#like someone at least do a masterpost jeez (although how could you even do that on Twitter?)

[amtrak12]

.... There's apparently been a month long Lucifer prompt event that I had no inkling of because it's on Twitter. aka the broken ass site that is unsearchable and way, WAY too public while deteriorating in functionality every single day.

Fandom, what are you doing?

[iya5rt]

Kalopsia Project [Bakugo Katsuki x Reader – Tokyo Ghoul AU]

Chapter 7 – Cold Villains and Villainous Colds

Chapter Summary: A creeping cold, an unexpected savior, and yet another day of trouble after trouble.

Kalopsia Project Masterpost

***

“No, no, no – this time I will get it right, I promise!”

“You sure, [Y/N]-chan? You’ve been saying that for the past three days.”

“W-well… I… I’ll try my best today!!”

“Hmm, I’m sure Recovery Girl-san will be pleased to hear that!”

“Huh? Recovery Girl?”

“Oh, yeah – I forgot you probably didn’t know,” Uraraka chuckled, motioning for you to come inside, as the two of you finally finished cleaning the outside tables. Opening time was soon, but you seemed to be ahead with the routine preparation today, so you had a few minutes left to simply chat away.

You both moved to put on the aprons of your standard Yuuei uniforms, and sat on two of the bar stools, as you excitedly awaited Uraraka’s story.

“You see, the old lady whose order you’ve been messing up for the past few days-” The remark made you blush a little but Uraraka only giggled and patted your shoulder. “It’s okay – she said she didn’t mind, remember? Anyway, you know how the CCG gives ghouls nicknames? Well, hers was Recovery Girl!”

You paused, trying to connect the dots in your head. You failed though. That old lady with that name? You’d heard of a handful of ghouls from your parents, but Recovery Girl was an unfamiliar name to you. It didn’t sound all that threatening, so perhaps that was the reason why.

“Yeah! And you know why she was called that?” Midoriya chimed in, emerging from the back room. “Her regenerative abilities were crazy fast! Like, the fastest we’ve ever seen! Of course, that was back in her prime.” He paused to stack a few trays on the counter. “Now she mostly avoids hunting by herself. This is why we help ghouls like her here at Yuuei by providing food!”

“I see… Hey, have you guys been given fancy nicknames by the CCG too?” you perked up, curiously glancing at Midoriya and Uraraka. The two looked at each other, but laughed and shook their heads.

“Nah, we’re pretty careful with not drawing attention to ourselves. A lot of ghouls at Yuuei are. We’re just trying to blend in with society – we don’t wanna have some hunters on our tails all the time.” She briefly paused, and looked around the room, as though to make sure someone wasn’t within earshot. Then she leaned in, lowering her voice to a whisper. “You know who here does have a nickname though? Aizawa-san!”

“He does!?” you exclaimed, but Uraraka motioned for you to keep quiet. You cleared your throat and asked again, this time lowering your voice like she had done. “He does? What is it?” Uraraka grinned.

“Eraser Head! And they called him that because-”

“The people he attacked always seemed to vanish without a trace, almost like they’d been completely “erased” out of existence,” a new voice interrupted, and both of you turned to see Bakugo walking through the front door. He moved to close it and looked at you. “Ya know, you’re not quiet at all. Be grateful Aizawa ain’t around.”

“Ah, sorry,” you mumbled, and, seeing as how the time had passed by pretty quickly, you stood up and went to turn around the front door’s sign, officially signaling the start of the work day. With that, you opened the door and the chilly air that suddenly hit you made you sneeze a few times.

When you turned around, you found all eyes were on you.

“What? The weather’s been all weird lately, I’m fairly certain I’ve caught a cold…” Bakugo cocked an eyebrow.

“You should just take the day off then?” Though you only shrugged.

“I’m fine and I promise not to get anyone else sick. I’ll manage for today. I can always rest tonight and take it easy for the next few days, I guess.” Bakugo didn’t look convinced, though before he could retort anything back, the sound of someone making their way down the stairs caused all eyes to snap in its direction.

He probably knew everyone was staring at him, not to mention the sudden awkward silence that had come along with his arrival, but he seemingly pretended not to notice.

You honestly couldn’t believe you had to go along with this. No one really asked you if you agreed or not but…

The moment Monoma’s eyes briefly glanced at you, you immediately looked away. No way were you going to get caught staring at him. He let out a chuckle.

“What? Is that the warm welcome of Yuuei’s staff? I’m not so sure about this idea anymore.” You could practically hear Bakugo gritting his teeth beside you.

“I never agreed either so here’s what I say – let’s just settle this here and now, huh?” The two took a step towards each other, twisted snarls on their faces. They were just about ready to throw hands.

“You act all high and mighty but a surprise entrance is a cheat, you know? If you wanna beat me, do it fair and square, Bakugo.”

“You wanna go? I still think we should have just killed you in the first place so let me do that real quick, hm? Asshole.”

The two continued arguing for a few more minutes, until the first customers walked in and they were forced to settle for murderous glares instead.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad everyone else is also here this time but… it still doesn’t feel right.

For the remainder of your shift, you remained wary.

He’d gotten the better of you twice, and you weren’t about to let him do so a third time.

***

You mentally cursed the weather and whatever was going on with it these days. Wrapping the jacket tightly around your shivering body, you clutched the small plastic bag of medicine closer.

If you were so insistent on me getting some meds, you should have just come with me, Bakugo-kun, jeez. I am freezing, ugh.

“I hate being sick,” you muttered under your nose, sneezing not long after. You were starting to feel worse and worse by the hour, and at this rate you wouldn’t have been able to get out of bed tomorrow.

I guess I’m pushing myself a bit too much. A lot has happened these past few days, so my body’s probably taking some time to cope. Maybe being around ghouls makes you more prone to colds?

