#quasi's mother wasn't the first or last

[esserisupremi-a]

i'm not judging because no one is perfect. everyone has their guilty pleasures in life. but anyone who ships fres//eme ( frollo and esmeralda ) i can't be on the same website with.

[annabelle--cane]

iirc the first audio bootleg that went around of andrew barth feldman's performance as evan hansen was from his first or second show, and despite the hype opening nights get they're never anybody's best work and abf was an Actual sixteen-year-old so it wasn't as airtight as some other performances, and in particular I remember getting to "words fail" on the bus to school and thinking he wasn't really giving it enough punch, it didn't even sound like he was particularly crying. and then it got to the next scene, and the line where he actually broke was "I lied, about so many things. not just connor. last summer, I just, I felt so alone..." and I had. like. a quasi-religious experience but for abject despair.

inspired fucking choice to leave some extra emotional escalation for that line. like, of course, that's the secret that always meant more to evan, it was buried so much deeper than any of the connor stuff, it's the original sin from which the entire rest of the plot stems. his whole thing with the murphys was just to offset and distract himself from his real bedrock problems with his mother, the letter confession is the climax of the plot but this confession is the resolution to the conflict set up in the first scene. evan's entire life for the last year has been molded by this untouchable white hot shame about attempting suicide that he resolved to simply never tell his mother about, so of course this is the moment that really breaks him, to him it feels like the dissolution of his entire world. from his point of view he could be just about to finally destroy the last vestiges of anything positive in his life, and stressing that makes it hit so much harder when heidi accepts him with open arms.

and then I had to go to homeroom ap spanish.

[paranoid-spotlight-everest]

Percy's a chaotic bisexual, he's decided. He's seventeen, and he's finally comfortable with label he's chosen for himself. Decidedly less comfortable with Annabeth's supposed crush on him. And apparently Rachel's crush on him. And… his not-relationship with Luke. If he didn't have Piper, he'd be sunk. He trusts her to keep his secrets, and to clue him into romantic interests.

It's ironic that Piper leads him through romantic love, when she doesn't feel it herself. She depends on him, too. He was the first person she told about her growing sexuality crisis, after three relationship failures. It hadn't come out of nowhere, something about how she talked about relationships, and her partners had stayed with him, and after she came out to him last year, it fell into place.

Some campers, mostly those that didn't know her well, had been confused. "How could a daughter of Aphrodite not want a relationship?"

No one was homophobic here, it was the Ancient Greek kids after all, but some struggled to understand being aromantic.

She'd confided in him that it was getting to her, and he'd been sympathetic. Aphrodite visited her that summer, and Piper had told her. Aphrodite had laughed, and assured Piper that she supported her, that she understood. There had been more to the conversation, but all Percy remembered was how happy and refreshed she had been for weeks after. He remembered when their bond had been non-existent, when Piper first came to camp, the same summer he did.

Piper had glowered at every mention of her mother, shrugged off her blessings, and belittled everything girly.

Percy was, well Percy was pretty proud of his best friend now. She was mature, strong, and comforting in a way he aspired to be.

He only wished his relationship with his father had the same strength.

It had started out… tense, with a 12-year-old Percy pissed at his dad for abandoning them. And maybe there was something to that he'd too easily forgiven after his first quest. Because even though it had seemed to be good between them, Luke was open wound between them.

Luke had opened Percy's eyes to so much, and maybe their odd quasi-friendship was really corrupting him.

He hadn't talked to his dad in a year, since Percy blew up at him, unable to hold back every little doubt, every horrible thing contrasting with the chill, laid back, semi-deadbeat father he knew.

But he didn't want to think about-

He just didn't.

But it wasn't like the rest of his life was much better.

He loved Annabeth. He loved Piper. Gods, he loved Luke, but that wouldn't save him. And he'd only been friends with Rachel for a year, but he loved her too.

He didn't know all the details. He couldn't sort out the different threads, find what he really felt about all of them. Other than Piper, she was his best friend, basically his sister.

But was Annabeth? Was the flutter of nervousness around Rachel because of her wild ideas and impressive talent, or because he had feelings? Was the way Annabeth looked at him platonic, like had thought, or did she have a crush on him?

And, most complicated of all, his first friend at camp, Luke. He'd known him for years. Knew the teen inside, under what Kronos had made him into. Was the ache he felt for Luke just worry for his ex-best friend, or did it come from a less platonic place?

The racing in his heart during their secret meetups, was that because of the terror of getting caught, or because of something else?

Scratch that.

He knew he had a crush on Luke, he was pretty sure he liked Rachel, he had just been too scared to admit it to himself.

After all, he'd hero worshipped the guy when he was twelve and Luke, fourteen. He still remembered every moment of sparring with Luke. He was willing to- do whatever he was doing now with him, despite the danger it put him (and probably Luke) in. Luke meant enough to risk everything, meant enough to actually listen when Luke talked about the gods.

Annabeth, though, he was less sure about.

He would take on dozens of monsters rather than sort out his own feelings on his love interests (that was just what Piper called them!), let alone act on them.

Great. Now he was thinking about kissing Rachel.

