#monster freak who only wants to raise some monster eggs and maybe eat some more pilots. is that so much to ask? are we so jaded that we

[fizzingwizard]

Episode 34 arrives and it’s a MUCH NEEDED breath of first air. I mean, this episode could have actually BEEN a 99 Adventure episode. I guess at least one person on the production team has actually seen the old show at least once!

In my opinion, it doesn’t quite equal the cuteness, silliness, and personality of similar 99 episodes, but it comes very close, and it’s certainly the best we’ve had in a long long while.

And it’s all because of these two.

More below!

The episode bizarrely begins with Tailmon barking to communicate with Komondomon. Which raises the question, if no one could talk with Komondomon before because he can only bark, how were they communicating? Did Lopmon just tell Komondomon everything he needed to know and tell the kids “just follow his lead” or something??

Also Tailmon’s opening line being her barking is pretty surreal. And yet, fitting for a cat Digimon who is a dog at Child level.

The kids are shown taking a break - the first sign that this episode is gonna be A Bit Different.

Taichi: Something feels weird. Why aren’t we fighting?

Sora: Taichi, don’t you think you should rest once in a while?

Taichi: I mean, I do, I just got the impression the rest of the world didn’t agree...

Sora: By the way, why do we like this world that constantly tries to kill us and never gives us any pleasant memories so much? Why don’t we just take our partners to the human world and leave this place to its fate?

Taichi: How else am I gonna get an outlet for my pent up aggression and adrenaline junkie issues?

Sora: That’s your backstory?

Taichi: I’m a complicated man.

Komondomon then randomly jumps... into the sea. “Oh no, they’ll drown!” No, they won’t, because Komondomon has the ability to build a dome over his back trapping oxygen inside. Submarimon I get, but Komondomon?

As they dive, Tailmon explains what we learned last week about Millenniumon trying to resurrect himself with a new body. Apparently a very large fragment of him is located undersea in a place called Farga (transliteration TBA). She thinks resentfully about how she was almost absorbed into Millenniumon’s most recent resurrection effort.

Hikari tackles her with a comforting hug, which Tailmon seems a bit discomfited by. But does not object.

Tailmon considers defeating Millenniumon for good to be her personal mission as a Holy Digimon. Patamon sees her determination and does his best to put on his game face too. It’s like being glared at by a sock puppet.

Tailmon: I can’t allow Hikari to be put in danger. It’s my job as the Holy Digimon -

Tailmon: - gosh darnit and she’s just so cute too!

They wind up getting hit by a rip current or something?? and thrown into another weird submarine sort of thing. They discourteously break a hole in it and wind up inside a self-sustaining underwater kingdom, apparently, which instantly goes on Red Alert as Manbomon come to attack them.

This is Daipenmon, or Big Penguin Monster. I love him. He is glorious. Gaze upon his expression of perpetually stoned haze.

Daipenmon: You try steering this thing every day in and out nonstop without turning to hard drugs.

She attac!

While fighting, some Mantaraymon break in through the hole they made and the Manbomon go to drive them off as apparently they are not welcome. Then MarineAngemon appears in all her creepy glory and they sort everything out.

MarineAngemon: Oh, Tailmon, I see you’re a Holy Digimon! I can tell by your Holy Ring. I have one too.

Takeru: Patamon, why don’t you have a Holy Ring?

Patamon: .... -.-’

Look! See! So cute! They are floating on bubbles! All the kids get their own and each has an individual design that shows their personality. Here Tailmon tries desperately to keep Hikari from falling off. I missed this kind of thing! Flashbacks to Monzaemon’s Toytown...

Turns out MarineAngemon is extremely small and the scene before was all “don’t pay attention to that man behind the curtain” type scare tactics. Not very effective since no matter how big MarineAngemon gets, she’s still extremely adorable. She invites them to stay the night. I really expected it to be a trap, but it wasn’t.

OH MY GOD IS THAT FOOD ARE THEY EATING ACTUAL FOOD OMG OMG

quick someone alert the producers! Someone’s having FUN with this show! I was starting to think that was illegal or something!

It’s not AS fun as when they went to Devimon’s illusory castle in 99 Adventure and stuffed their faces after starving and living on potentially poisonous eggs for a week... but I’ll take it.

Meanwhile an undersea band plays music and Taichi ACTS LIKE THE FIFTH GRADE CHILD THAT HE IS. For about 0.5 seconds but HEY he did something child-like! holy cheez wiz batman!

Hikari is mysteriously absent so Tailmon goes to find her. Turns out she’s asked MarineAngemon to heal Komondomon who is tired and wounded from their journey. Tailmon’s like, “Aw, what a nice person she is.” I’m all for exceptionally kind-hearted Hikari, but taking care of Komondomon should have been priority 1 for EVERYONE. At least Sora should have thought of it. I can see Taichi being too forward-focused, and Takeru a dumb eight year old, but Sora would definitely have thought about Komondomon.

Clearly the show wanted to establish how nice Hikari is, but I hate when shows inadvertently make all the other characters look like asses just to trump up the current star...

Taichi’s digivice glows and...

... MINI KOUSHIROU RETURNS!!! Hurray!

Um, what’s that Sora’s drinking? A mimosa? o.O

Well anyway, Koushirou just shows up to remind everyone of the situation with the satellites and that things are getting worse.

Taichi: Do you have any idea what we can do about it?

Koushirou: No, but I’ll keep you posted.

Taichi: Thanks for nothing braindead

Koushirou: That’s it! You’re not the man I knew in episode 3 anymore! I want a divorce!

Taichi: Fine with me it’s not like you’re ever home anyway!

Koushirou: Well at least I’m not cheating with YAMATO!

Taichi: I HAVE NEEDS!

*cough*

Uh, I know Taichi is shorter than Sora, but he looks... pretty tiny here... lol. Or maybe Sora’s just had a growth spurt again.

They spend the night sleeping in bubbles. Aw.

By the way, question: the kids seem able to walk and breath normally in MarineAngemon’s kingdom... but the fish-type Digimon can also swim around normally. And it seems the kids wouldn’t be able to survive in the ocean itself, but they and the fish can both survive here? And yet bubbles? What... what kind of scientific anomaly is this place??

So... MarineAngemon’s kingdom appears to be a Whamon’s corpse! X’D Wow that’s dark.

They are attacked by Anomalocarimon! For reasons. Actually, they did explain earlier that the ocean Digimon have been more aggressive lately and it seems to be the influence of Millenniumon’s stone in Farga or whatever.

Daipenmon: This sucks I don’t have health insurance

Tailmon frantically tries to fight off the intruders while also keeping Hikari out of danger. This entire episode is about Tailmon wanting to protect Hikari and keep her at arm’s length so she doesn’t end up in danger, while Hikari just keeps trying to stay close to Tailmon and support her.

Tailmon: I can’t take you with me, Hikari. It’s too dangerous.

Hikari: Fine. Big brother, will you bring me into the heat of the action with you?

Taichi: Sure thing.

Tailmon: ...

In his defense, Taichi does seem a bit freaked when Hikari TAKES A FLYING LEAP off MetalGreymon toward Tailmon.

(no I really love that Taichi immediately understands why Hikari wants to fight and takes her right to her partner without even a token “nuu but you’re still a baby.” I mean, if Yamato’s cool with Takeru being in danger all the time, Taichi shouldn’t be much worried about it...

Hikari has a flashback! Turns out she’s heard Tailmon calling for her since she as a little kid!

She caught one of Angewomon’s feathers back then too.

Hikari promises Tailmon that she’ll be by her side. Awww.

Hands again.

Crest of Light! I kind of expect that we’ll find out about the Crests and what they mean really fast at the end of the season... although I’m still kind of hoping Mimi is mining Crest crystals atm.

Hikari is able to magically produce a Digivice... I’d completely forgot she didn’t have one till now.

Here I expected Tailmon would evolve, but instead, the power of Light appears to give everyone a power boost like it’s done in the past. They all glow with their Crest colors, kids and partners alike (except for some reason Tailmon glows yellow???) and launch a joint attack on Anomalocarimon and defeat him. Yay.

Then they say goodbye to MarineAngemon and go on their way, I guess to Farga.

So... yeah! it was a nice episode. It had a theme. There was fighting, but it didn’t overwhelm everything else. There was character development. I really can’t complain about it. And it was SHOCKING that Taichi had so few lines (compared to what’s become the norm - a GOOD shock but still I was like “omg what’s going on!!”)

I am just confused because why is this sort of episode happening when we haven’t seen it in ages? What happened in that interim between when they all met up after the first team split up and just now that prevented the show writers from having fun with the show and just writing nonstop fighting all the time? I’m so confused. It makes no sense. Still suspecting that they couldn’t get anyone to come in and voice characters for long enough so they just focused on Sanpei Yuuko/Taichi, but without the others they couldn’t figure out how to push the show forward and make it fun too... Idk. It’s so weird. But oh well. We got a good episode, and maybe it’s a sign of changes to come. I hope so.

Next week...

We get attacked by a scary looking Digimon and Hikari... Idk, thinks she can block the attack somehow? haha. Aw but look how awesome she is protecting her brother and Greymon!

Hikari gets touched by the dark powers! Oh noes!

And more cuteness.

The episode title name-drops Angewomon, which surprises me because I figured they’d hold off on her and give Tailmon Nefertimon for an evolution first. But *shrug* whatever! Looking forward to it.

[autisticfangpyreclub]

Don’t fear the dark, let it protect you - part two

Lloyd never paid much attention to his dragon side. But he never could have imagined how much it wanted to be heard.

-

The smell of bacon and eggs greeted Lloyd as he entered the kitchen. He sat down at the table, and Zane handed him a plate.

“Sorry, it’s a little cold,” he said with a frown, “we were going to wake you up but…”

Lloyd shrugged. “It’s alright, don’t worry about it…”

He poked at the bacon with his fork, unease gnawing at his gut. He’d never had a problem eating meat before. He ate meat all the time. But the overwhelming smell of grease and burnt flesh coming from his plate was nauseating, headache inducing even. Suppressing a gag, he pushed his plate away.

Cole looked over at him in concern. “What’s wrong, you feeling sick?”

Lloyd’s cheeks flushed. “No, just, uh…” he stuttered, “I’m just not… uh…”

“You don’t appear to have any sort of high temperature,” Zane said, placing a hand on Lloyd’s forehead, “though your face is very red… is there something wrong with your food?”

Lloyd gently pushed Zane away. “No, it’s fine, but… do we have any vegetables?”

Zane blinked and raised an eyebrow. Everyone at the table gave him similar bewildered looks. “Vegetables?” Zane asked.

“Yeah, I’ve been really craving some all morning,” Lloyd replied, getting up from his seat, “we probably have some carrots leftover from thursday right?”

“Yes, but…”

Lloyd opened the fridge. He snatched up the bag of baby carrots and started shoveling them into his mouth. Zane stared at him, mouth agape.

“Lloyd, are you sure you’re… feeling alright?” he asked as he watched Lloyd toss the empty bag aside and move on to the lettuce.

Lloyd swallowed a mouthful of lettuce and shrugged. “I dunno, I feel fine, why?”

“Because you hate vegetables!” Jay said, “did you fall out of bed and bonk your head or something?”

Lloyd finished off the head of lettuce and stuck his head back in the fridge. He sniffed for more vegetables, growling when there were none to be found. He was still hungry.

Kai placed a hand on his shoulder. “Lloyd, what’s going on-”

He snarled at him, his teeth suddenly much longer and sharper. Kai jumped and drew back in alarm. “Woah, dude!” he yelped.

Lloyd slapped a hand over his mouth. How had that slipped out? His eyes darted between Kai, who was still slowly backing away from him, and the shocked faces of his friends. He shuddered.

“I… I have to go…” he mumbled, and ran out of the kitchen, ignoring the shouts behind him.

-

He didn’t stop running until he was outside the monastery, standing on a patch of grass overlooking the cliff. Lloyd sighed, and sat down to catch his breath. He shouldn’t have trusted those oni in his dream. He shouldn’t have let his oni side take over. Now he was turning into a monster.

...a monster with an unending hunger for vegetables, which to be fair, wasn’t the worst possible scenario. It was almost kinda funny. Okay, the snarling was bad, but he could deal with that.

Speaking of hunger, the grass he was sitting on smelled pretty tasty too…

Before he could stop himself, he was down on all fours ravenously munching on the grass. He probably looked so ridiculous. He didn’t care though, all that he could think of was how sweet and delicious the grass was.

“...guys, I found him.”

Lloyd froze like a deer in headlights. He hesitantly turned to see Nya standing behind him, and almost felt like dying from embarrassment.

“Um… this isn’t what it looks like,” he said weakly.

Nya raised an eyebrow. “Really? Because it kinda looks like you're on all fours eating grass like a goat.”

Lloyd looked down at his hands. “Okay, yeah, it is what it looks like…”

He stood up and brushed himself off, as the rest of the ninja gathered around him. Cole laid a comforting hand on his back. “Hey, no matter what’s going on right now, we’re here for you y'know?”

Kai nodded and patted Lloyd on the head. “Yeah, and sorry about what happened back there, I didn’t mean to scare you bud.”

Lloyd leaned into his touch and smiled. “Thanks guys… but you shouldn’t apologize, you were right to be afraid…” he murmured.

“Aw, don’t say that!” Jay said, “we’d never be afraid of you, even if you have turned into a werebunny!”

Lloyd squinted at him. “A… what?”

“Y’know, a werebunny, like a werewolf but a bunny,” Jay explained, “that’s what happened right? You got bitten by one and now you're turning! Oh no, tomorrow’s a full moon too-”

“I’m not turning into a bunny!” Lloyd shouted, “I’m turning into an oni!”

“Since when do oni’s eat vegetables?” Nya asked, “seems weird, given their whole destroy everything thing you think they’d eat meat.”

“Herbivores can be quite destructive, even more so than carnivores actually,” Zane said.

Lloyd groaned and put his head in his hands. “I don’t wanna turn into a giant bunny… wait, why aren’t you guys more freaked out? I just told you I’m turning into an oni!”

“Why aren’t YOU more freaked out?” Jay shot back, “I thought your oni side taking over was like your greatest fear.”

“It was, but… I had a dream last night that I turned into a full oni, but I wasn’t destroying anything, or hurting anyone,” Lloyd said, his body relaxing as he remembered, “it was… peaceful.”

“Have you talked to Wu about this yet?” Cole asked.

Lloyd shook his head. “No… but I think I should, before I start eating grass again… ugh…”

-

Master Wu was deep in meditation when Lloyd crept into the room. He sat across from him, and crossed his legs. Wu didn’t acknowledge him. The room was awkwardly silent for a moment.

“...I sense something is troubling you,” Wu said.

Lloyd flinched, then cleared his throat. “Yeah… so, um… it’s kinda hard to explain…”

Wu poured a cup of tea for himself, and then one for Lloyd. “I’m listening.”

Lloyd nodded in thanks and took the cup of hot tea. Deep breath in. Master Wu is part oni too, he’ll understand. “I had a dream last night… about the oni.”

Something in Wu’s expression shifted. His grip on his cup tightened. “...what happened in this dream?”

“I turned into an oni.”

Wu gasped and narrowly avoided dropping his cup. He coughed, composing himself. “You must’ve been horribly frightened by this vision.”

Something in the way Wu was looking at him made Lloyd nervous. Like he was being interrogated. He tensed his shoulders and looked away. “Uh… actually… it wasn’t that bad.”

An uncomfortable energy settled over the room. “What?” Wu asked, a dark tone seeping into his voice.

“Yeah, I know it sounds crazy but when I was an oni, when I was with the other oni I felt…” Lloyd wrapped his arms around himself and sighed, “safe… like I belonged.”

Wu stood up abruptly. He grabbed Lloyd by the arm and pulled him to his feet. “Wait, master, what-”

Lloyd’s next words got caught in his throat. Wu was glaring at him, like he had done something seriously wrong. “Lloyd, listen to me, and listen well.”

The nervous feeling Lloyd had was crawling in his gut, making his head foggy. He tried to pull away, but Wu’s grip was strong. “Master please let me go-”

“The oni are dangerous, deceitful creatures who only crave destruction, you cannot trust anything they say.”

“Master, please stop, please let me go-”

Wu ignored his pleas. “You must suppress the darkness, or it will consume you, just like it consumed your father.”

At that, something in Lloyd snapped. He growled. His nails transformed into claws, and he swiped at Wu with his free arm. He hadn’t meant to scratch him that bad, but from the pained scream Wu made he’d obviously done some damage.

Lloyd scrambled back the second Wu let go of his arm. The smell of the blood on his claws only riled him up more, his eyes narrowing and illuminating the dark room with a neon green glow. “I told you to LET ME GO, old man.”

Wu gaped at him, gingerly touching the gash on his face. “How dare you use your claws against me nephew!” he yelled.

“I am not my father,” Lloyd snarled, “I’ll never be my father, and I do not fear the darkness anymore.”

Green scales covered his arms and legs. He grit his fangs as his horns tore through his skin, this time not bothering to grow them slowly. The pain only gave him clarity.

“You say oni are dangerous and deceitful… what are you then?” Lloyd asked with a scowl.

“Excuse me?”

Lloyd rolled his eyes. “You're more oni than me, and you know it,” he said as he approached Wu, claws bared, “maybe that’s why you lie, maybe that’s why you don’t tell anyone your secrets even when it could help them.”

“What are you talking about-”

“You lied to me!” Lloyd could feel tears pricking at the corner of his eyes, but he pushed them back, “you knew embracing my oni side wouldn’t make me dangerous, but you still made me suffer!”

Wu’s face changed from anger to sorrow. “Lloyd… I’m so sorry, but you must calm yourself-”

“SHUT UP!”

Fiery tears poured down Lloyd’s cheeks. Scales had grown over his entire body, leaving him thankfully fireproof. He cried out as his limbs cracked and popped, becoming more animalistic and quadruped, until he no longer could stand on two legs. He fell to the floor with a thud.

He looked up at Wu, terror in his eyes. “This… this isn’t like what it was like before… what’s happening to me…?”

“I… I don’t know…”

Rigged spikes formed on his wrists and ankles, and along his newly formed tail. He heard a gross tearing noise as large bat-like wings burst from his back and ripped through his shirt. Lloyd’s pained cries morphed into growls. His face pushed out into a snout, the final part of his transformation before he collapsed in exhaustion.

Before he passed out, he saw Wu standing over him. Hopefully this scared him enough to make him never want to grab Lloyd like that again.

-

“Oh youngling, you poor thing…”

Lloyd opened his eyes to see a familiar face leaning over him. A gentle paw touched his cheek. “Oni…?”

The oni smiled, and stroked his hair. “My name is Theta, actually.”

Lloyd groaned. “Theta… what happened? My head feels awful…”

“You transformed into a dragon,” Theta said quietly, “but don’t be afraid, in time you will learn how to control your shapeshifting abilities.”

“But I… I attacked master Wu…”

“Oh don’t worry about that, he deserved it,” Theta scoffed, “he won’t harm you ever again, I promise.”

A calming sensation washed over Lloyd as he was cradled in Theta’s lap. “Um… sorry for the weird question, but what pronouns do you use?” he asked.

“She her dear,” she replied, hugging Lloyd close to her chest.

Lloyd sighed in content, and snuggled into her warm fur. She hummed a lullaby for him, one his father had sung to him when he was little. He felt safe.

“Rest now child… even when you awake in the physical realm, my shadow will still protect you.”

[local80smotel]

All knowing love

pairing; V x Trans Man! Reader

summary; being under V's loving and watchful eye.

requested; Anonymous

rating; T

warnings; transphobia, parental abuse (physical), hints of suicide (but never outright said)

word count; 2185

A/N; this isn't wasn't the fluffiest thing I could write but once talking to my trans boyfriend I couldn't help but feel having a bit of angst was acceptable.

When Y/N was still just a child, he knew something was off about him. Not something "bad" or "wrong" that people would call this feeling when he'd tell them. "It's just a phase" was a comment that was thrown at them mostly by their parents when they were still in their teens, just before high Chancellor Sutler was ever in the eye of politics. Oh, how those days would seem like a humid southern summer walk compared to when Sutler came into the picture. The transphobia he had experienced grew like how weeds grow in futile soil.

The comments like "You're confused" slowly started to warp into something more demeaning to the boy as the Chancellor candidate's toxic grip on the people of England started to squeeze any "unwanted" life out of it. "Undesirable" life as he would call it. When hair was cut after Sutler was elected, there weren't small arguments anymore that would be fixed when he'd be asked if he were hungry and wanted to eat supper with them. It became violent and unlike the people who had raised him for the last 15 years. Having handfuls of freshly cut hair be ripped out because his mother was holding him by his scalp just to yell in his face how much of a monster he was broke his heart.

