#like fuck off I don’t want to click on your shady job link

[wip-okae]

The block button is my favorite friend fr.

[trashyswitch]

Two Minds Think Alike

Vanny had just welcomed this stranger, William, into her head: a beige bunny with a shady past. As she tries to understand who they are and what their motives are, she discovers a fun little secret about her new bunny friend.

This fanfic was suggested by @trashylever on Tumblr. This is my first lee!Glitchtrap fanfic! So trashylever, and everyone else, I hope you enjoy!

Vanny was still trying to get used to there being more people in her head than just...herself. He kinda just introduced himself, said ‘I need a home’ and embedded himself into Vanny’s brain without a proper introduction. She didn’t even know who he was. And yet here he is: living in her head. If she’s gonna learn to live with him, she’s gonna have to get to know him.

Vanny closed her eyes and pushed herself deeper into her head. There, she saw the bunny being that had joined her head. Vanny decided to start off like all exchanges do: with names.

“So...Do you...have a name besides Glitchtrap?” Vanny asked. “Or something less mysterious than…’Malhare’?” Vanny asked, using quotations.

The being turned to her with a tired, bored face. “...Afton.” He replied.

Afton? Wait...Why did that name sound strangely familiar?

“Is that...a first name? Or a last name?” Vanny asked.

The bunny groaned and got up. “William. William Afton. Happy?” they spat at her.

Vanny raised her eyebrows. This person’s got quite the attitude. They sound pissed...over a need for a name. “Yes, thank you.” Vanny shot back.

The being looked at her before looking away.

“Are...Are you gonna ask me for a name? Or am I supposed to just give you a name?” Vanny asked.

The guy...William...looked at her from the corner of their eye and looked back down again. “You’re a teenage girl. That’s all I need to know.” the person said.

Vanny sighed and sat down on the ground. “Great...I’m expected to live with THIS-” She pointed to the bunny in front of her, “-For the rest of my life.” Vanny muttered out loud.

The bunny sighed. “Life isn’t fair, sunshine.” They muttered.

Vanny widened her eyes and turned to the bunny with a frown. “Excuse me?!” she walked right up to the bunny and pushed them down with her foot. “Just who do you think you are?!”

The bunny looked up at her with a frown. Then, they scoffed. “Try looking up my name. That’ll give you a pretty good idea.” they spat with a dangerous look in their eyes. Vanny growled and left her mind.

Vanny opened her eyes and hopped onto her phone. She typed the name ‘William Afftin’ into the search bar.

[A-f-t-o-n. AfTON.] the bunny corrected.

Vanny sighed and fixed the name. ‘William Afton’. She clicked the search button and watched as tons of links showed up right away. Tons of links about ‘child killer’, ‘The Man Behind The Slaughter’ and ‘Fazbear Entertainment’ came up. Vanny’s expression turned from annoyed to surprised in a single second. Child killer? Child killer?

She clicked one of the links. This brought up pictures of happy kids, and blurred images of their corpses beside the happy images. They were mostly aged 5 to age 10! Names of previously missing children filled her brain as she read them: Charlie...Cassidy...Fritz...Gabriel...Jeremy… And Susie.

[They were interesting kids. Somewhat ignored by the adults there. No one even noticed they went missing until they got home. Stupid people…] The bunny told her.

Vanny widened her eyes. Holy...How did he-

Vanny scrolled down and looked at the other pictures that came up. There were photos taken of...suits?

[Animatronics. Big robots with endoskeletons and programming designed for anything you want. In this instance, they were disguised as animals and made for kids entertainment. We were the talk of the town at the time! Freddy Fazbear and the Band. Kids loved it.] The bunny explained.

Freddy Fazbear- WAIT A SECOND! “That VR Video Game was based on real life?!” Vanny reacted.

[Yup. That game itself was Fazbear Entertainment’s way of saving their tarnished reputation of child-killing machines. Every entertainment spot the Fazbear company opened, ended up with at least one child or person killed from robot malfunctions.] The bunny explained.

Vanny frowned as she looked at the missing kids. “It wasn’t just robot malfunctions...It was murders too.” Vanny mentioned. “You were the cause of those murders! You killed up to 5 children!” Vanny reacted.

[Yup. Indeed I did.] The bunny replied.

Vanny huffed as she put her phone down and went into her head again. “Why?” She asked. “Did you know them personally? Why would you specifically choose to kill them?” She asked.

“Does it matter?” The bunny asked as they stood up. “I just did.” they replied.

Vanny looked at the bunny. “You’re not a bunny. I wanna see what you really look like.” Vanny told them.

William sighed and closed their eyes. “There’s plenty of images on the World Wide Web to give you a good picture.” they told her.

“I don’t want to use the internet. I wanna see you. The real you.” She told them. “That is, if your former self was programmed into your code.” Vanny mentioned.

William rolled his eyes. “I have no former self anymore. This is it. I’m a glitch shown as a bunny.” William explained.

“You know technology has advanced enough to change your appearance, right?” Vanny mentioned.

William gave her a dirty look. “Well maybe,” William walked closer to Vanny. “Someone didn’t put that into account when programming me into the fucking game!” William spat at her. Then, he leaned his head back a bit. “I’m afraid this is as close as you’re gonna get.” William turned around and walked away.

Vanny let out heavy breaths as she processed the words hidden under his overwhelmingly rude attitude. Despite not actually being responsible for how William’s brain and personality was handled, Vanny still felt hurt by his words. This man, who was once a physical being, is now stuck inside a girl’s head. Even worse: a teenage girl’s head.

Vanny closed her eyes and frowned as she looked at him. “Why…”

William hummed and tilted his head as he looked at pictures hidden in her head.

“Why choose me...of all people?” Vanessa asked.

William smiled a little at that question. He turned around and looked at her with purple, glowing eyes. “Because your curiosities can lead you down a really dark path if you let it.” William told her. “...And maybe I can help you with that.” William offered.

Vanny widened her eyes and stared at the bunny in both horror and awe.

William chuckled at her reaction. “The internet has offered you endless chances to satisfy your curiosities and yet…” William looked at their own hand. “You stop yourself.”

Vanny bit her lip and lifted her head up. “W-Well...that kind of job takes a lot of work to clean and cover up.” Vanny admitted. “And I don’t want the police finding out about my internet searches. They could see me as a suspect.” She added.

William chuckled at the last part. “There are always incognito modes.” William reminded her. “And as a guy who’s been there and done that, I will help you through all the steps. But only if you agree…” William offered.

Vanny’s awe-struck face shrunk down as she backed away. No...No she shouldn’t! She’s worked this hard trying to make a life for herself! She can’t ruin that now!

William hummed and waved their index finger. “Mmm...there’s that doubt. There’s the part of you that’s trying to return back to normal life.” William pointed out. “But that normalcy will not satisfy that instinct inside you. I’ve tried. Eventually, it found a crack and broke right through it. You’ll be better off starting early than spending your life trying to hide it. After all: Therapy always teaches you to let it out rather than shove it inside you.” William explained.

Vanny considered correcting him, but realised that he was still staying true to the facts. So, she let him talk more.

William walked closer to Vanny and gave her a charming, yet sadistic kind of smile. “You and I have something special in common: you and I both wanted to know things only the dark part of the web could provide you.” William said. “I’ve already answered all my curiosities. But you...You’re waiting to get your full answers. The world tells you to stay true to the law...yet your instincts tell you otherwise...” William explained. He started taking steps back.

“Besides: you gotta remember that everyone only has one life. It’s why I’ve been prolonging my life for as long as I have!” William explained. He spun himself around, sprinted up to Vanny and grabbed her shoulders. “Look at me! I’m in my triple digits now! I should be long dead! But I’m not! I’ve cheated death!” William declared with genuine excitement. “And now I have a chance to restart my killing spree...with a new body, and a loyal partner...something I lacked the first time.” William said eagerly.

Vanny smiled at the thought.

“So:” William held out his hand. “Will you be my new partner in crime?” William asked.

Vanny’s smile grew. It was a hard offer to resist. She’s been wanting to do this for so long. And now, she actually has the chance! Finally, after some thought, Vanny nodded and shook his hand. “I’d love to.” Vanny replied.

The two of them spent some time determining their action plans. With just a few google searches, William and Vanny were able to find a new Fazbear Mall that was opening up. And as luck would have it, they were hiring! So, Vanny pulled up her resume. With William’s previous business experience, he helped her sort out her slightly jumbled resume and cover letter. Before they knew it, the resume and the cover letter was sent to the business email. Now, all they had to do was wait.

While they waited, Vanny snuck back into her brain and looked at the bunny with curious eyes. “So...William Afton.” Vanny walked up and poked his shoulder. “What’s your little secret?” She asked.

William looked at her with confusion. “What do you mean ‘secret’?” William clarified.

“My deep secret is that I like really dark things. And I know you do too. But do you have another little secret you’d like to share?” Vanny asked.

William raised their eyebrows and smiled a little. “Like I’d ever share any secrets with you…”

Vanny frowned a bit. “Well, it’s only fair.” She told them. “Plus: we’re living with each other. I gotta know at least a few things about you.” She continued. “And specifically you...not just your history.”

William raised an eyebrow. The bunny had to admit she was stubborn. “Well...Okay.” William took a moment to think. “I was a father of three kids...all who I’ve outlived because… circumstances…” William admitted with a chuckle.

Vanny looked down with wide eyes. “Yyyyup...may or may not have found that within your history search.” Vanny admitted awkwardly.

William let out a laugh. “Wow! Okay.”

Vanny walked up to him. “Did you ever get tattoos when you were younger?” Vanny asked, grabbing his arm and looking at it.

William widened his eyes. “Uuuuuuhhh-” William pulled his arm out of her grip. “No. Even if I did, you’re not gonna see it on me now.” William mentioned.

Vanny looked down at the middle of his bunny tummy and gasped. “Look!” Vanny poked a visible light green little circle. “You have a bunny belly button!” she cooed.

William yelped and doubled over, wrapping both his arms around his belly. “HEY! No touching.” William warned.

Vanny raised an eyebrow and crossed her arms. “Why? You ticklish?” Vanny asked. “Is de bunny wabbit ticklish?” Vanny teased as she tried to poke his belly.

“No!” William yelled back, slapping her hands away. “And stop that! I am a grown man!” William yelled at her.

“Hmmm…” Vanny leaned over and stared at the bunny’s side while poking it a couple times. “Maybe a grown bunny…” She gave the belly a squeeze. William shrieked and slapped her arm away. “But a grown man?! There’s NO way!” Vanny teased, sticking her tongue out.

William growled. “Bite me!” he shouted with visible teeth.

Vanny stared at him with starry eyes. Even though William was trying to scare her into stopping, his bunny image didn’t help him at all. If anything, it just made things worse! Vanny giggled and snorted at his attempts to frighten her. Lastly: Vanny brought her index finger up to William’s nose and…

*Beep!*

William squeaked and held his nose in surprise and...almost fear. He made his eyes go cross-eyed as he tried to look at his nose, which only added to the cuteness. The moment Vanny let out an excited squeal however, William shot her a glare out of the corner of his eye.

“Don’t even THINK about pulling those stupid, childish-” William yelped as his backside was poked.

“OMG! Your back is ticklish too?!” Vanny reacted. William tried to turn around, but was caught by one of Vanny’s arms around his shoulders. With her free hand, Vanny started crawling her fingers slowly up his back. William’s eyes widened almost immediately as his lips formed a wobbly and crooked smile.

“Oooooh! I see it’s not just your spine…” Vanny started scratching the back ribs. “The sides of your back are ticklish too!” Vanny reacted.

William let out a muffled yelp and shook his head. “SSSTAHAP-!” He yelled at her.

“OH! I’m close! I’m cracking your wall down!” Vanny teased excitedly.

Then, Vanny moved one hand up to the rabbit ears. “I wonder…” She started tickling the inner ear just as a small test. The moment William moved his rabbit ear away and wheezed, Vanny IMMEDIATELY covered his ears with tickles! It was so hard to resist not going for it, when the perfect opportunity had come up!

Now Vanny was tickling his ears menacingly and listening to every laugh, squeak, titter and giggle that left his mouth. It had actually surprised William just how well the programming managed to replicate his laughter as well! Things have REALLY changed since he was younger.

“VAHAHANNYHYHY! THAHAHAT’S EHEHENOHOHOUGH!” William tried to tell her.

“Hell no it’s not! We have tons of time! I still have a response to wait for from the Fazbear company that YOU used to work for. So now I’m just quickly waiting! And while I wait…” Vanny started tickling the base of William’s bunny ears. “-I can see just how ticklish you really are!” Vanny declared.

“NOHOHOHO! UHUHUN- AAHAHAHA-! UHUHUNFAHAHAIR!” William yelled at her.

“Oh I KNOW it’s unfair. But wanna know something else that’s unfair?” Vanny asked rhetorically. “Refusing to tell me a secret of yours after you found out about mine!” Vanny replied to her own question. “Now THAT’S unfair! And just downright rude!” Vanny added.

William shook his head, flapping his ears around as she attacked the vulnerable base of his ears. “NAHAHAHAHEHEHEHEHEHE! COHOME OHOHOHON VAHAHAHAHANNY!”

Vanny smirked. “Whaddaya mean ‘come on’? Are you challenging me?” Vanny asked.

William shrieked and turned himself around to get away. Sadly, this just didn’t work. Vanny quickly wrapped her sneaky arm around William’s back and waist, and used her arm to dip him backwards like they had just flashbacked to the 20’s.

William yelped and giggled quite bashfully at this sudden turn of events, but was immediately thrown back into his frustrated frenzy the moment Vanny tickled all over his belly. “NoHO! VANNY! IHIHIHI’LL KIHIHILL YOHOHOHOU!” William threatened as he fell into another hysterical laughing fit.

“Ooooooh! I see…” Vanny said to herself while she poked and prodded at the green circle that highlighted the bunny’s belly button. “You don’t really have a belly button! Just a little green circle that sticks it out from your tummy.” Vanny explained to herself.

“YEHEHES! YOHOHOU HAHAVE YOHOHOUR AHANSWEHER! NOHOW LEHEHET MEHE GOHOHOHO!” William ordered.

Vanny rolled her eyes with a smile and continued to tickle his belly. “Ever heard of manners? Even dogs develop better manners than you!” Vanny teased.

William growled through his laughter and started to push her away. Vanny sighed and stopped tickling his belly. William went limp in her arms as bits of sweat started to fall down the bunny’s face. Was...was that just an overexaggerated emotion?! Or was William actually able to ‘sweat’? “Ohokahay. Can...can you put me down?...pleeeease?” William asked. His attempts to be polite sounded very childish. But, it somewhat worked.

Vanny smiled and laid William back down. “I-Thank you. Though, you didn’t need to lay me- HAHAHA! HEHEHEHEY- YOUSONOFA- EEEEEHEHEHEHEK!” William accidentally interrupted himself. It turns out that Vanny couldn’t resist sneaking a tickle or two onto his ears again.