At least he'd taken the first step. He's admitted that girls are pretty, boys are pretty, everybody's so beautiful and strong and he doesn't know what to do about it!

So, fine, maybe Annabeth had been right. He was a bisexual disaster.

[goldeneyedgirl]

Alright! That's the first time I send an ask message to someone I don't know and probably the last one (because, honestly, is kinda scary) but listen, baby, you had NOT the right to make me addicted to a fic where the mass-murderer-nightmare-of-the-south Major Jasper Whitlock is a whole ass baby daddy!!!! Seriously, I'd never imagine I'd read something like that and LOVE IT??? I mean, I could picture Alice being a mom in some aus, since her character seems to be very attached to the idea of having a family, but Jasper???? The one who killed a thousand of vampires and non-vampires with no mercy???? I have only one thing to say: I need more.

There is no way you're as scared of me as I am of you. I think we should just agree to be scared together. 

Anon, THANK YOU for your message. All my messages mean so much to me, and to know that I've written something that you didn't expect to love? Ugh, made my day. My week. 

The thing about babyverse is that I smashed out like 8k words of it during a Bad Time; I was having some kind of mental breakdown and writing the OG version was my way of mainlining a carton of ice cream and a bucket of fries to cope with my woes. I actually fucking hate baby fics because Jasper and Alice are not parents. Every single baby-related fic that I read on FF.Net pissed me off. But my brain ran away with me and then I decided to riff on the concept and we ended up with five or six variations on a theme, one of which you guys *love*.

I think the thing that is important to remember about Jasper is that he is an ice-cold killer, one of the most dangerous vampires on the continent with a strong reputation even though he walked away over *eighty* years ago. 

In Hybrid-verse, this means there are people in the known that lie away at night wondering exactly what happened to Maria's Major because his reappearance would be catastrophic. None of his past changes because he has a son and a partner; it arguably makes it worse. He still suffers from depression, he still has guilt and shame, and now he's somehow ended up with a mostly-human son to raise.

And the fact that he wasn't close to his father, and has vague memories of Civil Era parenthood has him crazy unprepared for being a dad (he is totally stunned the first time Alice just casually breastfeeds Ollie in front of him one night; she teases him mercilessly that they can have sex and have a kid, but breastfeeding shocks him.) 

As for Alice, she's just always an agent of chaos. I have a very, very hard time imagining her as a mother - baby-verse and the AH tattoo fic are the only two I ever bothered attempting that (and tattoo-verse is kind of a riff on a lot of the AH fics written in '05, so it doesn't really count.) Alice is always going to be authentically herself, and being a mother doesn't change her. Ollie is just the best-dressed kid in the room. 

So have a little snippet of the OG, Official (if there ever is such a thing) Babyverse

“Oh my god, Jasper.”

I gaped at him as Ollie babbled at me, his chubby hands patting at my cheeks. 

It had been two months since the Cullens had arrived back in Forks, since Jasper had come home to me - and to Ollie. It had gone by faster than I thought possible, honestly. 

Edward and Bella had decided to get married in the last weeks of August - the plan was the wedding, a quick honeymoon somewhere in South America (a surprise for Bella, apparently), and home just in time to start freshman year at Dartmouth. Well, ‘home’ would be the house that Esme had picked out in New Hampshire. I didn’t know if they were even planning to come back to Forks after the wedding. 

It felt like a strange and rushed choice after being apart for a year, but I had congratulated them and was pitching in with the wedding planning. They were happy about it, and that was the most important thing. 

My own college plans were a lot more diaphanous than Bella and Edward’s, and I was mostly content just to work out my new normal with my son and my quasi-boyfriend. The summer wasn’t over yet, and I knew I’d have to have a few hard conversations before it was over - mostly that if the Cullens wanted to go to New Hampshire and play college students, I would be staying here in Forks with my family - Simon had suggested taking a bunch of community college credits online to stretch my college fund a little further and to keep me close to home for a while. 

Adjusting Ollie on my hip, I gave Jasper a Look, as he tried not to meet my gaze. Since we’ve gotten home, he’d been… well, amazing. No one had ever taken co-parenting as seriously as Jasper was, and I had never seen as many parenting books as Jasper had somehow collected that first week. The Cullen house suddenly boasted an unnecessary amount of baby paraphernalia (right down to the framed photographs that Esme had asked Dad and I for - I had been mildly horrified to see my first photo with Ollie framed on the upstairs console table; my sweaty, disorientated, and white as a ghost face with Ollie on my chest immortalised next to Rose and Emmett in a Venetian gondola had really done a number on my self esteem.)

But Jasper had give me an insane amount of things since he’d gotten home. First it had been a new baby swing when mine ended up dying spectacularly. Then - when Esme found out that Ollie was an unenthusiastic sleeper at the best of times - there had been an insanely expensive cot that was meant to encourage him to sleep. Then there were books and toys - most of them under the guise of bonding with him. And then a second set of everything at the Cullens because Jasper didn’t want me lugging so many things with me every time we came over. 

