#maybe an agreement where he can live there as long as he eats regularly and stops drinking so much^^

[tartagliatum]

okay, imagine:

a kaveh who, due to his struggles with poverty and self-worth, never really eats that much. his stomach is sloped slightly inward and constantly roiling with emptiness and hunger. he feels ashamed whenever he heard a grumble or feels the skin of his stomach. he knows he’s neglecting his body, but at the same time he can do nothing but massage his thin tummy and apologize to it.

a kaveh who Alhaitham notices, is struggling.He invites Kaveh over for some dinner one night. then one night turns into two, then four, six, and soon they’ve made a roommate agreement. Despite Kaveh’s attitude, he’s extremely grateful for Alhaitham essentially saving his life.

Alhaitham notices as Kaveh begins to fill out his outfits, his once caved in tummy swelling to fullness with even a bit of slight pudge around the waist that Alhaitham never knew he had. Kaveh’s thighs grow strong enough to support him again, and Alhaitham can’t stop staring at the plushness of his buttocks that once didn’t seem so…round.

Alhaitham has never been into guys. But seeing Kaveh, who was once so thin and desperate for a meal, gain love weight once more…

He cant help but appreciate his boyfriend’s lovely new curves.

-🪶🤍

yes !! alhaitham, being very observant, notices how picky kaveh is with his food and how he often leaves most of it over. and so through trial and error learns what the architect likes and what he doesn't, and only cooks food kaveh seems to particularly like (often forcing himself through meals he detests himself in the process but hey, if kaveh is eating more that's all that matters - not that he cares about him of course, he just doesn't want him to die or something). alhaitham watches as he goes from barely picking at his food in silence with dull, sunken features, to talking through his meals - complaining about his clients, bitching about losing to cyno in "this stupid card game, whatever it's for children anyway", bemoaning being kicked from the taverns again. overtime alhaitham notices he speaks more positively, his face rosier and eyes bright, plate emptied and filled again as he talks nonstop about his friends and new upcoming projects. his hair is no longer thin and dull but shiny and voluminous. his gaunt face sharp enough to cut yourself on has been replaced by softer features; his cheeks are full and rosy, his clothes a lil snug, and when they're both in pyjamas in the evening time, alhaitham can't help but blush and avert his gaze back to his mug of tea at the sight of kaveh's thighs filling out his shorts and lil tummy pressing gently against his tshirt <3

[sergeantsporks]

Friendly Conversation

Rating: Gen, General Audiences

Hunter meets Vee's friends. Turns out you're NOT supposed to remember everything people say? Wild.

Part 4 of Camila is Hunter’s Mom Now

Ao3

Hunter let himself get tugged along by Vee, his palisman perched on his other shoulder. He dug his heels in as he started to recognize the path they were taking. “Aren’t we getting a little close to the museum? What about Jacob?”

“Oh, he won’t bother us. He’s terrified of you.” Vee seemed to stop and think for a moment. “Come to think about it, he might be scared of me, now, too.”

“Do I want to know?”

“Probably not. Besides, it’s the closest green space to the house, so that’s where we agreed we’d meet up! They’ve been dying to meet you ever since I showed them pictures—”

Wait. What. “You have pictures of me?!”

“Huh? Oh, yeah, sometimes I snap candid shots when you’re not looking. They think your ears are neat, by the way.”

Hunter reached up under his hood to cover his ears, disturbing his palisman from its perch. “They know about my ears?! Are you trying to get us discovered?!” Red warbled chidingly at Vee, then settled on Hunter’s raised arm, its claws digging into the fabric of his hoodie.

Vee rubbed her arms. “Look, I… I know secret is safe. And it’s not like I’m planning on transforming in front of them or anything. But you… you can’t just change your appearance to fit in like I can. Luckily, you’re pretty much human, except for the ears. And we can just call those a birth defect. You can’t go around wearing hoods for the rest of your life.”

“Why not?” He had up until now—in the coven and out.

“Because it makes you look… suspicious? You should probably start practicing explaining your ears if you’re planning to stay in the human realm. Besides, if you want to stay inconspicuous, you prooooobably shouldn’t walk around with a live bird on your shoulder.”

Hunter scooped up his palisman, cupping the cardinal in his hands protectively. “Red stays.” His palisman gave him an affectionate peck on the thumb, chirping an agreement.

“Okay. Just… have a good explanation for it.”

“I do. It’s a service animal.” Red chirped an agreement and fluttered up to land on his head.

Vee wrinkled her nose. “A service animal, huh? Alright.” She waved to a group of teens hanging around the statue that Hunter just could not get over how much it looked like Belos. “Hey, guys! This is my brother, Hunter!”

A shiver ran down Hunter’s spine. He still wasn’t used to being called Vee’s brother. Or getting called “Noceda,” it was all so weird. But a good weird.

Vee’s friends all bobbed their heads in acknowledgement.

“Hey, Hunter. I’m Janea,” the redhead grinned, “Nice bird.”

“Thanks.”

“Oh, whoa, hey!” The one in all black peered at his face, and he shuffled back. She knew—he didn’t know how, but she knew. “You have a gap tooth like me!” she said finally, “Gap-tooth buddies! My name’s Anissa, by the way, and that’s Steven.”

The guy nodded. “Sup.”

“I’ve never seen you before,” Anissa commented, “You’re not from around here, right?”

Hunter nodded. Perfect chance to practice his backstory. “Traveled a lot, until Ms. Noceda took me in.”

“Ooooo, mysterious backstory, I like it! Love your ears, by the way, are those natural?”

Hunter reached up under his hood, putting his hands over his ears. “Yeah.”

“Hey, don’t be embarrassed,” Janea piped up, “They’re cool!”

Hunter slowly lowered his hands. They really didn’t seem suspicious at all. Humans were… a lot dumber than he’d thought they’d be. “You think so?”

“Definitely,” Anissa chimed in, “I wish my ears looked like that—I have to settle for fake ones, though.”

The conversation moved on to aimless chatter about where to get fake… elf… ears? Hunter felt himself get pulled along in without really registering what was being said. It was a sort of… friendly noise? He nodded along, then forgot what they’d been talking about a few minutes ago after the topic of conversation had moved on.

That was a bit concerning. He had a memory like a steel trap—so what was going on?

“I have to go,” he piped up suddenly, “I have… things to do.”

“What, more algebra?” Vee teased.

“Ew!” Anissa yelped.

Hunter wrinkled his nose at Vee. “Yes, in fact. More algebra. It was… nice. To meet all of you. But I should go now.”

“Don’t be a stranger,” Janea called, “See you in school?”

He waved, wandering back to the house. “Luz!”

Luz poked her head down the stairs. “What?”

“What do you know about interdimensional travel and its effects on the witch brain?!”

“…What?”

“I can’t—I’m not remembering everything!”

Luz traipsed down the stairs. “So? I don’t remember everything. I forget a lot of things, actually. What was your name, again?”

He grabbed her shoulders. “Quit messing around. This is serious. I don’t forget things!”

“I’m sure you’ve forgotten things before. I mean… what did you have for breakfast three months ago to the day?”

“Nothing, I didn’t eat breakfast regularly three months ago, but that’s beside the point, the point is, I forget maybe some stuff, but I couldn’t remember what we were talking about five minutes ago, what if it was important—”

Luz wriggled out of his grasp and put her hands on his shoulders, gently pushing him back and down. “Hunter. Breathe. I don’t remember every conversation I’ve had with Willow or Gus. I remember the important stuff, but I don’t remember every single thing we ever talked about.”

Was she crazy? How had she kept friends this long? “But you should, right? I mean, if they’re important to you, you should remember everything they say, right? What if you suddenly need to know something they mentioned in a conversation five weeks ago, and you can’t remember it? What if they said something, and it seemed trivial, but it had a deeper meaning, and they want you to figure it out, but you can’t because you can’t remember what they said?”

Luz gave him a look that was bordering on concern. “Then I ask them—uh-oh, we’re unlocking a new trauma today, aren’t we? Okay. Hunter. You don’t have to remember everything everyone says. Your head will literally explode. No one expects you to, and especially not in friendly conversation. You’re supposed to forget half of what everyone says. If it’s important, you’ll remember it. Promise.”

Hunter’s head was swimming just thinking about it, thinking in circles. “But how will I know if it’s important?!”

Luz shrugged. “If you remember it, it was important. If you don’t remember it, it probably wasn’t.” The color drained from her face. “Wait. Have you been remembering every single conversation we’ve had here?”

Hunter tilted his head. “A couple days ago, you said that Amity has most of the portal ingredients, and she can probably make a portal back in the isles. You also said there was a monster behind me.”

“You weren’t even paying attention to me! You were solving algebraic formulas! How did you—beside the point. I want you to forget about the monster part.”

“What?”

“Forget about the monster part. It wasn’t important. The info you needed from that conversation is that Amity might be able to build a portal. You don’t need to remember that I said there was a monster behind you.”

What was this supposed to do? Hunter eyed Luz. Why did she want him to forget about the monster part? So she could do it again?

Luz caught the look. “I’m trying to help you figure out how to tell what’s important to remember and what isn’t. Amity can probably build portal—important! Luz said there was a monster behind you to get your attention—not important. Got it?”

“Mmmmkay.”

“Don’t worry about not remembering everything said. Seriously. Don’t. You’ll drive yourself crazy—if you aren’t already.”

Hunter stuck his tongue out. “I’m going to remember you said that.”

“Good, you should remember not to remember everything people say.”

Hunter crossed his arms with a grin. “No, I meant that you called me crazy.”

Luz groaned. “Hunter! That wasn’t the important part!”

[hxwkslove]

Escapade (Hawks x reader)

cw: mentions of nightmares

Restless

You were having a rough time sleeping, constantly moving around and changing positions in your shared bed. You struggled with nightmares, and the fear of them happening again strikes a feeling into your heart that causes your anxiety level to rise higher than normal.

Nighttime is scary, especially alone. It’s the time where all the shadows in the house morph into terrifying creatures.

Lucky for you, Keigo was able to gauge how you were feeling with ease. He felt you constantly moving around and assumed something was wrong.

“Are you feeling okay?” barely a whisper from his lips as he turned to hold your hands in his.

You were quiet for a little, still high off adrenaline that would not stop rushing through you.

“Yeah, just having a hard time sleeping, I’m terrified of nightmares happening again.” you laugh softly as you fidgeted with his hands.

There was a small silence while he was thinking.

“I have an idea,” he gently guided your face to look into your eyes.

His eyes remind you of honey, sweet and addicting once you get one glance. You’re addicted.

“I can call my sidekicks to take over tomorrow and we can go out. I don’t think you’re planning to go to sleep tonight, yeah?” he chuckled at you, low and baritone from lack of use.

He reminds you of space. Eyes so breathtaking that they could not possibly be of this world. Beautiful expressions, with such a relaxed smile you could drown in. A personality that is like the stars, warm, welcoming and so, so lovely. You could never get enough of him, so addicted like you could never get enough of. A feeling of wanting to know more about him, what his motives are, what he’s like with different emotions, but one thing is for certain. You love him with all your being and had so much of your heart to give to him.

You apologize for zoning out.

“That sounds great to me, what do you have in mind?” relief flooded your lungs, happy that you no longer have to have your mind plagued with thoughts of terrifying nightmares.

He puts his forehead on yours and smiles brighter than the sun.

You hope it never dims.

“We could go to the convenience store and get snacks and afterwards we could go to the park or the beach! Or I could take you and we could sit on the top of a tall building and look at the stars together!” he excitedly rambles as his hands fidget with yours and he looks deep into your eyes.

You smile.

“Let’s do it all! We have so much time Keigo!” you hasten to get out of the bed, nightmares temporarily forgotten with thoughts of spending time with your favorite person swirled in your mind.

“Well, someone’s excited!” He gets up after you and goes to get some clothes as well.

You guys stand next to each other at the beach and stare at the moonlight’s reflection in the water. Both of you were holding hands as you leaned into his warm body.

Keigo rants about his agency and rambles about how Tokoyami’s progress is improving.

You love listening to him talk about nothing, yet everything at the same time.

You smile and squeeze his hand as a confirmation that you’re listening to what he’s saying.

He pauses for a moment and looks at you.

“Sorry for being chatty, I’m just really proud of the kid. He’s doing so well.” he sheepishly smiled.

“Oh, no it’s okay babe, I love listening to you talk. I’m proud of him too. I bet you’re teaching him really well, I have faith in you.” you hold his face and lean in to give him a soft kiss, which caught him off guard.

“We should all go out together someday! I would love to meet him. He sounds so great.” you smile real big at the thought of Keigo animatedly teaching a stoic teenager.

.

“Yes, I would love that Dove! I kinda talk about you a lot and I think poor Tokoyami has been subjected to it all.” He huffs out a bit embarrassed.

“But it’s not my fault I love you so much! And you’re too cute for your own good. How am I supposed to keep quiet?” He whines as he juts out his bottom lip in a cute pout

You laugh loudly. What did you do to deserve this angel of a man, you’ll never know but will be eternally grateful for.

He joins you in your laughter, which is very contagious, and thinks about how Tokoyami would absolutely enjoy your company.

As your laughter settles a bit, you open the candy that you and Keigo grabbed from the convenience store and start munching on it.

You talk about your job to Keigo, the bakery you and your friend co-own is gaining business, which makes you excited to meet more customers.

(Maybe Keigo had something to do with that but you’ll never know.)

You love your job, it’s your passion, and you are so happy with how far you have come with life with a stable job.

You continue telling Keigo about how a customer ordered a few dozen pastries, and you had naively thought that they were going to eat it all themself, but then they clarified it was for their coworkers. Which made you very embarrassed but is a funny story to tell.

“Babe, I don’t even know why I thought they would eat them all!” You grab your stomach and try not to laugh out the candy in your mouth.

He laughs with you and doubles over, finding your assumption hilarious.

God, everything was perfect about him. You wouldn’t have it any other way.

Listening to his laugh was heavenly. It’s deep and soft that leaves a fuzzy feeling in the pit of your tummy and a flush to your face.

You stare at him in admiration and then a feeling of a rush of love going through your body, of pure adoration and caring.. So you do the most reasonable thing that came to mind.

You attack him.

Jumping on him and attacking his face and neck with kisses filled with the most love in your heart.

The kisses made blood rush to his head and his wings puffed up. He laughed some more and grabbed your waist to steady you and keep you close, hoping this bliss and stream of kisses would last forever.

As your kisses got softer and more gentle, you held his face and looked at him.

You would give him the world, the stars, anything he wanted, you would make sure he would get.

He hummed as you both got lost in each other’s eyes.

“I love you Dove, I hope I helped you feel a little better,” he murmured as he pressed a loving kiss to your lips.

“I love you so much, Keigo!” you say to his face and then turn to the stars above.

“I love Keigo so much! Do you hear that? I love love love love him!” You shout at the sky as loud as you can and it listens.

You look back down at the man below you and you smile with your heart swelled with feeling, nightmares long forgotten as you give him another loving kiss.

You pull away as you grab his hands and sit next to him, leaning into his warmth.

“We should go get more sweets! Let’s go to the top of a building, I want to know what it feels like being so high up! I bet you’re used to it though, huh love.��� you turn to him and continue “I bet the view from up there is insane right?”

He hums, focused on your words and your body near him.

“It is something I’m familiar with, but I would love to experience it with you. The stars look amazing from a tall building. Sometimes if I had night patrol, I would just go fly up and look at the sky. It listens to you and it’s comforting even though it’s so vast.” he looked up and silently thanked the universe for listening and for giving you to him.

You nod eagerly in agreement.

“The sky is so cool! It protects the earth, and at night we can look at lights in the dark. It’s really reassuring.”

You stand up and grab his hand, guiding him to another convenience store to get more sweets.

Something you noticed while you were looking at the mini cakes is that Keigo constantly kept near you, with a hand on your lower back or around your waist. Maybe it was just an intuition to keep near to, to reassure himself and to reassure you.

No complaints, though. You smile to yourself as you think fondly of how he cares for you.

Your legs dangle off a tall building as you stare at the lights of the city. It’s freeing but terrifying at the same time.

You lean closer to your love and grab his waist to steady yourself.

He keeps his arm around your waist, firmly to ground you.

“Oh my god, how do you do this so often babe?” you cling to him and try to bury yourself in his shoulder.

He holds onto you tighter.

“We don’t have to stay here, we could go somewhere else if you want to.” concern glints in his eyes as he softens, looking at you staying as close to him as you can.

“No! I just was not expecting it to be this high up.” you eagerly say to him as you turn to the view.

He nodded in acknowledgement and squeezed your waist to confirm that he was listening.

The city was breathtaking at night. The lights everywhere, it seemed, were still on, never sleeping. The buildings look like tiny Lego blocks from your high perspective. Sometimes you never realized how in each lit up room there was a person, with their own life, their own choices that matter just as much as yours. This was a reminder that everyone is the same, with their own life, their own decisions to make, and with relationships of their own. Their own Keigo, someone that brought comfort and loved them.

“I love life.” you start, still staring at the lights.

“Life is so good, it blessed me with you, babe. I have so many good things in my life and I am so grateful. I have you, my friends, the bakery, and I hope that everyone that lives with each of those lights has things similar to this. I hope that life treats them as well as it treats me.”

You tear up a bit.

“Even though I get nightmares regularly, there’s no good in this world without a bit

of bad. But I’m so grateful for what I have. Thank you for being here for me, Keigo.”

You look at him as if he held the world and the stars in his hands and smiled.

“I love you so much, I could never imagine this world without you in it.”

You hear his voice, slow and careful.

“God damn it, I could never see myself without you.” he choked up a bit.

“You taught me how to love, how to see the light in the world. If you weren’t here, I don’t know what I would do with myself. Maybe tear up everything with my bare hands.”

He laughed dryly

“It hurts so much to see you wake up from night terrors Dove, I only wish I could rid you of them. They trouble you and it hurts to see you get sad and afraid of resting because of those.”

Grabbing your face, he turned to you and leaned in to look at your eyes.

“I will do anything to help you with it, name it and I will provide. I want to help.” a determined tone broke through his choked voice.

“You already do so much for me Love, I could never thank you enough for spending time with me at night and sleeping with me. That rids me of it most times and I could never ask for more. Maybe I should get some melatonin.” You say thoughtfully.

“Of course, anything to help. We should get some tomorrow.”

Perfect timing for a yawn to break out as you lean into him.

“That sounds like a plan babe, sounds real nice. Thank you.”

You fall asleep on him as the sun peaks through. Pushing away the dark with the warmth of the sun.

Reminds you of Keigo. Pushing all the nightmares and scary things away with his presence alone.

Fully dozed off, Keigo smiles at you and gently carries you back home into your bed. Happy that you were able to sleep. He tucked you into your bed, changed and went to join you. He held you close to him, close to his heart, where you would always stay, safely tucked away and joined you in slumber.

You sleepily arose to a warm arm around you and peaceful breathing, smiling and pushing his hair out of his face and giving a soft kiss to his forehead you cuddled back into him and went back to sleep.

You would never want to be anywhere else.

[celestialices]

QUEST!

Greek Mythology x Haikyuu 

Haikyuu!Ensemble x Reader

Summary: You were just a perfectly normal student at The University of Tokyo, when suddenly a bunch of 'normal boys', as they call themselves, appeared in your life and started to squeeze themselves into your life. Always saying something like "You're a goddess, we need to take you back to Olympus" (you brushed it off, saying that it was just a silly compliment) and even absurd sentences such as "You got Medusa's eyes" and "You're really Medusa's daughter!"

You really want a peaceful school year, but the universe beg to differ.

007: UNANTICIPATED ENCOUNTERS

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Your family is like a heap of stones, remove one and the entire structure will crumble. Living with your sympathetic mother and doting brother is a dream come true. Along with your only known relatives, Kyoutani Household and Inouka Family, completes the household.  It’s small; however, there’s nothing else that could compete over this haven of yours.  Moreover, your mother’s friend coming in the picture constantly every 6 months to take care of your family ever since you came into this world is another section of your stable life. He has been doting over you and acted as the father figure of your little family. His visits would always complete your year.  Speaking of your acting paternal, he just arrived two days ago and will probably stay over for another five days. It’s amazing how his visits remain unchanging though, always the same month and the same days. It was unvarying, maybe that’s where you grasp some of the mannerism you have currently.  Your surroundings has always been permanent. A little changes here and there would arise, but never big ones. That’s why it scares you if something ever happens; owing to the fact that this life you have is already part of you. It has always been you, your mother and Yuki. You’re already comfortable with this, possessing the same old life you had when you were born.  A knock on your door snapped you out of your trance, your name was followed shortly after. “Are you almost ready?” Recognizing the voice, you stood up pronto, so swift that it almost ruined your balance.  Shaking your head to dismiss the dizziness off, you picked up your school bag and opened the door. “Good morning, Heiji-san.” You greeted with a smile.  He ruffled your hair. One of his tendencies whenever he visits. It’s like messing up your hair before you leave for school is a must. “Good morning. Breakfast is prepared, your friend is also there already.” He announced.  Friend. He’s probably talking about Hirugami Sachiro, your infamous childhood friend. It’s like a tradition nowadays, he regularly comes over for breakfast, reasoning that your mother cooks the best meals. When the truth is he just dreadfully hates seeing to his older sister and her boyfriend being ‘lovey-dovey.’  You didn’t noticed that Heiji had already dragged you downstairs, startled when you overheard your mother and Hirugami having a chat. It happens so often now, being lost in your own thoughts. You approached them, kissing your mother’s cheek and saying your greetings before nodding at Hirugami.  “Let’s eat!” Yuki yelled out, provoking the four of you to come to the dining room. You immediately started to consume the served meal after everyone sat down, since praying wasn’t really necessary. Your mother never pushed beliefs into the both of you, your opinions and own faith will be yours to decide on. Freedom is a fundamental for her ‘How-To-Be-A-Perfect-Mother-101.’ “How about you invite your other friend sometimes?” Your mother, Shibayama Yumie, asked you. “Korai-kun, was it?” Her memory impresses you from time to time; but then again, you only have a few friends. Countable by one hand, howbeit they’re all as good as one’s word. “Hmm, I’ll tell him to come by for breakfast sometimes, mom.” You answered blissfully. Breakfasts are the most important meal of the day, and eating with the whole family are euphoric. Especially with your two best friends and Heiji, aka three of the most important people of your life? That’s like dreaming with one's eyes open.  “It’ll be nice to meet your friends.” Heiji said. “And also, invite your relatives. It’s just proper to celebrate our lady’s coming-of-age at once.”  Oh, right. You just turned 18 a few days ago, but throwing a party isn’t really  obligatory. But because your mother kept pressing you about it, you just excused that Heiji should be there, as he is an important factor in your life after all.  “We can party this weekend, a day before Heiji-san leaves.” Yuki suggested.  “That’ll be splendid.” Heiji replied while nodding his head. He smiled at Yuki before turning to you, “Request all of your friends to come, okay? It’s a must for me to meet all your acquaintances.”  Chuckling at his desire, you just bobbed your head as a sign of agreement. As if you’ll invite a lot of people.  “Are you two done?” Yumie asked, looking at you and Hirugami. “You better leave now, or else you’ll be late for school.”  “Right, right.” Hirugami stood up from his seat, gathering all his belongings after chugging a glass of water. “Thank you for the toothsome breakfast, Yumie-san! I’ll look forward to more of your cooking.”  Hirugami is.. shameless. What’s missing is him calling your mother ‘mom’ too. Who knows, it’ll probably happen sooner or later.  “We’ll be going now!” You both said simultaneously before exiting the house.  Walking with Hirugami to school is one of the thousands habits you’ve picked up as well since your friendship with him started. Your mother asking for him to “protect” you was the sole reason of it, along with freedom, safety has always been a big deal for her. It is her top priority for you and your brother, it’s honestly admirable. And of course, living in the same neighborhood with the Hirugami family made it a piece of cake.  Anyhow, it’s reassuring. As someone who’s not entirely fond of changes, having  your fixed routine, that you unconsciously formed while growing up, occur like the usual brings a sense of comfort to you. 

