#max going on an impulsive trip

[fromwarmclimate]

highly maxiel coded

[ruruumin]

race to your heart

₊˚ ᗢ itoshi rin x gn! reader.

⤷ inspired by my experiences playing wmmt, 3.1k words.

it is once in a blue moon that rin would agree to any of the blue lock boy’s shenanigans. they were always bringing up the most absurd ideas: whether it be buying all the popsicles at the local convenience store to win the prize (something he has done with ease) or going to the mall to buy new cleats, he found hismelf dragged. this time, he accompanied the rest of the team on their short trip to the arcade.

curtsey of nagi, they were able to find a local arcade that had very little people. surprisingly, there were hardly any kids. some middle-aged men stood over ancient machines and people in their early 20s playing with nostalgic smiles. while a few other guys left to play street fighter or other games, rin stayed around with the most rowdy group: isagi, bachira, nagi, and reo. the five of them decided to take up one corner of the arcade, settling on a game that nagi has been constantly raving about, wangan midnight maximum tune, a popular racing game.

bachira decided to sit out and just watch (an uncommon sight that had the rest of the group scratching their heads. apparently he wasn’t interested in racing games and just wanted to watch isagi). nagi and reo already had their own bana passports, a way of saving progress and upgrade cars in the game. this left rin and isago to sit down in their seats, swiping their cards and using guest accounts to play. 

isagi decided to choose one of the porsche that was displayed, reo had picked out a purple dodge viper for himself, and nagi was scrolling through his garage (trying to choose the slowest one for fairness). the white-haired man sat at the very left, with reo, rin, and isagi following the line up. 

the first game was truly something to behold. while bachira was off to the sidelines, cheering on isagi, nagi and reo were neck and neck with each other. rin’s eyes twitched in annoyance as every time he tried to make a smooth turn on the highway, isagi would crash into him, hitting the back of his car and effectively slowing him down. 

it would eventually end with nagi in first place, rin (miraculously) in second, reo in third, and isagi last. the purple-haired man would have been in second place had he not hit the center barrier in the tunnel, causing him extra time. midway through their game, someone had come up from behind rin’s chair, standing a few feet behind with their nose buried in their phone. dressed in a simple black hoodie and mask, it was clear they were waiting for him to give up his spot.

instead of giving a staredown as he always did, nagi was the first to speak up, turning his head around to reo as his eyes darkened. a look that he could only describe as impulsive and egotistic.

“reo. get out.”

“huh?”

“get out,” he says more carefully, “i want to race them.” pointing to the figure in the back.

wordlessly, reo gets out of his seat, choosing to stand beside nagi now as the person he’s been waiting for sits down. as if nothing happened, they pull out two cards, using the first to swipe for credits; 7249 CREDITS REMAINING, and the second to scan their bana passport.

rin taps the steering wheel, raising his eyebrow as the mysterious person goes through their garage. nagi looks strangely serious. this person must have been something else if his entire attitude did a complete 180. did they meet before? was this some kind of ongoing feud that happens in wangan midnight? rin wanted to leave already. 

regardless, instead of playing with his slowest car, nagi finally chooses the one he’s been using the most: a beautiful silver supra that had been max tuned. while isagi and rin chose any car they found interesting (with the latter choosing the skyline gt-r v-spec ii), the person beside him chose a midnight black, nissan fair lady 350z. so while not entirely fast on long stretches of road, it is a cutthroat killer amongst turns. 

the game starts on a very basic highway map. the moment the countdown had finished, rin and isagi were immediately left in the dust, a gap that spans more than 3000 meters showing up rather instantly. this left rin in a state of shock. he knew those bana passports were good but he never expected them to give the other person such a huge leg in a race. 

at this point, did he even have a chance to win?

this new player quickly outmaneuvers nagi’s best turns, keeping close to the railing to cut him off. weaving through the crowds of yellow pak man cars, they avoid nagi’s attempt at sliding next to them. the sounds of gears turning, pedals shifting, and the clicks and slams of their gearstick were enough for everyone to realize this match was leaning completely in this person’s favor.

finally when the game comes to an end, they turn to rin, tugging down their hood as they tilt their head to the side. this was their chance to see this strange, mysterious racer that beat them. everyone was on the edge of their seat, wondering what would come out of their mouth:

“why’cha play if you were gonna lose?” 

pure arrogance. 

✦

from that day on, rin decided to buy a bana passport. it wasn’t that he loved the game per se, and as much as he wanted to convince himself it was because of his own ego, it was little more than just that. he would frequent the arcade after practice, making sure to do so whenever nagi and the other boys are too tired to go anywhere afterward. he would rather die than be caught dead at an arcade trying to max-tune his car. 

he decided to stick with the skyline gt-r v-spec ii. not only because it was the first car he drove but he liked the way it felt. 

when he first started out, he was unaware of how much money had to be dumped into this game for you to consistently be able to tune your car. not that it was a problem, he was just flabbergasted at how much time passed. he spent all the credits he had on his card in a matter of minutes. he had to play through the story modes several times before he was even able to reach the next level of tuning. but despite of it all, it gave him a peace of mind that he hadn’t felt in a long time.

as he was practicing, he learned quickly about your name, hearing it whispered in the arcade. they would always point to one corner of the arcade, turning up their noses and leaving the other way, talking about how they’ll never get to win whenever you’re around. this would leave you playing alone with three empty machines beside you. but you never let that bother you, only continuing to swipe your card and play alone.

it only started to change when rin took the seat next to you, making up the excuse that the other two machines had loose steering wheels. as much as you wanted to say something about having a bana passport to race with you, he already pulled out his card and scanned it, immediately shutting you up. regardless, you hardly spared a glance at him, choosing to focus on your own screen rather than the cryptic soccer player suddenly wanting to sit beside you. locking in his car, the two of you play a few games together.

and while it always ends with your win, he’s beginning to learn more about you, like the habits you have as you drive, the way you flick the gearstick with the tip of your fingers, or the lifting of your foot every time you reach a tight corner. it goes as far as noting the times your lips would press tightly against each other, the pink tip of your tongue swiping across the edges. 

its cute—huh? he immediately turned off his brain, not wanting to entertain the idea that there was something about you that interested him. and it definitely wasn’t the way you concentrated on the game or how easily you beat everyone else around you. 

“you keep staring at me, is there something on my face?” 

“ah–erm, no, there isn’t.” 

there goes your first interaction with him. absolutely humiliated at himself, he closes his mouth, glaring at you to mask the way his heart leaps up in his throat.

✦

it felt like any other weekend. the sun was beating down on you as you entered through the doors, surprised to see rin already in his destinated seat. from the looks of it, he was already playing a few games before you came in. 

sliding into the seat beside him, you swipe your card, glancing up at him for a moment before tightening your grip on the steering wheel. if he could be described with one word, it would be owlish, because his focused eyes were blinking slowly. why was he so surprised to see you? tapping your bana passport on the side of the machine, you lean back into your seat, turning the wheel to select your favorite car.

from the corner of your eye, you can see that his skyline gt-r was max tuned, a feat that could only be accomplished if he came by regularly. 

in a rare conversation, rin speaks up: “why do you play alone?” 

you raise your eyebrow at the sudden question but think nothing of it. 

“no one else wants to play with me.” 

with the screen counting down from 3, you adjust your gear shift to the lower side. the raven-haired man taps his fingers against the steering wheel, fixing the weight of his foot to the pedal. soon, the race starts and you’re both speeding down the long strip of highway, weaving in and out of traffic.

its relatively quiet for a moment with nothing but the sound of your gear shift moving and the screeching of car tires. despite rin’s recent practices, there were still a lot of difficult sharp turns that had him scratching the back of his car. 

“is there a reason you only play this game?”

what’s with the sudden interview?

“...probably the same reason you play soccer,” even for a second, your eyes didn’t leave the brightly colored screen. your fingers had a tight wrap around the wheel. they moved in sync with the corners that were steadily approaching your view. “my brother and i played this game when we were younger. at the time, i barely knew anything about cars, so i chose the only one that i knew.” 

“that guy from tokyo drift likes to drive the fair lady too, i decided to use his car.” 

reaching a straightforward path, rin was able to catch up to you. the whizz of the engine pairs perfectly with the long stretches of road. it was music to both your ears. at the halfway point of your race, the two of you entered a beautiful mountainous field. autumn leaves cover the screen like an orange sea.

“i won my first race with that car.” stepping off the pedal, you hit the brakes once to adjust the direction of your car, “our hometown had a lot of small tournaments for wangan. decided after seeing my brother play that i wanted to be the best in the country.” 

rin found himself grinding his car against the road bumper, slowing down significantly for you to make a smooth turn inwards. it’s getting increasingly more difficult to see your weak spots. every time he finds himself close to you, every twist of the road pushes him even farther away. it still impresses him to see this kind of skill.

“it’s a pretty difficult feat, there are a lot of people who play this game in japan. regardless, it felt nice to dream big for once. we’d hop from arcade to arcade, attending tournaments that happen once in a blue moon, playing against other racers from every prefecture.” 

“how was that?” he asks, the two of you continuing onto an upwards highway. 

“i won, obviously.” 

having done so in the heart of tokyo, your shoulder was being vigorously pulled from side to side, your brother’s arm wrapped tightly around your neck as he smiled gleefully at the screen. there it was, your name in bright flashing lights, illuminated by a gold plate. your mouth was still left agape at your sudden victory. despite it being a small game with no significance in the real world, knowing that you were the best fueled you with indescribable confidence and joy.

flicking your gearstick, you make your way down a narrow curve, the tip of your car barely scraping against the railing. this effectively cut rin off from passing you on your right. “when he left for college, he stopped playing completely.” 

“he said he had no time and that i was wasting my life away.” 

do you want to go to round 1? you asked, tapping away at a steam deck you had in your hands, mashing buttons together. sitting on the couch with nothing more but a hoodie and shorts, your laid-back clothes contrasted your older brother’s tidy suit, a gift from your mother when he started applying to jobs. 

you’re still playing that stupid game? grow up already. he loomed over you, staring down with a glare sharp enough to cut down even the thickest of trees. you’ve done nothing for yourself since i left for college. the only thing i heard from mom was that you were going off to the arcade just to play games by yourself. shouldn’t you be thinking about what you want to do in your life? 

you let out a loud huff, out of all people, why are you lecturing me? i just asked you if you wanted to play a game together, like old times. does spending time with me not matter anymore? you just got home too so let’s go.

bouncing to your feet, you quickly made your way towards your brother, raising your hand in a high five that he turned his nose towards. having pressed your lips together, the air grows tense and heavy. why wasn’t he joining you this time? did spending time in college change him this much? your brother sighed when he saw your downturned reaction.

it’s not about spending time with you because you don’t do anything but go to the arcade. and because of that i’m starting to think: maybe i shouldn’t have taught you that game, your brother pulled back his hair, shaking his head in disappointment and grief, then you would actually be good at something else other than video games.

you might be the best now, but you’re nothing in the end.

rin’s car kept close to your tail, bumping into it when you found yourself weaving through tightly packed yellow cars. the pak man logo was beginning to bleed into your eyes at this point. 

“how did you… get over it?” your brother, he means. he can’t say it out loud. he thinks if he did, it might come out wrong. or that perhaps he’ll say too much that's too personal. regardless of what the reason was, it made his lips dry and his tongue feeling a little cold. 

“i like this game.” 

your answer was clear and concise because really, it was as simple as that. although you were hurt by your older brother, resenting him for the last few years of your life, at the end of the day, what kept you going was your love. that's what separates you from rin. the difference that he was looking for was right here, staring at his face with an open paw. it was unlike the hatred that brewed within him. it didn’t bear the same fangs as he did.

soccer to him was a battlefield. a fight to the death. anything outside of it was just a waste of time. friends, family, what good is it if it's not for soccer?  this kind of thinking had led to him feeling more lonely than he would have liked. and while you were alone by choice, you looked happy. you were comfortable in the silence you led because deep down, you knew who you were. 

you liked playing games because it made you feel happy. could rin say the same about soccer? does he love it? does he enjoy playing it? when he thinks about it, the only thing that comes up is his hatred towards sae and how good it’d feel to beat him at his own game. there wasn’t much to love about soccer itself other than his desire to beat sae. 

did he even want to win the world cup at this point?

unknown to his inner conflict, you hold your breath, watching the screen blare with a warning: 308 KM LEFT! DON’T GET CAUGHT! rin is only a few meters behind you. enough to catch up to you if he was able to make the proper moves to do so. 

“but...even if this small time thing won’t last forever,” from the corner of his eye, there was a faint smile loosely hanging onto your lips, “this game made me happy.” 

and with that, you end the race in first place, rin following only three seconds behind you. as much as he wants to be annoyed with himself at another loss, he was a little speechless. aside from sae, what made him love soccer the way he does now? 

the things you said were beginning to turn gears in his head. he should be enjoying soccer. even if everyone else thinks it might be a lukewarm dream, it makes him happy to think about what could come, it gives him reason in his life. 

“do you want to play again?” you ask, pointing to his steering wheel.

“oh,” rin breaks out of his trance, fumbling with his card, “yeah. we can do one more round.” 

the only person in the entire world who can reduce him to a bumbling idiot is you, the same person he’s been trying to beat in a racing game for the past month and a half. god, he felt stupid (about you).

“what were you thinking about?”

swiping your card against the reader, the two of you start another match. this time, you decide to race on a simple highway map. you would consider it one of your favorites. it’s easy and familiar and you like seeing the night sky above you as you drive forward.

“i guess i was going to ask you to come to my soccer game,” his words come out softer than he wanted them to be, “if you want to. i won’t be sad if you don’t show up.” he added that last part to convince himself more than you. 

a laugh escapes, “you’re a funny guy, rin-rin.” 

“shut up, don’t call me rin-rin.” 

[1800titz]

COME TOUCH ME TOO | Best friend’s dad

age gap. 11.2K on patreon

second part to LIQUID SMOOTH

You’d catch him over the sink sometimes. Or the stove. At the dinette, shirtless. Big bear, you thought, still only half-awake (starving), staring at his skin, swathed in ink that traversed limb, to torso, to limb. You’d catch the smattering of dark hair pooling over his sternum, and the hair beneath his navel, darker, more wiry, seeping into the band of his pajama pants. And later, you’d wonder if it was the substructure— torn out from you— that you were chasing (the surfeited rift between your ages, the sage wisdom you lacked), or if it was just the shape of him, the way he fit into your life, the subtle domesticity of a morning. The pantomime of a distant daydream. (Pretending this was your life you were living, and not taking a page from someone else’s.)

preview

The bar you’re at feels congested. Sticky, shoulders brushing shoulders, feet bumping feet, and the music is loud enough that you feel it droning along the skin of your bones. Past max-capacity; something you anticipated. Accepted on a Friday night— no sort of discomfort that couldn’t be waterlogged into an unconcerned bliss with enough alcohol. 

And that’s what it started as. 

One shot to ease the restless hypervigilance (when you shuffled in, sliding between clusters of bodies), that burned at the back of your throat, heat flaring across your crinkling sinuses. Then, a second, that radiated warmth along your chest, under your skin, that settled as a weightless feeling beneath the soles of your feet. Loosened the arc of your shoulders. 

(You never buy your own drinks.)

A third, cupped from a stranger’s fingers, with bright, powder blue eyes that lingered on your throat, the line of your jaw when you tipped your head back. Inkpools stuck to your tongue when you smeared it out across your lips, the bridge of your nose rucking. He gave you a wolfish, glimmering grin and told you what a pretty thing you are.

(And you think, staring up at him through the misting crest of intoxicant smog, he’s too young. Feels like a boy— one you can’t re-mold even in the haze of alcohol— in the absence of crows’ feet and shallow smile lines, the glinting, tawdry rhinestone stuck to his incisor. Skin speckled with ink that resembles zealous impulse rather than an aged, carefully-crafted tapestry. You doubt there’s any worthwhile story behind the dice in the nook of his elbow; RICH across the front, C and H tipped perfectly on their southern edges to show the S and K that could fill the word out, instead.)

(You can’t even pretend.)

You seldom find regret in the sea of a familiar gyre (the world spinning, and you, finally, spinning with it), but the spindrift crashes across in a misty fog of discomfort. The riptide lures you out to swallow you whole. You’re not sure when the euphoria mutates into anxiety— maybe somewhere along the fourth and the fifth— but it coagulates in your esophagus, in your stomach. Cakes in the warm, soft spot under your ribcage, until your bones feel like they’re wobbling with the pulse of your heart. Vibrating.

You showed up with a coworker. Admittedly, one you didn’t know too well, to a bar you haven’t been to before. But going out is going out, and a bar is a bar. You don’t need a babysitter, you don’t need to know her well, and you don’t need to scope the the pub, but—

Last you saw her, she was propped against the corner of the bar, and now, as you sweep your bleary gaze over the mass, she’s nowhere in sight. You’re alone. You’re alone, and the world is spinning, screaming, chattering over the pulsing base, and you feel like you can’t keep up. 

When you swallow, it lodges in your throat. You feel like you can’t breathe, nearly tripping over your own feet, brushing between tangled musculature, limbs like gnarled, warm roots for you stumble over. And you feel like you’re trying to part the sea to make room for your clumsy steps. Like you’re trying to move mountains. 

By the time you make it outside, your lungs are aching, and your shoulders are quaking. You don’t know where it’s coming from— what it is— but it feels like a flame licking its way up under your dermis, and you want to shed your skin off the bone. The gulp of air you take is welcome. Cold. Wet. 

It’s raining. 

Pouring. The gust drenches your bare legs in spittle off the sky, even under the awning. Helplessly, you pat around for your phone. 

And you don’t know what possesses you. You don’t know if it’s a clumsy swipe of your thumb across the glowing screen, or a cruel form of divine intervention, when you scroll and stutter along his contact. It’s a number you should’ve deleted. Haven’t pressed in months. 

You flung yourself out of orbit, and seeing his name feels like you’re a piece of star-shed that’s slipped too close— a hair from homecoming. It feels like the inevitable, crushing weight of gravity snagging you into the miserable ouroboros you’ve spent every evening running from. A tidal wave, reborn, swallowing you whole. 

And you know the repercussions— the potential there. The consequences of sticking wet fingers into electrical sockets, but you tell yourself, he won’t pick up. It’s too late. You’re too late. Too—

Your finger lingers. 

You don’t know what would be worse. Abandonment in another shape, or hearing his voice on the other end of the line. 

You call him. 

You regret it a split-second too late, staring down at the screen dialing. When you press the phone to your ear, with the rain spitting, the thrum of the bass behind the door— your heart rattling in your ears, your head spinning—

You barely hear the three rings before the line clicks. It’s quiet. 

And then—

“Hello?”

You suck in a gust of air. You expected his voice to hurt. To ache— you anticipated, maybe, a lot of things, with variegated hypotheticals spelled out in misty shapes through hours spent staring at your ceiling. 

But every chimera crumbles when the words stick to the back of your throat. Part of it is the slurry in your veins, the hard liquor, the way it’s all kicked in, all at once. And part of it is the realization that, despite the biramous conjectures you’ve crafted— the what if’s— it’s the heavy thought that all roads lead to this.

He sounds hoarse. Mean with sleep.

“Um. Hi.” The words sound garbled, like you’re underwater. Tinny, wet, strained. 

Eager in the shape of unrequited pining; a mangled fruition of all the nights you’d spent, thumb hovering over the call button, wondering if he’d pick up on the other end of the line, stockpiling the heap of broken wishes. The ones you cradled in your hands like jagged fractures of your rib bones, cracked from how hard your heart was pounding. 

(If only he could see the lovelorn tar in your marrow, leaking out in a rotting treacle and pooling in the crevice of your love-line; tragic, broken down a long gap right under the wedge between your pinky and ring finger.) 

The awning does a poor job of covering your toes, and they soak in the torrent that spumes from the midnight aether, shimmering against the wet asphalt. Silly, little girl— woman, nowadays— one ear corked with your forefinger to stifle the downpour spitting from the same sky you’d crane your neck and spill orisons at, the other fisting at your phone like a lifeline. Dangling onto the thread off this unspooled hope. 

You sound ditzy. Soporific. Lost. You wonder if he picks up on it on the other end of the line. “Are you, um. Are you busy?” 

The speaker crackles.

Finally, he rasps from the other end of the line— a thunderclap, like a gunshot, “You’re not callin’ me at one in the morning to ask me if I’m busy.” 

“I—“ the words stick to the back of your throat. 

Something seals up in your lungs with the breath you try to take. 

Bitter recrudesce, a reminder when it wakes back up in the slotted teeth of your heart— an ache, alleviated in his absence after time, that throbs at the sound of his voice. Your jaw quakes on what you want to confess, snarled in your throat. I love you— Please— I’ve loved you since—

Your lip wobbles. Teeth clack, staring at the wet asphalt. “Uh. Sorry.”

You settle for a middle ground— some compromise in the clouded welter of your docket— something you’ve been meaning to say for months.

(Sorry for being a silly, little girl that fell in love with you.)

You’re met with a beat of silence that eats into your marrow. Has your guts twisting, chest tight. Then, (solace) a sigh— surly— oozes across the crackling speaker. 

“Where are you?” 

The question reminds you why you called in the first place. That you’re sopping up dirty rainwater with your boots on the outskirts of town, outside some seedy bar you came to, to drown your demons (him) in burnt amber. A thunderbolt ripples across the pitch aether, zagging electric chalky across the swollen plumes. All at once, you…

Crumble. 

“I’m, um. Ah…” your chin quivers. You nod, “I’m here. At a, um. At a bar. Outside a bar.”

“Which bar? Who are you with?” 

The slew of questions nearly makes you laugh. 

The concern, there, throttles you and the tension in your shoulders like you expected anything less. You did. And you would laugh if hearing his voice, for the first time in months, wasn’t a sobering maelstrom on your psyche. Despite the way your tongue feels sticky, and useless, like it's caught on the roof of your mouth, you clear your throat.