(Rosalie had - with all the subtly of an infomercial - asked me if I preferred bracelets or rings, and I had had to squash the idea of any kind of jewellery as a gift. Both of the Cullen women had grown up in an age where the birth of a healthy son and heir would have come with a sparkly piece of jewellery and I thought that was so gross. Jasper had listened to me rant for nearly fifteen minutes, bewildered, after Rosalie and Esme had been insisting he had to gift me some kind of diamond for Ollie - preferably in blue - for weeks. Cynthia had thought I was insane to refuse. The first and only gem I would accept from Jasper would be an engagement ring - when we were ready.) 

And now, there was the latest - and most expensive - of his gifts. 

“You bought me a car?” I said dumbly.

The blue SUV parked out the front looked perfectly normal; shiny and new but not out of place. It was no Mercedes Guardian or Aston Martin or whatever BMW Rose was driving. And I kind of liked that - no one would give it a second look in Forks. 

The thing was, a car had been a much contested item in my family - the ancient little car Cynthia and I had been sharing had finally crapped out beyond repair and we had ended up pooling our savings to save for a new one. We were about three thousand dollars off something decent - Dad and Simon were vetoing anything that they didn’t deem safe enough. Simon and Dad were generous enough to occasionally loan me one of their cars, and Jasper had been more than willing to chauffeur me around. 

Until now. 

“I know you and Cynthia were saving for one,” Jasper began, reaching out to tuck one of Ollie’s curls out of his eyes. I was putting off getting his hair cut because his messy hair was too cute to lose. “But I was thinking…”

“Jas.”

“Cynthia has so many co-curriculars, and spends so much time on the Res that it felt like you’d be spending a lot of time in the car - or not getting to use it as much.”

I was still giving him a Look as Ollie had moved on to grasping at my necklace, fascinated. 

“…I wanted to make sure you were safe,” Jasper said finally. “Rose helped me pick it out - and the carseat. Both have the best safety ratings on the market.”

Walking closer, I could see the carseat already fitted in the backseat. It was, frankly, perfect. I was concerned about the qualifier ‘on the market’ - I wouldn’t put it past Jasper to try and get some kind of unreleased bomb-resistant baby carseat. 

“The car or the carseat?” I asked, looking back at him - he was finally looking a little bit guilty. 

“What?”

“Which is the safest you could find - the car or the carseat?”

“Both.” Jasper looked at me and offered out the keys. Ollie reached out for them with a squeal of delight. “Let me do this for my family, Alice. I want to make sure you have what you need.”

It was hard to argue with him when he called us his family. It always made me melt a little, that he thought of us that way. I had had to squash more than one of his old-fashioned ideas of babies and parenting over the last two months, but his staunch determination to take care of us always made me give in. 

The car was staying. I didn’t have it in me to argue when he was looking at me with that oddly hopeful gaze. And he wasn’t wrong - I did need a car, I wanted it to be a good and safe one, and it wasn’t like he’d gone out and gotten me something ultra expensive… 

“HE BOUGHT YOU A CAR?”

The front door banged, Cynthia bolted onto the street, her eyes huge and her hands on her hips.

“All your brothers are married, right Jasper?” She asked before darting over to the car to inspect it. 

“Nearly.” Jasper was trying very hard not to laugh; he really did get a kick out of Cynthia’s Teenage Drama Queen brand of dramatics. 

“I am doomed to forever have to work for my money,” Cynthia sighed, pulling back and looking over at us. She’d gotten a job at Forks’ bakery slash ice cream slash coffee shop and had spent the last month acting like she was being forced to work in the mines in the dead of winter. It was eternally entertaining, and she was keeping the house supplied in free pastries, ice cream, and bread. “Give the baby to Jasper, Alice.”

I looked over and Jasper looked so hopeful, his hands already twitching.

“He always just stands there with this half sad-puppy, half-hopeful look that you’ll read his mind,” Cynthia said bossily. “Every single time, you wait for her to offer. Just take him - I do.”

Ollie let out a crow of delight as Jasper took him, babbling happily and waving my new car keys in one hand. Jasper had a look of such tenderness on his face that I felt bad he thought that I had some kind of ownership over the child we shared. That he felt he couldn’t just ask to hold Ollie. 

“Hello Oliver,” he said, holding him so carefully. “Are you being good for your mother?” He got a spit-bubble reply; it had only taken two months for Ollie to recognise that Jasper was one of his people.

“You can ask me for the baby, Jas,” I said softly, leaning against his other side; his arm wrapping around my shoulders automatically. “You can hold your son, you don’t need my permission.”

“I don’t like to upset him; he’s always so happy with you,” Jasper murmured, nodding as Ollie brandished the keys at him importantly.

I rolled my eyes fondly. Ollie was happy when Jasper held him. Our son had taken like a duck to water at the sudden reintroduction of the Cullens to our lives; Esme was good for cuddles, Emmett was the one that would give me a heart attack by tossing him in the air and swooping him around until Ollie was red in the face and laughing, and Rosalie was someone that he was entranced with - something about the way that she was with him made Ollie go all soft and angelic when he was with her. Little ratbag had Auntie Rose wrapped around his little finger - probably why she had helped Jasper with the car. 