“No more statements, Giggly Willy. Just a thank you will work well.” Vanny told him as she stopped fully this time.

William grabbed onto his ears and curled up into a little ball on the floor of Vanny’s mind. It was...Quite hilarious to see a tough, put together man doing such a childish move.

“I...Am content with wo-working with you, but…*huff*...C-Could we keep the tickle attacks to a minimum?” William asked.

Vanny hummed as she thought. She finally sighed. “Fine. Once a month.” she told him. “I’ll tickle you once a month.”

William looked up at her and uncurled himself. “Wanna move that to twice a month?” William asked.

Vanny blinked in surprise. “Bi-weekly?! I thought you wanted to keep the tickling to a minimum.” Vanny reacted.

“For-forget that. I don’t mind them.” William admitted casually.

Vanny did everything in her power to not throw her hands in the air and shower him with tickles. But she knew one thing for sure:

Vanny is never letting William live this down!

[glassesandkim]

ok so anon sent me a rant that i asked for and I want to answer it but under a cut so we don’t have to spam the dash. 

Click under the read more if you want to read me and anon’s rant on grey’s anatomy s17 finale

anon said: “Magston... what the hell lmao. They literally had a whole plot in 1716 about postponing their wedding so they could do it right (with family) and then winston was getting all mad about it and thought maggie was backing out (even though its a pandemic and theyve only been engaged for like what? 3 months tops). Then they flew their older parent/grandparent out (in the middle of a pandemic and severely affects old people), only to have them object to the wedding at the ceremony and then they postpone anyways???? What???? They couldnt have done that over the phone lmao like I liked the idea of magston a lot in s16 but their arc this season made me hate them so much lol. Sometimes I think theyre less developed than schmico (like which writer decided to marry them this season ????? Fireable offence imo considering they have no previous relationship history Im pretty sure and Im pretty sure they were only dating/engaged for like a year???? Even if the show was ending a moving in together/dating/engagment endgame would have worked for them? Anyways).”

First of all: what the fuck is grey’s obsession with marriage?????

It might just be me, but take it from someone who worked in the wedding industry for 3 years, and lemme tell you: weddings are fun, beautiful, amazing, but they’re also hella for the privileged. YOU KNOW IT CAN COST UP TO $700 CAD TO HIRE AN OFFICIANT??? So the job Richard had? He could’ve made an easy few hundies. 

I really hate how fucking fake and badly acted that scene was when Maggie’s dad and Winston’s grandma objected to the marriage. Why did they wait until then and EMBARRASS both of them???? Like you said, what the hell was the point of last episode’s whole debacle???? They could’ve just not done that plot in ep 16 and had them get married anyway in ep 17 and had someone object to their marriage. 

Can’t believe Maggie flew two old people around the country during a goddamn pandemic. How irresponsible is it???? Again, I don’t know if it’s because they’re just way more relaxed in the states than where I’m from but wth....

anon said: Okay and then amelink. I LOVED how amelia was written this episode, but in the context of the time jump it was kind of weird? Like amelia was feeling this way about marriage/more kids for 8-9 months and never even hinted to link that she wasnt interested? And I like to think link respects amelia a lot, so why didnt he bring up marriage again before proposing? Or ask mer/maggie what they thought about him proposing? I can understand her not talking to link about her concerns but I find it hard to believe she didnt bring it up with mer/maggie once in that time frame? Idk it was just rushed and weird. And amelia clearly wasnt okay with the fostering thing and he still went with it anyways lol.

I can’t remember and I don’t care enough to go watch the ep, but did Amelia and Link move out of Mer’s house? 

The only good thing about this episode was Amelia, especially her conversation with Richard (in that not very Seattle courtyard rofl HONESTLY GREY’S PUT SOME EFFORT IN YOUR SETS. YOU KNOW YOUR ENTIRE SHOW IS SET IN SEATTLE RIGHT/???? LIKE MAKE IT RAIN IN THAT COURTYARD TO REFLECT HOW AMELIA FEELS IDK GAWD)

I also can’t believe Amelia would just be like, welp! I guess I’m a double mom now of my own child and this random crotch child that my baby daddy promised to his best friend. And oh ya, I don’t want anymore children but shhh its a secert.

I mean, I know Amelia technically fostered before but ............. (i’ll continue this in the next segment)

anon said: And the fostering thing... Jo’s plot was weird this ep too lmao. Like maybe Im just dumb but they never explained why she failed her background check? Idk this plot would have been a much better season long arc than a one episode arc lol. Although I think the single parent thing might be fun next season (the weird jo/levi friendship will be worth it if we get schmico babysitting)

They didn’t really explain why she failed her bg check. I also don’t know how money can fix her failed background check.

Also how fucking shady is it that Link and Amelia fostered a child? Wouldn’t the foster people want to give a child to a stable family who, let’s think, ARE MARRIED and HAVE A HOME OF THEIR OWN?

Who’s the dumbass in the writer’s room that thought of this ludicrous convenient solution for Jo? Only people with that much money and power can steal children. 

I really thought Jo’s fight for Luna should’ve started earlier and when it didn’t start, I thought it would bleed into next season. It’s not easy to adopt a child. 

anon said: Also is our last jackson appearance on this show really a random facetime with jo? Would have much rather had a face maggie to congratulate her on her marriage (why wasnt he there???) 

Maggie’s kind of his step sister or whatever the f they are. Jackson could’ve taken a break from solving racism to attend his family member’s wedding, right?

anon said: Okay and then the interns... we never actually saw mer teaching them? Im hoping that theres a bigger intern/resident focus next season because of mers new job but now Im not optimistic haha. And why are the residents and interns grouped together? And why was levi so involved with mer’s patient that he wasnt pulled from the wedding to help???????? Its a double lung transplant get the upper year resident in there PLEASE!!! Or at least let him take over the surgery when mer passed out. Cristina would have been doing this shit in her intern year. I assure you he would much rather be at the surgery than the wedding of someone he has never interacted with. And Surely that surgery would have been better if more than 2 surgeons were working on it?????? my ONLY hope is that the time jump means we’re getting helm and levi aged up to 5th years and we get some chief resident/specialization/boards plots for them next year.

i hate grey’s and their ridiculous time jumps and blatant disregard to HOW THIS WILL AFFECT THE CAREERS OF THEIR RESIDENTS. 

I bet, like Teddy’s child, Levi and Helm are gonna be residents for 10 years and never choose a speciality. I want to revoke grey’s rights to call themselves a medical drama. There’s nothing medical about this show.

JUST WATCH MER TOUCH A DIRTY ASS BASIN AND THEN TOUCH A WHOLE HUMAN LUNG WITH THE SAME HANDS

YOU KNOW HOW DIRTY THAT BASIN IS SITTING ON WHATEVER THE FUCK IT WAS SITTING ON??? GET A NURSE TO HOLD THE BASIN. YOUR HANDS ARE STERILE

(Okay, I’m also sure the basin would be sterile but I can’t. I can’t believe in real life, they’d have the same hands hold a basin and a human organ. Someone who’s a doctor or works in the OR, tell me if I’m right. I need to know. )

Also, Bailey taking off her mask when she’s hugging Mer after the surgery. Right TO JAIL!

anon said: And finally... not half of maggies wedding guests ditching the wedding to go stand in a hallway and clap for mer LMAO like they couldnt have done that the next day??? Like I said before, most of this episode was comedy lol.

it’s COVID. Why are people going into the hospital unnecessarily??????

Yes, but you’re right. I gotta watch these eps like it’s a comedy or I’ll LOSE MY FACKING MIND

anon said: Redeeming parts of this episode: merhayes still has potential, need them to stop having the same scene over and over again though. Nico ily and alex get that cheque for sitting there, dancing, and clapping for ellen. Jo selling her shares to koracick... lmao. Bokhee and the other nurse getting their vaccines :’)

LOL @ merhayes having the same interaction. I was telling some people that I’d love for Hayes and Owen to have some scenes and for Hayes to kick Owen’s ass. Because like @schmico-ing said, Owen is a child collector and Hayes would absolutely fucking hate him.

YES ALEX LANDI GETTIN’ THAT DOUUUUGHHHHHHHHHHHHH. What an amazing job. I hope he gets paid in the 6 figures for his time at grey’s.

I don’t know how I feel about Koracick. I love caring Koracick. I hate asshole Koracick. I feel like they’re two different people. 

BOHKEE <3

Anyways, love your rants. I look forward to them when s18 starts or even whenever you have the odd urge to rant!

[fletchphoenix]

October 27th

Part of a project I began ages ago about Hugo :) You can read the first part here if you’re interested, but this can be read as a stand alone piece if you want to :))

Chap 1: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26651674/chapters/64995220

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

Snow crunched under his feet, not very unusual weather for the fall in Pittsford, and his heels clicked against the cobbles as he made his way down the blackened alleyway, the only other sound accompanying it being the soft humming passing through his lips accompanied by little clouds of breath. Tightening the emerald scarf around his neck, he continued his descent into the cold winter’s night. At least he wouldn’t have to be out long for this job - Donella made it very clear that it was one of her associates and would go off without a hitch.

Yeah, as if.

Every time she claimed it was a ‘quick job’, it always ended up in a shoot out or at the very least someone dead on the floor of Pittsford. That's why it was always him sent out for her dirty work and, predictably, it was him once again to go and negotiate with some hot-shot crime boss for some firearm. Needless to say this is exactly what he wanted to be doing on his birthday. TOTALLY not sitting by a nice, warm fire in his admittedly tiny room with Olivia sitting on his shoulder. Not at all.

He knew he had a job to do for her to earn his place there, but sending a newly 19-year-old to go and perform a shady business deal in the back alley of the most dangerous of the seven kingdoms? Well, maybe second-most-dangerous considering how fucked up Corona seemed. After all, everyone had heard of the 14-year-old that went batshit insane and kidnapped the queen along with trying to kill the princess. Must’ve been one hell of a 14-year-old to take out most, if not all, of the Royal Guards like the rumour said. Even after that, the Saporians took over while the princess went on a road trip and then the handmaiden stole the legendary moonstone! Like, how dysfunctional does a kingdom have to be for all this to happen in less than 3 years? It was almost unbelievable if Hugo hadn’t been on duty and seen the black rocks growing in the forest, allegedly a product of the moonstone. However, now was no time to think about this. 

He had work to do.

As he continued, a rotting oak door resided to his left. A matching sign perched above it, the metal holding it up rusted and almost covered by a layer of snow. Hugo pushed his glasses up his nose, his eyes squinting to make out the lettering before comparing it to the parchment in his hand. Yep, this was definitely the place, though he really did struggle to see it through the large crack on his glasses’ lens. He took a deep breath, his hand hovering over the concealed pocket of his jacket to be sure the dagger Donella gave him was still there. Thankfully it was, and so with one additional deep breath, he pushed open the door.

Immediately, knives were drawn on him.

Raising his hands with a smug grin, he let out a little chuckle. “Woah, woah gentlemen. Calm down. No need to get aggressive.” Hugo commented as he pushed his glasses up his nose and headed to sit down. “Donella sent me for business. Pleasure to meet ya. The name’s Hugo, don’t wear it out.” 

The room they were in was nothing less that disgusting, the scent of decay and rot surrounding him as he tried not to throw up. Freezing winds barged their way into the room, only the candles trapped in lanterns still flickering and providing some semblance of warmth. The chair he was perched on moaned under his weight, Hugo being sure it would break and drop him onto the damp floor. He sighed softly and leant back. He just wanted to go back to the hideout and not be here.

“Yeah well, we said we wanted her to come here in person, not one of her lil’ servants.” The other man chuckled and leant back against one of the gross, wooden walls, Hugo grimacing at the sight. “So thanks but no, we want ya boss, pretty boy.” 

Looking the man up and down, Hugo examined the situation. He couldn’t take him - four more men now visible in the background and CLEARLY more muscular than him. All he wanted was a quick job. A quick, simple job where he could relax afterwards and just go to sleep. Was it really too much to ask?

“No can do, boss man. She’s got shit to do and so do I later so..we’re kinda on a time crunch.” Hugo declared, looping one leg over his other and settling his hands on the table. He linked his fingers together and pressed them to his lips gently with a soft smile playing on his lips. “Now, shall we get to it?”

“We made our instructions clear and she didn’t show, so no. Run off to your owner, you fuckin’ mutt.” The man sneered, his goons chuckling at the insult directed to the blonde. Hugo, however, rolled his eyes and resumed his original position with his arms folded and leaning back in the chair. Wow, they really were shit, weren’t they?

“Ha ha very funny.” His eyes rolled, not a stranger to the bitter insult, as he subtly slid his hand into his jacket and wrapped his hand around the handle, trailing a finger slightly down the blade. A soft sigh left his lips as he rose to his feet. “Look, I didn’t want it to come to this, but oh well.” He lamented, swiftly pulling out his knife and throwing it into the man’s shoulder. Lunging forward, he grabbed what he came for off the table he’d been sat at, taking a bullet to the shoulder courtesy of one of the goons, and swiftly turned on his heel, ignoring the intense pain.

And then he started running. 

He sprinted away, yells and thudding footsteps of the men accompanying their boss chasing him in a twisted symphony. His legs ached as he ran, heaving and struggling to get air into his lungs as he gripped his bleeding shoulder, the blood loss creating a dizzy sensation as he struggled to hold the package in his arms.

He knew that the package contained the weapons that they’d used to wound him - Donella had made a batch, only for them to be stolen, and for her to then request Hugo to get them back for her. In all fairness, she’d probably say the injury was worth the contents of the cargo, it being worth ‘more than his life’ and he should be ‘grateful’ to still live there with her, Cyrus and the gang. That, however, didn’t change the fact he was dripping blood onto the floor, blending in with the snow that decorated the floor and staining it red. 

Eventually, he lost the trail of the goons and entered Donella’s base. A sigh left his lips as he leant back against the door, Cyrus walking over and removing the package before sitting him down. “Take it off.” He gestured to his jacket and scarf, Hugo obliging and slipping down the side of his shirt to reveal the bullet wound to the larger man. “Luckily it’s gone through.” Cyrus muttered, picking up the medical kit and beginning to stop the bleeding and stitch up the wound marking his shoulder.

“I got the package for ya.” Hugo muttered, groaning in pain and, with his free hand, letting his hair out of the ponytail it was in. “Took a lotta work. Had to shake the trail of at least four of these big guys. Almost as big as you, yknow?” he chuckled, letting out a long groan as Cyrus put a stitch in a particular place. 

“Sorry.” Cyrus grunted, finishing up before the room went silent. There, in the doorway, stood the woman herself, a frown playing on her lips as she strode over and picked up the package. Glancing at Hugo, she gave an approving nod to him.