“Um. It’s called, ah— Southbound,” your eyes slip shut. The wobble at your feet clicks in your knees. “I came with a— with a coworker. But I can’t find her. And I just— sorry. Fuck. Sorry. I got, um. I’m… sorry.”

You set your teeth and stare down at the rainwater speckling the toes of your boots. Gusting against your bare legs, and you don’t realize you’ve been hanging onto the phone with both hands cupped, like a lifeline, until his voice comes through.

“Y’alright?”

He sounds a little more awake. No doubt at the quiver in your tone. The way you can’t cohesively suture the words together. You roll forward on your toes. It’s a miscalculated motion on your part, because you nearly topple forward. 

“No. Yeah. M’really— um. I’m a little, um. Drunk. I think. So—“ you slur. Take a breath. “No. I don’t—“

The words come out small. Tired. There’s a crack in your voice, like you’re on the edge of keeling over the precipice. You feel it in the burn at the back of your eyes, raw in your sinuses, when you admit, softly, “…I wanna go home.”

He doesn’t say anything. You take another breath, and feel it against the enamel of your teeth. Expect the sear of ice. Your fingers feel strained on your phone. Crushing. Taut. You think about his next words before he says them. Before the surly crackle from the other end of the line hits you, imagine it— call an uber. 

I’ll call you an uber, at best. At worst…

You swallow. The line crackles again.

“Send me your location. I’m coming to get you.”

[worth-the-chaos]

Adventures in Babysitting - Steve Harrington x female!reader - Chapter 5

Chapter Summary: The situation with the demogorgons gets increasingly more dire, leading you to the Byers’ house to wrangle four kids that can’t listen to save their lives (literally) while everyone tries desperately to save Will and the world.

Content Warning: swearing, upside down scary shit, billy being an actual complete asshole, physical violence

Word Count: 8.9k

Author’s Note: This chapter was pretty fun to write! Things get pretty intense in this part, so heed the content warning. I hope you all enjoy :)

Series Masterlist | Part 4 | Next Part

***

There wasn’t a clear path through to Hawkins Lab, making it pretty damn difficult to traverse through the woods, especially in the dark. Regardless of this fact, you were hauling ass, desperate to make it to the lab so you could take these demogorgons out, and maybe, just maybe, put all of this bullshit behind you. Steve was right on your tail, a little overwhelmed between making sure the kids were keeping up and that you weren’t getting too far ahead.

You tripped on a tree root, and you would have face planted if it weren’t for Steve quickly grabbing you by the elbow, aggressively pulling you backwards to counteract your forward momentum.

“Y/n, you need to slow down,” Steve said, his voice serious. His face was twisted in annoyance, which irritated you as you scoffed and shook out of his grip.

“This is time sensitive. We’re not here to take a nice stroll through the hiking trails. We’ve got shit to do,” you grumbled as you went to turn around, but Steve grabbed your arm again, pulling you closer. The kids were still lagging behind, but he kept his voice low to make sure they didn’t hear.

“Listen to me. We’ve got three kids mixed up in all this shit with us. I get that it might be time sensitive, but if you break an ankle, then we’re stuck out here defenseless, moving three times slower. You need to be a little bit fucking cautious. I can’t do this by myself.”

You took a deep breath to calm yourself down, trying to push the anger aside as you nodded. You hated to admit it, but Steve was right. You were being impulsive and it was putting everyone’s life in jeopardy. Steve could tell you were still anxious to get there, the anticipation being all too overwhelming. His hand fell from your arm as he grabbed your trembling hand, giving it a tight squeeze.

“I’ve got you, alright? So let’s do this together like we promised, yeah?”

“Okay,” you agreed quietly. He dropped your hand as the kids caught up. He cleared his throat as the air became slightly awkward between you.

After about fifteen more minutes of hiking, the trees started to become less and less dense, until you were almost out of the tree line. Suddenly you heard a voice shout out, which made you jump as your heart stopped in your chest.

“Hello? Who’s there?!”

You all finally made it out of the thicket, finally realizing who had called out.

“Steve?!” Jonathan and Nancy asked in unison.

“Nancy?” Steve stepped forwards just as confused as they were.

“Jonathan!” Dustin chimed in with a smile on his face, relieved to see someone else that could help them.

“Y/n, Dustin, Lucas, Max,” you said, rolling your eyes as you pointed to the rest of you, “now that we’re done with introductions, what the hell is going on?”

“What are you doing here?” Nancy asked, frustration leaking into her tone.

“What are you doing here?” Steve shot back, still not happy with Nancy’s recent actions. In his mind, he didn’t owe her an explanation.

“We’re looking for Mike and Will,” Nancy answered, cutting to the chase.

“They’re not in there, are they?” You asked hesitantly.

“We’re not sure,” Nancy replied, concern flashing across her face as she picked up the seriousness in your tone.

“Why?” Jonathan asked cautiously, but before you could answer, you all heard screeching coming from the lab, finally noticing that the lights were flashing outside in an orderly fashion, indicating that some alarm system was likely enabled.

You all began arguing, attempting to figure out when the last time anyone had seen Will and Mike, when suddenly each floor of Hawkins Lab began lighting up again, one by one.

“The power’s back,” you breathed out, unsure if it was a good or a bad sign. Jonathan sprinted back to the operator’s booth, rapidly pushing the button to open the gate with no such luck.

“Let me try,” Dustin tried to push past Jonathan, but he didn’t budge, “let me try, Jonathan!”

You rolled your eyes as Dustin whined, his pushing of the button making no difference than when Jonathan had been pressing it before. “Shocker, it’s not working,” you called out, sarcasm lacing your voice.

“Son of a bitch!” The boy exclaimed as he continued to shove at the button repeatedly. After a few minutes of button pushing, the gate finally began to roll open, Dustin celebrating the fact that he had saved the day. This kid’s a fucking idiot, you thought, rolling your eyes, confident that the gate opening was the doing of someone inside the building.

Jonathan and Nancy piled into his car as they drove off towards the facility, leaving the five of you behind.

“Should we try to follow them?” Dustin suggested. You glanced back over at the lab, lights still flashing and alarm still sounding. Though you desperately wanted to help in any way you could, you weren’t going to risk the safety of the kids, knowing that if you went, they’d be close behind regardless of whether or not you told them to stay put.

“No. We’ll let them handle this part. If they don’t come back soon, we’ll follow, but until then we’re all staying right here. Understood?” You asked, swinging your flashlight to point it at each of the kids while you waited for their response. They all nodded in agreement; they knew better than to mess with you.

And so you waited, you picking at your fingernails, Steve tossing his flashlight up and down, and the kids pacing and kicking the ground.

“Guys?” Max spoke up as she paused in the middle of the road, noticing two cars quickly approaching. You recognized the first one as Jonathan’s and he laid on the horn, clearly not slowing down.

“Get out of the way!” Steve shouted, grabbing Max by the arm and pulling her to the side. You swiftly followed suit, grabbing the two boys by their collars and yanking them to safety just in time for Jonathan to fly past you. Something was clearly imminent and you didn’t want to be there when it arrived.

The second car screeched to a halt, and you were met with the face of Jim Hopper as he shouted out the window, “let’s go!”

Steve threw the door open, hurrying the kids along to get in the back of the police vehicle, placing a hand on your back to guide you into the back of the van before jumping in the passenger seat and slamming the door. “Okay! Let’s go!” He gave Hopper the all clear, patting the side of the police vehicle to signal that everyone was safely boarded in the car.

“What the fuck is going on?” You asked from the backseat, leaning forward between Steve and Hopper.

Hopper looked at you a bit annoyed, but he knew enough about you to know that you were a good kid, so he tried to stay calm. “I’m assuming you know about the demogorgons given the fact you’ve got a golf club and a baseball bat. What else do you know?”

“Other than that shit is clearly bad again, not much,” you breathed out. What more was there to know? Hopper’s words scared you, and Steve was quick to put a gentle hand on your shoulder to help you settle down.

“There are these tunnels. Under Hawkins. The demogorgons have been using them to travel around town and all this shit from the Upside Down is leaking in. All the ash and shit from last year is there and there’s rot all across town,” he started. You looked wide eyed at Steve, both of you remembering the gaping hole in Dustin’s cellar.

“I noticed a tree in the woods earlier, its trunk was rotting from the inside out. It was marked…with-with a yellow flag. That was you?” You asked to clarify.

“Yes, but that’s probably the least of our concerns. The gate is still open, and those assholes at Hawkins Lab thought it was contained but it’s clearly not. They’ve been doing controlled burns, trying to tame it back, but it’s not working,” Hopper gripped the steering wheel tighter, his eyes fixed on the road ahead of him.

“What are we gonna do?” Dustin spoke up from the backseat, attempting to push around you to be a part of the conversation in the front. You shoved him back and rolled your eyes, giving him a look that told him to watch himself.

“Right now we’re going back to Joyce’s house where it’s safe. And you’re not going to do anything. We’re going to go home and wait for backup,” Hopper glanced back at the boy. You were about the protest, when Steve elbowed you and shook his head. Now was not the time. Besides, Steve wasn’t too upset about the idea. He wanted to be far away from the danger. He wanted you to be far away from the danger.

You sighed and flopped back. Shit was about to hit the fan, and you weren’t sure how prepared you were to deal with it.

***

The Byers’ house was equally as disheveled as it was the year before, but this time, instead of lights, there were crayon drawings scattered and taped all over the house. Steve watched as Nancy comforted Jonathan while Hopper yelled on the phone, his call for backup clearly not going the way he had hoped it would. Steve entered the kitchen, going to lean up against the counter with you. You could see the hurt on his face, and you gently nudged him in the side to get his attention.

“Hey, chin up,” you reminded him softly. You knew Nancy had hurt him and even though you wanted to be mad at her, you couldn’t. She was hurting too, still grappling with all this shit that life kept throwing in your direction. You couldn’t blame her for wanting different things; for realizing she needed to make changes to be happier. You still couldn’t understand how she wasn’t happy with Steve, though. He’d been your saving grace through all of this and you were envious of the ways that he had been able to be there for her that he couldn’t be for you. You pushed the thought aside and tried to take your own advice, straightening up in the face of it all.

“They didn’t believe you, did they?” Dustin asked as Hopper aggressively hung up the phone.

“We’ll see,” he shot back, not happy with the incessant questioning from these damn kids.

“‘We’ll see’? We can’t just sit here while those things are loose!” Mike yelled, frustrated with the lack of action that Hopper was suggesting.

“We stay here, and we wait for help,” Hopper slowly articulated, his tone making it clear that it wasn’t up for discussion. He exited the kitchen before anyone else could chime in. You rolled your eyes.

Mike began talking about Bob Newby, and your heart sank in your chest as you tried not to let your eyes well up with tears. All day, you’d been trying to prevent anymore deaths; to keep everyone safe. You had failed, but you were starting to find the grace to understand that this wasn’t on you. Despite that, it still hurt.

“We can’t let him die in vain,” Mike begged. You couldn’t agree more, but in more ways than one, your hands were tied.

“Well, what do you want to do, Mike? The chief’s right about this. I mean, we can’t stop those demo-dogs on our own” Dustin spat, clearly feeling just as frustrated as you had felt.

“Demo-dogs?” You asked incredulously. That might be some of the dumbest shit you’ve ever heard.

“Demogorgons. Dogs…Demo-dogs,” Dustin reiterated, and you scoffed.

“When it was just Dart, maybe, but now there’s a fucking army and we don’t have the manpower or resources to take that many fucking monsters out,” Steve spoke up. He still was partial to staying back, letting the grown ups figure this shit out.

“His army,” Mike spoke up and you could see the glint of realization in his eyes.

“What do you mean?” Steve asked.

“His army!” Mike repeated. “Maybe if we stop him, we can stop his army too!” He quickly stood up from his chair moving to pick up one of Will’s drawings. You gently grabbed it and your heart ached knowing that Will had been seeing this thing in his nightmares. By the looks of it, it was huge, its crooked arms reaching out and infecting every inch of town. You shuddered.

“The shadow monster,” Dustin clarified for those of you that weren’t privy, still not quite sure what Mike was going on about.

“It got Will that day in the field. The doctor said it was like a virus, it infected him.”

“And so this virus, it’s connecting him to the tunnels?” Max chimed in.

“To the tunnels, to the monsters, to the Upside Down. Everything,” Mike emphasized.

“Woah, slow down, slow down,” Steve spoke up, clearly not following the boy’s line of reasoning.

“The shadow monster’s inside everything. And if the vines feel something, like pain, then so does Will,” Mike explained.

“And so does Dart,” you added, following.

“Yeah, it’s like what Mr. Clarke taught us about the hive mind,” Mike confirmed as he looked at Lucas and Dustin.

“Hive mind?” Steve asked. Goodness gracious this boy was stupid, you thought, taking a deep breath to avoid snapping at him.

“A collective consciousness. It’s a super-organism,” you explained. The boys looked at you in awe, impressed that you also knew about this shit. Maybe you were more of a nerd than you thought.

“And this is the thing that controls everything. It’s the brain,” Mike pointed at the picture in your hands.

“Like the mind flayer!” Dustin exclaimed. The three boys shared a knowing look, leaving you, Steve, and Max in the dark. Dustin scoured the house, locating a book and slamming it down on the table. Hopper and Nancy had joined the kitchen after all the commotion, interested in knowing what had the kids so worked up.

“The mind flayer,” Dustin repeated.

Hopper looked at him exasperated. He didn’t have time for these kids pulling some imaginary bullshit. “What the hell is that?”

“It’s a monster from an unknown dimension. It’s so ancient that it doesn’t even know it’s true home. It enslaves races of other dimensions by taking over their brains using its highly-developed psionic powers,” Dustin explained.

“None of this is real,” Hopper groaned.

“Yeah, Dustin, this is a kids’ game,” you added incredulously.

“No, it’s a manual…and it’s not for kids. And unless you know something that we don’t, this is the best metaphor for understanding whatever the hell this is,” Dustin defended himself.

“Okay, so this mind flamer thing—“ Nancy started, trying to understand.

“Flayer,” Dustin corrected.

“—flayer—what does it want?”

“To conquer us, basically. It believes it’s the master race.”

“Oh, uh, like the Germans,” Steve stammered, trying to understand via his own metaphor. You all looked at him in disbelief.

“Uh, the nazis?” Dustin corrected and Steve nodded in agreement, “if the nazis were from a different dimension, then totally. It views other races like us as inferior.”

“Yeah, and it wants to spread to other dimensions,” Mike added.

“We are talking about the destruction of our world as we know it,” Lucas emphasized.

You felt the anxiety creep back up, and all of this was way too overwhelming. How the hell were you supposed to fight something that had control over an expansive and complex army?

“This is just great, this is fantastic!” Steve groaned as he pinched the bridge of his nose and stepped away. You made your way out of the kitchen, connecting the dots well enough to not need any further explanation. Steve followed you, wanting to make sure you were okay.

“This is insane, Steve,” you breathed out. “We’re not talking about just one demogorgon anymore. Not even a couple. This is a whole fucking army. Imagine the carnage! We can’t fucking do this! I can’t fucking do this!” You began rambling as you quickly began to spiral. The fate of the world was in your hands and you couldn’t do anything to save it.

“Hey, hey, hey, chill out,” Steve sounded exasperated. He was just as tense and overwhelmed about the situation as you were, but ruminating over it didn’t help anything. “When you freak out about it, it just makes everything ten times harder, so just take a deep breath, think about something else, and chill the fuck out,” Steve reiterated. It was tough love, but it helped. He was right; stressing about it wasn’t going to change anything.

The conversation from the kitchen moved into the family room with you as Mike followed Hopper into the hall, “how are they supposed to stop this? You can’t just shoot this with guns!” Mike exclaimed, talking about Hopper’s military backup.

“We don’t know that! We don’t know anything!” Hopper argued.

“We know it’s already killed everyone in that lab,” Mike shot back.

“And we know the monsters are going to molt again,” Dustin added.

“And it’s only a matter of time before those tunnels reach this town,” you finally spoke up, your voice even. You were more confident now after Steve’s words. You might not be able to save the world, but you could damn sure try.

“They’re right,” Joyce joined you all, making her way down the hallway. She looked distraught, and your heart broke for her. “We have to kill this thing…I want to kill this thing.”

“Me too, me too, Joyce, but how do we do it? We don’t exactly know what we’re dealing with here,” Hopper reminded her.

“No, but he does. If anyone knows how to destroy this thing, it’s Will. He’s connected to it; he’ll know its weakness,” Mike spoke up.

“I thought he was a spy for the mind flayer now?” Max asked.

“Yeah, but he can’t spy if he doesn’t know where he is.”

Everyone quickly got to work attempting to disguise the Byers’ shed so that it was unrecognizable to Will. You were outside, breaking down pieces of cardboard with Jonathan, while Nancy helped Steve hang tarps to cover the walls inside.

“So, you and Nancy?” You asked, getting deja vu to when you had asked Steve a very similar question during your car ride together that fateful day last November.

“What do you mean?” Jonathan was immediately defensive. You cocked your head to the side, shooting him a knowing look and chuckling before you spoke.

“Dude, it’s so obvious.”

“Well, what about you and Steve?” Jonathan fired back, aggressively ripping more cardboard.

“That is so not the same thing,” you whispered, hoping that Nancy and Steve didn’t hear him. The last thing you needed was to be on Nancy’s bad side. She was super badass and if she knew that things had been weird between you and her boyfriend (ex boyfriend?) you were sure there’d be hell to pay.

“I mean, it seems pretty similar to me,” Jonathan replied frustrated, “it doesn’t matter anyway; they’re not together anymore.”

“I mean, I know they argued, but I didn’t know they officially ended things,” you responded, doubtful of Jonathan’s words.

“Trust me. I know,” he remarked, saying the words with such finality that you could connect the dots to confirm that something had happened between the two of them. You dropped the subject, not wanting to piss Jonathan off further. After twenty more minutes of stapling and duct taping cardboard and newspapers to the walls of the shed, it was finally done, and everyone except for Hopper, Mike, Joyce, and Jonathan retreated to the inside of the Byers’ house.

There wasn’t much else to do other than wait, so you sat on the family room couch as Steve practiced his swing with the nail bat over and over and over again. It was weird, sitting and doing nothing while all of this was going on. You finally felt how tired your legs were from walking all throughout the’ woods and you really just wanted to take a nap.

“Did you put anymore thought into that essay?” You broke the silence as you asked Steve. His concentration broke as he stopped swinging the bat to look at you. The question caught him off guard and he wasn’t really sure what to say. What could he say? This had all been such a huge distraction that he hadn’t even really had the time to think about what his college essay should be about. Every time he thought about it, his mind would just go back to you and then he would push it aside.

“Uh, no. Not really, I mean…there’s kind of been a lot going on,” he chuckled, gesturing to the papers strewn about the house, a reminder of all of the shit you’d been through.

“That’s fair, that’s fair,” you replied, a bit bummed that your question hadn’t struck up a conversation like you had hoped it would; you hoped it would provide you an opportunity to be helpful in at least some capacity while you sat and twiddled your thumbs.

“What about you? What are your post grad plans?” He asked in return.

“You know, I’m honestly not really sure anymore,” you replied, your voice shrinking down into something meek and small.

“What do you mean? You work so damn hard all the time, I thought you had everything figured out,” Steve questioned. It was a red flag to him that you were expressing such uncertainty; it just didn’t make sense.

“I guess…I don’t know, it sounds stupid,” you prefaced, trying to save yourself the embarrassment of your vulnerability before continuing, “but I guess it just feels a bit futile to make these plans for the future when I don’t even know what that’s going to look like. I mean, I was always so set on going to college, but aside from the questions about feasibility—like can I afford it, will I get scholarships, how far can I go if I don’t have a car—I’m now starting to question if it’s something I even want to do. I mean, with all of this shit going on, who even knows if I’ll even live long enough to make it to—“

Steve cut you off, “woah, woah, woah! Y/n, we’re not doomsday prepping here. And if you think there’s a chance you’re not going to get a shit ton of scholarships, well then you’re not as smart as I thought you were…which now that I’m saying it, is a bit…a bit paradoxical but that’s besides the point. The point is, you’re gonna go to some fancy school—as far away as you want to go—collect a shit ton of degrees, and then you’re gonna live until you’re so old you forget how much a pain in the ass we all are.”

You couldn’t help but smile. You were glad that someone was in your corner. Your past self would have dropped dead if she knew it was Steve that was your biggest supporter. Sometimes you felt so lost in the shuffle, not having the social status to feel like your efforts really mattered—or that they were going to be rewarded. Life had a way of very distinctively not going your way, but it was nice to know that you at least had someone who believed in you when you couldn’t believe in yourself. Before you could get too sentimental about it, the lights started flashing like crazy and you could tell that Will had woken up.

It went on like that for several minutes, as you all moved to the front of the house, ready for whatever threat would find you. You jumped when Hopper burst through the door, grabbing a scrap sheet of paper and writing out morse code.

“What happened?” You were quick to ask.

“I think he’s talking, just not with words?” Jim replied. You all watched as he wrote out a series of dots and dashes, translating it as he wrote their corresponding letters.

“What is that?” Steve asked, confused by the mess of symbols on the page.

“Morse code,” you all replied in unison. He shrugged and you wondered for a moment if you’d truly been attending the same school. You looked at the paper, “HERE” spelled out, clear as day.

“Will’s still in there. He’s talking to us,” Hopper explained. So then began the operation of translating Will’s messages. Mike, Joyce, and Jonathan in the shed sharing memories with him while Hopper clicked Will’s communication through the walkie talkie. Huddled around the kitchen table were the rest of you, cheat sheets and scrap paper in hand, as you received Will’s message, letter by letter.

When Nancy wrote down the last letter, you all leaned over to read what Will had covertly been able to communicate to you.

