hands to Tav, his fingers delicately tangling with theirs.

The longer he stayed, the more detailed Tav’s form became until they resembled their mortal body, though never quite becoming as real as Gale desired.

“Gods I miss you, Tav.” “I miss you too.”

He leaned in to press his forehead to theirs only to be met with no resistance, and merging with their celestial manifestation. His hands slipped from theirs as he leaned back, retreating from their incorporeal touch. Yet another reminder of what he’d lost, what he’ll never get back.

Tav reached out and placed their hand on Gale’s cheek. “You look tired, my sweet love.”

He sighed as he leaned into the tingling sensation that resembled their mortal touch. “Perhaps I am, but I’m worlds better now that I’m at your side.” His eyes softly closed as he leaned into the feeling, illusory as it may be, he didn’t care.

Tav watched him, their gaze curious and almost vacant, silently observing the withering man before them. After a moment, they pulled their hand away as it came to rest in their lap.

Gale’s eyes shot open as the tingling feeling vanished instantly. For a moment, he was reminded of the emptiness he felt when they died. He slowly turned his head towards the shore, just beyond it a swirling void daring to suck him back in, and return him to the dismal existence he left behind as he sat in meditation on his terrace.

“Gale? What troubles you, sweet love?”

“I should go back,” he whispered as he turned his somber gaze back to Tav. “I cannot stay long. You know that.”

Tav rested their hand on Gale’s, the other tilting his chin so he could meet their starry gaze. “Stay with me. Please don’t go.” Their eyes swirled like shimmering pools of stardust, capturing Gale in a mesmerizing, breathless reverie. “I love you.”

Gale released a soft, shuddering breath as their words drifted over him. “Gods I love you, too. More than anything,” he breathed. “Then stay.” Tav’s insistent plea was like a prayer. “You made this place for us. For me. It’s so lonely without you.”

“I’d drift along this endless sea with you forever if I could, my love.” “Then come with me.” The boat remained steady as Tav stood and extended their hand out to Gale. “Leave the boat behind, and come with me.”

“Leave the – I don’t know if I can…” His brow furrowed as he considered Tav’s words.

“You can. I’ll be with you. Just take my hand.” Tav’s face fell as Gale stared at them in disbelief. “Remember what you said to me once? ‘Don't be alarmed – I’m here with you.’” They paused, gently raking their fingers through his hair and caressing their hand down, coming to rest on his cheek. “I’m right here. I’ve got you. Just take my hand…let me show you the world you created for us.” Without tearing his eyes away from Tav, he reached up to his cheek, and wrapped his hand around theirs. The boat rocked as he stood, and he froze. Uncertainty flickered in his aging eyes as he wrestled the war between the safety of his tower, and the blissful peace of his illusion. The water rippled out from the boat, and he watched as they grew and faded out in the distance, far beyond where he’d ever gone before.

But Tav would be his anchor, his guide, his beacon. Tav was his reason for living those many years ago. They were always his light. Never leaving his side, even when he didn’t realize how much he needed their strength. Their compassion.

Tav watched him with that same vacant, ethereal gaze, their wisping form patient and still.

Gale let out a deep, shuddering breath. “Alright,” he whispered. “Alright…I’m with you, my love.” He smiled as the fear in his chest gave way to an eerie sense of calm and safety washed over him. “Show me more.” Tav burned brightly, smiling with unbridled joy. It had been years since Gale had seen that smile. They stepped out of the boat and stood on the water. “It’ll be alright. I have you.” He took another breath, steadying himself before he stepped over the starboard side of the boat. The water rippled as his feet touched the surface, and he tightened his grip on Tav’s hand on instinct.

“Are you ready?” Gale took a moment, letting the words sink in. He had expected to feel more scared and uncertain, but all he felt was peace. Safety. Like the journey he was about to embark on was the most sure thing he’d even done in the world. “Yes, my love. More than anything.”

Tav stepped closer, lifting their joined hands slightly as they laced their fingers together. A bright light emanated from their bond, and Tav leaned in for a kiss. Gale sighed softly as their lips met his, closing his eyes as he melted into Tav’s embrace. 

Little by little his corporeal form faded and drifted into the sea as Tav’s light poured into him. They pulled away and smiled, gazing at their love before them.

He looked younger. His tousled hair flowing like stardust, eyes bright and swirling like nebulae.

“Come, my sweet love,” Tav smiled. “I’ve so much to show you.”

[wannabepoeticischiya]

if I can stop one heart from breaking

[ 07 ] — the promise

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He existed in the morning dew, in the afternoon haze, within the illusions of twilight. He was there. In the silence of midnight, in the wake of dawn... he was there.

Hoshina Soushiro was everywhere... except right here. He existed in every corner of the cosmos-just not in the space beside her.

Rivers of sunlight streamed through the windows, painting everything in the room an ardent white. Waves of flowing curtains waltzed to the tune hummed by the winter zephyr. Clouds drifted in the rivers of the ether, floating aimlessly before disappearing into the horizon.

Muffled footfalls echoed within the empty halls, trotting softly before coming to a halt.

Soushiro took a deep breath, letting the tension leave his body. He leaned against the threshold, careful not to tilt what he held, and slid the door open with his foot as soundlessly as he could.

If he was to be honest, the swordsman never thought he’d see the day he’d be itching to suppress every little noise. Growing up, Soushiro was a rambunctious child—and he still was—albeit a lot more tamed than then.

A free spirit, or so he would claim but in truth, it was just nicer to hear than ‘out of control’.

No place was hushed to a fault if he was there. His demons and angels joined forces to ensure that there would be no room for the stillness to settle, choosing to fill the void with deafening laughter, animated chatter, or even vexing teasing—anything so long as the vortex of doubt stayed far away as possible.

He was so certain that it would never change—and even now, he was sure he’d remain that way.

But here, where she lies awake in the world of her dreams… the voices in his head spoke in the love of silence.

Her figure lay covered by oceans of white, her breaths coming in long, patterned rises and falls. Threads of [h/c] pooled in the basin of her pillow, strings aglow with sunlight.

Soushiro treaded in caution, afraid she’ll suddenly wake. A pleasing scent of pastry danced in the air. Hurriedly, he turned the corner of her bed to set the tray down by her desk, the same one that was far too small to fit them both, and swatted away the air like it’ll rid of the aroma that already flooded the room.

[Name] turned in her sleep, as though her unconscious state knew that he was standing there—a breath away—no matter the mindfulness he spilled into his movements. Still, her eyes remained shut, choosing to remain in the cradles of slumber.

And Soushiro could do nothing but stare—frozen in place at the sight of her. Because how could it be true?

That at this moment, he was hers to keep, as much as she was his.

She looks like a princess. And he reckons he’d think so even at the ends of the universe, of time—of infinity. Because there was none like her in all the worlds. Even now, as the sun itself was fortunate enough to fall on her body, there was no inked mirror… for what miracle could ever be great enough to replicate her beauty.

Soushiro draws closer, slowly, like any signs of haste would chase her away. He kneels, chin resting on the planes of her covers as he raises a hand to hover over the hills of her cheeks, enough to graze her warmth but never sufficient to bask in it, as the other tangled in the roots of her silken hair.

Here, as she’s showered in the waters of daylight, shifting in the blankets he put her under, breathing softly—not a care for the world… he whispers.

“I’m in love with you.”

Soushiro was sure of it. And he vows that even if the souls of the living and the dead were to turn and raise arms against them, he would never revoke his words. Because if there was a place between heaven and heaven, [Name] is what he’s sure was in everything in between. He would choose eternal damnation over a life devoid of her—live a life where she did not know that his soul loved her so.

It dawns on him then, that he has never told her these words. His most fervent daydreams held the image of her, every waking thought, in all his breaths, there existed a piece of her. She was in everything he saw: visions by the sidewalk, fragments of the future, hopes manifesting into his reality. To him, she was the embodiment of love… everything that could have saved him and all that will.

Yet, Soushiro had never once told [Name] that he loves her.

Her nose scrunched in discomfort from the beaming sun rays. Quick to act, the swordsman moved from his position, shielding her face from the light. He secretly hoped she’d drift once more into the rivers of sleep just so he’d have a few more seconds to carve the image of her in his soul. A few more moments to think about the things he was too afraid to say.

[Name]’s eyes fluttered open, a small smile adorning her face swallowed by a yawn. And she turned to gaze at him, most sure that he existed in this space, only to be met by the vivid daylight; empty was the space beside her.

Panic swirled in her veins, where could her lover have gone? Because she was certain that just a moment ago, he was here. In a flicker of haze, his shadow painted over her. A heartbeat passed, and his caress flared. Did her mind conjure his image simply because she had dreamt of him? That she missed him so? Was his loving touch nothing but an illusion cast by the alchemists in her mind?

[Name] hopes that he wasn’t.

Her heart hummed a melody of melancholy, unsure of it all.

What grief would overcome her should he cease to be part of her waking moments? She’d choose his bothersome teasing, the roars of his laughter, rambles of his passion. Anything. So long as he does not treat her as a stranger.

A rhythmic clatter rang from the side of the room—footsteps thudded against the floors, unrestrained by the fear of her waking. [Name] caught a glimpse of violet, the same hue as the man from her dreams—from her memories. Familiar rings of calculated footsteps magnetized her lips upwards, a smile blossoming on the gardens of her face.

You’re here, she thought, raising a hand to touch him—to see if he was really there. When Soushiro leaned into her warmth, the earnest longing bubbling in the cauldrons of her stomach had eased, sparking to a flame that burned with contentment.

Weight rested on one side of her bed, both from Soushiro and the tray he set down: covered in plates of tarts and macaroons, and one for a tower of waffles drizzled in syrup. A glass of milk was on the side, accompanied by a bundle of roses. Red as the eyes of the one who gave them. Tender as the heart that beseeched their presence.

“Happy Birthday.”

Soushiro takes off his coat along with his scarf, revealing his black knitted turtleneck and trousers. He had hurried to arrange his gift the second he got everything he needed, rushing from the kitchen to her room, completely forgetting that he needed to take off the extra layers of clothing.

[Name] might just cry at the sight of him: pupils dilated to the brim, violet strands sticking from every which way, redness dusting the hills of his cheeks. What time of the morn did he wake? To have gotten here at seven in the morning and not look the least bit out of breath—disheveled, yes. Worn out? Oh, heavens he was far from that.

Silver brimmed the horizons of her eyes, crybaby, she would think. A behavior such as that is unfit for a lady. Yet, a part of her mind prompted her to think otherwise. If the erratic thrums of her heart were any help, [Name] could almost see that her eyes held just as much adoration for him as he did with her. If only her vision did not explode like a supernova at the sight of him, she would see that his collided into a million colors when he looked at her.

[Name] soared in the skies of his love—unladed by anyone’s expectations. Soushiro’s heart did not ask for anything but for her peace, for [Name] to be okay.

How could she not cry when he loves her so?

“What’s wrong, my love?” He whispered, leaning down to wipe the tears that streaked the canvas of her face.

“Nothing.” She would reply, her small hands resting on his. “I just—I love you so much, that’s all.”

