#oh they gonna LOVE my large wooden shack

[shadowhaert]

me logging on to fallout 4 only to spend the next few hours treating it like Building Simulator

[sadguy031109]

Shrek x Reader

It was a stormy night, you had just run away from your family. When they found out you've been secretly dating an ogre, all hell broke loose.

What are you gonna do when you have to get married? You can't marry an ogre!

The harsh words still stung, still sinking in, like a blade that has yet to cut, but pressed into skin enough to hurt. You continued to walk in the rain, you're thin cloak getting soaked by the falling water. You pulled the hood of your cloak over you're head, providing little protection. You started to walk faster and faster until you're pace had reached a sprint.

You knew where you were going without a doubt in your mind. You were running to a certain ogre's swamp.

Within a matter of minutes, you reached the swamp of the one and only Shrek. You walked up to the old wooden door and slowly knocked. Shrek opened the door quickly, a rage burning in his eyes, that no one would be able to see except you. His eyes immediately softened upon seeing you.

"Y/N? What are you doing here? It's too cold to be outside" the green ogre said in a slight panicked tone, being concered for his lover.

"M-my parents, they-they found out a-about us" You said, rain and salty tears pouring down your face.

He rushed you inside the cozy, house like shack, careful to not hurt you with his strength. "Go sit over there" Shrek called over his shoulder, going into the kitchen to make a kettle of tea for you. You followed his instructions, going to sit on the familiar couch that you've sat on many times, the thought of some of the things done on that couch brought a heavy blush to your cheeks.

You sat in silence for a few minutes, basking in your own thoughts, the memories of not even an hour prior, bringing tears to your eyes

"What's wrong my little onion?" Shrek questioned, seeing the tears in your eyes "Oh it's nothing to worry about, I was just thinking" you responded, quickly wiping the tears from your eyes, as to not worry him.  "Oh okay" Shrek said, not wanting to pressure you into talking.

He calmly handed you a cup of tea, your shaky hands grasping the cup tightly before taking a small sip.

The tea quickly calmed your nerves, while Shrek raked a green hand through your hair soothingly. You leaned your head on his large shoulder. "You tired?" Shrek asked calmly. You nodded your head slowly, eyes fighting to stay open. He picked you up bridal style with no question, bringing you into his bedroom. He set you down gently, making sure you're comfortable before laying down next to you, putting his arms around your waist.

"Good night my little onion, I love you"

I was laughing the entire time while writing this—

[introvert-no-chameleon]

Of Monsters and McGuckets

Fiddleford just wanted to have his morning coffee in peace, but Gravity Falls and the Stan brothers had other plans.

AO3

Fiddleford Hardon McGucket considered himself to be a patient, level-headed individual. One had to be if they ever hoped to survive Gravity Falls, and, even more daunting, live with Stanford and Stanley Pines. Keeping them in line was an occupation in itself. His co-workers were two of the most chaotic and morally questionable people he’d ever met in his life. (Then again, as someone who had once made a giant robot to terrorize his ex-wife in an admittedly misguided attempt to get her back, maybe he shouldn’t be throwing stones in that last department).

The point is, when it came to dealing with uncommon and frustrating situations, he usually managed to keep a straight head. But on one deceivingly lovely morning, just when he’d went out to the porch to sit back with a nice cup of coffee and the sun had just begun to kiss the horizon, he saw two large monsters sprinting towards the shack, and. Well.

It was only reasonable that he’d react the way he did.

The first thing he did was spit out his early-morning coffee, ruining his only clean tie in the process. The second thing he did was dash into the shack like the Devil Himself was on his heels. Lastly, he slammed the door shut, locked it, and began combing the living room for the shotgun he knew for a fact Stanley kept around. He thanked the Lord Stanford wasn’t here, lest he’d be chastising Fiddleford for “harming” (defending himself against) a perfectly healthy specimen. Never mind the fact that half of these subjects of study had tried to eat him, no sir. Scientific discovery was always more important.

(Sometimes, Fiddleford wondered how on God’s green earth Stanford Pines hadn’t fallen to his death into a ravine or some other nonsense in pursuit of an anomaly. Heaven knows the man, while undeniably brilliant, was severely lacking when it came to common sense).

A bang rattled the wooden door of the shack. Fiddleford yelped, dropping the pile of books he’d been in the process of moving in his scramble to find the gun. He eyed the secret lab entrance and wondered if the door would hold them back long enough for him to make a dash for it.

“Fidds, we saw you run in, will ya just open the door?”

Fiddleford froze. That voice, while even more gravelly than usual (a thing he hadn’t thought possible) was definitely familiar.

“Well butter my butt and call me a biscuit,” he said, dazed, as he walked over to the door and unlocked it. “Stanley?”

Upon closer inspection, he couldn’t deny that the square-jawed face that peered down at him belonged to Stanley Pines. There were some…notable…differences, such as the fact that he had glowing orbs for eyes, all his featured seemed to be carved from stone, he had ridiculous pointy ears and fangs to boot. He’d be right at home next to the gargoyles from those pictures of cathedrals he’d studied for his History of Western Art course.

“Took ya long enough,” said Stanley, ducking his head under the doorway and lumbering inside. Each step made the floorboard groan loudly, and for a few seconds Fiddleford thought the man would break through the wood floor. “Thought we’d never get back.”

“Stanferd, do ya have…fur?” said Fiddleford, stepping away from the door to let the other man in.

Stanford—it couldn’t be anyone else, not with that straight-backed posture and furrowed brow peering over thick-rimmed glasses—walked in behind him, hands behind his back.

 Hearing the question, Stanford adjusted his glasses, with a large, six-fingered paw. His facial features were lion-esque, as was his entire body, save from the colorful green, blue and red feathered wings that trailed behind his body. He even had a cute little lion tail poking out from a hole in his pants. “It appears so, yes.” He cleared his throat. “We may have a…problem.”

Stanley, who had gone to the fridge to get a beer, came back glaring at Stanford with those bright yellow orbs. “No shit, Sixer. I hadn’t fucking noticed.”

Stanford’s ears flattened against his skull. Fiddleford would’ve found it amusing if Stanford wasn’t now 7 feet tall and didn’t have large, sharp teeth. “Language, Stanley.”

Fiddleford considered grabbing some alcohol as he took in the situation. After a few attempts at forming words, he finally settled for the question he found himself asking on a near-daily basis. “What in tarnation did ya two get yerselves mixed up in now?”

“Oi, don’t look at me,” said Stan. He jerked his clawed thumb at Stanford. “Mr. Science here was the one who just had to walk right into a mysterious, glowing lake that he almost drowned in.”

Stanford’s tail twitched, and he growled. “We almost drowned, Stanley, because you turned into 300 pounds of moving stone.”

“I was only in the lake because you started flailing around growing a tail and screamin’ for help!”

Ford sniffed, chin held up in that way it got whenever he’d start getting defensive. “Swimming with wings is incredibly difficult.”

“Yeah, I would know, I have them now.” Stanley stretched out his bat-like wings for emphasis.

Judging by Stanford’s bloodshot eyes and Stanley’s slouched posture, along with the fact that they seemed even more short with each other than usual, Fiddleford guessed that they’d been arguing on and off about this for a while. He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Now see right here, the two of ya best calm down, you’ll tear the shack apart if you start fighting bein’ like this.”

The two of them, while far from calm, quieted down.

“Right,” said Fiddleford. “So ya discovered some magic water that turns folks into monsters?”

“Yup,” said Stanley. “We found it in some hidden path behind some bushes and a couple of boulders.”

It’s almost as if it was hidden away for a reason. “Did ya at least remember where the path is?”

“Of course,” said Stanford, having the audacity to look indignant. “What do you take me for?”

“An idiot who got us turned into two walking Summerween costumes because he couldn’t just collect the water in a cup and some gloves like a normal scientist?” said Stanley.

“As if you would know what a “normal” scientist does,” said Stanford, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Alright, fellas. Let me just get some food in me and then we can go back out and get some samples,” said Fiddleford. “I need me some caffeine to deal with this.”

Stanford opened his mouth but Fiddleford stopped him with the same withering glare he’d give his son whenever he tried to step out of line. “Stanferd Pines, if ya think I’m gonna run around the woods with the two of you, in this here state, on an empty stomach, yer sorely mistaken.”

“Fidds has got a point,” said Stan. “You probably haven’t had anything other than that piece of toast since you woke up.”

“I suppose some food wouldn’t hurt…” said Stanford. “I did have an incredibly strong urge to maul a deer we spotted on the way over.”

Fiddleford was getting some bacon out of the fridge when he heard the end of the sentence. He straightened up and slammed the door with more force than strictly necessary. “Y-ya did?”

Stanford seemed to come to the same conclusion Fiddleford had, because he raised his paws up. “Oh, n-no, rest assured. I don’t have any inclination to eat you.”

“Thank the Lord…”

“After all,” said Stanford, rubbing his chin. “According to mythology, sphinxes only consume humans if they are unfortunate enough not to know the answers to their riddles.”

“Don’t I feel better,” said Fiddleford, voice dripping with sarcasm. “Do ya reckon ya can still have some bacon and eggs?”

“Yes, that’ll do,” he said. “Oh! I must write down our findings in my journal. Now, where did I put it…” Stanford went up the stairs, muttering to himself the entire way.

“Ya know, he actually started running on all fours at least twice on the way over.” Stan grinned through another sip of beer. “was the funniest thing I’ve seen all week.”

Fiddleford sighed. That would explain the fighting. He rolled his eyes as he saw Stanley reach in the fridge for another can and shut it before he could. “Stanley Pines, it is 8 o’clock in the morning.”

“Ooh,” Stanley raised his eyebrows. “Two last names in less than five minutes, it’s a new record.”

“Stanley.”

Stanley pouted, and even with his new…physical features, Fiddleford still found it endearing. “Aw, come onnnn, Fids, I’m emotionally distressed!”

“Yer no such thing.” He smiled a soon as back turned to the other man. He took out their skillet and placed it on the stove.

“Y’know, I gotta hand it to ya. You’ve gotten a lot more assertive since we’ve met, it’s kinda hot.”

“Yer flattery will not sway me into lettin’ ya get another drink.”

Stanley laughed behind him. “Yeah, yeah. I’m still bein’ serious. Ford didn’t even try to fight you about getting breakfast. If it was me, he’d be yelling at me by now about how we were wastin’ time and crap.”

“It doesn’t take much for the two of ya to get at each other’s necks.” Fiddleford cracked an egg on the edge of the skillet. Anyhow, that’s because he’s hiding away scribblin’ field notes. The moment he’s done, he’ll be tryin’ to drag us on out of here.”

“Eh, true.”

For a moment, the eggs sizzling and snapping on the pan filled the warm silence. His stomach grumbled as the savory smell of cooking food reached him. “Stanley, can ya hand me the coffeepot?”

The floorboards creaked behind Fiddleford. A shadow loomed over him. “Stanley?”

“…You’re not, uh, scared of me or nothin’?” Stanley’s voice had gotten so quiet Fiddleford had hardly heard him.

Fiddleford glanced back at Stanley, who despite his size was hunched over, looking mighty small for someone who was now a literal boulder.

“Why on earth would I be?”

Stanley blinked meekly. He gestured towards his entire body. “Uh…’cause I look like this?”

Ah. He did try to threaten them with a shotgun. Some of the unease he’d gotten rid of returned, but he tried his best not to show it. He swallowed down his fear as best as he could. “Should I be?”

Stanley frowned. “Eh, I mean, I feel different, but not in a “eat somebody” kinda way. I do have a very strong urge to perch on the roof and attack pigeons.”

“Fascinating.” Even without his caffeine, his scientific curiosity was finally starting to get the best of him. “Well, gargoyles are known as guardians meant to ward against evil. Perhaps you’ve developed some sorta protective instinct…”

He stopped mid-ramble. Even without eyes to speak of, Fiddleford could tell Stanley was avoiding his gaze.  

Fiddleford brought his hand to Stanley’s cheek. It felt warm, to his surprise, like rock that had baked under the afternoon sun. Stanley peeked up at him. “Darlin’, the only thing I’m afraid of is the damage you’ll cause around the lab if we don’t turn ya back. Yer like a bull in a china closet as it is.”

Stanley chuckled, leaning into Fiddleford’s touch. “Somebody has ta make things interesting around here.”

Something crashed overhead, quickly followed by a string of curses. A series of heavy objects thumped against the wood overhead.

“I’m alright!” called Stanford’s voice. “I simply knocked a bookshelf over my person, but this new form is surprisingly durable!”

“Things are interestin’ enough as it is,” said Fiddleford, his brief moment of curiosity gone as soon as it came. “Where in tarnation is the coffeepot?”

“Relax, Fiddlenerd, I’ll make ya a fresh one.” He went over by his side, giving him a playful shove that sent Fiddleford to the ground. “…Oops. Sorry, uh, forgot about the whole…stone thing.”

Fiddleford glowered up at his boyfriend, taking his hand as he helped Fiddleford back up. “Yer lucky a got a soft spot fer ya, else I’d be mighty cross.”

Stanly gave him the gentlest peck on the top of Fiddleford’s head. “Once I have my human body back, I’ll make it up to ya.”

Stanley gave him a cup of his precious lifeblood, black with two sugars, just as he liked it. Smirking, Fiddleford took a sip, getting warmed by more than just the coffee. “I’ll hold ya to that.”

*

Somebody please give Fiddleford a raise. 

Comment on what monster you all think Fidds should be, and I may do a second part. I've read some people make him a scarecrow, and I considered making him a centaur.

[esperwatchesfilms]

Planet Terror (2007)

All right. This one I saw once before, long ago, when I was about 19 or so. But I’m learning fun new facts about it today, and I honestly don’t remember a lot of it, so it’ll feel kind of new.

IMDB Fun Fact: While on set, Robert Rodriguez would play the soundtracks from Escape from New York (1981) and The Thing (1982) to set the mood for the movie. I really love all the connections to other films I’ve been watching. Connection is lovely, and it just sort of makes me happy. None of these films exist in a vacuum. We are always pulling inspiration from each other, and I think that’s kind of the most beautiful thing about film... about art, generally speaking, honestly.

Kill Count Fact: Total body count of Planet Terror (2007) is 281. El Wray has 52 kills, Cherry Darling has 50 kills and Sheriff Hague has 13 kills.

Cool Reference: Escape from New York (1981) "Black Flight", the name of the Special Forces unit Snake Plissken served in, is featured on the back of a humvee.

Abby: Not so fast! [one of Abby's men brings over a large jug of formaldehyde with various circle-shaped objects in it] Abby: I also want your balls. Romy: I’m really quite attached to them.

Oh lord, whatever tool they use to remove those balls is horrifying. Yikes.

Tony Block: [while playing with toys] I'm gonna eat your brains and gain your knowledge.

Always a nod to Quentin Tarantino’s foot fetish.

Cherry Darling: Name's Cherry Darling... El Wray: Sounds like a stripper name. Cherry Darling: No, it sounds like a go-go dancer name. There's a difference.

Dr. Dakota Block: Hi, Joe. I'm going to give you a very strong anesthetic, so you won't feel anything during the procedure. These... [pats the needles in her shirt pocket] Dr. Dakota Block: ...are my friends. My yellow friend is to take the sting off. [injects Joe in the arm with the yellow needle] Dr. Dakota Block: My blue friend you'll barely feel. [injects Joe in the arm with the blue needle] Dr. Dakota Block: That means my yellow friend is already taking effect. See how fast my friends work? [injects Joe in the arm with the red needle] Dr. Dakota Block: And after my red-headed friend, you'll never see me again.

El Wray: Get up. We're leaving. Cherry Darling: I can't walk. El Wray: So what? Get up! Cherry Darling: Motherfucker! Look at me! [removes blanket to reveal her missing leg] Cherry Darling: Look at me! I was gonna be a stand-up comedian! Who's gonna laugh now? El Wray: Some of the best jokes are about cripples. Let's go. Cherry Darling: It's not funny. I'm pathetic. El Wray: Would you stop crying over fucking spilt milk? Cherry Darling: I have no leg! [looking frustrated, El Wray rips off a wooden table leg and shoves it in Cherry's stump] El Wray: Now you do. What do you think?

Cherry Darling: You could carry me, Wray. El Wray: You never wanted that before. Why start now?

J.T. Hague: Hey, hey. You want some barbeque? Best in Texas. Cherry Darling: Oh, no thanks. J.T. Hague: What's the matter? You don't eat meat? Cherry Darling: Oh, I eat meat. I also eat lots of shit. [grins] Cherry Darling: See that? J.T. Hague: What's that? Cherry Darling: Shit-eating grin. J.T. Hague: [laughs] You ought to be a comedian. Cherry Darling: What do you think of the leg? J.T. Hague: [laughs] Oh, that’s funny.

Cherry Darling: Look, you were being an unbelievable dick. I was walking out on you. I was cold, I took your fucking jacket. So, if you're go on one of your psycho, obsessive, controlling rants about a fucking jacket, then fucking take it 'cause I'd rather fucking freeze than fucking hear about it one more time!

“That boy’s got the devil in ‘im.”

[watching Cherry and Dakota on a TV monitor] The Rapist: I'm gonna go get my dick wet. Rapist #2: She's only got one leg. The Rapist: Easier access. Rapist #2: Oh... good point.

Cherry: Dance for me, motherfucker.

Cherry Darling: You're a doctor? Dr. Dakota Block: Hmm. I was earlier tonight. Cherry Darling: I always wanted to be a doctor, instead, I can do this. [Cherry arches her body up in a bridge position] Cherry Darling: Useless talent number 66. I'm very pliable. Dr. Dakota Block: You know, my girlfriend had a theory. She said at some point in your life, you find a use for every useless talent you ever had. It's like connecting the dots. Cherry Darling: I'm not that optimistic. I feel like I'm sinking down a drain and I can't get out. Dr. Dakota Block: She'd say, "when you're stuck in that spiral, you reach up". Cherry Darling: What if there's nothing up there? Dr. Dakota Block: Just reach up.

“Cherry Darling, it’s all you.”

ESE: 97/100

50 -25 for Harvey Weinstein +5 for the entire grindhouse film aesthetic +5 for fake grindhouse trailers +10 for kissy girls +5 for Naveen Andrews +3 for The Bone Shack +5 for Dakota’s list including “Kill Bill” +5 for J.T.’s dog +10 for Rose McGowan +5 for bisexuality -15 for Dakota’s shitstain husband +6 for Dakota’s cleverness +5 for table leg... leg -5 for giving Tony a gun +10 for repeated scooping brains line +10 for the “missing reel” during the sex scene +2 for the pocket bike -15 for rapists +5 for rapist’s junk melting off +10 for machine gun leg -5 because how is the gun leg firing without the trigger being pulled? +5 for helicopter kills +2 for reaching up

[blueberrypossum]

No One Does It Like You Do Dastardly Danny x oc

Hi everyone! This is another Shiki x Danny fanfic that I loved writing (I love writing fighting scenes and also winter atmospheres because it’s so cozy! So this is Shiki again (because I love writing her it’s so much fun) I hope you guys don’t mind and hopefully you can just place yourself into it! @greaser-wolf and I just love going back and forth with her oc and mine and it’s so much fun and she is just so wonderful! I hope you guys enjoy!!

WARNING: There is usage of inappropriate words and adult themes ( such as sexual content that is pass making out)

(Also I know that the Hidden city doesn’t have a sun or moon or even weather but I want them to have an atmosphere XD )

Word Bank: 

Big Cheese: Big Boss

We’ve been had- Been tricked or deceived.

Yuck- A foolish or stupid person

Music:

You brought your overcoat closer to you as the chilly breeze started to become quicker and snow started to dart through your vision at an easy pace. You tried to start a match between your hooves as you awaited for Danny and the others to investigate the bar, but after each click there was nothing but empty silence of the mountain.

It has been a hot minute since you’ve done a job somewhere this cold, of course it snowed in the Hidden City, but not like this. With your genetics, the cold wouldn’t really bother you, but without harnessing the true potential of your power, you were left shivering under your several layers of clothes. 

The mountain side was gorgeous though, the glistening of the snowbanks shined in the afternoon sun and the yokai’s that lived in the hidden village were enjoying warm beverages and gentle conversations. The white layer under your boots crunched as you continuously moved back and forth to keep warm as your boyfriend was taking a little too long to ask where this polar bear yokai was. 

When you were given the opportunity to go after one of the most psychotic war lords by your boss, you just couldn’t say no. But you weren’t given a team in the progress, so one you told Danny about it, him and the rest of the Mud Dogz created a plan to help you, with a small price to pay as well. 

You were honestly glad that Danny and the others wanted to join you, not only were they your friends, but you couldn’t really trust your teammates in the force. Too bad that Mickey had to do other business and had to sit this one out. 

 You finally spotted the usual purple wearing rat in the distance, his long brown coat flapping behind him as a gust of wind danced into town, two thin figures close behind him as they made their way over. Frost dusted over Danny’s whiskers as he came up to you, his hands rubbing each other under his gloves as Nova and Leonard joined as well. Leonard was the most bundled out of all four of you, his green body shivering under the black coat he wore. 

Nova seemed to be the only one who enjoyed the weather, her nose twitching every time a flake landed on her. 

“Are you actually enjoying this?” The ogre asked, an eyebrow raised as she gave him a sly smile. 

“When you’re this hot the cold never affects you.”

“....”

“I’m kidding! I’m a Mountain Fishing Cat, this is my element.”

You rolled your eyes at Nova’s comment and looked up at Danny, who had curled himself up close to your side for any connection of warmth. 

“Did you find anything out?” You asked him as Nova and Leonard continued to have their fake argument. 

Dastardly Danny shook the excess snow off his shoulders and hat as you watched his breath roll out like a cloud.

“Apparently the Big Cheese is holding up somewhere not far from here, hidden within the mountain,” he said with a low huff, his voice going quiet as a family walked by, their children running around them as they played in the snow. 

 Till’ then we should rent out a nearby cabin, Len said that there is a renting inn nearby.”

You pulled your beanie tighter onto your head as you let out another quiver, the mountain’s thin air starting to get to you. The rat yokai took notice of your sudden chill and unraveled his large coat and then the smaller one he wore under it, his hands gently placing the toasty coat on you. 

“Danny I’m fine-”

“Yes, yes, I know, sugar. But I’m sweating like a hog-”

The look you gave him as you settled the coat on you made him stop in his tracks and an embarrassed look crossed his face and for the first time you actually saw Dan flustered. 

“Uh, I meant..What I meant to say-”

“Ha! Danny actually messed up on a slang. Maybe Leonard will be cheerful for once!” Nova purred as she joined the conversation, Leonard right at her heels as they joined in on the full group. It seemed that the comment struck a nerve in the ogre and he looked down at the feline, a low growl rumbling in his throat.

“Only in your dreams, kitten.”

Woahhhhhhh, where did that come from?

Both you and Danny were in amazement as a dash of red flared against Nova’s face, and it wasn’t from the cold. It was good to see your friend get bashful for once instead of you and you grinned at the sight, taking in the heat and smell from Danny’s jacket. His cologne was trailed with cigarettes and old spice, and the fur that was sewn into the inside rubbed comfortably against your fur. 

Danny placed an apology kiss on your head as Nova and Leonard continued to banter back and forth and you took in the soft texture of his mouth as you sucked in an icy breath.

“Alright you two, we’re burning daylight. Let’s rent a cabin,” you ordered, and you couldn’t help but giggle at the relief that flashed in Nova’s multi-colored eyes as she headed towards one of the wooden signs that showed the option of renting out an isolated cabin, her tail curled against her back. 

“This is gonna be a long weekend.”

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

You four were able to rent a two bedroom cabin that was a few miles out and packed your bags into a waiting car that would drive you to the location. Leonard wasn’t the happiest to hear that they could only get two rooms, and commented that he would sleep on the couch, but Nova kept flinging comments that he didn’t want to cuddle with her. 

“We better hope dat’ our room is on the other side of the house,” Danny whispered to you as Nova would turn from her seat from the front to fight back with Leonard. 

“So we don’t hear them?”

Danny shot you a sinister smirk as the arm that was wrapped around you tightened itself. 

“More like they don’t hear us.”

The surprise that surfaced over your face only fueled the rat more as you squirmed in the car seat, the warm air that was blasted throughout the car was no longer nice, but overly steaming. 

The worker checked the cabin for food and cleaning supplies and left instructions if they needed anything. 

The wooden cabin was decorated with lemon and wine, candles and lanterns lit up the shack anda fire crackled in the fireplace. The front door brought you to the living room on the left and the kitchen on the right and the stairs were a few feet away right as you walked in. The only thing upstairs was one of the bedrooms and a door in the kitchen led to the other spare bedroom. After searching you all found that the bathroom was under the stairs. 

“I’m guessing the couple gets the upstairs room?” Nova asked as she took off her coat and placed it on the coat stand by the door. Danny sent the feline a cocky smile as his hand grazed over your lower hip. 

“You betcha.”

 Flustered words came out of your mouth as you moved your bags upstairs, almost tripping your way up to keep Danny’s wandering hands and him also trying to carry your bags.

The only thing upstairs was an open room and an extra bathroom, a large king bed laid up against the wall and furry rugs were enriched onto the wooden floor. Dressers and shelves were dotted around the room and all four of you started to unpack and get yourself settled. You undress yourself down from your layers until you only wear a black long-sleeve shirt with a maroon cardigan and elastic jeans to keep you warm. 

“Ya sure you don’t need help taking off the rest?”

“You know that Nova and Leonard are downstairs, right?”

“They gotta sleep at one point, darling.”

“And so do we!”

You dodged Danny’s hug attack and skipped down the stairs to the sound of light music humming throughout the cabin. A delicious smell had drifted into the air as you made your way to the kitchen and found Nova sitting on the kitchen counter while Leonard was behind the stove, his fingers working on dinner. You barely heard Leonard telling the feline to not get any fur into the food as Danny came up beside you, his body wrapped in grey long-sleeve and work pants. 