“Close gate,” you all read. Suddenly the phone rang, and you all froze for a second. It was a dead giveaway that Will was still at his house. Dustin quickly scrambled to hang it up, but it rang again, likely Hopper’s military backup. You ran beside him, ripping the phone from the wall and tossing it across the room.

“Do you think he heard that?” Max asked hesitantly.

“It’s just a phone. It could be anywhere, right?” Steve added, trying to quell the anxiety permeating around the room, the air thick with worry. Steve was proved wrong, when Hopper came flying through the back door with his rifle, grabbing another gun as he shouted at all of you.

“Hey! Hey, get away from the windows!” He pulled the kids away from the front of the room. “Can you use this?” He held his gun out to Jonathan. The boy stammered in response, and Him didn’t have time for this. “I said, can you use this?”

“I can,” Nancy spoke up and you felt a bit relieved that she would have the gun. You trusted her with a gun more than anyone else, glad that it was her and not you. Everyone who had weapons held them up, aiming them towards the door. You gripped your knife tightly; this was a fight you were going to finish.

Your breath hitched in your throat when you heard the familiar screeching and chattering of the demogorgons outside of the house. It kept getting closer and closer, and your jaw set as you tried to focus your energy on the task at hand. You knew that after this, you were going to fall apart, and you just hoped that someone would be there to pick up the pieces.

Suddenly, the screeching stopped and a demo-dog—as Dustin had so idiotically coined them—came crashing through the glass of the window, falling in a heap on the family room floor. Dead.

“Holy shit,” Dustin whispered and you couldn’t help but agree. Holy shit was right, this was fucking insane.

You all turned as you heard noise by the front door. You reached up and grasped the back of Steve’s shirt out of fear, as the locks were undone from outside. You almost couldn’t believe your eyes, but you had seen a lot weirder shit, so this was pretty tame in comparison. Despite how ready you had been earlier, in the face of the impending threat, your confidence started to falter, as you pressed yourself up against Steve in hopes that holding on to him would make you feel more secure.

The door slowly swung open, and in stepped a girl about the same age as the other kids, her short hair slicked back, dark makeup applied around her eyes. Everyone lowered their weapons, Steve going to put an arm around you, squeezing your arm. You realized that this must be Eleven, the girl with the telepathic abilities that Dustin had told you about. Mike swiftly stepped forward to hug her as she burst into tears. Your heart broke for her; you couldn’t imagine what it was like to be someone’s science experiment for your whole life.

Hopper stepped forward to pull the girl in for a hug and that was when you all connected the dots that he had been hiding her since she disappeared last year. You were shocked, but not as shocked as Mike.

And he was mad.

***

Hopper had calmed Mike down, leading to a very long discussion of how you were able to kill this mind flayer without hurting Will in the process. Jonathan, Nancy, and Joyce had left with Will to steam the mind flayer out of him so that Hopper could take Eleven back to Hawkins Lab to close the gate.

That left you and Steve in charge of the four remaining kids…which really just made you want to cry. Because now your babysitting consisted of Dustin throwing all of the food from the Byers’ fridge onto the floor while Steve shoved a dead monster from an unknown dimension into it. And you weren’t even getting paid for it.

“Fine, but you’re explaining this to Mrs. Byers,” Steve reluctantly agreed, holding the demogorgon like a damn baby before the boys worked together to slam the fridge closed. Good riddance, you thought as it disappeared from view. Steve put his hand on the boy’s head, jostling his hat, before turning away from the fridge. The sight would’ve been endearing if they hadn’t just bonded over a dead monster that had almost tried to kill you.

Mike began pacing back and forth, frustrated that you were all stuck at Will’s instead of helping Eleven close the gate. The kids swiftly started arguing over it and you pinched the bridge of your nose, unable to take another second of their bickering.

“Would you all just shut the fuck up? Please?” You begged, but no one listened. Steve noticed your frustration and tried to help in the best way he knew how: with a sports metaphor.

“Listen, dude, a coach calls a play in the game, bottom line, you execute it, alright?”

“First of all, this isn’t some stupid sports game. And second, we’re not even in the game, we’re on the bench,” Mike argued. You sighed at how little Steve had thought this through. He noticed you glaring at him and tried and failed to salvage what he could of his life lesson to the impressionable young children.

“So…so yeah, my point is…” he stammered, and you all watched him expectantly as he paused. “Right, yeah, we’re on the bench, so, uh, there’s nothing we can do.”

“That’s not exactly true. When we were at the bus, the demo-dogs got called away,” Dustin reminded you all.

“So if we get their attention, maybe we can draw them away from the lab,” Max continued.

“Clear a path to the gate,” you chimed in. Steve looked at you, betrayed. He needed you to back him up on this otherwise this babysitting shit wasn’t going to work.

“Uh, yeah. And then we all die!” Steve threw his hands up in exasperation.

“That’s one point of view,” Dustin argued.

“That is not a point of view, man, that is a fact.”

“It doesn’t matter whether it’s a fact or a point of view, the point is, it’s still dangerous,” you added, coming to your senses. There was no way you could attract these monsters without someone getting hurt. You’d rather be on the bench than lose a teammate to a career ending injury. Fucking hell, I hate these sports metaphors. Who am I?

“I got it! This is where the chief dug his hole and it’s our way into the tunnels,” Mike explained, showing you a spot on Will’s map, “right here, this is a hub, it connects to all the other tunnels. Maybe if we set this on fire—“

“Yeah, that’s a no!” Steve yelled.

“The mind flayer would call away his army. They’d come to stop us,” Dustin continued.

“We circle back to the exit, by the time they realize we’re gone—“ Mike started.

“El would be at the gate,” Max finished his thought.

“Hey, hey, hey!” Steve clapped to draw the kids out of their batshit crazy plans. “This is not fucking happening.”

“But—“

“No, no, no, no, no. No buts. I promised I’d keep you shitheads safe, and that’s exactly what I plan on doing. We’re staying here—on the bench—and we’re waiting for the starting team to do their job. Does everybody understand that?”

“This isn’t some stupid sports game,” Mike shot back, annoyed that his sister’s now ex boyfriend was trying to tell him what he could and couldn’t do.

“I said, does everybody understand that?” Steve seemed scary, and honestly it was kind of a turn on. You didn’t mind him telling you what to do if he looked that damn hot doing it. You tried to shake the thought away, but you couldn’t help but enjoy the way he seemed so paternal. He was stepping up as a babysitter and you couldn’t be prouder.

“I need a yes,” you added when none of the children responded, trying to demonstrate to Steve that you were on his team. While Steve was scary, Dustin still thought you were a thousand times scarier, even though you’d only said four words. Before Dustin could open his mouth to speak, you were all distracted by an engine revving outside.

Max ran to the window, recognizing the car as her heart leapt to her throat. “That’s my brother. He can’t know we’re here. He’ll kill me. He’ll kill us!” Max rambled, clearly intimidated by her step brother. You went to put an arm on the girl’s shoulder in an attempt to calm her down.

“Don’t worry about it Max, I’ll handle it. I promise,” you told the girl as you stepped towards the door.

“Uh uh. No way. Not happening,” Steve pulled you behind him a bit aggressively as he had recognized the plates from sunny California, connecting the dots to figure that Max had the misfortune of being related to the biggest asshole he had ever met. Before you could protest, he swiftly exited the house, slamming the door behind him.

“Am I dreaming or is that you Harrington?” Billy asked with a shit eating grin on his face, stepping out of his car.

“Yeah it’s me. Don’t cream your pants.”

“What are you doing here amigo?” Billy asked.

“I could ask you the same thing,” Steve replied, wanting to give him as little information as possible.

“Looking for my step sister. A little birdie told me she was here. Small? Redhead? Bit of a bitch?”

“Sorry doesn’t ring a bell.”

“I don’t know, this whole situation, Harrington, is giving me a bit of the heebie-jeebies. My thirteen year old sister goes missing all day and I find her with you at a stranger’s house, and you lie to me about it.”

“Man, were you dropped too much as a child? I told you, she’s not here,” Steve was surprised he was able to keep his voice even. He was face to face with Billy and all he wanted to do was beat the shit out of him. He had been an ass to you and clearly Max was afraid of him too, so he deserved to have the shit kicked out of him. All things considered, Steve thought he was being pretty damn civil.

“Then who is that?” Billy asked, pointing his cigarette at the window. Steve turned around and watched as all four kids ducked out of view. Where the fuck were you when all of this was happening?

“Oh shit,” he whispered before turning back around to face Billy, “Listen—“

His explanation was cut off when Billy shoved him to the ground. “I told you to plant your feet,” he seethed, kicking Steve in the stomach before entering the house.

When Billy slammed open the door, there you were, in a protective stance in front of the kids, slowly backing them towards the kitchen. “What the fuck is this, y/n?” He approached you. Your breath hitched in your throat and you were scared out of your mind. But in that moment, all that mattered was those kids, as you took a step towards Billy, chin up.

“And look who it is, Lucas Sinclair,” he added, looking past you. He turned to Max, “you disobeyed me. And you know what happens when you disobey me…I break things.” He lunged to grab Lucas but you shoved him back enough to knock him off kilter, redirecting his focus as he grabbed the collar of your windbreaker instead, forcing you into a corner of the room. Your shoulders tensed up and you froze, struggling as you attempted to pry yourself out of his grip.

“Y/n, I’ve gotta say. I’m disappointed. I’ve been nothing but nice to you and this—” he dropped your collar, hand shooting to grab your wrist to prevent you from moving away as he gestured to his sister, “—this is how you repay me?”

“Let me go!” You seethed as you kicked him where it hurt. He groaned as he backed up, but it wasn’t enough room for you to escape. He slapped you across the face, grabbing you by the shoulders and slamming you back against the wall. He threw another punch to your face and your nose began to gush blood, most likely broken.

“You bitch! You’re dead!” He shouted, pulling you towards him to slam you into the wall again, when Steve suddenly grabbed his arm.

“No. You are,” he said before throwing a solid punch at Billy. You fell to the floor, grateful you were in the kitchen as you reached for a towel to hold up to your nose. He doubled over before twisting back up to face Steve, cackling with a wide smile on his face. He was absolutely insane, as you sat horrified. You wanted to get up, help Steve, say anything, but you were struggling to keep your eyes open as you began to hyperventilate.

“Looks like you got some fire in you after all, huh? I’ve been waiting to meet this King Steve everybody’s been telling me so much about,” Billy stepped towards him again.

“Get the fuck out,” Steve warned, pushing him away. There was a moment of stillness in the kitchen before Billy swung at Steve, but he ducked at the last minute, throwing another punch back that landed at Billy’s temple. He backed up and the kitchen erupted into a chorus of cheers for Steve to fuck Billy up as Steve threw another punch.

Steve’s advantage didn’t last for long, as Billy grabbed a dinner plate, breaking it over Steve’s head. Steve moved back into the family room, clutching his head as Billy followed him, throwing a punch that knocked Steve off balance.

“No one tells me what to do,” Billy seethed, shoving Steve to the ground before getting on top of him throwing punch after punch his way. Seeing Steve hurt gave you the strength you needed to stand up. You wobbled slightly, grabbing the golf club from your backpack and heading over to the family room where Steve was getting the shit beat out of him.

You swung back, your vision blurred as you attempted to line up your swing. You didn’t want to kill the boy, but you did want to incapacitate him, and there seemed to be a very fine line between those things when you could barely see straight to swing with accuracy. Billy must have seen you in his peripheral as he swiftly stood, Steve long passed out, and grabbed the club from your hand. Your eyes fluttered as you attempted to stay standing, wanting to crumble under Billy’s wild gaze. He shoved you to the floor, your head hitting the ground hard. Your ears were ringing as he got on top of you, pinning your hands down beside your head. A tear escaped your eye as the ringing stopped and he got dangerously close to your ear to whisper in it.

“You should’ve just been a good girl and listened on Halloween.”

A small cry escaped your lips as he grabbed your shoulders and slammed you into the ground again. Your eyes were fluttering shut, but the last thing you saw was Max appear behind the boy, a needle plunging deep into Billy’s neck. He shouted out in pain as Max administered the sedative, Billy standing up to face her. You wanted to say something, anything, stand up to protect the young girl, wrapped up in fighting these monsters even though she lived with one.

You wanted to fight for her, but she disappeared as the world went dark.

***

Steve woke up in the backseat of a car, double vision making it hard to make out anything in the dark. He saw someone holding a can of gasoline and thought the features seemed familiar.

“Nancy?” He croaked out. But as his vision cleared, he was met with the confused gaze of Mike Wheeler. He felt a deep pain in his face and he went up to feel his nose, which was undoubtedly broken, when a hand pushed his away.

“No, don’t touch it,” he heard Dustin’s voice, turning to look him in the eyes “Hey, buddy. It’s okay, you put up a good fight. He kicked your ass but you put up a good fight.” At least the boy was honest, but couldn’t he at least sugarcoat it a little bit?

The rest of his body started to wake up, and that was when he noticed the weight across his chest, lifting his head which ached in such an indescribable way, to notice you, brightly covered band-aids littering your bruised and battered face, unconscious on top of him.

He heard Lucas giving the driver directions and that was when it all clicked for him and his mind finally showed up. If you were unconscious then who was driving the fucking car?!

“Oh my god!” Steve choked out causing you to stir. His hands grabbed onto you as groaned, eyes slowly fluttering open.

You came to much faster than Steve had, pretty much immediately noticing that Max was driving the car. “What the fuck!” You exclaimed, attempting to sit up, but Dustin pushed you back into Steve.

“Just relax. She’s driven before,” Dustin assured you.

“Yeah, in a parking lot,” Mike shot back, clearly not happy about this plan either.

“That counts!” Lucas chimed in from the passenger seat.

“Oh my god,” Steve repeated gripping onto you tighter.

“They were going to leave you behind. I promised that you’d be cool!” Dustin told him, trying to convince him to behave.

“Woah, woah, woah, woah, woah, what’s going on?” He yelled out as Max accelerated. “Ohhhh, woah! No! Stop the car, slow down!” He yelled and you shrieked as you buried your face in his neck. His arm instinctively curled around your waist, holding you tight against his body.

“I told you he’d freak out!” Mike yelled, annoyed that they hadn’t just left him behind. To be honest, he knew you’d freak out too but he couldn’t in good conscience leave you there. Especially if Billy woke up.

“Stop the car!” You screamed, but it was slightly muffled as you were unwilling to leave the safe haven that was Steve’s neck, head still buried there as if your life depended on it.

“Everybody shut up! I’m trying to focus!” Max shouted.

“Make a left! Make a left!” Lucas shouted pointing at the turn Max was about to pass up. She cut it hard, the inertia throwing you all to the right of the car, as Steve squeezed his eyes shut, wrapping his other arm around you as he held onto you with all his might. Max, swerved as she attempted to regain control of the vehicle, taking out a mailbox in the process. Well, that’s a felony, you thought as she continued on. You’d faced monsters of unimaginable terror and this was how you were going to go out: in the backseat of a car with a child at the wheel.

After several more minutes that felt like hours of reckless driving, the car screeched to a halt at the opening of the tunnel Hopper had dug into. “I told you. Zoomer,” Max exclaimed confidently from the front seat.

“What the fuck does that even mean?” You cried out, done with this hellish car ride. The kids all swiftly made their way out of the car, you and Steve having a bit more trouble. Neither of you were able to gain your footing too quickly, as you stumbled into him. He caught you, allowing you to brace yourself against him as you righted yourself.

“Oh no, guys!” Steve groaned, “hey! Where do you think you’re going?” He added as Dustin made his way over to the opening of the tunnel, can of gasoline in hand. “We are not going down there! I made myself clear!”

No one was listening as the kids all moved around the two of you, grabbing supplies and preparing for their descent. “Hey! There is no chance we’re going in that hole, alright? This ends right now!” He moved away from you gripping the backpack out of the trunk before Dustin could grab it.

“Steve! You’re upset, I get it. But bottom line is a party member requires assistance, and it is our duty to provide that assistance. Now, I know you promised Nance you’d keep us safe, so keep us safe,” Dustin emphasized the end as he held out Steve’s backpack and tossed you your sheathed blade.

Donning bandanas and goggles, you and Steve descended into the tunnel before the rest of the kids.

“It’s this way!” Mike announced, following his crudely drawn map. Steve snatched it out of his hand.

“Hey, I don’t think so. If any of you shits die down here, I’m getting the blame, got it dipshit? From here on out I’m leading the way. Come on let’s go!” He yelled. You joined him at the front of the group to talk to him as the kids formed their own group in the rear to talk.

“I’m sorry, Steve,” you apologized. He turned to look at you and you wished you could see his face to determine the look on it.

“What the fuck do you mean you’re sorry? You have nothing to be sorry for,” he replied, shocked that you would even think that was necessary.

“It’s just, you stopped Billy from hitting me and then he beat the shit out of you. So I’m sorry because that should’ve been me,” you answered him, your eyes welling up with tears. You willed yourself not to cry. The last thing you needed was these dumbass swim goggles filling with water.

“I’m fucking glad it wasn’t you y/n. And I’m not gonna let him touch you ever again, okay? I promise.”

You nodded, too choked up to trust your voice as you continued down the tunnels. You pushed away the anxiety you were feeling about getting lost, trusting that the map the kids had drawn was correct. It took a while but finally the tunnels opened up and you saw countless other ones that fed to this location.

“I think we found your hub,” you exclaimed taking in the sight. It was pretty insane to look at and you couldn’t quite believe that all of this was here in Hawkins.

“Let’s drench it,” Mike replied, ready to kill the fucking thing; hit it where it hurt. You all poured gasoline all around the hub, the smell almost nauseating, making you glad you had the bandana around your face. When it was all finally said and done, you all retreated to the tunnel that you came from, facing your gasoline soaked work.

“Alright. Are you ready?” Steve asked.

“Light her up,” you replied.

“I am in such deep shit,” Steve added before sparking his lighter and tossing it into the hub. It erupted into flames and your mind flashed back to the fire Jonathan had set last year in his hallway, burning the demogorgon that had nearly killed you.

“Go, go, go!” Steve yelled, the kids running ahead of you as you and Steve took up the rear this time, wanting to make sure that if all else failed, the kids got out. You ran through the tunnels as swiftly as you could, attempting not to trip on the vines scattered haphazardly across the ground. Suddenly, Mike began screaming for help as you realized a vine had wrapped around his ankle, pulling him to the floor.

“Everybody back!” You yelled as you unsheathed your knife, slashing the vine and releasing Mike from its grip. He stood and you geared up to continue your way through the tunnels, when you came face to face with one of the demo-dogs.

“Dart?” Dustin asked. You all screamed at Dustin to get back but he didn’t listen. “Trust me. Hey it’s me. It’s your friend, Dustin. You remember me? Will you let us pass?”

The demogorgon opened its mouth to shriek at him and you were about to lunge forward to grab Dustin, but Steve stopped you.

“Okay, okay. I’m sorry about the cellar. You hungry?” Dustin asked reaching into his backpack, pulling out a three musketeers. “I’ve got our favorite! Nougat,” he unwrapped the candy placing it in front of the demogorgon waving all of you to go ahead of him. You hesitated but finally listened, going against all instinct and trusting that the boy might know what he’s doing.

You all finally made your way back to the rope when the ground began to shake and you heard the shrieking of demogorgons in the distance. They were coming, and they were coming fast.

Steve lifted up each kid, boosting them up so they could climb the rope and exit the tunnels, until it was just you and him. They were gaining on you and there was no time. Steve had his bat ready to swing, and you braced for impact knowing that there was nothing the two of you could do to stop the dozens of demo-dogs that were inevitably coming. You shut your eyes, hearing the growl of the demogorgons and the cries from the kids above you, but the impact never came instead, you clutched Steve to keep your balance, as the demo-dogs sprinted past you, headed somewhere else.

You chuckled in disbelief, hugging Steve, burying your face in his chest as his hand went to the nape of your neck. You both swayed like that for a moment, holding each other in relief before the kids broke the magic of the moment.

“Hey lovebirds! We need to get out of here!” Dustin yelled down the hole.

Those damn kids.

***

Steve agreed to drive Dustin to the Snowball, and you begged to go with. Despite all of the bullshit he’d put you through, you loved the kid more than you loved most things, and you weren’t going to miss the opportunity to see him all dressed up for this school dance.

“Alright, buddy. Here we are,” Steve said as he pulled up to Hawkins Middle. “Just remember, go in there—“

“And pretend I don’t care.”

“There you go. You’re learning, my friend,” Steve smiled and you rolled your eyes from the backseat. Dustin leaned forward to check the visor mirror, but Steve slammed it back shut before he could open it.

“Hey, come on. You look great, okay? You’re gonna go in there—you look like a million bucks—and you’re gonna slay ‘em dead, okay?”

“Like a lion,” Dustin replied, rolling his r’s in a weird purr that had you cringing behind him.

“Yeah, don’t do that, okay?” Steve warned and Dustin nodded. “Good luck,” he added as he shook Dustin’s hand before Dustin exited the car, making his way into the gym.

You moved to the front seat a wide grin on your face. “That was sweet,” you told Steve and he rolled his eyes.

“Whatever, freak,” Steve grumbled.

“Hey, that’s a good thing you know,” you reminded him as he began to pull away, making his way back towards his house. “Are you sure you’re okay with me staying at yours again?” You asked. You two were beginning to blur the line between friends and something more.

“Yeah, yeah! Of course. I wouldn’t want to go home to an empty house after all of that shit either,” Steve told you, though most days he did go home to an empty house, his parents on various different business trips. Your parents just worked nights occasionally, and every once in a while they coincided. Since Eleven closed the gate, even though things were better, you still weren’t too keen on staying home alone, so you’d made it a habit to stay at Steve’s, so long as his parents were gone (which they usually were).

Steve wasn’t going to complain. And he definitely wasn’t going to tell you no. He wanted more than anything to be there for you and if company was what you needed, he made damn sure he could provide it. Plus, you still shared a bed with him when you stayed the night.