You gasped.

What if every time you get a cold, that’s because you’ve had close contact with a ghoul!? …

You shook your head, chuckling a little.

That’s ridiculous. Seems like the cold’s making me delusional. I promise to take it easy starting tomorrow! I don’t feel like worsening my suffering…

Your thoughts were suddenly interrupted by the sound of whispering, alongside hurried footsteps, coming from somewhere not too far behind you. Upon rounding a corner, you managed to briefly spot the source of it too, and your heart almost stopped.

Great, someone’s following me now? Gosh, how do I keep getting myself in these awful situations!? Okay, okay, calm down – just find a more crowded street to get to Yuuei and you’ll be fine!

I.. hope…

Although, as fate would have it, perhaps you were a tad more screwed than you thought you were. You glanced around, only to realize that there was no way to get to the cafe without passing through some weird dark alleyways from where you stood right now.

Great. If I get myself killed by weird stalkers instead of ghouls, at least that would be a change. Haha, look at me, joking about this stuff…

Your furrowed your brows. Despite playing it as a joke, you were actually scared. It was kind of becoming the norm for you lately, so you weren’t nearly as scared as you had been that first time you’d been attacked by Monoma but… death was still something you feared. You couldn’t die just yet. Or let yourself be attacked by weird creeps following you out of nowhere, for that matter.

You almost screamed when a hand was placed on your shoulder. You could swear the men had been too far away from you to reach you in such a short time, you should have had longer, you would have been fine, you-

“Well, hello there!”

You froze, though the hand on your shoulder ushered you to continue moving forward, forcing you to only gulp as you were lead ahead. He must have noticed how your shoulders tensed up however, and he faked a pout.

“Aw, not happy to see me, hm?” Monoma joked. You weren’t in the mood for jokes though. Or in the mood to see him at all in the first place. Despite his words however, he leaned down and lowered his voice, whispering in your ear. “There are two weird guys following you, you know that?”

You growled quietly and turned to shoot him a glare. Meanwhile, he only looked back with a raised brow. You could swear he was just trying to hide his smirk though. It was almost like he was expecting you to be grateful.

Well, sucks for him.

“Yeah, I know,” you retorted, trying your best to stress how ungrateful and unimpressed you were. “As a matter of fact, I was trying to avoid them.” You made an attempt to shake him off. “Now would you mind getting your hands off me!?”

Monoma shrugged but complied anyway. Even so, it’s not like you could have just run off either. He would easily catch up to you, not to mention that you’d have to deal with three people on your trail in that case. You did have a slight suspicion as to why he was acting the way he was though.

“What, you’re just keeping your prey to yourself then…?” you frowned, turning to look anywhere but him. This time, Monoma remained quiet for a few seconds. You almost had a heart attack, thinking that he was mad now. A single chuckle followed, then he leaned in closer. Only now did you notice the two men were walking dangerously close to the both of you.

“Are you crazy? If that Bakugo guy found out that something happened to you while I was nearby, he might just kill me for real this time.” When the two of you were forced to a stop while waiting at a red light, Monoma turned to look back. Not long after, you heard hurried footsteps rushing away.

Did… did he chase them off?

“If they see you’re with another ghoul, they probably won’t attack you.” Your eyes widened.

“Ghoul? How would they know?” Monoma laughed.

“Aw, come on – I’ll have you know, I’m quite famous around here. This was my feeding ground before I moved to the Second Ward. Anyway.” The light turned green and you crossed the street. Monoma had let go of your shoulder, though he was still walking practically beside you and casting you frequent glances to make sure you wouldn’t run. “Don’t flatter yourself like that – I just don’t feel like dying quite yet, so we’re heading straight for Yuuei. You can thank me later.” That annoying smirk was back on his face. You scoffed.

“As if.”

The remainder of your walk to Yuuei, however short it may have been, was… awkward. To put it mildly. And who could blame you – getting along with the one who almost murdered you twice in the span of a single week wasn’t exactly possible. You still couldn’t quite place his motives for chasing away the two men from earlier, though you would think twice before easily believing him again. Not after what happened last time anyway.

Even so, he did get me out of potential trouble… However selfish his motivations may have been.

You glanced at Monoma, trying to discern what his reasons were. Before you could look away though, he caught your stare and raised an eyebrow, at which you promptly pouted and looked away.

Walking into Yuuei was not something you were exactly looking forward to either. Especially if Monoma planned to come in with you side by side.

And true enough, your worries turned out to be quite reasonable. Lunch break was going to end soon (you cursed your weird stalkers for slowing you down), and upon opening the door, all eyes in the cafe turned to stare at you. Most took a second to process everything and remained still. You didn’t dare look up to see their reactions. One person however, didn’t even give you time to explain.

In the blink of an eye, he had rushed past you and was gripping Monoma’s collar.

“Oi, you really have a death wish, huh!? The hell were you doing!? Answer me, asshole!!” Bakugo growled, not actually giving Monoma any time to answer.

See, normally you would have rushed inside the cafe and let him handle this. It’s not like you felt sorry for Monoma. But…

Damn it, I’m becoming such a softie…

You cleared your throat and a pair of crimson eyes suddenly looked at you. At least, you assumed they did, since the profanities spilling from Bakugo’s mouth also stopped, though you yourself were looking somewhere off to the side.

“Bakugo-kun, it’s… it’s okay… I- He, um...” You glanced at Monoma, then turned to look at Bakugo, whose eyes were wide and trained on you. “He, uh, kinda helped me? I-I think?” The ash blond stood frozen for a moment, then took to frantically looking back and forth between you and Monoma.