Was it fear that caused this? Were they scared of losing their only child as many other families had? Was their bundle of joy in their life really an undesirable and the cause of this virus outbreak? Just why? He'd ask himself that as he was packing his bags in preparation to leave the family home for good.

Three long years had passed and at the ripe age of 18, he moved out into the busy streets of London. A small pit in his stomach began to form as the sickening feeling came back. The cause of it was from one simple but yet complex question; could he survive in this fascist regime? Sadness also fueled this emotional fire, sadness from knowing he'd have to use so many things he knew was wrong and didn't describe him truthfully just so he could get a place to come to when curfew hit; The name that was long dead to him the second it was given to him and female pronouns. He'd be signing his own death certificate if he put Y/N instead of his deadname on his application to rent.

They'd look it up and find no Y/N L/N in England and call the police on him in a split second. Shivers ran down his spine as he imagined what would happen to him if that became a reality. No one knew what happened when you were deemed "undesired" but everyone after having Sulter for three years knew that they would go missing and would be never seen of or heard from again. You were just wiped off the face of the Earth.

Y/N lucky had enough money saved from working in retail for the past 2 years to get a small apartment. When he was finally given the keys to the place he couldn't help but sigh in relief. At least in this tiny space, he could be his true self without shaking in fear as he had in his past while being stuck in his parents' home. The next three years were some of the worse when it came to dysphoria. Being forced to go to work almost every day and be called ma'am or miss and be deadnamed constantly damaged his mental health to the point it felt easier just to be open with his identity.

Anything would be better than being forced to hide in this shell of terror. Nights of panic attacks and sobbing that sounded like a wounded animal as he laid on the rotten wooden floor became a routine. On the morning of his 21st birthday, he woke up in the late afternoon. There was no panic in him when he realized he was late for work, how could someone care when this would be their last day on Earth?

With scissors in his hand, he grabbed his hair and began to chop it off sloppily but that didn't matter to him as long as it was finally short like it was when he was a child, and that was enough for him. The thought that when the police would see him, that'd see a man instead of what society had deemed him brought a smile to the young adult. The feeling of freedom pumped through his veins as he went on with his day. It felt odd but refreshing to feel the cold air from his AC on his neck as he fixed himself some bacon and eggs. It wasn't the fanciest thing someone could eat on this day, but it was enough for him.

Around ten AM he left his flat, walking with newfound confidence due to his hair and now his wrapped chest. He had heard from the grapevine that wrapping one's chest in medical bandages could cause serious damage like nerve loss but one this final day he decided to risk it so he could pass in normal daily life. Being called sir by ticket seller at the movies brought him so much joy as he grabbed his "Count of Monte Cristo" tickets and wished them a good day as he went deeper into the movie theater to find theater four to watch the movie. Y/N was somewhat surprised to see only one other person in the audience. Sure, he was 10 minutes late but this was a classic film that was finally being let out of the vault to be watched again! Nevertheless, the man sat down a few rows in front of the figure, settling down into the uncomfortable chair.

“I didn't expect you to come.”

He could tell from how the figure's words were muffled that they were wearing a mask. Y/N turned to them with a confused look on their face.

“Excused me?” Y/N asked but their confusion just deepened as he saw that the figure was wearing.

A Guy Fawkes mask with a matching hat while wearing pitch-black clothing. The man under the mask chuckled as they stood up, Y/N couldn't help but be slightly intimidated by the height of this masked figure.

“I should have done this first so you wouldn't be so perplexed, ” he cleared his throat as began monologing, using many words that start with the letter V in his speech which in turn slightly impressed the 21-year-old.

“But you can simply call me V.”

"V" said while taking a bow

Y/N couldn't help but snicker at this display of some kind of knightship which in turn had V cocked his head in slight confusion on what could be so funny

“Well, Mr. V, might I ask why you're here alone?”

“I could ask you the same thing, but as I am apparently on a tight schedule I won't elaborate”

“Tight sch-” the man interrupted them by placing his leather glove covered finger on top of their lips

“Yes, very much tight schedule as I only have 2 hours till your self made demise am I correct?”

He was blown away at the fact this random stranger knew of his most shameful plan, but the feeling of shock was soon replaced with anger. This creep was stalking me! He thought as he slapped away the masked man, getting up from his chair as he did so.

“You have some right talking to me like that!” he yelled as he started to march away from them.

V reached out and grabbed their hair in a somewhat gentle way

“Y/N wait please, ” he sighed as Y/N stopped who's face was twisted in bitterness “I understand how you feel Y/N, I truly do. I was labeled an undesirable so please don't think that I've been keeping an eye on you in for any other reason than just to keep you safe.”

When he said this Y/N rage seemed to melt away slowly. How was he able to survive being an undesirable? So many questions filled the male's head but the only word he could speak was

“How?”

V let go of his hair as he straightened his posture “If you come with me I'll tell you.”

The more sensible side of the man told him to run away from this masked freak and enjoy what little time you had left in peace but something stopped him. After a moment of silence, he nodded to V's pleasure. He took the 21-year old by the hand and lead them to the back exit. The two walked down the alley and what drew Y/N's eye other than the 6'3 black mass was the posters. Every single one they pasted seemed to have a V cut into them.

He broke the long silence with another question “Did you mark those posters?”

“Does a raven speak?”

“But why?”

V didn't stop walking but he could feel his eyes on him. For being an undesirable he sure seems fine being out after curfew Y/N thought as they waited for the answer.

“The people deserve a symbol. Something to get them through this.”

He opened his mouth to ask what he meant by that but quickly shut it once the meanings of the words came to mind. Maybe he wasn't this creep, more like this country's guardian angel that would save them all from high Chancellor Sutler. It didn't take long for him to reach what Y/N guessed as V's home which turned out to be an abandoned Victoria station. Y/N looked over at him with an eyebrow raised as V opened the hatch that kept the station locked to the public who had originally thought it was abandoned. V turned back to the man and gave him his hand simply saying "follow me, sir Y/N".

Once V was given the curious man's hand he rubbed his thumb over their knuckles before tenderly pulling them inside. He held the hand as they walked in the pitch black, guiding them until they found a giant door which to Y/N's touch felt like it had complex carvings in them. When the masked man opened the door Y/N couldn't help but wince as golden light hit his E/C eyes that had just gotten used to the dark. He had expected V to let go of his hand once they reached his "lair" but he didn't. Oh, what a perplexing and mysterious man he was.

Y/N would be lying if he said his face wasn't blushing at this moment in time. V led them deeper into his beautiful home until both of them to were behind his couch which was black leather. In front of the said couch was a glass coffee table with a box on it. Y/N's hand was finally let go of as V sat on the couch.

“Come sit, I have something to give you.”

“But you said-”

“Please?”

He sighed as he complied, arms folded as he sat next to him. V opened the box and to Y/N's surprise, there was a biner in it. Once again, all he could ask was "How?" as all production and selling of items that could help trans folk was banned just as the Koran was. The masked man took the folded bundle into his giant hands and gave it to them once again shocked male.

“Life has been tough enough on you even if we don't add our government into it. Thank you for holding on. For surviving this long and not letting them take away your love for life and your fighting spirit.”

Without any hesitation, Y/N pulled V into a tight embrace with tears threatening to fall. No one had ever put their life in danger to give them this piece of happiness like this stranger had. All he could do was whimper out a "thank you" as a sob shook his chest deeply.

“Since I showed you my lair, you're going to have to stay till the next November the fifth, is that okay?”

Y/N couldn't help but nod immediately. He could finally be somewhere he was truly accepted for who he really was; a man who was just simply given the wrong body at birth.

V placed his hands on top of the weeping H/C man, stroking the uneven hair and placed his head onto the others.

“I'm cooking ham, is that okay?”

“mmhmm..”

“Thank you, Y/N.”

[luci-in-trenchcoats]

Make It Through The Night (Part 3)

(x)

Summary: The reader meets Dean’s friend, Benny, but everything isn’t as smooth sailing as it seems...

Masterlist

Pairing: Apocalypse!Dean x reader

Square: Dean Winchester

Word Count: 3,100ish

Warnings: langauge, minor violence

A/N: Written for @spngenrebingo​​​

_____

“Morning sunshine,” said Dean as you walked into the kitchen. “Eggs and rice for breakfast.”

“It’s hot. I ain’t complaining,” you said, fixing your arm in it’s sling.

“You change your bandages out yet?” he asked. You yawned and nodded, taking a seat at the counter. “Ever been shot before?”

“No. Hurts like a bitch,” you said, looking around. “So where’s the rice come from?”

“One of the largest rice distribution plants is about twenty minutes down the road. I stocked up,” he said.

“Smart move,” you said. “So where the hell am I exactly? This place I mean.”

“Short version, there used to be these guys, Men of Letters. My grandpa was one. This was their base of operations. They got wiped out in the fifties though,” said Dean. “They used to research monsters, how to kill them, that sort of thing. Through a very long series of events which started long before I was born, I wound up being raised by a hunter, my dad. Along with Sam. Hunters used to kill monsters back when the world was normal and no one knew about this stuff. After my dad died, it was me and Sam for a while and a whole bunch of other bad shit happened and then he got on demon blood and we went our separate ways. I ended up meeting my grandpa who traveled through time before he died and he told me about this place. It’s safe from monsters, demons, you name it. It runs itself. There’s a bunch of information in that library that might be useful. It’s pretty...I lost you at the time traveling grandpa, didn’t I.”

“If that’s the short version, I can’t imagine the long,” you said, resting your head against your palm. “You’re serious?”

“My life’s always been strange. Everyone else finally caught up a year ago,” he said.

“It’s completely safe here?” you asked.

“I mean, nothing is completely safe but it’s probably the safest place on the planet,” he said.

“Good,” you said, closing your eyes. “I could do with someplace safe.”

“It’s not pretty out there. The world now I mean,” he said, handing you a plate, your eyes fluttering open.

“Those guys were probably going to sell me to a monster...or a demon. It seems to be the hot commodity,” you said.

“Speaking of which, after breakfast, you’re gonna have to get tatted up,” said Dean. 

“Um, what?” you said as you started to eat.

“Tattoo,” he said, pulling aside his flannel and t shirt, showing off a tattoo on his chest. “Anti-possession. A demon can’t take over your body that way.”

“Oh. Yeah, that’s probably good to have,” you said. “You know how to do tattoo’s?”

“Personally, no but one of my friends should be getting back home soon. He was out on a supply run,” said Dean.

“Oh. Cool,” you said.

“Y/N,” he said, poking at his food. “I thought about last night, what we talked about, what you said. You’re right. I can’t kill Sam. I never could. I don’t want to kill him. It’s my job to fucking protect him. I’m not going to give up on him. I want to try to talk to him, figure out how to catch him and get him off of the demon blood, get rid of his powers. That’s the only option. I know you offered but I won’t go down that road.”

“No killing Sam. Okay,” you said with a nod. “We’ll figure something out then.”

“Thank you,” said Dean. 

Thirty minutes later you were in the library trying to figure out some basics about demons when the front door opened and man in combat gear came walking down the stairs with a box.

“I found you extremely stale gummy bears. You’re welcome,” said the man, setting the box down on the war room table, staring at you. “Cher.”

“What?” you asked, glancing at Dean.

“It’s a nickname thing he does. Y/N, this is Benny. Ex-vampire I met in purgatory. Benny, this is Y/N. Met her yesterday when a few unscrupulous fellas were on my property again,” said Dean.

“Vampire,” you said, instinctively getting out of your seat and taking a few steps back.

“Ex-vampire,” said Dean as he flipped through a book. “He doesn’t bite.”

“Unless you’re into that,” he smiled, flashing you a wink.

“Dude. I get that the dating pool is limited but-”

“Excuse, Dean,” said Benny, ruffling his hair as he went past and took a seat. “He’s a worrier. Plus it’s fun to tease him. He’s totally into you anyways.”

You blinked slowly, Dean giving Benny a bitchface.

“Let’s not scare off the first company we’ve had in oh, months? Hm?” said Dean.

“Ignoring the purgatory part of that sentence for right now, how does one become an ex-vampire?” you asked, staring at Benny.

“Ordinarily there’s a cure but it only works if the person has never tasted human blood and if you have the fang of the vamp that turned you. Benny though...well when we got out of purgatory, he was still a vamp,” said Dean.

“I was almost at the point of asking Deano to end it for me. I knew I would break and hurt someone. But the world decided to go to shit and I drank from an infected person. I got really sick. Majorly sick,” said Benny, peeling off his boots and kicking up his feet in a nearby chair.

“We tried the cure, figured what the hell and now Benny is as human as the day he was born,” said Dean. “He’s like really fucking old by the way.”

“Shut up,” said Benny, pushing Dean’s face, a smile popping up on it for a moment. “So ex-vampire. No need to be afraid.”

“Alright,” you said as you sat back down. 

“What’s with the chicken wing?” asked Benny, nodding at you.

“Shot yesterday. Graze on the arm, through and through in the shoulder,” said Dean, flipping through his book again. “Y/N’s gonna stay here, help with the Sam situation.”

“Good. We could always use a few more hands,” said Benny.

“How many hands are there?” you asked.

“There’s a network of hunters out there. It’s not huge but it’d be useful to get close to Sam,” said Dean. “Plan’s changed by the way, Benny. We take him alive and cure him or it’s the end of us.”

“Whatever you want, brother,” said Benny, standing up with a sigh. “I’ve been on the road all night. I’m gonna shower and crash before I have to head out again.”

“I’ll need a tat done before you go. Gonna stick around more than a day for once?” asked Dean.

“I’ll be here a few days. I know you miss this pretty face, Deano,” he said. Dean rolled his eyes and Benny wandered off down a different hall. 

“So purgatory...no one can ever say you have not led a full life,” you said. Dean chuckled and leaned back in his seat. 

“Full of horrors. But yeah, I suppose you’re right. It’s been interesting,” he said.

“Did you like...die,” you said, Dean cocking his head. “Purgatory.”

“No. Accidentally wound up there when I killed a special kind of monster. I met up with Benny there. We found a way out together,” said Dean. “Just because a monster is a monster...they can be your friend too. I got a buddy who’s a werewolf actually.”

“Here I thought study abroad would make me exciting,” you said. Dean smiled and slid over his book to you.

“Read this one. It’ll give you some good info. We’ll go over some good ways to kill demons maybe later in the week,” he said.

“I’m not a soldier. I don’t know...everything I know, I picked up on my own,” you said.

“I’m pretty confident in your abilities,” he said. “We don’t have to go after Sam this second. Something like this, we need to know our game plan first and I don’t even know where to start so focus on healing and training a bit for now.”

“Alright,” you said, Benny cutting back in wearing nothing but his boxers.

“Dude. We have a lady in the house now,” said Dean.

“She can walk around in her underwear too. I don’t care,” said Benny, going to the box and pulling out a bottle of soap. 

“You and your old spice you freak,” said Dean.

“Don’t knock it,” said Benny. “There’s some shaving cream in there too in case you decide to shave that peach fuzz.”

“Asshole,” said Dean as Benny laughed, carrying the box away with him.

“I like the beard,” you said with a shrug.

“See, brother? Match made in heaven right here,” he said.

“Oh shut up,” said Dean. “Go get clean. You smell filthy.”

“Whatever you say,” he said, whistling as he went.

“Sorry. He’s a bit...Benny sometimes,” said Dean. 

“I like him,” you said, glancing through the pages.

“You actually like the beard?” he asked. Your eyes glanced over and met his, noticing just how pretty of a green they were. 

“It suits you. You look like some badass or something,” you said. He smirked and you rolled your eyes. “Oh my God. I can only handle one man-child at a time.”

“Speaking of badasses, you’ll need some new gear. I’ll take a look around in storage,” he said. “Also, I am so not a man-child.”

“Gummy bears?” you said with a smile.

“Touche,” he said, grabbing his notebook and jogging up into the library. “You get bored of reading come find me. I’m sure we can find something for you to work on.”

“Hey,” said Dean a few hours later. You let out a hiss and grit your teeth, Benny wiping off your bicep. “How’d she do?”

“She was good,” he said. “Barely made a peep.”

“How’s it look?” you asked.

“Good,” said Dean. “It’s just a precaution we have to take.”

“No, it’s fine. I probably should have gone with the right arm is all,” you said, wincing a bit. 

“Come on you two. Dinner’s done,” said Dean. You followed him back down the hall while Benny turned off the equipment. Dean plopped a bottle of pills in front of you at the table. You shook your head and he took two out, putting them on your plate. “Y/N. Take the pain meds. It’s fine.”

“So you come up with anything today?” you asked as Benny joined you, diving into his bowl of stew.

“Maybe. I was thinking Ben, we could retrofit the dungeon, turn it into a holding cell, detox chamber kind of thing,” said Dean.

“It could work. How we get him inside is another problem,” said Benny.

“Do you think you could work on gathering materials, figuring out the best way to build a safe room?” asked Dean.

“I can think of something. I’ll head up North, visit Donna. She’s good with that sort of thing,” said Benny.

“So are you two an item yet or are you still living in denial?” asked Dean, giving him a smirk.

“Who? Me and Donna?” scoffed Benny. “No way. Strictly platonic. We both been burned before.”

“I know about the camping store incident,” smirked Dean. “Benny bear.”

“Fine. We’re dating. You girls gonna chat about this too?” he said, crossing his arms.

“Maybe. We do love to talk about boys and braid our hair,” teased Dean. “Nah, man, that’s great. You and Donna make a good team. Tactically.”

“Shut up. Worse than a high school girl,” said Benny. “You see what I’ve been dealing with during the end of the world?”

“Is she cute?” you asked, Benny throwing up his hands.

“Oh yeah,” said Dean with a laugh. “Donna’s a pretty girl. Sweet as can be but she’s tough. She and Jody…”

He trailed off and pursed his lips, Benny nodding.

“Jody didn’t make it,” said Benny. “Demons. If you guys are all set, I’m gonna head out soon.”

“You travel at night?” you asked.

“Safer actually,” said Dean. “Most of the infected people, they still sleep for some reason. Benny can get up to Sioux falls by dawn pretty good this way.”

“Write down any gear you think you may need,” he said, finishing off his drink before he took off.

“Why is he leaving already?” you asked. “He just got here this morning.”

“He has a job to do and I told it to him,” said Dean. “Benny moves at his own pace. If he wants to go tonight, he can go, I won’t baby him.”

“Doesn’t he want to rest?”

“Benny crashed most of the day. He’s good,” said Dean. “Unlike you. Early bedtime tonight.”

“What are you, my mother?” you mumbled.

“Do I need to be?” he asked. You rolled your eyes and went back to your food, Dean finishing his off before he started to pick up. 

You closed your eyes and rested your head against the table.

“I feel funny,” you said. “Did you drug me?”

“It’s the pain med’s, dumbass. They’re kicking in. It’s pretty strong stuff,” he said. He walked over and sat you upright. “Finish your food and then you can sleep.”

“Or you drugged me,” you said, reaching for your knife. Dean quickly knocked it away and you pulled the gun out of the back of his pants. He froze as you turned off the safety. 

“Y/N. Calm down. No one’s going to hurt you,” said Dean.

“Back up,” you mumbled. He stared at you before you were suddenly on the floor, gun back in his hands.

“Are you infected?” he asked, aiming the gun at you. “Are you?”

“Whoa,” said Benny as he came rushing back in. “What the hell is going on in here?”

“She thinks I drugged her which is insane,” said Dean.

“This ain’t pain medication, dip shit,” you said, flipping him off as you propped yourself up against the wall, the cold floor making you shiver. “Fuck you. You’re the one that’s nuts, not me.”

“You’re both idiots,” said Benny. He walked over to you and reached behind his back, a pair of restraints around your wrists. You shoulder would have been killing you if it weren’t for the drugs. “I drugged her.”

“Excuse me,” said Dean, suddenly lowering the gun and tucking it away. “You did what, Benjamin?”

“I heard of this chick, the second you said her name I knew who she was. She knows Sam.”

You shook your head when Dean slowly turned and stared you down.

“I don’t. I swear,” you said.

“I definitely heard of some demon talking about this chick right here and Sam,” said Benny. 

“You’re thinking an inside job?” asked Dean, pulling the gun out again.

“Possibly. Could be a human that decided to side with what she thinks is the winning side,” said Benny. “Could be a lot of things but point is, we can’t trust her.”

You were too tired to say anything more, simply sat there and shut your eyes, trying not to think of how odds are you wouldn’t be waking up again.

“Y/N,” said Dean. You breathed slowly, Dean’s hand on your shoulder shaking you. “Y/N. You with Sam or not?”

Last thing you remembered you slumped over, straight to the ground.