“Nice job out there, kid.” She muttered, her hand resting on his injured shoulder before removing it at the sound of his discomfort. “I’ve set up a fire in your room for you if you want it.” Hugo sighed and nodded weakly, rising to his feet and grumbling at the pain in his shoulder from the bullet wound earlier. Still, he swallowed his pain and travelled down the hall. “Oh. And this.” She began, pushing an emerald case into his hands. “You have a job soon in Koto, so begin heading there tomorrow. Thought this would help you.” Donella walked off down the hall, the door to her study shutting and the sound echoing throughout the small base. 

As soon as he got to his room, Hugo sat beside the fire and let Olivia out of her confines in his pocket. Slowly, he opened the box and smiled softly at the sight of new glasses, their lenses shining under the light of the fire. They were the perfect make and size - Donella remembering the exact frames that he liked. He removed the old pair, placing the new ones on his nose and pushing them up to the bridge with a smile before leaning back with a smile despite the throbbing pain in his shoulder. 

Maybe his birthday wasn’t so bad.

[yoonguurt]

Mine

Warning:this is a Mafia!au so there is some violence. Just a heads up

Word count:2,083

A/N: this was requested by @jookyunhoevercoupshoe it got way longer than I planned so I made it a post and I'll link it in the request answer. I got a bit into it so, I hope you like it, love!

You love your husband, you really do, but lately something's fishy. He's coming home later than usual, getting more calls that have him leaving in the middle of dinner, and despite asking what was up multiple times, he just pecked your forehead and told you there was nothing to worry about. So, it was time to take matters into your own hands. 

The private investigator you hired wasn't very good at his job. All he could, or would, tell you was that your husband was involved in "shady dealings" whatever that meant. You had tried to ask Jooheon about what little evidence you had, which pretty much amounted to blurry pictures of him in back alleys with some pretty suspicious looking characters. Of course, that only angered him. "Stay out of it, Y/N. Everything I do, I do for your safety." was all he had to say, before yet another forehead peck and a quick exit. Yes, this would be something you would have to find out on your own. 

Following Jooheon may not have been the best idea, but it was the only one you had. So here you were, parked in the shadows of some shady ass shipping dock, spying on your husband. You really did not like that it had come to this. All Jooheon had to do was be upfront with you, but no. Nothing even seemed to be going on, just men standing around with Jooheon front and center along with another man. He looked unlike the man you knew and loved. His big smile with those beautiful dimples was nowhere to be found. In its place, a hardened scowl. Though you couldn't hear him, you could tell he was speaking in rough, deep voice, not the honey tone you were used to. When he suddenly pulled out a gun and pointed at the man opposite of him, your heart seized. Who did you marry? 

You made sure to be home before Jooheon. You needed time to prepare yourself. You needed answers and tonight was the night you would get them. You were in his office when you heard the front door open, you took a deep breath, and waited. When his office door opened, your husband came in and immediately gave you that beautiful smile. It almost made you forget why you were here. Almost. "Hey, baby" he said in his usual saccharine voice and moved to give you a kiss. You quickly dodged, leaving a bewildered look on your husband's face. "Jooheon, we need to talk." was your only reply. 

After hours of discussion, and a bit of fighting, you had finally been told the truth. Your husband, the sweet bubbly man you knew and loved, was the head of the local mafia family. He had between 150 and 200 men beneath him, 6 of those being his most trusted.You learned that while he himself rarely got his hands bloody, he was not above doing so. Still, he insisted that he loved you and would never harm you in any way. You were his whole world, he said. And after a great deal of thought, you believed him. 

The first month with your newfound knowledge went by smoothly. Not much changed between you and Jooheon. You still had dinner every night, sometimes it was interrupted, sometimes he didn't come him until the early morning. The main change was that you had been allowed to attend family parties with him. It had taken quite a while to talk him into allowing that, something about it being unsafe, but you weren't having that. So, you were allowed to attend on your husband's arm. 

The looks you got at these parties made you feel on top of the world. Women looked at you with envy, men looked at you with lust. But no look compared to the look of love you saw when you looked into Jooheon's eyes. Of course, there were people who looked at you with disgust and hate. Your husband was a powerful man at the top of his game, someone was bound to get jealous and have ill will towards him, and you by association. But of course no one would dare try anything, not wanting to deal with the wrath of Lee Jooheon, right? 

Tomorrow was you and Jooheon's anniversary. He bad promised that he would be yours the whole day and you two would do anything you wanted. After some thought, you decided all you wanted was an at home dinner date. Just the two of you, cooking dinner together and just being together. 

As you got ready to go to the grocery store to buy what you needed, one of Jooheon's most trusted came up to you, ready to accompany you. Lately, Jooheon had been pushing for you to have someone with you at all times. Something about a new family trying to gain new ground. You adamantly refused. You were an adult and you could take care of yourself. You very politely told Changkyun that you didn't need him today, much to his displeasure. "Don't worry, Kyunnie. You won't get in trouble. I'll handle Jooheon." you called before closing the door behind you. 

You made your shopping quick, just wanting to get what you needed and get out. You said the cashier, and made your way to your car. As you put your bags in the back, a young woman ran up to you in hysterics, trying to form a sentence. You spent a moment trying to calm her and finally she was able to get the words out. "My son. He's hurt. Please help me." You immediately asked her to take you too him to see what you could do to help. She led you to an alley nearby, and as you looked around for the boy, you felt a pain in the back of your head. Falling to the ground, you turned back to see what hit you. Right before you lost consciousness, the young woman bent down to look you in the eye. "Sorry, doll. Nothing personal, just business."

Changkyun knew Jooheon would have his head if he didn't go with you. He let you get a good lead, then followed. You were already in the store by the time he caught up, so he parked and waited. After about 20 minutes, you still hadn't come out. He had a bad feeling, but he opted to give you 10 more minutes. After 10 minutes came and went, he went inside to look for you, and came back out empty handed. He pulled out his phone, dialed and waited for an answer. "Boss, we have a big problem."

Jooheon wasn't mad, he was furious. He had never been so angry, and though he'd never admit it to his men, he was afraid. The one thing he loved the most, was taken from him and he had no idea where to look. He had given Changkyun a beating for his part. He should have been with you from the beginning. The kid would make it, he'd just be bruised and sore for a while. He had sent his best charmer, Hoseok, to get the security footage of the parking lot from the store. After about an hour, he got a call from Hoseok. "Boss, she walked off with some woman. Want the photo of her?" Jooheon scolded him for even asking, and told him to send it. Once he got the picture, he had his surveillance expert Hyungwon look at it to see if he could place the woman. Hyungwon almost immediately identified her as the girlfriend of the head of the new family in town. Now knowing who he was looking for, he called for his second in command. "Kihyun! Gather Hyunwoo and Minhyuk and let's go! Send Hoseok the location, tell him to meet us there" Getting behind the wheel, he took a deep breath, whispering to himself. "I'm coming, baby"

You woke up to a blast of water hitting your face. Your head was pounding and you had no idea where you were. You tried to move your hands, only to find them tied behind your back, legs tied to the bottom of the chair you were seated in. "Rise and shine, cupcake." came from an unfamiliar voice to your left. Turning your head, neck muscles screaming in pain, you saw a man you didn't recognize. He walked closer to you, giving you the chance to get a good look at him. He was definitely handsome, you'd give him that. You could see the gun on his hip, making it finally click that you were not among friends. "Now, my name is Jackson. I'd rather not hurt a pretty lady like yourself, but I need you to tell me what that husband of yours has planned." he spoke in a voice that seemed too kind to be coming from a man who'd kidnapped you. You knew you should just answer his questions, but you couldn't betray Jooheon like that. Mustering up your courage, you simply spit at his feet. "Ok. I understand why you would do that. One more chance. Tell me what you know, or I will beat it out of you." Sill refusing to resort to betrayal, you looked him in the eyes and replied with a "Fuck. You." Jackson's smile quickly faded. "If that's the way you want this to go, then fine. I think I'll enjoy breaking you, sweetheart." His reply frightened you, but you refused to show it, spitting again before his fist collided with your face. 

After what felt like hours of beatings, your whole body hurt. You were pretty sure a couple of ribs were broken, you had a busted lip, and you were confident in thinking you two black eyes. It hurt to breathe. But not once did you think of telling him anything about Jooheon. You knew your husband would be looking for you. All you had to do was stay determined until he got to you. "Let's try this again. Tell me what I wa-" Jackson started before he was interrupted by a tall, slender man. "Boss. Someone's here." the tall one managed between breaths. Hope bubbled in your chest. Had Jooheon finally arrived? Your thoughts were confirmed when you heard a booming voice "Where's my fucking wife!" 

You could hear gunshots and bodies falling to the ground. All you could do was hope it wasn't any of Jooheon's men. You knew he himself was safe, his voice calling your name. While Jackson was on the other side of the room, you screamed out to your husband as loud as you could manage. Jackson quickly crossed the room, pulled out his gun and pointed it at your head. Before he could pull the trigger, 6 guns were pointed at him. "That is a really bad idea, Wang." Jooheon warned as he made his way around to untie you. 

Untying your hands and feet, he wrapped his arms around you tightly. You whimpered in pain and he immediately loosened his grip. "Baby, can you stand" he asked you, only to have you reply with a shake of your head. He scooped you up into his arms carefully, and began to walk out of the room. Kihyun's voice rang out just as you reached the door, "Boss. What do you want us to do with him?" Jooheon didn't even bother turning around, just ordered his men to shoot. 

Jooheon carefully put you in the back seat of the car. He drove well above the speed limit, wanting to just have you home again. Once he reached your home, he carried you upstairs, helped you undress and ran you a bath. The entire time, he kissed your forehead and apologized and told you how much he loved you. When your bath was finished, he carried you to bed, had Kihyun bring you up some food, and planted himself next to you. 

For the next two months or so, Jooheon never left your side. You had healed a while ago, but he refused to leave you. Your days were filled with cooking together, watching movies, and tickle fights. He still had a family to run, of course, but he let his men handle most of it. He made sure to make you his number one priority. He had almost lost you once, from then on he vowed to make sure that it was something that would never happen again. 

[spacegaywritings]

Communication of Silence - Chapter 11 Spi(c)es

Logan and Virgil are at work together but have different shifts at the library. Virgil gets to leave earlier and grabs some food with Remy. Roman makes interesting discoveries and does not know what to feel about it but he is sure Virgil is shadier than he lets on at first glance.

TW: food mentions/eating, working, watching other people, therapy talks, implications of insomnia/ED etc, Roman being a bit radical and protective, slightly stalkerish? and creepy roman, Virgil being shady af (aka dealing drugs, implied)

Tell me if you need me to tag any more than this!

Virgil uses he/they pronouns (for the day) in that chapter so the pronoun use is split for a reason. Yes, they do that for a reason. Just read on, it should be a topic later ao3 link *clicky* read under the cut:

A yawn could be heard and Virgil rubbed the sleepy tears from his eyes. Work was almost over for him and he had barely gotten any sleep after whatever this shitty thing had been with Logan.

The nerd was in the break room working on some project for one of his classes while Virgil had to take the front desk. One of their colleagues had just arrived and was getting ready in the back so they would be able to take Virgil’s part.

Only a few more minutes and Virgil would be on his way to leave. Today was one of the rare days during which he could not even relax with the smell of books surrounding him. A book on folklores from all over the globe was on his lap but he had not bothered turning the page in a long time. By now, it was more decoration than anything else. It was a comforting weight on top of that.

Another yawn caught him and he squeezed his eyes shut and covered his mouth for he was in public and attempted to maintain proper behaviour. However, it did not seem to be enough for some people.

“Dear gosh, this is so rude! Do you greet every costumer like that?”

Ah, that sound. It was the all too familiar noise of annoyance embodied by an actual person. He would have wished to call her a boomer but she was not. She looked like a woman in her uh.... late 30s, maybe fourties. Someone who decided to re-evaluate her life and start studying again even though it was lat. Nothing wrong with that but some people forgot that this was literally a bunch of tired student helping over tired students during the phase of upcoming deadlines for finals, assignments and other kinds of projects.

And there was a slender woman. Taller than him, rather fair skinned in nature but seemingly tanned by artificial help. Wasn’t tan actual damage to the skin? Why would that look healthy to anyone? Society was so weird and he was sure Logan had taught him that shit when they compared their skin colours at some point when working together on putting books into their respective places. (Nobody thought it was fair that Virgil would not put books away since he was small and he did not mean getting some help if it meant not sitting at the help desk and interact with people who smelled of desperation or entitlement at worst.) Virgil barely got to forcefully shut his own jaw and stop the yawn. Uncomfortable.

The woman was already ranting. For the sake of it, the emo just named her Karen. If he had to deal with her, he might as well try to mentally make it a bit more humorous.

He leaned back. On the outside, he seemed okay, awfully calm and probably just sleepy. The woman seemed to hate it and her head was already red as she demanded some book. He could not even ask which one it was because she rapidly blabbered herself into rage.

Did she even want help?

“Um, like.. What do you want?”

Karen had taken one moment to breathe in and Virgil was quick to slip a bookmark between the pages he had long given up on. He had spoken now and taken the wind out of her sails.

Her glossy, empty cans of eyes stared into him without any sense of understanding.

“Excuse me?”

Virgil supported his arm on his elbow and let his chin rest on his outstretched palm. He was not made for costumer interaction. Was it even a costumer? He did not exactly get money from them unless they had to pay overdue loan fees for keeping books for too long.

“I asked you what you want. You kinda talked for like”, he moved his left hand in a circle as if to show that it was an estimate rather than an actual calculation, “two minutes or something.” He shrugged. “Keep it short, it is 2 in the afternoon and I have no attention span for people yelling at me in a library.”

His voice sharpened at the end as to give an extra emphasis to the word library because it was a place of being silent. She was anything but silent.

The woman let out an unholy shriek and her angry eyes narrowed as she tried to eat his poor unfortunate soul.

“You are not listening to me and then you even dare to be this rude to me, a costumer? The costumer is always right and you suck at your job! If you keep up your shitty attitude, I will tell your manager and get you fired.”

Virgil sighed.

“I still do not know what you want. Do you want to return a book, request the library to get a special book or do you want to loan anything? Do you need help finding a book? You know, there is a computer that does not talk back at you, if you want to try with that.”

He pointed towards a row of computers, some of them having special signs to indicate that they were without internet access but only served as means to navigate around the library and find certain books.

Somehow, that must have been the most offensive couple of words ever used around the woman. She seemed to puff up in anger, her hair curling a bit and her face tinting a reddish shade.

“How dare you! You are being so rude! I thought student knew better than to disrespect their elders!”

She went on saying that she wanted to see his manager, had never been mistreated like this before and found it to be an “audacity” to be disregarded like that. Suddenly she started dashing out claims of having been insulted and discriminated against.

Virgil sighed and checked the clock. Yeah, two minutes. It was time to go and he was sure Tiara was gonna be there any second now. He rose to his feet and picked up his bag.