As Steve looked at you, moonlight hitting your face and making all your features look soft as you hummed and nodded along to the music on the radio, he knew he wasn’t going to write that damn college essay. College wasn’t really for him, and deep down he’d always known it.

And besides, he wasn’t quite ready to leave you yet.

***

a/n: I hope you enjoyed this part! I’m excited to start writing for season 3! Comment and reblog if you enjoyed it! I’d love to know what you think ;)

[morganbritton132]

I love that Eddie is a craft guy! It just makes so much sense. Do you think he's one of those people who is CONSTANTLY doing a new craft and their house is just littered with Eddie's crafts, and he's always making little hand made gifts for Steve, the party and the band? I can totally imagine Steve coming home and the house just being in total disarray and Eddie's just like "I made a bird table and i personalised all your coffee cups :))"

Eddie Munson and the ADHD urge to start a new project before you finished the last one.

Despite Eddie’s big personality and the joy he gets galivanting across cafeteria tables and award show stages, he is very much a homebody. His favorite places growing up was his bedroom, Gareth’s garage, and the drama room where he hosted D&D. Then he went on tour and when the shows were over, he just wanted to be home.

He liked being able to strip away the Eddie Munson persona, sit down, and channel all the ideas in his head into a creative output.

Honestly, making money just made it worse. He can afford shit now.

Steve’s the opposite though.

Steve likes to be out of the house. He was a kid that lived in a big house with parents that never wanted to see or hear him, sometimes year-round sports were the only thing keeping him sane. Once Eddie made it big and was touring, Steve was once again alone in a big empty house and so he found things to do.

He meets up with Robin at least once a week to get dinner and drinks, and sometimes they go dancing or they sing karaoke. Him and Dustin meet up semi-regularly to catch up. He was a part of their neighborhood walking group before Diane annoyed him out of it. He goes bowling with some teachers from work occasionally and takes a pottery class that he sucks at. Him and Max are a part of a trivia team that has only ever succeeded at being the drunkest team in the game.

So, the combination of ‘Steve is 90% of my impulse control and he’s not here right now’ and ‘If I don’t create something, I will die’ means that sometimes Steve comes home to a new windchime or a questionably made bird house.

 Sometimes he comes home to Eddie embroidering one of his jackets by hand even though he bought an embroidery machine that he has never used. Other times, he comes home and Eddie has carved every bar of soap they had into a little fucked-up guy or he found a recorder and wants to play Steve a song.

Or sometimes, Steve returns home from the cooking class he’s taking at their local community center to beads. Beads everywhere.

Beads in the carpet. Beads on the hardwood. Beads in their shoes by the stairs. Beads everywhere.

Steve – who is pretty Type-A about their house being clean and organized because he has a shit memory and needs to be able to find things – very calmly sits aside the ravioli that he made and says, “Eddie, what the fuck?”

“I dropped them.”

Steve makes a gesture like ‘yeah, no shit’ and then just makes a distressed noise, but Eddie waves him off as he dumps a handful of beads into the good punch bowl that they use for parties, “Don’t blame me. Your cat tripped me. I nearly brained myself.”

“She’s only my cat when she’s bad,” Steve sighs, sitting down to help pick the beads up. “Why do you have beads anyways? Since when do we have beads?”

“Do you remember those beaded lizard keychains?” Eddie asks, and then when all he got was silence. “I’m going to make you one…after we pick up two thousand pony beads.”

Steve makes another noise that’s somewhere between ‘you’re causing me actual pain’ and ‘I love you so much it makes me stupid’ and Eddie grins at him. He gestures to the punch bowl and says, “Stevie, think about it. Once we fill this bad boy up, we can separate the beads by color. That’ll be fun, right?”

“…Yeah, I’d actually really like that.”

[kiss-me-muchoo]

𝐒𝐨 𝐦𝐚𝐧𝐲 𝐬𝐢𝐠𝐧𝐬 || 𝐌𝐢𝐠𝐮𝐞𝐥 𝐎'𝐇𝐚𝐫𝐚 𝐱 𝐅𝐞𝐦!𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫

part one: hurt me, it's okay || part two

𝐒𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲_Turns out that you were originally from the earth Miguel collapsed, you just replaced your body, because you were the spider woman from there. Now you have to deal with the revelation, seeing Miguel with another woman and discovering more lies from the Spider Society. 𝐖𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢���𝐠𝐬_MEGA canon divergence, plot twist, asshole!Miguel, angst to the max, miscommunication, happy ending. 𝐀/𝐍_do u see the reference? "So many signs?"... It's exile. Recommendations in order: Where do we go now?, Look what you made me do and exile (all in my playlist).

♪ ♫ My Miguel O'Hara playlist ✰ Index (+ fics here)

….

One morning, you questioned everything.

Why did you become a spider without the same characteristics as others?

Why did you have to be a danger to everyone?

Why couldn't Miguel trust you enough to stay?

And of course... Why did you have to fall in love with him?

You could be in any dimension, with no glitches.

You could learn to control the cosmic abilities you were developing.

But in the end, nobody had trusted you. Not even a warning sign.

Out of them all. Miguel never said anything, he always made you believe you were special. And kick you out at the last instance.

That's why it hurt so much. That's why every morning you questioned everything. That's why you had the impulse to be something.

To soothe the resentment, the sting in the heart, and the enormous amount of stubbornness you had been carrying for months.

The temporary block you made to your earth would end sooner or later, and although there was no reason for any of the spider society members to come, you weren't ready to be found vulnerable.

"Hija. I'm going to the market. Do you want something?" Your mom asked through the door.

"What do you want me to cook today?" You ask, smiling. Already changed and am ready to take the trolley to go to classes.

"You don't have to cook, mi niña" again, you smile. Grabbing your bag and shoes in your hands.

"I always cook. Grab whatever you want and I'll come up with something" She nodded, kissing your head and letting you walk away.

On the way, with a single move from your hand, you lifted your books and finally, you left home.

Every day, you felt less like a spider and more like a witch. ...

It was confusing and annoying how at the end of the summer you lounged for autumn and winter, and then in late spring you were eager to savour summer again.

Your skirt is a grey, black top with mid-length sleeves, long black boots, and a vintage bag.

The trip on the trolley was always pleasant. The line was full of students, unlike other lines that were full of violent homelessness.

Looking out the window, you see the tall palms, and freeways that cross with others, and when your phone buzzes, you turn your head only to scream.

You apologize to the other passengers with a shy smile and then turn again to the seat in front of you.

The small figure of Lyla is there. The annoying yet friendly AI.

"Hi!" She greets happily. Her silly heart-shaped glasses are pink now. Her coat is cream-coloured now, and her hair looks slightly caramelish.

You stood quiet, unable to reply to anything. Anything, it just doesn't come out. Unlike your little head, it's already burning.

Why is she here?

Did Miguel send her?

"I told you to wait till the wagon was empty" Peter came out of a portal. When you looked around, the wagon was empty.

What actually impressed you, was the baby attached to his chest.

She was the cutest baby you had ever seen.

However, beside your face showing confusion and irritation, you stood quiet again. "Hello y/n," Peter said, offering you an awkward smile as the baby cooed.

He took a seat in front of you. And Lyla floated around the baby.

"We counted the days till we could come to your earth again" Lyla noticed the shade of your eyes darker, and immediately she worried. The necessity to drag you back to the HQ to make up with Miguel growing immeasurably.

"Please say something..." Peter urged.

"You had a baby?" Was the first thing that popped into your head?

"Yes. She's Mayday Parker" You smile at the baby.

"So you fixed things with MJ..." he nods. But you think about another lie. Or maybe not a lie. But now you realize Peter hid his upcoming parenthood from you.

"And you hide that from me too" Peter sighs, holding his kid's tiny hand. "Only Miguel knew at the time..."

His name was enough to make you feel like your heart was sunk into gasoline and then thrown on fire.

"Miguel... of course" you whisper with anger. The venom is evident to everyone.

"You need to talk to him. It's important..." the AI reveals.

"I KNEW IT!" You yell, exasperated.

"You just ran without hearing what happened. It's all a misunderstanding. We are uneasy about this, we need you, and what you did just created more chaos than-"

"Am I the villain know?" You ask interrupting the man. He stands quiet. Lyla pinches the bridge of her nose.

"Tell me, Peter... Or you Lyla. Does the rest of the Spider Society know what happened?" It was causing you more anger than sadness to you. The more you caught on them, the more you discovered painful stuff.

Silence.

The gizmo of Peter beeped. He placed his wrist in front of him, the image of Miguel appearing. At the moment, you felt emotionally constipated.

He looked great. Unlike you...

"Peter, Can you hear me?" He asked. You noticed he wasn't wearing his suit. "Yeah..." your ex-friend replies.

"I don't know where you took Lyla, but I need her in my office in an hour. I'm going out with Dana..."

Dana?

While Miguel could not see you or anyone. You could see him and a little of his surroundings.

A woman with beautiful caramel hair and bright eyes called him. She seemed adorable, with a gorgeous skinny body and a lab coat covering her yellow dress.

Peter's eyes went wide. He cut the connection immediately and looked worriedly at you. "It's not what you think. She's just a lab partner in Alchemax..." Lyla started for him. "You need to talk to him. It's very important and-"

"No." You answer with a voice and face full of pride.

"No?" Peter asks goofily.

"I'm not doing this now, nor today, nor tomorrow... maybe never" Hurrying to leave, you waited for the train to stop at the doors.

"Take care, Peter. That baby suits you well..." you explain emotionally before waiting for the doors of the wagon to open.

Lyla turned to look at the man.

"Should we go and make it like Hobie said?" Mayday giggled.

"Yeah. Hobie's way will work"

As soon as the doors opened and you made your first move, you fell into a portal.

Well, you were about to fall into a portal...

Because you closed it skillfully with your hands, innocently stepping over it. You turn to look at Peter and Lyla, dead serious face.

"Slowly, I could become the villain" you simply say, and Lyla finally panicked when she saw your eyes glowing iridescent with green, blue, and silver sparkles.

Without another glance, you kept walking through the station, soon disappearing, mixing with the crowd.

"This is bad. We need to go back with Miguel" the AI said. Peter sighed, rubbing the tiny little hands of his daughter.

"Not everything is lost, Lyla..." Peter liked to believe you would agree to meet Miguel again, that he would explain everything and life would secure you two together.

"There's some new things I have to tell you," she said. Knowing it would hurt Miguel. But probably it would make him go to you.

The waters were literally changing. Unfortunately, not for the best. ...

That night, you stepped out of the shower blindly. Because of the river of tears you had made over the afternoon.

They didn't explain the situation, they let the whole HQ believe you just caused a drama. Peter hid his baby from you. And Miguel had a new lover. He seemed great, he moved on. Maybe he only wanted to talk to you because of the potent danger you were. And at least he was decent enough to send his employees and not disappoint you in person.

Nah... Why disappoint you? While a part of you wanted him to beg you on his knees. The other was full of rage and proud to make everyone believe you were fine and you didn't care.

But you did care. No wonder your chest hurt and your eyes were swollen. Your wet hair dampens the pillow along with your tears. Your body curls into a little ball that it would feel as nice as comfort.

Because for some reason, you couldn't tell your family.

You scream and weep against the wet pillow. Letting all the anger and sadness consume you.

And through the pain, you realize maybe you weren't meant to do anything. You're an accident. And there's no point in being a hero. Nor a villain.

Just the comfort to save your broken heart and shattered soul. And whatever you had to do to protect it, would be fine.

...

A figure that was once a man moved across in your closed eyes. The black void everyone sees is now invaded by a man. Every inch of his deformed figure was white as the snow, but it was disturbingly covered in black holes. The biggest and roundest black spot was what was once his face. He seemed to be elevating the spots emanating dark auras.

Suddenly the dark void behind the figure changed. Your unconscious state creates a disastrous scenario. New York. With piles of dead spider people at the feet of the deformed man. Your heart started beating faster. Finally, realize you were scared.

It was a dream. You're in your bed.

It had been four weeks since your encounter with Peter and Lyla. And his baby... The panic slowly melted. Making you overthink it all over.

The figure scared you in your sleep. You woke up gasping for air.

Your room is dark, it's a little past 3:00 a.m.

It wasn't a dream. It was a premonition. ...

You barely used your suit. You barely balanced through the city with your webs. You stopped being a hero for Los Angeles. Slowly becoming a vigilante. You cried a lot, avoided your family, and took at least an hour every night to practice your new abilities.

Miguel knew that. Miguel knew everything.

He knew he shouldn't be spying on you. He should collect the guts to open your window and explain everything to you. He should reveal once and for all that he was your canon event, that he loved you and missed you. That the only reason he thought about sending you home was because he didn't know yet. That he hated seeing you cry every day and that he never felt so attached to any woman.

But most days he followed like a ghost, far from your smart eye. He paid a visit to you on campus, at the mall, library, and at home.

When your family was present, he remembered the night you invited him to dinner. Your mother is so sweet, your father eyeing him but finally relaxing. And your grandmother, it reminded him of his family.

So he ached to have you even more.

It's not what you think. She's just a lab partner in Alchemax...Peter had said.

But Miguel looked over and over to replay how your face changed as soon as you saw him in Peter's gizmo.

Soon Miguel theorised you thought the worst. That he was dating another woman.

While Dana could have been a potential interest asset for him, the truth is that Miguel never matched her toxic traits. This is why he preferred her friendship, and now that she was moved from the station again, he re-affirmed it.

But it wasn't enough. Not when he hadn't seen you in person in months. Not when the last time you exchanged words with him didn't end well. Not when he had to tell you he was your destiny and that he genuinely loved you.

And to add to his frustration, Spider-lego had alerted him of a new anomaly. Looking at Gwen and Jess in front of him, he sighed.

"Please. I'll be quick and quiet. I just want to see him, I don't even have to say hi to him" Miguel wanted to yell at the blonde girl. But soon he remembered that she had suffered not long ago, and only thanks to Jess, she was stable.

"Miles is THE original anomaly. You had contact with him in the past. It's already dangerous enough-" he started lecturing.

"If y/n was here, she would have backed me up" Jess whistled quietly. The pregnant woman knew you were a delicate subject. She also knew you had limited time to get back with Miguel. Or else, the canon would be disturbed.

Even worse with the information only Lyla knew.

"But she's not here," Miguel concluded, making it visible how delicate you were to him.

"I propose, you can go, see your friend FAR from him, and come back with the anomaly" Jess decided to suggest something. Miguel huffed annoyed.

"Thanks, thanks, thanks, Jess!" The blonde spider was so happy and not even Miguel decided to interfere with her happiness.

"I'll be fast, I promise" With that, she left to earth 1610. Also your home... "You let her go, you keep an eye on her" Jess nodded.

Both turned around to go to the briefing room and start new missions, but like an ice bucket, surprise and shock assaulted them.

You were walking across the long hallway.

You were literally there. Wearing a black dress with red tights and heel boots. Dark purple decorated your lips and your hair was on your usual ponytail back when Miguel met you.

You looked gorgeous. Better than all the times Miguel looked at you before. "I-, y/n? What are you doing here?" Jess asked in shock.

You kept walking. Every spider you passed by, looked with shock and curiosity. But the aura you charged felt heavy.

Miguel couldn't help but blush. You were feet away from him, looking strong and certainly indifferent about him. Just by looking at your new image, the eagerness to have you back on his side grew bigger.

"The Spot is a big danger. That's why I came" you announce when you're finally in front of the pregnant woman and Miguel.

You tried avoiding looking at Jess and her round belly. Another sting pulsated when you realized how much you had missed.

And again, facing that mask again. Miguel's full suit was something that would always intimidate you. Since the first moment Gwen, Hobie, and Peter introduced you two, it had been the same.

"The Spot? How do you know him?" You huffed at the woman's question.

"I've been doing irregular stuff..." Miguel knew what you meant. Even when he was getting lost in your small height and gorgeous eyes, Miguel remembered what you'd been doing. Witchcraft...

"It's been some time since... the last time"

"I'm not here to talk about the past, Jessica." Your answer surprised her. For Miguel, he was expecting the worst to be honest. He couldn't describe what you were feeling. And it was making him anxious.

"I saw him while I was sleeping. It wasn't a regular dream. Lascarred, I've been scar- surprised by weird visions and more" Miguel worried. He supposed you were about to say scared. And he hated not being able to be there for you. It was a lot, in a short time.

"The Spot is more than a regular anomaly. He's going to make a disaster. I saw... piles of spider people dead in New York" The pair of adults exchanged looks. They believed you. But they were unsure about what to do.

"It's gonna get out of hand. And even after all... I thought both of you needed to know" Jessica blushed after remembering the embarrassment she felt when you called her and everyone else a bunch of liars. The venom in your eyes and voice was evident, making everything heavier.

"I can sense he was a normal civilian before. He has a lot of rage, regret, and hate inside. Be careful, and think twice before acting" It was a double entendre, where you wanted to give them an indirect hint about what they did to you before.

They stand quiet. The background noise never stopped, a lot of spiders talked on their way to the cafeteria. The sound of doors opening and closing as well as portals. The world keeps spinning on Earth 928, but to Miguel, time is frozen.

Until you turned around and just how you came in, you were leaving.

Miguel felt Jess nudging him. So he went straight to you. Hoping to stop you. This was his chance...

"Wait..." he called. You didn't face him, but you stopped walking.

"I'm begging you, y/n. Please let me explain everything" It caught you off guard. But you really wanted to listen to him. However, at that precise moment, more than feeling angry, you felt scared.

Probably it would be better to open up a little. For the last time.

"My feelings are changing, Miguel. I don't even know what I want or how I feel anymore..." you said over your shoulder.

And again, you're leaving.

But you won't go this time. He's making sure you listen.

"I'm sorry, y/n. But you'll listen this time..." his hands suddenly grab you by the hips. And in a second, you're thrown into his shoulder.

"Miguel. Put me down!" Jess can't help but chuckle. She highly hopes you listen.

For everyone, more than keeping canon intact, they wanted to see Miguel happy, and have you back.

"This is such a caveman act. I'm gonna harm you" he knew you wouldn't.

More looks are drawn to you and the man. You only see the floor of the HQ. And the more he walks with you on his shoulder, the more you try to ignore his grip on you.

His right hand still holds your hips, and his wide arm secures your dress to avoid being hiked and leaving you exposed. He cared, even with tiny details, he cared.

Finally, he enters his office. And closes the door.

He doesn't put you down though. Until he gently placed you on his chair.

His wide back facing you, and you crossed your arms annoyed.

"Can you start talking?" Your nervousness was so evident and it made Miguel feel more relaxed. Because that meant he wasn't the only one panicking.

"I'm in your canon events. And you're in mine..." your eyes are wide open. He finally turns around to look at you. Your silence is enough to let him know you're shocked.

"The only reason why I wanted to send you home, is because I believed that would be better for us. I thought my...I thought my love for you was dangerous" he always expects eye contact when talking. He's meticulous enough to know when he imposes respect. But for you, he pleads for you to look him in the eyes. He needs to hear you might forgive him.

"I learned about us and canon right when you left the HQ. If you had just waited a minute to leave. If I had waited to tell you. Everything... might have turned differently"

Like peace invading your body, you want to jump straight into his arms and smooch him. He wasn't lying, he was a man of word. But you also weren't ready to forgive him at all.

"You still lied to me. You and everyone I considered my friends. Everyone considered me a danger. And... You said I was special, you made me feel like..."

"I'm in love with you. Since the day you invited me to dinner with your family. That day I fell in love with you" tears form in your eyes, remembering the day you two connected like never. That night you went to bed with giant butterflies in your stomach. And knowing that day he felt that way too...

"That's the truth. And the only lie I ever said to you, is that I didn't love you, that everything was a lie" There's a pout on your face, and you don't know what to do.

“What about the woman?” Miguel frowned confused.

“The woman Peter told me about not to worry” you explain embarrassed.

“Dana. As a young adult, I saw her as a potential partner. But… it never became anything. Now… she’s not even an option. I have no other options… Just you”

"I-..." a beep. You can't say anything else. You only open your mouth to say nothing. You were about to say that you forgive him.

"Miguel. Gwen let The Spot away. Pavitr earth is colliding because of Miles, I'm already here..." Jess spoke.

Miguel sighed heavily. Pushing his hair back in place. He reaches for his gizmo to answer her.

"Bring everyone here. Now..." he remarked to everyone louder, you also sighed.

The stress, panic, anxiety, anger, and sadness were edging him.

"Miguel..." you called, barely reaching his shoulder due to the height difference. His shoulders relaxed, and he enjoyed the touch.

"Please. Tell me you won't leave this time. Tell me you'll give me a second chance" he sounded so tired. And you decided to try. You could try to forget everything and begin a new chapter with him.

"I promise you I'll try, Miguel. This time I'll try to understand" he nods, and he hopes you take the hand he's offering.

You do, you intertwine your fingers with him.

"I need you..." he says, again sounding stressed.

With his dark past and the circumstances he was in when you met him, seeing Miguel in a vulnerable state of honesty was a lot to process.

"We still need to talk about a lot of things. But I'm here, Miguel" Maybe it was your prescience that calmed him enough to not yell and lose his mind at first sight.

Something in the back of your head was whispering to you that it wasn't over. That there was more to unveil. But you believed Miguel. The fact that he was honest and open to talk about his feelings was enough to make you see how real he was at that moment.

It was the peace before the storm. ...

The eyes of Gwen, Peter, Noir, and more spiders on you were unsettling you. But you were feeling terribly bad about Miles Morales and the issue with his dad. Miguel was trying to calm him. But slowly, you could feel he was losing his temper once again.

"You've been quite a mystery to everyone here" Hobie whispered. You glanced at him. "I'm pretty sure you're the only one I've missed," he smiles briefly.

"You may still want to leave. But even destiny wants you with that beastly man"

He sure looks beastly. But he had made you feel special, he tried to push you away for your security. And now he has begged you to stay with him.

You follow Lyla when he opens the millions of webs from the Arachno-Poly-Humanoid. Miguel explains to Miles, but you start searching for your own web.