“Hey,” said Dean. Something wet was on your forehead, a washcloth if you had to guess. It took a moment for you to get your bearings, finding yourself in your room strangely. “Relax. You’re okay.”

“Drugged me,” you said, frowning at him, pushing the washcloth away. “Asshole.”

“Benny made a mistake,” said Dean.

“I wanna go,” you said, shutting your eyes, head swimming. “Let me go.”

“You can go. Just let this stuff get out of your system first,” said Dean. He took the cloth away and you scowled when he put it back. “I’ll make up your bag for you.”

Four hours later you were standing in the garage, trying to get your bag on unsuccessfully.

“Y/N,” said Dean quietly. “Maybe you should stay.”

“Maybe you need better friends,” you said, throwing the bag on, immediately shooting a hand to your shoulder. You sniffled and swallowed hard, giving Dean a dirty look when he stared at you. “What?”

“We both know that if you go out in your condition, the first sign of trouble and you’re dead,” he said.

“What do you care?” you said. You tried heading out but the pain was too much and you had to shrug off the backpack. 

“Something is going on. Benny was adamant that he heard something involving you. I was adamant that whatever your part in this is, you aren’t the bad guy,” said Dean. “You know how it is now. You can’t take chances and Benny wasn’t taking one. But I will.”

You sighed and set the bag down.

“Why?” you asked dryly.

“Because you’re not the bad guy. If you want to go, you can go. Or you can stay and recover and maybe you can help me save my brother.”

You spun around and went past him, heading inside.

“Next time something like that happens, I shoot. No questions asked,” you said. “And don’t think I didn’t realize you put a brick in the bottom of my bag.”

“Welcome back, Y/N.”

_____

A/N: Read Part 4 here!

[doodleferp]

Monsino Map Decoding Update!!! (spoiler warning)

Link to previous freakout post: https://doodleferp.tumblr.com/post/623224885207040000/yall-im-up-tryna-decode-the-monsino-map-from-the

So what feels like a week ago, I decided to try and decode anything I might be able to find on the map of Monsino locations that was revealed to us in The Girl in the Woods. I wasn’t really getting anywhere trying to unblur the photos of the map I had already taken, so I decided to pull a MatPat and watch the scene where Carrie finds the map a quarter-frame at a time to uncover any additional Easter eggs.

What I found was something that blew my mind even further.

On the map, on Pennsylvania, I shit you not, there is an icon that is a dead-ringer for the Look-See.

Take a look:

That’s Look-See, all right. He’s there, he’s riGHT THERE. This ho knows a Look-See when she sees it, and that? THAT IS A FUCKING LOOK-SEE.

Additionally, I had some suspicions about another icon that I saw in one of my OG screenshots. It was very vague and I couldn’t make it out with my amateur Photoshopping, but I thought it looked like something with antlers. And GUESS WHAT IT WAS.

YEP. The FUCKING MORDEO. Right there in West Virginia (and uncomfortably close to home sweet Ohio). Monsino knows about not one, but TWO heavy-hitters of the Crypt Monster Universe (three, if I can figure out what the mind control icon is all about. Maybe the Kinderfänger? The monster from Tethers?). This only serves to confirm my suspicions and overall theory, so I’m gonna lay that out for ya right here:

The Monsino Corporation is trying to make monsters. I don’t know how, I don’t know why, but that’s their ultimate agenda. They want to make more of these suckers, or at the very least, study them or wherever they come from.

Here’s my main reasoning: the Freaks in the film Taste. For those who haven’t seen the film, I’ll summarize it here: two step-siblings, Clover and Malcolm, have to fight their way through their neighborhood after a shipment of meat from Monsino Farms turns out to be royally messed-up and turns anyone who consumes it into a ravenous beast called a Freak, rather grotesque creatures whose sole thought is what they’re going to eat next to fill the hole in their hungry tummies -- be it fruit, veggies, or human beings. Mostly human beings. Something I liked about Taste is that it ended on a hopeful cliffhanger, which isn’t something I’ve seen too often from Crypt. Usually the shorts end with implications that the monster is still there or that the main character is just about to get chomped on by a monster or something, but Taste ends with Clover and Malcolm going out to kick some cannibal butt, their newfound sibling bond stronger than ever, and that makes me really happy.

But as much as I love these two, the Freaks are what I feel to be a big point of contention in the Monsino puzzle. What intrigues me about these monsters is how similar they are to one of the heavy-hitters previously mentioned -- the Mordeo. Here’s some key similarities, just to name a few:

The way they’re formed. Both monsters are created through eating meat. The Mordeo is created when someone consumes human flesh out of desperation to survive. While not as bleak as the Mordeo, the Freaks are created when humans consume the likewise tainted meat.

Their transformation. As they are created, both monsters undergo a graphic transformation in which they lose their humanity. The Mordeo’s transformation is quite instantaneous, with the victim turning almost immediately after they consume the forbidden meats. The Freaks’ physical transformations are slower, but like the Mordeo their personalities disappear almost immediately after they consume the meat.

Their ravenous hungers. Both monsters are slaves to their vicious appetites. They want that human flesh and they don’t care who they have to kill to get it, be it the crazy hermit they only saw once in the alleyways or their identical twin sibling who they’ve been with since birth.

Get the picture? It’s my assumption that in their goal to study monsters, Monsino attempted to create a Mordeo through scientific means rather than supernatural. But since human testing is frowned upon, they had to find another way to test their theories -- and what better way to see the effects firsthand than to distribute it to a neighborhood under the guise of giving out free samples of a brand-new product?

That brings me to my next point -- Somnidyne.

Making its first appearance in Dream Screechers, Somnidyne is a drug that “relieves fear, inhibits paranoia, and supports sympathetic nervous systems". In layman’s terms, it’s designed to help people with severe phobias or anxieties function in day-to-day life. Sounds tame enough, right? Wrong. Apparently, a nasty side-effect of Somnidyne that they don’t put on the bottle is that it makes people experience nightmares so intense, it’s almost impossible to distinguish them from reality. Hell, one guy even died from these things. That made enough people raise hell over this that Somnidyne was pulled from the market

In the film, we get to see what the drug actually does: instead of helping you conquer phobias, it makes you a potential victim to a hella monster called the Dream Screecher. Now, it’s not exactly clear how exactly you encounter this Dream Screecher, so here’s my guess on that: Monsino wanted to study the Dream Screecher, but it inhabits in an alternate level of our reality -- meaning we can’t see it and it can’t see us, which is why they created Somnidyne. We only ever see the Dream Screecher when the main cast is on the drug, so it most likely acts as a mini-portal to wherever the Dream Screecher lives. Monsino may have had a bit more leeway when it came to testing this on humans, but perhaps they didn’t feel like taking the human test subject route and decided to give it to a bunch of people and see what would happen.

Which brings me to my last points -- the map Carrie found in The Girl in the Woods, and the Torment Fragments.

Torment Fragments are weird purple crystals that originate from portals to the Plane of Torment, the realm that The Brute supposedly hails from. These things also seem to be able to create monsters, such as the case of The Mauler and Miss Annity. A.D. has a map of this Plane of Torment, as revealed in The Girl in the Woods. But the map that we really need to pay attention to is the second map, and it’s the one that really puts the nail in the “Evil Monsino” coffin.

A.D. has a map of what looks to be every Monsino business location in the United States. Monsino ain’t just limited to farming -- from what I’ve been able to decipher, they’ve got Monsino Therapeutics, Biotech, and a pharmaceuticals HQ in New York. It looks really fucking official, too, which makes me wonder what postion A.D. was in for him to get one of these.

What makes me go even more off-guard are all the P markings on the map. If you look down in the bottom left corner, what little we can see of the map’s key identifies the P’s as portals to the Plane of Torment. And all those blue mountain-lookin’ things? You can’t make it out as well, but look at the key again and the blue lines are identified as “torm”. I’ll bet my left ass that the full ID is “torment fragments”, because those lines ALWAYS seem to spawn around the portals.

And even more so -- what’s the deal with all these mini monster icons? We got a clown-looking thing in Texas, and the Mordeo and Look-See symbols as previously discussed. What does Monsino want with all these portals? I can understand them needing to ID the Mordeos, but what makes Look-See so important to them? Do they wanna disect these monsters? Do they want to replicate them? What is Monsino’s game, and how long until we see things unfold? I get that with the second wave of COVID coming up here in the US, things are gonna be slower in entertainment than usual, but I can’t take it.

Crypt TV, we need answers. And we hope that you’ll provide.

TL,DR: Monsino is secretly evil and wants to make monsters, which is why they ID’d the Look-See and the Mordeo on their company maps.

[ain-t-bovvered]

Epiphany 3

read first ACT 1

EDIT:  @waywardbaby​

Summary: Less than two years later, you finally passed the men of letters’ initiation and, finally, you now set foot in America eager to be reunited with the Winchesters. But if Dean thought that you spent your days only with your nose in books and hands in monster’s guts, he was dead wrong. Your mission? Something that the British branch tried and failed miserably,  or at least that’s what they told you anyway.

Pairing: Dean X Reader

Characters: Dean, Sam, Castiel and Jack

Warnings: slow burn guys…slow burn. Also, some fluff, humor, feels and angst.

Feeling out of place in their little domestic banter, you volunteered to help with the cooking and felt relieved when she accepted. You could use this time to get to know her better, she was a hunter so... kinda what you were here to do. The boys set up the table and unloaded the rest of the luggage from the car.

“Want to cook something you are familiar with? If I have the right stuff?” Jody asked, gesturing you to look into the fridge, where you found eggs and bacon. You already knew what to do.

“There is plenty for a pasta recipe if it’s ok with everybody…? Do you have …what do you call them here…noodles?”

“Yes, I have them, and don’t worry… Those guys will eat everything that’s homemade and they’ll make you feel like an honest to God chef.” She scoffed grabbing the beer from your grasp and putting it on the counter with hers. Then she opened a cabinet and pulled out two wine glasses and a cork, “Red or white?”.

“Red please,” you said while waiting for the sink water to become hot. While pouring a generous amount of wine she watched you filling up the pot and putting it on the stove. She handed you the pasta but you shook your head. “Wait for it to boil, trust me... I feel bad having to tell you what to do in your own house …”

“Oh don’t worry. I’m more than ok with people cooking for me,” she said whisking the eggs lightly while you chopped the bacon and let it sizzle in a large pan with some olive oil.

“The water is boiling now.” You took a big handful of salt and threw it in the water, spaghetti going in right after.

“I smell bacon!” Dean's head popped into the kitchen. “Y/N, you cooking?” he asked taken aback.

“I asked her. Hope you are hungry because this looks amazing “

“Anything with bacon is awesome.” 

He grinned, coming to stand behind you, perking above your shoulder, while you tossed around the chunks of bacon. His scent again covering whatever smells were around and you inhaled deeply, groaning mentally.

“It should be almost ready,” you said while fishing out a single noodle, with a fork, to taste. Blowing on it you pick it up, testing the consistency with your fingers. “Yeah, should be okay” you raised the noodle to Dean who bent down to catch it with his mouth and you froze.

“Yep, ready!” and he walked out of the kitchen. You picked up the pot and began to drain the pasta in the sink.

“Well …so that’s what happened back then.” Jody's eyes didn’t miss that little moment you had and smirked.

“What?” you asked startled, splashing some of the boiling water on your arm. Hissing in pain you continued to drain the rest of the pasta without stopping.

“You ok? “

“Yeah, don’t worry, it’s nothing” Your skin burned, tossing the pasta in the pan with the bacon.

Jody passed you the beaten eggs, pepper, and grated cheese mixture.

“I’ll let you stir it up while I take care of this,” you stated, showing her your arm and you left the kitchen. You passed in front of the brothers that were sitting at the table quite quickly but not quickly enough. Dean saw the angry red forearm you were holding to your chest and stood up, chair scratching the floor. 

“What happened?” he was by your side in a flash, taking your arm gently to check it.

“Nothing! I just splashed some boiling water on it. Don’t worry, I have something.” He followed you to your backpack that was leaning near the entrance.

“Can you help me ..?” you asked, whispering. He crouched down near you and opened the zip. You searched inside with your good arm and took out a clear tube full of green gel. He grabbed it from you and before you could say anything, he squirted out the gel on his hand. Grasping your arm again with one hand and furrowing his brows in concentration, he touched your skin. You hissed at the contact with the gel, and he stopped to look at you. 

“It’s okay, it’s just really cold,” you said smiling. He nodded and began to massage it into your skin. You sighed in relief as the cooling of the gel erased the burning, and peered at Dean’s face who, sensing your gaze, looked up at you.

“Am I doing this right?” he asked, anxiously.

“Yeah, feels great,” you said softly and watched as his pupils grew wider.

Someone cleared their voice.

Both your heads shoot up at the source. Sam and Jody were awkwardly waiting for you at the table, steamy food in the center. You scrambled on your feet stumbling a bit, Jody exchanging a funny look with Sam, and of course, your face went up in flames.

“Oh, God!! This is amazing!” 

The Winchesters stuffed their faces with the food, moaning in appreciation. “What is this?” Sam asked, mouth full, while Dean guzzled up another bite like someone would come and steal his plate.

“It’s…just eggs, cheese, and bacon….” You said baffled while taking another sip of wine.

“It’s awesome, that’s what it is.” must have been what Dean tried to say.

“Delicious, simple and quick” Jody nodded, approvingly.

“Thanks” you mumbled behind your glass.

Bellies full and spirits intoxicated, the boys offered to do the dishes while you and Jody lounged, watching tv.

“Soooo..” she began and you already dreaded what was coming, “... you and Dean, uh?” and wine went down the wrong pipe.

“No, no, we are not…I mean …”

“Hey look. I don’t know what happened, but I’m not blind,” she said, smirking. You blushed and sipped from your glass trying to buy time.

“Uhm…yeah well… maybe something happened. Maybe!” you said looking in the direction of the kitchen door, making sure no one was listening. “Maybe there was something, but it’s been long and I don’t know anymore…err.”

“That thing before…  didn’t look like nothing” she chuckled.

“…I think he liked me better when I wasn’t part of this” you said lowering your voice.  “He isn’t happy with what… I am now,” you mumbled, the bottom of your glass looking extremely interesting right now. “He made that clear.”

“That’s just how he is. I saw something before, and trust me, you  don’t want to let it slip away.” She looked towards the kitchen too, where you could hear the boys talking. “Especially, if you both are in this life. Sometimes, it’s simpler that way” Suddenly, you could see her lines more clearly. You knew that look. She had lost someone.

“Tell me about the girls …” 

In the kitchen.

“Dude…”

“What?” Dean replied, failing to look clueless.

“I mean, that little scene from before…really? In Jody’s living room? We were wondering if we should have just left the two of you alone. So embarrassing!”

“I don’t know what you are talking about “

Sam sighed, frustrated by his brother stubbornness. 

“For almost two years you checked on her regularly and every time you didn’t hear from her, you’d freak out and when she would  finally text or call, suddenly it was all rainbows and unicorns”

Dean scoffed “I was not…”

“Yeah… you were! Even Jack noticed it!”

“So…? We all care about her!”

“Sure, we do…but…”

“It’s been almost two years, Sam. Things have changed.” he snapped.

“Have they?....she is in the life now, and from what I could see she looked pretty competent and happy.” Dean’s jaw clenched as his brother cut him before he was able to say anything. “And don’t say it’s your fault! Remember what she told you last night, yeah?”

“She looked like she wanted to eat my face” he chuckled.

“You two looked like you were going to have angry sex right in front of me”

Dean quickly focused on the plate he was drying and then peered at Sam again. “That was pretty hot, right?”

Sam paused and rolled his eyes, and then smiled wickedly, “If you don’t, then I will” he whispered.

*crash*

“What was that?” Jody exclaimed, alarmed. “Guys are you breaking my china?!”

Sam’s head appeared, grinning. “Sorry, Jody! Dean’s hands slipped! Why don’t you and Y/N choose a film? We are almost done here.”

“…no chicks flicks!” Dean’s tensed voice roared from the kitchen.

“My Netflix, my rules!” Jody shouted back, then she turned to you, “Any preferences?”

“Mmm, not really. I mean, I love Austen’s movies but I don’t want to torture the guys” you laughed.

“How about some action?” Jody said, scrolling through the library; suddenly you saw a familiar name.

“THAT!” you cried, jumping up. “Oh my God! I can’t believe it! Can we? Please?”

“Watch what?” Dean came out of the kitchen, drying his hands on a towel, followed by Sam.

“They call me Trinity,” you said excitedly, turning to him. “You know it?”

“No, what’s that?” Sam asked.

“Oooooh, it’s a - I mean, you never saw it? Really?” Both shook their heads. “It’s a spaghetti western from the ‘70s… it’s so great! It's been years since I last saw it!”

“You had me at Western,” Dean said happily and pushed Sam when he elbowed him smiling like an idiot.

“Hell yeah…! If… if it’s ok with you?” you asked Jody, embarrassed for taking the initiative.

“I’m ok with that! Let me grab some beers” she said giving you the remote.

“Oh, you are all gonna love it!”

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

“If you don’t, then I will”

Dean’s hands slipped when his muscles twitched and he turned his head to Sam, eyes wide. “What?”

“Guys, are you breaking my china?”

“What do you mean ‘if I don’t, you will’ ?” Dean stared at Sam’s back. He turned to face him.

“Well…Dean...” he sighed as he watched Dean’s eye twitch. “I mean…she’s cute, and clever and funny. I like having her around. It’s refreshing.” 

He walked to his brother lowering his voice. “I stood aside because I thought you two were...Dude, I mean, I’m not blind…”  

He picked up the broken plate, Dean staring at him in silence “... but if you decide not  to act on it, then I will!” Dean’s gaze shifted to the door that overlooked the living room.

Sam sighed, “Look...I don’t pretend that what I feel now is deeper than what I think you feel, but if you tell me to back off, I can still do that”.

Once everybody was seated, Dean in the armchair, you squeezed between Jody and Sam jumping slightly on your seat, feeling so thrilled as the movie began with the old nostalgic whistling tune that you tried to follow.

Dean snorted looking at you. “What are you trying to do?”

“I can’t whistle, sue me!” you snapped unfazed by his question and resumed your poor attempt, earning a throaty chuckle from him. 

Dean watched you from the corner of his eye. How you laughed and whispered the lines over the ones playing. 

‘Nerd’

His eyes softened seeing you so caught up with it. Sam occasionally leaned into your side to ask about something in your ear, you whispered back, and both laughed softly. Dean had been biting his inner cheek to stop himself from walking over to you two. After a while, he just gave up and shoving his brother aside, sat in between. Sam had patted him on his shoulder, saying he will give him time to sort his shit out. 

‘Sort his shit out’

Yeah, like it was simple. His mind went back at how things were left between you two. He’d be lying if he said he hadn’t thought about it and most of the time there was nothing innocent about it.

It had begun after the first week they came back. He had had a dream about that kiss and woken up in the middle of the night, sweaty, hugging the pillow and, with great horror, he realized he’d been dry humping it. Looking down at the throbbing bulge in his boxers he had mumbled something about behaving like a horny teenager. Nothing good came from trying to re-adjust himself. In fact, it made it worse. 

“Jesus, I need a cold shower” 

But moving, at this particular moment was almost painful, with his blood buzzing like it did so he had fallen back on the pillow, exhaling. His hand lazily grazing down his navel, drawing the path to his groin. He had paused, unsure if thinking about you this way was dangerous and deciding that it definitely was. His mind wandered, again, to that night, you breathing out his name, teeth nibbling his ear, your body desperately trying to find some friction and he lost it. 

‘Fuck, I’m gonna explode if I don’t take care of this’. 

His hand sneaked under the waistband of his boxers. The skin was burning and he was already a sticky mess down there and as soon as his hand wrapped around himself he let out a low moan. 

‘Son of a bitch, this is ridiculous what am I? 15?’ 

He tentatively gave a slow pump and his hips jerked on their own account. Again and this time he had to bite down on his lips, muffling a swear. He stilled and closed his eyes diving into the memory of you, your face burned on the insides of his eyelids, your hands around him and your name on his lips like a prayer.

“Dean, you ok?” 

His eyes flew open at the sound of your voice and he turned his gaze to you, who looked concerned and a bit disappointed “Are you bored?”

“W-What?” he stuttered.

“The movie…is it boring?” 

His eyes once focused, registered that you had shed your sweatshirt and he could see your whole cleavage the way you were bent toward him. You were, now, in a loose shirt and after all that had just played back in his mind, this had definitely come at the worst timing.

He cleared his throat and shifted in his seat. “No no, the movie’s awesome. I guess I'm just tired”

“Oh then, maybe we should leave before you fall asleep here”.

“What? You leaving?” Jody asked. 