The tabby pulled her hair up into a ponytail and continued to read the book in her hands, the cream turtleneck she wore blazed against the fire’s shadow. 

You looked over Leonard’s shoulder and saw the rice, herbs, and sauces that were stirring in the pan while he separated an egg yolk from its whites. 

“So, can all members of the Mud Dogz cook?” You asked as you sat at the island of the kitchen. 

“Mickey is not good at cooking, never ask him to cook for you.”

“Oh come on, it can’t be that bad.”

“Nah, toots, never eat what that eel cooks up. Not after the meatloaf.”

“Oh don’t even remind me of that day! My stomach still doesn’t sit right after that.”

A confused laugh escaped your mouth as the ogre continued to make dinner, Nova handing him ingredients that he needed while flipping through her book. The melody that came from the bluetooth speaker from the living room swayed into the kitchen, and the cozy and friendly atmosphere made you loosened up as the conversation continued on without you, your body heading to the fridge in search of milk. 

The scent of dinner floated around as you dug through the cabinets, Nova moving over when you came around the area she sat. You finally found the hot chocolate packets as Leonard had just finished up the meal, the steam rising from the mixture of rice, vegetables, and potato chips made your stomach growl with hunger. 

You set the ingredients you were gathering aside as you four enjoyed the dinner, the cooked egg and spice made your cheeks spill with warmth. There were a few comments thrown here and there, such as going over the plan and what they were gonna do with the money. Your main concern was just getting the guy, Shia Albright, and he was on the top list of criminals for a reason; you just hoped that you and your friends could handle the polar bear yokai. 

Apparently your concern was noted because a hand under the table was placed over your thigh. 

You looked down and watched as Danny gave your leg a squeeze of reinsurance, his nails digging into the fabric. 

It had been several months dating Danny, and you were surprised that it was the most love and happiness you’ve had in a long while. Even with his open book personality, there was still a lot more to uncover from the rat yokai. It was pleasing to learn from Danny, to give him the chance he had been fighting for since the beginning. He was very open to you, with how he felt, what he wanted to do with you. And of course it made you squeal with exhilaration, but you both kept things slow. You were still a cop, and he was still a thief. 

After dinner, Nova and Danny did the dishes while you started to make the hot chocolate. Your hooves worked carefully to boil the milk and then get out the whipping cream, happy to find that they also bought the chocolate syrup you had placed on the shopping list.

“You are so washing that pot afterwards,” Nova commented, her paws drying themselves on a cloth after placing the dishes in the drying rack. 

“With how good it’ll taste, you’ll be licking the pan clean,” you joked back, pouring the creamy liquid into multiple cups before decorating them with the heavy cream and dark liquid. You found a platter to carry the drinks and you brought them over to the living room, Leonard was in one of the chairs, Danny on the couch, and Nova on the floor. Each of them gave you their own thank you as you let them grab a mug off the tray, leaving it on the floor as you got comfortable next to Danny, your legs curling up to you.

The soft guitar played in the background as snow drifted outside, Nova flipping her nails through her book, Leonard going over the plans notes in his hands, and Danny was holding you tight, one hand held the drink and the other held you. And within the guitar strings and the casual crackle of the fire, the dread that was growing on you was almost unnoticeable. Almost. 

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The summit air was brutal against your fur as you and your group headed up to the hidden factory, your boots making deep imprints in the white ground. 

The plan was simple, you had your laser and taser gun, and once you and Danny found the opportunity to get Shia, you would pounce while Leonard and Nova went after the gold they had been mining for in the factory, a lightness spell to carry it was placed on the bag the ogre carried. 

It almost seemed that it didn’t matter how many coverings you wore, the winter hands reached around into your body and gripped every nerve ending. 

Nova was the only one up ahead, her long legs carrying her easily through the snow as she led up to one of the broken areas of the factory; Leonard had scouted out in the blueprints, the metal and scrap of the building being torn away as if a large animal bit into it. The tabby hopped over one of the uprooted pieces of metal and plummeted into the darkness below and you followed, your feet landing harshly on the metal floor as the boys followed, the only light being seen was a glow stick, the orange glow outlining you and everyone else. 

The feline handed Leonard the light stick as he pulled out the layout of the workshop, his footprints leaving weak imprints of snow on the black floor. You tried to flick a flame between your hooves, but all you got was the snapping echo of the aftermath. Ever since the run-in with your dad a month ago, your powers seemed to bury themselves into your body, where you couldn’t even feel the swirling ball of warmth that usually danced in your veins. It almost made you feel useless in situations like this, when the group needed fire, it just seemed like you weren’t the match for it to light. 

But your feelings were gonna have to wait as you heard the slightest pitter patter against the metal and you pushed your friends up against the wall in a swift move. One of Shia’s guards walked slowly by, his body decked out in warm armor and a gun was strapped against his chest. The male yokai strolled down the hallway, the flicker of his flashlight slowly dying out and the staircase went silent. 

Once the cost was clear, Leonard turned to Danny and handed him a copy of the map.

 “Alright, once you have him, meet up at the F2 tower, he should be in his office,” Leonard ordered, even with being in an isolated area, his breath still collected in front of him.

Danny took the extra map and you eyed it at his side. Shia’s office was up several floors, and you both knew that there would be groups of henchmen on lookout. But, with stealth and silence, you and Danny could make it up there effortlessly. 

“Stay safe you two,” Nova purred quietly and her and the ogre dashed into the shadows, the only sign of them ever being there was the leftover snow from their bodies drifting off. 

You rolled your shoulders as your biceps tensed under the cotton shirt and Danny turned around and handed you the map. 

“Lead the way, toots.”

A grin leveled on your face as you took the map and started the walk up the first flight of stairs, your boots eagerly carrying you up, Danny right at your heels. You ran into your first guard at the third floor, the husky yokai let out a yelp of surprise before your fist came into contact with his snout, and then your knee into stomach, and with one single swipe you had your taser in his chest, a loud thud vibrated against your feet as he made contact with the ground. 

The next flight had you and Danny taking out multiple guys, both of you darting between crates and mining equipment and you took out yokai’s with your taser and Danny took his fair share out with a knocking out technique. 

After minutes of fighting and sneaking around, you both finally made it the top and final floor, the staircase leading straight to Shia’s office. 

The hallway that looped to the office was long and dark, the only sound the mirrored around was the old factory settling to its age. Dastardly was flanking you as your fingers grazed over the metal door, the bitterness of the cold traveled from the metal to the inside of your glove. The door was already unlocked from its handle and you pushed it open, the unholy light that dripped out of the room pooling over you like water. 

You pointed your gun through the doorway and you took in the large office. The room was cold and white fur littered the ground as you continued further in, Danny’s tail curled in dread as you got closer to the large office chair, the end of the laser gun pushing the leather seat to the side. 

No one was there, nothing was there except a half done cigar that sat in an ashtray. Your small brows furrowed in confusion as you placed the gun back in the holster on your thigh as your hands started to dart around his desk. 

“He’s...he’s schedule said that he would be here, if he’s not here, then where is he?” You asked out loud. The office had large windows and Danny peaked his head out to watch the soldiers quickly dart around, his arms crossing in question. 

You searched his drawers and file cabinets for any information, but even if you did find anything, you still wouldn’t have him in chains. 

And then the door slammed shut and the sound of a blockade over it blasted through the cracks. 

“Well dat ain’t good,” Danny grunted and the sound of hushed orders and then a slow, irritable ticking clicked throughout the room. Your ears snapped with the rhythm and then the sound of gunfire was heard in the distance. 

The clicking was getting faster, and with all the yokai’s running away…

“We’ve been had!”

Danny grabbed your hand and raced over to the furthest window on the left, his hand taking hold of your laser pistol and shot through the clear material until the glass shattered into falling pieces, like icicles hanging off the side of a house. There was a torn edge that led over to a large scissor lift and your boots scrapped over the broken glass, the grey outer layer held your stance steady as the beating of the hidden bombs continued. 

“Ladies first!” The rat exclaimed as you both looked at the jump ahead. You sent him a hot glare but got ready and pushed off, one of the blasts from the concealed bombs went off and the heat waved knocked you forward and you landed hard against the platform, the pop in your shoulder caused a grunt to escape your throat. 

You got up and looked up at Danny, whose figure was still against the window frame, the blast of the bomb sooted the side of his body. 

“Alright, your turn!” You screamed up at him and then let out a wail as the scissor lift groaned under you and the metal bars started to creak under the new weight.

The rat took a step back and with a graceful leap he landed right next to you, his hand instantly pulled the level on the side just as the rest of the bombs started to go off one by one. He blocked his body over you as flying debris exploded around you in a ray of black and orange. The impact of the blast knocked both of you over, sending Danny sliding next you and over the side. 

“Danny!”

The hanging platform whined as the weight was shifted over to one side and you scooted over to the ledge, your hand gripping Danny’s wrist before his claws slipped from the ledge. His mass was nothing you were used to, but you were used to him being on your back, not over the side of a dangerous overhang that could collapse any minute. The metal shafting and room was groaning with pain as the pillars and other rooms started to fall apart due to the explosion.

You pulled your other hand around him and stood up, your boosts digging into the black outline of the scissor lift as you brought him back up and before he could thank you the ramp gave way and dropped towards the first level. 

Curse words sprinted out of both of your mouths as you held onto the sides as the platform crashed into the floor, sending you both rolling to the opposite side as the destroyed roof rammed into the scissor lift once it hit the bottom. 

A fit of coughs lashed out of your mouth as the dust swirled around you, the light creaking of broken metal and fire ringing in your ears as your name was called out. 

“Shiki?! Shiki!”

You pushed yourself up and hissed at the small cuts and bruises that were scattered over your body, but you counted your blessings to find no major injuries. The rat’s voice continued to vibrate against the splintered mess.

“Danny?! Are you alright?!” You called to him and then took several steps back as more debris gave way, taking you further away from the wreck and Danny. His voice became muffled and you just had to tell yourself that he was fine, that you needed to meet him and the others at the tower. 

Hateful tears sprang in the corner of your eyes as you made your way through the factory, your legs dodging small piles of flames as you started to recognize the area you were in. Of course this plan had failed, this mob boss knew everything about everyone, and he wanted to make sure that the death of you would be a prime example to not go after him. That only gave you more rage, more strength to go after him as you crawled through a small hole created by shattered mining equipment. 

You reached for the door in front of you until two forms crashed through it, your body flattening itself against the wall as the two balls of fur ripped each other apart. A cat-like yowl came from one of the forms and you recognized the winter outfit that was torn from battle. 

“Nova?!”

The cat then swiped her claws across the wolf yokai’s face that made him let go of her. She pushed herself against the wall and used the hard surface to kick the yokai into one of the multiple holes that lead into the mines, his terrifying howls haunting the rocky surface. 

Nova turned to you with an astonished expression, a cut on her head bleeding a trail down her face.

“Are you okay? Where’s Leonard?”

“We got seperated, but he has the gold. What about Danny? And Shia?”

“This was a setup! They knew we were coming.”

Nova frowned as you both started to look for another way out, her tail whizzing back and forth like a strip of rope. 

“This wasn’t a setup, another revival gang showed up. Apparently that dumb polar bear thought that he would make his hideout into a trap so he can get rid of them.”

It felt wrong but joy pulsed through your body as you found a torn apart wall that led outside, the light snowfall was now a blizzarding storm. If Shia was fighting against a rival group, then he didn’t know that an officer was here, and you could still get the jump on him. 

The feline started to proceed over to the watchtower F2 but you grabbed her hand and tugged on it. 

“We can still get Shia! He’ll be so distracted that he won’t see us coming!”

Nova’s eyes flashed down to you and then over to the tower, her left ear flicking with concentration along with her tongue licking off the excess blood from the corner of her mouth. 

“Alright, if we can find him under ten minutes.”

You led in the opposite direction and towards one of the gaping holes of the mines, the echoes of gunfire and battle cries filled your ears like music.    

The snowstorm was slowly getting worse, the petals now turned into sharp splinters as your vision started to get covered with white. The crunch under your combat boots was barely heard and you could barely feel the metal pathway that was under you, your covered hands holding onto the side as a large gust of wind tried to push you over. The bellow’s of the yokai’s started to get louder and with one flick of your thin ear, you were spinning around to push Nova out of the way from a hidden attacker. 

“Look out!”

The female snow leopard leapt onto you, her claws shredding out of her gloves and into your coat and a low hiss growed out of her white throat. Your hooves wacked into her nose as you pressed yourself further into the railing and with the yokai’s extra burden of weight the rusted pipes gave way and folded over, taking you and the henchmen with you. 

“Shiki!” Nova called for you but it was barely heard as you and the snow leopard rolled through the snow and down the slope, away from the factory and the watchtower. Even with the smooth snow to impact your tumble, the frozen floor underneath still stabbed itself into you as you both came to a sliding halt. 

Your body was freezing now, the cold hands of winter grasping over your form and it took all your strength to raise yourself up. Far from the factory, you and the female snow leopard had landed over a frozen lake, ice holding your weight easily as the war around you continued. Not far from the lake were several military vans and henchmen shooting bullets and arrows at two hidden figures behind separate crates.  

“Danny! Leonard!”

The two yokai turned at the sound of their names and spotted you. Leonard had a few cuts scrapped over his body and his shirt was torn while Danny was covered in more soot than before and his hat was gone, but both seemed relatively fine. When the rat caught sight of you, a gust of comfort filled his hollow lungs to see that you were still breathing. His hand planted against the crate he was behind to get up but he instantly lunged back down when more ammo was shot at him. 

You made a step towards him but a blur of chalk pounced for you out from nothingness, her claws tearing up the ice surface like nails against a chalkboard. You dodged a swipe from her and then a kick with your hands, your hands going for the laser pistol from your thigh but the flexible feline broke it out of your grip, the weapon skating over the frozen water.

Jeez! Is every cat yokai like this? 

She drove you further into the middle of the lake, your boots having trouble keeping friction over the slippery exterior while the snow leopard didn’t wear any form of shoe except for her pants connecting with the middle of her paws, but it kept her upright as she continued to chase you. 

Nova, if you can hear me right now, know that you and I are having a fighting session once this all over! 

The woman jumped for you and you swiftly moved to the side, and with one kick of your foot it sent the leopard back to the bank of the lake, her face going straight into a pile of snow near the battle Danny and Leonard were in. You couldn’t help but smirk at the small victory, but a pair of azure eyes poked from the heap of white, fury marking the snow leopard’s face as she looked around. 

Near her was a minecart filled of pickaxes and safety hats and her paws swaddled one of the weapons, a wicked smile on her face as she neared the lake once again and with one hit she stabbed the axe into the frozen glass and millions of broken cracks surfaced and the watery hell took you down. 

“SHIKI!” 

Danny was on his feet as you disappeared into dark liquid, the clumps of ice drifted around the spot you had fallen into. Leonard was by his side now and as the rat started to race towards the lake, the ogre tackled him and rolled them both behind a tree as the polar bear’s henchmen started to make their way closer. 

“Are you crazy?! You can’t survive that temperature! You’ll also die before you get there!”

“Get off of me you bloody yuck! She will drown!”

Before Danny was going to elbow his friend right in the jaw, a pair of legs jogged right past them and they glanced up to see Nova racing towards the half-ruined lake, her arms quickly working off her two layers of coats and her cream turtleneck until her grey thermal showed. She then hopped over the snow leopard yokai and took the pickaxe from her grey paws, her momentum slamming the ax into the shattered ice until a large enough hole was created and the Mountain Fishing cat jumped in without another thought. 

“What is wrong with these girls?!” Leonard exclaimed as he let Danny go and knocked out a guy who came too close, his fingers taking control of the rifle the henchmen had in his talons. 

Danny could hardly hear the leader as he searched over the lake, trying to find your figure drifting in the cold liquid. 

He had never felt fear like this, as if he was the one drowning instead of you. He ignored the ongoing dogfight around him as every second that ticked by felt like lifetimes. With how shattered the pool of water was, the rat yokai saw how strong and recentless the current was underneath, the tide pushing up against anything it could get its grasp on. Including you. 

And then him and Leonard saw it. It was barely visible but a white paw came crashing out of the ice on the other side of the lake, the enlarged nails broke into the ice like an anchor and created long marks as the creature heaved itself out. 

Danny felt his friend next to him lose his breath as Nova broke the surface, water droplets falling down her hair and fur as she pulled herself out of the water, and in her arms was a waterlogged you, steam rolling off both of you as your friend dragged you out. 

 The men didn’t have to have sonic hearing to hear the feline’s grunts as she dragged you over to the shore, Nova’s paws working on your chest as she performed CPR. 

Danny’s body hurdled into action as he stole the gun out of Leonard’s hands and shot at the criminals crowding them, his dead-eye like aim taking out over four before he started to haul ass over to you and Nova, not even giving Leonard a heads up as the black-haired stared dumbfounded at the rat before joining the retreat. 

You couldn’t hear anything, you couldn’t taste or see anything, all you felt was the cold. It violated you and suffocated you as you felt the water slush around in your lungs. And then the pressure, something or someone was placing pressure on your filled lungs to the point your chest couldn’t take it anymore and you perked up, your head turning over to vomit up the lake water you had swallowed. 

You could barely open your eyes as you tried to take in your surroundings, but it was so cold, why was it so cold?

“Shiki! Shiki are you alright?!”

A bubbly groan came out of your waterlogged throat and you thought to yourself that you would never drink water again and that you hated winter. Your head was exposed to the elements and you realize that your beanie was gone. 

Your dark eyes were able to open to peer up, the flakes of snow coating your eyelashes. Nova was soaked leaning over you, her fur drooped with the soggy water and her whiskers started to become white. But another figure was coming into your vision and as you tried to warn your friend, all that came out was a backbreaking shiver. 

The cat then let out a cry as she was grabbed and tossed to the only unbroken part of the lake and all you could do was watch in horror as the snow leopard started to attack your friend, nothing protecting Nova except her thin thermal shirt and her own wits. 

Nov...Nova,” you shivered out and your hand reached up as the evil leopard took a hold of Nova’s neck and slammed her into the ice, the fragile solid breaking under her. Hands were wrapped around you now and your freezing hand went for your taser but the familiar and tender scent of Danny wafted your senses. 

“Dann...Danny?”

“I’m here, sweetheart, I’m here.”

“No..Nova needs..”

“Leonard has it handled, we need to get ya outta here.”

The yokai lifted you up easily, the crisp drops of water that fell from your clothes barely made it to the ground as they froze. Even with your head making contact with the rat’s soft fur, it was almost nothing against your frozen skin and stiff fur. 

As your boyfriend carried you deeper into the woods, you turned your head and spotted Leonard and Nova not far behind, the bitter color of crimson dripped from Nova’s claws and Leonard’s hands. 

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You all four made it back to the cabin in one piece and Nova was quick on getting her boots off and looking over at you. 

“Danny, I need you to go and take off her clothes.”

“I’m sorry? What?”

“Because if she sits in those wet clothes she’ll get hypothermia! And then she can die! So take her upstairs and get her undressed and in a new pair of clothes!”

You could tell Nova was panicking, when her voice rose over and past a joking manner you knew she was nervous and you could hear her dive into the kitchen and started to search. You wanted to argue that you were fine, but you found no power behind your muscles and all you could do was give a little cry of pain as your body was pounded with the cold. 

When Danny made it up to your room he sat you on the bathroom floor and started to derope you. His fingers scrambled over the black coat, and then the green overcoat, the maroon cardigan and then your black sweater was all off. You were cold to the touch and your brown fur was dyed to a darker oak. Even with the cold layers off of you your body reacted violently against it and your arms wrapped around yourself. Danny felt his heart shatter like the lake that consumed you and placed a small kiss on the top of your head, as if he was afraid you would break with just one touch. 

You had to help him take off the two layers of pants you wore until you laid almost nude in front of him and the harsh flush of warmth crossed your face, but it just made you feel a lot more sicker. The rat saw the temperature in your face change and he got up and to your dresser, not one flash of emotion came across his face as he headed a new outfit for you. 

“You got this, call if ya need me,” he whispered silently to you and then left the bathroom and leaned against the wall next to you. 

You couldn’t but try to roll your eyes as you tried to ease your bra off. Even in a life or death situation he was still going to be a gentleman towards you. It was hard though, the cold undergarment clinged into you like glue and it took you several minutes to even get both of them off. You threw the wet clothes aside and placed the ones Danny had handed you and the cotton grey long-sleeve and black leggings under sweatpants were on after drying yourself off. 

You could still feel the sickness trying to settle on you and a sneeze blew out of your face. 

“Gesundheit.”

“You..you speak german?”

“And french, if you’re catching my drift.”

A laugh curled out of your throat but it came out in a fit of coughs. From the restroom you heard Nova call for Danny and his light footsteps drifted away from the room and down the stairs. 

Nova and Leonard were in new clothes and the only evidence of Nova falling into the lake was the dampness in her fur and the silent shiver that drove through her body every few minutes. 

“Okay, keep her warm and under blankets. No placing her in hot water either.”

“Rag-a-muffin, why are ya telling me this?”

“Leonard is coming with me to find elderberries, it will help make a beverage that will make her feel better and push away any case of fever. But you need to bring her temperature up.”

“And how am I supposed to do dat’?”

“You’re her boyfriend, figure it out.” The feline joked and slammed the front door. 

Danny, for the first time in his life, felt an awkward hotness in his stomach as he headed up the stairs to find you curled up in the bed, the vicious shakes that erupted under the sheets made your boyfriend worry, and then Nova’s words came in mind. 

The snowfall had slowed down to a gentle delay and the cabin was sprinkled with the light sugar. Danny started the fireplace that was settled in your room, his calloused hands throwing the pieces of firewood into the hungry flame.

His frame floated over to your trembling form and joined you under the blankets, his hands wrapping around you and you instantly curled into his chest, your hooves digging into his back as you tried to absorb every ounce of warmth he had to offer. A rough chuckle vibrated against your head and you buried yourself into his exposed chest fur. Danny placed a soft kiss on your head, and then your cheeks, and then the tip of your snout, and he waved his hand under your chin to look up at him and he kissed you. 

The contact from his lips sent a jolt of fire into your throat and you took in the kiss with every pint of strength you had left. But when his body jostled to where he was hovering over you, one hand holding himself up next to your head and the other holding your head up to meet his, you realized the eagerness behind each kiss and release. 

His body was over you now, his legs tangled with yours as you sunk further into the mattress, his fingers playing with the tufts of fur behind your head as you felt your heart rate pick up rapid speed.  Your hooves held onto his back as he continued to tease you with each feverish kiss, with each touch over your curves and muscle. And as he peppered kisses up your jawline and near your ear, a growl full of R’s rolled into your eardrum.

You instantly had to close your legs as your very core was rocked and you no longer felt cold as heat traced itself throughout your body. He had never growled to you before, especially rolling his R’s like that. This man always had something under his sleeve, but at this moment, you couldn’t think straight, as if every peck of his mouth and the hands that advanced over you made you braindead. The keenness in his movements as his snout started to make its way down your neck created a moan out of your mouth, your voice raspy and needy. 

Another hust growl went against your throat and you shivered, and your heart bounced in your ribcage when you realized that it wasn’t from the cold, and that this male was going to heat you up like a oven. His hands were slowly riding up your shirt, his nails tenderly digging into your fur and his thumb doing slow and taunting circles under your chest. 

He was teasing you and you squirmed under his hold, but a feather-like moan popped out of your mouth as his teeth grazed your throat and shoulder.

“Danny,” you breathed out and you felt the mammal over you tense up and he stopped, a savage-like look in his eyes as he took in the shameless sight of you. The redness was peaking out of your fur and your chest heaved with pressure and he took a large notice with how your legs were crossed. 

“Say it, doll.”

You knew what he wanted you to say, you knew exactly what he wanted you to do. 

“Please.”

He was on you like a cat on a mouse, his large build practically swallowing you whole as he took full control. The rat was a sucker for you, almost like a kid in a candy store, wanting to have every single bite. He effortlessly started to mark you as his, the small little squeals that started to rise into the house made his blood pump and you were pushing up against him now, chestnut fur flushed against oak fur as you both tried to get closer to each other. His hands were fully under your shirt now and your neck was covered in small little black spots, all perfectly lined up as the rim of his mouth went for the hollow of your throat and your spine bending to give him full access to your body. 

You honestly didn’t care if Leonard and Nova came back early, the heat that rushed through you like water through a pipe was almost too much to bear and you felt himself bump up against you and a heartful gasp came out. 

Oh gosh he was too much for you, the senses he spiked within your body was a remedy you never thought you needed. 

His warm hands felt good against your chest and you groaned into his mouth, his own vocals sending a growl in return. You were sweating now as you escaped to get a breath of air and you could feel the hot pants from Danny as he left more love marks on you, much lower than your neck. You had to bite your lip to keep yourself quiet and your tail wiggled with ecstasy as his hands spread your legs apart so he could get closer, his large mitts now explored your back and your rump. 

You both were burning under the blanket and the fire felt like nothing against your heated fur, you felt like you could be rubbing up against the sun for all you know. 

Danny had you pressed against the headboard now, and every vibration from your thighs or your arms when he touched you made him want you more, he desired you more. The hunger and ache he had for you was beyond unbearable and having you to himself without work or anyone getting in the way was paradise. 

The bruises under your skin ached but Danny’s hands were gentle over the purple areas and he was gentle with you and... The emotion that roared in your heart was stabbing you, pinching at your lungs as you continued to kiss Danny, his tongue sneaking its way into your mouth and you gladly accepted it. And between the kisses and the cries of pleasure that was spilling out both your mouths, you let out the holy words that he had wanted to hear from you since the day you started dating.

“I love you, Dan.”

The male rat stopped in his tracks and looked down at you, surprise spinning in his eyes as he looked down at you and you swore you saw his eyes flash with heartache. You were so out his league, he would always believe that you were better off without him. You wouldn’t have to worry about your job, you wouldn’t have to stress over the idea of being caught with him, but you stayed with him, you cared for him, and now you loved him.