Like the red string many believed in. The red string attached two persons together. You found your web.

And it was true, your web was attached to Miguel's. The last canon event showed you and Miguel together. But as you watched closer, you started seeing your past.

You were a spider woman, but it wasn't true. You became a spider woman at a much older age. You were a scientist working on Alchemax and surprisingly, you were dating Miguel. You then found he died, and you wanted to bring him back to life. You contacted Doctor Strange from that earth, and he warned you about a collapse coming. So he made a ritual to save you. He made you take a variant of yourself. The y/n of Earth 1610 who was a witch.

"Lyla. What's this?" You ask her highly confused. Miguel stopped talking to Miles and turned to see you.

When he walked closer, he saw it. Looking as much as confused as you were. "Oh!-, uh-..."

"Lyla. What's his?" Miguel pushed further.

The AI sighed.

"Miguel...In reality, y/n was a citizen from the earth you collapsed. She was the spider woman from that earth, and she was the couple of your variant that died" The man felt like he couldn't breathe.

"She made a deal with Strange to get your variant back. But the wizard knew it was impossible due to the collapse happening. So he sent y/n to take her variant's body on Earth 1610. The real y/n from Earth 1610 died on the collapse. During the process, you must've forgotten a lot of things. The body you took, was the body of a witch. That's why you started developing some weird activities for a spider. You were not bitten between portals"

It was too much. You don't know how to feel.

"See. She's proof that canon isn't accurate. Send me home!" Miles argued.

"Kid..." Peter tried to calm him. But you weren't listening, you just started panicking more than ever.

Miguel saw you and reached you.

"I'm sorry. It's too much" you barely say to him, feeling your eyes water once again. "Calm down. It's okay, y/n"

"I can't do this. And that kid can't suffer, Miguel" you say, catching everyone's attention.

"You know I can't let him go" Without a warning, he traps Miles. And another wave of arguments explodes between your ex-friends.

"Maybe y/n is right" Gwen admits, but soon is ignored.

At the same time, you looked at Hobie telling Miles to break out. So you know what's about to happen; Miles would break the barrier.

You run behind him before anyone can notice and Jess is able to hold your forearm for some seconds. But it's not enough.

"Don't do this, y/n" Gwen yells. And it angers you.

"You know this isn't right. Don't make the kid go through what I did" Like a parallelism, Miles was told lies, and he felt betrayed like you once did.

Everyone is talking. Peter tries to calm Miles, Hobie, and Jess making comments. Miles looks scared at you and Hobie. So you point at him.

Hobie reminds the kid to use his palms. And then he smiles at you.

"Whatever happens. Do what you believe is right." Hobie changed his mind. Even if canon was supposed to want you with Miguel, you would not make anyone else suffer.

"You'll visit me?" Hobie nodded, making you smile.

But then a bright flash blinded everyone, and then the silence was killing everyone.

Miguel sees you looking at him. An apologetic and sad look, before you start running after Miles.

Not this time, not again, Miguel thinks.

"MILES!, Y/N!" He shouts, going straight to you and the kid. Because he's aware you'll try to save the kid from every spider. He knows you believe in canon changing instead of being accurate. But he won't risk anything. He won't risk losing you like it happened with his family.

He knows you're fast, but that day you surprised him.

How you easily get rid of the tons of webs shooting at you? All while you apologize because they were your workmates.

Most of the spiders go after Miles, making it easier for you to break a glass and fall to the void of the sky in Earth 928.

And when his bright web caught your waist, you were terrified. Your watered eyes collide with his. Regret invaded him. He had done a lot, but he wanted you to hold tight and listen.

But your face gave him enough to feel sad and angry. He blamed Miles if he hadn't done another canon intervention. You would stay longer to listen to him and officially forgive him.

"I'm sorry, Miguel"

So you made his web disappear with your magic. Making you fall faster, away from him. Breaking his heart.

...

"NO. MOM!. YOU CAN'T LEAVE ME LIKE THAT" You rolled your eyes, hugging the girl beside you tighter.

"So dad chased you?"

"Yeah. Have you heard Uncle Peter say someone is going Miguel mode?" Gabi giggles and nods.

"He went crazy?"

"Yes. A lot I would say. I convinced him to help Miles and slowly, we got together again"

"Not so slow, you had me within months of being back together" you blushed.

"What? Who told you that?"

"Dad. He said you loved him so much that you let me grow inside you the day he asked you out" You were gonna kick Miguel.

"Oh, yes... We decided to have you too soon. But it took longer to move in together, get married." You explain to the five-year-old girl"

"And now there's another baby inside you" Gabi points at your round belly.

You sigh, nodding. Of course, Miguel had to get you pregnant right after funding a new base for the Spider Society.

"Yes. Your baby brother will arrive soon"

"What are you talking about?" Miguel appeared in the frame of the living room.

"Mom was telling me how you chased her to tell her that you loved her" Gabi answered happily.

"I still love her, Gabi. Y mucho..." You smile at him.

When Gabriella was born and she started the toddler phase, Miguel and you realized she was the exact same copy of Gabriella he had in the earth that collapsed. Still shocked you, but she was your baby girl. Obviously a daddy's girl.

"That was a dark day, though," you added. Miguel got closer to help you stand up. Your belly poking his tight chest.

"Can we focus on the present? We got over that." He was right. "Okay. Can I have a kiss?' You ask innocently.

"Just because you're pregnant" Gabi pretended to be puking and left the living room making you laugh.

"And it's your fault!" After years of being together, you got used to Miguel and his cheeky side.

"No. It's your fault and that stupid new suit you wore at the inauguration" You smirked. Your new suit always delayed missions and patrols. Because your silly husband couldn't resist the temptation.

"I take the guilt. Now... Are you ready?" The plan was to go eating and have a little walk on the beach.

"I'm still waiting for my kiss" he rolled his eyes and grabbed you by your hips, making you giggle as he passionately kissed you.

"Te amo un montón, muñeca" you smile, kissing his nose as he chuckles.

"Yo también, corazón" In the middle of a new round of kisses, Gabi came back.

"Ugh, enserio?. You're still kissing?" Both you and your husband laughed before leaving with Gabi.

__________________________________________ Taglist: @justleavemealoneyeah @nishinoyahhh @perfectprofessorloverapricot @liz96893 @deputy-videogamer @legbouk @oxrchd @cas-planet @gabbym-dizzy @avxntxrine @karleequinn @sunshinesetsstuff @aurabambi @mymommmy @billaboon @brittney69 @liz96893 @ariparri

I’m so excited to write my Halloween and día de muertos fics 4 Miguel (u Can notice it by the way I inconsistently wrote this) so tell me if you want to be tagged🩷

[woah-were-halfway-there]

The Makeup

aka, The Fight: Pt. 3

a/n: alrightyyyy here's the last part of this bit of the series. i think after this i'll go back to writing the scare when little man is born and mia becoming a big sister if y'all are still wanting to read that :)

word count: 9.3k

“You’re sure you’re ok?” Lexie asked from the other end of the phone. “Do you want me to come to Toronto this weekend? We can do something fun. Get you out of Mitch’s condo and do something other than work.”

“Lexie, I’m fine,” Carson told her best friend while nodding a quick thanks to the Starbucks barista who handed her the drink she ordered. It was nearing the end of her lunch break at work, and this was her last stop before returning to the office. “You’re in Chicago, babe. You don’t have to come all the way here for me.”

“Carson, you’re not fine, so don’t even try to lie to me about it.”

Carson sighed and tried to keep her composure because she didn’t have it in her to cry again.

“I’m trying to be fine, Lex.”

It’d been 13 days since Carson and Auston's fight after she found out he’d been charged and tried keeping it from her. That also meant Carson had been staying with Mitch and Steph for 13 days, and it’d been 13 days since she last spoke to Auston.

Following the fight with Auston, Carson missed a couple of work days as her depression about the situation made her feel like she couldn’t get out of bed. By the end of the work week, she returned to the office only briefly but decided to take an impulse trip to Vancouver to see her dad and sister, Mya and get out of Toronto for a little bit as she navigated her feelings.

After returning from Vancouver three days later, things went back to normal for Carson. Well, as normal as they could.

She went back to work, all while acting like nothing was out of the ordinary and continued staying in the spare bedroom at Mitch and Steph’s place. But she still hadn’t talked to Auston about anything because she didn’t know how.

Carson’s friends and colleagues at work noticed something was up. Gone was the friendly, bubbly girl they came to know and loved having as a new addition to the office, as she became a much quieter and mopey version of herself. To them, it was apparent something had happened, but they didn’t want to overstep if she didn’t want to talk about it.

Two people in that office knew what was happening. Max and Tara worked directly with Carson on the same projects, and in the short month and a half Carson had been working there, she immediately clicked with them. They knew all about Carson’s relationship with Auston, having even met him in a non-work setting when the three of them went out for drinks, and he chatted with them for a little bit before driving himself and Carson home. They knew how absolutely in love Carson and Auston were with each other and how this fight affected Carson.

Max and Tara were Carson’s rock in the office, and despite feeling her chest get heavy while talking on the phone with Lexie, she knew they’d help her get through the rest of the day.

“I know you are, babe,” Lexie spoke softly and sighed, bringing Carson back to reality. “I’m just worried about you. And I miss my best friend.”

“I know, and I appreciate you,” Carson told her honestly. “I miss you too, so freaking much. But I don’t want you to come here while I’m like this. I know you’ve seen me in a worse state, but I’m just trying to decide what I want to do about everything with Auston. This is fucking hard.”

“I still want to give Auston a piece of my mind, but for your sake, I won’t. At least not yet. Have you thought about reaching out to him so you can talk?”

“Of course I have. I miss him, Lex—more than I can explain. I miss him, our conversations, our routine, talking with his family, and the feeling of safety I had being with him. But whenever I think about any of that, I think about how he kept such a big thing from me, and it hurts. I almost cracked and told him I was at the game last week, but I knew he’d want to talk afterwards, and I chickened myself out.”

“I understand,” Lexie sighed again. “But Carse, I’m going to give it to you straight here, okay? If you don’t want to fix things, let Auston know. You also gotta let him know if you want to figure things out. It’s been two weeks, babe. As mad as I am at him for hurting you, I know this entire situation is killing him, too, and I really think he deserves to know where you stand.”

Carson took a moment to respond but slowly nodded her head as she entered the front doors of her office building.

“You’re right,” she agreed. “He’s given me space and been patient. I feel like I’ve been stringing him along, making him wait so long and in the dark. God, I just wish none of this happened.”

“I know, it sucks. But you’ll figure it out, babe. You always do.”

“Thanks, Lexie,” Carson responded and took a deep breath. “I plan on figuring it out soon because I’m over feeling like this. But anyway, I’m almost back in the office, so I've got to go. Love you. I’ll text you tonight.”

“Love you too, girly,” Lexie said. “Keep your head up, and I’ll talk to you later. Bye!”

“Bye!”

Just as Carson hung up her phone and slid it back into her bag, the elevator door opened, and she quickly scanned her pass so she could be taken up to her office floor.

Once she was back at work, Carson was greeted by her coworkers as she passed them and headed toward her office. After she set her bag and iced coffee on the desk, her computer lit up and showed the time. She still had 20 minutes before her lunch was officially over, so she decided that was enough time to eat the last bit of food she had in the fridge.

Max and Tara were still in the breakroom when Carson entered, and she couldn’t help but smile at how it was just the three of them there.

“Carson!” Max greeted her excitedly and waved her over. “You have good fashion taste. Tell me what you think of this sweater. Tara thinks it’s too extra.”

“Let me see,” Carson replied as she grabbed her container of strawberries and joined the other two at the table. Once she was sitting, Max handed her his phone, showing a tie-dye sweater from a website he was looking at. “I like it. Auston has a similar one-.”

Carson immediately cut herself off and shook her head, taken back by her comment. In the last two weeks, she’d only mentioned Auston when talking about what happened. She hadn’t mentioned him in general conversation like she always did before their argument, which didn’t go unnoticed by Max and Tara as they sent each other knowing glances, and Max slowly took his phone back from Carson.

“Well, I doubt something like that would look as good on me as it does on Auston,” he said. “He looks fine in just about anything.”

“Oh, would you stop talking about her man like that? Go find your own to thirst over,” Tara scolded before glancing sideways at Carson and noticing she wasn’t reacting to what they were saying. “Speaking of Auston…”

“Hmm?” Carson hummed, zoning back in on what they were saying.

“Auston, babe,” Max spoke bluntly but softened his voice when Carson looked at him sadly. “Still nothing, huh?”

“No, we haven’t talked,” Carson replied, then stared down at her strawberries, suddenly losing her appetite.

Max and Tara looked at each other again and sighed, knowing full well the toll this was taking on their friend.

“I see you put your necklace back on,” Tara said, nodding to the designer white gold chain around Carson’s neck. “That was a gift from Auston, right?”

“Yeah, it was,” Carson explained as she gently brushed her fingers against the two bands that linked together in the middle, making her love necklace. “He got it for me when I graduated in June. I’d only ever taken it off to have it cleaned before I took it off after our fight. Not having it on felt weird, so I dug it out of my bag to wear it again.”

“I need a man who gifts me, Cartier,” Max tsked, hoping to ease the mood, but regretted it when Carson remained silent. “Carson, honey, is there anything we can do to help?”

“We hate seeing you like this,” Tara added, leaning over to squeeze Carson’s hand. Max quickly joined and placed his hand on top of both of them.

Carson relaxed at their gesture and smiled.

“Sorry, guys,” she responded and took a breath. “Unfortunately, I don’t think much can make me feel better until I talk to him.”

“Understandable,” Max told her with a soft smile. “But also don’t be hard on yourself for taking the time you need to figure out what you want to do.”

“Exactly,” Tara agreed. “If Auston were remotely the type of guy he’s always seemed to be to us, he’d be okay with you taking your time regardless of how he’s feeling.”

“You two always know what to say to make me feel better,” Carson smiled and squeezed both of their hands. “Thank you.”

“We got you,” Max stated.

“Always,” said Tara, patting Carson’s hand before pulling away. “We’ll let you eat your strawberries in peace.”

“OK, guys, I’ll see you out there.”

“And you better actually eat them, or we’ll have issues,” Max threatened as he pushed in his chair and sent Carson a slight glare before following after Tara.

Carson just shook her head as she watched them go, then glanced down at her strawberries again before picking one up and popping it into her mouth.

About 10 minutes later, Carson’s lunchtime was almost over. She stood up from the table and went over to the sink to rinse out her now empty container before heading back to her desk to prep for the remainder of the work day. However, just as she was about to exit the breakroom, she almost ran right into someone.

“I’m sorry,” Carson stammered as she stepped back and looked up to make eye contact with Spencer, another of her coworkers.

“It’s quite alright,” Spencer replied and smiled charmingly. “How are you, Carson?”

“Oh, uh, I’m alright, thanks. How was your weekend?”

“It was good, pretty uneventful.”

Spencer was nice. He had been nothing but friendly toward Carson since she started working in the office, but something just put her off about him. Spencer’s condo wasn’t far from the one she shared with Auston, and for a reason, Carson didn’t understand; he drove to work almost every day and always offered her a ride. Their office was located downtown. Therefore, driving wasn’t always necessary, but Carson would’ve been lying if she didn’t appreciate those rides on days she was running late or the weather was bad.

However, something still rubbed her wrong with him. Spencer was charismatic, meaning he was very good at conversing. He had a way with words and could chat with anyone about anything. But, he also made many comments that had Carson pausing, feeling as though he was hitting on her, which she’d always responded to, making it known she was in a relationship.

Spencer knew she was in a relationship, but there were still times he tested those boundaries, and Carson hated it. She didn’t think this would be one of those times.

“That’s nice,” Carson told him with a smile and internally hoped the conversation would end there. “Anyways, I should probably get back to my desk.”

Carson nodded, and Spencer did the same back, but before she could walk around him, he spoke up again.

“Wait, Carson, before you go, I was hoping I could ask you something.”

“Oh, sure, of course. What’s up?”

“Are you free to get drinks with me today after work?” He asked, making Carson go stiff.

“As colleagues?” Carson hesitantly asked, but she knew better. She was sure Spencer’s intentions weren’t just friendly, but that was a boundary she needed to set.

“I was thinking it could be more like a date if you’re interested.”

“Spencer, no. I have a boyfriend. I’m not interested in you like that at all. I’m sorry.”

Spencer’s entire demeanour changed at that.

“I see,” he said and adjusted his posture, looking slightly more intimidating. “I thought you and the hockey player broke up.”

“I- no, we’re still in a relationship,” Carson explained, despite feeling a little unsure. She and Auston were still together, right?

“You stopped mentioning him, and I noticed you turned the pictures of the two of you on your desk around, so I figured you called it quits.”

There was something about his tone that Carson didn’t like. Maybe it was ignorance. Perhaps it was arrogance. Either way, though, it pissed her off.

“We didn’t break up,” Carson confirmed out loud, mainly to reassure herself. “Things are… rough right now. But we’re still together.”

Spencer scoffed.

“I doubt this will be the only time he hurts you, Carson. Maybe you’re just too naive to see that.”

“And maybe you’re just a dick who made an assumption and then got his ego hurt by a girl who is not and will never be interested in him.”

Spencer blinked, surprised at how she snapped at him, but didn’t say anything.

“This conversation is over,” Carson continued, seething. “But before I go, just know that if you attempt to corner me or anyone in the office like this again, I’ll ensure HR knows all about it.”

Nothing else could be said, so Carson stepped around him and wasn’t stopped.

Part of her wanted to cry as she beelined for her office. She was annoyed and frustrated with the situation, but one thought was prominent in everything she felt: her desire to talk to Auston.

The remainder of Carson’s work day went by quickly despite an anxious nagging feeling she had. Spencer kept his distance while Max and Tara promptly addressed the tension between him and Carson, but not in a way Spencer would hear it. Tara immediately messaged in the group chat with Max and Carson, asking what happened, which Carson filled them in on. She ended the conversation by admitting that the ordeal with Spencer made her want to talk to Auston because she hated not knowing where they stood.

Carson then internally admitted that although she was still hurt and upset with Auston, she still loved him and wanted to be with him. But she didn’t know how to go about it. For all she knew, Auston thought she was overreacting and didn’t want to wait for her to come back around. Of course, she didn’t want to believe that could happen, but Carson’s brain could be so damn mean to her sometimes.

But that’s what she needed to remind herself. Her brain was just mean. There was no way for Carson to know the future of her and Auston’s relationship if she didn’t talk to him. It wasn’t fair to Auston or herself to make assumptions and let that scare her away without first talking to him about it.

Her mind was scrambled, so Max and Tara convinced her to leave the office early and have time to collect her thoughts in a place that wasn’t the office. Carson was hesitant to leave early, but she had completed everything she needed to do that day before her lunch break and got a head start on some other things despite feeling all jumbled. About an hour went by, and she was still on the fence about leaving, but that changed when Spencer went to the photocopier that directly viewed Carson’s office despite a different photocopier being closer to the break room and his office.

Carson went stiff when she saw him walk by and didn’t miss the way he looked into her office as he went. He said nothing, but Carson was not up for playing any of his petty little games. So, after sending a message to her supervisor explaining all the work she’d completed that day and asking if it was alright if she went home early, Carson wasted no time packing up her things and leaving the office once told it was okay to leave. She didn’t even look in Spencer’s direction as she stormed out of her office, only stopping to say bye to Max and Tara and waving at those she passed on her way out.

When Carson arrived at Mitch and Steph’s condo, it was quiet. She knew Steph had things to do that day, meaning her friend probably wasn’t home, but she wasn’t sure about Mitchy.

The Leafs played against St. Louis that night, so it was likely that her cousin was home having a pregame nap before he had to get ready to go to the arena. Carson glanced at her watch to see it was nearing three in the afternoon. Therefore, it’d be odd if Mitch wasn’t home, so she tried her best to be quiet as she took off her heels before heading to the guest room to put her work things in there and maybe watch a show. However, she didn’t make it far when a familiar brown lab entered the hallway and rushed toward her excitedly.

“Hi, Zeusy boy,” Carson quietly greeted the dog as she crouched to his level and scratched behind his ears. “Is your dad sleeping?”

“Nah, I’m right here,” Mitch said as he entered the hallway. He was wearing a t-shirt and a pair of basketball shorts, and his hair was dishevelled, showing that he had been lying down.

“Shit, I’m sorry, Mitchy. Did I wake you up?”

“No, you’re good. I was just scrolling on my phone. You’re home early, though. Everything alright?”

“Uh, yeah,” Carson mumbled as she stood back up and smoothed her blouse. “I finished all of my work early and have a really good start on the stuff I have to do for the rest of the week. I just have a lot of stuff on my mind. I know I’m not in the office for the rest of the week now because my boss is away, but I didn’t want to be there anymore today. ”

“I see,” Mitchy responded, then narrowed his gaze at his cousin, knowing something was bothering her. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Of course, she wanted to talk to her twin about everything bugging her, but Carson didn’t want to bother Mitch with her problems.

“No, no, it’s ok. You have to start getting ready soon anyway. I think I’m just going to curl up and watch a show. Have a chill night in.”

“Carson.”

The look Mitch gave her as he crossed his arms showed that he wasn’t impressed by her answer, which made Carson sigh.

“Fine,” she huffed. “Let me change into something comfy, and then I’ll tell you.”

Mitch smirked at her triumphantly before calling for Zeus to follow him to the living room, and Carson went to the guest room. A few minutes later, she emerged in the hallway again wearing a pair of sweatpants and a hoodie, then made her way to the living room and curled up on the couch next to her best friend.

Carson spent the next few minutes telling Mitch what happened with Spencer at the office, including the back story of how he’d been flirty before despite knowing she was in a relationship. She then explained what Spencer said after she turned him down and what was on her mind afterwards.

“First off, fuck that guy,” Mitch said once Carson finished her spiel.

