#oh look at me answering asks in a timely manner (looks at my filled inbox) oops

[shoyostar]

vieeee hihi <3 i jus wanted to pop in and say ur themes always slap so hard i love the yellow so bad

hi oak!! thank you so much aaa >_< !! i always love ur themes too!

i remember ur blade theme that said smth along the lines “of five people, three must pay the price” AND IT WAS SHO COOL HEHEUWHUW u make me want to do a cool dark theme but i’m afraid they dont fit my acc LOLL

[thesunicarusfellfor]

Mortal of Gold - Part 3

(Yandere!C!Techno x GN!Shy!Reader x Yandere!C!Philza)

Anyone want my list of the characters as gods? There were a few characters that I couldn't think of like Ponk, so I just left them out. ANYWAY. Hi, how's it going? ALSO I CANT EDIT THIS DAMN POST AND THE SPELLING ERRORS ARE SO IRRITATING

Part 1 Part 2 TW: Mention of amnesia, memories being altered Send me a message via inbox if you wanna be added to a general or series tag list. Make sure to turn off anon, please. ------- “They weren’t born… A mortal?”

A light wind brushed over your features, causing you to give a small sigh and roll over onto your side in an attempt to block the light from hitting your lidded eyes. It was nice and quiet for once… “(Y/n)?” A distorted voice echoed softly, causing you to flinch a bit. You opened your eyes slightly to see a silky blackbird sitting on the sheets beside you, a few golden trinkets laying beside it. Upon seeing your eyes slide open, the creature hopped up onto its legs and began making soft cooing noises, “(Y/n)! (Y/n), you’re awake!” Glancing around at the surroundings you had been placed in, racking your mind for any sort of familiarity but failing to come up with anything at all, even who you were. You sat up, slowly brushing your fingers along your ombre silk clothing before putting your hands on the sheets below your body, frowning as you didn’t recognize the bed as yours. “Hello…” You murmured softly, reaching your hand out to the crow who eagerly jumped forward to nuzzle your hand. The feathers of the bird felt… Odd. They felt more like grabbing at misty fog, but with a light staticky cotton texture that caused a buzzing sensation on your fingertips, “I’m sorry, my memory… Seems to be a tad faulty… Could you tell me your name?” “I’m Chat, Dadza- er… Philza’s familiar! I was a gift from Mumza, oops... Kristen, the Goddess of Void and Death.” It chirped, its voice having multiple layers in your head, causing you to shake your head a slight bit, “No, they’re not married, only parental figures to the souls that pass on to the afterlife or those they saved sometime before they passed on… I believe they have more of a co-worker relationship.” You nodded slightly, pursing your lips at how the creature’s voice sounded in your mind. It was unsettling and caused shivers to crawl up and down your back, but at the same time, it was incredibly calming and had a soothing aura. How that worked, you had no clue whatsoever. Brushing off the unsettling voice of the bird, you decided to focus on the name that caused a light to go off in your head, “Alright… Philza… I think I remember that name…” “Yeah! Dadza- Eck… Sorry. Phil, he’s the God of Survival and Crows! He controls not only every crow in the mortal land, but he also controls whether or not someone will survive a situation. If there is no way that the mortal can survive, he will send a crow down and have them guide the soul of the mortal to him! Then he escorts them to Kristen! He has gained the name Angel of Death because he works for Mumza!” You decided not to question why the crow called Philza and Kristen Mumza and Dadza, knowing that you’d probably find out later, but by the sound of it Chat seemed to be multiple children, “Okay… Makes sense…” You mumbled slowly, nodding your head up and down. With a sigh you slowly brought your legs over to the side of the bed, only now becoming aware of how large the soft mattress was. Lowlands! (Hell) You could probably fit six people who were ten feet tall in it with room to roam! Pushing yourself off the bed, you also realized how high the beautiful bed was off the floor, Gods, whoever lived here was tall! Behind you, you heard a small chirp, and you saw Chat watching you curiously. With a small shrug, you decided to pick the familiar up and hold it in your cupped hands as you walked out the door, “Oooh! Dadza never carries us like this, and Technoblade does only when he’s about to yeet us out a window!” “Yeet?” You scowled in confusion as you walked through the arched doorway, your bare feet padding silently on the quartz flooring, “I'm scared to ask. Technoblade? Is he also a god of some things? He sounds familiar as well…” “That’s its word for throwing something. Well, it yells the word when they throw something or get thrown, so I assume it’s yelling in excitement,” A deep voice spoke from in front of you, causing you to gasp and lift your head from the crow. The telepathic chirping and squeaks from Chat in your mind quickly formed the name Technoblade, so… You had a feeling that your answer was on its way past his

lips, “I’m Technoblade, or Techno, the God of Blood and War. It’s… nice to see you finally awake…” He shifted awkwardly on his feet as you curiously studied him. His appearance could certainly be described as godly if anyone asked you. His long pink hair was mostly twisted and tied into a braid with bits of golden chain and a polished golden crown adorned with rubies, garnets and diamonds. Upon his pale skin, dozens of scars of varying sizes decorated his skin in different areas, but they were displayed in an almost proud manner. Almost. When he spoke, his dark pink eyes hidden behind cracked glasses searched your form for any sort of injury, “I’m… (Y/n)... I think. I don’t know if this bird is exactly trustworthy in its information… Do you know where I am?” Techno snorted as Chat gave an offended squawk at your statement, “That’s very fair, to be honest. You’re in the Tundra of the Upperlands, and this is my palace. No there is no snow, I believe the person who named this place has never looked into the name or word Tundra, but it’s been like this for too long to change it-” He paused for a moment as he noticed you looking extremely confused, “Ah. Right. Desert. Don’t worry about it.” “Oh… Okay…” You frowned at the tusked male for a moment before shaking your head, deciding not to question it much, “Now, uh… How did I get here, and why don’t I remember anything about myself? Or, about you and this Philza guy, I was told about.” You lifted Chat slightly toward Techno as a silent indication that Chat was the one who told you about Phil. “That’s uh… Phil’s field of expertise.” He rubbed the back of his head with his black-tipped fingers before adjusting his crown, “I don’t understand much of what happened, and Phil will tell you what you need to know that will keep you safe.” Hesitantly, he held his free hand out towards you making you realize that he was easily over seven and a half feet tall, “C’mon, I’ll take you to him and get you the answers you need.” His hand was extremely steady, you noticed as you stared down at it cautiously. Once you noticed that he didn’t seem to want to do you harm, you slowly shifted Chat into one hand and used your free hand to take the one extended to you, which you couldn’t help but notice, made Technoblade very happy, “Okay. Thank you.” The god held your hand in his calloused one for a few moments before beginning to lead you down the tan and white hallways that were turned a light golden hue from the rising sun. It was quite a long walk filled with a slightly uncomfortable silence, but you distracted yourself by looking around the palace curiously. It was obvious he was the God of War by how many swords hanging on walls and sets of armour he had placed on armour stands in the hallways. Eventually, he walked you through an archway that led into a wide-open room with multiple windows that had many crows perched on the windowsills, some chirping and singing some little tune in perfect unison while others shuffled around, seeming to do a little dance. You were quick to realize the whistling of one of the birds didn’t match up and noticed that it was coming from the man with the large white and green striped hat as well as massive black feathered wings dangling on his back, fluffing themselves up every so often. When you and Techno stepped in, the blackbirds started chirping loudly, losing the rhythm of the tune the winged man was whistling as Chat started telepathically squealing about… 2/4? Two out of four what? “Ah!” The hat-wearing male turned around and clasped his hands together upon seeing you standing up, “(Y/n), you’re awake. I was worried the injuries you sustained were enough to keep you out cold for a few more weeks. I’m glad to see I was wrong. I’m Philza, God of Survival and Crows, and I see you’ve met Chat and Techno. Pesky bird, I told it not to wake you...” You pursed your lips for a moment, analyzing the shorter god as the bird squealed out its protests. While he was shorter than Techno, he was certainly tall, standing roughly around six feet tall, his wingspan

probably double that for each wing! His blonde hair was long around his face but was pulled into a loose braid like Techno’s was, although instead of gold intertwined into his hair, it was silver. His outfit was made up of a loose green shirt and black pants, with a red heart-shaped pendant dangling off of a chain into the center of his chest. Why did that pendant… Look familiar? You slowly rose your hand up and clasped at the pendant around your neck, noticing how Philza smiled softly, “Technoblade… Said you could tell me why I can’t remember anything?” “You’re still wearing my gift, I see,” Philza gave a soft hum as Chat jumped from your hand and onto his shoulder, before gesturing for you and Techno to take a seat where he already had drinks and some form of cakes set out, but they certainly weren’t there when you came in. Upon seeing your confused blinking, he gave a soft laugh, “I’m a god, mate, magic is no difficult task for me, let alone creating some measly tea and desserts. Now, sit down and I will tell you everything…” - General - None Mortal of Gold -@generalalmond @binas-idea-vault @ohworm-writes

[violetnotez]

HC: Being Super Fluffy and Giving Them Lots of Love!

Anonymous: Could I request something for Izuku, Todoroki, Shinso and Bakugo. They're doing their own thing and are super concentrated or something and reader is just so entranced by them and they're so glad to have be able to call them their boyfriend and reader just gently cups their face and gives them and the most love filled, soft kiss cause AGH THEY'RE PRECIOUS TO READER! 😭 You can totally ignore this if you don't wanna 😂😂😂 I just feel so soft rn

Ahhhhh this is adorable anon! Honeslty some days I just wanna give these babies the biggest hugs UGHHHHHH

Also I changed up my layout a little to be more “aesthteic”, so sorry it it looks different! Do you like it? Drop me a comment on this post or inbox about which style you like better (the usualllll vs. this one!)

Buy Me A Ko-fi! | Masterlist

Pairings: Izuku x reader, Shoto x reader, Shinso x reader, Bakugo x reader

｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆ ｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆ ｡･:*:･ﾟ

I Z U K U 

You and Izuku are having another study night, your body sitting next to his

Obviouskyyyyyyyy this boy does nothing but study smh

But you had completely given up- your brain had shut down after an hour and now you were just half listening to Midoirya mumble and half just admiring your adoarble boyfriend

You honestly miss seeing him look so domestic- you always see him in his uniform, his hero suit, and occasionally his All Might PJs on the weekends

But it feels like agessss since you’ve seen him in proper clothing

He looks just so cute in his teal sweatshirt, his scars peeking out of his sleeves as he wrote random equations on his paper

And his mannerisms are just so adorable-his tongue is poking out of his lips as he tried to work through a math problem, his eyes squinted in concentration and freckles dusting his cheeks like stars

How did you get so lucky getting someone so sweet and cute as him?

“If two goes into this fraction then possibly the variable will be isolated once I subtract the four-” hes mumbling under his breath, his voice so comforting against your ears

You lean your head against his shoulder, the scent of him just barely noticeable but so intoxicating- 

AND HES SOOOO WARMMMM

“’Zuku?” you asked tiredly, a lovesick smile plastered on your face

The sound of your voice breaks Izuku’s thoughts, his brows softening as he looks down at you

“Yes puppy-oh, are you getting tired? You look pretty sleepy...maybe we should take a break-”

omg why is he so sweetttttt

You just feel so calm, so comforted with Izuku it felt like your chest was just filled to the brim with love for this boy

Without warning, you leaned up to Izuku and kissed him softly on the lips,  your head feeling like it was spinning from butterflies

AHHH HE COMBUSTING TOO THO

Once you pull away, Izuku’s cheeks are as bright as cherries and you cant help but smile, cause seriosuly no matter how many times you kiss him he ALWAYS gets flustered

“You know I love you right?” you tell him, butterflies filling your stomach as he looks down at you withe wide, green eyes

COMBUSTING IZUKU IS DECEASED REPEAT IZUKU.EXE IS NO MORE

“o-of course! I-I-love you too!” he stuttered out, his nerves so intense that his tongue was like lead in his mouth

｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆

S H O T O

It was just one of those crappy

CRAPPY NIGHTS

You couldnt sleep, it was too hot, you were uncomfrotable, your ,ind was racing

And once you DID fall you course had a gut wrenching nightmare that left you panting and sweating from fear

WHAT THE HECK BRAIN

So time for some good ol’ Shoto cuddles

And that’s how your now cuddled up into Shoto’s side, his body keeping you nice and cool

This boy was literally the sweetest- even though it was like1 in the morning, he couldnt care less about that and just focused on you

He quickly knew something was wrong when you were waiting in the doorway, his strong arms encasing you in atight hug

“Y/n dear, are you feeling alright? Whats bothering you?”

You just snuggled yourself deeeepppp into that boy cause he felt so comforting, his voice was velvety

also how does he always smell like detergent and expensive ass cologne like yessir thats the scent for meeeee

He quickly ushered you inside his room, his hands gripping your shoulders firmly

Literally all fears from that dream melted away with Shoto- his energy was so unbelievably strong and protective, it felt like nothing bad in the world would ever happen cause Shoto was there, and he wouldnt let anything bad happen to you

Also- seeing him in a plain white tee and black shorts literally could have made you swooned, cause god this boy really looks hot in anything huh?

He didnt judge you in the slightest about the dream, just offering for you to spend the night with him

Your head was cuddled into his firm chest, that intoxicating detergent-cologne-rich boy smell making your insides feel fluffy like cotton as his hands quietly brushed the hairs away from your face

He’s ask you small question, like “Are you comfortable dear?” or “Is that dream still bothering you”, just little things to make you feel more safe and open to talk to him

Shoto never wanted you to feel like you had to hide anything from him, and the effort really showed

You were know getting sleepy but the overwhelming feeling of appreciation and love for Shoto was exploding out of you

At this point you just wanted to show your undying gratitude to your boyfriend for being so unbelievably adorable and sweet

You shifted yourself, propping yourself slightly on his stomach so you could look at his face

damn this boy really got blessed with all the good genes huh?

You ran your fingers lightly against his skin, relishing the slight changes from cool to hot, your hands cupping his cheeks and feeling both sensations course through your body

Once you felt him sigh from content, you took it up a notch, leaving feather light kisses on his sheeks, his brows, his eyes, his scar...any avaliable skin you marked with yours

“Love, may I ask what you’re doing- you should be sleeping right now, its quite late-”

“I wanna show you I love you tho...” you sent the boy a pout, a deep chuckle rumbling through his chest and vibrating throughout your body

“But I already know you love me,” he grinned sheepishly cause god your just so adorable, like a puppy desperate to give their owner attention

“Well-I still want to show you,” you stated, your voice slightly thick from sleep as you continued to kiss the rest of Shoto’s face

All this boy could do was lean into his pillow, his hands finding themselves on your waist cause he knew you were gonna do this until you were tired

He wasnt complaining though- you being cuddly and cute like this literally rocked his world in the best way possible

“You know- your very endearing when your half asleep”

｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆

S H I N S O 

Shinso is probably the most hardcore gamer you know

It was late in the night, and this guy was still going at it, now playing a game of Mario Kart on the TV, the screen bright against his features

You had gotten tired of the video games, just deciding to watch your boyfriend play instead of being the one to play

And god were you happy with THAT decision

He just looked so...adorable, his body clad in a tight black tee and baggy gray sweats, once foot straight and one foot bent as he sat on the floor playing

His hair was unruly as ever, sticking out in every direction

HIs eyes were completely enraptured by the task in front of him, scanning the screen 

He was just so cute, lookking so intense yet so sleep deprived 

it was adorable how badly he wanted to beat the player playing against him

And then he went a licked HIS LIPS

IN THE MIDDLE OF PLAYING

Your face erupted in red cause

OMG

HES JUST SO HOT AND PRETTY AND UGHHHHHHH

You waited unpatiently to the last round, the music picking up pace as he sped to the finish line, hes cart victoriously earning 1st place

The dude didnt even cheer, just the most self absorbed smirk plastered on his face in pride

THAT IS WHEN YOU POUNCEDDDDD

You quickly plopped yourself gently into his lap, your thighs cradling his sides

“Aww whats the matter kitten, not giving you enough attention?”

Yours hands fell against the softness of the black shirt and oh thank godddddd its so thin, your digits trailing upward and feeling the slight ridges of his muscles underneath the fabric

“No....its just- its not fair for you to look so cute while playing games and I cant cuddle you....”

“Heh, I look cute?”

This boy really cannot fathom how you find him so endearing, and now you just want to prove it to him

“Mmhmm,” you answer a smile on your lips as you cup his face in your hands

HIs hair is so tickly against the tips of your fingers, his broad chest radiating heat throughout your body

Your start to leave quick kisses on him, starting from his checks and working in towards his mouth, but not quite kissing him square on the lips

The closest you get to kissing him is on the corners of his lips, leaving electric sparks against his skin

The boy is desperate now

You cant just do that to him 

“Aww cmon darling, dont tease me like that” he sends you a cocky grin, his pointer finger gently tilting your chin and pulling you into a deep kiss

SHINSO IS A GOOD KISSER FIGHT ME ON THIS

Once you pull away, your head is just spinning cause goddddd this boy is just a blessing

“Let me play one more round, and then we’ll head off to bed, alright?” he asks, his free hand now cupping your cheek

You sigh in content, your hands wrapping around his waist and snuggling into his chest, a warm, smoky smell like cedarwood drifitng to your senses and lulling  you to relax

“Okay...”

｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆

B A K U G O

“Im winning this damn bear for you-”

“Katsuki no you already wasted $15 now lets go-”

“Im WiNiNiNG. ThE DaMn. BEAR- SO SHUT IT AND LET ME CONCENTRATE >:(”

You have been standing here for 10 minutes now, Bakugo determinnneddddd to win this gigantic teddy bear for you from a claw machine at an arcade

You feel so bad about it, but honestly, its turned into a personal grudge from him now

HES DETERMINED TO WIN IT AND MAKE YOU HAPPY

While your watching him you cant help it but find him adorable

Hes wearing a plain black tee and jean jacket, something he NEVER wears but looks so good on him?

This boy could be a model fight me on this

His face is the cutest tho-

You can tell he’s absolutely pissed cause he expected to win the animal way sooner than this, his eyebrows pointed downward and his teeth gnawing at his bottom lip

and then

AND THEN

THIS BOY FINALLYYYYYYY GETS IT

He’s trying his hardest not to start cheering cause he really just did that (after wasting $25 but ya know we’ll overlook that)

Your so happy too and that triumphant look on his face just melts your heart

cause he may be a cocky asshole but hes YOUR cocky asshole

“Ha- see told you I’d win it!”

Whatverrrrrr- you roll your eyes, your hands already snuggling the big bear up to your cheek

ITS SO SO SOFT AND SQUISHY YOU MIGHT CRY FROM THE CUTENESS

Your mind is already thinking of where to put it in your room (names too??) but then you look up at your boyfriend and UGH you could literally melt on the spot

cause he looks SO PROUD and SO SOFT- his hands stuffed into the pocket of his pants as he gives you the smallest, happiest little smirk everrrrr

Your just feeling so grateful for the boy in front of you right now, that you put the teddy bear down and wrap Bakugo into a hug

Bakugo always acts like he doesnt want physical attention, especially in public-

But you know this boy lovessss to be touched, so when he returns the hug and gives your sides a small squeeze your weakkk in the knees

AND HE SMELLS SO GOOD

Always like caramel and something rich like firewood

You give him a quick kiss on the back of his neck

AND HOLY SHIT

HES COMBUSTING

Thank god the arcade is dark cause you would totally see his blush (something he will deny)

You pull away a smile on your face as you tell him thank you,

And

*le sigh

of course he ruins the whole cute moment you two had by saying, “Whatever-your the one who wanted the damn thing even though your too old for that shit-”

Just remind him of the All Might figures he secretly had stashed in his closet and he will combust again

｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆ ｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆ ｡･:*:･ﾟ

Taggings:

Everything Taglist:

@bunnythepipsqueak​ @pasteldaze​  @ionlyspeakinmyheroacademia​     @notadrian​  @hithoeshi​ @sizzlingbarbarianglitter​ @sunnie-nugget​ @shoutosteakettle​ @we-mentally-unstable​ @sm0kingcrack​

Izuku Taglist:

@pyrofanatic​ @askgiggles​ @ask-giggles1303​ @local-space-quexn​ @ihavenolife842​

Shoto taglist:

@teddybear-jelly​ @mishtimitsuri​

Bakugo Taglist:

@pyrofanatic​ @kai-charm​

Get Tagged to My Taglist Here!

[dragonrajafanfiction]

Ranked S

Tigre stood in the doorway to the dining hall of Cassell College in awe of the massive chandelier. It was gold, in the shape of a great tree under a high domed ceiling and every leaf was a light. It was the most magnificent thing he had seen in all of the College so far and it was accessible because he knew what a tree was and what a lamp was and he could see that this work of art was the two put together. What great innovation!

After spending a few hours last night with Chu Zihang’s friends, he felt too excited to sleep. He kept fiddling with the tablet computer all night, surfing the internet and googling all manner of things until the machine ran out of batteries. They had explained how to charge it, but Tigre felt a moment of great panic when the low battery warning came up. What if he tried to charge it and it didn’t work? He’d be up a creek on his first day of school.

The freshman students in green uniforms all sat at very long heavy wooden tables. He recognized the Smith sisters and waved, trotting up to them and sitting down. “Hi! I hope you feel better now!”