Ollie still held a grudge against Carlisle for giving him his shots last month, hiding his face every time he saw him. Edward and Bella were terribly awkward around Ollie, but kind to him. Ollie adored Edward playing the piano, and every time Edward had played for him, he had been transfixed. 

Whilst Jasper might have been one of Ollie’s people, he was only just grasping the concept of ‘Daddy’ and Jasper being one and the same. We would get there eventually. He was only a baby. 

“Thank you for the car,” I said softly. “You didn’t have to, but I love it.”

“You do?” Jasper adjusted his grip on Ollie, before pulling me closer. 

“I do. But you don’t need to buy me or Ollie all these things.”

He really didn’t. About two weeks after he got back, Cynthia had read him the riot act and pointed out that since he didn’t sleep, he could be pulling the nightshift, and maybe slip me the occasional twenty so I could buy diapers. That had resulted in him giving me a credit card, the acquisition of the sleep-training cot, and him literally expecting to sit in the tree outside my bedroom and watch over me and Ollie. He’d been surprised when I’d given him a set of house-keys, and allowed him to bring books and a laptop over so he didn’t have to actually watch us sleep. More than one night, he’d ended up in the living room giving Ollie a bottle and reading him back to sleep. There was nothing cuter than going downstairs in the morning to find Ollie passed out asleep on Jasper’s chest, as Jasper read some heavy book over his head. 

“I want to. I love you both so, so much. This is nothing, Alice. This is just a car,” he said softly. 

“Can you two kiss so we can go inside and I can make Dad and Pa feel bad for me?” Cynthia called and I started laughing, Ollie cooing at us before giggling along with me. 

The rest of the Cullens had given no indication whether or not they would be relocating to New Hampshire any time soon, and I hadn’t asked because it wasn’t a conversation I wished to have: I was staying in Forks with my family and my son for the foreseeable future, and no amount of bribery would make me budge. 

Not that Jasper would even try, I knew that. We had talked in through and he understood that I wanted this time with my father and with Simon and with Cynthia. 

Jasper had been spending every spare moment with us, and desperately compensating for leaving me; I knew that Carlisle and Esme had given my parents half of the cost of my medical care for the pregnancy (which neither of my parents wanted to accept until I pointed out that the financial hit would affect Cynthia’s college options, not to mention finishing the house renovation. It might have been loose change to the Cullens, but that money made a difference to us.) 

[imaginedigimon]

Takeru and #8!

Song: "Something Big" by Shawn Mendes

Lyric: "When they hear you and you thought they wouldn't listen/It's like an anthem that the whole world's singin'"

Word Count: 675

A/N: Thank you for your request! It was hard to pick a lyric from this song, but this fit our little troublemaker best <3 (even if it took a bit of a turn from the original intention)

It was gonna be a great day. At least, that's what Takeru told himself. But no matter how many times he tried to tell himself that, there was a pit in his stomach. A pit full of dread. He couldn't explain why it was there, but it was the same feeling he'd had when Hikari had gone missing. The same he'd had when the Digimon Kaiser had taken Agumon.

Okay, maybe that was a bit of an exaggeration. Really, the dread was more minor, like whenever he was about to catch a stomach bug or when the cafeteria was out of pudding. But Takeru had had a flair for the dramatic ever since he'd discovered his talent for it. How else was he able to get Yamato to buy him ice cream so often?

The day started off well enough. Except that his mother was so occupied with her phone call she barely seemed to notice when he left. That kinda sucked. Miyako and Iori weren't there to walk with him to school since they had previous obligations, so the trip was pretty boring. That kinda sucked.

School was... weird. Even though his friends acknowledged him when he walked into class, they didn't seem the slightest bit interested in anything he had to say. He didn't need a lot of attention or anything, but it was weird that they didn't look at him at all, even when he cracked one of his classic jokes. Eventually, he was tired of the quasi-cold shoulder treatment, so he left the room. His friends didn't even notice.

Class didn't go much better. Normally, the teachers were happy to call on him to answer questions and solve problems. He was pretty studious, despite the efforts of the Digital World's crises, and he more often than not got the answer correct. But today, the teachers' eyes all swept over him, picking on students at random (most of whom didn't know the answers) rather than making everything short and simple. It gave Takeru a weird feeling in his chest. Almost like everyone around him didn't like him anymore.

The last time he'd had this feeling, he'd had to say goodbye to his brother.

But no, that couldn't be it. Maybe it was just an off day. He really hoped that was the case; he wouldn't know what to do with himself otherwise.

Needless to say, Takeru was in a bit of a funk as he left class that afternoon. His feet turned him in the direction of the computer room, but he wasn't sure how much he'd be in the mood for scouting through the Digital World today. Not if no one was going to even look at him today.

He paused outside of the computer room, hearing Daisuke and the others milling around, asking about each other's days. For a moment, he considered feigning sick and going home, even though he knew seeing Patamon would cheer him up. But the benefits didn't exactly outweigh the cost. And right now, the cost was his mood.

Nonsense, he told himself. I have to go. I have a responsibility.