“I know, he sucks,” Carson agreed, then took a sip of the water bottle Mitch had grabbed for her.

“I’m glad you put him in his place, but it wouldn’t hurt to report him to HR or something, Carse.”

“I know, I’m going to tomorrow. I don’t want him to make anyone else in the office feel like I did today.”

“Good,” Mitchy replied, nodding his head, then stopping and glancing at his cousin again. “And you think you want to talk to Auston again now?”

Carson sighed.

“Yeah, I do. I miss him, Mitchy, and I need to know where we stand. It’s just frustrating because I still don’t know what I feel or what to do, but I know I need to talk to him. How is he? Is he good?”

“Matts? I mean, yeah, he’s alright. Same old now that the season has started. Not much else is going on at the moment. He asks about you a lot, though. Every day I see him, actually. He misses you too, Carse. I don’t want you to think he doesn’t. But, you gotta do what you think is best for you.”

“But I don’t know if what I want is what’s best for me,” Carson stressed, pushing her hair away from her face as she inhaled. “And that’s the thing. Can I trust Auston again after keeping such a big thing from me? I may have never known if the media didn’t get their hands on the information. Although part of me wishes I was as oblivious to the fact as I was two weeks ago, I still can’t believe it even happened and knowing that it did is a lot. But this is something I’d want to know. I just- how many other significant things hasn’t he told me? Is it too naive of me to want to think he wouldn’t keep something like this from me again?”

“It was extremely dumb for him not to tell you,” Mitch started. “It was even more ridiculous for him to do what he did, whether it was a drunken mistake or not. I will say, though, Auston seems to be learning from it. He’s trying, and that’s really all anyone can ask for. Of course, it doesn’t improve the situation, but he’s being cooperative. And I know one thing he really wants to fix is his relationship with you as he navigates moving forward from this. However, if you don’t think that’s best for you, you’ve gotta listen to that. I can’t see you tearing yourself up because of a relationship again, Carse. I’ve already made Auston clear of my feelings about the situation, and we’re okay now, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to say, ‘Yes, you two should figure things out and not break up.’ I love you and Auston together and am always rooting for you guys, but I’ll always care most about your happiness. You’re my best friend. And if you think Auston is who will still make you the happiest, you can’t let anyone make you think otherwise. If you can forgive him, great. But if not, I’ll still be in your corner and we’ll figure it out.”

Carson stayed silent for a moment, processing Mitch’s words. She inhaled deeply, reached up to wipe away a tear that broke free from her watering eyes, and then sniffled before looking back at her cousin.

“I wish I knew what to do, Mitchy. I wish I could go back to him and not be afraid he’d hurt me like this again. And I know I may have overreacted when all of this happened, but it was like being slapped in the face. I was blindsided, and now I feel like I’m in a hole. I don't know how to escape.”

“I know,” Mitch told her softly. “But I think you gotta do what you told me when we started this conversation, and that’s talk to Auston. You won’t know what you want regarding your relationship with him if you don’t.”

“You’re right,” Carson agreed. “I just have to build the courage to reach out to him. It should probably be soon, though, huh?”

“Carson, let me tell you it has been so pathetic seeing him mope over you,” Mitchy stated, making Carson cover her mouth, attempting to hide her chuckle. “Like good, he should know he fucked up, but Auston is so miserable because he misses you, and I can’t even tease him about it because the nice guy in me doesn’t want to make him feel worse.”

“Wow, how considerate of you,” Carson teased while Mitch nudged her with his shoulder. Carson pushed back, but soon enough, they stopped, and Carson leaned her head onto her cousin's shoulder. “Thanks for always looking out for me, Mitchy.”

“Gotta make sure my twin is always okay,” he responded, leaning his head against hers. “Like your mom used to say, it’s the two of us against the world.”

“It is. And I’m lucky to have you as my best friend backing me up every step of the way.”

“You really are stuck with me.”

“And I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Carson chuckled, then sat up again so she could look at Mitch. “But, you need to start getting ready, or else you’ll be late.”

“Shit, you’re right,” Mitch stated, quickly getting off the couch to gather his things. “You’re coming to the game tonight, no?”

“I don’t think so, Mitchy. I’m going to watch from here with Zeus. I don’t want to be back there just yet.”

“OK, fair. You’re welcome to join us after the game, though. Steph will want you there. I can give you a heads up if Auston comes out or not, too.”

“I appreciate it, but I’m ok,” Carson insisted. “I think I’m going to watch the game from here and think about what to do.”

“Alright. Promise to update me if anything happens or you decide you do want to come out?”

“I promise. Now go get ready.”

Mitch was ready and out of the condo within half an hour. Once he was gone, Carson put on Netflix and watched an episode of her show with Zeus before Steph got home. She was in a rush, too, having to get ready since she was going to the game that night with some of the other girlfriends. She tried multiple times to convince Carson to join her, but Carson was adamant about having an evening to herself, which Steph respected.

“I know you don’t want to come, but you’re sure there’s nothing I can do before I leave?” Steph asked as she battled with zipping up one of the tall boots she decided to wear that evening.

“I’m sure, Steph. You and Mitch have done enough for me,” Carson told her. “Go have fun tonight.”

“I’d have more fun if you came with me,” the blonde pouted, making Carson roll her eyes and smile at the dramatics. “But it’s fine, I’m fine. I’m sure Zeusy will love having you to hang out with.”

“The feeling is mutual.”

Carson then began scratching behind Zeus’ ears, which earned her a content noise from the chocolate lab before Steph spoke again.

“Ok. I’m going. You know to help yourself to any food or whatever, but please text me if you need anything or change your mind about coming.”

“You know I will,” Carson told her honestly. “I’ll watch from here and see you when you’re back tonight.”

“Ok, ok, I won’t press you anymore,” Steph said as she came over to give Zeus some love before leaving. “Alright, actually going now. Love ya!”

“Love ya too, have fun!”

And with that, it was just Zeus and Carson watching another episode of her show before it was game time.

Soon enough, the game started, and Carson hated that seeing Auston on the TV screen was still enough to feel a pang in her chest, but there was no arguing, just how much she missed him. As the game went on, Carson found herself paying more attention to Auston whenever the camera showed him than she did to the actual game, and before she knew it, the game was over.

The Leafs lost to the Blues, but Carson kept the channel on as post-game media started. She watched Will and Freddie do interviews and then felt her breath hitch when Auston came on the screen again. Hearing his voice answer questions about the game really hit her. It’d been almost two weeks since she last heard it, yet it still soothed her. She watched the entire interview, noticing how, along with the silver chain Auston wore around his neck, he was also wearing the Cartier love necklace that matched the one she wore. Both pieces of jewelry peaked out from Auston’s shirt, but when reporters kept bombarding him with questions, Carson noticed how he reached up to fiddle with the love necklace, gently rubbing his thumb over the two circles that linked in the middle.

It was then Carson decided she needed to talk to him as soon as possible. She wasn’t beating around the bush anymore; she knew they needed to speak, and there was no point in pushing it back then chickening out. But, as she waited to reach out to Auston, hoping he was home, her nerves returned, and she started convincing herself it wasn’t a good idea.

Carson’s heart pounded as she glanced at her phone again from where it lay between her and Zeus on the couch and debated what to do.

It was nearing 10:30pm. It had been over an hour since the game ended, and Carson knew Mitch and Steph wouldn’t return home immediately. Instead, they had plans to go out with some of the other guys and their girlfriends since the Leafs didn’t play for another few days. Mitch and Steoh invited Carson to join again, but she declined because she felt uncomfortable being the odd one out.

Carson didn’t know if Auston went with the group. There was a good chance that he did, and that was feeding into her debate about not calling him, but she wanted to. She needed to talk to him.

So, with a deep breath to calm her heart, Carson unlocked her phone. She opened the messages app and didn’t need to scroll to find her conversation with her boyfriend.

Carson felt like the wind was knocked out of her when she saw Auston’s name with the red heart emoji beside it and the photo of them in Arizona that past summer set as his contact picture. That feeling didn’t go away as she glanced at the text thread between them.

Despite not properly talking for almost two full weeks, Auston still messaged her every one of those days since their fight, saying that he loved her, missed her, was sorry and hoped she had a good day. The day after their fight, he still tried calling in hopes that Carson would pick up, but during his talk with Mitch, he was reminded that his constant calling was a bit overwhelming for her as she navigated her feelings about the situation. So, Auston opted to send texts.

Carson didn’t read or respond to any of those texts when she received them, but she found comfort as she scrolled through and read each one at that moment. In the days following their argument, she didn’t know what to think or feel, but receiving those texts made her feel normal. They were part of her routine, and although it was hard for her not to read them or respond, Carson thought she couldn’t until she knew what she wanted to say. Auston continued to send those messages despite her ignoring them, showing that he still cared and was willing to be patient with her like he always had been for the entirety of their knowing each other.

This was why Carson decided it was her turn to be patient with him and hear him out in a calmer setting than the last conversation they had almost two weeks prior. So, with another deep breath, she tapped his name at the top of the screen and hit the call button when it popped up.

It didn’t even take two full rings for him to pick up.

“Carse?” Auston’s voice sounded through the phone, making Carson’s breath hitch again. God, she missed him so much.

“H-hey,” Carson stammered before pausing in an attempt to recollect herself. “How are you?”

“I, uhm, I’m okay,” he responded, sounding surprised and as if he was still processing that he was talking to her. “Busy with hockey stuff, same old. How are you?”

“I’ve been better, and I’m sure you are. I still can’t believe you’ve got that ‘A’ on your jersey now, Aus. You deserve it. I was so proud seeing it for the first time in person during the home opener.”

“You were at that game?”

Carson nodded, even though he couldn’t see it.

“Yeah,” she almost whispered. “Mitch and Steph were trying to convince me to go 'cause I was originally going to watch from their place, but I didn’t decide until the last minute to actually go. So, I bought a ticket and went alone.”

“I wish you had told me,” Auston told her softly, which pulled on her heartstrings. “I would’ve wanted to know that you were there.”

“I know, but I didn’t know how Auston. Just seeing you out there made me so happy but so sad at the same time.”

Auston sighed at that.

“Carson, please know how sorry I am. I’ve spent the last two weeks beating myself up so much over this, and not saying I don’t deserve it, but fuck. I miss you so much.”

“I miss you too,” Carson admitted, deciding there was no need to hide her feelings from him.

“Is that why you called?” Auston asked, his voice a mix of unsureness and hopefulness.

“It is. I, um, I know it’s late, but are you home? Maybe I could come over, and we can talk.”

“Yes, please. I just got back. Please come home er-, I mean over. Do you want me to pick you up?”

“No, it’s okay,” Carson responded quickly, not wanting to be in such close proximity to him until she was at the condo. “Thank you, though.”

“Then, at the very least, let me order an Uber over here for you,” Auston suggested, not missing a beat.

“Auston, you don’t have to do that.”

“I insist. Please let me order it. I’d feel better if I could make sure you get here safely. Would they be picking you up from Mitch’s?”

“Ok,” Carson sighed in defeat. “And yes, it’s just Zeusy and me here.”

“Ok, perfect,” Auston said. “It says they’ll be there in five minutes. Is that too soon?”

“No, that’s great. I’ll put on my shoes and head downstairs.”

“Sounds good. I’ll see you soon. Love you.”

“Love y-,” Carson started but immediately cut herself off, then internally cursed herself because who was she kidding? Of course, she still loved him. “I’ll see you soon. Bye, Auston.”

Once she hung up the phone, Carson wasted no time getting off the couch and rushing to the front door to get her sneakers on.

“I’m sorry, Zeusy,” Carson muttered to the lab, who was rudely awoken from his slumber when she stood up but was still happy as he trailed after her. Zeus looked up at her expectantly, thinking he was going outside with her, and Carson felt terrible for leaving him behind, wasting no time to crouch down and pet him after her sneakers were on. “I know. I’m the worst for not taking you outside again, even though I did an hour ago. But how about I give you a treat? Will that make up for it?”

Zeus’ tail started wagging at that, so Carson quickly stood up straight again and ran into the kitchen to grab him a treat. Then, with one final pet goodbye, she rushed out the door.

As Carson waited for the elevator, she texted Mitch and Steph to tell them she was going over to Auston’s to talk because she knew they’d come back wondering where the hell she had gone otherwise. Both were quick to text back.

“Good luck, babe. Let me know how it goes,” read Steph’s message.

“Are you sure? Are you staying there? I’ll wait up so you can tell me what’s going on,” Mitch texted back, making Carson smile at the difference between the two messages. They both cared but in very different ways.

She messaged them each back, saying she’d keep them posted, then entered the elevator and went to the lobby. Upon seeing her reflection in the mirror that covered the elevator wall, Carson made an unimpressed noise. The thought of changing hadn’t even crossed her mind as she rushed out of Mitch’s condo, but she sure didn’t love that the first time she talked to Auston in person in two weeks, she’d be wearing an oversized hoodie and sweatpants. Carson quickly reached up to take her long brown hair out of the messy bun it was in and tried to make it look presentable, but then remembered Auston wouldn’t care about her looking like that. He’d seen her in similar outfits over the almost three years they’d been in a relationship.

Carson knew she didn’t need to impress him but still wished she looked a little better than she did.

Once the elevator reached ground level, Carson inhaled as she stepped off and entered the lobby. Her phone buzzed with a text, and she was half expecting it to be Mitch or Steph, but it was Auston letting her know the details about the car that was picking her up. Carson replied to his message this time and let him know she saw the car was waiting outside. Auston asked her to tell him when she was in the car and when she got to their condo so he knew everything was alright, and Carson promised she would.

When she entered the Uber waiting outside, the driver expressed his surprise after Carson confirmed they were picking up a rider named Auston.

“Not going to lie, I thought I was picking up Auston Matthews, the Leafs player, for a minute when I saw the name,” the driver explained, and Carson had to contain the smile she felt tugging at her lips.

“No, sorry, just me,” she responded, chuckling but not telling them she was indeed on her way to see the Auston Matthews.

“That’s alright, maybe another time,” the driver teased, then turned their focus back to the road as they drove.

It was a short drive. In all honesty, Carson had walked to and from the two condo buildings many times before, but with it being so late, she didn’t want to be out walking alone. She also knew that if she’d even mentioned the thought of walking, Auston would’ve shut the idea down immediately. The Uber driver didn’t ask questions about the short trip either and made small talk, ironically about the Leafs, since that was the first thing they and Carson had discussed.

A few minutes later, after thanking her driver and getting out of the car, Carson was standing outside the condo building that she began calling home a little over a month prior. Another wave of nervousness hit her, but she quickly shook it off as she entered the building.

She got into the building easily, still having her keys and fob to allow her access. The concierge at the front desk recognized her, nodding and smiling as she walked by and went straight for the elevator to take her to her and Auston’s floor.

Carson almost walked right into the condo out of force of habit once she arrived at the door. However, her nagging thoughts made her stop just before she could and opted to knock instead. It didn’t take long for Auston to open the door.

He looked good, really good. He was clad in a simple outfit, a black Raiders sweater and a pair of grey sweatpants that Carson always complimented on how good they made his butt look. His hair was a little damp still from his postgame shower, and a shadow of a beard was growing, showing it’d been some time since he last shaved. Carson stood there in silence momentarily, just taking in being in the presence of her boyfriend once again.

“Hey,” Auston spoke up, snapping Carson from her trance. She didn’t realize how tense she was until she felt herself relax just by being so close to him again.

“Hi,” Carson replied, her voice already cracking. Tears immediately pooled in her eyes, suddenly reminding her of all the emotions she’d felt since the last time she and Auston spoke.

“Oh, Carse.”

It didn’t require any thinking. The moment Auston saw those tears, he stepped towards Carson and pulled her into his embrace. The gesture felt so natural. Carson immediately melted into his touch and wrapped her arms around his middle in a tight embrace while instinctively hiding her face against his chest, letting the familiar scent of his favourite body wash surround her.

“I missed you,” she whispered after the two of them stood there holding each other for a moment.

“I’ve missed you more than I’ve ever missed anything in my life, Carson,” Auston replied, not missing a beat while tightening his squeeze around her. “I don’t want to open my eyes right now because what if I do and you’re not actually here? And this was just a fever dream?”

Carson couldn’t help the small laugh that escaped her mouth as she shook her head, still pressed against his chest, and then finally moved back and looked at him. Still, neither of them unwrapped their arms from around the other.

“I’m here. And we need to talk, Auston.”

“I know, I know,” Auston spoke softly as he finally let go of Carson, but only to reach up so he could cup her cheeks and use his thumbs to wipe away her tears. “God, I’m so happy to see you. But, you’re right. Let’s go inside so we can talk.”

Carson nodded in agreement and let her arms fall from Auston’s waist to her sides again, but Auston was quick to reach down his right hand and link it with her left hand, squeezing it after Carson intertwined their fingers, then leading her into the condo.

Once inside, Carson glanced around after she took her shoes off and walked further inside, not sure what she was expecting. Not a thing was changed. The same fluffy grey throw blanket she bought was still on the couch except instead of it being draped over the side neatly, it was bunched up and tossed to the side, indicating Auston had been using it. Her gaze then drifted to the walls and nearby bookshelf, which still had the same pictures of her and Auston and others of them with their friends and families displayed. On the bookshelf was her collection of books and trinkets she adored and the TV showed the paused episode of The Office Auston must’ve been watching when she called.

Carson felt at home again for the first time in two weeks and it was a perfect feeling.

“Uhm, can I get you water or anything?” Auston asked after a moment of observing Carson look around their living room, not missing how a small smile tugged at her lips as she did so.

“I’m alright, thank you,” Carson replied as she shook her arms so the sleeves of her sweater would fall since she’d pushed them up in the Uber. The sweater was large on her and it showed in the way the sleeves covered most of her hands. She then began to fiddle with and rub the hem of the sleeve between her fingers, something she tended to do when she felt uneasy or anxious. Auston knew that and wished she wasn’t feeling such a way, but mostly wished she didn’t feel that way because of him.

“Of course. Should, uh, should we sit?”

“Yeah, let's.”

The two of them made their way to the couch and sat down next to each other. It was a comfortable distance, but there was still a noticeable space between them which felt a thousand times bigger to Auston. He hated it. If it were up to him Carson would be right next to him with her legs over his thighs, both cuddled under the throw blanket as she told him about her day and he played with her hair while listening. He was yearning but was brought back to reality when Carson spoke again.

“I think you should start.”

“R-right,” Auston stuttered, shaking his little daydream from his head but not being able to hide how lost in his thoughts he got momentarily. However, he knew exactly what he wanted to say, he’d been thinking about it for almost two weeks. “You’re right. And I’m just going to start with how sorry I am, Carse. I’m sorry for what I did in Arizona and how it affected someone because of my ignorance and stupid drunk actions. I’m sorry that when me and you last talked, I didn’t take ownership of how I messed up. I know that what I did wasn’t ok. I wish I could take it all back. And I’m sorry that during all of this, I hurt you. I should’ve been honest with you about the charge as soon as it happened. It’s not an excuse, but I was embarrassed and didn’t want you to be ashamed of me. I told my family I would tell you, which is why they didn’t say anything, but I was a coward. It’s not that I didn’t trust you whatsoever, Carson. I trust you with everything I have, I was just stupid and thought I could ignore what happened. That it wouldn’t matter and I could move on with life normally. I should’ve known better. I made a huge mistake and I’m learning from it. I know I’m better than this, but I want to learn from it so I can move forward properly and nothing like this ever happens again. I don’t expect you to fully forgive me right away either, but you make me a better person. I know I can learn a lesson and grow from this. But, I really want you by my side as I do, if you’re still willing.”

Carson was so tired of crying, but she couldn’t stop the tears flowing as she hung on to every word Auston said to her. This conversation was already so different from the last one they had. She could tell the toll everything was taking on him and knew the weight of it all was crushing. But, he was taking full responsibility, seemingly accepting that this all happened on his own accord.

“I’m proud of you, Auston,” Carson spoke softly as she wiped her tears away with the sleeves of her sweater. “I feel like I’m having a conversation with a completely different person than I did two weeks ago.”

Auston felt good hearing that. During their fight, Carson voiced that she didn’t feel like she was talking to the man she loved. That, in that moment, he didn’t feel like home anymore to her, which hit Auston hard because Carson would always say it didn’t matter where they were as long as they were together, because he was her home. Hearing her say that was what pushed him over the edge that night truly realizing how badly he fucked up, but it was too late. Carson was already heading out the door and Auston couldn’t stop her.

“It shows me that you are learning from this and that’s really good,” she continued. “You owe that to that woman you distressed. But also the team, the fans, your family and yourself.”

“I owe it to you, too.”

“I appreciate you saying that, but this isn’t about me. However, that does lead me to talk about us.”

Carson paused to take a breath, already feeling herself get emotional again, but was soon met by Auston gently linking their hands together and stroking his thumbs over her knuckles. When she didn’t pull away, Auston gave her hands a reassuring squeeze.

“When I found out you kept something so significant away from me, I was hurt,” Carson said. “I felt betrayed, but also shocked because I never ever thought I’d feel the way I did and you being the one that caused it. I felt everything we built together, was a lie. Our castle was crumbling down because it seemed like you couldn’t trust me and I wasn’t sure I could trust you to not keep important things from me again. It was devastating feeling that way about the man I love more than anything in this world. We’re partners, Auston. And you didn’t treat me like one doing that.”

“I know, and again, I am so sorry, Carson. I never wanted you to feel that way and I feel terrible for being the reason you did. I-I can’t blame you for leaving,” Auston’s voice trailed off at the end of his sentence as he felt the words getting stuck in his throat. “Watching you walk out that door was one of the worst nights of my life. You’re my rock and suddenly that was gone and it was all my fault. I hardly slept not knowing when or if you’d come back, but I had to keep hoping, praying that you would. Part of me convinced myself Mitch was going to tell me that you weren’t coming back ever and I don’t know what I would’ve done if he did. I was a mess, I still am. These last two weeks have been hell and I deserved it. And I’m not saying this to guilt you into making a decision now, but Carse, if you did want to leave and not come back to this, us, I need to know. The not knowing is killing me. I don’t want to lose you, but I need to know if I have.”