“He did!? You sure!?” he raised his brows. You slowly nodded, first at Bakugo, then an Monoma (this was the best expression of gratitude he was getting from you). Seems like it wasn’t enough for him though, as you watched him stick his tongue out at Bakugo, who in turn pushed him, making him hit his back in the door.

Surprisingly enough however, even as Monoma was busy grunting from the small pain and rubbing at his back, Bakugo stepped back and drove a hand through his hair. You took that as your cue and walked to the counter, finally dropping the bag of medicine and digging through it to find the first vitamins you were taking for the day.

After you fetched a glass of water and swallowed them, Bakugo leaned back on the counter beside you, shooting you a curious look, at which you only shrugged.

“Don’t ask me,” you said, clearly noticing all the questions on his face, though he refused to speak them out loud. “I was just coming back and some weird guys started following me. He showed up out of nowhere, saying you would get mad if I got hurt? I’m sorry, I’m sure that’s probably all too much.”

“You bet it is.” He leaned his head even further back, staring at the ceiling lost in thought for a bit. “Guess we gotta make sure you’re not going out on your own until we figure out what’s up with those stalkers of yours, huh?”

“They’re probably just some random creeps from the streets, don’t worry about it. I’ll be more careful from now on anyway.” The teasing thought of Bakugo being worried about you crossed your mind, though, noticing you going to change into your uniform again, he stopped you, speaking up before you could even bring it up.

“You’re not gonna eat something? It’s your lunch break, you know?”

You shook your head and sighed, frowning.

“This stupid cold seems to have killed my appetite too.” With that, Bakugo watched you with furrowed brows, as you disappeared upstairs.

There was a weird sinking sensation in his stomach. Something was wrong. Something had been wrong for a while now. Yet he had no idea what was causing him such worry.

Too bad he was going to find out, whether he liked it or not.

***

The day had been pretty slow, perhaps the slowest you’d experienced in your short time working at Yuuei. There were barely any customers, yet most of the staff was there. You mentally blamed it on the weather, convincing yourself that you weren’t the only fool who got sick at such a weird time. Then again, maybe people just had better things to do.

You know who apparently didn’t have better things to do though? Kirishima, Ashido, Kaminari, and Sero. A mere half an hour or so after your “lunch break” (which, let’s be real, had been anything but a break, not to mention that you didn’t even have lunch during it), the four had walked in with wide smiles and taken the same table they’d chosen when you’d first encountered them a few days prior. The inside of the cafe was empty, so it seemed like that was just their preferred place.

You waved them hello and went to fetch their drinks. Much like Midoriya, you already had them memorized. With one last look around the place, you decided you weren’t needed anymore and sat beside the four.

That’s exactly what I need right now. I feel like crap, so hopefully this will distract me enough.

You spent the next few minutes catching up on everything that had happened over the past few days, and, at long last, began making plans to meet up soon. Ashido had mentioned how cool their arcade night had been (of course not neglecting to say how she had been the sharpest shooter out of the bunch, only for Kirishima to lean in and whisper that she had actually been the worst at it), and the thought of going out with them resurfaced in your mind. Even though you had to insist on putting it off a bit, so your cold could pass by then, you were already trying to figure out where you wanted to go.

“[F/N/-san, the hot cocoa is ready!” Midoriya called out, quickly disappearing into the back room yet again.

“Oh, excuse me then, I’m gonna have to bring that over real quick,” you smiled, and walked over to the counter, raising a brow at Bakugo, who seemed to be frowning an awful lot tonight.

Waving a hand in front of his eyes, you called out.

“Hey, you okay? You look more grumpy than usual,” a small smirk rose to your lips. Bakugo’s frown deepened even further and he waved you off.

“It’s nothing, go back to the loud dumbasses.” Your smirk fell in concern. Something wasn’t right with Bakugo, but you knew you had no right to pry. With a sigh, you turned your back to him.

“If you say so. But,” you turned to give him one final look. “If there’s something wrong, please don’t hesitate to tell someone, okay?” He mumbled a small “Whatever”, as you took your first few steps towards the table.

A loud crash came next. Accompanied by the sound of breaking glass.

In the blink of an eye, your vision went pitch black. Your knees gave out a mere moment after and you fell to the floor.

You were vaguely aware of the frantic cries that suddenly seemed to come from everywhere around you. Though even those went quiet in another second or two.

Or so it sounded like to you. After that, you lost consciousness.

***

[CLASSIFIED INFORMATION]

Protocol K78152112

Subject #35

Real Name: Bubaigawara Jin

Background: Volunteered as a subject; Left an orphan after parents were killed by ghouls.

Results: Subject suffered almost unbearable headaches; Personality seems to have been affected – borderline bipolar.

Full sync with the kakuhou was achieved in a few hours. Subject lived and showed no further signs of deterioration.

(scribbled in pen) Two in a row? We’re on a roll this months, aren’t we? This one had severe mental damage, so perhaps we should try and avoid that in the future.

***

Author’s Note: An early update today because I have other things that need to get done during my usual update time! Though I doubt anyone’s going to complain, haha!

Hmm, to those who guessed Monoma was going to join Yuuei – you were right! Aizawa’s much softer than he’d like to think, so they decided to give him another chance! Hope you’re excited to see where this is going to go!

And it’s official now – the real plot begins! I can’t wait, aaah!! Anyway, the Classified Information files are becoming very easy to guess, though a lot of you got last week’s correct too! Thank you guys so, so much for reading! Your support on this story means the world to me, please drop a comment with more predictions or just shocked gasps (I had to make up for the lack of a cliffhanger from last week, after all), I’d really appreciate it! I love you all so much and I’ll see you all next Wednesday! Bye~

(Psst, @afuckingunicornn  @creativedogs  @chims-kookies  - you know the drill by now - thank you for the support and here is the next part!)