Takeru stepped foot inside the computer room, his hand on the doorframe in case he needed to make a quick escape for the sake of his mental well-being.

Daisuke was the first to notice. "Hey, Takeru, we were just waiting for you!"

Miyako and Iori smiled in his direction. "You're good to walk home today, right?" Miyako confirmed, winking at him. "I have some wacky stories to fill you in on."

Ken didn't say anything, but he gave Takeru one of his patented soft smiles, and it warmed his heart to be on the receiving end of it.

"Takeru?" He turned to Hikari, whose eyebrows furrowed as she approached him. "Is something wrong?"

She was looking right at him.

"I'm just fine," Takeru assured her, his face breaking into a smile that nearly split his face in half. "This was exactly what I needed."

If he could've, he would've screamed his relief from the rooftop.

[chrsitophwaltz]

Bon appétit! (BBC Dracula fan fiction)

your eyes don’t deceive you! there really is a second part to this trash heap!

READ ON AO3!

Chapter 2: The Third Law

It is known.

For every narcissistic nightclub owner, there is an equal and opposite........bookshop owner/vet/professor......?

It wasn't her alarm that woke her.

"Ugh, fuck me." Her hand shot up lamely to grab her phone from the nightstand, and her groggy voice was muffled by the pillow she had over her head. She took a peek at her phone to check the time; it was only 6:58 on a supposedly blessedly relaxed Wednesday morning. Fighting the urge to throw her phone like a missile out the window in hopes of hitting the head of whoever was in charge of the thrice-damned ruckus outside, she clutched her pillow over head tighter. She might have screamed her lungs out in frustration too, but even she wasn't sure with all that noise.

Dr. Agatha Van Helsing was, for the most part, pretty chill, as her millennial students so eloquently put it nowadays. It might have been due to the fact that she'd always been stuck in between options and eventually got tired of stressing the smaller things and just opted to go with the flow. She was taller than most women, tall enough to be a model in fact, but was, as one kindly old lady who was judging an amateur pageant in her high school years ago said, 'all elbows and no tits.' Had she been born a few decades later her figure might have finally been considered The Shit, but of course it was just part of her continuing luck.

Her family was quasi-religious and she briefly toyed with idea of becoming a nun, even going so far as doing a trial as an initiate one summer when all her peers were busy doing internships for university or getting their first sexually-transmitted disease in some dank alleyway, but was eventually deemed too free-spirited and outspoken to spend the rest of her life as a woman of the cloth. That also might have been the reason why she didn't watch The Sound of Music anymore; it reminded her too much of the fact that she was basically Maria with the awkwardly-fitted clothes, but without the angelic voice and the hot naval captain who would come and whisk her away into a blissful romantic life. And so the disappointed nun, graduating with a double first in degrees that would lock her away in academic purgatory for the rest of her days, sought to find excitement and purpose elsewhere.

To say that her mother was apoplectic with rage and despair when she announced her decision to join the Army was an understatement. After about twelve fainting spells a day in the week that followed— which, for a formidable woman like Elizabeth Van Helsing, was unheard of— the wordless cries turned into heated screaming matches; the sounds that filled the household were from a broken record that played the greatest hits Why waste a perfectly good education just to get blown up halfway across the world? and Whatever happened to pacifism? How does one go from nuns to guns?, with the bonus track of Agatha Van Helsing, if you go through with this we will cut you off, you hear me?! We're serious!

Agatha mostly stayed quiet and let her mother rage, knowing it was coming from a place of love and that her mother didn't really mean it. Well, most of it. A few times, though, she couldn't help but answer back, and said she never said she was a pacifist and would've made a terrible nun, and that they couldn't really cut her off the will because she was the only child they had left. The moment those last words left her mouth she instantly regretted it; the ashen look on her mother's face before she ran from the room and the disapproval on her father's eyes, who had silently let his two women duke it out until then, let her know that she had crossed a line. Her twin brother's death was a topic actively not discussed in the Van Helsing household, and for her to toss it out there like it was nothing was uncalled for. She tried to go after her mother, but her father gently held her back and sat her down on their ancient dining table.

Abraham Van Helsing was a man of few words, so when he spoke Agatha knew to listen. She wasn't surprised that he didn't voice any objections like her mother did because he was a former military man himself and knew what she was going through. It was their conversation that evening that she always went back to whenever she needed strength.

"I always knew it was you who would most likely follow in my footsteps. Doesn't mean I like it, though," Abraham said, smiling sadly at his daughter.

"I know, Dad, but I have to do this."

"Why?"

"Well... because..."  Agatha fidgeted with her hands, suddenly at a loss for words. She was so sure of her reasons why before she came out with it to her parents, but now that her father was asking her a very reasonable question, she was drawing a blank. Which, of course, only served to fuel her own anxiety about her decision which she was admittedly not a hundred percent sure about in the first place.

Abraham sighed and put a steadying hand over hers. "Look, whatever your reason is, you're old enough to decide for yourself. Just..." his breath hitched and  Agatha looked at him with concern. "...just promise me, us, one thing."

She squeezed his hand tightly. "Anything."