Carson inhaled deeply again.

“The thing about these last two weeks, with how upset and angry I was at myself and you and the situation, not once did I think I no longer wanted to be with you. I love you, Auston. I knew I didn’t want to break up, but I wasn’t sure if staying in a relationship with you was what would be best for me. I fell into a depressive hole myself. I never thought I’d feel that low because of you and I wasn’t sure if I could forgive and move on or if this would have me feeling I could never trust you again. I can’t let myself get this destroyed by the person who is supposed to be my partner again, not after my ex. But, Auston, you are not him. You never will be him and that’s why, even with the space we’ve had since our fight, I knew I’d be coming back to you. I love you too fucking much to not even try to work through this and move forward together. I don’t want you to think we’re over because of this.”

Auston didn’t realize just how many tears had welled in his eyes until he let out a relieved sigh and smiled, allowing a couple of those tears to break free and stream down his face.

“You have no idea how badly I needed to hear that,” he said and squeezed her hands again.

“You have no idea how badly I needed to get that off my chest and actually tell you,” she replied and let out a small laugh at how emotional they both were. “God, we’re such messes.”

“I’ll accept being the biggest mess ever to exist if it means you’ll be by my side as I clean myself up.”

“Well, I can tell you that I’m not going anywhere. I mean it, Auston. You haven’t lost me.”

“Thank, God,” Auston sighed, feeling like so much weight had been lifted off his chest. “We’re good?”

“We’re good,” Carson confirmed, smiling as Auston let go of her hands and then held his arms out. She was quick to launch herself into his embrace and hold on for dear life while he fell back onto the couch cushion and she laid on top of him, feeling the safest and most content she had in weeks. “I’m glad to be home.”

“I’m never going to give you a reason to feel like you have to leave home again, Carse. That’s a promise.” Auston declared as he kissed the top of her head and started playing with her hair. “I love you, Carson.”

“And I love you, Auston,” Carson replied as she moved her head from Auston’s chest so she could look at him.

The two lay there for a moment looking at each other as Auston continued playing with Carson’s hair, debating his next move. He couldn’t help the way his gaze drifted to her lips, missing the way they felt against him so badly. He wanted nothing more than to cup her cheek with his hand and close the small gap between them with the kiss he craved. However, even though Auston knew he and Carson were good, he also knew they weren’t back to normal. Things being normal again would take time and Auston was ok with that. It didn’t matter how much time it may take because he had his love back and he wasn’t going to take any chances with anything that could push her away again.

Much to Auston’s pleasant surprise, though, Carson was the one to delicately place her hand under his chin and tilt it up before crashing her lips against his in a sweet, intimate kiss.

As soon as their lips met, Auston deepened the kiss as he wrapped his arm around her and rolled them over so that Carson’s back would be on the couch and he was on top. He used one arm to hold himself up and keep most of his weight off of her while his other hand cupped her cheek and jaw to prevent the kiss from breaking, finally getting what he had spent the last two weeks yearning for.

After a few moments of kissing, they pulled away to look at each other and laugh at how out of breath they both were. But that didn’t stop Auston from leaning in and stealing one more kiss.

“Will you stay over tonight?” He asked softly, not wanting her to feel pressured if she wasn't ready to come back home fully yet. “It’s an off day tomorrow and Mitch mentioned you weren’t going into the office, we could go get your work stuff from his place in the morning then come back here and have a lazy day together. Only if you want to, of course.”

“I would love that,” Carson replied, then pecked his lips again. “Let me tell Mitch and Steph I won’t be back tonight first, then can we go to bed? I’m exhausted.”

“Of course, beb.”

After they untangled themselves from each other and Carson texted Mitch and Steph to say she was staying, she and Auston turned off the lights before heading to the bedroom together. Carson felt so good after changing into a pair of her pyjamas she grabbed them from the dresser and then crawled into her bed after a long, almost two weeks. The best part, though, was being back in that bed with Auston. He felt better too having Carson in his embrace again as he fought to stay awake, wanting to make sure she fell asleep first. Once she did, Auston let his tiredness take over him too and both he and Carson had one of the best sleeps of their lives, together again.

[fastestmanalive333]

The Time Stream. Warning: Fragile

By fastestmanalive333

Bart was shock; he couldn't believe his eyes. It never occur to him the consequences of his time travel would be this bad. But he had been wrong. Very wrong.

It had all began a few hours ago in Bart's history class. They had been studying the prehistoric eras, and had to do a project on these times. Not a problem, unless you were Bart, whom's attention span lasted for about thirty seconds before something else came into his head.

The day ended. Back home, he quickly changed into his Impulse costume and zoomed out. But a millisecond before he reached the door, Max stopped him. "Where do you think you're going Bart?" he asked in a serious tone.

"Uh, out to save the world?" Bart tried to get away from Max, but his grip was too strong.

"Yeah, right. I saw your homework on the table, and I want you to start it right away."

"Fine, O.K, I'll start it right away,"

Max let go of Bart, and he started to climb the stairs, but then vibrated through a nearby wall and got outside. "Bart, come back here right now," Max shouted, but Bart was travelling at top speed. Max realized he had no idea of where he was going, so gave up trying to get him back.

Bart didn't know where he was going either, so he just ran around Manchester looking to see if anything was happening. Nothing was, so he ran to the Young Justice cave instead. Hardly anyone was there except for Red Tornado and Robin.

"Rob! Red! Hey!" he shouted to them.

"Hello Impulse," said Red Tornado.

"Hey Bart. What's up?" Robin asked him.

"Nothing much. Anything wrong in the world?"

"Well, nothing much for us. The Justice League's on something big, and..."

Robin was interrupted by snoring. "Bart, wake up!" he shouted next to Bart's ear.

"WHOA! Sorry man, but that was sort of boring."

"I only said 12 words!"

"Exactly." Robin sighed, and went over to the cave entrance. "Hey Robin, I gotta ask ya something!" Bart shouted to him.

"What?" Robin called back.

"Will you help me with my homework?" Bart said hopefully.

"Do your own homework," came the response.

Bart sighed. He had to find a way to do his project on time. If only he had been listening or...hey, was that a mushroom growing by the computer?

Bart snapped out of it. He had to concentrate. Think, Bart, think. He got it. All he had to do was go through time back to prehistory, write some things down, and he would get a good grade for sure. It was a great idea. He'd done it before, he knew what to do.

Bart began to run. He started off at a normal speed for him, then faster, then faster, then faster and faster and faster andfasterandfasterandfasterandfasterandfasterandfasterandfasterandslowerandslower andslowerandslower and slower and slower and slower and slower until...Bam!

Bart landed in a pile of dirt on the ground. He brushed it off his costume and looked around. He could hardly see anything that interested him. If this was prehistory, where were the dinosaurs? He pulled out a piece of paper and a pen that he'd got to write down the stuff Robin might have told him if had bothered to help. He scribbled down 'Nothing of interest happened during this time'.

He put the paper away and was a bout to go back to the future (Yes, I know it's bad but give me a break!) when he tripped over a quite large reptile on the floor. "Stupid lizard," he muttered, and kicked it. It landed in a hole full of funny-looking liquid. Bart couldn't be bothered to think about what he'd just done, and speed off back to the present day for us.

Which brings us back to the beginning. Bart had got back and saw an amazing sight. All of the people had been turned into half-human half-reptile mutant thingies. He screamed, but regretted it. All of the mutants heard him, and went after him. Luckily though, it was just like the video game 'Lizards from the Planet Reptilion' (What a corny title), a game he had got the highest score on. He dodged the lizards, and decided to go back in time and stop himself from kicking the lizard (Now it's getting a bit complicated.)

He sped up again and ran back to the past (I'll skip the whole 'fasterandfaster' thing 'cos I can't be bothered to do it again) and was back in the past. He looked around and saw himself. He looked really handsome, he thought. But he then saw the lizard and got back to the matter at hand. He zoomed over and picked up the lizard before it got in his way.

He had done it. He had saved the world from himself. Bart had stopped Bart. Wait. Did this mean he was a hero or a villain? He didn't think about it and ran home. He would have to use a...shudder...book to do his project. Oh well. The End. Thank you for reading.

[blamemma]

30 maxiel!!!

things I wish you’d said - this literally does not fit this prompt at all really, it does if you squint really hard at the end, but anyway :)) - 2,072 words - yes we're out of the depressed daniel era, but sometimes u just need to sit down and re-visit it for a lil cry

In the end, Daniel has to take a break from everything. Racing. Social Media. Public Events. Every One. Michael. His parents. Max.

He buys a converted van, featuring a sofa that pulls out into a single bed, a tiny kitchen, and a shower he can just about squeeze into, and heads out along the coast of Australia. He turns his phone off for the most part, only using it for Maps and to message the group chat his family forced him to set up every two days, a small update and a selfie, so they know he's okay, alive.

He avoids tourist trap areas; he received enough sympathetic looks and kind words in Abu Dhabi, can't face strangers who barely know who he is or what he feels, coming up to him and passing on their condolences.

He drives and drives and drives and drives.

Open road. Sandy banks. Rock faces and dried out trees. Open barren land with a singular road cutting through it.

He avoids busy restaurants and sticks to quiet bars. Drinks too much whiskey and then passes out on his too small, cold, bed. Stops off at vineyards he's been meaning to visit for years, stock-piles bottles of wine to gift his mum and dad when he eventually arrives back home.

Max had hated the idea. Had come stumbling out of the door of Daniel's home, sleepy-eyed from jet lag, when Daniel had driven up in the van after heading out early to collect it.

He'd looked perplexed, cocked his head as Daniel had clambered out of the driver's seat.

"What is this Daniel?" Max had asked. He'd walked forward to Daniel, still in his sleep clothes, an over-sized Enchanté shirt and tight boxers, arms lifted a little higher than his waist, looking to curl into the side of Daniel's body in the early morning sun that was already blisteringly hot.

"It's my van," Daniel replied. "I'm going to go away for a bit."

Max stopped in his tracks, his hands instantly forming fists at his sides, before stretching out his fingers again.

"What?" He asked again.

"I'm gunna go away for a bit Maxy. Just me. And the Australian Road. Get my head straight."

"No," Max had responded. Daniel knew this would be Max's reaction. It's why Daniel hadn't told him beforehand, had kept the secret since Brazil, an impulse purchase after he'd crashed out in his second-to-last race. "We have just got here Daniel. You are not going to go away on your own. You can stay here or I will come with you!"

Despite Max's defiant attitude, Daniel had won. He'd left Max at his home in Perth, the first time he'd visited as Daniel's boyfriend, a promise of barbeques with family and chasing each other on dirt bikes forgotten. They'd argued, they'd cried, they'd pleaded with each other to understand, but ultimately, Daniel's mind was set.

He hasn't spoken to Max in two-and-a-half weeks now. Doesn't know what he'd say. I miss you. Your love isn't good enough to fix me. I love you. I can't stand the way you pity me.

He doesn't even know if Max is still in Perth. He wouldn't blame him if he'd gone back to Monaco.

His decision had been finalised when his Mum and Dad had arrived in Abu Dhabi. The tears prickling at the corner of his mum's eyes as she'd pulled him in sent guilt washing over him. He'd failed. They'd sacrificed everything for him to drive. And he couldn't give them the one thing they deserved. A Championship.

He'd marked Exmouth as his stopping point, where he'd turn around and head back home, but he arrives, camps under the stars for two days, rents a boat and sits for hours with a fishing rod that's never successful and still doesn't feel complete. Whole. He'd imagined, in the days between Brazil and Abu Dhabi, that this would fix him. That a solo trip would give him all the answers. Show him whether he's happy with this being the end, or driven to find a way back.

Instead, he just feels lost and alone.

He clambers back into his van, pulls out the beaten-up map that came with the vehicle and tries to pick a new place to go. No where strikes inspiration in him though. The big bold lettering of PERTH near the bottom of the map taunts him over and over again and he scrunches the map up, throwing it at the windshield.

Across from where he's parked, just across his van on a grassed area sits a family, at a picnic bench, fitted with a barbeque. Two dads sat side by side, a young son and daughter sat opposite them. Daniel can't tear his eyes away from them, as the kids sit eagerly awaiting their dinner, laughing, conversing. They're happy.

He'd promised Isaac and Isabella in Abu Dhabi that when they got back to Perth, they could come round to his house, and they'd spend hours in the pool and have a large barbeque, and end the night around the fire with smores.

Instead, he'd been too chicken to say goodbye to them.

He'd promised Max that he'd take him hiking at his favourite spot. Take him out on a date to his favourite Italian restaurant. Promised trips to the farmers market, and out for brunch, and endless beach days. Promised him a winter break of relaxation. A Christmas at Daniel's parents, one filled with sunshine and shorts and a mountain of presents.

Instead, he'd made Max fly all the way out here, and then abandoned him. The guilt hadn't left him, not since he'd pulled out of his dusted driveway and away from Max.

He props his feet upon the dash and watches the family as they move about their evening. Burgers eaten far too quickly by the children. A plea from their fathers to at least try the salad they'd purchased. A rugby ball emerging from their bag that they kick around and throw to each other. Small gentle kisses shared between partners, an arm around the waist, one thrown around the shoulder. Kids piling on top of their dads as they fall to the ground in a tackle. Laughter. So much laughter. And joy. And happiness.

Daniel calls Max.

It rings and rings and rings. Then Max's voicemail sets in. Daniel tries again. It rings and rings and rings. He puts his phone down on the seat and starts his engine. He'll follow a road somewhere.

His phone rings. A photo of Max curled up asleep in the sheets of their Monaco bedroom fills the screen.

He answers immediately, clutching the phone to his ear. It's silent on the other end of the line.

"Max?" Daniel asks gently.

"Daniel," Max repeats back to him.

"Max." Daniel says again. "I miss you, I'm so sorry. I don't know what I was thinking, and I'm just so lonely and I hope you're okay, please tell me you're still okay. Are you still in Perth? I'm so sorry Max. I'm gunna drive home. Yeah? I'm gunna drive back okay. You'll be there right? When I get home? I'll make this up to you. Okay--I'll drive home tonight and then tomorrow we can do whatever you want. Whatever you want. " He's crying, and his words are coming out so fast, but the simple sound of Max's voice, the Dutch intonation speaking his own name, collapses him.

"Where are you?" Max asks. Daniel can hear his voice quiver on the other end of the line and a fresh wave of guilt washes over him. He should be there right now, Max shouldn't be feeling this way.

"I'm in Exmouth, it's almost at the tip of Western Australia. So it's about 13 hours to Perth but I can drive through the night Maxy, and then I'll be back home tomorrow. Yeah? Does that sound good?" Daniel selfishly, wants Max to beg him to come home, tell him how much he's missed him, and needs him. Daniel can't even tell if Max is still in Perth, too scared to outright ask.

"You should get some sleep Daniel. And then come home. You should not drive through the night you might crash. And then I will not be able to shout at you for all the horrible things you have done and I will have to attend your funeral with all these unresolved issues of course, so probably my speech would not be that good." The glimmer of teasing that comes through in Max's voice makes Daniel clutch at his chest in want.

"Yeah, okay baby, I'll see you tomorrow yeah?" Daniel asks.

"Yes Daniel. Come home. I will cook dinner for you when you get back. We can have a lovely evening."

"Sounds good. I love you." Daniel responds.

"I love you also." Max says, and Daniel has to hang up quickly before Max catches on to his desperate sobs.

---

He does what Max asks, and sleeps. Not very well, and not for very long, but the next morning, he starts the van up at 5am and drives, joins the open road and heads home. He turns the stereo up, his Max playlist on loud and proud, singing along to the lines that resonate most to him. Whenever he stops off for fuel, and snacks, he texts Max, updating him on his journey and when he'll be home. Max responds to Daniel's first message, when he'd left Max know that he was leaving Exmouth, with Drive safe ❤️, the second message with See you soon! 😁 and the third message with I hope your bum is not feeling too numb!

He pulls up onto his track road and into his driveway just after 8pm and is greeted with a house decorated and ready for Christmas. Lights strung across the porch, pretend Snowman's just beside the front door, mistletoe hanging from above the entranceway. Max had put out all his Christmas decorations from years past.

He's already crying as he fumbles to undo his seatbelt, and stumbles out the drivers door.

The tears start falling when he sees Max running out of the front door towards him, jumping over the steps of the porch and bounding towards Daniel. Max stumbles into his chest, his strong arms wrapping around Daniel and pulling him into him. Daniel collapses into him, exhaustion and want and love all seeping out of him.

"Your mum showed me where all the Christmas decorations were kept last week. I asked her if she could show me. I thought that maybe if you would come home, it would be nice for you to come home to." Max finally says, his voice shaking, speaking into Daniel's neck. "Isaac and Isabella helped. They kept on asking where you were. And I didn't have an answer for them Daniel. I had to tell them that you'd gone on a trip. And then they would ask when you were coming back and I would say I do not know. And then they would ask if we could go and join you and I said I do not think we can. You were cruel, Daniel. You were so cruel."

Daniel finally wraps his arms around Max, kisses the crown of his head and cries with him.

"I'm better now Max, I promise you, I am better." He whispers into his hair. Max's grip around his waist gets tighter, pulling him impossibly closer.

"You never said you were bad, Daniel. I could tell and I tried to help, but you would always shut me down. You never said--"

"I know baby, I know. I'm so sorry."

Max's hand comes to the back of Daniel's neck, holding him tight, his fingers moving through his hair. It's all Daniel needs, he's realised. Is Max. Is Family. Is simple moments.

They both stand there, crying, in each other's arms, birds singing above them, the last remnants of the evening sun warming their backs, until Max, pulls away, intertwining his hand into Daniel's.

"You have to come inside now and eat," Max insists, stepping forward and tugging Daniel's arm. "Your mum has been giving me food every few days and I think that Brad is going to have to work overtime."

Daniel laughs then, his first proper, from-the-gut, endearing, happy laugh, in a long time. Max watches him, the way his eyes light up and his broad smile make up his whole face.

Daniel's back.

Daniel's home.

[magicalrocketships]

Random fic ask i just made up: What is the nearest book to you right now, or what is the last movie you watched, and what would a fic based on that book/movie look like?

Any ship you want, and drawing however heavily or lightly on the plot of the book/movie as you want 😊

What a marvellous random fic ask you just made up. I'm just going to press pause on what I was actually going to talk about in this post and just circle around to the thing I've actually just been watching, which is ANOTHER detective show where the serious and methodical detective is derailed by being partnered (officially or unofficially) by a extrovert sometime-confidence-trickster who trades in being liked.

All I'm saying is (obvs acab) so let's throw this one BACK IN TIME, say the 1950s, and make Max a PRIVATE DETECTIVE somewhere around Monaco and have Daniel fall into his path as a bit of a playboy with a series of richer friends and girlfriends who kind of pay his way, and nobody really minds that Daniel can't afford to be in their set, because everyone loves him. Daniel's a bit bored, but he's got to keep in with the crowd who pay his way, and then there is a MYSTERIOUS DEATH at a club, and MAX shows up to investigate on behalf of some rich relative of the dead guy, and the whole time he's trying to investigate, there's this handsome vaguely hungover guy who keeps hanging around and asking questions and being annoying and getting in his way, but who actually gets doors open for Max because Max can't be bothered playing nice and he doesn't know the right people.

Daniel, fascinated by this single-minded, sometimes rude Dutch guy who always wears a variation of the exact same off-the-peg suit, and who is sharply focused on getting to the bottom of the death at the club, and Daniel finds himself blowing off his friends and the current divorcee paying his way in order to track possible leads through the back streets, and breaking into a YACHT and spending three hours cramped in a tiny room trying to listen to an illegal card game through the wall, and the whole time Max is pressed up against him, his breath warm against Daniel's throat, and Daniel's hand just settles on the curve of Max's ass, and Max trembles a little beneath his touch but they have to focus on the MYSTERIOUS DEATH and not on the way Daniel's lifelong need to be close to men is suddenly thrown into sharp focus.

And maybe it turns out that it's someone in Daniel's set, and Daniel's faced with the choice between telling the truth to Max or lying and saving his friend, and he chooses his Max and his rich friends exile him from their group. So it's just Daniel, trailing after Max, and Max takes him to this boat moored in a harbour down the coast, and it's small and familiar and private, and it's Max's, and it's where he goes when he's not working a case. And he takes the boat out to sea and makes a very boring lunch of soup and bread, and Daniel's sunbathing in small shorts, and they eat lunch and then Max, impulsively, leans over and presses his mouth to Daniel's. Daniel beams like the sun, and kisses him back.

Also, each subsequent mystery is just focused on someone else on the grid, like the mysterious death of Fernando's extremely rich wife, (Lance in the wings with his alibi and a lot more money than Fernando's wife) or George being framed for the death of the controlling partner in his law firm, eventually exonerated by photographer Alex, or the one with the BEES and the mysterious German guy who owns them. Saving unlucky Charles from always being in the wrong place in the wrong time, except this time he's discovering the body by tripping over it and finding the murder weapon stashed in his apartment. OH GOD maybe Charles is the Prince of Monaco. Anyway, whatever. And each mystery ends with Max and Daniel out on their boat, Daniel in a series of tinier and tinier shorts, Max with his gin and tonic and Daniel with a ridiculous cocktail, Max flushed with the sun and Daniel not regretting any of his choices in leaving his old life behind to solve mysteries with Max.

Please note that at no point in this ask did I refer to the rather lengthy Sweet Home Alabama AU plot I forced Sarah to listen to last week, which got out of hand and got too angsty and where I left it, Daniel was in hospital for the second time and Max was following him half way across the world and nobody was even mentioning divorce, so that went well. Two thumbs up to that.

[helpfandom]

Could i request some platonic yandere david headcanons with a camper reader? Ty!