Once more, her sentiments blanketed his; enough for the two of them so it seemed. The words lodged in his throat; I love you more—he wanted to speak. But the feel of her tender gaze and her warm embrace would not allow him to.

[Name] had said it already, and it was enough. For now… it is enough.

He breathed in her scent, a silent acknowledgement of her words. “Don’t cry,” he chuckled, tucking a stray lock behind her ear.

“I didn’t wanna wake you,” Soushiro’s words were nothing less than the truth. When he arrived at her room earlier, taking a peek when the blue hour was simmering to welcome the rise of the sun, her figure still lay motionless on the bed. He wanted to ask her to walk around the bay, watch the sunrise if she would… but the gentle breaths that slipped past her nose made him reconsider.

[Name] shifts, adjusting to rise to a sitting position to mirror the man before her.

“I went to your favorite bakery.” He beamed, gesturing to the plates of pastries on the tray laid on her bed. “Do you go there often?” he asked, raising a tart to her lips.

[Name] nods as she took a bite.

“Figures.” He mused, eating the rest of the pastry he had just offered her.

The woman stared at him, dumbstruck. A familiar fiery sensation threatening to set her skin alight. That tart was just in her mouth—

“They knew you by name there, you know.” Soushiro dusted the crumbs from his fingers, nonchalantly like he hadn’t just performed indirect kissing by his one seemingly harmless action.

“Oh, you mean that beautiful princess who lives down the street?” His poor attempt at mimicking the tone of the nice elderly lady almost roused laughter from her—almost. If only it wasn’t for his infuriating teasing that is.

“That is an exaggeration. A lie.” She crossed her arms over her chest.

“Hmm, no it’s not.” Soushiro looked at her again, this time a macaroon held between his fingers. “A princess does live here,” he grinned deviously, unfiltered adoration seeping through his narrow eyes and deliberate dallying.

“Aren’t I right, my princess [Name]~”

[Name]’s face erupted into a thousand shades of red. To think she would be subject to his—his… flirtatious advances so early in the morning!

His laughter echoed within the four corners of her room, pouring gasoline to her chagrin. [Name] swiped the small pink cake from his hold, taking a harsh bite out of it. I’ll get you back for this!

She looked away from him out of pettiness. Sure, it felt like a scummy thing to do—childish, even—but there was no besting Soushiro when it came to aggravating others. The most she could do was ignore his taunts and hope he'll take the hint and cease his ventures.

“Aww, but it’s true!” Soushiro cranes his head and leans his body to try and catch her gaze, careful not to knock over the food.

When she doesn’t turn, he sighs fondly and reaches to cradle the side of her face, tilting it softly so she can face his direction at least.

He swore he could have died at that moment. She is so adorable. [Name]’s eyes were still heavy with sleep, looking away from him as he expected, but in the place where he sought a scowl was an angry pout. Her eyebrows were drawn to one another, forming lines to paint her usually placid expression.

Soushiro’s heart swelled with adoration. His hand that once held one side of her head trailed upwards to smooth out her hair. “You are a princess, my love.” He leaned closer, pressing his lips to her forehead.

[Name] wove her arms around his frame, relishing in the comfort he gave. She could never stay vexed at him. Soushiro had so much more to offer than teasing remarks (thank the heavens).

“I have something else for you,” he mumbles, his lips grazing over the lobes of her ear.

Soushiro patted down the space behind him, wanting to reach what he had in surprise yet not wanting to let go of the woman in his arms.

“You can let go; you know.”

“No, it’s right here, I think.” He replies, still blindly searching for whatever it is that he has in mind.

[Name] peeked over his shoulders. There was nothing but waves of bedsheets in the spaces where his arm could reach. The nearest thing was his coat which was draped over the footboard, and Soushiro wasn’t going to get to that if he kept clinging to her.

“Aha! Here they are.”

Soushiro wedged something in the space between them: a bundle of red flowers. Roses, her mind reminded. Oh, but how could she ever forget?

“I went to this flower store, too.” He took her hand in his, prying her fingers open one by one to curl around the covered stem of the bouquet. “You’re really famous here, aren’t ‘cha?”

[Name] laughed at his discovery, shifting under the blankets she now realizes he must have put her under.

She was indeed, but it wasn’t for the reasons Soushiro would think it was. [Name] did not show magnanimous behavior to the townspeople, and her simple gestures weren’t anything out of the ordinary.  

[Name] went to that bakery to buy bread, just like any other customer would. She didn’t even spend more than ten minutes there when she visited. But somehow, albeit unknowingly, she always made sure to bow to the old lady walking around and restocking the shelves, thanking her for her hard work.

It was the same with the flowers. [Name] would greet the little kid whose hair was the shade of snow; eyes colored the same violet as the hair of her lover. His apathetic front gradually fading with every smile she’d sent his way.   

“I would have never guessed you’d went there,” Soushiro looks at the flowers in her hand, and [Name] pieced his words together, “every birthday.”

But it wasn’t just birthdays. She was there for every beginning of spring and at the end of it. In Summer breaks. After Autumn’s rain. In the bustle of the Winter holidays. [Name]’s visits were scattered in occasions that were swarmed with multiple faces. And every time, unfailingly, she’d ask for roses. She wanted the flower she’d seen countless times, held by different people, all for different reasons. She adored the flower that was favored by everybody. She loved the flower she had never once received.

“When I was my own Valentine, I celebrated it like that, too.” She smiled, tearing her gaze from the roses to look at him instead. “With roses and cakes down the street.”

Until now…

Her laugh echoed in his soul, the same one that fed on deafening volume stilled to a fault when her symphonies rang through his being. I love you. My heart is so full of you that I can’t even call it my own. How much luck did he stack upon one another to have come so close to heaven? It must have been a great deal because why else would heaven look a lot like her?

“But now, I have you.” She whispered as she pressed her forehead against his. Closing her eyes and relishing the comfort of his presence.

“I guess all the setbacks were for something.” He laughs as his hands caged her cheeks, trapping their warmth underneath his palms; every bit for him to take.

“You have me,” Soushiro could feel himself drawing closer—close enough that a breath would set his lips on fire with hers, “And I have you.”

How’s that for luck?

Soushiro’s touch lingered, unsure if it was right to tread that path so lightly. Despite the growing need for change—the desire to claim her lips as his own, he remained true to his beliefs: that he would wait until she would permit him so. Because [Name] deserved that, greater than anything he could possibly give her, she deserved his patience.

He could wait a thousand more years if she told him to. Seize every star in the sky if it makes her happy. Soushiro would move the universe for her, and she will only ever need to ask.

Because here, as he’s surrendered in the loving softness of her arms, his feelings rang truer than ever. I love you, he echoed, feeling his hold tighten—fearful of letting go. I love you so much and you probably don’t even know.  

“—Hiro?”

So, tell her, he would think, still, he remained hiding behind this invisible wall. His hand yearning to hold the person standing on the other side. How could I dream of you and be afraid of your rejection? Of your denial…

“Soushiro?” [Name] broke free from his hold, one hand holding onto his own, twining his fingers with her own as the other rested on his cheek, thumb grazing the plains under his eye.

The swordsman felt his world plummet into frost like the winter was only his to feel. The sun had gone and drowned him in a place brimmed with darkness. Warmth ceased to exist.

It was a life devoid of her, so it seemed.

I can’t change the past… even if I wish that I could. I’d pitch in a request too, you know. To have us meet a lot earlier.

During once upon a time, every second of his waking moment felt like he kindled with the purpose to one day be forgotten—left wandering in darkness.

Even now, it never feels enough, like this image of you will last me a thousand breaths before I will long to see it again.

But flares ignited the damnation away, casting over him in halos of fire, gravitating around his orbit in rings of warmth.

Still, when I look at you—everything, all the little things fall into place. And suddenly, it doesn’t matter. Not the world, or the Kaiju… it’s just you.

All this time, Soushiro thought he was burning to oblivion but now, it just feels like he’s burning so he could see. To light a path that will lead him to her, to the pieces of his dreams. If I can have you—if you will have me… I’ll be set to go.  

“Thank you, [Name].” Soushiro leans into her touch, covering her hand with his trying to pull hers closer.

“I should be the one saying that” she sighs, stroking his face lovingly.

No, because you are everything to be thankful for. How do you bear the weight of being everything to me… to anyone? You are the skies, an endless blue with a love so vast. Daylight shadows you, embedded itself into your soul as though you are one and the same. A vacation for everyone around but you’re the home I will always come back to, the home I will always yearn to be.

Soushiro shook his head, the curtains of his hair rising to give way for crimson irises to stare at the woman he had loved desperately. He wanted to deny her claims, [Name] had nothing to thank him for, or so he wanted to believe.

[Name] thought otherwise. Soushiro liked to think that every bit of his sacrifice would never be enough to be thanked for, that it was something to brush under the carpet. He grew to be faithful to the idea that his efforts were void if he could not see results… but that was not true. To [Name], everything he did was to be grateful for. And she thought, at some point, that no words could ever be enough to bring her gratitude to life.

Because how could you even begin to thank someone who gave you a reason to believe?

She craned her neck to meet his downcast gaze, eager to sever his views, yet when Soushiro did not raise his head to meet her stare, a different scheme flowered in her head.

I’ll give you a reason to look.

[Name] shifted in her seat, placing both her palms on the mountains of broad shoulders, hoisting herself up. But the force of her sudden weight caught him off guard, which along with being snapped out of his daydreams, had him toppling under her pressure.

Soushiro’s back met the soft covers, a curtain of hair shielding his face from the world. [Name]’s hands were on either side of his head, and even without the little grazes of daylight, he could see that her face would put the color of his eyes to shame. Her pupils were dilated to the brim, lips trembling from sheer embarrassment. 

“Well, take me on a date first princess~” as the pads of his fingers touched her cheek, [Name] was shocked out of her own daze, jumping to get as far away from him as possible only to have her head collide against the wall.

“[Name]!” He called in alarm, getting up so fast that his vision spun, merging everything in colors until they narrowed to a single point. Still, it did not have him deter in his need to make sure she was alright.

Soushiro replaced her hand with his own, rubbing soothing circles over the area.

“This is all your fault.” She whimpered, hitting his chest with her now unoccupied hand.

“Yes, it’s all my fault.” He agreed, circling an arm over her shoulders, and pulling her close. “Are you okay? Does it hurt? How many fingers am I holding?”

“How are you gonna do that when you’re hugging me, idiot.” [Name]’s fingers pulled at his clothes, her cries turning to soft sniffling.

The swordsman laughed, caressing the threads of her hair.

“I just wanted to do something for you, too.” [Name] admitted, the hums of his heartbeat lulling hers to match its rhythm.

“You don’t have to—”

“I want to.” [Name] wriggled free from his hold. Soushiro let her do as she pleases, yet he took a hand for his to hold.

“I love you too, you know. So, I want to do things that would make you happy as well. Like what I’d get you for your birthday—” She stopped, tearing her gaze from their tangled hands to look at him gingerly. He knew hers… so, why didn’t she know his?