“Yes, we saw a motel on our way here”

“Nonsense! Why don’t you crash here? Y/N can sleep in Claire’s room tonight, and the couch is a pull out bed big enough for both of you.” Dean opened his mouth to refuse “…and I also have bacon for breakfast” she added.

“Oh well, in that case…” Dean looked pleadingly at Sam who rolled his eyes.

Lying on the bed, after taking a quick, much needed, hot shower, you had your journal open on the werewolf section when a knock distracted you. 

“Come in,” you said, securing the towel tight around your chest. 

Dean’s head popped in. You saw him tensing a bit and awkwardly entered the room, eyes lowered and scratching his head.

“Uum sorry…  I can come back later if…”

“Nah, it’s ok! What's up?”

His eyes wandered to the journal in your hands “Is that..?”

“Yep…still using this. I can’t deal with the digital one.” 

He walked towards you and you felt the bed sinking under his weight. He extended his hand asking for permission and you handed him the journal.

“Well, look who’s been a busy bee!” he teased, scrolling through the pages. “This looks so much better.”

You scooted closer, staying in a prone position, and reached for the bookmark, turning the pages. 

“My records,” you said tentatively as he read the list of hunts you’ve been in. You had kept track of them as you had with your first one.

“I see you didn’t get any better at drawing!” he chuckled.

“My colleagues, back at the office, make me draw the monster of the week on the briefing board.” you giggled

He became serious and stared at you. “You fine, then?” he asked.

“Yeah! ” you sighed and smiled warmly. “I am.”

And there was that staring contest again. His eyes darting back and forth, unsure of where to look. Fortunately, the phone next to you rang.

“Hello?” Dean watched as your face brightened, a big smile blossoming on your face and he could swear he saw you blush slightly. “Tony, hi!” his heart dropped. You sat on your knees and threw an apologetic look at Dean, mouthing ‘sorry’. 

When he tried to leave, you grabbed his arm and forced him to sit back down. “Sorry, one moment” you covered the phone with your hand, “Stay, this will take just a minute,” you said and put your phone back to your ear. “Hey, yeah I’m here! Yeah, I’ve arrived safely. No, it was long and boring. NO, I DID NOT GET LOST…”

He couldn’t understand a word but your body language was obvious. 

What if he misunderstood everything?

Was he too late? 

You had never mentioned someone all this time and shit, why would you? It’s not that he had any right to know anyway.

Dean’s attention was caught again by your fit of giggles and you finished the call sighing. 

“...Boyfriend?” he blurted out, kicking himself mentally. He watched as you blushed,

furiously.

“…No … colleague” you said, avoiding Dean’s gaze.

“...Well, I came to tell you that we’re leaving tomorrow at 8. Goodnight.”

Dean stood up quickly before you could stop him. He opened the door and glanced back at you, sitting on your heels in your towel-wrapped body and wet messy hair. He hoped that this vision would not come back this night to torture him.

The smell of coffee and bacon woke you and your stomach up. Groaning, you slid out of bed, dragging your feet to the bathroom. Yawning and rubbing your eyes, you didn’t see who was coming out of the door and crashing your nose into whoever that was, you heard a sickly, crunchy sound.

“Ow! ” you winced, covering your nose with your hands, bending over. You felt your eyes filling with tears in no time.

“Oh geez, Y/N! I - 'm sorry, you ok?” Sam’s apologetic voice said above you, his hand rubbing soothingly on your back.

“ No, I’m not ok,” you snapped back with a nasal voice.”Is it broken?” you asked whining and looking up for him to take a look.

Sam’s gigantic hands cupped your face and tilted your head up. “Nah, you’re good.  It’s just a little bump,” he said, his face coming closer to look at it properly.

“What the hell is your chest made off…? Concrete?” you whined again, punching him slightly. He scoffed but didn’t let go of your face.

“Am I interrupting?” Dean’s annoyed voice came from the end of the hallway. “...breakfast’s ready…” 

Seeing your teary eyes when you looked at him, Dean walked closer. “The fuck’s going on? “ Sam's hands let you go, falling to his sides real quick.

“I broke my nose against a wall, aka Sam,” you said, tentatively touching the tip of your nose.

He chuckled at your nasal voice, then looked at his brother. “There’s some fruit for you too. I’m eating your share of bacon if you don’t hurry” 

“So, I called Donna and briefed her with what you told me. She’s busy but she’ll talk to the sheriff there so you’ll have fewer problems. Let me hear from you when you’re done, alright?” Jody said looking down at Sam.

“Like always! Bye, Jody and thanks for letting us crash here” you shouted and waved from your seat, smiling.

On the road again Sam asked you about that booklet you had given Jody.

“Oh…it’s…uhm....PR…” you finished in a whisper. The boys looked at you briefly. “Well, you said she was a hunter and she knows other hunters, and I’m here representing hunters and Men of Letters and we uhhmm… offer international shipping…so yeah…” you faltered, feeling flustered.

“It’s cool. It’s the job. Don’t need to get all worked up about it.”

“Dean’s right. Hey, can I have one too?” Sam asked and you passed him one of the brochures. His eyebrows shot up as he studied it. 

“A spray that hides your smell? …really ?” he asked amazed.

“Yeah, I brought some, that is...if you want.”

“There’s this thing that hides you from their bite for a certain amount of time, and something similar if you swallow vamp’s blood, and hear this out-...” Dean jumped in and just went on listing everything you had described the day before. He had remembered all of that when you thought he hadn't been listening to your rambling. 

“Y/N, you ready? Come on!” Dean looked at his watch and tapped his foot, Sam simply leaning on the balcony.

“Coming, coming, sheesh!” you called out while opening the door. Their eyes widened as they went up and down your frame.

“What!?” you asked looking down at you. “Do I have stains on my trench-coat? I thought I cleaned it after the last time”

You heard Sam snicker as Dean closed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Why are you dressed like that?” he asked

“Why..?" you said in a gruff, low voice. “What’s wrong with it, Dean?” you added annoyed, tilting your head and squinting at him. Sam lost it and he bent down laughing.

“Yeah, ok alright! Let’s go, Cassandra.” Dean’s eyes crinkled.

Once in the car again, you lifted your hips and tugged down your pencil skirt. 

“Isn’t that a bit too short for comfort?” Dean asked looking at you from the rear view mirror.

“There are many reasons for wearing this shit, ok? Mainly… it’s distracting when it needs to be distracting and I can reach my gun and knives easier”

“You…” his eyes looked down and then back up as he quickly licked his lips, adding,  “You have what under there?”

You looked at him and then at Sam who was avoiding your gaze. “Well…not now! I didn’t think I needed them. Why?”

“That’s hot!” Dean whispered smirking and leaning towards Sam.

“What?” you asked.

“Nothing” they both said.

“Good morning, agents. Sheriff Hanscum has already alerted me about your arrival. You are looking for a pattern between the murders, right?”

“That’s right! The coroner reports stated that their hearts were missing...” Sam started putting away his fake badge.

“Yes…more like ripped off…” the poor agent agreed, grimacing.

“… some of them had been used as chew toys?”Dean continued, leaning on the station’s counter. “We’ll need the addresses of the witnesses and relatives and…”

“Can we see the bodies?” you cut in, smiling.

“S-sure…don’t know what else there’s to find but I’ll notify the coroner” the agent smiled and left the counter.

“I can manage the morgue. You go and talk to people…” you said starting to follow him.

“Wait...someone should stay with...” Sam began and you turned to face him with a bitch-please face. “Right…never mind”.

“I’ll call when I’m done and meet up with you,” you said and followed the agent to the morgue after he gave the information to the brothers. You watched as Dean looked back at you and you gave him a thumbs up winking. He smiled, shaking his head.

You skimmed through the coroner reports while examining the wounds. Hearts missing and those were definitely bites and they were still relatively fresh. Making sure nobody was around, you took out a swab and quickly swiped it deeply in the flesh.

Putting the tip of the swab into a tiny test tube with a clear blue liquid, you closed it tightly and sent a text to the boys.

The cab stopped right beside the sleek, black Impala where you waited for them leaning on it and shaking the test tube between your fingers.

“What’s that?” you heard Dean asking before he was even close to you. You looked up at him, Sam left behind to say goodbyes to those poor bastards and handing them fake cards.

“Werewolves genes detector” you answered, squinting at the liquid which was starting to get slightly yellow. Dean lowered himself to peer at it too.

“What’s that?” Sam’s asked, parroting his brother.

“Dude…werewolf test!” Dean said, excitedly.

“Any moment now and it should tell us if we are dealing with those or not,” you said, giving another little flick of your wrist and the liquid started to darken to a bright red. “Yep, doggy genes!”

“That’s convenient,” Sam commented.

“So what did you two find out?” you asked, biting into your burger, making a mess, ketchup dripping down your chin.

“The vice all had something in common...” Sam started.“...hiking” Dean finished, handing you a tissue, pointing at his mouth and chuckling.

“So, we are thinking about a pack of rogues up in the forest? The same path, I guess”

“Likely”

“Phewww!  Luckily I have this job or Id go home floating like a balloon,” you said licking your greasy fingers. 

“What do you mean? This is all proteins and energy “ Dean said chewing on a fry. You and Sam shared a look. “You two can’t just enjoy the little things, can you?”

Switching to hunt mode you took out the local hiking path maps. “Guys, I thought we could cover these different paths that go around the one where the attacks happened and….” 

“You are not going in as bait Y/N!” Dean interrupted you and that earned him your lifted eyebrow look.

“I don’t plan to”

“Because I sai- what?” Dean was sure you were gonna fight him on that.

“I don’t want to go as bait. You should do it. Sam and I will keep an eye on you”

The fry hang from his mouth.

“Y/N, where’s the gun we gave you?” Sam asked confused, staring as you fastened the thigh holster secure, and slipping in a large silver knife.

“Oh, I’m not using it this time” you declared, straining as you tried to shove the jeans inside the worn, leather boots.

“The hell you aren’t!” Dean stated. “You ain’t going werewolf hunting, in the middle of the fricking night, with only a silver knife!! What are you, crazy?”

Rolling your eyes you groaned. “Guys, can you please just trust me? Let me do this my way” you said, tying another holster around the other leg, tight. “Right… now. Sam and I will wear the smell covering spray, you…” walking up to him, you patted his shoulder, “do your best and smell delicious.” 

You winked at his outraged face.

You and Sam left Dean at the beginning of his part of the trail before reaching yours a little further down.

 -We are in position. Start walking.

Sam typed quickly, eyeing you as you reached in the back seat, heaving out a big black case.

“Sam…may I present you…” you began unzipping the case, “... Darcy…”

With a big theatrical gesture, you took out a black crossbow,  with a reverted, automatic, cocking mechanism, swinging it on your shoulder, “... and its little fellas!  Silver pointed darts!” 

You continued, loading ten of those in the automatic mechanism and slipping five more in your tight holster, only now Sam noticing the empty slots.

You threw an optics at him and he, after catching it, raised it to his eye, “I - is this a night vision optic?”

“Yep.” you grinned, starting to walk down your trail, crossbow across your shoulders, your arms hanging on it.

Sam watched you from behind. “Dean’s gonna freak out so bad “.

Dean’s senses were on alert, steady grip on the gun, ears ready to catch the tiniest sound. The flashlight illuminated just a slab of dirt and a small part of the forest trail. His mood was foul though. He wanted this hunt to finish as quickly as possible. His mind racing and fighting with his heart. He wanted to trust you but at the same time, his heart decided that nothing was safer for you than to stay at the bunker in your nerd-cave. He had to admit, seeing you first thing in the morning, cooking pancakes made his stomach flutter and that should not have happened but still, what Sam had said made his blood boil. 

‘Dean Winchester you are a mess’

His brother was right. He needed to get his shit together and fast. 

Suddenly, he heard the classic twig snap. His steps slowed down, his mind cleared, a shuffle to his right and his hand twitched on the handle of the concealed gun.

“Please, help!” a female voice caught his attention. “Help! Is there anyone out there?” This is clearly the trap that was used to lure victims that would have been kind enough to offer help.

“Who’s there?” he decided to play along, keeping his guard up. Another rustling noise and a girl scrambled out from a bush almost knocking him down. He steadied her. “What happened?” 

The girl was covered in mud and he recognized the coppery scent of blood as his grip tightened around his gun.

“They are following me, please help!” She threw herself at him and he would have believed her, hadn't been for his instincts. Her eyes quickly switched to a sickly yellow and he barely had time to push her away when he was jumped by another shadow. He lost balance for a moment and the girl tried to attack him too. He lifted his gun to aim but it was swatted from his hand.

“Shit….A LITTLE HELP HERE?!” he shouted while he kept the female from chewing on his neck. The strain on the muscles on the still fresh wound weighed him down and made his teeth clench. He had completely forgotten to ask Cas to heal that shit. 

Finally, he heard some running steps, which he recognized as Sam’s. Immediately, he was freed from one of them and managed to kick the other one off of him. But Sam was held down, his gun too far to reach and Dean launched himself to him. But the male werewolf held him back. He could only watch, in the corner of his eye, as Sam struggled to get that bitch off of him. Then, he screamed when he saw her going for his throat he had left unguarded.

*Shunk*

Dean had time to see Sam shrugging off the body, still gasping for air.

*Shunk*

The struggling werewolf fell limply on him and grunting, he shoved him to the side.  He scrambled up, breathing hard, adrenaline running high pretty much the only thing stopping him from registering the muscle pain he was experiencing.

“W-What was that?” he asked Sam, helping him up

“That..that was Y/N,” he said breathlessly, hissing as he checked the gash on his thigh. Dean’s confused look fell on the two bodies. He crouched over one to get a better look while Sam picked up their guns, limping.

“Is this an arrow?” he asked, stunned.

“A dart, actually.” 

You said, coming out of the bushes, dusting off your knees, the crossbow held low on your side. Dean watched speechless as you walked past them placing a foot on the werewolves’ chests for leverage. You yanked back, recovering the darts with some, awkward, stumbling back rubbing them clean on your coat before slipping them in your thigh holster. You and Dean stared at each other for an indeterminate period of time, and eventually, you cleared your throat.

“Is that a fucking crossbow?” he asked amazed at Sam. “You use a fucking crossbow?” he turned to you.

“When I can.” you lifted your chin ready for another nagging session. “So?”

His face slowly brightened, a dazzling smile that made him look at least ten years younger spreading there. “Awesome!! That’s...” he breathed, “... that’s cool!”

 “Thanks” you mumbled looking at your feet. “Uuhhhm…we, we should clean up and go… drinks on you two “.

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

“Tell me again how you came to use that thing,” Sam asked when Dean came back to the table holding drinks.

“Well...” you began, leaning on the table, trying to reach for your glass, huffing as your fingertips barely reached it. Dean, chuckling pushed the glass closer to you.  “First, it’s badass!! Second, I suck at guns!!”

“From what I saw back there, your aim ain’t bad”

“You see these hands, Dean?” you said waving them at his face. “See these tiny, baby hands?... the recoil always throws me off. If it’s small guns, yeah sure. I can manage but those things you two use?... Nope!! My trainer just gave up and I had to improvise”

“You need to learn, though,” Sam said. “I can’t imagine a lot of hunts where you can use that”

“That’s what I tried to tell you guys from the beginning, but someone...” going louder on the last word, “... likes the sound of his voice way too much.” You glared at Dean who furrowed his brows. “…as I said, I don’t always go on hunts, and when I do, I’m just in the back as a backup...”

“Then how did you manage to get that scar?” Dean deadpanned in the middle of the conversation. You tensed as his eyes didn’t leave you while drinking from his bottle.

Damn it.

“What scar?” Sam asked, confused.

You signed, fingers clutching at your crystal pendant for comfort. A gesture that neither of them missed.

[minsyal]

[How It All Ended, Sam x Reader]

Summary: Reminiscing on the world you once knew. 

Word Count:  1.8k

The musty motel room didn’t feel the same as you passed through the threshold to find it empty. Despite the constant temperature, the room felt colder than before. The night brought an eerie feeling cascading over you, one that typically subsided with the Winchester brothers. The sounds of TV static and creaky faucets no longer tugged at your eardrums keeping you awake. It was something different. There were no more spitting fights, no more jovial conversations, no more… anything.

You walked somberly into the room, it was a mess. A few old flannels were laid out on the bed, ready for the youngest brother who had a habit of laying out his clothing before he needed it. A thick leather-bound book that had been “borrowed” from a library in Kentucky sat on the table opened to the section detailing possessions. You deeply frowned. How had it come to this?

“So, what?” You threw your hands up as you let out an exasperated sigh. “We just let Cas turn himself into a human cannonball for the freaks of Purgatory?”

“I don’t know what else to do, Y/n.” Dean frowned. He was just as irritated with Cas as you. Since the death of Raphael, Castiel decided he enjoyed prancing around as God and left on a whim and a prayer. You sat with the brothers at Bobby’s, crowded around the coffee table that was covered with discarded plates and empty pizza boxes.

“Maybe talk some sense into him?” Sam commented, leaning back and extending his arm over the back of the couch. His slender fingers played with the excess fabric on your shoulder, something he had been doing more since his soul was returned and the wall was instigated. If you were looking more into it, you’d say there was something there.

“How do we talk sense into someone who has a literal God-complex?” Dean took a long drag from his bottle of beer, eyes falling to Sam’s hand as he let his arm shift down to rest on your shoulder. An inquisitive brow raised. He spoke into his bottle, “you two got something going on here we,” he nudged an arm toward Bobby who was happier to fall into blissful ignorance than waste time with this conversation, “don’t know about?”

“What?” Sam quickly brought his arm back to his side where it remained the rest of the night. “No.”

The next morning was darker than usual, shadowy clouds filled the sky as rolling thunder sent bottomless vibrations through the small town you had stopped in. Your four-door outside was being pelted with golf ball-sized hail, the hard-plinking sounds making you cringe as you pondered the damage that was being done. You turned in your bed expecting to find Sam, but instead found nothing.

“Update: Angel is still on the fritz. He’s not answering prayers anymore.” You walked into the kitchen where Bobby was hunched over the stove, cooking breakfast.

“Tell me something we don’t already know.” He turned with the pan in his hand, a couple cooked eggs inside of it. His eyes widened for a moment as he took in your new look. “Isn’t that Sam’s?”

“What?” You stood in the kitchen shocked and embarrassed that you had forgotten. Sam wore a particularly large shirt that fell to your knees and acted more like a dress. “Oh!” A nervous sweat broke out on your forehead, “uh…”

A strong arm snaked around your waist, pulling you gently backward to crash against a strong chest. “It is.” Sam’s groggy voice rumbled through his chest making you stand on your toes.

“Gross.” Dean shoved past you, having none of it, as he snatched the skillet from Bobby who let out a disapproving sound.

He wasn’t there. The bed wasn’t warm. The place you expected him to be was cold, filled only by the unused blankets. There was no divot where his body should have been, there was no rustling under the sheets as he kicked his legs out, and there was no groan from Dean has he cringed in response to your couple-y behavior. You missed that.

“So, Cas turned to jelly and now we have chompers running around like chickens with their heads cut off.” Dean jerked the door to the Impala angrily, climbing into the car and falling into his seat. Sam’s eye caught yours as he looked into the rear-view mirror, a concerned expression on his face.

“Dean, we’ll fix this.” You attempted to calm him down, “We always fix things.”

“Pssh,” he rolled his eyes, “hardly.”

You found solace in a selection of hard liquors and the occasional cigarette. Empty bottles filled the small circular desk in the room, and more were discarded on the ground below. It didn’t matter what happened at this point. You were useless. You failed.

Sam’s hallucinations grew worse with each passing day. He insisted he was handling it, but he had prescribed himself zero hours of sleep a night and sparse eating. It backfired. You held a hand against his back, rubbing calming circles into the knots that had developed in his aching muscles.

“You need to sleep.” Your voice came out as a whisper as you leaned forward to press your forehead against his. “Sweetheart, please.”

“I can’t.” Sam stated with a slight tinge of irritation bubbling beneath his words.

“Sam-“

“I can’t, Y/n!” He said, barking angrily at you as he vehemently pulled himself away from your touch. As fast as he snapped, he broke, eyes going wide as he searched yours for forgiveness. “Y/n...” His head hung low, unable to bring himself to face you. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry, Sam. It’s okay.”

“It’s not.”

“Do you want to try again?”

He nodded. How could such a hulking man seem so small? Your hands found his as he settled into your embrace, his head resting lightly against your chest as he listened to your steady heart. A sigh escaped his lips, his head sunk further into you, and his nervous shaking stopped. He finally slept.