The Smith sisters all looked at him in silence and uncomfortable smiles. Except for Ruby. She gave a little laugh and said. “Yeah, we do… thanks.”

They all wore the same hairstyle with their hair tied up and back and the mass of curls poofed out like a bouquet of flowers. They still had the insect motif. Ruby with her butterfly earrings, Porsche with her dragonfly earrings, and Ladybug Celeste.

“Oh. What’s that on the wall? Is that dragon language too?” Tigre asked in wonder.

“That’s Latin…” Porsche drawled. “You should be able to tell if you speak Spanish.” She rested her cheek in her hand and pointed at him, doubt filling her voice.

“He said he only spoke a little!” Ruby was quick to defend him. “It’s just saying ‘Welcome new students.”

“Oh… Latin…” Now that he stared at it he could tell it was a bit like Spanish. 

Suddenly a silver platter was settled in front of him and the lid opened to reveal a plate of hardboiled eggs, bread, cheese and ham. He yelped in surprise. “Woah!”

Ruby laughed again. Even Celeste cracked a smile. “You must have grown up in the boonies. You act like you’re in Disney World.” She said, chuckling.

Tigre was already stuffing his face with the bread and eggs and mumbled. “No, I’m from Mexico.”

Celeste shook her head, covering her smile. “I know! What I meant was… you know what? Never mind. It’s nice to meet someone who’s not a sourpuss.”

A sudden hush fell over the dining room and a few students stood up as Lu Mingfei entered accompanied by the members of the Student Union Elite and a beautiful woman walking behind him. “That’s Lu Mingfei, S ranked President of the Student Union. I hear he’s back from killing a real dragon.” Ruby explained in a hush whisper. “I hear he’s the strongest student the College has ever had.”

“Really he did?” Tigre watched in awe. This guy was so quiet and normal and humble, he never imagined that he could have killed a dragon. “I heard he was President of the Student Union. What does that mean?”

“There are many clubs here but two main ones. The Student Union and Lionheart. The Student Union was run by Caesar Gattuso who killed the King of Bronze and Fire two years ago. He passed his club to Lu Mingfei. Lionheart was run by Chu Zihang who killed the King of Earth and Mountains year before last. They had a great rivalry but Lu Mingfei doesn’t seem to be interested in continuing that and Lionheart leadership has been hollowed out. Chu Zihang, Susie, and Lancelot all graduated. They were all the Lionheart elite.”

“Was run? Chu Zihang doesn’t run it any more?” 

“No, he graduated recently and was sent on missions. In fact, they’re all graduated now. Caesar is in Rome in the Italy branch.”

Tigre’s chewing slowed and he swallowed. “Graduated… so Chu Zihang doesn’t go here any more…”

“No, he was just here recovering from his last mission. He’ll probably go back to work now that he’s fully recovered.” Porsche shrugged.

He sighed and lowered his eyes. “Oh… he… he didn’t tell me that.”

Celeste’s elegant eyebrow raised. “Why would he tell you that? Do you know him?”

For the first time, Tigre seemed genuinely sad to the sisters. He stopped eating and hung his head. “Yeah. He saved my life.”

“Get out!” Porsche’s eyes were wide in her head. “How did that happen?”

Tigre looked on the verge of tears. “It’s kinda sad but I was not let out of a prison all my life. Chu Zihang broke me out of that prison and that’s how I came here. He gave me a computer tablet. He didn’t say he was leaving.”

The sisters all fixed him with sad serious gazes.

“No wonder you don’t know anything…” Ruby sighed.

“I… I’ll send him a farewell message later I guess.” He mumbled. He understood that Chu Zihang had to leave, but did he have to leave without saying anything? The tablet computer must have been a goodbye gift as well as a welcome gift.

The Smith sister’s eyes all went wide at the same time, like a row of kittens. They were looking behind him and when Tigre turned around, Lu Mingfei was standing behind him. 

“All settled in?”

“Yes… sir?” He asked.

“Oh no, not you too with the sir stuff.” Mingfei lamented, one hand on his head. 

“I’m sorry I just heard you were the strongest student in Cassell!” Tigre explained quickly.

Lu Mingfei winced slowly and sighed. “Anyway. I wanted to ask you if you’ve settled in alright.”

Tigre nodded. He noticed that all the students in the dining hall were staring at him. Some of them whispered to each other, their eyes fixed on him as they did so.

“I heard Chu Zihang was leaving. Do you know when?” Tigre asked quietly sad.

“Oh… yeah he left last night. He didn’t tell you?” Mingfei’s eyes widened slightly.

Crestfallen, Tigre shook his head. 

“Ah… Senior Brother is always like this. He comes and goes without a word and doesn’t understand how that might affect people. He thought a lot of you. Anyway, We can talk later, don’t take it so hard, okay?” He gave Tigre an awkward pat on the shoulder.

The sisters were rendered speechless. Lu Mingfei walked away to the Senior Student’s table where he sat down, surrounded by men in suits as he was served by three separate waiters. It seemed like he was in the lap of luxury, the King of Cassell. Yet, looking at him, Tigre couldn’t help but think that Lu Mingfei was very lonely. He didn’t really talk to the people next to him, just lowered his head and ate like a horse in a stable.

A hand suddenly slammed into his view. “Hey, I’m talking here.”

“Charles Xavier!” Tigre exclaimed.

The boy with dark hair and eyes who challenged him before apparently had been trying to get his attention when he was looking at Lu Mingfei.

“My name’s not ‘Charles Xavier’ I was messing with you!” He wrinkled his nose and glared his eyes down at him. “You know Lu Mingfei? How the hell?”

“I… I met him yesterday after the test. There was a little party at Chu Zihang’s house.” Tigre answered honestly with an owlish expression.

‘Charles Xavier’ massaged the bridge of his nose, squeezing his eyes shut like he suddenly had a massive headache. “You were at… Chu Zihang’s party?”

Tigre flinched. “Uh… Yeah… Sorry, if I knew you wanted to go I would have invited you…”

Celeste and her two sisters all lifted their coffee cups in unison and sipped, watching this scene with great pleasure.

‘Charles’ cleared his throat. “Well then… allow me to reintroduce myself. I’m Robert Musonda, of the Musonda copper mining company in Zambia. Nice to meet you.”

“Oh… nice to meet you too.” Tigre accepted the offered hand.

“Have you decided which club you were going to join? I personally have not. I was waiting to see how things were. With all the elites gone, things could go either way. The Student Union could fall, or Lionheart could resurge.”

“I haven’t… really thought of clubs. I…” Tigre looked to Ruby for help. She’d been very helpful so far.

“Lionheart and Student Union were huge rivals before. I think people are expecting that to continue but it doesn’t have to. It depends on leadership. I think Lionheart will really push hard to regain some ground after losing so much to Student Union.” She nodded to him.

Robert Musonda clasped his hands behind his back. “In fact, leadership itself is up for grabs at Lionheart. A lot of freshmen are thinking of going to see if they can snatch the spot. With you being good friends with Mingfei and Chu Zihang, you’d be a shoe in!”

“I wouldn’t call myself good friends… We just met yesterday…”

Robert Musonda leaned forward. “He came over here and greeted you and only you… I call that good friends.” He patted Tigre on the shoulder the same way Lu Mingfei had and dropped his card next to him. “Let’s chat after class.”

Robert sauntered away. His card had a small floral scent but was simple and white with black block lettering of his family business and name along with a phone number and email.

As they were leaving the breakfast hall, Tigre’s tablet computer chimed. When he looked at it, he had a new message in his inbox. “Oh. I got my exam results.”

“Quick check your email!” Celeste exclaimed.

Apparently all the results were posted publicly and at the same time.  Students all stopped what they were doing and were looking at their results, heads bowed over their phones. Some students cheered and pumped their fists. Others gave each other high fives. Some students huddled together, giving consoling pats on the back. They were listed in order by last name and, since Tigre didn’t have a last name, the null entry in the last name field put his name right at the top.

Name: Tigre

Resonance Test result: S

Attached to his email was several pages of materials. Based on his ranking, he was afforded a stipend of money. $100,000! He also had a lot of privileges like first pick of meals and he could call the train to take him to Chicago whenever he wanted.

“Congratulations on your high level of Ranking.” It said. “With these privileges also come responsibilities. You are expected to perform at high level in the college in both class attendance and performance. If you fail to perform, you will be downgraded and your privileges will be revoked.”

He looked up at Ruby, relying on her once again for guidance. “What classes do I have?”

“You have to pick your own classes.” She said, with a trembling voice. “I can’t believe you’re S ranked. That’s insane. Are you half dragon?”

“I don’t know. Maybe?” Tigre shrugged.

Celeste stepped in, pushing Tigre forward. “There’s a link to register for classes. But let’s not do this in the hallway where everyone stares at us.”

She leaned over to him, smiling gently. “So, do you have a roommate yet?”

“Uh… I don’t have a dorm.” He said quietly.

“Then you should stay with us. We’ll help you.” Celeste smiled at him.

“Yeah!” Porsche said, glancing at her Celeste and holding his hand. “We’ll start by registering you for classes and stuff. Do you have anything you need to move?”

“Not… really? Just a few things.” Tigre said nervously as he was herded out of the Dining Hall by the three women.

Ruby clung to his other arm. “Then I’ll help you move!”

“Move? Move where?” 

The triplets turned and looked at him with shining brown eyes. They beamed at him, speaking in unison. “To our dorm silly!”

[candlelight27]

Chapter 5: This Moment Lost in Time

Summary: Sylvain has been ignoring you since you met him. You had been in love with him since you met him. College is about to offer you a fresh start. New academic year, new life. You were ready to forget him. But fate seems to have other plans… (COLLEGE AU)

Series: Seeking Your Warmth If Only For A Day

Warnings: BLOOD, game spoilers and felony (don’t steal, kids)

Pairings: Sylvain Jose Gautier x Female Reader

Word Count: 5143

AO3: This Moment Lost in Time

A/N:  Thanks to @galamixx and their help!!! If you like this chapter, please consider commenting. My inbox is always open too, for suggestiong or just to chat! :)

You put a hesitant foot in Sylvain’s room, walking right behind him as he guided you. It was an ample space and it had a window that let the sunshine inside in the morning. The decoration was quite simple. The bed, placed under the window, was covered in white linen, and the walls were bare, without any pictures or posters. Its appearance broke your every expectation of what you had thought his room would be like.

You were surprised you couldn’t find anything that screamed ‘Sylvain lives here’, or any hint at all of his renowned affairs. You chastised yourself for thinking he’d have a box filled with panties he had stolen, or obscene magazines thrown around. He was now a close friend – perhaps something more, but your brain was trying to avoid that subject at the moment – so you’d have to stop assuming things about him. Especially regarding the high number of misconceptions you’ve had about him. Yet the truth was that you would have never suspected that he lived in such an austere manner. You began to understand how he got along with Dimitri so well.

Despite the absence of luxuries, there was something that caught your eye: the quantity of books he owned. His desk and shelves were crammed, and there were even a few piles over the floor. You identified in a glance some history titles, as well as fiction and philosophical essays. It was quite the collection for someone most people considered an airhead – a thought that made you slightly angry at those people.

“Sit wherever you want,” Sylvain commented. You sat on the bed, while he moved to take a seat on the chair in front of his desk. He carefully placed on the floor a board of chess, trying not to move any pieces. It was incomplete, with only a handful of blacks and whites. You wondered if Sylvain was trying to solve one of those problems that he used to do with Claude back in high school. Afterwards, Sylvain placed his hands behind his head and leant back. You looked around nervous, absentmindedly caressing the bed dressing with your fingertips, avoiding by all means ogling him.

“You have a nice room,” you said. This was awkward, and you didn’t know what to say. You felt once again you were invading his privacy by simply being there. And you were on his bed, where he slept. It felt very personal, and you were not sure if it was your place to be there.

“Not what you expected for someone like me, right?”, he hummed. You feared that he actually was able to read your mind after that line.

“How is Glenn?”, you changed the subject, hoping Sylvain wouldn’t notice.

“Oh, he’s fine! He’s conscious and recovering. Apparently, when he was going to work, a dog crossed the road and he crashed the car avoiding it.” Sylvain drew out a breath. “Honestly, I’m so relieved he’s alive.”

“That gives us time to proceed with our plan. But then again, Flayn is onto whatever is happening. It’s not just paranoia, there must be a clue somewhere,” you reflected.

You had a few days to come to terms with Sylvain’s crazy theories after that encounter with Flayn at the hospital. As if fate had been mocking you, you had even more visions of your classmates in times of war, which only reinforced Sylvain’s words. You started writing down the smallest details you could recall, hoping they’d be of help to clarify something. Anything. And you realised some names kept appearing time after time.

“I wanted to show you a few things,” Sylvain said. He turned around to look at the books opened on his desk. He moved a couple of volumes and used papers around until he chose one. The sound of papers being flipped frantically came from behind you. “Here it is!”

He stood up and gave it to you, waiting a minute for you to inspect it thoroughly.

“So?” He insisted. Sylvain was eager to know your opinion. “What do you think?”

“It’s…” you opened your mouth.

“Awfully familiar?”, he offered.

“Yes”, you nodded.

It was an ancient copy of Seiros’ precepts. There you could see a coloured engraving that displayed Saint Seiros, who had an eerie resemblance to Rhea, officially in charge of Garreg Mach High School and the cathedral annexed to it. Her light green hair, her bright and big eyes, her figure. Everything was exactly the same. She had a serene countenance, and she was surrounded by dragons. Once, you were taught that they represented the strength of Seiros and the four saints, but they had so many details, they looked real.

“And that’s not the only thing!” Sylvain added before you could finish examining it. He passed you another book. “This one is Linhardt’s, but he lent it to me indefinitely. He knows a lot about Saint Cethleann, he’s investigating her figure and plans to do a PhD.”

“What am I looking for?”, you asked, tracing the index with your finger.

“Look at the pictures first. There are a couple of engravings and drawings. Just look at any.”

You did as he told you. A chill ran down your spine. 

“This is Flayn,” you babbled, totally astonished. “But, like, it’s clearly Flayn.”

“Yes!” Sylvain was thrilled.

“They have the same face,” you repeated. You looked at the bottom of the page, where a footnote was written, and read it out loud. “‘Saint Cethleann was said to possess a kind heart and devoted her life to helping others in need. That’s why she developed an interest in medicine, and she is the patron saint of those who practice the art of healing. She healed countless wounded in her life, sparking the faith in those who met her.’ Is this real?” He nodded, an amused expression decorating his face. He seemed entertained by your reaction. “It looks like a set up.”

“It’s weird that all the pieces fit together as we go, right?”, Sylvain agreed.  

“If everything is so evident, why hasn’t anyone found out anything yet?”, you exclaimed exasperated.

“We’ve gone over that before,” he sat next to you on the bed. He crossed one of his legs and was careful not to touch you with any part of his body. After all, you were not the only one self-conscious about this meeting. He had been feeling vulnerable ever since he went all in with you – it was easy to recognise.

You wanted to tell him that it was okay to have physical contact and get close to you. And that you had similar feelings for him. But neither of you had said anything after his speech, and your conversations hadn’t got that way any other time. And now it seemed that you had lost your opportunity to give him an answer; it seemed forgotten and entombed.

“Yeah, yeah. Everyone has bigger problems. Except us, apparently”, you said ironically.

“I have plenty of problems”, he said with fake seriousness.

“Oh?”, you mocked him. “I’ve never noticed.”

“One of them is no one takes me seriously”, he smirked. You felt a pang of guilt on your stomach and averted your gaze towards the book. It was shameful to admit, but you had done it several times in the past. You didn’t know he resented it.

“I wanted to try something,” Sylvain said out loud, demanding your attention. He looked flushed, but you dismissed the thought.

That’s when you remembered his cryptic messages earlier.

Sylvain (13:25): I might have come up with a thing that can be useful 😊.

Sylvain (13:25): Come home whenever you want, I’ll be here.

He hadn’t texted you as regularly as he did during the previous days, thus when his icon popped up on the screen of your phone, your heart fluttered in your chest. Should you go right away? Should you wait? There were things unsaid between you, but you had been dying to spend time with your favourite redhead. You convinced yourself that curiosity was playing a big part in your decision, and not your own emotions, so immediately answered affirmatively to his proposition.

“Yes, you mentioned that before.” You looked at him in the eye. He was blushing, you had no doubts now. And it seemed that he was out of character, because who would have thought Sylvain would be ashamed at all flirting? “What’s wrong?”

“You might not like my methods,” he shrugged.

“Sylvain!” you sighed, annoyed. “We’re way past your mysterious phase! Just tell me!”

“No need to get mad, darling,” he laughed. Then, Sylvain coughed and recomposed himself. “I thought that maybe we could trigger memories so we can investigate them. Find a common pattern.”

“Okay.”

“What was the last thing you dreamt?” He inquired carefully. Sylvain knew that some dreams were… Unfavorable.

“That horrible nightmare where I bury an axe in your chest”, you said. It made you want to cry, just the mere mention of it. Such a brutal act, why would it have happened?

“Ah, yes. That one”, he made a disgusted gesture. “You could’ve picked a nicer one.”

“How are we going to trigger the memories?”, you questioned him.

“By touching,” Sylvain answered. You raised your eyebrows. “W-Wait, not in that way!”, he stuttered while waving his arms around, as if to clear the atmosphere. Hewas trying his best to correct his accidental innuendo. “We can hold our hands, or just bump our shoulders together? We don’t have to, of course, but–”

“Sylvain, relax. I don’t mind”, you took his hand in yours to downplay the issue. That warmth that had become familiar spread throughout your skin. “Besides, it’s a good idea. It’s worked before.”

“But it’s not working now,” Sylvain complained.

“What did you think that was going to happen? Fireworks and a narrated episode of the battle of Garreg Mach?” You mocked, while he simply smirked.

The situation made your heart fly. The light outside was fading, dying the room of orange and gold. Everything surrounding you belonged to Sylvain, and you were on his bed, holding his hand in yours. It was special. A great fluttery feeling was forming in your stomach, one that made you light in the head and giggly. You shifted your body around awkwardly, without changing your position, and his grip tightened.

You noticed the muscles in his arm flexing, and his palm becoming sweaty.

“It’s not working…”, Sylvain lamented again.

“Close your eyes. Let’s focus on that memory together,” you instructed, half hoping it would work, half hoping it would prevent him from releasing your hand.

You let your eyes close. Every sensation became sharper. His touch, his presence, his smell. Everything had a distinct scent, the detergent of his clothes, his cologne, his books. - ��Put yourself together!’ you scolded yourself and tried to envision your memory instead of focusing on Sylvain.

The large field of Gronder; the confusion of bodies, some dead, some alive; the  fresh blood; Sylvain’s horrid expression.

And, as if it was magic, it worked. You could vividly see it. The world surrounding you disappeared, and you were immersed in that moment lost in time.

The heat was suffocating, and so was the odour of burnt bodies and death. The podium where the archers had been trying to knock down the wyverns and pegasi had suddenly burned when the infantry had reached it. Many had died from all three parties: Dimitri’s, Edelgard’s and Claude’s. The flames were consuming everything on your left. Your arms stung out of tiredness, for you couldn’t even remember how long you had been there, fighting enemies.

Suddenly, you saw Sylvain. His horse was nowhere to be seen, and it saddened you. It was probably dead, too. A bad omen. You thought of the times he had insisted you rode with him, and the few times you accepted. Or when he stayed overtime to take care of the mount. You shook your head: he was now your enemy, and you had to kill him. Tears filled your eyes, and you voiced all the curses you could think of. How had everything turned into this? Where did it go wrong?

Sylvain was not aware that you were there. You traced his direction with your eyes. Was he escaping the fire? You hoped he was fleeing, but you knew him like the back of your hand. He had sworn loyalty to Dimitri and he wouldn’t leave him behind. Never. You looked far beyond.

When the realisation hit you, you started running.

He was heading towards Claude, who wasn’t riding his wyvern. Instead, he was supporting the infantry on the right flank with a sword and his bow. It was being effective in providing a much needed morale boost, but it wasn’t his brightest move. Damn him for not knowing how to keep himself safe.

Your gaze fell upon Byleth, who in this world had long hair, cuter clothes and was Jeralt’s daughter instead of his son. She had advanced more, leading the knights fighting the Adrestian forces, so she wasn’t going to save Claude, as she always did. Not this time, when she was risking her neck. You panicked, thinking about what disaster would happen if the heir to the Alliance, the only nation fighting actively against the Adrestian invasion, fell in battle.

You were almost there, axe in hand.

“Claude!”, you shouted. The Golden Deer leader realised Sylvain was about to stab him in the back, but dodged the hit just in time. Claude rolled on his side, while Sylvain’s lance got stuck in the ground.

You took advantage of this chance, arriving just a few seconds later, and with a swing of your weapon you broke the handle of his weapon in two. Moving with the momentum, your propelled the edge of the axe to Sylvain’s body. You contained your breath, wishing he would move away, that he’d escape. That you’d see him alive in the next battle, even if it meant going through another hell. Maybe you’d both survive, overcome your differences. But he didn’t move away. He stayed in place.

A lost arrow pierced your thigh. Even if you didn’t feel it at all thanks to the adrenaline pumping through your blood, it made you face reality.