@yanderefangirl

Gee Whillikers, He sure does love ya'!

With him, he must have a nice darling, [you] may be nice out of pity or out of the kindness of your heart, but he thinks it's the latter. Hopefully.

Be careful not to break this man's heart! He can't take too much!

Anyway, out of that realm now.

David is someone who could not bring himself to kill. David would rather die than hurt one of the campers, but it doesn't stop him from treating them rudely. [And by rudely, we mean that he wouldn't do as many activities the camper liked, such as he wouldn't make it mandatory for the campers like Max to show up at Preston's play, or something of the like.]

Gwen may notice this weird obsession with you, and how he babies you, but her worries are dispelled by the knowledge that David wouldn't do that. Right?

David [and any others observant enough] finds himself often giving you special treatment; going with what you suggest instead of what was planned, walking or otherwise sticking by you during activities, refusal to swap the channel [episode 8, season 4, After hours, for those wondering] from what you chose. And Max, being the little shit that he is, is quick to pick up on this and capitalize on it.

David and Max quickly find that it's an impasse between the two. David refuses to let you get roped in with the trio, and Max is adamant to use his obsession with you to get what he wants.

So, suddenly Max had to take a trip to the wood scouts.

It is unlike David to kidnap, however, he wouldn't mind if you got stuck, or lost, and missed the bus to go home and all of a sudden you have to stick with him until the bus arrives, but the bus won't arrive.

He's emotionally dependent on you, relying on your kindness to keep him afloat in this emotional world of his. Depending on the time, he may fall farthest into his obsession than ever, or he may be the lightest.

He wouldn't be afraid of becoming more confident in the terms of you, though. David would fight back if the Wood Scouts wanted to grab ahold of you, or even letting them just so that he could save you and have an excuse to hold you in the cabin instead of out with the other campers...

Although, he does realize that this is selfish of him, so it's a loop on whether or not he acts on that impulse of letting it happen, or if his sense of justice outweighs his sense of parental concern. If at the time where he knows that Jasper is dead, then he would act on it, letting it happen only to burst into the Wood Scouts and demand that you come back, his need to protect overpowering his urge of peace.

No matter what, you just have to get on the bus to go home. He would never follow you home! What's David doing at your school? Well, silly, he needs a job after the summer! Too bad he's your teacher.

[radioactive-earthshine]

I haven’t read all of Bart’s comics (so if I’m wrong Please correct me, drop issue numbers, let me at ‘em) but I’ve been thinking about how nobody like, tries to bridge the gaps in his experiences in VR with real life or understand how they inform his choices or view of the world. Like, I feel like everyone Tells him that this is real life and not VR but they don’t actually go through what’s different in the approaches that he needs or let him explain his thought process. I feel that the issue 23 camping trip conversation ended the instant he said the word points instead of giving Bart a chance to explain, you know? Perhaps that he was capable of assessing his own abilities and knowing that he could go for style points. He’s the most attuned to his powers of most any speedster, on account of all the time in VR that people berate him for even mentioning. Like, he’s easily bored(diagnosable), of course he’d go for the more difficult option. It’s more interesting. We’ve seen issue 18, (also Sins of Youth: Kid Flash and Impulse) he’s so so smart, he’s clever and competent and using skills and knowledge he learned in VR, and people are so mean to him

I have an astounding number of thoughts about Bart naming his dog Dox at the end of Mercury Falling. Something something allowing himself to remember and grieve the world he lost.

It really drives me a little bonkers too as I spin this in my head.

Bart spent years in VR as his primary form of understanding the world - his whole world was in VR which had its own rules and matter behaved in different ways than they do in the real world. So yes, acclimating to the real world was absolutely a hellscape for Bart when he first arrived.

He was distinctly NOT like anyone else on Earth, no one else in that time period was like him- born with powers. He never knew what it was like to NOT be a speedster and have something be able to meet him at his level - so OF COURSE he was frustrated.

Of course he had no baseline, of course everything was boring to him and painful, of course he struggled. And no one, NO ONE bothered to sit down with him and figure that out. Not even Max, who fell in the trap of trying to make him 'normal' when he never would be. Not even Iris. Certainly not Wally.

It's really quite distinctly painful with how successful of a series Impulse is in showing how a neurodiverse coded teen is persistently put through varying degrees of ableism in an effort to 'correct' a behavior that should have never been attempted to be corrected in the first place. Bart needed assistance with adapting, not hiding, and not masking.

I have so many thoughts.

[givemewallywestorgivemedeath]

What is the camping trip thing? I think you’ve mentioned it once or twice and now I’m curious

I... Oof. Okay, yeah, I will talk about the camping trip but I do want to give a heads up that I really don't like spoiling the heavy hitting moments in Impulse. That series is really just something that has to be experienced and I really really encourage everyone to read it first hand.

However, I do also acknowledge that sometimes people read stories because they hear about them and get intrigued (which is kinda what I'm all about)! So, I will discuss this story but there will be a disclaimer! This will spoil issue #23 of Impulse so if you want to read that series, I highly encourage you to do so before reading this.

All right, so with that out of the way let's jump on into it.

What you have to understand first is that we start this issue at a very established place in Max and Bart's lives. They have been living together for months now and they've really started to bond. This is the most stable either of their lives has been since... well, ever.

Bart is going to school, he has friends, he has a team, he's really doing well in his training and as a hero, and he very much views Max as a father figure at this point. Max was really the first parent Bart ever knew and this was Bart's first everything. Bart never had a house or a room before this, he didn't have family or friends, he didn't have a life. For the first time Bart was finally able to have a childhood and be comfortable where he was and he was thriving.

Now Max was a different story. Max is a flight risk by nature. He doesn't like to stay in one area for too long and he tends to change lives at the drop of a hat. Max will change his name, appearance, location, even his era, just to escape an uncomfortable situation. If someone said "Happy Birthday" and Max said "Thanks, you too", Max wouldn't just skip town, he would time travel two decades into the future and then skip town.

So needless to say, staying put for so long was completely against Max's nature. He was out of his element. He didn't form ties with people, he didn't let them in ever, and now suddenly he has a kid with him that he is starting to view as a son and Max doesn't really know what to do with that.

On top of that Max had been spying on his estranged daughter and she was not thrilled that Max was there. Max missed quite a few birthdays while time traveling... like... all of them. Helen wanted nothing to do with Max and was furious with him.

Now, Max had really only been staying for Helen and Bart. When Helen made it clear that she didn't want Max in her life, Max started questioning why he was sticking around.

And the answer was Bart, right? He was sticking around to train Bart. But Max started wondering if he was even helping Bart. I mean, Helen was better off without him, maybe Bart would be as well? And could Bart even be trained? Or was it a lost cause?

So Max decided to test Bart's progress.

And Bart.... didn't perform well.

Not to say that Bart didn't save the day, he did, but Bart was still jumping into situations without thinking about them. No plans, no thoughts, just plain pure impulse.

Bart had the fighting skills, he had all the moves and the power to back them up. He was failing upwards by the sheer virtue of how fast he was.

Max wasn't happy with Bart's lack of thought. Especially when it came to civilians. Max wanted Bart to care about the hostages and make them a priority. Not putting people in unnecessary danger was a key element of being a hero to Max.

Bart didn't understand it because he had won. He always won. And no one got hurt, so what was the big deal?

The two of them fought and then Max ran off to try one last time with Helen. It didn't go well.

And here's where things start to get intense.

Bart sneaks into the kitchen for a midnight snack and suddenly Max walks in with a backpack. They're going camping. Right now.

So already the energy is extremely... unhinged. Max is at his breaking point and Bart doesn't know it, but this is his final exam.

Max is having an existential crisis, a mental breakdown and a midlife crisis all rolled into one and Bart, god bless him, is not helping the situation.

Max tries to talk to him about it but it was extremely clear that Bart didn't really get what Max was talking about.

Max gives Bart one final test. He starts an avalanche and 'gets stuck', hoping that Bart will get him out of harm's way first before dealing with the rocks.

Max screamed at Bart to save him.

But Bart didn't. He went for the rocks instead.

This is the last straw for Max. He grabs Bart and he screams at him.

"Why didn't you just pull me out of the way? Why did you go after the gunner and not the hostage at the ice rink? WHY?"

Bart had been living in the real world for months. Max had been training him for months. Bart's performance in school, on his team, in his training, his hero work, ect, all of it was beyond excellent. He was thriving.

But at his core Bart still didn't understand. He wasn't thriving, not to him. To Bart he was just winning the game. In Bart's mind Max's rules and training were just the rules of the game.

Can't tell people your identity? Yeah that's just one of the rules. Bart didn't get it but, hey, that's just how it is. Bart has to 'make friends' and 'be social'? Sure, whatever gets him points. Can't let anyone die? Alright, sure.

Bart fundamentally did not understand the difference between video games and reality. He had no concept of danger or death. If he messed up, he could just respawn or reset.

The hostages and civilians never mattered to him because he didn't get points for saving them.

Max had always known that Bart had a difficult time figuring out the real world but Bart had been doing so well that the true scope of Bart's issues had never really come to light. Max didn't understand how bad it was until this moment.

Bart had been living with Max for months and Max had thought that their training was almost done, when suddenly Max was faced with the fact that Bart hadn't progressed at all. Bart wasn't even back at square one, Bart was at square -100 and nothing Max had been doing was helping him.

And Max just gave up.

He stopped caring. He was done. He couldn't help Bart and he just shut down.

Bart... just didn't understand. He knew that something was wrong with Max but he had no idea what he'd done wrong. This was the only parent he had ever had, the only one to stick around and give him attention and love. And that parent just completely shut down and there was nothing Bart could do to fix it.

And you can see that Bart tried. Bart desperately tried to fix it. He did the dishes, put the things away, brushed his teeth, went to bed, ect. Bart was playing by Max's rules because playing by Max's rules made Max happy and Bart wanted Max to be happy.

To me this issue makes me extremely emotional because here's this little boy who has come to depend on the love and support of Max, and that's all suddenly ripped away from him for reasons beyond his control.

Bart, I feel, is such a perfect representation of a neurodivergent kid. He's following a bunch of societal rules that he just doesn't understand and he masks so well that he is able to fly under the radar for quite a while. But masking doesn't get him the help he needs. All masking does is make Bart confused and frustrated because he's not getting the help he really needs. He's being held back because he's too busy jumping through hoops to make people happy and he never gets the support he needs to actually thrive.

Then when it becomes clear that Bart isn't progressing. That it was all just masking, Bart gets punished for it.

Let's be clear here, Bart was the one who was let down. Bart had been doing everything to make Max happy, even though he understood none of it, and Bart did it well. He should have gotten more support and it should never have gone on as long as this did.

And Max realized that. Max realized that he hadn't been helping Bart be a better hero and Max decided that Bart deserved better.

Max left after this issue. He sent Bart to live with Meloni in the future.

That's a whole other thing and it eventually gets resolved and the two reunite and it gets better from there. But this storyline... it's... yeah.

It's such a realistic portrayal of neurodivergency to me. It really is. The way Bart thinks it's his fault, the way Bart took two steps forward and five steps back, the way Bart was let down, the way Max is just suddenly hit with the extent of Bart's masking, the way Bart just wasn't able to understand Max's complex emotions...

It just really hits hard.

[astromechs]

hi, this show went off the air 22 years ago but i can't get it out of my head, so here we are; also on ao3!

Logan says it's no one's fault. That they've had their struggles they've faced together and alone, mostly alone over the past year, and there are bigger things. He even smiles just before she turns on her heel, tells her to keep her pager handy and that he'll see her around, kisses her on the top of her head before he lets her go; she manages an agreement and a smile back, and keeps it there, tears held back, until she's well out of sight, because for all that she's put him through, she feels like she owes him at least that much.

But Max knows the truth; anything her hands touch will always wither and die.

There are things even a cure can't fix.

She twists the throttle, motorcycle roaring to life under the metal touching her fingers, but it won’t last. Gas is harder than ever to come by these days, so if she were to even give into an impulse to pass Terminal City and keep riding, she wouldn’t make it far. It’s essential trips only now, for that practical reason, for a thousand other reasons that have everything to do with the people, her people, inside, who she has a responsibility to protect.

To keep alive.

(That won’t last either, though, will it? Because anything her hands touch will always wither and die. They’ll be cold like Tinga, too late having long since happened before she could manage to get anywhere, or they’ll be like Ben, life and warmth fading right under her fingertips because of her own efforts, but regardless, it will always end the same, no matter a cure or a fight.

There’s no defense against a curse entrenched even more deeply than DNA.)

Buildings rush by her that she doesn’t really see; tires squeal against pavement through twists and turns of a route followed more by habit and muscle memory rather than her active attention. Wind whips hair around her face and stings tears in her eyes at its impact; she blinks them away, furiously, keeps her head held up rather than ducked, and by the time she powers the motorcycle down and leaves it behind, there isn’t a single lingering trace of them on her face.

Her steps are quiet as she passes groups of children sleeping while adults keep watch and heads huddled together to, undoubtedly, formulate some kind of strategy, but apart from a few nodded acknowledgments, she doesn’t divert her focus from the only mission that’s on her mind: getting to the roof.

It’s colder here than it’d been on the streets, and even with a jacket, Max is forced to curl into herself to keep warm; she sits with her knees tucked to her chest and her arms wrapped around them, not bothering to look up to a night sky that’s covered only with clouds. Not bothering to direct her attention to anything at all, really, at least until —

Footsteps in her periphery, faint at first, but growing louder by the second as they draw closer to her.

They manage to plod in a way that gets under her skin, so she wouldn’t need a visual confirmation of an identity to know exactly who they belong to. But she wouldn’t even need that to know; there’s only one person she knows who consistently manages to find her at the moments she least wants to be found.

She grinds her teeth together as Alec’s form comes into view.

Go away, is the immediate thought that sputters out before it reaches her mouth, choking on the fumes of its own petulance. What the hell are you doing here? Is the next attempt, something that, over the months, has become familiar and easy while she hadn’t even known it was happening, but she lets that die, too, because she can’t let herself settle into that kind of complacency. That’s a mistake she’s made too many times.

In the end, with her knees still tucked to her chest, she turns her head and tips up her chin enough to meet Alec’s gaze. Asks, “How’d you find me?”

Even to her own ears, her voice is as worn as the rest of her. For someone who barely needs to sleep, she’s so fucking exhausted.

The line of Alec’s mouth is thin and contemplative, and his eyes are much the same as they search her, assessing; she can practically see the gears that are turning in his mind, because they’re the ones often turning in hers. You can take the X5 out of Manticore, burn the whole place to the ground, but….

She drops her eyes to her feet, something hard and sticky lumping in her throat.

“I can see in the dark, too, you know. You’re not as sneaky as you think you are, Maxie.” Without waiting for an invitation, he steps through most of the distance that remains between them, lowering himself down to sit next to her. Their arms are just short of actually brushing, but even so, the warmth from him radiates to her, seeping under her skin to the point that she almost forgets there’s a chill.

It could be a comfort, one she could lean into, but she doesn’t, instead swallowing hard to remain unmoving. Still, she doesn’t lean away from it, either.

That may be the worst part.

The wind cuts around them, and for a time (she doesn’t know how long), that’s all that breaks up the silence. At least until Alec, being Alec, can’t help but find some way to step into it; of course he can’t. “Figured you’d be up here brooding when no one heard from you for a while.”

Before she can find the will to stop it, there’s a tug at the corners of her mouth, somehow flickering to life over the death she carries, turning the chill in the air and what sits in her into practically a memory.

Though she follows the script of what has become their back and forth, rolling her eyes and scrunching her face, the objection she ends up voicing is half-hearted at best. “I’m not brooding.”

She feels, more than sees, Alec lift a shoulder in a shrug; she hears, more than sees, a smile creeping in for him, too, however small. “Speak for yourself.”

And when she feels an arm wrap around her, feels a hand rest on top of hers shortly after that, she relaxes rather than stiffens, leans into it rather than away; she doesn’t have the energy to do anything else, not when she’s so fucking exhausted. She exhales a long breath and closes her eyes, resting her head against a heartbeat that’s steady in a mess of a world that’s anything but.

It’s not a comfort, and she won’t delude herself into thinking that it is, but maybe, even if just for a moment, it would be nice for something to live in her touch for once.

[fastcardotmp3]

🎊 december bookshelf 🎊

november recs | recs tag

Happy (almost) New Year! Here are some bits of brilliance I'm closing out the year in reading, and here's to everything that you guys have made this year. I'm so grateful to exist in a space with so much talent and so many big hearts willing to share in it, and I can't wait to read what you have cooked up for 2024 🥂 love, dot

🎊 INCENDIUM by @stargazersteddie- I have always been and will always be a weird dragon kid at heart and this fic was tailor made for the weird dragon kids of the world LIKE! dragon shapeshifter eddie is SUCH a concept and then to add dragon hunter steve to the mix? to add a genuinely intriguing corrupted corporation claiming to help people? to add ronance espionage and secrets in the woods and-? you know? a treat of a journey really and truly.

🎊 captain's log webcomic by @rogue-alien - That sweet spot where beautiful, perfectly representative art meets a brilliant premise in which Dustin finds a bunch of old "Captain's Log" tapes Eddie recorded before he died and things develop from there. Truly makes my day every time I see this has updated with a new page and as a comic book lover I'm fully enamored with everything about this

🎊 if you wanted, you could do no harm by @eskawrites - I'm a lover of a road trip story in which everything becomes clear because the scenery has changed and this is SUCH a beautiful depiction of that. getting to live inside Nancy's head as she goes from knowing she has to get out of Hawkins but not necessarily why to finding this sense of peace within herself and the things she both can control (kissing the girl who made sure she wasn't alone for the journey) and can't control (the big unknowable that is life) was a delight and a joy <3

🎊 mark it on the starmap with an x by @cheatghost - the Eddie POV "show me the place (where he inserted the blade)" sequel/ companion piece of my DREAMS. I love an Eddie character study with my whole heart and the way lou explores him in this particular circumstance, being blocked off from the joy he built for himself and leaning on Wayne and almost being forced into adapting without getting a say in the matter? Brilliant, immaculate, perfect, HELP ME.

🎊 max the bloody handed by @hellsfireclub - KAS!MAX!!! Beautiful Lucas POV as things fall into disarray, as his sense of something's wrong gets proven right, and with such a cool and eerie tone the whole way through. also Lucas with a crossbow which you KNOW is everything To Me.

🎊 this time of the year by @gothbat99 - robin HEARS nancy even when nancy isn't saying anything aloud and robin KNOWS that nancy needs a moment to let her brain go quiet and just be and I'm beside myself!! sweet and warm and tinged with the inevitable grief of the holiday season what if I cry huh?

🎊 The Future is the Same (but i have to try) by @fragilecapric0rnn - such an intriguing world built in so few words but the thing that has me on the FLOOR is the nancy and steve reckless grieving power duo of it all LIKE. designed for me specifically perhaps??? the characterization, the looming danger of every choice they make, the impulsive nature of it all!!! brilliant!

🎊 crash by @cheatghost (yes, again! sue me!) - i say 'designed for me specifically' a lot but this time it's actually TRUE and let me tell you!!! the psychic damage incurred was IMMENSE!! the nancy character study of all time, the cyclical/non-linear journey through grief and catharsis and hope and acceptance of my dreams, i'm never going to stop thinking about this fic you HAVE to read it, it's imperative To Me okay? okay. okay okay.

PS. don't forget to tip your writer in kudos and comments if you read and enjoy these! it's talking to each other about the works we create that makes this fandom world go round 💖

[pluckyredhead]

(comes in with their face covered by a hood) Well heeeeeellooooo Stranger. I was wondering if I could mayhaps request from you a Bart and Thad "Parent Trap" Alternate Universe? Well met, kind sir-- for the very first time, as you don't know me at all! (coughs) Thanks in advance 😊 (the emoji is a mask I'm rising in front of my covered face, of course)

Why WHOMSTEVER could this be???

Okay sooo...I'm thinking Thad and Bart meet because Bart is time traveling where he's not supposed to be and he runs into Thad and Thad has to improvise (which he HATES doing). So he explains that he's Bart's clone but gives him this whole (fake) sob story about how he wants to be GOOD. And meanwhile Bart is fresh off of some argument with Max and Wally about how he shouldn't be going off on his own, and so he has the bright idea (read: is led there by Thad) that they should switch places! He will go back to the 30th century and take down his evil Grandpa and meanwhile Thad will go to the 20th century and learn to be good from Max. Of course Thad's ACTUAL plan is to kneecap the Flash legacy by killing all the heroes of the 1990s. (This takes place in the 90s because Impulse takes place in the 90s, as does the superior Parent Trap, the Lindsay Lohan version.)

30th century Bart quickly realizes that he was unprepared for the level of evil of Thaddeus Sr., and also Thad is a known supervillain in that time so the Legion keeps trying to arrest him, and he has to convince Jenni that he's her good cousin from the past (well, the future-->past) and is trying to fix things! Also he knows he can't go near his mom or he'll give everything away and it's very upsetting for him.

20th century Thad is likewise unprepared for being treated with love and compassion by Max and Helen and all of Bart's friends and he doesn't know what to do with any of it. Also Young Justice fights Match at one point and Thad tracks Match down afterwards and tells him the truth because he needs an ally in this time period and Match is very flirty and Thad doesn't know what to do with that either.

Bart eventually realizes that Thad played him and also...let's say Thaddeus Sr. was experimenting with siphoning off Thad's speed so that he could go back in time and Kill The Flashes, so Bart has to go back and save Max from Thad who has been agonizing over whether or not to kill him, and then they have to team up to save everyone from Evil Grandpa. This involves a lot of switching places and costumes and also a shoehorned-in rendition of "Let's Get Together" because OBVIOUSLY.

Both boys wind up staying in the 20th century and living with Max but they make lots of trips to the 30th century to hang out with Jenni and annoy the Legion. Thad and Match smooch and Bart makes fun of Thad about it FOREVER.