“What about you, when’s your birthday?”

Soushiro had the audacity to ponder over his answer like it was something that he had trouble recalling. “Hmm…” he placed a hand under his chin, fingers forming a checkmark shape, and pretended to think.

When he saw that [Name] wasn’t having any of it, he yielded and blurted out the truth. “On the twenty-first of November. It’s—”

She rushes to open one of her drawers, pulling out a white flipbook—a calendar.

“It’s already passed.” She mumbles, shoulders slumping in defeat at his revelation.

“Well, I didn’t get to tell you because you already left back then…”

[Name] was swarmed with guilt at the reminder. She left in the middle of the month due to some urgent matters. At that time, the idea of celebrating birthdays was a thought that would have never crossed her mind—much less wonder if Soushiro’s birthday was occurring the following week.

“Then we’ll celebrate it next year for sure!” She promised, grinning at him so fervently that it made it difficult for doubt to seep in.

At her declaration, Soushiro’s own uncertainty dulled. Because how could he not see the mirror of his adoration when she served it to him in affectionate gazes and warm smiles and willingness to sacrifice? When she gave him the hope of a tomorrow where he could live with her to live in dreams like birthdays, how could he find the heart to refuse? 

“I’ll hold you to that, my love.”

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[bagerfluff]

Sirensong

Percy Jackson x Non-Binary Reader

Prompt - Song Fic - Sirensong By Rosendale

I was alone

Drifting at sea

Living life without a purpose

Barely floating on the surface

You were floating in the sea. Your legs and arms spread out making you look like a four limbed starfish. You were mindlessly letting the sea waves take you to where they wanted.

Every once and a while the sea went over your head. Water got into your mouth and nose but you didn’t care. You didn’t really have a reason to care.

Nothing was important.

The sun shone down on you. You had to close your eyes every once and a while. You could feel the heat on your body and you were sure that eventually you were going to get sunburned. The water was cool.

Comforting.

The water that got splashed on your face was colder. It was under the surface. The water under the surface was colder since the sun couldn’t heat it. Your hair was wet as it was under the water. It floated next to your head.

Like how your limbs just rested above the water. You felt pieces of trash, plants, and fish touch you. The trash and plants floating around aimlessly like you and the fish wondered if you were dead. Seeing if they were getting a snack.

Not that you cared.

There was a reason you were floating in the sea all alone. Your mind was blank as you drifted. Not caring about anything or anyone. You were part of the sea. Just a person whose body was laying on the surface of the sea without a care in the world.

You were free of the worries of life.

Then came along

A beautiful creature

Body shimmering in the water

Emerald eyes so full of wonder

Then you felt something else brush against you. This time it didn’t leave after a few seconds. It stayed. Circling around you like it was trying to find out what you were.

You turned your head to the side to see what it was. Whatever it was, it was beautiful. It had a fish tail that shimmered in the water. It shined brighter than the sun.

But it had the top of a human. A human chest and arms. But a tail instead of legs. They had arms that were webbed and also shimmered in the water.

The thing circled you as you watched it. When you made eye contact with it you noticed that it had emerald eyes. It looked like it was a boy, but what was it? His eyes looked like he was curious, full of wonder.

Like he was mesmerized with what he saw. He had pointed ears that looked like elf ears. Like the ones you hear about in story books. He had black hair with a patch of gray. Not patches like he was turning old.

No.

A patch of hair on his left side that had turned gray. It was a light gray, but gray nonetheless. His scales looked blue, green, and teal. They all complemented each other.

It was beautiful, he was beautiful.

He kept circling you and watching you with wonder in his eyes. But why? You watched the boy as he swam around you. He kept watching eye, as you watched him.

You couldn’t keep your eyes off him. He looked beautiful. His eyes shone in the water and his scales, they looked like scales, were shimmering.

His eyes looked like real emeralds. Like the ones you’d find on rings that cost a fortune. It seemed like everything about this boy was beautiful.

He was a beautiful creature.

He pulled me into the deep end

Where all the ocean was sleeping

Showed me the secrets he’s keeping

Into his arms I was sinking

He said:

The boy reached a webbed hand to you and you grabbed it. You didn’t know why you did this. Maybe it was because he was beautiful, maybe it was because you had nothing better to do.

When you two held hands the boy smiled and pulled you under the water. You took a deep breath but when you were under you realized that you didn’t need it. You could breathe under the water. You opened your eyes to learn that you could also see.

Though the ocean was dark you could see perfectly. Even when he pulled you deeper. The ocean looked calm this deep. Like it was sleeping. There were barely any fish or any other plants.

The occasional fish came, but they were more curious than just passing through. The pants swayed slowly as the waves weren’t strong this far under. But moved back and forth like they were dancing.

Every once and a while you saw a rock with treasures on it. Coins, rings, spoons, random things that people have lost. The boy looked better from under the water.

You could see him more clearly this way. Everything you noticed about him was correct. He just looked even more beautiful under the water. He also seemed to have a small smile on his face.

Like he was happy that you came with him.

Eventually the boy stopped swimming but you kept moving. The boy opened his arms and you sank into them. He wrapped his arms around your neck and you wrapped your arms around his waist.

Hush

I’ll be your guiding star

I’ll keep you safe and warm

You believed what the boy said.

Though you both were under water you could hear everything the boy said, and you loved it. His voice was soft and trusting. Like it was made of honey.

His words made you relax and hold him just a bit tighter. You have never heard words like that before. You had to keep yourself safe and warm.

Had to guide yourself.

The thought of someone else doing it made you warm already. Though you didn’t know this boy, or what he was, you trusted him. Maybe you would regret it later.

When it came back to bite you but you didn’t care.

The boy held you like you were gold.

Though his arms were only around your neck you could feel it. His tail brushed against your legs. Going in between your legs every once and a while. Like he was trying to wrap his tail around you like they were legs.

You found that cute.

You did the same. Brushing your legs against his tail every once and a while. The moment was peaceful. Safe. Like the boy was already making his words reality.

Hush

Follow my sirensong

I’ll lead you through the storm

You had an idea what a siren was. Another story book creature. You’ve heard that they were dangerous, to never listen to their songs. But you loved this boy's song. It was beautiful. Like him. You wanted to follow it.

You would willingly follow it.

You would follow his song anywhere. His words sounded like the sweetest thing in the world. They made you warm and happy. You felt like you had something to do. No longer just drifting at sea without a purpose.

You were no longer alone.

So you would follow this boy anywhere. You had no idea what storm he was talking about though. But you didn’t care. He said he was going to lead you through it, and you trusted him.

He was going to keep you safe and warm.

He said that. You had nothing better to do. You were doing nothing when he found you. Just drifting, with nothing. Now you had him. You had no one, now you have someone to follow. No one better to follow. So when he grabbed your hand again and smiled at you. You let him drag you.

With a smile on your face.

[aphrogeneias]

𝐢𝐧 𝐦𝐲 𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞'𝐬 𝐧𝐨 𝐬𝐨𝐫𝐫𝐨𝐰 — 𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐭𝐰𝐨

summary: it was supposed to be a normal trip to the record shop, but he was lucky enough to see a different side of you when you thought no one was looking.

pairing: eddie munson x fem!reader

warnings: eddie's pov, no use of y/n, fluff, more flirting, eddie gets melancholic, lord of the rings references

author's note: short but sweet. again, only a few new lines were added.

series masterlist

2.

Summer came and went, but you stayed.

Not a lot of things stayed in Eddie's life — with the exception of Wayne and his seemingly endless high school career. One was his safe place, something steady he could hold on to through the ever tumultuous years of his childhood and adolescence. The other felt like some kind of penitence he had to pay. For being himself, maybe? Though that was not a crime, not for Eddie, at least.

It felt like he was drifting, wandering aimlessly from one day to another, trying to stay afloat. In his worse days, he often remembered the words of Strider, "not all those who wander are lost". However, unlike Aragorn, Eddie wasn't destined for greatness, he was simply, completely and utterly, lost in life.

It was a miracle, the steadiness of your presence. It didn’t make sense to him how someone like you would give someone like him the time of day, let alone hours of it, but he didn’t dare question it. You stayed, and that was enough for him.

He wished you would be the next thing that would take hold in his life. As naive as it felt. He wasn't used to craving something the way he craved seeing you, just being near you.

As the months got colder and the school year started, you fell into a comfortable rhythm. He’d visit the shop almost everyday, and you’d always be waiting for him with something new — a song, a record, a new mixtape. Sometimes, it was music you knew he’d like — like when Dio released Sacred Heart and you had a copy waiting for him before he could even call you to ask if you had one. Eddie was convinced he hasn’t stopped smiling since then, — but in others, you tried to make him venture out of his comfort zone.

It never worked, not really, but he appreciated it nonetheless. For the most part, he appreciated the way you eagerly greeted him, pulling him behind the counter and giving him a tape with no other explanation other than “listen to this, it will change your life”, and the spark in your eyes as you waited for him to tell you what his thoughts were. It almost made him feel bad to tell you he didn’t like it, but he also liked the way your lips looked when you pouted as he did.

Eddie was well aware “just friends” didn’t stare at their “just friend’s” lips, but he was trying not to think too much about that.

One of those days, where he sped through the school’s parking lot, leaving a trail of smoke and a heavy guitar riff screeching behind him, heading towards the city in a rush after another nightmarish day. His first thought while getting into his van was visiting you — as all of his thoughts tended to run towards lately, you permeated his mind like a broken record, turning and turning, endlessly.

He almost ran from where his van was parked in the street, right in front of the building where a red neon sign illuminated the words RECORDS, TAPES AND CASSETTES at the front, but before he could pass through the glass doors, he stopped in his tracks.

Eddie Munson could not believe his eyes — you were dancing. The store was empty, he didn't know where your co-workers were, but he was there earlier than usual. You were swaying to the beat of a song he couldn't hear yet, hips moving from side to side, arms following their own rhythm. It almost looked like you were floating, stuck in your own world.

The smile that grew on his lips was faster than he could hide it.

The bell above the door rang as he pushed through it, making you freeze on the spot. All Eddie could do was keep grinning, like a cheshire cat. You turned slowly, only to be greeted by him, a mischievous look in his dark eyes. "Don't stop on my account."

"How long have you been standing there?" You sounded out of breath, your hand resting right above your heart, half obscuring your Velvet Underground t-shirt.

"I just got here." He justified himself. "Don't worry, it was cute as hell."

Avoiding his eyes, you turned to the pile of records on the counter beside you. "It could be worse, I guess. At least it's just you."

"Just me?" Pretending to be heartbroken, perhaps not pretending that much, he brought his closed fist to his chest, dramatically staging a stabbing that ended on him sprawling over the nearest counter. "Oh, my lady, you wound me."

Raising his torso up from the flat surface, he looked straight at you, with a deadpan expression. "Sorry, just me." He pretended to correct himself.

"You're such an idiot." You laughed. It sounded like heaven, though Eddie was not sure what heaven should sound like. "I just meant that… I'm not embarrassed because… I know you."