Sylvain, disarmed, was on the other side of your weapon. You let go of the handle. It had cracked his armour, and his hot blood was flowing down. Sylvain fell to his knees, his face completely white.

“I’m sorry, Sylvain...” you said, as you fell backwards, unable to use your right leg due to the deep wound. He smiled but stayed completely still. Life was slowly escaping his body. You threw up on your side.

“Ignatz! Cover me!”, you heard Claude shouting. It seemed distant, while in reality he was too close. He was shouting your name, too, but your gaze was fixed on Sylvain. You couldn’t speak or move. Claude lifted you and placed you in his arms, carrying you somewhere safe. Sylvain was still alive, yet immobile. You couldn’t help thinking about him. Why was no one helping him? Is he going to die alone on the battlefield? Claude’s voice, assuring you that you were going to be alright, started to fade and his face was getting blurry…

 “Are you okay!?” Sylvain was shaking your shoulder. You were laid down on his bed and he was above you.

“Yes”, you answered, eyes open wide. You got up, and you returned to the position you had been in before on Sylvain’s bed. “What happened?”

“You’ve been gone for 5 minutes. As in, eyes opened, not responding to anything. I was about to call an ambulance.” Sylvain inspected you closely, quite worried. You could sense his breath on your skin.

“I’m fine”, you whispered, still a bit disoriented and dizzy.

“Are you sure?”

You nodded.

“Sylvain,” you called his name, his hand still on your shoulder. “What happened after you killed me? Did you see that?” Why did you want to know?

“Ah, yes. Ferdinand killed me afterwards”, he groaned. “He was avenging your death…”

“Typical of him. I’ll make sure to thank him, though. It was very thoughtful,” you joked. “What about Claude? And Dimitri?”

“They were dead too. Fallen in combat,” he said with an unsure voice. “Edelgard was the one reigning after that, or so I’ve thought. It makes sense.”

“I recall professor Byleth there, behind me. He was fighting side by side with Edelgard. They must have won.” You agreed with a gesture. “What about when we married? Was Byleth there?”

“Yes. Next to Dimitri. I think they got married too. That time, the Holy Kingdom of Faerghus got the victory.” He crossed his arms, but his leg was touching yours. “What are you implying?”

“I killed you to protect Claude”, you started. The redhead knitted his brows.

“We already know that,” Sylvain commented, annoyed.

“Why are you so irritated?” You got confused why he was hasty upon mentioning Claude, until a certain thought crossed your mind. 

“No reason, just that the last thing I got to see was you in the arms of Claude.” He sighed. A smile found its way on your lips, an eyebrow raising.

“Are you jealous?” You teased him.

“Then, you got together with Claude after that. He commented something once about it,” Sylvain continued, ignoring your question. “Okay, keep going. What are you trying to say?”

“The war is between the three countries of the continent of Fódlan. And the respective leaders of each are, coincidentally, the leaders of each House at Garreg Mach – former monastery, currently a high school.” He nodded, prompting you to carry on. “When I killed you, Claude was the winner. The other countries fell and the Alliance took over. And Byleth was at his side. The same happened with Edelgard and Dimitri respectively, right? So that might indicate that Byleth is the deciding piece of the board. Depending on what side he-”, you remembered how Byleth had different appearances, “-He, she, or they pick, the events change and makes their side win the war and, ultimately, take control of Fódlan.”

“And how did that occur to you?”, he looked concerned. “It’s plausible. I’m not questioning you, but it’s quite twisted.”

“Because they are the only thing that actually changes in the war. Everything seems the same until Byleth arrives.”

“Well, you changed from Houses all the time,” Sylvain pointed out.

“Every time, to join Byleth’s class. Don’t you see it?” You tried to convince him.

“It seems logical to think that Byleth has something to do with it but we can’t be sure…”

“It’s a hunch, Sylvain,” you explained. “I’m sure we have to talk to Byleth. We will find something. This time, when I saw Byleth fighting, something clicked.”

Sylvain hugged you without a warning. He buried his head on the crook of your neck and enclosed you in his arms. Your hands rested against his chest, you trapped and unable to make a single move. The warmth surrounding you felt so warm, so comforting. Everything was going to be okay, Sylvain was there, and he won’t be gone this time.

“I’m scared that this will lead to a dead-end street. But… at last we’ve found a clue. I’ve been waiting for this forever…” He said with a strained tone. Sylvain’s voice was quiet. He didn’t want to let you go.

“It’s thanks to all your work, Sylvain. Everything you wrote was very useful…” You smiled, leaning into his embrace, almost melting. “You had noticed too Byleth was an important factor–”

“I’m just really happy you’re here with me. That you haven’t chosen Claude or Edelgard over me this time.” He chuckled, trying to shoo away the remainders of sadness. “Not gonna lie here, I’m extremely happy you didn’t choose Claude. That bastard.”

“Hey,” you reprimanded him. “Claude is nice. It’s not his fault we’re in this mess.”

“Well, he took you away from me once”, Sylvain said as he hugged you closer. “Have I told you that you married him?”

“What did you want me to do? You were dead!” You chuckled. It was weird to talk so lightly about it, but Sylvain became more comfortable the less relevant it felt. “This feels nice…”, you muttered, turning your face to kiss the top of his head. His red hair was soft, and it smelt of citrus. “So now we’re on hugging terms?”

“Yes”, Sylvain affirmed. “I might never let you go now that we crossed that line.”

“I wouldn’t mind…”

But a loud gasp resounded behind you. The tender moment that you wished would last forever was suddenly replaced with surprise.

“I’m so sorry Sylvain!” A voice shouted, someone that you identified as Dimitri. He closed the door with a slam.

Sylvain moved away, averting his eyes. His cheeks were blushing, and your own were warm too.

“I’m going to explain to Dimitri that we weren’t doing anything weird, okay?”, he scratched his head, again, and you recognised it as a gesture he made when he felt awkward. Little by little, you had been learning his non-verbal language. “I don’t want him traumatized for all his life.” You giggled.

“Does it make you nervous that Dimitri thinks we’re banging? He only saw us hugging,” You questioned daringly.

“Shut up”, he flashed his handsome smile. Flirting was an art he had mastered, and he felt confident with it. “And say that you’re staying for dinner, instead.”

“Not if you’re cooking instant noodles, Sylvain”, you narrowed your eyes. “That’s not a real dinner. You won’t trick me – I’ve seen all the packages in the cupboards.”

“First, we’re in college, and everything’s valid.” He stood up with a flourish. “Second, Dimitri had gone to the supermarket, so he’s the one cooking. It relaxes him.”

“Okay, he cooks real food. I’m staying then.”

“Perfect.” Sylvain winked, as he ran out of the room. His voice could be heard all over the apartment, and Dimitri was still stuttering. You smiled to yourself and took out your phone and opened the app to write an email.

[From: YOU - To: beisner@gmuniversity.fe]

Dear Professor Eisner,

I hope everything is fine.

Sylvain Jose Gautier and I are having a few questions regarding the bibliography of our project. We’d like to meet you next week to settle the matter and discuss some work.

Thank you very much.

“I’ve never skipped classes legally before”, commented Sylvain casually.

You two were navigating the corridors of the building where teachers had their offices. Everything was dull and generic, except for the occasional cabinets that displayed trophies and nameplates that students and professors had earned long ago.

“That’s why you were in detention all the time”, you reminded him.

“It was intentional. I wanted to strengthen my relationship with Seteth”, he said, laughing. You had to give in and laugh too, not only because he was actually funny, but because his humour was contagious. You couldn’t help but mirror it.

You eyed him from head to toe. Your companion was wearing a pair of black jeans and a white t-shirt. He had a dark-grey, almost black blazer with rolled up sleeves on due to the chilliness in the air. His attire rang a bell.

“Why are you dressing like we did in the Monastery?” You wondered out loud to him.

“Because I’m pretty hot in black and white”, Sylvain chuckled in delight with a deep and sexy tone. He was right. You could outline with a glance his body, which was pretty well built. Of course, you did everything you could to deny it, so you put on your best deadpan face. “Okay, okay. I think it might make Byleth nervous.”

“Now that’s a joke,” you remarked. “Byleth barely showed any emotion during a war. Do you think it takes so little to irk him?”

“You might be right,” he conceded.

“Here!” You grabbed Sylvain’s sleeve, bringing him back after he walked past the correct door.

“The nameplate says Dr. Gloucester. Do you need your eyes checked?” Sylvain emphasized.

“Dr. Gloucester retired, and they gave his office to Byleth. He told us the first day! What were you doing?”

“Okay, okay,” he rolled his light brown eyes. “You knock.”

“What are you? Five?” You said while hitting the door with your knuckles.

“Come in,” Byleth’s voice came from the interior of the office.

You opened the door to see your professor encircled by lots of papers. No one can escape bureaucracy.

You stopped in the middle of the room. Right then, you felt an extraordinary sense of existence. As if all the years that had passed before your adventures with Sylvain were but a mere dream and your consciousness had come back to you a few weeks ago. You were sure that Byleth’s presence was having its own influence on you, now that you had regained a good number of your forgotten memories. There was a strange energy in the atmosphere.

Now that you considered it, this was just like that sweet time you spent at Garreg Mach Monastery. Wandering around to avoid boredom with Sylvain and finding much more than just entertainment, following Byleth around to ask all kinds of questions, spending the big seasonal events with your friends… That was what happiness looked like to you.

“You can take a seat,” Byleth said.

“Ah, yes, thank you.” You muttered. Sylvain was next to you in those uncomfortable iron chairs your university loved buying.

“What can I help you with?” He asked, ever so willing to help, yet enigmatic.

“Ah, we have a basic bibliography for the Crescent Moon War, but we’re lacking a few good articles in Loog’s biography”, Sylvain started, replaying the topics you had agreed on. “We don’t know if the authors are reliable.”

“I can take a look at those names”, Byleth smiled. “And I have a few books you could use.”

“That’d be great!”, you cheered with a fake façade. You had to admit, it was quite fun to play spies.

“They’re on that bookcase”, your professor pointed at the one right on your side. You stood up and started looking around.

“I had a question on Klaus I, that king of Faerghus, as well. What was the role he played in…”, Sylvain asked, so serious and well versed in the matter.

You disconnected from the conversation, turning to read the titles on the wall. You took a thick, blue book filled with dust, pretending it caught your interest. Then another black volume, with leather covers and golden letters. You kept investigating, about the Almyran invasion; the formation of the Academy of Garreg Mach, the base of your own high school; history of the Adrestian Empire… Nothing past the year 1000. It was quite suspicious.

You turned around, and Byleth was drawing a diagram for a focused Sylvain, who was all nods and questions. They couldn’t see you anymore, or at least it seemed so. Out of the corner of your eye, on the closest end of the professor’s large mahogany desk, you saw a bunch of letters. Discreetly, you looked up the sender. Curly letters with the address of Rhea were written there, right from the Cathedral.

You made sure Byleth’s vision was blocked by a stack of folders. With decision and a steady hand, you took the most recent one and hid it under your clothes. Desperate situations call for desperate measures, right? Besides, it wasn’t exactly stealing, and you had already made an excuse. ‘It got misplaced when I took the books you lent me, professor,’ you heard yourself say in your head. 

“Is there anything else you need?” Byleth said, when his discussion with Sylvain was done. He clearly intended for you to leave, as it was getting late.

“No, we were going away now,” Sylvain confirmed, walking towards the door. You followed him. Yet you grew bold.

“Can I ask just one more thing?” You said to the professor right before exiting.

“Of course.” The man with the dark blue hair.

“I can’t seem to find how the Crescent Moon War influenced the later war of 1180,” you stated.

Byleth remained silent for a moment. His jaw tensed. Your heart pounded. Did you catch him?

“That’s because there wasn’t any war that year,” Byleth responded. His demeanour was calm and serious as ever. Had he been practicing?

“Oh, really?” You tried to sound candid, feigning surprise. “I’m really bad with dates! That must be it!”

“You might have confused a couple of battles with a war. The battle took place around that year, but there wasn’t any declaration of war made” Byleth declared with a tense smile.

“Sorry for the trouble!” You exclaimed at last, urging Sylvain to go out with your elbow.

You closed the door behind you, and walked fast to distance yourself from any of the offices.

“What was that?” Sylvain was shocked.

“Wait until we get out of here,” You begged.

 Once you were on the common grounds of the student buildings, you stopped Sylvain. There was nobody around, as they were still in class. The ginger plopped himself on a bench.

“That was a good shot, but you were right”, he shrugged. “Byleth’s cold blood won’t make it easy. You were right, he’s special, I could feel a kind of connection… But we got nothing out of this…”

“I might have something”, you looked at him intently.

“On the books he gave you?”, he tilted his head. “Because I have revised all the library and –”

You took the opened letter out of your blouse. The silver details shone under the light.

“What the hell!”, Sylvain shouted. You shushed him, making desperate gestures with your arms to keep him from attracting any attention. You were paranoid, even though you were alone. Instead of any logical reaction, he had a fit of laughter.

“What?” You asked, irked.

“I thought you were physically incapable of anything remotely wrong in a moral sense!” He kept laughing, despite your attempts to quiet him down. “Why did you take it? Another hunch?”

“If you don’t get caught, you don’t get punished”, you said in a sarcastic tone.

“I knew it! You’re just as bad as me!” Sylvain was delighted.

“I might be,” You admitted because, well, he was right. Stealing the mail was a serious crime. But you took a small comfort in the pride and surprise Sylvain made you feel. You were no longer your dull, old self, that went on with the flow of events. No, you had a goal – multiple goals, in fact – and you were going to be an active participant in your life.

In that moment you wanted to kiss Sylvain again. But you had other priorities.

 “Are we going to read this or not?” You dared him.

“Don’t ask me twice.”

[bexterbex]

A Soul to Mend His Own | Ch. 72

This is the part where I reiterate if you see something in the tags/warnings you don't like, please just leave the story.

Warning, PLEASE CHECK TAGS IF YOU SEE SOMETHING YOU DON’T WANT TO READ THEN DON’T READ. | Tag lists are closed | INBOX OPEN

Tags: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Will tag as I go along, Will update tags, Slow Burn, Influenced by Star Trek and other Sci-Fi themes, References to We Happy Few, Tons of References and quotes to George Orwells 1984 see if you can find them all, The First Order is the new Big Brother,  but who is really surprised, Blatant Nazi Symbolism, Interrogation Themes, Eventual Smut, Eventual Romance, Really just drawn out Slow Burn, Don’t repost without permission, Torture themes, Suggestive Themes, Execution themes, Disturbing Themes, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Verbal Abuse, Controlling Kylo Ren, Physical Abuse, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Kylo Ren is Not Nice, Kylo Ren Has Issues, Supreme Leader Kylo Ren, Possessive Kylo Ren, A character shamelessly based on Zelda

A Kylo Ren x Modern! Reader in a soulmate au with canon divergence. —————————————SLOWBURN————————————–

He is already the Supreme leader, searching the universe to find you, his Empress. Your name on his wrist has been the only constant in his life, while you have doubts about his existence and his acceptance of you. He isn’t in the database and why did the name Kylo Ren cover Ben Solo?

MASTERLIST

Chapter 72: Ink and Lies

You woke up with a pressure behind your ear and a hand between your legs. The last few mornings since you’ve been crowned Empress, since your wedding, Kylo has woken you up by fingering you and playing with your clit. Basically giving you an orgasm to start the day, not that you were complaining at all. You also tried to happily return the favor, but it was much easier to do some sort of handjob, wrist match name attention mix to get him off since he has really too big for your hands to handle properly. But that is what your mornings consisted of.

You and Kylo had done some work over the last few days but not much, you weren’t going to be able to get a proper honeymoon in the middle of a war, but your love nest was enough. Today was the first day that Kylo would be leaving the ship. The Alazmac apparently had something for him, something of Vader’s that they wanted to give you both as a wedding present. You weren’t exactly happy that he was leaving the ship, as you had wanted him close, he was right in the sense that him guarding you made you feel safer.

In the last few days, you had seen very little of your staff outside a few visits from your ladies-in-waiting and Mitaka, who relayed important messages. Hux was bearing the brunt of the responsibility of the First Order at the moment, not unlike before you were in the picture, but you felt bad.

In the couple of hours that Kylo was gone, you and your ladies-in-waiting did some rehabilitation work. Your body in many ways had taken a beating and you needed to be restored to some sort of functional state.

Eyeing you up and down, scanning over the many, many love marks. “You know you look like you’ve been attacked by a pack of wild dogs,” commented Adlez.

This caused a snort of laughter at the comparison, “If only you knew the truth.” Especially with your new nickname for Kylo. You didn’t mind the beast, especially in bed. But after the last few days, it would be nice to be able to feel the lower half of your body finally.

“Maybe you need to put him on a leash, hmm? Some obedience training? It’s worked wonders on his knights. And the pack of dogs they are.” Again it felt like Adlez was full of surprises. She’s hinted at her sleeping around with the knights, teaching them ‘manners.’

You tried to play off the smirk that was on your face. “All of them or just Cardo?” You knew the rowdy Knight of Ren had a soft spot for her. So much so that Kylo asked you about it.

“All of them.” She shrugged, “But Cardo has been a special boy.” The images that popped into your head were rather... scaring. You were just grateful that you did not have to witness them in real life.

Your face flushed with embarrassment, “Oh my god, didn’t need to know that, but good for you.” You really didn’t, she had her private life, and you had yours.

“You should ask the Supreme Leader about their wedding gift for you two.” Some rather terrifying possibilities jumped around in your head. You almost didn’t want to know, especially if he hasn’t shown it to you yet.

“Do I want to know?” You probably didn’t, but you might be able to get an answer out of her, eventually. “Well, it might just help with that obedience bit. He is their leader, their alpha and now you are their alpha too. Teach him some new tricks.” And the dog imagery was back, you wonder just how much she knows. But for now you wanted to drop the subject all together.

They ended up filling the tub with bacta for you to soak, Kylo had expressed the discomfort about you going to the med bay for treatment. And since none of your ‘injuries’ were severe or life-threatening it was a long bath in gross bacta gel for you. Adlez told you to submerge yourself but that meant Kylo’s favorite love bites would be healed too and you weren’t about to do that, you wanted to wear a few of them with pride.

By the time you got out, you felt renewed again. The only bruises left were those high up on your neck, along your jaw, and of course the one behind your ear. Still marked up for him, still owned, but it wasn’t like you needed it because you had your wedding ring and you doubt there is any place in the galaxy that doesn’t know your face now. You were his and were proud to display his conquest marks. You also haven’t worn any proper clothes in the last few days, if you were just with Kylo you were either naked or wearing just a robe, but if you were meeting with someone you wore a wrap dress. Which seemed to be Kylo’s favorite type of garment on you because he could easily untie you and have access to whatever he wanted.  

After Adlez and Olivia-Rose made you human again you had a meeting with your staff and Hux. They seemed to eye your condition carefully. Not really knowing how Kylo had left you, since you had really only been meeting with Mitaka and your ladies-in-waiting.

“What are my most pressing matters?” You knew you did not have much time to be talking with them Kylo would be back soon, and your rehabilitation treatments took a bit longer than you initially expected. Adlez insisted on you being repaired from head to toe with face masks, hair removal, and the works.

“You still need to meet with Senator Apolin about your education,” said Mitaka. Your thoughts went back to the dinner, and how he treated you. Acting as if you were some idiot girl that tricked her way into Kylo’s bed with the intent to rule the galaxy.

A thought popped into your head, you had new privileges now. “Do I or does being Empress now negate that?”

Hux cleared his throat, “I would say that it negates it. He technically has no right to question you now, I suggest a letter versus a call.” He seemed to have your back in many ways, especially when it came to dealing with Pryde and his friends. You wondered just how much he hated the man.

“Right,” you turned to Lieutenant Amala Graven. “Can you write up something about it? Something along the lines that since he, unfortunately, did not set up a date prior to me becoming Empress that he now is not in the position to review my education?” This made you feel happy, knowing that an old man like him wouldn’t be getting his way this time, and that you had tricked him into thinking he had some power over you.

She pushed up her glasses before she began taking notes, very diligent in her work. “Yes. Would you like it to be formal or semi-formal?”

“Formal, but as much hidden sass as you can put in it. Also, let him know that it was unfortunate that he couldn’t attend the wedding.” You were glad he didn’t. You were honestly surprised you were able to handle Pryde being there, but then again, you didn’t know he was there until after the wedding and consummation of your vows were over.

“But we did not extend him an invitation m’lady,” said Mitaka you could hear the worry in his voice. You don’t know if it was because the invitation was ‘forgotten’ or if it was because you were possibly going to piss off a powerful ally.  

You thought for a moment. Even if he wasn’t invited he still had an expectation to uphold his duty. “Has he sent a gift?” You were sure you knew the answer, one of the rooms that shared your chamber’s hallway was cleared out just to hold all of them, some of them still arriving.

Hux answered for the captain. “No, he has not.” You could see the wheels turning in his mind, you knew he agreed with you and what you were about to do.

You looked between both of them, holding your ground. “Then my point still stands. Shall we move on to the next topic?”

Before you could move on Kylo entered the room and ordered everyone out. He was holding something in his hand that you could not see. He chose not to remove his helmet before speaking to you. The chilling sound of his distorted voice haunting you to the bone. “I must leave.”