[do-your-socks-have-holes-in-them]

Til the End of the Night / Ch16: In which Virgil does a stealth mission

Previous / Masterpost / Next

Summary: Virgil sneaks, does crimes, and gets another strong contender for the top 10 most stressful days of his life.

Warnings: more imprisonment than the average chapter, knocking-out of nameless guards, mind control

A/N: this chapter is a long boi! and one i’ve been really excited to write!

AO3

~ ~ ~

Virgil, very carefully and deliberately, did not think anything along the lines of “this should be easy.” His plan was simple, to be sure: find Logan’s bag, retrieve him and Patton from the dungeons, then go get Roman and be done with all this. That didn’t mean it wasn’t going to be difficult, especially now that there were all these guards everywhere. The witch had been more than happy to explain to him where they’d come from so suddenly, and insisted that the one stationed outside his room was there purely for his own safety. They served as both an inconvenience and a reminder of why he needed to break Roman out as soon as possible.

At least he knew his way around the castle somewhat by now. It was almost deliberately confusing, full of improbable staircases and unnecessary secret passages, but then again, it had been designed by Roman, so he wasn’t sure what else he had expected. He hadn’t been able to explore on his own, or even managed to leave his room without a guard immediately latching onto him as an escort, but he knew how to get to the dungeons and he had a vague idea of where Roman was being kept, and that would have to be good enough.

Another few days passed before Virgil finally saw his chance. The witch had succeeded in assembling and training her army despite Roman’s attempts to resist her, and she very specifically did not want Virgil there for her first time conquering, stamping out resistance and the like. It was nothing personal, she explained, but she wanted to make it clear that she was the one taking over the kingdom, not him or anyone else. Virgil couldn’t care less about that, although he did have to pretend to be annoyed by it- the important thing was that she would be gone, and he would be in the castle with fewer guards around than usual, since a good half of them were also part of the army.

It seemed like as good a time as any to learn how to use that invisibility necklace Logan had given him.

What with Virgil never having used any kind of magical item before, it took some trial and error to figure it out. Honestly, using magic at all in a controlled way was still hit or miss for him- he’d yet to practice it in any situation where he wasn’t actively in danger. He nearly destroyed part of a wall and somehow managed to set the bed on fire, but eventually, after what felt like hours, something clicked. When he looked at his reflection in the nearest shiny object… well, he didn’t, because it wasn’t there. Since Virgil was fairly confident he wasn’t a vampire, this seemed like a good sign that he’d finally got the invisibility working. Now, he just needed to move quickly so they could all be gone before that evening, when the witch was due to return.

High intelligence was not a feature generally found in expendable evil minions with no distinguishing characteristics, and so it didn’t take much to sneak past the guard at his door. For one thing, pretending to be on guard against intruders getting in and not Virgil getting out required him to face away from said door. All Virgil had to do was pull off the classic distraction of throwing a small object (of which there were many in his pockets- he wasn’t even sure what all of them were supposed to be) in the other direction from behind his back, and he went off to investigate the noise, giving Virgil time to slip out and close the door without being noticed.

Now… where to go? He knew where to find Logan and Patton, so maybe he should go down there first, just to see what the situation was. He wouldn’t be able to talk to them with guards around, and he’d really rather avoid any fighting until he had a definite way to free his friends, but it would be good to know exactly how hard it was going to be to get them out and not get caught. He was sure he could knock someone out if he had to, either with magic or a decent-sized rock, but if anyone found them like that they’d definitely sound the alarm for an intruder, and they might even send someone to tell the witch. Best to avoid any of that until he ran out of other options.

He slipped through the halls quietly, wishing he knew some magic to silence his footsteps and the rustling of his clothes. It was way too stressful having to freeze in place every time a guard passed by or so much as looked in his direction strangely. Thankfully, they all seemed to be working on video-game logic: after not hearing anything else for about two seconds, they forgot they’d ever been suspicious. It took longer than he would have liked, but he made it to the dungeons without any real trouble.

There were guards patrolling, but it seemed like a bit of a skeleton crew. He didn’t have much trouble avoiding them entirely. Frankly, he might have been able to pull this part off even without being invisible, between the atmospheric lighting and the infrequency of guards passing by. Still, he couldn’t risk trying to speak to his friends- sounds echoed down here; best save the explaining for when he actually had something to show for all his sneaking around. He stopped by to check on them anyway. Logan was pacing around the cell, mumbling to himself and looking frustrated, and Patton was sitting on the floor watching him, covering up his own unhappiness with a vague supportive air. Virgil doubled down on his resolve to be quick about getting them out of there. Now, on to looking for any likely places Logan’s bag might be.

He found himself surprised by how many other prisoners there were, besides his friends. Not that he’d expected the Dragon Witch to waste perfectly good dungeons by not throwing people into them for any offense she could come up with, but the castle as a whole hadn’t been around all that long. And- jeez, some of them didn’t look to be out of their teens yet, and they all seemed so hopeless. Virgil reminded himself that, first of all, they weren’t real, and second, everything would be fixed as soon as Roman was restored to his rightful place. Remind him again why it had been such a good idea to come rescue that idiot manually, as it were, instead of just waking Thomas up to summon him?

Let’s see… empty cell, empty cell, not-empty cell that he wasn’t going to look at too closely- aha! Coming upon a door that looked more like it belonged to a closet than any kind of dungeony room, Virgil glanced around to make sure no one was nearby enough to notice and slipped inside. He was in darkness at first, but once his eyes adjusted, he found a torch in a bracket on the wall beside him and, in the absence of any other fire-starting equipment, made sparks appear from his fingertips until the thing caught.