There was something more lingering behind what you'd just told him, but he didn't let himself get hung up on that, at least not yet. As he assimilated you'd just said, you continued. "What I mean is I feel comfortable around you. That's all. Can't say that about everyone."

If his heart could have grown cartoon wings and flown around, it would. Then, Eddie did what he knew best, hid himself behind the armor of his slightly acid humor.

It was only slight with you, though. Let it be known.

"You could be dancing to better music." He pointed, hoping to spark up a reaction. Vaguely, he recognized the duo of female voices singing in the background, a hit from the decade before. "Kind of expected better, sweetheart."

"I shouldn't have known you didn't like ABBA, of course you don't." You playfully rolled your eyes. "Do you even have a soul?"

"No, actually. I sold mine to the devil, didn't you hear?"

"Yeah, sure. How could I forget?"

When, a week from there, Eddie appeared with a shirt that said "DISCO SUCKS" in bold letters at the center of his chest, you flipped him the bird before he could even say "hello", and his heart skipped a beat for an entirely different reason.

[epicthemusical]

Haunted Thunder pt 1

WARNING THUNDER SAGA SPOILERS CANNON BLOOD AND DEATH

Time didn't work as it used to and Polites was left to float around aimlessly in the bleak underworld.He faintly remembers seeing Odysseus but already it was fading from his mind, how long has he been here? Minutes? Months? Years? He has no idea.

He is jolted out of his endless wandering and finds himself on a boat with…Odysseus?! Polites shakes himself out of his shock before rushing to hug his friend only to find himself unable to touch him only passing through him. He tries again to grab Odysseus’s arm and again he passes through his friend.

“Odysseus!” Nobody hears him though and as Polites sinks to the deck he hears singing coming from the ocean. Odysseus starts responding to a voice..wait it can't be possible. Penelope has no way of being out at sea like this so what? The answer hits him hard ...no please don't be sirens!

All Polites can focus on is stopping Odysseus from answering the siren's call. Any attempt is ignored until Odysseus raises his bow and…shoots at the siren? Polites breathes a sigh of relief as Odysseus reveals he had known all along about the sirens. The sirens had been caught and Polites couldn't help but smile.

His friend always has a plan and this time was no exception. The sirens call for mercy and Polites waits for Odysseus to convince the sirens to leave and not bother them only to freeze at the order shouted to the wind.

“Cut off their tails and throw them back in the water. Let them all drown.” Polites just stands there in shock before flinching as the crew obeys the order. Blood and screams fill the air. He slumps to the deck and sees Odysseus, cold and uncaring as he watches the sirens be thrown back into the sea before sailing on leaving behind a sea of blood and bodies.Polites feels sick to his stomach.

-------------------------

Everything fades away revealing another scene. They seem to be sailing through a dark cave and a haunting tune fills the air leaving the entire crew on edge.Odysseus orders for 6 torches to be lit and passed out to crewmembers.

Polites tenses as six monstrous heads centering around a terrifying body emerge from the inky depths of the cave. He rushes towards someone holding a torch unaware of the monster behind him wishing desperately to save them. It was a meaningless effort as he passed through them only able to watch as blood splatters the deck and soon Polites screams mix in with the screams of the crew being picked off and eaten.

One of the feathers from Julien’s ankle wings, a broken claw necklace from Nox, a scrap of Charis’s scarf.

Everything is soaked in blood as Polites sobs and screams at all the death. He knows the names of everyone that was eaten.

Julien who always put up an unbothered and mischievous front to hide his fear of hurting people he cared about.

Nox who often used his silent footsteps and cat eyes to scare the crew.

Charis who loves to sew as a way to be close to his dead mom.

Lykos who only wanted to explore the world outside of the forest they grew up in.

Almi the quarter water nymph who gifts any scales he sheds to people he trusts and loved swimming with dolphins.

Therme who welcomes hugs and cuddles using his above average temperature to keep everyone warm with a smile.

Huedo with his calming aura letting crew members sleep in his room to keep nightmares away. They are all dead now, life ended brutally and abruptly. Polites throws up as he sobs and grieves.

----------------

Polites is pulled out of his grief by Eurylochus’s voice.

“Please tell me you didn't know that would happen. Look me in the eyes Captain and tell me you didn't just sacrifice 6 men!” Polites stared at Eurylochus in shock. How could he ever think that about Odysseus he would NEVER. But the silence drags on

“SAY SOMETHING!” Eurylochus was breathing hard and Odysseus sharply turns to face him

“I CANT.” Polites stares at Odysseus in disbelief. Now that he thinks about it Odysseus had not reacted at all to the men being eaten almost like….like he had expected it…

Polites covers his mouth as his eyes tear up, feeling sick again. Odysseus didn't actually sacrifice 6 of the crew right? He watches Eurylochus face harden

“then you leave me no choice.” Eurylochus draws out the giant sword from his back and faces Odysseus.

“Please brother don't make me fight you!” Odysseus is panicking but as Eurylochus charges he pulls out his own sword to block with gritted teeth. Polites feels himself start shaking as he watches the fight.

What could have happened after he had died?! How could this happen?! Eurylochus is knocked down and Odysseus raises his sword for the final strike

“I won't let you get in my way!” Before he can deal the final blow he starts coughing up blood and he turns and sees that another crew member had stabbed him in the back with tearful eyes. Odysseus’s eyes fill with pain both emotional and physical

“My brothers…why..” He falls forward landing on the deck with a thud. Polites cries out and stumbles over to his fallen friend. Once again his hands phase through Odysseus and he sobs, unable to do anything to help.

Polites watches them patch up Odysseus before tying him to the mast. Polites stares blankly into the distance wondering how everything could have gone so wrong.

Part 2 here

[lotusseedguy]

The Devil's Price!

Platonic WHB kings +Sibling reader: How it came to be This is going to end up being my base for reader in platonic WHB fics, but I will specify if otherwise Short, Also the reader pretty much gets kidnapped and doesn’t care at all in most of them- No Beelzebub here, forgot him-

SATAN: KING OF WRATH.

Long before you had met Satan, you lived in a small hut deep in the forests of Gehenna (Think like Gamigin when he first met Lucifer). Despite your young age and lazy behavior, you survived on foraging alone with no one else around to help you. Satan found himself wandering the outskirts of Gehenna when he first laid eyes on you in a little hammock outside the small abode you had made for yourself, snoozing away without a care to be found. He felt something in his mind telling him that he MUST take you home. Satan wasn’t sure how to do that, so he waited for you to wake up. Once you did wake up, Satan looked at you, and said one thing; “I’m your brother now, no questions.” You didn’t get a chance to properly process what he said before Satan picked you up and walk back to his residence. You never questioned it, and neither did anyone else. It just worked out.

MAMMON: KING OF GREED Mammon has always been a busy man, more often than not consumed by the work of ruling over Tartaros. Despite this, he found himself craving something new: something that he couldn’t put in his treasure warehouse but was just as valuable as all the items inside. Mammon went to Eligos for advice, as Bimet wasn’t much help. Eligos, after listening to what Mammon had to say, suggested what may have been the best thing he ever said. “Maybe,”- Eligos starts- ”You should make a sibling for yourself, your Highness.” Mammon had a good idea of what to do after some thought and he went straight to work carving a small statue made of gold in the shape of a child. With a tiny bit of magic, you came to be. Though Mammon could technically be your father, He’s your brother, no questions.

LUCIFER: KING OF PRIDE

You were a spirit husk (Think like a Seelie from Genshin), floating around the world aimlessly, no ideas in your head to give you any sort of direction. Time was nonexistent to you, and so too was thinking foreign to you. Sometime within your thoughtless roaming, there was a blond man with white eyes and black Sclera, as well as a blue-haired man beside him. The blond man held his hand out to you, and within a blink of an eye, you had a form. Small red horns sat on your head, and a very confused look on your face. The blue haired man laughed slightly, and put a jacket on you, as you may or may not have had any clothes on (That's up to you).

The blond spoke quietly, almost unable to be heard. “Good. Come now, we’re going home.” He grabbed your arm, and within time, you became ‘Lucifer’s little sibling’. Unbeknownst to you on that day, Lucifer had been watching you for quite a while, and had been keeping an eye on you. Unlike the relationships he had with his brothers in heaven, Lucifer wanted a more… Simple relationship. A sort of relationship formed by trust. Lucifer had never been one for words, but you always knew what he wanted to say when Lucifer made subtle gestures to show that he cared.

LEVIATHAN: KING OF ENVY

You were lost. You were a demon, but that’s all you knew. Wandering the woods of Hades for even an idea for your identity, but you never found it. You watched the water levels rise and fall, until they didn’t stop rising. The land where you had once lived was flooded, turned into what could be considered a lake. You sat on the ground. Starting out at what had been your home. You felt watched; as if there was someone there. And there was. A gorgeous demon with black horns stood behind you, and put a hand on your back. “Tears are futile. I am now your home.” Leviathan yanked your arm, and shoved you into what seemed to be a coffin. You pounded on the door, desperate to get out. Seconds felt like hours as you became exhausted from trying to escape. You were scared; petrified even.

At last, the door opened and you tumbled out, falling flat on your face. Looking up, you see the beautiful face of Leviathan staring down at you. You frantically look around at the lavish bedroom, before you feel a yank at your neck. Within the time you spent confused and panicking, Leviathan put a red-rope noose around your neck, and pulled you up by it.

"Look at me." Leviathan stated grabbing your chin in order to force you to look at him. When you do, he looks at you as with an oddly calm face. "This is your room now. I am your brother, and you WILL stay here when I am not with you. Do you understand?" You nod, confused but you don't really care because he's pretty.

________________________________________________

This makes no sense but take it anyways.

[siren-serenity]

who is luffy to you?

characters: red-haired shanks, monkey d. luffy, portgas d. ace, straw hat crew (all platonic) warnings: fluff, angst, brief mentions of suicide?, spoilers of marineford a/n: - i've always liked the idea of luffy being this god that no one can touch, yet everyone wants to covet and hold precious to them - but i love the idea of the straw hats being so possessive over one another. like "he's mine and i'm his" vibes - the platonic soulmate vibes from the straw hat pirates??? i want that - @officialdaydreamer00, here is some ace angst for you!!! :D - feedback is appreciated!

if one were to ask shanks, akagami no shanks, the fourth emperor shanks, who was luffy to him, he would have grinned so brightly (his smile reminiscent of a man long ago, who had brought change…great change to the world that they knew of) and simply said, “he is my anchor. And i am his shanks.”

those who knew him best would have chuckled, a knowing glint in their eyes. their captain was fond of short, simple answers, concise yet confusing. To shanks, one of them smiled, kindly explaining. a similar glint of fondness could be seen in their eyes. luffy was his anchor in the midst of his mourning. before luffy, he was just akagami no shanks, floating aimlessly with no purpose, no life in him. alive but not truly alive. but luffy…he came crashing, tumbling, and flying into their lives and buried himself in their hearts, especially the captain's. to shanks, luffy was his savior. he lived everyday knowing that he had a home to go back to (and a ‘D’ shaped smile to look forward to.