“Where are you going, young man?”

Ugh.. that card... He barely spared her a glance and pocketed his book.

“My shift is over and you are my colleague’s problem now.”

The small student put his bag on and blinked at her before he left his desk. His sass sparked the explosion.

“I want to speak to your manager right now! I am going to get your little ass kicked you stupid -”

She never got around to finishing this sentence but he was sure she was going to say something racist, funnily enough. But glory had it, someone behind her cleared his throat and adjusted his sunglasses.

“Ma’am”, the taller man spoke. He was probably taller because of his hair standing up.

“I am the manager and I am afraid I need you to leave. If you resist, I will ban you from this location and inform campus security about your disturbing presence.”

The woman turned around. Upon seeing the man in a leather jacket and sunglasses, she frowned.

“You are the manager?”

Her words sounded like the hiss of a snake that just met their worst enemy. Eyes narrowed, she focused on the slightly smaller man than him who just nodded towards Virgil.

“Ma’am, I asked you to leave the property. Virgil, I think you need to inform security and help this lady out”, he started and leaned in a bit, his voice just turning a bit sharper than his words already were. “Tell them to inform the police for resistance.”

By now, her head was redder than a glowing fire. She was smoking about as much. Virgil tried to look as nonchalant as ever when he picked up the phone, face unbiased as if he had never picked a side in his life.

The woman let out another screech of fury. It sounded a bit like an angry Chihuahua, ready to eat your fingercap off your hand without hesitation. She was dead serious but so was the manager. Virgil started dialing and clicked his tongue, his dark eyes looking past her raging form.

When he opened his mouth, she stomped her foot and hurried off, he gloomy eyes shooting daggers at the leather-clad man for another moment before she stomped through the library and back outside again.

Virgil immediately dropped the phone and put everything away, his hands rushed as if he was handling hot potatoes.

“Fuckfuckfuck, what if she gets me fired!?”

He ran his hands through his hair, calming the heat and dissipating the energy in his sudden kick of anxiety. The man with the sunglasses walked over and pouted at him.

“Really, you are going to panic before you even greet me? I expected better from you”, he whined and stretched out his arms to take Virgil’s bag. “That bitch cannot do shit and she totally believed I am the manager. Did you see her panic when I mentioned the police? I fucking broker her, like, TBH she will not come back when you are around again.”

His shoulders flexed under the black fabric of his heavy jacket. Eyes rolled under his sunglasses that he wore despite the rather cozy dimness within the building. Outside, it was cloudy and horridly white but there was no sun to illuminate the day. Still, looking up into the sky would hurt worse than looking into the warmth of the sun for just a moment.

“Come on, you don’t need that job anyway and you can get other jobs if she really gets through with this”, he nudged the other who just looked up at him, eyes swollen in worry and decidedly looking at the other, then past him. He made the impression there was something to look out for. “Also, I fucking killed that performance. I want a bit of recognition here.”

He sing-sang his latter sentence, the words and notes wrapping around Virgil and softly pushing him closer to the taller person.

The emo caved.

“Ri, I swear you are going to be the death of me.”

He stepped into the other and just threw his hands around him.

“Whatever the fuck. You are right or whatever. I don’t care. Fuck work, fuck Karen.”

Virgil nudged Remy’s shoulder and started walking towards the exit.

“Karen? That was her name? You know why she was here? Did she come before? She sounded gosh-fucking-awful.”

The younger of the two chuckled and walked them out.

“Do I need to teach you memes, too? Am I obligated to explain every bit of Gen Z culture to you?”

The taller one inhaled the air in offence, one hand on his chest as he slowly craned his head to look at Virgil, his mouth agape in utter shock at the rude betrayal. He got as far as to slide his shades up to his head where it rested in his dark brown hair.

“Gurl, did you just fucking straight up and murder me after I saved your ass from that suburban super mom-monster?”

The student pushed the door open for them and took the time to shoot Remy an arrogant glare.

“Thank you, oh holy knight but I do not need to be saved by some random dude. Believe it or not, I would have handled that. It is the end of my shift and I was about to stall for time.”

Remy shook his head. Before he could try and bite back another comment, Virgil was already speaking again.

“Anyway, your performance did NOT suck, so I guess you are still allowed to call yourself a thespian or actress or whatever you wanna use... “, his voice dropped from high amusement down to sincere interest, “do you feel the actor today? Or, like, just Remy?”

The actor hugged Virgil’s side and blinked slowly as they walked back to his office.

“I am gonna be your brother today. What about you? Are you feeling a sister in you? A sibling or are you my brother as usual?”

This time, he stretched out his hands to open the door.

“Uh.. I mean, .. “, the other started but broke off as he quickly ducked down and walked into the office without missing another beat. Once inside, he shrugged and sat down onto the less cluttered side of Remy’s highly professional desk. “I dunno, man. I am just a thing, I guess”

Remy nodded and gave his sibling their things.

“Ah, alright, thank you for these clear words, Misc “I can stand up for myself” Lee.”

The other reacted with nothing more than a scoff.

“Whatever, just get lunch with me. Any suggestions?”

They pulled out their phone and started typing away on it, pulling up the email app he needed to compute a text to his therapist. If he was lucky, he would get some dismissed appointment and during winter time, maybe he was actually that lucky.

“I talked to your boyfriend, you know”, Remy started and Virgil waved him off.

“I am literally messaging her right now, can you calm down? I am about to go eat with you and you can take a picture if that makes you happy. Don’t get on my ass, I am.. I am trying..”

Virgil sighed and pressed “send” without reading over it or adding these funky “sincerely, yours” words and all that shit. They were not exactly in the mood to discuss the whole thing again. Their mood was already sore enough from everything that had happened before.

“Then she probably told you that I am okay and panicked enough over that. I am trying, okay? Just leave me be and get stupid food with me.” They sighed and threw their phone over. “Please.”

Remy caught the flying device with coordinated hands and skilled fingers. With one simple motion, he fastened his grip around the phone and glared back at Virgil.

“Don’t throw your shit, kid”, he warned them but did not intend to go any further than this. His eyes glanced over the shiny display. With how they used their things and just threw them around, it was a miracle this thing was still intact - at least from what it looked like on the outside. Then again, water damage was more likely than cracking the display, seeing that Virgil was almost constantly on their phone and texting him or other people.

The display was shining brightly into Remy’s face in the unlit office of his.

“Why do you need to have such a high brightness when you work in a library?”

Remy sighed and squinted before letting his shades return to the bridge of his nose. The tinted glasses did their job in making sight a bit more bearable and less painful. It was almost as if looking at bright things did not make his eyes sting dully and his head contract in pain.

In front of his eyes was a white bunch of nothing and some meek, black letters. An email to Virgil’s therapist. Well, it was not the therapist directly but it was the receptionist who was to plan and manage their therapist’s schedule.

“The library is not a dark cave, stop pretending the world is as dark as it looks from watching it through your dumb shades”, Virgil shot back casually as they fidgeted with their hands, fingers pushing together for no reason and curling up together. If they were longer, they would definitely get tied up like wild, cooked noodles. “Also, I am literally sitting right underneath a bigass lamp at the front desk. The shelves are a bit better when you are in the section with that fuckton of heavy books nobody wants to touch unless they are forced to.”

Ah, yes.

“You don’t have to show me. You are an adult and I trust you to do the right thing.”

They scoffed but left the comment unreviewed safe for a quick glance at Remy over their brow for less than a split moment. He almost thought it was nothing but imagined because he would expect them to do that.

The smaller of the two took their phone back and scrolled through it. Their fingers seemed a bit more at rest but they still rubbed over the display as if an apocalypse of message had just exploded in their notification feed. For sure, it was unlikely to get so many messages at once but Remy did not mind the quirks too much.

“Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii”

The student finally put their phone aside and let their nickname for Remy be stretched longer than wet and sugary sweet gum for kids. The one you would use to make really big bubbles before popping them in one wet and lazy sound. Feet swung forward and fell back against the side of the desk with a dull ‘clung’.

The addressed person angled his shades. His eyes were spitting salt at the other.

“Bitch, now you are going all sweet on me -”

“I will get food without you, hoe, I just want to get it done, come ooooon!”

He could not exactly argue with that. Considering Virgil sucked at eating food, at least they seemed to get this issue together around Remy. Possibly, their body just registered that being around him meant eating anyway so there was no faking it away and skipping meals and missing carbs and minerals.

It felt funny to think about it in this way. Honestly, he would not mind it if it was that way. At least then Virgil at properly at regularly.

But threatening to throw off their lunch tradition? Unbelievable.

Virgil took a threatening step down and stood by their words. They were getting their bag.

“If ya don’t hurry, I can get you something - preferences? Disgusting food? Fake Asian food fusion imitation? Weird fruits? Vegan healthy smoothie shit?”

Remy clicked his tongue but held up his hand for a moment to signal his need of time. Then he bent over to get his purse.

“Shut up, it is my treat. I might have eaten your job after all.”

The professor clicked a turn into the ground with his vocal heels and strove for the exit of his office. Virgil was quick to follow behind. When he opened the door and closed it again, he did not notice Roman just a bit away, on the staircase. He had come to find Professor Archimeda after all.

***

”Got it all?”

Virgil’s eyes rolled behind Remy, nearly turning back into the back of their head but they stayed put - as loyal and reliable as always.

“Yeah, just fucking chill for one moment in your existence”

They trailed behind him with the bags of food in their annoyed hands. Remy kept turning around to look at them, checking whether they were there, whether the food was there.

“Like you have to be talking, honestly”

Remy’s voice was so flat, it could barely be taken as more than a joke despite it being drier than any sand-dominated desert could ever be. Virgil snorted at the familiar salty flavour of his response.

“I am not going to disappear and neither is the food, seriously, I mean, you can hear me walking behind you. It is not that much of a big deal. I am just carrying the bags, calm your protective instincts, princess.”

The professor wanted to award that comment with a snarky glare but found his shades to be in the way as always. The brightly lit hallway had the stinging LEDs that would tear into his brain if he dared to even as much as consider taking off his shades and he had done this mistakes enough already.

Sweet relief was nothing compared to the satisfaction of reaching his office once more and finally opening the door to allow the unlit room to swallow them into the dim atmosphere of his beloved office.

“Finally”, the professor announced, clutching his tea tighter and kicking the door shut without glory nor car. One might have thought he just finished a whole day of work and extra chores but no, the dude just felt the pain of migraines and rubbed his temples as soon as he crashed into his chair and got to put his tea down.

On the other side of the desk, Virgil put the food down and looked at his miserable brother.

“You know what?”

Remy sighed and slowly brought his lips to his stupid straw. It was one of these funky things that was made of biodegradable something. No idea what it was but it was something and it was not paper, probably. It kinda felt different but yeah, whatever.

He sipped his tea. Decaffeinated cinnamon winter whatever tea. It was as spicy as the tea around the theatre department. Which was pretty much a lot. To indicate his attention, one of his eyebrows rose and Remy craned his neck a bit to lean towards Virgil who just got around to opening a window yet pull the curtains shut so it would continue to be dark and private. As always.

“You look like a VSCO girl”, Virgil stated with tired eyes as he moved his chair closer to the suffering blob of leather and black. “I am kinda disappointed I noticed only know but you really really do look like one and I actually think you might be the bitch of all VSCO girls. Like, the superior boss bitch.”

Remy snorted his tea back into his straw and decided to stop hugging it and just put it back onto his desk again. Tea spilled everywhere. His pants, his jacket, a bit of floor and a whole bunch of Remy face got a big load the gulp he had meant to swallow rather than spontaneously blow back into his straw (which did not have the capacity to take it all in.

Yeah, he should have never touched it after getting into the chair…. The feeling of drinking just made the migraines a little less worse most of the time. No, before and after was just as miserable. Fuck hydration. But drinking? Drinking was the cure for migraine pains for some weird, magical reason.

At least to him.

He smacked his lips and clicked his tongue. Another sigh flew from his lips as Virgil curled into a ball of laughter at the horrible image before him. It was too good not to. Remy’s lips were slightly apart as he seemed to growl the tea away from him with intimidation skills he definitely did not have on tea.

He looked.. genuinely offended at the liquid for deciding to do any of this to him and jut ruin his jacket.

“Fuck you, Virgil, just fuck you, little hate crab.”

The professor got up and shrugged his jacket off his shoulders. At least it had time to dry before lunch was over.

“You know, you could be helpful and give me something to, like, help and stuff.”

Remy stuck his tongue out at Virgil who finally uncurled but was still grinning as they reached for the napkins and gave them to their sibling.

“Alright, princess”, Virgil commented with a smirk in their voice.

The professor rolled his eyes but refused to thank him. He patted his jacket dry but accepted the loss on his clothing. It was not much, it was not really wet or anything, just damp - if any.

Remy put his jacket over the chair and settled back into his seat.

“Just hand over the food”, he muttered in defeat and Virgil seemed to comply.

They distributed the food by giving Remy some of the boxes and just push some of his stuff aside so the desk was providing some more space for them to clutter it in food items. Not to be a bitch but this was his food space now.

“Mind me, Ri”, Virgil warned before he rose his knees as a first gesture. Remy took the hint and kindly turned his chair a bit so his sibling could access his lap properly. Their feet settled on his lap and got out some bamboo cutlery.

“Yeah, whatever.”

Virgil smiled and put the cutlery between them before he started opening basically any bit of food. No box was left closed (safe for the ones in the bags, still. They were to be spared for another few minutes until it was time for them).

The next minutes were just spent with the two starting to eat, Virgil picking a playlist of Queen songs to play in the background so Remy would be a bit happier with them.

“Hey”, Virgil mumbled and grabbed their bag. Remy hummed in acknowledgment.

“Got some more trash for you and you bet you will love it~”

Virgil whispered and moved their legs so they could pull Remy’s chair closer to him. Because OF COURSE this was an office chair with wheels and movement.This was an office and this was Remy and he would definitely have these kinds of things. The student reached into their bag and handed Remy a little brown bag. It looked like one of these lunch bags.

“Yeah, so, you know.. Met my friend again and they made you something.” They shrugged, deposing the bag in Remy’s lap, right between his feet.

“Well, this just perfect here”, he commented with a sly smile but he took the bag anyway and put it away carefully. “Thank you. How much?”

Virgil rolled his eyes and shook his head.

“Just hand me those fucking honey batches, Ri, I am gonna eat them all on my own and we are even.”

Remy did not try to argue with that and silently shoved the box of dessert over to the other. They did not do much more. The rest of their lunch break was filled with some jokes and Virgil eating about as much as two people would. The two would cuddle and talk until time came for the professor to pack up and get ready to be a good teacher for his acting classes.

They parted with a warming hug right before the door, still in the safety of the dimly-lit office. Remy leaned down to press a kiss to the top of Virgil’s head.