It was, in fact, essentially a closet he was standing in. It was also exactly the room he’d been looking for. Shelves lined the walls of the small space, filled with various items confiscated from prisoners and small slips of paper indicating which cell’s occupant they belonged to. Virgil scanned all of them quickly, and then scanned them again, more slowly, and then he resisted the urge to bang his head against a wall. Logan’s bag wasn’t there.

Okay, he needed to think. She wouldn’t have destroyed it, would she? Maybe she wasn’t planning to ever let Logan out of the dungeons, much less return his belongings, so she’d just gone ahead and gotten rid of everything. Luckily for Virgil’s state of mind, he didn’t get much further along that train of thought before he heard voices out in the hall. He extinguished the torch in a slight panic and pressed himself against the wall next to the door, listening carefully and hoping no one was about to come in.

The voices seemed to belong to two of the guards, one of whom was just beginning their patrol.

“It’s just our luck, getting stuck down here when we could’ve been out helping to conquer the kingdom,” the one who’d recently arrived complained.

The other made a noise of assent. “Least we’re patrolling, not just standing in one spot for hours while nothing happens.”

“Yeah, this way we get to walk in circles for hours while nothing happens,” quipped the first. Their colleague laughed in the way one laughs when the joke isn’t all that funny, but is still the most entertaining thing likely to happen any time soon. “Actually, uh- on that note, why isn’t anyone stationed at that door?” Virgil assumed they were talking about the one he was currently hiding behind. “Seems like a lot of risky stuff to leave unguarded.”

“Oh, didn’t anyone tell you? We moved all the dangerous stuff for today. It’s up in some room on the third floor. Somebody had the bright idea that it wouldn’t need to be guarded up there, ‘cause nobody escaping from the dungeon would ever make it that far before getting caught.” They snorted, showing what they thought of that idea, but no one ever asked their opinion, nooo.

“I mean… works fine as long as nobody who isn’t an escaping prisoner tries to take them.”

“That’s what I said!” There was a clinking sound which could potentially have been made by a guard in light armor throwing their hands in the air. “But he was all, that’s ridiculous, it would be suicide to steal from the Dragon Witch’s castle…” The sentence faded and became unintelligible as the two walked away.

Third floor, huh? It would be suicide for anyone else, maybe, but Virgil thought he had a pretty good chance.

- - -

The journey to the third floor of the castle, as well as the subsequent search for the correct room, turned out to be tedious- stressful, yes, but not very interesting. After Virgil left the dungeon, snuck past the throne room, wound his way through the hallways on the second floor where his own room was located, and finally made it up the last staircase he needed to take, he found that the third floor had much less security than all the ones below it. This probably had to do with there being not much of value up here- on a normal day, at least. Today, there were quite a few valuable things on the third floor, and nearly all of them were in this same room.

Virgil looked around curiously. He needed a minute anyway, to get his heart rate back to normal and convince his hands to stop shaking, so there was no harm in checking out what else was in here besides Logan’s bag. Mostly, he saw confiscated weapons, which might have been tempting if they hadn’t been so impractical to carry and if he’d had any idea how to use them. He would stick to his knife, thank you very much, and not kill himself trying to use whatever that impressively and in fact concerningly spiky thing was supposed to be.

Ah, there it was- he extracted what he’d come for gingerly from its place beneath a small pile of swords, and sighed in relief when it registered as a part of his clothing and turned invisible once he’d slung it over his shoulder. After a brief hesitation, he grabbed a few other things as well- whatever looked both interesting and small enough to fit- and stuffed a few in his pockets and the rest into the bag. Logan would probably find some use for them. It hardly counted as stealing when the things had already been taken from their original owners by the witch, right?

As he left the room, Virgil realized with a sinking feeling that what he’d just accomplished had, in fact, been the easy part.

Logan’s bag, full of things like glass bottles and metal whatever-Virgil-just-stole, was not quiet. It was a lot harder to slip past guards when he was constantly clinking, not to mention the danger of letting anything fall out. But he couldn’t let himself move as slowly as he’d like- he was really starting to feel the pressure of watching the sun get a little closer to setting every time he passed a window. There were a few close calls, to put it lightly, on the way back down. Thank goodness for guards who didn’t care enough to question things when it must have seemed like they were being haunted by a very jingly ghost.

Alright… now all he had to do was break his friends out of their cell while avoiding the guards, get himself and them to Roman’s tower without getting caught, and then get all of them out of this stupid castle, all before the witch returned. As he crept down the last of the stairs to the dungeons, Virgil was feeling just high enough on adrenaline and success to feel like he had half a chance.

- - -

The second of the guards who’d been talking earlier was walking past the closet of confiscated items when the door suddenly opened, and they were pulled inside by someone- or something- they couldn’t see.

“Who’s there?” They tried to sound intimidating, not scared. Their interrogation attempt was stopped in its tracks by a hand covering their mouth.

“If it makes you feel any better,” said a low voice by their ear, “you were right about what a bad idea it was to move everything.” Then something hard struck the back of their head, and if the room hadn’t been pitch-black already, everything would have gone dark.

- - -

Logan had long since given up on being able to escape the cell on his own. He sat on the floor beside Patton- pressed against his side, really, in an attempt to stave off the chill of the dungeons- and talked softly to himself about strategies they might use against the witch once Virgil freed them. Ostensibly he was talking to Patton, but it was clear that the former wasn’t fully listening and just wanted to nap away as much of this unpleasant interlude in their journey as possible. Logan worried about him. The bruise on his head was slowly fading, but he still moved gingerly, and it wasn’t impossible that he’d received other injuries during their capture. When actually asked about his behavior, however, he’d deflected nervously and changed the subject, which only made Logan worry more. He was beginning to contemplate simply checking while Patton was asleep, but that was definitely a last resort.