Waves of confusion washed over you, with their freezing cold waters. “Leave be you just got back? Where are you going?” Your mind was racing a million miles a minute. You were supposed to be relatively safe now, that other danger was not supposed to happen for a while, or at least that’s what you thought.

“I have something left to do.” The black voids of his visor peering into you, this was no guard dog at the moment, this was something else. You could feel something was wrong.

“But why must you go? Can’t you take me with you?” You didn’t understand what was going on, because he wasn’t explaining anything.  

He stepped closer to you, but with his helmet on, like that it didn’t feel sweet it felt threatening. “No, I must go alone. It would be best for you to return to your home planet.” So he was shipping you back to your home planet, to do away with you?

“What’s going on? You’re scaring me.” You wanted answers, answers that he never seemed to give you.

You felt them again, inside your mind. You felt the black tendrils forcing themselves to wrap around your brain, stretching, familiarizing themselves with their new home once more.

His voice taking a whole new, unfamiliar tone of harshness with the mask. His hand with an extended finger outstretched towards you, “You will not fight me. You will do as I say when I say it. You will go home to your planet while complete what I must do. Do you understand?” You were being talked down to, like a child but all you could do is nod. Your body involuntarily doing what he asked, were as the small rational part of your brain was struggling to survive. She was losing the battle.

“I will have a ship and the knights escort you back to Earth. Where you will wait for my return.” So that was it, you were a princess being locked away in some tower before your prince in black armor decides to return to you. No more fairytale for you, just the cold harshness of reality.  

He then left you alone, standing there unable to move as the tears fell down your face and the black inky blob in your brain took over. It forced you to sit down while you began to sob, awful ugly tears. All of your hard work was for nothing, as he crushed your dreams in a second.

Your spark, your flame of rationality was loosing against the downpour of black water that was Kylo in your mind.  You blacked out, or you thought you did. When you woke up, you found yourself on board the Steadfast in your old cold and bright chambers. Adlez, Olivia-Rose, and Mitaka were there with you. The black ink creature receding back into the corners of your skull.

You took hold of yourself again. “Where am I?” You knew where you were technically, but your brain wasn’t clicking. How did you get here? You don’t remember a thing.

Adlez had a look of confusion on her face. “You’re onboard the Steadfast , m’lady. We transferred here three days ago. You’ve been with us the whole time.”

You tried to cool your features as panic set in. “Why am I here?” Something was wrong, something was majorly wrong. Why didn’t you remember any of it? The lack of memories for the last few days was terrifying.

“We were to bring you to Earth, the Supreme Leader said that you wanted to visit your family. So that’s why we are headed there. Are you alright m’lady?” Mitaka’s voice was full of concern. You could tell he was able to sense something was wrong and if he could, then Adlez knew something was.

Just as the word No was going to come out of your mouth you felt the black ink creature take hold of your head. “Yes, I’m fine. I just spaced out for a moment that’s all. I think I need to go lie down and rest for a while.” Your body then took you up the stairs, automatically, without your consent. As your head hit the pillow all you saw was darkness, but you heard a voice. His voice. Kylo’s voice.

‘I need to protect you. Let me protect you.’

‘Why are you doing this? You’re hurting me Kylo. You know this!’ The doctor told you as much. He was going to smother the life out of you, for what? You didn’t know.

‘I am protecting you. I do not know what this purpose is yet, therefore you must be protected.’

‘You’re killing me, Kylo. Your killing the part of me that makes me, me!’  You were internally screaming at him now. Crying and begging for him to stop, but the black tendrils only held you tighter.

‘Man serves the interest of no creature except himself, I must do what I need to do to protect you.’ You don’t know what scares you more, the fact that he was doing this or the fact that the voice that he was choosing to speak to you in your mind was that of the mask. He wasn’t even using his own natural voice, this was devoid of emotion.

‘Please… don’t do this.’ You could feel the grasp you had on yourself quickly slipping away. You were losing any control you had and terrifying didn’t even begin to describe it.

‘You are mine.’ While before you thought the mask made him devoid of emotion, this came out as a snarl. The monster was rearing his ugly head in full form.

When you awoke it was like you were staring out of windows, except they were your eyes. You could not move yourself. You could not move your own body. No, he was doing it. You were trapped inside your own mind, watching how the outside world spoke to ‘you’ without it being you.

You realized you were surrounded by dying embers in your own mind, with black rain attempting to wash them away. You were trapped. And your captor was on the other side of the galaxy, claiming to be protecting you, or at least the you that wasn’t you. A man who claimed to love you, but in fact he failed to understand you. The beast, the monster had taken over him, taken over you. But there was no exit that you could see around you, no exit to this nightmare you were about to be forced to witness.

A/N: I even bolded some of the tags you should be concerned with in this chapter. 

[callioope]

Hey there! Re: the WIP title game, I wanted to ask you about the rebelcaptain scene that's most excited you this year and whether you'd mind sharing a little snippet? Hope you're doing well xx

Hello!! Hope you are doing well too! Thanks for the ask!

Oh man, it’s been awhile since I’ve written any rebelcaptain, so I had to reread the last stories I worked on. Settled on a snippet from “YGM Draft1,” which is my yet-untitled, in-universe You’ve Got Mail AU. I actually got super excited rereading this story anyways. Man I really do want to get back to it... so many stories to write! So little time!

[This is in response to the WIP Title Game I did yesterday; anyone else reading this, please feel free to send an ask! I will actually answer in a timely manner this time...]

To the snippet:

“When are you going into town?”

They both turn to look at Bodhi.

“Today, apparently,” Maia says. “Jyn’s acting strange.”

Jyn catches Bodhi staring at her kyber crystal just as she covers it with her scarf, concern plain on his face.

“She seems—fine,” he finishes, looking away when Jyn meets his eyes.

“I caught her humming, and she’s enthusiastic about haggling with Orus.”

“I wouldn’t say enthusiastic,” Jyn says, passing Bodhi to pick up her jacket off the back of her chair—at least something was where she expected it to be.

Bodhi quietly takes in the kitchen area, Maia’s confusion, the parts splayed out on the table, Essie’s chassis next to it, the panel open in the back, the datapad that Jyn hurriedly shoves into her bag.

“You know what it is,” Maia says, gasping.

“I wouldn’t say that,” he says, looking back at Jyn.

Rolling her eyes, Jyn counts out the credits she’ll need.

“Bodhi!”

He ignores Maia and nods towards Essie’s chassis. “You got a fix for Essie?”

“Yeah, he sent the schematics this morning.”

When Bodhi doesn’t respond, Jyn looks up to catch him sharing a look with Maia. “What?”

They both shift guiltily. “Nothing,” Bodhi mumbles. “I’ll come into town with you. I’ll check on the ‘hopper.”

“Great.” Jyn grabs a ration bar off the shelf and tosses it at Bodhi. “Let’s go.”

He’s less eager fifteen minutes later, when they climb out of the cave and Jyn reveals her transportation plans.

“We’re walking?” Bodhi blurts. 

“It’s a beautiful day,” Jyn replies, gesturing to the rippling blue-green grass and the crisp blue sky. 

“I mean—yeah, it’s—it’s always beautiful here, Jyn, if you hadn’t noticed. I mean, I’ve only been here…” He glances up at the sky as he calculates. “...six years less than you, but yes, yeah, I had noticed.”

She shrugs and bites into a meiloorun fruit. “It’s good to let the speeders charge.”

“Sure.” 

“Something on your mind, Bode?” 

He shakes his head. “No. Nope. What’s on your shopping list?”

She pulls out her data pad, shows him FS152’s pricing chart, with the parts she needs highlighted. “And the disabling bolt for the refinery droids.”

Bodhi skims over the pricing chart, his expression unusually blank. She waits for it, a continuation of Maia’s interrogation, but it never comes. 

They walk a few tense minutes in silence for a bit, before Jyn finally takes the bait. “You two think I can’t be happy?”

“No, no, that’s not what we…” She raises her eyebrows. “Well, you know, I didn’t know you before…”

She knows what he means: before that night a year and a half ago, when an Imperial cargo pilot calling himself Bodhi Rook had showed up at the mouth of their cave, claiming that Mama had told him how to find them, claiming that their meeting on Rudrig had been ambushed, that he’d only just gotten away—

She closes her eyes and inhales. “Yes, Bodhi, I know what you mean.”

“Well, um, Idryssa just, she’s said… before… Ahh.” He shakes his head. “Nevermind.”

“It’s alright,” she says softly. “You can tell me.”

Bodhi looks out over the horizon. “How’s that penpal of yours?”

“Don’t change the subject.”

He looks back at her and meets her eyes. “I’m not.”

“I don’t see what he has to do with this conversation.”

“Okay.” Bodhi takes a deep breath. “Let me—let me paint a picture for you. You’re humming while you work. You lose track of things, drift off in your thoughts. You suddenly notice—I don’t know, how blue the sky is. There’s a word people have for that.”

Jyn glares at him, waiting for him to continue to explain this third train of thought, but he just holds out his hands for her to fill in the blanks. “You think I’m in love?”

“Well…”

“Not you, too,” she mutters. She shakes her head. “Hadder and I broke up months ago. I love him, sure, but not like that. Why is everyone—”

“I’m not talking about Hadder.”

No, she didn’t really think he had been. “You think I’m in love with FS152.”

“The evidence suggests…”

“‘Course I don’t love him,” she says, picking at the stem of her meiloorun fruit. “I don’t even know him. I don’t even know where he lives. He could be across the galaxy. What point is there in loving a person on the other side of the galaxy?”

“That’s very convincing.”

“Convincing,” Jyn says, tossing the word around in her head before tossing the meiloorun fruit core into the grass. “What’s convincing is that people don’t just fall in love with someone they met on an Anti-Imperial back channel, whom they’ve never met in person. I don’t even know his real name. How can you love a person you don’t even know?”

“Observe and report, right?” Bodhi says. “I’m just calling what I can see.”

“Then listen,” Jyn says, trying to keep her tone civil. She’s not mad, but Bodhi’s theory—it can’t be entertained. “FS152 is a useful contact who’s helped me plenty in the past, and is currently helping me repair Essie. And I’m excited to have Essie back.”

“Of course.”

Jyn sighs. She shouldn’t snap at Bodhi for caring. She’s grateful for him. She’s grateful for the intel he brought last year—not that she’s been able to do much about it, since then. That’s a dour thought for another day, one less bright as this one. She stows it away.

She’s grateful for his friendship, most of all.

And the stories he brought about Papa, although those, too, are too dark for today. 

Today, she has a message in her inbox from FS152, a schematic to fix Essie, and a friend by her side. 

Today is allowed to be a good day.

[therealjordan23]

Make a louna fanfric plzz!!!!

Sure anon. I’m also assuming you’re the anon who keeps spamming my Inbox, because in each one of your asks, you spell ‘fanfic’ as ‘fanfric’, so I am kindly asking you to leave less asks, as I cannot see my other asks. I see you, you don’t have to drop me 20 asks for Louna :))

ooo

It was quiet in the DeSpell-Duck household, and the only source of light was the dimly lit Christmas tree in the living room. Lena’s heart was heavy with worry as she looked out at the dark street, with no signs of activity. She was waiting for him, and with nothing else to do, she decided to wander the house, pacing silently. Lena had a worried expression in her eyes looking, as if she were about to cry. She cast her gaze downwards, glancing at the emerald green band she wore on her ring finger. Once she laid eyes on it, she began fidgeting with it, forcing tears to not fall due to silent frustration, but however, her attempts at that were beginning to fail. She groaned, frustration building inside her. Her calm thoughts became angry, her anger growing further when she looked at the clock, which read 5:55AM.

Louie was late to the point where Lena couldn’t really quite put into words how upset she was. She would normally shrug these types of situations off, and let it fade away as a funny story, but this time Louie made a promise to be here, and he wasn’t. It hurt her immensely this time, as it was such an important holiday: 

It was Christmas Eve. And Lena was missing the one person she cared about the most about.

Just as she was about to wreak more havoc in frustration, there was a knock at the door. Lena growled, and practically marched down with fierce footsteps, opening the door with more force than was necessary. When the door finally swung open, she stood there, arms folded, and a stern expression on her face. Standing in front of her was a snow covered Louie, who had an apologetic and nervous look on his face. He was shaking, his cheeks were bright red from the chilliness, and frost escaped his mouth with every breath. 

Lena sighed in relief, before drinking in the sight of Louie’s condition.

“Are you okay?” she asked in concern.

Louie nodded, rubbing his numb hands together in an attempt to warm them up. ”Yeah. J-just a bit cold.” He was shivering, despite the warm clothes that covered him from head to toe: the dark green trench coat, red scarf, black boots, black pants, and a simple green beanie, which was covered in snow, did nothing to shield him from the harsh weather.

Lena simply shook her head in an upset manner, and she led Louie in. He sighed in relief at the warmer air that hit his body… only to be shoved roughly towards the couch by Lena.

“Where have you been?!” she demanded. “You look like you’ve been to Mt. Neverest!”

Louie sighed. He was tired beyond belief, but complied knowing that Lena wasn’t going to stop asking until she got some kind of answer.

Louie took a deep breath. “There was a problem at Scrooge’s office, and Fenton asked me to come in. Turns out, Scrooge was going crazy over Santa Claus, got drunk off this Scottish whiskey, and nearly fell into his Money Bin headfirst. My brothers and I had to wrestle him back to the Manor, but he refused to get inside Huey’s car. So we had to walk him home, in the middle of winter, and to make things worse, it began snowing. It took us almost 3 hours, and I contemplated spending the night there… but I knew you wanted our first Christmas as husband and wife to be here, at our own home.” he said softly.

Lena softened. “Oh, Louie… you didn't have to come home in this state.” 

He sighed. “Yeah… well, I didn't want to let you down.”

She sat down next to Louie, relieved that he was here, and frustrated at the situation that led him here. Silence fell over the two as Lena began to calm down. “Want something warm to drink?”

Louie nodded, and Lena gestured for him to go upstairs.

Once inside his bedroom, he stripped out of his wet, cold winter clothes, and hopped inside the bathroom to take a hot shower. Louie grimaced, trying his best not to pass out due to the sudden change in temperatures. Once he was finished, he wrapped his towel around his waist, and grabbed a white T-shirt, a pair of thick black sweats, and pulled a dark green bathrobe over it, feeling toasty.

He came out of the bathroom, and saw that Lena was waiting for him, a cup of hot cocoa in hand. 

“Why didn’t you try to get in contact with me?” Lena asked, once they were cuddled up on their bed. “I could’ve helped.”

“I didn’t want to disturb you. I didn’t want to intrude on anything you might have been doing…” Louie sighed.

Lena shook her head. “I would have dropped everything to help you, especially if I knew what you were going through! Not to mention, we have other friends and family who could have helped you. Why not ask them for a quick pick up?”

“They were all busy and didn’t have the time to come and get us… I’m sorry I couldn’t get here sooner.” 

They both sat there, silence hanging over their heads. Lena couldn’t hold anything against Louie for the events that played out, not to mention he was being considerate of her. Lena could only sigh in defeat for what was out of her control. Louie felt terrible. Not only was his entire body a shivering mess, but he made his wife worry about him, when he could have just shoved Scrooge inside Huey’s car. Sadness filled both of their eyes at one another’s mistakes, and the bedroom was silent.

Eventually, Lena gave a sudden hug to Louie. She spoke in a pained tone. “Don’t do something like that again, okay?”

Louie returned the hug. “Okay.”

Both of them sat there for a few moments enjoying the moment that they finally were able to appreciate one another’s embrace. Something both of them wouldn’t trade for the world as they hugged each other tightly, silently forgiving themselves and each other. Moments went passed and eventually, they looked each other in the eyes, and simply nuzzled one another in affection in silent moments that seemed to last forever, trying not to notice that the sun was beginning to peak up from the horizon.

Just as he was getting comfortable, and ready to sleep, something came into Louie’s mind, and his eyes began to be more serious.

“I forgot Dewey in the car.”

ooo

I am terrible at endings. Hope that was good enough :D

[god-save-the-keen]

Charity Gala

Book: Bloodbound

Pairing: Adrian Raines x MC (Amy)

Warning: Fluff

Words: 1471

Prompt: Someone leave #14 of the list in my inbox and I don't know is Tumblr is broken, they deleted the question or their account but the question/request disappear. Anywhere, here it's the result!

Note: My PC is still broke so sorry I can cut the text! 🙏

Adrian Raines x mc tag list: @alesana45 @choicesfannatalie @itscassandraleig-blog @mattrodriguezmylife @bigmemesplz @perriewinklenerdie @x-kyne-x @livingpurpose @adriansbiss

Permanent list: @gardeningourmet @client-327 @desiree---1986 @dawn-1994 @violinet @darley1101 @blackcatkita @flyawayboo @drakewalker04

"I have never seen the point of these galas." Adrian commented as the limo continued steadily on their way.

"Oh trust me, I'm just as excited to be here as much as you are." Amy responded, an uncharacteristic ironic tone to her voice. Adrian lifted his brow at her and she sighed. "I'm sorry." She said after a small pause.

"It's still early, if you would like, you can stay." Adrian pointed out, in a calm manner, he didn't want her to feel pressured to accompany him, after all it was weird that Amy was this irritated.

"I don't know…" She bit her bottom lip. "It's just… I'm so nervous"

"Everything is going to be okay, love."

"It won't." Amy turned her gaze towards Adrian again, her eyebrow furrowed with concern and her eyes sad. "The people at these kind of events always look at me like I'm the secretary of the moment that you are just fooling around with." She redirected her eyes to the limo's window, resting her chin on her palm. "I hate that look."

"But you know that none of it is true" He took her hand in his and kissed her knuckles.

"I know." She said sadly. "I just want to enjoy a night out with you without being judged."

He got closer to her, taking her waist as she looked at him. "I promise you that that is exactly what is going to happen. And if you aren't enjoying yourself, I leave the donation and we return home."

She placed her hand on his cheek, a sweet smile on her lips as she observed him. "I love when you call it 'home'." They had been living together for a few weeks in an apartment overlooking Central Park and, since the first night they had shared together in it, Adrian started to call it home instead of 'the penthouse' like he used to, melting Amy's heart with happiness. He pressed his forehead against hers, smiling as her soft perfume filled his lungs and his hand tightened his hold. Before either of them could say anything else, the limo stopped in front of a luxury hotel. Outside were some photographers taking pictures of the couples on the red carpet as they arrived and Amy looked at them uncertainty.

Adrian gently kissed her, without rushing, opened the door getting out of the limo and offering her his hand to help her out. She took it, smiling and lacing their fingers together while she stood up next to him as her soft silver dress sparkled under the flashing cameras. It was a huge charity gala for Australian Firemen and their work, celebrities were everywhere, Avery Wilshire and his girlfriend Candece Dorian, Cassandra Leigh, Victoria Fontaine, Chris Winters among the business men and woman, politicians, designers and rich people in general, Matt and Jessica Rodriguez were the hostess for the night and Cordonia's royalty had donate a beautiful diamond necklace to be auctioned.

They posed for a moment, Adrian's arm around her waist and her hand on his shoulder as he pulled her closer, his lips brushing her ear for a moment, smiling, while he whispered to her "You look gorgeous." She turned her head and smiled at him, forgetting the camaras, the people, everything around them except him.

Hand in hand, they went inside. Adrian took two champagne glasses from a passing waitress and handed one to Amy. Her eyes widened at the luxury around her, even after all the time she had been with Adrian, as his employee and his girlfriend, sometimes it was still hard for her to get used to this kind of life, surrender of money, opulence and glamorous but fake people. They drank, Adrian's hand on her waist, as they milled around the salon, quietly chatting, laughing, observing photos of animals and the fires in Australia as people started to approach to talk with him about business.

A skeletal arm took Amy's as Adrian continued his conversation and she found herself being dragged towards the bar by Amanda Lexington, the size zero wife of an important CEO of NY, although Amy wasn't sure which one.

"Amy! It's always a pleasure to see you at these kind of events!" Her tone pretended to be affectionate as her little black eyes only convey coldness.

"Hi Amanda" Amy answered trying to sound calm and confident.

"You know, the other day we were talking about you with John" She said grabbing a glass of expensive wine and setting her gaze on her.

"Oh?" She sipped her champagne.

"It's great that you two are still together!" Her lips curled in a cynical smile.

"And why wouldn't we still be together?" Her hand squeezing the glass a little bit, she wasn't sure if she was annoyed, angry or sad with this conversation but she definitely wasn't happy.

"Oh! For no reason my dear, just you know how the CEO's are! Always want to play with the latest toy." Amanda drank her wine as her eyes assess Amy's reaction. "Especially with the secretaries."

"I--" Her voice was trembling, every fiber of her body hating her words, even if she knew that Adrian wasn't like that, that he loved her, Amanda Lexington always knew how to push her buttons.

"But I'm not saying it's going to happen with you, my dear!" She patted Amy's arm condescendingly. "It's just that Adrian is so handsome and wealthy. He doesn't seem like the kind of guy that just settles down with someone… well, like you." The glass she was holding shattered in her hand as champagne, glass and a few drops of blood fell on the floor.

"Amy" Adrian was beside her, he took her hand in his but the wound had already healed. Amy continued observing Amanda, her eyes angry as she took another sip of wine. "Is everything okay, love?"