Cars were crashed everywhere along the road with pieces and parts of bodies scattered throughout. You didn’t make it on time to save anybody. The motel room had turned into a bunker-of-sorts; it was a safe place. You had gone to the local hardware store, easily slipping through the bolted gates to grab wood and nails along the dark deserted isles. You stocked up on borax and cleaners, keeping a large supply tucked into ever crevice of the room.

Sam had turned to drugs, something you never thought he’d do. He found himself locked in a hospital with some of the crazier people on earth. Dean was disappointed but was far from disowning him. He was supportive, upset that his brother was giving up so to say, but stopped by often to visit Sam. Eventually, Sam forgot your name, who he was, Dean, Bobby… everyone.

“Good morning, Sam.” You nodded to the nurse as she exited the room. Sam had just taken his morning medication to keep him at bay. He laid on the bed that was far too small for his body, staring blankly at the ceiling with his hands folded over his stomach.

“The hunt went well. Dean saved my ass again, I should really stop hunting werewolves.” You pulled the chair at the desk out and sat down, pulling your purse to your lap as you withdrew a few pieces of paper and a pencil. He had used the paper you left last time. While it was mostly chicken scratches, it was the best you had gotten out of him in weeks.

“Cas has been trying really hard to help with the Leviathans. They’re some weird-ass monsters. You’d probably get a kick out of them, though. Their leader is Dick Roman, you know, the billionaire business man? Crazy right?” You watched as he continued breathing, chest rising and falling slowly. He only blinked in response.

“Sam,” you turned to make sure you were alone in the room, “I really miss you.” His hands were still warm. You hesitantly rested your hand on his, choking back tears as you looked upon the man you had grown to love. “I miss you being around. It isn’t the same with just Dean and I. I miss waking up next to you…” A tear fell to soak the thin sheet on the bed. “Sam, I don’t think this is going to turn out well. The Leviathans are getting really out of hand… we need you, Sam… I need you… Please, please come back to us.”  He had given up mentally and let Lucifer drive him to insanity. Your Sam died a long time ago.

The leviathans took over. They became too strong and wiped out almost every living being that they could get their slimy hands on. They easily hid in plain sight until it was too late. Dean was killed while fighting Roman, Cas disappeared, and the hospital Sam was at was burnt to the ground. You were alone.

How the world had taken a turn… The once triumphant heroes of the apocalypse had crumbled down to nothing. Both brothers, Bobby, and the majority of your hunter friends were dead, and the angel was missing. You spent countless days praying to some higher force, hoping some angelic asshole would answer, but no one came. God had abandoned you and the rest of humanity.

You laid mindlessly in your bed, staring up at the popcorn ceiling that had begun to leak and mold from burst pipes. It was dark out, silent, not even the summer crickets dared to make a sound in fear of the black sharp-toothed creatures lurking about. The roar of an engine caught your attention, but you hadn’t the mind to bother preparing for a fight. If it happened to be death, coming to break down your door and steal your soul away, you’d let it. The welcoming arms of the darkness were becoming more and more attractive as each lonely insufferable day passed. You just wanted Sam back.

You wanted Sam to burst through those doors with a camera crew telling you it was all a rouse. You wanted him to hold you in his arms, whispering sweet nothings into your ear as he enveloped you in the scent of old spice and gun oil. You wanted your life back.

Heavy footsteps padded outside, stopping at your door as a hand knocked softly on the rusted metal. “Y/n?” It was Sam’s voice. “It’s me. Can you let me in…quickly? I don’t want to draw any more attention to us.” The knob jiggled and rattled before it turned, and the door creaked open. There stood Sam clad in his white t-shirt and white pants that he died in. He looked how you remembered him, bags under the eyes, messy hair, and a heavy five-o-clock shadow. The only difference was the malicious smile that spread across his lips and the piercing teeth lining his mouth. “I���ve missed you so much.”

[icespur]

It AU:Look What I Found Ideas

I write stories, not many of my stories are online yet though, cause hardly any of my stories are finished! But I write stories of the current fandoms I’m in, and now I’m obsessed with IT 2017 and Pennywise

And I have some story ideas I’m working on, I’ve bothered and mentioned my ideas in reblog comments but now that I figured out how to post I can actually tell you my ideas here!

So here’s one of my IT AU story ideas

The story is called “Look What I Found” and it’s a alternate timeline of when Pennywise came to earth, in the book he came to earth in a asteroid and crashed years ago and then became active when human civilization was built.

Well in here he still comes to earth the same way, BUT——-

He’s an egg....

The asteroid has the egg inside and when the asteroid crashes on earth it cracks open revealing the unscathed egg.

Years go by, creatures die, new creature born, Humans come in. The egg sits in the background as life goes on until in 1988 October when a little 7 year old child loses his paper boat in a sewer gutter, he’s too small to reach it and his parents would kill him if he were to go down into a dirty old sewer. So he has no choice but to go home and break the news to his older brother that he lost his boat, his brother tells him that he’ll look for it for him tomorrow and not to worry.

The next day Bill and his friends go down into the sewers to look for the missing paper boat, they eventually find it—— along with a mysterious black egg.....

Eddie is hesitant and says that they should ignore it but curiosity gets the better of them, thinking this egg is some “new discovery” or maybe it’s a real life dragon egg! So they take the egg with them

Oh boy was that a bad idea.

It seems the more the egg develops the more creepy sh*t it does

* At first it randomly glowed, but as time goes on it seems sometimes glowing is tied to it’s emotions... sometimes.

* If you are brave enough (stupid enough) to put your face up to the egg or put the egg up to a light, you will see a bunch of glowing lights, that gets brighter and brighter as time goes on. It wasn’t until a very weird incident at the park where the egg came in contact with a pregnant woman’s belly that may or may not have caused the woman to bleed, that now if you look at the embryo you will see a normal human fetus

*Can hear and mimic music and voices

*Whatever is in there has two glowing yellow orbs for eyes and it’s creepy!

*Georgie seems very attached to it, he talks to it as if it’s alive and can hear him, Bill’s starting to worry if letting Georgie get so close to the egg is safe.

*The losers have contemplated destroying the egg many times and have come very close to crushing it to bits with a hammer but usually Georgie begs them not to and talks them out of it, or the egg letting out human infant sounding cries stopping them.

* Especially once it become clear that the egg is draining life and certain movement of other people’s organs and limbs so it can have working body parts.

*Gets a very concerning childish disturbing glee from the losers fighting or any negative energy in general, making the egg glow revealing the silhouette of a fetus clapping.

*Eventully starts being able to make noises, squeals, squeaks, weird chattering gibberish, etc.

*Not even technically born yet and it already keeps them up at night. 11:00 pm on a school night the children are trying to get a good night sleep all of a sudden the egg starts glowing and rocking back and forth and loud carnival music starts playing on full blast

*Parts of the egg start to crack leaving a hole where it’s yellow eyes can peak out. Everyone is creeped out by this, except for Georgie who happily walked around the entire house with the egg giving it a tour of the Denbrough house

(I have a bunch of different versions of how the hatching scene would play out)

*It’s chaos when the egg hatches, once the storm clears and everyone is able to hold their breath a small baby clown is revealed.

Raising baby Pennywise........

*He’s a a**hole

*Baby-mutant-clown or whatever he is exactly, apparently develop differently then human infants. The first few days nothing seems too out of the ordinary, sleeps a lot, (to the point where Richie and the rest sometimes wonder if he’s dead so they poke him to make sure he’s still alive which upsets him causing him to curl into a furry auburn ball) But then eventually he randomly learns to stand up in his crib and stares at them standing up......at one week old—— normally a baby doesn’t stand up on it’s two legs for a couple months! He’s only a week old!

* Stan bought a “baby month development guide” book and that soon proves to be no help*

*Learns to sit and crawl very early (too stubborn to walk though)*

*Tries to eat and put every possible non edible object in sight in his mouth. Even before he starts teething*

*Georgie and him are still close, he’s like the younger sibling that Bill and Georgie never asked for. Georgie and Penny have become partners in crime and like to harass Bill. But at the same time Penny also sometimes sees Georgie as food and gets very interested in his arms..... luckily it will be a long while til Penny gets teeth*

*Pennywise is very attached to Beverly, sees her as his mom, and acts like a angel only for her. But when she’s not around—-his true nature comes out. Beverly thinks the boys are overreacting when they complain about how much of a little monster he is*

*Can shapeshift But not as well, he’s just a baby so he’s still learning. Only parts of him will shapeshift, like instead of turning into a full werewolf only werewolf ears will sprout on his head, instead of a full spider——only spider legs will sprout from his waist. sneezing and hiccuping affect his shapeshifting hiccups will make him rapidly change forms (like Maui in Moana when he first tries shapeshifting with his hook) and sneezing will cause parts of him to shapeshift “ah, ah, ah, ACHOO” (werewolf ears spring out on top of his head)*

*He can float.......Well, the actual wording for it would be levitate but he refers to it as floating. Which as you can imagine makes baby proofing impossible*

*Speaking of floating, instead of sleepwalking he also “sleep floats” meaning in the middle of the night randomly while fast asleep he will levitate/float out of his crib and around the house, making the losers freak out once they find out he’s not in the crib anymore and so they have to get a butterfly net and chase him around the house and catch him without waking anybody in the house or him up*

*Oh boy, changing diapers———Well first off, baby clown poop and pee smells even worse then normal human baby bodily fluids. In the words of Richie “It smells like something died in there” for the actual changing part sometimes Penny won’t want to sit still and will try to roll off of the changing mat, or he’ll float off the mat and in the air. Other things to worry about is——he can shapeshift, he can change his gender in the middle of a change throwing everyone off, will shapeshift different wieners or will shapeshift multiple wieners so you have multiple wieners spraying pee at you meaning by the time you are done you are going to be soaked in urine*

*his throw up is like acid. One time his tummy wasn’t feeling too good and one of the boys were playing around with him and lifted him up in the air and “BLEGH” all over their shirt. Penny is all happy and smiley now cause he feels all better while the loser is screaming that it burns and that it’s burning through his shirt*

*Eddie has unintentionally become——maybe just a, teeny tiny bit overprotective of Penny——-just a little bit..... Richie always jokes he’s become just like his mom. Eddie gears him with a helmet (that’s way to big and heavy for his head) they go swimming and he goes overboard with putting the swimming gear on him to the point where he’s just a blob of protective swimming gear*

*Since the losers all live in different homes with their own family they all take turns taking Pennywise home for the day, leading to interesting outcomes. Even though Penny is a toddler he catches on quite quickly that Alvin marsh isn’t a good person and quickly dispises him and brings it upon himself to f*ck with him every chance he gets, non of the adults can see penny so Alvin is 100% convinced a ghost baby is trying to kill him. Every time it’s Richie’s day to take Penny home with him penny always comes back with a new curse word, and they all know who probably taught it to him..... eventually Richie is banned from watching Pennywise...... Mike lives on a farm, oh those poor poor animals..... Ben is kinda scared of Pennywise since Pennywise sees Ben as food since he’s so chubby. Penny pokes Ben’s skin fat, and calls him things like “Pig” or Yum” But since Ben is into reasearch and history Ben would probably try to show him all the newspapers and stuff he’s collected, and then have to take them away from Pennywise since whatever you hand to him his first instinct is to shove it in his mouth or chew on it. Ben also would try to do research to find out what the heck Pennywise is exactly, Stan would be too busy with studying for his Bar Mitzvah to play with Pennywise. Although one doesn’t simply ignore Pennywise, when Pennywise wants attention you give Pennywise f***ing attention. Penny would listen to Stan read for a while but then get bored and decide that Stan has read enough for the day and start tearing the pages out of the book much to Stan’s panic and anger*

*Pennywise is very mischievous, all toddlers are mischievous usually. But Pennywise does things intentionally just to get a reaction out of you. He knows he’s not supposed to do it, but he’s gonna do it anyway. In fact saying “No” only seems to encourage him. The words “No” and “Spit that out” have never been yelled so many times with little results. He seems to run on reverse logic “No! Don’t touch that!” Pennywise stares at the loser—- frozen in place with his arm reached out in mid touch of said forbidden object. His eyes flicking looking at the loser, to the object, loser——object, loser——object, touch, no touch, touch, no touch, as if contemplating his next move. Still looking at the loser, Penny slowly extended his hand out, before the loser scolded him again making him freeze, Penny looked at the loser again. The loser shook his head, “No, you don’t do that” Penny mimicked his head movement, shaking his head. The loser nodded “yes, that’s right, “no”” Penny slowly nodded along with him.... and extended his hand again “NO!” Penny shook his head again then nodded and finally make contact with the object, knocking it down and smashing it to a thousand pieces. “Spit that out!” Pennywise slowly shoves the object farther and farther down his mouth with every “No” the losers yell.*

*he eventually learns to talk, can’t say a full sentence but can say some words clearly or if he tries to say a sentence it’s not the full sentence, a couple words unintentionally skipped. “Where going?” Instead of “where are you (or we) going” “Wha doing?” (What are you doing?) etc. Can say all the losers names “Bill” Eddie” “Richie” “Stan” “Ben” “Bev” or “mama” “Mike” and calls Georgie “George” can say “float” of course, can say his full name or short name surpriseingly. “Pennywise” or “Penny” (he’s very proud of his name for some reason)

*In the movie there was going to be a “smoke hole scene” where we would’ve got to see Pennywise coming to earth but due to budget we didn’t get that scene cause it would cause to much cgi. Well in here they don’t have to do a special ritual cause they can just ask Pennywise! Who is happy to tell them except he’s a baby and all that comes out is gibberish since his vocabularie is still very limited so instead he tried to show them by drawing! But he’s a baby and his drawing and coloring skills aren’t that——readable.... so it becomes a guessing game trying to figure out what the heck that drawing is supposed to be.*

*his intelligence is very selectable, he chooses when he wants to do something, and some things just don’t make sense. Like he can write his full name in a style that would make any professional artist jealous but his drawing and coloring is that of a toddler (which does make sense cause he’s a toddler) he likes Henry a lot and calls him “Bow Wow” (bowers, bow wow) Why? Nobody knows. And sometimes calls him Henry but yet for some reason he can’t pronounce Patrick Hocksetters last name and the H turns into a C..... for once Richie did not teach him this but is very proud of him. And one day out of the blue penny started responding to the losers in Swedish...... no one knows why, there isn’t anything Swedish that he was exposed to lately but they now have a Swedish translation dictionary to find out what the heck he’s saying...*

*Always maneges to steal Eddie’s inhaler and then Eddie has to chase him to get it back*

*Loves water. So bath time is a lot of fun, that also mean they gotta keep him from trying to eat the bath products and the water etc..... also has a fascination with the sewers and always tries to go there but of course the losers stop him*

*when penny gets mad he pouts, making his pudgy little cheek puff out and he’ll refuse to look at said person that made him angry and maneuver himself so he’s facing the opposite direction of that person*

[duckybeth99]

Protector (Past!Fic)

there’s some refs in here I’m sure won’t be lost on some people lol

———

She hadn’t been much help, but venting his concerns to her made her aware.

Johnny drove fast on his motorcycle, worryingly over the speed limit as he drove into town. He was irritated and just needed to be away from his family. His sister, his dad, his godmother, all of them. Beth was too lost in a fantasy to listen, John wanted to believe everything was fine, and even Moirin was too optimistic for her own good.

She sat him down when he banged on the door, she talked to him and urged him to use a quieter voice while her children slept. Muttering an apology, he vented his worry, but again, she said he was too paranoid. They just couldn’t see what was right in front of them. Maybe he would go back when they could.

Johnny drove down to the diner, one of his favorite places to eat aside from Tony’s. It was one of the few places open 24/7. Johnny parked his bike and slid his helmet off, heading inside. Only the owner and one waitress were the staff there. Johnny sat up on the counter’s stool, glancing over his shoulder. One old man reading a book in a booth, and—

Marianna?

“What’ll it be?” the waitress interrupted Johnny’s thoughts. He scratched the back of his hair.

“Uh,” he mumbled, ducking down his head. “A milkshake. Strawberry. Thanks.” The waitress went over to the sofa fountain and Johnny stared down the bar at his friend. He slowly got up from his stool and sat beside her.

“Hey.” Marianna nearly jumped. When she saw who it was, she relaxed.

“Hey. I... haven’t seen you in a while.”

“How’re you holding up?” Marianna didn’t answer. “Yeah, uh... bad question. I know what it’s like. You, uh, mind if I sit?”

“No,” Marianna softly murmured. Johnny slid onto the stool beside her. She had a soda almost empty. As Johnny was about to wave the waitress over, she shook her head. “Don’t. I don’t need a refill. I just... came for some place to think.”

“Same here,” Johnny sighed. “Do... you want to talk about it?”

“I just needed to get away from my parents,” Marianna said. The waitress brought Johnny his milkshake. “My mom is taking it hard. Stella doesn’t know what to do, and my dad is trying to be a counseling anchor but then who’s gonna help him?” She played with her straw between her slim fingers. “And then there’s me. Body’s finally healing from the crash, but my brother is gone.”

“I’m sorry,” Johnny murmured. Marianna gave a sad smile.

“It’s not your fault,” she said. “It was a freak accident. Nobody was found in the car that hit us, it just... flew. The finances are going nuts because nobody knows who to pin blame on.”

“Yeah,” Johnny breathed slowly. But he was there when Beth screamed at the phone call. When she sobbed and said Alex was killed. John called the Wilsons and shortly after, there was Merhib in their house, slinking through the shadows. Bragging about his doing. He wanted to tell her so bad. Tell her it wasn’t her fault, tell Marianna that it was monsters, but—

But it’s a secret, Johnny.

He heard the words in his father’s voice; nobody can know. Nobody can know about these things. You can’t tell anyone Beth is back. You can’t show your powers. You can’t tell about the UpSideDown. You don’t know who you can trust.

But people found out Beth was back. But he showed his powers when he tried to save those stupid kids, at that party, when the gym exploded, when the news called it a freak accident, all those people who couldn’t know the truth of what happened to their kids—

“Johnny?”

Johnny blinked his eyes open, not realizing how tightly shut they were. His grip on his plastic cup would have shattered it if it had been glass. Electricity crackled down his spine.

“Sorry,” he shook his head. “I’m fine.” Marianna gave a thin, tired smile.

“I... I know you get it,” she said. “How Beth died. I... I can’t believe Alex wanted to get her a gift for her grave. He... he really liked her.” Johnny blinked and raised his brows.

“He did?”

“Yeah,” Marianna rested her cheek in her hand. “He... he had the biggest crush on her since middle school. He was so shy, but my whole family knew. We tried to get him to say something, but he never did. And when she died... he was a mess. Then, all of a sudden, he perked up, like a month later. Maybe Dad was helping him go through stuff? I don’t know. But he was happy again. He would text somebody all the time, and we thought maybe he made a new friend who was helping him. And one day, he asks me to take him to one of those fancy stores at the mall, that sell crystal figures and stuff? And he buys this crystal heart! I had no idea where he got the money. But I was starting to think he had a double life, haha. Anyway, we were driving home, and he finally told me what he planned to do with it: he was going to put it at Beth’s grave for her. And I thought, ‘what a waste’, you know? It was something he should have waited to do for Dìa de Los Muertoes, but... he was so excited so I didn’t say anything. And that’s when I realized it didn’t matter to him. Because he really loved her. I put it there at her grave for him, since he couldn’t. You should have seen it, Johnny. It was gorgeous. A crystal heart, all blue, in this tiny box, wrapped in velvet...”

Johnny choked on his milkshake.

Aquilo’s gift—no, it couldn’t be—

“Are you okay?” Marianna patted Johnny’s back. He spat out the last of his milkshake and wiped his lips.

“Uh, yeah,” his voice was still corse from the coughing. “I’m fine.” Marianna waited a moment, then gently took her hands off his back. She sighed.

“Anyway,” she played with a strand of her hair, “thanks for listening to me. I... haven’t really had any place to talk about this where my dad didn’t try to get involved.”

“No problem,” Johnny forced a smile. He knew it. Aquilo wasn’t what he seemed.

“Is there... something bothering you?” Marianna asked. “You’re not one to show up to this place close to 11 at night.”

“Needed to think,” Johnny admitted. “I was frustrated with stuff at home.”

“Do you want to talk?”

“No,” Johnny shook his head, standing up. “I think I’m okay now. I just needed time away from them. And talking to you actually helped.”

“Really?” Marianna blinked. Johnny hadn’t noticed the bags around her eyes that formed as of late. She gave a tiny smile. “Well... glad I did, then.” Johnny smiled back. He set cash on the counter and jutted his head outside.

“Need a ride?”

“I think I’ll walk home.”

“It’s dark. You know how this town gets.”

“Always the protector, aren’t you?”

“Yeah. Always the protector.”