At the current moment, Patton had his eyes closed, and Logan was speculating on potential weaknesses of the Dragon Witch and her guards-slash-soldiers. He made sure to do so quietly, since those of said guards patrolling outside the door would doubtless not appreciate this particular line of thought. He stopped mid-sentence when the cell door unlocked and swung open, apparently without anyone present to do the unlocking and opening. A moment later, his bag materialized from thin air and lowered itself carefully to the ground in front of him.

A moment after that, while Logan’s brow was scrunched up in concentration with his attempt to understand this series of events, Virgil deactivated his invisibility necklace.

“Virgil!” Patton gasped, perking up instantly at the sight of his dark strange son. Logan hadn’t been certain he was awake up until now.

“Oh, thank goodness,” Logan breathed. “I was afraid-”

“Don’t have time to talk,” Virgil interrupted just as quietly. “She could be back any time now, I have to get to Roman- you guys meet me there, okay?” He then rattled off a series of directions which only Logan could actually understand and remember. “Be careful.” With that, he reached for the glass pendant again and disappeared.

Logan stood, returned his bag to its rightful place with a sigh of relief, then turned to help Patton up. “…Approximately how much running do you feel capable of in your current condition?”

- - -

Virgil was beginning to care less and less about stealth. The impending return of the witch felt like a physical pressure, and besides, it wouldn’t be long before those guards from the dungeons woke up. He'd knocked them all out and left them in the closet, just to make absolutely sure they wouldn’t bother Logan and Patton on their way out, but he wasn’t entirely sure it had been the best idea. Anyway, at this point, it seemed worth it to risk making a little more noise if it meant getting the heck out of here faster. None of the guards had been concerned enough to go after him or anything yet, and that was good enough for him. He could only hope that he actually knew the way to Roman’s tower as well as he thought he did… and that he’d given the others the right directions, too… and that they could all get there in time.

The door in the northeast corner of the castle’s top floor, leading to a spiral staircase- that had to be it, right? Virgil closed the door carefully behind him and then all but sprinted up the stairs. At the top, he found a short hallway with a door at the end of it, still guarded despite the lack of staff today. He sighed, winced, and gave this guard the same treatment as the ones patrolling the dungeons, before pulling out a set of lockpicks he’d found among the confiscated items. The guard might have a key somewhere on them, but they also might not, and in that case, searching them would just be a waste of time- time he really, really didn’t have.

After a tense few seconds of fumbling with bits of metal, the door swung open with a creak. Roman was sitting on the bed inside, and Virgil staggered under the simultaneous waves of relief and concern that washed over him. He was here, and safe, and he looked awful- exhausted and despondent, refusing to move his gaze from some random bit of floor as he heard the door open. Virgil leaned on the doorframe, carefully casual, and let himself become visible again.

“Heya, Princey. Ready to get out of here?”

Roman shot up. A soft smile took over his face at the sight of Virgil smirking in the doorway. “Finally,” he cried, “my Dark and Stormy Knight has come to rescue me!”

Virgil huffed, amused. “I’m not Batman, Roman.”

“You could be,” he argued. “I mean, with your- black clothes, and all the brooding…” With a few quick steps, he was close enough to spin Virgil around in a hug as they both attempted to crush all the air out of each other’s lungs. “All you’re really missing is the skills.”

“Do you want rescued or not, jerk?” Virgil squeezed him one more time and stepped back. “Come on, we need to get out of here… before…” Uh-oh.

Just as he pulled Roman out the door, the Dragon Witch herself appeared in front of them, dropping her own invisibility spell. “Isn’t this a lovely reunion,” she sighed. “I almost couldn’t bring myself to interrupt… and wouldn’t you know it, standing here watching turned out to be very… informative.”

“If you haven’t figured it out by now, I’m not on your side anymore,” Virgil growled, reaching for his knife.

She laughed. “Oh, you idiot, I figured that out the second day you were here. It was very entertaining watching you try to pretend, though. Honestly, did you think I was actually leaving you alone in my castle for the entire day?”

“You…”

“I did sort of hope you’d prove me wrong. I’ve been following you around- it hasn’t been difficult, you don’t seem to even know how to muffle your footsteps. But that’s enough gloating… let’s get to what happens when people betray me and try to escape, now that your friends have been good enough to join us.” This last referred to Logan and Patton, who had really thought they were being quiet as they crept up the stairs behind her. They froze in place.

Virgil shifted into a fighting stance, lightning crackling around his hands and all the way to the tip of his dagger. “You’d better stay away from him,” he warned, not sure if he was bluffing or not vis-à-vis actually being able to do anything to her if she didn’t listen.

“Oh, I don’t need to go anywhere near him, thanks to you,” said the witch, looking infuriatingly smug.

Logan glanced at Virgil over her shoulder. Virgil wasn’t sure if the urgent look he returned meant “why are you just standing there, do something already” or “why are you just standing there, get out of here before this situation gets any worse.” Patton tried to move forward, but Logan held an arm out to stop him on instinct.

The Dragon Witch hummed thoughtfully. “Prince Roman,” she said, tasting the words on her tongue and finding them absolutely delicious. Roman turned towards her like a compass facing north, and she smiled. “Disarm your friend there for me, would you?”

“Wh- hey!” Virgil was taken off guard, and Roman had his left arm twisted behind his back before he could process what was happening. He tossed the invisibility charm to Logan with a subtle flick of his wrist when he didn’t think the witch was looking, just in time before his other arm was restrained as well. “Don’t listen to her, what are you doing?!”

“Oh, don’t worry, I think I’ll be nice this time. After all, you were the one who gave me his name.”

Virgil stared at her, twisted around to see Roman’s blank eyes, and slowly went limp and unresisting in his grip. “You can’t do this,” he snarled, facing the witch once more.