His hand caressed your cheek and you were practically putty in his hands as he said against your mouth. 

“I love you too, sweetheart.”

And he told you that over and over as he undressed you once again.

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The next morning was hard to wake up too. You woke up the burning glint of the sun over the snow and you went to roll over but you were held as if prisoner. Strong arms were around you and soft snoring was brushed up against your back. Flashes of last night danced through your head and the heat between your legs started to flicker again. You unraveled yourself from his hold and placed his forgotten long-sleeve shirt over yourself and your sweatpants and headed downstairs. 

It was quiet in the lodge and there was no sign of Leonard on the couch, you walked over to Nova’s door and the shocked gasp couldn’t stop itself as you saw the ogre curled up with the feline, her body rolled up in a ball next to his sleeping figure. 

You could only imagine the awkwardness once one of them woke up and you tiptoed back to the kitchen to find a wine-colored drink on the counter with a note. 

“Dear Shiki, drink this once you wake up, but by how the cabin was shaking and how you were hollering like you were dying, I’m guessing you might not need this ;). Love, Nova”

Humiliation rolled in your stomach as you took a few sips of the drink, your fist pounding against your chest once you realized that it was an alcoholic beverage. You would give anything to just have a cup of coffee. 

You headed back upstairs and for a split second, you remembered why you were truly here. Shia had gotten away, and even though it was a successful heist, it was a failure of a bounty hunt. You felt shame hit you as you failed your mission to get the polar bear. But once you made it up the stairs and saw Danny laying in the spot you had been sleeping in and his hand hanging off the side of the bed as if going after you, waiting for you. 

It might’ve been a failure of a job, but you won something today, you won him. 

And as you opened up the blankets and let his arms once again entrap you, you felt like the only thing you failed at was not telling him sooner.

[dadsbongos]

A Notice

Movie/Game/Show: Umbrella Academy Dynamic: Klaus Hargreeves/Reader Warnings: dead Reggie Summary: How did Klaus and his wife get together? ~~~

A note came back with her dog at noon on a fittingly sunny Sunday in late June.

(Y/n) held up the note to her face as she gently pat her plump dog’s side, sending Scratch off to the kitchen where he could pester her mother for lunch scraps. Her brows furrowed at how odd it seemed - words scribbled in a multitude of colorful markers ranging from bright red to murky brown.

“‘Your dog’s pretty fat, I’ll walk him for you if you want! For like two dollars anyway. Oh, this is your neighbor, Klaus, by the way!’”

She turned to the living room, where her little brother and father were watching television together, “Do we have a neighbor named Klaus?”

Her father hummed, squinting at the bright screen, “Those Hargreeves’ kids have wild names. Probably one of them,” he looked to the squirming four-year-old beside him with a wide grin, “Do you know, Owen?”

The small boy shook his head quickly, leaning his head into the man’s chest, eyes still stuck on the television. (Y/n) nodded, walking into the kitchen where her mother was cooking, “Do you know the Hargreeves? The kids’ names, I mean.”

“I believe there’s an Allison in there,” the woman murmured, still facing the stove, “Maybe a Ben… but I know one of them goes by Five. A little weird if you ask me but…” she trailed off.

“Oh,” (Y/n) pressed her lips into a thin line, “I’m gonna go over there and just check it out.”

“Why?”

There was no response, not when the tween was already at the front door shoving her shoes on. The woman shook her head with a light giggle, “Henry, your daughter’s going over to the neighbors!”

“Your daughter too, Miriam!”

That was all (Y/n) heard before she was rushing down the sidewalk towards the biggest house on the block. The biggest house in town, more likely. She pushed the gate open, cringing at how it creaked under her palm before coming up to the door. Clanging the heavy door knocker against the wood, she waited with the note in hand for someone to answer.

After a few seconds, a boy no older than she had answered. He quirked a brow at her before moving to slam the door, “We’re not buying anything.”

“Oh no, I’m not selling,” she instantly blurting, bringing the paper to his attention, “Does anyone named Klaus live here? He left this attached to my dog’s collar.”

He huffed, clearly disinterested in conversation as a whole, however, he gave her a tight-lipped smile and held up his index finger, “Just a moment.”

And promptly slammed the door shut in her face, she flinched at the rude move. (Y/n) blinked up at the manor, taking quick notice to how eerie it seemed from the outside - she wondered how the interior looked as well. A few seconds later, the comically large door opened, a new brunette boy peeking through.

“Hey, you got my note!” he pointed at the paper in her hands, “I’m glad it was you and not some weird old guy.”

“You… you didn’t know who it would be going to?”

Klaus looked to the sky, as if in thought, before shaking his head, “Not really.”

“Wow,” (Y/n) breathed out, placing a hand over her stomach, “I think that just took a few years off my lifespan.”

“Five says I have that effect on people,” he leaned on the wedged-open door, “So, do you need a dog walker or sitter or both?”

A note came back with her little brother at three in the afternoon on a rainy Tuesday in mid-March.

“Sissy?” Owen’s quiet voice called from the hallway, one hand clutching a crinkled piece of paper by his side while the other fiddled with pieces of his hair. 

(Y/n) looked over from her textbooks, no longer as invested in the Russian Empire of the seventeen hundreds as before. She spun around in her desk chair, giving her baby brother a sweet smile as he stepped into her room. Owen held up the paper, placing his rather sticky hands on his sister’s thighs, trying to hoist himself into her lap by himself.

She quietly chuckled before setting the parchment aside and picking the first-grader into her lap, cringing when she felt at his hands, “Oh, you mister, are going to have to wash those mitts.”

He whined, burying his face into the material of her nightshirt in protest to the mere idea of getting up and washing his hands.

“Fine, fine, not now,” she rubbed his small back, picking up the paper.

“‘You should come to our hangout spot, not the shack the other one. The secret one around midnight. This is your friend, Klaus, by the way.’”

Of course, it had to be the rickety old treehouse in the field by their neighborhood - at midnight. Let’s not forget midnight. (Y/n) huffed, pulling herself up by the splintering wooden planks acting as a ladder, though what worried her was the lack of Klaus-like noises. Usually, he would be eager to make his presence known to her whether it be by offering a hand or his loud, shrill giggles at whatever the ghosts were saying now.

Eventually, she managed her way up, finding Klaus sitting oddly still and silent. She reached for his shoulder, finding no pleasure in the way he flinched before whipping around to meet her. However, rather than a pale, cold corpse positioned to look like her friend, she was met with crooked, off-white teeth on full display. 

Klaus turned around, taking the girl’s hands in his, “I know I’m not the guy your parents would dream of you dating but- “

“Woah, woah,” she felt winded, looking to the side briefly, “Are you- are we?”

“(Y/n),” he breathed out, getting onto his knees in a mockery of a proposal, “will you do me the honors of taking you out on a date?”

A tiny giggle escaped from her, she pulled him down into a hug, “Yes, I’d love to.”

A note came back with her father at five in the afternoon on a cloudy Friday in early December.

“You’re doing it wrong,” Owen muttered, leaning against the fridge as his sister whisked eggs.

(Y/n) paused to glare at her little brother, “How does someone whisk eggs wrong?”

He gestured to her hands, “The way you’re doing it.”

The front door to her childhood home opened, the woman sighed, shaking her head, “Dad, I told you to let me know when you’re going out for a run! Scared me half to death when I couldn’t find you this morning.”

“Sorry, little lady,” Henry grinned down at his daughter, ruffling her hair before taking the bowl of raw eggs with one hand, “Your boyfriend asked me to give this to you.”

Another note. She took it with a quiet mumble of her gratitude, not understanding why her boyfriend of almost a decade - starting around fifteen years of age and still going strong into twenty-five - had to use a note rather than his phone to contact her. Though, she supposed the nostalgia was appreciated while they visited their home neighborhood.

“‘You should come by Griddy’s in like half an hour! You know, for old time’s sake. This is your boyfriend, Klaus, just so you know.’”

Klaus was a lot of things, spontaneous only scratching at the surface of that word bank. Of course, it was in the back of her mind that he’d invite his siblings, but she didn’t really expect it to happen. (Y/n) gave the four other Hargreeves a small wave before joining her beau at the smooth beige counter.

“I thought you guys only saw each other for funerals and weddings?” she murmured, tacking on a small laugh when it felt strange not to.

“Well,” Klaus reached into his coat pocket, “I suppose they make an exception for proposals now.”

“For what?” she gasped, watching, completely stunned, as he stood and took her hands in his own.

Klaus thrived off of attention, so it shouldn’t have baffled her that the eyes on them only encouraged his actions. He grinned wildly, not too unlike a maniac, “I always thought you were the foxiest little thing on the street ever since I saw you. Then, you became the sweetest little thing but now…” he let go of her only to open the velvet box and show off the ring inside, “I want you to be my every-little-thing.”

“Oh, sweetie,” (Y/n) cupped his cheeks, nodding, “Of course!”

The peeping adults, and some children who followed their parents’ example, gave over a round of applause. Agnes smiled at the newly engaged couple, making an announcement about a round of free donuts for the patrons. As it died down, Ben gave Klaus a pat on the back - well, the sentiment was appreciated even though his hand just went through the living man’s body.

He giggled, not willing to admit how nervous he truly was, “I didn’t think that’d work as well as it did.”

(Y/n) pulled his head closer to her lips, kissing his forehead before releasing him, “If there’s anyone I’d want to marry, it’d be you.”

Klaus brought up a hand to fiddle with the sleeve of his fiance’s shirt, a bad habit he partook in during occasional nervous fits, “Even if that anyone was an ex-junkie?”

“If I wanted to marry anyone,” she repeated, tone much firmer than before, “it’s you. Ex-junkie and all, babe.”

“That was just adorable,” Klaus snorted, leaving her sleeve in favor of watching Agnes come toward the family with plates of donuts in hand.

A note came back with her husband at eight at night on a rainy Saturday in late March.

(Y/n) was nestled into the couch of her and her husband’s home, with the heater broken there was little to nothing keeping out the creeping cold of March’s spring-winter amalgamation. The front door slammed open, alerting the woman until Klaus ran into the living room. He was holding up a torn-out article from the day’s newspaper, winded from rushing over to the house.

She stood, taking the paper before leading her poor, exhausted husband to the couch. Sitting beside Klaus, (Y/n) looked over the article while rubbing his back, “Oh my God…”

“I know!” Klaus wheezed, though despite the usually horrifying news he was smiling as if he’d just been told something uncontrollably amazing.

As awful as it was to say, (Y/n) didn’t feel bad about her upcoming disregard for her father-in-law’s life, “Do you think he left you anything?”

“‘SIR REGINALD HARGREEVES: DEAD!’”

“Are you sure you’ll be okay?” the woman murmured, stopping her husband from entering the manor, “I know he was an awful person and I just don’t want you to feel forced to come here.”

“I want to be here,” Klaus whispered, turning to his wife, eyes wide, “Gotta make sure the old man’s really dead!”

She chuckled, pushing the door open, “Wouldn’t you be able to see him?”

“Not sure,” he shook his head, looking around the main hall, “I think hell has delayed seance service, sweetheart.”

Just as (Y/n) went to make her own joke, a voice called out to them from the staircase, “Klaus, (Y/n), what a lovely surprise.”

Diego, of course, the little optimist that he was. (Y/n) gave her brother-in-law a tiny wave, “Good to see you as well, Diego.”

A warning came with her time-traveling brother-in-law.

“What- what- what do you mean?” (Y/n) shook her head, her hand intertwined with her husband’s, “The world can’t just end like that! Shouldn’t there be signs, like all the animals acting weird or extreme weather?”

Five paused, narrowing his eyes at his sister-in-law, “You know, it’s funny. I’m from the future, I can remember the tiniest details of my life before getting stuck, and I’m smarter than all of you combined but still…” he walked towards the woman, “I have no clue who you are or what you’re doing here.”

“Woah,” Klaus intervened, “don’t be so rude to your sister-in-law, little Five. She’s just trying to help.”

Of course, he knew that. Five remembered meeting her. He saw her. In the past, obviously, but in the future as well. He saw her there, in the rubble of the Umbrella Academy with her husband - dead. Eyes peeled open in horror, it was haunting to look at. To look at all of them, really.

Walking corpses stained into the individual wrinkles of his brain.

“Whatever,” Five huffed, turning to leave the room, “I don’t have time for this.”

Klaus came closer to his wife, brushing a thumb over her cheekbone, “I’m sorry about him.���

“Don’t be,” (Y/n) took his hand from her face, intertwining their fingers, “Assuming your brother isn’t coo-coo, he’s under a lot of stress.”

But there was no way he wasn’t crazy. The world couldn’t just end so abruptly, right?

Right? 

[hancocksspouse]

59 and 11??

Oooh the ‘I almost lost you kiss’ and the body curving kiss. Nice nice nice 👍🏼

-

“Please! They have my wife!”

The pathetic cries of the farmer they were sent to help were heartbreaking. Raiders had been holding settlers for ransom more and more these days and it was never any less soul crushing to see the terror in people’s eyes as they begged to see their loved ones again.

Doll rests a gentle hand on the crying man’s shoulder and helps him collect himself long enough to tell them where they’ve taken his wife.

“Th-they’re holed up in Saugus Ironworks not far from here! Please! Help her!” He cries. She looks over her shoulder at Hancock, who is already loading his shotgun as he nods her way and she turns back to the farmer.

“It’s gonna be alright. We’ll be right back with your wife. In the meantime, stay inside and don’t open the door for anyone”, she says. The man quickly nods and gives them both rushed thank you’s as he quickly dashes into his shack and slams the door behind him.

Hancock takes his place at Doll’s side and the trudge towards Saugus starts, both keeping their pace quick. Doll makes sure her gun is loaded the closer they get and it isn’t long until they’re right on the raider’s doorstep, a Molotov in both of their hands.

“Ready?” She asks and Hancock simply gives her a grin before flinging his Molotov into the back of a raider’s head, followed by Doll’s and the bullets begin to fly.

-

Click.

“Got it”, Doll murmurs after succeeding in picking the lock to the door holding the farmer’s hostage wife. She quickly swings the door open and the woman inside flinches and scrambles back against the wall in fear before nervously settling down for a moment.

“Y-you’re not...you’re not raiders, are you?” She hiccups. She scrunches in on herself, attempting to shield herself with her shoulders since her hands are still bound behind her and Doll holds her own up carefully while holstering her gun.

“No, we aren’t. We’re here to take you home. Your husband sent us to help you”, she says and slowly approaches the woman. “We’ve taken care of all the raiders here. Now, we just have to get you outta here.”

Hancock pulls out his knife and the woman flinches again before he holds his own hands up.

“Hey, it’s alright, sister. I’m just gonna cut your hands free”, he reassures her. The ropes quickly fall from her wrists and he pockets his knife again while Doll helps her stand up, checking her over.

“Are you hurt at all?” She asks but she shakes her head in response. Hancock smiles a bit and jerks his head to the door.

“Good. Then let’s get you home to your man”, he says, pushing the doors open for them. “Ladies first”.

-

It’s melting into evening when they’re finally approaching the familiar farm land they had been at earlier in the day and the woman beside them makes a dash towards the shack.

“Jacob!” She shouts and the door swings open at the name before she’s sweeped up into her husbands arms and spun, his body almost melded to hers completely as they let out tears of relief and happiness.

“Oh my god, Jen!” He cries out, tightening his hold around his wife before frantically turning her face to him and kissing her as deep as he could muster, almost bending them both in half from the force alone. “You’re okay”, he whispers gently when he manages to pull away, running a hand through her hair. “I almost lost you...”

Hancock can’t help but smile a bit at the display in front of them, mentally comparing it to old world posters and advertisements of sailors coming home to their sweethearts and laying one right on them. He glances to Doll for a moment and he finds that her smile is sadder, as if recalling a long forgotten memory that was recorded in the depths of her heart.

It wasn’t difficult to figure out why she would be saddened by the display of overwhelming affection in front of them. He didn’t doubt that there were times where she was in the same situation once upon a time when Nate came home from his own deployment and wanted nothing more than to take her in his arms so he could remember what home felt like.

“Thank you so much”, Jacob says, grabbing Hancock’s attention. “Both of you”. Hancock tips his hat with a smile.

“Not a problem, brother. You two take care and give us a shout if ya ever need a hand again”.

Jacob quickly begins to rummage through his pocket for a moment before tossing a small pouch to Doll, who catches it in one hand with a jingle.

“It’s the caps they asked for. I scrounged them up in case you didn’t come back and well...you guys more than deserve it”, he says, his wife still firmly tucked in his arms. “We’ll back the Minutemen. And thanks again. If you two need a place to stay for the night, you’re welcome to stay here. There’s a foundation on the other side of the crops where a house used to be”.

He points out towards the empty wooden frame beside the corn stalks.

“We cleared it out but haven’t been able to do anything with it yet so if you’d like to set up a camp, by all means”, his wife says. “We have some spare supplies too if you need anything”.

Doll smiles and looks out to see the sun quickly fading from sight.

“We may take you up on that offer. Thank you”.

-

It’s a spacious but cozy spot once they set up everything they need and light a few lanterns atop the shelf on the wall, allowing them to unwind and relax, shedding armor and weapons and getting food into their stomachs.

Doll’s mind wanders numerous times in between conversations and Hancock notices the more it happens.

“You okay, sister?” He asks, swallowing a mouthful of whiskey as he notices her face go blank the second she spaces out again. She blinks and is startled back to reality before letting out a small chuckle.

“Yea, yea. I’m fine. Just thinking”, she says while her teeth bite into her bottom lip and it doesn’t go unnoticed by Hancock but he can’t help but wonder what it is that has her so distracted.

“What’s on your mind then? It’s gotta be important if it’s keepin’ you that occupied”, he says and a small smile quirks at her lips.

“It’s just...” she’s hesitant at first to talk about it but she decides that perhaps it’s for the best to let it out or it may not let her be. “I remembered something from before after seeing them together”. The pip boy on her arm is unlatched and she sets it down beside her bag, La Vie En Rose gently playing from Diamond City Radio.

“Yea? What was it?” He asks her, passing her the bottle of whiskey. She takes it and swirls it for a moment before taking a quick sip and cringing.

“Nate would do this thing often when I would get really depressed and it worked every time”. A smile spreads over her lips as she takes another sip and passes the whiskey back. “I would keep music playing all the time so he’d sneak up on me and grab me and end up swaying with me to whatever was playing before dipping me and bringing me back up into a kiss. It never failed to make me feel a bit better. Even if it was just a little bit”.

The smile on her face remains but the sad furrow of her brow soon accompanies it and Hancock can’t help but stare for a moment at her. The thought that she deserved to feel like that again crosses his mind and he takes a large swig of whiskey before rising to his feet. Doll doesn’t notice for a moment as her thoughts swallow her again until Hancock’s hand comes into view and takes her own into his firmly, pulling her close to him and letting the other encircle her waist.

“May I have this dance?” He smirks at her and she chuckles at first before resting her other hand atop his shoulder.

“I guess so since we’re both here”.

It’s a slow and gentle waltz and Doll is quick to learn that Hancock is a very good dancer, swaying them both in perfect rhythm to the song playing.

“You’re...really good at this”, she says, a brow raising. “I can only assume you do this often?” He laughs and shakes his head.

“Nah, not as often as you’d think. But Magnolia did teach me a few steps”, he says and the way she looks up at him nearly makes him go weak in the knees with how warm and appreciative and just genuinely happy she is, if even for the briefness of the song.

As the end of the song draws near, Hancock quickly but gently dips her and she begins to laugh as her head hangs upside down before he pulls her back up to his chest and they both realize just how close they are. Her heart is beating in her ears at their proximity but she almost doesn’t want to untangle from the warmth and safety of his arms. He too can feel his heart racing and his arms tighten more rather than loosen, keeping her pressed to his chest.

Hancock wants to kiss her. He desperately, almost overwhelmingly, wants to lean his head down to her and tilt her head back and kiss her with everything he’s hidden from her and show her what she means to him and that he’d do anything if it meant keeping that smile on her face.

But when she rests her hand on his face and kisses his cheek, he decides that that’s good enough and gives her a smile.

“Thanks, Hancock”, she says, leaning her head on his shoulder as they resume their slow sway and he leans his cheek atop her head and shuts his eyes.

One day...

-

I’m slowly getting back into things, I swear. Things have just been fucky is all.

[un-official-artist]

A Man is a Horse, of Course!

Rdr2 centaur au

Pairings: Charles Smith x Arthur Morgan

Parts: part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4

Arthur began to pant and slow. “Charles, I can’t...” he gasps, “I can’t go anymore...”

“It’s okay, Arthur.. we’re far enough away now,” He patted Arthur’s back and let him rest, “...where are we, anyway?”

They were in a wasteland of nothing but rocks and dry grass. Outlining the area was a poorly built wooden fence, and in the center was a small shack made of sheet metal and wooden planks. Arthur pulled his map out. “Somewhere called Beecher’s Hope.”

“We could stay here,” Charles suggested, “It’s secluded and away from dangers like Micah.”

Arthur sighed. “I.. I guess you’re right... it’s better that we’re away from the gang.”

“Hey,” Charles said as he put his hand on Arthur’s shoulder, “it’s alright. I’m sure we’ll meet up with them again someday.”

“But would it be safe to?” Arthur looked up at Charles, “Micah wanted to kill us back there...”

“I’m sure it’ll be fine, Arthur.”

“I don’t know... I just...” Arthur huffed and crossed his arms, staring at the dirt to avoid showing the tears in his eyes, “I just don’t want you to get hurt...”

Charles blushed. He stared at Arthur, gazing at the man’s rugged face. He was still beautiful, even like this.

“Arthur, I...”

Suddenly, the men heard loud shouting. Their ears pointed back towards the river. It was a familiar voice, that struck deep into Arthur’s memory. Arthur got up and walked towards the voice.

“...Touch me again, and I’ll fuckin’ knock your teeth out!”

“Watch your mouth, boy!”

The red headed boy in question was being shoved up the canyon by bounty hunter.

“Charles, is... is that Sean?” Arthur asked.

“It is. I would recognize that hair anywhere.”

“How do we get him?“

Charles looked at the canyon. He studied the path and the bounty hunters that held Sean captive. “There,” he pointed to a large camp at the end of the valley, “Thats where they’re taking him. I recon, once they bring him there, we go in and take out as many people as we can.”

“We only have so many bullets, Charles,” Arthur commented, “Plus now we’re bigger targets to hit.”

“But we’re also faster targets,” Charles smiled and began to move up the canyon walls. Arthur sighed and followed him. This is such a stupid plan, he though to himself. He wasn’t sure why he was even going with Charles. Maybe it was because he felt like he needed to protect him. Maybe it was because he liked Charles. Maybe it’s because I love Charles, a thought told him. No! No. I don’t love Charles.

The two men continued up the canyon, and waited just outside of the bounty hunters’ camp for them, hidden in the bushes.

“Uh.. you sure we’re well hidden enough?” Arthur asked.

“It’s enough so that they’ll just think we’re regular horses. We spring out once they notice us.”

“This don’t feel right...” Arthur sighed and shook his head. Suddenly, they heard Sean’s familiar shouting grow closer. Their ears turned towards the noise, and Arthur slowly poked his head up to see where the kid was. They had tied him upside down to a tree limb, leaving him dangling in the air and unconscious.

“Hey, y’all see them horses over there? In the bushes?” Arthur heard one of the bounty hunters speak. He began to walk closer to the two men, and clicked his tongue, making Arthur and Charles’ ears flick in his direction. “C’mere, horsies! C’mon!”

“Now, Arthur!” Charles yelled as he pulled out his shot guns. He ran out of the bushes and started firing with his shotguns at the bounty hunters, who were shocked, startled, and fearful of what they were seeing. Arthur followed him, pulling out his revolvers and taking out as many people as he could.

“Charles, grab Sean! I’ll hold them off, then we run!” Arthur instructed his friend. Charles nodded and headed for the boy, pulling out his knife and cutting him down. He turned to see Arthur, who was skillfully taking out the bounty hunters with hardly any effort. He leapt over crates as rocks that their enemies were using as cover, and took them out.

Charles’ eyes shimmered as he stared at the man. He was so beautiful, yet so dangerous. It had never occurred to him that Arthur, a man so kind and gentle, could kill easily without hesitation.

Charles shook his head and hoisted Sean onto his back. “Arthur, I got him!” he yelled.

“Good, now go!” Arthur replied. The two men took off galloping back towards the plains. They were nearly in the clear, when suddenly a gunshot rang from across the land. Arthur screamed in pain as the bullet implanted itself in his shoulder. He managed to drag himself across the river and back to Beecher’s Hope, before collapsing onto the ground.

“...Arthur, Arthur! Wake up!” Arthur heard Charles yell as he slowly opened his eyes.

“I’m... I’m awake...” he groaned.

“Oh thank god,” Charles sighed in relief, “Arthur, I’m going to need you to take off your shirt.”

Arthur turned shocked at Charles’ blunt words. His expression suddenly turned seductive as a blush crossed his face. “Oh really now?” He asked Charles in a flirtatious tone.

“Arthur you are literally bleeding out!”

The pain suddenly kicked in, making Arthur groan in pain. He quickly used his good arm to unbutton his shirt and take it off. Charles pulled out a knife and dug the bullet out, causing Arthur to almost scream.

“It’s alright, just stay calm,” Charles reassured him. He pulled out one of his shotgun shells and began to poor the gunpowder into the wound. Charles pulled a match out of Arthur’s satchel and lit it on his hoof, then cauterized Arthur’s injury.

Arthur put his hand over his mouth to keep from screaming in pain. It hurt, and now it burned. But he wasn’t scared. He put all his trust in Charles to make sure he would be alright.

Charles pulled away the match and dug inside of Arthur’s satchel. “Do you have bandages?”

“N-No..”

“Why do you not have bandages?!” Panic started to infect Charles’ tone of voice, and his eyes were full of fear. He shook his head to regather himself, then grabbed Arthur’s shirt and tore off the sleeve. He quickly wrapped it around the wound and pressed on his arm to stop the bleeding.