"Yes." She responded stoically, still watching Amanda like she wanted to drain her whole blood supply from her tiny body. Adrian took her waist, smiling politely even when the warmth of his sweet blue eyes had completely disappeared.

"Amanda, even though your company is always…" He made a little pause and narrowed his eyes, his tone full of sarcasm in the next few words. "... A pleasure, I must say I didn't expect to see you here today." He grabbed two glasses of champagne and handed one to Amy, kissing her cheek. "Here, love." He took a swig, his presence intense, powerful, intimidating almost dominant.

"And why it's that?"

"Well, because John is in jail for a white collar crime and lost all his financial liquidity."Adrian said and Amy turned towards him, surprised, as some other guests stopped to discreetly hear the conversation.

"You must be mistaken, Adrian!" She said loudly enough for the people around them to hear her while her face was pale and her eyes grew wider with horror. "John is in London, on a business trip."

"My apologies, I must have received the call from Nassau County Jail from another John Lexington." A satisfied smirk on his face as some people in the crowd started to whisper. "Ready to head out?" He asked Amy as if the last five minutes had never happened.

"Let's go." He entwined their fingers together. "By the way Amanda… Raines Corp is looking for mail personal, give me a call, okay? You need it, I know It's not a secretary job, but you don't like those anyway."

Once outside, while they were waiting for their car, Amy crashed her mouth against Adrian, deeply kissing him as he responded with equal enthusiasm. After they separated a bit, she softly placed her hands on the lapels of his suit jacket.

"Was this suit expensive? Like, irreplaceable expensive?" He held her waist pulling her closer.

"No" He grinned.

"Good… does it have any emotional value?"

"Also no" His mouth started to kiss the hollow under her jaw.

"Great, because once we get home I'm going to rip it from your body." He chuckled before kissing her again. "The way you shut her up was amazing!"

"I heard what she was saying to you, and I know you can defend yourself, but no one is going to be disrespectful to you like that if I can avoid it." His eyes, warm blue again as always, fixed on hers.

"So… It was true that her husband called you?" She asked, getting in the limo.

"Not even close" He answered as she laughed putting her legs on his lap. "His lawyer is a colleague of mine and he may have commented about it. Are you okay?" His voice concerned and his hand softly caressing her legs.

"As long as I have you in my corner, I'm fine." She hugged his neck. "I love you, Adrian."

"I love you too, Amy"

[luxexhomines]

Hi! Can I have images for maki, shuichi, and rantaro who are dating an S/O who is struggling with their weight due to medical/allergy reasons (for reference, it's called exercise induced anaphylaxis) and is feeling self concious? If you dont want to write an overweight S/O then you can just do the self concious bit

Hi, anon! Thanks for the request. Sorry that it took me forever to fulfill (I thought I wasn’t going to ever get to the requests at the bottom of my inbox, but I looked back and thought I’d like to do some). Icon credit to mckindonalds!

It wasn’t an easy request for me to fulfill since I wasn’t sure what was appropriate for the reader to say or exactly how they felt about it, but this is kind of just a piece of comfort in each one. I hope you find something that you like in these imagines, although I’m unsure if this is what you were hoping for exactly. Hopefully, Maki isn’t too OOC because I didn’t make her very tsundere at all. Under the cut, since altogether it makes the post rather long.

Maki, Shuichi, & Rantaro x S/O with Exercise-Induced Anaphylaxis

Maki Harukawa

Maki rapped on the door politely. She had manners, unlike a certain someone she might name. After a short while, you came to the door. 

“Sorry,” you apologized. “I didn’t-”

“You didn’t want to move too fast in case you got sick,” she finishes for you. “I understand,” she says. Contrary to her cold demeanor, her dark red eyes softened around the edges as she looked at you, her beloved, and she came inside the house with the slightest of smiles playing at her lips. 

You lead her to your room, and the two of you sit on the floor and chat. At first, it was only idle chatter: what each of you’d been up to recently, and how the summer weather was treating you. But somehow, you end up saying the words, the feelings you had never wanted to reveal to her. 

“I hate this. I wish I could be normal,” you say spitefully before gasping and covering your mouth. You desperately tried to bite back the tears and stared at the floor heatedly. All the tears you’d been swallowing day after day, night after night, year after year. You could do it again. 

You felt a hand grab yours, and you looked to see Maki’s small but strong grasp on yours. You felt weaker than ever. 

“Hey. Look at me,” she says, and you do. Her eyes are filled with concern and a tinge of sadness. You chew on your lip softly. 

“Maki?” 

She grabs your other hand in hers, too, and somehow it only triggered more feelings you thought you’d left behind long ago. Feelings you buried never really went away; they marinated in the new feelings and warped, but they were still here. Feelings of shame, rage, and self-hatred. 

“Is it so bad to show your weakness to me?” Maki says quietly. “You know I was an assassin, and I’ve talked to you about all the ugly, terrible things I’ve done and seen. They’re not the same at all, but that’s my weakness, and I’ve shared it with you.” 

You tighten your hold on Maki’s hand slightly. Somehow, your hands fit together so perfectly. 

“I thought my weakness was obvious,” you said self-deprecatingly, throwing a wayside glance at yourself. Your body. 

She shakes her head firmly. Without letting go of your hands, she gets on her knees and shifts over closer to you, so that your bodies are almost touching. 

“I know you struggle with losing weight because of your condition,” she says. “But I hadn’t realized that you’d been suffering so much.” 

Maki sounded sorrowful. It was maybe the most emotion you’d ever felt from her, aside from when she had been talking about her time as an assassin or was pissed off by certain people. 

“...Are you disappointed?” you say. You didn’t want to hear the answer if it was yes, but you still asked anyway. 

“No. Never,” she replies, and she looks you right in the eye. “You’re just as strong as you’ve always been. But there’s no harm in sharing your worries and pains with me. I’m your partner. I’m supposed to be here for you, and I want to be here for you.” 

You attempt a weak smile. 

“Is it a part of the contract?” 

She sighs. 

“I’m serious, s/o.” 

“So am I,” you joke, and you feel the heaviness in your heart slowly dissolving. 

Maki presses her forehead to yours. 

The funny thing about being in a relationship with Maki was that she was so much more daring and affectionate than she would’ve been once her feelings were returned. She wasn’t as cold, per se, as she was before you two were together. 

“I love you, s/o.”

Your breath was whisked away by those words, and you froze. 

Maki squeezed your hands gently. “...s/o? Hey, are you not breathing or something?” 

Right. She was close enough to tell. 

You breathed in slowly. 

“Are you sure?” you say. But you know the answer. She wouldn’t say what she doesn’t mean. 

“I’m sure,” she laughs, and she kisses you sweetly. “You’re beautiful.” 

More words that would take away your breath. But you breathe normally this time. She was sweeter than any air you could ever take in, though. 

“I love you too, Maki. And for the record, I’m the ugly one in this relationship.” 

She pouts and draws away slightly, releasing your hands and putting her hands on your shoulders instead so she can look you in the face from the right distance. 

“That would be me,” she says. “You’re always smiling, and you have the most beautiful smile ever. Tell me if anyone says anything to oppose that, and I’ll punch them for you.” 

You chuckle. 

“Your services are always appreciated, but that’s alright. I can punch them myself,” you respond. “But fine. Neither of us is the ugly one. We can both be beautiful.” 

Maki nods in satisfaction. 

“We are both beautiful.” 

You can’t help giggling at her statement. It would sound so funny out of context. She leans in and tweaks your nose slightly. “And what are you laughing at, huh?” 

You bat at her hand. 

“Hey!” 

You fall into a fit of laughter with her, and the two of you lie on the ground, cheeks hurting from smiles and joy. Somehow, it was so easy to feel at ease around her. Even your most heavily guarded worries and pains seemed to sprout wings and fly away in her presence. 

“Thanks, Maki.” 

“What for?” she says and turns to look at you. Her serious expression makes your heart skip a beat, and you wet your lips nervously. Sometimes you still felt like you just had a crush on her instead of being in a real relationship with her. 

“Never mind that,” you reply, and you roll over and press a kiss to her lips. “I need to recharge.” 

She arches an eyebrow. 

“Oh? Well, now that you mention it, so do I.” 

You find yourself in her warm embrace and rather preoccupied for the rest of the day. 

Shuichi

“Shuichi?” 

The two of you were sitting on the couch and, up until that time, had been reading quietly in companionship with each other. He set his book down, probably sensing something in your tone. 

“Yes?” 

You weren’t looking at him, although he had now turned to look at you. Instead, you were poking at your round tummy. 

“Why am I like this?” 

He reached out and grabbed your hand, stopping you from poking yourself. You glanced at him, and his dirty gold eyes were serious. 

“Like what?” 

You sighed. 

“You know.” 

He shook his head stubbornly, looking irritated for once. 

“No, I don’t.” 

You struggled to take back your hand, but instead, he somehow made it so the two of you were holding hands snugly. 

“Ugh. Why do I look like this?” you complained and avoided eye contact with him. He was surprisingly persistent when it came to you saying things like this. 

He pulled you closer to him so that you were leaning on him, and let go of your hand only to wrap his arm around you. 

“You look like you. You look lovely.” 

You groaned. 

“But I don’t want to look like this. It’s because I can’t exercise that I’m like this.” 

“Do you think your true self lies elsewhere?” he asks. “Do you think this body isn’t you?” 

You pondered. 

“I don’t really know because I’ve pretty much always been like this. Of course, my body has changed since childhood, but...I’ve never lived without this.” 

There was contemplative silence for a while. Shuichi seemed to always compel you to think more about everything in his presence. 

“...I still love you either way. I know it’s hard, but I’m here for you,” he says solemnly. “I won’t let you just agonize over this alone. You’re my s/o, after all.” 

You turn your head to look at him, and you’re suddenly aware of how close in proximity the two of you are. 

“Is that a promise?” you say, one side of your lips quirking upwards. 

He leans in and boops your nose with his own.

“Always.” 

Rantaro

You were lying on the bed side-by-side with Rantaro, cuddling. He was gently petting your head, as he sometimes did, and you leaned into his touch. It was comfortable and soothing. It would be easy to fall asleep under these circumstances. You sighed. 

“Is something wrong?” he said, sounding slightly concerned. “I think that’s the fifth time you’ve sighed today.” 

“I...no, it’s nothing. I was just thinking.” 

He peered into your eyes curiously. 

“About what?” 

You sighed again. 

“About my condition. And how I wouldn’t look like this if I didn’t have it.” 

He didn’t say much for a moment, just continued to pet your head. Then, he responded. 

“Do you not like your appearance?” 

You bit your lip softly. 

“I wish I was thinner.” 

“And why is that?” 

You reached out and played with a lock of his wavy green hair. 

“Because...I would be more good-looking.” 

Rantaro was quiet for another few seconds, looking contemplative.

“Do you honestly think you would be more good-looking if you were thinner, or is that what society’s conditioned you into thinking? That thinner is more beautiful or handsome?” 

You were frustrated and looked away from those probing eyes. 

“Well, it’s not like it’s just that I wish I was thinner because I think I’m ugly. My condition isn’t exactly healthy.”

He stopped moving for a moment and then continued to pet your head. 

“You’re right, I’m sorry. Since we’d just been talking about your appearance at first… Well, it’s not an excuse. Aside from your condition causing health issues, I still think you’re as good-looking as good-looking gets, though.” He smiles in that casual, carefree way of his, and you can’t help but forgive him. 

“Alright, alright. Your opinion is the only one that matters, huh?” You arch an eyebrow and smirk at him. “Pretty boy.” 

He raised his hands in defense. 

“Hey, I was born this way.” 

You rolled your eyes and lightly punched him on the shoulder. 

“You were born this way, but you dress this way on purpose.” 

“Ouch,” he grins. “But true. And yes, for the record, my opinion is the only one that matters. At least, when it comes to you. ‘Cause I love you, and I’m blessed to have you in my life.” 

You freeze for a moment and then grinned back at him. 

“I love you too, Rantaro. And I’m lucky to be loved by you.” 

He pulls you into his embrace and affectionately smooches you on your forehead. 

“Ditto.”

[adashofniallandasprinkleoflunacy]

mutuals as tracks from fine line ?? 🥺

Golden - @moonchildstyles

It’s my fav track on the album and it just gives me this familiar soothing glow in my veins that just fills me with so much happiness and comfort and honestly that’s Lindsee to me in a nutshell. She’s so funny and her personality is so bright and I was literally on FaceTime with her for 8 continuous hours and it felt like the day flew by because her energy is just a constant flow of positivity and it’s so easy to get lost in a conversation with her, especially because she’s such a fucking DORK. We’ve been friends since late 2016/early 2017 and we fell out of contact for a while and then she came back into my life at a time where I didn’t even know I needed it and her support just helped me work through a lot. I’m so thankful that we reconnected because I really can’t imagine my life without her. I just love her okay she’s golden and that’s on god

Watermelon Sugar - @iambabyharry

nicole is such a gift tbh like she’s always in my inbox being amazing and hyping me up about my writing and whenever I make posts about a certain fic she’s always one of the firsts if not THE first to like it and reply and engage with me and I don’t think she knows how much I appreciate that like it warms my heart into a puddle and it’s one of those things where you look back at everything collectively and see that this person has been supporting you for a while and it just Hits. The line that specifically reminds me of her is the “baby, you’re the end of June” because seeing her on my dash and in my notifs just gives me that happy carefree feeling that summer brings

Adore You - @hazzlot

Preeti....I don’t even know where to begin, honestly. There’s so many people I’ve met on tumblr and it hasn’t always gone the right way but Preeti is one of the most beautiful, genuine souls I’ve ever had the honor of being friends with. She is just so inherently pure in the sense that she always has nothing but good intentions and I wish I could just make her tiny and have her in my pocket at all times. The whole “I’d walk through fire for you, just let me adore you” is how I feel about her because I would literally defend her with my last breath and I just admire the innocent kindness she has and the way she wears her heart on her sleeve is something so rare in the world and it deserves to be praised. Going off of that, it also coincides with the “You’re wonder under summer skies” because her ability to love so transparently and wholeheartedly is truly a wonder. She’s literally the human embodiment of TPWK.

Lights Up - @sunflowervolumeeleven

MJ is the sweetest thing ever oh my god!!!! She’s supported me and my writing for a while and whenever I post something I can always count on her to be there to give me feedback and build up my confidence in such a gentle, honest manner that I cherish so much. Along with nicole, she’s one of the people who always have my back when it comes to my fics and I always look forward to her replies specifically because she never fails to make me feel like my efforts are being appreciated. Thank you MJ 🥺 you’re the “shine, step into the light, shine, so bright sometimes” that keeps me from giving up

Cherry - @honeyskins

CHEYENNE!!! ISABELLA!!!! What can I even say about Chey...We’ve been friends for years and though we don’t keep constant contact, I feel like she’s a very important part of my life because all the memories I have tied to her are positive and full of happiness and goofiness and just a type of sweet, fulfilling nostalgia. She has a soft spot in my heart and anytime I see her on my dash or get a random little love message from her, my mood immediately lifts. The reason Cherry reminds me of her is because of the line “I noticed that there's a piece of you in how I dress” and I tie that to how her friendship has had a lasting impact on me and how all of the good times we shared are moments I’ll keep with me forever.

Falling - @imethiminthemorning

The song is obviously sad but it has a certain type of honest, unapologetic rawness to it that Bee also has. We’ve talked a few times and I’ve seen her answer some advice messages on her blog and she just has this kind of wise, self-assured vibe about what she’s saying that shows she is genuinely trying to help others and I praise that about her. So cheers to Bee *toasts with a slice of pan de jamón* to being a beacon of light and trying to guide others with her experiences

To Be So Lonely - @harrykilledmoi

TBSL has this energy where it shows that Harry has grown into himself and into his feelings, what with finally being able to say “I’m not yours anymore so stay in your lane.” The whole song is packed with that sort of sassy finality and sharp confidence that Onyeka gives me. She’s an astoundingly talented creator and she’s not afraid to show it and from the selfies I’ve seen of her, it also translates into her personal style and I bow down to her strong (yet kind) personality and I’m just in awe of her, honestly. You’re a legend, dude

She - @harrysorgasm

Who better to accompany this feral, h*rny, psychedelic tune other than Miss Enjolie Anne. Angel has this shameless, ecastic way about her that draws you in immediately, not to mention she has a crazy hilarious sense of humor that will literally make you break a rib, deadass. She’s weird and quirky in a morbid kinda way and i never get tired of it. Love you, angel 🤪

Treat People with Kindness - @strawberriestyles

This song reminds me of Laney because she’s always been nice to any and everyone I’ve seen interact with her and sometimes she’ll just pop into my inbox randomly with a sweet little comment and it brightens me instantly so thank you Laney 🥺 Her writing is just astronomical and whenever she asks me to make a banner for her, I feel so honored to have a part in her bigger picture, even if it’s as simple as a banner. Her personality reminds me of Harry’s little beep boops bc she’s adorable and i love them with my whole heart, just like I love Laney 🥰

Fine Line - @grandpasweaterking

PENNY!!! We haven’t talked a ton but I admire her from afar sooooo much. She’s so sweet and ridiculously funny and I feel like this song is kind-of a grand, cinematic, dramatic piece and Penny gives me the same exact energy with her sense of style and her way of being. Seeing her on my dash always makes my day and her kinda messages always make my heart flutter so thank you so much for everything you do, Penny. And I’ve noticed that even when she’s having a hard time, she always pushes through so the “we’ll be alright” line has become her brand in my head

[rkivepacks]

TITLE: this love (left a permanent mark) Originally posted on: AO3/dtgloss Pairing: taekook/kookv/vkook (Kim Taehyung & Jeon Jeongguk) Rating: PG13 Genre: Fluff, Angst Word Count: 3,249 Trigger Warning/s: Swearing,  Disclaimer: Title from This Love - T. Swift. This work is solely from the idea of the author. Should there be similarities with the works of other respected artists are purely unintentional. This also do not reflect on the real lives of the artists portrayed in this work. Comments, suggestions and any other concerns are accepted in my inbox. Thank you!

Summary:  “Hyung, you are the best.” Jeongguk starts off again, grin not falling off his face as the crowd chuckles once again. “Once you told me, your eyes are always on me. And you did, you took care of me. Because you are that kind of person. You put me before you. All the time. Which is why you are the best. To be honest, I would not even put me before me.”

“Taehyung, hyung. We have been friends for a long time that while I was memorizing this, I had to do a simple mathematics to know how many years I’ve called you hyung.” Jeongguk starts off, clearing his throat. “I have known you for 17 years. Not once did you ever let me go.” He looks at Taehyung who was already looking at him, eyes glossy.

“I think reenacting scenes together when we were young became the foundation of us, our relationship.” He laughs, and the crowd follows.

Jungkook and Taehyung loves recreating memories.

Jungkook and Taehyung loves reenacting scenes together.

Jungkook would always be there to catch Taehyung’s sudden monologues to counter with his own until all that’s engulfing the surrounding was the exchange between the two and the acts they created together, right there on the spot.

Jungkook was there when Taehyung was so into the movie they watched last night that all Taehyung gushed about was the scenes that bugged his mind all night, which is why he was unable to fall asleep because Jungkook, do you think if the Prime Minister tried to play it dirty like they planned to he wouldn’t need to do that hideous act? And Jeongguk -- he would always reply. Always ready to counter Taehyung’s claims, to voice out his thoughts.

Jungkook was there when Taehyung wanted to reenact one scene from an anime they watched together.

“Here, I looked up the manuscript.” Taehyung tapped his on his shoulder with his phone displaying the said manuscript he found on the internet. It obviously was a bad manuscript that it looks like a scanned copy, complete with the font and the slightly smudgy lettering.

“Hyung, that was ugly. Namjoon hyung, tell him the anime was stupid.” Jungkook replied, shaking his shoulder where Taehyung’s hand was resting to shrug off his hyung.

“It’s not really stupid, you see. Just unconventional. Also the ending was rushed.” Namjoon replied.

“Thank you, hyung.”

“I said read.” Taehyung nudged again, this time scooting closer to Jungkook.

And who was Jungkook to deny him?

An hour later, they have been laughing their ass off on the manuscript that they soon found out was lacking some pages. Along their sudden script reading session in the middle of Jungkook’s bedroom Taehyung was convinced that the script was really rushed and some decisions made for the characters were unconventional.

The tradition continued. Impromptu movie nights with illegally downloaded movies for the ones they could not find on netflix were a tradition. Reenacting memes also became a thing. If the two started reciting the opening for The Bee Movie script, the rest of their group decided not to ask.

“What should I tell him?” Hoseok asks to the people present in his apartment -- which is really just their group of friends composed of seven men.

“The Bee Movie script.” Taehyung raised his hand while speaking as if he was called to recite in a classroom, a mannerism he developed. Jungkook removes his gaze from his phone to offer a hand to Taehyung, posed as if to ask for a high five.

“Shut the fuck up.” Hoseok exclaims, exasperated.

“According to all known laws of aviation,-” Taehyung started, mimicking the voice of the narrator from the movie.

“There is no way a bee could fly.” Jungkook trails off, his voice somewhat a little to exaggerated.