”So, about that guy from last night.” Hirugami began the conversation after minutes of silently walking. Ever since bumping into the mysterious man yesterday and witnessing his unexpected reaction, your friends have been getting on your nerves with their constant queries. ”Shut up.” You cut him off pronto. Seriously, was blowing up your notifications up until midnight not enough? “For the last time, I don’t know him, Sachiro.” With an exasperated sigh, you fastened your pace, showing your obvious annoyance.  “I won’t tease you anymore, wait up!” Hirugami catched up while bursting with laughter. Him making fun of you was not new, but it doesn’t mean it isn’t irksome. “I just thought you finally found a partner after being single for so long.”  You immediately sent a glare to your friend after he said those words. “Hirugami Sachiro, I will end you.” You threatened with your most serious face, but nevertheless, he just laughed. Sometimes, the urge to choke him until he runs out of breath will pop up.  “Fine, fine. I’ll shut up.” With one last chuckle coming out his mouth, he finally piped down. Not a moment after when his phone started ringing, making you look up to him. “It’s Korai.” He announced, answering the phone call straight away.  You just stared at him while he talked to Hoshiumi, disappointed that you can’t hear what Hoshiumi’s saying on the other line. And your companion is insensitive enough to not put him on speaker.  After a few minutes, he ended the call and peeked at you forthwith. “He’s waiting for us by the gates.”  “Okay.” It didn’t take long after you reached the gates, already seeing Hoshiumi’s unique white hair from afar. His eyes perked up when you and Hirugami locked eyes with him, smiled when you waved at him.  After exchanging greetings with Hoshiumi, the three of you started to walk on your respective classrooms. “Oh, right. I heard a rumor.” Hoshiumi suddenly declared.  “What rumor?” Hirugami asked. What even kind of rumors for Hoshiumi to give a damn about it?  “Transferees.”  “Transferees? In the middle of the second semester?” You questioned. 

“Yeah. Two of them are in one of your classes, apparently.” Hoshiumi informed. “Hirugami and I share some of the classes with the other two.”  Who could that be? Who in their right mind would transfer in a middle of a semester? You halted, realizing that you already reached your class. “Oh, I’m here. See you later.”  “Library.” Hirugami gave you a heads up. The library is one of the places in school where you three meet up to fill up the free time before eating lunch. It’s amazing how your schedules go along with each other. You merely nodded in return before entering your homeroom.  You sat in your corresponding seat without interruptions, taking out your phone since no one will talk to you anyways. Plugging your earphones in after bringing out your book, you separated yourself from the world.  Music is another element of your life. It makes you forget the real situation in hand, transports you into a state which is not your own. Under the influence of music, it seems like you feel what you never felt before, it makes you understand what you don’t understand, to have powers which you can’t have. Music is powerful, it inspires. It gives you a glimpse of an impossible world.  A few songs played before you heard the bell rang, bringing you back to reality. It saddened you, but music will never leave your side no matter what. Your professor entered after a few minutes, two boys after her.  “Good morning. An addition of two students will be joining us this semester. Namely, Sakusa Kiyoomi,” The one wearing a mask and has curly hair bowed his head. “And Komori Motoya.” The man who has light-colored hair and thick, round eyebrows waved.  The class erupted into whispers, some of them waving back at the seemingly cheerful boy. “Please take care of us!” Komori uttered and inclined his head. “You two can seat behind Shibayama.” You flinched at the sudden call, but raised your hand nonetheless. You forgot that there are two vacant seats behind you, not that it mattered anyway.  As the two were seated, your professor instantly started her discussion. And as the good student you are, you quietly listened and took your notes.  After three boring hours, the bell finally rang, signalling the end of class. You stood up from your seat as soon as the professor left, not letting anyone approach you like the asocial you are.  You started walking towards the library while scrolling through your phone, confident that you won’t bump into someone. Well, surely a person with common sense would avoid you, will they not?  Wrong. You’re absolutely wrong.  You sighed before glancing at the person you bumped into. You’ve been bumping into people a lot these days, is this your new profound curse? “Sorry.” You hid your astonishment after locking eyes with him.  A student with dark-brown hair and grayish-yellow fox-like eyes who looks like he’s eventually on his way to murder someone. You bowed at him and immediately left.  It’s the first time you saw his face in the university, so he’s either a transferee or someone who doesn’t like going out in the grounds. Despite being introverted, you’re proud to say you know all the faces in your university. You stood in front the library’s door to let out another deep sigh. Backing away when the door suddenly opened from your side. “Oh, my apologies. That was rude of me.” He uttered, motioning for you to enter first.  You peeked at him, and saw that his gunmetal blue eyes staring at you. “Ah, thank you.” Offering him a smile before entering the library, completely unaware of his change of expression.  Plopping yourself down beside Hoshiumi, you started to read the book you picked up before approaching them. Unconsciously, you let out another groan, thinking back at today’s events.  Interacting with people is truly draining. 

A/N:  And there goes the second-years from the representative team 👀 Oh, and I just want to say that I may use she/her pronouns/fem!reader but please keep in mind that this is a safe space for everyone :). If it’s confusing, reader is from Shibayama family (consisting of a mother and younger brother). Family relatives [ Kyoutani, Inouka (comprising of a mother + son) ] and her mother’s friend (Heiji-san, standing up as her father figure) visits them from time to time. In conclusion, her family has very few members. Happy Holidays, everyone! May 2021 give us good memories. Always remember to stay safe! And as usual, thank you for tuning in! <3 

[leechobsessed]

Book Club

A look back in time to see why Ella, Beatrice and Leila weren’t regularly invited to social functions. 

characters: Ella Sagen, Beatrice Viano (of @juliandev0rak) and Leila Lonan (of @leila-of-ravens) pairing: beaellaleila words: 2.2k warnings: swearing, sneaky use of alcohol

notes: this fic takes place before the events of the game and was inspired by a very specific tea cup that Leila owns, referenced in this fic

“We’re doing what?” Beatrice half-whines, half-exclaims, literally dragging her feet as Leila pulls her toward the door.

“We’re going to a book club,” Ella repeats, sighing. She and Leila had, unbeknownst to Beatrice, enrolled them in a group that reads and discusses books in an attempt to expand their social circle.

“I haven’t even read the book!” Beatrice protests, yanking her hands from Leila to fold them across her chest. “Isn’t that the only prerequisite for such a club?”

“Did you read that book I lent you last week? That one romance novel?” Leila asks, mirroring her friend's stance. Beatrice nods slowly. “Then you read the book.”

“You— you… tricked me into reading a book?”

“Yes and no. Trick is a bad word for it, seeing as no one has ever needed to work very hard to convince you to read something.” Ella sighs again. “Come on, Beatrice, it’ll be fun. You have a very keen literary eye, and it will be a good chance to meet people.”

“Who came up with this idea anyway?”

“Me?” Leila shrugs. “Maybe your aunt? Or maybe Ella? Hard to say, it became a bit of a team effort.”

The hazel-eyed magician purses her lips at her two friends, who have come to stand next to each other, smushing their cheeks together and batting their eyelashes at her.

“Pleaaassee?” they whine in unison, which makes Beatrice laugh.

“Fine!” She huffs, grabbing her cloak from the back of her kitchen chair. She disappears into her bedroom and emerges a moment later, clutching the book Leila had given her the week prior. “It wasn’t even that good of a novel.”

“I didn’t think it was terrible,” Ella offers, but is quieted by Leila’s finger pressed to her lips.

“Hey! The whole point of this is to discuss the book with others!”

“Isn’t that what I was just doing?” Ella asks, her voice muffled from the finger against her mouth.

“Don’t get smart with me, Ellanora. We’ll be late to our own party if we don’t hurry up.”

The three women exit Beatrice’s home and wait patiently for her to lock up, then immediately lock arms and start down the street.

“Where are we going?” Beatrice asks, adjusting the book under her arm.

“To my place,” Leila answers.

“What about Leda?”

“She’s at my house,” Ella responds. “Your aunt Cora should be heading over there soon for their own version of a girls night.”

Beatrice shakes her head. “Was everyone in on this aside from me?”

“Pretty much,” Ella laughs, giving her a kiss on the top of the head. “Don’t worry. This will be fun,” she says again, though Beatrice remains less than convinced.

At Leila’s home, Beatrice and Ella hurry up the stairs to the living area and begin to pull couches and chairs around a tea table, while Leila starts a pot of tea in the kitchen.

“How many people are you expecting?” Beatrice asks, frowning at the number of chairs they’ve gathered. “And who exactly are they?”

“Four?” Leila says, though it’s more of a question and she peeks out of the kitchen at Ella for confirmation. Ella nods, even though her back is to her friend. “Four.”

Leila retreats into the kitchen to put some cakes on a serving dish, and Ella takes a seat on the couch and explains that those who were invited to this book club were regulars at either Vivian, Leda or Cora’s shops. They were all around the same age and had all just moved to Vesuvia or just moved back within the past year.

“Have either of you met them?”

“Um, I think I met one of them,” Ella shrugs. “And Leila knows of two. The other girl is friendly with the rest of them, which is why she was invited, but none of our aunts have met her.”

Leila returns to the living area, setting the cakes on the table beside the tea. “I do know that one of them has their eye on you, Beatrice,” she says, nudging her friend's shoulder. “Your aunt said so. But I won’t tell you who it is, because then you’ll just be a blushing mess any time they try to talk to you.”

“I would not!” Beatrice exclaims, her cheeks already burning. “I feel it would be better to know ahead of time!”

Ella rolls her eyes toward the ceiling and then fixes Leila with an unamused gaze. “Why would you tease her like that?” She mutters, standing from her seat to answer the door. “Sounds like our guests have arrived.”

Only three of the four invited guests were able to attend, and they each say hello to the three magicians before sitting down and gratefully accepting the tea Leila offers.

Anita was the first to make her introduction. The girls liked her immediately, with her very bubbly, loud personality and whooping laugh. She had kind gold eyes and a bright smile, and easily made herself at home with Ella on the couch.

Alice followed closely behind Anita, shaking hands with each of the women as she introduced herself in a soft, melodic voice. Beatrice quickly recognized the redhead as a nursing student that frequently made an appearance at her aunt’s shop. The two women made eye contact, and Alice smiled shyly and blushed before immediately looking away.

Charlotte, a very pale, very blonde, very pretty woman only nodded in acknowledgement as she was introduced by Anita, who was the one who had invited her. Charlotte found her seat quickly, at the head of the gathering, her dark eyes scanning the magicians up and down in silent judgement as she made a show of removing her fur coat.

Once they are all seated, the six women spend a decent amount of time making small talk, getting to know each other better, though it quickly becomes obvious Charlotte thinks too highly of herself to be associating with her hosts. She comments on how “small and humble” the home is and turns her nose up at the cakes offered, informing the others the only cakes she will eat are from a specific, high-end bakery in the Heart District. Not too long after, Charlotte makes a comment to Leila about magicians in a tone that suggests she thinks quite little of them, smiling as if daring Leila to challenge her statement. Instead of responding, Leila gives her a dangerously polite smile and excuses herself to the kitchen to get more tea.

Now alone, Charlotte holds her book open in her lap, waiting for the conversation to die out before she clears her throat to begin the discussion.

“We’ve all finished the novel, correct?” She asks, making eye contact with each person sitting around her, waiting for them to nod before looking to the next woman. “Good. I thought we could start by discussing general feelings toward the story.”

She waits patiently, her rings catching the light as her perfectly painted pink nails drum on the open book in her lap, her eyebrows raised like a teacher waiting for her students to participate. Out of the corner of Ella’s eye, she sees Leila return to her seat, now holding a different cup than she had before.

“I enjoyed it,” Alice offers. “It was an easy read, and the story had a nice flow to it.”

Charlotte nods and hums in agreement before turning toward Beatrice, placing a delicate hand on her knee and giving it a squeeze. “Beatrice, honey, what did you think?”

Beatrice blinks down at the hand on her knee, her gaze flickering up toward Ella and Leila. From the brief moment of eye contact, the three magicians silently agree that they are not fans of this guest.

Anita senses Beatrice’s discomfort at the unwanted contact, and offers instead her own opinions on the book, adding that it was refreshing to read a novel where some of the characters were meant to be unlikable.

Charlotte frowns at this, leaning back in her chair. “Unlikable? Would you elaborate on that?”

“No,” Anita responds, taking a bite of her cake. Ella clears her throat to cover a laugh and Beatrice and Alice share a small smile.

The tendons in Charlotte’s neck tense momentarily, but she shrugs off the comment and launches into her own analysis of the novel, which lasts at least a good thirty minutes alone.

She continues to dominate the discussion, asking questions of the others that she immediately disagrees with, calling them idiots in not so few words as she picks apart their opinions on the book.

The energy in the group continues to deflate as Charlotte drones on. Leila excuses herself again to get more tea, returning with more cakes as Charlotte admits that this book happens to be her least favorite romance novel of all time.

“Why is that?” Ella asks, reaching for a cake. “I thought it was pretty good.”

“Pretty good? No.” Charlotte scoffs. “Poor decisions were made on the part of Mr. Chauncey.”

“Elaborate on that,” Leila remarks, standing up to disappear to the kitchen again, and Anita lets out a chuckle.

Charlotte seems to miss the joke and straightens up in her chair, flipping a gold ringlet over her shoulder. “Well, the woman he was pursuing was incredibly beneath his status. Marrying her was a poor choice, as it only elevated her status and tarnished his own.”

“But they were in love,” Alice murmurs, frowning. “One doesn’t care much for social status when matters of the heart are involved.”

Charlotte snorts, dismissing Alice’s thought. “Mr. Chauncey’s mother worked so hard to keep them apart, to save her family and protect what they had made for themselves. I believe she is one of the characters you alluded to earlier, Anita, the ones that were written to be unlikable?”

Anita nods, but Beatrice speaks up before she can respond, surprising Ella and Leila.

“She is unlikable. The son she was trying to protect was not the heir to their family fortune, seeing as he was the youngest of five. He could marry much more flexibly than his brothers. The main character, Julia, was a respectable, intelligent woman, who didn’t pursue him out of respect for his status, and whom Mrs. Chauncey only disliked because she didn’t think a ‘mere seamstress’ was worthy of her family.”

“A ‘lowly peasant,’ actually, but—” Charlotte starts, only to be interrupted by Anita.

“Oh come on, Charlotte, you can’t actually believe she was written to be a likeable character.”

“I do.” She sniffs, tilting her chin upward. “I quite like her, and she even reminded me a bit of myself.”

“I think she’s a bitch,” Leila says, her eyes locked on Charlotte’s.

For a heartbeat, there is silence. Then Anita and Ella both let out a bark of laughter, falling into each other as their bodies shake. Alice and Beatrice giggle, attempting to hide the sound by covering their mouths with their hands.

Charlotte’s nostrils flare as Leila takes a sip from her mug, her eyes still on Charlotte.

“Mrs. Chauncey believes she’s better than everyone, that she always knows best, and that she deserves more respect than others, just because she was lucky enough to be born into money and status.” Leila shrugs, cocking her head to the side. “Having nice things doesn't automatically make you a good or important person.”

Charlotte fingers the diamond pendant around her thin neck, raising her eyebrows at the soft purple shawl wrapped around Leila’s shoulders. “Oh, but it does.”

Ella sees the flash of anger in Leila’s eyes and stands up quickly, moving her body in between the two women and clapping her hands together loudly. “Oh-kay! What a riveting discussion! But I am beat, whew, what a long day it’s been!” She pulls Charlotte off of her chair by her elbow despite her protests, leading her toward the door as Anita and Alice grab their things.

“Some of us need to work in the morning, so,” Ella opens the door and almost shoves Charlotte out. “Get home safe now!”

Alice thanks Leila for the hospitality and shakes Beatrice’s hand, giving it a small squeeze before she follows a fuming Charlotte out the door and into the night. Anita, still laughing, gives Leila a hug.

“You were spot on with that character analysis,” she chuckles, winking. “Thank you for having us. I’d really love to see you all again sometime.”

Ella closes the door after Anita and leans her head against the wood. She lets out a long exhale before returning upstairs to Beatrice and Leila, ready to scold Leila for blatantly antagonizing a guest. Instead, she finds both of them in hysterics on the couch, their heads leaning against each other as they shake with laughter.

“Well, I’m glad you two think that was funny. I think it’s safe to say we didn’t make many new friends tonight,” Ella says, flopping down next to them on the couch. “What am I going to do with the two of you?”

“Hmm,” Leila hiccups once, adjusting herself in order to rest her head on Ella’s shoulder. “I dunno, but I think you’re stuck with us.”

“It does seem that way,” Ella laughs. “At least we won’t have to plan any more book clubs.”

Beatrice wipes at the corner of her eyes, still giggling. “That sounds fine with me.”

[lyssismagical]

evermore

Just a Solid Vent Fic 

I wanna do 30 days of Taylor Swift-inspired fics (folklore and evermore) lmao but idk yet we’ll see lemme know tho 

 *

As a compromise for Tony not being able to pay Peter’s tuition to MIT thanks to his full ride, Tony bought an apartment right beside campus for Peter to live in, to ensure no awkward adventures trying to be Spider-Man with a roommate.

Peter’s still adamant about getting a job and paying for his food, phone bill, and any other things like clothing or entertainment.

And balancing classes, patrolling, and a job, isn’t easy, of course. But it’s always been better for him to work hard than to give himself time to think. It’s not like his mental health is on hold, but it’s easier to put it aside when he’s got so much to do all the time.

It doesn’t help that he’s also on the debate team thanks to MJ, and in the robotics club thanks to Ned.

When November rolls around and it brings the final projects, Peter pushes himself to the limit to keep up with everything.

He starts dropping his sleep to only a nap whenever he can squeeze it in, working all afternoon, classes all morning, and Spider-Man all night, and he starts making up excuses for anything that isn’t a number one priority.

He stops seeing his friends, stops calling May back, stops replying to Tony’s worried texts, stops helping out with his professors or the librarian or his classmates. He stops cleaning his apartment, letting dishes pile up on the counters and laundry go unwashed.

It’s bad, and he knows that, rationally and logically, he knows.

But that doesn’t stop him from doing it anyway.

Three weeks, he tells himself.

And he keeps pushing.

MJ shows up at his apartment out of the blue when he’s studying away, and he barely manages to clear the fog in his head to stumble for the door.

“I can’t talk right now,” he says before she can even say hello. “I’ve gotta study for my physics exam.”

“No, you’ve gotta chill the fuck out.”

He shakes his head, leaving the door open as he turns his back and heads into his kitchen for a quick snack so he can get back to his work. “No, I have to study.”

“Oh my god, you live in a garbage dump,” she says, eyes going wide as she takes in the state of his apartment. “When was the last time you washed a dish? Or, gross, your hair?”

He doesn’t bother responding, rolling his eyes and downing a protein bar. “Two weeks, now, and then I’m done for a month.”

“At this rate, I don’t know if you’ll make it through the next two weeks.”

Peter can’t help but roll his eyes again, part of him hating how much he’s lashing out despite wanting help, needing help, but unable to find the strength to stop it from happening as he brushes past her again.

“I know you’re stressed, I know you’re anxious about exams and papers and labs, but, seriously, Peter?” she says, following him to where he’s working in the living room, papers and binders and textbooks strewn across every surface. “You’re a genius, okay? You’ve been getting excellent grades all year. The only reason you might not do well on these projects is because you’re working yourself to death.”

He shakes his head, feeling very suddenly like he might cry. “It’s not that easy. Just… I don’t want to deal with this right now, okay?”

MJ doesn’t take that as a good answer, though, sitting beside him on the old couch. “I know you, okay? I know you better than most people do. I’ve seen you in some of the worst states you’ve been in. I know this. You can’t pretend that this is okay or normal or that this is you doing fine. I don’t believe it for a second.”

He opens his mouth to fight back, to argue, to try to convince her otherwise, or maybe just to kick her out. But he hesitates.

After the Snap’s reversal, she was the one who devoted all her time to taking care of him. He was such a mess of PTSD and depression and emptiness, but she was there. She kept the lights on for him, she brought him food and water, held him after nightmares, talked him down from panic attacks every other day. She was there, despite everything, she was always there.

Tony was too far and he never wanted to bother May, so he regularly would drop by her fire escape where she would patch him up after patrols, and occasionally, let him sleep next to her and make sure to get him to school on time.

She’s always been there.

She’s held him together, kept him sane, helped him through it all.