“There...” Charles said as he leaned back, “It didn’t look like it had hit any bones, just muscle. I think you’re gonna be okay, Arthur.” He smiled and offered his hand to help Arthur.

Arthur took it and pulled himself up with a groan. “Well, this is a bitch of an unfortunate situation...”

“How do you mean?” Charles asked.

Arthur stared at Charles. “How do I- what do you mean how do I mean?!” Arthur yelled, “There’s only one of us that can actually do stuff! I can’t just rely on you to do everything!”

“Well, there’s not just me,” Charles looked behind him. There, lying on the ground, was Sean. He was bruised, and knocked out, but nothing looked to bad. “...We should wake him up now,” Charles suggested. Arthur got up and walked over to Sean. He leaned down and shook him with his good arm.

“Sean? C’mon, kid, wake up-“ Sean’s eyes shot open, and he instantly started screaming. He kicked Arthur in the face in a desperate attempt to get away.

“Shit!” Arthur yelled as he put his hand on his nose. He shook his head and looked at Sean, who was standing and had a gun. Arthur’s gun.

“W-Who the hell are you?! What the hell are you?!” He yelled as he pointed the gun from Arthur to Charles.

“Sean, please,” Charles held his arms out and slowly approached him, “It’s us, Arthur and Charles. We don’t mean you any harm.”

Sean stopped panicking and looked at the other men. He didn’t speak for a few moments, which was a rare occasion in Arthur’s life. “By god, it is you too!” Sean yelled and he tossed the gun to the side, “What the fuck happened to you two?! Why are you back near Blackwater?”

“Charles and I managed to get ourselves cursed by some witch up in the Grizzlies a couple weeks back,” Arthur responded as he stood up, “And we’re here because..”

“Dutch kicked us out for being dangerous.”

“You two? Dangerous?” Sean laughed a bit, “I could take the two of you out with my bare hands!”

“Arthur and I both attacked Micah when he got on our nerves, Sean,” Charles informed him, “Dutch had the right to make us leave...”

“Dutch ain’t got no right to make you two leave! It almost sounds like you were doin’ the gang a favor by killin’ the bastard!” Sean replied. Arthur smiled a bit. Sure, Sean was annoying, but he had always been like family. And, he reminded him of the gang, whom he missed so much.

Sean looked at Arthur’s shoulder. “Say, you don’t look too good, Arthur,” he said.

“Well, I got shot when we were rescuing you.”

“Aw, you almost died to rescue little ol’ me? I’m honored Arthur, truly,” Sean teased, “In fact, to show my gratitude, I’ll take care of you boys!”

“Take care of us?” Charles asked as he crossed his arms.

“Yeah! You two can’t go into town to get supplies, you’ll be killed!”

“And you think you won’t?” Arthur snickered at Charles’ response.

“Not Blackwater!” Sean told him, “We’ll go run into the desert! We can go find a nice place to lie low, and live out the rest of our days. I hear Tumbleweed is a lovely place!”

Arthur looked at Charles, waiting for a response. Charles relaxed and smiled a bit. “Why not?”

“Charles, you’re not actually considering fleeing into the desert?” Arthur asked.

“Why not?” Charles asked, “It’s a good plan, plus if the law tries to track us down, we can always head into Mexico.”

“Alright!” Sean cheered. Arthur stared at Charles in disbelief. “We ride at dawn!”

[ashes-and-ashes]

Just One More Minute

(Just a little something I found in my drafts. I think the title already indicates it’s going to be angsty. Shrug.)

Just one more minute, he whispers to himself, standing on the wooden platform between stations on a rainy autumn day. He’s 11, his eyes fastened to the metal clock hanging on the side, watching the minute hand tick down to the hour, anxiously waiting for the white smoke and the hissing and the scarlet train pulling up on the rails. There are people all around him, their voices blurring into one another, chattering is odd of his head but Sirius ignores them, eyes still glued to the clock. Beside him, he feels a tug on his shoulder, Regulus’ anxious eyes staring into his own. “Siri,” he whispers. “You’ll come back, right? You won’t leave me with mother?”

“Of course not,” Sirius says impatiently; he’s far too excited to pay his brother much attention. He stands on his tiptoes, one eye on the hands of the clock, watching and waiting for the red train to take him away.

~

“Just one more minute,” he grumbles, turning over in the bed. The sheets are warm, deliciously so, soft and fluffy and Sirius feels like he could sink into the blankets. He’s not used to this, being woken a gentle tap or a light shake, is far too used to his mother’s screams and shouts and occasionally glass shattering against the wall. He takes a deep breath, the scent of clean cotton filling his nose.

“You said that 10 minutes ago,” Remus says, and hits him with the pillow. “You’re 12. No 12-year-old sleeps that much!”

“This one does,” Sirius mutters and he closes his eyes again, ignoring the pillow being slapped across his face. “Go away.”

Remus ignores him, finally resorting to yanking all the blankets off the bed, exposing Sirius’ skin to the cold air and Sirius sits up. “Oh, for God’s sakes,” he grumbles and launches himself forward, tackling Remus out of the bed and onto the floor. His head hits the back of the wall, his legs thrown over Remus and he can’t stop laughing as he smacks him over and over again with the pillow.

~

“Just one more minute!” Sirius calls. He’s 13 now, balanced on his broomstick, the air cold and clear as he swooped through the goalposts. The sun was setting, shining just above the Ravenclaw tower, casting spiky shadows all over the Quidditch Pitch.

Beside him, James lets out a yell as he flips himself over, weaving in and out around Sirius, trailing huge loops in the air. Sirius smirks and joins him, spiraling in huge arches and swooping into a dive. “Look at me, Remus!”

“You’re 18 minutes past curfew,” Remus informs him; his lips are turned up in a smile though, his eyes bright even in the darkening sky. “You’re going to give us detention.”

James flips him off and spirals back up, hair streaming behind him and Peter squawks. “You’ll kill yourself!”

“Doubtful,” James yells; he’s so high up that his words barely carry back down. “Shut up will you, Wormy!”

Peter blushes and looks down; Remus catches Sirius’ eyes and smirks. “Are you planning on killing yourself anytime soon?”

“Nah,” says Sirius; he’s lost in Remus’ eyes, the shifting colors, the way they seemed to glow even in the darkness. “I’m gonna live forever.”

~

“Just one more minute,” he calls; he’s bent over against the wall, the map lying on his legs. It’s his pride and joy - he knows every crease, every tear in the paper, loves the way the lines spiral across the parchment and unfold to the edges.

There were three things he loved at Hogwarts; his friends, the map and Remus.

Sirius bends back down over the paper, ignoring the banging on the door; he has his wand out, tip to the parchment, delicately tracing over the capillary of passageways, the lifeblood of the castle. “Give me a minute!”

“You’ve been in there for an hour,” says Remus; he’s got his mouth pressed up against the keyhole, his voice carrying through the room. “You need to study.”

Sirius stands, throwing his hair over his shoulders in mock anger; he can just barely catch the copper gleam of Remus’ eyes through the cracks in the door. “Homework can wait. I’m making a miracle.”

Remus sighs, leaning against the wood; it let out a pitiful creak. “Some miracle. It’s a plain old map.”

Sirius shakes his head, unable to keep the grin off his face. “Just you wait, Moons. Just you wait.”

~

Just one more minute, he thinks. Let me survive one more minute.

He’s curled up in the floor, the stone cool against his cheek, eyes screwed firmly shut. There’s the taste of blood in his mouth; he knows he’s bitten through his lip, blood running down his chin in steady streams, into the already large puddle around his body. His back burns, so fiercely that it brings tears to his eyes. The Hall still rings with his screams; he had tried to muffle it at first, letting blood flow instead of noise, but it was too much. He had cried out after the 5th Crucio and screamed after the 10th - his mother was resentless and he knew that he wouldn’t be able to walk for days.

He’s on his side now, curled up, what was left of his button down shirt now stained a dark red. Last time his mother had almost cut open his stomach, and so he had kicked his legs up to protect his torso. It was in vain though - all she had done was stack his unprotected back, burning it and cutting it and tearing it open until he had almost passed out.

He blinks rapidly now, fingers clenched on the floor, trying but failing to rise and bracing himself for the next round of pain.

Let me survive one more minute, he thinks, as he pain hits again. Please. Just one more minute.

~

Just one more minute he thinks, over and over again like a mantra, like some long-forgotten spell. One more minute.

He can hear the howling, coming from the Shack, can see the faint bursts of light trickling through the trees and Sirius sprints even faster.

Goddamn me, he thinks. I’m an idiot.

Because he was. He had let Snape bait him and curse him, had let himself be so caught up with rage and now he had spilled Remus’ secret. Now Snape was in the Shack and Remus was the Wolf and Sirius was desperately sprinting on legs that barely worked and he wanted to punch something but there was no time. He gritted his teeth, waves of pain shooting up his legs; there was still dark magic in his bloodstream, he could feel it. The world was swimming around him, making everything blurry but he didn’t care - Sirius followed the screaming as he headed into the forest.

~

“Just one more minute,” he says, Remus’ lips on his own. They were lying in bed together, the last day before school ended, Remus’ hands impossibly soft from where they rested on his hip. His hair was lighter, streaks of sun-bleached blond running through them like bits of gold and Sirius ran his hands through them.

“We’re going to be late,” Remus mumbles and Sirius presses him closer, tangling his legs through Remus’. “It’s fine. Classes are over anyways.”

Remus lets out a small yawn, eyes fluttering shut. “You’re a bad influence,” he mutters, his hair shifting due to his soft breaths. “It’s a wonder we’re all not expelled because of you.”

“I’m a star,” Sirius says and Remus laughs, burying his face into Sirius’ neck. “Be careful,” he said. “Stars are lovely and all, Sirius, but remember. They burn bright and then they explode and die.”

Sirius just shrugs, pulling Remus over him. “Better go out with a bang,” he smirks, and moves to cover Remus’ lips with his own.

~

“Just one more minute,” he hisses, his hands pressed to the steadily growing stain that was spreading across the bandage. “Please. One more minute.”

He can feel Remus’ heartbeat underneath his hands, the normally steady pulse now threads and weak and Sirius curses. “You idiot,” he hisses. “Absolute idiot.”

Remus gives him a weak smile from where he’s sprawled on the floor. His hand is covered in blood, the grip form where it was wrapped around Sirius’ wrist. “I love you,” he croaks.

“Don’t - “ Sirius begins, but it’s too late; with a small exhale Remus closes his eyes.

Sirius swears, redoubling his efforts, trying not to think about the way Remus’ body stiffened and went cold. “Please,” he whispered, and he didn’t know if he was praying or pleading or begging. “Please. Just one more minute.”

~

Just one more minute.

He’s huddled in the corner of his cell, his eyes tracking the motions of the Dementors gliding in the corridor around him. The air is bitterly, terribly cold, his clothing damp from the water dripping from the ceiling. There’s the taste of metal in his mouth, his hands sore and aching from where he’s slammed them against the wall countless of times; Sirius ignores the pain as he watches through the bars of his cell.

He’s numb now - even he can tell, lost in the haze of sea water and stone. His heart echoes slowly in his chest, his head pounding and his eyes heavy but he can’t fall asleep. Because that’s when the nightmares start, dark and realistic, the nightmares of Remus dying, over and over again. And he’d rather die, rather be tortured and cut and beaten, rather have his body ripped apart then see Remus dead.

So Sirius stares at the wall, fighting sleep, fighting the numbness and the despair with everything he has. Just one more minute. Stay awake for one more minute.

~

Just one more minute.

He knows he’s going to die.

The Veil whispers to him, soft and ghostly, filling his head with hundreds of images. He can see them, hovering just below his conscience, all the people who he had killed for and fought for and now would die for; Marlene and Dorcas and Fabian and Gideon, Benjy and Cardoc and Mary. And he can see them as well; the redness of Lily’s hair, the glint of James’ glasses, the locket gleaming at the base of Regulus’ throat. And above him is Remus, hand outstretched, still so beautiful even after all these years. He’s shouting something, his face terrified and by God, all Sirius wants to do is take that hand, pull himself up, let himself be with Remus.

It’s all he’s ever wanted, at the end of all this - the chance to live with Remus, to be with him, the ordinary trappings of an ordinary life. He’s already suffered so much, has gone through hell and back and God all Sirius wants to do is be with the boy he loved.

Please, he thinks, he begs, to the God he knows will not answer. Please. Give me one more minute. Let me at least say goodbye.

But he’s falling, backwards, into a pit that seemed to stretch on forever, and Sirius knows his time has run out.

[fvaleraye]

Old Debt

ayyyyyy, new Scintillam thing this one is... quite different, it is going to establish another protag to our story. there will be a couple more protags after this too asdlfkjn it also gives us the first hint of our main antagonist! noice :0 hope y’all enjoy reading-

The mountains of the northern edge of the continent were unforgiving, inhospitable. While many villages stood at the foot of the mountains, few dared ventured up the mountains themselves. Fewer still dared to make a home there. Not humans, at least. Unless they were very determined.

One such man seemingly had that determination required to climb.

A cloaked figure trekked through the serene mountaintop, his thick, black garb contrasting the snowy surroundings. Hooded eyes searched the horizon. He had little to go off of, only rumors. But he knew he had to be up here. There were few better places for a man who wanted to vanish from the world at large. And vanishing was always his quarry's forte. And tracking was his.

Eventually, a small wooden shack came into view. It was tucked away on a little cliff, around the edge of mountaintop, a quaint little porch barely shielded from the falling snow by a little overhang. You couldn't imagine anyone living there from looking at it, but it was clearly well cared for. And there was dim light in the window. There was most certainly someone home. And hopefully it would be who he was looking for. He stepped onto the porch, taking a second to appreciate the roof over his head, and the wood under his boots. Still outside in the snow, but better than having to trudge around in it. He stomped towards the door with purpose, and gave it a small knock. It was a very small house. He wouldn't have to knock very hard unless the occupant was asleep. There was silence. Then there was the quiet creaking of wood. Slow, hesitant, but deliberate footsteps sounded from the other side of the door. A click, and a creak, as the door slid open. A man stood in the doorway. Tall, but lean. Athletic. Graying hair tied back in a ponytail, a sizable beard on his face, and slight wrinkles, typical of age. Or a very stressful life. He wasn't dressed very warmly, wearing simply a black short-sleeved shirt and baggy pants. He probably had some sort of enchantments to make the interior of the house warmer. Or it was simply insulated much better than it looked. The man grimaced, though whether it was because of the cold or the one standing in front of him wasn't obvious. He slowly looked over the cloaked man in front of him. He was clearly not used to visitors, if his expression was anything to go by.

"... what do you want." He said slowly, simply, deliberately, though he phrased it more like a demand than a question, his low, aged growl of a voice rumbling off of the wood and stone.

The stranger let the question sit for a moment, tilting his head under his hood. "Oh c'mon, Sam..." He replied, his voice smooth and eccentric. "You don't remember me?" He raised his hands, and slowly slide the hood off to reveal his face. The hermit's expression turned to shock, then confusion, then anger, all in the same moment. The traveler's was simply one of smug confidence.

He tried to slam the door, but it was quickly caught. He glared at the visitor, his barely contained rage making it clear that he was not wanted in his home. "Snake."

"Charmer as always, I see..." He let out a sigh, and attempted to step into the shack, only to be shoved back onto the porch, the other coming out to join him.

"You are not welcome here."

"Oh, really? Here I thought I had walked into a bed and breakfast, the hospitality was so great..."

"Leave my home, snake."

"Snake snake snake, snake this, snake that- that's not my name you know! You'd think you would be a little nicer to your brother, Sam." He gave sly smirk, clearly delighting in the other's frustration.

"My brother no more." He shot back, clenching his fist.

"Oh, you wound me, Sammy boy..." He clutched his chest and gasped. "What happened to the good ol' days?"

"They are gone. As you will soon be gone from my porch." He reached a hand up to the other's shoulder, and promptly shoved him off of the porch and into the snow. He turned to walk back into the house.

"I-! How d-! Get back here, Samuel!" He scrambled to get up, dusting the snow off of his cloak and dashing back up the steps. "I did not climb up this Wyrm forsaken mountain just to have you kick me out!"

"Do not speak your dead god's name in my home, Ignis." He shot a glare over his shoulder, causing him to stop in his tracks. He turned, and strode up to him, glaring down at the shorter man. "If you dislike this mountain so much, I would be happy to throw you off of it."

"Since when are you happy about anything..." He mumbled, letting a sigh, and attempting to assert his own stance. "Just hear me out."

"No."

"But-"

"No."

"Just listen to me-!"

"Why. So you may spit your lies and venom, as you always have? So you may deceive me again, little brother?"

Ignis' expression turned exasperated, and he let out a groan. "Oh my gods, are you still on about that? That was years ago!"

Without another word, Samuel's fist suddenly collided with the unwanted visitors stomach, and he crumpled to the ground, coughing and gagging. "G-gods sakes, S-Sam-"

He grabbed his shirt collar, pulling him to his feet, and then off of them, holding him at eye level. "Leave my home." He growled, before throwing him back to the ground with a harsh thud.

"Gods d-damn it Sam- what happened to the days you would die for me?!" He cried, grasping his stomach.

"Those times are gone. There is no point in dying for a dead man, and you are already dead to me." He replied, his tone as cold and unforgiving as the mountaintop that surrounded the two of them.

Rage and frustration contorted the traveler's face, before he took a deep breath, and got back to his feet, his expression now more neutral. "You owe me, Sam."

"I owe you nothing, snake."

"Yes you do! I am the leader of the order-!"

"I belong to the order no longer."

"-but you still owe me your life!"

The hermit grimaced again, and it quickly became a snarl.

"Your honor- the warrior's honor- demands that you repay me! And I am calling in that favor, here and now, Sammy boy!" He began to look smug again, which did nothing for the other's frustration.

"And you expect me to put my honor before my reason." He huffed. "Go eat your tail, snake." He turned, and walked back into the house, slamming the door behind him, the force prompting snow to fall off the roof.

Ignis just stood there flabbergasted. "... did he just tell me to go fuck myself-?" He wondered allowed, before shaking his head and banging his arm against the door. "Open up, Sam!" Silence settled as he waited for a response. He pounded on the door again. "Open the door!" He grabbed the doorknob, shaking the door for a moment before slamming his fist against it again. "OPEN THE FUCKING DOOR, YOU OLD BASTARD!" He briefly paced angrily on the porch, before kicking the door open, the cold wind blowing into the small shack.

Samuel was simply sat on the floor, on a rug, glaring daggers into his brother.

"I want you to listen to me, you old fuck." He snarled, stomping over to his brother's side. "I am turning to you, in my time of need, because I need your help. Not anyone else’s! Is that not enough?! Do you really need me to say it?! I'll say it, okay?! You're better than me, always have been, okay?! Are you happy?! Will you listen to me now?!"

The words sat for a moment, the hermit's expression unchanging, unreadable. "If you honestly think that is the only reason why I will not listen to what you have to say, then you are even denser than I thought."

"Listen to me-!"

"No." He yelled, springing to his feet. "You listen." He placed a hand on the other's chest, gripping his shirt. "I trusted you. I loved you, you were my baby brother. I promised mother I would always protect you, and you..." His face contorted into a snarl, his other hand gripping him so that he could pick him off his feet. "You killed them. Not by your own hand, but through your actions. The information you let slip. The information I trusted you with. Maria, Sol, my wife and my only remaining son, their families, friends, and for what? Money?! POWER?! JEALOUSY?!" He threw him to ground with a scream, and put his foot firmly on his chest. "YOU ARE A SNAKE, A VILE, VENOMOUS SNAKE, AND I WILL NOT BE THE FOOLISH FARMER AGAIN!"

"WHAT ABOUT YOUR GRANDDAUGHTER, YOU CRAZY FUCK?!"

Silence settled over the room again, only the cold wind against wood breaking it. After a moment, Samuel took his foot from Ignis, and picked him up by his shirt, lifting him far above his head. "Explain. Before I pop your head from your shoulders, and feed you to the mountain wolves."

"She's in danger." He wheezed, his face still coated in anger and frustration with his brother's behavior. "She may not know it, but she's in... way over her head. She's looking for something, and if she finds it, she will die."

"Why would you tell me this? Why should I believe you, more importantly?"

He stayed silent for a moment, glaring, and opening and closing his mouth as if he was going to say something for a moment, but nothing came out at first.

He tightened his grip. "Why. Should. I. Believe. You."

"B-b-be-because if she f-finds what she's looking for, we're all gonna fucking die! Okay?!" He gasped, desperately clawing at the other's hands. "She's looking for the House of the Black Serpent, and if she finds them, they're gonna go fucking ballistic-!"

"... House of the Black Serpent..." He parroted, his expression turning to one of deep concern. He considered his words for a moment, and then tossed him to the floor again, prompting him to cough and wheeze. "Why would you tell me this? Are you not a member of this house?"

"A-are you c-crazy?" He gagged, weakly trying to pull himself to his feet. "These people are a draconic apocalypse cult, I'm not that fucked in the head..."

Silence hung over the room again. He was telling the truth. Samuel knew it. A liar and a snake he was, but he would spit out the truth if his life was at stake. And it most certainly was. He stepped out of the room without another room, and into a back room of the house. It was empty. Save for a large sword, and a set of warrior armor that seemed more ceremonial than anything else. He picked up the mask, and looked into its stoic, unfeeling expression. "... I can't believe I'm doing this." He mumbled, giving a deep sigh, before letting his expression soften to one of worry. "... but, if she's really in trouble..."

After a few minutes, he stepped out of the room again, dressed in his old apparel. A set of spiked shoulder-guards, clawed gauntlets, and a gray mask, designed to be similar to the face of a wraith, but no other real armor. Simply the shirt and pants he was wearing before. In his hand, a black claymore. He stared his brother, who only just not found the strength to get to his feet. "If you are lying to me, again." He started, his voice sounding deeper, and more menacing under the wooden visage. "I will kill you. In the most. Painful way possible."

"I know." Ignis replied, coldly. "Now, just... be on your way." He sighed, stepping out the door. He stopped, and glanced over his shoulder for a moment."And make haste, brother."

[canarhys]

Leo and Nico are both disasters and their dates always end with at least one zombie running around and something gets exploded

“so let me get this straight: you two went on a date to santa cruz, accidentally broke the carousel, set one of the game booths on fire which caused it to explode, created a temperature anomaly that caused people to have hypothermia, and you... raised some guy from the dead and set him loose?”

“well, when you put it like that it sounds like a bad thing,” was all leo said, twirling a gear around his pointer in one hand and holding nico’s hand in the other. nico stifled a laugh by faking a cough.

“it was on the news!” jason exclaimed. “i’m pretty sure it has to be a bad thing to be on the news. how did this happen?”

“well,” nico started, clearing his throat and making leo laugh and drop the gear to cover his mouth. “it all started...”

[[MORE]]

———

“huh.”

nico stared at the carousel they were on, the horses now spinning so fast they were a blur, the entire thing going in a backwards direction. leo had thought it was a good idea to interfere with the gears to make it go faster, and it was fun! not for the other mortals though — nico thought he saw a kid get flung off a horse with the funniest scream possible. eventually the two realized that they were the only ones on the ride and the only ones that were smiling and quickly got off, landing on the pavement beneath the carousel with accuracy. now they were both looking at the thing and, wow, it was not that fast when we were on it.

“huh,” leo copied. the two looked at each other.

“huh,” they breath simultaneously, before laughing their asses off. the other mortals were leaving the scene, scared and confused, but luckily the guy at the control panel was too busy looking at the buttons on his pad to notice the true culprits.

“you should probably fix it,” nico supplied, letting leo wrap his arm around his shoulders. leo was tiptoeing slightly, as nico had grown an inch or two in the year. it was cute, and he teased him constantly about it since the only person leo was taller than was hazel.

“yeah, i should,” leo replied.

they continued staring at the shit they caused.

“leo.”

“fine, fine!”

leo’s hand that wasn’t on nico strained open, and nico could hear the sound of cogs loosening. the carousel started to slow down, slowly and surely, until it rested to a stop. the two both cringed. one of the horses lost a head. a mirror on the column in the middle was in pieces. and was that blood? probably.

“we should go,” leo said, looking back at the crowd that gathered. nico nodded. the two bolted out of the caged attraction and ran to the pier.

———

jason looked like he was getting a headache. “leo, why would you do that?”

leo shrugged. “at least i didn’t kill anyone.”

nico ignored the thought of that goat screaming kid in the air. “yeah, jason, let him go.”

“okay, okay.” jason laid down on his bed, craning his neck to look at them. “and i suspect that he also set the booth on fire?”

“oh no, that was all me,” nico answered.

“what?”

———

leo gasped, unclasping his hand with nico’s to run over to one of the game booths on the piers (which didn’t make nico frown a bit, totally). the booth had a wooden stand with a backstage and a rainbow tarp on the top, advertising a ball toss. there were a string of stuffed animals hanging from the roof, squishmallows, nico thinks.

leo was staring with puppy eyes at a lime green one with little wings, a snout a white color, and two yellow horns on the head. a dragon, nico suspects.

“he’s so cute!” nico thought he was going to cry for a second. leo started fishing coins from his pocket. “i need to win him, festus is gonna love him—“

nico stopped his hand. “i’ll win him for you.”

leo blinked. “what?”

“i’m your boyfriend,” nico reasoned. “aren’t i supposed to win shit for you? like those straight guys who win gifts for their dates?”

“you’re not a straight guy, nico,” leo laughed, but he had a hopeful expression. “so...”

“so, i’ll win him! it’ll be easy,” nico said, taking out the coins from his pocket and placing them on the counter. leo’s face lightened up with joy, sending butterflies to nico’s with his glowing eyes and wide smile.

the guy, a large and happy mid-30’s man with a barbershop quartet-esque outfit, came up to them, handing nico three tennis balls. “you get three tries! if you get at least 60, you can get any prize!”

“nice rhyme!” leo commented.