She blinked at him. “What a ridiculous thing to say. Obviously I can, or I wouldn’t be doing it right now.” She glanced over her shoulder, and huffed in annoyance when she realized Logan and Patton were gone. “Take him into your room for now, Prince Roman. I’ll return to deal with him properly once the other two pests are back where they belong. Honestly, first order of business now that you’re under my control is going to be making some less useless guards.” She nudged exhibit A, still unconscious on the floor, with a look of distaste. They stood up and returned to their post thanks to a small burst of magic from the witch, only a little disoriented.

As Roman dragged Virgil into the tower room and allowed the door to be locked behind them, the Dragon Witch spun around in a swirl of long dress and cloak and began walking down the stairs. All she had to do was take care of the two heroes running around her castle with no plan, and her victory over the Prince would finally be sealed.

It should, she thought, be very easy indeed.

[do-your-socks-have-holes-in-them]

Til the End of the Night / Ch6: In which Roman has company

Previous / Masterpost / Next 

Summary: The Dragon Witch finally shows up in person.

Warnings: manipulation, breaking things in anger

A/N: Roman wanted more page time. And by wanted I mean demanded from me. So I gave it to him. :)

Read on AO3

Roman watched through his full-length mirror as his friends entered the forest.  All the walking wasn’t very exciting, but watching it was better than doing nothing. He had finally worked out how to zoom in on the stupid thing after tinkering with it (and shouting at it) for most of the day, and jeez was he ever gonna have to have a talk with those three about their clothing choices.  Virgil at least looked the part, although it was the wrong part.  And, okay, yes, Patton was freakin’ adorable, that was a given.  Logan, uh… yeah, he had nothing there.  Even his face- which was, of course, identical to Roman’s own face, and Roman looked good in anything- still couldn’t save that outfit. Back to the point, though, if they were going through the forest, that meant they were taking the same route he himself had a few days ago.  Which meant… hmm.

He flopped on the bed to think, staring up at the ceiling. When he traveled that path, he was always presented with challenges- three of them, to be exact.  Adventuring was his way of testing himself, making sure his improvisation skills were kept sharp, as well as his swordsmanship.  His friends probably wouldn’t be fighting much, though, given that they had no weapons and wouldn't know how to use them if they did.  No, they were more likely to face obstacles suited to their individual strengths.

“But what might those be?” he mused aloud.  Not that he didn’t know what their strengths were, but how did, say, Patton’s emotional intelligence and caring nature translate into anything that might pop up in the normal course of a heroic quest?  He tried not to dwell on the fact that he should have known, that he seemed to be losing control over his own dreamspace thanks to their presence and truly did not know what would happen.  “I mean, I’ve certainly never heard of anyone defeating a dragon with hugs.”

“Have you ever tried?”  He sat up in surprise at the sound of another voice, light and teasing, yet underlaid with a dangerous sharpness.  The Dragon Witch herself, stepping through the mirror.  He dismissed the images quickly and laid a hand on his sword, jumping to his feet.  “It’s been a while, Prince.”

“Not long enough, witch, and I believe the attempt would only earn me a knife in the back,” he pointed out, eyebrow raised.  She laughed, tossing her intricately braided dark hair over her shoulder.

“You know me too well.  How are you faring, all alone in here?  I know it must be difficult for you, what with the lack of adoring imaginary subjects and all.”

“You’ll be disappointed to hear that I am perfectly fine.” Actually, he had never been so bored in his life.  Now that the reality of his situation had really settled into the Imagination’s framework, he couldn’t conjure anything fun anymore.  “Enough small talk, what are you planning?  You must have a reason for wanting me out of the way.”  His weapon was drawn now, and they circled each other, Roman holding his sword at the ready, the witch’s hands giving off a warning glimmer of magic.  They both knew better than to attack first, so a wary peace existed for the moment.

“Oh, taking over your kingdom, terrorizing the populace, the usual.  I do wish you’d give me more complicated motives once in a while.”  The witch was one of Roman’s earliest creations.  He wasn’t entirely sure when she had become self-aware.  It was a bit worrying, if he was honest; sometimes he wasn’t sure if she was really under his control or just playing along for her own amusement.

Roman bristled at the insult to his creativity, clapping a hand over his heart in offended shock.  “You dare presume to tell me how to craft my stories?!  I wish you wouldn’t imprison me in my own architecture, but we can’t always have what we want, can we?”

“Point taken.  But that reminds me, I didn’t just come to indulge your love of antagonistic banter.”  She took a step towards him and he raised his sword defensively.  “Oh, put that down, I’m not here to fight.”

“Maybe I am,” he retorted, and, well, with an opening like that, what was he supposed to do?  He lunged at her with a shout, only to find himself suspended in midair, surrounded by green and gold light.  Stupid magic. His sword floated out of his hand and over to her while he was immobilized.  She finally released him from the spell after catching it and he thudded onto the floor in a very unprincely manner.  He glared at her and stood up, brushing himself off and trying to look at least a little bit dignified.

She responded as if nothing had happened between his last statement and this one.  “No, you’re here to wait for someone to save you from my evil clutches, but since I doubt that will be happening any time soon, right now you’re going to help me with this.”  She produced a rolled-up parchment and showed him a vague drawing of a castle.  “I mean, it’s definitely missing something, right?”

He blinked, taken aback and briefly forgetting to be angry. “Pardon?”

“The design of my castle,” she said, as if it should have been painfully obvious.  “How am I to take your place as ruler of this realm without anywhere to rule from?”

He really shouldn’t be helping her with that, but dangit, the temptation of having something to do was too strong.  It wasn’t as if she would have time to actually construct the thing, after all, he certainly wouldn’t be lending any assistance there, so there was no harm in merely planning it as a mental exercise.  And he really wanted to draw a castle, okay?  He snatched the paper and spread it out on the table, conjuring a pencil.