It wouldn’t be fair to get pissed.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbles, shoving a hand through his mess of greasy, tangled curls. “I’m such a mess, I’m so sorry. I don’t mean to be a bitch, but I just… I don’t know what I’m doing. I feel like I’m drowning.”

And she nods because she’s always understood, always known what he means. She puts her hand over his. “You deserve a nap. C’mon.”

He goes to shake his head, looking to where his lab is only half-done, he’s only a few chapters into the textbook to get prepared for his exam, rough notes scribbled out for a paper.

“No, c’mon. You’re taking a nice nap. You deserve it,” she repeats, tugging more insistently at his wrist.

But he shakes his head this time, pulling his hand away. “If I stop, I won’t be able to start again.”

“Peter-”

“I’m serious, if I take a nap or a break or take a second to breathe, I will crumble and I won’t be able to put myself back together in time for these due dates. I won’t get back up. I just-” He stops, taking a deep breath and rubbing at his wet eyes. “I need to keep pushing for the next two weeks and then I can fall apart.”

MJ shakes her head, fingers wrapping around his thin wrist. “That’s not healthy. And it certainly wouldn’t be right for me to let you do that.”

“I’ll fail my classes if I don’t do well on these assignments and exams. I need to keep going. I know it’s bad, but if I get into bed, I will fall into a slump and I won’t get anything done.”

Surprising both him and what seems like herself, she nods, holding onto him a little tighter like he’ll disappear before her very eyes. “Fine. But I’m going to stay here with you and make sure you don’t die over the next two weeks, alright? And you have to listen when I tell you to eat or watch stupid reality TV shows with me.”

He hums out an agreement, letting himself slump into her side, eyes focusing in on his mess of homework laid out before him.

“Come on. Step one, is getting you showered and in clean clothes because you smell like you spent the night in a dumpster.”

*

MJ does exactly as she promised she would. She calls it a ‘mental health sleepover’ and they set up camp in the living room.

She calls in sick for him at work for most of the week, telling them that he caught the flu and wouldn’t be back until after his exams, and even then, he’d already booked most of Winter Break off to go home to New York.

There wasn’t much she could do, in all honesty, it wasn’t like she could force him to sleep or take a break without a fight, but she could make him healthy meals and stop him from going out patrolling, which was enough to take a big load off his shoulders.

And she occasionally can convince him to watch those dumb reality TV shows, which occasionally makes him fall asleep on the couch for at least an hour or two.

It helps, of course, but it doesn’t solve any of the problems.

As soon as he’s finished exams, he’s going to drop, he’s going to fall, he’s going to drown, let the waves take him.

And nobody will be able to help him then.

“I booked your flight home,” MJ says over dinner and while he’s finishing up his lab report. “My flight’s a few hours after yours, so I’ll be with you until you board and then the Starks will pick you up.”

“Thanks. I really owe you one,” he says, only half-listening as he starts on his paper.

She grabs him by his shoulder and makes him turn to her laptop screen. “Say yes to the dress time. Your paper can wait a bit.”

“There’s only so much I can procrastinate,” he says but he’s already closing his laptop and tucking himself into her side, and shoulders finally relaxing.

She starts the episode, on a low volume, and presses a quick kiss to his temple.

By the time they’re onto the second episode, Peter’s slurring out his insults to the dresses some of the women pick, making fun of the different styles, and blinking getting longer and longer.

“That neckline?” Peter goes, giggling into MJ’s shoulder. “Especially with those shoes?”

“You’re a bitch.”

“I know, but seriously?” he laughs again, a little window into the person he once was. “I mean the first option wasn’t bad, but the choice of a grey dress in the first place…”

MJ’s voice goes all soft and gentle when she next speaks up, “Come on, go to sleep, you can afford to take a little break.”

And he nods sleepily against her shoulder, tucking himself just a little closer, making himself small against her side. It’s simple, for now.

*

As soon as he’s done his last exam, he can feel the adrenaline wearing off, disappearing from within him, all energy draining from his very veins.

He goes straight home afterwards, ignoring everybody who tries to stop him for a chat. And as soon as he makes it to his apartment, he goes straight to bed, tugging the sheets right over his head.

He shouldn’t do this, he knows. He should call MJ, ask that she drop everything for him again because he can feel himself slipping, but he won’t. He can’t. He doesn’t even know when the last time he saw his phone was, let alone have the effort to leave his blankets and try to find it. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t have it in him to care.

He feels empty and exhausted and strung out. Carved hollow. Putting everything he has into the past few months, he feels like he has nothing left to give.

There’s a knock on his front door, but he doesn’t move.

A few minutes later, his phone rings, somewhere in another part of the apartment. It rings again and again, a symphony for him to pass out to.

*

Time passes strangely when he’s this deep in a depressive episode. He doesn’t know how long he’s been huddled under his blankets, hiding from the world. It could’ve been anywhere between a couple hours and a few days, he doesn’t know.

His phone continues ringing, far away and echoing through his dreams, tears sliding down his cheeks at random intervals, hands trembling where they’re tucked under his chest.

He feels like he’s drifting away, collapsing into himself, fading away into nothingness.

He feels empty, hollow, gone.

He gave everything he had into school and work over the course of four months, and he has nothing left to give anymore. He’s nothing more than an empty well.

And he doesn’t know how he’s supposed to pull himself together, pack, get a flight home, and pretend to be one hundred percent for Morgan.

He’d rather just die here, in this cave he’s built, ghost-like and fading away already, than have to face another soul.

*

When he hears his front door unlocking, he knows he should be worried. Nobody has a spare copy of his key except for Ned, who already went home to New York a few weeks back.

He knows it should be at least a little concerning that somebody is breaking into his apartment, but he can’t find it in him to care. He doesn’t have the energy to move or hide or try to protect himself.

He just curls up a little tighter and hopes that this won’t be his last day.

“Peter?”

He lifts his head, just enough to see over his cave of his blankets.

And standing in his bedroom doorway is Tony.

“Hi,” he breathes, curling up a little tighter, knowing he’s safe.

Tony slips into his room and sits at the end of his bed, one hand on Peter’s ankle. “MJ called when you wouldn’t answer your phone or let her in. She knew something was up.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. I saw something like this coming after you finished your senior year and spent two weeks sick and depressed. I thought you’d be home in time before you started feeling so run down, but I guess I was wrong.”

Peter doesn’t know how he’s supposed to respond to that, so instead he lets his head fall into the pillows again.

“I’m not going to make you do anything yet, I think you could use a bit more time here. Though, Morgan thought two days sleeping was plenty, I think another one might do you well. But tomorrow, we’re going to get you fed and showered and your apartment clean, and then this weekend, we’ll get a flight home. Sound good?”

He nods, though he’s pretty sure he would agree to pretty much anything so long as the decisions are taken out of his hands.

“Come here,” Tony murmurs, sliding into the space beside Peter, arms open. Peter finally feels at home when he crawls into the awaiting hug. “MJ mentioned Say Yes to the Dress bingeing, you feel up for making fun of more dress choices?”

Peter laughs half-heartedly against Tony’s chest, tucking himself into him like a child would, and nods, breathing in the soothing scent of motor oil and expensive cologne.

He knows he’ll fall apart again, he knows that it’s not going to be a permanent solution, but the time being, he has Tony’s arms around him, a reality TV show quietly keeping them company, and the relief of having time to feel miserable before he has to pick himself up, it’s enough for now. It’ll be enough.

He’ll be okay with people like Tony and MJ at his side.

He’ll be okay.

Taglist: @littlemissagrafina  @fancyxparker  @romeoandjulietyouwish @c-artara @shadedrose01 @likeaphoenix13 @misskirkstark @you-get-killed-walk-it-off @kitkatwinchester  @emo-girl10 @justme--emily  @hold-our-destiny @imalivebecauseirondad @spiderman-peterman @dykeragee @maryserrao @heeeyitskay @parknerandirondad @lilacsandlilies4 @loveliestdisappointment @joyful-soul-collector @genderfluid-and-confuzled @fallenstar07 @gyurolls @sdottkrames {Let me know if you wanna be added or removed}

[wildriot]

Steter Week Day 5

It’s midday Saturday when Scott calls and begs Stiles for a favor.  Stiles, two days into his pre-heat, is fully prepared to deny him, but those puppy eyes are lethal, even through a phone, and he ends up agreeing to swap patrol shifts with Scott.  So he changes his clothes and heads out and is pleased when Peter joins him five minutes is.

It’s stupid, really, and irrational, but of all the alphas and betas in the pack, Peter is the one that gets his proverbial hackles up the least.  Maybe because, unlike the rest, Peter doesn’t use his dynamic as an excuse to act like an asshole – instead relying on his own personal charm to earn the title.

Stiles thinks at some point, a tally of all the shifts he’s spent with Peter running through his mind, that this might not be so bad.

Forty minutes later, they’re running for their lives.

“Fucking hunters,” Stiles growls, slogging his way through the mud.  “Always ruining everything.”

He’s out of breath, legs and lungs protesting the flat out sprint of the last who even knows how long.  The adrenaline’s starting to fade, the tepid beginning’s of exhausting slowly rearing it’s head and, to be perfectly honest, he really doesn’t think he can go much further.

Ahead of him, leading the way and dragging him along, Peter snorts.  “You have awfully low standards.”

Because focusing on Peter is better than thinking about what awaits them if they stop moving, Stiles takes offense.  “Excuse you,” he says, grip tightening on Peter’s hand as something – probably a tree root (they are in the Preserve, after all) – snags his ankle and nearly takes him down.  “I will have you know that my standards are reasonable.  Very reasonable.  So reasonable, in fact, that they spend their time reasoning with everyone else’s stupidly high expectations.”

“Is that right?”

“Yes!”

Peter just hums and Stiles silently flips him off.  In his head, obviously, he’s way too tired to do it for real.  

But Peter must sense his intentions anyway – all that werewolf-ism...ish? – and glances over his shoulder.  His eyes are glowing, too-bright in the darkness, and momentarily leaves Stiles blinking away white spots in his vision, and yet he still catches the tightening of Peter’s mouth, the way he seems to look past Stiles, deeper into the spaces they’ve left behind.

“Can you hear anything?” Stiles asks, trying to ignore the way his heart starts to bleed ice through his veins, sticky and cold.  He doesn’t think Peter can, over the rain and the noises they’re making, and Peter shakes his head.

“No,” he says.  

“But…?”

“But we have no idea what that thing was.  We can’t stop.”

Which is true.  Very true.  Hunters were one thing, but some sort of Lovecraftian hell-spawn was another thing entirely.  Just those few seconds in it’s presence, when it had entered the clearing where Stiles and Peter had been ambushed by a group of hunters, before it turned it’s attention to them and given them the chance to run, had been terrifying.  Stiles couldn’t even describe it.  The monsters they’d faced, human and not so much, had always scared him, but it had been the sort of fear that he could push aside and largely ignore until the problem was dealt with.

This, whatever it’d been?  It’d been fucking primal.

And he never wanted to feel that again.

So he shuts up, digs deep for the extra reserves he totally doesn’t have, and picks up the pace.  He doesn’t drop Peter’s hand.  He tries not to think about how, if Peter hadn’t been so quick to grab him, and Stiles had been left alone to race through the wet gloom of the Preserve, he’d most likely be dead right now.

They run for what could be another ten minutes, could be another hour. Stiles has no way of telling, phone dead and waterlogged in his pocket and he’s struggling.  The wet clothes are weighing him down, feet slipping across the forest floor more than before, and it’s only getting darker.

He’ll be damned if he says anything, though.  He cops enough shit from the pack as it is, being human and omega and thinking that he has what it takes to keep up with werewolves and alphas, because they’re jerks like that and he’s just stubborn enough to deny them the pleasure of being right even if it kills him.

Humans can do incredible things when their lives depend on it.  He saw that youtube video about that women that stopped a car from hitting her kid, yes he did, and he swears to god that if she could do it then so can he--

“Just a little further,” Peter says.

“Thank fucking Christ,” Stiles gasps.

Forget it.  He’s done.  Absolutely done, no energy left, no sir-ee.

Another handful of minutes and then they break through the treeline, staggering out into long grass and open skies.  The rain falls harder here, with no trees to act as a measly cover, which is just perfect, because it means Stiles can go longer than a couple of seconds without blinking the water out of his eyes and wishing his  hair was still short, if only so that it didn’t stick to his face like cold seaweed.  

Then Peter’s tugging him close, almost angling him so that Stiles is tucked into his side, and Stiles looks up, probably to ask him a flat why – they’re both soaked, the gesture is useless – when he sees what else is in the clearing, and instead ends up asking, “What?”

“We should be safe here,” Peter says, and starts forward, like he’s expecting Stiles to be okay camping out in some old house that looks, even in the dark, like it should’ve been torn down years ago for health violations.

Which, fine.  He wouldn’t be wrong – Stiles has always been freakishly adaptable to most things, and running for their lives during a freak storm is definitely a Thing – but, and Stiles is just putting this out there, really?

“With our luck?” He half snorts, half splutters.  “Doubt it.”

“So young,” Peter mutters, shaking his head.  “So cynical.”

“So old,” Stiles parrots, delighting in the way Peter tenses – so predictably – then relaxes.  “Such an asshole.”

Peter barks a laugh that’s drowned out by a sudden deluge.  

By unspoken agreement they both leg it across the remaining bit of what was likely once the front lawn and huddle underneath the overhang.

Stiles hugs his arms around himself while Peter fiddles with the lock. Kicks the toe of his shoe against the ground, bites his lip.

He must zone out, he thinks, because he jumps when the door swings open with a rusty shriek and Peter doesn’t look amused, only concerned, and doesn’t say anything smarmy before ushering Stiles inside.

“It’s safe,” Peter insists again, like he wants Stiles to believe him, and Stiles kind of wonders what his scent must be broadcasting, to get that tone in Peter’s voice.  “I promise.”

So Stiles looks over his shoulder at Peter strangely, a sort of ‘what gives?’ and sets off down the hallway.

The house is clearly old-fashioned.  All narrow and tight instead of the open and spacious.  It’s too dark to make out any detail, the little bit of diluted moonlight painted across the floor through the broken windows glinting dully off what Stiles assumes are bits of glass, maybe some metal fixings.

Peter is a steady presence at his back, a hand on his back.  The alpha is tense, strung tight like he’s on high alert and that’s making Stiles stress out even more, which is not fun and he kind of wants to tell Peter to chill out, only… This is Beacon Hills.  It’s the middle of the night.  Some creepy monster thingy is haunting the Preserve, and they’ve just spent the evening running for their lives.

In a town like this, you relax and you’re dead.  

In fact, a part of Stiles is actually, stupidly, rather pleased with the attention Peter’s giving him.  He feels like a priority, something important and it’s been so long since he felt like that…he just knows that’s the omega in him speaking, and firmly tells himself to knock it off.

“What is this place, anyway?” Stiles asks., figuring that, having nearly a decade and a half on him, Peter probably knows.  He doesn’t mean to be quiet, rarely ever is, yet something about this house reminds him of the Juniper Mausoleum he had to pass every time he went to visit his mom’s grave.

Peter is silent for long enough that Stiles labels it as hesitation, and opens his mouth to pester, when Peter finally talks.

“It’s my grandparent’s house.”

Stiles actually has to repeat the words back to himself before it sinks in.

“Wait what?”

Peter huffs a sigh.  “Of all the things – yes Stiles.  My grandparents lived here.  Happy?”

“No. I’m wet and I’m cold – what the hell happened to this place?”

“…”

“Peter?”

“They died.”

Well, Stiles considered, wincing.  Didn’t that just make him feel like a dick.

“Was it…?”  He isn’t sure what he want’s to ask.  Was it the fire? Hunters?  What?

And it’s like Peter reads his mind.  As the man maneuvers them up a flight of waterlogged stairs and into a room that Stiles is happy to see has all it’s window intact, Peter talks.

“It wasn’t the fire,” he begins.  “Though my father, Talia and I were never completely convinced that Hunter’s weren’t involved. They died when I was twelve.  Car accident, head on collision with a truck.”  He pauses, falling silent, and Stiles stands still as Peter drops his hand and moves away, heading towards what Stiles thinks might be an armchair.  “When they died… there are wards up around the clearing, still are.  When they died, this place, the house, the garden, everything, vanished.  Like it had never been here.  We spent years looking.  We could never find it.”

He watches Peter run his hands over the fabric and imagines the man must be trying to finds hints of familiar scents, doubts he’ll find anything after so long.

Stiles is lost for words.  They’re friends now – inasmuch as they wind up beside each other at pack meetings, and have a joint order at an Italian place that Stiles loves but can’t afford regularly and eats whenever he joins Peter for research at his apartment  – and Stiles has seen him with all manner of expressions and yet, this is maybe the most human Peter has ever been.

So he says, “I’m sorry,” and Peter waves his hand.

“It was a long time ago,” Peter says, voice light in a way that Stiles knows means the total opposite.  Peter pauses, then adds, “My mother was with them, in the car.”

“Jesus,” Stiles mutters before he can stop himself.  “You don’t have to, like, talk about it, or anything, not if you don’t want to.”

“Don’t you want to hear my story, Stiles?”

There’s an edge to his words, somethings Stiles can’t place, which makes him tip up his chin, makes him bristle like he’s been insulted. “Only if you want to tell it,” he says.

And maybe it was the right thing to say, because Peter seems to relax, shoulders no longer hunching forward, and he let’s out a quiet sound that might’ve been a laugh under different circumstances. “What’s a little more tragedy between us, right?”

Stiles snorts, and eases into the room, dropping his worry like yesterday’s laundry by the door.  There’s still a part of him that’s tense, keyed into every sound, every creak, but he’s not alone; he’s got Peter and, honestly?  That’s kind of reassuring.

“I wouldn’t call us tragic.”

“Then what would you call us?”

Stiles shrugs, and blinks and wonders at how everything is full of color, suddenly.  “Misplaced, I guess.”  

The colors makes his eyes hurt.  His head starts throbbing and he misses whatever Peter says when his blood starts rushing loudly through his ears and his fingertips go numb.

It reminds him of coming down from a sugar high as a child.

“Peter,” he says, or thinks he says, thinks he hears himself say, but he’s shaking so hard now he might not have said anything at all.  

And then Peter is right there, filling his vision.  He’s so close Stiles can feel his breath against his cheek but he’s blurry around the edges.  Sort of wobbly.

He swallows, focuses on not throwing up, whines, maybe, and lists forward.  “I don’t feel so good.”

“No,” Peter says.  “I imagine you don’t.  You’ve never Dropped before, have you.”

It’s not a question.  Stiles treats it as one, anyway.  “Almost once,” he says, and grabs onto Peter’s jacket because that is the only thing not spinning right now

He thinks of a funeral and the wreak of alcohol and the smell of a furious alpha.

Thinks of cold tiles and ambulance sirens and the fuzziness of medication. Thinks of being too young to understand what was happening.

“Oh god,” he groans, doesn’t fully register Peter grabbing him and holding him when he starts to sink down, legs folding beneath him. “Is that what this?  This can’t be happening.”

“It’s not ideal,” Peter agrees.  The world lurches, sways, making Stiles bury his face in Peter’s jacket, and the next time he resurfaces, it’s to find Peter has taken a seat in the armchair, and arranged Stiles so that he’s curled up his lap, feet free of his shoes, cold toes tucked between Peter’s thigh and the cushions, back pressed against the armrest.

“Just try and relax, sweetheart.”

And something just… slumps, inside him, goes warm and soft.

“That’s easy for you to say.”

Peter hums and Stiles kind of likes how it echoes through his own body, but then Peter is moving, jostling him around, and Stiles latches on, suddenly unbelievably terrified that he’s about to be displaced.

But Peter’s only awkwardly shrugging out of his jacket, which makes a certain amount of sense, being soaked through and all, and deftly flicking open the buttons of his shirt, baring his chest.

Stiles doesn’t even get the chance to appreciate the view before Peter is doing the same to him, shoving off his hoodie, sliding up his t-shirt.  The chill is immediate but Peter must’ve found a blanket somewhere and now covers him with it.

Stiles is certain he knows what Peter’s doing, positive he’s read about it, at least, and yet his brain isn’t making sense.  His throat is hot, bonding glands feeling swollen and puffy and his limbs basically useless.

“C’mere, sweetheart,” Peter says into his ear and Stiles huffs a whine and falls forward into the alpha’s warmth, into his strong grip.

He shoves his nose into alpha’s neck and inhales rapidly.  It’s maple syrup and warm blankets, sun-warmed soil with the bitter undertone of expensive coffee and something Stiles can’t name but craves anyway.

He probably isn’t under for longer than an hour.  Time passes and his mind… drifts, overcome by instinct and the overwhelming need to feel safe.

It feels like falling asleep, almost, stuck in that in-between where nothing feels real.

Wakefulness returns slowly, seeping in at the edges.  He is conscious of Peter’s hands running up his back, of his own hands curled into Peter’s chest.  The hint purr building in his chest tickles his throat and makes him blush, knowing how intimate that sort of reaction is, how intimate their position is; an unmated omega alone with an unmated alpha.  

His dad would lose his mind if he ever heard of this, which he was never going to if Stiles had anything to do with it.

Aside from their position though, Stiles feels… good.  Not better, still a little unsteady, but it isn’t as bad as before.

His fingers don’t feel like little ice-blocks, for one.  And he’s no longer shaking like some preteen that accidentally wondered into the horror showing in a cinema, which is wonderful, truly wonderful.  

Of course, there is the small matter – very small, certainly not a big deal at all – that he just Dropped for Peter.

Psycho Peter, whom the rest of the pack can’t stand and don’t trust.

Crazy Uncle Peter that pokes and needles until he’s got Derek looking ready to start throwing him through walls again, and drives everybody else insane.

Peter, who…

“Back with me, sweetheart?”

Peter who does things like that.  Calls him sweetheart and touches him like he’s something precious, something cared for, instead of a nuisance that’s too loud or too blunt or just too much.

Peter, who’s never mocked him for his dynamic, or put him down for instincts he can’t help.  Who always buys him his favorite coffee and orders in Italian food for him and never minds when Stiles just happens to fall asleep on his couch during a research binge because the house is empty and he’s so goddamn tired of being alone.