“why, thank you!” the guy replied, face flushing.

leo turned to nico. “you got this! you do archery practice, right?”

totally, nico wanted to say. there was an issue though — nico wasn’t that good at projectile weapons. he liked to get up, close, and personal with the enemy. if he was only gifted a bow and arrow in a battle he would die first thing.

“nico?” leo repeated, bringing nico out of his thought process. “hey.” leo kisses nico on the cheek, a soft and warm feeling that made him feel pride. “you got this, man!”

nico stepped back as leo got out the way, reeling back his arm and throwing the ball at the holes of the rectangular cut-out with the labeled points. his eyes widened as the ball entered the ten hole. nico tried to fake cough to stop himself for cheering for such a dumb accomplishment, but leo made him smile as he cheered. “wooh! that’s my husband!”

“leo, i’m your boyfriend.”

“not after this! this is basically an engagement.”

nico snorted as he tossed another ball, fortunately hitting the ten once again. leo cheered. nico smiled at the praise, but then he looked upwards to the squishmallow leo desired. it required sixty points. shit.

shit.

“what’s wrong?” leo asked when nico facepalmed and groaned. he looked at the plushie’s price, then at nico. “ah. it’s fine, there’s a forty hole—“

“i know but i’ve been hitting tens for two rounds. if i hit another i’ll have to get you that dumb buzz lightyear in the corner.”

“okay, first of all, he’s not dumb,” leo supplied. “he’s from infinity and beyond. second of all, i appreciate you trying more than you succeeding. i don’t give a shit if you don’t win the thing, and hey, i’ll get a lightyear action figure! i believe in you, dude.”

to show that, he grabbed the ball from nico’s hand and placed a light kiss on it before handing it back. “fuck em up, babe.”

nico smiled, staring at him with heart eyes. “you’re so dramatic.”

“you love it.”

nico reeled his arm back before realizing that the tennis ball... wow, the tennis ball was hot. so hot that...

“ah, shit!” nico screeched, the sudden burning sensation in his hand causing him to throw the ball without looking first.

“fuck, are you okay?” leo grabbed his hand, luckily not finding any burns. but his attention was limited by the sound of something hitting metal, and they both stared at the ball, which was bouncing all over the place in the small shack. the guy behind the counter had taken shelter in the corner, his eyes also following the green blur as it hit a beam and then the ground and later finally—

it hit the sixty hole.

nico’s mouth gaped open as leo whooped, throwing his arms around nico’s neck. “that was fucking awesome!”

“congratulations!” the guy had receded from his shelter and wiped down his clothes. “you got eighty points. what would you like?”

nico pointed to the squishmallow. the guy took it down and handed it to him. “you have twenty points left. what else would you like?”

nico pointed to the buzz lightyear action figure, making leo giggle. the guy handed it to him as well. nico then relayed his two prizes to the boy who started it all.

“for you, mi amor,” nico said. leo hugged the squishmallow, which was half his size and super soft to the point where all of it was affected by his grip. he was holding the toy story figure in his right.

“nico di angelo, you are incredible,” leo said.

“i mean, you’re the one that heated up the ball to help me make the shot.”

leo frowned. “i what?”

they both turned back to the booth. the cutout was on fire. well.

“hey, man?” leo said to the employee. “you might want to...” he let his sentence drag, pointing to the rectangle that was now on the ground and setting the fake grass aflame. the guy looked at it once before yelping and leaping over the counter with impressive strength, huddling beside them.

“what on earth happened?”

nico and leo shared a glance. “no idea,” they both said in unison.

apparently there was some catalyst in there because boom! the booth exploded in the inside.

the man turned to the kids, about to ask them what they did when he noticed the empty space beside him. well, he was lucky enough to have all the money in his pocket. and, like the boys, fled when a crowd started to muster.

———

jason was facedown in the bed. “so it was both of your faults?”

“pretty much,” nico said. he looked at leo. “did you even know you heated up the ball when you kissed it?”

“i can’t control my kisses!” leo exclaimed, exasperated. “you can’t just hand me something and expect it to not set on fire.” he crossed his arms, pouting.

nico nudged him. “it wasn’t your fault.”

“i mean,” leo said, “it was kind of my fault in the zombie incident.”

jason looked up from his place of torment. “not surprising. what happened?”

“so...”

———

“leo, you’re going to get a stomach ache.”

“pftt, no i’m not!” leo dug his hand into his pack of popcorn and ate i whole. “i’m basically immune to that stuff.”

“i had to take care of you when you had the stomach flu,” nico replied. “you threw up three times.”

“and what about it?” leo laid a hand on his hip. he didn’t expect nico to kiss him on his temple, feeling his face flush and his heart pound a little louder. he whined and laid his head on his shoulder, making nico snort and comb through his hair.

the two were sitting on the edge of the pier, feet hanging over the dark blue ocean, fading into a golden glow with the sun setting on the horizon. leo traced hearts on nico’s hand, breathing in the seaside air. despite the date being disastrous with the broken carousel and the blown-up ball booth, he never felt so at peace before. he looked up and caught nico staring at him with a soft smile, and took the opportunity to close the gap between them. nico’s breath smelled like mint, his chapped lips in a smile against his own and leo felt his mind clear, his senses calm and all his problems fade. leo made a small noise when nico kissed him deeper, ending with him biting his lip. they broke away.

“i’m cold,” leo said. nico raised an eyebrow.

“you can’t get cold if it’s not below zero, leo,” he said. leo pouted while nico gave a grin. “are you just trying to get my hoodie?”

“maybe...”

“dork.” nico unwrapped his hoodie from his waist and handed it to leo. leo immediately stuffed himself into it, laughing at how it was a bit bigger than him. leo had a huge fetish for stealing giant ass hoodies from his friends, and his boyfriend was no exception.

“you look cute,” nico deadpanned. leo caught him shivering slightly. he tried to give the hoodie back but nico refused, saying he was “cold,” so leo resorted to wrapping his covered arms around nico and letting himself warm him up. nico sighed in content, lying his head into leo’s embrace and peppering his neck with soft kisses.

leo hummed a soft tune as he watched the ocean rise and fall.

that was when he felt it.

suddenly, his senses went crazy, a red-alert sounding off in his head and his body immediately on edge. nico must have had the same reaction, cus he shot up from leo’s collarbone and narrowed his eyes, glancing around similar to the habits of a hellhound. the air was different.

a monster was nearby.

leo groaned. “are you fucking kidding me? we were so close to having a monster-free day!”

“i know,” nico supplied, standing up on the pier and helping leo up. “where is it?”

they both searched around before landing their eyes on... a headless guy. staring at them. well, not really staring, more like facing? nico and leo frowned.

“well,” leo breathed, “that is... uh...”

“where the hell is his head?”

the headless man started walking towards them. leo saw and felt the mist shimmer, letting him get a closer look at the headless man and—

“jesus christ!” leo yelped. “that is not okay!”

from one of the camp’s lectures, he had remembered hearing about these headless men. the man was shirtless and wearing a single cloth around his hips, giving the two a look at the face imbedded into his chest. two eyes protruded from his brests, blue and striking, his nose and mouth right under with a grim expression. the popcorn didn’t taste well anymore.

“acephali,” nico and leo muttered in unison. nico laid his left hand on his sword while leo opened his tool belt, taking out a small bomb he had made a few weeks ago.

“is he hostile?” nico asked.

the man’s chest mouth suddenly released a sort of battle guy, and his burly legs started a charge at them.

“he’s hostile,” leo assumed, before dodging out the way as the monster raised a club, a wooden and heavy beast, and hit the ground.

nico and leo were behind the thing as it tried to retrieve his club, as it was impaled deep into the pier’s structure. “you attack, i distract,” leo commanded, and nico nodded. it was their favorite way of fighting together; leo setting them up and nico knocking them down.

leo ran over to close the distance between him and the acephalite. “hey, headless!” the guy turned to him, his body face contorting in both confusion and anger. “did your mom know you were out here right now? or was she too busy being disgusted by your dumb face?”

that seemed to hit below the belt, because the monster directed his charge directly at him. leo retaliated by tossing up his bomb and throwing it at him, hitting him straight between his eyes and exploding. he cried out, but the worst for him wasn’t over, because nico shadow-traveled right behind him and attacked, releasing a torrent of slashes from his stygian iron sword. the monster bled with every slash, and turned around just to get face-chest-first with leo charging up his hand and releasing a fire ball, sending him flying.

by now the people around them were screaming (though leo forgot about them to be completely honest), running away from the water’s edge and down towards the beach to take cover. he wondered what they were seeing, because he’s pretty sure the mist was having a party trying to prevent them from seeing two gays battling a headless horseman.

as they were fighting, with leo throwing makeshift bombs and nico sword fighting with prowess, nico was able to take out one of the creature’s eyes. the monster yelled in pain, his blue iris now dark and bleeding profusely. and in revenge the creature knocked the blade out of nico’s hands, sending it straight into the ocean. nico only had time to widen his eyes before getting knocked down, sprawling out on the side of the pier.

“nico!” leo screamed, before feeling a hand knock him down as wall, making him fall on his back with a groan. he opened his eyes just to see the glimpse of the monster’s club swing down, and he dodged it just in time to see it lodge itself into the wood just two inches away from his ear. the acephalite huffed as i tried unlodge the the club from the wood, splinters flying from each effort. leo took the opportunity to grab the club, heating it up with his hands and making the creature screech and hold its hands in pain. leo then rolled over, got down on his stomach next to the monster’s feet and unsheathed a knife from under his shorts, the celestial bronze blade glinting in the sunset. he twirled it around his fingers to find the right angle, reeled it back and stabbed the monster straight in the ankle. the acephalite howled in pain, comedically grabbing his bleeding foot and hopping on one leg.

leo then ran over to nico, who had gotten back on his knees and staring at the water, muttering something. he was about to reach him when a large hand grabbed the back of nico’s hoodie, pulling him back and held him in the air. he kicked his legs and cursed at the monster, glaring at him with a single eye and a frown that reached his hip bones.

the monster made the mistake of pulling him closer to examine, letting leo hold up the knife and stab him directly in the eye. the acephalite whined before growling, the hand holding him up now grasping against his neck, choking him.

leo felt the air escape him. he gasped for oxygen, clawing at the hand encasing his throat. he couldn’t summon fire, because fire needed oxygen, and leo was out of it at the moment and it hurt so bad. dark spots clouded his vision. he tried to scream, for the gods, for his friends, for nico, but the hand closed in tighter and he couldn’t breathe—

then, suddenly, a blade pierced through the back of the monster, protruding from its mouth. a stygian iron sword.

the hand let go of him, nearly letting him hit the ground and splat if someone wasn’t there to catch him. leo heaved, hunched over and allowing the arms to envelope his torso, taking in as much oxygen as he could.

he looked up when he had finally been able to breathe properly to see an olive-skinned, raven-haired boy, with the scariest yet kindest eyes, sweating but smiling at him. leo smiled back, yelling “thank the gods!” and wrapping his arms around nico’s neck, burying his face in his chest. nico dug his face into his curly hair, sniffing a bit and kissing it with no abandon.

they were stuck in that position for a good minute when leo suddenly shot up. “wait a minute. if you’re here, and you don’t have your sword, then who...?”

he glanced back. the monster was frozen, the black metal still sticking out from between his teeth. suddenly, the monster disintegrated, yellow dust particles floating in midair before falling to the ground or whisking away due to the sea breeze. behind the acephalite, holding nico’s sword, was a skeleton, grimy and the color of oily metal, with seaweed hanging from between bone interlocks and out of his grinning molars. it was dripping wet, and the only article of clothing it wore was a sailor’s cap. leo made a small “oh” sound. that was why nico was muttering on the pier. he didn’t even know people died this close to the harbor.

nico pulled leo up with him, holding him tight by the waist and taking the sword with gratitude. “thanks fernando,” he said.

the skeleton replied by promptly screaming like a banshee, startling nico and leo, before dashing off towards the beach, its bones rattling with every step as it continued keening. nico and leo watched as fernando ran over to a crowd, making them scream in horror and run away.

“he was under the ocean for decades,” nico explained. “based on his freakout, i don’t think he remembers what oxygen is.”

leo touch his own neck and winced. “i’d be too if you hadn’t come in like the batman you are.”

“let me see.”

nico inspected his neck, frowning deeply. “you have ambrosia with you?”

“why of course.” leo fished out a ziplock bag from his tool belt. he took out a small piece and ate it. tasted like melted chocolate and that popcorn he had been eating, which was unceremoniously lying on the pier, a few kernels have made their way into the sea to become fish food. he already felt his throat open up, but he knew the image of the bruises would take a while to fade. ambrosia was good at healing internally, but externally needed a little patience.

“you need some?” he asked. nico shook his head. leo gave him an “i don’t believe” look. “uh huh, sure. yeah, you mind lifting your shirt for me?” not a question, but a command.

nico sighed, lifting the hem of his t-shirt to reveal an extremely ugly bruise. leo narrowed his eyes at nico before feeding him a piece of ambrosia. nico ate it, and leo saw the bruise begin to fade.

nico let his shirt fall, looking at leo with an apologetic face. “well, this date was a disaster.”

“are you serious?” leo reached into his backpack and took out his squishmallow, which he had named dexter, still clean and plump. “today was the most fun i’ve ever had. i’ve honestly never laughed that hard since percy and the... ya know.”

nico snorted. “yeah, that was fun.”

“and it’s not like we can control most of the shit that happened,” leo suggested. “we’re demigods. we got chased down by a headless man and unleashed a zombie on the town of santa cruz. that’s not the weirdest thing to happen to us.”

nico didn’t reply for a good ten seconds. “i mean, you do look cute in my hoodie.”

leo blushed. “you look cute when you smile.”

“shut up!”

nico wrapped his arms around his boyfriend, making leo chuckle and place their foreheads together. dexter was being squished by the two bodies, which was okay because squishmallow was in his name. this would probably be enjoyable for him.

they stayed in silence for a while before leaning in, softly locking their lips together. and as the sun finally disappeared, leo still felt it there, on nico’s cold, soft lips that seemed like the perfect puzzle piece for his own.

they broke apart. “next time, we should make our date more private,” nico ordered.

leo wiggled his eyebrows. “private?” he sang in a seductive voice. nico retorted by kissing him again and effectively shutting him up.

———

“and... that’s about it.”

jason was silent for a minute or two, staring at the couple on the other cabin bed. “i honestly don’t even know how to react.”

“i mean...” leo made a vague gesture. “we half fucked up and half didn’t. it’s like... pretty standard for a demigod.”

“more-so two demigods.”

“and leo, how was that your fault?”

leo opened his mouth to speak but nico cut him off. “he says if he hadn’t gotten himself caught the battle would’ve been won faster and i wouldn’t have to summon fernando. he’s wrong.” leo pouted but kept quiet when nico glared daggers at him.

jason shook his head. “okay, then what about the temperature anomaly?”

“from the fight,” leo answered. “i breathed fire on the acephalite and nico shadow-traveled a lot to hit it so...”

“well, at least the mist had covered it up.”

“what’d the news say?” nico questioned.

“carousel breaks down out of nowhere, booth explodes due to gas leak, and florida man proceeds to terrify countless people.”

“florida man?” leo chuckled. “we were in cali.”

jason shrugged. “i’m just glad the two of you are alright.”

“yeah.” nico tightened his fingers around leo’s own. “us too.”

and jason smiled.

[fireintheforest]

Behind the Blue: chapter 6

“Man, it feels like we’ve been walking for agesss.” Marcello moaned, “Are we there yet?”

“No.” Toivon replied. No further information was given. Saufinril didn’t participate in the conversation, his mind wandering more to the light nervousness of this road, where some weeks ago he’d walked them heading south after the breakup. Toivon had said last night they’d go to Skingrad, then Chorrol, and from there they’d cross upwards to Hammerfell until finally, to Evermor. Skingrad, Saufinril mused, was awfully close to Kvatch. What if he ran into Eramon? What would he say, how would it look? Or maybe he didn’t have to say anything.

Much like he did, Saufinril thought with a bite of anger. 5 years and it was suuuuuch a fucking pain to inform his partner that he had planned a threesome. Fucking jerk. And that wasn’t the only time! What about the time he didn’t tell Saufinril about the Valenwood green “business” he had? Or the Gardtide scam? Or why he got arrested by the barbershop? Oh! Or what about that he was married and then ditched him for his husband only to ask him back and then not tell him about a fucking threesome???

Yeah, no. He didn’t owe him shit. If he saw him then GOOD. He’d make sure he would see him enjoying himself. Without him. Fucking dick. Not telling him shit and then saying ‘I want to rescue this relationship’ as if he hadn’t condemned it from the beginning?? Asshole.

“-on, Saufinril?”

Saufinril looked up. Or rather, Toivon noticed, glared up. Shit, what’s wrong with him? Before he could repeat his question, Marcello piped in.

“What is our plan, anyhow?” Marcello inquired

“I won’t say it here, out in the open.” Toivon said, turning his head back to Marcello, who rolled his eyes and replied, “I’m not talking about then, I’m talking about the time before here and there! What do we do, where do we go, is there a pit stop? I need to hit the outhouse.”

“I told you to go to the outhouse when we arrived at the border.”

“I didn’t need to go then! Can we afford like, 5 minutes?”

“One would suggest we keep walking.” Saufinril interrupted, “We’re tight on schedule.” There was a silent pause as the three mer kept walking, killed only by Marcello’s words.

“I mean…if Toivon doesn’t look back and Saufinril can try to not step on it, I can multitask walking with-”

“NO.” Saufinril snapped, involuntarily too loud. Toivon stifled a laugh, “Let’s stop.”

“You said so yourself, we’re on a tight schedule!” Toivon protested, now turning to Saufinril.

“Then you walk behind him and one walks on front! But one is not going to be on the receiving end of the Second Seed rains!” Saufinril snapped.

“Can we make a consensus quick, lads? I really need to go. We surely can’t be that tight on schedule to not afford a normal, tax-paying mer a couple minutes!” Marcello added, looking between the two older mer.

“Ugh, fine. Marcello, one minute. Go.” Toivon said as he stopped.

“Yes!” Marcello quickly darted out of the road and past some bushes. Toivon and Saufinril, meanwhile, stepped out of the road. Saufinril rested against a tree while Toivon absentmindedly rolled a stone around the ground with his foot. Saufinril bit his lower lip and looked back, the awkward silence between the two mer dampened only by the rustling of leaves with wind and the faraway cawing of crows. Saufinril sighed. The minute dragged on. It felt like more than it really was, but finally Marcello emerged from the bushes.

“Let’s go.” Toivon said, going back to walking. All three mer took back to the trail, the soft brown ground underneath them mushy from the rains, with dead leaves cushioning the mud and making it walkable.

  Skingrad was as bustling and busy as all three mer remembered it. High walls enclosing the city, merchants and people of all races coming to and fro (well, most of all races. Khajiit tents rested outside of city limits) and the guards at the entrance of the city.

“So what’s the plan here?” Saufinril asked, moving his shoulder in time to avoid hitting a young couple with a baby.

“We stay one night at the Trotting Mare, then we keep moving. Before that, go get whatever you need for the trip.” Toivon said.

“Heyyy you-I think I have to do something first. Catch you guys later.” Marcello suddenly said. Toivon began to turn to the younger elf, “Do you even know wh-” but he was long gone. Saufinril turned to Toivon.

“Hope he knows where the Trotting Mare is.” He mused.

“For his own good, he better. I’m not gonna hunt around the city for him.” Toivon replied, heading back down the street, Saufinril in tow.

“How do you know about this inn?” Saufinrin inquired, moving past two gossiping Imperial women that insisted on staying in the middle of the road, his eyes never leaving the shorter mer ahead of him.

“I travel around, y’know. Admittedly, Cyrodiil isn’t exactly my cup of tea, too…weird. Imperials are weird.” Toivon skirted around a cart full of apples and books. Saufinril followed suit. In no time they reached the inn, larger than in Saufinril’s imagination. He’d pictured some small wood shack, not the large building of gray stone, round balconies and various windows in front of him. There was a wooden sign outside of it with a gray mare in a canter,  right next to a board with announcements of jobs, selling, buying, trading, praises to the Thalmor and their allegiance to the Imperial army (Saufinril suppressed a face of disgust at that) and shows that were to happen at the inn that week.

The inside of the inn showed more warmth than the exterior, if anything from the lighting of the candles around and the vase of flowers by the innkeeper and bartender, a short and robust woman with brown hair in a bun and a mole dead set at the tip of her nose. She reminded Saufinril of a hagraven, like the ones in the storybooks of his childhood. One glance from the woman to the two mer and she immediately smirked wickedly.

“Now, what’re you doing here, in the city?” she questioned with some glee to Toivon.

“Just work.” Toivon replied back, grinning, “What’re you doing here, still alive?”

“I’m gunna need more than sickness and three dead husbands to take me to the grave. Oi, who’s the tall one? First time I see one of them with you, thought you gave them the wide berth. You!” she motioned to Saufinril, the smile leaving, “The Lilypad is on the other side of the city, with the others of your kind.”

“What exactly are the others of one’s kind?” Saufinril asked, a snap in his tone. He knew damn well who she was referring to, but he was going to make her say it out loud if necessary.

“Calm down, Gianna. Do you get like this with every new customer? No wonder this place looks worse than last time.” Toivon interrupted, sensing the conversation would end in a headache for him.

“You’re damn right it looks worse, thanks to the Thalmor.” She narrowed her eyes, looking again at Saufinril, “He’s not with ‘em?”

“He’s not.” Saufinril replied cooly.

“He’s helping me and Marcello with a job.” Toivon added, giving Saufinril a look.

“Why didn’t you say so?” the probably-a-witch said, more jovially this time, “An Altmer messing ‘round with Dunmer. Hah! Reckon it’s the first time I see one stoop down here, they’re either out there in fancy uniforms or avoiding the place like it were shit, with their noses so high up, they drown in rain.”

Ah, stereotypes. Now he was in Cyrodiil, Saufinril thought.

“For twenty Septim, you can gawk at him ten minutes.” Toivon felt Saufinril’s glare at the nape of his neck, but didn’t turn to look at him, “Or you could give us some rooms for the night. Whatever you got.”

“Got one. Share the bed or sleep on the floor or something. 25 septims per room per night, and I want a job fer free next time you’re around.” Gianna scratched her mole. Saufinril was almost sure the mole moved on its own, “Giving ye the family discount, love.”

“Don’t wanna know how you treat enemies.” Toivon pulled out the coin and handed it, then both mer followed Gianna past the patrons at their tables drinking, eating or talking, up two set of stairs to the rooms. Some had closed doors, others were open, one had a suspiciously rhythmic banging going on. Gianna stopped at the room.

“Here you go, yer humble abode.” She announced

“Thanks.” Saufinril entered, followed by Toivon.

“If you need anything, don’t come to me, figure on your own and pay if you break anything.” She said the last part looking at Toivon as he got in the room.

“That was one time, Gianna!”

“Where’s Marcello, anyway?” she asked. Saufinril dropped the bag on the bed, sighing to himself and marveling at how heavy this bag was. Had he really packed this much, or was he just tired? He started to rummage through, trying to see what was causing the extra weight.

“He said he had to do something, then took off running faster than a whore in a raid.”

“I’m here!” Marcello’s voice came from the landing. Saufinril turned away from his bag when Marcello’s voice rang, then went back to his rummaging. Or tried to, because he had to stop when Marcello flopped on the bed. Toivon, on the other hand, was resting against the doorframe while talking to Gianna, observing Marcello. He seemed perfectly normal. Too perfectly normal.

“So, what was the mystery errand?” he asked

“Ah, well you said we had to go out and get whatever we needed for the road, right?”

Toivon blinked, surprised that Marcello had actually been listening, “Yeah…”

“So I did.” Marcello replied, then turned to Gianna with a beaming smile, “Long time no see!”

“Could say the same about you, but you look just like last time. Only grayer.” Gianna replied

“Yeah, you do too.”

Toivon let out a laugh as Gianna tossed the keys of the room to Marcello, making them land on his forehead. “Ya rude boy!” Gianna said, unable to hide the smile, “If it weren’t for your dead mother you’d be sleeping outside!”

“You know, I wouldn’t mind…” Toivon added

“I’d just share bed with Saufinril. Right, Saufinril?” Marcello asked

“Nope!” came the answer from the Altmer.

“It was worth a shot.” Marcello said, commenting half to himself and half to the others.

“Dinner’ll be ready soon, lettin’ y’know.” And with that, Gianna turned around and went back downstairs, letting all three of them.

“So, who sleeps in the bed?” Marcello asked, looking at Saufinril and Toivon. Saufinril pointed at the bone-carved couch with the red cloth seat that was on one end of the room and said, “One sleeps here.”

“Fine by me.” Toivon shrugged, putting his stuff on the bed,

“You guys sure?” Marcello asked, sitting down.

“Yeah? Why?” Saufinril asked

“I can sleep there.” Marcello offered, referring to the couch. Saufinril gave him a small smile.

“That’s very sweet of you, Marcello. But one is fine, you two use the bed. One prefers this.”

“Yeah, but,” Marcello looked at Toivon, who now was looking at him back with more attention, as was Saufinril, “It’s just…we’ve been travelling a lot and you guys are so old and frail.”

Toivon took one of the pillows and hit Marcello’s face with it.

 Some hours later, the three of them were downstairs at a table with their dishes and drinks. They’d spent most of the time talking, taking in the ambience and listening here and there to stories they each shared of the travels, where they’d been to, where they’d go to next. Debating here and there on topics. Hours that were felt like minutes. In one moment, however, Saufinril looked around the room, trying to find Gianna or the waiter, when lo and behold. Just entering the threshold. Black, wavy hair. Golden face dotted with the beauty marks. Eramon himself.

Fuck

Toivon, at that precise moment, turned to Saufinril and witnessed the looks of surprise, dread, sadness and annoyance that flooded the Altmer’s face in less than a second, all of them together, as he turned away from the doorway. He looked in the direction that Saufinril had looked at and saw another Altmer walking into the inn. Black hair, melancholic caramel eyes, built less in the lithe way that was common of mer, rather a little more like men.