———

After dropping her off at home, he decided to do a little investigating on his own. Just as Marianna had told him, he drove to the Riverview cemetery and looked for her grave. He remembered fairly decently where it was. Johnny stopped right in front of it, and a wave of emotions hit him. Anger. Hurt. He shook his head and swallowed. Now wasn’t the time.

Johnny crouched down and looked at the grave. Dead flowers in a bouquet, probably also left by Marianna. But no gift. There was, however, a small indent where it sat alone for a while. Johnny stood back up. He wasn’t paranoid. He was on to something, and he was going to prove it to his family.

Soon back at home, the next day, Johnny waited in the kitchen for his dad and sister to wake up. He didn’t sleep much. He stared at his milk in front of him and empty bowl of cereal. John woke up soon enough, yawning into the back of his hand.

“Work today, son?” he asked as he looked through the fridge to make breakfast. Johnny mumbled so quietly his father barely heard. “Hm?”

“No,” Johnny spoke louder. John blinked and set down his pan for eggs.

“You alright, Junior?” he approached Johnny. Johnny nodded. “You don’t look like you got enough sleep.”

“Lot on my mind.”

“Well,” John sighed, “after you left in a huff last night, I did some thinking of my own. And... if I invalidated your feelings, that wasn’t what I meant at all. I understand where you’re coming from, Junior, I really do. Believe me, all those thoughts you were saying were ones I had similarly for a time. But at some point, you realize it isn’t real. And you’ll be fine. It does no good to stay in worry all your life. Believe me, son.”

“I do,” Johnny shook his leg under the table. “Is Beth up yet?”

“Hm?” John glanced upstairs. “No, I suppose not. Mind waking her up for me? Don’t want her missing breakfast. She’s always been a twig.”

“Pops, she can’t gain weight as a ghost.”

“It’s the principle of it. Thought that counts?”

Johnny rolled his eyes and headed up stairs. He only paused when his father cleared his throat, “And I feel this goes without saying, but don’t mention all that we’ve been talking about to her, alright? You know how she feels about us, ah... talking about things like this.” Johnny gave a quiet nod and headed to his sister’s room. He stared at the paint on the door she did herself for a moment, then knocked. When no answer came, he pushed open the door.

“You decent?” he asked. Beth only mumbled through her pillow and clung to it more. “Just sleepy. Come on, Pops wanted me to wake you up.”

“Five more minutes,” Beth groaned. Johnny looked down at one of the pillows she tossed off and threw it playfully at the back of her head.

“C’mon, you gotta eat before lessons,” he said. Beth let out a muffled, exasperated grumble into her pillow, but lifted her head. “Oh, and uh, I’m gonna take you today. And sit in.” Beth blinked her eyes sleepily and rubbed them.

“Can I ask why?” she mumbled. Johnny shrugged.

“No reason,” he gave a smile, “just felt like it.” He spotted the crystal heart on Beth’s desk. From the light that peaked behind Beth’s curtains, he could see it shine and reflect on the walls. It was just as Marianna described it last night.

Breakfast went on normally, Beth being groggy and annoyed until she ate some of John’s cooking and perked up. Instead of eating with them, Johnny just sat there, waiting. He rubbed his nails anxiously while he waited, needing something to do with his hands. Indiana trotted up under the table and Johnny switched to petting him while he waited. He never noticed how good John was at small talk, saying things that didn’t end up mattering.

His sister got up to get ready for the day, and Johnny bolted upstairs to get dressed himself. His dog followed him, rolling around and laying in scattered piles of dirty clothes across the floor. Johnny went over to his dog and petted him once more, trying to get over his antsy feeling. Soon enough, Beth was dressed and knocked on Johnny’s open door.

“I’m ready to head out now,” she said. Johnny gave Indiana one last scratch.

“I’ll meet you at the garage,” he stood up. “I, uh, forgot something. Really quick.” Beth shrugged with a roll of her eyes, but did as Johnny asked. Once he heard her going down the stairs, he rushed to her bedroom and grabbed the crystal heart. He tucked it into his jacket pocket.

Finally at the Aster house, the witch mentor was surprised to see the two there.

“Johnny?” Virginica began, “I wasn’t expecting you to join Beth in her lesson today.”

“Is that a problem,” Johnny’s voice held almost a venomous pinch to it. He saw Virginica’s expression twitch for a split second. She shook her head.

“Of course not,” she smiled. “I simply like to know when I have company so I can treat them accordingly. But please, both of you enter.” She stepped aside and allowed the siblings in. Beth immediately began to chat with Virginica, and Johnny glared up at the staircase. He could see through reflections of ice that Aquilo was hiding up there. Johnny narrowed his eyes.

“Excuse me, Ms. Aster?” Johnny looked to Virginica, “Where’s Aquilo?”

“Oh, he was going to help me with the lesson today,” Virginica waved her hand. “But he wasn’t feeling his best.”

“Can I talk to him?” Johnny asked. Virginica looked confused. “I mean, he is dating my sister. I like to get a read on people.”

“But you’ve already met—“

“It’s best to just let him do whatever,” Beth sighed defeatedly. “He’s kinda pigheaded like that.” Virginica gave a chuckle that Johnny could tell was forced. He knew this was all a charade. Still keeping his stance, he glared at the witch.

“Fine, fine,” Virginica brushed her hand through the air, the other on Beth’s shoulder, “we’ll be here then, if you need us.” Virginica began to lead Beth away, and Johnny followed up the grand staircase. He glanced down behind him and saw the arctic fox watching his every move.

It’s eyes were different. He could tell even from the distance. Johnny shot a warning spark near the cat. It didn’t flinch.

Johnny followed the stairs up to where two doors stood. Everything was still carved with ice. The door that was more elegant, he assumed was Virginica’s. He’d look in there later. Johnny went to the other door and pushed it open.

Aquilo had his back to Johnny, staring at the wall. In the dark, icy room, Johnny could barely see anything outside of the brief light that let through the open door. He took another step in, and the door slammed shut behind him.

“You have powers of your own,” Aquilo slowly turned his head, glaring over his shoulder at Johnny. “I almost thought none of you but Beth did. But I had suspicions. What warm electricity you have.”

“How did you—“ the cat. Johnny balled his hands into fists. “Alright, I’m not here to play your little game. I’m here to put an end to this. You, Virginica... I knew you were liars. Too good to be true, too perfect.”

“So,” Aquilo shrugged, turning around, “what are you going to do? I stole a gift for her, whatever.” Johnny pulled the heart out of his pocket and glared at it in his hand.

“This wasn’t yours to give,” he growled. “Maybe Alex was too much of a wimp to say he loved Beth, but at least he actually did care. You just waltz in and sweep her off her feet... for what?”

“I’m afraid that’s none of your concern.”

Johnny charged Aquilo, grabbing him by the neck and pinning him against the wall. He drew back a fist. Aquilo only gave pained laughs.

“She’ll just think you’re paranoid,” Aquilo said. “You have no real evidence.”

“The heart—“

Aquilo flicked his wrist, and the gift shattered. Johnny dropped Aquilo and ran to the pieces.

“She’ll just think you stole it and broke it,” Aquilo teased coyly. “Because you did. I wouldn’t have had to do that if it wasn’t for you. It really is your fault.” Johnny felt his electricity spark up. In a blind anger, he grabbed Aquilo again, pressing his hand against his chest, shocking him. Aquilo yelled.

What felt like only seconds later, Virginica threw open the door and gasped at seeing her son on the ground, in pain and trying to get back up. Beth followed, looking shocked at the scene. She saw the broken heart on the ground. She gasped and hesitantly reached for the pieces.

“You are not welcome in my home!” Virginica shouted at Johnny. “I want you out, away, leave us be!”

“Not without Beth,” Johnny grabbed her wrist. Beth glared and pushed him away.

“What is wrong with you?!” she snapped.

“I’m just trying to protect you!”

“This isn’t protection! This is obsession!”

“Virginica? Johnny? Beth? Where are you?”

Everyone upstairs froze at hearing John downstairs. The old man hurried the best he could, looking confused and flustered at everyone. Johnny, electricity still crackling, distressed Virginica, enraged Beth, and weak Aquilo. He frowned at Johnny.

“What did you do?” he asked. Johnny only pushed himself away from everyone else.

“I did what I had to,” he pointed down at Aquilo. “He doesn’t love Beth, he’s manipulating her, and both of these assholes are putting up a fuckin’ facade!” John looked to the Asters, then back at his son. “Dad, please, listen to me. When have I ever lied about this?! They’re the people you don’t know! So wake up out of the fantasy that everything is fine, because it’s not! Who do you really trust?!”

Beth slowly released the tension on her face. She glanced down at Aquilo on the floor. John stared for a long moment at his son and sighed.

“Ms. Aster,” he slowly turned to face Virginica, “I’m sorry. But I have to believe my boy.” Virginica looked at Aquilo who finally was standing. Her expression was difficult to read. “However, we can mediate the situation, talk this out and—“

Aquilo quickly shouted a spell, and all of the Bosteaus fell unconscious to the floor.

———

When he blinked awake, the first thing he saw was the siphon.

John’s brown eyes, bleary and trying to make sense of what he was seeing, didn’t want to believe it. But he recognized such technology. Though, the one he had seen was an older style than this one. But the labs had used siphons before. As the old man tried to move, he found his body still, suspended in time. He glanced down and saw the runes written around him on the floor.

A common trap, but powerful. Leaving the person forced still once they were placed inside the ring. He tried to move his head, but it didn’t work. He pushed his eyes, trying to see the best he could, and his children were beside him, in the same fashion. He tried to move his lips, wake them up, but again, no motion. His body felt numb.

“They’re waking up, Mother,” Aquilo spoke up, turning to view the family in front of a wall covered in ancient writing. He shut the book he was holding. Virginica’s dark chuckles could be heard throughout the walls.

“Nice if you to wake up,” she hummed. “What a clever little boy you have, John. Able to see past everything better than even you. Oh, I knew from our first meeting how paranoid you would be. But sending calming aura spells to you helped. Upping our act helped. However, as ashamed as I am to admit, my lack of thought proved itself with that son of yours.” John tried to speak. He felt his vocal chords move, his lips twitch. Only groans came out. “No need to respond. Nothing moves inside of there.”

Aquilo slowly went up to Beth and gave her a teasing smirk, “You were the easiest to trick. So naïve. So trusting. It was cute. You were ready for anyone to say they loved you, weren’t you? How... hm, to put it mildly: utterly pathetic.” Louder groaning came from Johnny. Aquilo rolled his eyes, “Oh, shut it. You heard Mother. You can’t talk in there. I know that’s a problem for your big mouth and tiny brain, but try and keep up.”

Beth glanced her eyes down at the runes. Written with simple chalk. She farted her dark brown eyes fast around the room. John shut his eyes tight, focusing, bring forth your heat—

“If your powers require to be created from movements and your physical body,” Virginica tilted her head with a proud smirk, “they won’t work. Try and summon any powers, John. You’ll only make yourself tired. Electricity, fire, ice... you’re a nice variety. But we’re only here for the ice. You two are just trapped to not interfere.”

“The siphon is almost ready,” Aquilo glanced up at the large contraption. “Almost done warming up.”

“Finish writing the text on the wall, dear,” Virginica smiled at her son. “I’ll watch over these ones.” He did just as he was told. Johnny could feel his body sparking with energy that wouldn’t release. He couldn’t spring it out without moving, without control. Neither could his father.

He glanced over at Beth for a moment. Why couldn’t she have listened, why couldn’t she have just gotten control, why did she have to believe these people—

He noticed a cloth, moving limply on its own against the floor. He did his best to look at Beth’s face. Her telekinesis. She could use it without gestures. Her eyes still worked and so did her mind. That’s all she needed. Johnny kept making noises at Virginica to distract her. She only rolled her eyes.

“You’re an annoying little boy,” she grumbled. “I hope you’re aware of that. You never know when to stop. If you had just let us do what we needed, none of this would have had to happen. You tried to be the hero. Now you see where it got you.”

Wiping away just even part of the runes released Beth. She dropped to the floor, free from the trap, gasping. John looked in shock down at her. Virginica’s eyes went wide.

“How did you—?!”

Now further in control, she pushed her hand out to wipe away the runes of the other traps, releasing her family. Johnny charged up the electricity in his hands, and once he had his bearings, John began to summon his fire. Virginica and Aquilo looked with a cold anger.

“You want to play? Fine. We’ll play,” Virginica said, her voice low. She looked at Aquilo and nodded her head. Aquilo smirked. He raised his arms in the shape of an x, fists balled up, before slashing them down. In a bright light, he summoned magical blades that curled like a scythe against his arms.

“I think summoning weapons is an unfair advantage, man,” Johnny blinked. Aquilo smirked.

“The time for a fair fight is over,” he said. In the next moment, he charged at Johnny, shouting and trying to slash him with the blades. He summoned more against his legs, raising it high in a kick. Johnny ducked and backflipped out of the way.

“Pretty agile for a human!” Aquilo laughed. He slammed his blade into the wall, narrowly avoiding stabbing Johnny in the shoulder.

“Johnny!!” John began to hurry to his son’s defense, but Virginica blasted ice at his face, making him stop and shiver violently.

“You’re mine,” she hissed. John threw a glob of lava at the floor near Virginica. He looked over at his daughter.

“Beth, run!” he shouted. “Get out of here, get back home!”

“Not without you guys!!” Beth looked around the room. She levitated objects around the room, flinging them at the witch. John looked to the siphon and pointed at it.

“Start breaking it apart!” he said. “Hurry!” Beth nodded and focused, holding her hands out at the siphon.

Johnny kept narrowly avoiding Aquilo’s attacks, as he slashed and tried to stab him. The older man slid on the icy floor out of the way, charging up a small ball of electricity in his hand. He blasted it at Aquilo. The young sorcerer yelled, unable to move as he was getting shocked. Johnny ran towards the siphon. Charging his power again, he started blasting it to overload it as Beth tore it apart.

“You’re very slow, old man,” Virginica scoffed at John. “And have poor aim.”

“Keep riling me up,” John panted, holding his arm as more molten rock crawled up his pale skin, “and you’ll see what I can really do.”

“Unlike you, I don’t need emotion to power me,” Virginica commented. She mumbled another spell, sending John back with a blast of horrid winds.

As Johnny forced more electricity, he heard a weapon be raised behind him.

“We’re not done yet, Johnny.”

Johnny slid out of the way as Aquilo stabbed into the siphon. He growled as his blade got stuck. Beth, in one more pull, tore apart the siphon enough for an alarm to sound. Aquilo summoned his blades away and glared up at Johnny.

“Get out of here!” John shouted at his children. “Let’s go, now!” He tried to cool his fire as he rushed to follow his children.

“Not so fast!”

Aquilo held out his arms, mumbling a spell that held the family still. Virginica glared at the family.

“We’re not finished yet,” she continued. She shouted a spell, blasting Beth in her chest where her heart would be. The ghost girl gasped.

“What did you do to her?!” John screamed. Virginica smirked.

“Either let her stay here and we do what we want,” she began, “or take her back to the UpSide and see what we did. And risk your lives and everyone else’s.”

“What did you do?!”

“Anything she or that is part of her touches will freeze,” Virginica locked her cold, blue eyes with John’s, “people, objects. Oh, you can touch her just fine, though. And the moment she leaves this Realm, wherever she is will freeze. It will freeze until all who are alive will die. Or, like I said. Leave her here, and everyone else will be safe. We’ll take away all her ice, curse included.”

“Never,” John spat. Virginica rolled her eyes and waved her hand.

“Have it your way, dears,” she said. “Aquilo, you do what you wish with them now.”

Aquilo stopped chanting, dropping the family. But before they recovered the feeling of movement again, Aquilo stared at Johnny. With a smirk, he drew his hand back. Beth’s eyes widened.

“Johnny, watch out—!!”

A blast left Aquilo’s hand to Johnny, making him gasp for air and shiver violently, “That’s for shocking me.” Unable to breath properly or move, John hoisted up his son. He ran with him in his arms, Beth following, out of the ice house.

Once outside, able to function enough, he climbed back onto his bike, his father and sister crowding on the best they could. John held Beth in his arms to prevent her from touching the motorcycle and Johnny. Still shivering slightly, he drove everyone fast back to home.

But the minute they hit Riverview, what Virginica had said began to happen.

Right behind them, storm clouds followed. Beth gasped at seeing it.

“We have to get home,” John shouted over Johnny’s bike and the loud winds. “We have to stop the storm and undo the curse over Beth.”

“Way ahead of you,” Johnny shouted back. He glanced at the road. “Hold on tight! I know a shortcut!”

“Wait, Johnny, no—!!”

Ignoring his father’s pleas, Johnny revved up and drove away from the other cars on the highway and over the edge, launching the flying mechanic of his motorcycle. Almost slamming back into the ground of the woods, he followed the river back to their home.

———

“Breaking news: the entire city of Riverview plunged into a winter storm in the middle of summer. Experts are perplexed on how this single city is enduring temperatures and weather patterns typically reserved for times like December but are occurring in June. The entire city is not just blanketed, but rather covered in snow with no signs of stopping. Could this be an unexpected new development in climate change unforeseen? No answers have been given yet. But experts are advising people to treat this as any other snow storm. Prepare for the possibility of a full blizzard or being snowed in. Gather supplies, stay inside, and stay warm, Riverview. We’ll update you as this event develops. This is Eunice Gilbert, Riverview News.”

Johnny flicked off the T.V. and looked down at his dog. Indiana whimpered. Johnny sighed and pet his head, trying to calm him down, “It’ll be alright, boy. You’ll see.”

John rushed through the house, books in hand, flipping through several at once, “No, no, no, no! Not a damn thing about this!”

“Pops, we knew ice magic was hard to learn about this whole time,” Johnny said. “Whatever we didn’t find before, I don’t know if we’re gonna find again.”

“But there has to be a solution!”

“Sure, but it’s starting to seem like we’ll have to make one of our own. You know, taking parts from each of these spells and antidotes.”

“That could take ages to undo this,” John sighed. “We don’t have that kind of time. The city is getting colder every hour. Maybe every minute.”

“Then we have to find something as fast as we can,” Johnny said. After a pause, his gaze turned to upstairs. “How is she holding up?”

“Let’s just say her emotional status isn’t helping the storms,” John confessed, “and I feel useless to help. I have to focus on this, on the solution to this serious threat, but I want to be there for her.”

“Stay here and do some more readings,” Johnny said. “I’ll talk to her. We’ll take turns if we have to. And once she’s calmed down, we can all figure this out. We’ve got the weight of a town on our shoulders.” Johnny rushed upstairs before John could reply.

The father sighed, “A smaller scale Atlas.”

Up at the door once more, Johnny knocked. He could see the ice spreading past under her door. “It’s Johnny. I just want to talk.” Silence. He gently opened the door.

Beth sat with her legs curled up to her chest, her back to the door and staring out at the storm outside her window. As Johnny carefully navigated the slippery patches of ice, the icicles that sprung forth and threatened to pierce his body, he made his way to the curtains and tugged them shut. Beth lowered her head and pressed her lips to her knees. With a sigh of care, Johnny sat beside her.

“Staring our at it isn’t gonna do any good,” he said. “Beth, listen to me. This isn’t your fault. None of it is.”

“But I was the one who didn’t have control over my powers,” Beth slowly releases her legs and stared at her hands, “I-I was the one who stressed Dad to the point of needing help, I was the one who trusted them and fell for Aquilo—“

“Hey, hey,” Johnny hushed his sister. “It wasn’t just you who fell for it. Everyone else did, too. I didn’t think things would end up like this when I tried to get us all out. But the fault lies on the Asters. They put the curse on you, they’re the ones who lied and didn’t care. They’re the ones who wanted to use you.”

“But if I hadn’t—“

“Saying that is gonna do no good,” Johnny interrupted. “You gotta stop that. Listen to me, to what I’m saying. It wasn’t your fault.” He pressed his hand against Beth’s shoulder, giving it a squeeze. Beth only stared up at him, unable to touch him. He slowly lowered his arm as she sniffled. A tear slid down her cheek and landed on his hand.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured almost breathlessly. Johnny smiled kindly.

“It’s okay,” he spoke with equal care and honesty. “Come on. We need your help in trying to undo this, okay? And if you can’t, that’s fine, too. Then just check on Oba and her kids, make sure they’re safe in this storm.” Beth slowly nodded and wiped her left over tears with the back of her hand. Finally getting up to help, Johnny followed after her.

Though, where the teardrop touched his hand felt strangely cold.

[ladyseaheart1668]

Endless Summer Fan Novel (Book 1, Chapter 3)

Darkness enfolds me, cold, quiet, and still. Then it stirs, creeping towards me. Powerful, rippling muscles. Glowing golden eyes...