Peter, whom Stiles is just realizing he might be a little bit in love with, while sitting in his lap.

Talk about inopportune moments.

“… this is so embarrassing,” he mutters, feeling stiff and awkward.

Movement, then Peter’s fingers are tangling through his hair and tugging gently, sending a pleasant shiver down his spine.

Peter is quiet for awhile.

“It doesn’t have to be,” he says at last, quietly, like if he says it any louder, the meaning won’t be the same, will transform from something that makes Stiles’s heart stutter and race into something shallow and flippant.

Stiles swallows.  “You – you.  I, uh.”  He was not equipped to handle this kind of conversation.  “I am not equipped to handle this kind of conversation.”

“And what conversation would that be?”

Multitudes of snark appeared on the tip of his tongue, but he bites it back.  Breaths. Tries to get his thoughts in order.

“...you know very well what kind,” he settles on saying.

Peter doesn’t say anything in response to that.  He just sighs, turns his head so his nose is in Stiles’s hair, and somehow pulls Stiles closer.

It’s nice.  It’s so nice.  It’s the kind of nice that should be illegal and after the shitty night he’s had, Stiles is weak for it.

An illicit thrill runs through him when he thinks of what this would be like if Peter was his mate rather than just an alpha that his omega was sweet on… thinks of a soft bed and pillows that smell of both of them… thinks of purring, something he’s never done in front of anybody else before, ever.

“You are very young,” Peter says, sounding pained.

Stiles worries his bottom lip.  “I’m eighteen in two weeks,” he whispers, voice hitching.  He clears his throat, adds, “Besides. After everything that’s happened, am I really still that young? Are any of us?”

“The pack will never accept it.  Derek won’t accept it.”

“So? It’s none of their business.  I can do what I want.  Just because they don’t personally agree with what I do, doesn’t mean their opinion suddenly matters.”

“And Scott?”

“Scott,” Stiles starts, so sure of what he was going to say only to falter, because… because what if Scott didn’t understand?  Derek and the pack were one thing.  Stiles felt semi-responsible for them, mostly because he’d helped save all of their lives at some point, and that meant something, you know? ��But Scott was his brother, they’d grown up together, and Scott still looked at Peter like he was never going to be anything but a spree-killing monster.

He made a helpless sound, frustrated and confused.

Peter soothed him, humming unintelligibly into his hair.  

“Let’s not talk about this now.  You’re e--”

“If you say I’m emotional, I swear to god I will hurt you.”

“-exhausted. Don’t lie to yourself, you’re running on fumes right now, and I am not a good enough man to let you regret anything else you might say tonight.”

“Fine.”

“Okay.”

“Just because you’re being reasonable.”

“Thank you, sweetheart.  Now, why don’t you try and get some sleep?  The wards won’t let anything through.”

“...why’d it let us through, then?”

“They were once keyed to Hales.  You were with me.”

“So… what would’ve happened if I hadn’t been with you?”

“Likely something suitably horrible.”

“Wow, great.”

****

They don’t ever really talk about it.  The next day, when the storm’s passed and everything is yellow-wet and sweet, Peter steers them through the Preserve, back to town.  They come out two streets over from Stiles’s house.

After… nothing really changes.  They spend time together, do things together.  Nobody notices.  Or, if they do, they don’t say anything.  The Sheriff isn’t home enough to notice how often his son is out, and when he is home, Stiles is careful to not make it so blatantly obvious that he’s spending at least three nights a week in a bed that isn’t his. It’s not like he’s trying to hide anything, exactly.  Just, he knows his dad, okay?  Knows exactly how much he would freak out if he knew what was going on and… well, sue him but he likes what he has now, and he doesn’t want to ruin it.

Outside of that, being with Peter and researching and hanging out with the pack, Stiles graduates, and seriously thinks about what he wants to do with the rest of his life, which leads to him hunting down a mage that’s willing to be his mentor in return for free labor and a research assistant and moving halfway across the country.

Peter is with him every step of the way and officially begins courting him on his twentieth birthday.

By his twenty second, they’re mated and back in Beacon Hills and Stiles is incandescently happy with the way his life is going and Peter is leading him through the Preserve after making him promise to keep his eyes closed.

Stiles does, reluctantly.

It’s spring, the day warm and the woods seemingly come to life with bird song and the quick scamper of small animals across the ground.

Peter’s hand is a familiar weight in his, fingers laced together in a way that should be awkward but isn’t and Stiles is busy cursing how no amount of training will ever make him the kind of graceful that means he isn’t always tripping over himself and--

Peter slows them to a stop, and Stiles has the sense that they’ve come to a clearing, sunlight warm on his face.

The air is filled with the subtle scent of flowers and fresh grass and there’s a sort of hush that’s fallen over the place, like even the birds have gone quiet in anticipation.

Peter steps up behind him, presses against his back, arms going around his waist.  Stiles relaxes against him, not bothering to hide his smile, or the way his scent goes mellow-sweet.

“Open your eyes, sweetheart,” Peter tells him, and Stiles does.

His breath catches.  

“Oh my god,” he says, staring.  He can’t help it.  He’s thought of the house often, wondered what it looked like in the daylight.  In the months after, he’d even thought of asking Peter to take him out again, show him around, but Peter had never mentioned it, not once, and Stiles had figured that it was one of those things that had too many bad memories to outweigh the good but…

“Peter,” he says.  “You…”

“I bought it,” Peter responds.  “Fixed it up.”  Then, while Stiles is still staring and speechless because the house is beautiful and equal parts Peter’s taste in architecture and Stiles’s taste in color, Peter shifts so he can press a kiss to the bondmark on his neck and says, “Consider this my mating gift to you.”

And Stiles breathes in, trying, and probably failing to contain his excitement, and says, “It’s perfect.”

And you know what?  It kind of really is.

[ladyryukyo]

spicy sweet potato chips

inspired by this incredible art piece by @artisadie 

ao3 link

It has recently come to Ryo's attention that he is, it seems, perplexingly, a father figure to an unreasonable amount of children. Yes, that is apparently a Thing.

Ryo doesn't know who decided that all of these reckless, brave, stupid, brilliant kids should be put under his supervision but he would like a word or two with the responsible authorities. Where are these kids' parents? Who thought giving a twelve-year-old a spinning top with the necessary power to kill a man and then telling him to save the world from evil would be a good idea? Ryo doesn't actually know if any of them are twelve years old, all children look the same to him, even if one of them is his own kid. He just knows that there is no one to look out for them so he doesn't even hesitate to step up to the challenge.

Not everyone of the children immediately likes the idea of being supervised (protected). Some have been on their own for so long that they believe they can protect themselves better than any adult ever could (and he's not naming any names but he finds that Kyoya is the worst of them all). Ryo tries to respect their need for independence but- Ryo is stubborn. He'll wear them down.

Ryo knows that he finally succeeded when, one weekend in the middle of the night, he is woken by glass clinking outside of his bedroom. A glance at the too bright screen of his phone on the nightstand tells him that it is two in the morning and decidedly not the time for anyone to be surprise-visiting. He grabs Burn Fireblaze from its place on the window sill and prepares himself for whatever burglar was unfortunate enough to choose Ryo's apartment for a break-in.

When he steps into the kitchen with his launcher raised, the sight that greets him stuns him badly enough that he freezes for a good fifteen seconds. Kyoya glances at him briefly but seems to decide that he is not an immediate problem and sips calmly from his water glass. On the counter, Ryo can see two bottles of milk and the last bag of Ryo's favorite spicy sweet potato chips. The only light illuminating the strange scene is a streetlamp shining through the window and the light coming from the half-opened door of the fridge.

"Hey, dude. What are you doing here?" Ryo asks when he finally manages to unfreeze himself and lowers his launcher. He is a little embarrassed but he's not going to show it in front of the teenager who broke into his kitchen and stole his chips. He is not.

Kyoya looks between Ryo and the milk on the kitchen counter. He puts down his glass of water. "I ran out of milk," he says.

"Ah." They both pause. Ryo fidgets with his launcher and Kyoya drains the rest of his water. Ryo feels increasingly awkward. "How did you even get in?"

"The window lock is broken."

Ryo pauses, furrows his brows and throws Kyoya an incredulous look. "We're on the second floor."

"Yes," Kyoya says and doesn't elaborate further. He grabs the milk and chips from the kitchen counter and squeezes past Ryo through the doorway. "Bye. Sorry for... disturbing you."

The front door clicks shut behind him and Ryo is left staring at the wooden surface, thoroughly confused. He takes another look at the clock, sees that it's still two in the morning and decides this is a problem for his future self when he has had enough sleep and more brain capacity to think about this. He quietly mourns his chips and goes back to bed.

It doesn't take long for it to become routine.

The next time Kyoya surprises Ryo in his own kitchen, it's fortunately way past the middle of the night and Ryo is eating noodles directly out of the pot. He looks up when he hears his window sliding open and they make eye contact while Kyoya climbs in and jumps gracefully over the sink. It's not the first time Kyoya has done this since that strange two am encounter that Ryo isn't even a hundred percent sure actually happened. He knows this because in the last few days he noticed his spicy sweet potato chips going missing right after he went to buy three new bags. Kyoya stealing them is the only explanation he could come up with unless there are other people breaking into his apartment and taking nothing except for his chips and that just doesn't seem very likely.

Kyoya doesn't say anything when he opens Ryo's fridge like it's their regular Thursday afternoon, just raises an eyebrow at Ryo's noodles-out-of-pot situation. Ryo doesn't think Kyoya has room to judge considering that he's stealing from Ryo's fridge once again. Ryo is a functioning adult with adult eating habits, okay? He has to remind himself that despite his attitude and general approach to life saying otherwise, Kyoya is still a teenager. If Ryo knows anything about teenagers, it's that they're always hungry and just plain fucking weird.

He watches as Kyoya pulls out the last bottle of orange juice and chugs it straight out of the container while continuing to rifle through the fridge's contents. Exhibit A.

"I'm getting you a key," Ryo says suddenly. Kyoya barely pauses in his search for something edible that meets his standards but hums - in agreement, Ryo is fairly sure. He nods to himself, encouraged in his plans. Kyoya looks at him, sees him nodding, frowns and turns back towards his orange juice.

"You don't have any more chips, do you?"

Ryo snorts quietly at that. "No." And whose fault is that?

Kyoya purses his lips unhappily, and closes the fridge. "Buy more." He leaves the orange juice opened on the counter when he (once again) squeezes past Ryo to exit through the front door. He didn't even close the window, Ryo thinks resignedly, before going to close it himself.

The next day at the supermarket he looks at the three bags of chips in his shopping cart, struggles briefly with taking orders from a teenager, and then adds five more.

About a month later, one of Kyoya's raids coincides with a visit from Gingka. It was only a matter of time until this happened, Ryo knows this, but he still feels unspeakably weird about the whole thing. It's like two worlds that shouldn't collide colliding. It's, well, weird.

Gingka is telling him about his latest fight with Kenta, his eyes alight with excitement about the close outcome, when they suddenly hear the front door open. Gingka falters in his retelling and shoots Ryo a confused look. Process of elimination tells Ryo that this has to be Kyoya because the only other person who has a key to his apartment is Hikaru and she never shows up unannounced (as opposed to Kyoya who always shows up unannounced). He doesn't know what to tell Gingka other than shrug and watch what happens.

As always, Kyoya doesn't say a word to greet Ryo or announce his presence when he enters. They hear him rustling in the kitchen for a moment before he finally pops his head into the living room. His eyes widen almost imperceptibly when he sees Gingka.

"Hey, dude," Ryo greets him in an attempt to squash any awkwardness before it can occur. "What's up?"

Kyoya's eyes linger briefly on Gingka. It seems even he knows that this is kind of weird. "You're out of eggs," he eventually says and disappears back into the kitchen.

Gingka is staring very intensely at Ryo. Ryo squirms uncomfortably under his gaze but doesn't really know what to say to explain the situation. Yes, this is normal. Kyoya, your friend that usually avoids people but his own friends especially, steals from my fridge regularly, about twice a week. No, we haven't really talked about it. Yes, he has a key.

"Kyoya has a key to your apartment?" is what Gingka decides to focus on. "I don't even have a key to your apartment!" Okay, maybe Ryo can sort of understand why this is a concern for his one and only son.

"I can have one made for you," Ryo tries even though he knows that this isn't the actual problem. Gingka just continues to look at him, obviously weirded out.

Kyoya chooses this moment to pass the doorway of the living room with six bags of spicy sweet potato chips in his arms, one of which is held between his teeth. Gingka looks frantically between Ryo and Kyoya like he can't believe that this is happening right now, trying to discern who of the both of them is more qualified to explain this to him. It probably says a lot about Ryo that Gingka ultimately turns to Kyoya and his chips and ignores Ryo completely. Ryo gapes at his son's back but only Kyoya is in a position to see it. He openly snickers at Ryo's expression, the sixth bag of chips falling to the floor at his feet. It seems everyone is a traitor in this family.

"Are you," Ryo and Kyoya both turn back to Gingka, "are you stealing my dad? Is that what's happening here?"

Kyoya is shaking his head before the question fully leaves Gingka's lips. "No. Definitely not. You can keep him."

Ryo is so offended. He has never been insulted like this before. Inexplicably, he feels the urge to clutch his metaphorical pearls to his chest like a scandalized noblewoman, but realizes that's a tad too dramatic even for him before he can completely embarrass himself.

"Then what are you guys doing?" Kyoya and Ryo exchange a look over Gingka's head. Kyoya's eyebrows are raised almost imperceptibly. Ryo raises one shoulder then drops it back down when Kyoya frowns. Gingka is looking rapidly between the two of them, incredulity increasing. "Hello? Dad?"

Ryo straightens abruptly. "Right, yes." He turns to Kyoya. "What are we doing?" Gingka's frustrated groan quickly turns into a snort of reluctant amusement.

Kyoya rolls his eyes. "I'm going home. This is getting ridiculous." His gaze falls on the bag of chips he dropped on the floor. For a short moment, Ryo thinks he's going to ask one of them to hand it to him but then he doesn't. It's a shame. Ryo would have loved the image of Gingka holding up the bag of chips and Kyoya yanking it out of his grip with his teeth. He grins just thinking about it.

"Bye, dude. Get home safely."

Kyoya doesn't reply to that, of course, but he doesn't slam the front door shut with as much force as he could have so Ryo is counting this is as a win. When he turns toward Gingka, he is frowning at the bag of chips Kyoya left on the floor. He looks up at Ryo.

"Is that the last bag of your spicy sweet potato chips?"

Ryo stares at his son for a few seconds then puts his head in his hands. Unsurprised but mourning his loss nevertheless, he says, “Yes. Yes, that's the last one.”

[knightofthecourt]

Love Bites - Chapter 1

Belatrice Gray was a TA at Belgrave University, working hard to stay on top of her marking and trying not to flunk her own studies, when a night out with her bff Randall and his roommates, changed everything.  

Hamish Duke x OC fiction with fluff, romance and angst. OC description purposefully left out to allow for reader personalisation.

“I call this one a Wolf Bite.” Hamish set the tall glasses down in front of Randall and Bela, smiling as they both took a sip, and then another immediately. 

“Haim, this is amazing.” Bela said as Randall nodded in agreement. Her lips quirked up in delight, causing a rush of warmth to radiate throughout Hamish’s chest.  

He seated himself across from her, trying to ignore the sudden fluttering in his stomach. 

Belatrice Gray - Bela, to her friends - had transferred to Belgrave’s Linguistics department from a college on the West Coast at the start of the year. After Randall was assigned as her tour guide during orientation they’d become fast friends and now the RA spent almost as much time with her as he did with Hamish, Lilith and Jack. 

Though Hamish was usually reluctant to let the others bring friends back to the Den, when Randall finally introduced them to Bela he’d instantly made an exception for her. Not only was she sweet, funny and smarter than anyone else he’d met at Belgrave, she was also fair with the students under her guidance as a TA, and a loyal and caring friend to Randall - qualities that Hamish admired greatly. 

As Bela became a semi-regular fixture at their nights out, nights in and revision sessions, Hamish had found himself making an effort to be around whenever Bela was present. 

They’d spent many afternoons this semester studying in the Den’s comfy living room and as finals drew closer, Randall regularly recruited Bela for last minute cramming sessions. This afternoon it was Advanced Anatomy, with a side of Diagnostic Reasoning.  

The dark haired man sighed and flopped down next to Bela on the shabby-but-comfortable sofa. She shifted as he jostled the cushions, almost knocking her book out of her hands. 

From his armchair Hamish could see Bela reach over and run her hand up and down Randall’s arm in a soothing gesture. “You’ll get there.” She said, still focused on her work. “You know this stuff already, you’re just tired.”  

Randall scoffed. “That’s easy for you to say. I can’t believe you dropped out of Pre Med - your grasp of the human body is truly astounding.” 

“Yeah, my mother can’t either,” Bela joked. 

“Another thing you and the Ham-ster have in common.” 

Hamish winced at the nickname, but let it go. Randall was tired, after all. 

Bela frowned, “A good grasp of the human body?” 

Randall, who had taken this moment to have a sip of his drink, choked on his mouthful.  

Hamish reached over to pat his friend on the back. “Disappointing our parents.” he bowed his head slightly, “I was Pre Law.”

“Really? “ Bela said, raising an eyebrow. “When I imagine you in a courtroom, I put you in handcuffs.”

“Is that something you imagine regularly?” Hamish flashed her a smile. She laughed. 

“Jesus,” Randall muttered under his breath, just loud enough for Hamish’s enhanced hearing to pick up. “If I don’t choke to death on my drink, the sexual tension in this room is going to smother me.” 

He leapt up from his chair, narrowly avoiding the pillow that sailed past his head. “Anyone want a snack? I need popcorn.”  

As he headed to the kitchen Hamish turned his attention to Bela. She was chewing on the end of a pen, lost in the pages of her textbook. His breath hitched as the afternoon light filtering in through the windows caught the edges of her hair, lighting a halo around her. 

“Bels?” 

“Mmhm?” 

“Randall mentioned you’re swamped with work at the moment?” 

“Oh?” Bela made a face. “Yeah, Professor Liebernacht dumped all of his marking on me again - big surprise. I have to grade ninety Syntactic Theory papers by the end of the week.” 

“How about we mark papers together tonight?” Hamish tried to keep his voice light and even to disguise the hammering in his chest. “I have practise tests to get through, it’s going to take hours. Maybe we could get a take-out, keep each other company?” 

“Oh.” She looked up from her book. “Yeah, that would be great actually. As long as you make me one of your signature cocktails too?” 

A smile lit up his face. “I can make you as many cocktails as you like, I think we probably both need a drink this far into finals season.”  

“Great idea Ham-and-cheese!” Randall said, returning with a large bowl clutched to his chest. “Hey Lil,” He yelled up the stairs, “Big night out tonight with Hamish and Bela, let’s blow off some steam.” 

“What? No, that’s not what I-” Hamish began in protest. 

“I’m in.” Lilith appeared in the hallway. “But I get to choose the bar this time, the last one Bela chose was lame.” 

“Hey,” Bela objected. 

“Cool, I’ll tell Jack and Alyssa.” Randall sat down, setting the popcorn on the coffee table in front of him, and pulled out his phone. “Meet here at 8pm?” 

Bela looked from Randall to Hamish, who was glaring daggers at his friend. She shrugged. 

“Great!” Randall’s phone buzzed. “They’re in. Thanks, Haim. We could all do with a break tonight - your papers can wait until tomorrow, can’t they?” 

Hamish bit back his disappointment. “I guess they’ll have to.”

- - - - -

“Dude, you have to stop.” 

Randall placed a hand firmly over Hamish’s, stilling the older man’s fingers. He’d been drumming his nails on their table for the past ten minutes and even with the music in the club drowning out the sound, it was extremely irritating. 

“What’s up with you tonight?” 

“Nothing.” Hamish lied, freeing his hand from Randall’s grasp.  

Randall’s suspicion grew as he followed Hamish’s gaze to the bar where Jack, Bela and Alyssa were ordering a round of shots. 

“Fine.” Hamish groaned, when he noticed Randall surveying Bela. “It’s just weird. I asked Bela on a date and now we’re all hanging out together.” 

Randall’s eyes almost popped out of his head. “What?! You finally asked her out? When the hell did that happen?” 

“This afternoon. I asked her to hang out tonight.” 

“But did you really?” Lillith smirked over the top of her glass. “I’m not sure she realised you were actually asking her out.” 

“When did this happen?” Randall frowned “And how come you know about it when I don’t Lil?”

“Duh. I’m a werewolf.” She shrugged. “I can hear everything in that house.”  

“You were there, Randall.” said Hamish, glancing over at Bela who, thankfully was still out of earshot.

“Oh.” Randall’s eyes widened. “That was a date? Hamish, I totally blocked you!” 

“He blocked himself.” Lillith shook her head. “In what world is asking someone to mark papers with you a date?”

“I know.” Hamish rubbed his neck. “I thought it might be a good jumping off point? Actually spending some time alone together.”

A smile worked its way across Randall’s face. “Well if it’s alone time you want, you only had to ask!” 

“Randall, don’t” Hamish hissed. 

“Don’t what?” Jack asked, placing a tray of shots down in front of his friends. Bela slipped into the booth next to Hamish, brushing his thigh with hers as she slid across to make space for Alyssa and Jack.  

Randall grabbed a shot and threw it back. “Jack, Alyssa - Lillith was just telling me how much she wanted to dance.” He said, barely pausing to take breath.   

“No I - Ow.” Lillith bared her teeth at Randall. She jerked her leg out of his reach, massaging the sore spot on her left shin. “Yeah,” she agreed, “I totally want to dance. On the dance floor. With people. Hamish you stay here and look after our shit.” 

She grabbed Jack’s arm and yanked him from the booth before he could pick up his drink. Randall followed her, gesturing for Alyssa to join them. 

Bela and Hamish sat in stilted silence for a moment before Hamish cleared his throat. “You can go and dance if you want to, I don’t mind looking after everything.” 

“Actually, I’m good here.” Bela said.

Hamish’s cheeks glowed as he returned her easy smile.  