Namjoon and Yoongi remained unmoving, used to the two. It was not the first time the two planned to recite the transcript they memorized overtime, although they believe it wouldn’t hurt if they could stop the two before they get to the part about the bees going to school.

If you ask Taehyung, their favorite acting shenanigan would be the romcom ones, and so did Jungkook. The Notebook? Jungkook was there to carry Taehyung. Jungkook would be the one to initiate their usual skits even in the middle of the rain and there is only one umbrella to barely fit two people -- Jungkook would grab the umbrella from Taehyung’s hold, despite the latter’s grumbling of being a bit taller than the younger and thus, he should be the one to hold the umbrella for the two of them. Jungkook would halt their steps on the sidewalk after making sure their little skit would not affect anyone but them, and put his arms around Taehyung and with his other hand on the umbrella, he would slowly tilt it upwards, as if reenacting a slow motion from the series.

On better days when the two would be able to free up their schedules, they would uphold their reputation at the karaoke hub minutes away from the younger’s apartment. The two would do musicals, if they feel like it.

“Pardon the way that I stare, there’s nothing else to compare.” Jungkook exaggerates his action, projecting them to Taehyung.

“The sight of you leaves me weak, there are no words left to speak.” Taehyung digs the next line and more. Jungkook dances around, moving in sways, picking up his drink and taking a sip, letting Taehyung’s voice fill the room they occupied, watching him from behind.

“There are no words left to speak, but if you feel like I feel, please let me know that is real.” Taehyung sings, completely unaware of the man watching him. “You're just too good to be true, I can't take my eyes off you.” The interlude overpowers the surrounding as Taehyung continues to dance along with the instrumental.

Taehyung remains completely unaware of the man who found comfort in the walls he was leaning on, arms crossed in front of him as Taehyung continues to sway from left to right, his body has memorized the rhythm of the song already.

“Jungkook, sing the next part.” Taehyung calls out to him, his hand motioning for him to come closer.

“Oh pretty baby, don’t bring me down I pray.” Jungkook starts off, using Taehyung’s microphone instead of his own, going back to his previous overly-exaggerated motions to the older. “Now that I’ve found you, stay.”

The two greets the first two hours of the dawn at the hub, exchanging moments to sing solos or duets. If Jungkook sings his heart out about one-sided love and if he stares too long at Taehyung during those songs, he thinks the older chose not to speak of it.

“Oh, actually, everyone. I have a video of Taehyung singing Gabriella’s part with Gabriella’s voice and Troy’s part in High School Musical.” He grins and Taehyung laughs, throwing his head back, mouthing at Jeongguk to not show his video.

“Don’t you dare, sir.” Taehyung speaks and the crowd laughs once again.

“Since this is a special day and because I was threatened. I guess the video will never see the light of the day.” Jeongguk jokes. “Moving on, Taehyung is such an adventurous person. Always meeting new people, always out there. And as someone who knows him personally I continued to watch him close. From a clear view, just watching over him do things.” He swallows.

However, just because Taehyung did not speak of those moments, doesn’t mean his other hyungs would not.

“Jungkook, this is not high school musical. Just because you sang songs about love with him doesn’t mean he will catch on right away.” Yoongi sips on his soda to shut himself up after his short rant.

“You all don’t get it-” Jungkook has probably said it the fourth time now.

“No, you don’t get it. Taehyung is oblivious.It wouldn’t hurt the two of you if you tell him directly.” Jimin reasoned out.

“Taehyung is not ugly-” Hoseok gulped to pause, but Jungkook cuts him off.

“Taehyung is very handsome, hyung.” He supplies.

“I was saying, he is not ugly. Which means, people would be attracted to him, people that are not you. Which also means people can get too close to him, people that are not you. You wouldn’t like to hear the other scenarios.” He continued.

Jimin eyed him from Hoseok’s side before looking down at the wraps they were munching on.

• - -

If you ask Jeongguk if there are scenes he would be afraid to act out or scenes he would not do with Taehyung, first he’d tell you he has two different answers for those questions. First, Jeongguk is not fond of reenacting scenes from serial killer movies. Certainly not if he was the serial killer. Second, Jeongguk will not do scenes with Taehyung that requires him to let go of Taehyung, in all aspects.

See Jeongguk’s journal for references and explanations with graphs.

They would often watch scenes from movies with sad endings. Above all things, they would make Jeongguk cry and Jeonguk has a reputation to keep and he would very much appreciate it if his tear ducts could hold his damn fucking tears for just one more minute. There are also times when Jeongguk would look away from the sad scenes and makes a mistake of looking at Taehyung and remember that by fact and by law, Taehyung is not his. Jungkook would like to think he would not need to let go of Taehyung’s hand. The thought makes him reach out to the older who was watching the movie silently.

“Hyung, say, we met right, but since one of us has short-term memory loss, one would always forget the other…” Jungkook starts off, fiddling with Taehyung’s pinky finger.

“We get to have many first meetings. And dates.” Taehyung giggles.

“Yes. But you would forget me.”

“Are you saying I’m Lucy?” Taehyung turns his head towards Jungkook.

“Not the point.” Jungkook laughs.

“I will never forget you.” Taehyung replies, his words hiding more emotions than what the phrase implies.

“Make sure of it.” Jungkook replies, letting go of Taehyung’s hand, afraid that he wouldn’t want to let go.

And not letting go is what he did. The two had been running around town on a spontaneous get away (around town).

+ + +

“We need to reschedule the karaoke, Gukkie. Gyeongwoo wanted me to come watch his play that Saturday.” Taehyung tells him as the older gently brushes the small towel to dry his hair and the younger munches on the biscuit on the bed.

Jungkook tries very hard to remember a movie with a character named Gyeongwoo. Or a play. He didn’t need to. “Sorry?” He asks.

“I have a date.” Taehyung rephrases.

And oh. This is the part where Jeongguk acts out on his own. A one man show. Scene one Act natural. Or act like you don’t care. Or act happy. He thinks. Perhaps this is one of those movies where he is trailing of on a one man show. A man hopelessly falling for his best friend, his supposed soulmate who was busy catching another man. Perhaps this is the part where he trails of his monologue about not needing happy endings, as long as the person he loves gets his own.

He hears the first story of an outsider during one stay over, when Taehyung suddenly tells him a name he could not quite put a face on. Gyeongwoo. Jungkook wishes he can catch on to Taehyung’s sudden antics of acting out movies and roles.

Jungkook thinks, as he watches the older’s form, dead asleep beside him, clutching tightly on the pillow that’s supposed to be Jungkook’s. This is it. This is where I admit to myself and the hyungs that I will be okay.

Jungkook learns as he watch Taehyung cancel more traditions with him and even with the group that being okay is different when you’re trying to be okay alone or with someone. He learns it’s different to be okay without Taehyung. And it’s hard.

+ + +

Jeongguk - 1

Gyeongwoo - 0

He was not keeping count. But then again, Gyeongwoo makes an honest mistake, the biggest one of his life.

It happened when he returns to his dorm room with his peached hair love of his life sat in front of his locked door, beside a plastic bag endowed with candies, sweets and probably sojus.

“LQ?” He asks, unsurprised. This would not be the first time Taehyung runs to him when he and his boyfriend (Jeongguk makes a prayer everytime he mentions that word) are in a lovers quarrel (who the fuck says quarell).

“The last.” Taehyung adds. “We broke up.” He remains on the floor, beside Jeongguk’s legs as the man in a loose plaid unlocks the door.

“Hyung did you get me cereal?” Jeongguk drops his bag on the table before rummaging to the plastic bag Taehyung brought over.

“You’re not my sugar baby.” Taehyung snorts as he starts going to the netflix app of the tv.

“I’m your baby.” Jeongguk replies and stops when he realized what he just said.

“I’m sure.” was Taehyung’s only reply.

Jeongguk did not mention the relationships they have had with other people in his speech. It was not necessary. Who would love to hear about a man’s relationship with someone else at your own wedding? No one.

“For everyone’s information, Taehyung and I made up scenarios during our university days. Completely for fun. Like platonic, maybe. We had these thoughts and found out we were thinking about the same things.” Jeongguk turns to the crowd, then returning his eyes to Taehyung. “It’s almost like a bucket list. We thought maybe, in the future, let me be the godfather of your child and you’ll be the godfather of my child. All that shit.” Everyone laughs again. “And entrust my children to you? No, hyung. No offense.” Jeongguk jokes.

“I’m not bad.’ Taehyung reasons out.

“Are you saying letting the rice cooker toast our dinner is not bad?” Jeongguk challenges.

“Product defects are not my fault.” Taehyung replies.

“Whatever, I wouldn’t want my daughter to be like, face painted like mcdonalds when she returns to my home from a sleepover with your children.”

“Jeongguk, when we graduate. Let’s move in together. Then work and save money and let’s get married. I hope you got coins to get me salmon for our wedding. You know how much I love salmon.” Taehyung turns to him.

“Of course, hyung. And chocolate cake? I’m putting our budget all on the cake.”

“Also let’s invite Obama. Once a couple sent an invitation to the White House and Mrs. Obama sent her regards to them.”

“I was thinking of inviting Yoona, but sure.”

They laughed that night. Finished each other’s words. Laughed until it was three in the morning and Taehyung’s boyfriend at that time kept on calling on a phone that was off. They laughed when all Jeongguk wants to do is scream and cry.

“Hyung, you are the best.” Jeongguk starts off again, grin not falling off his face as the crowd chuckles once again. “Once you told me, your eyes are always on me. And you did, you took care of me. Because you are that kind of person. You put me before you. All the time. Which is why you are the best. To be honest, I would not even put me before me.” Jeongguk jokes, the last part of his speech was impromptu as he tried to swallow the lump in his throat and tried to keep his speech light and filled with happiness. As happiness is what Taehyung deserves. And happiness is what Jeongguk gives Taehyung. He continues to watch Taehyung closely, as he always did. Even as Taehyung watches over him from afar. Taehyung watches over him and not the same way as Taehyung watches over Minji, a junior from the Botany Department. In Minji’s defense (against Jeongguk’s broken heart and loud thoughts) she was a person worth protecting. Minji deserved being watched over. Jeongguk things he would also watch over her and protect her if he was not so busy giving his all to Taehyung.

Jeongguk guessed the cancelled movie nights and plans during the Taehyung-Gyeongwoo era (as their group of friends dubbed it behind Taehyung) was a training for the Minji-Taehyung era. Only Jeongguk understood better now. He always did. Even if Yoongi didn’t and Jimin stopped trying to understand them both.

“Welcome to iHOP!” Jeongguk greets as he opens the door for Taehyung.

“Jeongguk, my sweet bro pal.” Taehyung greets, doing his peace sign with both hands before kicking off his shoes and plops on the floor (near the couch).

“My mom sent me cake and carbonara. It was my sister’s birthday, remember.” Jeongguk starts opening the fridge to reheat the food.

“Is it chocolate?”

“Always.” “Thank you Lord.” and Taehyung stands up to grab a fork from the kitchen and digs into the cake.

“Did you know that Minji hates carbonara? She prefers red sauce.” Taehyung shares, words muffled by the chiffon in his mouth.

“That’s sad.” Jeongguk replies.

“It’s cute.” Taehyung corrects. Taehyung finds everything about Minji cute and he thinks it’s necessary to share them to Jeongguk. Jeongguk takes them and receives them like a good ass best friend.

“Martyr.” Yoongi sadly replies as as they congregate in the table at the far left of the fast food.

“Saint Jeongguk pray for us.” Jimin adds.

“Shut up.” He replies as Namjoon sets down their food on the table, eyes on the pasta.

“Minji loves red sauce with pasta.” He absent-mindedly shares. “Taehyung said Minji loved caramel syrup with rice crisps for the sundae.” He said as he looked at the Oreo Matcha Jin was eating.

“I told you you should have had your great grand mother curse Taehyung with a love potion for him and Jeongguk.” Namjoon whispers to Yoongi as they looked at Jeongguk separate his pickles from his burger.

Taehyung had Minji for almost a year. So Jeongguk thought he could have the cute architecture major from one of his class who gave him his number.

Jeongguk and Minwoo didn’t last. Taehyung was the first to know and the first at his door with soju and chips and chocolate cake.

“Does Minji know about this?” Jeongguk asks as they enter the dorm.

“That I have a secret boyfriend I go to?” Taehyung jokes and Jeongguk just wants to fucking die.

“Asshole. I feel so honored that you cancelled plans with your girlfriend to be with me. Thank you to the management, my family, and to everyone who worked hard.” Jeongguk makes a speech, bowing once before hitting Taehyung with his bag pack.

“Whatever, now, tell me why that fuckface cheated on you.”

Jeonguk spends the evening wrapped in Taehyung’s arms, although he doesn’t know if he was crying because he caught Minwoo hitting off on another boy in another class or is it because Taehyung left his dorm that night to wrap his arms around someone else.

“This speech is getting longer. I had to squeeze a 17 year long timeline in like ten minutes probably.” Jeongguk looks at his watch for effect. “Basically, to wrap this up so everyone can continue on with the ceremony and the celebration and the booze, thank you Taehyung.” He looks at Taehyung once.

“After this, I know you will only continue to look after me, just as I will continue to look after you. I will always follow you, and stand behind you. As we continue to take on another chapter in our life, just know I will always be with you. I love you hyung.” He looks at Taehyung for the second time.

“Everyone, let’s give it up to our newly wedded couple. Congratulations Kim Taehyung and Kim Minji.” Jeongguk looks at Taehyung for the last time.

[end}

[See all works here]

[inmytaste-blog]

Unsolved Problems

Word count: 4.8k

Warnings: Swearing and a very hot Shawn (what’s new)

A/N: Look who updated! This is something I came up with some weeks ago and I wanted to take a break from all the requests I have already received so here you have it! Massive thank you’s for requesting and following me and showing love to this account! Requests are still open and I have already started working on those I have in my inbox. Send me anything you want to see written on this blog or just vent to me! Till next time, happy reading!

__________________________________________________________

Friday. You could sit down and think about a numerous reasons why this was your favourite day out of the whole week. Nothing could compare to the exciting feeling of knowing that two days full of sleeping in and doing absolutely nothing were coming and were ready for you to go ahead and grab them. Besides, Friday was the last day of your working in the little candy shop you had found a place at in order to earn some money for your personal needs. You were more than thrilled to know that they accepted to have you as a member in their business since you didn’t want to work in something too fancy or too demanding for the first time.

The owner of the cute little shop was very eager to have you working with her since she was many years alone in there trying to make things work. Occasionally, her son would come by and help her but from what you have heard one day, he was always on the road or trying to do well on his studies, something you knew very well could be very frustrating and time consuming. So when you appeared one sunny afternoon at the door asking for a job, Karen, the owner, wasted no time in showing you around the small space and filling you in on anything you needed to know in order to work there.

You were very pleased to acknowledge that many people were kind towards Karen and consequently to you, since the candy the shop provided were ‘’out of this world’’. Karen really put her heart and soul into every new piece of sweet temptation she would get down and create and people’s reactions were proof that she was amazing at what she was doing. She once had confessed that she tried passing her recipes down to her son, Shawn, but he wasn’t as eager as his mother and after some time he was adamant altogether. You couldn’t understand why he wouldn’t just learn a few helpful tips concerning cooking since you felt that he was a very sweet guy himself but you tried not to think too much into it. You were just happy to observe his features every time he would come to the shop.

You and Shawn hadn’t really engaged into a normal conversation since you were both introduced to one another by his mother and he didn’t seem like it bothered him that much. On the other hand, you were left waiting for one word of his even if it was a simple ‘’Hi’’ or just a wave. You didn’t really know what was wrong with him and you were pretty sure you had done nothing wrong to scare him away. After some time, you had stopped trying altogether and you had persuaded yourself that maybe he wanted nothing to do with you. It confused you at first but you let that go since you didn’t want to get too involved with someone who barely acknowledged your existence.

‘’Don’t mind him dear, his hormones are driving him crazy and he puts it out at the wrong people’’ his mother told you one day, after he had barged into the shop without even looking at your way and started pacing down and forth for no obvious reason.

‘’I can confirm that!’’ you had agreed and proceeded to place the remaining doughnuts in the container.

Today was a similar day, having Shawn slamming the door shut on his way in the shop and putting his face into his hand in a rather aggressive way. Deep down you felt sorry for him and whatever rough patch he was going through but he didn’t really leave you any room to approach him and talk about it. Nonetheless, you decided you could have a go and ask him what was wrong even if it would flop.

‘’Everything alright?’’ you asked hesitantly, surprised to see he was looking straight at you.

‘’Oh, didn’t see you there. Sorry for that’’

Okay this was a first. Where did the fast and unapproachable Shawn you had grown accustomed to over the past few months go? However, you didn’t want to ruin the fact that he had calmed down and was open to your attempt to talk to him so you played along.

‘’No need to apologize. I know that days like these are hard to take’’

‘’What days? What do you mean?’’

‘’Rough days. Days when you just want to close yourself off from everybody and be on your own without really having to face anyone or anything’’

‘’Whoa. Thought I was the only one who felt like that’’ Shawn said scratching the back of his head and looking up at you with a shy smile.

‘’I can assure you I have plenty of these days myself. Not very fond of them’’ you truthfully said and wiped the small counter in front of you. From the corner of your eyes, you could see Shawn looking at you, with a mysterious expression on his face, something you could only identify with shock.

‘’You are not the only one being a human you know’’ you playfully joked and Shawn cracked a small smile.

‘’You know, sometimes I tend to forget about that and I act in ways that I regret later. But the damage has already been done you know?’’

‘’I know but you can control these feelings if you wish’’

‘’We’ll see about that. Hey wanna grab a coffee sometime? Been a while since I had a decent conversation with someone and I would like to do it again. Hope I don’t sound weird or anything’’ Shawn asked and you were positive your eyes were the size of the doughnuts standing in front of you. To say he took you by surprise was an understatement but you were more than pleased to accept his polite offer.

‘’Yeah why not? Happy to help a fellow human’’ you said and you felt pretty good when you heard laughter erupting from Shawn’s throat. Just on cue, Shawn’s mother walked in the shop and she instantly lit up when she saw her son smiling up at the girl she had welcomed in her shop.

‘’Morning mom’’ Shawn said and hugged his mother, something which took Karen off guard.

‘’Well, someone’s in a good mood. How are you today Shawn?’’

‘’Started roughly but got the hang of it from what it seems’’ he said turning to look at you, sending you a wink.

Your heart skipped a beat at this mannerism and you thought that maybe something good could come out of this if you just had an ear for him since this appeared to be what he was after lately. The thing is, you were always the one who was there for other people and tried to help them with their problems even if that meant pushing aside your own. That was the way you were though, and you more than pleased to know that the day finally came when it could be made up to you. The sound of the bell ringing put you out of your trance signaling a new customer was in ready to be served.

‘’So tell me what your magic potion is’’ Karen said to you while you helped her close the shop.

‘’What are you talking about Karen?’’ you asked dumbfounded.

‘’Well, I am sure you know what I am talking about but let me tell you myself. I am talking about the wide smile Shawn had on his lips this morning when I entered the shop which quite frankly, hadn’t seen for a long time’’ Karen explained and it pained you to think that Shawn had so many problems to solve that he barely even smiled.

‘’Well, I was just there to listen to him I guess. I only asked him what was wrong and I let him know that he isn’t alone in whatever he is going through right now’’

‘’Hmm well, I like having him be associated with a girl like you’’

‘’Why thank you Karen, this really means a lot’’

‘’Now come with me and let me treat you with some carrot cake I made at home’’ Karen suggested and you came to a halt not really wanting to intrude in her home even if she was the one inviting you.

‘’Karen, I really shouldn’t. You must be worn out from today and you need to get some rest’’

‘’Don’t worry about it. Now come because I will be very mad at you if you don’t’’ she insisted, wearing her most serious face, persuading you.

‘’Okay okay!’’

The walk to her house was a short one since she was living close by and you felt pretty light when you noticed a black vehicle parked in front of the house meaning that Shawn was in there as well. You were really unprepared to be met with Shawn for the second time today but you pushed all your anxiety away and you let yourself be consumed with the warmness of Karen’s house. It was pretty cozy and nicely decorated, with most pieces being very minimalistic portraying Shawn’s touch as well. Of course, the house had a staircase which led to the bedrooms and a restroom in the upper floor but your exploring was interrupted when Karen’s voice was heard throughout the living room.

‘’Shawn stop being an antisocial human being and come down to say hi to our guest!’’

Shawn’s response was silence which made you frown a little bit at the possibility of him not being home and you not seeing him again. But loud thumbing was heard from the stairs and your head was turned towards the source of the sound.

‘’Mom I told you I don’t want to see anyo- Oh hey’’ he instantly corrected himself when he saw you standing next to his mom.

‘’Hello’’ you said, stifling a giggle caught in your throat at his silliness.

‘’What were you saying sweetheart? Now come downstairs to have a slice of carrot cake with us’’ she suggested and he walked down the stairs entering the living room.

‘’So…. How have you been?’’ he tried to make small talk with you and you felt lightheaded.

‘’A little tired from all the work but good I guess’’ you confessed. ‘’What about you?’’

‘’Been better but okay’’ he said and went ahead to help his mom serve the cake.

You felt a little bit sad at his answer but you couldn’t do anything else apart from smiling lightly and sitting down on the dining table.