"I'll leave this hat with you. It's dear to me. Take good care of it! Bring it back to me someday, once you've become a great pirate!"

if one were to ask ace, portgas D. ace (never gol D. ace), fire fist ace, second division commander of the whitebeard pirates, who was luffy to him, he would have laughed heartily. ‘he’s my little brother of course!’ ace would have laughed, a loving smile crawling onto his face.

but luffy meant much much more than that to ace. if luffy was shanks anchor, then luffy was ace’s tether. a tether, a chain, a rope, something to keep him in the mortal world. a reason to stay alive even though he had to hear those bastards spew curses at ‘gold roger’s child!’ every single day. a reason to stay alive even though he knew he had a demon's blood flooding his veins. even though he knew that he was the sole reason for his mother's death (if he was never born, portgas D. rouge would have been alive. alive and thriving. if only he was never born)

"Even though I've been good for nothing my whole life, even though I have the blood of a demon within me... You guys still loved me! Thank you so much!"

if one were to ask the straw hat crew, the unofficial supernovas, the rookie crew who had shaken the world from its core, the everything-but-blood family, who was luffy to them, you would have received many different answers. some would have said luffy was their savior, dragging them from their mental torment and raising them to become something great. some would have said luffy was their brother. he was the younger, annoyingly endearing sibling, he was sometimes the older sibling, giving advice as if he had seen the world before his eyes. most would have confessed that luffy was irritating (but in a loving tone, as always). some would have said luffy was just...luffy. he was undefinable, unexplainable, yet they loved him the same.

some would have said luffy was a god. with drums echoing in their minds and resonating in their hearts before every battle. the fire of freedom licking at their souls, igniting something great, something life-changing again. sometimes, they would stare at tiny, stretchy, silly luffy and then imagine a tall figure, scarred with a cross on his chest, straw hat on his head, and then blinked. gone, dissipated in the wind. they could imagine a white-haired, floating being beside luffy sometimes, winking at them straight in the eye, before disappearing with a flash.

but luffy? luffy was theirs. luffy was their captain, luffy was their brother, luffy was their pirate king, luffy was theirs, theirs, and only theirs. at the same time, their souls knew that they were his. and he would never let them go.

so to the straw hat pirates? luffy was theirs.

and you don't touch what's theirs

"Luffy will become king of the pirates!"

[belethlegwen]

General li'l update

So, things have done anything but slow down for me in the real world. To keep it as vague as possible, there's a chance I'll be losing my job within the next month or so, though we're all currently working on possible solutions to this. Hoping for the best.

I've already done my panicking and preemptive grieving. 18 years in a single career is a hell of a run for someone my age, and if it has to come to an end then I've made at least some peace with that idea.

Still though, working every day to find solutions. To fix things. To keep surviving. It's exhausting, I will not lie. We're doing what we can over here.

There's so, so much good to look forward to this year. These are just bumpy patches of road. And some of the bumpiest roads I've driven on have taken me to the best places I've ever been. I'll be alright. I know I'll be alright. I'll be more than alright, by the time this is all said and done.

Been doing more reading of late, which I've been loving. You all are putting out such amazing work and I love bouncing in to read even if it takes me 3 attempts and a couple of hours to get through a posted chapter. Lovely escapes, all around.

My sister turned me onto a game ("game" kind of seems like an odd word for it but either way) on steam called Spirit City: Lofi Sessions. You customize a character, you have a little room, it plays lofi music at you and you can poke at a few playlists, build soundscapes around it (rain noises, thunder, wind, birds chirping, crackling fire etc etc) while your character mills about in spots doing things as just a beautiful little vibe-generator. You can collect spirit pals to vibe with you. It's just really cozy and nice, I love it. Highly recommend.

It has an optioning for in-app journaling, and I've been meaning to get back into journaling regularly just for the sake of my memory and everything else. That's been a huge boon over the last 2-3 days. It's got a productivity timer, to-do list, daily task/habits tracker.

Anyway, I've been making progress on writing but it's slow, staggered. Hit a bit of a wall last night with some of The Stranding where I wrote 8.5 pages of a scene and then just felt... unhappy with it. I had clearly lost the thread of why I started writing it, and needed to walk away to see if a fresher mind could find a place to rewind to and pivot so I can salvage it, or if I'm just gonna carve the whole thing out and set it in the Cut Scenes doc. The other 20 pages I've got waiting? Fine. Good, even. Proud of those. This one, I'm proud of what I'm writing but again... just feels more like floating aimlessly and bouncing. It was clear I wrote it while heavily distracted or with gaps between focus, so it jumps.

I'll see what I can salvage. Can't promise an update and am avoiding making it feel like I'm 'back on schedule' just to find something I can reduce pressure from in my life for the time being. But: I love you all. The Kudos, the views, the comments, the everything. It means a lot. You're all great.

If I do any generic vent/vibe writing, not necessarily attached to anything, I'll consider sharing it here for y'all. You guys deserve a bit of fun and sunshine <3

Have a great time everyone, love y'all to bits <3

~ Belle

[bushkit]

Erm

So I was up at like 2 am last night for some reason, and I sat down and accidentally started writing the prologue of my MiD rewrite, it absolutely needs editing but I'll share what I managed to vomit onto Google Docs anyway :3

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *

Darkness. Darkness was something Tramea’s world had known for a very long time. Sometimes the stars and moon would grace the continent with their subtle light and illuminate the sky with a splatter of glowing dots that stretched onwards forever, but other times the sky was barren, like looking up into an endless void of black-nothingness. Though the sky had no light, life on Tramea survived. The trees adapted, developing leaves and buds that glowed brighter than the stars did, creatures’ eyes gifted them with better visibility in the darkness, and now everything felt quiet.

But something was disrupting this peace, something brighter in comparison to the glow of the trees and flowers. A low shimmering noise echoed through the woodlands. Bluish-purple light quickly flashed between the trunks of the fir, startling a nearby kirin and sending it bounding for the safety of the shrub. Shortly after, a small orb appeared and snaked around a large tree before whisking lower to the ground, the shimmering hum becoming more prominent. The orb floated around aimlessly, like an insect caught in a trance. Suddenly another strip of light flashed past the trees with incredible speed, making contact with the orb and causing it to fall, hovering ever so slightly over the lush grass.

A tall horned man emerged from behind a tree, glancing at the sky for a moment before cautiously approaching the orb. His hand sparkling, he took the humming orb and cupped it in his hands, observing it. He took a small glass box out of the pouch at his side, gently placing the orb inside and sealing the box with a magic graze of his hand. His attention suddenly went elsewhere, whirling around to a large stone outcrop behind him. A younger and scrawnier horned man leapt down from the top. The newcomer was smaller and scrawny, however he circled with surprising swiftness.

“Drop it!” He demanded, gesturing to the glass box with one of his daggers.

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *

That's it wahhh

Definitely rough around the edges, but again it was two in the morning and it’s just a draft right now. I am quite proud of it though, though it wasn’t much it did line up with the vision I have very well so I'm stoked about that. If anyone has any tips to make it a bit better I’d love to hear them! I’m a beginner writer lmao

Oh also Tramea is a continent on the world the daemos are native to

Kk bye

[magicalmyths]

i decided why not share with you what i have so far for my fic Haunted Thunder where Polites as a spirit watches the events of the thunder saga for Scylla i used my EPIC OCs for the dead men so if you want to know more about them just ask and i will send link

Time didn't work as it used to and Polites was left to float around aimlessly in the bleak underworld.He faintly remembers seeing Odysseus but already it was fading from his mind, how long has he been here? Minutes? Months? Years? He has no idea. He is jolted out of his endless wandering and finds himself on a boat with…Odysseus?! Polites shakes himself out of his shock before rushing to hug his friend only to find himself unable to touch him only passing through him. He tries again to grab Odysseus’s arm and again he passes through his friend. “Odysseus!” Nobody hears him though and as Polites sinks to the deck he hears singing coming from the ocean. Odysseus starts responding to a voice..wait it can't be possible. Penelope has no way of being out at sea like this so what? The answer hits him hard ...no please don't be sirens! All Polites can focus on is stopping Odysseus from answering the siren's call. Any attempt is ignored until Odysseus raises his bow and…shoots at the siren? Polites breathes a sigh of relief as Odysseus reveals he had known all along about the sirens. The sirens had been caught and Polites couldn't help but smile. His friend always has a plan and this time was no exception. The sirens call for mercy and Polites waits for Odysseus to convince the sirens to leave and not bother them only to freeze at the order shouted to the wind. “Cut off their tails and throw them back in the water. Let them all drown.” Polites just stands there in shock before flinching as the crew obeys the order. Blood and screams fill the air. He slumps to the deck and sees Odysseus, cold and uncaring as he watches the sirens be thrown back into the sea before sailing on leaving behind a sea of blood and bodies.Polites feels sick to his stomach.

Everything fades away revealing another scene. They seem to be sailing through a dark cave and a haunting tune fills the air leaving the entire crew on edge.Odysseus orders for 6 torches to be lit and passed out to crewmembers. Polites tenses as six monstrous heads centering around a terrifying body emerge from the inky depths of the cave. He rushes towards someone holding a torch unaware of the monster behind him wishing desperately to save them. It was a meaningless effort as he passed through them only able to watch as blood splatters the deck and soon Polites screams mix in with the screams of the crew being picked off and eaten. One of the feathers from Julien’s ankle wings, a broken claw necklace from Nox, a scrap of Charis’s scarf. Everything is soaked in blood as Polites sobs and screams at all the death. He knows the names of everyone that was eaten.Julien who always put up an unbothered and mischievous front to hide his fear of hurting people he cared about. Nox who often used his silent footsteps and cat eyes to scare the crew. Charis who loves to sew as a way to be close to his dead mom. Lykos who only wanted to explore the world outside of the forest they grew up in. Almi the quarter water nymph who gifts any scales he sheds to people he trusts and loved swimming with dolphins. Therme who welcomes hugs and cuddles using his above average temperature to keep everyone warm with a smile. Huedo with his calming aura letting crew members sleep in his room to keep nightmares away. They are all dead now, life ended brutally and abruptly. Polites throws up as he sobs and grieves.

Polites is pulled out of his grief by Eurylochus’s voice. “Please tell me you didn't know that would happen. Look me in the eyes Captain and tell me you didn't just sacrifice 6 men!” Polites stared at Eurylochus in shock. How could he ever think that about Odysseus he would NEVER. But the silence drags on “SAY SOMETHING!” Eurylochus was breathing hard and Odysseus sharply turns to face him “I CANT.” Polites stares at Odysseus in disbelief. Now that he thinks about it Odysseus had not reacted at all to the men being eaten almost like….like he had expected it… Polites covers his mouth as his eyes tear up, feeling sick again. Odysseus didn't actually sacrifice 6 of the crew right? He watches Eurylochus face harden “then you leave me no choice.” Eurylochus draws out the giant sword from his back and faces Odysseus. “Please brother don't make me fight you!” Odysseus is panicking but as Eurylochus charges he pulls out his own sword to block with gritted teeth. Polites feels himself start shaking as he watches the fight. What could have happened after he had died?! How could this happen?! Eurylochus is knocked down and Odysseus raises his sword for the final strike “I won't let you get in my way!” Before he can deal the final blow he starts coughing up blood and he turns and sees that another crew member had stabbed him in the back with tearful eyes. Odysseus’s eyes fill with pain both emotional and physical “My brothers…why..” He falls forward landing on the deck with a thud. Polites cries out and stumbles over to his fallen friend. Once again his hands phase through Odysseus and he sobs, unable to do anything to help. Polites watches them patch up Odysseus before tying him to the mast. Polites stares blankly into the distance wondering how everything could have gone so wrong.