I awake with a gasp beneath a leafy canopy in a four-poster bed. Sweat soaks the soft sheets and blanket. I flop back on the pillow, willing my heart to slow.

“What the hell was that thing?” I murmur aloud. It takes me a few moments to stop trembling. But once I do, I start to feel the effects of the night before creeping up on me, and I groan. I knocked back a couple more cocktails after coming back up from the beach, mostly to calm myself down. The throbbing pain behind my eyes tells me that was a very poor idea. Not to mention the effects of the late night in general. It occurs to me to wonder what time it is. I fumble for my phone on the nightstand beside me.

9:27am. And still no cell service. I check for a wi-fi signal, but there is none to be found. Not even a secured signal. I sigh and put the phone down. Might as well get up, I guess. I push back the covers, stumbling into the bathroom.

I turn on the shower and gulp some water from the sink while I wait for the stream to get warm. It doesn't take long, and I strip and step under the soothing water. The strong pressure feels like a gentle massage. The shower is stocked with exotic floral body washes and shampoos. I savor the fragrance as I scrub the sweat from my body and rinse the chlorine from my hair. I should have done that last night. Blonde hair and pool water usually don't mix. But so far my hair hasn't turned green. Sooner than I want to, I turn off the water and step out onto the mossy green bathmat. I gulp more sink water. I make the bed—because I haven't seen the housekeeping staff anywhere, either—pull on some clothes, and hang my towel to dry.

By the time I've finished brushing my teeth, the headache is fading, and my stomach is starting to growl. I take a few more gulps of water, tuck my room key into my pocket and wander down to the hotel restaurant.

I'm greeted by a chaotic scene, and a cacophony of smells from the buffet table.

“Uh, Raj,” Sean says, “when you said you were going to cook breakfast, I figured, you know, pancakes and bacon. Not...what is this, again?”

“The Raj Hangover Special 9000! A perfect scramble of eggs, potatoes, oysters, and bananas, topped off with pickle juice. Trust me, dudes, it'll cure your hangovers before you can say 'this tastes gross and weird.' Just try it.”

“...This tastes gross and weird,” Jake mutters.

Zahra grimaces. “I do not want this in this place, I do not want this in my face.”

“Y'all are missing out,” Craig declares, shoveling in another mouthful. “This shizz is delicious!”

“I once saw you eat a rock,” Michelle says flatly.

“That was a dare, and I won ten bucks!”

As they notice my entrance, my classmates go quiet.

“Well, well, well,” Jake drawls. “If it isn't the Girl Who Cried Monster.”

“Seriously, Alodia,” Raj laughs. “You shut down the party faster than the cops back home.”

“That's what you care about?” Estella sneers.

I smile sheepishly. “Sorry about that. I know I kinda freaked everyone out last night.”

“Pfft. Didn't freak me out,” Craig insists. “Nothing freaks Craig out!”

“Craig, let Alodia talk,” Sean chides.

“...That's pretty much it. I promise I'll try not to ruin anymore parties.”

“Good!” Raj says. “Because tonight, we're running it baaaaaack!”

Everyone laughs. I join in, but I stop when I notice Estela looking at me with disappointment.

“Hey, stranger.” Diego sidles up to me, holding a plate piled high with Raj's sizzling hangover cure. “You okay?”

“Yeah. I'm fine. It was just...a rough night.”

“Care for some breakfast?”

I eye the plate in his hands warily. The concoction looks like pureed scrambled eggs and smells like salted fish. “...I don't know if I should.”

“It's actually not bad.” He grins as my stomach growls audibly. “And face it, you need to eat something. Let's get you a plate.”

I relent, and move to the buffet table where I fill a plate with pale yellow salty-fish-scented goop. I fill a glass with orange juice.

“So, uh...I hate to give you a middle school flashback, but what table should we sit at?”

I look around for two empty seats. At one table, Michelle asks Raj and Craig where the resort gym is. At another, Aleister, Grace, and Zahra are discussing something Grace found at the beach. I drift over to the first table. I know Michelle hates me, but I like Raj, and I don't have anything against Craig. Besides, I can probably follow their conversation better.

“Hey, guys. I heard you talking about the gym? I'd totally be down to hit that up.”

Michelle scoffs. “Oh, sweetie, did you think I was talking to you? I'm going to the gym because I want to work out, not watch you have another meltdown.”

“Hey!” Diego says. “At the peak of her gymnastics career, Allie was in the gym about five hours a day!”

“Slight exaggeration. And I hardly had a career.” But I flash him a grateful smile.

“Come on, Michelle,” Raj chimes in. “Go easy on Alodia. We're all stuck on this island together, we might as well get along.”

“Pfft. Says you. I don't get along with anyone I don't want to.”

“Craig, dude, you don't get along with anyone, period.”

“He's got you there,” Michelle says.

I cover a chuckle by stuffing a forkful of egg goo into my mouth. ...It's like eating a pile of mushy salt with fish, banana, and egg aftertaste. If only I weren't so hungry. I gulp the rest of it before I can taste too much.

“Hey, you got that down pretty quick,” Raj remarks. “Did you like it?”

“...I'm going to be tasting that in my burps all day.”

“Absolutely!”

At that moment, the door swings open, and Lila enters, looking bright-eyed and flawless.

“Good morning, everyone! I hope you're all enjoying your lovely breakfast in our five-star restaurant. But I might've found out what happened to all the guests.” She pauses to let us react, but we're all waiting for her to continue.

“...Well?” Jake prompts. “Spit it out, Dimples.”

“Well, I went into the staff office to look for information. One of the computers in there, the one used for island-wide broadcasts, was still running. It turns out exactly two days ago, at 3:45 PM, someone used the emergency broadcast system to trigger a full evacuation of the hotel.”

“An evacuation?”

“It's a standard procedure at all Rourke International resorts. In the event of a natural disaster, the guests vacate the premises and head to a secure shelter.”

“A natural disaster?” I snicker. “You mean like Raj's cooking?”

Craig laughs. “Ha! Buuuuuuuurn!”

Raj presses his fist to his chest. “Ouch, Alodia. Major ouch.”

Lila blinks. “Yes. Well...questionable cooking aside, the evacuation procedures here were designed specifically to handle only certain cases. A hurricane, a viral outbreak, or Mount Atropo finally erupting.”

“Yeah, well, I don't see any hurricanes, virus, or lava flows,” Jake says skeptically.

“So, why trigger the evacuation procedure?” Sean asks.

“False alarm, maybe,” Quinn suggests. “But in that case, why hasn't anyone come back?”

“Perhaps everyone is still at the shelter,” Estela says thoughtfully. “Lila, where is it?”

“I...don't entirely know. I've never actually been there. But the signs on the trail say we'll find it if we hike north for a few miles.”

“I'm in,” Jake says.

Lila blinks again. “I'm sorry?”

“You're going to go look for it, right? Well, I'm coming with you. The rest of these kids are having fun playing Home Alone 2: Island Boogaloo, but I was already supposed to be in Cancun. I'm losing cash every second I waste here.”

“I will come as well,” Aleister says. “I...I'd like to get the lay of the land around here.”

“I want to go too!” Quinn chimes in. “I'd love to help out and see some of the sights.”

“How about you, Princess? You coming?”

I start a little. “...Me?” Involuntarily, I think of the thing I saw in the shadows last night. “Well...I...”

Jake waves a hand. “Hey, don't worry about it. If you're scared, you're scared. Just stay back here with the rest of the Goof Troop.”

“Wait! I'm coming, too.”

“You are?” Diego raises an eyebrow at me. “Why?”

I shrug. “I want to see the island. This hotel is great, but there's so much more to see. I want to see the jungles and the ruins and the waterfalls.”

He smirks. “And the creepy bomb shelter that is almost certainly full of zombies?”

“Exactly!”

“Fine, fine. I'll go with you. But only so I can say 'I told you so' when something horrible attacks us.”

I grin and give him a thumbs up. “That's the spirit!”

“All right, then!” Lila claps her hands. “Let's head out!”

* * *

A short time later, four of us follow Lila down a winding path through the rainforest. Jake and Aleister lag behind. Quinn, looking angelic in a white blouse with a white bandana tied like a babushka over her copper hair, skips ahead a little ways to marvel at the flowers on the trees and bushes. The flowers glow with a soft, colorful light. When I first saw them, I thought they were lightbulbs, something draped over the foliage like Christmas lights. But the glow is coming from inside the petals themselves.

“Unbelievable,” Quinn breathes. “These colors, these textures...they're like something out of a dream.”

“I've never seen anything like it,” I agree.

“Beautiful, right?” Lila says. “Due to its geographic isolation, La Huerta has one of the most unique ecosystems on the planet, boasting flora and fauna not found anywhere else.”

“Sure thing, Minnie Mouse,” Jake grumbles. “Keep spewing that Rourke International propaganda. I ain't buying it.”

“What's that supposed to mean?” Aleister snaps.

“I'm just saying. All the brochures go on about how this place is some sorta Disney paradise. But drink in the right dive bars, and you'll start to hear rumors about what really goes on here. Criminal plots, illegal experiments, folks going missing...all kinds of crazy.”

Quinn wrinkles her nose. “Conspiracy theories? Really?”

“Laugh it up, Pippi Longstocking. While you were busy tweeting about your pumpkin spice latte, I was flying covert missions over Kandahar. Once you've peeked behind that curtain...well, let's just say there's some things out there that would blow your mind. The pretty purple flowers you're ooh-ing and ahh-ing about? They might just be sizzling with radiation.”

“That is preposterous!” Aleister cries.

“What do you think, Princess? You trust this place?” I hesitate a moment, eyeing the flowers. Then I back away. Jake nods approvingly. “Knew I could count on you.”

Aleister rolls his eyes. “Tell me you don't believe his conspiracy theory prattle.”

“I don't know what I believe, but I say better safe than sorry. Unique ecosystem or not, flowers should not glow like that.”

“Well, I still think they're beautiful,” Quinn says with finality. “And I'm not going to let some conspiracy theory keep me from appreciating that.”

She plucks a flower and puts it to her nose, inhaling deeply. ...Oh, my God, she is adorable. Diego elbows me lightly.

“What's with that goofy smile?” he whispers.

“Oh, shut up, Diego,” I hiss back, feeling myself blush.

Ahead of us, Lila stops suddenly and looks around in confusion. “...This...doesn't make any sense.”

“What?”

“Well, the signpost said the shelter should be right here...”

“Oh, great!” Aleister groans. “Even the tour guide's lost. What do they pay you for, again?”

“Tactical scouting 101 kids,” Jake says. “Get to high ground. See that rocky cliff over there? I'm checking it out.”

“Oh!” Quinn exclaims. “Do you hear that? Sounds like a waterfall nearby. The shelter might be near that.”

“Or you just want to go check out the waterfall,” Diego quips.

“Or that,” she agrees sweetly.

“I really think we should stick to the trail,” Lila says. “The shelter might be further ahead.”

“We could split up,” I suggest. “Cover a little more ground.”

“I'll stick to the trail with Lila,” Diego says.

Aleister crosses his arms stubbornly. “Well, I am staying right here. I see no reason to traipse around on some fool's errand.”

“Well, y'all know where I'm headed,” Jake says. He looks at me. “You wanna keep me some company, Princess?”

“Uh...yeah. Sure.”

“Stay within shouting distance!” Lila calls as we split off.

Jake and I head off through the undergrowth towards the hilltop. Jake moves easily through the dense tangle of leaves and branches. He deftly hops a log and slides under a low-hanging branch.

“Impressive. You do this a lot?”

“Get stranded on mysterious islands with a group of plucky college kids? Gotta say, it's a first.”

“I meant, go hiking, walk through jungles, that kind of thing. You seem pretty confident in the outdoors.”

“I grew up in a Louisiana town so rural it wasn't even on the map. When it comes down to it, the swamp and the jungle ain't so different.”

“Probably not as many gators out here though.”

“Less gators, more jaguars. I'll call it even. How about you, Princess? This your kinda scene?”

“Actually, yeah. I mean, I admit I grew up in the SoCal suburbs, but I love the outdoors. The blue sky overhead...the fresh air...that soft sea breeze... I should probably be more freaked out. Especially after that...whatever...I saw last night. Being out here, like this, I don't know. I can't help but feel happy.”

Jake raises an eyebrow at me. “That why you came along with me? You felt like a nature hike?”

“Well, you invited me. And...I guess I felt safer following you than Lila.You're confident. You're capable. And you seem to know what you're doing here more than she does. Or any of us for that matter.” I pause. “...Come to think of it, why would you ask me to come along?”

He shrugs. “Because I can already tell you're going to be the horse to back here.”

“I...what?”

“You're smart. Maybe not book smart. At least, not as much as Draco Malfoy back there, or...what's her name with the glasses?”

“Grace.”

“Right. Grace. But you've got a good head on your shoulders. You're also braver than either Grace or Malfoy, and when it comes down to it, I would bet money you're the one everyone's going to look to when things go sideways.”

“You say that like you're expecting them to go sideways.”

“I am, Princess. I am.”

I can't tell if he means that, or if he's just being facetious “...Are you ever going to call me by my real name?”

“When you've earned it.”

“I think you've forgotten it.”

“Have not. I saw all your boarding passes in Costa Rica. ...It's Alodia Chandler, right? Or do you prefer Allie?”

“Alodia. Diego's the only one who gets to call me Allie. That's a right you have to earn.”

“...Are you and he...?”

“Me and Diego? Please. I've known him since we were in diapers. He's practically my brother. Besides...” I discreetly point towards my pubis. “I'm missing a piece he finds essential. ...Best friend I've ever had, though.”

“Thought so. Got that vibe from him.”

“Is it that obvious? I know he's not Sean Gayle, but he's not camp, either.”

“He's not lisping or limp-wristing. It's pretty subtle. And if you've known him all your lives it's probably harder for you to pick up on since it's all just your friend to you.” He pauses. “And I'd be surprised if Sean Gayle hasn't kissed at least a couple boys in his time.”

“You think he's bi?”

“I think he's attracted to personality more than what's between a person's legs. Call that what you will.”

“For a lone wolf type, you seem pretty confident in your ability to read people. Or maybe it's just your amazing gaydar.”

“Well, it is damn amazing. Of course, it's wasted on you.”

“What do you mean?”

He grins. “Come on. You're not exactly subtle. If we put Quinn and Sean in front of you and had them bend over, you wouldn't know which ass to stare at.”

It takes a moment for his words to sink in. Then I laugh. “You're a brat, Top Gun! What about you, then? What's your pleasure?”

His smile slips. He looks away. “...Been a long time since I've shared my bed with anyone, man or woman.” He turns back to me with a wry grin. “Hard to get frisky in a hammock. ...But it don't much matter to me what a person's got in their pants. It's what's in their head that I'm picky about.”  

I am distracted from responding when we break through the branches and arrive at the foot of a sharp, jagged cliff face.

“If we can just get up that, we'll have a clear view,” he says. “How's your rock climbing?”

“Great. I mean...pretty good. Average?” I shrug apologetically. “I'm a gymnast, but I've really only done rock-climbing at the Y. But I never broke anything.”

“Good enough for me.”

He crouches down and gives me a boost, hoisting me up to a low ledge. Together, we carefully ascend the cliff face, grabbing handholds and sticking our toes in cracks to stabilize ourselves. Before too long, Jake crests the top. I'm just a few inches behind him when the rock I'm holding onto breaks off in my hand. I cry out, grabbing at the ledge, and hook my fingers on the edge. Jake grabs my arms and helps me up.

“Nice moves, Princess. Looks like you learned from the stairs on the control tower.”

“Still glad for the help.”

We take a moment to catch our breath, looking out over the island.

“...I gotta hand it to this place,” I say softly. “It never stops taking my breath away.”

“That's the radiation.”

I sigh. “You're a real glass-half-full kinda guy, aren't you?” I mutter.

“...I'm on an island owned by Rourke International. Don't trust that they haven't poisoned this place. In the military, I served near some of their mining operations. ...Massive machines that dwarfed skyscrapers. The kind that rob the earth blind and leave it barren.”

“...I gotta admit I didn't take you for an environmentalist.”

“I'm not. I just think you reap what you sow.”

“So...you believe in karma?”

“Doesn't matter what I believe. In my life, karma's made it pretty clear that it believes in me.” He pauses. “...Seriously, though...that is one hell of a sight...”

“No weird lights in the sky, either.”

“For now.”

“Oh, shut up.”

“...Hey...what's this?”

Jake kneels and brushes at some dirt. I see something glinting in the sun. I kneel beside him. Embedded into the stone is a square-shaped metallic plate with what looks like the head of a wolf embossed on it.

“What is that?”

“I dunno.” Jake frowns, staring at the plate. “There's no writing or anything. Looks like...some kinda wolf?”

“You think it's part of the resort? Like the corporation put it here?”

“Maybe...but why? If it's a warning that there are wolves in the area it's a pretty crap warning, given its location. And I don't know many species of wolves that live in the rainforest.”

I slide my phone out of my back pocket and snap a quick picture of the plate. As I tuck my phone back into my pocket, something catches my eye.

“Jake, look! Down by that river over there...the gray building? Sure looks a lot like...”

“A shelter! Hot damn! Good eyes, Princess!”

“Couldn't have got here without you.”

We smile at each other for a long, silent moment. Then Jake clears his throat.

“We, uh...should probably head back. Find the others and tell them where to go.”

“Yeah. We should. Definitely.”

Jake takes a step towards the edge, then looks back. “Gotta say...this was actually kind of fun. Maybe before I fly back, we can go on another climb together.”

“Sure. I'd like that.”

We regroup with the others and make our way to the shelter. The enormous concrete and cinder building is covered with creeping vines.

“Great job, Jake and Alodia!” Lila chirps. “You found it!”

“I wouldn't go popping the champagne just yet,” Diego says. “Anyone else getting some 28 Days Later vibes off this place?”

“It does look a little...dilapidated,” Quinn agrees. “How old is this place?”

“It's no older than the resort,” Lila says. “I will have to have a stern word with the caretakers!”

“Whole point of a shelter is keeping you safe inside, not looking good outside,” Jake points out with a shrug. “Come on.”

Lila pushes open the doors, revealing a long hallway that looks just as dilapidated as the outside. Vines snake along the floor, and broken fixtures overhead cough sparks.

“...Empty...”

Jake shudders. “On second thought, maybe Pop Culture Petey was right. This place gives me the creeps.”

“I finally get a nickname, and it's 'Pop Culture Petey'?” Diego mutters indignantly. “Everyone else got a cooler one!”

“Not everyone. I'm 'Princess', remember?”

“Anyone else want to go back to the pretty jungle with the magic flowers?” Quinn asks in a small voice. “Anyone?”

Jake kneels and trails his fingertips on the ground. “There's a lot of muddy shoeprints around. They seem recent.”

“You mean the guests were here?”

“Well...someone was.”

A skittering sound makes us all startle. Jake leaps to his feet.

“What was that?”

I look in the direction the sound seemed to come from. There is a gaping hole in the far wall where the concrete has crumbled. Vines and glowing flowers cover the edges like a wreath. ...Or dried blood on a wound, I think involuntarily.

I approach cautiously, the others gathering behind me. At the edge of the hole, I hesitate. Then I gather my courage and peer inside.

“...There's something in there.”

“What do you see?” Diego asks.

Something shifts in the darkness. Two spots of reflected light glint out of the shadows. A pair of eyes.

“There's something alive in there!”

“Certainly it's just a rat,” Aleister says most uncertainly. “...Right?”

There's a strange clicking sound that comes from inside the hole, separate from the sound of claws scraping on stone that accompanies it.

“That's no rat,” Jake murmurs.

“Allie, is that the...thing you saw last night?”

“...It's...” I'm cut off by my own cry as the shape rushes towards me, its shadow huge on the wall, and pounces into the light. We all whirl towards it, and stop.

A creature about the size and shape of a fox, with violet eyes and ice-blue fur, sits on its haunches in front of us and cocks its head.

“Mrrlk?” it trills curiously.

“...What the...?”

“Oh...my...God!” Quinn squeals.

“What...is it?” Aleister asks.

“Uh, literally the cutest thing I've ever seen!” Quinn answers, practically beaming.

“Okay, can we all officially agree this is not a real animal?” Jake says.

As if understanding, the fox-thing trills sadly, its tail and ears drooping. It backs away from us into a corner, trembling. Frost clings to the walls behind him.

“Huh...it looks scared.”

“But what would it be scared of?” I ask. “Us?”

Any reply I might have gotten is cut off by a deep growl from directly behind me. My veins turn to ice. I turn slowly.

An enormous feliform beast is prowling towards us from the shadows, muscles rippling under skin and golden-brown fur. Massive cuspids, each at least the length of my hand from fingertips to wrist, descend from its upper jaw. My heart drops into my stomach. I know in an instant that I'm looking at the creature I saw last night.