“Don’t like him?” he asked

“Hm?” Saufinril asked, looking at Toivon and then briefly where he was looking. When his gaze landed on Eramon again, he looked back away. “Something like that.”

“What did he do?” Marcello asked, leaning towards the two older mer. Toivon scowled at Marcello and whispered in Dunmeris, “Marcello, what do you care? It’s his personal business.”

“It’s ok, it’s nothing serious.” Saufinril replied, admittedly a little bit surprised that Toivon defended his discretion. Toivon looked at him puzzled for a second, before saying, “Oh, right. You speak Dunmeris.”

“One does. Anyways, it’s, yeah it’s just one’s ex.” Saufinril said, then took a sip. Altmer were good at keeping composed in the sight of anything, Toivon mused, but he saw the light tremble in Saufinril’s hand. Toivon discreetly looked over at the other Altmer, who at that moment was at a table with two Imperials.

“So,” Marcello interrupted, “I’m missing some dormouse drumsticks? Be right back.” He stood up and walked away, leaving Toivon and Saufinril by themselves.

“Rough breakup?” Toivon asked

“One thought this was one’s personal business?” Saufinril asked back, arching his eyebrows.

“You can just not answer me.” He shrugged, picking around the tuna balls and asparagus on his plate.

“One would rather do that.”

“Fair.” Silence, until Toivon looked at him mischeviously, “Hey.” Saufinril turned to look at him, drinking from his 3rd glass of wine, “Wanna have fun?”

Saufinril felt his heart pound especially hard then. Yet he remained his composture and put the glass down, “What do you mean?” he asked

“Well, I don’t know if the breakup was bad or the details, and to be honest I don’t care. But,” he shrugged, “You could make him jealous, if just for a bit. That’s never not amusing.”

The memory of his earlier fuming, paired up with telling himself that he’d enjoy himself, hit Saufinril on the forehead like the pillow had hit Marcello’s earlier.

“Well…”

“Even if you didn’t tell me, it’s obvious you guys didn’t end it like friends or like it happened a long time ago. Just an idea, though. And the place is packed, I know you can find anyone to get him go green.”

Oh, Auri-El.

“What about you?” Saufinril asked in a whisper. Toivon looked at him quizzically.

“Excuse me?”

“Why…why look around the floor when one already has someone sitting in the same table?” Saufinril eyed Toivon, “It’s…apologies, it’s too daring. And, if you don’t want to do it, that’s ok. Sorry, one can just go upstairs.”

Toivon looked at Saufinril, then at the other Altmer, whose gaze was dangerously getting closer to them. He moved closer to Saufinril and put his arm around him.

“Nope, we’re in this together.” Saufinril looked at him with wide eyes, a smile creeping into his face just when the other guy looked at them. And then his face shifted. Bingo.

“Hot! Hot! Hot hot hot!” Marcello said, reaching his seat and placing the drumsticks in front of him, “Can’t believe they almost let them get cold in the-” he looked at them, “Wh…what are you doing?”

“Just act like this is the default.” Toivon said in Dunmeris. Saufinril, meanwhile, figured that being so tense didn’t exactly convey the air of “casually dating some other hot dude one likes” so he leaned more to Toivon. Marcello nodded slowly, following along, “Okay. Sure, I can do that. Why though.”

“Because I’ll tell you later.” Then he turned and whispered close to Saufinril’s ear, “You should see his face right now.” Saufinril used the excuse of tucking his hair behind his ear to look in the direction where Eramon was at. By all the Aedra, he’d only seen him be this jealous once. He felt terrible. But also he felt good.

“He looks so annoyed.” Saufinril whispered back, “Honestly, one had never done this before.”

“Never?” Toivon asked, and Saufinril shook his head. This dude, for a courtesan, is playing the coy virgin role so well. Toivon closed the distance between him and Saufinril and said, “Wanna amp it up?”

This was just plain evil, Saufinril thought as he took a finger and stroke Toivon’s jaw with it, “Like this?” he asked

“Come on, just one finger?”

“One is being sultry, do you know how to flirt?”

“Is that a challenge, or are you going to show me?”

“OKAY I’m going to the room, bye.” Marcello grabbed the drumsticks and left the table. Marcello’s exit allowed Saufinril to give Eramon another glance. He seemed to try to focus on the gentlemen in front of him, while still looking confused and –dare he say it?- annoyed.

The rest of the night went by with casual talking, much like they had earlier with Marcello, except Toivon’s arm stayed around Saufinril and now and then there’d be grazing, hands resting on forearms or knees, whispering to each other on the status of Eramon (yes, eventually Toivon learned his name) by getting close to the other’s ear, and Eramon’s gradual deepening of annoyance and jealousy. At one point, however, the Imperials and Eramon stood up.

“Wellp, looks like they’re leaving.” Toivon whispered, “This was fun while it lasted.”

“Mmh. Or…” Saufinril drank the last of his wine, took Toivon’s face in his hands and pressed a kiss. Toivon tensed somewhat in surprise for a second. The kiss felt like it lasted longer than the 2 seconds it did. When they broke the kiss, Toivon blinked twice, Saufinril gave him a smile, then looked at Eramon’s direction with care. Oh, right. The ex. He looked there as well. Eramon was looking at them, very still, jaw very clentched, then he turned and left the inn. Only then did Saufinril move away from Toivon.

“That was…something.” Saufinril passed his ponytail from the front to the back, regaining his neutral Altmer demeanor, though his little smile was still on his face, “One…thanks. You were right, it feels oddly satisfactory.” And he went upstairs to the room. Toivon stayed at the table.

“…shit.”

 What woke Saufinril up in the middle of the night, hours after the show they’d put in the first floor, wasn’t exactly his feeling of being well-rested, or the rays of sunlight. It was groaning. Groaning that started silently, in a way that made one think it had been the wind or the dream one was having. Instead, it increased in volume and anguish, until Saufinril’s eyes widened open and he sat down at the couch he was sleeping at. Toivon, shirtless, was already crouched next to Marcello, talking to him in a hushed Dunmeris, something about what was wrong. Saufinril quickly grabbed his shirt, put it on, and conjured a ball of light before heading to the other side of the bed.

“What’s going on?” Saufinril asked in a hushed whisper

“Shit, I don’t know!” Toivon said, concerned, “He said he had a stomachache earlier, then I wake up and he’s like this!”

Marcello was on his side of the bed, curled up and sweating profusely. The sheets were moved away from his body, as if he’d kicked them off. His eyes were closed shut, he was hugging his bloated stomach and he was screaming as if his guts were exploding inside. Someone knocked hard against the wall.

“He’s gonna wake the whole inn.” Toivon whispered, hands still on the younger Dunmer. Saufinril crouched next to Marcello.

“Marcello? Sorry, but one will have to do this.” He placed two fingers to Marcello’s forehead, a rush of magic coursing down his fingers. Marcello suddenly relaxed and went limp and silent. Too silent.

“…did you kill him?” Toivon asked, looking at Saufinril warily.

“What?! No! It’s a spell to put him in a, sort of sleep? Like a trance. But it’s temporary. We have to call a healer or take him to a temple or something.” Saufinril said.

“There’s an asclepieion but it’s on the east end. If we’re gonna take him, it has to be fast.” Toivon climed down of the bed and yanked away the pillows and sheet that had been covering Marcello, “Get the upper two ends, I’ll get the other.”

“Two ends of what?”

“The bed sheet, come on.” Saufinril obeyed, removing the upper corners of the sheet as Toivon did the same on the other side, then they both lifted and carried the cloth (with Marcello in it) out of the room. Once in the streets they went as fast as possible, only stopping a couple times, both for Saufinril to create another sphere of light to illuminate their way and to put Marcello back into the dreamless sleep when the first spell wore off and he began to writhe, but finally they got to the marble building. They just hoped it was on time.

[junkyardlynx]

You like scary stories? Good. I’ve got one. Submitted for the approval of the midnight society, or whatever. Who fucking knows. Honestly, I’m not entirely sure it wasn’t just one shared fever dream between seven stupid kids. Except the part where the dream was real. Has to be real now that I think about it. Anyway. I’m rambling. About all I can do, right now. Haha. How sad. 

The year was 1998.

Good year.

Goldeneye came out in 1997, so it was really the year 0001 AG to me and my friends. We fucking loved Goldeneye.

I was seventeen and I lived alone in a small town in northwest Indiana. It’s farm country’s farm country. I’d been orphaned and bounced around since I was ten, but being nearly eighteen and relatively well-behaved was reason enough for the state to turn me loose with my inheritance. Quitters. You could stand at one edge of the town and spit to the other end. We had one bar, an elementary school, a post office, a vet, and a corner store. It sucked, but it was cheap and somewhat near the only living family I still had. I lived just above the post office and vet, which was probably the only really neat part of town, so I guess I had something going for me. Add a shitty 1988 Ford Probe bought at cost from a frustrated dealership into the mix and I was up street.  

My uncle Mike lived alone too, a forty minute drive away out by the county line road. He had a pretty nice farm house to himself after my aunt Sherry filed for divorce due to her own extramarital affair. I guess when you’re surrounded by woods on all sides and the only things to keep you company are a host of chickens, a couple turkeys, a goat, a dog, and a...fucking peacock, you kinda get antsy for some excitement. I suppose a two story barn and a grain silo aren’t exciting enough. Anyway. They hadn’t taken me in after my parents died because they had their own problems and I understood. Couldn’t force a kid on someone who wasn’t going to take proper care of it.

Mike was headed into the city for the weekend to shack up with this girl he was into. He did this from time to time, too awkward to ask her to move in with him and too shy to accept her offer, so they just had their trysts. Wasn’t really my business. He called me after I got home on Friday from classes and immediately launched into his request.

“Hey killer, I’m going to see Mary this weekend. Can ya hold down the fort for me? Just feed the animals once a day and don’t let Garfield eat anything dumb.”

“Uh, sure.” 

Garfield was the goat’s name.

I watched him eat the license plate off “Uncle” Van’s...van, once. His name was Van, he was a friend of Mike’s aaaaaand he owned a van. I guess life works like that sometimes, predictable and all. Anyway, Garfield would eat literally fucking anything near his big dumb idiot mouth, like most goats. 

“And uh, I think there’s a bunch of beer in the fridge that’s gonna go bad. Could you do me a favor and get rid of it, bud?”

I could hear the wink through the receiver. I grinned as I pinned the receiver between my shoulder and ear, rummaging around through the cupboards to find my little book of phone numbers.

“Oh yeah, sure thing. Wouldn’t want to have bad beer hanging around in the fridge.”

“That’s what I’m talking about. It better all be gone when I get back. Love ya, kid.”

“Love you too, man. Have a good weekend.”

With an audible click, the other line hung up and I was already dialing people’s numbers. Robert was first, as he was my best and most radically tight brother-man. 

“What’s up, Dingus Kong?” 

Ever since he was twelve, he had the voice of a full-time, carton-a-day smoker. I was honestly a little jealous.

“There’s a beer leak at my uncle’s and we have to plug it up. Call Louis and Alex and make their dumb asses come out. You know the address?”

“Hell yeah, dude. Can I invite Jay?”

“What do I look like, a cop? Of course you can. Saves me the trouble.”

“Cool, later dickless.”

“Peace.”

It wasn’t long until I’d roped Robert, Louis and Jay into things, along with Alex, Laura and June. Alex and Louis had been dating forever and were pretty much attached at the hip, while I had a thing for June. A very quiet, subdued thing, because I operated under the assumption that no one was ever interested and that any thought to the contrary was pointless and asking for trouble. 

We met up at my uncle’s house around 9. They’d pitched in and brought a shit ton of snacks but no one brought any actual food, so our diet that night was going to consist of...Natty Light, snack cakes and chips, pretty much. High school kids eat worse on a daily basis, so no one really cared. I remember being shocked at just how packed the fridge was with shitty Natty Light. Good thing I had good friends.

It was a pretty relaxed atmosphere - Louis and Alex were touchy in the corner of the living room, already a couple beers deep. Robert, Laura and Jay were playing Goldeneye on the Nintendo 64 in the den. They had a penalty game where you had to drink when you died and if you were that fucking prick that picked Oddjob, you both had to take a drink at the start of the round and two when you died. It was fair, believe me. Fuck people who pick Oddjob. 

That pretty much just left June and I. We relaxed in the kitchen, shooting the shit and laughing at each other’s bad jokes. Sometimes we’d look out over the kitchen counter and down into the den / living room - the farm house’s design was always kind of odd to me, but I liked it. The whole house was a one story with a basement. You could come in through the glass sliding door and be right in the living room / den area, then turn right and go up four or five stairs to reach the bedrooms and the turnoff into the kitchen / office area where the front door was. The kitchen had a very open structure, with the sink looking down on the den, and you kinda felt like a commander if sat there and just watched everyone. So I did.

“Hey, Charles?” 

“What’s up?” 

I turned back towards June, taking another sip from that honestly kinda shitty beer in my hand. Ah, the taste of youth - cheap alcohol obtained through immoral or subversive means, like a really cool uncle.

“We should go out to the barn.”

“Why the hell and fuck not?” 

I put on some bravado, but honestly, my uncle’s farm creeped me out. I’d stayed here for the summer once and I swore I could hear things swaying in time with the tall grass as the sun started to die. An animal would go missing every now and then, but my uncle always shrugged it off as coyotes. Never really felt like coyotes, but who was I to disagree when he was the one that lived here all the time?

“Hey, everyone! We’re going outside, time to get up in the hayloft and be stupid.”

I heard a chorus of replies and the click-whrrr of a tube television being powered off, followed by a rowdy collection of feet stomping up carpeted steps. Everyone poured into the kitchen, grabbing things like twinkies and cold hot dogs and new beers. It wasn’t long before we took the party outside, flicking the floodlights on the house on for comfort as much as visibility. We ambled as a drunken mass, slowly making our way towards the faded red barn. 

I have no idea why the barn was so fucking huge, given that less then ten animals lived there. The space was equipped for a sizable amount of large livestock like cows and horses, but all that it held was a collection of idiot birds with too much love and not enough sense. A ladder leading up to the hayloft poked through a square, and we began our inebriated ascent. 

It wasn’t long before we settled into a circle, talking about nothing in particular on the warm wooden floor of the loft. June had taken a seat next to me, so of course, I overthought absolutely everything before determining there was no way she was into me because why would she be? She was way too cool and cute. It was obvious. 

Somehow, we got onto the topic of scary stories. Spooky scary skeleton time. I made up some dumb thing about a cannibal cult in the woods, but it wasn’t very thought out, so everyone gave me shit. Robert just thrust his beer into the air and yelled “WHAT DOES IT LOOK LIKE, IT’S ALIENS”, which got a laugh out of all of us. It finally came around to June, who began to tell us about La Llarona, a crying ghost lady in Mexican folklore. 

It was actually pretty spooky until you realized June was like, four foot fucking eight with the voice of an adorable church mouse, and then you were unable to take it seriously. 

We swapped a few more before silence descended on us, slow and natural. The workman’s lamps that I’d lit with a long trigger lighter burned, casting shadows along the walls and illuminating our faces. I smiled as I realized June’s head had come to rest on my right shoulder, feeling not unlike someone blessed by the attention of a regal crow.

“Dude. I’m hungry.”

“You’re always hungry, Illberto.” 

I waved him off with my left hand before looking around. Something was bothering me, but I couldn’t put my hands on it. Honestly speaking, it was kinda like someone had some bodacious body odor going on and tried to cover it up with some sort of perfume. I took as...well, as discreet a sniff as possible, trying to see if it was one of us. 

I don’t think it was, because the more I smelled it, the more I realized it smelled less like body odor and more like that strange stench of death. Sickly sweet, putrefaction rendering the body of something no longer alive into components for bacteria to consume. I kinda wrote it off as dead mice somewhere since I was an idiot at 17. (I still am an idiot, but I was a bigger idiot. Harder head. More impressively stupid. Anyway.) The smell was bothering me though, so I gently pushed June’s head off my shoulder and stood up.

“Since Mr. Crunch and Munch wants some food, I’m gonna run back to the house and grab some chow and booze. Anyone want anything in particular?”

No one really had an idea of what they wanted, so the group just started chanting “FOOD AND BOOZE, FOOD AND BOOZE, FOOD AND BOOZE” at me. I laughed and nodded, giving a sort of half-wave to June who just smiled at me the whole time as I went to climb down the ladder.

Too bad the ladder was gone.

I groaned in annoyance, turning around to address everyone.

“Very cool, who fucked with the ladder?”

“What are you talking about, brother-man?”

Louis piped up, head resting on top of Alex’s. I gestured dramatically at the square hole in the floor, then pantomimed the act of climbing the ladder.

“There was a ladder here. It’s gone now.”

“It probably fell, Charlie.” 

There went Laura, being the voice of reason. I shrugged in assent. Stop making sense, god damn it.

“I’ll just pull a Spidey-boy and jump down. It’s like, ten feet.” 

Something in my head kept telling me that people can die from slipping and falling on ice, but I ignored it. I just had to brace myself, land on my feet and not hit my brain cage. Really simple. 

I walked back over to the hole in the hayloft, sitting down and scooching to the edge. That fucking smell punched me right in the nose once again, pungent and sweet. I almost stop then, but I don’t really wanna look like a goon in front of June. Uh, June and everyone else, that is.

So I stuck my foot down into the oddly deep darkness of the barn below. 

Something wet and hot smacked against it, nearly wrapping around my exposed ankle.

I yelped perhaps the most pathetic sound known to man and physically extricated myself from the hole by leaping up and jumping back. Everyone laughed of course.

“What’s up, penis pump?”

Fuck off, Robert.

“Either the turkeys have really long and slimy necks now, or something down there just grabbed my fucking ankle.”

“Very funny, Charles.” Alex fixed me with a stare, assuming I was taking the piss out of everybody. Holy fuck, I wished I was.

“I’m serious, you assholes.” I’d thrust my right leg out, showing everyone my ankle and foot. A reddish brown goop clung to it, thick and viscous. The smell was emanating from it, and everyone seemed to have taken notice to it. Unless they started retching for a different reason, like my ankle being particularly abhorrent.

“Brother-man, dude, what the fuck is that?”

You’re asking me, Louie Louie?

“Yeah, that’s a negative Ghost Rider, I have no idea. I’m gonna chill up here for a bit, if someone else feels like Rambo, they can go down.” 

I took off my button up and used it to wipe the goo off of my ankle, but the smell seemed to have set in. I noticed a burning sensation on my skin that increased in intensity as I wiped, but it soon faded to a dull throbbing, becoming the least of my worries. In that time, Louis got up to check out the hole.

 He returned to where Alex was, face pale and stiff. 

That’s when we heard it.

“veerrrryfufufufu-”

The sound stopped, then started again. Almost like someone starting a sputtering car engine.

“Verrrrry cocococococo-cokkkkkkkkkhhssssh. Wshooo fufufufufuf. Wshoooo fufufufuckt wishlatter?” 

You ever have someone come up to you and say “hey, we need to talk” and you feel your stomach drop out of your body and onto the floor? 

Yeah, that. That’s the feeling I felt, but way worse. After all, someone wanted to know who fucked with the ladder. Someone who couldn’t string together two words if they wanted to, and they desperately wanted to.

We’d all crammed ourselves into the back of the hayloft, the seven of us together. Oppressive darkness clung to the places not illuminated by the lamps, and the long lighter lay a good ten feet away from us. No one moved to get it. We heard it again and again, some twisted mockery of a voice continually asking who fucked with the ladder. Then it asked again, in my voice.

“Very cool. Who fucked with the ladder?”

Everyone’s eyes were on me, and I shook my head wordlessly as it asked again, perfectly, matching my rhythm and cadence and tone. 

“Hey, if this is a joke because you thought the Goosebumps books were high literature, we’re gonna string you up by your earlobes dude.”

“Fuck off. It’s not. You think I got bored and recorded me fucking around before you all got here? With the tape recorder I don’t fucking own?”

I was hostile.

We were all on edge.

“I don’t know, were you man?”

“Don’t start with me, Robert.”

“Yeah, whatever, you’re a lazy piece of shit. I know you wouldn’t do this.”

“I swear to god.”

The tension was almost lifted until we heard that wet smacking again, like someone slapping a steak on pavement. It was hilarious until you realized it was probably either something dead being slammed around, or some part of the mysterious thing’s anatomy. The smacking persisted as it mercifully ceased it’s questioning, realizing it’s bait wasn’t working. Slowly, the wet squelching of flesh against concrete grew quiet and far away and the stench that pervaded the air began to thin.

I appraised everyone and jerked my head back at the hole in the hayloft.

“Okay. Okay. We’re gonna drop down and run to the house.”

“Is there any better option you have that isn’t ‘jump down and say hi to the crazy stinky murder rapist’ below us?”

“Not really, Alex. Sorry.”

“Alex and I can stay up here,” Louis offered, but she looked at him with her mouth agape.

“Are you dumb, Louis? I’m not staying in that barn alone with this thing. No, really, are you an idiot?”

I looked at Louis with a kind of knowing glance, knowing he was just trying to help out and allay her fears. Couldn’t really blame her, though.

“He’s just looking out for what you want to do. Anyway, we should all go. I’ll go down first and keep a look out while everyone comes down. C’mon.”

I honestly don’t know where I found the balls of steel I was now equipped with, but I was thankful. I think it was just this overwhelming sense of “we have to go now or something bad is going to happen.” Without giving anyone a chance to reply, I broke away from our little heard and took a running start at the hole, leaping down it before my rational mind could catch up.

I let my legs hit and then tucked myself into a roll to rob the fall of it’s momentum, coming up unscathed. I glanced around, greeted by deadly...nothing. Just silence. It wasn’t until I looked at the ground that I noticed it was covered in a thick layer of that reddish-brown goop, and it stunk horribly. I started to gag but I had the sense to bite it down. No point in putting more disgusting fluids on the floor.

“Jump down! C’mon!”

I shouted up and June practically leapt into my arms, so I caught her and set her down, giving her a tender smile. She was all of four foot eight and ninety pounds, so it wasn’t really a feat of athleticism. Of course, Robert came next, and my knees buckled as his six foot frame met mine with that peculiar rapport we had. 

“No smile for me?”

“I swear, dude.”

I swore a lot, apparently.

The rest followed in suit until eight of us stood in the barn, devoid of animals as it was.  I hoped they’d just run off or sought shelter, but another part of me said that wasn’t the case. I exhaled roughly and looked at our group before nodding.

“Okay, we gotta run. I don’t know when that thing’s coming back, but I can already smell that weird stink getting stronger. I think we’ll be safe in the house since we can look the doors and call the cops.”

“Wait, cops? Dude, we’re doing a little thing called underage drinking.”

Thank you for stating the obvious, Louis.

“Oh, yeah! Way better to get murdered and eaten. You’re right.”

“Point taken.” 

We all murmured our assent before taking one last look around. The lamps burned, slowly dimming as their fuel began to run out. I think we left the lighter up there. Not that it mattered, I guess. I reached out and took June’s petite hand, tugging her gently towards the house.

“Let’s go.”

We began to do an awkward sort of power walk, too scared to run and draw it’s attention but not intent on going any slower than we had to. Our group of seven began to cut across the field, towards the shining lights of the farmhouse. 

A horrific wet SMACK from behind us broke that fragile discipline that kept us calm. A plaintive sort of gurgling howl, like a tiger braying it’s dying cry inside of a charnel pit spurred us on, and I roughly pulled on June’s hand. Her fingers slipped from mine for a moment, but her strong and lengthy fingers found mine, slick with what I assumed was sweat. I didn’t bother looking back as the warm porch lights flooded my vision. I let go of the hand I was holding and turned around to regard our group of eight, making sure everyone was there.

Wait.

Eight?

June, Robert, Louis, Alex, Laura, Jay, and myself. Seven. I glanced at my hand, realizing it was slick with that peculiar fluid. I kept the gorge rising in my throat down, somehow.

Swallowing both vomit and my fear, I began to inspect everyone before herding them inside, one by one. There wasn’t a face I didn’t recognize, but there was an extra person here. I got June, Alex, Robert, Laura and Louis into the house before I realized it. 

There were two Jays.

“Hey Jake, come inside.”

Jay kinda gave me a weird look, wondering if I was actually an idiot. The right Jay, anyway. The other one just slowly started to walk forward.

“Hey, I said Jake come inside man. Practice your manners dude.”

My stare was insistent on the real Jay’s, begging him to come in and not make a scene. He shrugged and stepped inside, and only a moment later I was behind him, slamming the sliding glass door so hard I thought I’d shatter. 

The Jay that wasn’t Jay pressed it’s face to the glass and that fetid liquid began to pour from it’s nose as it’s now-malformed hand began to tap lightly on the glass. What looked like clothes began to slough off in thick puddles of what looked to be flesh, pooling on the patio.

“Come inside. Hey. Manners. Come inside. Hey. Come inside.” 

Robert had noticed what was going on and yelled in what I’m sure he’d want me to report was a very manly and commanding shout. Basically, he screamed like a little bitch. Everyone else noticed and booked it up the sort little landing to the second tier of the house, not willing to look at what was happening anymore.

I couldn’t look away. It gently tapped at the glass,  as a second figure approached from the darkness, eventually pressing it’s face to the glass.

My face.

I watched my own face melt away into nothing, forming a featureless expanse of skin with two unseeing and empty eye sockets. The me that wasn’t me tapped politely on the glass like a door-to-door salesman, asking to be let in.

That sure wasn’t fucking happening. In a haze, I waddled backwards, reaching for the phone that sat on the coffee table by the sofa in this 70′s decor mess of a living room.

It wasn’t there. The cord lay neatly on the table, but the entire phone was gone. It looked deliberate, which means that...well, it meant that my uncle took it with him.