”You take care of yourself. See you later - tomorrow? You can sleep at my place if you want to. You look like you need it.”

He touched the darkened circles under their slightly swollen eyes. They looked a bit puffy as is from crying but it was so usual, Remy barely noticed it - that is how they met after all. It was not out of the ordinary. Sadly, that was exactly the point. Insomnia should not be the new normal (especially for a growing zygote like Virgil).

They just shrugged their shoulders.

“Yeah.. I mean, maybe, I guess. I w-”, they started but a notification sound interrupted them.

The emo pulled out their phone and unlocked it with practiced movements, barely looking at the display at all. Once unlocked, they checked for messages.

“Well, time for me to go get some stupid therapy - I mean.. get therapy. You know.. whatever. I gotta get going or I will be late. I uh..” They stopped and shuffled their feet a bit, black boots clacking together. “I will text you, I guess? Thanks for the food and the...um, all the stuff..”

Remy shrugged and nudged them, warmth quickly seeping into their shoulder. He gave the student a genuine smile, even his eyes were radiating warmth.

“No problem. Now go before any of us is going to be late, Virg.”

The smaller of the two flinched as if hit by the realisation that time was still a and they, in fact, were on a clock to get to their spontaneous appointment. They quickly jumped into another hug before dashing out of the door and disappearing down the hallway with quick steps.

Their feet were walking fast until they picked up further so they would run as the storm, dark jacket flaring out and making them look like an actual storm cloud. Their steps echoing through the halls were the thunder rolling in the sky and scaring your eardrums.

Remy smiled after the figuring shrinking in size and volume before he came to his senses and reminded himself of locking up his office and walking over to his course. Roman was waiting for him and he made a bad example of himself when he was late to his own course.

Little did he know that he would probably be there first because Roman was still struck by seeing his boss and roommate interact so closely, so intimately. He turned his back on the window and hurried away, remembering there was a place he had to be.

He really needed to talk to Patton about this. The thespian was not sure what was going on but it looked shady and he could not tolerate it any longer. Someone needed to make sure that Logan would not fall for some dangerous asshole. Logan was too emotion-dumb for that. Not to talk about putting Patton at danger in his currently still rather fragile state...

Just..

No, he would not take this any longer. As he hurried through the extensive building and the majestic pieces of architectural beauty, he reminded himself to address the issue. He would try his best to convince Logan and Patton to just kick that guy out. Roman had no patience nor understanding left for someone who would constantly snap at him. He was not ready to risk his friends’ well-being for the sake of being fair. Virgil had played all his chances and lost already.

His time was over.

Just you wait, Virgil. Roman knew his friends and come time, they would realise that this stranger was nothing but trouble and needed to leave. No matter the nice benefits of him staying around.

He better watch out. Roman was coming for him.

[marvelousworldgeek-blog]

Texting Strangers

Author: Kennedy

Characters: Fem!Reader and…?

Story: Y/N, who’s going through a rough patch, texts a random number in search of a friend.

Rated PG-13 for language, mention of drinking

Warnings: Reader is going through a rough patch, but I tried to keep it on the lighter side. Also, use of language.  

“Are you lonesome tonight? Do you miss me tonight? Are you sorry we drifted apart?”

The lilting voice of The King floated in through the open window as Y/N sat at her desk, staring at the blank screen in front of her. There was plenty of work to be done, sure. But what was the point now. She hated her job, her coworkers, the tiny cubicles, the sound the water cooler made every time an air bubble floated up. And here she was on a Saturday working from home to try and finish whatever dry, boring project her boss had saddled her with, knowing that Y/N was the only person who would actually get it done. Nevermind that Marc had ten years of experience on her two, or that it was actually Kayla’s department that was in charge of this particular project. Or the fact that Y/N was still technically an intern.

“Do the chairs in your parlor seem empty and bare? Do you gaze at your doorstep and picture me there?”

And to throw a cherry on top of this hate-my-life sundae, today marked the official six month anniversary of Jeremy moving out. Break ups were always tough, of course. But things could have certainly been easier if he hadn’t literally picked up and left in the middle of the night. It seemed as though the past year had been one big non-stop “fuck you”. Work? Terrible. Relationship? Long-dead. Family? Radio silence. Friends? Moved away. Apartment? Actually starting to feel like a cave.

Y/N glanced around the room at the stack of empty takeout boxes, the pile of paperwork, the week-old laundry. Motivating oneself to clean up seemed an immense task when the overwhelming feeling in life was ‘why bother?’

“Tell me dear, are you lonesome tonight?”

The sad song was just too ironic to handle at that moment. Her neighbor across the courtyard was a huge Elvis fan, and listened to old records nearly every night. For the most part it was nice to have the soft music as a background when she was home, but tonight it was a glib reminder of how lonely she actually was.

“This is bullshit,” Y/N muttered to herself and closed the laptop.

It was saturday night and she wasn’t about to stay at home and mope her way through another weekend. No sir. And so with all the energy and false confidence she could muster, Y/N grabbed an outfit out of the closet, threw on some makeup, and headed out on the town.

…

Okay, so maybe the nightclub scene wasn’t what she was after. Thirty minutes to get in, twenty waiting for a drink, then a whole lot of sitting around on garrish plush furniture waiting for someone to walk over and strike up a conversation. The closest she came was two drunk girls telling her they liked her shoes before stumbling off into the sweaty fray. And now this overpriced, watered-down drink was going straight to her bladder.

Y/N set the now empty cup on a table and headed off for the line to the bathrooms. Surprisingly, she only had to wait for two people before she got in and locked herself into a stall. The walls were as high as the ceiling and provided a satisfying amount of privacy. Behind the safety of four walls, Y/N finally had a chance to breathe. And once again the stress of the past months settled in, despite the cheap liquor pumping through her bloodstream. She leaned her head against the wall next to her and sighed, tracing the faded graffiti.

“Satisfaction guaranteed. Call now!” and a number scrawled below, along with a doodle of a stick figure with a ‘censored’ bar over its lower half. Giggling to herself, Y/N snapped a picture and tucked her phone back into her purse. With a defeated groan she clicked back out to the sinks.

“Oh my GOD, couch girl!”

The shrill voice cut through the bathroom, and Y/N (along with everyone else) turned to glance at its owner.

“Come here, come here,” the blonde girl from earlier gripped Y/N’s hand and dragged her out into the club again, “Come dance!”

And then the evening descended into a blur.

…

Y/N woke to the bright morning sun pouring through the window of her own bedroom. Her head was pounding, her feet ached, and her stomach felt sour. Last night had turned into a long, drawn out drunken dance fest with her two new friends (whose names and numbers she had never managed to get), and in the cold light of day Y/N vowed to never try and drink her woes away again.

After much groaning, she managed to shuffle to the kitchen and set the hot water on, all the while cursing her past self. Reaching into her pocket, she grabbed her phone and checked the screen. One unread text.

“Dammit,” she groaned.

Work never stops. Reluctantly, she opened the message.

“If you ever need someone to talk to, feel free to drop me a line again.”

An unknown number, great. Y/N scrolled back up through the rest of the conversation. And was surprised to find several hours worth of back-and-forth with the mystery person. Somehow, in her intoxicated state, she had poured out her heart to a complete stranger, telling them all about the stress and sadness and heartache over her life. In turn, they had offered support and humor, and if she hadn’t known better she would have assumed this was a conversation between close friends.

“What the-”

Y/N recalled the number from the wall of the club bathroom. In a panic, she checked the photos on her phone. But the number didn’t match the one she had texted. At least not exactly. Somewhere during her night out she had attempted to text this mystery man but instead had hit up some poor clueless stranger and had a long drawn-out conversation over the course of the evening.

With an exasperated sigh, Y/N tossed her phone on the counter and retired to the couch in defeat.

…

“You look really tired,” Kayla’s brunette locks appeared above the edge of Y/N’s cubicle.

Y/N nodded; “It was a long weekend.”

“Did you finish the projection project?”

“I put it on his desk this morning.”

“Ah man,” Kayla sighed. “I was hoping I could hand it in to him. I have some, um, stuff I had to go over.”

“Like taking all the credit?” Y/N thought to herself.

“Oh well, I’ll get the next one. Thanks!”

Then she bounced away, heels clicking loudly against the floor.

Y/N leaned her forehead against the desk and groaned.

“Fuuuck…”

Her phone buzzed and Y/N sat up, rubbing her temple, and pressed the notification.

“Hope they aren’t giving you too much crap today.”

Y/N frowned; it was the stranger from the night before.

“I’m sorry, who is this?”

It was only a moment before they replied; “You mentioned you might say that!”

“Ha ha sounds about right. But that doesn’t answer my question.”

“A friend.”

“Okay,” Y/N whispered to herself, frowning. “Is this being cute? Or shady…”

“A friend with a name?”

“I thought you said we weren’t doing names?”

“Of course drunk me would say that,” Y/N thought.

“Okay friend. Tell me a little about yourself.”

“I’m a member of a secret organization who kept me in a lab for the first part of my life in order to mold me into a super weapon. Now I spend my free time saving the world.”

“You’re funny.”

“You don’t believe me?”

Y/N smiled to herself; “Okay ‘friend’ I’ll leave it be for now. You’re a superhero.”

“Really just a run-of-the-mill hero.”

“Mm-hm, I’ll take your word for it.”

“If you didn’t have to do your job, what would you want to be?”

The question caught Y/N off guard; she hadn’t thought about it in so long. She had been fully focused on getting through school, then getting a job that could get her out of her parents  house and on her own. She hadn’t thought about what she actually wanted to be.

“Um, idk”

“That’s not good.”

“I have a job. That’s what really matters,” she paused, then added, “Do you like your job?”

“I love it.”

“You’re lucky.”

“What do you like to do?”

Y/N sat for a few minutes and considered this.

Another text came through: “???”

Finally she typed, “I love to cook. I actually took a bunch of cooking and culinary arts classes in school. But I would hate being a chef. The hours are outrageous and it gets stuffy in the kitchen.”

“What about a food truck? You could make your own hours, drive to different places every day, you could even travel.”

Y/N actually laughed aloud to herself. She had never considered cooking for a living. She had worked as a waitress when she was in highschool and the kitchen staff were always miserable and overworked. Not to mention kind of mean. She had written off cooking for a living right then and there.

“I’d never thought of that.”

“What is your favorite thing to cook?”

“Breakfast food and baked goods, mostly.”

“That is perfect food truck food!”

“I suppose it is…”

“You should check this out,” they replied, then sent a link to an article titled ‘Considering Opening a Food Truck? Read these fifteen true stories from other chefs who did the exact same thing!’

“I’ll check it out, thanks!” Y/N name typed back, still smiling to herself.

“Hey friend, can I text you tomorrow? I have to go save some kids from a bus on fire.”

“Of course. Be safe, Superman!”

“Hm, nah. Call me ‘Batman’.”

“Okay, be safe Batman.”

“Read that article; I’ll ask you about it tomorrow!”

Y/N chuckled as she pressed save contact and typed ‘Batman’ into the name.

To be continued... 

[krakenator]

CHAPTER 1 aka “Stranger Danger”

I’m rereading The Property of Hate by @modmad and overanalyzing it to hell and back because i can’t stop thinking about the story and getting madder and madder about the PUNS I keep finding. I’m scratching the itch and trying to find All The Details. Current plan is just to go chapter by chapter, feel free to chime in with stuff I miss! There’ll be a masterpost up soon linking everything in one spot

SPOILERS are sprinkled around extremely liberally. Masterpost

Okay, so just a million things right off the bat on page fucking one

‘The Hook’ is of course a term for the beginning of a story. Grabbing one’s attention and convincing them to go off on an adventure, so to speak

Speechboxes! Everybody’s got their own distinctive ‘way of speaking’ in this story. RGB’s are rectangular, but those straight edges are offset by these really loopy, meandering, and elegant speech tails. It’s just. Such immediate characterization.

Like, even the pose. The way RGB introduces himself by crouching on her drawers like an incredibly dapper gremlin. It creates a similar contrast to his speechbubbles- prim and proper existing simultaneously with fae and kinda ridiculous

So considering we’ve got a fairly detailed picture of roses up on Hero’s wall on the comics opening page I think we can assume this is some type of Important maybe. Just off the top of my head, isn’t the rose Englands national flower? IDK how relevant that is outside of RGB being incredibly, incredibly British

Oh god damnit I just scrolled down to go to the next page and fffFFFUCKING BLUE ROSES ON THE BUTTONS okay. Blue rose symbolism! They don’t exist naturally. You won’t just find one in the wild outdoors, so they represent the impossible, the mysterious and achievable.

Seeing blue roses right off the bat = important story theme probably. Impossible dreams are my first thought. RGB’s seemingly hopeless plan to save a world everyone else has given up to be doomed. Hero’s wish to go the fuck back home please after she’s had her fill of deadly adventure. RGB and Hero are setting out to achieve the impossible, defeat Her, and save the World of Make Believe

Last point for the first page; RGB’s drool. Except it’s not drool, we later learn it’s equivalent to blood, and he bleeds emotions he’s feeling. While recruiting Hero, RGB’s prominent feelings are, unsurprisingly in hindsight, a fair load of sadness but tinged with a dose of cheer. His last Hero failed, and every single one before that, but he’s still daring to have hope, the absolute madman. What he’s actually dripping most though is what looks like curiosity- it may be mixed with a bit of anger, which I wouldn’t begrudge the guy. Angry that he has to start over, again, angry that his world is dying, angry that he’d the only one doing anything about it

Ok but imagine you woke up to find a man crouched on your bedside table smiling this super-wide “TRUST ME!! :)” smile and blood dribbling out of it and welling up between the teeth. Like, I’m laughing, but I’d be screaming

OKAY BUT FINALLY WE’RE PAST THE FIRST PAGE. We get a clear look at Hero’s drawings taped to the wall, and check it- one kinda looks like the Idea they run into a few chapters ahead. The other picture might also be showing the House of Paint? I mean, there’s a sun there so that’s off, but the clouds and steps leading up to Madras’ door look right

And now we get Hero’s speechboxes! They’re circular in contrast to RGB’s boxes, and colored orange. The balloon tails don’t loop-de-loop all over the page like RGBs but they’re not ‘standard’ either- there’s always this little jag to them closer to the text

RGB’s speechbubbles are actually one of the plainest/most conventional in the entire story

Excluding the tails of course. Those never ever take the most direct or efficient path to his face. Yeah, it adds an impression of silliness, but also speaks to the fact that RGB takes creative and weird solutions out of situations. I’ll laugh about the entire Click arc later but like really. REALLY. RGB DID ALL OF THAT

I love how Hero’s first actual words to RGB send him immediately into ?????????????. He keeps up this huge grin for most of The Hook and this is the first time his “I’m your friendly neighborhood TV nothing to see here!!” demeanor gets shaken up

the ladder hurts Hero’s feet, so why does she sleep on the top bunk? The bottom bunk doesn’t have any bedding on it so it’s not like she’s regulated to the top by any kind of sibling dibs

Weird... weird detail to be showing us modmad..... 