‘’We’re not sitting in here! Let’s go to the living room’’ Karen said and you all followed suit behind her.

You took a seat across from the table, Karen was sat opposite from you and Shawn sat between the two of you. A conversation was sparked and you were all contributing to it by adding pieces of information on the subject when suddenly your phone started buzzing. Both Karen’s and Shawn’s eyes were fixed on you and you excused yourself to answer the call. Taking a quick look at your phone’s screen, you didn’t really liked the caller ID.

‘’Yes?’’ you asked cautiously, fearing your voice would fail you at any moment.

‘’Hello Y/N, this is Patrick’’ the last person you expected to call you.

Patrick was a thing from your past which never ceased to haunt you up to this day. He was your previous roommate who always got out and got drunk with his friends and then called you up to clean him up. You were always there to help him well because you felt sorry for his state and you really believed in that thing called karma, so maybe one day you could receive something good out of this yourself. But nothing good has come your way concerning Patrick so far. Instead, you only got anxiety and frustration because he couldn’t understand that he was nothing to you, you were nothing to him and you were no longer roommates for that matter.

‘’I know who this is Patrick. Please erase my number before I block yours’’

‘’But I want help’’

‘’Not my business anymore. Bye once and for all’’ you said agitated and hung up. If his name appeared on your screen one more time, you would surely block him. After ending that meaningless call, you headed back to the living room where everyone was seated. Just as you entered the place, four eyes were on you.

‘’Everything alright dear? You seem upset’’ Shawn’s mom noticed and you tried to smile as convincing as you could.

‘’Yes just some kid trying to play around’’. Turning your head to see Shawn, you saw that he was not exactly pleased with your answer.

‘’Hmm’’ was all that left his lips and you felt yourself shiver. Not really wanting to ruin the atmosphere you got up and politely thanked Karen and Shawn for their hospitality while proceeding to the door.

‘’Leaving already?’’ Shawn got up and walked you to the exit.

‘’Well, I have to get up early tomorrow so some sleep will do me good. Thank you very much for the nice afternoon’’ you said and hugged Shawn, taking him by complete surprise.

‘’It was nothing’’ he assured hugging back after a while.

‘’Have a nice evening’’ you offered and walked out.

‘’You too. We should really arrange something about that coffee we were talking about earlier’’ Shawn exclaimed and you agreed smiling in the dark.

Just before crossing the street to reach your apartment, your phone buzzed for the second time that night. You swore that if Patrick was playing tricks on you once again you wouldn’t tolerate it anymore. Getting your phone out of your pocket, you were confused to see an unknown number messaging you.

-Got home safe?

-Um, who is this?

-Shawn. Mom gave me your number in case of an emergency while you are at the shop and she is not there.

-Oh… Well, I just entered the apartment. Thanks for checking.

Weird. You never expected that Shawn would be like those guys who checked upon anyone to see if they made it home okay. But then again, you never really hang out with him that much to know what he really is like when it comes to other people. Heck, it is just now that you have started talking to each other after months of seeing him enter and leave the shop. Nonetheless, it was a pleasant surprise and you hoped he would reply your message just as quickly as he did some minutes ago. But, half an hour had passed and Shawn’s reply was nowhere to be seen.

Pushing these thoughts aside, you were ready to get comfortable under your sheets when your phone’s buzzing interrupted you. Getting it from the nightstand you saw Shawn’s name on your screen.

-Asleep yet?

-Just laid down actually… And you?

-Me too. It was nice having you today.

-I think you already told me that. It was nice indeed!

No immediate reply. Not really wanting to spend the rest of your night on your phone, you decided it was best to set it aside and offer yourself some sleep since you were beyond exhausted from the whole day. After all, many things happened that you never imagined happening actually, most of them concerning Shawn. Even though you wanted to close your eyes and travel to another dimension, you couldn’t help yourself but think who this boy really was inside. One thing you knew for sure, he was confusing. First, he doesn’t even greet you at the shop and then he even sends you goodnight texts. You couldn’t really decide if you liked this or if it frightened you. The only thing you could do was wait for him either to open up or just go back to his own self.

Having spent a night full of Shawn related thoughts, you found yourself waking up pretty late the next morning. Opening up your eyes, the first thing you proceeded to do was check your phone for any new messages. And not just any messages but Shawn’s messages. You couldn’t even explain why you were so hung up on this guy but something on him seemed very appealing to you and it was as if he was pulling you towards him. Just as you climbed out of bed, your doorbell startled you, having no idea who was paying a visit.

‘’Coming!’’ you shouted not ready to be met with a leaning Shawn.

‘’Well, good morning’’ he casually said like it was a normal thing to turn up on your doorstep on a Saturday morning or generally.

‘’Um hello. What are you doing here?’’ you said puzzled.

‘’Remember that coffee? I sent you a message but you never replied so I guessed I would stop by and inform you directly’’ Oh, so he sent a message you thought to yourself.

‘’Oh right. Well, come right in and give me five minutes to get ready’’ you said, realizing he had just seen you in your pjs. Cool.

‘’Yeah don’t worry about it’’ he joked, following your glance at your outfit.

Before giving him a chance to comment any further on your morning appearance, you hurried to your bathroom to clean up and change into something more appropriate. Since you didn’t want to make him wait very much, you decided on a pair of light coloured jeans, a white t-shirt and your black leather jacket. Grabbing your phone and some cash, you descended your stairs only to see Shawn talking to his phone rather upset.

‘’I told you no. How hard is that to get through your thick skull mate? Well, I am not down to partying tonight and that’s it’’ he said hanging up quite furiously.

‘’Someone’s worked up’’ you pointed out and he turned to face you.

‘’Don’t worry about it. Ready?’’ he said and you nodded exiting your apartment.

‘’You know, it won’t harm you if you share your news with someone. Remember that I am here to hear. Besides, I won’t tell anyone’’ you whispered the last part and he half smiled.

‘’Well, it doesn’t really interests you’’ he said and you frowned. Well, this wasn’t going too well. Maybe Shawn wasn’t so easy to open up after all.

‘’So, where are we going?’’ Shawn asked.

‘’Where do you drink the best coffee?’’ you answered and he led the way.

The walk to the small coffee shop was a short one and he tried to make small talk asking you how you enjoyed working with his mom so far and why you picked out that particular job. You provided him with all the answers you had to offer and by now, you were seated in one of the booths in the shop enjoying your coffee.

‘’So I heard there is a party tonight, isn’t it?’’ you said taking a sip from your beverage and Shawn stiffened.

‘’It is nothing’’ he tried to cut the conversation about it and you smirked.

‘’Well, it is Saturday and I would really like doing something different from staying in tonight’’ you slyly remarked and his eyes shifted to yours.

‘’You can’t be serious. And you want to go to a lame party full of drunk assholes?’’

‘’Well, I can’t really tell if they are assholes if I don’t go and see myself’’ you said and he threw his head back, biting his lip. Who would have thought that such a movement could be so hot?

‘’Alright then. Tonight we are going to this party. Be ready at 9. I’ll come pick you up’’

Had you really arranged another date with Shawn? You were sure the answer was yes and your legs shook tremendously at the realization. After some more time, you decided to head home, since you head to prepare for a night filled with some drinks, a lot of dancing and a lot of Shawn.

Not really sure of what to wear, you decided on a simple pair of black skinny jeans, a lacey top, a jacket and your high heels. You weren’t really in the mood for dresses and cute make up, that’s why you went for something simple but party acceptable at the same time. By the time you were finished dressing up, the doorbell rang signaling that Shawn had arrived and was ready to pick you up for that party. Truth is, you never really wanted to get up and attend but you had enough of Shawn being a smartass so you thought you would be one too. But now you were slightly regretting it.

‘’Ready to go?’’ you asked opening the door, letting Shawn get a good glimpse of you.

‘’Um… yes. Are you?’’

‘’Yep. Let’s go’’

Throughout the ride, Shawn’s eyes were fixed on you and you were kind of glad that he liked what he was seeing. But underneath that confidence you were gaining, you still felt like an outsider who had no place there. Shawn must have felt your uneasiness and he tried to make the atmosphere a bit lighter but to no particular use. Maybe you were a bit uneasy because of Shawn and his overall demeanour. This kid had you so confused that you felt a bit intimidated and lost. First, he appears glad to know you are trustworthy and he can confide in you anytime he feels like it. The next thing you know, he is closed off and almost snaps at you for trying to be there for him and help him.

‘We’re here. I am telling you again, if you feel uncomfortable or just want to go please tell me. I’ll understand’’ Shawn said, worry evident in his eyes.

‘’Shawn it is just a party. I don’t see what could go wrong’’ you chuckled nervously and got out of the car before he got any chance to protest or stop you.

However, many things went wrong that night. First of all, as soon as you went further in the house you lost track of Shawn meaning that you were all alone in a room full of unknown people. You opted for the safest option which was the bar, deciding that since you had gotten yourself into this mess you might as well treat yourself. Making your way to the bar, you spotted an empty space and sat on top of a chair trying to create your drink. Just as you turned your head around though, you got a glimpse of Shawn dancing with a blonde girl, and very close for your liking. You instantly averted your gaze in front of you, thanking the bartender for giving you your drink.

‘’Hey, what’s up’’ you heard someone ask beside you and at first you ignored it. Besides, he would be someone drunk out of his mind trying to have his way with you and that was the last thing you wanted.

‘’Having fun?’’ the man next to you persisted.

‘’Actually, I’m not ver-‘’ just as you turned your head to face the stranger next to you, you felt a lump forming in your throat.

‘’Patrick? What are you doing here?’’ you asked not really believing that the person you were trying to avoid so hard was right in front of you.

‘’What? Am I not allowed to have fun in a bar anymore?’’ he said, wearing his disgusting smirk on his lips.

‘’What do you want?’’ you asked, giving him the hint that you weren’t very pleased to see him there.

‘’Simple question with the simplest of answers. You. I’ve been trying to get to you but you just kept locking me out. Why?’’ he asked and you laughed.

‘’What part of the ‘’I want nothing to do with you’’ didn’t you understand?’’ you said and tried to get up from your seat but he instantly stood in front of you, blocking your way.

‘’Let me go before I make a scene’’

‘’I’d like to see you try’’ he said and grabbed your arms attempting to take you with him.

‘’No, let me go’’ you said trying to free yourself from his grasp, crying desperately for someone to come and save the day.

‘’I think she said to let her fucking go’’ someone said and you were relieved to see a head of curls glaring with fierce hatred towards Patrick.

‘’Bro mind your damn business. I am leaving with my girlfriend for fuck’s sake’’ he lied, trying to get out of Shawn’s face but he was having none of this.

‘’Bullshit. Y/N has only one boyfriend and that’s me. Now get off’’

‘’Or else?’’ Patrick smirked and he was met with Shawn’s fist right at his jaw. You were bewildered enough at Shawn pretending to be your boyfriend in order to protect you as it is so seeing Shawn beat Patrick up was the last push.

‘’Shawn enough. He let me go’’ you tried to prevent him from getting hurt by Patrick, not really bearing the thought of Shawn with blood anywhere on him.

‘’Bother her one more time and you will never see the fucking sunlight anymore’’ Shawn threatened and Patrick vanished immediately.

‘’Are you okay?’’ Shawn turned his attention to you and he cupped your face with his two large hands before you nodded in agreement.

‘’Thank you very much Shawn. Thank you. Are you alright?’’ you asked concerned, seeing a few scratches on Shawn’s lips and some drops of blood dripping from his nose.

‘’Don’t worry about it’’ he said but you knew better. Without really caring about the dancing figures in the room you grabbed Shawn’s arm and you guided him to one of the many restrooms.

‘’There must be some rubbing alcohol and bandages in here. Wait’’ you said, closing the door behind you and searching the small bathroom for the necessities you needed in order to take care of Shawn’s wounds. All the while you were opening and closing cabinets, Shawn was placed on top of the toilet seat, eyeing you closely and rubbing his hands together. He was used to getting into fights but he never had anyone taking care of his lip scratches before so he felt a bit… vulnerable. He hated feeling this way, always believing he had to be the strong one. So, in one swift move, he got up and was ready to open the door before you turned with the things in your hands.

‘’Here they are- Shawn what are you doing?’’ you asked a bit irritated that Shawn didn’t want to be in there with you.

‘’ I said I am fine Y/N. I don’t need you seeing me like this’’ he said raising his voice, without having any reason to.

‘’Wow’’ was all you could muster and he took his previous seat on the toilet seat puffing loudly.

‘’What’’ he snapped

‘’You know what… Screw this’’ you said, seeing Shawn being shocked.

‘’What do you mean?’’

‘’I don’t get it Shawn. You are so hard to understand. There are times when you seem pretty glad we get to hang out together and you try to protect me. But there are other times when you just shut me out and act like I am psychotic stranger trying to get your attention. I don’t like being played Shawn and this thing is messing with my head. It really is.’’ You finished and proceeded to walk to the door, when you felt a hand grabbing yours.

‘’I am sorry Y/N. It’s just that… Every time I get attached to someone they always find a reason to leave. So I guess, I am pretty used to being independent and having no one to care for me that when it actually happens I freak out’’ he confessed and you sighed.

‘’That doesn’t give you the right to mess with other people though. You should really let other people help you with your problems and your worries or else you might go crazy’’ you said looking him into his eyes and searching for something that told you to stop because you went too far. Instead, all you could see in Shawn’s eyes were hope and uncertainty, instantly making you feel guilty.

‘’I am sorry I shouldn’t have said that. I should go’’ you said taking a few steps back and opening the door before having it closed again by Shawn.

‘’What are you doing Shawn?’’ you asked worried but stopped questioning things when you felt his plump lips on top of yours.

‘’Can you be the one who helps me solve my insecurities and my fears?’’ he asked you almost out of breath, locking his eyes with yours. It was right at this moment that your eyes lit up and you lips curled into a smile before reassuring him in the warmest way possible.

‘’I think I can do that’’.

[advernia]

push me off a bridge (to catch me as i fall)

a separate post for my ramblings for this fic!! it’s actually the longest thing i’ve written in a while, so i have a lot to ramble about haha;;

prelude

oh man... this started when two of my friends decided to go through edgar’s route at the same time AND also decided to go reacting to every single part of the route through burst texting AT THE SAME TIME, effectively flooding my inbox.... they were fully aware that i was at a seminar and unable to reply... now my inbox is filled with so much edgar screaming i cannot... (゜▽゜;)

screaming aside they were also very willing to read whatever drafts of edgar/mc i had available and this was their favorite!! thanks to them, i decided to finish this omfg... i’m actually so proud that i got this done but tbh it was getting so long that i had half a mind to let go of it already halfway through scene three haha... (;*△*;)

this has uh... some fighting scenes and tbh the first draft had absolutely none of it... this is my first time actually writing long(?) scenes and while i found thinking about them to be fun, putting them into words was some struggle??? like... i've been told that it looks okay but idk it feels clunky to me. oh well ＼| ￣ヘ￣|／

general stuff + war phase, baby!

initially this was only meant to be 3 parts + primarily focused on edgar/mc + with an unnamed mc as usual! but then since it’s an au of kyle’s route, i found myself wanting to flesh out the relationship of edgar & mc when set in a different angle + circumstances rather than just automatically implying attraction...

plus their relationship canonically starts off on the wrong foot in that route & edgar’s fully aware that mc isn’t exactly comfortable around him, so it really doesn’t sit well if i just... put them together, lol. so thus we have five scenes of them getting(?) closer!(???)

in short its a hella slow burn and not gonna lie, when i was writing their scenes i was like f i n a l l y... bless... ಠ ּ͜೦

one of the reasons i like kyle’s route is bc i actually got some feel of an actual war??? idk i think there’s so much plot that u can fill in with it, so i decided going for alternating scenes of the battlefield + med tent. while there's glimpses of the action going on, there’s also the sort of complimenting(???) or offsetting more emotional perspective of what goes on with the medics. 

tbh i stared long and hard at the cradle map when formulating some tactics and i gotta say i had a hard time calming myself down bc... 

in kyle’s route, the red army has the advantage and have pushed the black army as far back as to their bridge, which means that more or less they’ve occupied central quarter... but what dawned on me was... where the hell did the red army position their encampment from there??? 

was an encampment even necessary given that they’re like, in a really convenient area????? they probably could’ve settled themselves in some houses but tbh okay maybe it isn’t so noble of the reds to do (imposing themselves n’ stuff) + they have larger numbers so accommodating all of them is a problem but still... where’d they set up camp??? u see, when kyle + mc step out of the med tent it shows the forest bg, so... where??? on the edges of the central quarter area are where u can see them trees??? on the civic center roof?!?!

well... a decent answer is that they could’ve set up several encampments around the area to ensure their hold on the central quarter... it still raises some questions but honestly it makes a lot more sense... but if not and they really decided to camp out like one big happy family all together, then don’t even get me started on the possibility that the camp was stationed somewhere around here:

because doing that doesn’t have a single lick of sense omfg especially tactics-wise haha... that’s like... why would you do that... you’re wasting all your advantages... o h  b o y... so you bet when i remembered that mc + loki had to pass by a forest to get back to the encampment + encountered ray & some disciples i was like... u m m... why???? if technically the reds took hold of the whole central quarter area then it actually isn’t necessary to skulk around in the forest?????? yes yes i know safety precautions + avoiding detection but... dood... it’s safer to walk in claimed territory rather than the unstable one ahaha...

plus the thing about the black bridge... uh... it's just said in the route that lancelot handles it through magic and that's all. but when i thought back on it oh my god... what did he do??????? how is he still standing??? how much of his lifespan did he shave off just to salvage that situation??????????? how is the poor boi alive?????????? the whole fucking bridge literally falls apart and that's a whole lot of chaos and people and AHHHHH!?!?!¿¿¿¿ if ur gonna make the bridge collapse (good thing they didn't think of disintegrate) it probably cost the magic tower a hefty amount but get rekt lancelot still saves the fucking day, what a king - he's practically got one foot in the grave already... this dood, seriously ಥ_ಥ

there were other things i noticed in the process of writing this based on the route events but i was like fuck it, let’s think on that another day and leave it as it is (┛ಠДಠ)┛彡┻━┻ ily kyle but oh no my brain started reprocessing the other details of ur route

thinking about all that also made me think of other more stuff, like cradle economy + livelihood haha;; it’s stated in edgar’s route (well... it’s actually pretty obvious in other routes too) that the reds are richer than the blacks, so i went ahead and assumed that the former engages in something more lucrative like mining -> jewerly / raw material / mineral trade, while for the latter something more wholesome like agriculture. idk, it works. even moreso that the reds give off the whole nobility vibe while the blacks are simple and casual. even the bg screens of the red & black streets are polarizing.

then i also went over the rest of the chosen thirteen... while the reds show no obvious weapon variety (see: swords), i’d like to believe that they’re taught to be versatile enough no matter what the situation. plus, since they have the funding, i'd like to think they're skilled in magic manipulation, too. meanwhile the black army shows weapon variety, and i’d like to think that it’s because most of their recruits aren’t soldiers in the first place: they’re farmhands / hunters / village people turned soldiers, and it’s actually easier to let them go with what they know first before encouraging them or asking them to learn something new. thus axes and spears and possible unconventional stuff like caltrops.

crimson glory

one of the things i realized was in kyle’s route, mc isn’t exactly so buddy-buddy with the red crew in comparison to other routes. she gets minimal interactions with the four, and zero aside her relationships with the top three are rather... tense.

zero was the other red officer i was initially going to add aside from edgar & kyle, but i added all of them anyway. while they don't appear all together, all of them have scenes together with edgar.

the first edgar & jonah scene shows an obvious contrast - while he's being incredibly critical about it, jonah shows actual concern for the living situations in black army territory. on the other hand, edgar chooses to tease him about it, his joking more or less implying that he isn't that concerned / bothered about it at all. the game touches up on this sometimes, often with edgar commenting on how noble jonah is while jonah shows obvious distaste for edgar's callousness.

still, they work well together. personally i'm amused with a hc of mine that looking at how edgar fights / acts only spurs jonah to act more honorably while for edgar, being exposed to jonah's noble-ness more or less makes him curious to try being honorable from time to time lol. that still doesn't stop anyone from calling him the gentle demon tho ( ⚆ _ ⚆ )

tbh since edgar is obviously sneaky on other routes i wouldn't put it past him to casually pressure lancelot to tell him wtf's going on with this war when he gets the inkling that something's wrong. edgar goes about this subtly not-so-subtly and in the most polite manner possible. lancelot knows him far too well to take bait tho - he makes sure to speak carefully since he's probably knows that edgar's going to pick apart at his words for meanings + implications, so it more or less leaves edgar a bit frustrated since it's clear that lancelot won't tell him much. still, edgar knows when not to cross the line - even he's not so keen on getting on lancelot's bad side.

that aside, i'd like to think that edgar respects lancelot a lot as a person + commander enough that he'd truly risk his life for him on instinct like a true soldier would. while i think i could've done more on writing the gravity of the collapsing bridge scene, i liked the last bit where edgar + zero immediately worried for lancelot.

let's be honest here tho in some way or another all of the reds chosen worry about their king bc bruh... let us in bruh...

the scenes of zero & edgar in the end are also my favorite! it isn’t much, but enjoyed writing their relationship briefly. tbh i think edgar is one of those people under the sleep = most vulnerable = death thinking (no thanks to claudius), so the fact that he allows himself to drift to sleep twice in zero's company is a definite sign of trust. then again, he's injured but still ( ᐛ )و

edgar, idike, kyle

y’know even if this is an edgar/mc thing, i found fleshing out the kyle/mc relationship equally important which i presented in scene three. personally speaking, i’d like to think that if ever kyle didn’t fall in love with mc (on his own route???) he’d still be watching over her anyway since her struggle in the medical field + war reminds him a bit of his younger self after his brother's death.

which is why he doesn't intervene with that one soldier scene - he doesn't coddle her either when she goes into a brief shock. perhaps it's bc he knows so well what she's going through, he decides to let her handle it on her own. this was her experience, not his. and to be fair, she asked to go to the front lines determined but wholly unprepared emotionally. he tried warning her, she wouldn’t listen. now she faces the consequences - how would she go about it?

i decided to slap a name into mc this time to highlight the trust plot: idk if i got it clearly across in the fic, but in times of war + for someone who’s been trained to be suspicious / cautious of everyone like edgar; secrets are a surefire way to catch attention + breed distrust.

tbh he's hella aware that the secret around her name is most likely personal and nothing dangerous, but it's better safe than sorry - by making sure she understands that keeping secrets wouldn't be of any good to her + situation, he gets reassurance that she really is harmless. how bad + seriously she takes it honestly surprises him tho, but then again she's been going through other stuff too so it all piled up.

idike isn’t my in-game name, but it’s the given name i spoke of in this ask, haha! initially scene five has her saying her full name (with surname), but i thought it would be more fitting if i didn’t lol ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

i tried to incorporate a mix of the personalities of edgar’s!mc + kyle’s!mc onto idike, tho at first i was only shooting for the latter - i think it kinda works??? while somewhat composed and determined (kyle’s), she still shows some naivete in her (edgar’s), especially concerning the ways of war + how secrecy & trust work in times of war.

i found emphasizing on her emotional struggle important, since it should be a big blow for her who’s never known the terror of war. the game touches upon on it a bit (tho it's post-med tent scenes) and i wanted to expand on it further since there are so many possible angles to go about it.

the i can’t heal you if you’re dead line sounds like something like shiro emiya might say but lol no i just remembered this p3 manga panel (pg 24) - its been years since i read it and i still love that line and i integrated it here... i was trying to expand that one scene for a while but then i just left it as it is.

in the catharsis scene where idike airs out everything, the fact that edgar fails to empathize with her + focuses more on her emotional state rather than offering actual help (advice maybe, but i honestly doubt he’d do that) reflects that he's still looking at her as an interesting creature and not her as a person. part 5 hints that this may be slowly changing, seeing as he called for her all of a sudden.