Bela was enjoying spending time with Randall and his friends but she couldn’t deny that she’d rather be grading papers with Hamish tonight. At first Randall has requested that they hang out at the Den as it was quieter than the dorms and closer to the campus than her apartment, but recently it had been at Bela’s insistence that they’d studied there. Bela hadn’t been sure if Randall realised it was because she wanted an excuse to spend time with Hamish, but his not so subtle attempt at leaving them alone to go ‘dancing’, had pretty much just confirmed that he knew about her crush. 

Bela cringed. Hopefully Hamish didn’t realise that their friend was playing matchmaker, that would just be too embarrassing.

“Bels?” Hamish was staring at her in confusion. Bela realised he’d been talking to her this whole time. 

“Sorry,” she stuttered, “what were you saying?”  

As he leaned forward in his chair the club’s strobe lights cast his face in shadow, picking out the contours of his high cheekbones and strong jaw. Bela’s gaze followed the line up from his neck, to his full lips and then up to his eyes, which were trained on her. 

“I was asking if you wanted to hang out tomorrow instead. I know I said grading papers but we could do something else if you want? There’s a new sci-fi film on at the student lounge or we could go out to eat.” He tipped his head towards the dance floor. “Lillith informed me that grading papers isn’t really a date activity.” 

Bela felt a well of happiness bubble up. So Hamish was actually asking her out? She hadn’t been sure before.

“She’s wrong,” Bela shook her head. “Anything can be a date if you’re with the right person.” As a smile flooded Hamish’s face her lips turned up to mirror his.

“You know you haven’t said yes, yet.”

Bela paused, as if considering his proposal. “Actually, I’m hungry now. Do you want to get some-”

“Yes,” Hamish interrupted before she finished. He beamed at her. “Let’s go, I’ll tell the others we’re leaving.”

“Great,” said Bela, “I’m just going to grab my coat. I’ll meet you outside.”   

As they made their way across the club neither of them noticed the figure watching them from the other side of the room. 

- - - - -

If you ignored the distant bass leaking from the building’s windows it could almost be considered peaceful out here, Bela thought. She inhaled the fresh, cool air, enjoying how it chased away the faint buzz in her temples, and leaned against a wall, scrolling through her phone as she waited for Hamish.  

“Hey,” a voice broke through the night. “You’re Bela, right?” 

Bela turned to find a young man next to her. He was wearing a Belgrave t-shirt under a fitted plaid shirt, and his dirty blonde hair was cropped in a trendy cut. Despite looking like every other rich, entitled frat boy on Bela’s course, as he grinned up at her his face was pleasant. 

“Uh, yeah,” Bela frowned in confusion. He looked vaguely familiar. “Do I know you?” 

“Tanner Jeffries - I’m new to the Linguistics department.” He held out a hand, shaking hers firmly when she placed her palm in his. 

He chuckled lightly, making his cheeks dimple. “I know what you’re thinking -  why oh, why would anyone join Linguistics? Well, I’m a glutton for punishment. I just couldn’t resist meeting the notorious Professor Liebernacht.” 

“He’s the worst,” Bela confirmed, with a small laugh “I’ll be surprised if we have any students left after this year.”

“Yeah, you should see his reviews on Rate My Prof.”

“I know,” Bela couldn’t help but return his smile. “Half of those are from his TAs.” 

Tanner chuckled again. He reached up to rub the side of his neck and shot her an apologetic look. “Hey, I know this is a bit weird but my car’s not starting. I was going to ask for a flashlight in the club so I can check out the engine but… could I borrow the light on your phone. It’ll just take a minute.” 

“Uh-” Bela hesitated. She threw a brief glance over her shoulder at the club’s entrance. “Yep, sure. No problem.”  

The parking lot beside the club was eerily vacant, considering how many people were packed into the heaving room. As they walked towards the only car there, a blue four wheel drive in the corner of the lot, Tanner dropped behind her, digging around his pockets for his keys.

Bela turned to the car, “Ok, where’s the latch-” 

As Tanner’s hand clamped over her face she let out a startled shriek.

Bela’s thoughts filled with panic. She acted on instinct, struggling against his hold as Tanner’s other arm twisted around her waist, almost lifting her off the floor. Her fingers scrambled to find purchase, finally catching around his shirt, which she pulled sharply, trying to throw him off balance.  

He grunted with effort, blocking her mouth to stifle her screams. “You don’t need to make this - urgh -  any harder. Dormitum Dimittatur.” 

Bela slumped in his arms. 

- - - - -

As Hamish predicted, Randall was incredibly happy that he was taking Bela out to eat. He’d thrown his arms around Hamish’s neck and tipsily mumbled about how his best friends were falling in love for almost ten minutes, until Lillith had taken pity on the older man and peeled Randall off him, promising they’d all meet back at the Den in a few hours.  

Hamish hurried out of the club, keen to find Bela and start their date, but she was nowhere to be found.

He frowned. It wasn’t like Bela to just up and leave without telling them. Even if she’d changed her mind about going out with him she would have just said - wouldn’t she? 

After pacing in front of the club for a few moments he managed to pick up the faint scent of her perfume on the cold night breeze - sometimes being a werewolf was really useful. He followed the trail around the side of the building, frowning again when he reached the parking lot.  

This doesn’t make sense, he thought, an uneasy feeling settling in his stomach. They’d walked to the club and none of them were in a state to drive anywhere tonight. Maybe the alcohol was throwing off his game. He pulled out his phone and dialed Bela’s number, silently thanking Tundra as his enhanced hearing picked up the sound of vibration. 

As Hamish followed it to the edge of the lot, his breathing quickened and the unease grew into dread. 

“Oh no,” he whispered, kneeling beside the glowing object. 

It was Bela’s phone, lying face up in the gravel.

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #335

“on my forehead, a birthmark  /  remove it with the kiss of a knife  /  even if it causes me to die”

Do you recover well from surgery? Judging by the two surgeries I've had, oh yeah. I was hyper as hell when I came home from getting tubes put in my ears as a little kid, even though the doctor said I'd be very sleepy. Then, after my cyst removal, I was put on very strong painkillers but was still warned it was going to be a painful recovery, when it totally wasn't. I literally only took painkillers the first day. What addictions have you had? Caffeine, technology. Would you change your name if you became famous? Nah. If Cupid were real, would you hire him to make someone love you? No. I don't want somebody forced to love me. Ever been to an auction? No. Which word(s) do you generally use to describe someone attractive? (e.g. “fit”, “sexy”) It kinda varies with gender. Women I tend to call "beautiful" or "gorgeous," sometimes "hot" or "cute," while men I usually refer to as "handsome" or "hot"/"sexy." The last person you kissed - are they older or younger than you? She's a bit younger. When was the last time someone wanted you to do something, and you refused? Hm. I dunno. I have a hard time saying "no," so. When was the last time you had Pop Tarts? What flavour were they? Many months ago; I kinda stopped eating them because they're truly not filling and just a load of sugar that veils itself as an actual breakfast choice. But anyway, I liked the chocolate sundae ones. Have you ever felt a temperature below 0? No. Did you ever play Spyro? I LOVE!!!!!!!!!!!! SPYRO!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Those games were my CHILDHOOD, and it's half the reason I'm dying for a PS4 to play the remastered trilogy. Speaking of which, it'd be awesome if they remade the The Legend of Spyro trilogy as well. I might just like those games more than the originals, but that's a bold statement I'm unsure about. Have you ever dated someone who was of a foreign origin? I dated a Hispanic guy for less than a day. Have you ever read any of your idols’ books/autobiographies? Ozzy Osbourne's, yes. I'm just fucking waiting for Mark to write one, but he's always said he has so little interest in writing about his life. DO IT, YOU FUCK. Do you own any succulents? No. I think they're pretty, though. Do you have a drone? No. What’s your favorite Netflix series? *shrug* What is something a lot of people like but you don’t? Summertime. The heat, the humidity (at least here), the sunburn from just standing outside for ten minutes... I hate all of it. The ONLY two things I enjoy about summer is swimming and then flowers, though spring is the more floral season here anyway. Do you have revenge fantasies that you never actually play out? They've... happened. Did your first real significant other change you at all? Pretty sure forever. Are you waiting to have sex until you’re married? Once upon a time, that was the plan. Now, nah. I'd just want to be in a healthy, stable, and long-term relationship. What do you think about divorce? It's sad, but necessary for some people in order to be happy, which everyone has the right to be. I used to be very firmly against divorce except in extreme cases like abuse, etc., and I'm still definitely no fan of it and think couples should do their best to work things out, but it's incredibly unfair to believe that someone should be stuck for the rest of their life with a person they just don't love anymore. Getting married can be a mistake; don't damn people forever to be chained to their bad decisions. Do you remember the first time your heart broke? What was the reason? It was probably when Dad just abandoned us. What's the worst prank someone has ever done to you? I don't think anyone's ever pulled a sick joke on me. Have you ever seen someone sleepwalk? Yes; my little sister deadass tried to walk outside late at night. Thank God I was on the computer in the living room and stopped her. What song are you listening to right now? I just turned "Mutter" by Rammstein on. When is the last time you cursed? I'm not re-reading, but I have probably cursed fifty times in this survey already. It's so deeply ingrained into my vocabulary. Are there any words on your shirt? No; it's just a plain gray tank top. Why do you forward forwards? I never do because they annoy the fuck out of me. How many people are you interested in at the moment? Just one in a healthy and logical way. I can't be truly interested in Jason because like come on I haven't spoken to him in four whole years. My PTSD just ensures I never forget the memory of who he was, who probably no longer even exists. I mean, look how much I'VE changed in four years. Do you know any mechanical stuff about cars? Nnnnope. Who was the last person (apart from family) that you spent time with? What did you get up to? Apart from family, I have no idea. If you have pets, when was the last time one of them got on your nerves? Venus never does, but Roman can get on my nerves sometimes when I don't let him lay on me when I'm on the laptop in bed. He's a large cat (not overweight, just a big male cat) and blocks the screen big time unless he lies down properly, which he doesn't always do. He still tends to win when he tries to come over, but sometimes I'll block him with my arm, and this spoiled brat will actually slap it a few times before walking away lmao. Would you rather live in a house with a swimming pool or an indoor cinema? Absolutely a pool. I want one badly. Do you own a credit card? If so, do you currently owe any money on it? Could you afford to pay it off tomorrow if necessary? No. How many hours of sleep do you typically get each night? Is that enough to function or would you rather have more? Especially lately, I don't get nearly enough. Like at the time I'm answering this question, it's 4 AM, and I've been up for almost a couple hours. I struggle with falling asleep, I will ALWAYS wake up at least once in the night, and I jerk awake from nightmares regularly still. It's a big reason why I pretty much require naps. Does your house have a loft/basement? Are they functional or do you just use them for storage? We only have an attic. Do you suffer from road rage? What kind of thing tends to set you off or wind you up while driving? No. I'm way too timid of a driver to get that outwardly pissy about stupid people. I'd just judge them in silence, haha. What kind of animal did you last see in the wild? Is that a common sight where you live? Because of just how common they are, I'm going to assume this excludes birds, in which case it was probably a squirrel? Yeah, the normal brown ones are common. Do you post a lot on social media? If so, what kind of thing do you tend to post on there? Since I was fucking stupid enough to post a suicide note on Facebook (I don't want to hear a goddamn thing about "attention seeking," I genuinely wanted to say goodbye), I almost never, ever, share things about my personal life. Even before, it was rare for me to actually share what's going on with me. All I really do now is share relatable, wholesome, or funny shit I find, as well as political things I'm in firm agreement with. What are some habits you have in common with your parents? I pace like my dad, and it drives people crazy because it apparently makes them anxious? I can't think of an obvious one I have with Mom, but I'm sure one exists. Where's your favourite place to swim - the ocean, a pool, river, lake etc? I feel safest and most clean in a pool, but c'mon, swimming in the ocean is so much fun. When you're saving your place in a book, do you use a bookmark or fold your pages down? Or something else? It depends on the book, it seems. Especially if someone else owns it, like in school or something. Is any part of your body hurting at the moment? Is there a specific incident that caused the pain? My legs always hurt. I've shared enough as to why; it wasn't an actual, singular "incident." What was the last thing to make you laugh out loud? OH MY FUCKING GOD. So in group therapy the other day, one of the girls had her bearded dragon out, and he was being aggressive. I think he tried to bite her aND SHE SAID WITHOUT REALIZING HER MIC WAS ON, "fucking dickhead," and everyone d i e d. She's a really cool chick, I'll miss her when I'm finished with PHP. Who was the last person you heard sing? Myself, surprisingly enough. I barely ever sing. Do you bite your lips a lot? Yes, especially when they're dry. .-. What part of your body would you never get pierced? Anyone who gets a piercing "down there" has a greater pain tolerance than this bitch right here. Have you ever dated someone with tattoos? Juan had quite a few. I don't remember if Tyler did... but I think maybe a The Legend of Zelda-related one? Have you ever failed gym in school? No. Are you scared of dogs? No; I love dogs. What is the saddest movie you’ve ever seen? Man, idk, I'm a little bitch when it comes to emotional movies. The Boy in the Striped Pajamas is high up there, as is of course Johnny Got His Gun. Old Yeller, too. Which one of your friends is most likely to be famous one day? Why? Sara's gonna write a fuckin book series ok you can't convince me otherwise. What is the worst present you have ever gotten? Damn dude, what an ungrateful question. I'm just appreciative someone even thought TO give me something. Do you shave your arms? My armpits, yes, but not my arms themselves. How many people have you dated? I only count three as even remotely serious: Jason, Sara, and Girt. Have you ever performed in a play? I remember back in Sunday school as a tiny kid I played Mother Mary in one we did in class. Do you chew gum? I have been more lately since my doc upped the dosage of one of my mood stabilizers (which I think is actually helping); I mention that because apparently a side effect is dry mouth, and it's the fucking Sahara in there. He advises those who deal with it to always carry around hard candy or something like that for the sake of forcing salivation, so gum works for me. How old were you when you first started dating? I was in the 7th grade when I had my first "boyfriend," but it was total puppydog love. I started dating my first "real" bf when I was just shy of 16. Are/were your parents strict? Dad, no. Mom, only to a degree that I feel was pretty reasonable. She only ever wanted to prepare us to be functional, independent adults. Didn't work so well on me though, ha... Do you wear glasses? Yes. God, I need new ones. I'm blind as hell. What do you miss most about your childhood? Being so outgoing and happy to just be weird lil me. Do you write “To-Do” lists? Not really, no, but I do have notes on my phone about a couple things, like a bulleted list of planned monetary investments by importance, as well as a list of drawing ideas. Do you have a favorite quote? What is it? I don't, really. There's loads I like, but no one favorite. Could you survive as a vegetarian? I pretty desperately want to, but I don't know if it's realistic. I am so, SO picky, and without meat, it's very questionable as to where I'd get an adequate source of protein. I still want to try again though once I'm at my goal weight. Has anyone ever asked you for your autograph? Lol no. Has someone of the opposite sex ever told you that you were sexy? Yeah, but that was a looong time ago when I was actually some semblance of pretty. Do you prefer to take your showers at night or in the morning? I used to be someone who firmly stood by nighttime showers, but now I'm all about them in the morning. It's a nice way to wake up and start the day with productivity. Could you handle living with a male roommate? I mean, I lived with my then-boyfriend once, but I'm going to assume you'd consider him more than a "roommate." We lived with our two other friends, though, also a couple, and I was totally fine with living with them. Has anyone taken their shirt off in front of you? Yes. Do you like Freddy Krueger? His concept is very scary, but all the movies I've seen bits of have always been super cheesy. Which do you prefer, Naruto or One Piece? I haven't seen either and really aren't interested. What do you think of Rob Zombie? I've never really watched his movies, but I'm a fan of his music. What’s you fetish? I don't have one. Have you ever been in the “friend zone?" Well, what I'd call a "fake" one with Jason after the breakup until I was blocked on Facebook. I know now he absolutely did not want to be friends; he was trying to appease me. Is the area you live in more liberal or conservative? Definitely conservative. Do you know anyone who had to have tubes put in their ears as a baby? Yeah, me. Were either of your parents baptized? I'm certain Mom was, but idk about Dad. I think so. The last concert that you were at, was there a mosh pit? No. What was the last computer game that you played? World of Warcraft. Does your bathroom have a theme to it? No. Are any rooms in your house themed? No. What was the last thing that you recorded? I think Mom and I singing "happy birthday" to my late dog Teddy; we knew it would be his last. Do you like the show Futurama? Not really. Have you ever been in a choir class? I was in the elementary school chorus, as well as the choir at my childhood church. Are you ashamed of any of your family members? No, only myself. Were you a chubby child? No. Did you ever have senior photos done? No, even though I wanted them. Who is the person you dislike the most? God, this is so petty... but it's the girl Jason dated after me. I know it's childish as hell to feel like she "took" him from me, and I just feel this horrible hatred towards her that is entirely uncalled for. I just can't get myself to move past it. Do you take part in paying the bills for your household? No, as I'm unemployed and also don't have disability, so I literally can't. How do you usually celebrate New Years? I really don't do much. Sometimes Mom will grab a pack of daiquiris, but that's pretty much the extent of it. Does the place you work have music playing? What sort? N/A What was the last job interview you went to? At a local grocery store to work in the deli. Got the job, lasted there for not even two hours. :^) Do you know anyone with autism, mood disorders or learning disabilities? Autism and mood disorders, yes. I myself may have high-functioning Asperger's (yes, I know that term doesn't technically exist anymore, it's just the umbrella term of "autism," but w/e). Have you ever had an immediate relative pass away of cancer? My grandmother died of pancreatic cancer, and it's pretty much guaranteed that, unless there's some sudden accident, my mom will die of cancer, too. Hers got too bad to entirely eliminate every trace of cancer cells, so it will inevitably re-emerge at some point, just obviously some place else given that she had a total hysterectomy. Would you rather work in an office, warehouse or on a retail shop floor? Office. Are you a fan of sweet, sour, salty, or savory snacks? I enjoy all of those, but sour I think tops the list.

[angelic-butnotinnocent]

♥-Mercury Retrograde-♥

Mercury retrograde through the houses ;

Mercury is a quick moving personal planet. When he reverses he triggers in each of us a period of reflection and re-organisation – in fact pretty much any word with the prefix ‘re’ can be applied during this period. How the retrograde will affect you may manifest in a myriad of ways.

you can check where mercury goes retrograde in your transit chart

♥1st house♥;How you approach the world may need to be re-thought. Consider a change of image – do the research but perhaps wait until the retrograde is over before booking a drastic haircut! Take a long look in the mirror. The most important thing is whether you are happy with what you see.You may find yourself tripping over words or unable to express yourself in a way you would like. You worry about how you are coming across to others. There’s a growing sense that you would like to express a part of yourself that perhaps you haven’t allowed to come out before. You may feel like the way others perceive you doesn’t reflect who you are on the inside. Mercury retrograde in this house can help bring the inside and outside together, restoring confidence.Take a personality test, read up on your natal chart – for others to know you, you have to know you.

Keywords – Reframe, reaffirm, re-vamp

♥2nd house♥;Take a look at what you hold dear. You may find yourself asking the question ‘Is it really worth it?‘. Money due may be delayed so it’s wise to keep some aside just in case. Sometimes unexpected money falls into your lap.It’s time to think about what you really value in life. Are you happy with how you make money? Are you financially comfortable? What do you really want? Do you believe you are worth it? Are you on the way to getting it or do you feel like you moving further away? Review your bank account; keep any sale’s receipts; pay overdue bills; avoid major new purchases; update or start a record listing your outgoings and income; open a savings account.

Keywords – Re-evaluate, replenish, re-stock

♥3rd house♥;All forms of communication, transport and thinking are brought into focus. You may feel like your mind is very busy. Sometimes Mercury transiting here can increase worry and nervous symptoms. Ensure you create some quiet time to gain clarity. On a deep level, you are working through what you know. Confusion may mean you need further information.Repair your car; check the tires; take the car for an MOT/service; check your oil and water before a long drive. Research, replace the battery in your phone; charge up your battery regularly; replace your phone (but avoid a new contract until after Mercury retrograde). Watch your speed limit.Ask questions to ensure you understand; check someone received your message if you haven’t heard from them; send important items early – by insured post if possible; check appointment times; spell-check before sending! Back up your computer, run your virus and malware checker regularly; double check emails are from who they say they are from.In personal communications, make sure you have understood the other person’s point of view before going off the deep-end. Diffuse arguments. Don’t make promises that you can’t keep; don’t say yes when you mean no and vice versa.Reconnect with your siblings – especially if things were left on a difficult note.

Keywords – Re-think, rewrite, review

♥4th house♥;Your home is your sanctuary. Does it reflect who you are? If you feel stuck in a rut in life, maybe energy in your home is also ‘stuck’. Change the furniture around to give yourself a new perspective. Revisit each room and try to see it with the eyes of a stranger. What does it say about you? Release objects that no longer have any meaning.The 4th house is also your foundation, your childhood, your roots. What were you told as a child that you still believe is true? You may become aware of negative thought patterns that have a significant impact upon your life. Don’t be afraid to ask yourself fundamental questions.Old family/childhood issues may resurface or there may be a need to walk down memory lane. Reconnect with your family. Make peace with your past.

Keywords – Re-route/re-root! Redecorate, re-establish, retrace, refurnish

♥5th house♥;There may be a withdrawal of creative energy. Let the process happen, your project may need time to ferment. Loss of confidence may be an underlying reason for creative stalling. Check in with what you are telling yourself about your ability to express yourself. Don’t compare yourself to others. You are who you are.Seek out new inspiration. Visit a gallery, the theatre, the beach, a local park. Try out a new craft. Take yourself on an artist’s date.This can be a wonderful time to reconnect to your inner child. Aim to re-capture your spontaneity. Play a game. Spend time with your children, see through their eyes. Be curious.An old flame may reappear. Past partners may remind you of how far you have come or how happy/unhappy you feel. Alternatively this is an excellent time to inject some romance back into a jaded relationship. Put your thinking caps on and devise new ways to ‘play’ together 🙂Traditionally this isn’t the best time to start a new love affair. Whilst life must go on during Mercury retrograde, it’s wise not to fall head over heels just yet.