After everything that he has seen so far, Polites' heart aches for his friend. He does not know what had happened but the rest of the fleet being missing promises a heartbreaking answer. Whatever it was that happened changed Odysseus so much that he can hardly recognize his friend. The Odysseus he knows always has a spark of mischief in his warm eyes. He always tries his best to avoid unnecessary fighting and bloodshed. He always puts his all into keeping everyone alive and safe, never asking them to do anything he himself would not do. The Odysseus he knew is nowhere to be seen anymore. The spark of life in his eyes has all but faded, becoming cold and calculated. This Odysseus shows no mercy, only cruelty. He is willing to sacrifice his men to a monster. This new Odysseus is a monster himself willing to do anything to survive. If Polites had survived would things have been different? If he had not died to the cyclops would his friend have been able to laugh and smile still? Polites leans against the mast next to his friend and grieves the broken person Odysseus had become.

You're evil omg why would you do this to me holy crap

I love angst though so thanks for this 😭

This definitely hurt to read

[devilfic]

❝small favor❞

IV. another white guy from new york.

parts: previously / next plot: it's uncanny, but it can't be. right? because that would be stupid. and spider-man isn't stupid. right? pairing: mcu!peter parker x gn!reader. cw: violence, guns, knives, blood mention, alcohol consumption, peter parker isn't beating the average white guy allegations, well. when he smiles like that he might. words: 6.7k.

You almost expect them to turn you away at the door when you hand over your badge, some paranoid part of you thinking they’ll take one look at you and know you don’t belong here, but the man at the check-in hands it back to you with a pleasant, “Enjoy your evening.”

That was half an hour ago, and Parker was nowhere in sight.

He was going to “meet you there” as Jameson promised, though without a clue what to look for, you found yourself aimlessly floating through perfume clouds of high society. You didn’t want to hit the bar this close to eight, but if you didn’t find an anchor quick, you’d vibrate right through the floor. Worst of all, you didn’t even have the guy’s number. What would you do if he was a no-show?

Your job, you suppose, sullen and already dreading the evening to come.

There’s no sign of Wilson Fisk either. In your usual setting, you might’ve already flagged down a guest or two to ask what they thought about the rumors, but your usual settings were messy, bloody, and out in the real world. Here, you had a list of questions to ask that didn’t even scratch your curiosity.

What’s your name? Are you excited to be here this evening? How does the Stark Charity Ball reflect the New York City you know and love? Were you attacked? Can you confirm Wilson Fisk was on the scene?

You hadn’t even made it to the fourth question before you’d given up. How would you last a night like this?

Slithering through the crowd, you make your way to the snack table with hopes to eat your way through the night. At least you could count on rich people to shell out on good cheese.

There’s a band playing in the corner, a gentle stringed melody that you appreciate over the chatter of the guests. You make your way over and let yourself get carried away in the tune, only glancing every so often at your watch to gauge the time. It was nine minutes to eight, nine minutes until Pepper Potts took the stage to start the night, and you still had no idea where your partner was.

It’s almost natural the way your hand finds your phone, swiping over the familiar contact name and pressing out a quick message.

The party can’t start without you.

Towering windows make up most of the ballroom, fading sunlight overpowering the chandeliers above, and you take advantage in hopes it might reveal your webbed friend hanging off the roof.

Almost immediately, you get a text back.

Aww, you really do like me :) No kidding. Are you already in place? Just about. Doing a quick perimeter check. You enjoying the party? I would be if my partner was here on time. Hey, cut Parker some slack! His train’s probably late and I don’t see any signs of Kingpin yet. I'm just glad you've stopped trying to fight me on this. If you can’t beat ‘em... And maybe look up every once in a while, you’re gonna run into somebody.

Just as your eyes scan the very last word, your senses go haywire. There’s cold liquid running down your hand and you've just run into something. When you finally tear your eyes away from your phone, you unfortunately realize that something is now wearing the remainder of your drink.

People nearby have formed a clearing around you, but it feels less out of courtesy and more to point and laugh at you. Regardless, you’ve got to fix this, “I am so sorry, I wasn’t looking where I was going. Are you okay?”

Your victim stands in a small puddle of sangria, the front of their tux dripping in it still, and you could see how red stains crawled up crisp white. You could only imagine how much every bit of their suit cost (and the Daily Bugle definitely didn’t have the budget to cover it).

They lift their copper head and you’re at first struck by the smile on their face, then the peppering of freckles across the bridge of their nose, and finally... their name.

He carefully removes his suit jacket to assess the damage to his shirt, “Nah, don’t worry. I was looking for a reason to leave early anyway.”

You’re breathless, certain you should be rushing to grab towels or begging him not to sue you into oblivion, but you don’t really get that far, “I’m... really sorry.”

He laughs, so genuine that you feel the tension in your shoulders deflate just at the sound. Just then, a waiter rushes over with a hand towel, insisting he lead him to the men’s room to clean up, but he’s waved off with little more than a “thank you” and “I’ll survive, I promise.”

He steps out of the puddle to allow someone to clean it up, bringing him that much closer to you. When he's done with the towel, he hands it off to you. His eyes trail to your chest and his eyes widen some, “The Daily Bugle. You a reporter?”

You realize he’s spotted your press badge and rush to introduce yourself, wiping absentmindedly at your sticky hand, “Uh... yes. Actually. Crime beat reporter.” You set your empty cup on a passing waiter’s tray and hold out your clean hand to shake.

His hand is warm, if not a little sticky like yours, though you have no grounds to complain, “Nice to meet you. I’m Harry.”

“Oh, I know.”

He quirks an eyebrow, still smiling, “Then... was that drink a calculated assault?”

“No! God, no. I genuinely wasn’t looking where I was going.”

“Not very safe for a crime beat reporter, don’t you think?”

You’ve got to be on fire. You feel like it, struggling between a laugh and a whine, “I’m sorry you had to be the one to teach me that lesson.”

“No worries. Like I said, you did me a favor.” Harry glances around, “So… you're reporting on what, exactly? You betting on a robbery or something?”

The humor of that isn't lost on you, “Actually, I’m filling in tonight. Our usual reporter definitely wouldn’t have ruined your nice shirt.”

“Oh, I don’t know. I find this stain rather charming.”

You can’t help it. You giggle and he smiles even wider, “May I ask why you want to escape so soon?”

“Not if you’re gonna write it down.”

“Off the record? In exchange for the stain.”

Harry Osborn has a boyish look to him even though he’s steadily approaching 26, some baby fat still clinging to his cheekbones when he smiles wide enough, “Well, this was my first stop since hopping off a nine hour flight from Oxford and I’m, as the English say, absolutely knackered. I was gonna leave in half an hour after photos but…” He laughs, casting a look over his shoulder at the stage, “I’ve made my donation. I won’t be missed.”

Perking up with an idea, you reach into your bag and pull out a recorder, “In that case, how about I get you down for a comment on your generous donation of…”

“Five million.”

You blink, swallowing hard, “Five million… to make up for it? I'll even throw in a few questions about your study at Oxford. I hear you're working on a revolutionary breakthrough with lab-grown bacteria that breaks down plastic.”

Harry's eyes light up. For a moment, the image of Harry Osborn is just Harry, “You sure Jameson would let you publish something nice about an Osborn?”

The Daily Bugle was no friend to Spider-Man, but neither was it a friend to Norman Osborn. You recall some of the more scalding headlines about Oscorp’s president that you’d published in the past. It was the one thing you and Jameson could agree on. “You know Jameson well?”

“Of course. I’ve got a buddy who works there too, actually. You might know him. His name’s-”

Harry’s voice is drowned out by the collective oohing and awing of the crowd when the lights dim, shrouding the grand ballroom in the fading glow of the sun. The stage, once empty, is now illuminated with the presence of Pepper Potts. Uproarious applause fills the room. Harry smiles politely at you. His buddy would be a conversation for later.

You want to focus on Pepper, you really do, but it’s like you’ve broken out of a spell the second Harry’s eyes leave yours, and you find yourself once again scanning the crowd for Parker. There was no good reason for him to be this late and you couldn’t even give him a piece of your mind about it.

You shoot off an indignant text to Peter.

Your guy better have been hit by a cyclist on the way here or he’s getting an earful when I see him. Pepper looks amazing :(

But no instant reply. In fact, three minutes pass and there’s nothing. You glance up to the windows for any sign of him watching and find none. Was... he here?

You glance at Harry. If Jillian were here, she’d punch you in the face for what you’re about to do, for the opportunity you're about to squander. Okay, maybe not a punch, but it’d be violent.

But then you’re thinking about Peter, about that night that changed everything, about his blood and bruises and the men with guns for hands. You think about how Peter worried for you. You think about Harry, who has just donated five million dollars to charity, and how there are over a hundred more of him packed in this ballroom right now. You think about Wilson Fisk, and how much havoc he could wreak if he put Spider-Man out for good.

And then you're elbowing yourself through the crowd, searching for the nearest emergency stairwell, hoping that if Peter’s still watching he might meet you halfway. Parker and those questions be damned. You'd find a way to make it up to Jameson somehow.

You’re about ten feet away from the nearest exit when someone takes a hold of your wrist, a few seconds away from the end of Pepper’s speech, and whoever is holding you back has a grip so iron it stings. You can’t clearly see the face of who’s grabbed you but it doesn’t feel familiar. Your heart jumps into your throat. Had Fisk's men infiltrated the room already? Had they gotten to Spidey? Did they know you? Were you next?

You’ve got no pocket knife on you, but you have a fist.

You curl your fingers inward and aim right for your captor’s head. Your fist makes contact with skin. The room erupts into thunderous applause. The lights go up.

You never actually land the punch, but your captor looks a little too wide-eyed to be one of Fisk’s men, too soft in the face. His own hand has completely stopped yours in its tracks, just a hair away from breaking his nose, and he’s staring at you like a deer in headlights. A big, brown doe-eyed deer. “Uh, hi,” your eyes flicker down to the camera hanging from his neck, almost blocking the badge beneath it that reads "P. B. Parker", and then you meet his eyes with the same bewilderment, “sorry I’m late.”

Parker is about average height with a build you can't quantify when his shirt is draping off him. It's a ridiculously huge plaid thing, the kind of thing someone would wear to hide themselves, but all he does is stand out in the sea of Armani and Givenchy. Old jeans, old shirt, high-tops, and a muddy-grey beanie to top it all off. It was a wonder they let him in the door at all.