Something clicked in my mind, but I buried it as I pedaled backwards slowly, approaching the display cabinet that held my grandmother’s prized compound bow. I heard from my uncle that she’d been an avid hunter into her 90′s and only passed due to the ravages of...well, a car wreck. I was never more thankful to have a badass relative I’d never met than when I pulled that compound bow out of the display cabinet and nocked an arrow.

Never mind the fact that the last time I went bow hunting was when I was like, twelve.

I stared down the two creatures, still begging to be let in in my voice. My hands trembled even as I began to draw back the heavy string. God damn, grandma, how strong were you? What the hell. 

I strafed up the steps, muscles in my arms screaming for release, but I told myself that they couldn’t come in unless they were invited. It was just a glass door, and these things weren’t dumb, apparently. I don’t know what they were. I’d met strange things in the woods around the house, but never anything like this. Obviously. The surreality of it all made it seem absurd to even question what they were. 

It wasn’t until I reached the kitchen with everyone else that I could slowly release the tension and lower the bow, though I kept the arrow nocked and ready. I gave everyone in the kitchen a wary nod as they huddled together, staying deathly quiet. Looking over the kitchen counter and down into the den, I could see one still tapping on the glass. The other was gone.

A soft knock at the door by the office let us know where the other had wandered off to. It repeated a broken string of words in my voice, asking to be let in, saying it was very cool. It’d be humorous if it wasn’t fucking terrifying. 

Wordlessly, I huddled everyone back into the hallway and lead them to my uncle’s room, unlocking it with the key I had. It was the furthest bedroom away from everything else and had a clear line of sight to the hallway, so if they somehow broke their self-imposed rules, I could at least take a steady shot. The door creaked open and the bedroom lay before us as I flipped on the light.

My uncle’s room was surprisingly sparse and barren. No personal effects remained and you could tell where the furniture had been moved in a hurry, like someone was looking for something. It gave the feeling of someone that wasn’t coming back, and the discontent in my heart grew. 

“Yeah, think he’s been moving stuff over to his girlfriend’s place.” 

I said to no one in particular, placating questions before they could come out. A barren mattress lay on a box spring in the corner.

“Let’s stay in here tonight. It’s not gonna be comfortable, but a couple of people can take the bed and the rest of us can take the floor. I’ll keep watch.”

“Charles...”

Robert sounded concerned for once. I laughed. I glanced back and his face soured before he smiled.

“Nevermind, you’re still a penis pump.”

Everyone, still slightly drunk and nervous, began to occupy their own space in the empty room. I sat against the open doorframe, bow laying on my lap, trained down the hallway. Minutes slipped into hours, and everyone began to pass into a light sleep.

Everyone except me.

The sight of the flesh sloughing off their mutable frames was burned into my mind. Not much sleep to be found after that.

Throughout the night, I heard taps all around the house, like a diligent inspector checking for termites in wood. If I strained my sleepless ears, I could hear my own voice rattling through the walls. The deathly sweet stench of the barn had returned, permeating my brain and setting up residence there. 

Once or twice, I thought I heard tapping and murmuring at the single window in my uncle’s bedroom, but surely that wasn’t possible. It was a good eight feet of the ground, as the room sat on the second “tier” of the house. I dozed for a moment and the tapping seemed to grow more and more furious, so I shook myself awake. I began to dig the bowstring into my finger, rubbing it up and down, fraying my own skin until it bled. 

I felt like I was going to go insane. 

A few long hours later and the sun began to rise, banishing the tapping noise with it and the scent after that. I rose, looking around at the sleeping faces of my friends, relieved. I looked around the empty room once more and went to close my eyes before I realized there was reddish goop smeared on the window of my uncle’s bedroom. 

I’d been watched, all night.

All of us had. 

How many had there been?

Enough to replace us?

Did it matter?

Adrenaline flooding my exhausted body, I crept around the house and checked every window, every door. They were all smeared with handprints, fingerprints, imprints of faces traced in that corpse-goo. My stomach roiled heavily, the beer and junk food of the night before threatening to come up.

We were supposed to be a sacrifice, weren’t we?

The copious amounts of beer. The lack of a phone. My uncle’s personal effects all gone from his room. I suppose the rest, even grandma’s bow, was replaceable to him. Including me.

I woke everyone up and told them we should leave. No one fought it, considering we’d survived the night by listening to me. It was a sort of hollow and empty accolade, but I’d take it. 

As Robert and June piled in my Ford Probe outside, I snuck a peek at the barn. Dark red stains and the remnants of feathers, fur and flesh stained the outside of it’s semi-dilapidated structure, as if the animals had been killed by being thrown at the walls in anger. I swallowed dryly, realizing what those wet thuds and smacks had been. 

We spent the rest of the weekend together, all seven of us. One night at Robert’s, the rest of the day at June’s. I tried several times to contact my uncle, but his girlfriend’s landline was disconnected and his emergency cell phone wasn’t picking up. 

Abandoned twice by the family that wouldn’t even take me in, I guess. 

I never found out what those things were. My uncle’s house was marked as abandoned and reclaimed by the bank, eventually being sold at auction for dirt cheap. I didn’t care. I’d stayed away from the forested areas and anywhere approaching natural, and even took to a vegetarian diet for a few months. 

Eventually the memory faded, and years later I had almost forgotten about it. Life went on, and I remained in that cozy little apartment above the vet’s office and the post office. 

Until tonight. 

When I smelled something sticky-sweet, like what the insides of a pitcher plant must be.

Where something tapped at the door to my apartment, begging to be let in. 

Where my own voice begged me to be let in.

[phroyd]

It is incredibly frightening how these people utilize all their power of thought in a reductionistic process limited by one old book, the Bible. These folks have never evolved! - Phroyd

Clay Crum opened his Bible to Exodus Chapter 20 and read verse 14 one more time.

“Thou shalt not commit adultery,” it said.

He prayed about what he was going to do. He was the pastor of First Baptist Church in the town of Luverne, Ala., which meant he was the moral leader of a congregation that overwhelmingly supported a president who was an alleged adulterer. For the past six weeks, Crum had been preaching a series of sermons on the Ten Commandments, and now it was time for number seven.

It was summer, and all over the Bible Belt, support for President Trump was rising among voters who had traditionally proclaimed the importance of Christian character in leaders and warned of the slippery slope of moral compromise. In Crenshaw County, where Luverne is located, Trump had won 72 percent of the vote. Recent national polls showed the president’s approval among white evangelical Christians at a high of 77 percent. One survey indicated that his support among Southern Baptists was even higher, surpassing 80 percent, and these were the people arriving on Sunday morning to hear what their pastor had to say.

By 10:30 a.m., the street alongside First Baptist was full of slant-parked cars, and the 80 percenters were walking across the green lawn in the sun, up the stairs, past the four freshly painted white columns and into the church.

“Good to see you this morning,” Crum said, shaking hands as the regulars took their usual places in the wooden pews, and soon, he walked up to the pulpit and opened his King James.

“Today we’re going to be looking at the Seventh Commandment,” Crum began. “Exodus 20:14, the Seventh Commandment, simply says, ‘Thou shalt not commit adultery.’ ”

The people settled in. There was the sound of hard candy unwrapping and thin pages of Bibles turning.

The presidency of Donald Trump has created unavoidable moral dilemmas not just for the members of First Baptist in Luverne but for a distinct subset of Christians who are overwhelmingly white, overwhelmingly evangelical and more uniformly pro-Trump than any other part of the American electorate.

In poll after poll, they have said that Trump has kept his promises to appoint conservative Supreme Court justices, fight for religious liberty, adopt pro-life policies and deliver on other issues that are high priorities for them.

At the same time, many have acknowledged the awkwardness of being both self-proclaimed followers of Jesus and the No. 1 champions of a president whose character has been defined not just by alleged infidelity but accusations of sexual harassment, advancing conspiracy theories popular with white supremacists, using language that swaths of Americans find racist, routinely spreading falsehoods and an array of casual cruelties and immoderate behaviors that amount to a roll call of the seven deadly sins.

The predicament has led to all kinds of reactions within the evangelical community, from a gathering of pastors in Illinois described as a “call to self-reflection,” to prayer meetings with Trump in Washington, to hours of cable news reckoning in which Southern Baptists have taken the lead.

The megachurch pastor Robert Jeffress has declared that Trump is “on the right side of God” and that “evangelicals know they are not compromising their beliefs in order to support this great president.” Franklin Graham, son of the evangelist Billy Graham, said the only explanation for Trump being in the White House was that “God put him there.”

A few leaders have publicly dissented from such views, aware of the Southern Baptist history of whiffing on the big moral questions of the day — such as during the civil rights era, when most pastors either defended segregation or remained silent. The president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s ethics commission, Russell Moore, asked whether Christians were “really ready to trade unity with our black and brown brothers and sisters for this angry politician?” One prominent black pastor, Lawrence Ware, left the denomination altogether, writing that the widespread reluctance to criticize Trump on racial issues revealed a “deep commitment to white supremacy.” The new president of the Southern Baptist Convention, J.D. Greear, said church culture had “grown too comfortable with power and the dangers that power brings.”

But all those discussions were taking place far from the rank-and-file. The Southern Baptists who filled the pews every Sunday were making their own moral calculations about Trump in the privacy of a thousand church sanctuaries in cities and towns such as Luverne, population 2,700, an hour south of the state capital of Montgomery.

It was a place where it was hard to drive a mile in any direction without passing some church or sign about the wages of sin, where conversations about politics happened in nodding circles before Sunday school, or at the Chicken Shack after, and few people paid attention to some national Southern Baptist leader.

What mattered in Luverne was the redbrick church with the tall white steeple that hovered over the tidy green lawns and gardens of town. First Baptist was situated along Luverne’s main street, next to the post office and across from the county courthouse, a civic position that had always conferred on its pastors a moral authority now vested in Clay Crum.

“A fine Christian man,” was how the mayor referred to him.

“He just makes everybody feel like he loves ’em,” said a member of First Baptist.

And the members of First Baptist loved their pastor back. They had hired him in July 2015, a month after Trump began campaigning for president and courting evangelicals by declaring that Christianity is “under siege” and “the Bible is the best.” A church committee had sifted through dozens of résumés from Florida and Missouri and as far away as Michigan and out of all of them they had picked Crum, a former truck driver from right down the road in Georgiana.

“As Southern Baptists in this small town, we want our leader to believe like we do,” said Terry Drew, who had chaired the search committee, and three years later, Crum was meeting their highest expectations of what a good Southern Baptist pastor should be.

He kept up with the prayer list. He did all his visits, the nursing homes and the shut-ins. He wore a lapel pin in the shape of two tiny baby feet as a reminder of what he saw as the pure evil of abortion. And when Sunday morning came, he delivered his sermons straight out of an open Bible, no notes, and it wasn’t unusual for him to cry.

“He is just really sincere,” said Jewell Killough, who had been a member of First Baptist for four decades, and as Crum stood at the front of the congregation now and looked out, hers was one of the faces looking back.

She always sat in the center row, fifth pew from the front, right in line with the pulpit. Jewell Killough was 82, and as Crum had gone through the first six commandments Sunday after Sunday, she had not yet heard anything to dissuade her from believing that Trump was being used by God to save America.

“Oh, I feel like the Lord heard our prayers and gave us a second chance before the end times,” she had said a few days before, when she was working at the food pantry of the Alabama Crenshaw Baptist Association.

It was a low-brick house where the Baptists kept stacks of pamphlets about abstaining from premarital sex, alcohol, smoking and other behaviors they felt corrupted Christian character, which was not something Jewell worried about with Trump.

“I think they are trying to frame him,” she said, referring to the unflattering stories about the president.

By “they,” she meant liberals and others she believed were not only trying to undermine Trump’s agenda, but God’s agenda for America, which she believed was engaged in a great spiritual contest between good and evil, God and Satan, the saved and the unsaved, for whom God had prepared two places.

There was Heaven: “Most say it’s gonna be 15,000 miles wide and that high,” Jewell said. “We don’t know whether when it comes down how far it will come, if it’s gonna come all the way or if there will be stairs. We don’t know that. But it’s gonna be suitable to each person. You know that old song, ‘Lord, build me a cabin in the corner of Gloryland?’ See, that’s not right. It’s not gonna be you have a cabin over here and I have one over there. It’s gonna be suitable to each person. So, whatever makes me happy. I like birds. So outside my window, there will be birds.”

And there was Hell: “Each person is gonna be on an islandlike place, and fire all around it. And they’re gonna be in complete darkness, and over time, your eyes will go. And worms’ll eat on you. It’s a terrible place, the way the Bible describes it.”

It was a binary world, not just for Jewell Killough but for everyone sitting inside the sanctuary of First Baptist Church, who prayed all the time about how to navigate it.

There were Brett and Misty Green, who sat a few rows behind Jewell, and said that besides reading the Bible or listening to Pastor Crum, prayer was the only way to sort out what was godly and what was satanic.

“Satan is the master magician,” said Misty, 32, a federal court worker.

“The father of lies,” said Brett, 33, a land surveyor, who was sitting with his wife and his Bible one evening in the church’s fellowship hall, a large beige room with accordion partitions that separated the men’s and ladies’ Sunday school classes.

“That’s why we have the Holy Spirit,” Brett said, explaining it was “like a gut feeling” that told him what to do in morally confusing situations, which had included the election, when the spirit had told him to vote for Trump, even though something the president allegedly said since then had given Brett pause. It was when Trump was discussing immigration, and reportedly asked, “Why are we having all these people from shithole countries coming here?”

“Jesus Christ was born in Nazareth, and Nazareth was a shithole at that time,” Brett said. “Someone might say, ‘How could anything good come out of a place like that?’ Well, Jesus came out of a place like that.”

Other things bothered Misty. Crum had preached a few Sundays before about the Third Commandment — “Thou shalt not take the Lord’s name in vain” — but as Misty saw it, Trump belittled God and all of God’s creation when he called people names like “loser” and “stupid.”

“A lot of his actions I don’t agree with,” Misty said. “But we are not to judge.”

What a good Christian was supposed to do was pray for God to work on Trump, who was after all pro-life, and pro-Israel, and pro-all the positions they felt a Christian nation should be taking. And if they were somehow wrong about Trump, said Misty, “in the end it doesn’t really matter.”

“A true Christian doesn’t have to worry about that,” said Brett, explaining what any good Southern Baptist heard at church every Sunday, which was that Jesus had died on the cross to wash away their sins, defeat death and provide them with eternal life in heaven.

“I think about it all the time, what it’s gonna be like,” she said.

“I know we’ll have new bodies,” said Brett. “We’ll be like Christ, it says.”

There was Jack Jones, who sat behind the pulpit in the choir, and was chairman of the deacons, the church leaders who tried to set a Christian example by mowing lawns for the homebound, building front door ramps for the elderly and maintaining standards in their own ranks.

“We stick strictly to the Bible that a divorced man is not able to be a deacon,” said Jack, who said it was uncomfortable being such a Bible stickler and supporting a president alleged to have committed adultery with a porn star.

“It’s difficult, that’s for sure,” he said, sitting with his wife in the church basement.

The way he and Linda had come to think of it, Trump was no worse than a long list of other American presidents from the Founding Fathers on.

“George Washington had a mistress,” Linda said. “Thomas Jefferson did, too. Roosevelt had a mistress with him when he died. Eisenhower. Kennedy.”

“None of ’em are lily white,” said Jack.

What was important was not the character of the president but his positions, they said, and one mattered more than all the others.

“Abortion,” said Linda, whose eyes teared up when she talked about it.

Trump was against it. It didn’t matter that two decades ago he had declared himself to be “very pro-choice.” He was now saying “every life totally matters,” appointing antiabortion judges and adopting so many antiabortion policies that one group called him “the most pro-life president in history.”

It was the one political issue on which First Baptist had taken a stand, a sin one member described as “straight from the pits of Hell,” and which Crum had called out when he preached on “Thou shalt not kill” the Sunday before, reminding the congregation about the meaning of his tiny lapel pin. “It’s the size of a baby’s feet at ten weeks,” he had said.

There was Terry Drew, who sat in the seventh pew on the left side, who knew and agreed with Trump’s position, and knew that supporting him involved a blatant moral compromise.

“I hate it,” he said. “My wife and I talk about it all the time. We rationalize the immoral things away. We don’t like it, but we look at the alternative, and think it could be worse than this.”

The only way to understand how a Christian like him could support a man who boasted about grabbing women’s crotches, Terry said, was to understand how he felt about the person Trump was still constantly bringing up in his speeches and who loomed large in Terry’s thoughts: Hillary Clinton, whom Terry saw as “sinister” and “evil” and “I’d say, of Satan.”

“She hates me,” Terry said, sitting in Crum’s office one day. “She has contempt for people like me, and Clay, and people who love God and believe in the Second Amendment. I think if she had her way it would be a dangerous country for the likes of me.”

As he saw it, there was the issue of Trump’s character, and there was the issue of Terry’s own extinction, and the choice was clear.

“He’s going to stick to me,” Terry said.

So many members of First Baptist saw it that way.

There was Jan Carter, who sat in the 10th pew center, who said that supporting Trump was the only moral thing to do.

“You can say righteously I do not support him because of his moral character but you are washing your hands of what is happening in this country,” she said, explaining that in her view America was slipping toward “a civil war on our shores.”

There was her friend Suzette, who sat in the fifth pew on the right side, and who said Trump might be abrasive “but we need abrasive right now.”

And there was Sheila Butler, who sat on the sixth pew on the right side, who said “we’re moving toward the annihilation of Christians.”

She was 67, a Sunday school teacher who said this was the only way to understand how Christians like her supported Trump.

“Obama was acting at the behest of the Islamic nation,” she began one afternoon when she was getting her nails done with her friend Linda. She was referring to allegations that President Barack Obama is a Muslim, not a Christian — allegations that are false. “He carried a Koran and it was not for literary purposes. If you look at it, the number of Christians is decreasing, the number of Muslims has grown. We allowed them to come in.”

“Obama woke a sleeping nation,” said Linda.

“He woke a sleeping Christian nation,” Sheila corrected.

Linda nodded. It wasn’t just Muslims that posed a threat, she said, but all kinds of immigrants coming into the country.

“Unpapered people,” Sheila said, adding that she had seen them in the county emergency room and they got treated before her. “And then the Americans are not served.”

Love thy neighbor, she said, meant “love thy American neighbor.”

Welcome the stranger, she said, meant the “legal immigrant stranger.”

“The Bible says, ‘If you do this to the least of these, you do it to me,’ ” Sheila said, quoting Jesus. “But the least of these are Americans, not the ones crossing the border.”

To her, this was a moral threat far greater than any character flaw Trump might have, as was what she called “the racial divide,” which she believed was getting worse. The evidence was all the black people protesting about the police, and all the talk about the legacy of slavery, which Sheila never believed was as bad as people said it was. “Slaves were valued,” she said. “They got housing. They got fed. They got medical care.”

She was suspicious of what she saw as the constant agitation of blacks against whites, the taking down of Confederate memorials and the raising of others, such as the new memorial to the victims of lynching, just up the highway in Montgomery.

“I think they are promoting violence,” Sheila said, thinking about the 800 weathered, steel monoliths hanging from a roof to evoke the lynchings, one for each American county where the violence was carried out, including Crenshaw County, where a man named Jesse Thornton was lynched in 1940 in downtown Luverne.

“How do you think a young black man would feel looking at that?” Linda asked. “Wouldn’t you feel a sickness in your stomach?”

“I think it would only make you have more violent feelings — feelings of revenge,” said Sheila.

It reminded her of a time when she was a girl in Montgomery, when the now-famous civil rights march from Selma was heading to town and her parents, fearing violence, had sent her to the country to stay with relatives.

“It’s almost like we’re going to live that Rosa Parks time again,” she said, referring to the civil rights activist. “It was just a scary time, having lived through it.”

She thought an all-out race war was now in the realm of possibility. And that was where she had feared things were heading, right up until election night, when she and Linda and everyone they knew were praying for God to save them. And God sent them Donald Trump.

“I believe God put him there,” Sheila said. “He put a sinner in there.”

God was using Trump just like he had used the Apostle Paul, she said.

“Paul had murdered Christians and he went on to minister to many, many people,” Sheila said. “I think he’s being molded by God for the role. I think he’s the right man for the right time. It’s about the survival of the Christian nation.”

“We are in mortal danger,” Linda said.

“We are in a religious war,” Sheila said.

Linda nodded.

“We may have to fight and die for our faith,” Sheila said. “I hope it doesn’t come to that, but if it does, we will.”

She rubbed her sore knee, which was caked with an analgesic.

“In heaven, I won’t have any pain,” Sheila said.

“No tears,” said Linda.

“I think it’ll be beautiful — I love plants, and I think it’ll be like walking in a beautiful garden,” said Sheila.

“Have you ever been out at night and looked at the stars?” said Linda. “That’s the floor of heaven, and heaven is going to be so much more beautiful than the floor.”

“I’m going to be in my kitchen,” Sheila said, imagining heaven would have one. “I think it’s going to be beautiful to see all the appliances.”

It was hard to know what a good Christian should do in the meantime, Sheila said, and that was why Clay Crum was so important. He had been inspiring her with sermons all summer, including the Sunday before Memorial Day, when he had everybody stand up and not only pledge allegiance to the American flag but to the Christian flag and the Bible.

“I see Clay as my leader,” Sheila said. “Clay just knows what we need on any given day.”

He had gotten through “Thou shalt not kill” the Sunday before. It was not easy. There were veterans in the congregation. Crum had to explain how God could command people not to kill in one part of the Bible, yet demand a massacre in another.

“God does not want you to kill on your terms, he wants you to kill on his terms,” he had concluded in his sermon. “So let’s promote Jesus in life. Let’s not kill. Unless it’s absolutely necessary.”

Now he sat in his office, where there was a metal cross on the wall and three Bibles on his desk and prayed about what the Lord wanted him to say.

“Thou shalt not commit adultery,” he read again.

“How can I get people to see the whole picture?” he asked himself.

What was the whole picture?

There had been a time before he became a pastor when Crum saw things differently. He saw the pastor of his childhood church stealing money, and as he got older, he saw deacons having affairs, Christians behaving in hateful ways and finally he came to see it all as a big sham.

“I thought it was very hypocritical,” he said. “That they pretend. That it’s all a show.”

He gave up on church. He started drinking some and went a little wild, dabbling in world religions and having his own thoughts about the meaning of life until one day when he was listening to Christian radio on a truck haul. He remembered the preacher talking about salvation and suddenly feeling unsure of his own.

“So I just prayed to the Lord while I was driving,” he said. “I want to be sure.”

The next Sunday, he began attending a Southern Baptist church near Luverne, where he was asked one Wednesday night to step in for the absent pastor and deliver a prayer.

He had just gotten off work. His back hurt. His feet hurt. He was exhausted and as he began to pray, something came over him. He started crying and begging God to forgive him for his rebellion, and by the end of it, Clay Crum had found a new profession. He felt God was telling him to go into the ministry, and 10 years later, here he was, the pastor of First Baptist church who had gotten to where he could discern the voice of God all the time.

“It’s not an audible voice,” Crum said. “We all have a million thoughts that come in our head every day. You got to know which are from God.”

He was sure that it had been the voice of God that told him to preach on the Ten Commandments. It would be a series on “the seriousness of morality,” Crum decided, because to him, the biggest problem in society was that “people do not want to own the wrong they do.”

“They want to excuse their actions by explaining them away,” he said. “They want to talk generally: ‘I know I’m a sinner.’ Well, what is the sin?”

And it was the same voice of God that had led Crum to vote the same way most of his congregation had voted in one of the most morally confusing elections of his lifetime.

“A crossroads time,” Crum called it.

He did not feel great about voting for Trump, who had called the holy communion wafer “my little cracker,” who had said his “favorite book” was the Bible, that his favorite biblical teaching was “an eye for an eye,” and who had courted evangelical Christians by saying, “I love them. They love me.”

“It’s a hard thing to reconcile,” Crum said. “I really do struggle with it.”

He knew what the Bible had to say about Trump’s behavior.

“You’re committing adultery, that’s sinful. You’re being sexually abusive to women, that’s wrong. Any of those things. You can go on and on,” Crum said. “All those things are immoral.”

He thought about whether Trump could do anything that might require the moral leader of Luverne to abandon his support, or criticize the president publicly.

“There are times when Christians have to stand up,” said Crum.

The dilemma was that Trump was an immoral person doing what Crum considered to be moral things. The conservative judges. The antiabortion policies. And something else even more important to a small Southern Baptist congregation worried about their own annihilation.

“It encouraged them that we do still have some political power in this country,” said Crum.

When he prayed about it, that was what the voice of God had told him. The voice reminded Crum that God always had a hand in elections. The voice told him that God used all kinds of people to do his will.

“Nebuchadnezzar,” Crum said, citing the pagan king of Babylon who was advised by godly men to tear down an old corrupt order. “Even sometimes bad leaders are used by God.”

He had wondered at times about the idea that God had chosen Trump, and the opposite, the possibility that God had nothing to do with Trump at all. He wondered about it again now, his Bible bookmarked to the 14th verse of Exodus Chapter 20 for the sermon.

“It’s a hard thing to reconcile,” he said. “I think ultimately God allowed him to become president for reasons we don’t fully know yet.”

Sunday came, and the followers of Donald Trump took their usual seats in the sanctuary.

“Hey, sugarfoot,” Sheila Butler said to one of her Sunday school ladies.

“Morning,” Crum said, welcoming the regulars.

They settled into the seafoam-green cushions along the wooden pews, some of which also had back cushions to make them more comfortable. They opened old Bibles bookmarked with birthday cards and photos of grandchildren, and after they all sang “I was sinking deep into sin, far from the peaceful shore,” Crum walked up to the podium to deliver the sermon God had told him to deliver.

“What is adultery?” Crum began.

Jewell Killough was listening.

“Adultery, simply stated, is a breach of commitment,” Crum said. “When one person turns their back on a commitment that they made and seeks out something else to fulfill themselves.”

He talked about the dangers of temporary satisfaction, of looking at “anything unclean,” and in the choir behind him, Jack Jones nodded. He talked about other kinds of adultery, such as “hardheartedness” and avoiding personal responsibility.