Keywords – Re-ignite, reanimate, rehearse, rekindle, recapture

♥6th house♥;Re-organise your workspace, office or desk. Sort out your diary, create a calendar or to-do list. re-work your routines. Re-connect with your colleagues and/or reflect upon your relationship with them. Sometimes this transit may manifest as mix-ups in communication and team work can suffer. Check everyone else has the right information to hand. Sometimes this transit can feel like your schedule has been thrown out of the window. Mercury may be asking that you become more flexible. Routines and habits can be an excellent structure to work from however they can also make life a little dull, safe and predictable.In matters of health, this is the time to do a personal inventory. How do you feel? Are you full of energy or weighed down by aches and pains and undefined maladies? This is the perfect opportunity to do some research into your own health issues. Unless there are serious consequences for postponement, a second opinion (when Mercury is direct) is advised before embarking on a course of treatment for an illness or problem. Test results now may be inconclusive. Avoid starting a new diet. Time is better spent researching the foods you will eat, gathering recipes and nutritional information.

Keywords – Reorganisation, rejuvenation, relapse, repair, recover, refresh

♥7th house♥;Whether marriage or business partner, Mercury’s transit here may call for re-negotiation of terms. In personal relationships, we often have unspoken contracts and agreements that have developed over time from who takes the trash out to who sleeps on what side of the bed. There are also others such as ‘don’t ever disagree with my Mother’. These ‘rules’ can be taught to us through certain behaviours and body language. What remains ‘unspoken’ is likely to be given voice during this transit and perhaps this is necessary in order for you to clear the path ahead.Alternatively, old issues that you thought forgotten may rear up and you may find yourself having to bite your tongue. Mercury retrograde in the 7th house can serve to bring you closer together by airing differences of opinion. By the time this transit is over, you may both feel like you understand each other a lot better.Traditionally it isn’t recommended to get married or set a wedding date under Mercury retrograde. If you have to sign a contract, read the small print! If possible, defer until after Mercury has gone direct.

Keywords – Re-negotiate, refine, reunite

♥8th house♥;In the house of shared resources, Mercury here offers you the chance to find out if you are getting and/or giving your fair share in a relationship. It may be time to redistribute the wealth. Renew your insurance, check when your insurance runs out, avoid taking out a loan, pay off your debts and taxes. There may be issues or delays with jointly held resources during this time. It is not the best time to take out a mortgage or loan or invest in a new business.Sexual issues may need to be discussed. Divine intimacy can be achieved through sharing your thoughts. It may be important to recall previous intimate relationships in order to understand better your preferences and needs.The 8th house favours eliminating the old. Cleanse your mind. Secrets and hidden things may come to light during this time. Psycho-analysis and other forms of healing are beneficial.

Keywords – relinquish, repay, re-allocate, relent

♥9th house♥;Re-examine what you believe about the world as Mercury backs up in the 9th house. Your beliefs create what you experience. It’s time to consider the future. What you do now effects the outcome. What’s your overall philosophy to life? Are you really living it? This house is also connected to morals and ethics. During this transit you may be called upon to re-assess what the truth really means.This is a good time to re-sit exams previously failed or to go back into education. Use this time to revise, to edit writing, to re-write and proof read your work. Explore books that make you think differently about the world.You may have a sense that you have lost the big picture somewhere along the line. Take some time to re-visualise where you want to be.You may find yourself needing to revisit a place. Generally however, travel plans at this time need to be triple checked. Be prepared for delays, cancelled flights and roadblocks. Mercury would like you to see where you are so you can be clearer about where you want to go. Sometimes we just have to stand still.The 9th house is also associated with the concept of faith. Your faith in yourself or in a higher being may be called into question. Faith adhered to without question can bind you. Keep asking the big questions!

Keywords – revisit, re-examine, retrain

♥10th house♥;Take care of old business, finish the job you started. A change in status can sometimes be indicated by this transit from promotion to job loss. There may be communication problems with a manager or team leader. Misunderstandings can lead to frustration. Patience and a cautious approach are necessary. This is not the time for a career change or to apply for a new job. Reapplying for a job you didn’t get before however is favourable. Use this period to consider whether you are happy with your career to date and what you would like to achieve. Researching a new career and connecting with people who work in that sector is a beneficial use of the retrograde period..If you are self-employed, take care with new contracts and clients. This may be the time to re-consider how you market yourself and the clients you want to work with. Re-vamp your public image.Alternatively, a great way to make use of Mercury in the 10th is to take a holiday from work, spend some time at home and recharge your batteries.

Keywords – redefine, re-assemble, reappoint, resign, retire, re-orientate.

♥11th house♥;Time for a catch up with old friends. You may bump into each other unexpectedly. On the other hand, this transit can indicate a withdrawal from the social scene for a while which may happen by choice or circumstance. If this occurs, it may be that you need to take some time to discover who you are away from others. Most often this can happen when too much time has been spent socialising and not enough time alone.There can be misunderstandings with friends at this time. Be sure you have the right end of the stick before you cross them off your Christmas card list. Gossip and rumour may play havoc with otherwise good relationships. It’s wise to follow the ‘hear no evil, speak no evil‘ motto right now. It could however be time to weed out connections that no longer serve you. Mercury retrograde in the 11th can help you to discover who your real friends are and why you move in the circles you do. It also serves as a reminder that people make their own decisions in the end. You can’t control what others decide to do.The 11th house is also connected to your goals and dreams. Re-capture a dream that you once had to get inspired about the future. Research networks that may help you towards your goal.

Keywords – Reconnect, regroup, reconvene, reform

♥12th house♥;As I start to write this piece, I hear Simon and Garfunkal singing ‘The Sound of Silence’ in my mind. When Mercury transits retrograde in the 12th house, the need for retreat and quiet may be very strong. For some this can manifest as a strong pull towards their own inner psychology. Mercury may bring you messages from your deep unconscious mind through dreams. Keep a record of dreams during the retrograde period as they may well provide information you need to be aware of. Images from past lives may surface.Sometimes it may feel like you have been left alone with no one to rely on. It may be because only you can decide what comes next. Regrets may characterise this time, with sorrow bubbling up about what could have been and should have been. Be kind to yourself and let it go. If you are telling yourself dark and twisted stories, give the tale a happy ending. Trust that you can make the right decision by yourself and move forward.Your spiritual life gets a boost when Mercury retrogrades the 12th. As the outside world loses its pull over you, you may find yourself more psychically aware and sensitive to subtle vibrations. Synchronicity speaks to you vividly. Spiritual renewal is a possibility. Meditate, remove your mental chains, set up an altar, commune with the world soul, pray.

Keywords – redeem, release, recharge, re-consecrate, repent

source ; leahwhitehorse.com

[greensydney]

Wellness Segments from The Friend Zone Podcast

This is where I’ll be listing Fran’s Wellness Segments. It will be updated regularly. Any specific products/stores mentioned will be linked :)

Ep. 1: It’s Ok to Log Off  

Being the first episode, Fran starts us off easy with a loving suggestion to take a social media break. At the time of this recording, “Twitterless Assante” was reaping the benefits of taking mindless twitter scrolling out of his life for some time.

Ep. 2: Family Matters  

This is where we start digging in and doing the work. Here, Fran asks us to look within to resolve family disputes that have gone unchecked. Have the talks that you have been avoiding, even if it feels uncomfortable. Remember to come from a place of compassion when approaching loved ones, and to not take anything personally. Which is a theme throughout many of the early episodes, as it’s the 2nd agreement in The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz, one of the many books Fran has suggested.

Ep. 3: Take 5  

Work on building and maintaining a healthy morning routine. This helps set the tone of the day. By leaving our phone out of this part of the day, we can avoid things like waking up to a long, angry text or some other drama  and letting that guide how the rest of day goes. Basically, set the tone of your day before taking in information from anyone else. 

Ep. 4: Surrender 

Meditate, meditate, meditate. 

Osho books are great for learning more about quieting the mind, as recommended by Fran. Sadhguru is another great teacher who I look to for insight on meditation, mindfulness, parenting, and just life in general. He has a channel on YouTube with tons of videos. Fran also recommends trying Mala beads to assist with meditation, or maybe journaling afterwards. She really just stresses the importance of beginning a meditation practice, without fear of doing it “right” or “wrong”.

Ep. 5: Even Martha Went to Jail  

No clear-cut Wellness Segment for this week, but the main gist of things was: create what you want, what feels good for you. Critics will appear for everyone, no matter how great they are, so do you. Don’t keep yourself from creating things because of fear of how others will receive it.

Ep. 6: Tacos & Quickweave 

In your journal, dissect the relationship you are in. Asking questions like, “Why are you with this person? Who are you *really* doing this relationship for?”   For singles, ask questions like, “What am I *really* looking for, in a person? How do I want to feel when I’m with them? How do I want to show up in their lives? How do I want them to show up in my life?” For those resistant to relationships, ask yourself why and really work through it to get those answers that you seek. ~meditate, meditate, meditate ~

Ep. 7: The Choir & The Competition Are Out 

Parents: Sit with our children and start asking them questions about their interests. Fran shares how she was impacted by her mom not being more encouraging about her becoming a singer, so she wants us to know how important it is to truly listen when our kids ask to pursue new things, even if it isn’t exactly what we pictured for them. 

For everyone, even those who don’t have children or maybe they aren’t quite at the age to start discussing these things: we were all a child at some point. Many people can benefit from asking ourselves if the profession we are in is for you, or if you were just trying to please our own parents. It’s never too late to begin learning more about anything that excites you.

Ep. 8: Fitness Regine Hunter  

(I’m pretty sure they purposely didn’t spell it “regime” because of the difficulty for many in pronouncing the word. lmao)

In this episode, Fran speaks on the importance of holistic health and wellbeing, sharing how much it has shaped who she is and improved her life. She wants us to really sit with ourselves and think about the things we want to work on. Ask, “What can I do to ensure that I’m being the most beautiful *me* possible?” From skin and hair care, to diet, to fitness, to the way we talk to ourselves or others. All the little things that make up holistic living. No quick fixes! We’re here to werrrrrrk, hunty. 

“Forget the internet for a second. Forget what the Instagram models look like, we’re talking about YOU...” - Fran the MF Goat.  

Implement a fitness regime that works for you. Maybe it’s part of your morning routine, maybe it’s an after dinner thing; everyone gets to choose what is best for them and that’s part of the beauty of this life. :) Try a few things and see what works. There is an emphasis on the importance of starting slow, allowing your mind and body to get used to new activity. Fran started off with walking, increasing her distance over time, and then turned that into jogging when it felt right for her. Blogilates and Yoga With Adriene are YouTube channels she mentions here. I have been hooked to yoga ever since trying a few videos from  Adriene. Yoga by Biola is another great channel to check out. Biola has this video, “Restorative Yoga for Collective Trauma”, which I love. I learned of her from The Friend Zone earlier in 2020. 

Skin and Hair: Check out Frans YouTube channel to see all the informative videos she has on all-natural beauty and health tips. Personally, I really like Naptural85 for hair videos as my curl pattern is very similar to hers. Click around on suggested videos to find the ones that speak to you. 

Ep. 9: Don’t Forget the Feet  

OIL UP! From head-to-toe. Get that moisture. Especially in these colder months. Hands, feet, nails, toenails...literally everywhere. Dustin cannot get over the importance of the feet. Fran says this aztec healing clay is great for dry, cracked feet, and she hinted at its ability to fix some facial skin woes as well. Extra Fran tip: put a small amount of oil on your nail beds before painting them. This protects the skin and promotes nail growth. I tried this myself and it’s a game changer in my nail health! They used to get cracks in them once they start getting to a certain length, but if i keep them oiled up, they are smooth as precious little stones. :) 

Ep. 10: A$AP Shirley Caesar  

This episode reminds us that finances, too, can impact our total feeling of well-being. The Friends all want us to get our finances in order, taking the tiniest of baby steps, if needed. Fran’s 3 things to cut back on: 

Eating Out

Online Shopping

Places like Target, where you go for 1 thing and leave with a full cart.

Making these sacrifices adds up. The goal is that eventually, any big things that are weighing on our mental due to finances can more easily be dealt with.

Ep. 11: And I’m Telling You, I’m NOT Going!

It’s all about skin-care in this wellness segment! Starting with what goes into your body, and ending with what goes on your body. First off: DRINK LOTS OF WATER! This not only promotes healthy skin but as we all know, it’s just good for the body in general. The body runs nice and smoothly when it’s hydrated from the inside-out. 

If you need to cut down on your caffeine intake (I’m right there with ya), Fran suggested Yerba Mate. It’s a natural source of caffeine and much cleaner than what comes in other energy drinks. I must say, I feel like the naturally occurring caffeine just hits different. I was hyyype the first few times I got a Yerba Mate instead of my usual orange Red Bull! Energy drink isn’t the only form to get your Yerba fix, thankfully. It’s sold as a loose leaf tea, or in bagged tea as well. I LOVE coffee though, and I am not giving that up so easy. I find that bringing mindfulness to my habits with it, helps me to not consume too much.

Now, for the outside of the body: washing and moisturizing daily is imperative. This may be obvious to some, but it can also feel difficult for those with a really busy schedule. I know for me, as a mom, there has been many times when I only had one chance to take a shower on a given day, and if I didn’t take it, I was always sorry. Or I would take a rushed, half-effort shower and get dressed immediately after without oil, lotion, anything. Having a routine in place for daily washing and moisturizing (that works with my sporadic life) helps me make sure it won’t get missed. Again, as with episode 9, OIL UP! Coconut oil is a great choice, but my skin just drinks it up like water. Sesame oil is a nice alternative because it’s a bit thicker. It was hard for me to get used to smelling like a huge sesame seed though, not gonna lie. But there are so many different oils and butters out there to love our bodies with, just use some trial and error to find which one(s) work best for you.

Last thing: Bedding. Change it at least once a week. Get on the silk pillowcase train! Or if you real fancy, like Fran, get you a full-on silk sheet set. Cotton sheets soak up all the moisture from our skin that we work so hard and lovingly on.

Ep. 12: The Shut Down Mixtape

House cleaning time! Clean your fridge, clean your closets, clean your desk drawers. Clean everything! Trying to especially bring focus to areas that are often overlooked in your regular daily cleaning. By doing this, we clear out old energy, removing heaviness from our homes that we may not even realize is there. I personally can vouch that this helps with anxiety and even lifts my depression symptoms as well. It feels good when the space I live in looks and smells nice, so taking the effort is more than worthwhile.

Ep. 13: Oh God…

Get in touch with what religion/spirituality mean to YOU. This one was hard for me because I wasn’t raised with much knowledge of (or respect for, sadly) religion. As I grew, I became super interested in the various religions and how they affect the lives of others - good or bad. I’ve now learned to adapt my own spiritual practices that support me and help me get by. And this is life changing.

Ep. 14: Say It Like You Mean It

Here, we are instructed to find out what our individual love language is. This comes from the book The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman. The 5 Love Languages are: 

Quality Time

Acts of Service

Receiving Gifts

Words of Affirmation

Physical Touch

You may already have an idea of what your primary love language is, but you can get some more information on that by reading the book or by taking quizzes on the book’s website. Knowing your love language, as a single, can help you define what you need from a partner. As someone in a relationship, it can help both partners learn how to best make sure everyone knows they are loved and valued. 

Ep. 15: Yo Mama

Scalp Care for Winter Weather!

½ Cup Olive Oil ~ Seals in moisture

2 Tbsp. Honey (Fran uses Raw honey) ~ Creates pretty shine

½ Cup Coconut Milk ~ Adds protein

½ an Avocado ~ Healthy fat

½ a Banana ~ Softens hair

Blend all ingredients into a creamy conditioner, which should come out a nice light greenish color. 

I keep forgetting coconut milk at the store or else I’d have been tried this one, smh *face palm* But I will edit to add my review after I finally do this. :) 

Ep. 16: Non Profit & Chill

This episode had no segments, but we can still gain a wellness tip from it. Recorded right after Fran returned from a trip to Africa, she had a ton of insight to share on why it’s so important to be an ethical consumer. This episode was a great one to re-listen to as it reminded me that I am reading labels and the “about” pages on brand’s websites for a valid reason that is important to me, not just following trends. Dang imposter syndrome, always trying to step in and ruin everything (shoutout to the Friend Zone for teaching me about that as well, in a later episode.)

Fair Trade Errything !!!

Ep. 17: There’s A Song For That

No wellness segment this week, per say, but again I’ll summarize the episode to make it wellness for us all. The friends basically dode over their favorite break-up songs, from the deepest of soul, to the pettiest of rap songs. Many genres listed, and many bangers. This episode is a great listen for those going through a breakup, or even if you’re a big fan of the episodes where the Friends just let loose and have fun.

Ep. 18: Don’t You Go To Work?

Inspired by Assante and his newly purchased stones, which he is carrying safely in his pocket, Fran suggested that us listeners get in on the magic as well by getting our own stones. Starting with Citrine. This stone is a light orange color, and can be found online or in local crystal stores in most cities. Often referred to as “the merchants stone”, Citrine is believed to attract success. Fran offered the idea of laying it on some money, because she did it and got a random check in the mail soon after...And I kid you not - I did it, and the saaame thing happened to me. I was shook and beyond grateful!

Other stones mentioned here are Lapis Lazuli and Black Tourmaline. Lapis is a pretty, royal blue shade, usually with gold flakes in it. Lapis is known as the “communication stone”. Black Tourmaline is, you guessed it, black, and often found in shiny pieces. Fran says she keeps one of these by her bedside to absorb negative thoughts; letting it cleanse her energy before bed.

Stores mentioned on this episode: Rock Star, and Namaste shop. Both New York based but have online shopping available. Personally, and this is gonna sound real woo-woo, but I prefer picking out stones in person because then I can actually feed off of their energy to pick the right one for me. Those living in a small town, there is probably a crystal shop not too far away.

Ep. 19: The Friend Zone & The Read Mash Up Pt. 1

Wellness this week: be messy and silly with your friends. For me, I don’t currently have any real life friends to hang out with, plus COVID, so my family gets to enjoy all my silly mess. Life just cannot be lived being serious 100% of the time!

Ep. 20: 2015, I’ma Let You Finish, But 2016…

I loved this episode because it brings us back to our journals. Fran asks the guys and us listeners to reflect on two simple, but powerful questions to answer at the end of each year:

What are 3 things you discovered about yourself this year that you love? Things that you feel will propel you into the next year, as a person, career-wise, and as a whole. Write freely about how you plan on maintaining and evolving.

What are 3 things you discovered about yourself this year that you did not like? Maybe some of these things are hard to face. Reflect on how you’ve allowed them to hold you back and what you are doing to adjust them.

[inkribbon796]

Forgotten Light Ch. 1: Refractions

Summary: Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall. Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. All the king’s horses and all the king’s men . . . couldn’t put Thomas back together again.

Chapters: 1, 2, 3

During the several days that the Sides were in Brighton, the Coalition went through their house and every room they tended to frequent in the base with a fine-toothed comb. Trying to find another aura trail, which King, Nate, and Mare were doing the bulk of the aura searching.

The humans came in their civilian attire, not wanting to draw attention to the Sides’ home.

Deep indigos, pastel blues, sparkling reds, and vibrant purples. All the Core Sides were accounted for. There was evidence that Janus and Remus had been over to their home by the faint aura trails.

“So what else are we looking for?” Silver groaned as Jackie came back in from searching places the Sides liked to regularly frequent.

“I’ve got fook-all[1],” Jackie groaned.

“We need evidence of someone living here since March, because that’s when Deceit and the Duke moved out,” King rubbed at his eyes under his glasses. “And Spade doesn’t count. Spade was just spicy Logan with extra steps. He’d have almost the exact same type of aura as him.”

Joan sighed. “Either way this place is clear, what if we don’t find it?”

“Then we hope the legate is dead,” King decided. “Which is probably a good thing. Being trapped for so long without a lot of aura, it would probably make any demon crazy.”

“So what are we supposed ta[2] do?” Jackie groaned. “Put e’erythin’ back an’ pretend nothin’s happened? All yah’ve told us about this thin’ is that it’s dangerous or somethin’.”[3]

“Honestly I’ve never heard of one either,” Mare admitted, coming out of a wall. “I knew there were other types of demons, but I thought it was just a regional language thing.”

“Well different cultures do call you guys different things in different part of the world and that does influence it a little,” King agreed.

“Kid,” Mare crossed his arms in front of his chest. “You’re an empath just like me, you’re just a small one.”

King frowned, glaring at Mare. “Least I still have my own body, I don’t have to borrow or steal someone else’s.”

Mare looked exceptionally smug, “Just wait until yours starts rusting on you. Bodies don’t last forever. You’ll pick a fight, or someone will pick a fight with you while Daddy’s not watching, and you’ll lose. Or your body will get so useless you’ll have to leave it. It happens to everyone. You think Nate was my first body, or the one your old man’s got was his? Bodies don’t last forever, Dark’s probably overdue a trade out. Being in a broken down body can’t be good but he was always made of nothing but spite and coffee so fuck that body, I guess.”

King just about bared his teeth at the older demon, but he didn’t want anymore of that smug look pointed at him and thankfully Nate intervened.

“Okay, okay,” Nate used his magic to nudge Mare away, trying to break the stand-off and deescalate the two of them. “Let’s focus on this legate, because I was raised with the Legionnaires and I just thought that a legion was like a group of demons like a murder of crows. It’s why the Legionnaires chose their name because they were a powerful force, or at least I thought so.”

“Well that is partially true,” King agreed, searching for something in the magic space he had on the inside of his cape. “A group of demons is called a legion, but it’s also a type of demon for the same reason.”

Then King paused, “Shoot, I forgot it at the base, and we should probably go back to the base, leave this place back for them.”

“Yeah we’ve combed through this place enough,” King sighed and Joan and Silver stayed behind to make sure everything was moved back to where it was supposed to be as everyone headed back to the base.

King went to go find the tome he’d been looking for in his room, and while he was gone Silver and Joan came back into the base.

“I think we got everything back to where it was,” Silver told them. “But I guarantee we missed something.”

Joan rolled their eyes. “Lo’s absolutely gonna[4] know someone went through their house, and if he somehow doesn’t find out I guarantee you Virgil will when he goes through his stuff. He used to live with the Duke after all.”

King walked back in, Lunky clinging to his cape, King smiled and was talking with his child. There was an old book in his hand. “You can stay, but you can’t meet the new demon, he’s not very nice like 할아버지[5] is.”