“Are you a monster?” “the very worst one” that’s a lotta blue dripping off yer chin there, stop crying

The mom is a character for two (2) seconds and even she gets her own unique speechbox; blue, fuzzy and barely connected, which does a really great job of communicating that she’s basically still asleep without ever having to see her

‘happy boi about to bring newest kidnapping to the sky world’

That’s a Mary Poppins reference, that is. RGB exclaiming ‘spit spot!’ earlier also got be thinking of Poppins

Clouds look so fluffy out of airplane windows, I’m honestly jealous

Doors! Gotta wonder where they all lead. Gotta wonder if they’ll get more use past this outside Hero’s recovery Time

I’ve just spend like 15m trying to figure out what the symbols above the doors are and I THINK it’s alchemy? “libra sign upside down” is luckily an easily searchable term, and that symbol in particular is for gas becoming liquid

I think the door beyond that has the alchemical symbol for gold? I’m not having luck on the others, including the door they actually go through here/its sister door Hero opens after the Elastic Valley fiasco.

RGB are you pissed that you had to tell this kid your name yourself? Are you upset about manners?? She’s like 7 dude cmon have you met a 7 year old. Thinking about it, possibly not, all the confirmed Other Heroes are definitely older- they all come across to me as adults

well, actually, who even knows how old Assok is. They might be the exception

The little ‘peephole’ eye popping open when the right key is close is nice atmospheric detail, but it kinda makes me wonder if there’s a person like. Seeing out of that eye. Whether someone gets a little notification every time one of these doors is opened

It’s the World of Make Believe! Stupendous! Break-taking! Modmad is exceptional at colors and beautiful environments full of personality! Hero’s last chance to turn back is gone!

Hero only being awake for 20 minutes before becoming Instantly Tired = biggest actual mood, my god. Me too sweetie

Except I can’t blame trees. And a sort of magical jet-lag effect. Yo, are sleeping tree’s making you sleepy the same sorta thing where when one person yawns everyone yawns

I just really like how this tail loops around RGB’s physical actual legs. It makes it seem like speech is a tangible thing that interacts with the world and that you could, like, touch or something. all it’s missing is a shadow

God, fuck me. That’s the yellow brick road. God dammit. Son of a bitch.

RGB, pg 14: do not touch me, do not look at me, don’t speak to me, you have tentative permission to breathe

RGB from the Market onwards: carries her multiple times (admittedly, almost always exactly like you shouldn’t), picks her up, swings her around, hugs her when she’s scared of the dark, ‘I Have Longer Legs, Hop On’ piggybacks, protecting her by putting his own bod in harms way, general Manhandling of Child

I kid, I kid, it’s more complex than that. For one, RGB doesn’t want Hero getting hurt cause she’s Important and has Heroing she can’t do if she’s injured. Second, that whole “don’t get attached” thing gets thrown out the window on like day 2

“I’ve only known Hero for a day and a half but if anything happened to her I’d kill everyone in this room and then myself”

RGB is honestly... super bad at not attaching to people. honestly, actually terrible at it

Ooh! Those flowers! I didn’t realize those always happen when Hero’s sleeping. They also look like she’s drawn them herself! That’s honestly… lethally adorable

Fun fact technicolor dream shell snail changes colors every panel

RGB bleeds static? What emotion is that? I dig it, unconscious is an emotion and i feel it in my soul

w...white noise.... god DAMMIT

ey, the tree’s look different in the light of day- all those blurry fairy light ‘leaves’ are gone now. 

!! Hero glows the exact same way when she’s asleep! RGB, however, is not. Tree’s have leaves when they dream, huh

oh god tree’s have LEAVES when they DREAM

...we’ll come back to this thought when we get to the sick sun tree cause that thing is a whole other can of Lore worms

In a different direction, there must be some sort of difference between Tree Dreaming and People Dreaming, because dreaming trees do NOT trigger RGB’s weird stuntman nightmares

these particular trees are also see-through; i can’t remember if they’re all like this throughout the world? will have to pay attention and see

oh- OH. also just made the connection for why trees provide a saf(er) haven- bottled nightmares will very shortly be used to dispel fears. Dreams repel Fears! It’s best to sleep near tree’s because just you dreaming might not be enough to keep things at bay while your rest

And the chapter’s finished off with a new character and new speechbox to go with it! It’s the first to use a different font and text color to our main characters

Honestly though, what is UP with the Butterfly? It’s clearly keeping close tabs on them, and only speaks to Hero when RGB is unconscious or otherwise occupied. It clearly doesn’t wanna be seen by him, which is shady. It shows up like twice? And the other time RGB and Hero don’t even know it’s there and listening. Between that and the Eyes, like… does it have it’s own agenda and interests or is it an agent of Hate? Idk man maybe I’ll pick up on more Butterfly stuff on this readthrough

*notices that the plant it was resting on withers once it flies away* ... that’s no good. especially if that butterfly can do the same to trees

...... ah. it kinda can. Consider, please, Hate’s likely role in the demise of the Sun, and Her confirmed ability to smother them in [-----]

Butterfly’s parting words: “be wise”. Hero’s next and immediate action: doodle RGB’s face

And that’s the Hook! Join me next time when Hero has a fun play date with some new friends everything goes wrong almost instantly.

[darkwriterpanic-blog]

Chapter 1

alcohol in my system that I can barely remember who the hell I am. I sulk and throw the bottle on the floor, adding to my mess of empty bottles and cigarette packs. I don’t really care if the noise bothers whoever’s under me, they can deal with it. For some reason the sound of the bottle connecting with my unswept hardwood floor is satisfying. I toil to light up one of my last smokes and decide that I need to make a run to the 24 hour store, which is my favorite store in the world. Out of everywhere that I’ve resided this store is the best. It’s close to me, sells everything I need, never closes and it’s the only store in Canada that sells my favorite kind of smokes. If I don’t make the trip I have a feeling that it’s going to be a really long night. I’m too drunk to put on my old, bloodstained shoes that I’ve had since my first murder, I can barely stay on my feet. After struggling for a few minutes I manage to slip them on. I stumble out the door of my apartment and lock it behind me. I focus hard on the red and orange pattern of the carpet in the hallways, I’m trying not to trip. I feel accomplished once I make it outside injury free. I love this apartment building for many reasons, one of them being that my rent is incredibly cheap- twenty dollars a month. My best friend Jacob happens to be the owner of the building. And I love the name- The Last Stop. It’s also pretty low maintenance and the other tenants don’t ask questions about shady happenings and other illegal circumstances. Sadly, the police do, and there’s a lot of legal attention drawn to this place, due to all the crimes committed. It’s risky as hell, it gets on my nerves. The other thing is that there are a lot of stairs which tend to be hard to get down when I’m drunk and hard to get up because I chain smoke. Somehow I’ve managed to never spill a drop of vodka while stumbling down the staircase.I would find somewhere better but this is the only place I can afford. The thing is, I don’t really have a job per se, it’s kinda hard to lay low when people identify you, and since my name is always on the news “Justin Hillsmith World Famous Serial Killer,” it isn’t hard for them. Besides it get’s in the way of my hobby (murder). I’m not broke or anything though because I sell drugs on the side so that I always have money for my vodka and smokes. I know what you’re thinking- “what about food?” Well, Jacob’s always getting on my case about that too. I don’t really eat because to be honest it just isn’t a priority for me. As I’m making my way through the dark alley that I always take on the way to the store I hear footsteps approaching. Initially I think that there’s somebody following me again, it’s usually someone trying to come steal my drugs- unsuccessfully of course, or a nosy citizen trying to expose who I am because apparently everybody wants to be a hero, and as I look around I realize that it’s a teenage girl walking the opposite way. She’s pretty short, and kind of chubby - but not fat. She’s wearing all black. Her hair is down to her hips and it looks black but with a tint of purple. The purple could just be from the lights though. She’s walking in a stride that isn’t quite a run. I stop dead in my tracks, hoping she won’t notice me. I decide to watch her for a few seconds out of pure curiosity, but to my dismay she starts sprinting to the alley exit. I roll my eyes (which is really a habit that needs to be put in check) and continue on my way to the store.I arrive at the 24/7 Convenience Store and go inside. It’s pretty much empty.I go to the counter to purchase 2 bottles of Smirnoff, 3 cartons of Marlboro cigarettes and a bag of All Dressed chips. I decide to check my phone because the old lady is working and she’s having trouble with the new touch screen cash register.There are a bunch of notifications from fan girls tagging me in their ridiculous fan fictions and my usual booty calls messaging me asking if I’m up. Those aren’t the notifications that get my attention though. The one I click on is a video link from Jacob. It’s a video of that same girl from the alley. Some cruel kids sent it out and it’s being posted everywhere, it’s titled “Ghost girl Loses It”. Ghost Girl’s running from something or someone- probably me if I’m being honest. Sadly, nobody takes it seriously when she comes running looking for help. There isn’t very much in me that feels bad for her and I can’t stop myself from considering that maybe she’d be a good victim. Nobody would believe her if she told someone about me. Besides, she’s already pretty isolated it won’t be too much work ruining her. She’s pretty hot too. I save the link to the post just before finalizing my purchase and exiting the store to make my way back.When I get home from the store I light up a smoke and start digging into Ghost Girl, I have nothing better to do anyways. It’s pretty easy to find her profile since people are tagging her in the videos. She’s also commenting telling people to grow the fuck up and to suck her dick. I like this one. It looks like Ghost Girl has a name: Sidney Holloway. Her profile tells me that she moved to Tombstone about 2 years ago, when she was 14. I don’t know why the fuck anybody would actually move to this shitty town, I only moved here because the police wouldn’t look for me in the middle of nowhere and right now there’s a lot of heat on me in the states. She has a girlfriend named Samara, which discourages me at first because how could I make a gay girl fall in love with me. After a bit more digging I find some good news- she has had boyfriends in the past, which means she can be pursued. After downing another half a bottle of Vodka and doing some basic research on Ghosty the sun starts to come up. I should probably go to sleep for a couple of hours. I can start my pursuit later. I haven’t slept in a week and Jacob get’s mad when the bags under my eyes are too dark- even though they usually are. I’m too used to being awake and about during the night time and by morning I usually have things to do, clients to meet with, people to stalk and errands to run. While I’m looking around I realize that I really need to redecorate. And maybe hire an exterminator. There are cockroaches all over the walls which are dirty and filled with holes from my drunken rages. The old green couch I got from an alley (someone was getting rid of it) has cracks and rips. It smells like stale smoke and vodka, combined with the lingering scent of my casual female conquests. The coffee table is wobbly too, it has marks from me stabbing my knives into it. Plus the stove doesn’t even work, it kinda does but it doesn’t really get hot enough to cook anything. I know that I need to sleep but I’m starting to think that isn’t going to happen- AGAIN. I’m too busy thinking but also not being able to think because I’m too drunk. That’s when I hear a knock on my door. I go over to the peephole and I can already guess the nature of this visit. Either a desperate customer or a whore. As I suspected, when I look I see the girl I took home from the bar a couple nights ago. I forget her name. I think it’s Victoria or Vanessa or something like that. She’s 19, and tall. Too tall for a girl in my opinion. And way too skinny. She’s wearing a pink and white dress that is extremely revealing. Unfortunatly for her I am not up for a repeat of my drunk Wednesday night. I open the door, aggressively. “Listen, Vanessa-” she stops me.“It’s Valery,  not Vanessa. I’m not hear for the reason you think. I’m here because I need help.” I open my mouth to tell her I’m not a charity worker but she puts her finger over my mouth and brushes past me into the apartment, closing the door behind her. She sits down on the couch. “I killed someone. And I don’t know what to do.” I’m suddenly filled with horror. Not because she killed someone but that she’s trying to drag me into it.“Look Valery. I can’t help you. I have enough to deal with, being involved with your shit is gonna get me arrested. So I’m going to politely ask you to get the hell out of my apartment and don’t come back.” I purposely ignore the hurt look on her face. I don’t feel bad, it’s everyone for them self in this game. On the verge of tears she hurriedly storms out of my apartment slamming my door behind her. Suddenly, I hear a blood curdling scream come from one of the other suites on my floor. That isn’t a good sign because it means that the police will more than likely be showing up within the next hour, knocking on doors trying to collect information. That wouldn’t be a problem except for the fact that as soon as they identify me I’ll be thrown in prison for the rest of my existence which believe it or not, doesn’t sound too appealing to me. I need to get out of here. Well I guess that my theory about not getting any sleep is correct. I pour some vodka in a plastic water bottle, and then I grab a pack of smokes, my lighter and my leather jacket. I rush to put on my shoes, experiencing the same struggle from earlier and run out the door. While walking down the alleys, making sure to avoid the main streets so that any cruisers circling won’t see me. I’m used to the drill, this happens at least once a week. Trying to shake off my annoyance and paranoia- and the feeling in my gut that Valery is no longer an issue, I make my way to Jacob’s house. He lives in his own house, instead of the apartment building because he says it “isn’t his style”, plus if he’s in a suite he’s losing money because it means a renter can’t be in it. His house is navy blue on the outside, the paint is cracked and peeling. It’s a two story house with a triangular shaped roof. There are three wooden steps leading up to the white front door. The steps groan when you put pressure on them and everytime I use them I fear that they will collapse.I knock on his door and he answers within a few seconds. He’s not wearing a shirt, just his blue jeans. His black hair is a mess. I try not to look at his abs as I walk in. “I have an issue,” I say ignoring the young girl with orange hair and a zebra striped dress climbing out his window with her sparkly silver high heels in hand. “There was another disturbance at the building, I am started to get thoroughly annoyed with the presence of trouble caused by people other than myself.” I know that there isn’t much Jacob can do about it, other than evicting people, which he isn’t going to do. That doesn’t stop me from complaining. I also make sure not to mention Valery. I don’t want anything to do with it. Jacob walks over to the window and closes it making sure it’s locked. We both know how insane girls can be.“Of course there is Justin,” he says, clearly annoyed. “I thought you’d be used to it by now. It’s not my fault that you always pick the worst area to live in everywhere you go.” This gets me mad because he knows damn well that if I lived in the good areas I’d be identified. People in the hood might identify me, but they damn well wouldn’t say anything. None of us want police involved any more than they already are. When he sees the pissed look on my face he changes his tone to sound more sympathetic. His already thin lips press together into a line and he lets out a breath through his nose. “I know you have to Justin. I wish there was a way to make your life normal. For you to be pardoned. But it isn’t possible, so you’re going to have to live with the little annoyances.”“If I were absolved I would stop. I would get help and I would start over,” my voice is shaking. Jacob is the only person who reminds me that I have feelings, no matter how hard I try to numb them. “It’s too late for me Jacob.” The look on his face tells me that he already knows that but hasn’t accepted it. he doesn’t want it to be true. The unspoken truth though, is that we both gave up on a normal life years ago. “I just don’t want you getting taken away from me Justin. We’ve been best friends since we were 2 and this is all either of us have left, your booze aside.” A single tear runs down his cheek and it breaks my heart. “I’m scared our time is running out. You don’t sleep, you rarely eat. You’re trying to drink yourself to death and the whole world is looking to throw you in jail other than your hookers and customers. I’m terrified for you.” “I need to tell you something about tonight.” There’s apprehension in my voice and my shoulders slump forward. “There was a girl at my apartment before the commotion. I had hooked up with her a couple nights ago. She came trying to get me to help her because she murdered someone. I made her leave and I heard the scream just after that happened. I think it might have been her.” His shoulders and fists tense up. My eyes meet Jacob’s and his are full of worry. “We’ll get it figured out, Justin. It will be okay. But you need to get better.”Jacob’s words hurt because they’re the truth. I’m not used to staring the truth in the eyes, I do everything in my power to avoid it. For the first time in months I break down. I’m on my knees sobbing while he holds me. He says it’ll be alright but we both know that’s a lie. “We could’ve been so much more than this Jacob,” my voice is shaking and although I’m slurring my words he understands. I blame myself for his lack of success. No matter how often he tries to convince me I’m not to blame it doesn’t work. We sit there crying for what feels like forever and after a while Jacob and I fall asleep on the floor with tear stained faces, just as the sun hits the sky.