“See, we don’t want to look at ourselves,” Crum said. “We don’t want to say, ‘I’m part of the problem.’”

Someone in the congregation coughed. Someone unwrapped a caramel candy.

“The purpose of the commandment is so we can see the sin, so we can repent of the sin and then fully experience the complete grace of god,” he said. “But only when we admit it. Only when we repent of it. And only when we return to him by faith.”

He was at the end of his sermon. If he was going to say anything about Trump, or presidents, or politicians, or how having a Christian character was important for the leader of the United States, now was the time. His Bible was open. He was preaching without notes.

He looked out at all the faces of people who felt threatened and despised in a changing America, who thought Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were sent by Satan to destroy them, and that Donald Trump was sent by God to protect them, and who could always count on Clay Crum to remind them of what they all believed to be the true meaning of Jesus Christ — that he died to forgive all of their sins, to save them from death and secure their salvation in a place that was 15,000 miles wide, full of gardens, appliances, and a floor of stars.

Not now, he decided. Not yet. He closed his Bible. He had one last thing to say to them before the sermon was over.

“Let us pray.”

“Amen,” someone in the congregation said.

Phroyd

[pipesflowforeverandever]

Legacy

I think it’s about time you guys actually met Gingie Joey, huh? He IS the Joey in my AU after all. Here’s a drabble about the father-son type relationship he and Henry have in my story. Oh by the way, the location here is a real one called Mackinaw Island, a wonderful vacation spot I’ve been blessed to have visited a few times.

(As a side note, I want to state that my Henry is Asian-American. These things don't really pop up opportunistically when I write, so might as well just let you guys know. even if it’s not super relevant here).

Henry could hardly see through the slits his eyelids made, fighting almost in vain to keep them open at all as wind and his bangs whipped about vigorously. His stomach ached as it rammed into the railing with the bouncing ferry. Whose idea was it to ride to the island on the upper deck of the ship? Joey, of course; Henry had planned on sitting in the peaceful inner chambers, sketching the waves as they lapped up towards the window. Henry supposed that was a good representative of the distinction between he and his business partner, the contentment of serenity as opposed to jumping in the eye of the storm.

Not that Henry wasn’t enjoying himself anyway, of course.

He let a smile creep his lips only to fall as he heard a shrill, familiar yelp. The young man turned his head to investigate. What is that over there, a large cloud-?

His eye was besieged once more by a flash of cream accompanied by a soft but firm blow. Fortunately, the rail of the upper deck prevented a flailing Henry from tumbling overboard, but he felt his raised hand graze against something. Instinctively, fingers clasped down and met a texture firm yet smooth like cloth. His poor, poor eyeballs eventually gathered the might to open once more and inform him it was exactly that- cloth.

A hat, to be precise, and its owner was standing in front of him, grin as wide as its brim.

“Joey, what made you think that wearing this on a boat would be a good idea?” Henry really meant the question, but it was one inevitably soaked with the care and amusement of the most substantial friendship he ever had. As such, Mr. Drew simply let out an enthusiastic chuckle, the wrinkles near his eyes more prominent as the corners of his mouth pushed upward. The marks of decades of laughter had imprinted themselves upon the cartoonist’s face, proof that some people only grow more beautiful with age.

“Good catch, my boy!” Joey’s voice rang, muted like bells clinking in a wind tunnel as it struggled to be heard. How utterly ridiculous the studio director was, Henry realized once again. Mr. Drew was an individual of short stature- even shorter than himself, and Henry wasn’t exactly what Americans considered to be tall. His usual “public” attire was replaced by what could only be considered its vacation counterpart, wrapping around his figure with the breeze. It was a light peachy-pink suit, brown and cream highlights in the tie and pocket handkerchief reminiscent of shells. But if it was a suit meant to match their nautical circumstances, it certainly wasn’t working. Definitely much more to fit whimsy than function.

A playful glint shone from Joey’s gaze as his hat returned to his head, informing Henry that this was exactly what he wanted.

“I knew what I was getting into, Henry! It’ll be worth it!”

Ah yes, Henry would have to continue to trust his friend till the end with this. He had been asking himself the whole time why he didn’t ask Joey more than a few questions about where he was taking them and why; it probably made sense to assume that- well- Joey would just say so. But Joey wasn’t like other people, was he? Henry’s almond eyes squinted just a bit more as he let out a soft exhalation of a laugh. He should have known. Just as Henry was a little too passive, Joey was a little too adventurous, but neither of them seemed to mind in the end.

And that’s why they were on a ferry this moment, an island in the distance beginning to sharpen in focus if one could see past the mist sprayed at the boat’s side. A grasp fell upon Henry’s shoulder as the old man approached, encouraging him to look back over the railing with him. Finally came the slightest of explanations:

“You’re going to love this, just you wait! I can’t wait to see how it’s changed over the years!”

Ah, so Joey had been here before after all.

They were the last to step off, shoes clicking onto the wooden dock as luggage came in hand. Speaking of luggage, all Henry had known up till this point was that he would need it- a weekend’s worth to be precise. Where were they going, anyway?

The gentle sigh of the lapping water below filled Henry’s ears, black hair tickling his forehead as it swayed to and fro. Henry closed his eyes for a second and let the lake air drift into his nose until he could taste it in the back of his throat. He was a city boy, born and raised, but not necessarily by choice; he was hardly an adult after all, and finally he was taking in the world as he always wanted. Never expected it to be so soon early in life, though.

The man it was all thanks to soon interrupted this peace, and Henry felt a hand at his back trying to push him forward.

“Come on, my boy, it’s just this way, just this way!”

Admittedly, Joey was eccentric, delighted, and most of all, excitable. But even so, this was unlike him. He was a man of aesthetics, someone who wasn’t afraid to stop in his steps as quick as a dime just to turn his chin up and appreciate where he stood. And they were truly in a place worthy of such admiration. As Joey grabbed his free hand and began to pull to the front of the dock, Henry did his best to take in the sights.

A cloudy sky, but not so cloudy that the bright blue didn’t shine into their eyes, running over colorful rooftops like a fairy tale. On the shore was a shop with rows upon rows of bikes, waiting on a long slab of cement a foot or two above the waves. He let himself look straight ahead past the obscuring view of his older friend’s top hat, but not much could be seen; once they finally moved through the last gateway, an arch overhead was weighed so heavily with shadow that the light at the end was blinding all in front of them.

What came to be was truly a fairy tale after all.

Flowers, flowers everywhere, their fragrance surrounding them the moment they entered a realm backwards in time. They were in the trees, in the railings, in the windows of every home. He had never heard the clip clop of horseshoes hitting pavement before, at least not so close. The carriages they pulled were striped like circus tents, touting the names of inns and restaurants, assumed to be the short buildings that lined the street with pastel signs and windows full of-

No way.

His head turned and turned and turned. This was impossible. He counted.

One. Two. Three.

…Six?!

His feet took a mind of his own. Eyes wide and emptied of all but disbelief, Henry began to walk down the street, shoulders brushing past those of other tourists. He looked and kept a tally, triple checking he wasn’t repeating any one.

Eight.

Nine.

Ten.

And another and another and another.

Finally, he reached a point where the shops ended. He stood at the last one, a light pink and brown shack somehow both untidy and obviously cared for. It was much more evident now that the perfume of petunias was tinged with something else. A different sort of sweetness. Its source sat right on display through the glass of the shop, just like all the others he counted.

“Seventeen fudge shops!”

One of the ginger man’s arms wrapped round Henry’s side while the other was thrown up into air, thinking nothing of dropping his luggage to do so. His youthful companion blinked, finally able to tear his eyes away from literally piles of candy. An isle of fudge shops?!

“…And you found the right one,” Joey answered more quietly. Henry knew this gentleness. It was familiar. It was the one that always came alongside a smile as warm as the sun, its light matched in the glint of half-closed eyes.

And certainly, there they were to look back at the boy now.

“…The right one?” Henry replied in a tone matched in all but Joey’s confidence. The cartoonist nodded in reply, dimples deepening even more.

“This is the place.” And before Henry could even ask, Joey once again read his mind. “This is the place it all started.”

The bells of the shop door tingled in song, a small but chirpy “hello!” ringing from the counter. A teenaged girl stood there with a tired, wary gaze. Her dark eyes widened just a touch at the sight of these two men- or surely just the one that looked like the cartoons he made.

“Hello!” Mr. Drew answered for the both of them, “I’ll be sure to buy something in just a moment but give me a second!” With the last word, he rose and fell from the tips of his toes and a point of the finger to the sky; the point soon fell in front of his nose, however, as his sight squinted, making a panorama from corner to corner.

“Joey-”

The point rose once again, accompanied with nothing but the silence he demanded. Henry rolled his eyes until they fell on the worker, a shrug from his shoulders and a grin that screamed “whaddaya gonna do, huh? That’s just Joey Drew for ya.” She kept her unattached demeanor, but a smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. These guys were certainly different; that much was something to appreciate.

Especially when one of ‘em looked like he lived in this shop in the first place.

“Oh, of course!” And suddenly they were dashing to the front counter, a glass display at the girl’s left side. His fingertip finally found its destination, touching just above-

“The Mama Melt Forever Chocolate Center Cookie!” he yelped like finding buried treasure, “Exactly how mama used to make it!”

A half scoff, half laugh came from the corner.

“You mean like how mama used to make it,” the girl quipped, “That there is a secret recipe.”

“I know,” Joey returned with just as snarky a tone, “My mother made it.”

And she was either too flabbergasted to reply or felt too sorry for a crazy old man to argue, simply letting a “pfff” buzz through her lips as the redhead asked for two.

Soon they were outside once more, one hand for a bag of clothes and one hand for a cookie each. The clouds had grown heavier and just as they stepped underneath them, a drip fell on Henry’s nose.

Joey commented how the island was crying because it missed him so much.

“Come on!” the gentleman said with an encouraging wave five times younger than he, “It’s time to go home!”

“Home?” Henry blinked once more. “You mean the uh- the hotel, right?”

Joey’s shoulders drooped in playful exasperation and his honey irises met eyelids as he looked up at comrade. “Hotel- home- same thing! Same thing when you’re on vacation! Get into the spirit, my boy!”

And so at his best friend’s heed, Henry allowed an eyebrow to raise and his own smirk curl. “Fine, Joey. Tell me where home is.”

He couldn’t believe it.

He still couldn’t believe it.

The Grand Hotel. Literally so grand that it was the! Grand Hotel.

And they were not only inside it. Not only staying there.

The sun was setting and the rain had left them, and Henry’s suitcase fell along with it to the porch floor, radiance kissing his dark locks and pale skin till it was lined with fire. The highest room in the best hotel on all this magical island, the summertime equivalent of a penthouse apartment. His back was turned to the inside of the room- twisting, golden architecture fit for royalty. That alone was enough, but this…-

Henry twitched his head a little to see if it was a dream, but the sunset over an endless lake remained, an ocean of candlelight underneath a sky shifting from orange to indigo. Geraniums teased the bottom corners of this sight, planted at the balcony where Henry stood.

Where they stood.

“Isn’t it something?” came a sigh. It was steeped in…hm. Joy? Whimsy? Memory. “We made it,” Joey continued in quiet victory. He looked to his partner. “And we made it again.”

Henry’s brow furrowed, and he studied the man with hair that matched the sky. No, he’d need help to solve this riddle.

“Joey, this is all spectacular but- but-…” He shrugged once more in defeat. “You gotta tell me what’s going on!”

Something in his peripheral. Henry looked down and saw a rosy hand, a circular thing slipped in thin paper between its fingers. Ah, he’d forgotten about the cookie.

“Good?”

Henry had hardly taken a bite when his shoulders pulled up like a marionette. “Amazing!” he gasped in a rare moment of verbal excitement, “It’s still gooey in the middle but- but it’s been hours. How- How did they-?”

Joey’s own brow flicked up and down in a split second of humor. “It’s hers.” He somehow grew…gentler. “It was Mother’s.”

And soon the old man’s elbows were leaned over the railing, his gaze leaving Henry to look not at the tide ahead but simply towards it, as if the quickly darkening sky above now projected his reminiscences.

And with the way Joey talked, Henry could almost see it, too.

“She invented it. The cookie with a chocolate center that never ever got hard. Always fresh. Always melted.” One of his hands absentmindedly curled his thumb and index finger together in a point, as if explaining to someone ahead that wasn’t there. “That was her creation.” His shoulders lifted in a silent sigh. He missed her. He may have been a middle-aged man, but that could never stop a boy from loving the woman who raised him. Eventually, strength returned to him, and eyes sparkling with fairy dust and passion fell back upon Henry. “We have our creation, too.”

Henry’s blue-grey collar skimmed against his neck in a tickle, wind suddenly but tenderly rustling again as if that word was a summoning. He didn’t have anything to say though; not yet. He knew there was more that’d come from Joey.

And he was right.

“She-” Joey coughed just a little, almost bashful at this next statement, “she made a lot of money selling the recipe, you know. And this was the first place they took it to. Test run, you see. And we followed right along with it to celebrate. Wouldn’t have had the money otherwise, of course.”

Ah, so that’s how he knew this place. He had an awareness that Joey came from a poor family, so Henry had always wondered how he came to start the studio in the first place. Who’d guess it’d be such a story to tell?

“…Henry.”

The man whose name was called was taken aback. This tone was different. Mr. Drew was a genuine man, certainly.

But vulnerability was a beautiful thing indeed.

Stars started to twinkle in the sky behind Joey, like sprites playing tag as the breeze toyed with his hair, and his round glasses were slicked in growing moonlight. The man himself was certainly enveloped in an aura, Henry surmised. The young artist wasn’t a religious or spiritual sort, per say, but Mr. Drew? Mr. Drew made it seem like anything you believe can be seen.

And that was how he felt this very moment, only the slightest of smiles laid across his face.

“She gave me her legacy, Henry. When she died she- she gave it all to me. ‘Be magical,’ she said,” And there was a flash of something deeper on Joey’s expression, something words couldn’t describe. “’Be magical, my dear, sweet boy. There’s enough inside you to fill the whole world.’”

His smile grew and suddenly his gaze was no longer mindless but truly directed at the boy in front of him.

“And I think you and I can do just that,” he confessed in the softest voice Henry had ever heard.

It was then Henry noticed that either Joey’s hand had never stopped reaching out to him or that he had put it back between them once more.

“If I have a legacy…I want it to be not mine but ours. Bendy is-…really something. Marvelous. Spectacular. He’s- oh, I can’t describe what you’ve made, son-!”

Both men blushed a bit as they realized one called the other his son.

…No.

No, that wasn’t a mistake, was it?

“H…Henry…”

For once the great spellcaster Joey Drew was at a loss for words. Good thing he didn’t need them.

Henry was the one to clasp hands this time, the one to assure, the one to be bold. Tension in Joey’s knuckles, and then release.

A handshake of partnership unfolded into a hold of commitment. It had been without description all this time, how they were two lost souls that never felt quite in place, never felt quite like someone understood till the other came along. They were polar in many ways, yes, but they both wanted the same thing:

“Let’s make the world a more magical place.”

And that was the day Henry began to feel like he was really his son, that he had a dad who loved him after all. And finally, finally Joey knew he wouldn’t be left alone anymore. They’d be separated over his dead body.

[swanqueeneverafter]

45. The Dark Swan, Pt.5

Merlin's Tower. (Regina slams a book closed in frustration. Robin is there, along with a mute Zelena.) Robin Hood: “It's all right. You'll get it. Perhaps it's time for a spot of tea. Calm nerves lead to clear thoughts.” (Regina nods and Robin leaves. Regina turns to see Zelena rolling her eyes.) Regina: “You're here so I can keep an eye on you, mute handmaiden. I don't need you rolling your eyes at me. We need to clear the air in fact.” (Regina restores Zelena’s voice.) Zelena: “Ah! (Laughs:) Oh, there you are, my lovely voice. It's so... light and feminine.” Regina: “Enough. Now... let's have a little chat about you trying to escape back to Oz. Zelena... you know you can't take that child away from Robin.” Zelena: “Well can you blame me? You're going to take it from me. This child could be my only chance for someone to truly love me, and... you got a second chance. Why can't I?” Regina: “Why do you think we brought you along? Robin seems to think you’re worthy of yet another second chance, even after you threatened his life. You can't keep painting yourself as a victim. It's absurd.” Zelena: “A second chance, with Robin? You do realise I only shacked up with him to mess with your happy ending?” Regina: “Yes, and how was that supposed to work exactly?” Zelena: "Well, when I followed your girlfriend back in time, I managed to find the Author. We had quite the little chat, Isaac and I. Even back then he was already writing fiction. But, try as I might, I couldn't convince him to do my bidding and change your fate. Something else must've done that. Anyway, I did manage to get something from him." Regina: (Thinks:) "Like what?" Zelena: "Remember the page depicting you and forest-boy kissing? (At Regina’s look:) Oh yes. I knew exactly what to do with that. So, after I returned to the present as Marian, I merely had to wait for the right moment." Regina: "You put that page in Robin's bag?" Zelena: "Oh, absolutely. I thought that if you believed you were destined to be with Robin, it’d tear you up inside, make you question everything. And by the time you decided you loved Robin, I’d already be in place to ruin your chance at happiness.” Regina: “Yeah, well nice try, sis. But you clearly didn't account for my feelings for Emma.” Zelena: "Obviously not. Still, (Rubbing her stomach:) at least I got something out of all my hard work. You can tell me that life is fair all you want. All I can tell you is that I'm still seeing one sister with all the...” Regina: (Taking Zelena’s voice once more:) “Be quiet and listen for once in your life. (Zelena stomps her foot:) You forget who I am. The Evil Queen. I can be a far greater nightmare than you can possibly imagine. Robin believes you can change, so for now... my gift to you is a promise. I will make sure your baby is fine and loved and safe. But if you betray us again, the same will certainly not hold for you.”

The Round Table. (Now clad in armor, Arthur shows David his selection of weaponry.) David: “Wow.” King Arthur: “I like to be prepared.” (They each take a sword. David turns and spots something.) David: “Is that... Percival’s chair?” King Arthur: “Yes. But no need for more apologies. A leader does what needs to be done. I'll find a man worthy to fill that seat. (Arthur gestures to the tallest chair at the table:) This is the one that will stand empty forever.” David: “I assume that was your chair. Suitable for a King.” King Arthur: “No. Mine is no different than the others in the same way that the table is round. Many of our order are kings and princes in their own realms. Nonetheless happy to sit shoulder to shoulder with the rest of their knights. No one of us above the other. Except for this one. This is the Siege Perilous. Reserved for the knight with the purest heart, the one destined to carry out the most sacred quests. It once belonged to a man I trusted more than a brother. But he betrayed me. It's been vacant since.” David: “Lancelot.” King Arthur: “You've heard of him.” David: “Well, all of you are kind of legends.” King Arthur: “Really? I shudder to think what our tale must be.” David: “Oh, only one of the greatest romances of all time. Your love for Guinevere was ripped away by your best friend, Lancelot. It's a tragic story that clearly had a happy ending. The two of you seem like all that's in the past now.” King Arthur: “Yes. Lancelot was a good man. The situation was difficult.” David: “I understand. Actually, Snow... Mary Margaret and I, we met him.” King Arthur: “You did? How is he?” David: “I'm... very sorry to tell you this, but we... learned that he died. I'm sorry.” King Arthur: “Lancelot failed to resist temptation, but he was a good knight. He tortured himself for his sins far more than I would've done. I wished him happy. Just not with my wife. (The door opens and a page enters, carrying a large trunk. As it’s placed on the table, Arthur opens it:) This... is our reliquary, containing sacred magical items our knights have recovered.” David: (As Arthur pulls out a burning torch:) “I've never seen magic like that.” King Arthur: “It's the Unquenchable Flame. Said to be part of the burning bush itself. This will light our path, and where we're going, we're gonna need it.” Brocéliande. The Forest of Eternal Night. (David and Arthur trek through the forest.) David: “What is it, noon? You weren't kidding about eternal night. I'm glad we have a torch.” King Arthur: “I'm glad we sent Grif home with the horses. These woods would make him restless.” David: “Your squire works hard, Your Majesty.” King Arthur: “‘And you don't thank him enough.’ I can hear you saying it even when you don't. You're right, though. I don't even have the excuse of ignorance. I was born a common man and I've been in service myself.” David: “You weren't born noble?” King Arthur: (Chuckles:) “I'm as peasant as they come.” David: “Shepherd.” King Arthur: “Ah. (Chuckles:) I can feel my backbone relaxing already. Let's stop with the ‘Your Majesties,’ shall we?” David: “Of course.” King Arthur: “As for my squire, I assure you Guin more than makes up the difference. Showering him and the others with gifts. She really is the kindest woman I've ever met.” David: “Sounds like my wife. When she decides you're family, she'd die for you.” King Arthur: “That's not to say Guin doesn't have her fierce side. With a bow and arrow, I've seen her take out the eye of a dove in flight.” David: “Mary Margaret could do that. She wouldn't, but she could.” King Arthur: “We should have a tourney. Get them to compete.” David: (Chuckling:) “Right. 'Cause I'm sure they'd love to be pitted against each other to let us feel good about ourselves.” King Arthur: (Hands David the flame:) “Here. (Opens a flask and offers it to David:) Then perhaps there are better ways for me to show off.” David: “You're a competitive man for someone with a round table. I thought the idea was you didn't want to sit above anyone.” King Arthur: “Someone who isn't competitive doesn't need a two-ton table to remind him to be humble. I know my weaknesses. Lancelot and Guinevere weren't the only ones to blame for what happened to them. I was a difficult man to live with. But I made a conscious decision to fix things.” David: “I understand that.” King Arthur: “This way.” The Lake. (They come to a lake and stand at the end of the bridge.) King Arthur: “Look upon that, brother.” David: “So it is real. (Uses an eyeglass to spot the toadstool:) Crimson Crown. (Puts the eyeglass away and steps on the bridge, which sinks into the water:) It'll never take both of us. I'll go.” King Arthur: “I'll wait here. Let the torch be your beacon back.” David: “Thank you.” (The wooden bridge beneath his feet creaks and cracks as he begins to cross. Halfway along, he falls. Picking himself up, David continues on as we see armor shining in the water.) 

(Upon reaching the other side, David cuts the mushroom from the island, while the enchanted armor of slain knights rise out of the water. The armor attacks David, one piece of pulls him underwater. Eventually Arthur saves him by pulling David up.) David: (Gasping for breath:) “Thank you.” King Arthur: “Think nothing of it. It would appear you did it. Well done.” (Quickly they both cross the bridge to safety. David suddenly looks panicked.) King Arthur: “David, what is it?” David: “The toadstool. It's gone. Either the phantom knights took it, or it was lost in the bog.” King Arthur: (Looking back at the lake:) “We could search for it.” David: “No. It's gone.” King Arthur: (Sighs:) “The word ‘quest’ means to seek, not to find. It's the seeking that matters.” David: “You believe that?” King Arthur: “Not truly, no. If the finding is what makes a difference in this world, then that's what I want. I'm sorry.” (David ruefully begins to laugh and Arthur joins him.) David: “My father, he drank his life away. My brother accomplished nothing but evil. There was a time I thought I'd be different. Change the world. But I just... I don't want to only be remembered as the man who kissed a sleeping princess awake 30 years ago.” King Arthur: “I understand.” David: “You do? You're King of Camelot.” King Arthur: (Chuckles:) “Yes, some large rock decided I was a hero. Prophecy fulfilled. (Both chuckle:) But since then, I've had victories and I've had losses. And I've learned that it's the losses that require us to be brave. So, if anything will make us heroes...” David: “It's the never giving up. Even after a loss.” King Arthur: “Indeed.” David: “Well, we might as well get out of here. (Stands and offers his hand:) There's work to be done. And it's not here.” King Arthur: (As David pulls him to his feet:) “Good man. David, if you want to be part of something, do something that matters, I have a place for a man like you.”

The Round Table. Night. (There is applause as David enters the room, followed by Mary Margaret.) King Arthur: (As David kneels before him:) “I dub thee Sir David of the Enchanted Forest. Now of the Round Table. (To David:) I know 'Knight of the Round Table’ is pale fire, indeed, next to the title of prince.” David: “No. I am beyond honored.” King Arthur: “Then rise, Sir Knight. Take your place.” (David moves towards Percival's chair, but King Arthur clears his throat and points to the Siege Perilous chair.) David: (Murmuring:) “Really?” King Arthur: “I never thought I'd find anyone I trust enough to fill that seat. But it's yours. (They cross to the table, Guinevere holding David’s shield:) It will bear your coat of arms. (They shake hands:) Not bad for a shepherd, eh?” David: (Chuckles:) “Thank you.” (As David takes his seat, applause breaks out again. As baby Neal starts crying, Mary Margaret steps outside the room, and sees a shadow move.)

Mary Margaret: “Someone there? (As the figure steps into the light:) It can't be.” Lancelot: (Approaching:) “It is.” Mary Margaret: “Lancelot. We thought you were dead.” Lancelot: “That is a long story. But trust your eyes... it is me. And right now, my struggles don't matter. What does is that there is a terrible villain in Camelot.” Mary Margaret: “The Dark One. We know. It's our daughter. We're going to fix it.” Lancelot: “No. There's another villain. Arthur.” Mary Margaret: “What?” Lancelot: “Trust me. Camelot is not what it seems.” (Troubled by this, Mary Margaret stares back into the room where Arthur is applauding David along with everyone else.) Later That Night. The Round Table. (Arthur sits alone at the table as Guinevere stands watching him.) King Arthur: “Today was a difficult day.” (Arthur unwraps the previously concealed toadstool.) Queen Guinevere: “You lied to him, to David.” King Arthur: “And it brought me no pleasure. He's a good man. A noble man, but I must think of my kingdom first.” Queen Guinevere: (Placing her hand on his shoulder:) “Of course you must.” King Arthur: “That is always the burden of a king.”

The End.