“You do know you’re talking about Dark, right?” Silver asked.

“Yeah, well, he’s nice to Lunky,” King smiled, before his level leveled onto a more neutral frown as he cracked open the tome. “Alright so on Illinois’s first trips to Egypt he found this book in the bowels of some library.”

“Does it talk about Legates?” Jackie asked, walking over and getting a low warning hiss from Lunky for approaching the spawnling’s father without Lunky’s permission.

“Hey, it’s okay,” King told his child, before looking at the book. “So this book doesn’t directly talk about Legates but it kickstarted this little bout of research he and I did. What this book details is some spawnling that was formed by a lightning strike and began conquering the area. The Old Man’s apparently met this guy too, he likes building stuff apparently.”

“They play poker on the weekends or somethin’[6]?” Jackie tried to joke.

“No, they haven’t spoken in almost 200 years,” King dismissed. “More importantly this research Ills and I did helped us learn a lot about demons. Mainly that demons aren’t categorized by aura or region of the world, but based on how they collect aura. If they can survive being struck by lightning without discorporating, control lightning, or technology; then they’re glitches. If they feed primarily off the emotional state of other humans or demons, then they’re empaths. If they collect aura by manipulating people and making deals: that means they’re deal makers. If they’re attention whores that collect aura from large groups, they’re showmen.”

“Wait, glitches have an affinity fer[7] lightnin’[8]?” Jackie asked. “Since when? Anti doesn’t go outside in lightnin’[8] storms.”

“Well, that doesn’t surprise me,” King replied. “Honestly there should be a hell of a lot more glitches with an outright phobia of lightning. Before technology really took off the only way to get a glitch was if one split off from another demon, like what happened with Lunky, or something like lightning strikes them. I’m pretty sure Anti was human once and he’s old enough that he was probably killed by lightning.”

“What?” Jackie shouted.

“Yep,” King popped the end of the world. “Which is why glitches were seen as weaker or rare for centuries, it was hard for them to get a lot of power until the industrial revolution hit. But while we were deep diving in some of the books we found, we found some myths and legends that talked about another type of demon. It was like a hybrid of other demon types. Like a jack-of-all-trades, master of none, kind of demon.”

“So if demons are separated by how they collect aura,” Silver commented. “How do these . . . legates? I assume these types are legates, right? How do they collect aura?”

“Yes,” King confirmed hesitantly, “and that’s the problem. Legates are like an octopus. Eight legs, but one octopus. Something in the process of creating a legate, regardless of what it would have become, doesn’t split properly. If the legate was already a proper demon it would just make a spawnling and both the demon and the spawnling would be fine. And 99.99999% of the time the person just dies instead of making a legate. But it’s that incredibly slim chance where the soul is resilient enough that the energy can’t fully make a proper demon. That energy has to go somewhere so it makes a legate and this pseudo-demon, for lack of a better term, is dangerous because the demon itself can’t collect aura, but it’s legs can.”

“Is that where the Sides come in?” Joan asked.

“Exactly,” King gestured with his arms. “It explains why there are so many. Because when a demon makes a spawnling, multiple spawnlings mean a lot of energy was split off but when a human is turned into a demon there’s barely enough energy to make one demon, let alone seven. So the legate can’t absorb aura properly on its own, making it crazy and hungry because it can’t feed like it’s supposed to. It’s like being lactose intolerant but only being able to eat and drink dairy products. But the arms or extensions of a legate are fully capable of getting aura and bringing it back to the legate in a way it can feed from. The better control a legate has over its arms, the better it can feed. So it quickly gains complete dominion over the arms and turns them into mindless thralls.”

“But all the Sides have some of the most bombastic personalities I’ve ever seen,” Silver reminded, as Nate hummed in agreement, Mare was talking to him in his head.

“Precisely,” King smiled. “They’re not thralls, so that means they’re not giving their legate aura. So the legate is either dead or is kept somewhere that it can’t collect aura and turn the Sides into thralls. If we can verify the legate is actually dead or kill it, then the Sides keep their individuality.”

“So how do we do that?” Nate spoke up. “Especially without hurting the Sides in the process?”

King thought on that for a second. “Well when they get back we should come clean and just talk about the whole thing and maybe they know something they haven’t told us.”

“Okay, what if they don’t?” Mare asked.

“Well they’re non-violent for the most part, so if we leave them be they’re not going to torch the city down,” King shrugged, he tucked the tome into his cape. “Unless there’s something you guys haven’t told me. How did Thomas die exactly? Knowing what all the Sides have in common will tell us a lot about the legate we’re looking for.”

Nate gestured to Joan, who quickly began explaining, “So I found this old camera at an estate sale and brought it to some party. I was messing around with it, dropped it, and Thomas caught it. When that happened, he split apart and that was it, it went that fast.”

“You’re sure nothing happened in-between that time?” King asked.

“Yeah,” Joan answered, hesitant but sure.

“We still have that soul splitter,” Nate supplied helpfully. “We’re pretty sure it used to be Wil’s.”

“What?” King spat.

“Yeah, I’ll go get it,” Nate offered and ran out of the room to go fetch the camera. King at the same time sent Lunky back to Google. The spawnling complained but eventually the two heroes came back with their little missions completed.

“Okay, Logan really likes it for some reason,” Nate informed King when they were both back. By the look on King’s face the young man was thinking along the same lines. “Deceit hates the thing apparently, but none of the others have more than a passing tolerance towards it.”

King picked up the camera and groaned at the pink mustache stained into the side. “Of course it’s Dad’s. His magic always did weird things to stuff to begin with.”

The young man began trying to send his aura at it, to get it to react, but he was met with nothing.

“Okay, Dad, what weird thing did you do to make this?” King grumbled in frustration.

“That’s all I could ever get it to do,” Nate lamented. “I’ve tried popping the film cartridge, but it’s stuck. I think it’s just old.”

Humming a bit in affirmation, King turned it over a bit and set it on the closest table, his fingers drummed pensively. “Okay, it’s Dad’s, there’s gotta be some trick.”

King took out one of the medallion necklaces Dark had made for Lunky and hung it right over the camera.

Still nothing.

Frowning, King channeled his aura through the camera and finally a reaction took place. A mix of King and Dark’s aura in proximity to the remnants of Wil’s that stubbornly held the camera together brought forth another aura. It was distinct and visible: a shimmering, rainbow aura. It lasted for a second but it was there.

In alarm, King flew back from the camera, pulling the necklace away. In an instant the aura disappeared.

King approached and experimentally held just the necklace above before taking it away again and trying to search for an aura trail.

“Oh, you sly bastard!” King realized as he pulled out the very dagger that had caused part of his soul to split off and create Lunky. He’d kept it because he was certainly not letting the Jims get their hands on the knife again. “I fucking found you!”

King tried to drive the soul splitter into the camera and some protective spell fanned out to break the soul splitter and bruised King’s hand.

At first King thought his hand had been broken or fractured, but as the pain subdued to a dull, aching throb, he began trying to move it and realized that at worst it had bruised his bone.

“Fucking shit!” King hissed as Silver ran over to him. The force of the barrier spell and King’s attempted blow had caused the table to break and the camera to fall to the ground, undamaged by the fall.

Nanites surged out of some unseen compartment in the camera and created a projection disk. There was a whirl and a hum, before a holographic symbol hovering in the air. It was a blackened symbol of three heads and dozens of arms surrounding it, the only words there were: “Hecatoncheires Projects Presents:”

The symbol lasted for a second before the projection showed an image of future Logan, Spade, standing in front of them.

Spade’s projection smiled at them and he took a deep breath before he greeted them, “Heroes.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Accessibility Translations:

1. Fuck-all

2. to

3. Put everything back and pretend nothing’s happened? All you’ve told us about this thing is that it’s dangerous or something

4. going to

5. Grandfather; Korean. Specifically the informal way to address your paternal grandfather. Phonically read as “halabeoji”

6. something

7. for

8. lightning

[dadzawa-adopt-dabi]

secret baby ch 10

(oof this is a long chapter! let me know if i forgot to tag anything!)

The first offer of business Dabi gets is for one of his neighbors, a nice elderly alpha woman who can't bend like she used to, she stays in the apartment with him the first few times as they build some trust between them. As Dabi cleans up for her and makes the trips down the block to the laundromat for her. At the end of the day she sends him home with leftovers, some cash and pretty decent leftovers.

Him and Kiyoko get invited back several times as she spreads the word to her friends. Eventually he strikes a deal with a young couple for a free house clean and meal made in exchange for a burner phone to get contact with his customers.

It takes a few weeks , Dabi is getting used to running his own business. He takes Kiyoko with him to almost all of his ‘appointments’, despite one of his customers offering to babysit for him. He places her in a room separate from the one he is cleaning in but close enough to hear him talking and singing to her and she doozes the day away while he works until he picks her up and they go to his next appointment. She has a special basket designed to let her wings poke through and Dabi carries her in a baby backpack to the appointments he can. Sometimes there’s mold and he has to leave her behind, sometimes he has another nurse Karen for a client, someone who judges him for bringing Kiyoko.  His first client eventually clues him into an omega in the building who watches the buildings kids for a small fee.He still brings Kiyoko when he can't bear to leave her with his babysitter, a consistent fear of something happening to her keeping him close. Sometimes when he brings her he gets paid less because Kiyoko's crying supposedly bothers his clients. It's only ever a couple dollars difference but every dollar counts when you're raising a kid by yourself.

Eventually he has keys to most of his clients places of residence as he cleans for busier and busier people. His networking slowly starts paying off as he starts making enough to squeak by on rent while keeping himself and Kiyoko fed. It’s close and it won't last but it's enough to get them through the month. It's stressful and he can feel the strain of it wearing on his health.

Kiyoko is 3 months old when his body snaps under the stress,just at the age where she can giggle at the funny faces and noises Dabi has been making for her lately. He’s canceled all his appointments for the next few days, head bent over a toilet when she giggles for the first time. Dabi feels like crying from all the stress, he’s sick and tired and is just barely going to squeak by on rent again unless he can reschedule all his appointments again. He’s cooking and cleaning his apartment and other peoples homes and is probably just sick from the anxiety and stress of being a single parent. Maybe actually sick from a bug he unknowingly caught and has now transferred to his daughter. He makes a note to make a doctor appointment for both of them as he heaves.

And his daughter is laughing, giggling at him as he makes funny noises to her. He kind of feels like crying, he wants someone to rub his back. He wants Hawks, he has no idea how Hawks would react to this. If he would be caring and sooth Dabi while he held their daughter, Or if he would tell him to clean up when he was done being dramatic. 

He’s doing everything by himself, trying to stay under Enji and Hawks radar. It's been months and they haven't come looking but that doesn't mean they wont. He honestly doesn't know if him and Kiyoko can make it. If he should call Hawks and come clean. Maybe he wouldn’t be as bad as enji had been, for a moment he wavers in indecision. The want to have Hawks close is something he thought would fade with time. Instead the want is only growing with every obstacle put in his path.

What steels his resolve is the chubby smile and giggle Kiyoko gives him as he turns his phone over in his hands. Maybe isn’t good enough for him, and it's not good enough to risk for Kiyoko. He reminds himself firmly. Dabi wipes his mouth and stands up. It’s not like he can call Hawks anyways when he left his old phone and Hawks number with it on his table. He can do this, for Kiyoko, he has to at least try.

“Something funny princess? You're the best thing to happen to me okay? No matter if I'm worrying my head off or you laughing at me as I lose my lunch. You're the best damn thing to ever happen to me.” Dabi scoops her up and steps into his tiny shower with her.

There’s not going to be any fear from her parents in Kiyoko’s life. No screaming and yelling. No being blamed for things she had no control over like being sick. Dabi isn’t going to be Enji and he’s not going to raise Kiyoko with someone like him either.

Dabi’s nest isn’t as big or well made as Kiyoko’s considering he’s had less practice doing it for himself and nothing ever feels quite right after they are both clean making faces at her. She giggles at nearly anything he does. It makes Dabi’s heart feel light again every time he hears the sound. He starts up a rumbling purr for her, the best one he can manage, still full of hiccups and uneven despite how happy she makes him. He’s going to do the best he can and it’s just going to have to be enough to get them through. No amount of how much easier life would be, how much less stigma he would face, status and comfort will ever be worth his daughters safety.

He purrs Kiyoko to sleep and follows moments after.

He gets up after their nap Dabi gets up after their nap feeling a lot better, maybe it has just been the poor sleep and eating habits. Whatever had made him sick, Kiyoko doesn't seem to have caught it. He's been checking both of there’s regularly to make sure she doesn't catch anything from traveling with her after a client brought it up with him. It's been something of a miracle that he hasn’t gotten sick. Kiyoko hasn’t shown any signs of getting sick as easily as he might have as an infant. He doesn't know if he got sick as often as an infant as he did as a child. He knows he was sick a lot as a child, remembers struggling through fatigue to get up and help fuyumi.  The constant exhaustion with the pain from bruises and then having to go ‘train’ with his father. Feeling nauseous and like his knees would go out from under him but he had to take care of the house before enji came home. Rei had been too much of a nervous wreck to take care of him and too busy ensuring the days of depression and neglect got taken care of. Her panic and screaming at them that enji’s anger was all their fault made things worse in those days. It was never anyone's fault other than enji’s that he hit his kids and wife, even as a kid Touya had known that, had repeated it to himself as he treated his and fuyumis burns and bruises. Had told Natsou as he grew older, asking Touya why neither of his parents cared for him and if it was really their fault. Just as he had known that his mother had not wanted to have him or his sister, born as part of a contract agreement for an arranged marriage.

Then Enji had decided that he couldn’t train Touya to be a hero. That Touya was weak,always had been, he would better serve enji’s legacy as a bride married off to an alpha with a strong quirk. Most likely a hero. Touya had been 17 and told that within the year enji would be looking for ‘appropriate’ suitors for someone born of enji. He’d started sneaking out and stashing away everything he could. Eventually he would meet Hawks and being as drawn to him as he was, eventually conceive Kiyoko and jumpstart his runaway plan.

“Hey no fever Kiyoko! Good job! You beat those germs!” Dabi coos at her shanking thoughts of the past from his head. Picking her up and scenting the top of her head as he searches for his phone, if he’s feeling better then he can start rescheduling his clients. He bounces her as she giggles and he talks on the phone, no amount of wishing for Keigo will do him any good. It’s not like he’s wishing for only keigo either, he’s wishing for anyone to help him more often than not despite knowing that he will never accept the help, he doesn't trust anyone enough for that. Keigo just happens to be the alpha he knows best outside of his family.

Most of his clients can’t reschedule and Dabi starts reworking his meal plans for the month, mentally stretching what money he will make to keep them with a roof over their head and the lights on. He’s going to have to ask for another extension on rent, the landlord has been getting increasingly frustrated with his problems but there’s not much more he can do.

It's a couple of weeks later when Dabi takes Kiyoko with him while he runs down to the laundromat for a last minute client that lives in his building. The man needed his clothes with his uniform done but was too busy that evening to do it himself and had offered Dabi cash. So despite the late hour meaning he couldn’t leave Kiyoko with the usual sitter he agreed. 

There’s a young couple fighting outside and Dabi tenses as he tries to ignore it while carrying Kiyoko and the bags of laundry through the dark nearly empty lot. Couple’s argue, they get mad at each other and fight, it's normal he reminds himself and he doesn't want to get involved.He leaves Kiyoko sitting in her carrier on top of a started washer and goes back outside for another bag of laundry outside the door. He couldn’t open the door with both bags and his baby so he had set one down and now had to go back for it. It’s not at all to keep watch on the fighting couple in case someone has to call the authorities.

Maybe they were breaking up and this had been their meeting point or maybe they had a fight here with no one around and whatever it was said was the last straw.

There’s another person hanging around outside,smoking, who raises an eyebrow at him but doesn't say much. Other than them and the arguing couple the place is empty.

“He has to learn at some point! I've got a say in how you raise him like it or not he’s my kid too.” The male of the pair points at a car in the parking lot. Ignoring the potential witnesses watching him.

“Get the fuck away from me, I said we were done and I meant it.” The woman who is getting yelled at by her partner in public growls at him. Dabi’s head refuses to turn away, he knows what comes next but can’t look away. 

He doesn't want to see it, see what comes next, but he’s frozen. His weight shifts, when the guy raises his hand to his girlfriend and the next thing Dabi knows he's let loose his quirk and the man is ash. The woman opens her eyes from where they've been pried shut and screams. She doesn't thank him, she runs to her car and drives off with her kid. Peeling out of the parking lot and almost running him over in her haste. As fast as she can while Dabi stares in shock at where a person used to be.

The other woman who had been smoking steps forward to kick at the small pile of ashes and dark spot left on the pavement.

“Well that's a neat trick.” she gives him a long look and then looks inside the mat at Kiyoko. “she‘s yours right? You on your own sugar?” she grabs his wrist without asking, ignoring his hard flinch, and drags him inside to sit down as she gets two bottles of water from the vending machine. Dabi snatches the cold bottle and tries not to curl into a ball, stares at Kiyoko’s giggling face to distract himself as he presses the water to the back of his neck. Cooling himself down and jolting him back to the present.

He takes a deep steadying breath and looks over at the women. She looks a lot calmer than he feels, she changes out her wash like nothing just happened and comes back to sit beside Dabi.

 “Yeah it's just us, please don- i didn-” he feels like he can't breathe much less beg her not to call the police. “You’ll never have to see me again.” 

This is the closest most convenient laundromat to his building, only a block away, but he would gladly go to one across the city if she doesn't call the police. Calling the police means Enji finding him, it means signing over his rights to Hawks. There's no way to hide Kiyoko from Hawks if Enji finds out. He’s been climbing rabidly in rankings, always on the news, on a magazine cover or giving an interview. Kiyoko with her red wings and gold eyes means you don’t have to be a genius to guess she’s his child.

“Actually I have a job offer for you, I know a guy who knows a guy. He can hook you up with some big cash and all you gotta do is take out the trash like you just did out there.” The mystery woman grabs Dabi’s phone from him. “I can tell that you're already running yourself ragged as is. Quick easy cash in hand, we call him the broker but he’s also known as giran. Has his hand in all kinds of things so if you're not up for ditching bodies ask for something smaller like delivery, he's good at working with you based on your needs and comfort level.”

“Thank you,I'll think about it but no promises.” Dabi carefully takes his phone back. She’s not going to call the cops and is instead giving him a way out. He wants to doubt her and some part of him still thinks this is a trap. The cops never show up even after she leaves and he doesn't delete the number.

@ruelukas22 : im unsure if you still want to be tagged in updates or not! please let me know

[hopeaterart]

The shittiest family reunion in the history of ever: chapter 6

This was supposed to be the chapter where Holly kicks Polnareff’s ass, but I changed plans at the last second. I also sprinkled in some soft Jotaro/Kakyoin content because this fic is nothing if not self-indulgent. And including Bandanaboi’s ‘Jotaro is accidentally a banchou’ idea.

Jotaro quickly made his way out of the classroom, making his way through the sea of students with Kakyoin not far behind him, holding hands and making sure that he wouldn’t lose the redhead. Kakyoin simply followed him, visibly uncomfortable with all the attention he had gained as ‘the new transfer student with red hair’.

Jotaro slowed down as they came outside, slowing down so Kakyoin could stand next to him and getting his phone out. The redhead stood close, reading the text messages between the taller boy and his mother. “What’s Kitahara?” He asked, turning his head toward Jotaro.

He shrugged, putting his phone back in his back pocket. “She’s talking about a family sushi restaurant. It’s not right next to our street, but you can easily walk there. And beside their sushi, they also make ramen, kaisendon, udon, and kare raisu. I don’t eat the kare raisu I think it tastes like shit, but the sushis are good, the rest is okay, and apparently I have a ‘difficult palate’.” He then did air quotes to emphasize his point, and Kakyoin snorted.

“Oi, Kujo!” The two boys turned toward the voice, seeing a bunch of other students come toward them, all looking like delinquents.

Jotaro groaned, and Kakyoin turned toward him. “You know them?”

“Yeah. They’re a bunch of punks I helped win a fight once, and now they won’t leave me alone. Come on, let’s go-” Jotaro had the time to grab Kakyoin’s hand and turn away, the redhead in tow, before a guy with way two many ear piercings was next to Kakyoin with a hand on Jotaro’s shoulder.

“How ya doin’, Kujo?” He asked. Kakyoin heard Jotaro take a deep breath, his shoulders rising with it, followed by a hiss of ‘five-foot rule, Sugawara’, and the boy’s hand shot off his shoulder, taking a few steps back as Jotaro turned his head toward the group.

“What.” He finally said, and a small girl with bleach blond walked up. The face-mask covering the lower part of her face, the dark eyeshadow around her eyes and the very long-skirt reminded Kakyoin of old-style sukebans. “The punks from Karasuno are starting to act up again. What do we do?”

Jotaro narrowed his eyes. “Are they harassing anyone from school? And is Noguchi back on his bullshit?”

“No, and no.” The small girl answered.

“Then don’t do anything. If they come anywhere near the school, you guys can handle it. If Noguchi comes back with re-enforcement, don’t try anything and come get me as fast as possible. Got it, Sakurai?”

The girl groaned. “It’d be easier to ‘get you’ if you actually gave one of us your phone number!”

“Fuck off!”

“Hum, excuse me?” Kakyoin suddenly said, gaining the attention of the small group. “I’m currently living with Jotaro-san. If you have a message you want to relay to him, I could probably help.” He then got out his own phone, pointing at it as if to emphasize his point.

The group looked at him as if he had grown a second head. “And who are you supposed to be?” A guy with a pompadour and bandage over one of his eyes asked, and Kakyoin nearly dropped his phone in surprise.

It was the guy he had puppeted the nurse to stab in the eye on his first day, back when he was being mind-controlled.

“... Kakyoin Noriaki. I’m new.” He finally answered in a small voice, looking to the ground as he felt shame well up. He looked up at Jotaro as he felt the taller boy squeeze his hand.

“If any of you know what’s good for you, you’ll leave Kakyoin-kun out of this shit.” He hissed, looming over the group of teenagers. The only one who didn’t back down was the diminutive blond (Sakurai, her name was Sakurai), who simply nodded and got her notebook out, turning toward the redhead.