What you can feel is the strength behind his hand as it holds your fist in place. Some people are looking—you realize, after the tremors of your punch reverberate back up your arm—and so you yank your hand back before any security can take notice.

Your partner waits a full second before holding out his own, offering a subtle, wobbly smile, "I would've been here sooner but... traffic, ya know?"

His voice is low, you notice this next. Practically a mumble. You kind of realize why your coworkers said you weren't missing much; outside of his awkward mannerisms and sweet, unassuming baby face, he looked like any other white guy from New York. He also seemed like he didn't want to be seen or heard, and you imagined that Jameson had no problem with that.

But his mumbling forces you to take notice of his lips so you can read them, and their thin, blushy quality is only marred by a little dryness. Broken by biting or... or something. "You're late." Is all you manage to say.

His lips part, turning downward, "Yeah, I know," he stutters, the pitch of his voice going up a hair, "I said- um, I caught the last half of Mrs. Potts’ speech." And then he turns his camera to you, flicking through images that are too small on the screen for you to assess the quality of. You actually have no doubt they're good, but you're upset he's late and you're certain there's nothing remarkable about this guy—nothing at all—and yet you can't stop staring.

"You know Spidey?" You blurt out next, and his eyes widen and zero in on you. You don't know why he's surprised. "He's mentioned me, hasn't he?"

Parker blinks, "Oh! Yeah. Yeah. All the time. You're very... good. At your job."

"Thank you. So are you."

And wouldn't you know it, he actually blushes. It's sweet and alarming how quickly red blooms across the apples of his cheeks, how his hands wobble around his camera a bit, how it disarms you for a moment. It'd be cute if you could just figure out what about him was throwing you off.

In fact, you're so enthralled in figuring out that something that you see his lips moving but just miss his question, barely hearing the tail-end of it. You watch his lips again as you ask him to repeat it, but the musicians have started up a jaunty tune with trumpets and high white keys, so you duck closer to him and ask him to repeat it once more.

"I asked-" And as you get closer, you have an excuse to look at him more deeply.

Your eyes follow the curve of his mouth to his chin (and all its little hairs that he hadn't caught shaving), down to his neck where you see, just peeking out beneath the lip of his beanie, a curl. You've abandoned his question now. You just feel, as strange as it is, that you need a closer look...

Your hand is moving before your mind can catch up with it, until it's caught in Parker's halfway to his throat. You're so close to him that you can see the way the skin of his chin rolls with the effort to lean away from you, or the honey speckles in his eyes that are all but eclipsed by his blown-wide pupils.

His fingers are latched around yours. He's not using the same strength he was before, doesn't need to, but you can sort of feel it beneath the callouses. Even then, it's so gentle. You don't know why you react with just as mush wonder. The world might as well be at half-speed. You almost wish him to speak again because you've got nothing to say for yourself here.

Parker looks on at you, still holding onto your hand. He smells... like the city.

"Do you-" He starts, chokes on his spit, and then swallows, "are you always this friendly when you're tipsy?"

You blanch. "What? I'm not-" You yank your hand back, cup it to your mouth and nose, and breathe in the sangria. Could he smell it on your breath? "I'm not tipsy. I barely even had a drink before I spilled it all over..."

You catch Parker's eye to find him looking interested. "Spilled it all over...?"

"Someone. Whatever. It was an accident."

"You spilled your drink on someone?"

"It was an accident."

"You know, I was feeling real bad about showing up late, but Jameson's gonna have a field day with this." You're mortified. He wasn't interested, he was amused. "Are we gonna get sued?"

"No!" Your voice draws the attention of a couple nearby, making you shrink even closer to Parker, "I told you it was an accident and I apologized. And you're still not off the hook for being late."

He folds his arms across his chest, smiles steadily this time, and agrees. The action is so unmistakable that it saps all the lightheartedness right out of you. Parker notices the change.

The only thing that breaks the moment is Harry Osborn finding you both.

Your head whips at the first "Peter!", thinking you'll see red and blue somewhere nearby, but Harry is gunning straight for Parker with the widest smile on his face. You break away just in time for him to envelop Parker in a big, friendly hug that would've knocked Parker off his feet if not for how solid he was. A few onlookers take in the scene, some amused, others not so much.

It takes you a moment to digest that Harry meant Parker, had called him Peter with such love and affection that there was no way he was mistaken, and Parker had returned the hug a beat later without correcting him.

There were probably a million Peters in New York alone. And yet...

They stay intertwined a minute longer, only breaking away so that Harry could hold... Peter's face in his hands. "Peter Parker! What the hell are you doing here?" Harry seems to remember you're there. He releases Peter and points to you, "So, you two know each other after all. Pete's the buddy at the Bugle I told you about. We've been best friends for years."

As if this Peter business wasn't enough for you to wrap your head around, you struggle to imagine these two being best friends. One of New York City's richest heirs and a contractor for the Daily Bugle. Your disbelief is evident as you ask, "How did you two meet...?"

"College. We went to ESU together. We were even roommates before I went off to Oxford." Harry smiles proudly, patting Peter on the back. It's then that you notice Peter is looking very, very uncomfortable. You wonder for a moment if this is all some elaborate joke Harry's playing, but it hadn't struck you as his type of humor.

This is, in fact, a man named Peter Parker. He works for the Daily Bugle, he's best friends with Harry Osborn, he works with Spider-Man, and they both share a name. Unremarkable Peter Parker. Nothing you were missing, they'd said.

Peter must see that you're focused hard on him, so he turns to Harry, "Yeah, Oxford. Why aren't you... there? Again?"

Harry laughs, unbothered, "Don't tell me you didn't miss me?"

"No, it's just... last I remember, your dad wanted you there until your project got approved."

The very mention of Norman Osborn kills the mood entirely. Harry's smile falls quick, though he tries to hide it, and shuffles a bit uncomfortably. "That was the deal. But you know dad: the world revolves around his every whim." Harry's eyes cut to you so fast that you tense up, recovering quickly. "Off the record."

Jillian would not accept that. You, on the other hand, swallow it down and tuck it away for another day, "Anything for a friend of a friend."

That gets Harry smiling again, however terse. The conversation quickly changes course as Harry pulls at the stained white of his shirt to show Peter, "Speaking of: you like? Our new mutual friend gave it to me."

Peter glances at you, chuckling with a nervous edge, and grabs at the fabric to examine for himself, "Something tells me you deserved it."

Harry immediately resorts to banter that Peter melts into. It was no doubt now that they were friends, that Peter's awkwardness had only been on account of you being here.

You can only smile and nod, smile and nod, while you watch Peter's every move. You couldn't say anything even though you were bursting, but now your heart was beginning to pound in your ears, making it hard for you to do what you were trying to pretend you weren't doing.

Spider-Man was smart. Beneath the quips, he was extremely smart. He wouldn't tell you his real name and then show up here as a civilian, so brazen, knowing that you'd instantly figure out it was him. That'd be too easy. He trusted you, sure, but he wasn't stupid. He'd been uncomfortable at the very thought of unmasking when you'd mentioned it last night. If Peter was... Peter, he wouldn't have come at all. Because that would be stupid.

And he wouldn't have bothered to pretend, up until the last second, that he wasn't Peter, if he was just going to flay himself before you like this. Because you would've figured it out eventually.

So, surely, there were a million Peters in New York and you happened to know two of them. And they knew each other. And one of them was a superhero. Of course.

You slip your phone out, checking your recent messages with your heart in your throat. If Peter wasn't Peter, he'd have texted you back by now. Because Peter—fuck—Spidey wouldn't miss a chance to make that joke.

There's one new message. You barely get to see what it says before broken glass sprays from above.

There’s a cacophony of sound all at once. Glass breaking, screaming amongst the crowd, and the sound of gunfire letting off into the ceiling. One minute, the room had been in peaceful bliss, and the next, a tidal wave of terrified guests were rushing at you.

You’re lucky that Peter’s arm is like iron, strong enough to rip you back and away from the crowd that converges on the exits, because if you had stayed in your spot for a second longer you would have been trampled underfoot. Like your phone, which is in pieces the second it slips out of your hand.

Harry is there too, huddled against the two of you in the corner, but that doesn’t stop you three from all being pressed upon by the panicking crowds. There’s no rhyme or reason, no order in the chaos. Beautiful clutches embedded with Swarovski crystals lay abandoned at your feet. Everyone in the room can see, whatever it might be, that their life is worth more than a single thing in this room. Even worth more than the lives of the other guests they shove to get out first.

You try your best to see over the heads of the swarm to get a glimpse of what had set the entire party off, and immediately two things are visible. One: Pepper Potts is center stage, the bright white stage lights beating down on her. If it weren’t for the sweat beading at her brow, you’d think her bored. The second thing was that there was a man standing beside her who wasn’t standing there before, a microphone in one hand and a gun in the other.

Even from all the way at the back of the room, you could see the gun trembling in his grip as the barrel kissed Pepper’s temple.

The next thing is his voice. It’s loud, feedback screeching off the walls so high that you think they might shatter the windows. The crowd is loud and he’s louder. You can hear him saying something about how everyone shouldn’t leave just yet, that they’d want to see this front row and not on the 10 o’clock news. You do not see Kingpin. This man is utterly alone.

Harry is shouting something at you, you can feel his breath and the spit that flies out in the hurry of his words, but you can barely make out what he’s saying over the guests. Peter clutches you both even closer.

“We… we have to…” You start, glancing up at the windows for any sign of Spider-Man, but you see nothing. Your eyes drop to Peter’s to find him already staring right at you. You’ve no idea what’s going through his head, and the adrenaline rushing behind your eyes makes it hard to speculate. You only know what you need to say, “…we need to find Spider-Man.”

“We need to leave!” Harry argues. He wriggles out of Peter’s grip and starts pulling you both toward the nearest exit, but he only makes progress with pulling you forward.

You were about to argue back until you felt Peter’s hand at the base of your spine, pushing you into Harry with ease and right toward one of the exit doors. You turn, clutching onto Harry as to not lose him in the crowd, only to find Peter isn’t following you. “You both need to get out of here.”

“Both? Wh- Peter! We’re not leaving without you!” Your attempt to grab at him is futile. He shrugs away from your touch, keeps pushing you and Harry through the stampede as if he really intended on staying behind. “Peter!”

He finally looks you in the eyes that second time, the desperation with which you’d said his name snapping him out of some dissociative spell, “I’ll be right behind you! I’m gonna help get people out. Some got trampled, I-I’ve got to-”

Harry is next to admonish him, “Pete, come on. This isn’t the time to play fucking hero!”

But Peter’s not listening again—eyes faraway, slipping over the crowd as if searching for something—he’s heading back into the fray, calling to you some half-hearted promise that he’d follow soon, and then his head disappears into the whirlwind of bodies. You were able to follow him up until the moment his hat got pulled off, and then… nothing.

The current pushes and pulls at you and Harry, dragging you down the hallway. You feel your ankle twist awkwardly and are thankful that Harry is still clinging to you because had he not been, you would’ve been dragged down and trampled for sure. He holds you upright, pressing you to his side, assuring you over the noise that you’d go back in to get Peter in a minute.