[kazosa]

Secrets - SoA: Chapter 5

Summary: Reader has lived in a life full of secrets. When her father dies unexpectedly and sends her on a trip all over the country, she finds out just how much like her father she really is. The end of her trip brings her to Charming, CA where she finally gets some big pieces of her family puzzle put back in place and form new relationships with the people there. Chapter 5: Chibs and reader go back to Chibs’ place, reader gets an email Warnings: language, implied smut A/N: If it wasn’t clear before, this takes place after the events of the final episode, so SPOILERS – I don’t write smut soooo, sorry, not sorry Word Count:   2800 Tags: @telford-ortiz-teller  @sam-samcro  @tstieff  @yourcroweater  @kacilove26  @hiddlelove  @evilsorceress  @reallynigga21

IF YOU WISH TO BE TAGGED, PLEASE LET ME KNOW IN SOME WAY. ASK BOX IS SAFEST WAY, BUT I DO TRY TO LOOK AT ALL COMMENTS AND REBLOGS. COMMENTS WELCOME! Secrets Masterlist

     Chibs, of all people, knew that life was too short to be wasting time worrying over bullshit. (Y|N) made it clear that she was interested, there was no question. Just because he’d been burned in the past, didn’t mean he would be now. There was something about (Y|N) that told him she was someone he could trust, someone he could let in, all the way.      When he got back to the shop and saw her standing there in the door, the sun making her hair glow, all he thought was “m’aingeal.” When he got close and she called him by his name… Maybe he had a heart after all, maybe he could convince her to stay when her work was done.      Now, with her behind him on his motorcycle, all he could think about was her body and how it was pressed against him, her arms wrapped around his chest. He took her hand from his chest and placed a kiss on the palm of her hand before returning it to the same spot and rolling on the throttle.

     He had taken your hand as soon as he got off his motorcycle and hadn’t let go, like if he had, you might run away. There was no way in hell that was going to happen. You and Chibs were finally going to finish your “conversation” from that morning. As soon as you got in the door to his apartment, he let go of your hand and pressed you against the closed door, unzipping your coat. You looked up into his eyes, his desire for you written in the depths of his brown eyes.      As Filip pulled down the zipper on your coat, he leaned closer and captured your mouth with his. He went agonizingly slow. You could feel every tooth on the zipper give way, all the while, his tongue explored your mouth, licking, swirling, caressing. Your hands gripped his kutte, unwilling to let him escape. Finally, your jacket was open and Filip’s hands grazed your breasts causing you to moan into him. His hands went up to slip the coat off your shoulders and it landed with a solid thump on the floor. Clothes littered the floor as you and Filip made your way to his bedroom.

     He didn’t know what time it was. It was fully nighttime but the moonlight was spilling into his bedroom through the glass blocks. (Y|N)’s skin almost shone in the soft light. She was sleeping on her side facing him one hand up by her face, the other tucked under her elbow. He reached carefully to move away a strand of hair that had fallen over her shoulder, his fingertips brushing over her smooth skin.      “M’aingeal,” he murmured and pulled the sheet up under her arm.      He’d taken his time with her, learning what she liked, making her love every second with him. He tried different things until he found her rhythm. He didn’t stop until she moaned his name. He couldn’t get enough of her. Later, he made love to her until her legs were shaking and screaming for him. He liked the feel of her hands on him, all over his body…the way she seemed to be just as hungry for him as he was for her…      How he was feeling scared him a little. (Y|N) was great. Her sense of humor was close to his, she was smart, she took obstacles in stride, and he was pretty sure that she even liked his brothers. He liked her a lot, maybe too much. He didn’t want to let her get too close, but he didn’t want her to leave either. In fact, that was probably what scared him most, he wanted her to stay… It seemed like whenever someone got too close to him, something happened. Jimmy O had stolen Fi, his wife, right out from under his nose, Althea… well, she was another type of woman. He’d always thought like he was the one she chose to feel a little dangerous with, too.      Even after Althea had told him to fuck off, she still came around now and again, looking to get laid. Only one time, he’d gone against his better judgment and screwed her. That was all it took though, she would show up at parties the club held, the Charming fair, and other mundane places, looking for him. He’d told her to back off, but she persisted. Althea could be vindictive and mean, he didn’t want (Y|N) to encounter that.      “Nothing will touch you, mo ghaol,” he whispered to her.      She stirred just then and he regretted waking her.      “Filip? Are you okay?” she asked, barely aware.      “Fine, lass,” he assured her, “Go back to sleep.”      She rolled over to face the glass window, exposing her breasts. My God, she’s beautiful, he thought, not just meaning her body. He settled in behind her and pulled up the blankets, covering them both.

     You woke to the bright morning light flooding Chibs’ bedroom. This was getting to be an annoying recurrence. Why the hell didn’t he have a curtain, or something? His personality didn’t scream “morning person.” The fact that he’d made love to you three times since getting back from TM told you that he preferred the night. You weren’t even sure if he’d slept much. Didn’t matter though, he was holding you close again, sleeping soundly. Both arms around you, one leg between yours, his breath soft and even on your bare shoulder. Filip Telford had made it his mission the night before to send you into the throes of ecstasy, and he had succeeded each time.      Unsure of the actual time, you picked up your phone carefully so you didn’t disturb Chibs. Pushing the ‘home’ button and the display showed 0545. Fucking military, you thought to yourself. Ever since you’d been in the service, you had a hard time sleeping past 0600. It didn’t matter what you had been doing or when you had actually gotten to bed, your damned internal clock told you to get up at 0600. You noticed one of the icons at the top was showing you that you had an email.      Your email accounts were all linked to your phone, but there was one account that had to be accessed from a desktop computer, your secure email. When you touched the mail icon, you saw that there was new mail in the secure mail mailbox. You didn’t need to know who it was from. Only one person would be sending you mail to that particular inbox, Jack, your COO. Your heart started to pound in your chest. Jack was damned good at his job, but you hadn’t expected him to come through with your request so quickly. You decided that now, while Chibs was still out, was the best time to look at what Jack had sent, rather than waiting.      You hated rolling out of the security of Chibs’ body. Opportunities like this, private time, didn’t often present themselves so you needed to take advantage while you could. Sliding to the floor, you looked around for the SAMCRO t-shirt he had let you sleep in the previous night. You spotted a corner of it and pulled the shirt out from under the bed to put it on. Your bag had been moved into the bedroom the day before and from there you pulled out your laptop and booted it up.      He had a chair and a small table set up by the glass blocks. Pulling the table in front of you, you put the laptop on it and logged into your system. That simple mail icon suddenly looked very daunting. Since arriving in Charming, everyone you’d met was very nice to you. It made you wonder if it was because they were just nice or if because everywhere you went, Chibs introduced you as “Bud’s girl.” You felt a little shitty about being shady like this, but you needed answers. Whatever was in the email from Jack would probably answer all of the questions you had about your father, maybe even your mother, too.      Double-clicking on the message brought up a text body from Jack and there were several attachments.         “Hi Kiddo,

                The name of our gal in the IRS is Alice Montgomery. She’s been helpful for a long time, I’m sure she can be helpful for you too.                 Attached are files about the major players associated with the club. The ones about your dad are noted. Kiddo, when he knew what was coming, we started making videos. They’ve been edited together. It’s his side of the story. It’s a bit rough to watch, but it says it all.            Let me know if you need me,                   Jack”      Well, that’s just super. You weren’t sure that you could look at the video of your dad just yet. Thinking it would be better, you opened the file that was saved as “John Teller” and began reading. The files read like a story, almost. It was memories your dad had jotted down as well as research Jack had done into what things he had been associated with. It wasn’t until you got to his arrest record and saw his mug shot that the memories all started flooding back. You remembered him. He was the uncle that always liked to pick you up when he first saw you. He’d always say how he wanted his own little girl but spoiling you would do just fine. Oh god… What the police reports didn’t cover was added by your dad or Jack.      There were a lot of files and pictures to wade through. Slowly but surely, the picture in your mind of the uncle you could barely remember started to become clearer. To you, he seemed like a man who loved his family, the Sons included, and wanted to live life how he saw fit, then things took a turn. The police report for the “accident” looked fake to you, but you weren’t sure of it until you started reading the file on Clay Morrow.      Your dad was only speculating, and he made that point clear, but you found that your dad had rarely been wrong when he assessed people. It was, of course, how he made a living, reading people, knowing what they wanted and getting it for them. Once you got through Clay’s file, you wanted to kill him all over again. You slammed your laptop shut.      “Goddamn-mother-fucking-cock-sucking-son-of-a-whore,” you grumbled.      “Good mornin’ to you, too,” Chibs said softly.      “Shit, I’m sorry, did I wake you?”      “No, thought you were gone,” he was looking at you, his arm bent with his head resting on his hand. “Then I heard the words of an angel.”      You chuckled, “Yeah, sorry. I was reading something that pissed me off.”      “I pieced that one together.”      He held the covers up for you while you crawled into bed and burrowed in close to him. Your lips met his for a deep, good morning kiss. He broke away first.      Needing to know, “Wha’ were ye readin’, lass?”      His hand went up under your shirt to rest on your hip, his thumb stroking your skin. Your first instinct was to lie to him and tell him it was some bullshit story on the internet. When you looked in his eyes, you didn’t want to lie. Pact or not, you didn’t want to have the kind of relationship with him that was built on lies. Even so, it was still hard as hell to tell him the truth since you pulled some shady shit.      “I asked my COO, Jack, to run a check on the Sons and send me everything,” you were watching him for a reaction. He didn’t seem pleased, but he didn’t push you away either. “My dad and Jack made the files when they knew my dad was dying. They were thorough. I haven’t looked at it all yet. Just John and Clay Morrow.”      “Is there one on me in there?” he asked after a few moments. You nodded. “I’ve not been an angel, lass. I’ve done things that you may not find forgivable.”     After reading the two files, and with your dad knowing ALL of the things you’d done over the years and he was still proud of you… well, you doubted there could be much Chibs could have done to not forgive.      “I’m not worried about it,” you admitted. “I’m not exactly gonna be wearing a white hat anytime soon, that’s for damn sure.”      He perked up at that, “Oh, aye? Enlighten me.”      “Okay,” you said. “I’ll tell you one thing I did that you don’t already know.”      “I’m listening.”     “I have zero debt. In fact, I’ve never had any. Ask me how,” you instructed.      “How?”      “When I was in college, I ran a very lucrative sports book. Paid for all of college,” you confessed.      “How’d you manage that?”      “Laundered it through a buddy’s business. Not even a hint that anyone was onto it. I was very careful,” you told him.      He was looking at you like you were made of cotton candy. “Jeaysus Chroist, lass. Did yer da teach ye tha’?”      It was your turn to look at him with shock, “My dad? No, he didn’t. Did he run a book?”      “Aye, was damn good at it, too,” he said. “Got the club a shitload of money. Buddy was always good with money.”      So, your dad ran a sports book, too, of course he did. No wonder he was always down to watch all manner of sports with you, speculating on how many times the ball would be fumbled during a game, what so-and-so’s 3 point line average would be.

     You laid there looking at Chibs for a moment, debating whether or not you wanted to ask him again where he was all day yesterday. Sometimes, you knew when not to push and judging by the way Chibs was looking at you, it was one of those times. Thankfully, your stomach rumbled, breaking the silence.      “Should we go out to breakfast?” you asked.      “That sounds like a great idea, let’s shower,” he said grabbing your hand, taking you to the bathroom.

     At breakfast, he told (Y|N) that he needed to go to Stockton and check on Diosa. Surprisingly, she knew a little Spanish which led to questions about what sort of establishment it was. She didn’t look pleased that he would be spending the day with escorts.      “Look, I know I just got here, and I have no business presuming I have any hold over you, but…” you felt heat rising to your cheeks. “I’m not one to sleep around, Filip.”      “Neither am I, lass,” he assured her. It was mostly true, but the croweaters and hang-arounds never really fulfilled the need he had, they were just a distraction and he never really did anything with them, anyway. He just hadn’t expected (Y|N) to walk into his life and fill that need so quickly. When he told her he didn’t sleep around, she gave him that smile, the one that would make him do anything she asked.      “Tell me about the club. How it works. What you do. Things like that,” she said.      There wasn’t much he could tell her that she wouldn’t be able to figure out on her own. However, he did tell her how the hierarchy worked, who was allowed to do what, where they were allowed to be, who got to know what things and who didn’t. It was probably best she knew about it in advance.      “I forgot to mention,” he said, “The club is hosting a St. Patrick’s Day party tomorrow at RedWoody.”      “RedWoody?!” she was smiling, her eyebrows raised. “Are you shitting me?”      He found himself grinning back. “Aye, the club is the proud owner of RedWoody Entertainment.”      She put her hands over her mouth as she gasped. “Oh. My. God. Please tell me it’s what I think it is.”      “If you think it is wonderfully profitable porn movie production studio, you would be correct,” he said wiggling his eyebrows.      She chuckled again, shocked expression still on her face, “Well, legit is legit. It’s trashy as all hell, but legit. Soooo, as a friend of the club, do I get to go? Am I invited? Can I bring a date?”      “Aye, you get ta go, but you belong wi’ me,” his tone not leaving room for discussion.      “Hmm… belong with you, huh? Moving things a little fast, aren’t you Chibs? Being your date and all, you ‘claiming’ me such as it is, isn’t that something reserved for your old lady?” she smiled that smile…      Goddamnit, she caught on quick. “Aye, it is.”      “Pick me up at 8, and don’t be late,” her eyes twinkled.      “Yes, mo ghraidh,” he answered.