“That!” Aleister cries. “That! It's scared of that!”

“You think?!” Lila shrieks.

The fox creature scurries behind me, curling against my ankles.

“Jake!” I cry. “What do we do?!”

Jake looks at me. For the first time, he looks scared. He grabs my hand and holds it tight.

“Don't. Move.”

[pheuthe]

“You bake when you’re stressed and sometimes you give me cookies, but recently you’re giving me whole baskets each day, now I’m not complaining but are you okay?” coldflash AU 

(from this post)

for @airydoorway

The smell is driving Barry nuts.

The day he moves in, he appreciates the homely undertones of vanilla in the air, and thinks that the previous owner of the tiny apartment must’ve been the type to collect those pricy, excessively scented candles. It’s not an unpleasant smell, per se, so he opens a window and doesn’t think twice about it.

The vanilla, however, persists for some time. When it finally goes away and Barry takes a deep, relieved breath, a hint of cinnamon tickles his nose. He spends two hours rooting through the apartment’s shelves and cabinets in search of the offending candle, but comes up empty-handed.

It fades soon enough, and Barry’s starting to think that maybe, he’s got those sensory hallucinations he’s been reading about lately.

But then, about ten days after moving in, he’s locking the front door on his way to work and a man steps out of the apartment next door. Barry feels like a gingerbread truck has just mowed him down. There’s vanilla and cinnamon and other sweet smells, and the neighbor is stuffing a plastic plate filled with the most mouthwatering cookies in the world… into a trash bag.

“What are you doing?!” Barry yelps, and the man shoots him a glare.

“Don’t need so many cookies,” he growls. Under any other circumstances, Barry would melt at the sound of a voice like that, especially when it falls from that mouth, but the guy looks positively murderous, and only the fate of those poor cookies makes Barry speak up again.

“I’ll take them!” he yelps, and the guy raises an eyebrow, then thrusts the trash bag right into Barry’s hands and turns away, slamming the door of his apartment behind himself.

Only belatedly does Barry realize that he shouldn’t have claimed cookies that have already been tossed in the trash… but when he opens the bag (just to see if there’s maybe one or two that could be salvaged), it’s filled with cookies only. Chocolate chip and nuts and snickerdoodles have been haphazardly tossed together and Barry swears he hears a quiet ‘hallelujah’ playing in his head as he takes a first careful bite.

They’re so good he wants to weep, but instead, he ends up pouring as many as he can into the largest plastic container in his apartment so that he can take this gift from the vanilla heaven next door to work.

He ends up sharing a few with Joe and Captain Singh despite his careful hoarding of the precious gift. He eats his weight in vanilla and butter for the next two days, and life is starting to look pretty good despite the awful sugar-induced crash afterwards.

Barry doesn’t think much about the whole deal – he’s been told that overeager relatives or girlfriends can sometimes bake too much, even though he’s never experienced it himself.

But then, a few weeks later, the smell of vanilla wakes him up in the middle of the night. Barry dreams about a cookie monster coming after him.

In the morning, he almost stumbles over the huge Tupperware full of cookies that has been left on his doorstep.

It becomes a pattern, afterwards. Somewhat erratic, but brownies and tarts and pies appear out of the blue at least once every couple of weeks, to the point where Barry feels a little uneasy about being fed so well by a complete stranger. He settles into the routine sugar-rushes easily, though.

Until cookies appear on Monday, Wednesday and Tuesday, in such staggering amounts that they are once again delivered in trash bags instead of food containers. Barry shares with everyone he knows, getting more than one question about this magical secret bakery he’s been frequenting lately (and a few sour looks from the cops who think that bringing twenty triple-chocolate muffins to Captain Singh is just plain sucking up). On Thursday, there’s a heavenly apple strudel, but when Barry comes back from work that same day to find four different pies sitting right there on his doorstep, he can’t just let it go anymore.

He takes a deep breath and knocks at his neighbor’s door, steeling himself for another murderous glare. Barry only notices the sound of a mixer from behind the closed door when it turns off, and there’s a moment of complete, eerie silence before the door is yanked open and Barry’s looking into the barrel of a gun.

He yelps and takes a hasty step back, nearly stumbling over himself, but the gun’s removed before he can truly start freaking out. The neighbor guy, looking just as stormy as before, tucks the gun into the back of his pants (stained with flour, of all things), and huffs.

“What?!”

“I… uh.”

It’s pretty hard to formulate a coherent sentence after that, so Barry’s grateful that the guy doesn’t slam the door in his face when it takes a few seconds for him to gather his wits.

“Look, you’ve been leaving a lot of stuff at my door these past few days and I’m not complaining or anything, but… um. Are you okay?”

That’s not at all what he planned to say, but the neighbor looks a little frantic, and not just because he pulled a gun on Barry a moment ago. There are circles under his eyes that Barry’s sure weren’t there before, and he looks like he hasn’t slept in a while.

Instead of answering, the man casts a suspicious glance down the corridor, and then steps out of the way, holding the door open.

“You wanna come in, kid?”

Barry wants to protest that he’s twenty-five, thank you very much, but he decides that irritating his sugar dealer, who also has a gun, would not be wise, so he tries to smile and, against his better judgment, steps in.

The apartment’s similar to his own, only much neater, almost meticulously put together in neutral shades of grey and beige everywhere.

Except the kitchen area, which looks very much like a baking reality show exploded all over the place, sacks of flour and stacks of eggshells and milk cartons everywhere, baking sheets haphazardly tossed over the limited counter space.

“Uh,” Barry says, not sure how to approach the subject of maybe, just maybe, the guy not being exactly alright. When he glances the neighbor’s way to assess the situation, it’s a relief to find him smirking.

“Helps me think,” he clarifies and moves back into the kitchen area, whisking the beginnings of batter in a huge glass bowl. Barry can see where he’s coming from – there’s something relaxing about watching him work, all controlled, precise movements and complete focus on the task. Barry finds himself slipping onto a flour-dusted barstool, mesmerized by the process.

Well, he’d be lying if he said that the baking is the only thing that captures his attention. Up close like this, in the man’s private space, Barry has the time to really look at him. He’s a lot less scary with a whisk in his hand and a splash of batter across his chest, but there’s something about him that still makes Barry’s insides tingle. His eyes are too kind for a man who just pulled a gun on someone, with laugh lines around the corners, and his close-cropped hair twists into the most perfect widow’s peak Barry’s ever seen. The barest hint of stubble gives his jawline that sharply defined look that Barry longs to touch, and the thought startles him for a moment. There’s both strength and vulnerability in the set of the man’s shoulders, in his long limbs and the way his fingers wrap around the handle of the whisk, and Barry suddenly feels like he should stay and make sure that everything’s okay with this guy.

“You should probably sleep,” he suggests – the only response he gets from the man is a shrug. After a moment, he stops whisking just long enough to glance at Barry and give him a good look into those winter-sky eyes.

“Can’t. No worries, kid, I’m a big boy.”

He says it with a wry smirk, the words dancing to a pretty sarcastic tune, but Barry must be slipping into insanity himself because he shouldn’t find that hot and yet here he is, sitting in a stranger’s kitchen, being inappropriately turned on by the sight of someone stress-baking.

“Would you like me to go?” he asks, suddenly uneasy.

“Nah. Stay if you like.”

There’s something about the way he says it that makes Barry feel like maybe he appreciates the company – but sitting here watching those long fingers fiddle with eggs is already making Barry restless, so he hops off the barstool and smiles a little.

“I can help?”

The assessing look the neighbor gives him, lingering and focused, turns Barry’s knees weak.

Eventually, the guy nods, like Barry has passed some sort of a test he wasn’t aware he was taking. “You can get the almonds.”

It takes a bit of creative searching in the chaos of the kitchen, but Barry feels unexpected peace wash over him as he prepares ingredient after ingredient to the sound of the guy’s quiet, precise commands. Barry has never really baked anything before, and the first few times, he worries about asking for more detailed instructions on something, but the man never makes Barry feel stupid or incompetent. His patient responses unwind something in Barry’s chest, some tension that he wasn’t even aware was there until it’s gone, leaving behind an odd sense of calm, and Barry’s actually unsettled to see the last baking sheet delivered into the oven.

He doesn’t know where to go from there, how to walk away from an impromptu baking session with a guy he doesn’t know at all, from this quiet, harmonious act of creation that has taken on an almost meditative quality. He turns to the guy to say something and finds him much closer than expected, watching Barry with that disconcerting gaze, not unkind, just piercing, like he can see Barry’s reluctance to leave.

The well-known vanilla scent is everywhere, stronger than ever after Barry has managed to spill some on himself. It messes with Barry’s head, makes him feel dizzy and fearless, and before he knows it, he’s reaching out and twisting his batter-stained fingers into the guy’s shirt and dragging him close.

There’s a sharp intake of breath, from one or both of them, and the guy stops barely an inch from Barry’s face.

“Hey,” Barry whispers, and it’s always sounded so stupid in all the movies, but it fits perfectly here, two strangers meeting in an unexpected place, in an impossibly perfect moment that flutters in the sweet-smelling air between them. The man studies him and up close, Barry can see something shift in those blue eyes. The guy starts pulling away but Barry’s having none of that, unwilling to part with this bubble of peace and warmth just yet. He surges forward and almost crashes into the guy, lips meeting in a hasty, misaligned touch that’s more a plea than a real kiss.

But then, oh, then the guy lets out this tiny sigh and tilts his head and his hands trail sugar into Barry’s hair, and it becomes a proper kiss then, unhurried, close-mouthed, but so damn perfect that Barry feels his throat go all tight, together with his stomach and his heart.

The slow, languid pace keeps them occupied until the vanilla scent in the apartment turns all smoky, and it takes both of them a while longer to shake out of their daze enough to realize that the cookies are burning.

The man swears quietly and jumps to the oven to salvage the batch, and Barry feels like he’s been torn out of a really good dream. What is he even doing here, kissing a complete stranger? It’s insane, and he needs to go before he makes himself go even more crazy over a pipe dream of domestic bliss with someone he’s met two times in his whole life – and one of those times, a gun was involved.

“I should, uh,” he starts, backing away from the kitchen in a sudden burst of panic, but before he can properly turn away, he’s stopped in his tracks by that deep voice, almost eerily calm.

“Been twenty years since I burned something,” the man says, his back to Barry, leaning over the counter with the ruined cookies. His shoulders are set, or maybe Barry’s reading too much into this, but the gun is very visible from this angle, sticking out of the waistband of his pants like a reminder of how foolish Barry’s been tonight.

He opens his mouth to say ‘sorry’ or ‘I didn’t mean to’ or ‘please don’t shoot me’, but then, the guy turns to glance at Barry over his shoulder, and there’s unexpected light in his eyes, like… like he’s not upset about the cookies at all. Like he’s actually amused, or… or fond, and Barry’s heart lurches at the thought.

“I’m Len,” he says, and that’s when Barry realizes he just spent at least twenty minutes making out (and planning a wedding) with a guy he didn’t even know by name.

It makes him laugh, and the tension cracks; instead of fleeing, he takes those five steps back to Len’s side and lets himself be folded into a hug that fits so well around him that he can’t help but wonder how it would feel to wake up in those arms.

How it will feel, because there’s little doubt in Barry’s mind that his slow descent into madness is inevitable, now.

“I’m Barry,” he says as he leans into Len’s solid chest, and takes advantage of the fact that there are no more cookies to burn.

[just-jordie-things]

Mommies - Allison Argent

You walked through the kindergarten hall, admiring the cute finger paintings and drawings of animals (mostly puppies, but you did see a very elaborate scribble of a dragon) on the walls.  You smiled here and there, recognizing a few names.  Your daughter, Maria, and a few of her friends names.  The twins, Claudia and Annakin Stilinski, Jonathan McCall, Abigail Raeken, and Danny Dunbar.  Why Liam and Hayden chose Danny, was purely because Liam thought it was funny to say ‘Danny Dunbar’.  

But you weren’t here to inspect the amateur artwork, you were here to pick up your little girl.  School would be over in a few minutes, and usually your wife was the one to get her, but you got off work early and saw an opportunity to surprise Maria.  As you neared her classroom, the duckling class, the bell rang.  You smiled watching all the five and six year olds putting on their backpacks with a little struggle, and you stepped aside as they came out the door.  Then you went in.

“Mommy!” Maria looked up from where she was sprinkling a mountain of glitter, and ran over to you.  You smiled wide, and lifted her up in the air, spinning her around.

“How was class today munchkin?” You asked, and peppered her cheeks with kisses, making her giggle.

“It was fun! The eggs are going to hatch soon!” You looked over to where she pointed at the chicken eggs, and smiled back at her.

“That’s great kiddo!” You said, and set her down so she could go collect her things.  You watched her put on her jacket, all by herself, and even zipped it up.

“Hello” You turned upon hearing a female voice, and turned to see who must be her teacher.

“Oh hello, you must be Ms Louise” You said kindly, and held out your hand, she shook it with a smile.

“Hello, I just wanted to come say, if the parent or guardian isn’t picking her up, that there needs to be a signed form from the parent or guardian saying that it is alright to take her” The older woman said, and you furrowed your brow for a moment, then let out a quiet laugh.

“Oh my apologies, usually Allison picks her up, but I’m Mrs Argent” You introduced.

“Mrs Argent?” You nodded.

“That’s me, it’s a pleasure to meet you, we hear all about you at home” You said sweetly, and the woman just nodded.

“I see...”

“Mommy I’m ready” Maria said, toddling back over to you and her teacher.

“Well how lucky are you dear... to have... two....mommies” Maria just shrugged her shoulders.

“Honey, why don’t you wait in the hallway, I’ll be right there” You said, and Maria nodded, going out to the hall.

“Ms...Mrs... Argent, I’m slightly concerned for Maria’s...um.. well being, I suppose”

“And what sparked this concern?” You asked, defensively crossing your arms.

“Well, try and see it from her point of view.  A child with two mommies, in a classroom of children who learn to play house with a mommy and a daddy” Ms Louise said, putting her palms together and moving her hands about as she spoke.

“Forgive me if I’m wrong, ma’am, but this ahem, concern, you show for my daughter, has nothing to do with Allison and I’s marriage, does it?” You asked, raising a suspicious eyebrow.  “Because it would be highly inappropriate if my five year old’s teacher is telling me that the relationship I have is wrong.  I don’t believe that’s your place” You said.

Ms Louise said nothing, as expected, and you pulled a tight smile, raising both of your eyebrows.

“Now, if you’ll excuse me.  I have a daughter and a wife at home to attend to” You said, nodding curtly and heading out of the room.

“Mommy was I in trouble?” Maria asked, and you took her hand, and her My Little Pony backpack.

“On the contrary, you are not.  In fact.  We are going to go get ice cream, and bring some home to mama too alright? How does that sound?” Maria squealed with excitement, which made you smile.  “Come on munchkin” You tugged on her arm, and lifted her up, swinging the backpack onto your shoulder.  “You know I love you so much, right?”

“Of course mommy we’re getting ice cream” Maria giggled back.

“Your mother and I care about you so, so much.  Just as much as a mommy and daddy would” You said, and she smiled at you.

“I know mommy” She said in a soft, sweet voice.  “I don’t need a daddy” You were stunned too much to say anything.  “I know most of the other people have a mommy and a daddy, but I think having two mommies is more fun” You were tearing up, and hid it by kissing her hair.

“Don’t tell Uncle Scott and Uncle Stiles, but two mommies is way more fun” You said, holding a finger to your lips.

“Surprise mama!” Maria yelled excitedly upon handing Allison a hot fudge sundae.

“Ooh, and what is the special occasion?” Allison asked, pecking your lips and taking the treat.

“Gross!”

“Hush munchkin” You laughed, ruffling Maria’s hair.  “Now, eat at the table so there’s not a mess” You said, and she scurried off to the kitchen.

“How was your day?” Allison asked.

“Pretty slow actually.  Scott and I spent a lot of the time playing poker” You chuckled, and Allison rolled her eyes.

“I love that you guys get to work together and hang out, but I feel like you get nothing done” She laughed, and you shrugged.

“Well, I met Maria’s teacher” Allison’s eyes widened slightly, but enough that you noticed.  “Five minutes with the woman, yikes.  I don’t know how you keep calm”

“I’ve learned a great amount of control” Allison said, sitting down across from your daughter, and diving into her sundae.  “You know my mother was never on the gay boat with me” Allison said.  “I’ve learned to keep other people’s opinions away from my own”

“That sounds no-know-noble” Maria said, testing out her newly learned word.  Allison giggled.

“She is my knight in shining armor” You winked at the huntress, and Allison winked back.

“So you’re like.. the princess” Maria lit up upon calling you so.  But you snorted.

“Girly, I’m the freaking queen”

“Language” Allison scolded you.

“I’m sorry, I don’t recall saying a curse word” You teased.

“Yeah mama, mommy’s the freaking queen!” Maria burst into a fit of giggles.

“Hey, you watch your mouth young lady” You said, pointing an accusatory finger at the girl.  “We don’t use that kind of foul language in this house” Allison sighed loudly, and shook her head.

“My girls are crazy.  I don’t know how I put up with you two” You smiled, and leaned over to kiss the top of her head.

“Because you love us” Allison waved a dismissive hand.

“Yeah yeah” 

You were all ready for bed, in sleep shorts and a tee shirt, while Allison was in the bathroom brushing her teeth.

“So” She said with a mouthful of toothpaste.  “How bad was Ms Louise?” You shrugged, pulling back the covers to your bed.

“She could’ve been worse” you said.  “I kinda put her in her place.  Reminded her where our hard earned taxes go” Allison chuckled, and washed her mouth out.

“Well at least you didn’t rip out her hair extensions” She said, and you smirked.

“Hey, if Maria wasn’t there, a lot more would’ve went down” You said.  “Oh takes me back, you and me, the pack, fighting the bad guys” You sighed.  “You were so sexy with those leather jackets” Allison chuckled.  “Don’t worry babe, you still are” You pecked her lips sweetly, and Allison sighed in content as you both climbed into bed.

“Who knew our monsters would turn into homophobic kindergarten teachers?” She asked, and you took one of her hands, intertwining your fingers together above the blankets.

“I love you” You told her softly, and Allison smiled her angelic smile.

“I love you too” She said, before leaning forward and placing a long kiss on your lips.  “And I love what we have here, this family of ours” You nodded in agreement.

“Mm me too” You hummed, and pulled her closer, until she laid her head on your chest, you lying on your back.  Allison’s arm encircled over your stomach, and she hummed into your chest.

“I do sort of miss the old days.  Fighting the bad guys, saving the town” You smiled, running a hand through her short locks of chocolate brown ringlets.

“Yeah... those were good times.  High schoolers by day, badass team by night” Your smile grew a little.  “Werewolves and banshees and hunters oh my” Allison shook her head.  “Oh.., but you know the worst one?”

“Um...void?”

“Hell no, Stiles was never hotter” Allison burst out laughing.  “Jesus I swear he made me straight for a good three days”

“Tell that to Lydia” You shook your head.  “Yeah well some day you’ll be drunk and that little confession will come out, and you’ll never be able to take it back” 

“Ha.  My lips are sealed”

“Sure, you say that now.  But twenty bucks that Stiles won’t let you live it down” You just rolled your eyes.  “Anyways, what was the worst one?” 

“That stalker kid that was obsessed with you”

“Matt-”

“Don’t say the twerp’s name” You growled, and Allison chuckled.  “I remember beating the living shit out of him” Allison rolled her eyes.

“Yeah yeah, you just loved bragging about that, only all of sophomore year”

“Hey, the only reason my senior quote wasn’t ‘I beat the shit out of Matt Daeheler’ was because he died, and I didn’t want to be suspended”

“Yeah well my grandfather drowned him.  He’s gone now”

“God I just wish I’d been there” You sighed.

“You’re sick”

“I’m a dreamer” You said with a giggle to childlike giggle that just didn’t fit the conversation.

“Well maybe someday, something bad will happen and we can pull out your crossbow again” Your eyes lit up and you looked down at her.

“You mean it?” You asked hopefully, and Allison smiled beautifully with a nod.

“For your pent up anger, I do hope something attacks this town”

You both laughed, and you held her tightly and closer, as you both grew more tired.

“Goodnight” You hummed, watching her eyes flutter shut.

“Goodnight love” Allison whispered back.  It was quiet for a few moments, and your next murmur was barely heard.  But Allison caught it, as your lips moved against her forehead.

“That Matt kid was a little fucker though”

And you fell asleep with smiles plastered on your faces.

i could use a request, if anyone has any ideas? xoxo ~ jordie