"Pride. Always with pride and honor. You go into this with the pride and honor of a Van Helsing, and when you decide that you've finally had enough, you walk away with those intact."

Agatha straightened, a new purpose filling her veins. Probably the most purpose she had ever had in her short life. "Yes, dad. I promise."

"Good. Actually, there's one more thing."

"Yes?"

"Come back to us. Please. Your mother and I... we cannot lose you too. Not after— not you too."

Abraham turned to his daughter and put his hands on either side of her face. Agatha's tears finally broke free when she saw a single track run down his cheek. That was only one of the three times she ever saw her father cry; the first was when they buried her brother, that moment in their living room when he gave her his blessing, and when she finally came home from her last tour mostly safe and sound.

"Don't worry, Dad, you won't see the last of me just yet. I promise."

Agatha smiled to herself and she felt for the silver cross pendant on her neck, the only piece of jewelry she had ever bothered to wear. It was given to her by her mother when she graduated from the academy. By then, the animosity was gone and a mother's love prevailed, and she was sent off with only declarations of love and hot home-cooked meals with all her favorites when she got back. It was that promise she made that got her through four tours in Afghanistan, and the one that made her sink her claws to life when she almost didn't come back from the last one.

Realizing that she wouldn't be able to go back to sleep anymore, she finally crawled out of bed and did her morning stretches. She had the urge to feel and inspect the scar on her left hip that trailed down to her upper thigh, but she resisted; she was not in the mood to relive the circumstances of how she got that souvenir. After taking a quick shower, she fixed herself some toast and an Earl Grey in one of her quirky little teacups. It took her about two minutes to choose from her collection; she had three glass cabinets full, and she didn't know exactly how many she had because she stopped counting after two hundred. No two cups were the same, with the designs ranging from sophisticated china to a faded Spongebob in a graphic pose, but they all had one similarity: they were all chipped in some way. She knew some of them were useless already and should probably be thrown out, but didn't have the heart to. She loved those little broken babies just as much as she loved her books.

Speaking of books, she checked her kitchen clock and figured it was time to go down to the bookshop which was due to open in thirty minutes. It was a big advantage of having her flat right above her place of work; she never ran late, which was great because she absolutely hated tardiness. Taking the two flights of stairs to get to the main floor, she was surprised to see her co-workers already there doing the pre-opening prep.

"Well, hello there, sleeping beauty!" Lucy Westenra greeted from her station, stacking the newly arrived vampire-werewolf teeny-bopper romance novels near the entrance. When she finished putting up the last book, though, she made a funny scrunched up expression on her gorgeous face. "Actually, I'm gonna have to take that back. Sorry, Ags, but you look fucking awful. Like you slept in a garbage chute and it spit you out. Or a truck hit you, turned back, and ran you over again. Or—"

"Thanks, Lucy, I get it," Agatha bit out. 

"Bit harsh for a fine morning, aren't ya, Luce?" Bloxham, the assistant manager who preferred to go by just her last name— and whose first name Agatha never would've known if she wasn't the boss and had copies of all their identification and credentials— said as she turned from an aisle to meet them near the entrance, her nose buried in her tablet while taking note of inventory. When she finally looked up to see what was going on, she added, "Oh. Wow. You really do look like shit, Ags."

"Thanks for the input, Blox. Really needed that." Agatha glared daggers at her second, who only shrugged. "Any other things you two want to get off your chest before we start today?"

"Well, actually—" Lucy started, before the front door bell rang and a harried Mina Murray rushed in. She smiled at them in greeting before opening the door again and snogging her fiancé soundly... again. At least Jonathan had the good sense to look embarrassed for the both of them, but that went away quickly, as all other thoughts in his brain did, when Mina stuck her tongue down his throat. Lucy kept making lewd gestures to the loved-up couple from the other side of the window while the two older women listened to the ticking of the clock while waiting for the softcore porno outside to end.

Fucking finally, Agatha thought, as Jonathan was finally able to wrestle Mina off of him and ushered her inside and bade them all a good morning and goodbye before rushing off to work. The poor girl was about to run outside again to go after him if it weren't for Bloxham who pulled her towards their team meeting, and only then did she finally seem to come to her senses.

"Er, sorry about that, girls. Got a little carried away again!" Mina said in a voice too chipper for the early hour. Sometimes they couldn't understand why she would work in a bookshop when she was an heiress who could live off of her daddy's stacks of cheddar for the rest of her days, but she reasoned that even a girl like her needed something useful to do. Besides, she said, she thought working in a bookshop would make her smarter so she could at least try and keep up with her bookish lawyer beau. Her types usually drove Agatha nuts, but Mina was a genuinely sweet girl and loved the bookshop as much as they all did. They were all family in here.

That didn't stop Mina from faltering in her saccharine smile once she saw Agatha, though. Agatha noticed and raised an eyebrow, daring her to say something. "Yes, Mina?"

At least the girl had the decency to look sheepish. It must have been her genteel upbringing. "Um, nothing, Agatha. You look great this morning!" she added unconvincingly.

"It's okay, Mina, you can come out and say it: she looks like she woke up on the wrong side of the coffin," Lucy said with a grin.