You think that Harry Osborn is much kinder than his father seemed to be, and that you really do owe him a good soundbite in the Bugle after this.

You feel a draft coming from outside, promising you were close to being free from the confines of the hallway. You grab Harry’s hands and peel them off of you, pushing him forward into the crowd without a second thought, just as you see the light of the city come up ahead. His head whips to you. He calls your name as he’s swept away, but you press yourself hard against the wall and let the crowd lead him out to safety.

The crawl back to the ballroom is awful.

There are fewer people escaping, thankfully, and so it’s less like an undertow, but there are so many people and all of them are perfectly fine with throwing their bodies forward with caution thrown to the wind.

It takes you longer than a minute to get back to the door you’d come out of, even longer to squeeze through with elbows hitting you square in the chest and heels digging into your feet.

The room is less than a third of what it had been when the gunman had arrived. You frantically search for Peter in the remaining, scattered crowd; people are frozen in awe, in horror. Some people in the crowd were begging the gunman to reconsider, and others were praying. Your heart sank. A woman was about to die and there was virtually nothing you could do.

You look up to the windows one more time. You couldn’t see him, couldn’t call him, but you close your eyes and pray too. Whoever he was. Wherever he was.

And then you hear it. The familiar thwip! cuts through the air. You open your eyes and a second later, the clatter of the gunman’s pistol hitting the floor follows. You’re blessed with a whole five seconds of glee before the gunman surges forward and pulls a knife on Pepper, holding it to her throat in a panic.

“Easy there, buddy.” Your head snaps up to the rafters. From a single thread of spider silk, Spidey descends from the ceiling with a hand outstretched. He’s a ways away from the two of them, offering some sense of space. “You don’t wanna do this.”

The gunman has since abandoned his microphone, but his voice reverberates in the near empty room just fine, “Get out of here, Spider-Man! You’re next!”

“Why don’t you and I hash it out, then? Just you and me. Leave Mrs. Potts out of it.”

“No, no,” the man mutters; you can hear sirens growing closer to the building, “she’s part of it. You’re all part of it.”

Pepper speaks up for the first time, “Whatever you want, I can get it. This doesn’t have to end badly.”

That must’ve been the wrong thing to say. The man jerks his knife closer to her skin and you can see, after a moment, a thin bead of red dribbles down her collarbone.

Spidey holds out both his hands, “Whoa, whoa, whoa-”

And it happens in a flash. One second, Pepper is being held at knifepoint, and the next, she’s being pushed off the stage.

Spider-Man immediately swoops in and catches her, swinging her to safety on the other side of the room, but you’re too mesmerized by the new body on stage pinning the attacker down by the throat. How you’d missed him, you’ve no clue, but he’s wrestling the man onto his stomach and restraining his arms behind his back just as the doors to the ballroom are thrown wide open.

Cops stream in, rushing the stage to take the gunman into custody. Some head straight for Spider-Man and Pepper, but it’s the guests that catch your attention. There are maybe fifty of them in the room altogether, but applause catches on like wildfire. All of them, and the musicians and the cops at the door, erupt into applause.

Because the man on stage, the man who’d thrown himself at the gunman and disarmed him, the man who had just saved Pepper Potts’ life… was Wilson Fisk.

You can’t find Harry anywhere. Most of the guests had stayed behind out of sheer curiosity, but Harry was nowhere in sight.

You stand out on the sidewalk with the rest of the crowd as the police escort the gunman into a cop car, murmurs flitting from ear to ear on who he’d been, what he’d wanted, and whether they should stay behind for interviews. Pepper was still inside getting questioned. But Wilson Fisk was out here.

You’d been in the same room as Fisk only once before, the night of his infamous press conference three years ago when you were still an intern trailing after the likes of Jillian. He’d struck you as a measured man, one who carried himself with impenetrable humility, and even in the face of his detractors kept a cool head.

Back then, he’d been accused of money laundering, something to do with all his companies not adding up. In and out of trouble, he was. Jameson had likened him to a cockroach: never quite dead, even when he really ought to be by now.

And now he stands before reporters, guests, onlookers, and the like, giving a statement about his “harrowing” rescue of Mrs. Potts. He hadn’t even been invited.

You know you should be right up there with the rest of them, fiending for a soundbite, but you’re gnawing your bottom lip from afar trying to catch him in a lie. Something about this was refusing to add up, and thankful as you were that Pepper was safe, the whole thing was off. Convenient, even.

You watch him smile and nod, none of the charm ever reaching his dead eyes, but everyone eats it up anyway.

Just as you’re about to force yourself to head over, knowing Jameson would have your head otherwise, you’re flying.

“Jesus!” You screech, scrambling to cling onto Spidey as the crowd below watches the two of you swing away. Your stomach drops as he carries you to a nearby rooftop, and you all but collapse when you meet solid ground. “Oh my God, don’t ever do that again.” You expect a quip in return, but when you look behind you, Spider-Man is sitting with his head on his knees, utterly silent. Your stomach drops again, “Spidey?”

That gets him to look at you, big white eyes narrowing, “We’re not on a first name basis anymore?”

You’re stunned, and then you scowl, “Peter Parker.” When he says nothing, you repeat it, “Peter Parker.”

“That’s his name.”

“His? Or yours?”

His eyes stay narrowed at you, only now his head is lifted upright, “I’m not the only Peter in New York.”

“I’m sorry if I find it a little suspicious there’s a Peter Parker who works at the Daily Bugle selling the only decent photos of you in the city, who just so happens to share your name and- and your lips.” That last part awkwardly tumbles out of you and his eyes are no longer narrowed.

“My lips?”

Peter’s lips flash in your mind. You don’t know how to say it without sounding more suspicious than him, “You’re… you both… your mouths are very similar.”

A beat passes. The silence isn’t enough to convince you you’re wrong, but it is enough to make you fidget.

But then Peter bursts into laughter, and, well, it’s not funny to you at all. “Quit it.” You demand, meek.

“I’m sorry, I just- I stick to walls and you think it’s crazy that we’re both named Peter?”

“You can’t convince me I’m off with this one.”

“There were like… four Peters in my graduating class!”

“He even kind of sounded like you! When I could hear him clearly.”

“He sounds nothing like me!”

“He sounds a lot like you.” You say, and wish that there had been a moment when you’d caught him speaking at an octave higher than his, frankly, forced baritone and an octave below shouting. Peter—this Peter—has a voice you know well enough. You’ve memorized his vocal fry when his voice gets a little too high, that nervous ramble-y pitch of his. It’s so distinct. If you had just… heard him use it just once, “You can’t make me feel crazy about this.”

“’m not trying to make you feel crazy, I swear. You’re one of the smartest people I know. I’d be skeptical too.” You wait patiently for a confirmation or a denial, but he gives you none. He takes a deep breath and stares out over the edge of the building where Fisk is being escorted to his car. You crawl over to sit beside him.

Part of you wants to ask him to prove it, to peel his mask off and show you, but you can’t make yourself do it. He’d only just given you his name. He trusted you with that. You’re wary about pushing it.

Because the pieces fit so well, but he’d never make that kind of mistake. Would he?

Would he think it was a mistake?

Peter sighs. “Hey, you alright?” You ask.

He doesn’t really look at you, though his voice answers at a lower volume than before, "This was too convenient.” You hum in agreement. “That guy… he said we were all ‘part of it’. Like it was planned.”

“You think Fisk planned it.”

“I think he’s a little too eager to be in the spotlight about it.” But getting that off his chest doesn’t seem to change the solemnness in his tone.

“Pepper was never in danger.” Your hand presses against the scratchy concrete, itching to touch him. To comfort him. “If this was Fisk’s plan, it was all for publicity. Pepper was never gonna get hurt.”

“She got hurt.” Peter whips his head to you.

You knew Iron Man was his mentor, had plucked him off the streets and thrust him into a world of gods and aliens before his untimely death. And maybe with Tony gone, he thought it was his job to keep her safe.

“Peter, you can’t… you can’t think like that. You can punch your way through a lot of things, but that? That back there? You did what you could.”

“I could do more.”

You get that urge to touch him again, only this time, you let yourself do it.

Your hand touches the side of his mask, cupping below his ear. He watches you the entire time but doesn’t move to stop you. Your thumb rests on his cheek and your pinky- it brushes the overlap between his mask and the rest of his suit, “It’s not just that you’re Peter, too.”

You feel the muscles in his neck twitch, “What?”

“It’s that… in all that chaos, you chose to stay behind. To help people. You made sure me and Harry got out, but you stayed behind. Everyone was so busy trying to save their own lives and you were thinking about them. I don’t know Peter Parker very well. Maybe he’s just that kind of guy. But I know you. I know if anyone in that room was you, he’d be it.” Peter doesn’t say anything. You feel the tension in his jaw, feel the way his throat bobs with a hard swallow, but he doesn’t say anything. He just watches you. You stare hard into those white eyes and imagine a someone staring back at you. “Or maybe that’s just the kind of people Spider-Man hangs out with.”

He huffs humorously, “Yeah, that checks out. We’re friends, after all.”

Your heart swells to hear it, “friends”. “Don’t make this about me when I’m trying to expose your secret identity.”

“I think Peter Parker would be flattered you think so highly of him. He was kind of worried he made the wrong impression… after you tried to punch him in the face.”

Your jaw drops, having nearly forgotten in the mess of the night. “Well, maybe Peter Parker shouldn’t go around grabbing people in the dark.”

“You were walking so fast. How else would Peter Parker get your attention?”

“Are you just saying Peter Parker over and over to convince me that you’re both completely different people?”

“I just think it’s funny that you don’t believe more than two Peters can live in the same city.”

“There are other factors!”

“Can’t believe you’re the type of reporter who flies by the seat of their assumptions. But you do work for Jameson, after all.” When Peter stands, you naturally follow.

You decide to switch tactics, bruising the alter ego, “You- you know what? You’re right. You couldn’t be Peter Parker. Peter Parker would be shaking and crying if I so much as raised my voice at him.”

“Wow. I’m gonna tell him you said that—wrap your arms around me?” And he snakes an arm around your waist, sending your heart into overdrive again, “he’s never gonna talk to you again. He’s probably gonna issue a copyright claim every time you put his pics on the Web-Blog, now. Legs too.”

“Wait, no. We are not swinging again. We are taking the stairs.”

“How else am I gonna get you off the roof? Legs, please.”

“We can take the stairs!”

“Door’s probably locked and Kingpin’s already on his way back to his super-secret evil lair. Legs or I’m webbing you up in a baby wrap.”

You grumble. It’s enough to make you grab onto his shoulders and jump, locking your ankles across his back with the fear of gravity instilled in you. You reckoned he’d be fast enough to catch you if you did fall. The very possibility makes you sick to your stomach, though. “Please don’t drop me.”

Peter dips his chin into the crevice where your neck meets your shoulder. "Don't worry," and it's not even that you hear his voice, you just feel it, "I've only dropped someone once."

And you're plummeting off the ledge before you get the chance to run away.