“Alright, but I still need to be able to contact you fast. Kakyoin?” The redhead raised his head, and after exchanging numbers with Sakurai, the two boys parted way with the group of thugs.

Jotaro pulled his hat over his face. “Yare yare daze...” 

Kakyoin looked up at him, lifting an eyebrow. “Didn’t know you were in a gang.”

“I’m not.”

“They seemed pretty convinced you were in charge.”

“If I don’t help them beat up the delinquents from the other schools, they always end up coming after me. If I help them, they both leave me alone, and I get to punch out assholes.” Jotaro explained, Kakyoin nodding slowly.

“What’s the deal with this Noguchi person?” He asked, tilting his head. Jotaro groaned.

“My bully until I snapped in 2nd grade and started beating up people. We regularly had fist fights until 9th grade, and then he asked his parents to put him in a different school because I ended up putting a teacher in the hospital for being a creep. He still tries to harass me sometimes, and ” Kakyoin blinked in surprise.

“You put a teacher in the hospital?”

“I put several teachers in the hospital. Some of them are still recovering.” Jotaro told him, shrugging nonchalantly. “I hate people who try to use the weak for their own gain. My dad made sure to teach me that.”

-

“Alright, so we’ll have the usual family-size plate of sushi, with a bowl of ramen on the side for my brother.” Holly told the waitress, who nodded before walking off. Holly turned toward Jotaro. “Maybe you could-”

“No.”

“You didn’t even let me finish!”

“I’m not going to pay for that one time I ordered kare raisu. It tasted like shit anyway.”

“It’s basic decency and not going against the law!”

“It was bad and they should feel bad for serving it!”

“So... uh... Kujo-san.” Kakyoin started, turning toward Sadao and trying to avoid the argument. “You’re a musician?”

Sadao blinked. “Uh... yeah. Pianist and song writer, but I can also play the guitar and drums.”

“Are you a solo artist?”

“No, me and my group have been together for... over twenty years, now that I think about it.”

“Uh.” Joey noted, joining the conversation. “You’ve been with your group for longer than you’ve been married to my sister.”

“Your group has also stayed together for longer than the Beatles.” Kakyoin noted, and Sadao laughed nervously.

“Yes, well... we’re practically partners in crime at this point. And we take breaks when we need to.” He noted. “We... used to be pretty infamous in our first few years. Shoko’s change from teen idol to jazz singer did ripples, and Yuichi and Kaede did not know how to stay out of trouble. Add to that our difficulties with agents...”

“What difficulties with agents?” Jotaro asked his father, turning toward him with a confused expression. “They all- all three of them- you guys always end up with cocaine addicts for agents, somehow!”

“Jotaro, being addicted to drugs isn’t a moral failing on their part.” Holly told her son, and Sadao nodded in agreement.

“No, but treating us like producing music is the only thing we’re good at is.” Sadao hissed. “Personally, I couldn’t be happier to never see these fuckers ever again.”

“You’re... surprisingly amoral.” Kakyoin noted, and the shorter man shrugged.

“I’ve been told that.” The discussion ended as their sushi and ramen was brought to the table, everyone thanking the waiter (Joey slightly behind the other four) before they started digging in.

“Anyway, Jotaro.” Holly piped up, turning toward her son. “Anything new happening at school?” The teenager shook his head between stuffing two sushis in his mouth.

“Any girlfriend?” Joey asked teasingly. Jotaro rolled his eyes. “A boyfriend, then?”

Jotaro shook his head, swallowing his bite. “I don’t. I’m not...”

“Jotaro, I’m sure we told you before, but your father and I don’t care whether or not you like boys instead of girls-”

“It’s not that.” The teen cut his mother off, shaking his head. “Can we talk about it at home? When we’re not in public?”

“Of course.” Holly reassured him, and the group resumed with eating their food, this time in silence.

About half-way through the dinner, a man with tall with hair and blue eyes approached them. “Excusez-moi,” He started, “j’ai besoin d’aide avec le menu, et je me demandais si vous pouviez m’aider?” Everyone looked at each other with confusion in their eyes, trying to decipher what the strange man had just said.

Holly finally took the reins. “Sorry, I didn’t understand... do you speak English?”

“Right! My apologies, mademoiselle, I didn’t realize.” The man excused himself with a smile that was just forced enough to put Kakyoin on edge. “I was asking if you could help me with the menu?”

“Literally the only good thing this restaurant serves is sushi, how difficult can it be read the menu- what?” Jotaro turned toward Kakyoin, who had put a hand on his shoulder. The redhead shook his head, a frown on his face.

“I have a bad feeling about this guy, like I saw him back when I... wasn’t myself. Just stay back, and be ready to call out your Stand.” The redhead muttered to him. Jotaro’s eyes widened, before nodding gravely as his mother invented the stranger to sit down at their table.

“My my, what a lovely little group we have here!” The man started. “Family, I suppose?”

“Why, yes! Well, beside Kakyoin-kun, he’s my son’s friend.” Holly declared cheerfully as said friend grabbed a napkin, cutting a strip of it with a knife he got out from his pocket. She blinked. “Kakyoin-kun, what are you doing?”

The redhead blinked, before smiling awkwardly. “Don’t worry, Ho- Seiko-san,” he remembered in the nick of time she liked to be called a different name in public. “Just making some origami.”

“Alright! Tell me when you’re finished, please?” Holly asked, and Kakyoin nodded. He quickly folded the paper, the discussions between the rst of the table’s occupants fading to background noises. If this guy really is on Dio’s side, then he won’t resist...

“Aaaaand ta-da~” Kakyoin exclaimed, showing off the small origami star to everyone at the table. Impressed sounds came up for everyone, Holly taking the star and passing it around.

“You did this with a napkin?” Sadao asked as the star ended up in his hand, an inquisitive expression on his face. Kakyoin nodded, and the older man flashed him a surprisingly cute smile. “You’ve got some talent, then.” The teenager blushed at the praise, but quickly snapped out of it as the paper was passed to the stranger. Moment of truth.

“Indeed, this is impressive!” He started, slowly lifting the little paper star to his neck. “You know... I know someone with a mark shaped just like that on the back of his neck...”

Called it. 

“STAND BACK, HE’S AN ENEMY STAND USER!” Kakyoin yelled, summoning Hierophant in a shower of watery green sparkles. Jotaro and Joey followed suit, the purple warrior appearing in a burst of stardust and a being with multiple fanged mouth in what looked like a sound’s wavelength.

At the same time, a strange knight-like being shimmered into existence next to the stranger, who clapped as if he was congratulating Kakyoin. “Bravo! How did you guess I was after them?”

The redhead’s mouth turned into a snarl, a watery hiss coming from Hierophant. “With DIO parading around naked every chances he gets, it’s kind of hard not to notice the literal tattoo on his ne-”

“Birth mark.” Joey suddenly said, his head turned toward Kakyoin with his eyes round like saucers. “It’s a birthmark, it’s not his, and we’re gonna have to talk about that later.”

“Oh? Awfully bold of you to assume there’s gonna be a later, Monsieur Joestar.” The stranger mocked Joey. A growl built up in the taller man’s throat, echoed and amplified by his Stand’s.

“Alright, alright, everyone calm down.” Holly called out, getting up and gesturing with her hands. “Let’s not fight inside of the restaurant. Causing a scene is the last thing we want. Kakyoin-kun?” She turned toward the redhead with an unusual harsh expression. When she saw the redhead flinch back in surprise, it softened. “We’ll talk about this... Dio person later, alright?”

“... Alright.”

“As for you,” the only woman in their group turned backtoward the stranger, glaring.”What is your name?”

“Why, it’s Jean-Pierre Polnareff!” He answered. 

Holly nodded, a forced smile appearing on her face as she folded her hands, slowly making her way to Polnareff. “Well then, Polnareff-san, I am Holly Kujo. And I-” She suddenly cracked her knuckles, yellow light and darks vines wrapping around her hands and forearms. “Will be your opponent.”

[thisspaceintentionallyleftblank]

Try, Try Again (pt. 12)

(Cpt 1) | (Cpt 11) ||  (AO3)

Chapter 12 (2953 words)

There’s this cool movie, the kind that even older kids don’t usually get to watch, where a bunch of evil space aliens show up, eat people, and ruin everything. You know it’s hardcore because the poster has the tagline “In space, no one can hear you scream.”

Now, an angsty teen seeing this poster hanging over the horror movie section of the film store might assume that the screams in question are going unheard on account of everybody getting eaten by aliens. 

This however, is not completely true. 

Within the scientific community, experts agree that - evil aliens aside - sound simply cannot travel through space. Unlike light or heat, sound waves travel by causing surrounding particles to vibrate until some of these particles happen to smack into someone else’s eardrums.

So, if you happened to be aboard a spaceship whose engines have just imploded, ripping massive holes in the hull, forcibly venting the atmosphere, and leaving you hopelessly adrift in the vacuum of space, then there would be no particles left for your screams to vibrate. 

This again, is not completely true. 

Even in space, there are a few things left which can transmit sound - namely, the human skeleton. Microscopic vibrations are capable of traveling through the skull, from the jaw up to the tiny bones within the ear. This is the same principle behind those delightful singing toothbrushes, and is the reason why your voice always sounds different in recordings. 

The point here is that the truest thing to say, would be that in space, no one can hear you scream except yourself. 

Of course, this particular detail was of little importance to Emmet Brickowski as he found himself hurtling through the void of space, his own panicked wails ringing in his ears. 

The noise stopped abruptly as he slammed into ground, knocking the wind out of himself. He bounced at least three times, each impact as jarring as the first. Eventually though, his momentum dissipated and he began to slide on his back, leaving clean streaks in the dust and dirt before skidding to a stop in some kind of dark, cavernous space.

It was quiet here, and for a moment, that came as a comfort to Emmet. 

Then, with a mounting sense of dread, he took note of his leaden limbs and uncooperative vocal cords. 

He couldn't move. He couldn't speak. He was paralyzed - a sensation both alarming and familiar. 

“I’ve been here before,” he thought. And, while he didn’t recognize his immediate surroundings, the sentiment still rang true. 

Years ago, he’d leapt from Lord Business’s tower into the Abyss below. His memory of the fall was vague, perhaps due to the time that had passed since or to the surreal, ephemeral nature of the fall itself. His memory of the place he’d found himself afterwards was much stronger. Just like now, he’d lain paralyzed on the ground, an unwitting witness to the events unfolding around him. 

He’d eventually escaped from that place, sent back by one of its strange inhabitants. 

Emmet stared up at the vast thing looming over him, unable to turn or look anywhere else. A cold voice in the back of his mind asked how any of those beings would be able to find him here. 

“It’s okay,” he told himself. “The raptors sent me out on this mission. They'll notice that I’m gone. They’re the ones that pre-programmed the flightplan, so they’ll already know where to look.”

At the time, he’d thought it was weird how the raptors had been rushing him around, especially considering that the ship seemed like it had been prepped a while ago. They’d been in such a hurry that no one had even explained what this new mission was or why none of the crew could come with. 

Emmet’s lips twitched in an attempted frown. His past concerns all felt so trivial in the light of this new situation.   

“They’ll find me soon,” he tried again to reassure himself. “I just have to be patient.” 

---

Ironically, Emmet found himself thinking about Vitruvius pretty regularly. 

It was ironic considering that Vitruvius was the only one of his friends that couldn’t possibly come to his rescue. Regardless, he was the one at the start of all this, and so Emmet’s thoughts routinely returned to the old man and his “fake but real” prophecy. 

Vitruvius had understood that these states were not mutually exclusive - a clarity granted to him after spending countless hours meditating, dwelling on the nature of the universe, and occasionally napping in a super enlightened manner. Trapped here in Undar, Emmet had nothing better to do than meditate himself, and as a result, he was beginning to better understand the truth that Vitruvius had seen. 

“The only thing anyone needs to be special is to believe that you can be,” Vitruvius had told him. “I know that sounds like a cat poster, but it’s true.”

The cat poster, like most things, existed somewhere beyond Emmet’s current prison - out of sight and out of reach. But, even here, he clung to his ability to believe.

The thing about belief is that its power is firmly rooted in the mind. It is something that you choose to do, and by choosing, you give power to the belief. 

These beliefs can be personal - like a New Year’s resolution. You convince yourself that you will eat better or exercise more and, as long as you remain committed to that belief, the resolution maintains its power. 

Beyond that though, there are many things in the world maintained only by the power of collective belief. Things like laws and money might seem like indisputable facts of nature, but in fact, their strength depends on society considering them as such. 

Take language for example. We know that every word was at some point invented by a person but, if everyone simultaneously started making up their own words instead of using those commonly agreed upon, then conversing might get eh fideckal discvanger upso.

It’s like the prophecy - something simultaneously made up and real. 

At first, Emmet was comfortable with this realization. It gave him a sense of comradery, this idea that society was based on mutual agreement and trust. But, the longer that he ruminated, the more that these thoughts ate at him. After all, the power of belief could only go so far…  

The thing about belief is that it can’t go beyond the mind. Believing that 2 plus 2 equals 5 won’t make your math teacher give you back points on your exam. Believing that you can fly won’t suddenly cause the laws of gravity to flip. 

Believing that your friends will come save you won’t make them appear. 

As time passed, Emmet felt the weight of this truth sink further and further into his chest. Here in Undar, he was quite literally trapped in his own mind. But, as he continued contemplating his situation, he began thinking that maybe he always had been. 

Maybe that’s why the other Apocalypseburgers had been tougher than him. Maybe they’d already recognized the lies inherent to the concept of belief. Maybe they’d all seen the truth of the world while Emmet just kept clinging to stupid things like instructions and turn signals. 

He lived in the world of belief - either too naive or too afraid to face reality, to face the fact that maybe just believing that you are special, that you are worthwhile, that you are loved… doesn’t make any of those things true. 

But now, trapped here, staring helplessly upwards into the maw of the machine above, he had no choice. Now reality screamed at him in the wind, and there was no amount of belief that could save him. 

---

“What are you going to do with him?”

The voice, muffled by the thick cell door, snapped Rex out of his reminiscing. 

Taped to the prison wall, Rex found himself slipping into thoughts about Undar far more easily than he was comfortable with. It made sense, considering that he was once again trapped and motionless, an unwilling witness to his friends talking, laughing, and joking with each other just beyond his reach.

The familiarity burned, a deep, hot ache in his chest. He pressed his eyes closed and forced himself to breathe, struggling to maintain his composure. 

He’d escaped from Undar, and he knew he could escape from this prison too. It was just a question of time, and if there was anything that he’d learned in Undar, it was patience.

He started trying to free his hands again. They were taped across his chest, his fingers tucked into his armpits. With every attempt to move, he could feel the fine hairs on his arms being ripped out. It hurt like heck, but it was only physical pain and so Rex could push past it.  

Dimly, he noticed the sound of the door opening. His eyes flashed open, and he forced himself to be still.

Lucy walked in, leveling a hateful gaze his way. Clearly, he thought, she was still upset about his little trick.

“Okay, listen,” Lucy started, her voice rusty. “I don’t know what your deal is, but I know that Emmet doesn’t deserve to get caught up in all this.”

She walked up to the Tape-estry, resting a hand on its edge. “Just tell us where he is,” she said, peeling the corner back slightly, “and maybe we’ll let you go.”

Rex frowned. If the others rescued Emmet from Undar, then things would play out like they had in the last timeline - except that this time, he’d be trapped and unable to access the flux capacitor. Rex wasn’t sure what would happen to him in a “Rex-less” timeline, but… he had a hypothesis. 

“Tough luck, sister,” he spat. “I think you'll find I’m a pretty tough nut to crack.”  

“Oh, you’re nutty for sure.” Lucy sneered, resealing the edge of the tape. 

She turned her back to the prisoner, stepping away as if to leave. Rex’s pulse sped up at the thought, and he cursed his treacherous heart. 

She stopped in the middle of the room, getting just enough distance to try and clear her head. She was certain that Rex was their only hope of finding Emmet. Benny may be able to track his ship, but that was less than useless if Emmet wasn’t on said ship. 

But how could she get Rex to talk? She knew nothing about the man except that he was dangerous and cruel. It seemed like he knew Emmet, but she just couldn’t understand how anyone familiar with her special best friend could do something as heartless as kidnapping him, or worse.

“Can you...” She started. “Can you at least tell me why Emmet?” 

Rex shrugged, wincing as the thoughtless motion caused the tape to pull at his skin again. “To protect him from all of you.”

“From… us?” She stepped back, physically shaken by the utter ridiculousness of the idea. “From his own friends? We wouldn’t hurt Emmet. We- we miss him! We just want him back! Want him to be safe!”

“You don’t want him back.” Rex muttered, exhausted by how obvious it all was. “You guys don’t even like him.” 

“How would you know?” Lucy hissed. “You don’t know us! You don’t know Emmet!”

“I am Emmet.” Rex stated flatly, the confession coming easier than he would have expected. 

Lucy’s fists clenched at her sides. She scowled, forcing herself to ignore the way her nails bit into her palms. “You’re an idiot if you think I’m falling for that again.” 

“I mean, I was Emmet. ” He replied dryly. “It’s time travel stuff, you wouldn’t understand.”

“Emmet could never do the things you've done. He would never lie… never hurt people.” 

“If you want,” Rex pressed on. “I could prove it. I could tell you something that only Emmet would know...”

Lucy didn’t turn. She couldn’t let him see the way his words wormed into her brain. She knew Rex was an imposter, a liar, but… she couldn’t deny that she wanted to hear what he’d say next.

“Like what?”

Rex smiled, the scent of blood in the air as the prey lumbered into a well placed trap. 

“I could tell you that he liked his coffee with just a touch of cream and 26 sugars.”

“Lots- Lots of people know that.”

“I could tell you that, back before the world ended - the first time that is - he told you that you were the first person to ever tell him that he could be special.”

Lucy kept her eyes pointed down. “That’s not proof, he could have tol-”

“I could tell you that I loved you.” Rex answered, his voice increasing in volume, the raw intensity of the sentiment overpowering his usual stoicism. “Even long after you stopped loving me. Even after you left me behind.”

Lucy whirled around, her face dark with rage. “How DARE yo-” 

She stopped abruptly, staring at the trapped man in shock. She was so ready to be angry, but the pain and grief on Rex’s face was dreadfully genuine.

“Why wasn’t I good enough?” Rex screamed, his voice cracking under the strain. “Why?” “Why wasn’t I good enough to come back for?” At some point, he’d stopped forcing his voice and it had slipped back into something unmistakably like Emmet’s, though Lucy had never heard Emmet like this. 

“S-Stop talking like that! You’re not Emmet.” She pressed her fists into her temples, trying to convince herself as much as Rex. “You’re just a vindictive jerk!”

“Well, Emmet wasn’t good enough either was he?!” Rex roared.

“I-” Her voice trembled. “You don't know what you’re talking abo-”

Rex laughed mirthlessly, interrupting her. He was rapidly losing his composure, but couldn’t seem to care. He managed to find a point of vulnerability, a chink in her armor. “Soft little Emmet… that poor, sweet guy. What a Hufflepuff he was. What a stupid loser he was.”

“Hey!” Lucy spat. “You don’t get to talk about him like that.” 

“But everyone else does?” Rex met her eyes, pinning her in place with his steely gaze. “But you do?”

“I don't….”

“What,” Rex asked in a low voice, “was the last thing you talked to Emmet about? Your Emmet? The real Emmet?”

Lucy froze. The last time she’d seen Emmet had been over a week ago, and the memory came to her slowly. He’d asked her yet again if he could come with her on a patrol, hadn’t he… which meant that…

“I told him that he couldn’t come with me.” Lucy droned, almost mechanically. “I told him that he wasn’t tough enough for patrols…”

“Exactly.”

“But that's not the same thing!” Lucy cried. Pricks burned at her eyes. “I was trying to protect him. Telling him that he's not tough isn’t the same as calling him a loser!”

“It is if you hear it enough.”

Rex’s voice was soft. Lucy took a pause. It was a hard thought to come to terms with.

“You… really are him, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” Rex pushed. “And that’s why you need to trust that what I’m doing is in his best interest. If you go after Emmet,” Rex looked her directly in the eyes, “you'll only hurt him more.”

The tears started now. Lucy could do little more than tremble as they coursed down her cheeks. 

“Okay,” she whispered, no fight left in her voice.  

She stepped forward, and pulled Rex free from the tape. As he stepped down, he stretched out, flexing feeling back into his arms and legs. He turned towards her, placing a hand on her shoulder.

“You made the right choice, Lucy.”

She shivered and watched him leave.

---

The winds had started up again, a persistent, rumbling thunder that shoved any thoughts out of his mind. 

If Emmet could have cried, he would have.

There was another sound somewhere in the distance, and Emmet braced himself for another one of those terrible, crawling monsters to appear. 

The sound came again, closer and clearer this time. It was a high-pitched droning noise, and with a flash, Emmet recognized it as the whine of an engine.

The drone cut off, abruptly replaced by the whirr of a docking mechanism and the hiss of an opening airlock. 

His heart soared in his chest. He knew the raptors would come for him. He knew it!

Unable to look over, Emmet strained his ears, listening for footsteps or voices, willing them to come closer. 

A sudden fear struck him. What if they didn't find him? This place was huge and dark, and, unable to move or speak, Emmet had no way to signal them. Frantically, he tried to move, to scream.

His arm twitched. 

It wasn’t a lot, but it was more than he’d been able to do before. 

His resolve strengthened, Emmet redoubled his efforts. He tried harder than he’d ever tried anything before. 

His leg kicked, followed by a flick of a wrist and a twist of his neck. Slowly but surely, he regained some kind of control over his body. He grunted, instantly delighted by the sound of his own voice. 

In his self sustained commotion, he failed to notice the sound of approaching footsteps. 

“THERE HE IS!” The voice that rang out was muffled, likely by a helmet, but Emmet still vaguely felt like he should recognize it. 

A figure ran up to him, kneeling at his side. They reached down, taking his hand. Instinctively, Emmet grasped back, not even noticing how much easier the motion had become. 

“DO NOT WORRY,” the speaker continued. They loomed over him, a set of glowing green eyes peering out of the darkness. “WE ARE HERE TO RESCUE YOU, GROMMET!”