"Uh..."

"How about we all take a page from Mina's book and shut up if we have nothing else nice to say, hm?" Agatha crossed her arms and stared them down, to which they all responded with only a giggle. Rolling her eyes, she continued, "All right, anything to discuss before we open for today?"

Bloxham started first. "We've got about three shipments due to come this week, all modern young adult novels, so that should hopefully improve foot traffic. Apparently it's all the rage nowadays, Christ knows why."

"Sex sells, Blox. That's why," Lucy answered in a bored tone, checking her new manicure for chips. "If you look at that inventory of yours, you'll see that 50 Shades is actually the one paying the overhead bills."

"Oh yes, I know that one," Mina added her two cents. "Actually, just last night, Johnny and I—"

"Okay, next," Agatha cut in before she said something that would ruin her morning further. To be perfectly honest, she gave the book a try; a good number of older ladies she met in the shop recommended it to her to add some "spice in her life," which was really just old woman speak for You Need to Get Laid ASAP! She managed to get past the first sex scene and an experimental rub on her nub before disappointedly returning the book back to the shop. She got more thrill reading the Bible than that drivel.

Lucy raised her hand. "I was hoping to get Saturday afternoon off, if you don't mind."

"Why?"

Lucy looked at Agatha like she was from another planet. "Uh, duh? The hottest nightclub ever will be opening that night!"

"You mean the one across the street that's closed off the road for months with their construction activities and cut our sales in almost half?" Bloxham replied hotly.

"Or the one that's been trying to buy me off this property? You know, the one where the bookshop stands? The bookshop you work in?" Agatha said, her voice raising uncontrollably. Lucy gave the least fucks known to mankind, but boy, was this a real low.

"Whoa guys, take a chill pill, all right?" Lucy raised her hands up in surrender. "You all know how much I love a good spot of fun, and word on the street is that Hedo's gonna be the nightclub to end all nightclubs. Can't a girl have some fun?" She added a pout that would have been considered cute by anyone else, but not by Agatha. Especially not right now.

Lucy and Bloxham continued to argue about the conflicting virtues of supporting an establishment that was trying to off one's own source of livelihood. Agatha, on the other hand, was pinching the bridge of her nose in an effort to ward off the migraine that was about to erupt. The damned nightclub had been a pain in her ass ever since its conception, and now that it was about to open she doubted that things would get easier. If anything, they'd be even more earnest in their efforts to kick her out.

She'd lost count of the amount of offers she'd received to give up her coveted spot in the city center. Perhaps, if she were a more reasonable woman, she would have taken the latest offer from that rodent man whose manners only confirmed that he had been raised in the sewers. His offer was more than generous, really; it was five times the value of the land and the bookshop and all the material things she had ever owned. She never would have had to worry about comfort again, and wouldn't have to stress about running a business that was nearly on the brink.

But what she was carrying and representing was more than just herself. No, she was the last living descendant of the Van Helsing family and it was her duty to uphold the name to the end of her days. Not only because of duty, but also because of genuine love for her family. This was where she was raised, where her love of learning had been ignited, where some of her happiest memories with her family were set. It was also home to the saddest one, but that only made her cling on to it even more. This was more than just her flat and her business; this was her life, and no heartless capitalist pig would get their hands on it if she had her way. Over her dead fucking body.

Pride and honor. That's what her father told her. And she intended to be true to her word.

Agatha continued to devise increasingly creative ways on how to keep the bastards out of her property when she felt a gentle hand on her arm. She turned and saw Mina looking at her with concern etched deep into her features. It was a heartbreaking sight.

"Hey Agatha," she whispered gently. "Everything okay?"

"I'm fine. Just thinking."

"It's about the bookshop, isn't it?" Maybe she should give Mina some more credit; the girl really was smarter than she looked. "Are we in trouble?"

"No, no we're not in trouble." Agatha patted her hand, and hoped that what was on her face was a passable convincing smile. "Okay, maybe a little bit, but nothing I haven't encountered before. We'll be fine."

"Are you sure? I've told you lots of times before. I could really help, you know?"

"No, Mina. I don't need your money."

"It doesn't even have to be an investment. Just think of it as a lost bag of cash. Or we could start small, if you want. You don't really have to pay me a salary."

Agatha squeezed her eyes shut and breathed deeply through her nose. Mina's suggestions were seriously grating on her already wounded pride, but she refused to take it out on the girl. She truly meant well and it would be unfair to hold it against her.

She squeezed Mina's hand and looked her straight in the eye. "Mina Murray, you are my employee and therefore under my care. You will be treated the same as anyone under my care, and will receive the same deserved compensation. Got it?"

Mina looked like she was about to protest further, but she surprisingly held it in and nodded and smiled instead. "Whatever you say, Agatha. You're the boss lady."

Agatha smiled in spite of herself. "Damn right." She clapped her hands to get the attention of her two other colleagues, who were still locked in an argument. "Okay, ladies. Time to get to work."

"But you haven't even given me an answer yet," Lucy protested.

Agatha sighed and said, "We'll see how the week goes and then we'll revisit the topic, okay Luce?"