[hellomissmabel]

Manhattan Mistress part 9

MASTERLIST

Pairing: Bucky x reader, Steve x reader, Tony x reader and OC!Casey (daughter of Y/N and Tony)

Summary: The devil may care what happens in Brooklyn, but the Manhattan Mistress has lost all her trust in Steve and is getting ready for battle. Song is “Shoot and run” by Josef Salvat.

Word count: 3.051

Warnings: Cursing, mentions of murder, death and rape. Please do not read belong the cut if you’re not comfortable with any of forementioned!

A/N: Dedicated to my favourite mob AU writer @caplanbuckybarnes. Enjoy sweetie!

Part 6: the white noise

Part 7: the waiting game

Part 8: the heathens

Disclaimer: I do not own this pic, credit goes to the rightful owner.

The killers

When she was young, they gave her a gun And said SHOOT AND RUN It's a job well done, It's a job well done If you speak its language, It will do the rest A little too soon she put it to the test She put it to the test

Then

“These are not the kind of marks make-up can cover up, darling,” Natasha warns as she dips some foundation onto a make-up sponge and applies it where malicious fingers have left a nasty imprint on your neck. “I’m sorry this happened to you, honey. I’m so sorry,” she repeats as her voice grows softer and softer. “Are you sure you don’t want me to call anyone? Tony maybe?”

You violently shake your head no. “I don’t want to talk to anyone about it. I just want to get up on that stage and sing. Got a couple new songs I’d like to introduce to the public tonight. Sam’s been bugging me for something new for a while now.” You try to talk away the nerves but your voice keeps faltering, your hands keep shaking and slowly but surely you’re tearing up inside. You feel extremely filthy, you feel soiled and violated but most of all, you feel broken.

“Y/N, you’ve just been assaulted,” Natasha carefully breaches the subject. “You need to talk to someone about it, someone that is not me. I am not a therapist.”

“I know, it’s just… I wanted to call the police, I really did. But I can’t because what good will it do? The police is corrupt, Nat. They’ll wave it off, tell me I was asking for it. People will probably say I shouldn’t have worn such a short skirt.”

Natasha’s hand stops right above your collarbone, her eyes frantically searching yours. “Don’t do that to yourself, Y/N. You wear what you wanna wear. Just because you’re wearing a short skirt doesn’t mean it gives men the permission to rape you.”

Lulling your head to the side, squeezing your eyes shut to keep the tears from spilling, you are unable to look your friend in the eye. “He knew, Nat, he knew. He knew about Peter Parker.” Something in her expression changes dramatically. Natasha looks poised and she’s adept at hiding her inner turmoil from your scrutinising gaze, but the flash of worry behind her eyes does not go unnoticed.

Peter Parker. It has been a long time since you’ve come across that name. Peter used to be Tony’s protégé, his number one. He was a young lad and much like Pietro, Peter was always ready to do his boss’s bidding without ever asking questions or second-guessing the motives behind the task at hand. Casey took a liking to Peter and considered him as somewhat an older brother. Needless to say, he took advantage of that.

“He knew what we did and he told me that if I made one sound, he’d tell Tony. He said I was going to takes his cock like a good girl before he banged my head into the wall,” you choke out in a loud sob, clutching your hand over your heart. “Tony loved that kid, even refused to believe me when I,” you run your hands down your face, completely distraught, “When I told him that the only reason Peter Parker sticks by his side like glue is because he is spying on him for the competition.”

Tony wouldn’t hear a word of it, already too deep entangled in the spider’s nest that Peter had woven for him. He wanted a son so badly that he was even considered adoption at one point. But then Casey got taken very ill and the subject never resurfaced again, partially because you didn’t feel like being a substitute mother for a little traitor. Nevertheless, their relationship was strong and not even you, still Y/N Stark, could break them apart. “He would never forgive me, forgive us for killing his surrogate son.”

The entire thing was all a grotesque mix-up. Clint was the one who came to you with the information and told you that Peter had been played and manipulated by men he admired and looked up to in order to betray the one person that ever properly looked after him, Tony Stark. You then confided in Natasha about what you had found out and together you arranged a deal. You didn’t mean to kill the poor kid and even though you weren’t exactly inexperienced in the field of extortion and the game of shoot and run, you couldn’t help but to hesitate to pull the trigger, resulting in one of the worst decisions you’ve ever made. And somehow the man who attacked you found out about it and used it against you.

Now

Oh, she doesn't know much, But she knows this Life's too short not to take risks Oh, she steels herself and she goes for luck She pulls the trigger and lives it up

“Y/N,” Sam pipes up from behind his bar when he sees you passing by, arm linked with Steve and a playful smile on both your lips.

“Sam,” you mimic with a less than amused glance in his direction when he interrupts your amicable moment with your husband. You want to share at least one more night free of woeful worry before shit hits the fan tomorrow morning. God knows how much longer you have to keep up the charades.

“Can I talk to you for a sec?” He motions for you to follow him to the back. Pecking Steve’s lips in a chaste kiss, Steve wining a little at the loss of your warm body enveloped in his arms, you quickly follow suit, your heels clicking in a steady and confident rhythm that perfectly conceals the hammering of your frantic heart.

“Bucky asked me to talk to you ‘bout something but we’ll get to that in a minute,” he whispers carefully, shutting the door closed behind you. Taking a quick look around the room, you notice Sam doesn’t keep many trinkets or other personal items for that matter. He prefers to keep his place neat and tidy, so you are not surprised to see a single leather couch occupying the backspace. “First I gotta tell you a whole other story.”

Taking a seat on its armrest, you cross your arms over your chest and nod for Sam to continue. He’s painstakingly nervous, holding a handkerchief in his one hand to wipe away the tiny drops of sweat trickling down his forehead. You’ve never seen him this jumpy before.

“Get on with it Sam, I’ve got a date with my husband.” My voice carries a steady rhythm and it feels foreign to me considering, well, my second marriage is about to go down the drain.

“Yes, boss,” he is quick to reply, leaning with his back against the door. Hesitation is evident in his chocolate brown eyes and for a minute I consider walking over to him and hug my friend. “You see, a while ago, Steve has confided in me about a very delicate matter and it just so happens that Bucky told me a couple things as well.”

Sam clears his throat a couple times, stuffing his hands in the pockets of his blue jeans. He tries to find the correct words to voice out his opinion but fails to find one. He doesn’t want to do this, be the middle man in Bucky’s conquest for Y/N’s heart and Steve’s ransacked fixation on her and her daughter. Bucky wants what he is bereaved off, Steve is living in his own fantasy world and Sam just wants to take care of his friend who just happens to be the Brooklyn mob boss too.

“Bucky wants me to tell you all about how Steve killed Peggy and how he’s bribing Tony into paying for his stupid campaign. But I have a feeling you already know this, am I right?”

“Steve told me himself,” you confirm coolly. “And I had Scott do a little research. Steve knows about the affair with Bucky.” Motioning for Sam to take a seat, you tell him about Scott’s discoveries.

Happy hunter, ripe fresh kill On to the next one, gotta chase the thrill You gotta chase the thrill If you wanna have fun you gotta SHOOT AND RUN Leave, leave, leave it all behind, behind, behind, behind!

The bar had been filled with unsavoury characters, instantly providing an easy climate for this eve’s shady business transaction. Scott is waiting for me in the booth in the far back that has a perfect view on the stage. This spot is usually reserved for Steve and Bucky when they attend one of my performances, but tonight it serves an entirely different purpose.

As I slide in the eat across from Scott, nursing a dark and syrupy liquor that can only be one of Sam’s latest illegal brews, he carefully eyes our surroundings before speaking in a low, hushed voice. “Here’s the file you requested,” he whispers as he hands me a small stack of papers. I notice he has a faraway look about him and there’s obvious disdain in his movements as he passes the information to me.

“So what did you find out?” I try to keep my voice level and take a small sip from my glass of white wine. Usually I would opt for red but I don’t feel the need to get completely hammered tonight, which is a job for red wine, so I ordered a bottle of Chardonnay instead.

Scott nervously cards his fingers through his pitch-black hair. “Look, Y/N. I respect you a great deal, but this,” he pauses momentarily, searching for the right words in an attempt to not piss of the Brooklyn mob boss. “This is heavy shit, love. These photographs caught you in a few compromising positions with your…” Scott searches for the appropriate term, trying his best not to offend you. “With your lover, Bucky Barnes.”

Sending him a curious glance, you peer into the folder in front of me. As you open it, photographs of Bucky and yourself are revealed alongside a series of notes and numbers, some of which you vaguely recognise as a couple of Tony’s bank statements. “What the fuck is this?,” you murmur under your breath, reaching out for your glass of wine.

“It seems like your husband is keeping tabs on Bucky, too, Y/N,” Scott explains gingerly. “The numbers are for the amount of money Tony Stark withdrew and the notes clearly indicate the date on which the pics were taken and other trivia such as where you were and what you were doing. It also contains a couple graphic descriptions. I believe this,” he taps the USB twice with his pointer finger before resuming, “This doesn’t belong to Tony. I think this belongs to whoever has been stalking you and Bucky. From what I’ve gathered so far, I believe that’s Steve.”

Scott is wary of your words and remains stoic for as long as you remain silent. “So Steve and Tony know about Bucky and me,” you respond calmly, not even batting an eye. After what you’ve learnt about Steve, this doesn’t come as such a surprise anymore.

“He has an unhealthy obsession with you and your daughter, love.” Scott closes his laptop and slurping the remainder of his drink in one go. “Better be careful, dear,” he advises as you hand him the money you owe him. “I’ve seen cases like this before and I can assure you, it never ends pretty. Either the spouse ends up in the river or the entire family never makes it out alive. You don’t want that for your kid. For your kids.”

Scott notices how your entire body tenses up at this and he places a gentle hand on your shoulder. “People talk, whether you’re the mob boss or not, they’re going to find out one way or the other. Better to stay out of trouble, Y/N.”

“Scott,” you sigh, looking upset, “I’m not going to have a child with Steve, Dr. Cho assured me. Also, I’ve got other plans for my deceitful husband, trust me.”

“Very well,” he chuckles softly, “But that doesn’t mean someone else can’t knock you up.” And with a wink, Scott takes his leave and you’re left behind flustered, confused and frustrated.

Oh, she doesn't know much, But she knows this Life's too short not to take risks Oh, she steels herself, she doesn't give a fuck She pulls the trigger and lives it up

“Sweet baby Jesus,” Sam hisses at you after you finish your story, spinning on the balls of his feet whilst furiously shaking his head. “Why, Y/N, why on earth are you still with that fucker?,” he emphasises his words with wild gestures, groaning in frustration as you simply smirk back at your flustered friend.

“What did you expect me to do after finding out my husband’s been blackmailing my ex into funding his stupid campaign for him, using my daughter and myself as leverage! Shoot him in the ass? Flame his balls off with a blowtorch?” The words are coming faster than you can keep up with and as your mind is struggling to pick up the pace as well, you’re already seething with anger till you reach the point of no return. “I have to stay with him to protect my daughter, Sam. But believe me when I say his actions will not go unpunished.”

Sam huffs at you, refusing to believe it has come down to this. Through gritted teeth he says “Listen to yourself, Y/N.” Stalking over to you in big steps, his hands grip your shoulders and gives you a good shake. “Y/N, Steve’s a psychopath. You have to leave him and take your daughter with you. Tony has the money and resources to get you, Casey and hell, even Bucky outta New York by tomorrow morning!”

“I can’t! I can’t leave him, Sam!” You push Sam away from you with much more force than you thought you were capable of. “He’s obsessed with me. Till the end of the line, Sam, till the end of the line and he means it. He will find me, he will hunt me down.”

“Please, Y/N, leave him.”

“I CAN’T!”

Something within Sam snaps. “YOU HAVE TO LEAVE HIM Y/N, STEVE IS THE ONE WHO…” He clasps his hand in front of his mouth, knowing he just overstepped his boundary of confidentiality. But it’s too late now to backpedal the hell outta this mess.

“Sam,” you point a finger at him, a menacing look on your face, “Continue. Right. Now.”

Sam swallows audibly, gazing into the darkness behind your pupils. “Steve is the one who raped you.”

Up until now you had managed to keep your composure but when he delivers that final validation it is as if there’s no need for you to continue anymore. Your life has crumbled into tiny little pieces in a matter of seconds. Sam’s arms reach out to catch you as your trembling frame makes its acquaintance with the carpet underneath my heels. You are screaming but the music on the other side of the door is too loud for anyone to ever notice it. You are screaming and cursing and as string after string of profanities and whatnot leave your body, you resume to the empty shell you used to be when you were younger.

“It can be true, it can’t be,” you cry without ever holding back, just letting it all out. “I fucking loved him, why does everyone I love…”

The words get stuck at the back of your throat as you reach for the empty bucket serving as bin and spill your heart out. Throwing up has left you with an even bigger void inside your heart, for as far as you still had one. God knows you’ve already cut it up in so many pieces and given it to so many men.

“Hey hey hey, Y/N,” Sam shushes gently, sending you a half-smile in pity but pity is not something you need right now. Right now you have to make a change of plans.

He helps you get back up on your two feet, readjusts your dress for you whilst you take a minute to level your breathing. Your fingers find the zipper of your purse and you pull it open, feeling the sudden need to check your otherwise immaculate make-up. You’re relieved to see that the waterproof mascara is indeed waterproof and that your lipstick only needs a bit of touching up here and there. If you can’t look your best when you’re at your worst, then what’s the fucking point?

The thought of standing face-to-face with the man that ruined everything for you, your trust and your love and your belief that there is still some good in this fucked up world… It was all too much for you. You couldn’t do it, you couldn’t bear the touch of Steve’s hand on your lower waist as he escorts you out the bar and towards your home. But you have to steel yourself.

“Tell Bucky to give me a call at midnight,” you order Sam as you put up a straight face and bite your tongue. “Tell him not to pack his bags, we ain’t going to run from one shithole to another. But tell him to bring a bag with him, one big enough to fit a body. That’ll do.”

Sam concludes your conversation with a sad smile and walks you back towards where the two of you left Steve. He’s just finishing up on his drink and when his eyes land on you, a sunny smirk almost splits his face in two. You think it’s despicable but for the sake of appearances, you wrap your arms around his thin waist and bury your hands in the back pockets of his jeans, teasingly squeezing his sexy bum whilst kissing him deeply, keeping the shivers at bay by rubbing your crotch against the bulge in his pants and prompting a feral growl from your husband. Despite the obvious physical attraction, there is nothing but hatred you feel towards him. So you’re going to ruin him like he ruined you.

He’s going down tonight.

Part 10: the betrayal

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