“Alright, you’re definitely going to need more spikey bits here… No, no, this is all wrong-” he erased an entire section of the building- “this should be over here, and then maybe some spires… Oh, and of course there’s got to be a wall with a nice, intimidating front gate…”  Without her noticing, he also scribbled in a small back-door entry.  No impenetrable stronghold would be complete without a way to sneak in, obviously.

Soon he was flipping the paper over to sketch different angles on the back, and then unconsciously summoning up more, so absorbed in messy floor plans that he didn’t notice when the sun went down. The witch watched over his shoulder as he muttered to himself, smirking at how easy it had been to get him going. Eventually, he finished off one last illegible annotation with a flourish and stepped back proudly. “Done!  Beautiful, right?”

She stepped around him and shuffled through the papers. “Oh, yes, you’re so talented!”  He preened.  She glanced sideways at him, a glint in her silver eyes and a smug smile tugging at her lips, and he faltered, realizing he may possibly have made a slight mistake.  “And so, so incredibly easy to manipulate.”

Her eyes flashed green.  He gasped and braced himself on the table.  It felt as though someone had wrapped a hand around his internal organs and given a sharp tug.  Something was torn from him, forced violently out into the world.  His closest reference point was a dream gone wrong, the feeling of nightmares forming themselves from his creative power against his wishes, only so much stronger. He couldn’t breathe for a second, and then the witch flicked a hand at him before he could try to move, walking away and leaving him frozen in place.  He could only watch as she oh-so-casually opened a wooden door that definitely had not existed before, on the opposite side of the room from the window, and stepped out into a long torch-lit hallway, taking his sword with her.  “Thanks for the castle, Princey,” she sang while closing the door.  There was the metallic sound of a key in a lock, and he stumbled a bit as her magic dissipated from the air around him.

“No,” he said out loud, surprising himself with how angry he sounded.  “No! How could I be such an idiot!”  He swept the papers off the table in frustration, and the look he gave them as they fluttered harmlessly to the floor should by all rights have burst them into flame.  “I finally get a chance to do something in this story, the story I was supposed to be the hero of, might I remind you-”  He appeared to be reminding the lantern.  “-and the one thing I’ve been able to do in like a week, it all goes completely flipping pear-shaped!  It’s not fair!”

He was vaguely aware that this was the literal definition of throwing a tantrum, but given that no one could see him anyway, he didn’t particularly care.  In fact, he decided to go ahead and throw a pillow, too, while he was at it.  Then he accidentally knocked the lantern off the table, again, while pacing angrily around the room, and then the pillow he’d just thrown was on fire and so were the drawings, and the lantern survived but he burned his hand retrieving it and at that point he was too frustrated and tired to clean up properly, so he didn’t. He just fell into a convenient chair and glared at nothing in particular, trying to get himself under control before his burning anger morphed into hot tears.  Stupid, stupid, stupid.

He couldn’t tell how long it took him to calm down.  When he felt like sitting up properly again, it was really dark outside, and that was all he knew.  The lantern was flickering, because a lot of its oil was now pooled around the charred remains of paper and fabric and fluff.  He simply snapped his fingers to get rid of that mess, now that he was stable and not at risk of making it worse instead.  While he was at it, he cleaned himself up and changed into some more comfortable clothes for sleeping, red flannel pajama pants and a soft t-shirt.  He sat on the edge of the bed, dropped his head into his hands, and sighed.

“Am I… losing control?”

The room didn’t respond.  His own thoughts tried to answer him instead, and he didn’t much appreciate what they had to offer.  The evidence was beginning to add up, as Logan would say, probably while dressed as Sherlock Holmes for some reason.  Getting stuck here in the first place could be dismissed as a fluke.  The others having influence over his realm, well, that made sense, given the way it responded to his thoughts, although that didn’t mean he liked it.  But the Dragon Witch hijacking his power to bring an entire castle into existence?  That should not have been able to happen.  He created her.  She was a figment of his own imagination.  Why was she suddenly doing things he didn’t expect, or understand, or know how to stop?  It was… scary.  He had never been genuinely afraid of anything here, always knowing on some level that none of it was real, but this scared him.

He wanted to conjure up a new pillow, but was hit with the probably-irrational fear that it wouldn’t work and he would have proof that his power was fading.  Maybe leaving him entirely, stranding him here, never to return to Thomas except in dreams, where he would desperately try to get a message through each night only to have it forgotten upon waking and okay no this was not a hypothetical narrative he needed to follow to its conclusion, that was only making things worse, stupid brain seizing on anything it could turn dramatic and taking it way further than necessary.  This was exactly why he needed the others to get here soon.  Logan would bring him back to what was real and actually happening when his thoughts ran away with him like that, and Patton would surely give him a hug and believe in him so hard he’d forget he ever doubted himself, and Virgil would make him feel better just by being there, ready to stop him if he tried to do anything else stupid for the sake of showing off.  He and Logan were basically 85% of Roman’s impulse control, but Virgil was the one willing to literally tackle him to prevent a bad decision.  He’d never expected to miss that.

This wasn’t getting him anywhere productive, and he couldn’t sleep with his thoughts in such turmoil.  He gave up after fifteen minutes of trying and sat up.  The room was nearly pitch-black, but there was a dim sliver of light coming through the crack under the newly-extant door, making the mirror appear to glow.  Maybe he would just check on them once more before going to sleep, just, you know, to see how far they had gotten since last time.  They were almost certainly asleep by now, but still.  He felt his way carefully across the darkened room and pressed a hand against the cold glass of the mirror, focusing his thoughts on his friends.