"Okay, okay. But I'm never gonna shut up about it until you say yes!"

"I'm sure," Agatha muttered under her breath as she went over to the front door to flip the sign.

It's finally eight o'clock in the morning. Showtime.

She could still hear the drilling and the pounding from across the street and tried not to let it get to her. She had a whole day to get through and she had to redirect her energy into actively getting customers instead of stressing about the competition. Easier said than done, of course.

An hour had passed and only two customers had dropped by, both of them regulars. Lucy was filing her nails behind the cash register. Mina was somewhere in the aisles singing the latest Lady Gaga single. Bloxham was still on her tablet, but Agatha was sure it wasn't the inventory she was focused on judging by the telltale smile of someone reading smut on her face. Agatha tried to busy herself by rearranging the already pristine stacks of books, checking for non-existent dust, and whatever else she could get her hands on. She was just about to get some mid-morning tea when the bell rang again, signalling the arrival of a new customer.

Putting on her best service-with-a-smile smile, she turned around to greet the person but the words got stuck on her throat. Lucy stopped filing her nails and not-so-silently whispered Holy. Fucking. Shit. Bloxham looked up from her literary porn and her jaw dropped, looking like the man from her stories suddenly manifested right in front of her.

Truth be told, it wasn't his face that Agatha saw first. What she saw were loafers and slim fit pants, a nicely toned chest with some very attractive fur peeking out, covered by a crisp, fitted white button-down shirt that was complimented by a very well-tailored black suit jacket. A classic and very expensive-looking navy slim cashmere scarf was hung over deliciously broad shoulders. She had to look up quite a stretch, in fact, because the man was just so fucking big and tall. Two day-old stubble covered a square jaw, and atop were some nice cheekbones and a prominent straight nose. Even further up were artfully-tousled slicked-back hair, and molten chocolate brown eyes that swept over the space of the bookshop critically before settling on her.

She was breaking her number one rule of business: greet the customer.

But fuck if she wasn't dumb and mute. He was probably the most beautiful man she had ever seen.

That was, until he opened his mouth, flashing what could only be described as fangs.

"Hello. I've been dying to meet you."

[hamingo]

🖊️ June from Heatbreak Hotel

June is a complicated lady.

I think what I've enjoyed most about her progression through Heartbreak Hotel so far is that at the beginning of the story all of my players automatically distrusted her and adored Evan (mainly because we had just finished Family Matters and they saw parallels of Eleanora and Anthonio).

As the story has progressed, most of my players just kinda. Tolerate Evan cause he's not an antagonist but IS a general piece of shit and have come to like June, as she's definitely not a victim in her relationship with Evan but is certainly a little more sympathetic.

Another fun fact, June is incredibly similar to Rosalia, the mother of Eleanora and Rosario. This is actually because I had the concept of June already and wanted to put her in a chronicle, but I couldnt find a way to reasonably insert her into Family Matters without it feeling forced and unnatural. So I took her concept of "blonde, miserable, unsuccessful actress whose career never really took off and just kinda burned up after having children" and made her into the twins' dead mother instead. Then when we finished Family Matters, I still wanted to use June for her original purpose, and so made Heartbreak Hotel where she would fit in more seamlessly.

Using essentially the same character twice wasn't a problem for a while, because Rosalia never actually existed in the narrative, she was just lore for the twins. Now though, it may become an issue, as last session Rosario was called in to come help the posse at the hotel. And he's weird about women who remind him of his mother... so we'll see how that goes lol

Aaand final piece of June Lore- her relationship with Evan was a concept before her character was ever finalized.

As mentioned, I had her concept already, but I also had this idea of like. A doomed romance, or two characters who are deeply in love with each other but not actually together for whatever reason.

My players actually hated June for this at first, too. I think they had the assumption that Evan was deeply in love with her, and June was just using his affections to keep him loyal to her. It wasnt until much further into the game, when Akari actually tried to get close to June, that they learned she's just as in love with Evan, but holds him at arms length not for her own gain, but because she doesn't want the kind of power imbalance that would come with dating someone when she has full control over his job, housing, blood supply, safety, etc.

They were actually sleeping together for a time when Evan first arrived at the hotel and started working for her, but June put a stop to that after they got into a fight and she told him to leave the hotel and never come back. The statement was obviously immediately retracted, but it made her realize it was far too easy for her to destroy his entire existence if she gets a little too passionate (which toreadors are quick to do). So they sat down and didn't quite break up, cause they were never technically in a relationship, but they did set some ground rules, and now have a quasi-relationship where they do couple shit but can't actually touch eachother or get too close into relationship territory.

Evan has tried multiple times to get June back into bed under the pretense that he's the one affected by the power imbalance and he doesn't care, but so far she's refused. The only time she's come close to breaking is when she saw Akari as a threat, which Evan, being the "general piece of shit" I mentioned earlier, took as a challenge and fucked Akari to get June jealous enough to break her rules (which she almost did if Akari hadn't immediately gone and interrupted them lol)

Anyways there's some June facts for ya :)

Bonus June Fact: she's named after one of my oldest mutuals :3