... idike probably keeps edgar’s glove as a token of friendship or smth haha ooPSSS i forgot to bring that back ahahaha..... ヘ（。□°）ヘ

ooofff i guess that’s all i have??? a big thank you to whoever read both hot messes™ and by that the fic + commentary itself!!! do feel free to hit the inbox for any comments + questions + more brainstorming + general screaming haha! ( ´ ▽ ` )ﾉ

[ofhoneyandrosepetals]

We Move Lightly - Chapter 7

Pairing: Modern!Ivar x reader

Description: Y/N moved back in with her parents, after 7 years of taking care of her grandparents in another town. She had no idea how her neighbors would be, or who would they be, or even that she would fall in love with one of them.

Warnings: swearings and fluff. Nothing to worry about.

Word count: 2.193

A/N: due to Tumblr’s links problems, I’m not going to put here the link for previous chapters, masterlist and my ask (which my inbox happens to be OPEN for requests) but you all can keep up with the link for my masterlist in my bio! Just a catch up on the fic. Y/L/N stands for “your last name”, as you already may know.

It was one week since Amy left and you were already feeling lonely. You haven’t seen Ivar either, even though you text each other all the time. He was super busy with his last projects before summer vacations hit and he could get some free time, since Floki was about to travel with his wife. He was finishing some essays as well as you helped him over the phone.

And that was the fun part, you thought: you live right beside each other, but sometimes it wouldn’t look like that at all. How are the chances to not see your neighbor, even from the window? Not that you actually tried to do that; you liked to play, not looking for him from your window, otherwise it wouldn’t be so fun. You thought that, maybe, if you see each other all the time, soon enough it would get boring and… and well, it would end.

And do you wanted that? Of course not, but that was your opinion and you had no idea what Ivar’s thoughts were.

You tried to do something different that morning - you tried to call him.

He wasn’t picking.

It was being quite a pain in the ass when your classes were already finished and he still had his - plus his intern.

You waited patiently. Noon arrived - and nothing.

How are things doing?, you texted him, but still nothing.

In the afternoon you were bored, bored and more bored. You missed that sweet and constant presence of Amy and you really wanted to see Ivar - you were already missing all his features, manners, voice, laugh, every little detail, and audios and phone calls and his profile picture weren’t doing any justice as he was in person.

And that’s why that you, finally, had the guts to knock on his door - without a plate of brownies, but you hoped that your cutest blouse and smile would do.

Aslaug answered.

“Hi Y/N, what can I do for you?”

“Hey Aslaug, is… is Ivar home?”

“Ivar? Oh… no, he… Ubbe drove him to the doctor, he had an appointment.”

“An appointment? Is everything alright?”

“Yes, everything’s fine,” she waved her hand. “It wasn’t a scheduled appointment, but everything’s fine. Do you want to come inside and wait for him?��� She cracked more the door open, but you shook your head.

“No, thank you, actually… I think I’ll wait here. Air’s good.”

“You could wait at the backyard.”

“Here’s fine, thank you, Mrs. Lothbrok.”

Aslaug gave you a sweet smile and gently closed the door.

An appointment with the doctor. That wasn’t an uncommon thing for Ivar, given his legs’ situation, but you still were worried. What if something serious happened? Aslaug even said that it wasn’t a scheduled appointment, so something probably happened.

You sat on the doorsteps, hugging your knees while scrolling your phone, looking for something to pass the time. You found a paper on Shakespeare that got your attention, and so you went for it.

*

Two hours had passed when you heard a car approaching. It was a dark silver SUV, and it parked in front of the house. You bit your lips. Ubbe got out of the driver side and waved at you, all smiles. He went for the car trunk and got from there a wheelchair.  Your heart stopped briefly before pounding against your chest.

You didn’t know Ivar for so long, okay, but during that time you never saw him in a wheelchair, so you didn’t know if it was a normal thing or if something bad had happened. You couldn’t see Ivar inside the car and you didn’t want him to see the expression on your face, but you couldn’t hide it. Ubbe, before opening the passenger door, showed you a thumbs up, probably wanting to tell you that everything was okay. You took a deep breath and tried not to look at Ivar as he was helped by Ubbe to sit on the wheelchair. You saw that he was standing and moving his legs towards the wheelchair, so you got that as a good sign. He grunted.

“Goddamnit.”

“Sorry, lil’ bro.”

You looked at Ivar.

And you couldn’t tell his expression. He was unreadable. As he was coming closer his features changed from unreadable to a sweet smile, filling those plump lips of him.

“Hey Y/N, I saw you called but my phone died,” you waved your hand dismissively. “Is everything alright?”

“Yeah, I was just… super bored and… and then I came here but you weren’t…”

“I was at the doc.”

“Your mom told me,” don’t ask if he’s okay, don’t ask if everything’s alright, just don’t ask. “So, is everything…?” Ivar raised an eyebrow. “Do you want to… I don’t know, hang?” He laughed airly.

“Hang? Yeah, alright, bored girl. Let me just change, okay? Meet me at the backyard.”

You bit your lips and nodded.

“Hey,” Ubbe whispered at you. “If he says anything that’s… that doesn’t sound good, just don’t listen to him, okay? Experience, trust me.”

*

Before Ivar could come down to the backyard, you heard a noise of something breaking. You couldn’t tell if it was Aslaug or Ubbe at the kitchen or if the owner of the breaking was Ivar.

You were finishing to read that Shakespeare paper when he arrived.

“Whatcha reading there?”

You were sat by the big tree, the one that Ivar told you the Yggdrasil story, and he put himself right beside you, near the big roots.

“It’s just a paper on Shakespeare that I found - nothing big, pretty simple.”

“So you like Shakespeare?” You nodded. “How come I never knew that?” He said with half a smile, tilting his head. You shrugged.

“I don’t think that the subject ever came up.”

“But a lot of subjects came up.”

“Just not Shakespeare.”

“Just not him, yes,” Ivar took a deep breath and looked up at the sky. “I wish it was autumn,” he said closing his eyes as he felt the sunburn in his skin.

“Why’s that?”

“The leaves are prettier in autumn. Not that I like autumn or winter - I don’t. It’s too cold and this is bad for my bones, my legs hurt a lot. But I wish it was autumn.”

“You look like a cold person,” you said innocently.

“A cold person?” You could see a cocky smile growing on his lips. “But not a hot person?”

“What?” You said laughing at his silly face.

“Tell me, Y/N, that you don’t find me a hot person.”

“It’s not what I meant,” you said between laughs.

“Oh, it not what you meant?” He raised his eyebrows. “So explain to me why I’m not a hot person, but a cold person.”

“Oh god,” you covered your face. “It’s not what I meant, Ivar, it’s not… You just look like someone who enjoys the cold weather more than the hot one.”

“Why would someone who’s hot enjoy a cold weather? It wouldn’t work,” he said with a thinking tone and an expression of someone who’s trying to discover a new formula.

“Oh, shut up,” you said laughing and he laughed back. You were staring at each other as silence took place.

“I have to tell you something,” he said seriously. You nodded. “What happened today… It’s nothing, okay? I know you never saw me in a wheelchair before, but it’s only because I try to make a lot of effort to not use it around you. Me and this asshole,” he tapped his wheelchair “we’re very known friends. Being summer I thought that maybe my legs wouldn’t hurt that much, but today was an exception. I woke up in so much pain, I had to go see the doctor, it wasn’t normal.”

“If it wasn’t normal, how come it’s nothing?” You asked lowly.

“It’s just a normal pain, probably hit me because I’m too tired and working too much, I don’t know. But it’s nothing, Y/N, there’s nothing for you to worry about.”

“Okay,” you got closer to him.

“But it will always be like that.” You frowned at him, not completely understanding what he meant. “I… will always be like that. There’s no getting better, only getting worse or being stuck. I’ll never get better, Y/N. My legs will always be like that - some days working, not at its fully, and sometimes I will need my crutch, or my cane, or even my wheelchair. And those will be the most days. The days when I walk freely? Those are rare.”

“I’m not quite following where you want to get, Ivar,” you were searching his face, trying to find any hint.

“It’s not that I’m a grenade,” he closed his eyes. “But I’ll always be stuck, and I don’t know where we gonna get, you and me. I’ll never be able to spin you around, high up the sky, or to climb trees with you, or to practice any stupid sports together; I’ll never be able to run with you, to bike with you, anything,” he bit his lips. “We wouldn’t be a normal couple.”

“Who said so?” You said gently, getting his hand on your own while you sat on your ankles to level the height. He opened his eyes to find yours. “What makes you think that I want to be spun around up the sky or to climb trees? I’m terrified of height. Who told you that I wanna practice stupid sports with you if, well, you said it already: they’re stupid? I don’t like to run and I don’t even know how to ride a bicycle,” Ivar frowned.

“You don’t know how to ride a bike?” You laughed.

“Okay, that one was a lie. But who said, Ivar Lothbrok, that we’re not going to be a normal couple? What is a normal couple, actually? Do you want to be one? One normal boring couple?” He looked down the grass, shyly.

“No,” he murmured.

“Me neither. And I don’t know as much as you where we heading from here, but one thing I know: there is nothing, Ivar, nothing… that will make me give up. I just like you a lot, Ivar Lothbrok. What can I do?” You shrugged. “And so what that your legs aren’t perfect? You remain to be yourself, and that’s the Ivar I like.”

You could see his chest going up and down, you could hear his breath. His lips were slightly open and all you wanted was to lock yours on his.

“If you think that your legs are a problem, and if you think that I think that, then don’t you think that I wouldn’t have already dumped your ass and run to your eyebrowless brother’s arms?” Ivar laughed, closing his eyes.

“Oh Gods, you didn’t say that.”

“I did.”

“You just ruined the whole thing.”

“The whole thing?”

“Yeah, the whole thing.”

“Oh boy,” you said in a whining mocking tone.

“I really want to kiss you, Y/N,” Ivar said.

“Okay.”

You leaned towards him, slowly. The tip of your noses touched, Ivar brushing his against yours. Your lips touched and he pecked yours gently, holding your cheek. He pulled you to him, making you sit on his lap to level the height.

“Your legs,” you said against his lips.

“You could never hurt them,” he helped you to adjust yourself on top of him.

His hands were firmly gripping your waist as your fingers were tangled on his long and loose hair.

You missed this.

You missed his lips.

You missed his tongue.

You missed his kiss.

You missed his hands.

You missed his touch.

You missed Ivar.

One week and you already missed him.

You two broke apart to catch some air.

“Are you sure your legs are okay?” You asked him. He nodded. “I just missed this, you know?”

“You did?” You nodded. “Well, next week we’ll have the whole summer to work on that. I even dare to say that you’ll be bored,” you laughed.

“You could never bore me.”

“Never?”

“Never.”

“Never say never, Y/L/N. But really, it’s not you, I promise to all the Gods, my legs were already hurting, so…”

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” you got out of his lap quickly. “I’m so sorry, Ivar.”

“That’s okay, it wasn’t your fault. What do you tell me about some boring movies?”

“Boring movies? My favorite,” you said smiling.

You and Ivar headed inside the house to the TV room, where not only you two watched boring movies, but Ubbe tagged along as well.

You couldn’t say that you three “watched movies”, so much Ubbe was talking about Amy. You smiled at his sweetness and raised an eyebrow to Ivar. You talked with him about it. Someone has to tell him. Ubbe was falling pretty hard for Amy while she… well, while she wasn’t, simple as this.

Every time Ubbe left to grab some snacks, you and Ivar kept a strong eye contact game, until Ubbe came back and someone had to break it, which was always you.

You slept good that night, dreaming about Ivar and his lips.

Taglist:  @mblaqgi @akamaiden @dangerousvikings @oddsnendsfanfics @deepdarkred @irishhiggins @tinypuppysoul @kingbouji3 @i-war-s-boner @capitanostella @loothbrok @noaor @thehuntress26 @sassymcgonagal1651 @hoodirwin5 @attorneyl @collecting-stories @certainobservationwasteland @dreams-in-different-colours @3x5gurl @readsalot73 @thisisparadisemylove @action-adventure-and-cheesecake @titty-teetee @cutiedaij @austenkingmylady @ivarthesweetheart @golden-pickaxe @lokis-sunflower-anna @bill-istvan @cynthianokamaria @slut4hazeleyes @chinduda @hallowed-heathen @cherryblossombaby69 @paintballkid711

[pulitzerpanther]

You have a verse where Adam dies but is still The Cat Grant we all know and love? How would she not be sad of it?

“I’ve thought on this question for a long time,” 

The typeface of an article hangs underneath a bold headlined Ask Kitty, spread in the margins of The Daily Planet’s cornerstone piece. Ask Kitty is billed as a staple for reading, every week’s addition full of jibe comments and flippant, but poignant insight regarding the week’s events. Self-claimed as the bridge between the house wife and working woman’s interest piece, Cat Grant rarely dives into her personal life for anything but a diatribe, or two–thinly veiled references attempting to create the illusion of connection with her readers, given the rarity of Cat Grant connecting with anyone but the few stubborn souls who would allow anything but. 

Today, her words seem to be full of self-reflection and an accommodating understanding, a rarity in the articles:

“For everyone looking for your daily dose of sass and sarcasm, you’ll likely find this week’s article similar to how I find my ex-husband: lacking and short; but I felt like this question was equal parts important and annoying. The sort of annoyingly important thing that stays with me even when I’m trying to clear out my morning Inbox or drink my fifteenth-cup of afternoon coffee. The sort of pressing, writhing thing that wouldn’t sit still or quiet even during long silences at my therapy sessions, or during one of Perry White’s boring, cricket-chirping speeches hoping (and inevitably failing) to invigorate the motley crew of jaded insomniacs on his payroll. So here I am, answering your question because you’ve annoyed me. And, worse, you’ve made me introspective. But note my word-choice: annoyed. Not angry.

I suppose I could be angry at you for implying that a mother has no right to move on after the loss of her child, but there’s a truth to the question. Or at least the feeling of truth, veiled guilt that all of us ask ourselves after loss: should we move on? Do we move on? Is there something offensive in being happy, when all you should be for the rest of your life is overbearingly sad? This is more than just how society sees you. Or, more aptly, how society sees me. Because, of course, when a woman loses a partner you’re labeled a widow–you become something else, shifted and changed, pushed into the future unprepared and irrevocably different. But what does a woman become when she loses a child? 

She’s always a mother, a man is always a father, there’s no other label smeared over you like a badge of dishonor. You’re irrevocably changed but you’re certainly not propelled into the future like a widow might be. No one is trying to set you up for another child like I’ve seen friends do for widows after a few months (stop trying to push people past their grief in a timely manner that you see fit, you idiots). No one stops you during holidays and points at your niece or nephew and whispers like some conspiring secret, your parental wingman: ‘Well, I know it’s not your son, but don’t you think it’s time for a new one? Look at that one, it’s almost close enough if you squint’. No, not for a parent. Society will always label you as what you were in the past, and what you still are to this day: incomplete. A parent with a title without a reason to have it. It might imply that it’s a heinous crime to move on, but that’s another argument for another day, isn’t it? Which, for the record, so is policing anyone’s grief. It’s another article, another time, another anthill to scream on top of like a Republican who claims to want to see evidence for every email correspondence but the ones in their own party.

No, let’s go back to you.

To equate all grief as if it’s the same like some mansplaining boss who looks down at his secretary (who is only ever a set of leg) and claims that all office experiences are the same would be more offensive than anything else I could ever print. All grief is different. All grief is painful. All grief is personal. But, there are some things that are universal.

Your question implies that grief stops someone’s life in its tracks permanently and, oh, it might feel that way. For a time. Grief is a journey–a treacherous one. We trip and stumble and fall along the way, the edges of the mountain we’re all climbing are sharp and cutting. We’ll go up highs and lows, have near-falls and misses, and everyone will one day face crumbling rocks far deeper and more fragile than we ever prepared ourselves for. Maybe not all of us will lose a child, I hope that’s true, but all of us will lose someone. A friend, a lover, a child, a parent. And at the end of the day, even with all of our mountains being different climbs and different paths–different heights but all difficult–we’re all universally left with one unfortunate thought at the end of it: 

Life goes on. 

The silence filled with them becomes a part of your day. And then that part of them that’s silent is filled in with life. It becomes filled with other people’s voices, whether you’re ready for it to, or not (you’ll never be ready for it). The world keeps going. You still have bills. You still have a career, or a family, or a place in the world that suddenly doesn’t seem nearly as important as it was, before, but it is still important. You start to grow, and heal, and become a different person, and the pieces filled with them are still there, they’re just different than before. They’re not them, but the you that’s become you without them. Life goes on, and loss is a part of life, not the end of it. We live on for the ones we lost, not despite them.

We climb because that’s simply what people on mountains do.

Sadness, happiness, they’re not roadblocks–they’re cycles. Those crumbling rocks aren’t our down-fall–they’re our handholds. They’re the fragments of a much larger piece of rock for all of us to overcome, the sturdy places we all must learn how to hold on to in order to triumph and ascend. The knowledge we take with us to show other people behind us how to climb their own paths. 

‘Life, although it may only be an accumulation of anguish, is dear to me, and I will defend it.’

Yes, I just quoted Frankenstein. Yes, all of you who want to feel a kinship for some gothic 1800′s Wednesday Adams can pat yourself on the back for guessing right. Congratulations, all the rest of us were forced to read it, too. Focus on the quote. It sounds a little macabre, doesn’t it? It’s not. It’s perseverance. 

Life is a series of ups and downs–life does go on after losing the people we love–and there will be more grief, and worse grief, than anyone can ever be prepared for. But there’s something beautiful and important in the act of going on, anyways. There’s something beautiful in reminding people to do the same.

I miss my son every day. 

But I’ll still keep climbing my mountain and you’ll still keep climbing yours and we’ll all keep going up, up, and away because it’s simply what people on mountains do. And if there’s someone who stumbles up a different path behind me and I can reach out to them and show them how to climb it, well…maybe it’s a little pompous of me. Presumptuous. But I’ll offer a hand, just the same. A piece of advise to everyone out there who was, and will, and is going through grief:

Whether or not you let your sadness overwhelm you while dealing with grief isn’t a question anyone else can answer for you–or anything they can judge–because it’s your mountain, and yours alone. Be sad. Be happy. Be whatever it is you are and were and will be: these are the moments of life where you learn who you are, and learn who you will be. The choices you make today and the way you climb can never be wrong as long as you keep climbing. And maybe someday, you’ll offer the hand behind you to someone else and what them climb higher than you could have ever dreamed. 

Dare to climb and just know, even if you’re on your own path, you’re not climbing alone.

-xoxo

Cat Grant.